Alexander Lee: Dick of Justice

This was it. Alexander was the last line of defence between the wendigo and the huddle of scared orphans in the bunker behind him. He could see where the other mages had blasted away chunks of the beast's flesh with unfettered energies, the slightly pink flesh still raw from regrowth. It had carved its was through dozens of young men and women, and now he was the last one standing. There was nothing for it. He'd have to give it the D.

He dropped down into the specialised stance he'd hoped never to use, shifting the middle of his body slightly forward from the rest. Gathering his chi and extending his hands forward, he tried to ignore just how fast the wendigo was closing the kilometers between them. The chi was now becoming a speartip, a potent shaft of searing potency. The wendigo was still coming.
He tried to ignore the consequences of failure. That to fail was to be torn limb from limb and eaten alive. That to fail here was to allow his soul to be tortured for all eternit. Worst of all, to here was to fail an entire generation of Lotus mages cowering some three kilometers behind him. The wendigo could smell them.
Now the beast was three hundred meters away and closing.

At this distance, Alexander could smell the gore matted into the wendigo's patchy fur, the only remainder of powerful mages who'd tried and failed before him. It was a powerful, grating stench that announced death and doom to those who dared oppose that which it heralded.
He tried to close his mind to it. Now the chi was visible in its concentration, a blinding point of sacred light in the middle of Alexander's figure. The effort of maintaining the stance under the pressure was starting to strain him. His arms shook slightly, taut and stretched out towards the wendigo like rock-hard steel cables. The D only worked on contact. There could be no margin for error here.
One fifty meters.

Now the bloodshot eyes of the Wendigo were visible in detail, the only still element of the heaving and pumping figure tearing up the landscape. Muscles like the fingers of God slid around underneath scarred skin, pulling and propelling the deceptively emaciated frame at speeds no mortal could ever hope to defend against.
One hundred meters.

The gore-splattered teeth were bared in the middle of a twisted mouth pulled back in a horrifyingly unhuman scream. Alexander only noticed it in absence as the wendigo pauses for a breath. The sheer length of the howl had blended it into the background.
Fifty meters.

Now Alexander completed the stance, pulling back his core in preparation for the D. Feet planted in a horseriding position, hands outstretched towards the target, body hunching slightly over to maximise the push distance. The point of chi was now painful to look at, but the Wendigo was no longer bothered by trivial concerns such as pain or even the loss of limbs. Only total destruction would halt its rampage
Twenty-five.

Now Alexander pushed forward with all the superhuman strength he could muster, a force capable of turning aside mountains in days compressed into milliseconds for a single stroke. His arms pulled back towards his waist, turning outwards and forming fists. His spine groaned as it was forced to arch the other way, thrusting the point of chi forwards faster than the brain could percieve.
Five.

The wendigo never showed fear or hesitation as it bore down upon the figure barely visible around the searing tip of light. It reached out towards Alexander's face, a whirling scythe of rending claws coming closer and closer to his eyeballs, the razor-sharp tips now inevitably moving towards desctruction-
Zero.

Just as the wendigo was about to start the process of flaying the skin from his face, Alexander felt the spear of chi projecting from his waist make contact with the beast's body. The effect was almost instantaneous.
The first thing seen was a sizziling, searing shaft of pure energy projecting from the back of the wendigo and into the infinite sky. The sound was indescribable, an act of God centered on the pair that made the skies explode and the orphans in the bunker cry out as the roof shook and spat pebbles. The smell of charred offal filled the air. To its credit, the beast never stopped trying to kill Alexander. The beam flickered, and stopped. A neat circle had been bored straight through the wendigo's gut, centered on Alexander's pants. Then the second thing happened.
Tiny lines of yellow-hot energy spread across the wendigo's body, rippling out from the wound. The lines swirled, met and split apart again, turning into a beautiful mesh of golden wires that then turned into a series of cracks and then the wendigo was no longer a wendigo but something that looked like a wendigo and then it was suddenly breaking apart at the seams into ashes.
Alexander fell backwards, his energy spent.

Alexander woke up, and heard the sound of children. Then he opened his eyes.
The orphans were clustered around him, tiny concerned faces streaked with tears at the apparent death of their beloved protector. He tried to sit up, but the muscles in his back wouldn't move. He decided to keep lying down. Alexander spoke, the words coming from far away and through a throat like a corn thresher.
"You're safe."

> FIN.