Questionable Matters

“Are you high, stupid or both?” Wallace asked the man across from him through the steam rising from the coffee cup perched just at the edge of his mouth. “You want to rob The Un-Secret Lair or the Caped Cuisiner? Places that transhuman heroes go to eat.”

“Why not?” Billy shot back. “The prices there are outrageous. Anyone in there has to have a bunch of money on them.”

“I think most of the customers pay with plastic, Billy.”

“Whatever. Point is, the place is busy, I bet lots of people at least are carrying cash for tips, and this is about volume. Plus, no one ever robs cafés and coffee shops and restaurants. They’ll never expect it.”

Wallace stared hard for a moment at his friend, and wondered once again—as he did about twice every month—why he was friends with him. “Billy, please tell me you are not getting your ideas about the best crimes to commit from Pulp Fiction.”

“What? I don’t get it,” Billy said, pursing his lips and shrugging.

“Pulp Fiction. The movie. That’s how it starts. A boyfriend and girlfriend having a talk just like this in a breakfast joint. And they try to rob the place. And then at the end of the movie we see how it turned out, and what happened is the dude and his lady almost get themselves killed by two mobsters in the place, including the illustrious Jules Winfield with his ‘Bad Mother Fucker’ wallet.”

“What are you talking about?”

“Billy, we saw that movie when it first came out,” Wallace said. “Kind of a hard movie to forget, even if we were both 12 at the time.”

“I was baked. I don’t remember shit about that movie.”

“Well, apparently the coffee shop caper bit stuck in your head,” Wallace retorted. “Except for the part where it went bad. Shit, I don’t know what’s worse: That you can’t remember a classic scene like that in a classic motherfucking movie or the fact you’ve never watched it since then.”

“Well, life ain’t a movie, bro,” Billy said. “This will work.”

“I’ve got 100 billion reasons to not want to do something like this.”

Billy slapped the table hard. “Jesus! Man, do you have to exaggerate like that? You gotta feel all special. You couldn’t list 100 reasons, much less 100 billion.”

“I don’t need to list ‘em or name ‘em, Billy-boy. That’s the number of neurons in the human brain, and every single one of them tells me this is a bad idea,” Wallace said. “That’s the kind of knowledge reading grants you, my man. I know how many cells are in the brain. And the fact that none of them in your head are raising red flags about this idea of yours scares me.”

“Give me one good reason other than an apparently very forgettable scene in a movie,” Billy challenged him.

“Just one? Easy. The place would be filled with transhumans.”

“Maybe. Maybe not. Those places are mostly filled with a lot of fanboys, fangirls, wannabes and doubles—plus plain ole normally dressed folks,” Billy said. “And any real transhumans probably won’t raise a stink trying to foil the robbery, because they’re in a place like that so that they blend in and people don’t know who they really are. If Greenguard suddenly steps up, and the real Freak-Easy is sitting right next to him, he risks getting hit from behind…”

“Freak-Easy works New York City; he hardly comes over to this side of the  Long Island Sound,” Wallace pointed out.

“And a trans crook isn’t gonna worry about giving up a wallet because it’s chump change and he won’t want to risk outing himself as the real deal in front of a hero that might be there,” Billy said, ignoring him. “It’s like the Cold War—mutually assured destruction. See that there? You aren’t the only one who’s done some reading, Wallace.”

“Sketchy reasoning, man.”

“Wallace, we knock over a liquor store or bank…”

“I’m not all that keen on knocking over anything these days…” Wallace began.

“You owe me…”

“I don’t see how you see that…”

“Anyway, Wallace, when a person robs a liquor store, they gotta worry that the till won’t have much money and it’s a big, fat wasted effort and maybe the guy behind the counter is the owner instead of some low-wage fuckface, and then maybe you get a shotgun blast. Or you rob a bank and get a little wad of cash with a  dye-bomb in it plus you end up on the FBI’s shit list because it’s a federal crime. A restaurant means a lot of people with wallets and jewelry and shit. Plus whatever’s in the cash register.”

“See? Again. You’re using the same reasoning as in Pulp Fiction.” Wallace noted.

“I’m telling you I don’t remember shit about that shit movie. This is all my own brain working.”

“Or not working,” Wallace groused, sipping at his coffee and glad that the coffee shop they were in right now had almost no other customers to tempt his friend, given how excited Billy was about his “epiphany.”

* * *

Query walked into the Caped Cuisiner, almost immediately picking out three people conveniently clustered at or near the counter whom he was pretty certain were the real thing as far as being transhuman heroes or vigilantes. He knew their habits, patterns and mannerisms well enough, and had spent enough time in here in his Milo Phillips identity or some disguise, to pick them out. Once he got closer, his enhanced senses were able to confirm them by scent.

“Ladies and gentlemen,” Query said generally, so as not to focus his attention only on the real transhumans in costume, in case they wanted to stay anonymous. “I thought I’d stop by and share some information that just came my way: Amateur Knight is out and about tonight.”

“Shiiiiiiit,” groaned Brickhouse quietly. “I am not in a mood to bail that geek out. I heard Hardcase almost got killed rescuing that loser a few weeks ago.”

“He did not almost get killed. He did not even almost get injured,” Query corrected him.

“Still, I am not feeling the idea of playing nursemaid to a guy who gets himself into trouble just so he can meet folks like us,” Brickhouse retorted. There were grunts of assent from the two other real transhuman white hats nearby.

“In all fairness…” Query began, then noticed a man at the end of the counter pull the bottom of his red demonic skull mask over his mouth and chin, hastily toss down a fifty for what was clearly a tab of a lot less than that—the food and drink unfinished at that—and hurriedly stand up. Query knew the secret identity of the real Speed Demon but had never had a chance to scent-mark him, so he couldn’t be sure this was the real guy. Still, no paid body-double would be this eager to move along with Query in the room. He had no interest in busting a colorful criminal whose most notorious crimes were grand theft auto, but…

Query stepped over and stopped the costumed man with a  firm grip on one bicep. “The dark green Mercedes—it’s mine. It had better goddamn well still be there when I leave,” Query hissed, and then released the man.

“As I was saying,” Query said, returning to where Brickhouse was, “Amateur Knight is a nuisance, but as idiotic and reckless as he is, he means well and thinks he’s helping. Yes, he’s trying to get to meet a lot of us, but he really thinks he’s a sidekick to every hero.”

Nearby, Wreck Lass cleared her throat. “Well-meaning or not, he puts himself in danger and then one of us has to bail him out or feel guilty that he goes to an ER for some stitches—or worse—if we don’t. And he could get one of us hurt. Least he could do is get some real armor instead of a Spandex silver suit that looks vaguely like a suit of armor.”

“You’re not going to get any argument out of me,” Query said. “I’m just giving y’all a heads-up in case you care. Like it or not, when you decided you wanted to patrol the mean streets in tights, you kinda signed on to deal with annoying shit, too. But it’s your choices,” he said, signaling a waitress so he could order a sandwich and fries to go.

* * *

“See?” Billy said. “There is no way that’s the real Query over there.”

“There are four people no one in this town is ballsy enough to dress up as,” Wallace said. “Janus, Tooth Fairy and Odium on the black hat side, and Query on the white hat side. Look, I hoped you’d get this crazy idea out of your head after a few days. Only reason I’m here while you case the joint is to remind you why you don’t want to plan—much less pull—a job like this.”

“C’mon! Look, it’s all roleplay over there. That Speed Demon who just left isn’t real and the fake Query knows it. They’re acting out a scene. A fake Query wouldn’t put his hand on someone who might be the real thing and the real Query wouldn’t let a crook just walk. And look at how this ‘Query’ is chatting up with those other fakers. Query’s a damned loner. He wouldn’t be having some stupid convo with a bunch of transhumans.”

“Billy, I don’t think you’ve worked out all the possible angles and scenarios,” Wallace countered. “I’m just saying you came here to case…”

“We came…”

“You  came here to case the joint and I came to provide input, and on the first visit here, we have more than one probable real honest-to-God transhuman white hat in the place.”

“Let’s say you’re right, which you aren’t. Even so, look, there’s a Dog Pound or Hellhound over there, so again, no white hat is just going to jump up and make themselves a target to deal with a small-time heist…”

“See? You can’t even figure out if that guy is Dog Pound or Hellhound. Even I can tell he’s neither because it’s just a cheesy furry dog mask and both the villains wear leather masks. He ain’t no one, but that Query is real. Don’t think about coming back here to…:”

“I won’t,” Billy said, sliding a gun across the table to Wallace and standing up to pull his own from out the waistband beneath his sweatshirt. “No need to come back since the job’s going down now when it’s perfect timing…”

Then Billy was standing, gun upraised as he shouted, “This is a robbery! Be calm and cooperate and don’t none of you motherfuckers move or pull any shit or we’ll execute every last motherfucking one of you!”

* * *

Nobody moved, but four people in costume were tensed and poised. One of them though, clad all in black with only a red question mark to adorn his mask, signaled to them with one hand to stand down.

Firmly and calmly, so that everyone could hear, Query said, “I’ve got this.”

Billy looked over at him with an expression of murder in his eyes that Wallace had seen him adopt all too often, even though he’d never actually killed anyone. He didn’t think Query—and he was certain it was the real man behind that mask—was fazed at all.

“You’ve got this, ‘Query’,” Billy taunted. “Do you, now?”

“No, he doesn’t,” came a voice with an angry growl and a little waver. “I’ve goddamn well got this.”

Bill turned his head slightly to see a gun pointed at him. Query stopped his slow approach. Wallace cleared his throat.

“Put your gun down and give yourself up to the nice Query,” Wallace said. “Or I will put a hole in your shoulder. Remember, though, I’m a lousy shot and your chest is really close to your shoulder.”

“Wallace? Man, what are you doing? We’re a team!”

“We ain’t no team here,” Wallace said. “I told you time and again I’m not going to jail and I’m not pushing my luck anymore. I told you I was only coming here with you to show you why this was a bad idea. I didn’t want you to toss me a gun when you lost your mind and started badly misquoting a scene from a great movie you claim you don’t remember. Now, though, I have a gun, you have the attention of at least one very real transhuman, and this shit is all about to end right now.”

“You won’t shoot me,” Billy said. “Just point your gun at the fake Query and let’s get on with…”

“I will sooner shoot you than let that very real Query fuck me up,” Wallace said. “And this job is over. It never shoulda started.”

Billy’s lip quivered. “Wallace? Man…”

“Don’t make me revoke your New Judah privileges permanently, Billy,” Wallace said. “I ain’t never hurt anyone before, and I don’t wanna start with you to make sure no one else gets hurt. Also I don’t think it’s worth it being your friend anymore.”

* * *

In a quiet booth, Query looked at Wallace in silence, then folded his gloved fingers together on the table in front of him.

“My fries will be ready soon, and I have things I ought to be doing,” Query said softly and steadily. “The only thing left to figure out is whether I slap a zip tie around your wrists, too, and sit you next to your buddy to wait for the New Judah police to arrive.”

“I was not down for this heist,” Wallace said. “I didn’t even know he was going to actually improv the whole thing and toss me a gun.”

“Nonetheless, I’m willing to bet this isn’t the first time you’ve held a gun and not the first time you and Billy there have been together when a robbery went down.”

“Whatever might be in my past, I’d like to leave it there. You let Speed Demon walk just now.”

Query glanced out the window and into the street. “Speed Demon left my car alone; you and your friend tried to relieve me and a lot of other people of their wallets.”

“My friend. Former friend, I might add, after this stunt. Not me.”

“I bet I could do a lot of digging and figure out what crimes you committed in the past,” Query said. “I bet the statute of limitations has run out on hardly any of them.”

“Why, man? Why would you do that?” Wallace asked, hating the whine he could hear in his undertone.

“Because I have an idea,” Query said, looking for a moment at the guy in the cheap dog mask off in the distance and then toward the register. “Oh, look! My food is ready and bagged up. So, Wallace, are you coming with me, or would you rather go with Billy and the cops in another couple minutes?”

“Guess I’m riding with you.”

“Great. We have to make a stop along the way.”

“Along the way to where? What stop?” Wallace asked, a nervous flutter in his stomach.

“Wouldn’t want to ruin the surprise,” Query answered. “By the way, what’s your inseam? And do you know your chest size by any chance?”

* * *

The woman ran her fingers through the black and green feathers of the mantle draped across her shoulder and over her chest and upper back, then regarded him through the holes of her domino mask.

“Seriously? This is the favor you’re going to call in?” she sneered.

“Favor number one of two,” Query corrected her. “C’mon—it might even be fun. I need you because your face and costume aren’t plastered all over the media.”

Coldraven looked over at the man Query had with him, wrinkled her nose and tried to suppress a laugh. “And who’s this?”

“A guy earning a ‘Get out of jail free’ card,” Query said. “I’ll fill you in along the way.”

* * *

“Psssst!”

Amateur Knight spun around at the sound, a heavy mace in one hand and a growl issuing from his throat. “Stand down, evild…”

“Relax,” said Query. “Or, rather, refocus. I need your help. There’s someone new and green on the scene about to get killed and you happen to be in the right place at the right time.”

* * *

Amateur Knight pressed onward as Query fell back to cover him, whispering that there was an ambush team behind them.

It’s up to me, Amateur Knight thought. I can handle this.

He rounded the corner and was met with the sight of the lithe, athletic female villain in mask and feathers Query had told him about and whom he’d never seen or heard of before. And hopelessly outclassed against her was…a…a…

Who the hell is this and what is wrong with him?

“Surrender, villainess!” cried a man with a buccaneer-style mustache and goatee, brandishing a rapier and wearing—Amateur Knight could hardly believe the ludicrous sight—a dog suit covering everything but his face. “Lay down your arms and surrender to Swashbuckler Hound!”

Amateur Knight rushed in, knowing that while he lacked finesse at times, he had Brute powers to help shield him from serious harm in a lot of fights—and the woman fighting this newbie, he realized, was fast and agile. “Get clear, uh, Hound!” he shouted. “This is no place for you. Let me handle…”

“Look out!” shouted the man in the dog suit, lunging toward Amateur Knight, “She’s gonna…”

Swashbuckler Hound tripped and fell into Amateur Knight, stumbled past him and crashed into a wall. Before Amateur Knight could right himself, he saw the woman fling something and felt a soft, firm impact against his legs. Then dampness and stretching and gripping. He stumbled and fell himself as he realized a tangler had been thrown at him, completely tying up his legs.

Suddenly, the woman was over him, and a gun was trained right between his eyes. “Good night forever, Amateur Knight,” she snarled, and pulled the trigger.

He wasn’t sure if his ears registered the laugh first or his chest the sudden impact against his costume as the gun shifted position. But he knew both preceded him looking down to see a neon-green stain across the front of his torso.

“You’re right, that was fun,” she called out. “But I’m still mad at you.”

Amateur Knight struggled to turn his body and see who was approaching from behind. Query, with the silly-looking dog-suited amateur right next to him.

Amateur… the prone young man thought.

“Amateur Knight, I’m going to need you to focus on your memory of that bumbling fool drawing you into a dangerous situation and then messing up your approach and almost getting you killed,” Query said. “I need you to remember that forever. Do you know why?”

“Ummmm. Because…uhhh?”

“You’re taking too long,” Query said, cutting him off. “It’s because that’s how every other hero and vigilante in the city sees you, man. And this is the kind of thing we’ve been afraid of happening ever since you started making these forays out at night several months ago.”

“Oh. Uh….”

“No need to thank me or apologize—after all, you gave yourself the name Amateur Knight, so you know you have rough edges, and you’ve clearly been hoping for a mentor. I’ve just mentored you. I’ve brought clarity and understanding to your world,” Query said as he sliced at the tangler strands with a Bowie knife to release the young man. “We do understand each other, right?”

Query couldn’t see the embarrassed flush beneath the mask, but the change in posture told him everything he needed to know, even if it took a bit of time for Amateur Knight to get the words out.

“You want me off the streets, don’t you?” he finally said.

“Amateur Knight,” Query said, “you have at least one thing going for you that my little creation Swashbuckler Hound doesn’t, and that’s actual transhuman powers. But yeah, I need you off the street.”

“I just wanted…”

“Shhhhh,” Query said. “No more words. I want you off the street. I don’t think even this lesson will be able to keep you off them, though, so I’m going to have to insist you be patient while I find someone with enough patience themselves to train you. I don’t want a ‘thank you’ and I don’t want you getting your hopes up. I just want you out of that costume and out of everyone’s hair until you hear otherwise from me.”

“Do I really look as stupid as that guy did?” Amateur Knight whined, looking toward the dog-costumed man, who was pulling off the fake mustache and goatee now.

Query looked from one to the other and back again.

“No, ‘Knight, you don’t look that stupid,” Query answered. “But in comparison, you look as stupid to us experienced folks in the field as he did to you.”

“Yeah, I’ll wait to hear back from you I think,” Amateur Knight said.

* * *

“So, we cool?” Wallace asked Query as he struggled out of the stifling costume.

“We’re a long way from cool,” Query answered, “but I appreciate you cooperation and you have a clean slate with me now. Don’t squander it.”

“I get to keep my New Judah privileges?”

“Yes, Wallace, you get to stay in the city,” Query said. “This isn’t a movie, after all.”

Identity Crisis

This story is unique among my one-shots so far in that it involves a very central character in this world (Query) and doesn’t take place before or during the events of the as-yet-unfinished saga “The Gathering Storm” but after them instead. As such, this story actually reveals some minor plot points not yet revealed in “The Gathering Storm.” It’s not really a big deal, though, because those plot points have been mentioned in some of the “About” and “Bio” entries on this blog.
____________________________________________

The sky was dark as twilight prepared to give way to full night, but the man standing in the courtyard of what had once been the Grand Marquis Hotel was darker still, with the only portions of his ensemble that weren’t black being the red question mark on his full-head mask and a red exclamation point on the palm of each glove.

As he regarded the ornate marble fountain, cracked wide open in two places along the edge, then gazed at the blackened terraces all around, he considered the battle that had taken place here two years earlier and had gutted much of the once-elite hotel. A battle he’d had no part in, but one that almost everyone in New Judah knew about.

He considered the decay and disrepair. He considered the rubbish left behind by the homeless men and women who often camped here and the junkies who often smoked or shot up here. He considered the dead bird three feet from his right boot.

Mostly, though, he simply wondered how much longer he was going to have to wait.

Forty-seven seconds later, five men converged on him from the four sides of the courtyard, all but one of them carrying Uzis and sporting small headlamps.

“Nice night,” Query said amiably, nodding to the one man not openly brandishing a weapon, as four beams of light swayed back and forth and finally all settled on him directly.

“Nice for me,” the man said. “Only nice for you in terms of being a good night to die.”

“Except your men don’t actually intend to kill me, do they?” Query said.

The man squinted at him. “Why do you think that?”

“Partly because if the plan was to kill me, Mr. Haven, the shooting would have already started, and the bullets would be flying down from the terraces above me if you were smart,” Query pointed out. “Mostly, though, because I hacked your email and saw the message to your brother Quinn in which you wrote, ‘I’m going to make Query suffer for a while before I kill him’.”

“Why would you have been hacking my email?”

“Because you did a terrible job of setting up this meeting and making it look like someone needed my help on short notice. The only way you could have made it look more like a trap would have been to send an invitation saying, ‘Your presence is requested for a very special trap’.”

Dennis Haven frowned and squinted even harder, then said, “Well, now that I’ve captured you, I imagine you’d like to know why I went to all this trouble.”

“No, thanks.”

“Pardon me?” Haven sputtered testily.

“I’ll pass on the soliloquy, thanks,” Query said. “Main reason being that you haven’t, in point of fact, actually captured me yet. So, it’s premature.”

Haven spread his hands and regarded each of his men in turn. “Just how do you think you’re going to escape from this?” he asked. “We know you didn’t bring any friends because we’ve been watching the place all day. You walked into a trap with your eyes wide open and without backup. That’s the problem with being a loner, Query: You’re always outnumbered by your enemies. Also, you’re cocky.”

“I’m going to escape simply by Hedwig strafe,” Query answered him.

A furrow formed across Haven’s brow. “What? That didn’t make any sense,” the mobster said.

“It will in a moment,” Query said, and smiled behind his mask as he heard the mini-drone with an owl head that he had named Hedwig descend from above in response to his voice command. His Sensor powers gave him an edge there, he considered—the drone was very quiet and the others wouldn’t hear it until it actually entered the courtyard.

Five heads turned as it did, seeking the source of the muffled propeller sound, and then they cried out as the drone released two dozen micro-ordinances, targeting everyone in the area who wasn’t Query. Then the drone gained altitude again as it swooped away.

“Fuck!” Haven snapped, hissing his pain as he swore. Addressing his men, he said, “If anything comes in here again, forget what I told you earlier and shoot him dead! What did your toy shoot at us? BBs? Are you fucking kidding me? Are you asking for me to hurt you even more before I kill you?”

Query shrugged. As one of Haven’s men fell to the ground, he said, “Actually, I’m asking you to take a nap and give me some goddamn peace and quiet.”

Almost in unison, Haven and the other three men dropped to the cobblestones, weapons clattering against the ground.

Query bound the mobster’s men, then dragged Dennis Haven himself to a corner of the courtyard and stuck him with a needle that brought him to consciousness in a few seconds with a shuddering, gasping start.

“OK, now I’d like to hear why you went to all this trouble,” Query said.

* * *

Swallowing his mouthful of coffee and setting the cup down on the table at which they sat—costumed hero on one side and suit-wearing lawyer on the other—Carl Beacham asked, “So what was it all about?”

“A damned woman,” Query said. “Unbelievable. Turns out Dennis Haven’s main mistress hired someone to get her free of Haven because I guess she decided the jewels and furs weren’t worth the abuse anymore. He was pissed because he particularly liked that specific piece of ass.”

“But that isn’t one of the jobs you’ve been hired for or that you’ve taken pro bono,” Carl pointed out.

“I know. I know my work schedule as well as you know it, Carl. It’s not like I do side jobs without keeping you in the loop.”

“So why did he target you?”

“I asked him the very same thing, and he told me that he had security video showing his lady being led away by a guy all in black with a long coat and a mask that covered his whole head and had a big red ‘X’ on the forehead,” Query said.

Carl blinked a few times and then picked up his cup again, savoring the fragrant steam. “Your mask has a question mark over your mouth, though.”

“Exactly! Told Haven the very same thing. Even asked him if he had a learning disability that made him unable to distinguish letters from punctuation or mouths from foreheads,” Query said.

“Did he?”

“Nope. Copped to the fact that he was perfectly capable of handling basic skills like that, so I slapped him around a bit just for being generally moronic and wasting my time.”

Carl took another swallow of coffee. “So, end of story, then. Mistaken identity and a bad guy behind bars because of it.”

“Hell, no,” Query snapped. “It isn’t ‘end of story’ until I find out who’s running around New Judah dressing almost exactly like me and getting my time wasted by goons with Uzis.”

* * *

The problem with trying to track down someone who dresses almost exactly like you, Query realized, is that you end up getting a lot of reports of people having seen you.

It had been three days of going through street-level informants, posting Twitter, Facebook and StreetWize requests for help, and checking in with random costumed transhumans. But no matter how often he stressed the red “X” on the forehead, what Query ended up with after all that effort were a bunch of reminders of several of the places he’d been over the past week.

The experience made him mourn for the U.S. educational system and reminded him of why eyewitness testimony was often among the least reliable evidence.

The television news reports, newspaper articles about transhuman activities, police reports and the like hadn’t been any more fruitful.

This guy is either very new to the scene or flies under the radar even more aggressively than I do, Query brooded.

Fortunato, whose people had obviously noticed Query’s activity on the street and online, left Query a message asking if he wanted The Whethermen to start hunting the doppelganger down. Query had Carl send the man a curt message to keep away from the matter—the only reason Fortunato wanted to help, Query figured, was to have him owe the billionaire something or reduce his own indebtedness.

And then, five days after the ambush by Dennis Haven, Carl told Query a message had come through his office from the man they’d been begun referring to as X.

“He called you?” Query probed.

“Actually, he used the email account for reaching you,” Carl said. “He apologizes for not realizing you were looking for him. Says he’s been out of town for a few days relocating a domestic violence victim. Wants to know if you can meet him someplace public but quiet, like Whitley Park.”

“Set it up.”

Carl paused. “You think…I dunno…this might be a trap you’re walking into on purpose and maybe you shouldn’t push your luck pulling that kind of reckless move twice in one week?”

“Well, then, I guess I’d better have Hedwig fueled up and re-armed, won’t I?”

* * *

Two men in black stood across from each other. One had a dense treeline at his back; the other the open meadows of the city park—all the better to allow Hedwig a good approach path.

X had already been here when Query arrived, and had said nothing thus far. Query returned the favor—for now—and studied him.

A smooth and utterly featureless black mask except for the single red “X.” Black boots and black gloves. Black unitard. Black flak vest. Long black trench coat. If not for the different symbol and the fact the man was slightly taller and slightly leaner than him, Query might have thought he was looking into a mirror.

No matter how close our appearance, I still don’t feel bad for beating up Dennis Haven a little bit more than necessary; he should still have been able to figure out I wouldn’t try to disguise my identity by changing my question mark into an ‘X,’ Query mused.

“Mind telling me who you are?” Query inquired of the man before him, who simply stood in an at-ease position. He wondered if the man might be recent ex-military and filed the thought away for later digging to find out who was under the mask.

“Name’s Deus X.”

“Soooo…like ‘deus ex machina’ but without the second ‘e,’ I’m guessing?”

“And without the ‘machina,’ too.”

