No, not The Scimitar, he is not called that anymore...
The man who had done this to him, he was gone, his body completely vaporised by the explosion. But his powers for some reason had remained. The terrorist’s gravely wounded form absorbed them, brought him back to life. Even some of his attacker’s memories too. But they were just fragments, pieces. They’ve yet to make sense.
One day they will.
The Scimitar marches on, towards civilization in the distance. No, he has a new name now. A new name...
This city, this place he keeps seeing. He must go there. His attacker was from there.
It shall be destroyed.
It is inevitable.
Nine
Lily never really stayed in one spot for long. She was always on the move, always looking for someplace else, someplace better.
She hadn’t found it yet.
She often had thoughts about returning to Port City, but she resisted them. She can’t go back there; it was where she had lost her parents. It was still too painful, that’s why she left.
Still, even after all this time she hadn’t yet found a place that even felt close to home.
Lily had come to the resort town on the coast. She’d been here before, once on a weeklong holiday with her parents, probably the only time they ever took a vacation out of the city. But it was such a long time ago; she could barely even remember it.
Back then Seahorse Cove was a quiet, laid back piece of paradise, but in the time since it had grown exponentially. High rise hotels overlooking its long sandy beaches, a casino under construction high above the town’s namesake. A brand new water park. Bars and clubs lining the main street as far as the eye can see. A real burgeoning tourist hotspot.
But with growth came vice.
The burger joint seemed quieter than usual, even for this time of night. The staff were away in the back, the two or three other customers had kept to the shadows. A chirpy group of young women, out of towners like herself, had come in earlier and ordered take away.
She guessed that they didn’t know they were in a bad part of town.
Lily exited to find a group of men had surrounded these girls and their vehicle. Ten at most, they had boxed in their car at the darkest, most isolated reaches of the parking lot. A calculated move.
The women were agitated, frightened. They wanted to leave but the men wouldn’t let them. They needed help.
Lily pulled her hood down.
They immediately noticed her approach. The catcalls came immediately. They weren’t scared or intimidated, they thought they had this under their control.
They were wrong.
“How about you leave them alone?” she ordered the group in her fiercest voice. They laughed at her, loudly. One called her a dumb bitch. Others called her worse.
“Or what?” the bitch caller enquired, pulling out a blade, intending to frighten the vigilante. It didn’t work.
“Or do your worst.” she muttered as she extended the baton in her hand.
Ten was the most she ever took on at once. She handled them the way Seth had always done: hit and run, using her powers to disappear and reappear at will, to strike them on all sides before they even knew she was there...
It worked devastatingly. She took down each and every one of them quickly, using her baton to deliver stinging blows as she covered the girls’ escape in their car and away from this place. Some of the more stubborn ones continued to get up and fight on but she just rained down more pain on them. Lots of pain.
Their bodies bruised and their egos hurt, Lily let the attackers retreat but not before they promised her retribution, revenge. Not just from those that were there, but from everyone they could muster. Their friends, their brothers. The whole gang will hunt her down and kill her.
She said she looked forward to it.
She wiped the blood off the baton before again stowing it away under her jacket. Only later did she discover that this same gang had been the ones terrorising the town for months. For some reason they ran unchecked, left to wreak chaos in the streets and back alleys away from the lights of the tourist strip. They felt invincible, free to do what they pleased. Robbery, carjacking. Drugs. Rape. Murder.
This gang. Lily always wanted to make a difference.
This will be her first project.
It took her a little detective work to find out where they usually gathered. An old bar, in one of the more dangerous parts of town. It seemed that many in this place, the police, those behind the new tourist developments had ultimately turned a blind eye to their presence in this town. She didn’t know why they did, nor did she really care.
Lily would not turn a blind eye to this.
Many of those she had beaten were there, still nursing their wounds. They were surprised by her sudden presence; some cowered, others were itching for their chance at revenge.
There were too many of them. They rushed for her. It was fight or flight. She didn’t want to flee. She wanted to stand and fight.
She drew her baton.
She fought bravely against the mob but it quickly became clear she was out of her depth. They came at her, like an immense wave of anger. She loses the baton. She is punched in the face. They drop her to the ground. They kick her while she’s down.
She gritted her teeth trying to fight past the pain as she struggled to pick herself off the floor. They wouldn’t let her. Her fingers started tingling.
Lily screamed.
She shoved forward her hands as a blinding blast of bright light pushed the mob away. Rabid, she launched herself at her attackers with fists that seemed enveloped in white fire, the strikes burning through the gloves that she wore. She quickly discarded them, still smouldering to the ground.
In the brief pause she looked down at them, her hands, her fingers. Again they tingled. Again they glowed.
Another came in, swinging for her face. She sidestepped before striking him so hard in the stomach in made him cough up his dinner. She continued to attack as they again surrounded her. There were just too many of them.
She closed her eyes. She tried to that thing. She tried to blink.
Nothing.
