The Lostkind

by Matt Stephens

  "But she's not especially wrong. The less traffic back and forth the better. We've still got the information Owen collected, so Vandark can't get in; at least not in anything like the numbers he'd need to do some damage. But we were able to clear Dorcan, so..."

  "Dorcan's innocent?" Vincent interrupted. "That's good. He's saved our lives."

  "Yeah, I'm relieved too." Yasi admitted, though he noticed a blush on her face. "He's barely speaking to me, but there was a perfectly good reason for all the things he was doing, so..."

  "What was his perfectly good reason?" Vincent asked with interest.

  Yasi's gaze flicked to Vincent as her blush spread down her neck. "That's not important."

  Vincent's interest was piqued, but he knew better than to press it. "Okay."

  "By the way…" She said lightly. "Welcome to the team."

  "Vincent?" A voice commented.

  Vincent spun in surprise; to see Davidson in the doorway. He sent a look over his shoulder; to see that Yasi had vanished. "Hey Boss." He said, fighting for calm. "What brings you down here this time of the weekend?"

  "I was about to ask you that..." Davidson came closer. "Were you just talking to someon-My God, what the hell happened to you?"

  Vincent winced. His bruises were still relatively fresh and swelling up nicely. "It's nothing. I fell down the stairs."

  "How many times?" Davidson demanded. "You should be at the emergency room."

  "I'm fine." Vincent waved it off. "I was just..." His mouth shut suddenly. It just hit him that he didn't have an alibi ready.

  Fortunately, Davidson was thinking about something else at the time. "By the way, did you hear about Owen?"

  Vincent nearly swallowed his tongue. He had absolutely no idea how to answer that one. His heart stopped for a moment, and then started again at triple speed. "What about him?" He asked carefully.

  "He quit." Davidson said, and Vincent relaxed. "Got a job somewhere on the West Coast."

  Vincent could feel his heart thundering as the sudden spike of adrenaline started to fade. "Well... W-we knew he wasn't staying on permanently. Remember?"

  "Sure, but that was two years ago. I guess I figured he had settled here." Davidson sighed. "Well, people move on. I just wish I had a little more warning. The man resigned by letter. He tell you?"

  Vincent bit back the first response that came to mind. "No." He said finally. "I had no warning at all."

  Davidson took that at face value. "Okay. Glad you're okay."

  ELEVEN: Plans in Motion

  The Triumvirate of the New York Underside usually held court in the Throne Room above the Twelfth Level Dome. But to address the Underside, they needed different facilities. Yasi was overseeing the repairs, when Tecca had quietly informed her that an address was coming.

  Keeper and Archivist were there when Yasi arrived, and the three of them gathered in the Whisper Chamber, assembled before the central trunk of steam pipes, as though at the brass altar to a forgotten god.

  One thing Connie had not noticed when she had visited this room, was the window. It was at the base of the trunk of pipes, and covered over with an oilcloth curtain. Keeper drew it back and the Twelfth Level was visible. Standing before the pipes, Archivist opened a few valves, and Keeper spoke, her voice rang through all of them, taking her words to the entire Secret City like a Public Address System.

  The feeling of dread in the Underside was still thick after the Riverfolk attack, and remained until Keeper spoke. She had been the Arbiter for longer than most anyone could remember, and the sight of the ancient woman with a smile on her face was a blessing. She told them half the truth and all of the results.

  After that, the party began in earnest. There was a real sense of victory in The Underside. The threat had been neutralized, the enemy plans brought to nothing by quick and decisive action.

  Archivist closed the pipes as the celebration began. Among the Triumvirate, the overriding feeling was relief. "We were lucky." Keeper said finally.

  Archivist nodded. "We were lucky, but we had help. History is full of examples where one person acting in good faith can bring all the plans of evil men to nothing."

  Yasi let out a breath. "Is that why you guys decided to give Vincent and Connie a chance?"

  "Sort of." Archivist nodded. "A lot of the time we forget that we're part of the city above too. We eat the same food they do, breathe the same air they do... We need them more than they need us. We have our secrets, and we only survive because we keep them; but if we keep ourselves closed off from them completely..."

