Hero Types

Chapter 32

"Lucas!"
"I can handle it—"
Kit picked the chipped boomerang off the gym floor and hurled it at the back of the Raider's helmet.
Clang!
He turned around and Lucas rolled away, clutching his throat.
"Yeah!" She pumped her fist in the air and charged him.
She was exhausted. She didn't know how long they had been fighting. It was war if it was anything. Her arm was cut and bleeding and she couldn't remember from what, and she was missing a shoe. Her hair had come out of its ponytail a long time ago. At this point it was pure adrenaline that kept her going, and that didn't lead to any amount of common sense or good choices.
She shouted and ran into him, and the Raider didn't budge. He gave her a shove, and she flew ten feet across the room and landed hard on her back. She couldn't breath again. She'd hit her head hard. The dark ceiling spun over her head, bright camera flashes or something spotting up her eyes. She blinked.
She sat up and frowned around. Someone ground beside her and made her jump.
"Mardie?!"
She ducked beneath a ball of blue light and crawled across the floor on her stomach. She grabbed Mardie's coat and pulled herself in. She shook her.
"Mardie?"
She didn't reply or open her eyes. Kit's hands were wet, and she realized it was from Mardie's coat. It was hot and soaked and smelled like the color red.
Her stomach was sick. She looked around the room, which spun at odd angles. There was Jersey, fighting off—no, he was on the ground, and there was a glowing staff at his throat. She couldn't see Howe. And Lucas—where was—
"Lucas—wait!" She got onto all fours and stumbled to her feet. The Raider forced him onto his knees and grabbed his head in his hands. Kit didn't have anything to throw but her own body. She launched herself off the ground.
Her arms clenched around the Raider's throat and she kicked and flailed as he toppled into the wall, effectively crushing her. She landed her foot in the back of his shin and he tripped, and she fell to the ground.
"You're getting on my nerves," he hissed, and then he had grabbed her head and she was staring back into soulless panes of darkened glass. She twisted frantically, searching for someone to help—Lucas was still against the wall, showing no signs of life or movement—and green smoke was billowing up her nostrils.
She thought about Gran and her mom. She thought about her father and what an asshole he was. She thought about high school and how she really hoped he didn't kill her because she didn't want to die in that fucking cafeteria. She felt like she was going to be sick. She felt weak.
Shadows crept up around the edges of her vision. She willed herself not to blink. Blink and you're out like a goddamn light. She couldn't move her arms, she was paralyzed, she couldn't breath or fight back.
It was over. They had lost.
She had to suck it up, because there was nothing she could do about it.
"Fuckin' loser..."
There was something humming in the back of her head. Maybe it was the sound of her powers draining. She couldn't conjure a shield, she couldn't move at all. She could barely think. She didn't have enough energy to be scared.
The sounds of the battle faded away, droning and cries washed away by the sea. Something was cooking. She hoped it tasted good, but it just smelled like blood.
Bang!
She jumped, and all the noise cut off. Something was banging around outside. The grip on her head lessened. Everything hurt. Why was her arm bleeding?
Bang...bang—BOOOM!
She would have screamed if she could have. She was thrown backwards, and the hand was wrenched from her head. She heard a slam somewhere far behind her.
EEEERRRKK....
The wall gave a tremendous groan and snapped. There were faint screams among the dizziness and scattered footsteps.
SLAM!
It hit the floor, which shuddered. A ceiling tile fell next to Kit's head. She winced and blinked her watering eyes in the glare of all this fresh brightness. She shielded her gaze and squinted at the figure sauntering inside, silhouetted against the blue sky.
"The fuck do you think you're doing?" Mickey rested his cannon, bigger and smoking more than before, on his shoulder, and turned to her. "Not without me, lovey." He shook his head, and he powered his arm back up till it glared blue. "Not without me."
Somebody shouted. It was Mardie with some cloaked woman in a headlock. Somebody charged over to help. A blast of blue light hit the center of the floor, causing it to rupture and spill several tables into the locker room below.
Chaos erupted.
A dagger landed next to her head. Kit rolled to the side, rubbing her head to see clearly. Amanda sprinted toward her, hair flying, lipstick stained halfway across her left cheek. Kit dodged her and ducked under a table.
