CH - 43

The young pirate Captain finally stood before a massive metal fortress. It was built over a large, nearly-flat slab of stone that went on for a few hundred feet. He had taken far too long to climb up this cursed mountain. He had endured the heavy snow and the whipping winds. The higher up he had gotten, the harsher the weather had gotten. His body shook from the cold. So he hurried toward the building.

He wandered about, trying to find an entrance from the outside. But the place seemed steel-tight on the outside; no openings to be seen. So he continued searching the area. He was still walking around when his senses alerted him. Something was about to happen. He froze, mid-step. Halcen tried to feel out with his Haki, but he couldn't find anything in the area. So he took a moment to look around him. Upon closer inspection, he saw it: mines. There were tiny little metal heads popping up from the snow that covered the stone. He had wandered into a minefield. Well, fuck. That's just perfect.

He picked his foot up to see that indeed, there was a head right where his foot was about to go down.

Thank God.

Halcen carefully replaced his foot down in the last spot it had it before it was almost blown off. He took a few moments to gather his thoughts and figure his way out. He knew there was a reason they had the minefield there of all places. But thankfully, Halcen was much too alert to fall for it. He proceeded through the field, slowly paced, by taking short steps around the heads of the mines. He balanced himself extremely carefully so as to not make a mistake. One small slip would mean serious injury.

Finally, he arrived on the other side of the building, and out of the minefield. That's one down. I'm sure they have plenty more to go, Halcen told himself.

He continued walking until he arrived at the far side of the massive structure. Just how they had built such a giant all the way up here in the mountain was beyond him. But it was the best fortress he had seen in his life.

Halcen searched desperately for about twenty minutes, searching for a hidden door somewhere. He knew there had to be a secret entrance, but it would take time to find on such a magnificent building. But he didn't have time. So, in frustration, he pulled back a black fist, and thrust it as hard as he could into the metal sheeting of the building… and nothing happened.

Halcen shouted out "DAMN YOU, LET ME IN!"

And then there was a click from underneath, and his body suddenly dropped. Instantly, he was surrounded by darkness and he looked up to see the sky closed in on him. He had the feeling of falling, but could not actually tell where he was or what he was falling into. And then he splashed down into cold liquid.

A bright light suddenly emanated from in front of him, blinding him for a moment. He needed to adjust. He was wading in what looked like water. He was a in a vat of about twenty feet wide with nothing around him. He looked about frantically, then finally saw a window high above him, with two silhouettes staring down at him.

"You bastards! Let me out of here!"

There was no response from the faceless figures. They stood ready.

Halcen looked around, trying to figure out how to get out. The walls went up about fifty feet before the window, but they were so smooth, there was no climbing up it with the gear he brought. He needed to find a way up, and fast. He was already over a day into his climb. He needed to get out of this place as fast as possible.

Then there was the metallic shriek of a machine whirring to life. It was underneath him. He dunked his head down under the water to see a giant metal rotary fan blade beginning to move. There were a total of five blades, and they were massive. Halcen knew, even with his Haki, they would cut him apart.

Well fuck.

He rampantly looked about, trying to find anything that might aid him from being decimated by the metallic monster, to little avail. Other than a small ledge, which was only about an inch wide, coming from just above him. It went around the tube that had him trapped in a full circle. He swam for it as quickly as he could. He knew there was little else he could do, but attempt to hang on for dear life.

The water began to drain rather quickly as the fan reached full spinning speed. The water let out at an alarming rate and Halcen barely managed to get the slightest grip on the damned ledge. He looked down to see that the water had already gone all the way down. He grabbed at his knife, charged it with Haki, and stabbed it as hard as he could into the wall, in a vain attempt the pierce the metal and gain himself a foothold. The wall was too dense for his knife. He looked about in another frantic attempt to find anything. The only exit, other than through the shredder, was that window. They had put this room here intentionally to kill any intruders to their fortress. Halcen would not let that be him.

He dug into his bag, with only one hand gripping tightly on the ledge. He was beginning to slip. Be he had an idea; a stupid, crazy, dangerous idea, but it was the only plan he had. He pulled out a small bomb in his one hand and held it tightly. He looked very carefully toward the fan.

This has to be perfect.

And then he shoved off with his legs from the wall, toward the spinning metal blade, his bomb hand outstretched. His whole body coated itself in rich black Haki.

It all happened in an instant. The bomb Halcen held hit the center of the fan, as it spun, creating a massive blast that tore apart the fan blade, as well as sending Halcen flying back into the air, upwards. He turned his body so he was front side up as he sailed. Halcen was just slightly above the height of the window and he threw all of his might into shooting his body forward toward the window. He smashed through the glass and landed on the ground, rolling on his side until he stopped.

Not the most graceful landing, but I'll take it, he told himself as he tried to get up. His body wobbled and he fell back down to his knees. He huffed. That blast took a lot out of him, but he was alive. He looked around the dark room. It looked like some kind of control room, with stations full of buttons and levers and screens all around. But nobody was there. The two that had been watching him must have fled when he came up. Cowards.

He sat back on his ass and spread out his legs to take a breather. He was tired. But he still had a ways to go. Now he had to get through the rest of the building to actually find these two bozos. "This is not why I went off on my own," he griped out loud. "I just wanted to get revenge, kill some pirates, and then go home." He began to stand back up, finally getting his legs under him. "But GOD FORBID anybody wants to make it easy. Fuckers."

Halcen began to walk towards the open door on the other side of the room. His body was slow, but there was no real damage. Just pain. He was sure it would be over in a few hours. He pushed his hand up against the wall as he finally passed through the door to help stabilize himself.

Halcen limped out of the room and down through the hall. The whole inside of the building was plain metal, the same as the outside. They seemed to lack creativity. But they sure had the place locked down. Wolves, mines, trap doors, murderous fans. These guys are ready. But… I'm plenty capable too. "They're gonna have to throw a hell of a lot more my way if they really want to take me down."

And as soon as he turned the next corner, he wished he hadn't have said that.

There was another long hallway at the end of the one he had just gone down. But this one didn't have another control room, it held a turret. Off to the side, sticking out of the wall, was big machine gun. It was far too big for a person to carry comfortably. He stepped into the crosshairs and immediately, the gun locked on and began firing. It released heavy bullets in a rapid fire.

Halcen was surprised. The first thing that happened, was he felt something hard and fast hit his left shoulder, and he immediately ducked behind the wall, clutching his shoulder with the opposite arm. He grunted in pain. He was still in his full black Haki armor, but it still hurt. He was already weak from the wolf fight and the blast. He was bleeding, but not badly. The bullet seemed to have only barely penetrated the skin and then bounced off, but that was all it needed.

The wounded pirate cursed to himself. He had to deal with this new contraption as well as the million other things. Things just kept going wrong. He peeped over the edge of the wall to see where the machine rested, hung on the far right side of the end of the wall. Halcen stood to think for a moment. He didn't have much in the way of shielding against this thing.

I need to know what this thing can do.

He stuck his arm out from behind the wall and hung it outstretched. The gun saw this and began firing almost immediately. Halcen yanked his arm back to safety but a bullet had grazed him. He grimaced. Of course, the damage wasn't severe, thanks to his Haki.

It's powerful and it's motion-detecting. Which means if it can't see me, it can't hit me.

Halcen dug through his bag once again. He had just such an item for this. He took out another random round bomb-looking device. It sat neatly in the palm of his hand. He uncorked the device and tossed it quickly down the hall toward the gun. He knew a simple bomb wouldn't be enough to do decent damage to it. The bullets whizzed toward the entrance of the hall as the bomb bounced down to the hall, missing the bullets. Then there was a loud BANG!