Location: Forest in the Former State of Virginia
"RUN, GET OUT OF HERE!" The words of Eliat still rang in Summer's head as her short legs carried her as fast as she could. Away from the four nobles that ambushed them, away from her protector that saved her from the clutches of the White Queen. She could still hear the blasts of magic behind her, though they became less audible the farther she ran. Suddenly a loud BANG BANG rang out throughout the forest, with a following ear piercing screech of what summer could only assume was pain. The commotion that preceded the wretched noise sounded like near total silence in comparison.
Summer just kept running, even as her legs started to feel like they were burning. She wasn't even really sure where she was running to, all she knew was that she was running away from the fight, and her friend. She swerved and weaved through the trees, climbed over logs, and ran through bushes. The branches would scrape her soft skin, sometimes drawing blood as she desperately forced her way through. She could still hear the fighting, but it was fainter now, breathing was heavy, and she was tired, so very tired. Her legs felt like giving out, and with the fighting seeming far away enough, she decided to sit behind a tree, letting her legs rest. Summer breathed in, and out, trying to take in as much air as her young lungs could.
"He'll win" Summer said to herself still huffing and puffing "He has to… he'll get me back to mom…. He promised…" Summer's voice was shaky, but lacked any doubt. He was big and strong, he could bend metal. Summer smiled a bit to herself imagining how the fight must be going. She pictured Eliat tossing the bad humans around like dolls, as they struggled to hit him hard enough to even make him notice they touched him.
Another bolt of white light crashed against Eliat's raised right arm as it guarded his face. He had already deduced that it was his head they were aiming for, it was after all a blow to the face that knocked him out. The fight was… frustrating to say the least, fighting four opponents? Easy, happened all the time back in China. Fighting four opponents that could teleport? That was where his problems started. If it was just one he'd probably have no issue, but having to guard his head and keep track of an opponent that could move to any point on the battlefield in an instant while constantly being pelted with bolts of white light? It was a good thing they sent regulars on this mission, no Irregular could have handled this.
Eliat swerved out of the way of an incoming bolt of light, raising his fist to 'punch' another out of the air, the bolt exploded around his gloved fist. "I'll admit you put up a fight!" One of the 'civilized' humans yelled before teleporting as he drew his pistol on him. Eliat was starting to form a plan in his mind. It was clear that despite their extra sensory powers, the nobles were certainly not superhuman, at least not physically. Their reaction time, while certainly well trained and developed, was still only Human.
Another bolt of light was fired, this one connected with Eliat in the chest. "ARGH!" Eliat yelled as he fell backwards, arms flailing.
Anshey felt a sense of accomplishment as the beast of a man took a fall, after all they had finally done it! It was only until the thunderous sound of the uncivilized human's weapon, and the large holes in Oni's chest and Wayi's stomach did they realize their folly. Anshey's mouth was agape in horror behind her mask as the blood and guts of her compatriots splattered the ground. She blinked away as far as she could, as the uncivilized human… no, monster, was already back on its feet. It tricked them, the damn thing tricked them, it's flailing was just a mask to hide it taking aim.
The projectile went right through them, with the trees that were behind them getting parts of them shattered. Wayi was screaming in pain, Anshey sensed that he was trying to use magic to heal himself, but the wound was simply too great. She could not detect Oni, he must have been dead already.
Anshey's chest was heaving, the fight had taken it out of her.
"Third form.." Anshey heaved again "Blink Dueling" she cursed to herself. It was the wrong combat style to choose against an opponent who never seemed to tire. Blink jumping rapidly and copious amounts of magic usage could rapidly tire one out. It was made to end fights quickly with swift, unpredictable, and intense attacks. While Humans couldn't run out of magic like a bug could, which was what made this fighting style viable to begin with, the body still had its limits.
"By the queen… what is that?" Anshey said to herself in a shaky voice.
No human should be able to move like that, or shrug off their attacks like that thing has. Its soul says it's human, but if that were true, her friends wouldn't be dead. She didn't know where the other one had gone, she never learned his name, perhaps he retreated? Or… Perhaps he tried looking for the girl, wherever she was. At least it wouldn't be a total loss? The thought still felt vile in her mind, her friends in the nobility were gone, no amount of service or prayers to the White Queen could bring them back.
"Summer!?" Summer's head shot up, it was Eliat's voice! She knew he'd win!
"Eliat! I'm here! I'm right here!" She moved out from behind the tree and started holding her hands and jumping up and down, hoping to get Eliat's attention. She felt a hand on her shoulder.
"Eliat?" She said looking up.
"Guess again" The hand on her shoulder turned into a choke hold as Summer felt herself get lifted into the air by the nobleman.
