Mage Catalyst (32 page)

Had it been allowed to impact I'm sure it would have taken Vin out. He had after all not bothered to raise a shield. Unfortunately, with a contemptuous flick of his wrist Vin intercepted it with his own thread and deflected my attack away from him.
The arrogant bastard hadn’t even raised his shield in defence.
His counter attack when it came was predictable and I was able to pull my thread back to intercept it, which caused a loud crash as the two particle threads collided.
“Pathetic,” Vin called as he stalked back down the carriage towards me.
He launched several over arm attacks at me. I parried those too, but it was getting close and it was obvious that I was over matched. He wasn’t giving me any opportunities to launch an attack of my own in retaliation. Eventually he’d break through my defences.
“You know, I’d almost be prepared to believe that you actually are a student,” he laughed as he launched another attack. I grudgingly gave ground before him.
It was fortunate that I had chosen to sit near the middle of the carriage when I’d sat down. This means that I now had approximately half the carriage to retreat into. It looked like I was going to need all the space I could get.
Vin launched into a lazy over hand strike at me, which I easily parried. As he struck he gave me the impression that he was playing with me and could finish me at any time. I hated him for it, but there was nothing I could do. A second sweeping attack came from the opposite side, crashed against my shield, and sent me tumbling down into a row of chairs. I hadn’t even seen it coming.
He was just too damned fast. He waited until I regained my feet before launching a spearing attack at my torso. I had no doubt that should this strike have hit it would have impaled me directly through my chest and have ended my life immediately. It was only by throwing myself to one side and putting everything I had into a thread against it that I was able to push his attack firmly to one side. As a consequence his mana thread speared through one of the train windows.
“Ooh, nice,” Vin snickered smugly. “I hadn’t expected you to block that one.”
Why hasn’t this train stopped yet?
Surely someone must know that something strange was going on. The smashing noises alone must have gotten someone’s attention. The sound of the wind howling through the broken windows was almost deafening.
Someone must have surely raised the alarm by now.
I noticed with some degree of frustration that there were three faces pressed up against the window of the opposite carriage. It was the drunks from before. Surely one of them would have thought to press the damned emergency button, but no such luck. I couldn’t see the old lady or the businessman either – what the hell were they doing? Couldn’t they see that I was in trouble here?

A snapping attack launched at my head ricocheted off my shield causing my head to snap to one side. A whiplash of pain tore through the left side of my neck and down my back.
Great, I was sure I’d be feeling that one come winter.
“Focus, focus,” Vin chanted in his annoying sing-song voice. “You mustn’t let yourself be distracted.”
My head throbbed a little but I was otherwise okay. I replied in the form of another attack that led into a small but savage exchange of blows. It was infuriating. Try as I might I just couldn’t get through his guard and I was still slowly but surely losing ground. I was gasping for air but it couldn’t have been more than two minutes since the first strike.
“Well, I’ll give you one thing boy,” Vin grunted as our heated exchange slowed. “You’ve certainly got stamina.”
He didn’t appear to be as out of breath as I was, but I could see a notable layer of sweat on his brow. I didn’t respond. There didn’t seem to be much point. I used the time to catch my breath.
It was almost by an unspoken agreement that the two of us launched our attacks again. I could see the gleam in his eyes as he launched his attack. The bastard knew as I did that eventually I wouldn’t be able to return fire. He was revelling in it and there was nothing I could do about it. The simple fact was that he was more skilled, stronger and faster than me.

