Amulet fic... originally a drabble, turned out way, WAY bigger. =S
It’s not been properly spell-checked, it’s probably got some grammar errors but it’s already late, so here’s what happens when you go messing around with programming files and inadvertently give the Amulet a temporary power boost. Feel free to pick it to pieces.
*collapses*
The last time he’d made the mistake of coming to the carnival alone, he had almost gotten himself killed.
Mark wasn’t really worried about that this time. To be honest, he wasn’t worried about much. He didn’t care about the fact that he’d walked right out of class in the middle of a lesson, he didn’t care about the fact that he had sent someone with a pile of books flying as he left the room. He didn’t care about the fact that he’d left Random in LJ seeming very confused. He didn’t care about the risk of getting killed every time he went to the carnival. Because he knew there wasn’t a risk. At all.
Kat had said something to him about an “amulet” being a source of defence once. (She’d been the only one who’d actually done any research, being a reporter and all. Investigating was what she did.) But he’d had no idea it could do something like this. At some point he passed his neighbour on the street, Samantha’s mother. Walked straight past her without even acknowledging her greeting.
The carnival was empty when Mark got there, though it probably wasn’t closed… He stood there for a second and waited for…
Waited for what? Mark hesitated, suddenly a little confused as to just why he was here. The thought ‘what the hell,’ vaguely crossed his mind, but he didn’t give it the time of day. All he felt was… was…
Okay, he didn’t actually know what it was, but he wished Ace had told him about it sooner. What felt like charges of electricity raced through his body. Was this how Ace felt? After a power up? Or maybe how Sparx felt, all the time?
A sharp, maniacal laugh interrupted whatever thoughts he had.
‘Head’s above, Lightning bug!’
Mark smiled, though he didn’t really know why. Usually that voice sent a chill down his spine. It was like there was another voice in his head. Something telling him exactly what was going to happen and when it was going to happen.
He didn’t actually turn around.
He just felt a shudder, which should have been a huge blow to the back of the head and turned his head just in time to see Googler hurtling in the opposite direction.
Okay, this is cool!
There was another wild laugh. Maybe of pain, maybe surprise, maybe just total… craziness… with Googler it was about impossible to tell. Mark wasn’t bothered. He stood there with his arms folded watching Googler bounce back from behind a stall and uncurl.
There was some grumbling and a muttering of what sounded like “my brain hurts” from one of the puppets.
‘Missed.’ Mark said, surprising himself by how calm he sounded even though his breath was coming in gasps, he didn’t feel frightened. Not in the least.
‘Scrawny little Lightning Knight thinks he’s so smart?’ Googler cackled.
A blur of red – which one was that again?– came flying right at him. Mark winced, throwing up an arm to protect himself on impulse. Remembering how it felt to have Zip latch onto you and pump you full of whatever the poisonous… stuff was that it used to knock you out. But not this time. And this time, Mark saw exactly what happened. He saw the air in front of him glisten gold as the creature made impact and bounced right off again. The dangerous sock puppet that had once taken a huge bite out of a tree was sent sprawling backwards.
Mark found himself grinning. He couldn’t help it. Something was telling him that right now, whatever the amulet was doing was completely unbreakable. The crackling sensation increasing with every attack it deflected, until if felt as if it’s power was gripping his skin.
It didn’t hurt. Nothing hurt. Didn’t mean it felt right though. A small part of his brain was still screaming at him that this was completely insane, but Mark refused to listen to it. He glanced down at the amulet around his neck, feeling the energy crawling across his skin.
The next time he looked, Zip and Snip seemed to be bickering with each other (to hell if he couldn’t remember which was which.) From the crackling gold light in front of him, he figured they’d rammed into him a couple more times, while his attention was diverted. He hadn’t even noticed it.
‘I’m not hitting it again, you do it!’
‘No you!’
‘I just did!’
‘No! It hurts my teeth!’
‘Cry-baby! So it’s alright for me to get bounced!’’
‘Mortals don’t use shieldy-blocky-things! How was I supposed to know you’d bounce?’
‘Puts a sock in it, socks!’ Googler snapped. (That was probably the most sensible thing Mark had ever heard him say in his life.) ‘The lightning brat’s a goner!’
‘You wish. ‘Third time lucky, then?’ Mark said.
‘Googler’s gonna show ya, smart mouth! You can’t keep it up forever.’
He must’ve hit again with several times more force as before, this time. Whatever was happening to Mark obviously didn’t change the fact that he still weighed exactly the same. It still didn’t hurt or even make contact, but the impact shock was enough to send him staggering backwards. There was a painless “crack” as his back hit a stall. The energy of the amulet-induced shield causing the wood to splinter. He gasped, even though there wasn’t any pain. He’d had no idea being struck full on by Googler felt like THAT.
His next instinct was to raise his right arm, before he remembered he had nothing to shoot.
Great. Just great.
Okay, no matter. If Googler kept bouncing right into him like this he’d just wipe himself out anyway. It was a question of waiting. And… not getting knocked out.
Oookay so this wasn’t such a good idea.
