In which we awaken a miracle, pull a trigger, and discuss the difference between beetles and excretion.

The boy looked around, assessing his battleground. Then he nodded at the room of scrambling lab coats and green tint. He raised his freckled arms, revealing two heavy assault rifles, black as wet obsidian. Then justice reigned in the form of searing lead. Gunshots rang around the room felling all that the boy saw. And the boy saw everyone. Mr. Luitpold sprinted towards and exit, bowler hat toppling off his bald pate. A well aimed bullet crippled him mid stride, striking him on his pinned lapel. In a matter of seconds, All but the hum of the growing-machine was persisted.

The boy walked out of the smoking doorway, revealing himself to be a redhead, and one that needed a trim, too. A baseball hat capped his fiery top, and he wore a stained baseball jersey and black cargo pants. His arms were freckled to the point of tan-ness. He was visibly strong, a strange feature for such a lanky frame.

As he walked towards the cylinder in the center of the room, he released a barrage of bullets into the humming mechanism. The machine spluttered into silence and the silhouette of the girl stopped growing. The ginger boy tapped furiously on a keyboard, and the green glass tube disappeared into the ceiling. As the two in the operation beds came into view, the boy cursed. “Too late! I’m too late!” He rushed to the beds muttering ferociously. When he reached the sleepers – one a battered woman and the other a preteen, he stared at them for a full minute, his hand on his forehead, his breathing rapid and sharp. “Another gemini.” he whispered, “And I told ’em I could save her…” He looked the girl up and down, and shook his head. “Well,” he sighed, his voice burdened with stress and disappointment, “At least they didn’t finish. Maybe the other one has a chance, maybe.” He looked up with determination in his eyes, and breathed deeply.

“Um, ladies?” said the boy, unsure how two deal with the awkward situation. “Up, please? Ma’am? Yo! Y’all wake up, we need to move!”

And at that, a miracle opened her eyes for the first time. The girl shifted in the bed, sitting up slowly. He eyes fluttered, and she looked around, yawning. She was actually quite good looking, but the boy obviously didn’t care. In seconds, he was pulling her off of the bed. The girl toppled and sat on the floor, surprised. In the other bed, the woman woke up, hand to her shaking head.

“What the…” the woman grumbled. “Who, where-“

“No time now.” the boy rushed. “I bypassed the security system before I came, but it won’t take long before the idiots realize I got in here. Take this.” He held out one of his guns, and replaced it with a short roman sword hidden in a sheath in his boot.

“What the…” the woman started, but the boy shoved the big gun into her hands. He turned to the girl.

“Yo, gemini.” The girl didn’t respond. “Hey! Look over here!” The girl looked up surprised, frightened, and frazzled. Her hair was crazy and extremely long from sped up years of growth with no cutting. So much growing also made her look very muscular, but not much shorter than the woman, who was definitely no NBA star. He pulled a sawed-off shotgun from a holster on his side and handed it to her. She took it, but not in the right way, holding it by the barrel. The boy quickly took it away from her.

“We need to go.” The boy said as he turned back to the lady. He nodded at the gun in her hands. “You know how to use that gun – um, what’s your name?” The young woman rubbed her face. “Marie. And yes, I can shoot a gun.”

“Great. It looks like the girl doesn’t know how to walk. Are you going to carry her or am I?” Marie looked at the girl for the first time. She froze.

” She’s, but that’s – that’s, me. How-“

“Now time for that right now. I’ll carry her. But I’m tellin’ you it won’t be easy. Ripped kids weigh a ton.” He bent down and picked up the girl (who looked like she was about to cry) by the stomach and then swung her onto his back. It would’ve been easier if she did her part.

“Alright, let’s move. There are three rules to escaping. One: run as fast as you can. Two: don’t stop until you reach the end, or the end reaches you. Three: and I’m not kidding when I say this, if someone starts chasing us, shoot ’em up. The people in this base do real bad things, and I mean real bad. Justice is due, as some say, so don’t be afraid to deal it out. But ideally, we won’t have to kill anyone, so run fast. Got all that?”

Marie hung her head processing all the information she had seen and heard. Dozens of questions came and went like swooping pelicans. “Is he good? If so, can a kid get me out of here? Where is here? And who the beep is she?” If all of this can get me home, she thought, then I’ll do it. She raised her afro-ed head and nodded slowly.

