Chapter 3: Loothouse Roshambo
The trio found themselves now parked in front of the loot house. Their journey had taken slightly longer then expected as Felt began to feel carsick halfway there, and Subaru and her had to trade spots in order to feel better.
The sun was beginning to set in the sky and everything was being illuminated in a hue of orange and pink.
Subaru and Felt exited the car and headed towards the loot house before turning back to see Lyra remaining in the car.
Subaru gave Lyra a tilted head look with a raised brow, and Lyrareplied with a shrug.
Subaru: You're not... you're not coming in?
Lyra: I would, but someone's gotta watch the car to make sure nothing bad happens.
Subaru: I see, well, a look out would be appreciated.
Lyra: That I can do.
Subaru walked over to his window and said in a low voice so Felt couldn't hear.
Subaru: I'll just say it... *sigh*
Subaru's face turned to one that was rather serious, with a tone of voice to match.
Subaru: If you see a woman with dark hair dressed in black, just drive away, run. She'll kill us all.
Lyra gave Subaru a startled look followed by a serious expression.
Lyra: That bad huh? What's the deal with her?
Subaru: She's the one who put Felt up to stealing what I'm after. If I can't get a deal finalized before she shows up, we'll be in big trouble.
Lyra couldn't think of anything to say. She had no weapons of his own on this trip and probably didn't have good enough fighting skills to defend herself with against most folks in this world.
Subaru and Felt walked to loot house door and disappeared inside.
Lyra moved and parked down the street from loot house. She had retrieved a pair of cheap binoculars from her belongings in the trunk, and watched the loot house from afar. It was around this time she wished she could have some way to communicate with Subaru should she spot anything or anyone suspicious.
Lyra set down the binoculars, and shortly after, noticed something, no, someONE in her rear view mirror.
A girl with silver hair and elf ears. Only this time she was walking down the road, outside of her car and not in the backseat, a welcome change of pace.
Lyra ducked down in her seat, determined to hide from the silver-haired girl should she begin to be hostile. She was positioned in a way that she could still see her side mirror as she passed. She passed without giving the foreign vehicle a second glance. Lyra counted in her head as soon as she was past the car, before leaning back up to peer over the dash.
The silver-haired girl was walking dead on to the loot house. But how could she know where to go when both Lyra AND Subaru had to figure it out? Subaru had said something about a loot house on their drive to Felt's shack, but wasn't Felt the one to suggest going to the loot house in the first place? And who was this woman dressed in black he'd been warned about? How did he know anything like that?
Lyra was puzzled by the order of events, struggling to think that maybe she didn't have everything in line. Shee remembered that she still had been up for more then twenty hours at this point, and what rest he had before was minimal. Perhaps she was just really beginning to become tired?
During her mental monologue, she noticed the silver-haired girl enter the loot house through the front door.
Lyra put her binoculars back up to her eyes to see if she could see inside the loot house, but unfortunately, she couldn't recognize anything of note from this angle.
She decided that she needed to get closer in order to see things properly. All parties were now in attendance for... well whatever they were all after. And there was no sign of a woman dressed in black.
Lyra walked around the backside of the building that she left her car next to, and from there, approached the loot house. Walking forward, she could see shimmering flashes of lights coming from the window. She sidesteppedwith her back against the wall to peek though the side of the building and get a closer look at things.
It was there and then that she saw the drama unfolding inside. The silver-haired girl stood resolute by the door, hands raised, and at her command, large crystals of ice formed and launched at a figure that seemed to move in inhuman ways.
What caught Lyra's attention more than anything ,though, was Subaru yelling at the top of his lungs.
Subaru: PUCK! SHIELD!!
As soon as he had said that a dark figure collided with the silver-haired girl, but right before impact, a wall of white, like a giant snowflake, guarded the girl.
And from out of the confusion, a small, gray cat like figure emerged, floating above the girl. The entity smiled and waved to Subaru.
What? Lyra thought. The longer this escapade goes on, the more questions start to arise, such as how Subaru knows about events that have yet to happen and people that he seemingly has yet to meet.
Lyra was determined to ask Subaru some serious questions now. She knew it wasn't just herself being tired at this point. Perhaps, Lyra thought, Subaru was using her obvious drowsiness to dissuade her from getting any funny ideas,
She soon figured out, however, that Subaru hadn't lied. He was at best stretching the truth. Nonetheless, if Lyra was going to work with Subaru, the only person who she could currently relate to in this world, she would need a full explanation from him about these oh-so-too-many happenstances.
