The Trick to Falling in Style

Golden

Ankh called forth golden lightning from the palm of his hand. He pressed his fingers against the back of a hybrid with Impulse in their system. The hybrid let out an animalistic cry of pain before they fell unconscious against the street. Ankh leaned down on one of his knees, pressing his fingers against the hybrid's neck. As steadily as a drum, Ankh could feel the hybrid's heartbeat pittering. Ankh had made certain that the lightning would only incapacitate. His mother had made certain he knew from a young age that he should never call down the full power of the sky, not unless he was ready to bear the weight of having taken a life.

Ankh looked up from the unconscious hybrid. His emerald eyes flickered behind his cubic mask to see Nemesis fighting a different hybrid. Silvery blue water whipped around her hands before going out to wrap around the hybrid's face. The hybrid clawed at the air in front of them as bubbles appeared in the darkening water. When the hybrid's arms fell to their side, Nemesis flicked her hands. The water formed a ribbon-like structure in the air that floated out of the hybrid's mouth, twisting to carry their body. The water gently sat the hybrid down on the ground. Nemesis pressed both of her gloved hands on the hybrid's chest, checking that all the water had left their lungs. Like Ankh, she knew how to stop herself before she actually killed someone. While her name was synonymous with revenge, she never took that to mean murder, especially of an innocent person.

A little further back from Nemesis, Blaze was fighting against the last hybrid in that general area. He had eleven floating golden rectangular prisms burning with an internal fire surrounding him. He manipulated them telekinetically. He usually used them as projectiles, but he was using them right now to trap the fleeing hybrid. When the hybrid tried to run in a specific direction, they suddenly had a golden rod blocking their path. By the time Blaze was done, all eleven rods were sticking up from the ground like small pillars. A thin film of fire-like curtains shot up between each rod, creating a roofless cage. Blaze jumped through the wall without getting hurt, and he reached out to press his fingers against the part of the hybrid where their neck and shoulder met. This knocked them unconscious. As they slipped onto the ground, Blaze flicked his hand up. The rods floated out of the ground, surrounding him in slowly moving circles once again.

Ankh was about to call out to them when he felt a strong wind push him forward. He let out a surprised noise as he rolled across the ground. When he finally stopped moving, he could still hear the swirling wind. He looked up to see a hybrid had been standing behind him with a knife. They were a cat hybrid, so their footsteps had been so light that Ankh hadn't heard them. He would have gotten seriously injured if the wind hadn't decided to nudge him out of the way and lift the hybrid into the air. Ankh blinked as soon as he realized what thought just passed through his mind. He might be able to control lightning and rain on occasion, but the wind was not part of his domain. The only person who could stop a tornado or unleash a gale was...

Vermillion ran out from the shadows of an alleyway with his hand outstretched toward the hybrid ensnared in the winds. Vermillion shifted the wind to bring the hybrid floating down. When the hybrid's butt touched the rough street, Vermillion pressed his fingers against a nerve in the hybrid's neck. The hybrid succumbed to the darkness, and the wind safely brought their entire body to the ground, cushioning the head right before impact. Vermillion looked down at the hybrid before he looked up.

Ankh sucked in a deep breath. Logically, he knew that Vermillion had reappeared. He read all the reports. His own mother had told him that Vermillion was working again. And, less logically and more instinctively, some part of Ankh always knew Vermillion wasn't dead. He didn't want to tell anyone in case he was wrong. He didn't want to tell anyone because he hoped that he was wrong. How unfair was it to think that his friend had abandoned them all without a word, leaving them with grief and empty promises? But Ankh couldn't shake the feeling churning in his gut that someone had been given new life. It was the same feeling as when Banshee lost his life for a few moments and came back as Siren. It was the feeling of undeath, Ankh called it, and he assumed it was a secondary power that was pretty useless considering most people didn't come back from the dead. Siren and Vermillion, however, were both creatures of undeath.