Rosseweisse was not expecting something like this to happen.
Ashen, who had been acting all energetically just moments ago collapsed on her chest like a puppet with its strings cut after telling her that she 'smelled annoyingly good'.
"Eh? Mr. Ashen?", she whispered anxiously while fighting the urge to let out a moan as she consciously felt Ashen's hair through her robes touching her skin and tickle her.
She tried to move him with her hands but for some reason, he was unreasonably heavy just like the time she had 'carried' him through the forest.
'I have never actually seen his body under those baggy tattered clothes of his even when Mr. Jack treated his wounds since he asked me to stay inside the shack but...', she looked down towards Ashen who was motionless on her chest, 'It is unbelievable that he weighs this much!'
But even though she thinks that, she cannot seem to entertain the idea to just push him off her. Even when she tried to move him, it was to only adjust his position so that he wouldn't be inconvenienced in his current position.
'What is this feeling I wonder? I mean, I feel like I should just let him rest like this for a bit longer.'
It was a strange feeling that seemed to well up from within her.
'J*****, rest now. Me and I**** will guard you with our lives so worry not.'
A sudden voice that somehow sounded like Ashen when he's laughing hysterically echoed in her mind and as soon as she had snapped out of her apparent stupor, she realized that her arms had moved on their own and was now wrapped around Ashen's head. Not only that, his head had been adjusted so that his face now faced to the side and allowed for him to breathe.
"Eh?"
She could only mutter in disbelief and then she immediately remembered that Ashen really hated being touched by her and so was about to quickly remove her arms from his head but then her body won't respond.
'He needs rest, let him be.'
A voice different from before echoed in her mind again.
"Eh?", she remembered the voice from somewhere.
Neither the voice of a man nor that of a woman, an ambiguous voice that she had always heard throughout her life as a Saint.
If it was this voice that is telling her to let him rest, then it must be because it is of utmost importance and so she just smiled and continued to lay there while cradling Ashen's head in her chest.
*****
In the past few days, Ashen had continuously questioned his sanity almost every minute of each passing day.
First of all, he was freaked out by the seemingly sentient environment that always forced him to never abandon Rosseweisse. Seemingly attempting to kill him whenever he tries to do so.
Then there was the fact that he encountered a huge talking lion moments before he fell unconscious. He was sure he did not hallucinate the whole thing as he was wide awake due to the last drops of adrenaline coursing through his veins that made his mind clear for a good few seconds before passing out.
And finally-
"Are you ok now Mr. Ashen?"
"Why am I in your arms and in-between your uselessly fat chest?"
-he was being embraced by Rosseweisse whom he detests to no end.
Rosseweisse and him locked eyes for a few seconds in silence and then,
"Get your filthy arms off of me..."
Ashen growled.
Rosseweisse was visibly shaken by his hostile demand and her arms loosened. However, Ashen realizes that he could not very well separate himself from her because his one remaining arm seemed to dislocated.
'Ah damn it.'
He curses to himself while trying to move his arm. But then he realizes something he overlooked-
"Oi Nitwit, I remember you healing me with your weird voodoo a day ago. Can you do it again?"
-Rosseweisse's strange power that healed him of his previous injuries.
If it was able to heal even fatal gunshots, then a simple dislocation should be easy to fix. He's not gonna expect that his other arm would return since it's already blown to smithereens along with the bear that choked on it, but a least the majority of his wounds should be healed.
"I apologize Mr. Ashen, but I cannot use my Privilege in rapid succession.", Rosseweisse downheartedly apologizes.
"Privilege? Is that what you call your voodoo thing?"
"It is not voodoo, Mr. Ashen.", Rosseweisse corrected him.
"Meh. Whatever. That light stuff you're doing is voodoo for me and that's it.", he stubbornly retorts.
Rosseweisse makes a 'hmmph!', but decides that it might be a better idea not to let Ashen's obstinate denial get to her too much so she tries to explain,
"Privilege is what we call the power granted to us by the heavens to perform our duties in our respective faiths and how well and for how many we use it depends on our experience."
Ashen found it quite annoying to listen to her explain but he also realized that if he is to accompany her until she gets to safety, he'll need to know her limits. Considering that he is currently in no shape to fend off any attacks.
"Healing is but one of its many effects. Other effects include purification, exorcism, blessing and others, but not all of the Saints can actually do all of such things.", Rossweisse points out a rather important factor.
"Eh? But aren't you guys believing in the same god? Why would you guys have differing voodoo?"
"...I'm sorry. But even I as a Saint do not know why. We do share the same experience of being called out to by divinity, but somehow we perceived them differently."