"Get your ass out here—"
With strength surprising for her tiny frame, she pushed the table away and slashed at Kit's face. She felt hotness on the tip of her nose. She fell on her behind and scrambled backward, the swick swip of the blade making a breeze on her face. Multicolored lights reflected off of it. She backed into the bleachers.
What are you doing?
She threw up a shield, barely in time, and Amanda staggered off of it. The light flickered. The room seemed warped to one side. Kit wanted to take a nap. Focus, she told herself, blinking hard, but her shield continued to flicker madly like an out of tune radio station. She couldn't pay attention. It was worse than English midterms.
I'm going to pass out.
She was definitely going to pass out. Amanda snatched up her knife and ran at her again. Kit couldn't find her shield. She was sluggish as she tried in vain to crawl away, and—
"AH!"
A bolt of electricity knocked the crazed Southern belle off her feet. Lucas stood behind her, his hand still raised, breathing heavily as sparks flew off his clothes.
"You okay?" he shouted over the fray.
She gulped and gave the thumbs up. A ghost dog hit him and chased him in the other direction, and then a woman in billowing clothes stepped in front of her before she could react.
She stared down at her for a minute. Kit didn't know what to do. The woman's hair was rippling off her neck, her cloak snapping in the wind that wasn't there. She had one eye.
Cyclone.
Kit flipped over and clawed at the ground, but the sudden rush of backwards wind pulled her away. A detention slip whistled past her ear. She was being lifted off the ground, and now she was spinning with dizzying speed above people's heads. She closed her eyes. If she threw up would her puke circle around and hit her? That would be embarrassing. She'd had worse.
The next second she hit the matted wall.
"OOF!"
She slid to the ground, holding onto her not-totally-recovered ankle, and the world spun around her. She heard a scream. There were people hiding under the table to her left. She turned and frowned at them, then a gust of wind flipped her onto her back.
She pried herself up, gasping for air, and conjured a weak shield that warded off another attack. Cyclone turned to the people beneath the table. Kit lunged for her legs.
She knocked her to the floor, and a gust of wind swept them both a foot into the air, and when they landed Kit was on the bottom.
Close your eyes...
She shouted and used strength that seemed to have come from nowhere to flip them over and lock her legs around the woman's neck. Air blasted Kit's face, whipping through her hair. She dug her hand down past her own thigh and squeezed in the right place till she groaned and fell still. She rolled off, sucking in air, and used the wall to get to her feet. She felt sick. She really needed a day off.
"Kit?"
She looked around. Ms. Bernard and several students were watching her, eyes wide, from beneath a table. Kit opened her mouth, and then there was a shout and somebody was charging her from the other direction and—
Mickey came out of nowhere, countered his weight by latching onto his arm, and threw him into a nearby table. He turned to her, panting, and lowered his glowing cannon.
"Kitten."
Something happened, because he lowered his head and took a step closer, and then she leapt up and he was pressing her into the mat, a hand locked beside her head, and she was shaking, had she been shaking this whole time?
Adrenaline. She was running on adrenaline, and she was pretty sure she had a concussion.
They broke apart. He blinked at her. The noise that had been cut off seemed to suddenly swell up to a deafening roar.
He raised an eyebrow. "Okay?"
She swallowed, nodding. There was a blast from the other end of the room, and they both turned around. They dropped instantly back into superhero mode.
"Everyone needs to get out of the building," she said, dropping down beside the table. She pulled someone out and pushed them toward the hole in the wall, and the rest of them followed. She accidentally caught Ms. Bernard's gaze for a second, and she turned away and pretended there was nothing to worry about.
You have other things to worry about first.
"We have to get his mask off," Mickey yelled, pushing the last student out through the hole. "He can't breathe without it!"
"We need to get close to him." She surveyed the room, but there was no sign of the Raider. "Where—"
"On the roof!" came a shout from outside. The onlookers outside were screaming and jabbing their fingers at the roof of the school. They exchanged a glance.
"I've got your back," he said.
"Let's go."
