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A rush of adrenaline could be felt through each person’s veins as human and Guardian stood eyeing each other. The misty atmosphere of the area began to grow thicker and colder with the drums of war beating inside their hearts. Over the sounds of each breath were the sound of readying firearms, communicators going off, and the police talking between each other. An overly fearful and under confident grunt fired off his pistol, letting out a large screeching boom noise as the projected bullet shot out towards the two Guardians. The rest of the police and military squad did not follow up on this shot in their surprise. The poorly aimed bullet melted in the air through Joel’s heat field and spattered across his clothes.

Ryan tiled slightly over to his side towards Joel and whispered in Guarshokha, "Looks like they’re going to try making their moves to arrest us soon, man. How about you take the right, and I’ll take the left?"

"Hmm?" Joel blurted out commonly as he looked towards Ryan. He realized what Ryan was doing in the middle of danger and began following along in his own Guarshokha tongue, "No, let’s get out into a more open area before we start fighting, but let’s take as few lives as we can in the process of getting away."

Ryan nodded at his partner, and the two began looking for a good escape route. It appeared as if every possible path was flooded by layers of police and assault men. As the two communicated to each other in their own language their surrounding opponents looked between each other in confusion. No one in the world besides the Guardian race knew how to speak Guarshokha due to its complexity. A leading officer pointed across the area towards four men and began barking orders, then pointed sharply at Joel and Ryan.

"You four! Restrain those two!" the officer called out, "Any resistance and we’ll blow their brains inside out!"

Ryan shrugged his shoulders with a proud grin and snickered, "Could he be anymore unoriginal than that?"

"Does originality count when you’re in the middle of the battle field?" Joel asked his friend.

"I guess not, man. But to say anything about if we resist or not, why, of course we’re gonna resist!" Ryan said, widening his grin.

As the four men swayed in uncertainty of their selection the officer barked at them, "Do it now!" he quickly turned toward Ryan as he was being laughed at and yelled, "Hey! Don’t laugh at me you hell-sent bastard!"

The four police men slowly approached the two Guardians cautiously. They breathed deeply as if their lives were to end shortly as a bad sacrifice.

"That’s right! Keep going!" the officer shouted, "Once we nail these monsters we’ll go in and get Mister Howe for associating with them, too."

Joel shook his head and said, "That’s not good. If something breaks out here we’ll risk danger to those inside these houses."

"Yeah, man, and your fire shield won’t help us much if they bring out the explosives." Ryan told Joel.

Joel shook his head slightly towards the direction where the four men were approaching from and said, "Let’s make our move now while there’s a weak spot in the barrier that way."

As the men continued their slow and cautious approach they gazed into Joel’s green eyes and began to remember how red they were when Joel had first gone berserk. Some could even recall the nightmare’s voice in action as he recovered and summoned his Lavathan monster to his side. The pain and horror from the loss of their friends struck grief and anger through their minds, and they could not feel any hope to forgive Joel to this day for killing their fellow humans all across the city of Traquo. Those who ran from Joel and survived were only blessed with nightmares of what had become of their city there after. The sight of his returning with another demon friend and their conversing in their strange language only aggravated them, releasing their fears.

Right as their fears turned into courage as they advanced on the still demons in front of them, Joel quickly broke his fighting position and brought his right arm up, pointing it in the direction of the four police men. They each stopped abruptly and began to quiver in fear, not knowing what to expect from the wanted youth, and the surrounding wall of police squads shared the same feeling as they all jolted back slightly, gripping their firearms tight. Joel and Ryan chuckled out loud so that everyone could hear them, and Joel waved good bye to the men standing in front of him.

"Time to break their concentration." Joel thought.

"Right behind you." Ryan replied to him through telepathy.

Joel threw his right hand up with a flat palm into the sky suddenly, causing the group of startled humans to look up as well, and he shot a large sphere of fire up above them. The ball of hot energy lit up the area as if it were clear day time. The heat generated by the sphere cause the surrounding humans to sweat tremendously in their dark and heavy suits. They all scattered for cover behind walls and vehicles as the ball of energy flew up high above the residential buildings. Once the sphere of burning fire flew several hundred feet above the ground it burst into thousands of smaller orbs of fire down towards the ground, and as the assault teams saw the fire raining down upon them through the streets they each jumped under whatever they could find for shelter.

