by Megan Morgan
June was floating in a morphine haze. She felt a thump on the side of the bed. A brown and black fur ball trundled up the mattress.
“Dipster.” She smiled.
“You do have a bullet in your chest cavity, though,” the doctor said. “I don’t have the equipment to do extraction in the field, and I don’t think it’s prudent anyway.” He finished with the IV bag. “Don’t panic, though. Contrary to what you see on television, most gunshot victims never have their bullets taken out. It’s actually more dangerous to remove a bullet than it is to leave it in. You’ll just be setting off metal detectors.” He swept June’s face with a critical gaze. “More than usual, I mean.”
“Actually… Oh, never mind.” She reached down to pet Dipity.
“And,” the doctor said, “you’re very lucky, Ms. Coffin. Lucky, ironically, that you almost died. You quit breathing for a short time, which actually saved your life. It stopped your injured lung from moving, which gave your blood time to clot and kept you from bleeding to death. I had to give you a small transfusion, but it would have been much worse had you been struggling to breathe and pumping blood out in the process.”
Dipity rubbed against June’s hand, eyes narrowed. “Is that so?”
“The bad news is your lung is going to take a little longer to heal than normal. I would suggest now is a good time to quit smoking.”
“Crazy enough, Doc, I don’t feel like a cigarette at all right now.”
When the doctor left, June looked at Micha, still sitting at her bedside. “Her fur’s all crusty and matted from my blood. Will you clean her up?”
“Yes. I’ll make sure she gets a good grooming.” He knitted his brow. “Where did she come from anyway, in the car?”
“She was in the duffel bag.” June smiled at the cat. “The one Sam gave me. Turned out to be quite useful after all.” June continued petting her. “Everyone really thinks we’re the bad guys?”
Micha nodded, his face somber. He was definitely pale and had dark circles under his eyes. “We’re safe here, though. It’s Aaron’s building. Just like the hotel is Sam’s. I don’t think they legally own either one, but they do ‘own’ them, in a sense.”
“Is that part of the treaty thing? What’s that all about, anyway? This ‘territory’ stuff?”
Micha scratched behind Dipity’s ears. “When Aaron and Sam drew up the treaty between the Paranormal Alliance and the SNC, they made certain places their territory. Not the entire city, just a few spots. Members of the opposing group can’t go on officially claimed territory without a concession, or else the owning group has a right to ‘punish at their discretion.’ There are neutral places, too, where members of both groups aren’t allowed to inflict ‘hardship’ on each other. Sam is on the Parks and Recreation Board for the city, so he was given Promontory Point and a couple other parks as his territory.”
June’s astonishment increased. “Wait, what about Navy Pier? He said that was his too.”
“He also has a seat on the Metropolitan Pier and Exposition Authority, which owns Navy Pier.”
“I had no idea he was that powerful.”
“Strong-arming and affirmative action might have had a little to do with it.” Micha petted Dipity, the cat eating up the attention. “That’s why people take such umbrage to him being the leader of an anti-Institute, anti-normal group, because he’s so prolific outside the paranormal community. And that’s why so much hell is about to be loosed at the idea of him ‘assassinating’ Eric Greerson.” He paused. “A war is coming. I’ve expected and feared it for a long time.”
June slid her hand over Micha’s on Dipity’s back. “You’ll survive it.”
“I’ve been fucked up. I don’t know what’s happened to me or what’s going to happen to me. I can’t promise you anything.”
June squeezed his hand. “Well then, it’s a good thing I like surprises.”
When evening fell, June got another visitor. The pain medication had made her subdued and all her worry dulled in the fog. But when Jason sat down at her bedside and took her hand, her head instantly cleared.
“Are you all right?” June asked, clutching her brother.
Jason nodded. “I’m okay.” His voice was gravelly. “I’ve been worried sick about you.”
“What did they do to you?” She touched the marks on his wrist, rage and anguish rising, making her chest tighten and throb.
