by wildbow
“We need to make a call soon,” Grue said. “You said the other team is already attacking?”
“I thought this would be simpler,” I said. “Let’s go in the ground floor. Clear each floor, block off escape routes, so they can’t just exit the building and go wreak mayhem elsewhere, or notify Jack. They can fall back to the main room where Hatchet Face is waiting, and—”
“And then we’ve got a hell of a fight on our hands,” Grue said. “Against enemies with hostages.”
“Cornered rats with hostages,” Vista said. The little of her face I could see in the flashlight-illuminated gloom was somber.
“Ground floor,” I said. “If nothing else, it buys us time to think of something before we reach a crisis point. The alternative… I don’t like the idea that so many of these guys could escape. They’ve bottled themselves up nicely. Stay on your guard.”
“Are you staying outside?” Clockblocker asked me.
I shook my head. “Need to maintain communications against this team, and I don’t like how long it would take to communicate using my bugs, or the chance you could get cut off. I’ll come with, help watch your backs.”
There were nods all around.
“Go,” I said, before touching my earbud. “Tattletale.”
There was a pause.
“Weaver. Kind of busy watching over the other team. Sup?”
“Entering the fray. Looks like Mannequins, Murder Rats, Breeds and one Hatchet Face hybrid.”
“Got it. G’luck.”
Rachel had kept the dogs at a smaller size so they could patrol the building we’d been hiding out in. It meant they were big, but not so big that they filled the entire hallway. They passed through the corridor Vista had made without trouble.
We filed in, shoulder to shoulder, and I did what I could to track the various villains in the building. Grue dissipated the darkness as we got close enough to the respective areas to shine our flashlights on the objects in question.
Ominous, being in the midst of this building, almost like being in a submarine. There was an incredible, devastating pressure all around us. A leak meant a possible terminal end to all of us. The darkness was oppressive, and every surface was covered in the red sealant, scabrous, hard, removing the human touch from everything around us.
I was so caught up in it that I nearly missed it. A figure in the ducts.
“There,” I said, keeping my voice low. I pointed.
Our side turned to look.
Mannequin, I thought. I immediately switched mental gears. Who to protect, what to do tactically.
I hit the briefest stumbling block when the recollection of what Clockblocker had been talking about crossed my mind. Why does he remember his suit?
The same outfit, with alterations. The all-concealing, all-protecting shell surrounding his body, even the joints.
Bastard lunged for him, jaws snapping shut, but the Mannequin cartwheeled back and away.
Vista fired her gun, sending a single green spark zipping ahead. Mannequin swayed to one side, bending his body at impossible angles to avoid the shot. The bullet hit the wall, then briefly flared, disintegrating a scab-covered vending machine.
Lines exploded forward from Clockblocker’s hands, one from each finger, and the Mannequin staggered back. The narrow cables flew past him, glanced off his armor to ricochet into the surrounding area, and one or two even managed to wind around his arm or leg.
Clockblocker used his power, freezing the Mannequin in place.
“Vista,” he said, “another shot!”
She still had her gun leveled at Mannequin. She aimed—
And the Mannequin let a blade spring from his palm. It punched through the wall at the very edge of our tunnel.
Ice exploded into the interior of the hallway, consuming the Mannequin entirely.
Vista dropped her gun.
“No escape route,” Crucible said.
“Can’t shoot without putting us at risk,” Vista said. “I can make another exit, but it’s going to take a minute.”
“Not a focus,” I said. “Upstairs first. Hostages first. We’ll cross that bridge after.”
We had to walk around in a semicircle before we found ourselves by the elevators and stairwells of the lobby. The stairwell was framed by two bodies, hung by their feet. No wounds were visible.
I felt with my bugs, and I could sense warmth from them. Still alive.
Breed.
What were we even supposed to do with his victims?
For the second time in as many minutes, I found myself saying, “We deal with them after.”
