Wyvern Pt 12 (Patreon)

[A/N: This chapter beta-read by Lady Columbine of Mystal.]

Wyvern

I let out a screech as Victoria opened her locker. The blonde was moving fast enough to accidentally rip the door clean off though to her credit, she hadn't actually done that yet. Reaching into the metal box—I still had unpleasant memories of my locker—Vicky grabbed a familiar-looking set of folded clothing, with a tiara on top. Irritated at being ignored, I screeched again.

"What?" Vicky whipped around to face me. "Amy's in trouble. Whatever it is, can it wait?" Her aura pulsed back and forth, making me feel almost palpable waves of fear interspersed with saccharine levels of adoration. Fortunately, the latter didn't last long enough to trigger my change back. Even if they could, given my current agitated mindset.

This was the huge problem with the wyvern form; specifically, my inability to communicate in any meaningful way. Right now, the only messages I could get across with ease were 'yes', 'no' and 'I have lots of sharp teeth, so don't mess with me'. Anything more required time that I just did not have. Unfortunately, the message I was trying to get across was you can fly a lot faster than me, so I'd better start right now, but I have no idea where you're going. Hoping against hope that Vicky would figure it out, I reached out with my wingtip and traced the letter 'W' on the floor.

"What?" Vicky stared at the letter, then up at me. "What's a 'W' supposed to mean? Why am I costuming up? Who are we going to save? You know all that." She lofted off the ground, preparatory to flying down the hallway—which I was almost certain was forbidden within the grounds of Arcadia—but I spread my wings to block her way, letting out another screech. This one was louder and more forceful than before, and included more sharp teeth. Pay attention to me. Again, I traced the letter 'W' on the floor.

"What the fuck's gotten into you?" Vicky seemed about to barge past me anyway, then paused. "W …. um … who, when, where, why—" She stopped as I let out yet another screech before waddling awkwardly backward a step on my digitigrade legs. "Um, back? Back! Why … where! Fuck, I'm an idiot. You want to know where she is." I nodded and let out my most encouraging chirp. "Isaac Lord Museum. You know where that is?"

Finally. I nodded enthusiastically, then turned and scuttled off down the hallway. My clawed feet scrabbled at the plastic floor tiles and my 'elbows' ached slightly from thumping against the floor, but I still managed a fair turn of speed. Students scattered out of my way, whether from courtesy or fear I wasn't sure. Just so long as they actually get out of the way.

The front doors slid open in front of me, and I burst out into the courtyard. A van with PRT markings was just pulling up at the gates, but I ignored it. Spreading my wings, I leaped into the air, beating them strongly for altitude. As I passed over the outer wall, I saw an armoured man get out of the van, his helmet faceplate tilted up toward me. I suppose he doesn't see a wyvern fly overhead every day of the week.

Perhaps it was the urgency of the matter, but I felt no strain on my muscles as I pushed myself to fly faster and faster. While I hadn't known Amy for long—only a few hours less than I'd known Victoria, after all—the occasionally-snarky healer was someone I had decided I liked having as a friend. This was quite apart from the fact that she was Victoria's sister. The idea of her being put in danger by a bunch of gangsters and drug dealers made me … angry. Very angry. They're not going to hurt her if I've got anything to say about it.

I'd spent my entire life in Brockton Bay and I liked to think I knew the city fairly well. The Isaac Lord Museum was a place I knew rather better than that; Dad had a fondness for local history and he'd dragged me along to the place about once a year until I left middle school. Based around the life and exploits of the man after whom Lord Street and Lord's Port was named, it wasn't particularly fancy or upmarket. Isaac Lord was one of the pioneers who had opened up the Brockton Bay region for settlement, so his name was well-known in the local area, but not so much anywhere else. As such, the museum had been gradually declining in the last few years, subsisting mainly on donations from local residents and a few patrons of cultural history.

Fortunately, it wasn't all that far from Arcadia as the crow—or the wyvern—flew. I wasn't quite sure what I was going to do when I got there, except for the broad strategy; chase off the gangsters, save the innocents, make sure Amy was okay. If that involved scaring the living bejeebers out of a few dozen low-lives, or even inflicting minor first-degree burns on a few of them, I didn't mind. First-degree burns were survivable, after all, and would make the experience all the more memorable. And if me being memorable meant they wouldn't try this shit again in a hurry, then I intended to be as memorable as fuck.

