by Jack Truxton
The two over-muscled goons stalked forward, Bimmy cracking his knuckles and Jimmy slipping on a set of brass knuckles the size of a license plate, while Mario chortled behind us. “You’re makin’ me shake in my boots, Jakey, and besides, it’s not greedy to take what’s mine.”
That was some kind of cue for the neo-roid freaks, as that’s when they went into full bum rush mode. Bimmy in his shimmering salmon let out an incoherent roar as he swung a Buick-sized fist at my head, and piss-yellow Jimmy took a shuffle step to one side in an effort to corral us towards his buddy. Surprisingly smart tactics for guys like this. No doubt they had run this play a thousand times on far more unfortunate people than Annie and me.
Fortunately for us, we weren’t a couple of helpless folks to be crushed under Romine’s heel, well, not anymore.
As Bimmy’s fist rocketed in, I was already out of the way, rushing forward to squeeze through the gap between the twins. That punch had enough force to blow my long hair back, and I lost sight of Annie behind the wall of muscle as I spun to face their backs. I only heard her hiss loudly even as Nyala was mewing in fear. I was a little worried for Annie. While I hadn’t exactly been bluffing about her capabilities and resolve, well, this was only her second fight.
Of course, it was also only my second fight ever, but who’s counting?
“Annie, pan ‘em!” I shouted as I snapped a punch right into Bimmy’s unprotected kidney. Those genemods on him might have given him muscles harder than granite, but he was still human, which meant all the soft spots were still soft spots. The giant let out a groan of pain as my fist buried into his back, but it was followed by a roar of fury as he spun back around with a haymaker. I ducked low, Bimmy plowing his hand right through the wood paneling and into the drywall.
While I was dancing with Bimmy, Jimmy must have decided to go for Annie. He kept lumbering forward as the sound of iron on canvas filled my ears, Annie whipping the cast iron pan out.
“You’re very bad people,” she cried out, “but I’m still very sorry for what I’m about to do!” But the triumphant clang of cooking implement against skull didn’t come. Instead, there was a whoosh and a yowl of surprise from the Kat.
Time seemed to slow as those deep-down instincts that were ingrained in me since the explosion kicked in, spurred on by worry for Annie’s safety. Bimmy’s square jaw was hanging open, spittle dripping from his dumb face as his fist was still buried in the wall, so I hopped up the short distance between me and his skull. Clapping my hands around the top of his head, I yanked down with all my newly enhanced strength, which had the equal and opposite reaction of bringing my bent knee up towards his stupid face.
A crack like thunder accompanied my knee exploding into the brawny thug’s pug nose. Cartilage crunched as the bridge of that nose caved in, blood spurting out as Bimmy’s head rocketed back for a moment before I pulled back down. Stunned, the brute was almost entirely limp as I brought him to faceplant into the shag carpeting. Hopefully, Bimmy was down for the count, but more importantly to me, his wall of meat wasn’t blocking my view anymore.
And what I saw just made me mad. Mario hadn’t even gotten his fat ass up out of his leather throne, braying like a jackass as Nyala pressed herself into a corner, her tablet clutched to her chest. Meanwhile, Jimmy held Annie aloft by her frying pan, gripped tight in one of his massive mitts. Maybe she was too surprised by the turn of events to let go of it, her right hand clenched tight into the indentations she had already squeezed into the cast iron, her tail completely poofed as her yowls turned into hisses.
“Let go of my pan, you big dummy,” Annie cried, squirming in the boneless way only a Wonder Kat can, as Jimmy began to sweep his other hand forward to stop those struggles.
I barely heard it since I was already in motion to save Annie. A quick spring forward with my new body was enough to let me bound atop Bimmy’s downed body, one foot planted on the small of his back. Without losing a step, I pushed off with that leg as I cocked a fist back.
Even as I launched myself towards Jimmy’s face, Annie suddenly swung her body up toward the steroid freak’s outstretched arm, keeping one hand on her pan’s handle while gripping his wrist with her free hand. Her legs and tail twisting around his arm, she cinched her grip and yanked hard, wrenching Jimmy’s elbow joint a way it wasn’t supposed to go. While Jimmy had never skipped arm day ever in his life, I hadn’t been lying about a Wonder Kat’s physical prowess, and Annie had her whole body working against only one limb.
