Arrival - Chapter 13

The moment Lares learnt of Bunny’s attack, he called Eric.

“Gather your team and your gear now! Bunny has taken over an entire block of flats in the city; she’s currently contained thanks to the first responders on the scene. The cars to take you guys to the city will be there in two minutes and you need to be ready by then.”

“Understood.”

“…Eric, be careful out there.”

“…I will!”

***

The jeep zoomed down the streets of Imperial as police officers cleared the roads, allowing Eric and the other Guardians to arrive quickly at the scene.

Eric, Jasmine, Elthia, Evony and Laila were in one car and the other two in their convoy had members of the Guardians, including Aria to provide support.

For Eric, this was not just his first time in a real fight, but it was also the first time he’d ever fought beside someone else since coming to Ferris.

He had spent the last few weeks being taught by Aria and Sapphire, but he was still anxious about fighting a real battle, and he didn’t feel like he’d gotten that much stronger.

He could deploy deploy blades from above his wrists and he was decent with his magic, but he wasn’t able to use a lot of his Mana yet.

The girls had all changed into their combat gear, while Eric remained in his casual clothes, making him feel a little out of place.

Jasmine was wearing a freshly cleaned white shirt and an ebony skirt with various pieces of gold armour over it. Her arms were covered with clockwork gauntlets, her back and chest was covered in a golden chest plate with her guns and ammunition placed strategically all over it. She had two shotguns holstered on her back, two collapsible submachine guns folded into her lower back with a semi-automatic rifle in between them which could compress, and two pistols that deployed from her gauntlets.

She had made all of her own equipment and created them with lightweight, but strong, materials, allowing her to carry an armoury on her without weighing her down too much.

Elthia was wearing a short jade dress that was cut off above her elbows and just above her knees with a silver tiara engraved with diamonds in her hair, leaving her tattoos on display.

“Elthia’s tattoos need to be exposed to the natural Magical Energy in the air for them to work,” Jasmine told him. “They can’t store Magical Energy in them and can only activate when they’re in direct contact with the Magical Energy in the air. It makes it a bit harder for them to use their tattoos depending where they are on the body, but they could theoretically never run out of Mana as long as they’re tattoos are in contact with the air.”

Evony was dressed smartly in a smart white shirt with a pale green overcoat and black jeans, her quiver and bow resting beside her in the car. Laila was clad in dark leather armour with a black hood and scarf hiding her face. She kept her hair tied in her pigtails and her dagger was held in its sheath at her lower back.

“I still don’t get why we’re being sent to deal with this,” Evony whispered.

“The Headmistress told us, didn’t she? Eric needs some real combat experience and this is a good opportunity for it.” Jasmine grunted. “At least that’s how she rationalised it to us.”

Elthia grasped Jasmine’s hand firmly and she held it gently back. “Don’t worry, we’ll be fine.”

Elthia smiled, her cheeks slightly red, and leant into Jasmine’s shoulder, a sight which Eric couldn’t help but smile at, even though his hands were shaking.

What if I mess up or freeze up? Eric worried. What if I get wounded or, worse, one of the others gets hurt? What if I throw up? He grasped his chest. What if I have a panic attack?

“Scared?” Laila asked Eric, catching him off guard.

“Yeah, of course,” Eric answered honestly with an anxious laugh.

“Understandable. However.” She looked directly into his eyes. “Don’t worry. I’ll protect you.”

“Thank you.”

Even if it was just a throwaway line, it helped calm Eric down a little and, for that, he was extremely grateful.

“I’m pretty sure the line is meant to be ‘We’ll protect you’,” Evony chimed in.

“We’ll protect each other I think would be better,” Eric offered.

Evony smirked. “Says the guy who’s shaking in his boots.”

Eric lowered his head in defeat, making Evony laugh; Laila lightly pat him on his head, making him feel a bit worse.

The car made a sudden, sharp turn as it pulled up outside the block of flats Bunny had taken over.

The area was swarming with police and Guardians, forming a tight perimeter around the building. There were thirty gigantic spotlights which were pointed at the structure, illuminating the exterior, and two helicopters circled around the building from a safe distance. The streets surrounding the flats were in the process of being evacuated and hundreds of members of the press were kept at bay by a line of police cars.

When Eric stepped out of the car, he could see from the ground a few large blood stains on the side of the building, and several corpses strung along the balconies like they were gargoyles.

“Holy shit.”

