The Warriors: The Rune by The Warriors (beach books TXT) 📕

she wasn’t alone. Her blood turning to ice, she backed around the next corner and stood in the shadows, silently taking an arrow and sliding it into her quiver. Listening, the footsteps got louder and more hurried; just as they were around the corner, Verity moved from the shadows and was met with a stifled squeal and something hard, knocking into her and whatever it was, fell to the ground, leaving a small throbbing in Verity’s elbow.
“Do you mind, I thought you were a bloody guard!” hissed Nicki, getting up. Verity put her arrow back and rubbed her elbow. God, her dragon armour is hard!
“Come on!” Verity whispered, helping Nicki up. The two made their way to the second warehouse along.
They came to the warehouse second along and they both stopped.
“Wait.” Mumbled Verity before Nicki disappeared around the front. “Are we sure this is the right one, because it’s so dark I can’t see past the end. Are we sure there’s not another one that way?”
“I’ll go check.” Nicki jogged into the darkness and re-appeared a moment later. “It’s not the right one; it’s the next one along.”
“They all look the same, and it’s so dark!” gasped Verity, following Nicki to the next warehouse.
“Let’s hope the other’s are at the right ones.” mumbled Nicki before disappearing around the front of the warehouse.
Verity got into the warehouse through the back door and made her way to the nearest ladder that lead to the metal balcony above. One in the rafters, she could make out voices from the middle of the warehouse. She started to patrol, looking out for any sign of disturbance.

Nicki made her way to the front of the warehouse, pausing just round the corner. She could hear the mumbles of the two guards and the soft clicking of their machine rifles.
“So, how’s the wife? Did she get the job?”
“No, apparently she tasted too much of banana and they wanted someone more peachy.”
“Ah, too bad man.”
“How’s Celeste, did you pop the question?”
“Yeah, the weddings gonna be in Greece, but you know Big Dave?”
“Yeah.”
“He’s only gone and invited himself, so now we’ve got to find a place to put him up.”
“Ah, yeah, they’re a bit short of padded rooms in Greece aren’t they, you know, the recession and all.”
“Yeah, so now we’re...wait, you hear that?”
Nicki froze and coughed again.
“Yeah, someone’s here.”
Nicki, still concealed in the shadows, stepped out into the dim light of the moon.
“Hey you!” shouted one of the guards who stepped out, pointing his heavy machine rifle at Nicki.
“Hey.” Smiled Nicki, before leaping forwards, the dragon bursting from the alley way and taking the guards head off before he could cry out. Nicki immediately turned to the other guard and locked her jaws around his head before he could even think about screaming.
Her work done, Nicki changed back to her human form and ignored the two bodies, sat cross-legged in the entrance and gazed around, bored.

Fury sped to the warehouse, the back entrance empty and deserted. She took her place and stood sentry, sending a mental thought to Georgia to say that she was in position.

“No, it goes in there, look, it fits in there!”
“Yeah, but that monitor isn’t connected to that big, wiry thing that looks all important.”
“But that’s the only place it fits!”
“Daniel, that monitor is off and has no wires attached or anything.”
“Well you do it then, go on!”
Holly stooped to look at the software more closely.
“Look, it might fit in this red port.”
“Just coz the memory stick is red doesn’t mean that it’ll fit in there. And look, it’s far too big!”
Daniel tried to push the memory stick into the port.
“Daniel, that’s my hand!”
“Oh.”
“To hell with this, Imperia, get Fury in here right now!”

