Damsel[ed]: Some Rescue Required (#2 of the Damsel[ed] series)

Chapter Thirty: Brothers

Poison and Angel. (Bolded for Poison and unbolded for Angel)

Flow is an interesting concept. It's supposed to come when you're so comfortable with the task at hand you become one with it. You forget everything else around you, the room, the time, your own body. All you feel is a sort of flow of work leaving you. Nothing else exists. And at first, that's how the fight with Luce goes for me. 

Sure, I don't like him. Sure, I disowned him and he's violent and I never expected his backlash, but the movements come fluidly from me. My breathing is regular, like I'm sleeping instead of fighting. I feel nothing and take in nothing. Not a flit of emotion or pain for each blow he deals. I don't even recognize the room's stench, though under other circumstances it would send me to my knees in a puddle of my own sick. 

When Luce catches me by the neck, I hit the ground under him, the breath knocked out of me. I'm about to flip him, give myself the advantage, but he springs to his feet, waiting for me to stand. Of course. He won't fight on the ground. I bring myself to a full stance and we dance.

And by dance, I mean fight. The wolf project slinks a few feet away, wraps its tail around its paws and tucks its snout under its big claws. It even whimpers.

Angel kicks. I duck and swing. He blocks. We fight in circles. It feels like a dance, at least. He tips his head to the side, sweat-tangled strands of hair stuck to his eyepatch. I lean forward to fake him out and he flinches. I have the advantage. I usually do. 

It's almost laughable. He's the strong one. The Frankenstein of a super stitched together of all the most powerful pieces. And yet he can't use his powers; he won't.

Brother. The word is a whisper in the back of my mind as I size him up. I feel a slight tug in a place I haven't felt in a while. My heart. He isn't my brother. It was funny to prod him with our 'brotherhood' at first, but the thought of us being connected like that now is something I can't take. Don't want to. Parrying my opponent's blows, I search for flow. I empty my mind, trying to be one with my defense, with my offense. But it's harder now.

Angel—Luce, I mean—scowls, his brow furrowed, mouth drawn in a tight line. He's younger than me, I think almost out of nowhere, by a year or two. He banks his knee and throws a kick that connects squarely with my side and almost splits my ribcage. I gasp, the pain snapping through my bones in waves that wash through my entire body. 

A ghost of a grin appears on his face.

First hit.

It'll be his last.

My thoughts splinter off and race in hundreds of different directions through my maze of a brain, snarls and spirals that lead from one place to another to another. White. My brother. Violet. My aura. Blue. My friends. Red.

My fight.

Poison punches. I swipe back. I'm a clumsy person, but I'm finding my grace. Few words flit to the front of my mind while I stumble. Hands up. Don't stop moving. Two feet on the floor, except for kicks. I can't wrestle well, so I keep the fight standing, even if that means sacrificing the immediate advantage. That's why when I knock Poison over, I let him up. I don't run when he's down. I don't run when he rises. Those times have passed. He stands, and I attack. He defends, eyeing me up and down with a suspicious gleam in his eye. Eyes. He has two that work. It isn't fair, I think, him having two eyes, but then again, what is? He's supposed to win. He's trained and ruthless and a villain.

My heart slams against the inside of my chest, over and over, like a prisoner throwing himself against the door of his cell. I land a kick. Just one. My blood sings with adrenaline. The heat is crawling. I force my breath to ease up because I can't let out that aura. I don't want to accidentally kill all of these poor creatures trapped here. I need to keep up some self-control.