God, fighting always hurt, with that first blow you take always hurting a little more than the others. It was the one that you took before your adrenaline could get pumping through you. The first hit was the one that grounded me. It wasn’t a TV show, it wasn’t a book, and it wasn’t a movie. Fighting hurt. If it wasn’t for all the people I cared about being nearby, I was positive I would be a coward who would have never lifted a finger to hurt another person. Survival and protection instincts were the biggest things that drove my willpower.
I was in a lot of pain from the attack, trying to force breaths through my ribs screaming at me to take it easy. It kicked my fight-or-flight into gear, sending that sweet adrenaline coursing all throughout my body. I pushed the injury I knew I had to the back of my mind to focus on survival. Survival first, protecting second, and winning third. I couldn’t protect Rebecca or anyone else if I didn’t survive. That meant I had to withstand the onslaught of creepy dolls before I could do anything else. No big deal and certainly no pressure on a kid from a small town in Oregon.
Instead of just launching javelins at the mannequin, I created a sword to use as close-range offense and defense. The concentration required to use the sword—a weapon I’d only created and practiced with a small number of times—took a lot out of how I could use my javelins or any other new weapons. I kept backing up, taking swipes at the closest mannequin with my sword whenever I saw an opening. I had to keep the fight directly in front of me if I didn’t want to risk hurting my friends. Every time I managed to see a mannequin trying to sneak up on me, I was able to hold them back with a few javelins.
In a way, Cregene and I had very similar powers. We both had control over inanimate objects and to an extent, could almost give them a sort of “life”. I didn’t know how to use that information to my advantage, since our powers still differed too much for me to get much from my observation. I created objects with my mind and could deactivate them whenever I wanted. I doubted she created all her little pets with her head, which meant her supply was finite and mine was unlimited. Unlimited in theory, anyway.
My weaknesses wouldn’t apply to her, at least not in the same ways, but I was gaining confidence in something from our fight. In the same way that I struggled to use my Shimmer-Sword while ensuring I could keep up my javelin defense, she couldn’t use too many mannequins in a complex way. Sure, the display where all of them ran out to greet us with some of them climbing the walls was impressive and creepy. Thinking back on it, I realized they weren’t doing much of anything. Having three fight me with separate movements and attacks? That’d be a lot for one person’s mind to keep up with. One source of intelligence to go along with three distinct bodies was probably her reasonable limit.
The attacks from the one in front of me were intense. It used its winding body and segmented body parts to keep its strikes unpredictable and difficult to follow. When one punch came in normally, the next was a little slower with its elbow joint extended, throwing off my timing to dodge or block. Strong and difficult to track, I figured she was putting most of her effort into that mannequin’s assault to wear me down, which meant it was time for me to work on a counter without the threat of other mannequins being as difficult as the one I had right in front of me.
It was a risk to give her any time to regroup, but I needed my own time to regroup. I quickly put up a barrier around Rebecca and me. She’d been staying behind me, slowly following my movements to make sure she didn’t get in the thick of the fight, avoiding any accidental damage I might’ve inflicted. She said nothing and didn’t step in, which was great because that meant most of my focus went where it was needed. If only she had been behind enemy lines. The whole thing could have been over in a second when she took away everyone’s Anomalies.
“Here, take this,” I whispered, handing her a spear that I put a little extra effort into making durable. Concerned, she just looked at me. “I need you to just hold off those two guys, okay? She’s putting most of what she has into this one to wear me down. I need to make sure I can take this one on without the two stragglers getting in my way or breaking my focus. Their movements are slower and less coordinated, but if they slip by my javelins and get their hands on me, I’m done for.”
After a second, her eyes lit up with the fire of someone who wanted to protect and help. “I can do that.”
The mannequin outside wasn’t much for our conversation, repeatedly banging on my barrier in a rage. Cracks and chips ran through the purple-pink creation and I could feel its power waning.
“Just hold them back, okay? Don’t fight them so hard you wear yourself out. Use your best judgment, but right now, those two aren’t the threats. Don’t get me wrong, if you can kill one—if they can be killed—be my guest. If those two start picking up the pace, scream and fall back behind me. We’ll figure something out.”
