Chapter 21~ Of Gunfights and Saviors
PREVIOUSLY ON BECAUSE OF A FIGHT, BELIEVE IT OR NOT:
After a few seconds, Max let go with what I felt was reluctance. "Fang, there's something I need to tell you," she stated as she looked at the ground, pushing some of her blond hair behind her ear. Her cheeks were tinged with pink. What could she want to say. "I-"
The hairs on the back of my neck suddenly began to tingle. That could only mean one thing. I grabbed ahold of Max's body before she could tell me anything and duckeded to the ground.
Bam!
I cast my gaze upward. There was a bullet hole in the wall. Slowly, I turned around without getting up.
There were five men dressed in black standing behind us, one of whom was pointing a gun at us.
What?
MAX POV
Don't get me wrong; I was currently scared shitless.
What the hell Max you come all the way to San Fran' to visit your aunt and you make friends with a hot cabbie only to find out that he's actually your best friend who you thought was dead but turned out he faked it cuz he was in danger from an evil company named after Zac Efron's character in High School Musical because he used to be an agent for another company that created immortal kids with wings and now you're being threatened by creepy guys in black with guns holy shit you're gonna die you're gonna die you're gonna die while your thought waves sound like Nudge talking what the fuck Max what the fuck what the fuck what the actual fuck
That was only in my brain, however.
If I was any other person, I'd be cowering in fear and begging for my life, but you see kids, I'm Maximum Martinez. For me, fear triggers my fight-or-flight instincts and also my sarcasm-and-bad-jokes part of me.
My first reaction was to kick the gun out of the first guys hand, grab it while using some pretty advanced tae kwon do to defend myself, shoot them all in their legs or arms, and then get the hell out of here as fast as I could.
Then I remembered I've never even touched a gun before. Damn it! OK, here was a different idea. Kick the gun over to Fang and trust that he knew what to do with it.
Before I could put my hastily put together plan in action, the dude with the gun began speaking.
"That was just a warning shot," he calmly said, lowering his gun. "I wouldn't have shot if I didn't know you two were capable of avoiding it."
Totally ignoring the fact that I had been literally a two inches away from dying and that I was being threatened by some hotshot gunman, I snorted in an unladylike manner. "Gee, thanks, I—" Fang put out a hand in front of my face, effectively cutting my words off.
Frowning, I turned to look at him, questioning him with a glance, but Fang's face was passive, and he asked, "What do you guys want from us? Give me answer before I have to do something about it!" His hand lowered down to encircle my wrist in an almost possessive manner. "Are any of you from Troy? Itex?"
The front man smiled and replied, "Very clever of you. Yes, in fact, we are from Troy. Funny, isn't it?"
He gestured himself, holding out his hands in front of him as he took a few steps forward. "The very people you were trying to hide from, right here in plain sight. You see, Nick," the man continued. I froze. How did he know his name? "It's not really a question of what we want, per se. It's more of what we need from you two." Then he casually held up his gun towards me.
"We need the girl, Nick."
Holy crap Max now these creepy guys with guns turned out to be pedophiles that need you for some effed reason what if they take your brain and put it in a robot like in Spongebob cuz isn't that's what geneticists do or worse they mutate you into something lame like an amoeba or they want to torture you for information you're too young to die Max too young too young too young
I blinked.
Then I began, "Listen, doucheface. If you or any of your goddamned henchmen try to come near me, I will make absolutely sure to rearrange your faces so badly that not even your mothers would even dare—"
Fang interrupted me again, demanding, "Why the hell would you want her? She's completely irrelevant to the whole situation!" I resisted the urge to feel annoyed by this second interruption because I knew that if I kept talking, the man might just shoot us right there.
The man shook his finger. "Ah, ah, ah. That is private information known to Ter Borcht and me and only to us. Now hand her over, Nick, or it might get very messy," he warned, malice seeping out of each word.
Fang spat in his direction. "Over my dead body," he growled.
The man sighed heavily. "Shame," he announced. "You had so much potential, too." He aimed his forty-five at Fang, and was about to pull the trigger when I put my plan into action.
Thanks to the fact that he kept coming closer during his and Fang's short-lived conversation, it didn't take very long for me to rush over and ram into his body He misfired as a result and the bullet hit on the building next to us, leaving a hole with black soot surrounding it.
The person whose name I still do not know lost his balance from the impact. I used it to my advantage by jumping on his back. I landed a single, sharp blow to the back of his neck, and he stumbled to his knees, taking me down with him. I reached over to grab the gun from his hand and threw it as far as I could, away from his backup.
Behind me, I could hear his backup taking action, hoping Fang was capable of taking on four men by himself. I inwardly snickered. Of course he can.
My thoughts were soon hindered when the man under me flipped over. I landed on the cement, and my head hit the ground with a crack. I groaned silently, but then he grabbed my wrists and pinned me to the ground. His face was red now, and I doubted that he was going to be easy-going anymore.
"Resist," he rasped, "Before I have to break both of your arms!" His hand traveled from my wrist to my forearm, ready to snap if he needed to.
I wheezed, "Make me!" before lifting up my knee and slamming into his groin. The man's grip slackened as he yelled out in pain, and I used my strength to flip both of us over. It wasn't east, considering he was twice my weight.
I rose to my feet and kicked his stomach.
Hard.
"Bitch," I muttered. I then heard a shout and remembered that Fang was still holding up on his own and turned around to be punched in the face.
