Chapter 12: Defeat.

The impact of the crash destroyed the ring's border, my spine was shaken up in the process which caused my nervous system to breakdown temporarily and shut down Pulze-overdrive, I became confused from the pain signals my brain was receiving from all over my body and my head was starting to get a severe ache. I was now buried underneath the debris of the destroyed border and I could not find the strength to move the debris lying atop me away.

I tried reactivating Pulze-overdrive to speed up my healing and strengthen me enough to free myself, but my breathing was out of control.

"What's this!!!?,a severe hit taken by Brian, he was sent crashing into the borders, there's no way he's rising from that one!!!"

"Pftt, there's no way my brother will stay down from something like that"

It took the referee about thirty seconds to move from his position to the border where I lay, it was enough time for me to get myself together, he started a countdown from ten but before he could end, I broke free from underneath the debris and was back on my feet. There was a cut on the back of my head and I could feel my blood trickle down into the back of my gear, if not for this gear I could have been in worse shape. Though I managed to stand I could barely move a muscle, it was already taking all my will power just to keep standing.

"Hahahaha,I bet you don't even know what hit you,give it up and plead for my mercy", Ashraf said as he walked towards me.

"That was just force-blast using sound energy, I could feel the vibration all the way in my marrow", I said with a smile starting to draw on my face.

"So what, even if you do know about my abilities, you can't dodge or stop my attacks because they're just too fast, with my sound ability I can also predict every move you're going to make by listening to your breathing and the contraction of your muscles. Even now I know you have three broken ribs and a lot of internal injuries, I bet you're glued to the spot , your bravado is stupid"

"We'll see about that".

"Good, make it up to me by getting beaten to a pulp".

During his little speech I'd managed to reactivate Pulze-overdrive, I rushed at Ashraf unleashing a barrage of punches being led by my pain,rage and desperation but he managed to evade all of them.

" Twenty four punches in five seconds, that's quite impressive but with my sonic speed you just look like a kid throwing a tantrum"

He retaliated by shooting a punch at me with incredible speed. However, I managed to dodge it by a hair strand by ducking down, while ducked I countered with an uppercut, which sent him flying sky high, I jumped above him while he was still airborne and slammed him into the ground with an axe kick.

"How's it feel to be on the receiving end of an attack for once", I said standing over him in the crater we'd just made on the battle floor.

"That was a great attack", he said as he got off the ground coughing blood,"I nearly passed out, it's good I reduced the strength of that attack fifty percent by activating a sound blast on impact, I'm done playing with you, my next attack will end this!".

I charged at him again trying to attack him from up close but I was suddenly blown up by an intense wave of sound vibrations, after falling from a thirty feet height I was in no condition to move, my consciousness was starting to fade but I could hear Ashraf saying something...

"How's it feel to be on the receiving end of an amplified version of the crowd's cheers".

...so he gathered the sound from the cheers of the crowds, amplified it and fired it at me, that's hard.

After the tournament had ended in Ashraf's victory Mike was making his way home, a lot of thoughts were flashing through his mind and a lot of questions that needed answers were popping up in his head, the best person to answer them would be his grandmother, he thought. He knew they were already hiding a lot of stuff from him and so was he from them but he was planning to put an end to that today.

"I'm home"

"Welcome back little brother"

"I told you to stop calling me that, Michaela,where's grandmother?"

"She's at the back,what's up?"

"It's none of your business, wait maybe it is, you're coming with me"

"What's with this behavior all of a sudden Michael, you're normally moody and almost never talk"

"All the more reason why you should know I'm serious, let's go see grandmother".

"Ooh Mike, you're already back from school"

"We need to talk grandmother"

"What about I was getting bored by myself anyway, come, sit down".

"I remember when I was younger you used to say that not all people on this earth humans, lately I've been seeing strange things —"

"Wait we can't discuss such matters here,let's get inside follow me".

Mike's grandmother led him and his sister into the house to the living room, she took out a device that looked like a remote with only a big red button at it's center, when she pressed the button, the floor of the room started splitting and soon there was a staircase leadind underground the house, he couldn't hide the look of shock on his face and turned to look at his sister's, but she was indifferent, whatever was happening she probably already knew about it.

"Well what are you waiting for,let's go".