Rising Shards

Zoey had to open windows in her stupid energy bubble to let people out, and she’d just done that for Anastasia, who she also just stabbed with a Sharai Dagger. Anastasia roared on the ground, a familiar spiky tail shooting out of her. I’d seen that tail, and the horns that followed before when we fought during the camping trip. Zeta, still stuck as some tiger-looking monster, growled.

But I barely had time to process whatever was happening there as Oka had shot a vine into the window just before it shut.

”OW!” Zoey screamed as the vines wrapped around her. She then let out a string of swears that sounded like me the time I tripped and bashed my hands on the sidewalk one summer. She realized she blurted out sounds of actual pain, and pretended she didn’t. ”Heh, whoa, oops, kinda tickles!”

Oka held her hand forward as she marched ahead, more and more vines growing from the conjured path she made. She kept Zoey in place, and two more vines branched out to get Chickadee and Caeda too. I’d never seen her make so many plants so quickly, the window overflowed, then it spread upwards across the entire dome. The window was overflowing with plants, and the dome lifted up, toppling over behind the stage, dissipating into twinkling energy as the conjured plants faded with them.

Oka rose to the stage, one target in mind. That terrifying tone came back to her voice.

”I warned you,” Oka said. ”I warned you. You hurt Zeta. I’m going to hurt you.”

It hit me then as Oka advanced, repeating those words like they were a chant. What if Jeans had it wrong? What if this chick was just good at making shields, and wasn’t actually super strong? Now she was standing across from a pissed off Oka like I’d never seen. I heard crackling, and realized little sparks of fire were beginning to form on the vines.

”Did you do that?” I asked Lillia, who shook her head.

I leapt on stage too, trying my ice pillar prison trick on Caeda and Chickadee. It had caught the latter once before, and would be better than them getting burnt up if the sparks turned into full flames. The two hadn’t prepped for that in spite of Chickadee getting caught in it before, so they were out of play for a minute at least.

Zoey grimaced as she struggled against the plants around her. Could we have this taken care of this quickly? This girl was terrifyingly strong, but this was the first time she felt fallible. Oka actually hurt her so she wasn’t some almighty demigod power wise.

Oka grasped her hands together like she was crushing something in her hands, and the vines around Zoey tightened.

”Let’s...keep her there, I dunno,” I said, glancing around between Zoey in front of me and the scene behind me, where Anastasia was halfway through turning into a monster that looked very spiky and Zeta still howling as Lillia and Marmalade stayed on them, not rushing to act as they waited to see if the monster-ified sisters would strike.

A flash in front of me caught my eye. Aira teleported again, this time right by Zoey’s head, readying a kick. It looked like a direct hit, but Zoey just stood there. Aira jumped and tried it again, but this time Zoey blocked it, an arm tearing through the vines long enough to grab Aira’s ankle.

”That’s really annoying, you know,” Zoey said. She broke through the rest of the vines, which exploded outward before spinning, chucking Aira into the wall behind the stage, a loud crash and a puff of smoke at the point of impact. ”Go stay over there for a minu—”

A burst of flames right by Zoey’s head interrupted her. Oka was closer now, arms outstretched as fire billowed out in front of her. The cloth Oka always had wrapped around her wrist burned up, the only part of her outfit not made from the same materials as the adaptive gear we all had. If I had a second to think, I guess I’d say it was a good thing we had prom outfits with Cani stuff added into them in a case like this.

In the moment though, I was freaking out thinking Oka just burned Zoey alive. The girl did cry out as she stumbled, grabbing her face. She pulled her hands away, showing she wasn’t horrifically burned, but it did scuff her up.

”Thought your power was plants,” Zoey scoffed. ”Did I get my notecards mixed up, or did you have a secret second power all along, ya sly dog?”

”You hurt Zeta,” Oka said again, sounding more and more detached each time she spoke. While somehow also sounding more and more furious. ”Change her back. Now.”

”Heh, can’t just—whoa!” Zoey stepped back as another burst of flame let out in front of her, like fire from an exploding wreck that billowed upwards. ”Gimme a second! Don’t you know how those daggers work? They turn a Cani into a monster, and you can’t just turn them back. They’re stuck indefinitely, you know?”

Oka slammed a burning vine that I didn’t even see her conjure onto the ground, cracking the floor of the stage.

”Change. Her. Back.” Oka said.

”Oh, you’re just having a little tantrum, it’s understandable,” Zoey said as Oka tried to grab her, our enemy just barely side stepping each attempt. ”Well, kinda understandable. You know, you could keep her like this, first time she’s ever been actually cute—”

Oka charged faster than I’d ever seen her move, landing a burning punch across Zoey’s face, actually knocking her backward.

We actually had an advantage, I had to act too.

Downside, now would be a really great time to shift.

I didn’t hear anything back from my icy friend.

Come on, Oka’s gonna get hurt if she keeps going like this.

That wasn’t enough. It was a really weird feeling being at odds with myself here. But I couldn’t focus on that now, I had to do something, anything. I tried the ice pillar thing again, this time putting walls around Zoey. As soon as I did though, Oka started punching at the ice with her burning hands.

”Wait, wait!” I said, grabbing Oka’s shoulders. ”We got her, we can just keep her in there!”

”You hurt Zeta,” Oka said, and I couldn’t tell if she was ignoring me completely, or if she was blaming me, too. Either way, she kept punching at the ice until she burst a hole into it.

Something flashed in front of us, it took until I sneezed to even register it. Zoey had thrown something at us. I kept sneezing over and over, and Oka cried out too, both of us stumbling back as whatever it was burned my eyes. More cracks formed on the ice pillar until Zoey broke out, panting from the attacks but grinning now, a yellowish powder on her gloved hands.

”I could brag and say this is one of my powers, but Chickadee actually helped me get a hold of this stuff,” Zoey said. ”There’s a world a long ways from here with these powders that put you in a certain kind of mood.” She patted a zipper on her weird bodysuit where she must’ve been keeping the stuff. ”Red powder makes you so mad you get in a blind rage, so Oka didn’t need that one. What does yellow do then? Just wait and see.”

A dirty trick, but nothing we couldn’t handle. Oka reacted like she had been given was whatever the red one was as she clawed at the air faster, unable to even graze Zoey now. That pit in my stomach said that we hadn’t seen a fraction of how strong this girl really was. I understood Oka being this pissed, but we couldn’t stop her like this, not with whatever this was clouding our vision.

”Hold on, we gotta strategize, stay back a sec!” I said.

Oka didn’t react like she heard me. She was in such a state of rage that she had tunnel vision just focused on retaliation. Zoey’s demeanor made it clear she was going to easily use that to her advantage.

My body moved without me thinking, and suddenly I pushed between the two, my fist flying toward Zoey. Maybe my subconscious thought I could get the two apart so Oka wouldn’t get wrecked while she was vulnerable.

I punched Zoey’s cheek. Pain shot through my arm, it felt like when I punched a brick wall. Zoey just smirked.

”Oh, I really hope that’s not all you’re capable of, I have a lot of hope for you,” Zoey said.