Orso Fiction 026

Orso Fiction 026-Sky and Tragedy
“Sabra.”, the Mist Agent remembered Zach Stimely saying, as he and Nicole Roberts stood at her office door. “You’re the best illusionist we have in the family.”

“That’s right.”, Sabra said, casually making illusionary mythical animals one twentieth their original size fight each other on her desk to demonstrate.

“We have a job for you. It’s a big one.”

“Give me the three word summary.”

“Absolute hypnosis.”, Zach said. “Please.”

“Sounds like fun. Details.”

“One of the younger ones.”, Zach said. “He’s good. Really good. But he’s not ready, yet. He’s got the potential to create some impressive flames, but his Dying Will is…”

“Yes?”, Sabra asked.

“He’s got the resolution of a brain-damaged lobster.”, Nicole said.

“So what’s the job?”

“Power limitation.”, Zach said. “Set something over him, so that everyone but the three of us, including him, are looking at something totally different than the truth.”

“I’ll do it.”, Sabra said with a smile.

---

The rain came crashing down around them, the two Orso facing each other.

“Matt…What kind of monster are you?”, Alex asked, unsure of whether or not he should fire…or if, indeed, it would do any good.

“Come at me.”, Matt said, more boldly than Alex ever remembered him saying anything.

“You never told me about this…Zach…”, Alex murmured, watching the flames of Matt and Muffins, clearly against the night air. “Since when…was Matt a Sky-type…?”

---

Approximately one hour before Zach and Nicole had spoken to Sabra, Zach was standing atop the roof of Century, watching the sun rise.

“Zach!”, Nicole called. “I brought him!”

He turned to see his apprentice stepping toward him, Matt Iannone next to her. The first thing he noticed about Matt was how he was attaching himself to Nicole. The second was how he was actively screaming for his life. The third was how, in direct defiance of what he should be doing, he was looking down.

“Did we really have to meet on the roof, Zach?”, she asked, teasingly.

“I didn’t know he’d be so opposed…”, Zach said, raising an eyebrow. “So you’re sure Matt will do, huh?”

“Yup. He’s your guy.”

“Well…Curious.”, Zach said, chuckling. “From first glance, I guess he fits right in…”

“Are you…Zach Stimely?”, Matt asked, pausing from his fear of falling to his death to find out.

“That’s me.”, Zach said with a smile. “And you’d be the Matt I’ve heard so much about.”

“Um…yes?”

“Curious…”, Zach said. “You’re right, Nicole. I feel it. This one’s got a huge store of Dying Will in him…somewhere. He’ll do perfectly.”

---

Alex trained his gun on Muffins, the bird now burning with orange flames.

“Matt…What just happened?”, Alex asked. “People don’t go around switching flame types, you know that, right?

“That doesn’t matter now.”, Matt said, stone-faced. “All that matters now is the battle.”

In that moment, Alex began racking his brain for all the potential explanations for this. Nothing came to him, so he kept the gun on the bird.

“Are you really Matt?”, Alex asked, going off one unlikely solution.

“I am.”, he replied. “Here I come.”

Muffins, without needing to be ordered, shot at Alex and his two illusions. With a single flap of his wings, there was an explosion of Sky Flames, and the two illusions on either side of Alex, were pixelated, and crumbled to pieces. Alex jumped away from the explosion, feeling the intense heat.

“This is impossible...”, he said, mostly trying to convince himself he was hallucinating. “People don’t change from Sun to Sky over the course of a fight…”

He was interrupted from his doubts by Matt leaping at him with far more agility than he should have had. Alex sped away, barely dodging Matt’s reach.

---

“It’s already been five minutes…”, Sabra breathlessly said. “We only have five minutes left!”

“Five minutes of what?”, Mike shouted, utterly confused.

“That boy…I did what Zach asked, and suppressed his power…but we also left in a safety. That suppression, and the illusion with it, would break, if he ever needed it! All his stored power is flowing to him as fast as it can, right now!”

“Who!?”, Paige shouted.

“That boy!”, Sabra shouted. “Matt Iannone! We need to get to him, in five minutes, before he burns out, and whoever he’s fighting kills him!”

