The Empowered, page 16
After what seemed like forever, Silverly finished, pulled off his surgical gloves, and mopped his forehead. He looked so damn old, and tired.
“Her accelerated healing along with your bringing her to me made the difference. She just needs rest now.” He leaned against a counter.
My phone vibrated again. I let it vibrate.
“Thank, you, Rance,” I said.
He sighed. “Is this really not what it seems?”
I nodded my head fractionally. “You could say that.”
“Good, I’m very glad to hear that.” He put the instruments into an autoclave. “Life is too short to be spent making all the wrong choices.”
I leaned over the gurney and watched Keisha’s breath rise and fall. I hoped Silverly was right.
13
I found Gus waiting by the truck.
The sun was almost up. I had caught a few snatches of sleep while Keisha recovered in a post-op room. Silverly had given her painkillers and a massive dose of antibiotics, telling me that would be the only dose she’d need, thanks to her Empowered healing. An orderly who didn’t ask questions pushed her wheelchair to the truck.
I helped her stand with Gus’s help.
“I didn’t think I was going to live,” she said, her voice barely audible.
“You’re gonna live,” I told her.
“How did I make it?” she asked as I buckled her in.
“We got help."
Her eyes focused on me. “You nearly killed me, bitch,” she said and then slipped away into sleep. How long would it be before she started another metal cyclone and tried to kill me again?
The sun was shining by the time we arrived at my house. Going to have to forget about being stealthy. Support might get pissed. That was tough.
I parked the truck in the garage. Gus jumped out and rolled the door back down. Keisha pulled away when I tried to help her out of the truck.
“No more help from you,” she said. “You’ve done enough.”
Screw her. I let Gus help her out of the truck. Sunlight shone through the garage door windows.
“Thank you, thank you,” she kept murmuring to him.
I had nearly killed her, granted, but she’d started the damn fight. I had saved her freaking life. If I hadn’t taken her to the Doc, she’d be deader than that dead mouse in the corner of the garage.
The inside door to the house opened, and Alex looked out, wearing his scruffy hoodie and torn jeans.
Gus gave Alex a funny look, surprise mingled with I don’t know what, distrust? He definitely acted like someone had given him a wedgie. Maybe he still had some of last night's iron in his backbone. Old Gus would have blended and vanished as soon as he saw Alex.
For an instant, Alex looked surprised, but he covered it nicely.
“I thought you said the house was empty, Mat,” Gus said accusingly.
“You’re not supposed to be here,” I told Alex.
He shrugged. “You said I could crash here, didn’t you?”
“I don’t remember that.”
“Hey, not fair to go pulling the rug out from under me because you want to loan your crashpad to someone else. You said I could, and now you're acting like you don’t remember you told me that.”
“I didn’t say you could.” We stared at each other; me the annoyed keeper of the crashpad, and Alex, the friend being denied what he wanted.
“This sucks.” His gaze wandered over to Keisha. “Your friend looks hurt, dude.” The stoner slacker he was playing had a short attention span.
“We got it covered, thanks.”
Alex shrugged. “You gonna get help for her?”
“Already done.”
He shrugged. “Okay, just thought I’d point it out.”
“Go out through the back, remember?”
Alex slouched off back inside the house, conveniently leaving the door open.
Keisha kept silent through all this, watching.
“Friend of yours, Mat?” Gus asked.
“Just some guy I met on the street. I fixed a problem he had with a drug dealer, he pointed me to this place, but the agreement was that this is my house. Not ours.”
Keisha's lip curled. “Since when does a streeter like him stick to ‘agreements’?”
“Sometimes they do.” I wasn’t letting her under my skin. Not now.
She frowned. “You’re still a fool.”
Inside the house Gus helped Keisha stretch out on the futon. I checked her temperature. She tried to pull away, but I insisted. It was almost normal.
I went into the kitchen to make her breakfast and Gus followed me.
“She’s going to be okay, isn’t she?” he said.
