"Lady Jane!" Iris yelled and ran over to Jane and I. I kept my hand pressed tightly to the wound on Jane's stomach. Feeling her blood gushed from the wound and between my fingers was a familiar feeling I wished I didn't have to relive.
"J-just a s-scratch…" Jane stuttered when Iris reached us. The sound of her voice made my blood freeze over, she was already starting to sound weak.
It was not just a scratch, while I knew that gut wounds were normally only fatal if the wounded bled out before they got treatment or s artery was nicked, Jane sounded like she was already in a bad way.
"Take her somewhere safe!" I ordered Iris and placed Jane in her arms. "If you know any first aid or healing spells use them!"
"Of course! Kill this Bastard!" Iris replied.
[Guard them! Keep then safe!] I ordered Bone-lasher.
[What about you?] He asked.
[GUARD THEM!] I reiterated with as much steel in my tone as I could muster. Bone-lasher complied and as Iris stood up and carried Jane out of the square he ran with her, guarding her flank. I looked down at my hands, covered in Jane's blood and felt a odd calm com over me.
I popped my claws and quickly etched three runes into the stock of my Skazzas then retracted them and smeared the blood over the runes. I leveled my eyes on Anansi, who was just now managing to sit up. I reloaded my Skazzas without taking my eyes off of the Paragon as Alberto approached me.
"Please tell me you have a plan to hold out till Lady Baset gets back?" Alberto asked, looking to me for some sort of reassurance.
"We're not holding out, we're killing this bastard." I replied.
"The two of us alone can't kill him! I heard the fight as I was running here, it sounded like a freaking war zone!"
"Its not a war zone, it's his grave." I said coldly. Anansi stood up and laughed.
"Brave words star keeper, but there is no way that a brat that's been pampered and not known any hardship throughout his life can kill me!" Anansi said.
This time it was my turn to laugh. It was a loud and hearty laugh that made me almost double over from the stabbing pain in my side.
"What is so damn funny!?" Anansi demanded stomping his feet on the ground like a toddler having a tantrum.
"You! You keep acting like you're the only person in the world who's been hurt or wronged or abused or whatever the fuck happened to turn you into a fucking psychopath!" I cackled.
"You think my pain is a joke! My suffering something to laugh at! What do you know about suffering!" Anansi snapped. I stopped laughing and looked at Anansi.
For a split second I wasn't in Tolapo village but in the woods back at home, surrounded by hundreds of hungry thrads mashing their jaws at me, my shirt and pants soaked in blood. Not mine but I would have given anything for it to have been. Standing before me was a ascended Thrad that towered over the trees and looked down at me like I was no more dangerous than a knat to it. And just like that I was back in the town square facing off with Anansi, looking at me with the same expression.
"I know what's its like to be treated like you are nothing more than a burden to everyone around you, I know what it's like to be unwanted and despised, I know what it's like hate everything about yourself and wish you could change in the hope that maybe then people will accept you, and I know what it's like to watch the one person in your life that made life bright and bearable die right in my arms." I said forcing my voice to not portray any emotion.
Anansi narrowed his eyes at me and sneered and started casting a offensive spell sigil from his right hand.
"You're a star keeper! Probably treated better than royalty by your country! There is no way you know anything about pain!" Anansi shouted as multiple small fireball fired from the spell sigil aimed at me.
I channeled volt attribute mana in my legs again and ran as fast as I could. The fireballs crashed into a building behind me and set it on fire.
Anansi snapped his finger and that annoying shield guarded him again. I threw my Skazzas over my shoulder while I pulled out another spell from my pocket. All I had left was the frostveil way spell. I channeled mana into my hand and it jumped into the paper activating the sigil.
A gust of freezing wind and snow blew from the sigil covering everything in its path with ice. Anansi's shields came together again with a snap of his finger and moved to block the ice wave but it blew around the shield and still managed to freeze Anansi, if only partially.
"You Bastard!" Anansi exclaimed then started casting a offensive spell sigil. Before he could finish I skidded to a stop, drew my Skazzas and fired.
The shield moved and blocked the shots predictably. I kept running towards Anansi, firing as I ran so the shield would stay in place and block Anansi's shot at me. When I was close enough that the shield could repel me I jumped over it, switching the mana attribute I was channeling from Volt to burst. Flames engulfed my shoes and propelled me high above Anansi, clearing several of the three story buildings in the distance.
Anansi fired a trio of lightning bolts at me but they were slightly off the mark, but still close enough that I could feel small sparks arching from the bolt and licking my skin as I free fell towards Anansi.
Taking aim, I channeled burst attribute man's into my hands. The mana in my hands was drawn to the runes I'd etched on the gun. Jane's blood began to glow and the runes flew off the gun, flying in front of the muzzle. A spell sigil formed in the blood and I smirked wickedly.