Mark suddenly shook his head. His hand mechanically reached up to grasp the amulet piece around his neck and he felt it crackle with heat. And finally he asked himself the question he should probably have asked himself ten minutes ago: What am I doing?
Mark didn’t dwell on the thought for long. He staggered up again, dodging slightly to the side as the spiked projectile form of Googler pounced at him again. The movement of Mark’s “shield” made the insane clown fly off in completely the wrong direction, crashing right into the dunking booth. Mark almost laughed before the insane clown exploded out, smashing the stall half to pieces and sending multicoloured plastic flying in the process. Mark swallowed as several of them struck his shield and, quite literally, burst as they made contact. The puppets (who had been half buried in the cascade) started shrieking in surprise.
‘Hey, hey!’ Mark recognized the voice nearby. ‘Watch it out here! If you’re gonna do the whole battle-for-the-world thing, can you please keep it off the midway? This is where the—’ the carnival owner’s voice drained away as Mark turned and looked at him. He didn’t know exactly what Duff saw, but it freaked him out, and actually made Mark feel a little uneasy too.
‘What the san hill…’ Duff choked.
‘Get out!’ Mark yelled, finding he had to literally force the words out of his mouth. ‘Just get away from here!’
Duff didn’t need telling twice. A few seconds later he’d vanished behind one of the stalls, tripping on the plastic balls that were now decorating the midway.
Mark grit his teeth, feeling the vibration of Zip and Snip, trying to ram into him again and again and staggering every time and still, they couldn’t get to him. The thought What am I doing? leapt into his mind once again and this time he couldn’t ignore it.
He hadn’t had any reason to come here. He didn’t have any reason to want to fight. He tried to think of some logical explanation for where he was and what he was doing. Anger? Heck, he had a lot to be angry about this week. Month. Year. This… whatever had happened here was just giving him a possible means to show it.
Googler had done so much damage. Attacked him, attacked his friends. Wiped out Ace’s power. Wiped Sparx out completely – as good as murdered her. He tried to tell himself that these were the reasons he was here.
Why not? Why shouldn’t I teach this freak a lesson?
Googler struck. Harder again, slamming into him and making the shield spark, energy bursting along it’s shell. It could stop anything from hitting him, but it couldn’t stop him being knocked around like a skittle. For the first time Mark actually felt worried.
But he can’t break through this his own voice said at the forefront of his mind. Nothing can break through this. Not even Googler. He can’t hurt you no matter how hard he tries…
So… so why am I scared?
He didn’t have the chance to speak before he was on the ground again, slamming hard against the back of a stall. Googler let out a manic cackle. ‘Watch yourself, lightning junior, Googler’s gonna make ya pay.’
And that was when Mark heard something. Sounded like a superhero who has just come out of faster-than-light travel and was landing right in front of him. (Mark was only momentarily freaked by the fact that he actually KNEW what a superhero who has just come out of faster-than-light travel sounded like.)
‘Aren’t you supposed to be in school, kid?’ A voice said.
Mark blinked. ‘Ace, what’re you—’
‘Forget it, Mark, just get out of here!’ Ace didn’t bother with conversation. Mark tried to work out the look on his face. To be honest, he looked kind of like he did those few days after Mark has stupidly tried bargaining for amulet pieces with Lord fear, unwittingly threatening Lady Illusion’s life in the process.
‘Not likely,’ Mark muttered.
He would remind himself later on just how completely stupid and unlike him this behaviour was. For now though, it didn’t matter. The next thing he knew he was on his feet and half pushing past Ace
‘Mark, wait!’
Mark didn’t listen, he practically ran forwards, daring Googler to retaliate. He did. With his usual cackling gusto. Mark thrust out a hand on front of him, not to protect himself this time, but to force the shield of energy forwards. He saw Ace, raising his wrist cannon, ready to attack, but Googler struck the shield again.
The force of the impact sent both of them sprawling to the dirt. A spasm of pain burst in his shoulder.
Ace blinked. Suddenly realising what Chuck had meant when he said Googler was “bounced off him.”
‘What the… Mark how?’
‘Don’t ask!’ Mark stood up again, ‘I don’t have a clue! All I know is they can’t get to me, Ace. They can hit me as many times as they like, they can’t get through.’
‘Mark, this is crazy!’ Ace was still staring at him. ‘What the heck are you…’
‘Don’t worry, it doesn’t hurt, it CAN’T hurt.’
‘That’s not the point, Mark this has to have something to do with the—’
‘Heads up lightning!’ Ace never got the chance to finish his sentence before he was blocking an attack by Googler and narrowly missing being spiked.
‘Finally!’ Snip yelped. ‘A REAL hero to chew on!’
‘Yeah, bring on the cavalry, bub!’ Zip sniggered in response.
‘You handle the kid, Googler’s gonna do some googlerisin’!’
‘Awww!’ Zip obviously didn’t look happy at the thought of charging into the weird “shieldy-blocky-thing” again. ‘Do we have to?’
‘Yeah, now hop to it!’
‘Mark get back!’ Ace yelled, and honestly wasn’t that surprised when Mark didn’t listen to him.
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‘Stupid Amulet,’ Sparx muttered irritably as she swept the Flash in over the carnival. ‘Stupid computer files… stupid Chuck for not warning me what was in those files. I never even touched anything, this so has nothing to do with me.’
