No Name

Chapter 12 - XII

Authors Note: Sorry about posting on a Saturday, don't forget to comment if you have any questions about anything and thanks for reading this far!

"Watch it!" Holly ducked back down as the bullet dug into her cover, sending tiny shards of rock everywhere. "Cut it out! We can talk about this!" All the response they gave was another bullet. "Lysander, who are they?" The old man shook his head in wonder. "People live here?" Holly risked a peek over the top of her cover. From what she could see, their attackers were roughly humanoid. They had cut them off in the pass, directly in the middle of a bottleneck. They had a few scarce boulders for cover, but if they tried to run, their backs would have massive bulls eyes painted on them. In blood and lead, that is. "Damn!" Holly yelled as a bullet whistled passed her ear. "Sniper!" she confirmed. Lysander stepped out of cover. Holly cried out as bullets flew towards the old man, but he telekinetically brushed them aside and raised his hand, a bolt of green energy flying across no-man's land like lighting, smashing into the enemy's position. The smell of ozone filled the air, and there were yells from the other side as they were blinded by the huge flash and explosion. Holly stepped out of cover, fired twice, and then barely scrambled back to safety before bullets began to pepper her boulder, slowly chipping away at her cover. From the original state of the boulder, Holly guessed this had happened many times before. "Elizabeth! Cover me!" Holly yelled, and the two girls stepped out of cover, Elizabeth emptying her clip into the enemy cover, while Holly took clear precise shots. She managed to drop two of the- bang! Holly ducked down, heart trying to beat out of her chest. That was almost the end of me. "We need a way out of this!" Holly said. "Any suggestions?" Lysander shook his head. "If we go one by one, maybe I can shield each of you. But I doubt I can do it for all of us." Holly shook her head. "Not an option." The old man nodded; seemingly relived he wouldn't have to leave anyone behind. This was going to require some seriously creative thinking.
Left. "Left?" Left. I'm the voice in your head, Matt. Don't question me. "Left. Sure." Matt turned left, and hiked up the pass, the sun setting behind him as he climbed. Suddenly, Matt heard the sounds of gunfire. "You're kidding me, right?" Nope. "I leave for three seconds, and they get themselves into a full blown firefight?!" Yep. "Why am I not surprised?" Matt rounded the corner, and realised he had come out on a ridge overlooking the fight. The three were badly outgunned and outnumbered, and were stuck in a horrible bottleneck. "Damn." Matt said, looking at the bottleneck. "You could defend that with three old ladies wielding brooms." The Bounty hunter ducked down, and moved along the ridge towards the bad guys, the path becoming little more than a few barely feasible handholds and mere suggestion of a goat trail. The things I do for these people. Matt thought, and peeked over the edge, and saw that he was now behind the shooters. "What are they?!" Matt asked, shocked. I'll get to that later. But this is on you. I'm out. Good luck!

Holly tried desperately to think of a way out. Nothing came to her. The enemy could keep them staved off with a few mere shots, whilst they could barely fire without getting their heads taken off. They would need a miracle. More than a miracle- "Damnit." Elizabeth sighed. "What?" then Holly saw the silhouette outlined behind the enemy position. "Is that?" the figure suddenly raised a rifle. "It is."

