Collin Versus Jon
Collin tried to hide how nervous he felt, as he stepped off the ladder and turned to Rich.
"Oh, Hi Rich" Collin said, feeling awkward. "I uh, I'm sorry about-"
Rich waved him off. "Yeah it sucks that I lost. Nate is a good man though, and I will learn a lot from him. That's what's important."
Rich turned to face Collin directly, giving Collin the feeling that he was going to shoot laser beams into his head. Collin imagined red beams of light coming out of Rich's eyes, and Collin dodging out of the way, launching a thousand squidies to ward off Rich's eye-beam attack. Collin giggled.
Collin's giggling turned into nervous laughter when he saw Rich staring at him even MORE intensely, if that were possible. He had an eyebrow raised.
"Collin. Don't worry about your next fight. It will be fine if you calm your head, think clearly, and use everything Dan taught you."
Collin decided to just nod, and run off to the arena.
When he got there, his opponent was already there. He was a sight to behold. Collin felt his gut in his throat. He was about 6 feet tall, and thin. He had brown hair, and wore sunglasses. His nose looked slightly misshapen; it looked a little too flat.
Besides that Collin could tell almost nothing about his opponent, because he was dressed from head to toe in a long black trench coat. The collar on the coat went all the way up to his nose. Half his nose, his cheeks, and his ears were the only bare skin Collin could see. The coat and the glasses hid everything else. He had deep sleeves that covered his hands completely, and his coat went all the way down to inches off the ground, just enough to reveal black boots. He had simply-cut brown hair, and just stood there in the middle of the ring, as if he had just grown there, as if he were a statue that someone had placed in that position. He was rigid as a board, and didn't move an inch. Collin would bet a good amount of money that this kid hadn't blinked in YEARS. It was impossible to tell though, because of those silver-black sun-glasses that glinted the stadium lighting back into Collin's eyes.
The old bearded man sitting on the chair to Collin's right suddenly stood up. When he spoke, his words boomed in the air, it had to be magic-enhanced, Collin felt like that voice would carry for miles.
"Ladies and Gentleman, I now bring you Match Four! On my right, from the Order of Hermes, Blue House… COLLIN!
There was a roar of applause, and Collin squinted up into the balcony. He could see Rich up there, and Jeremiah and, hey look it was Dan. And who else… Hal! Then he was ok, thank god. He was certainly on his feet and yelling hard enough.
Collin felt a sudden surge of pride. No matter what happened, he was here, and people were rooting for him. He would just have to make sure he did them all proud.
"And to my left, from the Hermetic Order, in Green house…JON!"
There was more applause, just as deafening as Collin's had been.
"I present to you, The Biannual Hermetic Tournament, Match 4!"
"BEGIN!"
Collin felt suddenly queasy and nervous, looking at the Goth wannabe in front of him. What was he supposed to do now? Jon wasn't moving an inch, he hadn't since Collin had reached the arena.
Collin tried to think clearly, but he felt way too nervous. Well, I guess I better take out my lighter and ring , Collin thought. He began to do just that, but then stopped. Rich's words came back to him.
No, he had to be smart. He had to wait until the last second, and then completely end this match with the first blow, in Spectacular Squidy fashion. But first- he had to find out what this Jon guy could do. Collin couldn't take any chances here. After all, he was a one trick pony. Or a one trick Squidy, as the case may be.
Collin wasn't much of a fist fighter, but he knew how. And it was the only way to find out what this guy could do.
He flung himself forward at the unmoving trench-coated figure in front of him. That was one high collar, it almost reached his sunglasses.
When Collin got in range, he threw a jab straight on, right towards Jon's misshapen nose. Jon turned his head slightly, but other than that didn't move an inch. Collin's fist moved towards Jon's face, but as he hit him, something felt wrong. Jon's face felt like jelly; like play-do. His fist moved slow as it hit Jon, and his face only reverberated slightly. Collin's fist actually started sticking there once he had finished the motion of the blow.
What the hell? What WAS this guy?
