Steve let out a chuckle, although it sounded forced. Michael looked to him, then back to us.
“Speaking of the shop, we should probably close up for the day,” he continued. “I think our regulars will understand.”
“I’d hope so,” Sunshine replied.
“Sorry to cut this short, Dawn.” Michael turned to me. “I feel like we don’t get to talk enough as it is. How are things going with school?”
“Midterms went well,” I said, my eyes drifting to the blood on the floor again.
“That’s good. Hopefully next time, we can meet under better circumstances. Until then?”
“I understand.”
Sunshine and I headed toward the door.
“On a similar note, I’m going to have to skip lunch,” she said. “I think I’ve entered the-officially-too-much-stimulation-for-one-day zone.”
“Oh?” I said, unable to keep the disappointment out of my voice. It was unfair, I know, but between school, being Hikari, and Sunshine’s extracurricular activities, we hadn’t had that much time to hang out lately.
And then my phone buzzed, signaling a new text message. I pulled it out of my pocket and froze.
“Well, I mean, maybe we can…what is it?” Sunshine asked, catching my pause.
“Um…it’s just from my mom?” I said, hoping the lie sounded believable. “She wants me home.”
“Oh, another time then.” Sunshine looked down.
We exchanged one awkward final good-bye and headed in different directions. I pulled my phone out of my pocket once more; a single text message showed up on the screen.
“We need to talk.”
Alex had reopened the lines of communication. Only unlike my dream, I was pretty sure it had nothing to do with hot cocoa.
3
Alex
The Previous Summer
“Interesting. I assumed you wouldn’t show up.”
Amity Graves stood at the back entrance to the Grand Bailey, dressed like she was headed to a board meeting—red skirt, fancy shirt, and heels. It was, I would learn, what she wore every day. On the day she first hired me to work for Calypso, it made me feel underdressed. I had just gotten off my shift at Colossus Fitness, where I had started working the week before. And sure, the place had a dress code, but it was far from suit and tie.
“Well, you did mention lots of zeroes.”
My voice came out light, but it was all show. In the inside, I was wondering what the hell I was thinking, standing in a back alley and accepting shifty criminal work. From the little Amity had told me, this sounded like joining a gang, albeit a gang where the members dressed like lawyers.
Of course, I had known close to nothing about Amity back at the beginning of the summer, including her ability to search through someone’s memories and rewrite them with a touch of her hand.
“Glad to see you have your priorities straight.” Amity’s voice was cheerful, but in a fake way. “Come on in. The lady awaits.”
She stepped aside. I followed, keeping my stride confident. If this was like joining a gang, I didn’t think they’d react too kindly to any sign of weakness.
I took in my surroundings as we walked down a long hallway toward a set of elevators. Christ, this place was a mess. The wallpaper had been stripped away, and there wasn’t a scrap of carpet beneath my feet.
“Nice place you got here,” I remarked.
“It lends a certain ambiance.”
“Not sure if that’s the word I’d use.”
Amity reached for the button to call the elevator, but before she could, a loud, off-key ding rang throughout the hallway. The elevator doors rolled open, revealing a tall, gruff-looking man. He had dark, curly hair and a mustache that would have made him look right at home in the eighties. Not that I was stupid enough to comment on it. I had several inches of height and a significant amount of muscle on this guy, but there was something about his cold, calculating stare that made him look like someone you didn’t want to mess with. He sniffed.
“New recruit?” he asked Amity.
“Potentially,” she replied in a sing song voice. “But we don’t want to count our chickens before they hatch.”
“Huh.” He nodded, looking back to me. “You know about loyalty, boy?”
I frowned at the “boy” comment, with my twenty-fourth birthday just around the corner, but decided to let it slide.
“Depends on how much you’re willing to pay.” I met his gaze square on.
He sniffed and rolled his eyes.
“Good enough,” he said, then nodded toward the woman beside me. “Amity.”
“Sully,” Amity replied, echoing his nod. “How is she?”
His gaze went distant for a moment. “A good day…I think.”
“Wonderful! Thank you for filling me in.”
“Whatever.”
He exited the elevator, and we stepped in. Amity pressed the “5” button.
“One thing you should know, if you’re going to be spending time with us, is that it’s best to keep to certain sections of the building,” Amity said. “The floors are a bit weak in places.”
“Sounds dangerous,” I replied.
“Only when you’re not paying attention.”
Once the elevator made it to its destination, we stepped off and headed down a hallway filled with doorways. Few of them had actual doors, but the one we stopped at did. Amity knocked once, waited a second, then entered.
“Callie?” she said, stepping in. “Are you ready?”
It was the only time I had ever seen the woman hesitate. I frowned, craning my neck so I could see through the crack. Not that I needed to. A second later, Amity had opened it wide.
The room inside was set up much like a regular hotel room. Queen-sized bed, small bathroom. All that was missing was the TV. It was weird how ordinary it looked compared to the rest of the place. I almost didn’t notice the other woman at first.
She stood in the shadows, but I could still make out her long, curly blond hair and green dress. She was staring out the window, which was strange given that it had been boarded up on the outside.
