by Danny Bell
Chalsarda went pale. Paler than normal. She didn’t speak, so I continued. “I lied to myself. I told myself that there was only one way, that I wasn’t rushing to power, but I knew it wasn’t true. Abarta is a shitty, small god, but he’s still a god. He could’ve solved all of this, but I didn’t want his help. I couldn’t take his help. Not after what he did to you.”
“And you,” Chalsarda added softly.
“And me,” I admitted. “But mostly you. I told you—you’re family. What he did to you—hell, even just what I know he’s done to you—I don’t know that I can ever forgive him.”
Chalsarda looked forlorn and wrapped herself in her mossy green cloak, soaked as it was. “That staff reminded me of someone,” she started, not finishing her sentence.
I knew who she meant, but not wanting to rat Ann out, I asked, “Would you like to talk about them?”
Chalsarda made an almost imperceptible attempt to control her breathing before replying, “No.”
Neither of us said anything after that, we just sat there on the metal steps bathed in fluorescent white light, each of us thinking thoughts that the other couldn’t possibly read. This is what trauma looked like, and as much as I loved her, I didn’t know how to reach her in that exact moment.
“I’m going to take this seriously,” I said softly, looking at my feet. No one said anything else for a moment, and just as Chalsarda looked up to say something, we were interrupted.
The crackle of the radio in my pocket was overpowering, as its tiny hiss filled the room. “Elana!” Ann hissed from the other end. “Elana, they’re here! All of them!”
Dread filled my heart. I knew this was it, break time was over. I locked Chalsarda’s gaze for a brief moment before I spoke. This was no time to ask questions, no time to be hesitant. It was time to be the terror everyone needed me to be.
“Get ready. It’s time.”
Chapter Thirty-One
I stood confidently inside the main hall, my eyes focused on the biblical rising waters outside. The wind howled, lightning crackled in the sky, and it began to feel like the whole city would be washed away soon. But this would be done, one way or the other, tonight. A tense moment passed. Then another. The opening in the brewery we’d made so obvious as the only safe way inside remained clear, and for a second there, I began to rethink my plan. My thought was that they could sense magic, so I warded the spaces out around the fringes but left the biggest one in the middle as a decoy to draw away from Olivia. When they realized what she was up to, every one of those snakes would be focused on her and her alone. If they saw me from the outside, and if they were making a show of force by coming in together, and if they could sense the magic close by and if they were focused on it, they might just be herded where I wanted them. Yeah, that was a lot of ifs, but they were overly confident and desperate, and I could use that.
It felt like forever, but it paid off as the eight of them gathered one by one outside the threshold looking in. With the exception of the ice kid whose clothes had been ruined with puncture holes, the rest of them maintained human forms and apparel, seemingly unconcerned with how drenched they were. “Hey Voltron! Which one of y’all forms the heads?” I shouted out to them. I gave it a second. They didn’t react. “Just saying, you’d all be a lot more scary if you were showing off your powers, you know, something for the movie poster. A proper end boss monster maybe, instead of this whole Orange County Republican vibe. Unless there’s supposed to be some metaphor here about climate change and the real monsters being—”
“She is stalling again!” the actor looking one hissed. The leader of the bunch put up a patient hand to silence him.
“See?” I observed. “That’s a bit more scary! Not that seven middle-aged yacht owners and someone’s dipshit spoiled nephew isn’t scary, but you get it, right? One might lay acid eggs in my stomach, and the other won’t vaccinate their kids.”
“Is that what you’d like?” the leader said calmly. “To be scared?”
“I want you to leave, same terms as before,” I replied evenly. “Come on, you know I have the advantage here.”
“It is true, we sense wards inside,” he agreed. “As well as our treasure and something else. But that much magic must’ve cost you. You cannot fight, and we are willing to negotiate. It is why we come before you as men and women of business.”
The way he said that made me sick a little, but I tried not to show it.
