Bullets tore behind Alex’s back as the turrets tracked and failed to keep up with his blistering speed and flaming feet. Instead of the giant rounds tearing apart the crowd of turrets he danced around, the metal flowed back right into the housings and barrels, recycling and firing again in a constant hail. His legs pumped as he leaned into his newly revealed Title, speeding faster than ever and grinning before flipping on the secondary effect.

  Right away the drab exterior of Pearson airport’s colours saturated and his speed picked up a touch more.

  “Brody!” Alex called and turned his face back quickly as he weaved around a barrel going to head shot him. “Like my glasses? My SPEED glasses?”

  Rather than waiting for a reaction, he howled over the bullet fire and made his way forward toward the entrance, almost overwhelmed from his Title’s new raw speed addition.

  [Title: Alternative Goggler]

  [You successfully speed ran ego death and witnessed the River of Parallels. Congratulations, you can now enlighten everyone with your laisse faire attitude and remind them to center themselves within nature. Please continue to wear deodorant, as psychesystemispiritual experiences are no excuse for uncleanliness.]

  [+4.51% Raw Speed + The Ability to summon alternative running goggles. When worn, gain another +4.51% Raw Speed and enjoy un-dry eyeballs. Alternative goggles last for ten minutes and can be repeatedly summoned.]

  He didn’t have the capability to take them off and see what they looked like at the current moment. Just because he outran the auto-tracking of the turrets didn’t mean he could do too many silly things, especially since he heard another stream of bullets likely firing at Brody. But somewhere in his soul he just knew the summoned glasses were cool.

  “Catch up, dude!” He yelled while keeping his eyes ahead. The bit ahead was certainly different and certainly more murderous. “You’re going to miss all the—”

  “Silly. Ugly.” Brody suddenly said right beside him, matching his speed and clearly having used his [Wherever Step] to catch up.

  “Wombo combo? Wombo combo!?” Alex ignored the slight, gesturing up ahead to the death trap.

  Brody narrowed his eyes as he analyzed, and a small grin appeared on his handsome face. “Wombo,” he said. “Me first. New…”

  He struggled with the last word and snarled in frustration, wanting to show Alex his new Skill. Happy as he was for his Link’s new prowess from the Titles, and never mind how ridiculous the glasses were, Brody had appearances to maintain, and the murder machines they sprinted towards from The Councillor protecting the entrance of his fortress were coming fast.

  A storm of sharpened pencils violently clouded around a massive row of vintage city busses acting as barriers in front of the entrance. Even from the distance Alex could see the writing utensils buzzed and stabbed with hooked graphite as they searched for interlopers. There must have been some sort of hive mind enchantment, since most of them were quickly focussing their tips right for the pair.

  “Watch…me. Then wombo.” Brody gurgled out, winking at Alex and firing his newly claimed signature hand sign before shooting off.

  Alex’s mouth opened. He was surprised, impressed, and frankly slightly jealous that he hadn’t chosen the “hang loose” and naturally opted for the finger-gun.

  “Finger guns are better anyways—Woah!” He shouted as he saw Brody shoot off and use his new Skill.

  [Elegy’s Exit] was a strange Skill that had taken Brody some time to figure out. Just a week he’d had it after a splendid night with his goth girlfriend, and only at Giat’s behest had he continued to experiment while standing, then walking, then eating, then lounging, then sprinting after so many frustrating failures. He was supposed to be good at everything. Thankfully, perfection begets stubbornness, and after hours working through all possible ways he’d simply gotten lucky and activated it at the correct time. Right as his foot hit the ground. Not a second before or a second after. Since then, though it took a lot of Essence, it was the easiest thing in the world to use.

  Each step he left two things while he kept it on. A gloomy glow of blackness that left a terrible stain once dissipated, and reality stuttering out quarks as it bent to Brody’s will. It was as if he cancelled the window of time between steps, and to Alex, it appeared that he skipped film frames as he flung forward in a jittery speed boost. The skips between was where his legs moved invisibly, and though he was intelligent, Brody’s brain couldn’t quite process the fact that he tore himself slightly forward in time and reality with every step.

  In no time at all, and with the turrets almost turning to gun Alex down from behind, Brody turned off his boost Skill and flung himself right toward the storming horde of H2s. He pinged a [Wherever Step] and teleported fifteen feet in the air as the pencils stabbed air, shooting forward and upward from his momentum. Toward the upper part of crust of the pencil cloud he flew. Good move, but from where Alex stood, he wasn’t likely to make the thirty feet of bus and danger splinters.

  The story has been taken without consent; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.

  “WOMBO COMBO!” Both yelled together as Alex activated his port toward Brody.

  Bullets melted pencils, missing Alex’s hide by a breath, and once on the other side of the port, he fired a [Phantom Step] [Planar Skating] combo mid air, catching the drift at just the right angle. Halfway through his arcing glide he fired [Phantom Step] again and pulled Brody out with [Illusory Copy]. The clone immediately appeared beside him, perfect quaff waving in the wind, then disappeared into his own port only to land on the other side of the barrier before Alex.

