Sorry, The Only Power Left Is Alteration.

Swarms of roaches scattered from around the crate as contestants sought to avoid them. Some sought to kill them, as they gave a crunch when pressed under the bottom of a shoe. Most tried to make sure the six-legged insects didn’t crawl up their legs as they scattered about. Some spread their wings, took to the air, and landed in clothing, hair, or someone’s face. Nickey swiped at a few that tried to fly into her hair. She darted back and swatted them to the ground. They were big enough that she could feel them smack when she back sided them with her hand.

Circe shifted her butt while turning around so she could get a view of the panic unfolding.

“What’s the big deal? They’re just roaches. My room is full of them sometimes.”

“Yeah, mine too toots.”

“Stop calling me that.”

“Callin’ yuh what?”

“Toots, it makes me cringe.”

Alfredo shrugged, “Fine, whatever yuh want. What am I supposed tuh call yuh then?”

“You don’t need to call me anything, just talk to me like a normal person. You can use my name if you need to get my attention. Can you do that?”

“Yeah, I can do that,” he grumbled.

A small hoard of roaches stormed towards them. Ebony backed up slightly.

“Well, you know whose house isn’t full of roaches, mine! I don’t much appreciate any of them either.”

Roaches crawled over Circe even though Alfredo tried to wave them away. She caught a few more and concentrated on changing their color. It felt strange. The more she did this, the less tired it made her. She could even check her mana bar while holding a roach. Her mana filled up little by little after using her power.

“Would you two mind showing me your mana stat bars?”

Ebony was too busy hollering at roaches creeping up to her loafers and threatening to crawl up her legs to pay attention to Circe’s request. Alfredo’s strategy was to simply stomp anything that got too close regardless of the mess.

“I wouldn’t kill too many of them,” Azoria addressed everyone in the cave, “Vengeful roach golems are known to shred through high level parties, and calling any of you high level at this point would be a stretch.”

The sounds of crunching reduced as people tried to let the roaches go their way. Azoria put her hands together and smiled as she shifted on her throne.

“Oh my, they’re learning! Would you look at that! I do love it when humans learn new things.”

“Sho! Sho! Get away!” Ebony shouted as she stood on her toes and tried keep them off her without stepping on any.

Circe frowned and waved to get their attention but neither of them responded. She took a deep angry breath and let it flow through her system. This was just how things were. She wasn’t worth being paid attention, much less being the boss of this party. That was probably just Alfredo’s attempts to humor her anyway. And to think she’d actually started to believe it.

A fistful of roaches went between her hands, actually more than a fistful. Between her legs a sea of roaches crawled and skittered around each other. They entered her shorts, which she didn’t find very amusing. It tickled her thighs in a bad way but there wasn’t much she could do about it except hold a huge ball of roaches between her hands. Where was she at with her power anyway?

[Alteration Novice 05:]

[Can change coloration of a subject’s hair, skin, eyes, or nails once daily.

Must make physical contact with target for thirty-five seconds to take effect.

The change will register over the period of fifty minutes or longer depending on mana consumed and the severity of change.]

She had changed the color of more than one roach, so that meant a subject was one subject. She could use her power as much as she wanted so long as she didn’t run out of mana and she wasn’t targeting the same subject twice. That was really good to know, because with so many roaches between her hands she could pour her power into this project until her mana became exhausted. Though she’d make sure to save a decent portion, at least a quarter.

With so many roaches running about it became difficult to keep track of which ones she’d poured mana into and which ones were fresh. Though when her attempts to utilize mana were rejected that became a clue. Her power came with a sense of the subjects body, at least as far as colors were concerned. Wait, so she could change the colors both inside and out? It used more mana, but her power could sense the inside of any roach she focused on. A mental diagram of the creature formed in her mind.

With so much work done, Circe celebrated by performing a roach toss. Roaches thrown into the air tumbled or spread their wings and glided away. Roach confetti! Circe had roaches in her hair, on her shoulders, running into her clothes, and while her companions were freaking out, she tossed them in the air as if making a salad.

Ebony established a distance from the crazy girl, a very distant distance. The roaches behaved oddly, as if they were attracted to Circe. Ebony certainly hoped the critters approved of whatever was going on, because she wasn’t in the mood to face a roach golem or see one, ever. Alfredo tried to help by dusting off roaches and scattering them. He used his hand to push the roaches out from between her legs and let them run away. Though a group of roaches clustered around Circe’s right leg to fill the improvised splint. Since Alfredo didn’t want to mess with the broken leg, he didn’t do anything to disturb them so long as Circe endured it.

“Yer bein’ a real champ all tuh sudden. What lifted your mood?”

“I think I might be onto something, boss.” Circe said, finally having Alfredo’s attention. He looked taken aback when she called him boss, but a fierce huff escaped his nostrils as he glowed just a little while she continued speaking, “Let’s get some food. I want to talk to the officer about it. Him specifically. Can you carry me please?”

A hand rubbed her hair, which was now mostly free of roaches. Her shoulders and back needed brushed off as well.

“First of all, I preciate tuh knowledge of it, but we’ll keep tuh keep callin’ you tuh boss, aight? Second of all, we spent too much time gettin’ that leg in order to go bustin’ it again. So no dice. Capisce?”

“I have a very important thing to do, and if you aren’t going to help me then I’ll go myself on my hands and knees if I have too! I’m going to have to move around eventually.”

Alfredo looked to Ebony for support. The doctor crept closer, as no matter where she went some number of roaches remained present.

“What kind of idea has she gotten into her head? I heard about half of it. We’ll carry you when necessary, girl. I worked too hard to bring you back from the brink and if something bad happens I might not be able to do it again.”

“I’m not a girl. I’m twenty-seven years old.”

Circe huffed angrily; nobody ever listened to her. This just proved it. She folded her good leg and started to get up. Alfredo caught her from under the arms so she didn’t accidentally put too much weight on the broken leg. He lifted her up, not concerned with roaches falling from her or bracing themselves around her splint. Somehow the slightly faded roaches were bracing her splint and making it more stable rather than less. Though Alfredo was hesitant to let her too close to him and held her out with his arms extended. Circe pursed her lips together hard and made scrunchy faces with squinting eyes. She did her best not protest, as she was getting what she wanted after all and she needed to keep her legs still. She promised herself she’d do her best.

“I feel like I’m being lifted by a crane.”

“Well, yuh got roaches all over your splint. I’m not sure what they’re doin’ in there, but they don’t seem tuh wanna drop out.”

“Don’t worry about them, they’re fine. They’re helping.”

Alfredo made eyes toward the doctor, rolled them, and looked down toward Circe to get his point across.

“Fine, if you don’t want to take me to him, I won’t beg him for food.”

Alfredo’s stomach grumbled, “He tried tuh kill yuh twice miss. Why don’t yuh sit down and let the doctor handle it?”

Circe deflated while cursing her injury, “Fine, fine. There was something I really wanted to try. But fine.”

Alfredo cleared a spot and sat Circe down like she was a broken doll. At the very least, she had learned to behave herself.