'Transmission start'
'static'
H-H-hrzzzzz-Hello?
'static'
I-hrrtz-hing-on?
Hello? Oh there we go. Sorry about that, where I am right now is not exactly the ideal place to...
'static'
...anyways here's the sto-
'static'
'Error: Transmission lost'
'Input disclaimers'
All OC and characters belong to their respective owners, anything else is owned by D.W.
(Third-person POV)
"Spread out! Make sure she doesn't escape!" a large knight with black armor and a flowing red cape shouted to his much smaller subordinates. Moments ago, one of their prisoners escaped her confines and was now trying to evade capture. The captive was last seen running into the dense forest.
Gun-wielding knights fanned out to search for the escapee. They looked everywhere, but couldn't find her.
If they only looked up...
Crouched on a high tree branch, was a woman with a green hood and cloak. Under that was a common hunting outfit, consisting of a dark green long sleeved shirt with a tan vest, camo green shorts, and dark green boots.
"I'm lucky they never tied my hands," she whispered to herself. "Or else I wouldn't be able to get up here," she looked around for any knights before climbing down. "But they took my bow and knife..." she started to sprint away from where the knights were gathered. "Wait a sec, my catche!"
As she ran through the forest, a black mountain lion appeared beside her.
"Sabre, be vigilant," she said to the lion. "We're outnumbered and I don't have a weapon,"
He grunted in response.
"Hopefully they never found my little weapon catche,"
After a few minutes of running, she skidded to a stop in front of an oak tree. She chuckled to herself, "And they said I never needed this," she said as she started to tap the tree. She tapped around the trunk until a part of it sounded different from the rest.
"Gotcha," as she opened the compartment.
It turns out that a portion of the trunk was hollowed out and camouflaged. Inside was a sleek, black colored bow with a matching quiver, as well as a small, curved dagger.
"How the tides have turned," she said to herself as she slung the quiver over her and grabbed the two other items. No soon as she did that a bullet missed her head by mere inches.
"There she is!" a knight said before falling to an arrow.
"Crap, Sabre let's go," she said as she took off, bullets flying after her.
What the knights didn't know was that, despite outnumbered, the woman had the advantage over them. Now that she has her weapon, they are as good as dead.
She ran through the forest with lightning speed, effortlessly dodging trees, rocks, and bushes that came her way. An arrow was notched and ready as she catapulted herself over a fallen tree and let the arrow fly. Metal cut through metal as the arrow hit it's mark, falling another knight. And another and another. But arrows weren't the only things these armored peons did not have to worry about- no- another thing was cutting through their ranks.
A horrified scream echoed throughout the forest as a knight was mauled to death by the mountain lion, his claws easily slicing through the armor. The lion shrugged off the bullets hailing down on him, ignoring the feeling of pain as it sank his teeth into the next victim.
As the last of the screams died down, the forest was quiet once again. But she knew there was one left, hiding.
And hiding is the worst thing one can do to when facing a hunter.
Her eyes turned from their normal shade of brown to bright emerald green, as they did so the world around her tinted green, her already heightened senses became increasingly aware of her surroundings.
Then she heard it.
The faint and shallow breathing of the last knight.
She turned in the direction of the breathing, her eyes found a faint outline of the knight, hiding behind a thicket of bushes about twenty yards away. She drew back the string.
The knight never had time to see it coming.
With the last of the threats taken care of, the huntress breathed a sigh of relief. She could rest easy for the moment.
"Sabre, you ok?" she asked as she scratched under his chin, causing the big cat to purr.
'SNAP!'
She quickly turned to the source of the noise, and slowly made her way to it. Ready to pounce like the predator she is.
(Heather's POV)
I should have thought out my plan to save mom a little more through, but whatever.
When I rammed the knight we both fell through the portal, and I kinda blacked out as I did so. I don't know how long I was out, but it wasn't that long was it?
I hope.
