by W. J. May
Rae’s chest tightened, and for a split second she found herself unable to look the young girl in the eye. She focused on the table instead. Focused on her breathing. “Samantha, it was nice meeting you, but I think I should be getting ready to speak with Commander Fodder now,” she said quietly.
Samantha looked like someone had snatched away her favorite toy. “But I really want you to tell…” Then her eyes met Rae’s, and she trailed off with a sigh. A second later she pushed to her feet, looking like that cartoonish light had been snuffed right out. “You should drink your coffee,” she said dully. “It’ll wake you up.”
Rae nodded, but was no longer thirsty. She couldn’t see past the girl’s profound disappointment. Not disappointment at the fact that Rae didn’t answer her questions, but disappointment at the fact that, somehow, they both already sensed what those answers would be.
How many other people will feel the exact same way? How many other people already do?
Really,” Samantha said again, “you should drink.” As she pushed open the door and slipped out into the hall, Rae heard her mutter, “You’re going to need it.”
The door slammed shut, echoing in the sudden silence.
* * *
Rae was still drinking when Fodder came into the room. In fact, she hadn’t stopped for a second since Samantha’s departure. She set down the cup, still feeling dazed.
“Happy Thanksgiving,” he said curtly.
Pie. He had brought pie. It slipped from his hands when he saw my father.
The sudden flashback filled Rae with a wave of guilt, and she bowed her head to her chest. “Not exactly the one you were expecting…”
He made no attempt to answer. Instead, he simply sat down on the opposite side of the table, folded his hands in front of him, and waited.
Rae shifted nervously under his piercing gaze, and gestured to the newspapers to break the ice. “They really work fast, don’t they?”
His eyes never left her face. “Well, it’s such a sensational story. Mind telling me?”
He was reining it in. Playing the part of the Commander. Trying not to act as hurt and betrayed as he felt. Rae didn’t blame him. They had come so far in the last few months. Made so many strides towards an open, sustainable partnership. Transparency was key. Friendship—the unintentional yet welcome result. With a grandchild on the way, he was literally going to be family.
And now this.
“Let me help you start,” he said sharply.
His eyes flashed with scarcely-contained frustration, and Rae was suddenly reminded of the Commander she’d met back at the Abbey that first time. The one who had held her and her friends prisoner. At the same time, she felt a belated stab of sympathy for Luke as a child. No wonder he had turned out so perfect. Those eyes demanded nothing less.
“In an unbelievable turn of events, you somehow discovered that your father—our world’s most notorious criminal—was alive. Instead of coming to me, or Louis Keene, or literally any other person in this government—of which you are the PRESIDENT, Miss Kerrigan—you decided to keep it to yourself and hide him with your friends in a countryside estate. How am I doing so far?”
So far, that’s right on the money… “Mr. Fodder,” Rae began, “I understand that you’re—”
But there was no interrupting him now. The gloves were off and he was just getting warmed up. “You see, normally, I would only take a professional interest. Normally, I would only chalk up this massive, inconceivably stupid faux pas as a governmental lapse in judgement. But I can’t only be professional here, Rae. I take it personally as well. Because one of the people in that house happens to be carrying my grandchild. One of them happens to be my son!”
She let him calm down for a second, let him catch his breath. Then she cleared her throat softly and started in on a half-hearted defense. “He was going to tell you. Luke, I mean. He was going to tell you today. We had it all worked out—”
“Spare me the insipid rationalizations, Miss Kerrigan!” He seemed unable to decide which to call her by: her last name, or her first. At the moment, he was too incensed to see past the next sentence. “If there’s one thing that’s been made clear to me in the forty-five minutes since this has been brought to my attention, it’s that at NO POINT did you have any of it all worked out.” He took a breath to steady himself, but it did very little good. “Luke has been dodging me for days. Rescheduling. Avoiding my calls, not returning my texts. I’m assuming this is also why you refused to allow me a visit after the meeting the other day. Your house was already too full with your recently resurrected father, PRESDIENT KERRIGAN!”
It was too surreal.
Since Rae first set foot on the Guilder campus all those years ago, it felt like she had been fighting tooth and nail just to be heard. Like she alone had seen through to the treachery that lay beneath. To the inconsistencies between dogma and practice, to the monstrous people who’d infiltrated into the very heart.
She felt like she had been shouting at the top of her lungs, just to get attention. Screaming at walls and chasing at shadows, just trying to save the people she loved. Carter had always listened, her mother, once found, had always listened. But her mother had been lost for most of her life, and even Carter had been slow to get on board.
In the beginning, it had only been her. And Devon. And Molly. And Julian. The four of them against the rest of the world. Fighting the good fight. Hunting down demons when the rest of the world denied they were there. Going out on limb after limb, just trying to do what was right.
Luke had come along later. An invaluable, yet belated, addition to their gang. Both Angel and Gabriel were soon to follow. The most unlikely candidates of them all, but members of the family nonetheless. Four had made room to become seven. Becoming stronger and stronger with each new unbreakable bond. Growing in a way none of them had ever thought possible.
