Magical Scribe Eleanor Slam versus Magical Pyromancer Belinda "Blue" Contra

Miss Bel's class takes place out on the firing range again. Outside, in the scary, not-city parts of Australia. Full of stuff like poisonous spiders and drop bears. At night, with only a few people carrying flashlights. And with no sign of Miss Bel herself.

Maybe the wild animals are put off by how much this place smells like smoke and gunpowder. Or by all the craters and scorch marks left around. How can the Sixth hide something like this? Don't people notice all the explosions here?

Like the one that happened just now: a sudden fireball that appeared out of nowhere, briefly illuminated everything, and then dispersed on its own. Revealing an unscathed Vindicare Rank Leader inside of it, and making the almost-dozen novice Eversors, myself included, and the few other girls from other ranks nearly piss ourselves as we focus our flashlights on her. Yesterday she just showed up in some kind of military uniform. Now she has a cape and shit and appears in a burst of fire.

With a self-satisfied smile on her face, Miss Bel greets us. Loudly. "Goooooood evening, ladies, and welcome to the last leg of training for the day! For those of you that skipped out yesterday, I am the one and only Belinda Contra, a.k.a. Miss Blue, your Vindicare Rank Leader!" But I'm sure that everybody that was here last night is here now...

She holds out her hand, and an orb of fire the size of a basketball materializes in it with a 'whoosh.' "And I'm very hotly passionate about fire!" she exclaims. She holds it up and slants her arms at an angle, letting it roll down her shoulders to her other arm. "In fact, I like fire a lot more than I like any of you!" Then she catches it with her other hand and holds it up on the tip of her finger. All without breaking eye contact with us. "So do what I say, or I'll burn you to death, okay, kids♥?"

...The ball just turned into a heart shape.

All of us nod in unison.

"Fantastic!" Miss Bel... Miss Blue exclaims, clapping her hands together, the orb winking out of existence. "So!" she says suddenly, both of her hands ablaze while she starts gesticulating. "Tonight I'm going to teach you brats about regeneration, something any sparkly can do!"

Wait, seriously? Anybody? Apparently she guessed at what I was thinking, going on to explain, "Even a Vindicare or a Vanus can pull it off. It's just that Eversors have a better healing factor by design." She splits into the second-smuggest grin I've seen all day, adding, "Well, usually." I just blinked, and she suddenly has a knife in her hand, the fires having disappeared. I drop my flashlight, because it's literally in her hand. She just fucking stabbed herself in the hand. I heard the sound of it piercing her flesh, and it's run all the way through to the other side.

Waiting a few seconds, still grinning as if this isn't something completely messed up, Miss Blue yanks the knife out and stows it in her inventory. She holds up her hand for all of us to see - though I have to squint a little. And all that's there is a black mark. No blood, no wound, just a black thing. Soon that's gone, too.

She is absolutely showing off tonight.

"Anyway," Miss Blue continues while I fumble with the flashlight on the ground, "what nobody told you yet is that your healing ability can be trained and harnessed, until you can do it faster, with less magic spent, and without conscious effort." When I have it pointed back at her, her hands are burning again. "And from what I've found, the best way to train it is to inflict a lot of little injuries repeatedly over a short period of time..."

No. Please no. Please don't be what I think it is.

A large column of fire erupts behind her, drawing gasps from all of us trainees. "That's why we're following last night's live fire drills with tonight's live fire drills... with tonight's live fire drills! With actual, live fire!"

...Okay, no. No. I resolved I was going to try harder but this... just fuck this. Fuck this with a rake. If I ran now, there's no way any of them could catch me. If I could just make my legs move, I could be out of here and back in bed. I can handle being scolded or having my nightmares come after me, but fuck this. Fire -hurts-!

Miss Blue doesn't seem to think there's anything wrong with this insanity, and keeps talking. "First I'm going to non-fatally burn you, and you lot will heal your burns using your regenerative ability. Then I'll ignite you again, and we repeat the whole process for about an hour." I look at the others for some voice of dissent or something. And it's not there. Holy shit, some of them actually look eager. What is wrong with these people?!

"Everybody ready?" No. "Good! Now let's start this off-" the psycho pyromaniac stretches her arms out in front of her and makes a finger gun gesture using both hands "-with a BANG!"

On 'BANG', Miss Blue makes a shooting motion with her finger gun and a small fireball is 'shot' from her hand at a random girl. It hits her and explodes, the girl screaming as she bursts into flames.

Then another girl is pegged with a fireball. And another. And another. Miss Blue kept going while everyone was distracted, still making that obnoxious gesture. The air fills with heat, smoke, and tortured screaming- well, okay, some of them are laughing. I move away from those people.

Then Miss Blue focuses her attention on me, and winks.

...I throw my hands up in surrender, but I'm not quick enough. The fireball impacts my chest and explodes.

