In the bar, there are 2 threats on both sides. On my right, Limon is drawing 1 of his 2 short swords. On my left, Tangerine is ripping the right index finger part of the glove he’s wearing off, which will probably summon something. Definitely a sticky situation, but I do have a “plan.” I immediately toss my glass of alcohol to Tangerine, which hit him in the face, probably impairing his vision. Then, with the glass, I turn to my right and place the glass in the path of Limon’s sword. I can see a confused look on his face when he sees that I’m trying to block his sword with a glass cup, but does retract his swing. Seeing that he’s not cautious by my strange action, he probably forgot the first rule when fighting a storyborn, expect the bizarre.

  The sound of metal hitting glass echoes across the train, but not the sound of glass breaking. The blade is clashing with my cup, not showing any signs of breaking.

  Limon couldn’t contain his surprise, “How the hell-”

  I don’t let him finish as I get up, step back, and throw the cup to Limon. His surprise causes his reaction to slow as the glass hits the side of his head, breaking upon contact. He staggered from the force of the throw, and the pain of glass covering his body. I turn to see what Tangerine is doing, and I see him taking his sunglasses away, and wiping away the alcohol on his face. When he finishes, he throws the piece of his glove that he ripped off at me.

  I knew to move out of the way and vaulted over the counter. As the piece hits the wall, the symbol glows a yellow light that spreads with the rest of the index glove. The shape begins to grow and change, until the light displeases, and forms into a black wolf with yellow streaks that look like lightning bolts.

  As the wolf lands on the ground and looks at me, I couldn’t help but say, “A 3 vs 1. Wonderful”

  After recovering from the blow, Limon says, “Welcome to the real world!” He goes around the counter and is coming at me with both of his swords. I quickly grab a bottle of alcohol from the shelf and throw it at him, unfortunately, he is wise enough to move out of the way. I grab 2 more corked bottles and when Limon swings, I parry them with those bottles. I successfully blocked 2 of his strikes, but since he is clearly more experienced in sword play than me, he strikes upwards with such force that I let go of one of the bottles.

  Luckily, the bottle flies upwards and hits the roof directly on the cork. It was carbonated or something because the force causes the bottle to be launched like a rocket and smashes on Limon’s head.

  Although I’m as surprised as those 2 by what happened, I have to react quickly as a wolf is running straight at me with god damn electrified teeth. As the wolf tried to pounce on me, I threw a bottle at me, and it hit dead on, splashing alcohol and glass around it, but it didn't stop the flying wolf. So I grab another bottle and try to block the attack, but it was too late as it bit down on my arm and caused me to fall on the floor. The fall causes the shelf to break and a bunch of bottles fall on top of me and the wolf, which naturally hurts like hell. Thankfully my toughness is slightly high compared to non-storyborn, so there won't be anything life threatening.

  The wolf keeps biting down harder, but its teeth aren't able to puncture my coat sleeve. I still feel the electricity coming from the wolf’s teeth, but it’s noticeably dampened. At first, I thought the standard issue protective jacket would be a waste of resources, still is, but now I will sure as hell not complain about it ever. I began to smack the wolf with the bottle over and over, until the wolf let go, allowing me the chance to get up. However, as soon as I got up and stepped away, I stepped on a glass bottle that miraculously remained unbroken, causing me to slip backwards into the approaching Limon.

  Both of us fell on the ground, and he cushioned my fall. I immediately roll over him and avoid his impending slash. Both of us got up, and the wolf got up on the counter, ready to pounce again. The 4 of us just stand there, weapons drawn, waiting for either of us to make our move. Tangerine moves closer, he does not seem to be injured, so it wasn’t a jojo situation where the user gets damaged when the summon gets injured. But, it seems he has a limit or cost with how many summons he can use, or else he would have summoned another creature.

  Limon has some good swordwork, but not so much to be considered an expert. After all, I was able to fend him off with my lack of sword-to-bottle combat. So he can probably do something else, something that he doesn't want to, or can’t do right now. I say, “This is pointless, something will happen on this train. Something that we need to focus all of our attention on.”

  Tangerine is expressionless as he says, “I thought you were here for your mission?”

  Limon smirks and side eyes Tangerine, “You believed him?” His eyes then met mine. “You're obviously full of shit. I mean, if your real mission is to keep the macguffin safe, then you would have just grabbed it and left the train.”

  The story has been illicitly taken; should you find it on Amazon, report the infringement.

  Tangerine added, “Something that we wouldn’t have to worry about if we just kept it with us.”

  “Not the time bro,” Limon said.