“Naturally,” Query responded drily. “Mind telling me why you dress like me? Because it caused a bit of trouble with Janine Daly’s former beau, who thought you were me.”

“Oh. Sorry about that. Actually, you’re my inspiration. I figured people could tell the difference between a question mark and an ‘X,’ especially if I put it on a whole different part of the mask.”

“You’d think so, wouldn’t you? Go figure. So, I’m inspirational now. Not sure how to feel about that.”

“You don’t just run around beating up transhuman villains or chasing down crooks; you help people or groups that need help. You charge the ones that can afford it and you do freebies for the ones that can’t. That resonated with me. I thought about calling my operation ‘Deus Ex Machina’ since I do like you do and help people who don’t have any other choices for help, but that seemed a bit redundant with my name so I went with ‘In Extremis’ instead.”

“You like Latin a lot, don’t you?” Query retorted. “Actually, a lot of the people who hire me do have other places they can turn; they just choose not to.”

“Well, there’s one other point of distinction between our operations, then, since I only do it for people who are truly and completely up against the wall,” Deus X said.

“Bully for you,” Query answered. “So, you’re not here to apologize because one of your recent jobs got me targeted by Dennis Haven, since you didn’t know that had happened. But you knew I was looking for you, which is a big, bad warning sign to most folks and encourages them to stay away from me. So why did you agree to this meet?”

“Because even if my operation is a tiny bit more noble than yours, you’re way more talented and better equipped. I thought you could be a great resource if I asked really nicely—even if it’s just to get information and intel through you. Thought maybe you could be a bit of a mentor, too. Maybe even lend a direct hand—or fist or kick—in a job now and then.”

“Not great at being a team player,” Query said. “I’m the strong, silent, lonely type.”

“You’re on Fortunato’s team.”

“No, I consult for Fortunato’s team,” Query clarified. “And I charge him an arm and a leg every time I do.”

“Fair enough. It was just a thought. Dreaming big and all that,” Deus X said.

“So, what’s the first distinction between your operation and mine?”

“Hmmmm?” Deus X responded.

“Earlier, you said your whole ‘people with nowhere else to turn’ thing was the other point of distinction. Kind of implies there was a ‘first thing’ you mentioned earlier. Except you didn’t.”

“Oh. That. Yeah, that’s the part that sucks about you not being cool with helping me out,” Deus X said, extending his arms and waggling the fingers of each hand in a “come out” motion.

Three other costumed people stepped into sight from the shadows—not that it was any surprise to Query since he had smelled and heard them with his enhanced senses long before. He recognized one of them—a woman in a red mask and bodysuit, with large, oblong amber lenses over her eyes and a blue musical note over her mouth—as Blue Note. The other two, a man in a white unitard and mask with a gold ankh adorning his forehead, and a woman in a black cloak with orange exclamation points decorating the oversized hood and another one marking her pale cheek, he didn’t recognize.

“Query, meet Golden Ankh, Hyperbole and Blue Note,” Deus X said. “They were theoretically the rest of In Extremis, but they’re not all that hyped to band together unless you’re onboard.”

For nearly a minute, Query simply scanned the quartet slowly, his head tracking one way and then the other, saying nothing and moving no other part of his body.

Finally, he said, “Mentor, huh?”

“Yup,” Deus X said.

“Plus logistics and intelligence help.”

“Uh huh.”

“What do I get out of this?” Query asked.

“The warm and fuzzy feeling of helping some less experienced transhumans help others?”

“Do I look like a Hallmark Card store?”

“Ego boost?” Deus X suggested.

“Thanks, but my ego’s pretty big already,” Query said. “How about being sidekicks?”

“Seems a little cutesy for you, Query.”

“Well, the black hats have pretty much taken over the term ‘henchmen’ and I thought ‘minions’ sounded a little demeaning,” Query teased. “How about we call you ‘associates’?”

“And you’d be working us for your own ends how often?”

“Not very. A few times a year at most. But you’d need to be on-call and move immediately on my ‘go’ unless you were already in the middle of being shot at or pulling people from burning cars or something. And no one knows we’re working together. Ever. No one.”

“Your own secret team? Kind of goes against the whole ‘I’m not a team player’ lone wolf thing,” Deus X pointed out.

“Well, sometimes I find myself dealing with moose and bears instead of rats and sheep,” Query said. “Times like those, the lone wolf thing isn’t a good look. Better to have a pack, then. Or maybe y’all being my buccaneer crew is a better analogy.”

Deus X looked to the other three, eliciting a trio of nods.

“You’ve got a deal, Query,” Deus X said, extending his right hand.

Query shook it, then gripped hard and leaned forward toward the other man’s masked face. “One thing, though. Bad enough that Odium wears damn near the same outfit as me most days, but he’s a villain and I can’t do much about that—plus he has a red mask and no symbol. Ditch your black for Navy blue, wear a shorter coat or a utility vest, and get some eye holes or some visible lenses for your mask. Otherwise, I may have to have my other associate, who’s a lawyer, sue you for infringement.”

A low chuckle from the other man. A release of hands. And an almost imperceptible bow of Deus X’s head.

“Aye, aye, Cap’n Wolf.”

Deus X and Blue Note images based off illustrations of Marvel Comic’s Spider-Man and Spider-Girl, respectively. Source for base image used to create Hyperbole unknown. I think the image I based Golden Ankh off of was one of the G.I. Joe Ninja characters.

The Gathering Storm, Part 30

[ – To view a list of all current chapters, click here – ]

Chewing thoughtfully on his cheeseburger, Carl realized he probably wasn’t doing it thoughtfully at all. He was considering the scent of machine oil and harsh cleanser in the room. He was blaming it for how his stomach now churned. And as his appetite quickly fled, he realized that all of that—far from being thoughtful—was just a delaying tactic.

There’s something I need to deal with—there are important thoughts tumbling around in my head, but they’re something my brain knows I don’t want to face, Carl considered. So why deal with them when I can sit here and leisurely gnaw on greasy hunks of food like a cow chewing cud?

Query looked up from the fuselage of the drone he was fiddling with, and regarded the lawyer through his mask. “Are we going to get to new business any time soon, Carl?” Query asked. “Usually you plow through your two burgers in no time flat—this second one’s taking you a while. Did Wendy’s use some rancid meat?”

“More like my employer using rancid-smelling and probably toxic substances that aren’t supposed to be used in enclosed spaces,” Carl said, finally setting the remains of the burger down on the table next to him.

Query put down his tools, turned in his chair, and pushed the recently installed bulletproof window behind him up about halfway. “There’s no good angle to get a bullet through that particular window anyway unless you’re in a cherry picker, so as long as no one is waiting to lob a grenade up in here, we should be good. Can we get on with things so I can get back to this without complaints from you?”

“Feel the love,” Carl teased wearily, and regarded the compact surveillance craft occupying all of Query’s desk and extending nearly a foot past each end of it. “What’s wrong with your drone there anyway?”

I’m stalling again, he realized, because I think the new business is what will put my mind where I don’t want it to be—it’s what’s going to trigger a talk I don’t want to have.

“New Judah PD shot at it and got lucky,” Query answered. “Nothing too serious, but a pain in my ass. Seems they don’t like my eyes in the sky. Guess they don’t like the competition for the three drones they have that are twice the size of mine, half the speed and not nearly as cool-looking.”

“Well, next time they should steal theirs from the military like you did instead of settling for first-generation models,” Carl shot back, looking at his half-eaten burger and sighing. “OK, new business, then. I’ve heard from inside Fortunato’s building, but only from one of our parties: Zoe. After a few days, Fortunato finally made a job offer, and she’s got a contract to send me for review.”

“Look it over with the finest-tooth comb you have and don’t let him screw her, Carl. At least not screw her over legally and contractually. I don’t care what other kind of screwing might happen.”

“I’ll keep her safe and solidly armored by flawless paperwork. Don’t worry about that. What you should probably worry about is yourself. Fortunato finally gets your attention and now leaves you hanging for three or four days? What’s he up to, you think? Why so coy now?”

Is this what’s bugging me? Carl thought. Fortunato’s plans? No, there’s no sense of dread. What am I avoiding?

Query paused in adjusting the wing articulation controls in the drone and looked up again. “Partly he wants to make me sweat, because he’s delusional enough to think he can. Mostly he’s busy trying to figure out how to get Zoe in his camp—”

“Loc-Down,” Carl interrupted.

“Hmmm?”

“Just occurred to me you might want to know. Zoe’s codename’s apparently going to be Loc-Down.”

“Cute,” Query said. “She’s got a whole head full of locs that can punch through metal plates and tear you to ribbons when she morphs. As good as any name. Anyway, he’s busy with her,” the black-clad hero continued, “because he knows I’ll sit tight. Zoe’s slippery and he doesn’t want to let her get away. Certainly not until he puts her to work with the plans he’s hatching.”

“Which are?”

“I don’t know,” Query admitted. “I’ve got wonderful intuitive powers, Carl, but I’m not an oracle. Most likely it has something to do with his cousin that took a dive out a window. I think Fortunato wants revenge.”

“On who? Did the guy’s pharmacist give him the wrong anti-depressants?”

“No, Crazy Jane gave his cousin all the right incentives to make the leap to the great beyond,” Query responded.

“How do you figure that? Did one of your birdies see her watching his swan-dive?” Carl asked, nodding to the owl-head-shaped cowling on the desktop that Query had removed from the nose of the drone some 10 minutes earlier.

“Nah. I got hold of some video that shows her making regular visits to the guy. The images were sent to Fortunato privately so he’d know who was responsible. I knew she could unnerve people psychically as well as transmit electrical shocks, but always wondered if she had more powers, given how unstable she is. Guessing this was either some mind control in action or, more likely, she can make people lose their fucking minds. That’s in line with her name, so it seems most likely. Nasty power.”

“I thought she was being held in the Givens facility under high security.”

“You must have been hung over or out of town a few months back, Carl. She was busted out of Givens. Bloody damn job, too. A dozen dead staff or thereabouts—and they took one of the doctors there with them—hard-ass, DA-hired headshrinker named Marcus Blood. No one knows if he was an accomplice or a hostage. Still haven’t found him. Big news. Janus busted her out personally—well, with some of his lackeys with him. Those three scary killer women he’s got and a couple norm human troopers.”

“So, Crazy Jane got busted out, maybe just to do this job against Fortunato’s cousin, which means Janus is behind it all, and he isn’t just going after you but Fortunato, too. Fortunato wants your help with getting back at him.”

“Probably,” Query acknowledged. “But I can’t say for sure yet. It feels like Fortunato has something else brewing. I think he may be trying to form some kind of team, but I can’t tell if it’s just a revenge kick or some kind of vanity project with longer-term goals. I need more data. Which is part of the reason I’m even going to lend him an ear when he finally calls you up to meet with me. As far as I’m concerned, the biggest single threat to New Judah after Janus is Fortunato right now. Man has a God complex and even if he thinks he’s doing good, he’ll probably leave a whole lot of damage in his wake—eventually, his ego and greed always get in the way.”

And there it is, Carl thought, and with a sickening mental lurch, he realized he was finally in the territory he had been avoiding all along. No stopping now…

“With all due respect, Query—”

“In other words, ‘let me point something out something potentially insulting to you’.” Query said, cutting him off.

“Anyway,” Carl sighed. “No offense—”

“Same thing,” Query teased him.

“Jesus! OK, Query, what I’m trying to say is, you’re right that Fortunato has an ego bigger than the city itself, but you’re not in a position to judge somebody else’s God complex. You have a squadron of high-tech, programmable, auto-pilot mini-drones flying around the city, you’ve got a network of informants, you regularly hack into all kind of surveillance systems and all that, and you share hardly a speck of your intel with the police. You know the identities and even the damn home addresses of several costumed whackjobs and you mostly keep that to yourself. You don’t go after them yourself very often, you don’t send other white hats after them very often and you almost never share with New Judah’s finest men and women in blue. Why?”

For several moments, Query said nothing. Carl’s guts clenched, but he didn’t sense anger from the man. Bewilderment, maybe, but not anger. As the sharp cramp in his belly eased, Carl could almost imagine the hero’s eyes blinking behind the mask like a startled cartoon character. The mental image calmed him a little.

“First off, Carl, my personality gives me plenty of right to judge Fortunato,” Query retorted mildly. “If I’ve got a God complex, and I don’t—but anyway, if I have a similarly large ego and level of presumption as Fortunato—then I’ll judge him all day long. Takes one to know one, and I have enough distance from his issues to know when he’s too close to them to think straight. Honestly—and this pains me to admit—the same could probably be said of him sorting out my issues if he knew enough about me to know what I was up to.”

“So why don’t you?”

“What? Share my entire wealth of data with everyone who’s going after the bad guys, you mean?” Query asked.

“Yeah. Because you should be.” Carl’s tone was flat, but still, the sense of accusation transmitted clearly.

“Partly because I’m not God, Carl. I can’t fix everything, and I shouldn’t try to. I also don’t want people knowing just how much I know, because then they’ll start wondering if I’m more a danger than an asset to the city or, if they’re the bad guys, they’ll realize I’m even more a threat to their operations than they know already. I don’t need to be dodging hit squads like the one Janus sent on a regular basis. That shit’s tiring, and I’m getting too old for that.”

Carl said nothing. But the accusation remained.

“But in the end, it’s really about balance,” Query said.

“You think the crooks deserve to have some kind of balance?” Carl spat out. “That’s crazy. A level playing field for them?”

“Oh, hell no,” Query sneered. “It’s not about making things fair for the black hats; it’s about not adding to their numbers, man.”

“Huh?”

“Look, transhumans aren’t crazy per se, Carl, but we’re wired differently. We have issues in our heads—an awful lot of us, anyway. And some of us more than others. Let’s say I handed out my data like candy at Halloween and we cleared out most of the costumed bad guys in the city. What would happen?”

“I guess folks would come in to the city to fill the voids. That what you mean?”

“Worse, Carl. Some of the heroes and vigilantes in the city might fill those voids, too. Without suitable challenges…that is, without enemies that are like them—peers in power, if you will—I suspect some of the white hats who mostly like kicking ass or getting attention might gravitate toward the dark side. Jedi/Sith-style like in Star Wars. A lot of those heroes need an outlet—fighting folks who are like them. Without that, seizing power and misusing their power might start to taste good to them.”

“But some of these black hats are way more of a risk than the average crook, and you let a lot of them continue to run free when you could shut them down. Doesn’t that—”

“Make me feel conflicted? Make me feel like shit sometimes knowing if I’ve misjudged that someone I thought was no big deal might kill a whole bus full of children or a convent full of nuns? Yeah, Carl. My job sucks. But the fact is, no matter how big my ego, I’ve got enough perspective and humility to know that sometimes I need to let nature run its course. I need to remind myself that no one—not even me—can make crime ever go away. We all have our roles to play, Carl. A lot of times, mine is to sit back and keep my nose out of other people’s business—even when I can smell things are going to go sour.”

* * *

Although her work as an assistant district attorney took her to the main building of the New Judah Police Department on a fairly regular basis, Andrea realized this would be her first time going above the fourth floor since she had started the job two months ago. Truth be told, though, that little bit of trivia was only a minor note in her mind right up until the elevator doors opened.

Then she gasped.

The man standing in front of her in a crisp suit-and-tie ensemble might have thought she was gasping at the sight of him, she considered many hours later—he was tall and handsome enough—but what had taken her breath away was the crisp, clean, high-tech appearance of the mostly open-plan landscape of the sixth floor. The rest of the eight-story main precinct building and the other, smaller precinct buildings she’d visited weren’t that much different than what she’d seen in the city of Cleveland’s Division of Police—the offices were neither startlingly decrepit nor were they models of modernity.

But this floor looks like it belongs on the set of some science fiction show, she thought.

“ADA Yates; good to meet you,” the lieutenant said, extending his hand. She took it and gave him a light, quick shake as she exited the elevator car. “Can I get you a coffee?”

“Sure. Black. Do you have a machine that teleports them straight to you, Lt. Greene?” she joked.

He chuckled, low and slow, as he stepped around into a small reception desk and grabbed a cup, pouring from a pot just underneath the counter. “Well, a lot of the officers around here do call this floor ‘The Enterprise,’ but no. Old-fashioned brewing and pouring,” he said, smiling and handing her the paper cup as the steam from it spiraled up in the air between them. “C’mon, let me give you the grand tour. So, I know this is your first time here, or I wouldn’t be your tour guide, but I wanna make sure I show you the right things. I hear that you wanna handle a lot of transhuman cases?”

“Yeah. Is that weird or something?”

“Not at all, Ms. Yates. You see,” he said in an almost boyishly excited voice as he extended one arm in an arc to show off one half of the floor like a gameshow prize, “a lot of this floor is forensics. State-of-the-art lab computers and stuff—the actual labs and clean rooms are a floor above us. Lots of great equipment in there, but that floor looks pretty much like standard police issue architecture. Fortunato actually paid for a lot of this floor as a goodwill gesture to the city. But this—this is what you’re really gonna wanna see.”

He pointed toward the other side of the floor, and led the way to a door marked “SO/GT Div.” Opening it, he waved her in and followed right behind her. It was one of the few parts of the floor that wasn’t open and airy, and there were no windows to let anyone see into this section from the rest of the floor or see out onto the main part of the floor.

“Why do I feel like I’ve been ushered into a secret lair?”

“In a way, you have. This part of the department doesn’t get talked about a lot. I wouldn’t say it’s secret, but it’s probably best if you kind of behave like it is. We talk about it too much, and it may not work as well for us as it does.”

“As what does?” Andrea probed.

“Well, remember how Detective Sergeant Lindemann kind of read you the riot act a few weeks ago about not pushing the department to arrest transhumans on weak evidence?”

“Good God. Is he telling that story all around the department or something? Am I going to be like the village idiot around here?”

“Oh, hell, nothing like that. He’s discreet as hell. But I asked anyone in the department who feels like they have any sense of you or any major interactions with you to come and talk to me before our appointment today.”

“Why, Lieutenant?”

“So I know what your level of knowledge is and what I need to teach you about what we do here. What did Joe tell you was one of the biggest problems about arresting transhumans?”

Andrea sighed and didn’t bother to try to mask the exasperation in her voice. “Making a positive ID and linking them to a crime, since they typically wear masks and gloves—hell, whole costumes that make it less likely they’ll even drop hair as evidence. Plus some of them use body doubles as misdirection.”

“Bingo!” the detective said eagerly. “Even if you get good video, making an ID is hard, because unless the mask is pretty form-fitting, you might not even be able to use facial recognition software to match a suspect to the perp you caught on tape. And that’s why we have the SoundOff Program. That’s the ‘SO’ part of what was on the door back there. We have high-quality recordings of the voices of a lot of transhumans—criminals, vigilantes, heroes, whatever—and we can use those to match a suspect with their voice on file to help make the identification stick when we charge ‘em and you try to convict ‘em.”

With a rush of awareness, Andrea realized what felt strange about this area. Much of it struck her like it was a sound recording studio or radio station.

“But you’d only have them recorded if you’d captured them before, right?”

“Oh, no. We estimate we have voiceprints—good, thorough ones—on probably a third of the trans crooks in town, regardless of whether they’ve ever been caught or even questioned,  and average to middling quality on another third.”

“How?”

“They call us.”

“No, seriously.”

“Dead serious, ADA Yates. Dead serious. Transhumans who put on costumes tend to be the ones most touched in the head. They’re the ones who often want the attention, or why would they put on costumes and give themselves these crazy names? They love to call and taunt us right before or after a crime. Or just to try to strike fear into our hearts when they first enter the scene. Or to complain to us when the press is mischaracterizing them or we’re supposedly slandering them. And of course the heroes and vigilantes call in to let us know there are bad guys to pick up—so we’ve got them recorded and stored, too.

“Attention,” Lt. Greene continued. “The biggest mental block most any costumed transhuman has is a desire—on some level—for attention or validation. So we sometimes know the villain’s name before anyone’s even seen the creep in action in costume, and we have a voice to match to it—all because he called to introduce himself—or herself. We’ve even been able to nab a few who changed their costume and name later thinking it would help them avoid capture, and charged them with the crimes committed under their previous identity.”

“How long have you been doing this?”

“We’ve had this division and this equipment—or earlier generations of it—for a decade, give or take. There are similar centers like this in Manhattan, D.C., Chicago, L.A., Dallas, Philly and Gryphon. Marksburgh flat-out refuses to adopt the technology, even though God knows they need it more than anyone else.”

“And they still call you? No one’s caught on? Surely you have to reveal to the defense and the judge that you have a recording and how it was obtained.”

“Yup.”

“Then why don’t the newer transhuman villains stop calling you and giving you evidence to help identify them?”

“Same reason people see shows on TV like CSI or Law & Order or some cheesy Lifetime woman-gets-murdered-by-crazy-husband movie and know the police have special sprays and lights that can show bloodstains that aren’t visible to the naked eye and yet still clean up all the blood and think they’re free and clear. Or rape a woman without wearing a condom. Or don’t wear gloves even though fingerprinting technology’s been around forever. They’re either dumb, overconfident or want too badly for us to realize how amazing they are. And it’s not like we go trumpeting the fact we have all these technologies—that’s why I say behave like it’s a secret, even though it really isn’t.

“But in the end, who knows?” the lieutenant continued, “Ego? Stupidity? Both? I dunno. Maybe just ignorance in some cases. Doesn’t matter, though. In the end, we have these trans guys and gals on file—and non-transhuman folks who crave attention, too, like serial killers or activist extremists. And that’s where we get into the ‘GT’ part of this division’s name. The GeneTrapper Program. Genetic material when we can get it from a crime a trans villain is known to have been at, cross-referenced with the voiceprint and with the gene records and voiceprints of known associates and enemies. And other stuff, too. But showing’s better that saying, and I’ve got some people for you to meet. C’mon, Yates—let’s show you what you’ve got to work with when you go after these costumed nutjobs.”

Barely even looking at him—her head swimming with the realization of just what kind of people she was about to start making the focus of her work and the strangeness of them—she followed in his wake.

I guess we’re not in Cleveland anymore, are we, Toto? Andrea mused as her guide continued to regale her with tales of technology and transhumans as he led her farther down the long hall. Or maybe I’m picking the wrong fantasy analogy. Maybe I just fell down the rabbit hole like Alice did.

* * *

Pushing a comic book just slightly to cover an errant view of the dull, pitted hardwood of his apartment’s floor, the man leaned back. He admired the wall-to-wall “carpeting” of his small, dingy place in the part of the city known as The Hollows—the sea of comics. This tiny place was more than he deserved, really. Crazy Jane had told him that so many times, even as she stroked his hair and called him her good little puppy. Or her bad little puppy.

In the end, both terms were usually used for the same behavior.

He didn’t deserve this little hovel furnished with nothing but two wooden chairs, a small table, and hundreds of comic books to cover the floors. He didn’t deserve Jane. But in the end, he’d played that small part in her escape because she was his world by then. He needed her. Craved her attention. Even now, he shook with stress over the fact she hadn’t been to see him since two mornings ago, and rubbed his hands nervously across his black-hooded face.

Usually, she’d visit him daily—sometimes a few times in a day—to monitor his progress. To see how he was developing.

Her art project. Her pet project.

Her pet.

And her toy.

Oh, never to play with sexually—such a thought repulsed him. Not because he didn’t desire her. He did. Oh so much. But it would repulse her he was certain. And it would anger Janus, which might cause him to be permanently removed from Crazy Jane’s attentions. He couldn’t disappoint her like that. So he would never overstep that line.

Besides, he could slake his desires on other men and women just like Crazy Jane had taught him. Just as she had molded him to do. Because she’d imprisoned the sanity that had always held him back from glory. She’d freed his mind to the wonder of what others called madness.

But it was really just truth. Problem was, most of society couldn’t handle the truth.

He admired the colorful, paper carpeting of his abode. Comics with Doctor Doom on the cover. Or Doctor Fate. Or Doctor Strange. Doctor Octopus. Doctor Light. Doctor Silvanus. And so many others.

He’d need to get a tarp today. And then a victim. Mustn’t disappoint Crazy Jane, who’d expect him to have some kind of project to show her when she arrived tomorrow. That’s why she was making him wait, probably—he’d been slack in giving her new pieces to admire. It had been a couple weeks now. He needed to find someone new to—modify.

But first, the tarp.

It wouldn’t do to bloody all these famous comic book “doctors.”

Even if his own name was Marcus Blood, M.D.

Dr. Blood.

* * *

Janus looked out through the broad window of the conference room in which he and Underworld were ensconced. Toward the figure sitting outside on a small sofa. Long-legged and busty with silver-streaked dark hair pulled into a pair of pigtails. Black, sleeveless top and plaid miniskirt. Fishnet stockings with a big pair of lacy white garters at the swell of the thighs, matching the four smaller garters on the arms, over black opera gloves. High-heeled red pumps with their own lacy garters. Face shining with pale powder and highlighted with a black circle at each cheek and equally black lips. And to top it all off, contact lenses that made the eyes look red as burning embers.

“I cannot believe you convinced me to let that on my team,” he sighed.

“Our team,” Underworld corrected him. “And you can’t deny the test results and reports. She’s everything I promised you she would be. Her powers are incredible, especially now that my team has honed them with vocal training and couple technological additions. She’s a goddamn work of transhuman art.”

“She? She has a dick. Cleverly secured back between his ass cheeks or not—a dick. That’s a man, and I wish he would act like one.”

“She already agreed to change her name from Shrill to the more intimidating Caterwaul—and go Goth for you so that she doesn’t look too frilly in a fight. And I have to admit, she does Goth so well. She’s made her concessions. I’m not going to make her dress in slacks and a button-down for you.”

