Apex

by Robert J. Crane

  “So, we could go west, hope he shows up in LA,” I said, shrugging as we started to cross the parking lot toward the car. “But to cover the west coast, without aid of an airplane …”

  She got it. “You’d spend days going from LA to Seattle. Less dense, more spread out.”

  “Bingo,” I said. “So, until we know his motive, we’re going to pick the geographically closest and most populated section of America—and hope that since he’s already evinced interest in a person, that his next attempt to get whatever he wants involves another person—one located in that giant metroplex we call DC-Jersey City-New York-Boston-whatever.”

  “By the sheer numbers … you’re probably right,” Cassidy said, blinking and thinking. “How did you—”

  “Learn people, Cassidy,” I said, waiting for Eilish to fiddle with the car keys and pop the rear of the SUV. “It makes everything easier when you do.”

  That shut her up. We stowed our baggage and got in, Eilish in the driver’s seat, me in the passenger side, and Cassidy like a black hole of churning thought in the back. Eilish started the car, fiddling with the seat, with the steering wheel, what felt like endlessly.

  Finally, my patience at an end, I asked her, “What the hell is wrong with you?”

  She stopped fussing with things. “Well … you Americans drive on the wrong side of the road.”

  I chortled. “I thought the same thing about you Brits.”

  “I’m Irish, not a ‘Brit,’ okay?” She blew air impatiently out. “But the fact remains—I’m driving and I’m not familiar with the way you do things here. Also, I’m pretty sure that since I never went through customs when I arrived on that magical SR-71 with the shrunken living quarters beneath the seat, that I’m probably going to be in big trouble if I get caught for driving without a license.”

  I glanced back at Cassidy and she paled. “I’m—I can’t really drive very well—”

  “Another area of theoretical knowledge yet to become practical in your life, Cassidy?” I took a shot at her. “Well, Eilish, you’re either going to have to convince Cassidy or do it yourself, because I’m really not capable of it after two rounds of scotch.”

  “Three,” Cassidy said.

  When I fired a glare at Ms. Skinnyjeans in the backseat, Eilish chimed in. “Don’t think we missed that nip you took just before we left.”

  “Fine,” I said. “Three. In any case, I’m drunk, and cannot drive.” I smacked my mouth together. “So … we’re left with either Cassidy, who apparently hasn’t—”

  “I mean, I maybe could,” Cassidy mused. “I guess I haven’t tried.”

  “Yeah, let’s not learn now, on interstates filled with truckers and busy people,” I said. “Or we could go with you—experienced—”

  Eilish did a little flushing herself. “Well, I’ve been in London the last few years, so—no, I haven’t exactly been driving there—”

  “Oh, for f—” I started.

  “Well, I ask men to drive me places if I need a ride,” Eilish said, throwing up her hands. “It’s not like driving’s this great, fun thing!”

  “Not in European shoe cars, it probably isn’t,” I said, thumping my head against the headrest.

  “And that’s another thing,” Eilish said, looking around the SUV. “It’s so big! I feel like I’m going to run over a small child and not even notice in this thing!”

  “I imagine the screaming would give it away,” Cassidy muttered.

  “But it’s insulated, see?” Eilish said, knocking on the door. It made a light thump, her fist against the pleather. “Anyway—I think we should ask a nice man to drive for us. I can do that.”

  “How do we know he’s going to be any more competent than you two?” I threw a little feral savagery into the question, a little shot. A shot. God, I wanted a shot right now. I slumped, my head in my hands. “I’m casually shrugging aside the fact that you’re proposing kidnapping a man in order to chauffeur us. How far I’ve fallen.”

  “Look, there’s a man coming right now,” Eilish said, looking at the rearview. “I’ll just step out, and ask him kindly for help—”

  “Bending his will to yours,” I said.

  “And then we’re home free,” she said.

  “Except for the kidnapping.”

  “And across state lines, no less,” Cassidy said. “That’s extra bad, in the US. I mean kidnapping at all is bad, but statutorily and punishment-wise, involving federal authorities—”

  “Ugh,” I said, gurgling into my hands.