That however, wasn't the main priority as of right now, but rather, the battle raging inside was instead.
Lyra was shocked to see the scene unfolding on the inside. That very same cat was now also shooting ice crystals. After several volleys, it had appeared to have finally stuck the black figure jumping about the room. Before she could get a good look at the figure, a glimpse of Subaru, Felt, and a rather gargantuan man in the corner of the room stole hef attention. All before a wall of ice blocked them from view.
Lyra: D-did they get it? I don't see that black figure anymore—
Lyra stopped her outside thoughts when, suddenly, the figure re-materialized between her window view and the wall of ice.
It was a woman. A woman with black hair in a single braid, a woman dressed in black...
Subaru was right yet again.. but how?
With some unheard words from behind the glass of the window, the floating cat retreated, leaving only the silver-haired girl.
Lyra continued to observe the fight, awestruck by what she saw.
With only a few tactile guards by the silver-haired girl, the woman in black had managed to overpower her and launch her behind a counter in the store.
I have to help, Lyra"s mind groaned —but what good can I possibly do?
Lyra thought hard about what she had at his disposal.
It's not like I thought I'd have to fight on this trip! I didn't bring anything I could use as a weapon. Lyra wracked her mind for ideas.
Could she use the car? No, the car was far too small to have the inertia to carry itself through a wooden wall and still have any power to strike this woman. Lyra thought and thought and thought, her vision not being able to take itself off the fight.
The gargantuan man tried his club at the woman in black. With only getting a few unsuccessful swings, he was quickly dispatched by her knife work, but not before Felt launched her sword to parry the blow. She had perhaps saved him a lethal blow, but he was seriously injured and taken out. With this exchange, the silver haired girl had gotten back and up and continued the fight.
Fighting head on doesn't seem to work, Lyra began to ponder. Someone has to have an element of surprise, but who—
Lyra realized there was one element she wasn't aware of.
Lyra: Me...
Lyra was determined to find an opening, but she still needed a weapon.
She peered back into the window, scanning the floor for a sword, a knife, a club, a fork... Anything. But there was nothing but rubble from their fighting.
It was then that Lyra heard something drop from behind her, her adrenaline growing more intense, she turned and fell against the wall of the loot house in surprise. Making her escape as her silhouette ran against the moons gentle light, Felt had abandoned the loot house and the fight inside.
Lyra determined what she needed to do was dire. She was done being an observer. She opened the door to the loot house. Stepping in, Lyta was surprised to see Subaru gesturing the giant's club at the woman in black, before taking a lunge at her.
With that they began a desperate skirmish.
Subaru was saved by a few choice slashes thanks to the silver-haired girls precision shots of ice countering the woman in black's blade. With this, the woman changed her position in the fight, swaying side to side, keeping Subaru's back to the silver-haired girl, making her shots more difficult to hit without possibly hitting Subaru.
Lyra balled her fist, waiting for her time to strike. She had to make this count. She thought about her foot work, she needed to reach the woman in black on the correct foot to give the maximum impact of her fist and put her entire weight into it.
Subaru, in the midst of his fight was about to come to one final blow with the woman. He reached up with the club to bring it down upon her, but instead chose to go for a face-kick, which the woman had caught easily.
Lyra knew from the position of both candidates that this was the moment she'd been waiting for. Lyra began her charge, fist tight, counting her footsteps, calculating when to swing, aiming for the back of her head. Subaru and the woman in blacks angle to one another from the silver-haired girl made it extremely risky to engage with more ice, but it was a choice angle for a sucker punch.
Lyra dashed past the silver-haired girl, causing her hair to sway with the wake of the wind. She couldn't understand who or what had just gone by. Subaru's attention was taken by the knife coming down from the woman in blacks hand held above her head, ready to amputate his leg.
One footstep away from showing her what a freight train felt like, Lyra charged forward. Her adrenaline was pumping harder then she could ever remember it. She felt she could punch through steel!
But behind her adrenaline, she felt another force, propelling her forward. She didn't have time to ponder what that could possibly be, but this was the footstep, perfectly time and distanced. She had the momentum, she had the adrenaline, she had the angle, and most importantly, she had the element of surprise.
Lyra had practically rolled a perfect nat twenty.
As soon as Lyra launched her arm forward, at full force, her eyes locked with Subaru.
Subaru had just noticed her, and time seemed to slow down. No sooner then had Subaru's eyes turned back to the woman's, her entire head had already turned to meet Lyra's eyes, a smile on her face.
