The Taste Of Night

13

The sanctuary exploded with sound just before dawn. I took a jagged path toward awareness, fits and starts of comprehension battling the fatigue brought on by my sessions with Tekla and the alcohol I’d drunk earlier. Footsteps pounded in the hall, and the strobe light above my door fired light in half circles across the concrete walls of my room, left to right, then back again, while emitting a high-pitched whine that had my teeth clenching hard. As soon as my feet hit the floor, the screeching mercifully stopped, but if I were to lie down again, it would start right back up.

Not that I would. The strobe was a part of an emergency system notifying the troop to assemble. Something had happened on the streets of Las Vegas, something bad enough that those on patrol tonight weren’t able to contain it alone. I lifted my chemise over my head and yanked on the tank top and jeans I’d let drop to the floor only hours earlier, pulling my hair back without brushing it. I did take the time to pull on sneakers, then grabbed my conduit on the run.

The briefing room was at the mouth of the barracks, its location chosen for emergencies such as this, and as fast as I’d been, most of the others were already there. Nobody else, I realized, had bothered to get dressed. Warren stood at the front of the room, barefoot and in sweats, along with Micah and Tekla, who-though robed as crisply as ever-looked like she hadn’t slept a wink. They were bent together, obviously arguing, so I joined Vanessa and Jewell at a table near the back, while Felix and Riddick sat hunch-backed in front of us, heads close, whispering back and forth. Hunter was working the grave shift tonight, I remembered, catching myself scanning the room for him, and Gregor was on patrol in his cab, but a moment later the door opened again and Chandra entered. She seated herself directly across from Jewell, running her hand over her short, uncombed hair, and turned to Vanessa without glancing at me.

“What’s happened?” she asked, before I had a chance.

“Multiple attacks on innocents,” Vanessa said, lifting her head to the front of the room to indicate she’d been eavesdropping. She was still in her pajamas, long curls springing from her head in a thousand opposing directions. It made it difficult to concentrate on her face, though her words were dark enough to make me. “All in different parts of the city, but same method, and nearly in unison. Warren thinks it was timed. The attacks all began after dusk.”

“How do we know it’s the work of the Shadows, and not another mortal?” Jewell sagged against her chair, and nervousness had her knotting her fingers together. This would be her first real test as the Gemini of Light since her sister’s death. I too looked to Vanessa for the answer.

“Because it’s too widespread…and they’re dying in groups, mostly pairs.”

“Pairs?” I said, speaking for the first time. “Has that ever happened before?”

“No,” Warren answered loudly, and that was how he called the meeting to order. Micah took his seat, and Tekla moved to the right of Warren’s shoulder, watching him gravely. “It seems the Shadows have been saving it all up for this one go.”

Warren’s eyes flickered my way, then quickly away, though I’d been careful to keep my expression blank. Now didn’t seem like the time for I told you so’s.

It seemed Gregor had gotten a blip on his police scanner after dusk the previous night. It sounded like nothing more than a domestic dispute at first; a husband and wife had been killed in their bedroom, and police were sending in a forensic unit to investigate. Gregor changed the channel. About fifteen minutes later, another call came in.

“He thought it was the same call,” Warren said, “a man and woman found dead in their bedroom, but then the dispatcher said it had a similar M.O. as the one on Bridger, and that was the one he’d heard earlier.”

So the mortal police suspected a serial killer, and Gregor began to as well, though one of a different sort. He drove past the site of the first incident, but picked up no scent of Shadows, and was quickly shooed away by police. Ditto the second crime scene.

“So what convinced him he was right?” Jewell asked, looking up from the pad where she’d been taking notes.

“The scanner itself. Homicides began being reported almost like clockwork, every quarter of an hour, then every five minutes, then one right on top of another. All were at residences in the core of the valley. Then the reports began coming in from the clubs.”

“Strip clubs?” Felix asked. Under different circumstances I’d have teased him about that-masquerading as a frat boy, he was most familiar with those establishments-but there was nothing joking in his tone, and I glanced back at Warren to find him just as serious. Exactly how many victims had been found? I wondered.

“Mostly, but a few dance clubs and ultra-lounges as well.” Expression distant, he bit his lip. “The Palladium alone had three attacks in one hour.”

“Jesus,” Riddick said, sitting up straight in his chair. “They’re everywhere.”

“But they’re not. Gregor wasn’t able to pick up the scent of even one Shadow. Whatever they’re doing, they’re doing by remote, and they’ve been planning it for a long time.”

This time Warren did look at me, and it was I who averted my eyes. A told you so looked like it would have killed him.

“So how are they attacking?” Riddick said, stroking his goatee. We all looked back at Warren.

“That’s what we have to find out. How are the victims being approached? How can they catch so many people off guard, couples especially, without one of them getting away, or fighting, or at least one victim left alive to report it to the police?”

“And no one’s seen a thing?” asked Chandra, tucking a chunk of hair behind her ear. It sprang back out immediately.

Warren shook his head. “That’s the strange thing. Nobody’s reached for a phone, called out to their neighbors for help, nothing.”