"FUCK!" I screech. Excruciating pain makes my body lock up completely as the flames spread. The costume I hate so much only acting as fuel for the blaze to cover almost every part of my body. Everything gets blurry from the heat, or from the lack of oxygen, the air full of the smell of burnt meat.

"Hey, do you hear that?" Miss Blue's voice snaps me out of staring at nothing. "The fire's saying you need to try harder! If you're still burning, you don't want it bad enough! Try not being on fire!"

What the FUCK kind of STUPID BULLSHIT SENTIMENT IS THAT?! I'd be ALL OVER NOT BEING ON FIRE RIGHT NOW IF IT WAS THAT EASY! I just want to scream at how FUCKING UNFAIR this whole FUCKING RETARDED exercise is! SO I FUCKING DO THAT! "FUCK YOU!" I roar at the pyromaniac! Everybody's staring at me but I DON'T FUCKING CARE right now, I'm sick of being DUMPED ON by these-

"There you go, then!" Miss Blue cheers, turning to everyone else before she says, "See that right there? You CAN stop being on fire through force of will, so don't give me any of that 'stop, drop, and roll' crap!"

What just happened? I'm not burning anymore? Everything still hurts like hell, but I don't see any remaining trace of a fire besides badly singed clothes. My anger cools in a flash - damn, I wasn't supposed to rely on anger - and I start to feel tired again.

Looking at it, the damage isn't even that severe. The skin's peeled in some spots, but it just looks like a bad sunburn.

"Good job, kid! Now focus on not being burned!" Miss Blue gives vague instructions and a thumbs up, then goes back to deal with everyone else. Leaving me here feeling even more exposed than usual in this getup. At least everyone else appears too busy to stare at me.

Okay. I got this far. I just have to give it my all and... Focus.

I tune out everything else, like the stink of burned hair and flesh, and the noises of girls screaming and laughing. Turning out everything other than the pain, which seems to be lessening - thank you painkillers, sorry Miss Madge. With my not-burned metal arm, I focus the flashlight on the tender, red thing that is my left arm. Then I focus my thoughts.

Focus on not being burned. Imagine what it used to look like. Try to remember what it was before.

...

...

...

Nothing's happening. Gotta try harder. Focus on not being burned... Send your magic to your arm... Imagine it mending...

It's not working... am I doing it wrong?

I keep trying, though I glance up every so often, seeing Miss Blue lighting other kids on fire again after they've healed their wounds. I'm falling behind.

Sometimes I catch Miss Blue looking in my direction. And each time she's smiling a little less.

---

An hour flies by, and soon the only ones left are Miss Blue and I after I insisted she stay behind. She's been entertaining herself by talking to a fireball in her hand. Me, I'm still trying to make my skin mend and stop being red. It's starting to hurt again.

Suddenly, she lets out a tremendous sigh of disappointment. "Okay, kid," she says, gesturing to me as the fire disappears and she pulls out a clipboard and pen, "I have important things I need to do, soooo I'm marking you down with an F before going back."

"Please don't!" I beg her, trying to make my skin mend itself somehow. "I swear I can-"

"No, see, we're done here, kid," she interrupts, glaring at me disdainfully. "Everybody else has already tapped into their power and been sent home, and I've stayed behind for fifteen minutes watching you wince from first degree burns." After she jots down her notes, she starts walking back and motions for me to follow behind her.

"You have the weakest healing factor I've ever seen," she continues as I start my walk of shame back to the Officio behind her, flashlight trained on her the entire time. "It's like it's not even there. And that wasn't mentioned in your profile, but giving up sure is."

"But I was trying!" I insist, trying not to cry again. If I can't do this, then it means going back to paperwork and everything everybody did for me was meaningless! I have to do it!

"If you were trying, then you'd be healing!" Miss Blue suddenly shouts, sounding irritated. "But you didn't, so you failed! And I have to say, that was unbelievably disappointing! After what I'd seen you do, I was expecting good things from you, y'know?"

"I swear I was trying!" I tell her again, almost tugging at her cape so she'd turn around and look at me when she's writing me off like this. It can't end here. Not like this. Not after coming this far.

Miss Blue glances over her shoulder, and then lets out another loud, exasperated sigh. "Okay, okay," she says, "this is just a shot in the dark, but are you on any medication?"

"No," I answer her.

"Kind of a shocker, really," she says under her breath, and then asks, "Have you been taking any drugs?"

"No," I repeat, wishing it was so simple.

"Legal drugs?" she presses, "Analgesics?"

"Miss Madge told me to stop doing that this morning."

"Then it sucks to be you, because-"

I stop in my tracks as sadness washes over me like a sudden flood.

"I didn't," I confess. "I took some before I got here." Because the rest of the time before the last training exercise of the day (other than dinner) is always spent doing drills. So many goddamn drills. Run this course, climb this wall, crawl this trench, jump this gap, carry this weight, hit this target, navigate this maze, save this person, block this attack. I didn't think I'd be able to move my legs without taking one, considering how it went last night. Even though I was told not to do it.