The pit in her stomach grew as she came to the realisation. She had lost it. Her new powers, these new powers meant she had lost the ability to blink. To escape.
So now, she had to run.
She had lost most of them through the network of side streets that criss-crossed the old neighbourhood like a maze.
Key word: most.
Three were still on her tail, still doggedly after her. They chased her towards a dead end. One drew a knife, a long one. He intended to use it.
She quickly pondered what she could do. The blade worried her; melee combat would be too risky – he could slice open her gut before she could even get a swing in. What else?
Her fingers tingled again. This energy, could she project it? Could she fire it, she thought to herself...
Could she?
As the man dashed towards her, she pushes forward her hand. In a flash of light, the bolt of energy erupts from Lily’s palm, a fiery bright white ball of plasma. It streaks quickly towards her attacker, impacting him square in the chest, its energy washing all over him as his knees suddenly buckle and he collapses to the ground. Letting go of his blade, it crashes to the ground with a clang as his face hits the concrete, knocking him out cold.
One down, two to go.
“Woah.” she mutters, softly, breathlessly. There’s an odd taste in the air, she can feel it on her tongue. Metallic. Electric. Lily looks to her hand. Again, no wounds, no burns. It seems just fine...
The two men left standing rush for her. Lily quickly shoots off another bolt with her other hand. The first man goes down. She switches hands again. She winds up, this time for show.
“Incendio!” she shouts as another bolt streaks from her palm. The third quickly goes down too.
Again, that taste hangs in the air. She grins.
“Cool.
”
In the weeks that followed, her one woman war continued. Lily continued to harass the gang, slowly dismantling their operation across town. Destroying their transport, scaring away those that supported their drug network. Putting the fear of god into any wannabe members. Buoyed by her success, even the authorities had started to act against them after sitting out for so long.
Finally, she thought to herself.
They followed her that night on one of her patrols. More initiates, just some dumb kids. They thought they could ambush her. They were wrong.
It was another lopsided fight, as Lily took down her would-be attackers in the space of thirty seconds. The pummelling only ended when the young man in the yellow hoodie raised his hands in surrender.
“He wants to speak with you.” he told her as he trembled. He looked so young.
She let him go.
Ultimately she let them all go. They were all just scared children, some not even out of high school yet. Is that who he was sending out now? Jesus Christ.
In these past few weeks she had learnt who he was, where she could find him. It was time to confront him, the man behind all this distress.
She’ll be ready.
The men pulled open the huge metal doors of the warehouse. This was the place.
She came face to face with the man that called her here. A failed MMA fighter, the son of a retired cop, this once quiet town was his home. Ambitious, he left as soon as he could, to look for fame and fortune elsewhere, but found none. Now he came back, drawn by all this new wealth, all this new opportunity. He knew this place, and used his knowledge to make a buck, to push people around, to give him what he wanted that he could not find on his own.
A bully was all he was. A bully.
“So you’re the cunt causing me all this trouble huh?” he smirked at her, not bothering to hide his air of contempt.
“Yeah, I’m the cunt.” Lily replied bluntly,
He smiles.
“So what do you want to do to me? You wanna fight me? Come on – fight me.”
He puts his fists up. He grins.
Lily stretches out her arm, charging a bolt in her palm. She throws it at her opponent, who braces himself by puffing out his chest.
It strikes him. He still stands. His underlings cheer him on.
Lily throws another bolt. Another. He dodges them like a fleet footed dancer. He quickly crosses the distance between them, again raising his fists. He swings at her, she dodges. Lily tries to strike back with her own hand but he blocks her attacks effortlessly.
He weaves, he moves. He sucker punches her right in the face.
Another punch. This time, it fells her.
Dazed, Lily finds herself unable to move as her opponent marches over, lording above her. He smirks, bemused by her predicament as he raises his boot to stomp on her skull...
Opening her hands wide, Lily blasts herself across the ground, propelling herself away with a sudden burst of energy fired from her palms. Sliding across the concrete floor, she almost crashes into the wall behind her as she manages to get away from his grasp. Picking herself up, she doesn’t have much time before her foe again immediately goes right for her.
She launches a bolt, it hitting him square in the chest. It doesn’t stop him. She launches another. This time it slows him, knocking him off kilter. Another.
She launches bolt after bolt at him, her wrath driving her fervour. They slam into him, but he still kept pushing forward like a freight train. Lily continued to attack, concentrating hard. He wanted to put this bastard down.
She threw one last bolt with all the force she could muster. It struck him, and set his skin on fire.
The man screams as the flames engulf him as his remaining followers run in terror. Snapped out of her violent trance, Lily can only mutter...
“Oh god.”
Lily pulls off her hoodie and runs to the burning man, covering his body with it. She smothers out the flames but she is too late; the burns are still horrific.
She stares at him, unsure what to do as he lies whimpering in the foetal position on the hard concrete floor. Only the smashing of glass breaks her stare.