Rebecca nodded and leaned in for a second like she wanted to tell me something. I waited, giving her the chance to speak up. Instead, she shook her head and changed her mind. Instead, she got up and turned her back to me. “You can trust me.”
“Always do,” I said quietly, breaking the barrier down.
With the distraction of those two others out of the way, I went to work actively focusing on the mannequin in front of me. Keeping the weapon I made for Rebecca maintained was easy enough since I didn’t need to control where it went or what it did. It just had to stay in one piece. I had total confidence in her to watch my back, so much so that I felt like an idiot for not handing her a weapon to begin with. Yeah, her power wasn’t great if she couldn’t touch anyone. That didn’t mean she couldn’t do anything with her two working arms. She didn’t need training. She just needed to swing the spear and look scary. I was an idiot for not trying that from the start.
Battling the mannequin became so much easier. It was still unpredictable to an extent, though its attacks became easier to see and follow. Having Rebecca there to pull the focus of the other two, along with forcing Cregene to use more brainpower to control, made the fight manageable. Dodging came quicker, my reflexes faster and more responsive, even with my injured ribs. Parrying with my sword was hardly an issue, despite my inexperience with the technique. I could tell the mannequin's attacks were stronger than the ones I threw out in retaliation. All I needed was for my sword to hold.
I started to hunt for weak spots in its attacks, slashing at joints when I could, trying to take advantage of openings I saw. One of those slashes resulted in awful scraping sounds and sparks flying. My slash didn’t do any damage to it, but I was getting closer. I was getting better at attacking its vulnerabilities, and Cregene knew that. Cautiously, her mannequin took a few steps back. I took a few seconds to sharpen my sword with my mind. That weapon was still in its infancy for me. Every strike it dished out and every block it made was valuable information for me to improve it on the fly.
The mannequin backing away to regroup gave me a chance to assess another fight. Alex and Val were taking on Cordell, matching up well enough against his freakishly strong cables to create a stalemate. Val slashed through whatever came her way, spraying black liquid everywhere. More cables replaced the ones she cut down, like an inky hydra. Alex destroyed them with his immense strength to the same result. It wasn’t ideal for a fight. At least they were holding him back. That counted for something.
Unfortunately, the mannequin was ready for more, so I couldn’t see how anyone else was doing. With my eyes trained on the opponent in front of me, I was hearing some very loud and unusual sounds, which I took as a sign that Rosie was putting in some work with her sound powers. Everything else was a chaotic mess to listen to, making it impossible to pick out anyone else in the scrum. I had to hope for the best and take care of my own business.
With an ugly, mechanical groan, the mannequin lunged at me to start the second round of our fight.
I was doing well for a few minutes before the disadvantages started piling up. The mannequin couldn’t even get tired, only its master, and she wasn’t the one who had to dodge my attacks. She also wasn’t the one attacking me. I was starting to get slower and its attacks were starting to land more. I avoided direct damage thanks to my armor, but the time it took for me to repair it was increasing too. On top of all that, it kept its joints sheltered, so all of the rapidly weakening attacks I could land were doing nothing.
It was a battle of attrition and I was losing ground fast.
I thought I had an opening when I correctly read a punch and dodged it perfectly. When I brought my sword down on the mannequin’s neck, my weapon exploded into thousands of shards, all of which dissipated a second later. Stunned, and without any good way to defend myself, I could barely brace myself for what happened next.
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The mannequin tackled me with its full bodyweight landing on the center of my chest. I thought that mannequins didn’t actually weigh that much, since they had to be transported around and regularly moved, a rule that clearly didn’t apply to this one. Weren’t they hollow or something? It could have just been my rib injury talking, but I was sure it weighed at least a couple hundred pounds. Its knee pressed against my chest, its right hand grabbed my left arm, and its left hand grabbed my face. Struggling under it did nothing, and I couldn’t muster the concentration to summon another weapon.
Slowly, the thing started to squeeze with its hands. In just a few seconds, my armor started to crack and buckle under the pressure. I hadn’t had any of my Shimmer creations buckle under something. That bend but don’t break nature was my enemy at that moment. My armor was putting pressure on my scar, and more importantly, the sides of my head. Its fingers were starting to drive into my temples, pushing my helmet in too. The pain was manageable for the first few seconds. I thought I could handle it. Then it didn’t stop. I was too freaked out to even open my mouth to scream since I didn’t know if that’d speed up the process of having my head crushed.