In the blink of an eye, the woman had released Subaru's foot and sidestepped away, as if she was given a premonition of Lyra's attempted strike.
With Lyra's fist flying forward with nothing to stop it, it continued, shifting her entire weight far too forward, causing a massive shift in her center of mass and a sporadic change in motion for her inertia.
Needless to say, she was falling from losing her balance.
Lyra: WHOA!
Lyra slammed into Subaru's still extended leg, bringing herself inward towards him, causing both of their heads to collide side to side before falling to the ground. Sitting back up, Lyraand Subaru both groaned and grabbed their heads.
Lyra: Owww...sorry about that... I tried... damn, she's smart...
Subaru: Ehhhhh, I gotta give you points for style but your delivery was way off.
Silver-haired girl: Now's not the time!
Woman in black: I've grown rather tired of this. First one gets away and another enters the fray. I'm finishing this now—
Just as she began to lunge at the two holding their heads on the ground with her knife, something, or rather someone, propelled themselves through the roof of the loot house and between them and the woman in black.
Subaru: Reinhard!
Lyra: H-HUH?!
And so began round two of the loot house melee.
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During their fight, Reinhard had introduced himself to the woman in black, who had been determined to be 'from the northern provinces,' and was famously known as 'The Bowel Hunter, Elsa Granhiert.' In the midst of their parlay, Reinhard's sword at his hip had refused to be drawn, instead, he was forced to use a sword that was laying at his feet, knocked off its rack among all the fighting and destruction in the loot house.
The silver-haired girl had rushed over to the fallen giant, where Lyra had snatched some cloth from the debris and was trying to keep pressure on the man's wound.
Girl: I need you to move so I can heal him.
Lyra: Are you crazy?! I've got some of the bleeding down but if I let up now he'll start gushing again. We don't want him to bleed to death, now do we?!
Girl: Good, now let me take over then.
Lyra: No! Unless you plan to stitch close the wound I-
Subaru couldn't take them bickering at a moment like this and intervened.
Subaru: I really think you should listen to her!
Girl: That's right.
Her hand began to glow a deep blue color.
Girl: You only have the means to treat him, I have the skills to heal him.
As much as it tore Lyra to do it, she let up on the wound and let the girl have her way with this. She could only tell it was some sort of healing, magic based, something be hasn't realized existed in this world.
Lyra and Subaru watched in awe as the wound began to close.
Subaru: So, will Reinhard really be able to defeat Elsa?
The girl shook her head 'no' while still preforming her magic.
Girl: He hasn't even gotten serious yet. If he were, he would have sucked all the mana out of the air and I couldn't heal this man at all then.
Girl: Give him the signal on my queue after the wound closes.
A few moments more of healing and the wound was back to normal flesh and skin.
Subaru: Alright, Reinhard! Let her have it.
Reinhard: Will do. Thank you.
Reinhard lifted his sword and began charging his strike, the entire loot house began to rumble with mana rushing in.
Feeling the mana wash over her body, Lyra began to feel very weak and heavy. Her breathing became heavy and shallow, unable to get a deep breath in, amd her knees began to buckle.
Lyra: Ugh...I...don't feel so...good...
D-Did Elsa poison me? She hasn't used anything like that yet but— Lyra thought, but in the midst of it, she collapsed backwards, trying to fall down to one knee, she found herself on the ground, back against the wall. The silver-haired girl's attention was only brought off Reinhard's display of power by Lyra's coughing and wheezing. She crossed Subaru's line of sight to bend down to Lyra's level.
Girl: Hey! What's wrong? Why are you over here acting like you can't breathe?
Lyra: I-I'm...*pant* ...*pant*...not..."ac...ting"...*gasp*
Lyra's head was tilted down until the girl lifted it up so she could see. The girl gasped.
Bloodshot eyes stared right through the silver-haired girl.
At this point, even Subaru was concerned enough to take his eyes off the soon-to-be final blow of the fight at hand, and step over.
Subaru: Hey what's going on?! Is everything alright over here?!
The girl returned a look to him and explained:
Girl: She's lost all of her mana somehow! It's like her gate was opened up and began to pour out everything to her Od as soon as Reinhard began gathering mana...
The girl stared in disbelief.
Why did this happen? This shouldn't happen! She thought to herself.
Girl: Reinhard! Hurry and attack! We've got another problem over here!
Reinhard, at those words launched his attack, sending the entire structure of the loot house into low orbit with just the swing of his blade.
