"No!" Fortune cried, but whether he meant the thing crawling in his flesh or the plan to cut him open wasn't clear.
The knight shifted his attention from Fortune clawing at his own flesh, to Jonathan's trembling finger. The lump passed under Fortune's jaw, and then up through his cheek. As Lohengrin stepped forward, the sword glowing into being in his hand, the thing reached John Fortune's forehead. Something like a detonation filled the room: light and heat and a kind of shockwave that Jonathan felt in his bones though it didn't blow back his hair or his clothes. The air smelled of dust and overheated stone.
"Mein Gott."
Where John Fortune had been, a huge she-lion crouched, light streaming from her like a small sun. She bared her teeth at Lohengrin, who stepped back, his sword held at the guard before him. The lioness howled.
"What the fuck!" Jonathan shouted.
The lioness turned to him, startled by his voice. When she opened her mouth, he saw the billowing flame in her throat. He barely had time to expand out, wasps exploding in all directions, before the blast of fire passed through the space where he had been.
The study descended into chaos. Lohengrin swung his sword, the tip cleaving pits of lathe and plaster out of the walls. Flames burst over him like water while the lioness leaped and roared. Jonathan, not sure whether to flee or try to save Lohengrin from Fortune, or maybe Fortune from Lohengrin, buzzed madly around the room.
The lioness leapt and snapped, growled and screamed. Jonathan split himself, rolling and dodging every time the lioness shot at him.
Fire, Jonathan thought as he fled out to the hallway, why does it always have to be fire?
Lohengrin staggered out, victim of a lucky swipe of the lioness's huge paw. The lioness followed, pressing her advantage. The screams from the beast's throat were terrible.
Lohengrin seemed to be fighting a defensive battle, keeping the lioness at bay and trusting to his armor for protection from the flames. The lioness had no such compunction. Her lips were pulled back in a snarl that would have made Jonathan certain that he was about to die if he'd been back in his human form.
With a howl, the lioness leapt past Lohengrin and into the main room. The open architecture served her. There was no way to block her path, and she was able to leap from one end of the room to the other, claws digging into the walls and floor.
"Stop!" Lohengrin shouted. "You must stop!"
Fuck that, Jonathan thought. Go! Let it go! But without the benefit of lungs or a throat, all he managed was a slightly louder buzzing.
An alarm blared. Jonathan felt a few of his wasps cook off and die. And then a few more. Either he was getting worse at dodging the lioness or . . .
No, nothe house was on fire.
In the study, flames had taken the desk and the wall of awards. The hallway was also alight, tongues of blue-and-orange flame licking at the walls and ceiling. The lioness roared again, and flames belched out, breaking off Lohengrin's armor and setting the curtains on fire.
Jonathan condensed back into human form at the front door. Another fire alarm went off, the high squeal like the house itself screaming in fear. The sound seemed to shock Lohengrin and the lioness both. Two headsone armored the other leonineturned toward Jonathan. He threw open the door. "Get out! Now! Out!"
For the first time, both the lioness and Lohengrin noticed the flames sheeting up the wall, the swaths of sword-slashed and burning furniture. To Jonathan's profound relief, they bolted for the door.
The lioness paused on the lawn, her head shifting from Jonathan to Lohengrin and back.
"Ah. Good kitty?" Jonathan said. The lioness howled, turned, and sped away into the night. Lohengrin took two fast steps after her, and then stopped. The lioness was already half a block away, and still accelerating. Lohengrin's sword and armor vanished.
Flames flickered inside the house. Smoke was billowing out of the movable skylight in Peregrine's bedroom. Jonathan sat on the lawn. Lohengrin stepped over and squatted down beside him.
"The house," Lohengrin said.
"Yeah," Jonathan said. "We torched it."
"Where are your clothes?" Lohengrin asked.
Jonathan sighed. "In the house," he said.
"Und the key for the auto?"
"In the pocket," Jonathan agreed. "With my wallet."
In the distance, sirens were just starting to wail. Jonathan sucked his teeth, Lohengrin looked around, shamefaced.
"Well," Jonathan said, "that could have gone better."
Star Power
Melinda M. Snodgrass
THE FRONT DOORS OF the bank blew into sparkling shards. Even safety glass was no match for one of Curveball's marbles. The robbers fired wildly with their paint-ball guns, and retreated as Curveball, Hardhat, and Wild Fox rushed through the doors. The paint-ball pellets bounced harmlessly off the web of glowing yellow girders that served as a shield for the advancing aces. The building gave a lurch and settled. There were screams of terror from the bank customers held hostage in the safety deposit vault.
Noel Matthews sat huddled among the bound and gagged bank customers. His henchmen were succumbing to Curveball's Nerf balls and the touch of Hardhat's girders. There was the sound of paint-ball guns firing wildly from the back of the bank. The last two of his men came stumbling into the lobby. Earth Witch pursued them, and soon had the floor cracking and dancing beneath their feet. They shouted with alarm and fell in a tumble of guns, arms, and legs. All six of his henchmen were now effectively dead or captured.
Hardhat moved to the door of the vault and gestured to the prisoners with a grandiose sweep of one brawny arm. "Okay folks, you're safe now."
Noel shook back the trailing curls of his long blond wig, and looked pleadingly up at the big ace. Hardhat's chest swelled and he swaggered over to Noel, pulled a utility knife off his carpenter's belt, and cut Noel's bonds. Noel pulled the gag out of his lipsticked mouth. "Thank you," he whispered huskily.
"No fuckin' problem. It was my goddamn pleasure."
Earth Witch had found Noel's trademark black, snap-brimmed fedora in front of a wall of safety deposit boxes. She picked it up and frowned from the hat to the boxes. His reputation as a magician and a wild card had her wondering if he could have somehow crammed flesh and blood into a metal box.
Wild Fox and Curveball were moving to cut the ropes holding the extras who had played the bank customers. Noel flowed to his feet and stepped up behind Hardhat. With one hand, he pulled out the paint-ball gun and shot the big ace in the small of his back. With his other hand he threw a flash/bang, blinding everyone except himself, because he had closed his eyes.
Noel heard Hardhat's bellow of "Son of a fucking bitch!"
Noel opened his eyes. A mic on its boom swung wildly for a moment, as if Hardhat's curse words had weight. The sound man grimaced and reasserted control of the long metal handle with one hand, while with the other he mopped at his streaming eyes. Everyone else in the small vault was also knuckling or covering their eyes.
Wild Fox had vanished, using his illusion power to transform into someone else. The floor began to vibrate beneath Noel's feet. He aimed carefully and shot Earth Witch in the left tit. She gave a yelp of pain.
Her cry drew Curveball's attention. "Ana!"
Noel used Hardhat's bulk and weight to spin the big ace and send him staggering into the gaggle of people, like a human cue ball. During the spin, Noel patted Hardhat down, located the cell phone in the ace's pants pocket, and pulled it free. There were more cries of pain as Hardhat arrived. Noel thumbed the phone to camera and swept the lens across the milling crowd. A pretty girl was revealed as the Japanese-American ace. Quite a lot of gender bending going on here, Noel thought with a grim smile, as he tossed away the phone and threw a handful of smoke bombs, while simultaneously shooting Wild Fox.