Meta (15 page)

  
I'm falling so fast that it's still hard to move my arms, which are pinned to my sides. With all my strength, I thrust them out to either side and my metabands appear.

  
Halfway there.

  
Straining with every ounce of energy I have left, I struggle to bring my arms together, but the wind and gravity have other plans. I feel every part of my body pulling close to the point of complete muscle failure. My lungs feel like they are going to explode right out of my rib cage. With a final guttural, primal scream I push past the wind resistance. Once past that point, the wind pushes both of my forearms hard into my chest without any additional assistance on my part. The now familiar surge of electricity travels through my body as I close my eyes and prepare to hit the ground. I close my eyes, hoping my invulnerability is enough to keep me alive.

  
Then nothing.

  
Ten seconds pass and my eyes are still closed. I should have hit the ground by now, but I haven't. Everything is just quiet. I wonder to myself if I'm dead as I slowly open one eye to peek at my fate.

  
The good news is that I'm not dead. The even better news is that I'm hovering a foot above the ground. I reach out and touch it with my hands. I've never been so happy to pick up dirt in my life.

  
And with that break in concentration, I fall flat on my face.

CHAPTER TWENTY

It takes a few hours but I actually do start to feel like I'm getting the hang of this whole flying thing. It's unlike any activity I've ever done in my life and requires simultaneous relaxation and concentration, but in the end it really feels like learning to ride a bike. Once you get the hang of it and the confidence that you're not going to fall, you can't imagine a time that you weren't able to do it.

  
I practice taking off from a standing start and landing with the grace of a ballerina. Then I practice taking off from a running start and landing with one too. I see how fast I can fly along the ground, zooming through the cornfield at what must be at least Mach 1 or Mach 2. After beginning to feel extremely comfortable with my newly honed ability, it's time to tackle height again.

  
From a standing start, I once again prepare myself for an explosive launch. I'm nervous but I try to tuck that emotion away and remember the confidence I felt while flying earlier. The ground beneath me trembles again, and I take off into the afternoon sky at a hundred feet per second.

  
I watch again as the ground below me shrinks and keep pushing higher. Faster and faster. I break through the clouds and keep going. Finally after a couple of minutes of climbing, I decide I'm high enough and I stop. Just like that. I have to laugh to myself since it was so easy this time, I feel like an idiot for nearly killing myself before.

  
It's peaceful up here. Everything is quiet and looking down at this small country town, I feel calm. My concerns seem miles away (technically they are), and for the first time in a while, I'm just completely still.

  
Looking down on everything makes me feel powerful. Of course the other times I've used my abilities have made me feel that way too, but there's something God-like about hovering here above everything, where no one can see me but I can see all of them. I can go anywhere from here. Do almost anything. It's a frighteningly intoxicating feeling.

  
That feeling is disturbed by the roar of the jet's engine that, in all of my self-indulgence, I had failed to notice was cruising at the same altitude I am, and now is about to smash right into me. I dart out of the way in the nick of time and just barely miss getting clipped by the left wing.

  
So stupid. Not only did I almost get myself hurt, I probably would have killed everyone on that plane if its wing had been torn off by hitting my practically indestructible body. That would have been a nice legacy to have. The idiot who killed two hundred people because he was day dreaming so hard that he didn't even notice a plane smash into him. My feelings of power are quickly replaced by embarrassment.

  
The plane banks hard to the right, presumably in a late attempt to avoid me. Dammit. Now I really feel bad. I probably gave that pilot and the entire group of people onboard the plane the scare of their lives.

  
Without thinking, I fly over to catch up with the airplane and approach the pilot's window. He's animatedly talking to his co-pilot and removing his cap to wipe the sweat off his brow. Yup, I definitely scared the hell out of him. I tap on the window to get his attention.

  
Well, now I've officially scared the hell out of him twice.

  
Mouthing the words, "I'm sorry", I wave and move back away from the window to give him space. The pilot is screaming now, and it looks like he's talking into his headset. Okay. I think I've done enough damage here, so I start backing away even further and slow down to let the plane pass me. As it does, I see all the passengers crowded around the left side of the plane to get a look at me. Some are snapping photos with their phones. Some look like they have or are about to throw up. I mouth the words "I'm sorry" again to them, wave sheepishly, and fly off in the other direction.

  
I hover thirty-thousand feet above the ground and watch as the jet full of passengers, that I nearly killed, flies off into the distance. I'm feeling pretty stupid and like maybe Midnight was right. I'm not ready. There's a reason why he didn't want me out here just doing whatever I feel like, and it isn't just because I could get hurt; it's because other people could get hurt too.

  
It's then that I think about that frazzled airline pilot, screaming into his headset. He was calling into air traffic control that he almost hit a meta. Calling in on frequencies that are open and available for anyone with the right radio to hear. Hobbyists. Other pilots. The news media. Literally almost anyone.

  
There's a loud screech behind me that startles me so badly I actually lose a few feet of altitude. It's in the distance. I can't see it through the clouds, but as I hear the screech again, it's apparent that whatever is making the noise is moving closer. Fast.

  
Whatever it is, I'm sure The Controller has sent it. I feel even stupider than I did two minutes ago, but now I've got no choice. I look at my gloved hands and they're visibly trembling. I don't know what to do. Teleporting out of here is an option of course, but a cowardly one. If I do, there's no telling what this thing might do to that jet full of innocent civilians. So I wait for it to break through the clouds and when it does, I can't believe my eyes.

  
I still can't believe my eyes even after the dragon barrels into me full speed and sends me hurdling through the sky.

