by Bob Dattolo
He smiled as he stepped into me, “You’re just doing this because you think I’m handsome.”
I smirked at him as I touched his eyes, “You’re not handsome. You’re wet panty sexy. I bet plenty of girls masturbate thinking about you.”
Parece laughed, “I’ve talked to at least three. Including me.”
Laughter from the group. So out of place considering where we are.
I have one more in me. One more load of power. Do I hold onto it? Or do I try something funky with it? Hmmm…
Everyone stepped back from me when my head snapped up. “Kynal? If we get some of our own dragons in the mix, will you be okay?”
He looked around the space, “As long as no one chomps on me? I want out of this fucking thing.”
They each met my eyes and nodded. They smelled completely honest.
“How are we gonna shift without someone killing us, though?”
I smiled at Samantha’s question, “Easy. No one knows what we’re doing in here. We make the space larger and then birth the fuck out of some dragons. We stay together and see if we can get folks through whatever the fuck is ahead of us. If anyone comes for us? Kill them. If those dragons show up? Kill them for killing Stacey, Paige, and Gage.”
“You fucking know it.” Levi’s smile was positively evil, “They deserve some pain.”
Shared psychopathy, I love it.
“Fine, then get with the shifting. I’ll expand the space as we need it. Try to stay curled up, though. I’ll put a wall around the two of us so that you guys don’t squash us by accident.”
Samantha nodded again, “Spread out, let’s fucking do this. The clock’s ticking, and we need to get out of here with our power intact.”
They moved away and I slowly expanded the bubble, trying to feel for people attacking the outside. It never came, so I kept spreading it out bit by bit as they went into their shifts. A shield went up to protect us in the middle, and we watched them transform.
Kynal leaned into me, “We’re gonna live through this, right? Them shifting?”
“That’s my fucking goal.”
He shivered, “This is…we always told Angelica not to shift. It’d put us at a disadvantage. Too much of one.”
“I know. I can see it. I’d like to think that we have a good group here, but…it’s a risk. I just think it’s not much of one with this group.”
“Even so? I’m staying with you. If anyone here can protect me from them, it’s you.”
“Concentrate on your spells. Maybe prep something that heats things up? I’m gonna try to get rid of more weapons. See if you can burn some bats. Make people hot to keep them away from us. Things like that. We have to figure out what it takes to get across to the end. I’m hoping it’s not something crazy dangerous.”
He gave me a look, “It’s the trial, of course it’s dangerous.”
That says it all.
In just about 30 seconds, we had four huge dragons curled up in here with us. I met their eyes and smiled at them, “I’m bringing the walls down. I’ll raise the roof in here first so you can stand, then we take it down. Figure out what it takes to get across to the end. Then figure out if we can get there ourselves and let the others sort themselves out or if we have to stop them. Or maybe force them across.”
“Let’s do it. Except for those four dragons. I want a piece of them.” Samantha’s anger matched mine.
The bubble grew and, for the first time, I felt someone attacking it. “We have an earth affinity attacking, at least I think so. Get ready. I’m taking both down at once. We’ll want shields and walls ready. If any of you dragons can figure out what it takes to get to the end, shout it out.”
Growling assent had me taking a deep breath and holding it for the longest moment. Magic pushed my voice as the walls around us disappeared, “FOR STACY! FOR PAIGE! FOR GAGE!”
Four massive dragons roared around us, bringing everyone in the huge room to a complete standstill.
My voice stayed loud as I moved to the front of the group, “All you motherfuckers stop being complete fucking psychos and stop fighting! Get to the finish line!”
Shared looks from others, with some actually backing away from the fight. There are two dragons in the mix, and they look uncertain as they take in the fact that we have four shifted dragons in our group.
Riley stumbles out of the mass of people, “Thank fucking God!” She eeps as a spell wraps her and carriers her to us.
“Where are Cleo and Cesar?”
“I haven’t seen them yet!”
“Dammit…” My voice went loud again, “What does it take to get to the finish line and why aren’t people doing it? We have 26 freaking minutes before we lose our power!”
Samantha calls out from above me, “It looks like a twofer. Challenge and test at the same time.”
One of the dragons in the mass ahead of us nods, “It is. If you’re human, you have to go across the swinging monkey bars to the testing spot. When you’re there, you have to cast two light balls and then two balls of your affinity. At the same time. Then you have to finish the monkey bars. If you fall? Dead. If you don’t do the spells right? Dead.”
“God dammit! What the fuck is wrong with you adult assholes!”
Some of the kids laughed, but I’ll take that as long as they’re not killing each other.
The dragon speaks up again, “We can’t trust that someone isn’t gonna knock us down. You can fall before and after. And you die.”
Dammit!
Levi laughs and moves forward a little, “What do dragons have to do?”
“Fly out and hover for the test.”
Groans from the four dragons. Hovering for them isn’t impossible, but it’s haaaard.
Hmm, “Then someone get with creating a fucking shield across the gap. High enough that humans can hold the bars and basically walk across while holding them. Same for the dragons. That way we can’t fall.”
