In the Willows

Chapter Thirty-Seven: Carpe Diem Baby

Kai's POV:

You rub your leg trying to keep your nerves down. A battle is coming, a small skirmish maybe, but something you haven't experienced yet. Not that you know of at least.

"Kai, you remember anything from your past?" asks Alec.

You pause contemplating on if you should divulge the figure you've been seeing, "Not anything from my past, but I keep seeing a figure."

"A figure?" says Emory.

You nod.

"Just a figure?" asks Alec.

"It reminds me of someone, but it looks like Emory."

"Looks like me?"

You nod scratching the back of your head, "Yeah."

Emory looks shocked and a little uncomfortable.

'Great.' you say to yourself.

Alec brings the vehicle to a stop, "Alright, this is our stop. We walk from here."

You grab your weapons and exit the vehicle behind Emory. You're in a small camp next to a couple grain silos. Tyler and his squad are waiting for us.

"Where's team three?" asks Alec.

"They've already pushed up to do some recon." says Tyler, "They've held their position so far and kept quiet since."

"They see anything?"

"Just a few New Salem, looks like they're Gluttony soldiers."

"That's great." Alec says with a sigh.

"Is that bad?" you ask.

"Well, just don't get to close to them. They won't be able to take a chunk out of you." he responds.

"Excuse me?"

"We need to move. I'll take my team and push left, you go right and try to link up with team three." says Tyler.

"Sounds good." says Alec, "Comm channel three still work?"

"Yeah stick to that one for now. Try to stay low, it's open space till the airport."

Alec leads you and Emory out into the grass cutting right to the airport. Tyler was right, its open space with a few broken down vehicles and farms as cover and concealment.

"So about this figure you're seeing, how exactly does it look like me? My hair?" asks Emory.

"Your eyes are different. Maybe I've seen you before- "

"I haven't seen you ever in my life." she cuts in rather coldly.

"Right, just forget about it."

You stop at a broken-down truck and Alec pulls out his binoculars.

"Oh shit." says Alec.

"What's wrong?" asks Emory.

"Team three is in there. This is bad."

The female figure appears in front of you and grabs your hand. You're retched forward as the truck you were behind is smashed in with a giant axe. If you haven't moved, you would've been decapitated at minimum. A large grotesque man-beast jumps onto the car and tries to pull out the axe. He has multiple shiny golden spikes protruding out of his skin, and a mouthful of razor-sharp teeth.

"You die today." the man-beast snarls.

Multiple Gluttony solders come around the truck and attack your squad. Emory pulls out her katana and cuts into her foes with ease. Alec stabs a couple with his spear. You pull out your kukri as a Gluttony soldier charges you.

It goes to bite you and you block it with the blade. You fall to the ground with the thing still trying to get a snack out of you. It growls at you as you flip it onto its back and push down on the blade, cutting down into its mouth. Blood spurts out onto your hands and face.

Left

You roll left as the man-beast slams his axe into the gluttony soldier you were just on. You pull out your pistol and unload into the man-beast. The man-beast grunts and falls to his knee as you run dry on your pistol.

Right

You dodge right as the man beast thrusts a large cleaver at you. You raise your kukri up and slam it into the man-beast's head. The man-beast twitches and falls over.

"Everyone good?" asks Alec.

"Good here." says Emory wiping her katana off on a Gluttony soldier.

"Kai?"

You reload your pistol and fire into the man-beast a few more times.

"Yeah, yeah I'm good."

"I assume that's not your blood."

You attempt to rub the blood off your face, "No, no it isn't."

You grab the kukri and pull it out of the man-beast. As you hear the wet sound of the blade dislodging from the man-beast's head, the man-beast reaches for you one last time. You jump back and Emory sends her blade into the man beast's head, finally ending the fight.

"Jesus christ." you say.

"That's a Gluttony lieutenant. They've gotten a lot bigger last we saw them." says Emory, "You ok?"

You sigh leaning on a broken-down car. The adrenaline from the fight is crashing out of your body. Your hands shake and you become lightheaded.

"That was my first real fight." you finally say.

"Doesn't look like it was." says Alec. "Maybe you've done it plenty of times before."

"Maybe."

"C'mon, team two is probably waiting on us." says Emory walking towards the airport.

'The figure saved my life, twice. Just who the hell are you? Why are you helping me?' 

You look down at your shaking hands thinking to yourself, who exactly are you? You should've died back there, but your body reacted on its own and the figure came to save your life once again.

"Kai, we have to keep moving. Carpe diem and all that jazz." says Alec.

"I'm coming." you say catching up to your team.