Chapter 3 is here! I'm not going to do much as far as Joe's accent because I'm not really familiar enough with the type of accent he uses to be able to imitate it properly. Sorry about that, but I'll still try somewhat. That said, on with the chapter!
Chapter 3: The Enemy Strikes
Once the elevator reached the top, we stepped off of the platform into Joe's suite. He was standing next to the window and staring at the sky. Not surprisingly, he didn't immediately turn around. He likes watching the sky because it helps him relax. Or at least that's what he tells everyone.
"Hi Joe!" Todd shouted, excited to see him. He still practically idolized Joe. Joe finally turned around to see us after that.
"Howdy, pards!" he said. "Whaddaya need?"
"Well, we came to talk to you about a strange situation we have." Rupert explained.
"It involves me and Rupert mainly." I added.
"Okay…" Joe said. "What kinda situation are we talking about?"
"Well earlier we went for a hike in the forest by Treasure Lake." I explained. "We got attacked by a Coatlus, and before I killed it with Ace and Teffla, it killed Rupert."
"If that's the case, how's he standing here?" Joe asked, clearly skeptical.
"I kind of… brought him back with the revival machine…" I replied nervously.
"YOU DID WHAT?!" Joe, Pauleen, and Todd all shouted at once. Pauleen, of course, added "digadig" at the end, but that's not important.
"Do you even realize how dangerous that could be to Rupert?" Joe asked in a worried tone.
"With some help from Ace, I learned that after I had already revived him." I explained. "But there is a bit of a side effect we wanted to discuss with you."
"And what would that be?" he asked, raising an eyebrow.
"This." Rupert said. A white light engulfed him and shrank into a small white ball that flew back to my hand and became Rupert's medal. The medal was a solid gold color with a full-body image of Rupert on the front. There was no colored ring or stripes to indicate his element, but the gold color meant that as a vivosaur, he would be rank 20. After a moment I threw the medal and released him again.
No one spoke for a moment, clearly trying to let this sink in. Joe was the first to speak up.
"So let me get this straight. You turned Rupert into a vivosaur?" Joe asked.
"Yeah…" I replied nervously. "But the reason I came here is because I was hoping you could give us advice on how this would work."
"Well, from what I can guess, it'd work just like a regular dino medal, only he'd probably be able to stay out for longer and be able to use the medal form anytime." Joe explained. "But as far as stuff like fossil battling, I dunno if he'd be usable as a vivosaur, or even if his own vivosaurs would be usable. In other words, he technically might not even be able to be a fossil fighter anymore."
"We'll have to find out when the time comes then." I said.
Joe nodded. "But I have a word of advice for y'all." He said. "Try not to let him get hurt too much. I dunno if he'd survive and heal in the medal like a normal vivosaur, or if he'd die. I doubt y'all wanna find out either."
"No, I don't." Rupert replied. "One death was bad enough. I don't want to go through that again, especially if I might survive it and be in pain until it heals."
"I don't blame you, pard." Joe said.
"Have you ever heard of something like this happening before?" I asked.
"Can't say that I have, Dina." Joe replied. "But Professor Scatterly might have. You can go talk to him if you wanna know."
"It's really not that big of a deal." Rupert responded.
"And I really don't want to sit through another of his stories…" Todd added.
"They are kinda boring sometimes…" I replied.
"Let's just go home then." Rupert suggested.
"I second that idea, digadig." Pauleen said.
"Same here." Todd said.
"Then let's go." I said. "Bye, Joe!"
"Adios!" he responded as we stepped onto the elevator platform. "Oh wait, one more thing about Rupert! Don't let him get too far away! He'll probably return to his medal if you do!"
"That could be a problem…" Rupert said as the elevator descended.
"We'll figure it out." I said. "Your father might not be too happy about this though."
"I don't want to tell him." Rupert replied. "Not yet, anyways."
"What if he gets suspicious with you staying at my house every night?" I asked.
"I'll figure something out." He said.
"Okay…" I replied, a bit nervously.
"Let's just go home." Todd said. "We can discuss everything there."
"He's right." Rupert replied.
Just then, the elevator opened. We stepped out, walked downstairs, and left the fighter station. I got out my medal case so I could release Ace and Teffla to give us a ride home, but as I was about to release them, I saw someone in a nearby tree. I couldn't see them clearly because the leaves and shadows obscured my view, but I saw enough to tell it was a human, and I knew they were watching us. And that meant we needed to get out of there right then.
"Pauleen, get out Dimorph Ace and get out of here now." I said.
"Why, digadig?" Pauleen asked.
