As Connie walked towards Crystal Hall she heard a sneering voice call out "Hey, It's the fox bitch again!"

She'd already been having a bad day. Her classes were a lot harder than at her last school, and she had more power testing coming up after lunch.

The testing worried her. There were things she didn't want them to find out...

She was jerked out of her thoughts as someone grabbed her tail and yanked.

"Hey, bitch! Look at me when I'm talking to you."

It didn't really hurt, just startled her a bit. But it was the last straw.

She spun around and glared at the boy. It was one of the ones that'd been harassing her all week.

She decided she'd had enough. She'd already checked and it was a green flag day. So she didn't need to worry about anybody seeing anything.

"Listen, idiot. I've had about enough of you and your buddies. Why won't you go bother somebody else?"

"Awww. Is the bitch on the rag?" taunted another of the boys.

She flinched. He didn't realize just what a sore spot he'd hit. Connie wanted to cry at the reminder of what she'd never be.

Her flinch drew laughter and more taunts. Like sharks smelling blood in the water, the predators circled for the kill. Only these predators didn't realize what they'd gotten themselves into.

Her fox ears went flat on top of her head and her tail stood straight out and bottled as the fur stood on end.

She fought the impulse to lash out at them. She took a breath and reached out to a watermelon sized chunk of granite next to the path. She put one hand on top of it, flexed her fingers a bit and lifted it as if it was so much styrofoam.

Bringing it up to waist height she took it between her hands and squeezed. Still with no visible effort she looked straight at the ringleader and said in a flat voice "I'm not a bitch. I'm a vixen."

As she spoke she was sort of rolling the chunk of rock between her hands and with some alarming cracking noises it got smaller and smaller.

"You don't want to make me angry. You wouldn't like me when I'm angry."

With that she turned and tossed the now grapefruit sized and glowing rock over her shoulder. The concrete of the path cracked as it impacted.

She walked off towards the dining hall again as the smoking sphere of something that used to be rock cooled. Her ears were back up and her tall swished from side to side as she sauntered away.

The boys were stunned for a moment. Then one started to reach down to poke at the sphere.

"I wouldn't do that if I were you".

The boy turned to see someone from Whateley Security looking amused.

"Why not?" asked the boy.

"Well, I don't recall you being invulnerable or a regen, so if you're fond of your fingers, you might want to poke it with a stick or something else you won't mind losing."

The boy stepped back looking nervous. The security man picked up a fallen branch from under a tree and poked the sphere. Smoke and flame erupted as the wood contacted it.

"See what I mean?"

He pushed harder with the stick and barely managed to get the sphere to rock a bit in the depression it'd made in the walkway. He nodded to himself and keyed the mike on his radio.

"Security? Evans here. I need someone from the labs to do a hazmat pickup. One of the freshmen. Flying Fox, just turned a quarter ton of granite into a lump the size of a grapefruit. And it's hot enough to glow yellow...."

"Yeah, it's sitting on the path about halfway between Poe and Crystal Hall."

***

The hazmat team quickly scanned the sphere sitting on the cracked concrete walkway.

"No radiation hazard..."

"Surface temp 1000 C and dropping..."

"No magic signature..."

"Okay, looks safe to move."

The guard watched as they used a couple of crowbars to lever it into a heavily insulated box sitting on its side. Once the sphere was inside they carefully tipped the box upright and closed the lid. A small front loader rolled up and chains from the bucket were attached to lifting lugs on the box.

The head of the team turned to the guard. "They want this down in the lab, pronto. They also want you to write up what you saw.."

With a sigh the guard followed them to the lab. Paperwork...

***

The powers testing boffins were poring over the reports.

"Elemental composition looks about right for something that started out as a chunk of the local granite. But the molecular structure is pretty weird."

"Yes, but allowing for the pressure and heat, you'd expect that."

"Why's it so hot?"

"Compression, friction, pretty much what you'd expect from forcing normal rock into a hyper-dense state like that"

"How dense is it, anyway?"

"About 140 grams per cubic centimeter. More than 6 times as dense as platinum"

"Good grief. The earth's core isn't that dense!"

"The pressures involved...."

"We're still trying to figure out what sort of pressures were involved. But as you can see, this means her powers have still more aspects we hadn't expected."

"OK, we need a list of things that need to be investigated based on this incident. And we need to see how much of it can be worked into her testing after lunch..."

"I think Medical should check out the bit about how her ears and tail reacted."

"Why, well, supposedly they are props. But from this, it sounds like they are part of her."

"OK, send that along to them. And be sure we get an examination of her hands as soon as she gets to testing. I want to know if there's any sign of damage from the heat."

"Right".

"Next, the report says she picked up that boulder by putting her hand on the top and grabbing it. Even with super strength she shouldn't have been able to get a grip on it that'd work. Not unless she sank her fingers into it. And that'd have caused a lot of cracking and spalling, right?"

