Charis sat in her hotel room finishing her new Bubblegum Blush nail polish topcoat, blithely ignoring Dave who was knocking on the connecting door and asking, yet again, in a bewildered voice about getting naked. Dusty, who had the room beyond Dave’s and seemed to be visiting him, was a muffled voice beyond the door as well.

  “I don’t get it, why’d my Id change my—I mean her—mind?” Dave asked.

  “Maybe you are, like, denying yourself things,” Dusty postulated thoughtfully.

  “Maybe I have performance anxiety,” Dave sounded perplexed. “I don’t know why, though. I’m not bad at this stuff. Am I? I never thought I was. Or did I?”

  “Did you?” Dusty questioned, sounding vaguely wise. “Maybe you did, an didn’t know it.”

  “I didn’t think I did.”

  Charis giggled, blowing on her nails. Her hair was up in a white hotel towel and she had on her aqua blue flannel pajamas with pink popsicles on them.

  “Or maybe I overheard an ex-girlfriend saying I was bad at something I’m convinced I’m good at. But I didn’t realize I’d heard it.”

  A pause from Dusty, then, “Hey, wanna go check out the hot tub? It should be a cool view from the roof.”

  “I don’t really feel like taking drugs right now, teenaged-drug-me. I’d rather get naked for my Id. I always wondered what it’d be like to lose all inhibitions. I thought I’d be trying it out by now.”

  “Obviously you still have some issues,” Dusty mourned.

  “I didn’t know I was so sexually insecure.” Now he sounded frustrated.

  Charis had heard enough for one night. She was done with her nails and felt like getting a little sleep. She yelled loud enough that they could hear it beyond the connecting door: “GO TO BED! YOU’RE NOT GETTING ANY SEX!”

  Dave: “Why not?”

  She rolled her eyes and turned on the TV, hoping to drown them out.

  His voice was just barely audible. “But we need to resolve my sexual insecurities!”

  She turned it up, and took out her notebook to document how her day had gone, scribbling on the pages with her purple sparkle pen. Dave muttered something incoherent beyond the door, then reluctantly retreated.

  ‘Tuesday, 11:46 pm. Reacquired David Tolin this morning as he was attempting to leave the city. It isn’t safe for him on his own but he doesn’t seem to know this yet. Dust, Scott and I tracked down the goat-sucker with Dave’s help. The Normal’s mantle is very powerful. It allows him to see things hidden even from Dusty. We had Master Ebenezer with us this time, which was good; when we found the goatsucker he gave it a real fight. It wasn’t much trouble, although I think Dave might now be emotionally scarred for life. I was hoping he’d stay in the hotel or sleep longer and miss the fight, but no such luck. I guess my sleeping suggestion wasn’t strong enough to completely overpower his paranoia.’

  She snatched a paper drink cup from the night stand and slurped down the last of the chocolate malt that they’d gotten before coming up to the rooms. When it was empty she tossed it in the general direction of the trash, which was nearly forty feet away, then directed its flight with a pointed finger until it went in like a homing missile. She went back to writing.

  ‘Now Dave thinks he’s crazy and I am his Id. He also seems to think a person should be able to have sex with their Id. I haven’t bothered to point out the obvious conflicts inherent in this belief. I figure he’ll snap out of it, eventually.’ She paused, smiled, chewed on the end of the pen a moment, then added, ‘He was coming on to me at the Pier when we had dinner. Maybe I don’t want him to snap out of it just yet. I think he’s cute.’

  She snapped the lid onto the pen with satisfied finality and got ready for bed. When she pulled off the towel her damp hair visibly dried while she stared at it in the mirror. In seconds it curled perfectly. Putting on a puffy pink eye mask and kicking off her feathery pink slippers, Charis jumped into the bed with satisfaction, yanked the blankets up to her chin, and the lights went off by themselves.

  “Good night, Mike,” she said.

  “Night, Charis,” the familiar Guardian’s voice was quiet by the front door. Indigo would be roaming about with the other Guardians all over the hotel, but Mike rarely left her. She smiled as she listened to the city night sounds and thought about tomorrow. Dave was in for one surprise when he found out where they were going… she tried not to giggle.

  About an hour and a half later, just when Charis had slipped into a quiet doze, she was waked rudely by the sound of the connecting door between her room and David’s slamming open. Almost immediately it shut again and she heard the quick breathing of at least one excited young man.

  “David!” she gasped, determined to yell at him yet again that he was not going to get into bed with her, when she heard Dusty’s hiss.

  “Shhh! We got company! We gotta get out of here!”

  Dave’s voice was baffled. “Why am I imagining being arrested?”