With the situation now under their advantage due to Joel’s attack, the two Guardians stepped forward and began running down the street together in what ways they could at high speed. They put their hands over their faces to avoid any debris and hot, melted metals from the gun fire that commenced as they made their escape passed the frightened police. Every bullet slid off them like running drops of hot sweat. They took many sharp lefts and rights as they passed through the neighborhood, waking up the surrounding residence as they were being pursued by the trigger happy police. It seemed as if the defending forces of Traquo were not the only people after them.

Ryan kept an open eye out for good cover as he ran close to Joel through the city. It appeared as though the neighborhood was endless through the large city. He managed to spot an empty alley path and stopped to pull Joel into the safe darkness, using his superior speed to disappear in a flash teleport to the side. They let out deep gasps for air as they tried to catch their breath behind the corner, but they silenced themselves and held their breath as the police stopped to search for the invaders. This time the police had brought a heat detecting radar to aid them in their search for Joel, and they began searching through the area with flash lights.

"This is no good. I can’t keep their bullets for much longer. It’s really sapping my energy away." Joel thought.

Ryan stood silent as he watched the police search through the area. He sped away as a light came toward him, leaving Joel in the far back by himself. Ryan’s eyes then came across a lone van parked on the far side of the alley near the entrance, and he began focusing his powers through the vehicle, trying to gain access to the mechanisms inside. He managed to unlock the van, and he dashed forward slightly and teleported behind the car near the driver’s door. As Joel continued to avoid the search lights Ryan ducked behind the van in an attempt to figure out how to start the van from the outside before he revealed himself getting into the van.

He heard a click from inside the van, ensuring him that the key hole was being turned by his proper concentration, and he jumped into the vehicle as fast as he could. Ryan started the car and signaled Joel to run up and join him as the police became aware of Ryan and the van. As the humans turned their attention to Ryan with their guns, he sped off down the road before the vehicle could receive much damage. Joel took this opportunity to recharge his energy using the proper procedures, and then he leaped up over the police men, melting the bullets they fired towards Ryan, and ran on foot to catch up with Ryan. Ryan’s wavy driving showed that he did not know the first thing about driving. As Joel caught up Ryan opened the door for him, and Joel leaped forward and caught onto the side of the van. He swung in and sat down, and he closed the door as he put his seat belt on.

"Don’t you want me to drive?" Joel asked in a panic as they swerved left and right across the street.

"Ah dude, who needs a license? They aren’t stopping me!" Ryan laughed in entertainment of the moment.

Joel looked around and back towards the road and noticed several police cars beginning to chase their van down the road. Ryan shortly took notice of the police’s advancement and began steering off to different sides and streets in an attempt to stay away from them. Soon the police began planning ahead of Ryan and made attempts to head the van off, blocking their way from further escape, but Ryan ignored their barricade of cars and rolled over the three police cars in his way. The policemen inside the cars fled to safety as they saw Ryan without intent of stopping while the demon’s giant van thoroughly crushed and distorted the smaller vehicles. The van tilted down as it came off the police cars and rolled over onto its top, bumping Joel and Ryan around inside as it flipped onto its wheels again.

Ryan shook his head for a moment in a daze, then hit the gas peddle and sped off down the road again. He looked down at the approaching road and noticed lines of spike strips ahead, and he began turning wildly left and right off to the sides of the road into other police cars stationed waiting for him as he made his moves to avoid having his tires popped. As Ryan turned off to another road a heavily armored combat vehicle met him on the other side of the road and began following along to the side of their van. As the police matched Ryan’s speed they began to ram the van across the passenger side in an attempt to destroy the vehicle even more and send it off the road for good. In short success Joel’s side was crushed in rather bad and Joel was forced to kick the door off from the van. He unbuckled his seat belt and leaned outside slightly, holding onto the side of the vehicle as tight as he could, and Joel shot a long Fire Bolt beam down across the ground between them as the tank made a move away for another attack. The attack slightly melted the wheels over, causing it to slant down to its left side a bit and off setting it.

One of the men inside the armored vehicle threw open a door and climbed out as Joel was from the van and aimed a rifle up close at Joel and cried, "Melt this, bitch!"

