Today we saved Centaur and Pete. Pete was at a main facility back in England, but we had to go after Broadcast first, because now news of our attacks on strongholds will travel much slower.
Centaur was made to guard Pete's facility, and is apparently the only surviving member of the Zodiac members that Dragon introduced us to. HG tried to use Blast as a defense system, and overloaded her. She didn't make it. Cecil escaped before HG had a chance to experiment on him, and after healing, went for HG alone. He did fairly well, until he grabbed HG by the arm, and his power was automatically flipped. Turned to dust, poor guy. I hate this future, I want to go home. Broadcast's the only Pen-friend to have lasted this long aswell. While being moved to her facility, Shockwave managed to get off the power blocker, and brought down the transport vehicle, but it came down on top of her. She was crushed. He had big plans for freezeframe, but overworked her power, spread it too thin, and caused something of a cave-in of her mind. Left in a coma, she was no good to him, and he 'disposed of her'. I'm going to kill him. Then I'm going to go back in time to the present and kill him again.
So, Broadcast was in some sort of stunned state, we had to carry him, he had this glazed look in his eyes and just kept mumbling. Having made it back into England, we managed to get to the outskirts of London. The 'Power Station' was just at the edge of London, fortunately, because London is one of the places that's still running, and is something of a hotspot for HG-ness.
We approached a large silver box with two aerials on it's roof, a wind turbine propeller on either side, and the whole place seemed to crackle with energy. The propellers were spinning fast, and as we crept towards the door, I was slammed to the floor. Rolling away and leaping up, I saw a man with glowing red eyes, bat's ears, a dog nose, four legs ending in two spiked hooves and two giant birds claws, four arms, two of which were tentacles, one a huge Gorilla arm, and one an arm sized scorpion tail. there was a patch like Broadcast had had stabbed into his shoulder.
'Centaur?! I can just about tell it's you. It's Tempest. Can you understand us? What's wrong? Waaah!'
I dodged as the scorpion tail lunged, and saw the power blocker patch flashing madly. thin sparks of red energy shot from it and danced over him.
'I think they're using Pete to boost his power, and the patch is controlling him!' yelled Diffy, who was helping Jingle lie Broadcast down, as I'd left him with them to check out the main building.
'I can't get past that thing, what do we do?' I caught him in a forcefield, and grimaced as he beat against it, snarling.
'Let me have a go, my ability gives me a different approach to yours.' I heard Hana from my pocket. I reached for my phone in time to see her shrinking to a small blue dot. The wi-fi symbol flashed, and the dot disappeared. The red light on the power blocker flicked suddenly between red and blue. Then it turned green, and Hana's faced smiled up from my phone. I can get it to it's default: Power regulation only. He won't be under it's control anymore, so it should deny his ability access. Centaur was, it had to be said, turning human again. He slumped in the forcefield, and I released him.
'Wha? What..what happened? You? Tempest? But, you look a bit too young?'
'Long story. Diffy, Catch him up and look after Broadcast. Me and Jingle'll have to do this one.'
'You sure?'
'These two aren't fit to help yet, and you know most about what's going on.'
'Be careful.'
'Duh.'
Me and Jingle set off for the door. The guards acted strange. They looked as if they were pretending not to notice us, looking the other way as we snuck behind. No complaints from us.
'You know who we need?' I whispered as we carefully entered and I searched the system for Pete's location 'Dragon. He'd be so great with all this.'
'Yeah, I wish I'd met him'
'Huh?'
'He was destroyed. Didn't Diff tell you?'
'No...he did not.'
'Gave himself up trying to save everyone. Completely destroyed.'
'That's a lie. He'll have survived, I know it.'
'I really wish I could believe that, but he's gone.'
'.......No. He'll have got through it, you'll see. I believe in him. If he couldn't survive, I doubt any of us will. Ah, two up, third on the left, off we go!'
I phased and FF'ed us upwards, thinking. Dragon? Really? NO! I couldn't believe it. I won't believe it. I DO NOT BELIEVE IT.
We found the right door. It wasn't locked. Or blocked. Or anything. Let us in with out any trouble, to a middling sized dark room, with a red glow in the middle.
We walked, slowly and carefully, towards the silhouette of a person, giving off red flashes of light.
