"So what your saying is that you have no idea where he went?" Instructor Audrey asked for what felt like the 15th time. Since last week our team had been regularly questioned on a lie detector. Allister had expected this and coached me on what to do. Namely how to breath properly and manage my heart rate. When I asked how he knew about that if he had amnesia he only said that he's 'basically a ninja' which feels like a non answer but what do I know. It does seem like it's worked so far.
"Yes. I was back at the cannon when Kaiju boy interfered. It was far away and he disappeared into the dust." Which is obviously a lie. I feel so devious haha! Well technically I did disappear using all the dust as a cover. So let's just call it a half truth.
"I see." She stares at me with an unreadable expression. "Well, it doesn't seem like I'm going to get anywhere with this method. Your all genuinely clueless." Feels like she could have put that more tactfully but whatever. "He split a mountain in two. How could we lose him?" She mutters with frustration clear in her voice. I feel a little bad now. "You can go." She says as she shoos me away like one would an annoying child. I stand up and walk out the pure white room. Walking through the door into the waiting room, I pick up my bag while trying to avoid eye contact with everyone waiting. Shen seems to be the most worried about this, but he'll be fine, he doesn't know anything. Or at least I assume so.
"How did it go?" Allister whispers. I ignore him until I make it into the halls. While there are still people around, there's enough noice that people shouldn't notice me talking to my bag, or overhear us at least. I just hope Allister didn't ruin my sketchbook.
"It went the same as every other time." I finally reply to him as I make my way to the canteen. We still have training today so all I can do is wait for the questioning to finish. "Your tips seemed to work out well. Having a secret identity is quite exciting." I order 5 burgers and wait at a table in the corner. I should be able to get some peace here.
"I wouldn't exactly call keeping secrets from your government fun." He's such a party pooper. I pull out another volume of mariner satellite when my order arrives. "Also, I'm out of biscuits. We must retrieve more when the opportunity arises." I munch on a burger as I think of when we'll be able to get more.
"Thank you." I quickly say to the waitress but still try to be polite. Her fast steps are making me wonder if it worked. "You'll have to wait a few hours." Here we go.
"A few hours?! Are you trying to kill me?! I'll starve!" Basically a ninja he said. How is this what makes him lose it?
"They don't have biscuits here in the facility. I don't really know what else you want me to do." I'm a little surprised by myself with how comfortable I am with him being mad at me. I don't think I'd be like that if it was someone else.
"This is inexcusable! I demand we take drastic action! Are you listening?" I place my headphones on and press play on 'Kaiju today'. Maybe they like me now. Even if they don't it's better than hearing him have another biscuit breakdown.
"What I'm saying is that this was a calculated attack against our species! Kaiju boy must be stopped!" Oh boy.
"Derek come on. Didn't Kaiju boy literally defeat that S class? That doesn't seem like an attack on us to me." As usual the lady is making a lot more sense.
"He's just using these fights to gain support from the public! He gets to attack infrastructure that's meant to defend us and gain support! I mean, have you seen the chart?!" You know, if I was a villain, that wouldn't be the worst evil plan I could come up with.
"I'm not looking at the chart Derek. Anyway, if that is his plan then it's working decently well. He's been gaining support on social media." Wait, REALLY?! That's awesome! Oh, this is the best day ever!
"Oh please. This so called 'gossip bug' is obviously Kaiju boy himself. Leading the battle of public opinion. No one else would be that dedicated to supporting a known criminal." I probably should have thought of starting a Kaiju boy social media account. Then again someone could probably track it.
"All of that's assuming that Kaiju boy actually has malevolent intentions. As I've said before, it's entirely possible he's actually as benevolent as he appears. I mean, taking down that turtle thing was a pretty good thing." I feel like I've been very honest about my intentions. If I wanted to hurt people then I would have let big turtle keep spinning. In fact, I even feel bad for killing it. I won't pretend I'm a saint, I know I'm VERY flawed. But I don't want to hurt anyone.
"I won't pretend that's not a possibility. But we also need to consider that he's making Kaiju. We're talking about the most destructive creatures on the planet, and he's making more. That's dangerous. We should be questioning what someone like that is capable of. Or at least why he isn't being kept in check by the ranger force like everyone else with an ability." I mean, he technically is. Not in the way he means but still. Besides, if I did turn myself in to the government, they'd take the wand. If that happens I'd be as useless as before. I can do so much more good like this! And most importantly, my kaiju are cute gosh darn it!
