Chapter 54: Chapter Fifty-Four: Teamwork
As Finn was getting ready to finish off Paul, he notices that Paul seemed to be sniffing the air. Finn tried to cut Paul's throat but Paul grabbed Finn's hand. Paul takes Finn's hand and plunges the knife into his own chest. Using his other hand, he puts his hand over the wound and then throws blood from his own wound on Finn's clothes. Paul sniffs the air again, smiles, then head-butts Finn. After Finn stumbles backwards on his feet, Paul pulls the knife out of his chest and throws it on the ground. Paul tackles Finn before Finn had the chance to stabilize himself. Shoving Finn's head into the ground, Paul forces Finn to skid across the ground. Finn's left shoulder smashes into a rock that was sticking out of the ground, shattering his bone completely. Alex jumped up behind Paul while yelling "Aah!" and tried to hit him in the back with a distortion spell packed with a punch. He was hoping to distract Paul in order to keep him from harming Finn even further. Paul used a distortion spell to reflect the impact. The impact from Alex's spell being reflected back into him suspended him in the air for a split second. As Alex was kept in the air, Paul slapped Alex with the back of his hand using another distortion spell. With a simple slap, Paul sent Alex flying into his back. Paul grabbed Finn by his shattered arm and threw him over his shoulder with an immense force. Paul didn't let go of Finn, but his already broken arm tore off and Finn flew into Alex. Screaming in pain, Finn could no longer compose himself. Blood from Finn's wound began to cover Alex, until Demetri pulled him away.
"Come, come" Demetri says to Finn as he screams in pain, "let's get you out of here".
As Demetri pulls Finn out of the battlefield, Paul rushes both of them. Paul jumps at Finn, but Alex shoots him in the side of his stomach with his gun. The impact from Alex's gun sent Paul rolling across the ground. When Paul gets up, he looks back and forth, trying to figure where that attack came from.
"Can he still not see me?" Alex asks himself. "Is Finn's spell still active?".
Demetri pulled Finn next to Blake's unconscious body. Demetri put this white power called diatomaceous earth over Finn's wound, where Finn's arm used to be. Demetri then put a black powder over that, gun powder. Demetri pulls out a lighter and ignites the powder. The powder lights up in flames quickly, but instantly goes out. The fire and powder cauterized the wound, stopping most of the bleeding. Finn passed out from the pain, and now two of The Six Guns were down. Demetri stays with the two injured crew mates, trying his best to keep them alive. Soon after, Rose, Satomi and Mikoto approach Demetri.
"We just took down two of them" Satomi says.
Rose looks down at Finn and covers her face with her hands. "Oh my- what happened!?" She asks.
"They appear to have taken down two of us as well" Demetri says.
"Where is his arm?" Mikoto says as she looks at Finn's missing left arm.
"Judging by how twisted these monsters are" Demetri says, "probably being used as baton right about now".
"Are those two going to be alright?" Mikoto asks.
"They're stable" Demetri says, "and as long as they stay that way, they will be fine. For now, there's an ex-soldier trying his best that could proooobably use your help right now".
Demetri points the three of them at Alex's direction and they run to go help Alex. Rose hesitates before she leaves too, looking at Blake then at Finn. She bites her lip in frustration and begins to run towards Alex. Paul was having a hard time dodging all of Alex's attacks, but Alex was also having a hard time keeping up with Paul's speed. When Rose approached, she tried to blind Paul but it had no effect.
"It seems Finn's spell is still affecting his mind" Alex says. "He can't see us, but his other senses are allowing him to avoid us".
"He can still hear us?" Satomi asks.
"He can smell us too" Alex says.
"That's not discomforting" Mikoto says.
Suddenly, a bolt of electricity from an elemental spell shoots over Alex's head. As the four of them turn around, Garreth was quickly approaching. Garreth came down for a punch at Alex, but Satomi swung her bat at Garreth's face. Garreth barely blocked her bat in time with a digital shield, but Mikoto nailed him in the stomach with a punch full of armament magic. As Garreth flew backwards from the punch, a shot from a sniper rifle was fired at Garreth. Robin quickly approached, with the sniper rifle that Siran gave to him. Garreth shifted his weight while flying and used digital magic mixed with a punch, and he punched the beam from the sniper rifle right out of the air. Robin's shot hit the ground instead and didn't even leave a scratch on Garreth's knuckles. From behind, Paul tried to rush at Alex. When Paul got close, Alex hit him with a left hook punch downwards on the top of his head. Before Paul has the chance to hit the ground, Alex hit him with another hook. Using a right hook punch, punching upwards on Paul's stomach, Paul was barely lifted off of his feet. Alex then grabbed Paul by the back of his shirt and tossed him behind Garreth. Suddenly, another sniper rifle went off. A bigger, stronger beam pierced right through Paul. The beam tore Paul's torso, detaching both of his arms and legs, instantly killing him. Garreth managed to dodge the attack, and from several meters behind Garreth, stood Holly.
"That takes care of that" Alex says, "but now we have another problem".
"Make that two more problems" Robin says. After saying that, Tory Peterson charges at Holly. Holly creates a shield and moves it behind Tory's arms and Tory smacks her face right into the shield. Holly creates another shield, but this one bends quickly at Tory like a spike. Tory grabs onto the shield and avoids getting stabbed by it, but is thrown back just enough for Holly to get her distance. Holly gets behind Alex, Rose, Satomi and Mikoto.
