"What do you mean there's another Harbinger?" I demanded. "I can't go out there. You know that. Actually I'm supposed to run in the opposite direction of the nearest Harbinger. I don't want to have to…kill someone again."
Katie just stared at me blankly, her hand stretched out expectantly, so she could teleport me to the battlefield.
"I'll fight anything else." I tried again, "Look Meg and I just killed a Scokytocles. Easily too. Just…give me anything that isn't a Harbinger."
"Look, this isn't my decision to make. Tell that to Hylla when you meet her." Katie said.
I wasn't sure I wanted to meet Hylla just yet, which was funny because all I'd wanted for a while was a simple conversation with her. Now I couldn't even bear to face her.
"And what about Meg?" I asked.
"Not an option." Meg said, "I'm still not fully recovered yet. Plus Harbingers hate me. The last one I met threw me down a hundred feet through a building!"
"She has a point." Katie agreed, "She can't come. It's a whole battlefield out there. Giant bulls, humanoid stuff, an army of Skyraxes and flying creatures. The whole package. Bringing an injured person there? You'll be shredded in seconds."
"Great." I muttered. "So where is this happening?"
She grinned, "The concrete jungle, New York City."
"Why'd I assume New York would be one of the first big cities to fall?" Meg wondered.
Katie shrugged "Well it's always like that in movies. Anyway, this is one of the few big cities that has still not been overrun. Along with Tokyo and Sao Paulo. So we kinda need all hands on deck for this one."
"Fine." I grumbled, "Let me go suit up."
Ten minutes later, Katie and I stood arm in arm in front of the cabin, ready to teleport.
Meg spent some time fusing over and tightening my END suit straps before stepping back.
"Please stay safe, Meg." I told her. I couldn't hide how worried I felt for her, especially after a Scokytocles had just appeared to try to kill her.
She waved aside my worry, "I'll be fine. I have my dangerous baby here with me." She said and patted the machine gun strapped to her back, "More importantly, try to come back in one piece. Remember, we have…stuff to talk about."
A slight shiver went up my spine at the sound of that.
I nodded, not trusting myself to say anything.
Meg walked towards me, stood on her tiptoes and kissed me, deeply and passionately. I could feel Katie gasping in surprise beside me.
My knees suddenly felt weak. Her lips tasted like lemonade. Did she have lemonade before I woke up? I suddenly wanted to taste anything she'd drunk from her lips.
Was that too far? I didn't care.
She pulled back and looked me in the eye and whispered, "Better come back to me or I'll literally kill you myself. Also try not to kill your comrades while you are at it."
"Yes, ma'am." I swallowed.
"Alright then." Katie said a little too loudly, "We have to go."
Meg nodded, "I'll go bury that guy over there. And good luck, to you too Katie."
Katie grinned, "Thanks. Would definitely need it."
And with that, we got sucked into a vacuum and in less than a second, appeared right in the middle of Times square.
Immediately my legs touched the ground, I stumbled and dropped to my knees. I'd forgotten how awful it felt to teleport.
I would have emptied my guts right there on the pavement but I didn't even get to eat breakfast this morning.
I expected Katie to fall into a stupor again but she was surprisingly still on her feet, although she couldn't seem to walk straight.
The first thing that made me realize I was in a battle field was the usual deafening noise—the roars of jet engines, guttural roars of monsters echoing between buildings and rapid gunfire of machine guns.
For once, Times square was completely deserted, the giant screens flickering uselessly over empty streets. More than a few times, army aircrafts zoomed above us, vibrating buildings around.
Katie pulled me to my feet and started pulling me to the nearest building.
"Come on. We can't stay out here in the open."
I still felt groggy but I didn't see any immediate threat around. "Why the hurry? There's literally nothing-"
I heard a loud squawk from the sky above that sounded suspiciously like a giant chicken.
"Hurry!" Katie cried, fear and panic in her voice.