Heads nodded.

"Then she brought it up to waist height and started using both hands to squeeze it. And how did the guard put it? 'Rolled it between her hands like a lump of clay'. That shouldn't be possible It'd shatter under the pressure long before it started compressing."

"Maybe it's another aspect of her force fields? That'd explain how it wound up spherical, too".

"OK, list that as tentative explanation and figure out how to test it."

"Uh, boss? I just realized we overlooked something."

"What?"

"You said it was a granite boulder about yea big, right?" He held his hands out to indicate the size.

"Yeah?"

"And we figure it weighed about the same as the sphere does, right? A quarter ton or so?"

Someone chimed in "257 kilos".

"Right. How much does she weigh? 40, 50 kilos?"

"Yes..."

"Ever see a crane try to pick up something that weighs more than it does? Unless it's properly braced, it falls over. She just stood there and didn't fall over even with a rock weighing five times what she does at the end of one arm."

Much frantic discussion ensued as the subject of their discussion ate lunch.

***

Connie decided to indulge herself a bit. She was attempting to devour a bacon-mushroom cheeseburger and onion rings in a "delicate" manner. Well, at least somewhat more ladylike than some of the other bricks.

Between sips of her chocolate shake she wondered what they had in mind for this round of powers testing. She was interrupted by her boyfriend appearing next to the table.

Poor Art. He was looking longingly at her burger. He had a salad. And she knew his drink was likely a diet soda. They both knew why he was being so careful with his diet. Maybe the doctors here could help him some. At least now that Don was their guardian, they had a chance. Not like either set of parents...

She took his mind off the food by telling him about her latest attempt to discourage the idiots who were bothering her.

"Well, if they don't get the hint from that..." was his comment once he quit laughing.

"Yeah, well, I hope you don't have to go as far as that knife trick you came up with. That's a bit dangerous."

"Still better than a blip with the knife into them"

She nodded.

"Not like they can bother you much. They'd have to be able to catch you."

"Connie, you know as well as I do, that if it looks like I'm running away, it'll get worse."

"OK, OK. I get the point."

"Have those idiots from the school radio station gone after you yet?:

"No, I think Alice unnerved them a bit, and since I'm the older sister, lord only knows what they'd think I'd do."

Just then, as if summoned by the mention of her name, Alice came up with her tray and a wicker basket.

She was a cute girl who looked about 12. The gingham dress she was wearing only emphasized it.

"Not the Dorothy outfit again!" complained Art.

"I told you not to give it to her." said Connie. "And where'd you dig up the wig?"

"Oh, Don got it for me." replied Alice.

Art snickered. "You know your brother gives her anything she wants."

"Like he's got a choice!" Connie shot back.

Alice just ignored them and started to eat her lunch. She noticed a few boys watching. She smiled sweetly and caught the eye of one at a nearby table as she peeled a banana. Maintaining eye contact, she slowly pushed it into her mouth. Then she let it out again. All the while looking ever so sweet and innocent. Like she had no idea what it looked like..

Art and Connie just ignored her. They'd seen it before.

But all the boys (and a few of the girls) at nearby tables were transfixed watching this sweet innocent girl ever so innocently do something frankly obscene to the fruit.

Once she was sure she had the full attention of enough boys, she let the banana out again, licked the end, and then still smiling innocently, bit the end off. All the boys cringed.

Alice continued eating as if she hadn't noticed any of it.

Art commented, "I'd say that was going to get you in trouble on of these days, if I didn't know how many times it has already."

Alice smiled. "It's only trouble if you can't get out of it."

Connie shook her head. "Sometimes sister, you freak me out."

Alice shrugged.

Art asked "So, did you and Don come up with code-names yet?"

Alice nodded.

"So what are they?"

Alice smiled. "Oh, I'm Lolicon, and Don is Bishounen."

She'd timed it perfectly. Both Art and Connie had their mouths full. The spray was impressive.

I'm putting these at the end now otherwise they'd take over the teaser.

Name: Constance (Connie) Sutherland
Aliases: Ronald Sutherland
Code name: Flying Fox
Ratings: flying, strength, PK (contact?), radiation shielding? levels uncertain
Techniques: none
Weak vs.: [unknown]
Backup/ Team affiliation: family

Name: D'artagnan "Art" Gayle
Aliases: Dorothy Gayle
Code name: Blip
Ratings: warper (teleportation) level unknown
Techniques:none
Weak vs.: [unknown]
Backup/ Team affiliation: family

Name: Allison "Alice" Sutherland
Aliases: none
Code name: Lolicon
Ratings: [redacted]
Techniques: Lolita, age inappropiate behavior, kawaii, [censored], [censored],[censored], [redacted]
Weak vs.: normal human vulnerabilities
Backup/ Team affiliation: family, [redacted]