Joel’s eyes widened in surprise as the gun was aimed for his face, and the bullet was shot into his head before he could make any moves of evasion. The small projectile pierced through Joel’s skin slightly under his nose, breaking through his muscles, skull, and brain, and eventually through the other side out through the van’s windshield. As blood spattered through the inside of the vehicle, Joel dropped lifelessly down in his seat, slightly hanging out of the speeding vehicle. His body jolted slightly and his pupils opened wide, and Ryan reached out and pulled Joel into the van completely, tossing him in the back seat. He pressed the gas peddle down harder as he steered through the city passed large buildings and over long bridges. The police tank kept matching their speed, and the man hanging outside was getting ready to fire another shot into the van at Ryan. Ryan looked sharply to the side and released one hand from the steering wheel and threw a punch out into the air in the police vehicle’s direction, and the tank was crushed in its side as if a large force had run into it, causing it to swerve out of control behind Ryan’s van. The police man with the rifle jumped off and ran away as the tank began to explode behind him.

Ryan sighed and shook his head for a moment. He looked ahead and noticed that the bridge he was driving over had been torn apart in order to trap Ryan from advancing any further. He slammed the break down as hard as he could to stop the van before he reached the edge, and Joel flew slightly up from his seat and hit the front of the van as it came to a sudden stop. Ryan jumped out of the broken vehicle and pulled Joel out with him. He looked over his partner’s body quickly, and then looked up to find the advancing army of humans that continued their pursuit for them.

"You’re bleeding rather badly, man. Don’t let out on me and die now." Ryan told Joel as he patted his face slightly.

He looked up again and saw the army’s position and began backing off away from the vehicle towards the edge of the road. He looked back behind him and gazed towards the bottom of the world. He looked back and saw a missile flying his way towards the end of the bridge, and he jumped back off the bridge and began to fall as the missile collided with the van and destroyed the rest of the bridge.

"I’ll just make like I’m dead in the air and fly away to safety!" Ryan thought with a sly grin. He looked over at Joel’s body as it dropped lifelessly with him and thought, "Wait… Nah, he’ll be fine!"

Joel’s wound began to close and heal as his Core began to take action. He shook his head and mumbled slowly as he opened his eyes again into life. He felt the breeze running around his body at high speed and looked back, seeing the ground approaching swiftly. Joel looked up and noticed Ryan slowing down in the air to a stop with his ability to fly, and he spun his own body around towards the floor and put his arms down and began to concentrate as hard as he could. His body would not stop, and he began yelling in panic as he tried to fly in his own way. Suddenly his body began to slow down in the air, but not completely. He looked around quickly as he floated down in the air to the ground, and Ryan flew down to join him in curiosity.

"Hey man, nice move! Glad you figured out how to fly!" Ryan said, congratulating his friend.

Joel looked at his hands briefly and shook his head, saying, "No that’s not it. I’m only floating now, but it does keep me in the air for a longer amount of time."

Ryan patted Joel hard on his back, causing Joel to fall down slightly faster, saying, "That’s alright! It’s still one step ahead of where you used to be!"

"I guess so." Joel said, slowly nodding. He put a hand up to his face and groaned, "Man, I hate getting shot like that."

"Sorry! I didn’t know you had a vulnerable range!" Ryan exclaimed apologetically, waving his hands frantically about.

They both looked down and noticed another large swarm of policemen down on the ground waiting for them to land. They all shouted violently at the two Guardians in hopes to kill the two themselves with their guns and various weapons. It was if they were a thousand angry villagers carrying torches and pitch forks.

Joel shook his head at the sight and told Ryan, "Looks like we’re going to have to give them another scare so we can get out of here."

Ryan nodded at Joel and asked, "What did you have in mind this time?"

Joel stood silent for a moment as he looked around, counting how many people were down below them. He then arced his body up and raised his hands up into the sky.

"Go up out of the area." Joel told his companion.

Ryan stuttered for a moment as he looked at Joel, jolting back a bit, and then said, "Alright, man, be careful with what you use!"

