76. Harding vs Tyler VI: Rewind

Tyler lowered his stance and charged at his opponent.

“Executive Power!” he screeched, “Inaugural Address!”

A sonic blast shout from Tyler’s mouth towards Harding’s feet. Harding jumped back, dodging the bullet of sound as it struck the ground where she stood.

Before she could land back down, Tyler flung himself forward, slamming his leg onto the floor exactly where his bullet landed. The ground underneath Tyler’s foot burst open upon impact, whipping up a cloud of dirt surrounding the pair of fighters.

Harding stepped back and swung out her morning star in front of her, deflecting a piece of shrapnel headed her way. As she finished swinging, Harding noticed Tyler emerging from the dust cloud besides her, lunging at Harding’s exposed side.

Harding turned to her opponent. As she did so, Tyler gave a wide grin and flung out his hand, throwing a clump of sand at her eyes.

The debris collided straight into Harding’s face, forcing her back as she let out a light cough. Tyler flung out his leg, kicking her in the side before she could recover her balance, then followed up with a heavy punch to her gut.

“Gah!” Harding screeched in pain before gritting her teeth together. “Executive Power: Return to Normalcy---^v^v^v---

Harding turned to her opponent. As she did so, Tyler gave a wide grin and flung out his hand, throwing a clump of sand at her eyes.

Swiftly, Harding threw up her shield in front of her face, blocking off the debris.

“I thought you might do that,” Tyler snickered, “Inaugural Address!”

Harding felt one of Tyler’s sound blasts strike against the front of her shield. Before she could move further, Tyler’s fist burst through the metal shield and into her face, sending her back. Harding tried to recover her footing, but Tyler stepped forward and delivered a barrage of attacks before she could steady herself.

“What’s wrong, madam?” Tyler mused as he struck against his defenseless opponent. “Why don’t you go ahead and rewind the clock for yourself? Personally,” he slammed into Harding’s skull with a heavy punch, “I’d wager that after using your EP to rewind time by 5 seconds just now, you aren’t able to use your EP again until waiting another 5 seconds in turn. Which means…” he grinned, lunging his razor-sharp nails towards Harding’s chest, “…you won’t be able to undo your demise this time around!”

Harding let out a bloody smirk.

“You’re half right there, friend…”

Harding raised the handle of her shattered shield in front of her chest.

“Executive Power: Return to Normalcy!”

Tyler continued with his attack for a moment, then let out a hideous yelp as something sharp slicing through his sides.

“Gaaahh!”

Tyler glanced down, watching as the shards of Harding’s shield cut across his torso before gathering around Harding’s handle. As the various shards reached the shield’s handle, the individual pieces started merging into one another, ending with Harding holding onto her original, undemolished shield without a single crack in it.

“What the—?”

“You see,” Harding explained as she slammed her shield into Tyler’s face, knocking him away. “Last time I used Return to Normalcy, I only activated it on the two of us, not on my shield or anything else around us.”

Tyler gave a soft click of his tongue as he wiped the blood trickling down his nose.

“…which means you didn’t have any sort of time delay for activating your EP on your shield…”

Tyler ducked down, dodging a swipe of Harding’s morning star.

“Wait a second,” Tyler continued, widening his eyes. “That means—”

“Yup,” Harding smirked. “With my EP---^v^v^v---

Tyler ducked down, dodging nothing.

“Shoot!” Tyler screamed, realizing he had rewound.

He started to turn, but not before Harding smashed into him from behind.

“…I can freely rewind time,” Harding continued, “on any set of objects of my choosing. For example…”

Tyler gritted his teeth and lunged forward, raising his arm and---^v^v^v---

Tyler gritted his teeth and lunged forward, only to be struck in the side by Harding’s morning star.

“…I might choose to only rewind my opponent.”

Tyler stumbled back from the blow, then jumped away to dodge a follow up strike.

“Coward!” Tyler screamed into the ground, “is this honestly how you---^v^v^v---

“Coward!” Tyler screamed into the ground, “is this honestly—”

Tyler blindly swung his arm out behind him the moment he realized he’d been rewound, but his punch struck nothing but air as he received a devastating blow to the side.

“Oh man!” Thompson shouted, “Tyler seems to be in quite the real bind!”

“Indeed,” Truman nodded his head. “Harding is repeatedly rewinding Tyler back half a second at a time, during which she positions herself in Tyler’s blind spot and strikes at him the moment her EP comes to an end.”

“Which means that Tyler is stuck in an infinite loop of agonizing pain! Do you think there’s any way for Tyler to recover from something like this?”

“Normally I wouldn’t,” Truman grumbled, “but you have to remember: Tyler’s managed to kill a President not just once, but twice over. It’s unclear how much of this was due to his own abilities versus that of pure, dumb luck…but one thing remains certain…”

He looked down as Tyler continued taking blows from Harding

“…no one should ever let their guard down around that man.”

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Return to Normalcy. This was the main campaign slogan of Warren Harding in the Presidential election of 1920. Essentially, it called for moving America away from the political chaos caused by World War I and back to business as usual.