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Chapter 8:
Escape
Amy stared over the edge of the
building, a look of terror on her face. "Calmar! Hold on!" she
yelled.
Calmar was hanging on to the broken railing, Thomas was
clinging to his legs. They were too far away to reach, but something had
to be done before the rail gave way.
Alan rushed over and tore the railing out of the roof,
pulling Calmar and Thomas back up. "You two okay?" he asked.
"Yeah... thanks." Calmar stuttered, glancing
back over the edge.
"Idiot! Get away from there!" Amy shouted at
him, grabbing Calmar's collar and dragging him away from the edge of the
roof.
"Well done Alan, but we must hurry. Get them
now." Thomas said, an air of urgency surrounding him.
"Right away." Alan ran back into the
staircase, it was in bad shape and the smell of fire was coming from
below. He carefully stepped in and took something from a large crate in
the corner. A crack was heard as the floor beneath him began to crumble.
He threw what he had taken from the crate out onto the roof just before
the staircase gave way, and Alan plummeted into the rising smoke.
"Alan!" Maria and Thomas shouted, dashing over
to the doorway. They couldn't see anything through the smoke, Alan was
gone.
"No.... damn it.... Alan..." Thomas mumbled,
peering down into the smoke and ash. Maria stood next to him in silence,
trembling.
After a moment someone spoke, "Well, you planned
for everything, didn't you?" Clint said, picking up what Alan had
tossed onto the roof. He was holding three parachutes, two were the normal
size but one was a fair deal bigger. "This was your escape plan I
take it?"
"Yeah, I planned to blow this place up no matter
what, once the battle was complete the four of us would get out of here
with those, Alan must not have had time to grab the fourth one."
Thomas said.
"This one was meant for Alan, but it looks like
I'll be using it." Ozzie said, taking the largest parachute and
putting it on. "Those two should be able to hold two people, I know
this one will."
Clint tossed one parachute to Calmar and put on the
other. "We had better be going, the building won't hold out much
longer."
"The last one is about to go off, once it does this
building is going down fast." Thomas said, running over to Ozzie.
"Everyone get ready!"
They each prepared to leap off a different side of the
building, Thomas was with Ozzie, Clint was standing by with Maria and
Calmar was reluctantly holding on to Amy. Time seemed to stand still,
waiting for the last explosion as a signal. The blast was heard, and the
three duos leapt off the edge as the building fell in on itself.
Calmar stared down as they fell gently through the air
thanks to the parachute, but he realized something moments before they
were on the ground.
"Uh... how exactly do you land one of these
things?" Calmar asked
"You mean you don't know?!" Amy shouted back,
tightening her grip on him.
"I've never done this before!"
"Oh shi-" Amy said, letting herself drop
when they were a few feet from the ground, she landed fine but Calmar
didn't notice the building he was about to hit until it struck him in the
face, knocking him to the ground.
"Come on you idiot, it couldn't have been that
bad." Amy said, poking his arm. "We've gotta find everyone else,
get up!"
Calmar groaned, rubbing the bruise on his cheek.
"Couldn't you have warned me about that building?"
"If you couldn't see it maybe you should get
glasses." Amy said, pulling Calmar to his feet.
They looked back at where the Viridian Tower once stood,
nothing was left but a pile of smoking rubble. After a couple minutes of
searching they met up with Clint and Maria, who also seemed to have a bit
of trouble landing, Maria's white outfit was covered in dirt and torn, and
Clint had lost his hat on the way down and the impact had broken the right
lens of his glasses. Thomas and Ozzie found them a moment later, and they
began searching the remains of the building for Alan. After two hours they
gave up hope and began the long walk back to the populated area of town.
