Fighting the Boss

Mamoru didn’t reply. He pointed the tip of the blade at the newcomer.

Yes, yes, kill him! Hikari hissed. Her ghostly vestige glowed red. Mamoru shook his head, a mistake in the end as his back smashed into the far wall. He spat up blood and felt his legs go weak. Everything seemed to become under a strong blue light that danced like a hundred lanterns were lit overhead.

The lazy man stood where Mamoru had just been with fist outstretched. The opponent’s hair had suddenly turned blacker than the night sky and hung down to his feet. Two horns bulged out from under the hair with pale complexion that followed the loss of color across his face. He looked at Mamoru with red eyes that remained just as disinterested before the transformation and sighed. The man pushed the hair behind his shoulders and fiddled with the device on his waist.

“The artificers and their silly magic tech, this thing is always so uncomfortable to use.”

Mamoru stood up with shaky legs, he had to use the sword as a crutch for only a moment before turning it back onto the opponent. Two slashes of air whistled across the blue tinted warehouse and harmlessly smashed into the man. “Hmm. Still a little fight in you. Lord Maou won’t like that at all.”

A voice that wasn’t Hikari’s began to scream in Mamoru’s head. The blade fell from his hands and he pressed them to his ears.

WHY MAMORU, WHY DID YOU LET ME LEAVE? WHY WON’T YOU COME? ARE YOU TOO WEAK TO SAVE ME?

The voice was of his sisters, and she was screaming in more agony than Mamoru ever thought he could imagine a voice making. Did that make it real? He wasn’t sure. The high school boy fell to his knees as the screaming continued in his head. His whole body felt cold, still, as if he was locked inside a freezer, but he was sweating intensely at the same time.

The man lifted Mamoru up by his shirt and ripped his mask off, he chuckled at the face of the highschooler, and tossed the boy across the room. He crashed through some crates and rolled across the hard floor.

“I suppose this does make for an interesting toy,” the transformed opponent muttered as he picked up the katana. A second later he winced and the blade clanged on the ground. “It cut me? A cursed blade then? How interesting.”

Mamoru still lay with the voice of his sister screaming in misery. If any part of it was true, then every second he waited was a second longer she would suffer, but the screams kept him frozen. What if he wasn’t good enough? What if he was going to fail his sister again? This opponent so easily bested him.

Mamoru! Hikari’s voice cut the noise. It was gruffer than it had been, like when he first picked the sword up, but it was still recognizably hers and not his screaming sister.

“I, ah!” Mamoru replied. Every part of him ached, the screaming continued, and the pale man was kicking the katana like a soccer ball as he approached the downed boy.

That guy is going to kill you. You need to fight!

Hikari’s words were easier said than done, she didn’t have to live with the voices in her head.

The attacker stopped about halfway across the warehouse and looked down at his foot. The floor had suddenly broken, and a fragment popped up as a trip hazard. He frowned and kicked the hazard so hard stones bounced off Mamoru’s face.

“Ohohoho, I suppose that was a bit too obvious.” Yamiko floated just above the broken window and looked down on the battlers below. Her face was one a student wore when they were about to take a test for their worst subject, without studying, but she continued her forced gloat all the same. “And if you don’t want to face the full wrath of an itako, you will tell me what you have done with the yokai whose powers you stole!”

“I ate it,” the man lazily replied with zero care for what he said. That gave the purple-haired girl a shock.

“You… you… surely you can’t mean….”

Mamoru, now, while he distracted, grab the sword and cut him down!

“Can’t,” Mamoru grunted, “Too loud.” The voice of his sister did not let up even with other outside distractions. He was starting to believe that he could see her face with all the agony to accompany the screams, and he felt even weaker for it.

You hear something then? Ah, he’s in your head! Okay, whatever you are hearing is just an illusion of fear manifesting as sound, try thinking of something else with sound to push it down!

“Not helping,” Mamoru grunted as he pressed his hands down firmer on his ears.

Something else to hear, something else to hear that can occupy you mind…. Ah drat. Fine.

Hikari sighed. She made a sound like a deep breath, then began to sing. The Mirai song Mamoru had let loop in his head was now pushing its way back in. At first the thoughts of the screams seemed to fight with the earworm, but as he focused on the lyrics the sounds of the false sister were lessened and he was able to stand up.

Okay, that seems to have done it.

MAMORU WHY?

Mamoru winced and Hikari whined.

I have to keep singing this stupid song? Fine, just defeat him quickly.

She began to sing the song once more, her voice sounded like fresh rain after a long drought. It was nothing like Mirai’s chipper voice that he did his best to keep looping as accompaniment.

