The Shadows In The Dark

Chapter Nine

"Arrrgghh!"

Vex cried out for the 10th time as another of Victor's pellets made its way into his neck. Even though he was running, jumping, and dodging like he was on the battlefield, the young human managed to hit him time after time. 

It was starting to piss him off.

Raising his clawed hand, he unleashed a stream of ammo at his opponent. The boy set himself into a fast sprint, avoiding his shots and returning fire with his magnum. Even while sprinting, he still managed to hit Vex.

So far, Vex had caught Victor in a short stream of fire with his SMG while Victor had caught him 8 times with his magnum and twice with his sniper. It's not that Vex was bad with a gun. He used to be the best in his unit in the Covenant. It was just that Victor was a demon (a very annoying demon) with any sort of firearm in his hands. The Sangheili could beat Victor in a melee fight in any situation, but he was screwed in any sort of long-range combat with the boy.

Throwing a look over at Theo, Vex was surprised to see that he was actually turned away from the two combatants. He was looking down at a datapad in his hands, his face blank as he read something. His mind was quickly brought back to the demon boy as another hard pellet connected with his left arm.

Weighing his options inside of his head, Vex decided that his current strategy wasn't working. He needed to be more aggressive. Compared to the boy, his pain tolerance and stamina was much greater. Even after all of the hits he'd taken, if he could get a few solid shots on Victor, he could still win. 

Stopping his forward momentum in three steps, he threw his body towards Victor. He quickly gained speed, and ignored the pellets that peppered his body. After releasing more than 10 shots on the large alien, Victor decided that whatever Vex had planned was worth the constant fire. In other words... he needed to move.

Sprinting away from Vex, Victor realized what his partner had in mind. Getting hit by just a few of those hard pellets had left marks that would surely turn into bruises. Unlike his counterpart, Victor didn't have the pain tolerance to tank massive amounts of hits. If Vex got close enough to unleash his gun with no chance of missing, it was over. 

Now Victor knew what Vex was doing. The problem was that he didn't know how to stop him. Vex was faster than him, and they both knew that. If Victor kept running, Vex would eventually catch up to him and get his revenge for all the shots Victor had poured into him. If he stopped and shot at Vex as many times as he could, he would still be in the same position due to his friends pain tolerance.

Victor could only think of one way to win the fight. It wasn't cheating per say, just...strategic planning.

Tilting his body to the side, he arced across the floor to a place perpendicular to where he started. Vex quickly made progress towards him, raising his SMG to catch the boy in a spray of fire. As soon as he did, however, Victor dropped to the floor. Vex's confusion quickly turned to aggravation as he could now see Theo 20 feet directly in front of him, behind where Victor had dropped down. 

"You little-"

The choice words that were about to fly out of Vex's mouth were cut off as the cuff on his arm whirred and crackled with electricity. The arcs of energy ran through his body, dropping him to the floor in a matter of seconds. Victor quickly raised himself up and ran to his downed friend, aiming his sniper rifle and magnum directly at the Sangheilis head. 

"What was that? I didn't hear you."

He stood triumphantly over the alien, a large smile on his face. 

"Good job, Victor! Oh, I'm so proud of you!"

Victor jumped as a loud voice rang behind him when a pair of arms was thrown around his body. The small man embracing him was jumping up and down, which was very awkward for Victor. He detached himself from Theo and turned around to face him.