  Stabby pencils nipped at Alex’s flaming heels as he hollered at witnessing Brody’s perfect landing complete with tuck and roll. Too bad for the guardian pencils, because he was ripping through the air, too fast for them and still able to keep his eyes wide open to take in all the detail of their failure to kill him by impalement.

  THUMP

  Alex hit the pavement, hugging the pizza and keeping his knees spry as he rolled to absorb the impact. Without scraping skin or faltering he summersaulted and shot to his feet to speed toward Brody, who headed towards a massive pitted concrete column just in front of the converted airport covered in thick metal sheets to keep out prying eyes. Behind he heard the turrets blast into the bus and the chittering of the pencils trying to hide from the carnage. They didn’t follow the pair, clearly and thankfully tied in some manner to stick close to the barrier and act as evil little barbed wire rather than hornets.

  Skidding just as a fifty-caliber bullet skimmed his heel that darted around the corner, Alex and Brody huffed smiling snarls at one another.

  Brody clapped him on the shoulder. “Be careful. Plan.”

  “You’re right,” Alex’s breath began to calm as the bullet fire continued to tear apart the other side of the concrete. “Bit much on my part, but look at us. Straight through a field of turrets and over that bus,” it was his turn to clap Brody on the shoulder, “We are a fricken deadly at running.”

  Brody puffed out his chest. It was easy to get caught up in Alex’s can-do attitude. And he was right.

  “Still stupid.” He gurgled and gestured with his eyebrows towards Alex’s glasses.

  “Oh yeah,” Alex started, going to pull the summoned glasses off his face. “Let’s see what kind of accessorizing I’m going to be able to…”

  He blinked, looked up at Brody, then back at the glasses. “What the hell are these?!”

  “What those? Terrible. Just…terrible.” Brody shook his head.

  A single massive blacked out frame was surrounded by a thick border of fake jewels. Thin temples ended in even more dazingly bejewelled temple tips. Out of a bad futuristic fashion show for the unapologetically gaudy or unapologetically annoying is who they looked made for. Not him. He imagined that out of all the possibilities of glasses that he could summon, odds were he’d get a slick pair of aviators. Apparently not.

  He slotted them back on anyways, feeling the return of the speed in his bones.

  “I bet I look awesome in them,” Alex said as he made duck-lips. “They suit me? Make me look like a restauranteur? A cool restaurant—”

  “Uncle DJ.” Brody answered.

  Alex nodded seriously, turning back to face the concrete column protecting them from certain death. It was slowly disintegrating. “I’ll take it. Everyone loves a weird uncle. Actually, never mind, no they don’t. Gives an extra kick to my speed though. And that Skill you have now? Man, you’re fast!”

  Brody held in the urge to tell Alex that the glasses did in fact look kind of good. “Thanks…Uhh,” He leaned around Alex to look at the column himself. “We…should…go.”

  Alex scanned the metal plates encasing every giant window and entrance of Pearson Airport. They looked thick, and there weren’t any holes to be found where one could squeak through. The whole place was sealed shut.

  “I know we’re still catching you up on the best movies, but you know Keanu, yeah?” Alex asked, and once Brody nodded, he continued. “Yeah, always suspected he was crazy back then, but in a non-weird way. Picked Toronto post System for whatever reason, now he’s on the Council,”

  Alex sucked his teeth as the column continued to crumble. They had to think, and fast.

  “Speed? Great movie. Matrix? Killer. But Devil’s Advocate? Yuck. And can you believe Snu made me watch the Lake House like three times?” He shook his head, tapping his glasses rather than his lips. “He did make a great Aragorn, though. Thank System he convinced the director to let him take the role. We still got over an hour and a half, which makes me think the inside is--”

  Brody snapped his finger as an idea hit him on how to get in. “I first. [Wherever] in. You…follow. I boost.”

  “You sure? I can outrun them first. These glasses let—”

  “No,” Brody interrupted him, eager to show he was still a speed demon. “Me first.”

  Alex clicked his tongue. With the column almost gone and their bodies on the line, it was a good enough plan. “Alright. I’ll open my Title once we’re…uh…yeah let’s go. We’re kind of about to get gunned—”

  Brody had already shot off with his [Elegy’s Exit], skittering over where cars once argued to pick up tired travellers who arrived stinking of recycled breath, under and pitifully calorically dense food, and other people’s stuff.

  Alex watched his clone jitter speed as bullet fire clanged off thick metal plating, seriously impressed with how fast Brody was moving. He could use a boost Skill. Maybe his [Chosen One] Title would unlock something like that?

  No, it’s going to be something even better. Nino thinks I’m lucky…and he’s a bloody Lich.

  Just before Brody sprinted into a metal plate, he disappeared, porting into the Fortress. Alex grinned, adjusting his glasses one final time to sit comfortably on his face as he readied to port into one of more powerful people’s hide-outs in the northern hemisphere. All to deliver a pizza and a note.

  “I wonder if he actually knows kung fu…”

  He ported over to Brody just as the bullet fire tore through the column. The man inside now known as Keanu Bereaves had already felt their presence and went to grab his sledgehammer, his black suit, and began to download his guns to his brain. The pair had impressed him, and he wondered what they wanted. But they’d need to pass all his protections to tell him first.

  “Yeah…” He said to no one but himself.

  A pitbull made of more metal and dog clacked after him.