“Restraints.” Jason pressed his other hand over hers. His eyes glittered, his form bright against the darkening windows. “When I wouldn’t…use my power for them, they put a scope down my throat. I think it damaged my vocal chords.” He blinked back tears. “They made me swallow stuff too, stuff that kept me from talking when they didn’t want me to.”
June wanted to scream, but the hot ache under her ribs kept her from making a sound.
“I figured they would kill me. I almost hoped they would, eventually. I kept thinking about you, hoping you got away, hoping they hadn’t found you and brought you back.”
June closed her eyes, but the tears slipped out anyway. “I never stopped trying to get in there and get you out. I did everything I could. Everything.”
“I know that.”
June opened her eyes.
Jason rested his head on her shoulder. “This isn’t your fault,” he whispered.
June pushed her face into his hair and kissed the top of his head. He smelled like home.
“Aaron said people think we might be dead,” June said. “What if Mom hears that?”
“I don’t know. We can’t risk contacting her. She might come, and they might get her too.”
“We can’t let that happen. Maybe we can secretly contact her somehow and let her know we’re all right.”
“I just want to go home.” He sounded small and lost. “It seems like I haven’t been there in a million years. Like it’s not real anymore.”
More tears fell from June’s eyes. “This is all my fault. I’m sorry I blew our cover. I’m sorry my big mouth led to them bringing us here.”
“Stop it.” He squeezed her hand. “We both agreed to it. They promised us a lot of money.”
June sniffed. “I was gonna give it to Mom. To pay off her house.”
He gave a wet, ironic laugh. “So was I.”
“Goddamn, I hate everything.” She brought her other hand up and mopped at her eyes.
“So do I,” he whispered. “So do I.”
Jason still had his head on her shoulder when Micha appeared. June didn't bother to wipe at the wetness that had leaked out onto her cheeks. The tears were unstoppable.
“Dipster is clean,” Micha said. “But she’s not very happy about it.” He held up his hand, the back now decorated with claw marks.
“Ow,” June said. “Cats and water. Worse than cats and blood.”
Jason lifted his head.
“We haven’t really gotten to talk.” Micha indicated Jason. “We’ve just been taking turns watching over you.”
“Micha,” June said, “this is my twin brother, Jason. Jason, this is—” She paused. “Micha.”
“It’s overwhelmingly nice to finally meet you,” Micha said.
The corner of Jason’s mouth quirked, a knowing light in his eyes. “I’m not the least bit surprised.”
June arched an eyebrow. “At what?” She didn’t possess a hope in hell of actually pulling off the innocent act. Not with Jason.
“You’re the only one I know who could pick someone up in the middle of a crisis,” Jason said.
June snorted but promptly regretted it when pain settled across her chest.
“What can I say?” Micha shrugged. “She’s a lovely lady. I see the family resemblance. You could both be movie stars.”
“A lady,” June said. She stage-whispered, “Are you flirting with him? Cause that’s really weird.”
Micha chuckled. “No. I’m a one-twin kind of guy. Also I only swung that way in college.”<
br />
She didn’t know if he was joking, but she didn’t care.
She licked her lips. They were dry, and her mouth tasted like she’d been blowing Satan. “Do me a favor, guys.”
“Anything,” Micha and Jason said in unison.
“I’m hungry. The doctor said I have to start on liquids. Make sure no one tries to feed me any broth made with fucking flour or I’ll die.”
Micha laughed. “Vegetable puree it is. When you get a little better, I’ll find you some veggie bacon.”
“And wine. I want wine. That’s liquid.”
“I’m not sure wine is good for chest wounds,” Micha said.
“No, but it’ll be great for my mind wounds.”
Chapter 21
Their drama stayed on the front page of the Tribune, and every other paper in the city, for over a week. Most of the articles included full-color pictures of Eric Greerson looking humble and munificent, followed by unflattering black-and-white photographs of Aaron and Sam.