If I didn’t do something to even the odds I was going to lose, it was only a matter of time. The problem was, I didn’t know what I could do. There really wasn’t much room to manoeuvre in the cramped walkways of the train carriage so if I couldn’t block out of the way, I had to rely on my shield and pray that it held.
He’d only caught me with glancing blows so far but I was certain that a direct strike would shatter my shield and end me in one fell swoop. With a quick series of strikes, Vin pushed me back further, forcing me to leave the protective cover of the rows of seats. This was a mixed blessing as whilst I was sacrificing the cover afforded by the seats, I now had a greater freedom of movement and could attempt to use this to my advantage.
“Looks like you're out of space, boy,” Vin grunted.
I frantically looked around looking for an escape, but he was right. There was no way I’d be able to escape into another carriage as he'd finish me before I could get the door between carriages open.
A quick glance out the window informed me that it was at least two or three minutes away from the next station. Vin would easily finish me off in that time now that he had me trapped. I needed to do something, anything to turn the odds.
I needed to get out. I didn’t have any other option. It was something that I never would have considered doing if I had any other choice. I sent a thread arching towards Vin's head and was satisfied when he easily deflected it into the direction I’d suspected that he would block that one to. I used this to my advantage and placed all my strength behind the redirected thread and watched with devilish delight as it slammed into the carriage door to my right.
The mana hit the carriage door with full force and easily smashed the door open. There was a satisfying crunching noise and the sound of twisting metal being torn from its frame as the door came loose. The wind rushed into the carriage through the wrecked doorway, pulling at my clothes and hair.
One of the carriage doors hung on its railing from the side of the doorframe but the other had been torn completely away leaving a gaping hole in the side of the carriage. I had my escape. I just couldn’t let Vin know it yet or he’d move to stop me.
“Now look what you’ve done,” Vin smirked.
“I know,” I replied as I took a deep breath.
Although I’d planned this, I was now having doubts as I looked at the power poles flashing past the doorframe. It looked like the train was going awfully fast and it would really hurt if I hit one of those poles on the way through. I didn’t have a lot of time to let my fears linger as Vin looked like he was gearing up for another attack. It was now or never.
I timed it so that as Vin was just about to attack I threw myself on to my side under his attack. I leapt back to my feet and began running towards the gaping hole in the carriage. Before Vin could do anything about it, I’d thrown myself from the moving train carriage. I’d just jumped off a speeding train.
I hit the ground hard. Fortunately, due to a combination of the trajectory at which I landed, and the relative softness of the ground below I wasn’t too hurt. The fact that I still had had a shield around me when I actually hit the ground was probably the only reason I was unhurt by the fall.
When I turned to look back at the train I saw Vin hanging onto the side of the carriage door as the train swept away. I could just make out his mocking grin as he disappeared back into the carriage.
It was a long walk back home as I was still about three or four stops from my station when I had ‘disembarked’ from the train. I made a pretty quick pace as I wasn’t sure if I had been spotted jumping from the train or not. Furthermore I wasn’t sure if Vin was going to pursue me further.
After the first hour I came to the conclusion that I needn’t had worried anyway. Vin had obviously gotten his victory in that he’d forced me to run away. If Renee was right then that was all he was after anyway. He wanted an acknowledgement that he was better than me. I gritted my teeth with anger at the admission, however there was little I could do to ignore the simple truth of the statement. He was better than me.
There was no denying the fact that everything I tried, every tactic I had employed or the strength I applied he simply matched and then exceeded. I opted not to inform Renee of the incident as no harm had come from it and she would just needlessly worry. With any luck the police would pick Vin up at the next station and he’d do something stupid and then the problem would be solved for us.

