Shouldn't Be

chapter 7

 “Phew” said Jason grinning “hehe, morning Neil”

Neil stared blankly for a few moments and then seemed to come back to his senses.

“Jason!” he cried, a smile bursting onto his face “You're okay”

“Well you know me” grinned Jason “I did say we'd finish the tree house didn't I?”

Jason took the time to look about the courtyard and view the apocalyptic destruction that Neil had wrought.

“You, ah, have a hard time getting in?” Jason asked.

“Oh” Neil looked around “I, er, wasn't paying much attention...”

There was a thud and Jason turned to see the last standing soldier collapse in a faint.

“You know” Jason winced as part of a wall collapsed “perhaps we should leave, they know about you too now”

The two of them quietly made their way towards the gates, clambering over clinking, cooling metal.

“Sorry for dragging you into this” said Jason after a while.

Neil blinked confusedly.

“Dragging me into this? But I came to find you”

“Yeah, but if you hadn't met me then you would have moved on and now the government knows about you”

“But I've been on the run for years, so I don't see much difference”

“Well, at least we've gotten out of this alright”

The next few seconds seemed to by in slow motion for Neil. They stepped out through the main gates back into freedom. Sunlight glinted in his face, blinding Neil. Then, the first thing his adjusted eyes saw was a flash of red to his left. Blinking, he turned and saw Jason, his eye's blank, as bright crimson sprayed from his forehead. Jason's body went limp, like a puppet whose strings were cut. Jason slowly began to fall to the ground as Neil stared unseeing. He turned his head and looked out, the glinting had come from the guns and metal of roughly fifty soldiers with a tank as back up. Time started to speed up again as the soldiers opened fire, bullets whizzing towards Neil. His pupils narrowed and the air in front of him started to shimmer like a heat haze. The bullets reached about three metres from Neil before they just melted away completely, evaporating into mist. Neil pointed at the tank, at first nothing happened, and then the tank, with no warning, both melted and exploded. Dollops of scalding, molten metal fell onto the nearby soldiers who started to scream at the excruciating agony, all thoughts of capturing the boys gone from their minds. The soldiers that were unscathed all started to fire more but still nothing could reach Neil. Slowly expression wormed it's way onto Neil's face, a harsh, twisted grimace filled with hate and rage. He held out a hand and white hot flames instantly engulfed it. Neil snarled silently and the flames grew in size and brightness. The soldiers could no longer see Neil any more in the blinding white light. Everything around Neil began to burn, grass instantly turned to ash, tarmac on the ground bubbled. The soldiers guns all melted and their gear all burst into flames.

“Are you sure you should be doing that?”

Neil blinked, the flames were dying down around him. Confused, he looked for the speaker. From behind, walking past him out of the gates, came a young man. His outfit was odd, he wore a huge overcoat that covered him completely. He had plain brown hair and quite high cheek bones. And, when he turned to look at Neil, he had golden eyes, beautiful golden irises. With each step he took the fires around him went out, the grass reappeared alive and healthy, the tarmac went back to being shaped as a road. He held out a hand and all of the flames, all of Neil's flames went out. Neil stared in shock, nothing like this had ever happened before, he could always make his flames.

“If you'd carried on going like that there wouldn't have been much left for miles around” the man spoke with a playful, lilting voice “I doubt even your immortal friend there would survive what you were about to unleash”

Neil blinked again, slowly though the words filtered into his head and he span round just in time to Jason sitting up. A bullet popped out of his forehead as the wound turned to scar tissue and the scar faded away. Jason looked around, saw the stranger, saw Neil, saw the terrible burning devastation.

“Not again Neil” he groaned standing up.

“Not again” laughed the stranger “good words, good words, but unneeded since Neil here didn't do anything”

Before the boys could even consider wondering what he meant the stranger clapped his hands once. The soldiers all looked at each other confused. The tank was still there in one piece, nobody was burning, their weapons weren't melted. Neil and Jason's jaws dropped, the scene in front of them had suddenly and instantly rewound itself.

“You're surrounded, give up” shouted a soldier “or we'll be forced to open fire”

“Well you could” said the stranger “but I'm not too sure what you can do when you threaten us with umbrellas and an ice cream van”

Neil and Jason's jaws dropped further. The soldiers all suddenly found themselves wielding umbrellas of all shapes and sizes and the tank was playing that distinctive ice cream jingle. The driver was looking particularly confused seeing as he now had a steering wheel.

“Honestly, all this work because the ordinary humans got a whiff of something interesting” the golden eyed stranger sighed “Bad enough that they kidnapped one of us but then it turns out to be a kid. I mean really, they were never going to get any secrets of immortality out of you” he pointed at Jason “ah well, in just a moment they will never have taken you, in fact when I clap my hands you'll have spent the day finishing that tree house you were making”

Jason and Neil frowned and opened their mouths to ask how he knew about the tree house... when the stranger clapped his hands.