I was about halfway there when I saw the flying form in front of me. For a second I thought it was Victoria, and wondered how the hell did she get ahead of me? Then I got closer and realised it wasn't her. For a start, the figure was wearing rust-red armour. And of course, there was the whole 'big muscular guy' thing. He was travelling on the same course I was, which indicated that this was either a huge coincidence or he was also going from Arcadia to the fight at the Isaac Lord Museum.

By the time I figured that out, I was almost up alongside him; he turned his head to stare at me. I figured it out just before he spoke; this was Aegis, of the Wards. He was their only innate flyer, as far as I knew, though there was footage (mainly shown on the PHO boards) showing Kid Win zipping around on a flying skateboard. And falling off of it too, which made for much more entertaining footage.

I wasn't sure what was going to happen next, but nothing was going to stop me from going to save Amy. Whatever he did or said, I was going to basically ignore. Amy's welfare was more important. Besides, it looked as though I could fly faster than him. Which seemed odd, seeing that Vicky could fly faster than me, but who was I to argue? Maybe he'd gotten his version of bullshit no-effort wingless flight from the dollar store.

As he turned to look at me, I made a private bet with myself. Either he'd say what the hell are you, with or without a panicked scream, or he'd decide I was an animal and treat me accordingly. After all, that was what most people I'd met in wyvern form had done. It was actually kind of depressing.

"Oh, hey," he said. "You're, uh, Wyvern, aren't you? Armsmaster briefed us on you."

Or he could just say hi. For some reason, I hadn't considered that possibility. I let out a friendly chirp and nodded my head. It was nice to meet another parahuman who didn't consider me a dangerous monster. In fact, it was nice to meet another person who didn't consider me a dangerous monster.

"Yeah, he said you were nonverbal," Aegis noted. "Also that you could breathe fire. Please don't kill anyone with fire, okay?"

Now I was just plain surprised, though I really shouldn't have been. Armsmaster had passed on what he'd learned about me, and Aegis had actually listened? Did this mean I wouldn't have to beat him up until he paid attention to me? This revolutionary concept went against every comic book I'd ever read, not to mention most of my real-world experience to date.

Unsure of what else to do, I gave him a toothy grin and a shrug. I could see that my conversational inputs were going to be fairly limited, unless he asked me some extremely specific leading questions. Fortunately, we were going in the same direction and I was pretty sure he was on my side. The trouble was, I had no way of articulating Panacea's in trouble and I'm trying to save her without either landing or carrying out some remarkably improbably charades in mid-air.

"Wyvern! There you are! Oh, hi, Aegis. Sorry, can't stay to chat. My sister's in the middle of that gang fight, and I'm gonna get her out."

Or Vicky could tell him. That works, too. I looked around and let out a screech of welcome as Glory Girl swept up between us.

"You ready to go toast some gang butt?" Vicky gave me a remarkably vicious grin. For a human teenager, her teeth looked almost as sharp as mine. "I figure if you fold your wings, I can give you a lift."

That … actually sounded like it could work. I began to nod vigorously, then paused, remembering the meeting of the previous night. Mrs Dallon and Dad had agreed that we could go crime-busting so long as we had a chaperone. Preferably a flyer. While 'but Amy was in trouble' could possibly serve as a good excuse for going in two-fisted, the fact was that we had a ready-made chaperone right there.

Before I could talk myself out of it, I pulled one of my patented snap barrel-rolls, ending up on Aegis' back. This was obviously something he hadn't been briefed about—probably because Armsmaster hadn't observed me in flight—and he yelped in surprise as my prehensile feet latched on to the heavy belt he was wearing. "Wait, what are you doing?" he shouted. "Glory Girl, call her off!"

I had to say this about Vicky; she wasn't slow on the uptake. Quite possibly, she'd been aiming to violate the terms of the agreement by omission—sorry, Mom, but it totally slipped my mind, and Ames was in trouble—but I'd dragged it out into the open. So to speak.

"Aw crap," she said, even as she facepalmed. "Okay, fine. Aegis, we're gonna need you to stick with us. Mom's decided we need a minder, and you're the closest thing we've got at the moment."

"Sure, fine," he said; for a flying Brute, he certainly sounded more than a little nervous. "But can you make the nice fire-breathing lizard girl let me go, please? I don't know what she's doing back there, and I'm not sure I want to."

