Except... except now I felt that strong. Strong, fast, and my shoulder barely hurt at all. Nor did the back of my neck. I brushed my hand over the spot that had burned so badly only moments before and felt nothing but just a lingering numbness.
The thing growled at me. “Run away,” I said. “Leave.”
It ran, all right.
Right in my direction.
Okay. Fine.
I stood my ground as it closed in, and the moment it leapt for me, I gathered myself up and launched right at it -- but where it had been going for my throat, I was aiming for its midsection, unguarded as its tentacles reached for the place where I had been.
I hit it so hard that it flew up into the trees, breaking branches as it went. I landed lightly and listened as it slammed to the ground several yards away.
In a flash I was by its side, a splintered branch in my hand held to its throat. It moaned and looked as though it was trying to escape, but whatever it had that passed for a spine must have been broken because its legs wouldn’t move. “I’m sorry,” I said. “I told you to go.”
It growled again, this time weakly, and reached for my leg with its tentacles.
I shoved the sharp wood into its throat as hard as I could, until I felt it bite into the ground below the thing. Thick, dark blood flowed from the wound and it thrashed its arms and tentacles, but only for a moment.
Then it died.
I stumbled backward, falling on my butt in the dirt, and hugged my knees to my chest. The adrenaline was suddenly gone, and all I could think was holy shit, I just killed a monster.
Holy shit.
“That’s all well and good,” Buffy says, “but what happened next?”
I shrug. “I went back to the camp, back to my cabin, and changed my clothes. Doug was in the infirmary; his arm was in a splint. He said he told the nurse he fell out of a tree while waiting to play a prank on someone.”
“Let me guess.” Buffy levels an intense stare at me. “He didn’t ask what happened, and you didn’t tell him.”
“How did you--”
“I’m not always asleep when you’re watching that stupid show I’m named after.”
“It’s not--” I cut myself off this time and chuckle at her. “You’re a bitch.”
“And you’re an idiot.” She licks her paw, then rubs it over her ear. “So you had powers. And you rescued your friend. Good for you.”
“Good for me.” I run my fingers over Willow’s shoulders; she stirs in her sleep but doesn’t wake up. “Anyway, I came home, met the Professor, and learned that I had a destiny. I--”
“I don’t care.” Buffy stands up and jumps down to the floor, raising her tail as she goes. “I need a drink.”
I feel a smile come to my face. “And I need to go shopping,” I say. I have a habit of getting rid of clothes that don’t fit, so I don’t really have anything I can wear now that I seem to have misplaced fifteen pounds.
Just to see it again, just to prove that it’s not all in my head, I step onto the scale and my eyes widen. Now I’m down to 205. Did I really use that much energy today? “Whatever it is,” I tell my reflection in the bathroom mirror, “I’m not complaining.”
CHAPTER NINE
HELP
+++++
Shopping is really not my thing. Like, really-really. Like, if I had to choose between getting a paper-cut every morning when I woke up or going to the mall once every six months... well, honestly, I’d probably take the mall.
Though maybe not anymore. If my powers really are back, then I can heal paper-cuts in seconds, right?
At least there are other, non-mall options. Now that Americans are more overweight than ever, I can go to Target or Wal-Mart and find stopgap choices until I figure out exactly where my weight is going to end up. Jake complains to me sometimes that he’s even bigger than the biggest sizes they sell at those stores, which sucks for him, but lucky for me I’ve never reached that point.
I decide not to run -- it’s the middle of Saturday afternoon, and I could be seen. Not that that bothered me this morning, when I was zipping around the mountains and back again, but while I wait for the bus I remember what the Professor used to tell me when I showed off too much: “Times have changed, Alexandra,” he’d say -- he was always careful to differentiate between my superhero persona and my real self. “As little as ten years ago, you could’ve gotten away with being careless, but now too many people have cameras in their pockets."
No, running to the store would be a mistake. Plus, I’d use up more of my stored energy -- sounds a lot better in my head than “all that fat I’m carrying around” -- and by the time I got home I wouldn’t fit into my things anymore.
So I wait patiently for the bus and take it to the nearest shopping center that has both a Target and a GNC. Because if the powers are back for good, I’m going to need energy to sustain them.
The strange expression on the face of the GNC cashier stays with me as I sit in the bus shelter with my bags, waiting for my ride home. He'd acted like it was forbidden for an overweight woman to want to improve her physical condition. It’s as if I didn’t deserve to ask him about what formulas gave the most energy, or helped convert nutrients to usable fuel, or tasted like anything but the chemicals they were made from.
It took a lot for me to hold back my initial reaction -- crushing one of those giant drums of powdered muscle builder with one finger -- but I managed. Besides, I’d already had to deal with the Target cashier as she scanned each set of clothes I’d picked out, all of them in multiple sizes. I mean, if I’m going to keep losing weight the more I use my powers, then why should I have to keep going back to the store to buy new clothes? Why not buy them all at once?
At least the cashier had been smart enough not to say anything.
