War Game

Chapter 1 Battle Among the Dogwoods
James ran to the bathroom knowing it was a mistake but he didn’t realize how big of a mistake it was right at that moment. He just ran simply because he had to find a way to stop Frank and his gang from finding him. He rushed in but it didn’t shake them so he hid in a stall.
“Come out come out wherever you are.” Frank chanted.
James had no hope and he knew it he was now kicking open stalls and Frank and his gang were the only other ones there. One of the gang kicked open the stall James was hiding in. He knew he was doomed or so he thought.
“Here he is boss.” The guy said with no interest.
“Thanks Joe” Frank droned “Now do you know why I’m here? You didn’t pay me the twenty bucks so now you’re going to pay one way or another… with your blood or with you cash.” Frank managed an evil smile.
James knew he didn’t have the twenty bucks. He panicked. He didn’t know what to do could he use…? No that was out of the question he couldn’t blow his cover… not that easily. His mind chanted. He didn’t know what to do but he had to do it now.
“War Game!” James yelled with his entire soul.
A circle appeared with James in the center and it threw out everyone but him and Frank. It would be a battle for the ages. They were the only ones left. Then they were gone and then on what was like a floating island. James felt a pit in his stomach. He didn’t even know what he had just done. He just knew that he would have to use it to defend him now. He had no choice.
“Watch out for yourself now you’re the last hope to stop what you just started.” A voice from nowhere whispered.
He looked down at his shoulder and saw a small ball of blue light shining. Normally he would have panicked but for some reason he felt a connection to it. It felt just right to have it on his shoulder getting ready to go into battle.
“I’m your guardian. You can only see me in a War Game but I’m always there. I can tell you’re wondering what a War Game is. It’s a battle of sorts that only people with it can fight in. There are always different rules but well you make a wager and the winner gets their wager. That’s the basics. There is a few more rules. “
“Wagers!” A voice proclaimed
James looked up and was astonished to see a bright ball of pure white light illuminating the area. Staring at the miraculous sight, James thought of everything he had seen but none of it seemed to compare. James felt a connection to the thing in all of its beauty.
“Wagers!” it blared in the same voice.
“I just don’t want Frank to ever be able to do anything to me again.” James said glaring at Frank across the way.
It was the first time he realized Frank went with him. James smiled and wondered. If he had it in what form would it be? At first James thought his form of it was lame. Until he realized James could create razor sharp disks and throw them. James balled up his fists ready to use the power he had been granted. Well not really granted he just knew he had it, he really knew nothing about it.
“I want everything he owns.” Frank blurted in the middle of James’s thought.
“Rules: Last one standing wins. A fatal hit normally will just knock you out of the game. Begin”
He thought about what had been wagered for only a moment before a giant ball of lightning went right by his face. It went so close it singed his hair. He looked up and he saw Frank holding his hand out with his fingertips pointing towards him with a dark smile on his face. Whatever it was he had just done it had just begun.
James outstretched his hand palm our as the next ball of lightning came bolting through the air just waiting to kill him but it never hit. He had created a barrier right in the middle of the ball slicing it in half. The ball just simply disappeared.
James smiled and whispered under his breath “Not so big now are you”
His victory was short lived as three smaller balls rushed at him. He ducked and got a view of the horizon and only then did he realize where he was. He panicked. He panicked a hundred feet above the ground on a floating island filled with dogwood trees in full bloom.
His panic was ended by an electrical jolt to his shoulder. He was launched back into one of the dogwoods. Furies of petals were sent flying like bullets in a war zone, and truthfully that was what it was, a war zone. The petals reminded him of that old spring day filled with the dogwoods. James closed his eyes and remembered and he was gazing into his memory like a shadow.
He peered out at himself through his memories back to that old spring day when it had happened. The same memory that he had tried to forget happened next. The day that sent a plot twist into his life. He looked at Jeffrey’s old backyard.
“So all four of us have this thing whatever it is.” Jeffery accepted.
They looked at each other happily. Fate had brought them together and was just as soon going to take one of them away. Jeffry would never see another day.
“Whatever it is it comes in different forms. Like in your case being able to create wings made of energy and fly. Katelyn can control the wind. Jade can teleport things and well I can create barriers made of energy that can block things.” James said.
