Daedalus/Synopsis

## Daedalus

Joe plummets down the side of a building somewhere in the city of Walker's Point, quickly approaching the street below. His terrified scream dopplers as he nears the bottom. Suddenly a yellow ring begins to shine in his eye and it transforms into the eye of an ancient creature with leathery skin. The fingers of his hand extend, and one finger lengthens all out of proportion, a web of skin stretching out with it. The creature that was Joe wraps his wings about his body and elongated head. The hoodie on his back stretches as he transforms, with only the hood left showing. When his spine flexes and spikes form, the remnants of the hoodie are shredded with a tremendous ***RPPPPPPPPPPPP***. Still wrapped in a ball, the falling Joe begins pleading. Just as the light from passing cars begins to reflect off his body, Joe spreads his massive wings and a creature not seen on Earth for roughly 90 million years quickly changes the fall into flight. Joe's flying form, while not an exact match, closely resembles a pteranodon. The change happened just in the nick of time, and Joe glides gracefully about ten feet above the cars in the street. He flaps his wings and quickly ascends back up toward the tops of the buildings.

A young child riding in the back seat of a yellow cab gapes in wonder at seeing a living dinosaur, the toy dinosaur held in his hand pressed to the glass all but forgotten.

Watching from the building he'd thrown Joe from, Corkindale considers what just happened. Seeing what Joe has changed into, he realizes this was too visible, and too soon.

Joe continues to climb effortlessly, finally breaking through the clouds into the light of the full moon. Below him, his moonlight shadow paces him atop the billowing clouds. Joe navigates his way to his house and attempts a landing on the roof. On final approach, he starts transforming back to human, and he lands badly when he's suddenly flightless and still airborne. Being naked on landing added to his pain. He clambers down off the roof to the open window of his bedroom, telling himself that flying was awesome, except for all the terror. Finally at the window, he climbs in, adding in a bit about the naked.

Unnoticed by Joe, there is a watcher on the sidewalk near the driveway to the Gomez home. Phoebe stares at Joe's window, astonished by what she's just seen.

In his room, Joe complains about needing a second job to pay for clothes as he pulls on a pair of shorts. A knock at the door, and Joe's mother, alerted by noises coming from his room, asks to come in. At Joe's "Yeah," she steps in as he's pulling a shirt over his head. She tells him she heard something … again. Joe tells her it was birds. She talks to Joe, ignoring his automatic "I'm fine," saying current events seem to point to him not being fine. He gives her that one. She says they're trying to grade on a teenage boy scale for how he's been acting, but they're worried. She admits that maybe they don't need to be, but they are. Looking away, Joe tells her he just has a lot going on. She says they can talk about it, he says he can't. She counters asking can't or won't. Joe admits it's both, then assures her he's okay. He promises to talk to her if he needs to. She accepts that and gets up to leave. At the door, she gives it one last try, telling him he can tell her anything. Once she's gone, he quietly tells the room that, no, he can't.─────────────────────

Pratt and Hemsworth follow Evans across the football field at the high school. Hemsworth says, to Pratt's disgust, if this is some kind of cult thing, he wants to be, like, the high priest or something. Pratt swears to Christ, and Hemsworth says like that, without the dying. When Evans stops on the trail into the woods above the school, Hemsworth asks if they're here, while Pratt asks what's up. Evans responds cryptically, saying there is no here, here. With his face in the shadows, Evans tell them he is stronger, more is required. Worried now, Hemsworth declares it is a cult thing, and Pratt demands to know what Evans is talking about. Evans turns his head to show the nightmare face Yaslatol has given him. Frightened now by the way Evans is acting and what he's become, the two boys try to back away, not noticing that something has come up behind them. A pale pink beak hangs over Hemsworth saying "Yessss", and he finds that he can't move. A bug-eyed pale green spirit stands behind Pratt saying flesh, but Pratt is faster and runs for his life. Looking over his shoulder, he doesn't see the low-hanging branch that trips him up. The bug-eyed apparition catches up with him, and despite his plea, it funnels into his body through his gaping mouth, breaking out most of his teeth as tears run from his eyes.