I woke to a bird chipping and I hope that whatever happened was just a dream (though I really hoped that some of the things that happened so far was actually real). I expected to be back right in my room, but that wasn't the case.
I was in the middle of a forest.
Yes, you heard that right.
A mother trucking forest.
Teufort is far from a forest, heck, does New Mexico even have a forest for crying out loud?
"Where am I?" I muttered to myself as I got up and adjusted my hat, I'm surprised my hat was able to stay on my head the entire time. I also found my pistol that I was using during the battle next to me as well. I picked it up and checked the clip.
Five bullets, and I have no extra clips.
"Only five...gotta make my shots count," I wasn't a marksman like Uncle Mundy, but I am a decent shot with most of the weapons the my uncles used.
The knight that fell with me was nowhere to be found so that's a good sign right? Anyways, I'd decided to lay low and keep a low profi-
'SNAP!'
Well shit.
I looked down to find I stepped on the only branch on the ground.
"Are you kidding me?" I muttered. I didn't have much time to curse myself as my instincts kicked in and ducked down just in time to avoid an arrow entering my skull. From the time I've spend with my uncles, I've kinda gotten good at dodging things. Especially when Jane and Tavish start to argue.
And guess who has to clean up after them.
I aimed my pistol back where I thought the arrow came from. I looked around for any signs of movement in the brush and trees.
Then I felt something or someone was behind me. I whipped around to find a black mountain lion about to pounce on me.
"Holy cow!" I shouted as I emptied all the bullets I had in my pistol at the large cat. The lion shrugged off the bullets and knocked me to the ground. It snarled at me, its teeth glistening in the low light.
I struggled against the lion to ensure that it wouldn't rip me to shreds. I punched it in the throat, causing it to let up slightly, allowing me to get it off myself. I started to crawl away from the lion only to get a face full of dirt as it jumped on me again.
"Get off me!" I yelled.
"He'll only bite if you keep struggling,"
Though it didn't seem like a good idea, I decided to follow whoever said that, less I get mauled to death in some unknown place. I felt the pressure lessen on my back and I quickly got to my knees.
"Get up now and you're dead," the voice continued.
I bit my lip. Out of the sides of my left eye I could see someone walking into my view. It was a female, judging from her voice, and she wore a similar green hood and cloak like Jackie, but she was wearing totally different clothes, was a bit taller, and I don't think she wields a bow.
"Who are you?" she asked me, her green lit eyes making contact with my red colored eyes.
"W-why should you know?"
"So, I can decide whether or not to put an arrow through your head,"
I gritted my teeth as one of her arrows glimmered in the light.
"Heather,"
(Unknown POV)
"Heather," the girl said to me. My eyes darted around, looking at the girl. Two things bothered me about her: one was her eye color, something just felt uneasy about her blood red eyes, and two, the fact she was able fight off Sabre with relative ease. She doesn't look like someone who has fighting experience.
"So Heather," I said. "What are you doing out here?"
"I doubt you would believe me if I told you," she said. "Besides, I don't even know where I am right now,"
Hm, I wonder...
"Did you happen to fall through a big, blue colored portal of some sorts now?"
"Yeah! Wait, how do you know-?"
"Let's just say I'm "aquatinted" with folks like you falling through those things,"
"Can you get me back?"
"No...sorry," I was going to say something else when I heard movement behind us. Looking over my shoulder, I saw a bunch of those knights through the trees with my Hunter's sight. I grabbed her hand. "C'mon! We need to go!" before she could say anything we were off.
As I raced through the forest with Heather in tow, I said, "Oh, name's Swift and that's Sabre," I motioned to him. "Huntress and Tracker for the Allies,"
(Wheel's POV)
"Ok, how much fucking people do they have?" I yelled as another knight fell to my blade. We've been holding off the endless onslaught of knights and dragons for the past hour and it looks like it wasn't dying down anytime soon.
