=== KARI ===

"So, here's my idea. We'll continue practicing combat. But you're not allowed to attack back at all. Only defend." Suiren stood as tall as she could. She still only came up to my belly button. I sighed and collapsed to the floor.

  "That sounds really boring. Why can't I attack back?"

  "Because you're already good at attacking. Attacking isn't your issue. It's defending that you're terrible at."

  "But what if I become too good at defending and forget to attack."

  "Then you're even dumber than I thought you were. And I already think you're really dumb." Suiren motioned for a man to come out into the field, and he prepared for sparring. "Here are the rules. You can't fly or attack back."

  "Why can't I fly? Isn't that a good defense?" I asked.

  "It is, but you won't learn anything from it. And neither will he." The man took his stance. I stood up and stretched some. He charged forward, and I blocked the first hit, pushing his fist away from my face, but then he caught me with the second and the third strikes. He was fast for a regular person. He grabbed me and threw me to the ground. Even though I could barely feel it, I grunted in discomfort. Well, more out of surprise. Thinking about it now, I did that regardless of what hit me. It was a little strange.

  I got up and dusted off my gi. Suiren made me dress in this instead of my super outfit. They even gave me a little white belt. Apparently, if I trained hard, I would get other colors. All the way up to black. I was going to earn a black belt. I had to. The man rushed again, and I blocked his strike and struck out with my knee. He went flying. Suiren slammed a pole into my knee, knocked me down, and smacked me in the head. "No attacking!"

  I grumbled and got to my feet again. Her other student struggled to his feet, stumbled over to me before shaking his head, and retaking his stance. He struck out again five times, and I managed to block two of them before he knocked me away again. We kept at this for an hour, with Suiren swapping out the people attacking me every once in a while. I had also earned several more smacks from her pole for attacking back. It was tough not to punch people who were hitting you.

  Eventually, I gave up any pretense of letting them have their fair share. If I was looking for it, I could figure out what they were doing the instant they started, and I started countering their moves as they began. After a round or two of that, Suiren sent in more of her students. It started out as two-at-a-time, but it quickly spiraled, so I was being attacked by five-at-a-time, and at that point, I had to actually try again. I could see the moves coming in well before they could have connected, but I would get confused and block a kick from one side the way I would try to stop a punch from the opposite side. This was way harder than rubbing your tummy and head simultaneously. I got overwhelmed and couldn't keep any of the attacks straight. And that's when I started to lose my temper. I ended up blocking a punch and then pushed back. The man went flying and slammed into the wall on the other side. The other students were still mid-attack. I received a punch to the face, a kick to the knee, and a knee to the stomach for my trouble. My anger got the best of me, and I grabbed a flying fist, slamming the man into another attacker, and swung them both into the last two attacking me before letting them fall to the ground.

  Suiren jumped into action and swung the cane she had borrowed from her grandma at me. I blocked every one of her strikes, and on the final one, it shattered. Mostly because I didn't roll my block with it. Breathing heavily, I rounded on the girl, and she stumbled back. Her eyes were wide with fear. I had never seen her afraid of anything before. I caught sight of myself in the polished floor. My face was contorted in rage. I had probably seriously hurt some of her students. I had broken their guidance. Just because I got annoyed. I crashed down to the floor, closed my eyes, and tried meditating again. Tried to find a place of calm. I could hear her labored breathing. "Wh-what are you doing?"

  "I . . . I don't know. I need to calm down. I . . . I lost my temper, and I probably hurt some of the guys who are trying to help me learn."

  "Why did you get angry?"

  "Because," I began, deflating. "I don't know. I knew what I was doing was wrong. I knew I was using the wrong blocks and leaving myself open, but I couldn't do the right thing. There were just too many things happening. And the worst part of it is that none of it mattered!"

  "What," Suiren began and took a couple of deep breaths. "What do you mean 'none of it mattered'?"

  "They can't hurt me. No one here can," I whined. "So, it's tough to motivate myself to get better if there's no real threat."

