An Imago of Rust and Crimson
Chapter 3.04
The world had been consumed by fog. Visibility was down to the tens of yards – the light post outside my window was vague and blurred even with my glasses on. This wasn't some parahuman attack, it was just part of life in Brockton Bay. It was early in the year for it, though. Mulls like this usually didn't start until May, but maybe the better weather coming in from the west had kicked it off. Dad kept saying the weather was getting strange, not like when he was a kid. The scientists blamed it on all those volcanoes the Behemoth made.
Sighing, I turned away from the window. It was 07:02, and I'd got bored of lying there. I wasn't sleeping unless I had to. I'd found that by maiming Cry Baby, I could 'cut off' bits of my tiredness and when I reabsorbed it I was mentally refreshed. I still had to get physical rest, but that just meant I had to lie down and pretend to be asleep until I was sure Dad was asleep. Then I could turn my side light back on and read, or send out barbed-wire cherubs to spy on the city. It was really hard to get a glimpse of parahumans out on patrol, but I'd managed it a few times. It was a good pick-me-up.
And I could go like that for two, three days before Cry Baby got too big and strong and started trying to break free. Good enough. Better than wasting my life sleeping. Better than having nightmares every day.
Shambling off to the bathroom, I relieved myself, washed my hands, and began the skincare routine for the scars on my face.
The fog hadn't cleared at all even by the time I got around to making myself breakfast. Wisps of whiteness clawed at the windows and clung to the grass in the back yard. Even if I didn't need to sleep, even if I'd relaxed as much as my body needed, I was still tired. Tired of everything. School was a daily drudge, only tolerable because of my powers. I needed this weekend. I'd probably have to sleep properly tonight, which meant nightmares. Maybe I could send the nightmares to Emma – except, no. Some of my nightmares were about things I saw in the Other Place and the sweatshop. She might use them to find out about me. I couldn't take the chance.
I yawned into my cereal.
Madison still lurked outside classrooms every so often. I didn't know what she was planning, but I was safe. I kept Isolation up all the time except when I actually was in class. I hadn't seen much of the others. My guess was that they'd drawn straws or something, to take turns on doing things to me. I hoped so, at least. That meant that as long as I avoided Madison, the others would just have to wait for their turn.
At least I'd found a few people who tolerated me, like Luci. I made sure to give them a good first impression of me. I was harmless. Inoffensive. I didn't chatter in class and get them in trouble with the teachers. And if things were helped along by having a little thing on their shoulder, whispering that I wasn't so bad – well, it wasn't like my powers were hurting anyone. Emma didn't count. She was the villain, not me. Pinning my little needle-fanged Cravings to her wasn't anything like as bad as what she'd done to me. And she'd done it for no reason at all.
Dad came downstairs. "You look like a mess, kiddo," he said, turning on the radio as he went to grab himself a bowl. "Forget to splash cold water on your face this morning?"
"I did. It didn't help. Didn't get much sleep," I said, with total honesty. "I think it's the weather. It's all… claustrophobic."
He shook his head as he sat down, music playing in the background. "We never used to get fog this thick this early in the year," he said. There was a pause. "Was… was it the nightmares again?"
I swallowed and lied. "Yes."
He clinked his spoon against the side of the bowl, tapping it as he thought. It got on my nerves. "Taylor," he said, hesitantly, "… do you want a nightlight?"
I did not pout. I would like to make that clear. "I'm not a little kid anymore!" I protested.
"I know, I know. It's just. Well. How do I put it? Maybe it might help?"
I sighed, running my hands down my face. When I pulled them away, I could see foundation on my palms. Stupid, stupid, stupid. I kept on doing that when I forgot I had it on, especially when I was tired. I never used to wear makeup. "I'll get through it," I told him. I paused, and took a breath. "But… it can't hurt," I said reluctantly. He was only trying to help, after all. I'd find a way to deal with it with my own powers. But like I had told him, it couldn't hurt.
"We'll get one today," he said. At least he'd stopped with the tapping. "You want coffee?" he said, getting up.
"Yeah. I could do with it."
Just then, the radio crackled and the song cut off midway through. Five short bleeps sounded.