We entered the stairwell. I was aware of a Murder Rat popping in on the ground floor, crawling on hands and feet that each had excessively long blades on the ends. She moved faster than she should have been able to, considering her means of locomotion, but she had an exceedingly strong, flexible body. Enhanced senses, too, with her conical nose close to the ground, long greasy hair brushing against the surface. I almost turned back to deal with her, but she was already gone, moving faster than my bugs could.
Claustrophobic. I was acutely aware of the dimensions of the space, the fact that only a fraction of the building could actually hold people. Of that portion of the building interior, the elevator shafts took up an awful lot of space.
Their territory, really.
The stairs hadn’t received as much of the ‘scab’ treatment, but they were still treacherous ground. The stairs blocked our view of what was above or below us. I was careful to check for threats every step of the way, watching doors, sweeping over surfaces, all too aware that Mannequin had evaded my bugs before.
Had this one somehow retained the lessons the original had learned? I could use thread to cover more ground, spread out my bugs.
An air vent at the very top floor was punched free of the wall. My bugs could sense the long claws, the conical nose. They started chewing on her, devouring and biting, but her skin was tough, as though most of it was scar tissue. I could feel the hot air as she rapidly inhaled and exhaled.
“Murder Rat, she’s on the top—”
She pushed herself free of the vent, lunging, drawing her claws together as if she were diving into water from a height. Her narrow, emaciated body slipped right between the railings of the ascending and descending stairs.
“Incoming!” I shouted. I pushed the others back as I could reach them. The only ones in reach were Rachel and Crucible.
She reached the stairwell just above us and kicked off it, changing her orientation and the trajectory of her dive. She slammed into the largest, most obvious target—Grue—all of her claw-tips drawn together into one long spike.
He was thrown against the walls and the stairs, and his tumble down the stairs just below him drove him into Toggle and Vista, who nearly fell down the stairs along with him.
Murder Rat was still on top of him, shifting the movements of her limbs to remain more or less upright as she perched on his body. Her head cocked quizzically. The blades hadn’t penetrated.
She lashed out, striking, only her target was exposed skin, this time. Vista’s face, Crucible’s jaw. Bastard’s shoulder.
And then she kicked the wall, drawing her shoulders together as she slid between Clockblocker’s legs, her nose pointed at the gap in the railing.
Clockblocker shifted his foot to make contact with the long blades at her toes, touching her, and froze her in place.
“My face,” Vista whispered.
“Put pressure on it,” Crucible said. His own face was bleeding badly, but he didn’t even seem to notice.
And, more troubling, the wound was smoking. Murder Rat’s power.
I turned my attention to Grue. “Are you hurt?”
“No. I… shit, how did that not break a rib?”
I shook my head. Still using the costume I made, and it saved your life.
He accepted my help in standing. I turned my attention to the Brockton Bay Wards, but there were too many people crowded t
here for me to jump in and help. I focused on the other threats.
I could sense the others swarming around us, on stairs above and below. I drew out lines of silk to stop them from using the same approach this Murder Rat had managed.
For extra measure, I tied thread around the frozen Murder Rat’s throat, tying it to the railing.
She was a composite of two ‘kitchen sink’ capes. Mouse Protector and Ravager. Two primary powers that had blended into the one, a dozen other minor powers. Flexibility, a bizarre kind of enhanced strength, reflexes and agility that had peaks and valleys, and skin as tough as leather.
“Pinch it shut, tape it,” Clockblocker was saying. “We spray it to keep it closed. Smells awful.”
“I kind of like the smell,” Vista said, her words muffled by the hand Crucible was pressing to her face. “Hey, this’ll be a badass scar, huh?”
“Quiet,” Clockblocker said.
I could hear another Murder Rat on the stairs below us. She let her claw drag on the wall, and the metal on concrete made a sound like five nails on a chalkboard. Loud, slowly increasing in volume as she approached us.
