REWRITTEN 12/15/15

Firefighting and Mud Fights

As I drew closer to the burning building, the flames grew hotter than the guts of an active volcano. I stopped, lifting a hand to shield my face, when the heat began to bake my skin tight across my bones like the flaky crust of a baguette. With a flick of my wrist, I gathered a thin film of water around my body and then pressed forward. Teemo and Arin pushed through the heat to stand by my side, but the others were forced to hang back.

I closed my eyes and lifted my arms, concentrating fiercely. The fire began to snake away from the building towards my straining fingertips, gathering into a giant, writhing ball in front of me. Finally, the force of containing the fire grew to be too much, so I released the ball into the sky. It shot away into space like an arrow released from a bow, swiftly disappearing from sight.

Arin launched herself into the air and got lost in the dark clouds. She reappeared a moment later with a gigantic thundercloud streaming along behind her. She dropped lightly back to the ground, and the cloud released its contents the moment her feet touched the dirt. The air instantly filled with foul smelling steam that rolled out in every direction. Teemo sucked the flames hidden inside the walls into a large ball in front of him and slowly squeezed his palms together. The ball winked calmly out of existence.

With a wave of my arms, a sheet of thick mud splashed onto the lower levels of the building, smothering the last stubborn remains of the fire. I was thoroughly soaked, but the rainwater had washed away all of my doubts and insecurities. I laughed merrily and flicked my wrist, dousing Teemo in a wave of mud.

"Hey!" he spluttered after he'd wiped his mouth clean. It made the shape of a comical 'o', and Teemo's eyes were wide and shocked. I burst into laughter, quickly followed by Arin and the others.

Arin gathered up the raincloud and positioned it directly over his head. Teemo shrieked as the cold water doused him and tried to flee, but the cloud followed his every move.

Zeus ran forward, bending to scoop up a fistful of mud. As Teemo ran past her, she snapped her hand up and slung the mud straight into his face. Teemo careened to the side, knocked off balance, his arms wind milling violently. "What is this? Beat up Teemo Day?" he demanded, shaking the mud from his coat.

Arin's grin was scarily malicious. "Yup."

I turned just in time to see Samik stoop to gather up a large clump of mud. Winking at me and cackling, he dropped it over William's head. The werewolf screeched like a cat who's tail had been stepped on and lashed out, but Samik danced out of the way. I giggled, but the next moment, something cold and wet struck me on the back of the head. I stumbled forward, shocked, and turned to find Teemo, Arin, and Zeus clustered together, laughing. Teemo's hands were dirty.

I gaped at them in mock shock. "This means war!" I shouted dramatically. "Samik, Minka, to me!"

"What about me?" William asked.

I huffed at him, squinting my eyes, but relented. "I suppose you can be on our time. That way we'll have the numerical advantage."

He grinned like a happy puppy and bounced over to me. I curled my nose at him, sliding away.

Our opponents gave us no time to strategize. Howling war cries, they began to pelt mud balls in our direction. Laughing, I dove to the side and flung my own mud balls back at them. One nailed Zeus in the shoulder, spinning her around, and another missed Arin's ear by less than an inch.

Teemo leapt into the air, hands flung out to bring a tall wall of mud with him. He shot it at us with a jerk of his hand. I yelped as I lashed out with my air magic, sending the mud flying in all directions. "That was close," Samik gasped, his face streaked brown.

"No kidding," I agreed. "But if that's the way they want to play, I'm happy to accommodate."

My team gathered together and sprinted towards our enemy. We combined all our power – Minka's telepathy and Samik's and my magic, William really wasn't very helpful – and held the mud out in front of us like a battering ram, aiming to crush the others flat.

Suddenly, we collided with something solid, and the resulting explosion sent everyone flying through the air, surrounded by mud. I skidded across the ground, bouncing several times, and rolled into a wet pile of snow. For a moment, everything was silent. I stared up at the sky, breathing heavily, then started to laugh, clutching at my stomach and rolling side to side.

"That was awesome!" Teemo shouted, bolting into a sitting position and flailing his limbs around.

"Let's do it again!" Zeus crowed. She crawled out of a shadow crater and wiped mud away from her face.

I grinned, about to respond, by a heroic shout zinged through the air. "Onyx to the rescue!"

Onyx came crashing out of the sky in a violent explosion of rainbows, slamming into the ground with enough force to set off a baby tidal wave in the mud. She stood up dramatically, flinging her long, orange hair around and grinning triumphantly. "Never fear! Onyx is here to save the day!"

I stared at her and cocked an eyebrow, smirking. "Uh, Onyx, we're already done."

Onyx's mouth fell open. "What!"

"Yeah," Zeus said. We all began to pick ourselves up from the ground, brushing off our hopelessly stained clothes. "But she killed herself. Then we put out a fire and had an epic mud fight!"

Onyx's eye literally twitched. "Vhat?"

"Sorry." Zeus shrugged.

"But-but," Onyx spluttered, waving her hands irritably. "Agh! You mean I did all that work for nothing?"

"What work?" I asked. "Wait, did you go somewhere?"

She glared darkly at me. "You mean you didn't notice my absence? Enia Silverson, I am offended." She huffed and flipped her magnificent hair again, sticking her nose in the air. "Yes, I did go somewhere. I went to get this!"

She stepped to the side and gestured grandly at a small shape that had been hiding behind her.

My eyes fell open, and my eyes bugged out. "Is that…?"

"Yup," Onyx said proudly. "Ladies and gentlemen, I give you Riskapoop! The Rainbow Sparkle Glitter Unicorn Pegasus Pony that eats rocks and shits zombies! I give you Rodriguez, Queen of the Unicorns and Father of the Ninjas!"

We became statues once more, staring incredulously at the three-foot tall winged unicorn with the horn that was the same length as its body. It looked like someone had vomited up several rainbows and about a thousand bottles of glitter.

"Wait a second," Arin snapped out of her shock suddenly. "Shits zombies? We're in the middle of a zombie apocalypse! Don't you think it's a bad idea to have it here?"

"We just won't feed it," Onyx replied simply.

"Isn't that considered child abuse or something?" Teemo asked with a raised eyebrow.

Onyx shrugged and turned to me, holding her clasped hands beneath her chin. "Can we keep it, pweeeese?" she begged, turning on the puppy-dog eyes to full blast.

I almost caved. It would be so incredible to have Riskapoop for an ally. I made a face, remember one other fact about the unicorn. "Riskapoop and its ninjas only enter a battle once they've deemed it hopeless for the side they've chosen, right? Do we really want it to join us?"

Onyx gnawed at her lip, looking back and forth between me and the unicorn. "I guess not." She rubbed the pegasus on the horn, looking disappointed. "Bye Riskapoop! Come back and visit us sometime!"

Riskapoop whickered a farewell, beat his wings a few times, and launched his body into the air, shitting a zombie in farewell.