The sound of shouting and battle was like music to Pip’s ears.  

Her phone vibrated furiously in her pocket as she approached the warehouse, barely keeping herself from sprinting. She was late, very late, but it wasn’t her fault that it took so much time to get all the trackers off her clothes. She wasn’t going to get caught like last time. 

A figure darted out of the shadows of the warehouse. Pip tensed for a moment, gripping the figment of a knife in her hand before she recognized them and released her power. 

“You’re late!” Izzy shouted, throwing up his hands and all efforts at being subtle. 

“A hero is never late,” Pip fired back, met with a deadpan stare from the blue haired boy. 

“Heroes also don’t get caught by their mommy after sneaking out the back door.” 

Ouch. 

Pip brushed the comment aside. “They won’t catch me this time,” she said, smoothing down the front of her jacket, a smug grin on her face. “I double checked everything. No trackers.” 

Izzy clearly wasn’t impressed. “I definitely trust you,” he said drily. “Now get inside there! The good fights are almost over and I bet so much money on you. You don’t want to rob a poor guy of his income, now do you?”

It was Pip’s turn to look unimpressed. “You’re not poor,” she said. “You go to an exclusive private school. You have money.” 

“Wrong. My parents have money,” Izzy said. “Not me. I gotta make some cash somehow.”

“Fine,” Pip said. She shoved her hands into her pockets, setting her sights on the warehouse, noise picking up from inside. She shifted from foot to foot, heartbeat quickening. She was missing a fight. “I’m going in.” 

“Thank god!” Izzy threw his hands up in the air in praise, but Pip was already gone. 

She sprinted to the front door, adjusting the hood of her jacket over her head before throwing the door open. It wasn’t so much a disguise as it was a part of her costume, orange and painted with pastels that matched the rest of her athletic gear. The only thing that really set her apart from her normal, school self was a smearing of paint across her cheeks around her eyes. 

It stung a bit, where the paint touched the corner of her eye. She needed to be more careful. 

But she looked badass. 

Noise and heat surrounded her, growing more intense the further into the warehouse she went. She found her way only by the lights of the open room up ahead, flashing and multicolored, originating with the noise, heat, and a scream of metal against metal. Someone shoved past her, bumping into her shoulder and making her stumble. She grumbled and moved faster, elbowing her way into the room until she broke through the crowd of bodies and sucked in a breath of cooler, albeit stale, air. 

The Summoner’s Ring. 

A low metal fence, no taller than Pip’s knees, ringed the center of the room. Two people sat outside on either side, facing each other on a pair of wooden chairs that looked like they’d seen better days. Inside the ring, creatures fought. 

Not living creatures, at least not in the usual sense. Summoned creations, battling against each other in a fight of will and skill. A blobby, pink rabbit looking creature like the Energizer Bunny with radiation poisoning stood on two legs and fought with the other two, claws as sharp as razor blades. It danced around a blocky electronic creation, whirring angrily as it tried to keep up with the summoned rabbit. It chirped loudly, letting out a sort of metallic frustration, and charged. 

The rabbit leapt up into the air, pouncing onto the robot from above. Just before it hit, the rabbit kicked out with both feet. They struck the robot dead center and metal went flying. People cried out as nuts and bolts shot across the room, pieces of metal curling up from the machine. 

The man in the chair closest to Pip slumped, barely catching himself against the edge before sliding off and hitting the floor. He took a moment to breathe, body shuddering, before rising to unsteady feet and wobbling off. 

Pip darted for the chair the moment it was empty. She wasn’t the only one. People scrambled for the seat, eager to be the next one in the ring and fight while there were still good summoners to fight. 

Someone stepped down on the back of Pip’s shoe. Unwilling to give up her shot, she threw herself forward, slamming into the chair with her whole chest. The air whooshed out of her lungs as her arms wrapped around the seat, nails digging into the wood before anyone could grab her and drag her off. 

There was a scuffle around her before one of the moderators forced the others to back off. With a bit of space, Pip sucked in a breath, ribs aching, and pulled herself onto the seat. 

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Sweat mixed with paint to drip down her face, running into her mouth. She spat it out, tasting chemicals. Yuck. 

The moderator looked at her sharply, nose wrinkling as he took her in. “What are you, twelve?”

Pip scoffed in disgust. “I’m seventeen!” 

The man raised an eyebrow like he didn’t believe her, but stepped back as a lady who was not wearing a lot of clothes stepped into the middle of the ring. Pip wondered for a moment what a bikini had to do with the rules, only to realize she’d completely missed the beginning of the woman’s explanation staring at her, well…

Pip coughed and pulled her eyes away from the woman, ignoring the warmth in her cheeks. She’d missed the rules, but she’d been here before so she definitely had it all memorized. Don’t target the summoners, only fight with the summons, blah, blah, blah. 

“Summoners!” The announcer’s voice boomed out of a speaker nearby, vibrating against the floor. The room quieted for a moment, waiting for the call to go. “Fight!” 

