I knew they were out there, closing in, hunting...

Flying parallel the ground and barely a few inches above it, I concentrated on the mental map of the surrounding streets Force Awareness granted. The lack of precise details had made adjusting to the new sense a bit frustrating, with my brain trying to focus on the blurs that distant objects became, on top of the synesthesia when the new sense and sight occasionally mixed. It was like trying to use Hollywood movie thermal vision with one eye while looking normally with the other, except having an extra full pair of eyes that could look all around, including through the back of your head.

Despite all those drawbacks, Force Awareness proved its value repeatedly the longer I used it to navigate the city suburbs. While everything dense enough was plain as day even behind obstacles or around corners, moving dense things took on different "colors" for lack of a better description, probably because holding things together and moving them around were different applications of force.

A pair of undead skulked around the corner a block away, their eight-foot-tall outlines betraying their nature not just due to size but because there was no pulsing vortex of motion within, no flow of blood. Feet striking pavement with every heavy step, dead muscles moving round, they were like splashes of color very different from the immobile background... but not for long.

With both targets and path "visible" all I had to do was think it and my own body burst into motion. Unlike before, there was no feeling of acceleration, no pull against any one body part, only the air roaring against my ears. Crossing more than a city block in under a second, I slammed into the pair of enemies like a missile. To me the force of the impact was bruising, staggering even, the shock rattling bones through my flesh and causing damage that would take a minute to heal. The monsters simply exploded, the fight ending before it could even begin. A good thing, too.

The moment I flew in the open over the larger street the air shifted, a jagged, violent splash of color in my awareness leading back to the center of the city. My body kept moving, the predetermined path of my flight crossing the street in a fraction of a second and taking me into another back alley even as every bit of exposed skin itched. Then the whole street shook as a blindingly bright, deafening lightning strike missed me by less than thirty feet.

Someone had not taken my flying around the city well. The couple of hours since bathing in a pool of molten asphalt and metal and fighting the platoon of undead spearmen had become a high-stakes game of hide and seek. I'd had to dodge lightning strikes every time I tried to cross a main street and flying in the open was out of the question entirely. Worse, monsters kept converging in my direction, trying to flush me out. The ground-bound ones I took out as quickly as I could but any fliers, even just Imps, had to be either avoided or handled at range because I couldn't afford an aerial duel.

Fortunately, my latest power upgrade let me beat the monsters in both flight speed and maneuverability.

Proximakinesis III: exert total forces up to double your maximum strength on touch, divided and controlled as easily as you can visualize them.

The improvement from having to control Proximakinesis like extra limbs to simply visualizing what I wanted it to do had made the difference between being bogged down by a fight long enough for more enemies to catch up and keeping ahead of the majority of the hunters.

A trio of imps swooped down from above, staying just above the skyline as they made passes over the streets. Grabbing some rubble out of a ruined building, I launched them with Proximakinesis at just under the speed of sound. Visualizing where I wanted them to go took care of aiming and a split second later they struck true. Imp bodies were tougher than rock; they might even have stood up to bullets if someone shot at them. They weren't tough enough to take hits from projectiles fifty to a hundred times heavier than the average bullet, each of them being torn apart.

The trickle of energy marked my three hundredth kill after the last big bird. Whoever was after me seemed to have an endless supply of monsters to work with and a rough idea of my movements but eventually I'd grind down hi-URGH!!

A huge clawed hand slammed into my gut with the force of a runaway truck, knocking me out of the air as its towering owner blinked into visibility...

xxxx xxxx

The looming shape of shadow with the glowing blue eyes did not exist in my Force Awareness and only registered in my hearing as an area of total silence that seemed to drink in all nearby sounds. It moved eerily, more like a real shadow flickering between places as the light that cast it shifted than anything physical and with its every step, every blow, every maneuver claws of icy dread tried to sink into my flesh.

The ring-wraiths were scarier! I tried to taunt but the words died in my lips, their sound, too, drained away by the figure's very presence. The mist around us condensed into water for half a block, crushed to the ground by an unseen weight, the same weight that stuck my feet to the ground every time I tried to fly.

I blinked cold sweat off my eyes and in that fraction of a second I hadn't been looking the shadow had come up to me, one arm already swinging. Parrying instinctively, I got only numbness from elbow to wrist, then an explosion of pain as its touch tried to tear my arm apart. Then its arm, having continued through the block unimpeded, sunk into my diaphragm. It both froze and hurt, like an industrial water cutter drilling through steel at barely above the freezing point.

My body refused to get more than skin-deep bruising, but the sudden cold and numbness slowed me down just a little. Realizing the danger, I punched at the monster as fast as I could. Freezing cold bit into my fingers at the contact but Proximakinesis exploded, hurling the shadow back as if it'd been hit by a cannon. Then I picked up a nearby Dumpster and threw it at the figure. It sailed through with absolutely zero effect.