I teleported behind some cover to catch my breath, the fighting went on for at least a couple of hours right now, and we sustained many casualties on our side. Civilian evac was taking way to long right now.
"Wheel!" an Officer yelled. "All civilians are off the planet! But how are we going to get outta here?"
"I don't know!" I yelled back.
An explosion went off somewhere in front of me and an bloodied arm fell on the Officer, who quickly shook it off him.
"Who's still alive?"
"We've got a couple Gunners, a Sharpshooter, five Shield Soldiers, a Commando, and a Rocket Troo-ahhh!" the Officer was suddenly snapped up by a dragon.
"Shit!" I was about to leap up to intercept the dragon when an bright green arrow entered its skull. It came crashing down, landing on some of the knights.
"Looks like we've came just in time, didn't we Wheel?"
I looked behind me to find a certain huntress and her mountain lion as they ran up towards me.
"Swift, I thought..."
"Was caught? Long story short, whatever toxin they used to knock us out didn't affect me," she said. "I couldn't help the others, I only had time to knock out the knights that were guarding me before the alarm was raised,"
"We can talk about what happened later," I said. "First we- who's that?" I pointed to the girl behind her.
"Oh this is Heather," Swift explained. "She's supposed to be the daughter of the RED Pyro and Engineer, you know, the ones that were involved with the "Rift Incident"?"
"Why's she here?"
"You know those knights?" Heather said. "Yeah, they kinda attacked us and I kinda fell into a portal so yeah..."
Attacked? Oh god, I hope Jackie and Skyla's ok, but then again...
"We'll talk about this later, right now we're evacuating anyone still left on this planet," I said. "Swift, help any soldiers that are still here, and make sure she's safe. Oi! Kid!"
"I have a name!"
Oh the sass...I like it.
"You know how to shoot right?" I asked her as I pulled out a submachine gun and shoved it into her hands.
"My parents were mercs," she said as she grabbed the gun.
"Good," I hurled over the cover and ran towards the hoard of knights.
"What about you?" Swift yelled as I ran into the fray.
"Don't wait for me! I'm going to buy everyone some time, now go!" I shouted back as I leapt towards an armored dragon.
"I'll make a nice bag outta you!"
(Third-Person POV)
Meanwhile back at the abandoned RED HQ
"BWAAAAAAAAHHHHHHH!" Ana brawled as tears streamed from her eyes.
"Ana, Heather's a strong girl, she'll be fine," Dell said as he tried to console his significant other.
"BWAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHH!"
After overcoming the initial shock of losing Heather to a portal, the five were able to defeat the remaining knights and close up any more portals. The victory was quite hallow, since the love and joy of Ana's life was now gone.
"Jackie, is anything you can do to find Heather?" the Texan asked.
The green hooded girl shook her head. "Sorry Engi, I wish I could but I can't,"
"Why not?"
She snapped her fingers and a projector screen appeared next to her. A picture of a normal rift with two exits appeared. "First off, the rift that the knight came through wasn't a simple rift, it was more like this," the picture changed to a mess of a rift with multiple exits. "This is what we call a major rift, which means she could end up ANYWHERE," she snapped her fingers again and the screen disappeared. "All we can do is hope she landed in a dimension that isn't hostile,"
Ana suddenly grabbed Jackie by her collar, "Hope...hope! My daughter is in some godforsaken place and you say the only thing we can do is to HOPE?!" at this point, Ana was literally on fire, the others backed away and prayed that she didn't hurt the teen too much.
"Look, I'm sorry about your daughter, but I cannot do ANYTHING to get her back. That is out of my capabilities right now,"
Ana gave Jackie a hard stare before letting her go. She walked out of the room in a huff, Dell tried to follow her but was stopped by CV.
"Look, Dell, I think it's best to leave her alone for now," the robot said. "Trust me,"
He looked where Ana left before turning around and sighing.