  At the same time she could hear running in the hallway outside and the sound of tense voices. Indigo rushed into the room through the wall, partially materializing. “Cops. And there are Dark Ones with them.”

  “Crap,” with that Charis was out of bed, trying to find her shoes in the dark. “Dusty! You got a light?”

  The young man gestured toward the center of the room. A dim ball of violet illumination sizzled to life there, just enough to see by. Dave stared at it, impressed, able to discern that it was not physical and would not be visible under the door to normal humans.

  Scott entered through the joining door from the other direction with a “what the hell is going on?” before he was silenced by both Dusty and Indigo. Then the dark blue angel faded away as he returned to his surveillance.

  “Cops, with Creeps,” Dusty whispered.

  “No way. Does Base know about this?” Scott asked, running across her room toward the window.

  Dusty put both hands on the door. “I’m making it look like the door isn’t there… we gotta get outta here, Charis you got some kind of transport?”

  Scott parted the curtains slightly. They could all see the red and blue lights flashing reflected against the tall building across the street. “Shit. The street is full of cops!” He was still fully dressed, minus his ridiculous long coat.

  “I didn’t inhale anything! I never went to the hot tub with teenage-drug-me. What’s with the cops?” Dave said.

  Suddenly Scott leapt back a second before a griffin landed on the balcony outside the window, scrambling loudly against the stucco floor with his claws. “Allo all of you,” it said. “Hurry up then. I think we’d all better run for it. There’s enough Dark Ones with these fellows to give us a fight we don’t want, especially tired out like we are. I don’t have enough odyllis left for a real brawl.”

  “Great! Grab your stuff, let’s go!” Charis told them, snatching her purse and jacket from the chair.

  “I paid that speeding ticket,” was Dave’s bewildered response.

  Charis grabbed his hand and dragged him toward the window balcony. “Come ON!”

  “It’s because I shot that dog, isn’t it? I never shot anything human!” Dave got shoved by both Charis and Scott out onto the balcony, digging in his heels immediately. “No!”

  “Do it or I’ll make you!” Charis threatened.

  “I saw this movie! I don’t do movies! NO jumping out of buildings!”

  “GET ON!” the Griffin urged, glancing down. “They’ve got fliers and I’m a little too tired to be performing a high speed chase after the fight we had this afternoon.”

  “What? Dude! Eeiw! I’m not riding the talking man-beast!”

  Now the cops were banging on Charis’s door. Dusty was leaning against it, as if holding it shut. The door knob worked, the lock beeped, but it wouldn’t open. The banging got louder. “Open up!” they yelled. “This is the police!”

  Charis made a fist in the air in front of her and shoved. David was thrust by an invisible, powerful push right across the balcony and onto the griffin. The next moment she jumped on behind him. “Come on, Dusty!!” she yelled, “leave it!”

  A case of literary theft: this tale is not rightfully on Amazon; if you see it, report the violation.

  Dusty did something to the doorknob to make it glow, then booked it for the griffin as Scott climbed on behind Dave.

  Dave gasped, grabbing big fists full of feathery ruff. “I don’t like heights! I don’t want to deal with my fear of heights right now!” Then he looked down. “We’re ten floors up! No way bird-man can carry all of us!”

  “GO-GO-GO!” Charis shrieked to Ebenezer, lifting one open palm as if she was carrying something.

  The griffin launched, unfurling his huge gray wings and leaping into the air while Dusty was still running toward them. Like something out of the movies, Dusty jumped over the balcony into thin air and Charis ‘pulled’ him toward her with a yanking motion. With remarkable grace, Dusty flew forty feet to land on the griffin behind Scott, skateboard tucked under one arm.

  “I hated this movie! Both of these movies!” Dave wailed.

  Looking back Charis could see the police running to the balcony of the room they’d just vacated, peering out at the giant mythical creature with astonishment. To her dismay she saw that they had with them several tall shadow forms with horns and large, dark wings. Eight of the tall, black shadow-figures took to flight and followed.

  “Incoming!”

  The Griffin flew fast over the night-time streets of San Francisco, its shadowy form reflecting briefly in the dark windows of offices shut down for the night. Down below the streets were rivers of lights and noise, and up above Rune glowed down bright and full in the upper heavens. Several cop cars which had been near the entrance of the hotel turned and wheeled after them. Their sirens and lights came on; the cars could easily keep up with the griffin, weaving through the sparse 2 am traffic.

  “I don’t even like the wizard-kid book!” Dave said. “It’s a dumb series!”

  The winged black demonic forms with feathery, greasy wings and red eyes were gaining on them, and a feeling of terror flowed ahead of them like a fog. The nasties were huge, at least seven feet tall each, and terrible. Every movement they made was a threat of what they’d do to the riders should they ever catch up. Their fingers and toes were tipped with enormous claws. The nearest one opened a mouth that was too big for a human and a long, pointed red tongue unrolled slowly as it screamed, a banshee wail that no living thing should make.

