My Ex From Hell (The Blooming Goddess Trilogy) (12 page)

“Why were you the one who found me? Don’t tell me it was coincidence.” I wasn’t going to let this go.

Hannah was seated on Ms. Keeper’s desk, following the whole exchange, rapt.

Theo stayed mum.

“Tell me,” I demanded.

“I was supposed to meet Demeter. I wanted you to see her. But she didn’t show and there you were.”

That was about the last thing I expected to hear. Kai too, from the stunned look on his face.

“No way,” he refuted. “She couldn’t have gotten into the Underworld back then.With Hades all freaked that Persephone would be stolen back? He had that place on lockdown. No ally of Zeus’ would have been able to enter.”

“She was pretty convinced she’d be able to. I figured she had inside help.”

“Don’t look at me,” Kai retorted. “She’s the last person I’d have wanted down there.”

“Oh, I believe you, bro,” Theo replied. “Can’t imagine you wanted a face-to-face with Demeter after stealing her kid.”

“Could you have been the one helping Demeter?” This from Hannah. Three pairs of eyes swung my way. “She is your mom.”

“I don’t know.”

“Convenient little amnesia scam you’ve got going,” Kai muttered.

“Aw. You figured it out. One dash of no freaking clue who I am, add stupid guys I can’t trust and presto. Super evil scam to take over the world. Gonna need a lair though.”

“The kitchen,” Hannah suggested cheerfully. “Definitely an evil vibe there.”

“Hey!” Theo was still stuck on my “stupid guys” remark. “You can trust me.”

Kai snorted.

“Jerk,” Theo scoffed. “If you hadn’t cocked this all up because you couldn’t keep it in your pants, we wouldn’t be in this trouble.”

“Exactly,” I echoed.

Kai turned on me. “Poor little human. Stolen kiss in the moonlight. Pretty exciting for you, huh?”

“I am willing to break all kinds of immortality laws to take this dickhead out,” Hannah said to me.

“He’s right, Soph,” Theo said. “You can’t compare. Kai’s a real god. Banging everything in sight these past sixteen years. Just like his dad.”

Kai swung around with a look of surprise. Theo smirked. “Yeah, even I heard about your exploits. Doing the old man proud, are we?”

“Take it back,” Kai said in a low voice.

“Make me,” Theo challenged.

In a burst of inhuman speed, Kai grabbed Theo by the neck in a chokehold. “Just one little snap. Humans break so easily. Can’t imagine why you’d want to become one.”

Theo wedged one hand between his neck and Kai’s arm to keep an airway. With the other, he reached down and snapped off the chain holding his wallet to his pants. Immediately it began to glow with a hot white light as it doubled in length.

My eyes widened as Theo whipped the chain around Kai’s arm and spun himself free, retracting the chain with a snap. I could smell the burning flesh. Theo took several steps back, faced Kai and wrapped one end of the chain around his fist for a better grip.

“That had to hurt,” Hannah whispered.

Kai didn’t even look at his burned arm. He narrowed his eyes at the chain and then smiled like he was pleased to see it. Whatever turned his crank.

Theo shot him a cocky grin. “Just because I’m human doesn’t make me stupid.” He snapped the chain at Kai. “Come closer if you want, but she’s a nasty bit of business. Forged by order of Zeus himself. The master at inflicting pain.”

“It’s the chain that was used to bind him to the rock,” Hannah gasped.

“Quit it. Both of—” I tried to interject but had to grab Hannah and scramble out of the way as Kai blasted Theo with a black light that somehow seemed to come to a point. Like a really nasty sword that wouldn’t just play nice and pierce you to death. The light seemed to have depth and a very creepy, well, wriggliness to it.

Theo deflected it with the chain like it was a solid object and Kai’s light struck Ms. Keeper’s desk.

The spot in which Hannah had been seated seconds ago was instantly incinerated into a pile of smoking ash.

It looked toxic. I gingerly reached out a toe to poke at it—

“Sophie!” Theo snapped.

Guess it was toxic. I pulled my foot back.

“He can’t do that!” Hannah sputtered, swiveling her head between the Hazmat waste on the floor and the boys fighting with impossible weapons.

“Which one?” I asked.

“Either!”

Apparently, this had all just been foreplay for the boys because that’s when their fight began in earnest. Hannah and I were trapped across the room from the door, taking refuge behind a filing cabinet. Until Theo split it in two with his chain like slicing a giant pat of butter.