I set my bugs on her. She persisted, simply enduring what they were doing to her. I tried to go for the tiny eyes that were nearly buried behind her altered face and brow, but she shut them, relying on touch and smell to move. I started to pack bugs around her nose and mouth, and found that slowed her just a fraction.
But the noise continued. I could see the effect it was having on the others.
A rattling noise from above, joined by another nails-on-blackboard screech. A Mannequin, using the blades he’d extended from his forearms to scrape the wall and hit the individual bars that held the railing up at chest level, the same bars that the Murder Rat had tried to slip between to make her escape.
“It burns,” Vista said. Her fingers raised to the mark that ran from the side of her chin to her cheekbone.
“The meds?” Clockblocker asked.
“The smoke. Stinging my eyes, and feels like it’s fizzing. I read the file, this is her power, right? It’s what she does?”
“It’s going to take a long time to heal,” Clockblocker said. “Pretty much guarantees a scar. But we stopped the bleeding, which is better than most get.”
The dog growled as another Murder Rat joined the fray, her clawed feet clicking against the steps as she made her descent, the screeches of her claws against the concrete joining what was quickly becoming a cacophony. The blades at the fingertips of her other hand struck the bars of the railing, which set them to ringing.
Then, from the first and fourth floors, I could sense Breed’s minions make their approach. In the midst of the banging and screeching, their hissing was almost impossible to make out.
One more Mannequin hung back, letting the little bastards climb on him. They were smallish. Smaller than the ones in Killington had been.
I shifted my weight, ready for one of them to make an attack at any moment. Indirect attacks, surprise attacks, all from directions that were hard to anticipate.
“Three Mannequins and a Rat above us,” I said. “Two rats below us. Lots of Breed’s bastard parasites on both sides.”
“I could use my darkness, but it wouldn’t help much,” Grue said.
“They don’t sense things like we do. My bugs aren’t going to do much either,” I said. “Laying tripwires and trying to bind them here and there, but these aren’t guys my bugs can sting.”
“So?” Rachel asked.
“We die,” Imp said, with an odd cheerfulness. “Horribly, gruesomely. They’ll break or sever our arms and legs and cap them with Mannequin’s stuff so we don’t bleed out, and then they’ll let Breed’s bugs devour us from the inside out.”
“Not helping, Imp,” Grue said.
“I’m only saying what we already know. Kind of counterproductive, morale-wise, to have us read all the dossiers on these bastards.”
“Yeah. Just a little,” Crucible agreed.
“Why are we waiting here?” Rachel asked, her voice a little too loud. “Why don’t we just fucking attack them?”
I didn’t have a good rebuttal to that.
No, that wasn’t right. I had a dozen rebuttals. That these guys would take any offensive action on our part as an excuse to slip past us and murder our more vulnerable members.
But I didn’t have a better strategy. Not one I was eager to use so prematurely.
“Attack,” I said. “Now.”
Rachel whistled, a long sharp sound that cut through the various noises the Nine’s members had created. There was only silence as the whistle echoed through the stairwell.
She snapped her fingers and pointed up the stairs, snapped again and pointed down.
The two dogs charged in the alternate direction.
“Wards, go up. Grue, Imp, Rachel, help cover the rear,” I gave the orders. “Watch your backs!”
We split into two groups, the Wards leading the charge, while the Undersiders covered the flanks. I remained in the center, my knife drawn.
A Murder Rat tried to jump down through the gap, as the first had, but got tangled in the threads I’d woven. She began severing them, one by one, but too slow to slip through. Vista shot her.
With her death scream, the others shifted tactics, abandoning the offense. Mannequins advanced to take over the assault.
Another got caught in the threads, but blades sprung out all over his body, the individual components rotating, and the threads were cut. He dropped down.
Crucible caught him. A forcefield bubble surrounded the figure, pale blue, then flared a brilliant orange-white.
Mannequin would be fireproof, though. Even an extreme heat like Crucible could create wouldn’t have an effect. Still, it meant one was contained.
