[IC] 01101001

[NuttsnBolts]

Akio was tapping away at his phone while thinking about the Hack Live feature that he noticed earlier. Feeling the sense of curiosity begin to get to him, he went back to "The Hack" homepage and although he didn't plan on logging in to The Hack directly, he could least look at this Hack Live App and maybe shed some info on what was going on. He tapped the link and a App opened up that looked very similar to a messaging board.

==Hack Live==
> Anon - Offline
> John Doe - Online
> Rawr_Pwr - Offline
> xxYangtze92 - Online

The sound of three cups tapping on the table next to him and he looked up to see Alex handing him a fresh drink. "Thanks," he replied as he took a sip and placed the plastic cup back on the table edge near the pitcher, ensuring that he didn't accidentally slip it.

"Whatcha doing?" The question came out with a real sense of curiosity and Akio looked at her to see Alex handing her father some tools in order to work on the car. She had walked back over for her drink when Akio began to think whether he should tell her. Being of a younger generation she would probably know a bit more when it comes to the cyber world, so he filled her curiosity to see if she had happen to hear anything.

"I'm just on a chat group at the moment that I found online," the question was soft in speech, enough that it wouldn't travel to her father that was back under the car making all sorts of tapping and knocking sounds. "Well... it looks like only 4 people have access to it, and two are online."

Akio looked at his phone in silence trying to understand what it was. He could see an open section for him to type and entered a message to see if anyone would reply. With a faint beep the message popped up onto the screen.

> Rawr_Pwr: "Hello?"

[Daxam]

"Whoa!" Zac yells as he crashes through the wall of a building. Groaning, he pushes himself to his feet, using his sword to stand. "Damn," he says, grinning. "You're tougher than I thought."

In front of him stands a large, silvery, three-legged machine. From the top part of the machine, two tendrils slowly wave. Three lights, one in the center and two on both sides, shine down on the hole it had just launched Zac through, acting like spotlights for the young man. As Zac steps back out into the street, sword in hand, he grins up at the machine. "It's been awhile since I've had a good fight like this!"

Just then, his holographic gauntlet lights up. Raising his arm in front of him, he notices the screen and a keyboard had appeared. On the screen was what appeared to be a username and a single word:

>Rawr_Pwr: Hello?

Weird, Zac thinks. I've seen this message board thing before, but no one ever uses it. Shaking his head, he quickly types up a response:

>John Doe: cant talk fighting monster will get back to you

As his gauntlet disappears, he grips his sword with both hands, and charges with a yell. The machine lifts one of its legs and swings it at Zac, who manages to lift his weapon and stop the attack. One hand on the back of his sword, the other holding the hilt, he grins up at the machine and calls, "What're you gonna do now, you piece of scrap?!"

One of the tendrils extends and, unnoticed to Zac, who was busy holding the machine's leg back, wraps around his ankle and lifts him up. Yelping in surprise as Zac suddenly finds himself upside down, he quickly attempts to slice the tendril in two. However, before he has a chance, the machine chucks him through another building, this time, the mirror copy of Ai International. Crashing through the wall, he hits another inside the building and falls to the floor, groaning. "Damn," he mutters, once again rising to his feet.

He was about to charge again, only to stop once he notices someone else there. Seeing the blonde woman, he stands for a moment, dumbstruck. I've been coming here for awhile, now, he thinks. Up until now, this place has been empty! However, grinning, he says, "Hey. Just give me a second and I'll be right with you."

That said, he jumps out of the building and on top of the machine, where he drives his sword into the top of its head. However, that only seems to annoy the machine as it tries to shake Zac off.

[SilverWolfAngel]

"I'm just on a chat group at the moment that I found online, Well... it looks like only 4 people have access to it, and two are online."

“Uh, huh.” She thought for a sec, that was more Rick’s area of expertise, but curiosity still nibbled at her, causing her to ask, “Can I see?” Although she ended up being rather rude, shuffling behind him to peek at the screen. The green writing caught her attention, making both sense while meaning nothing. Reading it a second time she finally took in the words on his screen;

==Hack Live==
> Anon - Offline
> John Doe - Online
> Rawr_Pwr - Offline
> xxYangtze92 - Online

Followed by

> Rawr_Pwr: "Hello?"

And a reply;

> John Doe: cant talk fighting monster will get back to you

Her eyes shooting wide, Alex paled slightly, remembering the terror from last night. The gnashing shard-teeth of the dog, the one that had tried to tear her apart. She didn’t even notice as one of the leftover tools in her hands slipped, but the clatter as it hit the concrete ground dragged her wandering mind back to reality with a jerk. "Ah, sorry."

