Seltron Super Academy 16

“ALEXANDRA!!” I cried out, looking shocked at the mousy little girl that had just annihilated my friend. To my own disappointment, I just stared at her in shock for a moment. How had I not been prepared for this? I knew there were plenty of dangerous powers, but still- Why hadn’t she ever used this power before?

“She’s trapped in another dimension. She’ll be stuck there for at least a good while... if she survives at all.” The one who did it told the other classmates in a monotone, save for the ending where her tone took on a hint of malicious glee.

“Now we just need to eliminate Camila, just in case the monster survives,” another boy said, but I was already charging towards them, my tendrils lashing out at anyone nearby. The surprisingly deadly girl backed away, looking above us, obviously trying to find a spot to drop down another block on my head, but the others weren’t making it easy, swarming me. That’s a relief at least. If she has to avoid friendly fire and Alex isn’t actually dead yet... I can work with this.

One girl dodged under the tendrils and tried to strike at my legs with a scythe of all things. I scoffed, jumping over it and reaching down to slam the girl. The scythe wielder spun out of the way, defying physics and lifting herself up as she twisted the polearm around for another strike. Some kind of rotational power? I found myself approving, even as the scythe lanced into my arm.

Pain dully pierced through me as the blade split through my arm, but it got caught on the massive bones that protruded out and made my claws. Using the embedded scythe as leverage, I hauled the girl up in the air, then hit her with a tendril. She spun to divert the power of the blow, and I had the tentacle wrap around and constrict her to stop the spinning. All of that happened as I galloped ahead, fending off the other students with my good claw and remaining tentacles (and one foot, for an unfortunate boy who fell before me and got a leg crushed as I trampled him).

The boy had tried shooting crystal shards at me, but his aim hadn’t been very good. Right after I stomped his leg, he stopped fighting back. Obviously in pain from the leg, but he should have still been able to use his power against me. He also clutched his head as well as his leg, a sign that my previous theory that doing enough damage could break the mind control was correct.

Those thoughts unfortunately distracted me long enough that Maximus, somehow recovered, was able to charge me (seeing him again also made me question that theory, which added to my hesitation). I jammed a claw at him, redirecting it slightly at the last minute when I saw that he wouldn’t stop. It ripped into his side, rather than his heart, but his muscles protected him, to a degree. Enough of a degree that my injury didn’t snap him out of it or stop him, and he was able to grab my side and hold me in place.

The metalshaper followed it up, stepping forward into a risky range himself to bring forth a dozen or so spears from the ground while I was distracted with Maximus and pierce my legs several times over, pinning me further.

Maximus loosened his grip to smash at my skull with huge arms, nearly as big as the piston-like super arm I made to attack Alex in the tournament. Copycat. He beat upon the giant armored structure around my head and smashed off a large chunk of bone from the front of it, the shock sending cracks throughout the rest, making a ringing in my head and bloodying Maximus’ own knuckles. I ripped my own arm down and out through his side in response, tearing out a good chunk of flesh.

Even with this sudden assault, I felt a sense of calm wash over me. Was I so angry I entered a ‘tranquil fury’ type state? Nope, I’m just having my mind assaulted by a boy standing back a few meters. I assumed it was him at least, given the look of concentration on his face and Dryden standing beside him, sending out his waves of sleepiness and lethargy my way. Even if I survive the current physical assault, the mental attack might spell my doom.

Stuck, I shifted, collapsing my body down into a lower half made of writhing tentacles, made around the blades that had pinned my first legs and were easily tearable on their own to avoid getting caught in the same trap. I traded the tendrils and claws for five ‘stinger’ limbs, each long and with pointed ends jutting out from my torso. Shrinking and stretching my neck, I changed it so it was longer and more flexible to avoid attacks. I pulled back and smoothed out the broken chunks of the bone plating around my head, keeping a small ball of armor around the top. There was a bit of plating on the neck stalk, but it relied more on mobility than armor to protect my brain. Most importantly, though, I replenished my blood and fixed other critical systems in my body. I also increased my adrenaline and pumped it through my system to counter the lethargy to an extent.

