Eyes racing, Steve collected the number of approaching enemies. Three incoming, all looking stunned by his sudden explosion of power. That was good. Last time, the black goggled monsters got the drop on him because he hesitated. This time he was ready before they were.

  One was a massive man, towering over the other two and standing in front of them defensively. The ones behind him were a young man and woman, the girl with a crown of flowers and the other wiggling a handful of marbles in one hand.

  Shouting as he threw, his first clay spear launched forward like a missile, smacking into the largest enemy’s face and locking his mouth shut and full of clay. Sliding down a slanted mound of dirt he made, Steve jumped at the end, flying high. While the first assailant was prying the dirt from his mouth, Steve threw another projectile. Darting with expert precision, it slapped the other man of the group in the face, covering his eyes and throwing him on his back.

  “Wait, wait! What’s going on? What are you doing?” The girl in flowers turned between her allies and Steve in abject fear. Shivering, flower petals fell off her head.

  A good ruse. Steve almost fell for it. But if the “Black Goggles” were the kind of people to ambush and paralyze him within seconds at HUE, he wouldn’t put it past them to try and act innocent when they were under duress.

  “Surrender now. Get on your knees and hands behind your head.” Steve’s mind raced, flashing through scenarios where they all had powers that didn’t require their hands. All of them could breathe fire until proven otherwise. “Nevermind, face on the ground. Don’t move an inch.”

  “I’m not surrendering to some scumbag that attacked me the moment we showed up!”

  Steve found the notion ironic considering that’s exactly what he thought of them. “Don’t say I didn’t warn you.”

  Clapping his hands in front of himself and pulling them apart, Steve created a new javelin. Rearing it back, Steve recoiled when something struck his helmet, sinking into his protective dirt. Blinking, Steve saw the smaller of the two enemies had torn just enough clay from one eye and was firing marbles from his thumb, flinging them like fired from an airgun. Another struck his stomach, then his shoulder, his armor cracking.

  Bracing his forearms together, Steve created a clay shield and marched forward, closing the gap between him and the black goggled enemies. Spikes protruded out of the shield with every additional step, creating a spiny shell. Creating a small slit to peek through, Steve saw he was almost upon them now. Next step was to place them in a clay cage, then there would be time for questions.

  The largest one had just cleared his mouth of clay, but his eyes were still fully covered.

  “Chanter! He’s right on top of us!” The flower girl shook the largest member.

  The large man sat up abruptly, breathing sharply.

  “Back off!” he exploded.

  Like a massive air cannon went off, Steve was blasted backward, thrown off his feet and shredding half of his armor. He hit the floor and rolled twice before coming to a halt.

  What kind of power was that? A Sonic Wave, like Apex’s, but more directed. At least the power validated that it was a good idea to gag them all.

  “I got you.” Sami’s voice was close behind him.

  Steve felt the Shadow Hand pull on him, easing him to his feet.

  “Your clay is super cool, dude.” Sami looked over the broken armor. “What are we up against? I see they all have one power.”

  “Good to know. The big guy, Chanter, shouts, blowing you away. The smaller guy throws marbles like bullets and the girl… I don’t know yet.”

  Clay snaked up Sami’s limbs, placing protective greaves and bracers on him. Simple armor, but serviceable considering that Sami wouldn’t be able to bend his armor while he moved like Steve could. Constantly in flux, Steve always had a sense for where clay he was in contact with was and where it needed reinforcement. Refueling his armor, he tossed Sami a dry clay staff. His Shadow Hand caught it.

  “What do you even want?” the flower girl asked.

  “Your surrender.” Steve said, his stance hardened.

  Chanter tore the last piece of clay from his face. “I think they’re criminals.”

  “We’re not criminals! We’re HUE!” Sami dug in his pockets for his identification card.

  “I don’t know. I saw something about a shadow person in the news recently,” the marble gunner said, sounding like he wasn’t paying attention to Steve or Sami.

  Steve tired of their confusing chatter, smashing the ground and building a dome around his enemies. Chanter yelled at it before it could fully form, breaking it apart, but it was a distraction, anyway; just enough for Sami and Steve to close in.

  Nimble on his feet, Sami threw his staff in the air. Chanter breathed in and Sami stretched and rammed his Shadow Hand into his mouth before he could shout. Baffled, Chanter could only blink before Sami caught his staff and bashed against his head. Just as Sami was about to take another swing, a volley of five marbles smashed his clay bracer, crumbling it off his wrist.

  Steve threw a wad of clay at the marble thrower, slapping him right in the face and throwing him off balance. When he caught himself with his hands before hitting the floor, Steve threw clay cuffs on his wrists, pinning him awkwardly to the parking lot. The clay wouldn’t hold, but it would give Sami and Steve time to get control of the situation.

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  Chanter belted out a muffled scream at his gag, and Sami’s Shadow Hand exploded from the force, the recoil sending Chanter’s head skyward in a fraction of a second. Tottering, he looked woozy under the tight black goggles and fell to his knees in a daze. Sami groaned in disappointment at the loss of his power, gripping tighter to his staff and standing over Chanter.

  “Sorry if you’re not criminals, I don’t know the dosage on this.”

  The flower girl sprayed a perfume in Steve and Sami’s direction. Sami snapped to her direction with staff raised, then blinked, stunned.

  “Is that lavender?” Sami asked, sounding pleasantly surprised.

  Then he fell to the floor, unconscious.

  “What did you do to…” Steve got just a hint of a whiff of lavender, then fell to the ground.

  * * *

  Snapping straight up, Steve created a wall of clay around him before he had time to assess the world. Sami startled awake, seemingly awoken by Steve’s quick action. Fortunately, he looked unharmed. Then Steve noticed Beth standing above both of them, hands outstretched and grateful smile on her lips, happy to see them both awake.

