Everything slowed down in my vision.
I bulged my calves as I crouched. Then, in a single, successive motion that left a small dent on the metal floorboard, I took a large, rage-fueled leap toward Germaine with precise, unrivaled speed.
"No! Stella!!" Mangé cried out behind me. Oh, but it was already far too late.
My right fist was blistered, so I couldn't use it. And so, I clenched my left fist tightly, drawing it backward, toward my waist as I streamed through the air.
Then, the moment I arrived just a few inches from where Germaine stood, I pivoted my waist, aiming a tightly clenched left blow toward Germaine's unguarded face.
On my face, there was a grotesque frown. My mouth was closed, teeth clenched, eyes flashing with unsealed malice.
My fist connected–
Bam–!
Then, the speed and motion of my surroundings snapped back to a normal pace as a dry gust of boiling heat blew over the room.
Amid the cascading hot air, my then narrowed eyes widened, flickering toward Germaine's right palm that firmly grasped my left fist.
What?
Slowly, my gaze moved from Germaine's palm, tracing his widened brown eyes that held a subtle, gleaming hint of madness. The same madness was present in his unhinged, satisfied grin.
As soon as his gaze met mine, his grin faded instantaneously. Replaced by that same neutral expression that I had come to abhor.
It was his sudden change in facial expression that made me miss the upswinging movement of his clenched left fist.
My instinct tugged at my insides, warning me of the incoming fist that was aimed at my right ribs.
My right fist was blistered. But not my right palm. It was completely free. And so, instinctively, my right hand moved, blocking his heavy punch.
The impact of his fist felt like I had been hit by a heavyweight metal. They dug into my palm, but I grasped it, held it tight, while he held my left fist.
His fist was strong.
"What?" Germaine uttered, his voice oozing with unfiltered dread. "Exactly. Is. Your. Problem with me?"
The moment he asked that question, his aggressive brown eyes keenly locked onto mine.
My brows arched subconsciously.
We were in a suspended tug of war. It had begun to seem like his strength and mine were equally matched.
Though it only seemed that way. Because in reality, that was greatly untrue.
My strength was unparalleled. And I was pretty damn sure that no being in the entire backlands could match my purely physical strength.
There was a subtle hint of hesitation in my action, strike and composure. The rational side of my brain had posed a very strange question, contrary to my burgeoning instinct.
'WHY exactly do I want to kill him?'
I didn't know. I mean, the guy hadn't done anything wrong to me. The only thing he did was to track me, a mission that was given to him by Mangé.
So why? Why did he feel like a threat? Why did his very presence and every movement he made seem to trigger a primal rage that was hidden deep within me?
Why… Why was I attacking him?
Was I projecting my fear, trauma or insecurities on him?
The liquidity of the question he asked me had seeped into my brain, overriding the cognitive, instinctual setting that unconsciously controlled every movement of my body.
My clenched left fist slowly softened, and my gaze grew clearer. Although it was still focused on Germaine, but this time, it was calmer. Less aggressive.
Germaine's grip on my left fist softened, and I took my fist down, simultaneously releasing his own left fist from my grip.
I took a calm, disoriented step backwards. And he stood calmly, fixing his posture.
"I.." A whisper escaped my lips as I shook my head, the haziness that came with the rage subsiding from my vision. "I don't know." I fully responded to Germaine.
Then, as if declaring that he wasn't done with, and that he didn't really care about my pathetic little breakdown, Germaine's cybernetically enhanced left leg flew with precision toward my nose, splitting the air as it streamed.
My eyes narrowed immediately. And my right hand moved, grabbing onto the calf area of that machinated leg just before it could graze my nose.
"It seems you have greatly underestimated me because of our even clash." I voiced out, my right palm tightly clenching that leg-shaped machine attached to his waist. It pulsed with a faint cyan light that cast a hollow blue glow in my grey gaze.
Germaine's neutral expression hardened, a faint trail of looming anxiety began to crawl on the wrinkled lines that surfaced on his forehead and his entire face.
Through my biceps, raw strength raced, surging toward my right palm. And, with a sickening crunch, the cybernetic leg shattered into large pieces as I squeezed it.
—"Argggghhhh!!!" Germaine screamed aloud. His scream was raw, guttural and pain-painted.
He quickly fell to the ground, grasping the left leg area of his waist, where thin cyan-colored wires ran through, droused with red blood that flowed over his grey pants. Those wires sparked as his blood touched them.
"My Leg!!!! My fucking leg!!!" He yelled aloud. Thick beads of tears rolled down his cheeks.
As I looked down over the disgustingly pathetic sight that Germaine displayed, a cool feeling calmed my heart. The rate of my blood flow returned to normal.
I was satisfied. Even though I didn't kill him.
But Germaine was far from satisfied. He looked up to me, his brown gaze smeared by the flowing liquid that was his tears. His gaze carried the full intensity of his intent.
And even without him saying it, I knew what he was thinking: 'I will make you suffer.'
And strangely, it felt like he was right. It felt like he really would.
His Te flared. And that disturbing quality quickly filled the space of the room. It felt like his Te controlled and spun the very air itself, twisting the air and forming tiny streaks of whirling tornadoes.
This air was cool, it wasn't as hot as the air that my Te had boiled. And slowly, Germaine stood up, standing on his one working, biological leg. His gaze was fixed downward, on the pool of blood beneath him. And when he slowly raised his head, my eyes narrowed slightly as his bloodshot gaze met mine.
Then, without so much as a warning or warm-up, a stroke of air, shaped like a bladed sickle, spawned in the middle of the room, the bladed end hurling toward my direction.
My narrowed grey gaze widened subtly as I caught the exact direction of the blade; my forehead.
So his Til is of the wind element.
Almost simultaneously, a warm blue laser beam tore through the air, dissolving the bladed sickle at once.
Then, Mangé leaped, plasma pistol in hand as he landed in the area between I and Germaine.
"Enough of this." His voice echoed, dripping with palpable, seething annoyance.