“Yes.” Relief washed over me. She was going to live. Her healing had taken over. You could already see the old Keisha coming back. I opened an egg omelet with fruit Insta-Meal, added water, pulled the tab underneath, and the mix began heating. I felt lighter than I had in days. I never would have guessed I’d feel so good at her not dying, but I did.
“You’re a lot alike,” Gus said.
“Keisha and me? Don’t be crazy.” I opened the fruit packet, then fished around in the cabinet for the package of plastic cups, poured some orange juice.
Gus leaned on the counter next to me. “But you are. You're both headstrong and fearless.”
“You were pretty fearless back at the hospital, Gus.”
“I couldn’t leave you in the lurch.” He didn’t look away. “I’m sorry about the Renegades, more than I can tell you.”
I stiffened. “Why did you have to go bring that up?”
He didn’t flinch. “I was afraid, Mat. The Professor had sent me out to look for something.”
“What?”
“It doesn’t matter now. Not after what happened.”
“But you were the perfect lookout Gus—that was your job. What the hell were you doing going off on some stupid errand when we needed you?”
He pushed himself off the counter, and his eyes narrowed. I’d never seen Gus angry before.
“It was for the Professor—medication.”
“What?” Empowered don’t need medication.
“He was dying. And there was a lab nearby that had a drug he could alter to help him.”
“What did he have?”
“He had Thalik’s.”
“Thalik’s?" I suddenly felt heavy. What were the odds the Professor and Ruth had the same thing? Seemed really unlikely to me, but there it was. Thalik’s. Stinking disease.
“He never said a thing.” My anger fled me and I leaned back, rubbed my eyes. God I was exhausted.
Gus laughed sadly. “Prof never did.”
“True.” For a short Empowered wearing glasses—nearly unheard of for one of us to have eye trouble—he had been charismatic, but he played things close. He'd been unbeatable in poker.
Thalik’s.
“I was on my way back when the hammer fell,” Gus said. His voice got small and his eyes widened, staring into the past and reliving a horror I couldn’t feel.
“So you did the only thing you could do.”
“Ran like a coward.” He gulped air. “I didn’t even get what the Professor wanted. The lab I broke into didn’t have the drug he wanted. Nobody did. It was a dead end. I only lived because I was sent off on a fool’s errand.”
I swallowed. I had wanted to kill Gus ever since that day. But really, what other choice did he have? None. I was the only one who had survived the attack on the Renegades, in the underground haven we’d made. Everyone else had died. I’d spent years in Special Corrections reliving that day and being angry at Gus.
He hadn’t fled because he’d tipped off the Hero Council. He’d been doing a secret job for the Professor.
I squeezed his shoulder. “No. You stayed free.”
Gus blinked away tears, stared outside. He wiped his eyes and sobbed. I hugged him close then, let him cry against my chest, my hand on his head, pressing him against me.
Keisha was sitting up on the futon when I returned with her breakfast.
She wrinkled her nose. “What is that crap?”
“Insta-meal mushroom and cheese omelet.”
“Where the hell did you get those?”
“Liberated them from a food services outfit that had extra.” Back in the Renegades, Professor used to say that the best lies were the plausible ones.
“Great,” Keisha grumbled and began forking egg into her mouth. “Tastes like shit,” she said around a mouthful of omelet.
Nice to know Keisha was still Keisha.
My phone woke me up, vibrating in my pocket. I groaned, rolled over and blinked. I was in one of the other bedrooms, lying on my coat. Wind rustled the arbor vitae outside. It was around noon.
Not a huge surprise, the caller. Mutter. The phone kept vibrating. He didn’t stop at three.
I went into the living room. Gus sat in the one chair, lost in thought. He looked up as I came in.
I held up the phone. “Our leader calls. He’s just letting it ring and ring.” Up to fifteen rings now.
“Better answer then.”
“Yes, but it isn’t…” I trailed off. It wasn’t the damn phone protocol Mister Big had insisted on using.
Gus shrugged. “He must really want to talk to you.” Great. I stared at the phone.