"It feels like we're not getting anywhere like this." The lady sighs in resignation. I agree but it's also quite entertaining so I don't really want them to stop.
"On that we agree. So how about we take on some callers and see what they have to give us on our next segment. But first, a quick word from our sponsor." Skip!
"Haruo…" Huh? I take my headphones off and look around. I'd thought nobody would find me here. "Haruo!" I finally see who's calling my name. A small yellow blur comes towards me that soon becomes clearer. It's
Lilith.
"Great. It's the ugly fairy." Allister says from the bag. Is there another fairy that I didn't notice?
"Um, hello." I say nervously. "Can I help you?" I ask as I place my headphones back in my bag, accidentally hitting Allister on the head.
"I just wanted to let you know that training is starting soon. Let's go." She says before flying over to my shoulder and taking a seat.
I guess I'm done here now. I put my rubbish in the bin and head towards the training room she points out. "So what was he like?" She asks while swinging her legs back and forth, her pitch black eyes staring at me.
"What was who like?" Is she talking about Shen? Howlett? She knows them doesn't she?
"Kaiju boy silly!" Oh! Yeah that makes sense. "You were there when he took down the S class right?" That is true, just not in the way
she thinks.
"He was ok I guess." Just play it cool. Don't give anything away.
"Just ok?! He seemed like he'd be your favourite." She starts to hover in front of my face. The buzzing of her wings faintly playing
in my ears like a strange melody. She looks frustrated for some reason, with her arms on her hips.
"What do you mean?" Am I missing something?
"He seems to play a lot into the aesthetic you really like. Y'know, flashy costume hero's with magical trinkets." She explains as she performs a copy of mariner satellites signature pose. A peace sign over a wink that's making me feel something strange.
"How do you know I like that stuff?" She looks at me confused for a moment before letting out a giggle.
"Your not exactly subtle about it. You always read that stuff." I wouldn't say it's that obvious.
"O-oh, I see." I respond while trying to avoid eye contact.
"Anyway, he's clearly a powerhouse. He managed to save the anti sky cannon. Heck, he even beat his kaiju almost as fast as I did!" She looks really excited about that last point.
"You had to fight Kaiju as well?" That's actually quite surprising. I hadn't heard anything about that.
"Yeah but it was only 1 S rank. Some lizard with a nuclear reactor for a heart, no biggie." She looks quite smug while she exclaims that. But given she's being so humble about it I'm assuming she just looks like that.
"Wow. You really are amazing Lilith." This seems to catch her off guard as she starts twirling her hair.
"Yeah, I really am. Thank you. Your petty awesome yourself." That's nice of her, but I'm really not. "It wasn't just me though. Misty put in a lot of work as well.".
"Oh yeah?" I've stopped walking at this point to listen to the story.
"Ok, so, the ranger force were morons like usual and decided to put us on the decoy team. But somehow Shen gets to go with the real stuff. Sure. Ok. Whatever. I'm not mad." She seems a little mad. "So me and Misty were debating if code creatures is actually any good.".
"It obviously is.".
"Oh boy we do NOT have time for that conversation." Her left eye twitch's slightly. "Anyway, we were rudely interrupted by the aforementioned S rank. After a terrible landing from the pilot, everyone evacuated. Although I had to take control of some of them to get them out when they started panicking. Had to be done." She exclaims with a shrug.
"You sound sooo torn up about it." Allister sarcastically whispers from the bag. What is he doing?! What happened to not getting caught?!
"So obviously we weren't going to take that lying down." Oh thank gosh she didn't hear. "Misty was blooming mad. But I wanted to have a crack at it first. So we played rock paper scissors to decide who would deal with the S class and who would deal with the others. And I, in my perfect existence, won." Glad she's happy about winning. "She was pretty bummed about it but neither of us would ever disregard her sacred trust of rock paper scissors" obviously. Anyone who would disregard rock paper scissors would be an irredeemable monster. "So I fought the lizard. It's atomic fire was pretty interesting but nothing I couldn't handle. I used my telepathy to stop it from moving, then I used a bunch of poison to painlessly put it down and then I used my strings to slice it up into smaller pieces for easier cleanup." I should probably take notes on this. " but enough about me (never thought I'd say that), Misty was leading the others against all the C ranks. She was switching between fire and ice like it was nothing. Until suddenly, she was eaten by an A rank!" She places her hands on her cheeks for added effect.
