Set Alight

Chapter 14

In a single instant, every amount of order we'd established was shattered. There was no moment of slowed time, no sudden clarity of what to do. There was noise and pain and light all compressed too tightly in one moment.

Danny was struggling in Fright Night's grip, and Jack and Ellie were suddenly overwhelmed by the five other ghosts that had flown with unnatural speed towards them. Time skipped like a broken record, images and sounds coming to me all jumbled up and skipped.

Slow down, I try to command my brain. I have to help. These ghosts need reason, I can talk them-

But then I remember. Time actually does slow as I realize with cold, hard certainty... They aren't fighting because they want to, but because they have to.

They're being controlled.

We can't talk them out of it. They're machines following orders. Time being at a normal pace now (as I have all the information and am now in slightly more control), I see Danny break the grip squeezing the life out of him and turn, using ectoplasm to add more oomph into the punch he sends to Fright Night's chest.

"I thought we'd reached an agreement!" he shouts. Out of the corner of my eye, I see Ellie and Jack barely holding off the onslaught of attacks coming their way.

"They're being controlled," I shout as fast as I can get the words out. "Their items... Not in control anymore."

Danny nods, understanding, shooting more ectoplasm at all six ghosts to have time to regroup. They group together immediately, forming a three-person wall in front of me. "Thank you, Em, now GO!!"

I can't leave, I decide without a second thought.

"I know you think you can help, but you can't! Go, find Sam and Tuck!"

I turn, seeing the logic, and begin to fly. But I have to turn back, to see them. They're fighting too many. Each of them should be fighting two, but Danny is fighting Fright Night and Ellie is holding off three while Jack fights two. They're all losing.

No matter how powerful halfas are, controlled ghosts have less mercy and know just where to hit you to make it hurt. Danny is slowly winning the fight, but I see that Ellie and Jack can't hold them off on their own. They're almost as powerful as Fright Night, and Jack's power is healing, for the Zone's sake.

Sam. I need to get-

But a ghost breaks from Ellie and aims at Danny's turned back. I don't think. I don't even act.

The fire does.

It shoots out of me, as fast as a bullet, to knock the hands holding what could've been Danny's death. The ghost screams, a horrible sound, as it's essence begins to burn. Ecto-freaking-fire. Fire that burns ghosts.

It turns, furious, to me and I see for a second... doubt.

The pain knocks them from their trance. I look at my hands, a moment that costs me. I'm suddenly airborne (or as airborne as you can be in a place with no gravity), a ghost methodically lighting his burnt hands alight with ectoplasm and aiming a punch. He sends it. It hurts.

Stars dance across my vision as I fight his grip. But I'm too inexperienced, too new to this all to do anything but take the punches. So, I turn to a part much more ancient and experienced than myself.

I call to the fire.

It springs to my skin, wanting to protect me (as I'd identified the threat) and doing anything to do so. The ghost lets go, crying out in pain, and I stop my hurtle away. I feel pure power rushing through me, and I'm not afraid, the fire won't hurt me.

I reign the fire as it tries to escape again, before it singes my will, trying to break free. Angry, I squeeze it close, threatening to push it all the way down.

In a single instant, the alliance I'd made with it was damaged and it sulked. No, no, no. I need it. The fire wants to burn and destroy all in my-our-way. I want to find a way to use it safely without hurting everyone it came in contact with it.

The ghost that had attacked me twice before rises up, intent on attacking a third time. I'm still not sure if my fire and I can work together, and frustrated, I reach to another source. Ectoplasm. It's not alive, like my fire, (or if it is, it's content on being used whenever I please) but a cool substance that I feel everywhere: my blood, my bones, my skin.

I gather it in my palm and my eyes, the neon light shining. "Back off," I command, the ectoplasm leaking into my voice and giving my words an echo. The ghost doesn't listen or even react to my display, so I hold my hand and build the energy in it.

The energy grows in my palm until it bursts like a bubble, shooting a ray of green light towards him. It's dead center. The ghost flies backwards until it hits a stone wall of the castle hundreds of feet away, sliding down to rest, nearly unconscious, on the ground. I turn the the rest of the battle.

It's going better. Danny has gained the upper hand, and with one less ghost to fight, Ellie is holding her ground. Seeing this, I move towards Jack, my hand still alight. I hold it out, palm up, and build the energy again. My aim is not nearly as good, and it only smacks a ghost's arm, spinning it around three times almost comically.

The ghost's posture slumps just a tad, but the next instant it's straighter than ever. "It," it says. Confused, I split my focus, losing control of my ectoplasm. All five remaining ghosts stop their fighting immediately, startling the three halfas into stopping as well. The three halfas look to me, confused as I am as the full ghosts snap to attention at me.

"Um..." I begin as the ghosts shoot towards me.

"FLY!!" screams Jack, and I pivot in the air and shoot in the opposite direction. For a terrifying second, I don't know what's happening. How close they are, where Danny and Jack and Ellie is, if I'm flying fast enough.

So I drop. So suddenly, my pursuers continue without me. I summon power, any power, to my hands, and the only one fast enough is the fire. It bursts out, too fast for me to stop, towards the turned enemies. They're blasted forward, still unaware what's happening, and spin end over end in the air.

One of them turns and a bright orb surrounds his hands. He holds it above his head, letting it grow, bigger and bigger, so fast, until it's passed through us all to make an impenetrable barrier. I'm trapped.

Danny, Jack and Ellie have reached the edge of the bubble and Danny begins to use a concentrated ectoblast to start lasering through the wall. But not fast enough.

I turn to them, holding my hands out in fists, before realizing that looking menacing wouldn't do a thing to stop them. They're being controlled.

So I stand uncertainly, looking for an opening, waiting to be attacked. I don't have to wait long. They all surround me at once, closing in, keeping me turning, trying to find the biggest threat. It doesn't matter, though. One left alone and I'd be finished. One by one, their hands fill with ectoplasm, getting brighter as more concentrates on their hand.

I look down and up, trying to determine an escape route. There is none. The bubble contracts the closer together we get, making dodging impossible. They all fire at once.

Being hit with ectoplasm hurts. It burns like acid, eating at my own ectoplasm, fighting with it on a molecular level. I refuse to cry out, but the pain is unlike anything I've felt since the burning, and suddenly, they deserve my burning. This pain is so like it, so unstoppable and endless, I'm suddenly angry. I dip my hypothetical hands into the wells of power where my fire dwells and gather it, more and more, until all at once, every well of power I possess-the secret ones, the deep ones, the ectoplasmic ones-erupt all at once.

A volcano. They erupt like volcanoes. And in one burst, it leaves me, a single wave of ferocious power, throwing the five ghosts back, shattering the barrier, moving around my three friends like water around rocks, and continuing, destroying and burning.

Stop. My call freezes it in its place and it retreats, faster and faster, until it slams back into me, a wave of power returning, and I feel crushed from all sides, squeezed. I gasp for air as the fire tumbles through my veins, trying to find it's home, before it rushes past my eyes, sending light out before I close them, turning the light to dark.