„Are you serious?“
Urtico spoke into the mouthpiece of his device.
The bullets rushed past him, alongside the wall, just nearly hitting him and landing a fatal strike.
“Now tell me where I am, goddammit! Ermine, tell me now!”
The only answer he heard through his earpiece was the statics. The mechanic drones still tried to shoot their target through the walls, but, luckily, it was of no use. Unfortunately, the Stray Potential could not move without becoming an easy prey for them.
He strained his muscles. They felt somehow wrong and disjointed. It shouldn’t have come to this, and now he was here, in this situation with no foreseeable way out.
Suddenly his earpiece gave out a sharp, piercing sound. The hedgehog hissed and slightly jumped, startled. But finally he heard the familiar, oily voice of the ermine.
“Can you hear me, you stupid bastard?”
Urtico gave a dismissive growl.
“If you ever want to get paid, get me out of here, idiot! It’s not funny and I don’t want to end as a cheddar cheese.”
Feeble sounds of fingers working on a keyboard could be heard. The impacts of the bullets into the walls still tried to drown them.
“Okay, I got back into their security system. You have to give me a minute, so I can hack into the protocols to stop the drones. Think you can wait?”
“Do I have any other choice? But hurry. I guess I won’t be alone with those machines for long!”
Hastily, Urtico looked around and tried to focus. There had to be a place he could hide from the bullets somehow. He had to get out of this place. He was happy that those drones were stationary ones. He would be in much deeper trouble if it were movable. But who knew how long they would take to arrive. Or, even worse, how long the Guards would take to find him and open their fire.
He didn’t really want to find that out.
His ear piece crackled.
“Got it! Ha, believe me, there are tougher nuts to crack. I’ll give you… let’s say, one minute! But hurry, I can see, backup will be there in less than ten seconds! Go straight ahead and take a left! There should be a window for you to burst through!”
Urtico laughed sarcastically.
“A window to burst through? I’m in the twelfth floor! I’m no Air Rider, you idiot!”
“Just trust me on this, you stupid hog! Now go, your minute is on!”
What other choice did he have? He took a last deep breath and jumped forward. Right this instant the drones stopped their fire. But instead of the shooting he heard footsteps. They were far behind, but still, you didn’t want to get in sight of the Guards. Urtico knew this.
With a swift move of his left hand he pressed an air current under his feet. He felt his legs moving faster and his steps became near to silent.
‘Where’s this left corridor’, he asked himself. The only things he saw were blank, white walls. But another corridor was nowhere to be seen. Suddenly he heard a big pang next to him. He stopped and saw a dark, little mark on the wall.
A sneer was audible from behind, wicked and not really human.
“That was just a warning, Stray One! You better come with us!”
Without looking back, the hedgehog dashed into a sprint.
“Ermine! They got me! The Guards caught up! Help me! There’s a Living Bullet among them!”
“Fuck… You can’t be serious! Okay, just get faster, the interjection is right in front of you!”
Another shot was heard. Urtico ducked but didn’t forget to run. He tried his best to stay fast.
He wished he wasn’t as chubby as he was, so he didn’t have to trust in his talents to move that fast.
Another shot. And another. The decals on the wall became bigger and bigger with every shot he heard.
But then he saw it. There was an opening to the left. Hastily the hedgehog ran to it, tried not to slip on the polished floor and made a turn. He heard another shot and suddenly a big part of the wall’s corner exploded into dusty bits.
Luckily he didn’t get a scratch.
And he realized Ermine wasn’t lying, just at the end of the wall was a glass door, leading to a balcony to overlook the city.
Without any other thought Urtico reached forward. In his hand, a small glimmer formed itself, growing bigger, into a little flame, and bigger, into a head-sized, burning ball of heat. While he ran, he threw the ball towards the door, it hit and in seconds the glass exploded outwards, making way for the thief.
Urtico jumped through the broken glass and made a halt on the balcony. It was still night time, but the complex was brightly lit up. They were searching for him, and the Guards were right behind him.
Ermine’s cry rang in the hedgehog’s ear “Jump!”
He had no time for second thoughts and obeyed.
He ran to the barrier and took a leap.
The wind was rushing.
Ermine was yelling something in his ear, but he couldn’t understand.
His mantle flapped around his body, like ocean waves, which tried to drown him.
Finally he understood Ermine’s word “Three, Two, One!”
Urtico looked up and saw a sly smiling man standing on the balcony, pointing his finger in his direction.
He heard a familiar ‘Pang’ as the Human bullet gave another shot as the world became pitch black in an instant.
A body clasped around the hedgehogs body, the air was pulled out of him, the fall came to a sudden halt.
He panted, but he was without injuries. He knew he survived.
He was saved…

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Another Portion of the story I would like to write^^"
This time it's not looking great for Urtico. He broke into a big complex to steal something (why the Hell would a group of criminals choose him to do it >__< he's a chubby, slow guy, he should have had no chance of escaping >_>) but well, you read it yourself :)

Also the artist was so nice to draw herself into the picture as the 'Living Bullet character', though it sounds more like this char is a guy, but well^_^ everything can be changed, so why not the genders, either :D

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This reaaaallly awesome piece of art is made and © by  detts
Her character is also © by her
Urtico is © by me