“That is not a woman,” Janus insisted. “I cannot believe you are enabling this ridiculousness.”

“She feels like one, and I’m on her side,” Underworld said. “A chick with a dick, as she likes to say. Variety is the spice of life, Janus. I’ve even found a Regenerator who assures me he can get her body to start producing estrogen consistently. With that and a little cosmetic surgery help, she won’t need the padded bra anymore.”

“A fucking she-male on our team. Just what I wanted,” Janus sneered.

“She hates that term; so do I. You know, for someone who wears masks that express some kind of duality and has the name of a two-faced god, you’re awfully persnickety about sexual identity issues,” Underworld observed.

She also observed, silently, that there was a subtle difference to his mask today compared to others he had worn. The forward-facing central part of it struck her as angry and male. On each side were two other faces, one looking right and the other left. Both of them seemed feminine, with one smiling and the other’s mouth exhibiting a more neutral affect.

In a sense, he’s wearing three faces today instead of his usual pair, and it mixes masculine and feminine. A little outside his box and perhaps a sign of confusion. I do believe I’ve hit a nerve and found a new way to make Janus uncomfortable, Underworld considered. And that’s always a good thing for me.

“I’m a superpowered kingpin. I reserve the right to be a hypocrite. I just happen to believe that when it comes to gonads, you play the hand you’re dealt,” Janus said. “Or you go under the knife and change your hand to a whole new one. You don’t mix up two different decks.”

“She likes having a dick. It’s like her big, fat juicy clitoris,” Underworld taunted him in a syrupy sweet tone. “And for a pussy she has—”

“Oh, God, please shut up,” he groaned. “Will he go all the way in a fight if necessary? Does he have the killer instinct?”

“She’s sexy and pretty, not a pushover,” Underworld said. “She’ll perform. She will get the jobs done. She. C’mon…say it. Sheeeeeee.”

“It…has…a…dick,” Janus enunciated slowly. “He’s your responsibility, so just make sure he—”

“She.”

“If I start using ‘she’ and ‘her’ can you promise me we will never again discuss its sexual anatomy or who and what it sleeps with?” Janus said with quiet intensity.

“Oh, of course, my dear,” Underworld said with even more exaggerated sweetness. “That sounds just lovely.”

“Then I look forward to her proving herself. If she fails me by showing the slightest hesitation—if she crumbles at any crunch-time—I will not hesitate to crush every one of her protuberances before I kill her.”

“Fair enough, Janus,” Underworld said with a smug undertone. “You’ve gotta admit, though, she has a great ass and gorgeous legs.”

Janus sighed heavily. “In hindsight, I suppose I should have made you agree not to talk about any part of Caterwaul’s body.”

“Yeaaaaah,” she responded, slowly and softly.

“I think we’re done today,” said Janus. “Tell the others to come back in a couple days and we can finish sorting out the final roster and backup members. Hopefully, you’ll be over your gloating by then. I trust you can see your Goth-tart protégé out by yourself.”

“Of course, darling,” Underworld said as if addressing a small child, her glee at ruining his day a little taking some of the edge—a sliver at least—off her burning daily desire to murder him. “Wouldn’t want Caterwaul to get any of her transvestite cooties on youuuu, would weeee?”

“Go,” Janus snarled, then smiled brightly beneath the angry frown of his mask. “Please go before I forget how much I need to keep you around.”

The Gathering Storm, Part 29

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It was an alien feeling for Solstice alone in the skeez lab. It wasn’t her first time in such an environment, but usually when she was in a place like this, it was to kick ass, leave soon thereafter and call the cops.

Instead, she was alone and surrounded by all the equipment, chemicals and other accoutrements of a drug lab. All arrayed around her as if they were her own. In a sense, they were now. She’d claimed this place and Query’s hired hands had removed the people who had been here previously. They’d picked this lab out precisely because it wasn’t affiliated with organized crime or any gangs in the area. Just a boutique operation that hadn’t been gobbled up yet partly because it wasn’t really squarely in the middle of anyone’s territory.

Her drug lab.

What a weird damn feeling. And I’ve been here a night and most of a day so it just feels weirder and weirder, Solstice mused. I know the slow tink-tink-tink of the dripping pipe over that metal plate on the floor. I know the squeak of that one ancient ceiling fan. My drug lab. Even though I have zero interest in or intention of slinging skeez.

On the other hand, being the owner and operator of this skeez lab was precisely what Marty the Hun was supposed to think of her. That was the fiction that Query had slipped into ears of a few select people on the street—that Solstice had gone rogue and went over the dark side. That perhaps her crime-fighting before had been nothing more than a sham for winnowing out the competition.

It would be an easy thing for Marty to envision; it would resonate with his black heart, Solstice thought. His bigoted, sexist self would expect just that kind of thing from her, especially being a Goth, Wiccan, Asian transhuman who’d humiliated him and gotten him arrested.

If only he knew I was bi, he’d really think me the scum of the earth, probably.

Creating the notion this was her lab was precisely why she’d been camping out here for more than 20 hours.

By now, Marty the Hun knew where she was and no doubt he still wanted blood. Except now he thought he was doing more than getting revenge. He’d also be taking out someone whose own drugs and money could be added to his own—if, of course, Query’s team hadn’t removed most of the finished drugs and taken the money, too.

I won’t begrudge him the money, even though under other circumstances I would have helped myself to plenty of it after a bust; I’ve certainly gotten major assistance from Query on this little operation, so if he has his own plans for the cash, so be it, she thought. Now we’ll see if his help and this crazy plan Isabella and I hatched gets me killed or if I get clear of Marty’s wrath for good.

The screen of the smart phone Query’s team had left behind for her lit up suddenly, revealing a floor plan of the building and two flashing red circles that indicated someone had slipped in through the front and the back almost simultaneously, tripping a couple of the sensors Query’s people had installed inside the building’s perimeter.

Marty won’t be in the front of the crowd, but he will almost certainly be here with his goons, Solstice reminded herself. He likes hands-on, and given what he’s heard on the streets and from whom, this wouldn’t smell like a trap. After all, he’s been thinking all this time since he got off that I’ve been running and hiding from him, when I didn’t even know he’d been hunting me until Query told me.

Marty the Hun would also be here, she realized, because the lab was too valuable a target to let his crew be running loose here without him.

The intruders didn’t expect her to know they were here, so she moved swiftly toward the rear of the building to keep that edge. Marty wasn’t the type to slip in through the back of anyplace, and she wanted to deal with him last of all. She spotted three men slinking in, wary and guns drawn. Her Attractor powers yanked the weapons from their hands and as they all gave out confused cries of irritation, she tossed a flashbang grenade into their midst and slipped back around the corner, closing her eyes and covering her ears as the grenade made the room a frenzy of light and noise.

She had been a little too close to the action, she realized, as her ears rang and she felt herself sway a bit as she rose to her feet—not even realizing she had dropped to her knees in the first place. She mostly regained her bearings in time to see the butt of a shotgun stock rushing toward her face, and clumsily blocked it with her left arm. Her arm vibrated and throbbed from the impact as she heard the man shout, “Got her for ya Marty!” and swung the shotgun in a tight, hard arc as he added, “Softenin’ her up.”

Oh, Marty wants me intact so he can do me himself—how romantic of him, she thought, and ducked under the attack, dropping to the floor. She lifted her legs, wrapped her ankles around one of the attacker’s thighs and poured an intense burst of thermal energy through them, then ran her ankles down toward his feet, burning his leg all the way down. His pants smoldered and the stench of burning flesh assaulted her nostrils. As he screamed in agony, she used her feet to pull him off balance, and relieved him of the shotgun. Taking a cue from his attack on her, she slammed the stock of the gun into his head half a dozen times in quick succession.

Another man came into view in front of her, bringing his pistol around. She lowered the temperature around him abruptly to startle him and slow him down just a hair, and aimed hastily at his legs with the shotgun. Her  aim was sloppy, but good enough to take out one of his kneecaps, and she hurried over to his prone body to take his gun before he could recover his wits.

“G’night, bitch-whore,” came Marty’s voice from behind just as she touched the pistol, and the shock and humiliation of him getting the drop on her was enough to throw her off. Instead of reacting, she froze for just a moment. Just a moment too long.

I’ll never swing around in time and he’s going to put a bullet into my head and oh fuck and…

Marty grunted, and then his towering body fell onto her, a heavy dead weight. There was stickiness between their bodies and Solstice wanted to retch with the knowledge it was her blood, or his, or both. That she was finished.

But why did he fall? she suddenly considered, and frantically shoved at his body to prepare for another attack. I didn’t hear a gunshot why would either of us be bleeding? She couldn’t dislodge Marty’s body from her own and she began to thrash, keening with fear and rage.

“Calm down,” said a firm and quiet voice, and Solstice saw Query above them, a large Bowie knife in one gloved hand. “Hold still and I’ll cut you free. I shot him with a rubber slug and then hit him with a tangler. You got caught up with the tangler threads.”

There were a few quick slashes, and Solstice rolled free of Marty.

“I took the liberty of trussing up the guys in the back,” Query said, grabbing Marty’s half-stunned body by one arm and dragging him to another room. “Kindly take care of the guy you roasted, please, and the one you shot, while I see to Marty.”

Solstice got the burn victim’s hands behind his back and cinched a plastic tie around his wrists, did the same for the hobbled thug, and then followed Query to the office where he’d dragged Marty.

“What brings you to the party?” she asked. “I thought this was my mess to clean up.”

“I came because I’m not half the asshole I let you think I was,” Query answered. “I don’t like dead peers, not even the young, headstrong, sometimes idiotic ones.”

“Goddamn you’re a charmer, Query. The girl heroes must be throwing themselves at you.”

“Only when we’re sparring or one of them confuses me with one of the bad guys,” Query said, then jabbed Marty in the ribcage. “Evenin’, Hun. How’s it hanging?”

“You’re both dead,” Marty the Hun slurred as he regained his senses. Then, with more gusto: “I’m gonna see you fucked up in every possible way I can think of; both of ya!”

Solstice slipped up close, and got in his face, almost nose-to-nose. “Gonna be hard to do from behind bars, Marty. Especially given how long you’ll be going away, seeing as how I’m going to leave you here for the police with lots of nice, strong evidence that makes it look like you run this place. Judges like to put skeez-cookers away for long, long time. They send lots of cops to skeez busts, Marty. Not a chance that you’ll only have your pet cops on the scene. You get to go down, down, down—for years before you see any shot at parole.”

“Don’t matter, because I hold grudges forever. Same to you, Query. And I got ways to touch people from prison.”

“You’re a pretty decent-sized fish, Marty, but not that big,” Query said. “There isn’t anyone who’s going to have anywhere near the tenacity in going after us on your behalf as you would, even if you can lay hold of money to pay them. And I’m not sure you’ll have much in the way of support from your friends on the outside when the child porn comes to light after your arrest. In fact, you won’t do too well with the guys on the inside when that gets around.”

“I’m not into kiddie porn any more than this is my lab!” Marty growled.

“You may believe in the motto ‘old enough to bleed, old enough to breed,’ Marty, but fucking 14- and 15-year-olds is plenty sick enough for me—it’s kid-fucking—and Query says that shit’s confirmed. Not to mention all those women you tortured and killed thinking they might have been me. So I don’t feel bad at all planting downloads with little kids on your computer—well, the computer that’s going to seem to be yours, especially when we finishing putting your fingerprints all over it. When you do get out someday, Marty—you know, if you don’t get killed behind bars first by a convict who thinks you might fuck his little kid when you’re released—you’ll want to be rethinking this whole concept of ‘If you want something right, do it yourself’ and stick to letting lackeys do the work.”

“Dead! That’s all I got to say to you, bitch.”

“Congratulations, Solstice,” Query said. “You have your first arch-enemy. You know, if he gets out of prison. As my own little gift to honor that occasion, here’s a little of the lab’s cash,” he added, tossing a bulging fanny pack to her. “Also, I’m going to let you take credit for all this. I wasn’t here. You’re the hero who took this place down solo.”

“Oh, fuck no,” Marty hissed. “You’re gonna boost her street rep like that? Oh, no. I’m not only gonna tell everyone I know that she needed your help, but I’m gonna tell them she didn’t take down a single guy tonight and you’re covering for her. Let’s see how long she lasts in the streets when people think she’s a pussy can’t protect herself.”

“You might want to rethink that, Marty,” Query said. “Not one of your guys out there had any wits about him to see me here. And everyone knows I leave dirty, street-level shit like busting drug labs to the younger and more impetuous generation of heroes. Start trying to convince people the big, bad Query was here, and they’ll be thinking you’re the pussy who not only got his ass handed to him by a girl but that he’s not even man enough to suck up that fact.”

“Gosh, Marty, that would go together real well with your new kiddie porn rep,” Solstice taunted. “You’ll be such a bigger hit with the other cons then.”

“Dead,” Marty repeated. “One way, one day. Dead.”

* * *

On her third day in Fortunato’s high-rise, Zoe found herself in what she considered an obnoxiously gargantuan office, finally meeting her benefactor.

“I hope your stay has been pleasant so far,” Fortunato almost purred.

“Can’t complain,” Zoe answered disinterestedly. “Query said if you took me in you’d treat me right. I appreciate that you’ve given me up to four months to stay. Not sure if I’ll put you out for that long, but it’s nice not to have two transhuman psychos breathing down my neck for a while.”

Bowing his head slightly in acknowledgement, Fortunato said, “You could stay longer. Room and board for as long as you like, free of charge.”

“Oh. Really? Sir, I’m not in the market to become a kept woman. Ain’t going for the mistress look, no thank you. No matter how rich you are.”

Chuckling and waving one hand dismissively, Fortunato reached into a humidor on his desk and extracted a cigar. “Do you mind if I partake?”

“Only if I get to flaunt the city’s no-smoking-in-the-workplace laws, too,” Zoe said.

“Fine with me. Cuban or domestic?” he offered.

“Cigar? No. I’ll stick with good old Virginia Slims, thanks,” she said, retrieving and lighting up a cigarette from her purse as Fortunato toasted and lit his Havana with a wooden match.

As he puffed silently, Zoe regarded their slowly growing and mingling smoke for a minute or so before saying, “I’m still not interested in living here as some sort of sex-toy, by the way. Especially now. I’m not attracted to men who smoke.”

“Ironic. And hypocritical,” he said, eliciting only a shrug and a haughty exhalation of smoke from her. “But that’s not what I had in mind. I wish to employ you for your transhuman abilities. Query provided only a very meager file on you. No doubt to pique my interest so that I’d be more inclined to give you shelter in case I decided his payment for hiding you wasn’t good enough.”

“He paid you? Didn’t know his pockets were that deep. I bet your help is expensive.”

“It is. That’s why Query paid me in a currency more valuable than cash. But back to you and me, shall we?” Fortunato said. “I am in need of talented transhumans. You somehow got the very intense interest of Janus, which means you must be something special, perhaps even beyond just the powers Query mentions in the file. I’d like to hire you at a very generous salary and benefits, plus the free room and board I offered. A much bigger suite, of course, than you occupy now.”

Zoe took a thoughtful drag on her cigarette. “I’m not really the costume-wearing and crime-fighting type, sir,” she said through her exhale.

“Please, call me Fortunato. And I think it’s a career you should very much consider, since I’d be financing it. Not many transhumans who put on tights are able to find any kind of benefactor, much less one as flush as I am.”

“I rejected Janus and Underworld and hired Query to get them off my back,” Zoe responded. “They offered a lot to me as well.”

“True, but I think you like to fight—mostly in a verbal or metaphorical fashion but still, you’re a fighter. And I suspect that despite your recent and harrowing little adventure that a big part of you would like to find an excuse to put your powers into action again,” Fortunato said, pointing the smoldering tip of his cigar at her. “And the main reason you turned down Janus and his crew was because you’re not criminally minded. You have too many moral compunctions. Well, about robbing, killing and that sort of thing. You certainly didn’t mind hiding from the NCAA and your college that you’re transhuman. Now that’s something that could come back to haunt you.”

“Let me guess: If I don’t take your generous offer now, my college and the NCAA will conveniently find out about my fraud, and you’ll swoop in with a less generous offer of employment that I’ll have to accept so that you’ll bail me out of the lawsuit they’d threaten me with.”

“That’s a cynical line of thought,” Fortunato said.

“True, too, isn’t it, Fortunato?”

“I know Vanessa approached you. I didn’t know that she put such slanderous thoughts in your head.”

“The fact that you know she talked to me for less than a minute tells me that I should invite Query to my room soon to find the hidden cameras and mics,” Zoe said. “Also, it’s nice of you to confirm that you must have extorted her in some way because she really didn’t give me quite that much detail when she warned me about you.”

“Oh, I’m sure she dropped big enough hints to get your imagination going, Zoe. Allison…I mean, Vanessa…has some issues with me, but I assure you…”

“She dropped the name Allison, too. What the hell?”

“Sorry, it’s her codename for costumed work. Allison Wonderland,” Fortunato clarified. “I sometimes get it…”

“Anyways,” Zoe said, cutting him off, “it was Query who warned me you’d probably make a pitch and I should be on the lookout for possible snares and blackmailing.”

“Query? He has more issues with me than Vanessa…”

“Plus he gave me a file on you, just like he gave you one on me,” Zoe continued. Reaching into her large shoulder bag, she pulled out a manila envelope and tossed it onto Fortunato’s desk. “As you can see, it’s way bigger than the one you have on me. You have an interesting history for someone who’s on the side of the good guys. I think Query left out a lot. You’re probably even a way bigger ass than he’s letting on to me.”

Fortunato set his cigar aside even as Zoe reached over to the same ashtray to stub out her half-smoked cigarette, and he said, “None of that changes anything about my offer or about your circumstances.”

“No, but it changes the nature of our negotiations, Fortunato. I’ve had a few days to think, knowing this meeting was likely to happen after you did the due diligence and digging around about me, and I’ve decided that maybe it wouldn’t be so bad to work more or less on the right side of the law since it’s clear I’m being dragged into this costumed world whether I like it or not. I’d probably have to leave the country to have a normal life in the short run, and I don’t want to do that. I’d also like to make some good money, because I’ve got grad school in my plans and a desire to get through life debt-free and without two bankruptcies like my parents did.”

“What, pray tell, is going to change about our negotiations simply because you expect duplicity from me?”

“First, you’re going to make sure that neither UConn nor the NCAA drags me into the courts, and that means you don’t tell them that I withheld information to get my free ride. It also means that if they come to that conclusion on their own, you’ll do whatever you need to in order to make sure I don’t get sued by the college. Like buy them a new library or whatever,” Zoe said. “You’ll also make sure that no one ties my civilian identity to my costumed one. If I’m exposed, or sued or any of those things I want you to protect me against, you will pay me the equivalent of ten years of my most recent annual salary with you in one lump sum, immediately. A penalty. Or severance. Or whatever you wanna call it.”

“You mean I’ll pay if I’m somehow responsible for any of those things happening.”

“No, you’ll pay regardless,” Zoe said. “Consider it incentive to be very protective of me.”

“That means that you could, theoretically, expose yourself at some point in the future on purpose, at any time in your life, and collect on ten times the last salary I paid you before you left my employ,” Fortunato said.

“Yeah. Well, you need to take risks for big payoffs. I’m pretty sure I’m a five-power transhuman, Fortunato. That’s about as rare as we come. So I’m worth it.”

“You’re more ruthless a negotiator than I expected, Zoe. I think I like you.”

“I don’t know if I can say the feeling’s mutual, but thanks. We can talk about the other details now, but I won’t be signing anything until I have a lawyer look things over. Query’s going to lend me his attorney friend.”

“Oh, how she twists the knife,” Fortunato said with a smile, retrieving his cigar. “Zoe, I might have to watch out or I could fall in love with you.”

[ – To view the next chapter, click here – ]

The Gathering Storm, Part 28

Quick Recap (since it’s been a while since I’ve posted a new chapter in this series):
Thus far in the series, a supervillain named Janus has moved his operations from the West Coast to the East Coast, with designs on the Connecticut city of New Judah primarily, it seems. One of his first acts was to target one of the city’s primary heroes, Query, as well as to recruit a semi-retired supervillain named Underworld. In addition to gathering various villains, Janus and Underworld aggressively and threateningly courted a young transhuman named Zoe, who then sought out Query for protection. Meanwhile, billionaire and former hero Fortunato has been drawn into Janus’ machinations, as well as scheming something himself. Query has fended off Janus’ attempts to abduct Zoe, as well as trying to nudge along a young hero named Solstice in growing up, and he has taken down a small part of Janus’ operation in the process. Zoe ended up unleashing her full powers in the last kidnapping attempt by Janus, and wrestles with the deaths that led to. In the midst of all this, a friend and fellow hero of Query’s, Mad Dash, has found himself in an unlikely romance with a violent vigilante named Ladykiller, who now also dresses up as someone named Honey Badger so that she can occasionally patrol with Mad Dash and not smear his reputation.
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Two men in black faced each other across a desk. One in a tuxedo, after readying himself for a charity event; the other in body armor almost from head to toe, eager to be back on the streets.

One seated; one standing. One who no longer wore a mask; one who did. One who was lifting a tumbler of scotch to his lips; one who made almost a show of avoiding the drink that had been placed before him.

“So, tell me, why I would take this young lady in and provide her with protection against Janus and his machinations?” Fortunato asked Query, raising one eyebrow. “No matter how interesting she sounds from this…clearly very abridged…file you’ve given me on her.”

“Because you’ve been trying to reach me so damned hard for days now—well, weeks, really,” Query said, rocking back on his heels a bit with his gloved hands clasped behind his back.

“I fail to see the connection,” Fortunato said in a tone mixing a growl and a purr.

“Perhaps you’re not as smart as everyone thinks you are, then,” Query responded dryly. “Perhaps you’re not even as smart as I thought you were.” He paused for several moments, savoring the growing irritation in Fortunato’s gaze, then smiled, despite the fact the other man wouldn’t be able to see that grin beneath the full-head mask.

“What I am saying,” Query continued, “is that because you are so eager to speak with me about something—a topic that I would successfully dodge for years, until it became irrelevant, given that I find you so odious—and because I want safe harbor for Zoe…well, I will actually begin returning your phone calls and you can tell me whatever it is you want to tell me. Or pitch to me. Or plead for my help on. You’re a man with something in mind; guard her true and I’ll spare you my time.”

“I hate it when you lapse into rhyme, Query. Even near-rhyme. It suggests to me that your mind is getting ready to spin out plans that will confound my own.”

“Plotting and planning by someone theoretically on the side of the angels. Yes, it’s a trait I find pretty irritating in you as well,” Query retorted. “So, do we have a deal? You keep watch over her while I assess things, and I stop putting you off?”

“Doesn’t sound like an equitable trade,” Fortunato drawled, his accent lapsing into something more befitting his upbringing in a Latino neighborhood  than the Wall Street-style tonality he had perfected over the years. “Why could I possibly want that much for you to listen to me? I think you have misread the level of my interest in speaking with you.”

“Well, then, I’m sure I can throw a few shekels someone’s way for some babysitting or some recommendations of someone who can watch over Zoe. Cheshire always knows people…”

“Fine, fine,” Fortunato said quickly and irritably. “Negotiating with you is so irritating, since even my best poker face is useless. She can stay in a suite here in my building for a few weeks if necessary—or maybe a couple months. If you actually listen to what I have to say. Play me off or tune me out and she can hit the streets.”

“Excellent,” Query said. “Although I seriously doubt you could bring yourself to kick her out. Well, I’m all ears right now, even if you can’t see them. Talk.”

“Now I want you to wait for a while,” Fortunato said. “I have an event I’m already late in attending and some things to take care of first before we talk. New business, as it were. Until I settle that, talking to you would be premature.”

“Yes,” Query said. “And I’m sure that ‘new business’ has cafe-au-lait-colored skin and multicolored locs upon her head. And a very interesting—if abridged—file.”

* * *

Solstice couldn’t fault Isabella’s background work about the skeez lab; her stepsister’s research had been impeccable, and the floorplans she had unearthed for the building were nearly spot-on accurate. But apparently, a small bathroom—suited only for a toilet and sink—had been installed in the past year or two. That was the one thing not on the blueprints.

Also on the “unpredictable list” would be the annoying fact that one of the guys working in the drug house was using that crummy little bathroom because, presumably, someone else was occupying the better two toilets elsewhere in the building.

Which also wouldn’t be so bad, Solstice thought, if he weren’t armed and coming out of that bathroom just when she was halfway through a back window trying to slip in unnoticed. Normally, she was quicker on the draw with her chilling powers than people were with guns—especially people who’d just finished taking a piss and still had damp hands from washing them—but a bit of panic set in at her sensation of utter exposure and she thrust herself through the window in an ungainly lunge.

As she tumbled awkwardly to the floor, the man had his gun pointed at her. Her Attractor power took a few moments to focus, so there was no way she could relieve him of his gun in time. Instead, she began to lower the temperature around his body sharply as she kicked over a nearby trash and dodged. The sound of the can wasn’t precisely in sync with the gunshot as he squeezed the trigger, but it was close enough, she hoped, that no one would realize a gun had been fired.

She heard the bullet whiz past her, far too close for comfort, and she pounced—counting on the sudden chill in his muscles to give her an edge—and pinned his cheeks between both her palms as she set her thermal powers to work and burned him severely. It was more brutal than she would have liked, but felt better than killing him outright. The only thing keeping him from bringing attention to their struggle by screaming in agony was her bosom smashed up against his face as she mounted his torso—legs squeezing his ribs hard—and forced him against a wall hard while searing his face.

