The Wall Pt.II

Whether it’d been hours or days Sec couldn’t say, they’d been trudging through this warren of identical looking tunnels for a long while now, following Dica as she retraced her and her brother’s former escape route. She seemed more tense than normal, every sound making her twitch, but thus far the only dangers they’d encountered were a few Waste Rats and some occasional falling debris. The rats mostly ran away and the debris was easy enough to avoid, so far Dica’s warning upon entering the tunnels had seemed unfounded, though it was not like her to be over cautious or hyperbolic, maybe if Lox had been the one to say i-… Sec was snapped out of her contemplation when she realized that Dica had stopped dead. It took one word from her to make all the warmth drain from Sec's face, "REAPER".

The encounter with the monster had shaken Dica down to the bone. Yes the creature itself was deeply terrifying and she winced a bit as she walked, her whole right side had been slammed into the concrete tunnel pretty hard, but it wasn’t the injuries or fight that had taken over her thoughts, it was Sec. The kind, but distant girl who would most often be found lagging behind muttering to herself and staring off at a seemingly random rock formation or distant peak, or commenting on how this river or that forest were children or some other such nonsense.

When the Reaper first attacked, Sec had taken a defensive position near Echo, weaving some bits of rubble to fly at the reaper; they didn’t seem to harm the creature, but did work as an alright distraction. Dica had been able to get close enough to get a dust-enhanced punch into the creature’s ribs, while Lox used his speed to hit it in the legs. The creature howled and stumbled, the speed of its recovery though was blinding. It slammed Dica into the wall stunning her, and got hold of Lox’s leg as he’d rounded back to hit it again, and threw him so hard to the ground that Dica heard bone crunch. Through her dazed eyes she saw the creature, a dark blur, go straight for her friends. It lunged, a razor claw outstretched inches from Echo’s throat when the creature froze in mid action.

The air distorted and vibrated around the reaper, Sec stood deadly calm, one hand up fingers moving rapidly, her eyes glowed silver, she was weaving but this was completely unlike anything Dica had seen before, it felt primordial. The creature spasmed and screamed, and then, quite grotesquely, crunchily compressed down into a single point of glowing dust and was gone. Sec seemed to snap back to reality, looked around, saw her injured friends and ran to offer healing, Dica waved her off nervously scooting back, and watched as the familiar strange girl did a healing weave on her brother. Who the hell was this person.