Insomnia

32

Esme and Max pinwheeled through the air. Wind streaked past their faces as they shot up towards the sky. His shoulder dug into her ribcage. Esme groaned in pain before wrapping her fingers into his hair and tugging hard. He yelped but maintained his grip. Below, Esme could see an urban sprawl begin to sprout from the verdant green hills, a cobweb of streets, windowless warehouses, and a few skyscrapers. WBI standard operating procedure when outnumbered: create a tactical city and regroup.

She slammed her elbow into a vicious blow to the side of Max's neck. He made a choking sound before falling away from her. They both began to plummet. Esme sensed Psionic blasts warbling the air around her, waves of thought that rattled her bones like a heavy bass. The Omens were launching an attack against the city, fire tearing from the heavens to burn it to the ground.

Esme concentrated and her descent accelerated. She willed her bones into steel before crashing into the hard earth, cratering the ground on impact and scattering the nearby Omens. The momentary disruption allowed the WBI to finish raising the city, ensuring it was invested with enough Belief to survive a concerted effort to unmake it.

The Omens began moving into the streets, stepping over the grassy threshold of the nearby hills and onto the jagged ends of the asphalt. Esme moved to intercept them before Max, looking the worse for wear after his sudden fall, lunged forward and jabbed towards her right eye. Esme lurched away, feeling his knuckles graze her cheek.

"I'm not the enemy, Max," she grunted, dodging a carefully aimed kick. A knife hand to the soft space behind his knee nearly toppled him, but he recovered his balance by hardening the surrounding air and leaning onto it..

"Don't think the WBI agree, May," Max panted with a grin, before making a quick hand gesture, starting a recording. "It's nothing personal. A video of me, taking down Esme Trahan, a Psion so good she doesn't even compete in the rankings? That'll really get my fans going." A disappointed shrug. "Shame about our date though. And I'm not really into conjugal visits either."

"Shut up!" Esme yelled. "Fame? Celebrity? That's why you're doing this? While we waste time here, Minerva is being tortured by the Knightmare!"

"Oh come on," he said. "Even if the Knightmare was real, I'm sure she can take care of herself. No second tier Psion could beat one of us."

"You're not invulnerable, Max. None of us are. " Esme cracked her knuckles and stepped forward. "Guess I'm just going to have to prove it to you."

Max had stopped paying attention, shifting forward to drive an elbow towards her abdomen. His movements were so stylized - to impress the viewers no doubt - that she was able to step cleanly out of the way.

She grabbed his elbow and stepped forward, sliding her foot behind his left leg and kicking back into his knee. A single heave brought his tumbling frame over her shoulder and onto the ground.

Screams in the distance. Esme whirled towards the city and watched as a pair of WBI agents collapsed to their knees, surrounded by Omens. Waves of Psionic power streamed from the cultists, bombarding the agents with as many thoughts and sensations as possible. A lesser version of the Knightmare's brand of torture.

Esme shifted and dropped the first Omen with a backhand to the neck. Their Psionic attack was redirected towards her. Her body convulsed as the initial impressions washed over her mind.

Intense fire. Agonizing loss. An undercurrent of mania. Glass shards jutted out from under her skin. She could almost pull at the fleshy flaps where the pieces protruded.

A roar of pain leapt full-throated from her lungs before she lashed out with a wave of rejection. The Omens rocked back like limp dolls, falling to the ground and disappearing from the dream. One of the agents winked out of existence, caught in the blast radius, though the other held on. Right now his body would be generating an immune response to the trauma it thought it had undergone. Waking him up from Somnus would shut off the channel feeding his brain misinformation, and quicken the healing process.