The three in the back of the loot house; the girl, Subaru, and Lyra found themselves in what was now a moon lit patio decorated with rubble. The colder outside air filled their lungs, and as they could only breathe and observe the destruction, one noise broke the silence
Lyra: *GAAAAASSSPPP*
Lyra rocketed up to standing position, sucking in the new wind and life force that could now return to her.
Lyra: *Pant* Nothing like, *pant* ...drowning in mana, ...*pant*... to really wake you up
...*pant*...
The silver-haired girl turned towards Lyra and put a hand to her chest, shaking her head at her.
Girl: Not quite. It's more like you were suffocating from lack of mana. That's what Reinhard's attack does, it takes all the mana in the air, and that's why I needed you to let me heal that man, so Reinhard could fight.
Lyra simply looked down at her trembling hands, still slightly stained from holding the cloth on the giant's wound.
Lyra: I see...so he really is that strong, huh?
Girl: Yeah...
With their exchange, the girl thanked Subaru and Lyra for risking their lives to retrieve her pendant and Subaru asked for his reward to be knowing the girl's name, which was Emilia.
No sooner then that, Elsa lunged out from behind a pile of rubble, taken to going straight for Emilia, but with quick movement, Subaru used the club from before to block her strike, and with that, Elsa vowed her revenge and retreated into the cover of the night.
However, Elsa's strike had a delayed effect on Subaru's gut, creating a nasty gash, where he passed out.
Emilia immediately set about healing Subaru, and after he was stabilized, her and Reinhard spoke, and he took Felt with him as "punishment" for her thievery against Emilia.
The giant, who everyone referred to as "Old Man Rom" remained passed out, but otherwise healed and stable.
With Reinhard and Felt's departure, the only two left standing and conscious were Lyra and Emilia. Lyra informed Emilia of that day's event, but not of her and Subaru's shared origin. She also told her of her "car" that held her belongings and that she had walked right by her on her way to the loot house.
They had only been speaking for a few minutes before Lyra abruptly changed the topic as she collapsed to one knee.
Lyra: I'm really sorry, Emilia, but it looks like I'm gonna have to drift off to sleepy-land now.
Emilia turned and blinked twice, surprised.
Emilia: Wha-what? Why so abruptly??
Lyra: looked down at her hand, shaking more now than before, and opened and closed it a few times before responding.
Lyra: When I ran into Subaru this morning, I had already been up for almost an entire day, and now it's been much longer, and all this is being done off of a few poor hours of sleep.
Lyra slowly stretched out on the ground, ready to slumber where she had just stood.
Lyra: Between fearing for my life and getting the wind knocked, or I should say 'sucked' right out of me, my adrenaline has already been zapped twice for the extra strength, and I've officially ran out of steam to even keep standing.
Her eyes began to close and her voice grew softer.
Lyra: Sorry I'm leaving you by yourself here like this but, I have a favor to ask.
Emilia expected a request for a reward or money, but what Lyra asked in her drowsy, slurred speech surprised her.
Lyra: Just do something with my car. Hide it, move it, bring it with, just don't leave it out here to get stolen.
Emilia smiled softly at Lyra and nodded her head.
Emilia: Yes, I can see what I can do.
The half-elf smiled and cast her gaze down to the ground as she continued her agreement.
Emilia: It's the least I can try and do for the strangers who have helped me so much today.
Lyra This was all Subaru's idea anyway. I'm just a wayward traveler who was along for the ride and agreed to help out because I felt like it.
Emilia: It still takes a good person, a kind person, to accompany a stranger to help another stranger.
Lyra: Yeah, good point there, actually.
Emilia brought a hand to her chest and gazed up to the moon once more, and in a more serious tone, trying to make a serious face to her listener who she knew wasn't looking, asked her question.
Emilia: I'll want to ask why you two knew about this when you both wake up though, about the pendant, Felt-chan, the loot house, all of it.
Lyra nodded.
Lyra: Fair enough.
And with that, Lyra closed her eyes, and let her body begin to be refreshed.
Emilia stared at the two strangers who had come to assist her in her time of need, both of them resting from extreme exhaustion.
She put her hand back to her chest, this time lightly touching her crystal that adorned her neck, the one in which her contracted spirit, Puck, rest.
I wonder, she thought. does she now? I was certain I felt it, but she might have been too tired to notice it. But with my abilities, I'm almost certain she is...
As Emilia stood under the moonlight and reflected on the days happenings, one thought struck her hard enough to get her to wonder it aloud.
Emilia: How am I going to get that 'car' moved?