The Push Chronicles (Book 1): Indomitable by J.B. Garner Read Free Book Online

and every muscle and fiber of tissue fired at exactly the right time to make this the most perfect movement a human body could make.   It was like hysterical strength only a thousand times more extreme.
    The helmet exploded into a million pieces as the vibration of the impact added another peal of thunder to the growing storm of sounds.  It was like the unstoppable force meeting the immovable object with all the side-effects such an impact would cause in the real world.  His perfect Grecian head spun to the side with a look of utter surprise (a first for Eric, no matter the face) and the rest of his body followed, corkscrewing twice in the air before landing heavily in a black marble monument, cracking it in two.
    Shards of plastic and bits of metal exploded like shrapnel, gouging into my leathers and, in more than a few places, my skin.  I didn’t feel the pain, at least not at that moment, but in addition to all those little pinpricks of injury, I knew I had sprained at least half the muscles in my arm.  I may have even broke something.  I will still, though, riding high on whatever was going on in my mind and body.
    Despite the impact and the rough landing, Eric wasn’t a normal man anymore.  My initial thought of a god-made-flesh seemed fairly accurate as he righted himself instantly, suspended by whatever force let him fly in the first place.  I expected that I was about to be splattered like a red mist across the graveyard and tensed.  If I was going to be killed by a crazy ex-boyfriend, I’d be damned if I wasn’t going to at least bloody a god’s nose in the process.  A second passed and I didn’t explode.  Instead, Eric looked puzzled as he hovered there, one massive hand rubbing his perfectly-sculpted new chin.
    “You are not Pushed but still you actually caused me discomfort.”
    “Hurt me again and I’ll show you a lot more than discomfort, Eric!”  I was going for tough, but whatever I had just experienced was fading, replaced by wholly insufficient adrenaline and conventional human pain.
    “I did not mean to.  Irene.  I am sorry.”  God Eric only looked sad, but Real Eric looked like he was crying.  “But you must trust me.  You will see.”
    “I can’t trust you.  Not anymore.”  I was coming to the realization that I had hurt myself more than I thought.  The world was getting gray around the edges from the mounting agony.  I found myself leaning against Heinrich Flynn’s headstone for support, my strained arm dangling funnily to one side.
    “Eric ... Schuller.  Don’t kill him.”  Maybe if I could keep Eric from crossing that moral event horizon, I could still reason with him later.
    “Why would you ever think I wanted to kill him?  That would never bring back my parents.”  The sadness in Eric’s eyes was gone again.  The inhuman confidence of before had returned.  It was an ugly sight.
    My body was sending every signal of imminent collapse.  It wasn’t the pain or the bleeding, it was something more.  It was as if I had spent every bit of energy my body could muster in those few seconds of glory.  I know I must have been starting to slur when I replied.
    “But ... no ... you can’t.”  Again, the last puzzle piece fell into place a little too late.  He wasn’t going to kill Schuller.  He was going to try to bring his parents back from the dead.  To me, that seemed even more twisted than the murder I thought he had been planning.
    I wanted to tell him so but I finally succumbed under the black blanket of unconsciousness.

Chapter 6 Rise
    Of all the things to rouse me from unconsciousness, it had to be my cellphone.  Maybe it was the fact that the ring tone (The Year 1812 by Tchaikovsky) made my dormant brain realize it was the dean calling.  Maybe it was simply a Pavlovian response ingrained in modern First world citizens to answer anything that was ringing.
    Either way, I was awoken to the most complete full body ache I had ever experienced.  I