Re: Vendetta [S!2 Round 1 ~ Presidentialgon]
02-07-2012, 05:01 PM
Originally posted on MSPA by SteelKomodo.
“Faster, you scrawny bastard! Keep up with him!”
This was becoming more and more difficult for Artemis to do. Even while hoisting a live leopard over his shoulder, Johnny was surprisingly fast - faster than any ordinary human could achieve, if the urchin was any judge. Every turn was gradually turning into a guessing game as the brief glimpses of chisled shoulders and sulking feline became more and more fleeting as the distance between boy and man grew. Whoever this Johnny Raptor was, he could probably have won any parkour race back in Portsheath city and still have energy for a few laps of the main traffic island.
Mind you, Artemis hadn't been in much of a chasing condition to begin with. Having already run down several sets of near-identical linear corridors while Grendel shrieked about how all the rooms looked the same meant that the boy's legs were beginning to protest quite painfully at the inhumane treatment they were now forced to undergo. Which would have been fine otherwise, except that the demon kept on shouting at him to go faster and faster still, like a man in the passenger seat egging the driver on, and that's enough to distract anyone from keeping up with a mystery man in an awesome hat.
I wonder where I can get a hat like that, Artemis wondered.
“Never mind the fucking hat!” screamed Grendel. "You're losing him!"
"I can't help it!" retored Artemis in thoughtspeak. "He's too fast!”
“This, coming from a kid who vaults over fences and shit?!”
“That’s nowhere near like chasing some guy down identical corridors!”
“Oh, for the love of... Here, let me do the running.”
And suddenly, Artemis couldn't feel his legs anymore. Mostly because they were now doing their own thing, which consisted of trying to be in two different places at once at the same time. The net effect of this was akin to a man riding a bike down a slope, too terrified to hit the brakes as the wheels take him on a journey of their own devising. Once again, Grendel was showing that he was not above taking over the wheel when it came to important matters.
His legs a blur, the boy veered down the laybrinth of corridors and sharp turns as if he were on a motorcyle. As he ran, he could see from the corners of his eyes the confusion and chaos that this man had left in his wake. Female secretaries lay in a daze on the floor, accompanied by piles of what could only call itself paperwork because it was in a tidy stack several lifetimes ago. Huge holes could be seen in the brickwork where Johnny had lost patience with a door, and glimpses through those holes showed that whatever had been happening in those rooms would not be forgotten for a while. The cost in redecorating would be astronomical.
“His mind..." Grendel was still babbling, as if enraptured by the most awesome T.V. programme in the history of Earth. "His fucking mind, it's like a bowling ball on clingfilm."
“Not sure what that's meant to mean," replied Artemis as he veered round another t-junction to avoid slipping on some spilled coffee, leaving a beffuddled waitress behind.
“As in, reality warps to his mere presence.”
This still made no sense to Artemis. "What? How is that-?!”
“WATCH THE FUCK OUT!"
Sadly, Artemis did not watch the fuck out. Hitting Johnny Raptor at full tilt was like trying to demolish a skyscraper by headbutting it - all you ended up with was a headache. The boy practically somersaulted backwards before landing with a thump onto his back, dazed and winded.
Johnny Raptor calmly finished tying his bootlaces, picked up Zeus the leopard in one arm as he stood up, and then looked down at the teen boy spread on the floor behind him. For a minute, he wondered if he'd seen the kid before, but at the time he'd been too occupied with trying to eat a live tiger to pay much attention.
"Hullo," he said, casually, as if this sort of thing happened to him all the time. "Where did you spring from?"
Artemis would have replied to the question immediately were it not for two things. Firstly, his head was ringing, and it is usually not a good idea to talk when you have just smacked head-first into a man who seems to be made of concrete. The second was the sight of the leopard looking down at him from over Johnny's shoulder. The animal was clearly not in the right frame of mind for whatever was happening, or at least about to happen, and the almost pitying look it gave the urchin said as much. Run away, it seemed to say. Get out of here while you’re still a same man, and don’t even think about looking back.
“...dumb kid, doesn't watch where he's bloody going...” Grendel muttered to himself, clearly not wanting to bail his host out of the awkward situation. He needn’t have bothered, though – Johnny insisted on reaching down and hauling Artemis to his feet in the manner of a tractor pulling a car out of mud. If shoulder muscles could scream, Artemis’ would have done then.
“Haven’t I seen you somewhere?” asked Johnny as he watched the boy nurse his aching shoulder. Zeus growled impatiently from behind the man’s head.