Grinning sheepishly she bent to pick up the spanner, backing away a bit and turning back to the bench without looking at Akio, moving lose bits around without really paying attention, mostly just a way to calm herself down, to do something even if that something was just making the already disorganized bench even messier.

Half of her wanted really badly to ask what he knew about all The Hack business, but half of her was reluctant to admit that any of it might have been real and not just a screwed up dream.

Realty seemed to disagree with the dream theory however, as her username had appeared on a strangers phone. Yeah, reality was messing with her, a lot.

"So, …uh ……what do you know about that ………uh …… the …… uh ………… The Hack?" she muttered saying the last two words in a bit of a rush.

[NuttsnBolts]

The words "Can I see?" barely registered to Akio after he had just seen the 1 line reply from the unknown responder, suitably named, John Doe.

> John Doe: cant talk fighting monster will get back to you

"No caps? No apostrophe? No punctuation?" These errors in one's grammar caught his attention as the only reason why someone would rush a message out like this was in fact if the said person was actually in danger... But if that was the case, did that mean that "The Hack" was real? "No, that couldn't be right. I...I just had a nightmare."

He began to think back to the previous night and what happened, the moment he logged in, the creature that broke through the window and his immediate ejection out of that dream. Could that be all real? Was there another world out there that mirrored this one, and was it full of more monsters? More importantly he remembered how he saw the two knuckle-buster like devices and their beckoning call for his attention. "Could they be?" He wondered if they were some kind of weapon, especially since John Doe was apparently fighting one, and no one in their right mind would go into a fight with bare fists. His interest began to peak and he could feel his desire to re-enter The Hack.

"So, …uh ……what do you know about that ………uh …… the …… uh ………… The Hack?"

The words carved through his thought process like a shooting pain and it instantly bought his attention to the workshop surrounding. More importantly he suddenly looked at the young girl asking the question wondering himself what it was that she knew about the world.

Akio hesitated for a moment before replying, "Why do you ask?" He couldn't help but notice the way she phrased her question considering how bubbly she appeared earlier, and now she seemed to clam up into a shell. He wasn't sure whether to completely tell her or not. A regular person wouldn't believe him if he mentioned anything about the world that he saw, but Alex on the other hand seemed to be growing more pale with every moment that passed. "Are you feeling alright? You're looking like you've seen a ghost."

[McHaggis]

.

[Daxam]

"Whoa!" Zac cries as he finds himself thrown off of the monster, sword in hand. However, instead of falling to the ground or crashing into a building, he manages to flip in midair, his feet hitting the building he had been flying toward.

Lowering his sword, he aims the tip behind him as another message appears on his screen. However, focused on his enemy, he doesn't notice it. With a yell, he pushes himself away from the building and back toward the machine-like monster. Flipping once again, he raises his sword above his head and slashes as he passes underneath the creature, slicing it's underside.

The cut, however, isn't deep enough to do any major damage. One of the tendrils wraps around his arm and yanks him back the way he came. The sudden jolt as he changes direction forces Zac to drop his sword. "Damn!" he mutters as he reaches up and attempts to unwrap the tendril as the machine lifts him in front of it.

The center light begins to glow red as a low hum fills the air. Sensing the danger, Zac lashes out with his foot, but finds that the creature was holding him too far away for the attack to do any good. Guess this is it, then, he thinks. I think I've had a good run...

[SilverWolfAngel]

"Why do you ask?” She looked at him, dragging herself round slowly, so she was facing him and leaning against the bench, nervously unscrewing and re-screwing a nut and bolt. “Are you feeling alright? You're looking like you've seen a ghost." Scowling a tiny bit at that Alex sighed, “A ghost? ……I wish. More like a killer robo-dog.” She shuddered slightly remembering the dream where the dog had actually gotten to her. She vaguely hoped that she hadn’t said it loud enough to be heard, but realistically she knew she had, she wanted to tell someone, but wasn’t sure a stranger was the best bet. Although…, thinking on it, maybe a stranger was ideal. If he knew something, there was a possibility he could help, and if he thought she was psycho; well there was a chance she wouldn’t have to see him ever again. And if his believing she was psycho meant one less customer for her dad, that was a small price to pay, and probably the worst it could get.

With that she decided to spill, and hope for the best.

