Somehow the shirt had held together despite the abuse it had received.
I kept myself on guard for any tricks but I should have known better. He was too blunt for anything like that. He locked his fingers with mine and, without warning, he just started laying into me. Not being braced for it I was taken by surprise and lost the advantage.
The pressure on my hands began to increase, slowly, but I was able to match it for a while. Sweat broke out on my forehead and was, blissfully, wicked away by the mask. Up till then, despite the heat, I'd remained dry as a well-picked bone.
Every time he knocked the pressure up a notch I could match it but, somehow, I couldn't best it. No matter how deep I dug, he always had more, another layer of reserve. Tendons so taut they threatened to rip through our skin, muscle fiber tearing, sweat running down his face and my back, we stood there, straining against each other like Greek gods in a statue. We were beyond words. Even the grunts had stopped as we strained to get enough oxygen to fuel our bodies.
And then he found one last layer, one more burst of strength, and with a roar he pushed.
I couldn't match it. Slowly, fighting with every fiber of my being, I found my right knee was buckling, and I sank to the ground.
He screamed in victory and redoubled his effort. "I'm stronger! I'm stronger!"
I felt my fingers start to be pushed back. He was right. He was. As much abuse as he'd taken, as much pain as he must be feeling, he still had just that little bit more than me.
The blow to my ego would have to wait. Not losing my fingers was more important.
I only had a few seconds before something bad happened to me. I couldn't hold him off any longer. The problem was I wasn't in a good position to do much. I'd tapped reserves I didn't know I'd had just to get to where I was. Only one thing I really could do, and if it didn't work...
I gritted my teeth and threw myself to the side, pain flaring up each of my fingers as he sought to hold on till the very end and failed. I had yanked my arms as hard as I could and had thrown him, his own bodyweight and strength fueling the throw. I had no idea how far he flew as I collapsed on the grass, struggling to catch my breath as talons of white-hot flame burned lines of agony into my brain.
My arms and legs were weak as I tried to get back up. I couldn't find my center, I couldn't get balanced, and I'd overtaxed every part of my body and mind. Memories, voices, explosions of color and sound blasted through me, pulling me back down. I saw a dog I'd fed for a week in a Central American village before we'd had to bug out. I watched again as he stepped on a land mine trying to follow me into the bush. A baby cried in a crib, her mother tied to a bed and cut from crotch to breastbone. She'd been gang-raped by some dictator's soldiers before being murdered. I saw the maggots squirming in and around her eyes, her spilled intestines, the baby screaming and screaming and screaming...
I was crawling, my body and brain warring with each other. The grass was warm under my palms, the hot sun almost a pressure on my back, but inside my head all I heard were explosions and screams, all I saw was flames, blood, death.
They came faster and faster, bleeding into each other until it became a giant panorama of pain. My hands hit the wall and I clung to it, the warm concrete a solid presence in the landscape of suffering in my mind. I bit down on my lip sharply, the jolt pulling me back to reality long enough to see the sun blot out above me before getting sucked back in.
A voice that came from outside of my head pierced deeply enough to register. I heard the words, understood them, but couldn't make sense of them. "I'm stronger."
I'm stronger.
Something hit me. I couldn't feel it but I saw the explosion of white light, the blissful cessation of noise and sight. I felt my body jerking as more blows landed, unable and unwilling to stop myself from being thrown around. Alas, the peace was short-lived and my body quickly started reporting the damage.
I snapped back to reality in time to see and feel a ham-sized fist with reddened knuckles turn into a blur and another explosion of light as it slammed into my eye. My head crashed into the wall and bounced back, jarring my teeth and scrambling my thoughts momentarily.
Enough of this.
I ducked the next punch, driving my own fist into his gut. It sank in just enough to say it did before it hit what felt like a rock wall. He was forced back a step and grunted as the air in his lungs air was blasted out between his teeth.
I felt the blood trickling out of the corner of my mouth because it itched. A quick probe with my tongue found a few spots where the skin was broken inside my mouth. I couldn't remember how that'd happened, but I could guess.