Now, though, I’ve managed to calm down -- meditation-style breathing really does help, even if I’m not in a quiet or comfortable place -- and the bus is actually on time. I board, arrange my stuff, and take out my phone.
Where are you? I need to speak with you. Call me.
I can almost hear the Professor’s concerned tone coming through the screen of my phone. He’s knows I wouldn’t have listened to voicemails, so he didn't leave them, but he's sent plenty of texts over the course of the day. Like all the others, I ignore it. I also ignore the note he left in my mailbox, which I stop at on my way up to my apartment.
Willow paws experimentally at the shopping bags. “What did you get?”
“Clothes. Nutrient powders. Nothing for you.”
“Nothing?” She looks up at me as if I’ve betrayed her somehow.
I shrug. “You have plenty of food. Don’t give me those eyes.”
Cats don’t shrug, but if she could, she would’ve shrugged back. Instead she settles for walking away, moving slowly, every step light but precise. Buffy, meanwhile, is sitting on the back of the couch, staring at me. “People knocked on the door,” she says. “A lot, and loudly.”
“Did they say anything?”
“Just asked if you were here. I told them you’d gone shopping.”
“I’m sure they understood.”
“Don’t be stupid.”
I make a face at her. “What the hell is wrong with you?”
“I don’t know,” Buffy says. “What’s wrong with you?”
“Well,” I say, going into the kitchen, “this conversation has gone absolutely nowhere fast.”
The kitchen isn’t nearly as exciting as I’d hoped -- I still haven’t gone shopping for food, which I really should’ve done today; I’m going to have to do it tomorrow instead. I refill the cats’ bowls with fresh kibble and water before opening the drawer where I keep my takeout menus.
But...
No. I don’t want to be here tonight; I don’t want to be the fat cat lady sitting on the couch by herself on Saturday night. Not again.
I want to go somewhere.
“You look different,” Carolyn says as she drives us to the restaur
ant.
“Different how?” I smooth my hands down over my stomach.
“I’m not sure.” I let her pick the place; it’s a Greek restaurant I’ve never heard of, but I can eat pretty much anything. Especially now; an upset stomach is the least of my worries, what with my accelerated healing. I remember that pretty well from high school. “Did you lose weight?”
“Some,” I admit. I’m not going to tell her how much, nor give her the details on how it happened. And, just to be safe, I had one of those shakes while I waited for her to come pick me up. They still taste awful, by the way. “I haven’t really been eating a lot.”
“I’m happy for you,” she says.
“Uh-huh.”
We come to a stoplight; she looks over to me, apologetic. “I didn’t mean--”
But I wave her off. “It’s fine. I know you weren’t trying to be catty or anything.” I shrug. “Mostly I think it was just behavior-related. When I get upset about something, I eat less, or forget to eat altogether.”
“You shouldn’t do that.”
“I know. But I’m feeling better now. Good, even.” I smile at her, and it’s genuine. “And, in case I didn’t say it, thanks for coming out with me.”
“No problem,” she says. The light changes and we start moving forward. “You saved me from an evening of Tinder and OKCupid.” A sigh. “Do you do online dating at all?”
I shake my head. “I haven’t dated anyone in a while. I never tried online, though; the last guy I dated, we met through someone at work.”
“It’s a wasteland,” she says. “You wouldn’t believe some of the responses I get -- and how many unsolicited photos of penises find their way into my mailbox.”
“That’s... awesome.” I say it flat, sarcastic, and she laughs. Good. “I wonder why they think that works. I mean, hello, porn, right?”
Oops.
I catch a blush on Carolyn’s cheeks. Might have gone too far there. She’s quiet for a couple of minutes, until she starts humming along to the radio.
Dinner is good -- not Marietta Diner good, but good enough -- and I keep my half of the conversation away from anything too risqué. With as much time as I spend on Reddit or just BSing with Jake, I’ve sort of forgotten that I need to use my filter. It’s a bit dusty, but I clear out the cobwebs and put it firmly in place.
Things go much better once I have, and after we share an enormous piece of cheesecake and linger far too long over coffee, she brings me home. “You want to come up?” I ask. “Watch a movie or something?”
She gives me a look that I can’t read. Not at first, anyway. “Andi, I’m not... I mean...”
“Oh.” Oh. “Oh! Oh, no, Carolyn, no, neither am I. I just... I mean, it’s just me and the cats up there. I literally meant watch a movie, not, like, Netflix and chill.”
She seems to slump in the driver’s seat after that.
“I mean, not that there’s anything wrong with it if you are. I’m okay with--”
“I’m not,” she says quickly -- too quickly, which tells me more about her than I think I needed to know.
“Neither am I.” Aside from a little experimentation some years ago that told me it wasn’t my thing, but I don’t think that would help my case. “I just... I haven’t just gone out with a friend in a while. It’s been a rough few months for me. And it’s not that late, so I just figured--”
Carolyn shakes her head. “It’s not even that,” she says. “Even if you were gay, it wouldn’t make me not want to be friends with you--”
“Nor I you,” I put in.
She smiles. “I just didn’t plan to be out this late, is all. I have to get up early for church in the morning.” A pause. “You can come, if you want.”
