“I think I know who that is,” Victoria said. “You can hang back—maybe get the drop on them if it comes to that. I’ll see if I can talk them down first.”

  I nodded and slipped around the inner walls of the building so I would keep out of sight from where the lights were shining through the partially open hangar doors. I couldn’t peek out the windows that ring the upper-level catwalks surrounding the inside of the building without potentially exposing myself.

  I squatted behind the door, where I would be able to hear any interactions just fine. My heart was pounding in my chest, my breath deep. I felt amped up.

  If this got violent, I wasn’t staying inside. Principle over prudence. If this is a gang, I won’t leave Vic- Glory Girl out to dry. Not that she couldn’t handle it on her own, but it’s the principle.

  I felt my hair squirming and coiling on my shoulders.

  Is this it? The debut of Apex?

  My attention was diverted as Glory Girl stepped out of the doorway.

  The truck or car revved up several times with a series of loud backfires, and then that same man’s voice called out: “Well, well, well. If it isn’t Glory Bitch! What’s the Bay’s golden girl doing smashing and crashing around in our trainyards?”

  Victoria’s voice, loud and clear: “Your trainyards? I must have missed seeing your names on it somewhere.”

  Your names. She’s telling me there are a couple or more of them.

  A screechy laugh sounded, another male voice, higher-pitched, reedy, annoying: “Better get your vision checked! Our tags are all over this whole place!”

  Victoria, affecting a bored demeanor: “Gang tags? The paint on the cars and buildings is half an inch thick, with the amount of graffiti on them. Am I supposed to know which one is yours?”

  Screechy came back with a retort: “The ones on top! Idiot!”

  The truck beeped twice, and the sound made my ears ring.

  Fuck, that’s loud!

  The first male voice rang out once again: “You want to fuck around up here, you pay the TOLL! You think you can just fly around and do whatever you want? This is our turf!”

  Glory Girl had that same mildly bored voice responding back: “Does it look like I have pockets? And please. This place is two steps away from being a landfill. Turf? Don’t make me laugh.”

  I heard her shift around, maybe pacing. “Besides, what’s stopping me from just flying away? Let’s face it. You’re out of your league.” Her voice took on an edge: “Hop back in your oversized truck and save what little face you have left right now.”

  The first man’s voice came back with a snarl: “We’re not running away from the likes of you! You pissed me off now, we’re gonna kick your ass! Or are you gonna fly home to mommy!?” I heard Glory Girl stop walking back and forth, her boot grinding on the concrete and gravel. “Or are you gonna run? Get her!”

  Oh hell. So much for not getting into a fight.

  The truck’s engine roared, and tires squealed. I hopped straight up to get a glance through the windows before I went out. I liked Glory Girl’s idea of surprising them. A willowy guy was squared off with Victoria; there was a blob of some kind of trash with the upper torso and head of a scrawny guy sticking out of it, and a truck…thing that looked like it came from some Aleph wasteland apocalypse movie fishtailing and spinning around.

  Ugh. It’s the Merchants. This is what happens when parahumans become crackheads. Or is it the other way around?

  I landed on my feet and tried to gauge their relative positions on the other side of the door. I didn’t want to potentially mess up Vicky, but I knew worst case, she could potentially take getting clobbered by the door.

  Fuck it. Here I come.

  I took a few steps back, dropped to all fours, and let the idea take shape. Not original—just Victoria’s idea, cranked up to 11. I’d surprise them, scare them, get them on the back foot. I’d go hard on it, too. Apex was about to make an impact in her… their first encounter.

  I charged the massive two-story hangar door, dropped a shoulder, and crashed into it. My goal was to knock it clean off the track and send it flying into the scrap heap truck.

  It worked, partially. I hadn’t cooked the idea long enough in my head to really take into account the sheer surface area and wind resistance that door would have. I slammed into it hard enough to cave the middle like it had been hit by a tractor-trailer. It tore off the track, skidded a dozen feet, then flopped onto its face. It crashed flat, directly in front of blob-boy Mush, and king crackhead, Skidmark.

