Arc 2 - Chapter 19: Last Saw Him Heading East

“FIRE!!”

Caught in her little victory, hundreds of bullets came crashing toward Gemma. Her chest and stomach riddled with hot lead, it was a mixture of rifle, pistol, shotgun, and even sniper rounds.

Letting go of Hope, her hand immediately lost strength, as a tsunami of tar gushed from her bullet wounds, along with her organs being liquified. Crashing onto the floor, Hope laid motionless while glass and leftover bullets blanketed her body. Shielding her eyes by closing them shut, the deafening noise continued to surround her.

Meanwhile, Benn laid against a wall, away from the Vulcan of bullets that grated the poor girl’s body. Slowly, he watched her organs and body be liquefied by the hot lead, leaving her head to be unattached to her neck.

“Guns down!”

Outside the bar, an entire platoon of soldiers lowered their weapons by the gesture of their superior officer. Their ears perked up, all of the soldiers looked to be armed to the teeth, as they carried military-grade ammunition and weapons with them. Their barrels pointed downward, a middle-aged man looked at a large squad of six soldiers, his nose wrinkling from the coarseness of his voice.

“You six, enter inside the building to check up on any survivors! And make sure the enemy is dead!”

“Yes sir! You heard the Lieutenant! Let’s move out!”

“Yes Sergeant!”

Pushing their boots off the street pavement, they ran toward the broken down bar as they made their way past the door. Pulling out high-beamed flashlights from their suits, five out of the six of them carried them, while the Sergeant wielded nothing but a pistol. The privates carrying rifles with their primary hands, the five of them noticed something…

The target had its stomach and chest missing, along with her organs and tar burnt and lumped into a spoiled soup. Oozing onto the floor, the smell alone hammered itself into their nostrils.

All of the soldiers looked away, with some of them gagging from just the sight alone. Turning their attention onto another matter, they noticed a young woman being blanketed by leftover bullets. The Sergeant, who lumped himself in the back of his group, straightened his back along with his feet.

“We have a survivor! Get the medic team now! She looks like she’s barely alive!”

Three of the soldiers ran outside, and holstered their rifles to their jackets as they ran unsoldierly. Placing his hand onto Hope’s forehead, her skin flared up, making his palms already saturated with sticky sweat.

Followed by hearing a faint trace of static, it made him rub his thumb on her shoulder. Getting zapped by electricity, he pulled his hand back, as he felt all of his bones riddle with mini lightning.

‘How the hell did she get electrocuted?’

The other two soldiers looked around the room, their eyes panning the wooden floor and it's broken panels. Looking up towards the tall soldier with blonde hair, the short soldier with a buzzcut sharpened his eyes at him.

“I’ll look for the survivors, you look for any corpses to bring back.”

“sighs … alright.”

And as they scour the wooden floors, the short soldier notices a being laid against a shadowed wall. Analyzing the cold figure's face, a frozen frown dwindled, which left the soldier to glare at him in return.

The Sergeant, looking toward the short soldier, spoke to him while the soldier had his body blocking Benn.

“See anything?”

“No sir … just a corpse.”

He carried onward like nothing, as he avoided Benn’s glare. His palms on the wooden floor, he leaned his head back against the wall, as his eyes slowly flickered to stay awake, or alive.

Fortunately for him, a miracle was given.

The tall soldier focused his attention on the conversation of both the Sergeant and the small soldier, making him notice a shadowy figure. Squinting his eyes, he traced the outline of Benn’s bulky body, configuring that the person…

His breath caught in his throat.

“Wait, we got another survivor!”

Wielding his rifle, he ran toward the bloodied Benn who sulked in the dark. Passing through the many broken shards of wood and glass, he kicked them to the side, until he finally reached in front of Benn.

Placing the butt of his rifle on the floor, while gripping it with his right hand, he crouched down on one knee. Ignoring the scent of smoke and metal, the soldier extended his left hand out to him.

—“You’re a soldier, right? Here, take my hand, I’ll help you walk.”—

Benn stared at the soldier’s white palm, leading him to look downward to the floor. Seeing small cracks of wood plastered below his feet, it made him think of a different material with similar style…

Which led him to extend his hand outward in return, leaving the soldier to pull him up from the ground.

Once up, Benn trailed the soldier’s youthful face, along with the young man’s slim and tall appearance. Moving his arm around Benn’s neck, he held him up and walked him out toward the exit of the bar. Dragging his feet against the wood, his eyelids felt like anvils the more he stayed awake.

‘Why can’t most of my soldiers be more like Private Zirardge?’ thought the Sergeant, before he spoke out loud to his subordinates. “I’ll carry her out of here then.”

Having his right hand on Hope’s forehead, he moved his left arm between her calves and thighs, leaving him to carry her bridal style. Having one knee on the ground, he placed her cheek onto his chest, and checked to see her breathing. Unfortunately, it was dimming fast, sending him to lift his knee off the ground—

“Sir! The lich is gone!”

