by J. B. Garner
"Beat me to it," I muttered as I clambered onto the floating hunk of floor. Thank God Epic was going to carry me. The thought of moving that far under my own power scared me.
"Be careful, milady."
"What Robin Hood said. Don't get us nuked, Indy." Ex couldn't help but cast a suspicious eye at Epic, but he said nothing.
I only gave a brief nod in reply. I was busy, trying to muster every rational fiber of my mind for what was to come. With the barest of gestures, Epic launched out over the city, following the direction the mass of people below seemed to be going, with me and our sleeping cargo in tow.
Despite the problem I was wrestling with and the ever-increasing mental focus I had to use to keep standing with broken bones, oozing wounds, and constant spikes of pain, my eyes just couldn't peel away from the citizenry below. How had they gotten the idea to do this, to march towards the impending danger instead of hiding away? Why would they even want to make the army stand down? Hadn't weeks of oppression turned them wisely against their superhuman masters? That's what Ian would have thought, for sure.
No, it wasn't that. It also couldn't have been Eric's reversal. Oh, sure, the people that saw him fighting Reaper alongside the rest of us might be even more motivated, but that didn't explain the source of this. I could only guess that the Whiteout had sparked some kind of simultaneous divergent thought in so many people, some kind of assurance that the Pushed were a better choice than the army. That was asking for a big coincidence and even that seemed a stretch. Maybe it was the message I had recorded with Stephanya. If it had gone as viral as that original film, maybe it could have sparked this, but that too seemed pretty far-fetched.
Epic seemed a bit more focused but, even so, I could see Eric doing sweeping scans of the people down below. It was obvious to me that he was as puzzled as I was. Well, it wasn't as if his supposed omniscience hadn't been proven spotty in the past, especially in regards to anything involving Naturals. I'm sure my and Quentin's presence was playing havoc with him and Mind's Eye.
It was only moments, even if my rapid-fire thoughts made it seem like minutes, before the front line of the Army's advance came into view. They hadn't ventured far beyond the dome's former perimeter, just past the I-285 bypass that circled Atlanta, and that very fact hammered home just how swiftly our battle had come to its conclusion. It couldn't have been more than ten minutes since we had first engaged Reaper and his other flunkies. More than that, it made the marching citizens even more of an enigma. How could this have been planned with such foresight as to be ready for this?
The answer presented itself as plain as day as the frontlines of the citizen march came into clear view and the final puzzle pieces clicked into place. Standing in the back of a pick-up truck, extolling the normal men and women of Atlanta onward through a bullhorn, was a heavily-bandaged Rachel Choi. The truck itself was eased slowly towards the Army lines by Duane Brooks, looking as mummified by gauze, if not more so, than his partner.
"How did I not see them before?"
Epic's question was rhetorical because his mind was only a pace behind mine. It really only made sense, if you considered what had already been laid out for me. Any normal human could become Pushed, or else new Pushed wouldn't keep cropping up. I had seen first-hand that a Natural could become Pushed, as Ian had. Why couldn't a normal person gain the will and, to be honest, the suspicion to break free of the Whiteout and become like me?
"Well, at least it explains a lot."
"Indeed. With them at our backs, it will make attaining our intended goal that much more likely, yet I still fear for our success." A darkness fell over Epic's eyes as we arced down towards the ground and the fated meeting of all three sides. "It would be so much easier to save the people by wiping out this army before it even has a chance to fire a shot."
"No." My gaze narrowed. "We don't work that way. You trusted me back there, keep doing so. I just need a little faith from you and a steady hand." He let out a sharp hiss of a sigh.
"I will do my best, Irene."
"Good enough for me."