  “Wake up now, Dave! You’re in a little room with a shrink. Just wake up,” he muttered, eyes squeezed shut, hanging on to the griffin for his life.

  Scott turned and launched his giant Ninja star blade weapon at the winged black shadow-men. It burst into flame and cut them off, forcing their pursuers to dive and scatter. The Artifact chased them, slicing neatly through one raven-creature’s wing and clipping another. Scott directed it with sharp, short movements of his hand as if it were a long-distance killer yo-yo as the griffin swooped between buildings wildly.

  Meanwhile Charis dialed her pink sparkle cell-phone. Holding it to her ear, she impatiently waited through the ring tone and the night secretary’s sleepy greeting.

  “This is Charis Gades, Jericho team,” she said in a tense voice that booked no interruption, “Scott, Dusty, Ebenezer and the asset, David Tolin, are with me. We are under attack from local police forces and attempting to escape…”

  The secretary was surprised and said it loud enough they could hear: 'Local police?' The sound of quick typing.

  “Yes! Local police, and they have shadow-men crawling all over them! Big ones! With wings! What the hell is going on! Mars never pulls strings like this unless its really serious! This can’t be about the goat-sucker. Why are they after us? The baddies got the humans involved! They never go to these extremes!”

  “Ask them who they think it is!” Scott yelled.

  Charis listened as the startled secretary made some fast checks. 'Nothing from the D.S.S. feeds… wait. I just got something from the T.H.R. Looks like the Guiding Light have moved in during the last hour.'

  “They think it’s the Warlocks!” she shouted back to him.

  “Take the blue pill,” Dave was muttering. “Wake up and believe whatever you want to believe.”

  Scott yelled at him, “WOULD YOU SHUT UP???”

  Sirens howled as the cop cars screeched around corners down below, following the nimble griffin toward the bay. Their lights flashed blue and red sending glittering reflections off of the buildings all around them. Ebenezer was trying, but laden as he was he couldn’t fly faster than the cars… even with Charis’s help.

  “IT’S MY NERVOUS BREAKDOWN!” Dave screamed back at Scott. “YOU’RE ALL JUST FIGMENTS, SHUT THE HELL UP AND LEAVE ME ALONE!”

  “Can I kill him? Come on, Char, all we have to do is drop him over City Hall…”

  “Stop having a testosterone problem, Scott!” Charis yelled, stressed. She tried to hear the secretary over all the noise.

  “Let’s drop Scott over City Hall! I hate my super-ego!” Dave countered, squinting against the wind that blew his slightly too-long hair down into his eyes.

  Charis didn’t have time to listen to the boys fight. She was concentrating to hear Base over the howls and the sirens and the yelling. “Well, what can we do about it?”

  'I’m afraid all we can advise you to do right now is go to ground…'

  “What do you mean, go to ground! They have cop cars and they have GUNS!”

  “Yes, but we can’t get anyone to you for at least two hours…”

  “I don’t care, I don’t want to be chased in the middle of the night by cops with GUNS!” Charis shouted at the phone. “We’re just a level two Team! We’re not Scythe or something! We can’t deal with this crap!”

  Behind her she could feel Dave pat himself with one hand, then groan. “My gun was on the night table. Oh shit, oh shit, oh shit. Cops have my gun. Shit, shit.”

  Dusty peeped up from the back with a big grin as if none of this bothered him a bit, “Don’t worry, man, trust me. We’ll get you better guns.”

  “I don’t like this nightmare. Why am I doing this to myself?”

  ‘The cops have an A.P.B. out on David. He’s considered armed and dangerous, the want him for murder,’ the secretary read from her computer screen. ‘They say he took out three men over the last few days in San Francisco.’

  “Did you actually shoot someone?” Charis asked him, yelling over the cold foggy wind with the phone pressed against her shoulder to block it from the noise and chaos. They all leaned into the turn as Miradon cut a corner very close, almost clipping the side of a skyscraper.

  He grimaced as he ducked, “A dog. A nasty tom cat. I shot at a guy once, but just enough to make him back off. He was possessed, and I didn’t actually hit him!”

  “Okay, because the cops are saying that you shot three guys in the City, probably the same guys the goatsucker ate, but they are blaming it on you.”

  “Oh God, what if I’m not in an asylum, but I’m running around on the loose, totally fucking insane? Christ, what if I did shoot that guy, and those cops were real?”

  “Jeez,” Charis didn’t sound amused as she went back to the phone. “I don’t think he really shot anyone. I think they’re framing him with the goatsucker’s victims so they can get their hands on him. The cops had lots of mazik with them. Tall ones, with wings.”

