by S. J. Delos
Kurt was avoiding me for a reason. I was going to get an answer as to why, one way or the other.
Even though there was a copy of his house key tucked in the pocket of my uniform, I decided that since I was here on business rather than pleasure, I wouldn’t use it unless the good detective decided to not open the door. I rapped on the front of the door with the back of my knuckles, giving the knock an official-sounding tap.
After a few seconds, the light shining through the peephole dimmed for a second before Kurt pulled open the door. He glanced at me as if not really sure I was standing before him.
“What are you doing here?” he asked, looking past me to the empty street.
Greg’s voice appeared in my head, warning me to remain professional and detached. Of course, I decided to not listen to it. Pushing past the surprised officer, I stepped into the foyer, turned around, crossing my arms over my chest.
“Wow!” I said with a sneer filled with every ounce of sarcasm I could muster. “That’s a shitty-ass way to greet the woman you’ve been fucking on a regular basis these past six months.” Okay, maybe it was more like half-sarcasm, half-pit viper venom.
He glanced around outside again before closing the door, placing his back against the wood.
“Jesus, Karen,” he said, giving a shake of his head. “That’s not what I meant. It’s just that… I didn’t expect you to come over here.” He ran his hand through his hair. “It’s just not a good time right now.”
I straightened my back, feeling the muscles throughout my body tighten considerably. My decorum, already been hanging by a thread, broke loose and went right out the window.
“Oh. Now’s not a good time? Why, Kurt? Are you expecting company?” I nodded my head toward the stairs. “Or do you already have company upstairs waiting for you to come back to bed?”
His blue eyes widened, and his mouth hung slack for a moment. “Are you serious? Do you really think I’m cheating on you?”
I shrugged, not uncrossing my arms. I didn’t trust them to not break anything. “Well, you haven’t really returned any of my calls or texts in the past two days.”
He shook his head. “I’m not seeing, or sleeping with, anyone else. Believe me.” He held my gaze, staring to stress his sincerity. “I …you mean too much to me for that to happen.”
“Fine,” I said, turning my face away from him to look at the wall. The framed photos hanging there were mostly of Kurt with his parents and sister, save the newest one which showed me squeezed between Mr. and Mrs. Braddock. “So why are you avoiding me like the plague?”
He sighed, then walked past me into the kitchen. The moment I was in the room, I noticed the island in the center of the room, as well as the small dining table nearby, covered with photos, memos, file folders, and several empty bottles of beer. It was as if a couple of insurance adjusters had thrown a little party. It was a complete turnaround from Kurt’s usual, nearly OCD level, neatly organized environment.
It was one of the things I liked about our relationship. Because I was messy as shit.
I stopped next to the island, looking over the piles of data. “What’s all this?”
Kurt leaned against the side of the counter and ran both hands through his hair. “In the past two days, I’ve been through five intense questioning sessions with Internal Affairs. My superiors’ superiors want to know why George covered my shift last Thursday. They keep asking if I know why he disobeyed his orders not to go into the museum.” He looked up at me. “They’ve also been grilling me on our relationship, asking some really personal questions.”
I blinked and shook my head. “That’s… that’s none of their damned business.”
“They disagree. While not ‘officially’ prohibited, there is definite frowning upon an agent having personal relations with a hero under their jurisdiction. Most of the time, the local bosses just turn a blind eye. They know that things can sometimes happen. They usually don’t mind if an agent and a hero use each other, sexually, to blow off some steam.”
“Okay…”
He sighed. “But we’re doing more than that, right? The IA thinks, or at least hints, that the complexity of our relationship might be clouding both of our judgments.”
I clenched my jaw. “Well, since they haven’t bothered to ask me a damned thing, I want to know why they think my judgment is clouded.”
“I think they’re trying to say that your closeness with me, and George by proxy, was the reason you lost control when subduing Carbonado.”
