Jackson Ford - Random Sh*t Flying Through the Air

Some kids have tempter tantrums. Others completely and totally lose their shit. Matthew is way past that. I don’t think I’ve seen an uglier expression on anybody, adult or child, in my whole life.

But as his piggy little eyes settle on me, something else crosses his face.

Surprise.

For a second, his attacks on Burr and the others stop. A dirt tentacle dissolves, dropping to ground with a huge whump . A rock, freed of Matthew’s mental control, impacts one of the shattered building walls.

“Up here, dickhead!” I yell.

Not exactly my strongest opening – especially since he’s already noticed me. I make up for it by sending two metal sheets whizzing through the air towards him.

Give him this: he reacts fast. Two pillars of dirt erupt from in front of him and bat the sheets aside. I have to focus hard to keep hold of the metal, bring them back under control. I move sideways, circling him twenty feet off the deck, doing everything I can to keep his attention.

No point trying to control the earth myself. Just because you’ve figured out you’re good at shooting three-pointers does not mean you’re ready for the NBA. I’ll stick to what I know here.

My platform, the car door, dips a little. It nearly topples me right off. I bring it back, willing it to stay in place. But I’m losing energy fast, much quicker than I should be.

“Yeah, come on!” I yell at him. At this point, I’m not exactly thinking too hard about what I’m saying, as long as it keeps his attention on me. “Do you know how goddamn long that paella took? My plan for Nic was totally working and you ruined it and you don’t even know what I’m talking about because you weren’t there, so how about you stop before I completely lose my shit? Huh? How about it?”

He howls – a little boy howl, nearly a scream. Two rocks, each one the size of a microwave, explode out of the ground. They fly through the air like they weigh no more than softballs, both aimed straight at me.

I swing two metal sheets around to my front just in time, blocking the rocks. There’s a thudding bang as they hit. The mental feedback as I take the impacts nearly makes me black out – I don’t actually know how I stay upright. No sooner do I deal with the rocks than a lance of twisting dirt snakes towards me. Then a second. I dodge around them both, slicing them in half with two more metal sheets. One of them reforms – literally just comes together again, undamaged – and whips at my head. I only just manage another dodge.

And all the while I’m circling, circling. I don’t know a lot about kids, but I do know this: it’s hard for them to pay attention to more than one thing at a time. I don’t care how smart they are. If I can just keep him focused on me…

Hey, Teagan, do anything fun on your trip to Washington? Oh, you know, just fought a giant dirt monster while riding a hoverboard. Nothing special.

From where I am right now, I can’t see any of the others – no Burr, no Annie, no nobody.

At that moment, Matthew attacks with everything he has. He’s fast – scary fast. Rocks, big and small, hurtle through the air towards me. Three dirt tentacles, right on their heels. I drop, stomach lurching as my platform moves downwards, only just avoiding getting brained. It takes every ounce of control I have to block the rest, swinging my metal sheets around in front of me and over my head. I’ve only got four left, three sheets and the car door – I lost track of the others at some point, missed them in the chaos.

Christ on a bicycle, isn’t this kid tired yet? Or is he like me, running on adrenaline?

I’m almost hyperventilating, exhaustion pulling at me. It slows my reactions, winkles soft fingers into my grip on the metal sheets. I force it back, dodging and ducking and weaving in and out of the trees.

That turns out to a mega-shitty idea, because the next thing Matthew does is collapse a tree on top of me.

There’s an enormous, crunching, ripping sound, and then the tree next to me fills my vision. I spin sideways, out of control now. Branches scrape my at my arm, leaves whipping at my face. I only just manage to not get crushed, but the tree takes out two of my metal sheets, burying them as it collapses to the forest floor.

And still no sign of Annie. She was right – this isn’t a plan, this is suicide. I am very quickly running out of juice, and it feels like I’m trying to fight the entire planet. For the second time today, death – the real deal, good night, game over – claws at my mind.

But this time…

This time, I smile back. The adrenaline and the exhaustion and the sheer insanity of what I’m doing all come together, ripping an cackling laugh from me, even as I try to stay afloat.

I grab hold of my car door with both hands, launch it forward. Just as the kid launches another dirt tentacle at me, I duck under it and throw myself right at him, screaming out of the sky like a meteor.

For a second, there’s nothing between us. No flying rocks, no pillars of dirt. Just him and me, separated by thirty feet of air.

He reacts quickly, sending a wave of dirt that looks like the one that he threw at the camp building, after Okoro missed. I turn upwards, flying over it, letting it crash to the ground beneath me.

And right then, I see Annie.

Annie and Burr.

They’re both sprinting as fast as they can across the broken ground, hunting for a gap in Matthew’s shield. I want to yell at them that it’s too soon, they’re never going to get past it—

Except they are. The spinning cylinder of soil and rock that Matthew has surrounded himself with is getting patchy. It’s much less solid than before. Even now Burr has his gun up, as if hunting for a clear shot. As long as I keep Matthew focused on me, he might just get it.

Of course, I may actually die before that happens. Matthew won’t even have to kill me. I’ll just drop dead from exhaustion.

“Come on!” I roar at Matthew, dodging yet another rock. “You want a piece of this? I’ve taken shits bigger than you, you little brat!”

It’s working. He gives one of those little-boy-howls, sending another wave of soil lurching towards me.

Behind him, Annie gets a clear shot.

I actually see it happen. The gap appearing in the wall, right in front of her. She drops to one knee, raises her rifle, takes aim.

And Matthew…

I don’t know whether he hears something, or just senses it. But he spins round, eyes wide in surprise. Before Annie can take the shot, he closes the gap, shielding himself with another wall of earth that appears as if from nowhere.

Burr yells something inaudible, and both he and Annie open up. Yellow muzzle flash spits from their guns as they fire in controlled bursts. I don’t know if they’ve seen a gap I’ve missed, or if they’re trying to create one through sheer volume of fire, and I don’t care.

I dive back in, one metal sheet left – I don’t even know where the others have gone. I hurl it at Matthew’s head, spinning it through the air. He knocks it aside, and I bring it right back, refusing to give, dodging left and right because through some goddamn miracle I am still riding the car door. We hit the kid on two fronts, forcing him to focus on the wall and on me.

He drops to his knees, face still twisted in that horrible grimace. It’s working. It’s working! Any second now, he’s going to make a mistake. He’ll let a gap open up in the wall, or my lone remaining metal sheet is going to get past his defences.

Through the flying dirt, his eyes meet mine.

What I see in them isn’t defeat. It’s not even anger. It’s triumph. It’s the look of a kid who just had a really cool idea.