“Stay here,” John commanded Joanna before rushing out from behind the palm tree he had been using for cover.
He needed to find Truffle, but in the ensuing carnage caused by the koala hoard, that would be a tall order.
Running into the fray, guns blazing, he dipped, ducked, dived and dodged the incoming flurry of throwing knives and furry murderers.
Above him, the Hob-Koala relished the slaughter, dropping fragmentation bombs into the swarm and cackling madly as his brethren exploded like blood-filled pinatas.
A koala jumped out of the crowd towards John, it was frothing at the mouth and holding two, bloodied knives.
Jumping deftly to the side, he turned and fired a shot which glanced off one of its blades, ricocheting into one of its fellow bears.
Firing again, he began moving backwards but the koala didn’t fall. It deflected more bullets than it took, but it still did take some rounds to the abdomen.
Bleeding, and seemingly ravenous, it kept coming.
John fired again, this time aiming for its head. Brain matter and gore exploded out of the back of its skull, covering the twins who were panicking as they fought off another group.
“Ew!” James screamed, his man bun dripping with blood as he threw an ineffective kick at a smiling bear which rushed towards him with dual knives.
John shot the beast, and continued his search, ignoring the twin’s cries of pain and anguish as they stood back-to-back, desperately throwing kicks at the oncoming swarm.
“Truffle!” John shouted, though his voice was lost amidst the sea of clattering and explosions, “where are you?”
John dived to one side as three koalas in a trench coat stumbled forward, slashing wildly. The one on top wore a hat and flashed him a fangy grin.
Where did it get a fedora?
“Do not be alarmed fellow human,” a computerised voice coming from inside the trench coat said. “I am Bill from accounting. Darn these tax returns.”
Is that what koala’s think we’re like? John wondered to himself as he absently booted a nearby murder-bear like a football. I guess it is pretty accurate to be fair.
“Will you help me with my tax returns, fellow human?” the voice said as the trench coat wearing koalas chased after him, “perhaps afterwards we can engage in small talk and lament the rising cost of electricity?”
“If there is one good thing about the end of the world,” John said, turning to face them, “it’s the destruction of the IRS.” He fired a few shots into the koala on the bottom and the entire charade fell apart as the two others came tumbling out of the beige detective wear, the one in the middle was holding a cell phone which seemed to be where the Stephen Hawking-style voice had come from.
He shot them both and moved on.
“Truffle!” John shouted again, still struggling to be heard above the riotous noise which encompassed his immediate vicinity.
“I’m over here!” A small voice replied from somewhere within the swarm of murder-bears.
Trying to locate the direction the mini-pig’s voice had come from was no easy task. Still, John waded through the corpses of destroyed koalas in search of him.
“Heeheehee!” The Hob-Koala squealed from overhead and John ducked as the mechanised surfboard passed close enough to shave him.
Dropping to the ground, he fired his twin revolvers at the psychopathic supervillain rip off, narrowly missing as it danced like a court jester atop its surfboard, doing a back flip and sticking its palms over its lips as it blew a raspberry.
Cheeky fucker, it’s too agile, John thought in frustration, no matter what I do I just can’t hit it.
The Hob-Koala turned to John, staring directly into his eyes, and gave him the finger. John wasn’t aware that koalas could do that, but he guessed you learned something new every day.
“Boss!” Truffle cried, jumping onto his chest and padding at his shirt with his trotters. “I heard you calling for me, but I was a little… tied up.” That was when John noticed the congealed blood that was stuck to the pig’s thin mouth hairs.
Gross.
“Come on,” he said, scooping the teacup pig into his left arm and dropping his pistol back into his card. “I have a plan, but we need you.”
“I’m needed?” He squealed wondrously, “damn right I am! I told you I’m fierce.”
John rolled his eyes as he dashed back towards the palm tree where he’d left Joanna, shooting a few koalas on the way for good measure.
“This is what you made me wait here for?” She said, gesturing incredulously at him with open palms. “What am I supposed to do with a pig?”
“Surely you’ve heard the expression?” John replied with a single raised eyebrow as he held out his tiny companion in the palm of his hand.
This narrative has been purloined without the author's approval. Report any appearances on Amazon.
“You’re certifiable. I don’t think you’ve thought this through,” she protested, “you’ll end up getting him killed.”
“Don’t worry about it,” John replied eagerly, “he’s fierce, aren’t you buddy?”
“Damn right I am boss!”
“Alright, fine,” Joanna reluctantly agreed, “but if this doesn’t work then-”
“Then you’ll come up with a better plan?” He interrupted, “I haven’t seen you suggest any bright ideas so far.”
Joanna furrowed her brow as she considered John with a harsh expression. If anything, it made her even more attractive, but John had been married long enough to know that it was unwise to tell a woman that. So he kept it to himself. Once again something in her eyes bothered him but he couldn’t quite put his finger on what it was.
With a resigned sigh, Joanna lifted her hands and a deep blue glow surrounded them, and Truffle. The little pig levitated out of John’s palm, kicking his trotters as he got used to the odd sensation.
“Look boss, I’m flying!” He squealed happily, “no longer am I forced to suffer the consequences of being easily stepped on.”
John gave his companion a concerned look.
“I hope you’re ready,” Joanna said, an air of concern in her tone.
Then she launched the pig, who soared through the sky, enveloped in a bluish hue, as if fired from a catapult.
Truffle’s short flight captivated the twin brothers who both stopped their galivanting to stare.
