Worm

by John Mccrae Wildbow

  Newter had changed, but he didn’t need much. He had handwraps and footwraps that left his fingers and toes free, basketball shorts and a messenger bag slung over one shoulder. He was the first one to exit the apartment, disappearing out the window, then poked his head back in long enough to give a thumbs up.

  Elle opened the window into a proper exit, complete with a staircase leading to the road behind the hotel. Faultline paused to look at the looming stone wall, only a few blocks away. Three hundred feet tall, it was all smooth stone. Parahuman made, no doubt. The barrier encircled the area the Simurgh had attacked, containing everything within.

  Every house and building within three hundred feet of the wall itself had been bulldozed. She couldn’t help but feel conspicuous as they crossed the open area. It was dark, there weren’t any spotlights, but she couldn’t help but be paranoid.

  “Cell phones are dead,” Shamrock commented.

  Faultline nodded grimly. Of course there wouldn’t be any transmissions into or out of this area. No messages of any sort would be permitted. Not even water entered or left the quarantine area, let alone communications or goods. Anyone still inside was left to fend for themselves with whatever resources they could gather.

  She’d checked and double checked the measures authorities were taking, ensuring that the area wasn’t being watched for intruders. There weren’t any people on the wall, and the only surveillance was busy keeping an eye out for anyone who might be trying to make it over the top of the wall.

  Going through the wall? Anyone digging through would be caught by the daily drone sweeps, and anyone trying something faster would make too much noise.

  Besides, they certainly didn’t expect anyone to be trying to get in.

  Faultline touched the wall. She felt her power magnifying around her fingertip on contact. She just had to will it, and her power would dance around the contact point, leaving a hole a third of an inch across. If she really pushed for it, it would extend several feet inside the object.

  Her power worked better with multiple points of contact. She touched with her other fingertip, and felt the power soar between the two, running through the surface like a current.

  She let it surge outward, and a fissure appeared.

  She tapped one toe against the wall, and power surged from either fingertip to the point of her toe, drawing a triangle. Moving closer to the wall until she was almost hugging it, she moved her other toe against the surface. Four points of contact, six lines.

  Then she pushed, literally and in the sense of using her power. The power surged into the object, the lines widening and she swiftly backed away as the resulting debris settled.

  Once the dust had more or less cleared, she could make out a tunnel, roughly door shaped. Her power had destroyed enough of the material that there was barely any debris on the ground.

  “Labyrinth,” Faultline said, “Shore it up? Make a nice hallway? Taller and wider than this, please.”

  Labyrinth nodded. It took only twenty or thirty seconds before there was a noticeable effect. By the time they were halfway down the tunnel, there were alcoves with statues in them and torches burning in sconces.

  Walking through the tunnel was claustrophobic. Faultline could handle that, but she could see Shamrock clinging to Gregor. It made his progress through the narrow tunnel that much slower.

  How fragile civilization is, Faultline mused, as she emerged on the other side. Newter clambered up the side of the nearest building for a vantage point.

  Some of it was the Simurgh’s doing, no doubt, but the thing that made her catch her breath was the degree to which things had degraded. Windows were broken, plants crawled over the surroundings, a building had collapsed a little further down the street. Stone was cracked, windows shattered, metal rusted. The buildings, the cars that still sat in the middle of the street, they looked as though they had been left abandoned for a decade, though it was closer to a year and a half in reality.

  It didn’t take much. Animals found their way inside, fires started and spread, and weather damaged the structures. Once the spaces were partially breached, the wind, sun, rain and temperature were free to wear on the interiors, and everything accelerated.

  That damage, in turn, paved the way for other things to take root. Mold could get into materials and surfaces. Plants could take root, winding roots into cracks, widening them. Ice did much the same in the winter months.

  Still, it was so much, so fast.

  She couldn’t help but think about what Coil had said about the world ending in two years. However it happened, if it happened, how long would it be before nature had destroyed every trace of humanity, after mankind was gone?

