Chapter Forty-Nine: Crisis in the City

Stopping in front of a hot dog stand, Officer Kurtis Stryker ordered a hot dog with mustard and sauerkraut. The plump man who owned the stand happily took the policeman's order and got to work preparing the hot dog. As the man worked, Stryker looked around the sidewalk at the people who passed by. He was enjoying his day off and had decided to go for a walk through Deacon City. After some time in the park, the officer soon got hungry and just happened to see the hot dog stand nearby.

A few minutes ticked by and the cook handed Kurtis his hot dog. The policeman paid the man and continued his walk. Just as he was about to take a bite of his food, a strong wind blew past him and almost made him drop his hot dog. In fact, Stryker felt as though the wind was about to pick him up from the ground. And apparently, he was not the only one.

A blonde woman wearing a red dress just a few feet away had stumbled to the ground, unable to fight against the abrupt wind. Kurtis immediately ran to the woman's side and helped her to her feet.

"Hey, you alright?"

"Y..Yes. Thank you, I….Oh my god."

"What's wrong?"

The blonde did not answer. Instead, her eyes spoke for her and Stryker looked over his shoulder to see what the woman was staring at. His eyes instantly widened, and his mouth dropped open in a silent gasp. The mother of all storms had consumed the sky and spots of green light flashed through the dark clouds. How no one was able to notice the storm until now was a mystery.

Another strong wind blew through the city and the blonde woman clung onto Kurtis' jacket before she could be swept away. The officer was also struggling to keep himself from flying into the air, as well as the people around him. Some citizens were hanging onto streetlamps and benches, but the unfortunate ones who could not find something to cling to were rolling down the street. A few had even been thrown into buildings because of the powerful winds.

Just when Stryker was sure he was going to be taken by the storm as well, the wind suddenly stopped blowing. It appeared as though time had stopped as the officer looked up from the ground. While the wind had ceased for the moment, he was sure that they would rage again sometime soon. Like the calm before the storm.

"Get inside. Now."

Kurtis ushered the blonde into the nearest coffee shop. As the policeman was about to step inside after her, Stryker almost fell to the ground when an earthquake occurred. Fortunately, his hand was still on the door handle, so he was able to keep himself upright. The earthquake stopped as soon as it came, but the officer's relief was cut short when a cacophony of screams broke out close by. Kurtis turned around to see the source of the screams, as well as the cause of them, and once he was sure that another earthquake was not going to occur, the policeman ran towards the incoming mob that was headed his way.

Stryker managed to grab one of the people who was running, a young Asian man wearing a red cap, and asked him what he was running from. The man's breathing quickened as he explained.

"This…I..I don't know what it is, but…it was some k..kinda of…monster."

"Monster?"

"It was c..coming from a huge c..crack in the ground. It looked like it was s..stuck and…"

Before the young man could say anything else, a roar resonated throughout the area. Kurtis quickly let go of the citizen and pulled out his handgun. He may be off duty, but he never went anywhere without his firearm. With his police instincts taking over, Stryker ushered as many people as he could to safety while keeping a look out for whatever made that roar. He also pulled out his phone to call his partner to issue some backup. After the first few rings, Kurtis had begun to grow impatient as he wondered what was taking his partner so long to pick up his phone.

"Come on, pick up dammit!"

Two more rings and his partner finally answered.

"Stryker? What's going o…?"

"Listen, I need you to get down here right now. And bring some backup."

"Wait, what? You in trouble?"

"No, but I think I'm about to be. Along with everyone around me."

Another roar, closer this time, was heard not only by Stryker, but his comrade could hear it from his phone.

"What was that!?"

"I don't know. But I think you get why I need backup now, right?"

"Yeaaaaaaah. I'll be there as soon as I can. Try not to die on me, alright?"

"No promises."

Kurtis hung up his phone just as a taxicab came tumbling down the street. It crashed into a brick building on the other side of the street and it was fortunate that no one had been in the cab's way or they would have been crushed. The policeman looked back the way the taxi had come from and his mouth dropped open at the sight of a giant, clawed hand gripping the top of a skyscraper. The owner of the hand used the building to pull itself up from the earth it had been trapped within and slowly made its body visible. It jerked one of its feet free from the ground and as it took a step on the street, the force shook the ground almost as much as the earthquake. Maybe the monster had caused the earthquake when it was struggling to free itself.

Its snout was dripping with saliva and filled with razor sharp teeth that could easily tear a human apart without any difficulties. Scars adorned the beast's brown skin and iron shackles clung to its wrists with broken chains hanging from them. Whatever this thing was, it had been locked up for some time before its arrival in Deacon City. And being angry and hungry all at once was not a good combination, especially for something that could be confused for Godzilla. Or at the very least a relative of the iconic monster.