She took off down the opposite hallway, ducking beneath a frozen wave of soda drinks. She skidded around the corner, Mickey at her heels, and raced up the steps of the main high school building.
She had been to the roof once, as a freshman, on account of a dare, and she had received a week of detentions for it. It came in handy now.
"Mickey—over here—"
He almost ran past, and he turned back and followed her into the girl's bathroom. She pushed on the window, but it was stuck.
"Duck your head," he said, and she covered the back of her neck while he shattered it with a single blow. Glass rained around her feet, and when she straightened more slid off her back. "Right behind you."
She clambered through the broken window and dropped onto the roof. The sunlight was blinding. A breeze blew through her torn shirt. She didn't remember tearing it. A whole chunk was torn open over her stomach.
Whatever. Mickey had already seen her naked.
She ran over a slope and slid down the other side, and she found him.
The Raider stood at the edge of the building. He wasn't alone, but Lucas wasn't conscious.
Kit could hear screaming from below. She could hear crackling breath and his voice, and she saw how close he was standing and how Lucas was lifted in front of him.
Fuck.
"...the end of the supers," he was saying. "Others will continue my work. I will not be the last of us, and I'll take as many as I can with me. With that—"
"Hey!" Kit cupped her hands over her mouth and shouted. He turned around. She stepped forward, taking her time. "Hey, you!" She didn't know what else to say.
"I regret that I don't have the time to take care of you..." he said. "I didn't expect this much trouble from a kid. I suppose I should be thanking you. I needed to get rid of the sheep."
She took another step, waiting for him to complete his villainous speech, the explanation.
"You're confused." He stepped toward her.
Good. Come on.
"We're all monsters," he said. "I'm here to purify the world. I suffer every day. We all do. I'm saving you poor souls, but I can't save myself. It's too late for me...." He turned back to the edge.
"Wait—" she cried, running closer while his back was turned. "Wait—why not kill us all?"
"I don't want to be a monster." He watched the crowd below. "I never asked for this."
"You—why not take their powers, then? Everyone working for you?"
"I can't save them either."
"You—" she had to keep him talking, she just couldn't think of anything to say. "You don't have to do this. You don't have to be a—a monster, some of us do the right thing."
"No." He shook his masked head. "No. You're not real. None of us are. We're not real people."
Mickey was beside her. She looked at him. He raised an eyebrow, and she nodded. He stepped away and quietly padded around the side while she inched forward.
"What about—so what was Benji's mom?"
The villain seemed to pause, though he hadn't been moving. He lifted his head.
"Excuse me?"
"I know a kid named Benji, and you killed his mom."
"Benni...didn't understand her own power, I put her out of her misery."
Mickey was right behind him. Kit moved closer, keeping him distracted.
"What could Benni do?"
"Benni was a mindreader..."
This wasn't true. The Raider was crazier than she had thought.
"Oh?"
"She manipulated me. She was one of the monsters." He looked at the sky. "She needed to pay. And so do I."
He took a step forward. Mickey grabbed him from behind and they both fell onto the roof.
Kit hurried over as they struggled, and by the time she reached them Mickey had freed Lucas and he was pinned to the ground.
"I'm not going to kill you..." the Raider said, lifting his heavy hand from Mickey's throat. He stood up and Kit pulled Lucas away as fast as she could. "Or you. Take your friend. His guilt will take him, or someone else will." He stepped back to the edge.
"Wait—" Kit shouted, and in that second the Raider turned, whipped a pistol out of nowhere, and fired a single shot at her head.
She jumped at the sound and it was four years of reflex training that saved her life. Her shield burst to life. The bullet zapped off it and skittered across the ground. She leapt to her feet, and before she could close in on him Mickey had pushed him over the edge.
Her shout was caught in her throat. Everything was silent but the breeze. It ruffled the collar of his coat as he looked up at her.
Sirens were crying in the streets below. There was blood in Lucas's hair and there were hot tears on her face. She watched Mickey's eyes, and her hair was tossed about in the wind on that cold breezy Friday morning, and in her heart she knew that it was finally over.
The battle had been won, the day was saved, and the Raider was gone for good.
          Whatever that meant for the rest of them.