As Jimmy’s elbow hyperextended, ligaments and muscle tearing, he let out a horrible screech of pain … which ended only a split-second later as I drilled the giant with a flying punch that would have made Superman proud. His jaw deformed under my first, his entire head snapping hard to one side, blood, spittle, and teeth flying out. As Jimmy’s grip went limp, Annie dropped free, twisting in mid-air to gamely land on her feet, and then the rest of his brawny torso followed the twist of his head. Jimmy’s waist and legs followed, his entire body pirouetting once before falling like a felled tree to the ground.
The floor shook as I landed in a crouch in front of Annie. “You okay, Annie …?”
My voice trailed off as she hugged her pan to her chest, rubbing her cheek against the edge of it. “Did that mean man hurt you, Mr. Panny? Don’t worry, Nurse Annie will—” The scuffle of hands and feet on the carpet from behind me made my ears perk and Annie’s eyes go wide. Looking past me as a shadow loomed over us, she cried, “Jake, duck!”
I didn’t think. I just trusted Annie. Dropping low to the ground just in time, Bimmy’s huge hand cut the air with a crude backhand right where my head had been, sending the snorfling, broken-nosed goon off balance. Rolling to one side, I was barely to my knees before a black blur of cast iron hurtled through the air as Annie went on the counterattack.
A tremendous clang of iron on skull thundered through the office as Annie’s pan collided dead-on with Bimmy’s giant head. His entire body went stiff, his face flattened against the black iron, and for a moment, I thought he was going to shrug that off too. Hopping up to my feet, I clenched my fists, ready to unload on the goon, but then he let out a painful gasp as he collapsed like a boneless pile of goo.
Relaxing back into a casual pose, I grinned with relief as I turned back towards Romine. “Now, where were we?” I said, trying to do the ‘super cool dude’ act. “I think we were at the part where you—"
And my whole speech was partially ruined by Annie leaping atop the downed Bimmy. “Yes! Another victory for Mr. Panny!” Annie thrust her now-rather dented frying pan skyway like Excalibur, and her sheer energy made me think a lightning bolt was about to strike it, at least until concern flashed across her face. “Oh, but I am so sorry! I better look at those wounds!”
Romine finally found his voice, wresting his eyes away from Annie’s antics to look at me. “I … what … hold on now, Jakey!” He raised his fat hands up as if that could possibly stop me if I wanted to deck him. “Maybe I was hasty when I did that, but come on. You gotta admit that I had to try, didn’t I? I can’t just roll over for some college kid, can I?”
Fuck the cool guy act. I stalked to his desk, growling. “I don’t care.” I planted my palms on his desk hard enough to crack the finish. “Are you going to give me what I want, or do I have to get serious here?”
Nyala looked past her tablet, her ears starting to perk forward as Annie started to attend to the two thugs’ wounds. There was real hope in her eyes as she glanced from me to Annie and back. “Master Romine, as much of a loss as Mr. St. Clare’s terms may be, you can easily recoup that. Even purchasing a new Business Kat would—”
“I know that, you stupid—” Romine grunted, but before he could really get going, Nyala did the surprising thing by cutting him off.
“No,” she mewled. “You don’t know that! You don’t know anything about how your business works. I have to tell you everything, Master, and then … you …” Nyala’s rant trailed off into a sort of strangled
sob, and I tensed to vault the desk then and there.
“I knew you were total scum before, Romine, but whatever you did to her …” I snarled as my fists clenched. “I should beat the shit out of you right this second …”
Seeing me tense, Romine’s eyes got so wide I could almost see them past the shades. Quaking in fear, he flinched back. “Okay, okay! You win, goddammit! Your loan’s voided, okay? And Nyala, this asshole’s your Master now, okay?” He shook his fat face wildly. “Just leave. Take that traitor of a Kat, take your crazy nurse, and get the fuck out of here, the fuck out of my life!”
“I … I belong to Mr. St. Clare?” Nyala whispered as she pulled herself out of the corner. “Oh, thank my whiskers!” she shouted to the ceiling, confidence starting to replace her fear. “Anyone is a better Master than you, Mario. You’re a horrible person and a horrible businessman!”
