Chapter 8: Part 8: Sturdiness, POV: Sam

It’s been about a week since I saw Andrew out in the city testing his prototype for the first time. Xeno has begun doubling down on our training, but primarily towards Sage and Adam. According to Xeno, The light and dark duo have more potential for more useful spells although conjuring them is much harder and much more unstable than anything Sheila, Zack, and I can muster currently. A new development was that the seventh discovered person to possess magic was actually Zack’s older(by ten minutes) twin brother. So Zack has been tasked to teach him the basics by Quinn. While they’ve been doing that, Quinn has been working with Andrew to continue improving his suit and Andrew begrudgingly has been helping to improve our suits. Lastly, Sheila and I have kind of been left on our own to improve by ourselves with little help just like Zack, but we are sometimes tasked by Quinn to do random odd errands for him. 

Today’s task though, has been much larger than getting Quinn a salad bowl or a coffee. He left the two of us to track down the eighth magic possessor on Earth. The two of us have spent most of our morning using Quinn’s handheld magic tracker that he usually passes to his agents, but now we have it.

“They’ve gotta be here.” I told Sheila while staring at the tracker. We were situated at the McCarren Park Track right in the heart of Brooklyn, about twenty some blocks to the labs, so pretty close. It was an extremely cold day but we were still out searching and people were still out in the park running and dog walking. 

“Yeah the tracker says they’re probably nearby.” Sheila looked over my shoulder and looked around at the people on the running track, “He’s gotta be on the track right?” 

“Yeah most likely, we should probably look for someone around our age though. So far everyone we work with are within the age range of fifteen to seventeen.” I just started to point the antenna end of the tracker towards random people who look to be our age and see if it increases or not. 

“This is taking too long, Sam.” Sheila started to pull her whip out of her snowcoat, “let’s interrogate some people.”

“Can we try recruiting people WITHOUT whipping them first?” I put my hand over her hand with the whip in her grasp. She put it back on her belt and zipped her coat back up. Both of us were in our combat suits to stay warm without wearing tons of layers. Though we still had snow coats draping over our suits because we didn’t want to just walk around with them in public just in case. I kept my Odachi in my younger brother’s guitar case which I borrowed from his room on my way out today. 

“Find anybody yet?” 

“Nope, you wanna try?” I offered her.

“Bet!” And she ripped it out of my hands and- “ummm… hmmm, it's probably that guy!” The graph on the tracker was spiking with similar vigor as if we pointed the tracker at ourselves. 

“How did you-”

“What can I say? I’m just better.” Sheila shrugged. 

I jokingly hit her right elbow with my left arm, “Shaddup! Let’s just go get the guy now.” I got up and patted the snow off the back of my pants, “Yeah okay let's go.” 

“Wait.” Sheila slowed me down, “... how are we going to coerce him with us? I mean, a group of teenagers training superpowers in a basement with an alien watching us, trained to combat other aliens sounds kinda strange y’know?” 

“Yeah I feel ya,” I put my hand over my mouth and started thinking.

“Sam.” Sheila started to hit my chest, “Sam. Sam.” 

“What?” 

“We should probably deal with that first!” she pointed into the sky. I saw a tiny oblong shape moving in the sky and it's slowly getting larger and larger.

“That… can’t be a helicopter or plane, right?” 

“Yeah that, that’s probably not a helicopter.” I assured her, “Go. We need to disappear and ditch the coats.” I started to push Sheila back into the leafless tree lines of what would be Cherry Blossom trees in the Spring. We went into a part where it was hardest to spot us and we ditched the coats and clipped on our masks. 

I started doing stretches and I told Sheila to, “Call up the rest of them to come out and help.” 

She nodded and got out her phone to make the call. 

“We’re realistically going to have to hold them off for the initial few minutes along with evacuating the people on a short notice… haahooo deep breaths, we got this.” I told myself. 

“I made the call. Let’s go evac the people.” Sheila suggested. 

“Alright.” I started to walk out of the bushes with her, “let's,” I put my foot up on a tree trunk and jumped up and leaped far forward,”get going.” 

