[6] Chasing Trisha

[Kaden]

It's always easy to imagine one's self doing the heroic thing. Striking down evil, leaping into harms way, shielding the innocent from danger, the kinds of things one would see in a movie trailer. It was almost a cliche to see the muscle-bound hero standing triumphantly after thwarting the bad guy's attempt at vileness, but it was cliche in that cool "I could totally do that if I wanted to" kind of way. When actually staring down the barrel of the gun, though, being the good guy didn't seem quite as easy.

So maybe Kaden wasn't really a "good guy" and he definitely wasn't a muscle-bound action hero, but he liked to think that when push came to shove he would instinctively do the "right" thing. His romanticized ideals of "right" and "wrong" however, turned out to be no match for his body's biological imperative to get out of the way of a giant zombie overlord's titantic fist. And so, for the second time in as many days, Kaden found himself leaping through a window to escape harm.

There were a handful of sit-in restaraunts scattered throughout the foodcourt, and it turned out Kaden, Piper, and Sophia had been standing directly in front of one. As The Overlord poised itself to strike, Kaden turned and jumped. As the sound of cement and steel crumbling beneath the zombie's fists filled the court, Kaden was picking himself up off of the floor of the restaraunt.

It was as though some switch had been thrown in the courier's mind. With little more than a wave of its hand, this abomination could crush Piper, Sophia and Kaden. Even if they did somehow manage to destroy it, they still had to find their way to Trisha, then beat her to get the emblem...

"This is bullshit," Kaden said mumbled to himself. "God damned zombies..."

Turning back to face the food court, Kaden was horrified to see the zombie oozing towards someone else, swinging its malformed fists with reckless abandon. Scrambling through the window he had already broken, Kaden carefully climbed onto what was left of the food court's second floor. Several yards away, Sophia was taking aim with an outstretched arm. Kaden's eyes tracked the movement of her ki as it flowed into her hand and exploded outwards toward the giant zombie

Given the partially coagulated state the titantic zombie seemed to be in most of the time, Kaden expected Sophia's blast to cut right through it. To his great surprise, though, it crashed harmlessly against the creature's skin; at least it seemed harmless... the creature didn't seem to respond to pain at all. While that was an interesting phenominon in-and-of itself, something else caught Kaden's attention. Just before Sophia's attack hit, a light flickered through the grotesque giant.

"Sophia!" Kaden called to the priestess while keeping his eyes fixed on zombie. "Do that again."

"Do what?" Sophia turned toward the courier. "Shoot it?"

"Yeah."

With a nod that went unnoticed, Sophia turned her attention back to the zombie. The courier felt a pang of guilt as Piper hopped about the bottom floor of the food court, avoiding deadly blow after deadly blow from their zombie aggressor. As Sophia loosed a second attack, however, Kaden's guilt was pushed the back of his mind.

Now that he was actively looking for it, the tiny flicker of light that he saw before might as well have been a thousand watt bulb before Kaden's Sight. Again, just before Sophia's blast hit, light surged through the beast's skin, protecting it from damage. Another peculiarity arose as Kaden made his observation: where the light flowed, the skin definitely seemed to harden.

"Piper!" Kaden called down to his companion as he rushed to Sophia's side. "Kick where I shoot!"

"Are you serious? I'm kind of busy down here," came the medic's reply. A stolen glance at the courier's face answered Piper's question.

"Sophia," Kaden held out a hand as he approached the priestess. Pulling Piper's make-shift bandage off his hand, Kaden pocketed the scrap of fabric and exposed his self-inflicted wound to Sophia. "Can you take care of this for me?"

"Uhm," Sophia examined the courier's hand quickly. "Yeah. Hold still."

A green light enveloped Kaden's hand as Sophia's hovered centimeters away. When the glow faded, seconds later, Kaden was happy to see he was as good as new. As he clenched and unclenched his fist, the courier turned to face Piper and zombie on the floor below.

It was difficult to make out exactly what was happening. As Kaden had rounded the balcony to join Sophia, he had placed the Overlord between him and Piper. Kaden expected this to create a problem in coordinating an attack, but his red-headed ally had a solution for that. As the zombie threw a massive punch toward the medic, she darted forward and slipped easily between his legs. As she turned to face the zombie's back, Piper shot a quick nod to Kaden.