Their strategy was actually quite good. It would defeat most foes of my caliber, but they made a slight error. The calmness risks putting me to sleep with the lethargy waves, but it puts me in a better frame of mind to counter the rest of them than I would have been, hurt and panicking as I would be without it. I thought that as I took Jeremy down with a number of blindingly fast precision stinger blows and planned my next course.

The adrenaline was helping, but there was still a slowness to my movements and thoughts that was overtaking me from the combined powers being used against me. I ignored another boy reaching out to me and rushed over to the two standing back, assaulting my mind. He managed to brush by a tentacle ‘leg,’ and suddenly my body had massive injuries spreading out all over it, seemingly at random. My skull cracked, four of my stinger arms broke, lacerations appeared, a couple of ruptured organs, and even a few burns appeared all over my body.

I was tempted to turn around and attack him, but I continued my course. More wounds are never a good thing, and each regeneration costs energy and some mass, but I’m more worried about being overcome by the psychic students. Injuries suck, but I can at least heal those. There’s also another risk: If I fall, then I fall, but if they put me to sleep, will I be at risk of being turned against Alex again? Cube girl hinted Alexandra might break free in time, but if I was again turned against her... Besides, so long as I’m not slain instantly, I still have my trump card, though revealing it at this juncture would mean I’d have to kill everyone still conscious in this room.

I was injured, but not critically, thanks to my redundancies; one stinger and a few spare tentacles were more than enough to incapacitate Dryden and his accomplice with ease, the two boys not skilled fighters. I saw the boy who mysteriously injured me, the pale shade of his blue eyes indicating Pantarion heritage. He reached down and then fixed the wounds I caused to Maximus, which was good in that it stopped the boy from bleeding to death but bad in that it brought back another foe for me to fight.

Recovering from over a dozen inch-wide puncture wounds and forced to fight? Does that kid have Biokinesis? That would be- no, not true biokinesis; otherwise, he would have taken me and possibly Alex out in a second. My eyes saw the entire battlefield, and I recognized a couple of people that had been healed by him. The wounds... they’re the same ones he gave me, just combined from several or all of them. He must have some type of ‘Damage Transference’ power, able to store up wounds from others and then deal them back. It made sense; I thought I recognized him hanging out by Janet’s office sometimes, possibly looking for tips with his power since they seemed similar.

I was worried for a second that I’d have to take him out and everyone else again, but my worries seemed unfounded, as those who were healed seemed dazed, clutching at their heads or running away in fear. So they are free from the control then... except Maxi-Jerk is still fighting me, despite all the hurting I’ve laid down on him. Just how much is he really under the Nightmare Manipulator’s control? The gleam in his eyes indicated at least a part of him was using this as an excuse to try and get back at me. Something devious enough that I could almost respect. Almost.

Both of them were ready now, moving to engage me again, something I was actually glad about; if they had backed up and made more space between us, Cube Girl would probably have room for her dimension trap attack. I flowed around the large boy’s lumbering attacks, slipping through them. The other boy circled to the left, trying to find an opportunity to strike me from ‘behind,’ but that was the (possibly eldritch-esque) beauty of my battle forms; there were no openings, no weak points to strike at. I saw all and knew exactly how he’d try to attack me.

Darting underneath another haymaker Maximus threw at me, I let a tentacle trail behind. Damage Shifter Lad predictably lunged for it, not noticing the ripple that spread throughout my body a moment before. He grabbed onto it... but nothing happened, because it was no longer a part of my body, detached with that shift. The albino boy had just enough time to look up and see one of my many remaining tentacles scrape across his face, ripping at his eyes with some razor edges I added onto it.

