James couldn’t come up with a good comeback. He relished the smile on his face, he loved a good competition, even of wits. She beat him, but instead of bothering him as it usually would, he was happy she was doing better. The present situation contrasted strongly with the sobbing, haunted woman he saw this morning. He hoped it lasted.

Seeing the stream in the distance, he picked up his pace.

“You can get the water while I set up the fire to boil it.”

Gathering the logs and sticks, James was eager to get to the bear, so he rushed. He started the fire by simply blasting it with flame, the hungry fire quickly devouring the wood and sending embers in the air establishing a large flame instantly. Gracie was dismayed. Now was that necessary? She thought while shaking her head. James quickly added more fuel and held the water bottle a short distance over the flame, his energy mixed with the fire made him immune to the heat.

“Won’t that melt the water bottle?” Gracie asked.

“No, the water cools the plastic by transferring the heat causing the water to boil before the plastic ever reaches its melting point. It leaches harmful microplastics though, but what option do we have.” James said with a bit of annoyance, if only he could control the earth element. He could form a bowl.

Gracie looked at James with a bit of admiration. “How do you know that?”

James shrugged, “Since my dad died and I dropped out of high school I spent my time training my body and my mind. Probably read it in a book somewhere, don’t really know.”

When the water started bubbling James carried it back to the river and submerged the closed water bottle, cooling it off. James opened the bottle and downed half of it, handing it to Gracie who drank the other half.

“This water tastes like chemicals,” she said with her face scrunched in disgust.

“That’s the microplastics I was talking about,” James said, thinking of a solution. They really needed to return to Dahlonega soon for supplies. First, he needed to get some food for Gracie. Then he would turn the pelt into fireproof clothes, removing the issue of burning his clothes off when he fought.

James repeated the process a few times until they both felt completely hydrated. After he was done refilling it for the road–or walk–he put out the fire by dispersing his energy, not wanting to start a forest fire.

Gracie’s stomach rumbled loudly, causing James to frown, feeling apologetic he hasn’t got any food for her yet. “Alright, let’s go, I can hear your stomach growling from here. Let’s get you some food.” James said as he walked back towards the battlefield.

James realized he hadn’t eaten in two days, yesterday he slept the entire day away and woke up that night. The day before that early in the morning when he ate the peaches and potted meat was when he last ate. Still, he felt barely hungry at most. Odd, he thought. He was used to not eating for prolonged periods as he got caught up in his training and work. The added urgency to his situation must be tempering his appetite.

“Yeah right, you’re just hearing yourself,” Gracie said trying to hide her blush at him hearing it. She felt silly for being embarrassed by that.

He saw Gracie shy away from him in embarassment. “No, I heard it coming from right….. Here!” He said as he reached around her from behind and tickled her stomach.

She screamed and laughed as she ran from him, James eventually caught up to her, tickling her as he pushed her to the ground. Standing over her as he kept tickling her stomach. Her laughs disguised she was flustered again, which she was getting sick of. How could he keep making her embarrassed and flustered over such minor things?

“Stop tickling me! We have things to do you oaf!” She used her legs to kick at his hands so he’d stop, standing up she dusted herself off while she evil-eyed James.

“I’m going to get revenge for that.” She said with a genuine attitude, using the annoyance to push away the flustered feeling she still had from being pushed to the ground by him. Wasn’t hard to feel annoyed by it, she hated being tickled.

“Yeah, whatever, let’s go.” James was just content he was bringing a smile to her face. Whether it brought her annoyance as well he didn’t care. He started walking in the direction of the battlefield, which Gracie had never seen. She only saw the outskirts of the devastation. He was honestly looking forward to seeing her reaction. She’d probably just call me a brute again, he thought.

Gracie’s mind was on that bear meat. She was starving. She had to stop herself from drooling. She was so excited to have some real food. She hoped James with all her being could find a way to skin the bear. He seemed so capable with everything else. She gently nodded to herself that she could probably rely on him for that too.

Back on the outskirts of the devastation, James had time to look at the consequences of his unrestrained powers. Trees looked like lamp-posts, all the limbs scorched off and charred a deep brownish-black color. As they kept walking through the debris, they eventually entered a section of the woods where all trees were uprooted and torn apart forming a clearing. James looked over at Gracie, her eyes wide and brows were furrowed. James couldn’t tell if it was anger or a deep focus.

