I flew at him before he could do whatever he planned to do to the others, my aura down. A hand came up, intercepting me, and I hit it. The building creaked and crumbled as hands twisted and wrenched at wood to maintain his position. He turned his attention back to me.

Another swipe of the hands. I flew down, away from the direction of the swipe, and again, something collided with me, knocking me downward at an angle this time.

“Looksee,” I said.

“Mm?” was the response, small and emotional.

She’d seen Rain.

“Can your cameras see—”

I flew to evade as the hands moved. They weren’t moving my way, but to get him oriented, as he closed on the others. I changed course, flying more toward Cradle himself.

Two hands came up, one to either side of Cradle himself, as if they were going to slam together, catching me in the middle.

They didn’t. I hit something, a field or barrier between the hands. It didn’t hit the Wretch so much as it dashed the Wretch to pieces, with me bouncing fifteen or twenty feet back. The hands came after me, and I flew to evade.

“Can you see what he’s doing?” I asked.

“I think so,” Looksee said. “I need the projector disc, and you need to connect it to my camera, it’s easy to do, and I need to get it ready.”

Operator Red had exited out the far end of the building, and was circling around. I wondered if Capricorn’s power had given him pause. Chris was only just now going out the door that the others had left by. He had the cloth bundle with his boxes and things.

A… mess of emergency measures, it looked like, for a boy who thought he might fall apart with any transformation, but who had no choice but to transform.

I had to get past Cradle to get to him, and I had to get to him to get the projector.

Sveta hauled Rain a distance off to one side, his back to her chest as she used herself almost as a sled, for the easier ride. She pulled herself to a fence.

I could see Cradle’s thought process, as he considered going after her, as he turned his mind to the others—to Vista, to Capricorn, and more specifically, to Chris.

The hand came down, a good distance from Chris. Chris, a mound of armored, furred flesh, hopped, ducking and rolling, as the entire area around him was demolished. Dirt and soil became a cloud of particles and mud, as something smashed into it and sent the destroyed ground up ten feet in the air.

And as it settled, splattering against one outside corner of the barn, and everything around them, Chris was there, moving slower than an ordinary person might run, with short, heavy running steps.