  "What if we tried a visualization?" Suiren suggested.

  "Like what?"

  "What if we pictured a real threat to you when you were fighting? Like Esvanir." My eyes shot open at that name. I must've been glaring because Suiren took another step back. "Okay, maybe not him. But what about the Grignau? Or Lady Blade?"

  "Lady Blade?" I asked, trying to calm myself down.

  "You said you fought someone with a sword that could hurt you. That has to be Lady Blade!" I could hear that Suiren was controlling her tone. There was something about this Lady Blade that rubbed her the wrong way. But I couldn't focus on that. I had to focus on getting better.

  "I don't know. Do you think visualizations will work?"

  "Honestly? No clue," Suiren answered. "But we have to try something."

  "You know, you're smart for an eight-year-old. Like way too smart," I said. I didn't add that she reminded me a little of him. Even when he was scared or angry, he also tried to process whatever was happening. It only now occurred to me that it was a trauma response. He had to do that because otherwise, his parents might've killed him. I looked at Suiren again. She was a kid with too much muscle for such a small thing. Someone tough and wiry. She and Curt had grown up hard. But I doubt she'd ever become a criminal.

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=== CURT ===

"Alright, hon," I began, sitting up. "I'm going out to Avalare for a while. Need to see what's left of my apartment. Maybe grab a thing or two."

  "Mm," Cindi said absently. She was obsessing over something to do with the wedding plans. "Be back soon. I will need your help picking napkins and flowers and such."

  "Right. I think I can help with that," I said, almost certain that I would somehow be less than useless at this. But it's what Cindi wanted. I snapped and appeared at the corner of my street. I guess it's not my neighborhood anymore. I had seen a report or two of me stealing stuff that I hadn't been around to steal. I had thought about correcting the record, but I figured that no one would believe me, and it would keep the cops looking in the wrong place for me. I walked into my building. There was some door security, and I took out my keys and held them up to the little RFID reader. Nothing happened. They might've disabled my access, I thought to myself. Well, that's no big deal. I snapped and appeared at the elevator and pushed the button, and impatiently tapped my foot. How do people do this? Which was a weird thing for me to think about. Before a week or so ago, I hardly ever snapped outside of my jobs. And now I was doing it constantly. It was one of the benefits of my name being out there. I no longer felt the need to hide.

  I snapped my fingers and appeared outside of my door. There was police tape everywhere. I didn't bother disturbing it; instead, snapping forward all of a foot but behind my door. I looked around. The police had not been kind to my stuff. No surprise there, I thought. I walked around and stopped at the counter; Kari's letter was still sitting there; I picked it up and unfolded it. My hands were shaking. I was still angry. She was lucky that she was not there in front of me right now. I'd finish my job. Probably less cruelly. Just surround her head in the same ocean. Let it get crushed or let her drown. I shook my head and dismissed these thoughts; Cindi was safe; That's all that mattered. I read her letter. Our names were both in this messy cursive, but the letter itself was written in careful print, as though she had gone through several drafts before coming to this one.

Curt,

I don't know what happened to make you think that this is okay, but it's not. You really should turn yourself in. If you don't, I will stop you. I don't want to do that. I care about you and want what's best for you. But I can't stand by and let you commit crimes. You're better than this. I know you are. Please, just turn yourself in.

Sincerely,

Kari

I crumpled up the letter and threw it away. I had already taken most of the important stuff out of my apartment. I grabbed my old Sorcerer cards and dropped them down into a portal. I briefly considered trying to teach Cindi how to play and quickly banished the thought. Cindi and I had several things in common, but I doubt this would ever be one of them. I should probably visit Des. They may appreciate seeing me without having to patch me up, I thought.

  As I was about to snap, my door exploded, and shards flew everywhere. Out of instinct, I dived behind the couch and tried to make myself as small as possible. For some reason, I never thought to teleport when something like that happened. My instincts just would never remember that as a possibility. I sighed and prepared to snap when the couch flew away, and I was plastered to the wall via electricity. Static electricity. Powerful static electricity. Before me was a black man in a purple and red suit, who was grinning. "Oh man, do you ever have bad luck, white boy? You just happened to teleport in front of me, Esvanir. What rotten luck."