"I'd love to," she replied sweetly. "But she's got the right idea. Say, if your spine dislocates, you'll get over it, won't you?" As she spoke, she swung up behind me. I crouched, clenched my claws through Aegis' belt, and furled my wings.

"Yeah, but whaaaaaahhhhhhh!" he hollered as she wrapped her arms around me and piled on the pace. From the pitch of his voice, I suspected that I might've been inadvertently giving him an armour-wedgie but as Victoria had said, he'd get over it.

Even with me and Aegis as dead weight, Vicky managed to accelerate to speeds that I could only normally reach in a dive. I flicked my nictitating membranes across my eyes and left them there; while they made things a little blurry, I could still see where we were going. It helped that Aegis had stopped struggling and stretched himself out in an effort to be more aerodynamic. I appreciated the effort.

"It's up ahead!" Vicky called out. "Aegis, stay with Wyvern! She's the rookie here!" As she let me go, I reflexively spread my wings and released the grip I had on Aegis' belt.

"What are you going to be doing?" asked Aegis. "My orders were to observe but not engage until backup arrived." I could kind of see his point. The gangs were definitely out in force today, with Roadhog and her crew occupying one street and the ABB in the other. The museum was on the corner where these two streets converged, and the intersection was by now a no-go zone. Unfortunately, it would only be a matter of time before some overly-sneaky gangbanger decided to go through the museum to ambush their rivals on the other side. Unless, of course, they already had.

"Saving Amy," Vicky stated through clenched teeth. "And oh, look." She pointed at me. "Backup." That seemed to be all the words she was willing to use, as the last one was punctuated by her abrupt departure.

Aegis watched her dive toward the museum, then turned to me. "Okay, um … have you done this much before?" Implicit in his question was the subtext I'm not being paid enough to try and stop her, and I don't think I could even if I was. I kind of sympathised with him; Victoria Dallon was a force of nature unto herself. While there were probably things on Earth Bet that could make her reconsider, once you got past the Endbringers and the Triumvirate they'd have to be few and far between.

Irritated, I shook my head. You'd think Armsmaster would've covered that bit as well. Unless he's been holding back on my trigger details so as to keep my identity secret …. huh. Maybe he's not such a dick after all. But I was still irritated, if only because Vicky had ditched me so I could watch Aegis' back while she went to find Amy. Down below, there was a distant crunch; going by the brand-new hole in the roof of the museum, Vicky hadn't bothered finding a window or door. Well, that's definitely her, all right.

"Um, okay." Aegis seemed to come to a decision. "We need to maybe disperse some of these gang guys before they get the idea to take cover. Or hostages. Follow me and act scary." Looking a lot less sure about what he was doing than Vicky had, he dived toward the street below where Roadhog's Merchants were tussling with Inago's ABB. I followed, not because of anything he'd said, but because Vicky was trusting me to not let him get killed.

He swooped down over the street, about a dozen feet over the heads of the gang members. With my superior speed and manoeuvrability, I was able to match my speed and course to his while staying alongside him. Follow him, my scaly wyvern ass. As per his suggestion—I certainly wasn't taking it as an order—to act scary, I opened my jaws wide and let out the loudest screech I could pull off. From the way Aegis recoiled sideways, he hadn't been expecting that.

Nor had the people beneath us. With matching screams, they fell away before us, some of them not even looking around before scrambling for safety. A few brave souls fired guns at us but they must have missed us altogether, because I didn't feel anything hit me. Aegis, of course, was wearing armour and he was a Brute anyway.

Our path led us to the intersection, where the front-line capes were clashing. Roadhog's latest mechanical abomination, looking like the illegitimate offspring of a Mack truck and a centipede, was attempting to climb all over what looked like an honest-to-goodness giant robot. I'd never seen a robot of this type in Brockton Bay before, which made me wonder who the ABB had recruited as a Tinker. Inago's been holding out on us.

"Whoa, hey!" Aegis pulled up in a steep climb to avoid the oversized combatants. I couldn't see the rest of the ABB and Merchant capes, but I knew they had to be around here somewhere. Inago wasn't one to watch from the back lines, and while Skidmark was no longer alive, Roadhog still had a few capes to call on. The word on the street was that he'd died when she backed up over him with one of her vehicles; the sixty-four million dollar question on the PHO boards was 'accident or assassination?' Whichever one it was, she'd renamed herself (from 'Squealer', believe it or not), taken over the team, and started a program of active recruitment to bring the Merchants into the big leagues.

