An Imago of Rust and Crimson
Chapter 5.05
Glory Girl was available and raring to go, thank goodness. This was the first streak of proper luck I'd had all day. It took her twenty minutes to get here and by the end, I was pacing back and forth, half an eye on her image that a cherub was showing me and the other half watching the skinheads in case they decided to try to shut Megumi up.
I could have nailed down my nervousness, but I wasn't prepared to do that. It was keeping me sharp and keeping me focussed. That's what I told myself, at least. But I just couldn't stand it, and so I tore my worry in half and threw one part down through a sewer grate, where it wouldn't bother anyone.
That let me wait for Glory Girl without feeling like my heart was going to tear its way out of my chest. Just as well - my gas mask and my glasses were fogging up and I took the chance to take them off and wipe them. For the final approach, I guided her into a back alley where hopefully no one would see us talking. She descended from the grey sky, a black figure in biker leathers and a hood, wearing a white cat-like mask. Victoria had made a really good job of it. She could have been anyone – at least, if you didn't wonder who could fly.
"I'm here, Panopticon," she said in a mechanical growl that sounded like she was gargling gravel.
"What's up with your voice?" I asked without thinking.
"Oh, right!" She tapped her throat. "I got this awesome new voice scrambler! Isn't it cool?" she said in her normal voice.
Damn. That really was cool. I wished I'd got one of them. She probably bought it from some expensive place. "Try to be more professional," I said, to cover my envy. "But that was a good idea."
"Okay!" Glory Girl cracked her knuckles, shaking herself down. "Urgh, I'm soaked. Trying to keep out of sight by sticking to the clouds is literally like going through a rainstorm. Some water always gets in, no matter what you're wearing." I'd never really thought of that. "So when do we get started? We got to stop these kidnapping thugs who're going after girls!"
"Just one girl. But they're skinheads who kidnapped a Japanese girl from Winslow High School."
"Those bastards!" Her voice burned with righteous fury, or possibly enthusiasm at getting to kick in some shaved heads. I could have checked in the Other Place, but I didn't want to bliss out on her powers just yet.
"They're holed up in that building, above the hardware store," I said. "Intel report that they've scared and internally divided. Some of them weren't behind the idea of the kidnapping, but others were. They're panicking about what the cops or the Japanese gangs will do to them if they're caught."
Victoria puffed up her chest, crossing her arms before her. "They don't need to worry about the cops or other gangs," she announced. "They've got something much more closer to be scared of. Me."
"Yes," I said. I didn't want to be petty, but that was my line. "But at least some of them are thinking of… eliminating her as a witness. We have to stop that. She's not involved in this. Things are bad enough in the city as it is. If they murder a schoolgirl, it'll get much worse."
"You got that right. Well, the good guys are here to stop that!" She bounced up and down on her toes. "Don't worry, I have a plan. I got a good look at the back on my way in. There's a courtyard at the back which the houses and shops back onto. You know, where the loading bays and stuff are. I think it might've been back yards back when these were family homes. There's stairs leading up to the upper levels. Have you got any special government skeleton keys that'd let you get in through the back door?"
"Yes," I said. It wasn't exactly a lie. Being able to reach through a cherub window and open a door from the inside was like a skeleton key.
"Great! Because I have a plan. I'll go in the front. They can't touch me, and it won't be the first lot of gang scum I've taken down." She sounded particularly proud of that. "And when they're all paying attention to me, you can go around the back and get the girl out. If you get into trouble, just call me and I'll punch through to you. It's not very complicated, but that's probably for the best. It means there's less ways it can go wrong."
"Good… good idea," I said. I didn't have a better plan, and a distraction was something I was a fan of. It was easy to underestimate Victoria if you thought of her like a dumb blonde. Of course I didn't because I was smarter than that, but I bet other people did. "I'll get into position and then contact you when it's time to move. Here." I handed her a badge I'd painted silver. "Put this on."
"What is it?"
"Prototype cloaking device," I lied. "It's only got a short battery life, but it'll hide you from onlookers when you get into position. As long as you don't do anything obvious that'll short it out, that is."
"Oh, cool," she breathed.