The hell with it.
I thumbed the receiver button. “Hello.”
“About time you answered me.” Mutter’s voice was ice-cold. I was glad we weren’t having this chat face to face. My throat ached already.
“We’ve been busy.” No excuse in my voice, just kept it matter-of-fact.
“Too busy to answer your phone?” Ice-cold, but there was rage underneath. Royally pissed, but controlling it. For now.
There was no easy way around it, so I just told him. “The job went south. The Scrambler--”
He cut me off. “No details over the phone. This needs to be discussed in person.”
His voice deepened on that last word. Made it sound menacing and dangerous.
“Got it.” I struggled to keep worry out of my voice. “Where do I find you?”
“Call me from a pay phone in one hour, and I’ll give you the address. Bring the others with you.”
He hung up. Why couldn’t he have just given me the address over the phone? If I had been fingered, wouldn’t I be followed? Okay, so I actually was compromised, in that I was an agent for Support, but Mutter didn’t know that. Unless he did, and I was taking myself to my own funeral. Crap. Couldn’t worry about it. If I didn’t go he’d be suspicious for sure.
The kitchen suddenly felt like my old prison cell in Special Corrections. Too small. I paced the house.
Gus trailed behind me, asked me something, but I was lost in thought. I was in deep shit—we all were.
There was a tug on my arm. Gus. “Stop for a second, Mat.”
Keisha watched from the futon, her anger clearly bubbling just below the surface. She was barely keeping it together.
“Mutter’s mad at us,” I said. “He wants me to call him in”—I glanced at my watch, “fifty-three minutes.”
Keisha leaned back on the futon. “Of course that asshole is angry. We screwed the job.”
“It wasn’t our fault,” Gus said. “The Scrambler didn’t work.”
“You’d better hope he sees it that way,” Keisha told him. She looked at me. “You wrecked his goddam safe house.”
“Maybe I wouldn’t have, if you hadn’t been trying to kill me.”
She pulled herself up, began gesturing.
Gus looked from her face to mine, and back to Keisha. “Stop it,” he said.
Keisha looked astonished. I must have looked surprised, too, because Gus smiled.
“Where do you get off being so tough all of a sudden, Silco?” Keisha asked him.
He looked at his hands. “You guys have a lot in common.”
“No we don’t,” Keisha and I said in unison.
Gus gave me a sideways look. “Like I said, you two have a lot in common.”
“Don’t go spreading lies, Blender,” Keisha said. She looked pissed.
Keisha and I didn’t have anything in common.
He pointed at me. “That look you just gave me? That’s an annoyed and soon to be angry look.”
I pushed my boot’s toe into the floor. “I’m not annoyed. Irritated maybe.”
Keisha shot him a dirty look. “Where do you get off saying she and me are the same?”
He shook his head. “I didn’t say you were the same. I said you have a lot in common.”
She crossed her arms, simmering anger tightening her forehead. “Lots of people get angry.”
Yeah, and Mutter was one of them.
Gus turned on a portable radio. “Music calms me down,” he said.
He didn’t have nearly as much to be worked up about as me or Keisha, but I wasn’t going to argue. His nervous pacing made me twitchy, and I wanted to punch him when he pointed out that I did the same thing. But I didn’t want Keisha to lose it, and I didn’t want to get angry again, either. This time one of us could wind up dead.
A blander than bland boring pop music tune finished. Thank God for small favors. Then a news update came on.
“Police and the FBI are investigating the apparent murder of billionaire tech titan Jonathan van Cleeve, founder of three technology companies and three-time recipient of the Friendship Medal, awarded by the Hero Council for Meritorious assistance by a civilian to the Empowered. Van Cleeve and his security detail were found dead in his West Hills mansion late last night.”
Gus paled and looked sick.
“What is it?” I asked him. The news story seemed to have smacked him upside the head. But why? No way Gus knew someone like Van Cleeve. Billionaire tech dudes didn’t mix with rogue Empowered guys like Gus.
