The young man made sure his three rowdy friends got into the back of the cab before he slid into the passenger seat.

"Dude, I'm hungry..." "Yeah lets go, drive man!" "They better have food at this party!" "Hey, where's my beer?" The three slightly slurred voices caterwauled from the back in a mishmash of sound.

"Sorry," Nick glanced at the cabbie's placard, "Vern. Tenth and Governor's please."

"Right-o." He dropped the cab in drive and they began to roll away. His dark eyes glanced towards the rear view mirror and the three typical bar-goers in the back and then shifted to the man beside him. "OK, so what's with the kilt?"

The ogre swatted at the flickering globes of light that buzzed around it's head. "STOP IT!" the brute bellowed.

A golden globe of light landed on its bulbous nose. The giant crossed its eyes to look at the miniature humanoid with dragonfly wings. "Give back what you stole!" the pixie said with a stomp of its diminutive foot. "Or we'll turn you purple with pink spots!"

Nick tried to focus on his book, but the bumps and shanking proved to be too much so he set it aside. He felt cold sweat prickling his brow and his mouth was incredibly dry. The young man closed his eyes as a ding sounded overhead.

"The captain has turned on the fasten seat belt light," a warm voice oozed over the cabin speaker system. "As you can feel, we are experiencing a bit of turbulence. A storm is rolling in, and she is trying to find a patch of smoother air." The attendant did not have time to continue because the bottom fell out of the world.

Nick dove and kicked with all is might. The boat raced by overhead, its three outboards churning up the sea where the young man had been a second before. "Come to the Cayman's," his friend had said "everything was on him." Well his ex-friend had forgotten to tell Nick about his cartel friends.

The little boy looked up at Nick with big brown eyes. "Please mister." He reached out, but came into contact with the wall of his invisible prison. The arcane circle around the child flared azure and miniature lightning lanced up to strike his hand. "Let me out."

Nick slammed his phone back onto its cradle, but it tumbled to desk with a clatter. The young man rammed the two pieces of offending technology together, growling as he did so. "Those worthless, pigheadded, lazy..."

"How did my family get your number?" Bradly asked from over the cube wall.

"You're crazy!" Lynn screamed as she tried to pull him away from the engine's throttle by the arm.

Nick placed both hands on the lever and threw his body weight into it. Pound for pound the petite but fiery, raven-haired woman could not stop him. The lever hit full throttle with a satisfying metal "thunk." "We're on a locomotive, we've only got two choices! Back with them, or plow through the barrier. I'm taking my chances!" He felt the massive engine gain speed and the two, shoulder to shoulder, grimly watched as the flaming truck straddling the tracks grew closer.