*Okay so apparently, I've been posting this on the wrong site, so I will continue to update this every Saturday of course, but in case it gets taken down, the link to it on FictionPress is in my profile, as well as below. Thanks for following all, please continue to support the story, I love writing it. As always, any comments / questions / concerns, feel free to message! And sorry to for the confusion*
s/3317271/1/A-Chromatic-Soul
TIME TO SHINE
The roar of John's bike is reverberating through the city as he weaves between the cars at 80mph. The star on his glove flashes red, and he leans left to dodge an opening door from a double-parked Toyota.
"He's still on the same path, John," chimes in Urchin's voice through his earpiece, "he's headed right for the bridge."
"You think a wielder is stuck in traffic?" asks John.
"Perhaps, but we have no data on another wielder appearing. And the bridge itself has no value."
"Not exactly. That bridge is the only convenient way out of the city. Could be cutting someone off from escaping."
"Perhaps. Be careful."
"Always am. Going silent."
The bike skids around another corner, and John revs the engine as it hurdles towards the towering cables of the approaching suspension bridge.
Van is leaning against the wall to the "S" bar, waiting for them to open. His eyes look bloodshot, and the growth of beard suggests that he hasn't shaved in weeks. His white t-shirt is heavily wrinkled, and has various stains of an eclectic range of colors scattered about. The bartender walks around to the front of the bar from the alley and scans Van up and down.
"You look like shit," she says.
Van looks at her slowly.
"Just knock me on my ass so that I can sleep," he says sadly.
"I heard what happened last time," she says, "you gonna be a problem? You've been comin' here for awhile and never been an issue. I'm guessing you're just goin' through a tough time, yes?"
"Yeah. I won't be a problem. I just need a drink to turn my brain off."
She nods. "Alright then."
She unlocks the door, and they both step inside.
The suspension bridge stands tall above Avalon. Over two miles long, the bridge connects both halves of the city, cutting transportation time into nearly a third by cutting over the bay. However, traffic seems to be at a halt. A loud explosion sends out a shockwave, and civilians take off running and screaming, away from the center of the bridge. Cars swerve to avoid colliding with the halted vehicles, trying to peer over their steering wheels to see what is holding up traffic. A man in a business suit is on the phone, and gets out of his car to look, narrowly being missed by an errant rocket.
Star is hiding, crouched, behind a large, black van. He is slinking towards the front of the van, looking underneath it at another wielder, who is standing in the middle of an empty clearing, laughing hysterically. His indigo colored armor looks like it was thrown together from an old pipe organ. There are several pipes sticking out of the armor in seemingly random directions, with steam fuming out of each of the vents. His torso, legs, and helmet have dense armor, protecting him from the intense heat of the steam being ejected from his armor. On his forearms are dozens of small, rocket-like projections that are being fed into a pipes by steam pressure. He aims another one around and fires the rocket at a nearby car, blowing it up in a tornado of flame.
"COME OUT STAR!" screams the indigo wielder obnoxiously. "I CAN'T SEE YOU, SO I THINK I'LL JUST KEEP GUESSING WHICH ONE OF THESE RANDOM PEOPLE YOU MUST BE!"
"You have one chance, Aeolipile!" Star replies. "Tell me everything you know! Are you working for him!? What were you looking for in that factory!? And what is his location!?"
"AHAHA, LIKE YOU SCARE ME WORSE THAN HE DOES!" Aeolipile replies.
"Always yelling, how irritating." Star grunts as he thinks to himself. "What was his profile again? Obnoxious behavior, explosive personality, makes rash decisions. Subconsciously targeting the brightest cars, the red one on the left will be his next target."
Star rolls right just as Aeolipile turns left. He opens his hand palm down again, and his wrist mounted laser lights up with heat. The turret fires a superheated beam into the truck behind Aeolipile. Simultaneously, the vents on his back seemingly power up, sucking in massive amounts of air, and several flaps open up on his body, revealing the tips of tiny missiles of his own. Aeolipile snaps around upon seeing the beam, and raises his arm quickly, but it is too late. The moment he faces Star, several heat-seeking missiles are en-route towards the burnt truck, with Aeolipile caught right in the way of the salvo. The missiles slam into Aeolipile and the truck alike, sending Aeolipile ricocheting down the street, bouncing off of a car, leaving an enormous dent in its side. He groans, and stumbles to his feet, right as two red beams slice a steel support beam in thirds above his head.
