Middel World

Scratching the Surface

He raised his hammer high and then brought it down on the back of her head. Her face collided with the linoleum and left another dent.

The man shouldered the hammer and walked calmly towards a frightened Vann who was struggling to get the IV out of his arm.

"Relax, kid, I'm not gonna hurt you," the man said.

Vann froze. That voice sounded familiar...

"Besides, you're not gettin' anywhere with your leg like that." He motioned to Vann's leg. He noticed for the first time that it was in a cast.

"I'll take my chances," Vann said, eager to get out of the way of something he obviously was not supposed to see.

Before he could move, however, he noticed something behind the masked man. Vann didn't notice soon enough, however, and Kasuno's metal-clad fist collided with the man's spine.

He turned around to defend by raising his hammer again, but wasn't strong enough. Kasuno grabbed the hammer with both hands and forced it downwards. The man's defenses lowered, Kasuno threw her head forward and head butted him in the nose.

He want to his knees, a hand over his now bloody nose.

Kasuno looked to the hospital bed only to notice that her target was gone. "Dammit!" she growled.

Then the hammer slammed into the side of her head, sending her flying through the weakened wall.

---------------------------------------------

When Vann had jumped out of the bed, he had expected to feel pain in his leg, and maybe the rest of his body since he had been run over. But he felt fine.

No pain anywhere.

Well, except for his chest where his heart continued to hammer away at his ribs.

The hospital seemed to have emptied out. All the employees, patients, and visitors had likely been run off by Kasuno and that man's fighting.

But not totally, apparently. He came upon two people, a little boy and girl. They looked oddly familiar...

He made eye contact with the boy and instantly remembered.

Yumi and Apollyon.

Vann didn't know why, but seeing them made him feel like something was lodged in his throat. He stopped before he could get very close.

Unfortunately, Yumi had seen him.

She ran towards him as Apollyon's body cracked and shattered like glass, glowing with pink light, and the pieces floating into Yumi's open hand where they reassembled into a sword. The sword was the strangest looking weapon he'd seen. It had a curved blade and what appeared to be a revolver for the hilt.

As Yumi closed the distance between herself and her target, all Vann could do was hold his arms over his face. He was to terrified to move.

CLANG!

Vann opened his eyes and lowered his arms to see that Yumi's sword was only a few inches from his neck. It was blocked by another, much larger, sword, this one shaped like a butcher knife.

The hilt of the sword appeared to be a red double barrel combat shotgun. The owner of this sword was also wearing a ski mask, but was much smaller than the hammer-wielding man. It might have even been a girl.

The girl separated the gun from the blade, and blasted Yumi in the face. The girl crashed into a wall. She seemed to still be alive.

The other sword-wielding girl turned to Vann.