CHAPTER 59

Emily was doing her best to calm her nerves as they flew through the air. They had been flying on a massive, indigo crane heading in the direction of Eustace's address. She wasn't sure what to expect from this. She'd barely lasted against Swarm and apparently this guy was way more powerful than him. And, unlike him, didn't seem to rely on his microbots to help him but raw power alone. Emily looked down at her hands and wondered what stretchy powers could do here.

End of the world. It was hard to wrap her head around a threat like that. Sure, she'd seen a few movies with those kinds of stakes, but she never really felt anything about it because she knew it wasn't real. Even now, going up against an actual world-ending threat, she still didn't feel like it was real.

That was, until the enormous spire burst from the ground.

"What the hell?" she yelped, scrambling back as Sumin brought the crane to a stop, both watching the spire continue to rise up above them, more spikes forming from it.

"That is our destination," Sumin told her. "That is where the map says Eustace's house was."

"So…the Sculptor did this? Why?"

"Unclear at the moment. But I assume he and our comrades are at the top."

"Right," Emily nodded, prepping herself. Still, if the Sculptor was able to accomplish something like this, what wasn't he capable of? And what could she possibly do against him?

What you can, she told herself. This was just another challenge for her, and she would overcome it just like all the others.

She was so focused on her thoughts that she almost didn't see it. They were passing over a large open field when the ground suddenly shifted. Emily glanced down, seeing a bunch of strange, pointed rocks circling the field. She frowned, looking at them a little more closely. She was pretty sure they hadn't been there a second ago and when she followed their trail, they were positioned in a circle around where she and Sumin were flying over and looked a little like…

"Teeth," she murmured, fear taking over her whole body. "SUMIN, WATCH OUT!"

The ground erupted, the enormous mouth rising up to bite down and swallow them whole. Emily screamed while Sumin tried to fly them out of there but it was too late, the jaws clamping shut around them.

Emily closed her eyes, preparing to feel her body get crushed, but nothing happened. She blinked her eyes opened when she heard someone grunting and looked up to see Sumin right above them, arms held up on either side with a large indigo pole holding the jaws at bay. Emily gasped at how close they were, only a small shaft of light still visible above them.

"We need to get out of here," she said.

"Yes, that would be preferable," Sumin replied. A second later, a large indigo platform appeared in front of them. "Step on this. We will have to…DUCK!"

Emily instinctively ducked as an earthen tendril shot out to strike at Sumin. The platform moved, blocking the blow but even in the darkness, Emily could see more tendrils forming.

"Emily, you must leave," Sumin told her.

"What? I can't leave you here!"

"My powers will help me survive but I am not sure you can," they said, blocking another tendril. "Trust me, you must leave now while you still can. Do not worry about me. I have a plan."

Emily gulped but nodded. "Ok."

"Here." Another platform suddenly appeared next to her. She jumped on and it began to move upwards quickly, making her stumble slightly. "Get up the tower and stop Sculptor!" Sumin shouted after her. "Do not…NO!"

Emily cried out as several tendrils suddenly shot for her. She bent her back unnaturally to avoid one, and then twisted around to avoid another but several more were coming and she couldn't dodge them all.

A glowing buzz saw appeared next to her and cut through all the tendrils, letting them fall down below, but more kept coming. Emily gritted her teeth. Sumin couldn't keep this up. They had their own problems below but were too focused on helping her out. She needed to end that now.

She looked up, eyeing the stony teeth, and stretched her arms up as fast as she could, grabbing hold of the teeth as soon as she reached them. Knowing she only had seconds, she pulled herself up right to them, retracting herself back into them. She pushed herself, soaring up quickly, the wind flapping against her face.

She felt her hands twitch and knew she was out of time, the stone beginning to form up around her fingers to trap her. She gave one last tug on them, launching herself up even faster, before letting go, allowing momentum to carry her the rest of the way up straight through the gap and back into the outside world. She grimaced, seeing the giant jaws had formed a sort of hill, making it impossible not to land on it. But the second she did, she had a feeling it would still try and swallow her whole. She needed something else right now as she was already falling back down.