  I stopped myself with a flap of my folded wings. Top arms braced on my knuckles. Back legs coiled, ready to spring. My tail lashed behind me, smooth and sinuous. I took a huge lungful of air, dropped my vocal cords low, and tried to bellow at them. To call my attempt a resounding success would be an understatement.

  What came out wasn’t a yell. It was guttural, full-throated, a roar that rattled the windows behind me and shook the air. Skidmark fell on his ass, and his eyes looked like they were going to pop clean out of his skull. Mush screamed in a decidedly undignified way.

  The truck-thing swerved up on two wheels, pulled up next to them, and Skidmark practically leaped into the bed of the vehicle. I stood up on two legs, four arms held wide like I was about to drop some wrath of god biblical shit on them, my wings flared out, tail lashing behind me.

  I started to run towards them. Mush was halfway up into the back of the truck, and Skidmark was screaming: “Go! GO!” Squealer, who I presumed was driving, floored it, and the truck screeched and took off, sparks shooting out from the base of Mush’s pile of junk as he struggled to get up into the back of the truck.

  I dropped onto all fours, dug my claws in, and gave chase. I was catching up to them, although I wasn’t terribly intent on actually catching them. A big, cylindrical gun of some sort popped out of the hood of the cab, rotated, and fired at me with a fwoomp!

  A cargo net shot towards me, and I flapped my wings and dodged to the side with plenty of room to spare. I got within arm’s reach of the back of the truck and lashed out with a swipe of one big arm. My claws tore a huge hole in the rear panel of the vehicle and ripped the bumper entirely off.

  I gave them another roar for good measure, skidded to a stop, grabbed the bumper, and hurled it at them as they drove off. It was heavy metal, a solid thing, and it flew well. I wasn’t seriously aiming for them. It crashed into the road they’d pulled onto alongside them with a small explosion of asphalt that clanged and clattered against the side of the truck.

  I squatted down and stuck my tongue out to lick some crud off one of my eyes without even thinking about what I was doing, then spat it on the ground. The tail lights of the truck lit up, and it swerved in an intersection and disappeared around a warehouse.

  I looked down at my massive right hand and flexed my clawed fingers. During the landing and subsequent chase, I’d moved just like we talked about. It felt natural to me, even over the grumbling protests of my rational mind.

  Victoria floated up next to me, and she was holding her sides, cackling and wheezing.

  I turned my head to look over at her directly, let my tongue hang out of my mouth, and said: “Bark bark.”

  She gasped for breath and said: “St-stop-please, oh my god, I am going to die if you don’t!”

  That could have gone badly. But it didn’t.

  I switched back to the voice that passed for normal when I was like this. I was aware I didn’t sound like myself, or even particularly female for that matter, but right now? I didn’t care in the slightest. “I feel a little bad about that. But I’d rather feel a touch guilty than face the consequences of potentially hospitalizing someone, even if it is loathsome people like that.”

  Victoria wiped her eyes with the backs of her index fingers and shook her head slowly. “Don’t you dare feel guilty or apologize for doing something like that. Those people,” she snarled the word people, before continuing: “Sell all sorts of drugs to anyone. Kids. People who can’t afford to eat.” Her voice was dripping acid: “I hope they pissed their pants and have nightmares for a month. They deserved that.”

  I sat upright, rolling my neck and shoulders, and glanced back at the warehouse. “I’m going to go see if I can’t fix that door real quick.” I jogged over to it. I stepped on it and used my weight to mostly flatten out the sheet metal where it’d caved in from the impact. There were a few tears in it and broken welds, but that wasn’t something I could fix.