It was out of habit that she flew over the midway, one eye on her recently repaired NaviTech all the way. She was so intent on the reader, that it took her a few moments to notice the charges of electricity shooting around below her. Sparx jolted in her seat, having the momentary nasty thought that Ace and Fear had started on each other again…
No… wait. It was cool. He was blasting Googler, not Fear. That wasn’t so bad. She could cope with that…
Wait… Ace was blasting Googler?
‘Oh that’s great,’ Sparx muttered, pulling the Sword of Jacob out of thin air, charged by the very electricity running through her body. ‘They’ve gone and started the party without me!’
‘About time you got here, Sparx!’ Ace yelled as the Lightning Flash swept into view over the midway. Sparx didn’t answer, for a long moment she sat there, staring at Mark. Or rather at whatever that gold, shiny thing was AROUND Mark. She say Zip and Snip throwing themselves at the mortal over and over, going ‘Ow!’ every time they hit the shimmering wall-thingy and bounced off. It was kind of like… like those moths she always saw after dark, bashing themselves pointlessly against the lights in the Thunder tower or the Haunted House for hours on end.
Uh… O-kay that’s weird.‘Uh… yeah, Ace… care to fill me in here? Why are Punch and Judy bouncing off of Mark?’
‘I’d love to, Sparx!’ Ace yelled, firing a couple more sharp bursts at Googler and missing both times. ‘But your guess is as… good as mine!’
‘Um… alright, so why are—’ Her sentence was cut off by a violent jolt to the underside of the Flash and had to cling to the handlebars to avoid being thrown off. She grit her teeth in frustration. Damn it, not again! Should’ve seen that one coming. ‘You know this thing is falling to pieces as it is, why does everyone keep bashing the Flash?’
Sparx bit her lip as she leapt down from the ‘Flash, putting two and two together. ‘Okay, Ace, if this has anything to do with the amulet, it really wasn’t me—’
‘What?’ Ace frowned slightly. Distracting him, Sparx realised, was a bad idea, as the next second he was flying into her on the receiving end of one of Googler’s slam attacks.
‘Hey hey! Watch it, Ace!’
‘Sorry.’
Googler screeched with laughter somewhere behind them. Sparx felt herself fuming.
‘Ah put a sock in it, clown-face!’ she snapped. ‘We’re not finished with you yet.’
‘What, sure you’re even ALLOWED to attack Googler these days? Dunno if your boyfriend would approve.’
Sparx shifted uncomfortably. She tried to remind herself that Ace had human emotions now and, as a result, was prone to saying (and doing) stuff he’d regret later, but somehow she figured he meant it this time.
She snorted. ‘Yeah, sure, I mean it’s not like I couldn’t live with myself for pounding the guy… Fear does it all the time.’
‘Oh well, as long as THAT’S alright…’
‘Lay off it, Ace!’
‘Okay sure, this is not really the time, Sparx I…’ then he clicked. ‘Sparx do you have something to do with—’
‘No!’ Sparx interrupted way too quickly. ‘No I haven’t touched anything. I swear!’
Ace groaned. ‘Oh great, just great! Didn’t Chuck WARN you about that?’
Sparx bit her lip, seeming to faintly recall Chuck telling her something about “not messing around in people’s heads” which she hadn’t really been listening too. ‘Um…’ she was saved from answering by another headlong charge from Googler, narrowly missing her.
‘Sparx do you realise we’re probably lucky to still have all our body parts after you’ve been messing round in there?!’
‘Hey I didn’t touch anything, okay? Nothing at all I was just… just looking.’
‘You were just… Sparx, why can’t you THINK about these things?’
‘Hey I just said didn’t I? I didn’t touch anything., I’m not stupid enough to go rearranging peoples… heads or limbs or anything!’
‘No but you’re—’ Ace cut himself off.
Sparx grit her teeth, hastily reminding herself. an emotions, human emotions, human emotions. ‘What? I’ll do WHAT, Ace?’
‘Nothing. Forget about it. I said nothing.’
‘Ace—’
Sparx was about to retort, but instead caught her breath and raised her sword. Ace started realising it was pointing right at him, lifting an arm to shield his face.
‘Sparx!’ he gasped, but the burst of pink lightning shot straight past him and crashed into Googler who cried out and leapt away again. ‘Oh… Um… thanks.’ Ace mumbled. ‘Now watch out!’ he yelled and Sparx turned just in time to deflect a blow from Snip on her sword. Ace flicked his head round.
‘Mark, you don’t have a weapon, are you going to get out of here or what?’
‘Ace, what the heck is the kid DOING?’ Sparx yelled, without getting an answer. Googler was too distracting. He fired again and again, each shot missing by a fraction of a second. Googler certainly hadn’t slowed down since their last encounter.
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Mark barely heard this exchange of frustration. He was too distracted. Something had changed now. He could hear the blood rushing in his ears at what had to be three times it’s normal speed and feel a web of electricity lance up his spine with every time the puppets threw themselves at him; the shield shaking so violently it knocked him off his feet.