None of the articles mentioned Eric’s vampirism. An expensive and well-attended funeral was held, closed-casket of course. The search for the “assassins” was quickly blocked on all sides by furious marauding members of both the Paranormal Alliance and the SNC. Institute researchers were attacked and arson attempts made on the Institute. June waited hopefully for a bomb to go off, so she could head over and piss in the rubble.
Speculation on Jason and June’s involvement, and their whereabouts, came up sporadically. The Institute initially resisted handing over surveillance footage to the police, claiming they wanted to conduct their own investigation once again. None of the footage, once in authority’s hands, revealed the fate of the “disappearing Coffin twins.”
“We sound like a sideshow act,” Jason remarked when this hilarious title appeared. He read diligently every word of every article they printed.
June could only stomach the news in small doses.
“Of course,” June said, “this whole damn thing is a circus.”
“They don’t really care about us, do they?” Jason said. “They’re much more concerned with Eric Greerson’s killers.”
“That could be to our advantage. Gone and forgotten makes it easy to hide.”
Aaron’s doctor stopped by daily to check on June. Jason and Micha fed her vegetable broth and tea—tea—and kept her entertained. The doctor made her do breathing exercises, including coughing, which he told her she had to do or fluid would build up in her lungs and she’d get pneumonia. She wanted to stab him in the face with her IV needle, sound medical advice be damned.
The doctor also attended to Micha. At times, Micha seemed distant and lethargic, but when asked, he attributed the melancholy more to his mental than physical state. He cycled through various mild flu-like symptoms, but none of them lasted more than a day. The doctor didn’t know how to treat him and told Aaron that without proper tests, he had no way of knowing what was going on inside Micha’s body. He wanted to take a vial of blood, but Aaron wouldn’t allow it, lest it accidentally fall into the wrong hands. Suddenly, Micha’s blood was a precious commodity.
Then, something bad finally happened.
June was on her second day of being able to sit fully upright in a chair next to her bed. Micha sat in another chair nearby. His hair was rumpled, the white T-shirt he wore tight across his chest showing he’d lost some weight. He hadn’t been eating much lately.
“You all right?” June asked him.
“I guess,” he replied, his voice soft.
“I’m worried about you.” She took a drink from the glass of water she had and put it aside on the table next to her. “I wish the doctor could do tests on you. Are you feeling anything weird?” She presented the question every day.
“What’s weird? I don’t know.”
This was not the answer Micha usually gave. Most of the time, he replied with a simple monotone “no,” or a mere shake of his head.
June frowned. “Are you feeling something?”
He tilted his chin down and looked at the table next to June. Uneasiness welled in her stomach.
The glass lurched, and June flinched. Her eyes went so wide they were on the verge of popping out of her head. Micha continued staring at the glass; it lurched again, water sloshing up the sides and splattering on the tabletop.
“Oh my God, it worked.” June was half horrified, half relieved. If the serum did what it was supposed to, Micha might be all right in the end. Maybe it wouldn’t kill him.
“That’s not all,” Micha said.
June watched, holding her breath.
Something started happening to the water. Little bubbles formed at the bottom of the glass and sped to the surface. Then the water began to churn. A thin wisp of steam rose from it. June dropped her mouth open, but couldn’t form words. The glass vibrated on the surface of the table, making a low thrumming sound.
“You’re one of those—pyro things,” June said. “Like your sister.”
A sensation moved up her left forearm: warmth, initially mild, but the sensation quickly grew hotter, enough to cause pain.
June yelped and grabbed her arm. She winced at the sharp stab in her chest when she moved. Micha gasped, his expression turning horrified. The heat ceased, or at least it didn’t increase. The aftermath felt like a sunburn.
“Oh shit, I’m sorry.” Micha leapt up, rushed over to her, and grabbed her arm. “Are you all right?”
“I’m fine,” June said, though truthfully, she was shaken. “It’s all right.”
