And I knew I had one second to decide what to do.
I didn't want to kill this guy by accident. But I also didn't want anyone else getting hurt.
That one second passed.
And I made my choice.
I forced the green energy down, controlling just the smallest flicker of it—nearly nothing, but enough. With what little focus I had, I drove my elbow backward with everything I had.
It connected with his chest.
A deep grunt ripped out of him, followed by a sickening, muffled crack. His upper pectoral muscle gave under the blow, and the thief let out a strangled scream. His grip on me loosened as he staggered, but instinct—or desperation—kicked in.
He slapped me hard across the face, sending stars bursting in my vision, then lunged, remembering too late that I was supposed to be his hostage. He tackled me, shoving me onto the floor and falling on top of me in a clumsy, painful heap.
My breath was knocked out of me.I blinked, disoriented, and saw the gun.
Still in his grip.
Almost on instinct, I lashed out with my leg and kicked him square between the legs.
The effect was instant.
His entire body seized, a choked yelp strangling out of him as his grip faltered. The gun clattered across the tiles—but not far enough for comfort. The sounds around us blurred into a storm of shouts, screams, running feet. None of it mattered. All I could focus on was the man above me as he crumpled forward.
His elbow came down across my throat.
The pressure crushed into my windpipe, and suddenly there was no air—none. Black spots danced in my vision. I clawed at his arm, but he bore down harder, shouting curses through clenched teeth.
"You little—! I swear to—BACK OFF! BACK THE HELL OFF OR HE'S DEAD!"
Somewhere around us people screamed. Someone shouted for security. Someone cried. Gwen's voice tore through the noise—raw, terrified—"BEN!"
But my vision was narrowing.Darkness crept in from the edges, fast, thick, suffocating.
The thief kept yelling, spitting threats at anyone who stepped too close. His arm trembled with pain and rage, digging harder into my throat. My lungs burned. My chest spasmed.
I thought—just barely, through the roaring in my ears—that I heard gunshots.
Not close. Not hitting us.Maybe security. Maybe someone panicking.Maybe I imagined it.
I couldn't tell.
Everything was slipping.
Mana surged again, wild and unrestrained, buzzing against my skin like electricity begging for release.
I didn't know how much longer I could hold it—or consciousness—before something gave.
And then—something gave.
But not in the way I expected.
Uncle Frank burst into the chaos from my left, moving faster than I'd ever seen him move. He didn't hesitate. He didn't shout a warning. He didn't freeze.
He just swung.
His fist connected with the thief's temple with a sharp, ugly crack—a sound that cut through all the noise like a blade. The man's head snapped to the side, his arm slipping from my throat as he reeled backward.
In that split second of stunned confusion, Frank had created enough space—just enough—for me to drag myself out from under the thief and crawl out of his reach. My limbs felt like wet sandbags, vision blurring around the edges, but I kept moving, scraping across the tile until I reached the edge of the open floor.
Air rushed painfully back into my lungs. My throat throbbed. The world spun.
I managed to lift my head.
Gwen was crouched behind a metal trash bin, tears streaking her face as she screamed my name. People around her were stampeding in every direction—some running, some crying, some shouting for security, for police, for anybody to stop this.
I turned back toward the center of the chaos.
Uncle Frank and the thief were fighting.
No—struggling. Desperately.
Frank wasn't winning.
The thief, even injured, was wild—swinging, grappling, clawing for the gun that lay just out of reach on the floor. Frank tried to hold him back, tried to pin his arms, but he wasn't trained, wasn't built for this. Every time he gained leverage, the thief twisted out of it. Every time he tried for the gun, a knee or elbow slammed into his ribs.
The gun skidded across the floor as they fought over it, metal scraping sharply on tile.
Frank threw a punch and missed.
The thief didn't.
A hard blow caught Frank across the jaw. He stumbled, hitting the ground with a grunt.
"FRANK!" someone screamed—maybe Gwen, maybe me, maybe a stranger. I couldn't tell.
Frank pushed himself up on his elbows, dazed, breath ragged. He was trying—God, he was trying—but his arms were shaking, his movements sluggish, his face going pale.
He wasn't just losing.
He was about to be overpowered.
The thief lunged for the gun.
Mana trembled under my skin again—violent, instinctive, rising like a tide I couldn't stop.
And as the thief's fingers closed around the weapon…
I kept up and towards him, hesitating but I didn't stop, but before I could even make it half way, "STOP AND PUT YOUR HANDS IN THE AIR"
A cop yelled something—sharp, commanding—as more officers rushed in behind him, their footsteps echoing through the chaos.
Before I could react, strong arms hooked under mine and lifted me clean off the floor.
I jolted, instinct flaring for a second, until I looked up and saw Uncle Frank.His face was a mess—blood trickling from a cut above his eyebrow, a deep bruise already forming on his cheek—but he was standing. He was moving. He was alive.
