“It’s dead. Is everyone okay?”
The shop victims crowded further down the street, but Baxter hovered over them like a fretful hen.
“Rattled but whole,” he reported. “And you? You weren’t harmed?”
“It’ll take more than that to take me out,” said Laura.
“Glad to hear, Miss Kramer.”
Okane all but collapsed onto the sidewalk. Laura knelt beside him.
“What’s wrong? It didn’t touch you, did it?”
“No, nothing like that.” He knit shaking fingers together and attempted a smile. “I’m just—Back in the interior, after Clae—I could touch infestations and they’d leave me alone. This one wasn’t afraid of me at all. Is it—was I not scared enough? Am I not that strong anymore? Was it stronger than months-old swarms?”
Laura didn’t know, and she didn’t like the idea. “This one could’ve been a lot older,” she suggested. “Mobs plant hibernating infestations all the time.”
His nose wrinkled. “Since when do they hibernate?”
“Since always. It’s a defense mechanism. If an infestation reaches a point when it eats everything alive around it and can’t sense movement, it pulls back into the amulet and goes dormant. It resurfaces to check the surroundings and starts up again if it senses anything. If not, it just keeps sleeping. It can go weeks, or years. Decades, even.” She paused. “That’s the reason we even have the wilds. Infestations eat nonliving things too, so if there was no dormancy they’d eat the trees, the ground. There’d be nothing left.”
Okane shuddered. “Scary.”
“Most dormant infestations are from the wilds, so mobs buy from the idiots who harvest them. God knows how they keep from being eaten themselves.”
“Or maybe it’s not older at all,” said Okane.
“What else could it have been?” said Laura.
Okane’s brow furrowed. “The hive mind learns. Maybe it’s already adapted past my abilities, after seeing us in November.”
A distant wail reached them, coming closer by the second. Another police car tore around the corner, followed close by a white-canvased ambulance. One of the local shopkeepers must have called for help during the ordeal. Baxter waved them down, and soon medics fussed over all of them. While most stuck to the victims, one jogged over to the Sweepers.
“Are you hurt at all?” she asked, looking them up and down.
“Rattled but whole,” Laura echoed.
Okane nodded slowly. “I’ll be okay.”
Once the medical personnel attended to all the victims, the Sweepers quickly retreated into the shop. It felt good to be there, safe, in a place completely saturated with the smell and feel of magic.
“I don’t understand what they were trying to do,” Laura said once they were inside. “I mean, at first that woman was trying to convince me of something, then she threatened me to stay on the right path, and then she doesn’t even give me a chance to follow her advice?” She threw her hands up in frustration. “What was the point? If you’re going to kill me in a flashy way, why not do it with the backdrop of a burning building?”
“Maybe it was just emphasis,” said Okane.
“On what?”
“They can catch - - - off guard.” He peered through the window, up the street at the damage. “They can catch us even in a place we thought was safe. If she was handling infestations so easily, it could also be emphasis on their own Sweepers.”
Every mob had a Sweeper force, rarely seen. In the past, most mob-related incidents were settled quietly or specifically left for the Sinclairs to clean up. With all the talk about one of the Mad Dogs being an ex-Sinclair, Laura had always imagined the Mad Dogs being Sweeper-heavy, but of course the Silver Kings would have their own.
“So what, they’re saying we’re not needed?” she grumbled, joining him at the window.
“I wouldn’t know,” said Okane. “Sullivan never met with Silver Kings. The few Mad Dogs he invited to the mansion didn’t talk much about Sweepers, but then again he never cared about such things.”
They were startled from their thoughts as the door banged open. The wind chime downright clanged, and in came Juliana.
“Are you two all right?” she cried, before she was even over the threshold. “We got a call from the police about some kind of mob hit on the shop, and came as soon as we could. You’re not injured, right? They didn’t actually catch you?”
Laura was too overwhelmed to respond as Juliana caught her by the shoulders and gave her a critical once-over. Finding nothing, Juliana simply stared at her.
