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: 2794348" data-attributes="member: 63">Halloween9:30 pmHetfield pulls open the door to the car he’s jacking and starts unbuckling the driver. In his heavy green kevlar and body armor, shooting him is nearly pointless, but he has a bag slung over his shoulder that could well hold the detonators.Nathan supposes he could try to ram him, but the terrorist has already survived several gunshots and an overturned truck; Nathan’s not sure it’d be worth the damage he’d inflict on his BMW. So instead Nathan closes within 30 ft. and makes a hard turn left, exposing his car’s passenger side and skidding to a stop. Immediately Scarpedin is out of his seat and out the door, charging Hetfield with sword in hand. John, wounded but not debilitated, exits the back door and scurries toward the overturned truck. Cars are backing up on the interstate, their drivers fearful of getting anywhere near the gunfight about to erupt.“Hi there!” shouts the terrorist as Scarpedin closes. “I'm an *sshole. I know I'm an *sshole. I've been an *sshole for a very long time. I LIKE being an *sshole, the hours are good and there's no heavy lifting.”He punctuates this by shooting Scarpedin in the chest with a shotgun. Scarpedin sags for a moment, then surges forward and hacks at the Canadian with his longsword, chopping down once on the man’s shoulder before turning the blade and slashing a low strike at the man’s kidney. The blade slices through kevlar far better than a bullet, and though it glances off plating on the shoulder, the strike to the abdomen goes through and draws blood.The Canadian steps back, looks down at his bleeding side in annoyed disbelief, and then kneecaps Scarpedin. The knight goes down. Hetfield is about to get into his car and drive off when he notices John standing atop the driver-side door of the armored truck, kicking in the shattered safety glass. Hetfield tries to shoot John, but his shotgun is empty and he has to reload. Meanwhile, John aims his silencer inside the wrecked truck’s cabin and finishes off the driver (a Canadian terrorist who looked a lot like Noah Wylie).Nathan, still sitting in his car, has been busy getting out ammo for his magnum and reloading it, and so as Hetfield is lining up his shotgun at John, Nathan leans across the front seat, aims out the passenger window, puts a round into the man’s waist, where the body armor offers limited protection. Hetfield grimaces and moves to take cover behind the back of the car, then pulls a grenade off his belt and tosses it in a high arc toward Nathan’s BMW. Nathan sees it coming and kicks the car forward a dozen feet, so when the grenade lands and explodes he’s a safe distance away.Meanwhile, John has leapt off the armored car and is making a line for the fallen Scarpedin, who, although conscious, is too wounded to fight. Hetfield fires at John but John jukes sideways and the shot misses. Nathan returns fire from the front seat of his car and shatters the windshield of the car Hetfield’s hiding behind. For a few moments Nathan and the terrorist exchange gunfire, each of them ducking for cover after shooting. Nathan hopes this is distraction enough for John to get Scarpedin to safety, because knows it won’t take long for Hetfield to realize he can just go and carjack another vehicle.In the brief moments Nathan’s head is above the level of his door, he sees that John has kneeled beside Scarpedin and is struggling to convince the knight to retreat. Scarpedin looks adamant about not fleeing, though, and finally John throws up his hands in frustration and just grabs Scarpedin. When it happens, Nathan is aiming a shot at Hetfield, not looking at his two allies, but out of the corner of his eye, perhaps even beyond the bounds of normal vision, he sees something beautiful and shining flare with light.He is too shocked to fire, because suddenly Scarpedin is on his feet, magically healed.Hetfield turns in surprise as Scarpedin comes at him, but the knight’s sword moves faster than the terrorist’s aim. One downward slash cuts along Hetfield’s triceps and forearm, slashing armor and flesh. Then, before Hetfield can react, Scarpedin steps in even closer, grabs Hetfield’s arm to hold him in place, and brings an upswing across the man’s chest and into his face, knocking off the bulletproof face mask and sending a spray of blood into the air. But in his eagerness, Scarpedin lowered his guard, and he takes one final shotgun round to his shoulder as Hetfield slumps to the ground.“Sh*t!” Scarpedin curses. He turns away and staggers toward John. “The *sshole shot me. Gimme some more of that magic, John. C’mon John.”Scarpedin assumes Hetfield is down, and so he doesn’t see it, but Nathan senses it as Hetfield, covered in his own blood, pushes himself to his knees and reaches for a grenade. He’s about to pull the pin when the laser sight of Nathan’s magnum finds the man’s throat. Nathan fires, and Hetfield goes down with a final gurgle.“Grab the bag!” Nathan shouts. “We’ve got to go.”Already in the distance he can hear police sirens. He imagines he could explain this situation, but he’d quite prefer not to. Some cars have started driving along the shoulder to get around them. As Nathan waits for John and Scarpedin to get back to the car, it strikes him that this is the second time he has backed up traffic like this, the second time it has been a bomb, and the second time he has seen American drivers rush around a roadblock by driving on the grass. It would amuse him if he weren’t so worried for his car.John helps Scarpedin into the car, both of them bloodied and injured, but less than they ought to be. Nathan catches John’s eye and smiles.“What?” John glares.“I’m saying nothing,” Nathan says.His car is riddled with bullet holes and pieces of shrapnel, the seats are going to stain with blood, there’s a broken radio jammer in the back seat, along with a bag holding a detonator, Hetfield’s shotgun, and a mini-gun. Leaving a trail of sparks from his right rear wheel, Nathan cuts off the freeway and onto a feeder road, and hopes he can avoid being found by the police.Scarpedin, with the luxury of time to loosen his armor and pull out his cel phone, checks his messages.“Who called you?” Nathan asks casually.Scarpedin shrugs. “An unknown number, and that crazy elf girl. She sent. . . .”Scarpedin trails off. Nathan glances over and sees Scarpedin staring with ever-widening eyes at his cel phone.“Pictures?” Nathan asks. He grabs the cel phone from Scarpedin’s hand before the man can object, and starts scrolling through a series of pictures taking from a picture phone. His smile widens as he sees each one. First is of what appears to be a young, dark-skinned woman with pointed ears and white hair, dressed in Renaissance Festival attire, smirking as she snaps a picture of herself. Then, photo by photo, she first removes her fake ears, takes out her contacts, washes the paint from her face, and takes off her costume to reveal a t-shirt beneath. In the last photo she winks.“So,” Nathan says, “pictures of her ‘undressing,’ then?”He hands the phone back to a grumbling Scarpedin.“Call Belladonna,” Nathan says. “We won’t be headed back to the party any time soon, but I want to make sure things are alright in our absence.”“No more visions?” John asks.“No, no. I’m quite certain we’re safe for the rest of the night.”In the back streets of lower-class New Orleans, they scrape and squeal their way through the night, looking for a 24-hour body shop that won’t ask too many questions. Only several minutes later does Nathan realize that they forgot to make sure Hetfield was really dead.  To be continued . . .</blockquote>

Verification