  'That sounds bad. Stay away from the mazik at all costs, and keep away from the police until we can clear…'

  “… Well no shit we should stay away from the cops!” She hollered angrily. “Okay, I’m calm, I’m calm,” Charis continued as the secretary tried to talk her through their emergency.

  They flew north and out over the Bay, leaving the crowded streets of San Francisco behind suddenly at the edge of the water. The yowling police cruisers headed for the golden gate and bay bridges but were quickly lost in the distant freeway traffic. Below them was suddenly nothing but ink-black water, a void beneath the merciless white giant moon.

  A few more black shadow raven-men tried to follow, darting out from between the piers, but another pass of Scott’s weapon and they backed off. Some landed on the edge of the breakwater fanning their wings and probably cursing after them, but the wind was too loud in their ears to hear.

  The night water was pitch black, the moon reflected on it in broken shards shimmering. Soon they were in the middle of utter darkness with the smell of the sea sharp in their mouths. The wind was cold and very moist, and it was strangely quiet. Only the rustling of the griffin’s feathers and the steady quiet rush of the wind, and the chattering of their teeth, made any sound. The glossy black water beneath them seemed to stare hungrily up at them, wanting them, like the void of space. There were no UFO lights in it now, but Dave still had to wonder what was hiding down there.

  He suddenly wondered if the Loch Ness Monster was real. Considering the last few days, he was pretty sure it had to be.

  Charis kept the Base updated, using her elogic energy reserves to lift the flagging griffin by decreasing the weight of his passengers. With half of her mind on that she could only spare terse answers for the Nythian base command. “We’re heading into Marin County. They will have to switch cops, and the next county might not be as cooperative.”

  “If the cops were real, then how did I get out of the hotel room?” Dave speculated. “There is no British griffin. What am I doing, standing on the balcony flapping my arms?”

  Scott yelled to the griffin: “how ya doin’ Mir? Can you carry us a bit further?”

  The griffin panted, “I can go on a bit longer, Charis is making all of you lighter and giving me a lift. I can make it, I think.”

  “Char, how’s your OFP? Got some to spare or you need a shot?” She could feel Scott’s life energy behind her, bright and crackling, ready to send her an infusion.

  “I can take it, just …” she began, but the secretary was talking on the phone and she had to cut herself off to listen.

  Dave shivered violently, his teeth chattering. He was barefoot in nothing but his pants, looking absolutely miserable as he muttered to himself about random quasi-psychological things.

  “Yes… yes we did… no… no!” Charis argued with her phone, annoyance quickly building as the secretary went through the usual checklist as if they had all the time in the world. It wasn’t like Charis was sitting on a couch twiddling her thumbs here… when Base was satisfied and told her they’d keep her posted, she finally flipped it shut in relief, able at last to focus totally on keeping them in the air.

  “And why is that big voice yelling to ‘get him’! Why is the moon talking?” Dave said in total frustration, looking angrily at the sky. “SHUT UP! SHUT UP, MOON!”

  Charis ignored the over-wrought Normal, reporting back to the others. “They say they are getting someone on it. They say just stay low and get the cops off our tail as soon as we can, and make contact when we find a safe house.” She shivered until her teeth chattered, hating temperamental San Francisco weather.

  “Can we just knock this guy out or something?” Scott asked, pointing at the former UCLA student right in front of him. Instantly Dave tried to push Scott backward, hoping he’d fall off.

  “HEY!” yelled Dusty in alarm, almost sliding off the back.

  “Oops. Sorry, teenage-drug-me.”

  Scott yelled, “Watch it, man, or I’ll kick your ass!”

  “I’m just trying to dump the whiney super ego.”

  “You wanna see whiney?” He made a fist.

  “Give it your best shot, you little walking rule book!” Dave challenged boisterously.

  Okay, that was it! She couldn’t handle the male posturing anymore! Charis screamed, “STOP IT, STOP IT, STOP IT!! LOOK!” She twisted around to yell over the top of both of them, “We are on the back of a really tired griffin in the middle of the San Francisco bay, so unless both of you want to SWIM to shore, you will shut up and keep your stupid macho adolescent insecure man-crap to yourself, do you hear me??”

  “Yah” agreed Dusty reproachfully, a little tiny voice in the back.

  Dave hugged her. “We should have gotten naked while we had the chance. Now the snot-nosed fashion victim Superego is back.”

  She rolled her eyes in exasperation but ignored him; she didn’t have time to babysit.

  Scott ground his teeth, muttering under breath as he attempted to fix his completely disheveled hair. Charis didn’t try to listen very hard to find out what he was saying.