Fic: Spit (Shadow Hearts)
I've been replaying Shadow Hearts, one of my favorite games and a ficlet poked it's way up and out. Some of the inspiration came from Vathara's fics, and how some things affect demons (namely human spit) and Margarete's "element" in the game is water.
This is set in the side-quest in Kowloon/Hong Kong during the Asian half of the game and is from Margarete's perspective.
Margarete lowered her gun with a not-quite yet trembling hand as the red demon toppled with a floor-shaking thud. That fight had hurt, the big demon's fists pummeling her hard several times, she'd kept to her feet thanks to the new spikes on her boots, added just for the extra traction after nearly being knocked through the inn door in that tiny fishing village. Old Zhuzhen was muttering and digging out one of his little potion bottles for her, though she didn't miss how he was watching Yuri, still not yet out of his fusion form, the falcon shape cutting back and forth overhead in the narrow alley.
"Is he alright?" She asked the old adept as the healing magic flowed over her, erasing the bruises and contusions like they’d never been.
"Oh, yes, I think he's just scouting a bit." Zuzhen tucked his staff against his body and leaned on it a bit, his wrinkled face showing no signs of worry. Margarete would love to be able to emulate that, worry lines were the last thing she needed at her age. "He'll settle in a moment, that fusion makes him a bit restless is all."
Well, if they were stopping for a moment, she'd best reload. She popped the magazine out of her pistol and removed the few rounds still inside. Four left, she pulled eleven new bullets out of the ammo bag tucked inside her coat and spat. She’d never have done this before coming to China, before meeting up with these people. But after seeing how so many of the monsters had simply shrugged off her bullets in Dalian, she'd made the half-mad proposition that maybe she should just spit on them and see how that worked. Zhuzhen had taken her ranting seriously though… apparently human spit had some unknown power. So she coated her bullets with her own saliva and spit on her grenades right before she threw.
It was crazy, but it worked. She was doing real damage again and even Yuri had eyed her with a little more respect. "Just don't freak out and accidentally shoot me with those," he'd said. Spit had seen her through that crazy maze when Alice's magic was sealed away - though the girl had rallied pretty well with a spate of old-fashioned bible-thumping - now it was doing the same in the alleyways of Hong Kong as they searched for Wugui.
She'd finished with the pistol and was applying a fresh coat to the sniper rifle bullets - she had only a few of the powerful bullets, so she was extra careful with them - when Yuri finally winged down and changed, staggering a bit as the demon vanished back inside his body.
"I spotted the building where the largest concentration of demons are, it fits the description of Wugui's place." He gave Margarete an almost apologetic glance. "Umm... some of the demons are kind of..." he made a rather rude gesture with his hand, only the implied length he was stroking was... umm... she was not going to blush damn it!
"Well, I’ll have a nice sized target then," she said with a too-cheerful edge in her voice and was gratified when both Yuri and Zhuzhen winced in tandem. When all this was over she was going back to Europe, where things were sane.
No more crazy monsters and spit laden bullets for Malkovich!
This is set in the side-quest in Kowloon/Hong Kong during the Asian half of the game and is from Margarete's perspective.
Margarete lowered her gun with a not-quite yet trembling hand as the red demon toppled with a floor-shaking thud. That fight had hurt, the big demon's fists pummeling her hard several times, she'd kept to her feet thanks to the new spikes on her boots, added just for the extra traction after nearly being knocked through the inn door in that tiny fishing village. Old Zhuzhen was muttering and digging out one of his little potion bottles for her, though she didn't miss how he was watching Yuri, still not yet out of his fusion form, the falcon shape cutting back and forth overhead in the narrow alley.
"Is he alright?" She asked the old adept as the healing magic flowed over her, erasing the bruises and contusions like they’d never been.
"Oh, yes, I think he's just scouting a bit." Zuzhen tucked his staff against his body and leaned on it a bit, his wrinkled face showing no signs of worry. Margarete would love to be able to emulate that, worry lines were the last thing she needed at her age. "He'll settle in a moment, that fusion makes him a bit restless is all."
Well, if they were stopping for a moment, she'd best reload. She popped the magazine out of her pistol and removed the few rounds still inside. Four left, she pulled eleven new bullets out of the ammo bag tucked inside her coat and spat. She’d never have done this before coming to China, before meeting up with these people. But after seeing how so many of the monsters had simply shrugged off her bullets in Dalian, she'd made the half-mad proposition that maybe she should just spit on them and see how that worked. Zhuzhen had taken her ranting seriously though… apparently human spit had some unknown power. So she coated her bullets with her own saliva and spit on her grenades right before she threw.
It was crazy, but it worked. She was doing real damage again and even Yuri had eyed her with a little more respect. "Just don't freak out and accidentally shoot me with those," he'd said. Spit had seen her through that crazy maze when Alice's magic was sealed away - though the girl had rallied pretty well with a spate of old-fashioned bible-thumping - now it was doing the same in the alleyways of Hong Kong as they searched for Wugui.
She'd finished with the pistol and was applying a fresh coat to the sniper rifle bullets - she had only a few of the powerful bullets, so she was extra careful with them - when Yuri finally winged down and changed, staggering a bit as the demon vanished back inside his body.
"I spotted the building where the largest concentration of demons are, it fits the description of Wugui's place." He gave Margarete an almost apologetic glance. "Umm... some of the demons are kind of..." he made a rather rude gesture with his hand, only the implied length he was stroking was... umm... she was not going to blush damn it!
"Well, I’ll have a nice sized target then," she said with a too-cheerful edge in her voice and was gratified when both Yuri and Zhuzhen winced in tandem. When all this was over she was going back to Europe, where things were sane.
No more crazy monsters and spit laden bullets for Malkovich!