Almost kills Ballsistc

[You’re in my way.​]

I lifted Tauropolos, my bow. I wasn’t going to give him the chance to keep shooting at me.

The world seemed to slow down as I pulled back upon the bowstring and an arrow formed from a flash of blue light. A breath. A heartbeat. I zeroed in on my target, eyes narrowing as my vision seemed to sharpen and the world condensed itself into that single moment. For those few seconds of forever, that instant of eternity, nothing else existed except me, my bow, and my target.

Another breath, let out slow, another heartbeat. My hand steadied, my mind centered, and my fingers began to let go — and, with a horrified jolt, I barely managed to tighten them back around the bowstring as I realized what I’d just been about to do.

A killshot. I’d been about to shoot him through the heart with an arrow at full power. There was enough strength behind this bow that it would have obliterated him.

It had been so long since Lung, I’d forgotten what it was like to use an Install in battle. How the hero’s instincts and reflexes could affect my actions, how her mindset and thought patterns could influence my own. How she could overwhelm me and almost take me over, if I let her.