My thorns won't listen to me anymore.
That's the thought that keeps circling through my mind as I watch them grow toward Vazroth instead of away from him, reaching for Johann's copied flesh like they've found something worth nurturing. Plants have always responded to me - to my will, my intention, my understanding of growth and cycles and the patient progression from seed to bloom. But now they're acting on their own, following instructions I didn't give them, obeying a logic that has nothing to do with my commands.
It feels like betrayal. Which is stupid, because plants can't betray you. They don't have loyalty or malice. They just grow toward what sustains them, seek out what helps them flourish, respond to fundamental forces that predate human concerns about allegiance.
But it still feels personal.
I pull my power back, forcing the thorns to retract even as they resist me. It's like trying to uproot trees that have decided they belong exactly where they are - possible but exhausting, requiring more effort than it should. The vines curl back reluctantly, and I feel their confusion ripple through our connection. They don't understand why I'm calling them away from something that wants to help them grow.
Vazroth watches this with that expression that's becoming familiar - fond appreciation mixed with clinical interest. Like he's watching a student struggle with a concept they'll eventually understand.
VTH: Your ability is beautiful. Genuinely. The way you commune with living things, ask them to manifest their potential, guide their growth toward purpose. It's more art than power.
LIS: Stop talking.
VTH: But you're fighting your own nature. Plants grow toward what sustains them. And this body - Johann's body, copied and sustained by duplication itself - is fundamentally about growth. About becoming more. Your thorns recognize that. They want to help.
Alexander's obsidian crashes between us, giving me space to retreat and regroup. I'm breathing hard, not from physical exertion but from the mental strain of fighting my own power. Every vine I manifest wants to turn traitor. Every root I send through the earth tries to find Johann's flesh and nurture it.
Astra lands beside me on platforms of starlight, her face showing the same exhaustion I feel.
AST: Your thorns still rebelling?
LIS: They think he's trying to grow. They want to help him.
AST: Can you override them? Force them to attack anyway?
I consider it, feeling through our connection to the plants scattered across the battlefield. Technically yes. I could force them to attack, could override their natural inclination with pure will. But it would be like forcing a river to flow uphill - possible but requiring constant pressure, constant attention, constant expenditure of energy I'm not sure I have.
LIS: I could. But I'd be fighting myself as much as fighting him.
Ivy circles around from the left, moving with that predator's grace that suggests poison-enhanced reflexes working overtime. She's lost her blade but fights empty-handed now, toxins coating her skin in concentrations that should make her untouchable. Vazroth just catches her wrist mid-strike and holds it like poison is just another interesting sensation.
We're all being countered. All being negated. All watching our abilities turn useless or worse against an enemy who exists outside the rules we built our fighting styles around.
VTH: You're all so desperate to use your powers. Have you considered just fighting without them?
He releases Ivy and gestures at the battlefield around us - scorched earth, shattered obsidian, wilting thorns, dissipating starlight. Evidence of abilities being thrown at a problem they can't solve.
VTH: Pure skill. Pure technique. No supernatural assistance, no cosmic forces, just trained bodies and disciplined minds. Have you practiced that? Or have you all become so dependent on your abilities that you've forgotten how to fight like normal people?
Alexander answers by manifesting obsidian armor and charging forward. Not because it'll work - we've all seen how easily Vazroth breaks through his constructs. But because yielding ground to an enemy's psychological warfare is worse than wasting energy on attacks that fail.
I watch them clash, watch Alexander's technique adapt in real-time as obsidian proves useless. He's good without it. Better than good. Years of training with Johann have made him competent in ways that transcend supernatural assistance. But competent isn't enough against something that's been fighting for centuries.
My hands move through familiar patterns, calling to the earth beneath our feet. Not thorns this time. Just roots - the deep network that connects all living things, that carries nutrients and information through soil too complex for human understanding. I'm not asking them to attack. Just to tell me what they're sensing.
And they sing back with information that makes my stomach drop.
The soil is dying. Not slowly, not through natural processes, but actively being drained. Every place Vazroth steps, every spot where Johann's blood has fallen, the earth loses vitality. Minerals leeched away. Microorganisms going dormant. The living network that sustains all growth withering like someone's extracting its essence.
LIS: He's killing the ground.
Astra looks at me sharply. "What?"
LIS: Everywhere he touches, the soil dies. He's not just fighting us - he's draining the battlefield itself.
NOL: Why would he-
VTH: Because I need sustenance. This body is copied flesh sustained by will, but will alone isn't enough. I need nutrients, energy, vitality drawn from somewhere. The earth beneath your feet is incredibly rich with all three.
He steps forward, and I watch - feel - the grass wither where his foot lands. Feel the roots that were alive and active go still and silent. It's not violent, not aggressive. Just consumption. Just an ancient thing taking what it needs to sustain existence it has no right to.
My thorns react before I can stop them, surging toward him again with renewed eagerness. Because dying soil means opportunity for decomposition, for breaking down what exists to feed new growth. My plants recognize the cycle - death feeding life feeding death - and want to participate in it.
LIS: No!
I yank them back with force that makes my hands shake, makes my connection to the natural world strain under pressure it wasn't meant to sustain. The thorns retract but don't retreat fully, hovering in that space between my command and their instinct, confused by instructions that contradict everything they understand about growth.
Plants don't fight against natural cycles. They embrace them. Death becomes fertilizer becomes new life becomes eventual death again. It's beautiful in its simplicity, honest in its inevitability. But I need them to fight against that honesty, to attack instead of assist, to act against their nature because tactics demand it.
It's not working. Can't work. Like asking water to flow uphill or fire to burn cold. I'm demanding something fundamentally contrary to what they are.
VTH: You understand the problem now.
Vazroth has stopped fighting, stopped moving, just stands there watching me wrestle with thorns that want to help him. His expression carries sympathy, and somehow that's worse than mockery would be.
VTH: Your power is rooted - pun intended - in cooperation with natural forces. You ask plants to grow, and they grow. You request their assistance, and they assist. But cooperation requires aligned goals. When your goals contradict their nature, the partnership breaks down.
LIS: I can force them-
VTH: You can. But forced growth is stunted growth. Coerced assistance is half-hearted assistance. You'll spend more energy fighting your own power than fighting me.
He's right. I hate that he's right. But I can feel it in every vine that resists my commands, every root that wants to help him instead of hurt him. My connection to nature has always been my strength, my ability to work with living things instead of against them. But now that cooperation has become a liability.
Alexander launches another assault, Ivy moving in synchronized attack from the opposite angle. Noel's barriers force Vazroth into a narrower defensive space, and Maeve's temporal manipulation - despite the visible cost, despite more gray appearing in her hair - slows his reactions just enough to make the coordinated strike possible.
It still doesn't matter. Vazroth moves between their attacks like water through cracks, and the ground where he steps loses another layer of vitality.
I kneel and press my hands against dying earth, feeling the damage spread through root networks that used to carry life and now carry only depletion. This is what we're fighting - not just an ancient consciousness in stolen flesh, but something that consumes the world just by existing in it.
My thorns reach toward him again, eager to participate in the cycle of consumption and renewal. And I hold them back, fighting against every instinct they possess, forcing cooperation that grows more reluctant with each passing moment.
This is my contribution to the battle. Not attacking, not defending, just desperately trying to prevent my own power from helping our enemy.
It's not enough. It's never been enough. But it's all I have, so I keep doing it, keep wrestling with thorns that think I'm the one who's confused about how growth actually works. Maybe they're right.