He felt his stomach churn as a paralysing chill spread across his body.

“Eric,” Aria called, throwing a syringe to him. “Take that. It’ll help calm your nerves for the next few hours and stop you from vomiting.”

“T-Thanks.”

It was a black cylinder filled with a light blue liquid; a potion that was injected directly into the bloodstream rather than ingested through the throat.

With little hesitation, Eric injected it right into the largest vein in his arm and, just a few seconds later, he no longer felt ill.

Before Eric could process everything that was happening, Aria grabbed his arm and brought her face close to his ear. “If things start to go horribly wrong, we’ll storm the building. Keep yourself and your friends safe, and rescue any and all survivors you find. Understood?”

“Y-Yes.”

Aria smiled and gently patted him on the back. “Good. Come on, let’s go brief you guys.”

Aria pulled Eric by the arm towards the front entrance where the rest of his teammates had gathered, as well as two people he didn’t know, and a familiar face.

“Dead Eye? What are you doing here?”

“I volunteered when I heard you were getting involved,” Dead Eye said in a matter-of-fact tone. “I also heard what happened to Alexis.”

Eric smiled. “Thanks.”

“Don’t mention it. As for these two.” He turned and pointed at the two people Eric didn’t know. “They’re two of my teammates; Fayre and Khan.”

Fayre had sapphire eyes and long brown hair, curling down her neck and the side of her face, showing off her delicate and smooth pale skin. She was dressed in an elegant white dress and heels and had beautifully woven black tattoos along her arms and legs in the shape of rose thorns.

Khan was a small statured Asian boy with thick black hair and murky green eyes, wearing a tattered old shirt and ripped jeans. Eric knew Khan by name as he also had a God Armour; the Armour of Genghis Khan.

No one knew why Genghis Khan had become a God Armour when he died and, despite many theories and investigations, no one ever came up with a concrete reason.

“Not their real names I presume?” Jasmine asked.

“Mine is. Khan, however, insists that we call him by a codename when we’re in a fight,” Fayre said sweetly

Khan nodded. “What’s the game plan?”

“I’ll explain that,” Aria interjected. “The situation, as we know it right now, is that Bunny has invaded and taken over this block of flats, and we fully expect that everyone inside is dead. However, due to government concerns that there could still be civilians left alive inside, we aren’t able to just level the building and take down Bunny and her ‘puppets’ that way. Instead.” Aria looked around at the massive numbers of police and Guardians. “We’ve set up as tight of a perimeter as possible.”

“Would we really level the building if we could?”

“It would be the quickest and safest way of dealing with the crisis and not put any more lives at state. However, as we can’t do that, we’re doing the next best thing; containment and extermination. You lot are to enter into the building and neutralise the threats on every single level, rescuing any civilians we find. Well, the police and the Guardians will do that and move in behind you guys after five minutes. You guys however have to hunt down and engage Bunny.

“Normally, it’d be the other way around, but the Headmistress applied some pressure to the government to switch it around. Dead Eye, you’ll lead the squad and take everyone, minus Elthia, straight up to the top floor where Bunny was last seen. If you guys attack her all at once, you’ll scare her off and she’ll retreat which is the ideal situation, as it’ll make it easier to kill her puppets and find survivors.”

“Why?” Dead Eye asked.

“After compiling reports about previous incidents with Bunny over the last twenty-five years since she appeared, we’ve learnt things about her abilities and habits, including that her puppets are only effective while she is within a mile radius of them. Force her to run away and they’ll become mindless and easy to take down.”

“So, Bunny is our priority?”

“Correct. Any other questions?” No one else said a word. “In that case, enter into the building and neutralise Bunny.”

“Roger that,” everyone replied.

“Before that.” Aria pulled out a small bag filled with black cylinders filled with a glowing purple liquid in them. “Night vision potions. Take them now and they’ll last for the next few hours.”

The team didn’t hesitate to inject them into their veins, before gearing up to enter the building.

Khan and Eric transformed into their Armours, the former spawning a scimitar in his hand. Dead Eye swung his rifle into his hands, Jasmine deployed her pistols, Evony took her bow off her back, Laila withdrew her dagger from its sheath, and Fayre giggled softly, pressing her fingertips against her lips.

Aria guided Elthia back to the police line as the young girl looked on anxiously at her friends.

Everyone, please be okay, Elthia prayed in her mind.

