Josie watched her best friend walk out of sight. She felt a pang of jealousy, but she
put it away. She had a few things to do before she could indulge in things like envy.
And she could get a guy any time she wanted as long as it wasn’t an adventurer.
Her reputation had grown too much there at the Hall to do her any good.
“They are lovely,” said Matilda. Aviras rode on her head as she jumped up and down.
“You were so right, Beatrice.”
“He was flabbergasted,” said Laura.
“Never saw that before,” said Alicia.
“The tailor lady was right,” said Melanie. “The dress enhances everything.”
She made a gesture with her hands to show what she meant.
“We should have tried to go too,” said Angelica. “I would be able to see what kind
of show and food was available.”
“I think we can let them have their moment,” said Josie. She smiled at the middle girl.
“We still have work to do now that we have Jack out of the way. I have to write up
the case logs and send a letter to Juni to see if she wants to visit. We need to think of
things to show her so she won’t be bored.”
“Ice cream for us?,” said Aviras.
“You need to go on a diet,” said Josie. “I think that the amount of sweets for you have
to go down.”
“Really?,” said Aviras.
“When Juni shows up, you all will have to be on your best behavior,” said Josie. “She
likes to make people work twice as hard and do things to shape themselves up. We’re
asking her to look at Jack and assess his mental state. And Jack will try to ditch us.”
“Ditch us?,” said Alicia.
“Leave without telling us where he’s going,” said Josie.
“He can ditch us,” said Beatrice. “He can move like lightning when he wants to.”
“You should mail her now,” said Alicia. “That way we can know if she will arrive
here from there before Jack comes home and thinks of some way to leave town. Then
we can think of some way of helping people.”
“We still need to make sure if we have the room to work,” said Josie. “On the other
hand, we can do a lot from here. I think Jack is thinking about trying to build separate
rooms for you lot. Make sure they are normal rooms when he is done.”
“Normal rooms?,” asked Matilda.
“He was talking about a crossdimensional mish-mash, but I told him no,” said Josie.
“We’re not doing anything like Encanto.”
“Why not?,” asked Melanie.
“Because when the magic is taken away, the rooms could collapse with you inside of
them,” said Josie. She clapped her hands once and held them together. “I think that
would be bad for anyone caught inside.”
“It would be like being stuck between a hammer and anvil,” said Matilda. “That
doesn’t sound good at all.”
“Which is why I said no,” said Josie. “Now, we talked about shirts like mine and
Jack’s. I know I promised a catalogue for you guys to look through so we are going
to do that tonight. Let’s see what we have for food and if we don’t have a lot, we will
go out and get something to eat.”
“Can you make shirts for us?,” asked Angelica.
“I don’t see why not,” said Josie. “Where did Jack get that black suit?”
“I think he conjured it when he first went to the gaming house,” said Laura. “Elaine
said some people had come by to collect money.”
“All right,” said Josie. “I think we will do some simple symbols and maybe some
logos for you guys. Then we will see what we can do for personal wear.”
“Complete outfits?,” asked Melanie.
“Would you like that?,” said Josie. “Some of these characters wear outlandish gear.”
“Let’s look at things that resemble your lightning first,” said Beatrice. “Then we can
start trying to build what we want for ourselves.”
Josie nodded. She didn’t know a lot about Marvel, but she should be able to do some
things there, and from the independents. She didn’t want to just give them DC
characters to choose from for their personal things. She decided to also throw in the
logos from the sports teams that she knew too.
Maybe there was something there the kids would like and want to take for their own.
She became Zatanna. A small application of wish magic brought on catalogues for
the girls to look through with the various symbols, and some small explanations to
whom they belonged to such as her lightning and where it came from.
She reverted back. She could do the same for the case books when she wanted.
Sending a letter to Juni required her personal touch. The kids were right that she had
to arrive by surprise, or Jack would ditch out and take off in the Enterprise to do
something rash.
He always seemed close knit with his family. She wondered what had changed since
he had come home from overseas. He would tell her if she pried, but she didn’t want
to pry that much.
Josie took a minute to smile as the girls looked through the pictures. Aviras and
Matilda debated which symbol she should make her own. She wondered why the
dragon had not fried Jack instantly. There was something there that said something
to her about a broken kinship.
