Crawling From the Wreckage

by Michael C Bailey

  Finally, the tears come. “What if I’m not strong enough?”

  “You have people in your life who love you and will lend you strength when your own fails, but you have to let them. You think you can do that?”

  This time, despite the tears, despite the ache in the center of my chest that makes me want to curl up into a ball right there in Bart’s office, my smile is completely real.

  “Yeah. I can do that.”

  ***

  After my session, I walk down the street to have lunch with Sara. My girl is on top of things. I walk into her office and takeout barbecue is waiting for me — beef brisket, hot and fresh. It smells delicious, but a memory of mediocre takeout barbecue atop the Notre Dame Bridge floats through my head and any enthusiasm I had for my meal vanishes.

  “Good timing,” Sara says, handing me a little packet containing white plastic cutlery and a single tissue-thin napkin. She waits until I’ve settled in at her desk before asking the inevitable question. “How’d it go today?”

  “It went. I don’t know if I made any progress, though.”

  “You did,” Sara says quite decisively.

  “Not enough. I don’t like feeling this way. I want to be better now.”

  “I know. I get that. But this is a process and it’s going to take time. The important thing is —”

  “That I keep going to therapy and I talk openly about what I’m feeling. I know. Bart hammered that into me pretty good.”

  “Not what I was going to say, although that is important too. What I was going to say was, the important thing is for you to understand that even when you feel like you’ve made progress, it isn’t a step toward being cured or fixed or however you want to phrase it. You could be dealing with this for the rest of your life, so you can’t think of the process as moving toward an ultimate goal. The goal is to always make progress.”

  “But if I’m always making progress, doesn’t that mean I’ll eventually shake this off?” I say. I do not like the thought of feeling cruddy for the rest of my life. If that’s what I have to look forward to, what’s the point of even trying to get better?

  “Have you ever heard of Zeno’s dichotomy paradox?”

  “Is this some science thing I’ll need Matt to translate?”

  “No, this is some philosophy thing Meg told me about.” Sara grabs a pen and draws a line on the small notepad she keeps next to the phone. “The conceit is that when you travel any path, you must first travel half the distance toward your destination,” she says, marking the halfway point on her line with a small X. “Once you’ve reached the halfway point, you then travel half of the remaining distance —” She jots down another X. “— and after that, half of that remaining distance, and so on. The paradox is, even though you’re constantly moving forward, you’ll never actually get to the end of your journey because there will always be half the distance in front of you.”

  “So I’m always going to be a mess is what you’re saying.”

  “I’m not saying that at all. As long as you keep moving forward, things will continue to get better. You might never be one hundred percent again, but you’ll have more good days than bad. I still have bad days, but they’re fewer and farther between. Even Meg has bad days sometimes.”

  That almost makes me spit-take my iced tea all over Sara’s desk. “Meg? But she’s always so bright and sunny.”

  “Not always. More often than not, but not always. Sometimes all you’re seeing is the happy face she puts on for other people. Fake it until you make it, you know?”

  “And when she can’t fake it?”

  “It can get bad. She had one day a few months ago that was...it was rough,” Sara says, choking up at the memory. “She didn’t want to get out of bed. She didn’t want to talk to me. She just wanted to be left alone. I’ve had a few days like that myself.”

  “How do you handle it?”

  “All you can do is ride it out. I won’t lie, it’s tough. I’ve had days when I was convinced I hadn’t made any progress and I was always going to be a pathetic basket case, but I made it through. I thought about Meg. I thought about Christina. I thought about Matt and Missy and Stuart, about Ty and Bo.” She smiles. “I thought about how I needed to be here when you finally came home. I found ways to help me deal with it. You will too.”

  I hope so. I really hope so.

  A man and a woman hurry into the office and immediately set off every alarm I have. There’s something familiar about them, though I can’t put a finger on it. They slam the door shut and move as far away from the big picture window as they can get.

  Sara, I say over the brainphone.

  I know, she says.

  Play it cool. Let’s not tip them off.

  Right.

  I power up in stealth mode. Sara stands, puts on a pleasant, professional face, and says, “Good afternoon. May I help you?”

  “We want to turn ourselves in,” the man says.

  “We want protection,” the woman says.

  “Protection?” Sara says.

  “From the others. We think they’re hunting us.”

  “Hunting you? Who’s hunting you?”

  “Who are you?” I demand.

  They shrink away from me — and for a damned good reason.

  “My name is Drake Anzo. This is Candy Tanith. We killed the Wardens.”

  TWENTY-SEVEN

  Edison arrives within minutes. Drake and Candace — alias Typhon and Echidna — shrink under his deathgaze.

  “What’s their story?” he says.

  “I ran a quick background check while we were waiting for you,” Sara says. “Drake Anzo and Candace Tanith. No adult arrest records but they’re suspects in several armed robberies in the New Jersey area, including one that resulted in the deaths of two police officers.”

  “Killing cops was no biggie, but killing teenagers, apparently, crossed a line,” I say. “After the Manchester Massacre, they had a major crisis of conscience and bailed on their buddies. They’ve been on the run ever since.”

