Twenty-Three
Lana was quiet most of the drive over to the college campus. It was only when I was pulling around the long loop towards the main parking lot that she suddenly floated up to the front of the truck and waved her wand at the glove box.
It dropped down to reveal a small round device which was painfully familiar.
“Is that an Emitter?” I asked softly.
Lana used a pinch of magic to telekinetically yank it out of the glovebox and confirmed my suspicion with a dramatic little head nod. The dreaded Signal Emitter was completely busted open. A tangle of wires spilled out of its shell and it looked like a very angry fairy had ripped it apart with a flurry of spells.
“I tracked it down while you were busy with the tree. No need to thank me. Just doing my job,” she said sourly, floating up to the dashboard and glaring at the college’s massive library as we drove up to park before it.
“Her name is Autumn, and she’s not a tree. She’s a forest-spirit,” I corrected.
“She’s a whore.”
“Hey!”
“No. Introducing you to Autumn was my idea. She only did what I told her to do. It’s bad enough that she roped you into fucking her to get it done, but does she have to get all the credit, too? I’m the magical genius who told her how to craft the cure in the first place. Do you think she came up with that spell? No, I did! She spends all day in the park, smoking and ‘convening with nature.’ I’m the one who mastered the magical arts and coached her on how to make that ritual work. That was me.”
With her tiny little arms crossed, and the way her wings flicked up or down for emphasis on every couple syllables, I was really struggling to take her seriously as I parked the truck and listened to the tiniest tantrum on the planet. As a result, her words took an extra second to wash over me before they fully registered.
“Wait, so her fucking me was your idea?”
Lana sighed explosively. “No. My idea was for her to use geothermal energy from the hot springs down south. Fucking you was her genius contribution to my idea. Bitch.”
I shook my head. “Honestly Lana I’m not really sure I understand where your attitude is coming from with this. You’ve been pissy ever since you saw me with Selene, you’re all up in arms over this thing with Autumn, but why? I’m confused. It’s not like they’re taking something from you. If you’re jealous of them for having sex with me, I don’t really know how to help you. It’s not like the two of us getting together was ever an option. You’re what, four inches tall? No offense, but my dick is over twice the size of your entire body.”
Lana took a full step back, recoiling in shock. “I-I’m five inches tall, first of all.”
I shrugged. “My statement stands.”
“And secondly…is the size difference the only reason you’re not interested in sleeping with me?”
I glanced out at the college campus we were about to raid. “Uh, I mean, we’re a little busy at the moment saving the world and all. Not really the right time for a quickie even if you were the appropriate size.”
Lana turned her back on me, making me think that I’d said the wrong thing.
After a second she turned back, wiping a tear from her eye and looking determined. “You’re right. We have a world to go save. I’m sorry for getting all emotional. Who you fuck is your business. It was wrong of me to…presume. Let’s go kick some ass.”
I shook my head. “Slight correction. I’ll be kicking the ass. Your job is to stay back and not get hurt. No offense, you seem really intelligent with your magic, that cure wouldn’t be possible without you, but in combat you’re not exactly a powerhouse.”
Lana’s eyes narrowed and her wings fluttered, raising her up off the dashboard. She drew a second wand into her other hand and the tiniest little smirk played across her face. “You’ve got me all wrong, Ryan. This whole time I’ve been holding back, trying to be a team player, trying to impress you with how well I fit in with Euna and the others. Clearly that’s not the right way to get your attention.” Her head rotated to look at the campus. “Let’s go take out this necromancer. Keep track of how many undead you kill, Ryan. We’re making this a competition.”
“Oh?” I asked, intrigued.
“Oh, yeah. If you kill more undead than me, I’ll leave you alone for good and stop bugging you so much. But if I get more kills, you have to promise to sleep with me. Do you consent to my terms?”
“Still don’t see how that’ll work,” I admitted, reluctant to agree.
“You let me worry about that. Take the size factor out of the equation. Just see me and tell me if you think I’m hot enough to earn a slot on your roster.” She gave a little twirl and showed off her tiny booty.
I mean, she was hot, don’t get me wrong. And the whole bikini armor thing that the fairies from her world had going on worked wonders to show off just how hot she was. Maybe a little itty bitty in the titty department, but she had a cute little dump truck of an ass that balanced things out nicely. But she was also…tiny.