"LET ME GO! LET ME GO!" Summer shouted in panic, her legs kicked with as much force as she could muster, the burning she felt moments ago feeling numbed in the face of danger.
"Summer, where are you!?" The voice of Eliat yelled out again.
"Quiet you brat!" The nobleman put a hand up to Summer's mouth to silence her, only to recoil in pain as Summer's teeth bit into his hand drawing blood.
"HELP!" Summer yelled again, only to be thrown to the ground with enough force to knock the wind out of her.
"SUMMER!" Another yell was heard, closer this time.
"Damn that beast!" The nobleman cursed to himself.
The noble hoisted Summer up, and put a small nail to her throat. "Be a good little hostage or the last thing your god sees of you is a carcass!"
Tears streamed down Summer's face as the nail was pressed against her neck. The stress of the situation was becoming more than her young mind could handle. Her eyes began glowing a soft yellow as something seemed to build up inside her more and more until the dam finally broke.
A bright flash of yellow light blanketed the surrounding forest. The light was so intense that the noble dropped summer to clutch at his eyes. Summer hit the ground running, tears still streaming down her face.
"Eilat i'm here! I'm here! Please help HELP!" Her act of resistance was short lived as the noble ran up on her from behind, kicking her down, and plunged the nail into her right hand. Summer screamed with pain as blood gushed from her hand onto the grass.
"That is what rebellion gets you!" The nobleman growled, once more hoisting her up, his nail held to her neck once again, only this time wet with her blood.
"What!" A voice from behind yelled in anger. "Did. You. DO!" The black clad beast demanded, pointing his larger projectile launcher at the Noble.
"Ah, the brute shows himself at last, you have a lot to answer for-"
"I'm going to kill you" Eliat stated with great anger.
"Oh please, you wouldn't fire your little toy at me while I have your little girl… would you" The Noble chuckled.
"What makes you think I won't? I'm a good shot" Eliat growled.
"Not good enough are you? Or you would have taken it" The noble said mockingly
"And you would have zapped yourself away by now... why haven't you?"
"Perhaps I still need you, you animal. You took two of our numbers today! TWO! Do you have ANY idea how much this sets our Queen back?! We'll need you to break even"
"You have no one to blame but yourselves!" Eilat growled, his rifle aimed at the Noble's head, and took a deep break before exhaling. "The kid is coming with me, let her go willingly, and I won't kill you today, if not I show you what we did to people who hurt children where i'm from"
"Pfft, can't stand seeing a little discipline?" Eliat's eyes narrowed under his helmet at the noble's words. "For a big strong brute, you're a softy" A wicked grin spread across the noble's face, and Summer's eyes widened.
"Look out!" Summer yelled despite the dagger to her neck. Eilat whipped around only for a bright white flash to engulf his vision. The black clad giant of a man fell first to his knees, and then fell face first hitting the ground.
Anshey stepped back from the fallen monster, anger and sadness still boiling in her, but also relief. The monster has been subdued, but oh how she so wanted to enact a revenge on it, how could after all it did, be worthy of service to the White Queen? 'Despicable creature" Anshey said under her breath. But the White Queen's will was clear, she would just have to take solace in everything that made the brute would be wiped away, with a new clean slate their fair Queen could mold.
The child was screaming "ELIAT!" she yelled over and over.
"So that's your name" Anshey said to herself, it's not like it mattered, that name will soon mean nothing. Anshey looked over to see the other noble still holding the writhing child walk over to her and the downed brute. Anshey noticed the child's wound on her right hand.
"Did you really have to be so rough with her?" Anshey asked, sighing.
"Eh, you know how these nomads are, annoyingly independent and all. Sometimes you just have to put your foot down to keep them in line"
Anshey sighed again "Look, I don't have bandages on me, and I'm too spent from the battle to try and heal her right now, and looking at you, I assume you're the same,"
"Oh she'll live for long enou- ach- HEY!" Summer had smacked the noble across the face with her wounded hand, blood splattering the noble's face, temporarily blinding him. Summer dropped to the ground, and crawled over to her downed guardian, holding her still bleeding hand to her chest. Summer began shaking the downed man's shoulder with her good hand.
"Please get up, please! You promised you'd get me back home, I know you wouldn't lie to me, please get up! PLEASE!" Tears streamed down her face and onto Eliat's uniform.
"Why I ought to-" Anshey quickly cut the noble off "No, you already did enough damage to the Queen's prize. And look at her, she's not able to run away, not like that"
The other noble looked displeased "Fine, as the Queen wills" he said conceding. "What are we going to do about the big oaf?" The noble said pointing to the black clad giant with the little girl still crying over its shoulder. "We can't carry him, and we're both too tired to to start blink running through the forest"
"How about this, you take the girl, I stand watch over this… Eliat? You'll call for assistance in transporting it when you get back to the city" Anshey offered. The other noble nodded "Fine by me" The noble moved towards the crying girl who seemed to not even process him.