"There's someone watching us from the trees." I replied. "We need to go now."
Without another word, she released Dimorph Ace. Her and Todd climbed on his back and took off at high speed, ending up out of our sight in less than five seconds. I put Teffla's medal back, but before I could throw Ace's medal, the person jumped out of the tree.
The person turned out to be a tall girl with very dark brown hair and bright orange eyes. Her hair was tied in a ponytail that was long enough to reach her waist. She wore a black t-shirt and black shorts, but the real issue was that attached to her belt on her left hip was a huge katana in a sheath. It had to be about five or six feet long. She put her right hand on the hilt and was about to pull the sword out of its sheath when another girl with short silver hair and orange eyes jumped out of another tree holding a black broadsword with an orange stripe down the middle of the blade. This girl was wearing the same basic outfit, only dark orange instead of black. As she jumped down, the silver-haired girl swung her sword at the brown-haired girl, who blocked the attack with the sheath of her katana. It apparently had a quick-release from her belt so she could do that in emergencies.
As soon as the two objects collided, a loud clang sounded out through the town and orange sparks were thrown from the colliding weapons. The sound alerted some of the people in the town to the two fighters. Some of them started watching the fight, thinking it was an act. Others ran away, knowing that swordfights weren't normal on the islands and that something was wrong.
The silver-haired girl pulled her sword back and slashed at her opponent again, only to be blocked by the sheathed katana again. This cycle continued for a few more swings, but then the brown-haired girl pulled her katana out of the sheath and swung at the silver-haired girl. The silver blade sliced through the air, aimed straight at the silver-haired girl's throat. The silver-haired girl tried to dodge by ducking and leaning to her left. The sound of the blade slicing through cloth and flesh was clearly audible, even over the spectators' voices. The silver-haired girl managed to avoid getting decapitated, but she received a deep slice in her upper arm and lost a small amount of hair as the blade struck her right shoulder instead. The silver-haired girl barely reacted to the pain or the blood running down her arm, but the bystanders must have realized that this was no longer an act by the fact that the injury was clearly real. Some of them stood there, frozen in fear. Several others ran away. Rupert and I just stood there and watched from where we were. We didn't know what to do or think about this.
Since the silver-haired girl survived the attack, this gave her a brief advantage. Since a katana can only slice with one side, the brown-haired girl had to shift her grip and flip the sword before she could slash again. The silver-haired girl took advantage of this opening and sliced open the brown-haired girl's left forearm, causing her to drop the sword, which landed a short distance away.
Unfortunately, the sword was still close enough that she could easily get to it. And as the silver-haired girl slashed at her opponent again, the brown-haired girl rolled out of the way, grabbed her sword, and stood up, all in one move. She then charged at an unnaturally high speed and slashed at the silver-haired girl again. The silver-haired girl blocked the attack with her own sword, sending more sparks through the air. The brown-haired girl pulled her own sword out of the sword lock and ducked to avoid losing her head as the other sword finished its swing. She picked up her katana's sheath and swung both her sword and its sheath at the same time. Both were blocked as the silver-haired girl raised her sword and pushed them both away. The brown-haired girl's katana swung through the air again, but was blocked once more. I was surprised the katana wasn't breaking from the force it was hitting the sharp edge of the heavier broadsword with, but I was too interested in the battle to care at the time.
"Go!" the silver-haired girl shouted to us as she held the other girl back. "Get out of here, now!"
That snapped me out of my thoughts almost immediately. I released Ace and Rupert climbed on his back. I was about to do the same when, out of the corner of my eye, I saw the brown-haired girl jab the silver-haired girl with the sheath. The silver-haired girl fell backwards, dropping the sword as she did. I knew she was in trouble now. The brown-haired girl thrust her sword straight towards the silver-haired girl, who rolled out of the way just in time to avoid getting stabbed.
However, the direction in which she rolled increased the distance between her and the sword. The brown-haired girl pulled her katana out of the ground and put it back in its sheath, which she propped against a tree next to her. The silver-haired girl reached for her sword, but the brown-haired girl kicked it away, somehow not cutting her foot on the sharp edge in the process. She then stomped on the silver-haired girl's right arm. A sickening crunch and a brief scream of pain was heard from the silver-haired girl as her arm was broken as if it was a twig. I winced and felt nauseous just from hearing that noise and knowing what caused it. The silver-haired girl stood up after a moment and punched the brown-haired girl in the face with her left arm, resulting in the brown-haired girl getting a bloody nose and a split lip. She swung her fist again, but the brown-haired girl caught it with her right hand and twisted the silver-haired girl's arm behind her back, dislocating her shoulder. She winced and tried to break out of the hold she was in, but being unable to use either arm while she had her back to her opponent made that almost impossible. The brown-haired girl then reached into her left pocket as she held her opponent by her dislocated arm. She pulled out a silvery object. I instantly realized what it was.