  Twice! The black goggles knocked him out twice! And Beth had to Restore him twice! How long had they been knocked out for? Were they still under attack? Steve needed to stop them immediately, before—

  “Calm down Steve, they’re gone!” Claire called from the top of the first clay wall he formed.

  “Gone?” Sami asked.

  Twice… Steve had let people attack his friends and get away twice. Frowning, his heart felt heavy; a deep ache pushed in his chest. How was he supposed to be a leader in HUE when he couldn’t even keep the kids safe?

  “What did they do to the civilians? Is everyone okay?” Steve only half lowered the clay walls, wary that they were still close by.

  “Everyone’s safe. The attackers ran off. Flower Power knocked you guys out with some weird flower concoction for five minutes. She woke up Chanter and Gunner, and they ran. Bunch of feral birds chased after them too. I wonder if they had multiple powers and asked for backup.”

  “No extra powers, I checked. Maybe someone they held back? You got their names from the Subtitles?” Sami asked.

  “How else?”

  Steve ground his teeth, closing his eyes and evaluating the situation. The most charitable self-assessment was that he failed. The criminals got to continue roaming, and he barely got any information. Worse, Sami got knocked out. The poor kid raced out from cover to help, and Steve let him get hurt. He needed to do everything in his power to protect the people of Hammerton, HUE included. Another wave of shame washed through his bones.

  Sami held out a hand. “You as upset about this as I am?”

  Steve blinked, eyebrows raised. Sami’s voice lacked its usual levity. A slight, encouraging smile on his face remained, but the motivational tone was gone.

  “Yes. I thought we had them. I should have paid more attention to our surroundings. And why didn’t I think to cover our faces when she sprayed that stuff at us?” He took Sami’s hand with a trembling palm and pulled himself to his feet.

  “You’re being way too hard on yourself. I felt like I didn’t do anything. You protected the civilians and Claire and Beth. Then you went three on one and looked like you were gonna win before that Chanter guy got a hit in. Even then, I think you would’ve overwhelmed them on your own if you didn’t get knocked out. But yeah… It’s super lame. I complained all this time about not fighting Awakened people and I can’t do anything when an opportunity presents itself on my deployments. Twice!”

  Twice. Steve could see himself in Sami. Shared frustrations. The kid had a good heart, if a lack of patience to go with it.

  “You did good, Sami. I’ll bring this up with Naomi.”

  “You sure like to talk about her. Anyway, we’ll get them next time,” Sami promised.

  Next time. A surprisingly optimistic claim. It implied that Steve would have another opportunity and he would win. Yes, that’s exactly what Steve would do. He would hone his skills even further and protect everyone at once.

  Next time.

  Clapping his hands and kneeling to place a palm on the floor, all the clay in the area lowered itself away into nothing, like ice melting on a hot stove. Breathing hard from the energy expenditure, Steve felt sweat pool down his neck. Always out of battle, he felt the worst of his sweat. Or when he was around Naomi. Sometimes he wished he could remain perpetually in combat.

  “What were we doing here again?” Steve asked, his mind chugging to catch up to the business of parking.

  “The attendant has magnetic power and is probably getting fired,” Beth reminded him politely.

  “Probably?” the attendant asked, scared.

  “Right. You, get out of here so we can sort this out,” Steve said.

  He realized he was still kneeling, looking somewhat pathetic. The crowd of civilians and the parking employee watched him with wide eyes.

  “You heard him. Let’s get this over with.” Sami waved his clay staff at the attendant. “Steve, you can rest up. We can handle the lame stuff from here.”

  “No.” Steve forced himself up to everyone’s surprise.

  Sami was trying to be honorable and give him time to rest, but Steve didn’t want it. He knew how people saw him. A lumbering, sweaty fool who could barely string words together when he was nervous. And the only way he was going to overcome that was to force himself to be more.

  If only so that Naomi could rest and maintain weight. He was terrified for her. When he first met her, she was tall and proud. Now she was less imposing and gaunt. She deserved so much better.

  When Steve stumbled over to the booth, the attendant immediately unlocked the door and held it open for Steve to enter. Sighing, he sat himself down in the chair and stared at the blinking screen, shooing the attendant away without looking at him. When Sami pulled the young man away, the screen finally focused.

  The first customer placed her phone screen on the glass, proving they owned a particular vehicle.

  Nodding, Steve gave them a set of keys and looked at the next customer. The first stopped and turned around, somewhat courteous in her stance, hands clasped in front of her and head lowered.

  “Excuse me, but I seem to be blocked in.” Clicking her car keys, the lights came on to a car twisted at an angle that would force it to scrape against its neighbor.

  Steve stood up, and the others backed away slightly.

  “Ummm…” Steve felt his brain buffer for a plan. Frazzled, it was running on fumes. “Claire, take care of tracking which car is which. Beth, double check there were no injuries. Sami, keep an eye on the surroundings. I’ll go deal with the car.”

  He quickly made his way over, hoping to rest soon. With a twist of his feet on the floor, the car rose above the others on a clay platform and lowered gently back to the ground, safe from any dents or scratches. The owner opened the door and hesitated, looking up at Steve.

  “Thanks. For the car and for protecting us.”

  “It’s what we do at HUE,” Steve replied cordially, though it was almost like a prerecorded response. Wiping his forehead, he was too tired to put any enthusiasm behind his words.

  The woman read his expression. “You did great. And you’ll definitely get them next time.”

  Steve couldn’t help but smile, nodding at her.

  “Next time. I’ll make sure it’s the last time I deal with the black goggles,” he agreed.