"This is a Department for Homeland Security priority warning to Region 1 New England," said the speaker on the radio. It was one of the identical-sounding women who always seemed be chosen to make government announcements. They were probably selected for their ability to sound professional and reassuring even if they were announcing the end of the world. "We are upgrading the terrorism threat level from Yellow-Elevated to Orange-High, for the states of Maine, New Hampshire and Vermont." That was us.
"Turn it up," Dad said from beside me, nodding towards the radio on the table.
"Known threats to American national security have been sighted in Augusta, Maine," the voice announced calmly. "They are believed to be linked to multiple attacks in Vermont and Maine over the past month. The group is believed to be made up of a mix of US nationals and Canadians. Reports confirm that at least one of them is displaying parahuman powers. Citizens should not approach suspicious individuals – the suspected parahuman is mentally ill and is dangerous. Do not attempt to interact with any members of suspicious groups. This may lead them to attacking you. If in any doubt, call the emergency hotline on 3-6-9. Remember – do the right thing and dial the right side."
The kettle hissed as Dad spooned out instant coffee. "Fat lot of use that is," he muttered. "Somewhere in three states there are a group of dangerous maniacs, but we're not going to tell you what they look like. Why do they even bother sending out these kinds of useless warnings? I can tell you why – it suits their interests to keep us in a permanent state of fear."
"Yes, Dad," I said, trying to avert a diatribe. It didn't work.
He sucked on his teeth. "Who wants us scared? That's the wrong question. Who doesn't want us scared? The government wants us scared, because people don't question it when everyone's more worried about the Endbringers and terrorism and criminals. Companies want us scared, because people don't ask for raises when they're worried about losing their jobs. The press want us scared, because scary stories sell papers and advertising space. And advertising certainly wants us scared, because you can sell things to scared people who aren't thinking straight."
"Yes, Dad," I tried.
He poured the water into the mugs from the kettle. "It's what makes me laugh about people who claim there's a big conspiracy controlling society. Conspiracies? Hah! Who needs secret conspiracies when it's in the self-interest of everyone who's rich and powerful to get a scared population? Not too scared, of course. Just scared enough to stop them asking questions, not so scared that they start doing stupid things. Just scared enough to keep them buying, not so scared that they stop spending. It's the blind fuc-flipping worship of Saint Reagan. I'm surprised half the damn country hasn't started petitioning the Vatican for his canonisation."
This was getting awkward, as it always did. I just sat back and let him run out of steam, which took about as long as it took for the coffee to finish brewing. "Milk? Sugar?" he asked.
"Just sugar," I said. I needed it to help me wake up.
The fog was thinning by the time we left the house, but visibility still wasn't great. At its worst, fog could shut down half the city for days. Dad hated that, because the docks got hit worst. Even the rest of Brockton Bay got hit with more brownouts and power cuts, because the power plant out at Red Beach really doesn't like the fog. No, I don't know why. Maybe it's the moisture, or maybe it's just people not showing up for work. I was just glad it was still working, for now. There'd been only one big brownout lately, on Thursday, when I was in the computer lab. The lesson had been cancelled, and I'd gone to the library and read. The rest had been pretty brief.
At least the Boardwalk had its demisting stuff. When we stepped past the threshold, it was like stepping inside. Or maybe like stepping into a different day, because the smartfabric overhead made it look like it was sunny and clear, and the heaters took the nip off the air. Dad harrumphed and muttered something about 'wasteful', but I was just glad that my glasses weren't fogging up in these streets. I took them off and polished them. The Boardwalk was pretty busy, so I made sure to stay close to Dad as we headed to the garden where I was meeting up with Sam.
Between the fog slowing down the traffic and the walk from Dad's work, we were running a bit late. Sam was there already, along with a smartly dressed woman who I guessed was her mother. They had the same hair colour, at least.
Sam's hair had been tidied up since I'd last seen her. It used to be jaw-length and crudely-cut, like someone had gone at it with scissors. Now it was even shorter, in a tomboyish pixie cut. She had the right face for it. Hair that short would have just made me look like a boy. Of course, we had at least one thing in common – long-sleeved tops, to cover up our wrists. She was also wearing blue-tinted glasses, which surprised me. She hadn't been wearing them in the hospital. Her eyes couldn't be that bad if she'd got away without them, surely? Then I looked more closely, and realised they weren't spectacles. They were tinkerfab hudglasses.
