by Jester Joker
They don't get very far before Will runs out in front of the car. The girl's driving, and she veers so sharply to avoid him that she ends up with the car perfectly perpendicular to the center line. It's a narrow street with cars parked on both sides, so there's little room for maneuvering. She's basically trapped. Way to go, Will!
Unfortunately, he ruins the good will I have toward him right away. "Villains, prepare to be SNAPPED and BURNED!" Even I have to cringe. At least he didn't call them "evildoers"... yet.
I jog on over so I'm on one side of the car and Will's on the other. Analyze the situation, I say to myself: girl at the steering wheel, engine still running; one guy in the front seat next to her, one guy in the back behind her. Neither were wearing seat belts, so they're a little discombobulated by the sharp turn and stop.
I aim the nuzzle at the guy in the back. Not very big, but very young... they're all just kids. WE are all just kids here.
"Okay now, nice and easy, out of the car with your hands where I can see them," I say, keeping my voice calm and level, like the heroes always do in the movies. The guy in the back raises his hands, but I get a feeling he won't be doing this easy.
Sure enough, his plan springs into action. He opens and kicks his door out, trying to get it to hit me. Only I wasn't standing close enough to it, so it flies out then flies back and hits him in the leg. Right on the shin. Ow. I actually feel for him when he shouts in pain.
"Now that we've got that out of the way, let's go to Plan B: stepping out nice and easy." I look at the two in the front. The girl's gripping the wheels extremely tight and looking straight ahead rather than at me. Her knuckles are white. I address them after the guy in back finally steps out. "You too, Bonnie and Clyde. Move slowly and easily, and it'll be better for all of us."
The guy in front has other ideas. He shouts out, "The Vertigo Man does not go quietly!" What the fuck is this, a Max Fleischer cartoon? He pulls himself through the passenger window and climbs to the car's hood. He looks down at me, like he's daring me to try something. Whatever.
"Will, you take that one." What happens next happens so fast... but none too smooth. Here's basically all I see: a blur climbs the car, the 'Vertigo Man' panics and almost falls over to the ground but manages to stay atop the hood, and suddenly Will's flying over me at top speed. I duck instinctively and hear a collision behind me. When I turn around, I see a piss-yellow car with a huge dent in the side that probably wasn't there before, and Will's stumbling like a drunken sailor.
The rest of us all freeze for a moment. The girl still isn't looking in this direction. I don't know what to say.
Finally, the guy on the ground asks Vertigo Man, "Dude, what did you just do?"
Vertigo Man, for his part, seems just as shocked. "I-I don't know! Motherfucker moved so fast, and I just kind of... you think he's dead?" Kind of a stupid question, since Will's trying to stand up, but the kid's a little shaken up, so I won't hold it against him.
"Don't worry, he'll be fine. He only hit his head," I say, trying to relax my muscles a bit and finding the trigger again. "But let's stop this before somebody does something that can't be taken back. Just surrender now so nobody else gets hurt." Not easy to bargain when the more powerful member was just taken out of the equation, but I've been told I can be quite intimidating, even without any weapon in my hands.
Vertigo Man looks at his accomplice, who looks at me. "Uh... we kind of can't do that," he says.
I show them I'm getting angry. "Fine, let's do this the hard way," I say. I squeeze the trigger and the flame emerges, just enough to be menacing. The kid yelps a little and flicks his wrist and... suddenly the flame is out. I squeeze the trigger harder, and still nothing. What the fuck?
"I didn't know you could do that!" Vertigo Man says from the hood. This is just fucking great. We're getting owned by two guys who clearly don't know what they're doing and a chick who may as well be comatose.
"I don't need any damn gun, I'll just take care of you two myself," I snarl. The kid on the ground clearly ain't a fighter because he immediately runs around to the other side of the car when I advance toward him. Fine. Vertigo Man seems to be a bigger threat anyway, so I start to climb the back of the car.
When I lift my foot to put on the back bumper, however, the car is suddenly no longer underneath me, and the world feels like its spinning. Desperately, I try to grab on to something around me, but it feels like I'm in limbo or something. I move my arms to brace my fall, only to feel something smack my forehead hard. I'm seeing stars. Am I on the ground or floating? I can't tell anymore.
Something rolls me over, or pulls me somewhere, or does something I can't quite figure out, and I hear some quick shuffling of feet, some car doors open and close, and eventually something drives away. There is ground underneath me, I decide. It's kind of warm. Pleasant warmth.
An unseen force pulls me up, and my feet are kind of underneath me. I feel an arm around my back and trying to support me under my shoulder. I think a voice asks if I'm all right. After a couple seconds I decide the floating voice might want an answer.
"I'll be okay," I mumble. "I only hit my head." Then the world spins again and goes black.