The awkward and blunt-force assault stunned him just enough to ensure his silence for a moment as she grabbed a mop from a bucket near the tiny bathroom and struck him in the skull several times. For long moments, she stayed quiet and crouched, awaiting an attack but hoping her panicked plan had worked and the whole brief fight had sounded like nothing more than the guy clumsily knocking stuff over.

When no attack came, she gagged him with a dirty cleaning rag and bound his wrists with one of the many plastic ties in a pouch on her belt.

She worked through the lab efficiently—trying to do so slowly even as her pounding heart and throbbing temples urged her to rush—and took out her opponents by ones and twos—five in all—somehow without getting shot in the process. By the time she actually got to the working part of the lab where the skeez was cooked, there were only four people left, all of them unarmed cookers, and they surrendered without hesitation.

Pulling out her cell phone after the last of them was restrained, she dialed up Query. The voice on the other end made a curt greeting, and she couldn’t quite place it. “Hello? Is this the Dark Jerk or is this his faithful sidekick, Portly Lawyer?”

Might as well get a little passive-aggressive dig in somewhere,  she thought.

“I don’t pay Portly Lawyer to answer my phone, and please don’t call him that again. Only I have authority to tease him. Would this happen to be Careless Impetuous Goth by any chance?”

“Yes. Operation Hun is a done deal. Part one, anyway. Can you come pick up the trash and drop off the merchandise?”

“Oh, darn, we’re going to get all professional and official now and cut the witty banter short?” Query said dryly. “In all honesty, I’m glad you pulled it off. Team will be there in less than 10. Good luck on surviving part two.”

“There’s still time for you to join up with me and help out so that I do,” Solstice said.

“Some lessons need to be learned the hard way, my dear,” Query said, and hung up.

* * *

Sitting with her legs drawn up to her chest at one end of her sofa, while Mad Dash wolfed down spoonful after spoonful of Raisin Bran that was filling half of a mixing bowl, Ladykiller blinked several times. “Um…did I hear you right? You want to take me to…a bank? In costume. As Ladykiller.”

Swallowing a mouthful of milk, soggy flakes and raisins, Mad Dash smiled. “Sure! Or as Honey Badger. Or we can do two trips and make it both!”

“Why? Weird date even by your standards.”

“Well, they always give out an iTunes or Starbucks gift card when you open your first new account,” he said happily, a little dribble of milk running from one corner of his mouth back into the bowl. “Way better than a toaster or a hair dryer or whatever they gave out back in the olden days. Well, at least Bank of America gives out gift cards. Not sure about Citibank and Wells Fargo. I’m not a big fanboy of B&A but they have the most market square.”

“Ummm…OK. I have a bank account already. Also, since when does B-of-A give out gifts for opening accounts? Also, don’t you think going to a bank as Ladykiller is a good way to make the guards think the place is about to get robbed? A lot of people assume the worst about me.”

“Well, of course B-to-the-A-izzle gives out inventives,” Mad Dash mumbled through a mouthful of cereal. “Fierce composition for the transhuman customers, ya know. Important market but not the biggest one. Only the national chains have the resources to do that kind of business.”

“I already have an account. At a nice little community bank in my neighborhood here. I’d think you’d be the sort of guy who’d support the little guys, Petey.”

Mad Dash smiled, frowned and smiled again, setting down the bowl. “I’ll finish the rest later when it’s ooper-dooper nice and mushy,” he said by way of preamble, then sat down near her on the sofa, setting his right hand on her clenched knees. “You’ve got an accounting at a bank, sure, but as Sarah. But you should have one for your dress-up self—whichever one. Or both, though I’m not sure what banking rules are about that.”

“Accounts for costumed weirdos like us? What are you talking about?”

“Wow! I know you were a…um…prisoner…um…here for a while, but you’ve been in costume for more than a year now and don’t know about things like Cape Checking and Super-Savings accounts? Masked Moneymarkets? Any of this ring-ding-a-linging any horns?”

“Dash, I’m spending the money of the dead man who kept me here as his sex-slave and have been for the past couple years,” Ladykiller answered. “The only reason I even have a bank account as Sarah is because I had it before I ended up in this crazy life. I don’t think it has more than a hundred bucks in it anymore. I’m an e-payment and cash economy kinda girl these days.”

“Honey-runny, you really, really didn’t care about costumed folks before you jumped into becoming one, did you? Or how they live.”

“Dash…Peter…I still don’t really care about them. I just dress and act like some of them,” Ladykiller said. “And now I date one. Anyway. The bank thing. What the fuck already.”

“Well, my cinnamon sticky bun…the big three banks will open accounts for your hero identity, with checks, debit cards and all that. You can even get credit cards—even loans sometimes—if you’re established enough. It kinda helps when you need to pay for things when you’re in costume, but don’t want to muck with a bunch of cash. I once had to rent a car to get to a meet-up when my boots were on their last treads. Sure, the Hertz folks blocked off an extra thousand bucks on my debit card to cover themselves while I was using the car and didn’t remove the block until a week afterward, but still, I wouldn’t have been able to doo-doo that if I was on a cash ecology.”

“I don’t want to tell them my identity and show my civilian ID and shit, Peter!”

“You don’t need to. Banking privacy for exotic customers law—or whatever it’s called. Don’t you know about that either? The big three pushed that legislation through to get the trans business years ago,” Dash said. “You confirm your identity with a thumbprint scan. Police aren’t allowed to demand print records from the bank to match to their own fingerprint files unless the transhuman is being charged with bank fraud or bank robbery.”

“I can’t believe that all of you would be that trusting. What if the laws change?”

“Do what I do—thanks to paranoia coaching from my buddy-pal Query: Do palm print instead, since police don’t do those. Or you can even do retina scan if you choose Citibank. It’s sort of their point of distinction. Wells Fargo has a voiceprint option. But Citi and Wells don’t have as many flexible account options as body odor of America. Main downside usually is that if your card gets stolen, you’re usually on the hoof for half of the charges to your account, unlike the civilian crowd. That’s the way the banks  help make it less risky for themselves. Also, the monthly fees for us can be a sung of a twitch.”

Ladykiller sighed. “Why would they even do that? How much money can that be worth to them? I mean, the villains wouldn’t dare open accounts there and heroes make lousy money usually—no offense.”

“Sure they would. Well, sorta,” Mad Dash said. “Most of the successful bad guys hire minor transhumans to do low-level hero work part-time for show and then launder their money through them. Use their debit cards. Stuff like that. As long as the money isn’t used for obviously illegal things, the banks don’t care.”

“I dunno. I have lots of money still left from Mister Master’s civilian accounts.”

“Sarah-baby-pecan-pie…you need to get out of here someday. Set up a life away from this. I mean, you were held prisoner here. Raped. Staying here in his old condo and spending his old money—it’s kind of dork and twizzler.”

Ladykiller paused for several moment to process that. She’d gotten better at figuring out his nonsense words here and there, but she was confused. Frowning, she finally ventured, “Dark and twisted, you mean?”

“That too,” Mad Dash said. “Besides,” he added, standing up and holding out his hand, “there’s a Bank of America branch just down the street, I want you to get an iTunes card for opening an account so you can buy me the latest Adele album and a Fruit Ninja app for my iPad, and by the time we get back the rest of the cereal should be really sludgy goodness.”

* * *

Zoe finished her latest chapter of The Girl Who Played With Fire, deciding that while hiding out in Fortunato’s building was as boring as it was safe, at least it offered a chance to catch up on her reading list. The free ride she had been given for the building’s commissaries and the small account set up for her at the gift shops didn’t hurt either. Not even two days into this hiding out thing yet, and she was feeling almost comfortable.

As she slipped the bookmark into the novel and set it down to return her attention to her mocha, she noticed a presumably twenty-something Latina looking directly at her from a nearby table. Before she could decide what to do or say about the unexpected stare-down, the woman got up, walked over to Zoe’s table, and sat down.

“Hi, I’m Vanessa,” the woman said, holding out her hand.

“Zoe.”

“Yeah, I know, and I don’t know if I’m too late yet, but when I heard about a transhuman in the building, I wanted to warn you.”

“I thought I was supposed to be under the radar here—and warn me about what?”

“Only a few of us know about you, and not much about you, at that—I think Fortunato told me as some kind of test. I’m probably about to fail it and get in a lot of trouble,” Vanessa said, then paused to take a breath before a rapid-fire delivery of: “Whatever he offers you, don’t take it. Don’t trust him.”

“He hasn’t offered anything yet, and I wasn’t planning to trust him.”

Vanessa stared hard at Zoe like a frustrated parent dealing with a stubborn child. She shook her head, gritted her teeth and leaned forward.

“I mean it, Zoe!” she hissed. “No matter how smart you think you are, don’t even start up with him. I’m telling you, I know from experience. I’m in a pile of crap so deep I feel like I’m drowning. And he’ll never let me out of it probably. I’ll be Allison Wonderland for him probably until the day I die. He’ll stoop lower than you think to snag you. Believe me.”

Zoe sighed heavily. “Vanessa, was it? Or…Allison now? I’m confused. But anyway, Vanessa, I appreciate your concern. Really. But you need to understand. I’ve been dealing with devils for weeks already, and I wasn’t exactly an easy mark before then. I don’t know how you got in your mess, but just because you stepped in shit doesn’t mean I will.”

Vanessa’s gaze darkened, and she frowned, and Zoe realized she’d just carelessly hit a nerve; the blunt tone of her voice probably hadn’t helped. But with the blood of two men already on her hands and Janus and Underworld sniffing after her, she didn’t have it in her to worry about someone else’s hurt feelings just yet. Still, the awkward silence wasn’t helping her mood, so she stood, turned, and left both her drink and Vanessa behind her as she sought a new place to continue her reading.

[ – To view the next chapter, click here – ]

The Gathering Storm, Part 27

[ – To view a list of all current chapters, click here – ]

Almost human again, thought Zoe. Almost human. It’s amazing what water—hot enough and copious enough—can do to sluice away the remnants of a day full of horrors.

In the steamy confines of the small bathroom, a towel wrapped around her torso, Zoe looked at herself in the mirror. No one’s blood on her anymore. And on her face, neck and arms—the places people might see when she had clothes on again—she bore only a few scratches. Once she was dressed, it would almost be as if nothing had happened today. As if she’d never been kidnapped and never killed two men and then watched two more die at the end of Query’s gun barrel.

The intertwined mass of dreadlocks—a ropy mass of reds, pinks and light blonde on her scalp amidst those bearing her natural dark brown, almost ebony, color—reminded her too much of today. She wanted all memories of it shoved as far away from her consciousness as possible.

She closed her eyes, concentrated for a few minutes, and then opened them again, noting that the steam had mostly retreated from the room and the towel had slipped a bit down her upper body. She looked upon the  re-colored landscape of her hair and managed a small smile. A minor change, but a new start of sorts. Most of the locs remained their natural deep dark-chocolate hue but about a third of them now were deep purple or dusky orange, and a couple of them a swirled mix of the two. A few ribbons of lavender wove through the other hues here and there as well.

It’s all got to begin somewhere, she thought, and then slipped into the borrowed clothes from Query’s closets. As she walked out into the main area of the safe-house Query had sent her too, Zoe was greeted by the smell of scrambled eggs and sizzling bacon.

Breakfast for dinner. Mad Dash, I think I love you right now. A little of that in my belly and some TLC from this healer Asclepius when he shows up—I do have a few gashes on my torso along with some serious bumps and bruises—and I just might feel fully human.

* * *

Nearly an hour of searching through Janus’ forest cabins had, as Query had suspected would be the case, yielded no hard evidence to track down the criminal kingpin nor disrupt his schemes. He’d removed the hard drives from several laptops just in case, and commandeered all of the cell phones that Janus’ minions had been carrying, but his hopes weren’t high. The web caches, phone numbers, IP addresses and all the rest would likely lead him on a circuitous path to nowhere.

He’d have more freedom to go on those potential wild goose chases later, once he figured out what to do about Feral and then sent Buttress and Peregrine back home. Even dead-ends could yield insights, though those insights would be hair-thin—Janus seemed quite adept at not leaving evidence that could point to him.

On the other hand, Query didn’t make it common knowledge that all of his senses were highly enhanced, so Janus wouldn’t have guarded against that possibility, perhaps. Janus was probably smart enough that none of these men and women had been near his main headquarters, but that didn’t mean they hadn’t been at some key satellite operations and didn’t bear evidence for Query’s investigation. Every strange scent he picked up that didn’t belong in the woods gave him another clue. Every bit of debris or miscellany in a minion’s pocket that didn’t have anything to do with the forest fed him more information.

I have dozens of tiny puzzle pieces, he thought. Sure, it’s a 5,000-piece puzzle and I can only complete small portions of the overall picture, but I’m getting closer, Janus. My intuitive powers can guess at what some other portions of the puzzle are supposed to be. By having as big an operation as you do, you have lots of people. Eventually, I’m going to find one who can lead me straight to you.

Query glanced up at the two small cameras mounted near the ceiling, and then to the table lamp and potted plant with their hidden spy equipment. He’d disabled all four cameras shortly before beginning his search, but he smiled at them all the same.

Hope you liked the show, you son of bitch.

* * *

The growling and shouting had been going on for some time now; when Buttress first came to tell Query that Feral was fully aware again and angry, the response was simply, “Tell him I’ll be out in 10 and then leave him be.”

Six minutes after that, Buttress was urging Query to come resolve the situation since he had created it to begin with. Without even turning his black mask toward the man, Query held up four fingers and then waved him off with several flicks of his wrist.

Query didn’t really need the extra time to do any more searching for evidence—he was done with that. This exercise in delay was in part meant to gauge Feral’s temperament.

It’s also the principle of the thing. I said 10 minutes and I meant 10 damned minutes.

When he emerged from the cabin, Query was carrying a large black duffel, unzipped and filled to bursting, with a shotgun stock sticking out. He let it drop to the ground. In his other hand, he held a spray bottle he had found in one of the cabin’s kitchens.

Peregrine and Buttress’ eyes were drawn more strongly to the bottle than to the duffel bag that held a firearm. In other circumstances, Query thought, he might have found that amusing. The memory of the horrifically mangled body of one of Janus’ minions in one of the cabins, though, squashed all hope of merriment tonight.

“Get me the fuck outta these!” Feral shouted at Query, spittle flying from his lips, straining at the pair of handcuffs and the various nylon ties as he struggled in his kneeling position.

“Calm down, first.”

“Untie me and unlock me or I will rip your goddamn heart out!”

“That’s not my definition of calm. It’s not anyone’s definition of calm.”

“Let me loose you fu…!”

Query sprayed Feral in the face a dozen times; he could almost feel Peregrine and Buttress tense up at the first few squirts. Clearly, it never occurred to them the bottle would be filled with mere tap water.

“What the hell are you…!”

Query sprayed him again, eight more times, saying, “Calm down so we can talk like humans.”

Sputtering as water dripped down his face, Feral half-growled, “I’m not a damn pet on a counter making a mess or getting hair on the couch. Stop trying to humiliate me.”

“I’m not trying to humiliate you, Feral. I am trying to get your attention and appeal to your rational side. I thought this would be a lot nicer than slapping you around.”

“I’m calm now,” Feral answered, his eyes glittering and a snarl teasing at one corner of his mouth.

“No, you’re not, but you’re close enough that I think we can begin to have our talk,” Query said. “I believe I asked you earlier not to kill anyone unless absolutely necessary. I’m pretty sure you could have beaten her senseless instead of shredding her into kibbles and bits. Certainly if you were going to go for a kill, a cleaner and more merciful one seemed appropriate.”

“I was wounded; it sets things off. I wasn’t thinking straight.”

“And I’m concerned that this might not have been the first time, Feral. Is it?”

“Plenty of people don’t deserve to live, Query,” he snarled. “Or deserve to die messily.”

You’re avoiding my question, Feral, even as you show you understand my intent in asking it.

“I’m worried about the ones who did deserve to live and might possibly have met a bitter end at the claws you wear. Maybe a petty criminal or an innocent bystander.”

Feral mouthed neither protest nor confirmation, which was precisely what Query had feared might happen. It was a more damning response than an overwrought denial.

Query reached into a side pocket on the duffel bag, extracted something that looked vaguely like a wristwatch, then took out a charger, and tossed both items on the ground near Feral’s feet.

“When I do finally unlock the cuffs and cut off the ties on you, you are going to put that on,” Query said levelly. “I don’t care where. Wrist, ankle, dick—whatever. You will make sure it is charged at all times and you will make sure you wear it every time you leave your home. Do you understand me?”

“An electronic leash? Are you kidding me?”

Query raised the water bottle. “Are we losing our will to be Zen about this?”

“You have no right…”

“I want to know where you are at all times,” Query said. “I want to know if and when you are in the vicinity of a death or serious injury that is…unjustifiable. If I find a pattern, I will chase you down and we will have words—or more. I suggest some meditation classes and anger management.”

On the periphery of his vision, Query saw Buttress and Peregrine fidget, and without taking his eyes off Feral held out a hand, palm out, to urge them to stay out of it.

“I am a Primal. Hardcore Primal. That’s why I call myself Feral,” the man said to Query in a hard growl. “Being a Primal is my key power. It’s in my nature to be wild.”

“That doesn’t mean you can’t control yourself and set limits. And if that is what it means for you, then you cannot be on the streets doing what you do because you will put innocent people at risk or you will go too far with someone who is just a minor thug and you will cause me to worry at night and make the rest of us look bad.”

“You can’t tell me what to do, you son of a bitch!”

“I just did,” Query responded, “and you need to calm down.”

“I will not calm down, you piece of shit!” Feral roared, a venomous look in his eyes, his torso and head pressing outward as if he thought he could stretch his way through his bonds to reach Query’s throat. The straining effort left him teetering, though he didn’t tumble.

Query dropped the squirt bottle, quickly snatched the shotgun out of the duffel bag, gave it a quick and hard pump and said with a placid voice, “If you continue to confirm my worst suspicions about you, I will put you down like a rabid dog. I suggest you act like a man instead.”

Feral kneeled back onto his heels, closed his eyes and took a few deep, slow breaths. When he opened his eyes again, there was still anger there, and resentment, but the raw fury had bled away.

“Uh huh,” Query said, sliding the shotgun back into the bag. “You can control yourself when you really want to. Thought so. And that makes my concerns so much more salient. Don’t do anything stupid when I cut you loose, and don’t do anything stupid for the rest of your career in costume. We’ll be working on your control and your boundaries.”

Feral said nothing.

“Did you hear me…Alexander ?” Query said quietly.

Feral flinched at the name, shocked to find that Query knew it and wondering what else he knew.

“Yeah, I heard you.”

“Good, because if you don’t want to cooperate with me on this, you either need to move to Marksburgh or somewhere else far away from here, or get used to the idea of being hunted down. Now let’s get you loose and get the hell out of here.”

* * *

There was no overt odor yet, though it was only a matter of time, and Janus hoped he could dispense with the rest of the unpleasantries in time to get the custodial crew in here before the air became rank. Sparing one last glance at the blue tarp slightly behind him, oblong and lumpy as it lay wrapped around the contents, he put his hands calmly on his desk and centered himself for a few moments.

Picking up the handset of his phone, Janus pressed the button for his receptionist and said, “Please send the next one in.”

“Yes, sir,” the young man answered, and Janus could hear his light chains tinkle quietly as he said “You can go in now” and set down the phone in its cradle, severing the connection to Janus.

Janus glanced down at the file on his desk to remind himself of the name of the man now stepping into his office.

“Please, have a seat, Walt,” Janus said, and spread his hands invitingly as the man settled in. Walt’s eyes drifted around the room, confused, and settled on the back door of the office for a few moments.

“Did Kevin go th…” he began, then stopped as Janus lifted a finger to one set of the lips on the two-faced helmet he wore tonight.

“So, Walt, you are my person in charge of logistics.”

“One of them, sir, yes,” he responded nervously.

“Well, among your various duties, you were charged with oversight of the teams in the Langehorne Woods, correct?”

“Yes, sir.”

“So their supplies were your responsibility?”

“Yes, but what…”

“And do you think you adequately supplied them with…ahhh…defensive tools?”

“As well as my budget allowed. More than they would need, I think.”

“Perhaps you didn’t think hard enough. Perhaps you should have suggested some budgetary adjustments.”

“Sir?”

“The team there has been wiped out. The safe-houses there are compromised. Kevin was in charge of communications with that team and I found his defense of his actions somewhat…lacking. I don’t think he communicated my desires well enough to the operatives there. Did you supply them well enough?”

“Yes, sir, I think I…”

“There you go thinking again. But you seem to be doing a lot of thinking now, when I would have preferred you thought ahead earlier. Thought outside the box, perhaps. Anticipated various contingencies like competent trans white hats.”

When Janus paused, Walt fidgeted a little, and then asked, “How big a strike force hit them, sir? Did someone on the team there betray the location? Was it all transhumans in the assault team? There’s so much I don’t know that it’s hard to defend myself to you. If it was more than one transhuman, that wasn’t the sort of thing one could anticipate…”

Janus stood up, calmly stepped past the tarp behind his desk and stood near Walt. “You’re paid to anticipate. You are compensated quite well with other things besides money to anticipate.”

A hand flashed out as Walt opened his mouth to speak, gripping the side of his head firmly. Then a soft, wet, rending sound and a gurgle from the man’s throat instead of words. And then silence, and sluggish lines of gore running down the man’s face and neck toward his torso.

Not as messy as with Kevin; I must be starting to calm down finally.

Janus casually pulled out a second tarp from behind the sofa in his office and deftly whipped it out to lay flat on the ground. No rush. The man’s own clothes would slow the flow of blood and other fluids before they reached the carpet. Then he tipped the chair back onto the tarp, rolled the dead man onto it, and wrapped him tight, dragging him next to his co-worker. Fishing out a tube of Clorox wipes, Janus pulled out two sheets and cleaned a few stray bits of gore from the chair before he set it back up again.

Next time I find your lair, Query, I will have a dozen men fire rockets into the building. No more finesse. I will more than kill you. I will obliterate you for this. You were supposed to already be dead. Why won’t you cooperate?

Janus returned to his leather chair, feeling much less anxious and wondering where Crazy Jane had run off to. He shrugged, sighed, pulled out a new file, and picked up the phone to have his receptionist send in the third and final of the employees to question about this—the one who was supposed to be on top of security protocols for the Langehorne Woods safe-houses.

Maybe she’ll have better answers, Janus thought. It would be nice to send at least one of them back to the offices breathing to show I’m a merciful man at times.

* * *

“Good evening, and welcome to ‘Nighttime RightView,’ Isaac,” Ben Glick said into his headphone as the first caller of the evening was patched into the booth from which he hosted three radio shows a week: mornings on Monday, afternoons on Wednesday and late night on Saturday.

“Thanks, Ben,” said the caller. “I listen to your show at times, and rarely agree with you, but I’ve only felt the need to call tonight with you trying to fire up a race war in connection to transhumans.”

“And how have I done that, exactly?” Ben responded smugly.

“Oh, I don’t know…maybe your insistence on a 50-foot-high wall with snipers and electrified gates along the Mexican border, your call to suspend all immigration and naturalization from Latin America, Africa, the Middle East and Asia for the next decade and…uh…your crazy insistence that there’s a ‘Tex-Mix buffet’ of dangerous transhumans all through the Southwest raping norm women to corrupt peaceful white American genetics…”

“Well, Isaac, Caucasians are decidedly less prone to developing transhuman powers, aren’t they? Kinds of puts us at a disadvantage we need to correct and protect against, don’t you think?” Ben retorted.

“No, not really,” Isaac answered. “Whites are still the overwhelming majority of people in this country, even more so when you factor in white Hispanics. So the number of transhumans here is pretty close to even between whites and non-whites in the U.S.”

“Sure, sure,” Ben said with a patronizing tone. “But the projections say that whites will be a minority by 2050; what’s going to happen then?”

“Whites will be a little less than half the population, I think is what the studies say, and that will still make them the single largest group—not a minority.”

“But the transhuman figures won’t be anywhere near as close to equal then, will they, Zach-y boy?” Ben countered. “And when our not-native-born ‘President’ Obama starts ramping up immigration for his extremist Muslim pals abroad and hands out all sorts of government money to them and encourages them to build big, strong families, and then starts marching our Christian, Caucasian women to the abortion clinics to start slicing into our numbers—well, whites will be a minority well before 2050.”

“That’s ridiculous! He doesn’t have broad powers like that, not to mention he’s U.S. born, no matter what your birther nonsense paranoia, and he’s Christian. People like you…”

“Hey, gotta go to the next caller, Isaac. I’m sure you have an militant Liberal-Islamo-Socialist Party meeting to go to so you can raise funds to get Obama his fascist emergency powers and a lifetime seat in the Oval Office anyway. Don’t want you to be late.”

“Muslim, terrorist, socialist, leftist and fascist? That doesn’t even make any…”

With a slice of his index finger across his throat as the signal, Ben had the technician cut the connection, smiled broadly as he saw a thumbs-up in regard to the next caller, and said, “Hello, John, and welcome to the call-in part of our show. I hope you’re a bit smarter than the last guy.”

“Ben, I’m a huge fan, and I wish you’d put your hat in the ring to run against that pretender in the White House. I just wanna say that…”

Ben smiled broadly, and winked at the technician through the booth’s window, watching the phone lines light up with callers, and knowing it was going to be a flood of contempt for the opinions of Isaac and every other weak-willed idiot out in the world who thought like he did.