I heard her sigh in the background, “showoff.” 

“They’re here.” Sheila said with her eyes glued up to the sky. 

I looked up too, they were hovering atop the park maybe fifty or so feet from the sky. The ship was the same size as the one in Times Square, same design and everything. Just much closer… 

Sheila burst out of the trees and bushes first and shouted to everyone who had yet to run in a panic, “GET THE HELL OUTTA HERE! GET TO SOMEWHERE SAFE!!”

Everyone started to run in a frenzy. The Zankoku had already landed and to our surprise, were targeting the guy WE were supposed to RECRUIT. 

“I’ll go get the guy out of harm. Just don’t die.” I told Sheila. 

“You’re more likely to die before me.”

“Ha. Ha.” I said slowly before sprinting towards the target. The Zankoku were going to reach him before I could so I swung my odachi and it ignited. I casted the flames onto the grass and track to block them from reaching him. 

I leaped in front of him and said without looking at him, “Long story short. They may be after you and I’m here to get ya outta here. Got a name?” 

I heard from behind me, “Yeah, it's Cyrus… alright, where we headed?” 

“Nice to meet you Cyrus. We’re going… anywhere but here.” I turned around and he shook my hand, “Damn his muscles are toned.” I thought to myself. 

“Why are they after me?” He asked, still gripping my arm. 

I pulled away, “I’ll explain later. Right now I need to get you out of here while my colleagues hold them back.”

“Your ‘colleagues’. Dude speak in smaller words.” 

“Yeah. People like them.” I pointed at Sheila whipping some of the enemy soldiers back with a quip of water,“Now. Let’s go!” Now I grabbed his arm and we started running the other way. We got towards the end of the park and I told him, “Go. I got you out of the general vicinity and now I need to keep them away from the rest of the city.” I unsheathed my Odachi from my hip again, “Go. I’ll get you later to come check on you.”

“Why do you need to check on me?” he asked. “Shit I said the last part by accident.”

“Shit. Agh, screw it, why not he’s gonna figure it out anyway,” I rambled and mumbled, “You’re like me but not exactly like me. You can manipulate some kind of element, it may not be fire but you can. Don’t tell anyone about this or it's your head.” I explained EXTREMELY briefly and vaguely. 

“Wait what do you mean by-”

“Bye I need to keep the rest of the Zankoku away from New York!” I leaped ahead and away from him. 

I ran back up to Sheila, “Has shit gone to hell since I left?” I lit my Odachi on fire. 

“Not yet, although-” she whipped back a soldier and I jumped ahead to slice him, “where is everyone else?” 

“Not far.” Andrew suddenly landed in front of us and shot out wires and pulled the soldiers around, “They have to run here. I can grapple through the air.” He had a sniper rifle strapped around his back, a Barrett M99 specifically. Zack told me before. 

He took it out and quickly loaded a shell, “don’t get in my way.” And shot it at a close range. 

A sniper at close range is… definitely a strategy I’ve heard of before.

I have to admit, his movements were fluid though. Andrew never wasted energy or wasted any movements, he was as fast as us, even with his heavier suit and gear. 

Together the three of us held off the initial wave and then a range of marksmen dropped out after. Andrew stated, “Don’t get in my way. And don’t die so quickly.” He pushed me aside and took cover into the trees. 

“Yeah Yeah whatever I’ll try.” I shrugged him off, “When are the others arriving.” 

“Dunno.” He blasted a bullet right into the head of an enemy about four feet in front of him. 

I swept past him and fanned out a long wave of flames through the air lashing at the enemy. 

“I got this. All you have to do is make sure they don’t run past this park.” Andrew assured me. 

“... fine.” I sheathed my Odachi, “I’ll head towards the edge of the park and clean up anyone that tries to flank around you or any enemies deployed outside the park.”