"NICE MOVE!" Aeolipile screams. "TOO BAD THAT WON'T BE ENOUGH TO..."
He doesn't finish his sentence before the support beam above him gives way, and Aeolipile gets crushed from the falling beam above. His fingers twitch, and he moans.
"Urchin, come in." Star says. "This was, by far, the most irritating wielder yet, but I've captured the Indigo Aeo..."
Aeolipile screams, and hundreds of rockets begin to fire in every which direction, impacting every car and person within a 50 foot radius. The rockets slam into support beams and cables alike, and the bridge groans from the lost support. The 50 foot sections of the bridge begins to sink.
"Oh shit!" snarls Star.
Meanwhile, on the other side of the bridge, Van is seemingly attempting to rid the "S" bar of every last drop of alcohol. An impressively more disheveled looking man than Van is sitting beside him, with his hand on Van's shoulder.
"You…you're a great guy!" the man slurs out before taking another sip of beer.
"I am," agrees Van, nodding. "I'm pretty fffff…I'm pretty awesome. And so what if that building fell, I…you're a great guy too!"
They both laugh and Van takes another large sip.
The tattooed bartender sits across from him, and stares at Van, whose eyes look sunken, and his mouth looks slack-jawed.
"Hey, give me your keys," she demands. "You ain't driving home."
"Me?" he asks, then laughs. "Naaaa, I drive to block and jump and whoosh and then I just fly."
The bartender raises her eyebrow.
"Right…" she says. "I'm gonna call you a cab. Just sit tight for a minute."
Van stands up, nearly falling over. He straightens out the barstool, and uses it for support to stand.
"It's cool!" Van says, waving his hand, then grabbing his necklace. "Silver…bubble…" He bursts out laughing. "Bunny? Hmm…bullet?"
His necklace emits light through his fingers, covers Van in blindingly bright light, and the Bullet armor encases Van. He crouches, the thrusters ignite, and he rockets out the front door right as someone enters, launching over their shoulder into the sky. The entering customer, all patrons within, Van's drinking buddy, and the bartender stare on in shock.
"What in the world!?" the bartender screams. "He's hammered at four in the afternoon...and I'm the one seeing shit. I don't get it."
The man who entered looks at her and shrugs.
"Whatever he drank" the man says, "I want two."
Bullet is twirling around in circles in the sky.
"Whoo!" he screams in elation.
He leans back, aiming upwards, and flies into a double loop de loop.
"Whoooooooooooooooooooooooo!" he screams again. "This is so co...ugh...I don't feel well. Ooh, what's going on down there!?"
He looks downwards, noticing random spurts of flame, and flying cables on the bridge below.
"That looks exciting!" he says. "Everyone is gonna want a piece of...hiccup...me! Yeah, I'm aweswhoaaa."
Bullet rocks left and right in his trajectory, dodging a flinging cable easily, and an errant rocket. As he nears the pavement, he looks down and sees Star dodging rockets while trying to clear a path for panicked civilians. Star leans back to dodge another rocket, and aims his left arm's cutting laser to slice a car in half, opening a path for a trapped family to escape the chaos. Overhead, several rockets fly towards some other escaping civilians, and Star quickly slices into a car ahead of the projectiles with the beams, and fires some of his heat-seekers at it, causing the car to flip upwards. The rockets collide with the car instead of the people. Immediately after, he snaps around, takes aim behind Aeolipile, and shoots a car's fuel tank. The beam slices right into the gasoline canister, and the liquid ignites, causing the car to explode, launching Aeolipile away.
"Lightning!" screams Star into his transmitter. "Are you in the area!? I need your assis..."
Bullet shimmers into existence right in front of Star's face.
"Hey buddy!" Van says excitedly.
Star gasps and stumbles backwards, sighs, then seems to focus.
"Bullet!" he says. "Help me evacuate these people at once! I can't focus on stopping Aeolipile while covering everyone. You showed up at the perfect..."
