LEGACY OF THE BLAZERS - CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO (Patreon)

CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

Lux lowered her hand because she didn’t know what else to do.

As the energy welling in her palm faded away, her legs grew weak. Never before had she felt so useless, not even during Blowhole’s assault on the Blazers. She should’ve seen this coming. She should’ve known he wasn’t going to lie down so easily and die!

“So what now?” she asked.

“That is the question,” he said, lightly swaying and puffing his cheeks out like he was holding in a serious burp. Maybe, with one well-timed attack, she could…

…No.

It was too risky to do anything stupid. Other people’s lives were on the line and if she made one wrong move, they were dead. She’d already lost too many people and needed to play this smart, like Jess would. For now, no matter how miserable it was, she needed to play Blowhole’s game and listen.

He took a seat on a pile of rubble, heaving like he’d just run a marathon, and waved his fin. “Take a seat,” he said. “And don’t try anything fucking stupid.”

His tone had changed. That cockiness from earlier was noticeably absent. He wasn’t going to joke around or toy with her anymore—from now on, this was serious to him. She had proven herself a threat, or maybe just a tad bit smarter than him. She sat down. Rusted metal springs poked her ass, but tetanus was the least of her concerns right now. “I’m sitting.”

“You actually listened for once,” he said. “Good. Goddamned good. Apparently the only way you know how to follow orders is when you’ve got a gun to your head.”

“My friend's heads,” Lux spit back. “Lemme guess—you don’t wanna fight anymore until you’ve sobered up?”

“Clever girlie,” he said. “I’ve never had to take multiple hits off this damned thing, and I’ve never been one for drugs. I wasn’t expecting it to pack such a goddamned punch.”

That’s because you’re a wimp, she thought. But now wasn’t the time or back-talking—you never back-talk someone when they’re holding your friends hostage. You smooth-talk them. “If that’s how it has to be then that’s how it has to be. Be more honorable to beat you at full strength, anyway.”

“Honor,” he said, shaking his head. “Idiotic.”

“Lemme guess, this is the part where you give your tragic backstory and tell me how you’re totally not evil?”

“Some might call my backstory tragic. I just call it life. And no, I am evil. There’s nothing I enjoy more than squashing you humans like bugs.” He looked away from her. “But you somehow keep getting away from me, and that seriously pisses me off.”

“I’m sitting right here,” Lux said. “You’re the one delaying—”

Blowhole jumped to his feet. “—Everyone else I’ve ever encountered I’ve been able to whip into submission! But you! Somehow you don’t seem to give a DAMN!” Having exerted too much energy, he dropped back down onto his butt and glared at her.

“You killed my family,” she said. “Why the hell would I give up?”

“Because I’ve killed plenty of families,” he hissed. “And those who live always give up. That’s part of the thrill of it. Taking everything from someone and utterly ruining their lives but having them fear you so much that they just accept it! You should’ve ran from me and never looked back but instead you keep coming back and that makes me want to kill you even goddamned MORE!”

As Blowhole sat there looking like he was about to keel over, clutching the blunt between his fingertips like he was holding the trigger to a bomb, Jess’ voice floated into Lux’s mind, telling her that if she snagged it from him, it was game over. Hell, all she had to do was knock it out of his hand, even, and she’d win. There was no doubt in her mind.

He is starting to sober up already, though…

If I don’t move fast…

Knowing she’d psyche herself out if she thought too much, Lux dove forward and slammed her teeth down onto his fin. There was no more surefire way to get somebody to drop something than to bite them, and when the blunt hit the ground, she almost snagged it—but the thing went rolling down the hill of rubble.

…Soon they did too, fighting with each other on the way down. There wasn’t much weight behind his punches because his body had been wounded into frailty and there was only so much the panties could do, and so her wolves were able to defend his attacks easily as they shredded what remained off his body. By the time they hit the ground his stomach had been gouged so many different ways that he looked like a murder victim.

But still, he moved.

He clawed his forward, toward the blunt, and while Lux wanted to climb on top of him and wallop him endlessly, she remembered what had happened to her against Cheese. How she’d lost control and become someone else. She wanted revenge, and she’d get it—but not like that.

She picked the blunt up as Blowhole’s fin thwacked the ground.

“No,” he hissed. “It’s mine!”

“Technically, it was never yours,” she said. “You just stole it.”

“That bitch Jess…she went down easy.” Stuffing was pouring out of his mouth like blood. “She never deserved such immense power…”

“And you did?”

“I won,” he said. “I beat her!”

“Beaten by your own arrogance,” Lux said. Then, she took a hit of Jess’ blunt, conjuring up the two snakes. They were their normal size and stood menacingly over the whale. With them both here, Tegan was safe. Bon too, not that she gave a shit about him. “Eaten by your own weapon.”

“My only solace…is that you won’t…be alive…much longer…” he groaned. “Kern and Bon…won’t let you…live…”

“Then I’ll fight them, too. And I’ll win.”

“Maybe your arrogance…will be…what gets the best of you…too.”

Blowhole’s entire body shook as he made once last attempt to pull himself to his feet and flee—but it was useless. His body was too wounded, his brain was too stoned. All he could do was sit there and wait for his death. Lux flicked ash off her blunt, commanded the snakes forward, then closed her eyes.

Part of her wanted to revel in his death, but that was the same part of her that had lost control when she battled Cheese and she didn’t want to let it free again. She listened as the snakes, back under Blazer command but still in their warped mental state, ruthlessly tore Blowhole to shreds. It only took them seconds. Seconds to kill the person who had ruined her life.

She waited for him to reach out and grab her. To stab her in the gut or wallop her in the face. To proclaim that, despite her best efforts, he couldn’t die and she was a fool for thinking so. But he didn’t, and long after the snarling and chomping of the snakes had ceased, she dropped down onto the ground, too overwhelmed to do anything but sob because it was over. So many people had been lost due to his reign of terror, but it was over. She had won. She had…won.

He was dead.

Blowhole…was dead.

END OF CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO