by Zeppy Cheng
He holds up two fingers. “The second condition is based on the fact that powerful monsters tend to create a sort of Anima gravity around them, enhancing and changing its effects.” Three fingers. “And the third condition is for you to think about. If you choose to activate the latent energy of this potion, your entire life will change.”
Surprisingly, I understand everything Dr. Barrimore has said. It makes a lot more sense than I thought it would. “So what does this potion do?”
“I do not know,” says Dr. Barrimore.
Great. “Then why did you give it to me?”
Dr. Barrimore holds up his hands. “Just like everyone has a different spirit, potions made of Anima have totally different effects on different people. Thus, I cannot guess what effect it will have on you.”
“Can you at least tell me what it might do?”
Dr. Barrimore thinks for a moment, and then shrugs. “All I know is that you will be very special, from a conventional standpoint.”
“That doesn’t help.”
Dr. Barrimore shrugs again. “You drank it already, so I can’t change anything. Just trust my judgment.”
“Okay. So, will you be measuring me?”
Dr. Barrimore shook his head. “Not until the change happens.”
I glance at the clock. “It’s this late?” It’s about time for me to go to club — time has passed much quicker than I thought.
Dr. Barrimore turns back to his microscope. “If you start to feel as if your pinky finger is turning green, come to my lab immediately.”
“Um… okay.” I head for the door.
When I’m almost out of range, Dr. Barrimore speaks again. “And, um, if you happen to suddenly believe that you are a papaya, well, if you have the wherewithal… come to the lab.”
I can’t help but chuckle, even though the reality of the statement is rather frightening. “I will.”
I take the elevator down to the shooting club’s basement room. Dres and Rey stand and talk in the corner.
“No, I’m telling you, it’s more complicated than you think. It’s not just a run and gun game where you shoot generic bad guys. It’s so much more than that!” Dres tells Rey, gesticulating. He catches sight of me. “You know Bad Happening, right?” He points towards Rey. “This idiot thinks that Bad Happening is a bad game.”
“I’ve never played it before. But I’ve read reviews.” I walk to the rack where the bows are stowed and pick mine up. Walking to the range, I look at Dres. “Do you play a lot of video games?”
Dres grins. “Of course. They call me Dreadfingers.”
Rey elbows Dres. “That’s the most idiotic thing I’ve ever heard.”
“But it’s true!”
I string my bow. “All right, I’ll believe you.” I knock an arrow. “But regionals are coming up, and we don’t have much time to play.”
“All right, all right.” Dres brings his bow to the range.
We spend the rest of the night shooting on the range. I am getting a lot better at this than I ever thought I would be. At one in the morning, I unstring my bow and head upstairs towards my dorm. As the elevator car approaches the ground floor, muffled noises, voices and pounding feet, bleed in around me. I prick my ears and think about stopping to see what’s going on. Before I decide, the elevator stops at the ground floor without my help.
When the doors open, everything is in chaos.
“Where are the Black Cats?” yells a woman, one of the professors.
“We don’t know! They must be in the center of it! There’s a blackout bubble!”
Dozens of Adventurers are running back and forth in the lounge, obviously on important errands. At least ten people are lying on cots on the ground, some of them bleeding profusely. Sirens wail in the background, and gunshots pop in the distance.
“What happened?” I ask as I step out of the elevator. I didn’t mean for it to sound so forceful; it just happened automatically.
Ms. Bossman grabs me by the shoulder. “Markus. You’re awake. Call everyone in the Riding Valkyries and tell them to come down here.”
“What—”
Ms. Bossman’s eyes are filled with fire. “An A-class portal prolapsed.”
“What? How did that happen?”
“It opened in a warehouse on the bay. No one noticed it because it’s a stealth type.” Ms. Bossman turns away. “Hurry! We need everyone we can get!”
“Balrog!" someone yells from the other side of the room. “It’s a balrog!”
Shivers go down my spine. A Balrog is the ultimate manifestation of demonic terror. Only the S-class tiamat is scarier, and those are only supposed to occur in S-class dungeons.
But an A-class opening in the middle of New York? I’ve never heard of anything like it.
The power shuts off. Emergency lights flicker on after a moment, but I know I won’t be taking the elevator now. The ground shakes and a roar of hellish proportions resonates through the air. Tanks roll past the Association building, and I hear helicopters fly overhead. The blast of a jet aircraft screams from above.
I take out my cell phone and hope for a signal. There is one — the cell tower system must be really hardy. I call Evan. The phone rings twice.
“Hello? Markus, is that you? What the hell is happening?”
“Come down! Wake everyone and tell them to get down here. There’s a balrog in the city!”
“Well that’s unexpected.” There is a short silence. “Where are you?”
“On the ground floor. I’ll be fighting on the street.”
“We’ll be there as soon as possible.” I hear cloth rustling — Evan must be getting dressed.
“Be careful. The power is out. You won’t be able to take the elevator.”
“Thanks,” says Evan. There is a click.
I run up to Jane Bossman. “What happened to Mr. Tuffman?”