“Maybe,” Artemis offered. “There was a lot of food on a table, from what I can remember.”
“Small world, huh? By the way,” and here the man grabbed Artemis’ hand and pumped it with enough force to wrench it out of it’s socket (which, thankfully, didn’t happen), “I’m Johnny Raptor. Secret Service.”
“Artemis,” came the meek reply.
“Odd name for a-”
A sudden explosion rocked the building, and a cloud of dust billowed out of somewhere, because that’s what happens when explosions happen suddenly. As Artemis staggered, trying to keep his balance, Johnny whipped round just in time to see a cabal of green-clad men vanish down the hallway he'd meant to go down before having to stop and tie his bootlaces.
"VIPER!" he roared, his face twisting into a snarl. "I should have KNOWN you'd have been behind this! C'mon, kid, we have a dastardly plot to foil!"
Before Artemis could protest, Johnny had picked him and hoisted him underneath his free arm, dangling like a sack of potatoes. The next second, an epic bellow of “JOHNNYYYYYY RAPTOOOOOOOOORRRRRR!!” cut through the as the man leapt down the hallway after his foes. It was like being on an express train with the sports commentary on full blast next to your ear.
Artemis glanced over at the leopard, who made the feline equivalent of a disinterested shrug.
““This," hissed Grendel with the glee of a small child in Disneyland for the first time, "is going to be FUCKING AWESOME.”
"Did you say something, kid?" asked Johnny as he ran.
“Wasn't me," replied Artemis meekly. Mentally, however, he was kicking Grendel for forgetting that one thing about lower-class demons – as in, the thing about other people being able to hear them if their host touched someone else. Having a beefy arm wrapped around your midsection was, in that regard, like opening up a cave for someone to shout down.
But it was too late to explain that to Johnny, as he was already careering headlong down a hallway which, thankfully, didn’t look the same as all the others had done. It was much bigger, for one, and the concrete was a different shade of grey. It also had a series of gigantic windows in one side that gave the impression of a perfect summer day, if they weren’t overlooking a sheer drop followed by a snow-capped mountain range. In the agent’s experience, it was just begging for some kind of action sequence to happen, one with lots of bullets and strafing.
So Johnny wasn’t too surprised when a Viper gunship hove into view.
Artemis and Grendel were, though.
“SHIIIIIIIIIT!”
“Faster, you scrawny bastard! Keep up with him!”
This was becoming more and more difficult for Artemis to do. Even while hoisting a live leopard over his shoulder, Johnny was surprisingly fast - faster than any ordinary human could achieve, if the urchin was any judge. Every turn was gradually turning into a guessing game as the brief glimpses of chisled shoulders and sulking feline became more and more fleeting as the distance between boy and man grew. Whoever this Johnny Raptor was, he could probably have won any parkour race back in Portsheath city and still have energy for a few laps of the main traffic island.
Mind you, Artemis hadn't been in much of a chasing condition to begin with. Having already run down several sets of near-identical linear corridors while Grendel shrieked about how all the rooms looked the same meant that the boy's legs were beginning to protest quite painfully at the inhumane treatment they were now forced to undergo. Which would have been fine otherwise, except that the demon kept on shouting at him to go faster and faster still, like a man in the passenger seat egging the driver on, and that's enough to distract anyone from keeping up with a mystery man in an awesome hat.
I wonder where I can get a hat like that, Artemis wondered.
“Never mind the fucking hat!” screamed Grendel. "You're losing him!"
"I can't help it!" retored Artemis in thoughtspeak. "He's too fast!”
“This, coming from a kid who vaults over fences and shit?!”
“That’s nowhere near like chasing some guy down identical corridors!”
“Oh, for the love of... Here, let me do the running.”
And suddenly, Artemis couldn't feel his legs anymore. Mostly because they were now doing their own thing, which consisted of trying to be in two different places at once at the same time. The net effect of this was akin to a man riding a bike down a slope, too terrified to hit the brakes as the wheels take him on a journey of their own devising. Once again, Grendel was showing that he was not above taking over the wheel when it came to important matters.
His legs a blur, the boy veered down the laybrinth of corridors and sharp turns as if he were on a motorcyle. As he ran, he could see from the corners of his eyes the confusion and chaos that this man had left in his wake. Female secretaries lay in a daze on the floor, accompanied by piles of what could only call itself paperwork because it was in a tidy stack several lifetimes ago. Huge holes could be seen in the brickwork where Johnny had lost patience with a door, and glimpses through those holes showed that whatever had been happening in those rooms would not be forgotten for a while. The cost in redecorating would be astronomical.