His eyes took on a haunted look. “I can’t say.”
“Spill it, Gus,” Keisha said. “Otherwise, buck up and don’t let on you know something we don’t.”
“Why can’t you say?” I asked him.
“Mutter wouldn’t like it.”
Keeping secrets for Mutter was no surprise, but this was different. Gus was scared to death.
I wasn’t going to push him. But I’d damn sure tell Support.
The dead neon sign in the grimy window said “Atlas Motors.” The two-story brick building wasn't far from the old National Guard Armory. The place looked like a total dump on the outside, but inside bright fluorescents lit clean, uncluttered garage bays.
Mutter waited for us in the main bay, perched on a stool, tapping his fingers together. He looked like a fashionable undertaker, wearing a high-collared black suit. His snakeskin boots were gray-green in the garage lighting.
A spendy four-door was parked behind him. A silver Pontiac Elegant, from the looks of it. Funny how Mutter always had nice rides. Peep stood next to the car, fiddling with his glasses and not looking at us.
“Nice of you to show up, asshole,” I shouted at Peep.
Keisha surprised me by joining in. “Thought you’d be long gone by now, coward.” He flinched, but kept his head down, still fiddling with those damn glasses of his.
Mutter’s face was a mask of cold fury, making me take a step back. He raised a hand, made a twirling motion. “You are the last ones to take umbrage at Lyle’s actions.” The air gusted around me, rustling the remains of an old newspaper lying on the garage floor. I breathed faster, desperate to keep the oxygen coming. My throat throbbed.
I pointed at Peep. “He ran off.”
Mutter’s mouth moved, he gestured and wind slammed me. I fought to keep standing. Keisha and Gus backed away.
Mutter raised a hand and the wind whirled around me, tighter and tighter, squeezing my sides. He didn’t smile this time, like he had back at the Imperial Hotel. Instead, he looked like a psycho who was ready to kill me.
“He cut and run!” I yelled.
Mutter snapped his fingers and the air was still. “With good reason.” He gave Keisha and me both the stink eye. “You wrecked the safe house after making an absolute hash of the assignment.”
I stayed silent. No excuses.
Mutter stared at us like a judge.
“Good,” he said. “You understand your failure.” His sudden attitude swings gave me whiplash.
He ordered us to report what happened, so I did. I left out the part where I wondered were the hell he was. This was all on my team, even if his being gone might have helped screw things up. That wouldn’t help things here in the garage with our deadly boss.
I finished and watched his reaction.
“That was certainly quick thinking on your part to block the hallway,” Mutter said. I couldn’t believe it. A compliment? At least a kind of compliment.
“Keisha? Why couldn’t you find the documents?” She didn’t answer. He began twirling his fingers. She flinched.
I spoke up. “We did find the file, but it wasn’t in a red binder like you said.”
He arched an eyebrow. “Rising to your enemy’s defense? My, my, how things have changed since you tried to kill her in the house. My house.” Everything seemed to be Mutter’s, including us.
“I started it,” Keisha said.
“Really?”
“Yes—I was mad because she and Peep left when I wanted to search further.
Gus was shaking visibly.
Mutter raised his fingers to his lips. “Guilty conscience, Blender?”
Gus shook his head.
“The Scrambler was fully functional, Gus. I wonder why it didn’t go off?”
“I deployed it, Mutter, I did, really.” The words tumbled out of Gus’s mouth. “I did what you ordered. The lights were green, they were!”
Mutter walked over to Gus, a nasty grin on his face. He put a finger on Gus’s lips. “Something is rotten in Denmark, and I will learn what the source of the stench is.” He wrinkled his nose. “The urine stink is obvious.”
A dark stain spread down the front of Gus’s cargo pants. “Oh, God,” he wailed.
“It is me you need to worry about,” Mutter said. He turned to Keisha and me.
“I’m surprised at you, Keisha. Why aren’t you angry with Mat for nearly killing you, even if, as you say, you started it?”