  
A real deal, honest to God, dragon. Something I never expected to see in real life and here it is, in front of me. Not only that, it's trying to kill me, and by the horrifying looks of it, it should be very capable of doing so. It's probably got at least a hundred foot wingspan and is at least as long in length. And it's mean looking. Really mean looking. Did I mention it can breathe fire? Yeah, it can breathe fire too. I find that out when it starts
breathing fire at me.

  
I do a barrel roll to avoid the fireball heading towards me. This seems to piss off the dragon as it comes flying at me head-on. I wind up and throw a punch directly into it's gigantic beak. It seems surprised by this move. I'm surprised by this move too. Who punches a dragon? It's knocked back and stunned for a second, but shakes it off and releases an ear shattering screech into the air. It's pissed and I take that as my cue to run. Er, well, fly.

  
As fast as I can fly, it seems that I cannot outrun this thing. Flying away from it is just a temporary solution to this very permanent problem, but I'm hoping it gives me enough time to come up with an actual plan. I don't understand how something propelled through the air by leathery wings is able to keep up with me as I break the sound barrier for the third or fourth time today, but it does. I guess I also don't understand how a dragon is existing and trying to kill me at this very moment either, so that's fair.

  
As I tilt up to try to lose it in a nest of clouds, suddenly a sharp pain flares through my right leg. The dragon has caught up and clamped its beak down on my leg. I scream in pain and instinctively start hitting it with my fists. Every blow seems to just strengthen the animal's grip on me though, like a steel vice tightening.

  
In an act of desperation, I plunge my right fist into its left eye, gouging it. It's a dirty move, but it's an imaginary creature so I think I'll sleep all right tonight. If I survive this, that is.

  
If I thought it was pissed off before, it's
really
pissed off now. But at least, it has released me from its grip long enough that I can put some distance between it and myself. Distance that it begins to close very quickly. I concentrate harder on increasing my speed to give me more time to come up with a plan, but I still have absolutely no idea what to do. That's when I get hit with a fireball.

  
The pain is like nothing I've ever felt before. It's a searing agony that I would do anything in the world to make stop. For a moment, nothing in the world exists except for the pain that I am feeling. If it weren't for the metabands, I surely would have been vaporized instantly.
 

  
In the midst of this excruciating sensation, I realize that I'm falling. Rapidly. I finally feel my metabands begin to kick in and start repairing my now badly burned body. I should be good as new in a few minutes, but only for so long. If I'm attacked again before the healing is complete, I have a feeling I'm done for.

  
As I tumble towards the ground, I look up and see the dragon hovering into position above me. We lock eyes, well I lock eyes with its one good eye. It lets out a bellowing scream and then dives. It's going in for the kill, to kill me, if I don't come up with something fast.

  
It's flapping its wings as it dives to increase the speed of its fall, catching up with me quickly. That's when an idea finally hits me, and I realize the way to beat a dragon is to challenge it to a game of chicken.

  
I steady myself, take one last look at the dragon quickly gaining on me, and then turn my body towards the ground, diving straight down. We're at about twenty-thousand feet and dropping, quickly. I can hear the dragon still screeching. It's getting closer. Another fireball comes my way, but I'm able to dodge it this time. Fifteen thousand feet.

  
The screeching is turning into one long scream. This dragon was born into this world with one mission in life, to kill me. It's starting to get excited at the idea of fulfilling that mission. Ten thousand feet.

  
I concentrate harder on increasing my speed. This is by far the fastest I've ever gone. Time is slowing down around me. Five thousand feet.

  
We're over a large clearing, a few miles from the cornfields where I started. The dragon's beak nips the heel of my foot, and I kick it away as I pull my arms into my body to decrease my drag even further. Two thousand feet.

  
I feel an internal click inside my body, like a progress bar hitting one hundred percent and letting me know that my repairs are complete. I'm back to full capacity. Everything has slowed down to the point where it feels like I'm swimming underwater by the time I plunge through the tree line. The screech of the dragon has turned into a low, rumbling roar. I can see individual rocks on the ground which is now only a few feet away.

  
If I wanted to, I could now reach out and touch one, I'm so close, and it's at that moment that I teleport. I could have teleported anywhere in the world at that moment but I didn't. Instead, I teleport exactly fifty feet above my current position.

  
The dragon dives straight into the ground. It looks, sounds, and feels like an explosion has gone off. Trees nearby are uprooted and blown back. I'm still traveling with the same momentum when I fly into the dragon's crater and slam into it with my fists in front of me. I feel myself literally tear a hole through the dragon's body and continue drilling into the ground itself. I'm twenty feet down before I finally stop.

  
Standing in the crater we've created, I catch my breath as the dragon takes its last; a gurgling, coughing breath as its eye loses focus. A few seconds later, the monster drifts away from existence entirely, like a nightmare fading away after waking up from a very realistic dream.

  
This isn't a dream though. What it was, was a very real attempt on my life. One that almost worked too.

  
I think that's enough practice for today as I imagine my house with the intention of teleporting there, safe in the knowledge that Derrick is at work so I don't have to take the long way home.

  
And just like that, in less than a heartbeat, I'm home.

  
And my foot is in the toilet again.

  
Dammit.

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

The next day at the lakefront feels more like a day off than my actual day off, probably due to the lack of murder attempts by mythical creatures. I even volunteer to take the shift cleaning the men's room. No one ever volunteers to clean the men's room. Usually, it's decided by a fiercely debated game of Paper/Rock/Scissors, but not today. Today, the weird new kid seemed so happy just to be alive that he practically whistled on his way to the horrors that awaited him in the men's room.

  
One of the advantages of taking such a terrible shift, is that Jeff at least tends to stay off your back for the majority of the day. After he's personally inspected that every urinal mint is replaced and skidmark removed, that is. Lucky for me, my work is to his satisfaction, and I'm allowed to work beach duty for the rest of the day.