It was a beautiful day outside, the man thought. The weather was warm but not humid, the sun was shining brilliantly, and there was a cool breeze gliding through the park. A perfect day for... Oh. Hmm.

The man stood, picked up his bag, half-eaten burger and drink, and moved to another bench a good distance away.

The flaming wreckage of what might've been a bus at one point crashed down where the man had just been sitting.

(Everything all right?) the man asked, (I nearly got crushed by a bus.)

embarrassment/annoyance/amusement/anger

Finally, someone collected themselves enough to think back to him.

(Sorry about that,) Tide thought back to him. (My fault.)

At any given moment, Psion could shift through the minds of well over ten thousand different people. Right then, he focused on four.

The four of them were in costume now, off fighting one of the numerous giant slime monsters that popped up every now and again. It was an old fight, repeated a dozen times in their short time working together, so he felt confident leaving them to it.

Psion was out of costume; he had told the kids they were on their own, and he wouldn't be helping them if things got bad. That was a lie of course. If they couldn't handle it, he would step in immediately and do whatever needed to be done, confidence building be damned.

He reached out a bit further, into their minds, borrowing their senses, but careful not to disturb them. Seeing and feeling and hearing from four different perspectives was a little disorienting, but Psion was practiced enough to handle it easily.

Tide was still a little flustered about the bus. She was trying to put it out of her mind, but she was too annoyed with herself for letting it happen, and it was slowing her down. She worked water like razor blades into the oozing, black-and-green monstrosity, but wasn't really making much of an effect; anything she managed to cut off would just slither back on.

Jetstream was trying to find the core of the creature, the center that kept the thing together. Strong bursts of wind hammered into the slime, moving the goo around, trying to uncover what made the creature tick.

Sand was trying to do the same thing, actually. Sand was Tide's identical twin, and together they were proof that one's power was not determined by one's genetics. Like Tide, Sand ruled over her namesake, and it would stream perpetually from her too-long sleeves, never slowing or running out. It was with these streams that she was digging through the monster's body, searching for something solid, something they could hurt.

Oddly, Vigor was playing defensive role. Vigor had been the only one of the four to pick a name based on it's ambiguity; he'd be less effective if they expect him to throw fireballs, he said. Right now, he was just covering Sand and Jetstream, blowing up any "limbs" the monster tried to reach them with. But he was getting very annoyed by now.

"This thing's starting to piss me off!" he yelled. "If you two can't find the core, I will. Just stand back!" Tide glared at him.

"Vigor, what are you--" but Vigor didn't acknowledge her. Twin burst of fire catapulted him into the air, and he spread the flame to cover his entire body and plunged into the creature.

"Vigor you dumb--" Sand was interrupted when a burst of fire tore out of what passed for the creature's back. Then another one at the head, and another. Another moment, and slime was thrown everywhere, covering the street and nearby buildings, and at the center of it all, waist-deep in black and green goo, stood Vigor, panting. To his right lay the clear, crystalline core the team had been searching for.

"See?" He said between breaths. "Easy."

Immediately, Psion regretted not teaching the kids that you never, never say something like that. Ever.

Slime crawled rapidly up the core, the scattered globs leaping off the buildings and cars and sidewalk to return to their source. Vigor panicked and tried to escape, but he was too tired and the ooze to thick and the reconstruction too fast and in a moment he was swallowed and the creature stood again. Only this time it was on fire.

"JACOB!" Tide cried, forgetting herself. She reached back with one arm towards a fire hydrant, and it erupted in a spray of water. The spray arced over and began circling her, and she renewed her assault, bladed lines of ice, one after another cutting haphazardly though the monster. Jetstream swept down, catching one arm min-swing and carried her up into the air with him.

"Stop that!" he said, "You wanna cut him in half?"

"Well what am I SUPPOSED to do?!"

"Just try and douse the flames," Jetstream said, "Sand and I will..." at that moment, they passed over a frozen, terrified Sand. "Damn it." Jetstream dropped the twin he was carrying back where he had picked her up and glided over to Sand.

"Sand!" he yelled as he approached her. "What are you doing?! Dig in and FIND HIM!" That seemed to be enough. Sand shook herself back to reality, took a breath, and sent about a dozen tendrils of sand into the flaming monstrosity that held their team mate.

Wow, Psion thought, He handled that better than I thought. Maybe his pedigree wasn't his only strength.

"Well, now they have something to do..." Jetstream uttered, "But I'm just wind. I'd probably just spread the fi--" He stopped. That might work!

"Sand!" he yelled, "Get ready to catch whatever comes out!" Sand looked up at him, and nodded. Jetstream wrapped wind around him, tightly, and enough of it to carry two. And he entered the monster the same way Vigor had.

Wind kept the black slime off of him, and the boy pushed himself through the creature's water- and sand-logged body, until he found one of what he was looking for. The clear, crystalline core was now humming with red and green lights. Red, for Vigor's fire, and green for his own wind, he guessed. He shifted himself so he was beneath the object, and then, using the wind he had carried with him, propelled it out of the creature's body.

Sand was ready for it, wrapping her grains around the core even before the monster's slime chased it. Tide was ready for it too, with a small arsenal of hastily-forged spears of ice. Most of her work was wasted; the first hit truly, cutting easily through the core. The slime lost what was left of its flame and its color and soon its shape, degenerating into a stinking pile of gray. The girls leapt into it, digging for their friends. It didn't take long to find them, and they were happy enough to be able to breathe again.

"That," Jetstream gasped, "SUCKED."

"If I try to do that again? SHOOT ME."

"Tch. As soon as we get home, I'll shoot you anyway."

Yes, Psion thought, I think they'll do fine.