Lightning's Limit by Mark Brandon Powell Page B

assignment. It doesn’t take him long, and he turns to go back to the bus. Walking back he sees all the girls are finally here.   Amber walks over to him and says hello. She is the teams healer and is a shy girl who doesn’t have many friends. She’s also the only one truly nice to him within the sea of the privileged he is in. She spends most of her time in the test lab learning new healing techniques or at volunteer hospital using what she knows. He’s just happy to have at least one friend in this place.  
    As they walk back to the bus talking about what’s going to happen today, Julie appears beside them as they talk about their chances at winning the tournament today. Vargas looks over and can see that she doesn’t realize that her spell has worn off. He decides to play a joke on her.
    “So Amber, I just wanted to tell you something that you might be able to help with.”
    Amber looks over to Vargas and sees Julie between them, and answers Vargas without any surprise in her voice. “What might that be Vargas?”
    “Well you see Julie confided in me the other day, and told me that she was in love with me.”
      Julie blurts out, “No I did not!”, followed by her covering her mouth.
    Vargas gets a big grin on his face as he says, “Well then you shouldn’t be spying on people.   You don’t want people to hear a rumor about you falling in love with the poor kid.”
    Julie starts to turn four different shades of red in anger, “I swear Vargas if you tell anyone that I will have your head on a platter.”
    “Well you would have to catch me first.” He says as he directs the flow of magic in his body down to his feet. Starting with just a spark of electricity to a full bolt of lightning that he arcs around behind Julie and he glides behind her and whispers in her ear,   “And you’re not fast enough to catch me.”
    Julie turns to slap him in the face but she hits nothing but air. He is already back standing next to Amber.  
    Coach Hillborn yells out from the bus, “Julie Brawn please stop using your illusion magic outside of lessons to spy on people.”  
    “But people get paid really good money to do that, I have to practice sometime.” She retorts.
    “Yes yes, you’re going to be a big spy one day but not today.   Load up on the bus so we can head out to Bastion.”
    Vargas heads toward the middle of the bus and takes a window seat and the bus slowly fills with the girls as they each have their chauffeurs take their luggage to the underside storage compartment of the bus. They all sit toward the front of the bus and begin gossiping about everything that had happen the week prior. Vargas rolls his eyes, and pulls up his overlay. He scrolls through his songs he has on his HaLO because he would rather listen to music than those girls chattering on the whole way there.  
    The ride through the dome was quick as they pull up toward the gates that leads out. The gates themselves are massive in size. There are three of them in total and each are as thick as the bus is long. As they approach, each go through an opening process that unhinges and spins out of the way. Once though, waiting at the next door, the one behind spins closed, creating a seal before the next can open.
    Trees cover the road on either side of the bus and Vargas is shocked to see as much technology as he does on the drive there. He had heard there are digital advertisements attached to everything, that can only be seen with your overlay. A few boys were talking about when they left the dome for vacations how awesome they were. They must have been talking about further out than what they are or they could have just been full of it. Nothing he is seeing right now is any different from what he normally sees.
    Passing through the forest they come out to the open sky and a clear field and view of Bastion in the distance. The sun shining off the water and buildings through the ever thinning tree line.   The Coliseum is clearly visible