Lincoln Correctional Facility, Part 3

"Aw man, I told Austin I'll be back in ten minutes and it's been a half hour! I feel bad now." I pick up the pace and begin jogging back to where Austin was. "Thank God we haven't gotten any action."

A few minutes pass by, and I'm almost back to my post, so I slow back down to a walking pace. "Hey, Austin, sorry about that!" I call to my partner. "Me and the other's got tied up talking about our day and…Ausin?" I peer over at the end of the hall and see…

Austin...unconscious on the ground in a pool of blood!

"Austin? Austin!" I cry as I frantically rush over to my ally, kneeling down besides gim. "DAMNIT!" I roar as I slam my fist into the ground besides Austin. "I just HAD to take a break, didn't I?! Austin's right, I'm just some sniveling kid who shouldn't have bothered joining the Organization."

My shouts are interrupted when the alarms begin screeching overhead as they flash red, causing me to flinch and cover my ears.

"Code Black! Code Black!!" A voice blares from over the loudspeakers. "The Cursed Power weidling inmates have escaped from their jail cells! I repeat, the Cursed Power weidling inmates have escaped from their jail cells!" My eyes widen as I instantly turn to face the prisoner cells.

"Cell and Spike are missing?!" I cry. I then look around, seeing that all of the other prisoners are where they are supposed to be, just Cell and Spike are gone. "So that means the other two Cursed Powered prisoners are most likely missing too," I grumble as I stand up and attempt to hoist Austin over my shoulders. I'm pathetically unsuccessful. "What the Hell, this guy's heavy!" I complain.

Luckily, that's when a spiraling light green wormhole appears in front of me, that Grover steps out of. "Come on, let's go!" Grover says, dragging both me and the unconscious Austin into his wormhole. When the three of us step out of Grover's wormhole, we're faced with Ella and Jamie.

"Austin?!" Jamie cries upon seeing his blood-stained face. "What happened?!"

"I…I'm not sure," I awkwardly stammar as I turn away from Jamie, too ashamed to look her in the eyes. "I found Austin like this when I got back from our lunch break."

"Lay him down, I'll heal him," Ella orders as she ties her hair into a ponytail. Grover and I lay Austin flat on the ground, and Ella kneels down besides Austin and places her hands on his chest. Austin's blood seeps through Ella's fingers, as a mint green Cursed Power flows out of Ella's hands and into Austin's body. From beneath Austin's skin, I can see his bones and organs shift, like time is being rewound on them as they settle back into place. It looks grotesque.

"Is he alive?!" Jamie cries as she grabs Ella by her shoulders and frantically shakes her back and forth.

"Very much so, yes," Ella answers as she shrugs Jamie off. "You're overreacting." Jamie apologies and lets go of Ella. "Cracked skull...one, no, two shattered ribs...broken fingers, the trigger finger on each hand…" Ella mutters to herself as she heals Austin. I can't help but be impressed by the normally-timid girl's impressive display. After a few moments, Ella removes her hands from Austin's chest and flops backwards, wiping the sweat from her brow. She looks impressively drained. Austin's eyes slowly flutter open.

Typically, when you wake up after getting knocked out you ask: "What happened? Or where am I? And even on the rare occasion: who am I? A worse case scenario. Or sometimes, the person who finds you asks: "What happened?" But no one says anything of the sort. Instead, the second that Austin opens his eyes, he says: "That's why you don't go on lunch break." What a prick.

We all let out a sigh of relief, and Jamie jumps up to run over and hug Austin. "Austin... Austin...I'm so glad you're ok!" She cries. Austin pushes Jamie to the side. 

"Yeah, me too. I'm glad I'm okay. And...I'm glad you are too," Austin awkwardly replies as he turns away from Jamie and blushes. Ah…I see how it is. Jamie smiles and wipes away her tears. This is the first time I've seen either of the two seem emotionally vulnerable.

"Austin, man, I'm sorry!" I bow. "Please forgive me!" Austin glances at me for a second but didn't acknowledge my words.

"The situation is far worse than we thought," Austin says.

"Why?!"

"It seems...that the prisoners have already developed Cursed Abilities."

***

A half hour ago.

Cell is still laughing creepily, and Spike is still letting out his grunts. "Oh, is it time?" Cell asks, but to whom? "Ready, Spike?"

