Power (Book 1)

Chapter 22

I was in front of the guy with superstrength, Andrew, a millisecond after the words left Malone's mouth. I hammered Andrew with lightning-quick punches, aiming at the area around his abdomen. He was down in the first five seconds.

The fire elemental- Paul- was a little bit tougher to beat. Jake was hurling everything he had at him, conjuring up icicles and snow barriers to protect himself. The elemental was putting Jake on the defensive.

I came into Jake's battle without rushing to the enemy. I didn't expect that to work too many times, plus the fact that I didn't know if I could get back in time to outrun the fire.

I watched from next to Jake wondering what I should do. My speed couldn't do much in close range combat. Jake wouldn't even have the opportunity to distract Paul for me to get an opportunity to attack. I could see his eyes darting between me and Jake, making sure I didn't try anything.

"Jay," Jake said. "Run around him in circles..." he blasted a wave of snow and ice at the elemental. "...You'll suck away all of the oxygen he needs to create the fire."

Without a moment's hesitation, I did as he instructed, running in a circle around Paul. And just as he said, Paul's fire immediately went out. I had sucked all the oxygen from the area. His powers were neutralized for the time being, and he couldn't breathe either.

I went around him one more time, making sure he couldn't see where I was running, then I slowed enough to be able to move outside of the ring of lightning I had formed around Paul. But instead of moving outside of it, I went inside and punched him square in the jaw. It knocked him clean out.

When the ring dissipated, the only one inside of it left standing was me.

I walked over to Jake and we high-fived. I think he forgot about what had put him in such a stump earlier.

Coach did the same thing he did when I fought Dick, restoring the gym floor to what it had been before the battle (I left scorch marks on the floor, apparently) and waking Andrew and Paul back up- only to tell them that they had lost. They didn't mind losing, but they were upset that I had pulled a "trick move" and used an ability they hadn't prepared for.

"Come on, Coach!" Andrew shouted. "I didn't even get a chance to hit him!" He pointed at me. "And plus, they were supposed to fight girls. That isn't fair. If he had used his other powers, the ones we knew about, then-"

"Then you still would've lost," Malone finished for him. "Go on. You're embarrassing yourself. Take your loss and move on. The first battle is boys on boys anyway."

I could just barely hide the snickers that were coming from my mouth. But I couldn't get rid of the grin covering my face.

"Alright, next fight!" Coach said to everyone in the gym. "Jay and Jake vs. Danielle and Jennifer!"

We beat everyone who went against us- boys and girls, since a girl's team hadn't won yet- including Dick's team, which consisted of him and a kid with laser vision. They were a little trickier to fight, but we eventually won when we figured out that Dick was a lot slower than me, despite his superspeed. I got him by tripping him when he was at top speed.

Now it was time for the last battle, against the strongest team there: the Terror Twins. Yep, they were so good that they gave themselves a name.

The reason they were called the Terror Twins was because they were twins, and they had corresponding powers. One, Ian, one of the brothers, could shoot lightning from any part of his body, including his eyes, hands, head, or anything else. And I wasn't sure I could outrun lightning (the irony in this: I emit it when I run).