  “Pretty,” Labyrinth said, as she emerged from the tunnel. Her head craned as she looked around.

  Faultline and Spitfire gave the girl a look of surprise. It wasn’t like her to talk on a bad day.

  “You think so?” Faultline asked.

  Labyrinth didn’t venture a response.

  “Guess you like different architecture, huh?”

  Still no response. Faultline rubbed the girl’s hooded head, as she might with a dog.

  Gregor and Shamrock were the last ones to exit the tunnel.

  “All good?” Faultline asked.

  “A little much,” Shamrock said. “Knowing how tall the wall is, how much pressure’s bearing down over our heads… I’m a little claustrophobic at the best of times, and that’s worse than the best times.”

  “We have some time before we need to pass through again,” Faultline said, “Maybe Labyrinth can make it wider, shore it up more so you’re more comfortable, for the future.”

  Shamrock nodded. “I hope so. Thank you.”

  “We’re looking for any signs of life,” Faultline said. “Avoid confrontation if you don’t have backup. We patrol this area in a pinwheel formation. We have four people patrolling, each in a different cardinal direction. Head three blocks out, turn clockwise, travel two more blocks, then zig-zag your way back to the center. One person always waits with Labyrinth in the middle, so we have a fortified spot to fall back to. We take turns staying with her, so nobody walks too long.”

  There were nods from each of her subordinates.

  “Flare if there’s any trouble or any find. Everyone has their guns?”

  Everyone did.

  “Gregor and Shamrock babysit during the first patrol, don’t need anyone to backtrack, obviously. Move out.”

  It took only a second for Newter, Spitfire and Faultline to choose their individual directions. Gregor and Shamrock stayed behind.

  Better to give Shamrock a chance to calm down, Faultline thought. Her boot heels made noise as she walked.

  Doctor Foster had been asked to keep an eye on those being released from the city’s quarantine. Each individual got a tattoo of a bird on one hand or on one arm, marking them as someone affected by the Simurgh.

  It had been a short-lived policy, covering only two of the Simurgh’s visits to America in the span of four years. Shortly after the second event, the idea was abandoned. The idea, that people could take extra caution around anyone with a tattoo of a white bird, only generated prejudice. The affected individuals couldn’t find work, they were beaten and they had their lives threatened.

  The outcry had meant it was hard to spread the word about what the tattoos were intended for, and the problem was further exacerbated when some people had started getting the tattoos as a matter of protest. In some poll a year back, something like six out of ten people had been unable to say why the tattoos existed.

  But it wasn’t likely that the tattoos were why the Doctor had been asked to oversee this situation.

  No. The person who had assigned the Doctor the job, Christof, most definitely wasn’t working for the United Kingdom. Christof was, according to data they’d picked up on a job a week ago, supposedly working for Cauldron.

  Which meant Cauldron wanted someone expendable that could keep an eye on things.


  Faultline noted a message scrawled onto a wall: ‘three thorn babys seen here may twenty. killed two one lived’.

  Just below that line, there was another message, drawn in pink chalk that had streaked where moisture had run across it: ‘thanks’.

  Faultline walked on. Where doors were obviously open or unlocked, barriers hacked down, she peeked inside. There weren’t any signs of people having resided anywhere nearby.

  Her patrol carried her back to Labyrinth, Gregor and Shamrock, and the statue-topped gazebo that Labyrinth had put together in the meantime. Newter had returned and was looking out from a nearby perch.

  “No luck?” Shamrock asked.

  “Signs of life, not too long ago, but no people.”

  Gregor put down the backpack he carried and handed Faultline a water bottle.

  Newter scaled his way down the side of the building nearly as fast as if he’d fallen, arriving a few seconds before Spitfire returned.

  “Anything?” Faultline asked.

  “Ominous graffiti, not much else.”

  “Those… spine babies, was it?”

  “No,” Spitfire said. “I couldn’t read it all. Very broken English. But it said something about a Devourer.”