He yelped in pain and blindly lunged forward, somehow managing to grab a part of me. His eyes were instantly recovered, and I felt two of mine get torn up. Of course, I had plenty to spare, and what had been a crippling injury on him (enough to distract him from causing any more damage than that) was hardly a nuisance to me. Healing himself as well, Damage Transference really is an incredible power. I could do so much with it if I had it... 

I sighed and used the blunt sides of my stingers to strike him in the back of his neck. He crumpled down, and I tossed him aside to get his unconscious body out of the way. I was surprised at how strong of a power he had and realized he must have had a bad power match-up in the tournament, like he just had with me now.

Of course, that’s part of why I picked this power - shapeshifting is a great counter for plenty of abilities, and very few are a good match against it by themselves.

Maximus continued his attacks, but he was easy to avoid, especially when I only had him to focus on, his moves heavily telegraphed. Then the purple cube appeared behind me, shocking me. Was the bitch willing to risk Maximus’ life and everyone unconscious on the ground in an attempt to stop me? No, as it turned out a moment later when Maximus used the distraction the dangerous energy block provided to lunge and grab my neck and body, the block disappearing. She had just been trying to throw me off, and it worked. Darn it.

The muscled giant ripped and heaved at my neck, cracking it apart in places and tearing it mostly off my body. Mostly because I had made several thousand high-density strands of tissue inside when first shifting just in case of something like this, to maintain connection. Even then, several broke, but I only needed one connection to manipulate the rest of my mass. Ripples spread down, and my flesh rose up in response, tubes of it rising and attaching back to my head from below.

Maximus tried to wave them off, but he was overwhelmed by the rest of my attacks, the shift turning my stingers into a half dozen clawed hands ripping into his ligaments and joints. Let’s see you get back from that, asshole. He dropped me, his muscles shrinking to let his hand that broke and was now partially in my neck free as he fell away, screaming.

I won that round, but the injuries and time had cost me. Some of the few remaining others had recovered and were moving in again when suddenly a small flash of purple appeared in the air twenty meters over. It fell and hit the center of the gym so hard it sent out a shockwave, stunning and drawing in the attention of everyone else. Alexandra had returned.

The schoolgirl rose dramatically from her three-point stance, wings unfurling with a snap as she eyed the situation. Her clothes were torn, and she even seemed to have a few more scratches on her face and arms, though none of them looked deep or serious. Seeing me in the path of a bunch of students, Alex rushed forward, the ground shaking where she stepped off of, fists crashing into the unprepared mind-controlled students.

Using the distraction, I fixed myself up as best I could. I renewed my ‘battle form’ with some slight alterations for the damages I had taken, making my two arms regular size and making the ends smaller, talon-like claws than the gigantic slicers I had before. I regrew the four legs, but only three of the tentacles, and made the bone armor around my head smaller, closer to a knight’s helmet. The internal injuries were too extensive, so I just focused on closing my wounds for the moment and shutting down some of the damaged stuff, relying on the enhanced physiology I had set up before.

With remaining attackers mostly smashed aside, Cube Girl recovered from how flabbergasted she was at Alex’s reappearance. “How did you escape so fast?”

Alex shrugged, raising a single wing to block some hail sent their way. “It was just a maze and race to the finish type thing.” To me she commented, “Weird place though. Everything was so floaty, and the dimensions were-”

“I’m glad you’re fine, but- watch out!”

Cube Girl, seeing everyone else around us incapacitated, raised a hand to drop another block on top of the two of our heads. We both dodged to opposite sides, and as I moved past the block, I saw Alex dashing straight at her. Cursing, I moved to intercept the winged girl as our adversary had the first block disappear and made a new one, right in front of Alex.

I pulled Alex back with a tendril before her uncontrolled rush would have taken her back into the portal block. “Dammit, I already lost you to that portal thing once; don’t go charging in again!” Scanning around the room, I couldn’t see any openings, but there was a weak spot in the top left corner of the gym. “Quick, break an opening there!” I whispered, pointing at the spot while using my body to cover the motion from Cube Girl’s sight. “I’ll draw her off.”

