Chapter 70: Friends in Need II
It was 3:52 AM, Marcus was staring at the digital clock next to his bed. He could not sleep and had spent the last hours trying to come up with a plan to uncover this corruption. It was a good thing he could not sleep because he was wide awake when he heard screeching tires and the tortured roaring of a car engine. He was out of bed and already running down the hallway to the foyer of the villa before the car had reached the entrance. And he was not alone, the whole clan was up and about. Janette was running past him only in her undies and a sleeping shirt but with her heavy sniper rifle in hands. In seconds Marcus was through the door, ready to take on who ever was coming after them.
The first thing he saw was a small Italian car, heavily battered, deformed and riddled with bullet holes. The second thing he saw was Pierre jumping out of the car. “They are allies!” Marcus shouted remembering most of the clan had never seen the Cullen team. Elena left the car on the other side and Marcus could see blood on her civilian clothes, but she seemed fine. “We were followed! They will be here any minute!” Elena called out and Pierre threw open the backdoor. Ben was holding Elise in his arms. Her clothes were bloodied and her face white as death. Pierre carefully took Elise and carried her towards the house. “Candis!” Marcus shouted and followed Pierre while the rest prepared for unwanted company.
“Janette, Grace keep them out of the villa. Team Cullen follow their orders!” Marcus said without turning around and entered the building. Pierre put Elise on the couch in the foyer and Cullen was already next to her pushing liquids down her throat and checking her vitals. Pierre looked like hell, his hands were shaking and his eyes were dilated in shock. Candis came running, in a light dress and with ruffled hair. “Ohh dear god!” She said and moved to heal Elise. “Candis you need to tell me if you need Link or not.” Marcus said after a few seconds.
“Yes, she is in bad shape I need to Link you.” Candis said and Marcus clenched his teeth, he could hear cars rushing towards the villa and he would not be able to fight this time. He grabbed Pierre by the shoulders and shook him “I will stay with her, she will be fine! Go and help the others, make sure they can not disturb us.” Pierre’s eyes focused and he nodded. A second later he was gone, leaving a heavy air draft behind. Freaking speedster!
Marcus sat down next to the priestess who put a hand on his chest “I will need a lot.” She said and he nodded. 40 crests of vitality rushed through Candis into Elise and the old woman bit her lip. “It is more than I can handle but I will do my best. She will not die.” Candis said and then she stayed quiet, all her effort went into saving Elise. Outside the fighting started with the heavy roar of Janette’s rifle and Marcus could not move.
Several gray and black van’s rushed down the driveway in the night, their headlights illuminating the villa and the waiting defenders. Janette shot the driver of the first van in the chest. She did not know who they were but they had combat gear, weapons and evidently no seatbelts on. The first van crushed into the wall of the driveway and at least on of the attackers flew straight through the windshield. He rolled over the ground and Janette put a bullet into his head. Two down, she thought but there was no time for celebration.
The other cars had stopped and a dozen or more armed attackers stormed the ground. In seconds it turned into a chaotic fight like it always happens when several class holder fight each other. The attackers had numbers and equipment on their side. Non of the defender had armor on and Janette was the only one who slept with her weapon next to her bed. Kou was unarmed, besides a few stones he had picked up, Achara was invisible and Grace just engaged an attacker with her bare hands.
Janette aimed and forced another bullet to hit an attacker with a nasty looking machine gun but her bullet bounced of an invisible shield. A Guardian? Who is it? Janette tried to find the person who could create powerful shields around themselves and people in their vicinity. In the meantime Grace fought a man with a sword and a shield, from the glow of his sword it looked like he was also a Paladin. Poor bastard, Janette thought. Grace dodged the sword strike elegantly and her hand moved forward in a flash and pierced the man’s heart. Before he had dropped to the ground Grace had taken his sword and shield and moved on. Blood and viscera on her hand was burning to ash as she charged her next victim, a guy who shot a ray of light against her shield.
