“They’re on their way back,” Wade replied. “We should get back to the casino, too. We’re done with this side.”
My blood chilled as I looked up and noticed movement on top of the Catholic church across the street from us. We were five minutes away from the casino—two minutes if we ran. That’s how long it was going to take the rest of our team to reach us.
I tapped Wade’s shoulder and pointed at the church roof, where several black figures slithered across the red tiles. Their bat wings and long, spiky tails confirmed what I already knew, deep in the pit of my stomach. “Gargoyles,” I whispered.
Wade stilled, then followed my gaze. Astrid couldn’t see them, given her human nature, but she was quick to tap a few icons on her Smartie tablet. “I may not have eyes for these suckers, but Smartie can read energy levels in the atmosphere. Monsters have exceptionally high body temperatures. They stand out like bright red spots once I get Smartie to look for them, and… there they are. I see them. Oh, crap.”
“Ten of them,” Wade finished her sentence, examining the rooftop. “Astrid, call the team back. We need to catch these suckers before they wreak havoc.”
Astrid nodded and quickly texted the others, shaking her head in confusion. “I don’t get it, though. What are they doing out in the middle of the day? It’s completely unprecedented.”
“It is?” I asked, gathering enough sense and strength to make myself ready and available to intervene if needed. I had a bone to pick with these ugly bastards, anyway.
“Gargoyles only hunt at night, and never on a full moon,” Wade explained. “They thoroughly dislike daylight. Let’s move in closer; we need a better angle. Astrid, stay back and keep the line open. Put your earpiece on.”
Astrid took out a small Bluetooth device from her pocket, activated it, and put it in her ear. Wade handed me one, out of the two he had with him. “Put this on and press the main button. It’ll take you directly into our communications channel. Each team has a different frequency. Yours is already tuned in."
I pressed the button as instructed, and the rest of the Rag Team’s voices came through, crystal clear. “We’re one minute away!” Santana said, breathing heavily as she ran.
Turning my head toward the casino, I could see her and Raffe darting across the pavement. Soon enough, they were joined by Tatyana and Dylan, who came in from a side street.
We moved closer, getting a clearer view of the gargoyles. They were all perched on the edge of the roof, but they didn’t seem like they were going to attack anyone—and there were plenty of people out in the middle of the day. My heart shrank to the size of a pea as I watched mothers pushing baby strollers and churchgoers emerging from the building.
“Why aren’t the gargoyles moving?” I asked.
“I wish I knew,” Wade replied. “I’m more worried about why they’re all looking at you, Harley.”
“Huh?” I managed, then realized he was right. All ten gruesomely fierce gargoyles had their big, black, beady eyes focused on me. My blood curdled, but my anger was stronger. One of their pals had destroyed my car, after all.
The others reached us, just in time to watch the gargoyles stretching their necks and baring their fangs, thick drool pouring out of their gaping mouths. The spikes on the backs of their heads rattled—a trait I hadn’t seen on the other gargoyles I’d dealt with. The sound sent shivers down my spine.
Tatyana cursed under her breath in Russian, from what I could tell, and rolled up her smart jacket sleeves. “I’ll go set a ground-floor net trap,” she said. “You guys keep them on the roof.”
Without waiting for a reply, she rushed into the building, disappearing in the emerging crowd of people leaving the religious service.
“Dylan, Raffe, take the other side, behind the parish school,” Wade commanded. “Santana, you’ve got El Cerrito Drive. I’ll put out the ball. Astrid, make some noise somewhere farther down the road. Make it loud enough to get everybody off this block.”
“Got it,” I heard Astrid through the earpiece. “Would a fire alarm do?”
“It had better get people running as far away from the boulevard as possible,” Wade replied.
“Air-raid siren it is, then!” she said.
“Wait, no—”
Wade didn’t get to finish, as a fire siren started blaring out of several stores farther down the road. The noise was loud and stringent enough to draw people’s attention. Like moths drawn to a flame, several people walked toward the source of the alarm, while most hurried down the boulevard in the opposite direction.
“I was kidding!” I heard Astrid chuckle through my earpiece. “Air-raid sirens would’ve brought fighter jets scrambling around on full after-burner. Imagine the joy of the gargoyles to have something with wings to hunt.”
“Thanks, Astrid,” Wade replied flatly, then moved toward the church with his hands out. His rings lit up blue as he pushed out a much bigger time-lapse bubble. The energy ball spread out, gradually encompassing the entire area around the church.
