The Next Page 4

“Well, that didn’t go so badly,” Alex said with a nervous chuckle, once the three youngsters had entered the library. Dru spun quickly and glared at him. “Okay, okay,” the hyper-intelligent boy said, raising his hands in surrender, “I stand corrected.”

“Let him be, Dru,” Lincoln said dryly. “He’s not at fault here.”

The goth girl’s expression softened. “I know,” she said, giving Alex a half smile to ease his nerves.

“If you do,” replied Lincoln, “why didn’t you stand up to those rotten bullies back there?”

Dru’s expression hardened once again. “Oh, I have my times,” she said darkly. “Don’t for a moment think they’re off the hook, simply because I laughed and did nothing. Oh, I’ll get my pound of flesh, I will. But these things take planning.”

“How much time do you need to plan such things?” Alex asked. “A day? A week?”

“A week is the shortest, and for someone who just pissed me off a bit,” replied Dru, idly watching her fingernails as they pulsated with an ominous red light. “No, theirs will be longer.”

“What’s the longest you’ve ever taken to execute a revenge plot?” Lincoln asked, curious as to how one week would be too short to plan come-uppance.

“Five years, and the local newspaper carried it.”

There was silence, as the boys looked at Dru and then one another. “Come on then,” the girl said, smiling uncharacteristically brightly, “we’ve got city-keeping to perform.”

“Remind me never to get into her bad books,” Lincoln muttered to Alex, as they tailed Dru.

“Speaking of books,” came the reply, “can’t you use your powers to arrange books and stuff? Something to make our work quicker?”

“Been training that,” Lincoln replied. “But I’ve been putting more effort into another technique I just learned.”

Before Alex could ask what it was, the librarian, a perpetually scowling fellow, rounded on the three teenagers. “This library is not for idle talk. Get to work.”

Just then, in walked the three bullies, talking at the tops of their lungs and laughing loudly. The librarian paid them no heed, perhaps because the person who walked in after them was one of the biggest names in superhero lore in town: Monolith.

More people knew Monolith’s codename than they knew his real name, but he was probably the most popular person in the city. “Apologies for the noise of my protégés,” he said to the librarian, who smiled fawningly. Dru made a retching sound.

Lincoln looked at Alex. They were probably thinking the same thing. Not only did those bullies have the cool powers, now someone as iconic as Monolith was supervising them. “Why do some people get everything…”

The words stuck in Alex’s throat, as a tall, thin man with snow-colored hair, holding an ornate staff, walked into the library.

“Wizard!” Monolith yelled, springing at him. The thin man held up his staff, and Monolith was sent flying back by an unseen force to smash into a large bookshelf behind which he disappeared.

“You might have noticed,” Wizard said menacingly, as all the doors and windows of the library snapped shut with a loud click, “that my powers seem to have improved. You would all be wise to do as I say. And don’t bother screaming, your voices cannot be heard over the hermetic seals of the electronic locks which were installed on the doors and windows of this place.

Now, I hear there’s a copy of the Codex Magica in this place. Where is it?”

To be continued...

Thanks for coming!

That little boy,

@pearlumie