"Remember to re-activate your voice scrambler," I said, turning my back on her. "I'll be in touch." I stepped into an alcove, then wrapped myself in Isolation. Splitting off a few of my butterflies I sent them to her, to hide her too. Yes, I could have just done that anyway, but what if she tried to talk to someone and freaked out because they didn't notice her? I needed to give an excuse. Secret government gadgets helped me impress Victoria, and also covered up that it was just me working alone.
Viva la taylortech.
No one looked at me as I let myself in through the gate that led to the back area behind the houses. The light here was grey and second-hand, reflected off the walls of the tall houses which flanked this narrow space. All the plants were yellowing; all the paint was flaking. It felt like I was half-way into the Other Place already.
There was a hopscotch square on the ground in the gap between two parked cars, the chalk smudged by many feet. Someone had drawn the silhouette of a girl in white holding a red balloon on the wall, covering up the grey eagle sprayed on the old stone. I was vaguely aware that it was a reference to some kind of cause célèbre of the skinhead movement, but all I could think of was that the kids who played down here saw it every time they did anything.
Counting the doors, I found the stained concrete stairs that led up to the back entrance to the apartment. The door on the other side didn't look like it'd been opened in years. It had been painted shut, and the broken glass had been boarded up with cardboard from the other side. I didn't think I was getting in that way, unless I used an angel. And I didn't want to have to do that now when I might need to use my powers a bunch later.
Scanning the back of the building, I saw that there were balconies that optimistically overlooked the dingy space. There was a thin ledge that ran between the steps and the edge of the nearest one. I took a deep breath and climbed up onto the wall on the edge of the steps. I pulled my gas mask down, and peered at the thin line of brick without the lenses in the way. I couldn't see any signs that it was rotten. The ledge seemed solid and didn't crumble at a touch when I tested it with one foot.
God, why hadn't I thought to have Glory Girl just drop me off here? It'd be a really stupid death if I fell here.
Trusting in the fact that I was skinny, I let myself down onto the ledge, clinging to the rough brickwork. I was very glad it hadn't rained recently. One baby step sidewise, then another. My breaths were tiny shallow things. I managed to get one hand on the drainpipe halfway between me and the balcony. It was just plastic so I couldn't rely on it to support my weight. Then came the hair-raising moment where I had to straddle the drainpipe as I eased my way over it and my foot slipped.
When I finally collapsed bonelessly over onto the balcony, my body was screaming at me that maybe I could have taken some bleeding and pain from using an angel. At least that way I could have avoided having to do that. But no, I'd been a proud idiot.
Just had to catch my breath. Just a bit. I gulped down lungfuls of air, until I felt ready. Sliding my gas mask back down, I checked that I could see properly.
Time to do this.
A cherub was all I needed to slip a hand through and undo the sliding door from the inside. I eased it open. The smell of stale beer, not enough cleaning and old fast food hit me. The faint mutter of voices grew much louder and I froze, trying to listen in. They were arguing again; deep male voices, cracking teenage boy voices, and shrill female voices.
Good. Keep arguing, I thought to myself. The more distracted they were, the less chance there was of them seeing Glory Girl coming.
I crept through the messy household. No one was cleaning it. There were stacked beer cans in the corner and the walls were sticky. A scrawny and spotty teenage boy was sprawled outside the door, playing on a GamePak. Tinny synthesised music and electronic bleeps drifted over to me. In the Other Place, he was a brutish, piggish creature and the electronic noises were just an insect-like buzz.
I exhaled. "Glory Girl," I said softly to the cherub that floated before my face. "I've located the room that they're keeping the girl in, but it's guarded. You may begin when you see fit."
There was no need to send a cherub to collect her response. From the sound of it, she'd literally kicked the door in. The boy on the GamePak looked up, and I reached out. A thick white Idea squirmed off my finger and into his ear. He leapt to his feet and dashed down the hallway as it gnawed into his brain.
That was him out of the way. There were screams and shouts and the sounds of things breaking, so Victoria was busy and I had my distraction. Once I'd got Megumi out, I could watch her fight. I bet it'd be wonderful to watch.
I slipped into the room where they were keeping Megumi. It looked like it'd once been a bedroom, but there was no mattress on the king-sized bed and they'd just been using the room as a place to dump junk. Or maybe it hadn't been a bedroom at all and the old bed was some of the junk dumped in here, because who had a bedroom without windows? Weird.