“Does he know that we are the targets?” I thought to myself. I climbed up one of the taller trees to see around the area, “They deployed various squadrons around the edge of the park and are now moving in. We can’t realistically escape from the sky because of the giant spaceship hovering over the park right now so-,” Then I realized, “Wait… we’re being fenced in instead of trying to fence in THEM!” 

I immediately said in the voice chat, “Sheila! Andrew! It’s a trap, we’ve been encircled, we need to push a way out! IF anyone else is on the channel, carve us a path from the outside!”

“Copy that.” Andrew said calmly, “I’ll carve a path for you two to escape.” 

I ran back out to the track field in the center of the park and lots of forces armed with their spears that could also shoot bolts of magic were cornering us right into the track. I saw Sheila leap backwards into the track and Andrew had been zipping around the trees fighting them off and pushing them back. 

“So, where exactly is our help?” Sheila sarcastically asked, “I heard your report on the vc and came right back here.” 

I looked around to see the droves of Aliens, maybe a hundred or more slowly marching towards us, they had just gotten out of the tree line and were soon to enter the tracks. And to fight off all these troops, there were only the three of us. 

Andrew grappled back to Sheila and I, then he  stated, “Sam. I’m gonna need you to create a wall of flames so they can’t break through unless they decide to shoot magic.”

“What do we gain from the wall besides them crowding around it waiting for it to dissipate and for them to come in and stab us?” Sheila remarked. 

“With that much fire, a smoke screen.” I pointed out. 

“Exactly. I’ll be zipping you out one by one. I can only carry one person at a time-”

“I’ll stay.” I sacrificed myself. 

“Y’know this is a teensy bit over dramatic, we could just try and fight it out and wait for the others to get here.” Sheila pointed out. 

“... Fine,” Andrew accepted those terms, “But we’re gonna need to reduce numbers from a range.” Right as Andrew said that, a bunch of the soldiers in the front on one side started to open fire at us. Sheila started to make water spells to neutralize the magic bolts as defense. 

Andrew used his magic to grab the metal poles from the fence of the track and uproot them from the ground to him. He pulled a small cartridge of oil out of his belt and started to pour it over the pole, “I use this oil to reline my wires for easier shooting and retracting, but right now it seems easier to use this as a tool to spread fire.” 

“So basically you want me to light the oil coated pole on fire and you magic throw the pole onto the troops shooting at us, telekinesis style?” I assumed. 

“Good job on actually deducing that. But yes, that’s the plan.” Andrew insulted me and then assured me of the plan. 

Sheila yelled at us without looking at us, “Whatever the two of you decide to do, HURRY IT UP!!” 

“Ignite it, NOW!” Andrew had the pole floating in the sky and I lit it on fire. Andrew then threw it as far as he could with magic and it collapsed right on the front lines knocking down some Zankoku soldiers back. 

“Do you have more oil?” I frantically asked. 

“No, why would I carry around more than one cartridge?” Andrew commented. 

“Welp, guess we have to hold 'em as long as we can.” I weaved a  small magic circle that released three fireballs to hover around me so I could freely throw them as I pleased and also unsheathed my Odachi to light on fire, “All we have to do is kill thirty-three of these guys each, right?”   

“There are more than a hundred and I doubt our ignited pole stunt did any damage to a group that has to be counted with more than a singular digit.” Sheila wittily commented. 

“Not the time, we just have to fight them off.” 

At that moment, Xeno said over the voice chat, “We’re here now and we’ll clear a path on the outside.”

“Who is ‘we’?” I asked. 

“Xeno, Sage and I.” Zack responded over the mic, “Just as Xeno says, we’re on the southern side of the park and are currently fighting off the rear guard of their forces, we’ll be with you shortly. “

“Oh wait since Sage is here, how's the outfit suiting ya?” Sheila tried to make small talk during this situation. 

“It fits like a nice glove! So many bells and whistles… OH! and I just got this suit from Quinn TODAY. And this bow is hella cool too!” Sage excitedly exclaimed. Quinn forged Sage a compound bow but made no arrows because Xeno had taught Sage how to manipulate her light magic into the shape of arrows to be fired. 