“Maybe they didn’t have time.”

Warren inclined his head in Jewell’s direction. “Except the victims show signs of dying silently and slowly, and by that I mean hours, painful ones at that. It’s like when the exterminator comes to your house. The next day there are roaches belly up on your floor. That’s how these people are being found. All over the city.”

“Cause of death?” Vanessa asked, grimly.

“Also unknown. Gregor’s still monitoring the ETS scanners, but the only thing they’re reporting openly are the location of the victims and that they all seem to be burn victims.”

“Like in a fire?”

“A fire with no flame, no smoke, and no ash,” Tekla said from her corner, her voice taking on the lyrical cadence of prophecy and prediction she was so famous for. We all turned to her. “A flash fire. People incinerating for no reason.”

I winced, the visual coming unbidden.

Micah turned back to Warren. “Sounds like a chemical fire.”

Warren shrugged to show he just didn’t know.

“Definitely Shadows,” said Chandra.

“Duh,” I said, earning a glare from her but getting to the point. “So what do we do?”

“We are going out there to investigate, find the cause, and see if we can’t head off any further fatalities. You are going to stay here.”

Stunned, it took a moment for my eyes to narrow. “Wha-?”

“Uh-uh.” He held up a hand, silencing me with a stiff shake of his head. “This isn’t open for discussion. Chandra will go in your place, and you’ll-”

“Bullshit! I’m the star sign!” And I’d find a link to Regan, I knew it, if only I were allowed out.

“But Chandra can help Micah determine whether this is indeed a chemical attack,” Tekla said reasonably. “And this may be the onset of the second sign.”

A cursed battlefield.

My fist found the steel table, and everyone around me jumped. I wasn’t in the mood for reasonable. “Even more reason for me to go. You need me out there!”

“She’s right,” Felix said, leaning forward as he turned back to Warren. “We don’t know what this is. We need all the manpower we can get.”

This earned him a stare so hard, he dropped back in his seat, face burning. When nobody else spoke up in my defense, Warren turned that same steely gaze on me. “Olivia, we’ve done a search since your discovery of the lab in Valhalla. A genetic scientist and an evolutionary biologist have both gone missing in the past five months. Now that the Tulpa’s mole”-he couldn’t even speak her name, his lips screwing up on the word-“has been banished from inside the sanctuary, he needs another way to get to you.”

So that’s what they hadn’t been telling me. I looked at Gregor, who averted his gaze, then to Micah. They thought the Tulpa intended to inject me with the makeup of his genetic template, thus linking himself to me. And why not? The same ploy had almost wiped out the agents of Light just months earlier. What better way to keep track of me too-to draw me in closer, and know what I was thinking and feeling at all times-than to bind me to himself.

The Tulpa’s found a way to wipe you all out in one fell swoop.

Binding himself to the Kairos could do just that. No wonder they didn’t want me leaving the sanctuary.

And yet I didn’t think so. What about what Regan had said? We’re already in. And what about her claims that the Tulpa needed me to come to him willingly? I decided to try again. “Tekla…?”

She frowned and gave me a small shake of her head. “Warren’s right. The Tulpa will do anything to get to you. It may be that these attacks are really just a smokescreen to draw you to him. But if we think you can help after we’ve assessed the situation-”

I stood up, my chair toppling behind me. “But I’m the one who told you about the lab!”

“Which is how we know to take this precaution.” Warren stared at me, brows drawn, face pinched, and I stifled my next comment. That look said he’d lock me up if he had to. The others saw it, too, and were glancing around uncomfortably. Vanessa put an hand on my arm. “Olivia,” she said softly.

Slowly I lowered myself to my seat, and when I finally broke eye contact, Warren’s shoulders dropped, and he exhaled loudly. The rest of the troop relaxed as well. “So, for the rest of you, I’ve designed a plan that will put us in all corners of the city, working inward.” He pulled down a projection screen, while Tekla got the lights, and the others settled in to retrieve their assignments. Felix sent me an apologetic smile, and Vanessa patted my hand lightly before turning her attention to the front of the room, and I sank back into my seat, forgotten from that moment on.

They discussed and debated strategy right until the approach of dawn. I wasn’t consulted, or even acknowledged, but they didn’t kick me out either-at least Warren had enough decency not to do that-so I listened, observed, and learned with the others. I also put together what I knew from each of the times Regan and I had spoken, letting her cryptic remarks tumble in my mind like an ongoing craps game until I finally had enough information. After the meeting was adjourned, and the others began to prepare for dawn, I sulkily left the briefing room, making sure Warren saw me returning to the barracks.

But once back in my room, I began to make plans of my own.

Dusk’s arrival found six superheroes-and Chandra-lined up on the launchpad, preparing to hurtle up the chute one by one from the steel womb of the sanctuary and into the cool hours of a predawn boneyard. They were dressed in the clothes needed to play their roles as mortals on the outside, as they’d begin this reconnaissance mission by scouring the sites most familiar to them.