Ana's emotions clashed inside her. Anger easily dominated her mind, leaving her full of rage. She punched a hole through one of the crumbling walls before landing another, and another, and another, until the wall looked like Swiss cheese. Slowly, that fire died inside her and was replaced with sadness. She slowly slumped to the ground, tears filling her eyes once again as she wept into her hands.
"W-w-w-w-wh-y-y-y..." she manage to choke out.
After weeping for an unknown amount of time, she felt something soft next to her. She looked to find the slime girl, Skyla, curled up next to her. Ana cracked a small smile to her.
"Hi there," she said.
"I hope you're not angry at us," Skyla said.
"I'm not," Ana said as she stroked Skyla's "hair". "I'm just...disappointed I wasn't able to save Heather,"
"Aunty Jackie says she's disappointed too, but I think she's just as devastated as you are,"
The two sat in silence.
"Do you mind if I hug you, like for a long time?" Ana asked sheepishly
"So you don't know where the others went?" Jackie asked Dell.
The Engineer shook his head. "Ah wish I knew exactly, but I think Soldier lives around here, that's for sure,"
"Wheel makes everything look so much easier," Jackie thought as she mentally groaned.
"I guess we have to start looking then," she said. "Where does Soldier live?"
"In some wizard's castle, ah believe," Dell said. "Don't ask, long story,"
"Ok...can you show me?"
Back at Allied HQ
"Everyone fall back!" Swift shouted as she fired an arrow into the fray. "Get outta here!"
A swirl of purple appeared next to her. "Fancy finding you here, Swift,"
"Evie,"
The two women made no attempt to make eye contact whatsoever, as the two were preoccupied with the battle going on all around them.
"So who's this child you brought here?" the purple haired witch said as she fell a knight with pinpoint accuracy with a bullet to the cranium.
"RED Pyro and Engi's daughter," Swift responded. "Long story short, fell down an open rift, ended up here,"
"Shouldn't she be in a safer place?"
"I think she's handling herself pretty well," she pulled back on the string and shot off a green colored arrow.
"How can you tell?"
The huntress motioned over to Heather, who gunned down an impressive amount of knights already.
"Blood red eyes?" Evie questioned.
"Yeah, just like Pyro's when she's in her elemental form. And she's quite tough as well, took on Saber with ease. Most of our soldiers fall to him easily when they tussle,"
"Hm, interesting," the witch grabbed a nearby propane tank and hurled it at a group of charging knights. She took aim and fired.
'BOOM!'
"Where's lunatic number two?"
"You mean Joli's boyfriend?" Evie said with a chuckle. "He should be somewhere in mess of things, as usual,"
A large, blue colored explosion followed by a maniacal laugh drew the two's attention.
"Oh there he is,"
Meanwhile in the fray
Wheel's blue bladed digi-katana cut through one of the giant knight's large broadsword with ease. He followed up with slash that not only cut through the knight but also the several knights behind him. He repositioned the katana in his hand before sprinting over to another group of knights. He brought back his arm for a slash only to be met with an explosion right in front of him.
Teleporting a few feet back so he wouldn't get caught in the blast radius, he shouted to the perpetrator, "Hey watch where you're aiming, furball!"
"Then stop running where I'm shooting!" a tall, anthro. fox said as he landed next to the Allied leader. He was about at least a foot taller than Wheel, and looked extremely muscular. He wore tattered tan pants, and a green tanktop. Drenched in sweat that soaked his clothes and his copper colored fur, he used his left hand to wipe the sweat off his face. He would've used his right hand, but it was currently being used as a energy cannon.
Yes.
His arm is a FUCKING energy cannon.
"ME?" Wheel shouted. "Why should I watch where I'm running, can't you just shoot elsewhere?"
"Uh no,"
"Really..." the hooded figure sweatdropped as the camera panned out to show other areas of the battleground where the fox could've shoot.
Wheel pinched his nose. "Why do I even put up with you anyways, Kaori?" he muttered as he facepalmed. "Just-just be more careful, ok... and he's gone,"
The fox was already off and causing more mayhem throughout the battlefield. Spreading pain, explosions, blood, explosions, body parts, explosions, and more explosions just for the hell of it.