One of the large picture windows in the side of the museum exploded outward, and Vicky came flying out, backward. A massive cloud of bugs poured out after her, and just like that, I knew exactly where the leader of the ABB was. Also, from the way Vicky's limbs flopped bonelessly, she was in a bad way. Twisting in mid-air, I swooped down with all the speed at my command. I had less than a second to catch her before she hit the ground. Normally I wouldn't have worried, but something had disabled her, and I didn't know if it had gone through her invulnerability or if her invulnerability was down.

There were still some gang members on the street when I came back through. They didn't bother trying to shoot at me a second time, which showed that they could learn after all. I paid them no heed at all, straining forward with my wings beating furiously. It was going to be close; too close. Far too close. I wasn't going to be able to catch her and still pull up, so I did the next best thing.

A fraction of a second before she would've hit the curb on the other side of the street, I caught up with her. Wrapping my wings around her body, I curled the rest of myself into as close to a ball as I could manage. The impact was massively bruising; we hit the curb, then bounced over it and demolished a mailbox. Loose letters went everywhere as we kept going. I closed my eyes as we smashed into a storefront in a hail of broken glass. After we rolled to a stop, I cracked an eyelid to see what was going on. Pieces of glass were lying everywhere, but nothing seemed poised to fall on us quite yet. For a mercy, it appeared that the storefront wasn't in use right at that moment.

"Shit, are you guys all right?" Aegis swept into the store then crouched down beside us, heedless of the broken glass. I ignored the pointless question and unwrapped myself from around Victoria. Despite the fact that every inch of my body was sending me urgent messages about not doing that again ever, I reserved the hiss of horror for when I saw Vicky's face.

She looked like she'd been on the receiving end of a pile-driver, repeatedly. One eye was swollen shut, and it looked like her jaw was broken. Blood was leaking from both nostrils, and lumps and welts covered every free inch of her skin. Worst of all, her mouth was wide open and she was trying to breathe but from the sound of the choked gasps, nothing was going in.

"Shit!" Aegis stared at her. "She's choking." He grabbed her jaw and pulled it open a little farther, then hooked two fingers into her mouth. When he pulled them out, I saw a couple of fat black bugs fall on to her face, then scuttle back toward her mouth. With a growl, I darted my head forward; my teeth clamped on to the bugs and I bit down hard. With a pop, they dissolved into a bad-tasting gas. I shook my head in confusion. What just happened?

"It's Inago," Aegis muttered. "They're his bugs. She's got them in her lungs. She'll suffocate if we can't get them out." Taking a deep breath, he crossed one hand over the other and shoved down hard on her sternum. She coughed convulsively; bugs flew out of her mouth, but most of them buzzed straight back in on the inhale. I snapped at another one, just as Aegis tried to grab a few; at the last instant, I pulled back before I would've taken his hand off at the wrist. Or broken some teeth on his armour, whichever happened first.

Scrambling out from under Vicky's body, I chirped to get Aegis' attention, then nodded at Vicky. Take care of her. He stared up at me, his eyes wide behind his visor, as he prepared to repeat the chest compression. "What are you going to do?" he asked.

I didn't bother trying to explain. Turning, I lunged out through the broken storefront window. Vicky's only got so much time, even with Aegis doing CPR. I've gotta fix this shit. My wings spread wide as I took to the air, but I didn't fly too high. My target was just across the street, after all.

Panacea

A Little Earlier

Amy Dallon knelt on the floor of the museum in the middle of the timeline exhibit. This was where the teachers had made them gather when the shooting started, as the bulky stands actually provided cover from all sides. When the ABB had burst through, looking to ambush the Merchants, they had merely huddled up a little closer, on the principle that if they didn't look like a threat, the gangsters wouldn't bother them. That had worked, up to a point.

This point had come when Inago himself strode through the museum, his steel bug-mask gleaming in the overhead lights and the long black coat flaring behind him. He looked over the teachers, obviously dismissing them almost instantly. His gaze similarly raked over the students, and he pointed at the two Asian students in the group, beckoning them to come to him. Hesitantly, Chet and Kayla did so, and Amy's heart sank. Inago had already built a reputation for recruiting or killing off all the Asian gangs in the surrounding cities. She had no doubt he was about to make them an offer they couldn't refuse, as the old saying went.

