[272] Metamorphosis: Intangible

[minntaka.livejournal.com]

Challenge: [272] Metamorphosis
Title: Intangible
Word Count: 384
Rating: G
Summary: This fight was quite easily my favourite bit in Aqua's story.

  

Intangible

She wakes up into her nightmare of years ago, of barbed black and acid green and a witch's cruel stare. Behind the safeguard of her Keyblade, she witnesses Maleficent contort and explode into a fierce column of darkness that stretches into the clouds.

Prince Philip falls back. His boots and the tip of his sword scrape the trembling earth and together, they lift their heads to acknowledge the monstrous dragon before them.

She thinks of home, of reading legends on magic and monsters and men and how, until now, they had only ever been alive in a story.
 
She hasn't felt such fear for a long time, but it is definitely fear that courses through her veins and materialises as sweat and a hammering heart. The ground trembles at the dragon's sheer weight, and snarling breaths escape through the serrated arcs of blackened teeth; and it's a creature no longer confined in the crinkled pages of a storybook or the old words of a fairytale.

Slowly, she eyes their three defences in turn – the sword, the shield, the Keyblade – and between her striking blows at the creature's loathsome body, she wonders if it's enough. She wonders if she is enough to defeat a dragon – a dragon – and for the longest of moments that crush an eternity in a split-second, her mind strays to linger on one word.

No.

Philip calls her name, and then the thought slips free. She ducks behind him, just as harlequin green flames consume the road to the castle. She pants, struggles to see beyond the lapping tongues of cursed fire and the Prince's singed cape, and with a sting she remembers – how could she ever have forgotten? –  that the best defences are those which are intangible, the kind Maleficent could never comprehend.

The dragon's mighty head looms over the fire and she knows that there's only one way to pass it. Philip reaches out the same time she does, because he too has so many reasons to keep fighting, and he seizes her wrist with a nod.

She flies, soars over the snapping flames and it's deadly quiet in the air. She remembers her friends and her reasons – and that's why her Keyblade is so strong – and she forgets to be afraid.

Hey, thinks Aqua. I can transform too.

Comments

[synchroshatter.livejournal.com]

This fight was great in-game and I think you've managed to capture it really well here, especially how teaming up is what helps them win.

I really liked the insight into Aqua's thoughts, especially in this line: She flies, soars over the snapping flames and it's deadly quiet in the air. She remembers her friends and her reasons – and that's why her Keyblade is so strong – and she forgets to be afraid.

[wishingdreamer5.livejournal.com]

Wow, that was pretty epic. At one point I realized that I could even imagine the little sounds that were described in this drabble (and even the quiet).