“No, thanks.” I try to say it politely, non-judgmentally, but it’s almost impossible to tell someone you have no interest in her religion without sounding like you’re judging her for it. “But if you ever want someone to go out to dinner with, I’m totally your girl.”
I swear I can see a touch of a blush on her cheeks. “Thanks. I know we’ve only been friends for a week, but... well...” She looks away. “I don’t know. I just feel more comfortable around you than I do around Janice.”
I'm not quite sure how to respond to that, so I just pick up my leftovers from the floor between my feet and reach for the door handle. “Drive safe, okay?”
“I will. Have a good night.”
I open the door. “You too.”
Carolyn drives off as I start walking up to my apartment. I still haven’t gone to the grocery store -- breakfast tomorrow is going to be what’s left of dinner, which was too much food even for me -- but it’s too late now. Especially for a get-up-early-and-go-to-church sort of person.
I hear Buffy meowing as I unlock my door. “Andrea! Andrea! Andrea!”
“I’m coming,” I say, pushing the door open. It’s dark in the apartment; I use my elbow to try and hit the lightswitch. “Did you eat all the food again?”
“Andrea!”
That was Willow, and even though I’ve only been listening to the cats talk for a day, I recognize that sound: it’s the sound of a scared cat. I haven’t heard Willow meow like that since the time a dog got into our room at the vet and backed her into a corner.
I drop the food and my purse and flip the switch.
On superhero TV shows, when a character uses super-speed, there’s always some sort of special effect -- usually a ripple around a fast-moving object, like a bullet -- to show how slowly he or she perceives everything. We’re asked, as viewers, to believe that just because Clark Kent has super-speed he also instinctively knows how to do everything perfectly while using it. Or that, in Captain America, once Cap has his powers he instantly knows how to move like a trained commando despite the fact that, once he gets the serum, he doesn't get any actual combat training.
Yeah. Not so much.
It took almost a year and a half for me to learn how to track the path of a bullet on sight, and another six months to get the math just right so I’d know where to stop if I needed to take one for somebody. The Professor went through a lot of ammo on that part of the training. And not every bullet moves at the same speed -- guns have different muzzle velocities, and caliber, weight, and construction of the bullets themselves also matter. By the time I got to my final showdown with the Dark King, I could intercept maybe one in four bullets that weren’t aimed at me.
Avoiding them altogether is much easier -- I don’t need to see them. I just need to be somewhere else.
But the problem with avoiding them is that I have to hear them, and I don’t have super-hearing.
What that means is: the moment I turn on the light, a tiny dart of some kind nails me right in the neck. It's like being stung by a really angry wasp with a really large stinger, and I gasp and stumble.
Fortunately, I also remember what to do in situations like this: duck and cover.
I duck behind the kitchen island and yank the dart out of my neck. I can almost feel the tranquilizer rushing through me, and I’m not sure how well my enhanced healing is going to work.
I wish I could pop my head up, see what I’m facing, but my eyes aren’t cameras. All I have is the glimpse of my living room that I got when I turned on the light: two men in black outfits, both holding what I’m guessing are dart guns, and, behind them, standing near my television, Professor Wedlund.
I open my mouth, about to speak, then close it again. I’m not feeling very tranquilized, but he doesn’t need to know that.
“Whass...” I fake-swallow hard and thump my shoulders against the island, as if I’ve just lost my balance. “Whas goin’ on, P’fess.. ‘r?”
“You haven’t been replying to my messages,” he says, his voice all solicitous concern -- very different from how he sounded last night. “I was worried about you.”
“You... shot me?” I try to keep it simple; one thing I did learn how to do was figure out where people are based upon the noises they make, and maybe I
haven’t had my powers back very long, but some things don’t require special abilities. I know exactly where he’s standing, and exactly how many steps it’s going to take to get to him, and exactly where I’ll have to step to get there without falling. “Why?”
“I think you already know.” He sighs. “Come out, Andrea. Let’s talk about this.”
I pause long enough to make him think I’m having trouble forming the words. “Okay,” I say after a long enough interval. “Don’... don’ shoot...”
“Gentlemen.”
That’s all I need. I draw my legs up underneath me and move.
As the darts hit my side, I realize the folly of holding a tall, skinny man in front of someone my size. Only one or two penetrate my shirt, but it’s enough. I fall hard, my fingers too nerveless to grab any handholds on the way down. More darts hit me once I’m on the floor, until I can’t move at all.
The Professor dusts himself off, adjusts his jacket, and then kneels beside me. His cool, thin fingers turn my head to one side, and I feel him smooth my hair up off the back of my neck. “I’m sorry, Andrea,” he says, his voice soft and a little sad. “It has to be this way.”
I try to ask why, but all I hear is a monotone groan through my half-open lips.
Something hot touches the mark on the back of my neck -- the Device -- and pain sears through me as if every nerve is plugged into an electrical socket. It hasn’t been this bad since the first time, and I can’t stop my eyes from blurring with tears or my breathing from going fast and gaspy.
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