Romine just folded his arms, doing his best spoiled brat impression as he glowered at his desk. “Whatever. Just go before I change my mind, call all my guys to put holes in you.”
I snorted as I opened my arms to Nyala, Annie breaking away from doting on the Steroid Brothers to come to my side. “Typical bully bull. Already trying to cover up for your cowardice with stupid threats.” Nyala, despite her newfound confidence and tail held high, still kept a wide berth around Mario until she could slip into my arms.
“I don’t know where you came from exactly, Master St. Clare, but thank you for coming,” Nyala whispered against my chest. “But he’s not lying. There are at least six more gunmen in the building, and Romine’s had people killed before.”
Nodding, I glanced over at Annie. “Okay, Annie, let’s get out of here.” As we turned toward the door of Mario’s office, I called over my shoulder at him. “Don’t do anything stupid, Mario, or we’ll be back … and Annie won’t be the only Kat capable of kicking your ass.”
Maybe it was the implication that the Wonder Kat that he had dominated for who knew how many years might come back for some payback that set Romine off, or maybe he had just been waiting for his moment. As we were about to open up the door after pushing Bimmy out of the way, Mario let out a strangled cry of frustration, pushed himself to his feet, and snatched up the pistol he had concealed in a holster under his desk.
“Stupid kid!” he cried. “Don’t you turn your back on Mario Romine!”
I spun the moment I heard his cry, the glint of real gunmetal catching my eye as he swung the weapon toward our backs. As his stubby finger flexed on the trigger, I snatched Annie’s frying pan out of her hands, swinging up to act as some kind of defense as I pushed her and Nyala down to the ground. There was a sharp, echoing crack as the pistol went off.
The pan shuddered in my hand, sending a shock through my arm and shoulder, as a bright spark accompanied the flash of gunpowder. Somehow, the bullet hadn’t blasted through my chest as Romine intended. Instead, the bullet had hit the pan at just the right angle, ricocheting off the pan, spanging off a gaudy, polished wall clock, and drilled right into Romine’s temple.
Mario’s eyes went wide in shock, teetered in his chair for a moment as blood poured down the side of his head, and then fell forward, crashing into his desktop, dead as a doornail.
15
I blinked slowly, the pan still vibrating slightly in my hand, as Annie and Nyala both looked up from the floor wide-eyed. I hadn’t intended to kill anyone coming here, but then again, the only sane way to look at it was that Mario had killed himself.
Annie, of course, broke the silence, hopping up to her feet and pointing at the outstretched pan. “See? I knew it would stop a bullet!”
It was Nyala that had something more pragmatic to offer, the business Kat rising more elegantly and smoothing out her skirt, her ears up and attentive as a remarkable calm set in over her earlier panic.
“Master, we have to act fast. Standard Wonder Kat protocol in this situation is me to call this in both to the police and Katsukami Biodesign. On top of that, it won’t be long before there’s a call from downstairs about the gunshot.” As I turned to her, my arm still aching as I handed the pan back to Annie, she brought up her ever-present tablet.
“Wait,” I said, arching an eyebrow. “Why haven’t you ever reported this before?”
“Later, Master. Right now, after observing what you just did, I believe we can get ahead of this if you trust me … and do what you did for your nurse friend to me.” Her golden, almond-shaped eyes bored into me with need, joined by Annie’s crystal blues, as if she needed to bear witness. “Make me free. Please.”
“Hold out your arm and roll up your sleeve.” I didn’t need prompting or pressure. Even if Nyala had been cursing my guts for Romine’s death, I’d still have freed her in a heartbeat. That’s just how revolutions work, right? “Annie, finish checking out Bimmy and Jimmy, make sure they don’t die too. Neo-roids do so many bad things to your head that I really can’t blame them for what they did.”
She nodded, the nurse Kat swinging her pack around to fetch what few first aid supplies we had left. “Nurse Annie is on the job! Just holler if you need help, Jake.”