The highway was wide enough to accommodate the tanks three abreast and the main guns swiveled to follow our motion. More concerning to me was the infantry mixed in loose formation around and behind the initial vanguard of armor. We were small targets, after all. The chance that I would be hit by a burst of suppressing machine gun fire was much higher than being splattered by a tank shell. The thing that gave me hope was that no one opened fire, not even a jumpy private who might be seeing action for the first time. Was it the proximity of civilians that held them back or some deep seated understanding that we didn't come as the enemy? I didn't know and I didn't honestly care.
Epic settled my rock platform on the ground as Brooks pumped the accelerator behind us. There were probably two dozen guns immediately trained on me and even more on Epic as I found the strength to cradle Schuller like a baby and step off into the street. Brakes signaled the truck halting behind us as I stepped forward, searching the eyes of the soldiers in front of us, most of them as anxious and scared as the thousands of civilians in our wake.
"Stay cool, guys, we're on the same side." I tried to find a medium between soothing and authoritative in my tone. "I really need to talk to someone in charge before something bad happens." To try to emphasize the 'we come in peace' point I slowly laid Gerald carefully out on the ground and raised my hands. Taking my lead, Epic actually deigned to lower himself fully to the ground and spread out his hands openly.
There was a murmur back and forth, whispers among the infantry, as footsteps from behind announced the arrival of Rachel and Duane in the flesh. I risked a glance at the two of them and gave a brief nod and smile. It was a relief to see them alive, even if they looked like they had been caught in a tenement fire. Maybe they had taken 'torching the place' literally.
"Look, gentlemen, I'm former FBI agent Rachel Choi and this is my partner, Duane Brooks," Rachel said, flashing her old identification. "There's no need for any of this. If -"
"No need for more chatter, Ms. Choi." The gravelly voice of a man who chain-smoked three packs a day came out of the top of one of the lead tanks' turrets as a helmeted head followed.
Square-jawed, so sun-weathered that I wasn't quite sure I could peg his ethnicity, every inch the career soldier, the man who emerged from the armored war machine certainly seemed to ooze authority. I knew just enough about military markings to tell he wasn't a general or anything so high up, but he had to be at least somewhat in charge with how the other soldiers reacted to him. The name tag on his urban camouflage read 'Jackson'.
"Major Frank Jackson." He nodded down at us from the safety of his turret. I couldn't hold that against him. "I've been fully briefed on the Atlanta situation pre-dome. No need for introductions." He glanced at Gerald's peaceful form. "Where are the rest of them?"
"Down, not dead, and that's probably all that's important right now." I made a face. "We weren't in time to save Liberty though." I frowned. He wasn't the only one we didn't save. "Reaper snapped his neck before we got there."
"I'm sorry to hear that, ma'am. Served with him for months now. He was a good man." He gave Epic a glance. "I don't have the authority to do more than halt the advance right now, but I need some damn good reasons to even do that much, especially with our primary target hanging out in front of our main line." Jackson looked back at all of us. "That's what you're here for, I take it. A cease to the advance? Otherwise, we wouldn't have a line of civvies marching towards us. They sure as hell aren't evacuating."
"You are most correct, Major," Epic began, paused for a long doubtful moment, then continued. "I have come before you and your men to surrender myself for the crimes I have committed against this country and its people."
"I don't enforce laws but if it were up to me, your willingness to turn yourself in would mean something." He rubbed his face. "Still, you're going to have to forgive me for not taking you at face value, son. I'm personally glad you have that psy
cho deactivated but, to be frank, you're the head of an army of a thousand people each with more firepower than an platoon of infantry. Why would you surrender at all?"
"Major, if you know everyone here, you have to know me." I decided to butt in before Eric started to get frustrated. He was so brilliant that he tended to take even rational questions aimed at him as some kind of insult and even the soul-searching he had just recently undergone probably wouldn't change that.
"I do, ma'am. Maybe you can enlighten this old warhorse as to why the people who last I saw were beating the holy hell out of each other are now standing side-by-side."
"Oh Lord, this is going to sound really corny, Major, but," I took a deep breath, "Epic has changed. He's being honest about this and I think most of the other Crusaders will fall into lock-step. There's not going to be a need for any of this by nightfall."
