A powerful gust of wind threw Anna against the wall.  She slumped to her knees, one hand on the ground supporting her as she looked back over her shoulder.  

Tempest stood at the far end of the hall.  

“Run Anna.”

Anna snapped her head up, her eyes wide as she saw Mira standing in the hall in front of her.

“Mira!” Anna exclaimed.  “Jesus, you look like shit!”

Mira didn’t spare her a glance, looking down the hall at Tempest.  Her clothes were torn and bloody.  Another blood soaked cloth was tied tightly around her right thigh, her entire pant leg soaked crimson.  She had an odd looking rifle slung over her shoulder, and it took Anna a moment to recognize it as Arquebus, Adam’s gun.

“I said run,” she repeated.  Her hair, most of it having fallen loose from her tight bun, fluttered in the growing breeze in the hall.

“But-” Anna started.

“I’m fine.  I’ve got a new friend.”

“TEMPORARY ACQUAINTANCE,” the gun corrected.

“Whatever.  Just go.  We got this.”

Anna pushed herself back up to her feet and ran, looking back over her shoulder as Mira stared down Tempest.

The wind picked up, and Mira had to steady herself with one hand on the wall.  She leveled the gun, holding it steady despite the gale force winds buffeting her around.  She didn’t even try to conjure any illusions.  The air was in too much turmoil; anything she tried to summon would be shaky and obvious, easily blown aside by the powerful elementalist.  

Mira pulled the trigger.  Arquebus automatically set to non-lethal rubber bullets, but even the advanced weapon’s ballistics failed in the face of the growing wind speeds, blown harmlessly to the side.  Mira shielded her eyes, squinting down the hall.  Tempest still stood at the other end, as his winds cleared 100 mph in the tight corridor, whipping dust and debris about in tight circles.  Her eyes widened as he launched himself forward, propelled forward by his wind at his back, he sailed towards her like a bullet.

“Shit,” she muttered, ducking.  She concentrated, trying to keep a believable illusion of herself still standing in the strong winds.

He didn’t buy it for a second, seeing right through the shaky illusion.  He brought his knee up into her chin, hard, so hard it lifted her off the ground.  Blood squirted into her mouth as she bit off the very tip of her tongue.  She still had the pretense of mind to aim Arquebus as she sailed backwards threw the air.  At point blank range, even Tempest’s winds couldn’t protect him, and he was thrown backwards by a powerful concussive blast.

“YOU CANNOT TAKE MUCH MORE,” Arquebus told her flatly.

“I’m ‘ine,” she said, blood spilling down her chin.  She rolled to her feet and leveled the gun, firing rapidly.  Tempest was already up, and he swept the projectiles to the side with a sweeping wind, charging her again.  She focused and sent illusory blasts straight at Tempest.  He ducked, dropping to the floor reflexively as his wind didn’t remove the danger.  Mira roared, switching her grip on the gun.  She leapt into the air, bringing the butt of the gun down against Tempest’s head with both hands in a desperate overhand strike.

He got his arm up in time to take the brunt of the blow, but the butt of the gun still connected with his temple, dazing him as blood poured from the wound into his eyes.

He pulled forth another strong gust of wind, which threw Mira off him, the smaller girl thrown straight down to the floor.  She reached up, grabbed the waist band of his sweatpants, pulling them down around his ankles.  

He had his bodysuit on underneath, but the pants still hobbled him as he scrambled backwards.  Mira flipped the gun back around and fired again.  Tempest stumbled as he tried to dodge to the side.  Mira whipped the gun around, catching him in the heel again as she swung Arquebus with all her might.

Tempest gritted his teeth in pain, toppling backwards.  Mira lunged at him, slamming the barrel of the gun into his broad chest.  She squeezed the trigger, but he grabbed the barrel, yanking it to the side just in time to avoid getting a blast in the chest.

Mira relinquished the gun immediately as he tried to wrench it from her.  If she was lucky, Arquebus would simply shock him as it had done Adam.  Even if she wasn’t, she wasn’t about to get into a tug of war with the Legend.  She scrambled around him, climbing him like a ladder as she fought the growing wind, wrapping her body around him and tightening her arms around his throat.

Tempest discarded Arquebus, throwing the gun to the side as he clawed at Mira’s strong arms, desperate to pull them from his windpipe as she cut off his air.

His nails drew blood as he ripped at her arms, summoning wind that focused on them, on her, peppering her with debris as he fought to break her hold.

Mira threw herself back onto the floor, pulling Tempest on top of her like a shield.  Still junk sailed at her head, and she squinted her eyes closed as she choked him out.  “Come on you son of a bitch, pass the fuck out!” she screamed.  Tempest gasped in response, clawing at her arms.

The wind died all at once, and he went slack in her arms.

She held on, tightening her grip for good measure until she was sure he was out, and then she let go, rolling his unconscious body off of hers.

She looked at her clawed and bloody arms, and spit out a mouthful of blood.  Still, Tempest was one she hadn’t been sure if she could take fresh, let alone beat half to hell.  