"You're stronger," I gasped, loud enough for him to hear. No sense in denying it. The admission cost me less than I thought it would. Admitting and accepting the truth rarely does.
He laughed, a manic gleam in his eyes matching the hysterical tone of the laughter. "I am the strongest!" he bellowed, throwing his hands over his head in triumph. Before I could react he balled both his fists together and swung, connecting squarely in the middle of my chest. Pain flashed through my body and my feet left the ground.
I cannoned off his fists; the wall not even slowing me down as I went through it, into the street. I knocked protesters off their feet, injuring many of them, and smashed into a large luxury-class SUV that just happened to be driving by at the time. The solid-steel frame finally stopped me, but not before I tipped it on its side and sent it sliding across two lanes of traffic, into a metal utility pole. It hissed and snapped, bending threateningly but not breaking. The SUV's horn droned, joining the moans and screams of the injured, adding another note to the symphony of destruction surrounding me.
I couldn't drown out the pain as I lay on the road, my back and chest arguing with each other for which hurt worse. It was all I could do to open my eyes. I couldn't even turn my head to stop my cheek from burning to the asphalt.
I saw a little girl, about maybe eight, holding someone's hand and screaming for all she was worth. "Mommy! Mommy!" she yelled, pulling on the hand. It was still attached to an arm, and the arm was attached to a body, but the woman's head had been crushed by a large piece of fallen masonry.
I could make out the tears running down the little girl's face.
I tried to push myself up but the pain was too great and I collapsed again. I had to move, had to get up. Clarence was coming and if I wasn't up and moving I'd be dead.
I heard something creak and crack ominously. I forced my head to turn so I could look at the wall. Goddamn it! He was pushing the wall over!
"Move!" I tried to yell but it only came out as a croak. Damn it! I dug and dug deep. Somewhere there had to be a reserve I hadn't tapped, some reservoir of energy left I could use.
Seek and ye shall find...
I pushed myself up with one arm and tried again. "Move! The wall!" I got out, pointing with the arm not holding me up. "Get out of the way!"
People saw and screamed, grabbed friends and family, pulled them away. Small pieces were falling already, raining down like small hail, bouncing off people and making them wince.. I struggled to my feet. I had to move, had to get out of the way --- the wall was tall and thick. I didn't want to be under it any more than anyone else out there.
Still the little girl didn't move. "Mommy! Mommy!"
A large piece fell and shattered, shrapnel from it peppering me like rock salt from a shotgun and every bit as painfully. The cracks were wide and deep and the wall was tilting. Soon it'd reach the tipping point and it'd fall fast and hard, crushing anything underneath it.
"Mommy!"
I limped, my left knee not wanting to bend, as fast as I could; forcing myself to ignore the pain and the voices that tried to pull me down. Almost there...
With a crash the broken section of wall passed the tipping point started to tilt, two large chunks shearing off ahead of the main part. I could see where they were going to fall...
I threw myself at the girl, shoulder-checking her, wrapping
my arms around her and trying to put my body between her and the lamppost on this side of the road I knew we were going to ---
I slammed into the metal pole hard enough to crush the decorative base. I almost lost consciousness, but I held her --- that screaming, wriggling little girl --- away from the impact. I just hoped she didn't see that I'd pulled her mother's body a good distance before she'd had to let go --- or that her mother was now little more than a greasy, bloody smear underneath a huge chunk of broken wall. I held her for a second longer before I let her go. Her frightened sobs helped keep me from letting the voices, the pain, and the fatigue win.
"Mommy!"
I didn't see where she ran to when I made myself stand. I kicked the stiff leg three times, finally getting the joint to pop. Sharp pain flared up my leg but the relief I felt at my knee working again was more than enough to counterbalance it. The voices quieted. I took a couple of deep breaths and let whatever parts of me that could relax do so.
"Come out, come out, wherever you are, boy!" came a sing-song shout. Clarence appeared through the thinning dust cloud, standing on top of the largest lump of wall. "We've got to finish playin'!"