"Shit, shit, shit!" she swore, heading right back towards the closing jaws. She looked around, trying to find anything to help her, and her eyes landed on something a little ways down the giant formation. Without stopping to even think about it, she threw her arms towards it, stretching them as fast as she possibly could, groaning a little from the strain of it. But her hands slammed into the tree, wrapping tightly around its branches just before she could fall back into the mouth. She yanked hard and retracted, pulling herself at full speed towards the tree.

She was still too close to the ground though, her feet slamming into the formation and creating gouge marks across the surface as she kept pulling herself.

"Damn it," she muttered, seeing the ground rising up in front of her and forming up. She was expecting some sort of monsters or tentacles or something like that. But she was immediately proven wrong as instead, several large pillars appeared just below her arms with long blades protruding out of them that instantly began spinning around rapidly until they looked like chainsaws, ready to slice her in half.

"That is so not fair," she muttered. "Why does he get this and I'm stuck with freaking stretchy powers? Now am I'm going to beat him up even more."

Thinking fast, she stretched out her legs, growing tall enough that her body would avoid the saws. Then, she just retracted her legs back into her midair, all the while still moving at the same speed. She now flew through the air, the saws passing below her harmlessly.

"Ha! Score one for stretchiness!"

As if they heard her, the saws suddenly rose up as well to meet her.

"Damn it, score one for…whatever that is, I guess."

She needed a new plan, ASAP.

Unfortunately, before she could even start to think of one, there was a loud chopping sound and she saw the tree she was pulling towards get cut down by another earthen saw.

"Oh come on!" she growled. "Ok Emily, you can do this." She looked down at the saws coming up to chop her in half, eyeing each one. There was only one way out of this and she would need to have perfect timing, aim, and precision.

Thankfully, that was what she excelled at.

She picked out one saw and shot her foot out to it, aiming directly for the central pillar. The pillars were too small to stand on but were just big enough to kick off of. Her foot slammed into it and she put just enough pressure on it to push herself forward, hopping onto the next rising saw, stretching out her leg and kicking off that pillar too, constantly keeping herself above the saws.

They were still rising quickly and she knew all it would take was one misstep and she would be cut in half. So she just had to move faster than them, hopping from pillar to pillar with swift precision. She looked ahead and saw the tree she was holding on to was still being chopped to pieces, with the branches her hands were on only a few feet from joining it.

"Come on," she told herself. "Just keep going."

She kicked off another pillar, just narrowly avoiding an earthen blade, and landed on the next one when she felt something. She kicked off right away but chanced a look back, hissing as she saw a hand had formed in the pillar, having been trying to grab hold of her. And one slight look ahead showed that the next pillars had hands growing on them too. The second she landed on them, she could be caught and that would be it.

She considered her options within the span of a second. There were only three saws left. That would have to do. This would be extremely close, but it was all she had.

She pulled herself even harder, shooting right over the saws to the tree. But the saws were still rising up and she knew she wouldn't be able to outrace them.

"Acrobatic training, don't fail me now," she muttered and then twisted her hands on the branches forward with all her strength, shooting the rest of her arms up and forward along with them just as a saw rose up towards Emily's face.

It was the longest second of her life. She didn't see her whole life flash before her eyes or have any last thoughts. All she saw was that spinning blade about to slice open her head. Then, she felt the pull reach her whole body and she was suddenly yanked upwards a little. She tucked her head into her body and just managed to avoid the saw, flying right above it. She then pushed as hard as she could off the branches before letting go just before her hands could be cut up, soaring right down the giant formation to the real ground below.

She flew right down, scanning quickly and finding another tree. She shot out her arms again, grabbing it and pulling herself right to it, landing feet-first on the branches. She huffed, heart practically beating out of her chest as she tried to catch her breath.

"Well that was certainly a workout," she said to herself. "And I guess this Sculptor can't reshape organic stuff, huh?" she nudged the tree.

She looked back at the giant mound and saw flashes of indigo light coming from the top. "Looks like you're still fighting then. Good. Least you don't have to worry about me. Just hurry up and help us out. We're gonna need everything we got."

She looked up at the towering earthen spire above her with all the large spikes or…branches growing out of it. The Sculptor was waiting at the top. And he'd already proven his powers were godlike. So there was only one thing to do.

