Knightfall's Nominations

“Move!” yelled the thin man, shoving me past. The next thing I knew, I'd turned and saw him at the centre of a ring of old folks, their eyes all fixed hungrily on his jigsaw.

“Come on!” I cried back. “Push on!”

One of the old people lashed out at him with a walking stick; he ducked it, put the jigsaw inside his coat and drew out what appeared to be a rapier from his pocket.

“Go on without me!” he replied, parrying a second blow and slashing at an old woman's snatching hand. “I'll keep them busy!”

“But your niece—!”

“She has parents – they can buy her presents.” His blade was a blur, flickering from point to point around the circle as the encircling elderly attacked. “Go!”

“But—”

“Go!”

He turned to look at me, and it was that momentary lapse of concentration that was his undoing. Someone released a Jack-in-the-box from a shelf into his hand; the Jack's pointy hat jabbed his thumb and he dropped his sword with a yelp. A moment later, he was just a face between the clawing hands of the old people, screaming wildly; a few seconds later, he had vanished entirely in a swell of cardigans and wrinkled skin.

“No!”

I lashed out at the nearest old person with my pipe, but I was shoved aside; I was no match for five of them at once. There was nothing more I could do, and if I stood still I would be crushed – so I left the thin man and ran for the Lego.

As I got close, I noticed a man on his hands and knees, searching for something on the bottom shelf; I stepped onto his back and jumped off without breaking stride, crashing into the top of the shelves where the Lego was and snatching up the boxes mid-leap. Toys, pieces of wood and one teenager with an armful of Lego rained down on the unfortunates on the other side of the shelf; thankfully, I landed on a fat man's belly, bounced off and kept running. One woman watched me open-mouthed, and shouted in a high, keening wail:

“He's got Lego!”

This was a dream; this was not the order of events that were supposed to take place. He brought the marker, he would receive the reward, and they would go home; that’s it, done! This did not fit into his life, this was not his path. He knew Ronnie was inside, and he knew that he probably would have no idea what had taken place right outside his office.

Through a flickering hallway he followed Kecleon, who had adopted a speed Dorian had never witnessed. The four of them burst through the door to his uncle’s office a moment later, almost tripping over each other in an effort to get through.

Dorian’s heart stopped.

Smoke billowed across the ceiling while lines of blood crisscrossed the floor in small rivers. The streams of crimson emanated from the body of his uncle, who was lying in the floor, head cocked to the side unnaturally. As Dorian fell to his knees, he saw that the word ‘thief’ had been carved into his uncle’s chest, the letters jagged and deep.

Kecleon started shrieking.

I looked around the corner again to see another striped firedog, similar to Spencer’s, but this one had a horrifyingly vicious expression right now, causing Typhlosion and Arcanine to recoil slightly, seemingly losing some of the tension in their muscles.

It took me a second, but then I recognized what it had done. Her Arcanine must have had the Intimidate ability, which cut the strength of any attacker it encountered.

“Crap, gonna Intimidate us, is that it?” Spencer mumbled through gritted teeth. “Time for ranged moves, then…Typhlosion, Arcanine! Flamethrower!”

Simultaneous blasts of fire flew down the hill, striking the other Arcanine right in its front. It snarled as it took the assaults, noticeably affected by them despite its natural resistance to fire. But then suddenly flames were scattered everywhere as a tan horse jumped in the way of the blaze, glowing with a fiery sheen—it didn’t seem to even notice that it was being hit. In fact, the flames of its mane and tail only intensified.

“Did that just make it stronger?! Oh crap, it must have Flash Fire. Typhlosion, stop the Flamethrower and use Dig! Arcanine—” And then Spencer’s face lit up like he had just made the best realization of his life. “Dude, I’ve got it! Typhlosion, quick—use Flamethrower on Arcanine!!”

"He's…" the Gallade said while trying to stand up, "… He's down!"
"YES! HAHAHA!" Pikablu gave off a prideful and loud laughter, "We did it! We won! Victory is ours!"
"Way to go, Zerobi!" Lucario yelled, the happy feelings of having won turning his joy into actually feelings of being a professional coach. He ignored his pain and smiled brightly at his partner, who still had her back turned to him. Her black and unusually red back…

"… Blood…!?" Lucario exclaimed, angry at himself for not having noticed it sooner. Zerobi stood where she landed after the final attack, her body covered with tiny speckles of blood from the Garchomp. She wasn't saying a word, but was instead shaking profusely.

Lucario got worried and tried to run to her, noticing just how badly damaged his right leg had become from fighting the Garchomp. Whether it had been the constant fiery attacks or the fact that his roundhouse kicks might as well have been directed at a brick wall he did not know. All he knew was that if someone was to happen to Zerobi now, he would…

"… Zerobi…?" Lucario slowly asked, patting the shoulder of his partner.

In an instant she spun around with a claw outstretched, cutting through his throat with a quick slash. Blood splayed across the field as time seemed to stop all around them. Pain filled Lucario's head while a gargling sound escaped his throat as he tried to draw breath, but the passageway to his lungs had been completely severed and he began choking instead. He felt his warm blood running the fur on his neck, holding up a hand in a futile attempt of stopping the flow. Falling to his knees from the lack of air, all he could do was stare deeply into the eyes of the smiling Weavile in front of him.

Inside of them, he noticed that there was something unusual.

Nothing.

“I suppose there's nothing we can do, ” Bond said at last, leaning back into his seat. “Never mind. There can't be much further until we arrive.”

Well, technically you're right, Jeeves, but I like to know where I'm going. The last time I found myself on a train at random, I ended up in City 17. And I ain't no Free Man, so you can guess how that went. Pigzie Doodle sighed. I do realise you can't hear me, but I also find it hard to stop talking. Centuries of travelling alone does that to a person. Anyway, did I ever tell you about Mombasa? There was me, this Gastly and a Misdreavus called Sandy, and we thought it'd be a good idea to possess a couple of elephants…

As the train rattled on, his story continued, growing steadily more unbelievable and sadly no less unhearable.

This is somewhat personal, but he's honestly helped me with so much in my story. I wouldn't be were I was today without his efforts to fix my grammar in my story.