On sheer instinct, I lean backwards, my spine screaming in agony in response. As I come up in a low crouch, I extend my arms in a defensive guard, baring my teeth in a silent snarl of challenge. I squeeze my fists, and teeth sing in response, emerging from the spaces between my knuckles, right where I'm used to them.

Pumice pauses at the sight, eyes widening almost imperceptibly as he takes in this fresh evolution of my powers. For a heartbeat, the two of us simply regard each other across the span of a few scant feet, the air thrumming with the weight of unspoken challenge. "Just like last time," he mumbles.

Then he's lunging forward again, this time leading with a straight jab aimed squarely at the center of my chest. I pivot to one side, letting the blow whisper past as I whip my own fist around in a blurring counterstrike, every ounce of my wiry strength channeled into the point of that bony protrusion.

My knuckle-spikes slam into Pumice's obliques with a resounding crack, sinking into his solid stone hide before the sheer unyielding density forces it to a halt. Pumice flinches ever so slightly at the impact, a subtle shifting of his weight that betrays a startled wince of... not pain, not quite, but certainly discomfort.

The next few heartbeats dissolve into a whirlwind of savage exchanges, the two of us trading a barrage of crunching blows and grappling locks in a lethal dance of fists and elbows. I'm fighting with every ounce of skill and tenacity I can muster, channeling the full extent of my training into landing each precise, surgical strike. Or as precise as it can get while I'm also slowly bleeding out. You know, whatever.

But for every thunderous impact that slams home, every fresh crack and fissure that blossoms across Pumice's stony hide, he simply shrugs it off with that same infuriating half-smirk, like I'm little more than a gnat buzzing around his head. Even when I land a particularly savage elbow spike directly to the juncture of his throat, sinking another tooth-point into his stone, he barely even registers it beyond a subtle cough and a widening of his smirk.

"Gotta say, Smalls... you've definitely stepped up your game since our last tango," he rumbles, already beginning to circle me with slow, predatory strides. "That little trick with the knuckle spikes is a real doozy - almost makes a fella think you've been practicing in your spare time."

I snort out a breathless chuckle at that, shifting to match his movements step for step. "What can I say?" I rasp, wiping a trickle of sweat from my brow as I settle into a fighting crouch. "I'm just a fast learner with a great teacher. Speaking of which..."

With a sudden shift of my weight, I launch myself forward in a bounding lunge, leading with a blistering feint towards Pumice's face. He reacts instantly, hands whipping up to deflect the apparent strike.

Only instead of following through, I pivot at the last possible second and whip my leg around in a blurring roundhouse kick, channeling every ounce of my wiry strength into the point of the vicious tooth now jutting from my shin, through an exposed gap where a piece of metal tore the costume open. The impact is like a thunderclap, that razor-sharp protrusion slamming directly into Pumice's abs, concentrating everything I have in my good leg into a single point.

This time, Pumice can't quite suppress the flicker of discomfort that ripples across his features, a subtle tightening around the eyes that betrays the first stirrings of genuine pain. He lets out a low, rumbling grunt, almost more of an exhalation than an actual vocalization as he staggers back a step, one hand instinctively going to clutch at the wound, a fracture blooming across his body.

"Atta girl..." he rumbles, already squaring his stance as that same smirk blooms across his craggy features. "Knew there was a reason you were always my favorite little spitfire."

I snort out a breathless chuckle at that, already circling away to create some distance as I brace for his next attack. "If you think that was impressive, just wait'll you get a load of my other moves," I quip, unable to resist needling him just a little. "I've been practicing this real sweet little number I like to call 'the nutcracker'..."

Pumice throws back his head and lets out a rusty peal of laughter at that, the sound almost startlingly genuine. "Is that so?" he rumbles, already beginning to stalk forward with that same inexorable menace. "Show me what you've got, Jaws."