She doubted Aviras wanted to give her an explanation for that. He seemed to want to
obfuscate his motives with another persona just like Jack habitually did.
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They were almost the same in her opinion.
And he clearly liked Matilda for some reason.
Josie dug out some paper and went to the kitchen table. She wrote out a short letter
to Juni. She put in that Jack and she had received a job they couldn’t turn down. She
asked Juni if she wanted to come by for a few days to talk to Jack. She looked the
letter over and thought she had kept a lot of the things she was concerned about out
of the words.
She added that Juni should send the letter back to let her know if she wanted to drop
by.
She became Zatanna again and wished the letter on its way. She doubted Juni would
send an immediate answer back. She had no idea what the time was like in the real
world.
The letter returned almost immediately. Josie was surprised at the speed. She sent
back another letter and told Juni to pack a bag and burn the letter as soon as she was
ready to visit.
“Girls,” Josie let her persona go. “Juni wants to visit us. I sent her a pass. I don’t
know if it will let her visit, but it’s the best I can do from here.”
“When will she come?,” asked Angelica. “We’re not ready for a guest to stay.”
“We’re ready,” said Beatrice. “I can let her have my room when she arrives. I’ll move
back to my old space with Laura.”
“I doubt that will be necessary,” said Josie. “What do you think about the symbols?”
“I like this one,” said Alicia. She held up her copy with the Avengers’ A in a circle
with an arrow as the crossbar. “It says archer to me.”
Someone knocked on the door. The girls looked up. Josie nodded. Who could be
knocking at that hour? She went to the door and cracked it. She felt Laura and Aviras
at her back, ready to fend off anyone trying to break in.
“It’s you,” said the visitor after Josie looked out. “Looking good, small fry.”
“I’m taller than you now,” said Josie. She smiled.
She and their visitor exchanged a complicated hand slap routine until they wound up
pointing at each other at the end.
“Come in, June,” said Josie. She stepped out of the way, opening the door wide. “I
thought you would take some more time to think things over.”
“I got a fight coming up,” said Juni Lee, smiling as she walked into the apartments.
“If I didn’t visit now, I would have to wait for a month. That was a dark walk up
here.”
“I thought you were getting out of the game,” said Josie. She gestured for Juni to
come to the dining room table. Jack’s sister hefted her bag and dropped it on the
table.
“I need a few thou to finish filling up my retirement fund,” said Juni. She looked at
the girls looking at her. “I’m Juniper Lee, Jack’s sister.”
“You’re built like a pony,” said Alicia. “Only smiths have arms like that.”
“I lift a lot of weights,” said Juni. She smiled. “Are you Jack’s kids?”
“Gods no,” said Beatrice. “We’re her sisters.”
She pointed at Josie. Josie nodded to confirm the statement.
“Are you really Jack’s sister?,” asked Aviras. “He said you are so famous you have
a show named after you.”
“Did he now?,” said Juni. Her smile took on an edge. She looked at Josie. The leaner
woman just shrugged in her Mage shirt.
“We don’t have anything ready,” said Angelica. “This is all so sudden.”
“June,” said Josie. “This is Beatrice, the eldest. Laura, who Jack has taught to fly.
Melanie, who is like Hyouka in attitude. Angelica, our cook. Alicia, who wants to
learn how to turn people into moving targets. And Matilda, our brainiac. The blue
lizard is Aviras, whom we have adopted because of Jack. Jack and Elaine are at a
show, enjoying a date night before we go to work tomorrow. The kids were looking
for something that appealed to them like my Mage shirt, or Jack’s Deadpool thing.
If you guys want to talk, I’ll whip up something quick in the kitchen for us to eat.”
“All right, kids,” said June. She brushed a stray hair back as her long braid danced as
she moved. “Tell me everything.”
Josie walked into the kitchen. She checked the ice box and the pantry. She had some
ingredients to whip something up. She thought a few minutes of the Zatanna touch
should give her something that would feed a crowd.
Maybe she could help with June’s retirement fund. She had some gold and she could
always make more for June to take home and sell.
Josie pulled on Zatanna. She concentrated and the ingredients danced around the
kitchen and cooked themselves into a meal that fit on the plates that floated down
from the cabinet. She made sure to give June two servings before she let the persona
go.