From on top of the skyscrapers around, two massive bird-like creatures swooped down on us like killer aircrafts.
"RUN!" Katie cried, abandoning me instantly and sprinted towards the building.
So much for her support.
I tried to follow but my brain was still moving too sluggishly. I tripped on my leg and fell on my face.
Did I mention how much I hated teleporting?
I was only saved by the greediness of the chicken monsters.
Just as I was about to become bird food, the monsters slammed into each other in their haste to get to me first and crash landed on the road, tumbling over each other across the street.
I used that moment to get up and made it to the lobby of the building Katie had escaped to.
The whole lobby was filled with END soldiers, gearing up and refilling their ammo. Others were cleaning fancy weapons like the blades of their axes and swords.
There was something about this crowd of END soldiers that was different from the general vibe of ones I'd met.
I mean I loved the people I'd fought together with, but they had this vulnerability about them. But thinking back on it now, they were all just probably as new to the job as I was.
These ones here lacked that vulnerability. They looked battle hardened. They had this strength and aura around them that told me they were the real hardened veterans of END.
They all reminded me of the likes of Bloodfang, Hylla and Brody.
These were the real deal.
I spotted Hylla at the back in her black combatant uniform, sitting on the floor among other soldiers.
She seemed to blend in better here than in our camp with her quiet strength.
Katie had already met up with her and was giving her a report but Hylla didn't seem to be listening to her.
Because she was staring right at me.
Katie turned to see what she was looking at and spotted me, "oh, you made it."
She tried to sound enthusiastic at least.
Hylla beckoned at me to come over.
"You good?" She asked when I came over.
She didn't sound angry at all. Or sad. Or disappointed. Just genuinely concerned. Like a real friend.
"Yeah. I'm fine. Are you okay?" I asked, genuinely concerned about her.
She smiled, "Yeah I'm fine, Zeph. But that's not important right now. We are in battle. You said you can't fight a Harbinger or at least be near one right?"
"Right." I answered.
"So I'm going to need you to join the Bravo Null squad to help push back the enemy hoard. Right out of Manhattan."
"Bravo Null squad? Those guys hate my guts!" I complained. I remembered how they didn't hesitate to try to kill me when I lost control and how Macy pumped me full of high voltage electric current after.
"You'll be fine. Just do the best you can. We'll hold off the Harbinger here."
"Where's the Harbinger though?"
The whole building started shaking and a few cracks appeared on the concrete wall next to me.
"An earthquake?" I asked stupidly.
"No." Katie said grimly, "The Harbinger is back."
Massive explosions from outside rocked the building we were in. The glass doors shattered.
The whole place was starting to have a thick smell of ozone.
"Katie, get Zeph out of here."
The soldiers were already matching out to battle the Harbinger outside.
From where I stood in the lobby, I saw a very massive golden foot step on a truck and flattened it on the road in the distance. The fuel tank of the truck exploded from the amount of heat emanating from the giant.
Katie yelped, took my arm, yelled good luck to Hylla and then with a 'pop' sound we got sucked into the air again.
We appeared at the center of Brooklyn Bridge and this time, Katie collapsed immediately, her eyes half closed and she started murmuring incoherent things. She was clearly drained from having to teleport back to back.
I still felt a bit woozy but it wasn't too bad. At least I could stand this time.
I carried Katie and put her in an abandoned car by the side of the road, a fairly safe distance from the battle.
Ahead of me on the bridge, our forces had created a strong defensive line against the enemy armies.
It was kind of like how it was back in Florida but this was different.
This time our forces were evenly matched, more or less.
There were multiple heavy hitters at the front line, progressively pushing the enemy back with attacks—fire balls, electric attacks, laser beams and heavy artillery.
I spotted Macy(the girl that had delightfully tried to electrocute me to death that one time). She was standing at the front of the defense line sending massive tendrils of electricity at the Skyraxes army, scattering them to dust. Her whole body was covered in a bright white light and her eyes shone.
