Heroine Complex (7 page)

My palm sweat spiked in temperature, a jolt of heat, bright and burning and hot . . . hot, hot, hot, way too fucking hot . . .
hot
 . . .

Flame shot out of my hand in a blur of orange and red and yellow, whizzing across the room with a mighty
whoosh
, and obliterating the Aveda statue demons one by one:
Bam! Bam! Bam!

The demons exploded, but the fire kept going, crashing into the
actual
Aveda statue.

Baaaaaaaaam!

It went up in flames, the chemical-heavy scent of plastic drenching the air.

I braced myself for the screams. The stampede toward
the door. The feeling of helplessness I was all too familiar with.

But then the flames disappeared in a puff of white mist and Lucy emerged from behind the remnants of the statue, clutching a fire extinguisher.

“What . . .” Her lacy dress was tangled around her legs. And her eyes were full of terror.

“Lucy . . .” I whispered.

But it was lost in the din that started as a slow clap and built into genuine applause. Bea sagged more heavily against me, snoring in earnest.

I glanced up at the ceiling. The portal flattened into a line and winked out of sight.

“Holy cats!” shrieked Maisy. “Is that a new power?”

“I'm tweeting it!” yelled Hair Doppelganger.

“You shouldn't do that before Aveda's ready to answer the fourteen kazillion inevitable questions!” countered Giant Dude.

“Which she'll be doing in my gosh-dang exclusive interview!” interjected Maisy. “Isn't that right, Aveda?”

As they all continued to shout and murmur and buzz, I said nothing, my gaze still locked with Lucy's. Bea chose that moment to start awake.

“Mmm,” she snuffled, rubbing her cheek against my shoulder. She raised her head and squinted.

“Wha' happened?” she slurred. Her eyes sharpened as she took in the smoke lingering in the air and the charred remains of the Aveda statue. A bit of sobriety crept into her gaze. “What did Evie burn down
this
time?”

AVEDAPOCALYPSE!

Who's the New Girl on Fire?

by Maisy Kane, Bay Bridge Kiss Editrix

Aveda Jupiter never received the key to the city at tonight's shindig . . . but as it turns out, sweet 'Friscans, she had a big surprise for us! Apparently, the beloved Daughter of San Francisco can make FIRE. Like, with her HANDS.

No word on whether this is a new development or merely a trick A chose not to bust out 'til this very moment (and really, Aveda-girl, you couldn't give your pal Maisy a heads up?), but rest assured I'll be the first to know. And you, dear readers, will be the second!

Sadly for us, this means we may now have to share our glorious superheroine with the rest of the world. I mean, yes, non-Bay-Area-ers are familiar enough with A as a kickass local demon slayer, but I can't help but think having a show-offy new superpower—a superpower so obviously better and stronger than any we've seen before—puts her in the running for International Celeb status.

In other words? This changes everything.

Shasta's Corner! Shasta (Maisy's bestie) here. Want to look as cool as Aveda? Then check out Pussy Queen's brand-new selection of corsets. Fire power not included. Haha. (Editrix's Note: Shast, when you actually write out “haha,” it kills the gosh-dang joke.)

“OFF, OFF . . .
get it
off
!”

The fingers of my right hand clawed at my back as I burst into Jupiter HQ, trying to free myself from the corset. An errant curl fell over my eyes. Three hours were up and my glamour had worn off.

“Evie, love. Hold still and we'll get it off!”

Lucy trailed behind me, dragging half-conscious Bea with her. I motored into the foyer, the force of my stomping feet sending one of the gear-like buttons from my boots to the hardwood floor with a
clang
. But even the sheer realness of that sound wasn't enough to bring me back to Earth.

Scott was waiting for us in the foyer, his usually relaxed shoulders rigid with tension. I stopped abruptly, sending another button to the floor.
Clang
.

“What are you doing here?” I gasped. “And how could you—”

“I'm sorry.” He held up his hands in placation. “We left the liquor cabinet unlocked. And Bea took advantage. And then climbed out her bedroom window.”

Shit. In my overeagerness to squelch Anxiety Ball, I had forgotten to relock the liquor cabinet. So this fiasco was my fault.

“I came over to see if I could help,” he said.

You could've helped earlier,
I thought.
Why wouldn't
you try that damn spell? I've begged you to for years and it might've stopped me from . . . from . . .

I tamped down on my rising anger, hauled Bea from Lucy's grasp, and shoved her at Scott. “Take her. Patch up her knee and put her in one of the upstairs bedrooms and go home. We'll talk later.”

I brushed past him and marched toward Aveda's bedroom. My breathing sped up as my brain cycled through an array of horrifying thoughts.

What if Lucy hadn't been there? What if the statue had been bigger? What if there had been more demons? Whatifwhatifwhatif.

By the time I flung open the door of Aveda's bedroom, my breath was coming and going in shallow gasps—the gasps of someone who was being slowly but surely buried alive.

