~~~
Ever an optimist, the Colonel. Kuma often showed up in the dark and spent a night or a weekend with me. I was glad of her company, for Kendra and Millie, though in no way growing unfriendly to me, were drifting apart from me. Boys...
Over time, Kuma learned from me to read and speak nal Tan, to use the correct name of Tan speech. Mostly, though, she wanted to watch superhero movies and practice special-forces skills. She wormed out of me tales of my early free-lance missions and of my current assignments from the Colonel.
Going to him, she begged him for assignments of her own. Gently but firmly, he told her, "Not yet." From a look in her eyes I gathered that she took "Not yet" as "As soon as possible."
As a consolation prize for her not getting to go on missions with me, I took her to meet Lona. Kuma liked the Bohemian air of Lona's house. I guessed that it was much like Kuma's. She was bright and friendly towards Lona, but, from Lona, I sensed towards Kuma a coolness that I didn't understand.
I also gave Kuma Dala's address. Soon, I was getting from Bennettsville calls and e mails complaining of the strange child disrupting Dala's life. Both Lona and Dala began in their e mails to me to refer to the "Kuma action-figure."
Telling the Colonel and Mom of the problems among my fellow Tani, I sought permission to have all three in for a sleepover. The Colonel smiled at me. "A summit conference, do you say?"
This time, even Dala ran to my house. My three visitors came out of the dark just before breakfast, napped afterwards, and joined me in my room.
The four of us watched a superhero movie, which sparked a debate over how we Tani should use our gifts. Kuma said, "We need to help the earth-humans --"
"We needn't help them by hitting them!" Dala cried out. Her words' intensity stunned me. Clearly, Kuma had rubbed her the wrong way. "We can help them by cleaning up their world," Dala went on to say. "It's our world, too, now, you know."
"Not all of us can be the Warrior Twins like you and Mira," Lona said to Kuma. I felt shocked. I'd never thought of myself as a warrior, but, somehow, I'd gotten tagged as one. "We should use our gifts to rescue earth-humans from disasters, and to build things," Lona went on to say.
"The boy who does all of the crime-fighting would disagree with you," Kuma called back.
Her statement at least had the virtue of turning a fight over gifts into a discussion of boys. The four of us girls guessed that, as all of us lived east of the Mississippi, all of the boys lived west of it. Clearly, three of the boys were living quietly, but one was doing daring deeds and avoiding detection.
"A regular Scarlet Pimpernel," Lona murmured in a sour tone.
"I hope that he's Un-Thor," Kuma said. "If I must have a husband, a warrior-husband is what I want."
Dala rolled her eyes. "We need to find him before he gets us all into trouble."
"Lona and I have tried to find him," I said stiffly. "The West is big."
"I'll gladly join the search," Kuma said brightly.
"I can't run away from home all of the time as you other girls do," Dala said, "but I can do Web searches and let the rest of you know their results."
At least, the four of us had found common ground on searching for the wild boy, as we at first called the crime-fighter. Alone or in pairs, Lona, Kuma, and I scoured his haunts for him, but never found him.
One night, though, while Kuma and I were watching a movie with Lona at her house, Dala called. "I just read on line news of a wild-boy event outside Bettendorf, Iowa. Witnesses at a fancy nightclub reported seeing a masked figure dressed in black pick up a Porsche and fling it a hundred yards through the air. The car caught on fire as it flew."
Lona, Kuma, and I looked at each other. "A flying, burning car sounds like our boy's work," I said.
The three of us ran through the dark and scoured the Quad Cities till dawn. We saw no sign of the wild boy, though we did break up a mugging.
As we ran back to Lona's house, she muttered, "He could've been watching us from the rooftops all along, and we'd never have seen him."
Kuma smiled. "I'll find him yet, just you wait and see!"
Par-On holds up a hand and turns to Un-Thor. "Just why did you throw a car and set it on fire?"
Dour, brooding Un-Thor shrugs. "The car belonged to a drug-dealer who'd done some killings. Destroying it put fear into him."
"Such a public display of your Tan gifts, with no preconceived plan, put yourself and the rest of us Tani at risk."
"Mira said so, too, when I met her. I understand now what you and she are saying. Luckily for me, the police blew off eyewitnesses and put down the car's destruction to a firebomb." Un chuckles. "The police thought that the eyewitnesses had hallucinated when they said that a boy who just happened to be standing behind the car when it blew up had actually thrown it."
Dala sniffs. "The Internet believed the testimony. There must be a thousand Web pages on your exploit."
Un gives her a wry smile. "According to the Internet, everyone and his dog is a space alien, or a member of some global conspiracy. The Internet has given us Tani perfect cover for who we are and what we do. Still, you, Mira, and Par are right in saying that I got cocky. Sorry, Mira hadn't taught me tradecraft yet."