  “How come they didn’t go back home?” Edison says.

  “They thought that’d be the first place Massacre would look for them, so they kept moving until they could figure out what to do. Then they saw our press conference the other day and thought we’d be able to protect them.”

  “Where are their battlesuits?”

  “They realized Massacre might be tracking the suits somehow so they ditched them.”

  Edison grunts thoughtfully. “Stands to reason. I found similar chips in Damage Inc.’s gear.”

  “Not that you need further evidence our mystery organization outfitted our perps here,” I say with a nod toward our guests, “but they said Massacre has a secret sixth member — a handler named Jason X, who answered to an unseen, unnamed superior.”

  “I already ran the name,” Sara says, anticipating Edison’s next question. “All that came up was that stupid Friday the 13th movie.”

  “They said they never learned anyone else’s real name so there’s nothing to track down there, and Massacre would meet at random locations so they have no idea where they might be.”

  Edison looks to Sara for confirmation. “They’ve been telling the truth so far,” she says.

  “Which means we’re at a dead end — again.”

  Edison’s brow furrows in thought for a moment, then he storms up to Anzo and Tanith. They recoil and tighten their grips on each other.

  “Give me one reason why we should help you,” Edison says. “You’re cop killers. You’re child killers. Give me one good reason why I should give a damn whether either of you live or die.”

  Tanith, with no lead-in or buildup, bursts into tears. “We’re sorry! We’re sorry!” she sobs hysterically. “We didn’t mean to!”

  “We swear, we didn’t know they were kids,” Anzo says. “We didn’t know.”

  “They’re dead, regardless. You’re going to answer for that,” Edison says.

  Tanith buries her
face in Anzo’s chest and weeps.

  “Sara, call the police station. Tell them to send a cruiser over.” Edison turns back to Anzo and Tanith. “You’re going to confess to everything you’ve done. Everything.”

  “Then what?” Anzo says.

  Edison shrugs apathetically. “Then you’re the justice system’s problem.”

  “Look, man, we came to you for help.”

  “You mean you came to us hoping we’d run out, take care of your problem for you, and then let you go. That’s not how this works. We’re not trading one set of killers for another.”

  “Oh, come on, man, you can’t hang us out to dry like that!”

  Tanith grabs him by the arm. “Drake, no.”

  “Candy, baby —”

  “I can’t do this anymore,” she says with such exhaustion, such resignation. The weight of Candace Tanith’s world is crushing her, and she doesn’t have the strength to bear it anymore — the strength, or maybe the will. I don’t need Sara’s psychic lie detector to tell me it’s totally sincere. I almost feel sorry for her.

  Almost.

  ***

  A Kingsport cop shows up to transport Anzo and Tanith to the police department for booking. Edison says he’ll talk to the chief and take care of making any necessary statements on the Protectorate’s behalf, then heads out.

  I pass the rest of the afternoon hanging out with Sara at the office. After she closes up for the night, we go home to get dinner started — and by we, I mean Sara stands back and lets me reclaim my rightful spot in the family unit as the back-up cook. It’s a small gesture but a meaningful one.

  Sara’s upstairs when Mom comes home to find me happily laboring away at the stove, whipping up a batch of her cheater pasta sauce. I know, not terribly ambitious of me, but what can I say? I’m out of practice.

  “How was your day, honey?” Mom asks, grabbing a bottle of wine out of the fridge.

  “Okay,” I say. “Had my session with Bart, hung out with Sara, captured a couple of fugitive super-villains.”

  “Really?”

  “Don’t be too impressed. They turned themselves in at the office and then we took them to the police station. Boring stuff, really.”

  “Nothing wrong with boring. Where’s Sara?”

  “In her room, talking to Meg, making plans for the weekend.”

  Mom pours herself a half a glass of wine and leans on the counter. “I was thinking.”

  “About?”

  “What do you say we go out to dinner Friday night, just you and me? Go get something to eat, maybe hit the mall afterward and do some back-to-school shopping...”

  It’s a nice offer and a lovely idea, but my stupid brain can’t let me say yes gracefully. “Do you really want to spend your night with me instead of...whoever?”

  “Of course I do. I wouldn’t ask if I didn’t —”

  “Feel guilty?”

  Mom sets her wine glass down on the counter. “That I haven’t been spending as much time with you as I could? Yes, I’ll admit to that, but I don’t feel guilty or ashamed of my social life, if that’s what you want to hear.”

  “But I don’t like that you’re so...”

  Mom says the word I can’t quite bring myself to say. “Promiscuous?”

  “Yeah. I don’t like it.”

  “And I’m not thrilled that my only child risks her life on a regular basis,” Mom counters, “but I understand why you do it and I respect your decision. All I’m asking is for the same consideration in return.”

  She has me painted into a corner, but I throw out one last plea anyway. “I worry about you.”

  “And I worry about you. I always will. But I can’t let my anxiety stop you from living your life.”

  Before I can think of another line of argument, Sara dashes in. “Carrie, you have to see this.”

  I follow her into the living room. She turns on the TV and starts flipping channels. “Meg had the TV on, and guess who popped up on the evening news?” she says. “Here it is.”