  “I’m going to ask him,” Eilish said and started to get out. “I mean, he’s coming this way anyhow—”

  “He could be a dad on vacation with his wife and kids,” I said, still speaking into my hands. “And you’re going to kidnap him for possibly days, and when he gets back to his wife he’s going to have to explain why he disappeared in a car with three strange young women—well, two strange young women and me, a perfectly normal young woman who just has a lot of shit happen to her—”

  “Oh, hell,” Eilish said, “he’s coming right up to the—”

  There was a knock at my window and I jerked my face out of my hands before I could even stop myself. I threw open the door and the man leapt out of the way, a step ahead, and kicked the door back at me expertly.

  It caught me in the hands as I was springing out to attack, driving me back into my seat before I could deploy, so fast it just bowled me over without warning.

  “Didn’t come for a fight!” he shouted at me, “Sienna … it’s me.”

  I blinked, the painful ache in my wrists slightly dulled by the alcohol. “Who is that?” I asked. His head was out of sight, blocked by the roof of the SUV. I ducked down slightly, trying to see.

  “Just me,” he said, and something drifted into my view, extended from between the door and the vehicle’s frame. If I yanked the door closed, it’d catch whatever he’d stuck in—

  Oh.

  It was a bottle of scotch.

  “Timeo Danaos et dona ferentes,” Cassidy murmured.

  “Clearly a good friend of mine,” I said, yanking the proffered scotch out of his hand. He let me. I yanked the top and took a long pull, sighing once I was done.

  “Well, definitely someone who knows you well, at least,” Eilish muttered, still looking a little on edge.

  “Obviously,” I said. Mm. Peaty. “Who is that?” I asked, trying to peer at the man standing there. He was definitely in fine shape, definitely metahuman, definitely … uhm …

  Kinda yummy. And that probably wasn’t the alcohol talking. He was wearing a suit, no tie, and … shapely. Greyscale suit, pressed white shirt …

  He popped down into view, his short, dark hair impeccably coiffed. He stared at me with intense eyes, and a knowing smile, as I blinked in surprise.

  “Harry Graves?” I asked, my breath escaping me once more. “What the hell are you doing here?”

  “I’m here to drive you,” he said, with a muted smile. “And also …” His smile evaporated, and he grew still. Graves wasn’t a twitchy man, so this came with some serious sense of setting off alarm bells in my head. He breathed, and when he spoke, it came out as a low, dramatic proclamation. “I need your help.”

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  Harry Graves was just standing outside my window, handsome face framed perfectly, a boyish smile on his actually-not-that-boyish face. And he’d brought me scotch before asking for my help.

  A lesser woman might have melted.

  Not me, though.

  “Well, join the conga line forming for those needing my help,” I said as I jerked a thumb toward Cassidy, sitting in the back seat with a sour look on her face. I wondered if she wore it because she had no idea who Harry Graves was, or if she did know but was wondering what the hell he could possibly need my help for.

  Gripping the bottle of scotch that Harry had gifted me in one hand, I took another quick nip before pushing the cork back in. The scotch tingled and had a good flavor. I faux-gargl
ed with it for a second, then swallowed it down. “Oaky,” I said.

  “That’s a lovely review of the scotch,” Eilish said, looking at me with serious doubts, “but, uhm—who is this fellow?”

  Harry slipped around the front of the car and over to Eilish’s window where he dropped down and knocked on it. He bent so he could look in, and she was graced with a perfect view of his good looks. Very devil-may-care.

  The scotch might have been affecting my judgment, because I couldn’t recall finding Harry quite as attractive as I was finding him now. Not that I’d ever found him unattractive, just …

  Humm. He was, uh …

  Tasty … now. Very tasty.

  “This is Harry Graves,” I said, trying to put Eilish’s mind at ease. “He’s cool. He helped save the entire world once, and all metahumans another time.”

  “I suppose I should be grateful for that, then,” Eilish said, staring out the window at him.

  “Plus, I offered to drive,” Harry said, a little muffled by the window. “Thus sparing you the trouble, Ms. Eilish.”

