by Martha Woods
Seeing him a few years ago… seeing him in the state of fury he must have been in when his brother had been killed, the very thought of that sends chills down my spine. This just solidified to me how important this alliance was if they could fight like this while holding themselves back, what the hell would they be capable of if they let go of their limits?
I was so in my own head thinking of what could be that I almost missed the werewolf sprinting towards me, teeth bared and claws ready to swipe across my skin and leave me with a rather severe injury at the very least. A quick pivot on my heel and a thrust of my palm towards them sent them flying backwards, a surprised yelp ripping from their lips as they sailed towards another group of vampires and witches alike. It still came as a shock that I could do that, but I wasn’t exactly going to turn down an opportunity to practice, was I?
Running through the crowd and sending them flying with a simple touch, I felt more powerful than I had in weeks, so much power resting in the palm of my hands just waiting to be unleashed. I was very keenly aware that I could easily shatter each of their bones if I wasn’t careful, constantly having to hold myself back from my full potential to avoid splattering them where they stood and ruining the entire plan. If Tabitha could do it after coming so close to being killed by the being she was actively fighting against, I could control my base impulse for a few more minutes, I needed to get more comfortable with my body and my powers anyway and a very important step of that was learning control.
But when a claw swiped down my shoulder and drew a line of white hot pain that made me lean my head back and scream, I may have overreacted and shattered the bones in their forearm on impulse, sending them back away from me before the pain could really set in properly for either of us. Well, at least it made it look more real for both of us, that wasn’t much of a comfort right now though with their arm flapping uselessly like a windsock and my shirt soaking with a liquid that I much preferred to remain inside my body.
It was bringing back very unpleasant memories of being stabbed by Damon, that same ball of ice cold panic rising in my chest and freezing my blood, quick breaths making me lose the composure that I had before. I knew it wasn’t rational, I wasn’t in any real danger, it wasn’t even really Damon who had done it to me in the first place, but that same feeling, that same panic was so overwhelming that I couldn’t think of anything else.
When Tabitha laid her hand on my shoulder I almost shattered her on pure instinct, a look into her eyes and a cooling aura emanating from her hand the only thing giving me the second’s pause that I needed to come back to myself.
“Are you ok?” She asked, hand over the gash in my shoulder. “You look… like you’re not doing so well.”
“I am… I mean I’m fine.” I shook my head, gritting my teeth and getting back to my feet. “I just… got a bad feeling, nothing really, don’t worry about it.”
Tabitha stared at me, clearly not convinced but this was neither the time nor the place to start questioning each other. If we said that we were ok then we had to take it at face value, any questions could come after we had finally managed to do what we’d come here to do. It was best that I stick by her side from now on though if I slipped like that again there was a very real possibility that I would end up seriously hurting or even killing one of our allies. I’d already broken one arm, that was skirting the edge of acceptable in my opinion.
Even if I was more powerful, Tabitha had more control over her abilities, it would do well for me to watch how she worked so I could learn the proper way to reign myself in. I watched her tiny movements, graceful like she was painting a picture, exerting only enough force to push people out of our way, maybe sending them stumbling a foot or two but nowhere near enough to send them flying. While I definitely had power right now, I wouldn’t say that I had anywhere approaching proper control, not in the way that I could use my powers almost artistically like she was.
And then there was Tariq, large, forceful movements shooting jets of flame from his palms, air bursts of heat pressure erupting from him with every thrust he made. The atmosphere around him was like a sauna, the ground beneath his feet almost bubbling from its prolonged contact with him, yet his clothes remained utterly untouched by tears or scorches. Though he wore an expression of utter focus while he torched the ground in front of him when I approached him from the side he turned and gave me a wide smile, corners of his eyes crinkling in his mirth while he nodded his greetings.
“Amy! It’s good to see you, it’s all very chaotic right now isn’t it?”
I nodded. “Yeah, it’s… a lot more than I was thinking, is it always like this?”
“Oh yes, if anything this is far more pleasant than it normally is. That’s why we try to stay out of each other’s way rather than clash over territory, every time it escalated to a fight we all lost at least half our number. The loss just wasn’t worth it in the long term, or even in the short.”
I whistled, glad for the opportunity to talk about something else other than how I was feeling. “That sounds… bad, at least we might not have to do that anymore.”
“You’re telling me, I wasn’t looking forward to the prospect of another war before you came along.” He squared his shoulders, grunting harshly and sending a burst of hot air out in front of him, scattering the gathering group of attackers and pushing them further back into the clashing crowd. “But at least we have a chance to work out any lingering aggression we still had, an alliance cannot work with that still festering under the surface.”
“No, I guess it can’t,” I said, “After seeing all of this I guess people really needed to get it out of their…” I spun my head around, feeling something painful emanating from the middle of the lot. “Do you feel that?”
Tariq shook his head, shooting another pulse of air at the people in front of him. “I don’t have that same sensitivity that you do, but if you feel something I recommend you look into it.”