“Remember that time I asked your wife if she’d set me up with her sister,” Baz began, “and she said: ‘when pigs fly,”
“Yeah?” James replied, shaking his leg like a defecating dog in a vain attempt to remove the koala that clung to it.
“Well you’d better call her, bro, because I know I haven’t been spiked this time.”
Truffle soared through the air, controlled by Joanna, making a beeline for the Hob-Koala whose back was turned as it danced atop its surfboard, raining fragmented carnage on the ground below.
The pig impacted the hovering bear who barely seemed to notice as the small quadruped landed on its head and began biting at its fur.
“What was the plan?” Joanna said, folding her arms, “have the pig do a Ratatouille or something? Because that only works in cartoons.”
“Not quite,” John said, taking out his pistol and leaning heavily on his locate weakness skill. “I just need one good shot… Truffle, keep him still!”
“I’m trying boss,” the pig replied, “but I can’t find the right hair to control him.”
When did he see that movie?
That was all it took.
Despite his small size, Truffle had quite the loud voice and the Hob-Koala noticed. It dropped the grenade it had been preparing to throw and began clawing at its own head, trying to dislodge the teacup pig who rode it like a rodeo bull.
All John needed, was a small distraction.
Aiming a single gun up at the Hob-Koala’s surfboard, John fired.
The bullet erupted from the chamber and down the rifled barrel in what seemed like slow motion as it split the air like a wave and embedded itself onto the surfboard’s right engine.
Skill Unlocked:
Marksmanship
“Ok, bring him down, quickly.” John commanded.
“I can’t’, I have to touch him first.” Joanna protested.
“What!?”, he said, turning towards her, “but you already did.”
“My card has a cooldown, and conditions.”
“Shit, Truffle!” John yelled, “Jump!”
Without question, the pig leapt from the crown of the boss monster and for a second he seemed to be floating gracefully in mid-air, legs pumping like a cartoon character.
With eyes wide, John dashed back into the fray, arms outstretched in an attempt to catch his trusted companion.
As Truffle fell, John remembered the day Anne had brought him home. He wasn’t much smaller back then, but he was much louder. The teacup pig had screamed the house down, causing quite the uproar at the next tenants association meeting.
Mr Parkinson had stirred up a riot among the other tenants renting in their apartment complex. Not that it mattered now, the old codger had been killed when the building collapsed.
If John was a better person he might have spared a thought for the dearly departed, but in truth, he’d always hated his downstairs neighbour.
Coming out of his flashing memories, the world sped back up as Truffle fell helplessly towards the ground. John dived, catching him with relative ease, and luck, and rolled into a sitting position in the middle of the bloody, open space.
Skill Unlocked:
Basic Athleticism
Two skills back-to-back, he grinned, must be my lucky day.
He nodded his approval, placing the mini pig onto the ground and re-summoning his weapons.
There was a loud clanking sound coming from the air, and, looking up he located the source of the noise and smiled to himself.
The Hob-Koala stumbled, off balance, as its surfboard rocked and turned in circles. One engine was on fire and emitting a dark black smoke which could only spell trouble.
With a high-pitched whine, the machine plummeted to the ground in a large explosion which sent shrapnel flying all around the open space.
Koalas screamed and squeaked like dog toys as they were sliced by the small pieces of metal which embedded themselves into everything in the vicinity, John included.
He threw his body over Truffle and hunkered close to the ground, attempting to avoid the worst of it. He succeeded, but still gained a few nasty cuts and scratches as the hot metal sliced his right arm, shoulder and back like so much salami.
Once it was over, he stood up with pained gasps as rivulets of blood cascaded down his arm in a crimson stream. His new duster was torn to shreds, and though it would repair itself, the cut-up shirt underneath it would not.
“I’m glad that’s over,” Truffle said as the two gazed at the blazing inferno that covered the wreckage.
John wasn’t sure that it was though, as he hadn’t received a quest update.
“HeeheehEEEEEE.”
The voice came in a ragged, broken noise from the inside the flames themselves. As the two looked towards it, the Hob-Koala limped towards them.
It’s fur and skin had been peeled back, leaving only clumps of charred flesh and hanging organs to cover its skeleton.
Inside, it was made of metal. Fangy teeth hung at odd angles from its mouth, one of its eyeballs had popped leaving a terrifying red dot in its place, housed in metal caging.
The sound of clanking and whining machinery rang out across the battlefield as it limped towards them.
“I hate this damned game,” John muttered as he shot the legs out from under the boss monster.
That barely deterred it though as its robotic eyes locked onto them and it began a slow crawl.
Pulling a grenade from God knows where, it slipped it into its mouth and pressed a large red button on the side. The bomb began flashing red and, wide eyed, the Hob-Koala started crawling towards them with a surprising amount of speed, just like one of those zombies in Call Of Duty.
“It’s a suicide bomber!” Baz shouted from behind them.
“You can’t call them that anymore, little bro,” James said, “the politically correct term is-”
Thankfully, he didn’t get the chance to complete that sentence.
Relying heavily on his locate weakness skill to guide his aim, John raised his revolver and fired a single bullet straight into the Hob-Koala’s fangy maw.
BOOM.
It hit the grenade, which exploded with a hiss and a bang, spraying phosphorus everywhere.
Seeing this, and possibly with aid from his new basic athleticism skill, John scooped up Truffle and dived back behind the palm tree where he had left Joanna.
James screamed bloody murder as the phosphorus sprayed his chest, setting him alight. John watched on helplessly as the man’s skin caught fire and began melting before his eyes.