I could hear chains of lightning in the distance, “Great new suit and all, great great, Can we talk about our superhero fashion choices AFTER we get out of here alive!?” Zack frantically asked us. 

“You’re right. The priority is to make sure all of our team is alive. If the three of them die, that's equivalent to all of us dying.” Xeno assured Zack. 

“That makes… no sense.” Sheila said. 

“I think he was trying to make a unity statement… or something?” Sage tried to reason with Xeno’s argument.

“This is NOT the time.” Andrew shouted at us, “We have to fight our way out of here.” He lashed out his grapples impaling two riflemen up front. 

“Alright,” I started to make some callouts from the inside, “They’re keeping us in this track and wanting to fire rifles from afar,”

“No shit sherlock!” Sheila cut me off. 

“Shut it…,” I kept going, “they’re busy loading up their spears right now. Andrew is using this time to kill off as many as possible. We need Sage and Zack to use mostly AOE attacks to-”
Sage asked, “What does AOE mean?” In the middle of my relay. 

“Area of effect.” Sheila responded. 

 “Seriously guys,” I was going to say something about them cutting me off but, “Agh fuck it, just clear us a path out while Andrew, Sheila and I will try to live.” 

“Understood.” Zack stated calmly. 

“Ooh Sam!” Sheila perked up. 

“Hm?” 

“Can I use that spell now?” 

“Do it. Though if you’re gonna, MOVE YOUR ASS!!!” Andrew responded instead of me, “We’re gonna need it soon.” 

“Fine, fine.” Sheila brushed him off first and then started to create a decently large magic circle in the ground. At this time, Andrew kept grappling and pulling a bunch of soldiers on the inside. I could hear distant sounds of strong winds and lightning crackling. I don’t particularly know what light sounds like, or if it even has a sound? All I did was keep lashing out flames from my Odachi into the crowds of soldiers to burn them down or keep them back. 

Andrew started to back away towards us and shouted, “They’ve reloaded their spears with magic again! Ya done yet Sheila!?” 

“Yup, have been for a while.” She assured him. 

Andrew and I ran back inside the magic circle that Sheila had made and then she casted the spell. From the rims of the magic circle, pools of water spread out and created several currents of water constantly moving and overlapping each other to form one cohesive dome of water. Sheila cried out in success, “WOO! I successfully created it! Welcome to my domain boys.” She smugly declared. 

The water neutralizes all the blasts of magic as it moves so we are safe under here. 

“Oh also I can make holes in here so Sam can shoot flames or Andrew shoots bullets or whatever,” Sheila stated, “But the most powerful way to use this spell… is this.” Sheila forcefully jabbed her middle and index fingers into the moving water and it shot out bursts of water inflicting damage on either the magic bolts or the soldiers from even further. 

“Can you do this infinitely?” Andrew asked. 

“As long as the circle is active, yeah.” She assured him. 

I contacted everyone on the outside, “How’re y’all doing out there? We’re perfectly safe inside of Sheila’s bubble.” I smugly asked and bragged. 

I could hear slashes and strikes on the other ends of the mics, “Sage here. We’re doing, uhh fine-ish. Xeno and Zack are on the ground and I’m perched on a tree, we’ve cleared like a solid clump or bump of soldiers, I guess? I don’t know the exact numbers but we’re slowly diverting attention from you guys.” 

“Sage you need to learn better callouts.” Zack commented over the mic. 

“Shut up! You didn’t report shit!” She backlashed. 

I heard lightning crackle in the background, “Cause my hands are a bit full!” 

“You guys are on the south side, correct?” I wanted to check and cut off the slew of insults.

“Correct!” Xeno exclaimed. 

“Good!” And I muted myself in the voice chat, “Sheila,” I said to her, “I need a window on the south side when I say so.” 

“Cool, cool, very nice, WHICH SIDE IS SOUTH!?” She shouted. 

“That way.” Andrew pointed to her left. The two of us stared at him and he said, “What? I keep a compass on my belt just in case. You need to be ready for anything after all.” 

