Wonder Guy (20 page)

“It’s a drag, big fella,” he spoke to the length of tail in his arms, a body part as capable of understanding him as the beast’s tiny brain. “You’ll be safe on your feet soon enough.”

* * * *

The wash of the hero’s sympathy overwhelmed Elysha. She lost the thread of the spell that displaced the great lizards from their proper epoch. It broke in her face, stinging like a whip as the monsters snapped back to their proper places in space-time. What had she been thinking, bringing two of the beasts here?

She’d gotten the idea from that foolish statue the humans set out in the lake. She’d thought bringing a real creature forward would wipe the grins from their faces and generate a proper bit of horror and panic. Not until its appearance did she realize the first thing was more interested in chomping on trees than on people.

Live and learn. In retrospect, she should have sent that one back before summoning the predator. Of course the monster with the huge jaw full of teeth totally ignored the scuttling humans in favor of prey more its size. Even so, she’d hoped for at least a few fatalities.

The experiment hadn’t been a total waste despite her huge expenditure of energy. Hundreds of humans had been deliciously terrified, scared out of their wits, scrambling for safety. Many had been ready to trample their fellows into the ground to save their own skins. Unfortunately, the surge of tasty self-interest had been offset by many small acts of heroism. Strangers acted as one to get children to safety and rescue swimmers and sailors caught in the confusion. How disappointing. Sometimes she wondered why she even tried to engineer disasters anymore.

But, of course, she hadn’t expected to get more from this exercise than she had.

His appearance justified the whole thing. Just as she’d suspected. The old biddies had created a Hero. That sort of thing went out of fashion centuries ago. What were they thinking?

Still, she now had a bead on the fellow. She’d soon find a way to get rid of him.

* * * *

When T-rex vanished from his grip Greg shot abruptly a thousand feet higher before catching himself, as if he and the earth had been playing tug of war and the earth had suddenly released its hold on the rope.

What the hell?
Where had a several-ton dinosaur disappeared to? Not to forget asking where it had come from in the first place. What in heck was going on here?

He did a flyby over Lake Calhoun, verifying the Apatosaurus, too, had disappeared. As if he weren’t already sure magic lay at the root of the whole incident.

The crowds milled below, agitated as a disturbed anthill, some people venturing out to the beach again, but warily. Others gathered in small knots at some distance. A television crew moved among them. The KARE 11 News van parked on a sidewalk nearby.

Great. No chance of landing here without drawing a crowd. He angled his flight path into a long curve, heading back to the University.

* * * *

“No, dear. I didn’t know there would be dinosaurs.” Serafina stood with Greg on the roof of the Computer Science building. “There’s no telling what Elysha might do, after all. But I recognized her power signature. She must have noticed the good work you’ve been doing and made this effort to draw you into the open. But now we know she’s the one who’s been aggravating the general levels of misery in this area in recent years.”

Given the diminutive woman’s matter-of-fact manner, it took Greg a long moment before the outrageous import of what she said hit him.

“So, I’m what? Some kind of goat you staked out to lure a tiger into the open?” He’d never been this outraged. He imagined himself as a cartoon character, steam shooting out his ears.

“Not at all, dear. Not unless the goat has bullet proof armor and heavy artillery.” Serafina tsked. “There’s no call to get worked up. You’re making a real difference for the people of this city.”

“Would they ever have been in danger from dinosaurs if I hadn’t gotten sucked into this hero gig?”

Speaking of which, he muttered, “Back to me,” and shed the flashy costume and mask for his familiar slacks and math t-shirt. He might be safer standing up to a little old lady while he had superpowers to call on, but as she gave him those powers in the first place, any sense of safety had to be pure illusion.

“The threats they faced would have been subtler,” Serafina said in a soothing tone. “But we certainly don’t expect you to deal with Elysha directly. You may encounter a few challenges she throws your way, but now that we know who’s obstructing us, the FGU will address the problem of Elysha.”

“FGU?” Greg tried to make sense of her words. Somehow, with Serafina, he always found himself feeling like he sat in the advanced version of a class, having missed the whole introductory course.

“The Union, the Fairy Godmother’s Union, of course.” She frowned, a slight moue of her usually smiling mouth. “Didn’t I give you my card?”

“Yes. Yes you did. But who exactly is this Elysha? And how did she manage to put a couple of dinosaurs in Lake Calhoun?”

Serafina gave him a speculative look as if gauging how much she should tell him, or how much he’d be able to understand. He bristled under the scrutiny.

“She is certainly not a fairy godmother, or a member of our Union.” Serafina’s disapproving look mellowed as she went on. “But she is somewhat akin to us. She does not share our goals, but she has powers of a similar nature, if the power of rose essence to please can be compared to the power of skunk musk to repel.”

“I get the idea.” Greg crossed his arms. The gesture felt much the same whether he wore his superhero costume or his math T-shirt, though in the latter, probably wouldn’t seem as impressive to others. “So, she can defy the known rules of physics too?”

Today Serafina’s hat included a bunched swath of gauze around the edge, forming a tidy brim shielding her eyes from the sun. The same sunshine beat down hot and heavy on his unprotected head. He gestured to the stairwell, and Serafina continued talking as they moved off the roof and started down the stairs.

“Precisely, but she does not have a cooperative nature.” The fairy godmother’s nose wrinkled. “And so acts alone, or with the help of a few minions and usually in secret because she cannot contend with the combined efforts of the Union.”