Shocks from everyone.
“Uhh, if this is like last year’s trial, then stopping ourselves from falling will make us fail the test!” I didn’t see who said that.
“Right? Except those that were here last year? I cast a spell that was basically walls next to the beam. They stopped you from even starting to fall. That’s the same here. You’re not stopping if you fall, you’re stopping from falling.”
The dragon looked back at the test, “Do…do you think it’ll work?”
A chorus of I’m not trying it came to me, so I flapped up, gaining more attention, “Fine! Then I’ll try it. I won’t go all the way through, but I’ll do the shield and get up to the test and then come back.”
I’m shocked as shit that they agree. I really am.
I’m also appalled at how few people I’m seeing here.
We started with 117 and lost 16 before the start. I’m seeing 14 kids over there, fewer than I thought, and only like 30 on this side. Possibly less.
Fuck. How many have died so far?
No one stopped me as I flew over and tried the dragon side, casting a shield spell and “flapping” out while actually walking.
It worked.
The same approach worked on the human side, getting me to return to my group.
“Now, everyone line the fuck up and get out of here. Seriously.”
Shocked looks from everyone before they actually started lining up, at least a little. There were some exceedingly angry looks, but no one attacked anyone else. As a plus, it started getting people through to the finish line.
Each person across was met with cheers on the other side, which made me feel good. Even if too many of the people making it across are on my fuck you list for taking part in fucking up my stuff or laughing at me. I should have let them die, but…maybe I’ll be the bigger person. At least for now.
The one pain point here is that casting four spells split between two different things? That’s difficult to do, which means that others are finding it harder to get through. Especially since they keep
trying as humans.
“Dragons? Shift already and get through on the dragon side! We don’t have enough time for everyone to go the human route.”
No one wanted to shift until we set up a guarded spot and let one shift at a time. That really started clearing out the people.
I was ecstatic when Kynal and Riley made it through.
I was less happy when Marc showed up, sauntering out of one of the hallways. Cleo and Cesar are with him.
As are the four dragons.
There’s less than 10 minutes on the clock at this point.
Lovely.
Levi groaned, “This is what it was like when we showed up last year, wasn’t it.”
I laughed at his comment, “Pretty much? Although I think you were there with like a minute left? So at least we have some time.”
The newcomers roared, while Marc laughed. “Huh, caught you at last!”
“Just stay the fuck back there and wait your turn to get across, Marc!”
“Don’t tell me what to do, loser!”
“Go fuck yourself. The finish line is right there. Just stop being a dick and we can all graduate this year.”
“Umm, yeah, no? I have four dragons on my side. No, six.” He smiled at Cleo and Cesar.
“Cleo? Cesar? You guys with him now?”
The look on her face is pure hate, “You let Stacey get killed!”
You have to be kidding me, “No, in fact, I didn’t. I wasn’t there when she died. At all. I only found out from Levi how that happened, and it was because those four fuckheads with you attacked. I had nothing to do with it.”
Cesar pointed at me, “You were supposed to protect her!”
“I wasn’t anywhere near her! You were her allies too! How am I more responsible for her than you are? Or than she is for herself?!?”
“You talked a big game. A good game. You really did. Now one of us is dead.” Cleo started to contort into her shift. Cesar matched her.
I’m so not sure what to do. They have a good mix of dragons there covering the affinities, at least mostly.
Without planning it, I hit them with a spell that wrapped their shifting bodies with bands of rock, all covered with razor sharp spikes.
Their body is growing uncontrollably and quickly, and they didn’t realize it was happening until they were pin cushioned and screaming.
The other dragons with them tore the stone apart, but not before their two newest dragons were too hurt to do much. Yeah, they’re in dragon form, but they’re fuuucked. Not dead or even close to it, but it’s hard to move when most of your major muscle groups have dozens of holes spiked through them.
The air sucked from my lungs and another spell threw me towards the dragons. I felt it coming and caught a look behind me in my tumble. It was a lucky look.
Kaylee. She’s in the test, yet she just hit me with two spells while also casting four others. And now she’s through.
My flight from being thrown ends as I hit the stone. Thank God I was back in dragon mode, because the spells they hit me with mostly fizzled, although some did mess with me. Just not enough to stop me from pushing to my feet.
Too bad I didn’t think to watch for dragon teeth.
The steel dragon clamped its mouth down on me. When their head is as large as my shifted torso, you know their mouth is plenty big. Has plenty of huge teeth. And the chomping power to crush a car, at least the body part.
As you can imagine, I screamed.
Then the steel dragon screamed as he realized just how close to his eyes I am when he comes in from the side like that.
They tore out in my hands. He had a blessed moment to realize the error of his ways, then my expanding wall of stone destroyed his face and took out most of his brain as his power flowed into me.
More magic raced through me, and I hit the shifted dragons with a command to shift back. It bounced off. They’re protected. Fucking hell, I didn’t even know that’s possible!
Instead of pissing away too much time, more power flowed into my healing, just in time for Marc to wade into me, swinging a sword at me that disappeared before it hit. He went off balance and fell, nearly getting trampled by the water dragon.