  “And he’s a mannerly one, too,” Eilish said, opening the door. “Sienna, would you kindly—”

  “You can sit in the back,” I said, slurring a little. “I’m not moving.”

  “By the way, Eilish,” Harry said, grinning, “I always thought of myself less like a Hugh Jackman, and more like a Kurt Russell.”

  Eilish flushed. “I—I didn’t say that Hugh Jackman thing out loud, did I? Wasn’t I just thinking it?” She put her hands on her cheeks, which were tilting a hard red, like Cassidy on a normal day. “Wait,” she whirled around on me, “is he a telepath?”

  “No,” I said, taking a leisurely sip of scotch and enjoying the burn, which felt less harsh than it had four sips ago. “He’s a Cassandra, so he can read your future. Probably picked out a probability of you saying it, like one percent or something.” I met Harry’s gaze, his grin wide. “He does that sometimes to show off.”

  “She’s got the right of it,” Harry said, still grinning. “In your case, it was about a 0.001% chance of you saying that, but it was enough that I knew you were thinking it.” He shifted his gaze to Cassidy. “So you’ve never seen a Cassandra at work, Cassidy?”

  Cassidy just blinked once, then, realizing he’d plucked her thought out of the probabilities, rolled with it. “I’ve only read anecdotes.” She leaned forward to me and didn’t even bother to whisper. “His power would be so useful to you. Why haven’t you absorbed him?”

  I was feeling pretty relaxed before she went and said that. I caught Harry’s flinch of reluctance at her comment, and figured some of my possible responses to that must have been pretty epic. But instead of flying off the handle in an unmitigated display of drunken emotion (because I was soooo gone by now), instead I said, “Why didn’t you drink that super powers potion that President Harmon gave you for safekeeping?”

  Cassidy blinked. “Because he would have scooped the brain right out of me and left me either dead or a vegetable. He doesn’t—didn’t—really suffer competitors, Sienna.”

  “Oh.” I stared at her, having trouble holding my head up straight. “I thought maybe you realized the limits of power and decency … or something.” Eilish was surrendering her seat to my left, I realized, and Harry was slipping in. A few seconds later, I heard Eilish get in behind me, then slam the door as Harry started the engine.

  “We’re going to—never mind,” Cassidy said, probably realizing that Harry already knew where we were going.

  “Heading north,” Harry said, backing the car out of the space.

  I glanced at our little beachfront condo. Sometimes, when I wasn’t too drunk, I did take scotch out onto the beach. Stared up at the stars. Walked with Reed. Or Augustus and Taneshia. Occasionally Eilish. The sand beneath my toes. My dyed hair blowing in the wind.

  Scotch, neat, flowing down the back of my throat. Good times. Or, y’know … as good as I could expect at this point.

  “How long is it going to take us to get to this Norfolk?” Eilish asked. “I say ‘this Norfolk’ because you know we’ve got our own.”

  “Yes,” Cassidy said, a little acidly. “I did know that.”

  “This is going to be so much fun,” Harry said, meta-low, so low I suspected only I could hear it.

  “Heh,” I said, and all the levity went out of me.

  I was on the road with Eilish, who followed me around like a co-dependent, with Harry Graves, who I didn’t really know that well and understood even less, and Cassidy Ellis, who usually hated me but now wanted to use me for revenge.

  And somewhere out there was a meta who I apparently had to fight, and defeat … with none of the powers I’d once boasted.

  “Good thing I packed the Walther,” I muttered, and put my head against the window as my brain rattled in my skull at a bump in the road. I looked out the window as we turned onto 30A, a few people walking down the sidewalks around me, heading to the beach or to the pools or just enjoying the brisk “not-really-winter, go home, Florida, you’re drunk,” air. (I might have been projecting there.)

  “Anyone know any songs for the road?” Eilish asked, just a few notes too chipper for me.

  I put my head against the window and felt the slow drag of unconsciousness pull me away. I didn’t want to be awake for this crap anyway.