'Ho? Maybe because it's from different gods like how there are diverse religions all-over the world? Probably.', Ashen concluded in his mind. The whole time he thought that humanity was just fighting over something incredibly stupid as having different gods even though it might just end up being actually only one, but hearing Rosseweisse's explanation, it seems maybe the reason why they were bickering in the first place may be actually true.
"Well okay. I'll think about that but why does that have to do with you not being able to cast your weird voodoo?"
He could feel Rosseweisse's sigh under his cheek, "Like I said Mr. Ashen, please stop calling it voodoo.", her heaving chest betrayed her distress. It was plain as day that calling her 'Privilege' as mere voodoo was making her sad.
Unluckily for her though, Ashen was anything but a sympathizer.
"Who cares what anyone calls it? Just continue.", he muttered without even hesitation.
"Well that is-"
Before Rosseweisse could cointinue-
"Mm. You youngsters sure are pretty close."
-the two were interrupted by the sudden interjection of Jack.
"Do you want me to leave you alone and buy you a bit more time or do you want to get out of here?", Jack playfully teased the two.
"What the hell are you saying old man? What about the people outside?", Ashen growled. Annoyed by the impish smile on the old man's face.
"Well them men went away to follow me directions. It should buy you a good 5 minutes. A good enough head start for you?", Jack mused while lifting the bed slightly, allowing Ashen to roll off Rosseweisse.
"Ugh...", Ashen groaned as he settled by Jack's feet, "Moving around will be a total pain."
"Hey girlie. You might want to help your lover boy here. Meself cannot hold up me bed for long.", Jack urged Rosseweisse to get out as well.
"Oi Jack! Who are you calling this nitwit's lover boy?!"
"Excuse me Mr. Ashen.", Rosseweisse hurriedly got up and crawled over to Jack and then pulled the motionless Ashen away so Jack could let the bed down.
"Argh! Stop pulling me like I'm some-", before Ashen could finish his words, he noticed something flash through the slit under the door of the shack and almost immediately, "GET DOWN!!", his body moved on its own as he said that; his body immediately turned to face Rosseweisse who was surprised by his sudden shout then with his teeth, grabbed the collar of her robe and then used the entirety of his body weight to pull her down.
"Ahh!", Rossweisse yelped while tumbling forward.
A moment later, a hail of something perforated the shack and before Jack who was bewildered could get hit, Ashen immediately kicked him down by the leg making him land rather comically on the ground with an equally comical yelp,
"Kweh?!"
*Dun!*, *Dun!*, *Dun!*
Numerous holes kept on appearing on the walls making Ashen wonder.
'Judging from the sound of the walls being punctured...bullets? But I hear no gunshots which means'
"Tsk! Total Silencers huh?", he grimaced at the realization.
"Total Silencers? The heck is that boy?!", Jack asked while laying prone on the ground with his arms over his head.
Ashen adjusted his body so that he was literally face-to-face with Jack, "Jeez old man! You look like you're thrice our age and you don't even know about those?!", he complained.
"Hey now boy! Meself is only 69 years-old!", Jack retorted.
"You are thrice my age!!", Ashen also retorted before continuing, "Bah! I can explain later! For now, is there like a spot in this decrepit shack of yours where we can exit without getting riddled by bullets?!"
At Ashen's question, Jack pondered for a bit and then a moment later, "Ah! There is!", his face lit up as he remembered something, "The part by that corner!", he points a finger towards a corner of the shack, "Meself have yet to fix that! One good kick can send it flying!"
"Do you seriously think that I, who is missing the use of both arms can easily get up, run towards there and kick that thing down without getting shot?! You might as well tell me to go die you stupid old geezer!!". Ashen angrily pointed out.
"Then what you suggest we do boy?! That girlie's not exactly useful in this situation!", Jack pointed at Rossweisse who was too terrified by the incoming bullets.
Ashen clicked his tongue in annoyance but quickly changed gears after realizing that if he gives in to his emotions in this situation, he'll just get himself killed.
'The bullets coming in has not stopped since a couple of minutes ago...assuming they're quite rich for a criminal organization, then their guns should be the Type-2100 AR of the US which has 100 rounds per magazine...', he then starts to take stock of his surroundings and then happens to see one of the bullets roll down before him, 'A NATO .60 calibre FMJ...so I'm correct.'
"Hey boy!"
"Shut up Jack!!", he shouts at Jack then continues to think,
'Time elapsed since they started firing is exactly 2 minutes, 43 seconds, and 76 milliseconds from the moment I finish this thought.'
*Crash!*
One of the objects on the shelves get hit and fall down.