"Oh no!".
"Oh no indeed. But not to worry. Because she literally clawed her way out! She had the heart in her teeth! It was bigger than she was!" That's a pretty gruesome image actually. "It was a pretty awesome image. I tried to take a picture but she threw it away before I could. Rude." Honestly seems like a missed opportunity. A look of realisation suddenly appears on her face. "We're late!" Huh?.
"What?!" How?! How could we possibly be late?!
"Oh well. Ya win some ya lose some." She shrugs.
"How are you so calm?! We have to hurry!" I start to run.
"Yeah yeah I'm coming. You worry way too much Haruo." I feel like I worry the proper amount. We do at least make it to the training room quickly, so I guess there's a silver lining here. Oh well, just have to bite the bullet on this 1.
"Welcome. I'm glad training to protect the human race is such a high priority for you." Oh come on!
"Don't worry about it. We didn't miss anything important. Besides, we were in the middle of a matter most important!" Lilith slips on a posh accent for that last bit which I'll admit got a chuckle out of me. A glare from the instructor gets me straight faced right away.
"Now that everyone's arrived, let's begin. To celebrate the completion of your mission with passing marks all around, we'll be taking it light today. We're going to play a game." Are we gonna play ultra assault sibling?! This is gonna be awesome! "A game of 'find the kaiju'!" What? It's not even the fact that it's not
what I wanted. It's the fact that she has the most forced smile on as she says this. I'd much rather go draw. I have a lot of catching up to do since SOMEONE thought it looked like a scratch post.
"What is 'catch the kaiju'?" Misty asked. This was followed by mumbles from everyone else.
"It's simple. Hidden around the city are a series of objects taking the place of Kaiju. You'll know them because they have an orange band around them. Teams of five will have 3 hours to collect as many as they can
while obstructing other teams attempts. Other restrictions are that you can't harm civilians, each other or the infrastructure of the city. Is that clear?" We all gave nods in response to this. It seemed simple enough.
"Is that really all it is?" Misty asked with a noticeable quiver in her voice. It's unusual for her to seem so nervous. Instructor Audrey
seemed the most surprised.
"What else could there be?" The instructor asked while taking a step towards Misty.
"She's asking if there's some hidden reward or catch to this." Lilith interrupted whilst flying over.
"There will obviously be a prize for whoever wins the competition. But in keeping with our sympathies for your struggles in your mission, there is no 'catch'." With the way the 2 were looking at each other you'd think they didn't get along that well.
"Well that's good then!" Lilith's tone suddenly becoming much more positive as she sits on Misty's shoulder.
"Quite." Was all the instructor had to say. I guess it's good that this is just a nice, friendly game. Especially after we almost died. I mean, I fell from orbit! "Now then. Your groups have already been selected. If you will all please direct your attention to the screen." She pointed to her right and we all followed. The screen on the wall showed a bunch of names grouped together. It took me awhile to find mine but eventually I did. Oh nice! I'm grouped up with people I know. Howlett, Lola and Boba. With those guys this should be nice and relaxing. It's not until I get closer that I'm able to make out the last name. Shen. Oh boy. I definitely don't dislike Shen, but there's a case to be made that he's not the best at playing well with others. Except for the high ranks he spends time with I guess. Why wasn't he paired with any of them?
"Drug guy!" Is all I hear before 2 familiar figures crash into me. I'm almost knocked to the ground, the fact I wasn't leads me to believe that Lola and Boba have learned some restraint. So that's nice.
"What's up kid?" Howlett says as he walks up. Still wearing that leather jacket over his military uniform I see.
"Haha, your barley older than me." I respond shyly. " so where's Shen?" I ask looking around, which is a little difficult with these 2
clinging to me.
"Lilith! I swear I'll beat you!" Found him. He's challenging Lilith again while his friends try to drag him away. She's not even looking at
him. Can she not hear? He's being pretty loud. Oh no! Is she going deaf?!
