The Tales of the Legendary Mimic : Momo

LASERS ON MY STINGER

Who would have thought a giant wasp’s headbutt could hurt this much?

Max’s vision spun.

A sharp throb pulsed through his skull, hot and wet. Blood trickled down from his forehead, slipping past his eyebrow and into his eye, dyeing the world a murky red. Every blink smeared the colors together—floor, walls, the flailing silhouette of the wasp—blending into a hazy, furious blur.

But not even this bleeding forehead, not the sting of pain or the dizziness clouding his sight, could stop him from slaying this pest.

He gritted his teeth and forced his gaze to steady. The giant wasp buzzed loudly, its wings a violent blur that sent gusts of air whipping against his face. The smell of it—like rotting fruit mixed with metal—curled into his nostrils. The sound alone was enough to rattle his bones, but the anger burning in his chest drowned everything else out.

His gauntlet seemed to sense that rage. The metal hummed softly around his hand, and a hot red hue pulsed along its edges, flickering like embers. The glow grew stronger, flaring in response to his fury, as if the weapon itself wanted blood.

Ching!**

The sound rang out as he shifted his stance. Max dropped low into a crouch, his knees bending, muscles coiling tight. He dragged the tip of his gauntlet across the tiles as he moved, the metal screeching against the floor. Sparks spat out in a jagged trail behind him, marking his path.

Ahead of him, the wasp was locked in a brutal tug-of-war with Lorne.

Lorne gripped an aluminum pipe with both hands, his jaw clenched, his arms trembling from effort. He swung it again and again, smashing it against the beast’s chitinous side. Each hit landed with a hollow thunk, denting the glossy black armor that covered its abdomen. The wasp screeched in fury, its mandibles snapping, its legs clawing at the pipe.

For a moment, Lorne managed to knock it off balance. The wasp’s legs slipped on the smooth tiles, and it toppled sideways, crashing to the floor with a heavy thud. Its wings spasmed, buzzing frantically, and it fell still.

The wasp had fallen, almost on impulse, but it wasn’t down for long. With a violent shudder, it shook itself off, its legs scrabbling for grip. It rose again, angrier than before. Its wings flared open, and greenish saliva dripped from its mandibles.

Max saw this as his chance.

He pushed off the ground and sprinted forward, boots pounding across the tiles. He lowered his shoulder and threw himself at the creature, aiming to tackle it before it could fully recover. The distance between them shrank in a heartbeat.

But he wasn’t fast enough.

The wasp’s compound eyes flicked toward him. It twitched, body jerking in a sudden burst of speed. It had noticed him easily and slipped aside, his lunge cutting through empty air. Max’s shoulder slammed into the floor instead, the impact rattling up his spine.

Before he could scramble up, it pounced.

The full weight of the creature crashed onto him, knocking the breath from his lungs. Mandibles snapped dangerously close to his neck. Max raised his arm on instinct, shoving his gauntlet between them. The metal braced against its jaws with a loud crack.

He tried to parry the incoming blows, shoving and twisting, but one gauntlet wasn’t enough to keep all its limbs at bay. The wasp’s claws raked down his side, tearing at his shirt, and one hooked against the edge of his weapon, trying to wrench it away.

If only there were two of them, he thought. Two gauntlets. Two blades. Something.

The wasp hissed, and a thick, viscous drool began to drip from its mandibles. The liquid sizzled when it hit the floor, eating into the tiles and leaving small smoking pits.

It was starting to drool acid from its mandibles. Its claws scraped and tugged, already pulling his weapon away from his grip, threatening his life with every inch it stole. If it disarmed him now, he was finished.

He needed help, and he wasn’t sure how to get it… But he could only try.

“Alright, magic pouch, don’t fail me now,” he muttered through clenched teeth.

With his free hand, Max fumbled at his belt, fingers searching for the small pouch that had replaced the teddy his dad once gave him. That pouch had released purple fumes when the gauntlet first appeared—some strange aura that had birthed the weapon into his hand.

If it gave him one weapon before… maybe it could give him another.

His fingers finally brushed the pouch, but as he yanked it open and reached inside, he felt nothing. Just empty…Gas. No solid grip of a handle, no cool touch of metal. Nothing.

On the other hand, he had reached his pouch—desperation flaring—but there was nothing in there.

The wasp’s buzzing faltered. It paused, its head tilting slightly as if it sensed something was off. Its body pulled back a little, stepping away from him in suspicion. That tiny hesitation gave Max a sliver of hope.

He seized the moment and rolled hard to the side, slipping out from under it. His shoulder scraped against the ground, but he didn’t care. Air rushed back into his lungs as he gulped for breath.

The wasp skittered back, antennae twitching, gauging him from a short distance.

Seeing there wasn’t any obvious threat in his hands—no swing of a pipe like Lorne’s, no new weapon appearing from nowhere—the wasp shrieked. It roared in its insect way and plunged at Max once more, wings thrumming with murderous intent.

Was there really no threat? Max wondered. Or was he just not using the right one?

What did he do wrong? The pouch had reacted before. The gauntlet had appeared when he hadn’t even understood how.

His gaze dropped to his weapon.

The gauntlet wrapped around his arm looked a lot like the forelimbs of the mantis he had battled the other time—the strange creature whose limbs had crackled with power. And there had definitely been two limbs on that mantis that day. Two blades. Two sources of power.

If the gauntlet was modeled after that…

Shouldn’t he be able to summon a pair at a time?

The idea clicked in his mind, sharp and clear amid the chaos.

With this thought, Max did the opposite of what panic told him. Instead of clinging desperately to the weapon he had, he let it go—willing the gauntlet to vanish.

The metal faded from his hand in a shimmer of red light, dissolving into thin air.

For a heartbeat, he was completely defenseless. The wasp drew closer, its shadow falling over him, its acid-laced mandibles opening wide.

Max shut his eyes and focused.

Two, he thought. Not one. Two.

He pictured both his hands wrapped in armor, both fists holding those jagged stinger-like prongs. He imagined the weight of them, the heat, the glow. He imagined raising both arms at once, crossing them as the mantis had.

Immediately, a surge of energy rushed from the pouch at his waist, up his arms. Purple fumes burst out around his hands, swirling like smoke. From that haze, metal formed.

A pair of stinger gauntlets appeared on his hands, already perfectly fitted, plates locking into place over his forearms. Red lines of light pulsed along their edges, alive with power.

The weight felt right. Balanced. Complete.

With the wasp already upon him, Max pushed himself to his feet and prepared his weapons.

He planted his feet firmly, drawing his arms up. The wasp lunged, mandibles snapping, claws stretching for his chest.

"Bring it on!" Max taunted, his voice steadier than he felt.

He slammed the prongs of his gauntlets together, smashing one against the other to prove his stance, to prove—to himself and the monster—that he wasn’t backing down.

As soon as the prongs met, they slid into an ‘X’ pattern, the stinger of one gauntlet crossing against the other.

The air between them crackled.

From the exact point where the two prongs touched, red energy swelled and then suddenly expanded, exploding outward in a focused beam. The blast tore through the air with a sharp hiss, a straight line of crimson light that shot directly at the wasp.

The beam slammed into the creature’s torso, punching through its chitinous armor. A sizzling hole burned through its body, the smell of scorched shell and acid filling the room. The wasp shrieked, its wings spasming wildly as it was thrown backward by the force of the blast.

Max stared at the fading beam, his chest heaving.

It was the laser element of the mantis—the same terrifying power he had once faced. Only now, it was his.

Now he could shoot lasers of his own.