Sequel: Released into the Air
Status: Finished

Submerged in Water

Source

"That's impossible." I argued.

"No, it's quite plausible."

"No, I'm not rejecting the idea. I'm just saying that if it is indeed true, it'll be impossible for me to freeze things." I pointed to my head. "There is no peace inside this screwed up head of mine. How am I supposed to find peace?"

"Well, when I was learning archery, I had to learn to calm my nerves and a great way for me to do that was meditating. Why don't you try that?"

I groaned miserably and fell to my knees on the sand where the river met with the shore. "This is going to be so hopeless."

"Don't give up before you even try."

"I could do the angry thing, that's easy. This? No way."

"You can't boil people to death, Emele."

I gave him a dull stare.

"Okay, well you can but freezing is way more useful."

"I know, I know, it's just..." I looked down at my thighs that were spread across the back of my shins. "This might be kind of a long term project."

"Well, we do have time." He assured me. "If you want to let go of it today and pick it up later, that's okay with me."

"It's probably for the best, I need to dwell on it a bit. Let's do something else."

"What do you have in mind?"

A wicked grin came on my face.

"I don't like that look." He seemed worried but I knew he was joking.

I stood up off the shore and started walking back into the river. "I want to learn to fight... with my abilities." I told him. "I can still fight and do things without freezing."

"Okay." He agreed, seeming to like the idea. "How are you going to do that?"

"We're going to fight each other." I answered him smoothly.

"That isn't fair."

I chuckled. "I'll be gentle."

"I mean to you."

I raised my eyebrows.

"I've been trained all my life to fight, even without the archery I'm a strong opponent. Some Joe Blow off the street can't just take me."

"I'm Joe Blow now?"

"I just... I just don't want to hurt you."

"Then go easy on me, I will for you until I become more accustomed to it."

He paused for a second. Considered this notion. Then took off his bow and quiver and dropped it on the ground. "Okay, but let's set up some ground rules."

I nodded. "Agreed."

"No weapons until we understand each other's strengths and weaknesses better. I don't want this to be a massacre." He started rotating his shoulders, like he was warming up the muscles in them. "We should probably take it easy at first. First, because I don't want us to get permanently hurt or just hurt in general, but also because I don't want to attract attention. The last thing I need is some human stumbling upon this place and seeing us going at it like wild dogs."

"Okay, that seems fair."

"No leaving the cove area, I don't want to turn this into a man hunt. It's a battle not a race." He continued. "I think that about covers it. Are we ready to go?"

I nodded. "Yes."

I had already reached out to the river water behind me. After practising at the lake during school yesterday and practising at home, I had become more accustomed on how to do offensive techniques.

I saw the sun rising just behind his frame. When his wings expanded, it reminded me of an angel again, but it also broke me out of my reverie. He meant business and so did I.

Taking the water I had in control behind me. I shot off a few water bullets in his direction. They were small, barely bigger than a golf ball, but they were going fast enough that they would cause some damage if he didn't block them.

When I saw the smug smile come on his face after he deflected my shots with a gust of air, some sick part of me took over and it was like I wasn't even human any more.

Covering myself with water to create a thin shield around me that fit the contours of my skin, I started my assault with what I liked to call my water whip. My own form of a weapon without actually using one. It was just like a real one, except it was made with water and it worked just as quick as fast as one and instead of only having one. I had at least five snapping at him at once.

Moving quickly, he deflected my attacks by avoiding and parrying them. He even shot one away with one of his wings, which caused a few feathers to fly off. Once I realized it wasn't working and my attacks were fewer and far between as I thought of what else I could do. He made his move.

I saw his hands spread out from his chest, like he was charging up some sort of attack. I tried to throw up a large wall of water in time to counter it, but the gust was already heading my away and the water fell and broke around me as I got shot back into the river.

Without much of a scratch on me from the skin-tight water shield I had around me, I was still mad that I got sent back so far. I popped my head out of the water and instead of swimming towards the shore, I stayed in it and found a rock underneath to balance myself on. His attacks would probably do less damage in the water, I assumed.

Slices of wind came at me then. I threw up a shield faster this time and then sent the shield rocketing at him once he was done his assault. He managed to fly up into the sky to avoid it and that's when I started to get angry.

The water around me was boiling now.

"Calm down, Emele!" I heard him yell from the sky.

He was right above me now and I couldn't calm down. Not with what I was feeling, not with how useless I felt right now. With those feelings, a deeper part of myself took over. The deeper I went into it, the more I lost touch with reality and humanity. Feelings, thoughts and reason left and the only thing that remained was this overwhelming urge to control.

A deeper source of power came out of nowhere and I grabbed it and held on. I heard screams in my head, but I didn't know where they were coming from and frankly, I didn't care. The screams were far from my mind as I used my new found power to raise the entire bed of water from the river in an attempt to latch a whip of water around Rune to suck him into the river with me. I figured I must've been manipulating an entire pool full of water, or two pool fulls. The image reminded me of a snake popping out of the ground to grab a bird out of the sky.

Rune couldn't fight against the immense power I was using and he became immersed into the river. The sick part of me was happy that I had won. That I had defeated him. Unfortunately, the part of me that was still Emele, came free and let go of the power that had taken control of me.

I brought Rune to the surface with manipulation. He hadn't been under for more than a few seconds, so he was perfectly fine physically. Not even a scratch on him. His mental state however... that was yet to be discovered.

"Rune!" I yelled as I swam over to him. "I'm so sorry."

He was breathing hard, his wings still out to its full form. When I came over to him, he noticed me and started backing away. He was scrambling to get up off the shore but he couldn't seem to get up, from shock, fear or a mix of both, I didn't know.

"Rune, it's okay." I told him, coming closer to him and putting my hand on his shoulder. "I'm so sorry, I didn't mean to... I don't know what happened."

He stopped scrambling, looked into my eyes and I felt like we were communicating through our eyes. He was scared. He was frightened.

"How did you...?" He whispered, his breathing hard and heavy.

"I don't know, it just happened. I didn't mean to, you have to believe me. I didn't want to hurt you."

I laid my head on his chest and wrapped my arm around his waist. I felt his chest rise with his heavy breathing against my head and he remained silent until his breathing had slowed down.

"You didn't hurt me." He finally said, his voice shaky and weaker than usual. "But I was really scared."

"Why? I mean... what was so wrong? I knew I was using this immense source of power but..."

"You controlled a lot of water, Emele. It was borderline god-like. You should only be able to control like ten bathtubs full of water. That had to be two-hundred or so."

I brought my head up off his chest to look at him. "Wow."

He was silent as he watched me. He stared at me as if at any moment I could turn into a demon. With his wings still exposed and the rise and fall of his chest, he reminded me of a wounded bird. He looked so vulnerable at that moment that I was speechless.

"I'm so sorry." I told him again. "I didn't hurt you. I could never hurt you, Rune. You're my friend and I care about you."

I reached for his hand and gripped it tightly.

"You have to believe me." I begged.

Sighing, he held my hand as tightly back. He locked eyes with me, sending a shudder down my back. This time it wasn't because I scared or nervous. It was because I knew I didn't want to lose him.

"Just who are you, Emele?"
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So, this is interesting, isn't it? Let me know what you think! I had so much fun writing this and Emele's story that I'd like to say that this has to be one of my favourite chapters.