“Aveda,” I wheezed.

She was perched on the bed, ensconced in her mountain of pillows, her face lit by the glow of the iPad in her hands. Nate was leaning against the dresser, his expression flummoxed, as if he couldn't begin to comprehend what had just happened.

I couldn't, either.

When Aveda saw me, her eyes went wide and shiny.

“Evie,” she breathed. “My brilliant, beautiful Evie. The tweets and Facebook posts about your little adventure are uh . . . may . . . zing.” She beamed at me. “You finally embraced your true self. And at just the right moment. I know you've always been a little shy about the whole ‘I have an insane fire power that could potentially kill millions' thing, but—”

“Whoa,” Lucy said. I'd forgotten she was right behind me. “Hold the flippin' phone. You have what, now?”

“What did you think that was, Luce?” I croaked. “Cheap-ass memorabilia doesn't spontaneously combust like that.”

“My special collector's edition life-size replica statue
was cheap?” Aveda said. “We're going to have to speak to the manufacturer about that.”

“Let's get back to the matter at hand.” Nate pushed off from the dresser and started pacing the room. “Evie, Aveda said you would explain all of this?”

He turned to face me, his harsh features morphing into something that resembled concern. On him, it looked really fucking weird.

The absurdity of the night hit me full force and a hysterical laugh rose in my throat. I squelched it, but the effort forced my breath out in gasps again. I could only choke out a squeak expressing my most primal desire.

“Off.”

Nate crossed the room in two strides, wrapped one of his giant hands around my corset ribbons, and yanked. I heard the satin rip and then suddenly, miraculously, the corset was on the floor and I was gulping precious oxygen into my lungs. The flouncy white blouse billowed around my torso. I breathed so deeply I started to get light-headed and felt myself tipping forward.

“Hey.” Nate grabbed my elbow. My air-deprived brain focused on his hand, warm and solid. I unclenched my fists. I needed to calm down. Where the hell was my Soothing Inner Voice?

“An explanation would be good, love,” Lucy said gently.

“Okay,” I said, my breathing slowly returning to normal. “Okay.”

I removed my elbow from Nate's grasp and hobbled over to Aveda, perching myself on the foot of her bed. I glanced at her out of the corner of my eye, wondering if she'd help me with this explanation. But she was too busy scrolling through her Twitter feed.

“Incredible,” she murmured. “The pictures of you—er, me—all lit up have already gone viral.”

So I was on my own then.

I folded my hands in my lap, focusing on taking deep breaths.

“It's like Aveda said,” I began. “I have an insane fire power. That could potentially kill millions.”

I lowered my eyes to my lap, not wanting to witness the inevitable horror that was surely dawning on their faces.

“I got it when Aveda and Scott got their powers,” I continued. “Back when the first portal opened. It didn't seem serious at first. There were a few . . . minor incidents.” I twisted my fingers together, calling up the memories. “I figured out it was tied to moments when I would have these big, crazy bursts of emotion. And so I decided I would just not have those feelings anymore.”

“You stopped feeling?” Lucy said, her voice skeptical.

“Sort of.” I still couldn't look at them. “I mean, I am Asian. We know from emotional repression. It worked out pretty well. Until grad school. And Richard.”

“Guh, Richard.” Aveda chose that moment to interject. “He was such a . . . dick.”

“Yes.” Our eyes met and I couldn't help but exchange a wry smile with her. “I remember that being your pet joke. In any case, he was also my professor slash secret boyfriend in my Gender Archetypes in Modern Cinema class.”

My eyes drifted to my lap again. I could practically feel Nate and Lucy's judgmental eyes boring into my bowed head. I powered forward, trying to get through the story.

“We had a moment over my paper on the female power dynamics in
Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon
. One thing led to another and . . . well. Anyway. As it turned out, Aveda was right about his dickishness. He was also boning a whole cross-section of faculty and fellow students on the side. Until the day I caught him and Ms. Clarion, the too-cool-for-school Human Sexuality
professor, doing it behind a stack of encyclopedias in the campus library.”

“Human Sexuality?” Lucy murmured. “Really?”

I gave her a look.

“Sorry,” she said. “It's kind of on the nose.”

“When I saw them, I felt this stab of rage. More than a stab. Like a full-body feeling. Like I couldn't see anything else, couldn't feel anything except this soul-deep throb of pure mad.”

I clenched my fists in my lap. I didn't like what came next.

“Before I knew what was happening, fire was shooting out of my hands and destroying the shelf behind their heads.”

I uncurled my hands, forcing them to slacken.

“No one was killed, but . . . but people got hurt. A few of them had to go to the hospital. There was running and screaming and everyone was so terrified . . .” I shook my head, trying to erase the images. “The library burned to the ground. I knew I had to leave school. I had no idea what to do next. I was lost and scared and I showed up on Aveda's doorstep later that night in hysterics. She calmed me down and she offered to let me work for her.” Recalling that moment, I felt a small rush of warmth. “She saved me.”