“His mind..." Grendel was still babbling, as if enraptured by the most awesome T.V. programme in the history of Earth. "His fucking mind, it's like a bowling ball on clingfilm."
“Not sure what that's meant to mean," replied Artemis as he veered round another t-junction to avoid slipping on some spilled coffee, leaving a beffuddled waitress behind.
“As in, reality warps to his mere presence.”
This still made no sense to Artemis. "What? How is that-?!”
“WATCH THE FUCK OUT!"
Sadly, Artemis did not watch the fuck out. Hitting Johnny Raptor at full tilt was like trying to demolish a skyscraper by headbutting it - all you ended up with was a headache. The boy practically somersaulted backwards before landing with a thump onto his back, dazed and winded.
Johnny Raptor calmly finished tying his bootlaces, picked up Zeus the leopard in one arm as he stood up, and then looked down at the teen boy spread on the floor behind him. For a minute, he wondered if he'd seen the kid before, but at the time he'd been too occupied with trying to eat a live tiger to pay much attention.
"Hullo," he said, casually, as if this sort of thing happened to him all the time. "Where did you spring from?"
Artemis would have replied to the question immediately were it not for two things. Firstly, his head was ringing, and it is usually not a good idea to talk when you have just smacked head-first into a man who seems to be made of concrete. The second was the sight of the leopard looking down at him from over Johnny's shoulder. The animal was clearly not in the right frame of mind for whatever was happening, or at least about to happen, and the almost pitying look it gave the urchin said as much. Run away, it seemed to say. Get out of here while you’re still a same man, and don’t even think about looking back.
“...dumb kid, doesn't watch where he's bloody going...” Grendel muttered to himself, clearly not wanting to bail his host out of the awkward situation. He needn’t have bothered, though – Johnny insisted on reaching down and hauling Artemis to his feet in the manner of a tractor pulling a car out of mud. If shoulder muscles could scream, Artemis’ would have done then.
“Haven’t I seen you somewhere?” asked Johnny as he watched the boy nurse his aching shoulder. Zeus growled impatiently from behind the man’s head.
“Maybe,” Artemis offered. “There was a lot of food on a table, from what I can remember.”
“Small world, huh? By the way,” and here the man grabbed Artemis’ hand and pumped it with enough force to wrench it out of it’s socket (which, thankfully, didn’t happen), “I’m Johnny Raptor. Secret Service.”
“Artemis,” came the meek reply.
“Odd name for a-”
A sudden explosion rocked the building, and a cloud of dust billowed out of somewhere, because that’s what happens when explosions happen suddenly. As Artemis staggered, trying to keep his balance, Johnny whipped round just in time to see a cabal of green-clad men vanish down the hallway he'd meant to go down before having to stop and tie his bootlaces.
"VIPER!" he roared, his face twisting into a snarl. "I should have KNOWN you'd have been behind this! C'mon, kid, we have a dastardly plot to foil!"
Before Artemis could protest, Johnny had picked him and hoisted him underneath his free arm, dangling like a sack of potatoes. The next second, an epic bellow of “JOHNNYYYYYY RAPTOOOOOOOOORRRRRR!!” cut through the as the man leapt down the hallway after his foes. It was like being on an express train with the sports commentary on full blast next to your ear.
Artemis glanced over at the leopard, who made the feline equivalent of a disinterested shrug.
““This," hissed Grendel with the glee of a small child in Disneyland for the first time, "is going to be FUCKING AWESOME.”
"Did you say something, kid?" asked Johnny as he ran.
“Wasn't me," replied Artemis meekly. Mentally, however, he was kicking Grendel for forgetting that one thing about lower-class demons – as in, the thing about other people being able to hear them if their host touched someone else. Having a beefy arm wrapped around your midsection was, in that regard, like opening up a cave for someone to shout down.
But it was too late to explain that to Johnny, as he was already careering headlong down a hallway which, thankfully, didn’t look the same as all the others had done. It was much bigger, for one, and the concrete was a different shade of grey. It also had a series of gigantic windows in one side that gave the impression of a perfect summer day, if they weren’t overlooking a sheer drop followed by a snow-capped mountain range. In the agent’s experience, it was just begging for some kind of action sequence to happen, one with lots of bullets and strafing.
So Johnny wasn’t too surprised when a Viper gunship hove into view.
Artemis and Grendel were, though.
“SHIIIIIIIIIT!”