by Kipjo Ewers
Sophia retaliated with an arsenal of strikes she pulled from all three Ong Bak movies, as well as “The Raid: Redemption.”
The ground shook and trembled at she unloaded a barrage of elbows, forearms, knees, and shin kicks with the force and intention of breaking bone. The shots she got in could total a tank. Peace, however, was her physical equal and not without a fighting style of her own which also consisted of forearms, elbows, knees, and, when all else failed, picking up something heavy and hitting her with it.
First she picked up old dirt bike, clobbering her with it. She went to hit her again, but Sophia swatted the bike out of her hand opening herself up to a kick to her chest drilling her back first into a car. Peace charged going on the offensive. Sophia managed to sidestep her barreling through, using her momentum to slam her face first into the roof of the car. She did it a repeated three more times, caving in the driver side of the vehicle with her face.
Peace stopped the skull-bashing by using her forearms to block the next hit. She spun around delivering an elbow to knock her off. Sophia rolled with the hit gripping the driver side hood of the car. Lifting the entire vehicle up, she swung it with ferocity. In the split second before it connected Peace fired an eyebeam blast cutting through the car which ignited the gas tank blowing it up in both their faces.
Flames, smoke, and shrapnel was all Sophia saw for a couple of seconds, forcing her to spin around. It left her wide open for a chokehold crushing her breathing. Feeling Peace’s legs attempting to wrap around her, she widened her stance to keep from being pulled down knowing that if she succeeded it would be over.
Her first thought was to take to the sky and shake her off, but she would have to bring her legs together to achieve flight. Right now, between fighting to keep her chin tucked in, keeping her stance, using one arm to prevent a scissors leglock and the other attempting to pry one of her arms from around her neck in hopes of slipping out, Sophia was in very bad shape.
As she continued to struggle to break free of her Earth crushing grip, she felt intense heat generating near her face. The inside of Peace’s semi-clutched right fist began to glow as she focused on channeling raw energy in the palm of her hand.
“Science question for you Doc.” She seethed. “How much nuclear energy do you think is needed to blow up this dirt ball of a planet? Let me give you a hint, an estimated fifty thousand kilotons times sixteen thousand. Now the next question is how long you think it’ll take me to generate that amount of power.”
“No!” Sophia groaned.
She began to violently thrash around fighting to break free, but each move allowed Peace to cinch in her rear neck body scissor choke even tighter. She could feel the energy she was channeling increase with intensity as her arm moved from the side of her face near the back of her head. Sophia gurgled and fought to stay on her feet, as she struggled to grab her hand harnessing raw Earth killing energy, while attempting to keep Peace’s arm from sinking into her neck.
“Now… now,” Peace growled, “you can’t have both. You can’t stop me from finding an opening to tear your head off, and save the planet at the same time. You have to choose. Personally I’d choose the one I know I’d probably survive in the next sixty seconds.”
Sophia’s eyes became blurry. Her body trembled as her neck was losing the battle to stay tight. Her heart quickened as she realized in a couple of seconds if she did not stop struggling, everyone she loved and cared about would be dead in a flash. It was the opening Peace needed to finally slither her arm around her neck like a python, and clamp down around her with her body scissors lock. She dispersed the energy in her fist so that she could focus on pulling. On the first tug, Sophia’s mind went semi blank as she gasped at the immeasurable force she was using to rip her head from her torso.
Her body went into a violent seizure as she fought to remain on her feet through the ordeal. The only thought echoing through her mind was that she regretted wishing to die back in 2008. She wanted to live. Three days was not enough time, she needed more time.
“You know why I chose to exile you instead of killing you on the sand of the Sahara?” Peace snarled. “Because as crazy as this may sound, you were the only semblance of family I had. Whether you want to believe it …that nuke bonded us. All you had to do was stay gone. Now, this only ends one way.”
Sophia squealed as Peace continued to pull. Her eye began to flicker as she felt her neck about to snap in two.
“And just so you know, this little sacrifice of yours saved no one.” Peace whispered to her. “I intend to pull real slow…so I can hear you die screaming. And then I and your pretty little head will be making family visits… and my first stop will be…”
Her words were silenced by the shaking of the Earth and the sound of exploding glass. It was as if a fighter jet was flying at street level. She turned to see the source of the mayhem coming right at her. The topic of her unfinished sentence.
She became so transfixed on what she saw, her grip loosened, not bothering to evade what was coming at her. A screaming Kimberly delivered her version of the Infinite Mass Punch connecting with the side of Peace’s face. The entire area detonated with a seismic blast that shattered windows and brought down already weakened structures.
Peace sent flying lost her grip of Sophia. She crashed through several small buildings racking up mileage before slamming into the side of the Sugarloaf Mountain. A landslide of rubble buried her.
Sophia laid out on her side, curled up into a ball trembling and groaning as she clutched and cracked her neck while severely stretched vertebrae and torn muscle fiber began to heal. Kimberly landed and then ran sliding to her mother’s side to check on her.
