The Empowered, page 29
“So she found information that Brandon Ellis’s company operated that factory?”
“Yeah. And the warehouse, and the village.” My hands gripped my glass. “This needs to be stopped. Now. It’s an abomination.”
His eyes widened at the word.
“Yeah, I can use big words,” I said.
“No, it’s just, you are so…” He nodded. “I believe you about what you found. I’ll tell Support about Ellis.”
My shoulders relaxed and I released the glass. “Thank you.”
His smile was gentle. “Absolutely. And you’ll have a chance to talk to Support yourself soon. They’ll want to speak with you.”
“They?” Usually it was just Winterfield and Alex.
He hesitated.
“What’s this they? You didn’t say we?”
He glanced away. “Not for me to say. You’ll find out soon enough.”
Soon enough. Typical. I was still a mushroom to Support, even to Alex. I got up from the table, and took an insta-meal from the cabinet. Chicken something-something with rice and beans.
I pulled the heating tab on the meal box. “You’d better head back to your place unless you want to test your stoner neighbor act tonight when my roomie comes back.”
He looked sad for a moment, then got all business and nodded. “Fair enough. See you later.” He went to the door, turned back toward me. “Get some rest.”
“Yeah, I will.” He left, closing the door softly behind him.
I could have been nicer, but he could have told me what the deal was with the Support meeting.
While the insta-meal warmed up, I picked up the remains of the cactus. It was an exploded mess. I threw it in the garbage, wiped the floor with a rag, still hearing its screams in my head.
Keisha got home about an hour later. I was stretched out on my bed, still in my clothes, my bedroom door open a crack. I couldn’t sleep, remembering those people, those kids, thinking of all the ways I could kill the people responsible.
“Hey, you okay?” Keisha asked, standing in the doorway.
“Not really. You?”
She sat down on the bed next to me. “No. I can’t stop thinking about those kids down south.” A tear ran down her face.
I sat up, held her close. “Me neither.” Keisha didn’t show her caring side much. I hugged her.
“What are we going to do?” she asked.
“Figure out who did that and stop them.” I was going to put the screws to Support about that shit show, and keep after the Scourge, too.
Someone had to take action. I was going to make sure someone did.
6
The next day ended up being one of those crisp fall Oregon days I wish I could put in a bottle and drink when the winter rains wouldn’t stop.
Keisha was going to go shopping. I didn’t ask what for. She acted all tough again, but I could tell from the look in her eyes that she was still thinking about those kids.
I gave her the keys to the Lion, and drove the Dasher across the river and through the tunnel to Beaverton. My grandmother Ruth and my sisters now lived in a house in south Beaverton, where Support had moved them. I made sure to keep under the speed limit, and that the Dasher’s tail lights worked. Didn’t want to get pulled over by a cop.
No sign of a Hero Council surveillance blimp. Must be elsewhere. I parked the car next to an oak tree with leaves turned golden, and the ground below covered with them. I heard a boom and looked up to see the needle-like form of a scramjet boosting hypersonic.
Must be nice if you had money to be able to fly to Tokyo in like three hours.
I stood and stared at Ruth’s house, the little split rail fence, the dried out but still well-kept lawn. Ruth’s old car was parked in the driveway.
I stepped onto the sidewalk and the front door opened. My sister Ava came out and strode across the lawn to meet me at the fence. Her hair was now super short, a buzz cut.
“Hey,” I said.
She lifted her chin. “You aren’t supposed to be here,” she said.
Leave it to Ava to pull no punches.
“Glad to see you, too, sis.”
Her lips curved into a sneer. “You aren’t much of a big sister, Mathilda.” She knew I hated my full name, so whenever she wanted to add a little dig, she shivved me with my full-name.
I looked away. I’d nearly gotten killed taking out that bastard Mutter in order to win a place in the Scourge, which was the price Winterfield and Support had put on helping my family. Bastards. Ava knew zilch about that.
