by Barry Lyga
She went down a bit farther.
“Oh no,” she said.
Mouth full of cheese and bacon, Rene said, “What’s wrong?” It came out uts ong?
“We have bug trouble!”
“You mean . . . big trouble?” Rene clarified, swallowing his food.
“No! Bug trouble! Big bug trouble! Larvan’s an entomologist!”
Rene shrugged. “He knows words?”
“That’s an etymologist! Very common mistake. An entomologist studies insects. Larvan majored in entomology in college.”
Rene got it. “Are you saying . . .”
“I’m saying he’s not just Brie Larvan’s brother. He helped her design the bees! She’s a mechanics genius—probably got the idea for robot bees by talking to her brother, the bug guy. They did it together!”
She spun around to her console and called Joe and Dinah.
• • •
Joe felt his phone buzz in his pocket, but right now there was another buzz he was more concerned about—the swarm of bees that seemed to be everywhere. He hadn’t been stung yet, but it had only been a minute or so since the swarm vomited itself out of that briefcase. He’d never been particularly afraid of bees, but being enveloped by a whole swarm of them was a bit different from slapping one away at a picnic.
“I can’t shoot a bunch of bees!” Joe yelled. Even if he could, a bullet could easily go through the swarm and hit Dinah or Larvan. “We gotta do something!”
He couldn’t see her, but he could hear Dinah’s reply over the loud buzz of the swarm. “Cover your ears!” she warned him. She didn’t wait for him to comply. Drawing in a deep breath, she belted out a wave of sound that seemed too impossibly powerful to come from a human throat. Joe caught the beginning of it before he managed to clap his hands over his ears, but even that tiny taste made his eyes water and his teeth shake in their moorings.
Even with his hands over his ears, the sound was intense, piercing. He felt a filling in one of his molars loosen and tremble. Clenching his teeth to keep them in place, he squeezed his eyes shut, as though that would help.
Just when he couldn’t take it anymore, it was over. He dropped his hands and opened his eyes.
Dinah stood in the middle of a bee apocalypse. There were hundreds of the little critters scattered all over the floor of Larvan’s apartment. Some of them still twitched legs or wings, but none of them were going to be flying anytime soon.
“What did you do?” Larvan wailed, flinging his arms out from his sides. “You destroyed them! How did you do that?”
The swarm had prevented Larvan from witnessing Dinah using the Canary Cry. For all he knew, she’d used an app.
“You’re welcome,” Dinah said with a huff.
“We all could have been stung to death,” Joe said.
“Not me,” Larvan retorted. “Brie programmed her bees never to harm either one of us. They recognize me by scent analysis. That so-called Mr. Terrific had to hack them to hurt poor Brie. Otherwise our safety is hard-coded.”
“Well, that’s nice for you . . .” Dinah said.
Joe checked his phone, which had stopped buzzing. Felicity had given up on a call and sent a text instead: LARVAN IS AN ENTOMOLOGIST! WORKED WITH B-EB!
Thanks, he texted back. More soon.
“You helped your sister build her bees, right?” Joe asked. “Or at least inspired the idea.”
“Brie was—is—a genius,” Larvan sniffed. “She didn’t need my help.”
Dinah shifted her stance a bit, keeping a wary eye on him. “But she knew about bees from you, right?”
Larvan shrugged. “She might have picked up a bit here and there from our conversations. It’s not a crime to talk to my sister, you know.”
Slipping his phone back into his pocket, Joe produced his handcuffs and rattled them meaningfully. “Bertram Larvan, you’re in possession of stolen property—”
“Stolen?” Larvan clenched his fists and turned on Joe, his concern over the bees morphing into rage. “They’re my property to begin with! I just took them back!”
“Yeah, well, you don’t get to blow up a bunch of buildings and break into a government facility just because you think you were robbed,” Dinah told him. She had a hand on her holster, just in case Larvan tried something else.
But Larvan seemed more perplexed than anything else, his anger mutating into bemusement as he looked from Joe to Dinah and back. “Blow up . . . Government . . . What are you . . . ?” His confusion blossomed into horror. “Oh my God . . . Those buildings . . . He didn’t!”