Dead Eye lead the way into the building, bashing through the shattered see-through doors and breaking what little glass remained in their frames. It was pitch black on the inside as the building’s power had been severed by Bunny herself.

Had they not taken the night vision potions, they wouldn’t have been able to see a thing.

Dead Eye swiftly aimed his gun from side to side, scanning for any and all enemies but there were only ten butchered corpses., lying in an ocean of blood and organs.

“Disgusting hobby,” he spat as the others followed in behind him.

Laila crouched down to examine one of the bodies while Evony and Jasmine slowly began to spread out, looking for any signs of Bunny’s puppets. Khan stepped over to one of the other corpses and plunged his blade through its head, but the body didn’t react in the slightest to it.

“This one isn’t a puppet,” he said as his blade glowed green, evaporating the blood on it.

“How can you tell?” Eric asked.

“Bunny’s puppets can only be killed by destroying their brains or hearts,” Dead Eye explained. “Further, it seems that only she can bring people back as her puppets if she kills them personally.”

Laila shoved her dagger into the corpse she was examining, piercing its heart and it let out a banshee like cry, causing Eric and a few of the others to cover their ears in shock.

In that moment, the other eight bodies had leapt onto their feet, brandishing improvised weapons, and leapt at them.

“As I thought,” Fayre said as black vines shot from her arms.

They smashed through the puppet’s hearts, exploding them in an instant and they stopped moving. Fayre recalled her vines and they returned to the tattoos on her arms.

“How many people would usually live in a block of flats this size?” Jasmine inquired, switching her pistols for the shotguns on her back.

“About a thousand,” Evony replied.

Dead Eye pressed one of the lift buttons, but nothing happened. “Even the emergency power’s out? No choice; we’ve got to take the stairs which puts us at a great disadvantage.”

“No more than us all being trapped inside a small steel box,” Jasmine said.

“Agreed. So, why are the stairs bad?” Khan asked.

“On the stairs, Evony, myself and Jasmine will be largely useless because we need space to attack from a distance.”

“Then why didn’t we enter through the rooftop?”

“Because a group of officers tried that earlier and Bunny leapt up to the helicopter, kicked it and blew it up.”

“What the hell?” Eric whispered.

“Anyway, we need to get moving. Khan, Laila and Eric go in the front, Fayre at the back and the rest of us in the middle.”

Jasmine went through the doors to the staircase first, her shotguns in her hands, and saw that the concrete stairs were covered in dried blood. She glanced up and spotted that the railings still had fresh blood dripping off them, each drop echoing endlessly when they splashed into the crimson ocean at the bottom of the stairs.

“No contacts.”

Laila took the lead and slowly crept up the stairs, Khan close behind her and Eric behind him, his above wrist blades deployed. Even though the blood on the stairs had dried, there was still a chance that they could slip on the steps and hurt themselves which, in a fight, could get them killed.

Everyone remained dead silent as they slowly climbed up the floors, listening carefully for any sounds of Bunny or her puppets.

If they were ambushed on the stairs, it would be a worst-case scenario as they wouldn’t be able to fight as well.

As they went up each floor, Laila counted them off in her mind.

First floor; no contact.

Second floor; no contact.

Third floor; feint whispers from the top of the stairs.

Laila thought about getting the group to stop temporarily, but they were right next to the door leading to the third floor and, if they stopped moving, they could be ambushed from the door and the top of the stairs at the same time.

Fourth floor; obstruction on the stairs.

The group came to a stop in front of a makeshift barricade of sofas, tables, chairs and other miscellaneous household items on the stairs, preventing them from climbing any higher. Laila put her dagger back in its sheath and held out her hands, shadows wrapping around the makeshift barricade. She tried to use her magic to lift parts of it up but nothing would budge, as if they were bolted to the concrete itself.

“Nothing,” she whispered as Khan stepped ahead of her.

He handed her his scimitar and tried to rip apart the barricade with his bare hands but, even with his God Armour, it didn’t move.

“What the hell?” Khan hissed, kicking the barricade with his boot. “It won’t move.”

“Magic, perhaps?” Fayre offered. “Although I’m not sure of what kind.”

“I’ll call it in and let Aria know,” Dead Eye said. “For now, we go back to the third floor and wait there.”

They went back down the stairs to where they had just been, and Laila and Khan went through the doors first; there were no bodies or puppets in sight.