Josie poked her head out of the kitchen. The girls and June had gathered around the
table. They were telling her friend about some of the things they knew she and Jack
had done over the last two weeks.
“Angelica?,” said Josie. “Could you help me with the plates?”
“Of course, missus,” said the middle girl. She got up from her place and walked to the
kitchen. “Jack’s sister is just like him.”
“I would say so,” said Josie. She handed Angelica two of the plates, and some cups
of water. She gestured for her to go. She grabbed as many plates and cups as she
could carry and took them to the table. “I have to get the rest.”
Josie went back to the kitchen and got the rest of the plates. She placed them on the
table as the girls started digging in. She settled in at her place at the head of the table.
“The girls say you can do magic now,” said Juni. “How did that happen?”
“It comes with the job,” said Josie. “What’s going on with your fighting?”
“I had some problems and need to refill my bank account,” said Juni. “This last match
is it. After I have enough, I’m out. No more sore muscles, no more cuts, no more
cracked bones.”
“I can give you some gold,” said Josie. “You can skip this last fight.”
“Under contract,” said June, shrugging her massive shoulders. “I would have to pay
back my commission to get out of it.”
“I can give you enough gold to cover that,” said Josie. “I’m rich.”
“What is this job, Jo-jo?,” said Juni.
“I’m the champion of order and defender of the world,” said Josie. “I am the Justice
League.”
“Really?,” said June. “Is Jack a champion of order too?”
“He’s my sidekick,” said Josie. She smiled slightly.
“Sidekick?,” said Matilda.
“I’m the hero like Gowan Hand, and Jack is my knight that I boss around,” said Josie.
“Does he know that?,” said June. She almost laughed.
“He knows which side the boot kicks,” said Josie.
“I wouldn’t mind retiring here,” said June. “Take it easy, that sort of thing.”
“Try to find a place with a bathroom,” said Josie.
“Has Jack always been angry?,” asked Aviras. He sat on Matilda’s head. His sapphire
eyes watched the older sister from across the table.
“I have never seen him really angry about anything,” said June. “On the other hand,
he has never been a champion of order’s sidekick before either.”
“Hmm,” said the dragon. The level of anger he had seen seemed like an old friend to
his keeper. Maybe he had been better at hiding it when he was younger.
“Jack will be home soon enough,” said Josie. “June, you can take the kids to their
practice. Elaine and I have a lot of work tomorrow. We have to figure out how we are
going to help these people we have stored on the Enterprise.”
“The Enterprise?,” said June. “The Enterprise?”
“The Big D,” said Josie. She sipped at a cup of water she had poured when she got
the rest of the plates. “Jack ripped up some town and lab for the material. It doesn’t
have any furniture. Maybe we can take the tour tomorrow after practice.”
“I have to see this,” said June. “I can’t believe what you said.”
“Why not?,” said Josie. “Jack is great with that sort of thing. Aviras used to be fifty
feet tall and really dangerous. Now he is as cute as a smurf.”
“Bah,” said Aviras. “Curse Hank Pym and his mastery of size.”
“I know, right,” said June. She grinned at the small dragon. “That Hank Pym has
some tricks up his sleeve. I remember when he built a prison and hid it in an atom.”
“What is a smurf?,” said Matilda.
“A small person who lives in the forests in villages made out of mushrooms,” said
Josie. “They have a speaking tic where they substitute smurf for random words.”
“I smurfed that smurf up the smurf with my smurfing smurf fist up his smurf,” said
June with a grin.
“Smurfed that smurf up his smurf?,” said Alicia. Her face concentrated on trying to
translate what June had said.
“Don’t think about it too hard,” said June.
“Alicia wants the Avengers’ A,” said Josie. “Have the rest of you picked anything
you want to wear?”
“I found this bird,” said Laura. “I think it’s from something called Astro City. I think
it goes with my ability to fly.”
She showed Josie Samaritan’s stylized bird he wears on his chest from her catalogue.
“Looks good,” said June. “It’s a dove from the Samaritan, the greatest hero of his
setting.”
“Maybe that’s what I’ll be when I’m ready,” said Laura.