“You’re gonna call me stupid, but I swear there was a Matrix-like episode last night, although I guess the world looked more like the one from Tron Legacy, but there was this dog with the sharpest teeth, like someone had shattered a window and added the glass to torn corrugated iron and a jarful of nails and then shoved them haphazardly into the thing’s giant maw. Not to mention it attacked me, even though the thing was only about knee high. Terrifying. Anyway, I got to this world-thingy by logging into a thing called ‘The Hack’. Which might be the name of the world? Oh well. Anyway, there was no one else there, at all. Except the killer robo-dog, that tried to attack me, but I killed it, at least it turned to dust. There were these glove things with knives on the front, that’s what I used to tear it to pieces. But……… I’m not even sure that it was real.” She spit the words out faster than a Gatling Gun, but slow enough to still be heard. Keeping her voice relatively quiet so her dad couldn’t hear as she explained, Alex added, after a small pause for breath; “My username was Anon.”

She had been twisting the nut and bolt the whole time she was talking, and had threaded and unthreaded it quite a few times. Finishing her story she looked down, watching her nimble fingers as they deftly pushed the nut around in circles, till finally it dropped off the end. She didn’t want to look at Akio, she didn’t want to see his reaction to her tale.

[NuttsnBolts]

Akio sat there in full horror of the story that he had just heard. His jaw shivered as he tried to respond, but what was it that could he say. Her story confirmed everything that he suspected, but he didn't want to believe that it was real. All he could do was look at her and know that she shared the same experience.

"I thought it was just a nightmare," he quietly responded, "I didn't want to believe that it was real, but from what you have told me, it's a real world." He paused for a moment in order to remember the events of last night, "I entered The Hack in my room, and saw some knuckle-busters floating on the table, but I never touched them..."

Akio turned to his phone and as a third message appear on the screen.

> Rawr_Pwr: Hello?
> John Doe: cant talk fighting monster will get back to you
> xxYangtze92: hey whats going on xx

Looking at the online status of the members list he came to a short conclusion, "So if you're Anon, then these two people must be inside The Hack at the moment? and one of them is fighting one of those things?!?"

"The car is ready," announced a fatherly voice from in front of the car. The sound of the bonnet thudding shut made a small echo within the workshop. It caught Akio off guard and he felt his heart pounding from the initial shock. He got up and composed himself, turned to Alex and spoke to her one last time.

"I'm actually going straight home after this to re-enter The Hack," and with that he ventured over to Alex's father to complete the payment.

[McHaggis]

.

[Daxam]

Zac had closed his eyes to brace for his sudden death. However, feeling the world suddenly lurch, he opens one eye and watches as the machine fires a beam up into the sky, whatever made it lurch having thrown its aim off. Looking down, he sees the woman from the building by one of its legs, a strange shield on her arm. She must've done that, he thinks as the creature's grip loosens on his wrist.

Reaching up, he quickly unwraps the tendril from his wrist and drops down to the ground. Running underneath the monster, he grabs his sword, then, as he passes, wraps his arm around the woman's waist and jumps back up into the building. Setting her down, he says, "Thanks, but stay here."

Turning around, he jumps back out of the building and looks at the machine as it turns to face him. Smirking, Zac says, "You know, I'm gonna have to thank that woman for showing me your weakness. In all honesty, I don't even know why I didn't think of it sooner."

Gripping his weapon with both hands, Zac charges again. The creature, apparently having had enough of the swordsman, begins firing beams of energy at him. Unfortunately for the machine, Zac was able to sidestep the blasts as he races underneath the creature. Reaching the machine's leg, he slices clean through the thin support. With a metallic wail, the machine falls to the ground. Before it could attempt to find a way to salvage the situation, Zac runs over and drives his sword through the machine's center light.

Slowly, the monster begins to disolve into pixelated dust, allowing Zac to finally take a breather. Looking up at the hole in the building, he calls, "Yo! It's safe, now, come on out!"

[SilverWolfAngel]

"I thought it was just a nightmare," he quietly responded, "I didn't want to believe that it was real, but from what you have told me, it's a real world." He paused for a moment "I entered The Hack in my room, and saw some knuckle-busters floating on the table, but I never touched them..."

He doesn't think I'm was crazy! Although that might not be a good thing…… Alex realized as it meant it was all true. All of it.

"So if you're Anon, then these two people must be inside The Hack at the moment? and one of them is fighting one of those things?!?"

“I guess, ………” Alex started but was cut off by her father, who couldn’t hear their conversation, “Car’s ready!” Or something like that. With the bonnet slamming Alex flicked her head round looking at the source of the noise, seeing her father coming round the car towards them.