“Don’t let your guard down,” Dead Eye reminded them and he reached for his radio. “Aria, this is Dead Eye, come in.”

“Aria here. Report.”

“We’re currently on the third floor of the building and found a barricade preventing us from moving any further. It’s unbreakable and we believe it may be some form of magic or enchantment. Over.”

“You couldn’t break it? What’s it made out of?”

“Regular household furniture. Any ideas?”

“Hmm, this isn’t the first time we’ve run into something like that during a Bunny case. We can only guess that she has some sort of reinforcement ability, given how her clothes can stop bullets. Head over to the staircase on the other side of the building and another team will begin clear up on the lower floors.”

“Understood.” Dead Eye turned off the radio and, as soon as he did, all of the doors to the flats opened up on their floor. “Shit!”

Over a hundred of Bunny’s puppets poured out of the rooms, eerie smiles on their faces and they were covered in stab and slash wounds.

Khan and Laila jumped into action and charged at the corpses, Eric quickly following behind them; they sliced, stabbed and slashed at everything in their path. Jasmine holstered her shotguns and took out her rifle and Evony began to fire normal arrows, both making sure to only fire when they were sure that they wouldn’t hit their friends.

Dead Eye was about to fire his rifle when the doors behind them burst off their hinges, revealing thirty more of Bunny’s puppets. Fayre clicked her tongue and six vines smashed some of the puppets back, sending them flying down the stairs. More dropped down from the upper floors to take their place.

Fayre sent more vines from her arms and began slicing the puppets in half, allowing Dead Eye to provide support to Eric and the others. Dead Eye reloaded his rifle and then he heard it; hundreds of footsteps from above them.

“They’re above us! Run!” He shouted.

Jasmine and Evony were the first two to start running, while Eric, Khan and Laila were almost at the end of the corridor when Dead Eye had shouted his warning. Fayre gritted her teeth together and ran as fast as she could, corpses chasing her from behind and more swinging down to her side.

“Bunny just wants to play,” the puppets playfully called.

Fayre sent vines to destroy several of their heads at once just before she reached the end of the corridor. Once Fayre was in the staircase, Evony loosed an explosive arrow at the upper floor, dropping rubble in front of the doors and cutting off their pursuers.

However, the puppets smashed against the debris, clawing at it with their fingers so hard that it began to break and crack.

From the lower floors, the doors blew open and an army of giggling corpses ran up the stairs.

“Evony!” Eric screamed.

She ran to catch up with the others and Eric fired a bolt of black energy at the stairs behind her, taking out some of her pursuers and collapsing a part of the stairs. However, the puppets leapt over it and began jumping onto the railing of the stairs where Eric and the others were.

Evony screamed as she slipped on the stairs and rolled down eight of them, smashing her knee against the floor and leaving her centimetres from the puppets.

“Evony!” Jasmine shouted. She dropped her rifle and pulled out her machine guns, unleashing a hail of bullets upon the corpses.

Even though she kept cutting them down, it didn’t stop their advance.

Eric jumped in front of Evony and shot a black beam from both of his palms, eviscerating several lines of the corpses. He scooped Evony up into his arms and ran up the stairs.

The group continued to fight their way to the eleventh floor but there was another barricade there, stopping them from reaching the top floors.

“Not again,” Dead Eye hissed, smashing the doors to the eleventh floor wide open.

There were no puppets waiting for them this time but the corridor was littered with blood, organs and severed limbs. Everyone quickly rushed out of the stairs and into the corridor and Fayre was the last one through.

After checking that everyone was in the corridor, she spun on her heel and faced the door they’d come from. She thrust out her hands and erected a barrier made of thorns in the door frame. The puppets threw themselves at it, shredding their bodies and killing themselves, all of them desperate to get through to her.

“Will that hold?” Evony asked.

Fayre smiled. “Of course.”

With a flick of her wrists, the connection between her tattoos and the barrier was severed but it didn’t disappear.

With the puppets behind them unable to reach them, Eric and the others took a second to catch their breath.

“How’s everyone doing?” Eric asked.

Jasmine’s machine guns clicked. She reached for more magazine and she cursed. “Out of ammo for these.”

She holstered her machine guns and took out her pistols.

“My rifle’s out as well,” Dead Eye added.

“At least now they won’t be able to hit us from behind,” Eric said.

“I imagine that they’ll start to come at us again in any minute,” Laila noted. “Dead Eye, what do we do?”