“Wait,” I said, holding up a hand. “You mean to tell me that the EAPF actually believes I thrashed that crystalline punk because I was mad he hurt my boyfriend’s cousin?” Which, come to think of it, wasn’t completely untrue. Although, I would have beaten the crap out of Carbonado just the same for his threatening those kids.
He shrugged. “Not that they’ve come outright to say as much, but yeah.” He nodded at the pile of papers in front of him. “I think they are focusing on you and me to not have to focus on other, more distressing, details about that day.”
“What do you mean?” I asked.
“I cashed in a lot of favors to get all this, but it kind of looks like someone higher-up in the EAPF actually wanted the Doom Quartet to get away with whatever they were doing. If George hadn’t taken my shift, they probably would have, too. He spotted them because he drove past the scene on his way to the station.”
Kurt grabbed one of the pieces of paper from an open folder, holding it out to me. It was a dispatch form from the day of the museum battle showing that Officer George Braddock was the one who called in the report about the four villains breaking into the Delgado building.
My headache from earlier was starting to return, I pinched the bridge of my nose. “This doesn’t make any sense.”
He picked up one of the bottles that still contained some liquid, took a swallow, and nodded.
“I know. However, I’ve found out there was an intelligence report indicating that Quartet was in the area, but that information was never disseminated to the rest of the department. Or to The Good Guys, apparently. When George radioed in, he was given orders to hold position, maintain radio silence, and wait for backup.”
“Orders from who?” I asked, trying to follow along.
“There’s no record of who issued that order,” Kurt said, pointing at the pile of papers. “It was sent to dispatch through an encoded authority channel. So, all that’s on record is that it came from someone at the top.”
“You mean, someone higher than your boss?”
He nodded. “It took about ten minutes after George called it in for the transports to arrive. When they did, the commander on scene ordered his men to not engage unless civilians were in danger.”
“That doesn’t make any sense, Kurt,” I said, shaking my head. “Ten minutes? No one on my team even knew anything was going on until we started hearing explosions.”
“Exactly!” he shouted, punching his fist into his palm. “It’s SOP to contact The Good Guys immediately upon discovering an Enhanced crime in process. George followed his orders until Mega-Blast started opening fire, then he called Mister Manpower.”
“But why?” I asked. “That’s what I don’t understand.”
“I don’t know. But I guarantee the reason they’re not letting George talk to anyone is because he knows the truth about what really happened. Hell, I’ll also bet they’re trying to pin the incident inside the museum on the both of you so it will look like he’s a negligent officer.”
“That’s bullshit, Kurt! George showed up, distracting Carbonado so that Zip could get those kids to safety. It was all in my fucking report.”
“Yeah, I read it.” He shook his head. “The EAPF’s official response is you’re lying to make George look like a hero. Carbonado confessed to trying to break into Delgado, but he claims he never threatened to kill those kids. In fact, he says he offered to stop fighting you so they could be evacuated, but you were only interested in be
ating him down.”
“What?” I felt like I was going to be sick. “Are you shitting me?”
“No. They keep referring to the footage of you pounding on him in the street as proof that you were out of control.”
“Well, Luminosity’s report should back up mine,” I said. “She was present. So was Zip.”
“Your teammates are ‘lying to cover your ass’. The EAPF’s words, not mine.”
My jaw tightened so hard that I probably could have bitten through two layers of durasteel. The pounding in my skull took on a heartbeat rhythm, and the only good thought I could summon was the fantasy of snatching Kurt’s boss’s bosses in my hands and flying straight up until the air thinned before dropping them like eggs.
“However,” he said, gesturing at the files, “I found a common denominator.”
“Which is?”
“So, you know that chick in power armor who tried to nuke downtown?”
“Mechanika? How could I forget? I’m the one who ended up being radioactive.”
Kurt nodded. “Well, turns out she didn’t steal money, she took a bunch of safety deposit boxes. She even dumped out a Treasury crate full of cash just to have something to carry them in. Care to guess who the owner of those boxes was?”
