Paradox Part Two
Chapter Two: Not-So-Good Morning
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"Let's just take care of this now," a sarcastic, young voice spat.
The teacher and student looked suspiciously at each other. The scene that appeared as the walked through the dust confused the two.
A rough triangle split the three groups in the hallway.
At one point, Ben stood with a grim frown on his face and his left hand resting on his right wrist. Gwen stood next to him, crouching in a fighting stance.
The two confused normal people (the best way to put it, I guess) obviously stood at another.
And, at the top was the most confusing of them all: a pale boy growling at the two. He stood strong with his arms held out to his sides. A blue ring of what looked like electricity floated around his thumb and forefingers. To the teacher, he looked as if he should be in about the seventh, maybe eighth, grade, and appeared, aw, I'll say it... "emo", complete with ripped shirt and pants, with stringy black hair. A demonic grin spread across his face.
"How do you think you'll beat me, squirt?"
Ben shouted, "Like this!" Gwen twisted her head over to the direction of two onlookers, shouting, "Wait, Ben, no!"
He hardly noticed her as he slapped the green face on what the two intruders thought was his wristwatch.
A green haze filled the hall that had just begun to clear from cement dust. Two noises commenced at once: one like that of a heavily-sprung trampoline, and another, like a surge of electricity. The haze cleared, quicker this time, to reveal two completely different figures than before: one, in Ben's place, was an anthropomorphic being that radiated heat. The other new person was much larger. In fact, he was a large, crimson man with an extra set of limbs.
The two onlookers, surprised to find that they were huddled against the wall, were in a shocked trance. However, any further quiet lasted less than three seconds as a fight broke loose.
Punches rained at the heat monster while spurts of flame shot across the room.
"You... can't… beat… me…twerp!"
Shouts came out between throwing punches and blasting whatever odd element they came equipped with at each other.
"Oh… yes… I… can!" A stream of molten rock flew across the tiled intersection, now thickly coated with crushed mortar and dust.
Kevin's fist flew across the way, landing in Ben's shoulder with a thwock. "I'd… like… to… see… you… try!"
A flash filled the room and a heavy buzzing, like a large bee or fly, entered as well. Some poisonous acid shot out as well as his opponent tried to shield his head.
"New… juice… I've… been…working…up… how… do… you…like it?"
"Not…wheeze…much!" Ben threw a punch or two in between gasps for breath. "How… did… you… get… back… to… yourself… again?" The deep voice of the creature echoed off the painted cinder blocks of the wall.
A squeaky, slightly annoying voice of the insect replied. "Who knows? Maybe somebody thought I had had enough time…" The voice stopped momentarily as another sound of surging electricity released into the air. A deeper, stronger voice spoke up again; however, it was oddly distant and echoed. "…in…hell, Tennyson. Who cares? I'm here now, aren't I? Powers and all, thanks to you!"
Ben noticed that the attacks stopped and slowly pulled down the arms of rock too his sides. "Jeez, when will you get over that!?"
His response came quick, without hesitation. "Never, whelp! Not until you're long gone!"
An uneasy grimace spread across the man of flame's face. "Any alternatives… heh, heh... buddy?"
A flash sounded again and a near-exact replica of Ben appeared; this one was slightly taller and a taller plume of flame rose out of his head. His voice was filled with dry sarcasm. "That, or I get the watch!"
Ben uneasily continued. "I'll take choice number two…"
Kevin grinned. "It's not that easy. I decide…" He shoved a flaming forefinger into his cringing counterpart's face. "…and I say choice number one."
A flash filled the room still again as the fiery creature was replace with a creature of diamond. His incarnation was slightly taller, and larger pillars of diamond went out his back.
Fate decided to intervene; a red panel on the Pyronite's chest glowed scarlet, moments before returning the strong creature to the weak ten-year-old hidden underneath.
"Couldn't have timed it better myself."
Gwen, who was seeing to the cuts and bruises the teacher and student received when they were attacked, spun around at the last second to see Kevin shove his diamond-speared arm right into the frozen form of her cousin.
