Mom stepped forward. “Gary, maybe you should take a breath. You just got your horn back. You don’t have control like you—”
“Unicorns are dumb,” the man said, apparently incapable of fear. “And pointless. And they annoy me.” He paused, considering. “And I don’t like their faces.”
Before I could take a step forward to do something, a bright rainbow shot from Gary’s horn. It shot up into the air like a firework before it arced and started to fall to the ground.
The crowd shouted as they ran out of the way.
The man didn’t have time to move.
The light hit him on the top of the head and exploded. I waited for the man to keel over or burst in a flash of blood and gristle. I was already forming a plan in my mind to smuggle Gary out of Camp HaveHeart, where he’d have to spend the rest of his days on the run as a fugitive. Maybe one day we’d be able to meet up again, but it’d have to be in disguise, and we would reminisce about the times we’d spent together before I’d betray him by turning him in for the offered reward. I’d feel bad about it, sure, and when I testified against him in court, I’d cry on the stand about how I thought I’d done the right thing by helping him escape, but that my conscience wouldn’t let me sleep at night knowing a murderer walked the streets because of me.
But I needn’t have worried, because the man didn’t die.
Instead, his skin turned blue.
“What,” I said.
“What,” Ryan said.
“Pretty,” Tiggy said.
“Ha!” Gary crowed as he began to prance. “Suck it, random speciesist guy who thinks we all look the same! You’re going to be blue for the rest of your life!”
“Oh dear,” the King said as random speciesist guy began to scream.
“One day,” Justin said, staring up at the heavens. “That’s all I ask. One day where nothing weird happens and everything is normal.”
“What did you do?” I demanded as the man continued to wail.
Gary frowned. “I turned him blue.”
“But what does that do to him?”
“Nothing. He’s just… blue.”
I blinked. “But why.”
“I am a unicorn. With a horn. I don’t have to have a reason to do anything.”
“Change him back.”
“No.”
“Gary.”
“Sam.”
“Tiggy!” Tiggy said.
“I get it,” I said. “Dude’s a jerk. But you can’t just change someone’s skin color because they insulted you.”
“Sam,” Gary said slowly. “Did you or did you not turn Ryan to stone when he tried to kick your ass when you were kids?”
“I didn’t do it on purpose.”
“It sort of felt like it was on purpose,” Ryan muttered.
“It’s the same thing,” Gary said, flipping his newly colored mane prettily. “He hurt my feelings, and so I got my revenge.”