We jumped behind the sofa. That didn’t last long either as Theo jumped on it for a better angle to attack Kai and Kai blasted him. Theo survived. The sofa didn’t.

As the debris flew, Hannah and I sprinted to our last refuge; the bookcase. We frantically pulled it far enough away from the wall so that we could squeeze ourselves in behind it.

“Can’t you do anything?” Hannah asked.

“Oh, yeah! I can.”

Hannah glared at me.

“Don’t be all huffy. I’m still getting used to it.” I stepped out from behind the bookcase, taking care to avoid all ash piles.

It was no holds barred between Theo and Kai. Both were bleeding, not from hits but from blasted furniture fallout.

For a human, Theo was amazing. But Kai was a blur, his speed and strength giving him the edge. He was a fighting machine, seemingly completely relaxed and yet not missing a single step. The way his eyes were glinting made me think he was getting off on this.

I kept from dwelling on how hot he was by reminding myself that the last thing Kai needed was another groupie. I hated him. My ex. I’d never had an ex but I was glad it was him because—

Kai spun and I tilted my head to get a better look at his very fine butt.

“Sophie!” Hannah nudged me sharply with an elbow.

“Right.” I had a job to do. Not that that kept me from looking twice.

I aimed one hand at each of the guys and shot out ribbons of light to wrap around their ankles. I lifted them up and dangled them in mid-air. That stopped them.

“Light really shouldn’t behave like that,” Hannah said.

“I know, right?” It was way cool. Back to the boys. “Now that I have your attention,” I began.

Theo apparently didn’t care that he was hanging upside down. He snapped his chain at Kai. I panicked and managed to drop my hold on Kai, sending him crashing to the ground.

Theo’s chain missed him entirely and smashed into a window. Oddly, no glass rained down on us.

“That was unexpected.” I lowered Theo to the ground and pointed to the row of three windows. In the centre one, where there should have been a gaping hole to the outside, was a perfect square of blue light.

I put my hand up to it.

Kai snatched me back before I made contact. “Do you touch hot stoves, too?”

“It’s a window frame,” I said.

“That could have some kind of trigger around it. You’re lucky your hand wasn’t cut off. Or worse.”

“He’s right,” Theo agreed. “That was fairly daft.” Holding tight to one end, Theo flung his chain toward the square of blue.

We all watched as Theo’s chain crashed and rebounded off an invisible barrier right at the window frame.

For a second, nothing more happened, then suddenly there was a loud WHUMP noise and a flurry of motion as a bevy of arrows shot across from right side of the frame to embed themselves in the left.

I waited for Kai to gloat.

“Too easy,” he said.

“Like your standards, dating Bethany?” I murmured.

“Jealous, are we?”

Please. As. If. He and I were
so
ancient history. “Whatever.”

Theo peered at the window frame. “It’s warded,” he said.

I groaned. “Great. We’ll never get through.”

Kai slanted a look my way. “Why not?”

“Intention to harm? We’ll never bypass it.”

“You really forgot everything, didn’t you?”

I crossed my arms, disliking his tone. “Enlighten me.”

Kai crossed
his
arms and shot me a “why should I?” look.

I re-crossed my arms right back at him and shot him a “because you need me” smile.

“Just tell us already,” Hannah said.

I got the feeling that our fight was not over, just kind of put on hold. But Kai did explain.

“There are different types of wards. Some, like the one Theo has at Hope Park, are based on intention to harm.”

“Figured that out, did you?” Theo muttered.

Kai shot him a cool look. “Wasn’t too hard after Sophie nearly killed herself going after a Pyrosim.”

I squirmed under Theo’s stare. “I may have forgotten to fill you in about that.”

Theo swung his gaze back to Kai. “Convenient of you to happen to be there.”

“Doing my part to keep Sophie safe.”

Theo didn’t bother to respond to that whopper.

I didn’t either.

Kai continued. “Some wards are like a closed door. The person warding it doesn’t really expect anyone to follow so they don’t deadbolt it. Just close it. Maybe booby-trap it. But if you know how to open it and avoid the trap? Instant access.”

“She’d hidden the passageway behind the window and figured anyone who managed to find it would be killed by the arrows,” Hannah said.

Kai inclined his head. “Exactly.”

“So how do we get inside?”

“Give me a minute,” Theo muttered, examining the frame.