Dead Eye threw his rifle over his shoulder and took out a silver pistol. “We’ll have to deal with her and her puppets at the same time. Eric, Laila, Khan; you three will have to take care of Bunny.”

“Why us?” Eric asked.

“You three are the best suited to handle someone like Bunny. The rest of us are far more suited to dealing with her puppets. If you guys can force her to retreat, then we’ll be able to manage and, even if you don’t, the other team are clearing each floor and will be here soon enough. Any objections?”

“Of course not,” Fayre purred.

“In that case, let’s go.”

Just as they were about to move, a door at the far end of the corridor opened. A figure dressed in a bloodstained hoodie and pair of jeans walked out and turned to face them, wearing a bunny mask covered in red splatters.

“Bunny.”

Then, from behind her, a girl with strawberry blonde hair and red eyes, stepped out, an eerie smile on her lips, even with her rotting skin and empty eyes.

“Stephanie.”

The rest of the doors on the floor opened and corpses slowly began to march out of the rooms, each of them horribly mutilated.

“Won’t you come and play with Bunny?” They asked.

Eric and the others prepared to strike and the corpses all snapping to face them.

“Why won’t you play with us?” They asked in a sinisterly innocent voice.

Eric fired a blast of energy towards Bunny, but she bent her back at an impossible angle to avoid it.

“That wasn’t very nice,” the puppets said.

“No shit,” Dead Eye shot back, before firing a bullet through a puppet’s heart.

“Why don’t you want to play with us?” The puppets cried, charging at them, giggling.

Jasmine unleashed a volley of bullets at them but, no matter how much she shot at them, it wasn’t enough.

If she killed one, five more ran at her.

Eric, Khan and Laila charged forward and cut through them, pushing through to reach Bunny. Evony and Dead Eye covered Jasmine as she reloaded and Fayre began to send her vines through the chests of puppets.

Eric tried to pursue Bunny but found himself cut off from her by a wall of puppets.

Dozens of bullets flew past his head and cut down the puppets, leaving only a few standing, including Stephanie.

Upon seeing her, Eric hesitated, time felt like it had slowed to a crawl.

From what Ajax had told him, Stephanie had been a beautiful, joyful and energetic person.

It sickened Eric to see her like this.

She was smiling, but her eyes were lifeless and bleak.

She was still energetic, but spewing Bunny’s sick words and dancing to her sadistic tune.

As much as it sickened him, Eric didn’t want anyone else to see Stephanie like this.

He ground his teeth together, let out a mighty roar and thrust his blade into her heart, turning her back into a corpse, and she went limp.

“Rest in peace, Stephanie,” Eric whispered, gently removing his blade from her and placing her body on the ground.

I wonder…if Lucifer took over my body, would I end up being something like that?

As he was placing Stephanie onto the ground, several puppets leapt towards him, but were quickly dispatched by vines and bullets.

“Eric, get Bunny!” Dead Eye roared.

Bunny turned on her heel and ran to the far end of the corridor, bursting through and breaking the doors, before leaping up the stairs to the roof.

“Yay! Bunny gets to play!” The corpses screamed.

Eric and Khan reached the stairs and charged after Bunny but Laila struggled to find her way through the corpses. Every time she tried to teleport from one shadow to another, they were able to predict and intercept her, forcing Laila to retreat every single time.

“Fayre, Laila’s unable to pursue Bunny!” Jasmine called back.

Her pistols clicked and she swore under her breath. They disappeared back into her gauntlets and two knives slid down beneath her wrists. Jasmine charged at the nearest puppet and stabbed it through the forehead, killing it.

“We need to go and help Eric and Khan as soon as possible!” Jasmine cried, before engaging another puppet.

Fayre sent a vine down the corridor weaving it through thirteen corpses heads and ripped them from their bodies. She then sliced the vine like a blade and cut the already dead puppets in half.

Fayre cracked five of her vines together like a whip and grinned. “I’ll clear the way.”

The vines wrapped around her hands and turned them into a bladed glove with the vines extending off it as individual whips. She swung her arm and, with a single slice, cut ten corpses into several pieces each.

***

Bunny burst through the doors and rolled across the rooftop, Eric and Khan right behind her. She leapt onto her feet and onto the roof of the stairs. Bunny stood there, basking in the moonlight as the wind whipped through her hair. She reached behind her back and drew her knives from their sheaths.

Khan readied his blade. “Here she comes!”

