Growing Heart

Ch 19 - A Partial Trust

Sid grabbed what remained of her tattered bandages with her teeth and pulled it off of her hand. The shredded cloth practically fell apart at the touch and its bloodstained bits fluttered to her feet like crumpled petals. She glared at Nathaniel over the top of blackened hand before working on freeing her other hand. Even though his needles had torn through her bandages and made it practically threadbare, it still felt distracting against her skin and she couldn't afford to have her focus go elsewhere.

It was by the skin of her teeth that she was able to block the incessant stream of needles Nathaniel shot out from beneath his chain mail. His power was difficult but not because they couldn't pierce through God's Armor. It was because of the Needle Needle user's blatant disregard for his combat with Sid, choosing to shoot out his needles from his entire body at a complete 360-degree angle, not caring if he hurt friend or foe.

The blood on her bandages did not come from her own veins.

Everyone else had fled the plaza and those who got caught in Nathaniel's storm of needles were finally dragged away to safety by their friends, families, and/or guards and pirates alike.

"Sid! All clear!" Shachi yelled from the rooftop of a nearby building.

"Ah!" Sid shouted while glaring right at Nathaniel, "Leave this bastard to me."

With one final rip to the last inch of the sullied cloth, she loosened her jaw, spitting out any tattered threads lingering on her tongue, and picked up the trident that laid at her feet. Sid's eyes fell on a dirtied teddy bear that lay strewn in broken pieces behind the needle man, "You monster...There were children here."

"Doesn't matter," Nathaniel laughed. His voice was gravelly and hoarse, "One kill. A hundred kills. It's all the same to me as long as I get paid for my work."

The humor never left his lips as Sid charged at him with her trident. She stuck the prongs onto the ground at the last second, using it as a vaulting pole to launch herself at him.

"Needle Needle Deluge!" he shouted. A flood of needles came shooting out of his chest and towards the Shandian. She held her arms up over her face to deter any needles from getting into her eyes while the rest of her God Armor clad skin kept herself from becoming a human pincushion.

Thwack!

She speared him right at the midsection, landing her knees right in his stomach and knocking him to the ground.

Thwack!

She punched him hard across his jaw, knocking away his helmet. It landed with a clatter against the cobblestone and rolled clunkily away from Nathaniel, revealing a face with a crooked nose and a deep scar that ran down one eye, sealing it permanently shut.

"You have no honor," Sid spat.

"Honor doesn't keep the belly full," Nathaniel sneered, increasing the tear in his lips and causing a small stream of blood to come out from it's folds. He grabbed Sid by the shoulders. "Needle Needle SPIKES!"

Sid flinched. No matter how hard her God's Armor was, it was no match for a thousand tightly concentrated needles that pierced out of his hands and into her skin but it only made it that far, stopping right at her bone. However, Nathaniel was merely using that as a way to hold her in place.

"Needle Needle...Monsoon!"

Sid sucked in a breath and ripped herself away from Nathaniel's hold. She flung herself to the side just as a cascade of needles came shooting out from the front of his body. The needles that were previously stuck in her shoulders ripped all the way down one of her arms and over a wing, tearing a few feathers loose and making a shallow cut down the blade of the wing.