“Alright cool, Sheila open a window there when I say so.” 

“When will that be!?” 

“Just when I say so,” I started to form a magic circle about the size of the circumference of a football. It took around thirty seconds for it to be ready and I told her, “Sheila. Open the dome.”

“Opening in…

3…

2…

1…

You are reading story S-GOU (REMASTERED) at novel35.com

NOW!” She declared and I shot out a thin strand of flames that extended out all the way to the soldiers on the outside shooting at us and the thin strand rapidly expanded once it impacted the soldiers almost completely enveloping the vanguard in flames. Right after the fire from the circle cut off, Sheila closed the dome back up. 

“Okay good, what now?” 

“Many of the forces toward the front have been burned, it’d be advantageous to take this current forward momentum and push them aside.” Andrew informed us. 

“I support that idea, because I don’t know how much longer I can hold this dome up!” Sheila cried out.

I then asked, “Can you hold up till the bolts of magic end!?” 

“Well I don’t know when that ends, Sam!” Sheila commented with an attitude, “I need to drop this dome in I’d say fifteen seconds.” 

“Then we prepare ourselves,” Andrew preloaded his rifle. 

I unsheathed my Odachi, “We dash towards the south since that's where the others are plowing through the masses of soldiers right now.” 

“...y’know your mics are on except Sam’s right? Like I can hear your guys' plan and you can coordinate it with us.” Zack said.

“It’s fine Zack.” Xeno intervened. I could hear some winds being forced on the other side, ”They’re still fresh on the battlefield.” 

“So am I Xeno, yet I know the reason we wear earpieces!” Zack sarcastically commented.   

“Y’all! SHUT UP! You’re all so annoying god damn!” Sheila shouted into her mic. I could hear it twice since she’s only a few feet away from me but there was also a loud reverb on her mic, “God.” she sighed, “We’ll meet up with you in a minute or two.” I could hear her mutter to herself, I didn’t want to step into that, “I’m dropping the dome NOW!” She shouted at us. 

The several flows of water all finished their traverse and fell back onto the rims of the magic circle. Sheila dropped to the ground looking a bit pale while Andrew and I were vulnerable. 

“Grab her, we’re leaving!” Andrew created two large shields, each about 5 feet tall, out of metal of course. 

“Where’d you get that?” I asked as he tossed me one.

“Like you can muster up fire. I can do so with metal.” 

I grabbed Sheila and carried her on my back holding her in one place with my left arm and clutching Andrew’s shield with my right, “You owe me one for this!” I commented as we started to dash towards the droves of Zankoku soldiers who were reloading their spears right now, “You’re not gonna’ die on us are ya?” 

“That spell took a lot out of me. All the magic it took to cast it and hold the portal hit me all at once. I think YOU owe ME one.” Sweat dripped down her arms as she sarcastically retorted. We got closer to the mass of soldiers, I thought of throwing my shield. It didn’t go that far… just a few feet, “You’re dumb as shit Sam. This ain’t a comic book movie.” She sighed. 

“Shut up! I don’t need you nagging me! WOAH!” I backed away from the vanguard trying to impale us with spears. 

“USE FIRE DUMBASS!” 

“Yeah Yeah I’m doing that now!” I shrugged off her comment while forming a fireball in my hands, “YAH!” I threw it and the flames exploded into groups of them. I dashed right through the flames and caught up with Andrew. 

“Hey.” I said while Sheila raised her hand and waved to him. 

“Sam, you can put me down now. I can walk y’know.” 

“No I didn’t,  actually.” I dropped her, “You were looking awfully unable to walk earlier.” 

“Can the two of you can’ this stupid tension for later?” Andrew sighed. Sheila just rolled her eyes as a response, Andrew stated on the voice chat, “We need current locations. Xeno, Sage, purple one!” 

“Really? Purple one?” I asked.

“What? I have never met him personally yet.” 