“It was an infestation, not a bombing,” Laura said once she finally found her tongue. “We were able to take care of it, but you probably saw the damage outside.”
Juliana nodded solemnly. “Were any people caught up in it?”
“One dead, multiple injured,” said Laura. “We had a policeman already on-site and more arrived fast. They’ll have the official numbers.”
“I’m just glad you two weren’t caught up in it.”
Lester entered far more slowly. “Juliana, the officer out here says it was a mob hit.”
“A what?” Juliana looked aghast.
Laura winced. “I think they were after me. One faction got upset over all the newspaper articles and decided to make a stand. It doesn’t make sense to me, though. I don’t see what they’d gain from it beyond public backlash.”
Juliana’s expression became thunderous. “Of all the ridiculous—If this is how they’ll be, fine. We’ll teach you to defend yourselves more. Lester, let’s move up the training schedule.”
3
THE SUNDOWN SHOWDOWN
The popping and cracking of the shooting range made Laura flinch.
“Terrible, isn’t it?” said Juliana, smiling sympathetically. “I could never stand it myself.”
“Guns aren’t your specialty,” said Lester, as he returned from the check-in desk. “You’re all the running and throwing type. More athletic.”
“You’re just as athletic as we are,” Juliana chuckled. She turned to Laura and Okane to elaborate, “Lester’s Sweeper training was just as rigorous as mine, but he focused more on guns after the apprentice stages. He likes keeping his distance.”
“Clae was the same way,” said Laura.
“Probably for different reasons,” said Lester. He held out what looked like a pair of metallic earmuffs. “Put these on. It’ll help with the noise.”
Hesitantly she set them over her head. Juliana set to work adjusting the settings so it fit snug, and soon all sound was gone. Laura’s ears felt hot against the cloth padding. A buzzing sound echoed in her head, the world so quiet her brain had to imagine noise. This time Juliana twisted a dial on the earpiece. Her mouth moved and Laura simply stared. Two more turns. Juliana spoke again and this time came a faint echo.
“What?” said Laura.
Six turns forward, one turn back, and Juliana said, “How’s this?”
“Muffled,” Laura replied.
Another gunshot came from the range, but this time it was so dull, the sound didn’t hurt her ears at all.
“Wonderful,” said Juliana. She handed Laura a set of goggles, then moved on to fix similar equipment on Okane.
“Usually we’d have to purchase all of our ammunition here at the range, but that wouldn’t work with our equipment, and that’s what we’re trying to drill into you,” said Lester. “Back in Puer, ammunition wasn’t regulated the same way it is here. It was the gun itself that was hard to get hold of.”
“Puer’s might be the better system,” Laura sighed. “Ammunition is limited here, but somehow the mobs come up with more than enough of their own.”
Lester smiled sympathetically. “Nothing’s perfect. I’ve brought the less powerful kin bullets this time, so we don’t end up burning down the building.”
“It’s not like the range can argue about our brands. They make our equipment already,” said Juliana, nodding up at the wall.
The entry room they stood in was wood paneled, the entire wall opposite the desk covered in guns of every type. A bold red sign hung at the top, marked with the same flower logo and the words CHERRY CO. AMICAE-MADE FIREARMS FOR ALL OCCASIONS. Cherry Co. produced Amicae’s Sweeper bullet supply, but Laura had never been under the impression they’d looked favorably on Sweepers.
“Don’t be nervous,” said Juliana, misreading her expression. “I’ll walk you through it all.”
Once equipped with ear protection, the four Sweepers filed through the door to the range proper. The place was huge. A wide section stretched ten feet before being cut off by a waist-height wall, beyond which lay the no-man’s-land, dead-ended with targets. Most targets were basic: a sheet of paper with the outline of a man. At the very end, however, two shooting stalls used very different targets—robots fitted with cloth skin, faces, and clothes painted in a mockery of a person. The nearest one had been graced with a white tie, implying a mobster from the Silver Kings. The doll lurched up and down, stump arms waving as if for mercy while the teenagers at the stall jeered. Juliana stopped short.