My head snapped back, and I cupped my jaw. A thick, coppery smell permeated my nose, and I spat blood on the ground.
I growled and meant to hit back but the person who punched me, one of the men fighting Fang previously, aimed a kick at my legs. I jumped up and avoided it, but then he swept his leg under me. I grabbed it just in time and threw him over my shoulder, his body sailing to the ground.
He quickly got up and I went for a punch, but I was blocked. We continued like that for a while. Punch. Block. Kick. Jab. Block.
There was this one point during the spar when my defenses were too weak, and he managed to nail a kick to my pelvis, and let me tell you one thing:
It. Hurt.
Where the hell was Fang? I thought.
Oh, right. Fending off two brutes by himself.
I collapsed onto my knees and moaned in pain. Come on, Max, get back up, I chanted to myself. Then my thoughts were interrupted by another punch in the face, fatiguing me even further. Punch after punch, my breathing labored and I wheezed.
Remember, Max, they want you alive. But reminding myself wasn't working; I was almost convinced that I would die.
Abruptly, the punches came to an end. I cracked open an eye to see the man who was hurting me fly against the wall.
There, in front of me, stood Fang, looking about as beaten up and bruised as I probably did. But there was a glint in his dark eyes, a steely one that gleamed, like a star in the middle of a night as black as obsidian.
Maybe it was that glint that propelled me to my feet again. Maybe it was the new rush of adrenaline or the relief from being saved from a beating. Looking back, I still don't know. But whatever it was, it got me up on my feet, ready to kick more ass.
I took two seconds to observe my surroundings. The previous man came charging off of the wall, causing me to tense up in my fighting stance, but Fang rammed his shoulder into the guy before I could do anything.
Okay, that was one. But what about the others? In my peripheral vision, I saw the ones Fang had to deal with get up. One wiped the blood off his nose as another pointed me out.
Great. I did a quick calculation in my brain. The main guy I took down, where was he? I glanced out of the corner of my eye, and saw him on the floor. Kay, then that made two (Note: I did all of this in my head in five seconds. Let's just say fighting for my life literally makes me think fast).
So how was I supposed to take down three trained men by myself? I wasn't a guy. I wasn't Fang, who probably learned from tae kwon doe masters.
Then I remembered. The gun.
Where did I throw it?
Before I could even look, both of my arms were grabbed by thick, meaty hands. I whipped my head around to see a huge, beefy guy that looked like the love child of John Cena and the Situation. He wrestled me to the ground, and I swear, I tried my best to get him off of me, but he was way too big.
His hot breath washed over my ear as he threatened, "Come with me to the car or that pretty face of yours will get fucked up."
"Get away from me!" I hissed while frantically searching for the gun in the alley. The only thing I saw was the other two going to help their friend with Fang, who I may add, wasn't looking so good. I could tell he was getting tired from defending himself.
The big guy must have known that I was searching for something because he reached into his coat and pulled out a long black revolver. "Looking for this?" he smirked.
I inhaled sharply. Now there was no way for me and Fang to get out alive. We were either going to die or be captures and sent to the company's headquarters, only to be subject to more torture or testing.
He saw the frightened look in my eyes chuckled lowly. "Don't worry," he reassured. "We need you alive. Your boyfriend, on the other hand? He can say goodbye." He held up the gun and my eyes followed its point, looking upward and landing right on Fang. One of the men he was battling was down, and it was now him versus two others.
I tried to keep up my bravado and not let the gunman see any more of my fear. "Please," I scoffed. "You'd probably miss and end up hitting one of the other two.
"Wanna bet? I'm the best shot out of these guys, hon'."
Uh oh. Wrong move. His finger seemed to go in slow motion, being placed on the trigger and just about to pull it. My eyes squeezed shut, not wanting to see this.
I'm going to lose Fang…again.
A tear escaped from the corner of my eye. There was no way out.
Bam!
Bam! Bam!
The man's grip on my body slackened, and I felt a drop of what I thought was water land on my forehead. I lifted up a hand and touched it. It was a crimson liquid that smelled like copper. Blood.
Where did it come from? I looked up and saw the man's head bent low at an unnatural angle. There was a bullet hole on his forehead.
So if he was shot, that means…
A spark of hope burned inside me, and my head shot up. I stared at Fang, who had collapsed on his knees and panting heavily. The two hit men he was fighting were lying on the ground, their glassy eyes staring up at the sky. I saw dark red spots on their foreheads as well.
There wasn't a gun even near him. So who was the shooter?
My question was immediately answered. Fang must have seen someone behind me because he rapidly got back on his feet. He seemed shocked, an emotion that was rare for him.
I turned around to see who he was looking at. It was a girl.
She was walking toward us with a rifle slung on her shoulders, wearing a jacket, cargo pants, and combat boots. She had olive-toned skin like Fang, but looked nothing like him. Her long, straight brown hair was tied in a high ponytail, and her eyes were a light brown. If I hadn't known better, I would have said she had golden eyes.
"Elizabeth?"
Author's Note:
Chapter 21 finally done, and we finally have introduced our 100th reviewer's character. Violetfang= Elizabeth.
Ya'll better thank Aliza for remembering to update and finish this story! And I lied when I said this one would be up quicker and I apologize but summer break and we have nothing left to do so cross our fingers... (;
How about 31 reviews for the next chapter? So 445?
Thank you~
Thank you~