Apocalypse: Fairy System by Macronomicon (fox in socks read aloud txt) 📕

Svek had to take control of the situation, and that boded poorly for Jeb.

“NNG!” Jeb strangled back a scream as the knife sank into his stomach, so much more painful because there was nothing he could do about it.

“He’s lying,” Svek said, turning away from Jeb to address the rest of his crew. “The cripple doesn’t know the first thing about Myst. He’s a dumbass who lost his leg in the Normal Tutorial, nothing more. If I see you sitting on your ass with your legs crossed and eyes closed, I’ll rip out your spine.”

There was one more thing Jeb had to do. It came to him instinctively. He’d acted in good faith. He had to give them an opportunity to fulfill their side of the bargain.

He forced air through his throat, trying not to tense the blazing muscles in his stomach as he spoke.

“My…payment?” Jeb gasped.

“Here’s your payment,” Svek said, turning back to Jeb and twisting the knife, forcing a howl out of Jeb’s lungs. Through the tears in his eyes, Jeb spotted Smartass perched on his right arm, loosening the bonds on his arms until a simple flick would open them.

“Didn’t you say he was in the Impossible Tutorial?” one of the dumber pirates near the back asked.

“Who said that!?” Svek demanded, whirling to scan the cowed mass.

Now.

Jeb gave the mental marching orders to the butterflies as he breathed in, siphoning Myst out of his Core and creating a slender thread of telekinetic energy.

He flicked the bonds open on his wrists in a fraction of a second, while Smartass leapt between his ankles, tossing the latches open.

“What the Roil is that?” a pirate said, pointing straight up at the veritable wall of butterflies descending onto the camp.

Jeb landed on his knees, desperately muscling down the urge to scream as the blade wobbled in his guts. He wasn’t out of the woods yet. He turned away and began crawling as fast and quiet as he could, the noise masked by the increasingly alarmed cries of the outlaws.

“Attack!” Svek screamed. The pirate lord was much faster on the uptake than his men, and he whirled back around, swinging his thick black nails through the air where Jeb’s jaw had rested, taking a chunk out of the wood itself.

Jeb directed the butterflies to sink down around him faster as Svek stepped around the torture restraints.

Maybe if he’d gone through them, he would have arrived in time. The extra second it took to move the giant’s bulk gave Jeb enough time to bring the butterflies down around himself like a protective barrier.

All through the camp, the sound of stunned pirates getting chunks torn out of them grew to a fever pitch.

Mostly the screaming.

Jeb was hoping the pirate captain would try to dive through the wall of butterflies and put himself out of Jeb’s misery, or wait until the rest of them collapsed in on the center of the formation and tore the guy to shreds.

Predictably, the pirate chose the least polite option. The giant dug the front of his foot into the dirt and flung it up in front of him, sending a violent scatter of dirt and small rocks through the wall of butterflies, popping the majority of Jeb’s butterfly defenses in a fraction of a second.

I hate fighting smart people, Jeb thought, scrambling backward.

Svek grabbed a nearby belt lying on the ground and snapped it straight, and for some reason, it stayed straight. With a couple flicks of his wrist, the melas had used the belt to pop the last remaining butterflies between the two of them.

Shit! Jeb thought, bunching his foot under himself and shoving away, trying to put more void butterflies between the two of them. If the melas got his hands on Jeb, it was game over.

It wasn’t some Hollywood movie or kids’ cartoon. When someone with overwhelmingly superior strength gets their hands on you, they don’t toss you; they pull you in and snap your neck.

Jeb was halfway through his awkward frog-leap when Svek flickered forward, meaty hand seizing Jeb’s leg—peg leg! Jeb shoved himself farther away, the pegleg detaching in the pirate’s hands.

The cloud of butterflies was only four feet off the ground now, so the melas crawled after him, fiery murder in his eyes.

It took less than a second for the pirate king to overtake Jeb, and Jeb felt the huge hands grab his real leg at the same moment Jeb’s questing hands touched down on something cold and heavy. Jeb’s eyes flicked up and he spotted Smartass standing above his revolver, giving him a thumbs-up.

Jeb’s hand seized around the grip just as Svek gave a bellow, hauling Jeb’s leg nearly out of his socket.

Jeb slid back toward the pirate violently, bringing his gun to bear as the pirate’s hands went for his neck.

For a crystalline instant, Jeb and the pirate stared each other down.

Then Jeb pulled the trigger.

…

Gun no go boom?

Jeb’s eyes widened as he spotted the pirate’s finger lodged between the hammer and the frame, a victorious smile on the man’s face.

Jeb felt the man’s scratchy fingers wrap around his neck, and he knew he could break Jeb’s neck one-handed. One second left.

In a last, desperate bid, Jeb reached out with his meager Myst, smacking the bullet’s primer inside the barrel with everything he had.

BOOM!

The fingers around Jeb’s neck went slack as a pancaked piece of lead dropped off Svek’s forehead onto Jeb’s neck, scorching his skin as it rolled off.

Svek gave him a confused, punch-drunk look, a bit of blood pooling in his eyes where the blood vessels had burst.

Then black butterflies ate his face.

Jeb rolled out of the way as the corpse toppled over, squirting blood out of a