“He’s on the front lines,” says Ms. Bossman. “He’s with the first line of defense. The Upper West Side. You’re an apprentice, so you should stay here and clean up any fiends that make it through the lines.”
“I need my bow.”
Ms. Bossman picks up a bow from beside a wounded Adventurer and hands it to me. “Be careful. Since we’re in the real world, healing magic won’t work. I doubt you’ll be able to do anything the military can’t.”
I examine the weapon Ms. Bossman gave me. It’s a compound bow, with a system of pulleys and wheels holding the string, as well as a scope. I pick up a quiver of arrows leaning against a low wall. “I’ll be off.”
“Not without me you won’t.” Esla approaches from the main hall. Behind her is Corbin, both of them equipped with armor. Esla carries a long leather whip.
“I didn’t see you.”
“That’s because we’ve been out there. The Civilian Adventure Patrol was among the first responders.” She rolls up her whip and tucks it under her arm. “It’s lucky that you’re here. We need more manpower. There are thousands of lesser devils running around. The military and National Guard can’t even handle half of them.”
“Even with tanks?”
Esla shakes her head. “Even a lesser devil has the power to destroy a tank. Those tanks just aren’t equipped to deal with magic.” She turns. “Come on!”
I hold my bow and hurry after them. The minute I leave the building, I am faced with chaos. Hundreds of people are running away from explosions.
Dread washes over me. My parents live in that direction. I take out my cell phone and select my mom’s phone number. As I run towards the action, the phone rings, and rings, and rings. No response.
“This is bad.” I slide my phone back in my pocket.
Pushing through the crowds, with Esla and Corbin behind me, I race for my home. I won’t be able to use the subway at a time like this, but I need to know my family is all right. At the end of the street, a single lesser devil stands, shooting fire out of its mouth. A lesser devil is a B-class monster. It’s about the toughest enemy the Riding Valkyries co
uld take as a team. But it’s not our entire team facing this devil. It’s just me, Esla, and Corbin.
Perhaps this encounter was what Dr. Barrimore, in a fit of clairvoyance, had prepped me for. Staring at the demon, I hope so.
A military helicopter blazes overhead. Air pushes down on me, giving the world a sense of heaviness. Papers and trash flutter everywhere. A ridiculously loud bruuuup explodes from the helicopter’s main gun. The lesser devil is forced backwards, but even the full force of a chain gun can’t penetrate its magical defense layer. Bullets and magic just don’t mix. The attack helicopter climbs and flies away, clearly called to some more important strategic location.
I nock an arrow to my bow, fully prepared to make this my last stand.
Esla steps up beside me. “I can go all out, right?” Yellow rings adorned with ancient lettering come into existence around her wrists.. She holds her hands up and a violent wind rises.
I remember that I never asked Esla what her spirit’s rank was. Judging from the power radiating from her body, it must be at least a high C.
Esla yells and a huge maelstrom of wind roars, flowing through the skyscraper canyon with enough force to shatter every window. Debris, picked up by the gale, darts about in pockets of explosive shrapnel. It bends around the three of us, heading straight for the devil.
“Whoa!” Corbin yells over the howling wind.
“I know!” Esla seems surprised at her own strength.
The gale whirls through the street, gathering ammunition. Along with the shattered window glass, it finds hundreds of metal bits — the fractured remains of a dozen destroyed cars. With a last shriek, the wind blasts over the devil, and the shrapnel perforates it. The devil rocks back toward the nearest building, shouting.
My Anima vision catches a single spot, about a millimeter thick, where the demon’s vitals are showing through its injuries. Without thinking, I nock an arrow and fire. The arrow flies true and straight, the wind backing it. The arrowhead slips into the small point and buries itself to the end of the shaft. The devil grunts and falls to its knees.
Corbin pulls out his steel rod, shapes it into a javelin, and throws it with a mighty swish. The javelin pierces the devil’s face, spraying blue blood all over the concrete. The devil collapses, blood pooling on the ground.
I remember what Ms. Bossman said about these monsters. “There are thousands of these things?”
An Abrams tank rumbles down the intersection in front of us. It stops, the hatch opens, and the commander stares out as us. “Get out of here! Run!”
Esla holds up her Adventurer badge. “We’re Adventurers!”
He does a double take. “Then get on board! We need all the manpower we can get!”
A fighter jet zooms past, letting loose a pair of Sidewinders. They trail smoke through the fire-lit night towards the balrog rampaging through the city. We’re closer to the main battle than I would like. My family is even closer, if they haven’t already evacuated.
I recall my purpose as an Adventurer. If I want to keep my family safe, I have to protect the city. Remembering this, I focus my concern on the battle itself. I climb onto the tank along with Esla and Corbin.
My pinky finger begins to turn green. A beautiful, radiant, mossy sort of green.
I groan. Dr. Barrimore said to go to him if that happened. I don't think I am going to make it. Instead, I am headed to a balrog.
Oh, no. At this rate, this is not going to end well.
10 Greenfingers
As my hand turns greener and greener, the tank takes us closer to the balrog’s rampage through the city.