“Great. Now run.” At that, the renegades became as wind, jumping over bodies, dodging pillars. They raced through the big doors the boy came in through, entering a dimly lit hall. They ran through sharp corners and up countless flights of stairs. They ran past many rooms much like the one they were just in. Marie looked in one and saw rows upon rows of sleeping people in what looked like jars. Marie yelped and kept running.

After about five minutes of running, Marie was getting very tired. The boy, who had introduced himself as Hunter while running, looked a smidge weary himself. Eventually they came to a large doorway, and Hunter stopped abruptly. He sneakily peaked his head through the doorway, and swung back out of sight.

“Dang.” Hunter spat. “Dangdangdangdangdangdangdangdang!”

“What? What’s wr-“

“Darn!” Hissed Hunter in a loud whisper.

“Tell me what’s wrong, beep it!” Marie loud-whispered back.

“Guards. A lot of guards.” He replied. Marie put her face in her hand. She grumbled an unintelligible string of annoyance and looked back at Hunter. “So,” she sighed, “what now? I mean you have a kid on your back and I’m not as good a shot as you, judging by the bloodbath in that torture room.” Hunter tapped his foot on the cement floor, strategizing mentally.

“Alright,” he whispered at last, “okay, so the first thing you need to do is carry little miss gemini here, capiche?”

“If you say so.”

“Great. Next I need to create a diversion. I’m going to keep going down the hall and make ’em go there, and you hide in there with her.” He nodded at a near cart of clothes in the guarded room.

“How the cuss do I get in there?” Marie loud-whispered.

“You be quiet? I don’t give a dog!”

“A… okay, fine. But if both of me die than you will have to face my brother.”

“Whatever. Anyway, after I distract them -“

“And how will you do that?” Marie cut him off.

“I have an idea, just listen, please. Anyway, once I effectively distract them, you’ll get out of the cart, leave the girl, go down the hall and kill ’em all. Sound like a plan?”

Marie looked dumbstruck. “Just, like, – I won’t be put in jail for this, right? ‘Cause I am NOT going to jail.”

“Jail? Wow, you really have missed a lot, haven’t ya? No, you won’t be put in jail. Anyhow, after we hide the bodies, we make a run for it and the Coleocopter picks us up.” He took one last look at the exit. “Okay, get in there. I’ll go down the hall.” He gave her a hasty salute and disappeared behind a far off corner. Marie was left behind.

“Well, it could be worse.” Thought Marie. “I could have to sneak into a room full of psychos who want to torture me, depending on a kid to get out. Oh wait! I am!” Marie took a deep breath, and quickly poked her head into the doorway. The room was well-lit and filled with guards. Guards by the heavy iron doors, guards by the huge black marble pillars, and guards gambling at a green fold-up table in a corner. As Marie strategized the short path to the laundry cart, the voice of reason resonated on her train of thought, derailing it. Would she make it? Probably not. Would the guards kill her? Most possible outcome. And, most pressing of all, could she trust this strange, determined boy? Marie gagged Reason before it could answer. I can do this, she thought, my life depends on it. And with this final thought, Marie entered the room. Thinking only of getting into the laundry cart, she took two acrobatic leaps and dove headfirst into the cart, only to hit the bottom of it. The teen on her back gave a dangerously loud yelp. Marie exhaled for the first time in a while.

“Hey!” exclaimed a deep and staticky voice. “You there! Stay where you are!” Marie realized that her top half, nicely concealed by black garments, was also the only half concealed by the black garments. She felt ready to barf, or to scream, or to die, when suddenly a series of explosions rang out outside. The soldiers quickly changed directions and piled out of the hall. After a muttered prayer of thanks Marie pulled herself out of the cart. She raced down the hall leaving the girl behind, ready to use the weapon she barely knew anything about. She zoomed around the corner and saw Hunter shooting in all directions with a barbaric battle cry. “TOOK YA LONG ENOUGH! KILL ‘EM!” And with that, Marie closed her eyes and pulled the trigger of the heavy lunk of metal she held.

Nothing happened.

The only sound she heard was an empty metallic clunk. Hunter cursed and threw down his similarly empty guns. “Run, dang it!” he screamed. Bullets whizzed around Marie’s ears as she raced down the hall hitting her in several places, but even still stopping only to chuck her weapon at a soldier that had gotten too close. Hunter whipped the teenager (now quietly crying) out of the cart and lugged her on his back without a change of speed. Marie banged open the metal double doors and dove out into the world. Guards could be heard storming across the room not far behind.