  I took a look at the rollers, then picked it up and managed to hook it back onto the stout track it was meant to roll on. With a screech, I slid it closed, and Victoria re-did the chain around the broken handle so it was closed and locked to a passing glance. She took one of the bolts that had pulled through the door when she broke the handle and stuck it back through the base plate of the handle and into the steel of the door like it was an oversized thumb tack.

  It’d have to do.

  “I’m hungry,” I commented, half to myself.

  “Yeah, me too. Snacks this afternoon wore off a couple of hours ago.”

  “You could’ve said something, you know.” I grabbed the duffel bag I’d left on top of a boxcar outside the door with my clothing and our empty bottles and snack wrappers in it, looked at it for several long minutes, and then slung it around my neck.

  “Are you going to change back? Then we can go get something to eat?” I looked up at the night sky, not as visible now with the light pollution from the city. I searched my feelings. I was riding an emotional high right now. A fight I’d won without throwing a punch. Nobody had gotten hurt. I was smiling, but it wasn’t visible under my helmet slash mask.

  “Or…?” Victoria let the question linger in the once-again quiet area.

  “You know,” I paused a moment, thinking things through at a surface level. “I don’t think I am.”

  Being a cape is a pretty weird experience. Deja vu bubbled up. “Brocton Bay might not be entirely ready for me, or maybe they are. I don’t know. But I don’t think I-I don’t think Apex is the kind of creature to hide away. I don’t want to be in the limelight, I’m not ready for that yet, but I’m not going to slink around, either.”

  “Creature?” She asked, a note of concern present.

  “An idea for a persona. Not a dumb beast, not feral, and not a monster, but something in a similar vein. A creature, a dire beast, I think, was what Dragon said. I might lean into more of that from just now.” I gestured at the door. “If I can tap into that fear, use it constructively to avoid or end fights and confrontations? That’s like the ideal scenario in my mind.”

  Unauthorized use: this story is on Amazon without permission from the author. Report any sightings.

  “Hmm. Maybe, yeah. My aura works like that. It scares people I want to scare and inspires people I want to inspire. It can work out really well sometimes, but not everyone responds or reacts to fear the same way. Some people get the fight reaction and get aggressive instead of backing down. Are you ready to escalate in those situations and throw gasoline on that fire?”

  I contemplated for a moment. “I think I am. And I think I’m more capable now than ever before if they do want to pull a weapon or rush me.”

  She laughed briefly and bobbed her head: “Yes, there’s no doubt about that. Worst case, try the persona out, if it doesn’t work, give up the game.”

  I reached up a clawed human hand, unzipped my bag on my upper chest, and fished around carefully before pulling out my wallet. I pulled out a few middling denomination notes and held it out to Victoria. She took them and tilted her head.

  “Let’s hit Fugly Bob’s. Can you order for me? I’m paying for both of us.”

  She rolled her eyes, crossed her arms over her chest, and sighed, then said: “Fine. I know you heard me talk about not having a wallet earlier.”

  I crossed my human-like lower arms over my chest and said, “Please. You’ve got a forcefield. I’ve got tentacle hair. If either of us can’t smuggle a couple of twenties, we’re just not trying.”

  She couldn’t hold back a grin. Kneeling down, she stuffed the notes into what looked like an elasticized pocket in the top of her just-below-the-knee boots. When she stood back up, she asked me, “What do you want, anyway?”

  “What’s that one tourist trap burger called? The impossible?”

  “No, uh… The challenger.” She replied.

  “I want two of those bad boys. And a whole pitcher of iced tea, just for me.” I dropped my voice a touch lower, then patted the hard plates over my lower abdomen with one lower hand, and rumbled: “Apex hungry.”

  She rolled her eyes and fluttered her eyelashes with a groan.

  We took to the sky and made our way over to the boardwalk at a lazy pace and a low altitude, maybe a hundred or two hundred feet up. I flew slowly and easily. We’d both noticed that any time I really shifted my bulk around in anything resembling a nimble or acrobatic maneuver, I created downright wicked blasts of wind and swirling vortexes. The incredible thing was that I could do them in the first place, but I wasn’t a true mover. Newton had things to say about my darting around, and I’d toppled a fair few trees earlier at low altitudes.

