Power (Book 1)

Chapter 39

The others took off. Que went chasing after a red blur. Cassie started throwing large concussive telekinetic blasts from in the air. Jake went for a fire elemental, and Blink began to phase through people and attack them from behind.

Me? I had to get through my sister before I helped them.

Sage shot two twin rays of energy from her eyes at me. They collided into my body, but they didn't hurt, thanks to my diamond skin.

Sage came to this conclusion, too. She transformed her arms into scythe-like weapons and tried to slash them across my torso. I blocked them easily with my arm.

"Switch!" she yelled.

"Ah!" Metagor came crashing down from above. I jumped clear from his point of impact. I wasn't doing that again.

He swung his tail, and spikes were hurled at me. I dodged most of them, but one found its mark. It embedded itself deep into my side.

I grabbed it and pulled it out, even though it hurt. I didn't think anything could pierce my skin, but this spike just did.

"It's made of boron nitrite- a mineral that is harder than diamond," he explained with a slight nod of approval. "I got an upgrade. Apparently, it worked."

He threw off another shot, but this time, I had to dodge them all. I bent down to avoid the first one, then to the side so that the other two didn't hit me. "Is that all you've got?" I asked him, trying to put in a brave facade.

"Nope. That was the distraction."

I felt a bullet for the first time. It hurt. It felt as if a thousand ants were crawling into a hole in my back and they wouldn't get out. They bit my insides, tearing at my internal organs.

I dropped to the ground, my body automatically shifting back into its former state. Blood began to pool on the ground. My blood.

"Hurry up," I heard Sage say. "Before he comes back. I want to make sure he stays dead this time."

My body was immobile. I couldn't move. I could only watch helplessly as the scene played out around me.

"Hey, you!" Metagor yelled out into the crowd of people trying to get Cassie down from her advantageous position. The fliers couldn't gain a foothold because she was sending them in the other direction with her blasts. No one could touch her. That said, she couldn't help me- she had no way of getting to me while keeping them at bay at the same time.

A man emerged, one I had never seen before.

"Come here for a sec." Metagor raised his ugly, long finger at me on the ground. "I need you to shock this boy. Give him a good jolt, probably 300 watts."

300? That was enough to...enough to...

Suddenly, I figured it out. They were trying to destroy my nanobots so that I couldn't heal. And with a bullet embedded in my spine, that would mean definite death.

I started wriggling on the ground, trying to get as far away from the man as possible. But, unfortunately, at a casual walking pace, he got to me easily.

The man stood over me, rubbing his hands together like a defibrillator. He bent down to get a good grip on me.

I was sure my suit wasn't going to be able to protect me from this, and I didn't have the strength to change back to my diamond form, nor the will to, since the pain would be amplified.