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Achara had passed by the whole enemy front line and watched a guy hiding behind the last van unloading bursts from his assault rifle into the position of her teammates. She had only a small knife, that she normally carried in a holster on her ankle and was about to cut the man’s throat when his rifle suddenly vanished. Still perplexed about the event, Achara watched as a freaking rocket launcher appeared in his hands. A Gadgeteer! Achara thought. This class can store objects in some kind of subspace, or so humanity believed. They were tricky opponents, convenient for allies but lacked raw combat power. She acted quickly before the man had any chance to use that dangerous weapon. She grabbed his head from behind and slit his throat in one fluid motion. He dropped dead and Achara hid behind the van, inspecting the shoulder mounted weapon the Gadgeteer had left for her. Of course she had no idea how to use it, but it could not be that hard.
Kou and Elena worked together trying to push back the attackers who tried to storm the house. He slowed them down and lifted them up while Elena tore them apart with deadly plasma balls. Heavy gun fire returned from the attackers and they had only a few decorative rocks to hide behind. In seconds they suffered cuts and grazes. They gave as good as they took and Elena got a few good hits in. Another exchange followed and several of her plasma balls exploded but did not cause any damage as the attackers finally realized that there was a lot more opposition here than they had expected. They started to bunch up around a large guy in heavy armor and a machine gun and Kou could see the thin outline of shields around them. This was not good. Kou thought about ways to counter that when a sudden explosion threw the bunched up attackers around like dolls. Kou could see Achara, standing in the back with a rocket launcher, and he smiled “That’s my girl.”
On the right flank Ben was in an epic struggle against an enemy Channeller and even so Ben was superior in speed and skill the fact he could not touch the large blade of the enemy was a problem. Also Ben only had a pocket knife but the blonde woman had taken out a man with her bare hands before so only having a small knife was no excuse. He covered the small blade with his Weapon Aura making it far more deadly as it had any right to be. A moment later Ben dodged an attack, tried to parry the next but remembered that was a bad idea and stepped back instead. The man saw an opening and made a big downward strike against Ben who rotated to the left and cut the wrist of the Channeller clean through. There was screaming and aching but only until Ben had taken up the long sword and made a first test swing. It was acceptable, he decided and left the now headless man behind.
Pierre had found the kitchen in the villa and a set of sharp cooking knifes. Then he had found three attackers who tried to circle around the house and attack them from behind. The first of the three never realized he was there. The second tried to warn the third but a knife in his throat made that difficult and the last fought back by throwing plasma balls at him. Elemental Mages are scary, at a distance and if you can not move with the speed of sound. The second knife Pierre had taken from the kitchen found a new home in the eye socket of the mage. Pierre went back to the kitchen to get more knifes.
The last of the attackers were just getting back on their feet after the rocket. The Guardian must be high level because his shield had absorbed nearly all of the rocket explosion, Janette thought. She aimed at the big guy with the machine gun, but before she could shoot, she suddenly could not breath anymore and gasped, but no air made it into her lungs. Her chest cramped and pain spread through her body starting from her chest. She tried to get up and confront the source of the effect but she was unable to act. A second later the effect was suddenly gone and she took a deep breath. She grabbed her rifle and oriented herself again.
The guy who had controlled her was furthest on the right flank of the remaining enemies. That meant the first in the path of Grace and that meant he was dead meat. Grace had cut him open like a turkey and moved on to the big guy while the rest of the attackers started to run away. “Keep one or two alive!” Elena shouted. Before Grace could take the man down a gust of wind moved by and Pierre unleashed an endless combo of strikes and kicks. The shield of the Guardian had already weakened and eventually cracked under the onslaught of powerful attacks. Pierre removed the weapon of the attacker by breaking his right hand and then knocked him over. He did not gloat over his victory but moved on to chase down the rest.
The whole fight took less than thirty seconds but 16 attackers went down, 14 of them dead. In the meantime, Marcus did not know what happened outside the villa but he had faith in his allies. The sound of combat had finally vanished, the treatment of Elise would go on for hours.
