Bloody Decisions

As they got back to the Barrier, John quickly led them to the staircase where he had encountered James and the berserker. When they went down those stairs, John’s hair was immediately standing straight up…

The spot where James’ body had been lying was empty. There was a trail of crystalized blood going down the stairs... John quickly pulled out his spear, ready to be attacked at any moment.

The others understood his gesture and immediately went into attention as well.

“Don’t touch the blood, it seems to be infected.” said John.

“Infected with what?” asked Aloy.

“Vampirism.”

“How can there be a vampire at the school and no one notices it? Shouldn’t the Order be on that immediately?” pondered Kim.

“I would like to know that as well… aren’t they supposed to be the ones ‘protecting the innocent’? Or at least punish the evildoers?” wondered John, by now very much not impressed by the Order.

So far, he had been attacked in his own home by a stranger, found multiple Barriers at a public building without any oversight, witnessed a small-scale war in the streets and had to deal with multiple people that had been experimented on…

Someone was clearly not up to snuff on their task.

“Well, I guess it’s no wonder why many people don’t turn to them anymore when they need something fixed; they either do it themselves, get some mercs, or ask us… I think the Order is very much not up to the task anymore to deal with this town… Actually, maybe they never were and now it’s just becoming more obvious? I don’t know, shit’s weird,” said Brunhilde, obviously not a big friend of the paladins.

Silently, they followed the blood trail into the labyrinthine basement, taking turn after turn and following the blood spikes on the ground.

“What happened to the blood to make it look this way?” asked Aloy, clearly unsettled by the blood on the ground.

“James was seemingly able to harden his blood into armor and spikes. It was really annoying…” said John quietly, trying to keep the conversation down low.

Another turn, and they were presented with a wooden door in their face. The blood trail was going through there.

“Okay, this could potentially be a trap; I’m not sure how smart James actually is. Two of you will come with me in there, two of you will wait outside in case something happens. Brun and Aloy with me, Kim and Kaen, you’ll wait outside,” hushed John, trying to keep a cool head.

“But whyyyyy?” whined Kaen.

“Because there’s a chance he saw Brun and Aloy looking around earlier, but he shouldn’t know about you…

“Fair enough…”

Slowly putting his hand on the doorknob, he made sure everyone was ready before quickly twisting and opening the door.

Inside was a view that was positively horrifying…

Two bodies were hanging from the ceiling with their hands chained to some meat hooks, cuts and bruises all over their bodies. Beneath them was a container, collecting thick, red blood running from the cuts.

The two hanging there? None other than the Bitch Queen and her boyfriend, Vanessa Hawthorne and Frank Dickinson Jr.

Something now clicked inside John’s head. When he had noticed that the two of them weren’t around on Wednesday, he hadn’t thought much of it. But it was exactly the day after James showed up at school, and Frank had been beating him up…

But this was more than petty **** for some bullying… This was beyond fucked…

With his back to the door, James was standing between the two bodies.

“Oh great, the hero shows up to foil the ‘villain’s’ plan, and this time he brought back-up. How quaint.” James was now clad in a blood red set of armor, glowing ominously.

Giving his spear a twirl, John was trying very hard not to empty his stomach, “You’re sick, James. All this just because Frank bullied you? Are you that insane? And you are aware that an hour ago I vividly handed you your ass when you tried to fight me.”

Turning around, James’ face was now a twisted version of his former visage, sharper edges, crazy eyes, and razor sharp teeth. “This? This has nothing to do with the bullying, these were just easy pickings to feed on. No one was bothered by their disappearance. I’m far above petty things like ****... But you’re right, you did handle me pretty easily back there, and three against one isn’t any more in my favor… Which is why you will let me go.”

Raising an eyebrow, John was not sure if he was joking, “Excuse you? Let you go? Are you high on some kind of blood ****? Why would we ever let you go?”

As a response, James raised his arm to face level, showing a silvery bracelet hanging from his wrist, “Simple, because thanks to this bracelet, if I die, this whole Barrier will lock itself down, keep you in here and then it will instantaneously crystalize your blood. You, John, would probably survive, but what about your friends? Can you be so sure about them? Can you look into the eyes of their parents because you tried to kill someone with a dead man’s switch? You wanna play that gamble? And don’t think about trying to capture me, because if you do, I’ll just kill myself and take you with me. You’ll let me leave this room, and you will let me leave the Barrier at my leisure. In exchange I’ll even give you these two,” and he pointed at Vanessa and Frank.

Both Aloy and Brun looked at John, waiting for his response. Taking a moment to feign thinking, John tried to Observe the bracelet, hoping to find out if it could actually do that:

Observe failed! Item shrouded!

’Fuck! There goes checking if it’s a bluff…’

The choice John had to make here wasn’t really that hard, but he certainly wondered if it was the right choice… John was not sure if everyone else could survive whatever plan James had cooked up… Gamer’s Body had protected him against the effects of the magic and the blood apparently. But what about the others? Did they have the same chance? They all kept saying how much bullshit his abilities were, so probably not… and just because he knew how his body reacted to it, he had no idea how theirs would do...

“I’m waiting, Newman.”