“We have heard your terms, and our counter is this,” he continued. “Return Yata no Kogami to us now, and we will kill only you. Your friends and loved ones need not pay for your arrogance. Refuse, and their screams will haunt you in the afterlife.”
I held my gaze on the eight of them, lightning crashed once more behind them as if to emphasize their point. “Hey, quick aside, you think anyone’s called the cops?”
“She’s stalling again, and you’re falling for it!” the actor shouted. “What are you waiting for? We can see the source of the power right in the center of the room! No idiot could miss it!”
He broke free from the pack and strode across the threshold with purpose, his skin, and features changing as he did to something monstrous. The leader of the pack tried to shout a warning at him, but it was too late. As he stepped through, the ward I’d etched into the metal above the entranceway activated with its full fury. As a general rule, wards aren’t one-shot deals, they can expend a portion of their magical energy, and that gets the point across. I knew what I was dealing with here, so I left nothing to chance. If there was a ward present in this room, it let whoever crossed it get everything it had. These weren’t alarms, they were claymores. And the ward he just triggered was a gust of wind hitting with the force of a hurricane, concentrated into a cone no bigger in diameter than a dinner plate. The power of it audibly cracked bones as it struck him from behind, sending him crashing wildly out of control.
And right into the very obvious ward in the middle of the room that no idiot could miss.
Before he could hit the ground, he was encased in a twenty-foot cube of sap that instantly solidified, leaving a look of shock on his face that mirrored that of his comrades. No one could believe what they were seeing, and being unable to help myself, I said, “Well, one down, seven left.”
“You…!” the ice boy seethed, losing any cool composure he previously had.
“Me?” I asked innocently. “I’m not the one who punctured your lungs. Either time, actually.”
He was eager to do something about my tone, but the leader held him back, physically this time. He said something to him in a low, harsh tone that I only partially picked up, something about restraint and damaging their treasure. It was more than enough to give me the gist. They were still afraid to use power without knowing if they might damage their reason for being here. “This escalates matters, certainly,” their leader said, changing into their more reptilian appearance. Everyone behind him followed suit. “You wanted us to be scary. Well, are you scared yet?”
“Getting there, yeah,” I admitted.
“One more chance to save your friends,” he rasped. “Do you yield?”
“Do I what? We’re not dueling with swords, talk normal.”
“Last chance to surrender to your fate,” he clarified impatiently, “before you make things so much worse.”
“You haven’t been paying attention.” I sighed. “Everything I do makes things worse.”
Sora was next to charge me, clearly eager for revenge for the last two times we’d met. Janet was behind him, keeping just enough of a distance that if he triggered anything, she wouldn’t be caught in his wake. Smart. And he’d also been smart, at least enough to watch the floors and ceilings for anything. It was too bad for him that he hadn’t looked under the bar counter. He was coming fast, but the invisible force of kinetic energy that struck him with the power of a Howitzer shell briefly shook the floor beneath our feet. Ice boy went through a support beam as if it had all the structural integrity of a waterf
all and slammed into the sap hard enough to shatter it. That much was unfortunate, I hadn’t planned on him making that kind of impact, but it was done. No time to worry about it, however, as Janet was just a moment behind and already recovering from the surprise of what had happened to Sora, whipping her tail wildly through the air as she bore down on me.
I remained motionless, making no effort to dodge, and said, “I keep trying to tell you I’m the distraction.”
She realized just a moment too late as that horrible tail of hers went clean through my simulacrum, and she saw what was just behind it. Another ward, and this one was packed with what was perhaps the most potent spell in my staff. My consciousness returned to my body at the same instant a world-splitting explosion rocked the facility.
Chalsarda’s grip on her bow tightened as she looked at me with something like disappointment and concern, and I didn’t think it was possible to feel as bad as I already had. Fair play to her, however. I did just blow up a beloved brewery.
“You know the plan, right?” I asked, ignoring the unspoken question.
“Stay high, stay hidden, keep moving,” Chalsarda said as she disappeared up into the rafters. It was about as much of a plan as brushing your teeth before you went to bed was a plan, but it was something.
