“That’s him!” she screamed. “That’s the demon!”
“Wow,” Gator said as he thumbed off his phone. “Crazy bitch, huh?” Then he spun around and started running away.
Bing was so confused he didn’t even give chase. Damn, the big guy could move when he wanted to.
Sand came up to his side, breathing hard. “What did you do?” she asked. “What did you do?”
Bing shrugged. “Nothing. I gave an interview.”
She stared at him. Then she abruptly snapped her fingers in front of his face. “Wake up, you idiot! He’s a demon.”
“He’s a tourist.”
“Damn it,” she moaned as she scanned the woods for Gator, but he was long gone. “He bespelled you.”
“No,” Bing said firmly, “he didn’t.”
Unless he absolutely had. How was that possible? How could one tourist be a demon? He grabbed Sand’s arm. “Why do you think he’s a demon?”
“Because he sucks power out of you, out of me, out of all of us! And he spreads it around to everyone else.”
“How?” Bing pressed.
“Don’t you understand? He’s the internet!”
Bing grimaced, working hard to keep hold of his temper. “The internet is not a demon.”
“It didn’t start that way. Do you think all that energy, all that attention, would stay forever as just a toy?”
He tried to walk through her logic. His paranormal identity was maintained because people put energy into believing he was Red Wolf. Because all that psychic power manifested into him, it made him into a living, breathing icon.
“You’re saying that he’s… what, stealing the power that keeps me alive? How?”
“All the attention, all the energy goes to youthrough him. He uses it to become more powerful than you, than me, than anyone!”
“All I did was give an….” His words slowed down. “Interview,” he finished softly.
“Yes.”
“And somehow he’s going to use all the energy that would usually go into me—”
“To do what he wants. Not what I want.”
“How?”
She threw up her hands. “I was created centuries ago. I do not understand the internet.” Her shoulders dropped and her expression tightened into fury. “But I know his attention is fickle. He will take everything and leave us with nothing.”
