Bandit's Revenge

by Max Jager

  A scream was heard throughout the entire city, and Scarlet gasped in shock when she recognized whose it was.

  "Red!" she screamed in terror, "Are you out of your mind? What the hell are you doing? Bandit! Get out of there!"

  "This is bad…" said Brayne as sweat dripped down his face, "This is really…really bad!"

  "What do we do?" asked a mercenary, John, who looked at him in fear.

  Brayne shook his head as he spoke.

  "We can't do anything," he stated, "We can't even run! At the rate that sphere is growing…he won't just take out Virtue..."

  "…he'll take out the surrounding cities, too!"

  "He's concentrating all of his power into one big attack," said Abe nervously, "Bandit must have pushed him so far he didn't know what else to do! Damn it, Bandit! Where are you?"

  At that exact moment, the sphere suddenly began to increase at an even greater rate than before, and everyone on the battlefield yelled as it enveloped them.

  "Oh my God!" screamed Scarlet as tears filled her eyes, "Red…why…? Why would you do this?"

  She and Rachel trembled in fear before shouting out the name of the man they were the most worried about.

  "Bandit!" they screamed at the top of their lungs.

  The sphere quickly enveloped them, and in a matter of seconds, the entire city of Virtue was enveloped by it.

  In the adjacent city of Wor, the streets shook violently, and everyone ran around in fear as buildings all around them came crashing to the ground, injuring and killing a great number of them.

  The sphere quickly began hurling things out of Virtue, from small items to entire buildings, and the people of Wor screamed as they struggled to avoid these meteoric flying objects as well.

  Electricity all over the city went haywire, and people screamed as they were electrocuted by nearby electrical items.

  All the while, the sphere grew bigger and bigger, and the few people who managed to evade their demise ran from it in terror as it expanded into Wor as well.

  "Why the hell is this happening?" they asked as tears ran down their shocked faces.

  "My God…!"

  "This can't be happening!"

  "It's not over! It's getting even bigger!"

  "I'm freaking out!"

  "This can't be the end!"

  "We can't do anything to save ourselves!"

  "It's the end of the world!"

  "We're all finished!"

  In one home, a little girl looked up at the sky from the living room window.

  "Mommy," she began as tears filled her eyes, "Are we gonna die?"

  The mother held her daughter close as tears streamed down her face.

  "I… I don't know, sweetie…"

  "I'm scared, mommy!" cried the child as she held her mother.

  "It's going to be alright, sweetie," lied the mother in an attempt to comfort her child, "I promise!"

  God, help us all!

  If only God had answered her plea.

  November 14, 1854…

  The Ice Lands…

  …On this day…Scarlet Blood screamed for her brothers.

  …On this day…Bandit Lane suffered total and absolute defeat.

  …And on this day…

  …Red Blood…

  …annihilated three cities in the course of ninety seconds.

  All was hell.

  Bloodlands

  Ruins now replaced every inch of what used to be the cities of Virtue, Wor, and Revi.

  All life seemed to have been extinguished in those areas, but in the midst of all the wreckage, there were a number of people who had managed to survive the unprecedented ordeal.

  One of those people, a fifty-five year old man, was moving about, or to be more specific, trying to move about. He struggled to get a large stone off his body.

  What the…? What the bloody hell just happened…?

  He grunted as he struggled to get the stone off his body, and gritted his teeth as he slowly managed to lift it off him bit by bit. After a few moments, he managed to get the stone completely off himself, and used his remaining strength to throw it aside.

  He slowly sat up, and panted as he rubbed his eyes, for dirt had gotten into them during the explosion. He rubbed his eyes for about ten seconds, and slowly opened his now slightly teary eyes.

  He saw a figure lying before him, but he or she was not clearly visible to him because of his teary eyes. As his vision slowly cleared up, however, the man recognized the woman lying unconscious before him, but it took him slightly longer to register what had happened to her, for he was still awfully dazed.

  His eyes slowly widened in fear as he slowly registered that his daughter was the one lying unconscious, bruised, and covered in blood before him, and he looked at her motionless body with his mouth agape as he remembered using his body as a shield to protect her during the blast.

  "Mary…" he said with an emotional and soft tone of voice, "…Mary…! Are you alright?"

  Unfortunately, despite his effort to wake her up, Mary was completely out of it.

  More tears welled up in his eyes as he looked at her, and he became incomprehensibly morose as the reality of the situation began to sink in. His breathing increased as he began to tremble, and his eyes widened when he saw that he had her blood all over him.

  "M-Mary…" he stammered, "…Ma…ry…! Please…! Please!"

