5.17

The hall was absolutely jam packed with people. People were crying and people were laughing, and everyone looked nervous.

“Uncle Jazz,” cried the kid that Hunter had been carrying. Hunter scanned the room and saw an adult rabbit had started walking toward them.

“Heya kiddo. Where’s your mum?” the rabbit put out his arms and the kid launched herself from Hunter’s arms into the arms of her uncle.

“She’s not very well. I don’t think she’ll be coming home.” The kid said it in such a plain way that her uncle was taken by surprise.

“I’m sorry,” said Hunter.

“There’s nothing to apologise for. It wasn’t your fault. Thank you for rescuing my niece.” The rabbit shook hands with Hunter and then walked back to the group he had been standing with.

“I guess all we can do is sit and wait,” said Silas. He looked a little uneasy, as did everyone else.

“Hey, should we check in on Stick?” suggested Jimena.

“Hey Stick, where are you? You okay?” Hunter spoke into his wrist communicator and nervously waited for a response.

“Yeah. I think so.” Stick’s voice finally came through on the communicator. Her voice was shaky and had no trace of the usual confidence Stick carried about her.

“What do you mean? What’s going on? Where are you?” Hunter sounded almost angry.

“Don’t stress.”

“Well we are. Where are you? We’re coming to get you.” Hunter clenched a fist.

“No. Your mission is to help as many people as you can through this. Don’t worry about me.”

“Well we are. You need to tell us where you are. People are safe in the hall now, and there are plenty of heroes here to keep them safe. Where are you?”

“Hunter. You n-”

“No, you listen to me Jadell. We are coming to get you. You can’t seriously think we’d leave you. We’re a team. Now tell us where you are.” There was a sigh of frustrated defeat.

“I’ve just sent you my location to your communicator. Follow that and you’ll find me. But you need to be careful, there’s many more of those trash bastards out here. And if you died, I’d be so pissed.”

“All right, we need to go,” urged Hunter. His two friends nodded, and they ran back out of the hall.

***

Stick had been in the middle of the unfolding chaos. She had been fighting off a horde of trash golems single-handedly but had finally been overwhelmed. Her magically enhanced abilities couldn’t keep up with the constant onslaught and she had been caught off-guard by a golem and the stick had been knocked away from her.

To make it worse, a building had collapsed on top of them, and Stick was unable to react fast enough. A massive chunk of cement now lay on top of her body, pinning her to the ground. Stick could feel the life being crushed out of her. She hadn’t wanted Hunter and the others to see her this way, but she couldn’t say no to Hunter. Maybe it was better this way?

Stick could hear the destruction play out not too far behind her as the Trash Queen and Gadgeteer duked it out. Stick had wanted to be the one to kill that monster herself.

A trash golem wandered over near her and Stick lay perfectly quiet, trying her best to ignore the crushing weight that was flattening her body. She wasn’t going to let a trash golem finish her off.

The trash golem stopped within a few feet of her. Stick grimaced and blood trickled from her mouth. She watched the golem out of the corner of her eye and was relieved to see it walk away. Maybe it had figured she wasn’t a threat.

Stick lay there, defeated. She had wanted to see her teens grow. They had already come so far. She was proud of them.

***

The three teens raced their way toward Stick’s location. They had taken out three trash golems already.

Each one was defeated with swift fury and in a way, they were almost keen to try and fight more.

They could see the fight between the Trash Queen and Gadgeteer. Most of the buildings around them had been destroyed and visible damage could be seen on the golden robot.

Hunter looked at his communicator and could see they weren’t that far from Stick.

A lone trash golem could be seen stumbling about and when it noticed them and rushed toward them.

Jimena made quick work of it before the others could react.

“Are we almost there?” Silas asked.

“Yeah. She should be over there. Near the crumbled building.” Hunter’s voice trailed off as his imagination ran wild.

“Stick!” Hunter called.

“Yeah. I’m here.” Hunter clocked where Stick was and rushed over to her. The other two were at his side in a flash.

“Stick. What happ…can we help? What can we do?” said Silas.

“There’s, nothing. I’m sorry to go out on you like this. But I’m done.” She gave a low chuckle and looked at each one of them

“Don’t be stupid, you’ll be fine.” There were tears in Hunter’s eyes.

“I’m so proud of the three of you. The four of you. Make sure you bring Gauzelle back. I love you guys. Don’t get killed.” Stick laid her head on the ground in a pool of blood and stopped breathing.

“This is bullshit!” cried Jimena. She punched the debris and winced at the pain in her wrist.

“There’s gotta be something else we can do to help beat the Trash Queen. Why does she keep coming back every time she gets beaten?” asked Silas. Tears streamed down his face.

Hunter looked up at the colossal fight and clenched his fists. The Trash Queen was going to be ended tonight and she was never going to come back. He didn’t know how, but he knew it was going to happen.