27. A Sticky Tarzan #3
I look around at everyone and realize I’m still sitting on a moving target. Shit!
The problem is, this target is twice as tall as the normal Darkstars, but that doesn’t mean I can’t take it out like I did the other ones, except my shoulder is garbage, and I have no powers. I might have bit off more than I can chew.
Nixdice starts attacking my friends as I balance along her back. I’ve been in this position before, so it should be nothing to slice her neck. As I move forward to get into position, a pincher swings up into my face, and I stumble back.
“Not so fast, dubious one,” Nixdice hisses as one of her torsos and heads turns toward me. What the hell?
“She has two torsos?!” I yell out in shock and warning.
“Yes!” Blessing answers. “That’s what Nixdice means, night having two heads for short.”
“Thanks for the warning,” I grumble to myself as I block the pincher and dodge the hand reaching for my useless arm. Fuck, this will not be easy.
Well, since there are two torsos and heads on this hairy beast, I’ll call one A for Asinine and B for Brazen Brat.
“I’m coming, bestie!” Moni yells and flies up to me, increasing her size. She stands on my right and looks down at my injured arm. “Oh, you’re honey-glazed and peppered with ripped berry poppers.” She wrinkles her nose. “Sorry.”
I don’t know what she just said, but I think she means I’m fucked. Tell me something I don’t know. She does a mini boom that rocks the torso back, causing us to shift along Nixdice’s back.
“Oopsies.” Moni turns pink as she pulls out her sias. “I’ll just stick to these.”
“You’re good. Use whatever you can. I’m not much help, I’m afraid,” I tell her, raising my glaive right as the pincher comes around again from torso B. The sheer force of it colliding with me causes pain to shoot into my injured shoulder and slides me across the monster’s back a few inches.
“Oh my goodness. Do you need help?” Moni asks, concern lacing her voice. Even though I don’t dare take my eyes off the pincher in front of me, I know she’s turning her nervous dark gray.
“I got this distraction, help take down the bitch,” I grunt.
I could possibly take it down like I did the other one, even with one arm, but I would have to be faster. I quickly dismiss that idea. Even if I could somehow mask the burning and throbbing of my arm, my body just can’t pull more speed out of thin fucking air.
I guess I can just be a distraction while everyone else takes this thing down, like I told Moni.
Slashing down at the pincher, I spin towards its weak joint and try to hit it, but I miss as it pulls away to strike again.
I take a defensive stance, knowing I’m not doing much beyond just being annoying, but if I can help out at all, then I’m helping somewhat.
“No! Sister!” A shrill scream makes me flinch, and my eyes flick over to Moni and Asinine’s torso, who’s jerking unnaturally.
The slight deviation costs me when the claw strikes and I miss it as it catches my injured arm, clamping me at my shoulder. White-hot pain pierces me as I’m lifted up, dangling from my socket alone, causing screams to be torn out of me as I fight blacking out, but eventually lose.
‘We are not weak,’ the voice in my head growls as I see two slight glowing orbs floating before me in the darkness.
They are at least fifty feet away and look no more than a pinpoint in the distance.
Where am I? Am I inside my own head? The light disappears for only a moment before the shimmer returns, brighter and closer, looking more radiant with each passing moment.
‘We are the vexed, the frenzied, the one that deals out the pain. Not the one that bows to it.’ Five feet in front of me, and I realize, the orbs are eyes, and they are the bluish gray luminousness of a lethal psychopath.
‘You are demented.’
A wide and wicked smile of sharp teeth appears out of the darkness briefly before disappearing, and a raspy laugh replaces it.
‘Certifiable. Yes, or at least so I’ve been called. The point is, you do NOT bow. Take this pain and Give. It. Back!’ she demands.
The darkness clears, and I find myself still in Nixdice’s possession, and she’s jerking me around like I’m some Raggedy Ann doll in front of my friends. And worse, she’s trying to use me as a ransom.
I suddenly feel heat flare within me. I can still feel the pain that’s throbbing through my body, but it somehow coils within me and merges with the heat that’s gaining traction inside me.
“If you want your precious thing back—” I can’t hear anything else she says as this new heat surges through my body, and I throw out my good arm towards her, screaming as I release all the pain and heat that’s gathered there.
An arc of white light slices through the air and passes through Nixdice’s body. She freezes mid-speech, and her eyes laser-focus on me as her lips let out a gasp before her upper body slices off her abdomen, taking me down with her.
Shit! I didn’t think that through. This is really going to hurt, I manage to think as the floor rushes toward me.