But in a way, it would always be those first four. Four friends racing around the world in an attempt to stop the worst man of them all. Four friends racing against time.
What Rae would have given then to have even an ounce of the power she did now. Just a hint of the authority she now carried. They would have freed the hybrids long ago. Lanford would never have gotten a foothold. Victor Mallins would not have been permitted to remain in a position of leverage over any other living creature. And Cromfield? Cromfield would have been hunted down and destroyed the second he first made entrance into her life.
The world would have been a different place. Lives would have been saved. Families would have remained whole. If only she’d had a voice then.
But now?
President Kerrigan.
The words had never sat well with her. From the first time they’d been uttered, the day she’d been sworn into office, they’d weighed heavy on her heart. Now? She outright hated them.
“I’m sorry,” she said softly. The second she heard the words, she realized there was really nothing else she could say. Nothing more she was able to offer. “I’m so sorry.”
Her lack of resistance quieted him, then softened him a fraction of an inch. With a dignity she knew she would never be able to approximate herself, he lowered back into his chair.
“Start at the beginning,” he commanded. “Tell me everything.”
* * *
For the next thirty minutes, the two of them went through the story, line by line. It sounded even more incredible said softly within the confines of an office than it did in real life. And not at all in a good way. When she got to the part about Simon helping Molly with the uncontrollable nausea, she thought he was going to burst a vein. When she got to the part about misappropriating governmental resources by stealing the tatù-inhibitors, he ran his fingers slowly over his eyes.
“And so… we said goodbye.”
Well, not hardly. That moment in the kitchen, the moment before it had all gone wrong, the word goodbye hadn’t been uttered once. It had been an unspoken implication. A permanent realigning of
things, one that none of them was able to say out loud.
To his credit, Fodder had held his tongue and listened all the way through. At several points Rae could tell he had been dying to interject, but he’d kept his composure and allowed her to finish.
But now that she had finished, he seemed to realize there was a bit more to the story left to be said.
“You said goodbye,” he began slowly, “and then the house exploded?”
Oh, right. That little detail there at the end. “Not everyone wanted to turn Simon over to the authorities. Kraigan,” she clarified quickly; it was impossible to distance herself fast enough. “Kraigan wanted to send you away. The rest of us refused. Then Angel baited him, Simon lunged forward to hold him back, and Gabriel…”
Her throat closed and the words stopped coming.
How could she explain what happened next? How could she even explain it to herself?
Gabriel had been about to murder her father. Because Angel told him to. Because he wanted to. Because he thought it was the right thing to do. The just thing to do. To protect them all.
And when Rae couldn’t let him do it…?
She’d already played back the moment again and again in her mind. Trying to understand what could have possibly happened. Trying to make it make sense.
Time had… stopped.
Yeah, no way was that making sense anytime soon. To anyone, let alone me.
So far, she hadn’t told anyone. To be fair, so far there hadn’t been time. But there was something more to it than that.
The manipulation of time wasn’t possible. At least it wasn’t supposed to be.
Not with any set of ink. Not with any tatù.
It had been one of the first things she’d looked for in the grand chronicle of active powers they kept at Guilder. Coming from an orphan with a tragic past, it really wasn’t that surprising. If there was a way to go back and rectify the wrongs of her childhood, Rae most certainly wanted to give it a try. Of course, she hadn’t found anything. And of course, she turned out not to be an orphan after all. But the fact remained.
She had literally stopped time. She and she alone. She knew it for certain, because she was the only one not affected. She was messing around with powers now that were so far past the limits of reason, so far past her control, she didn’t know how to begin to handle it.
She was scared. Scratch that: she was terrified. And exhausted. And she had absolutely no earthly idea where she’d even picked up a tatù like that. To be honest, a part of her was hoping it would simply go away.
Either way, she didn’t have the strength or wherewithal to deal with it right now. There were slightly more pressing matters at hand. And if young Samantha was any indication of the rest of the tatù world, she and her friends could be in a lot of trouble.
“So,” she began tentatively; as always, she found herself looking to Fodder for help, “where does this leave us?”
There was a brief pause, then the ice between them finally started to thaw.
“I don’t know, Rae.” He pushed to his feet with a sigh. A second later, he offered her a hand up as well. “I don’t know what any of this is going to mean.”
A chill ran through her body, but she accepted the hand with a nod of gratitude.
That was the problem. She didn’t know either.
Chapter 2
By the time Rae got out to the main lobby, most of the others were already there. They were milling about in various states of disrepair, and judging by the looks on their faces they had all received a lecture similar to hers.
Julian, especially, was looking rather grim. One side of his face was still sporting an oddly geometric arch of triangular cuts. Collateral from falling through a glass ceiling when he leapt off the bridge. Now, the other was slashed down the side with five fingernail-shaped gashes. Mementoes of Kraigan’s retaliation.
In a gruesome way, it wasn’t entirely unflattering. Like he was the anti-hero of some rain-soaked movie who’d just gotten his ass kicked. Or a dark prince, come to torment the living.
Devon, who had walked out from another door at the same time she had, appeared to think the same thing.