Fury froze when she heard Georgia’s worried voice in her head.
Fury, they can’t get it to work, get in there, now!
She turned and, within milliseconds, she was in the middle of the warehouse....
...and stood, alone in the clearing, staring around in terror.
“Shit!” she mumbled.
“Did someone just say a naughty word?”
Fury turned to face the cruel, silky voice. Lorna was stood, leaning against the metal crates, a cruel smile on her face.
“You should watch your mouth; someone might come along and cut out that dirty tongue of yours.”
“You bitch, you planned this!” yelled Fury.
“No, I just happened to notice 5 people sneaking onto my property and snooping through my stuff. Oh don’t worry; your friends are all safe. And I’ll find that telepath that’s skulking around somewhere.”
Fury turned to leave, but was greeted by several machine-gun-wielding guards.
“You really think you’re fast enough?” smiled Fury.
“No, but it’ll delay you. Just enough time to incarcerate your friends who call themselves the Warriors.” Lorna turned to leave and Fury tried to follow, but the guards stepped closer, completely surrounding her.
“Hi guys...” Fury mumbled.
Behind her, one of the guards was about to pull the trigger when Fury disappeared. The guards stood, dazzled, looking around before a black blur shot between them, taking two of the guys with it. The guards shot at the blur, but were too slow as the black blur cut through them in the other direction. The guards shot their guns in all directions, the black blur shooting in all direction creating darkness. The shooting eventually stopped and as the darkness lifted, the bodies of the guards covered the floor.
Fury came to a halt in the middle, took one of the machine rifles and raced from the warehouse.
She came to the warehouse second along and, sure that it was the right warehouse, came to a halt in front of the entrance.
“Nicki?” she spoke to the darkness.
Imperia? Imperia! She shouted the thought out, but got no reply. Where were they?
She entered the warehouse, slowly, brandishing the rifle, tenses tingling.
“Where is it? I know you have it!”
“I don’t know! I swear!”
“Liar!” the sound of bones breaking echoed around the warehouse.
Fury backed up against the metal crates and slowly crept towards the centre of the warehouse.
“Now, you will tell me where the rune is or I will cut out your tongue!”
“Bitch please! You come anywhere near my mouth and I’m gonna char-grill your face!”
Fury leapt up to the top of the crates, leaping off the walls of the narrow alley way and peered over the scene. Nicki was tied with chains to a crate and Daniel, Holly and Georgia were all held at gun point, on their knees. The Beatle stood, towering over a beaten Nicki.
“Knife!” ordered the Beatle, holding out her hand to a guard. The guard dropped a silver knife into her hand.
“Just you try!” growled Nicki.
Fury looked up, hatching a plan and her gaze came to rest on Verity, who was stood on the balcony above, aiming an arrow at The Beatle. Verity met her gaze and pointed towards the guards. Fury nodded and made her way back down the crates and doubled back, moving around the outside of the warehouse, coming up behind the guards.
“Don’t!” screamed Holly, her yell stifled with a hard thump.
“You shout out again, and they’ll shoot.”
Fury stopped for a moment.
Imperia, it’s me, I’m behind you, don’t react!
Hurry up, Fury, please!
Fury readied herself, and then dropped her gun and sped towards the guards, the world around her moving in slow motion!
She moved around the first guard, pushing his gun up into the air and reaching for his head and twisting. He was about to fall to the ground, when she moved to the second guard and, reaching for his shoulders, leapt over his head and down the other side of him, taking him with her and propelling him towards the last guard. The two guards collided and landed in a heap on the ground.
Fury turned to see the Beatle on the floor with an arrow in her eye, blood seeping down her face and onto the floor.
Another arrow shot down and lodged itself in the concrete next to Nicki, the chains that bound her clattering to the ground.
“Where were you? You were s’posed to be here!” yelled Verity, jumping with grace to the ground.
“I’m sorry, I had the wrong warehouse! And besides, I just saved everyone!” yelled Fury back at her.
“Guys! Stop it! Will you just stop arguing!” yelled Georgia, silencing the two of them. “We need to get rid of this thing!”
Fury stepped up and took the memory stick from Daniel. She tried to find the port, but after searching through the wires and trying several ports, she turned and said “Sorry guys, I misjudged the technology.”
“You better be sorry! This was all a wild goose chase!” spat Verity.
“Guys...” mumbled Nicki.
“You brought us here and made us search all the warehouses, sent us into a trap!” shouted Verity.
“Guys!”
“You come in here, expecting us to trust you!”
“GUYS, GET OUT OF THE WAY!” everyone looked at Nicki, before, “ACHOO!”
Flames burst forth, narrowly missing Verity and Fury and totally engulfing the software.
As the flames died, everyone stared at Nicki.
“Job done guys.” She grumbled, wiping her nose on her sleeve.

Part 5: The boring Aftermath

“They are beginning to really irritate me, to the point where I want them all dead. Especially my sister.” Lorna stood in the middle of the warehouse, gazing at the black, scorch mark on the floor.
“What would you have me do?” asked the Beatle, holding a bloody bandage to her eye.
“Go to plan B, send him in, it’s time we sent him into battle.”
“But, we don’t know it we can trust him yet!”
“We must. He is our only hope. Or, and while you’re at it, start recruiting. Humans will have to do. Even though they won’t be at sophisticated as your kind, they will still obey us as mindless beats!”
“As you wish.”


“So, I’m going home and I’m going to bed. I’m angry and tired and I want a bath.” announced Verity, turning to the front door of Daniel’s house.
“She’ll come round. Her insults art to grow on you eventually.” Nicki said to Fury, who sat with her face in her hands.
“You sound like you’re speaking from experience.” She mumbled.
“Oh I am!”
“So, we’re once again one step ahead of the Red-haired Maiden. I’m rather pleased with tonight’s events.” smiled Daniel, sucking on a strawberry flavoured ice lolly.
“You’re always pleased.” mumbled Nicki.
Bruno sat, his tongue hanging from his mouth, facing Daniel, his gaze fixed to his ice lolly.
“Well, now all we have to do is find a way to send them back through the gate, right?” asked Nicki.
“She’ll find a way to come back. She always will.” replied Holly, gazing meaningfully out of the window.