Summus Proelium

Ximeno Arias, also known as Flashflak, had grown up in Minnesota, specifically in a small town about sixty miles south of Minneapolis. His dad did odd jobs, whatever he could get paid for, and his mom… well, his mom flipped between drinking a lot or running off with other men. When she was drunk, she tended to be depressed and self-loathing, so she stayed in the house and made sure everyone in earshot knew just how miserable she was. When she wasn't drinking, she had ambition. Specifically, the ambition to get the hell out of her current life, so she would seduce any trucker or random guy who was just passing through town on business. She'd leave, have a fling with her new beau for awhile, but inevitably end up drinking again, get kicked out of that relationship, and come back home. No matter how many times the woman did that, Ximeno's father always took her right back in.

The one thing Ximeno had been good at, the one thing he thought might get him out of that life, had been baseball. He was good at pitching. Not the best, but good. Maybe good enough to get onto an actual minor league team. When he was a freshman in high school, he'd immediately been put onto the varsity squad and seriously excelled there. In fact, he'd done so well he'd even started to think a little bit about getting into the majors. He'd allowed himself to dream big.

But that was when Michael Panwell, star center fielder and the local homerun king, had gotten a bit too handsy with Ximeno's friend, Dana, until she managed to punch him and escape the situation. Not that it had led to an arrest, or even a firm talking to. It had led, at least officially, to nothing at all other than Dana being told she should keep her head down and not make waves.

Michael was considered to be untouchable, given his skills and the fact that his father was the sheriff. No one else would do anything to him, even when the guy started harassing Dana later. He would leave notes in her locker, stare at her from across the room, point and laugh, even make suggestive comments in her vicinity. He'd made it absolutely clear that he wasn't going to stop, and that no one with any power was going to stop him. His dad ran their law enforcement.

So, Ximeno did something. After practice one day, the same day Michael had said something very quietly near Dana's ear that made the girl cry in the restroom for an hour (and that she still steadfastly refused to repeat), Ximeno took a bat to the boy's arm and wrist in the locker room. He didn't give the other boy any warning, just ambushing him out of nowhere before telling him that if he went anywhere near Dana again, he'd break something more important than his arm.

To say that Michael's dad, Sheriff Panwell, had reacted badly was an understatement. He took Ximeno into custody and was all set to make sure the book was thrown at him, including total expulsion from school and felony assault and battery charges. Along with probably anything else he could possibly come up with. He was going to use all of his considerable power to make damn sure the boy who hurt his precious, perfect son would pay for it for the rest of his life.

The man had even tried to set up some sort of big moment where this little nobody upstart would apologize to his son for hitting him. But one look at that smug, arrogant face, even as he stood in that police station, handcuffed and surrounded by the sheriff and three deputies, made Ximeno YOLO into a wild headbutt against Michael's nose, followed by a thorough kicking.

Ximeno would probably still be in juvenile detention if Michael and two of his friends hadn't tried to come after him while he was in the cell. Michael himself hadn't been able to do much with his broken arm, but his goons sure did. The boy was severely beaten, though he gave almost as good as he got. It was something that not even Sheriff Panwell could have completely covered up, especially if the whole thing went to trial. So he dropped the official charges, but made it very clear that he would be looking for any excuse whatsoever to find other ways to hurt that family.

And, of course, Ximeno was still expelled from school. No more baseball and no more school, since that was the only one within twenty miles or so of the town. He'd been looking at a future of possibly getting a GED and then probably ending up doing the same meaningless day labor that his dad had been doing for years. Which, don't get him wrong, Ximeno loved his dad, but he had wanted more. He'd been close, had gotten a taste of it, but now he had no idea how he could get noticed. He'd been depending on a scholarship to get into a local college, then he would jump from there to a pioneer league team somewhere in the state, and from there… well, the sky had been the limit. Had been. But without high school he was just lost.

He might have stayed lost if, during a long day of helping his dad do some roofing work while he should have been in school, a certain special, small glowing orb hadn't appeared to him. Ximeno Touched, and suddenly things were much more open to him. The then-fifteen year old was soon recruited right into the Minneapolis Minority team, with him and his parents being moved up to a new house and all-new living situation. His dad had been given a job as a custodian, one that paid decent money and was regular work. It wasn't baseball, but life was looking up once again.