  He gritted his teeth when he, once again, received no response from her, and looked up at the sky as tears rolled down his face.

  It was too much for him, and his mind had finally begun to crack.

  He buried his face in his hands for a moment, before he screamed in incomparable fury.

  "Red!"

  On the south side of the city of Virtue, a bloodied and truly exhausted Bandit Lane groaned in pain, for a large piece of rock lied on the lower half of his body.

  Blood ran down his face as he desperately struggled to free himself from his predicament.

  Unfortunately, he did not have the strength to do so, regardless of how hard he tried, and he tried ever so terribly.

  Damn it…! he thought as he gritted his teeth and closed his eyes in pain, What the…? Just what the hell happened just now?

  Realizing that he would not be able to escape his predicament on his own, he stopped struggling, and panted as he looked around at the surrounding area. He had been too preoccupied with his dilemma to pay attention to his surroundings, so when he noticed what the area that surrounded him looked like, he gasped in complete shock, and slight tears filled his eyes.

  A gargantuan crater now replaced the cities of Virtue, Wor, and Revi.

  Within it, a multitude of smaller craters existed throughout the area, and an unhealthy amount of dust and dirt floated in the air.

  Any building that had not crumbled to the ground had caught fire due to the lightning, and Bandit looked at one of these buildings in complete awe.

  Wha…?

  Speechless, he trembled at the scene before him, and grunted as he grew increasingly wrathful at the destruction that had been brought upon his homeland…

  …Destruction that his older brother had brought to the land for the second time.

  "…Crim...son…" he said to himself with rising fury.

  He closed his eyes as he balled up his fists, and punched the ground so hard, his fist formed a crater.

  "You…bastard… I'll kick your stupid ass…"

  He looked up at the sky and threw his hands in the air as he screamed.

  "…all over the place!"

  Rachel groaned in pain as she slowly got on her knees.

  "God…" she grimaced, "…Scarlet…Abe…are you guys oka-?"

  She panted heavily as she opened her eyes to look over at Scarlet and Abe.

  When she did so, however, her eyes immediately began to fill with tears.

  No… she thought as she shook her head, not wanting what she saw before her to be real, No…!

  She placed her hand over her mouth
as she looked at her beloved friends.

  Half of Abe's body had been crushed by concrete, while a barely conscious Scarlet was covered in blood.

  Scarlet…! Abe…!

  Broken by the sight of her friends, Rachel gritted her teeth in great mental anguish, and let out of scream of pure agony.

  "No!"

  Most of the citizens of Wor and Revi now lied dead beneath the remains of the buildings that once stood erect in their home.

  Meanwhile, most of the mercenaries on the battlefield of Virtue grunted as they slowly crawled out from underneath huge slabs of rock that had crushed them or broken their bones.

  Luckily, the vast majority of their adversaries were now swimming with the fishes.

  It seemed they had finally won the battle…

  …but clearly, they had lost the war.

  On the west side of the city, Brayne crawled onto his knees through the seemingly endless land of debris. He coughed heavily due to the dust in the air, and closed his eyes as he covered his mouth with his hands.

  What the…? he thought, What the hell…?

  When he opened his eyes, he gasped in great shock when he saw the destruction that surrounded him, and his eyes began to twitch as he gritted his teeth in deep anger.

  Not again… he thought, remembering what Red had done to Lax a few months before, No, no, not again…!

  He grunted in pain and closed his twitching eyes as he balled up his fists in fury.

  Red!

  Bandit continued to struggle to free himself from his predicament, when he heard footsteps coming from behind him.

  "Oh, thank God…" he groaned in relief, "Hey, look…whoever you are…please… Can you give me a hand here…? I'm…stuck…!"

  The person who the footsteps belonged to, however, did not respond to his plea, and Bandit yelled for the person's help once more.

  "Seriously…" he said irritably, "I would really appreciate it if you could help me out here...!"

  Once again, he did not receive a response from the person. This time, however, the person walked into his view, and stood before him.

  "Thanks, man," he sighed with relief as he looked up to see the face of his savior, "I really appreciate…"

  The expression on his face instantly transformed into a scowl, and he gritted his teeth in fury when he caught sight of the bloodied man who stood before him.

  It was the last person he wanted to see.

  "You…"

  After having lifted the rock off Abe's body, Rachel stopped his bleeding as best she could.

  Tears streamed down her face as she looked at her fallen friends in sadness.

  "Are you okay…Abe…?" she asked weakly.

