“I recommend caution,” said Phobia, his raspy voice as patient as ever. “These are old tunnels with old foundations. You wouldn’t want us all to be buried alive, would you?” He spun his scythe overhead. “I wouldn’t mind so much, but I doubt that was your intention when you came to interrupt our repose.”
With Ingrid still blocking her view, Nova sank back between the wall and train car. She reached the metal rungs on the side of the car and, gripping the gun in one hand, scampered to the top. She stretched out on her stomach, inching forward until she could see the platform below.
“I think what Phobia’s saying,” said Ingrid, blue sparks flickering at her fingertips, “is that sometimes showing off can have negative effects.”
Frostbite smirked. “I wouldn’t know.”
Screams of hysteria echoed up from the far tunnel. Nova planted one hand on the rooftop of the car, craning her head upward. At first Honey’s wails were indistinct cries of panic, but as they grew nearer, they began to merge into desperate words.
“Put them back! Put them back! You don’t know what you’re doing!”
Moments later, Gargoyle lumbered out from the overhang of the tunnel, his arms cradling close to two dozen bee hives of various sizes and states of completion. The swarms of angry drones were buzzing all around him, creating a black writhing mass that engulfed his torso, but he had turned his entire body to stone and their vicious stings appeared to have no effect.
Honey came marching after him, dressed in a pale pink negligee, her hair rolled in curlers. “You have no idea the work that goes into those, you giant chunk of rubble!”
When Gargoyle continued to ignore her, she started to run and launched herself at him, grasping for his thick arm. She dangled from his elbow, her pale legs kicking vainly at his side.
Irritated, the Gargoyle gave one powerful shake of his arm, sending Honey skidding across the platform. She crashed into the pile of supplies, her shoulder smacking the toppled metal shelf. Though momentarily dazed, her eyes were vicious when she raised them again.
Gargoyle came to stand before Frostbite, who seemed to tense, her eyes darting warily around the cloud of wasps and hornets, some of which had bodies as long and thick as Nova’s thumb, and venom that could burn like hot pokers.
Frostbite jutted a finger toward Honey. “Call them off,” she demanded, her voice dulled by the buzzing all around her. “Send them away or this will be treated as a use of prodigious abilities against an active Renegade.”
Honey pushed herself up to sitting. “I will as soon as he puts those back where he found them!”
“Puts them back?” Frostbite said, her tone laced with amusement. She turned to Gargoyle. “Where did you find them?”
“She’s got a room a few hundred feet down that way,” he said. “An old storeroom of sorts. Was brimming with these.”
“Well, for a prodigy with control over bees,” said Frostbite, cocking her head, “that sounds like harboring deadly weapons to me.”
Honey let out an aghast cry. “Those are my babies! And you’ve just taken their homes—the homes you have no right to!”
“And I’m telling you to call off your babies, now,” said Frostbite. “Or else your next home will be a prison cell at Renegade Headquarters.”
Honey fixed a glare on her and Nova could see her shaking. Her eyes flashed and the air seemed to hum around her—though perhaps that was the incessant buzzing as the bees continued to throw themselves at Gargoyle’s impenetrable skin.
Nova could see temptation written across Honey’s face, coupled with indecision.
Perhaps she couldn’t harm Gargoyle, but Frostbite would be plenty vulnerable to the stingers of her most deadly wasps. Nova had to admit, seeing Frostbite writhing in pain from a hundred venomous stings seemed very appealing at that moment.
But it would last only seconds before Gargoyle reached Honey and either killed her or arrested her.
This tiny revenge wasn’t worth it, Nova knew, and Honey seemed to realize the same thing. Drawing herself up amid the toppled cans and boxes, she squared her shoulders and flung her arm wide.
As one, the swarming insects cycloned into the air, then turned and retreated back into the tunnel.
Once they had gone, Frostbite nodded at the Gargoyle. “Destroy them.”
Nova gasped, but the sound went unheard behind Honey’s shriek.
Gargoyle dumped the hives onto the ground and began stomping through them, crushing them one by one beneath his massive stone feet.
Honey’s cries turned from enraged to heartbroken as she watched the destruction being wracked upon the hives—many with drones and worker bees still inside. Honey’s body was ravaged by sobs as the destruction grew. Papery walls scattered across the platform, and the corpses and detached wings of bees smashed into the concrete.
All the while, the Gargoyle was grinning. It was the smile of a child who had just discovered the sadistic pleasure of crushing beetles beneath his heel.
Nova ground her teeth until her jaw hurt. She swung her attention from Honey to Ingrid, Cyanide to Phobia, but no one moved to stop the Gargoyle.
Any attempt to stop him would be seen as an attack on a Renegade and would be cause for arrest. The Renegades had made it quite clear when they accepted Cyanide’s truce all those years ago that the Anarchists would not be given any third chances.
Finally the Gargoyle was finished. He kicked aside the remains of the last hive. It skidded across the platform and tumbled onto the tracks, not far from where Frostbite had dumped out Winston’s cereal.
“Well, now that we’re all accounted for…,” said Frostbite sweetly, twirling the shard of ice like a baton. “We have some business to attend to.”
She turned and, before Nova could guess her intentions, heaved the ice like a javelin at Phobia. It struck him through the chest and his body dispersed into black smoke, wisping back into the shadows of the tunnel.