  I struggled against it; it didn't hurt; it more tingled than anything. He kept a hand held up in the air and forced more electricity through it to bond me to the wall. "Do I know you?"

  "No, but I know you. You hurt a friend of mine pretty bad, and I'm here to take you in. Hope they give you the chair," the man spat back.

  "I generally only hurt people who deserve it," I gasped, inching my foot to a vase that I had near the window sill.

  "Smash Gal ain't done nothing you didn't deserve."

  "Ah, so you're friends with Kari," I said with disdain. I managed to dip my toe in the water. The electricity around me jolted through my body and back to him, and we both yelped in pain. Then I fell to the floor. I caught myself and jumped to my feet. I tracked his hand and opened a portal in front of it, and lightning flew through the portal and back at him. It hit him square in the back, and he stumbled forward.

  "Hah, gonna have to come up with another trick, bro. That just charges me back up." He threw another two bolts at me. This time I snapped and appeared at the street below. Lightning exploded through the bricks, which went tumbling down to the earth. There were people here. Fucking supers! Never fucking consider what they're fucking doing. I opened a portal below the falling debris and another back into the apartment. I heard a yell all the way from the apartment on the eighth floor. Then the man burst out of the hole he created and started falling to earth as well. He threw out a lance of electricity and caught himself on a light pole, which flickered to life weakly, and he landed in front of me. He was bleeding. I think I had hit him with one of the bricks. Good, I thought. "And it's gonna take more than that to take out Thunderblast!"

  "Thunderblast?" I asked, preparing more portals to be opened. I had to think of something quick. Wait. A water blast! It'll short him out. I prepared to open a portal to the sea, but in that exact moment, he slammed his fists together, and a wave of ozone-smelling, charged air burst forward. The AR display of my glasses faded away. Fuck! An EMP? Really!? That fucking figures! I spent a fucking month looking for something to generate an EMP, and this fucking jack-off comes out of nowhere.

  I ducked behind a car to dodge his onslaught of lightning. I had to think of something. An EMP may have knocked out my rig for thirty minutes to an hour. Or maybe forever. It's really hard for me to know. Also, my phone will be down too, so I can't possibly call Cindi or anyone else. I heard Thunderblast walking forward. I edged around the car. Maybe I can catch him by surprise. But I can't touch him. He'd just zap me, and then I'd probably pass out. I was kneeling in front of a hubcap. It was probably made of aluminum, which meant that it wasn't magnetic. He may not be able to control that. I yanked on it, and it came off. The car wasn't in excellent condition, and it looks like these may have been pretty worn. I stood up over the car and flung the thing as hard as I could at him like a Frisbee. And he caught it. Not with any energy. He just yanked the hubcap out of the fucking air. He tossed it up in the air, grabbed it again, and started charging it. I could see the electrical energy pouring off of it. "Aw, fuck!"

  He threw the thing at me, but at that point, I was already diving behind the car again. He had charged it into being a fucking buzz saw of electricity. I watched it cut through the car and bounce off the ground. I crawled under the car and waited until he circled around, then crawled to the sidewalk and threw myself into the alleyway. I found a two-by-four. It would have to do. I grabbed it, brandished it like a baseball bat, ran down the alley to the next street, and crouched on the building. I heard him blast through the alleyway behind me. I listened to the crackling of electricity get closer and swung when I thought he had gotten close.

  My makeshift bat slammed into his chest, and he tumbled back. I stepped into the alley and slammed the wood down on him repeatedly. I gripped it tightly over my head and brought it down for one last swing, and that's when he burst up from his fetal position and caught it. He incinerated the wood in an instant. Then he socked me in the jaw, and I went flying. I think he had used electricity to repel me further. I slammed into a car and dented the door. My vision started to go black. The last thing I saw was this red and purple blur loom over me. I could hear the crackling of electricity charging the air.