“Right,” Alex said somewhat sheepishly, running off where I directed, large bounds propelling her across the gym. The enemy looked warily at my friend, but she also focused on me as I turned to face her, aware that I was up to something. That’s it, keep looking this way.

Shifting again, I took on a more humanoid, winged form, with two powerful legs, as I began to play the most dangerous game of chicken with a huge, glowing purple block. My other form is faster for straight-line movements, but Alexandra is even faster than I am there, and she nearly got caught that way. I’ll need to do something else. I leapt at the mousey girl controlling it, and Cube Girl shifted the block into my path. The wings, while immensely strong, couldn’t let me fly, not with as much mass as I still had. They could help shift me out of the way, though, redirecting my aerial movement to the side. I caught a glimpse of Alex fighting off three students in the corner of the room (no danger there, but they were slowing an escape down).

I thought about spitting acid at the girl before discarding the idea just as fast. It would be too slow, taking too much of her attention, especially when a single hit here could mean my doom. One student was blasting himself my way, jumping and blowing out a large amount of wind to send him flying across the gym. Before he could get turned to face me and presumably blow me away, I jumped up, meeting him in the air.

The purple block was already moving towards us, but I used Blowhard as a springboard, jumping off him and over the purple cube of doom. I couldn’t fly with my wings, but they did help propel me across the air over the cube to the other side where she stood. Then the block reversed direction, flying upwards, faster than it had before. Clever girl, she lulled me into overconfidence so she could catch me off guard here. She’d make a good demon. Though, it’s not like I’m out of tricks either. I shifted again, blood exploding out of my body.

The blood was released at critical points to serve as jets, propelling me just ahead of the purple block, which slammed soundlessly and harmlessly into the ceiling behind me. I glared down at the mousey girl, far below me, and smiled viciously.

A peregrine falcon could dive in excess of speeds of 200 miles per hour. My form may not have had quite their optimized diving speed, but it was still fast enough that I was sure she had no chance of dodging my dive. That’s why I was quite surprised when the girl was suddenly flying backwards, well out of my range to course correct.

Percy had telekinetically thrust her a safe distance away, with better control than I had thought he’d have. It was unfortunate because that left her still sound enough to plan another attack on me as I fell through the sky.

Not for the first time, I was grateful for the eyes on my back. I saw where the new cube was and the closest corner to me, so that when I hit the ground, my wing was already tucked over me to help roll that way. Luckily, it happened to be the closest path to Alexandra too.

On my way over, I tried to take a potshot at Cube Girl as I rolled up and started running, who was protected by the boy I had jumped on, not as taken out of the fight as I had thought. He blew, his breath making a vast gale of wind that sent my bone spike careening harmlessly away.

At the same time, I saw Alexandra had finished off her three opponents, now lying before her feet like lumps, moaning in pain. The winged girl crouched down, then jumped, creating a small ‘boom’ and then a larger ‘BOOM’ as her fist hit the ceiling high above us. The roof smashed open, metal screeching and turning upwards. The aftermath had cracks spreading out from the corner, further into the gym, and wherever they were, chunks of earth and bits of steel fell downward upon the gym. Overall, the debris was small, and none of the students were in danger of being crushed.

I grit my teeth and ran forward, keeping one glowing blue eye in my back trained on Cube Girl as I left. The girl was too disoriented to make another cube crushing down on me before I made it to the corner. I let the blue eye dim as I let go of that power and focused on my ascent.

The gym was a cavernous underground room, too high for me to leap to the top straight up as Alex had, but as it was in the corner, I was able to bound off from wall to wall and quickly rise to the top. The cool night breeze was a literal breath of fresh air, and one I was overjoyed to feel after being stuck fighting down there.