"Major, the lady's right," Duane added. "Besides that, you guys have rules of engagement and shit. There's tens of thousands of people that are willing to stand in your way because, hell, we don't need the army blowing up everything now. The situation is handled."
The infantry's murmurs picked up. Some of them even lowered their assault rifles. The Major's expression was unchanging but his eyes seemed to soften just a hair.
"I want to believe all of this. Heaven help me, I certainly don't want to be the officer who didn't listen and mistakenly shelled a major American city." He rubbed his eyes. "Give me something, some real assurance than if I hold this line, that when the inevitable screw-up happens, it won't make me regret not stopping you all here and now."
The four of us glanced between one another. Did we really have anything to offer the Major? It was stupid, but there was only one thing I could think to say.
"Major, you have my personal promise that nothing will happen." I gestured behind me. "There are a million people, if not more, that trust me and I didn't let them down." I looked to Epic, then Brooks and Choi. "We didn't let them down. Sir, we won't let you down either."
The Major locked eyes with me and we stood there, taking a good measure of one another. There was a long moment when I thought he was going to make the call to unleash hell down on us. Instead, he popped back down into the tank and, like a ripple, tank cannons raised and the infantry seemed to back down.
I let myself take a deep breath as relief washed over me. We did it. Promises kept and lives saved.
Well, most of those lives were saved.
The tears that came were that strange mixture of joy at what we had accomplished and grief at what we had lost and I knew, as the Army line took a symbolic yard-long retreat, I wasn't the only one doing the same.
Chapter 26 Funeral
It was remarkable how few of us had died that day. In a way, it upset me that so few of the creators of the crisis had paid any real price when so many normal people had. Still, to be honest, I don't know how many funerals I could have taken and that selfish part of me was glad that I would only have to bury one friend today.
No one had wanted to wait a week to bury Medusa. Not me, certainly not Hexagon, and most of all not her family. The family that I had never had a chance to meet before now, hidden away like so many other families of the Pushed, and I would have to meet them, face them, tell them how their daughter died saving my life. I scrubbed my face with cold water, trying to reassure myself that I had made the right choice for the tenth time this week.
While we hadn't wanted to, we had little choice in the matter. The past seven days had been an endless flurry of activity, debriefing, accusation, and reconstruction. Even the three days I had spent in the hospital recovering contained little rest, at least not for my mind or spirit, as I was bombarded with constant visitors from the military, from the FBI, from the Department of Homeland Security ... it was endless.
I looked in the mirror and sighed. The gray was spreading quickly beyond a few stray hairs. Was I vain enough to get that touched up? Should I do it anyway just to present a strong public image? I flipped open the medicine cabinet and stared at the now-barren shelves. My first act when I got back to my apartment here at the Brooks-Choi Foundation was to swipe every pill bottle into a trash bag and hand it over to Duane for disposal. I couldn't stand that temptation and, besides, it was time to clear out the past.
I popped an antibiotic from the sole remaining bottle in the cabinet and took a deep breath. I had to finish getting ready. The funeral procession was only an hour away and I wanted to be ready well ahead of time.
Even through the morass of government activity, there had been a few chances to check up with most of my friends and allies in the aftermath of things, usually with the Human Tank at my side. Tank had really walked away from that final battle in the best shape of all of us and, with Mind's Eye still recovering from strain and exhaustion, he wound up hanging around me quite often. Really, in retrospect, Tank was the unsung hero of the story. We would be attending four funerals today instead of one if not for him.
I gingerly slid into a fresh uniform, doing my damnedest not to aggravate any of my numerous injuries. Rachel had been the one to decide that the funeral procession needed to be a big, flashy public event. We had an argument over it but, in the end, she had made a strong case. After all, the truly impressive occupation force, far more insidious than the Crusaders or the U.S. Army, was now the world media. After over a month of isolation and drama, everyone wanted to know anything and everything about what had happened. Rachel had realized that the media would be out in force anyway so why not take control of the situation and at least have some input into how they dealt with it.