“What is this, a Godzilla movie?” yells the tank commander, whose top half is sticking out of the hatch. He bellows over the engine’s roar. “Left!”
The tank takes a left at the next street. We grip the equipment around us, hanging on. The barrel straightens into the new street, and a couple of lesser devils stand in our way. The treads of the tank are tearing up concrete as we move, spraying it behind us. We careen through an unoccupied car, exploding its gas tank and sending shrapnel everywhere. The devils don’t move.
“Smash them!” yells the commander.
“You won’t be able to kill them!” Esla yells back at him.
“We’re not trying to!”
Corbin looks afraid. “We didn’t get to absorb the ring of the devil we just killed.” Unlike the tank commander, his voice is almost drowned by the noise.
“Why is that important?” I yell over the sound of the tank’s engine.
“I don’t know,” says Corbin. “But I have a bad feeling about it.”
The tank swerves around another intersection. I didn’t know tanks could move like this. It’s like a ballet-dancing sumo wrestler. With a fierce acceleration, we bowl over the three lesser devils. As we roar past, the tank’s main gun swivels and fires back at one of the devils. The round smacks into a shield of magic and sends a rain of sparks falling onto the ground.
The three lesser devils begin to chase us. Three people with Spirit Rings and Adventurer badges appear from a doorway and engage them. A couple seconds later, the tank turns again and I lose sight of the conflict.
“Where are we headed?” Esla asks the tank commander.
The tank commander says something into his mic. Then he turns to Esla. “The front lines! We’ve got a command to get as close as possible!” He signs with his hand to his crew, and then looks back at us. “We’re carrying some valuable cargo!”
“Tell us about it!” yells Esla.
“You guys don’t need to know!”
“The why’d you tell us!?” yells Esla. “If we knew, we’d be able to help!”
“You guys are Adventurers, right?”
“Yeah!”
“The boss just told me to hand it to the highest ranking Adventurer I could find! But you guys are apprentices!”
The tank sideswipes a pizzeria and flour flies everywhere. I almost lose my grip and fall off. The tank swerves onto another street.
“We’re the best you got!” Esla climbs towards the commander’s open hatch.
The commander thinks for a moment. Then he gives Esla a headset, placing it over her head. He gives one to me and one to Corbin as well. “We have a big stinker that can pierce magic.” The commander’s voice comes clearly through the headset. “But it needs to be guided because of some stupid rule of magic or another.” He gives another command to the driver. “We’ve got the guiding platform.”
We take another turn at high speed, trading paint with parked cars. Sparks fly from the contact of metal with metal. We pass another tank going in the opposite direction. The commanders of both tanks signal each other.
The balrog’s feet appear between two buildings. It rounds the corner towards us, belching fire from its two heads and setting the buildings around it alight. A tenement crumbles to the ground, falling in an explosion of brick and steel. A crowd of lesser devils spread out in front of its feet, cackling and spitting fire everywhere. Two missiles dart into the fray and explode against the balrog’s skin, doing no damage. Bodies litter the ground, including at least one group of unfortunate Adventurers. The noise is incredible.
“We’re going to have to hit it on its head,” the commander explains through the headset. He looks around. “Where the hell are the Rangers?” He holds his hand to his headset — it appears he is getting info. “Well, damn.”
The balrog takes a step closer. Both heads stare down at us.
“The Rangers got knocked out,” says the commander.
Esla looks at me, then Corbin. “We can do it.”
The commander pauses and then nods. He reaches down into the tank and pulls out what looks like a bulky laser pointer. He hands it to her. “Hold the dot on the monster’s head. You’ll need to be at least twenty stories up.”
Esla rips off her headset and gives a thumbs-up. Corbin and I follow her.
“Good luck,” mouths the commander.
The three of us nod a
nd jump off the tank at the same time. The tank backs away as soon as we hit the ground. The balrog is a block and a half away, striding through the streets with the presence of a movie monster.
Corbin kicks in the door of the building closest to us and points to the interior. “I’ll stay here and keep the devils out!”
Esla nods. She and I run inside and start climbing stairs.
I’m happy that I’ve been working out lately. If I hadn’t, I wouldn’t be able to keep up with her. As it is, I barely manage. We reach the twentieth floor just as the balrog passes by the nearest window. Esla holds up the laser device. There’s a timer. A minute and twenty seconds. She runs to the window framing the balrog and points the laser at the spot between its horns. I make sure my bow is in its place on my back.
A green dot appears on the balrog’s head. Half a second later, it stops and looks straight at us. With a single meaty hand, it claws out the nineteenth floor. The ground begins to tilt. Steel groans.
Esla manages to keep her balance, and keep the dot trained on the balrog’s head.
The balrog rips out another floor beneath us. I’m starting to slide, but manage to lean against a pillar and hold on.
Esla is not so lucky. She slides towards the window, feet first, and hits the glass. The glass shatters and she falls out. Grabbing the ledge with one hand, she uses the other to toss the device. “Catch!”
I catch the device — a feat I have never managed before in my life. Holding onto it with my free hand, which is now completely green, I notice the time is almost done. Quickly, I point it back at the balrog’s head.