As I stand there, absorbing the fact there's another nineties fashion-loving skinny bitch around, and she's thinner than me, Toad Broad begins walking towards me and my Super Friends like she's at a ball-even lifts her skirts, which gives me an idea for how to trip her up if it comes to that-and starts talking in a voice like glass sliding up my asscrack.

"I am Selene. We are the Wrath of Baphomet. Give us the blood or we will slaughter you and everyone who is still alive."

I'm stuck between telling her she looks more like Scylla, if we're bringing Greco-Roman shit into this (I hope that thing isn't real here) and saying that I'd get my panties in a twist too, if jagoffs like them put my mug on their friendship necklaces. Luckily, I don't have to spend much longer deciding, because something else Selene said is starting to bug me.

I turn to glance behind me with a sound like a crossbow bolt flying off, appropriate given the speed, and see there are still some vanillas around. Typical: dumbasses all tried to squeeze through the door at the same time instead of using the communal brain cell and moving in a way that fit them.

Watch your mouth, Stark, James says, as disappointed and dismayed as anyone who's ever known me. They do not think of such things when scared.

Then maybe they should stop shitting themselves and do something useful, like, I dunno, slit their own throats so the witches can't get power through killing them. I'm not sure how local magic works, besides the fact it's nasty, but that's enough to suggest it can draw from such sources.

See, according to Chalk, who's about as bigoted as you'd expect an inked up Southern cue ball to be (though he has better reasons than most, since the supernaaturals he's skeptical around are mostly evil fucks), but somewhat knowledgeable, "magick" was this corrupting force that got more addictive the more you cast, eventually turning you into people like the three jokers mean mugging us, at which point you start eating babies and athing in puppy blood, I don't know.

In any case, eeeevilll magick or not, I'm more than aware humans are some magicians' favorite clay to mold, so if the humans could haul ass outta there, that'd be just awfully sweet, really.

I'm tempted to kill them myself, because the scared sounds, combined with the thumping as they try to get out, the heartbeats and the panicked breathing, are driving me up the goddamn wall.

Fuck. I've felt like my balls fell off the moment I started standing in for Hadleigh as cosmic cop, but at least my temper's still there. The fact I don't really have anything better to do home makes me wanna cry, and laugh.

Eh. At least I'm not bored.

Especially once things start heating up, as Chalk brings out his playground-level insults. He points his gun at Selene-from the corner of my eye, I can sorta see the others doing the same, though I'm more focused on how much ass it sucks to have Larson almost outta my sight-and snarls, "Alright, Scary Poppins. You've had your entrance. Now explain what the hell's going on, before shit gets deadly up in here."

Is that how I sound? Fuck. My fingers itch and I wanna make a Malediction, but the kind of office drone I'm cosplaying us wouldn't just start smoking in this situation. And yeah, I sorta ruined that when I started mouthing off to the scarecrow skank, but if I start shooting the breeze, they might start focusing on me, and...

...And, what? Why am I being so careful, anyway? This is the type of crap the Blue Clifford would burn out his handful of neurons going over, all tacticool. Why haven't I lit these bastards up? Now it will feel stupid, after Chalk made what he musta imagined was a cool threat.

A jagged grin splits my face as I begin to reconsider, but before I can make a move, Chalk and his crew does, pumping the resting witch faces full of lead.

They fall down, twitching under the rain of silver-jacketed steel, and it's so anticlimactic I almost laugh. Is it really gonna be this easy?

Natch, just when Larson begins voicing similar thoughts (and damn if I don't wanna jump on him and start throttling; I'd almost think he's the reason I'm here, but he's too much of a small fry to be the threat I sensed. In fact...), the witches rise to their feet, flattened bullets spilling out of them. That barely-dressed weasel is even pulling one out of her teeth with her tongue.

I figured something was fishy when they didn't bleed, despite clearly not being bulletproof, and for once, it's nice to be proven right. I could have something like an actual fight on my hands. Living like the average schmuck makes me want to rip my head off. I can't even see Hell when I close my eyes anymore, I have to focus just to glimpse it as if from a distance, like it's a town on the horizon I'm walking to. Must be all the lag, or whatever you'd call it. The difference between timestreams is just one part of it-like I needed help with never getting anywhere on time.

You could be reading stolen content. Head to Royal Road for the genuine story.

Kasabian would probably mumble something about how only crackpots would get mopey 'bout no longer being able to eyefuck Downtown whenever, but screw him. He's such a loser that I'm his best friend. I'm surprised he hasn't killed himself.

Before Chalk can redo his impression of John Wayne meets Elmer Fudd, or his smurfs can try anything cute, I mutter a spell. Spoken so fast and under my breath, I doubt a human would understand what I'm babbling even if they caught it.