  “Let’s move. We move up six blocks, then do another patrol,” Faultline said. She thought about the Devourer, and the fact that the number one priority of the people in this place seemed to be warning about the local threats. “And, until we’re out of here, we walk with our weapons at the ready, flare guns in hand.”

  They moved up to the next location, moving deeper into the city. Faultline was pleased that she didn’t have to order her team to hold formation. They were practiced enough that they did it naturally. Newter scouted out front, Gregor took the rear. Shamrock took the right flank, shotgun at the ready, and Spitfire took the left. Faultline moved in the center with Labyrinth.

  She called the group to a stop when they had traveled far enough. When they paused to look at her, she gestured for them to move out, staying with Labyrinth.

  “Sorry to drag you around like this,” she said. “Do you feel thirsty?”

  Labyrinth shook her head.

  “I know new places don’t help you feel more lucid,” Faultline said. “And it’s more than just today. We’ve been going from city to city, doing a series of jobs to try to dig up more info. I wanted to say thank you.”

  Labyrinth only stared around her, looking at the buildings.

  “Maybe you want to stay here?” Faultline asked.

  Labyrinth shook her head once more.

  “Well, I’m glad.”

  A flare detonated overhead. Faultline whipped her head around. Newter.

  She bolted in the direction he’d gone, holding Labyrinth’s hand, pulling the girl after her.

  When she saw Newter, she stopped, let herself breathe.

  Civilians. Five of them. They were wielding improvised weapons. A makeshift bow and arrow, spears. Nothing that posed a serious threat to Newter.

  “These are my friends,” Newter said. He was holding his hands and tail up in the air. “More will be coming shortly. We’re not here to hurt anyone.”

  “Why are you here? You’re insane, coming to a place like this. You know what the Simurgh does.”

  “We do,” Faultline said. “But we have a friend, she’s got a bit of precognitive talent. Enough that it should clear us of any schemes the Simurgh is pulling.”

  Eyes went wide.

  “We’re looking for answers,” Faultline said. “Information, either about or from the monsters who came through that portal the Simurgh made. Give us something to work with, we’ll show you how to leave.”

  “Assuming we want to,” one man said.

  Why wouldn’t you? Faultline wondered. She chose to be diplomatic and keep her mouth shut. “Assuming you want to. I’m sure we could come to another deal.”

  “Why do you want to talk to the monsters?” the woman with the bow asked. She had improvised urban camouflage paint over her face.

  Faultline gestured in Newter’s direction, was aware of Gregor and Shamrock arriving. She turned her head to see Spitfire coming around the corner. She gestured at her teammates, “These guys are my friends, and they’re my employees. We want answers about why this happened to them. Once we have those answers, we decide where we go from there. If nothing else, it’s valuable info.”

  “You’re on their side?” a man with a spear asked.

  “Yes,” Faultline said. “But I could be on yours too.”

  The woman with the bow stepped away from her comrades. Her weapon pointed in their general direction. “You have a way out?”

  “Yes.”

  “And you just let us go? There’s no catch?”

  “No catch.”

  “I… how do I know I can trust you?”

  “You are one of us,” Gregor said.

  The woman froze.

  “Maddie?” a man asked.

  “How did you know?” Maddie asked.

  “I know this feeling, of being lost. Of being very alone and not knowing who can be trusted,” Gregor said.

  “How can I believe you?”

  “Because we’ve been where you’ve been. These two don’t remember, they had their memories taken,” Shamrock said, “But I didn’t. I remember what it was like in there. And I get why you’re afraid.”

  “You were in there?” Maddie asked, her eyes going wide.

  Shamrock nodded. “One moment, I was going to bed in my temple-school. In another, I was in a cell. A cot, a metal sink, a metal toilet. Three concrete walls, a concrete floor and ceiling, and a window of thick plexiglass with a drawer. You might know the kind of cell I’m describing.