“What is that?” she said, voice carefully flat.
“Moving target practice,” Lester answered reluctantly. “It got popular here after that MARU group disbanded. It’s a petty revenge on the mobs, since the city couldn’t enact punishment.”
“It’s teaching them to shoot people,” said Juliana.
“What else do you expect them to shoot, in a city?” said Lester.
“It’s not the target so much as the mentality,” said Juliana. “If it were someone shooting to practice self-defense, or preparing for real danger, I’d have no problem, but look at that. Look at the way that doll’s moving. That’s not a threat, it’s a plea for help. These people are just here to get their kicks murdering something, like a great exercise in destroying their own empathy. That’s the type of person who’d shoot first and leave an innocent person to die.”
“Is it?” said Lester.
Most shots had missed the dancing doll, but one finally hit. A great hole opened in its torso and reddish sand poured out. The teenagers whooped.
“Our stalls are right next to it,” said Lester. “If you want, I’ll go on that side.”
Juliana took one look at Okane’s green-tinged face. “No need to coddle me. I can handle some bloodthirsty boys.”
Lester didn’t look convinced but didn’t argue. They took up their positions in the stalls. While brick dividers hid the neighboring shooters from view, the no-man’s-land had no barrier, and Laura could see the doll floundering, more sand pouring from another hole in its gut.
“I’m sorry,” said Juliana. “Back in Puer the shooting range is a lot more … professional. They’d never allow something in such bad taste.” She looked genuinely upset.
“Don’t worry about it,” said Laura. “We’ve seen a lot of messed-up things these days.”
“Amicae’s out of control, isn’t it?” Juliana murmured.
In Laura’s mind, Clae had been the only thing holding the city together. It was a silly thought—far more than Clae had been lost and tarnished—but if he’d been here he would’ve controlled it. No newspaper could make a fool of him, no Council could’ve ripped him away, and he’d have a plan for post-“enlightenment” Amicae; he’d probably dreamt of that day his whole life. But no, now the city lay in shambles with a stranger at the helm of the Sweepers. She couldn’t wish him back. She’d tried.
“It used to be better,” she said. “Well. Maybe not better, but peaceful.”
Juliana smiled ruefully. “Ignorance is bliss, isn’t it? But you know, that’s what we’re here for. Once we can prove ourselves to the city, to the media, that we’re vigilant and capable, they’ll start to breathe easier. We’re not hobbled like Sinclair was. We can do this.”
Laura’s mouth quirked. “You sound confident.”
“I am. I figure I’ve got a wealth of knowledge and the Sweeper city at my fingertips. Determination can get me anywhere here.” She winked. “And I fully intend to make you my second-in-command.”
On the one hand Laura wanted to say, Of course you will, because she was the obvious choice, the most veteran local Sweeper. On the other hand, the media had been none too pleased with her, and the Council couldn’t have given Juliana any recommendation for it. Juliana could just as easily have named Lester to the position.
“Thank you,” said Laura.
Juliana nodded, pleased. “Sure, you made a mistake and got fired for it. But most mistakes in this line of work get you or someone else killed, and not only did you avoid that, you learned a lesson that’ll stick. I want smarts and guts, and you seem to have a fantastic blend of it. Now! First things first. Have you ever used a gun?”
“No.”
“Show me how you think you should shoot.”
Laura tried to line herself up the way Clae had. It was difficult; most memories seemed tied to running and shooting, and while Clae had frequently managed one-handed shots in all the twisting and pivoting, that couldn’t possibly be good form. The Puer gun felt ridiculously heavy and awkward in her hands, but she held still and tried to relax as Juliana looked her up and down.
“You’re on the right track, but not quite there,” she said, and began adjusting Laura’s position.
