Free I Am Titanium (Pax Black Book 1) by John Patrick Kennedy

flung it away.
    He threw it so hard the two halves of the stick flew up and over the trees, disappearing over the edge of the park.
    “Wow!” said the black kid. “What are you? Superheroes? Where are your superhero suits?”
    “You’re naked, dude,” the white kid added helpfully.
    Crap. In the middle of all this, he’d forgotten about clothes.
    “Just back off,” he said.
    “Gimme your stick,” the white kid said. “They’re not superheroes. It’s just special effects. Here.” He reached toward the black kid, took his stick, and swung it at Pax.
    The stick made his skin ring like a church bell. Donnnng!
    “Holy shit,” the white kid said.
    “Stupid kids,” muttered Pax. He flicked his fingers, and a blue wave of energy slammed into the two kids, carrying them backward and throwing them into the grass.
    “I told you they were superheroes!” the black kid screamed at the top of his lungs as he sailed through the air.
    A dozen other heads were turned toward Pax and Scarlett now.
    No, no, no!
    He threw up a shield. It resisted slightly when he tried to surround Scarlett, but he pushed, and it snapped over her. Now he and Scarlett were inside the sphere. Hypothetically safe, all their problems solved. Except he wasn’t sure how much damage the sphere could withstand…
    …and it didn’t seem to be doing anything about the dark tentacles pouring off the people around them.
    The tentacles were black and kind of wet-looking, like slugs, and they oozed over the grass and even through the air toward the two of them. When the tentacles hit the sphere, the shield rippled and gave way, allowing them to ooze through.
    Scarlett stumbled backward with her burning-coal hands held up in front of her until she hit the wall of the sphere and slid down it, landing on her ass on the charred ground. The tentacles shoved themselves onto her. Some of them latched onto her feet. Others onto her thighs. The ones she tried to push away just stuck to her hands.
    They were absorbed into her charcoal skin with sick, bulging twitches, like leeches sucking up blood.
    Negative energy.
    The black kid ran toward the shield at full speed and hit it with a spray of blue sparks before being thrown backward.
    The shield flickered. Brightened.
    The kid got back up again. The white kid stood beside him. They looked determined, like they were getting ready to fight the bad guys. They were stupid. They were ten.
    Both the kids charged the shield. This time they were joined by several adults, some of whom were trying to catch the kids to stop them, and some of whom seemed to be charging at Pax’s sphere on the general principle of “If it’s weird, kill it.”
    The sphere sent up more sparks as it threw the group of people back. Dimmed. Brightened.
    But not quite as bright as before.
    The kids were dragged off by a group of adults, but that wasn’t the end of it. The sphere was still being charged by several adult men who all wore orange and white shirts and looked like they were on the same soccer team. One of them charged the sphere and got flung back by the sparks—but the blow pushed the sphere a few inches off the lawn and toward the trees behind them. The next man charged, and the sphere slid farther. There was no sense to it. No reason for it. They were doing it just because they could. Pax was trying to save their lives, and all they could see was a giant soccer ball.
    “Knock it off!” he shouted.
    The men kept charging.

    The wall jerked out from behind her, dropping her head on the ground. Big waves of fire whipped around her face like they were trying to choke her. She screamed and tried to scrape them off—then realized they were her hair .
    She grabbed it all in a hank and flipped it up into a bun. It wouldn’t stay, so she grabbed a pointy stick and jabbed it in.
    The stick burst into flame, and her hair just got all over the place again.
    Why did everything have to be so damn hard ?
    The sphere was dimming. In a few