“Oh my god… that was… wow.” Andrea exclaimed while they walked down the sidewalk.

  Pepper chuckled. “Huh, crazy to think that people love your voice and what you have to sing.”

  She leaned in and squeezed around his arm. “Thank you Pepper. I would have never done that if you hadn’t pushed me.”

  “I know. And look at what happened, you have that one lady who wants to be your vocal coach, right?”

  Andrea smiled and lifted her head up slightly. “Yes, Rebecca. She was so sweet and kind too. She practically had a whole exercise routine written up and ready for me to start using. I told her I’d call her once I got back home and we could start testing it all out and see if we’re a good fit for each other.” She paused and then looked around. “Where are we going?”

  Her question was soon answered when they came to a stop in front of the red foot cart. “Hey! Well look at this guy…” Pete then leaned out the window and shifted a toothpick around in his mouth. “So… slick was finally able to find himself a girl. Quick, blink twice if you’re being held against your will.” Pete smiled and then gave Pepper a wink.

  Andrea stopped and Pepper could feel her hesitancy. He gave her a gentle rub with his hand across her back. “Andrea this is Pete, he’s got the best gyro’s in all of Atlanta. Pete, this is my girlfriend Andrea. She’s visiting from bac home.”

  “Sure, sure. I remember.” Pete shifted his attention directly to Andrea. “You should have heard this guy, came into my shop, wouldn’t stop running his mouth about how much of an angel is girlfriend is. The most beautiful woman on the planet and he didn’t deserve her. Dear god, it was so bad I thought I was gonna have to kick him out of the joint, he was making all us other lowly humans feel bad for not snagging such an amazing woman.”

  Andrea pushed the inside of her cheek with her tongue and she rolled her eyes. “I’m not buying it.” She finished with a smile though and sighed.

  Pete turned back to Pepper and lifted up his hands. “Sorry slick, I tried.”

  “What’s new with you Pete?”

  “Oh, same old same old. My closest friend is back pain and sleepless nights. Momma back home has more to-do items on the list that she is going to work in me into an early grave. I swear, that woman just doesn’t know when to stop.” Pete shifted his hands around and was gazing off into the distance. “Like… hey, I work for a living too you know, and would love to have a moment of peace and relaxation every ounce and a while too you know.”

  He pulled himself out of the re-enactment and then looked back at the two standing before him. “And then there is Jez.” He turned and yelled back in the cart. “Jez! We got the kid back, get at the fryer and get some fries going. They want them hot and fresh fries, not the crap you’ve had sitting off to the side.”

  All three were taken by surprise as a soft British voice called out from behind them. “Pete… I’m not even in the trailer mate. I told you I was taking a call and stepped out five minutes ago.”

  “Oh sure, sure… leave me to do all the work around here.” Pete narrowed in on Pepper and Andrea. “You see what I work with? Kid, you see this… this is your future, you gotta work with guys like this that just bust your balls all day long.” Pete finished with a wagging finger directed towards Jez.

  “Well look at you, telling stories again. You keep them fantasies up Pete, and you’ll be a best seller in no time.” Jez then leaned in and muttered. “Nothing but suspense and drama with this one. It’s all rubbish.” He then started to walk off towards the cart’s back entrance. He turned his head and called back. “Two of the usual’s then, aye?”

  “Yeah, that’d be fine. Thanks Jez.”

  “Right, be up in a few, mate.”

  Pepper turned back to face Pete and saw him motioning down at Amprage. “The pooch want a biscuit?”

  Pepper tilted his head. “He’s made of metal Pete?”

  “So?”

  He doesn’t have a stomach… “You know what…” Pepper looked down at Amprage who was just wagging his metal tail. “Sure, he can have a-”

  Pepper didn’t even have a chance to finish his statement when he saw the small dog treat float at a downward angle. His familiar jumped up and chomped down with a firm metal clunk. The chomping sound had Pepper laughing at how it sounded more like a metal alligator than a dog. By the time the metal dog was done there only remained a hundred finally crumbled pieces of biscuit scattered directly beneath him.

