On Sunday, February 27, Mrs. Oswald came home and found a very large tick in her backyard. The tick told her in a creepy voice that it was after her cats. She called the Guild. An hour later Eduardo arrived and killed the tick. Some people from the city—likely the Biohazard division of PAD—came and got the remains that night. The wolf griffin appeared on Monday morning. It was the size of a springer spaniel at first, and it ignored her and her two sons completely. It kept trying to claw its way into the house, but the bars held and the small beast didn’t seem like a terrible threat, so she’d called Eduardo again and gone to work. When she came home, the griffin was gone. Considering that the magic wave ended on Monday around nine in the morning, that wasn’t surprising. She thought Eduardo came out while she was at work and took care of it or that the wolf griffin flew away.

This morning when Mrs. Oswald was about to leave for work after a magic wave came, a much larger griffin swooped down on her and tried to maul her. She’d run back inside and called the Guild.

Watching it turn into a giant bug was too much for her.

“Can I use your phone to call Biohazard?!” I yelled over the roar of the enchanted water engine.

“Do what you need to do! I have my kids to take care of!”

Mrs. Oswald stepped on the gas and peeled out of the driveway like a bat out of hell. I went inside and checked the phone. Dial tone. Well, something had gone right for once. I dialed the Biohazard number from memory.

“Biohazard,” a gruff male voice said into the phone.

“My name’s Kate Daniels. I have a giant dead spider-scorpion thing on Chamblee Dunwoody Road. I need you to come and get it.”

“Sure,” the voice said. “Let me get right on that. You’re eighth in line. It will be twenty-four hours.”

“It’s an RM in a residential neighborhood.”

The phone went silent. “How bad?”

“It went from mammal to insect after death. The insect is ten feet long, not counting the legs.”

“Sit tight. We’ll be there in half an hour.”

Experience said it would be more like a couple of hours, but I would take what I could get. I dialed Cutting Edge. Derek answered, his voice raspy. “Cutting Edge.”

“Can you meet us here?” I gave him the address.

“I’m leaving now.”

“Thanks. Is Ascanio there?”

“Ready and willing,” Ascanio said into the phone.

“Call the Dunwoody Police Department for me and please check if there were any complaints against the Oswalds on Chamblee Dunwoody Road.” I gave him the address.

“Yes, Consort.”