  Low and slow. Gentle starts, stops, and wide banks. Those weren’t too bad. More helicopter flying overhead and less jet blasts sending things flying. Cutting flaps before landing helped with the downwash, and so did leaping into the air on takeoff.

  I suspected that my wings stopping before a landing had more to do with them not impacting the ground or obstructions than it did with anything else. The membranes of my wings were pretty durable from the little bit of poking and prodding I’d done on them so far, but I doubted very much that they were durable enough to be smacking into trees, light poles, or the ground without getting damaged.

  One thing I was still getting used to—besides the fact I could fly, which was awesome—was how my wings moved, felt, and sounded. I’d expected them to flap faster, maybe when I was flying fast, and they did, sorta, but not in the way I had imagined in my head.

  Flying slow like this, they flapped at one speed. If I flew four or five times faster than this, I didn’t flap four or five times faster, maybe half again as fast. I did flap harder, and my wings were moving through a wider range of motion.

  Slow like this, it was a throbbing thrum, loud, rhythmic, and there was an almost musical quality to it. When I was flying fast or maneuvering hard, the sound shifted somewhat dramatically. Layered, rolling pulses of whump-whump-whump. Sharp banks, rolls, or pitch changes caused my wings to make sounds like canvas snapping and slapping on a sailboat over the thumping bass backing track. I could feel vortexes and turbulence smack into the sides of my tail as it whipped around to assist in my maneuvers, far out behind me.

  Flying is fucking amazing. Even if I could roll back the clock, go back to being my previous normal… losing this? Hard sell.

  We approached Fugly Bob’s, glowing burger sign and smoky air calling to me like a beacon. My mouth was watering. My nerves singing a little too.

  People in window seats were leaning in their booths to try and see whatever weird tinkertech aircraft was approaching. I was thankful that the dining patio wasn’t facing the side we were landing on. Glory Girl swooped down and landed with effortless grace. I could see people pointing at her, smiling, and waving to their friends.

  I cut my flapping and dropped from higher than usual, doing my best to land with even a fraction of Victoria’s grace. I came down in the middle of an empty spot in the parking lot. My feet touched the pavement, and I eased into the resistance on my legs.

  My tail thudded into the asphalt, and I came to a stop in a deep squat. I didn’t crater the parking lot. I lifted one paw up, looked down, and saw there was a very cleanly defined imprint of one humongous foot, grippy pads, and claw slices included. It’d make for a cool stamp.

  I glanced at the people in the restaurant and on the patio. People were looking and pointing as they had with Glory Girl. There weren’t any smiles or people waving. There wasn’t any screaming or fleeing either, as far as I could tell. I’d take that as a small victory. I think the presence of Glory Girl with me, and her unconcerned posture, was what was selling it.

  She looked back at me and waved me forward in a performative manner before heading for the entrance. I thought about the image I wanted to project. My wings were retracting and folding, and I gave them a little buzz as they went down my back to their resting position. Not moving any air, really, just a little shake.

  I reached first one upper arm, then the other out, and rather than adopt the gorilla-like knuckle walk, I flexed my three fingers out, fully extending them and bending them back so I could place my weight on the pads of the fingers and not the claws. I wasn’t out to trash the parking lot.

  I tucked my thumbs against my palm; there was no amount of bending I could do to avoid those claws piercing the pavement, with their more aggressive curve than my other three fingers. My fingertips accepted my weight just fine, and it was perfectly comfortable. I could feel just a little squish under the pads of my fingers and paws, but I wasn’t leaving anything but very shallow, surface-level imprints behind.