* * *

After a 15-minute conversation to catch up, most of which she couldn’t hear—not that it would be easy to understand as Mad Dash lapsed into a string of metaphors and absurdities that confused her, anyway—Zoe saw the Speedster give Query a nod, wave to her and then exit the safe-house.

“Sorry about that,” Query said to Zoe. “I know it’s been a rough day for you but I needed to catch Dash up on things.”

“Oh, I feel a lot better,” Zoe said. “About most things, anyway. Not so sure about this,” she added, holding up a tiny, oblong black lozenge between her thumb and forefinger.

“Yes?” Query said in a tone that was unconcerned but also invited her to continue.

“Mad Dash called over that Asclepius guy on your tab, apparently. Nice guy. Fixed up my boo-boos really good. Also sensed a foreign object that he ‘encouraged’ my body to spit out. Funny—it seems to be in the same spot you ‘accidentally’ jabbed me on graduation day when you helped me off the ground.”

“Yeah, I wasn’t exactly 100% forthcoming about that small ‘mishap.’ I put that there on purpose,” Query said.

“Care to tell me what the fuck it is?” Zoe pressed, her voice gaining an edge.

“Transmitter. Tracking device.”

“So, I didn’t need to be kidnapped, or at least not wake up in a trunk panicked and out of control. You could have saved me all that bullshit and stress?”

“No, not really,” Query answered. “That was mainly an emergency backup plan. It’s a passive transmitter; otherwise, Janus’ people could have detected it and be tipped off that you were tagged. I needed to have something else like one of my flying drones get close enough to communicate with it and make it active. I had someone following you when I couldn’t, like tonight.”

“He didn’t do a very good job, did he?”

“He did a great job,” Query countered. “Kept track of you long enough for me to get a couple drones in your vicinity and make sure you had a rescue coming.”

“He let me get caught,” she snapped.

“It was his job to watch you, not protect you.”

“Yeah, that was your job, wasn’t it?” Zoe nearly spat at him. “Except you wanted me to get captured, didn’t you? So that you could get to Janus. You son of a bitch.”

Query regarded her for a moment through the eyeless black mask, arms crossed over his chest, and nodded slightly. “It was something I considered could happen. If I had wanted it to happen, though, I wouldn’t have saved you the first time at graduation, now would I?”

“You hadn’t tagged me before then, though” she pointed out.

“True, but I have my ways,” Query said. “But yes, I did consider that if I couldn’t stop Janus from succeeding with one of his nabs, I could use you as a way to either get to him or at least get close enough to some of his operatives to gather clues.”

Zoe threw the tiny transmitter at him and watched it bounce off the right cheek of his mask. It didn’t satisfy her nearly enough, so she swept one arm wide to knock over a torchiere-style floor lamp and a side table, along with the small candy dish and a set of coasters that had sat on it.

“Tell me how that makes you any different from that bitch Underworld who’s been trying to get me to join up with Janus and trying to manipulate me into saying yes or scare me into it. How the fuck are you any better?” she shouted.

“I could say that you’ve been getting my services for free, so you get what you pay for, but that wouldn’t even be true, because I’ve gone out of my way to keep watch on you—and Underworld where possible—and keep you from harm and prevent you from being whisked away from my surveillance,” Query said. “What I will emphasize though, is that I’m a shitload different from Underworld because my goal in all this—beyond any desire to use you as bait or gain something from Janus’ interest in you—is to ultimately free you from a threat so that you can make your own life decisions. Underworld’s been trying to snare you; I’m trying to get you free to move on with life as you choose. And then get me out of your life, too.”

“You used me,” Zoe said miserably. “I trusted you and you used me.”

“My plan was never to let you get caught, Zoe. That would have been plain stupid along with being rotten,” he said, holding his hands out, palms up as if in supplication. “You being caught and a teeny little passive transmitter vastly increased my chances of losing track of you altogether. But I considered the possibility you might be successfully kidnapped, and I’d have been a fool not to plan ahead to capitalize on that.”

“Capitalize?” Zoe sneered.

“Face it, Zoe: Regardless of any personal interest I have in taking Janus down, it’s in both our interests for me to find him. He may try to get at you again; he may not. Probably not. This latest attempt cost him a lot in terms of manpower, money and more exposure to me. You’ve become expensive. Going after you is now officially a liability and a loss proposition.”

“All the more reason to punish me by coming after me again.”

“Wrong. He’d come after me because I’m the one messing with him.”

“I killed two of his guys,” Zoe pointed out.

“He doesn’t know that. Also, it’s small potatoes compared to the damage I did. He’ll come after me or one of my few friends if he looks for revenge. I doubt you’re one of my friends after all this, so he won’t pick you.”

Zoe leaned against the back of the nearby sofa and sighed. “You could have at least told me what you were up to,” she said dejectedly.

“A secret backup plan ceases to be secret if I tell someone,” Query said. “And I like my secrets. For what it’s worth, I’m sorry. I’m not sorry I planned things the way I did, because I still think it was necessary, but I am truly sorry for what you went through. That’s the other difference between me and Underworld. She may not be as outright nasty or vicious as Janus, but she likes control. She practically orgasms when she breaks someone or gets them to submit to her will. I don’t get any pleasure from having played you; not even a little bit.”

For nearly a minute, they remained in silence, before Zoe finally broke it. “So, what now?”

“To be on the safe side, I find someplace you can stay that give you a bit more freedom than this little place and even more security. Cute as it is, I doubt you want to spend the next several months here while I assess the fallout and whether you’re still at risk.”

“Any ideas where yet?”

“Yeah, I think I have a place; a person who will make sure nothing happens to you.”

“A friend of yours?”

“No. I don’t like him much at all, but I know you’ll be safe from Janus with him. But for now, you get some sleep, and I’ll fill you in when the sun is up.”

“Where will you be?”

“Right on the couch,” Query said. “I’ll be reading. No one will find you here, and if they do, they won’t get by me. I promise that. I can do that because I’ll die before I break that promise, and if I die, I won’t have to worry about catching shit from you for breaking it.”

Zoe laughed despite herself, and muttered, “I still don’t like you right now.”

“I have that effect on a lot of people.”

“What if you fall asleep?”

“Not a chance. You see—and considering what I’ve put you through, I guess I can tell you what only a few people know—I don’t sleep. And before you ask, yes, I mean that literally. The price for my powers is a brain that doesn’t know how to shut down anymore, even for a few minutes.”

“You know, it’s not a secret if you tell someone,” Zoe pointed out, feeling some satisfaction for using at least some of his earlier words against him.

“It doesn’t need to be a secret, Zoe. It’s just personal. And I don’t share personal with many people. You may not like me, and that’s understandable. But I like you, and I wish we could have met under better circumstances. You’re good people, Zoe, and I want you to step out in the real world with as clean a slate as possible. You deserve that as much as I deserve your scorn.”

[ – To view the next chapter, click here – ]

The Gathering Storm, Part 26

[ – To view a list of all current chapters, click here – ]

The road stretched before Query, but he traveled it slowly.

If there’s a metaphor in there, I’ll just go ahead and ignore it, he thought. Too many people attach too much meaning to roads. Road trips as spiritual journeys. Intersections as allegories for life-changing decisions.

This road was simply a tool. A means to an end—getting to where Janus’ people were.

On his way to the location of Janus’ forest safe-house, Query began checking for messages from heroes and vigilantes he’d contacted before reaching Zoe and taking out Janus’ men—people who either owed him favors or could sometimes be cajoled to join him in a big fight.

Buttress had left a text response around the time Query had caught up with Zoe and Mad Dash—which Query hadn’t seen since he’d been a bit busy setting up to ambush Janus’ team—saying he’d be over as soon as possible and another one a few minutes ago saying he was now at the entrance to Grace Memorial Highway. Query sent him a button for the QuikLynx page he had created with directions to guide allies to the rendezvous point and a simple message reading: Thanks.

Feral, who was usually up for a fight of any kind, had minutes earlier sent a text that he was already a few miles up the old highway, since he figured there weren’t any places to hide a hideout anyway before that point. Query sent him the same link as Buttress, along with the message: Appreciate it; try to keep body count low.

Peregrine had messaged him that she was on the roof of the Dresden Building waiting on his signal, and should be able to glide all the way to his location. So he sent her directions, too, and the message: Consider me paid in full when we’re done.

Greenguard—at least that’s who he would be tonight; Query had long ago figured out the man had two other costumed identities called Knockout and Hardcase—had left a message that there was no way he could make it there in time to be of any help, as had Morning Glory and Python.

Morning Glory isn’t much good in a direct fight anyway, Query thought, but his Luminar powers could have been good for backing us up. Python’s probably too busy admiring his abs or posing for the paparazzi, but I’ll miss his sheer muscle in this, and that goes double for Greenguard.

High Impact hadn’t responded at all and Query hadn’t expected him to, loner and general misanthrope that he was. Solstice hadn’t responded either, but Query knew she was still trying to tie up loose ends on her Marty the Hun situation.

He found himself wishing he’d had more time during the ongoing Janus/Zoe situation to contact Coldraven and Good War to let them know he’d discovered their identities. He didn’t have any sympathy for Coldraven, who occupied the gray areas way too often and might actually be a little dirty, so blackmailing her into helping would have been useful. He had no intentions of blackmailing Good War, but now that he knew his identity, contacting him would be easier so that Query could ask how best to reach him in costumed mode and not as a civilian.

Finally, Query reached the rendezvous point, knowing he probably wouldn’t have any company at all for at least six minutes and wouldn’t have everyone together for 15 or 20 minutes. As he hurriedly switched from his sniper-friendly attire to a riot-style outfit, that thought gave him pause, since there was a good chance anyone at the safe-house already would be alerted to his impending arrival and preparing for that. The only question was whether Janus would tell them to sit tight in the hopes they would kill Query, have them bug out and take as much with them as they could, or torch the entire place.

The first option, given Janus’ attitude and approach thus far, seemed most likely. There was only one practical way out of the area in which the safe-house was located, and Query was close enough to that road now to pick off anyone who tried to flee with potential evidence. Given the likely timing of them knowing things had gone to shit, Janus telling them to evacuate when the road was probably being watched didn’t strike Query as a likely option. However, if Janus thought the safe-house might have any incriminating evidence in it, the place might end up rigged to blow or might already be burning, with a strike team in the woods waiting for Query’s arrival.

One way to find out, he thought, and decided to override the navigational controls for Pidwidgeon—which had been circling Janus’ place in the woods for several minutes—to remotely land him here, then hide him away somewhere for later retrieval, since Query didn’t have the van with him anymore.

Shit planning on my part to have sent Dash and Zoe off with the van so they could cart away the prisoners. Would have been better to leave the thugs in the woods for a while. I’ve burned too much of Pidwidgeon’s fuel already to feel 100 percent confident about letting him go home on autopilot anyway, and this sedan I’ve commandeered is stuffed with gear I needed from the van, so the drone will never fit in there.

Then Query paused in his thoughts. OK, Screw the regret, he chastised himself. I’m going to look on the bright side. I’d rather download Pidwidgeon’s data directly in this case rather than by wireless, anyway, just in case Janus’ men at the safe-house are both more talented and more well-equipped than I think they are.

* * *

Jack Hansen was rarely a man to be left speechless. Quietly snarky and sarcastic, perhaps, but not speechless.

But rarely did anyone expect the president of the United States to show up unannounced in their place of work, even if that place of work was a black-budget government operation. Especially well into the evening hours—though it was a common thing for Dr. Hansen to work late.

I wonder if I should be worried that the president knows my work habits that well and we’ve never met.

“Dr. Hansen,” President Barack Obama said solemnly, holding out his hand to shake but with little cordiality in his expression.

“Mr. President,” Dr. Hansen said, shaking the president’s hand and looking back and forth behind the chief executive of the United States.

“I’ve left my Secret Service detail elsewhere, doctor,” the president said as their hands disengaged, noting his confusion. “That’s not the easiest thing to make happen, but you and I need to speak privately.”

Dr. Hanson nodded and led the president to his office. “What can I do for you?” he asked when they were behind the closed door.

“You can tell me personally what you’re doing here and what I should know about that General Alexander won’t want me to know. More importantly, you can start by answering one simple question: Is this where Doctor Holiday was created?” the president asked.

“No, sir. There’s no connection…”

“…let me try this one more time, doctor,” President Obama said, cutting him off. “Think of this as a baseball game and remember what happens if you get to strike three. Did the Genesis One lab create Doctor Holiday?”

Dr. Hansen paused, stunned as surely as a deer caught in headlights. There was something in the president’s tone that clearly spoke of awareness of the deception, and all Dr. Hansen could think of was, Who’s the leak? and What’s going to happen to me? Finally, the head of Genesis One sighed and said, “Yes.”

“Why?”

“First, Mr. President, I am begging you not to tell the general. He was only trying to protect your plausible deniability and if he knows I’ve snatched that away…”

“…I’ll deal with the general soon enough,” the president interrupted, then repeated: “Why?”

“We didn’t create him intentionally—not the twisted way he turned out, that is. The goal was completely laudable; the results were unexpected. When he escaped—well, we had assumed he’d have been neutralized long before now. The scope of his powers are far beyond what we expected. You see, what…”

“…No, doctor. I don’t have time for details. I’ll get those from the general, unless he wants to lose his job, his commission and his freedom. I want a simple answer to my next question, and this time you only get one chance to answer it honestly. Are we going to end up with another Doctor Holiday?”

“No, sir,” Dr. Hansen said. “Well, vanishingly improbable, anyway. There were specific characteristics of that subject that even made the experiment possible. To attempt it on anyone else—including the effort it would take to find someone suitable and do so secretly—would cost an amount of money we’d never be able to lay hands on.”

“I have serious reservations about this program, doctor, and about the selection and retention process for the subjects.” There was a hard edge to the president’s voice now, a tone that was vaguely menacing. “I’m trying to quit smoking, not have new reasons to do more of it.”

“Mr. President, all of the subjects are either voluntary or had no right of refusal to begin with,” Dr. Hansen hurriedly explained. “This is an ultra-secret facility but nothing we do here crosses the lines of any existing national security policies.”

“What about ethical lines, doctor?”

“Ordering targeted assassinations or unseating regimes crosses ethical lines,” Dr. Hansen pointed out a bit defensively, “but those have been done before and I’d wager the same or similar things have been done at your command. Sir, this facility is not about turning people into monsters or using them as disposable guinea pigs. Our efforts are often harsh and unpleasant, but focused. We’re trying to stay ahead of nations like China, sir, or at least not fall so far behind them that we end up as potential victims of potentially hostile powers with armies of transhumans.”

“I’m going to tell you something, doctor, so that there is no confusion from here on out, and so that we don’t have any miscommunication,” the president said. “Don’t ever lie to me. That one time tonight is the last time. Lie again, and you’re through—and I don’t just mean you’ll be out of a job. I am going to keep tabs on Genesis One and will be contacting you frequently, in person. If you lie to me, I will know.”

“You’re…transhuman yourself…aren’t you, sir?” Dr. Hansen asked hesitantly.

“If you even suggest to anyone—if you even talk out loud to yourself about it, whisper it into the ear of a dog or discuss it with a vase of flowers—that I am transhuman, you and Jimmy Hoffa will suddenly have a lot in common,” the president said. “My own wife doesn’t know, and the only reason I’m telling you is because of what you do here. I need you to know how personally I will take any indiscretion committed here. But yes, I can tell when people lie. I got to the Oval Office on skill, but remember when I made my first appearance on the national stage—me, a relative political unknown giving the keynote address at the 2004 Democratic National Convention? I got the chance to give that speech thanks to a lie I caught the convention chairman in months earlier.”

For a minute or so, they sat in silence. Finally, Dr. Hansen cleared his throat. “Mr. President, if you can tell when people are lying, why do you keep making deals with the Republicans in Congress when they insist they are willing to work with you?”

For the first time, the president cracked a smile, following by a low chuckle. “Because believe it or not, most of them think they’re being honest when they say they’re reasonable and want to work with my party,” he answered. “That’s just how out-of-touch crazy they are since I got elected. I don’t know what’s worse in this country these days: messed-up racial attitudes or mistrust of transhumans. But I know which one is giving me most of my gray hairs and aging me way too fast in this job.”

* * *

Peregrine touched ground, as sleek and graceful as her namesake animal. She’d skipped the full-head hawk mask tonight and instead her eyes and forehead were done up in an elaborate feather pattern with makeup while a dark brown ninja-like mask covered most of the lower portion of her face and the sides of her head. As she came to a stop and approached, Query said, “That’s all of us. Gather ‘round.”

“Good turnout,” Feral commented, adjusting his fur mask and scratching one sweaty, bared pectoral—Query was pretty sure the man had run most of the way here since he hadn’t arrived in a car or on a motorcycle as Buttress had; chances were the man was exploring his wild side in the woods and that’s why he was so close and ready for action when Query contacted him. “Hard to get this many of us to show up in one place.”

“I think we’ve all gotten a sense of how dangerous letting Janus go unchecked in our city will be,” said Buttress, wearing the full-head brown leather mask that was his staple, but a light, brown canvas coat over his flak vest rather than his usual leather one in deference to the early-summer weather. “Surprised there aren’t a few more.”

“Well, it remains to see how smoothly we’ll work together,” Query noted, considering what it said about transhuman psychology that four of them working together could be considered a sizable group.  “But I give credit for the good turnout to my charming personality and winning attitude.”

Buttress was helping Peregrine get her glider wings folded and retracted into the pack she wore, and Query noted silently how the squat, muscular man seemed to know exactly how the glider system worked. Certainly, it would save time compared to Peregrine taking the unit off her back to do it herself, but mostly Query filed the observation away as another bit of evidence that Buttress and Peregrine were probably spending a lot of time together, and not just patrolling. He’d long suspected they’d casually hooked up shortly after Peregrine and Asclepius broke up—now he suspected they were a full-fledged couple, even if they weren’t obvious about it.

They’d almost have to be for Buttress to know those wings so well, since she’s only had them for a little over six months, he considered. Designed by Boeing aerospace engineers with assistance from Julian Gregori for the aesthetic and comfort side of the equation. United Airlines had picked up most of the bill on five of those babies for Peregrine in return for a three-year deal under which she would endorse their airline, do some celebrity spokesperson touring and do several commercials for them. For Boeing, it might mean some good military money coming in soon, since they had retained marketing and commercialization rights as their payoff for doing the work, and the wings seemed to be working splendidly for getting Peregrine around town by air, with some impressive glide times and maneuverability.

Of course, they won’t be of any use for what he and his short-term team gathered here would need to do, Query considered, and they might even end up as adornment for her corpse if he wasn’t careful.

“We have any intel on these guys, Query?” Feral prodded. “What’s the backstory? What’s the problem?”

“Can’t be 100-percent certain about numbers, but I think there are between eight and ten armed men in a few cabins down the road here,” he answered. “Janus was trying to abduct a transhuman civilian; I’ve been protecting her. He snatched her, I sent Mad Dash to intercept, she busted loose and killed her kidnappers before he got there and then Dash and I took down the team of seven that came looking for their little lost pair. Right now, Dash is keeping her safe and transporting the captured crew to a proper destination.”

“You had seven prisoners and…”

“…I had five. I killed two before I warmed to the idea of merciful justice.”

“OK, five prisoners and you aren’t sure how many more we’re facing? You’ve lost your interrogation touch, Query,” Feral taunted.

“My ‘client’ put the kibosh on me using more coercive tactics, but she did convince them to give up the location of their hideout. However, when I was loading folks in the van I did manage to whisper a few sweet-nothings to one of them and bend back a finger and jab a few select nerve bundles with just the right finesse for him to tell me there were ‘at least four or five’ guys at their safe-house. What my client doesn’t know won’t hurt her—and it wasn’t technically torture.”

“So where do you get the ‘eight to ten’ estimate?” Buttress asked.

“Partly from my experience with human nature. The guy wanted me dead so of course he’d lowball the number a bit, knowing he’d be far from me by the time I found out otherwise,” Query noted. “Also, I had a drone circling above them for a bit and there were six people outside working to lay mimetic explosive devices at the two most direct approaches we could take for an assault, and I saw movement at two windows—probably lookouts with rifles. Figured there could be two more who are just not moving much. There are only a few modest-sized cabins there and a couple storage sheds, and since they sent seven guys to find their missing folks and originally planned to bring a prisoner and two more people in for a little while, which would have made maybe 20 people staying there…well, even Janus doesn’t give his people the sardine treatment.”

“So, what’s the plan?” Buttress asked.

“Feral approaches one set of explosives while Buttress approaches the other, and I sneak in to gas and flash-bomb their asses a bit, Peregrine comes in low, fast and quiet from the rear, then we rush them old-school style,” Query said.

“What if we step on the explosives and ‘go boom’ while you’re skulking?” Buttress countered, and Query saw Peregrine wince at that image, confirming his suspicions about them.

“Follow my directions, and you won’t—I’ll place some fluorescent markers on the ground about 15 yards from the MEDs before I go in, so that you’ll know when to slow down and get ready for an end-around run when the shit hits the fan. I should be able to keep them dazed and confused long enough for your extra travel time not to be a problem.”

“What if they shoot us with their rifles when they see us coming toward the explosives?” Feral asked.

“Would you bother to use MEDs so that they’re perfectly camouflaged for folks to trip over and die without you needing to aim and then wreck it all by taking a chance you’ll miss with bullets and warn them off?” Query asked.

“Actually, I’d probably drop from the trees and rip their throats out, but that’s just me,” Feral said.

“Keep all the throats intact if possible, please,” Query said. “I’m trying to keep my body count down.”

“It would be my body count and you can just deny involvement later,” Feral noted. “I’m ready. Let’s go already and kick ass.”

“Wait,” Peregrine said. “I have some thoughts.”

“If they involve you stripping down naked and going in with your wings all out like a Victoria’s Secret angel and a pizza in your hand to distract them at the door, I’m all for it,” Feral said.

Query saw Buttress twitch at that, and one set of fingers curl into a fist—then his shoulders tensing as if to charge. Query straightened up, lifted his head up fully and fixed his gaze at a point between Feral and Buttress so that neither one would feel targeted but both might wonder if Query’s words were meant for him alone. “This is not the time or place for that bullshit. Don’t put me in a position to fight allies when I have real enemies to deal with. Peregrine, what’s on your mind?”

“Do you have video from your drone you can show me?” she asked.

“Sure do. On my iPad in the car.”

“Show and tell, then,” she said, a sort of sassy smugness creeping into her voice. “You show me, and I tell my idea.”

* * *

Trust me, Peregrine had said.

But for Query, trust was hard—particularly trusting that some else’s plan might be better than his own. Or, rather, her adjustments to his plan.

Still, he moved in stealthily as Buttress and Feral inched closer to the explosives that would have been damned hard to locate even with flashlights, given that they were designed to take on the color of the ground around them.

He waited.

He waited some more, maybe a minute past the appointed time, and started to get that itchy feeling. Anxious and ready to strike. Worried that he’d misplaced his trust.

Worried that the extra 15 minutes they’d tacked on to his plan already to do it Peregrine’s way might lead to more trouble rather than put them in a better tactical position and cause their enemies to grow complacent.

Then he saw her, and the poetic part of Query’s mind wanted to write lyrics to describe the sight.

He’d never have imagined that jumping off the very low hill near the cabins would have been enough altitude to pull off this maneuver, but she descended raptor-like from above, the white accents of the mostly black and blue-gray feather patterns on her glider wings reflecting the moonlight, and then angled her body almost sinuously as she veered toward the roof of one cabin, dropping a pair of tear-gas grenades perfectly down the chimney.

Then her feet just barely touched the roof, and with a few tiny running steps and one big push at the edge of the cabin, she was up in the air again, going up and then diving downward to swoop past the front windows of another cabin and toss in three flashbang grenades Query had given her.

She had a fourth flashbang but held tight to that as she touched ground, shed her wings while running, and tossed it into the third cabin, rolling for cover as she did.

There’s no way—no matter how good those glider wings are—that she should have been able to pull that off, he considered. That she’s an Acro is no secret, and I’ve long suspected she’s a Primal as well, but her gliding prowess suggests to me she’s an Eco, too. Able to manipulate air currents, perhaps? Slightly reduce the pull of gravity on her? Both?

The lightshow from the flashbangs was the signal for Feral and Buttress to move in. Query did his part, heading straight for the cabin where noxious fumes were wafting from the windows—the cabin farthest back of all them. He approached warily from one corner of the structure, did a quick check through one slightly open window from an angle, and then smashed the panes in with the butt of his shotgun, immediately turning it, aiming through the window, and firing at the one man who was standing and seemed most unfazed by the tear gas.

The shell burst open to release a tight cloud of rubber-covered metal shot that was meant to have much the same non-lethal impact as rock salt from a shotgun, but with more punch. The man stumbled backwards, unbalanced but—as Query noted—also wearing a vest, so likely not stunned. However, as he tripped over his own feet, he fell back against the mantle of the tear-gas-exuding fireplace that had taken down his partners, and went down as his skull cracked loudly against the heavy wooden surface.

Query ducked under the window, came upright on the other side of it, and kicked in the door.

Or tried to, anyway. The doorjamb cracked and the door gave a little, but remained closed as he hissed “Shitterific!” and kicked it again. The door flew open and Query stepped in quickly. There was a man on his knees, hacking and eyes watering. Wearing a mask with a respirator, Query was able to leisurely take aim with the shotgun’s stock and crack the man in the head where it was most likely to keep him down a while. A quick scan of the cabin and some exploration of the bathroom, bedroom and two closets yielded no other foes, and he quickly bound his two vanquished opponents. Then he strode out of the cabin, moving quickly toward the next-nearest building, to which Feral had been assigned.