Hannah looked around at the mess that had been made of the room. “What happens if we touch the ash?”

Kai glanced down at a pile. “Nothing, now that it’s cooled off.”

Hannah nodded. “Back in a sec.” She left, shutting the office door behind her.

With Theo focused on the ward, that left Kai and me staring at each other. A contest of wills. As I gazed into his fathomless eyes, it occurred to me that this was one staring contest I wasn’t going to win. “Guess you didn’t take that long to get over me,” I said, hoping for a sneak blink attack.

It worked. Ha ha. “All those other females to plug,” he replied. I couldn’t tell if he was being sarcastic or not.

“So much for ‘you’re my universe,’” I muttered, then caught myself, startled at the memory.

“You were.” He sounded equally startled.

An openly hostile fight I could deal with this. Whatever this was, I couldn’t. Because however Kai felt about me, it was too loaded a discussion to get into right now. Or was the problem what he didn’t feel about me, Sophie, but
had
felt about me, Persephone? How was a girl supposed to compete with herself?

Either way, it was time for a new topic of conversation. “I’m sorry about your dad. Even though he’s a son-of-a-bitch.”

Kai laughed; a bitter sound. “Remember that much, do you?”

“One thing I can’t remember. Did we ever go to Olympus? Or were we always in Hades?”

“We couldn’t go to Olympus. I wouldn’t have been safe there.”

“But I was safe in the Underworld?”

“Long as I was around, you were.”

“Where’d you go, then? When I was attacked.” I tried for nonchalant.

I failed.

“Hades had sent me on an errand.” He seemed kind of evasive.

“Doing what?”

Kai avoided my eyes. “Stealing Zeus’ thunderbolt.”

Theo turned with raised eyebrows at that. I motioned for him to focus back on the window frame.

“Bold move there, son,” I told Kai.

He glanced at me, surprised. “You’re not mad?”

“Why would I be mad?”

“He is your dad.”

“Of whom I have very little memory. Don’t forget, he sent a Gold Crusher to take me out. Not so much on the family fuzzies.”

Hannah returned with cheap plastic gloves, a few pairs of tweezers, and a wad of sealable plastic bags.

I raised an eyebrow. “Holy CSI, Batman.”

Hannah handed me the gloves. “Anything that seems like a promising clue to explain the ward? Or anything else out of the ordinary? Use the tweezers to pick it up. Then bag it. Even slivers. I can put them under the microscope later.”

She held one pair of tweezers to Kai who ignored it until Hannah was forced to give it to me, instead. “Ever seen an Inland Taipan snake?” she asked him, threateningly.

“You do get that I’m immortal, right?” Kai retorted.

“Immortal is not the same thing as unkillable,” she replied sweetly.

Theo chuckled.

I combed gingerly through the ash for a plausible clue. “How’d you do it?” I asked. “Steal the thunderbolt.”

Kai gave me a rueful smile. “I didn’t. We’d heard that Zeus was headed to see Poseidon for a secret meeting. I was supposed to steal it from him there. But it was an ambush.”

“You weren’t even in Hades when I was attacked.” My relief was overwhelming.

“Yeah, he was,” Theo chimed in, arching his back to stretch it out. “I saw him minutes before I found you.”

My stomach dropped. I was never going to get to the truth of the matter.

“I had just gotten back,” Kai said defensively. “And Pers—Sophie, was supposed to be on earth.”

“Why’s that?” Theo mused.

“None of your business,” Kai replied.

“It’s
my
business,” I said, bagging what appeared to be a broken fingernail.

“Yup. And when you remember it, you’ll know.”

“You’re particularly infuriating, you know that?”

Anything else I was going to say was cut short by Hannah’s excited squeal. “Check it out,” she enthused. She held up an indigo iridescent scale about three inches in diameter. “Wonder what it’s from? Theo?” She noted his pale look. “You’re not scared of reptiles are you?”

“I am when they’re that.”

“Dragon,” Kai said grimly. “One’s come to Hope Park.”

9

A dead minion tells no tales

θ
’

“Dragon? Tell me that means ‘fluffy kitten’ in Greek.”

Kai shot me a look of disgust.

“So that’s what’s taken Cassie and Bethany?”

“Maybe.” Theo didn’t sound certain.

I stomped my foot and pointed at the blue light inside the empty window frame. “Cassie and Bethany could be in there right now. In danger.”