'Imbue with lightning.' I recited the words I'd etched into the stock in my head as I pulled the trigger.
For a second I stopped free falling as the bullet left the muzzle and touched the spell sigil. Lightning and flames enveloped the bullet followed by a earth shattering sonic boom that knocked me back as the bullet rocketed towards Anansi.
His shield moved to block the bullet but it wasn't fast enough. My aim was off but with that shot it didn't matter. The bullet tore through his shoulder with so much force that the entire arm went flying. A second later the bullet exploded in the ground sending rubble and lightning into Anansi's back.
Still falling I channeled wind attribute mana into my hands and feet. I managed to right myself and send a gust of wind to slow down my fall enough that I only tumbled and rolled a little bit when I crashed into the rock hard cobblestone.
"Fuck! Son of a whore!" I cried out as I crashed into a crate. I wiggled around on the ground several seconds gasping in pain.
Anansi was lying face down on the ground, several feet away from where he was originally and I could hear him wheezing faintly.
I replied.
'Fuck...if it is we're screwed…' I thought.
I groaned loudly as I forced my body to stand. It screamed bloody murder as muscles and joints clicked and popped. I was definitely going to feel worse later. As I hobbled over to Anansi I looked around for my gun, the force of the shot knocked it from my hands. I saw the gun as I neared Anansi's body, it had landed right in front of the steps, twisted and warped beyond repair. The effect of using the spell.
I popped my claws as I stood over Anansi's body, the initial bullet had taken his right arm the explosion afterwards had blown his legs clean off as well. His wounds were cauterized by the explosion. Surprisingly he was breathing still if only just barely. I knelt down and rolled him over onto his back.
[Yeah its him…] I informed everyone as stared in Anansi's rage filled eyes. I expected to be angry and filled with rage, ready to strangle Anansi with my bare hands after he stabbed Jane but in that moment the only thing I felt was confusion.
"Why….why did you have to do all this? Why couldn't you have just walked away?" I asked.
"T-t-they took e-e-everything from m-m-me. Pride, d-dignity, even my n-name?" Anansi stuttered.
"Your name?" I asked. Anansi coughed up some blood then looked towards the tower and sneered.
"That bastard n-named me after him but once he realized I w-w-wasn't his…he…he abandoned me…" Anansi said.
"Who?" I asked.
"Dwarm'moo…my mother's husband…" Anansi said. My eyes widened and I looked over Anansi's face again. He might not have looked anything like Dwarm'moo but he did look like another elder that I met recently.
"Your real dad was Abra'bo…wasn't it?" I asked. Anansi scowled and looked away from me.
"T-t-that bastard was anything but a f-father." Anansi said then launched into a coughing fit. "He saw…a-and knew the abuse I s-s-suffered at Dwarm'moo's hands and did nothing! His image a-as Warden was more important."
I stood quietly for several seconds digesting what Anansi told me while he launched into another coughing fit. The rage I had been expecting suddenly surged and I glared at Anansi.
"Are you fucking shitting me?!" I yelled. "All this death, and pain and suffering was because you had a grudge against your dad and step-dad! That is fucking bullshit! The whole village doesn't need to suffer for that!"
"They knew! They knew how much I suffered! They knew about the beatings, and the days I spent locked in a cellar! They knew and none of them spoke out! None of them helped me!" Anansi barked. "These are pains you'll never know! N-never understand!"
"But I do know them…and I understand. I was born in America" I said softly. Anansi's eyes widened in realization. "For as long as I can remember I was treated like I was trash, even by members of my own family. At any given day I could be beaten and thrown in the gutter like trash…I lived every day knowing that I could be killed just because someone hated splicers and the police would never investigate. I know what it's like to feel pain, and want revenge against those that caused it…but I'll never act on that feeling."
"Why? America is…hell for splicers. Why wouldn't you want to burn that place to the ground?" Anansi asked.
"Cause my grandmother would come back from the dead to kick my ass if I tried…" I said with a hollow smile to hide the painful memories that tried to surface. "…and I could never face Grandma Lulu'nala after acting like a monster…"
Anansi frowned for a second as he eyes me then suddenly chuckled until he coughed up some more blood.
"I see…I see…you…you…really are…blessed…star kee…" Anansi words trailed off as he took his last breath. His eyes glazed over and his head dropped to the side. I let out a ragged sigh then knelt down and closed his eyes.
I stood back up and stated at Anansi's body for several moments until I heard Alberto talking to me.
"What?" I asked, a little dazed.
"You killed him?! I can't believe you killed a paragon!" Alberto exclaimed.
"Oh…yeah…" I said dismissively.
[Thank you.] I told Bone-lasher telepathically then turned look at the tower.
"Okay…I'm tired, in pain, and over this bullshit of a night! Let's get Raziri and end this already!"