“Hey,” we heard from above in the trees. Someone leaped down from the trees, “C’mon guys I said hey, you gotta respond back. That’s how conversations work. I know you have one secluded member in this trio but he doesn’t have to rub off on you.” She flipped up her mask and it was Sage, “so lets try this again,” she cleared her throat, “Hey.” and waved. 

“Hi.” I put my hand up, “So where are the others?” I immediately followed with. 

“Oh you actually ran past them.” Sage made a thumbs up and pointed to the side with it, “In the flames you completely passed them. They advanced to grab you but apparently you didn’t need the help.” 

“We didn’t need the help.” Andrew brushed it off while realigning his wires, “Y’all can pull back now!” He said into the voice chat. 

“Wait, Sage, what were you doing up in a tree?” Sheila asked. 

“I was shooting light arrows from up there.” Sage pointed up at her spot, “It was real comfy up there. But right now it’d be better if we moved up to go and help Xeno ‘n Zack.” 

“She’s… actually right.” Andrew stood up again, “I’m not much help in the front lines because I don’t have a melee weapon besides my grapple wires but that’s not the best weapon around.”

“Just leave your rifle here for now and come back. Can you at least make a crude sword or something like you did the shields?” I suggested. 

“No. It’s really hard to make really intricate designs like a sword, I don’t think it's possible currently, maybe ever. I only made the shields from combining sheets of metal and an extension point as a ‘that will do’ type handle.” Andrew thought about it for a second, “The best I can do is shoot out shards of metal. And maybe use them as knives if they’re sharp enough.” 

“That works!” Sage exclaimed, “I literally only have a bow so-”

“Ya got any spells y’know?” I smugly asked. 

“Ones that work with my bow better.” She shrugged. 

At that moment we saw Zack and Xeno hop over the bushes into the area we were hanging around at.

“We have a solid twenty seconds before we get swarmed. If you’re gonna need to tell us something or prepare something, do it quickly.” Zack said with his back facing us and he was staring towards the open area of the park with droves of Zankoku Soldiers starting to move towards the trees. 

I started to make the motion for a spell until Xeno said, “Sam! Sheila! Did you find the eighth possessor!?”

“Yeah, we did.”  Sheila responded.

“Then Leave. Use the tracker, find the eighth possessor, make sure he’s safe. Maybe bring him to the labs for safekeeping right now.” He ordered us. 

Zack nodded, “That’s the most logical decision. They’re DEFINITELY targeting us-”

“They’re here!” Andrew cut off Zack and impaled two in the trees that were about to jump us, both of their dead bodies dropped to the ground where all of us knelt down “prepare yourselves!” 

Sage feigned her right hand and made an arrow made of sheer bright light appear out of thin air and she drawed it back on her bow, she fired the arrow and said, “This is gonna be my hardest spell to try right now!” The arrow shot right through a soldier sprinting at us. At that moment she whistled at a high pitch. 

“What’s the reason for that!?” Sheila cried out, “My ears are sensitive damn it!” 

Sage’s arrow suddenly expanded from an arrow into a sphere with a radius of… I don’t know, maybe five to six feet encapsulating parts of trees and maybe body parts of the soldiers alike. The inside of the sphere turned into a darker color and suddenly everything it encapsulated dropped dead instantly, the tree’s roots rotted and two ended up collapsing down on two squads of soldiers. Sage collapsed to the ground, “Damn that spell is hard.” she heaved. 

“Impressive.” Andrew remarked while shooting a bullet right through the head of a soldier in the trees. 

Everyone was either slashing, stabbing or shooting down droves of Zankoku Soldiers and then Zack mumbled, “As I was saying earlier,” his tone started to become much clearer, “It's logical that they are targeting us and that they can only sense us in clusters on Earth's surface. They have yet to attack the labs even though we regularly congregate there.” he shot a blast of lightning which chained a whole squad of them.

“What Zack is attempting to say is: GO! Find the eighth and secure him!” Xeno ordered, “GO!” 

Sage boasted, “We’ll be fine here. We may not have six wizards on the battlefield but we’ll still have four!” She shot an arrow into the fray, “And four should be good enough.”