  Yasi nodded. "Why do you hate him so much?"

  "Because..." Keeper shook her head. "Doesn't matter. I don't hate him. Not anymore. I fact; I never really did; I just didn't approve."

  "Can I ask you something else then?" Yasi said casually. "Why'd you let Dorcan out?"

  The old woman barely flinched. "Because he's innocent. I let you arrest him because I thought maybe you had something your weren't telling me, something I didn't know about... but then I listened to your list of 'evidence' when he was locked up... Yasi, I can explain all that."

  "What?"

  "He started making great effort to become your second in command, because... I told him to."

  Yasi reacted. "What?"

  Archivist suddenly pulled out his fob watch. "Oh, would you look at the time? I have to go... do something very important."

  Archivist almost ran out of the room. Keeper and Yasi let him go, watching each other.

  Keeper sighed and scratched the back of her neck. For a moment, Yasi thought the old woman looked embarrassed. "I told him that I would look favorably on his attempts to put his name forward as your second in command."

  "I remember." Yasi admitted. "And I remember thinking that was odd. You don't usually care about my Team's appointments."

  Keeper sighed hard. "It was pretty obvious that he had feelings for you, and you'd known him for years but he liked you anyway..."

  "Hey!"

  "Well, it's true." Keeper defended. "I figured having him as your second... Practically your partner..."

  Yasi's jaw dropped. "You were trying to set us up?"

  "You've been on your own too long to be healthy, and I'm an old woman Yasi; I want grandchildren." Keeper said without remorse. "And you're not doing your part, so I had to push you along."

  "KEEP!" Yasi almost shrieked.

  "Yasi, I took a shot three years ago." Keeper waved it off. "I don't send you men anymore, you never slow down long enough to do anything about any of them. But Dorcan was a good kid who stayed loyal for three years of being ignored. And because he liked you, he got thrown into the Oubliette as a traitor."

  Yasi looked down. "He could have been."

  "Yasi." Keeper just glared at her.

  "Okay, he's innocent." Yasi admitted. "Don't set me up with people."

  Keeper sighed. "Fine. But I still want grandchildren."

  "Keeper!"

  Keeper glared. "Yasi, Dorcan was the one guy in the place that still called you by your name all the time. Even Wotcha was intimidated by you. It's a talent we took pains to teach you, but... Look, I'm your Keeper, like I am for everyone in this place, but I'm still your mother. When was the last time you sat and talked with someone? Not ordered about, or got a report; when was the last time you just sat down and chatted about nothing?"

  Vincent. Yasi thought about the time at the Brooklyn Bridge, the night in the Met...

  Keeper nodded as though she was reading Yasi's mind. "That's why I didn't like him."

  "Why'd you offer him and Connie a job then?"

  "Because I knew Connie wouldn't take it, and I knew we needed a friend in the City Planner's Office. If there's one thing the last month has proven, it's that our place here can be… fragile."

  Yasi shifted to the safer topic. "Have I completely screwed up with Dorcan?"

  "Yes. Fix it, would you?" Keeper told her directly. "If not properly, then enough that you can still work together."r />
  Yasi glared. "Keep, I just locked up a good friend for having a crush on me. This is already kinda mortifying. A moment of human sympathy from my mother would not be totally out of line from you right now."

  "Provide grandchildren, I'll be warm and fluffy." Keeper dared her.

  Yasi sighed and turned to go.

  "And don't pounce on Vincent." Keeper said blithely. "There's an appropriate period you wait after a breakup, and it's longer than two days."

  Yasi was so stunned she couldn't speak. He mouth just opened and closed in shock, making her look like a dying fish.

  "Since we pretty much detonated his relationship with Connie, you don't want to look like you were just waiting for the chance." Keeper continued, as though talking about the weather. "You do that when nobody's looking. Toodles!"

  Keeper vanished before Yasi could get over her shock paralysis. She stayed that way for a very long time, uncertain how to react to the whole mess her life had become.