  She lands on a channel running video recorded earlier today at the Kingsport Police Department, a press conference at which Edison announced that two suspects in the Manchester Massacre had been apprehended and were now in custody.

  “Drake Anzo and Candace Tanith have been positively identified as Typhon and Echidna, two members of the group we’re calling Massacre,” Edison tells a tight circle of reporters all shoving mics in his face. “They were arraigned about an hour ago in Kingsport District Court on multiple charges, including three counts of murder in connection with the deaths of the Wardens, and are currently being held without bail in the Plymouth County Correctional Facility. The Protectorate will keep the members of the press apprised as this case moves forward.”

  “Do you think?” Sara says.

  “Oh, I do think,” I say. The high-profile press conference, the full disclosure of names and locations, it all adds up to one thing:

  Edison just threw Anzo and Tanith out as bait for Vendetta.

  TWENTY-EIGHT

  This is not my night for winning debates.

  After dinner, I call Edison to confirm my suspicions, and he tells me flat out that yes, he’s using Anzo and Tanith to draw out Vendetta — and worse, they don’t know it.

  I lay into him hard. Once again, he’s rationalizing an ethically dicey decision, but all I bring to the argument is righteous indignation; it galls me to admit it, but his strategy is rock-solid. We reasoned Vendetta would want to cement Dennis’s loyalty by taking out the people who killed the Wardens, but Faultline and his cronies presumably don’t know where Massacre is hiding any more than we do. Without actionable intelligence, all we can do is wait for Vendetta to show themselves — or flush them out with a tempting target.

  Edison doesn’t expect Vendetta to take a shot at Anzo and Tanith while they’re sitting in jail, so they’re technically getting the protection they wanted, but he is hoping for an attempted hit during one of their many visits to the courthouse as their cases progress. His plan is to insert members of the Protectorate and the Squad in the security details, undercover, and wait for Vendetta to make their move. Since the court dates will be publicly available information, Vendetta won’t suspect a trap.

  “And you kept this all from Anzo and Tanith why?” I ask.

  “If they don’t know about our plan, they can’t inadvertently leak information to the wrong person,” Edison says. “We’ve known for a while the organization uses civilian operatives in undercover positions. If Anzo or Tanith —”

  “Yeah, I get it,” I say miserably.

  “Carrie, I want you to know I didn’t come to this decision lightly. I took what you said to me to heart. I truly did, but I can’t let these people run free. I can’t.”

  “No, I get that.” I’m not just saying that, either. The Manchester Massacre hit way too close to home for him. He knows better than any of us what the Wardens’ parents are going through, and he wants to bring them the closure he’s never been able to realize for himself. “And when the time comes, I’ll be there.”

  “Assuming I’ve cleared you for duty, I’d be happy to have you.”

  Oh, right, that whole I’m too much of a walking psychological disaster to trust in combat thing. Guess I shouldn’t hold my breath.

  “I need something to do,” I say.

  “I understand,” Edison says, but he hangs up without making any offers or suggestions.

  “I hate it when we’re right,” Sara says.

  “I hate it when Edison’s right,” I say.

  “You really think sticking Anzo and Tanith on a hook and dangling them out for Vendetta is the right thing to do?”

  “The right thing to do? God, no, but it’s the strategically sound thing to do. The Vanguard used me to lure Galt out of hiding, and that gave us the intel we needed to hunt down the Black End.”

  “But you were in on the plan. You agreed to it.”

  “I was ordered to agree with it,” I say, but Sa
ra’s point stands nonetheless. By using Anzo and Tanith without their knowledge or consent, we’ve reduced them to disposable assets. We’ve dehumanized them.

  Was it always this complicated? I swear there was a time when this life was so straightforward. A super-villain would pop up, do something objectively awful to assure us that yes, he was a terrible, horrible, no good, very bad person, we’d kick his ass, and that was that — no handwringing, no heavy moral debates, no second-guessing whether we’d done the right thing. Was it really that black and white, or was I too young and stupid to see all the shades of gray? And now that I see them, will I start to slide toward the darker end of the moral grayscale until I’m like Edison, sacrificing my principles when they become inconvenient and rationalizing it as doing what I have to in the name of the so-called greater good?

  “Sara?”

  “Yeah?”

  “I’m considering doing something that could get me in a lot of trouble with Edison. Like, thrown off the team amounts of trouble.”

  “The Squad’s your team,” she says, “not the Protectorate.”

  That’s all I needed to hear.

  ***

  I seriously consider going over Edison’s head, but if I’m going to do what I know in my heart is the right thing, I have to do it the right way, all the way through, or else I’m just a ginormous hypocrite.

  Edison makes time for me on his morning schedule. Since this is a formal request I’ll be filing, I suit up before I fly over to his office. I even land outside the complex and allow myself to be subjected to Lusk’s completely unnecessary third degree before I go in. That’s how committed I am to doing this properly.

  Trina sends me right into Edison’s office, where I find him sitting behind his desk, reading something on a tablet with mild interest. “Morning,” he says, laying the tablet on his desk. “What’s up?”