He stumbled up again, opening his mouth to yell ‘Can’t you… take a hint?’ at them, but no sound came out, only a gasp of shock as the two puppets threw themselves together. There was a sudden violent crackling from the amulet, like a defective wire. All of a sudden Mark felt… weird. Small. Trapped inside a bubble of energy with fifty times the power he had. He heard Ace yelling his name. His hand shot up in defence and this time, Zip burst the shield and latched onto him. An all too familiar pain shot in straight to his bones.
Pain… Uhoh…
‘Mark!’
He just about saw Sparx, reaching out towards him, the sword of Jacob clutched in one hand, the other reaching out and gripping the puppet trying to take a chunk out of his arm. There was a shower of purple sparks, energy shooting in waves down Sparx’s arm, mingling with whatever remained of the gold. That was about four seconds before everything blacked out.
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Sparx grinned, feeling the familiar energy thumping in her wrist and hand and fingers as she gripped the puppet, listening to it screech in surprise as her upgrade took effect. I love you, Chuck. She gave Zip a tug, surprised that the usually weirdly strong puppet didn’t put up a fight, at the same time she saw one of Ace’s attacks finally hit home and Googler, already battered by the multiple ramming against Mark’s “shield”, crackled and faded with a last screech of insanity.
Sparx would have liked to use that moment to turn to the astonished Ace and do that blowing-on-finger thing she saw them do with guns, like in that movie she and Chuck had seen. Unfortunately, she was kind of distracted by having to catch Mark before he fell into her, barely giving her enough time to turn the Pulse upgrade OFF first.
Sparx bit her tongue. ‘Oops,’ she muttered.
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He could hear again before he could actually see anything.
‘Mark? Mark, are you alright?’
‘Hey! Earth to Mark? Feel free to return to base any time now!’
‘You do realise that you really have to stop listening to the rat’s jokes?’
‘I DON’T listen to him, pounding him is much more fun. Stupid Googler, this is his fault…’
‘Oh so it was GOOGLER who messed around in the amulet programming files?’
‘Hey, Googler did this, not me! I just… looked at them, I didn’t touch anything. You know I wouldn’t try and hurt anyone!’
‘Whatever,’ Ace sighed. Adding afterwards. ‘Nice catch, by the way.’
‘Oh ha, ha. He nearly got a taste of my upgrade though…’
Great.. they were arguing again. What was it about this time?
Wait…
Mark blinked, his eyes flickering open of their own accord. Instinctively, his hand sought the amulet around his neck and gripped it like some kind of reflex action.
‘Mark.’ Ace had a hand at his back and was helping him sit up. ‘You okay, kid?’
‘yeah and care to fill us in on exactly WHAT the heck that was all about?’ Sparx said before Mark could reply, actually looking amused by something in a concerned sort of way… Mark tried to think why.
‘Um… I… would if I could?’
‘Seriously Mark,’ Sparx said. ‘THAT, was just freaky.’ She held up her hand, purple sparks dancing on her fingertips. ‘But hey, I did get a chance to try this out.’
Mark frowned. ‘Um... What’re you…’ then he noticed the carnival. The last thing he remembered was typing something to Random in LJ when he was supposed to be concentrating on programming creation or… something. And at some point he heard Mrs Thompson, uttering a yell of surprise. A glimmer of gold, a sharp pain in his arm… ‘Okay… why do I get the feeling I’m supposed to be being bored out of my skull in a classroom right now?’
Ace sighed as Mark got slowly to his feet. ‘Mark, I think we have some memory gaps to fill.’ He looked at Sparx, scowling. ‘And some program files to secure.’
‘I just said, it wasn’t m… oh never mind, you don’t believe me anyway.’
‘I never said I didn’t believe you.’
‘Yeah, but you were thinking it.’
‘I was not thinking anything, I was more worried about whether one of my sidekicks was going to get killed.’
Mark sighed, not honestly caring what the heck they were going on about. His head felt like somebody had attacked him with a hammer or something.
‘Look can we… just… get out of the carnival before something? I mean, this is not usually a good place to be when it’s deserted?’
Sparx grunted. ‘Hey you’re the one who brought US here, kid.’
‘What? Why would I…’ Mark hesitated, remembering the gold glimmering on his skin and a vague memory of complete invincibility wavering in the back of his mind. Along with the feeling of being totally and utterly doomed when he got back home. ‘Oh…’ he muttered. ‘Right…’
‘Yeah,’ Sparx said bluntly. ‘Right.’ She stood back and whistled for the flash.
‘Where are you going?’
‘Home,’ Sparx started to say, then noticing the luck on his face bit her tongue. ‘Well… Chuck’s. I’ve got some explaining to do… even though it’s absolutely not. At. All. My. Fault!’ She looked at Mark, half ignoring Ace. ‘And next time you get a power boost, kid, don’t do it when I’m online and they can blame me for it.’
‘Um… yeah. Sure.’ Mark mumbled, still not getting any of it.
‘Sparx—’ Ace started, but whatever he was going to say faded out in the sound of the Flash’s engine.