"I don't feel so...hyurggg!" Van vomits profusely within his armor.
"...are you drunk?" asks Star.
"Ugh! I threw up and it's everywhere in here! Go away, go away!"
Bullet shoves at his leg, as if he could push the vomit away from outside of the armor, then shoots into the air.
"It's going down my leg!"
Star stares in disbelief.
"You've gotta be kidding me. Bullet, focus! I need your help. Save these people!"
"Got it!"
Bullet flies straight down, into a car. He lays there, defeated.
"Ow."
"Pathetic!" roars Star.
"Why bother," groans Bullet, "I'll just screw up again."
"Unbelievable. Redeem yourself for your mistake, don't be this pathetic mess of a person. You killed all those people, do you want that to be your legacy!?"
"Hey..." Van retorts. "Shut up! Jerk."
Star dodges another attack, and shoots another beam in return, causing Aeolipile to dive behind a car. He is screaming something unintelligible.
"Look at me!" Star commands. "We all saw the footage of the wreckage. I know you can do it. You have a hero inside of you, and we all saw it the day you leapt off the building's frame to save that woman. I believe in you…" John frowns for a moment, contemplating his next words. "Besides, I think Aeolipile's weapons are faster than you anyway."
A car explodes in front of a mother and her daughter. The body of the car is hurdling towards them. The little girl screams, and the mother's eyes go wide as she grabs her daughter, putting her body in between the girl and the vehicle.
"Oh no!" yells Star.
The air wavers, and Bullet's fist collides with the car, launching it over the guard rails, into the water. He grabs the mother and daughter and disappears, reappearing with them both safely far away from the battle. He quickly waves with two fingers, then disappears again, reappearing by Star.
"Faster than me my ass!" he says proudly. "I can do thish...too. Hyurg!"
With a powerful convulsion, Van vomits within the Bullet armor once again.
"Ugh, I can smell it..." he groans.
"Whatever, you're doing great, Bullet" yells Star. "Focus, you can do this. One mistake doesn't make you a bad guy. Every single one of us has done an irredeemable act in our lifetimes. Here is your chance to repent. Learn from your mistakes."
A nearby cop is attempting to brace himself against the rumbling on the bridge. He yanks with both arms on a jammed car door, but to no avail. Within, there is a man desperately pounding on the door, trying to escape. He is screaming for help. Above, the cop is unaware of an approaching tension cable, falling towards his head. Star's beam slices the cable in half, then rips through an approaching rocket, causing it to fall harmlessly apart. Bullet zips it, punches through the door handle, then rips it off the car frame, allowing the cop to pull the man out. Bullet grabs them both and disappears right as the two halves of the cable slam into the ground where they once stood. Dozens of Star's beams intercept a hailstorm of rockets as Bullet appears and disappears beside civilians, grabbing then and transporting them to safety. Star's back is turned, sniping several more rockets from the air when an errant projectile aims right for his back. Bullet rears back, zips beside the rocket, then slams his fist down upon it, crushing it harmless downwards into the street. Star turns around, and upon looking down at the rocket, immediately recognizes what happened, then nods. Bullet appears where he has been dropping off other civilians, and placing two more down. He then boosts up into the air, roughly thirty feet above the people. The civilians start clapping and cheering for him. The cop and the man try to stand up straight, but their legs are shaking. Bullet salutes.
"Close one, occifer." Says Bullet.
"Thank you…wait, are you drunk?" asks the cop.
"Bullet, move!" screams Star.
A rocket aimed directly at him is hurdling towards his position in the air.
"Huh?" he asks. "Oh crap."
He does not have time to evade. The rocket is only a few feet from him.
"Shitshitshit," Van thinks to himself. "What do I do!?"
His heart begins to race, and his adrenaline spikes. Bullet clenches his fist, preparing to take the impact when seams appear on Bullet's sides, and auxiliary boosters roar to life from his abdomen. Bullet disappears, and the rocket harmlessly whooshes through the air where he once was. He reappears on the street, in the crowd, leaning on the cops shoulder, completely evading the projectile.
"Well, that's new," he says aloud. "Damn…this thing would be so cool, minus all the murder-y people..."