Yet as soon as we captured one, another slipped the net. The Murder Rat Clockblocker had frozen animated again, slipping through the railing, only to find herself hanging by her throat, a silk cord binding her. My bugs could sense blood trickling, but the movement suggested her neck hadn’t snapped.
Two ways she’d escape. The first was obvious, cutting the cord.
The second?
“Vista, Crucible!” I hollered their names.
They whipped around to face me, saw me holding my knife, ready to drive it forward.
The smoke on Vista’s face flared, blossoming like a smoke grenade that had just gone off, and Murder Rat materialized, one claw already poised with the points facing upward, ready to drive upward into Vista’s unprotected jawline.
I’d seen her gesture as she hung on the rope, in preparation for her materialization. I had to lunge forward, striking the stairs with the boniest parts of my shins to catch the villain’s wrist with my free hand, pulling her off-balance.
She rolled with it, almost doing a backflip as she threw one leg back to drive a point towards Imp’s scalp. Grue caught Murder Rat’s leg, and between us, we held her. I punched the blade into her throat.
Grue heaved her over the railing. He covered our retreat with darkness, then lunged ahead of the group. Murder Rat’s powers, it seemed.
Reckless, not like him, but he joined the front lines, where Bastard was giving two Mannequins a hard time.
Clockblocker threw out lines of silk, then froze them. The dog lunged, and the Mannequins were sandwiched between the dog and the silk.
Blood spurted at the dog’s shoulder where the lines had made contact. One Mannequin lost an arm, but they both managed to contort and angle themselves so they could slip over, under or between the threads.
Of course it wouldn’t be easy. Fuck.
“Back!” Rachel called out, before the dog decided to charge through the cables Clockblocker had used. The dog retreated a pace. Grue only hopped up, grabbing the railing, managed a grip, and then descended on them. He grabbed one and flung it towards the wires.
It only contorted, arching its back like a high jumper to slip through a gap. It got halfway before Bastard closed his jaws on hi
s upper body.
Shit. My bugs were so useless here. I couldn’t go after the Breeds until I knew which of the people in the building were them. The original Breed had died when someone had hit a building with an incendiary missile, and the bugs had stopped appearing. He wasn’t altered in appearance. For all respects, he was just an ordinary man.
Besides the whole ‘I create horrifying space bugs’ thing.
The Mannequin that crawled with Breed’s creations leaped down, only to get caught in more strands. He started to cut his way free, but Vista opened fire. Her shots glanced off his outer shell.
The creatures, though, fell through the gaps. More than a handful landed in our midst.
“I thought you said they don’t go after people!”
“They don’t!” I said. “So long as there’s other food sources available.” I kicked at one as it advanced on my right foot.
“There are dozens of bodies here!”
Already infected, I realized. These parasites were seeking fresh hosts, ones not already occupied by anything.
I caught the ones I could with my own bugs, used thread to haul them free, but there were twenty, and their dozens of legs were sharp, capable of punching through flesh and clothing to maintain a grip. Difficult to dislodge.
One had landed on my shoulder. I tried to pull it free and failed, stabbed at the legs with my knife, only for it to fold them into its carapace. It lashed at the lens of my mask with its spike-tipped tail. It didn’t penetrate, and rolled off my shoulder before I could get a hold on it.
Its legs extended, and it found a grip on my flight pack. In an instant, it was racing up towards my head again. It stopped twice, pausing for one second as it transitioned from my flight pack to my costume, then stopping again as it reached the area where the mask and body of my costume overlapped at my neck. The needle points of its legs were pricking through the fabric of my costume, no doubt as it tried to find a way under. I got a grip on its tail, but failed to dislodge it. Too slick.
The others weren’t faring a lot better. Crucible shouted something incoherent as he used both hands to stop a softball sized creature from advancing on his mouth. Its millipede-like limbs left bloody tracks in his skin as it made excruciating progress towards the orifice.