“I can’t focus it,” Micha blinked rapidly, his eyes shining. “It started last night, in the bathroom. I moved some things across the counter. Then I melted a bottle of soap.”
“It’s all right,” June repeated.
He knelt in front of her. “I’m sorry,” he whispered.
She touched his face. “Welcome to the dark side, I guess.”
“Please don’t tell the others,” he begged. “Not yet. There’s no telling how this might work. I could develop more abilities. They might come and go. I might never learn to control or focus any of them. I want to know exactly what’s happening before I tell anyone.”
“I promise. I won’t tell them.”
“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to hurt you.”
“I’m fine.” She desperately wanted him to be fine too, for his mind to not be further broken. “We’ll both be fine, Micha. We’ll get through this together.” She tried to force a smile.
Micha dropped his head in her lap, and she stroked his hair. He gripped her waist, shaking. Again, like the morning after breaking into the funeral parlor, she didn’t know how to console, so she resorted to humor. She told herself not to bring up Hitler this time.
“Since you’re down there…” she chided.
Micha sniffed wetly. “Doctor told you no physical strain.”
“I promise I’ll sit still.”
He lifted his head. His eyes were glistening. “Thank you for coming back for me at the Institute.”
She swallowed. “I couldn’t leave you there. You didn’t deserve what they did to you.”
He sniffed again. “Maybe it would have been better if I—”
She placed a finger to his lips. “Don’t you dare. Don’t you say that.”
He nodded, her finger still resting on his lips. She took it away.
“We both deserved to be saved,” she said. “Things wouldn’t be any easier without us.”
He dropped his head back in her lap. She touched his hair.
“But seriously,” she said. “While you’re down there.”
He lifted his head again. “I don’t know where everyone else is…”
“I don’t really care where they are.”
June found out orgasms sucked when you had a bullet lodged in your chest.
Still worth it.
And so the situation became more convoluted.
An extraordinary number o
f people came and went from the penthouse considering they were in hiding: Cindy, repeatedly showering June with physical affection and making her yell; Muse, grim and twitching away like a rattlesnake, bringing Sam news from the front lines; Ethan, cocky as ever despite his unemployment.
“I can’t believe they fired you,” June told him the first time he showed up to see Sam. “That’s bullshit.”
“Any condemnation of the Institute is quick to put you under suspicion right now.” Ethan actually sounded pleased he’d been persecuted by the Man. “I’ll never sit down and keep my mouth shut, though. I’ll find a way. I still have connections. And I can’t let Sam down.”
June narrowed her eyes. “You’re a member of the Paranormal Alliance, aren’t you?”
“No, but I want to be. I’ve been petitioning Sam for two years now. He’s a great man. I want to serve him.”
“Yeah, I bet you do.”
“I’m damn lucky Robbie never targeted me, as often as I like to get the truth out there. Now there’s a story I’d like to follow, his mad campaign. Sensational.” He wandered off to find Sam.
“Right,” June said. “Sensational.”
Each day June got a little better physically. Mentally, she remained a wreck—a twenty car pileup, actually, complete with exploding gas tanks and body parts littered on the side of the road. She wanted to contact people back home. What had become of her shop? Was her friend and co-owner Diego running things? Did her friends think she’d skipped town? Did her mother think they were dead? Neither watching the news nor reading the newspapers—or reading blogs on Aaron’s laptop—eased her mind, as each day the situation spiraled deeper into political and civil chaos. Only the patient, easy kindness of both her brother and Micha kept her from completely losing her mind; and poor Micha had his own problems.
Within a month, June was something like herself again. She had limited mobility in her right arm, and her chest still ached when she took a deep breath, but she got around well enough, as far as she could go, anyway. The penthouse was now their domain. She tried to give Micha some space, to work through the issues concerning his wife—who thankfully, didn’t make any surprise visits—but this finally ended with a heated make-out session and some careful physically awkward sex late one night.