“That’s awful,” Hannah said. “Who are they?”

I growled in annoyance. “How do we fix this?” I hated what had happened to them.

“First find out exactly what Ms. Keeper is,” Theo said.

“Apparently, she’s a dragon,” Hannah replied with shining eyes.

“Or she has a dragon,” Theo countered.

Hannah shook her head. “Even if this dragon is akin to a Komodo and trainable, there should have been other evidence of its presence.”

“You know this from your extensive experience with real dragons?” Kai snapped.

“I’m extrapolating,” she replied testily. “If the scale was here, the logical explanation is that the dragon was as well. No way Ms. Keeper could have managed it to the extent that there were no claw gauges on the floor or scorch marks. Ergo, Ms. Keeper must have been the dragon herself.”

“My brainiac,” I beamed.

“Why not? The simplest explanation is usually the most logical,” Theo agreed, “but we still need to narrow down what type of dragon.”

“So Sophie knows how kill it,” added Kai.

“Me? Why me?” I asked.

“You seem to care.”

I stared at him, dumbfounded. “That was a tasteless joke, right?”

“No,” Theo said. “He means it.”

“How can anyone be so unfeeling?” Hannah demanded.

Kai looked to Theo for help. “What part of this don’t they get?”

“The part where you let innocent people be hurt without trying to save them,” I retorted. “What part of that don’t you get?”

Theo sighed. “Much as I hate to defend Kai, he’s not actually acting like a psychopath. There’s a fundamental difference between how humans and gods think.”

“Yeah,” Kai interjected. “Humans get all upset about the littlest things.”

“Littlest things?” Hannah sputtered. “We’re talking lives.”

“Little picture, sweetheart.”

Hannah made an “ugh” of disgust. “Don’t ‘sweetheart’ me.”

Theo tried to placate them both. “It’s like this. Humans see the trees, gods see the forest. We’re more infinite so our perspective is larger.”

Kai brightened. “Exactly.” He paused. “I do care about humans. They make great playthings.”

I frowned. He didn’t have to rub in his hots for Bethany now of all times.

Kai continued. “I don’t particularly want to see them destroyed in all this. But you can’t be concerned with the survival as a whole and be caught up in each individual sob story. You’d never get anywhere.”

“Run along then and go worry about your world dominance,” I scoffed. “I’ll deal without you.” I made a shooing motion.

Kai hesitated.

“Ohmigod.” A slow smirk spread across my face. “You can’t, can you? That’s why you’re here. Whatever you were up to involves me. I’m essential to your evil plans, aren’t I?”

“You didn’t think they were so evil when you were your proper self.”

“I am my proper self. With an attitude adjustment.” Cassie’s gibberish popped into my mind. “I’m the key, aren’t I?”

“Don’t flatter yourself,” Kai said. “It’s not all about you.”

“Then it’s about the two of us,” I continued. “Me from above, you from below, together we make a key.”

Kai stared at me warily. “How do you know this?”

“Cassie told us,” Theo replied. “We figure she’s a descendent of the Oracle.”

“Why didn’t you say something sooner?” Kai demanded.

Was he kidding me? “I did! Back in the bathroom. You wouldn’t listen. Too busy with the twisting of words and the kissing and being cryptic.”

“She’s the one you thought I wanted to harm? She might have had some useful information. Why would I hurt her?”

“Maybe you’d already gotten the information you needed from her, rendering her expendable,” Hannah pointed out.

“And maybe you’re deluded,” Kai retorted.

I had a sick feeling. “It was world domination, wasn’t it? I wasn’t going to simply stop the war. I was going to take over.” I looked at Kai for confirmation. “No,” I continued sadly at his look, “
we
were going to take over. That’s why you came back? Not because of me or us. Because you needed me to achieve your goals.”

“My goals were our goals. Stop being so human about this.” Kai sounded genuinely annoyed.

“I hate to say ‘I told you so,’” Theo began until Hannah smacked him.

Guess it had been too much to hope that I was merely an unwitting pawn in this battle for world domination. Nope. Little old me was a major player engaged in a coup d’état to usurp the two most powerful gods imaginable. Except, while they still wanted me dead, in true fashion of power mad dictators and gods everywhere, I was no longer major. Bet I hadn’t seen that little change in status coming. Big dummy.

