by Caleb Karger
The Betrayal jumped from one rooftop to the next. Each time she landed, her shoulder dug into my stomach. I tried to wiggle out of her grasp, but she held me with an iron grip. I looked back and saw Katherine catching up to us. She wasn’t alone, either. Spaz, Lily, Kavi, and Wolf were racing to catch up. Unfortunately, there was no sign of Hot Stuff or Castile.
I was starting to get a little dizzy from the sensation of momentarily flying over the streets between the buildings and the hard impact upon landing. It was like going over the big hill on a roller coaster and then crashing at the bottom. My stomach was bruising, and my dinner threatened to make a comeback.
My teammates were almost within reach when the Betrayal jumped as far as her legs could push her. The wind rushed through my hair. I looked down as we flew over a parking lot. We started to descend when the Betrayal kicked off of a tall billboard to keep up our momentum. I screwed my eyes shut; I knew whenever we landed it was going to hurt.
CLANG! We hit something metal. The impact threw me from the Betrayal’s shoulder. I slid across a cold, sleek surface. I opened my eyes as I rolled right off of the trailer on a semi-truck. I caught the edge of the trailer and whipped side to side as the driver freaked out. I pulled myself back onto the roof.
Wind blasted my face. I had to squint to see. I realized we were on the highway when I saw a bunch of red taillights surrounding us.
The Betrayal got up and stomped across the trailer to confiscate me. Suddenly, Katherine landed behind her, grabbed hold of her hood, and yanked her back. Katherine tried to stab the Betrayal’s stomach, but she missed as the Betrayal rolled to the side.
As she flipped onto her feet, the Betrayal’s bow transformed back into her two short swords. One swung for Katherine’s left arm and the other towards her right. Katherine leaned back, letting the blades swipe by harmlessly above her. Angered, the Betrayal struck the top of Katherine’s head. Her commander’s hat rang like a gong, and she seemed dazed for a moment.
Using the precious seconds she had before Katherine recovered, the Betrayal came towards me. Lily got in her way this time. Their swords collided and sparks flew in every direction. Then, Katherine lunged towards the Betrayal from behind. For a moment the Betrayal fought sideways, one sword was fending off Lily while the other tried to keep Katherine at bay.
Spaz, Wolf, and Kavi landed on the trailer. For a moment, they were reluctant to help the girls. The Betrayal was moving so fast she was a black blur. The boys tried their best to attack her. The Betrayal sent Spaz flying into the windshield of a car, knocked the wind out of Kavi, and slashed a deep cut into Wolf’s leg.
Next, Lily got hit so hard she fell onto the road. Cars honked and screeched as they tried to avoid running her over. I was about to go after her, but she hopped onto the roof of a car a second later. She skipped across the cars to catch up to us.
I looked back to see the Betrayal doing everything she could to get past Katherine. She punched, she kicked, she did all kinds of crazy flips in the air, and she tried to get a hand on Katherine to get her under her control again. I think the Betrayal realized she wasn’t going to win, so she gave up and tried to escape by jumping across the cars. Maybe she figured she could come back another time with reinforcements.
“Don’t let her get away!” I yelled.
“Wasn’t planning on it,” Katherine said and disappeared. I caught sight of her again bounding over the cars in the distance.
With a twirl of her sword, Katherine sent chunks of the highway, signs, and vines at the Betrayal. A chorus of breaking glass and crumpling metal followed as each projectile missed. The Betrayal was like a fly Katherine couldn’t swat.
I unsheathed my sword and flames burst onto the blade. I jumped onto the little Honda driving in front of the semi-truck I’d been riding. The moment I landed on the roof, I dented it. The woman driving squealed. The car jerked left and right. I hopped onto another car before I was thrown off. Only the same thing happened.
The drivers kept freaking out. They’d swerve and crash into a car beside them, or slam on their breaks and nearly throw me off of the roof. The wreckage was beginning to accumulate behind me, but I had no time to care. I was getting closer. I could feel the chill coming from the Betrayal’s body.
