Black Mirror

Chapter 30 - Crossfire

"Gee, it's not like you're the first to tell us we should never been born," Gabe mutters.

"But it doesn't hurt any less." Alex bumps fists with Gabe, then both of them coat their hands with ice. I take that as my cue to really start throwing fire, as does Steve, who targets Michael with near-unerring accuracy right alongside me.

Near, but not near enough, because Michael summons several of those under his control to get in formation around him and become humanoid shields. What a fucking asshole coward this guy is - and I thought Alicia and Penner were bad enough as enemies.

"Land and dark elementals take the crowd?" I suggest. "Ice and fire take the head of the snake?"

"I'm a little offended that you lumped our brother into the snake," says Annie, "but then again he always was one of the trouser variety." She clenches her fists, then a couple of collapsible-style dark batons appear in her hands.

Harlan forms a long dark blade, then says, "I hope you know what you're doing, Fionna, 'cause I bet we'd stand a better chance if we-"

"I can still hear you!" Michael waggles one finger in the air, and the closest Third 'Verse zombies to us start firing their elementals at us. "Come on, at least try to keep me in the dark!" As if to emphasize how much he isn't, he fires more lightning into the air, almost striking a couple of pods that haven't opened up. All he'd need would be flames as orange as mine, and he'd be able to say he's literally playing with fire.

Wait, can I make my flames blue? It's long been a challenge, increasing my heat. I've always run pretty orange. Yellow if I'm especially pissed. I can try to go for blue, but that might sap a little too much concentration, and I need to conserve my focus while I'm taking Michael on. If I can push past his mental blocks - because yes, I can feel him working to restrict the movement of my muscles the closer I get to him, and I know I'm not the only one - I can throw out a layer of enough fire, with Steve's help (and I notice his glows redder than mine; does his having died more times diminish his heat?), to keep Michael so on his toes that he can't control the whole horde he's got at his disposal.

Okay, don't let Annie or Harlan hear me lumping Russell into another group with an unsavory name. Capisce?

Together with Steve, I help form a continuous ring of fire around Michael. Continuous except for the lightning he keeps sparking off, which occasionally interrupts the path of the flames but is too insubstantial to really stop it. From time to time, Michael forms a light blade, with which he slashes out at us, but he can't keep track of us both because he doesn't have eyes in the back of his head. So these light blades, he throws them and they embed themselves in the sides of open pods just long enough to spark some more before they vanish.

The blades actually do come pretty close to striking both me and Steve, but they never really hit. I think, instead, he's targeting Alex and Gabe, who have to do some fancier footwork than us in order to dodge.

It's practically a video game, with God and three of His friends at the controls. Mash down the circle button, hit X from time to time when we need to jump, and pray for a critical hit each time someone presses square. Or something like that. (And what does triangle do? Most games don't assign a function to triangle. Except Kingdom Hearts, according to Ash, who always loved to abuse those games' reaction commands.)

"You really think this will help you out?" Michael laughs, high and cold like Tom Bloody Riddle. "Come on, I know you can do better than that! Hit me! Go on!"

"As you wish, my good sir." I break the circle and send the tongues of flame from my right hand right at Michael, but instead of hitting him directly, I connect my fire with Steve's right-hand fire above Michael's head. Then I pull my left-hand flame into a tighter curve, as does Steve, until these connect as well. Our fire circle is now a fire figure-eight. Or an infinity loop. Whichever shape you prefer to see it, Steve and I are turning up the heat on him, the red and orange tongues meeting in midair to form a spot of yellow, then blue, right in the center.