  I slinked forward, thinking about that uncanny agility we’d discussed, channeling my inner mutated panther. My mask with its many eyes was still on: I’d never taken it down, or off, or whatever. That was the face of Apex: a hard exoskeletal helm built from tentacles, covered in eyes, and a hinged, plated jaw.

  Apex, the many-eyed, many-limbed, tentacled, winged creature brought to life like some Lovecraftian horror. I was pretty sure I could do everything with the mask on that I could do with it off.

  My face underneath, while twice the size and still quite alien, bore a passing resemblance to Morgan Rivera—like her distant cousin with a slightly different ethnicity.

  From Neptune.

  While Glory Girl went in to order, I partially rounded the corner of the building to where the patio seating was located. There were a handful of tables that weren’t under the roof of the patio, and one was handicap accessible.

  Perfect.

  I came up to the side of the table where wheelchairs were intended to go and got into position to settle down to eat. My big arms were too thick and hard in the forearm section to fold over one another, so I folded them, one in front of the other, and slid them forward and mostly under the table. I also brought my lower arms forward and rested them over the top of my big arms, also under the table.

  Legs folded under me, I rested on my chest plates and curled my tail around one side before laying it on the concrete. I didn’t want someone to trip on it in the dark and faceplant on their way to their car. With my expanded vision, I was aware of the fact that I had adopted a sort of pose reminiscent of the Great Sphynx.

  People were murmuring to themselves and making some attempt not to gawk. I heard clicks, snaps, and other sound effects of phone cameras going off. I wasn’t doubting that there were posts going up on PHO in real time, maybe even a mobile livestream or two.

  I caught snippets:

  “...is that thing?”

  “It, he, whatever showed up with Glory Girl…”

  “Is that what that sound was?”

  “Ugly…”

  “Horrible…”

  “...call someone?”

  Some of the words hit, and they slid straight through my armored, plated hide to pierce my heart.

  Maybe this was a mistake. Maybe I’m making a huge mistake right now.

  Glory Girl came out with a giant pitcher of iced tea in one hand and a still-huge but more normal-sized cup of the same in her other hand. She smiled as she walked over, and I wasn’t sure if she was putting it on for appearances or if she meant it. She put the pitcher and cup down and took a seat opposite me on the bench built into the table.

  “Food should be out shortly, and the order has the staff buzzing! I don’t think they’re going to honor that whole ‘eat it all and it’s free’ deal after I had to point you out. So it was expensive. There was a decent chunk of change left over, so I left it as a tip for them.”

  I grunted and gave a slight nod. An attractive waitress wearing a short skirt and a tight shirt came out to our table and put down napkins, silverware, and a carrier with condiments. I held still; I didn’t want to startle her. I also… might have let my eyes wander, just a bit. They were all solid black, so it wasn’t like you could tell what I was looking at.

  “Food should be out shortly, give a shout if you need a refill in the meantime!” She left at a quick pace, but I got the impression it was more due to the restaurant being pretty busy on a Saturday night than because she was trying to get away from me.

  Glory Girl rested her elbow on the table and propped her head in her palm. Her voice was low enough that it was clear this was a us conversation.

  “So this is weird…” I dipped my head in agreement. “...I think I need to go out with you more often when I’m doing public appearances in costume like this.” I’d blink if I could. That wasn’t the way I expected this conversation to go at all.

  I tilted my head, and she continued: “I’m normally the center of attention unless I’m with my family, you know?” She looked over to the patio and waved at nobody in particular. A few people waved back. “Yeah, you’ve got the attention, big time.” She paused a beat, then beamed at me and exclaimed: “This is great!”

  I snorted, and she laughed. A few minutes passed, and she chatted a little more, and I stayed mostly quiet. I wasn’t sure to what extent I wanted to break the silence, and she got it. We were on the same wavelength. I… liked it.

  Our burgers arrived. Two comically large ones for me sat in equally large aluminum trays. Each one was stacked high with toppings, cut in half, and had several toothpicks pinning the pile of buns, meat, and toppings together. There was also a big striped paper tray loaded with fries, one for each burger. One was covered in cheese, bacon, and some kind of house sauce. The other was covered in Cajun seasoning, as far as I could tell.