"Look out!" I shouted to the silver-haired girl. "She has a gun!"
But by the time I finished the sentence, it was too late for the silver-haired girl to react. The silver-haired girl tried to twist out of her opponent's grip, but the brown-haired girl jabbed the silver handgun into her opponent's back and pulled the trigger before she could break free. A loud bang echoed through the area as the gun fired a bullet into the silver-haired girl's body at point-blank range. The bullet pierced completely through her body and flew into the ground in front of her. Two dark red dots appeared on the silver-haired girl's shirt; one over the left side of her chest and one on her back just to the left of her spine. The dots quickly spread out as blood poured from her wounds. She dropped to her knees, blood dripping from her mouth, as well, then fell forward, hitting the ground with a thud. Blood quickly started pooling around her. At this point, the few remaining bystanders ran away, screaming in fear and thinking that they might be the next to get shot if they stayed.
I was in total shock now. Everything seemed to happen in slow motion. I couldn't even move. I was frozen in shock over watching someone get killed right in front of me. I didn't even think before my next action. It was probably the stupidest move I could have made at that time.
"Idiot..." the brown-haired girl mumbled, though it was still loud enough that I heard it from at least ten yards away. "Haven't you ever heard the saying, 'Don't bring a knife to a gunfight?'"
"Says the one that brought a giant katana to one!" I shouted in an attempt to distract her. She glanced over to me long enough to say, "Don't screw around with me, kid." before turning her attention back to the silver-haired girl.
The brown haired girl pointed her gun at the silver-haired girl's head. As she did, I ran, not towards Ace, but towards the brown-haired girl. I picked up the silver-haired girl's broadsword as I charged, despite having no experience with a sword. The weapon was much lighter than I expected for the size of the blade. The scraping sound of the sword being briefly dragged along the ground as I picked it up was enough to fully draw her attention away from the other girl, giving me a window of opportunity to attack. I swung the sword at her arm as she pointed the gun at me instead. I managed to knock the gun from her hand just as she pulled the trigger, causing the gun to miss and shoot into the trunk of a tree instead. The rest of the slash took a chunk of flesh off of her arm. The gun landed several feet away, definitely out of her reach. I swung again, this time aiming for her head.
Unfortunately, she dodged it, picked up her katana, pulled it out of the sheath, and slashed at my leg with it, all in one swift motion. I didn't even feel the blade hit me, but I collapsed from the injury I received, dropping the sword as I fell. I sat up after a moment and saw that she had sliced completely through the upper part of my left thigh. It sliced right below my hip and severed my leg, which was lying on the ground a few feet from the bloody stub that it was once part of. A puddle of blood quickly spread out from my body, quickly filling the gap between me and the severed limb and spreading beyond it.
I couldn't think at all as the shock set in and I fell back to the ground. I barely even noticed as a green-and-red blur shot past me and crashed right into the girl as she was re-sheathing her sword. My vision began to blur from the mix of the shock and the blood loss as the girl disappeared from my sight. She was soon replaced with a red and white blur that I knew was Rupert. I heard him shouting my name in a panicked voice, but it sounded far away, even though he was right next to me. He knelt down next to me and shook my shoulder, trying to get me to respond, but I couldn't move or speak. I was too weak already.
I saw him take off his coat, and a few seconds later I faintly felt the pressure of something tightening around my upper thigh. I could tell he was using his coat as a tourniquet to stop what was left of my leg from bleeding out, even though I was unable to see clearly enough to confirm this. By this time, I was getting tunnel vision. The darkness started spreading towards the center of my vision and slowly filling the gaps as I started to pass out. With the small amount of sight I had left, I saw Rupert turn to the other girl, who was right next to me, and touch her neck, checking for a pulse. After a moment, he pulled out his phone, but I didn't know who he called or what he said because before he could even finish dialing, I had slipped out of consciousness.
And that's chapter 3. I changed the incident to this because I didn't really like my original idea too much and it didn't really make as much sense. Also, I know that there are no trees on Cranial, but this is four years after the game, so the landscape is a bit different. This idea also revealed that they are being attacked now instead of waiting a few chapters like the old one. Overall, this just seemed to work a lot better in my opinion. Anyways, keep reading and reviewing!