They should have paid attention, because the combined breath from all four of my dragon allies completely fucked it.
No one thought to get their power, so I did.
Marc shoved himself up with magic and came in hard, managing to tackle me to the ground as more of his magic went off. Being right up on me, he got through my protections with more of them than he should have been able to. Blood fountained from my throat. Just not enough to stop me from seeing the clock.
Just under 5 minutes left.
Marc’s spell picks me up and throws me into Parece hard enough for me to hear her ribs break down her left side. I can’t stay down, though, because he’s coming again, leading with a wall of magic.
Shielding and barriers of every type go up, blocking me from Marc as another spell picks Parece up and carriers her over to the challenge and up to the test. She doesn’t fight once she realizes she’s there and starts her magic going.
She makes it through just as Marc collapses my barriers with a particularly brutal attack that I couldn’t quite figure out.
The air and fire dragons are holding their own against my three allies, which is shocking to me. They must be used to working together, because their defense and attacks are pretty well connected.
Until Eva, Tiffany, and Brody come in from behind them.
Eva is pushing power like a beast, and she hits the fire dragon with a barrage of spells.
At first, I don’t think they got through, but then every bit of water in the dragon drains out, killing the huge bastard.
More power to me that she didn’t go for.
Not that she could, because she collapsed. Her allies didn’t notice it as they continued towards the fight.
My allies begin taking apart the fire dragon as I wrap Marc with a maze of metal and flood it with electrical balls. It’s not a huge maze, but I’m hoping it’s enough to distract him from everything. That lets me head towards Eva.
The fire dragon flips at the loss of the water dragon and being on the losing end of the fight and begins casting more and more spells. Tiffany gets taken down as some hit her, and she’s left bleeding on the ground.
Brody stops and stares at her, then back at Eva.
What the hell?
I can hear Marc battering at the metal around him and I can feel his earth magic triggering. I think he’s going to use the rock beneath us to destroy my walls. That…that might work pretty well.
Samantha, Angelica, and Levi are busy with the fire dragon. That leaves Eva and Tiffany down…and Brody not looking like a good ally at the moment.
Tiffany sees him coming but can’t protect herself as he comes down at her with a huge overhand chop with the sword in his hand.
My shield barely stopped him, although it sure as hell shocked him.
He whirled on me as I ran at him, “What the fuck are you doing?”
“Stay back, Maddie! They’re mine!”
“Yeah, they’re yours, they’re your allies!”
“They’re weak! They’re mine!”
He turned and hacked at Tiffany again, then left her and raced to Eva. He hit her with a barrage of spells that I barely blocked and managed to get the sword into her before I tossed him back with a spell.
The fire dragon dropped, shaking the room.
More power to me since the others don’t seem to want it.
Roars of triumph from my three allies makes Marc’s assault pause and trips up Brody for long enough that more magic flows from me and sends the three dragons back to the test. Samantha’s shoved up to the test itself, with the others in line behind her
3 minutes left.
“We gotta get through the challenge!”
“Fuck you, I want power!”
He launched more and raced at me, but I was kinda done. He nearly r
eached me before my magic tossed him away and a triple layer of metal, air, and fire formed around him, creating a looong hallway that turns around itself again and again. He’s basically in the middle of a box that has one way in and out and I think it’s powerful enough that he can’t batter his way through it.
For now.
Unlike Marc, who finally destroys the barrier around him.
Tiffany is limp in my arms as I grab her and carry her over to Eva. She’s awake when I arrive, but she feels weak. As I crouch next to her, staring into her blue eyes, I can’t help thinking that her face…it’s familiar on some level. Something inside of me triggers, and it’s like I’ve seriously seen her before school.
I just don’t know from where.
Her arm barely touches my hands as I reach for her eyes and pump power into her. She goes from feeling weak to feeling strong in like a second, and she has the most shocked look on her face as I pull my hands away, “Marc’s coming. Brody tried to kill you both. You’re hurt, but I can’t heal you just yet.”
She catches the gash in her stomach from the sword, “What the fuck?”
“We get through this, I’ll heal you. Can you get up?”
She climbs to her feet as focus on Tiffany and pump healing into her. Instead of fucking around, I crack open one of the powers I absorbed and use it on her so that we don’t waste time. Then I grab Eva’s hand and heal her too. I should have thought of that before.
When I’m done, I stand and tug Tiffany up.
Marc obviously sees us and heads our way.
“Girls? We have 2 minutes on the clock. Get through. You have to cast two balls of light and two in your affinity while hanging on the rungs. Put a shield under you so that you can’t fall from the rungs and it’ll work. Get going. Now!”
Power picks them up and they fly to the test, shrieking most of the way.
Marc and I are the only ones here. Well, except Brody.
Magic begins driving into me, pushing me back again and again as I block and shield.
That stops when I go on the offensive.
Spikes of power, of affinities, pressure, raw fire, jets of water, of air, and everything else I can think of pummel him mercilessly as I watch the clock tick.