With that, he lunges forward again in an explosion of force, leading with a flurry of crunching haymakers and straight jabs. I duck and weave through the onslaught, deflecting what blows I can't evade with deft blocks and parries, gritting my teeth as every one that lands straight puts a fresh crack in my radius and ulna. Slowly but surely, I start giving ground, letting Pumice herd me back towards the streetlights as I bide my time, waiting for an opportunity to counterattack, watching Rampart wrestle the figure into the fountain.

He doesn't disappoint. With a sudden pivot of his weight, Pumice snaps one granite-slabbed leg around in a roundhouse kick of his own, the sheer momentum behind the strike enough to punch cracks in solid concrete. I duck under it and shoot forward, swinging myself under his legs and popping up behind him, back to back.

As I come up in a low crouch, I can't resist flashing the big lug a cheeky grin. "You'll have to do better than that if you wanna impress me, Rockhead," I taunt, already settling back into my fighting stance. "I've taken hits from actual stone cold stunners that packed more of a wallop."

Pumice pauses at that, head cocking slightly to one side as he regards me with a considering look. "Stone Cold, huh?" he rumbles at last, lips quirking in a rueful smirk. I hear his heels grinding into the concrete before I see them, and only barely manage to avoid an impromptu People's Elbow that leaves a series of cracks spiderwebbing across the ground. He rolls back onto his sneakers and slowly rises to his feet, wiping dust off his shoulders and arms.

"What's the matter, Smalls?" Pumice taunts as we grapple in a sweaty deadlock, every word punctuated by the crack of stone meeting bone. "You getting a little winded over there?"

"You wish, Rockhead, " I rasp, swiping a trickle of sweat from my brow as I settle back into my fighting crouch. "I'm just getting warmed up."

This is what I live for.

...

Sorry, Jamila.

With that, he launches into a fresh offensive, this one more measured and controlled than his earlier berserker rushes. I brace myself for the onslaught, every muscle tensed as I fight to keep ahead of those blurring, thunderous strikes.

We grapple and feint and parry, trading a dizzying flurry of blows in a lethal dance of fists and elbows. Pumice is relentless, an implacable juggernaut of stone-forged fury weathering my barrage of precision strikes. But I can tell I'm starting to make an impact now, can feel it in the way his movements grow just a hair slower, a fraction more ponderous with each passing exchange.

Something I don't think enough people think about is just how hard your bones are, how hard they have to be just to hold up all of your meat. They're a five on the Mohs hardness scale!

A sudden crunch of shattering stone sends a starburst of pulverized gravel raining down around us. Pumice flinches, ever so slightly, as a fresh spiderweb of cracks blossoms across his stony brow from the force of my knuckle-spike slamming home.

"Looks like the Sixers might just have a shot at making some noise in the playoffs this year after all," he rumbles almost conversationally, even as we continue to trade blows with savage intensity. "Embiid's looking healthy, Harden seems to have found his groove again..."

If you discover this narrative on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen. Please report the violation.

I snort out a breathless chuckle at that, ducking under a wild haymaker, skidding three inches back and discarding my used up, broken teeth from my knuckles like shotgun shells. Squeezing my body so that a fresh set rises to the surface. A bit of metal pops out, too, around my shoulder, and I didn't even intend that one, but all the motion combined with the weird freak shit my muscles do is just causing them all to start popping out on their own. I feel a wave of blood spurt out of me, and dizziness hits me right between the eyes.

"You're really gonna stand there and run your mouth about basketball? " I laugh, a little drunkenly, feeling high on the adrenaline. What weed and alcohol can't provide, a good scrap can, apparently. Go figure. "While we're in the middle of trying to pummel each other into a fine paste?"

Pumice lets out another of those rusty peals of laughter, seemingly utterly unconcerned by the steady accumulation of fresh wounds pockmarking his stony hide. "What can I say, Smalls?" he rumbles, deflecting my barrage with almost casual indifference. "Sports are the great equalizer."