I had to admit she looked pretty badass like that.
As I was watching, I felt a weird clattering noise from underneath the bridge. Right underneath where I was standing.
I turned around and saw a giant black crab climb over the bridge railing .
It came at me at an alarming speed (sideways too, it was almost funny. Almost), pincers snapping menacing.
I was so disoriented, I stumbled backwards in surprise, narrowly missing getting snapped in half by a pincer.
I'd barely managed to get out of the way when a hot energy blast flew past me and slammed into the crab, sending it flying backwards and scattering through a couple of cars like bowling pins.
"Well well, look who came to join us?" A voice said.
I turned and saw Sam hefting a massive gun on his shoulder. That must have been what he'd used to shoot the crab. And in case you don't remember who Sam is, he's just one of the guys in Bravo Null. We'd met earlier shortly before I got poisoned.
He pulled me to my feet and said, "Go help the guys out in front. They'd need your strength."
"Right…uh, you guys got any spare weapons? I was kinda just snatched up before breakfast straight to the battlefront."
Sam shook his head, "We are running low on ammo and every kind of weapon right now. That's exactly why your strength is needed here. Now go out there and help Macy. She'll run out of juice soon."
"Great."
Just then did I realize I'd not lost control since I'd left Meg's side. Did spending the whole night with her have a lasting effect on me?
I made my way to the front of the defense line to join the others.
I was worried I'd accidentally get shot by my teammates behind but they didn't seem to be firing shots at the army randomly. They were only firing at the monsters that broke through the metal spiked barricade.
A giant bull creature broke out of the enemy line and bounded towards Macy. Its body still had earth clods stuck on its body. It seemed like it had just broken to the surface very recently. Bullets bounced off its hide like nothing.
"Macy! Look out." I warned.
She just stared at me with her glowing eyes like "what?".
She couldn't hear me over all the noise.
I ran forward and stood in front of her and braced myself.
The monster put his head down and charged.
I rooted my feet down on the pavement, just as I'd seen Brody do a few times and I caught the monster by the horns, stopping it in its tracks. The momentum pushed me a couple feet back but I heard my ground.
The creature strained and bellowed but I didn't budge.
I had this under control.
Then I grabbed it by the massive head and swung it over the side with all my strength.
It flew backwards, scattering the crowd of Skyraxes and hit the bridge railing as it fell down into the East River below.
Our side erupted with cheers. Macy came over and clapped me on the back, giving me a grudgingly respectful look. "Not bad, Zee."
In spite of myself, I blushed a little.
But I didn't have much time to celebrate. The Skyraxes had surged forward.
As usual their strength was never a problem, it was just the overwhelming number.
"Drive these things back!" I heard someone yell beside me and the crowd cheered in agreement.
I made my way through the crowd, punching through a wall of flesh and ripping their limbs like wet paper.
The Bravo Null followed close behind me, cutting through the enemy hoard and driving them back out of the bridge.
We could win this. At this rate…
Behind me, I heard Joshua abruptly ask, "Is it just me or is this place getting really hot?"
And he wasn't wrong. The temperature had been dramatically rising rapidly. So much so that I could see the hood of some cars smoking.
I heard the faint sound of explosions in the distance.
Could it be…?
The enemy army was now withdrawing from the bridge at once.
"What's going on?" Macy asked.
I looked back towards the main city and my heart stopped.
Towering above the skyscrapers, was the Harbinger knocking down buildings as it moved, the heat melting glass.
And then I was certain it was the first Harbinger I'd seen back then when I jumped off that helicopter. The one that looked like it was made purely of gold and had eyes that looked like miniature suns.
Wherever it stepped, the ground erupted in cluster mini explosions, rocking the city.
Hylla and the others had failed to take it down.
And now it was coming here.
I knew I needed to leave that place immediately because something told me the Harbinger was coming to me.