Pattern recognition

Those guns seemed to be firing at very steady intervals, roughly one shot every second and a half, and they didn't run out of ammunition. Where they hit a target, they crackled outward, arcs lancing out to the nearest conductive target. It was one of these shots that hit the ground beneath Withdrawal's stilt-legs, then arced up to shock the metal there.

Once I recognized that there was a pattern, I could adjust. Earlier, I'd had to dismiss instinct. Here, old sparring matches against my extended family came into play. There had been brief skirmishes against thugs who were willing to pull a real gun on a teenage girl in costume, and even an intense skirmish against Fenja had its relevance. As I'd moved in time with her giant-sized weapon's swipes, I flew in general circles while I found the cadence here and they divided themselves by focus. Three people who had turned my way had those guns. Two of them were firing almost together, one firing out of sync with them, their spark-gun being bigger. A fourth had a laser gun, like the one that had produced the blue laser.

Two shots, change direction by going to their flank, change direction again to account for the adjustment of the third man, going up. The laser gun glowed blue as it charged up for the next shot.

Two shots, change direction, dropping down, account for the late shot from man number three by flying up and to the right. The laser beam fired, and it hit the Wretch. The Wretch was better at handling sustained damage than a single good hit. The beam burned out before the Wretch did.

I closed the distance, grabbing one of them by their hair. The movement of my arm reminded me that I'd been burned- my skin felt tight.

Fingers gripping hair and coverall-shoulder, the top of my foot hooking in between the man's legs, I strained my entire body and used my flight to fly him into his buddy.

My aura was affecting others, as I was flying closer.

- Gleaming 9.5