Aveda perked up, smiling benevolently from behind the iPad. “That was before I had actual staff,” she mused. “Evie was my first.”

“I've kept my fire under control since then,” I continued. “There have been little flare-ups, but nothing like that. Nothing for the past three years. I made my life ordered. I never allowed myself to get stressed or upset. Not until tonight.”

I looked up, searching their faces. Nate's expression was hooded, revealing nothing. Lucy, on the other hand . . . her eyes were wide and she was trying to hide how unsure she was. I knew that look, but it had never
been aimed in my direction before. It was for demons. For girls who blatantly copied her signature fashion. For outsiders.

“This power,” Nate said, his voice thoughtful, “do you know the exact moment it triggers, once you have this so-called ‘big, crazy burst of emotion' or—”

“Oh, no.” I held up a warning finger. “You are not turning me into a science project. We're going to focus on fixing this situation. Oh, and we'll need to see if the cleanup crew made it to Whistles post-portal.” I'd been freaking out too hard to even think about checking in with Rose. I had no idea if she'd hung out long enough to witness the craziness. I frowned, a stray thought worming its way through my panic.

“There was something weird about the demons tonight,” I said.

“Weird how?” Nate said.

“It was the way they moved. Or didn't move.” I shook my head in frustration, trying to put it into words. “They were slow. Lurchy. Bea's knee was bleeding and they didn't immediately swarm us.”

Nate's brow crinkled. “But they kept moving toward you, yes?”

“Yes. I mean, they were still obviously attracted to the blood, but they weren't as fast as they usually are.”

“Perhaps it had something to do with the composition and weight of the statues they imprinted on,” he said. “If they were moving as a statue might move—”

“But the demons always move the same way,” I interrupted. “You might not be a aware of that since you're never on the scene with us, but—”

“People!” Aveda snapped her fingers. “Let's not get distracted. We need to discuss our course of action.”

“Right.” I stood up and folded my hands in front of me, trying to make my tone as brisk and businesslike and personal-assistant-y as possible. “This isn't so bad. I'll draft a press release saying that this was a
fluke—some kind of power surge—and then we'll call Mercedes—”

“No,” Aveda said. “Really, Evie, you're missing the most obvious plan of attack.”

“Which is . . . ?”

“Look!” Aveda shoved the iPad in my face. The screen displayed her Facebook fanpage. She pointed to a new thread of comments.

“Aveda: You lit a fire under my heart!”

“Kewl new POWER . . . what else can it do?”

“That was fierce, Firestarter!”

“You may have gotten the supervillain power of the lot,” Aveda said. “But look what happens when you let loose. We get headlines. And not just on Maisy's blog.” She smiled at the iPad screen. “I'm getting new Facebook fans from all over the world.”

She lowered the iPad and scrutinized me for a long, uncomfortable moment. Her eyes took on a ferocious gleam.

“You have to keep pretending to be me,” she said. “At least until . . .”

I flapped my hands incredulously. “Until what?”

“Until I can get my own fire power, of course!” She smiled in a “that settles it” kind of way. “Mayor Mendoza just announced that he's rescheduled the key to the city ceremony for two months from now, and I figure I'll definitely be ready to go by then.”

“You can't just get one,” I sputtered. “They don't hand them out like free samples at Costco.”

“I'm aware that it might not be easy, but I'm sure I can accomplish anything I set my mind to,” Aveda said, steel creeping into her gaze. “It's just a matter of doing the work.”

I jerked my head at Nate. “Tell her! Tell her it's medically impossible to get your own fire power!”

But he just stared at me. His expression had gone all inscrutable again. I turned back to Aveda.

“And like I said, I can't call it up at will! I don't even know how it works!”

“You'll figure it out.”

“Aveda! This whole me-being-you thing was only supposed to happen one time. You promised—”

“And things have changed. It's like Maisy said: this changes
everything
. Imagine what I could do with a fire power. This could take the Aveda Jupiter brand to a whole new level, which, in the end, means heightened protection for the city and continued employment for all of us.” Aveda reached over and took my hand, her expression turning intense. “I know you can do this. Remember: you're my Michelle Yeoh. You don't need tears. You don't need anything except that incredibly powerful ability you've been suppressing for so long.”

She squeezed my hand, her gaze boring into me. When she'd called me Michelle earlier, it had been earnest, a genuine plea born of desperation. Now it seemed calculating, like she was thinking of what exactly she could say to get me to agree to this insanity.

“And remember, Evie: I've—”

“—always been there for me. I know.”

Oh, man, did I know. She was my oldest friend. She was my
Heroic Trio
compatriot. She had been there when I needed her.

And she sure as hell knew how to manipulate me.