The Water

Chapter Nine: Electricity In The Water

As we stood around the bodies, we all grew silent. Vicky quickly placed us all under her protection again, just to be safe. Alice, Blaine, and Voren all readied themselves for the worst as the rest of us did the same. Suddenly, ice spikes began firing at us from the shadows. Before any of us could do anything, Jessica stomped her foot into the ground, causing a wall of earth to rise, shielding us from the ice.

"Huh," I said, my hands catching on fire. "I was wondering what element you could control."

"I'm sorry if you were expecting something cool like fire or water or light or something," Jessica replied. "I know earth is kinda lame."

"Not at all!" I replied, evaporating more spikes as they flew towards me. "My brother, Emerson was an earth elemental. It's really nice fighting side by side with you. It reminds me of how my brother and I used to do things."

Suddenly, I saw spikes flying towards Vicky. She didn't even flinch as she held her hands out, blocking the spikes. As the ice shattered, Vicky turned it back into liquid and armed herself with the water. She kept it flowing around her. Seven began waving his arms around, creating a small tornado over us, ready to strike. Silver clapped his hands together and armed himself with a sword made of light. I kept my fire burning as Jessica had rocks levitating around her. Us and the professors stood in a circle, back to back to defend ourselves against attacks from any direction.

"Smart move," the killer cackled from out in the shadows. "But it won't be enough. You will all die and Rick, you will suffer. There's no stopping the inevitable. Vengeance is a force that can't be stopped."

"Yeah?" I asked as Blaine began to send fire out into the shadows, trying to find the killer. "You do realize that nothing that happens tonight will bring your brother back right? Trust me, I know the pain of losing a loved one. I've lost plenty. Killing the person you blame doesn't help anything. You could kill my friends and leave me to suffer and you're still going to miss your brother after all is said and done. Which isn't a great plan anyways because I've already lost enough and you've already gone down a path unworthy of redemption. So that said, if you want to blame me and if you think you're going to win this, I invite you to try! I invite you to bring everything you got. Because if you try to kill anyone here, you'll be seeing your brother sooner than you think."

"It's bad enough that you kill my brother!!!" She exclaimed, sending 20 spikes towards me. "But that wasn't enough for you?! Now you want me dead too?"

"I don't want to ever have to kill again," I replied, blocking the spikes, evaporating them instantly. "But I will if I have to. I'm not saying I didn't kill your brother. If I could go back and do it differently, I would. But you have to understand that we're different. Your brother was a tragic accident. He never should have died. And that's on me. But I didn't know he would've died. Whereas for you, you're going out of your way to kill innocent people. If you stop this, I'll help you heal. Sure you'll go to jail, but I'll do whatever it takes to help. But if I have to fight you, I will."

"Speak for yourself, Rick," Jessica said, her voice growling like the killer. "This bitch is going to die for what she did to Sarah."

"Well well well, Rick," the killer taunted, sending more spikes at us. "You must think I'm a fool. There's nothing you can do to help me. I've gone through every other way of grief possible. This is the only one that makes me.... happy. And you can bet your ass that I will achieve my goal!"

Suddenly, we found ourselves in a rain storm. It was insane. Water surrounded us at every turn. The water began to swirl around us until our backs were touching. We then found ourselves, Blaine included, floating in a giant water ball above the ground. We began to drown as our lungs ran out of air. We were all violently shaking and trying to break free. I knew we drove her over the edge and that we were all toast. I thought for certain we were going to die when instantly, the ball broke free and we all fell to the ground. As we landed, I looked over to see the hooded figure shaking with electricity. Suddenly, she went flying with a lightning strike.

As she collapsed to the ground, Starla emerged from the shadows behind her. "Not my brother or my friends, bitch."

The killer laid on the ground, twitching as Starla walked over to her and knocked her out by kicking her in the head. Well, I thought. She's gonna be even more pissed when she wakes up. Before I could even say hey to my sister, Jessica began screaming and ran over towards the killer, a spike of rock in her hands. As she want to stab the killer, I grabbed the spike and held her back. I stood between her and the killer, calmly looking at Jessica dead in the eyes.

"You know that's not the answer," I said smoothly. "Sarah wouldn't want you to do this."

"How would you know?" Jessica asked as tears streamed down her face. "You never even knew her!"

"You're right," I replied. "I never had that privilege. But I do know that no one, even in death, wants their friend to go through this. I can promise you that. She would never have wanted you to kill anyone."

"She took my best friend away from me, threatened to kill your loved ones, make you suffer, and killed Lord knows how many students!!! And you don't want her to die?!" Jessica yelled as she showed every sign of being out for blood.

"I'm not gonna lie," I said, taking the rock spike and throwing it aside. "Part of me wants that bitch to die for what she's done. But part of me relates to her. Granted, I didn't intentionally kill innocent people, but I did let rage consume me. As I've said before, I haven't been the same since. Killing someone changes you. It's dark. It's a dark place that you can never truly come back from. I can honestly tell you that the person I am now is very different from the person I was when I first arrived at this school. Also knowing that I accidentally killed someone innocent doesn't help either."

Jessica eased up a bit as tears began to flow down my face. As I cried, Voren restrained the killer in chains of light energy. As he waved his hands, the killer began to levitate and Voren began carrying her back into the school. More specifically, the dungeons.