As Ryan flew up and away, Joel looked down again towards the ground. The outline of his body began to radiate with blazing energies, and a sparkling light started to rotate around his body quickly. He appeared as a bright star up in the dark and cloudy sky. The energy light began to grow in mass, engulfing the sky slowly in a massive body of fire. It incinerated the sides of the bridges as Joel’s form of attack come in contact with them, and the policemen began to scatter in fear once again from Joel’s oncoming attack. Little by little Joel could feel his supply of energy sapping from the use of the attack, which was causing him to loose altitude faster by the moment.

A fire truck arrived in the scene and set up quickly at the closest fire hydrant. They police and fire fighters began working together and started blasting Joel’s engulfing wave of fire with a spray of ground water, but the small amount of water they could get out of the hose was not enough to counter the effects of the burning attack. The massive amount of heat generated from Joel’s giant ball of energy eventually caused the whole stream of water to steam away up to the tip of the fire hose, and the fire men had to drop the hose and retreat before the fire engulfed them as well.

Ryan watched from up high as Joel’s energy erupted into a form of a tiny star. Even he was beginning to take some heat and was sweating a bit. He continually scanned the area with his line of sight, searching for anyone foolish enough to stand up and challenge Joel’s tremendous attack. Several townsfolk were running across the open field where the action was, trying to move from place to place, and Ryan sped down under the giant sphere of fire to send them off away from the scene. On his first trip around he rescued a slow couple carrying bags of groceries with them. Next he turned around and caught a child who was reaching out curiously for the flames unexpectedly. With a drop and a sharp turn he sped down under the flames again and found a downed and injured policeman trying to crawl away with an injured leg. Ryan picked him up and ignored the man’s constant screams of pain and fright, and he sent the police man to a safe location away from danger.

Ryan flew back up into the air and called out, "Alright, I think we got the area cleared!"

Inside the flames Joel snapped to his senses out of the attack and began to withdraw the energy. He began to glide quickly down to the ground at his loss of energy and wiped his forehead dry as he touched the ground. Ryan flew down to Joel’s side and helped him on his feet.

"That Fire Phase attack of yours really takes a lot out of you, but it sure made them run!" Ryan exclaimed.

"The fact that I was using some of that energy to keep me lifted only made things worse." Joel added. He looked up and around and asked, "Did I get anyone?"

Ryan shook his head and said, "No way, man, I got all the slow runners out as soon as I found them." He looked up and scratched his head and said, "I just wonder when these guys will quit! Remind me, what were we sticking around here for again?"

"We’re going to find out what’s really made Traquo such a bad place to live in, and we’re going to find out what happened to my old friend Dirk." Joel told his partner.

They looked around and saw another flood of humans marching their way, but this time it was not the police or an army force. It appeared as if the whole city of Traquo was coming against them both in protest. Joel stood up on his own and preformed the Charge technique to refresh himself before the townsfolk stopped in front of them. Ryan rolled his eyes at the sound of the people arguing against their methods of escape from the police.

"You think you monsters are so big and bad!" they heard from one group.

"You’re just destroying our city more!" another group cried.

"Leave us alone!" came a voice from the far back.

"We wouldn’t be in this situation if it weren’t for you anyway!" another voice yelled.

Ryan chuckled and began speaking in Guarshokha, "So the humans like the way they’re living now."

"I’m sure they’d love to be free again." Joel said in return, "But if we’re going to help we need to find the source of the real problem."

"Well do they expect to just kill everyone in sight?" Ryan asked, shrugging his shoulders.

"Not everyone, I hope." Joel said, "But I guess I was being a bit extreme back there when we were trying to get away. It’s only going to cost them more money to rebuild and repair."

"Every action has a reaction." Ryan said, widening his grin.

While the crowd of townsfolk yelled at them in a rage, the two Guardians caught sight of several more military vehicles carrying missiles and explosive devices stopping just outside the crowd. They turned up a loud speaker and began shouting out a garbled warning message, but no one could understand what was being said under the much louder voice of the people. The message was sent through again, but no one caught what was being said again. None of the townsfolk turned to take note of the military vehicles set up around the crowd. Joel and Ryan stopped paying attention to the crowd and began watching the military closely, appearing as if they were still looking around the crowd in confusion at the same time. The men in the vehicles began setting up the missiles to fire straight into the middle of the crowd to where Joel and Ryan stood, and as the missiles fired off with a loud sound the crowd finally took note of the projectiles. The two jumped up into the air to evade the three missiles flying their way, and the crowd began to scatter away in a much louder panic.