The pale man was focused on Yamiko, who with movements of her hand, disrupted the floor and flung harmless stones at him. Eventually he must have gotten tired of it. He caught a stone and threw it like a pitcher going for the strikeout at the floating girl. She yelped and dropped to the ground below.

Mamoru didn’t waste any more time; he spurted to the sword and slashed upward as soon as it was in his hand. The man winced as the tip of the blade made a clean flesh wound across his arm.

A fist was wound back, certain death if it hit Mamoru directly. He stepped to the side and let the pale man’s attack graze his side. It felt as if his side was burst open, but he pushed through the pain and focused back on Hikari’s singing.

A downward strike of his sword cleaved into the man’s outstretched arm, but it wasn’t strong enough to cut through the bone. Mamoru took a back hand from the opponent’s free hand and felt several bones crunch from the blow. He stood his ground, the blade pulled free, he took another stance and began to circle the pale man. The opponent in turn spun to match so their faces were always aimed at each other.

The laziness of the man dropped along with his blood on the floor, though Mamoru had a fair share of his own gushing from his side. He was sure the next blow from the opponent would end him, but wasn’t sure his own sword strike could do the same. If he went for a true killing blow—there was a slim possibility—but the idea of killing still felt wrong for him. In the end, what was all the resistance he made to evil sounding Hikari when he got the sword if he would just do it anyway?

The end of this battle would still resolve poorly if Mamoru did nothing. Had Hikari not been focused on singing the song on loop she might have been able to give him some ideas, or maybe even offer a new spell besides the wind, but she was preoccupied and Mamoru had to think quickly. He scanned the pale man and his white clothes and locked onto the steampunk belt. The apparatus seemed to move and hum, and looked difficult to damage—why else would it be in the open—but he didn’t have any better ideas.

Mamoru changed his stance and swung for a high slash to the head. The man predictably defended, but the attack was a feint. Using the wind burst, Mamoru quickly changed the vector of his slash faster than any swordsmaster could even hope to accomplish. Had he not had some experience, the way the weapon twisted his wrists would have caused it to fly from his hands. He brough the blade’s tip down the center of the belt, and slashed into the metal cleanly—then stopped, caught in the belt with only a small crack to claim as victory.

The lazy man looked stunned a moment, then his face twisted into a grin. He laughed and grabbed Mamoru by the neck. Air lessened along with the sensation of the ground.

“A fair attempt boy, but you were mistaken to think your sword’s magic was greater than ours.”

The edges of Mamoru’s vision began to darken as the pale man continued his evil grin. Then before the high school boy could register, Yamiko stood behind the pale man. She was hunched over, dirty, bloody, and looked about ready to pass out, but pressed her hand to the pale man’s back while chanting something. “Eh?” the man said with whimsey as the high school girl finally caught his attention. His red eyes suddenly grew wide and his grip loosened on Mamoru until the high school boy fell free.

The pale man screamed and tried to spin around to hit Yamiko. Mamoru took the opportunity to run the blade through his shoulder. As their opponent cursed, Yamiko finished her chant with a loud declaration in some foreign tongue and slapped the pale man’s face. Two bodies fell to the floor. The first, the pale man now looking normal save for the fresh wounds Mamoru had inflicted. The second, a girl with white skin and blue dress. The blue tint of the room seemed to get sucked into her and she quickly scanned their faces before flying to the broken skylight and disappearing into the night.

“Gee, you like couldn’t even thank us?” Yamiko weakly spat. She stumbled but managed to stay standing. Mamoru fell to his knees and coughed up more blood. It certainly wasn’t looking good. “Hey, hey, hold on. I know a little healing spell.”

You pushed it too far. Hikari, now freed from singing, commented. Her voice seemed laced with concern, but Mamoru wasn’t sure.

Yamiko weakly hoisted Mamoru’s arm over her own and tried to stand him up with her. She was unable and both remained hunched close to the floor. She tried again, but with the same results.

“That was impressive,” a new voice rang out. The white-haired man Mamoru saw earlier stepped out, “but sloppy.”

“Well, sorry we like couldn’t entertain you!” Yamiko held her palm out as what must have been a magical threat.

The newcomer shook his head. “Take it easy, you both are in no shape for a fight, especially with someone who was about to offer to help.”

“Help?” Mamoru grunted.

“I’ve called in some backup, but I didn’t expect you to take down a middle manager like that, consider me impressed. We will take you back to our base and help you get healed up.”

Mamoru wasn’t sure if he could trust the man, but he wasn’t sure if he had a choice either.

I think we can trust him. Hikari sounded confused even as she made the declaration. I don’t know why, but I get a sense that he is trustworthy.

It was good enough a reason as any for the injured boy.

“Very well,” he croaked. “We’ll go with you.”