"Leave them alone!" she had shouted, standing up. "Leave us all alone!" Guns were levelled at her, but Inago knocked them toward the ceiling; he, at least, recognised her. Recognised that hurting or killing Panacea would paint a huge target on the ABB's back. Of course, she realised a second or so later, it may not have been the smartest thing after all to reveal herself to him.

"I will leave them alone," the gang lord said in accented English. "You will heal my men." Raising a hand, he barked an order in some other language, and men scurried to obey.

"No," she'd told him, with a boldness she didn't feel. "I won't. You can't make me." Go ahead, she dared him silently. Touch me. I'll make you sorry you ever came to Brockton Bay.

Inago didn't hesitate. He reached out and grabbed the Asian girl by the throat. Her feet lifted from the floor and he began to squeeze; Kayla began to let out the most horrendous choking noises, her hands vainly pulling at his iron grip.

Amy's eyes widened. "No!" she shouted. "Stop! Don't kill her!"

The girl continued to choke and thrash, although her movements were becoming weaker. Inago ignored her, staring directly at Amy. "You will heal my men." His tone was implacable. The sky is blue, water is wet, you will heal my men.

There was no way out of it. Even if she let Kayla die, there were dozens more in the class. She had no doubt but that he'd butcher his way through every last one of them if he had to, in order to get her to cooperate. "I'll heal your men," she said, hating the sound of surrender in her voice.

"Good." He opened his hand and Kayla fell to the floor, coughing and choking and clutching her throat. Amy wanted to go to her but she felt eerily certain that if she did, Inago would end the girl as an object lesson. She's breathing. I'll heal her after all this is over.

After that, it had become a nightmare of one wounded man after another; bullet wounds, knife wounds, more bullet wounds. Amy wanted to sabotage her own efforts in some way, but short of screwing with their brains, she couldn't think of a way to make it so that these men couldn't fight without alerting Inago of what she was doing. And all the while, she could feel the accusing stares from her teachers and classmates, silently asking why are you helping them?

The crash as Vicky came in through the roof came as both a total shock and a welcome surprise. Her sister's aura swelled in response to her anger, causing the men with the guns to cower away from her. Vicky took advantage of this opening with vicious glee, punching out all three armed guards before they could react. Inago was the next to feel her wrath; her next blow sent him flying through a stand in a shower of rubble.

"Okay, Ames," Vicky said, landing next to her sister and extending a hand. "Let's get you—"

She didn't get any farther because a mass of black, buzzing bugs enveloped her, hiding her entirely from Amy's sight. Two of them alighted on Amy's hand and she instinctively tried to exert her power on them. Absolutely nothing happened; there wasn't even a life signal from them.

That was when Inago came out of the cloud of bugs, even more of them buzzing around him, and back-handed Vicky into an up-till-then unbroken display stand. The stand broke and Vicky started making horrific choking noises, her bug-covered arms clawing at her bug-covered face. Amy felt Vicky's aura flickering wildly as Inago strode over to her and smashed her to the floor in a single punch. His foot met her head on the way down, snapping it back so hard Amy thought Vicky may have fractured her spine. Reaching down, he picked Vicky up, her limp form dangling from his hand like a doll. The bugs began to leave her. As he reared back, Amy saw her face; her eyes were closed, blood running from her nostrils. Amy couldn't tell if she was dead or just unconscious.

When Inago threw her, Vicky flew through the air in a flat ballistic arc. She struck the plate glass window in the outside wall, shattering it and continuing on with barely any reduction in speed. Amy lost sight of her sister then. She wanted to scream and run after Vicky in the hope that she'd survived the brutal beating but she knew exactly what would happen to the other hostages if she did. Kneeling on the floor of the museum, she wrapped her arms around herself and wept for her heroic sister. I'm so sorry, Vicky. So very sorry.

"You will heal my men." Inago's voice was as relentless as ever. She ignored him, clutching herself more tightly. Vainly, she tried to will away the emptiness that grew inside her, threatening to envelop her very soul. A sob was wrenched from her throat.

A scream jolted her attention back to the here and now. Raising teary eyes, she saw a cloud of bugs descending on the hostages, who were thrashing and rolling on the floor in an effort to get away from them. Inago stepped forward, as if there was a chance she would think someone else could control such a swarm. "You will heal my men. Now."

The screech cut through the screams of the hostages like a knife through hot butter. In a totally unconscious reflex action, Amy threw herself flat. Terror twisted her guts into a knot as the sound grabbed every primitive atavistic instinct she had and yanked on it, hard. Looking up, she barely had time to register a red-and-gold blur before it was gone again. Something metallic hit the floor with a clatter, rocking back and forth slightly. She stared at it; it was Inago's mask.

