The Prince of Astoria-Chapter 79: LXXIX - The Terminator

Etienne held his hand over the hilt of his katana and kept his eyes focused on the huge triceratops and the woman kneeling next to it.

Etienne tapped the black earpiece in his ear and spoke frantically, "I’m up against some old lady and her pet Triceratops. Who is this Gabe? Should I be scared?"

Gabe’s voice came in clearly and immediately, "That’s Dog Catcher, the 55th-ranked hero. Fun fact, she’s the highest ranked non metahuman hero—"

"I don’t need fun facts, Gabe," Etienne stated flatly, "But that is interesting. She’s not a metahuman, I’m guessing the dinosaur is?"

"It’s not a dinosaur! It’s a—"

Dog Catcher pointed at Etienne and calmly commanded, "Play."

The triceratops leapt at him with frightening speed, and he was barely able to dodge. Etienne slid across the ground and brandished his sword in front of him.

The dinosaur turned on a dime and charged at Etienne once again, this time extending its horn and aiming it at Etienne.

Etienne flipped his sword around and pointed the hilt at the triceratops. He redirected the dinosaur’s motion with a simple motion, causing it to go charging past him.

Etienne took a deep breath and flipped the sword back around, holding it by the hilt once again.

Flap, flap.

He snapped his head around and looked in confusion as the dinosaur sprouted wings and flew towards him.

"Wings, Gabe? What is this thing?" Etienne barked out.

"It’s a dog!" Gabe responded frantically, "The INHO calls it Weird Dog, and it has the ability Chimera! It can transform into any other animal, either parts of its body or everything. As far as I can see, there’s no limit to the amount of parts it can mix and match!"

Etienne sheathed his katana and closed his eyes.

"I don’t care if it can transform without limits, I’m not using my katana on a dog," Etienne thought to himself, "In fact, I’m not fighting this thing at all. I need to distract them and make my way to the museum..."

Etienne caught the charging triceratops. It pushed him across the ground for a few feet until Etienne found his footing and stopped its assault.

He turned his body and tossed the triceratops off to the side. The triceratops skipped across the ground like a pebble on water and landed in the parking lot, on top of a compact car.

Etienne turned to the Dog Catcher, who stood a few feet away with a bored expression on their face.

"Weird Dog, huh?" Etienne taunted, "I wonder how you came across something like that?"

Dog Catcher adjusted her hat to reveal her sharp green eyes and glared at Etienne, "Came across him? Give me some credit; I raised him from birth. And he doesn’t like that name, Weird Dog. He likes to be called by his real name."

Dog Catcher cupped her hands together and called out, "Max! Heel!"

The triceratops came rocketing past Etienne and planted itself at Dog Catcher’s side.

Dog Catcher kneeled down and rubbed the triceratops’ head.

"Max. Flame," Dog Catcher commanded calmly.

The triceratops opened its mouth, and a torrent of flame exploded out and engulfed the area where Etienne stood. Dog Catcher watched in morbid glee as the flames became brighter and more intense. After a few seconds, the flames stopped, and Etienne was nowhere to be found.

Dog Catcher walked over to the spot where Etienne stood, now scorched with deep black marks on the ground. She touched it briefly and grabbed a partially melted shuriken off the ground. She looked at the triceratops with its mouth hung open and its tongue wagging.

"He escaped. Typical," She spat out. Weird Dog looked at her with a inquisitive look and she pinched her forehead. She held the melted shuriken up, and the dinosaur ambled over and sniffed it.

She called out flatly, "Max, find."

___________________________________________________________

Etienne walked through the front entrance of the OMSI building cautiously. All of the power in the building was completely out, and even with his superior night vision, it was hard to make out the fine details.

"I need to hurry up and find the Terminator before that dog finds me," Etienne thought to himself.

He tapped the black earbud in his ear, "Gabe, any idea where this guy could be? This place is too huge for me to search blindly."

"Hmm..." Gabe pondered, "I haven’t read anything about his reasoning for being there. But if I had to take a wild guess, I’d bet he’s in the Future Sciences Hall."

