Origin Story: Part 11

“Take that, you Commies! ...Are you Commies?”

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<PREV

“Yes, that’s me, the...” Madeline sighed. “Pink Princess.” She concentrated on the shield protecting her, Nadia, and Andrei from the soldiers' rifles. “And as for the last guy who shot at me, that didn’t turn out so well for him.” She thought again about how she accidentally killed Strytle and had to fight back nausea. “So let us go, or I’m... um... going to...”

As Madeline tried to figure out how to end that statement, she realized she didn’t know where Harvey was. Suddenly, one soldier flew through the air, and then another. Harvey had somehow slipped out and flanked them and was now fighting the soldiers with his super strength. “Take that, you Commies!” Harvey yelled as he struck a soldier so hard he flew across the room. Harvey then paused for one brief moment. “Are you Commies?”

The three soldiers left used that pause to flee out the door. Nadia and Andrei quickly grabbed rifles from the knocked-out soldiers while Harvey readied the AK-47 he had under his coat. “We probably should get going,” Harvey told Nadia and Andrei. They nodded.

They went out the door, Madeline sticking close behind Harvey, and soon they were under fire. Harvey, Andrei, and Nadia ran for cover and returned fire while Madeline hid behind them, covering herself in a forcefield. Madeline then spotted four more soldiers coming from another direction about to get the drop on Andrei and Nadia, who were fighting the first group.

“Watch out!” Madeline yelled as she put up a forcefield between them and the soldiers just as they started firing. She could feel the bullets hit the forcefield, and she had to fight collapsing from the strain to keep the shield up.

A whole jeep flew through the air at the soldiers, crashing down among them and causing them to flee in fear of the show of force. “Yeah, you better run,” said Harvey, dusting his hands, “you... I don’t know a slur for you guys yet.” He looked to Madeline. “It’s still okay to use ethnic slurs in battle, right?”

All the soldiers were currently fleeing, as were Nadia and Andrei. “I’d get out of here!” Andrei called to them as he ran with Nadia. “You’ll soon have the whole army coming down on you!”

“Should we follow them?” Madeline asked Harvey.

“Better idea,” Harvey said as he walked over to a motorcycle the soldiers left behind and started it up. “Come on.”

“Oh, I don’t know about this,” Madeline said. “I promised my mother I’d never ride one of these.”

They heard a noise and saw military vehicles headed their way. “Come on!” Harvey urged.

Madeline jumped on. “So there’s not like a seatbelt? And where are the helmets?”

The motorcycle lurched forward, and Madeline clung tight to Harvey. “Man, I hope these people we’re fighting are all bad,” Harvey yelled over the engine's roar. “I might have killed one or two of them. To be honest, I’m a little unclear on the political situation here.”

“I saw a link to an article about this country the other day on Twitter,” Madeline said, “and I really meant to read it.”

Madeline looked behind them to see some jeeps catching up with them. And one had a mounted machine gun that started firing at them. Riding a motorcycle in normal conditions seemed too dangerous to Madeline, but a machine gun firing at you was over the top. Madeline suppressed the panic and put up a forcefield in time to deflect some bullets headed their way. Each shot that struck felt like she was personally absorbing a punch to the gut. “I don’t know how many of these bullets I can stop!”

The motorcycle veered to the left onto a narrow road alongside a mountain, Harvey not slowing down. Madeline looked over to their right and saw a drop-off of a hundred feet down to a forest — without even a guard rail between them and the fall (being this was a poor country). She really didn’t like riding on a motorcycle.

The jeeps following them seemed to be taking the road more cautiously and had fallen far behind, but suddenly Harvey screeched the motorcycle to a stop. Blocking the road ahead was a tank with a cannon pointed right at them. Madeline put up a forcefield between her and the tank, but she really didn’t think she could not stop a tank shell. Harvey looked to be trying to find an option and turned to see the jeeps behind them catching up. They were boxed in. Except for one direction.

“Drive off the cliff!” Madeline yelled.

“What?”

“Do it! And hold on to me!”