Death's Kiss Hello

Another loud bang had me stepping out of the wall's protection to survey the fight. May was already roughed up pretty badly, and Ares' lightning cloud was barely producing enough bolts to cause damage. Another ice and fireball crashed into the blood wall. I rushed behind it just in time to prevent myself from getting splashed by molten lava. My heart thumped so hard I could barely hear the fight. Suddenly, something splashed on me from above. My first thought was liquid fire, but when the expected pain didn't come, I opened my eyes. My arm was red. It was blood. "Shite," I cursed. The wall was melting! I looked out again. The battle raged on. "Cover me!" May yelled, just as the beast, a ghastly mish-mash of a reptile and an octopus, shot a flaming ball out of its mouth at her. She was open and unprotected. But just in the nick of time, a thin red bubble surrounded her and easily deflected the missile. However, Ares spat out blood from the impact. Splash. Another chunk of the blood wall melted down. By now, it was barely two-thirds its previous height. She sat cross-legged on the ground, and with her eyes shut, May's lips moved rapidly. When she opened her eyes, they had turned pitch black, like they had been when she rescued us from the prison. Violent air surged around her in silent fury. Obviously unable to withstand it, Ares' shield came down. The beast didn't rush to attack her; instead, it stared warily. At this point, Ares was slumped on the grass. He tried to get up, but his arms shook, and he fell back down into the wet grass. The mist was returning, even as the forest was becoming an inferno. The beast noticed the fog as well. And then, spurred by the return of its natural defense, it crouched and released a fierce screech. There was an ominous crack. The blood wall shook. Then it collapsed. Now exposed, I panicked. Ares was down, and May was in a magical trance, so I took a gamble and ran to the left, towards May. The beast was momentarily distracted by the sound of the wall falling. Now close to her, I could hear May chant in a hypnotic singsong voice. "Spirits of agony, chaos, and loss, turn that which I touch into dust." Over and over again, she repeated the words. By the end of each chant, the winds around her beat fiercer. Suddenly, her pitch increased, and a blast of energy shoved me away and put me right between May and the beast. Shite! I cursed, scrambled to my feet, and ran to safety. Not! Heck, I tripped on the first try, landing on my ass with such a loud smack that I successfully caught the attention of the beast. Yay. Not! I tried to shuffle towards May, but the wind turbines her power created just pushed me forward. The slimy beast hissed and ambled towards me. I guess it figured it should at least take a bite of the only human pest not shooting lightning bolts or spells at it. Well, tough luck. Being eaten by an ugly, steam-blowing, part-octopus, and part-reptilian beast was never on my bucket list! Now I didn't suddenly glow with a power I never knew I had. Nope! Tough shite. Instead, I keeled over in the most realistic scene of death I could imagine. I lay down, eyes shut, and so deathly still I could have fooled a coroner. I could feel its confusion. The beast shuffled a few steps closer to me and then paused as it inhaled sharply. It was sniffing to confirm that I was truly dead. Too bad, I could play dead but I couldn't smell dead. Keeeee! The beast screeched in anger; it had found out it was being fooled. I didn't care, though. After all, I wasn't trying to fool it. Nope. I was just buying us some time. And I wasn't disappointed. "Dust!" May screeched. She was even louder than the beast. Her red hair had grown at least an inch long between the last two seconds I glanced at her and now. It whooshed about her like a cape as she shot forward and past me with such speed that I could barely keep sight of her. She reached the beast in a millisecond. Her hand was lifted, then she brought it down palm-first in a harsh hit on the beast's one of many tentacles. There was a sound like the clap of thunder. Then she fell like a broken kite. She was no longer dazzling like a second ago, and she looked mighty pale. She was so high up, I couldn't let her fall; she would surely break her neck...and die. And even though I knew she might just crush me instead under the weight of her fall, I ran forward anyway to catch her. The beast was disintegrating from the part May had hit. The monster was rapidly turning into dust. I watched as it tried and failed to stop half its body from corroding. Then its eyes turned to me. I don't think a look filled with such hateful malevolence has ever been directed at me. I paused in shock. A heavy thud told me I'd failed my rescue mission. But that was the least of my concerns. The beast rushed towards me, even as its body was falling off and blowing away with the wind. All that was left was its head. It opened its mouth, and I knew what was coming. I ran faster than I was sure I was physically capable of. But I felt the heat of a Yin Yang fireball. And then it happened. That annoying thing that always happened every time someone was escaping from danger. I tripped. And smacked face-first into the ground. I turned around just in time to see the fireball so close I could feel the heat singe my hair. But then, a thin red film appeared in my vision. My mouth opened in surprise. I looked to the side. Ares' hand was stretched towards me, even though he hadn't gotten up from the ground. I frowned. His face was bruised and pale, but he was still weak. This means that if this ball hit the shield, Ares would surely suffer a fatal backlash! He was annoying, but I didn't want the kid to die. I wanted to yell at him to take down the shield, but it was too late. Boom! The shield held long enough to absorb the impact. But the blast of steam from the fire and water mixing shot me so high in the air that I felt weightless. Falling was the same. It's not like all those dreams where you're falling, because I knew this was real, and the ground was getting too close for my liking. I shut my eyes in fear and braced myself for impact. But instead of turning into a bloody pancake, I bounced off a bubble-like surface and landed once again face-first in the dirt. Ares was still helping. But the next second, a sharp pain in my abdomen alerted me to the fact that all was not well. I moved my hand to find out the problem. My hand came back bloody. This time it wasn't from the blood wall or the beast. Nope, now I was truly wounded. I tried to move, but the resulting pain had me doubting my life. The world started to go out of focus, and for a second, my life flashed before my eyes. It was awful. I hadn't even kissed a boy! Then my thoughts strayed to Sinbad. I thought of his handsome face and entirely kissable lips. I thought of his tall build and the smooth, hard pecs that surely hid beneath his clothes. I thought of goats flying in the sky and clowns eating sushi. Then the world went dark. *** "Hush, little baby, go to sleep. Mother will buy you a mockingbird. A mockingbird. A mockingbird. A mockingbird..." The song seemed to lull me to sleep with its low melody and subsequently yank me back to consciousness with its overbearing eeriness. I opened my eyes to see warm brown ones staring at me in worry. "Mom?" I called out in surprise. I sat up easily and gave her a tight hug. My nose twitched, and I fought the urge to cry. My mom slowly patted my back as she had done on that fateful day. I ended the hug to level her with an accusing glare. "Where have you been?" I asked. Mom shrugged and didn't say anything. I would never admit it, but I was so disappointed and hurt. I blinked away the tears pressing to fall. I turned away from her dull eyes and studied our environment. It was daytime, and Everburn had lost its sinister look and aura. The trees, bushes, and animals were still burning, but it all seemed very picturesque. Then I saw them. A small shirtless boy and a girl with slightly tattered clothes and a head full of bright red hair. They were gathered around a still and unmoving body. Even if I banged my head and lost my memory, I could still remember that face. After all, it's a face I have seen in the mirror since I gained awareness.