'No lapse in their assault which means they do a volley then switch with another before they run out of bullets and judging from the spread, they're exactly 6 of them outside shooting at us which means...'
A plan formulates in his mind and he thinks it would definitely work.
"Hey geezer.", he calls out to Jack.
"What?", surprisingly, Jack was calm and simply stared at Ashen with a rather relaxed face.
"Here's what we're gonna do-"
*****
[Outside the shack]
6 men in black tactical gear holding high-powered rifles, stand before the façade of a rickety shack that was situated right under the bridge.
Their purpose, to kill the Saint they had tracked to here along with the young man presumed to be accompanying her.
In silence, they continued to douse the rickety shack with lead without fear of getting caught since they were using Total Silencers to eliminate the sounds of their guns.
They originally thought that it sounds overkill to spray a couple of young people with an entire magazine of fullmetal jacketed bullets. But then changed their minds after seeing the carnage that the young man accompanying the Saint presumably wrought;
An entire group of their comrades dead. Killed mercilessly either by multiple gunshots or being ran over by a vehicle.
It made them question what kind of insane human would do such a thing.
Their orders were as such;
Find the Saint. Kill her on sight then kill her alleged Guard as well but leave the homeless old man alone.
However, they had already started shooting at the shack well after the old man had already entered so they could only think of it as an unfortunate miscalculation and chalk it up to sheer coincidence that the old man had entered without them noticing.
But then, the door of the shack flew open and out came the old man seemingly out of breath and was coughing.
The 6 gunmen stopped their assault and then pointedly looked at the old man.
The old man notices them 10 seconds later and then quickly gets up and brushes away the dust from his ragged clothes.
"Oi! You youngsters! What's the big idea shooting me tiny shack?! Have I done something to offend you? Just so you know, meself have yet to leave from this area in the past month! Meself have yet to annoy any of you well-off brats!"
The old man suddenly flies into a tirade. Expressing how annoyed he was of the gunmen's attack.
But the gunmen only stared at the old man and simply thought that it was a good miscalculation that the old man was not dead yet before brandishing their guns at him meaningfully.
"Hey boys meself gets it! Meself gets it! You want something from me. Meself gets it.", probably picking up on their gestures, the old man raised his arms to show that he was surrendering, "So like, did you come here looking for someone?"
One of the gunmen nodded.
"Ah you must be looking for that young man with a nun that was running around the city recently."
Again, the gunman nodded.
"Well, meself don't really know where they went precisely but meself can point you towards their heading like how meself did for a bunch of tourists earlier."
Surprisingly, the old man was being cooperative. Probably because he was at gunpoint but the gunmen didn't care.
"Okay so like, do you see that trail of blood by your feet?"
One of the gunmen looks down and sees a rather long trail of blood on the concrete and was surprised that they did not notice it earlier.
"Well, that's irrelevant to where they went so from here, you will have to go towards the city. You see that stairs a few meters downstream?"
The old man points at a rather conspicuous staircase leading up towards the city.
"Take that stairs and then face north towards the rather disgusting façade of the church near central park. From there, head a few meters north, past 2 blocks. There should be hotdog stand there if I'm not mistaken."
The gunmen looked at the old man suspiciously as his words sounded rather stupid. But since it wouldn't hurt to check, one of the gunmen, presumably the leader, gestured for 2 of his comrades to go check it out.
4 minutes later, the two confirmed the old man's instructions via radio. After that, the leader gestured for the old man to continue.
"Ah! If you see the hotdog stand, it means you went too far so you have to double back. There should be an alley somewhere that you might have missed."
The leader then radioed the old man's instructions to the two and a minute later, they radioed after finding an alley.
It was at this point the the gunmen never knew that they screwed up.
The old man continued to give them directions in the following hour that ended up making the leader send off the others to look for the 2 men who had gotten lost following directions.
And when it was finally just the leader who was left,
"Oh! Look! Isn't that him?!"
The old man suddenly exclaimed as he pointed at a couple of youngsters taking a stroll near the road above them.
The leader turned to look and sure enough, he saw one of the couple wearing something resembling a nun's habit and so immediately radioed his comrades to return while he goes to finish the job. But then he noticed something was amiss immediately, the old man was quiet.
When he turned to face the old man again, all he saw was the rickety shack and the old man nowhere to be found. Bewildered, the leader approaches the shack cautiously and then looks inside, only to realize his mistake when he saw the a pure white nun's habit with the symbol of the Saints embroidered on the cuffs on the sleeves inside and a note written with blood on a wooden plank placed deliberately in the of the entire scene that said,
'You got punked, sucker! By: The Troll Under the Bridge'