“So sue me for wanting to see how you guys are doing.” I looked back at her. She was so angry, so sure of herself. “Self-righteous much, Ava?”
She jabbed a finger at me. “Hey, you are the one that screwed up again and are a crook, again.”
What the hell could I say to that? Nothing, unless I wanted to “compromise” my “covert status,” as hard case Winterfield would put it. As far as Ava, her twin, and Ruth knew, they’d gotten low-income school grants to attend a private school, and that Ruth’s super spendy meds were from an experimental program she’d been placed in to find a cure for Thalik’s. They didn’t have a clue I was responsible. Because I was a criminal, again, as far as they knew.
* * *
I looked her straight in the eye. “Fine. Just tell me how everyone is. Ruth. You. Ella.”
The anger fell away from her face. She glanced down at her feet, suddenly looking younger than seventeen, and very worried.
“Ruth’s okay. The treatment’s working. She still has bad days, but mostly she’s better. She’s working in the backyard.”
“What about you?”
She shrugged. “School sucks, and I don’t have any friends, but other than that, I’m fine.”
She hadn’t lost her sarcasm. “No friends?”
She looked disgusted. “None that count. I hate this new school. All the rich kids think they own the world.”
I wanted to hug her then, but that would have been the wrong thing to do.
“What about Ella?”
Her shoulder’s slumped, and suddenly the wall went down and she looked vulnerable, worried. “Ella’s been sick a lot.”
“Sick a lot? With what?”
“She sleeps all the time, she’s missed almost two weeks of school already.”
Ella was the brainy one. She loved libraries, loved learning. Ava was like me, she hated school. But Ella lived for school. She’d never miss it.
Worry wormed its way into my gut.
A bizarre thought hit me. “It’s not Thalik’s, is it?” The bastard disease that had been stealing Ruth’s life. The mystery sickness no one seemed to know much about.
Ava jerked her head up. “No! No, it’s not that.” She glared at me. “Don’t you think I’d know if it were?”
I raised a hand. “Okay. I get it. You’d know.”
She exhaled loudly. “Good.”
“Then what do you think it is?”
“Do I look like a frigging doctor? I have no idea.”
“I’m just asking. Ruth won’t let me inside, how the hell else am I supposed to find out how you, her or Ruth are, for fuck’s sake.” I met her angry stare. She and Ella were almost as tall as me now.
The tall girl. I used to get ragged all the time about that in Special Corrections—got in a few fights until I figured out it wasn’t worth decking other inmates over something I had no control over. Besides, I actually liked being tall.
Ava clenched her teeth, then looked away. “Why can’t you freaking Empowered cure people?”
Hell if I knew. That would actually be a godsend. There was Medico Blue, an Empowered who was a healer, but I assumed she couldn’t cure diseases. It suddenly bugged me that I didn’t know.
“Maybe she’s just in a funk.”
Ava was angry again, practically hopping from foot to foot. “Ella? No way.”
“I want to see her. She’s my sister, too.”
“Yeah, but she’s my twin, and I don’t know what’s wrong with her.” Ava’s eyes were wide, and I thought I saw tears swimming in them. She held herself, squeezed her eyes shut.
Screw it.
I pulled Ava close. Let her sob into my chest. Stroked her hair. We stood like that for a while.
Then Ruth came out of the house.
She walked steady, didn’t look nearly as frail as last time I’d seen her. Her eyes were bright. She wore a sweater and slacks—the first time I hadn’t seen her in a house coat in forever.
“You aren’t supposed to be here,” Ruth said. Just like Ava had.
Ava stepped away from me, wiped her eyes.
“That’s your rule.” I suddenly felt twelve again. It wasn’t fair, but I’d done what I had to do, so I’d face her consequences. “I just wanted to see how everyone was doing.”
“Everyone’s fine.” Ruth didn’t blink.
“Really? Everyone’s okay?”
Ava scrunched her face up, turned and walked back into the house, the screen door banging behind her.
I crossed my arms. “Doesn’t look okay to me.”