Joe pursed his lips. “Who didn’t? Your partner, Ambush?”
Larvan shook his head madly. “You don’t understand. He’s not my partner . . . He . . . He approached me a couple of months ago. Said he’d heard about Brie and he wanted to help. Said he could get ahold of some of her bees for me.”
“You expect us to believe a Good Samaritan just dropped out of the sky for you?” Dinah said with some asperity.
“I swear it’s the truth!” Larvan exclaimed. “All he wanted in return was some of the bees and some of Brie’s old schematics. I said, Sure, why not? I figured maybe I could sell the bees to help pay for the lawsuit and get Brie into a private facility.”
Joe had confronted and interrogated many a suspect in his career. He had a good built-in lie detector. He thought Larvan was telling the truth. Besides, he’d seen Brie in the Coma Care Unit; if she were his sister, Joe knew he’d do just about anything to get her out of there.
“What do you think?” Dinah asked him.
Joe shrugged. “You had no idea Ambush was going to blow up buildings to make this all happen?”
“No!” Larvan said. “I didn’t ask for details. I . . .” He rubbed his eyes with both hands. “I just wanted a piece of Brie. I wanted her legacy. Her work. Our work.”
Larvan seemed horrified and baffled all at once. He wasn’t a master criminal, a Bug-Eyed Bandit. He was a somewhat jerky guy who loved his sister and was blind to her crimes. He’d been suckered into this.
Joe relented. He tucked the handcuffs away. There was still possession of stolen property to deal with, but they could handle that later. For now . . .
“Prove you weren’t involved,” Joe said. “Take us to Ambush.”
Larvan gulped . . . but nodded.
26
Barry returned to the Cortex. He stood in the doorway for a moment, unnoticed.
Caitlin, Iris, and Diggle were all huddled under the big monitor, which showed only the words NO SIGNAL in blue against a black backdrop. The monitoring equipment had been vaporized by the trans-dimensional burst of energy that had sealed the breach.
There was no easy way to break the news.
“Guys . . .” His voice cracked on the single syllable.
They all turned as one. “Did it work?” Iris asked, running to him. “Did it work?”
He caught her in his arms, folding himself around her. Oh God, he still had her, and she still had him. But the others . . . Cisco’s family. Curtis’s friends.
Felicity. Oh, Felicity. And William, Oliver’s son. An orphan now. Oliver left behind an orphan and a widow.
Barry squeezed his eyes shut against the tears, greedily inhaling the scent of Iris’s hair. Shea butter and peppermint. He wanted to dissolve into her, to become nothing more than a thought in her mind.
A memory.
Like the others.
“Did it work?” Caitlin demanded. “You haven’t answered.”
“It worked,” Barry whispered, and opened his eyes.
Diggle hooted and pumped his fists in the air. Caitlin applauded. Iris clutched him more tightly.
“Why are you so morose, man?” Diggle asked. “We won! Does S.T.A.R. Labs have a champagne budget?”
“We might have some old, fermented grape juice in Lab 12,” Caitlin offered.
“Look,” Barry said. “I don’t know how to tell you this . . .”
And then, with Iris still clinging to hi
m, he told them. His grip on her tightened as he did so, as though afraid that she would melt away with the news. Or, worse, pull away in outrage and disgust.
Caitlin’s mouth hung open and she stood perfectly still, unable to move, unable to speak. Then, without a word, she turned and fled into the depths of the medical bay.
Dig’s face went gray. He suddenly seemed a hundred years older. His eyelids fluttered and he felt around for something to lean on, finally finding a chair to slip into.
“No,” he whispered. And then, louder, “God, no!” He buried his head in his hands.
“What . . . what are we going to do?” Iris asked, pulling back. Her eyes swam with tears and her lower lip trembled. “What do we do now?”
Barry shook his head. “I don’t . . . I don’t know.” Names and faces spun in his mind. Dante, Cisco’s brother. They’d been getting along well lately. How would he find the words to tell Dante that his brother was dead?