While she got to work, Nyala had pulled up the sleeve of her suit jacket and rolled up the blouse underneath. “I’m ready … I think.” As she held out her arm wrist up, the angle of her tail betraying the concern her cool demeanor was trying to hide. I couldn’t blame her for a wash of second thoughts. I was about to scrambler her genetic code, after all. “Whiskers, I hope you know what you’re doing. The risks are—”
“Well worth it,” I finished for her, gently taking her outstretched hand as I pulled one of the cure-filled genemod injectors out of the inside of my jacket. “Freedom is always worth the risk. Truth, justice, and the Wonder Kat way, right?”
That brought a quirked smile to her face and a flash of that child-like wonder Annie had so often. “Good old Krusader Kat.” Nyala puffed out a faint mewing sigh. “Fine, let’s do it before I get cold paws.”
“You’ll experience some shivers and chills, but they’ll pass fast,” I explained as I pressed the injector tip to her arm. The faint hiss of the hypo was almost overwhelmed by the sudden, sharp chime of a ringtone that came simultaneously from Romine’s smartglasses, still sitting on his dead face, and Nyala’s tablet tucked under her other arm.
Annie looked up from where she had just popped an unconscious Jimmy’s elbow back into proper position. “I’ll get it!”
In near lockstep, Nyala and I spun towards Annie and said simultaneously, “No, Annie!” We glanced back at each other, that first spark of connection flashing in her eyes just as the first shiver ran upNyala’s lithe form. As I steadied her, hands on her shoulders supportively, Nyala shook her head slightly.
“I’ll be fine,” she said weakly, shaking her head as she tried to compose herself. “I’ll deal with downstairs, St. Clare. This has happened before.”
That little revelation didn’t really surprise me, not with what had just happened, so I nodded. “Okay, Nyala. I trust you.” I still kept supporting her, glancing over at Annie. “Please lock the door, just to be safe. If Nyala can’t placate the other guards, it will buy us some time.”
Annie snapped a salute, bouncing over to the door panel and tapping at the controls. “You got it, Jake!” Almost all the trepidation and confusion the nurse Kat had shown when we were attacked at my apartment was gone. God, I only hoped I would adapt so well to this crazy new life of ours.
Of course, I guess you could say I already had.
Nyala raised her ringing tablet up to give the best, undamaged angle of the office, one hand over her face as she took a deep breath. It looked like she was doing one of those exercises I had heard that actors did when they tried to drop into a character, and it looked to work, her expression falling into the mask of a cutthroat businesswoman the moment she passed her hand down her face. Even her sorrel red ears and tail ceased their shivering from the cure I had given her, everything about Nyala’s demeanor taking on an eerie calm.
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“Wow, awesome trick there,” I said softly, taking a step back so that my hands and arms wouldn’t be in the tablet camera’s view.
A flash of appreciation colored her eyes before she focused on her screen and tapped the call answer button. “Candy, this is Nyala. I’m sorry for the delay in answering. Master Romine was still concluding negotiations with Mr. St. Clare and his Kat when you rang.”
The nasally voice of the downstairs secretary played out from the tablet’s speakers. “I wouldn’t have figured that slip of a kid would have been so much trouble. Is everybody okay? Do you want me to send Carl up for clean-up?”
“Negative,” Nyala said with curt authority. “Bimmy and Jimmy can handle the cleaning for now. Besides, Mr. Romine is having a private discussion with St. Clare’s Kat. You understand how he hates to be disturbed doing that kind of liaison.”
What surprised me wasn’t the dark implications of what Nyala said. I figured Romine was one of that kind of scumbags who took advantage of Kats in every way. No, it was that Nyala could keep her cool in recounting it because I had seen the pain and fear in her eyes before. There was a tremendous steel inside this business Kat, much like the strength I had seen come out in Annie. I was starting to think that every Wonder Kat had that inside them if they could only be freed to unleash it.
“Oh,” Candy replied, and I could hear the knowing wink in her voice. “I hear you, Ny. You want I should move back the boss’s appointments? I know he likes to take his time.”
Without even a stutter, Nyala shook her head sharply. “No, you need to cancel the day’s meetings entirely. Beyond Master’s … discussion, St. Clare made some rather vehement and destructive counterpoints. I can only surmise he must have had some mods of his own to be so … loud. It will take the twins some time to get the office back in order, and the Master does not wish to give even a hint of weakness.”