"Climb up this stupid thing and punch God in the face," she said, grinning as she cracked her knuckles. "Let's do this."

Gabriela flew as fast as she could, aiming right for the giant earth tree dominating the skyline. Ever since she'd read those texts from the others, she'd gone into full panic mode, trying to understand exactly what was happening. So far, she still didn't have a clear idea but she figured the answers would come when she reached the tree.

She had been sitting, brainstorming ideas with her friends on what to do with her powers, when the whole roof came alive, formations cracking out of it to attack her. She'd only just managed to lead them away from her friends, obliterating a few of them, when the spire had gone up. It was at that point that she'd looked at her phone and realized just how much trouble they were in.

She hoped her friends were safe and that her theory that the formations would only attack her was right. Otherwise…no, she couldn't think like that. The spire was dead ahead. That was her focus. Nothing else.

She found flying to actually be relatively easy once she got used to it, pushing power out of her legs to propel her forward while letting some power out of her hands as well just to balance things out. And it was quite relaxing, if she wasn't currently flying directly towards a battle with an apparent godlike being inhabiting the body of a boy her age.

She propelled herself even further as she got closer, angling herself upwards. She hoped the others were ok too. Luke should be safe at the hospital but the others should be around, trying to find a way to get to the top of the earth tree like she was. She hoped Travis and Madison were still there and that this Sculptor hadn't…

No, she told herself again. Positive thinking only.

The closer she got, the more she analyzed the earthen tree. When it had first appeared, she had noticed spikes growing all over its trunk. Now she saw that the spikes were still growing, but only in the top section. Along the bottom, the spikes had transformed into earthen vines that were wrapping around each other, effectively forming a barrier to prevent anyone from climbing up.

"Well that's one way to do it," Gabriela muttered. If she was right about the others, she just hoped Frankin and Emily were with Sumin and they were able to fly up the tree. Otherwise…well, she didn't think those vines were just there to form a barrier.

She shot up into the sky, using her hands and feet at full power now. She was still a ways away from the trunk so the branches so far hadn't reached where she was, but those things were growing fast.

"Where is all this material coming from?" she wondered aloud before glancing back down. "Never mind. But…why? What is this guy's goal?"

Emily's text had said it was world-ending but that didn't really make sense. How exactly was this guy going to destroy the world with a tree? He would have to…oh.

Gabriela often took pride in how smart she was and how quickly she put things together. It was why she had been so disappointed in herself when she hadn't realized Swarm was Mr. Warners or that the earthen monsters Travis had mentioned couldn't possibly belong to Swarm. But now she was disappointed for figuring something out that terrified her.

The Sculptor was going to keep building the tree, taking from the earth's resources, until there was nothing left. That was…insane. But it was the only thing that made sense.

Gabriela gritted her teeth and propelled herself even faster, needing to get to the top. She had no idea if this Sculptor was a god or an alien or whatever. Right now, he was just something that needed to be stopped. She didn't know why it had to be them, why the freaking government or whoever ran the superhero world or whatever wasn't coming to stop him themselves, but right now it didn't matter. She had a planet to save.

As she reached the top, she saw the branches here were now reaching out for her. She dodged past them, heading straight for the flat surface where one giant and one small figure were. She looked for any sign of Travis or Madison but there was only those two. And neither looked like her friends.

She grimaced and prepared to move faster when something shot out at her from the corner of her eye and she just managed to duck in time.

It was a dust tentacle with three sharp fingers at the end. It turned around and attacked again, Gabriela giving a burst of speed to avoid it. She grunted and shot a laser beam, slicing it down the middle, letting it crumble away. She didn't have time for distractions like this.

Unfortunately, more popped up, reaching out to grab hold of her. She grunted, moving one hand forward to blast a tentacle to oblivion, but the others kept coming.

"Shoot," she muttered and let go of her power. For a split second, she just hovered there right before gravity took hold and she started falling, just avoiding the tentacles. She waiting a few more seconds before pushed her power out again as hard as she could right for the platform.

She knew she wouldn't last long in a fight against those tentacles. She didn't have great maneuverability in the air, or any for that matter. She just had to outpace them and get to that damn platform now.