  “Was that good?” Pepper asked.

  “Delicious! Can I have another?” Amprage replied while tilting his head.

  Pepper again, didn’t even have a chance to answer and a new dog biscuit was lofted down, only to achieve the same result. He shrugged his shoulders, “So, what does it even taste like Amp?”

  “Dried cardboard and tart, bitter dehydrated cornbread.”

  Pepper was about to ask how exactly his familiar knew that, but he decided to not. The food arrived and they sat down at the same picnic table set out. To their surprise, Pete and Jez came and joined them and the two pestered Andrea with questions about her life and how they had met. A new set of customers, arrived and the two began to get up and make their way over.

  “You ready for your competition thing?” Pete asked.

  “Almost, a little bit more training and we’ll be locked in and ready to go.”

  Pete lifted a fist in front of his face, then pointed his way. “There you go kid, give them that old one-two combo, you feel me?”

  Pepper chuckled. “I feel you, Pete.”

  Pepper ordered up a Buzz Podz and the group climbed in and began to make their way home. As the vehicle arrived the sky darkened and rain drops came crashing down as if it was a direct assault from above. Lightning and thunder roared overhead and it reminded them of storms they would have back home.

  They pulled in to the neighborhood and noticed the area was filled with darkness. They each looked on both sides of the street and Andrea finally said what they both were thinking. “Looks like a power outage.”

  Pepper shook his head in agreement, and they soon arrived in front of the house. They ran to the front door and confirmed their suspicion. They flicked the light switch up and down a few times before they both shrugged and accepted the situation. Without warning, a beam of light appeared in the center of the living room.

  The light angled up and exposed Wilson’s face. They both jumped out of their skin and Amprage bolted ahead for a half second before he realized who it was. His small framed roommate finally spoke in his monotone voice. “Powers out.”

  Andrea sighed, “Really? Is that what this is? Would have never guessed Wilson.”

  Pepper knocked Amprage’s leg with his foot. “How did you not pick him up on your sonar ability, scanner, thing?”

  “I was scared.” Amprage said in an embarrassed tone.

  “Really!? You’re made of metal! A practical walking tank, and… more importantly I’d like to emphasize… you can’t feel pain!”

  “But… I was still scared.”

  Pepper shook his head. “Any idea where Marcus is?” Wilson didn’t answer him as the bright beams of light flowed across the front windows. He turned around and noticed Marcus’s truck pulling into the driveway. He turned and headed to the front door, opening it up to ease their entrance.

  Stolen from Royal Road, this story should be reported if encountered on Amazon.

  “My man! Thanks P-Dub.” Marcus said as he entered.

  Pepper left the door wide open for an extra second, thinking there would be an additional person trotting up to the door. But to his surprise, it was just him. He closed the door and they each huddled around Wilson with his small flashlight.

  “Marcus this is my girlfriend Andrea, Andrea this is Marcus.” The two greeted each other and they each took a seat on the couches.

  “I can’t even remember the last time we had a power outage?” Andrea said.

  Marcus scratched his head. “I mean, we get them all the time in my area of Arizona. But come to think of it, it has been a while since the last time I had to wait one out.”

  “We should tell scary stories.” Wilson chimed in.

  “Yes!” Andrea called out while tapping Pepper’s leg. A split second later and the sky crackled, the thunder so great that it shook the house. The group shuttered and a nervous chuckle came over them.

  Marcus was about to speak but was cut off by a chaotic banging on the front door. The group collectively jumped out of their skin and they each snapped their heads towards the door. Marcus swung his head back around to Pepper. “What do we do?”

  Pepper didn’t know what to say. He scanned the room and realized that everyone, included Amprage and Rattler were all looking at him with fear in their eyes. He started to shrug but the banging at the door repeated. The loud thuds so rapid that they made Pepper feel there was panic infused within them.

  “Guys! Guys it’s Elowen! Pepper? Wilson?”