She must’ve known we were gaining on her. She spun around and fired a wave of arrows at us. Katherine and I scrambled to dodge them. One arrow hit the road and turned it into a sheet of ice. Cars went in every direction, drifting and fishtailing into each other.
The cars piled up into a wall of wreckage in front of me that nothing could get through. The truck I was riding hit the brakes, but there was no friction to stop in time. I braced as we crashed into the wall of cars. I flew forward.
I landed on the ice and slid across it on my stomach like a penguin. I got up, slid carefully to the edge of the ice sheet, and then sprinted to catch up to the rest of traffic.
I climbed onto a van when a lightning arrow flew past me and broke against a car beside me. A burst of winter air hit my side. Frost grew on my uniform and cold nipped at my skin.
At least ten cars ahead of me, Katherine reached the Betrayal. Their blades met, again and again, neither having the upper hand. Sometimes the Betrayal would retreat onto another car, but Katherine would be right on her heels.
I was panting as I tried to get to them. Katherine made a boulder appear out of nowhere and sent it at the Betrayal, but she ducked, and the boulder came straight at me. I froze a moment too long. The boulder caught my shoulder and knocked me over like a bowling pin.
I smashed into the road. The breath got kicked out of my lungs. A semi-truck drove over me, the tires almost squashed my fingers, but by some miracle, I rolled out of the way. The pavement shredded my uniform. Rocks and dirt flew into my eyes.
Like a fishing pole, I flicked my sword out in front of me. A lava-like whip shot out from the tip, and it wrapped around some car’s side-view mirror. The car’s momentum pulled me out from underneath the cars speeding over me. I pushed off of the ground and held onto my sword desperately.
I went skidding across the highway on my shoes like a water skier. I used the inertia to propel myself up onto the roof of another car. The lava whip shrunk back into the flames on my sword. I looked down to see my slippers were smoking and had lost all traction on the bottom.
The sound of the Betrayal’s and Katherine’s swords bashing together grew louder as they struck with all of their strength. Then, at last, Katherine’s blade sunk into the Betrayal’s chest. Only this didn’t seem to have any effect on our enemy. The Betrayal kicked Katherine hard enough to send her flying off of the highway. She gripped Katherine’s sword, pulled it free of her torso, and chucked it out of sight.
I growled and sent a flurry of fireballs at the Betrayal. The darkness lit up like the Fourth of July as my fireballs met a dozen lightning arrows. They canceled each other out on impact leaving a trail of sparkly snowflakes and embers.
Wolf flew over my head and landed on the highway barrier. He raised his arms like a conductor. The sound of sloshing came from underneath the highway. Then tall walls of water surrounded both sides of the road (we must’ve gone over a bridge). Mist tickled my forehead.
Wolf sent the water towards the Betrayal. It looked like the highway had flooded. Waves went crashing down the road, picking up cars and tearing down light posts. Before the water could overtake her, the Betrayal fired an arrow, and the waves froze.
A car flew towards the Betrayal. I looked back to see Spaz had thrown it. The Betrayal dove out of the way rolled back onto her feet and ran down the empty highway in front of her. We’d finally caused enough chaos that every car on the highway had come to a halt.
Before the Betrayal could get far, the concrete morphed into a hand and grabbed her. Katherine landed in front of her. Streetlights hopped towards the Betrayal and formed a cage around her. I saw Kavi controlling them. The rest of the team all closed in. Finally, we had her!
I climbed do
wn from the car I was crouched on and weaved my way through the narrow spaces between the wrecks. Confused people got out of their cars to figure out what on Earth was going on. I snatched the phone from someone who managed to take a picture of the frozen waves and crushed the device.
“Hey!”
I was only a few feet away from Katherine’s side when the lights went out. It wasn’t just the street lights, the car lights went out too. Buildings went dark, entire streets, entire area codes; the whole state went black. The only light came from the fire on my sword. Aside from that, the world seemed to have disappeared.
The people in the crowd cried out in fear. Even I had jolted. Blackouts had always startled me, but I knew there was no need to worry. The power would always come back on. Still, in that brief moment when I’d been sitting in the dark and nothing was working, I was scared. The power was all that separated civilization from pure anarchy.