I’d better assist the loose cannon, he considered. Even though the final cabin only got one flashbang tossed in, at least Buttress is a Tank, so he’s strong and resistant to harm—plus he’ll have Peregrine as backup.

* * *

Buttress didn’t bother with finesse. Peregrine already had out her twin batons, each weighted at one end with a small mace-like head and an falcon-claw-shaped rake at the other, and she was headed toward a closed window, getting ready to smash it in and likely dive through it. So he hit the front door with a full charge and took it straight off its hinges. As he cut to the right upon entering, he felt a bit of instant gratification as the door slammed into one of the combatants, and she stumbled and tripped, dropping her gun. A nearby comrade heard the shattering of the window and turned to deal with that.

His stomach knotted as he saw the gun aim straight for the window. But Peregrine didn’t come through, to both his surprise and the potential assailant’s. Instead, she flashed by the now doorless entry and to the other window, diving straight through it. Buttress rushed the gun-wielding man he’d feared would shoot her, realizing that somehow he had managed to avoid being stunned or blinded by the grenade, possibly by having been in the bedroom or bathroom when it went off. The man tried to bring his gun to bear on Buttress but the hero grabbed his wrist and crushed every bone in it with almost no effort. As the man screamed, Buttress punched him three times in the face with his left hand and the man went down hard. As the woman who had been struck by the door got to her feet and reached for her gun, Buttress got her into a headlock and then applied a chokehold.

While he cut off the flow of blood and oxygen to her brain and waited for her to pass out, he saw Peregrine land a couple stomping kicks to the gut of someone on the floor, whom Buttress could only imagine she’d taken down seconds earlier with a roundhouse kick or a high-kick, both of them signature moves for her.

Once the woman caught in his grip was unconscious, he gave Peregrine a quick, hard kiss and then they tied up the trio, heading out toward the sounds of gunshots and shouting.

* * *

Query’s arrival at the middle cabin was greeted by a pair of bullets whizzing through one window—probably strays since they were headed at an angle away from him. He slid into the ground underneath that window, crawled past the mostly closed door and huddled under the next window, listening to the cacophony of shots being fired.

He could make out swearing and threats—Feral’s voice—and figured that at least two and perhaps three people were shooting at him.

That makes no sense, Query thought. With three stun grenades having been tossed in there, Feral should have an easy cleanup, not a shootout.

Query popped his head up twice in quick succession to survey the scene through the bottom part of the window, then whispered, “Dammit.”

He had seen three people out of it on the ground and two firing at Feral from behind cover. The vigilante-hero was pinned down, using a couch and coffee table as cover, while his assailants made use of a barricade consisting of a large maple table and a sturdy wardrobe-style cabinet that they had pushed over onto the floor.

Taking cover again, Query tried to sort out what little he had seen of the two shooters.

A man and a woman, him shirtless and wearing a riot helmet and her with a shoulder bared and her top only half on, with a vest haphazardly thrown over her torso, he thought. Damn…they had been taking a break in the bedroom behind a closed door doing things Janus would probably string them up by their nethers for doing while on the clock. All the flashbangs did for them was alert them to trouble.

Clearly, the extra time Query and his team had taken had made at least some of them complacent. The unfortunate part is that if this pair was able to go have a tryst without catching shit from the other three, one or both of them were probably in charge. And Janus didn’t put people in charge who weren’t skilled.

And overconfidence on their part by taking time out for a quickie doesn’t mean they aren’t deadly, Query reminded himself.

Not having drawn any fire yet, Query risked another peek through the window to assess Feral. The man was bleeding heavily from one temple. Given how bloody even minor flesh wounds to the head could be, it might be nothing. On the other hand, it would be triggering Feral’s more violent instincts, and he might shrug off blood loss and other injuries to keep on fighting—to his own risk and possible demise. He also appeared to have a shoulder wound, though it was hard to tell if that was from a bullet or perhaps catching a corner of the coffee table as he dove for cover earlier.

That extra glance revealed his position, though, and he felt several bullets strike the wall where he was hunched. One penetrated the wood and sizzled past his leg, grazing his thigh and leaving a hot line of pain behind.

Without hesitation, he rolled away to brace his back against the corner of the cabin, where they were less likely to aim and the bullets less likely to penetrate.

Query glanced over at the side window near him—closed and with curtains drawn. It tempted him, but he knew by the time he was able to break it and clear away the visual obstructions, he’d be riddled with bullets. His armored vest would probably protect his torso, but his head, throat and limbs might not make it through the ordeal. He caught sight of Buttress and Peregrine making their way toward the cabin and gave them a hand signal to stop and duck low. He held up three fingers and pantomimed sleeping to indicate three were down at the moment, and then held up two fingers and pantomimed a gun with his thumb and index finger. Both of them nodded, and then they leaned their faces close to one another’s. Not going for a kiss, Query figured, but probably discussing a plan of action. He considered calling or texting one of them to coordinate, but Feral probably wouldn’t hold out much longer. So he caught their attention one last time to signal he was going around the back of the cabin, and then set off.

His hope dimmed when he made it to the back wall and the window of the bedroom where the two shooters—apparently with no shortage of ammunition considering how long they’d been firing—had presumably tried to get their freak on while their three comrades remained in the main room. They had shoved a dresser and the bed up against the window, already having anticipated someone might try to gain entry there.

I could get past it easily enough, but not without announcing my arrival with all the subtlety of a bucking bull in a china shop.

He looked with dismay at the small window to the bathroom. He could remove it quickly and quietly enough, but he’d have to shed his vest, shoulder rigs and duster and leave the shotgun behind to shimmy through the small aperture—and then just barely fit. If he made the slightest racket, he’d be a sitting duck and get his head blown off.

Well, today’s a good day to die, I guess, he decided, and got to work, removing the window before he removed his coat and armor, just in case someone came gunning for him while he was occupied. Once he was down to his unitard, he propped the shotgun against the wall in the hopes of reaching down for it afterward.

Halfway through the window, his foot tapped the stock of the firearm, and he heard it slide to the ground, swearing silently as it did. No gun now but a tiny Beretta strapped to his ankle, against two people with automatic weapons and probably more besides.

Query could still hear Feral shouting epithets, and counted that as one bright spot, at least—I’m not too late, anyway, and a storm of bullets haven’t been fired into this tiny deathtrap of a room I’ve entered.

Taking a deep breath, Query quietly gripped the doorknob and then turned it quickly and shoved it open. Both heads turned as he came through, and Query launched himself at the pair. The woman rolled out of the way, suddenly tangled in some table linens but quickly working to extricate herself and bring her gun to bear.

As the man swung his weapon around, Query batted it away with his left hand—his dominant hand, as it happened, so he had maximum coordination and force behind the swiping strike. At the same time, he slapped the palm of his right-hand glove against the man’s neck and pressed a small button near the base of his index finger. A small ampoule in the red exclamation mark on that black glove shot forth, extending a needle as it did. The paralytic venom acted almost instantaneously and the man went down.

Query turned immediately to face his other opponent and also stepped to the side, toward the bathroom, in case he needed to take very temporary cover. A sputtering stream of bullets whizzed by him and he had visions of being cut in half in moments by the armor-piercing rounds when a dark blur bounded over the top of the barricade Janus’ minions had been using. Query shouted “Fuck!” as blood sprayed against him, Feral laying into the woman with his clawed gloves, slashing at her and beating her. Between his enhanced strength as a Brute and the fury-fueled savagery that was both the blessing and the curse of his particular brand of Primal abilities, he was making short and bloody work of her. She was dead before Query could even get a grip on what was happening.

Not wanting to get in the path of Feral in full bloodlust mode, Query vaulted over the barricade. Then he remembered the temporarily paralyzed man back there with Feral—not to mention the fact the vigilante wasn’t likely to be any more calm when he came back out of there after being driven temporarily mad by serious injuries and the prolonged anxiety of being pinned down by gunfire—and he swore fiercely before leaping back over and slapping Feral on the neck with one the last two doses of toxin in his glove. Feral backhanded him and Query spun almost all the way around, then completed the circle of his own volition and slapped Feral with the final dose.

Finally, with a shudder and a sudden seizing of his limbs, Feral went limp as the double-dose overcame his powers. His eyes were still wild, though, and Query bound him thrice over with nylon ties—both hand and foot—and then slapped a pair of handcuffs on him for good measure.

When he went back over the barricade, one of the three stunned minions was mostly recovered and reaching for a gun when Peregrine leaped in and took him down with a blow to the back of his head with one of her batons. She looked at Query, who said, quietly, “All clear now. I need some damn air. Tie everyone up please.”

As Buttress came in shortly behind Peregrine, Query remembered the man had experience as a field medic and asked him to grab the gear left behind the house. When he returned, Query fished a small first aid packet out of a hidden pocket in his duster, told Buttress to tend to Feral, and then stepped out into the moonlit night.

He considered two lives taken tonight at his own hand—not so much in self-defense as in a pre-emptive strike. Thought about Zoe’s own two kills she hadn’t even consciously sought, which were because of him. And now another person indirectly dead because of him; dead in large part because he’d used Zoe to get this close to Janus.

As he pulled the bottom of his mask up, pushed the respirator aside and took a deep, shuddering breath of warm night air, he gazed solemnly and reverently at a wide puddle in which the moon was beautifully reflected—a thing of lunar wonder on which he promptly vomited.

If I wasn’t my own boss—and an asshole boss at that, he thought as he looked at the second-hand gore covering him, reminded of Zoe’s own bloody clothing, I’d quit after this shit tonight.

Instead, he pulled his mask back on and went to try to figure out what he was going to do with Feral for now, as well as determine where to start in his search for evidence and answers on this grim little battlefield.

[ – To view the next chapter, click here – ]
_____________________________________________________
Bird makeup imagery from a photoset of makeup artist Linda Truong.

The fur mask thumbnail pic is, I think, from a photo by Bart Hess.

The Gathering Storm, Part 25

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She’d known he was coming—she’d been alerted by phone.

But apparently he’d also been warned she was on edge.

All for the best, Zoe supposed, as she heard a twig snap in the distance and a youthful, jovial voice calling out amiably, “Fringe, not foe!” as Mad Dash came into sight. The mask he wore—revealing only his nose, cheeks, mouth and chin and sporting almost comically large dark yellow goggles—was only slightly less grin-inducing than the garish short-coat he wore over his gray-green unitard, which was a medley of different colors, types and shapes of fabric. A sturdy looking coat and well-constructed, but ridiculous as hell, she thought.

God can I use a laugh right now, even if it’s only a chuckle and gone almost as fast as it arrived, Zoe considered, flinging her spent cigarette into the road from the rock on which she sat near the tree line. Before she’d fully exhaled her last lungful of smoke from that butt she was already extracting another one to light.

“Those are terrible for you, you know,” Dash told her when he drew near, though to his credit, Zoe noted, he didn’t wrinkle his nose or wave at the air to disperse the fumes like so many people did when they said something like that. “Your lungfish are going to go belly up in the aquarium if you keep up that habit.”

He delivered the cautionary note so matter-of-factly, without any trace of judgment in his tone, that Zoe decided to forego the usual snide response. “They’re right; you do speak a little odd,” she said. Then she cocked her wrist so that the smoldering cigarette stuck straight up into the air and she pointed at it with the index finger of her other hand. “Bad for me though these may be, they’re the only thing making me feel a little human right now, a little sane right now and a little calm right now. Chain-smoking several butts is phase one. Phase two will be a very long, very hot shower and lots of scrubbing until my skin is raw and any blood I see I know is my own. Phase three would be getting piss-drunk, but I can’t even hardly get a buzz drinking, so I’ll settle for some herbal tea and a warm bed and not getting up for 12 to 15 hours.”

“I didn’t bring a shower. Or tea. Or a bed,” Mad Dash said, though he glanced quickly inside his backpack as if he might find one or all of them in there, while he awkwardly juggled a large and apparently mostly empty soft drink cup from Wendy’s in one hand. He rattled it a little, lifted the lid, and then downed the last swig and let the last few chunks of ice left slide into his mouth. “I have some water bottles left in my backpack and a few snickety-snackedy-munchies,” he mumbled as he crunched the ice. “If you like granola bars and Cliff Bars and stuff.”

“I think I can keep food down now, so a granola bar sounds great,” she responded with a smile. “I’ll make Query come up with the other things to make up for letting me get kidnapped.”

After he handed over the snack and a bottle of water, he paused and then said, “Oh, salmon! Your clothes look like they came from the fall war-refugee fashion line at Macy’s and I should get you a…whoa! I’m so sorry I’m looking at you I just saw a nipple sorry sorry sorry,” he stammered, wrenching off his coat and handing it to Zoe.

“I like you, Madster,” Zoe said as she put her arms through the sleeves and buttoned it up. “You’re weird, but I like you. Chivalry’s not dead, even though your fashion sense might be. Comfy coat, though.”

“Thanks. I make them myself,” Dash said, positively beaming.

“Well, don’t give up your day job, because I think there won’t be many customers for this kind of style. But you’re a Renaissance man, Mad Dash, and you’ll make a fine catch someday.”

“Oh, I’m already the lobster special of the day—got a girlfriend named Honey Badg…hello? Yeah? Querio? Where you at, man? I’m here with Chloe…”

“…Zoe,” she corrected him.

“Zoe,” Dash repeated, and then rattled off a series off a series of “yeah’s” and “uh-huh’s” as his part of the communication with Query.

At least I hope he’s really talking to Query via a Bluetooth or some hidden headset, because I don’t want to find out he has voices in his head, Zoe thought. I can’t deal with shit like that tonight.

Mad Dash paused, then turned to Zoe. “Query says we need to stay put, stay down and don’t get involved with what’s about to happen until he says so.”

“Huh? What?” Zoe sputtered. “No, no, no. Tell Query to call me on my cell phone right now.”

“Says he’s kinda busy setting stuff up.”

“Tell him to call me on my phone right the hell now,” she snarled and then, as if on cue, her phone rang. “Talk to me. What’s gonna happen?”

“Zoe, I need you to trust me right now. I’ve got stuff to do and probably not much time to do it and I just want you and Dash to stay out of the way for now,” Query said.

“Oh no no no no no,” Zoe said, dragging hard on her cigarette and then expelling smoke in a chaotic mass like some angry dragon. “Look, I’ve had a really shit goddamn day and I’m just barely holding it together and you failed to stop them from getting me and I want some damn answers.”

“I take all my jobs very seriously, Zoe, but you’re not being charged for this work,” Query said. “What do you want? A refund check for zero dollars? I’m trying to protect you.”

“And I just killed two guys and some of them is staining my clothes and that’s fucked up and I deserve some answers,” she retorted, her voice sounding angry and anxious all at once. “Plus, if shit is about to go down, I want to know what is going down. Tell me right now or I will walk out into that road and flag down the next car I see.”

“OK, fine. Zoe, they were taking you into the woods. Must mean they have a safe-house somewhere around here. If I were running this operation, I’d have at least a few people waiting there in case there was trouble getting you out of the car. I’ve made some best guesses based on the topography around here and I’ve got some ideas of the most likely places. Also, the guys you zeroed out aren’t able to check in or respond to any communications so chances are Janus and gang will know soon shit’s gone wrong, if they don’t already. I intend to ambush them when they come looking for their friends’ car.”

“How would they find it? You had me drive it off the road.”

“I already figured Janus would likely have all the cars fitted with locators,” Query said. “Pidwidgeon’s on-board sensors have confirmed transmissions from it—someone’s likely monitoring. So I’m going to wait for them to come. I promise I’ll get you out of here. Just sit tight.”

“It’s almost dark already,” she noted.

“I have night vision equipment.”

“We don’t.”

“Dash does. And if things get too hot, and I need you to pitch in, I’ll provide the party lights,” Query said. “I promise. Now find cover, keep quiet and let me do my job. Pretty please. With sugar on top.”

* * *

He was standing in the doorway to her office. Had he been anyone else, Underworld wouldn’t have cared. But she hated him right now, and she was trying not to think of murder right now so that she could get work done. It was way too soon to deal with him again.

Not to mention the fact he never visited other peoples’ office—he summoned them to his. That disturbed her even more.

“I thought we were done after we discussed Odium,” Underworld noted.

“I may have been too quick to praise you for your successful abduction plan,” Janus said, the sourness of his tone mixing in an interesting way with the slightly tinny echo produced by his two-faced helmet.

Underworld said nothing; simply arched one eyebrow.

“We’ve lost contact with the car carrying Zoe,” Janus clarified.

“Where?”

“It was last seen getting ready to get onto Grace Memorial Highway by Breathtaker and the two men in his car when they parted ways.”

“Then I still win,” Underworld said dryly, taking her eyes off him and returning them to the computer monitor.

“How do you figure that?”

“Because if my plan had been flawed, the car would have been stopped or commandeered or whatever long before it got to that point,” she said, still not looking at him. “And the other car, too, for that matter. I assume Breathtaker and the two guys with him are still in contact and running free.”

“Yes.”

“Then the problem isn’t that I had a bad plan or that I failed. The problem isn’t that my hand-picked team got sloppy. The problem is, I suspect, that you picked a fight with Query and he’s still got tricks up his sleeve for keeping tabs on Zoe because this shit is personal and not just business.”

A loud metallic sigh, and them a simple “Hmmmph” from Janus. “I hate it when you’re right,” he said as he walked away. “I think I’ll kill somebody after I finish handling this.”

* * *

A car finally arrived nearly 20 minutes after Query got off the phone with Zoe, stopping very near to where Zoe had driven her abductor’s car behind the tree line. Making some educated guesses about probable locations for any Janus-owned safe-houses out here, Query did some quick calculations about when the car with Zoe might have been expected to arrive at any of those areas, figured their comrades would wait until they were 10 or 15 minutes late to panic, factored in required travel times for those other bad guys to show up here from all the possible locations, and had the sites for Janus’ place in the woods narrowed down to three prime leads.

All while he used the scope on his rifle to size up the three men who were now getting out the car. One of them had a device in hand—probably some kind of receiver/locator—and was likely getting a read on just how far away their missing car was and in which direction it lay. All of them had flashlights; the two guys with Mr. Receiver—as Query had mentally designated the lead guy—had Uzis in hand as well.

If Mad Dash and Zoe were following instructions, they wouldn’t be anywhere near the car and its two corpses right now—wouldn’t be in any spot where the three new arrivals would be scanning the trees with their flashlights.

Hopefully, they’ll also be behind some cover, since Mr. Receiver has clearly figured out where the car is and is now pulling out night vision goggles to look for threats, Query thought. He probably doesn’t really expect any police presence here, or else the car they were seeking wouldn’t be out of sight. But he might be expecting a trap of some other sort. As well he should.

Mr. Receiver even took a long, slow look at the other side of the road, where Query had found a tiny hillock to give himself just a bit of high ground. Query didn’t flinch; the modified portable hunter’s blind he had set up in front of himself would block his heat signature and look like a rock or bush to the night-vision goggles. The barrel of his rifle like some branch.

The man was very thorough in taking stock of his surroundings; his companions were very vigilant in watching his back.

And Query’s trigger finger was feeling quite itchy.

But it was too soon. He trusted his instincts and waited for what he expected—for what he would have done in their place.

And so it was that a second new car arrived on the scene some five minutes after the first one, pulling off to the side a bit farther up the road. For a moment, Query considered waiting some more for a third car, but that was just getting paranoid. So he simply waited until the new quartet of men started walking toward the trio, pulling night vision goggles on as they did.

Odds are that the first team will be going down to check out the car and team two is here to give them some additional protection.

About 10 meters from the trio, the quartet’s tight formation began to fragment just the slightest amount as one man slowed a little, and Query knew that was the point one of them would stop, as the other three would continue on and each stop in turn so they could fan out for the best coverage and ability to kill anyone coming at them from the woods. The two armed men from the original trio were already keeping watch on the road from near the edge of the trees.

Since Query knew the most dangerous threats were getting into position, he decided there was no time like the present to prevent them from getting organized.

While the newest arrivals were still clustered relatively closely to one another, he said into his headset, very softly, “Dash, in 10 seconds the first three guys are yours—take them alive,” and then fired off five shots in rapid succession at the group of newcomers.

The first bullet entered the skull of the man who had just stopped walking. The second bullet went through the throat of the man nearest him, who likely would have been the next to stop in a few more meters. Figuring the time for piling up corpses had come to an end, the fourth and fifth bullets took the third man’s ability to shoot and to run with a bullet in his gun arm and another in one thigh.

Naturally, Query thought, the fourth guy would be alert enough and agile enough to take cover.

Query set down his rifle, picked up a grenade launcher not much larger than the Uzis that Janus’ men were carrying, and said into his headset, “Wait, Dash. Close your eyes until you hear two booms, then hit them.”

Query fired two flashbang grenades just past the roof of the original trio’s car, where his quarry had taken cover, one near the front of the car and the other near the trunk. A loud “whump” and another a second or two later accompanied two bursts of bright light and then Query was bounding down the hillock and toward the road.

He wasn’t trying to beat Dash—no sense in trying that anyway and there was a bit of cleanup work yet. Once he had sprinted across the road, he walked to the man he had shot in the arm and thigh and pepper-sprayed him in the eyes and mouth before quickly binding his hands to his ankles with nylon ties, then continued around the front of the trio’s car, confirmed that his target there was stunned insensate, and quickly bound him as well. He did his best to focus on the task at hand and not react to the sounds of shouting and running so close to him; did his best to be as quick as he could without rushing. Then when he was done, squatting behind his place of cover, he closed his eyes and let his ears sort thing out.

Feet running through the dirt, twigs and rocks—faster than a normal person’s. Mad Dash was still moving. Voices calling out to each other and swearing—only two, though, so Dash had likely taken one man out. Shots fired, but none of them in the direction where Query was huddled against the car, so the remaining pair was clearly too focused on Dash to think about or deal with their other threat: Query.

Query opened his eyes and stood, taking out a tangler. He was just in time to see Mad Dash do a furious high-speed zig-zag through the trees, sliding finally as if trying to beat a ball thrown to home plate and slamming into the legs of one of Janus’ men, who went down about as hard as one might expect when being hit at about 35 or 40 miles per hour.

I know Dash’s unitard is padded and/or lightly armored in places like the thighs and ass, but that costume’s likely going to be a goner and Dash is going to be sporting some rather bloody scrapes, Query thought.

The last man, seeing his comrade go down and realizing he was alone now, was already headed for the car and an attempted getaway, but came to a startled halt as he saw Query.

“Evenin’,” Query said, casually throwing the tangler at the man’s legs and smiling as the sticky tendrils burst out and then contracted back on themselves. The man wobbled for several seconds and finally fell over in a heap. Query tossed a small plastic bag of nylon ties to Mad Dash to restrain these last three men and added to the man on the ground at his feet: “You just relax while I make sure those two friends of yours are really dead and decide whether to make all of the rest of you the same way—only much slower.”

* * *

Underworld was finally in a decent frame of mind again—she’d done a quick set of breathing exercises and a few calming yoga poses and was finally able to get back to the work she needed to finish for phase one of her and Janus’ team expansion plans.

It was, therefore, very disheartening to her when a person burst through the door to her office, ran all the way to her desk and jumped over it, pushing by her legs and then crawling underneath it.

Underworld looked down to see a completely tattooed face staring up from between her legs, and resisted the urge to make any number of snide and risqué comments to the woman huddled underneath her large maple desk and only inches from her lap. She was less able, however, to control the flood of irrationally joyous feelings over the fact that Crazy Jane was near her, though she was pretty sure she managed to keep those feelings from showing on her face.

Crazy Jane’s eyes were wide and earnest as she looked up at Underworld. “If Janus comes looking for me, I’m not here. Please don’t tell him. Please say you don’t know where I am.”

Keeping her eyes fixed at a point she could see both her doorway and Jane in her peripheral vision, Underworld said quietly, “He’ll know if I’m lying. He always knows.”

“Not always,” Crazy Jane. “Not when he’s enraged. It doesn’t work when he’s really mad. That’s when he can’t do that and that’s also when he can do other things. That’s why I need to hide. He’s furious.”

“You do something naughty?”

“No, but Query did,” Crazy Jane answered. “At least I think it’s Query. We’ve lost contact with the team sent out to find out what happened to the car Zoe was in.”

“I don’t think you have to worry, Jane,” Underworld said soothingly. “If you got out of Janus’ way, he’ll likely find some staff member to take it out on. Pretty unlikely he’ll come to my floor looking for trouble, much less looking for you.”

“Thank you, Undie,” Crazy Jane said, and Underworld almost teared up at the sincerity in the younger woman’s voice. “Sometimes, we girls have to stick together, right?”

Underworld simply nodded.

“Can I stay here a while, just in case?”

Underworld nodded again.

“You know, while I’m down here I could give you a foot rub. I’m really goooooood.”

“Oh, what the hell,” Underworld said after a few moments of consideration. “Why not? Girls sticking together, right?”

This time is was Crazy Jane’s turn to nod. And to smile as well.

As Underworld settled in to get her admittedly aching feet pampered a little, she smiled, and not just at the wonderful feeling of having knots and kinks worked out of her toes and soles. She smiled as well as getting some unexpected intelligence about Janus.

I’ve long suspected his ability to tell when a person lies was gender-specific, since he only ever stresses to women that he can tell when they’re not speaking the truth, she thought, but I never realized it was tied to his mood, too. And Jane’s reference to “other things” makes me think perhaps Janus has two sets of powers: one for when he’s calm or relatively so, and one for when he’s not. Makes sense when you consider he named himself after a two-faced god.