My mind was clearing faster than the cloud. I could see the dust, feel the particulates move as it swirled through the air. It wouldn't take much, just a thought, to send it all flying at him.
He looked quite surprised as the rapidly-thinning dust cloud coalesced itself into a ball and shattered against the side of his head. He fell off the wall fragment and I was on him a split-second later, so filled with rage everything I looked at had a red tinge to it. I was kicking, stamping, driving my foot into his stomach, his back, his head. The blows landed fast and hard, driving him into the sidewalk until it cracked and pieces of it went flying into the air.
I bit down on the anger before it totally overwhelmed me and stopped kicking him. I bent down and grabbed his hair, jerking him to his feet roughly. He was stunned and unable to stand by himself, his breath coming in rough gasps.
"You're stronger," I said, my voice so cold the grass behind us started to frost. "But I'm better."
With that I brought my knee up and pulled his head down with every last bit of strength I could muster or steal from the movement around me. My knee hit his nose and, to my surprise, I felt it give. The sound of his face hitting my knee was muffled by the dust still in the air and the cloth covering my leg, but it was still loud enough to hurt my ears. I let him fall backwards, his hands clutching his face and some high-pitched, animalistic screams flying out of his mouth.
I sagged, my knees trying to drop me on the ground again, but I caught myself on part of this section of the wall that hadn't fallen. I was tired, I was in tremendous pain, and I knew we weren't done yet.
But whatever else might be said, I'd done the impossible. I'd dislocated The Justice Fiend's elbow, yes, but I'd also broken his fucking nose.
I could hear him kicking the ground behind me as he rolled around, whimpering in pain. There was no way he was going to just shake that off.
I had to rest for a few moments. I'd have liked a lot longer, but I didn't have it. I had to put him down and I had to do it now.
"You ready, big boy?" The words were out before I could stop them. I was angry, I was hurting, and some part of me wasn't going to let him get away with it. "Because this is going to end now."
Some part of him was still functioning because he stopped rolling around once he got himself on his stomach and started crawling toward the gap in the wall.
I pulled him to his feet and spun him around. The bruise on his face was already bad, but the big thing was the blood. I'd made The Justice Fiend bleed.
"Well aren't you pretty?"
He spat. The gob caught my mask somewhere on my cheek and fell off. "Fuckyou," he managed through swollen and bleeding lips. A thick string of bloody snot started to curl out of his nose, propelled by sobbing gasps.
"Oh, the mouth on you!" I drove my fist into his gut, amazed at the lack of resistance. He doubled over and vomited a large, reeking mess on my shoes. It was almost like he wasn't even a super anymore. The beating had taken it all out of him.
And that was it. The part of me that was still detached and rational crowed in triumph. That was his big secret. As tough as he was, it was ablative --- beat on him long enough and hard enough and he got weak.
"Such a mouth. Your daddy must have loved it. You throw up on him, too?"
He had some reserves left and I must have touched a nerve because he threw himself at me again, grabbing me and throwing both of us into the street. A roar of primal fury echoed in my ears as he rained blow after blow on me.
I just laughed. I was beyond pain, beyond anything he could do to me. I backhanded him once, knocking him off me and onto his back. I got to my feet and grabbed him, pulling him to his.
"I guess what they say is true. You can take the redneck out of Georgia but you can't take his father's dick out of his ass, huh?" I drove my fist into his face twice, but there wasn't much on them. There didn't need to be. His head snapped back and he staggered, the thick string of bloody mucus still hanging from his nostril finally breaking and falling to the ground in a strange, almost graceful way. He was still on his feet, somehow, and I could feel my own breaking point approaching fast. It was time to put him away.
I reached out, slowly, and grabbed his throat. I squeezed as hard as I could without breaking his neck. His eyes got wide and he tried to pull me off, his norm-weak fingers scrabbling ineffectively against my wrist. I lifted, slowly, holding him off the ground and letting him choke for a few seconds. Then, almost casually, I drew my arm back and slammed him into the asphalt. He bucked once and then lay there, basically still, but with his chest still rising and falling. His eyelids fluttered and I could see that he was still barely conscious.