Etienne walked slowly down the dark museum corridor, "The Future Sciences Hall? What makes you say that?"

"First, it’s the newest exhibit. And second, The Speed the Superhuman part of the exhibit has a lot of the Geeks inventions on display. Including their prototype time machine."

Gabe typed away on his computer, "The time machine doesn’t work, but according to Evan Locke, it was ninety-five percent completed. The Dark Pattern’s streams involve a lot of coding talks and discussions about cutting-edge technology, it wouldn’t surprise me if they want to steal the futuristic technology the Geeks created."

Etienne squinted his eyes and followed the signage to the Future Sciences exhibit.

"I was so focused on Nairobi last time, I didn’t even pay attention to this place. There is some interesting stuff here..."

Etienne glanced at various iterations of hoverboards, futuristic gauntlets and power armor. 𝗳𝚛𝚎𝚎𝘄𝕖𝕓𝕟𝕠𝚟𝚎𝕝.𝗰𝕠𝐦

He leaned against the glass display and stared at the items.

"These look a little bit like Alex’s gear..."

Etienne continued down the exhibit hall until he tripped over something solid. He looked down and spotted a security officer lying face down in a pool of blood.

Etienne kneeled down and put two fingers on his neck. He stood up slowly and grabbed the hilt of his sword.

"He’s dead. Terminator is probably close..."

Etienne stalked down the museum corridor slowly, his hand hovering over his sword. As he continued down the hallway, he spotted several more incapacitated guards.

He leaned down in front of one of them and moved them onto their back. Despite lying in a large pool of blood, his body was completely free of any wounds.

"What kind of weapon did this?" Etienne thought to himself.

"It makes me happy—" A voice boomed out suddenly. Etienne drew his sword and turned around to find a giant hologram displaying a stern looking middle-aged man with thick glasses.

"This guy looks familiar," Etienne thought to himself.

Etienne sheathed his sword and walked over to the hologram and read the label, "Evan Locke. Leader of the Geeks."

"Right," Etienne thought, "We learned about this guy in school too. Evan Locke. Leader of the Geeks, Speed’s main collaborator, the one who invented most of Speed’s equipment and one of the smartest men in the world."

The hologram continued, "It makes me happy that heroism has turned into all of this. When we first started, we were just a group of friends who wanted to help the world in our time off from work. We never imagined it would turn into this. If he were here to see all this, especially his successor, Speed II, he’d be thrilled. People like to attribute everything supernatural and extraordinary in the world to us, but there were heroes long before Speed, and there will be heroes long after him. They may go by a different name, they may go about helping people differently, but they are heroes all the same."

Etienne moved over to another exhibit, a picture of Evan and Speed shaking hands.

"This picture is almost 85 years old. How is he still conducting interviews? And how does he still look the same?"

Etienne looked back briefly as the hologram message repeated, before slowly turning and continuing down the hallway.

Etienne finally reached the last display in the Speed the Superhuman exhibit. Surrounded by red ropes and sitting on top of black carpet was an enormous cube, easily over eight feet tall, with various lines and grids all over it.

"I have never seen anything like this," Etienne thought to himself, "This looks like something from the future. Is this...is this the time machine Speed created?"

Behind the large cube, there were loud noises, and sparks flew into the air.

"Who’s there?" Etienne called out, brandishing his katana once again.

There was shuffling for a few moments before a tall man stepped out from behind the cube. He wore a perfectly polished silver knight helmet and shiny silver gauntlet, with an orange fur-lined puffer jacket and a ratty apron over it. He pulled the apron over it and tossed it to the side.

"Terminator..." Etienne murmured to himself.

"Ninjaman. I didn’t expect to see you here. I suppose I should’ve trusted Yorrk’s judgement," A jovial voice called out from inside the armor.

"Be careful, Etienne," Gabe chimed in, "Remember, we don’t know what he can do. He could be completely unpowered, or he may be unranked."

Etienne dropped down into a battle stance and gritted his teeth. He thought to himself, "I guess I’ll have to see for myself."