My foot shakes the stage as I rocket forward, speed like that of a track star suffusing my steps. Jeremiah’s eyes open a little wider for a moment, but return to their previous squint as he subtly bounces out of the way.
“Pretty fast for a wee babe, though nae much else!” He cackles as I slam into the sides, unable to stop myself.
The walls sting wherever I touch them, dozens of static shocks lighting up my arm as I try to separate from them. Rising from the floor, I just stare at the old man, seething. I won’t let what he said slide, but I already screwed up once by running at him. I’ve gotten the hang of walking normally with my new levels of strength, but sprinting or fighting are an altogether different beast.
I try jumping in place a bit, hopping from side to side to get a feel for the force I can now bring to my actions. It may look a bit embarrassing, but I’d rather do this than let him continuously kite me around like a bull.
“I cannae believe it! Tha’ gal’s actually hoppin’ mad!” He laughs, red in the face from his wheezing.
Taking steady steps, I approach him, guard up. He reacts quickly, but casually, standing at an angle from me, his cane brandished in front of him. “Learned from yer mistake, I recon?” I throw out a punch as he speaks, trying to catch him off guard, but he leans back effortlessly, avoiding it.
I don’t notice the handle of his cane coming under my guard until it's inches from my jaw, and despite throwing myself backward, it slams into the tip of my chin. My mouth slams shut; the taste of pennies on my tongue. I roll my tongue against my teeth, the memory of Naomi saying chipped teeth being easy to fix at the forefront of my mind.
I spit out some of the blood filling my mouth, far too mad to care that the floor absorbed it. I dash forward again, but this time I stop before I get to him. My feet scrape the ground as I pull back, hoping he’ll overextend to punish my rush. To my chagrin, he only raises the tip of his cane, the rest of his body remaining motionless.
Not wanting to abandon my only real chance to fake him out, I summon Silo’s Tactigon to my hand, willing it to become a cane of my own. Halfway through the swing towards his hand, I notice that rather than a cane like I imagined, it morphed into a mangled spoon-like shape with half the length I intended.
Entirely missing my target, I overswing and completely unbalance myself. Not giving me a chance to recover, his cane jabs fiercely into my sternum, a loud crack letting me know something snapped. I heave for breath, my lungs begging for air as I struggle to remain on my feet.
“Pahaha! Right barry job on that one, lass! Silo’s famous weapon... reduced to a spune!” He jeers, spinning his cane on his fingers.
He doesn’t approach me, letting me catch my breath as he walks the edge of the arena. Behind him, I see Revision, his face set into a frown, though I don’t see Catherine anywhere. I suppose I knew that she was a busy person, but I figured this would be important enough to stick around for. Especially since she’s the one who made me do this.
I shake my head, clearing unnecessary thoughts as I try to manipulate Tactigon again. It’s… misshapen. But I at least made it longer and gave it a heavy—though blobby—head. Steadying my footing, I face him again, my mind racing to find an avenue of attack. He’s faster at reacting than me, and refuses to attack me first. If I want to hit him, I’ll either need to overwhelm him, or trick him into missing me.
Rolling my shoulders, I prepare myself to try again. The pain in my mouth is mostly gone, though my chest feels like it's on fire, adrenaline be damned. I wind up before throwing the mace as hard as I can, and while it’s as poorly aimed as I expected, Jeremiah hops out of the way regardless. By the time the mace impacts the shields, I’m nearly on him; my empty-handed swing suddenly no longer empty-handed as the mace reappears in my grasp.
He narrowly avoids it this time, jumping over my low swing altogether and aiming the top of his cane at my head. I tilt my head, letting it impact the jelly-beret instead of me, and I barely feel the hit at all. I take no small amount of satisfaction that his expression now looks somewhat pressed, and almost earn a broken nose for my distraction.
“Shit–!” I blurt out, rearing backwards to avoid his swing. His toothy grin is already back, clearly pleased by my reaction. What a bastard, I think as I twist my body mid-swing of my mace to body-check him instead. He rolls nearly out of the way and scores a hit on my midsection, but I clip him with my shoulder, his arm slamming into the wall.
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“Quite the scary face ya got there, girlie.” He says, keeping his wounded shoulder behind him as he positions himself farther from me. I feel at my face; a wide smile I hadn’t realized I was wearing revealing itself beneath my fingers. I drop it immediately, a bit mortified to have been doing that.
I regain my composure just in time for him to race towards me, his feet barely touching the mats beneath us as he gets within striking distance. I lock my mace against his cane, blocking his first attack, but his foot snakes behind mine and knocks me off balance. My back hits the floor like a sack of cement, leaving me completely open to another attack.