"I'm actually going straight home after this to re-enter The Hack," She looked at Akio, blinking, he wanted to go back in there? But he had a point, even if she wasn’t sure what that was yet, but it was comforting to know she wasn’t the only one in this predicament, even if the only way to contact them was by logging in. But she wasn’t going back there! Ever! Was she………? It was sooooo…… tempting. Terrifying, sure. Trouble, …duh! But oh so tempting. It wasn’t just because there was someone else, this feeling had been nagging for a while, but Alex had just shoved it aside, like so many things before it. But temptation wasn’t giving up on this, oh no. It liked the idea of her going back, and adventure agreed. Caution and fear were yelling not to, but who listens to them any way? Well Alex normally, …sometimes, ……occasionally. Okay, only when it suited her, or when she thought they might be right.

So lost in thought, Alex was paying no attention to her surroundings, not noticing what happened in the workshop. She wandered over to a small side door and slipped out, heading back to the house, to ponder more. Grabbing a hunk of cheese she headed upstairs, clambering up the ladder to the study, and switching on her laptop, checking things and fiddling, opening and closing the online math’s website, finishing up her cheese, scanning her latest art into the computer, opening it to edit, but closing it just as soon.

Her gaze kept drifting over to the Desktop, sitting in pride of place, and currently switched off.
No! I’m not going back! No, never! she thought, while idly wondering whether there was food in that world, or how things worked, like was there water? Nuh huh, I’m not going back! She told herself, sternly; I’m not going back! I’m not going back. I’m not goi………… I might just take a peek?

[NuttsnBolts]

The car engine slowly rumbled as Akio pulled over to the curb and parked the car. Giving the handbrake a pull he sat there in the car with the stereo quietly sounding it's rhythmic tunes and contemplated his future actions. He had decided he was going to do this, and knowing that he wasn't going to be alone gave him some sort of comfort. Turning the key he heard all noise and music suddenly end as he stepped out of his car and walked towards his house.

No one was home when Akio entered and he proceeded up towards his room where his laptop sat on the table. Pressing the power button he watched the machine load up onto the homepage screen, then proceeded to navigate himself towards "The Hack" webpage where he saw the infamous intro text.

> Enter The Hack
> Input Username _

He typed in his username, hit the enter button and witnessed the screen turn to it's brilliant light before hearing that familiar popping sound. Akio blinked, and within that fraction of a second his laptop was replaced with the two devices that he saw the previous night. These items laid there on the surface of the table, hovering and giving a slight pinging sound as they begged for him to acknowledge their existence. His hand leaned over and grasped the knuckle buster, holding them tight within his fists.

"These are pretty cool," he thought to himself as he looked over them admiring the smooth glossy finish. They had a sleek and sharp finish but was absent of any pointy edges that could cause damage. On the inside of the grips was a red glowing button positioned near his thumb. He tapped the button, and heard a whirring charge up sound as a pair of cannons began to construct themselves underneath his forearms. These cannons seemed to appear digitally as if coded into existence and when fully complete the trimming lit up to form a iridescent, red glow. A small ignition source could be heard as the open ends seemingly fired up into a low level, heated light source.

"Freaken hell! This is like some sweet arse Mega Man shit!!!" blurting out his excitement like a child. Letting his excitement get a hold of him he lifted his arm towards the hallway and gave a squeeze of the trigger. An explosively loud *KATHUMP* sound rang through the house as a shell exploded on the far wall. The wall itself ripped open with a hole towards the outside world and showered the area in pixel like debris and smoke. Noise pollution, air pollution... it didn't really matter considering the amount of damage that the structure had taken from the single shell.

Akio moved over towards the point of impact and assessed the damage that he had created. He kneeled down and looked at the charred surfaces, noticing all the jagged edges that were left from the blast. That is before some simple text appeared within his glasses like a Heads up Display.

> No Target Found...

As he looked out towards the horizon he noticed a beam of energy fire up towards the sky in the direction of the Ai International building and the text within his glasses removed itself from existence. The building wasn't too far away but it would still take him some time to arrive at his chosen destination.

"Like moths to a flame..."

With those words he stood up and proceeded down the stairwell and towards the light source. He had no idea what he would be presented with, but with the two cannons within his grasps he felt some sense of safety.

[McHaggis]

.