Bunny bent her knees and pounced towards them. She landed in front of Khan and began to slash at his face and chest, barely giving him enough time to block her attacks. Eric charged at her from behind, trying to stab her, but Bunny back flipped over him, kicking him in his back and sending him into Khan. The boys fell over each other and landed roughly on the floor.

Khan pushed Eric off him and lunged at Bunny. She swerved to the side and kicked him in the side of his face, sending Khan stumbling off to one side. She then ran over to him before he could recover and took out his legs, sending Khan onto his back. She leapt on top of him and began to slice at his face, her knives scraping sharply against his helmet.

Eric fired a black beam at her, but she bent her back at an impossible angle to avoid it. She then cartwheeled backwards away from Khan until she was stood by the edge of the rooftop. Khan got back onto his feet and stood ready to attack once again with Eric beside him, black energy gathering in his hands. Bunny tilted her head to the side before sprinting at the boys once more.

Eric unleashed a barrage of black bolts, but Bunny danced through them all. Khan’s sword glowed green and he slashed through the air, a blade of green energy flew towards her. Bunny twisted her body to avoid them and jumped between the two boys, landing in a crouched position. She turned at Eric and began to relentlessly attack him with kicks and slashes. Eric couldn’t block all of them and a powerful kick sent him back ten feet, but he was able to remain standing.

Khan tried to stab her from behind but she leapt up into the air and then landed on the blade. She then leapt off the blade to one side, performing a handstand and she brought her foot into the side of Khan’s face, sending him flying. She then jumped behind Eric and took out his legs in a single movement.

Eric smashed his back onto the roof and grunted in pain. Bunny climbed onto his stomach, her blades poised to stab him through his heart.

Not again! Eric screamed, his fear manifesting through his aura.

Khan roared and slashed at Bunny but she bounced off the ground and high up into the sky.

Khan pulled Eric onto his feet. “You okay?”

“Yeah, I’m okay,” Eric said shakily. If Aria hadn’t given me that potion earlier, I would’ve gone into a full panic attack.

“Still, this one doesn’t sit still, does she?”

Bunny landed back onto the roof of the stairs and then kicked off the ground hard into the air. She then kicked off the air and went hurtling towards Khan. Khan’s blade glowed green and he pointed his scimitar upwards, his blade aimed perfectly at Bunny’s heart.

She fell straight onto the blade and it pierced her heart.

Her blood gushed out of the wound, coating the blade and Khan in crimson. Khan relaxed a little, believing that he had done enough, that Bunny was dead.

Khan felt the pressure on his blade increase. Bunny’s hands wrapped around the sharp side of his blade, blood spilling out by the gallons from her palms and chest.

“Wha-?”

Bunny placed the soles of her feet onto Khan’s chest and, with a powerful strike, kicked him off her, removing the blade that had been lodged in her flesh and Khan stumbled backwards. She landed on her feet and rushed at Khan, quickly taking out the boy’s legs and she smashed her elbow into his face in a single motion.

Khan wasn’t knocked out but he was dazed, and in pain.

Bunny wasn’t going to let him recover.

She kicked him as hard as she could in the stomach and Khan went rolling off the rooftop. Before he fell off, he plunged his blade into the concrete and held onto it with all of his might, leaving only his arm and head on the roof.

“Khan!”

Eric tried to run over to Khan but Bunny landed in front of him. Before Eric could respond, Bunny jumped towards Eric and kicked him in the chest, causing him to buck forward. Bunny landed on her hands and sprung up onto Eric’s back, wrapping her legs around his head. She then dug her hands into the concrete roof and threw Eric over her head using her legs. He landed awkwardly near the edge of the building and Eric ran back towards Bunny.

Bunny, however, was faster.

She dove in front of him, took out his legs from the front, straddled onto his back and tried to stab him in the back of the neck.

Laila emerged from Bunny’s shadow and parried the killer’s blade. Bunny swiftly retreated by cartwheeling multiple times backwards. Laila dove into her own shadow and tried to stab Bunny when she emerged from hers, but Bunny jumped into the air, kicked off it in mid-air and tried to smash her heel into Laila’s skull.

Laila fell back into her shadow and appeared in Jasmine’s who had just reached Eric, her golden blades deployed.

“I’ll get Khan and you distract her,” Jasmine yelled.

