Name: Gael Rios-Vega
Branch: Bestial (Familiar)
Finch leapt up, lunging for Gael with his venomous claws. Without an ounce of fear, Gael twirled to the side, evading the strike and lashing out with his meteor hammer.
Even as it missed, Gael’s telekinesis carefully twisted the trajectory as Gael yanked and turned the angle of his weapon. Through precise aiming and added magic, he continued making brutal swings that’d knock Finch off balance.
As Finch adapted to Gael’s attacks, he found himself facing the wrath of the world’s most aggressive bird yet again. King Clucks sprang into combat, avoiding Gael’s weapon and knocking Finch into the path of a strike every time.
Whenever the witch managed to dodge the hammer, a beak or claw sliced into him. Whenever he evaded King Clucks’ fury, he found himself smacked with the meteor hammer. All the animal skills in the world didn’t help. In fact, they worked against him. This hybridization ability allowed him to take on animal traits, but his thoughts turned feral the longer he used them. His hostility made it difficult for him to think, to focus, to counter.
“How is your damn bird immune to the pheromones?” Finch roared.
“He’s not,” Gael said with a smirk. “But if you think King Clucks, Peckfender of the Unhatched Dozen, is only with me because of the familiar bond, then you don’t know a goddamn thing about friendship.”
“Cl-cl-cluck!” King Clucks kicked Finch into the path of the meteor hammer with a powerful addition of telekinesis.
The hammer smacked the witch directly in the face, flipping him back onto the ground. Gael swung the weapon a few times, building up as much momentum as possible, before adding his own telekinesis to the fold and slamming the meteor hammer directly onto Finch’s chest.
He knocked the air out of Finch’s lungs. He sent a searing pain coursing through Finch’s body.
Finch snarled, chattered, and roared all at once. His skin turned scaly. His mind went feral. Wings sprouted from his back. Webbed flesh hung from his arms. Tails thrashed. Hundreds of tiny horns erupted from his head.
I had no idea how many animal traits he currently channeled, but it overrode his senses. Finch lunged at Gael, spitting an acidic sludge from his throat.
“Ba-ba.” King Clucks flapped his wings, telekinetically knocking the spit off course.
“Thanks,” Gael said, swinging his meteor hammer.
Finch rolled out his tongue, easily the length of Gael’s weapon, and snatched it away. When he landed in front of Gael, he swiped at him with those venomous claws. No, more like talons now.
Gael darted out of Finch’s path, barely avoiding the deadly swipe, and managed to retrieve his stolen weapon in the process.
“This is over.” Finch gloated, gesturing to his own unblemished arm.
Gael looked to see a small cut on his forearm. Panic took hold. He’d been warned about the venomous cut. My breathing hitched, caught on the anxiety building inside Gael.
“It only takes a drop to kill a man in minutes.”
Gael trembled, slowing the swing of his meteor hammer. I didn’t know what to do for him. How to help. If there was even help for venom from an animal not native to this city, state, country. A snake’s venom that killed with every bite.
“Then I better finish this fast,” Gael said with a smirk. His cheeks twitched nervously, but he maintained his confidence, even if purely bravado. “Not a sentence I say often.”
Gael waited for Finch to move in close again; this time, he was prepared to let the witch land a strike, so he could bind Finch with the meteor hammer. He was already poisoned, so he figured it couldn’t get much worse.
He was wrong. If a drop had already made his legs wobble, what would a dose ten times that do?
Finch moved in close, about to slash Gael across the chest, when a watery portal opened above the pair.
“I don’t think so.” Carter leapt out and swung a fist direct center into Finch’s gut.
It knocked the breath out of the villainous witch and sent him flying back several yards before he pivoted with a touch of telekinesis and the adaptability of his animal traits.
Name: Carter Howe
Branch: Rejuvenation (Vitality)
Carter stood tall in a defensive stance I’d seen Gladiatrix take on many times on her missions. It appeared Carter’s mentor taught him more than how to compose himself for the media. She’d taught him how to channel his vitality just right so that he could swing a punch nearly as powerful as Gladiatrix’s.