The first thing I did was remove her blindfold. Megumi blinked in the light, squinting at me from her good eye. The other was so bruised and swollen that she could barely see out of it. From the yelps and thuds in the rest of the apartment, Victoria was busy paying back some of the beating they'd dished out.
Shh, I gestured, holding one finger to the front of my gas mask. "Don't scream," I whispered. "I'm going to get you out of here. If you promise not to make any loud noises, I'll take the gag off."
Trembling, shivering, she nodded. I pulled it away and she worked her mouth. The corners of her mouth were chafed raw. They'd tied it too tight. She licked the corners of her mouth with a wince. "Who are you?" she asked.
"Panopticon. I'm from the government," I said, pulling out my penknife and getting to work on the tape tying her to the chair, "and I'm here to help."
"Police?"
"I'm with the PPD," I lied, getting her hands free. I could hear shouts and screams from elsewhere in the apartment. The skinheads sounded very distracted by Glory Girl getting up in their faces. Megumi whimpered, rubbing her wrists to try to get rid of pins and needles, and I shifted to cutting the tape around her legs. "I've been after this gang for a while."
There was a loud gunshot from next door, followed by a scream. From the tone, it sounded like a man. A little bit of me didn't mind friendly fire among skinheads.
"What happened?" gasped Megumi cowering.
"One of my…" I sawed away, "... someone is taking them down. My job is to get you out of here." Goddamnit, I needed a better knife for this kind of thing. My penknife wasn't cutting it, both figuratively and literally. They'd just wound layer upon layer of electrical tape around her legs and I didn't want to slip and hurt her. That was why I wasn't paying enough attention to my surroundings.
Heavy footsteps clattered outside. The door behind me slammed open. I flinched in shock, dropping my penknife, and whirled to face the intruder. It was a big, older guy with a squashed-up face. His hair was the same red as Alexander's. He was limping, and the left side of his body was covered in plaster dust. But I wasn't really paying attention to that. I was paying attention to the black pistol in his hand. His good right hand.
"Who the fuck are you?" he screamed, levelling the gun at me. "What th-the fuck are you doing here?" The black plastic danced between me and Megumi. She screamed, recoiling away. "Hey, get in… you! Don't move. Call your jap bitch in the mask off! Do what I say! Or else!"
"Phobia," I exhaled, tasting the rot of the Other Place as I breathed out. "Get rid of him."
But he didn't leave, even if his hand trembled more. He swung the gun back towards me, shaking so much he seemed to have palsy. When he raised his left hand to try to steady his aim, he winced in pain. If I had to guess, Victoria had thrown him into a wall not quite hard enough to stop him coming back here to try to get a hostage.
And I could recognise his expression. It was Ryo's expression. It was the expression of a scared man trying to psyche himself up.
I took a deep breath, trying to think of a way out of this. I couldn't get an angel to carry me out. I wasn't going to leave her to him. I didn't think an angel could carry her and I wasn't going to risk it.
The barrel of the gun was very small as it danced around in front of me. Bullets aren't very big things. But it occupied my whole world. His face was snarled up in an agony of indecision and knowing my luck, he'd probably shoot even if I tried to surrender. I shouldn't have used Phobia. He'd chosen fight over flight.
I didn't want to be shot. I had to stop him shooting me.
"Cherub!" I gasped.
He fired. The noise was deafening in this tight confines. And his gun exploded, plastic and metal shrapnel flying all over the place. Paint flaked off the ceiling and walls and the room smelt of mildew and damp.
My cherub had opened a window in front of the gun. The exit had been to the right of the pistol. Physics had done the rest.
The skinhead screamed. His hand was oozing blood from the shrapnel. He compulsively squeezed the trigger, but his gun had come apart in his hand and wasn't going to be firing anything ever again. He seemed to be in shock, not registering what had happened.
And then I was up and moving, hands grabbing for the nearest thing close to me. It turned out to be a dented aluminium baseball bat, and I swung it in both hands into his injured left side. He left out a groan and his face turned pale, dropping the broken remnants of the gun. He brought one arm up, trying to defend himself with his good arm, but I was running on adrenaline and panic. My gas mask fogged up and my breath rasped in my ears as I hit him in the arms and his injured left side again and again.
