Chapter 33 - Night of the Gumiho’s Revenge

Day 27

Mid-Morning

Erin woke with a start, her heart racing and a cold sweat on her skin. She couldn't recall having a nightmare, but this reminded her of the early years after her dad was murdered.

Hopping out of bed, she stepped into the upstairs bathroom to throw some cold water on her face. It helped settle her nerves from the unpleasant wakeup, but didn't settle the nagging feeling she had in the pit of her stomach.

Heading back into her room, Erin managed to kick a gift box she didn't recall seeing the night before, or this morning. A tag on the box read To: Erin and From: Noah and Sky. This must be the gift Noah left her. How she didn't trip over it last night, Erin couldn't even guess.

Setting the box on her bed, Erin slid the top off to reveal the contents. Inside, folded neatly, was a cobalt blue dobok with black trim, and her name on the left breast in Korean. Erin smiled.

Tearing the top half out of the box revealed the bottom was present as well. It looked exactly like the one she got from the system, but without the damage done when she was protecting Brown and Johnson. She didn't waste another second, stripping off her pajamas and pulling on the new equipment. Lastly, she retrieved her belt from inventory, and it tied neatly around her waist in a perfect knot.

They felt exactly like the last set, and Erin had to wonder if Noah didn't just repair her original dobok. Checking the stats though, she noticed the name simply read Platinum Dobok. Digging further, she couldn't find any modifiers, but it have two fields listed in the information for modifiers. I'll have to ask Noah about that, she thought.

She decided to deal with that later. Knowing Noah he was up late working on some project or another, and was now sleeping in. So she headed downstairs.

At the bottom of the stairs, Erin heard muffled talking. Looking left towards the front door, she could see vague silhouettes through the small panes of frosted glass. The pit in her stomach made itself known again, and worsened.

Stepping toward the door cautiously, she reached for the door handle, only to have the door open from the outside. Eun-ha was coming through, and startled for a second, grabbing her chest, only to have her face fall when she saw it was her daughter.

Anderson stood on the porch just behind Eun-ha, with most of the soldiers visible on the front lawn.

"Gosh, you startled me Ttarai." Eun-ha waved Erin outside and said, "Come outside for a minute, Erin."

Without realizing she was doing it, Erin shook her head subtly, as if to deny her mom's request, before Eun-ha grabbed her hand and gently pulled her out. Leading her to the grass, Erin started noticing the looks on the faces of the soldiers. They had sorrowful eyes, and they had trouble meeting her gaze.

Down the street, parked in front of her first home, was Logan's SUV. He stood beside the driver's door, looking Erin's way. She couldn't read his face from this distance though. Leaning against the passenger door was Sydney. While she looked Erin's way briefly, there was an awkwardness as the woman averted her gaze from Erin. Her body language didn't match that of everyone else, though.

When they got to the grass, several meters away from the house, Eun-ha turned to face Erin. "Ttarai, I have to tell you something."

"No." Erin heard herself whisper. This had all the hallmarks, and she knew bad news was coming.

"Erin, there were…altercations this morning…" Eun-ha said delicately, "Involving some of your students."

"Okay, why all the fanfare. I'll go to the hospital and check on them." Erin started to pull away, but her mother took a firm grip on her arm.

"Listen to everything first, please." Her mother was pleading with Erin to let her finish.

"Several of your students were attacked at their homes." Eun-ha said, her voice starting to shake, "One of the houses was Zack's. He had several of the younger students there for training."

Erin tried to speak, but words wouldn't form, or air wouldn't enter her lungs, she wasn't quite sure because her mind couldn't get traction.

"Zack…he fought to protect the younger students…" Eun-ha continued, "But they outnumbered him." Erin's mother accented the word they, like speaking the name of the people would summon them.

"Stop beating around the bush, mom." Erin barely gasped out the words, she could already feel the tears forming, even though she didn't know the outcome. That was a lie she told herself, something bad happened. Worse than her students getting beaten up.

