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Act 2: The Spreading Darkness

Chapter 5: The Hellions

"Damn." I said again; still somewhat shocked.

Then Ed slapped me upside the head and reminded me that I had a job to do and some Cursed to halt.

Tearing my eyes away from the young cub, I lifted by pistol once again and continued to unleash the hounds of bullet Hell upon the amalgamation of bodies now laying in front of the building. Sure, I was firing shots into a pile of corpses, but if you took the time to actually look at the pile, a close look mind you, you could see that it was moving and shifting and trying to fucking attack still. Being right in the mountain's face, all I had was a close look; a REALLY close look. I didn't want to take any chances, so I unloaded, loaded, and unloaded my gun; over and over again into the mound of former people. They screamed and howled when shot sometimes, evidence that however horrific and grim the act was, there was still a good reason to be shooting.

And there was still good reason to further hate myself.

"There aren't many over here anymore!" shouted Roger as he smacked one of the last few Cursed on his end of the room in the head with his club; indenting the poor victim's skull and sending them sprawling to the floor. "I think Mikey got most of 'em!"

"It only seems logical that they would have all been burnt to cinders in that blast of holy fire." added Maylene coolly. "Afraid and uncertain of himself as he is, his flames are not know to leave much behind; besides ashes of course."

"That's comforting!" I yelled; half smirking. "Remind me to tell him not to sneeze in my general direction!"

"Duly noted." retorted the Riolu humorlessly.

Rolling my eyes at how much of a robot the little girl was, often completely devoid of emotion, I reloaded my Desert Eagle and prepared to open fire once again, but stopped cold in my tracks when something amazing happened. Nothing. Nothing happened; not a budge or a sound from anywhere in or around the building. Squinting warily, I turned to Ed and shook my head, prompting the large turtle to nod his. Though we hadn't voiced our opinions, we both knew what each other was thinking; we both knew that something, whatever it was, was amiss.

Why the Hell is something always amiss?

"Too good to be true?" growled Ed; suspicion filling his eyes.

"Definitely." I answered. Oh, most definitely.

With a soft but quite audible growl, somewhat unbecoming of her, Maylene added, "Agreed."

Turning to face her, I quickly questioned, "Someone's out there, aren't they; someone's waiting for us?"

"Indeed, though I doubt that they shall wait for much longer and indulge us in the luxury of formulating a strategy." replied the blue canine as she slowly stood up from her meditative position. "And there is no more need for shields, as I am certain that I could not hold this creature at bay."

"Then we're just gonna have to fight them, aren't we?" I smirked casually as I slid another clip into my gun.

"...M-more... f-fighting?" huffed and puffed Mikey as he pulled himself up off of his knee and tried his hardest to stand.

Twirling his club with one hand, Roger thumped one fist to his chest in defiance and exclaimed, "I'll take on all challengers! I didn't train to become the strongest for nothing!"

Upon hearing that, Ed snorted and held back a laugh; clearly filled with confidence.

"You hear that, motherfucker?" I said with a merry grin as I looked to the body-littered doorway; hooking my thumb, pointing towards the riled and ready Cubone. "We've got this guy on our side, so you're really fucked now."

And don't I just always seem to say the wrong things at the wrong time? Well, if you thought otherwise before, then now would really be the right time to start doubting my verbal social skills. After all, when the only reply you merit is a bloodcurdling, deafening roar, you should probably shut the Hell up.

"I... will... not... die...!" boomed an enormous voice from outside; each word elongated and stretched to twice their original length. The massive vocal explosion that ravaged our ears was soon followed a terrible crunching sound and the lightning fast web of cracks that appeared all along one of the terminal's solid concrete walls.

Gripping my mini-cannon with both hands, I nervously sneered, "I'll never taunt a monster again, I swear."

Yeah, foolish me; thinking that I could take on a creature that a little girl deemed frightening, right? Right; fucking right. Because what came crashing through the concrete and cement walls mere seconds later wasn't something that a child alone would be afraid of; no no no. It was something that I'd most certainly have hauled ass away from at full speed had I been given the chance to do so. Sadly, I hadn't been given the chance, as per the usual, and I was instead forced to stare directly into the maddened eyes of a pure abomination.