Then he met his teammates, and while they clearly weren't the worst, there was just something about his leader that rubbed him the wrong way. The guy was one of those privileged rich kids, but that wasn't the whole problem, because one of the others was pretty wealthy too and Xime got along with him just fine. The simple truth was, the two just didn't like each other very much.

So, he had been looking for a new place to move to, a new team to join and hopefully launch a real career out of. When the opportunity to come to Detroit, one of the biggest Touched cities in the country, came up, he had jumped on it with barely more than a second thought. And even that much had mostly been about making sure his father would be okay with moving again, this time even further away. But his dad agreed, so he officially left Minnesota to join the Detroit Minority.

This was his first real mission with them, the first time they had been challenged since he came onto the team. It was the first genuine test of this newest (best) version of the Detroit Minority. And how was that going so far?

"Ahhhhh fuck, fuck, fuck!"

The world was fire. Or at least the part of it that actually mattered right now. The air around him was entirely engulfed in flames, as the boy flung himself sideways in a desperate attempt to escape the range of that heat before it turned him into a well-done steak. Given an actual choice, he preferred being rare. Very, extremely, inedibly rare.

Fortunately, the source of that fire, a somewhat heavyset guy in a sweatsuit and ski mask, was distracted away from pursuing him right then. If he hadn't been, Ximeno might've been in trouble, considering the awkward way he'd sprawled out across the ground after that wild dive.

Carousel was the one responsible for distracting that guy, and subsequently saving Xime right then, by sending half a dozen dirt clods that her power had ripped right up out of the ground flying into the side of the man's head and face with enough force to make the clumps poof into dark clouds. She was literally throwing dirt in his eyes. And just as the guy grew accustomed to the smaller clumps of dirt, she followed up with a much larger tree branch her power had grabbed from somewhere nearby. A tree branch that, to that guy, was about the size of a toothpick as it first circled around the girl before she sent it flying toward his face. Then it very rapidly grew back to its original size of a good eight feet long and a foot across. Big enough to put him down.

Unfortunately, the man never even blinked. Before the branch could collide with him, a wave of freezing cold seemed to burst up from his shoe, instantly freezing the branch while sending it flying up and out of the way. At the same time, he pointed with one hand, sending fire at Carousel.

But before that fire could hit her, the girl was grabbed by one of the Syndicates, who shoved her backwards to get her out of range before immediately shifting into his intangible state so the fire would pass harmlessly through him. Which seemed to really annoy the guy who sent it, at least.

All of that happened in the very brief time that Flashflak was sprawled out on the ground, before the boy rolled sideways and managed to pick himself back up.

Yup, this whole thing was going just peachy. Really just a great first real mission all around so far with his brand new team. But Xime would be damned if he was going to let these complete strangers turn them into a joke.

After that unexpected teleportation, they were out here on the outskirts of the city, in some field near the freeway. Actually, he was pretty sure his family had driven past this spot on their way in. It was almost the full Minority, all eight of those who were still here in the city, facing three of the strangers, which should have made things pretty easy, but these people were just… dangerous. For a group of complete unknowns who weren't even wearing real costumes (they just had the simple ski masks), they all seemed to have pretty goddamn strong powers that they clearly had plenty of experience with. He may have been new to the city, but Ximeno had been doing this for a couple years now, and he'd developed a fairly good sense of how dangerous someone was. These people were ringing near the top of that mental scale he had. They were bad news.

Three of them here, that giant with power and sound negation powers, the one who could shoot fire and ice from his hands, and the girl who… uh, controlled people or something. That part was still pretty unclear. But in any case, it had soon been six on two, after That-A-Way and Fragile took the big guy somewhere. Then that Yeet girl had said something about second generation Touched, before hitting the girl who controlled people with one of her eggs, followed by herself and her brother. Just like that, those three had been sent flying off out of the way, far from here.

Royal Road is the home of this novel. Visit there to read the original and support the author.

Which left Wobble, Syndicate, Carousel, and Flashflak himself to deal with this fire and ice guy. They could do that, right? The four (technically seven with all the Syndicates) of them had to be able to handle one guy. No matter how weirdly powerful and experienced the guy seemed to be.

