Elwood Tenkaichi: An Arthur Story

Chapter 31: Open your Eyes, Fern! Awakening!

"What a waste," Tingley droned with a flick of her wrist.

"W-what did you do?" Fern choked as she scrambled to Molly. She surveyed the damage with a gasp. "No. No. Nonono--Molly? MOLLY!"

"Fern," Molly murmured.

"Please," Fern breathed, her eyes welling up.

Molly lifted her hand to Fern's cheek, wiping her tears away with a weak smile. Fern held her hand in place, gripping it.

"S'okay," she soothed, her voice dry and quivering. "I never s-said thank you, Fern. For everything..."

"Molly, please--save your strength, I...I can't do this without you," Fern sobbed.

"You can," Molly assured, pressing a weak fist against Fern's chest--against her heart. "You are a fighter, Fern," she smiled. "I-I'm proud of you..."

Molly's hand went limp as her smile faded. Fern's eyes widened as she held her best friend's lifeless body.

A solemn breeze swept over them, unveiling Molly's face from behind her bangs. For the first time since Fern had ever met her, Molly looked peaceful.

Fern cradled Molly's head against her chest as she cried in silence, eyes unmoving.

"Miss MacDonald had developed a rather annoying conscience," Tingley sighed, studying her fingernails. "I require a warrior--not a weakling," she spat.

"You...you monster!" Binky roared, charging at her.

But before Binky could land his superman punch, Tingley backhanded him with enough force to send him flying to the other end of the field.

"BINKY!" Jenna panicked, her heart nearly bursting from her chest.

"He's okay!" Marina confirmed, noting his lifeforce hadn't gone out. "He's just unconscious..."

"T-this is getting out of hand," Prunella stammered.

"Prunella," Marina suddenly chimed, stepping forward. "Stay back. Jenna and I will try our best to handle this."

Jenna swallowed, but gave a firm nod. "Right."

Tingley laughed.

"Please. You two? The blind girl and the bedwetter? This will hardly do," she scoffed, readying herself for a fight. "But if you insist on joining Miss MacDonald, I'll be happy to oblige."

With flickering speed, they dashed at Tingley, who deflected every one of their attacks, chuckling all the while. No matter how hard or how fast they struck--high or low, fist or knee, even together, they were no match for her. It wasn't long before they had drained too much energy.

"Have you had your fun, then?" Tingley taunted, gripping both their fists.

Without an ounce of effort, Tingley swung the girls up into the air before whipping them down into the ground with a loud crash. The girls coughed in the dust that was kicked up; they could hardly move. Marina struggled to get up, quaking on her elbows, but was shoved back down under Tingley's foot.

"You see, children, this is where you belong--where all mortals belong," she relished. "Under. My. Heel," Tingley stressed, digging her stiletto into Marina's shoulder as her defiant silence gave way to grunting and, finally, screaming.

"Stop it!" Prunella begged. "Please!"

"I suppose you're right," Tingley sighed, unpinning her foot from Marina. "Let's not waste any more time, shall we?"

Violet orbs of light bloomed from her hands, aimed both at Jenna and Marina.

"NO!" Prunella wailed, falling to her knees.

Just then, Tingley was swallowed in an explosion of golden light. Prunella snapped her head to see Sue Ellen, hands outstretched in the entrance to the field.

When the smoke from the attack cleared, Tingley was still standing, but was visibly upset. She eased when she saw Sue Ellen in the distance, the corner of her mouth curling upward.

"Miss Armstrong!" she greeted, turning to face her. "So good of you to join us. Feeling better, I hope?"

After checking Binky's pulse, Sue Ellen approached, her gloved fist creaking at the sight of Fern sobbing over Molly's body.

"Oh, you needn't dirty yourself, my dear. You should count yourself lucky--I've chosen you as my next h--"

Sue Ellen popped across the field, reappearing to wham a deafening punch into Tingley's face. Prunella let out a sigh of relief.

But for all the power she had loaded into the attack, Tingley didn't lose her footing. Sue Ellen's eyes widened as Tingley turned her face with ease against her fist, locking eyes with her.

I...I put nearly everything I had into that punch!

"Now that was rude."

Tingley slammed her fist into Sue Ellen's gut, felling her to her knees.

"Now, hold still," she grinned, forcefully gripping Sue Ellen's forehead. "This will hurt quite a bit."

But just as Tingley had started to raise her ki, she felt another suddenly swell as the ground rumbled. The others felt it too, and turned to discover its source.

The earth around Fern began to fracture. Chips of rock rattled before being lifted off the ground by the rising tide of her ki.

Memories of Molly flooded Fern's mind: sharing in her meals, taking her hand when Fern was too weak to stand after a hard day of training, her smirk...her last words.

You are a fighter.

Fern could feel it crumbling--the wall that sheltered her from the universe. Her restraints were swept away--her energy exploded as Fern released a kiai that could be heard for miles as the land cracked open around her.

She screamed as her lifeforce resonated with the ki of Mother Earth--with the oxygen molecules in the air, with the atoms that comprised the ground beneath her feet.

Fern was suddenly awash in an azure blaze of sparkling energy that illuminated her entire body--white-hot at its center; debris caught in the air surrounding her shimmering aura sailed gently as if in slow-motion. She opened her eyes to reveal a luminous new gaze, unstoppably piercing.

No one could believe what they were seeing.

Even Tingley found herself impressed by the hidden beauty and magnitude of Fern's lifeforce, now brilliantly revealed.

"Well," she grinned, turning to face her.

Marina could see Fern in her entirety. "Fern's energy, it's--I've never seen anything so...pure."

"W-what's happened to her?" Jenna marveled.

"It...it can't be," Marina realized.