"And I guess that's why everything thinks he's Joli's boyfriend,"
(Heather's POV)
Right now two emotions are running through me. The first is how fucking terrified I am right now. This is nothing I've experienced in my life, like what I saw (or rather heard) at Teufort of what my parents and uncles do PALES in comparison to this. Like I can't imagine how anyone can sleep after a battle like this, there is no way.
People are getting mowed down by swords and bullets (huh, never thought those two would co-exist in the same tim- oh wait never mind). Dragons mauling the utter daylights out of people. Just a clusterfuck of things I really want to unsee.
But in all honesty, I wasn't actually terrified.
I was having the time of my life. Let's see...
Adrenaline's pumping- check.
Heart pounding- check.
Multiple life and death situations- check and double check.
Despite being mercs, my parents would not had allowed me to do the things I was doing right now. Safety and my well being perhaps?
Whatever, anyways, I'm digging this SMG that Wheel (what a weird name) gave me. Never runs out of ammo for some reason, but who cares? I hate reloading. Guess that's something we can agree on huh?
So right now I'm gunning down anyone that looks hostile. I'm actually surprised how much knights I've taken down so far. I kinda expected to be doing way worse than this.
"Heather!" I turned to find Swift rolling into cover next to me. "Come on, we're getting out of here,"
"Got it! Am I going back to...?"
"Not yet, we have to get out of here first, then Wheel's going to send you back,"
"Sounds good,"
"EVERYONE FREEZE!"
Suddenly the room turned a shade of blue, I looked out from my cover to find the enemies frozen in place. I was surprised to find all the Allied personal weren't frozen in place like how the knights and dragons were.
"Uh what was that?" I asked Swift.
"I stopped time," Wheel said as he walked up to me. "We better get going, time won't stay like this forev-"
But then there was a flash of light that blinded me. When it disappeared I found myself standing in front of an ice-encased Wheel.
"Wheel? Swift, what-?" I turned to find Swift frozen in place as well. "Guys, what's going on?"
I soon discovered I was the only person not frozen in the mist of all this.
"Hello? Anyone there NOT frozen?"
Silence only responded.
"And there goes my way home...gah," before I continued to pout I heard something. I instinctively raised my SMG and scanned the room.
"Hey, kid," I whipped around to find a purple haired woman wearing a brown trench coat and fedora. She held a rifle in one hand. "You ok?"
"What happened? Why is everyone like this?"
"I don't know, but something's telling me something's going on, and it's not good,"
"How can I trust you? What if you work for them?"
"If I did I would be frozen already," she said.
"Got that right," a tall orange colored fox said as he walked up to us. I noticed that his arm was a cannon of some sorts which suddenly morphed back into an arm. "I thought only the knights got frozen,"
"Who are you two?" I asked.
"Evie," the woman said. "Fox guy is Kaori,"
"Sup," he said.
"You do look like your mother, don't you? You even have her...assets, heredity perhaps?"
I blushed slightly. Yes I have big breasts, and yes Mom does have large ones as well. I'm pretty sure any woman would kill for these...things. Why did I have to choose to wear such a tight shirt today?
"Kaori, stop ogling. You already have your special someone,"
"...huh what?" the fox blinked before turning red. "I wasn't looking..."
"Yeah right...be mindful she's only fifteen perv," the purple haired lady said.
"You're only fifteen?" Kaori asked in disbelief. "You look way older,"
"Yeah I get that a lot," I said, rubbing the back of my neck.
'ROAAAAAAAAR!'
"Uh oh, that does not sound good," Evie said. She turned to the frozen Allies. "There's another dragon outside, but we can't leave everyone here. Kaori how much time will it take you to take everyone here to the evac?"