Am I really going to die because of this shitty doll?
I didn’t have an answer to my own question. I didn’t have anything to save myself at all. I prided myself on being calm in scary combat scenarios, which wasn’t doing me a lick of good. With each passing second, the pressure increased. With each moment gone by, a new black spot added to my fading vision. At that point, even if I could focus enough to create a spear or something, I didn’t have the strength to do much. I was convinced that I was going to die, and to my surprise, my life didn’t flash before my eyes. I just had a terrible sadness that I wouldn’t be able to tell Shelly, Rebecca, or Megan goodbye and how much they meant to me.
I started to slip into unconsciousness. Somewhere, I heard a loud scream, a shrill sound muffled by my body giving out. I wasn’t sure who it was. It wasn’t me. Well, it probably wasn’t since I couldn’t open up my mouth. There was a disjointed thought floating around in my head. I couldn't focus on that. I was only able to hope it hadn't been any of my friends who screamed. Maybe Val or Alex had been able to take down Cordell and score a win to turn the tides for everyone.
Then the pressure on my head and arm suddenly let up. Through blurry vision, with it still on top of my chest, I saw the mannequin grab its own head. It shook its head back and forth, which was very weird for something that couldn’t think on its own. Weakly, I tried to move, but I was still pinned. I didn’t let being immobilized stop me from regaining my composure. My vision was clearing up and I could feel a second wind coming on.
Knowing I wouldn’t get another chance like that one, I put most of my strength into creating a huge Shimmer-Hammer—another first—and blasted the damn mannequin off me. It crashed into the wall next to me, exploding into at least a dozen disjointed pieces, my hammer following suit. An attack that big and costly was something I could only pull out because of whatever caused the distraction.
Sitting up slowly, I tried to knock the cobwebs out of my foggy brain. My head was killing me and I felt something warm running down my face. Positive it was blood, I tried to keep my cool. Looking to my right, where I sent the mannequin toward the wall, an uneven hole led to an ancient passageway. Cracks in the solid part of the wall radiated out from the center. At some point, someone with powers must have covered it up for whatever reason. I silently thanked whoever revealed the passageway. I was pretty sure it wasn’t any of the current Sentinels, so that spared me the mortifying ordeal of having to thank them for anything.
Looking back toward the fight, everyone was still holding their own. I was thrilled and proud to see them managing better than I had been. Lori had this blue aura surrounding her and she was staring Cordell down, looking like she was on the verge of collapse. I had no idea what the hell she was doing or how long she could control whatever it was, but it had Cordell buckled and on his knees, his sweat visible on the stone beneath him. The other Sentinels were still fighting, though their attempts to strike back were crippled.
“Guys,” I yelled, my voice barely more than a croak. “Here, we can escape through here.”
Right when I said, whatever Lori was doing gave out, and she hunched over. It took so much out of her that she lost her lunch right there. The tough girl was right back up after wiping the back of her hand over her mouth. Glancing over, the Sentinels were still recovering, not putting up enough of a fight to prevent everyone on our side from looking at the passage I pointed out. There was still a chance we could have escaped through the way we came in, but I didn’t want to risk having everyone try to run through the enemy to do it. We had a choice to make and barely enough of an opening to call a quick timeout.
“You’ve seen better days,” Val said, wiping a thin trail of her own blood off her forehead. Her skin was shiny in the light, a thin layer of sweat covering her.
“I’m still pretty new to this,” I reminded her, clutching at my ribcage with a wince. Now that my adrenaline was starting to wear out, fatigue and pain set in. Mostly pain. A lot of pain. Good God, fighting hurt. Pushing that aside, I got to the point. “I don’t know where that goes, but it goes away from them. Can we win this? Honestly.”
The Sentinels were starting to recover faster. Julio and Braden stepped up to keep their attacks at bay while we focused on our next strategy. They both looked uncomfortably like I did: exhausted, wounded, and on their last bit of power. Without those two, there was no real way Val, Alex, and Rosie could hold with their powers. I knew what the right answer was.