“Mom! Mom! Are you okay?” she frantically asked.
Sophia, realizing it was her daughter, forced herself to sit up. She grabbed her looking her up and down and then into her eyes with rage and fright.
“Oh my god,” she screamed. “What did you do? What did you do to yourself! You promised!”
“I came to help you!” Kimberly responded with a hurt look.
“I don’t need your help!” Sophia screamed back. “This is not a stupid game or comic book!”
“I know that!” a frustrated Kimberly screamed back.
“Then you need to get out of here!” she sternly ordered her daughter.
“Mom, no!” Kimberly refused. “Let me help you!”
“I said to go!” she roared back at her daughter, “get out of here now!”
“Mother, no! Listen to me, dammit!” Kimberly screamed back at the top of her lungs.
Sophia fell quiet as Kimberly’s white glowing eyes blazed, mirroring her emotions. In that moment she saw anger and determination. She saw herself.
“Mom,” Kimberly calmed down a bit, “when this is over you can treat me like a little girl all you want, but right now I have to be your equal. If we don’t work together to stop Peace, a lot of people are going to die, and the planet might not survive. Your fighting could eventually destabilize the planet destroying it. Lady Tech told me this.”
Kimberly’s words brought Sophia to her senses. She turned to where a buried Peace laid. She figured they had less than a minute before she busted out. She realized her daughter had similar bracer gear to her own. Quickly she grabbed her arm sliding open the compartment revealing another personal computer.
“Did Lady Tech show you how to set this up?” she feverishly asked.
“No she…” Kimberly began to explain.
Sophia cut her off with a hand wave opening up the compartment to her own computer.
“Vincent, are you still with me?” she asked her personal A.I.
“I am still functional, Ms. Dennison,” he responded through her bracer’s speaker system.
“Can you patch into my daughter’s bracer,” she requested, “and then guide her to the location of the Eye of Ra?”
“Yes I can,” Vincent confirmed.
“Who?” a bewildered Kimberly asked.
&
nbsp; “Do it now,” she commanded him before turning to her daughter. “His name is the Eye of Ra. He won’t be too hard to spot. When you find him, tell him this.”
She quickly grabbed her daughter whispering in her ear. Kimberly’s eyes widened as she absorbed her mother’s instructions.
“Do you understand?” Sophia looked her in the eyes.
“Yes,” she rapidly nodded.
“Put this in your ear.” Sophia pulled out the earpiece from Kimberly’s bracer attaching it to her right ear. “Vincent will tell you where to go. Once you find him, text me immediately. Now go. Go now!”
An explosion of rock and rubble announced that it was too late as a savagely enraged Peace torpedoed herself toward Kimberly. Seconds before contact she was intercepted furiously by Sophia sending them both crashing and rolling to the ground. She managed to get a mounting position straddling her while holding her arms down.
“Go!” Sophia turned screaming at her daughter.
Kimberly shook herself from her frightened trance turning on her heels and, taking to the sky once again, flying as fast of her power could propel her.
Sophia turned her attention back to Peace only to get a head removing eyebeam blast to the face. She screamed as it felt like she was being scalded by a blow torch. Powering through it, she took her right hand gripping it around Peace’s eyes to block the beams. Peace retaliated by rifling Sophia’s ribcages with machinegun body blows and then backhanding her off.
Sophia rolled off springing to her feet, while Peace performed another Kip Up landing on her feet.
She does not wait as she performed her version of a flash step darting over to her and executing a whirlwind legsweep to the back of her legs taking her feet from under her dropping her on her back again. Sophia then leapt into the air roaring as she delivered a trademark Bruce Lee double foot stomp.
Peace employing her flash step to roll out of the way within milliseconds of being stomped as she cratered the ground going a good fifteen feet down.
Sophia blasted her way out of her hole taking to the air as an oncoming semi-truck was javelined at her. She eradicated it with a low level energy blast from her hand unaware that it was just a diversion tactic used by Peace to slam into her propelling them both into sky at crushing speeds.
˜ ˜ ˜ ˜ ˜ ˜ ˜ ˜ ˜ ˜ ˜ ˜ ˜ ˜ ˜ ˜ ˜ ˜ ˜ ˜ ˜ ˜ ˜ ˜ ˜ ˜ ˜ ˜ ˜ ˜ ˜ ˜
Back in Washington, Shintobe’s body was brutally cannoned through a skyscraper. She would have stopped if the building she tore through was not sheared in half by Wendigo’s sonic blast sending her slamming violently into another building.
Dropping a good twenty feet, she was able to get her feet underneath her landing on them. The impact blew out her right knee in the process. She used her right-handed sword to keep herself propped up. Her left- handed sword lost during the first impact of the building as she clutched her ribcage on the right side. Her breathing was shallow and difficult signaling that her ribs were cracked. If she stayed put a couple more minutes they would heal along with her knee.