"Give me five minutes,"
"Fair enough, Heather, go with Kao-"
Before she could finish, the magma colored reptile decided to make an early entrance into the base. It spewed an orange colored fireball at us. Kaori grabbed me and jumped out of its way just before it exploded harmlessly on the ground.
"-and help him defrost everyone, and Kaori, you better work fast," Evie said as she dropped her rifle. A purple aura surrounded her hands as a large golem made of stone appeared in front of her. She noticed that he wasn't moving. "Stop staring and get to work, dammit!"
(Third-person POV)
"Ok for a second there I thought you were pulling my leg about the castle part," Jackie said as she and Dell stood outside Merasmus' castle turned Soldier's home. It was a small castle, slightly larger than an average house. It wasn't the cleanest though, as Jackie could tell from the abundance of raccoons and trash around the place. "Besides the raccoons and trash, I think this looks like a great place to live,"
"Yup," Dell replied.
"You know, I think I should change what wearing right now,"
"Why? I think you look fine right now,"
"Yeah but, the way I'm dressed right now makes me look like I'm in some kind of cult or something,"
"And exactly how are you going to do that?"
"Um, super magical being here, helllllo?"
With a snap of her fingers, her cowl (it's the hood, fyi I'm calling the hood this now) and cloak shortened and became a green, unzipped jacket. Her top half of her armor turned into a red colored shirt with black sleeves, while the bottom half became black colored jeans. Her boots stayed the same.
"There we go," she said as she took off the hood of the jacket. Her face was slightly tanned, and she had green eyes with golden brown hair in a ponytail. "What?"
Dell blinked. "Uh...nothing, it's just...you kinda look like Heather,"
"Hmph, coincidence?"
He went up to the door and knocked. "Soldier! It's me, Engi! You in there partner?"
No answer.
"Soldier?"
"YES?"
The two jumped as Soldier appeared out of nowhere behind them. "Hello there!"
"Soldier, never do that again," Dell said as he caught his breath.
"Sorry about that Engi! I didn't expect you to react in such a way," he looked at Jackie. "Who's this maggot?"
"Remember the Allies, Soldier?"
"..."
"Hoo dear..."
"Let me help you," Jackie said as she snapped her fingers in front of Soldier's face. "...and now we wait,"
"What did you do?"
"I just brought him up to speed by replaying memories in his mind. Wonder why I've never did that with you and Pyro, would've saved some time,"
"Holy mother Mary Joseph...Private Heather is gone! WE MUST MOUNT A RESCUE MISSION!" he picked up Dell and Jackie. "ONWARD MEN, I WILL NOT ALLOW HER TO BE BRAINWASHED BY THE COMMIES!"
"Soldier! Wait!"
"Put me down!"
Their screams and yells didn't faze the patriot as he ran down the road towards the direction of the RED HQ.
"How long was she hugging me for?" Skyla asked CV.
"Uh, I think...this," he flashed a time on his monitor.
65 minutes 4 seconds
"And I thought Arachne was attached..." she mumbled.
"Sooo soft..." Ana said as if she was in a trance. "You smell like blueberries..."
"Is this normal for her?"
"Yeaah, pretty much,"
Suddenly Ana stopped stroking Skyla's hair, she sensed something else with them. She narrowed her eyes.
"Something's with us," she said as she let go of Skyla, much to the latter's relief.
"Really? I would've detected someone if they came here already,"
"Check again then, cause I got a feeling someone else is here," Ana said as she stood up.
"Yeah...I was thinking the same thing too,"
The three turned to find a white, human sized dragon slowly hovering in place behind them. It's large blue eyes stared back at them. "So what's this "someone" we're looking for?"
"Auntie Diane!"
Hello? This thing on and working now? We rolling?
We are?
ALLLLLLLLLRIGHT!
I'm back! Sorta but I'm not dead!
Final exams for the semester is coming up for me so don't get too riled up for more chapters, but they will come out, slowly but surely they WILL come out.
Till next time,
-D.W