He was alive. That was more than I could have said if our positions had been reversed.
I stared at him like that for about fifteen seconds. He was beaten, bleeding, defeated, but it wasn't enough. There needed to be something more. He needed something to remember this by, something he'd fear for the rest of his life. It was the only way. Men like him never gave up unless they had reason.
I knelt beside him and took his arm. Bruises were forming along its length, small scratches and abrasions almost hidden by the thick hair seeping blood and plasm, making it slippery under my gloved hands.
It was a simple matter of leverage --- I put his forearm against my shin and with an effortless jerk I shattered both bones.
He screamed, consciousness returning fully as he clutched his arm against his chest. I waited for a five count before I slapped his face with my left hand. "Open your eyes."
I slapped him again. "Open 'em, goddamn it!"
I grabbed his face and screamed. "Look at me, you fuck!"
His eyes opened; pain and shock painting terror even through the blood and swelling.
"Look at me," I said, ripping the mask off. "Look at me."
"You!" he hissed, panic overpowering even the pain. "You!"
The punch that knocked him out was a kindness. It hit the point of his jaw precisely and sent the remains of his conscious mind somewhere else.
I sat down, heavily, and winced. Was I ever going to be sore in the morning.
The realization that there was going to be hell to pay in a minute or two was there, somewhere, buried in a part of my mind that was still rational, still sane, but it failed to register. Revenge, rage, and hate had fueled me and pushed me past my ability to control it.
The part of me that felt responsible for anyone other than myself, that I'd fought so hard to bury after Magda had left me, that the scientists and doctors at Alpha Zulu had tried to burn out of me with tests and conditioning, that the serum had suppressed, had been screaming at me since I'd woken up with Venom watching over me. I'd managed to ignore it till now. But now...
Now it had a voice. A little eight year-old girl, screaming, holding her mother's dead hand, trying
to get her to stand back up.
I couldn't move. Well, that wasn't true in the strictest sense. I could move --- I was breathing and blinking, my heart was beating, I was even swallowing once in a while, but really conscious movement seemed beyond me for the moment.
The reek of hot metal and ozone oozed off me.
I could hear moaning and cursing and crying and other assorted people noises, but no sirens yet. I didn't dare risk turning my head for fear I'd find I couldn't.
And I hurt. There wasn't a part of me that didn't hurt somehow; either in direct response to an injury or in sympathy for something else that did.
A fly landed on my face and I tried to wave it away without success. Overall I considered the exchange a net gain; my arm moved, albeit slowly and weakly, but I got to know what it felt like to have a fly crawl around inside my nose. A net gain, yes, but only barely.
A cloud drifted overhead, mercifully blocking the sun for a few moment. I took advantage of the opportunity and wiped some of the sweat beading uncomfortably on my brow. The mask made a nice mop, soaking up and wicking away all the moisture it came into contact with. I worked some saliva into my mouth and swallowed, trying to rid myself of the dust and blood flavors I'd been dealing with since my first trip through a wall. It didn't work, but it did moved enough grit so that after I spat a gob of something gray onto the ground I could close my mouth without it crunching.
I had to get up. I had to do something for some of the people who'd been hurt, see if anyone was alive still in the SUV I'd been thrown into.
Using the wall for leverage I forced my legs and arms to move, to push, to propel me slowly, painfully, up. I could feel every rough edge, every jagged corner digging into my skin even through the tough fabric of the costume as I rose, feeling very un-phoenix-like, to a standing position. A stiff breeze would have knocked me over, but I was upright.
In the distance a siren started wailing. I had no way of knowing which direction it was going or coming from, but it made me feel a little better. The moans of the injured protesters and bystanders hadn't changed in intensity, but I was amazed at the lack of shouts, or coherent orders. Where was the anger? Where was someone to direct help, or even perform basic first aid? Was the Guild just going to sit this one out despite the damage, the hole in the wall, and the outright culpability hanging around their necks? What of the PR damage? What of the blood running into the street right in front of their fucking headquarters?
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