Suddenly, being Crazy Jane’s friend, willingly or not, didn’t seem like such a bad thing.

* * *

Two corpses had been added to the pair already in the car with the ruined trunk. The five surviving members of Janus’ team were well past the tree line now and all of them bound and gagged. The two other cars were now parked near each other by the side of the road and a little closer to the tree line.

Query walked back toward Mad Dash and Zoe from those cars, after having left Mad Dash’s backpack on the trunk of one of them and a few scattered granola bars on the hood of the other, along with a jacket and a pair of shoes and socks from one of the dead men

“Why did you do that?” Zoe asked.

“To make it look like they pulled over to do a little wandering and hanging out, instead of looking like they need help. Less likely that a state trooper will check things out if a cruiser happens down the road, and regular drivers will be even less likely to stop and look at things,” Query answered, looking over each man in captivity as if assessing and comparing each one, and then setting down a small tool case he had brought back with him.

“What now?” Zoe asked, fiddling with her bright orange disposable lighter nervously.

“You and Dash will go to my van parked a couple hundred yards down the road and head to a safe-house I have near Fishmonger’s Wharf. Dash knows where it is. You can clean up and you should be able to find some clothes that’ll fit you, Zoe. Have a decent meal, too, if your stomach can handle it. Watch some DVDs or listen to some music. Get some sleep. Dash’ll keep you company there until I’m finished. If I’m not there by dawn, chances are I’m dead and Dash will know who to call to get your situation as sorted out as possible.”

“What about them?” Zoe asked, nodding toward the captive men.

“Don’t worry about them. I have that covered.”

Zoe looked at the case at his feet, and then stared down his concealed eyes behind the black mask for several seconds. She walked up to him, pointed to the red question mark on the mask over his mouth—her finger just inches from it—and said, “Your name is Query; I just asked a question.”

“I ask questions; I rarely like answering them,” Query said coldly.

“You’ll answer mine,” she said, nervous at his tone but reminding herself it was probably bluster to get her to leave—and reminding herself that even if she was wrong, she was hardly powerless. “What are you going to do with them?”

Query sighed behind his mask, and Zoe imagined that his eyes were probably rolling behind it as well. “Zoe, I’m going to ask these fine gentlemen where their little hideout in the woods is. If they don’t answer me, I’ve going to demonstrate how badly I can hurt them with easily accessible items here in nature, and then tell them about the tools in my case here that are more professional-grade. If they don’t answer me even then, I’ll begin using those tools on them.”

Zoe shuddered. “You’re going to torture them.”

“Only if they make me.”

“You mean only if it’s the most convenient route for you.”

“Zoe, I don’t want to debate situational ethics with you right now,” Query groused. “These men kidnapped you. They were willing to kill you.”

“Noooo,” Zoe said. “Two of the dead men in that car over there, and I guess some guys in another car from what Dash has told me, were the ones who kidnapped me, and only one of them maybe was trying to kill me. They’re dead. I fucking lost my composure and killed them. Two other men are dead at your hands. These men came to check on their buddies. I don’t know what they would have done if you hadn’t attacked them.”

“Surely you not suggesting I shouldn’t have…”

“Of course not. You shot first. Wise move. They work for Janus. They were armed. But goddamn it I’m not going to let you torture them just to find out where they came from or for anything someone else did to me. I mean, really, do you expect to find Janus at their hidey-hole? Do you expect him to come here to the woods and throw down with you? I’ve been dealing with Underworld all this time and nothing suggests to me that they’ve suddenly gone lax on their security. I’d bet dollars to doughnuts these guys probably don’t even know where Janus is or the other guys who tried to nab me before at graduation probably would have known.”

“I think we need to be sure, Zoe. And if I go to their place here in the woods, I can look for clues that will help me find Janus later,” Query said. “I need you to go now.”

“How would you even know if they were telling the truth if they did give up a location to you, huh?” she pressed. “People will say lots of things under torture or to buy time.”

“Because,” he responded, raising his voice for the benefit of his captives and turning his head slightly in their direction, “I’ve already figured out from their response time and what I know about this area where the three most likely locales are. If they give me any other location that isn’t in one of those areas, I’ll hurt them more.”

“No.”

“Zoe, this isn’t your operation. This isn’t about you.”

“Yes it goddamn is!” she shouted. “I was the one kidnapped. I’m the one who’s got bits of people all over her. People have been firing bullets all around me and one zipped right past the top of my head. You took on my case so I’m your fucking employer—kinda. It’s all about me and I say you aren’t going to do this.”

“It’s more about me than you know, Zoe. In any case, I need this info…”

“…fine!” she interrupted him, and stalked toward the bound men, morphing as she did to take on a slightly more attention-getting and menacing look—though Query noted her locs, while clearly hardened and sharp, were no longer animated as when she was panicked in the trunk. “Here’s how it’s gonna be, boys. One of you will tell me right now where your little place in the woods is. Then after you’re handed over to the police or whatever—somebody less likely to torture you, in any case—you can go back to clamming up and not saying any damn thing about Janus and if he asks you can all tell him you don’t know how Query knew how to find your hideout. He can just assume Query found your place on his own with his super-intuition. Totally plausible, since he’s apparently already narrowed it down. But he’s really cranky, as you can see, and if you make him search too long, or waste too much time talking to you about it, he’s going to go all Spanish Inquisition on you. Whoever wants to tell me can just nod and I’ll pull off your gag.”

No one nodded.

“Unless Janus is there at your place in the woods, this is a win-win for everyone to tell me, guys,” Zoe said more firmly, flexing her fingers with their sharp, glistening burgundy nails. “You stay quiet about it, then Query is going to start thinking Janus is there, and if that happens I think you’re all going to be probed in a lot of places humans weren’t meant to be probed with things that weren’t meant to go there. Your choice.”

Ten minutes later, Zoe was in the passenger seat of Query’s van on her way to a date with a hot shower, with Mad Dash humming some tune wildly out-of-key on the driver’s side, while Query was taking a ride in one of Janus’ cars to a place in the woods.

Zoe closed her eyes and smiled a little.

I win.

[ – To view the next chapter, click here – ]

The Gathering Storm, Part 24

[ – To view a list of all current chapters, click here – ]

Stale stifling blackness. Spinning bouncing. Smells—Greasy sweaty green. Sensations—rough, warm, damp, gritty.

No room to move; can’t focus. What? Where? How?

Drifting. Panic. Sleepy. Weak. Angry. Terrified.

I will no go…I will not…gone…go…quietly.

* * *

“Dash! Please tell me you’re not in the middle of something you can’t get out of.”

“Query? Yeah, I’m cool. Just at my place deciding whether to patrol or watch a chickety-chick-rom-com-flick on streaming.”

“Zoe’s been nabbed,” Query said over the phone. “She’s on the move with her captors and I need an intercept while I’m driving like a bat out of hell to get there.”

“How do you know where she is if you’re not…”

“Quiet, Dash! Listen. Time’s short,” Query said, thinking about how the private investigator had needed to drop out of the pursuit of the kidnappers mere minutes ago when they pulled over in a dark area to put an apparently drugged and now also handcuffed Zoe into the trunk out of sight of any passing motorists or cops. The last thing the PI had seen in his rearview mirror were the cars getting back on the road, the one with Zoe still heading toward Grace Memorial Highway, apparently, while the other car headed back into the city proper.

“I had someone following her,” Query said. “He lost them but I reacquired her with one of my drones. Pidwidgeon is following now and keeping tabs. But they’re headed into the woods using Grace Memorial; I may lose them if they go anyplace thickly forested.”

“Grace?” Mad Dash said. “Q-man, I’ve got a few pre-packed school backpacks for emergency crapiolus like this but that’s a long way over a lot of different species of terrain. I’ll have to pack a hiker’s backpack with one or two extra pairs of boots and tons of snacks to refuel on the way.”

“No!” Query snapped. “No time for that, and a backpack that big’ll throw you off balance. Last thing I need is you breaking an ankle. Throw one extra pair of boots in a small pack and toss as many energy bars and water as you can in it. Do you have cash around? A decent amount?”

“Yeah, surely whirly I do. I guess maybe 60 or 70 bucks?”

“Fine. Grab it all. Take Parliament Avenue then hit Madsen and then Mozart. Cut straight through Whitley Park near where the bike trails start and then pick up Route 136 on the other side of the park and head toward Grace. That route will take you by plenty of fast-food joints. Hit the drive-through lanes as you need to fuel up; ignore the lure of Happy Meal toys. Make sure you have your headset on before you leave, set to our channel; remember to turn it on. I’ll keep in touch and guide you when you’re close enough. Got it?”

“Gotcha. Getcha. You betcha!”

“Go! Run like the fucking wind, Dash.”

* * *

A large hand engulfed Cole’s right shoulder, settling there with surprising gentleness. Then the couch squealed a bit in protest as PrinSass settled her bulk down next to Cole.

“What’s gotcha down, bruh?” she asked quietly, the softness of concern weaving oddly amidst her more gravelly bass tones. It always struck Cole as odd how unfeminine PinSass’ voice was aesthetically yet how obviously female it remained nonetheless.

“Nothing’s changed. Nothing’s ever gonna change, PrinSass,” Cole said. “I’ll be the outsider that the top guys can’t stand as long as I’m here, and these fucking migraines and clouded vision will just get worse from the stress probably and I don’t know what the hell I’m doing anymore anyway.”

“Muddling through, Quantum,” she said to Cole. “Gettin’ by. Toughing it out. That’s what it’s about, bruh. Just cuz I weigh a few hundred pounds and can squash almost anyone by sittin’ on ’em or punchin’ ’em, it doesn’t make it easy. I’m still a bitch. Cunt. Twat. Chick. Girl. To Desperado and all them. Whatever. You ain’t noticed that yet?”

“Of course I have…sorry…I know it’s not easy for you ladies and for a lot of other folks in the Corps. I know I’m having a pity party,” Cole acknowledged, grimacing and now flushing with embarrassment. “But is it worth going through?”

PrinSass made a rumbling chuckle. “For me, for you or for everyone else?”

“I was thinking about me, but…whatever you can provide your wisdom on, oh mighty oracle,” Cole joked.

PrinSass smiled. “I like beating folks up and not having to feel bad about it, so…yeah, it works for me, Quantum. Fightin’ crime’s good for my complexion, too. Keeps me a cute big gal. Is it worth it for you? I dunno…is it?”

Cole hesitated, frowned and finally sighed. “Doing what I do is worth it. I’m just not sure it’s worth doing with Desperado calling my shots. But what else is there for a noob like me? I’ve got a name—Quantum. I almost have a costume. But that’s about all I have at the moment.”

“It’s a start,” PrinSass said, slapping him hard on the thigh and making him wince. “Now let’s go grab a couple cups of really bad coffee while everyone else cleans up this time and we wait for Sweet Talker.”

* * *

Query’s altered brain functions since he became transhuman were well-suited for multi-tasking; however, trying to make phone calls while driving fast and trying to avoid police cruisers that might pull him over—all while checking on the video and GPS info from his drone—was straining that ability.

Not to mention the fact that the drone was moving so much faster than it should be while on autopilot that he had to make sure to adjust its course now and again with the tablet computer in the passenger-side seat of his car, lest Pidwidgeon crash and make this entire exercise a moot point. He wasn’t sure he’d be able to reacquire Zoe with another drone in time if that happened, though he’d sent out a summons for Bubo, the nearest of the other four drones out tonight—to join Pidwidgeon in the pursuit—just in case.

No telling how much longer that will be, since I don’t have any more attention to spare to track Bubo.

At full tilt, even with a few stops for food, Mad Dash would almost certainly beat Query to Zoe, if he was able to get to her in time at all. Dash’s apartment was closer already and he had the advantage of being able to cut through alleys and across parks and such, unlike Query’s van.

Would have been better for speed of travel had I been driving the Mercedes or Porsche, but it’s a little hard to stash much in the way of costumes and gear in a four-door sedan, he mused bitterly, and damn near impossible in a sports car.

There was a tiny flash of movement on the display of the iPad Quinto in the passenger seat. Something narrow and long. If not for his enhanced senses, it might not have caught his attention at all. Then another. And another.

Trusting his instincts that he needed intelligence more than he needed to try to keep up with Mad Dash’s arrival time at the narrow old highway heading into the woods, Query pulled the van over to the side of the road suddenly and snatched up the tablet computer.

He saw the trunk bulge slightly in one place, the dent produced from inside. By Zoe, no doubt.

Then another long, thin something punching through the metal. Four holes now.

Those looked like damned red, black and yellow snakes, Query considered. Or eels or tentacles. Or…Zoe’s locs. Her hair.

Another dent, and now there was a trio of razor-sharp, frenzied locs punching through. Then a flurry of them. Holes and more holes, and some of them tearing the metal a little.

Despite all the ruckus, the driver and his partner in the car didn’t seem to notice anything over the noise of an already bumpy road and their conversation and whatever music might be playing on their radio or disc player.

I want to get to her; I want to be close, especially if it might lead me to Janus or end up with Janus arriving on scene—unlikely though that would be, Query thought as he watched the video feed from Pidwidgeon. But in all honesty, it looks like at this moment, there isn’t a thing I can do about whatever’s about to go down, except watch, analyze, let Dash know and then get there as soon as I can.

The trunk was quickly becoming a ruin of holes and rips, and then Query saw a hand punch through, one cuff of a pair of handcuffs attached to it, but only a few links of chain dangling there. Five nails of that hand dug into the exterior surface of the car in which Zoe was trapped. Then her other hand, just as lethally clawed and bearing the other half of the broken handcuffs, tore a huge gash through the top of the trunk.

Her movements angry and panicked, she started flailing, finally ripping a hole large enough to let her rise to a squatting position, her head now level with the top of the sedan that had so recently been her prison. Her body was criss-crossed with various cuts and scratches, Query could tell—Pidwidgeon and the other drones offered fantastic video resolution.

But she’s not nearly as hurt as she should be considering all the jagged edges of metal she just burst through, Query noted mentally.

Her head swiveled slowly, taking stock of things. She still seemed a little confused, but he swore he saw something like realization now, and cold fury along with it.

They probably drugged her, but she’s not very much out of it anymore; perhaps she’s a Regenerator on top of her Acro and Morph powers.

Her locs of varied colors were swirling and writhing like the serpents on Medusa’s scalp, and then she looked through the rear window, toward the driver and passenger.

Query couldn’t see Zoe’s face after she turned to behold her captors, but he could imagine any number of expressions that might be on it, and few of them struck him as something either man in the car would want to see.

But the passenger had clearly registered the flurry of motion and the bulk of a human body now half out of the trunk, and turned to get a better view of what his peripheral vision had picked up. He saw that look that Query couldn’t, and Query was pretty sure it scared him. The driver himself jerked, probably in response to a warning from his partner—though perhaps he’d seen something in the rearview mirror as well.

Too late. Way too late, Query realized.

The only question remaining unanswered for him right now was whether it was too late just for Janus’ minions or for Zoe as well.

She surged out of the trunk and onto the roof, her sharp and apparently very hardened nails giving her firm purchase, aided by the uncanny balance and agility afforded to her by her Acro powers. But the hair and nails weren’t the only change from her Morph powers—her skin was glossier now, and seemed smoother and tighter against her muscles. Perhaps a tad darker as well. Her clothes were shredded from the metal of the trunk ripping at them, but her skin was mostly unmarred.

She managed to get above the driver and passenger seats and ripped a good-sized hole above the driver’s side with one hand. But before she could make any more progress, the driver hit the brakes as hard as he could without swerving completely out of control.

Query’s belly cramped and twisted at the thought of Zoe’s fate now, as physics won out over her firm grip and sure reflexes, and she flew forward past the front windshield, taking a small piece of the roof of the car with her.

One of her feet managed to make contact with the hood—intentionally, it seemed—and her leg thrust her upward even as she flew forward. Then to Query’s amazement, she flipped once in the air, came down hard on the road on both feet, and then flipped several more times, including a one-handed flip that sent her nearly straight up into the air.

She was awkward and almost lost her balance several times. In competition, such sloppy form would have lost her plenty of points with the judges. But considering she’d just been flung from a rapidly braking car, the fact she hadn’t slid across the asphalt earning a body-wide case of road rash was amazing to Query.

When she competed in college gymnastics, she was holding back as least three-quarters of what she was capable of doing, he estimated.

When she came to a stop some dozen meters from the car, she was in a crouch. The driver of the car was disoriented at first and unsure what was going on, but as soon as he saw her, he put the car back in gear. By then, though, Zoe was already on the move. By the time he was accelerating at all, she was already on top of the car again, and yanking his head up toward the hole she had made in the roof. He was strong, but it was clear Zoe was at least a low-level Brute on top of everything else, and she wrestled his head through the hole. No longer able to press the accelerator or steer, the car slowed and drifted toward the shoulder, as the passenger yanked the emergency brake.

Looking into the driver’s eyes for a split-second, and then glancing down to see one hand reaching for something under his left armpit, Zoe started yanking his head back-and-forth, slashing his neck against the sharp edges of the hole in the roof of the car, even as the claws with which she gripped his scalp dug furrows into his skull.

Satisfied that he was no longer a threat, Zoe let him fall back into his seat and leapt back to the road as the passenger scrambled out of the car and pulled a gun.

Query’s renewed concern for Zoe was tempered slightly by the knowledge that if this man did kill her, Janus would do something far worse to him than simple death for cheating the crimelord of his prize.

Zoe hesitated only a moment, pulled between the desire to fight and the urge to flee to cover, and then she lunged. The man got off a shot, but it went wide.

Zoe’s attack did not, however.

She slashed him with one set of nails, and then began to circle him in something that seemed half a dance and half an acrobatic spectacle. She whipped her head back and forth as she spun and flipped around him and over him. Her locs, clearly razor-sharp and harder than they had any right to be since she had employed her Morph powers, laid into him like a scourge in the hands of a Roman centurion. In moments, half his face and one arm were thoroughly flayed, and the rest of his upper torso didn’t look much better.

His gun was on the ground now, and Zoe stopped her deadly dance.

She looked at her victim almost curiously, and Query thought he detected a hint of shock and queasiness in her eyes now, dulling the rage. He stood for several moments, though dead or nearly so, before gravity introduced his corpse to the ground.

Query made a call to Mad Dash, hoping the man had remembered to turn on his headset.

“Dash?”

“En route, toot-e-toot-toot, Query. Moving as fast as I can,” Dash said, sounding winded but chipper.

“It’s not that, Dash. I just want you to know this isn’t as much a rescue operation as I had expected. It looks like more of a clean-up.”

“Oh, no! She’s dead?”

“No. No, she isn’t. Dash, when you get close to her position—and believe me, I’ll give you plenty of warning—go in as calmly and as non-threatening as you can. If you go in hot and she thinks you’re an enemy, I might be burying you in the woods along with the two guys she just laid waste to.”

* * *

“Thank you for coming, Underworld, though I had told you to be here 20 minutes ago,” Janus groused. He was wearing a bulky metal helmet with two faces on it today, but more science fiction or fantasy-like, Underworld noted, compared to the one he often wore with the ancient Greek-style dual faces of the god Janus gazing into the future and the past. The mask he was wearing now suggested something more like paranoid conjoined twin warlords looking out for attacks. Also, it seemed familiar, as if she had seen it in some movie trailer or poster some years back.

It was a Vin Diesel movie, now that I think of it, she remembered. What I wouldn’t do to have a nice-looking piece of man like that right now here beating Janus’ face in while I watch.

“Janus, you don’t tell me to do anything,” she retorted sourly. “And you should feel lucky I only showed up late and not with an Uzi or a pair of Rottweilers trained to attack anything that smells like your cologne or your sweat.”

“Are you still on about the Crazy Jane situation?” he asked. “You needed a girlfriend to hang out with; you should be happy. I can’t believe you’re still imagining the most vile ways of killing me because you think I’m responsible.”

“My choice of examples should indicate I’ve downgraded from the ‘most vile’ notions,” she half-growled. “Some of my earlier ideas involved blowtorches, red ants, sulfuric acid and things along those lines. You’ve got too many fucking sins stacked up with me, starting with threatening my family so no, it’s not just about having a Crazy Jane addiction. That’s just the final straw.”

Janus leaned back, the oversized helmet somehow both completely out of sync with the lean and sleek silver-gray suit he was wearing today and yet somehow going so well with it. “You need to lighten up, Underworld. I treat you with far more kindness and respect than 90 percent of the people I deal with. Relax. Enjoy our promising life of crime together. Get to know Jane. Stop projecting your anger outward and redirect your energies.”

Those words from any other mouth might have been reasonable, thought Underworld, but she was certain she detected a taunting note in them. He doesn’t fuck me over as badly as most people, but he enjoys pulling my strings like a puppeteer far too much. It’s intolerable.

“What do you want, Janus? Why did you call me? If you want me to stop hating you so much, you need to let me have some space from you when we aren’t interviewing or orienting new recruits and prospects.”

“Amazingly enough, I actually did call you into my office because of staffing issues—as well as to kill time while I wait for word on Zoe’s delivery to our wooded enclave,” Janus said. “Excellent work, by the way, on the snatching of Zoe. Stealing her right out of a party and no one at it any the wiser. I’d almost think you were showing off.”

For once, Underworld noted, there was hardly a hint of jeering or needling in his words; instead, he seemed pleasantly amused and legitimately complimentary. That threw Underworld off her game a bit. She wanted—needed—to hold tight to her hatred and anger. This was not a man she could trust; she could not allow herself to think of him as anything more than an uneasy ally.

“Thank you,” she said stiffly. “I knew Breathtaker would be perfect for that job.”

“I hope you’re not going to petition for him to be on our A-list. He did well, but I’m not sold on him.”

“Not a chance,” Underworld answered, putting the slightest hint of offense in her cadence. “He’s B-list. Second tier. I don’t think he’s discreet enough and I wouldn’t trust him to be any closer to the center of our circle than he absolutely needs to be. But he’s certainly not on the C-list like Hellfire and your other cannon-fodder recruits.”

“Agreed. But it’s not really Breathtaker I wanted to talk about. It’s Odium.”

Underworld winced and made a small groaning sound. “I don’t deny that his powers would be useful—and his non-transhuman skill sets,” she said, “but he disturbs me. There’s something terribly wrong with him.”

“There is something terribly wrong with most of us, my dear,” Janus pointed out. “You are regularly hanging out with a woman who is guilty of several very grisly and sadistic murders and who revels in using baseline humans as material in the pursuit of her creation of artistic works of insanity.”

“You’re responsible for making her that way, Janus…”

“…you’ve just made my point,” he cut in. “There’s something terribly wrong with me—by society’s standards, at least—and I’m the kingpin of all this and you’re my partner.”

“Point is,” Underworld said sternly to retrieve her line of argument, “that I was never comfortable with Crazy Jane being around, either—at least not out of that giant bird cage you had made for her—until you directed her to use her powers on me and I was biochemically coerced into being her friend.”

“You know, I’ve never admitted to doing that; it’s all speculation on your part,” Janus noted. “Did you ever consider that Jane just liked you? She has odd ways of showing affection at times.”

“Stop trying to deflect me and stop pretending you didn’t order or at least strongly suggest she ensnare me.”

“Ooooh, ‘ensnare.’ I do like that word choice. Has a very sensually kinky feel to it. You continue to prove day by day that you were a much better choice than my backup plan of Madamnation as a partner.”

“Would you please shut the fuck up!” she snapped. “Point is that we need to be careful about bringing people onto the A-list—or the B-list, for that matter—who might be a little too crazy. We already have you in one of the top two seats, we then we have Jane and Tooth Fairy. Too much crazy already for my tastes, no matter how obsessive and effective a control freak you are. Eventually, you will have a herd of insane, murderous cats you can’t herd anymore.”

“In fairness, Tooth Fairy is in the A-list in only a peripheral sense,” Janus countered. “She’s going to be a key player, but she’s not a team player. She’s primo hired help.”

“Odium isn’t exactly striking me as a team player either, Janus.”

“Not exactly, no. But he wants to be, and I can use that to rein him in,” Janus said.

Underworld paused and considered. She’d already picked up on Odium’s self-hatred, but she hadn’t considered the deeper source from which that might spring. “You think deep down he wants a family, don’t you? Someplace to belong.”

“Yes, I do,” Janus stated. “And I don’t think; I’m sure of it. And Crazy Jane might be just the sister-figure he needs, with Papa Janus and Mama Underworld.”

“God, Janus, don’t use Jane to snare everyone and have some hold on them,” Underworld warned. “The more people she juggles and who want her attention, the more you set up risks for conflict and competition. Also, it goes both ways. She gets attached, even if it often is a creepy kind of attachment. What if she has her hooks in Odium and you have to sacrifice him later?”

“Worry not, my dear,” Janus said. “I’ve considered that, too. He’s not someone I’d just toss away on a whim, and we won’t have to worry about romantic entanglements—Jane would be going for a sisterly approach as she sets her hooks. And Odium is the only person on whom I plan to have her use that particular power—and tell no one on any of our teams about that power, Underworld—at least the only person for a very long time.”

“Aside from myself,” Underworld noted with a sarcastic edge.

“I continue to tell you that I am not taking credit for Jane and you. Perhaps she has deeply buried bi-curious tendencies or simply feels isolated by her demeanor and needed a girlfriend to hang out with as much as you did, for different reasons,” he responded reasonably. Then his tone shifted suddenly to the taunting mode that so infuriated her as he said, “Now, go toddle off and do some girl things together while I wait for word on Zoe.”

