Alex knew it was late. She knew she should really have called an Uber ride, or grabbed a ride from a friend. But her place was only a few blocks from the pub the munch had been at, and she always loved walking through the fall air. Even if her knees weren’t appreciative of it some days. She knew things were strange in DC, but she hadn’t expected what she’d walked across that night.

She hadn’t expected the unconscious woman. Nor the strange gremlin-like creature that stood on top of the woman and seemed to be the source of her lack of consciousness. Well now. Alex was NOT about to stand for that. Narrowing her eyes, she strode over with all the presence of a mother bear and, as the gremlin-thing turned around, kicked it. Hard. It landed a few feet away, making angry chittering noises, and Alex placed herself between it and the woman. It wasn’t too hard to find something to help fight the thing with, a wooden spoon on the ground nearby [had it been there earlier?], and though it wasn’t her weapon of choice, not against something obviously trouble, it was what was there.

She hadn’t expected the sudden rush of power through her, or the change in wardrobe. Eyes wide, she missed the creature charging at her and ramming into her, knocking her over. Alex [no, not Alex anymore? Someone else?] yelped, wincing at the concrete below meeting her back. The creature tried to claw at her, but she was back in the game again, and pushed the little monster off of her, and promptly kicked it again. This time into the wall of a building. That seemed to do the trick, because the creature seemed to just poof into dust. A moment later, the woman groaned and opened her eyes. And something in Alex just ‘switched’ and she was herself again, not the strange woman who was her-but-not.

“Wha…”

“Hey, don’t move too quickly. You’ve been unconscious, and I’m sure you’ll make yourself dizzy if you do that.” Alex knelt next to the victim, soft smile on her face. “I saw something standing over you and managed to get it to go away. Once you’ve had a moment, do you mind if I make sure you don’t have any injuries?”

“Uhm…sure?” An hour later, once she was sure the girl was okay, and had gotten a nice warm drink and some food in her [ala Starbucks, since she wasn’t sure her own place would be such a great idea at that moment], she sat in her favorite armchair at home, frowning as she thought.

That wooden spoon had caused her to change. Change into what? She wasn’t...entirely sure. ‘Kildare’ came to mind, but she wasn’t sure why. Rubbing her temples, she felt a headache coming on as she tried to think herself in circles, trying to figure out the whats and whys and hows. It had been magic, that was plain enough. But why her? Why now, when she was half a century old and certainly not spry enough to be taking on the things rumored to be milling about DC at night.

This would require some Googling. Some serious Googling. Because she was rather certain she’d need to talk to another person to figure this strangeness out.

[Word Count: 555, according to Google Docs]