Please note this is a guest entry.

“Huff. huff.” Oliver rested his hands on on knees. “With the distance -huff- delta, between us and -huff- the abomination -puff- and its relative spee-”

“Shut it!” Mike howled, panting only slightly less than Oliver. “I can’t hear your stupid math now.”

“He means to say we got away from it.” April said, before adding “For now.” She eyed the two paths of the fork in the road. “Left or right?” she said, turning around. “Oh, hey, weren’t there five of you?”

Mike turned around. “Kite, Flan, where’s Rob and Ken?”

They looked at each other for a second. “No idea.”

“You’ve got to be… We have to go back for th--”

DING-DING-DING-DING. Like a hammer striking pipes, a metallic sound echoed.

“Two hundred years shaven off, for any man who catches one of the five deserters.” the voice sounded like the speaker held his nose. Perhaps someone took the “I got your nose” game a bit too literal, April thought.

“You’ve got to--” Mike said, getting cut off by the pipe.

A different voice spoke through the web of pipes. “Erh… One of them is a male, about 6 foot 3, black hair and stout build… He’s got two companions…”

Mike’s voice boomed into the pipe. “Rob, I’ll rip out your da--”

“They’re at corridor sixty seven.” the first voice said. “Dead or alive... Actually, preferably dead.”

in the matter of seconds, the boots of a small mob resounded from the right fork.

for a brief moment, the group just stared at each other, before they almost kicked up the stone bricks from the floor as they accelerated into a mad dash.

Snick-snick.

“What’s that soun--”

SNAP-clank

April tumbled to the ground, the last iron pole had slipped from her makeshift splint.

“Gah!”

Oliver’s shoes slid across the rough floor as he came to a halt. “April!”

April grit her teeth. “Oliver, I can’t get up.”

“W-we can still fix it, if I just reattach the metal bar--”

“There’s no time. Oliver, I need a shoulder.”

Oliver grabbed the metal bar and started wildly fumbling with the ruined cloth that was supposed to hold the splint together.

“It’s a wonder it held up so long” April said, putting a hand on Oliver’s shoulder. “Here they come. Run!”

Oliver stood up with a wild look in his eyes. He held the iron pole in front of himself, but could barely hold it still, before swinging it uncontrolled and with closed eyes from side to side. “Get away from us!”

The mob consisted of a single gladiator team of ten people, all wearing the same red sash around their waist. They didn’t even slow down at Oliver's wild swinging.

April tried to stand, but winced in pain as she fell. “Oliver, don’t!”

the mob was within ten meters.

nine..

eight..

seven..

Oliver lifted the pole over his head.

five meters.

“Here they come!” Oliver said between his grit teeth.

Mike’s voice boomed.“THROW!”

Three javelins flew through the air, ramming the first three gladiators.

“Shields!” one of the gladiators yelled.

“Push them back!” Mike howled.

Mike, Kite and Flan held large tower shields up, charging the gladiators with ferocity only matched by a stampede of angry elephants.

“Push, push like you’re giving birth!” Mike howled.

Oliver was rammed with a shield from behind and fell to the ground only to get stepped on as Mike passed over.

The gladiators were rammed, five of them fell over, two of whom skewered by the short swords the three wielded.

“Push-Push! They stand between us and freedom!”

Their sheer aggression took the remaining gladiators by surprise, an unrelenting series of rapid stabs from behind the large shields ensued.

The unexpected ferocity made the remaining two gladiators turn and run.

“T-thanks.” Oliver said.

Mike turned his head, looking at Oliver from over his shoulder. “It’s a dead end, except for an armory. If you want to come with us, you’ve gotta come now.”

Oliver scrambled towards April with the metal pole in hand. “I’ll just--”

“Hmh. Suit yourself. Move out!” Mike said.

Oliver fumbled to fit the metal pole into the broken cloth that once held it in place. “Wait, I’ll be quick it’ll only take a sec-- Wait--no-no--don’t go.”

“There.” Oliver said. “We can go.”

“They’ll be at the fork soon, we’ve lost them.” April responded. "We can't catch up."

RATTLE. “Nephilim!” Mike’s faint voice cried out. “Get into formation!”

April stood up. “Run to the armory, grab some ranged weapons. Whatever you can find-- and some shields.”

April started a zombie-like walk towards the fork where Mike and his crew had engaged the nephilim.

clank-clonk-clank-clonk..

She peeked over her shoulder, Oliver was already close holding a selection of weapons in his arms. She let a slight smile show on her face. Oliver was both fast and reliable.

In front of her, the combatants were barely showing around the curved hallway.

“Here it comes!”

A chain with a large hook, or by most accounts, a hunk of vaguely shaped metal at the end, came crashing towards Mike’s shield.

CRASH-RIIP.

Like dropping an anvil on a ketchup bottle, Mike’s shield broke to a thousand pieces, and the metal continued into the man himself, tearing his flesh apart.

“By the-- RUN!” Flan howled.

“Gimme the bow!” April cried at Oliver, who promptly responded.

The mighty chain swung once more, a sideways sweep. Kite came tumbling to the ground from getting struck by the hand that held the chain, yet the chain continued, and flung Flan sideways like a ragdoll.

Flan and the hook-like hunk of iron rammed the side of the hallways, which shattered into a thousand pieces. Human fragments became indistinguishable from the blood-showered brick fragments.

the nephilim turned its attention towards Kite, who was laying on the ground, staring back at it, with fear painted on his face.

“No you don’t.” April howled as she loosened the arrow, which whistled through the air. The razor sharp metal tip aimed straight towards the head of the nephilim. Then it dived, the arrow tumbled through the air and hit the nephilim sideways like a twig.

The nephilim looked over at April and Oliver… Then took a step, ignoring Kite.

“O-oliver. D-ditch the weapons and gimme a shoulder.”

Oliver dropped the load of weapons onto the floor, and wrapped April’s arm around his shoulder. Oliver and April each felt the shaking and rapid heartbeat of the other, as they limped with all their might towards the dead end with the armory.

rattle-rattle.

rattle-rattle.

rattle.

I'm behind. 3 chapters to go.

Ps. Noodle Knight should have more chapters.