  Pepper immediately recognized his friends voice. He sprang up from his seat and started to jog towards the door. His hand reached for the doorknob but then the door opened up and Elowen took a step inside. They froze in front of each other for a half second and a new loud earth shattering thunder clap roared overhead.

  Elowen reached up and grabbed onto Peppers shoulder “Get into your safety bunker!”

  She hardly got her statement out when Pepper felt a new rumble under his feet. “That wasn’t thunder!” He exclaimed while his eyes bulged wide. He turned and looked out the back window and saw a flash of orange and red flame erupt in the distance, with another small rumbling vibration under his feet. “We’re under attack!”

  Elowen began to tug on his arm. “We have to get into your shelter, now!” Elowen was frantic, she looked down at her holodex and saw a notification. “Oh my god, they’re in the neighborhood!”

  Without delay the group surged for the backyard. Andrea yelled out, “Where are we going?”

  “Safety shelter in the backyard!” Pepper yelled.

  Marcus was crying out in between, “Who is they? And Why are they here?”

  Andrea swung the back door open but that was when the backyard erupted with a fireball. The shockwave from the blast shattered the back windows and knocked them all back into a pile. It took the group a few seconds to fight through the ringing ears and blurred vision.

  Pepper shook his head and reached for Andrea. “Andrea! Babe!”

  “I’m okay.” She yelled back while fighting her way up.

  “Marcus, Wilson?”

  “We’re okay also!” Wilson called out.

  “Elowen?”

  “Tank and I are okay.”

  “Alright, let’s move!”

  Pepper bolted out the door and immediately turned to his left. He knelt down and started feeling for the shelter door, but nothing. His hands swiped across the mixture of dirt, grass, and weeds, but still there was no door where Elowen’s dad said there was.

  Another orange fireball flared behind them and Pepper saw a shovel propped up against the side of the house. He jumped up onto his feet, grabbed hold of the shovel and plunged it into the earth. He kept working his way to the right. Soft… soft… soft… *clunk. His forth stab into the ground made impact and Pepper went about clearly off the door.

  “Why aren’t the canons firing?” Marcus yelled.

  “I don’t know!” Elowen screamed back.

  Pepper was just able to get the door unearthed enough for him to see and grab hold of the handle. He lifted the solid metal door up and saw a step ladder leading down inside the shelter. “Come on! Let’s go!”

  There wasn’t a time for an answer, Elowen’s guard dog Tank began to viciously bark. The hair on the back of Pepper’s neck stood on end. He snapped around to see that Tank was standing in the center of the backyard. His body lowered down to the ground in a tense and ready position.

  “Get in the shelter!” Pepper commanded in a scream.

  Wilson started to lower his body down into the shelter with the rest of the group huddled around the door. Their ears blared with the girls scream as both Andrea and Elowen cried out in unison. Pepper’s eyes narrowed when he saw the faint glow of two beady red eyes. There was a chattering of teeth and his spine had a cold shiver.

  “Move, move, move!” He yelled. The group started to piled down the ladder as quickly as they could, but Pepper knew there wasn’t enough time. “Come on Amprage!” He sprinted forward, with the only weapon available, his shovel. Amprage was barking in a rage, matching Tank’s ferocity.

  “Come on boys, let’s do this!” Pepper surged past Tank and then felt the guard dog match he and Amprage’s pace. Pepper was surprised when Amprage’s chest piece shot a beam of light out. It provided the illumination they needed to see the threat.

  The creature before them leapt forward and was now fully exposed by the light. It’s entire body was that a pitch black. It’s head was shaped similarly to a hammerhead shark. A wide mouth with sharp black razer teeth and a charcoal grey tongue that slithered down and out. The bulbus head rose up to a thin angle that looked like a shark’s fin, but that was when Pepper noticed there were additional fins that repeated in a pattern down the creatures spine.

  The creature clawed into the earth and sprang off to Pepper’s right side. It was aiming for Amprage and Pepper felt that his familiars light was the threat the creature was most concerned with. It’s claws dug into the earth with small clumps of dirt being ripped up and flung behind its body as it went. It was in that half second that Pepper was able to see the monsters body was covered in scales. He couldn’t help but now see the comparison to a Komodo Dragon.