"The younger students are a little beaten up, but…Zack refused to give up…he…he…" Eun-ha started sobbing, unable to finish the words.

Anderson stepped into view to rest a gentle hand on Eun-ha's shoulder and finish what she was trying to say. "Erin, he fought hard. He didn't go down without a fight."

The air burst from Erin's lungs like she was gutpunched. Stumbling back, she fell on her ass, eyes unfocused as tears filled them and then broke free to run down her cheeks. She fought to catch her breath, grabbing at the chest of her dobok as she attempted to breath in air that just wasn't enough.

Her Ki started flickering, trying to release, but it didn't quite feel right. Her eyes began to glow, causing those around her to gasp and take a step back. While Erin couldn't see her own eyes, her subconscious registered that the glow coming from her eyes was pure red, carrying none of the blue it normally would.

As her Ki stopped flickering, releasing in a steady stream from her body, the people around her started to fall away, dropping lower in her vision. When her legs lowered to a dangling position below her, that same subconscious part of her mind registered that everyone wasn't falling away from her, she was rising up above them.

"Ahh!" Erin let out a short scream, and her Ki pulsed out several meters with it, pushing the people nearest to her back.

"Ahhhhhhh!" She screamed louder and a longer this time, and the pulse went further. Those closest to her were knocked over, and she vaguely registered the pulse reaching out to Logan's SUV.

"AAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHH!" This yell was the loudest yet, screamed at the sky, sending a pulse several blocks away and shattering some of the windows in nearby houses.

Then, without any preamble, there was a SNAP! BOOM! as Erin took off. Moving. Flying. The city blurred by, and Erin paid no mind. She didn't know where she was going, but her subconscious had an idea.

A few minutes later, Erin pulled up in front and above an apartment building she had only ever been to once. Flaring her Ki, Erin drove into one side of the building and out the other. It was a mostly clean passthrough, but a few pieces of debris went flying when she came out the other side.

It wasn't enough though. The damage didn't satiate her. This symbol of people she hated needed to disappear. Erin repeated her initial action again, then again, then before she knew it Erin was perforating the apartment building like swiss cheese.

She could hear it groaning, threatening to collapse. She didn't want idle threats. Erin rose up above the apartment, then accelerated straight down, smashing through the roof, through each floor, into the basement, and through the foundation.

Angling her path tight, she pulverized or melted everything in her path as she came up through another part of the foundation, travelling the inverse of her previous path to come out another section of the building.

Before she even broke through the roof, the building had started to collapse in a haphazard fashion, not clean like a demolition. Erin watched from the sky, emotionless and cold.

When the collapse finished, Erin found she still wasn't satisfied. Raising a hand, she screamed at the rubble as her Ki pushed out, projecting away from her body, licking at the air like flames. It engulfed a section of the rubble, and within moments the concrete and rebar had melted to molten slag, while other materials turned to ash by the cubic meter. Moving her Ki over every square inch, making it light up the night with an orange glow.

Erin was almost done with the remains of the building when a voice caught her attention.

'HEY! What the fuck do ya think you're doin!?" Came a voice on the ground.

Erin turned, scanning the area she heard the voice come from. There, at the intersection she fought The Antagonist, was a group of men. Erin blinked and was in front of them. Not touching down though. She hovered in the air, keeping her eyes level with the taller man who yelled at her.

With the same calm and cold assessment, Erin looked down at the man's jean vest, and the DN logo on the left breast. Looking at the other men present, they had the same. Erin didn't smile. She didn't scowl. While a glint may have flickered in her eye, these men wouldn't live long enough to recognize it.

Erin grabbed the man's shoulder with her left hand, and with a slow, deliberate motion she made a knife hand and pushed it into the man's chest. He gasped, he struggled, but Erin wouldn't be denied. Her hand continued on its path, past his ribs, through his heart, between the lungs, and then out his back, going through his spine. She didn't use her speed to make it quick and painless. This man was DN. He had to suffer. They all had to suffer.