Noise exploded in the room at the word, but it was as if Pip slipped into a calm. She sucked in a breath through her nose, and contacted the power that lived inside her. 

It was as easy as breathing, as natural as every other process of her body. Glass summoned out of nothing, piecing together until a tiny soldier stood before her, holding a blade as long as its forearm. 

It wasn’t truly from nothing. Hers wasn’t a proper summon, but that wasn’t relevant. She crafted it with her own special made glass, presumably made from the dust and sand and little particles of atoms or whatever. She was failing physics, so she wasn’t entirely certain, but who needed physics anyway when half the people in the world could just defy all the rules?

The summoner across from her crafted her pink bunny again. Pip felt a bit bad about having to kill a bunny, but considering it looked like it was made out of jello, she didn’t feel too bad. Jello was gross anyway. 

The bunny hopped once, slashing its claws through the air. Pip’s soldier lifted his sword, snapping into position. Glass joints scraped against each other, the sound reaching Pip’s ears even through the noise, and she winced. Apparently she still didn’t have joints down exactly. Oh well. 

“What is that?” She looked up in surprise as the summoner across from her spoke. “Glass?” She laughed. “You really have no clue what you’re doing.”

“Hey!” Pip exclaimed. She searched frantically for a quick response, something sharp and smart, but instead she stuttered out: “You don’t know what you’re doing!” 

The woman struck before Pip could drag her attention back to the fight they were supposed to be having. 

The rabbit sprinted across the ring, slashing its claws at Pip’s soldier (his name was Fredrick, in case you wanted to know) in a one-two rapid attack. Rabbit attack. Ha. 

The claws screamed against glass as they scraped lines down the soldier’s front, causing several people to clap their hands over their ears. Used to the unfortunate sounds glass made, Pip was ready for it, and the soldier struck back. 

Fredrick struck as fluidly as Pip’s mother, slicing up and across the rabbit’s stomach. Pink ooze seeped out of its stomach as it leapt back, too late, its summoner crying out. 

He advanced, not moving forward fast enough. Pip strained to get him to move faster, a vein popping out in her forehead as she put pressure on his joints, trying to smooth them out on the fly. 

She let it go as the rabbit bounced again, bearing its teeth as it circled around Fredrick. It bounced on its feet like a boxer, shifting from foot to foot in a bit of fancy movement. It was too much, and Pip struck between steps. At her cue, Fredrick struck down at the rabbit’s feet while it shifted. The sword caught against the rabbit’s toe and it stumbled, backpedaling as the glass knight continued to advance. 

Yes!” Pip cheered under her breath. “Good job, Fredrick!” 

The summoner across from her let out a growl, rising halfway out of her seat before a moderator stepped in. She sunk back into the seat, hands balling into fists as she focused on the rabbit in front of her. Was she angry? Well, she’d never lost, so it made sense she might be angry. 

The rabbit moved forward in a burst of energy, running as if to bodyslam Fredrick only to leap directly into the air last minute. That seemed to be this summon’s ending move. Too bad it wouldn’t work. 

Pip had watched too many of these matches. She knew exactly what this summoner would do, even if no one else seemed to ever prepare for it. Everyone always expected people to do something new, but why would they, if what they did always worked? 

Fredrick brought his sword straight up, flush to his chest like he was laying down to die. Instead, as the bunny came down, it drove itself straight into Fredrick’s glass blade. 

It let out a horrendous, gut wrenching squeal as it kebabbed itself on the sword, pink ooze dripping down the tip as it extended from the rabbit’s bright pink skull. 

Pip let out a whoop, leaping up in excitement as the crowd around her went wild. 

It wasn’t until she’d reached down to grab Fredrick that she realized the cries weren’t from excitement, but from terror. 

“Heroes!” The MC’s voice boomed around the room, laced with fear. “The heroes are coming.”

Pip froze, leaning halfway over the railing as she reached for Fredrick to give him a hug. 

“Ah, fuck.” 

Pip debated briefly if she should run with the rest of these people, streaming and screaming out of the packed warehouse, stumbling over each other in a frantic need to escape. But she had a sneaking suspicion the hero was here for her, so she probably wouldn’t be able to get away anyhow. 

Had they managed to get a tracker on her again? 

The summoner’s pink rabbit disappeared along with the summoner, though it left a film of pink goo behind. It stuck to Pip’s hands as she lifted Fredrick up, hugging him to his chest like a doll. 

The hero stepped into the room, eyes locking immediately on the small girl crouched in the center of the summoner’s ring, ignoring everyone else escaping the room. 

She towered nearly seven feet tall, carrying a spear that brushed the roof of the warehouse. She looked as if she’d stepped out of history, or off a LARPing event, wearing Roman-style leather armor and a centurion helmet over her head. 

“Phillipa Carter!” Her voice boomed, shaking the earth as if she used her power to make a point. “You are grounded.”