She tried pushing harder, the tentacles falling behind, but as soon as she did, a wall of earth rose up, blocking her from the platform. It kept growing, rising up and up until it towered over her. All over it, she saw more spikes growing with hardly a gap between them.

"Oh you have to be kidding me."

The wall then started falling down on top of her.

"Ok, now you have to be kidding me."

Gabriela came to a stop, pushing with just enough power to stay afloat, before turning her body to the side and blasting away, trying to make it past the edge. But of course her bad luck stayed with her as the wall suddenly shifted, following her. She gaped as it moved, like there were people holding it up and chasing after her on the platform.

"You don't want to go easy on me, that's fine," Gabriela said, analyzing the wall still coming down on top of her. If it was just made of dirt, it would be easy enough with her powers to bust through. But the Sculptor may have added other components and she also didn't know how she would hold up against those spikes.

She fired off a laser beam, pushing as much power into it as she dared use, and moved her arm up fast, cutting the wall right down the middle. She grinned for a second before she realized the wall was still falling on top of her, just in two pieces with no gap between them.

No, that should have worked, she thought. If she cut them in two, the pieces would separate by force and fall in different directions, leaving a gap between them. But one quick look at the platform and she saw realized that the Sculptor still had a hold on them and was making them fall the way he wanted.

And now they were falling too fast, right about to hit her.

"AGGGHHH!" she screamed, thrusting both her hands together and gathering as much power as she could into them before pushing it all together in one giant blast.

A ball of energy shot out from her, striking the wall before it could hit and detonating in an orange explosion of energy and dirt, creating a large hole.

Gabriela didn't waste a second, flying right up through it just as the Sculptor started to close it. She soared past the wall and flew right up to the platform, hovering right above it and the two figures. Now that was closer, she saw one was a giant formation of what appeared to be kitchen appliances and the other was a boy she vaguely recognized.

"Must be Eustace," she muttered. "And the Sculptor."

"Gabriela Fuentes," the boy greeted, a wide smile on his face. "I'd say I'm surprised you made it this far but I don't actually care. Still, well done."

"Where are my friends?"

"Which ones? I'm currently attacking all of them so you'll have to be more specific."

Gabriela did her best to repress the wave of fear but it didn't help much. So the others were all in danger. She just had to hope they'd all be ok. "Travis and Madison."

"Oh those two. Yeah, they're still here…somewhere," he said, looking around the platform. "I buried them over there I think."

"You buried them?" Gabriela sucked in her breath, imagining her friends buried alive. It took everything she had not to blast the ground apart to find them.

"Yes. Well, I'm trying to anyway. That girl is putting up a good fight. Her force field is quite annoying. Still, it'll fall eventually and then they'll be dead."

So they were still alive. Good. That meant that Gabriela could focus on stopping this guy and then save them. "So you're the Sculptor then? Why are you trying to destroy the world?"

"I've already explained this to the people down there, but very well I'll say it again," he said in a bored tone. "My existence has only one purpose. To make my masterpieces out of worlds, a true work of art from their doom. It's beautiful. Beyond compare."

"So, let me just see if I've got this right. You're going to turn our world into a giant, rocky tree all in the name of art, destroying the planet in the process."

"Yes," he nodded.

"And you really don't care about all the people who are going to die."

"Couldn't care less. They're all going to die anyway, I'm just speeding the process along."

Gabriela nodded once before lighting up her fists. "Yeah, I was kind of planning on giving a speech to you on why this world is worth saving, but it's clear that it'll be just a waste of time on someone like you. So I think I'll just skip ahead and take you out."

"My word, are you always so violent?"

"When you plan mass genocide without a care in the world, you can bet I'll get violent!" Gabriela almost snarled. "We have too many crazy, power-hungry maniacs on our world already. We don't need another actually destroying it."

She launched a laser beam his way but he easily stepped out of the way. "Just so you know, if you hurt me, you hurt the host body as well."

Gabriela hadn't thought of that and grimaced. "Well, I'm sure he'll be fine with me knocking you out to stop the apocalypse."

The Sculptor just laughed. "That is funny. You think just knocking me out will do it. The last Cloak Guard had to kill my host to get the job done. Are you saying your world isn't worth killing for?"

"I'm really starting to hate you," Gabriela replied, but she held back. She had to kill the host to stop him? That couldn't be possible. There was no way she could do that. She'd just have to find another way.