'Ha, boss man said you'd come here next. Powers half his buildings with that kid, makes sense you'd want to come here soon.'
'Ooooooooh, so the guards made it easy for us so we could get to you and YOU would kill us. Fine, who are you then?'
'That doesn't matter. Why waste your last few minutes talking?'
He ran at us as the lights came on. I heard a beep from my phone. Turning to avoid him, I saw the frame Pete was in properly. It was like a goalpost without a net, but with large metal cuffs bolting him arms and wrists to it, and crackling with red energy, like his eyes. His Power Blocker was flickering between red and blue, but it was still forcing him to send streams of power from the cuffs to cables, out of the room and across the world. Our Attacker's nails had became huge, long claws, and were sealing together into blades. spikes of bone were sliding out of his arm, and he slashed at me. I ducked, froze his arm where it stuck in the wall, and pulled out the power blocker as it turned green. Pete woke with a groan of pain and I clicked my fingers, causing the cuffs to undo. He fell, and I just managed to catch him and help him to the floor. looking at the spike of the underside of the blocker, I stabbed it into Bone guy as he lunged. He gasped, reeling, then, as Pete was coming round, I was slammed against a wall by a fist coated in bone armour. Holding his other arm up as a shield against needles, he sneered at me, a sharp needle of bone growing towards my throat.
'Oi!'
Jingle shouted as hooves were heard outside. Centaur, a centaur again, entered, with Broadcast on his back, and Diffy following behind. They looked horrified, but were stopped from getting closer by a hail of bone quills.
'What do you want, pine tree boy?'
'Let him go.'
'Why? Because otherwise, the deadly, deadly power of bits of plant will continue to uselessly hit my boneshield?'
'You went straight for Tempest. What am I? Useless?'
'Yes. Boss wants Enemy number one, he don't care about you.'
'But you will.'
Pete was shaking his head and looked up. A few red sparks shot from his finger and sank into Jingle. He started to glow white, and looked pleased. As he talked, noises and lights filled the air, and his power grew to fill the room, spreading from him in all directions, and warmth and hope filled each of us.
'Wow. Well, I may not have a bounty on my head or multiple powers, but I'll tell you what I do have. I have memories of Christmas morning. A winters light, and a distant choir. The peal of a bell, and that Christmas tree smell. I have eyes full of TINSEL AND FIRE!'
He did. His eyes glowed, as if they were alight, and the noise of bells and choirs broke out around us, as he glowed with warmth, and the smell of pine filled the room. Tinsel shot from him to cover the floor and walls. Baubles grew like apples from the tinsel, and paper chains spread across the ceiling. I saw Broadcast stir as sleigh bell and church bells rang out, and as he wiggled his fingers, fanfares and drums joined the noise, creating an orchestral crescendo, and as the tinsel moved to swarm Boneman and started mummifying him, pine needles whirling through the air and baubles exploding, damaging the machines, the fire in his eyes seemed to break free, and the tinsel burst into flame. A screen came on showing HG, looking smug, but a look of horror replaced it as he stared at the room. Bone man was screaming, ablaze, and baubles had blown a hole in the wall. Jingle, smiling, needles in his hair, warm light spilling from his eyes and a clenched fist shaking as red sparks danced over it, whistled. Reindeer appeared in the gap, kicking at the air, as if treading water. Broadcast was now conducting the invisible orchestra, looking restored, as we rushed to the hole.
'You can do more than one reindeer?'
'Apparently!'
'Laughing, we looked back at the screen, which was now being engulfed in flames.
'Hallelujah!'
'Noel!'
Jingle stared straight at HG 'Be it Heaven or Hell, the Christmas you get, you DESERVE!'
I saw now what had been happening with his fist. Opening it, he threw a lump of coal straight at the screen, smashing it. We leapt aboard a ride each, as Centaur grew wings and took to the air, and we flew off into the night. I looked back as we rose. The whole facility was burning now, and I could still hear bells and choirs and drums. A burning strand of tinsel was swept out of the hole, fluttering in the night air. Mistletoe was growing up the outside, catching fire helping to spread the damage.
'Weirdest. Rescue. Ever. Jingle, that was awesome!'