Inwardly I sighed. I'd picked up that she was from a pretty well-off family back at the psych hospital, but I didn't realise she was outright rich. The way her mother dressed just made it even clearer. She was wearing nevercrease smartfabric, and there were little fish swimming across her blue shirt. I sighed. It looked really good on her.
I sunk into the Other Place to check her for signs of hidden evil – and yes, maybe plant some Sympathy on her for a good first impression. In there, the resemblance to her daughter vanished. Sam looked… actually, she looked better than she had in hospital. She was still burnt and frozen at the same time, but now there were little chains, each link the same bright colour as one of her pills, which seemed to be – hah – literally holding her together. By contrast, her mother had pale skin and a mouthful of needle fangs, like something from a horror movie. Her eyes were mechanical, stapled to her face, dried blood seeping out where flesh met metal.
Well. I had no idea what the eyes meant, but the mouth suggested 'vampire' or 'leech' or 'predator'. Maybe she worked in finance. Or, hell, I don't know, liked her steaks raw. Stupid useless vague Other Place.
Sam said something to her mother, and then waved at me. "Taylor," she called out. "Um. Hey."
I rose out of the Other Place as I approached her. "Heya," I said, just as awkwardly. It wasn't even because I'd just seen her as a monster chained by symbolic drugs or anything. That was hardly the worst thing I'd seen, and it was a clear sign she was getting better. I just wasn't great with people. "Um. How are you doing?"
"Better, yeah. Definitely better. You're doing okay?"
"Well enough," I said, shrugging. "Some days are better than others. You know how it is."
"Yeah. So. Um." Sam swallowed. "Weird weather we're having, right?"
"I know," I said, glad to have something else to talk about.
"Pia," Sam's mum introduced herself.
"Danny," Dad said. I shot a glance at him, trying to tell him to behave and not talk about politics or do anything embarrassing. I wasn't sure how well it worked. It's hard to convey complex sentences in glance form. I'd probably have to make a construct to do it. And I didn't think it was really important enough to do something like that. Also, possibly immoral.
We made noises about the weather and other nothing-topics for a bit, and then Sam's mum suggested that we go sit at one of the Boardwalk cafes. It had a vaguely nautical theme, and was pretending to be a traditional seaside New England place. That would probably have been more convincing if it hadn't been a chain. At least the demisting and the heaters let us sit outside like it wasn't a cold foggy day. I ordered an orange juice, and nursed it.
"You just missed the fire, you know," Sam said, leaning back in her chair. She sipped at her green tea.
"The fire?" I asked.
"You didn't hear?" she said, raising her eyebrows. "Well, I guess you wouldn't. There was a big fire in the kitchens, back at the place. I heard it was the deep fat fryer. That's what Leah said she heard, anyway. We all got herded out to the fire evacuation point and got rained on and it sucked."
I'd been lucky to avoid that, apparently. "Wow," I said. "Did anyone get hurt?"
Sam shrugged. "I dunno," she said. "But there were a bunch of ambulances showing up. I'd kinda hoped you might have seen more about it in the papers."
I shook my head. "Nothing, although I wasn't really looking," I said, rubbing my fingers up and down the side the condensation of my glass.
"Yeah, well, because the kitchens had caught fire, the food went literally straight to hell. It wasn't all that great to start with, remember?"
I hadn't thought it was that bad. It had been better than Winslow's canteen food, at least. "Yuck," I said, to show solidarity.
"Yeah, you got that right. And the fire must have damaged something because we had a bunch of power cuts. Not normal ones, I mean. I could still see lights on outside, over by the highway. And – get this! All the lights in the canteen blew, can you believe it? Like, they literally blew up. Shattered. Glass went everywhere. Some people got cut up."
Wow. "Was everyone okay?" I asked. "Leah and you and… the other two?"