A sharp, hot ribbon of rage flashed into Underworld’s brain, as if a rocket of hate had launched from the base of her spine.

After all that, trying to mollify me, and then at the end he throws it back in my face again to let me know he did it without openly admitting it. Oh, I’m back to wanting you dead, Janus. Thank you for that. I don’t know how to pull it off yet, but I’ve been involved in long cons before—this is just a more lethal variant of that. I’ll find a way to end you and still keep Jane to myself without her ever knowing it was me—alone with her to console her and move beyond you.

* * *

She’d just killed two men. And she’d thrown up. And she was half-naked, her clothes largely a mass of tatters on her now.

One of the last things Zoe Dawson really expected or wanted was a phone call.

As she heard her phone ring and felt it buzz in her pocket, she began to reach for it, and then realized her hand was covered in blood. She started to wipe in on her pants, then thought better of it—as well as almost being seized by a desire to retch at the idea—and then she wiped it off on the car’s interior upholstery. By that time, the ringer had stopped and voicemail had picked up. Then the phone rang again, and she yanked it out of her pocket.

“Hello?!” she blurted in a voice too loud and shrill with anxiety and panic for her own comfort.

“Thank God your phone’s still on you and not damaged. This is Query. I need you to toss those guys in the car and get that car off the road and mostly out of sight now.”

“How do you know…”

“Zoe, do it now. We do not want police entanglement or witnesses. I’ve made calls to slow any traffic heading up the road from the city, but someone might come the other way. Get those men in the car and drive it off the shoulder and just past the tree line. There’s a small rocky rise you should be able to use to keep anyone from seeing the car. Now, Zoe, before someone sees that carnage!”

To her credit, Query thought, she was good under pressure, and got one man into the car quickly. The other one, closer to the shoulder of the road, she simply rolled down toward a ditch-like depression, which would put him out of sight from the narrow highway. Then she started driving the car, realized the hand-brake was still on, disengaged it and got the car off the road.

Then she put the phone to her ear, and asked, firmly and quietly, “How do you know what’s going on?”

“I had someone watching you tonight,” Query answered. “He lost you after they nabbed you, but I have some Air Force-issue military drones in my possession and one of them, Pidwidgeon, has been watching you since shortly after that happened.”

“Pidwidgeon…” she said dubiously. “You read the Harry Potter books?”

“I have eclectic tastes and sometimes a lot of time on my hands,” he answered in a dead-pan. “How are you doing?”

She looked down at her bloody clothes and stained hands, and said, “I think I may throw up again soon, if that’s all right.”

“By all means, Zoe. By all means. Look, I don’t want to worry you, but this isn’t over yet. I need you to stay put and stay alert and stay calm,” Query told her. “I have a friend, Mad Dash—you may know about…”

“…runs really fast. Acts a little loopy. But pretty much a straight-ahead good guy,” she said.

“Yeah. He’s on his way. Please don’t confuse him for an enemy combatant when he arrives and kill him or anything. He’s one of the few real friends I have.”

“OK.”

“You’re doing fantastic, Zoe. Really.”

Then she doubled over, threw up violently, and when the dry heaves finally stopped, she placed the phone against her cheek again, a thin trail of tears on either side of her face. “How about now?” she said in a whimper.

“Still doing great. You’re tough as nails, Zoe. I know that. But killing someone isn’t pleasant. It messes with you. That’s natural. It means you’re a decent human. You’re doing great.”

“Thanks. I want to go home. Very badly,” she said in a quiet voice.

“I think we need to find someplace safer than home, Zoe, but I promise I’ll keep you safe. We’re almost done with the worst part of things,” Query said. “Just wait for Dash. Zoe?”

“Yeah.”

“You ever watch Pulp Fiction?”

“At least eight times in my life so far, I guess,” she said, perplexed but feeling a sense of calm return. Just small talk now. She’d killed two men, but now it was small talk. Normal life in the midst of madness.

“Well, Zoe, you and Dash sit tight,” he said. “I’m sending in The Wolf.”

“Shit, nigger, that’s all you had to say,” Zoe said, laughing and crying a little at the same time, delivering the movie line in a half-anxious, wavering manner, but not too far off Samuel L. Jackson’s original cadences. “Wait, though,” she said. “If Mad Dash isn’t The Wolf, who is?”

“That would be me, Zoe,” Query said. “Big Bad Wolf, in fact. I’m going to blow down someone’s house. At least one of them. It might only end up being the straw house, but I’m gonna fucking blow it down.”

[ – To view the next chapter, click here – ]

The Gathering Storm, Part 23

[ – To view a list of all current chapters, click here – ]

Darkness is a comforting shroud. A sturdy cloak.

Those thoughts passed through the mind of Query, sitting in the semi-darkness of the club as Milo Phillips, while various pairs of rappers took their turns on stage to do a bit of freestyle vocal battling with one another. But not Milo tonight; he had to make sure he was on-call.

In so many aspects of his life, he preferred darkness. And many times, a mask as well to further obscure him and wall himself off from the world. He lacked the escape of dreams from reality, and sometimes, putting layers in between himself and others was all he had.

He reviewed his iPhone Sextet as a new message came in, disregarded it for now, and slipped it back into his belt holster. Then he pulled out his “real” smartphone—or at least the one he relied on as Query and when he was simply Alan Millos—his Android Hyyper. It was much easier to modify the Droid smartphone for his critical needs, but the iPhone was part of Milo’s identity and image.

Really need to make some time to buy the new Droid Nexusz soon, get it up to speed for my needs and transfer my data over, he considered. So hard to find time to do everything sometimes, even being awake 24 hours a day.

When he saw no messages there for Alan or Query, he slipped that phone back into its secret pocket and pulled his iPad Quinto out of his satchel to review some notes and files, as well as some pilfered video feeds from the police and FBI.

At least all my identities agree on the iPad as far as tablet computers go, he thought with mild amusement.

Reviewing his files did nothing but dim his flash of good humor, though. It had been nearly two weeks now since Janus had attempted to abduct Zoe, and there had been no sign of him, his lackeys or any freelance hired help since then.

Local and federal cops had questioned the mercenary team that Query had brought down after Zoe’s graduation ceremony, but nothing had come of it. A couple members of the team had been willing to give evidence and testimony for lighter sentences, but had precious little to offer. They couldn’t even say for certain who had hired them. That was a sharp divergence from the team that had tried to kill Query three months earlier. The two mercs that Query had spirited away then to question personally, as well as the survivors the police had questioned, were clear and consistent as to who they had been paid by—Janus—even if they were far less willing to give much information about him.

Not that they knew much anyway, but Janus has never been known for his forgiving streak, so most of those he hires tend to be discreet when captured, to the point of often not even sharing information that seems innocuous, Query considered.

Still, there was plenty of evidence to point to the fact that this team had been hired from the same source as the mercenaries that tried to kill Query. That supplier of talent was pricey indeed, and for two teams from that source to show up in New Judah over a three-month period was unlikely to be coincidence.

Not that the police have put that together, Query noted mentally. The FBI has made note of the oddity, but they don’t seem to get the connection is to Janus yet. I do, though. So, the question is, since Janus could have hired talent from a different source for the Zoe job, is he becoming lazy and sloppy? Or did he hope I’d figure it out and know he was still fucking with my city—even though it’s unlikely he would have expected me to be protecting Zoe and find out from first-hand contact?

It also didn’t help his mood to be reminded he was using Zoe as bait even as he was protecting her, and that might come back to bite her in some unexpected ways. Because Janus’ hired kidnapping team had struck in such a public place and focused on one woman, some people were looking at Zoe now and wondering, “Why her?”

The mercs hadn’t admitted to trying to nab her—or anyone, really. They didn’t want to be implicated in any more crimes than necessary, and so far, the hard evidence that they planned to kidnap anyone or even kill anyone was slim. They’d clearly face any number of assault and weapons possession charges—maybe even some domestic terrorism charges—but they weren’t going to want to face charges of attempted murder or kidnapping as well.

At least one person at UConn’s New Judah campus was speculating quietly in the upper-level administrative offices that Zoe was the sole target, and perhaps it had something to do with her athletic prowess. So, now rumors were circulating that she might be transhuman and that might have made her a target. The admin who’d had that epiphany was even suggesting to the dean that they might need to sue Zoe to make her pay back the scholarship money since she hadn’t disclosed she was transhuman.

It likely won’t happen, he realized, if only because they don’t want the scandal of having an athlete in violation of NCAA anti-transhuman rules. It would be a black eye they’d want to avoid unless they needed to be pre-emptive—and so far, the NCAA didn’t even seem to be taking any notice of the attempted abduction, much less have any reason to be suspicious about Zoe’s abilities.

Still, he had played a part in bringing about just the kind of attention that Zoe had so assiduously tried to avoid, and it was messing with his conscience more than a little.

A voice and a bit of verse from the stage pulled him out of his Query mindset and back to the Milo Phillips role in which he currently was dressed.

“…Parlez-vous Français? Cuz all the Froggies say you’re gay. Comprende? Capiche? Cuz I’m deep old money, but you be nouveau riche.”

Milo groaned at that—both the rhymes and the awkward delivery. He hadn’t heard what verses had led up to that portion, but knowing the rapper who was delivering them, Milo knew all too well the prelude had probably sucked just as much and perhaps more. Killah-Be tended to get pretty far in these rap battles even though he was so terrible at hip-hop—Milo suspected the young man had some transhuman powers, though he might not be aware of them. People who went up against him on stage often got flustered, lost their concentration, and became nervous and hesitant—as a result, their flubbed verbal attacks ended up being worse that Killah-Be’s delivery.

He’s probably a Primal pumping out pheromones of some sort, or maybe an Interfacer who disrupts neural processing slightly, he considered. Might even be a Psionic projecting thoughts of inadequacy or worry.

Killah-Be’s opponent on stage, a 23-year-old indie rapper who went by the nom de rap of EZStreet, seemed utterly unfazed, however. Although Milo was certain Killah-Be was transhuman, he was uncertain if the young man’s powers were erratic or some people just resisted it better than others. In any case, with no muddling of his mind or confidence, EZStreet volleyed back verbally within seconds.

“That’s all you got, polyglot? I know what I am; know what you’re not. Not worth a second or a third thought. Be here long after your verses rot,” EZStreet snarled, then continued with: “You’re hip-hop-i-vomitous; I know that sounds ominous. But all it really means is you make me feel nauseous. My rhyme are plenteous; I’m rap-i-venomous. Toxic to fools like you who are the pettiest.”

Milo snickered to himself, happy to know that Killah-Be would be knocked out of the rap battle early for once, as he deserved. Then, once again, his brief bit of joy was snatched away as his Droid smartphone buzzed in its hidden pocket and as he realized it was a call from the private detective he had keeping an eye on Zoe tonight.

But whatever grim and dark thoughts that brought, as he wondered what mess was likely unfolding, it was quickly replaced by the hunger for the hunt.

I think Janus has finally made his second attempt, Query thought. I just hope there’s still time to keep Zoe from harm in all this.

* * *

Michele Cho opened the freezer door, pulled out the pack, shook it experimentally, frowned and then strode into the living room where her stepsister and roommate, Isabella Fuentes, lounged watching a DVD.

“Any idea where my cigarettes are?” Michele questioned Isabella with a snide edge.

“Oh, yeah, I’d hoped you’d see the empty pack and buy some more,” Isabella responded mildly, not even looking at Michele as she did. “You know, it’s really hard to enjoy smoking when you buy them so infrequently.”

“Buy your own, you cheap bitch,” Michele grumbled. “Or get a boyfriend to buy them.”

“Like you said, I’m cheap, and I don’t have a boyfriend just at this moment in time,” Isabella said, finally meeting Michele’s gaze and rolling her eyes as she said it.

“I’m going out to Club Darque, and now I gotta stop by a convenience store to buy something that I thought I already had because my stepsister has been bumming them all week. Really, Izzie, could you at least have told me you were stealing them?”

“You woulda just hid ’em, Michele,” she answered. “Hard enough to just sneak a couple a day so you wouldn’t notice for a while. You hardly even smoke, so why stress yourself out by keeping a pack in the house that I’m just going to steal from anyway?”

“I like to smoke when I go out clubbing and drinking and dancing and maybe hooking up with someone, you twat. You know that, Izzie. Fuck! Fine, I’ll buy a pack for you, too, when I’m out. Find a boyfriend soon so you don’t dig into the one I put in the freezer for myself.”

“I’ll do my best,” Isabella said sweetly, if with an obvious and humorously disingenuous note.

“When you were stealing my cigarettes like you did from my dad and your mom when you were 13, did you remember to get that intel on the skeez lab?”

“Of-fuckin-course,” she answered. “It’s all on the dining table. Not like I want you getting killed during a drug lab raid, Sis.”

“Yeah, because who would buy your smokes then?” Michele asked.

They both broke out laughing.

“God, I hate you,” Isabella said.

“Love you, too, Izzie.”

“Seriously, though, why do you even buy cigarettes? I don’t get the social, once- or twice-a-week smoker thing. I started my off-and-on love affair with cancer sticks at 13; you didn’t start until 17, which as I recall is when you started piercing and tattooing and dressing in black a lot. Is smoking a required part of the official Goth uniform?”

Michele chuckled. “Kinda. Dunno. Gets me in the right mood when I’m out clubbing—feel more bad-ass and rebellious. Also, nice to have a cheap high that doesn’t inhibit my judgment, my ability to drive, or break the law. All right, so I’ll look over the stuff when I get back so I can start our little ‘catch Marty the Hun plan’ on Monday.”

“Yeah, because heaven forbid you should do the take-down and set-up this weekend and fuck up your chances of nailing some Goth chick or Emo dude that you hook up with tonight or tomorrow,” Isabella sneered good-naturedly.

“Girl’s gotta put herself first sometimes for the sake of mental health,” Michele said, then her equally good-natured tone suddenly turned serious. “Besides, Izzie, I’m more than a little nervous about this plan, and I’d like to have a good time before I possibly check out.”

* * *

Taking a life was a thrilling thing, Breathtaker thought, and something he didn’t get to do near enough of. Sadly, he wouldn’t be doing it tonight, either. However, making someone feel like they were dying and leaving them with their last conscious thoughts that they likely would end up a corpse was pretty satisfying, too.

The dreadlocked bitch that Underworld had set him to nab as his graduation test to join her and Janus’ operation had been easy pickings. She seemed largely withdrawn from the party she was in, which was attended mostly by current and recently graduated college students. She just stood there holding up a wall, a half-smoked cigarette in one hand and a drink in the other—either a cola or a mixed drink.

Stuck-up, much, Zoe? he had thought. Too good for everyone else? Shy? Psycho loner? Or do you just not feel like you fit in with all these fuckin’ norms?

He’d gone up to her, introduced himself and made small talk like he was trying to hit on her. After a minute or two she was clearly a bit short of breath and said she needed to get some air.

“Maybe you smoke too much,” Breathtaker had said. “Maybe that’s all it is. Then again, I make a lot of women breathless.”

The tone of his voice at that point—having taken on a more aggressively taunting tone then—had tipped her off that something might be wrong, and he had seen it in her eyes. But that had been what he’d wanted. Fear was good. Made things more fun.

He had grabbed one of her arms and then, with physical contact, could put his Interfacer powers fully to work, completely shutting down her ability to breathe. Her eyes had taken on a panicked look, and he noticed her appearance begin to change slightly. He had stepped back, knowing that he could keep her respiratory system in his mental grip for bit longer from a distance now that he’d made direct contact with her nervous system. She had swung haphazardly and slowly, her fear and inability to breathe throwing her off. Still, her nails grazed him, tearing open his leather jacket and shirt and one of them leaving a red line of blood. Janus had said she was a Morph, and he hadn’t been wrong about how sharp her fucking nails could be.

But then she was stumbling and beginning to lose her balance, and Breathtaker had rushed in to catch her. He had embraced her like they were making out, keeping her lungs from working until she passed out against him.

She had smelled good, he recalled. Really nice perfume or scented oil or something. He had taken a few moments to suck at the light brown skin of her neck, and cop a cheap feel for a couple minutes as he let her body begin to breathe again just enough to keep her from dying on him. She wasn’t his usual type—she was like some Rasta chick with those dreadlocks and about half of them colored red or bleached blonde. For Breathtaker, he liked his sisters to have long hair, but preferred it straight as hell and black as night.

Finally, he had spoken into the transmitter on his shirt collar, saying to the rest of the team, “One of y’all get the fuck in here and help me with this bitch.”

Now, she was in the car ahead of him, pumped full of sedatives, and on her way to Janus.

Hello, opportunity, Breathtaker thought, smiling. I’m in the Big League now.

* * *

“Talk to me,” Query said into his phone as he exited the club and left the world of hip-hop behind him, striding with purpose toward his van. The private detective wouldn’t be calling for some routine check-in—something was almost certainly happening.

“You said this Zoe isn’t the getting-piss-drunk type, right? Or the recreational drug type, either, right?”

“Correct on both counts,” Query told the man. “Why?”

“She’s been at this party thing at a college friend’s house for a while. Two guys were just carrying her out like she was drunk and needed help walking. She looked pretty much totally passed out to me. Got her into a car and drove away. One of the guys carrying her got into another car that followed the one she’s in.”

“You are tailing them, right?” Query said with an edge in his voice.

“Of course. Discreetly as hell. But I think they’re headed toward Grace Memorial Highway. Think they’re headed for the woods. Fifty-fifty chance, anyway. If I’m right, I gotta break off soon. No offense, Query, but if you’re involved, at least one of those mo-fo’s is a transhuman and I don’t fuck with transhumans directly. I follow them too far on Grace and they’re gonna spot me and make me out for a tail.”

“I don’t want you getting spotted either,” Query said, “and it has nothing to do with you keeping your out-of-shape ass bruise-free and bullet-free. Give me an exact report on your position and their direction and give me updates every minute until I tell you otherwise or you have to break off the pursuit.”

* * *

The Guardian Corps headquarters had an odd vibe, Cole noted. It was hard to put his finger on what it was, but he felt out of place somehow. It almost seemed like a whole other organization tonight to which he was a complete alien.

He tried not to let it bother him as he hung out and waiting for some marching orders. Desperado or one of his lieutenants would assign Cole to a team—

…a team, Cole considered. Why don’t I see many of the usual…

“Fuck! Shitfirefuckgoddam!” someone shouted, and Cole’s wasn’t the only set of eyes to turn toward the voice, which belonged to Blockbuster, the one person in the Corps who seemed to dislike him more than even Desperado did. “Another fucking patrol just got hit! Desperado! We’ve been fucking hit again on the streets! Total ambush! The raid on the red crush lab! Two injuries but no one dead this time.”

Desperado burst from his office, eyes blazing with anger and seeming to Cole as if they were seeking something in particular. They landed on him within seconds, and there was a dark satisfaction in them as they did.

“Talk to me, Blockbuster,” Desperado said, dragging his eyes from Cole and toward his right-hand man. “Who the fuck is doing this? Was anyone on that team who didn’t fucking get hurt connected to any of the other teams that got hit? I want a fucking suspect already.”

While Blockbuster started pulling up files on the six-year-old PC, another voice rang out.

“I don’t think we need to look very far,” said Puma, one of Desperado’s chief lieutenants. He walked toward Cole, one finger pointed at him like a gun. “That motherfucker over there has been around your office a lot when we’ve been talking lately. Including when we were talking about tonight’s major motherfucking operation. And guess who was conveniently fucking off the night we fucking had a bloodbath in here?”

“Yeah, you’re on to something there, Puma,” Desperado said, and Cole felt his chest constrict and his vision began to swirl darkly at the edges.

Wait! What? Oh shit what the fuck’s going on what the hell am I gonna do, Cole thought, panicky and confused.

“You know I am, Desperado. That shit-fuck joined us just to give us up to the fucking enemy!” Puma shouted. “Let’s take this motherfucker…”

“…Let’s take him out for a motherfucking drink why don’t we, Puma,” Desperado snarled, and now it was Puma’s turn to join Cole in confusion.

“Huh? What the…”

“Let’s talk about who else was at every meeting about a patrol that got hit,” Desperado said. “Only one goddamned person besides me knew about all those missions that got ambushed. I should know. I set up half of them just to fucking flush out the traitor and if the leader of each team hadn’t known they were fucking bait from the get-go I’d’ve probably lost a hell of a lot more people. And I made motherfucking sure Cole was fucking around so you’d aim for any patrol he might have been around to hear about and then make him the scapegoat. Right on schedule, you traitor shithead! Actually, ahead of schedule. What are you gonna do now?”

Suddenly, Cole realized what was weird about the headquarters tonight. He was one of only a handful of relative newbies here. He doubted there were more than a few people among the couple dozen or so in attendance tonight who hadn’t been in the Corps for over a year.

It’s a fucking trap for Puma and shit is going to go…

“Cover me! Hit the fucking exits all y’all!” Puma shouted.

In a panicked rush, Cole’s head swiveled and jerked in a haphazard attempt to take stock of the whole area, and it seemed that at least three people were reacting to Puma’s words.

He’s got friends in here who are traitors, too, Cole realized, and they’ll be fighting their way out.

One of those men, standing several yards from Cole—who went by the codename Kobra—made a lunge for one of the Corps members from behind, his hands growing to the size of spades and the fingers becoming deadly claws. From seemingly out of nowhere, PrinSass barreled into him before he could strike. She wasn’t a Speedster—just a Tank—but still Cole was amazed she could move so fast given the size of her body. Her big fists were pounding at Kobra with blunt, determined blows that sent blood and teeth flying from the man’s nose and mouth. The blows made sounds like wet thumps and Cole was certain he heard them punctuated by the cracking of a cheekbone despite his distance from the fight. PrinSass made up for lack of finesse and agility with hits that were harder and faster than anything he’d ever seen, and Kobra was down without having been able to so much as scratch anyone.

A shot rang out, entering the back of the computer monitor where Blockbuster had been working, coming out through the screen and nearly clipping the man as he ducked for cover. Cole whipped around and saw the gunman, a guy who went by the name Breakout—clearly another of Puma’s friends and now taking aim at Desperado from behind. Marshalling his will, Cole began to twist space near Breakout but even as he did, someone shouted a warning and Desperado spun, both revolvers drawn with breathtaking speed and aimed with unwavering accuracy. Desperado only pulled the trigger of one gun, and took Breakout down with a single shot between his legs, shouting out gleefully, “Hah! Gelding!”

The gun in Desperado’s other hand moved in an arc to reacquire the target he had wanted to take down before Breakout had become a threat. But that intended target, Puma, was already on the move and Cole got an inkling of at least one reason for his name when he realized the man was a Speedster.

Desperado’s chances of hitting Puma as he headed for an exit were slim, as he couldn’t track the man quickly enough with the gun in his left hand…

…until Cole realized Desperado’s other gun hand was moving inward, and Puma was headed right for that arc. A pair of cracking sounds and two small explosions of blood and torn fabric from his shoulder and hip, and Puma tumbled to the ground, rolling and crashing against a wall. Several Corps members rushed him.

There had been noises all around him during those hectic moments, and now Cole tried to figure out where the other conflicts might be—there had to be at least one or two other threats…

…but there was suddenly silence.

Relative silence, anyway, and Cole realized that five men and one woman were down, and only one of those people seemed to be getting field care at the moment. So, Puma and four accomplices—and only one casualty among the loyal Guardian Corps members.

Cole was close enough to Blockbuster’s desk to overhear as Desperado approached him, and said quietly, “Yo, ‘buster. Isolate Nightstrike from those other motherfuckers. Puma brought him on a few weeks ago; he might not know about Sweet Talker. Lock him up and get her in here to pump him for information. If that doesn’t work, torture his ass. I wanna know if anyone else not here tonight is on Puma’s payroll.”

Blockbuster hurried off to carry out Desperado’s order, and the bronze- and brown-clad man holstered his guns, cocked his Western hat and stepped toward Cole.

“Exciting night, huh?” Desperado said blandly. “You get hit or anything?”

“No,” Cole said. “I don’t think…um, no.”

“You almost messed up my shot with that Warpsmith shit, Cole. Don’t mess with my fucking shots. That said, sorry for the rude surprise of all this. You were the perfect fall guy to make this plan work but obviously I couldn’t tell you what was happening. The fact you weren’t here the night they attacked us directly here was fucking gold—made things move quicker when Puma knew he could finger you perfectly. Probably why he had several guys here tonight, to make sure you didn’t live through the night to defend your case. You being off that night was spectacular for my plan.”

“I doubt the people who got killed or hurt that night feel spectacular about it,” Cole said darkly.

“What? Fuck you, Cole. Or fuck you, Quantum. Whichever you prefer. Don’t get high and fucking mighty with the moral high ground. I didn’t know they were gonna fucking attack us that night. You not being here was luck, man. I appreciate divine providence when it comes knocking. I wouldn’t put that many people at our HQ at risk to flush out a traitor.”

“You put patrols at risk to flush him out. You said so,” Cole noted.

“Every damn time I send out patrols I put them at risk, motherfucker,” Desperado retorted.

“So, all this time you didn’t really hate me,” Cole said. “Ever since I came on, you’ve been eyeing me as the guy to use to figure out who the leak was.”

“No, I hated you from the start, Cole. Made it a whole lot easier to play you, in fact. I don’t hate you any more. I just really strongly dislike your smarter-than-thou ass,” Desperado said. “I’m still hoping you quit soon or wash out of here, because I don’t think you have the shit to make it on the streets.”

Desperado turned and strode away without another word.

I just helped save the Guardian Corps without even knowing it, Cole thought, and I’m still just as much a pariah as I was before.

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