True Darkness

We had been here for three days. The first I was injured in training. The second day I was forced to rest as to ensure I could continue my training. Today was the third. Today we trained. Today I "honed" my abilities while desperately hoping I don't get myself killed. I had hoped I would be training with Ashton as I have no idea what he's going to teach me but I was wrong. I was training with Julian again. Greeaatttt.

We stood at opposite ends of the field again. Ashton and Lamia sat to my right watching so closely someone could have broken in and danced around the pitch and they wouldn't have noticed. Julian was going to attack and I was supposed to block him with my voice. God knows how that's gonna turn out. So here I was. Stood here at the end of the pitch, staring down my worst nightmare and wishing I didn't have to be doing this.

I took a deep breath and flexed my hands, rotating my wrists, trying to relax myself. It wasn't working. I watched his scythe materialise from mid air. Threatening, scary and dangerous. I gulped and closed my eyes.

"Ready?" he yelled from the other end of the pitch.

Eyes still closed, I nodded once.

When I opened my eyes he was running at me. Fast. Deadly. Attacking. I didn't like it. I felt my heart beat frantically and increased my breath rate.

This is stupid. What are you doing? Go. Run. Now! the voice in my head screamed.

I ignored it, slowed my breath and calmed myself down. What else could I do? He was getting closer and closer. Faster and faster. I was running out of time. So I waited for the exact moment when my energy told me it was time.

Closer. Closer. Closer. NOW!

"STOP!!!!!" I yelled, feeling my energy rush out of me, stronger than ever, and watching it rush toward him at an alarming rate.

It's going to hit. It's going to hit. It's going to hit. It's-

Julian dodged to the side. My energy rushed passed him and hit the opposite wall making a small "duff" noise.

"Wha-"

Julian hit me, hard. So hard in fact that he knocked me off my feet and threw me at least ten feet backwards. I slid to a stop and just lay there.

I'm going to die. Everywhere hurt. I must have broken something. But that wasn't the worst part. As I laid there on the floor, groaning and writhing in agony, Ashton was on his feet, storming towards Julian. He didn't go all the way up to him, maybe in fear that he wouldn't be able to keep control.

"What do you think you're doing?!" he screamed at Julian.

"I don't know what you're talking about." Julian replied calmly.

"You know fully well what you did! You weren't supposed to dodge!! Do you want to kill her?!"

"Of course not. Don't be stupid. What was I supposed to do? Stand there and let her hit me?"

"Erm... let me think about that. YES!" Ashton screamed.

"The enemy aren't going to just stand there and let her hit them are they? She needs to learn to work with moving targets. Stop protecting her and realise that without this she's going to die Ashton!" Julian said losing quite a bit of control.

"Stop protecting her?! Julian what you're doing means she's going to die before the enemies even get close to finding her! Stop being such a jerk."

At this point I sat up. I could hear the venom in Ashton's voice and knew that he was close to snapping. I watched the two boys with intense concern as they screamed at each other in the middle of the pitch. Lamia was no where to be seen. Probably got bored of watching me get beaten up.

"Me?! A jerk? At least I'm not completely obsessed with my reputation and appearance that I let my friends get hurt!"

"That was one time you douche and you know it! You know exactly what I've been going through with that! Stop trying to look good in front of her."

"What like you've been doing all along? Do you even know how to fight?!"

"Oh I'll show you how to fight Julian!" Ashton roared, losing whatever control he had, and went to step towards him.

I was up on my feet before his foot hit the ground, sprinting towards the two. They weren't going to fight. Not here. Not now.

I jumped between them and threw out my arms.

"NO!! Don't you think there's enough fighting going on already without you two fighting over something stupid. I need to get stronger and you two being at each others throats all the time isn't going to help me achieve that! So calm down and realise that what you're doing is pathetic and stupid!" I screamed at the two boys.

But neither of them answered me. When I looked around they weren't where they had been. In fact they were both flying in opposite directions, heading straight for the walls at unimaginable speeds. They both smacked into the walls, with a sickening crack and a "humph" from both, and slid to the floor either unconscious or dead. I personally hoped for the former.

It was then that the familiar burning sensation appeared but this time on the palms of my hands. I turned them over to stare at them, watching as the ink of a new tattoo swirled and twisted it's way across my palms and down part of my wrist ending with a bracelet like pattern wrapped around my wrists.

The tattoo itself was a swirl pattern, a deep scarlet colour outlined in a thick black border. The colour pulsed a vibrant scarlet when the tattoo was finished but then settled to a rich, deep scarlet. I longed to see the previous colour again but at the same time I was happy. It would be a difficult thing to explain to anyone who happened to see it if the tattoo was pulsing.

I looked up from my hands, a huge grin on my face, as the burning subsided and looked between the two boys.

"Guys! Wake up. You are so not gonna believe who just got her second power!" I yelled happily.