Chapter 6

On Monday, Dad picked up my Taurus at noon, so it was waiting for me when I got home. The first thing I did was to call Muffy to offer her a ride. Of course, she jumped at the chance, and I picked her up at her house. We drove around for a little bit waving at every person we knew. Yeah, I know that was kind of juvenile, but it was fun!

Our first stop was at the place where Jack worked. He was a helper in the shipping warehouse of a large company, but the foreman was a nice guy and let him come out to see my car. He was as impressed with the color as I was, but he had to get back to work, so he was not able to spend any time with us or the car.

Jack was full of questions when I saw him at school at lunch time, and I told him all about Dad buying it for me. I didn’t tell him where Dad got the money. I gave Muffy and him a ride home after school, and said that I would pick them up the next morning if they were interested. Ha, of course they were interested!

Jack and I took my car on our Friday date, and that was the first time we went to a make-out spot. We both were very nervous on that date because we were not sure what one was supposed to do on such a date. Well, nature took over, and we were making out like any other high school students might do. The difference was that we did not remove our clothes. We were not ready to go that far, yet.

That night, Jack announced that he had been able to rearrange his work hours so that he could attend the Krav Maga classes if they would accept him so late into the program. I promised to pick him up on Tuesday to take him with me to the class so that he could talk to the instructors. That would also give him a chance to see me whip some ass. Ha! When the boys found out that it was my boyfriend watching us work out, I spent most of the rest of the evening flat on my back. That was all right because I did manage to toss a few of them during the evening.

Jack was accepted into the class, and he was going to start regular class work on Thursday. I gave him a big kiss as he got out of the car when I took him home.

It was the fourth time that I picked up Jack for the Krav Maga class when the fit hit the shan, to coin a phrase. We were headed home when we were passed by a car loaded with high school-age kids. They went whizzing past us like we were standing still; well I was obeying the 30 MPH speed limit. A girl was driving, and I am sure that she was trying to impress her boyfriend. Anyway, there were two girls and two boys in the car.

Somehow, just as they passed us, the car seemed to spin out. That caused them to hit broadside on a monster tree that had to be 200 years old. I hit my brakes and managed to stop without hitting the tail end of the car which was sticking out into my lane. I had hardly come to a stop when the wrecked car burst into flame.

Shit! There were already flames in the passenger compartment, and the kids were screaming as they were being burned. They kept trying, but none of the doors would open. I don’t know that I even thought of the consequences of what I was doing, but I do remember yelling at Jack to call 911. I was still sitting right beside Jack when I switched to my Avenger uniform, never giving thought to the fact that Jack had a ringside seat to my metamorphosis.

I teleported to the car and, using TK to augment my own strength, I jerked a door open. My God, the temperature inside the passenger compartment was as hot as a pizza oven. I jerked the first person from the car and laid her to one side. I worked my way around the car, removing the passengers as fast as I could grab one and laying them on the ground.

Finally I got to the driver, and she was really in sad shape. The air bags had saved her life, but she was pinned into her seat by the steering wheel. The steering column had broken just as it was supposed to, and that had saved her life so that she could burn to death. Her clothes were burning by now, and she was wearing something made of nylon which was melting and dripping on her bare skin. There was no doubt that she was in agony.

Well, I couldn’t stand there and let her burn to death, so I grabbed the steering column and used my TK to help me pull it from the car. That freed the girl enough that I was able to remove her from the car. The problem was, though she was out of the car, her clothes were still burning. I had no choice but to rip her clothes off to get that burning fabric and melting plastic away from her skin.

Nevertheless, there was still molten plastic in contact with her skin. One of the few useful things that I had learned in the Health class I had been forced to take back in middle school was not to try to pull molten plastic off of skin. It just would not work. Fortunately, we were next to the city’s water reservoir, so I picked up the girl in my arms and ran to the water’s edge.

I jumped in without hesitation to submerge the girl in the cold water. I didn’t leave her head under water more than a few seconds, and she came to herself enough to stop breathing while she was under water. I dunked her a few more times and turned to leave the water just as the car exploded.

Pieces of burning car flew in all directions, and some of the pieces actually hit my beautiful car. I heaved a sigh of relief when I saw that my car was protected by the body armor that I had applied back on Monday.

The first Fire Department people were arriving, including their ambulances with the EMTs. Uh-oh, included in the entourage was a full load of TV reporters with their cameras. Between their lights for the cameras and the burning car, there was enough light to catch me on tape. I guess that I was going to get my formal introduction to the public before I was really prepared for it.

I put down the nude girl I was carrying and covered her with a sheet of opaque frozen air. The EMTs could apply a blanket after they had examined her. The first person I noticed was Jack. He was starring at me in absolute disbelief. Here I was in the bright red uniform, and only a short time before, I had been an ordinary girl dressed in a tee-shirt and jeans. I had to make sure that they did not identify me as Elizabeth Long. That would be too much.

I said to Jack, “Talk to the reporters as much as you want to, but don’t tell them about my transformation or my real name. Just call me Avenger. I’ll explain later.” Before he could say anything, I ran to my car and blacked out the license plates before they could be photographed. The plate number would identify Dad, and I wanted to block that. If I were lucky, nobody of importance saw me do it.

Now, I bowed to the inevitable and talked to the Fire Department, the Police Department, and the reporters. It was obvious that I had been the one to save the teens from a horrible death, so most questioners were polite, at least.

However, there was one TV reporter who was down right rude, and would not back off when I told her that I didn’t want to answer certain specific questions. I told her that she’d had her last interview with Avenger and to get out of my face before I lost my temper. She did back off, but she went on and on in a soliloquy about how I must be hiding something.

Finally, Jack and I escaped. Once we had moved far enough away, I removed the black shielding over the license plates. I didn’t want to get stopped by a traffic cop for that silly infraction. I also switched my clothes back to what I had been wearing before the accident.

I found a good place to park and told my story to Jack. I could tell that he never would have believed me if he had not seen me in action at the accident. I told him all of the things that I could do except for the gold finding. I didn’t want the possibility of getting rich to color our relationship. I would tell him about that skill once we had advanced far enough.