[Daxam]

Sheathing his sword, Zac turns to look at the woman who had helped him. She was short, roughly five feet, with blonde hair. Something about the way she carried herself screamed 'business woman' to Zac. Smiling at the woman, he says, "I'd say so. They tend to mess with computers like that. No idea what they are, though. Hell, I barely know what this place is."

Turning to the woman, Zac holds his hand out, a friendly smile on his face, and says, "The name's Zacary Yoxall, but everyone calls me 'Zac.' My screen name here is John Doe."

[NuttsnBolts]

Akio was walking through the town streets experiencing the lonesome presence of the place that he called Westbay. Whether it was Westbay was another question however with every corner that he turned he felt that he knew the surrounding areas and the local layout. He hadn't seen any creatures around the place and because of that he was slowly letting his guard slip.

During the still silence a large, metallic groaning sound radiated itself from a distant building. With a world that was made mostly of what seemed like a digital solid surface, the sound came across as foreign and ominous.

Carefully Akio detoured his path towards a set of stairs that lead to a higher level of ground and proceeded to make his way up them in order to see if he could spot the origin of the noise. As he began to clear the top step he could both begin to see across the roof of some of the houses, and came to a larger open parkland area. The Ai International building wasn't too far away from this parkland but it was pretty difficult to tell without the ability to see the building itself.

Again, the ominous groan sounded in the distance but this time it felt a little closer than before. Akio leaned up against the step and felt his heart rate begin to rise. Maybe it was a mistake to come back to this world but he couldn't help the curiosity. It felt like a drug, a feeling that would bug him until he was in this place. He held out his wrists looking at the grip, which had now consealed it's weapon, wondering if this all would be worth the risk.

As Akio looked at his wrist, he saw the Hack Live window pop up and a glowing keyboard hologram roll out before his view. It surprised him but more with curiosity than fear considering he had seen two cannons form between his forearms earlier.

> Who's around?

He wrote, noticing that some people were still logged into this world.

> I couldn't help but come back here to fill my curiosity and I'...

His words were cut off by the large moaning sound that came from a short distance away. He laid down onto the step and peeked over the top to see what was around. Realising he was a bit out in the open he shuffled along the step until he met a wall and leaned up against it in silence.

[McHaggis]

.

[SilverWolfAngel]

Finally giving into temptation, Alex wheeled herself over to the Desktop, booting it up, drumming her fingers rapidly on the desk, waiting, waiting, wait… bingo! ……or not. Clicking on the icon for the single account, Alex realized she didn’t know the password. Growling she typed one in, and another, and another. Till finally the computer booted her out, deciding she’d tried enough and locking the keypad. “Damn” She muttered dropping her fist on the desk with a thump, before sulking back to her own laptop.

Typing up part of her English ‘homework’ on wolves, Alex suddenly wondered if the site was accessible from other computers, typing in the url she attempted to access the site, but apparently she couldn’t remember the whole thing, and so she resorted to typing ‘the hack’ into the search bar, coming up with pretty much everything but what she wanted.

Growling, she slumped down in her seat, her eyes sitting level with the edge of the desk. Muttering not-quite-obscenities, Alex pulled herself up, dropped down the ladder and padded along the corridor to Rick’s room. Knocking she stuck her head inside, glancing round and seeing a lot, but not the one thing, or person, she was after. Withdrawing, it suddenly clicked that Rick had possibly mentioned something about a friend’s house? Yep that sounded right. Groaning and comically collapsing slow-mo to the floor, Alex considered her options: one: log in to the desktop, Unable. Two: Ask Rick, Unable. Three: find it on her computer: no Cookie. Four: Ask.

Four sounded viable, only problem? Who?. Who should she ask? Sure she knew that Akio obviously knew how to get in, but she couldn’t contact him, she had no clue how. With a sudden thought she quickly scaled the ladder, dropping down into her chair, and firing off an email to a friend. He was a gamer and book freak, so they got along well, and he was bound to have come across The Hack page at some point in time. Wandering back downstairs Alex snagged a Gingernut from the biscuit box, checking the roster, and managing to be quite glad it was tomorrow night she had to cook.

Pottering around, Alex gave her friend twenty-ish minutes, before leaping back up to the Den, and checking her emails. Yes! Sitting in her inbox was a email:

To: [e-mail]
From: [e-mail]
Sub: Re: the Hack.

Hey, haven’t heard from you in a while.

The Hack? Why do you want that? It’s a dud, trust me.

But here’s the link, cause if I don’t give it, you’ll bug me no end.

The Hack

Gotta meet up some time, yeah?

