Chapter 9: All Hail

Blood is spilt while holding keys to the throne

Born again but it's too late to atone

No mercy from the edge of the blade

Dare escape and learn the price to be paid

Hail to the King, Avenged Sevenfold

Warnigns/Tags: Plot, violence, graphic depictions of violence, profanity

South Town, Petreli's Parking, Tuesday, 1256

"REPPUKEN!" Geese Howard roared and focused whirlwind knocked Laurence Blood back even as he blocked the attack. He heard automatic fire, the sound of flesh parting and screams from within the smoke cloud and spat out a curse. Heidern was probably still alive as well.

Geese took one step to follow his prey when one of Bernstein's mercenaries saw him through the choking cloud of smoke. The man switched to the underbarrel mounted shotgun, aimed at Geese's chest and squeezed the trigger.

The massive man turned his side toward the mercenary and raised his arm in an earbrush block. Buckshot slammed into Geese's body, once, twice, a third time. The last round of the small shotgun was ejected and behind his face-shield the merc's eyes went wide. Geese Howard dropped his arm, and the pellets fell off his body and the plated lining of his suit, his lips were pulled back in a vicious snarl, and he had taken precisely one step backwards from the impact.

Laurence Blood pushed one of Berstein's cronies towards the melee, swearing at the low born thug to do his job, and suddenly another of them came flying from the cloud screaming. He slammed into the ceiling over Laurence, and the bullfighter was forced to dodge the man's limp form as he and his rifle-shotgun combo fell to the ground. Another wind blast exploded, this time peeling the cloud away and sending three of Bernstein's soldiers flat, again letting Blood make eye contact with Geese.

Growling low, his anger fueling every calculated motion he made, Geese's hands flexed into almost claws. Mai had deserved to defeat Krauser, she had needed to. Her execution of his asshole half-brother had left Geese with exactly one regret. That he hadn't been able to do more to the fucker. Laurence Blood was by no means his brother's equal, but he'd be an appropriate outlet for some Howard fury.

Blood flared his capote in a wide swath, concealing his motions as he dashed to the left. And saw that Geese had simply leaped over the cape, whirlwind energy coiling in his hands. The Sempuken wasn't his hardest strike, but it still knocked Laurence to the side and opened a series of cuts on his cheek. Blood struck back with a high feint into a low fencer's stab, only to watch as Howard read his movements like a headline, pivoting past the stab, cracking an inside to out crescent kick into Blood's shoulder, then flowing into a straight open palm to the chest that blasted the bullfighter back into the darkness of the garage.

As he hit and rolled with the practice of decades of training, Blood looked up and saw Howard not fleeing but walking back into the garage. His tie wasn't even out of place.

"Cobra Bite!" Howled K2, sending two arcs of cutting energy flame at Geese from the side. Annoyed but not foolish, Geese stepped to the side and let them pass by.

"King Cobra Kick!" K2 announced, having followed his projectiles with a tremendously athletic jumping downward crescent kick aimed at the old man's head. Then, impossibly, Howard deflected the blow with a single arm, guiding K2's momentum into the nearest wall. Gagging as he smashed into the concrete K2 raised his arms, and received a nasty side kick to the knee in response. That jarred K2's focus just enough to let Howard follow up with another lead leg side kick to the huge clone's forehead.

His face a dispassionate mask, Geese crushed his right palm into the Krizalid clone's gut, flowed into a whirlwind throw, and hurled K2 in Heidern's general direction. He turned back towards Blood, and raised his right arm, barely mistiming the deflection. Laurence's thin bladed sword punched through Geese's forearm, kept going and skewered his deltoid as well.

Snarling in anger and pain, Geese front stomp kicked Blood in the chest, the sword blade ripping out of his arm with blinding pain. Geese forced the rage into energy, he'd been hurt worse and won, he'd crush that little- Abruptly Geese Howard's right arm dropped, numb, burning in a growing, weakening agony. His eyes widened.

"Yowamushi! Fucking coward!" Geese roared, using his good arm to hurl another Reppuken at Bernstein's thugs.

Two more of his men had been killed by Heidern, after poor Yuri, and his separated head. The first, the old soldier had pounced on then inexplicably threw. Inexplicable save for when the man realized both of his grenade's pins had been pulled. Dimitryv had shot his ally in the head so he'd fall and the concrete floor took most of the blast, but still enough for one of the Americans Rugal had brought on to get knocked down. Like some kind of horror movie ghost Heidern was on the man slashing his arm with fucking hand, then stripping the American's rifle away, pushing it under his helmet and against his throat. Even the advanced armor Mr. Bernstein had outfitted them with couldn't take a point-blank rifle round to the throat. So, the three-round burst Heidern fired just seemed excessive to Dimitryv.

He and the other five survivors took cover behind a pillar after the one-eyed old man shot Sergei in the groin with a single shot. Dimitryv dragged the weeping Sergei behind a pillar and reflected that age had made Heidern fairly mean. True he was trying to kill the old bastard, but a groin shot was just mean spirited.

Dimitryv grabbed one of Sergei's flashbangs and pulled the pin lobbing it around the pillar, then wincing as Heidern shot it in mid air, making the explosive detonate three feet from point of throw. Dimitryv's ears rang and he began to feel somewhat picked on.

