Amaranthine

The heat of rage crept up the sides of Kennedy’s neck, then did so in a more literal sense through her throat. A roar of flame washed over Goliath’s legs, accomplishing nothing but temporarily blinding her. His pre-spirit shot through the wall of flame first, giving Kennedy just enough warning to dive out of the way of a shin the size of a treetrunk on a collision course with her abdomen.

Calm, she thought, fighting back the anger, you aren’t him. Anger makes you weaker.

She focused on his strikes. They came fast and wild, but still somehow perfectly controlled. In almost every fight Kennedy had been in, at least the ones against a humanoid opponent that lasted long enough to be called a fight rather than an execution, an encyclopedic knowledge of the world’s fighting styles had served Kennedy well. Her mother might not have been able to permanently impart her omni-competence on Kennedy, but she’d make sure to give her a damn fine simulacrum when it came to combat. Kennedy had insisted upon it; you never knew when you were going to have to kill another immediate family of incestuous apocalypse cultists. Or kill the same one again.

This fight was the exception. Goliath followed no pattern, inhabited no forms, yet each and every blow was delivered perfectly. To her chagrin, Kennedy realized that without Willow’s odd form of precognition, she’d almost certainly be getting her ass beat. As it was, it was all she could do just to dodge, to keep his attention on her rather than on her friends.

A rainbow flash out of the corner of her eye buoyed her spirits a bit. She couldn’t even spare the instant it would take to confirm, but that probably meant Qi had just gotten pulled through a mandala to someone who could make her pretty again.

‘Time to go on the attack Kennedy,’ Willow whispered into her ear, although she couldn’t have, Kennedy could see her 20 feet away behind the giant, still muttering and doing some arcane bullshit with her hands. ‘His soul is well anchored, but I am Working upon its moorings.’

Bitch, you get more cryptic the spookier you are, you know that? Kennedy thought, but swiped out experimentally at Goliath’s arm in the instant it was extended after his next strike. Again, she came away with a handful of soulstuff, dissipating instantly like cotton candy in water. She also learned something new about Willow.

‘Insults are uncalled for, Kennedy’ The witch whispered into her mind, apparently fully capable of reading her thoughts when they were linked this deeply.

Fuck you, don’t scold me during a fight, Kennedy riposted silently, but you gotta teach me how to do this, it’ll scare the ever-loving fuck out of Cait.

‘Deal.’

The arm Kennedy had scored a hit against had slowed. Just barely, it still probably would outpace any combatant Kennedy had faced save dear departed Freeflow. But, it was an invisible sign of wear and tear on that perfect monolith of a human body. She wondered what would happen if she started doing the same to his torso. Would it just slow as well, creaking as with age? Or would it begin to fail, and might Kennedy win her first fight due to forfeit via liver failure.

The point was somewhat moot, as it stood. Until she slowed him down a little more, she was not going to be getting in close enough to test the idea out. Even at a distance, her scale armor was beginning to wear under a constant barrage of grazes and near misses.

Okay, you’re right, creepy bitch, this is untenable, Kennedy thought, receiving the empathic equivalent of a scowling emoji from Willow in return, just subtle enough not to be distracting. She began working those limbs as they came at her, snatching bits of their animating force away with each strike.

It was a risky proposition. If she timed it wrong, even a little bit, her hand would take a hit, and even through the scale, that was not good news. After one such failure, all the fingers on her left talon were bent so far backwards that it became a fair imitation of a clenched right fist.

The pain didn’t bother her. She didn’t let it bother her. That was another thing her mother had given her, combined with the numbing of years of abuse from the parents she didn’t claim; a relationship with pain that bordered on apathy. Yes, it was there, yes, it typically signalled something important, but if it wasn’t something she could immediately do something about, why worry?

Unfortunately, this time there was a reason to worry. Maybe Qi’s talons were special. Maybe it was entirely a mental block. But waving her ruined fist through one of Goliath’s limbs simply didn’t have the same effect as a move that looked like an actual attack. And Kennedy couldn’t afford to be at half effectiveness.

She reached out for Breastman, needing his regeneration and hoping Samsara hadn’t evac’d him as well. There wouldn’t have been a need; Kennedy had watched the little terror take hits a lot worse than that and keep fighting, dangerous as ever. She found him, a little ball of anxiety as he watched his friend in the fight of her life, and eager to lend his aid.

Immediately, Kennedy felt bone and tendon shift and snap as her hand ground back into shape. If it had hurt getting damaged, then the process of returning to its normal form was agony. Kennedy felt a cold, feverish sweat break out on her brow, a completely physiological response to the pain that no amount of emotional control could master. Still, the next time Goliath struck out, only to be intercepted by that hand, Kennedy came away with a larger chunk of his soul than ever.

Only this time it didn’t dissipate. Her link to Breastman roared as the soulstuff was sucked through her, shooting along the link back to him. Kennedy cut it immediately.

Probably should have known these powers wouldn’t mix, she scolded herself, and simply resolved to not take any more hits.

Goliath was slowing by now, not from exhaustion, or injury, by all appearances he was still literally perfect, 15 feet of deific humanity, all but unmarred by the assault of a whole team of some of the strongest heroes Earth had to offer. But on the inside, he was flagging. His pre-spirit was full of holes, ragged and moth eaten, and it lunged out far further ahead, far slower than before.

Time to finish him.

After the next haymaker, still superhumanly fast, but a shadow of his former ability, Kennedy darted in, raking an ethereal claw up through his abdomen and coming away with a chunk of soul so large it seemed to actually have physical weight. She crushed it in her talon, then dug that same claw into his thigh, pulling herself up his back.

She darted around, climbing him like a colossus, swiping at his hands when they got too close to her on his back. To be honest, for a moment she wondered if this had been a good idea. It took all of her focus and all of her limbs just to hold on, and avoid his grip lest he get a good hold and spike her to the floor, an experience she wasn’t keen on her chances of surviving.

‘Hands are just convenient, girl,’ Willow’s voice whispered, and Kennedy, for once, caught her meaning immediately. If she’d had a free hand, she’d have used it to face palm.

Instead, she focused Willow’s power into her sinuous, barbed tail, which looked no less deadly as its tip faded to ethereal mist. She drove it forward, and Goliath froze as it pierced bloodlessly straight through his heart. He let out a grinding sigh, one that sounded more resigned than angry. The sound of a man finally resting at the end of a long day. Kennedy ripped it upwards, dragging the ghostly weapon out through his head, as the giant finally fell to his knees. She hopped off, absolutely fixated on the pulsing, beautiful orb transfixed on the tip of her tail.

Kennedy knew this was him. Everything the giant was despite how well it had been bound to its physical form. Freed from it, from that massive, perfect repository of a power never meant to be held by this small, wonderful, thing, it was at peace.

A burst of warning from Cait, and she let it go, off to whatever awaited those who escaped this realm, a moment before a purple tentacle speared the space it had just occupied.