  "I'm…fine…" he said as he struggled to move, "Don't worry…about me…"

  Unfortunately, he was lying, in an effort to spare her feelings. In reality, he was pretty sure the entire left side of his body had been crushed the minute the stone had landed on it.

  Fuck! he thought with frustration, I can't…move…!

  He grunted as he tried to sit up, but Rachel quickly placed her hand on him and held him down.

  "Oh, no," she began, "You're not going anywhere."

  "But-!" he began defiantly

  "Abe!" she asserted sternly.

  As he looked at her adamant face, he sighed, for he knew there was no way he could win this argument. He closed his eyes as he took a deep breath.

  "You need to go check on the others," he suggested as he trembled in pain.

  She shook her head as she responded.

  "No," she said, "I can't leave you here like this."

  Abe sucked his teeth irritably before he spoke.

  "You need to…make sure everyone else is okay…"

  "No," she said adamantly, "I won't leave you."

  Slight tears filled his eyes as he slowly put his hand on her shoulder and looked right into her eyes.

  "Bandit…" he said.

  Her eyes widened as she thought about what had become of her best friend.

  "But-."

  "Rachel…" continued Abe as he panted heavily, "I'll be fine… I'm not that easy to kill…and if what I saw…her do earlier…is any indication…"

  The two of them looked at Scarlet as he finished his sentence.

  "…she isn't that easy to kill either…"

  Rachel touched the hand he had on her shoulder as she watched a tear stream down his face.

  "You and I...both know…how you feel about Bandit…Scarlet and I…are strong…so go… Go… Find Bandit…and make sure…he's…still alive…"

  He smiled a small smile at her as he continued.

  "That's an order…"

  Though she was unwilling to leave his or Scarlet's side, Rachel reluctantly acquiesced to Abe's plea, and began to crawl away, for she lacked the strength to stand up.

  Sadly, following his order did not take away the incredible level of uneasiness she felt about this whole thing.

  Bandit… she thought as she looked at her injured friends, adversaries, and the rubble around her, where…?

  Where are you…?

  Bandit glared at his older brother with fury, while his older brother looked at him with his trademark indifference, as well as a hint of what one might interpret as sadness.

  "So…" began Red, "You're still alive…"

  He watched as his little brother tried harder than ever to push the rock that pinned him down off his body.

  "You may not believe this…but…I wish it didn't have to come to this, Car… I really do… You know…when I first came back here…I had no desire to kill you… I didn't even want to see you…let alone fight you… I wanted absolutely nothing to do with you…but as soon as you saw me, you punched me in the face and started antagonizing me… Now…here we are… You started this fight between us…and now…I am the victor…and you are the one…who is about to lose his life…"

  Bandit looked at his brother seriously as he continued.

  "First…I am going to kill you… Then…I am going to kill all of your allies… By the end of the day…I will rule the Ice Lands…and unlike before…I will have absolutely no opposition."

  Bandit gritted his teeth in anger, and Red crossed his arms as he put his little brother at ease.

  "Do not worry… I have no intention of killing Scarlet… She is family, after all… But I suppose…you don't know what it means to be part of a family…do you? After all…if you did, our mother would still be alive!"

  "Shut up!" yelled Bandit furiously.

  "Make me!" yelled Red back at him as he stomped his foot.

  He cracked his neck as he raised his foot and positioned it a foot above Bandit's head.

  Bandit blew up in anger as he shouted.

  "You sociopath…! If… If… If you really cared about family, you wouldn't be trying to kill me!"

  "I take no pleasure in this," asserted Red, "Make no mistake, though… I am not killing you because I don't care about you; I'm killing you because I do. If I left you alive…you would continue to get in the way of my shaping the Ice Lands into a better place to live…and because you're my brother…I fear there is a…small chance…that I might actually…listen to you if I left you alive… But if I did that…if I let myself listen to you…and stopped trying to make the Ice Lands better…I'm sure only more pain, suffering, death and bloodshed would follow... In the end…you have no one to blame for this but yourself…for you have left me no…other…option... You turned your back on me all those years ago…and now…I must turn my back on you…"

  "That's a lie and you know it!" shouted Bandit, "What is the matter with you? You say one thing and then turn around and do something the complete opposite of what you say, and you keep doing that over and over! You keep saying you care about me, yet you keep threatening to kill me! You are completely delusional, and I've had enough of your inconsistencies! Stop acting crazy and stop acting like I am the one who has turned you into this…monster hell-bent on having control and power! I
blamed myself before, but…now I see everything clearly! I am not responsible for what you are or what you've done, and despite what Scarlet says, I'm not so sure your psychosis is either!"