Wider stance, unlocked elbows because apparently the recoil was a doozy. As Juliana fussed over hand placement, Laura asked, “You’ve been a Sweeper for twenty years, right? Why did you join?”
“My heart has always belonged to Sweepers,” Juliana chuckled. “Being able to come in and work with magic in its purest form … I’ve never gotten over it. It sings, you know?”
“It does.” Laura had heard kin sing, laugh, and scream. She’d never expected magic to do that before she’d joined the Sweepers, but Juliana probably understood it better than anyone.
“What made you want to leave Puer?” said Laura.
“Ah, that,” said Juliana. “It’s such old news, even the gossips in the Puer guild don’t talk about it.”
Laura raised a brow. “You admit the Puer Sweepers are gossips?”
“You’d have to be an idiot not to notice,” Juliana snickered, but became solemn again. “Two years ago, one of my friends died fighting an infestation. Her name was Eliza. She was a very talented Sweeper, but in this business you can’t just rest on your laurels. Infestations are always learning, and always growing, and this one caught her. I was there, but I didn’t react in time to save her. You know in your head that Sweepers die, but when it’s someone you know personally, it affects you in ways you don’t expect. Lester took it particularly hard. The three of us were close, you see. I worked harder after that, promised myself I’d never let any other friends die, but.” She shrugged. “Passing the place she died, day after day … it wore on me. I needed to get out of there or I’d go crazy.”
Laura could relate to that. Death had felt somehow distant from her until Clae died.
“I’m sorry for your loss,” she said.
“No need to be. I’ve gotten over it.” Juliana stepped back. “So, now that I’ve fixed your stance, how do you feel?”
“Foolish,” Laura admitted.
“Practice makes perfect,” said Juliana. “Now, remember, this bullet leaves the barrel at tremendous speed, and it’s going to exert a lot of force and make a really loud noise. Make sure you’ve got a good grip.”
“I know.”
“Just a reminder. Pull the trigger.”
Laura took a deep breath. She looked down the sight of the gun, down toward the target, and squeezed the trigger with her finger pad. The flash of light from the gun registered first, then the bang, then the fact that said gun seemed determined to launch backward into her face. She managed to keep hold of it but staggered back a step. Juliana stepped with her, arm out as if to save her from swooning.
“There you go! How do you feel?”
“I didn’t expect it to be that strong!” said La
ura. How had Clae ever shot one-handed with such backward force?
“Words can’t really describe it,” said Juliana. “But you’re feeling okay?”
“Yeah, I just need a minute.”
“No hurry. You’re actually taking it pretty well. A lot of first-time shooters I’ve seen refuse to pick it up again or actually start crying.”
“I thought this was supposed to be enjoyable. Aren’t there hobbyists?”
“Some people love guns from the start. First reactions aren’t logical, you know? And just because you get scared the first time doesn’t mean you can’t progress to the point you’re comfortable with them.” Still, she gave Laura a conspiratorial wink. “Personally I still hate them, but you don’t want to end up stranded with the one piece of equipment you don’t know how to use.”
Laura nodded but frowned at the target. The bullet had left a dark smear two feet under the place she’d been aiming for.
“Juliana?” Lester leaned around the divide, looking pained. “Could we have them swap guns?”
Juliana cocked her head. “Why?”
“He brought the Amicae gun, and he’s very adamant that we can’t use the bullets I brought.” Lower, he said, “I don’t think he likes me. Perhaps a feminine touch…?”
Juliana frowned at Laura. “Did I spring this on Okane too fast? He doesn’t seem terribly open to team bonding.”
“He has trust issues, and good reason for them,” said Laura. “I could go over and show him what I just learned.”
“That would be the blind leading the blind,” said Juliana. “And I hate to say it, but he can’t just use you as a crutch for the rest of his life. What would happen if you’re not there? I want to make sure he can trust us in an emergency. No, not even an emergency. I want to be able to share his burden. That’s what Sweepers do.”
The Monstrous Citadel Page 5