"YOU'RE FAST!" screams Aeolipile. "YOU'RE A FUN TARGET! TRY TO DODGE THIS!"
Steam gathers like a compressor into Aeolipile, and suddenly screams like a teakettle. Hundreds of rockets explode out of his body, aimed directly at the drunk, silvery blob hovering above the people. He easily dodges three of them, and twirls around another suspension cable to evade two more. He turns around to dodge more, but one of the micro-rockets nicks his shoulder, erupting on impact, setting him ablaze and hurdling to the ground. He yells in pain, and grabs his head.
"Okay, that part sucks too," he groans. "Ugh. At least that sobered me up. Why do I smell like...oh fuck me."
The section of the bridge finally gives way, crumbling hundreds of feet into the bay below. No pedestrians were anywhere near the crash site, and the rest of the bridge remains intact. Bullet looks around for Star and Aeolipile, but they are both nowhere to be seen. He notes a young man on a motorcycle with a strange glove driving through the pileup, off the bridge.
"Man, you always have some crazy asshole driving through his shit," he says, annoyed.
Aeolipile has also seemingly disappeared. The people standing where Bullet and Star rescued them all peer over the edge, watching as the remaining pieces crumble into the water. The whir of sirens blare as cop cars and ambulances finally begin to arrive.
Bullet sighs, then relaxes his body. "Alright, if my tab is ridiculous because I missed happy hour, I'm finding the vest guy and punching him in the nuts."
He flies above the crowd.
"Hey guys, I think you're safe now. I'm out, lat…"
Before he can finish, the cop interrupts him.
"You saved us!" the cop yells. "C'mon guys, give the guy a hand! We got a real hero here!"
The crowd explodes in cheers and applause. Bullet stares at them, speechless. Within his armor, he jaw is wide open, and his eyes tear up. He sniffles, then shakes his head, and looks at the screen in front of his face. On his monitor, the screen reads 52%.
"Guess that's how much power I have left," he wonders. "Trust me guys, I ain't a hero."
He spins around.
"Wait!" yells the cop. "What's your name!?"
"Umm" replies Bullet, then he laughs. "I can't really say, but the color of my armor, plus bullet."
"Silver Bullet?"
Bullet points his finger at the cop, and makes a firing motion.
"Bingo."
Bullet flies off into the distance, trying to be somber, but he can't help but grin a little bit.
"Well," he thinks. "It's a start."
Off in the distance, John is leaning against his bike, watching the people react through a pair of binoculars. He watches as Bullet shoots off into the sky amidst the cheering crowd. He smiles.
"Not bad, Bullet..." he says.
Urchin is watching the news feed. It is a video of Bullet, shot through a phone camera, waving to the crowd as he flies off. A woman then turns the phone around and screams into the microphone, causing Urchin to back away in disgust and turn off the feed. She turns to Sprigs.
"Well, we've been bloody wrong before," she admits.
Sprigs grunts.
"John" she continues. "Stay hidden. Guard him. He's going to be a target, since unlike the rest of us, he isn't very…subtle."
"Understood" he replies.
A soldier runs over to Urchin. He seems flustered and out of breath, indicating that he just sprinted across the entire facility.
"Ma'am, permission to speak confidential information!?" the man half asks and shouts.
"Yes." She replies kindly.
"Ma'am, Claymore's reports are in. Target has been eliminated, all four of them, including all of the accompanying guards. No prisoners to interrogate. Still no clues as to where Mimic is recruiting all of these wielders, although Claymore mentioned something about one of them speaking a Middle Eastern dialect."
"I'm sure those were his exact words," she sighs. "Always a trail of blood whenever he is sent on a mission. It can't be helped I suppose."
The soldier looks up at the monitor featuring Bullet's rescue on a loop.
"I know it's not my place," he begins, "but I don't think the Silver Bullet should be considered hostile. We need all the help we can get, and anyone under similar circumstances would do the same. I mean, haven't every one of us done something we're ashamed of in our past?"
"You know nothing of that, son," Sprigs says with authority.
Urchin nods her head. "I've known many a good man to go corrupt. We've seen it with our own eyes. There is a thin line between evil deeds and evil men."
"Agreed," replies Sprigs. "We need to speak with the Commander."