The dog-man let out his first words. "HELL YEAH!!"

"What the hell are you two planning?!" Austin roars as he uses his Gunsmith to create a Cursed Power shotgun, aiming it at Cell. "Take no prisoners…" he mutters to himself. Austin puts his finger on the trigger and fires, BANG! But the bullet...it seems to just phase right through Cell, as if the man was made up of the air itself! Cell laughs, and his body begins to glow a sort of minty blue-green-purple color, and then he steps right through the bars! On the other side, Spike presses his palms against the bars, and then spikes made out of what appeared to be his own flesh shoots out of his palm, shattering the bars. "Damnit!" Austin shouts as he fires his gun again, this time at Spike. But the instant that the bullet grazes Spike's body, spikes shoot out, piercing the bullet. Austin then spins around and whips his gun towards Cell, but then BAM! Cell delivers a punch straight into Austin's skull, sending Austin crumbling to the ground.

 "Now, these two fingers are quite troublesome," Cell smirks as he kneels down beside Austin, grabbing his wrist and holding it up and grabbing Austin's fingers. Crack!" Austin howls out in pain as Cell snaps his right trigger finger, before doing the same to his left. Contrary to Austin's howls of pain, Spike howls in laughter. Cell then lets go of Austin, who crumbles to the ground. The last thing Austin hears before slipping uncious is Cell say: "Now, let's go to the middle wing and meet up with others"

***

"And that's what happened," Austin says, finishing recapping his story of getting knocked unconscious.

"So it seems that the inmates have Cursed Abilities...and have mastered them?!" Ella cries.

"Yes," Austin calmly replies.

"Any idea for how long they've had these abilities?" I ask.

"Not sure" he answers.

"Well then, you know what that means!" Grover cheers as he punches his hand into his palm.

"Oh yeah," Jamie swoons.

"It's time to do some slaying!"

***

"Where the heck is the middle wing?" Jamie asks. The five of us, Ella, Grover, Jamie, Austin, and I are running through the halls of the Lincoln Correctional Facility, chasing after our escaped convicts. Austin leads us down a few more hallways, following a map of the Facility.

"We're almost there!" Austin announces.

"It's too bad Mr Lincoln didn't give us the full tour of the place, it would have been valuable information for my Wormhole," Grover sighs.

"Maybe you should have explained that to Mr Licnoln," I reply. "You should have told him that if you've seen every square inch of this place, you could teleport anywhere instantly."

Eventually, the five of us run into Mr Lincoln, who's running back and forth like a chicken without his head. "Your security here is terrible, where did you find these guards, a special ed class?!" Austin snaps, sounding annoyed.

"Clam down, my boy, what's the matter?" Mr Licnoln asks.

"Um...ah...um...you see," Ella stammers.

"Jeez, you guys can't speak normally to save your lives! Literally in this case," Grover laughs.

"You aren't much better, you're always laughing and shouting!" Jamie, well… shouted, at Grover

I sigh. Incapable children, the lot of them. "Yeah…so some inmates escaped. Apparently they didn't just develop Cursed Powers, but Cursed Abilities," I explain. 

"What is the difference?" Mr Lincoln asks.

"Cursed Power just means that they have the capability of developing a Cursed Ability, a Cursed Ability is a super power which is used via Cursed Power. Aka, these inmates are now superhuman," I explain.

"The inmates that you were looking after?" Mr Lincoln asks.

"Er...yes."

Mr Lincoln takes a deep breath in. "WHY THEY HELL DID I HIRE YOU SLAYERS, I KNEW THAT KIDS WOULD BE WORTHLESS! BUT NOOO THAT SLAYER HACHI INSISTED THAT YOU KIDS ARE STRONG!" He screams.

Mr Lincoln screams, then Ella screams, and pretty soon, I'm screaming as well. "We're all gonna die!" The three of us cry.

"Now, calm down children," Austin says. "Mr Lincoln, by any chance do you know where the Middle Wing is? For once in your miserable life, please be useful."

Mr Lincoln points a shaky finger in the direction of where I'm assuming the middle wind to be. "Thank you," Austin says before turning back to us. "Now, team, we're about to head into battle to fight dangerous prisoners, those who have killed and will most likely kill more given the chance. If you want to be a half decent person you will go into battle and fight those prisoners. Will you die? Maybe. Will you die a hero? Meh, decent possibility. Now, who's with me!" Silence.