"I can't tell if we're going to win because of or despite him." Lola states dryly.
"Could you 2 please get off me?" I ask while trying to suppress the panic attack I feel coming on. They're at least nice enough to
oblige.
"We'll win no matter what. A man dreams can never be stopped." Howlett says in his usual dramatic fashion while showing his back to
us.
"I guess my dreams are very stoppable?" Lola asks plainly. Howlett just makes a bodybuilder pose, which feels like it doesn't work when you have so many layers on but I won't pretend I'm an expert.
"Manliness has nothing to do with gender! It's what's in your soul!" We all nod at this surprisingly progressive claim from Howlett.
"I want to make clear that I have no faith in any of these people." Allister whispers from the bag.
"Don't be mean." I whisper back.
"They're buffoons. I can't stand buffoons." He says with clear disdain in his voice.
"What is up with you and buffoons lately?" He's been using that word a lot for a few days. I wonder what happened.
"What did you say?" Boba asked as all 3 of them look at me. Oh no! They're gonna find me out! I've ruined everything! I should just die why am I like this?!
"Uh. I'm really hungry." They all nod in understanding at this. Wow! That was close! I guess I've picked up some of Allisters super
special ninja powers. Hehe.
"Sorry for the wait." Shen says as he walks towards us. "I had to make clear that Lilith shouldn't underestimate us.".
"That good I guess?" Is all I can really say. It's hard to think with Shen staring at me. What did I do now?!
"Lilith is sulking that your not on the same team. Misty was chastising her for 'bad thoughts'. I hope your not going to have any
conflicting loyalties?" Huh?
"I have no idea what your talking about." I respond while trying to avoid eye contact.
"Good. You proved yourself a reliable teammate during the anti sky cannon mission. Please don't make me change that opinion." I didn't even do anything!
"Lay off the guy will ya? It's just a game." Lola
interjects.
"No, it's a training exercise. And I'm not going to let anyone get in the way of me beating the number 1." Shen rants before walking away. I feel like that could have gone better.
"What a jerk." Boba grumbles.
"He's just passionate." I say. No need for the team to be so divided. After that things moved pretty quickly, given the open nature of the game there wasn't really much preparation to be done, beyond Shen making clear that we HAVE to win this. Not gonna lie, seems unnecessarily stressful. But soon enough we all headed out into the city. I took a ride on Howlett back since he offered. Much faster. Some of the teams were taking the train back into the city, probably search the train itself. We on the other hand, did not.
"Jump!" Shen ordered, taking us all off guard. That seemed needlessly risky.
"Are you serious?!" Boba asked, clearly just as shocked as the rest of us. It's not that it's impossible for us to jump the canyon, it's
just that it's also possible that we don't make it and get seriously injured. Shen glances to the right and my gaze follows. Lilith was flying over while Misty was carrying her other 3 teammates, effortlessly making the leap across.
"We'll make it." He says with clear determination in his voice. The others look conflicted but decide to go along with it.
"You secure?" Howlett asks me.
"Yeah." I reply, although I'll admit that I'm not that sure myself.
"I'm also ok with this, not that anyone asked." Allister says.
"Go!" Shen ordered. And like that we made the leap. The wind rushing past my face makes it hard to hear what anyone is saying. It's probably not that important anyway. It takes everything I have to not fall off. Against
my better judgment, I look down. A pure black abyss that looks like it goes down forever, surrounded by sparkling gold. It's both mesmerising and terrifying. The terrifying part is amplified when I notice that Lola and Boba
aren't going to make it! They're coming up ever so slightly short.
"No!" Is all I can say before they extend their extra long tongues out, sticking them to the cliff side. They swing down and crash into
the rocks, it looks very painful. Soon we land on the other side with a noticeable impact, in stark contrast to Shen gracefully landing from his flight. I quickly get off Howletts back and rush to the cliff side. I look over to see if the other 2 are ok. I let out a sigh of relief as I see them easily climbing up the side, their fingertips clinging to the wall.
"Shen! You are an unbelievable jackass!" Lola yells once they both make it up. I immediately start healing them. Shen doesn't respond to
her insult, instead looking out into the distance, surveying the city.