Unsure of what he was supposed to do against the Commander, Dimitryv was somewhat relieved when K2's big form crashed in between his cover and wherever Heidern was. K2 roared in berserk fury and slammed both hands into the concrete under him. The darkened garage was illuminated by a column of flame erupting from around the downed clone. Heidern was highlighted by the inferno, wincing as he was blinded.

His eyes wide with humiliation and fury K2 leapt at the old soldier, hands trailing cutting energy. Heidern slipped the first arc but his borrowed H&K took the brunt of the next, getting sliced in two. Annoyed, the one eyed soldier slammed a spearhand towards the big clone. Improbably, K2 weaved to the side and latched on to Heidern's arm.

"Slow old man!" He laughed, cocking an arm back primed with cutting fire. Arching an eyebrow, Heidern drew his sidearm with his free hand and fired from the hip, shooting the idiot in the stomach twice. The body armor held, but K2 nearly puked in pain. He hurled Heidern away, managing to toss him in Geese's direction. Heidern flipped with practiced grace and landed in a crouch.

He spun and saw a flare of red, throwing himself to the side on instinct, Laurence Blood's blade sang through where his chest had been. Cat quick, Blood reset and danced forward, keeping Heidern backpedaling from the razor point.

"Ole!" Blood laughed and snapped his cape out. Heidern slashed the fabric to ribbons with a knife hand and kept moving, trying to deflect the stab. Agony speared up from his left thigh, and he saw that Blood was pulling back from an extended low fencing lunge, a smug look on his face. The old soldier compartmentalized the pain, pointed his pistol at Blood's chest-

And collapsed before he could squeeze the trigger.

Heidern looked at his numb leg as if it had betrayed him and saw K2 grinning from the center of the parking garage. Almost taunting him, behind the freak, was Heidern's vehicle. A rifle had been left in there, if he had made it to the vehicle he could die with a proper weapon, he thought, annoyed at his position. Abruptly he was grabbed and jerked upwards, shock quickly giving way to recognition. Geese Howard had grabbed him and lifted him with his left arm. Howard's right arm hung as limp and useless as Heidern's leg.

Without a moment's hesitation the one-eyed soldier raised his pistol and fired at K2, sending the big clone leaping away spitting curses at them. Howard shot past him, stopped short and let an arc of cutting flame whistle past him then sprinted forward again. Bullets hissed past them, and Heidern and Howard both grunted as rounds from in front and behind slammed into their body armor.

Geese slammed into the side of Heidern's SUV, the old soldier near ripped the door open, and both men piled gracelessly into the vehicle. A fusillade of bullets thumped into the SUV, the armored cab holding for the moment. But there were too many, and K2's inhuman power was likely too much for even this vehicle's armor.

Geese used what was left of his tie to tightly bind the stab wound in his useless right arm, Heidern doing the same with his leg. Both men felt a creeping burn through their bodies, and both knew what that meant. The vehicle dropped slightly as its tires were blown out from under them, not that either man reacted.

Heidern reloaded his pistol and held it by the barrel to Geese who took it in his remaining hand without a word. But even with resigned focus the old soldier had to say what both were thinking as he pulled the spare rifle out and chambered a round.

"If one of my men had told me two weeks ago I was going to die fighting alongside Geese fucking Howard, I would have had him shot for incompetence." Heidern said flatly. Geese chuckled, working his way to a portion of window that hadn't been spiderwebbed yet.

"I don't plan on dying without making them hurt more." He growled, idly curious why the shooting had stopped. Heidern nodded distractedly, trying to see through the cracked layers of clear armor, and wondering the same thing as well.

"Caballeros!" Came Laurence Blood's voice. "Gentlemen, gentlemen. Why do you hide? Especially you, Senór Howard."

The two trapped men exchanged a puzzled look. From behind the cover of a chipped support column, because even Laurence Blood's incompetence had limits. Heidern could see the tip of that damned sword the bullfighter held.

"Come out, we will finish this as men of honor! You may both fight me at once! You will not get such an offer from these others I think." Blood looked at K2 and his face twisted into a cruel grin. "As I said Senór Howard, you especially have no choice non? Even now your pretty little ninja girl is being made comfortable by my men. I intend to teach her the true nature of how a nobleman loves a woman, as Herr Krauser did!"

Geese Howard's eyes widened, and Heidern was pretty sure there were sparks of lightning flashing in them.

"We don't know if he actually has her. He's trying to get you to attack." The old soldier said carefully. Geese had turned slowly to stare at the door that faced the direction Laurence Blood was in.

"He may well succeed." Geese answered, the low rumble of white hot fury in his voice far more terrifying than if he had roared. Heidern was fairly certain that while Howard would definitely die in the effort, there was no way Blood would survive Geese's assault. With a resigned sigh he shifted so when the irate gangster attacked, he could at least lay down some covering fire.

Then all of them were stunned by an unexpected sound. The roar of two turbo powered engines, echoing in the garage, and coming closer.

Author's notes: I was hesitant to use "Fanboy" language insertions until recently watching Kengan Ashura and playing some import games. Then I realized how much Japan does it, so at this point it's tradition. Much like all bad things relating to fighting games occurring on Tuesday.

Also we all love cliffhangers right!