I nodded, waiting until he shot another blast towards the crowd and blew them off their feet, sprinting forward through them and putting down any that were still standing. I could feel something yelling out for help, screaming with its mind because its mouth couldn’t form the words. I had a sinking feeling that I knew exactly what it was, the hunters had made their approach once the fight was well underway and swinging away instantly, all of them eager to split the skull of a monster and work out the aggression they’d been holding onto since they’d been told they had to help.
My suspicions were confirmed as soon as I shoved my way through the crowd and looked towards the ground, Tristian struggling with a vampire that was clearly far too hurt to be able to fight back properly, every movement it made an effort to stop his stake from driving into their chest and killing them instantly. They hissed in pain every time the tip scraped against their skin, burning lines carving into the flesh and leaving smoke and a horrible smell in the air. He slammed his fist into their cheek, knocking them off balance enough that he could swing his leg over and mount them, putting his entire body weight behind the stake and pushing it steadily down, the vampire’s injuries catching up to them and leaving them to stare in horror as it slowly pushed into their chest.
I acted without thinking, thrusting my hands forward in a desperate effort to stop the young vampire from becoming yet another victim of prejudice in a time where we were working so hard to overcome that. I didn’t anticipate that not only would it shatter the stake into a thousand pieces, but it would snap Tristian’s arm at the wrist and shove him ten feet across the concrete. The scream that he let out when his arm broke was something that I was going to remember months from now, the look of hatred in his eyes something that I was going to see in my dreams. I wanted to go to him, to see how bad his injuries were and if there was anything I could do, but it was all I could do to keep the vampire that he had been assaulting down on the ground and not on their feet tearing his throat out.
The last I saw of him was when he spat a mouthful of blood out o
nto the ground, getting to his feet and making his retreat through the crowd, grabbing a few of his men on his way out and escaping out over the wall. I had a feeling that the next time we met it was going to be under very hostile circumstances, but I could hope that on that front I might be wrong. I’d managed to get these three groups to work together, it wasn’t impossible to think that a fourth could be possible.
“Just be still, you’re very hurt,” I said to the vampire, kneeling by their side and squeezing their hand. “You’ve already done enough fighting, any more and you might not be able to walk away from this.”
“Why did… you let him go?” They asked teeth clenched while they tried to push themselves up onto their elbows. “He’s just going to do it again, you could have solved it right here…”
“That’s not how we should do things,” I said, shaking my head. “Besides, if he died here the other hunters would make sure to kill as many of you as possible, I can’t take that chance.”
They let their head fall back against the concrete, laughing shakily while their bones started to reset themselves. “You’re too soft right now. But that’ll change,” They said, “That’ll change.”
I stood, making sure that no other hunters were around to take advantage of their injured state. “Just stay there ok? Wait until the fight is over before you do anything stupid.” I walked away, trying to see if I could find Damon. The situation was absolute chaos, seventy-percent of us were down on the ground or close to it, the amount still capable of fighting dwindling fast and already outnumbered by the injured. If there was a time that Alvin was going to make his appearance, this was it.
A thunderous snap sounded in the air right on cue, a hole ripping open in the ground and the man we had been aiming to see stepping free, flanked on both sides by a dozen of his closest men. The entire fight stopped, even those mid-punch letting their arms fall to their sides and staring in anger at the man who sought to pit them all against each other. He had almost succeeded, but unbeknownst to him, he had in fact not succeeded. It was all I could not grin in triumph as he stepped forward, arms out to his side in triumph as he walked over countless vampires and werewolves that he thought dead or dying, yet all were simply biding their time until I gave the signal.
“Is this it?” He asked, turning in place and searching the crowd until our eyes met. “Is this the fearsome force that you sought to gather against me? Torn apart from within not even a week after it formed?”
“And what of your little group of sycophants?” Joseph asked, stretching out a blood covered hand and pointing lazily at each of the witches dressed in black and red, the seeming official colors of evil. “Don’t tell me that you think a dozen of your worst and most foolish is what you consider enough to destroy us?”
“You? All… twenty of you? I would say that you did a fine enough job of destroying yourselves, this is just… mopping up.” A quick probe of his mind, no more than a half second told me that he really did think us almost completely wiped out. But that… couldn’t be right, he’d been such a shrewd opponent through this whole ordeal, how could he let his guard down now of all times?
Whatever the reason was, this was our chance to put an end to all of this, and I intended to take it as soon as I could. All I had to do was wait until the right moment… when his back was turned…
“I come marching out here, all dressed up and prepared for a most righteous cleansing, and what do I find but a group of half feral wolves, a vampire with no sense of decorum,” He scoffed, looking over at me with a sneer. “And a vampire’s painted up whore.”
From Damon’s roar of anger, it was obvious the insult had clearly carried over the crowd, my boyfriend bursting through the few still standing and sprinting towards Alvin with intent to kill written all over his face. With one simple flick of his hand, Alvin froze him in place, turning his back to me and walking towards Damon in preparation to kill him.
Arrogant ass, this was almost too easy.