“Look, whatever. You figure out the size difference thing, then fine, I agree to your terms. But there’s no way you’re going to get more kills than me.”
Lana giggled. “Try to keep up,” she flirted, and suddenly she zipped out of the truck and was halfway towards the nearest building. Seriously, she was fast.
“Oh shit,” I cracked open the truck door and ran after her at top speed.
-
I ran out into the center of the Eastport College Campus to find Lana resting on the outstretched hand of the statue rising over the central fountain. Dozens of zombies lay all around the grounds. Tiny needle-thin crystals were embedded in all of their skulls, and the entire scene was a gory mess.
“My count’s forty-eight. What’s yours?” She asked gleefully.
“Uh…zero. I just got here,” I said warily.
“Uh-oh. That’s no way to win a bet, slowpoke. Better hurry up then, huh?”
My eyes narrowed. “Where was all this when we were fighting the chimera?”
Lana rolled her eyes. “I thought you’d want to feel useful. So I figured I’d make myself seem small and fragile. I saw how deeply you cared for Euna, and I thought maybe I could coax the same sort of response out of you. Clearly I misread the situation.”
“Euna pulls her weight. She’s an asset to my team. You…” I glanced around at the nearly fifty dropped zombies in complete bewilderment, “you let us take unnecessary risks when it was well within your power to do this the whole time?”
Lana scooted off the statue’s hand and dropped down to the cobbled road below.
Halfway down, she morphed. With a burst of glittering dust, the five-inch-tall fairy girl landed as a five-foot-tall woman–still a card carrying member of the itty bitty titty committee, and the dumptruck ass delegation, just closer in size to a normal human is all–in the superhero crouch (you know the one). Even at this size I still had my concerns about her trying to handle my dick to be honest. I’d grown since sleeping with Autumn, and was now probably pushing seven feet tall.
Lana rose up to a standing position and frowned. “So when I hold back I’m too weak. When I show off I’m too powerful. I’m too small. Too emotional. Too much. Has it crossed your mind that maybe you’re just not man enough to handle me?” She trailed her dainty little hand over the curve of her ass in a blatant attempt to short-circuit my brain chemistry.
She was feisty, manipulative, gorgeous, with ass for days and a talent for pissing me off.
My head tilted down by a few degrees as my eyes darkened.
“Our challenge isn’t over until the fat lady sings, Lana. You hear a fat lady singing?”
She tilted her head to one side and feigned listening attentively. “All I hear is you standing there with zero kills and me standing her with forty-eight. You really think you can catch up to me?”
I knelt down and placed my bare hand to the stones, closing my eyes and reaching out with my new dryad powers. There were roots here older than Eastport. Plants buried deep that longed to feel the warmth of the sun once more. Commanding them to rise once more took less effort than shedding my human skin and going full werewolf. Feeling the shuffling steps of the undead roaming around the campus, disturbing grass and brushing past the leaves of potted plants, letting me know their precise location, felt no different than reshaping my forearms into blades or splitting myself into two identical copies.
My eyes opened and I saw my veins had turned green. My hair stood on end as my flesh hardened into bark, and the world took on an emerald-tinted filter that made everything not made of plant matter stand out in sharp contrast to the natural world.
I glared up at Lana and smirked.
She raised an eyebrow, looking a little worried.
She should be.
All across campus, giant twisting vines erupted from the earth and shot skyward. The zombies–all seventy-three I’d managed to locate within my radius of influence–impaled upon each vine were all lifted clear of the campus by their pierced skulls and left to hang overhead, serving as a warning.
I rose to a standing position and pulled out both of my pistols. “Seventy-three to forty-eight. Who’s falling behind now, twinkle-hoe?”
Lana’s eyes flashed a violent shade of purple as she leapt into the air, shrinking back down to her normal size and flitting off at top speed to go find more prey to even the score.
A sudden surge of movement caught my eyes.
A troop of college-age students, some undead some not, were marching out of the fraternity house and turning towards the football field. On their shoulders rested a coffin. Out ahead of them marched none other than Kevin.
Not even my competitive nature could win out against my desire for vengeance.
He killed Hannah. He took my hand. He completely altered the trajectory of my life.
This time, the zombie virus was already cured. This time, I could just kill the bastard.