I do not own Lorien Legacies or any of the characters.
Capture the Flag
I rest my dulled sword on one shoulder and my blaster on the other. John and the others had returned two days ago. Not just with Number Five, but with a human boy named Sam and his father, who apparently had helped the Loric get started on Earth. Sam, apparently, was one of John, Six, and John's girlfriend Sarah's friends, and apparently more than that for Six. He was smart, nerdy, and pretty good with a gun. Sarah was good with a gun too. Five seems a bit...awkward, or like he's trying not to be as much of an asshole as he wants to be. I've seen a lot of that in the Marine Corps. Everyone else doesn't know what to make of him. Me, Hawkeye, and Rookie simply don't trust him. At dinner two nights before, which Marina had done a spectacular job cooking, he had flat out lied about most of his backstory, though I doubt anyone who wasn't around liars all the time noticed.
Now, we were assembled in the Lecture Hall for a game of Capture the Flag. So far, the only two chosen were John and Nine as captains. The ground rules are set, no healing breaks, no Telekinesis on the flag, no teleporting the flag back to the other side. Then, the teams were chosen. in order, John chose Six, Five, Bernie Kosar which is the name of John's Chimæra, Sam, and me. Nine, chooses Eight, Marina, Sarah, Ella, and Hawkeye. Rookie is the odd man out, so he sits on the sideline to watch.
"Everyone ready?" Nine asks after everyone is done planning and I'm placed on defense with Sam and BK. "Go!"
The chaos is instant. Ella, Sarah, Hawkeye, Sam, and me all open fire on each other, all trying to knock the other out before they could hit anyone else. A moment later, Sam spins around, firing behind out lines, toward the flag. Probably Eight. Sam moves to handle that as I keep Hawkeye from sniping anyone. Nine attacks John, but is blocked by a bracelet on John's wrist opening into a strange shield. I spin, shooting at Nine and clip on on the shoulder, knocking him off of John in time for Five's arm to stretch over and wrap around him like it was made of rubber before throwing him across the room. Then, Five walks over to him, his skin turning to a shiny metal as Nine stands. As I return to shooting at Hawkeye's cover, Sarah and Ella suddenly begin shooting and a skeletal system lights up before collapsing and Six becomes visible again before scrambling out of the way of another volley. I send a shot toward Sarah and Ella, managing to get Sarah in the shoulder. However, in the second that it takes me to do that, Hawkeye fires at me, hitting my left shoulder and making it go numb. I curse, staggering backward and dropping my blaster.
Suddenly, there's a tall ten-armed lion standing over me, grinning.
"Um, hello again Eight," I greet.
He sends several punches at me at once and I roll to the side, grabbing my sword from where I had dropped it then stand, turning toward him. A rumble comes from his chest and I get the impression he's laughing. Figures. He punches at me again and I duck under the punches, slashing his calf. He drops to one knee as I stand from a roll behind him. Just as I move to slash again, he spins, five hands slamming into me and throwing me away from the flag. I land in a heap, my sword sailing away from me, and Eight teleports away. I push myself up, feeling beginning to return to my arm. I sprint to my blaster just as Marina streaks past. I grin for a half second before it registers that she's not supposed to be on our side. I turn to look at the flag and shout in surprise. John and BK are sprinting after Marina but Eight teleports BK to the other end of the room. Nine tries to intercept John but Six, who's on the ground for whatever reason, trips him. I fire into the wall just ahead of Marina and she shouts in surprise, dropping and sliding under my stream of fire. Which John is unable to avoid. John drops and I fire at Marina again. This time, instead of sliding under the fire, she runs up the wall, streaking across the center line and starting back down. My rifle falls, pointing at the ground as I stare, open-mouthed, as she steps back onto the ground, her team cheering.
"When did she learn that?" I gape.
"Oh, that's right," John sighs, making his way over. "Nine can transfer his Legacies and can use antigravity."
"That's cheating!" I laugh. "Sorry about shooting you."
"It's fine," John chuckles. "Just don't do it with a live gun."
"Deal," I laugh nodding.
I smile as Marina is wrapped in a hug by Eight, Ella moving to join them. Nine makes his way over to talk to John but stops.
"You should congratulate her," Nine grins. "Maybe she's so excited that you'll get a kiss."
"Maybe I'll drop my blaster and it'll hit you in the nuts," I reply, grinning at him before setting it down against one of the barricades and making my way over.
As I draw near, I pass Six and Sam, who's trying to apologize for accidentally shooting Six. When I reach the other side, Marina is being lifted onto her team's shoulders, holding the flag high. She beams at me and I simply smile and nod. Then, Hawkeye wraps an arm around my shoulder, getting me in a headlock and beginning to grind his knuckles into my head.
"Of course, you know this victory secures me one command you can't refuse," he gloats, going off our usual bets.
"Nothing related to her," I say seriously, extracting myself from his grip.
"No no no," Hawkeye grins. "That's not how this works."
I groan.
"You have to give her a big sloppy-"
He stops when I stomp on his foot. He shouts in pain, hopping around dramatically and holding his foot before loosing his balance and falling over. Everyone starts laughing, so hard, in fact, that they accidentally drop Marina. She shrieks as she falls but she crashes into me and I catch her.
"Good job," I grin and she smiles, hugging me. "How'd you manage to slide under my shots?"
"Ella told me to drop before you fired," Marina says stepping back. "I actually thought Six would get it though."
"Was she close?" I ask. "I didn't notice. I was a little preoccupied with Eight."
"Yeah, I saw what you did to his leg," she says, giving me a mock-exasperated look. "You really should stop playing with pointy objects."
"No pointier than his claws," I laugh. "Besides. It was only his calf. I could have aimed a bit higher."
"That would have been...cruel," she says.
I consider making a joke about her healing it, but I decide I don't want to go there, for several reasons. I look over at Hawkeye and he grins at me. I narrow my eyes at him and shake my head and his grin widens. The penalty for refusing a command isn't something to be enjoyed. And no one is as creative as Hawkeye.
"What's he want?" Marina asks. "He said something about giving you a command right?"
"It doesn't matter," I say. "It's not going to happen anyway, whatever the penalty."
"Penalty?" Marina asks.
"If someone refuses a command, they get a penalty, a punishment," I say. "Hawkeye is...very creative. But his command is something I simply can't do."
Marina opens her mouth to respond just as her team grabs her and drags her away to celebrate some more. Hawkeye flashes me another grin and I sigh. Then, I turn and leave the room, deciding to clean up before everyone else gets done celebrating. It's my turn to cook dinner anyway.
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