"That would happen." I hissed silently to myself as I eyed the creature; its four gargantuan arms assisting it as it dug itself out from under the rubble of what was formerly a reasonably solid wall.

Walls these days; they're just not what they used to be.

Clearly a Machamp at one point in time, though not quite anymore; its skin had turned jet black and an actual aura of blackish flames radiated evilly around it, glowing with some kind of mysterious anti-light that absorbed all of the sunshine and luminous fluorescence shinning in its general vicinity. What this resulted in looked something similar to a detached, walking shadow; the features of the man beneath the thick black mist being far too nebulous and muddy to properly describe. Roughly eight feet tall and 300 pounds of pure muscle, the standard for the mighty Machamp Clan, the creature carried himself with a disturbing sense of purpose as he lurched towards us; that purpose being our annihilation of course.

"I... will... never... die...!" roared the crazed creature as it swung two lumbering arms in my general direction. "He... promised... me... immortality...!"

Jumping aside and rolling to a halt, I sprang to my feet and unloaded three rounds into what looked like the monster's head. Long story short, either it had no brains to blow away or I missed completely, because it just turned angrily around after pulling its hands out of the ruined linoleum floor and made haste with trying to smash me again.

That's when you know you're screwed; when you shoot something in the head and it gets pissed instead of getting dead.

"What the Hell is this thing?!" barked Ed hurriedly as he hefted his shotgun and unleashed a devastating spray. "You just shot it in the head, didn't you?!"

Dodging yet another pair of man-sized fists, I replied, "I thought I did, but I guess my aim just isn't quite what it used to be!"

"No, you hit the son-of-a-bitch right in the head!" shouted the cerulean-shelled reptile as he opened fire again. "And I think I did too; with a shotgun no less!"

"Then what are we supposed to do?!" I exclaimed frantically; circling around to the beast's other side. "He has telephone poles for arms! He's gonna smash us to bits eventually; little bloody bits!"

"I think not." said Maylene in a melancholy tone. "Aura Sphere!"

Appearing from absolutely nowhere, the small child thrust her palms forward and then launched a glowing sphere of some kind towards the rampaging creature. The ball of energy slammed into the Machamp like a speeding freight train and sent the titan sprawling violently to the floor; its four arms and two legs flailing chaotically as it crashed into yet another wall. Maylene then assumed a crane stance and closed her eyes; her expression neither boastful nor superior. And as the monster stood back up, the tiny warrior sprang high into the air and delivered a devastating missile dropkick directly to its nebulous cloud of a head. Seeing as how bullets had no prior effect, a physical attack like a kick, however masterfully performed, seemed doomed to inevitable failure as well. And as often, my expectations were miles and miles away from correct; the powerful attack touching down with the intensity of a wrecking ball with an attached rocket engine.

"Holy shit." muttered Ed and I at the same time as Maylene bounced back off of her target and landed ten feet away; all with more grace and beauty than an entire ballet dancing squad could have managed.

"This creature is one of the greater-demons that the prophet foretold us of." explained Maylene as she assumed yet another stance; the form and style unknown and alien to me. "Before you arrived, we were warned of such monsters; creatures emanating foul and malevolent auras. Born from souls either too black and tainted to be saved or from the souls of those who attempted to resist the curse and were broken to the point of excepting the terrrible insanity with open arms. He called them them 'Hellions'; living shadows, abominations to be avoided at all costs."

"You could have mentioned that earlier!" I shouted angrily.

Cocking her head to the side, the azure Riolu replied, "I apologize, as it did not occur to me."

"Fine, fine, whatever!" I spat with a wave of my hand; watching as the monstrous thing slowly pulled itself out of the wall it had collided with. "How do we fight them, that's what I want to know; how do we put them to bed for good? I just shot the shit out of that big bastard and failed more than miserably, but you kicked him in the teeth and put him straight through a wall. Is there something I'm missing here?"

"The prophet warned us that only our truest weapons could damage them." answered Maylene; pressing her index finger to her forehead. "I do suppose that there is much I should have explained."

"Yeah, no shit." I growled. "But now is really not the time to scold you, kid. Just elaborate on what 'our truest weapons' are, okay?"