Ryan looked down at the approaching missiles and grinned, thinking, "It’s my turn!"

Ryan put his right hand up to his forehead and switched his suit into his leather armor. He then put his left hand down onto his sword’s hilt and began waving his right hand down towards each missile.

"Gather all time…" Ryan began to mumble, "Stop!"

A wave of energy shot down over each projectile, causing them to stop in their place in the air, motionless. Even the smoke behind the missiles was frozen in place. Ryan flew down to each missile and began flinging them up into the sky, and then he flew straight up and destroyed them with quick slashes with his sword. From within each missile came a burst of sticky white substance and shot down over the area from where Ryan had opened the missiles at, and it covered Ryan’s body thoroughly as it dropped down towards the ground. The rest of the substance dropped down and covered most of the townspeople, and it began to harden around each of them, stopping them in their place. Ryan had begun to loose his concentration with flight as his body hardened in place, and he fell down to the ground with a loud crash and a bounce.

"Aww man, this isn’t good. They don’t know how hard it is to clean this hair!" Ryan cried as began to struggle inside the hard case.

Joel dropped to the ground and rushed to Ryan’s side and asked, "Are you alright? Can you break free?"

"I don’t know, man, but go help the people over there!" Ryan exclaimed, "I may be stuck, but the enemy doesn’t know the first thing about killing us yet!"

Joel nodded and turned for the nearest human who was caught under the hardened substance, and he rushed to break them free with his own hands. The army men had already turned and driven away as if they were successful. Joel looked down and fisted his left hand and forcefully hit the white goo surrounding several townsfolk, crushing it apart. He made his best attempts as to not over do things to the point where he crushed the people inside as well.

While Joel was working he felt the ground shake tremendously. He broke free another set of humans, and then looked behind them to find a giant war machine advancing slowly towards them. It looked almost humanoid and stood as high as a tall building. Its body was covered in weapons and artillery, weighing it down greatly. From behind the machine were two tank escorts and several long tubes that spread out from the robot’s backside and back into the city. Along its chest plate was a painted logo that read ‘Freedom Golem TGD’.

Joel shook his head and sighed, "Traquo, the city of technology and trade, and this is what they’ve put it all into."

Ryan’s eyes lit up in amaze and said, "What a wonderful device!" He slumped down and sighed, "Do we really have to blow it up?"

Joel put his feet down in place, ready to make a quick and sudden move of evasion. The giant robot began to open up its body and let out a rain of bullet fire, and Joel began running quickly off to the side as the line of fire followed quickly behind him. Thousands of bullets, missiles, and lasers flew down in a solid ray after Joel’s shadow as it chased Joel through the wide open space of the city they had stopped in as it tried to destroy the Guardians. Joel made a quick dash by Ryan, and the beam of attacks from the robot soon followed and began to shatter Ryan’s hard case. Ryan popped back from the stony substance onto his back, then jumped to his feet and patted himself off as he watched Joel continue to run away from the war machine.

Joel turned to his side and faced the robot as he sped around in circles around the battlefield inside the city, and he threw out his left arm and began firing back with his own Fire Bolt waves. As the Fire Bolts pierced through the robot’s fire and hit its armor the attack only seemed to be absorbed into its being. He shot again at the machine, but his attacks still only seemed to fuel its engine.

"It’s no good, Ryan. It’s taking my fire attacks in for itself." Joel thought, "You’re going to have to try getting at its armor."

"Alright, here I go, man!" Ryan told Joel, "Don’t trip and fall, now!"

Ryan jumped forward and quickly ran under the line of fire from the giant war machine and towards one of its legs. The tank escorts quickly took notice of Ryan’s advancement and began to adjust their gun positions slowly to fire at him. Ryan brought his right arm back and threw it in a bunch into the robot’s side, but his attempt to crush the robot had no success as his strength could not dent into the robot’s heavy armor. He looked to the side and noticed the tanks about to fire and flew back away from their line of sight. The robot began to step forward again towards Joel after feeling Ryan’s punch. Ryan looked down sharply at the two tanks and dropped down on the closest one, breaking it apart with his hammering fists. Wasting no time Ryan jumped across the cord between the two tanks and lifted up the tank with all of his strength together. He spun around with the tank in his hands, the gun turret spinning around in confusion and the pilots fleeing for their lives, and he threw the tank up at the machine’s back. The large armored vehicle crashed into the robot’s back and exploded, causing the robot to stagger forward slightly.

