Magic Madness™️

Chapter Three: Fight or Flight

    Eli ran as fast as his legs would take him. As soon as Joan held his hand up, Elijah knew he was in danger. Now, something funny about Elijah was that he had no fight or flight reflex. It was just "flight", in his mind.
Unfortunately for Elijah, Alex was taller and, therefore, faster than him, so Alex was able to catch up with him and tackle him to the ground.

    "Dude, what the hell are you thinking?!" Alex asked scoldingly, waiting until Elijah stopped struggling before standing back up and brushing himself off.
    "I'm getting out of here! I know there's a way to go back home. This isn't right. This place isn't real, it isn't safe, and I'm not going to stay here. Joan is going to drive me crazy, I feel like Amber is going to kill me any time she gets within, like, ten feet of me, and Eva is, like, scared of me or she hates me or something. I need to get back home before something happens, and so do you," Eli rambled, arms and hands flying around as if they made his point any clearer. Alex grabbed him by both wrists.
    "Look, I get it. You're freaked out. I am, too. But-"
    "Are you? Are you really freaked out? I don't think you are. You seem just freaking fine, to me. I don't think you get how serious this is. I told my mom and dad I'd be home by dinner. Your mom thinks we're upstairs, playing video games right now.     What happens when one of your siblings walks into your room and doesn't see you there? What happens when your mom calls my mom and says we're both missing? What happens when we die here and nobody in the real world ever finds us or knows what the hell happened? What happens when-"
    "Shut up!"
    "Don't tell me to shut up, Alex, I swear to-"
    "Shut. Up." Alex repeated, slapping a hand over Eli's mouth. Eli looked at him in alarm, eyes wide, while Alex looked in the direction that he had apparently heard something from.
    "Did you hear that?" Alex whispered, taking his hand off of Eli's mouth. Eli shook his head feverishly. Alex listened for another second, and his eyes widened as Eli's had, a moment ago.
    "Run!" He said suddenly, not letting Eli's left wrist go as he started running again. Eli had a very difficult time keeping up, but he did his best with the legs that he hadn't used for running since sophomore year PE.
    "What are we running from?" Eli asked, out of breath already.
    "I don't know," Alex replied honestly.
    "Then why are we running?!" Eli demanded.
    "Because we're in danger, idiot!" Alex yelled.
    "You wanna know something really funny? We wouldn't be, if you hadn't tackled me! We could have been back home already!" Eli shouted.
    "That's assuming you could even figure out how to teleport. Did you think we were just gonna walk back to Earth?" Alex shot back.

    "Stop bickering, you guys are such an old, married couple! I'm coming up on your right, watch out," said Evalyn, easily catching up to Eli.
    "We've taken out twelve of it's health points. Eight to go," He said informatively, and Eli didn't even bother asking, this time.

    He couldn't, even if he had wanted to. He tripped in a valiant attempt to run faster, and he fell down, taking Joan (who had been right behind him) with him. As soon as Alex felt Eli's hand leave his own, he turned sharply with arms up, ready to throw a punch at someone (or something? He didn't quite know). It took Evalyn and Amber a second longer, but they stopped running as soon as they noticed the others had stopped.

    "Oh, good. We lost it," Alex panted.
    "I wouldn't be so sure about that. It's still here, I can tell, it's just...not somewhere we can see it," Joan said quietly, looking around slowly.

    There was a moment of deadly silence before Amber ran forward, dragging Eli (who was still on the ground) harshly away.

    "Hey, what-?!"
    A wolf, just then, made itself visible, biting down on the air that would have been Eli's foot, had Amber not dragged him away.
    Eli was so shocked, he didn't even have a chance to say anything before Joan was standing up and curling his fists at his sides.
    Before his brain could catch up, Evalyn was standing in front of him protectively as she did a dance with her hands, successfully producing a ball of water between her palms. She looked at Joan dutifully as the wolf stood in front of them, growling with sharp teeth on full display. It stepped forward, slowly, and Evalyn dug her feet into the ground a little more.

    "Are you ready?" She asked. Joan nodded, making his stance wider as he raised his hands, as well. His fingers sparked, and Eli scooted back as quickly as he could.

    The ball grew bigger and bigger between Evalyn's hands, until finally, she threw it at the wolf with more force than seemed possible for someone Evalyn's size.
    As soon as it hit the wolf, Joan ran as close as he could and held both hands out with palms facing the wolf as small shots of lightning shot out. The wolf shook uncontrollably, switching between looking real and looking like a block of large pixels. A bar appeared above the wolf's head with pixelated numbers under it. It started at 8/20, and continued to go down as the bar ran out of green, and Joan got closer and closer.

    "Are they-"
    "Electrocuting it? Yeah," Amber replied, arms folded as she backed up a little.

    As soon as the health bar ran out completely and the number reached 0/20, the wolf fell over. It flashed white a few times before disappearing, and Joan looked disappointed.

    "You just—did it die?" Eli asked, scrambling to his feet.
    "It died," Joan confirmed, "And it dropped absolutely nothing but fifty experience points for me and fifty for Evalyn."
In white, pixelated font, +50 EXP appeared over both Joan and Evalyn's heads.
    "You can make lightning with—you killed it with—by electrocution?" Eli asked, amazed. He almost forgot why he had tried to run.
    "Yes. I have lightning powers, but only if I'm within three feet of the target," Joan confirmed.
    "That is so...crazy. You three are the weirdest people I've ever met," Alex said, wide eyes looking down at the dirt where the wolf had been.
    "You don't know that. There are a lot of extremely weird people that never let it show. Everybody is weird, it's only a matter of who's brave enough to be proud of it," Joan replied, "Now let's not get distracted. We still have a destination, and a long walk. And I would appreciate it if nobody tried to run away, this time."