Before his entourage could make a move and before he could discover my movements, I thrust my hands forward as hard as I could, Alvin managing to turn right at the last movement and deflect the blast of energy that I’d fired towards him, the pulse shooting off to the side and connecting with one of his witches. In hindsight it was probably bested that he deflected it, we needed him alive after all, but the sight of the witch crumpling into a broken heap as half her bones shattered into dust was something that I was going to be thinking of whenever I tried to eat.
The deflection hadn’t left him without injury though, cradling his arm close as the muscles seemed to flare with pulsing pain from having to absorb and release such a sudden burst of power. His eyes widened in horror as he realized he had been led into a trap, all hope for a speedy escape thwarted when the werewolves and vampires that had previously been laying still at their feet sprang to life and dragged the witches down to the ground, teeth clamping into necks and hands crushing skulls like dust. Their small battle was over so fast no one moved at first, not quite believing that it could be the case.
When it sunk in that he was alone though, everyone began moving fast, a circle forming around him of snapping jaws and clenching fists, every one of them eager to throw the first blow and make him feel their displeasure at being the object of attempted genocide. Though I needed him alive, I wasn’t exactly going to deny them their opportunity to cause a little pain.
They were about to move in when a gunshot sounded over the lot, every pair of eyes turning towards the entrance to see who could possibly be shooting at this time of night and in such a bad place. My eyes widened in shock when I first recognized the sound as one of our service weapons, hoping that I was wrong until I followed the arm that the pistol was held in down to the familiar shock of graying hair and the face that was so familiar to me from years of working together. Rick looked horrified, confused, most of all he looked like he was losing his mind, but he held his gun steady at us and spoke with the utmost confidence.
“Put your hands in the air and step away from that man!” He yelled, approaching us steadily and watching for the slightest of movements. “We can work this out, no need for anyone or… anything to get hurt.”
I felt the aura swelling behind me, knowing immediately what was going to happen right before it did, the wall of paranormals flying backwards as Alvin gathered energy in his uninjured hand and shot it out towards us, the barrier breaking and knocking us all to the ground as he made his escape, disappearing into the darkness of one of the nearby buildings before we could get to our feet.
I dragged myself up, about to chase after him when I felt Rick’s gun pressing into my back, my hands raising on instinct even as I wanted to grab the gun and toss it off into the darkness somewhere, and maybe him with it for good measure. “Rick, what the hell are you doing? He’s who we’ve been after all this time!”
“This is what you’ve been into this whole time? This… freakshow of wolves and… and parlor tricks?” I could hear the desperation in his voice, his profound need to know to clash with his inability to understand. I understood that well, up until a few months ago I’d felt the exact same. “Just… tell me what’s going on Amy.”
I sighed, “I can explain it all later Rick, I promise but… we need to get after him right now. If we don’t then a lot of people are going to die, good people who just want to live their lives.” I turned around slowly, feeling the barrel of his pistol sliding along my back until it was pointed at my chest. I looked Rick in the eye, making sure he could see how honest I was being when I said, “Please Rick, this is one of the most important things that we’ll ever do.”
He didn’t look happy at the idea of taking the gun off me, nor at the fact that answers weren’t forthcoming just yet, but he looked like he understood something very clearly; that he didn’t understand anything at all it turned out. He clicked the safety on, holding his gun down at his side and leading the way forward.
“You’re going to tell me what’s going on
after this, I’m holding you to that.” We stepped in through the door, immediately finding ourselves unsure of which way to go, the hallway stretching to the left and right of us into darkness. Rick shrugged, taking the left path and shouting back, “You go the other way, this is the best chance we have!”
“Ay ay captain,” I said, turning and running down the hallway, ducking my head through ruined doorways and expecting to see Alvin hiding in the corner, just waiting for the moment that our backs were turned before he either made his escape or attacked, but alas I couldn’t find hide or hair of him no matter how many doors I checked through and how much I tried to sense his presence. He was obviously trying to block me from his mind, and while I might be able to sense the blind spot if I was given enough time there was a very narrow window where we would be able to find him before he ran away for good.
By the time I ran out into the main area of the building, a large, open foyer that was more dust than concrete at this point, I’d accepted that I wasn’t going to find him searching room by room, and I likely wasn’t going to find him at all.
I am going to fucking kill Rick when I get my hands on him, I swear to god.
“Amy!” I heard his voice yelling out at me, my fists clenched when I turned to meet him. “Any luck out here? I haven’t seen him at all!”
“No,” I said through clenched teeth, “Haven’t seen him at all, wouldn’t have needed to if you hadn’t screwed everything up, to begin with.”
He raised his hands in an attempt to pacify me, but it wasn’t working at all. I had half a mind to drag him out there and perform the ritual with him instead, but something that flashed in my vision stopped me in my tracks.
“Amy?” He asked, tilting his head at me. “Is everything alright?”
There was a faint shimmer around his head, like static making everything stand on end, or like an… after image that was a millisecond behind every movement he made. But that wouldn’t make sense for me to be seeing, not unless…