I saw Alex, lying down on the grass a few feet away, and moved to join her. “So... this has certainly been quite the night.”

“You can say that again,” Alex responded, opening her eyes. “Do you think... we’ll get thanked or get detention for this?” The two of us laughed for a moment.

“Knowing Gunther? Probably both.” I cursed the words internally as soon as they left my mouth (only one of those now, on my left shoulder). It was too casual, revealed too intimate a connection to a man I should only be a fan of, and even then the context and response are wrong. Alex merely laughed it off, thinking it to be a joke, or perhaps she was distracted by everything that had happened tonight and didn’t notice my slip-up. I didn’t question it, just happy she wasn’t grilling me.

“Definitely both.”

“Heh. Still, if we’re to receive our ‘comeuppance/reward,’ we still need to take down a few more. I can hear them down there.” Alex sat up, and I looked over at the hole in the ground. I could hear some sounds there, and I had no belief that the others had given up yet. Mind control is annoying like that. Plenty of times I could just find a place to hole up for a few days when demons were hunting me and just wait till they got bored. “How many did you take down?”

“Ah, about a dozen or two? I think, hard to tell exactly, they just kept coming after me, no matter how many I beat down.” The winged girl stood up, stretching slightly. She looked in pretty bad shape given the burns, cuts, and blood on her. The fluffy pajamas she once wore were utterly ruined with blood, rips, and scorch marks. Despite that, I sensed no fatigue from her, like she could go through another ten rounds of this.

There were a number of ‘whoomp’ sounds from below that I could just barely hear when I strained myself. They must be using Yuki’s power to climb up. I regretted not taking the girl out, but she had always stayed in the back, and we had had more dangerous students to worry about, even with her Stone Wall power providing an obstacle to me and Alex.

“I took down about the same, I think. There can’t be that many students left. We just need to stop these last few... then we can go to Null." I hated saying that, and it helped that my current mouth couldn’t grind her teeth that well, or I thought that might have given me away. Still, if there’s anyone who won’t be affected by this and can calm things down afterwards, it’ll be him. Besides, given our performance thus far, he should have no reason to be upset or even get mad at us (that won’t stop him from doing so, but still).

As I spoke, I changed my body again, forgoing my wings and any outward bone plating or claws, looking mostly human-like, save for the blank, mostly featureless hidebound body. My arms and legs were heavily muscled. I knew that it wouldn’t be anywhere near Alex’s level of superstrength, but I hoped that that wouldn’t matter with the few students we had left to face. A fair bit of my energy had to go to also really fixing up my insides and setting things right there, more than just quick patches now that I had a moment to properly recover.

The two of us readied ourselves for the hopefully final fight of the night, the clouds above clearing way for the full moon to shine down brightly upon us just as the first student leaped out.

Cube Girl was the first to jump out of the gym, and the two of us charged her immediately, knowing how her power could easily take us out, only to be pushed away by the two boys popping their heads up. Percy Hunt and the guy with super blowing power forced us aside.

The small girl raised a hand dramatically above herself and created another large cube, this one in position to take both of us out- then the pressure on us suddenly cut out, and the two boys blasting us pulled back down, underneath the opening, the sounds of scuffling below.

Alex took immediate advantage of it, blasting forward, moving ahead before even me, and lowering her body to the ground as she did so, soaring towards the other girl.

The block descended faster, and I threw myself flat to the ground to hold out for as long as possible. As fast as it went, though, it couldn’t match Alex’s strength-fueled burst of speed, rocketing her fist towards Cube Girl- no, smashing her with an explosion of dirt? The block disappeared, and I picked myself up as I put together what happened. Alex must have realized her punch would kill the girl at that speed, so she kicked the ground to slow/stop herself, but at the speed it caused the earth to burst up and incapacitate her anyway. Hopefully she’s still alive.

Something rose out from the hole, and I rushed at it before stopping and realizing who it was: “Seven?”