Warren would crawl along the underbelly of the inner city under the soiled rags of his vagrant persona. Gregor would continue to drive his cab, Chandra masquerading as his fare. Micah would scour the hospitals as a physician, and Felix’s long run as a college student would allow him into the clubs and parties where this thing had really taken off. Vanessa, meanwhile, would join the drove of reporters trying to get a bead on the sudden spike in apparent homicides, and if all that failed, they’d each work their way into the city’s center, and less familiar environs.

Tekla and I were there to see them off, both of us dressed as well. She’d be heading directly to the astrolab to cast lots or run charts or whatever she thought the situation called for, so she was in her work robes, and I was wearing old jeans and a tee, a bandana covering my blond locks in that white-bread gangsta way. After the others had disappeared, the airy hiss of the tunnel swallowing them up, I turned to her in the ensuing silence.

She held up a hand before I could speak. “It’s for the best, Olivia. You’ll see that in time.”

“I doubt it,” I said sullenly.

Tekla knew I was baiting her, and she merely inclined her head, aura steady. “I can tell you’re not going to be reasonable today, so I’ll be off to work. You’re free to remain here to pout.”

“Oh, I can remain here, can I? Thanks so much.”

“Don’t get snippy with me.” She whirled on me, snapping, “I’ve never been wrong about something of this magnitude before.”

“Tekla,” I said softly, shaking my head. “We both know that’s not true.”

The barb-a reminder of all the lives that’d been lost when she’d been usurped in the troop by a mole-struck as I’d intended. Her expression hardened, and I was careful not to look into her eyes. Right now was not the time to find out if she really could trap someone with her gaze. “You know, Olivia, not every horrible thing you say can be attributed to your Shadow side.”

As much as I wanted to, I didn’t call her back to apologize. Instead I waited until I was certain she’d gone, and slipped behind a pillar to snatch a slim leather satchel I’d deposited there only an hour before. Then I placed my shield over my eyes and yanked back the propulsion lever.

A whoosh of air jerked the breath from my body, then biting cold stung my skin as I hurtled up the chute, the voices of those who’d gone before me still echoing off the cylindrical chamber. Bright lights streamed past my mask, but Hunter’s invention did its job, shading my Shadow side from the light so I cleared the bright spiraling tube safely, vaulting in the air with the same sort of free-falling emergence a child must feel at birth. Suddenly my limbs were free and reeling, and I was reversing direction, again the victim of gravity. I spotted my landing and dropped to a crouch on the Silver Slipper.

Backlit in the approaching dawn, perched on the highest sign in the boneyard, I was now at the greatest risk of discovery. All any member of the troop had to do was look behind them, and that they didn’t revealed how much they trusted me, or how little they really knew of me. I was about to set them straight, though if all went well they’d never know it. Vaulting the fifteen feet to the dusty ground, I charged ahead, careful to keep silent, downwind, following their lead.

The exact moment when night and day split isn’t a palpable thing. I don’t know how to explain it, except to say it’s like entering the embrace of a familiar lover. At some point you’re able to anticipate timing and touch, melding the new sensation in with the familiar experience, so that your movement from one side to the other is sure, smooth, and relaxed. So at the moment Gregor gunned his engine, wheels spinning madly against gravel and broken glass, and just before the cab shot forward like a greyhound out of the gate, I lowered myself into a runner’s crouch.

He barreled ahead, and I bolted across the remaining acreage of the boneyard, eating up the ground with long, sure strides. Metal screamed through stone as the cab hit, the high-pitched tearing of the car’s body muffled by the explosion of disintegrating concrete blocks. When the ripple came around the final wall-the one I’d breached before-I fired another full round into the congealing concrete, then plunged headlong into the chasm. I knew it’d be close, but when the shockwaves shuddered around my frame, and concrete pressed in, pressuring my skull, I could only hold my breath, keep my eyes shut, and work my way through what felt like a mile of concrete. The wall was solidifying at my heels so quickly it would swallow me if I stopped. My satchel took on drag, like a parachute opening after a diver, and I had to fight it-limbs wheeling madly-to power through to the other side.

The wall suddenly released me and momentum thrust me forward, so I ended up on hands and knees, concrete dropping from my face in wet chunks. It took a moment of wracking coughs, but eventually I was able to reach blindly behind into my backpack. I washed my face with a wet towel, then my hands, the towel quickly stiffening as I blew my nose and started digging out the concrete in my ears.

Senses restored, I stripped off the bandana protecting my hair and dropped it to the ground. It fell like a rock. My jeans crackled as I stood, and I glanced behind me to see a splinter in the newly formed wall, an opening, if one knew where to look. I pushed away my unease at leaving the barrier compromised yet again, and reasoned that the Shadows had to know we were looking everywhere for them. The last thing they’d do was come knocking on our front door, and I’d return and mend the small fissure before it was found…by Shadow or Light.

So, mentally apologizing to the God of Fine Vehicles, I clicked open Olivia’s Porsche and climbed into the driver’s seat with brittle chunks of cement falling off me everywhere. First stop, home to change. It didn’t matter how fast Gregor and the rest were. They had seven stops to make before they could begin their investigation. I had two. And in this car, I’d make them both in record time.