He clutched me against his chest and ran.
The world blurred past in streaks of color and noise until he skidded to a stop near the overturned trash bin where Gwen was hiding. The second he set me on my feet, she launched herself at me with a force I wasn't prepared for.
"BEN!" she sobbed, arms locked around me like a vise. I tried to pull away—just enough to breathe—but she only tightened her grip, shaking, refusing to let go.
She held me like something precious she'd almost lost.Like a kid clinging to her favorite stuffed animal after a nightmare.
Frank crouched beside us, panting breathlessly, one hand on Gwen's back, the other bracing himself against the floor. His chest heaved with every inhale. He looked like he was about to collapse—but he still positioned himself between us and the chaos behind him.
More officers stormed in. People cried. Someone shouted that the gun was on the ground. Another yelled for medics.
And then—
"GET ON THE GROUND!"
The command blasted through the mall like a gunshot, snapping everything into razor focus.
It was aimed at someone.
Someone behind Frank.
And as the three of us froze, I realized—
He had a second gun.
BOOM!
The first shot cracked through the mall like lightning splitting the air. People screamed and ducked. The sound bounced off the walls, sharp and deafening.
BOOM! BOOM! BOOM!
Shots fired in wild, chaotic bursts as the thief—bloody, staggering, half-mad—emptied the second gun in every direction. He wasn't aiming. He wasn't thinking. He was just shooting—at the cops, at the crowd, at anything that moved.
The officers dove for cover, shouting orders over each other.
"DROP THE WEAPON!""GET DOWN NOW!""MOVE, MOVE, MOVE!"
But he wasn't stopping.
The thief lurched forward, eyes wide and glassy, hands shaking as he kept firing. When the second gun clicked empty, he didn't hesitate—he scrambled for the first one lying on the floor and snatched it up with a snarl.
"No—no, no, no—" Uncle Frank whispered, pulling Gwen and me tighter behind him.
The thief spun wildly, raising the gun again.
BOOM!
A flash. A scream somewhere in the distance.
The smell of gunpowder and fear choked the air.
Gwen clung to me so hard my ribs hurt, her face buried in my shoulder. Frank wrapped an arm around both of us, trying to shield us with his own body, even though he was already half-beaten and barely standing.
Another shot rang out.
BOOM!
Tile shattered near the storefront beside us. Glass exploded across the floor.
The thief laughed—a broken, breathless sound—as he swung the gun toward the nearest shadow, ready to fire again. His hand trembled violently, blood dripping down his wrist, but his grip on the weapon stayed firm.
He wasn't giving up.
He wasn't surrendering.
He was going to keep shooting until someone put him down… or until he killed someone else.
My pulse pounded in my skull. Mana crawled up my spine like a living thing, reacting to the panic and danger.
Not now. Not here.
But the more I tried to push it down, the more it surged.
The thief raised the gun again, finger tightening on the trigger—
And I felt the green energy spike hard behind my ribs, hot and desperate, ready to burst—
Whether I wanted it to or not.
So with everything I had—heart pounding, breath shaking, tears blurring my eyes—I shoved Gwen away from me.
"Ben—NO!" she screamed, reaching for me, but I tore free.
I pushed past Uncle Frank before he could grab me, before he could stop me, before fear could root me to the floor. I ran straight toward the gunfire, toward the screaming, toward him—the thief still firing wildly in every direction.
The world narrowed into a tunnel.People huddled on the ground, covering their heads.Officers shouted orders over each other.Glass crunched under my shoes as I sprinted, lungs burning, legs moving faster than they ever had.
Mana surged hotter with every step, gathering and spiraling up my arm like a living storm.
I reached him.
Right beside him.
And the moment my foot hit the tile beside his, all the green energy rushed into my left hand—dense, electric, vibrating like it was trying to tear free.
I didn't hesitate.
I threw my fist forward with everything I had.
My knuckles connected with his ribs in a brilliant flash of green light.
CRACK
The impact blasted through him like a cannon. His body twisted unnaturally, lifted clean off the floor, and then he was airborne—sent flying across the open mall space. He slammed into a display counter with enough force to shatter the wood and collapse the structure beneath him.
For a heartbeat, he didn't move.
The gun clattered from his hand.
The entire mall went silent.
My arm trembled violently, green light flickering beneath the skin like something trying to escape. My breath came in sharp, painful gasps. The smell of ozone and gunpowder hung thick in the air.
Behind me, someone whispered, "Did that kid just—?"
Gwen screamed my name.Uncle Frank shouted for me to get back.The officers began closing in, weapons raised.
But I just stood there, shaking, staring at the unmoving thief and the faint green glow fading from my knuckles.
I had saved them.
But I had also just revealed something I didn't understand…To everyone.