But before the cub could get a word in edgewise, Mr. Big, Black, and Massive had found his footing again and was charging toward us like a ballistic projectile. Moving with all of the grace and elegance of a meteorite, he threw two balled fists at Ed from tens of feet away and missed by the width of far fewer hairs. The large tortoise sidestepped the attack, thrust a single foot forward, then slammed an open palm into the behemoth's back; a classic technique used to trip an opponent. Using the monster's immense forward momentum against it, Ed threw it into another unfortunate wall, sending more and more rumbles through what I assumed to be an unstable building at this point.

A lack of supporting walls tends to have that effect on a structure.

"No..., no..., no..., I... can't... lose...!" trumpeted the Machamp again. Staggering to its feet, it turned slowly and glared at Ed, its new prime target.

"I'm the biggest guy here." sneered Ed as he prepared for the giant thing to come back for a second helping. "And I've done my fair share of hand-to-hand combat. He's big and he's clumsy, so don't worry. I'll hold him off while you put together some kind of a plan; just don't take too long. He may be sloppy in his assaults, but he's not normal either; if he does get his hands on me you'll need a lot scotch tape and super glue and the original instructions when trying to reassemble me."

"You can't honestly believe you can hold that thing off on your own, can you?!" I yelled; pointing at the former-Machamp.

"Bonemerang!" shouted Roger suddenly as he launched his club at the monster; the bone spinning like a propeller as it struck the beast in the head and knocked it off balance once again. Then, like magic, the bone bounced off of the creature's thick skull and flew in a semi-circle, back into the hands of its owner. "Don't forget about me! He's not alone!"

At the same time, both Ed and I pivoted around and glared at the little boy. I wanted to yell at him, but I really had no place to do so. He did just knock the giant motherfucker down, right? So I thought, what the Hell, at least he attacking from afar.

"We've got this under control, dammit!" exclaimed the Chief gruffly. "Talk to the girl and figure something out while we've still got time to stall for time!"

"Yessir!" I replied hastily; turning my attention towards the little girl and her seeming endless wellspring of knowledge. "So, and answer my question quick, what do we need to do?"

"Your question itself is proof that you have not what is needed." retorted Maylene calmly as she stepped into the sunlight offered by a destroyed wall and thrust he palms into the air. "But you shall soon. So for now, allow those that already do to take part in this battle."

Watching as the huge beast blitzed Ed and Roger again and attempted to tackle them, I shouted, "Are you asking me to sit this one out?! Who do you think you are, my coach?!"

"No, I think I am saving your life." answered the Riolu; a touch of heated anger in her voice. "You are distracting me; please desist immediately."

Looking as though she were reaching up towards the sun, the young canine maintained this odd position and steadily began radiating a faint glow; a dim shine not unlike the light on a cloudy day. The lambent, lucent glow gradually became stronger and stronger, eventually sharpened and focused into a blinding pinpoint of light held between her two closed palms. Like a small star, it pulsed and burned and shimmered; the shinning energy growing more dense and dangerous by the passing seconds. And that's when it hit me; that's when I knew what she was doing. She was absorbing the sunlight, photosynthesizing it like a plant, and focusing it into an energy with which she could attack.

Now where the Hell did she learn to do that?

Somewhat frightened at this point, I held up my hands as a sign of surrender and said, "I'll shut up."

Lowering her hands to rest just below her shoulders, Maylene closed her palms even tighter; the light now forced to spill out through the gaps between her fingers. The power that hummed and crackled audibly between her paws weighed heavily against me, as though I weren't good enough to be in its presence, as though I weren't strong enough to exert my control over it as she did. Watching on like a spectator as Ed rolled to the side, narrowly avoiding a foot through his face, I got the distinct feeling that I was incredibly useless. Observing the battle like a piece of furniture as Roger jumped aside and dodged three fists only made me feel worse. Not that this was a surprising feeling, especially coming from a man who failed to notice his own wife's addiction to narcotics, but damn it all, wasn't I supposed to be some kind of fucking savior?! What use is a savior who can't save anyone?

"Fuck this." I growled as I planted one foot forward and strode towards the hulking creature.