Ruth looked away, bit her lip, then looked back at me. “There’s lots of emotion at their age.”
“Ava says Ella is sleeping a lot, and missing school, that she’s sick with some sort of illness.”
Ruth shook her head. “She’s had the flu.”
Not like Ruth to lie to me.
“She see a doctor?”
Ruth nodded. “I had her examined. She’ll be better soon.” She lifted her chin, stepped close. “You need to go.”
She was angry. It oozed ice cold just under the surface. Ruth never yelled when she got pissed, never waved her arms or stomped her foot.
I wanted to yell at her. My anger wasn’t ice cold. It was molten. But I kept my mouth shut as I stormed back to the Dasher. I jumped in, slammed the door, and drove off without looking back.
7
A couple of days after my screwed up visit to Ruth’s, my cell phone rang, three times, then a hang up. It was just after dinner. Keisha was watching TV. It was a show called Rogue Hunters, about some group of vigilante normals who helped the Hero Council look for rogue Empowereds. Rogue Empowereds like Keisha and like the one I was pretending to be. Like the one teenage me had been.
I wanted to gag after just watching a minute of it. What a load of bullshit.
I pulled on my coat, pulled the hood up over my head.
Keisha was sprawled on the couch. “You’re going out?”
“Yeah.”
She didn’t ask where. We had an unspoken agreement not to ask. That way we could room together and not kill each other. Pretty convenient that it also helped my secret spy work for Support.
Funny though, there’d been no sign of Alex since that first night.
On the TV a hidden normal watched some rogue Empowered asshole threatening old folks at a big picnic at some fancy Lake resort. Of course the normal was a clean-cut guy in a wetsuit, hiding in the lake with binoculars, peering through reeds at the asshole Empowered woman who pranced around the shoreline in a low cut dress, cheesy lightning coming out of her eyeballs.
I looked at Keisha. “How can you watch that crap?”
She shrugged. “Something to do.”
“You gotta have better things to do than that?”
“Not really.”
“That’s gonna rot your brain.”
“You got any better suggestions, Mathilda?” Now she sounded annoyed.
Change the channel. Or read. But Keisha didn’t read. She was bored. Probably wanted to do something with me. She was out of luck in that department. Like I said, if one of us was going off on our own the other one didn’t ask what was up, or if they could go.
I drove to the nearest Night-and-Day Mart and made my call to Winterfield on the wall-mounted payphone. That was the deal. No cell phones when calling Support.
He answered on the fourth ring. “Winterfield.”
“Brandt here,” I said.
“You ready to meet us?”
Stupid phone protocol.
“At your earliest convenience,” I said. Blech. This was almost as bad as that crappy Rogue Hunters show’s dialogue.
“Parking lot at Mount Tabor. Fifteen minutes.” Click.
Gee, nice to hear from you, boss; glad you were sooo concerned about me down in Colombia, embedded in a dangerous rogue Empowered organization. Yeah, I’ll bet he lost a lot of sleep over what happened to me.
I parked the Dasher on the street near the parking lot—that was the deal. Protocol and security, as Winterfield put it. I’d say it was anal bullshit, but I wasn’t in charge.
There was a black van in the parking lot. That would be Winterfield.
I pulled my hood up, my breath misting in the freezing fall evening. No moon tonight, so it was dark. The fir trees on Mount Tabor slept.
Don’t trust anyone, ever, Lenore, my cell mate in Special Corrections, used to tell me, over and over.
It could be someone else’s black van. I slowed down. My boot crunched on a dried walnut shell. I stopped. Listened. Watched the van to see if anyone came out. Nothing. It was cold. Screw caution, I wanted to cut to the chase.
I trudged up to the van. The side door opened. There was Alex, all cleaned up in the black suit and white shirt all Support agents wore. He even had the silver tie clip on his skinny black tie. His black hair gleamed with gel. He smiled.
“Good evening, ma’am,” he said, just a hint of a drawl in his voice. I’d be more likely to be charmed if this wasn’t a ride to spook central.