With a small knock on the heavy metal door, I called out to Olivia, “Are you good in there?”
“Yes!” came the strained response in a shout.
“You’ll give me the signal when it’s ready?” I asked.
“Stop…talking!” Olivia managed with an impatience that penetrated the thick walk-in cooler door.
I gave the door a couple of quick raps with my knuckles in acknowledgment and prepared myself for what was out there. I’d been afraid to focus again after the side effects I’d felt earlier, but this wasn’t the time to get nervous, I had to be all-in on this fight. I saw the lapping red and yellow flames coming from the main hall, smelled the acrid smoke burn my nostrils. I felt the weight of my body creating a dull reminder on my numbed ankle and heard the creaks and groans of the now compromised structures ahead of me. Lastly, I sucked hard on the cut from my busted lip, tasting the blood like I’d been sucking on pennies. It took me a moment, but I found my calm, and I really hoped it would last.
Stepping out into the main hall, I could see the devastation, though even now, the rain was already defeating the flames. As far as field tests went, I knew to use that particular spell sparingly in the future, and not just for how much magic it took out of me. It was a last resort. Wrong situation, mistime the spell, or anything else, and I could really hurt the wrong person. It would kill just about anyone, but given how nigh immortal the Orochi was, I could let loose.
Janet was breathing, but otherwise entirely out of commission for the most part as her charred flesh was making a valiant attempt to regenerate from the blast, the same went for the actor and the ice boy. The remaining snakes were all disoriented, some more damaged by the explosion than others. I expected as much; in fact, I already figured out their weakness, and it wasn’t fire. It also wasn’t quite time to reveal to them what I knew.
I took my time shaking out a Blister shield as I calculated my moves, letting the seconds play out as moments. Ginshi was getting to her feet first, and I called upon the kinetic bolts from earlier, though this time, I concentrated them on one target, striking her in the head one by one, the last seeming to stagger her something fierce. That got the attention of their leader and the creepy one from the lobby that tried to sideswipe me. Not being super mobile, I held my ground and braced my shield as they rushed in, intent on tearing me apart. The goon of the two stumbled as an arrow pinned his ankle to the floor, and the leader spun around with sickly green flame welling up in his mouth, his jaw distending as he attempted to unleash the fiery burst in Chalsarda’s direction, only to have it all cut short as an arrow punctured his throat. With a look of shock and annoyance, he immediately ripped the arrow free and tried to croak out a command that almost sounded like, “Take care of her.” Though with that much blood gurgling in his throat, who knows?
Their leader scrambled up after Chalsarda, and I had to trust that she could play keep away long enough. The lackey was already pulling the arrow out of his leg as I focused an ice spell around his head, cutting off his oxygen. Again, something I’d never do otherwise, but these things wouldn’t go down from something like that, and I couldn’t hold back. Some human part of him must’ve still been in there as he reacted in panic to his new icy helmet. And that just left the dads.
So far, so good, but I knew it wouldn’t last more than a moment longer, maybe two. We got in a sucker punch, and I had to take advantage. “Wait!” I shouted at the two of them, who, of course, did not wait at all. Kaito got to me first and tapping into the magic in my gloves, I let a wild swing fly with my staff as he pounced, a resounding crack echoed in the room, even over the sounds of the storm. The sudden pain snapped me out of my short-lived calm, and without thinking, I tried to rip the gloves off my hands on instinct. It cost me. Makoto landed a staggering clubbing blow to the side of my head; I only avoided the follow-up attack because I’d been knocked down so thoroughly, and Makoto was ultimately not a natural fighter.
In the second that it took him to regain his balance, I tried to reason with him. “What about your daughter?” I managed through gritted teeth, my head throbbing from the blow.
Makoto grinned sickly and stood over me. “Dr. Wada isn’t here right now,” he rasped, raising a glowing fist over his head.
Well, shit.