Sam frowned. "The other two?" she asked. "Henna and 'Tash? Yeah, they were fine. Oh yeah, you didn't meet 'Tash. Tori got moved out almost immediately."
I sipped my juice. Oh yes, Emily had left just before I had. "No, Kirsty," I said, the name clicking after some thought.
"Kirsty?" Sam said blankly.
I stared at her. "You know? The quiet one? Who spent all her time in her room and never talked."
Vague recognition flickered in Sam's eyes. "Oh yeah. The one in the room next to me. Sorry, not too great with names. I don't think I said a single word to her, you know?" She snorted. "Nah, we were all fine. It was the old people who were eating in there."
"That's good," I said, nodding. "Um. Well. Not good-good, but at least you were all okay."
"Yeah," Sam agreed. "Still, you thought it was boring normally? With no power, it got even worse. There was literally nothing to do. So glad to be out."
Well, that was something we could both agree on. "Me too," I said.
God, we'd already run out of things to say. We'd talked about the weather. We'd talked about how good it was that we weren't in a psych hospital anymore. Did we have anything else in common? What did people who weren't being bullied by three psychotic bitches even talk about? I guessed we could complain about schoolwork, but – wait, no. She wasn't back at school yet.
She looked just as stuck. "So, what do you want to do?" Sam asked, finishing off her tea. "Want to go hang out at Little Paris?"
I swallowed. "Uh," I began, "I don't have… one of those card things you need to get in or anything." She seemed really casual about the idea of getting into that submall, and her next words confirmed that.
"Oh, no problem," she said. "I've got a Gold card, so that means I've got guest passes. That'll be okay, Mum, right?"
"Yes. You know I prefer you shopping somewhere that's safe," her mother said airily, breaking off her conversation with Dad.
"Yeah, see. Come on, there's better shops down there than in the main Boardwalk. Definitely better than anything elsewhere, at least."
How was I supposed to turn that down? Without letting onto the fact that I probably wouldn't be able to afford anything in there, I mean? Well, maybe the food, although that was probably super expensive too. Maybe I could buy a single hair clip. But on the other hand, there was a bit of me which wanted to have a look inside. Dad was always talking about the inequality of society and how the rich didn't even want everyone else seeing how much better off they were or else people'd be breaking out the guillotines. It had piqued my curiosity.
The two of us made our way to Little Paris, on the edge of the Boardwalk next to Ashton Park. The streets were just as fake and full of eyes in the Other Place as they had been last time I was here. Plastic grey men and women served monsters. The cameras were everywhere, and bloodshot eyes blinked from behind their lenses. Squirming, coiling things wriggled over the billboards covered in misspelt slogans telling the world to
BuY bUY BUY
and
DONT WORY ABOUT THE FUTure
WHO CARES ABOAT THE passd
DO WHAT YOURE TOLD
and
death is the ONLY WAY to pay off the ORGINAL SIN of mankind so whatre a few more?.
Somehow, my power managed to be even more cynical about politics than Dad.
Getting into the submall meant we had to go through the whole security process. Taking our shoes off and being waved at with metal detecting rods and walking through the tinkerfab scanners and filling out a form with our personal details and so on. Well, I say 'we', but Sam got to use the quick access checks, because it was her card. That meant fifteen minutes in line for me and another five actually being checked. I didn't see what they did to her.
She looked pretty awkward on the other side. "Sorry," she said, hands in her pockets, as we waited for the elevator just past the pickup point. "I didn't know it was like that for guests. Everyone I've been with had a Bronze at least. You should get one. It makes it so much faster 'cause they have all your details on the system."
I looked away, trying to force down the hot shame in my stomach. "I wouldn't use it enough to make it worth it," I said. "I don't really shop much. Well, I mean, apart from books and there aren't any proper bookstores down here."
Sam snorted. "Yeah, Leah says much the same. 'bout the books at least." The wood-veneered elevator arrived, and she grinned at me as we got in. "I guess maybe I'm just a magnet for bookworms?" The interior was plastered with deliberately old posters. They were all in French. It was a really subtle nod to the mall's brand.