Then a terrible noise tore through the darkness.
Sirens.
Chapter 20
My Fate
T hese weren’t the normal tornado sirens. These sirens sounded broken. The droning noise they made was warped like a distressed spirit. The sound filled every nook and cranny of the city. To hear it in the pitch-black only made it worse.
“You need to find a way to move buddy; I need to get home now!”
“Then you find a way to start my car, pal!”
More arguments sprouted up from the crowd. People tried to make calls and start their cars. When that didn’t work, they gave into their panic. I expected a fight to break out at any moment.
I looked into the darkness beside me, hoping Katherine was still nearby. “What’s going on?” I asked.
“I don’t know,” she said.
Out of nowhere flickering blue lights appeared. Some were on the streets below the highway. Some were on the rooftops. They made it look like we were surrounded by beautiful stars. I struggled to make out what all of the lights were. Then one of the lights came flying towards us, and I saw the unmistakable shape of a lightning arrow.
“Get back!” Katherine shouted. I started to freak out as I realized we were outnumbered and under attack.
The arrow struck the road. I half expected a blast to go off, but it looked like the arrow had been snuffed out. Feet scurried around me. Wolf yelled at Spaz to get out of the way.
“AAAHHH!!!” A blood-curdling scream filled the air.
“Light—we need light,” Lily said.
I shot a fireball into the air like a flare. It bathed the area in dim orange light. It was enough to see a green cloud of smoke emanating from where the arrow had hit the road. I could see Wolf dragging Kavi out of the smoke. Kavi’s body was twitching and jerking like he’d gotten electrocuted.
“Get away from the smoke.” Katherine punched the air and a stone dome formed around the smoke cloud.
The crowd by the cars shouted and ran in every direction. More arrows streaked towards us. Kavi continued his awful screams; his thrashing made Wolf lose grip on his arms several times. The team pulled back down an exit ramp, towards the towers of downtown.
When the next arrow hit, the air rippled like a shockwave moving away from a bomb. I watched it spread as I tripped over my feet. Once the rippling energy reached a car, it was crumpled and then torn apart until it was a bunch of useless scrap metal.
My eyes widened with terror. Some of the people in the crowd wouldn’t outrun it. Car after car got destroyed. Finally, the ripples caught up to a man. He didn’t have time to scream. He was folded over and squashed before exploding everywhere.
“Run! Run!” Katherine yelled. She turned me around and pushed me forward.
I almost ran into the arrow that struck the ground in front of me. Fearing what it might do, I leaped to the side. It exploded, and sizzling acid rained down on the team. The others shouted in pain but didn’t dare stop running.
We sprinted out of the spotlight cast by my fireball. In the madness, I’d ceased to feed the flames on my sword. I didn’t relight it for fear our enemies would see us. So, we were blind in the darkness. Someone ran into a trash can. Someone else hit a sign. Unfortunately, Kavi’s screams were giving our position away. Arrows continued to fly our way.
“Left! Go Left!”
I turned left and bumped into a brick wall. I scrambled alongside it, using my hands to search for a door. Suddenly, the wall disappeared, and I fell through the air. Someone grabbed my arm and pulled me into the building. A door shut behind me.
The whole building quaked. I could hear the street tear apart as the destructive ripples passed. Thankfully, it sounded like they were dying.
Now that we were indoors, Kavi’s screams bounced off of the walls. I set my sword on fire and held it up like a torch. We were in a stairwell.
Panting, Katherine crouched down beside Kavi. I winced when I saw him. His clothes were smoking. His exposed skin looked like ravioli after it had been attacked by a two-year-old with a fork.
“What happened to him?” Spaz asked, holding his arm where acid had eaten away at the skin on his shoulder.
“Some kind of poison,” Katherine said and pressed her hands to the concrete floor. The concrete spilled over her hands and formed a coating of protection. She reached into her belt and pulled out a tube that looked like toothpaste. She covered Kavi’s wounds with it. “I know it hurts, but you have to try to be quiet.”