The others had varied reactions. One threw up, one pissed his pants, most tried to run. Erin broke the legs of anyone who tried to run. She wanted to take her time with these people, and she wanted information. She would get what she wanted, one way or another.

A Few Minutes Earlier

When Erin took off, she moved so fast that a pressure wave released in her wake. Due to Erin's height and position, Eun-ha and the soldiers were rolled, but not thrown. Not left uninjured, but not fatally wounded. More of the windows shattered, some smaller vehicles sitting idle in driveways were rolled as Erin's speed increased, and trees were partly stripped of branches and foliage.

Before anyone could get on their feet, Mrs. McGibbons came running outside trying to find out what just happened. When she saw Eun-ha, Mrs. McGibbons ran to her, assessing the woman's injuries. "What happened? Are you hurt?"

"I'm fine, just bumped my elbow." Eun-ha tried to wave Mrs. McGibbons off.

Anderson, now on his feet, helped his old friend get Eun-ha on her feet, where she immediately turned to look in the direction Erin went.

"What happened?" Mrs. McGibbons asked again.

"Domus Nostra happened." Anderson said, moving to check on his soldiers, but finding nothing more severe than bruises and scratches.

Johnson chuckled, "She's going to fuck those guys up." Before he could properly enjoy the thought though, Cohen smacked him in the back of the head.

"She just lost a close friend, and when she gets back she has to deal with the damage she did to this neighbourhood, which you know is going to make her feel like shit. So pull your head outta your ass." Cohen was drilling Johnson in the chest with a finger by the end of his rant, and fortunately for Johnson he looked properly chastised.

The dressing down was interrupted before it could go further, as they heard yelling from where Logan and Sydney were located.

"What the fuck do you think you're doing, Logan!?" Sydney yelled loud enough to wake the neighbourhood.

Anderson started moving towards them, his soldiers in tow.

"I warned you! I fucking warned you, Sydney!" Logan yelled. "She's a danger to herself, and she's a danger to others!"

"You self-righteous asshole!" Sydney yelled back.

Anderson had shifted to a jog to reach the arguing team quicker, drawing the attention of both deputies. "What the hell is going on here?"

Sydney threw a thumb over her shoulder, "This jackass wants to drive around town chasing down Erin so he can arrest her for…crimes against anger or some bullshit."

Logan fumed at Sydney, "She just injured several people, including her own mother," Logan pointed at Eun-ha holding her elbow, "She needs to be brought in!"

"You ain't doin' shit to Erin." Brown started moving towards Logan, anger in his posture and gate.

"Stand down!" Anderson said, "Deputy Alvarez, are you a man who likes futility?"

"Excuse me?" Logan asked, confusion on his face.

"I ask, because you seem to think that you can chase Erin around town in your SUV, while she can accelerate to at least mach one before you can think to start reading the young woman her rights." Anderson's voice was polite, level, firm, but not confrontational. "Meanwhile, the effects of that pressure wave from the sonic boom may have caused some injuries," Logan started to raise a finger to interject, but Anderson raised a hand and increased his tone a few levels to avoid being interrupted, "Superficial injuries, which may still require tending."

Logan deflated, telling Anderson that he had won this argument. "Logan, Sydney, please work with my people and go door-to-door. Check on everyone, triage any injuries, and we'll transport them to the hospital if need be."

Turning to Eun-ha and his old friend, Mary McGibbons, Anderson asked, "Can we reach out to Noah? I have a request to make of him."

Mrs. McGibbons nodded, "Let's get Eun-ha inside first."

Eun-ha smiled sadly at Mrs. McGibbons, her fear and concern for Erin not yet abated, "You pronounced my name correctly."

"No idea what you're talking about, Yune-ha." Mrs. McGibbons said with a fake haughty tone.