Zack pushed Sage’s head down as a blast of magic came her way. He blasted the shooter with lightning from his axe “It’s more like one dot five wizards here, the point five being Andrew, you and I combined. Also, you’re welcome.” 

“Sheesh,” Sage stood up again, “Why are you still here? Go!”

I looked over to Zack, he turned his head back to me and just nodded slightly. He stared once again at the mess of soldiers and deadlocked his axe with a spear, swiping the thrusted spear away and then electrocuting the spear and its wielder. 

“I’ll protect them all. Do not fret. I have this under control.” Xeno assured us. 

“Alright then,” Sheila pulled her whip back and let the water fall off of it, “We’re leaving Sam!”

“Right!” I made a quick fire spell and shot it in the general direction out of the park creating a clear line I nodded my head towards the flames, “lets go. I made some cover.” I dashed into the flames and Sheila quickly followed suit. 

“Y’know this was entirely unnecessary to set the trees on fire right?” Sheila whispered at me. 

“It’ll smoke out the rest of the Zankoku and they can beat em’ down easier.” I said as I made a few slices into trees to block our path. 

“Sure but… it’ll also smoke out our guys.” Sheila looked at me, “Are you stupid or something? You’re looking at me like that wasn’t obvious. You may delegate orders that aren’t half-bad sometimes, but you don’t know everything. Actually,” she covered her mic and turned hers off, “Sam turn off your voice chat for a bit,” she whispered. 

I did the same, “So? What do you have to say?” 

“ I was going to say that we barely know anything, we don’t even know why they’re after us or any real motivation the Zankoku are here.” 

“That… was not what I expected.” I commented.

“What’d you expect then?” 

“Nevermind.”

“... I’m not gonna address this any further, anyway, I’ve been holding it in. ‘It’ means all the complaints I have and small issues with all of this.” Sheila and I jumped out of the forested area out to the gates. 

“I understand. I don’t really know what we’re fighting for besides our own survival.” 

“What irks me is that, why are we fighting? A group of highschoolers and another edgy teenager, instead of y’know… the U.S army.” Sheila and I ran out to the streets. 

“Is it because it’s easier to have people with magic fight them than those who don’t?” I suggested a reason.

“It’s plausible. I don’t know …the whole thing seems fishy,” Sheila leaped over a car to enter a less broad street,”Like I mildly trust Xeno –and I use mildly as loosely as possible– but I don’t particularly trust Quinn.” 

“Why? He gave us all this stuff.” I gave a simple-minded answer, “Oh turn left by the way.” I pointed with the tracker in my right hand. 

We turned then Sheila responded with, “Quinn gave us all our gear sure. But he also makes us train to become wizards/soldiers and we don’t even know why. Everytime we ask him what he’s doing or where he's going he always responds with ‘classified’” Sheila said classified in a mocking tone, “Like, dude just tell us what you’re doing and allow us to trust you.” 

“What if everything he does… is classified? He is the official chairman for this whole government operation after all, take a right into this alley.” 

“Bah I barely trust the government as it is.” Sheila brushed off, “How close are we?” 

“The tracker says we're here,” I put the tracker in my pocket and said at the same time, “Sheila can we put a break on this convo and tell maybe Zack or someone else into this later, or bring it up at the debriefing after they clean up the battle.”

“Sure.” She started to climb the fire escape, “Well? C’mon. He’s probably up in one of these apartments.” 

I climbed up too. We sneakily peered into the first window. 

“That him?” 

“No.”

We did the same. Again… and again… and again. 

“Are you sure that tracker isn’t faulty?” 

“Positive, just keep looking.” I peered into another window. 

And then from behind us we heard someone call out, “OI, RED AND BLUE!”
We turned around and there he was, his head sticking out of the fire escape on the other side of the alley and two floors down from us. 

“That him?” 

“Ah. Yes. He was on the other side…” 

“Sam. I am going to kill you when this is over.” She threatened. 

“Whatever,” I leaped to the other side and slid down two floors, “Are ya safe?” 