---

It was a strange fight to watch, Alex relying on his speed, to dodge the assault of both Matt and Muffins. As his mind raced, he realized that right now, his wealth of combat experience was saving his life. He fired a few shots wildly, but the two targets were too fast to hit. It was unmistakable, he thought. He couldn’t feel anything in the way of Sun Flames from the two of them.

The stalemate was chipped, but not broken, when Alex drew his gun, and fired a large shot at them, covering the battlefield in Mist Flames. However, within a few seconds, the boy jumped at him once more, locking hands with him.

“Shun!”, Alex shouted. “Release!”

The wolverine assumed its animal form, and lunged at Matt, clawing at his chest. He did react to this, and jumped away, leaving Muffins room to attack Shun. Matt once again jumped at Alex, but Alex now locked hands with him, relying on superior strength and adrenaline to let him push Matt to the ground. He held him there for a moment, as he struggled to get up. Shun was keeping Muffins too occupied to assist his partner. His eyes widened, though, when he felt the surge of power rising under him.

“You’re not going to…”, Alex murmured, disbelieving. This, however, he decided to trust, and jumped away from him urgently. Less than a second later, Matt’s body erupted with Sky Flames in every direction. “Fucking EXPLODE!? That can’t be a real thing!”

Matt slowly stood, and took a step toward Alex, who assumed a better stance for battle. Matt took another step. And then another.

And then he fell to the ground, unconscious.

Alex relaxed his guard, taking a step backward. He saw Muffins, running out of energy quickly, return to his box. Shun looked up at him through the rain, questioning. Alex returned him to his box.

“Let’s go.”, he murmured. “We’re leaving, Shun.”

---

Matt awoke in the base’s medical wing, confused, and feeling as though all his muscles were uniformly going on strike. He was strangely comforted by how much they ached.

“How you feeling, big guy?”, Nicole asked, from the side of his bed. The rest of the Agents were there with her, but she was the only one sitting.

“Severely puzzled.”, Matt replied.

“That’s what we expected.”, Nicole said.

“What happened…NO!”, Matt shouted, jumping up, and immediately falling back, in intense pain. “Alex…Alex…Where is Alex?”

“Alex is gone.”, Paige said sadly. “We’re glad you’re alright…”

“What happened to me?”, Matt asked, choking on this news.

“Well…I’ll explain.”, Sabra said, stepping forward. “This isn’t how we planned to do this, though…”

“What happened?”. Matt asked, seeing the girl through fuzzy vision. His glasses. His glasses weren’t on his face, but on the table next to him, with, with his pain, might as well be on the moon. Damnit.

“You tried to fight Alex…”, Sabra said. “And you released the limiter Zach and I put on you.”

“What?”, Matt mumbled.

“Zach told me that you were the best man for the job, but you weren’t ready just yet. He told me to restrict your power, so you couldn’t hurt yourself with it, and we could train you better. To make you less suspicious, we cast the illusion that you were a Sun type over you.”

“I’m a…”, Matt mumbled. “I’m a what?”

“You’re a Sky type. The rarest kind.”, Taylor Houston stepping from behind Sabra. “I told Zach this was a stupid idea…You burned up all your energy over that last ten minutes of the fight. You’re going to hurt a lot for the next week or so.”

“You said…you said Zach wanted me to do a job…What…what’s the job?”

“Zach said you were perfect for it.”, Sabra said. “To serve along Conner Warrell and Zach Jacobs as Boss and Commander… and become the Second Generation’s Head Agent.”

---

Stumbling through the woods, Alex tried to block the downpour from his eyes with his hand. He tripped over a root, and fell to his knees. Suddenly, he felt the rain stop hitting his head. He opened his eyes to see a pair of boots.

“Well, look what we have here…”, came a voice far too happy for the weather. He looked up to see Zeke’s smiling face from under an umbrella. The Apostle offered his hand to the boy.

There was a moment of silence, save the sound of the rain crashing around them.

Alex reached up and took Zeke's hand. Zeke's smile grew.

“Welcome to our humble abode…”, he said. “Comrade.”

-

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