The trembling of the ground and vibrating of the windows to darkcore music meant she did not have a couple of more minutes. She quickly pulled up her mask revealing her lips spiting some blood on the concrete before pulling it back down again.
Wendigo hovered ten feet from her with a sadistic Cheshire grin. She had been toying with her mouse, and now it was time to feast. With no striking distance and a bad wheel to run on, she prepared for the worse.
“Your music sucks ass!” she yelled, gripping her sword.
Wendigo raised her left hand delivering the killing blow.
It was delayed by Kimberly plowing into her. Her sonic shielding was the only thing saving her from being broken in half as they cratered the streets of downtown DC. Now in the heart of Wendigo’s sonic output her body shook, as her vision became blurry, and her brain felt as if it was about to explode from her skull, while she held onto the front of Wendigo’s trench coat.
Wendigo screamed and howled fighting to get away as part of her headset slid from her skull greatly reducing the effect of her sonic powers. A dazed Kimberly realized that she was trying to protect her iPod Touch.
Fighting through the soundwaves that could pulverize a normal human’s bones to dust while turning their brain to goo and exploding their heart, she tore the Apple device from her grip. The sadistic Wendigo was reverted to a sobbing bawling child reaching for her iPod.
Kimberly crushed it in her hand stopping the music and her power. Wendigo collapsed onto the ground wailing hysterically. She curled up into a fetal ball clutching and clawing at her skull unable to be consoled.
Kimberly stumbled around getting her vision back as her body and insides stopped rattling. Shintobe almost healed limped over to her.
“Thanks for saving my ass.” She placed a hand on her back. “You alright?”
Kimberly held a finger up as she turned and hurled up the remaining food in her system along with bile.
“Yeah, you’re alright,” she nodded.
“Have… to… find… Eye… of Ra,” Kimberly groaned.
“Don’t think he’ll be too hard to find,” Shintobe said.
Kimberly turned to where she pointed to see a purple and black fireball crashing two blocks up from them tearing up the street.
A rattled Revenant struggled to his feet as the Eye of Ra descended landing in the streets with a concrete cracking thud.
The second in command of the Zombie Nation wasted no time retaliating as he unleashed a stream of dark matter energy at the Egyptian demigod. Ra raised his staff absorbing it.
“We should help him!” Kimberly prepared to take flight.
“Hold on.” Shintobe placed a hand on her shoulder. “I think the big man wants to handle this little scuffle ‘hombre a niño.’”
“But we don’t have time!” A frustrated Kimberly turned to her.
“Trust me.” Shintobe gave her a pat. “I don’t think this will take long.”
The Eye of Ra waded through Revenant’s energy attacks advancing toward him with purpose. The dark matter wielder realizing that his streams and volleys were ineffective against him switched to channeling dark solid constructs. By focusing he created two ginormous fists which mimicked the physical movements of his own hands.
This show of power did not halt the Eye of Ra’s forward motion. Revenant roared as he threw a right haymaker that tore through the street heading straight for him. Ra responded meeting the blow head on with a cosmic charged right fist shattering the construct. It sent a shockwave which shattered windows and sent parked cars flying into store fronts. He continued to advance.
“Stay back!” Revenant frantically yelled.
This time he dropped his right constructed fist for a hammer blow. Using his staff, he created his own solid gold construct of an ancient Egyptian shield to both block and destroy his second attack on impact. His continued advancement broke Revenant’s nerve.
His first thought was to flee as he took to the skies, but a faster and stronger demigod also took flight getting face to face with him twenty feet up. With a backhand fist to the face, he swatted Revenant out of the sky dropping him awkwardly onto the hood and windshield of a Toyota RAV 4.
“Ooooh! He brought out the Egyptian pimp hand!” Shintobe cringed.
Kimberly quickly turned wondering who was this energetic and extremely vocal woman under the mask as they watched the one-sided beating taking place.
Revenant slowly rolled off of the damaged mini SUV as the Eye of Ra returned to Earth shaking the ground now towering over him. He held a hand up attempting to reason with him.
“Now… now.” Revenant displayed a twitching smile. “No need for any further violence. You’ve proven your point exponentially, dear sir. I surrender.”
“You must be punished for your crimes,” Ra’s voice calmly boomed from underneath his mask.
“Yes… I imagine I should be punished for my crimes,” Revenant nodded in agree
ment, “but not today!”
He lashed out with one final act of defiance touching the breastplate of his armor with his hand to absorb its properties and destroy it. Instead the armor temporarily changed to the black and purple color scheme of the dark matter energy he wielded before reverting back to gold.
“I… don’t… understand.” He fell back against the vehicle. “I have the power to absorb matter itself… I wield the darkest of powers…”
“But I wield the most oldest,” Ra answered, “one that gave birth to the universe itself.”
Before Revenant could truly plead for his life, the long metallic scorpion tail attached to the back of the Eye of Ra’s helmet coiled up and struck him deep in his right side taking him three inches off the ground before releasing him.