“Yeah I’m fine. Been chillin’ in my room thas bout it really.” He said while raising his right arm and pointing back into his room with his thumb. 

“Good we did our job, we can go back to the battlefield c’mon let's go.” Sheila nodded towards the exit of the alley.

“Wait,” He gripped my left arm, “I have a few questions.” 

Sheila and I sighed, “sure.” I said. Sheila and I climbed into his room through the window. Sheila sat down on a chair at a desk across from his bed, I just leaned on the window sill. 

“First of all, what's your name? Never got it.” She asked first. 

“Cyrus, Cy works too, either way it don’t matter” he shrugged. 

I asked next, “Alright, how thin are your walls?” 

“Pretty thin, I can hear conversations people are having in my building through the walls.” 

“Yeah I ain’t spilling shit with that condition.” Sheila crossed her arms. 

“Yeah me too,” I stood up and looked out of the window while turning my voice chat on again, “Hello? Quinn are you on this line?” 

“That I am.” I heard his tired voice groaning. 

“DAMN!” Sheila asked on mic,  “what happened to you?” 

“The current battle in a public park of my hometown is a starter. I kinda run everything in the background while y’all are fighting. That and I chugged a hot coffee that was a bit too hot, anyway what do you need, make it quick.” 

“We’re bringing back the eighth possessor to the labs,” I said and peered out his window into the alley, “His name is Cyrus and we’re ten to fifteen blocks away.” 

“Wait what?” I could hear in the background from him, “Yeah that’s fine, though I can’t send support. Most of my men and any national guard or NYPD are currently creating a perimeter to keep the Zankoku from not going too far. They may not be able to fight one-hundred of them but they can catch stragglers, if need be.” 

“So TL;DR we’re on our own with escorting him to the labs.” Sheila condensed Quinn’s small ramble, “Alright let’s go then!” She pushed herself up and I stood aside from the window while she opened it with force. I hopped out, then her and then… 

Cyrus just stood there, “Dude I on’t know if I wanna go with you. How can I trust y’all?” 

And right then and there Zack reported, “A squad of about ten pierced through the perimeter and are probably heading your way. They had shields and had rifles that shot the magic bolts but faster.”

“Thanks for the intel.” I said and then turned to Cyrus, “Alright ten Aliens are heading to us right now, would you rather die today and in your own room or maybe move to a spot where you’ll live for a while longer?” 

“Shi’ man if you put it that way I’m goin’!” He leaped out of the window with urgence. 

Sheila groaned as she watched Cyrus sprint down the staircase, “great we’re gonna need to play ‘protect the president’, I don’t wanna do that.” 

“I rather have the praise of saving him than having his death on my hands.” I said while jumping out of the fire escape. Sheila followed and we landed before Cyrus could get to the bottom. 

“Wow both of y’all are fast!” He exclaimed.

“Comes with practice,” I patted the city grime mixed with alien blood and ash off my gloves, “Now move it.” I unsheathed my Odachi and followed closely behind him, Sheila had already run ahead to scope out the area. 

I was about to step out onto the street and then, “Wait.” Sheila stopped me, “Look to your left and right without peering your head out too far.” 

I looked and there was a squad of five blocking each side of the street and very slowly closing in being extremely cautious, “Shit. You take five and I take five?”

“That’s about how it's gonna go.” 

“And what of me?”  Cyrus asked. 

“Duck in a dumpster or watch I don’t know. Don’t get shot, maybe try to figure out your element.” I suggested a few ideas. 

“How do I figure out my element?”

“You can do so by just focusing and trying your best to muster energy,” Sheila said while creating a magic circle, “This is a bit advanced for trying to figure out on your own, so just try to focus doing anything, it feels similar to doing a really hard exercise at first. If you can’t… yeah go hide in a dumpster. Sam ya good?” 

“Yes, Sheila.” I enunciated Sheila while finishing my spell circle.

“... thanks for finding out both of your names I guess.” Cyrus started to back away into the alley. 

“No problem, now watch the experts!” I shouted!

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