The sound of sharp pincers sliced through the sudden calm.
Sirens blared extremely faintly as Gwen, Ryan, and their teacher sat frozen in their respective positions as Diamondhead-Kevin turned to them. Most of them thought they were next, but he just grinned malevolently, saluted by raising a hand to his forehead, and leaped through the roof of the building, skillfully wielding his diamond as he ascended.
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"Get that girl out of here right this moment!"
A woman clothed in a pale blue turned her head towards the orange-haired girl swiftly keeping pace with the moving stretcher. She simply shook her head to say no as they turned a corner and wheeled into a room. The group of people huddled around the bed as they lifted a pasty-skinned boy onto the bed, immediately beginning to hook him up to numerous machines. The annoying throb signifying the boy's pulse came into hearing range as a heart monitor steadily flickered on.
One of the doctors lifted a breathing mask to the boy's face. His chest slowly rose and fell as he struggled to breathe. His shirt was tattered and blood-stained.
One of the men in the group began studying the small form of the boy as one man clothed in white dashed out of the chaos outside the door and studied him as well. His hands caressed small holes across his shirt and, bewildered, said, "What the hell happened here?"
A nurse systematically began reading a chart. "John Doe. Ambulances picked him up at… Madison Elementary. Some kind of code-red attack."
The doctor quickly continued to ask questions while inspecting the body.
"Age?"
"Around ten years old."
"What are these holes from?"
"Some kind of diamond. They acted like bullets, according to a teacher there. Sliced everywhere, bleeding everywhere."
The doctor's next question was cut off by a shout from the corner of the room. "His name is Ben Tennyson."
The white man whipped around to see a young girl around the same age as the victim on the bed in a chair. Her eyes were puffy and red; her hands hugged her sides.
"What is she doing here?"
The nurse continued on after the slight break of silence. "Refused to leave. Says she's related to the boy."
The doctor waved away the girl and continued to concisely talk to the nurse. "Get some blood in here, ASAP. He's not doing well." He looked anxiously toward the heart monitor.
"And call his parents, too."
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His blood-stained chest rose slowly, rhythmically, to the annoying pulse of a nearby machine. The room was silent, echoing with the ever so slight din concealed behind the heavy door to the room. Only two people occupied the room at this time. They were cousins, and they happened to be sitting next to each other.
The boy and girl were alone. The boy's face was covered in an oxygen mask. His eyes, half-closed, had a pleading glint in them. He looked up sadly to his girl cousin as she sniffled and began quietly talking to him.
Her eyes were bloodshot, teary, and her nose was red. Her elbows rested on the corner of the soft hospital mattress. "Listen, Ben. I'm sorry. About everything." She sniffled again. "I'll do anything to protect you. No matter what." Ben's mouth opened, as if to say something, but his cousin cut him off. "Don't say anything. I don't think we have any time left. I just want to say this: I will always defend your secret. I'll never tell anybody. That's safe with me, grandpa, and anybody else we've met this summer." She cracked a smile for a single moment.
"Just promise me you'll fight it."
Ben tried to open his mouth again, but only a hot stream of gasped air was released. He thought for a second, and than nodded solemnly.
The hospital clothing hung haphazardly around his shoulders has small spots of blood on it. Gwen glanced to points she recognized from a biology class: one blood stain near the lungs, another near the stomach, and a tiny pinprick in his neck. A somewhat large point spread across his shoulder.
"And just promise me that you know everything will change."
The voice was clear, angry too. Gwen spun around in half a second and watched as Ben sat straight up in his bed, pulling masks and valves and tubes from his form. A smirk was spread across his bruised and cut face. Gwen's face was twisted up in confusion as she watched him slowly get out of bed, his hospital gown shaking with some invisible wind.
His voice became sarcastic. "Why won't you promise?" He pushed a hand out in front of him. A pillar of flame exploded out of his hand. Ben laughed like a manic, and the last thing Gwen did was scream.