Aegis

Fuck, I'm losing her. Aegis tried to compress Glory Girl's chest again, but the bugs were too far down her throat, filling her lungs. Her heartbeat was thin and thready now, her finger relaxed against the floorboards. He gritted his teeth and tried again, refusing to give up hope.

Suddenly, the breath whooshed out from her lungs; he caught a whiff of it, and started to cough at the acrid taste. Poising himself over her, he pushed down on her chest once more. This expelled more of the noxious gas, allowing her to inhale life-giving oxygen.

"Vicky!" he heard a familiar voice calling from outside. "Vicky! Oh god, where are you?"

"In here!" he called out, not pausing in his efforts. Glory Girl still wasn't out of the woods, but he wasn't going to let her die on his watch. He could hear the sounds of ongoing combat, but this was more important.

Panacea came scrambling in through the shattered window, moving carefully to avoid the shards of glass. "Vicky!" she nearly screamed. "Oh, god. Is she—?"

"She's alive," he assured her. "Just. There's some crap in her lungs—"

In the next instant, she was on her knees beside her sister, cradling Glory Girl's hand in hers. The blonde hero convulsed, inhaling deeply, then coughed. More acrid gas came out of her lungs, then Amy triggered another deep breath. And another.

Thank God. Aegis slumped back against the wall. She's going to be okay.

Wyvern

We smashed our way out through the plate glass and into the open air. Immediately, I turned my muzzle skyward and tightened my grip on Inago's arm. I was going to make him so very sorry for hurting my friend and frightening her sister. A fall from twenty thousand feet, I figured, would be a good start.

Inago, as it turned out, had other ideas. He wriggled and twisted, causing me to jink oddly in my flight, but he couldn't break my grip. That is, until the sudden weight fell on my back. That came as an unwelcome surprise, as did the blade across my throat. Oni Lee, I presume. As he tried to slice my neck open—it seemed that even my soft underbelly was proof against ordinary blades—I twisted my head around and snapped at him. Coppery-tasting blood filled my mouth as my teeth crunched through flesh and bone alike; the weight vanished once more. All except for an itch right in the middle of my back; a second too late, I realised that—

BOOOM

I came to with wind rushing in my ears. As with the last time I'd been knocked out by an explosion, I found myself in human form. Unlike the last time, I was still in mid-air, falling. Inago had wriggled free while I was engaged with Oni Lee, and had presumably already hit the ground. My costume was flapping about me in a rather less than intact manner, but I wasn't even worrying about that. Looking down, I could see the blurry ground rushing up at me. And Inago—at least, I presumed it was him—watching as I fell to my death.

Not gonna fuckin' happen. I took the surge of rage and rode it through the fastest Change I'd ever experienced. My wings spread and flapped mightily, catching me just yards above the ground. As I looked down at Inago, my jaws opened and I let out a screech of pure challenge. I found that I didn't care about the Merchants or Roadhog. The ABB had threatened Vicky's sister, and Inago had tried to kill Vicky herself. They were going down.

Inago opened his mouth and replied with a chittering screech that was nothing like mine. It was like the combined, concentrated sound of every biting, stinging insect I'd ever heard. As I watched, his mouth opened wider and wider, and mandibles began to push out from inside somewhere. By now, his eyesockets were filled with bulbous black masses. Compound eyes, I guessed.

From his open mouth poured more of the bugs, swarming up toward me in an almost impenetrable cloud. I flapped my wings, gaining height. The bugs followed, until I had them right where I wanted them. Inhaling deeply, I released a long, rolling burst of flame. The cone blasted downward, overwhelming the upward-moving swarm and reducing them to nothing but immaterial ash. It also hit Inago, setting fire to his long-coat.

He didn't seem to be overly worried by the fire, even as the coat burned around him. I bared my teeth and prepared the cutting flame; if it could melt Armsmaster's halberd, it could surely fry Inago where he stood. Furling my wings, I dropped into a dive; while I could easily target him from higher up, the distance might attenuate the flame.

Again, I felt the weight on my back at just the wrong moment. However, this time I knew what to do. Altering my focus, I spat out an explosive fireball. I didn't spit it far, and it was quite short-fused; less than half a second later, it went off … just as I was passing it, with my unwelcome passenger on board. He screamed and fell off, his costume on fire. I didn't care; all my attention was focused on Inago.