Without skipping a beat, Kaden shot his newly-healed hand forward, loosing a small orb of ki. The blast slammed into the back of the super zombie's knee, once again seeming to do no damage. Before the proverbial smoke could even clear, Piper was leaping into the air, driving her heel into the same spot Kaden had just blasted. To pretty much everyone's surprise, the zombie's knee gave in and he stumbled forward.

"Ha!" Kaden couldn't help but give a triumphant laugh, though his companions weren't entirely sure why. Such a minor blow wouldn't do anything but slow the beast down. "Ok, Piper. We'll need to do that one more time."

"Alright," Piper nodded and turned her attention to the still-prone giant zombie.

"Sophia," Kaden turned to the priestess. "Need you to shoot this time."

"Alright..." Sophia nodded. "Where are you going to be?"

"Over there," Kaden pointed to the third floor of the food court, just above the zombie's head. "Wait for my signal, ok?"

Without waiting to her the priestess' response, Kaden took off down. Only a few feet from the priestess/courier duo was an escalator up to the third floor. Like the second, the top-most floor of the food court was a balcony that wrapped around in a large circle. Kaden shot up the escalator and began rounding the third floor as quickly as he could. By the time he had put the zombie between himself and his comrades, the Overlord was back on his feet and turning towards Piper once again.

Sophia watched as Kaden came to a stop above the zombie and signaled her with a flash of cerulean light. Taking in a deep breath, the priestess leveled her open palm at their common enemy and quickly formed a ball of ki. More focused on hitting than striking a vital location, Sophia took aim at the undead abomination's chest and fired away.

"Hit it, Piper," Kaden called out. "Hard!"

Taking several steps backwards, Piper shot forward as soon as Sophia's blast entered her field of vision. The medic vaulted into the air, easily bringing herself level with the giant zombie's chest and struck immediately after Sophia's attack. Both of the medic's boots crashed into the zombie's chest with such force that the beast was actually forced backwards. The flailing undead amalgam tore into the second floor balcony as it stumbled, placing it almost directly beneath Kaden.

As the courier watched the joint attack take place below, he was trying to steady himself. He took in deep breath after deep breath and tried to push the fear out of his mind. He reached into his jacket and pulled out Trisha's dagger, almost dropping it as he tried to control himself. This wouldn't be a gut reaction, this wasn't him acting on instinct, he had made the choice to do this, he had made the choice to be the "good guy."

It was disbelief that caused the courier to shake his head as he placed a hand on the rail of the third-floor balcony. It was with astonishment that his eyes widened as he watched himself vault forward, using his hand to pivot himself 180 degrees. But it was with courage -- shaking and uncertain though it may have been -- that he gripped his dagger in both hands and drove it into the zombie's flesh.

Ohmygodohmygodohmygodohmygodohmygod was the only thing going through Kaden's mind as his dagger, glowing with his own energy, cut a swath down the undead giant.

Having fallen on its undead ass, Kaden was able to ride his dagger all the way to the floor of the food court. As his feet touched tile, though, his legs gave out and he suddenly found himself falling to his knees. A light-headedness overtook the courier's mind and a sharp burning filled his chest. Just as it seemed he was about to lose consciousness, Kaden remembered to breath.

While the courier would later commend himself on his plan -- stupid though it seemed in hindsight -- it only got the job half done. Through the split skin of the giant zombie's torso, Piper, Sophia, and Kaden could see a much smaller version of the same abomination. With a ear-splitting screech, the zombie leapt out of it's skin, it's sights set squarely on an otherwise incapacitated courier. Kaden braced himself as the beast lunged.

Fortunately, the only damage he would have to worry about would be the damage to his hearing. The report of Piper's double-barrel left a dull ringing in Kaden's ears and no small amount of zombie entrail on his jacket. If Kaden had been able to hear right then, he would have heard another shriek from the zombie puppet master and the sharp snap of Piper closing the barrel of her gun. A second shot rang out, leaving virtually nothing left of their smaller adversary.

With the proverbial puppet master gone, its monsterous marrionette melted to the ground, little more than a puddle of goo. Shakily, Kaden climbed to his feet and managed to return his dagger to its sheath without cutting himself. As he looked about, in disbelief, Kaden turned to Piper and Sophia. With a shake of his head exhaled deeply.

"I can't believe you let me do that."