Renaissance

XV

Heph's P.O.V

   recap

      "Right! What's the plan?" Leo asked, barely audible over the violent, hungry snarl of the Hollows.
      "I honestly didn't think I would get this far!" I squealed out as yet another Hollow lunged for me and I swear I felt Leo mentally facepalm at me. I think our only hope is to wait for Eterna and the rest of the turtles. So yeah, we're screwed.

End recap

       "Leo!" I scream, my eyes wide as saucers as a Hollow lunges right for him. Claws and teeth flailing as he just managed to fend off the seething Hollow. I can barely see Pi in the background, watching. His hands linked behind his back.

      He's just got to be so smug, doesn't he? I glare at him. My attention shifts to the Hollow in front of me, lunging towards me. Pressing my back against Leo's shell, the air is nearly pounded out of me as we both stumble. His hand searches for mine and the contact forces me to draw in a breath. In any other situation, this would have thrilled me.

       Me and Leo both look up as we hear a sound resembling...yodeling?

      "Booyakasha!" Mikey sails in from who knows where and kicks one of the Hollows in the face, Donnie and Raph follow with less style but announcing their arrival with yells and waving weapons. My heroes. Eterna trails after Donnie with a baseball bat and I gotta roll my eyes.

      "Nice of you to drop in!" Leo's sarcasm urges my mouth into a smirk. Now at least we can fend these brutes off a little better. Donnie hands Leo his katanas, and I'm handed my tanto. More like it was hastily shoved into my hands and I just managed to keep it from hitting the floor but same thing.

      The room was alive with the sounds of fighting, crawling along walls and skittering across floors to bound up and make your ears flex with every shriek of metal on bone. I can hear my own breathing in my ears, my heart joining in to accompany the hollow scrape.

      It was as if my surroundings melted away, leaving everyone else frozen around me. Darkness rose up around myself, smudging the blue and red of Leo and Raph's mask, the brown of their shells, the other Hollow's eyes were just hazy pinpoints. The surging, pulsing light in the middle of the floor was brighter than ever, but I didn't need to shield my eyes. Within seconds, I was standing in front of it. I didn't even register moving towards it. Moving was the wrong word...I just appeared before it.

      It was the most beautiful thing I had ever seen. Like deep aquamarine and labradorite all swirled together in a big cauldron. I almost couldn't tear my eyes from it, and the more I looked the more I wanted to dip my hands into it. A buzzing started in my head, building into an angry stabbing that made me wince. I felt like I was being dragged down towards it, like gravity was pushing down on my body harder and harder and suddenly I was face to face with the light. The stabbing I felt in my head spread into a honeyed glow and it felt like my eyes snapped open and all the air was sucked from my body.

      The spell was broken like that. Looking around in shock, I found myself standing next to the light in the floor, my hands full of fire.

      I don't like it.

      "Sweet! Heph can fire bend!" Mikey howled as he sailed through the air and smacked a Hollow in the face with his nunchucks.

     "What!?" Pi erupted, smacking Donnie in the plastron and sending him sliding shell first across the floor. All attention was turned towards my person, the fighting ceased and all I could do was stare at my palms in abject shock.

      "The universe has been kind to you, Hephaestion!" Pi snarled, "Blessed you with Greek fire!" I have no clue what he's on about, but I shake my hands trying to get the fire off but to no avail. My veins feel hot and icy all at the same time and taking another look, my veins are glowing red through my skin.

      "What the fuck!" I cry out and the fire retreats back into my palms, leaving me shaking and pressed for time as all the Hollows seem to charge at me all at once. I grab my tanto, eyes darting between each one as I try and determine which is gonna reach me first. All thoughts evaporate from my head as I feel the weight of a Hollow glide onto my blade and nearly force me into the blue light. I skid back, teetering on the edge as the Hollow lets out a strangled, wet snarl and collapses with my blade sunk between it's ribs.

      I open my eyes and gasp as the Hollow falls into the pit of blue light and disintegrates and I quickly step away from it.

      "Okay, update! Heph can kill Hollows!" Mikey shouted from his place beneath a Hollow's foot and abruptly kicked the brute off, triggering everyone to step into action once again. I can do what?
      A quick look down at my hands and I notice a symbol on my right wrist much like the ones painted on the Hollows' chests.

  ል

      In a pulsing red colour, it seems to stare back at me and my skin crawls. My head snaps up. Three hollows are bearing down on me. Whatever. I can do this. I get away from the blue pit in the floor and brace myself as one swings its claws at me. Suddenly like a flamethrower, my hand engulfs my tanto in flames. And I'm left staring at it in awe.

      Leo runs over and knocks a Hollow forward and I take that chance to drive my blade between it's ribs, just like the other. This might be easier than I first initially thought!

      After at least 20 minutes of trying to wrangle up these Hollows and shove them all into the blue glowing pit, we're left with Pi seething in the corner. He looks about as angry as a skull for a head can get—which is surprisingly seething.

      "You'll pay for this!! You'll pay for this!!"