Hellion, as a language, is very...compact, I guess you could say. Like German, except without those words with more letters than a speech. Yeah, it's flowery, while simultaneously sounding like preteen shitheads trying to be scary, but the way one word can contain so much information is useful when casting.

For example, the stuff I just incanted is meant to create a barrier that separates those behind it from the world at large, but without cutting them off from oxygen or anything else they need to function. It's a description and a request to my own power, though, my Hellion being what it is, I start improvising halfway through. The other thing my mutt blood's good for, besides guaranteeing a scrap wherever I go.

Chalk and his bosom buddies find themselves encased in a sphere of invisible force, which thankfully stops their shrieking from reaching me. Fun as it'd be to hear their bitching, I have another thing in mind.

As I turn to face the witches, I muse that the barrier is strong enough to keep them in timeout for a while. Chalk's not that much stronger than a vanilla his size would be, and the others aren't exactly gym rats. Although...

Yeah, shoulda probably put their asses to sleep in case Larson decides to be clever and pulls something outta his sleeve. Maybe I'll be lucky and they'll try shooting their way out, get a bullet where the sun doesn't shine. That'd be friggin' hilarious.

I'm smirking as I look the terrible threesome up and down, wondering who I should feel sorrier for, Jafar or the mom and daughter tag team. He's standing in the middle, so maybe I'll stuff Selene's fat head up his ass, then his up the skanky crank's. Just call me John Hancock, folks.

"Who are you supposed to be, fool?" Jafar hisses like-yeah-a cobra, a comma appearing between his peepers as he frowns. He's flexing his hands, like I do before and after giving someone a chin check, and I see he's either wearing steel talons over his fingers, like trashy, reverse finerless gloves, or they're part of his mitts."No signs of your interference were-"

The beanpole cuts him off, with a laugh so happy it must be fake, because people this joyful don't exist. I killed 'em all, outta jealousy. "Don't you get it, Ahriman? He's the reason the future's been thrown into disarray. The chaos is the sign of his presence..." She trails off, giving me a hooded look. "Not that he's long for this world."

Aw, baby's first scawy pwomise. I wonder if she wants a cookie? I'm sure we could arrange something with a cow pie.

Ahriman bristles, and I relax a bit, not that they can see. Just a nickname, just like in Tubby's case. If he and Selene are deities, I'll eat my goddamn pants. Either they're titles, or, if these bozos are packing some divine mojo, they're weakened, or hiding their powers for no good reason.

"You act too familiar with me, Athame," he tells the skinny chick in a warning tone. "Do not forget that you are the third of our circle."

Should I tell them they can only make a triangle, really? Do ya think they could take it?

James sighs, and I get the feeling he's staring up at the ceiling, as it were.

Athame looks away from him, almost lifting her nose up, in a motion so petulant I wonder if she's actually a teen, even if a freakishly ugly one. This must be how my adoptive dad looked at me every day. "And you are not the boss of me."

Yep, definitely a kid, even if one with a face I doubt even her mommy can love.

Selene steps forward before they can bicker more, to my disappointment, skirts swishing as she gesture with both hands. The two more or less rally behind her. "Step aside, stranger. We have no quarrel with you. We seek the Blood of the Trinity."

I have a suspicion what she means, and when James tugs on my mental sleeve, I nod absently. Another woman who's aster Chalk. I might actually be the sanest person around, and that's...horrifying.

"But," Selene adds, narrowing her eyes, and I feel power beginning to gather behind them and around her hands, "if you do attempt to interfere, like Ahriman warned you may, we will not hesitate to dispose of you." She's looking at me like I'm the slowest kid in class, lips pressed together in a thin line. "Now, make way."

I don't. Instead, I twirl the gun I've summoned, while tapping my na'at on my thigh. I'm headbanging like there's a good song in the air, rather than a bunch of asswipes bleating as they try to leave. I never take my eyes off the three, and keep a grin plastered to my face.

Ahriman scoffs. "You will die, then." He holds up a taloned hand, reaching into his cassock with the other. "Any last words?"

Who asks for... "Sure," I say brightly, turning the na'at into a whip. "After I send you packing, and you come crawling back, looking for revenge...just remember it was Harry Dresden, wizard for hire, who kicked your asses."

There. I doubt they can find their way to him, funny as it would be for Dresden to get jumped by three fruit loops he's never met, but in any case, it'll send them on a wild goose chase for a while.

And, if they do escape...the sense of threat I've been feeling has only intensified since Selene has started glaring at me, and it points to her like a compass' needle. I don't get drawn to things that can only threaten one reality, so either she can reach more, or plans to get the power for that.

So. Either she goes on the run, and I see what this is all about, or I hogtie her and get all I need to know out of her after I kill her lackeys.

Or, James chimes in like the buzzkill he is, you inflate Dresden's reputation, as people learn he beat a trio of witches without even being in their universe.

Oh, fuck that.