The Rebels sensed the energy around them, pure and potent from Alex and wild and uncontrolled from Daniel. Daniel lay there, recharging his energy. Alex let him. He could have simply killed him there and then but he didn’t and it made him wonder why.
John ran into the hallway. Four doctors and half a dozen nurses rushed in and out with medical equipment and shouted frenzied orders. John pushed his way through to see his mother lying completely immobile on her hospital bed. He looked at the EEG and the ECG monitors. There were sharp dips and spikes in the graphs.
A doctor stepped in front of him, his face barely centimeters away. He smelled of tobacco and dried fish.
“Get away from me,” John said, shoving him aside.
“Sir, we need you to wait outside.”
“The hell you do! She’s my mother and I’ll be with her whether you like it or not.”
“Sir,” said a nurse behind him, “We really do need you to be outside!” John scowled at the doctor. He turned around to walk away. The computers made a faint but monotonous droning sound, which brought chills up his back. No! It couldn’t be!
It was confirmed by a voice, “We’ve lost her.”
Alex felt his heart had fallen into a bottomless pit. She was dead! He could feel her soul leave the body. He wanted to cry, to do something, but he had to concentrate on Daniel. “Grandma!” he said softly, “Don’t leave us.” He felt her presence around him.
Daniel had gathered plenty of energy now. He grinned at Alex, trying to taunt him.
“Alex, I have to go,” he heard his grandma’s voice say. “My work is finished.”
“No. You have yet to do something. I know it; I can feel it.”
“I’m not strong enough, now, child.”
“You don’t need to be strong. You just need to be alive.”
Daniel created a massive energy ball in his right hand. The whirring of the energy was humanly audible now, which meant it would be a massive blow. The vampires could feel Daniel’s raw wrath.
“Now that I am gone, someone else will take my place,” said Alex’s grandmother.
“I won’t have it!” he said angrily. She was farther away now, “No! Don’t go!” But it was too late.
John grabbed the doctor by the collar. His eyes filled with hot spiteful tears and his face shook vigorously. “Do something!”
The doctor said nothing. His blood boiled. He stepped away and said, “I told you! There’s nothing we can do.” He stormed out of the room.
John went to his mother and the others left him alone. He laid his head on her hand and cried. Rage took over from grief and he began to smash all the damn machines in the room. None of them could save her, so what the hell use were they? He punched and kicked them and threw them around the room. Once on the floor, he crushed them with the soles of his feet. He yelled curses and flung everything within reach, vandalizing the entire room. No one was around in the hall. They were all so afraid that they left the ward. John suddenly fell to his knees and then onto one side where he bent double in pain. His stomach and throat burned like hot coal. He took out a handkerchief as he coughed into it. The soft white silk was spattered with droplets of ruby red blood.
Alex hovered in the air. He was aware of the energy ball and waited for it to be blasted at him.
Daniel leaned back and threw the ball hard and fast at Alex. Alex put his hands forward and stopped it. The droning noise stopped simultaneously. He flung the ball ten meters away from him where it hovered in the air. Alex moved his right hand backward and then forward, causing the mass of energy to spin faster and faster and out into the vacuum of space, outside the Hangar. As it reached the speed of light, it collapsed in on itself and exploded like a small nuclear mushroom cloud.
Alex wielded his sword, swinging it to and fro. He smiled. Daniel attacked him and the swordfight began. In turn they led and followed each other, circling around as if dancing. The onlookers watched in amazement.
Sparks of steel flew everywhere and the quick crackling of electricity filled the air. The blue, red and black colors converged and created a bubble around the fighters. The floor lit up in a dazzling array of colored lightning. The audience suddenly levitated in the air, thanks to the vampires’ sudden reflexes. Dazed, confused, and scared they looked on.
A swirling mixture of hot and cold air could be felt, as though a tornado were approaching. The humans felt electricity on the minute hairs of their forearms. The Rebels suddenly lost their concentration and the humans fell to the floor. Luckily, the lightning on the floor disappeared. The two fighters locked swords again, creating another wave of lightning. Just before it reached the humans, they were levitated back in the air.
This new burst of energy instantly shut down the entire power supply of the Regnum.
John stood still as the lights flickered and then went out altogether. When his eyes adjusted, he groped for the chair, and sat down, not knowing what to do. He yelled out, “Mom! Oh Mom!” He cried his heart out. How could this have happened!
Alex gritted his teeth. “Daniel,” he said through them, “let go of all this. I will allow you to go back safely, if you just agree to leave us alone!”
“You really think I would do that? You have too much mercy, Falsifier. That is your flaw.”
Alex released a spurt of extra strength and pushed him. “And stubbornness is yours!” He quickly shot six green energy balls at Daniel. The unleashed energy flew past its target and smashed a hole in the wall. Alex head butted Daniel in his chest. He grabbed his right arm and squeezed it tightly, until Daniel’s sword fell to the ground, making a crater. With his free hand Alex choked him.
He wrestled Daniel’s arm behind his back and threw him into space, away from the Regnum. He swung his sword at Daniel’s chest. Daniel used his will to pull his sword from the crater and into his hand and blocked. The impact created bursts of lightning and wild raging energy. As the swords locked, light came from each finger of Alex’s left hand. The small lights swirled and converged together creating one mass of energy. The mass collided with Daniel’s abdomen. In surprise, he let go of Alex, staring at the deadly energy touching him. I can’t,Alex thought.
You must,slithered a voice in his head. Do it!
No! He’s my blood, my cousin!
Do it!
And he did. The balls solidified and pushed Daniel farther away from him. The light surrounded him until finally he was consumed by raw, uncontrolled energy. This indestructible force ripped him apart from limb to limb. His body turned into a mess of raw flesh, then into a fiery black skeleton. Finally, it crumbled and dissolved away to nothing.
Oh my God!He screamed at the top of his lungs into the black emptiness that was peppered faintly with sparkles of diamond dust. But he could no longer hear or make any noise. Was he even alive?
No,he thought. This was space. The eternal.
Grandma!She was still there, suspended in limbo. She wasn’t fully gone yet. He could save her, bring her back. But he felt himself weak now. He was afraid. He had used all the strength that he gained on his first kill. This last thought lingered in his mind like a worm cut in half and still fighting for its life, before it faded into nothingness.
Enough! I have to try and get her back.
He flew to the Regnum, which now had its power reconnected. The lights had turned back on and there was life once again.