Right after that guy managed to freeze the incoming tree branch and send it flying, he was hit by a shot of nausea-inducing waves from Wobble from one side. At the same time, one of the other Syndicates went at him from behind with a pair of the stay-down cuffs. The two of them timed their efforts perfectly, with that Syndicate coming in range of the nausea wave an instant after Wobble stopped sending it. And they weren't the only ones who were part of the timing on that. In that same moment, Carousel sent another handful of big dirt clumps, each almost a foot across, into the man's face to make sure he was distracted for just one more second so Syndicate could get the cuff on his wrist. Even if he reacted supernaturally quickly to the nausea waves being shut off, there was no way he could deal with the flying dirt clods and Syndicate--

Without any warning or hesitation, the man was already pivoting toward the incoming boy. Simultaneously, a new blast of cold tore from the side of his torso that was now facing Carousel, freezing the incoming dirt clods and sending them back that way. The girl was taken by surprise. But Flashflak was already there. He'd seen what was coming, scrambling that way just in time to dive into her, taking Carousel to the ground while the wave of ice passed right over their heads.

Even as they hit the dirt like that, the man had continued his pivot toward the boy who had been trying to take him from behind. Before Syndicate could shift which one of his selves was solid, that guy grabbed his raised wrist and yanked him forward, his foot lashing out to kick the boy's leg, sending him into the dirt. But just before he hit, that Syndicate instantly became intangible, disappearing through the ground. Which was good, since this stranger followed up by pointing down to send a burst of flame right into that spot. A burst of flame that was quickly redirected to fly right at Wobble's face just as he was about to send another wave of his own power that way. That armor of his seemed to protect him somewhat, but he still stumbled backward away from it.

Okay, that was enough. Flashflak rolled off Carousel, muttering an apology for the ungraceful way he'd knocked her down. But most of his attention was on the piece of shit who had, just in that moment, switched from fire to ice. Now Wobble was literally being frozen in place, his armor probably good enough to keep him alive, but hit with so much cold it was completely locking up.

Seeing that, Xime quickly cocked his hand back and summoned his familiar little metal sphere, about the size of a tennis ball. A passing memory of standing on the mound back when baseball had been his entire life came to mind, just as he gave the thing a hard sideways chuck. It flew straight at that evil fucking bastard's chest, and Xime detonated the thing right before it would've collided with him. Which sent a hundred or so of those tiny metal pellets exploding out of it.

Most people who knew anything about Flashflak understood the general way his power worked. They knew each pellet could only maintain damage on one thing at a time, so when that same pellet was reused to do damage to something else, the damage it had done previously was erased. That way he could easily do enough damage to traumatically injure a person, but then use those same pellets to damage something else and magically erase all of those injuries.

But what most people didn't realize was that he could also mentally direct all those pellets once they exploded out of that ball. They didn't just fly in every direction, they went where he wanted them to, including multiple targets or multiple parts of one target. And right now, he wanted every last one of the pellets to hit that guy's chest and legs.

Aaaand then the bastard did something unexpected. His entire body was abruptly engulfed in flames. He looked like the goddamn Human Torch. The fire seemed to erupt out of every part of him, encasing him in flames that were so hot, the metal pellets instantly melted and disappeared before they got anywhere near him. They were so hot, in fact, that Xime himself felt a wave of heat that made his eyes water as he stumbled back away from it. He would've fallen, but Carousel caught his arm, pulling him to relative safety as the heat from those flames got worse.

The girl's voice was tense and uncertain as she raised it to be heard over the sound of the fire. "What can we do about this searing blaze? As we'd surely die from barely a nearing graze."

"I--I don't know!" Xime had to admit, staggering backward another step while Carousel did the same. The heat was getting even worse. The ground all around that guy was scorched, the vegetation destroyed. Just how hot could he make that fire? Because this had started off bad, and was only getting worse. "My bomb can't get anywhere near that dude when he's like that!"

"We can!" Two of the intangible Syndicates were there, on either side of them. One was talking, though his head shook at the same time. "But the second we try to be solid to actually do anything to the fucking guy, we probably won't have time to regret that stupid, stupid choice!"

"At least Wobble--wait, what?" Even as he started to say that, Xime was looking over at the boy in question. The boy who was still frozen. "Damn it, can that guy direct the heat too!? Look, the ice on Wobble doesn't look like it's even sweating, and he's a hell of a lot closer than we are!"