He went down, too out of breath to scream properly. My fear oozed out of him and across the ground, sinking back into me. I clung to the metal bat like a drowning man would cling to a lump of wood. Megumi had topped out of her chair, and was frantically scrabbling with her hands to free her legs, but I wasn't even thinking about her. I was on the edge of collapsing, and why the fuck had I chosen to wear a gas mask anyway? I couldn't breathe! I had to get it off me and I was going to be sick because I could feel Phobia crawling up out of my throat and—
Nails kept her confined, but things didn't return to normal. I could taste blood. I could hear whispering. There was a big wet stain spreading across the ceiling that hadn't been there before, rotting plaster falling like rain.
I couldn't stop now, though, even though I wanted to pause to get my mind together. My powers didn't scare me, I told myself – lied to myself, really. I bent down, breathing on one gloved hand as the Other Place embraced me. Cry Baby squalled in my hand, coated in grime and rot. I pressed it against his brow, forcing my creature through his skull and into his brain. That'd keep him out of it and stop him from waking up and trying to stab me in the back.
As I withdrew my hand, a flurry of thoughts and memories oozed out. I shuddered as his ideas seeped through the material of my gloves and lodged in my own mind.
There was confusion and annoyance at coming home to find all my kid brother's friends here and shouting at each other. Then came pride in Xander, mixed with fear. Confusion, alarm, then a wall of fear hitting me hard enough I could barely breathe as a black clad figure kicked in the door. Scott went for her; she just slammed him into the ground with an almost casual kick to his thigh. When I went to help him, she threw me into the wall so hard my word went grey from the pain. I couldn't breathe. Everything hurt. I had to run for it. I wasn't the only one. It was only one against many, but no one was thinking - and then I started thinking properly and realised that they must be here for the jap. I'd take her as a hostage, yeah, I thought as I ran for where they'd put her, even as Xander's annoying blonde friend yelled at everyone to get clear and get out of the house. And then—
Recoiling, I wiped the muck off on the ground before anything else could get in my head. "Yuck," I whispered.
The fact that I was kneeling down probably saved my life.
The wall just came apart. Something slammed into my right shoulder, spinning me around and knocking all the breath out of me in a flare of red-hot pain. I gasped for air behind my gas mask, breath rasping. The drywall in front of me looked like moths had been at it. There was more hole than wall. I rolled onto my back, gasping in pain. Had I been shot? No one ever told you what it was meant to feel like. My shoulder was just a solid mass of screaming nerves.
I didn't seem to be bleeding, as far as I could tell. That was something. The air was thick with dust and my shoulder was covered in something sticky and yellow. Acid? No, it was more like… mustard. I dabbed at my shoulder, trying not to scream from the pain, and it certainly had the texture of some kind of condiment. What the fuck?
Behind me was another interior wall so whatever had smashed through had just kept on going. Around the holes, there were sprays of yellow, white, and a red that I desperately hoped was ketchup rather than blood. Broken packets of instant noodles littered the floor. Ruptured bottles of Coke bled out their contents onto the dusty ground. Someone had thrown half a week's shop through the wall, along with the cupboard it'd been stored in.
"Dammit, ow, ow, ow," I panted, breath hissing between clenched teeth.
Megumi was swearing, mixing up English and Japanese. She was probably hurt, but she'd be okay. She sounded too angry to be badly injured. And the skinhead didn't seem to be injured worse than he already was. It looked like he'd fallen out of the path of the projectiles.
Every time I moved my right arm, there was pain. In the fog in my head, I was strangely happy that I'd managed to avoid hurting my dominant hand in this way until the afternoon after my last exam. Swallowing the rust-tasting spit in my mouth, I grabbed the bed with my left arm and pushed myself to my knees. Pain. Had to handle the pain. Sinking into the Other Place, I focussed and coughed up a little red-hot nail. It clattered to the ground in front of me, sizzling. Even breathing in the smoke from it hurt. But now I could think clearly.
And through the holes in the wall, I could see two brilliant, beautiful lights that washed away all the memory of the pain. There was nothing to worry about. Everything was better.
Wait. Two. Even through the bliss, I realised I had forgotten to tell Glory Girl that Tash might be a parahuman.
Oops.
