Chapter 36

"Two minutes."

Lucas moved swiftly to strike at his mom with a right jab; however, she blocked with her forearm. A smile crept across his face as his eyes locked onto her, pulling back her left arm to try to return the blow. As her arm came down to deliver a fast and heavy jab to her son's face, Lucas stopped her attack using his right forearm. The force behind her blow caused his arm to lock up while at the same time lifting him off the ground. He flew across the grass for a few inches before forcing himself to tuck, duck, and roll. His feet and hands gripped the grass, causing him to slide across a few more before coming to a complete stop.

His face was covered with sweat as a tiny droplet of blood hit the grass below him. The arm his mom struck was aching in pain, but he barely felt it thanks to the adrenaline pumping through him. His breath was hot as he took deep breaths and could feel his throat drying up. Yet, he couldn't help but smile. He was excited and having a good time as he looked up towards his mom. He could see small amounts of sweat forming on her face, some strains of her hair were either sticking to or starting to stick to her forehead, but the most crucial thing he noticed came from her chest moving up and down.

"She was breathing heavily as well," The thought and realization quickly came to his mind. Yet, Lucas's focus was more stuck on the soft smile that formed across her face as well.

"We've been back and forth for a solid two minutes now. I'm doing it," Lucas told himself as he tried to keep track. Slowly getting back to his feet, his aura danced around him. While he wiped the blood off of his lip, his smile didn't fade and only grew more as his mom motioned him to come at her.

"She's enjoying this," he thought to himself.

Lucas felt his legs tense up as he pushed himself off of the ground towards her. As the wind rushed pasted him, he could feel his heart pumping with excitement. The tingling sensation that once barely warned his body of danger now danced around his body as he got closer to his mother. Even the taste of his blood felt like a welcome to this new sensation.

"This feeling. This drive. The way my body moves. And this excitement. I feel so alive," Lucas' inner voice spoke to him. He couldn't help but think of how addictive this feeling was. For the first time in a while, he was enjoying the reward he worked hard to earn. He felt as if he was on top of the world. Yet, the feeling of knowing there was so much more to learn made him giddy with excitement.

As he swung his right fist at Elizabeth, she gracefully maneuvered her head out of the way of the strike. Lucas noticed how grateful she moved out of the way. No. It didn't just stop with her dodging. He realized that everything she did was precise, careful, elegant, and had a flow to it. It was almost like a dance to her, and she was leading him in it.

When she moved to his right side, Elizabeth did a quick spin with her left leg and carried the momentum into her right. Her right connected with Lucas's side and nearly sent him flying in that direction. Blood came from Lucas's mouth as he could feel pain shoot from his side and throughout his whole body. He hit the grass hard and could barely stop rolling. As he came to a stop, he started to cough up more blood from that hit. He struggled to catch his breath just as he looked back over to his mother.

Lucas watched in awe as he saw his mom land on that leg; she kicked him. Even though she had her back to him, she pushed off her right leg and flew backward into the air. His eyes went wide as he saw her gracefully twist her body in the air until she was facing the ground. Elizabeth took in a deep breath as she did a flip while she was almost over his body. A white aura leaked from her left leg as she was about to bring it down on Lucas's back.

Lucas's body reacted before he did and quickly pushed him out of the way and back to his feet. As her leg touched the ground, the very earth itself creaked and raised before caving in from her impact. There was a small yet decent size crater in the ground as if a meteor landed. Lucas gulped hard as he realized he could have died if that had hit him.

A chill went down Lucas's spine, and his face went pale white as his eyes locked onto his mom's now orange eyes. As he took a step back, she suddenly vanished before his very eyes. He blinked and nearly had a heart attack as his face, and hers was only a few inches apart, but she was still eerily calm. He then felt a single object touching his chest, and before he realized it, she spoke a single word.

"Sleep."

Elizabeth spoke in a calm but assertive voice. The object that was touching Lucas's chest was Elizabeth's index finger. Faster than any average person could see, her finger turned into a closed fist, struck him, and went back to normal. The tall grass behind Lucas's back blew back as everything around them went silent.

The only thing Lucas heard was a "whoosh" as his body seemly jerked before stopping. The aura that surrounded him went out like a candle. Lucas didn't feel any pain as his body began to fall backward while his vision began to fade to dark.

