“All balls, no brains, or so they tell me.”
He chuckled, apparently having realized that already, and moved forward.
The talking over, we began to circle one another. Not expecting him to fight fair, I thought it best to get off first to see what I could make happen. I darted in with a jab and a quick, straight right. The jab clipped him and he adjusted, sweeping my right to the side. He countered easily, his hand speed much faster than I would have believed him capable of, and punched me in the liver. A flash of gray sparked off when he hit and my side exploded with pain, tendrils of it snaking down my leg and across my crotch.
I stumbled, barely getting my arms up in time to block the follow up. His fist crashed into my forearms, once more throwing up a flash of gray light. It was like he’d hit me with a sledgehammer. The bones in my arm throbbed, my shoulders stiffening up as I backed away. He grinned, stalking me down. My prediction as to the fairness of the fight played out and I knew I wasn’t gonna be walking away in one piece. I cast a quick glance toward the house and hoped Veronica had run like I’d told her. It would tear me up to think what might happen to her once McConnell was finished with me. I shook my head to clear away the images that popped up. I didn’t want to picture the possibilities. Driven to a rage by my way too active imagination, I lashed out. I threw a feint with my left, following it up with a kick to his ribs. My shin struck home with a thump, knocking the wind from McConnell. He gasped hard, doubling over, but he managed to catch my leg. With it leveraged against his side, he twisted hard and I heard a snap, his magically-enhanced strength making it easy. I screeched as stabbing pains shot through my calf, the bones of my lower leg broken. McConnell lifted it up over his shoulder and dumped me on my back. I hit the asphalt with a thud, reaching down to cradle my right leg as he hovered over me.
“Any last words,” he huffed, his breath still a little short.
I moaned against the hard surface of the street, rolling my head to look up at him. “Yeah.” I did my best to smile through the pain. “You might want to watch your back.”
He burst out laughing. “You think I’m gonna fall for tha-” A flash of red behind him cut him off. He spun around, but was too late. Rahim let loose a burst of searing energy that smashed into him, blowing him a hundred feet into the air. I heard him land a few seconds later, crashing down through the roof of an aluminum storage shed in the yard next door.
“Are you all right?” Rahim asked with surprising gentleness in his voice. His upper lip peeled back into a disgusted sneer when he saw my leg, the bones protruding from the skin. He looked a little pale. I shook my head. There wasn’t time to do Page 206 anything else.
There was a squeal of aluminum being torn apart, then a flash of gray blasted through the neighbor’s rock wall and streaked over my head, tearing into Rahim. He cried out as the force of the blow drove him back. Knocked off his feet, he slid along the asphalt, shredding flesh in crimson layers as he went. He tumbled to a halt and got to his feet, wobbling as McConnell stepped over the wreckage of the wall and stormed toward him. Rahim seemed dazed.
I shouted a warning as The Gray walked past me, unable to do anything to stop him. Rahim looked up just as McConnell let fly another burst of energy. The old wizard threw up a shield and reflected the blast, grimacing as he did. I could see his arms shaking from where I lay. No doubt McConnell could as well. He pressed forward.
Tenacious, he fired blast after magical blast, alternating hands and angles in an attempt to take Rahim out. Rahim was just as intent upon not being struck. He conjured shield upon shield, turning away each of The Gray’s attacks, many at the very last second. Though he held his ground, I could see he was tiring. Sweat trickled down his face and he was breathing in deep, sucking gasps. It wouldn’t be long until he missed a block. Things would be over for us both when that happened.
With no magic of my own to aid in the fight,
I thought about what I could do to help. Injured as I was, it wasn’t much. I glanced back at the remains of my house and had an idea. Tearing the sleeve from my shirt, I wrapped it tight around my broken leg. I clenched my teeth to hold back my screams, doing what I could to work through the pain. The wound, like any caused by a supernatural being, wouldn’t heal on its own so I couldn’t expect it to get better. The best I could hope for was it didn’t get worse. I tightened the tourniquet to keep the bones from shifting too much, rolling over onto my stomach.
As the battle raged behind me, I dragged myself toward the house. Each agonizing inch was like dousing my leg in gasoline and setting a match to it. The punctures, where the bone had torn through the skin, burned with searing intensity as it scraped across the unforgiving asphalt. Dirt and grease were being ground in, guaranteeing infection, if I lived long enough to worry about it. The bones twisted and turned inside the leg, grinding against one another with every shift of position. Tears streamed from my eyes and I bit down on my bottom lip to keep from calling attention to myself. An agonizing eternity later, the sounds of the magical duel muffled by the wreckage, I crawled into the house. Fortunately, given my current condition, the majority of the front rooms no longer existed. There was nothing but smooth tiled floors and open space. Compared to the street and the sandpaper surface of the sidewalk I’d had to cross to get here, this was like Heaven. Too bad I’d have to crawl out once I found what I was looking for. I stowed the negativity and continued on, hauling myself to the bedroom. Once inside, I headed for the back wall. Thanks to the wind assault of McConnell’s, if I was going to find anything, it’d be there. Halfway across the room, where the debris began, I found it harder to navigate. Wooden splinters dug into my legs, their sharpened points piercing through my jeans and finding a home in the soft flesh. Glass shards snapped and cut deep as I crawled over them to reach the back of the room. Though there’d been a decent amount of blood oozing out of me when I’d arrived in the bedroom, there was now a lake pooling beneath me, a tributary running behind. I was beginning to feel the effect of the blood loss. My vision had begun to tunnel, the edges hazy and indistinct. My thoughts had become sluggish, chaotic; more so than usual.
Realizing how little time I had before I succumbed to my wounds, I dug through the debris with abandon. I ran my hands recklessly through the pieces of broken furniture and the shredded pieces of my house, searching for my gun. I was coming up empty.
I heard Rahim cry out from the street and redoubled my effort, only slightly reassured by the continued sounds of magical warfare. There wasn’t much time left for either of us. I crept closer to the Page 209 discarded mattress, digging through the wreckage. I had just about given up all hope, my thoughts wavering in my head, when my hand lighted on something cold and metallic. I sighed as I ran my numb hand over its surface, identifying it. I groaned. What little energy I had spiraled to nothing.
It wasn’t my pistol.
I collapsed in defeat, the vestiges of my resistance crumbling beneath the weight of my despair. My vision narrowed further as unconsciousness came to call, whispering soothing lullabies. My eyelids, far too heavy to resist the pull of gravity, drifted closed. I felt the darkness rising up to meet me. The end had come.
A whoosh of air startled me back to consciousness. I lifted my weary head and forced my heavy eyes open. There in front of me, laying flat upon the mattress was Rahim. He didn’t look so good. The places where his clothes had been burnt away by The Gray’s magical blasts, scorched and bubbled skin shone through. Patches of deep red and even blacker burns stood out against his natural dark hue. He lifted his head and met my gaze. I saw something in his eyes I’d never thought I’d see there.
Fear.