Slayers: Friends and Traitors Read Free Page B

Pieces of plastic fell onto the floor. “These don’t just shatter . You must have…” Her voice trailed off, her anger fading away.
    They looked at each other. Then they looked at the simulator. It was still making the same soft thudding sound. They looked back at each other. Neither said anything for a moment.
    “Do you feel extra strong?” Willow asked tentatively.
    “No,” he said. “I still feel the same.”
    Willow scanned the room, saw the screwdriver, and picked it up. “See if you can bend this.” She handed it to him, then took a step back from him as though the screwdriver might not only shatter, but explode, too.
    Ryker laughed at the change in her expression. He already knew he couldn’t. “I bet anyone can break an e-reader if they grab it wrong.” He put one hand on the tip of the screwdriver and slowly applied pressure to show Willow it was pointless. “I’ll buy you a new—”
    He didn’t finish. His mind couldn’t form words. The metal spike of the screwdriver was bending into a horseshoe shape. He did have extra strength. It had just taken a few minutes to kick in.
    Willow let out a high-pitched squeal. “You did it!” She bounced on the balls of her feet, a bundle of excitement. “This is so awesome!”
    Ryker turned the ruined screwdriver over in his hand. “No, it isn’t.” His heart beat against his chest in a fast rhythm, a drumbeat pounding out a new and insistent call. He wasn’t normal. He wasn’t like everybody else. “This is really bad. Do you know what this means?”
    The excitement drained from Willow as quickly as it had come. Her mouth opened into an O of understanding. “It means,” she said in a voice that had gone still, “that the other stuff is true, too. Dragons are real. They’re going to attack.”
    *   *   *
    Ryker paced around his living room waiting for his parents to come home. He and Willow had just had a long talk about secrecy and caution, about what they should say and who they should tell. Slayer or not, signing up to fight dragons was going to take some thought. Especially since Dr. B had written about Overdrake, the dragon lord, who was lurking around somewhere, waiting to pick Slayers off.
    Dr. B also reported on his site that he had met with Ryker’s parents when his mom was pregnant with him. Dr. B didn’t give many details about what led to the meeting. He just said that, instead of agreeing to let him train their son, Ryker’s parents had moved without a trace. It was the reason Dr. B now kept Slayers from revealing any information about their training to their parents. It was the reason why Ryker wasn’t supposed to tell his parents anything now.
    But then, maybe his parents had good reasons for keeping him away from Dr. B. Maybe the man was dangerous. Or crazy. Or had an agenda of his own.
    Ryker looked out the living room window to the street in front of their house. No cars were heading in his direction. It wasn’t a surprise. They lived on a cul-de-sac. Ryker turned and paced back the other way.
    No matter what Ryker’s parents thought of Dr. B, they still should have told Ryker he was a Slayer. That part really ticked him off.
    Willow and he had spent the last couple of hours trying to find other powers. He jumped off his trampoline about fifty times. He could leap huge distances, but he hadn’t flown anywhere. He dragged every candle his parents owned onto the back patio and tried to extinguish their flames. That hadn’t worked either. He wasn’t sure what throwing a shield up entailed, so he waved his hands around, attempting to create some sort of force field over the basketball hoop while Willow shot baskets. That experiment was probably doomed from the start. Willow kept trying to make wild, impossible shots. He might have had a working shield up there half of the time and wouldn’t have known it.
    Next, Ryker went into the guest bathroom to test his night vision. The bathroom didn’t have any windows, so it