The world blurs and tilts around us, our lethal tango of fists and fury dissolving into a maelstrom of crunching impacts and ragged exhalations. Pumice is an implacable force, weathering my barrage with unnatural calmness. But I can feel it now - that subtle shift in the rhythm of our exchanges, the almost imperceptible slowing of his movements as the accumulated toll of our duel begins to make itself known.

Every fiber of my being screams in protest with each fresh eruption of violence, my battered body pushed well past its limits. But I can't stop, I won't stop - not until I've carved my way through that unyielding stone edifice guarding Pumice's core and made him understand.

I reel up, and I throw.

The impact is like striking an anvil, shockwaves of pure concussive trauma radiating up through my arm in a blinding tsunami of white-hot agony. But I grit my teeth and lean into it, fighting through the pain as I feel that brittle stone carapace finally begin to fracture and splinter beneath my onslaught.

A sound escapes Pumice then, low and grinding and very much like genuine pain. Just for a heartbeat, that insufferable mask of bravado slips, revealing a flicker of raw vulnerability in his smoldering eyes. Then the moment passes and he's rearing back, clutching at the fresh wound now marring his stony flank as he regards me with a look of grudging respect.

"Not bad, Smalls..." he rumbles, the words almost seeming to catch in his throat. "Not bad at all..."

The stalemate doesn't last.

One moment, Pumice and I are locked in that same brutal, grinding slugfest, exchanging thunderous blows and deflecting haymakers with almost casual indifference. The next, a sudden commotion at the edge of the killing ground shatters the tension, heralding a fresh surge of chaos crashing over us like a tidal wave.

"Paramedics, get those civilians to safety and establish a triage!" A voice like rolling thunder booms across the park, cutting through the din of battle with an unmistakable cadence of authority.

I risk a glance over my shoulder just in time to see a rippling blur of motion resolving itself into three identical figures decked out in familiar crimson-and-black-and-boxing-gloves. Multiplex - the old warhorse himself has decided to grace us with his presence. Could've probably been here a little faster, buddy.

But any resentment I might feel is swiftly swept aside by a surge of raw relief as I take in the fresh calvary arrayed against the still-thrashing form of the metal mutant. Rampart has done a stellar job of herding the poor bastard into the dubious confines of the fountain, restricting its deadly peals of fire to a much more manageable angle. But even from here I can see the big man flagging, muscles trembling with the strain of maintaining that constant, Herculean effort while deflecting the creature's relentless barrage.

The Multiplex clones don't hesitate, three identical figures blurring into discorporate motion as they surge forward to seal off the remaining vectors of attack, riot shields deployed to eat any remaining projectiles, channeling the creature's thrashing motions into an ever-tightening series of kill boxes.

A fresh bloom of agony lances through my side, the sharp sting of reality once again asserting itself over my momentary reverie. I hiss out a ragged curse, whipping my head back around just in time to deflect a savage overhead smash from Pumice's granite knuckles. He doesn't let up, simply using that same motion to pivot into a blurring knee strike aimed squarely at my abdomen. "Eyes on the prize, Smalls."

I catch the next blow on my forearms in a desperate cross-guard, tendons screaming in protest as the full force of his impact detonates against them. For a breathless heartbeat, I simply hang there, suspended in the void as every nerve ending in my body flares into searing wakefulness.

Then, with an almost casual motion, Pumice shoots forward into my rapidly diminishing guard. I have just enough time to register the shift in his stance, the sudden flexing of his shoulders as he cocks one arm back for a haymaker of truly apocalyptic proportions.

I brace myself for the blow, already wincing in anticipation of testing my regeneration to its limit. Can it, in fact, put together my skull if it's been busted open like an egg?

Which is why I'm caught completely flatfooted when, instead of following through on the fist, Pumice suddenly whirls on his supporting heel, swinging around in a blurring pivot as he hurls himself backwards in a flat retreat. For a breathless heartbeat, I can only gape after his rapidly receding silhouette, stunned by the abrupt shift and utterly at a loss as to what just happened.

