"Could I not say I decline any further tests, and fight anyone who wishes to press the issue?"

"If you wanted to risk it," Burnscar threatens.

"Do you know what your test would be yet?"

The fire around Burnscar's hand has been gradually growing since Ellie mentioned fighting her. "You know what, never mind," she says flatly. "Let's just do it this way." A pool of fire spreads out around her feet, and she disappears into it.

So that's a no, then. If Crawler is not already immune to fire, Ellie will be very much surprised. This ought to be easy.

She leaves to look for the fire Burnscar emerged from, summoning Crawler's shade. The nature of this power means that it does not follow behind as a distinct entity. Rather, it wraps around and through her, a ghostly image of the horror she killed.

Crawler had adapted to fire, but not just fire. She feels herself mutating, the extra mass coming out of nowhere, until she's exactly the size of the Crawler body on the ground.

There's a trail of small fires. Burnscar decided on a whim, so no setup ahead of time. The problem is that she doesn't have to be going linearly: she's appearing and disappearing between fires to lob small fireballs and expand her list of places she might be at any given time.

Ellie does have to travel linearly, her teleport is limited by line of sight. She stomps out fires where she can, and tries to catch up with Burnscar. She only needs to get one hit in.

Yeah, but she's enormous. Crawler may have been deceptively fast, and all that experience transferrable to her, but that doesn't mean hard to avoid.

Burnscar's easily avoiding her but hasn't tried anything offensive yet.

Then she will continue to cut off lines of retreat as she finds them.

Her opponent has plenty of time to wait for an opening. The first time Ellie is standing over a big enough flame while prioritizing the fires next to her, she erupts from underneath. She's directing concussive blasts upward—how does that even work, it's massless—and jolts her vertically. Then does it again, and again.

"Stop," she says, an Edict-enforced command.

After using her power enough to knock Crawler around, Burnscar is in no condition to just stop. Whatever the penalty was isn't slowing her down.

Ellie lands with a crash, completely unharmed. Bonesaw's voice shouts "Not here!" but Burnscar's not listening. Ellie's Crawler-sized bulk suddenly vanishes, along with all her shades.

What the hell- Bonesaw said something about resurrecting Hatchet Face. Must be it.

She can't get shot by a fireball in here, but Burnscar can still ring the place in fire. She needs to get out now. She runs through, pulling at Crawler's shade all the time, wanting it up as soon as she's able to.

Burnscar is launching obstacles at her the same way she moved her when she was Crawler-sized. A piece of a tree trunk here, a rock there. Much to Bonsaw's dismay. None are very accurate as weapons, but it's more than enough to make her think twice about running straight through.

And then a knife appears in Ellie's leg. "Our dear Burnscar wasn't the only one who hasn't had a go yet, remember."

Ow.

"Oh, but Jack. I thought you liked me."

"Oh, what's a little stabbing between friends?" He's lazily tossing more knives, none of which do more than scratch her. That and give Burnscar some time.

"Maybe treat me to dinner, first."

She takes a winding path through, trying for cover from both knives and fire-propelled projectiles.

Hatchet Face's range was never very wide.

Apparently what Burnscar came up with was an enormous fiery pulse. Her control over it fizzles out, highlighting the boundary neatly, but the blast of superheated air continues.

...Hatchet Face will be at the center of the circle. She grabs the knife out of her leg. She'll just do another resurrection with Bonesaw if she complains.

From the outside, this probably looks like she's fleeing the heat. But the circle is small enough that seeing the curvature could point her toward the center. When she finds Hatchet Face, he's standing inactive. No current orders.

She cuts his throat.

He does move to defend himself—more than zero instincts, apparently—but not quickly. And his brute powers do not render him immune to knives.

After he falls, her attempts to reach for Crawler's shade go through. She can walk through the fire and probably shrug off most of whatever Burnscar is throwing.

Good. She heads in the direction of the most recent missile.

Jack is enormously pleased when the power nullification goes down and the Crawler shape goes up. He seems to be trying to talk Burnscar into conceding. She's not very receptive.

"You should just let me kill her."