  Glory Girl had a ‘normal size’ but still humongous cheeseburger and a tray of sweet potato fries. I looked at our food, the smells assaulting my sense of smell and tying my stomach into knots. I also saw steam, or maybe fog, drifting up from where the patties were sliced in half, and over each basket of fries. I looked at the aura around Victoria; it was a similar color and texture, but not identical. It also didn’t obstruct or block my vision at all, like it was layered into it. Suddenly, it clicked for me.

  It’s heat. Thermal vision. But maybe only parts of my eyes, or some eyes specifically, see it, and it’s being mixed? Cool. Now time to figure out how to eat with this mask on.

  I reached out with a few tentacles and grabbed a fork and knife to cut each of the burgers a second time, into more manageable quarters. Then I plucked out the toothpicks and managed to lift and transport a quarter of the burger to my mouth with a pair of tentacles without creating a terrific mess of things. Opening my full jaw wide and sticking out my tongue just a little, I made contact and guided it in before chomping down and chewing it up.

  Flavors exploded in my mouth, which distracted me from the sensation of chewing with far and away too many teeth. It was delicious, and my taste buds and body felt like it was singing out in joy at the greasy, fatty, sauce-covered, and nutrient-dense calorific bomb I’d just swallowed.

  I was also well aware of people pointing phones at me, eating with my hair, pointing, and gossiping. I wasn’t going to pay them any mind right now.

  I ate another quarter, trying my best not to eat too loudly, as my mask lacked lips. I think it wasn’t too bad, considering I only had to chew a couple of times, if that, before swallowing. Glory Girl picked up on my attempt not to be gross and giggled. For her part, she’d tucked into her food and was doing a heck of a number on her own meal. Credit where credit was due, Victoria could eat.

  “So good,” I said in a low rumble intended for the two of us, and she nodded emphatically.

  “Yeah, they’re on their A-game tonight. Which, you know, makes sense. Busy night, fresher food, full staff, yadda, yadda.” She wiped her mouth on her napkin and added, “Panacea and I come over here every once in a blue moon, but it’s rare. A special treat, like hitting a soul food joint. Places like this will destroy your figure otherwise, and Mom would lose her shit.” She rolled her eyes.

  With a once-over at my unusual position, she said: “Probably not your figure, though.”

  I snorted, and we mowed down our food. Drinking from the pitcher was a touch tricky when it was really full, but I only spilled a little down my front. The liquid, like pretty much everything else, didn’t stick to my skin at all. Instead, it beaded up and rolled off like water off a duck’s back.

  Small blessings.

  I wound up just eating the lemon wedges in the tea rather than fussing about trying to pick them out. When I was done, I stuck the tentacles I’d eaten with through the jaw slot on my helmet and slurped them clean like noodles.

  Glory Girl cackled at the sight.

  Just as we were finishing our meal, a young boy no older than ten broke away from his mother and ran over to Glory Girl and me.

  “Ethan!” His mother’s voice was sharp, but he wasn’t listening.

  “Hi, Glory Girl!” He said, his voice loud and energetic, at meeting a real-life superheroine.

  She giggled a little and said, “Hello, Ethan, I think your mom wants you.”

  He shifted from foot to foot, and went: “Yeah,” then pointed at me and asked her: “Can I pet him!?”

  Oh. My. God.

  Glory Girl clapped her hand over her mouth and looked at me, her eyes sparking and chest heaving. Only wheezing a little, she answered Ethan: “Sure, he’s friendly. Unless you’re a bad guy!”

  I was dying a little on the inside, but I tilted my head over to the side, and Ethan petted my tentacles. His Mom looked like she was about to pass out. His dad was snickering.

  As much as I hated it, I had to admit it felt pretty good.