She crawled back over to Arquebus, picking the gun up and training it on Tempest as she leaned against the wall.  “Gonna take a moment,” she gasped.  “Warn me if moves.”

“YOU HAVE MORE PRESSING PROBLEMS,” the gun told her.  “YOUR FOUR O’CLOCK.”

She spun, just managing to deflect the throwing star speeding towards her head with Arquebus.  She squeezed the trigger, firing wildly down the hall.

Zen did a flip, his body contorting in the air as he dodged the spray of rubber bullets.  The martial arts master landed in a crouch, untouched by the bullets.

“That wasn’t a long enough moment,” Mira said, pushing herself up the wall with her good leg.  



Another wild blast of kinetic energy grazed Aegis’ upper arm, succeeding only in clearing the dust off in a wide streak, revealing the bronze skin beneath.  Barrage’s blasts hadn’t lost their punch, but the cowboy’s aim had gone to shit as he was worn down.

His left arm hung limply at his side, his shoulder broken.  What were left of his cloths were in tatters, covered in dust and his own blood.  Izzy wiped blood and sweat out of his eyes with his right hand before releasing another barrage of energy at Aegis, keeping the immortal back.

The remains of the destroyed warehouse kept Aegis from charging him on foot, and when he jumped, he was an easy target for Barrage to blast back when he got into point blank range.  It was an effective strategy, but one Barrage couldn’t keep up forever, and Aegis knew it.

Izzy staggered as he dodged a piece of rebar thrown at him at frightening speeds.  He nearly fell, but he caught his footing.

“You can’t keep this up much longer.”

Izzy shrugged his good shoulder.  “I’m not gonna just roll over for you, Aegis.  You want to stop me, come stop me.”

Aegis hurled a cinderblock with each hand.  He sprinted to the left, making small jumps across large pieces of rubble along a carefully navigated path.

Izzy blasted one of the cinderblocks and spun as he dodged the other, screaming as pain ripped through his shoulder as his arm swung up, and he fired, blowing a large chunk of wall out from Aegis’ feet just he landed, sending him crashing into the debris.  He fired with his good hand, laying into Aegis as he struggled to get his footing again.

“I ain’t out yet,” Izzy said, continuing to unleash hell.



Anna remembered the first time she’d ever been up to the roof to the LC.  Callie had taken her up there, showing off the view.  It had been breathtaking, up until the point where Callie had pushed her off the edge.  It was a joke, one young Anna hadn’t found very funny, but Callie had known Pegasus would catch her.  For a brief moment, as she plummeted through space, free falling, she had been sure she was going to die.

The feeling was back as she slammed through the door up on to the roof.  She might die up on that roof.  

Ursula locked eyes with her across the roof.  Her concentration wavered, and an explosion of blue sapphire exploded from the nest of black tentacles clustered in a dome at the far end of the roof.  

Lady Sapphire flew free, quickly noting Ursula’s distraction, and Anna’s sudden entrance onto the roof.  She gave Anna a curt nod, and fired an array of blue crystals at Ursula.

Ursula muttered, a pair of tentacles sprouting from around her, blocking the oncoming sapphire crystals.

“I didn’t expect you to make it this far, Ariel.”

“I’ve got good friends,” Anna said, twirling her metal pipe.  “And my name’s not Ariel.”  All her fatigue and exhaustion faded, replaced by a surge of pure adrenaline.  

She glanced up at Lady Sapphire, hovering over everything.  The entire roof was covered in glowing lines and runes, forming intricate patterns.

“She can’t take us both,” Lady Sapphire cried, summoning more sapphires, launching them at Ursula.

Another tentacle blocked them, sweeping towards Anna.  “Bullshit I can’t.”

Anna rolled under the tentacle, Ursula too busy blocking another round of projectiles from Lady Sapphire to bring the tentacle downwards to crush her.

“I’ll deal with her magic, you take her!” Lady Sapphire cried, calling up her sapphire armor around her as more tentacles swarmed around her, attempting to crush her.

Anna nodded, hurling the pipe.

Ursula deftly caught it.  “Did you really think you could stop me?”

“I’m going to stop you,” Anna said, leaping into the air, bringing a powerful punch down into her face.

Ursula stepped deftly out of the way, another tentacle shooting past her.

Anna’s eyes widened, and she threw herself to the ground, only to hear a thunk as the tentacle smashed against a wall of Sapphire.  Lady Sapphire stood above her, holding up the wall of conjured blue crystal.

“Thanks,” Anna said, rolling over, panting.

“Is it just you?” Lady Sapphire asked.

The tentacle snaked around the barrier, and Lady Sapphire sighed, summing it in a full circle, forming a protective dome around the two of them.

“If we’re lucky.  From what I’ve seen, the rest LC’s under her control.”

“I figured.”  Lady Sapphire placed her hands against the barrier.  Razor sharp protrusions exploded from the crystalline dome, slicing the tentacles.

Ursula barely managed to step aside to avoid getting her face carved off, a sliver of blue crystal tearing through her cheek.  She wiped away blood from the scratch, smiling.

