Upgrade your account to a Community Supporter account and remove most of the site ads.
Rocket your D&D 5E and Level Up: Advanced 5E games into space! Alpha Star Magazine Is Launching... Right Now!

Reply to thread

Message: <blockquote data-quote="RangerWickett" data-source="post: 2778706" data-attributes="member: 63">Halloween9:25 pmThe black BMW skids sideways out of the gate, coming to a stop scant feet away from the armored truck. Nathan, bedecked in all the finery of a Transylvanian count, nods politely to the Canadian terrorist."Holy sh*t," Scarpedin says from the passenger seat. "Nice driving."The terrorist, who looks like the lead singer of Metallica, James Hetfield, swings open the back door of the armored car and jumps inside, shouting for the driver to go. The armored car starts to chug away sluggishly, its back door hanging open. They can see Hetfield pulling out a black detonator."You still got that shotgun?" Scarpedin asks."Here," Nathan says, proferring the gun, which he had made a point to take out of his trunk before the terrorists arrived. As Scarpedin rolls down his window, Nathan drives after the armored car, getting close enough to give Scarpedin a shot. Hopefully they'll be able to handle the Hetfield look-alike before he pulls out his mini-gun.Scarpedin leans out the side window and fires from twenty feet away, hitting Hetfield in his chest. But Hetfield, safely protected by heavy body armor, simply flips them the middle finger, then uses the same finger to mash down on the detonator.Nothing happens. Nathan breathes a sigh of relief that the jammer is working. The armored car swerves slightly and Nathan has to back away to keep from getting rammed. Hetfield nearly falls out the back of the truck, but once he regains his balance he hammers at the detonator a few more times, until Scarpedin fires another shotgun blast at him. This shot goes wide, but Hetfield must not want to take any chances. He grabs the back door of the truck and pulls it shut.Scarpedin spitefully fires a shot at the truck's tires, but misses."This gun sucks," Scarpedin says. "Open the sun roof. I need a better shot."In the back seat, John asks, "Was he trying to blow up the mansion?""Yes," Nathan sighs. "I don't just make these things up, you know."The armored truck keeps swerving from side to side, keeping Nathan from getting next to it for a shot at the driver. From the sun roof, Scarpedin tries again with the shotgun, and John leans out the rear window with a pistol, both of them popping shots at the tires, to no appreciable effect.The truck is nearing the interstate. Remembering his vision, Nathan guesses it's foolish to try to direct the terrorists in any one direction and risk getting his car crushed. However, same as in the vision, the truck veers northward, cutting toward the freeway at seventy miles an hour. Nathan's BMW cruises after it, following in the wake the huge vehicle cuts in traffic. There are too many cars on the interstate for Nathan to feel comfortable, and he still has no idea how to stop the armored truck, but the radio jammer has a short range, so he cannot dare fall behind.Another few shotgun blasts sound out from overhead as Scarpedin fires round after round, most of the shots missing the truck entirely and instead clipping other cars. Nathan hears Scarpedin cursing, and glances up briefly to see him trying to pass the shotgun back down through the sun roof. In his plate armor, though, he takes up all the space, so he has to struggle to shimmy back down into the car."This gun sucks!" he says once he's finally inside. "Gimme another one.""You used all my ammo," Nathan yells, "and you accomplished nothing? I thought Americans were supposed to be good with guns!"John grumbles audibly in the back seat, then leans out the side window and puts three bullets into one of the left rear tires. The tire sags a little, but the truck still has several to spare.Scarpedin, seeming suddenly bored with the gun fight, starts to fiddle with the radio, muttering that they need driving music. All he gets is static, the station's being blocked by the jammer. He punches the radio in frustration."Your car's broken," Scarpedin says.Distracted by Scarpedin's fit, Nathan doesn't even notice until the last moment that Hetfield has slowly managed to get himself and his mini-gun onto the top of the truck, standing out of a hatch on the roof. In addition to his body armor, the man now wears a clear-fronted bullet-proof helmet, and he waves and smiles, then takes aim with his mini-gun.Nathan swerves as dozens of bullets tear into the road where his car just was. He has to struggle to avoid crashing into an SUV, and after a moment of frantic driving, he ends up two lanes to the left of the armored car, with a family sedan in the lane between them."Where the f*ck-?" Scarpedin says, the rest of his cursing cut off as he scrambles to stand up through the sun roof."Scarpedin!" John shouts. "Get inside, dammit!"Hetfield flashes a smile at them from twenty feet away, then fires, aiming for the body of the BMW. In an instant, Nathan knows that if he brakes, the shots will miss him and instead tear into the family car next to him, so instead Nathan slams his foot on the pedal and swerves toward the concrete median, the automobile equivalent of a distance parry. Hetfield's mini-gun volley misses the engine block and instead cuts into the passenger side doors and right rear tire. The car drops sharply, back and to the right, and Nathan grimaces as he begins driving on what sounds like a horribly mangled rim. He has run-flats, but the rhymic clipping and shower of sparks trailing from behind his car tells him the tire is not just flat, but torn and jagged."Scarpedin!" This time Nathan shouts it. "Get down!"Scarpedin drops back down inside the car and glares at Nathan. "Stop screwing me up! Drive the car straight for a second."Just then, over the crackle of the radio, the whir of mini-gun bullets, and the bleating of car horns, Scarpedin's cel phone begins to ring from inside his plate armor. He twists awkwardly to try to reach the phone, but he finally resigns himself to not being able to answer it."He's bloody insane," Nathan mutters, continuing to swerve as a whirring line of bullets chews up the interstate beside and behind them. "And his ring tone is annoying."He has no idea how many rounds Hetfield has, but he can see an ammo chain feeding  up from inside the truck's back compartment. Hating himself for doing it, Nathan swings his car on the far side of a large van, getting a bit of cover from the hail of bullets. To his horror, he hears the heavy, chunky clanging of the mini-gun chewing through the van to get to the BMW.Then suddenly Nathan realizes what it means if Scarpedin is getting a cel phone signal. He glances at the radio jammer in the back seat, and sees it smoking from a bullet hole. Worse, it is spattered with blood, as is the entire back of the car. John is clutching his right arm, which is a mess of torn and bloody flesh."I'm okay," John gasps. "But we've gotta fall back." For a moment he despairs, until again he hears the sound of the mini-gun, and instinctively he swerves the car, managing to avoid getting hit."Get closer," Scarpedin says.John groans, "We can't handle the damn mini-gun!""Says you," Scarpedin says. "I'm gonna get it. Hold the car f*cking straight this time."Scarpedin once again stands up through the sun roof, and Nathan sees him concentrating, holding the Dalai Lama prayer beads in one hand. They are speeding along at well over 70 miles an hour, barely twenty feet from the armored car, both their vehicles weaving in and out of traffic. The van that briefly provided cover has braked suddenly, and in his rear-view mirror Nathan sees it skid, overturn, and catch fire. The yellow lights of the interstate strobe across them, cars honk in desperate confusion all around, and for a moment, the terrorist loses sight of the BMW.Nathan knows perfectly well that Scarpedin cannot use magic. Anyone would agree that it would be impossible for him to suddenly manifest spellcasting powers, without being psychic or having a ghost. But then again, impossible is Scarpedin's life.Through the sunroof (and the various bullet holes cut in his roof), Nathan sees Scarpedin reach out a hand toward Hetfield. And then, impossibly, the mini-gun is torn from the terrorist's grasp, flies across the gap between the two cars, and lands in Scarpedin's hands."No way," Nathan says, smiling.He can't help but laugh as he pulls in closer to give Scarpedin a clear shot.</blockquote>

Verification