"Where would they hide them?" He asks himself. He appears stuck in deep thought, his long green hair waving in the wind. It makes me think that Howlett should grow his hair out, it would make his poses look a lot
cooler. I'm snapped out of my thoughts by someone tugging on the tip of my horn,
sending a very weird sensation through my body. I jump in place to get them off and cover my horns with my hair again.
"What the fire truck?!" I yell out. Boba is staring at me on his knees with one hand out, practically screaming that he's the one who did it. He actually looks a little regretful, or at least as regretful as either of those 2 can look.
"Sorry dude. I just noticed you had those and wanted to feel em." He explains while standing up. I immediately lose the energy I had before.
"You could have at least asked." I mutter.
"Want me to break his kneecaps?" Allister asks as casually as offering a drink. I just give a subtle elbow to my bag because why would that be the first response?!
"Y'know, it is weird that I've only now noticed you have horns." Howlett notes. That is kinda the idea. I don't want people staring at me all the time.
"Yes it's quite interesting now let's focus on the game." I say, trying to get things back on track.
"So like do they grow back if they break?" Gosh darn it Lola.
"Yes." I respond plainly.
"Do they taste like blueberries?" Gosh darn it Boba.
"No." I respond plainly.
"Have you ever killed anything with them?" Gosh darn it Howlett.
"Probably not." I respond plainly.
"Ooooohhhhhh." They all respond in unison. All these questions are really making me thankful that they don't know I'm Kaiju boy.
We'd never get anything done.
"If your all done with whatever this is, we're moving out." Shen cuts through the conversation with confidence. "I've been scouting the area with my feathers and I think I've found some of our targets. Given that
the instructor wasn't very thorough in her description I can't be sure until we see them but it's a good start." Well that's good. At least we have a lead. "I hope I don't have to be the only one pulling his weight here." Harsh but not entirely inaccurate. "Follow me." He turns around and starts to fly away towards the city. I quickly hop on Howletts back and we all follow after him, running and jumping great distances. A lot of people in the city look up at us in surprise. It's a little embarrassing.
"It's kinda funny how tame this is." I hear Lola say.
"What do you mean?" I ask.
"If the ranger force had it their way, this would be so much more brutal.".
"Then why didn't they?".
"Probably protests from guardians. The force isn't as powerful as they want you to think. In the government, they're basically the construction companies bitch." She responds with a smirk. Huh. I never knew
that. I don't really keep up with politics I'll admit.
"We're here!" Shen announced. It's a park. Finely cut green grass stretching far into the distance, all sorts of people walking around,
having picnics and playing. This is nice. "Alright, the object should be somewhere around here. Fan out and search for anything with an orange stripe on it." He orders before he walks away.
"If we find 1, would you be able to pick up the scent of the others?" I ask Howlett. I'm not sure if his ability works like that but it's worth a shot right?
"Yeah I think so. It really depends on how similar the objects are." Howlett responds after a moment of contemplation.
"I think I found something!" Boba calls out. We all walk over and see that he's standing over an old couple having a picnic. "Just give
it to me you old hag!" Boba yells down at the old lady. Classy.
"Leave us alone you ruffian!" I look past Boba and see that the old lady is holding a walking stick, but what really caught my attention was
that the stick had an orange stripe on it. Jackpot! Wait a moment. Is this actually part of the game? Or are we just harassing an old couple? Oh geez. Oh no. We're horrible people! I'm gonna be thrown in jail! "If you take my walking stick I won't be able to walk!" Wait a second.
"Sorry to interrupt." I interject while staring at the ground. I place my hands in front of the old lady and activate heal. The pink aura emanating out from my palms towards her. It takes a moment but eventually it's finished. "There, that should have sorted out any walking troubles for the time being." I say between tired breaths. "I should warn you that this isn't permanent, my ability can't reverse long term ailments so I'd advise a trip to the hospital when you can." I'm not quite sure if she's listening as she's back on her feet with a shocked look. After a few minutes of gratitude that I kinda tuned out because my social battery is running low, the old couple gave me the walking stick.
"Good job man!" Howlett gives me a smack on the back.
"Uh, thanks." I respond shyly.
"Although I do wonder, if you can do that, why not work at a hospital?".
"I mean, I tried about a year ago for volunteer work. It didn't really work out though. My powers are less effective the longer an injury has been around. Adding to that is that every heal drains my stamina and more stamina is drained the more extreme the injury. It was just quite inefficient." That's right, even in a literal hospital my ability is useless.