“Greetings and good evening. Or good morning now, as I should-” my robotic ally was interrupted by a spear hitting them. The spear didn’t manage to pierce its body, but the blade did nearly knock Seven off of the stone block it stood on.

“Get up here,” I said and offered a hand to pull them out from the hole. I pulled it out, and we backed off a ways, aware that someone else could pull the same thing on us as Seven did to Percy and the other boy if we stuck around. “How many more people are left?”

“I counted eight after I was forced to fight my way through. Kadir told me about what happened to them, so terrible. I hope we can help them.” Another thing I’ll have to thank the jerk for. Ok, maybe he’s not actually a jerk. Note to self: Don’t tell him that, he’ll just get a swelled head.

We waited for the other students, Alex brushing off and spitting out some dirt that had covered her from the stunt she had pulled. The others sounded close, but I couldn’t see any of them rising from the top. The moments were tense, and then suddenly Alex fell on her face, without any sign of why.

Wait a moment; we have a classmate that can go invisible. Panveer Edge. What if she can do more than just turn herself invisible?

“Ambush! Seven, they can turn themselves invisible, try and-” Before I could finish that thought, Seven was stepping forward, thrusting their hands out at where Alex was. A near translucent force washed out from them and over the area, creating several cries of panic as students tumbled about, now visible, pushed away from Panveer. Percy’s power. A good choice, though it doesn’t seem as controlled or invisible as Percy can make it. Does it take a while for Seven to get a good handle on the powers it copies? Something to keep in mind for later.

The slightly chubby girl, Panveer, was still getting her bearings by the time I was on her, taking her down with three swift open-handed strikes. Didn’t even need to use the enhanced olfactory senses I shifted.

A few more picked up their weapons, obviously scavenged from the already vanquished students below. They charged at us but were ineffectual. I was too skilled for these untrained students, and any attacks that did come close were deflected by my thick hide. My strength and skill allowed me to knock aside most of them, though I had to be careful - with my stamina flagging from the long battle and many shifts I’d gone through, I had to make sure not to go too far with their far more fragile bodies.

Seven was made of metal and an alloy that seemed to be of tougher stuff than the quickly made swords pitted against it. It also countered with powers of some of our other classmates, pushing them away with force blasts or making walls of stone to block them.

The worst match for any of them was easily Alex, the weapons outright breaking when swung too hard against her, and she’d knock the lighter students back with just her wing beats and the wind. When she missed with an axe kick, it shook the entire ground, making everyone pause for a moment, but it stopped, and when we realized we weren’t going to go crashing down to the gym, the fighting was back on.

That distraction actually helped me disarm and judo throw Holly Hart, the temperature controller, hard into the ground. Normally I wouldn’t have a problem dispatching her, but I’m tired, and dealing with excessive heat wasn’t something my current body is optimized for. I moved past the girl only to find myself faced with Rahul, drilling at me with his hands. “Again? I thought we dealt with you already, I said, dancing back from his attacks.

Upon closer inspection, though, I noticed a few key differences, like his black hair grown out a bit longer, his face looking slightly younger, and the drill hands being both a tad smaller and not on fire. Right, he had a younger brother, Timothy. Who apparently has a power that’s like his, but worse. Odd.

I didn’t spend any more focus on that thought, diverting more effort on punching the boy, getting around his guard a few times without getting nicked by his spinning metal death hands.

A wall of stone suddenly appeared between us during a tiny pause in our fight, throwing us both off guard. I looked over, looking for Yuki, but saw the robot giving me a ‘thumbs up.’ Seven is trying to help, but we really haven’t worked on our teamwork enough, and not even with just me and Alex. Something to work on later.

Recovering first, I vaulted over the wall and used it to land a double kick to his chest. The kid rolled with it and rose, running right back at me. He was more skilled than his older brother, even opting to turn a drill back into a hand to pull me close and try to strike me with the other drill. Unfortunately for him, that wasn’t good enough to best me, and pulling me in just brought my own hand down, chopping the back of his neck and knocking Tim unconscious. Not bad, kid, but you’re a hundred years too early to be challenging me.