Mark didn’t say anything. He figured that he’d only end up making things worse. He tried to reach out and pat Ace’s shoulder, but ended up wincing as a strand of gold electricity weaved its way up his arm. ‘So… bad day, huh?’ he mumbled, rubbing his arm.
*collapses*
The last time he’d made the mistake of coming to the carnival alone, he had almost gotten himself killed.
Mark wasn’t really worried about that this time. To be honest, he wasn’t worried about much. He didn’t care about the fact that he’d walked right out of class in the middle of a lesson, he didn’t care about the fact that he had sent someone with a pile of books flying as he left the room. He didn’t care about the fact that he’d left Random in LJ seeming very confused. He didn’t care about the risk of getting killed every time he went to the carnival. Because he knew there wasn’t a risk. At all.
Kat had said something to him about an “amulet” being a source of defence once. (She’d been the only one who’d actually done any research, being a reporter and all. Investigating was what she did.) But he’d had no idea it could do something like this. At some point he passed his neighbour on the street, Samantha’s mother. Walked straight past her without even acknowledging her greeting.
The carnival was empty when Mark got there, though it probably wasn’t closed… He stood there for a second and waited for…
Waited for what? Mark hesitated, suddenly a little confused as to just why he was here. The thought ‘what the hell,’ vaguely crossed his mind, but he didn’t give it the time of day. All he felt was… was…
Okay, he didn’t actually know what it was, but he wished Ace had told him about it sooner. What felt like charges of electricity raced through his body. Was this how Ace felt? After a power up? Or maybe how Sparx felt, all the time?
A sharp, maniacal laugh interrupted whatever thoughts he had.
‘Head’s above, Lightning bug!’
Mark smiled, though he didn’t really know why. Usually that voice sent a chill down his spine. It was like there was another voice in his head. Something telling him exactly what was going to happen and when it was going to happen.
He didn’t actually turn around.
He just felt a shudder, which should have been a huge blow to the back of the head and turned his head just in time to see Googler hurtling in the opposite direction.
Okay, this is cool!
There was another wild laugh. Maybe of pain, maybe surprise, maybe just total… craziness… with Googler it was about impossible to tell. Mark wasn’t bothered. He stood there with his arms folded watching Googler bounce back from behind a stall and uncurl.
There was some grumbling and a muttering of what sounded like “my brain hurts” from one of the puppets.
‘Missed.’ Mark said, surprising himself by how calm he sounded even though his breath was coming in gasps, he didn’t feel frightened. Not in the least.
‘Scrawny little Lightning Knight thinks he’s so smart?’ Googler cackled.
A blur of red – which one was that again?– came flying right at him. Mark winced, throwing up an arm to protect himself on impulse. Remembering how it felt to have Zip latch onto you and pump you full of whatever the poisonous… stuff was that it used to knock you out. But not this time. And this time, Mark saw exactly what happened. He saw the air in front of him glisten gold as the creature made impact and bounced right off again. The dangerous sock puppet that had once taken a huge bite out of a tree was sent sprawling backwards.
Mark found himself grinning. He couldn’t help it. Something was telling him that right now, whatever the amulet was doing was completely unbreakable. The crackling sensation increasing with every attack it deflected, until if felt as if it’s power was gripping his skin.
It didn’t hurt. Nothing hurt. Didn’t mean it felt right though. A small part of his brain was still screaming at him that this was completely insane, but Mark refused to listen to it. He glanced down at the amulet around his neck, feeling the energy crawling across his skin.
The next time he looked, Zip and Snip seemed to be bickering with each other (to hell if he couldn’t remember which was which.) From the crackling gold light in front of him, he figured they’d rammed into him a couple more times, while his attention was diverted. He hadn’t even noticed it.
‘I’m not hitting it again, you do it!’
‘No you!’
‘I just did!’
‘No! It hurts my teeth!’
‘Cry-baby! So it’s alright for me to get bounced!’’
‘Mortals don’t use shieldy-blocky-things! How was I supposed to know you’d bounce?’
‘Puts a sock in it, socks!’ Googler snapped. (That was probably the most sensible thing Mark had ever heard him say in his life.) ‘The lightning brat’s a goner!’
‘You wish. ‘Third time lucky, then?’ Mark said.
‘Googler’s gonna show ya, smart mouth! You can’t keep it up forever.’
He must’ve hit again with several times more force as before, this time. Whatever was happening to Mark obviously didn’t change the fact that he still weighed exactly the same. It still didn’t hurt or even make contact, but the impact shock was enough to send him staggering backwards. There was a painless “crack” as his back hit a stall. The energy of the amulet-induced shield causing the wood to splinter. He gasped, even though there wasn’t any pain. He’d had no idea being struck full on by Googler felt like THAT.
His next instinct was to raise his right arm, before he remembered he had nothing to shoot.
Great. Just great.
Okay, no matter. If Googler kept bouncing right into him like this he’d just wipe himself out anyway. It was a question of waiting. And… not getting knocked out.
Oookay so this wasn’t such a good idea.
Mark suddenly shook his head. His hand mechanically reached up to grasp the amulet piece around his neck and he felt it crackle with heat. And finally he asked himself the question he should probably have asked himself ten minutes ago: What am I doing?