"You are a shitty prep-talker!" I cry.

Even still, the five of us again take off running to the middle wing.

"We're here," Austin says. The five of us find ourselves inside of a large steel room in the Facility. Behind us, the hallway that we have just come from, and in front of us are three more hallways, each leading to an unknown location.

"How do we do this, should we all go down one path as a group...please?" Ella whimpers.

"Staying in a group would be the smartest course of action…" Austin begins to say as he does the anime glasses guy thing before creating a Cursed shotgun in his hands. "...but I want to test out my Cursed Ability one on one without any interference whatsoever. I'll see you guys later. Try not to die," Austin says before walking down the left path.

"Austin!" Ella cries. "You were just bleeding out a few minutes ago, you shouldn't be going off alone again, what if something bad happens to you a second time?!" Austin ignores Ella's pleas as he keeps walking away until he disappears out of our line of sight.

"So, I guess we continue on in groups of two?" I ask as I turn to the rest of the squad.

Jamie smirks. "Come on, Ella, girl power! Let's go test out our strength without those boys around!" Jamie shouts as she grabs Ella by the arm and drags her down the right hallway, causing Ella to yelp.

"Stay safeee…" Ella calls to us, her voice traveling down the hallway and growing smaller and smaller until she and Jamie are out of our line of sight as well.

"So, the two of us go down the middle hallway?" I ask Grover.

"Hell yeah, bro, let's go!" He answers, and the two of us take off walking down the middle hallway.

"Stay safe, you guys," I mutter to myself.

***

After running down the hall carrying Ella for a while, Jamie and Ella run into their opponent: Inmate number 1904, Naomi Sierra. "Hey, ladies!" Naomi calls to Ella and Jamie while chugging down what appears to be wine that was probably made in a toilet.

Ella fidgets nervously, while a confident grin spreads across Jamie's face. "Looks like we've found our first target, Ella!" Jamie exclaims. "Let's go!"

***

Meanwhile, after walking through the left hallway for a while, Austin finds himself in a clearing. "Alright, where are you, inmates?" Austin grumbles as he looks around, until a shadowy figure leaps down from the ceiling above Austin. It pressed its flesh against Austin's shoulder, which causes a spike to shoot out! Luckily, Austin pulls his arm away in time for it not to be pierced. The figure then lands, and there Austin stands, face to face with the crazed man known as Spike, who was perched on the floor on all fours and laughing.

"Hey-ya! Proooo Slaaaaa-yerrrrr! Want some...hahahahahaha...some... heheha...some spikes?"

"Hmm, so you are my first opponent? Austin asks as he aims his shotgun at Spike. "I was hoping that it would be Cell, but it seems that you will be the first to taste my lead."

***

Grover and I keep running, until we stop an inmate up ahead. Upon closer inspection, it appears to be prisoner 1903, Rose cherith

Rose spins around to face us. "Interesting...interesting...yes, yes...it seems that I knew that you two were coming....yes, yes, indeed. Cursed Power truly is amazing."

"What the Hell are you whispering about over there, acting all creepy?!" I snap, before turning to face Grover. "You ready, Grover. Same plan as last time, only without Ella?" I suggest.

"Naw, I'll take this chick on by myself," Grover answers.

"Yeah sure?" I ask.

"Yeah, you go on ahead! I'll catch up with you in a second," he answers.

I gulp. Of course, I know that Grover can take care of himself, it's just that I don't want to fight alone. I haven't had to, yet. Especially if it's against Cell. But here Grover is, not phased by his opponent in the slightest, sending me out on my own because he's confident in my skills, not just his own.

And I can't betray his trust.

I close my eyes. I take a deep breath in…then out. And when I open my eyes, my look of fear is masked by an expression of confidence. "Right!" I reply, and I take off running onwards, deeper into the facility. Rose allows me to pass her.

"You shouldn't have done that," Rose says as she turns to face Grover. "I let your friend go, because past me…is the strongest Inmate of them all," she says.

"Don't worry, Luis' got this!" Grover replies with a laugh. "You'd better focus on me, or I'm leaving you in the dust."