Matt took careful aim, and then cleared his throat. "*Ahem*" one of the shooters turned around. "Stay away from my forced acquaintances. If anyone's gonna kill them, it's going to be me." Then, he shot it in the face. Matt rushed down the hill, firing as he went, every shot taking one of the creatures down, Geoffrey sprinting into the fray and leaping upon one of the things, pushing it to the ground. They began turning, realising that they were being flanked. Matt sprinted forward, switching weapons on the fly, grabbing his pistol and combat knife. "Come on!" Holly yelled, and she Elizabeth and Lysander bolted forward. Matt rushed forward, went low, then high, and caught the being with a precise kick, sending it flying into a boulder, turning, and unloading a shot directly into the head of one of his compatriots, sending blood everywhere. Matt did a fast turn, dodging the butt of a rifle, and pistol whipped his attacker, spun, shot another at point blank, and drove the point of his knife into another's throat as it tried to blind side him. The Bounty Hunter turned, and ducked under a punch, Geoffrey flying past him as he engaged another attacker. Matt blocked the next attack with his forearm, stepped inside the punch, and flipped the surprised being onto the ground. Just as the things seemed to be recovering from the surprise attack, Holly and Elizabeth leapt into the fray, Lysander playing out the role of a flash bang, blinding numerous enemies at once with blasts of green light. Matt caught a glimpse of Holly and Elizabeth as they began decimating the remaining forces, the bounty hunter a whirling force of destruction and violence. Then, Matt saw the sniper. It was zeroed in on Holly. He rushed forward, rolling out of the way of a frantic swing. Matt realised he could never reach the sniper in time and in an instant raised his pistol, took careful aim and- smash. Matt was knocked to the ground as the thing lashed out with a fist. Bang. The sniper fired, and there was a yell of shock from the other side of the small warzone. "damn." Matt said out loud, rolling out of the way as the alien being tried to shoot him, Matt rising up and knocking it cold with the butt of his pistol. He began methodically destroying the remaining members of the squad, anger fuelling him. Failed. One shot, and you missed. You never miss. You messed up, Matt. The Bounty hunter dislocated the shoulder of an opponent, barely putting any thought into the move, his brain going on auto pilot. He didn't have to look to see Holly's body, blood pooling around her. He saw it in his mind's eye. He drew his knife out of a throat, and realised he had killed every remaining soldier. He didn't pay any heed to their long, elongated limbs or strange mouths with mandibles, and crossed the ground to where Holly lay. Lysander and Elizabeth were on their knees beside her. "Well damn." Matt said, looking down at her. "There goes my pay check." Suddenly, Holly sat up, groaning. "Polite, Matt." The bounty hunter raised an eyebrow. "Want to let me know how you survived that?" he asked, helping her to her feet. "This T-Shirt is a Kevlar vest." She said motioning to the Hello Kitty shirt she was wearing. "Shouldn't the bullet still cause massive bruising?" Holly nodded. "Lysander healed those in a few seconds though. By the way, you're covered in blood." Matt looked down at himself. "Wow. That's impressive, even for me." She nodded. "And also, if you ever call me a pay check again, I'll kick you into next week." Matt grinned. "For one thing, it's my job. And for a second, Good luck with that." Holly gave him an evil grin. "I'm sure I could find a way." Matt began cleaning up. "Oh... Why did you come back?" Matt thought on that. "It's one hell of a pay check." He said. Holly nodded, seeing that the case was closed. "So, any idea what these things are?" Holly asked, looking at one of their fallen adversaries. They had long legs and arms, and roughly human faces apart from the large mandibles covering the mouth, and strange slits that angled down towards the mouth that served for eyelids. When they were open, the eyes were quite large, only a tiny portion of them visible. But Matt knew that somehow they had great peripheral vision, as the leader had managed to see Matt when he was nearly directly behind it. The body was only slightly larger in width than a man's, but the creatures stood a few centimetres over a grown man's head by Matt's estimate. They were strong, the one punch Matt had let slip in had already turned a section of his arm a violent purple, and Matt guessed they could do massive damage if a punch was taken straight on. They were definitely intelligent, as they had realised the huge potential of the bottleneck. What really puzzled Matt was how the creatures had never been found or reported by anyone. After all, Expeditions often used the various passes to get into the inner ring. Then again, they barely ever came back, and were often raving mad if they did. Even more strange, was the fact that the beings wearing altered human military cammo and bearing human weaponry. "I don't want to know." Elizabeth said, visibly shaking as she put her gun away. "Well." Matt said, looking around and doing his best to comb blood out of his hair. "Back to walking!" Elizabeth sighed, colour returning to her face. "You have this incredible way of sucking all the joy out of life." Matt grinned "And I get paid for it!" Elizabeth gave him a genuine smile, and Lysander led the way through the pass.