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“I–I put my scarf on that wound on his arm,” she said. Then she glanced over her shoulder at the wizard and whispered, “He’s got a gun. Aren’t you afraid?”
Ah, so that’s what that funny hand position was about. He’d conjured an illusion of a gun and was “holding” it. I didn’t see illusions, so I just saw his hand bent in a way that looked very uncomfortable. “I don’t think he’ll shoot us,” I whispered to the woman.
Just then, she ducked and screamed, and the deliveryman jerked as though he was reacting to something loud or frightening, I turned to see the wizard holding his gun hand out in front of him, like he was taking aim. “Next one won’t miss,” he said, breathing heavily.
“Oh, did you shoot?” I asked. “I didn’t notice.” He frowned and brought his gun hand up to his face, inspecting it. I shrugged and went back to the injured man.
I carefully peeled back the scarf—which had a designer logo and probably cost more than my entire outfit—and saw that the gash on the man’s arm was bloody, but not deep and not bleeding badly enough to be life-threatening. I wouldn’t have to stretch my first-aid knowledge to play medic. “The bleeding seems to have slowed, so I’m not going to put much pressure on it, in case there’s some glass in the wound,” I said, making my voice calm and reassuring. I wrapped the wound in gauze and handed the scarf to the woman. “Soak it in cold water, and the blood should come out,” I told her. “If that doesn’t work, try club soda.”
“I don’t know what happened,” the deliveryman mumbled groggily. “I just suddenly went through the glass door.”
“Someone must have pushed you,” I said as I bandaged the other cuts on his arms and legs. Considering the amount of glass he’d gone through, I thought he was extremely lucky not to have a severed artery.
That part of my mission dealt with, I tried to think of something I could do to distract the wizard. He was obviously disconcerted by my arrival—pacing anxiously, his hands shaking, and his shoulders twitching—but since Owen and Mack hadn’t yet stormed the place, I figured he wasn’t distracted enough.
The wizard loomed over me. “How did you—” he began, then shook his head. “Why are you –”
“I told you, I’m a medic,” I said, standing up and facing him. “There’s an injured man here. You may be willing to sit around all day, but I figure he appreciates the help. It would be even better if you’d let him go as a sign of good faith. They might be less likely to shoot you as a way of resolving this.”
“They can’t shoot me,” he said, rolling his eyes.
“Oh, okay,” I said in the exaggeratedly soothing tone you use with crazy people. “But what are your plans? I mean, you’re not going to spend the rest of your life here. You’d run out of food. And, believe me, they’re not getting bored out there. They’re not going to just wander off when the game comes on and let you sneak away.”
“Shut up!” he screamed, pointing his non-gun finger at me. I felt a wave of magic, but it didn’t do anything to me. He frowned at his finger and gave it an “is this thing on?” shake before whirling to point it at the older man. The older man’s eyes went glassy, then he squawked like a chicken.
“Father!” the young woman cried out, rushing to his side.
The wizard turned back to me. His breaths came faster and more shallow. If he kept this up, I wouldn’t have to worry about a distraction because he’d pass out. To help that along, I said, “You do know the Special Situations squad is out there, right? You don’t want to go up against them. They can handle all kinds of stuff, if you know what I mean, and I’m pretty sure you do.” I hoped he wouldn’t know I’d made that up.
He raised his imaginary gun at me and braced it with his other hand. “Shut up! You don’t know anything! I’m more powerful than everyone out there!”
“Everyone?” I asked, raising an eyebrow and allowing myself the slightest hint of a smile. “Really? Are you sure about that?”
“I’m not talking about guns!”
“Neither am I.”
His eyes went so wide, they seemed to be mostly whites, and his breathing sped up to sharp little pants. Momentarily forgetting his hostages, he turned to look out the window, and I figured that was my chance.
I spun with a high kick, hitting his hands and, I hoped, knocking away the imaginary gun. He knew the gun was just an illusion, but the other hostages didn’t. The older man threw himself on the floor, grabbing thin air and then holding his hands up as though aiming at the wizard. While the wizard was still shaking his hands and cursing, I dove at him in a flying tackle that would have made my brothers proud, knocking him to the ground and digging a knee into his stomach. Okay, Owen, is that enough distraction for you? I thought.
It must have been, for a moment later, the door flew open and Owen and Mack ran into the shop, both of them wearing official-looking police jackets. At the same time, two other guys wearing FBI jackets burst in through a back door. Both of them held their wrists up, showing wide rubber bands like those fundraising and disease-awareness bracelets. They weren’t carrying guns, which led me to believe that they weren’t real FBI agents. They looked more like TV FBI agents. That or the Swedish water polo team. They were blond, and brawny, with toothpaste-commercial smiles.
The non-FBI guys seemed surprised to see Owen, Mack, and me. For a moment, they lost their pretense of authority as they looked at each other in confusion. “How did you get in here?” one of them blurted before the other could elbow him in the ribs and give him a stern shake of the head.
The second man then glared at Owen and Mack. “We’ll take over here,” he said. “FBI. I think we outrank you local guys.”
“It’s not your jurisdiction,” Mack said.
“It’s part of an ongoing investigation,” the fake FBI guy shot back.
His partner cleared his throat and said, “I think they know what we are. I recognize them. One of them’s with the Council and the other one is that Palmer guy from MSI.”
“What the heck?” muttered our suspect, and I remembered that I was still sitting on him. I figured I was light enough that it wouldn’t kill him if I stayed there until we worked all this out.
“Since you seem to know who we are, who, exactly, are you? You’re obviously not FBI,” Owen said.
“We’re here to help,” one of the blond guys said. “We were able to get through the barrier with these.” He pointed to his rubber bracelet. “So we thought we’d help with the situation.”