"He's been toying with us and playing games," Carousel muttered. "Taunting and mocking are his basic aims."

That rhyming thing was weird, but yeah, she had a point. It was obvious that this guy could've completely engulfed the area they were in with fire by now if he was trying to. Instead, he just seemed content to simply protect himself and wait to see what they did. Maybe he was playing with his food, maybe he was testing them, or maybe he just thought it would be funny to see what they could do. Whatever the reasoning, he just stood there, his constant flames keeping them away.

"Well our basic aim is to punch him in the face," one of the Syndicates put in. "But how the hell do we do that when the space around the fucker is… uh, hell? There's gotta be a way to distract him, shut him off, make him run out of gas? He can't just keep doing that forever, can he?"

Xime's head shook. "I'd say leave and let him burn himself out here in the middle of nowhere, but we can't just walk away and leave Wobble there. He's stuck. And if we get any closer to try to get him out of there, fuckface'll just move the fire that way. Which might be great for Wobble, but--" He stopped, glancing at the pair of Syndicates. "What if one of you gets close enough to draw his flames, then go ghosty so they hit Wobble instead?"

"Circle around and go in from the other direction," Carousel suggested, gesturing with one hand, "so his flames may chase too quick for correction. And don't be afraid, you'll have my aid. I'll cover your run, lest you be well-done."

"In other words, be a moving target to draw the flame, got it, perfect, we sure love our job," that Syndicate mumbled before giving both Carousel and Flashflak a quick pat on their backs with both hands. "We got this, time to get a little toasty." With that, he was already pushing himself up to launch into a sprint.

Damn it, what could Xime do to help right now!? He'd thrown his bomb one time so far, accomplished nothing with it, and now those flames were stopping him from even trying again. There was no point if his pellets couldn't even get close, and that guy wasn't showing any sign of needing to let up on the damn fire any time soon. If they could free Wobble, maybe he could turn things around by hitting the guy with a sustained nausea wave while the rest of them covered him. But how could Xime help with that now? There had to be something he could do.

By that point, that Syndicate was running in a wide circle, drawing bursts of flame from the still-burning figure. Those geysers were intercepted by much larger piles of dirt that Carousel's power had already ripped out of the ground and started to fling that way, covering the boy as promised while leaving gaping holes in the landscape around her.

Wait, he could do something. There was a tiny opening right where this guy's eyes were, allowing him to look out so he could follow the progress of Syndicate as he sent more and more geysers of flame after or ahead of him. It wasn't much, but it was something. Seeing that, Xime summoned his bomb once more. He waited, doing his best to time it perfectly. Then, just as the other boy was getting near Wobble, he let the bomb fly. It took off, exploding just as the heat started to get to it. A hundred or so tiny pellets were suddenly flying right at that barely visible opening in the flames. Most of them melted too much along the way to accomplish anything. But a few made it into that hole. Enough that, at the exact moment that Syndicate crossed in front of Wobble and slowed down, those few half-melted pellets struck their target.

Xime couldn't even see where they were hitting, but it was enough to make the man audibly yelp and curse. Which meant that he wasn't paying enough attention to where he was aiming, so that last geyser of flame went right at Wobble. Syndicate turned intangible, and the fire completely melted through the ice.

Immediately, the armored boy leapt backward while raising both hands. The twins waves of nausea struck that fucking bastard just as he was starting to recover from Xime's pellets. Just like that, the geysers of flame around him vanished, revealing the man himself as he stumbled and doubled over with a groan. He was going down.

Or he would have. Except in that exact moment, something small and sharp, like a needle, whistled through the air before driving itself right into Xime's arm. Immediately, he felt a wave of nausea and weakness that probably wasn't too unlike what that guy was feeling. His legs went out from under him, as he collapsed with a pained groan. His stomach was rolling and he felt so weak, so… so awful. What…? Beside him, Carousel went down too. They both had small golden needles sticking out of them.

"Four on one, really?" The man who was saying that as he came into view was shirtless, wearing only a pair of sweatpants and a mask. He stood barely a couple inches over five feet, with hundreds of those tiny needles sticking out all over his body. They were a mix of gold, black, and purple. "That's not really fair, is it? But don't worry,

"I'm here to help even the odds."