I was, however, still key. Both to the battle and to Cassie’s plight. This dragon would never have taken Cassie if I hadn’t somehow set off her powers. She was the vision-seeing aftershock of my goddess earthquake. Whether intended or not, this was my fault. The enormity of my responsibility hit me full on.

“I’m taking the scale to examine it further,” Hannah announced, breaking into my pity party.

“I’ll come too,” Theo said. “I have an idea about how to break through the ward and the scale is key. Soph, what are you going to do?”

A glimpse of red hair outside the window caught my eye. “Bethany?”

Everyone rushed to look outside.

“Who’s she with?” Hannah asked, squinting for a better look.

“She’s strolling around pretty casually for someone supposedly abducted by a dragon,” Theo commented.

“I’ll go talk to her,” I said, and raced out the door. I’d been feeling itchy inside and the chance to get outdoors was compelling.

By the time I reached where I’d seen her, Bethany already hopped the fence and was headed into the woods.

Of course.

It was incredibly stupid to follow her outside the protective bubble but I didn’t feel like I had a choice. I had to find out if Bethany had escaped Ms. Keeper. If so, how? Did she know where Cassie was? And yes, was Bethany all right? Her obsessed fangirl Veronica had forgotten her completely, which meant that something wonky was at play.

Plus, time was still ticking for Cassie. I was worried for her life, not to mention the fact that she might be able to clear Theo and I of any wrongdoing where poisoning Hades was involved. And if Cassie knew who had poisoned the Underlord, I might know who tried to kill me.

All things considered, it was a calculated risk I had to take. I climbed cautiously over the fence, touching my pendant for luck and courage.

No Infernorators or Gold Crushers showed up. Hopefully, Hades’ change in status was keeping the Underworld busy. And if Zeus thought I was behind it, could be he’d leave me alone.

I continued through the forest, keeping a sharp eye on my former foe up in the distance. I tried calling her name but she didn’t appear to hear me.

Even though I was anxious about being ambushed by a variety of deadly supernatural beings, every step deeper into the tangle of trees and further away from people recharged me. While I wasn’t at the “dance naked amidst the flowers” stage yet, my almost drool-inducing need to let it all hang out in the outdoors was bordering on severe embarrassment territory. I had my shoes off again and had started to pull up my shirt before I realized what I was doing and restored my clothing. I consoled myself with the feel of autumn sun on my face.

I found Bethany deep in the woods, at the edge of a steep ravine. Or should I say, I found a twelve-year-old wearing my Bethany wig and sneaking a smoke with her friend.

I snatched the lousy wig off her head.

“What’s your deal?” she sneered. God, I hated lippy tweens.

“The deal is, that’s my wig, which you probably stole from Principal Doucette. Not to mention, smoking kills.”

“Yeah, well, you’ll be dead before us,” her annoying friend piped up. They snickered.

Seriously? I’d risked life and limb to be insulted by a pair of prepubescent brats?

“Not really,” I assured them, “I’ve got this special longevity thing working for me. Do you know what ‘longevity’ means?”

They exchanged an annoyed glance.

“It means that when your cold bodies are rotting in the grave, I’ll be radiantly youthful. And you are going to be rotting sooner rather than later if I ever catch either of you smoking again. Got it?”

Fun fact number one. Goddess pissyness totally terrifies kids. Or they thought I was insane. Either way, they tossed their cigarettes into the ravine and bolted.

“Burn down the whole forest, why dontcha?” I yelled after them. Grumbling, I scrambled and slid my way down the fifty feet to the bottom of the ravine. This Goddess of Spring gig meant a whole new attachment to the earth for me and I couldn’t risk their stupid cigarettes accidentally burning down the forest. Bad enough I had the ancient Greek pyromania squad mucking around.

I scuffed my feet through the leaf-strewn ground at the bottom until I found their butts. Sure enough, they were still smoldering. Carefully, I put them out and tried to re-dirtify the area.

Storm clouds darkened the day. I glanced up, hoping the rain would stay off long enough for me to get inside, and realized there were no clouds.

Photokia and Pyrosim filled every inch of sky.

Me against all of them. I gave a grim smile and lashed out.

An eerie calm filled my entire body and I felt as if time slowed down. Infernorators and Gold Crushers descended upon me, fireballs and thunderbolts raining down upon my lone human form.

Yet I had plenty of time to avoid them. I brushed their destruction away like I was swatting flies. My stranglers spun about me in a blur. I laughed in sheer delight as I realized that I’d only been using a fraction of my power.