Then a deep, rumbling bellow of exertion splits the night, and a veritable mountain of corded muscle and sinew barrels past me in a thunderous charge. Rampart doesn't slow, doesn't pause, simply transitioning from a dead sprint into a bounding lunge as he throws himself bodily at Pumice's exposed flank in a textbook spear tackle, catching him with his shoulder and then going dead in the air.

The two juggernauts collide, the sheer force of their combined momentum enough to send a plume of pulverized masonry billowing outward in a choking cloud. No, I don't think Rampart did anything, but slowing him down is something.

Then, with a sudden heave, Pumice simply shifts his weight and hurls Rampart aside, flinging his sturdy frame away like a broken toy. Rampart goes tumbling in a tangle of flailing limbs, rolling halfway across the plaza before coming to a shuddering stop in a crumpled heap amidst the rubble. I don't like seeing Rampart with blooming red across his costume. It feels wrong.

"Nice try there, Chuckles," Pumice rumbles, already skidding backwards with slow, purposeful backstrides as he casually brushes a few errant specks of debris from his shoulders. "But I think you're gonna wanna sit the rest of this dance out before you end up biting off more than you can chew. We out."

Then, before I can react, before I can even think to try and continue this fight, a sound like a screaming mountain lion splits the night. I turn about 30 degrees, just in time to see a looming silhouette resolving itself from the shadows of a nearby alleyway, a hulking, quadruped shape that seems to flow and heave with every ponderous step.

Pumice doesn't hesitate. With a final, mocking salute in my direction, he turns and breaks into a flat sprint directly towards the onrushing monstrosity. For a breathless heartbeat, it almost seems like the two are destined to collide head-first.

But then, I can only watch in stunned disbelief as Pumice grabs hold of it from around the scruff, climbing onto its back like he's mounting a horse. Then, without any further preamble, it's whirling around and bounding away into the night, rapidly receding into the maze of shadowed alleys until only an echo of splintering concrete remains.

The sudden silence that follows is almost deafening, a palpable weight that seems to press down on me from all sides. I simply stand there for a long moment, chest heaving with ragged exhalations as I struggle to process everything I've just witnessed.

A low groan snaps me out of my reverie, the sound visceral and raw. Rampart - I'd almost forgotten about him in the insanity of those final moments. The big man is already stirring, hauling himself upright in a tangle of torn armor and pulverized masonry with a pained grimace etched across his battered features.

"Well..." he rumbles at last, spitting a gobbet of bloody phlegm onto the cratered killing ground between us. "I don't know about you, Bee, but I could use a coffee."

My answering laugh sounds almost hysterical to my own ears, a breathless peal of delirious, bone-weary mirth as the weight of the world finally crashes down around me in earnest. I'm dimly aware of raised voices and shouted commands echoing across the plaza as the paramedics and Multiplexes move in to secure the area. But it all seems strangely muffled and distant, like I'm experiencing everything through layers of thick gauze wrapped around my senses.

"You don't know the half of it, big guy," I murmur, sparing one last glance towards the shadowed mouth of the alley where that... thing disappeared into the night.

Elias.

The name floats to the forefront of my thoughts, crystallizing into sudden, terrifying focus amidst the swirling chaos. That's what I recognized. The parts. The noise. The scream.

These days, it seems like there's always another shoe waiting to drop.

I try to take solace in the fact that tonight, at least, the scales remain balanced - lives were saved, a greater evil averted. But even as the paramedics finally reach us and the first flickers of blessed oblivion begin tugging at the edges of my consciousness, I can't quite shake the feeling that this was merely the opening salvo. That the forces we've unwittingly unleashed here tonight are destined to crash over us again in a tide of blood and fury, again and again, until this city is scoured away.

I wave off most of their concerns, although I do accept the painkillers. Honestly, I'm just more worried for Rampart. But, well. I've also broken at least ten bones, am bleeding from every limb and most of my torso and back, and probably have a concussion. I think I've earned my nap time.