Super Nuts Chapter 13: The Brewing Storm (ending rewrite)

Author's Note: I have decided to stop using AI in my writing from now on. I rewrote the ending of chapter 13 to make it better.


\*\*\*

Rhea looks up at Arlo, the man who she trusts absolutely, just waiting for him to send another branch down to her. Or maybe tear a giant root from the ground to carry her away to safety. Or to drop down and fight off all the guards.

"Sorry Rhea, you were fun while you lasted," her savior murmurs with a cruel smile, before he resumes the growth of his branch and hardens the branches being used as cover. His pace is slower now that he has already exhausted so much of his power and because he's controlling so many branches enhanced with hardening to prevent bullets from sending him to his doom as well.

Glassy eyes stare at the retreating form of Arlo. A look of confusion is cemented on the young woman’s face. *Where’s he going? Isn’t he going to save me?* The jumbled thoughts bounce around her poisoned mind in a frenzy. The obvious betrayal doesn’t quite hit her. It can’t. Arlo is always there for her. She must always listen to Arlo. She loves Arlo. That’s why she’s so confused as he gets further and further away while the guards get closer and closer. Through the fog clouding her thoughts, one loud scream pierces the veil. *I HAVE TO SURVIVE!* The primal drum of survival instinct rouses her from her delirious confusion. Arlo disappears from her brain and is replaced with the image of a small pill with a red S on the side. The hidden super pill Rhea keeps at the bottom of her backpack in case of emergency situations. Situations where she was practically guaranteed to die if she doesn’t take the pill, so might as well take it. *Even if they just capture me, nobody will be able to take care of Grandma. But I’ve read that super-pills kill in the most painful way imaginable…*The thought, plus the adrenaline from the life-or-death situation, ensure her hand shakes violently as she grabs her backpack and pushes her hand through the opening, moving aside the cold steel of her gun and grabbing the small ziplock bag at the bottom. “Huu!” she gasps as she nearly drops the clear bag while trying to unzip it. *Please don’t kill me* is her last thought as she grabs the super-pill and throws it into her mouth, trying to swallow before she can reconsider. Before she can think any more about how the pill is far more likely to kill her than save her.



*Please don’t kill me* is the last thought that passes through her mind as she swallows the flavorless pill. One second passes. Then another. *Did it work?* She wonders for a brief moment, feeling the tension in her body decrease a little. A moment later, her world explodes. White hot, electric agony shoots through her entire body. It’s as if every nerve in her nervous system fires at maximum capacity conveying one singular message up to her brain. Pain. “AUGHHHH!!!! Her banshee-like scream pierces the night air, its volume above even the noise of the guards storming the house and shouting commands at each other. There are no more thoughts in Rhea’s brain as she slowly tries to even comprehend the depths of agony she’s experiencing. *Storm clouds…* the thought somehow reaches through the agony. She’s aware that her body is twitching and writhing on the grass, but her body doesn’t even really feel like her own. In fact, even the pain begins to feel distant, replaced by another sensation as her glassy, unfocused amber eyes bear witness to the dark storm clouds rolling in as if summoned by some ancient god. She’s always liked watching storms, but this one feels different. Special. It feels like… *her storm*. She can *feel it.*



\*\*\*

“Should we shoot her?” The battle-hardened guard nudges his squad leader and casually points his gun at the writhing girl on the ground. “That screaming is really freaking me out,” he adds, a mocking chuckle escaping his lips.



“Check out those storm clouds,” the man beside him gasps, voice full of awe.



“Huh?” The first guard exclaims dumbly, looking up at the sky for the first time since giving up on shooting the tree dude. Above the slowly expanding mass of branches towered imposing, dark gray clouds promising the full wrath of nature. Yet nature meant very little to the man who had been calling death his friend since age 14. “What, you scared of a little rain?” he mocks his comrade while glancing back down at the girl laying face up on the grass. “Oh, looks like she died,” he comments offhandedly while walking up to the motionless girl. “Too bad, she was kinda hot,” he adds with a laugh, prodding the presumed corpse with his heavy boot, staining her  faded t-shirt with mud. An instant later, his entire world turns white.



\*\*\*

An electric sensation courses through Rhea once more, but this time it’s not pain. No, it’s something much more intense. **Power.** The world around her seems frozen for a moment as Rhea feels the powerful bolt of lighting strike her body. She feels the lightning’s electricity merge with the flow of electricity within her own body. Becoming one. Her electricity. Her power. Her storm.



The pain is gone. In its place: pure unbridled rage. Wrath. Vengeance. Her body rises from the grass into the air, slowly orienting correctly once more such that her feet are pointed towards the ground. Her clothes are singed and torn. An electric streak has been added to her dark hair, glowing brightly in the dark night. Her shining white eyes take in the pale faces of the guards backing away from her fearfully as well as the screaming guard writhing on the ground, his body charred from the lightning which had struck her soul. Yet her wrath filled gaze passes over these men as if they were mere insects. She locks onto her true target. The man who she had fully trusted yet abandoned her. ***ARLO MUST PAY.*** The timid girl who had never fired a gun before was gone. In her place, the divine incarnation of nature’s fury. Yet, this being of pure power pauses for a moment before ending the life of the one who had wronged her. *Can’t hurt Arlo. I love Arlo.* The foreign thoughts wriggle and writhe their way into her mind. The glow of her eyes fades away, replaced by a dim green pulsing in her irises.



The storm rejects the foreign entity poisoning its goddess. Her wild dark hair dances from the roaring winds. The guards are lifted from the ground and tossed yards away as if they were mere leaves caught in a windy fall day. Thunder booms a moment before another bolt of lighting strikes Rhea, the force shattering all the windows of the house which had forever changed her life. The shards of glass are picked up by the wind torrents, turning the storm even more deadly and cutting the faces and exposed skin of many guards, adding their blood and screams to the hurricane. A second electric blue highlight has been added to her hair. **“GET OUT OF MY HEAD!”** The pain-fueled scream leaves the girl’s lips only to be picked up by the wind, carried throughout the country club and echoing all around.



A writhing, thorny mass of leaves and vine travels up Rhea’s throat as electricity bubbles her blood. She feels so hot. So powerful. So electric. The writhing mass feels so gross. So disgusting. So invasive. “Ughhh!” she groans as she vomits up the plant that had been poisoning her for so long. As soon as it leaves her lips and splashes onto the grass she recognizes what it is. Who planted it within her. **“ARLOOOOO!!!”** She screams into the night. The storm responds to her call as it intensifies even further. Men are lifted into the air and carried towards a tornado that forms near Rhea, tearing across the empty field and capturing grass, dirt, and debris from the house alongside any men foolish enough to stand in its path. What she felt before felt like mild irritation compared to the rage she feels coursing through her now. The white glow of her eyes has returned full force as she raises a hand towards the branches that are moving faster, as if in a hurried panic to escape from the storm’s wrath. *You won’t get away, Arlo.*