Jasmine darted over to Khan and Laila appeared in Bunny’s shadow after dropping into her own. Bunny skilfully parried every single one of Laila’s attacks and kept dodging her Necromantic attacks by twisting her body.

Jasmine reached Khan and threw out her hand to him. “Are you okay?”

“Perfect,” Khan groaned, taking her hand.

Before she could start to pull him up, Jasmine heard a terrifying crashing sound behind her. She turned around and found Laila lying crumpled against the steel doors, bruised and bleeding. Bunny landed gracefully before Laila, her blades wet with fresh blood.

“Laila!”

“I’m fine; go and save her!”

Jasmine let go of Khan’s hand and ran towards Bunny just before she could finish off Laila.

Jasmine stabbed her blades into Bunny’s side and pushed her off Laila, sending the two of them tumbling to the side. Bunny tried to kick Jasmine away, but Jasmine dodged it, removed her blades and slashed both of them across Bunny’s throat, emptying more of her blood onto the roof.

Bunny jumped into a handstand and kicked Jasmine hard in her chin, before cartwheeling backwards. Jasmine spun through the air, corrected herself and landed on her hands and knees, blood leaking into her mouth.

“Why won’t this bitch die?”

After a quick evaluation of the rooftop, Jasmine realised how dire her situation really was. Khan was too weak to continue fighting but he was able to hold himself onto the side of the building, Laila was in no state to fight and Eric was only just beginning to get back up.

If I can hold out until the others get here, no one will die.

Jasmine needed to believe that in her heart or else she wouldn’t be able to fight Bunny with everything that she had.

Bunny titled her head and looked at her hands, bloodied and without knives in them; she had dropped them in her tumble with Jasmine. Bunny reached behind her head and pulled out two more knives. She twirled them in her hands, before crouching low to the ground and pouncing at Jasmine.

Jasmine jumped at Bunny and the two exchanged blows with one another, each going for slashes, stabs, kicks, punches, and whatever else they could think of. In terms of fighting ability, they were equally skilled with knives.

In terms of endurance however, Bunny was far stronger.

As Bunny countered and blocked many of Jasmine’s attack, she noticed that they were getting slower and slower. Jasmine also realised how desperate her situation had become and tried to take Bunny down as quickly as possible.

Jasmine lunged with both of her blades at Bunny, but Bunny danced to the side of them. She then stabbed Jasmine in the stomach with one of her blades and blood trickled out of the wound onto her blade.

Eric had only just recovered from his fight with Bunny when it happened.

“J…Jasmine,” he stuttered, his rage and despair building up inside of him.

Bunny shot a curious glance over at Eric as the boy’s aura began to grow and grow. She removed her blade from Jasmine’s stomach and then kicked the girl where her wound was, sending her flying towards the edge of the rooftop.

She did not get back up.

“Jasmine!”

His black aura exploded and a light red aura replaced it which was twice the size of his old one. His Armour shifted and changed, developing a crimson trim, and it took on a more demonic appearance. Eric’s gauntlets glowed a deep red and he fired two solid beams of energy at Bunny.

Whereas Bunny had had no trouble dodging his attacks before, she only narrowly avoided them this time.

Bunny leapt high into the air, kicked off of it once more and landed in the car park next to the block of flats. Eric ran to the edge of the building and fired a beam from both of his palms which left a large crater where she had been standing.

Bunny broke into a sprint, before leaping high onto another building’s rooftop and she ran off into the night.

“Get back here!” Eric shouted. His wings expanded and began to flap, preparing to fly.

He was about to take off when someone wrapped their arms around his waist.

“Eric, don’t!”

“She killed-!”

“Jasmine’s alive.” Laila almost collapsed onto the floor, but she caught herself on his arm. “If you go now, you can save her. If you go after Bunny, she’ll die and so will you.”

Eric quickly looked at Jasmine and saw that she was breathing but ruggedly.

Seeing his friend still alive, Eric felt his rage subside and he slowly calmed down; his wings stopped flapping and folded back inside his Armour.

It was only after Eric had lost his wings that he understood what Laila meant.

His Armour had almost evolved because Jasmine was wounded and, if he had gone after Bunny, if she didn’t kill him, then his own Armour would have.

“Get her down to Elthia. We’ll be fine.”

Eric nodded at Laila as she sat down, trying her best to stay awake.

“Jasmine!” Eric cried, lifting her up into his arms. He ran as fast as he could down the stairs. “Stay with me! We’re going to get you help.”