His body flinching upward, he sharpened his eyes toward the subordinate that spoke to him. Trembling from his quivering throat, he pushed out a growl that could’ve frozen a block of ice.

“What the hell do you mean she’s gone?!”

With Hope in his arms, one of his soldiers pointed toward the body of where Gemma laid. But like mist in the wind …she wasn’t there, or rather faded into the evening sunlight.

________________________________________________________________________

(Quintiles 29, 59 / 7:53PM)

Sitting on a small metal chair in the middle of the street, Benn had his arms motionless to his sides.

“Heal him! He ain’t going to do nothing!”

Without nodding, the two medics began operating on Benn, replacing the soldier who held his injuries. Wearing white latex gloves, both medics evaluated his liver and hand, while the shark-human looked above to see the blonde-haired soldier staring at him back.

Which made the soldier fold his arms above his chest.

“Is there something I did sir?”

“Nothing, just surprised, that's all.”

The crevices of his lips reached down toward his jawline, making his mouth look like an upside down U. His safe hand shaking, he rubbed his thumb along the edges of his knuckles, and began scratching the old pigments of his flesh. Looking up at the tall soldier again, he furrowed his brow and cleared his throat.

“You’re not like the others.”

“Pardon me, sir.”

“Do I scare you?”

“Why would I be scared sir?”

Benn looked up to the soldier with a wrinkling nose, and a sharpening face. Seeing the soldier so nonchalant in talking to him, Benn looked down to the pavement while letting out a sigh. Analyzing the many cracks along the pavement, this time being black asphalt, he directed his low voice directly upward.

“It makes sense, if you’re raised in Ticia.”

“Actually sir, I was born in the countryside, in Haxouburg.”

He gulped, once he heard a specific word from the soldier’s sentence. His forehead littered with cold sweat, he wiped it by using his safe hand, but it only worsened his body heat.

Unable to look at the soldier, he put on a reassuring smile, the corner of his lips reaching halfway between his jaw and his ears.

“Rest assured, I’m not a discriminant. I don’t know if this makes me open-minded, but my girlfriend is a cat-human. Take it as you will.”

The soldier placed his hand onto Benn’s shoulder, his palms smooth enough for no wrinkles to litter his leather jacket. Unable to squeeze his shoulder, Benn managed to look and make eye contact with the soldier’s reassuring eyes. He didn’t tighten his fingers, nor his grip, but he felt the shark-human's body loosen tenfold.

“She loves me as much as I love her, although my family despises us for being a couple … but you know, love is love, right?”

The two medics slowed down their healing with Benn, leaving their hands to stall on the white bondage of tape they had. One of the medics shrugged and kept doing what he had been doing, while the other turned toward the soldier, with a furrowed brow.

“You’re not beating the feline-fucker allegations Zirardge.”

“Huh?”

“I don’t mind beast-humans, and I believe everyone has value. But…”

Turning his attention back toward Benn’s hand, he grabbed a roll of adhesive white bandage with his right hand.

Holding Benn’s hand with his left, he used his right to roll up the bleeding wound. Ceasing the blood to stop, he finished the rotation, and then stared at the covered up bandage.

“I think it’s wrong for humans to breed with beast-humans. Nature likes purity, so humans should breed with humans, and beast-humans should breed with their said species. Too much intermixing, humans will look like group projects.”

“Oh, stop being a hypocrite.”

Both the soldier and Benn felt silent at the commotion now infolding in front of them.

The medic that tended Benn’s stomach, turned to face the medic that dealt with Benn’s hand. Moving his left hand underneath his left chin, he tapped his fingers lightly, before he spoke to him in a sincere voice.

“You have no right to say anything about mingling. Did you forget who your past lover was?”

“Well, it wasn’t a beast-human, that’s for sure.”

The medic straightened his back and pushed up a sly grin, with the right corner of his lip reaching the bottom of his ear. Once he dealt with wrapping up Benn’s hand in a white bandage, the medic placed both of his hands onto his hips.

Which left the other medic to rub gel on Benn’s stomach, all the while he swayed his head back and forth.

“Ok, tell them what the lover looked like then.”

“Well … her name was Eve—”

“I thought it was Steve.”

“Screw you!”

He stood up and stomped away huffing, leaving his nostrils to fume out seething steam. All three of them were left to stare at the angry medic, and then glanced at one another.

Both Benn and the blonde soldier let out soft chuckles, while the other medic bursted out laughing. Pushing his hand on the chest, the blonde soldier cleared his throat and swayed his head.

“So yeah … I guess love is love after all…”

Benn nodded softly at his words, as he then recalled a little memory from not too long ago, a memory of a woman with freckles.

[Quick question. You never talk, but you’re always near me. Why is that?]

He lit up a warm smile, his back still hunched as he then poured his eyes downward. His elbows situated deep onto his knees, and his hands now cusped together, the pain from his injured hand drastically dimmed.

“Yeah … love is love …”