"No....not yet...not yet." Lucas thought to himself as the world, and he began to fade away. He then felt a sudden jolt of electricity and a warm sensation flow throwout his body and harnessing itself in his right hand.

Elizabeth watched as her son's body began to fall back before an energy source hit her. She, Amay, and Martha felt a sudden boost of Magical energy overcome Lucas's body.

"What the-" Elizabeth said as she could feel her son's energy all of a sudden. She then felt his left-hand grip her wrist. A look of utter shock came across her face as she felt the pressure on her arm and the sudden jolt of electricity shocking and running up her arm. "This.." Her words came short as she stared at her son.

"Not YET!!!!" Lucas roared as his body jolted back forward. A light blue aura and electricity surrounded Lucas as his hair stood upon his head. He then clenched his right hand as it started to glow bright blue with electricity dancing off of it. Everything seemed to slow as his fist connected with his mother's stomach with the force of a speeding car.

Elizabeth's eyes were wide as she felt his energy and the force behind her son's punch. His punch caused her and him to split away from each other forcefully. She soon realized that she couldn't get her body to move as she tried to catch or stop herself from flying. It was as if her whole body was frozen. She could only watch as sparks danced off of her body and tensed with each surge.

"I...can't move.." Elizabeth thought to herself in pure shock and disbelief as she fought to gain some control of her body.

A blur moved quickly behind Elizabeth and pushed their hands into her back to stop them with their strength. The figure's feet dug into the ground as she slowly began to bring Elizabeth and herself to a dead stop. They finally came to a halt nearly 15 feet away from the initial impact zone. The figure's long black hair covered her face as her now green eyes looked down at Elizabeth with now worried eyes. Martha was breathing hard from the sudden running and catching of her mother. She fell to one knee while slowly sitting Elizabeth down on the ground.

".....Mama?" Martha said with actual concern in her voice as she saw the wound on Elizabeth's stomach.

Elizabeth coughed up a little blood as her skin went from regular to gray as the electricity around her faded. Elizabeth had a softball-sized wound in her stomach that had a mixture of darkened, burned, and bleeding flesh. Around the wound was damaged as well but was a visible off-color from her grey skin. Elizabeth clenched a little as her injury began to heal as she tried to push herself to stand.

Martha worked as her support to get Elizabeth back to her feet, but her worries were still on her.

"Mama?" Martha repeated.

"I'm fine, dear. Hurt but nothing I can't heal from." Elizabeth said, taking deep breaths. Her hair was now covering her face, so she used her free hand to move it back. She then looked at the results of what had just happened. "I overdid it and let my guard down. But that...I...was taken off guard." She slowly said as she was trying to grab her bearing and figure out what caused this reaction.

A visible trail from when Martha tried to catch her could be seen leading to an area where the hit had happened. Burnt grass made a full circle around an unconscious Lucas, who laid face-first on the ground unconscious.

Amay was the first to make it to him, and her eyes went wide as she saw his right arm.

"Lizzy, you need to see this, now!" Amay shouted with visible concern on her face.

Elizabeth and Martha made their way over to Lucas as quickly as possible, and their mouths dropped when they saw his body.

For the most part, Lucas' body was fine, all except for his right arm. The shirt around his right side was nearly evaporated as majority of his right arm was twisted and badly mangled. His entire arm was purple with visible cuts going down it. A few sparks crept across it before finding their way to the ground. Whatever he had just done took a massive toll on his arm.

Elizabeth quickly moved from Martha and got down to her son's level. Both of her arms glowed white as she placed both hands on Lucas's damaged arm. A silent moment went by, and Elizabeth let out a sigh of relief as she could see his arm slowly and steadily begin to heal after a minute of no progress.

"It can be fixed. He will be okay," she told the girls as she could feel their worries.

"How about you? Your wound doesn't look that good either." Amay asked as she noticed how nasty Elizabeth's wound was.

"If my healing weren't as good as it was to allow me to heal myself and his arm, I would have been in serious trouble. I'm glad I raised my energy at the last moment. This certainly took me off guard." Elizabeth said, looking down at her son. A look of worry and nervousness filled her eyes as she was not prepared nor ready for him to do that. Yet this brought something significant to her attention.

"His power is starting to rise. This was.....what I was afraid of." Elizabeth thought to herself.