  CHAPTER NINE

  Jamie Barton

  New York City

  Night had fallen on the city early, winter lowering its darkness on the canyons and towers. Jamie Barton was slipping through the night, reeling herself across the harbor on a gravity channel that anchored her to Freedom Tower on one end and the Statue of Liberty’s torch at the other. She slipped over the water, watching it wash beneath her, half-asleep.

  Her new cowl was a little itchy; it was mostly for effect at this point, since everyone in New York knew she was the superhero known as Gravity. She’d designed it herself. That was her job—her day job, after all, designing clothing, and boy, had that business taken off since her secret identity had come out. She was a top clothing manufacturer in New York at this point, her superhero-themed outfits selling like wildfire, as her friend Clarice would say.

  Yeah … Jamie had it pretty good at this point, she had to concede, the wind whipping her hair behind her. If she was fortunate, online orders would spike again tomorrow. Because tonight she’d been photographed at the scene of a particularly large bank robbery, foiling the perps just as things were getting intense. She’d just split them up like badly behaving kids at a party, yanking them apart with simple gravity channels. Easy enough.

  The Staten Island Ferry’s horn bellowed beneath her, and Jamie smiled, waving down. There were a couple people shadowed on the deck as she slid over them in rough approximation of flight. It wouldn’t do for Staten Island’s own superhero not to wave at the ferry, after all. She reached her apogee, only a few hundred feet from the Statue of Liberty’s torch, and started to adjust. She’d need to throw her next gravity channel down on the island, probably somewhere near—

  A bright flame lit in the night, just above the torch, as though someone had set it on fire. Jamie paused her ascent, stopping in the middle of the gravity channel, hanging in midair. She peered into the dark and realized—

  There was someone just … floating there.

  And they had fire coming out of their hands.

  Her first thought was, “Sienna?” but she stifled it. She’d seen Sienna just a few months ago, during that rescue mission in Scotland, and … she didn’t have fire powers anymore.

  No, this was someone else.

  She could see the hints of his profile in the dark, even at this distance. His face was grim under the flames, mouth a flat line. With a jerk, he floated toward her, not too quickly, and stopped fifty feet or so away, just hovering.

  “Who are you?” she asked, a little tentative. She wrapped a couple gravity channels around his feet, snugging him to the ground very lightly, preparing to activate them full bo
re should he go from looming to …

  Well, threatening.

  “Who I am is not important,” he said, voice echoing in the cold air. His accent was Eastern European, reminding her of a Polish man who sold her cloth.

  “What do you want?” Jamie asked.

  “It is not about ‘want.’” His voice was clear, and he just hovered there, almost blocking her. She could adjust course, dip lower, or set up a channel straight to Staten Island—and might, if he proved intransigent, but …

  So far he wasn’t being threatening. He was just hanging there. Like he wanted to talk.

  “Then why are you here?” Jamie asked. She peered at him. Hadn’t she read something on her phone earlier? Something about a meta who attacked a bridge after that carrier disaster down in Virginia? A man who—

  Wreathed himself in flames? Was that it? Jamie couldn’t remember. She’d been rushing around New York most of the day, dealing with one police scanner call after another. You’d think criminals would get it through their heads that Gravity was on the scene and call it a day, but no …

  “I have to be here,” he said, crisply. His hands still glowed, or else he’d be barely visible, a shadow in the night in this place.

  This was the most frustrating conversation Jamie could recall having since … well, probably this morning, when she’d last talked to her teenage daughter. “Oooookay,” Jamie finally said, wanting to give up and shrug, just walk away like she had with Kyra. But it wasn’t entirely wise to leave a man with flaming hands and flight powers at your back while you were riding a gravity channel home. “Well … unless you have some other need of me, I’d like to call it a night—”

  “There is need,” he said. “You … have power.”

  Jamie just hung there, waiting for more. “… Yes?”

  “I have power,” he said, and the flames grew brighter. “We must … test powers, one against another.” His English broke a little in the middle.

  “I’m not looking for a fight,” Jamie said, preparing to scoot back on the Freedom Tower channel and laying out a few more delicate ones from herself to other points that she could throw the switch on in case of emergency. Two at different spots on Liberty Island, one attached to the statue’s waist, and a final one onto the Staten Island Ferry some two miles out by now.