Little Paris, like a bunch of submalls around the country, had originally been built as a shelter. Lobbyists had got the state governments, back when the Endbringers were a new thing, to build far more shelters than were actually needed. The surplus ones had been sold off to try to recoup some of the wasted money. Well, that was one version of events. The other one was that big business had talked authorities short on cash into cheaply selling off inner city shelters for commercial use, and no-one seemed to care it meant the nearest shelter might be half an hour away. Either way, places which handled expensive technology took up residence in them. That meant labs, tinkerworks, and of course, submalls.
I glanced around as the elevator doors opened. However it started, nowadays it had a very pretty Old World look. They'd clearly done a lot of work to cover up its origins – even the low ceiling of the entry hallway was masked by a smartscreen, showing a view of a sky. Not the one above Brockton Bay, though. A nicer one. I drew a deep breath. The air was clean and fresh – in fact, it tasted fresher than the city above, with a slight scent of herbs.
"So, where d'you want to go?" Sam asked me. "I thought maybe we could go to Blackmore's. That's always good. Check the screens, maybe see if they have the new MaC out… do you play MaC?"
I wasn't really listening.
Beyond the entry hall was the submall proper. Objectively, I knew it was the same size as the other shelters I'd been to in the quarterly drills at school. Despite that, it felt a lot bigger. I guess when you're not cramming thousands of school kids and teachers into this space, it goes a lot further. And of course, it's not like they were selling in bulk like regular shops. Normal stuff like that you picked up from the collection point on the surface.
Down here? Down here you had electronics shops selling paper-thin flexible tablets with more processing power than the entire computer lab at Winslow. You had fashion shops stocking high end smart fabric which could literally reconfigure itself as you wore it. You had a medical clinic advertising cloned organs and cybernetics. There was an animated billboard listing the merits of the 'Bushmaster XG-3 – the ultimate hunting coilgun'. Where normal shops had assistants, here they had genejacks – vat-grown meat robots – and the shelves were being restocked by little squat white robots.
And that was just tinkerfab stuff. I heard they sold actual tinkertech down here.
I was jealous. No, I was more than jealous. Seeing these things displayed so casually down here was… was wrong. I sunk into the Other Place, just waiting for the horrors to make themselves evident. I would find the lies they were hiding.
I closed my eyes, trying not to shiver as the usual chill crept in. It was always cold. Better than the alternative, I supposed. If the Other Place were ever hot, it'd probably be on fire. My nostrils flared. It smelt like old coins and nails. Fresh blood, not the usual gory rot. There was less mildew to the air, less wetness, but that just made the blood stand out more. There was a strange edge to it, too. Under the blood and tarnish, there was a definite smell of – I inhaled – plastic. It was the slightly stale, hot smell of a shrink-wrapped thing after the cellophane came off, with maybe a hint of ozone.
It's really hard to describe smells, you know that?
I opened my eyes. It was fake. It was all fake. Splintered wood veneers revealed grey concrete. Cracked yellow stone shopfronts were grey plastic underneath. The floor was thick with grime. Looking around, I realised it was thickest where people were. It must have been walked in. Up above head height, things were just rotting away slowly, but where people sat and ate and touched and talked, the walls and floors were caked with dried blood. In places, the trails were even fresh. Charming.
I drifted forward, peering over my glasses, taking the place in. To my left was a clothes shop, its tinkerfab garments all locked in cases. I didn't know how you were meant to try them on. Maybe they just fitted them to you. None of them had any trace of the reek. None of them had any trace of... anything. They were grey and sterile and lifeless. Of course the clothes they sold here weren't made in sweatshops. They'd probably never been touched by a human being before they were put in the display cabinet. And given that the robots on the shop floor, maybe they'd never been touched by a human at all.
God, how many actual real human beings were even staffing this place? The thought struck me as I stared. In the real word, there'd been robots and genejack meat androids with barcodes on their foreheads and automated tillers and touchscreens everywhere. Here, it was somehow more obvious. Any attempt to personify them failed. Even the genejacks were more like the furniture than the people. Their paper-thin skin flaked and peeled, showing off grey colourless muscle that did nothing to distract from the needles sticking out of their heads. They weren't the ones profiting here – they were equipment. Where did the money go?