Mark didn’t dwell on the thought for long. He staggered up again, dodging slightly to the side as the spiked projectile form of Googler pounced at him again. The movement of Mark’s “shield” made the insane clown fly off in completely the wrong direction, crashing right into the dunking booth. Mark almost laughed before the insane clown exploded out, smashing the stall half to pieces and sending multicoloured plastic flying in the process. Mark swallowed as several of them struck his shield and, quite literally, burst as they made contact. The puppets (who had been half buried in the cascade) started shrieking in surprise.
‘Hey, hey!’ Mark recognized the voice nearby. ‘Watch it out here! If you’re gonna do the whole battle-for-the-world thing, can you please keep it off the midway? This is where the—’ the carnival owner’s voice drained away as Mark turned and looked at him. He didn’t know exactly what Duff saw, but it freaked him out, and actually made Mark feel a little uneasy too.
‘What the san hill…’ Duff choked.
‘Get out!’ Mark yelled, finding he had to literally force the words out of his mouth. ‘Just get away from here!’
Duff didn’t need telling twice. A few seconds later he’d vanished behind one of the stalls, tripping on the plastic balls that were now decorating the midway.
Mark grit his teeth, feeling the vibration of Zip and Snip, trying to ram into him again and again and staggering every time and still, they couldn’t get to him. The thought What am I doing? leapt into his mind once again and this time he couldn’t ignore it.
He hadn’t had any reason to come here. He didn’t have any reason to want to fight. He tried to think of some logical explanation for where he was and what he was doing. Anger? Heck, he had a lot to be angry about this week. Month. Year. This… whatever had happened here was just giving him a possible means to show it.
Googler had done so much damage. Attacked him, attacked his friends. Wiped out Ace’s power. Wiped Sparx out completely – as good as murdered her. He tried to tell himself that these were the reasons he was here.
Why not? Why shouldn’t I teach this freak a lesson?
Googler struck. Harder again, slamming into him and making the shield spark, energy bursting along it’s shell. It could stop anything from hitting him, but it couldn’t stop him being knocked around like a skittle. For the first time Mark actually felt worried.
But he can’t break through this his own voice said at the forefront of his mind. Nothing can break through this. Not even Googler. He can’t hurt you no matter how hard he tries…
So… so why am I scared?
He didn’t have the chance to speak before he was on the ground again, slamming hard against the back of a stall. Googler let out a manic cackle. ‘Watch yourself, lightning junior, Googler’s gonna make ya pay.’
And that was when Mark heard something. Sounded like a superhero who has just come out of faster-than-light travel and was landing right in front of him. (Mark was only momentarily freaked by the fact that he actually KNEW what a superhero who has just come out of faster-than-light travel sounded like.)
‘Aren’t you supposed to be in school, kid?’ A voice said.
Mark blinked. ‘Ace, what’re you—’
‘Forget it, Mark, just get out of here!’ Ace didn’t bother with conversation. Mark tried to work out the look on his face. To be honest, he looked kind of like he did those few days after Mark has stupidly tried bargaining for amulet pieces with Lord fear, unwittingly threatening Lady Illusion’s life in the process.
‘Not likely,’ Mark muttered.
He would remind himself later on just how completely stupid and unlike him this behaviour was. For now though, it didn’t matter. The next thing he knew he was on his feet and half pushing past Ace
‘Mark, wait!’
Mark didn’t listen, he practically ran forwards, daring Googler to retaliate. He did. With his usual cackling gusto. Mark thrust out a hand on front of him, not to protect himself this time, but to force the shield of energy forwards. He saw Ace, raising his wrist cannon, ready to attack, but Googler struck the shield again.
The force of the impact sent both of them sprawling to the dirt. A spasm of pain burst in his shoulder.
Ace blinked. Suddenly realising what Chuck had meant when he said Googler was “bounced off him.”
‘What the… Mark how?’
‘Don’t ask!’ Mark stood up again, ‘I don’t have a clue! All I know is they can’t get to me, Ace. They can hit me as many times as they like, they can’t get through.’
‘Mark, this is crazy!’ Ace was still staring at him. ‘What the heck are you…’
‘Don’t worry, it doesn’t hurt, it CAN’T hurt.’
‘That’s not the point, Mark this has to have something to do with the—’
‘Heads up lightning!’ Ace never got the chance to finish his sentence before he was blocking an attack by Googler and narrowly missing being spiked.
‘Finally!’ Snip yelped. ‘A REAL hero to chew on!’
‘Yeah, bring on the cavalry, bub!’ Zip sniggered in response.
‘You handle the kid, Googler’s gonna do some googlerisin’!’
‘Awww!’ Zip obviously didn’t look happy at the thought of charging into the weird “shieldy-blocky-thing” again. ‘Do we have to?’
‘Yeah, now hop to it!’
‘Mark get back!’ Ace yelled, and honestly wasn’t that surprised when Mark didn’t listen to him.
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‘Stupid Amulet,’ Sparx muttered irritably as she swept the Flash in over the carnival. ‘Stupid computer files… stupid Chuck for not warning me what was in those files. I never even touched anything, this so has nothing to do with me.’
