Fenton squeezed his way through the crowd, and when he came out to the other side, he found Ace with a few of his teammates.

  Amy, Johnny, Sasha, Oz and Tetsuya were standing with him in the dark and dirty alleyway smelling of piss and beer. Fenton was about to yell at Acheus but held his tongue when he saw their grim faces.

  “What’s wrong,” Fenton asked.

  “Admin says they’re trying to target hospitals, and they sent all the four-star ability users,” Amy replied. “Since there’s not a lot of us who are that strong, we’re spread pretty thin.”

  “How can they attack the hospitals,” Ace asked. “All the shields in any town are centered around places like that. Why would they attack the hospitals?”

  “Because they can. It’s not any more complicated than that.”

  She adjusted her gun holster and ground her teeth, trying her hardest to not show how scared she was. The fact that the enemy might have the technology to break through their plasma shields was terrifying enough. Their intel told them that the threat against the local hospitals was very real, but how they would get to them, no one knew.

  “Stick to basics,” Sasha assured her. “We win.”

  “Their bombs can’t get past plasma shields. It’s impossible,” Fenton told her.

  “Are you sure,” she asked. “I-“

  Everyone flinched.

  The cold, crisp air suddenly felt hot, thick, and humid. The pressure dropped and everything went dim. They all felt the air being sucked out of their lungs and the color ripped out of their souls, the world now in greyscale.

  The only sounds that could be heard were their breathing, raspy and terrified.

  The soundtrack of reality began again when people started screaming. As a wave of color brought back new life into the world, a glowing figure grew in the street. People tried to escape, some of them pushing into the alleyways, but many didn’t make it.

  The heavy weight of the bright figure crushed those that weren’t fast enough to escape. Their screams were silenced and replaced by the shrieking sounds of metal emitting from the cars. The burnt cars were pushing up against it, emitting sparks and spilling gasoline everywhere.

  “It’s just like before, on the ship. Why is this one so big,” Amy asked Ace.

  “I don’t know!?”

  “Then do something,” she pleaded.

  Ace looked at his wrist to ask Invictus a question.

  He wasn’t there.

  “Where’s my bracelet!?!”

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  “He uh… he said he needed some space or whatever,” Fenton said.

  “So now, now of all times, he wants to give me privacy,” Ace screamed. “Damn it!”

  Everyone looked up into the sky as the glowing object finally stopped its deathly light show. Steam flowed out from it, making everyone on the street’s mouth dry and skin tighten. The steam pushed out the disgusting smells of the city and warmed their shivering bodies, but what was left gave them more problems than a regular bomb.

  Ace and the others cautiously approached the object. From their perspective, it was a warm blue ball with weird brown splotches of various sizes. With apprehension Ace touched it, and immediately regretted it.

  “letmeout.hungry.letmeout.”

  He moved his hand away as if he burned himself and wiped his hand on his pants.

  “Why is it wet,” he groaned.

  “Wet egg,” Sasha confirmed.

  “This is an egg,” they all shouted.

  “Yes.”

  Everyone waited for an explanation, but Sasha didn’t say anything else. He shrugged and repeated himself.

  “Big…wet egg?”

  “Doesn’t matter how big this dumb egg is, I can smash it,” Johnny said with pride.

  “Don’t,” Sasha warned him. “Now angry wet egg.”

  Fenton scanned the object and it in fact was alive, and very angry. It’s aura was dark red and malicious, seeping into the ground. The more Fenton looked into it, the more his face twisted in horror.

  A loud crack echoed in the dark.

  “Get near me, now,” Fenton shouted.

  They didn’t need to be told twice.

  All six of them ran as fast as they could and stood around him in a circle. Fenton fell to the ground, closed his eyes and clutched his left hand. A protective, faint purple orb surrounded them. His Fealty Ring shone bright in the dark, and the others followed his lead.

  Ace watched in awe, seeing how far they had come. The past two years they spent reaching their physical limits or breaking past them. No longer was Team 57 disorganized but a well-oiled machine.

  Their bodies shone the same colors of their respective auras— purple, orange, pink, green, and blue. It wrapped around their bodies, snaking up their arms and floated up into the sky leaving only skintight armor, morphed onto their bodies as their regular clothes faded away into the ether.

  All their respective suits were tailored to their abilities, giving them various designs, but the strangest outfit of all was Oz’s. He had the least amount of protection, with his forearms, abdomen, and lowers legs exposed, leaving his body to face the elements.

  A giant piece of the egg’s shell flung out in their direction, and Oz left the safety of the shield, charging right into it.

  “What is he doing,” Ace shouted. “Is he some kind of masochist?”

  “Pretty much, yeah,” Fenton said.

  The egg shell piece, the size of a small fence, struck him in the stomach, knocking him off his feet. His entire abdomen was bruised, with a giant gash on his side, and he was out of breath. No one seemed concerned for his safety except Ace, who had never seen Oz use his powers before.

  “I just needed a little push is all,” Oz told Ace. “My own pain is far easier to use than those of others.”

  Oz outstretched his bloody hands in the sky, trembling, and a blackish-green miasma seeped out of his wounds. In short, raspy breaths, he mumbled a few words. To everyone else but Ace it sounded like complete gibberish.

  But Ace didn’t like that he understood the words that came out of his mouth.

  Oz said several words in Ionadian, perfectly, albeit with a strange accent. All of the words he said were about pain and suffering. As his ominous chants continued the cracks in the egg got bigger and bigger, and smaller pieces fell off, crashing into the street.

  “Bless me oh Lord, that I am alive to feel such pain.”

  The miasma grew and flew out of his wounds, wrapping itself around the egg in a matter of seconds. Everyone cheered and clapped but Oz wasn’t satisfied. It felt easy, too easy, especially since the egg suddenly stopped shaking once it was covered by his miasma.

  Sasha ran up next to him, and used his ability to communicate with the angry, wet, egg.

  “Father is coming,” Sasha said grimly. “We leave, now.”

  “What,” Oz asked. “This thing has a father?”

  “Everyone has father, Oz! Rudeness.”

  Oz looked bewildered, as everyone else did because of the immense communication barrier Sasha had with people, but none with animals.