I walked over to the barren dresser. It too was swept clean save for my mask and the spirit gum. For now, that was all I needed.
Epic might or might not be at the funeral. We had only seen each other once or twice outside of government functions. Understandably, he was at the center of all the inquiries and I had more questions asked about him then about my own direct role in the invasion and the aftermath.
How could you blame them? No matter the reason and no matter his current intent, Eric had started this. All of this. The real quandary for them lay in what options they had. They couldn't harm him, they couldn't realistically imprison him, and they damn sure couldn't let him run completely wild. I only hoped Eric didn't tumble back to where he had been, especially so soon after reaching his own personal epiphany.
I picked up my mask and stared at it in my gloved hands. That was my life now, the woman in the mask not the one behind it, but I was content with that. This time, I had chosen it, embraced it, and in that way I was sure I could keep it from suffocating Irene Roman out of existence. It's not like I hadn't been offered an out. Both the FBI and Homeland Security were very plain that they would have loved to have me working for them in a much more low-key position. Indomitable could have disappeared forever.
We had already seen how badly things had gone to shit without the two lynchpins to hold it all up. I wasn't going to thumb my nose at the Whiteout again and see if we could really end the world this time. No. Indomitable wasn't going away, at least not until I just couldn't do the job anymore.
I wondered if this messed-up reality would let that happen.
The spirit gum took hold as I pressed the mask into place and I felt strangely whole once more.
"Irene?" Quentin called from the hallway. "The convoy is about ready to roll out." He and Frost were also quartered here at the Foundation for the short term. Voltage, well, that was complicated. I still didn't quite understand the whys or the hows, it was all Pushtech mumbo-jumbo, but Archer explained it best that somehow Alma and Vee had become 'entangled' when he focused himself through her crystal form. At least they were both alive.
"Yeah, I'm coming." I pulled out the black armband from the top drawer and pulled it up over my bicep. Opening the door, I could see that Quentin looked as haggard as I had in the mirror, but he still had that vague smirk on his lips.
"Now that I'm graced with your presence, we ca
n get this whole depressing show on the road." He offered me his arm and I shot him a glare. "So no love for the guy who pulled you out of your out-of-time trip?"
I didn't take his arm, but I did give the man in black a heartfelt embrace.
"Thanks, Quentin."
"No, thank you!" As I pulled back, he smiled and began to stroll. "You know, I kept my lips sealed about that like you asked but you never told me what the hell that was about."
"Just a ghost of a very bitter man offering one last temptation."
"If you say so, but you know I don't believe in ghosts."
"Quentin, let me tell you about the undead ..."
You would have thought we were burying the President with the turn-out on the city streets. I had expected something, but not quite what I saw as the procession moved slowly from the funeral home to Westview Cemetery. Certainly, the month spent under the Crusader boot had kept some at bay, but The March (as it came to be known as) that helped end it had emboldened many people and many more simply knew that Medusa had died to give them back their freedom.
It had been my idea that we walk out in the open, alongside the slow-moving hearse, all of the remaining Atlanta Five, Archer, and myself. If this was going to be a show, I figured we should at least show all of our colors. Medusa's, no, Esperanza's mother, father, and uncle rode behind, with Rachel, Duane, Alma, and the others bringing up the rear as a kind of honor guard, while the restored Captain Joe Braxton led the police escort personally ahead of us.
I don't honestly remember much of the procession itself. For me, it was a mechanical thing, to just keep those feet moving towards our goal. It let my mind sink into remembering Meds as she was in life. It shocked me to realize we had only known each other for four months and yet had bonded so quickly and completely. Every moment was burned into my memory. The effort it took to not stop and break down right then and there was tremendous. I know it wasn't a burden I carried alone.