Steady Ground | ✔

15 | Mom 2.0

"Atlas!" Ashe didn't step out any further, staying grounded in Alaska with one boot planted firmly on permafrost doused in two inches of water. She blinked a few times before she rapidly shook her head and ripped off a strip of tape from her arm. "Quick!"

It took him long moments before he acknowledged what was happening. This easily? And Chaos knew?

"I don't know where Arrone is," he said quickly, pressing a palm against the solid side of the oil slick. That was such a confusing sensory not unlike what he's seen in this world so far—his hand could grasp it like the frame of a door, and yet when he looked his skin touched nothing but glittering air.

"We'll come back." She ripped off another piece of tape.

Now he knew what she was doing. She was bursting the seductive bubble of the oil slick's Siren call with each rip of a bandage.

You don't really think that, do you?

Chaos' booming laugh made the ground shudder beneath his feet. Atlas scrambled for the edge of the shimmer to keep himself upright, his boots sliding on the skin under him.

Better look behind you.

And then came the most deep, rumbling growl he'd ever heard.

Ashe screamed and ducked, her body disappearing back through the portal. He saw a glint of light before something fast and nimble leaped into his chest.

The beast impacted like a hundred pound stone. It launched him eight feet from the oil slick and his body skidded even further. He crumpled onto the ground wide-eyed, gasping from the pain blooming in his ribs.

Atlas watched as the rest of them quickly met the same fate, creations of tangled, rusted iron standing over all three of them with heavy paw-like features pinning even Grayson's large form to the ground.

They looked eerily similar to Cerberus, just more dog-like, and far, far more agile.

He squirmed beneath its weight, kicking its hind legs and underbelly with all of his strength.

Somewhere behind him, he heard slow, heavy footsteps accompanied by the rattle of what his imagination could only fathom as steel-plated armor. He could hardly hear it over the frantic banging of his boots and his ragged breath, but it was enough to fill him with more vigor, because he didn't want whatever that thing was to get any closer.

Finally, he heard a solid crunching sound as the heel of his boot made contact with a thinner strip of iron. Somehow, the now-foot-shaped indent gave him the leverage he needed. He dug into the ground with his shoulders, and with an arching back and every ounce of strength in him, he managed to thrust the dog away.

Gasping for breath, he scrambled to his feet only to see Grayson had beaten him to it. The larger man stood above Dizzee, an elbow hooked around the third beast's neck. With a grunt, he yanked it back from his partner's body and kicked it away.

Somehow, he was surprised he could even move. That either of them could. Despite the bruise and ache in his body, he didn't feel like it was immobilizing.

Atlas backed up. He needed to stay as close to the two rescue workers as he could. They had already been separated and the three metal creatures stood between them and their only chance of escape.

Unfortunately, that put him in the position to see what had made the rattling of an armed knight. And unsurprisingly, it was the familiar, massive biped form of Cerberus.

His blood ran cold when he saw what it was carrying on its shoulder.

His mother smiled when she caught his eye. There was a new glint in her hazel gaze, and a smug smile on her face. He was forced to see her in full, Cerberus' shadow dropping over them, metal glinting in the white-gray lights from the movie film above their heads.