I. Was. Spring.

The time when life begins anew. I had all the elemental power that came with the season. Even now, in Fall, I was able to call upon it. I felt it surge up from deep within its sleeping place in the earth and blast from my eyes in a deadly green light.

I may have been the embodiment of the season when life began to grow anew, but I had the ability to push that power to the extreme. Pervert and twist it so that my attackers grew so fast, they hit the other side of existence.

This is what they’d meant when they said humans see the trees and gods see the forest. Big picture. Attacking my enemies one by one would only get me so far. It was a fraction of what I was capable of.

Power consumed me and shot from my eyes and palms in waves of moss green light, taking out row upon row of the deadly minions. I watched them age into nothingness, then disappear from existence.

I was unstoppable. Every inch of me was pure might.

I remembered this rush. More so, in fact.

I was on an island. No, not even that. More of a rocky outcropping in the middle of a turquoise blue sea that stretched as far as the eye could see. I lay on my back, the rock smooth and cool against my skin.

Kai propped himself on his elbows, his body stretched above me. He touched his forehead to mine and I was consumed with energy. All became light. I could see the world broken down into its tiniest fragments. Together we were the creator and the destroyer. Together, all was ours
.

I rushed back to the present with a snap. While my mind had drifted back into the past, my body had stayed present and focused, continuing its battle.

This. Was. Amazing.

Then I learned a valuable lesson. Like all power sources, I needed to be recharged. I had thought that because I was outside, the superpowers would be indefinite.

Not so, kids.

Apparently there was a limit on how much I could extend myself in any one session.

You know that moment in movies when the heroes are deep in it, guns firing away, and there’s that click? That super loud click, when all other sound seems to have stopped, that shows the hero has run out?

That’s what happened to me. One moment I was single-handedly decimating an otherworldly army, the next I was a puny human with a legion of foes bent on killing me. From one second to the next, my powers stopped and I stood there in defenseless disbelief.

I wasn’t the only one. There was a moment—it felt like minutes but must have been milliseconds—where I stared at my enemies and they all stared back. We had mutually frozen in stunned shock.

Looking back, I’m amazed I wasn’t killed. I was hideously outnumbered and for every being I’d taken out, ten more had shown up to take its place.

I closed my eyes as fire and lightning engulfed me. I could feel my skin sizzle as I spasmed violently from the electricity arcing over my body.

Something seized my shirt front. Dazed, my eyes struggled open to find a scarred Gold Crusher holding me in his grasp. He smiled, revealing his snaggle teeth. All I could think was “I guess Zeus doesn’t provide dental care.”

Both the Crusher’s eyes and his thunderbolt tattoo glowed with an otherworldly eeriness. He flew up in the air, my body clutched firmly to him like a child with his favorite teddy. No one was getting me away from him.

Whoops. Spoke too soon. A lone Infernorator swooped down upon us and used his flaming tentacle to knock the Crusher sideways so hard, my teeth rattled.

The two foes attacked each other. Fire met lightning and the sky exploded in red and gold, as they made their hatred plain.

I wasn’t sure who I wanted to win. I guess the Photokia. Better the devil already holding you and all that.

I got my wish soon enough. My captor hurtled his fiery foe into a Sitka spruce with enough force to cause an impressive Underworldy fireball.

My hero.

Problem was, then his attention turned back to the prize in his hand. Me.

“Pretty,” he leered, reaching for my pendant.

Over my dead body was he getting it. I reached far inside myself, beyond the pain, beyond the exhaustion. I was ending this
now
.

Something in the recesses of my brain that pre-dated my human consciousness stirred. A primeval force that had been sleeping, waiting for the command to “awake.”

I hesitated. I knew instinctively that tapping into that force meant there was no going back. I could never hide behind human ignorance again. To drink from this source was to fully commit; to my goddess nature, to the war, and to my birthright.

I chose.

Finally
.

The dental nightmare squeezing me placed one hand on my pendant. “Wonder what Zeus will give me for this?” he laughed, oozing foul breath.

Bzzz. So sorry. The correct answer was “What righteous babe is about to blow you to smithereens?”

Fully, irreversibly, finally, totally me. I closed my eyes, then girlfriend gave ‘er. Light blasted out from my entire body. The world around me trembled with the muted boom of my all-encompassing shockwave.

My eyes cracked open. Dazzling blue. The sky was clear. My enemies gone.