He helped me inside, slid the door shut behind me. Winterfield scowled at me from the driver’s seat.
I raised my eyebrows. “What?”
“Funny, Brandt. Very funny. What was that you were doing outside?”
“Being careful. Isn’t that what you wanted?”
“There’s careful, Brandt, then there’s being extremely obvious and forced in your caution. You didn’t look natural at all. Then you stopped suddenly and looked around. Suspicious as all hell.”
“I stepped on a walnut shell.”
He tilted his head. “And you thought mama squirrel might come and get you? So what?”
No one rained on a day like Winterfield.
“We will have to work on your subtlety.”
Something else to put on the list.
He got up and joined us in the back of the van. “Time to get suited up.”
Hanging on a rack was a thick rubber suit with even thicker elbow length rubber gloves, and then eyeless helmet. Great. The sensory deprivation crapsuit.
“I gotta put that on?”
“Why are you surprised? That’s the procedure.”
I crossed my arms. “You ought to trust me by now. I did take Mutter out.”
“I haven’t forgotten.”
“But it sounds like Support has.” I was pissed at having wear the crapsuit again.
“No, Support hasn’t. But procedures have to be observed. We must limit who knows where this facility is. You’re an infiltrator inside a very dangerous Empowered criminal organization that would love to discover Support facilities. What if you get found out, and have the facility’s location forced out of you. This way you can’t tell.”
Heart-warming how much they cared about me. But he had a point. The Scourge would be very interested in knowing Support locations. Ashula had told me to keep my ear to the ground. She wouldn’t say why, but I got the impression the Scourge would pay a very nasty visit if they knew where the facility was.
Winterfield gave me a thin smile. “Don’t worry, Brandt, we’ll help you.”
“Gee, thanks.”
Alex looked at me sympathetically, but kept his mouth closed. Probably didn’t want a lecture later from his senior partner.
They helped me into the suit, then strapped me into a rolling chair, locked the wheels. I got ear plugs, nose plugs, eye covers, and then the damn helmet.
It was like being in limbo. I couldn’t see shit, couldn’t hear shit. I couldn’t smell, or even feel anything. Support wanted me totally cut off from the world.
I lost track of time, and drifted off to sleep.
I was back in Colombia. The killer walking tree-things were chasing me again. Only this time the trees sprouted little kids with green fuzzy fur on their heads, and leaves for hands. The children opened their mouths and tendrils slithered out.
I woke up screaming inside my eyeless helmet, still cut off from the world. My heart hammered in my ears. It was the only thing I could feel. Even my skin felt nothing—the inside of the suit numbed it somehow.
Now would have been a great time to have Alex and Winterfield get me out of this thing.
I wasn’t so lucky.
I didn’t dream any more. I lay in darkness, remembering the horror show in Colombia.
My heart pounded harder. My world was all surging adrenalin and very bad memories.
I was in a royally foul mood when Winterfield and Alex finally got me out of the crapsuit. I stood, tried to stretch out my muscles. My thighs were cramped and hurt like hell.
We were in a windowless little room with a bed, a sealed door, and a little clothes rack. Oh, and a toilet. A guest room in the Support dungeon. Could have been the same cell, I mean “guest room,” I’d been in last time I was here. Or it could be a different one. Hell, I might not even be in the same complex. I assumed it was underground, but only because I never saw any windows the last time I was in the dungeon.
Alex looked sorry, while Winterfield just shook his head. “Brandt, don’t give me that look,” he said. “You’ve done this before.”
“It still sucks.”
I glared at Winterfield.
He glared back with those ice-blue eyes of his. It was like trying to stare down an iceberg. “I already told you why we have to do this.”
I turned to Alex. “What about you, Alex?”
He managed to look embarrassed. “If it were up to me, sure.”
I looked back at Winterfield, raised my eyebrow. He shrugged, which made me madder.
“Not my call either, Brandt.”