“Alex, this is Calypso,” Amity said. “Calypso, Alex.”
Calypso didn’t respond. Being unsteady on the meeting-your-future-mob-boss etiquette, I decided to keep my mouth shut too. Amity sighed before speaking again.
“Aaaanyway,” she said. “Calypso is looking to spend some time in your beautiful city. A decision that has not gone over well with a certain…set of the population.”
“And by set, you mean local gangs?” I asked. She had implied as much before, when she had mentioned the job.
“We’re not looking to take over things. We just require a certain level of mobility that we don’t have right now. As a result, we require someone with the proper skills to…deliver a forceful message.”
“And you think that someone is me?”
“For the right price, of course.”
“Well, I get that, but wouldn’t it be better if you found someone a little more experienced in that area?” I spread out my hands, which I had stuck in the pockets of my jacket. It was a movement my little sister Claire said made me look like I had wings. “I mean, I’m pretty good at breaking into cars, and I can take a punch or two, but this is way above my pay grade.”
“We have people with experience in the culture,” Amity replied. “And they can help you there. What you bring to the table is something more…unique.”
Unique? She couldn’t be talking about…
“Come on, Ally,” Amity said, circling around my back. “You know what I’m talking about. I have it on good authority that when you get upset, you’re very good at causing just the level of destruction that we’re looking for.”
“I don’t know—”
“What we’re talking about? Where do we start? The weird ‘accident’ that happened when you were fourteen? Or all that damage you were able to inflict on your sister’s ex-boyfriend with a single punch?”
I felt my blood run cold.
“How do you—”
“Know so much about you? That’s not the question you should be asking. That question is…why aren’t you doing anything with these skills?”
“I don’t want to put on spandex and pretend I’m a superhero,” I said with a scowl. “The world’s never given a shit about me.”
“Let’s be honest, Ally. What we’re talking about here has very little to do with heroics.”
I winced. That was the second time she had called me Ally, which shouldn’t have bothered me, but it was the same nickname my sister Mariah used. It sounded wrong coming out of her lips. And she knew I was Empowered, which I had kept a secret for almost a decade.
Had I made a mistake coming here?
“What we need is simple. A few punches here. A little intimidation there. We’ll leave it up to you how far you want to take it.” Amity paused and sniffed. “In a way, you’ll actually be doing some good for the city. It’s not like these are nice men. You’ll work as a contractor for us. When a job comes up, we’ll let you know. If you’re still in, you’ll let us know. You’re not required to stick around for the long haul, but once you take a job, there’s no backing out. I need to know that you can be dependable.”
She picked up a pen and paper on the side table and jotted down a number.
“This is how much we’re willing to pay per job,” she continued. “And over time, the jobs may become more lucrative.”
Amity passed me the paper. I read it and swallowed at the amount.
“Come on now,” Amity said. “I know your family has debts. Debts that are keeping your sister from fully committing to her education. A handful of paychecks like these and, well, you could make those numbers go down awfully fast.”
I frowned. How the hell did this woman know so much about me?
“But of course, there are other reasons too,” Amity said, her voice lowering to a purr. “You’ve been hiding the most remarkable part of yourself for almost ten years now. Wouldn’t it be nice to give yourself an outlet? An excuse to let out a little rage every now and then?”
I swallowed, trying to moisten my suddenly dry throat before responding.
“Okay,” I said. “But only for my sisters. On a case-by-case situation. If I see something I don’t like, I don’t do it.”
Amity grinned. “Oh, we wouldn’t want it any other way. Nothing to strain that conscience of yours. Of course, we’re going to shield your identity too. Not spandex,” she added, seeing the look I gave her. “Trust me, I have no interest in making you look like one of those clowns. No, I was thinking about something that could provide you with a little extra shielding, just in case you knock down a building or something.”
“A code name.”
I’ll admit it. When Calypso spoke, I started. She had been so quiet, I had forgotten she was in the room. Given that she was supposedly in charge, that was all kinds of stupid. Nice one, Gage.
“Ah,” Amity said, wrinkling her nose. “Well, I suppose we should embrace that unfortunate trend as well. What should we call you? Earthquake man? Avalanche?”
“Faultline,” Calypso whispered.
Amity’s response was to purse her lips in thought. Then she nodded.
“Faultline,” she said with a nod, then turned back to me. “Well, Faultline, when can you start?”
I shook my head at the memory of my first meeting with Calypso. Of course, I hadn’t known the whole story then. Not about the drones or the benefit. But I sure as hell had known that the situation had been shifty, and I hadn’t backed down. And later, when I had learned more, I had barely hesitated, my mind on the zeroes Amity had written on that paper and the excuse to get out there and bust some skulls.
Apparently, it took a lot more to “strain my conscience” than I had realized.
Colossus Fitness was another one of Calypso’s victims. Until a few weeks back, working here had been my full-time job. Then the paychecks had stopped coming in, and someone had figured out that the owner of the gym had been one of Calypso’s drones. It hadn’t surprised me. Amity had found me through my job at Colossus after all, and they had been way too understanding when I had needed to take time off to complete Calypso’s jobs. After Calypso died, the owner had lost his mind, same as the rest of the drones, and wasn’t able to run the place. Until that was settled, Colossus had been shut down. More than a dozen people, myself included, had lost their jobs.
