The tent’s zipper slid down, and Victor’s head popped out. His eyes were wide with fear, and his hair a bedraggled mess. He barely waited for the zipper to be down far enough before beginning to push his small body through the opening. He tripped on the bottom of the space and fell onto his hands and knees.

As soon as she saw his face, Melody rushed to him, gingerly leaping around the fallen bodies. When she reached Victor, she briefly dropped down to engulf him in an embrace before picking him up without letting go. After nearly crushing him for a prolonged moment, she set Victor down and turned to me.

“Let’s go find my uncle,” she suggested.

I was all for going along with that suggestion, but right after she uttered those words, I noticed a squad of soldiers moving quickly in our direction. They were moving through the woods in a wedge formation, seemingly heading toward a definitive location. I ducked down behind some rocks and pulled Melody and her brother with me. Right before we ducked behind the rock, I noticed that one of the soldiers spotted us.

“They saw us, run!” I urged.

Melody jumped up with her brother in tow and started to sprint away. I moved to follow her, but my foot slipped out from underneath me. It flew back, and I slammed into the ground chest first. Melody didn’t notice my fall and kept running.

“Over there,” I heard one of the soldiers yell from my prone position.

The clatter of the soldiers running toward my spot increased. Even though I was on the ground, I got ready to fight. Without slowing down or noticing me at all, the group of soldiers sped past my position. I realized that it wasn’t me they spotted.

“Get down! Halt! Stop, or we’ll open fire!” one of the soldiers yelled at Melody and her brother as they ran.

When I heard the last part, I jumped up just as Melody whipped around to face the soldiers. Her face was flushed with exertion and rage as her hair flew in an arc. She simultaneously moved her brother behind her to shield him as she spun. As tough as her skin might have been, there was no way she could survive multiple gunshots.

Melody didn’t back down, and the soldiers prepared to fire on her. I ran forward, trying to get as close as possible. The energies of the world flared to life as I activated my ability.

The ground’s smokey topaz color drowned the fading greens of fallen pine needles and cones. I jumped up on an outcropping of rock and leaped as high as I could in the direction of the soldiers. As I flew through the air, I concentrated on the color of the earth. I didn’t just change my hand or foot; I changed my whole body to the color.

As I landed, I stomped hard on the ground and focused on the disruption of Melody’s attackers. I didn’t know what would happen and didn’t have a specific outcome, but I poured all my worry and angst about Melody’s safety into the stomp. A wave of earth rolled from my impact toward the soldiers. I thought the wave of land would continue until it hit the wedge of soldiers, but it didn’t. The wave sunk back into the ground a few feet before striking the soldiers.

This book was originally published on Royal Road. Check it out there for the real experience.

My heart sunk in fear, but if my attack with the ground didn’t work, I would just have to run into the squad and take them out the hard way. Before I could run into the group, a bubble started expanding from the ground like a stovetop popcorn cooker. It arose in the middle of their wedge and exploded once it reached waist height to the soldiers.

Rocks of various sizes bolted from the popped bubble in every direction. I fell back from the barrage, but luckily I was still too far away to be struck. The soldiers fell under the deluge of projectiles; their armor did nothing to protect them as rocks slammed into every part of them. One soldier fell as a rock stuck him right on the jaw. Another went down with a combo of stones, one hitting him in the side of his knee, then in the neck as he fell.

I was sure they were all unconscious, but Melody didn’t want to take the chance. She stepped to the side and signaled to her brother with a nod. Victor placed his finger to his lips and shushed the soldiers to ensure they wouldn’t be waking up anytime soon.

“How did you do that?” Melody asked as I ran up to her.

I wanted to tell her everything about me right at that moment. I realized that there was nothing I wanted more than to be able to share what I could do with someone. It was a secret I had been keeping for too long. Unfortunately, we didn’t have the time, considering the circumstances.

“I’ll tell you everything, but now isn’t the right time,” I said.

“To my uncle?” she asked, thankfully realizing that our current position wasn’t the best for a discussion.

We cautiously set off again and soon found ourselves back along the same path we took getting to Victor. I froze when we came across the remains of our fight with the cadets. The body of the cadet I killed had fallen over. The spear still protruded from his gut through the crumpled metal, but his body was curled around it in the fetal position. The ground was stained deeply from the copious amounts of blood that soaked into the ground.

I was trapped once again, staring at the scene. Melody walked up next to me, and her hand rested on my shoulder.

“Just close your eyes,” she said. She moved her hand down my arm and grabbed my hand. “You don’t need to look at it. I’ll lead you away.” She gave a tug on my arm, but I didn’t budge.

“No,” I said while straightening a little. “I shouldn’t hide from it. I didn’t want to do it, but I didn’t have a choice.” I clenched my fists. “It just makes me so mad that this is what they turned us into.”

“Not you,” Melody said softly.

“No,” I smiled. “Not completely, but me and the other Carpenters are only a small percentage of the cadets living in the camp. Practically every Welder is willing to fight and act like this.

A muffled scream emanated from a few feet away. Melody and I saw Victor peering over a root-wrapped form half-buried in the ground.

“Victor, get away from there,” Melody admonished.

Victor didn’t move, he just put his finger to his lips and quickly shushed the cadet, and the screaming instantly ceased.

“If they were awake, why didn’t they remove the mask and yell for help.” Melody pondered aloud.

“They need to touch the metal to manipulate it,” I said.

“It’s touching them, though.”

“But not with their hands.” I spirit fingered the air in front of her face.

“That shouldn’t matter,” she said while rolling her eyes and slapping my hands away. “Touching makes it easier, but it isn’t strictly mandatory. You didn’t touch anything when you did your rock trick.” I looked away to avoid having to answer any questions about that. “As long as I’m close to plants, I can feel their vibrations. Plus, I can manipulate them no matter what part of my body they’re touching.” She held up her index finger to cut off my reply. “Welders aren’t different. I’ve seen others do the same.”

I thought about that for a moment. “Perhaps, they’re just weak then or stuck in the way they do things?”

Four slivers of metal thumped into a tree a foot from my head. I whipped around to see two iron-clad cadets running toward our position. They seemed to be preparing more knives to throw as they ran.

“Look!” Melody shouted.

To the left of the cadet’s position, and nearly as close, another squad of soldiers was advancing toward us.

“Run!” I yelled.