When I saw the long dark shape covering his back, I began to wonder where he'd found another coat. My mistake was revealed a moment later when the dark wing-cases opened and long, gossamer wings emerged from just behind his shoulders. Chitinous plates had grown over most of his body by now, with a second set of arms emerging halfway down to his hips. He was getting more and more insectile by the moment, and this wasn't a good thing. If I wasn't much mistaken, he was also about nine feet tall by now.

My jaws opened wide and I let out a blue-hot cutting flame. It lanced toward Inago as I closed with him, but at the last minute, his wings started beating with an audible thrumming sound, lifting him out of danger. He vomited another swarm of faux bugs toward me; almost contemptuously, I toasted them with a wide-stream blast of flame. I'd hoped that my fire would also wreck his fragile-looking wings, but no such luck.

The preliminaries over, we closed with each other.

I let loose a stream of blue-white cutting flame, but he dodged it; while he wasn't as agile as me in the air, it seemed he wasn't exactly clumsy either. His bugs swarmed at me, but they couldn't get through my scales and any that got as far as my mouth were incinerated by the flames escaping from between my teeth. Some tried for my eyes, but my nictitating membranes sufficed to sweep them away and keep my vision clear.

We slammed together, clawing and tearing at one another. I had to use my wings to stay aloft, which meant that he had two sets of limbs to bring to bear as opposed to my single pair. On the other hand, my neck was much more flexible than his, and my teeth were a good deal sharper than his mandibles. Locked together, we tumbled over and over in the sky. I wanted to toast him, but if he dodged my blast as he had before, it could endanger others. So I tore at him with my claws and crunched his chitin between my teeth.

When he got his mandibles around my neck, I had a bad moment. I didn't have the leverage to pull free, and he was squeezing almost hard enough to cut off my air supply. Fortunately, they were only sharp on the tips and not the inner edges, giving me enough time to claw frantically at his abdomen with my foot-talons. For the most part they just slid off, though I may have cracked or broken one or two chitin plates.

Useless as my efforts may have been, they stirred a memory. I'd been trapped once before, and my claws had failed to help me there as well. But I'd gotten out of my locker in a different way. If I could do the same here … this would take some doing.

I latched on to his lower abdomen with my feet and pushed upward as hard as I could, jamming a thicker section of my neck up into the vice formed by his mandibles. This forced his mandibles apart slightly, and gave me more of a chance to take a deep breath. Capitalising on that, I twisted my neck almost into a knot, until my muzzle was nudging at the gap between myself and Inago. Then I spat out an explosive fireball.

The concussion left my ears ringing, even as we were flung apart. Though I knew I couldn't let up for an instant. Inago was too powerful for me to gradually wear down; I had to take him down hard and fast. The memory of what he'd done to Vicky flooded my mind with anger and resolve, and the last of the fuzziness disappeared.

Inhaling deeply, I launched another explosive fireball; it flew straight and true, detonating right next to him. Weathering the blast wave, I flew at him as he tumbled through the air. Not giving him time to get oriented, I sent another blast of fire at him. This one was perhaps the most intense cutting flame that I'd produced yet; he barely had a chance to dodge before it seared off one of his wings.

Out of control, unable to fly, he began to plummet toward the ground. Given what he'd endured at my hands—teeth, claws, whatever—I strongly suspected that he'd survive the impact. I didn't intend to make it that easy for him.

Arrowing in at him, I latched on with both feet. His compound eyes could convey no more emotion than the mandibles, but I thought I detected both fear and anger in him. I didn't care any more; opening my jaws, I lunged in and clamped them on to his right upper arm. He screamed, a high insectile screeching, as I clenched my teeth together and wrenched hard with my neck. Chitin crunched, bone popped, and flesh tore; I came away with his arm in my mouth.

As I spat it out, I realised the ground was getting very close indeed. As I released my grip on him with every intention of flying up and away, his other three arms latched on to me. I flapped once, but when I failed to break his grip, I went with Plan B. Grinning a very draconic grin, I treated him to an explosive fireball. You'd really think he'd have learned by now.