“Get up!” She heard Hunter cry. “They’re on our tail. We gotta keep running!” Marie painfully got up, dazed by the impact of her rough landing and by the tunnels bore into her arms by bullets, and looked at her surroundings with bleary eyes. What she saw made them fill with tears. It was dark, but it wasn’t night. The sun was obscured by a black-red haze, only barely visible. The buildings around her were mostly demolished, save a few ghettos without people in them. Fire could be seen everywhere, smoldering in rain-soaked rubble. Muck and refuse filled the torn-up streets, and dark, slimy things reveled in it. She had a half-moment to take all of the horrid views in, but it hurt her as if she had been there for a lifetime. “Come on!” Hunter bellowed, and with that, she ran after him into the ruins of a city lost to the hands of evil.

***

Luitpold jolted awake, and not a second had passed before he felt the pain. Not pain like the sting of salt in a wound, but rough, rugged pain that spread and pulsed with the rhythm of his heart. He groaned. His surroundings were littered with bullet holes: on the walls, in the equipment, in his employees. Why, even his overcoat had a hole on the right lapel, and underneath it he felt the sting of burning metal.

Wait, metal? That can’t-

“Mein thunfisch*!” He yelped in a pained squeal, and as quick as a hot bullet he unbuttoned his overcoat, then his coat, then his waistcoat. Like a Frenchman eating a croissant he tore through the punctured layers one by one, until he found it. There, in his breast pocket speckled with oil, was a can of tuna. The metal (plus the fish and the many layers of clothing) had saved his life. He had loved tuna before, but now he was indebted to it.

“Danke* thunfisch,” he said with a professional tone that didn’t seem fitting in a conversation with a sea-fish. “danke.”

***

Marie, Hunter, and the doppelganger had been running for an exhausting half-hour before they stopped for a rest. Well, the doppelganger wasn’t running per se, but riding on the backs of her saviors. Marie had found a blown-up 7-11, and asked Hunter (who said he wasn’t tired but was obviously lying) if they could maybe stop for a sec. Hunter dissented, and they were presently laying on the soiled concrete beside a charred gas pump.

“Hey, Hunter?” Marie prompted after minutes of deafening silence. Hunter gave way to a half-attentive grunt. “I just – thanks for saving me back there. I owe you, bro.”

“Yer darn right you owe me.” joked Hunter. “I had plans today.”

“Other than saving ladies and shooting Germans?”

Hunter laughed, but his smile reverted back to a solemn frown quickly. “Marie,” Hunter’s voice grew alarmingly strict. “Listen to me. Those guys, they’re different. They’re evil. They’re not all German, they don’t even have a race. If they did, they abandoned it when they chose to be what they are.” His face was strange, like he was mentally scribbling on a memory he couldn’t get rid of. “We aren’t defined…”

Marie scanned Hunter’s face for some indication of a deeper meaning. She was good at that. “Hunter,” she said quietly. “are you okay?” He nodded. “Yeah. Just get kinda…” Hunter waved his hands around exasperatedly, and stared off into the distance. Marie looked at him worriedly. Not exactly worriedly as, say, a best friend would be, but the kind where you’re looking at a good friend who is doing something out of the ordinary.

“Um…?” Marie snapped her fingers in his face. He shook his head like a wet dog and made a subtle coughing noise, the “Hchem hm,”sort of cough that means, “Nothing to see here.”

“Yep. Right. Sorry.” Hunter said with a hint of embarrassment. “Zoned out there. Anyway, we need to hit the road. Naptime’s over, lady!” With that he slapped his knees, rose, and helped Marie up.

“So, what now?” she queried.

“Well,” pondered Hunter, “Reckon we better make our way to The Pickup. We can signal a Coleocopter from there.”

Marie looked at him in confusion. “Ummm, okay, how about this: I listen like a good student and you tell me what the cuss a… Colon-Copter is. Deal?”

“Colon-Copter?” Hunter snorted.

Marie laughed. “Hey, if you’re gonna make no sense, somebody oughta make fun of you, bro.”

“Well for one,” said Hunter, still chuckling, “it’s COLEO-copter. Coleo as in Coleoptera Magnum.” Marie tried to interrupt, but Hunter held up a hand. “Hear me out. You’ll know everything you’ll need to know once we get there.”

“Yeah, but where is ‘there’?”

“Can we just get a move on and trust me?”

Marie whipped her head around annoyingly and nodded.

*German for, “My tuna!”

*German for, “Thank you.”