She turns towards the noise. She could hear them breaking in. Law enforcement. The police quickly stride in, surrounding her, surrounding him, still smouldering.
“Step away from him!” they shout, their guns raised. “Get away from him you psycho!”
“I didn’t mean to!” Lily pleads. “I didn’t! I just wanted to stop him...”
Still, despite her words they ignore her. They advance on her. In her panic, a bolt erupts from her hand, striking a cop in the chest.
“Shit! Shit!”
They fire upon her as she dashes for cover, trapping her behind a sea container. Out of options, she holds out her palm again.
“Hopes this works.” she whispers.
Raising her right hand skyward, Lily blows a hole in the ceiling. With chunks of concrete and steel beams falling down all around her, she points both her palms towards the floor, using her energy blasts again as jets that propel her body up into the air.
Under the cover of the billowing cloud of dust and debris, Lily flies off into the night sky.
Night soon turned into day. Lily flew on, not knowing where to go.
Below her the chain of islands stretched on. An archipelago, like green jewels floating in a beautiful deep blue sea. The hot sun continued to beat down on her, sapping her strength with its unrelenting heat, almost blinding her with its bright rays...
She did not see the low flying plane coming.
She panicked. Unable to regain control, she began tumbling out of the sky. With the combined forces acting upon her, it was not very long before she blacked out.
Lily fell into the sea, where the currents pushed her unconscious body towards the shore and onto the soft sand of the sandy beach of the island.
It was not too long before the man in the bucket hat found her.
Ten
The salty smell of the ocean that collected in her nostrils slowly stirred Lily awake.
She found herself lying in a basic camper’s cot, the flapping canvas roof of the tent sheltering her from the mid-morning sun. She could hear the waves crash onto the beach outside, a constant rhythm filling her ears. She lifted her head up.
Ooh, dizzy.
Lily lies back down again in brief relief. A soft breeze travels up her body, chilling her. Only then does she realise that she is dressed only in her underwear.
“What the hell?”
Seeing her clothes hung up in the corner, Lily bolts up, grabbing them and quickly slipping them on. She turns towards the light outside only to find a figure blocking her way. Instinctively grabbing hold of the closest thing next to her – a flimsy fishing rod, once again Lily prepared to fight...
“Woah woah woah!” the man in the bucket hat pleads, raising his hands in the air.
“Where am I?” she demands of him. “What did you do to me?”
“You washed up on this island. I pulled you out of the water.” he answers.
“Why did you take my clothes off?”
“You were soaked. Hypothermia kills quickly. I was doing you a favour.”
She continued to stare at him. She snorts. This man was no threat. She lowers the rod.
“Out of my way.” she orders him.
The man steps aside, out of her way and out of the tent as Lily marches out, taking the rod with her. Pushing aside the canvas flap, she comes face to face with the sight of paradise before her.
For a brief moment, she’s awed by it.
“A boat comes in the morning.” the man in the bucket hat says to her. “You can leave then.”
She hands the fishing rod back to him.
She sighs.
“Maybe I don’t want to leave yet.”
Sunset. She’s been out here all day.
The man found her sitting on the beach, just staring out over the ocean, fixated on the breaking waves.
No, on her own thoughts.
“Why did you set that man on fire?” he asked her. The enquiry took her by surprise.
“What?”
“The leader of that gang. You set him alight.”
“How do you know about that?”
He smirks. “I just know. I know a lot of things.”
He sits down next to her.
“I’ve met others like you, with abilities like you. I’ve helped them; I can help you.”
“Sure, whatever.”
A moment. She sighs.
“I lost control. I was angry at the guy, angry at everything he stood for. He was a bad man, but I got carried away. I didn’t want to hurt him like that, just stop him. I want to do good. But that... that just went too far.”
“He’s in hospital right now.” he tells her. “He’ll live.”
“It doesn’t make me feel better though. I just lost it. I can’t be a hero...”
“Like I said, I can help you Lily. Help you focus these powers, help you be who you want to be...”
Lily snorts. “Why should I listen to you? You’re just a stranger in a bucket hat...”
The man rises to his feet. He dusts the sand off his hands.
“Am I?”
He suddenly throws an energy blast rocketing down the beach. Colliding with a palm tree, the force and energy of it shatters the plant into splinters.
It leaves Lily speechless. He again dusts off his hands, this time for show.
“Woah...”
Lily looks to him.
“Who are you?”
“Well, my friends call me Doug.”
“Doug?”
“Yep. Doug.”
She smirks.
“So Doug, how can you help me?”
“You know you have power. Now you must learn finesse and control.”
Doug put the last coconut on top of the wooden pole buried in the sand. There was a whole row of them: targets for training.
Lily smirks. “Easy.” she says.
“No no, not so easy.” counters Doug. “Knock them down - yes you can, but can you do it without breaking anything?”
Open Your Eyes (Book 2): Blink Page 4