The explosion was probably just as jarring as hitting the ground would have been. For my part, that is. My spread wings caught a lot of the blast, pushing me up and away. Inago, on the other hand, got slapped down hard, then stopped just as hard by the asphalt. I hovered over him, staring down at his crumpled body as it began to shrink and shed shattered chunks of chitin. It looked like he was unconscious at last. Still, he was dangerous as long as he lived. Better that he end now rather than—

"Wyvern, no!" It was Vicky's voice; a moment later, she flew in between me and Inago, holding her hand out toward me. I swallowed back the fire I'd been intending to unleash, a cutting flame that would've bisected Inago from crown to crotch. Vicky stared up at me with earnest, anxious eyes. "Wyvern, he's down. You can stop now. I'm okay."

I took a breath, and let myself relax just a little. Vicky looked so small, but she also looked … well, a little ruffled, but alive and well. Her tiara was missing, though that was no big deal—she'd shown me her collection of spares—and she looked like she'd been dragged through a hedge backward, but she was alive. I let out an inquiring chirp.

"Aegis kept me alive until his bugs vanished," she explained rapidly. "Then Ames got to us and made sure of it." She flew up and put her arms around my neck, which seemed to be wider than her whole body now. This seemed odd, but I couldn't figure out why. "You saved my life."

Gently, I came down for a landing beside where Inago lay. He was down to human form now; that is, a lot smaller than me. Once my wings were no longer needed for flying, I used them to hug her in return, then let out a friendly chirp. You're welcome. Then, remembering the rest of the fight, I looked around.

The giant robot and the centipede/truck combo were no longer fighting. Nor were the gang members clashing. In fact, most of the latter seemed to have vacated the field of combat. I couldn't even see the Merchant capes. Glaring at the mechanical monstrosities, and by proxy the people driving them, I drew in a deep lungful of air. Letting Victoria go, I took up the same pose as when I'd confronted Armsmaster; crouched, jaws wide, wings spread. I didn't spit fire this time, however; these two hadn't attacked anyone I cared about. Instead, I went to let out a screech. What came out, however, was nothing less than a full-blooded roar. Fuck off. When I want to deal with you, I'll come looking. As the echoes died away, I could hear car alarms going off up and down the block.

They got the hint, breaking off from one another. The giant robot ignited some sort of flight pack and roared off over the rooftops, while the centipede-truck thing scuttled away down the street. Another glance around told me that the remaining gang members were likewise decamping at best speed. I didn't really blame them; after the show I'd put on with Inago, I really doubted they wanted to push me at that moment. I'd not want to push me at the moment.

"Well, crap." Aegis' voice startled me for a moment. "I thought you were scary before." I swivelled one eye his way, noting that Panacea was standing beside him, and let my teeth show for a moment in my version of a grin. He grinned back and indicated where Roadhog and the giant robot had been. "I'm pretty sure they'll both be changing their underwear when they get back to base."

Vicky snickered, and I echoed her. The imagery was kinda funny. She looked up at me, while leaning against my shoulder in a familiar fashion. "So, I'm gonna take a stab in the dark here and guess that you got kinda mad when you were fighting him?"

Twisting my neck, I looked down at myself. Compared to her, I realised, I was kind of on the large side. At least twice as long as our car, I figured, and tall enough that even Aegis only came up to my lower chest. Nodding my head, I chirped in the affirmative, then shrugged. Fighting someone like that, what can I do?

"So wait, you don't normally get this big?" Aegis looked up at me, with something approaching respect in his voice. "I guess you scale up according to the threat you're facing?" Looking down at Inago's unconscious body—still missing an arm—he nodded slowly. "Seeing how powerful he is, I'm kinda not surprised you got this big this fast."

"Can I see, please?" Amy stepped forward, hands twitching as she reached out toward me then pulled back again. "You're a lot bigger than you and Vicky described. I mean, wow."

I gave her another wyvern-grin and an agreeable chirp, then extended a wing toward her. She took hold of it, her eyes widening as she stared at nothing. "Wow," she breathed. "Wow. Your whole system's reshaped itself on the fly to be more efficient at the larger size. I can't believe … wow. How hot is your flame, now?"

I gave her a helpless shrug. Not only could I not talk, but I had zero idea about how to measure the heat of something that could melt concrete and slag Tinkertech weapons. All I knew was that it was hot enough. Also, I had no idea where the cone of flame had come from, but it had definitely been handy against Inago's weird bug-swarm.

"I got a better question." Vicky's grin was downright mischievous. "Where's your costume?"

The answer was simple: 'gone'. As the first PRT van screeched to a halt, I closed my eyes and covered my face with my wing.

This day was just getting better and better.

Part 13