But…what if the world did end?

Focus on the now, she reminded herself. And that meant, knocking this guy out.

"You know what, I am glad you're here though," the Sculptor told her. "I enjoy playing around with the others, seeing how they react to what I throw at them, and they are doing quite well, I must say, but I do want to really test how far my abilities have gotten. Let's see."

He snapped his fingers and the entire platform began to writhe. Gabriela, still in the air, could only watch as it rose up with several large pillars, forming a cage around them. Then, each of those stone pillars suddenly turned a metallic shade. Tiny wires sprouted from each one and connected to the next pillar over until a net formed around them. It was only then that Gabriela realized it wasn't a metallic shade, but actual metal.

The final touch was when there was a buzz in the air and then bolts of electricity started zapping around the net, lighting it all up.

"I believe this is what is known as a thunder dome," the Sculptor said. "Now, let's add some of this too."

He clapped his hands and part of the platform bubbled up before turning into a liquid state that looked like water but had smoke spewing out of it.

"Sulfuric acid. Destructive isn't it?"

Another clap and more tentacles appeared except these ones weren't made of rock or dirt, but shined brilliantly from their prismatic form.

"Diamond," Gabriela breathed.

"It truly is one of the hardest substances, isn't it? Now what else. Oh, I know."

Another clap and part of the air became murky and more solid, transforming into a dense cloud that formed up into floating balls that began to move around randomly.

"Pure nitrogen, right there," the Sculptor informed her. "Well, I think that about covers it. Got a liquid, a solid, and a gas. Oh, why not one more?"

A clap and a bright blue flame appeared in the center of the platform. It then spread out like a spider web, strands of fire burning midair as they attached themselves to random parts of the thunder dome.

"Yeah, that's just fire. I wanted to add it cause it looks cool. Well, now I think that's everything. Oh, actually one last thing." One final clap and the air around the Sculptor morphed as an armor-like substance covered him, seemingly made up of all four things that somehow molded together.

"Why so surprised?" the Sculptor asked her. "I have the power to reshape whatever I want. And my power grows with every second that passes. I am so glad you came to fight me. I can't quite change periodic elements at will over long distances so your friends are facing my more basic stuff. But with you, oh ho, I can go all out. Do try and last a few minutes though, I haven't had a workout in quite some time."

Gabriela gulped, feeling like her heart stopped. She was so way in over her head, she felt like she had somehow sunk to the bottom of the Mariana Trench. This was nothing like Swarm. There was no way she could possibly beat this guy. He wasn't even treating her like a threat, more like a plaything for him to toy with before finishing her off.

Come on Gabriela, she tried telling herself. Use that big brain of yours and think of something.

But she was out of ideas. And pretty much out of courage as well.

"Where is your bravado now?" the Sculptor asked. "Don't tell me it's all gone. And here I was hoping for a fight."

Gabriela backed up, looking for a way out of this. She couldn't fight him. But there was no way to escape. She was pretty sure her lasers couldn't slice through metal and she wasn't sure it was possible to tunnel through the ground. So her only choice was…she didn't know what it was.

She was going to die. She wasn't going to see that better tomorrow after all.

A better tomorrow is only real if we never lose faith that it will come.

If Sculptor had his way, no one would ever have a better tomorrow. He'd already taken so many futures away from innocent people, from she-didn't-know-how-many worlds. And now he was going to do the same here. Everything her mother had worked for, had died for, would be for nothing.

"You can either stay down, feeling sorry for yourself, or stand up and fight to make the world a damn better place," she heard her mother in her head. "What's it gonna be, perrita?"

"Well," Gabriela said, feeling her power rising back up inside of her, "keeping the world spinning will give a better tomorrow a better chance, right?"

"That's my girl."

Gabriela called on her power and let it rush through her entire body, glowing brightly. She wouldn't stand a chance with just laser beams and whatnot. She needed all her power flowing through her to fight this guy. She could feel it, wanting to burst out of her. Her skin was practically burning, an aura of molten orange forming around her.

"Well now, that's better," the Sculptor said. "So are you just going to float there, or are you going to fight?"