As they kept walking they arrived at the giant crater in the middle, surrounded by smaller craters. Gracie looked down at it, her eyes somehow growing even wider. She looked over at James, disappointment painted in his eyes.

“How could you possibly do this? This crater looks like a meteor hit, You could destroy entire cities! How is this possible?!” Gracie was shaking her head. She looked around the battlefield and recalled James saying the bear put up a great fight. She saw scattered Earth from explosions and giant boulders sprawled through the field. The forest had always been her safe place, but with creatures who could put up a fight against such destructive power James had, she didn’t think she could consider it that any longer.

The thought made her want to get closer to him, which she realized was sort of ironic considering he was the most dangerous thing in this entire forest, if not beyond. But that in of itself made her feel safe, James could leave a crater in whatever creepy-crawly or gang member that threatened her safety. The thought of not being around James brought her anxiety.

The story has been illicitly taken; should you find it on Amazon, report the infringement.

James was slyly gauging her reaction. Her face was a mixture of awe and shock, her almost unperceivable small steps toward him reassured him her processing of the situation was positive in his favor, but he wasn’t very relieved by that.

Looking at the devastation of an entire section of the forest out of revenge, he undoubtedly killed other small animals pointlessly in the devastation. He no longer felt any pride in his victory. In his raw destructive power. He didn’t regret the revenge, nobody would desecrate his fathers items like that. But If he had lost control of himself like this around other people or even Gracie, he would’ve killed them.

He had to walk away for a moment, he was fighting tears at his failure. The thought of losing himself like that again and hurting Gracie felt very real to him. He didn’t want her to see him vulnerable like this. James was wrestling with his thoughts. The memories of the highway kept flooding in. He felt like he was still on that highway, bringing death and destruction to those around them. He was just another part of it.

His father always told him to be as sharp and precise as a sword, but he was a meteor destroying everything. He felt shameful. The image of Gracie’s innocent face charred by his flames passed through his mind. He lost his battle against his tears, silently crying as he faced away. He gritted his teeth, he was being weak.

Gracie was looking over at James. His head was dropped and his shoulders were forward, a far cry from his usual confidence. Did I say something? Gracie recalled what she had said to him. She didn’t think that was it. Why was he upset? Gracie expected him to be proud of the destruction he caused.

“Hey, are you okay? What’s wrong?” She said softly to James who was facing away from her. He shook his head.

“Nothing. Let’s find that bear.” James kept his voice even, he didn’t want to talk about his problems or show that he was crying. His emotions were his to deal with, Gracie has enough to process through and he didn’t want to put anything else on her. And to be honest with himself, he didn’t want her to lose respect for him either.

James looked at the direction they came in at, it was the same direction he went flying off in. He knew because they passed where they set up camp on the way into this section of the forest, and Gracie wouldn’t have been able to move his body when she found him.

The bear should be in the other direction. Looking that way, it was on the other side of the crater. He walked around the deep crater, chunks of dry, dead dirt breaking off and falling into the crater. The scene was just a valley of death. The landscape might not recover for decades if not centuries. James shook his head, realizing the long-term consequences his actions had.

Gracie followed behind James, feeling nervous. James’ change of character scared her. She wished he’d open up to her, but she wouldn’t force him. Looking at the giant crater reinforced that to her, she may have thought she knew James but what if he could snap when he got like this? She decided to keep quiet and ask him about it at a later point.

James’ mind was numb. He felt thoughtless in the moment, narrowly focused on finding the bear. The disappointment of failing his father, failing himself, and potentially failing others in the future weighs him down. He shut it all off. He couldn’t let the weight break him down in front of Gracie.

He kept walking for a while. He noticed trees snapped in half and splintered very uncharacteristically compared to other trees. He figured it was either boulders or the bear traveling at high speeds from the explosion. Following it for a minute, he found the bear lying against a tree, dead. Relief filled James. At least it wasn’t difficult to find like he expected.

The bear was still in one piece and the pelt was unharmed, he guessed the stone armor encasing the bear did its job but the shockwave traveling through the bear’s body killed him. Time to get to work.

“Hand me the knife please,” he said as he thought about how to do this.

Gracie handed him the knife, closely watching his face for his emotional state. All she saw was focus and determination, James was a complete mystery to her. Just moments ago he looked bothered at best and downright tormented at worst.