Collin jumped back, tearing his hand free, appalled.
And he STILL had barely moved an inch?
"What ARE you? A Jello-man?"
Finally, Jon responded. He narrowed his eyes. "You are holding something back. Coming at me normally is pointless. Show me what you are holding back, Now."
Collin's eyes widened. He had just been thinking he would have to use squidy. This guy couldn't read minds, COULD he? A mind-reading Jello-man? No. He had just guessed that Collin was trying to find out what he could do first.
He hadn't learned much in his little assault, but it hadn't been completely useless either. Obviously whatever Jello-Man was doing had something to do with his skin. Collin grinned.
Not even tough skin could stop fire.
"Alrighty then Sticky-Man, I agree, let's end your reign of gooey terror."
Collin jumped forward again, reaching into his back pocket with both hands. He slipped the ring on his right finger, and picked up the lighter with his left. When he was within feet of Jon, he swung both hands to the front simultaneously. He held his left hand farther out, flipping the Zippo open, and lighting it. His ring hand pulsed with energy, expanding the fire immediately into squidy, its long tentacles reaching out instantly for Jon.
"Go Squidy!" Collin shouted, bringing his run to a halt, and concentrated on capturing Jon.
Clearly he had caught Jon with his pants down. His eyes widened, and he leapt backwards. It wasn't faster than normal human speed though. He landed and then quickly ducked under three of the tentacles whipping out to grab him, but Collin had the other three flank. One went under, and two to came from the sides. Jon then leapt to the right, completely out of range of five of the tendrils. He managed to leap over the sixth one, but he was still close.
Collin saw this, and immediately collapsed the other 5 offshoots of flame, and put all his energy into the one on the right, making it swell with strength as it crackled and burned. It whipped up and caught the leaping Jon on the shoulder, immediately catching his sleeve on fire.
Collin whooped in exultation and immediately dropped squidy. He focused his ring on the fire on Jon's sleeve, and silently commanded it to grow, GROW! Within seconds after Jon landed, the small fire on his sleeve had spread all down the front of his jacket in a dance of flame. Collin giggled in delight. It was like squidy had given birth, to lots of little squidies.
Jon cried in pain and surprise, and ripped at the buttons to his trench coat, tearing it away and flinging it from his body. He was breathing heavy now, and his hair was singed. Collin gaped at Jon's now coatless figure.
He wore a loose white shirt that revealed a shocking fact about Jon. There were scars all over his body. It looked like someone, or an ARMY of someones, had hit Jon repeatedly with hammers. The scars were deep with badly healed-over skin, and the fracture wounds were EVERYWHERE. His face had many more scars on it than Collin had seen before as well. But they were all old; Collin didn't think he had received those in this battle.
No wonder he wore a trench coat. Wow. Just wow. What has he been doing, playing baseball with his head?
Jon fell to one knee, heaving. He was swatting hands at his face as if trying to bat down invisible flames. But they were all out now.
Wait- invisible flames, that's it! Collin's gaze fell behind Jon, to the trench coat behind him, still ablaze. He reached out his hand and concentrated. He focused on the flame, closed his eyes, tried to feel the heat, the fabric of the trench coat slowly being converted into energy as fuel, as food for the flames, dancing along the surface.
Grow, he whispered under his breath to the flames behind Jon. He opened his eyes. A single flame grew, flickering, towards Jon. Jon appeared to have calmed down now, and had himself under control. He was looking at Collin, confused.
Suddenly he glanced behind him, and saw the flame. He yelled in alarm, and jumped up in the air, falling towards the coat, a foot stamping down.
What is he doing? Thought Collin. Now I can just expand the flames and cover him after he-
With a loud CRASH, Jon landed on the hard stone floor. The stone broke underneath him, and the flames instantly died, being cut from their air source. He leapt up lightly from the little pit he had made in the floor, and landed just as lightly a few feet away.