  Hm, that by itself sounds reasonable enough, but straight up attacking me is a bit much in my experience. But now was not the time to question their decision. I chucked the bottle at Limon, which he dodge and look at while it sails by. I try to move in front of the door to escape to car 4, but the wolf leap and stood in the way of the door. I hoped that the door would open automatically since the wolf is close, but it remained closed. I look to the side, and see Limon advancing and swinging his sword at me. I grab my screwdriver and block the first blow, but from my side, the wolf bites down on my right arm and pulls me roughly down to the ground.

  I get ready to stab the wolf with the screwdriver when it quickly moves out of reach. So he doesn't want me to deal too much damage to the wolf. I look at Limon and quickly clash the swing from his sword. The strength difference is clear as he begins to push his sword downwards. Each second, the blade gets closer to my face.

  Limon says with seriousness that I haven't yet seen, “Tell us why you are really here, and we might spare your life. And don’t think I’m afraid to kill you right here and now.” His eyes show me that he is being sincere in his threat, but I also see that he does not want to kill someone if he doesn't have to. Unfortunately, I doubt my words will convince any of them that I was telling the truth the whole time.

  So I decided to do something more risky. If this fails, then I’m fucked. I smirk at him, and his eyebrow furrows, and Tangerine asks, “What’s so funny?”

  I reply, “Did you really think I would be by myself?” I then look towards the door leading to car 4. Both of them, and even the dog, look towards the door in anticipation. Seeing my bluff work, I punch Limon with my left fist. Although I’m not strong, the unexpected force causes him to stagger enough for me to escape. Once I’m close enough, I leap towards the surprised wolf and stab it in the body with my screwdriver. As the screwdriver sinks deep, the wolf pops like a balloon with no gore, only black smoke thankfully, and I fall to the floor.

  I look to my left to see Tangerine holding his right thumb, but seems to be hesitating on whether to pull on it or not. I also noticed that the right index part of the glove is back, as if he never ripped it off in the first place.

  Limon soon recovers and gets back onto his feet, takes a deep breath, and I see tiny bits of flame in his mouth. Before he could do anything, Tangerine yells, “Don’t, you’ll blow the whole train with all the alcohol around!”

  Limon is pissed, but he uses his nose to breathe out, causing fire to shoot out of there. I put my screwdriver away and grab a stool close by. Unfortunately, as soon as I pulled the top part of the seat, it disconnected from the bottom half. I look at the seat in disbelief, “How does that even work, the stool isn’t even connected to the ground?!”

  Tangerine quickly rips the Left thumb of his glove and throws it into the air. It forms into a small green snake with its teeth dripping with a dark green poison looking liquid and begins to slither quickly from the ceiling. It drops down once it’s close and opens its mouth to bite me. I try to smack it mid-air and I did hit it, but it just wrapped around the seat.

  In a panic, I threw the seat in a random direction. But as soon as I did, I see Limon is close and about to strike. I put my arms in front in the hope that the sleeve would protect me from the slash. It blocks most of the impact, but the force causes me to be moved back and slam into the wall and fall to the ground.

  Just as I thought it was the end of the line for me, the door next to me opens and a cat emerges and walks right into my lap. Both he and the snake that was slithering closer stop in their tracks, unsure on what to do. Limon sheaths one of his blades and tries to shoo the cat away, but the cat simply curls on my lap. I am also in shock, did it not notice that I’m covered in cuts and smell like alcohol?

  The snake moves closer slightly, but Limon turns at him and says, “We are not going to kill him in front of a cat.”

  Tangerine winces, he did not want his brother to have noticed. He justifies his action by saying “Oh come on, he’s clearly using some ability to use that cat as a human shield.”

  I say, “Wouldn’t that be a cat shield.” The cat meowed at that, for whatever reason.

  “Shut it, you have no right to talk,” Tangerine says. “Anyway, I can just have Eyes bite him and he’ll be dead without the cat noticing.”

  Limon’s look of concern intensifies, “That’s even more fucked up, and what happenes if he fell on top of the poor cat.”

  I point out, “I could also just move away from the snake if it got close.”

  Limon thinks about it, then says, “Yea, but you have that cat on your lap. So you're kind of stuck there until the cat moves. It’s kind of like the thing we have for our prisoner.”

  He does have a point there… wait. “What do you mean by prisoner?”

  Silence fills the room until both of them laugh, as if what I said was a joke. When my expression didn’t change, Tangerine says, “Son is our prisoner.”

  Surprise, I say, “The hell, it didn’t look like it to me?”

  Limon says, “It was very obvious. We both thought you knew cause of the thing you said.”

  What thing that I- Oh fuck! “No, I said that because in the story we are currently resonating with, Son dies.” The cat gets off of my lap and moves out of the door.

  The 3 of us just stare in silence for a solid 30 seconds. Limon breaks in silence as he says, “Temporary truths so we can check what happened.” I immediately nod my head and hope that Son isn’t dead by the time we walk back to car 7.