Game of Life

Chapter 19

"Nope," I spat, clutching my head, waves of pain still left me crippled. I'm not giving up.

"Are you sure about that? I can make the pain go away," Severin sang, clapping his hands.

"I think I can handle it." 

"Calla, really, why do this to yourself?" His grin faded and he pouted, running one of his pointy fingers down the side of my throat. "This could be so easy."

I gazed back over the battle field, the lake was a mess, bodies scattered around, oozing blood into the already stained water, were lit up by rays of vicious burning light. The orbs still hadn't finished raining down upon them and the beast had yet to make any further attacks. Thankfully, the stall I had created had given some of the others time to find proper cover and they were working together to protect each other.

"We have to work together to win," I groaned.

Severin sighed in frustration. "So desperate to win, why? So you can go back to your boring life?"

"Wouldn't you be? Boring is better than dead."

Severin chuckled and shook his head. "My dear, I can't die, death is not a luxary offered to those of my kind. And even if you could kill me, I'd merely possess someone else, warp them to my form, and live again."

These things are immortal? "What are you?" I sputtered.

He grinned at my surprise, flashing his teeth. "Well we've already established that I'm not a demon. Stronger than that."

"Satan?" I guessed. That got me full on hysterics.

"No, no, my dear, I am not Satan." He giggled as he spoke. "Although I am very well acquainted with our lord."

"So what then?" I had to admit my curiousity was getting the better of me at this point.

"It's a secret." He pat the top of my head. "And you have bigger things to worry about than what I am. Just know that there are no limits to the hell I can produce." He paused for another bout of giggles. "So you should be happy that we're friends, cause I'd hate to have to release them unto you. Then again...what isn't fair isn't fun, so goodluck!"

For fuck's sakes. I shook my head as he disappeared, glad to finally be free of his overly creepy cheerful presence. He's some kind of hell creature that's for damn sure. I didn't know if I believed him about not being Satan, didn't want to even imagine how anyone could be worse than him.

Now that Severin was gone the beast resumed its attacks, albeit with less urgency than before, probably due to how much energy it had expended in its rapid assault. I ran across the shore, trying to avoid tripping into the massive holes of glass that I could barely see on the dimly lit beach.

Light. "Redirect the light," I shouted as I ran, taking Severin's advice. "More effective than covering yourselves!"

"Are you crazy? We can't stop those!" I picked out Adrian's voice from the crowd of protests.

"Just try it!"

I watched as several of the spheres shuddered and shifted slightly to the side, it was something. At least now they could stop direct hits on their shields. 

"Thanks Calla!" Darren yelled. "Alright now light and dark users keep those blasted things off of us, everyone else hit it with everything you've got!"

"Try to trap it over here! The sand that got hit turned to glass, we can trap it in one of the holes!" I called back.

"We can't see you Calla, where are you?"

Fuck. I hope the time with Severin was enough to get some juice back. "Over here!" It took a moment, and I could feel blood dripping down my nose, but I managed a small flickering fire. 

"Okay, got it, watch out!"  He shouted out a few more words that I couldn't make out and a couple of the spheres began flying in my direction.

"What the hell guys!" I yelled, diving to the side when one almost hit me.

"We're going to make the gap bigger, just watch out!"

"Little bit of warning would have been nice," I grumbled under my breath, backing up a few more steps to get out of range of the flying balls of energy.

Steadily, the pit of glass grew larger until it covered a good portion of the shore and I moved as far away from it as possible, reluctant to stay near something that would be viciously painful if I took a wrong step. "Think that's good!" 

"Alright! Everyone let's go!" I felt the wind shift, blowing forcefully in the direction of the pit and backed off even farther. Tendrils of darkness worked their way up to the beast and fires lit up behind its back. Slowly but surely, they coaxed the creature forward while still trying to fend off its devastating attacks. My uselessness at this point ate at me. I couldn't do anything without the use of my elements. Even the slight effort required to light that pathetic fire had left me with a raging headache and a disgusting nosebleed that left dried blood caked on my face. I dabbed at it with the neck of my shirt, unwilling to get close to the water while they fought, to no effect. 

The beast screeched, drawing my attention. It was attempting to fly up and over the barrage at its back but they weren't allowing it, summoning massive waves and tugging more forcefully with the tendrils, just managing to keep drawing the beast forward.

A few of the water users began bringing the others to the shore, depositing them on the beach so they didn't have to work as hard to keep up their assault. "Over here guys!" The light from the beast was close enough that I didn't have to attempt to summon my elements again and they quickly ran over.

"Now what?" someone asked.

"Now we pull it in and bury it alive." Darren spoke from behind my back and I jumped slightly. "You doing okay?" he asked, placing a hand on my shoulder.

"I'm great, but spent, can't bring anything right now without getting a headache and a nosebleed," I waved my hands uselessly.

"Nosebleed?" He tilted my head so he could see and grimaced. "Take a break, we can handle this."

I nodded once and backed off to watch. Working together as one they forced the creature into the massive pit of glass. It took forever and I could almost see their growing frustration but they did it, together they rose a mound of earth above its head and forced it down into the pit.

For a long time all we heard were screams of agony, until, finally, blissful silence.