What with Ed encompassing all of the monster's attention and seething anger, I clearly didn't register on its radar at all. And that's just fine by me, because I'm actually a fairly big fan of the surprise attack. So, with my fist balled and ready to break upon impact with the massive tower of muscle, I jumped up onto the huge bastard's back and held on for dear life. I held on because although he didn't see me coming, he certainly noticed my desperate attempt to punch him in the back of the head. Reacting in the way that only an enormous monster could, the Machamp began thrashing and flailing; ironically unable to reach me due to the over-sized thickness of his titanic arms.

"Alan, what the Hell are you doing?!" shouted Ed frantically. "I said I had the situation under control! Don't do something stupidly heroic and get yourself killed!"

I didn't say anything in return. All I did was tighten my grip, steel my resolve, and focus. I wanted to do something to help; I just didn't know what. There was nothing in my normally sizable bag of tricks that would work against a demon like this. He was just way too huge. So, with all other options exhausted, I tried to take the manly approach to the situation. I clenched a fist again, raised it towards the heavens, which I was cursing quite loudly in my mind by the way, and then sent it screaming towards the creature's head. It was probably the best punch I'd ever delivered, and that's without the shipping-and-handling charges, but the sheer force of it wasn't what impressed me. No; what came after the hit was really impressive.

"I... will... kill... you...!" bellowed the shadowy beast as he continued to thrash.

"Lay down and stay down!" I yelled as I planted my knuckles firmly into the back of the monster's skull.

The punch touched down like an 80's rock concert; bright lights flashing and blinding me briefly. A powerful surge of energy rushed trough me as I felt myself become weightless; all followed by the painful feeling of excess weight. With the light leaving my eyes, I looked up and saw Ed looking back down at me; his face contorted with several expressions all mixed together. He looked worried, he looked surprised, and he looked happy all at once. Lifting my head for a better view, I saw the shadowy form of the Machamp sprawled across the floor and took notice of just how far away he was. Did he finally manage to throw me? That would explain my brief feeling of weightlessness I'd just experienced and why Ed looked so glad to see me. I'm guessing that the big lummox caught me in time to save my ass from a long nap inside a grave.

"Don't tell me you're gonna cry." I smirked whilst still in a daze; almost prompting the Blastoise to drop me on the floor outright.

Yep, my mouth runs on autopilot.

"Tears of joy that you're finally out of my hair." replied the old turtle with a roll of his eyes.

Setting me down, he looked back towards the downed beast and scratched at his chin. I looked to Roger too, who's eyes were firmly affixed on me; his expression one of amazement. Something was wrong here, but I just couldn't put my finger on what. If I'd been thrown and bucked like a cowboy from his horse and nearly killed in the process, then why was our violent friend down on the floor too?

Rubbing at my head, which now hurt from crashing into Ed's fat ass, I questioned nervously, "What just happened?"

Which must have been the million dollar question, because upon asking it, all eyes in the room immediately shot to me and maintained on me. Creepy...

"You don't know what happened?" inquired the rattled police chief. "You were right in the middle of it, Alan. Hell, you were the CAUSE of it."

Scratching my head again, I replied, "I opened a can of whoop-ass? Are you sure?"

"Positive." answered Maylene; here hands still held tightly around a staggeringly powerful force that threatened to explode forth at any given instant. "When you attempted to assault the demon physically, you must have activated you hidden potential."

"Yeah, whatever happened over there, it was you that made it happen." added Ed quietly. "The moment you hit the thing in the back of its ugly dome, a blast of white lightning burst forth on contact and launched you straight across the room and into my arms. You're REALLY lucky that I was standing there, man, otherwise you'd be a pretty nasty stain on the wall behind me." Turning around and looking behind him, Ed laughed. "Or the lack thereof anyway. Stupid monsters and their stupid destruction; we're gonna run out of building to bunker down in at this rate."

"But you're serious?" I inquired again; still a little stunned and confused. "I zapped him? I did that?"

"Yes you did." stated Maylene coldly as she trotted lightly over towards the massive body that laid limply on the tiled floor. "And I shall be the one to send him off to the promised land."

And as if on cue, both Roger and Mikey closed their eyes and whispered gently, "Forgive us for we have taken a life; that which cannot be given back once stolen."