Jasmine’s hands wrapped around Eric’s neck and she smiled, blood oozing from her lips. “You’re too optimistic for your own good, you know that, right?”

He leapt down multiple stairs at a time, pushing past a few police officers on the way. He ignored Dead Eye and Fayre who called out to him and jumped over Aria’s head.

“Eric…” Jasmine weakly whispered, her hands falling from his neck.

He felt her blood pour onto his Armour and he hissed through gritted teeth.

Six more floors! Come on! Just a little more.

With every step he took, her blood began to pour more rapidly.

“It’s…too…” She trailed off as her vision descended into darkness.

“Jasmine!”

He reached the ground floor and collapsed onto his knees transforming out of his Armour, and Elthia ran immediately over to him.

“Eric, put her on the ground!” Elthia ordered, her voice breaking and tears forming in her eyes.

Eric did as he was told and Elthia pressed her hands onto Jasmine’s wound. The tattoos on Elthia’s body began to glow a beautiful light green and, slowly, the wound began to close, as did the other bruises and cuts she had sustained. Eric gasped in joy and he felt a wave of relief flow over his tense and tired muscles. He looked at Elthia’s face, expecting her to be overjoyed as well, but she was not.

Elthia was in agony.

Her body was twitching like it was being stabbed all over. She was wincing, her teeth digging in hard to her bottom lip, splitting it and letting blood pour into her mouth. Her tears flowed uncontrollably from her eyes despite trying her best to hold them in.

Even though Jasmine had been stabbed, Elthia looked like she was in far more pain.

It was then that Eric understood how Elthia’s powers worked.

When she healed someone, the pain was transferred to her and the wounds that the person had sustained were healed. He could only begin to imagine how painful it must have been for her.

To save someone’s life, she had to put up with an immeasurable amount of pain but, if she didn’t, then they’d die.

What a cruel price to pay for such a beautiful power.

The wound on Jasmine’s stomach fully sealed and Elthia passed out, almost falling onto her back but Eric caught her.

“It must have been too much for you to handle,” Eric whispered, softly stroking her hair. He sat behind her and let Elthia rest against his chest. “Thank you for saving her life.”

Dead Eye and the rest of Eric’s team finally made their way down to the bottom of the stairs, all of them bloodied and injured, and all of them relieved to see that Jasmine was alive.

“Good work, everyone,” Aria congratulated them. “Good work on all coming home alive. I’ll bring the cars around, so wait here.”

Aria left them and everyone collapsed onto the floor, not a single one of them able to stay standing any longer.

With Bunny no longer near the block of flats, the crisis was over and Eric and his friends were taken home safely.

***

Even though the crisis had only been solved an hour ago, Aria had still been able to present a brief report to Kasmine the very same night.

The Headmistress read it in her office, basking in the moonlight and smiled sadly at it.

“Only a thousand this time.”

Kasmine finished the report and put it down on her desk.

Even though there was seemingly no way to stop Bunny, Kasmine couldn’t help but feel frustrated that they weren’t able to figure out anything else about her from this incident.

“If we had found a way to kill her, then these lives would have been worth paying.”

Her mobile phone rang.

It was a phone call Kasmine had been expecting to get since the Bunny incident began.

She answered it and let the other person speak first.

“Don’t worry, everything went as expected. We had safeguards in place in case something did happen, but they didn’t have to act in the end.” She hummed slyly. “Oh, I recall you being one of the people who gave their consent for this idea. And if the situation had called for it then they would have intervened and save Eric’s life just like then. Honestly, you worry too much.

Kasmine smiled sadly and played with her hair. “…No, of course I can’t. I don’t know if you’ll be happy to know this or not but Eric has gotten stronger as a result of this. He’s unlocked the second version of his Armour but he can’t fully use it yet. I’ll have to increase the number of lessons that Sapphire gives him to make sure he doesn’t end up killing himself using it.”

Kasmine giggled a little. “Sorry, but I just wanted to let you know that we won’t let that happen. Don’t worry so much about it. We won’t let anything happen to Eric. You have my word.” Kasmine smiled softly. “Don’t worry. I’ll protect him.

“I’ll keep you updated. I have some more work to attend to, so I’ll bid you goodnight.”

The other person hung up and Kasmine let out a small sigh of relief. She smiled and spun around to look out of her window, resting her arms on the windowsill.

“Honestly, he does worry too much,” she whispered, closing her eyes.