Meaning, on top of the rest of this bullshit, I had to find a place to work again.
But I still had my key.
I stood in the Women’s Gym, located on the second level. This floor ran about halfway across the building, meaning that it gave you a great view of the main room below. I had always thought it kind of weird that in their attempts to keep women away from jerks, we had basically put them up on a platform where they could be ogled from a distance. When I had mentioned this to one of my female coworkers, she had laughed and said maybe it was a good thing they could see ’em coming.
I was counting on that now.
I paused to look down at my armor, the military-grade tactical equipment made up of multiple pieces fitted to my body. I hadn’t put it on in weeks, not since Calypso had died. Now that I had, it was impossible not to notice the results of my final fight with Dawn. The helmet didn’t snap on like it was supposed to, and the hairline fractures in my left wrist guard were troubling. My powers, fueled by my anger, gave me the ability to see weak points in surfaces, to exploit them and, when I was really pissed off, create ones of my own. Seeing weak points in your own armor was not comforting.
I heard a door swing open and craned my neck toward the side entrance I had unlocked ten minutes ago in preparation. It gave me the perfect view of Dawn as she entered Colossus Fitness. But it wasn’t the Dawn that I had shared pastries and gelato with. She was dressed in her red and black costume. Not Dawn, but Hikari.
I was beginning to realize that the two versions were very different.
I stepped back and away from the window. The second-floor lights had been turned off, hiding me in shadow. If we were going to talk, I would have to be the one to approach her.
I made it to the first floor via the eastern-most stairwell. Around the corner from this was a decent-sized hallway to my left. Multiple doors lined the walls. Dawn was already here, a few strides in front of me, opening each door and peeking inside. Looked like she was trying to find me. I approached from behind, considered tapping her on the shoulder, then thought against it. She was likely to be a little tense after the morning’s events and all. Best to speak up.
“Hey, Dawn—” I began.
I skidded backward, ducking out of the way as Dawn spun toward me, right flying in a cross. The blow was sloppy, leaving her body completely open, my years of training in boxing automatically supplied. Her fist hammered past me, and I heard a smack and crunch as it connected with the nearby wall. I blinked, turning around. She pulled back, leaving behind a small, but troubling, gouge in its surface.
Okay, so maybe more than a little tense.
“Oh shit,” she said, eyes wide. “I’m s—”
“Hey, hey!” I spoke up simultaneously, raising my hands. “It’s just…” I paused, then reached up to detach my helmet. I pulled it off, revealing what I hoped was a more welcome face. “Sorry about that. I shouldn’t have sneaked up on you.”
“No, it’s not that.” Dawn relaxed her guard. “I’m just a little—”
“Tense?”
“Something like that. After what happened at Northwest Comics—”
“Yeah, I was there.”
“I know. Sunshine filled me in.”
“Ah. Does she know? About everything?”
Dawn shook her head. “No. I kept your secret.”
As she spoke, her eyes looked over me, and I immediately cursed myself. The armor, on top of being less comfortable than normal clothes, took a few minutes to take on and off. Dawn had come over right awa
y, leaving me short on time to change.
Unfortunately, when she saw me like this it was clear that her mind went to Faultline, not Alex. No wonder she had taken a swing at me. Even now she looked tense, as if part of her was expecting a throwdown. Not exactly how I had pictured our reunion.
The image of Hikari’s—no, Dawn’s—head snapping back after I had delivered a punishing, potentially bone-breaking upper cut to her jaw filled my mind, followed by the sound of a slap as her body had hit the top of a tram before falling to the city below.
Seriously, Gage, how did you expect this to go? Candlelight dinners? Bonding over ice cream on the pier? The chance that she would want to give it a go after everything—
“You said we needed to talk?” Dawn said.
“Yes.” I said, bringing myself back to the present. “Right. Marty.”
Dawn frowned and looked off to the side.
“Right,” she said, voice weirdly distant.
Shit. I was handling this one all wrong. Best to get down to business.
“Anyway, since Sunshine filled you in, you’re aware that Marty seems to have gone from half-crazed psychopath with a tire iron to half-crazed psychopath with a gun, which is a hell of an upgrade.”
“And not one that I’m a fan of.”
“That we can agree on.”
“Sunshine said…” Dawn paused, then spoke again. “Is he here?”
I nodded and jerked my head back toward the nearest doorway, the basement entrance. “After you.”
She hesitated, but only for a moment. Guess she wasn’t comfortable with the thought of me walking behind her down a darkened stairwell. And while it didn’t surprise me, part of me had been hopeful…
Wait. It had taken her only a couple of seconds to decide that she could take me. I should probably be insulted by that.
She pushed open the door to the basement.
“I’ve been keeping an eye out for him the past few weeks,” I explained as we made our way down. “Having about as much luck as the police. Then, a few days ago, I heard someone had seen him around this neighborhood and thought about Colossus, all big and abandoned, with lots of little corners to hide in. I know if I was on the run, I would consider this place.”
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