  “Amprage, jump to your left!” Pepper lifted the shovel high above his head. He was about to swing at a downward arc when a blazing beam of light streaked straight through the creatures skull and finally came to a stop when it slammed into a nearby tree.

  The creature fell lifelessly down only three feet away from them. Pepper spun around as quick as he could. Amprage’s light quickly proceeding to reveal four soldiers now pouring into the backyard.

  “Where’s Elowen?” One of the soldiers yelled out.

  Pepper was about to answer, but he was cutoff by a different soldier. “Contact right!” The man barely finished his warning when he started to cry out in a blood curdling scream. The soldiers immediately spun to the right and started to fire their weapons.

  “Amprage, Tank, get to the safety shelter, protect the group!”

  “Pepper, where are you-“

  “But Pepper, I am to stay with-”

  “Do it Amprage!”

  Pepper didn’t wait another second. He took off into a sprint and crashed into the workshop door. His finger punched away on the security code as quickly as possible. He flung the door open and ran inside, but quickly found himself tripping up on a random piece of equipment and crashing onto the floor.

  Damn it! He mentally scolded himself while rushing back up on his feet. Pepper reached up and activated his holodex. The small flashlight option barely made an impact but was at least enough for him to still feel his way over to the work bench. His hand padded against the countertop until he finally felt his 7 Seas Explorer.

  He slammed the control interface around his wrists and pressed the button to start the initiation sequence. The energy core of Mala glowed to life and the entire workshop was bathed in purple light. “Let’s do this!” He yelled and a slight echo rang out within the metal building.

  Pepper didn’t hesitate as he sent Mala charging forward and burst out of the workshop door. He followed behind and easily stepped through the bent fragments of the metal roll up door. His feet skidded to a stop when he saw the four soldiers were all lying in the water-soaked earth.

  He didn’t have time to see who was alive, but the flowing river of red draining away in the water beneath them left a knot in his stomach. The dog’s bark brought Pepper back into the moment, he snapped his head to the right and saw they were facing back towards the tree line where the first monster had arrived from.

  Pepper ran over and quickly met his familiar. The two stood over the shelters’ metal access door and in his heart and mind, he knew he was going to defend the small two by two foot door with his life. Mala had now made its way over and stood in the center of the yard. The golem was heavy enough that its feet sank a few inches into the water logged ground.

  “Pepper…. They’re here!” Amprage warned him.

  His eyes focused on the tree line and that was when he saw them. The darkened woods was now filled with pairs of eyes. The chattering of teeth sounded like a glass jar of metal nails that was being shaken uncontrollably.

  “I’m not hiding anymore! Let’s do this Mala!” Pepper yelled out. He commanded Mala forward, and his golem immediately responded. The monsters surged ahead, but that was exactly what Pepper had hoped for.

  Pepper waited until the wave of monsters came within the area of effect. He then activated his force blast rune and watched as the creatures were repelled backwards. His power core did not have enough power to activate the next rune he wanted to use, and had to meet the two remaining monsters with his mele skills.

  The first approached off the right side, while the second flanked from the left. The two launched themselves upwards at the golem as if they had planned out their attack. Pepper instantly analyzed the attackers trajectory and timing. He only had a fraction of a second, but instinctively knew the right side attacker would arrive first.

  He commanded Mala to lift its right leg up, in unison he began to rotate his golem around clockwise. The both attacks missed but presented Pepper with an opportunity. He reached Mala’s arms out and grabbed hold of the second monsters tail while continuing to spin around. His newly acquired weapon was whipped around in the air, and brought down in a slamming motion on top of the first monster.

  His energy levels had now reached the level he needed and Pepper activated his elemental expansion rune. A quick flick of his thumb and he choose the option for the metal to form into a spear. He felt his jaw clench tight as Mala’s hands brought the spear up. The weapon’s head was driven down and pierced through both creatures. Their bodies that had a second earlier been scrambling to regain their composure, now lay lifeless on the ground.