“’Sup, Lucifer?” He clapped Julian sadly on the shoulder. “How’s life in the underworld?”
“Don’t even remind me.” Julian winced painfully and brought a tentative hand up to his face. “If it weren’t for the fact that my girlfriend is damn pleased with me at the moment, there’s a chance this could really suck.”
Rae wrapped an arm around him with a sympathetic smile. “I could try to heal it for you. I haven’t worked much with that set of ink, but it’s not like I could make it any worse.”
His eyes flashed white for a second, before darkening back down with a shudder. “Yes, you could.”
Another door opened and closed, and the lot of them rolled their eyes as a spirited voice filtered down into the lobby.
Apparently, freakin’ pleased wasn’t the half of it. Angel could be heard loudly proclaiming to anyone in earshot how it had been her intent to kill Simon Kerrigan the entire time. When she finally detached from the agents escorting her and joined the rest of them, she was met by a host of sour looks. Not that she could have cared any less. “What?” she shot back, glancing eagerly about the room. “You know what thin ice I’m on with these people already. You expect me to let an opportunity like this pass me by?”
The others all deliberately avoided eye contact, while Gabriel merely slouched down on a bench that had been pushed up against the wall, pulling his hoodie lower over his eyes.
As it turned out, Molly’s ‘interrogation’ was nothing more than a checkup with a doctor, and some calming herbal tea. Fodder’s influence, no doubt. The entire thing did wonders for her mood, and by the time she emerged she was snacking happily from a box of Belgian chocolates. “Well, that wasn’t so bad, was it?” she said brightly, popping a caramel into her mouth. Only afterwards did she look around in confusion. “You guys didn’t get any chocolates?’
Luke had been the first one to go in, and the last one to come out. He’d spent a whole hour and a half with his father behind closed doors, and by the time he emerged there was a distinct ashen tint to his face. The others were all quick to offer him silent support. Molly even offered him a chocolate.
“Well,” Devon stepped forward to rally what little was left of their spirits, “at least it’s all over now. It’s done. Out of our hands.”
The others nodded stiffly, still licking their wounds. Rae stared blankly at the floor. Devon slipped his arm around her as Luke helped Molly into her coat.
“Come on, honey,” he murmured. “Let’s go home.”
Rae wanted to ask where home was now. She’d kind of blown most of it up somehow. She didn’t have the heart to bring it up. Maybe a drive would help.
If only they’d known what was coming next. If only Julian had been watching. If only the structural engineers who’d designed the facility had seen fit to equip it with a gate.
The second they stepped outside, it was déjà vu all over again.
A blinding neon flashbulb stopped them in their tracks as an accompanying roar of voices stunned them senseless. They were still blinking around in shock, trying to understand what was happening, when the first of the individual questions started filtering through.
“Is it true? Is Simon Kerrigan really alive?”
“Where has he been all these years? Why did he come back?”
“What happened back in Kent? Why was he staying there with you?”
“What else are you not telling us? What other secrets do you have to hide?”
Rae stumbled backwards a step, staring out at the growing crowd in horror as yet another neon flash of blue lit up her face. Devon was wrong. Things weren’t over. Not by a long shot.
In fact, she had the terrible feeling this was just the beginning…
* * *
The tenuous peace lasted just until they got back into the house from the
limousine. Just. The second they stepped over the threshold, the whole thing splintered into a thousand fractious pieces.
“What the hell were you trying to do?!”
Kraigan leapt out of the shadows and shoved Gabriel into the wall before the latter could even finish removing his coat. A crystal vase shattered behind him as his hair spilled into his face.
“Kraigan—back off!” Devon shouted in alarm.
But there was no ‘backing Kraigan off.’ He looked as feral as Rae had ever seen him. And right now, he was focusing all that rage directly at Gabriel.
“He tried to KILL my DAD!”
The second Gabriel got to his feet, Kraigan leapt forward again.
Only this time, Gabriel was ready. This time it was Kraigan who went flying backwards, landing with a painful crash somewhere on the second floor.
“This is bullshit,” Luke muttered, putting an arm around Molly as he guided her to the living room, the only ‘safe’ part of the house. “I’m not doing this again.”
“Kraigan! Come on! Stop it!” Rae shouted. “What did you think was going to happen? That he was just going to live here forever? That we’d all be some happy family?!”
With a ferocious roar Kraigan bypassed the stairs altogether and leapt over the railing, landing right in front of them. If anything, the sharp crack to the head had only made him angrier; only now, it was Rae who had his attention.
“You didn’t even try!” He shoved her hard into the front door. A stabbing pain shot down her neck. “You didn’t even try to keep him here with us! You just let them take him away!”
There was a sickening crunch as Devon’s fist connected with her half-brother’s face.
“Touch her again, I’ll end you.”
No one could doubt the dark sincerity of his words, but Kraigan wasn’t in a mental place in which he cared. He was seeing red. The house and all its occupants were already collateral.
“Like it was nothing!” he screamed, launching himself towards her again. “Like he means nothing to you!”