Young Writers Society

Eli didn’t have to look up to know that she had arrived. The pulse of energy in the room was enough, blue-hot and humming in his head.

He paused the hype-up playlist blasting in the built-in speakers of his mask. A paper shredder whirred softly in the poorly-lit office, and a BIC lighter sat on the black lacquered desktop, waiting patiently for whatever sinister purpose he intended for it today. His knees ached from crouching over the desk drawers, but he continued his work, sifting through the papers, skimming the titles for important-sounding descriptors.

"Management"? "Opportunity costs"? "Cash flow statement"? He knew nothing about business, but those sounded significant enough.

He dumped a stack of customer orders into the shredder, and it ate them with a satisfying, drawn-out crunch. A sigh drifted in from the open doorway.

“Halt, evil doer,” came the familiar deadpan.

Eli twisted his lips in an attempt to hold back a laugh. He straightened into a stand.

“‘Halt’?” he echoed, then winced as his knees popped back into place. "What are you, a medieval guard?”

Zenith scowled, her mouth the only facial feature visible thanks to her signature turquoise mask. The shadows of the empty furniture store loomed behind her athletic frame. Robert Allen Furniture, to be exact. Eli's target.

“I’m running out of quips,” she muttered, leaning one hip into the doorframe. Her goggles gleamed in the moonlight filtering through the wall-length windows. “And it’s only September.”

“Well, don’t waste them on me, hero.”

Eli twirled the lighter in one gloved hand as he glanced over his handiwork. The shredded paper filled the machine’s tray, evidence of entire folders meticulously sorted and destroyed. He clicked the lighter’s switch, and set the pile ablaze. The flames devoured the paper quickly, licking the edges of the container until it began to wilt, melting the plastic. A small cloud of smoke filled the air, but not quite large enough to trigger the fire detectors.

They both watched the swirling vapor for a moment, passive.

“What could possibly drive a furniture company to violence and sabotage?” Eli mused aloud, nudging the various drawers closed. He carefully placed the lighter in his pocket, zipped it closed. “Did this guy, Ethan Allen, did he steal a... what, a chair design, and now Maplestone is bitter?”

Zenith tilted her masked head, her goggles obscuring any chance Eli had at reading her true emotions. Even though her outfit made it difficult to take her seriously, gaudy turquoise and gold that it was, there were still moments when the hero's lack of response sent chills down his spine.

Of course, this was Grumpy Zenith, as he liked to refer of her mentally. He liked her partner, Happy Zenith, much better. But they swapped out weekly, so he wouldn’t be seeing the other hero for at least three more days.

Eli sighed and glanced at the smart device on his wrist as he stepped out from behind the desk, careful to avoid the broken glass from a computer he'd smashed not too long ago. The blinking white screen read off his profile and mission:

Villain: Rift.

Sponsor: Maplestone Furniture.

Target: Ethan Allen Furniture.

Status: Leading.

Time: 10:37 pm

“Hey, lucky you,” Zenith said, looking at her own screen. “Your sponsor seems pretty determined that you knock out the competition. You've been on "Leading" all night."

She paused, smiled darkly. "Maybe you’ll actually win for once.”

Eli bristled. Another reason that he preferred the other Zenith. This one had no problem with making their staged fights “look real” (translate to: Eli nursing a lot of burn wounds after the fact). And considering that his sponsors often dropped out mid-battle, leaving Eli to fend for himself and feign defeat...

He couldn’t quite stifle the surge of hope in his chest at this optimistic turn of events.

"Maybe," he admitted. He glanced at the time, tapped his wrist. "I'm off to find the heating system. Burning papers is fun and all, but I'm itching for an explosion. Want to come?"

She pushed off from the door frame, and a shiver of dread rushed through him as she towered nearly a full head over his small frame. There were bumps under the stretched fabric on her head that he believed to be marks of a hairstyle, but for all he knew, they could have been horns.

"I'd love to, but we need to get a move on," she said. "I have my sponsors to think of too, you know? I don't think Ethan Allen likes you very much."

Her lips quirked into a ghost of a smile, and Eli grimaced. He knew she hated this job as much as he did, but did she really have to act like she was eager to beat him up?

"Of course," he agreed, and crossed his fingers behind his back. Maybe she'd be gentle this time.

Zenith's hands began to shimmer with plasma energy, electric blue and terrifying. The hum in his head grew, edging dangerously close towards headache territory. Eli let his hands drop to his sides, muscles tensing in anticipation. As he backed up a few paces, he traced the map of the building in his head, plotting out his path to the basement, every corner, every wall.

The fastest route would be, of course, to cut straight through it all.