  ~oo00oo~

  Vincent honestly didn't know how to react to anything any more. He felt like a secret agent, living a normal every day life in a city office as a paper pusher, just waiting for his handler to make contact with a covert mission. In a very real sense, that was his life now.

  But then he looked around his house and realized that he couldn't afford it any more. And part of him didn't want to. Yesterday the apartment had a ‘lived in' feel because it had plenty of personal effects about. By the time Vincent had made it home, a lot of them were gone from the living room, and all of them from the bedroom. Connie had come in and collected her things. Every room was filled with empty shelves.

  Faced with the prospect of his home suddenly seeming like an echo chamber with everything missing, and staring at the TV all night with his nerves this jumpy, he chose a third option; and started cooking.

  ~oo00oo~

  Dorcan came into Yasi's chamber, and stood stiffly at attention on the edge; as the smell of cooking wafted over him. "Captain?"

  "I'm here." She called from the dark corners. "Please, come in."

  It was the first time he could recall the Shinobi Captain ever using the world ‘please' and he took the hint appropriately. She kept the lights low, and once he stepped away from the opening, his eyes could make her out by the glow of her cooker. She was stirring a pot on her small stove, and he came over to join her.

  "I was wondering if you'd accept the invite." Yasi said awkwardly.

  "I almost didn't." Dorcan admitted as he came in.

  A small inhuman hiss answered as he approached, and he glared in its general direction. "I don't like you either."

  "Be nice to my cat." Yasi told him without turning. "Merlin never did anything to you."

  "I'll be as nice to your cat as you are to your oldest friends." Dorcan shot back.

  "And thus ends the small talk portion of the evening." Yasi sighed. "Would it help if I said I was sorry?"

  Dorcan sat down, cross-legged. "I don't know. I've never known you to apologize for anything."

  Yasi turned the flame down low on her cooker, and spooned out two serves into bowls. "I know." She admitted. "Something the Sensei told me: The King Doesn't Make Mistakes."

  "Like killing Grey?" Dorcan challenged.

  Yasi paused. "You heard about that."

  "Yeah. I got eyes in this city too Captain." He spat. The bowl she handed him sat ignored on the stone floor beside him. "You want to know how many ways killing a cop was dangerous?"

  "I know." Yasi sighed. "But letting him live would have been worse… Owen lied to Grey, or at least told him only half the truth. He meant to expose us Dorcan. He was going to drag us all out into the world's attention; and for what? Trespassing? Squatting? You know how many places there are in this city where a homeless person isn't allowed to lie down in the gutter? If you can be booked for that; what the hell would they do with us?"

  "So you killed him?!" Dorcan hissed. "Just lopped his head off, like it was a… a…" He shook his head briefly. "I don't know, but still, what the hell?"

  Yasi glared. "Dorcan, if Vandark bought him off with the promise that we'd be exposed to the world as criminals, you know as well as I do that he'd never have lived to see that either."

  Dorcan was unforgiving. "So you figure Vandark would have killed him long before he got anywhere. Great, you just knocked something off the bad guy's to-do list. Good guys aren't supposed to do that!"

  Yasi sighed. "I know. Dorcan, you and I have both killed to keep this place a secret. We're Shinobi, it's our job to protect and conceal, no matter the cost. He may have been a cop, but Grey had declared his intent; the guy was an enemy."

  "Our enemy? Or Vincent's?" Dorcan challenged.

  Yasi almost swallowed her tongue. "What?"

  "Its not the first time we've faced and killed someone who got too close. Not the first time one has threatened to expose us either, but you usually don't strike so soon. So what the hell made this cop so dangerous? Could it be because he knew Vincent and Connie? I know you don't have any particular interest in his girlfriend, even if you had a hand in them getting together, but you keep..."

  "So what if I do?" Yasi forced out a short bark of laughter. "Vincent is a paper-pusher. And an Upsider. He's a baby in a snake pit when up against the Watchers, let alone Riverfolk. You were there."

  "Then why are you smiling?" Dorcan challenged.

  Yasi's expression schooled immediately, but far too late.