Most of the other controlled students had fared the same or worse, with only one girl left standing, and even then only due to a power that seemed to encase or transform her body entirely into metal. It was of limited helpfulness against Seven, who had that as a base state, only managing to clip off a few pieces of its surprisingly lifelike synthetic ‘skin suit’ but not causing any damage to Seven’s frame beneath it. It got even worse for the girl when she was telekinetically shoved at Alexandra, who promptly beat her down, metal limbs no match for the winged girl’s superior strength.

“That’s that then.” She said, looking at the eight students lying before them. “You said there were only 8 left, right, Seven? Wow, that sounds weird, Alex said with a tired giggle. It’s finally over. I hope things inside are more peac- wait. 8 bodies, but one of them is Cube Girl, and Seven said there were 8 left after Alex had taken her out. So that means...

Turning around, I saw one boy left, standing near the edge of the hole, and what he had done while we were distracted. I could barely make out the lighter he had in his hands or anything behind the wall of flame surrounding him, one that was leaping forward and growing at an unnatural rate. “Look out! We’ve still got trouble,” I warned the others.

Alex rushed forward, and the flames swarmed to meet her. They didn’t appear hot enough to hurt her yet, but she was still clutching at her throat. Oxygen deprivation. The pyrokinetic kept a few flames swirling around her while spreading the rest after me and Seven. I dodged to the side but was still hit by the flames, my skin starting to bubble and melt from it, pain surging through me. I scrambled further, rolling it extinguished and hiding behind the stone wall.

The flames raged around us, growing as they consumed more of the grassy field and burning hotter. I looked side to side but couldn’t see Seven beside me. Can it withstand the flames with its metal body, or- Speculation was worthless, so I took a look, shifting my body to recover from my burns and growing a heat-resistant eye stalk, and most importantly, preparing one last bone spike (only a foot in length this time).

Peering over the wall, I saw Seven, far larger than the robot usually stood, at seven feet tall, hunched over and still growing. The metal twisted and warped in ways that should have made wrenching sounds but didn’t. Two things jutted out of its back, but it was only when the metal turned into scales that I recognized what was going on. Seven copied Derrick’s power.

They finished their growth, standing at 9 meters tall, covered in scales and with a pair of wings, a tail, and claws on its hands and feet. Seven was using the full ‘Dragon Form’ power our coach had, not one of the intermediate stages I had occasionally seen. Seven’s dragon body still had a metallic gleam to its scales and body, despite otherwise looking like the organic dragon Derrick Beachwood could turn into. The form was, naturally, completely fireproof, so the pyrokinetic’s attempts to combat them were an impressive but ultimately pointless display when the mecha dragon ignored the flames and wrapped a wing around Alex.

Taking advantage of the distraction, I popped over the wall and shot out my final spike into his leg. Seven whipped their tail around as he stumbled and sent the kid backwards, the flames ceasing their unnatural movements.

The blow hit the boy hard, and he teetered on the edge of the hole for a moment, dazed, before beginning to fall down. Alex, despite the oxygen loss, was the first to react, dashing forward to him but missing as he had already fallen. She continued her rush, though, off the side of the hole and ricocheting downward even faster.

“Got him!” The relieved, shaky cry went up from the hole. I let out a sigh of relief. I... was worried about him? I suppose I was a bit; it wasn’t exactly his fault for being mind controlled, but... Is this what it feels like to be a hero? Way too much work and worry. I leaned against a stone wall for support, watching Seven turn back to normal and pump their fist in the air in celebration and Alexandra give a distant ‘woohoo!’ I suppose it’s not all bad, though.

“What,” Gunther said, his voice cutting through the air and any sense of relief or good cheer. “Is going on here?”