In response, Gabriela shot out to laser beams from her hands, striking him right in his armored chest. She knew it wouldn't do any good, but she wanted to see what exactly it could do.

It was as she suspected. Her energy beams should have been able to pass through the nitrogen and acid easily enough but the diamond segments were the real problem. They were mixed in so well that it was impossible to tell where they really were. He could even be moving them around to where she hit.

"My turn," he said and the diamond tentacles shot towards her. She shot upwards and used her hands to pivot around, dodging as best she could. There wasn't much she could do against the diamond stuff. Her lasers clearly weren't close to powerful to break them. And as long as she never touched the gas or acid, she should be fine with them. She was confused by the fire though. With her power, she should be able to pass through it easily. Her body radiated heat so it would serve as no true threat to her.

Unless, of course, the Sculptor had some sort of trick up his sleeve.

She dodged another tentacle, dropping down and then propelling herself to the side. As she did, she felt a wave of cold on her back and shot forward again, looking back to see the ball of nitrogen she'd nearly collided with. That was too close.

Two more tentacles shot to her and she shot up farther to avoid then, skimming the edge of the thunder dome. She blasted out with her hand, pushing herself to avoid any more nitrogen balls floating around. She didn't understand how Sculptor was able to make them float like that. Nitrogen was one of the densest gases on the planet, always sinking to the ground and spreading there. So…

"Surprise twist!" the Sculptor suddenly shouted and Gabriela saw the acid lake sink in on itself for a second before bursting up in a massive geyser, its drops spewing everywhere.

She swore in at least three different languages as she brought her hands above her head, letting out as much heat energy as she could. She felt the drops begin to strike her but they evaporated on impact with her hands, sizzling away. A second later and it stopped and she breathed out in relief. That had been too close.

She started to propel herself upwards when she felt something above her head. She glanced up to see she had flown into one of the blue fire lines. "Oh…"

The line detonated, the explosion throwing her down into the ground where she cratered. She groaned, coughing up smoke and trying to clear the blurriness from her eyes. But before she could even try to get up, she felt a sudden pressure against her chest and then she was yanked up only to be slammed back into the ground, cratering the ground again.

One of the diamond tentacles had her. She just managed to curse in four more languages.

"Well, that was slightly amusing but I guess this Cloak Guard just doesn't stack up to the original, does it," the Sculptor remarked sadly. "Oh well. Time to end this."

Gabriela gathered up her power again, trying to gain enough to break free, but to no avail. The diamond was too strong for her. She screamed out, twisting and wriggling like a fish in a vain attempt to escape. This couldn't be how it ended. She couldn't let it go this way. The world still needed saving. She couldn't just let herself…die.

She felt the tentacle tighten its grip, her body getting crushed. She couldn't breathe, her lungs almost flattened. Her rips felt like they would snap at any second. She tried to flex with her power, tried to propel herself out, but nothing worked. She was going to die.

BOOM!

Gabriela instinctively flinched at the blast. The tentacle stopped squeezing and she managed to grab a few deep breaths before looking up to see the large hole in the thunder dome's metal cage. She let out a sigh of relief. Someone had come to help. While she still didn't like the idea of being a damn damsel in distress, at least she wouldn't be fighting alone anymore and she would take that.

"Ah, you've finally arrived," the Sculptor said in a bored tone. "I thought you'd never get past my barricades."

"I'm guessing you're the arrogant bastard they call the Sculptor," said in a familiar voice. "I'm going to enjoy killing you."

Gabriela couldn't help but groan loudly as Swarm dropped into the thunder dome on a large platform of microbots, a cocky smirk on his face. Things had just gotten so much worse.

Eustace watched everything unfold with growing horror. He desperately wanted to do something, anything, but he could only watch. He barely understood what was happening, he just knew it was all his fault. If he hadn't let the Sculptor in, if he hadn't let himself be manipulated into attacking those places, then everything would be ok.

Instead, he saw kids his own age fight the thing possessing him and lose. He saw his city, the one he'd lived his entire life, get destroyed. He saw his father…die. Even though he hated the man, he never wanted that to happen. He didn't want any of this.

If him dying was what it took, then he would gladly make that sacrifice. This had started with him, it made sense he be the one to pay for it. Come on guys, he thought sadly. You have to.