The Great Belligerency [Round 4: Static]

Originally posted on MSPA by Pick Yer Poison.

---

Just as Phil was about to squeeze his finger down on the trigger, Balance moved to the side abruptly. Phil narrowed his eyes in irritation and shifted the crosshairs around in order to find the god again. They alighted upon Reinhardt, who was whispering conspiratorially with…Julia!? How did she get down there so quickly? Before he could do more than register the strange scene, however, Julia took Reinhardt’s hand, and the two vanished. No, not vanished, sped off into the woods. Curioser and curioser… Mulling this over, he dialed down the zoom and finally saw the reason for the god's abrupt shift. He had stumbled forward upon being assaulted from behind by a living pillar of...fungus? ...somehow I feel uncomfortable describing it that way, but it seems accurate enough. The creatures went down quickly, but they had the advantage of numbers, and Balance was losing ground quickly.

Wait, just Balance? Where did Soft and Cole go? Berating himself for losing track of them, Phil busied himself attempting to once again get the god’s head in his crosshairs. The god darted back and forth between the mushmen with catlike agility, barely being hit…but barely hitting in return. He had only destroyed one of the pillars of fungus and apparently crippled another, for it was only moving at half speed. Phil suddenly realized that this might be a chance to potentially gain an ally or dissuade a future attack. Well, he IS a god…and if Cole attempts to turn on me, having one of them come to my aid just might be the winning move. Switching targets, he selected one of the mobile mushrooms that was about to take a swipe at Balance, and let loose a shot. Despite being intended to collapse into the target to increase the damage done, the bullet easily pierced the soft fungus, flying through it and ending its journey in the mushman behind it. Both fell instantly. Balance glanced up Phil, and although the sniper should have been a mere speck in the distance from that range, he appeared to recognize him, nodding to indicate his thanks. Phil grinned inside his helmet and took aim at another cluster, firing several shots into it and destroying most of them. He paused to let his rifle cool off and shifted his scope back to cover Balance. He saw the god execute a wide slash at an approaching group, severing all of them in a single blow, their loose top halves tumbling to the ground to lay beside their twitching bottoms. His back was open for attack through that entire movement. How…balanced. Perhaps there is more to his name than I thought… By now there were only a few of the fungus pillars left, and they were throwing themselves uselessly at Balance, who was easily destroying them as they came. Looks like he’s got things covered now.

“Phil? Phil!”

The unexpected voice startled him, and without thinking he rolled over onto his back from his prone position, thumbing the switch to turn his weapon into an assault rifle, and snapped the barrel to aim at the spot that he had judged that the voice had come from. He found himself looking at very surprised Julia. Due to the tinted visor of his helmet, she was unable to see the quizzical look he gave her, having seen her at the clearing talking with Reinhardt not more than a few minutes ago, a distance that he estimated would have taken at least five to travel if you took the road at a swift jog. I smell a rat. He took great care to ensure his tone didn’t have a suspicious edge to it. “Julia! How did you escape Dove? Is he coming after you?” He raised himself onto both legs, just in time for Julia to bounce over and hug him tightly.

“I was so scared when those hands grabbed me, Phil! I thought I was going to die! La, but who would have thought that Reinhardt would have come to my rescue? He charged at Dove from behind and swung his sword into the jerk’s arm.” Julia folded her arms across her chest and pouted. “Too bad it was only a glancing blow, no? Dove just ran away like before.” She lightly ran a finger across Phil’s chest. “You should meet him. I think you two have a lot in common.”

Phil was well aware that the proposal could be a trap, but he was by now quite interested in what made Reinhardt so important. From what he had seen Julia do, she could have simply escaped herself; however, she had chosen to bring Reinhardt into things, and Phil wanted to know why. “I think you’re right. We should meet up with him and see if we can’t work out an alliance of some sort.” He looked around at the trees. “And quickly. The more allies we have, the harder it will be for Dove to pick us off.”