“Aye, best be safe than sorry.”
I was on my feet now. A helicopter had spied where I’d crawled off the road, barely able to move because of injuries from my last fight, and the dragging wounds I’d suffered while riding the bottom of the truck. For all I knew, there was a trail of blood leading right to me. A bloodhound could probably follow me easily.
“I thought you said you were going to call it in?”
“I am, I am; just a wee second.”
I clenched my fist. I couldn’t let them call it in, whoever they were. They’d bring all manner of hell down on me, and now that I’d lost my voices—my souls—I’d lost the power to fly the hell out of here in a hot second, to heal myself nearly instantly after a grievous wounding—hence my spending the night under the bushes—and nearly all my power to fight back.
Nearly all.
Choosing my path carefully, I set around the edges of the bush, snaking my way hurriedly but carefully back up toward the road. I had to stop them before they called for help, or else they might summon more trouble to me than I could possibly handle.
3.
Reed
Eden Prairie, Minnesota
It was just before midnight, and all of us had been glued to the TV in the bullpen for countless hours. I’d watched the footage coming out of Edinburgh with alternating fear and horror wrestling like twin snakes in my belly. Someone had turned loose metahuman powers in a major way, but naturally all the blame was going to Sienna, even though everyone on the planet knew she didn’t have the ability to shoot giant red exploding forcefield beams out of her hands (I don’t know how else to describe them). It was a subtle narrative trick, but one that the news anchor providing breathless coverage of the chaos—which hadn’t had an actual news update in about six hours—had well in hand by now.
“Again, we are coming to you live,” the head anchor—head wanker, more like—said, “and this is a BREAKING NEWS ALERT.” He got very self important as he said this, slight double chin wobbling, his bald head gleaming under the studio lights. “Sienna Nealon has been involved in rogue metahuman action this evening in Edinburgh, Scotland. Details are still scarce—”
“Hasn’t stopped you from talking about it non-stop for the last six hours though, has it?” Augustus Coleman said, his patience with this twenty-four-hour news bullshit as thin as my own. “I mean, really, people. Just shut up for a little while and let some facts roll in before you go running your mouths.”
“Well, that’s the hazard of humanity, isn’t it?” Jamal Coleman asked, quietly pensive. He was standing back, had been on his feet the whole time, occasionally walking back to his computer and giving it a tweak with his electricity powers, probably downloading the whole internet into his brain and coming back to stand, nervously, around the TV with the rest of us. “We always operate from incomplete information, but it never seems to stop us from arriving at our judgments. About our actions, about others…we’ve got an opinion on everything, but when you stop and think about it? It’s breathtaking how little we actually know.”
“Speak for yourself,” Guy Friday said. “I know lots. Lots and lots. I know so much you could fill books with it.” He was still wearing that black mask that he always seemed to wear, everywhere he went—which begged the question to me of how he didn’t get in trouble with stores when he did his shopping—but judging by the thin, pursed line that was his lips, showing through the gap for his mouth, he was as worried as the rest of us. You could kind of tell by the quiet. Under normal conditions, he wouldn’t shut up.
These were the first words Friday had said in about three hours. He had a hand on his chin, and he’d chewed his fingernails down to almost nothing, a ragged edge left on the tips.
Someone eased up to me, his curly, dirty blond hair visible by dint of the way he’d lowered his head, like he was doing some serious pondering of his own. “What the hell do we do about this?” Scott Byerly asked, voice so low that it wouldn’t be blazingly obvious to everyone else in the room that we were even talking.
“Yo, I can hear you,” Augustus said, not turning around. “Scotty. Meta-low talking only works around people who ain’t metas.”
“We’re not doing anything,” I said, answering probably a little too quickly. Every head in the bullpen turned to me.
“Yo, chief,” J.J. said, “this is Sienna we’re talking about.”
“She’s a big girl, though,” Abby said, giving a flash of her pink hair as she turned to speak directly to J.J. himself. “She can deal.”
“Hey, guys?” Chase Blanton asked, a little tentatively. She was the newest member of our team, and had only been with us for a couple months. She’d come recommended by Sienna. To me. In a dream. And as strange as that sounds, it was good enough for me. “I’m gonna head out, okay?”
“Sure,” I said, trying to be as quietly magnanimous as possible. We were way after hours here, and I hadn’t even considered how some of these people might have been hanging out because I was, following in the example of the boss. “Anyone who wants to go, seriously, guys, you can leave any time.”
“Yeah, we know that,” Jamal said, keeping his eyes fixed on the TV. “Angel and Miranda left hours ago.”
I looked around. I didn’t even know Miranda and Angel had gone. But then, I’d been a little distracted with what was going on with the TV and the complete lack of new news.
And here I was, left with a core group that had all—mostly—worked with and knew Sienna, and we were all standing around the bullpen with the hour hand creeping closer to midnight on the wall clock, watching a pointless news broadcast that would tell us no more than it had six hours ago, the last time they’d actually had something to report. The live broadcast from Scotland showed signs of the horizon lightening behind the reporter, grey skies showing themselves in full, UK glory.
I looked up; Chase had disappeared out of the exit to the lobby without another word, and that left those of us remaining all staring at the screen. No one was wavering, no one was looking around, trying to figure out when it was polite to make their exit. There was concern, there was worry—surprising, I know, coming from Friday, but it was there—and there was—I think—just a little fear.
Maybe that was just me.
“I’m heading out, guys,” I said, trying to put a pin in this before everybody stayed up til unholier hours for news that wasn’t forthcoming. Sienna had probably found a place to lay low, a nice hole she could crawl in and say, “To hell with the world,” until it forgot about her for a bit. Maybe she’d even jetted off to another continent. She could be almost to Australia by now, for all we knew, after all.
My announcement seemed to break up the party a little. “Say hey to Isabella for us,” Abigail called.
“You’re such a sweet and considerate person,” J.J. said. They leaned forward and kissed. Then again. Then—
“Yeah, I’m out, too,” Augustus said, on his feet at meta speed double time.
J.J. and Abby broke for air, and he winked at me, like he thought he’d done me a favor by clearing out the bullpen. “Just as well,” J.J. said. “You wouldn’t have wanted to see where it goes next.”
I cringed, not because of their inappropriate PDA, but because I saw one of our people had drifted over to them, leaning against over the top of the cubicle wall they were sitting in front of. “I’m interested,” Friday said, leaning over casually. “Go on. I’ll watch.”
“Time for me to call it a night,” Scott said, and bailed for the lobby.
“Yep, it’s late,” Jamal said, right after him.
“Too true, gents,” Augustus said, looking right at me. “Shall we?”