Free Epoch by Timothy Carter Page A

species. Vincent put his foot down and backed away. He was so scared he almost didn’t hear the faint buzz of the fire alarm, or the sound of hundreds of feet.
    “Wha…?” he said. He glanced quickly around the van and saw the Alphega employees evacuating the building. It was time, and he had to move. He looked back at Rennik, but the demon was gone.
    “Weird,” Vincent said, and he hurried off to meet Nod.
    When he got to the side of the building, he found that Nod had not broken a window yet. He also noticed the pixie hadn’t deactivated a single camera. Vincent hid behind another car, hoping he hadn’t already been seen.
    What’s keeping him? Vincent wondered as he hid. The plan was so simple, he couldn’t have messed it up. Vincent looked back at the entrance, where employees were still filing out. If Nod didn’t hurry, they would start to go back in and their opportunity would be lost.
    A loud smash made him look up. Nod sped by overhead, moving faster than Vincent had ever seen him go. Vincent wondered for half a moment what the pixie was up to, and then he saw the demon. It flew after Nod on dragonlike wings, and it was gaining.
    Vincent got up and ran, not caring if the cameras saw him as he chased the flying creatures. He kept his eyes focused on the two fliers, desperate not to lose them.
    Up above, the demon had almost caught up with Nod. A second before its teeth could clamp down on his legs, Nod turned himself ninety degrees and went straight down. The demon hovered a moment, as if trying to figure out what had happened. Then it looked down, saw the fleeing pixie, and sped after him.
    Nod made another last-second ninety-degree turn and flew along the ground under the parked cars. The demon flew above the cars, keeping time with the pixie. Nod made a hard right while under a pickup truck, losing the demon for another second before it picked up the trail again.
    “I can taste you now,” the demon said, waggling its tongue in the air. “You can’t hide from me.”
    Nod made another turn and sped right between Vincent’s feet. Vincent looked up and saw the demon cannonballing toward him. Without thinking he leapt into the air, directly into the demon’s path.
    The demon slammed into Vincent’s chest, and that was the last thing he remembered for a while.

Vincent awoke in a haze of pain. His chest hurt mightily, and his whole body felt weird. He felt light, almost as if he were flying. He opened his eyes to see if he was.
    He was.
    “Aagh!” he said, staring down at the highway below him. He was at least a hundred meters up, and traveling at a fair lick of speed.
    “Quit your whining,” Nod said from behind him. “I won’t let you go.”
    “You’re carrying me?” Vincent said. He looked behind and could just see the pixie holding him up by his pants. “I forgot how strong you guys are.”
    “Yeah, we’re pretty tough,” Nod said.
    “You’d better put me down before someone sees us,” Vincent said. “We’re over Highway 400. There could be accidents.”
    “Nobody’ll see us,” Nod said. “People see what they want to see, and they don’t want to see a kid flying above them.”
    “Oh,” Vincent said. It seemed to make sense, even though it didn’t really. Chanteuse had told him not many people could see fantasy creatures. A kid being carried by a pixie obviously fit into that category.
    Vincent rubbed his chest. It hurt a lot, and he couldn’t quite remember why.
    “What happened to me?” he asked. “I jumped up to stop that demon … ”
    “And you did,” Nod told him. “Thank you, by the way. You saved my life.”
    “I did?” Vincent said. It hurt to talk, even to breathe, but he couldn’t help himself. “I met a demon in the parking lot earlier. He didn’t seem that tough.”
    “That’s because it’s still your epoch,” Nod said. “Demons can’t attack you until your portals drop. They get a magical blast of pain if they try. But when your epoch ends, they