  “They drugged me, then they waited until I started showing signs that something happened to me. It took them a while to figure out, because my power was subtle. When they had an idea of what I could do, they gave me a coin. I had to flip it when the doctor came. If it came up heads, I got to eat, I got fresh clothes, a shower. If it didn’t, I got nothing. I realized I was supposed to control it. Decide the result of the toss. When I got good at it, they gave me two coins, and both had to come up heads.”

  “How long were you there?” Maddie asked.

  “I don’t know. But by the time I saw the chance to escape, I had to roll twelve dice and each one had to come up with a six. And if it didn’t, if I got more than a few wrong, they found ways to punish me.”

  Gregor put his hands on Shamrock’s shoulders.

  “They made me use my power. I… I think I was one of the people they used to punish the ones who failed their tests,” Maddie said.

  “Christ,” one of the men said. “And the freak has been with us for a week?”

  Maddie turned to glare at him.

  “If it means anything,” Shamrock said, “I forgive you. You didn’t decide to punish anyone. We did what they made us do.”

  Maddie flinched as though she’d been struck.

  “Come with us,” Faultline said. “You don’t have to stay with us, but we want to hear what you have to say.”

  “I’m a predator,” Maddie said. “Not because I want to be. You don’t want me to be near you.”

  “You were around them for at least a little while,” Faultline said. “You can be around us for a few hours.”

  Maddie glanced around, then nodded. “When… when they tested you, did they give you a name?”

  “They gave me a number at first,” Shamrock said. “I couldn’t use my real name or they’d punish me. When I passed a year of testing, they let me pick a codename. I picked Shamrock.”

  “I wouldn’t pick,” Maddie said. “So they gave me one. Matryoshka. I… I don’t deserve my old name. So call me by that one.”

  “Layered doll,” Faultline said. Matryoshka nodded. “Let’s go. We’ll leave the quarantine area, get you some proper food while we talk. If need be, we’ll come back and see if we can find more people. If you wanted to guide us for a return trip,
maybe direct us to others, I could pay you. Get you on your feet in the outside world.”

  Matroyshka smiled a little at that.

  ■

  It took a little while to verify that everything was in order at the hotel. Nobody had noticed their exit and there weren’t any law enforcement officers stationed nearby.

  They entered the hotel room much the way they’d left, with a makeshift ladder leading to the balcony, and quickly settled in. Matryoshka gorged herself on the groceries Faultline had bought shortly after they’d arrived. She stared wide-eyed at the television. It was the first time she’d ever seen one. It led to her excitedly describing her world between mouthfuls of food.

  Faultline visited the bathroom, then stopped as a square of white caught her eye.

  A note?

  She opened the door to verify it wasn’t attached to anything, then pulled it into the room with the toe of her boot. Closing the door, she unfolded it with her toe to verify that it didn’t have any powder inside.

  Only a message: ‘Front desk. Message from Brockton Bay. ASAP.’

  Brockton Bay? Faultline frowned. That would be Coil. He was the only one with the resources to get ahold of her group.

  She was loath to leave Madison while they were having some success pulling in more information on Cauldron’s operations, but… Coil did pay well.

  Well enough to warrant a phone call.

  She headed down to the lobby in civilian clothes, with Shamrock as backup.

  Oddly enough, there was a wait at the front desk. A young woman, dark-haired, wearing a suit and fedora, with luggage on wheels.

  Arriving at four in the morning?

  The woman smiled and tipped her hat at Faultline as she headed to the elevator. Faultline watched her with a touch of suspicion. She didn’t relax when the elevator doors closed. She watched the floor number for the elevator tick upward until it stopped at ‘four’. Two floors above the rooms her team was in.

  “What is it?” Shamrock asked.

  “Gut feeling.”

  “About the woman?”

  “Just… felt wrong. Do you mind going upstairs? Check on the others? Maybe tell them to be on guard, and get all the nonessentials packed up. Might be paranoid, but I’m thinking we should change hotels. Good enough chance we were seen, worth doing anyways.”