I fucked up again because I couldn't listen to people.

"I'm sorry," I mumble, too ashamed to speak up or stop staring at my feet. "I didn't mean to-"

"Well, that'll do it, then." I jump as Miss Blue's voice comes from right next to me - when did she sneak up on me like that? "I'm not going to bore you with the science of it, but your healing ability is hampered when you use painkillers." She glares at me through the flashlight beam. "It says so right on the- Oh, right, untrained Vanus. Anyway, those are for emergency use only, like to stop someone from witching out due to severe pain."

"So I fucked up," I mumble.

She breaks into a smile and pats me on the shoulder, making me flinch a little. "To be honest I'm kind of glad that's probably all it is. I mean, were you using that last night, before the live fire exercises?"

I shake my head, and she breams wider. "Then you took getting shot at a lot better than most of the people there did," she exclaims. I try to correct her, but she interrupts me, saying, "Yeah, I could tell you had help and knew what you were doing, and that's fine! There's more to it than just knowing the trick." She clenches her fist, and her grip on my shoulder starts to hurt. "It takes willpower to keep going! Even if you weren't the best, I was actually pretty impressed you lasted as long as you did!" She finally lets go, and starts scratching at the back of her head. "And after you actually turned down getting out early... weeeell I like rooting for the underdog if you catch my drift."

But I only stopped trying because I got shot in the head and died.

"But yeah," Miss Blue continues, not reading my thoughts, "spite's a powerful motivator. Whether it's your peers or your instructor, do better than they think you can." Making a grand gesture towards me, she shouts encouragingly, "Believe in yourself, kid, because nobody else will!"

...That is the least inspirational thing I've heard in a while. I was doing it for the cash prize, anyway.

She sniggers and slaps me on the back, "I'm just messing with you," she teases.

...That hurt.

"I know you said you were in it for the money. I can respect that," she clarifies, and resumes walking back to the Officio building. "There's no consolation prizes, though. You either go big or go home."

"But I only stopped trying because I got shot in the head and died," I murmur. And yelp when a gout of fire erupts a few inches in front of me. I stumble back and fall down before the fire disappears, Miss Blue having put some distance between her and myself.

"You got a problem with how I run things?!" she shouts from up ahead.

"No!" I shout back in response, not like I have much of choice after that display. I have to jog to catch up with her, wincing every so often because of my injuries. Burns sucks.

Miss Blue snorts once I've gotten close again. "Yeah, that's what I thought," she says in satisfaction. "So you're not at the 'keep going after a head wound' level yet. You'll get there if you practice."

"Practice?" You can practice surviving getting shot in the head?

She nods, but doesn't elaborate. Instead, she orders, "For tonight, though, wait for the drugs to wear off and then try to heal your burns on your own."

"Okay," I mumble again. Really not looking forward to that.

"Come on, cheer up!" Miss Blue exclaims, not liking my tone. She turns to look at me again, grinning widely, as if she's really proud of something. "We're shooting guns tomorrow! You like guns, right?"

I shake my head. "Guns kinda scare me," I tell her. Guns in video games are one thing, but having that kind of power in your hands just... makes me feel like I'd do something I'd regret.

Miss Blue hisses through her teeth. "Oh, that sucks," she states. She looks at me with eyes full of pity for all of a moment, and then asserts, "Then you'd better get over it by tomorrow night, kid!" Yet again, she walks off, making a gesture over her shoulder. "And you still failed today, though if you're all better next time I see you, I'll stick a note by it."

"'nks," I tell her. For the last bit, anyway. For the rest... why the fuck does an Eversor need a gun?

"Don't sweat it, kid."

After that, the rest of the walk back is mostly silent. Miss Blue hums something to herself the majority of the way, but I don't really ask her about it.

Once we're back into the Officio, I'm struck by an idea. And I start trying to think of something, besides how much the burns bother me. Something to ask her. Because I have the opportunity, and there has to be something that she can tell me. She's not an Eversor, but she stabbed herself without flinching. There has to be a trick to it.

It's just before we're about to part ways when it comes to me.

I clear my throat to get her attention, and pose what I think is the most important question I can think of: "Miss Blue? How do I deal with all the aches and pains that come from extended training, without... any kind of help?"

Miss Blue thinks for a second, and then shrugs. "You do what I did," she says plainly. "You get good. Then you get really good. And then... you get good enough to stand with the 'pure' Eversors without feeling ashamed of yourself." That sounds like a hell of a stretch, but she sounds serious. "Once you can do the 'Official Officio Bare Minimum Daily Workout' without your costume, daily drills get a lot easier."

I can barely do that -with- my costume. That... might explain a lot, really.

I nod gratefully and tell her, "I'll tr- I mean, I'll do that, then." I offer up a sincere smile of gratitude.

Miss Blue takes it. "Good. See you tomorrow, kid." Then, with a flourish of her cape, she leaves me to head back to my room on my own.

...I really hope she wasn't pulling my leg there.