“What-what the-the fuck-fuck was-was that-that?” Someone yelled. My hearing was doubled again, unfortunately, and my vision swam with stars at warp speed, but going every direction. My stomach did a barrel roll, a forward somersault, a back flip, then landed on its back and gave up moving. Heat came next, like sitting too close to a bonfire, and my marshmallows definitely felt toasty.
The
doubling subsided more quickly, this time, and the stars receded from my
vision. I propped myself onto my elbows to see Kate helping Nat to her feet.
“So what
happened?”
“You blew
up,” Kate said.
I looked
myself over, and, not seeing missing limbs or gory body parts strewn about,
disagreed.
“I’m still
here.”
“Yeah, but
as soon as my lightning touched you, it exploded, like ball lightning,” Nat
said, dusting her jeans with her hands. “Air came out of you, too, blowing us
back. What the hell is wrong with you?”
“How would
I know? I’m still kind of the new guy. Don’t you have wise guys for this? Where
the hell is Gandalf or some other wise guy?”
“We can put
something on the forums, but as far as I know, nothing like this has ever
happened, before.”
“What, so I
can’t use any lightning, anymore? That’s a giant fricking bug in the system.
That’s like three-quarters of what I do. What fun is life if you can’t zap
things?”
“Blow me,”
Nat said.
“What she
said,” Kate added.