They had just found each other. Four people at the same school with powers they didn’t know much about. In fact all that they knew was that they all had them. That didn’t matter to them they had found others like them. The three that would remain would become the best of friends after the car accident that would take the other, Jeffry.
Katelyn added on “Man that’s not all you can do you can like make barriers like between objects and like cut them. Plus you can make them like have razor sharp edge and launch them without even throwing them.”
“Yours is so much better I would love to trade.” James lied.
He loved his power. He used it almost every day. It always proved useful and he loved how it helped him. It was the only thing that made him feel powerful. He had always played the victim of bulling and exclusion. Now he would finally make friends.
“We can’t tell anyone or it won’t end well. When people are different or more powerful than others it ends only one way, in death. They’ll feel intimidated by us then presto we’ll have a mob on our hands. Let’s make a pack. None of us will expose our powers to anyone else unless we’re sure they have powers too. Deal?” Jade spoke politically.
These words sunk James’s heart. He had been fantasizing about using them against the people that cut into him so much. He had always thought about using it but he never did for the same reason Jade had just said.
“Deal.” The three of them said all at once.
All of them stayed in the back yard and talked for a while and then they realized how similar they really were. They all faced the same problems with people at school and then a bond began to form. Then they said their goodbyes and they left. The next morning James, Katelyn, and Jade got the news. Jeffry had died in a car accident.
All three attended the funeral. They cried over a kid that they had only were really friends with for a day. No one else could understand the bond that they had shared. They asked anyone there to come up and say a few words. James went up and managed “He had the wings of an angel and now he is flying with the angels in heaven.”
Then he broke down. Most of the attendees did. Only two really knew what that meant and the three of them broke down harder than anyone else. They had not lost a friend they had lost a brother.
James snapped back to reality, if where he was really reality. There was no time to think about that now. Memories were just that, memories. They couldn’t be changed but the present can and now he was in a battle to the death.
“This is for you Jeffry.” James whispered.
More electricity balls were coming at him but he summoned a barrier. The balls bounced back at Frank. He was astonished and ducked. Too late. One of the balls struck him and Frank swiveled through the air into a pond that was on the arena as James thought of it. He couldn’t use his electricity in water or so he thought.
Frank rose out of the water standing on a disk made of electricity. He looked triumphant with a proud look on his face. He looked cocky perhaps a little too cocky. A razor sharp energy disk whipped at his head but he ducked but it was too late for the tip of his hair. It feel to the ground. He jumped off the lightning disk angry.
As he jumped of it shot at James. He didn’t panic he just stood there and waited with his arm extended palms out. He waited for the disk. When the disk was just about a foot away he made the barrier. There was an explosion. Dust flew everywhere around James. Frank watched, waited, and hoped it was enough to take him down.
An energy disk flew out of the cloud of dust by him. Frank cursed. James rose out of the cloud standing on an energy barrier. He smiled as Frank looked at him in awe.
“Looks like you’re not the only one who can rise out of a sticky situation on a disk Frank.” James mocked.
Frank didn’t even think he just threw the biggest ball of electricity he could at James. James created a circular barrier that he held at his hands. It cracked and broke on impact and James was forced of the disk he was standing on. He was freefalling.
The trees caught him and he was hanging by his shirt on a limb. The ground was really only about ten feet away but it felt like longer. James began to sweat. He was just plain afraid of heights and he looked down. He started to squirm as he fell. He was grateful to be on the ground again. He was more than grateful.
“You can’t be cocky… not here.” James lectured to himself.
That was when James realized Frank had lost sight of him. He let his guard down. He could use the element of surprise now. He began to look for Frank but he was just plain lost on the floating island a hundred feet above the ground.
Just when he started to give up he spotted Frank. He was hovering on a disk staring down at him. Frank pointed his fingers and shot. James was flung of the edge of the island. He grabbed the edge of it to stop him from falling. He know he couldn’t hold on for long. He looked down and panicked and then he saw his guardian on his shoulder.
“You’re not going to let Jeffry down are you.” His guardian reminded.
“No” James thought “And I know just what to do.”