“It happened so fast,” Barry said. “Even for me. I just . . .” He replayed it again in his mind. He’d been replaying it since it happened, wondering if he could have done something—anything—to rescue the others. But even for a superspeedster, when time is marked in nanoseconds, it’s impossible to do everything.
“I’ll call Felicity,” he offered, feeling weak and lame. But it was the least he could do. Diggle seemed broken, the thinnest sliver of himself, slumped in the chair, staring off into a void only he could see. “I’ll be the one to tell her.”
“No,” Diggle said, standing. He shook himself and seemed to regain a measure of strength and resolve. He laid a hand on Barry’s shoulder. “It should come from me. I’ll tell her in person, back in Star City. She’ll need all of us around her.”
“Dig . . .”
Diggle grimaced, his jaw set firmly as a bulwark against tears. “You know, once upon a time I was his bodyguard. It was my job to protect him. Why the hell didn’t I do my job this time?”
“No one could have. He saved the whole world, Dig. Make sure she knows that. The whole world.”
In a shaky voice, Dig said, “You and Oliver . . . You had your differences. But he always respected you, Barry. I want you to know that. He admired your optimism. And maybe . . . Maybe he was even a little jealous of it.”
Barry was at a loss for words. “Thank you,” he managed at last.
Dig nodded once, opened his mouth to speak . . . and then realized he had nothing to say. He left the Cortex.
Iris leaned against a bank of equipment. “We should find Caitlin. She and Cisco were close. I’m worried about her.”
Caitlin chose that moment to emerge from the medical bay. Her eyes were hollow, haunted, and bloodshot.
“I don’t even . . .” She gave up and gestured helplessly. “I don’t even know what to say.”
Iris went to her and put her arms around her. “There’s nothing to say. And that’s OK.”
Barry looked up at the monitor. NO SIGNAL.
Nothing to say.
27
Bert Larvan led them through grimy streets to a distinctly unsafe part of Star City. Ambush, apparently, was living in a hovel, a burnt-out, dilapidated building that was fit more for demolition than anything else.
How ironic, Joe thought. The man who bombed buildings hiding out in one that should have been bombed.
Don’t do anything yet, Felicity texted. I’m tracking you through Dinah’s phone and I’m going to send Wild Dog as backup.
Joe snorted. He’d been a cop for a thousand years. He had Dinah as backup, and she had superpowers as her backup. They would be fine.
“Nice neighborhood,” Dinah commented, looking around. “What do you know about this guy?”
From the backseat, Larvan shrugged. “I offered to let him stay at my place. Or even put him up in a hotel. He said he’d rather stay here.” He paused. “He had a very weird sense of humor.”
“So, this guy has your sister’s bugs . . .” Joe said.
“And maybe some kind of teleporter,” Dinah reminded him.
Larvan’s eyebrows shot up. “Teleporter? Are they real?”
“Who knows?” Dinah said diffidently.
“We’re bringing you in,” Joe said, “but only to get him to the door. Then you’re back outside where it’s safe.”
Larvan made a show of glancing around the block. “Are you sure this is safe?”
“It’s broad daylight,” Dinah told him, then hauled herself out of the car. She yanked open his door. “You’ll be fine.”
Together, they went into the building. All of Joe’s cop senses were on heightened alert. Something about dilapidated old buildings . . .
A smell enveloped him—rotten food and a very human sort of stink. He breathed through his mouth and looked over at Larvan, who had put a hand over his nose. Dinah coughed quietly into her fist.
Larvan pointed to the stairs. Joe went up, going as quietly as he could, but the stairs creaked no matter where or how he stepped on them. Halfway up the flight, he surrendered and jogged the rest, grateful that the whole staircase didn’t just collapse under him as he went.
There were no lights. Actually, there were lights—mounted on the ceiling—but there was no power. The place was nearly pitch-black.
On the second floor, there were three doors, one of which was half rotted away. Larvan pointed to one of the other two. Without a word, Joe and Dinah took up positions, Joe to one side of the door, Dinah behind Larvan. They both had weapons drawn.
