Out of the Catacombs

Oscar burst into the circular room at the end of the tunnel.

He then changed his direction instantly and rolled to the right of the huge room.

Just as Chestnut hit the ground two Relentless shot out of the tunnel.

They flailed their arms as they smashed on the same ground he stood a moment ago

They rolled on the ground to face him and started running once more, the rest of the family not far behind.

Although Oscar did not have many seconds to look at the room, his eyes were already accustomed to such stress. They effortlessly guided his mind and body to maneuver as if the building was on fire.

‘Circular room, no exits on my level, stone spiral going up, heat source at the top of the spiral!’

By the time Oscar realized he was running up a stone spiral within a cone shaped room his legs were already burning. “ Don’t you guys give up!” he yelled as he shot another burs of flames at the face of a few of his assailants.

By the time their eyes healed, one of the monsters missed its step.

They fell down the ridiculously long hole in the middle of the drill shaped room, laughter stopping as they hit the ground headfirst.

This bought Oscar a few precious seconds, but he felt himself slow down as his muscles locked up on him. ‘Wish I had one of them fancy B ranked Mech’s big enough to have a sitting cockpit and not a full suit one’ Oscar thought as his calves tensed up and felt like rocks.

Oscar fell forward.

He tried to roll forward and preserve momentum, but something was grabbing his legs.

The fallen Oscar could only guess was the grandma based on the white hair and wrinkly appearance, got a hold of him and started to climb up Chestnut to get to its head.

The firefighter tried to shoot her with the flame thrower on his left hand, but she quickly grabbed a hold of it, pinning the barrel of the flamethrower to the wall. Another two fallen Oscar could not see grabbed his legs, letting the grandmother get to the cockpit and smash her head on the glass separating the man and the monster.

The reinforced glass cracked along with the skull of the Relentless, but the brain was still intact enough to reconstruct it.

Before it could try again Oscar switched his Mech’s right palm to a spinning saw.

The Relentless swung with all its might, only to meet Oscar’s weapon, splitting her head in half.

The moment the brain was destroyed the monstrous grandma let go of Oscar’s flamethrower.

Before any other relentless could mount him, the Man unleashed a torrent of flames towards the ground.

With their legs melted Oscar had the advantage and wasted no time in getting to the top of the spiral.

The moment his thermal imaging system failed Oscar’s eyes saw daylight pouring from the ceiling. ‘Finally, some good news’ he thought as his eyes got used to the light, seeing the skulls covering the walls he walked through for the first time.

Oscar ran upwards through the open hole and into the street above.

In the corner of his eye, he saw the Relentless almost healed completely,

desperately the man looked for anything to clock their passage, only to find a small family car in front of a streetlight.

He dragged the car across the ruined street and potholes the size of Chestnuts leg, only to throw it down the hole he came out of.

It was the first time he saw one of the relentless so close to him in daylight.

The monsters hand almost reached him before being run over and dragged under the engine down the slope with the rest.

The Firefighters eyes darted around registering anything in his vicinity.

He was in what he could only determine to be a battlefield. With grenade holes and bodies of many headless red Crystalline bodies of what looked like citizens of Paris, piled on top of a heavy looking mech.

The mech was an old Russian design Oscar recognized from old comic books he red as a child called Nocnitsa. The mech was covered in spikes that were all filled with poison that paralyzes the muscles, a brutal and efficient killing machine with loads of defensive capabilities.

But now it looked like a pile of junk. Most of the spikes were broken and lodged in the bodies of the Relentless it has slain in its final moments. Even the Mech’s morning star was broken and unusable.

At first Oscar wanted to stop and look for a weapon in the body of the mech, but the sound of the Relentless’ Hysterical laughter from beneath the ground caused him to reflexively start running.

He ran into the first defensible position he could find. a giant, almost castle-like building made of marble and gold.it took him a moment to recognize the historical landmark but the instant he did he was drawn in to the building.

Oscar ran into the Opera Garnier and shut the giant doors behind him.

He then proceeded to take everything that his mech could pick up and used it to block all the doors in he could before the sound of the Fallen arriving at the street made him freeze.

He could hear the laughing and cackling from the other side of the walls as the transformed individuals prowled the streets looking for him.

He held his breath.

‘I just want to go home. I want to eat that damn stew. I don’t want to be here.’ He thought to himself when the door to the opera rattled for a moment.

Oscar tried his best to walk on his tip toes and be as silent as his small Mech would allow.

He climbed to the top floor of the building and sat down with his back against the wall.

He could not move another muscle.

All he could do was breath and pray to every force of good that the monsters did not know where he was.

Oscar didn’t mind scary things; he did not mind physical work.

Hell, he was running into burning buildings for a living.

But this.

This was too much for his mind to handle at the time.

And so, the big man found himself weeping silently as the laughter of the Relentless faded to silence.