There was a glow at the end of the hall. A beautiful, wonderful light. It sank into me, and I shivered slightly from sheer joy. I had to follow it.
I felt a yank on my shoulder, and I whirled to face a burned and frozen corpse. Of course I flinched.
"Taylor," it demanded of me. I left the Other Place, and watched as Sam's face built itself up again from the wreck it had been before. "Taylor. Literally, what's going on with you? You just stood there and then when I realised you weren't following you started wandering off in the wrong direction." Her eyes gleamed as she stared at me.
"It's just a lot to take in," I said weakly. "I… I haven't been here for ages. Um. Ever."
I got to watch a series of emotions flicker over Sam's face. She went from surprise to confusion to dawning realisation to a look of mortification. Oh God. And now she was going to be embarrassed because she had thought I was someone like her and…
"Fuck," she said softly. "I mean… um… no, really, fuck about summarises it." She cupped her hands over her mouth. "You must think I'm such a bitch and I'm rubbing this in your face," she mumbled. "I… I just didn't put it together because all my friends go here at least sometimes and I didn't even think that… look, I know we're well-off but… um. Sorry."
Looking at her, I… I didn't know what to feel. She seemed genuine. It was easy for people to just pretend, though. I forced myself to smile, even as I watched her face twist into monstrosity again. "It's okay," I said. I was used to pretending, too. I'd had years of practice. What did I want to do? I didn't want to do anything with my constructs. I didn't care what she said, just why she was saying it. I wanted to see her feelings, not give her my own. "No problem at all."
Of course. It was obvious. I exhaled the raw stuff of the Other Place, unformed and unshaped black mist. She breathed it in, and then I inhaled again, drawing it out of her. Her guilt and awkwardness and the faint feelings of nausea and stomach aches – I felt them all, burning as I swallowed them.
She was genuine. She really felt bad about it. She wasn't faking.
I almost felt like laughing despite the sickness coursing through me. If I could send out bits of myself to make other people feel what I wanted, why not send them out to feel what they felt, to 'taste' them? After all, that was how the Other Place worked! It soaked up everything that happened, absorbing it and warping to match events. I was the one who controlled it, so I could do the same! The realisation felt as good as the chocolate-coated-opiates I got from watching powers at work.
"You aren't mad?" she asked quietly.
Returning to normalcy, I grinned at Sam, letting my glee show. "Look, it's not your fault you're rich," I told her. "Just the fact that you felt bad means you can't be too much of a stuck-up bitch." I really was happy, anyway. She really was sorry. Maybe… maybe this might work out. I could tell if she was going to betray me, which meant I could trust her. And she needed a friend as bad as I did. Maybe more. I'd heard the hope in her voice when I'd called her back.
I looked around, and saw there were some free seats down the hall. I helped her over, and we sat down.
"Thanks," she said, voice shaking. "I… I just didn't think, you know, and I don't know whether it's the meds or whether it's just that I didn't think and…"
"It's okay," I assured her. There was a stall ahead manned by a genejack selling 'homemade' pastries. The sheer incongruity of a vat-grown meat android – girl android, in this case – selling things which prided themselves on being made traditionally was breathtaking. Whoever came up with that idea must have had no sense of irony whatever. "Look, if you want to make it up to me, let's go get something to eat. With lots of sugar in."
Plus, how the fuck was it cheaper to get a genejack to do that rather than just hire someone? I was so glad Dad wasn't here. He would have had kittens.
She gave me a weak grin. "Sugar is good." She frowned. "Uh, but not nuts. I can't have nuts."
I snorted. "Look at that place. It's so sterile I bet they don't even use real nuts. They're probably some freaky GM stuff. Or something grown in a vat."
Sam shot a look at me. "Nah, it says it's made traditionally," she said, shaking her head.
Well, yes, it might have said that, but they were lying. I'd seen how grey and untouched and plastic the food looked. "You're probably right," I said. "So, that's okay?"
"Yeah," she said, before adding more strongly, "Yeah. Look. Um, after we eat this, you want to go somewhere else?"
"I'm fine," I said truthfully. And I was. I'd seen a parahuman glow in here. "It'd be a waste to not take a look around. Just for a bit, you know." I sighed. "I can dream, right?"
