Sorceress, Interrupted - By A. J. Menden Page 0,16
good.
“It’s taking the whole team?” Edgar was powerful, but not that powerful. And he wasn’t usually violent.
Cyrus shrugged. “He’s a particular kind of wound up today, apparently.”
“It’s mostly Wesley and Lainey that are going to be dealing with him. The rest are on crowd control,” Mindy said. She headed for the control room.
I carted Emily off to her room to play. The little girl seemed more used to the idea of being stuck here with the rest of us, her mommy being away. “Fay watch TV?” she asked when I sat her down.
“Not me, but if you must, go ahead.” I motioned to a selection of DVDs on the wall. “Pick one.”
She selected one with a brightly colored box and a cartoon monkey. “This!”
“Whatever.” I knew enough about the DVD machine to know how to stick the disc in, but not how to work it. God help me if I ever have to work the EHJ’s complicated database for their own entertainment. I was lucky that Emily, being a two-year-old, was still a bit behind the times like myself. “Know how to play this thing?”
“Uh-huh.” She found a remote control and started pushing buttons.
“Your parents must be so proud.”
The show immediately started with music. An animated monkey was singing and dancing with real children about being a good friend and always helping people and never being mean to anyone. It was nauseating, saccharine-sweet and condescending at the same time. I began to think the EHJ should play this video at every villain they caught. They’d give up their secrets within minutes.
Emily, unfortunately, loved it.
One of the on-screen boys pushed one of the little girls down. The cartoon monkey chastised him: “That’s not how we treat our friends. What do you say, Tyson?”
“Sorry,” the bratty kid responded.
“And what do you say, Megan?”
I suggested, “Do it again and I’ll rip out your entrails?”
“Fay, shh!” Emily gave me a serious look and put a finger to her lips. She looked just like her father when she did that.
“I forgive you,” said the little girl on the television.
I groaned. “This stuff is rotting your brain, Emily.”
“He silly,” Emily replied, watching the monkey do a dance with the children in celebration of everyone being friends again.
I couldn’t take it. “This show has an overly simplistic way of looking at things, Em. In the real world not everyone wants to be your friend, and the bad people won’t apologize for hurting you. And sometimes even someone you think is your friend will turn around and hurt you. Or leave you. Remember that. The real world sucks.”
You would think a child of superheroes would be more aware of that than anyone, but I had a feeling Wesley and Lainey wanted to keep Emily as sheltered as possible, all because there was the possibility that she might destroy the world one day. I had lived long enough to know that prophecies come and go. So had Wesley lived that long; he just didn’t remember. But no matter what, I refuse to think of us as slaves to fate. Emily would have the choice between saving the world or destroying it. And watching all-smiles, happy-all-the-time television wasn’t going to be what made her choose good over evil. If anything, it was going to lead her screaming toward its destruction. At least, it would if she was anything like her half sister.
To protect her sanity and mine, I stepped in front of the television. “How about we say good-bye to the monkey and play a game instead?”
Emily frowned at the distraction but then brightened. “Hide-and-seek?”
“If it’ll end this hell, sounds like fun. But we’ve got to stay in this room, okay?”
She nodded, and I triumphantly shut off the monkey in midsong. Take that, Spurious George.
“Fay hide,” Emily commanded.
I sighed. “Fine. Close your eyes and turn around.”
She immediately started giggling and did so. I briefly considered going back to my bar and hiding in my pocket dimension to see if her powers were great enough that she could follow me, but then I decided that was probably too hard for a two-year-old. And Wesley would be furious that I took his little girl to a bar. I was supposed to be setting a good example.
I lay down in her bed and pulled the covers up over me. A few moments later, I heard more giggling. A small body hurled itself atop me.
“Got you!”
I flipped off the covers. “Yeah, you got me, all right. You go hide now and I’ll get you.”