Ch.10: The Hunter pt.3

Inside of the forest outside of their hut, Tarin practices swinging her massive sword as Mattie walks up towards her holding a pair of water bottles. He hands one towards her and takes the other for himself sitting on a nearby stump as Tarin takes a big drink from the bottle.

            “Thank you.” She says putting the bottle down and gripping the hilt of her blade again. “It’s a fine day for training; maybe you should try taking in a few laps yourself?”

            “Sorry but no, it’s more fun to stare at your glistening body as it’s covered in sweat,” Mattie says jokingly with a grin on his face.

Tarin glares at him, resisting the urge to smack him with the blunt of her blade. “I’ll pretend to I didn’t hear that.”

            “Yeah yeah, just ignore me,” Mattie says jokingly starting to walk off.

            “You know we could be doing a lot better if you actually did some training of your own.”

            “Remember I’m the brains of our outfit, and you’re the brawn,” Mattie smirks back at her jokingly before quickly staring ahead into the forest. “Besides, I can tell something in those woods is coming straight at us and giving off a strong sense of malicious intent.”

            “An enemy?”

            “Most likely, so what should we do now?”

            “We do what we always do, we fight!” She says reaching for her blade. “Now let’s get ready, soon they will be at our door.”

A moment later Bronte walks up to the doorstep with a smirk on her face looking at the small humble shack. She summons her gun as her body starts crackling with electricity looking across the area for any sign of her opponent grinning mischievously before taking aim at the hut.

            “You know judging from the look of this shack, you’re going to be pretty screwed if I happened to wreck the place. You better come out before long because I like to smash things when I get board.” She says pointing her gun at the hut as she grins excitedly.

Suddenly Avani’s blade smashes into the area with Bronte jumping away to dodge the attack. “I hate idol threats, but I couldn’t take the risk that you were being serious about smashing my home.”

            “Sorry, I was only joking. I know how painful it is to not have a roof over your head, but it worked didn’t it?”

            “Yes, I cannot discount your effectiveness.” Avani rushes in grabbing the hilt of her blade. “But I wonder how long you will last?”

Avani swings her massive blade as Bronte leaps into the air her bug like wings emerging from her back as she takes into the air. “A Gnome such as you is weak in the air, aren’t you? So this is now my win!”

Avani leaps into the air extending her wings as she swings her blade with Bronte dodging the attack as Avani further raises into the air. Avani reaches open air space and holds out her blade clenching her fist as it breaks apart into pieces that start circling her.

            “Oh, that’s pretty cool, an advanced skill?” Bronte asks with a grin.

            “Been working on this for a while, so let’s test out this new technique.”

The shrapnel from her broken blade circles around her as Avani charges ahead towards Bronte. Bronte fires her gun out at Avani as she dodges her blasts and gathers the shrapnel into her hands forming small daggers.

            “You’re a clever one, but in the end, you have the same strategy of every other Gnome I’ve faced.” She says with a slight grin on her face.

She pulls the trigger and a blast of electricity hits Avani as the lightning passes over her. Bronte grins happily before realizing the remaining shrapnel forms a shield in front of her blocking off some of the electricity before she breaks it apart with the lightning dying down.

            “Well now, using what’s left of that big sword for defense? So what do you have left?”

            “This,” Avani says snapping her fingers.

She tosses the daggers into the air as the shrapnel shoots ahead out at Bronte as she ducks underneath, with Bronte trying to shoot them away. The shrapnel comes in hitting her in the side before Avani comes in grabbing the dagger from mid-air as it falls and charging upwards at her stabbing Bronte in the side as she drops her gun.

            “This is my win,” Avani says with a large grin on her face.

            “Oh yeah?” Bronte asks with a mischievous grin on her face. “Suddenly her body crackles with electricity and another gun comes out of her opposite palm and aims it into Avani’s stomach. She fires her gun with the electricity passing through Avani’s body causing her to fall to the ground crashing and leaving a large impact where she fell.

Bronte flies down to the ground pulling the earthen knife from her side as the blood dribbles from her side. “Damn, she managed to get me. Anyone without some mental fortitude would’ve lost with that blow.”

She looks back pointing her gun at Avani as she starts to glow slightly. “Your worth keeping around, so I’ll let you stick around. It’s been fun see ya again.”

Avani separates into Mattie and Tarin as the two lay in the recently formed crater with Mattie climbing his way to the edge and looking around. He falls down to Tarin’s side as the pair lie around in pain barely able to move.

            “Damn it, we lost,” Mattie says annoyed. “Come on Tarin say something witty for me.”

            “Something witty,” Tarin says sarcastically.

            “Oh now you grow a sense of humor, but anyway what’re we going to do about that one?” Mattie asks confused.

            “I can’t move right now, so please call Ms. Aidan whenever you can, I might need some form of medical attention,” Tarin says exhaustedly.

            “Right, let’s just lie here for the rest of our lives that’ll be easy,” Mattie says jokingly. “Damn it, well it’s up to you two to take care of this for us.”