"Well, still pretty manly of you to try. Plus, I bet your patients felt like a million bucks!" I'm not sure what being money feels like but sure.
"Excellent. Now hold onto that while I send out my feathers." Shen orders as several feathers start to fly into the distance. I offer up the walking stick to Howlett as he begins to transform into his beast form. It's quite intense seeing it from close up, tissue and bones growing over his uniform before being covered in black fur. The only piece of clothing left on him was his leather jacket. He's now standing at 10 feet tall, about the
same height as Raven. While others have said he looks like a werewolf, I think he looks more like a werewolverine. He started sniffing the walking stick, particularly the orange stripe quite enthusiastically. "What are you doing?" Shen asks.
"Oh, um. We're trying to see if Howlett can track the scent of the other objects." I explain bashfully.
"That seems unnecessary. I've already sent out my feathers." Shen says with arms crossed.
"I mean, if we both do it, what difference does it make?" I ask a bit confused.
"The difference is that I'm already using a much more efficient method. Your just wasting your time." Shen's wings start to extend outwards as he explains this.
"I guess so." I start to lower the stick.
"Stop being a jackass." Lola interrupts. She and her brother walk up and get right into Shen's face.
"Excuse me?" Shen asks clearly offended.
"Ever since this game started you've been a colossal jackass." They sure are using that word a lot now.
" I've been acting like a LEADER." Shen is clearly holding back some anger. I'm trying to silently message to the siblings to STOP.
"All you've been doing is stressing everyone out because you can't handle the idea that you might lose!".
"I will not lose!" Shen finally explodes with anger. I jump back because OH BOY! "I will give it my all! I will crush Lilith! And I won't
let you get in my way!" Both the siblings start to take steps back because it does seem like he's really going to attack them. Howlett starts to growl as he gets ready to protect them.
"Stop!" I yell out, causing everyone to stop what they were doing and look at me. "Shen, I may not know why you bully Lilith." He looks
confused when I say this but I keep going. "But I don't have the same problem with her. Or anyone else in our class for that matter. But still, I want to win this just as much as you do. So get that stick out of your ass!" He looks genuinely shocked at this.
"Um, right. Yes, I'm sorry. I've been acting unacceptably for someone of my rank." He says as he places a hand to his forehead. It was at this point that I realised my outburst. Did I actually say that out loud?
"Uh, I mean, that's good! I'm really sorry!" I blurt out while staring at the ground.
"It's fine. I'm the 1 at fault here." He says while
recalling some of his feathers.
"Yeah no shit." Everyone else said in unison, even Allister. Seems a little rude but whatever.
"So this has been a delightful moment of introspection, but I've got the scent." Howlett lets us know. That's amazing! This is gonna be a piece of cake!
"This is gonna be the opposite of a piece of cake." Boba dryly remarks as we all stare at the construction site. The quiet hum of modern construction equipment flowing in the air.
"And your sure the scent leads here?" I ask Howlett from the top of his back. I imagine I look quite interesting riding on the back of a
giant werewolverine wearing a leather jacket.
"Yes. My MANLY intuition is telling me this is the place." I'm not sure what MANLY intuition is but if it helps I guess. Would be a little nicer if this place wasn't so cluttered and busy. Howlett takes a few more sniffs and then points his nose upwards. "It's at the top of the steel frame!" He announces to us. Looking up it's hard to make out what he's pointing at because of the sun in the sky. But eventually we all see it, an orange ribbon tied to the top left corner of the structure, the furthest away from us.
"You can sniff me any time big boy." Boba practically purred. Wait a second. WHAT?!
"Well this shouldn't be too difficult." Shen remarks nonchalantly as he unveils his wings. I can't be the only person who heard that.
"My thoughts exactly." A familiar voice calls from our left. We all turned to see who it is and are half surprised and half terrified to see the familiar tiny fluttering wings of Lilith. She was floating towards us while being followed by her group. They consisted of her friends so that's pretty nice for her I bet. The most notable aside from her was Misty, her 9 tails swaying slowly back and forth. They looked friendly enough but it was clear that we were still opponents. I've never really faced Lilith or Misty before. Is this intense pressure normal? I feel like I can't breath. "Haruo! It's so good to see you!" She waves as she starts to get closer. Would it be rude if I didn't wave? I mean this is a competition. She wouldn't take it seriously would she? Or is this the type of etiquette that transcends competition? I don't know what to do!
