It was all going so well.

It was all going so well, until it wasn't.

Five minutes earlier, Kaden and Hollye had split up.

Well, they had been split up. The two didn't really have much choice.

When an unexpected horde of people with swords and knives had appeared before them, they had decided to run.

Kaden would have happily just burned them all, but Hollye had quite forcibly dragged him away. Then the two had been running, hearts pounding, and then, Kaden had found himself alone.

"Hollye?" Kaden pulled to a stop, eyes darting around. He wasn't scared exactly. He was pretty sure that Hollye couldn't physically die anyway. He just didn't like not knowing if his friend was safe or not. He took a deep breath, partly to steady himself a little, partly because he was out of breath. He shook his head. Hollye would be fine, but he had a control room to explode.

Nobody had followed him. There hadn't even been any guards at the control room. Kaden knew he should be wary, but maybe they had all been pulled away to deal with the others. He hoped so. He knew not. It was this thinking that made him all the more cautious as he pushed open the heavy metal door, to where he knew there had to be somebody, or something going on.

He was right.

Surrounded by the various machines, in amongst flashing lights and buzzing screens, was a man.

He wasn't doing anything of any significance. In fact, he wasn't doing anything at all. He just sat there, on one of the chairs that swirled and swirled until it broke, waiting. Waiting for Kaden. He didn't move though. He just waited, as Kaden stepped in, eyes darting around for any sign of a trap. There wasn't any. Even as the door swung closed behind him, the man made no move to attack, which just confused Kaden. Something was wrong. Something was very wrong.

"I've been waiting for you." He barely moved his cracked lips, and his eyes showed nothing. Kaden suppressed a shiver, but didn't take his eyes from the man, in fear of being attacked the second he did. He couldn't find his voice either, he couldn't find the words to reply. So he just stared, and the man stared back, and nothing happened for a good few minutes.

It was very suddenly that Kaden snapped out of the daze the man had seemed to put him in. He had a job to do here, he wasn't here to just stare at the man. He had forgotten, for those few minutes, what he came to do. His hands raised automatically, aimed towards the largest of the screens. He closed his eyes, let the energy dance within him, letting it come naturally. Kaden couldn't force his magic, that was it's biggest flaw. Even in the worst situations, in a case of life or death, he had to let it flow. He felt a pang of jealousy for others, Hollye for example, who could force it to come whenever they demanded. It didn't work like that for Kaden. So he let it dance, the power coming to him, tingling in his fingertips.

He was seven again. He was always seven at times like these. He was seven years old, standing in the training yard, surrounded by so many faces, so much laughter, at him, at his brother. It all blurred into one, into one sound, one face over and over again. The crying, Leo, nursing an injured wrist, crying at the injury, at his failure to succeed. Kaden's anger, coursing through his veins, at these people laughing at his brother. A hot feeling, not just anger, moving away from the anger, moving smoother, softer, calmer, bubbling and dancing, dancing through his body. The flames, every single one of those laughing faces turning panicked, scared at the flames erupting around them, around him, destroying, destroying but not harming, not really burning the running kids.

And everything was on fire.

And the tips of his hair were fire too, burning golden, flickering in the wind, in the power he produced. They weren't really on fire, but they looked it.

Now, Kaden stood, the tips of his coal black ponytail burning as brightly as they did that day. He resonated power, he was something to be feared. The fire danced, trickling out of his finger tips, dancing around him, not burning but waiting, waiting to be unleashed.

Five.

Four.

Three.

Two.

One.

He let it go, let it run it's course and do it's damage on the world. He released it to do whatever damage it wanted, whatever damage it could. It was never truly his, but it was his. It was his power, but the flames were themselves, not his, not the worlds. They belonged to themselves, they belonged to the destruction they created.

Then, they were gone.

Kaden could feel the pressure against his neck, but the man was nowhere, not there, not harming him. All that there was were shadows, pinning him down, an impossible enemy. The man, he had to be here, he had to be somewhere. Kaden needed a physical enemy, not this, not shadows, not something he couldn't hold, couldn't grab, couldn't kill.

He resisted, he resisted the shadows but he couldn't fight them, couldn't stop them, not until he could find the man.

Kaden always believed that Necromancers were cowards - they never really fought. They got shadows to do it for them - shadows of life and shadows of darkness, shadows of things left behind and abandoned, shadows of things snatched away from the light.

Nobody could fight shadows. Nobody.