Kavi nodded and chewed what was left of his mask. He squeezed his eyes shut. Tears ran down the sides of his face.
Everyone else sat dead silent. I shrank back against a wall. Dealing with one Betrayal was bad enough; who knew how many were out there, or what powers they had. They’d already taken down three of us.
Screams came from outside. We turned and watched the door, fearing someone would come barging in. I heard glass breaking and a dozen explosions. With each blast, we jolted and cringed. Who knew what was going on out there? Footsteps ran by the door. I raised my sword, prepared for an attack, but no one came through.
“We’re outnumbered,” Spaz said. His eyes were so big I didn’t need the firelight to see the whites in them. “They’ve got acid, and poison, and arrows that’ll rip you apart from the inside out! What’re we supposed to do?!”
“Can we call for backup?” Wolf asked.
Lily pulled her phone from her belt. When she tried to turn it on, nothing happened. “Yeah, good luck with that. With the power out, our monitors have no idea what’s going on down here.”
“Won’t they send people to check it out?” Spaz asked.
“We are the people checking it out. If we can’t contact them, they’ll probably assume we’re handling things,” Lily replied.
Katherine put the last bit of white paste onto Kavi’s skin. She sighed and shook her head, apparently feeling useless. I couldn’t tell if Kavi was stable enough to survive or not. He was still convulsing, but there was nothing else she could do for him. Katherine pulled a glow stick from her belt and rested it beside him.
“You’ll be safer in here. We’ll come back for you,” she said and stood up. She was the only one who wasn’t shaking or glancing back and forth at every noise outside. She pulled the concrete gloves from her hands and dropped them on the floor. “We’re going out there. Stay together. Do not go off on your own.” She approached the door and raised her sword. “They want a fight, so let’s give them a fight.”
The whole team gulped. That was easier for her to say. She was used to this sort of thing. Just how many fights had she gone through to not be affected by her nerves? I couldn’t help but admire her courage. I wished some of it could’ve rubbed off on me.
I was shaken up and downright terrified at the thought of going back out into the chaos. I kept debating whether I should ask to stay with Kavi or not, but I kept my mouth shut. I would be of better use out there, and none of the others were trying to chicken out.
I tightened my grip on my sword. My palms were sweaty. I took in a deep breath
to try and calm down. Katherine threw the door open and charged outside. Here we go, I thought and ran after her.
I could see about as much as I could when I’d come inside from a bright summer day. I could make out the shapes of the buildings because they were the darkest objects. Towards the middle of the streets, things turned a lighter shade of gray. Other than that, only the night sky was visible. Occasionally, little bursts of blue light would come from the rooftops.
The ground rumbled, it cracked and broke apart. The noise got the attention of our enemies. One by one the masks on the rooftops turned to us. Giant rocks the size of semi-trucks emerged from the broken ground. They hovered in place for a split-second then shot out in all directions. The boulders hit the rooftops like canons. Debris sprayed everywhere, and a handful of Betrayals were flattened. The rest prepared to shoot at us.
“Kaine! Being able to see would be useful,” Katherine said.
I swung my sword over my head. The fire on the blade extended outward like a lasso and formed a blazing ring all around us. The cool night air disappeared. The windows of the buildings around us lit up with the reflection. Now every Betrayal was visible.
A haze of arrows came at us. Before anyone could start running, Katherine sent up another round of boulders to deflect the arrows. Some exploded harmlessly against the buildings; others rebounded back to the Betrayals.
Spaz grabbed anything he could find on the streets. He threw cars, newspaper stands, and hot dog carts at the enemy. Lily fixed her stare on a guy perched on a balcony. He cried, grabbed his head, ran into the railing, and flipped over it. I heard a nauseating crunch that silenced his scream. Katherine continued the bombardment of boulders. It looked like rocks were raining from the sky.
Some of the Betrayals started to retreat. They disappeared from the rooftops. My unease began to subside. By some miracle, we were pushing them back. I sent fireballs at the few remaining in hopes to send them packing too.