“But now she knows about me? What does she want? What can I expect from her?” He hadn’t signed up for this. He’d signed up to impress Gloria and do some good in the process. “What if she goes after Gloria?”

“There, there. Elysha knows about you now, but only in your guise as Wonder Guy. She has no way of knowing who your loved ones are.

“As to what you can expect from her, nothing direct. She thrives on what you would call negative emotions. Though all emotion is necessary to being human, Elysha does not respect the balance of energies. She’s addicted to fear, anger and misery. What you can expect from her is trouble. You can foil her by minimizing the trouble around you.”

“I’m supposed to go along with this program?” Greg ground his teeth. If he refused, gave up the powers, and went back to normal, how could he sit studiously at his computer while people around him suffered from trouble he might prevent?

When he paused on the landing, Serafina turned on the stair above him, putting her eyes at the same level as his. “Will you give up your hero’s powers when a hero is needed?”

Her eyes, while kindly, looked as sharp as any hawk or eagle’s.

“What’s the use of it?” he asked her. “There’s more trouble than the whole police department or Wonder Guy can prevent.”

“I can tell you Gloria is already impressed with Wonder Guy.”

“She is?” If Wonder Guy impressed her, it might still mean something when the mask came off. “Hmm. Well, is there anything else I can do to make sure Elysha stays away from Gloria and my mom?”

“She’s averse to cold iron and steel.” Serafina faded around the edges as she spoke. “And to laughter and good fellowship.” The tiny lady vanished.

* * * *

In a patch of woodland in the park along Minnehaha Creek, Elysha lounged on a mossy bank shaded by trees and soothed by the sounds of running water.

“How fares the swarm?” she asked Minik who crouched at her feet.

“They grow,” he reported.

“Tell me when they reach a size and strength to lift children from their mothers’ sides.”

“Yes. They near such size, but can only seize a small dog or a cat as yet.”

“Then feed them more. Remember to use herds scattered widely through space and time so the mutilations will be dismissed.”

The gnarled creature scuttled away and another, a will-o-the-wisp figure only visible to such knowing eyes as hers, drifted near when Elysha beckoned it.

“What have you learned?” she demanded.

“He flew swift, but I as swift as he.” The reply came as a whisper only heard by her ears, attuned to mysteries. “To a rooftop I shall reveal if you follow. There he spoke with an ancient one. They spoke of thee.”

* * * *

Gloria completed the last section of the Monarch’s wings. What next? She looked through the book of butterflies. Mmm. This one, with the iridescent blues, a Blue Morpho. She looked through the drawers of beads on one of the shelves behind the worktable, selecting containers with colors ranging from robin’s egg to deep indigo.

What did she love about Pete, aside from the promise of security and escape from her father’s house? He listened to her as she chatted about her day at work, her projects, the movies they saw together and YouTube clips she posted on Facebook. Being a good listener was a great quality in a guy. Of course, Greg had been the one listening to her today.

She put a drop of glue on the wingtip of a sky-blue, butterfly-cut blank and picked up a mirror-backed iridescent crystal with the tweezers.

Lots of her friends were good listeners. Aggie listened. Jo had listened. That didn’t mean she should marry them. What did it mean to share your whole life with someone? To create a common destiny, good times and bad? Would she see Pete the same way if something happened to him and he couldn’t work, like her dad? She loved her dad, but she didn’t love sharing a household with him. He was a chore. What if Pete hung around the house all day and let himself go? He’d be miserable if he couldn’t work. She’d probably have to entertain him 24/7. He wasn’t exactly self-directed.

The more she pictured Pete left to his own devices, without the bulwark of his job, the more he lost substance and luster in her eyes. What they shared seemed increasingly superficial.

Tweezing one tiny crystal after another into place to form her butterfly wings, she lost track of time. Her heart lifted when Aggie’s wheels rolled up the ramp to the back stoop. She glanced at the clock to find it already after four. On an ordinary day, she’d be getting off work now. Gloria muted the DVD player. Keys jingled, but the expected sound of their turning in the lock failed to follow. Instead, she heard a low murmur of voices.

She set down the glue gun and went to the door. Maybe Aggie needed a hand if she’d been shopping.

Gloria opened the door and gaped at the man standing on the steps beside her friend.

“You remember Hank, don’t you?” Aggie looked up and blushed as she gestured to her companion. “He was kind enough to invite me out for a cup of coffee.”

“Kindness had nothing to do with it.” Hank grinned in a smile she’d think rascally if not accompanied by a just-kidding wink.

Gloria had to grin in response.

“Oh, you.” Aggie’s blush deepened as she swatted the air in his direction. “But what are you doing home from work this early?” she asked.

Gloria lost her grin. “Something happened.”

* * * *

Back in the computer lab, Greg set up another batch of simulations and let them run. He had the lab to himself. Judging by the junk food wrappers and abandoned soda cans remaining at a pair of workstations in the back of the room, Eric and Will had been here earlier. Their computers were processing. They must have gone off somewhere to tend to other business during the run time.

Having the lab to himself made this a perfect opportunity to call Tech Support. While students and graduate TAs handled a fair amount of daily upkeep and troubleshooting for the computer labs, the permanent staff set up the servers, managed the networking, maintenance and software installations and security. Ted Amundson, a junior member of the IT team, did most of the grunt work. Just the person Greg wanted.

“Hey, Ted,” he said when the familiar voice answered his call.