The Invincibles Read Free

later. Their little legs wouldn’t carry them far and he should find tracking them down fairly easy. They were still kids after all. For now, at least, they had left the other children alone.
    The Death Reaper whipped Nightshadow’s own burning-hot utility belt right into his facemask. Nightshadow grunted and cursed as he flailed back and away. He shouldn’t have let himself get distracted like that.
     
    ***
     
    Not feeling his gloved hands burning or simply not caring, the Reaper repeatedly beat and lashed the belt against Nightshadow’s back. Finally, Nightshadow caught it and snagged open a pouch. The Reaper jerked the belt back and a flash grenade went off in his face.
    Dropping the belt, he fumbled back, frantically rubbing at his eyes. Without looking, he nimbly sidestepped, falling onto a pair of blazing skyscrapers. He blinked a few times and gazed back up at Nightshadow. He shuddered, growled, and pounced. He bludgeoned into Nightshadow, scratching, clawing, and biting at him. Entangled together, they fell stiffly and painfully down onto the unforgiving stone floor.
    They wrestled and struggled, knocking over cameras and becoming tied up in cords. Nightshadow managed to knee the Reaper twice in the groin and, using his superior leg strength, kicked him off, hoisting him up and over onto the blazing city replica. The Reaper smashed down through the toppled buildings and ashy wreckage, actually banging his head on the fallen ladder. The flames jumped and danced all over him, blackening his pale white skin and suit.
    Nonetheless, he rose up, wiping off soot and gruffly laughing. “Every burn feels like a kiss,” he said before kicking the fire-blackened ladder into Nightshadow, who was still on his knees. It smacked him hard in the chest and he went down.
    After tossing the ladder aside, the Reaper grabbed Nightshadow up by the collar. With surprising strength, he hurled him up and spiked him down hard onto the flaming wreckage. Nightshadow even felt the pointed top of a miniature skyscraper stab into his back and break before the whole building collapsed under him. Fire wound up and down around his armor, and the heat punished all his aching bruises.
    Nightshadow locked all the pain away inside a deep box in his mind. He still felt it and knew it was there. It just no longer bothered him. This old meditative trick allowed him to still function despite the punishment he took and his own physical limitations, though he’d pay for it later.
    Ignoring that for now, he stumbled clumsily back up to his feet and tried to prime himself for more combat. However, he found the Death Reaper pointing both his escrima fighting sticks at him, having produced them from wherever he’d secreted them away in the room. In a moment, the ninja stars would swarm out in a sharp, bladed storm that’d finish Nightshadow once and for all. However, the Reaper grinned and instead aimed up at the children he’d kidnapped, who were still bound and helpless in their seats.
    “ NO!” Nightshadow rushed him and the Reaper turned, catching him in the face with a strike so hard it broke the fighting stick. Nightshadow crashed down to the floor in a heap. Tossing the broken fighting stick away, the Reaper stood over him.
    “ Oh you, my darling dark angel,” he said, happily licking some blood and patchy, burned skin off of his own face. “You’re my forever.”
    Solemnly, he reared back the remaining fighting stick, ready to bust open Nightshadow’s skull with it. Nightshadow braced himself for the blow and the sweet oblivion that’d likely follow.
    Neither came.
    Instead, the Death Reaper staggered wildly back, gagging and choking. He dropped the fighting stick to clutch at his chest. His face contorted and seized up. Nightshadow managed to sit up and was unable to believe what he was seeing.
    The Reaper looked pleadingly down at him. His eyes widened and his lipless mouth curved up into a ragged zero. He toppled over onto the burning