* * * *

I’d managed to get home not long after midnight and my feet were sore from the long walk home.
I hate walking.
I’m quite active in other ways, such as roller blading or bike riding but I can’t walk to save my life. If I’d had any other option last night, I would have taken it. It took me almost two hours to walk home. I suppose in hindsight I could have simply walked to the next station and taken the train, but to be honest I was a little jittery about running into Vin again.
I spent my first waking moments on my laptop looking through the major news websites for a report on mysterious train attacks or damage. There was nothing there, absolutely nothing. How can this be? We broke at least three or four windows on the carriage and the doors were completely ripped off their hinges, how could this not be news? Not to mention that this happened under the noses of at least three witnesses.
Although last night I’d determined that I wasn’t going to tell Renee, in the cold light of day it was obvious that I had to. I reached back and flicked my alarm clock around to check the time. It was a quarter past nine.
I’d let Renee sleep in for a bit before I called her. I wouldn’t want to be woken up first thing on a Saturday morning with this news. I didn’t even like thinking about it. The reality of the situation pained me like a sore tooth. Someone had just tried to kill me.
It’s a very simple statement to make but the implications of this are life changing. Your whole world narrows down into a single statement of fact. Vin had tried to kill me and would probably try again.
I had begun to shake as I reached for the phone and dialled Renee’s number. It took me several tries to get the number right.
“Devon?”
“Yeah,” I replied, a slight tremor creeping into my voice.
I breathed a deep breath to attempt to steady myself. I hadn’t planned on breaking down like this but I couldn’t seem to get the words out properly. I’d simply planned on repeating a rehearsed statement of fact. Unfortunately that didn’t look like it was going to be likely now.
“Are you okay?”
“Yeah, I’m fine,” I lied.
I wasn’t overly sure why I lied. It was just one of those things. When someone asks you if you’re fine, you say yes. I mentally kicked myself.
“You don’t sound fine,” Renee retorted.
“No, you’re right, I’m not.” I sighed. “Vin came after me last night.”
“Why didn’t you call me?” Renee thundered down the line. “I told you to call me!”
“There wasn’t time,” I protested. “It all just happened so fast.”
“You could have called me afterwards,” Renee continued icily.
“It was late. I told myself I’d call you in the morning.”
“Are you okay?” Renee’s voice softened a little.
“Yeah, I got away okay, I’m not hurt.”
I could hear Renee’s sigh of relief clearly down the phone line. I braced myself as I approached the subject I didn’t want to reveal.
“There were witnesses,” I murmured tentatively. This was the part of the conversation I wasn’t looking forward to. Renee had made her opinions about media exposure very clear.
“How many?” Renee replied dryly.
“Three or four, at least,” I whispered.
“That’s not too bad, what happened?”
I gave Renee the details of last night’s encounter and to her credit Renee remained silent throughout the whole story until the end.
“Well, it sounds like he didn’t give you much of a choice,” Renee concluded.
“No, not really,” I agreed dryly.
“For what it’s worth, it sounds like you handled yourself well,” Renee commented.
I shook my head.
“He was playing with me, he could have ended it at any point.”
“I know,” Renee agreed. “But I’ve seen him play – he plays rough, the fact you’re unhurt is actually kind of impressive.”
I wasn’t sure if Renee was trying to reassure me or she genuinely felt that way. In either event I was touched at the approval in her voice.
“We need to do something about him,” I grunted.
“What do you suggest?”
“We need to track him down and confront him. Together,” I urged. “We can take him, I know it.”
“You’re probably right,” Renee conceded. “But it will get ugly, he’s not going to walk away from this.”
“What’s the alternative? Let him find us alone and vulnerable again?”
“I don’t know,” Renee whispered. “Maybe I should call my grandfather.”
I hadn’t considered that idea, but I didn’t like the idea of running for help and in any event her grandfather was overseas – it’d be at least a few days before he could get here.
“All we need to do is scare him a little. To make him realise that if he keeps this up we’re going to hurt him,” I continued.

“I wish I had your confidence that it would go down that way,” Renee whispered.
“We don’t have any choice. Eventually he’s going to come for us again. Better that it happen on our terms.”
“Okay,” Renee sighed.
I knew I hadn’t convinced her but she, like me, could not see any other option.
“Just promise me one thing,” Renee murmured.
“What?”
“If I say, run, we run.”
“Okay,” I conceded. “So how do we do this?”
“Come back to my place tonight. We’ll go somewhere quiet and make a lot of noise. That’s bound to attract his attention, and when he comes for us – we’ll take him.”
“Sounds good.”
“Right,” Renee replied forcefully. “I’ll see you tonight.”
“Okay, I’ll see you tonight then.”