They were gathered in the kitchen, sitting quietly
around the table. Maria was cooking something for all of them, with
Ozzie's help. Clint was sitting at one end of the table, wiping the dust
off his spare pair of glasses, and Thomas at the other, staring down at
the table. Calmar and Amy were sitting together on the side that faced the
stove. Calmar stared blankly at Maria's back as she scolded Ozzie about
something, his mind was elsewhere, pondering everything that Daniel did
back then, wondering how one person could cause so much chaos.
"So what are your plans now Thomas?" Clint
asked suddenly. Calmar jumped a bit, so did Amy, she must have been in
deep thought as well. Thomas just looked over at him, the hate Calmar
normally saw in his eyes was gone, they looked cloudy, depressed.
"I don't know... I may just shut down The Hunters
United Guild and let all the guilds we took over go back to their own
ways... it's probably better that way. I'm not cut out to be a leader
anyway."
"If you do that, why don't you join us? It may not
be as large as your guild, but we are getting a little more famous and
need all the help we can get."
Thomas started to reply but was interrupted by a bell in
the corner of the room.
"Someone's here.... would you please watch the food
Oz, I'll go see who it is." Maria said, heading out the door before
Ozzie could express his dislike of the nickname Oz.
Thomas turned back to answer Clint and was once again
cut short, this time by a scream coming from the lobby. Clint was out of
his chair and through the doorway almost instantly, the rest of them
quickly followed.
Calmar turned the corner and slid to a halt, he couldn't
believe his eyes. Alan was standing in the middle of the lobby, he was
burnt, bits of fake flesh were peeled off, revealing the metal underneath
and there was a hole through his chest where a metal pipe had impaled him.
"What's wrong with you guys, I'm a cyborg remember?
It may be difficult to move but I can't feel a thing. Don't look so
worried." Alan said casually, "A repair shop would be nice about
now though."
A week later Alan was repaired and THUG was shut down,
the guilds that had been "united" by Thomas were on their own
and back to normal without any difficulties. Thomas became part of Miron's
Mercenaries, along with Ozmond and Alan. The only unusual happening was a
bit of information provided by Alan, leaving everyone else uneasy for a
short while, but it was soon forgotten. It wasn't long before everything
returned to normal.
Epilogue
Thomas Centime: After the closing of THUG, he joined
Miron's Mercenaries and became Clint's partner. With the credits he had
saved up over the years he purchased a larger building, more suitable for
a guild. He and Calmar soon became friends, recalling the times they had
spent with Vincent and going on missions together occasionally.
Ozmond Carlyle: He continues to train and compete with Clint whenever he
has the chance between missions. After buying a scope for his rifle, he
became a decent sniper, hoping to expand his skills, not that it did him
any good against Clint.
Alan Zephir: Turning his attention on things that didn't involve adding to
his power, Alan became a more outgoing person thanks to some advice given
to him by Maria. Although becoming fully human again was impossible, he
was acting more like one every day that passed.
Clint Miron: After Thomas became his partner and they had moved into a
larger HQ, Clint began focusing on making their guild a bit more famous.
Taking on a couple risky jobs helped that, soon they had become one of the
top guilds in the area.
Maria Zane: Still stuck doing most of the paperwork, she felt more like a
secretary than a hunter, but she didn't mind as much if Clint was around,
he seemed to do his best getting her missions whenever he could.
Amy Leanna: Nothing could change her, she remained as stubborn and
short-tempered as ever. She also became Calmar's regular partner on more
dangerous missions, they made an excellent team.
Calmar Orna: He never went back to using pistols, after seven long years
of training with a blade and the incident had put him off guns. When he
first joined Miron's Mercenaries, he expected it to be temporary, but
after all that had happened it felt like home.
Alan's unsettling story: After the stairway fell, he opened the fourth
parachute and it hooked on something long enough for him to break down a
wall and jump into a room. It was the room the Amy fought Daniel in, the
puddle of blood was still there, but Daniel's body was gone, and bloody
footprints led to the doorway. Although it was not likely that Daniel made
it out before the bombs went off, they couldn't help but wonder if he had
somehow survived...
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The end..........?
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