"Rift, this is when you move," Zenith hissed, the plasma fields growing into softball-sized orbs in her hands. They writhed and spat energy, filling the room with eerie, flickering light.

He didn't answer. Focused on dissolving into empty space.

The process of turning intangible was never a pleasant one. To the outside eye, it looked as if he were disintegrating into a sand-like substance, and then dissipating into thin air. But Eli's body was essentially ripping itself apart, particle by particle, molecule by molecule, and he could feel every step of it.

It hurt like hell.

But then it was over, and nothing could hurt him after that. Not Zenith's plasma, not bullets, nothing. At least, not for a little while.

He couldn't see when he was intangible, not really, but he could sense the building around him in a glistening haze. There was Zenith, a simmering ball of energy, coiled and ready to explode, and the remains of the fire, reduced now to a pile of smoldering ember and soft plastic. The gas heater was only one floor down, accessible by stairs on the other end of the huge furniture display area.

But the Rift didn't need stairs.

Eli walked straight through Zenith, and a strange sensation of nausea bubbled up from his non-existant stomach. Rippling balls of ionic energy passed by where his face would be, and a jolt of pain ran through his spine.

Crap.

His time was almost up. Usually he could stretch his powers out to 30 seconds, sometimes even a minute, but Zenith's powers had the very unpleasant advantage of clicking his timer forward. So when the sensations started to return, so did he.

As soon as he was past her, Eli felt his body piece itself back together and burst back into being. He gasped at the pain, like every bit of him was on fire. Beads of sweat popped up on his forehead, but he was experienced enough with these reformations to get his bearings back quickly.

He broke into a run, feet pounding on the hardwood floor as he entered the furniture display area. He spotted the security cameras out of the corner of his eye.

Show time.

Zenith's voice, altered by the plasma energy radiating off of her, echoed through the warehouse, warbling and low.

"Rift."

Eli didn't turn around. He launched himself over a minimalist white couch and matching coffee table, nearly jarring his shin into a chair in the neighboring display.

The main path is too open, he thought to himself. I'll get shot in the back.

As if she'd heard him, a blast of plasma struck the table next to him, overturning it with a sharp crack.

"Hey!" he shouted, dodging lamps and tasteful decor. Another explosion erupted next to his feet, and he hopped nimbly away, feeling the heat seeping into the toes of his boots.

"You're supposed to be protecting the merchandise, not destroying it! That's--"

He dodged a blast that exploded overhead, casting sparks of ionic energy onto the furniture below.

"That's my job!"

Zenith didn't respond, but he knew that she was pursuing him from the sound of scuffing feet on wood. She was faster than him, and he knew it. He'd fought her enough times to know that his best chances were to save his energy for close-hand combat, to phase away in the nick of time. He focused on weaving around the furniture.

Checking the map in his mind, he scanned the store to figure out where the heating system would be. There. He altered his path towards an ugly pea-green couch, underneath which, he hoped, was his target. If he could just get above it, he could phase straight down to the gas heater, and then--

Pain seared up his right shoulder blade. Eli gasped and veered sideways into a glass divider. It shattered, spraying his head with glass shards. He lay for a moment, biting his cheek against the already-fading ache in his back and the sting of the few glass shards that punctured the thick material of his suit. He pressed his hands to the ground and rolled onto his knees.

It had only been a small blast, from what he could tell. His suit had protected him from the brunt of it, but there was definite bruising, blooming out along his shoulder. He'd take it.

He lurched back to his feet, fumbling for his own weapon at his waist- a combat pistol, Program-issued. Clutching his arm against the throbbing in his shoulder, Eli leveled the weapon at the hero. She was far too close for comfort, still moving towards him about two displays away. The room was dark, and the shadows cast by the plasma made her mask look twisted and wrong.

"Destruction of property is a crime, Zenith," he called, attempting at lighthearted banter. He took aim, trying to calm the fluttering of nerves in his stomach. The way Zenith looked when she was in the middle of an assignment always scared him, with the plasma radiating off of her hands in waves, smoldering and hungry. As if he were the prey, and she was the predator.

She always followed the Hero Guidelines, but he was still never sure that she would stop in time.

"Tone it down," he added. He gave her a warning shot, shattering a lamp next to her hip. She flinched away, but kept moving, climbing over the back of an armchair, burning through the leather. One display away.

"Check your watch," she said, twisting her hands as she generated another blast.

Eli's heart sunk as he spun away, glancing at the screen on his wrist as he simultaneously dissintegrated, his whole body screaming. Before his sight faded away, he read:

Status: Losing.

Damn it.

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