She nodded sympathetically, swinging her legs. "Come on, then,"
As it turned out, the things from the stall actually were homemade. If you assumed the genejack was stored in this building and so it counted as its home, I mean. That had to be the loophole they were using, since it literally baked them on the spot there. The prices were pretty horrific, but Sam paid them without hesitation. She felt awful about dragging me down here, so she insisted on treating me.
It was a good thing that I was a nice person, or I could totally have taken advantage of this.
While we waited for the pastries to bake, I occupied myself with trying to catch another glimpse of the glow, flickering in and out of the Other Place. Little Paris wasn't that big compared to a surface mall, so I had a good chance of catching them just by waiting in the main hall. It wasn't as though a euphoric light would be easy to miss in a decaying plastic world of leech-mouthed men and women with rusty iron bull horns. Soon enough, I felt that happy, warm rush.
My heart sped up, and my breath hitched in my throat. It was a pure, brilliant white, its radiance draining the horror from the Other Place. If the criminal at the sweatshop had been delicate, fern-like fronds, then this was a roaring pillar of fire. Little embers flickered off it, alighting on those who stood nearby, sharing the glow with them. The woman at the heart of it was eyeless, with two horns of flame-blackened gold, but she mattered so much less than the light that burned through her skin, each muscle ablaze.
It was beautiful. It was wonderful. It was all I could do to stop myself breaking into a run, although I couldn't remember exactly why I shouldn't. Instead, I just watched her burning pillar endlessly shed its embers, making the world a better place. There were other, more subtle glows – hints of an electric blue coming from something at her waist, and a sparkling amethyst glimmer from something around her neck. They only added to her beauty, I thought, trying to swallow. My throat felt like a desert, and my palms were clammy.
I could have stayed there forever. I could have, but I didn't. I managed to force myself away from the bliss, though it hurt to return to the normal world, filled with lies and empty of that light. There was something I had to do. I had to see who she was. See her 'real' face so I could find her again. So I could send a porcelain-faced cherub after her and bask in the light.
Back in reality, she seemed so much more mundane. I almost pitied everyone else. So much of what the Other Place showed me was horrible, but those few moments of beauty almost made it worth it. With her fire hidden, the woman was revealed to be a blonde girl around my age. She was tall – though not as tall as me – but unlike me, she actually had a figure worth speaking of. She was wearing a clearly expensive tinkercloth outfit, and carrying a branded bag.
I could recognise her, though. I'd been reading up on the local heroes and villains as part of my research, and she was one of the ones with a public identity. Victoria Dallon, who went by the codename 'Glory Girl'. She was about my age, and went to Arcadia – obviously. You didn't see heroes in a shithole like Winslow.
Apart from me, obviously.
My mind whirred, riding a wave of euphoria. Yes. She was part of an independent hero group – obviously under PPD regulation – but not part of the Wards. I knew her name, I knew what she looked like. I even knew what her power looked like. I'd be able to find her again with Sniffer, I was sure of it. And then I could drop intel leaks with her. Yes! She'd be able to make sure they got to the police, and they'd trust her much more than an anonymous tip off. After all, if I just had a cherub drop evidence on someone's desk, it might get ignored, or passed over. They might even be a corrupt cop who'd make the evidence vanish. I was lucky the sweatshop worked out so well.
If a hero handed it in, it'd get attention. The right kind of attention. And if she met up with other heroes, I'd be able to see them too and-
Sam snapped her fingers in front of my face. "Uh, hello? Earth to Taylor? You zoned out again. Um… is that, like, a thing with you or… what?"
I said the first thing which came to mind. "I think it's a side effect of the meds."
"Oh." She fell silent. "Yeah. Mine have been giving me stomach cramps, and I'm putting on weight. It fucking sucks." She thrust a paper bag into my hands. "Here's your muffin. Don't let it go cold. The chocolate on the inside is gorgeous when it's melted."
The muffin was the product of an abusive and unfair system where the rich got richer and used meat androids when there were unemployed people everywhere. Still, even Dad would have had to admit it was a really good muffin.