“Probably not.” Alex cleared some dirt from the back of his hand. He was only lightly wounded like Val and could probably go for another hour. He wouldn’t have lasted that long against all five Sentinels. He didn’t look bothered by admitting that we wouldn’t be able to win. He casually said it like he would if he mentioned the weather or told someone the time. “Lori’s new ability bailed us out, but that was a one-time thing. She won’t be able to do that again.”
“He’s right, I can’t.” She was wheezing. Somehow, she looked worse than I felt, despite not taking a single hit from what I could tell. “I didn’t know I could change emotions until about a minute ago. Ah, fuck me, that took everything I had left.”
My sudden flashes of anger made sense. When I looked her in the eye when she felt angry enough, it transferred to me. Completely out of character for me since I never had anger issues except in specific circumstances with Lori. Those, and whenever I was around Cordell. If I had known what that was earlier, it would have been so useful to have her train it. Oh well, better late than never.
“Then we need to go and we need to go now.” I pointed back toward the passage. The cracks around the entrance were starting to get bigger. That passageway could have collapsed and trapped us in with the Sentinels. At least if we got through it and it collapsed behind us, we could keep going and get away. If it separated us, that would have been even better.
Cordell staggered to his feet, one hand on his head, cables flailing wildly behind him. His eyes were red and puffy with tears streaming down his face. He stared Lori down with unfiltered hatred. “What the fuck did you do to me, you bitch!?”
Wasn’t that the million-dollar question?
Lori was probably going to ignore him. Engaging in banter during a fight wasn’t always the best idea. Then he sent a cable speeding her way like a whip. He was slow enough that I put up a barrier to block it, but the barrier left the exchange with a huge spiderweb crack in it. The back of my head was starting to hurt and my limbs were feeling heavy. It took effort to stop myself from slouching. I had maybe a few more barriers or attacks left in me, but not much more.
“Do you know what you could have had here!?” Cordell yelled, his voice echoing off the chamber’s walls.
“Back slowly toward the hole,” Lori whispered. Cautiously, we backed up, not taking our eyes off our opponents. We let Cordell ramble and rave about whatever the hell he wanted to. What little bit of sense he might have made before was gone, and none of us were going to entertain him or his ideas anymore. At least McLeod was coherent through his aloof speeches. Even with all their strength, there was no way they would have been able to stand up to McLeod, which would have made us allying with them a failed experiment from the start.
Since I had the best ranged defense, even hurt, I made sure I was going in last. Cordell miraculously didn’t notice us until Alex slipped in, leaving Rebecca, then myself in order. Looking up, the cracks were spreading to the ceiling, and bits of stone were falling on my armor. Rebecca was in when I noticed the first proper rock fall and hit my shoulder.
Ah, shit, that’s not good.
I created a flat barrier above my head, which started collecting the falling ceiling. Rebecca heard the noise and turned around; horror-stricken on her face. Stopping only made the problem worse. It smothered the flicker of affection I felt knowing she was stopping for me.
“Go, I’m right here!” I yelled, trying to snap her out of it and get her butt in motion. She realized that she’d been standing there, blocking me, and scrambled through the hole. Large chunks of the ceiling were raining down my barrier. I could feel each impact and how much my impromptu trap had left. It was not a lot. Right when she cleared through entirely, I ran behind her.
Then there was a yank at my waist that stopped me dead in my tracks. Around my midsection was a slithering cable covered in black ooze. Whatever the liquid was, it didn’t do much to impede the cable’s grip. A single violent pull was all it took to send me flying backward, tumbling head over heels on the hard floor. I came to a stop on my hands and knees, at least a dozen feet away from where I needed to be. A little bit between myself and my escape was the Sphere, frantically blinking, as if to signal me that I was in big trouble. Or maybe I was concussed and was just seeing weird things in the room’s dim light.
Rebecca poked her head back out to see where I was. When she saw what happened, there was a look of absolute anguish that broke my heart. My barrier finally gave in, shattering and letting all the rocks it had admirably held up fall to the ground. With a loud crash and a cloud of dust, my friends were all gone with no way to get me.