It was out of habit that she flew over the midway, one eye on her recently repaired NaviTech all the way. She was so intent on the reader, that it took her a few moments to notice the charges of electricity shooting around below her. Sparx jolted in her seat, having the momentary nasty thought that Ace and Fear had started on each other again…
No… wait. It was cool. He was blasting Googler, not Fear. That wasn’t so bad. She could cope with that…
Wait… Ace was blasting Googler?
‘Oh that’s great,’ Sparx muttered, pulling the Sword of Jacob out of thin air, charged by the very electricity running through her body. ‘They’ve gone and started the party without me!’
‘About time you got here, Sparx!’ Ace yelled as the Lightning Flash swept into view over the midway. Sparx didn’t answer, for a long moment she sat there, staring at Mark. Or rather at whatever that gold, shiny thing was AROUND Mark. She say Zip and Snip throwing themselves at the mortal over and over, going ‘Ow!’ every time they hit the shimmering wall-thingy and bounced off. It was kind of like… like those moths she always saw after dark, bashing themselves pointlessly against the lights in the Thunder tower or the Haunted House for hours on end.
Uh… O-kay that’s weird.‘Uh… yeah, Ace… care to fill me in here? Why are Punch and Judy bouncing off of Mark?’
‘I’d love to, Sparx!’ Ace yelled, firing a couple more sharp bursts at Googler and missing both times. ‘But your guess is as… good as mine!’
‘Um… alright, so why are—’ Her sentence was cut off by a violent jolt to the underside of the Flash and had to cling to the handlebars to avoid being thrown off. She grit her teeth in frustration. Damn it, not again! Should’ve seen that one coming. ‘You know this thing is falling to pieces as it is, why does everyone keep bashing the Flash?’
Sparx bit her lip as she leapt down from the ‘Flash, putting two and two together. ‘Okay, Ace, if this has anything to do with the amulet, it really wasn’t me—’
‘What?’ Ace frowned slightly. Distracting him, Sparx realised, was a bad idea, as the next second he was flying into her on the receiving end of one of Googler’s slam attacks.
‘Hey hey! Watch it, Ace!’
‘Sorry.’
Googler screeched with laughter somewhere behind them. Sparx felt herself fuming.
‘Ah put a sock in it, clown-face!’ she snapped. ‘We’re not finished with you yet.’
‘What, sure you’re even ALLOWED to attack Googler these days? Dunno if your boyfriend would approve.’
Sparx shifted uncomfortably. She tried to remind herself that Ace had human emotions now and, as a result, was prone to saying (and doing) stuff he’d regret later, but somehow she figured he meant it this time.
She snorted. ‘Yeah, sure, I mean it’s not like I couldn’t live with myself for pounding the guy… Fear does it all the time.’
‘Oh well, as long as THAT’S alright…’
‘Lay off it, Ace!’
‘Okay sure, this is not really the time, Sparx I…’ then he clicked. ‘Sparx do you have something to do with—’
‘No!’ Sparx interrupted way too quickly. ‘No I haven’t touched anything. I swear!’
Ace groaned. ‘Oh great, just great! Didn’t Chuck WARN you about that?’
Sparx bit her lip, seeming to faintly recall Chuck telling her something about “not messing around in people’s heads” which she hadn’t really been listening too. ‘Um…’ she was saved from answering by another headlong charge from Googler, narrowly missing her.
‘Sparx do you realise we’re probably lucky to still have all our body parts after you’ve been messing round in there?!’
‘Hey I didn’t touch anything, okay? Nothing at all I was just… just looking.’
‘You were just… Sparx, why can’t you THINK about these things?’
‘Hey I just said didn’t I? I didn’t touch anything., I’m not stupid enough to go rearranging peoples… heads or limbs or anything!’
‘No but you’re—’ Ace cut himself off.
Sparx grit her teeth, hastily reminding herself. an emotions, human emotions, human emotions. ‘What? I’ll do WHAT, Ace?’
‘Nothing. Forget about it. I said nothing.’
‘Ace—’
Sparx was about to retort, but instead caught her breath and raised her sword. Ace started realising it was pointing right at him, lifting an arm to shield his face.
‘Sparx!’ he gasped, but the burst of pink lightning shot straight past him and crashed into Googler who cried out and leapt away again. ‘Oh… Um… thanks.’ Ace mumbled. ‘Now watch out!’ he yelled and Sparx turned just in time to deflect a blow from Snip on her sword. Ace flicked his head round.
‘Mark, you don’t have a weapon, are you going to get out of here or what?’
‘Ace, what the heck is the kid DOING?’ Sparx yelled, without getting an answer. Googler was too distracting. He fired again and again, each shot missing by a fraction of a second. Googler certainly hadn’t slowed down since their last encounter.
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Mark barely heard this exchange of frustration. He was too distracted. Something had changed now. He could hear the blood rushing in his ears at what had to be three times it’s normal speed and feel a web of electricity lance up his spine with every time the puppets threw themselves at him; the shield shaking so violently it knocked him off his feet.