“Fine.  So be it.”  She shut her eyes, calling forth more tentacles.

Anna barely heard her, watching for a pattern in the swarm of tentacles.  Ursula’s attention was clearly focused on the more powerful spell caster.  She ducked under one, rolling over another, bringing her foot down in a powerful kick that struck Ursula across the jaw.



“Shoot faster!” Mira shouted at the gun as Zen continued to dodge.

“AIM BETTER,” Arquebus retorted.

Zen watched the girl with Adam’s gun calmly.  He knew where the bullets were headed before they finished leaving the barrel, and he merely moved out of the way.  He’d honed his senses to near perfection.  His job was to stop her.  She appeared to be in no condition to fight him, and if she was content to stand there and fire wildly at him, he considered his task completed.  

“You don’t have any sort of tracking shots?  I thought you were like the most advanced gun ever?”

“NOTHING NONLETHAL.”

“Then don’t shoot to kill!”

The gun stopped firing.

“What, are you charging up or something?” she asked it, watching warily as Zen assumed a centered pose at the end of the hall.  She had no clue what he was doing, but she wasn’t about to complain.

“I AM OUT OF AMMO.”

“Seriously?  This a putting a real damper on our friendship.”

Arquebus didn’t respond.  

“What?  You’re not even gonna tell me we’re not friends anymore?”  She sighed.  “Where’d we land on lethal ammo?”

Zen turned slowly around, clapping.  “Your illusion work is most impressive.  Even I didn’t spot that it was a fake.  And your ability to throw your voice is beyond impressive.  But there’s one thing you can’t fake.  You reek of blood and sweat and desperation.”

“What the fuck does desperation smell like?” the real Mira asked.  She’d put up the illusion during Zen’s first flip, slipping down the hall and doubling back to sneak up behind him.  She pointed Arquebus at him, knowing full well he’d still probably be able to dodge even at this close range.

He smirked.  “What’s truly impressive is how you impersonated the gun’s voice.”

It was Mira’s turn to grin.  The gun disappeared from her hands.  “I didn’t.”

Zen’s eyes widened.  He turned, but he didn’t move fast enough, and Arquebus, on the floor where Mira had left it, fired, hitting him in his left achilles tendon.

He breathed through the pain, bringing his wounded leg up, balancing on his right.

“SWEEP THE LEG.”

“Fuck you, karate kid!”  

Mira swept the leg.



The surge of adrenaline was waning.  The distracted Sea Witch countered her frenzied assault with greater and greater ease by the second.  Lady Sapphire zipped through the air, battling the seeming unending supply of tentacles that sprung from the magic circles on the roof.

“You should have stayed put where I left you,” Ursula said, catching Anna’s wrist.  She twisted it, forcing Anna to her knees.  Anna cried out in pain, and Ursula backhanded her across the face, sending her sprawling.  She turned her attention back to Lady Sapphire, muttering an incantation.  A black sphere of arcane energy grew from nothing in the air in the Sorceress of Sapphire’s flight path.  Lady Sapphire veered to the side, but a tentacle swatted her back into it.  She screamed in pain as the dark hex wracked her with pain.

Anna grabbed Ursula’s ankle.  The Sea Witch turned, stepping on Anna’s outstretched arm with her other leg.  

“I warned you what would happen if you stood in my way.”  She turned back to Lady Sapphire, directing the tentacles as they sought the struggling leader of the Legendary Consortium.  Two more tentacles slithered across the roof, wrapping around Anna and hauling her to her feet as they encircled her body.

Anna gasped as the air was squeezed out of her lungs.  She tried to reach for the pouch that contained Ursula’s magic orb, but her arms were already pinned too tightly to her sides to move.

Ursula muttered the ancient words, resuming her complicated ritual as her two adversaries were sufficiently distracted.  It wouldn’t be much longer.

The black, inky tentacles continued to wind around, cocooning Anna in their crushing embrace as they constricted tighter.  She felt like her eyes were going to pop out of her head.  She couldn’t draw in breath.  She couldn’t move.  She couldn’t do anything but watch, stars exploding across her vision, as Ursula chanted in the guttural tongue.

Resistance in her network of tentacles broke her focus.  She whirled, staring wide eyed as Anna burst free of her tentacle prison.

Anna stood panting.  The pressure had suddenly stopped, and she’d felt her body surge with renewed strength and energy.  She stared down at her newly freed body.  Lady Sapphires blue crystalline sapphire armor coated her body, forming to her like a second skin over her yoga pants and bikini top.  It revitalized her, sucking away her pain and fatigue and replacing it with vigor.  It felt good.

Lady Sapphire, distracted by the act of transferring her armor, failed to dodge a tentacle that grabbed her ankle.  Ursula held out her arm and made a downward sweeping gesture, bringing the tentacle down to the roof, dragging Lady Sapphire with it.  Anna planted her foot in Ursula’s chest with a flying kick, sending her sprawling.  The tentacle released Lady Sapphire moments before she plummeted into the roof.

“My turn,” Siren said.