I arched a brow. “Delgado Corporation?”
The handsome officer gave me a wink. “You got it in one. Maybe I should let you wear the detective’s badge from time to time.”
I held up a finger. “So, there’s the attempted theft by Rupert.” I held up a second. “A successful theft by Mechanika.” A third finger joined the other two. “And another attempted break-in by the Doom Quartet. Methinks I’m seeing a pattern here.”
“Sure looks that way,” he said. “However, according to the EAPF, what you’re seeing is a string of coincidences, nothing more. In fact, each of these incidents are being considered an isolated event with a different team assigned to investigate each.”
“Who in the EAPF would gain from shutting out the heroes and helping the bad guys? Hell, what would they gain?” I didn’t care for this new turn of events at all, but I was pretty sure Greg was going to like it even less.
“I don’t know, babe. But the moment I began asking questions, I was hauled in for numerous interrogation sessions, then slapped on administrative leave. I think they’re trying to send me a warning to keep my nose out of it.”
I punched my fist into the other hand’s palm. “Oh, there’s going to be some keeping of noses, alright. Keeping them iced or bandaged.”
“You can’t, Karen. If you go after anyone in the EAPF, they’ll have you declared as ‘Unsanctioned’. Your parole will be revoked, and you’ll go back to the Max until a hearing can be convened.” He placed his hands on my shoulder, looking me in the eyes. “If whoever behind this is as connected as I fear, that hearing could take years.”
I growled, crossing my arms again so nothing in Kurt’s kitchen would get broken. “Fine.”
He rubbed my shoulders gently. “Well, there is one bright spot in the middle of this shit storm.”
I blinked as I tilted my head to the side, staring at him. For a moment, I thought he’d lost his damned mind. What bright spot could come from finding out the EAPF was conspiring against us?
“What?” I asked.
He put his arms around me, hugging hugged tightly. “At least now you know I’m not sleeping with anyone else.”
I turned my head to place my cheek against his chest, listening to the steady thumping against my ear. “Yeah, that is a good thing.”
After an hour of looking over Kurt’s evidence, I flew back to headquarters to give Greg an update on the strange situation. As expected, he took the news that our law enforcement association might be compromised with a good deal of head shaking and fist squeezing.
It wasn’t easy to actually get Mister Manpower angry. Years of being a high school guidance counselor granted him a level of patience that I would have sworn was an additional Enhancement.
“I don’t like it,” he said when I was finished relaying everything Kurt shared with me. “I don’t like it at all.”
I shrugged slightly. I still desired to pound on a few skulls to get to the bottom of this weirdness, but hearing Greg’s uber-calm words made me grin just a bit.
“Did you find out anything from Roanoke?”
When the EAPF was first established, in the months right after Activation Day, the general consensus among the populace was that Washington, D.C. was the logical place to establish the headquarters of a new governmental agency. However, when the politicians realized the organization was going to have to have a special prison to contain dangerous Enhanced criminals, the idea of putting it in the nation’s capital was squashed.
Roanoke, Virginia was selected as the ideal location. The rural mountain community provided the right amount of isolation while still being close enough for Federal oversight, and the structure that eventually became known as “the Max” was built into the side of one of the surrounding mountains, just a few miles outside the city.
EAPF Command was located in the nearby city with a dedicated underground transit system running between the two.
I spent two years of my life looking through the window of my cell at the sleepy municipality in the distance below. If I never set foot in the area again, I wouldn’t be the least bit heartbroken.
“I spoke to one of my army buddies who didn’t seem to know anything concrete. The only thing he would say, off the record, of course, was that there was a lot of hushed chatter about a possible restructuring of the agency.”
“Restructuring?” I asked. “What kind of restructuring?”
Greg shook his head. “He wouldn’t say outright and got a little squirrely when I pushed for more details. I think he was scared, Karen.”
“Between your guy and the shit Kurt’s dug up, I’m not sure we should be working with the EAPF anymore.”