The robot ceased its constant firing at Joel and turned slightly around at Ryan. Joel stopped his quick moves of evasion from the robot in curiosity, wondering what was going on with the robot. Ryan waved at the robot with a sarcastic laugh as it looked down at the flea-like Guardian on the ground behind it. He unsheathed his Masamura again and slashed down at the power cord, but the heavy cord deflected the attack without any sign of damage. The war machine let out an annoyed roar at Ryan and turned to fire at him, and Ryan began making his own moves of evasion as the beams of bullets, lasers, and missiles quickly started to fly towards him.

"His armor’s tough, too. You’ll have to take this opportunity to use the Masamune blade, man." Ryan told Joel through his telepathy. He grinned with amusement and split into seven figures with his great speed and called out, "Hah! Seven Fast Stance!"

As Ryan’s figure split out across the battle field in seven figures the robot tried to keep up with him and took turns firing into each of the seven figures as it guessed which one was real. While Ryan was busy in action, Joel removed his gleaming blue sword from its back sheath and made his approach towards the giant robot on his own. He leaped down and jumped through the small craters that had been created around the area from the robot’s constant artillery fire and dashed up towards the foot of the robot as Ryan had. He slid his sword’s edge across the surface of the heavy machine to test how tough it really was. The metal scratched slightly as the blade crossed over it. He gritted his teeth, hoping for the best, and Joel jumped up into the air to the robot’s chest. He brought the Masamune back, and then swung it quickly down into the monstrosity’s body. It caught and stuck slightly inside the machine’s body, and Joel struggled to cut all the way through both sides.

"Don’t sweat it! The Masamune’s the strongest sword out there!" Ryan assured him, "It can cut through any material, no problem!"

Joel looked down at Ryan and nodded. He brought the sword out and back, and then tried again. The sword finished the cut thoroughly through the machine’s metal body, causing it to begin to malfunction and shut down. Joel turned around as he floated in the air and moved to the robot’s other half, sending his sword through it and popping the robot’s upper body off. Joel kicked the large scrap of metal off, letting it fall to the ground, then he turned for the power cable and cut it apart, ensuring it would have no power left to run it. Joel dropped to the ground and returned to Ryan’s side, who had stopped his Seven Fast Stance technique when he saw the robot falling apart.

"Nice job, man!" Ryan exclaimed, giving a thumbs up.

"Thanks." Joel said, nodding his head, "You weren’t so bad yourself as back up."

A slight crackle was heard, and the two Guardians looked down at the Masamune in Joel’s hand.

"It’s… stressed out…?" Joel said in shock.

They gasped in disbelief and began shaking as the legendary sword’s blade broke apart and shattered in Joel’s hand. Streams of energy beamed sharply between each piece as they separated from a whole piece, and the material dulled from bright blue to dark. Joel looked at the green hilt closely, the color reflecting in his green eyes. He dropped it down to the ground and looked over the broken pieces scattered all around as he backed away slowly. Ryan dropped to his knees and began inspecting each shard from the sword closely.

"This hasn’t happened before!" Ryan exclaimed.

"What do we do?" Joel frantically asked.

"I don’t know! I don’t know!" Ryan told him. He looked up and away towards the mountains in the far background and said, "Maybe the answer is in your cage."

He summoned a bag into his hands and waved his left hand over the pile of broken sword, and the mess picked itself up and entered into the bag. The two Guardians looked out passed the destroyed robot and noticed even more police and military forces approaching, and they turned around with the bag of broken sword and began retreating swiftly again away from the face of action. With the Masamune broken beyond reparability Joel and Ryan’s To-Do list has increased and become longer in addition to their quest to save the city of Traquo. They could only hope that Lynn was still safe inside Howe’s residence undisturbed and not captured. The question echoed through their minds about if they could, in fact, save the once-grand city before their ventures through Traquo destroyed it completely along with everyone in it. How far would the enemy go just to get rid of the Guardians?

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