I mustered a gust of wind in his direction to no effect as he hammered the blow toward my face. This time, the Blister messed up his aim just a bit, but I still caught the sharp end of it on my jaw, a painful feeling like a bad sunburn instantly heating where he struck. I knew I couldn’t take another direct shot like that. There were two spells left in my staff, one I couldn’t read, which effectively left one final act of desperation. I summoned the one that I knew, more rushed than I would’ve liked, and a series of ropes materialized around him, restricting his arms in the blink of an eye. “Come on, this can’t be what you want,” I said as I scrambled to my feet. “Kaito believes he lost a son, and he’s wrong, but you? They’ll kill your daughter as soon as you’re done with me.”
Makoto was struggling with the ropes, but there was something unrecognizable on his already alien-looking face. Before I could say anything further, the ropes were already starting to snap. I ignited them in desperation, but it was no use. Makoto broke free as the goon shattered the ice around his head. As Kaito got to his feet. As seemingly everyone recovered. And as a hideous crash echoed from across the hall and I heard Chalsarda yelp in pain. I turned to run and was immediately met with an open palm strike to my chest courtesy of Janet that slammed me into the bar hard enough to crack it. It being the bar. Or my chest. Probably both.
Tears welled up in my eyes, and I struggled to breathe, the eight of them now moving to surround me. Their leader approached from the back, furious with me in a way that even his scaly face couldn’t hide. “Our treasure or your life!” he seethed. I couldn’t have answered him even if I wanted to. He didn’t wait more than another second before he lost his patience for good. “Kill her.”
Makoto raised his fist, now glowing so bright that it hurt to look at when I heard something that made my stomach drop.
“Dad! No!” Kaida screamed from just outside over the pounding rain. She had insisted on coming but had promised to stay hidden. She was defenseless, and the thought of the Orochi getting their hands on her made me truly afraid for the first time tonight.
The goon spun around and went to move on her when Kaida’s hand came down, only it was to grab his arm rather than cave in my skull. Parts of his arm caught fire as a sound like a steak being dropped on a hot grill escaped in concert with the goon’s shriek. “Not…yours!” Makoto rasped.
The sudden break in unity made everyone forget about me for the briefest of instants
as they turned their attention to the recent development. I scrambled a few feet away, falling into the far wall and turning around, trying to keep myself held up. And just then, before the situation could break down any further, the most wonderful thing happened. I lost my footing and went down to the ground, landing on my ass, as the Earth gave one violent jolt. It was Olivia’s signal.
Laughter crept up in me, mild, but I forced it into something manic. I had to, I was selling them something. Kaida turned and fled out into the storm, as far as her feet would take her. She knew what was coming next after all. “Third and final time,” I choked. “I’m the distraction.”
“What is happening?” their leader demanded.
“You still want the treasure? You have about thirty seconds to get to it,” I said through labored breaths. All eyes were fixed on me, a creeping panic reaching each of their eyes. “That power you felt? What was overriding everything else you were sensing? It’s in the walk-in cooler in the back, with my best friend Olivia Moore, the single most powerful sorcerer I know. That tremor was all her. Oh, and also a magical focus given to me by a Celtic god that absorbs stray magic, and holy shit. We have been expending just… just a whole ass-ton of it, haven’t we? Every last particle, every last mote, collected for one ‘eff you’ purpose.”
“What are you—?” Janet began.
“Olivia is going to destroy Yata no Kogami. Permanently!” I laughed wildly. “Maybe we lose, but you don’t win. I tried to warn you.”
“No!” their leader shouted frantically. In unison, they made a mad dash to the back of the building, and that’s when Olivia let all that power, that immense, unfathomable power, loose in one unretained burst.
But destroying their treasure had never been the plan. If I hadn’t already been on the ground, the violent, albeit brief, earthquake would’ve put me there. There was an ungodly sound as the earth itself was ripped open, and a deafening crash of literal tons of brewing tanks and brick and steel collapsed, and for just an instant, a deep part of my subconscious thought the world was ending. And then, just like that, all was still again, and only the sounds of rain and a burst water pipe could be heard.