Burn

Chapter eight: Lethargy

A little less action after a more action-filled one.

She was propelled harshly against the wall, the fire of the explosion heating the flesh of her face. She gave a gurgled yelp, electric bolts searing out of her fingertips involuntarily. Her ears rang from the grotesque sound the explosion made and her back was sore from being whipped against a wall by Wanda's magic. Her knees bent as she collapsed in on herself, bracing against the withering pain shooting through her body. She could feel her skin glowing blue with energy, but the explosion had rendered her blind and deaf, as she viewed the world behind a curtain of blur and ringing. 

As her senses were slowly coming back to her, she found herself on all fours, reaching painfully and breathlessly for the gun that had been knocked out of her grip during the blast. She latched it to the holster at her waist and sighed. She started to hear the rest of the group coming to their own senses as well, screaming and shouting names, making sure everyone was alive.

Her heart pinched when she imagined them all, lying broken and bloody on the blown cement, dead and wide eyed, staring at the bruised sky. She looked up through her tears, feeling her skin raw from the fire, her orbs searching the orange flames for any sight of her friends. She saw shadows of different colors crawling among the red glow, the world still too confusing for her to make out any details.

She was wrenched from her state when a foot made painful contact with the side of her face.

The world dipped and spun as she rolled onto her side, the ringing in her ears coming back twice as powerful. Her eyes found the purple sky, her breath rasping out of her throat when a shadow spun in her peripheral vision.

She had just enough time to evade the knife that was coming for her forehead and spun onto all fours. Her instincts kicked in savagely, adrenaline soaking her blood and dissipating her blurry vision into one as clear as day.

The person was stood a couple feet away from her, adorning all black pants and shirt, their face covered by a dark mask. Their hair was the color of the sand on a beach, yet that was all she saw that proved they were human as they dashed madly towards Addie.

She evaded his punch, growls and grunts coming from both their mouths as Addie replayed all the lessons Nat had taught her. She grabbed the man by the elbow, twisting herself up and under him until his back was facing her. She released enough of her energy to startle him. Blue rivers danced along his skin, visible under his dark clothing. He writhed in pain, skin churning and burning as smoke rose up from his wound.

Addie kicked him suddenly in the back, sending him sprawling forward, but he came back at her again. She took one good punch to the jaw and a knee to the stomach before she wrapped her arms around his waist and threw him off her, right hand making shocking contact with his cheekbone. Once he was back in her face, she managed to throw all the electricity she could muster into him, her hands locked around his neck. He fried like a pan, his mouth letting out gurgled sounds and gory breaths as she smelled his burning skin.

He tried one last time to come at her, but he was out of breath, his skin smelling like burnt bacon. He was slow and almost dead, and so Addie decided she would use his sorry ass as practice. She used all the lessons Nat had taught her and kicked, punched, scratched, and clawed her way through that awful man who had tried to kill her. She started to scream, her fear turning to anger the more her fist made contact with his face.

He was on he ground, his eyes closed, blood clotting his face, when she was brutally pushed in the back. She toppled over with a grunt, her eyes frantically searching for whoever had pushed her. Hands flailing, she spun on her heel to get caught off guard by a solid and brusque punch to the face. She felt her jaw crack, a sound that reverberated in her mouth, blood hot on the tip of her tongue. The world dipped ever the slightest, her mind a swirl of incoherence when she felt her legs being kicked from underneath her.