Two things happened almost immediately. First, the pain disappeared. Apparently it couldn’t follow her from form to form. Second, the villains weren’t as shocked as she had hoped. Jake, with shredded t-shirt ‘bandages’ wrapped crudely around his arms, was standing over her, a cruel grin distorting his fair features. Raphael watched on impassively.

A foot smashed into her stomach, driving the air from her lungs in a whoosh. Gasping for breath, she tried to roll away. The villain laughed and followed her, kicking out at her arms, legs, back, whatever was closest.

Her fear began to drive down deep through her, to where the trigger for her ability was. Again she found that doorway that she’d never been able to open, that was kind of like her transformation trigger but more so somehow; again she tried to force her way in and couldn’t…then the young villain kicked her in the temple and the door exploded.

Jake and Raphael took a step back as Crystal’s body began to shimmer violently. Long, wicked claws spiked out of her fingertips with a sound almost exactly like when Raphael tore his shirt into long strips. Her dark red hair turned coal black in a wave starting at her roots and covered her body, replacing her clothes like before. Except this time, she wasn’t shrinking down. She was gaining mass instead of getting smaller. And she was gaining a LOT of it.

Moments later a fully grown black panther climbed slowly to its feet, claws clicking loudly on the linoleum.

Crystal bunched her new, powerful hind legs, ready to leap forward and tear out the throat of the closest villain, when a baseball rocketed out of nowhere and burned down her left flank. She would carry that scar for the rest of her life, no matter what form she was in.

She turned her head, furious, and saw Kashif holding a splintered wooden baseball bat. With a roar that shook the building, she launched at him.

Nathan took advantage of the distraction by hurling one of his lightning bolts at Josh, who barely ducked it and responded in kind with two throwing knives. Nathan threw himself to the side. One of the knives flew harmlessly above him, but the other one embedded itself into his calf. He clenched his teeth against the pain, yanked it out, and staggered back up to his feet.

Josh smiled at him, empty handed, taunting him. It worked. Nathan pulled free the two strands wrapped around his thighs (the last ones he had ready to go) and ran forward, working the electricity like whips, driving Josh back.

And in doing so, forgot about anyone else. A small stone smashed into his head and he sank into blackness, electric whips slipping back into his palms.

Kashif stood his ground against the leaping jungle cat until the last second, then dropped to one knee and pushed up and back against her stomach, using his strength to send her flying over him, but not before she reached down with one paw and dragged all five claws over his shoulder. “A scar for a scar”, they would both think later.

While still airborne, a tenor scream hit her with the force of a tornado and sent Crystal spinning off in a new direction. She crashed into a teller’s station and crumpled to the ground, conscious but dazed.

Tyler watched it all as best he could, with his eyes and with his ability. He worried for his friends, but with emotions already so high pitched in there, he didn’t know what to do. Amping up the anger wouldn’t turn the villains against themselves, as he had previously hoped, but would probably endanger his friends further. Turning down the anger would only last until his friends started attacking again, which they most certainly would.

And then someone tapped him on the shoulder.