Santana started waving at the rest of the people left in the affected area, motioning for them to leave. I figured I could start making myself useful, so I used my Telekinesis to send out a couple of nudges, and push humans farther away and out of the time lapse. They couldn’t see it, but it did slow time on the inside. We just couldn’t afford any weirdness, not when fire alarms were blaring and people were beginning to panic.
The gargoyles looked up and around, confused by the loud noises and our movements.
“I don’t get it,” I said. “They’re gawking at me, but they’re not attacking.”
“Let’s focus on catching them first,” Wade replied. “Take the left side, and don’t let them get off the roof!”
I nodded, then rushed over to the doctor’s office on the left side of the church. Wade stayed at the front, his gaze fixed on the gargoyles, who were starting to get restless, scampering across the roof.
Lights flickered inside the ground floor, followed by a number of popping sounds. Whatever Tatyana was doing inside, it was loud and flashy, and it was making the gargoyles even more nervous.
One of them tried to take flight, but a bright wisp of light smacked right into it, bursting into a myriad of fireworks. The creature fell backward, squealing as its eyes burned. The others spread their wings and hissed, then attempted to fly out, but Wade shot fire projectiles at them, targeting their heads.
Tiny balls of green energy shot out from behind the building, whirling around until they hit the gargoyles again. No matter where they went, there was a magical using some kind of spell to keep them on the roof.
As soon as the monsters came over to my side of the building, I knew what I had to do. Even without an Esprit, I could still do my part. I latched onto the billboard advertising some random life insurance company, pulled it off the doctor’s office it was displayed on, then tossed it at the gargoyles.
It flew in fast, knocking three of them back, while the others tried to escape on the other sides again. They didn’t stand a chance, though. Whenever they came back to my side, I focused my mental lasso on their heads, and waved them back like loose coconuts.
One final bang rumbled through the ground floor, followed by a bright white flash that spread outward and upward, swallowing the entire building. Just as Tatyana ran out, the light reached the roof, covering all the walls before it formed a super-fine net.
The gargoyles roared as they made one last-ditch effort to get off the roof, but the glowing net covered the entire surface and came down with such strength that it crushed the creatures hard into the terracotta tiles. They growled and shrieked as they struggled against their restraints.
“Santana, Tatyana, you’ve got Mason jars in your bags, I hope,” I heard Wade say through my earpiece.
“Yeah, more than enough,” Santana replied.
“Okay, grab Raffe and Dylan,” Wade said. “Five minutes. You know what you have to do.”
“Roger that,” Tatyana’s voice came through.
I went back to the boulevard, where Astrid joined us from across the street. Wade had made sure to keep her in the enormous time lapse. “Not bad, rookie,” Wade said, giving me a subtle wink as I reached him.
My heart skipped a beat. This was Wade’s first sort-of compliment.
“Thanks,” I murmured, my cheeks lighting up like the 4th of July.
“Well done, Harley!” Astrid cheered, while tapping various controls on her computer tablet. “I wonder if all these bad boys came out of the Bestiary.”
“We’ll check for serial numbers when we bring them in,” Wade replied, crossing his arms as he looked up at the roof. I followed his gaze, and watched Santana, Tatyana, Dylan, and Raffe perch on the sloped edges, summoning the gargoyles one by one into Mason jars.
Once they were done, they snuck back through the windows and met us outside with two backpacks full of gargoyles. Pieces of the roof were missing, as terracotta slates lay crushed on the ground around the church. The gargoyles may have been invisible to the human eye, but the damage they left behind was clear as day.
“Does cleanup involve fixing the roof?” I asked.
“That’s the humans’ responsibility,” Wade said, shaking his head. “The building is insured, anyway.”
“Technically speaking, we’re actually creating jobs right now. Construction jobs.” Astrid chuckled, eyes on her screen. “Okay, I’ve planted a couple of phone calls to notify the authorities about the damaged roof. They’ll send surveyors soon enough.”
“I’ve never seen ten gargoyles in one place before,” Santana said, her brow furrowed. “Outside the Bestiary, I mean. What could this mean?”
“And why were they all staring at me? Why didn’t they attack?” I sighed, my shoulders dropping.
After a lifetime spent under the radar, being stalked by gargoyles wasn’t exactly my idea of getting attention. If anything, it scared the life out of me. Whatever happened to me trying to stay out of trouble?