I close my eyes, too afraid to even regain the breath that just got knocked out of me. I hear his swing tearing through the air and try to curl up, my instincts doing anything possible to avoid that pain. The sound of an impact comes, but no pain. I peek my eyes open, surprised to see the cane hovering nearly a foot from my torso, entirely wrapped within the tendrils connected to my hair.
“Aye, at’s a new one,” he says, wrenching the cane from my wiry grasp. “Neat, but na’ all that teuch.”
I sit up, wide-eyed, as I look at the inky tentacles hovering around me. I twitch a set of nonexistent muscles, and they twitch in turn, the action revealing an instinctual sort of control I’ve never felt before. Jeremiah looks at me, unimpressed, but to me this is incredible—like forgotten limbs I can finally remember. My command over them improves by the second; their lengths growing or shrinking as I channel Chthonic energy.
I force myself to stand despite the soreness permeating my body. My aches nothing compared to the elation at this discovery. I can feel that it’s not all, either, and a plan forms in my mind.
“Mighty confident there, lass. Finally ready ta’ fight like a Vanguard?” he calls, and I splay my tendrils out around me in response. “Ha! Right freakish, that is!”
I run at him, though carefully so as not to disturb the Chthonic energy roiling within my chest. Ducking under a sweep of tentacles, he closes in once again, his fist grabbing a handful of the appendages and yanking to pull me off balance. I let him, holding up my arms at his follow-up attack. The cane collides against my forearms with a crunch, and I grit my teeth as I grasp it with both hands, saying, “So I’m told I outrank you?” Before releasing the energy built up in my chest all at once.
His eyes go wide, the mass of fist-sized tendrils erupting from my torso like a cannon catching him off guard. I keep my hands on the cane, gripping it like a lifeline as he tries to twist out of the way.
I hear a click, and watch as the handle of the cane detaches, followed by a length of blade he holds to deflect the deluge. The blade is torn from his hands and flies toward the wall, but it gives him enough time to finish twisting out of the way. I have but a moment to feel disappointment before his elbow meets my temple and I collapse.
----------------------------------------
Waking up under perhaps the third unfamiliar roof this week, I groan after my first attempt to sit up reveals my new associate, Miss Migraine.
“Ngnghh…”
“Don’t move; you have broken several bones and completely exhausted your store of chthonic energy. Miss Catherine will be over after she ascertains the extent of Sergeant Duff’s injuries.” Roosevelt echoes in my skull, every word stabbing knives behind my eyes.
I mumble an incoherent “Ohkayy” to ensure he doesn’t speak again.
A few minutes of labored breathing go by before I hear footsteps, and two soft hands touch either side of my head. Immediately a pleasant cooling feeling washes down my bones, the wave bouncing back after hitting my fingertips.
“I swear, I didn’t think anyone could be more trouble than Silo.” Catherine says from above me, her tone gentle but sassy.
“I’m—ow—kind of impressive like that.” I respond, my headache undiminished.
“Indubitably. I’ve healed your broken forearms, sternum, and rib, though I can do nothing for your missing chthonic energy. You’ll have to live with the headache for a bit.” Or so she says. I think she just wants me to learn a lesson about overextending myself.
I feel something soft on my nose, and I twitch, opening my eyes. Catherines holding a small keychain—one of the ones from Hoagies Horrors—above my face.
“The plan was that I’d give you this to make you feel better after Duff knocked you around a bit, but by the time I told Hannibal to go get it, you had broken the old man's arm.” My eyes widened at that, guilt at actually hurting him souring my mood. “Don’t get all teary-eyed; if a broken arm was enough to bother him, he wouldn’t still be stalking the earth like the dinosaur he is.”
She puts the keychain in my hands and closes them around it. “So I guess you can consider it a victory prize instead of a consolation one. I figured you’d like it based on your reaction in the cafeteria yesterday.”
I nod seriously, though it probably looks a bit silly since I’m still lying down and upside down to her. “I love it, thanks.” I say, clutching it. “There’s something special about them, but I’m not sure how to explain it.”
“Sounds like you’ve found your obsession, Vanguard.” She says with a grin, standing up. “I told you we’ve all got one. I’ll be back in a bit. Gonna see what I can do to fix the bruise you left on the old man’s pride.”
I hear a scoff from somewhere on the ground past my feet, “I cannae believe me ears. Yer talking shite about me when I’m naught but a meter away. Just help me up, ya witch.”
I smile, enjoying their bickering as I recover.