Have you seen that book on Zombies yet?

Evan

Grinning like a loon, Alex clicked on the link, taking a mental note to reply to Evan later.

Confronted with the actual page, Alex paused, suddenly scared at what she was about to do. Just that morning she had been so sure she wouldn’t even be going near a computer for a while, but here she was, about to log back in to that purgatory hell.

Before she could really think about it, Alex typed in her username hitting the enter key with a ferocious growl. There came the compulsory flash of light, causing her to blink, before opening her eyes to the not-den attic. Glancing at her clothes she found herself in her frayed blue jacket, something she was sure she hadn’t been wearing, along with her cargo pants, facestompers, and the black gloves backed by red metal.

“Huh” She quoted intelligently.

Flexing her fingers she found the material managed to be light and ‘thin’ while also retaining a feeling of being flexibly solid. The red metal wasn’t folding out, so she assumed that meant she was safe. Or safeish. Inspecting the gloves she was rather shocked when the left one popped up a luminesent screen with the words;

> Rawr_Pwr: Who's around?
> Rawr_Pwr: I couldn't help but come back here to fill my curiosity and I'...

Followed by

> xxYangtze-92: im around
> xxYangtze-92: me & john doe r at ai international

With the last two sentences popping up as she watched, giving Alex the feeling that that was what prompted the screen’s opening.

Where was Ai International? It didn’t seem like somewhere she would be amazingly knowledgeable about, but then again…… it did ring a bell.

Deciding she was going to find nothing hiding out in the attic, Alex tramped downstairs, still ogling the gloves as she tried to work them out.

[Daxam]

Zac raises an eyebrow, seeing the blush on Jian's face, not understanding what it was about her username that prompted such a reaction. Instead, his Hack Live monitor comes to life with the conversation that was apparently going on:

>Rawr_Pwr: Who's around?
>Rawr_Pwr: I couldn't help but come back here to fill my curiosity and I'...

At this, Zac raises an eyebrow. Why did this 'Rawr_Pwr' cut his sentence short? As the next couple of lines, Jian's replies to Rawr_Pwr, appear on the screen, he thinks for a few moments before typing:

>John Doe: Everything alright? Where are you? We can meet up where you're at if you need help.

[NuttsnBolts]

Akio crouched down as low as he could when he heard the wall surface above him explode open. All he could see out of the corner of his eye a large eel like serpent flowing out of the freshly designed hole and burrow it's way into the ground next to him. To him it almost moved like a ghost through the solid surfaces, both effortlessly and seemingly without restrictions with the exception of exploding debris showing each of the entry and exit points. As soon as the creature had burrowed away Akio stood up and set foot on his escape.

The streets were narrow and Akio was weaving around the corners in an attempt to place as much distance between himself and the creature. He could see the silhouette doorways for people's homes on the buildings around him quickly wondering if people were actually inside and whether they would be able to help him.

"Idiot!!!" he breathed under his panting breath realising that he was only just talking to some other people just before. Glancing down at his wrist Akio saw the last lot of text messages holographically projected across his fore arm. He wasn't able to read them fully as he was dashing around corners and grabbing hold of the edges to swing a bit of extra momentum.

> John ###: Everything ###? Where ### you? ## can ### up ### you're ### if ### need ###.

It was all Akio could make out from looking at his shaky arm but it was enough. He held his hand up and hovered over the hologram keyboard, attempting to type in something. At that same moment an explosion from the ground behind him could be heard and the Worm leapt out of the surface, following him like a dolphin leaping after a fishing boat.

> Rawr_Pwr: Grernacte Redrrve (Greenacre Reserve)

"Close enough..." Spell checking while running for your life was the least important thing to be thinking of and looking back he could see exactly what he was running from. With each leap the Worm showed off it's glistening 10 metre long body and each time it entered the earth it would open it's mouth in order to consume the dirt.

On it's latest leap the worm opened it's mouth mid-air and gave it's whole body a violent corkscrew spin, firing off a projectile at it's victim. Akio could see the projectile land next to him as he had just enough of a moment to shift his weight to one side, but the impact of the explosion had pushed him into a nearby wall. His shoulder cracked against the hard surface giving him a sharp pain through the side of his body. Stumbling for a bit and loosing some speed he pushed his feet hard against the ground in order to continue his painful run.

"I gotta do something," Akio held up his fists and clicked the glowing button on the side, allowing his cannons to begin to form, "I ain't loosing my first fight like this."

[McHaggis]

.