“That’s not really an option,” he said with a frown. “According to the Enhanced Vigilante Act, we have to coordinate with them in order to continue to operate.”
I sighed “Okay, so how do you think we should proceed? I mean, knowing they might be setting us up for a fall?”
“We work with them, as normal,” he answered. “Do our usual stuff. Patrol the city, stop the crimes, fill out our reports. Keep doing everything we’re supposed to do. We also keep our ears to the ground so we’re ready for anything.” He rubbed the back of his neck. “I’ve still got a few more contacts I can reach out to, folks who might have some more info. But it’s going to take a little while.”
“I wonder what the connection is with the Delgado Corporation? Two attempted robberies and one successful one, none of which have shown up in our intelligence briefs. Someone’s after something, it’s important enough that they’re hiring different criminals to hit multiple locations.”
“Good point,” he said, nodding. “I’ll ask Richard to reach out to their CEO tomorrow. See if he’s willing to shed any light on what the thefts were targeting.”
Then he tilted his head slightly to the side, giving me a sideways look. “So, since you came back with all this new information, not to mention a little smile under all the gloom, can I assume things between you and Detective Braddock are back to normal?”
“As normal as can be hoped,” I said with a shrug of one shoulder. “He still thinks it’s a good idea for us to lay low for a while, at least until this whole thing gets resolved. So, our relationship is still there, we’ve just turned the heat down to ‘low’.” I looked toward the door that led to the team’s quarters. “At least it’s not broken.”
“Your friendship with Alexis isn’t broken, Karen,” he said as he followed my gaze. “Even the best of friends have massive fights over the stupidest things. Once you both cool down, I’m sure you’ll be back to being the annoying duo who constantly drive me up the wall.” He grinned, patting me on the shoulder.
“I hope so,” I said, shrugging
. “We both said some really nasty shit to each other.”
“That I’m sure neither of you meant,” he said with obvious assurance.
I shrugged again.
“Look, it’s late. You’ve had a pretty busy day, more than anyone could have expected. Why don’t you turn in and come at it tomorrow with a fresh, rested mind?”
“I thought you wanted Sonya to examine me,” I said, “to make sure I was okay and try to figure out what Martin did to knock me out?”
He shook his head. “It can wait until tomorrow, Karen. Sonya’s probably as worn out as you, with having spent all day finalizing the hovercraft repairs. I don’t want her to miss anything because she’s exhausted.”
I nodded in agreement. If we were going to uncover this fail-safe of Martin’s, I would rather Luminosity be bright eyed, not yawning around droopy lids.
“Fine,” I said. “I’ll see her in the morning.”
I left the room, heading down the hall to my quarters. I stopped outside of Alexis’ door to place my fingers on the cool metal. Normally, I’d pop in for a few minutes, regardless of how tired each of us might be. It was just one of the many routine things about my friendship with the teen that I feared might be gone forever.
I sighed, hoping that whatever she was doing right then, she wouldn’t end up regretting it. However, I thought about what everyone had said and promised myself that I would support her, regardless of my personal feelings.
“Good night, Lexi-chan,” I said to the closed door, then went to my own room.
CHAPTER 16:
THE END OF THE LINE
“Will you hold still for three freaking seconds?”
I leaned out of the imaging chamber to stare at the platinum blonde who was working on the laptop nearby, growling at both me and the screen in front of her.
“I’m doing my best, Lum,” I said with a little grin. “You have the damned air conditioning in this place running full blast.” I pointed at myself. “You try being naked in an Arctic gale. I’m starting to fear my nips might freeze off.”
She rolled her eyes, but didn’t look up. “Quit whining, Karen. You’re invulnerable, so I doubt you’re in any danger of frostbite. Also, for your information, I have to keep it cold in here until the new servers get acclimated to their environment.” She stared at me with a completely impassive—and unsympathetic—expression. “And don’t call me ‘Lum’.”