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Vanessa. He reveled in her wit and smile, her laugh and, yes, her body. She was his soft spot. So, despite it being a safe zone, he lunged.
    The Shadow conduits still didn’t appear. Their power was useless in a safe zone, but what could be done—what I didn’t know how to do the first time I was attacked in a safe zone—was to turn the attacking agent’s power against them. It was a more dangerous sort of power because, as any soldier knew, it was easier to defeat an enemy if they were already at war with themselves. It would have been enough for Harrison to face down Felix alone, but the Shadow troop timed their defense so perfectly it was clear they’d anticipated this response. When Felix was no more than five feet from Harrison, they all held up a hand, ringing him in silent negation.
    He didn’t freeze, as I’d thought would happen to an agent trapped in a cloud of their own power. Instead he thrashed as he was lifted from the ground, fighting invisible bindings, like he was being pulled from every side at once. One hand clutched at his throat when he hit the ground, the other at his chest, and he flopped like a fish on a dry bank. This eventually dropped off into random twitches, pitching the Shadows’ laughter even higher.
    I didn’t move, nor did any of the other agents of Light. I’d been warned against trying to help someone who’d breached a safe zone…warned too that no one would help me if I did the same. The bond between troop members was so strong that the negative energy would be transferred, and we’d both end up being strangled by our power.
    No, not strangled, I thought, watching Felix heaving.
Drowned
.
    “Anyone else want to try?” Harrison asked lightly as Felix continued to gasp. I swallowed hard. At least the gasping was an improvement. And his limbs had fallen still, so the power was abating, being reabsorbed. “How about you, little Kairos? I mean, you’re the cause of all this. Want to take a long shot at redemption?”
    “Why don’t you give it a go, Harrison?” I said. “I mean, take out the Kairos, the woman of legend, and you’ll go down as one of the most powerful, badass Shadows of all time.”
    His eyes flickered like he was briefly considering it, but a sneer quickly replaced the look. “In a safe zone? Do you think I’m stupid?”
    “Yes. Ugly, foul-smelling, and inbred too.”
    His gaze flat-lined. “Well, I’m not the single-handed cause of my entire troop’s collapse.”
    “Nor am I.” I wasn’t responsible for someone else’s evil, even if I was the target.
    “Oh, but you are. You broke your changeling, right? And breaking the changeling of Light, that one special little child, is what caused the manuals of Light not to be written. So now the children of the world can’t read of your antics in comic book form. Their fertile little minds don’t birth the dreams and power that give you the energy to fight us. Your entire troop is weakened.”
    “We’re not getting weaker.”
    He held out his bloodied hands. “We’re getting stronger, so it’s the same thing.”
    Because their manuals were still being recorded, detailing the battle between good and evil, and sold in comic book shops all over the nation. The fact that manuals vital to our survival were masquerading as comic books wasn’t as oxymoronic as it might seem. There was something to be said for hiding in plain sight, and though truth might be stranger than fiction, in this case they were one and the same.
    So Harrison had an ugly, foul-smelling point. Despite our demigod status in this smoggy, bright valley, our micro-universe was as fragile as a rain forest’s. Knock out one little organism, and suddenly the whole ecosystem was thrown off balance.
    “So you’re not the almighty savior of the Zodiac,” Harrison pushed, with a lift of his chin. “You’re a hindrance to your troop.”
    Though I’d gotten better in recent months at controlling my anger, I decided Harrison could use a