Trump Beast

A response to Nathaniel Lee's "On the Debate Floor" in Mirror Shards:

“The Senator from Arizona is out of line!” said Chairman Gordon.

“I demand the right to speak,” growled Senator Krantz.

“I invoke Rule 714-point-3,” said Gordon. He rose, his hand rising to the shimmering talisman at his neck.

“So be it.” Krantz narrowed his eyes and stepped from behind the podium. With a sharp gesture, he snapped the ruby off of his tiepin. It flared with crimson light, and the phoenix burst forth in a gout of flame.

Gordon clutched his viridian stone and the winged saurian form of his own guardian emerged, hissing. “Let us now debate!” he cried.

Gordon's dinosaur chased Krantz's phoenix through the dome of the Capitol building. The Phoenix glanced over its shoulder and spat a column of flame back at the dinosaur that deflected off the scaly hide, but the fiery blow left a scorch mark and seemed to slow the dinosaur in its chase.

Gordon and Krantz stood at the bottom of the room nothing between them and they paced around in circles. The Phoenix landed another blast upon the dinosaur and Gordon staggered with beads of sweat trickling down his bald forehead. Sen. Krantz screeched at the ceiling in a high-pitched caw that caused the other senators to cringe. The Phoenix flipped around in a barrel-roll twist that took it from fleeing from the dinosaur to a still glide. The Phoenix echoed Sen. Krantz's caw.

This time the flame came long and searing and the rest of the senators felt the air burn in their throats as sparks fell upon them leaving ash like black snow and scarred desks. The dinosaur closed the distance to the phoenix while not all of the Phoenix's flames reflected off the scales causing them to glow a pale orange. The Phoenix exhaled back and forth but the dinosaur shimmied so that its chest received the full brunt of the flames instead of its wings. With one final wing beat the dinosaur closed the distance between it and the Phoenix and it swiped a claw in an arc that came down diagonally across the Phoenix's breast leaving a trail of bloody feathers. The Phoenix's beak closed around the dinosaur's neck as the dinosaur's legs windmilled churning up a flurry of flying feathers. Both creatures hurtled now towards the ground as they concentrated more on each other and trying to keep themselves aloft.

At the last second, the dinosaur disengaged holding its wings out flat and coming to land hard. The Phoenix never got its wings open and crashed to the floor. Dazed.

Chairman Gordon looked down at Sen. Krantz who had fallen to the floor. However, Gordon's eyes were glazed and he leaned to one side as if he was going to fall over. One of the other senators, a first-term nobody from South Dakota, ran forward to place his hands upon the chairman letting his life energy soak into Gordon.

Gordon perked up and his eyes sharpened. He shouted, "As I said, the senator from Arizona is out of line!"