At Joe’s nod, Larvan knocked timidly on the door. Joe frowned and mimed a stronger knock.
Larvan tried again. Nothing.
With a frustrated sigh, Joe reached over and gave the door a good, solid cop knock.
Still nothing.
He leaned over and put his ear to the door, listening for footsteps, for Ambush heading for a fire escape.
Instead, he detected a sound: a familiar buzzing.
Joe’s eyebrows shot up. He tried the knob. It was locked, but the door was fragile, and he’d be damned if a cheap lock in a falling-down tenement would keep him from closing this case. Gesturing Larvan and Dinah to one side, he stepped back a few paces and kicked the door with all his might. It shivered in the frame but remained standing. He gave Dinah a pleading look—her Canary Cry could take the door down, easy—but she shifted her eyes to Larvan and shook her head.
Right. Gotta maintain the “secret identity.”
He kicked the door again. This time, it splintered at the lock and swung open. The buzzing sound grew louder. Joe drew his weapon and edged past the broken door, mindful of the now-sharp edge, and entered the apartment.
“Irwin Schwab?” he called out. “Ambush!”
“This is SCPD!” Dinah said, following him. “Stay where you are!”
The buzzing grew louder. They crept down the entry hall, past holes in the wall and peels of paint, into the open space of a ramshackle, run-down living room. It was nearly empty, except for a sleeping bag rolled up in one corner, a gas lantern, and then a desk against the wall, on which was mounted a complicated array of scientific equipment—magnifiers, lights, microscopes. They were plugged into a portable battery pack that rested on the floor. Taped to the wall over the desk was a sheet of paper: a schematic of a bee.
But that was all just detail. The real sight in the room was the human-like figure on the floor, writhing and moaning in pain, covered in a blanket of bees.
Joe froze for a moment, aghast at the tableau. He couldn’t move. And then a sound startled him: Bert Larvan had followed them inside and pushed through them, running to the bees.
Joe almost grabbed him and yanked him back, but the swarm parted as Larvan neared Ambush. Right. Programmed not to hurt a Larvan. The bees dispersed; most of them ended up going out the window. Some of them drifted up into the corners where the walls met the ceiling.
The man they’d been swarming was in terrible shape. Every bit of exposed flesh on his hands, arms, feet, and face had been stung, rep
eatedly. He was a mass of welts, bruises, and hives.
“Good God,” Dinah whispered.
Larvan was suddenly all business, rushing to Schwab’s side. “He’s in anaphylaxis!” he told them. “There’s something in my briefcase that could help!”
Just then, Joe heard a rumbling outside. Peering out the window, he spied Wild Dog pulling up to the curb on his motorcycle.
“Wild Dog!” Joe yelled out the window. “Car! Briefcase!”
Wild Dog tossed off a quick salute. Moments later, they heard his feet pounding up the stairs. He dashed into the room bearing the briefcase, then came up short when he saw the man on the floor.
“Aw, heeeeeellllll no!”
“Bees are gone,” Dinah snapped, taking the briefcase.
“Bees did this?” Rene asked. “Man looks like he went through a meat grinder face-first.”
Larvan unlatched the briefcase. “He’s in severe trauma from the apitoxin, to say nothing of the pain from the stings themselves. Unlike biological bees, Brie’s were designed with infinite sting capacity.”
“Oh, good,” Joe deadpanned.
“They were inspired by the paper wasp, the most painful of the beestings,” Larvan went on, unfolding a square of green fabric he’d removed from the case. “The robots can sting over and over, as often as they need to, injecting toxin each time. When their supply of apitoxin runs out, they can still deploy their stingers to cause pain.”
“Congratulations,” Rene said, indicating the writhing man on the floor. “From the looks of it, they did just that.”
“This can help,” Larvan said, shaking out the fabric. “Something I helped Brie put together, just in case the bees ever got out of control.”
It was a one-piece uniform of sorts, unadorned and baggy. It included a hood with a full-face mask that had large eyepieces and twin orange antennae protruding from the skull.