"Situation report" Holly says, "these two seemed to have gotten stronger as time goes by. Taking them out has been a challenge".
"I think I have an idea on why that is, actually" Rose says. "Well, Satomi and Mikoto came up with the idea mostly".
"Yeah, they seem to share the same mind and consciousness" Mikoto says, "which would make sense that they aren't able to fight very well if the same mind is controlling ten people. However, with each once that dies, there is less that the one mind has to focus on".
"If that's true" Holly says, "then the one we really need to focus on is the one with the most potential power".
Siran and Zia chase down Markwood as Markwood steals Paul's power as well. "Well, shit" Alex says. "This is getting worse and worse by the minute".
"This means Zia and Siran's in the most trouble" Holly says.
"I'd love to go help them" Alex says, "but we're a little tied at the moment".
"Was it a bad idea to separate them after all?" Rose asks.
"That's a hard question" Holly says. "On one hand, their teamwork will be tough to handle. On the other, every time some of us succeed, we make it harder for everyone else".
"What should we do?" Rose asks.
"We'll need to band together" Holly says, "and get all of them together too. We can't focus on James Markwood because the rest will take us out. If we continue like this, we risk suffering more casualties. If we want to keep as many alive for taking down the last one, we'll need to stay close to each other to make sure the rest aren't taken down".
Rose waits for Garreth to charge at them and blinds him. While he's caught off guard, they gather Robin and run towards Vivi, Ruby and Tanya. When they meet up with Vivi, Ruby and Tanya, Ying gets pushed back by Kyle Ross. Kyle charges at Ying, but Ying had her baton ready. As Kyle got close, Ying swings at him and a whip of pure electricity comes out of the tip. The electricity immobilized Kyle for a second, and Ying retreated with the rest of the group. There was now Alex, Rose, Vivi, Holly, Satomi, Mikoto, Ying, Tanya, Ruby and Robin against Garreth, Skylar, John, Kyle and Tory.
"So, what's the plan?" Ying asks.
"Take them all out together" Alex says, "then go support Siran".
"Roger" Ying says.
As The Mages slowly approach, the rainfall slowly grows heavier. Tory ran up to the crew first, and as she ran Ruby held her right hand out. Raindrops seemed to stop and freeze at her finger tips. As Tory got close, Ruby threw the frozen raindrops and they pierced Tory's stomach like needles. Tory ignored the pain and continued to try and attack Ruby. Ruby dodges her punch, and kicks Tory in the stomach. The ice needles went all the way inside Tory's stomach.
"You're up!" Ruby yells at Ying.
Before Tory hits the ground, Ying presses her hand on the wounds on Tory's stomach. With a quick burst of electricity from elemental magic, Ying created a massive shock on Tory's stomach. As Ying lifted her hand, the shock was intensified by the rain, as well as the melting ice inside her stomach. Kyle attacked Ruby, but Holly blocked his distortion attack with a digital shield. As the shield shattered, Ruby hit him with a concussive wind blast that was amplified with reactive endo. Kyle flew into Satomi's bat, which snapped his spine in half. Kyle tried to get back up, but he was quickly finished by Rose. Garreth charged after Robin, but Robin dodged under Garreth's attack. Robin rolled under Garreth and kicked him into a distortion field that Robin had set up as he dodged. The distortion repelled Garreth back into Robin, and Robin hit Garreth with a distortion punch. Before Robin had a chance to finish him off, Skylar charged after Robin. Vivi pulled Robin out of the way and hit Skylar with a weapon that Skylar did not see coming. Vivi used a wrench to hit Skylar, and smacked him right on the forehead. John tried to rush behind Skylar, but he was shot down by Alex. When he fell on his back, Tanya grabbed him by the feet and threw him at Mikoto. Mikoto uppercut him with armament magic and sent him flying back at Tanya. Tanya then hit him with a right hook punch straight across the left cheek of his face. His head spun, and his neck broke.
"C-c-c-combo breaker!" Mikoto says.
Alex then rushes at Tory, who was about to charge at Ruby again. Tory dodges a blast from Alex's gun, but is struck with electricity from Ying again. With her head starting to get hazy from the continuous shocking, Tory found it hard to stand on her feet. Alex goes for a punch but Tory barely manages to dodge. Tory smiles at Alex as she prepares to counter attack. Suddenly, a beam from a gun goes through Tory's right knee. Then another through her left thigh, and another through her back. Several shots pierce through her body as she falls. Behind her, Vivi stood with her jacket open and several guns pointing out from under her jacket. As the crew wasn't looking, Markwood had already stolen John's endo. Before they had time to react, Markwood had picked up Tory's body, stolen her endo too and then threw her body back on the ground. It was now down to just Kyle, Skylar and Garreth left. Siran and Zia kept attacking Markwood. Markwood seemed to keep dodging and running away, and it was clear that Markwood had a plan. Garreth, Skylar and Kyle get their distance again and prepare for a counter attack. The rain grew even heavier and it was getting harder to see. As the crew stares at the last few Mages left, Garreth shows a creepy smile and laughs.
Weekly Power Status
-- Power
Ranking 
-- Power
stone