"Energy Ball." muttered Maylene quietly as she parted her palms and revealed an orb of condensed energy. Gripping the sphere with one paw as though it were a solid object, the miniature warrior hurled it towards the gargantuan body that still occupied a massive portion of the battle-scarred floor; filling the large room with a dazzling flash of light as the orb crashed into the monstrous creature and instantly evaporated the black mist that surrounded it. What lay beneath the ugly cloud of shadowy vapor was no longer a man, not by my standards anyway. With a face suited only for screaming and a more scar tissue than actual skin, it was clear that whatever had done this to him had done it violently and against his will. As the dust settled, all that remained of the enormous beast were a sizable burn mark and some rather nasty memories that were best forgotten but would probably stay.

Stumbling over towards the scorched stain on the broken tiles, I ran one paw through my knotted hair and said, "It's over; just like that?"

"Indeed." murmured the Riolu as she folded her hands over her heart. "Forgive me for I have taken a life; that which cannot be given back once stolen."

After about five solid minutes of awkward, pensive silence, Ed finally spoke up, "Look, boys and girls, I don't think we should hang around here any longer than we absolutely need to. Sure, we're all a bit rattled, but we're all also alive. Let's get out of here while we still can; before another one of those things comes out of the woodwork."

Exiting through the jagged, ruptured entrance that the Machamp was kind enough to make for us, the five of us wandered back outside and simply stood there; confused and scared and more alone than any of us had ever felt before in our entire lives. The sun was setting as we shambled into town and laid claim to all of the odds and ends that we thought we'd need; food, water, medical supplies, sleeping bags, ammunition, a vehicle, and enough gasoline to run a home generator for an eon or so. And with every intention of finding more survivors somewhere out there, we decided to commandeer a city bus and use its spacious interior as our base of command. Upon climbing aboard, I immediately fell backwards upon one of the large seats and made an effort to lay as motionless and limp as my beaten body could.

I didn't feel like moving, but my mouth apparently did. So, as much as I resisted the urge, my mind had some questions and my mouth agreed that they needed to by asked.

"Maylene, if it's alright with you, I'd like to talk?" I asked; my eyes unfocused and unable to properly do their job. "There's a lot I'd like to know and I think you can tell me. Would you?"

"You would like to know more about yourself and the powers that are just now surfacing, correct?" replied the little girl.

With a solemn nod of my head, I answered, "Kiev told me that I'm supposed to be this world's savior; a holy warrior of some kind. For a brief nanosecond back there, when you told me that I'd somehow knocked that big monster out, I believed it; I really did. But then, as I watched you finish the job without even breaking a sweat of batting a lash, I came to my senses. I don't know how to utilize my gifts, but you do; you threw around at least five different kinds of magic back there while all I could do was shoot a fucking pistol."

"You will come to understand yourself and your abilities soon enough." assured the child. "In time, we will all come to understand."

In an aggravated growl, I protested, "Soon enough may not actually be soon enough. Ed can shoot lasers, why I don't know, but it totally shuts him down. I can shoot electricity, but only if I'm not expecting it and doing something incredibly stupid. What kinds of powers are those; how can he help is he's passed out in the middle of a field and how can I help if all I can do is shoot a gun that may not always do the job?"

"Now's not the time, Alan." sighed Ed as he turned on the wheel; rounding a sharp corner. "There's a long story behind that little show I put on back in Saffron, but I don't see it helping much to tell you right now; with you in your current state. You hit your head, you drained yourself shooting off those sparks back there, and let's face it, you've seen some stuff that shouldn't ever be seen by anybody anywhere. That's a lot of stress, Alan, and you clearly don't need any extra stress added on top of it all right now. Take a breather while you still can, alright? Who knows when you'll get the chance again."

And as though someone had flipped my power switch, I took the turtle's advice and drifted back into the comforting embrace of dreamland. To be honest, I was worried. To be brutally honest, I was petrified. I'd thought that Goldenrod might have somehow been a safe place to take shelter, it being across an entire ocean. But with just as many Cursed stampeding around as Saffron, it wasn't any safer at all; it even had a brand new infestation of ghoulish demons called Hellions. Was anywhere in the world safe anymore; truly safe? I decided not to dwell on the matter and proceeded to float weightlessly off into the euphoria of sleep.

Ah, comforting sleep; have you ever done me wrong?