He turned and addressed Collin. "I must admit, that was impressive. Everything you did showed real innovation and thinking ahead." He paused. "However, you cannot win this contest. Give up, and you will leave without injury."
How could he be so cocky, right after almost getting burnt to ashes? Right after looking so unnerved, he was now as cool as ice. Collin shook his head. What a freak. He laughed and ran at Jon again, flipping open his Zippo and creating Squidy once more, making it reach for Jon.
The ensuing skirmish lasted a few minutes, as Jon would rush forward to threaten Collin, and Collin would swing Squidy around to swat at him, only to have Jon leap away. Clearly Jon was not trying to actually hit Colin, only wear him out. Collin knew that after he lost the ability to control squidy, there would be nothing between himself and Jon. And Collin had seen what Jon had done to the floor. And punching him was more useless than wailing on marshmallows.
After a while Collin stopped, trying to catch his breath. This was not good. He was getting tired.
Jon spoke once again to Collin, during a lull in the fight.
"You should not be in this tournament. Your skills would be better suited for the Espionage division of Hermes. I can tell you have a keen mind, but little skill for combat. We must each serve Hermes the best way we can, without ego." He paused once more, and knelt down and picked something up off the ground. His sunglasses had fallen off. Collin had barely noticed. He rose up, putting the glasses back on with a flick of his wrist.
"This is your last chance, give up. I do not wish to hurt a member of Hermes needlessly."
Collin laughed at him again and ran forward. This time Jon came in, dodging squidy flawlessly, maneuvering under a tentacle and rising up to smash a fist directly into Collin's nose. Collin screamed in pain and then all went black.
Collin woke up to pain. His face felt like it had been bludgeoned with a pipe. He opened his eyes, moaning. There was a man in a simple white tunic above him, looking down. He had a kind face.
"Try not to move too much, young one. You have several fractures in your face. I can heal you, but you mustn't move for a while. Much of the energy from the healing must come from you."
The man took out a metal cross and began waving it over Collin's head, muttering something in a language Collin couldn't understand. He tried not to shiver; the pain in his face was intense.
Suddenly his whole body seized, as if gripped by something invisible, and there was a strong, warm feeling in his head. The pain eased, and Collin once again fell unconscious.
When he awoke again, there was a small crowd to greet him. He sat up immediately, realizing that he felt fine. It was amazing. It was like… magic. Collin resisted the urge to giggle giddily. He felt his face, good as new. He sighed in relief, and looked around the room.
He was in what looked like a small hospital room, with simple furnishings. He lay on a simple white cot. And sitting around him in various corners of the room were, Hal, Rich, Jeremiah, and Dan, all talking over him.
"Hey, can I join the conversation?" Collin asked, innocuously.
After things had died down again, and Collin had shaken everyone's hand, Rich turned to Jeremiah.
"Well? You promised."
Jeremiah sighed.
Collin looked around the room, confused.
. Hal pointed to Jeremiah. "This punk said he'd explain what happened during our matches. What our opponents did to us."
Jeremiah nodded. "Very well. You all fought very well, so you deserve to know."
Dan walked over to Collin and put a hand on his shoulder. "Especially you man, that was a good fight. You did really awesome, really. Your opponent had quite a trick. Are you sure you're ok? It must've felt like he hit you with a hammer".
Collin nodded, though he still felt a little weak, and stunned about his match. How had he lost so badly? Was what Jon had said to him true? Maybe he wasn't meant to be a fighter.
But Collin decided not to voice any of this. He would ask Dan about the Espionage tournament later. Instead he said, "What WAS that? Why did my punches stick to his face? How did he hit me so hard?"
Dan turned and looked at Jeremiah. Jeremiah immediately assumed lecture mode and began. "Your opponent was Jon, from Green House. Judging by the scars on his body, he has spent the last few months studying the force known as impulse. He has apparently learned to change the duration of any impact being made on him, or any he makes on other objects or… persons." He broke off awkwardly, but in a methodical manner, as if he had planned to sound awkward on purpose.