"Go!" Shen suddenly calls out as our group dashes towards the ribbon. I hold on as hard as I can as we manoeuvre to avoid the workers, who respond with era appropriate street slang. It's at times like this that I wish I could transform. It would make all this so much more convenient.
"Come on! You can't lose to that ugly bug!"Allister aggressively yells from the bag. Wait, what does he mean ugly? Also, is now really the time?! "If you can't win this then how can you face lord star fall?!" He's right! Louhi trusted me with that! I'll use this as another obstacle to overcome!
"Can I just say that you look really funny like that." Lilith says from right next to me. Wait a minute. Oh geez!
"Lilith!" Shen roared as he tried to hit her with a flying kick. Unfortunately hitting a target that small is a lot harder than it looks and he misses. "Go!" He yells at us before sending a swarm of feathers flying towards Lilith. She responds with a series of massive stingers that emerge from her back. Unfortunately I don't get to see how that goes as Howlett is busy dodging Lilith and Misty's 3 other friends. The bunny eared 1 proving to be particularly agile. Thankfully he's mostly able to avoid all 3 girls. My attention is then drawn to Lola and Bobas 'fight' with Misty. They're not landing a single hit on her. She just dodges everything while they all climb the steel pillars with inhuman acrobatics. Even their invisibility can't help. Most impressive I think is that she's expertly avoiding damage to any workers of equipment. All her fire attacks are so well controlled, just small streams from her hands that fizzle out quickly.
"Argh!" Howlett yelps as he stops in mid air in his attempt to leap to the top. I'm sent flying from the momentum and hit the top steel
beam, probably bruising my side. Luckily I'm able to grab hold and pull myself up. Construction workers have training, harnesses and magnetic boots to deal with the winds and narrow beam. I have a cat and a wand. Can't really use either of those right now. Just be very still and steady. I slowly look down and see that Shen has got Howletts head and arms pinned down with his wings. I guess Lilith will mind control people for the competition, or she offered him a burger. Would've worked on me. On Another platform, Misty was holding the chameleon siblings by their throats. I feel like this is getting a little excessive.
"And with that, it's just you." Lilith said as she flew up in front of me. She's right. This is really bad! "Meanwhile, I have so many friends!" She dramatically announces as she throws her arms out wide. It's only then that I realise that none of the construction workers are moving, they're all just staring at me. I can't believe it. It's not possible. She knows
everyone here?! No way!
"I-I'm going to get that ribbon." I let out through my quivering voice. For her part Lilith just looked amused.
"Of course of course. You don't need to feel bad for losing you know. I'm objectively the best after all. But this still a rare opportunity." She gives a warm smile as she comes closer.
"Stop playing with your food!" Misty yells from down below. Lilith doesn't seem to hear her.
"Go for her throat!" Allister angrily yells from the bag. The sudden motion almost knocks me off. But before I fall I feel an invisible thread wrap around my wrist and pull me back to my feet. Looking closer I can see a slight gold tint on the string.
"Are you ok?!" Lilith flies up to my face with a worried look on her face. "You have to be more careful you dummy! You could have been seriously hurt!" She scolds me with her hands on her hips. She's really nice.
"Thank you." I manage to get out through heavy breaths. "Lilith, there's something I want to confess." I tell her once I gain my composure back. Her face turns pink when I say this. Oh no, does she have a cold? I'll have to ask once we finish. Regardless, I ignore my fear and run as fast as I can past Lilith.
"Eh?" Is all she can say.
"I still haven't given up!" I announce as I grab the ribbon and pull it off the structure, claiming it for our team. "I did it!" I cheer, adrenaline still rushing through my brain. After that though things went downhill somewhat. I had no way to release Shen from Lilith's control. Maybe I could with the wand but I'll admit I'm not sure. Their team had also already collected 5 ribbons so we hadn't actually won. But as Liliths team was being announced as the winners, we didn't feel bad. We felt proud. We went head to head with the number 1 and 3 and we took that ribbon. And if nothing else, that means something.