James wanted to test the fire resistance of the pelt, he was curious how the bear being dead for a few days would affect it. He produced a thin torch from his index finger and held it to the pelt. It had no effect. He sped up the energy intensifying the flame into the roar of a torch, it had no effect. James was happy about this. It would do perfectly as clothes for him.

James took the knife and gently tried to stick it through the pelt, making sure he wouldn’t rupture the intestines and soil the meat. When he felt no give, he put some more force into it and it slowly sunk in. James frowned. He’d be able to skin it, but he’d be here several days struggling at it. He didn’t know why the pelt was so strong, his only guess was the earth energy in it strengthened it.

That thought gave him an idea. He laid his hand on the bear’s pelt, seeing if he felt any energy or something out of the norm. Not feeling anything, he moved the energy from his channels into the pelt with direct contact, concentrating to force the energy to not turn into flame. He saw his energy enter, and be forcefully repelled. Interesting, James thought, smirking.

He looked over at Gracie who was looking at the bear with a dumb expression on her face, nearly drooling. “Tried putting my energy into the pelt and it was pushed out. I want to test something. Move your energy into your palm and I want to see what happens when I try the same thing on your hand.”

Snapping out her daydream about food, Gracie looked at him like he was crazy. What in the world was James doing now? She sighed. She was hungry. She hoped this was quick. She moved the energy into her channel, flowing like a steady river to her palm. Holding her hand up to his, the energy in her palm started thrashing as the foreign energy entered her channels. Being forcefully ejected from her palm and back down her channel, causing a lot of pain.

“Ouch! What the f–” Gracie snapped her hand back. James nodded. He felt the same thing, his energy was pushed back down his channel. It didn’t hurt him as bad, his assumption was either he had better control of his energy or there was more energy in his channel that caused the repellence to be stronger for Gracie.

“Sorry, confirmed a suspicion. It seems elements seem to have some sort of polarity like a magnet before they’re converted into the actual element. I think that’s why the pelt was completely fire-resistant. I wish I had another fire user to test this out on, I think our energies would attract, but what would happen when they touched?”

James was thinking aloud. James was also curious about how this would affect close-range combat, could a sufficiently strong user destroy somebody’s channels if their energy was in it? Could you shut down their attacks? James shook his head, putting his mind back to his work. His curiosity would have to wait.

Gracie looked like she was about to hit him, her evil-eye made her look like she just got out of prison. “Well, Mr. Scientist I’m not your test subject! Find something better to experiment on.” Gracie glared at him, her hands still balled into a fist.

“Let me know when you find a better one,” James said with a blank face, focusing on getting ready to skin.

Despite her annoyance, she felt lacking compared to James. He was constantly improving and figuring things out, what has she contributed? With a sigh, she thought about what she could do. She had no idea how to skin, she could cook simple things like pasta, eggs, and the whatnot, but doubted she would do a better job than James with wild meat when he seemed to have so much experience.

All she could do was heal and now apparently create ice spears in the spur of the moment she nearly killed James with. She shook her head, she had to do better. She thought about what more she should try to do with her powers. Replaying her day, she realized she could’ve refilled the water bottle with her water element earlier instead of wasting time at the river.

She resisted facepalming. It was so obvious. How could I possibly miss that? She berated herself, she was incredibly weak at the moment and her overlooking the ability to refill the bottle made her feel even more useless. What if James considered her a burden and abandoned her?

Gracie looked back down at James who was actively skinning the pelt. She noticed he wasn’t even using her knife, his finger was glowing a bright red and he had some small torch precision cutting the pelt. Her eyes became distant, and a deep frown formed on her lips. His powers surpassed even the gift she gave to him. She never called it a gift to him, but it was.

She silently walked off. She needed some space. She knew it was a nightmare, but her parents were right. She was useless. At this point she was taking advantage of James. She brought barely anything to the table.

James was elated, he figured out a way to bypass the fire resistance and toughness of the pelt. If he concentrated the energy into his finger and forced bursts into the pelt, he repelled the earth energy and it easily cut with a minor torch. It created a lot of mental strain to do it, though. He had to force a lot energy to stay in his finger and time the bursts just right.

All James knew was it worked great at skinning the bear, going through the practiced motions he learned with his father leaving his focus centered on balancing the process of skinning it with a flame. He wished his father was here, they would be having a blast together. He was glad to have Gracie, he recalled his day with her and his smile deepened. She is something else, he chuckled to himself.

Wondering what she was doing, he turned around. She was nowhere to be seen. With wide eyes, his heart started racing. Where did she go?