This content has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

In retaliation, the shadowy figure raised an arm and green fire grew in its claw-fingered palm. The size of an egg at first, the orb of dancing, emerald flames seemed to suck all light from our surroundings as they grew to the size of a beach ball in a second or two. I threw several pieces of sidewalk in an attempt to stop... whatever it was trying to do to just as little effect as the Dustbin before the orb of unnatural fire flew at me like a missile.

I ran. Using Proximakinesis to speed up between steps I pushed so much I nearly lost my balance before the unnatural weight anchoring me to the ground disappeared. The green orb kept up pace and more, eating up the intervening distance in moments, its rate of approach only slightly slowed as I took flight. Wary of lightning bolts - nailing me with one as I tried to avoid another attack was exactly what I'd do if I had to hunt myself - I remained at street level, taking a turn twice a second or more.

The fireball proved slower to turn then me, plowing into an empty, half-burned apartment block and exploding with tremendous force. Not like a grenade. Not like a car bomb from a movie. Not even like the lightning bolts thrown at yours truly from somewhere Downtown. Walls and support columns were torn asunder, fragments as large as my torso launched entire blocks away as the building was destroyed. It was the kind of explosion that would have probably gutted a main battle tank, and however tough I'd grown over the past week, I hadn't grown that tough.

Small tongues of yellow-green flame licked at my boots, searing through my suit's material and biting into skin. I landed two blocks away and took stock of the damage. My arms shook and my teeth chattered, the numbness and cold lingering still despite the absence of any visible wounds. At times like these, I wondered why my mental character sheet lacked the health indicators so common in computer games. It would have come really handy just about now.

Name: Maya Wennefer Bio: female human, 17y3m8d

Powers [0/31 pts]

Force Adjustment III, Force Awareness II, Forced Acceleration II, Immutable Force II, Progressive Regeneration III, Proximakinesis III, Super Suit I

Attributes [0/31 pts]

Might 18, Agility 10, Reason 3, Vigilance 5, Ego 10, Luck 2

It didn't even have a progress indicator, leaving me to guess how close I was to another power-up from the vague ebb and flow of accumulating power in my body. I bet Jerry had a bazillion such trackers in his own system.

Digitized Existence I: you gain numerical representations of your health, stamina, mental energy and progress that accurately reflect on reality. Self-Analysis I: you gain perfect awareness of your health, stamina, mental energy and progress which your mind interprets as numbers.

Seriously? The powers list was making suggestions without me having to delve into it now? Or was it simply reacting to my idle thoughts? Either way, not a good time to think about what powers to develop.

A minuscule displacement of air behind me, a bit of shimmering from a sudden temperature difference, and I was already dodging frantically. Claws seemingly made of darkness went through the space my head had occupied a fraction of a second before, the freezing wind of their passage brushing against my cheek and hair.

Hah! You missed! I tried to tell the shadow that seemed to have sprouted out of the ground, but once again my words were stolen out of my mouth. I was already finding the inability to trash-talk annoying; throw the same shadowy enemy to ninety percent of all comic book or anime characters and they would have already given up from sheer frustration. I took a more constructive approach to working off the annoyance and punched them.

Not coincidentally, the shadow had started conjuring another orb of emerald fire in its palm. Unlike all the projectiles I'd tried interrupting the process with, Proximakinesis worked just fine. The moment my fist touched its arm it gave an explosive push, hurling said arm and the half-finished spell in the shadowy figure's torso. The explosion that followed engulfed both of us in green flames.

I found myself buried nearly a foot into the sidewalk, cracks fanning out from my point of impact and green sparks licking across my front but with very little in the way of pain other than in my ears and mouth. The third tier of Force Adjustment could apply directly to my suit now, which had considerably reduced both the explosion and the impact, with the rest absorbed by the suit.

That gave me an idea. I got up, shrugged off fragments of concrete and gravel, wiped the blood dripping down my nose and smiled. The shadow-thing had been blown to bits, its upper half slowly sucking back said bits and pieces and reforming... and the oppressive silence was flickering on and off like a bad radio station.

"Not so tough now, are you?" I taunted and the thing actually heard me, its misshapen head turning to face me. I had no idea if it understood but it didn't matter; the very fact that I could speak was message enough and if not, shit-eating grins were universal.

It vanished and reappeared before me in the blink of an eye, its fist aiming for my heart. Seeing it coming, I took a huge gamble and didn't dodge... and the clawed hand was stopped cold the moment it touched my chest. Like Force Adjustment, Proximakinesis could apply to anything I touched, including my suit. It could also make as complex an effect as I could visualize, and holding the suit immobile against incoming blows was well within its capabilities. Both of them combined were stronger than the shadow, whose main shtick seemed to be ghosting through anything physical... but Powers were not mundane objects.

"You'll have to do much better than that," I growled and threw a Proximakinesis-boosted kick between the shadow's legs.