Chapter Four: Alive

I laid on the Bolt, riding towards the city known as Arana. That is where I was supposed to find Alex and Izzy. I... I didn't want them to know I was alive. I had decided that while I rode. They were safer believing otherwise, and it would only confuse them. I just needed to know they were safe. I just needed to see Izzy again... Now, I wish I hadn't.

I entered the city, leaving Hell's Bolt on the outskirts. I climbed up the walls of a building and began to search through the Area. I found an alleyway, and heard shouts and fighting. I crept up to the edge of the roof, and my heart stopped. Alex was backed up against a wall, bow in hand. Izzy was slumped, pale and still in a corner. A crowd of thugs with Equinox tattoos had them surrounded. Alex was cut and bruised, and as I watched, was forced to use her last two arrows as daggers.

I was pissed. Alex would be fine, but no one- and I mean no one- touches Izzy and gets away with it. I jumped down, nearly getting stabbed in the back by a furious Alex. I caught the arrow, broke it in half, and shoved each half into one of the eyes of her attacker. Without saying a word, I picked him up, slammed his head face-first into the wall (shoving the arrow pieces through the back of his head) and let him slump to the ground. I turned to the next thug, whistled, then slammed my elbow into his temple and stomped on his head with my robotic foot once he fell. The next one came at me with a knife. I cowered and shielded myself, obviously pretending to be scared. I gave it up, saying "You think that's a scary knife?" I chuckled, and opened the compartment in my arm, taking out on of my extendable swords, and flicking it out. "This is a knife! Well... sword... Same difference. It's sharp , it's pointy, and if I go like this-" I shoved it through his chest, and his heart, "It still kills you!"

 I flung the thug at a fleeing comrade, then turned my attention to the remaining five thugs. "You know, its not nice to hit girls." I said, slowly walking towards them while closing my sword. Hell's Bolt pulled up beside me, responding to my whistle from earlier. I picked it up, one hand on the handle bars and the other on the rear frame, and activated the chainsaw. 

"You, however, will not be so lucky." I swung the bolt, causing it to slice (saw, whatever) through two of the men. "Three left," I growled. The three thugs ran. I threw the Bolt in a horizontal spiral, and it cut through all three of them, landed on its wheels, and puttered back to my side. I turned around and Alex was just standing there, awe struck.

"Wh-who are you?"

"C'mon Alex, you haven’t forgotten me already, have you?" I asked in a casual tone.

"But w-we... we went back... you... you were..."

I ignored her when I saw Izzy. I rushed over and checked her pulse. At first I felt nothing, then, as if responding to my touch, it was there. Faint as all hell, but there. "Alex," I said, now very stern. "We'll swap stories later. Right now, we need to get Izzy to a hospital."

"O-ok..." Alex studdered, still in shock that a dead man had saved her life by kicking some a*s and throwing motorcycles at people.

"Izzy..." I whispered softly, as if I didn’t want to wake her up. "I'm here.... I'm alive...."