Chapter 2: Borebacks Fight

Hothead:

"Watch out," Jump yells. Turning and looking behind me, I see a black and brown boreback charging toward me. As it charges, it leaps into the air and starts to spin. Spinning faster and faster, it turns into a blur before shooting toward me.

"Oh crud," I say, lowering my sword and holding the blade with my hand. The boreback hits my sword and pushes me back. Despite my best efforts, the boreback knocks me to the ground. Screaming as my back hits the dirt, I look up to see the boreback snarling as it lands back on the ground. It splits before charging at me. Jumping and about to hit me with its sharpened tusk, a pair of metal hands shoot out from the side and grab them.

"Thanks," I say, shooting Shocker a nod as he pushes the boreback away from me. Shocker nods back at me before raising his hand and slamming it down on the boreback's head. The beast snarls one last time before it dies.

Hearing something coming from above me, I look up and see Jump falling down from the leaves. She lands right between Shocker and me and raises her wrist-mounted crossbow. She fires and kills a few more borebacks, their bodies falling to the ground.

"Thank you too," I say, patting Jump on her back. "Even though I did get hit."

"Don't mention it," Jump replies with a smile. "By the way, we're not done yet. There's more!"

Jump nudges her head and Shocker and I turn to see more borebacks coming out from behind the trees.

"Ha," I say, preparing myself. I lower and hold my sword between us and all the borebacks. "I had tougher fights when I was just a novice fighter."

"In that case," Jump says, stepping forth. "Let's make this fast. Class is about to start and the headmaster won't be happy if we're late again. He already hates us."

Shocker hits my arms and nods his head.

"Charge," I yell, pulling back my sword as my friends and I run forward. The borebacks snarl as they charge toward the three of us. The three of us running our own way, I find myself surrounded from all sides by borebacks.

Once more, they snarl as they jump and spin. Shooting toward me, I jump out of the way of the first boreback before swinging my sword and destroying the second. It collapses onto the ground. The other borebacks all see this and turn to face me. Their eyes turn even redder and they all jump and spin. Only seconds from shooting toward me, I focus on my gift. I close my eyes and take a deep breath. As I do, bright red flames form on the blade of my sword. Opening my eyes, I see a massive fire on my sword. Just as the borebacks shoot toward me, I raise my sword and scream as I stab the ground beneath me.

A fiery eruption heats up and knocks all the boreback back. They're leaving behind a trail of faded white smoke as they disappear, only a few hitting the trees and falling to the ground.

"Whoo," I yell, holding up my sword. "Yeah! That's what I'm talking about! Yes! There's nothing better than an early morning fight."

Shocker:

The borebacks squeak as I use my gift to electrify my metal arms. They fall one after the other as I hit and destroy them.

Holding a boreback by its tusks, I rise and throw it into the air. With the boreback's underbelly exposed, I pull back my fist and punch it in its weak spot. However, as I watch the boreback fly through the air, I hear something coming up from behind me. Turning around, I see another boreback running toward me. Before I can stop it, it rams into me, knocking and cutting my jacket.

Falling to the ground, the boreback lands on me and try to cut me with its sharpened tusks. Before it can, I place both my whole hands on its head and use my gift to electrocute the boreback. It screams as it lights up the whole forest. After a minute or so, I throw the smoking boreback off of me.

Jump:

Jumping and spinning in the air, I shoot out my hands and fire off multiple bolts. Crossbow bolts rain from above and hit a bunch of borebacks. While a few do run for cover, most of them are killed by the time I land on my feet.

One of the borebacks running out from behind a tree jumps and shoots toward me. Seeing it come closer and closer, I use my gift to jump high into the air. Practically flying over the boreback as it shoots past me, I shoot out my hand and line up the shot.

"Bang," I say, pulling the trigger and shooting a bolt. My bolt hits the spinning boreback, causing it to fall onto the ground. Landing on my feet, I smile when I see the other borebacks squeaking as they run away.

"That's strange," I say, reaching into my pocket to pull out a new box. I switch out the empty box in my crossbow with the new one. "Why are the borebacks running? Beasts don't normally run."

As I watch the last borebacks vanish from sight, I find myself in a large shadow. The shadow grew bigger and bigger and before I knew it, the whole forest had gone dark.

"Oh no," I say, spinning around and shooting off as many bolts as I can.

Hothead:

"Hey Shocker," I say, smiling as I grab and pull him in for a hug. I pat his back before letting him go. Shocker nods his head at me before looking around. He turns back to me and shows me three fingers. He then lowers one of his fingers.

"Ohh," I say when I realize what Shocker is saying. I slap myself on the head. "Jump! Yeah. Where is she? Hmm. I haven't seen her since we split up. Have you?"

Shocker shakes his head.

"Jump," I yell, "Hey, Jump! Where are you?"

About to take a step to try and find where Jump is, her scream stops me.

"What," I say. Before I can figure out what is going on, Shocker tackles me out of the way. Just as he tackled me, Jump came flying through the air. She lands a few feet from us, looking bruised.

"Jump," I yell, Shocker and I run to her. The first to reach her, Shocker drops to a knee and helps her up.

"Jump," I repeat, "Are you okay? What happened?"

Moaning at first, I noticed her wrist-mounted crossbows. They're both empty.

"Aracharles," Jump finally says. She points behind me and I see a giant black and white aracharles crawling toward it. The aracharles cutting the trees with its legs pulls back its head and splits a ball of acid webbing at us.

"Watch out," I scream. Running toward the aracharles, I use my gift once more to encase my sword in fire. Swinging it as fast as I can, I manage to burn the ball of webbing, but the burning webbing blocks my view. I didn't see the aracharles as it swings its leg. Too late to block it, the aracharles hits and knocks me into a tree. The breath is forced out of me as I hit the tree before falling onto the ground.

"Ouch," I cry. Shaking my head to get rid of the blurry vision, I see the aracharles approaching Shocker and Jump.

With Jump back on her feet, she and Shocker raise their weapons and prepare for a fight, but I know there's no way the two of them can fight an aracharles. Sucking up the pain, I push myself up and ready myself for a fight.

"Ahh," I scream only for a few seconds before I see something shining in the trees. The thing, whatever it is, shoots out from the trees and hits the aracharles right in its ugly head. The aracharles scream and stumble, knocking over a bunch of trees as it swings its legs wildly around.

"Watch out," Jump says, pushing Shocker out of the way while using her gift to jump out of the way.

I watch from a distance as the aracharles calm down enough to pull the thing from its head. The thing, turning out to be a small axe, drops to the ground.

"An axe," I think, "Who axe is that?"

"It's mine," a voice screams. Looking up, I see a man with black hair and a small pair of glasses in a long white cloak jumping out from the trees. Landing on the ground, he looks at the three of us. "The three of you! Stay back! I can fight the aracharles!"

I ignore the man and run toward the aracharles with my sword over my head. However, the man shoots out his hand and stops me.

"I say stay back," the man orders. "With all due respect, you three are unprepared to fight such a powerful beast."

"With all due respect," I repeat.

With that said, the man charges toward the arachalres. As the aracharles tries to hit the man with one of its legs, he easily dodges it. Dropping the ground and sliding underneath the aracharles, he grabs his axe. Now armed with a sword, the man jumps into the air and attacks the arachalres with both of his weapons. I watch as the aracharles falls to the ground, defeated.

"Uhh. Thank you."