  "Just hearing his name cheers you up. That's a smile that comes from real emotion." Dorcan rubbed his face. "I have never once seen you smile like that, even for a little while." His tone turned bitter. "There was a time I would have given anything to get you to smile like that for me. In fact, it was yesterday."

  Yasi looked down, shamed. "I didn't know. I mean, I always suspected you felt that way, but I never really thought-"

  "No, it was far easier for you to think that someone who wants to spend time with you must be looking for a place to stick a knife." Dorcan growled. "Even if it's me."

  Yasi squeezed her eyes shut. "I was wrong." She admitted.

  "THANK YOU!" Dorcan exploded, as though he'd been waiting for that admission a long time.

  Long silence.

  "Dorcan, I screwed up, no mistake." She said finally. "I was hoping you and I might be able to figure out... I don't know, but I hate to leave it here. I was hoping that we could at least eat a meal together without coming to blows."

  Dorcan smirked bitterly. "I would, but you're a lousy cook Captain. That's why you're so skinny."

  Long silence.

  Yasi burst out laughing; and Dorcan joined in. It was harsh, bitter laughter; the sick kind that came when nothing was funny.

  "I made Vincent some soup. He thought it was medicine. Couldn't bring myself to admit it." She admitted between laughter, and that just set them off again. It went on for a while.

  Yasi settled first. "Just out of curiosity...I get that you're ticked at me over yesterday; and I don't blame you, but have you been waiting to say these things a long time?"

  "I've been waiting to say a lot of things for a long time." Dorcan admitted.

  Heavy silence.

  "This was a mistake." Dorcan stood up. "I should go. Don't worry Captain, I won't make it worse. I just wish... well, a few things."

  Yasi caught his wrist as he turned to go. "You used to call me Yasi. Ever since we were kids, even with my parents... We were friends a long time Dorcan."

  Dorcan didn't answer. His frame was practically radiating tension. "A very long time Captain, but... we were never really friends, were we?"

  "Dorcan, am I going to spend my whole life paying for a stupid mistake?" Yasi slumped a little. "Is there no way to salvage… anything?"

  Dorcan seemed to deflate a little himself. "You're right. We have known each other for many years. What I don't get is... why is all that history supposed to make me forgive you, when it couldn't make you trust me?" He spoke in a low, tightly con
trolled voice. "You're losing it Captain. The Underside is coming apart, and it has been by inches for years now. I'm Shinobi. My job is to protect it, and believe me I will. This is my home too." He paused at the entrance and looked back at her. "Do you even know who your friends are any more?"

  Yasi didn't try to stop him as he left the room.

  After a moment, the cat came over and nuzzled her hand. She pulled him into her lap and scratched behind his ear. "I really messed that one up didn't I, Merlin?"

  The cat wriggled free and went over to the bowl Dorcan left, sniffing at it for a moment, before retreating into the shadows again, looking for rats.

  "Everyone's a critic." Yasi snorted.

  But Dorcan's words had hit their mark, and she spent longer thinking about it than she normally would have.

  After a moment she rose to her feet and left her room behind.

  ~oo00oo~

  The rain had continued for over an hour. It wasn't a downpour, just a steady heavy rain that made gutters into rivers. Vincent was still cooking as the wind came up a moment and pounded the rain into the windows. He wondered idly how the Underside handled rainfall, and then remembered the River. It all flowed out somewhere, just as it did above.

  There was a knock at the door; and he paused. Connie still had a few things here, but he was certain she still had her key. Yasi would use the window... He sent a quick glance over to the hall closet by the door. The goggles and the crossbow were there, wrapped in the coat Yasi had given him. History suggested they wouldn't be much help; but he supposed Owen or Riverfolk wouldn't knock. "It's Open!" He called from the kitchen.

  The front door opened, and Connie's brother Drew, Benji and Tony came in.

  Vincent poked his head out and looked; his eyes going straight to Drew. "Oh. Come to make good on what you said the day we met?"

  Drew snorted. "You'd think so, wouldn't you?" He mock-growled. "But Connie has assured me that you were a gentleman, and that it was her choice to walk away. Something about heading in different directions."