Phoenix Part 10

Through twisted metal, shattered plaster, and fragmented rubber, I hovered over my ruined battlefield at a slow but steady pace. Years of work have taught me that long ago how to best control my emotions. Right now, that best way was to give these heartless bastards one last chance.

But for once, I was almost hoping they refused. Powers be damned. When I finally returned to where I saved Julia, they were already waiting for me, clearly hurt but still more than ready to fight, almost proud at every inch of devastation they've caused. Still, I held back my tidal wave of rage as I let my better self answer their call.

"Well, well, well, looks like miss goody two shoes finally decided to get off her high horse and join us, lowly peasants. Hope you like our little performance back there; it's the first of many," she said adamantly.

At that point, I nearly lost all common sense, biting down my lip hard so that I could finish my wager.

"I understand why you're doing this. I understand that you want to get heard, and you think that violence is the only way to happen. That the system can't get fixed, only burned. But feeding into every discrimination, you've faced only hurts your cause, not fixing it. So for once, I'm not asking; I'm telling you to stand the hell down now. Let me fight for your cause before we do something we all regret tonight," I said through already clenched fists.

From there, I waited for those precious few seconds of rethinking. But that never even came as the three all gave hearty, mocking, and malicious laughs. Then, instead of standing down, Lucia started to flex her wings open and even started to glow as the winged women looked at me with vengeful eyes.

"Sorry to disappoint, sweetheart, but you can shove all that kumbaya crap where the sun doesn't shine! We don't want peace bitch. We want war, and you'll be the first casualty with these ruins as your tomb! A reminder to the entire fucking world that we monsters are to get feared for a reason!"

From there, all words finally stopped as like two mounted rockets; we clashed in an entirely different tier of speed. Blue and purple blurs lit up the night sky like the Fourth of July as each clash caused the ground beneath to shake. Those few clashes were all I needed, though, as from there, I could tell the speed advantage remained with her.

But if her friends' sashes were anything to go by, I highly doubt her reactions matched the ones I naturally gained from speed mode. So instead, the archangel-like women relied on barely planned joust. I took that and unleashed a powerful hovering judo throw that sent her to the ceiling of one of the top floors.

In the beginning, I tried to close in and end her. But, before I could even rely on that, a blast of electricity tagged me to the ground. From below, I saw my earlier electrical opponent made his full appearance. With half a dozen tentacles a light, I found myself dodging dozens of electrical blasts.

However, their speed was too much for me, eventually overworking me several feet away. Before I could get a good landing, the wolfman earlier tried to close in with claws fully bared.

But it paid me no mind, still remembering his earlier attack pattern like it was the back of my hand. With a gravity-defying dodge I instantly counterattacked, grabbing and flying him high into the air and spun faster than a turbine, throwing him straight into the winged woman, burying them both in the rubble.

However, my range advantage quickly got taken advantage of as the tentacle man grabbed my leg. Before I knew it, I was eating an entire buffet of rubble as I get slammed down hard and dragged violently through the battlefield like it was a demented merry ground. The brutal throw-down ended as fast as it began as I get launched into the earlier cloud.

Bloody wounds and tears collected like raindrops across my body, telling me right here and now that 20% was never going to be enough, fully telling me that all my power is what I need for this fight. So in a split decision, my shaking body grew hardy as stone, embracing strength mode for all it's worth.

The jellyfish man noticed the power difference from a mile away, knowing full well that the tables had quickly turned. But, unfortunately, that realization didn't save him at all as I held my grip for all its worth and started to reel him in with a steel-like vice grip.

By the time he got within range, I had winded up another punch, charging it up till I could feel my bones creak and then unleashing said hit with force comparable to Julia's earlier meteor shower with no restraint.

The force created a vast crater formed at our feet, burying us in with any rocks in our way quickly turning into a thick powder. Then, when I saw the man still stirring, I started to wind up another punch but quickly got interrupted at the hands of the archangel once again.

This time she was armed with small feathered blades, swooping in like some peregrine falcon out of hell and forcing me to dodge definitively. I tried to lunge back with another punch in a boxing fashion, but she was far too fast, spinning around and promptly striking me with the blade now clad in neon-like purple energy. The blow was staggering but barely even stung as I immediately course-corrected.

I unleashed a wave of aimed sand right at her using my environment to the fullest. By the time she parried my small sandstorm, I was already closing, grabbing her by the throat with one hand. Despite the change of pace in the battle, the woman could do nothing but smile giddily as she aimed her feathers right in my eyes.

Even when I closed them in the nick of time, the small explosion made me feel like someone put salt in them. But I couldn't falter over that for even a moment, instead compensating as best as I could. I switched to speed mode using earlier info and sense mode style predictions.

Through blurring movements, I dodged and deflected dozens of feathered shots. A war zone full of explosions rang out from the mall as I backflipped out of the crater gracefully. However, I didn't dare move from that spot as I through my blurred-over eyes, I saw the archangel give another coy response amidst an alarming amount of feathers that circled me. With an even bigger smile, she gave one last coy remark.

"You don't want to miss this light show Omna. It's a killer."

At that moment, the surrounding buildings in view started to go dark, drawing my attention to the literal sparking jelly man from before. But the sounds of those sparks were entirely overshadowed by the rumbling sound I heard on the other side. When I turned around, all I saw was the wolfman charging a similar blast for before, except on a completely different scale. Then, realizing what's about to happen, I lost it.

"Are you guys insane!? You're going to blow everyone to hell!"

"That's the plan, so be a good, addictive heroine and take it. Beowulf, Sting, let's give this city a show they'll never forget!"

Realizing what happened, I had no choice but to pull out all the stops and unleash my strongest combo move. I spun around faster than any tornado, to suck up the wind. But that only stepped one, as I braced myself for the next step.

I kept that same speed using flight mode, but now with a lot more control as the air grew stale and contained. With that, I switched back into speed mode and started to engage in a clapping motion, but I made another switch up into strength mode for the final move at the last possible second.

When my hands finally connected, the air around me went from a harmless protective cushion to a deadly weapon that bathed the entire landscape in a sweeping shockwave of pure unrestricted power.

As soon as it got formed, the hearty wave obliterated everything in its path until it collided with the thunder-like scream and concentrated voltage, disrupting their power just enough for them to explode on impact. From there, our three attacks bathed my entire world in an intense, all-consuming white light.