The ground rips from underneath me, and my body is tossed into the air, catching itself horizontally, five feet off the ground. The kerosene hits the road and continues to spill out.

And then my body is falling, pulling my soul out of its skin.

I am a soul again, floating, and watching from above as my body hits the asphalt and the breath leaves my lungs. In a glide toward the wobbly earth of dead world, I land on my fingers and toes outside the kerosene circle.

My physical body lifts itself behind me, charges forward—furious and determined under Sawyer’s control.

Kill him. The mist pulses around my hands like rings of magic, offering its power. Kill him.

I raise my hands in defense, and a surge of power runs up the veins in my arms and explodes from the center of my chest. A cannon of pink and blue light obliterates my physical self into a cluster of stars.

And in those stars, Sawyer separates from my body like apple skin ripping off the fruit.

And my body—it flies like a paper airplane backward through the air, landing on its back, outside of the circle.

Sawyer doesn’t turn around for it. So focused on killing my soul, he rises like a phoenix in front of me. Red flares roar around him in the shape of tortured faces and curled fingers, all reaching out and obscuring the shape of him. He rips his throat open, and the wraith hands lunge for me.

I block them with a field of ecto-mist, which rises like a wall from the concrete. As it falls, it forms a standing shape of blue dust and red smoke, all of it melting into solid colors and textures—a light blue diner dress, a blond-haired head. A woman with a tote bag strung over her shoulder, holding a gun. The weapon is both there and escaping through the night like bubbles in seltzer. I lift my arm, lifting hers with me. She’s only a wraith of my creation—a puppet attached to my string.

But Sawyer’s eyes widen in fear—his face is of a scared child as he floats down to the ground. His feet sink slightly into the asphalt. His body is curled back and fearful, like a baby deer in front of a speeding truck.

I thrust energy out of my chest-arm network and through the wraith of his mother, sending a perfect slice of blinding ecto-mist through his mother’s arm in a bomb-shaped bullet. It hits Sawyer hard in the chest, blasts through his heart, and blows him backward. Then he’s frozen in midair: one leg bent upward, an arm twisted behind his back, head wrenched toward one shoulder, chest aimed at the sky.