He stumbled up again, opening his mouth to yell ‘Can’t you… take a hint?’ at them, but no sound came out, only a gasp of shock as the two puppets threw themselves together. There was a sudden violent crackling from the amulet, like a defective wire. All of a sudden Mark felt… weird. Small. Trapped inside a bubble of energy with fifty times the power he had. He heard Ace yelling his name. His hand shot up in defence and this time, Zip burst the shield and latched onto him. An all too familiar pain shot in straight to his bones.
Pain… Uhoh…
‘Mark!’
He just about saw Sparx, reaching out towards him, the sword of Jacob clutched in one hand, the other reaching out and gripping the puppet trying to take a chunk out of his arm. There was a shower of purple sparks, energy shooting in waves down Sparx’s arm, mingling with whatever remained of the gold. That was about four seconds before everything blacked out.
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Sparx grinned, feeling the familiar energy thumping in her wrist and hand and fingers as she gripped the puppet, listening to it screech in surprise as her upgrade took effect. I love you, Chuck. She gave Zip a tug, surprised that the usually weirdly strong puppet didn’t put up a fight, at the same time she saw one of Ace’s attacks finally hit home and Googler, already battered by the multiple ramming against Mark’s “shield”, crackled and faded with a last screech of insanity.
Sparx would have liked to use that moment to turn to the astonished Ace and do that blowing-on-finger thing she saw them do with guns, like in that movie she and Chuck had seen. Unfortunately, she was kind of distracted by having to catch Mark before he fell into her, barely giving her enough time to turn the Pulse upgrade OFF first.
Sparx bit her tongue. ‘Oops,’ she muttered.
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He could hear again before he could actually see anything.
‘Mark? Mark, are you alright?’
‘Hey! Earth to Mark? Feel free to return to base any time now!’
‘You do realise that you really have to stop listening to the rat’s jokes?’
‘I DON’T listen to him, pounding him is much more fun. Stupid Googler, this is his fault…’
‘Oh so it was GOOGLER who messed around in the amulet programming files?’
‘Hey, Googler did this, not me! I just… looked at them, I didn’t touch anything. You know I wouldn’t try and hurt anyone!’
‘Whatever,’ Ace sighed. Adding afterwards. ‘Nice catch, by the way.’
‘Oh ha, ha. He nearly got a taste of my upgrade though…’
Great.. they were arguing again. What was it about this time?
Wait…
Mark blinked, his eyes flickering open of their own accord. Instinctively, his hand sought the amulet around his neck and gripped it like some kind of reflex action.
‘Mark.’ Ace had a hand at his back and was helping him sit up. ‘You okay, kid?’
‘yeah and care to fill us in on exactly WHAT the heck that was all about?’ Sparx said before Mark could reply, actually looking amused by something in a concerned sort of way… Mark tried to think why.
‘Um… I… would if I could?’
‘Seriously Mark,’ Sparx said. ‘THAT, was just freaky.’ She held up her hand, purple sparks dancing on her fingertips. ‘But hey, I did get a chance to try this out.’
Mark frowned. ‘Um... What’re you…’ then he noticed the carnival. The last thing he remembered was typing something to Random in LJ when he was supposed to be concentrating on programming creation or… something. And at some point he heard Mrs Thompson, uttering a yell of surprise. A glimmer of gold, a sharp pain in his arm… ‘Okay… why do I get the feeling I’m supposed to be being bored out of my skull in a classroom right now?’
Ace sighed as Mark got slowly to his feet. ‘Mark, I think we have some memory gaps to fill.’ He looked at Sparx, scowling. ‘And some program files to secure.’
‘I just said, it wasn’t m… oh never mind, you don’t believe me anyway.’
‘I never said I didn’t believe you.’
‘Yeah, but you were thinking it.’
‘I was not thinking anything, I was more worried about whether one of my sidekicks was going to get killed.’
Mark sighed, not honestly caring what the heck they were going on about. His head felt like somebody had attacked him with a hammer or something.
‘Look can we… just… get out of the carnival before something? I mean, this is not usually a good place to be when it’s deserted?’
Sparx grunted. ‘Hey you’re the one who brought US here, kid.’
‘What? Why would I…’ Mark hesitated, remembering the gold glimmering on his skin and a vague memory of complete invincibility wavering in the back of his mind. Along with the feeling of being totally and utterly doomed when he got back home. ‘Oh…’ he muttered. ‘Right…’
‘Yeah,’ Sparx said bluntly. ‘Right.’ She stood back and whistled for the flash.
‘Where are you going?’
‘Home,’ Sparx started to say, then noticing the luck on his face bit her tongue. ‘Well… Chuck’s. I’ve got some explaining to do… even though it’s absolutely not. At. All. My. Fault!’ She looked at Mark, half ignoring Ace. ‘And next time you get a power boost, kid, don’t do it when I’m online and they can blame me for it.’
‘Um… yeah. Sure.’ Mark mumbled, still not getting any of it.
‘Sparx—’ Ace started, but whatever he was going to say faded out in the sound of the Flash’s engine.
Mark didn’t say anything. He figured that he’d only end up making things worse. He tried to reach out and pat Ace’s shoulder, but ended up wincing as a strand of gold electricity weaved its way up his arm. ‘So… bad day, huh?’ he mumbled, rubbing his arm.