"By increasing the time of impact, he can decrease any force levied against him to virtually nothing. And by decreasing the time of impact, he can increase the force of his blows exponentially." Jeremiah finished, looking around the room expectantly. All he got were blank stares.
Hal turned to Dan. "Yo Dan- Translate that. In ENGLISH."
Dan nodded. "Any of you ever drop a watermelon or something out the window like three stories up?" Jeremiah's eyes widened
Collin nodded and laughed. "Yeah, it's awesome."
"What happens?" Asked Dan.
"Watermelon juice" said Collin, laughing as he remembered.
Dan nodded sagely. Jeremiah looked at Dan like he had just turned into a pancake.
"Now, suppose you instead dropped the same watermelon into a deep pool, what do you think would happen?"
Rich spoke up. "It would fall through the water, intact."
"Why do you think that is?" Dan asked.
Rich's face suddenly showed understanding.
"I see. All the force from the watermelon's fall has to be absorbed by the watermelon in a fraction of a second when it hits cement. But when it falls into water, the time of the impact with the water is increased to seconds, so it doesn't damage it as much."
Dan nodded. "So when Jon decreased the time of his fist hitting you, your face had to absorb all the impact at once. But when you hit him, it was probably like punching water, right?" Collin nodded. "See? That's because all the force from your hand was hitting his face only slowly, over a few seconds."
"That sneaky bastard," said Collin.
"What about me? What did that punk Ray do?" Hal demanded.
Jeremiah spoke up again, this time clearly trying to explain things more simply. "He used quintessence to block out all visible light in a small area. Then he changed his eyes to pick up infra-red. So he could see you by the heat your body gave off, whereas you couldn't see anything."
"That sneaky BASTARD" shouted Hal, kicking his chair across the room.
"I think I sense a pattern" Dan said, mildly.
"And me?" asked Rich, calmly.
Jeremiah smiled sympathetically. "Nate was never in the place where you tried to hit him. He bent light around him, making it look like he was in a different place than he was."
Rich looked confused. "Ok, but how did he hit me then, if the whole time it was just a bunch of light?"
"He can change the distance between himself and his image. After he had seen you punch through his image, he changed it so it corresponded more closely with his body. That way he could punch you back without giving anything away."
Rich shook his head, impressed.
Collin spoke up. "Wait, I'm confused, I heard Nate said that he would tell you all that after the matches... Wait… what time is it? How much did I miss?"
"The Level Two Hermetic Tournament is over Collin," Jeremiah said. He then told Collin about the other matches. After Collin had been knocked out, Jon had faced Marianne, the weather chick with the wind. Apparently Jon had tried stamping the ground and increasing the duration of impact, making himself stick to the ground despite the gusts that were blowing him around the room. In the end it wasn't enough though. She caught him off guard eventually, and Jon had spun into a pillar.
Then Nate faced Ray. Since Ray could use a rote called "Dark Sight", which changed his vision to infra-red, Nate's trick was useless. It ended quickly. That's why Nate didn't tell Rich what had happened.
And then it had been Mari versus Ray. According to Jeremiah, she put up quite a fight blowing gusts all across the ring, but eventually fell to Ray inside the same big black sphere he used on Hal.
Jeremiah noticed their sullen faces, and tried to soothe them. "You have nothing to be ashamed of, any of you. All your opponents were very talented, and many have studied for years, whereas you all awakened only a month ago. Especially you, Hal. Ray could very easily win the Level Three tournament. "
Hal didn't seem much relieved by this.
"How do you know all this, Jeremy? I mean how do you know what everyone was really doing?"
"When you study Prime- the study of the substance matter is made of- as much as I have, you can start understanding how other people change reality."
Dan stood up. He glanced at a wrist watch. "Well folks, I'm going to go watch Erica's match now. You wanna come?" He grinned.
Collin was psyched. Apparently there were three members of House Blue in the finals in other tournaments- Erica, Kristyna, and Dan. Blue House had lost three times today in the first round, and Collin was looking forward to seeing them finally kick some asses.