Looking at his gun, Stryker already knew that his measly weapon would not stand a chance against the monster. He prayed that backup would arrive soon, but for now he will have to retreat along with the other citizens and try to help whoever he could. As soon as he turned around, Kurtis saw another unknown creature, a human-sized one, attacking a red-haired man with a white button-down shirt. A Tarkatan. It had the redhead pinned against a streetlight by the collar of his shirt and had a blade that stuck out from its arm aimed at the man's throat. Stryker pointed his gun at the creature and shouted it to get its attention.

"Hey! You ugly bastard! Either you let that man go or you're going to be eating lead!"

The Tarkatan jerked its head around and growled at Kurtis as he dropped his former target to the ground. The red-haired man scrambled to his feet and took off down the road, which was an awkward sight seeing that he had wet his pants during his encounter with the Tarkatan. If this was not a time of crisis, Stryker would have laughed at the civilian, but in this case, the officer could not judge the redhead. After all, he probably would have done the same thing if he were in that situation and did not have the proper training he had from the police academy. The Tarkatan summoned his other blade and crossed his arms to make an x over his chest.

"You dare speak to me that way, human!? You shall pay with your life!"

The creature charged at Kurtis and the policeman wasted no time pulling the trigger of his gun. Three bullets flew from his weapon and headed straight towards their incoming target, but they did not have the chance to hit their mark before the Tarkatan deflected the projectiles with its blades. It then thrusted its right arm blade towards Stryker's head, which the officer narrowly dodged before it could stab itself into his skull. Unfortunately, the Tarkatan managed to knock Kurtis' weapon out of his hand and now the policeman was forced to fight his opponent hand-to-hand combat. He just had to pray that the creature's blades would not slice him in half.

The Tarkatan swung his arm blade again and Stryker ducked under the weapon. He then countered with an uppercut that made his adversary stumble back a few feet. Kurtis used the moment to sweep the Tarkatan off his feet and quickly grabbed his gun from the ground.

"Alright, asshole, don't..."

As soon as Stryker turned around to face the Tarkatan again, he was surprised to see that his opponent was nowhere in sight. He turned a full circle in search of the creature with his gun held out, ready to pull the trigger if he deemed it necessary. The area he stood in was now cleared of civilians, so it should not be hard to find the Tarkatan in the empty space. Yet, Kurtis had not anticipated that his opponent would come from above. And he was not alone.

"You've got to be kidding me."

Jumping out of the way, Stryker avoided the two Tarkatan just as they slammed into the ground where the officer had been just moments before. He rolled a good distance away and quickly got back to his feet with his gun pointed at the ugly duo.

"Brought a friend, huh? That's unfair, don't you think?"

The Tarkatans' only responses were growls as they started charging towards Kurtis. They did not get far, however, before another gunshot was heard. But it did not come from Stryker's gun. Instead, a bullet flew through one of the Tarkatans' head from behind and that caused the other Tarkatan to turn around in search of the one responsible for the shot. That was a mistake.

Kurtis wasted no time shooting the creature in its own head while it was distracted by his friend's murderer. And just like his friend, the Tarkatan dropped to the ground, dead from its head wound. Knowing that his opponents were deceased, Stryker lowered his gun and looked at his savior with a friendly smile.

"Took you long enough."

A chuckle was heard from the other man as he walked up to his partner.

"Sorry. Thought you had the situation handled."

"Did it look like I had it handled?"

"Eh."

Kurtis' partner shrugged.

"Anyway, backup's on its way. I was the closest to your position when you called me, so I went ahead to meet you. It was a good thing that I did."

Kurtis looked back at the Tarkatan corpses. His partner was right. Who knows what would have become of him if his friend had not come to his rescue. And speaking of rescuing...

"We need to get everyone out of the city. With these monsters running around, no one is safe."

"Right. But it might be better if we could get an idea of where they're coming from. Up there."

Stryker looked to where his friend was pointing at and saw a huge, gray building.

"We can get a good view of the city if we get to higher ground. That'll be the perfect spot to wait out until backup gets here. There isn't much the two of us can do right now."

Kurtis could not help but agree. They were only two humans going against monsters big and small. There really was not much they could they now.

"Alright. Lead the way, Kabal."

It's been a while since I updated this story, huh? Sorry about that, guys. A lot has been going on with this whole corona virus thing and stuff with college. Apparently, my sister and I had tested positive for covid, but the doctor who had our results said that may be due to us having allergies. And he thought it was weird for us to get the results the next day when it usually takes days before anything comes back. We're fine honestly. No symptoms or anything like that, but for anyone reading this, please be careful. This corona virus is no joke and I pray that none of you guys get it.

Also, I probably am going to take down my Professor Layton story for now. As I said, I do want to finish it, but I rather focus on one story at a time since I have a lot of work to do for college. Please don't be mad at me! And honestly, I think I can write the story better and make the chapters longer. It was my first story, so I did not expect it to be perfect. And I definitely did not expect for anyone to actually like it. But it makes me so happy that someone is interested in my stories. Thank you guys so much for reading them!