Thoom after thoom.

Big enough to detonate whole worlds.

“Bella!” Mrs. Wall raised her voice. “Look at me!”

“No,” Bella protested, pulling her wrist free of the man’s hand.

Movement and the sound from her lips. She felt vibrations and thrumming and potential, like drumsticks raised high.

She hummed to herself for a second, moving her hand like she would when she stuck it out the car window.

“Bella!”

“No!” she cried out, with more force, swinging her hand down. She felt the impact as the power settled. Saw it like a ‘No!’ shaped shimmer that went down from her hand, like she’d thrown a snowball straight into the floor. Muted and blunt, like the head of a hammer. It didn’t feel like enough.

Something bigger.

“Cracka-Thoom!”

⊙

Finale, Now

She faced a crowd of people who wanted to kill her. A crowd of people who wanted to hurt her. Who wanted to take away one of the only things she was good at.

She had three, and being a cape was another one, according to the others. Drumming was another, except she wasn’t allowed when Caryatid had a migraine. Then there was dancing, which she had just started, and liked only because Withdrawal liked it and it was something she could do without bothering Caryatid.

Focus, she thought.

A lot of this stuff scared her. But these were people without powers.

People without powers who had gathered up to seventy or eighty in number, pushing past the barricades and defense. Some where trying to get by to the portal or demand things ‘get moving along’. But some were meaner and uglier. They wanted to hurt her and her friends.

“Blip, boop, bosh, blip, bosh,” she said each word with emphasis. Fingers flicked out, index and middle fingers extended. She visualized throwing ice cream cones with each ‘blip’ and a snowball with each ‘bosh’.

Lining them up, keeping track of order. Visualizing…

It was very easy to visualize.

“Stand down!” Fume Hood called out.

“Fuck you!”

There had been three with weapons so far. Two knives, one gun. It was scary, because there were so many of them who had slipped past the men in uniform that it was hard to make them all stop. It was the kind of mess where she could deal with two and a third would get close enough she had to physically push him away. So far, none of the ones who had gotten close had been armed, but they had tried to grab her.

“Called for backup!” the captain called out. “They said no.”

“No!?” Fume Hood asked, incredulous.

“Things are tied up elsewhere. Riots, refugees refusing to cooperate.”

“Is it a power?” Withdrawal asked.