"What's your name?" Anshey asked
"Hm?" The noble responded, standing over the crying nomad child.
"Your name, I never got it, and well, after risking our lives together, I think i'd like to know it"
The noble nodded, as he bent down to grab for the child, who immediately began screaming and struggling in his grip. Speaking over the screaming, the noble spoke loudly "My name is- WHAT THE!" The noble was cut off in shock, dropping the nomad child. The black clad beast was awake! The noble grabbed for his lance and tried to bring it to bear against the rising brute, only for it to grab with inhuman strength. The white bolt meant for putting it to sleep again to hit the grass and scatter dirt.
Eliat launched himself with great force at the noble, fist pulled backwards. Eliat threw his fist forward into the noble's face with such force that his jaw came flying off, and a sickening crack could be heard from his neck as his head was violently flung backwards. Blood splattered against Eliat's uniform as the noble crumpled to the ground dead. The black clad brute turned his blood stained visor over to Anshey who was shaking with fear. Anshey backed into a tree behind her, and fired two bolts at the monster, which effortlessly and wordlessly smacked them out of the air.
Anshey panicked as the beast started sprinting towards her, using the last of her strength to blink as far away as she could out of the beast's sights. She did not know where she ended up, collapsing from exhaustion soon afterwards, the strain for such a large jump, much larger than the blink she made in her initial retreat taking what energy was left out of her.
Eliat huffed and puffed, anger and adrenaline still coursing through him, which is what he guessed what allowed him to keep himself awake this time around. The damn noble was gone, escaping his wrath. Eliat punched the tree in anger, causing splinters to fly, and for a fist shaped indent to be left in the trunk. He took deep breaths, trying to calm and collect himself. He felt something wrap around his leg, looking down, he was unsurprised to see Summer, hand still… SHIT!
"Crap" Eliat said, leaning down, reaching an arm behind him. "Please still have the med kit, please still have the med kit, please still have the med kit- aha!" Eliat pulled out a bag, and started rummaging through it. "Don't touch anything with that hand! A wound like that is easy to get infected with" Eliat explained as he pulled out bandages and disinfectant.
"Give me your hand, '' Eliat commanded. Summer outstretched her still bleeding hand to her protector, with Eliat placing a firm grasp on her wrist. "This is going to hurt, but you have to stay strong for me" Summer nodded
"Ok" she said quietly, voice strained.
Summer shrieked a bit as Eliat applied the disinfectant, however she held in the noises Eliat was fairly certain she wanted to make. Eliat moved on to her palm
"You're taking this like a champ" Eliat said in reassurance, Summer just nodded wordlessy. Eliat applied the bandages to Summer's hand, quenching the bleeding, he wasn't sure how much blood Summer had lost, and he certainly wasn't sure if their tribe has any ability to heal such a serious wound. Right now however, all that mattered was treating the wound the best he could, and getting to the rendezvous point.
Eliat picked his rifle up from off the ground, and took a glance at the dead noble, and sighed. Summer shouldn't have had to see this, much less go through what that bastard put her through. "I kept my promise to you worthless piece of…" Eliat paused for a moment, carefully selecting his language with Summer in earshot. "I killed you, and you won't hurt anyone ever again" To his surprise Summer ran up to the corpse and kicked it, before walking Eliat and just hugging his leg again.
"I knew you'd keep your promise" Summer said, voice still raspy from all the crying and screaming. Eliat looked down at her in silence for a few moments, before dialing up his Radio. "Be advised, I engaged some of those humans aligned with the bugs, Summer is hurt, repeat, Summer is hurt. Over" It wasn't long before he got a response.
"Confirmed, how bad is the injury? Over"
"Pretty bad, ba- I mean monster stabbed her through the right hand. I've patched it up best I could, but she needs medical attention ASAP. Over"
There were sounds of chatter, and what sounded like yelling on the other end. Eliat could hear the distinct sounds of helicopter engines in the distance.
"Alright, keep on your way to the rendezvous point, reinforcements and extraction are close, we'll wait for you there. Be advised we are encountering increased resistance from the bugs, move as fast as you can and try to avoid any lore groups. Over"
"Understood. Over"
Eliat looked down to Summer who was paying attention to his end of the conversation. "We gotta get moving. Fast. I'll carry you"
Eliat slung his rifle over his shoulder, and lifted Summer up into his arms. The superhuman began blitzing through the forest as fast as his transhuman muscles would allow for. Summer began dozing off as Eliat ran with lightning speed through the forest. She was utterly exhausted from the encounter with the nobles. Little by little her eyes drooped before drifting off to sleep in Eliat's arms.