This was not about his own life, but Aloy’s, Brun’s, Kaen’s, Kim’s… He couldn’t just condemn them to **** because he tried to call a bluff… And he didn’t want to tell Astrid or Kwang what happened here… That would be something he wouldn’t survive.

“I’ll promise you this, James, if that even is your real name, until the next time we see each other, you’ll be a dead man walking.” And John put his weapon away with that.

“Smart kid. Now take these two, take your friends, and get the fuck out of this Barrier. Now.”

Gesturing for Brun to help him, John moved towards Frank’s limp body and hoisted it from the meat hook. With a little help from Aloy he was able to hoist the body on his shoulders, feeling the faint breath of the guy. Even if he didn’t like him at all, he wouldn’t wish the **** on him for it.

That privilege was only for James, so far.

Walking out of the room, James cheekily waved behind them, “Byee byeeee~”

Behind the door, John looked at both Kim and Kaen, “We leave. Now.”

Apparently they both had been listening to what had been going on. Kaen took his hand and squeezed it slightly. “You did the right thing. We’ll get him some other time.”

Hopefully that would be true... pushing his keycard into a slit near the door after checking that James wasn’t spying on them, John led the group through the door, which he immediately closed behind them.

Now that they were safe again, John gave his frustrations free rein, punching the wall where the door had been just a second ago…

“FUCK! Fuck this fucking asshole, fuck his entire family, fuck this entire thing! How are you supposed to deal with assholes like that?!”

Putting a hand on his shoulder, Kim said, “Don’t let him get to you, John. This is exactly what he wants… We will deal with him in due time, and then he will get what he deserves. But for now we can’t do anything against him… The moment we left the Barrier, we were safe, but we also lost his track… so leave him be for now, concentrate on the fact that you just saved two, potentially three, lives and avoided unnecessary bloodshed. All in all, this has been a success.”

Taking deep breaths, he thought about what Kim had said there. She was right, he saved Andrea, Vanessa and Frank, he dealt with the clusterfuck that was his corrupted Barrier, and he outed James in a way that would make sure that he wouldn’t be able to return to the school again… It was overall positive, even if it was mostly useless in the face of James escaping scott free…

Looking at the sullen faces of the girls around him, John sighed, “Okay, let’s clean this up; we’ll close down both Barriers if we can, get the bodies to someone who can help them, and inform the Order about what happened here. Hopefully that will be a wake up call for them… Maybe they can also locate this fucker.”

After a quick check on his captive (who was still ****), the group of six set back out to the monastery Barrier, quickly leaving it at a point where they would appear outside and then waiting for John to destroy said Barrier. Casting Delete Barrier granted him 75 MP back, which was three times the amount he had used to create it… was that why it fucked up? Did it somehow pull in mana from James’ Barrier, twisting it in the process?

Trying to delete James’ Barrier proved to be unsuccessful for him, but he had expected as much… He wasn’t the owner after all…

Looking at the people around him, he asked, “So, this is where we split up?”

Brun agreed, “Yeah, I’ll go home and tell the others about that vampire psycho running around.”

Kim nodded as well, “I will do the same, and I will contact the Order. I will also return to the Nexus once I’m home to get the two bullies, they are best suited to deal with those two.”

John didn’t really know if he would agree with that after everything he knew about the Order so far, but even Brunhild interjected in their behalf, “When it comes to rendering the memories of mundanes useless and healing them from damage, they do the best job unless you are able to pay enough money for an Apothecary, which I totally won’t waste on these two. Pretty sure those are the two that Astrid had told me about… punk-ass bullies…”

Looking at Aloy, John needed to know what she would do. Her answer was straightforward, “I’d like to return home for now, but I will come back. I need to talk to you, John. But at another time.”

Nodding, John just said, “Just use the keycard, you can return at any time you want. I think i’ll need to bring you into your world though.” With that, they split up each in their direction, bidding each other goodbye. John stayed at the side of the school. This was secluded enough so that he could open the Nexus door here and no one would notice. He would need to move his bike though, so that it wasn’t so obvious.

He decided that he would put his newly created garage to good use and parked his bike inside the Nexus.

Thinking about whether or not to close the door, he decided to do so, relying on Kim to pick up Kaen and the two bullies at some point tomorrow.

Last thing he had to do before he could be alone with Kaen was taking Aloy back to her Barrier. With a quick switch, the two of them were back in the woods where they had met. It was nighttime now, leaving the forest in a soft, white glow.

“Soo… I’ll see you around?” asked John, not really sure if she would actually come around again.

His doubts were killed though when she planted a kiss on his lips, “Definitely. I still need to talk to you about something. But right now is not the best time for that. You need some time alone, or rather, alone with the blue girl… I’ll be back in a couple of days at the latest. Promise.”

Smiling softly, he returned the kiss, “Don’t be a stranger, you’re always welcome.”

And with that, he left the Barrier again, leaving Aloy to her own thoughts. She probably needed some alone time as well…

As John reappeared in the Nexus, he was greeted by a sight that was draining all the life from his face and to a certain other place.

Kaen was lying in the middle of the room with closed eyes, spread legs, and slowly rubbing her clothed snatch.

This was certainly a nice way to end a night like this.