Kirsten fought her way back to a kneeling posture and tried to get her hands on the Medusa plugged into the woman’s head, but between the elastic strap and her feet getting in the way, she gave up. In a fit of desperation, she tried once more to break her restraints.
“Those things hold one-ton cargo boxes down, you ain’t snapping it. Use your teeth,” said Miranda.
Kirsten slipped, falling face-first into the ground. With thoughts of Evan at the tip of her brain, she ignored the pain. Dazed, she repositioned herself and eventually got close enough to nuzzle up to Miranda’s neck.
If Theo sees this, I will obliterate him. I’m not dealing with that taunting for the rest of my life.
“Ok, don’t move,” whispered Kirsten. “This thing is gonna shock the shit out of both of us if I touch your skin with my nose while I’m pushing the buttons. Security feature to prevent self-removal.”
Kirsten waited.
“That means stop shivering.”
“I’m cold and terrified and there’s a nugget of cat litter digging into my ass.”
“Miranda?”
The woman looked at her. “Yeah?”
“ Stop shivering.” Kirsten’s eyes gleamed with paranormal light.
Miranda went still.
“Was that psionic stuff?”
“Yep.”
Kirsten tilted her head, keeping her nose away from Miranda’s neck. The tip of her tongue found the Medusa box and she bit down on it, squeezing the release buttons on the upper and lower edges. For several seconds, she stopped breathing and tugged. A half-inch metal prong, asterisk-shaped like an M3 jack, gleamed on the reverse side. Just as the tip cleared the socket behind the woman’s ear, a spark leapt from her to the prong, hitting Kirsten in the nose with the force of a light punch. The flavor of tin filled her mouth and her eyes watered out of control. She rolled off Miranda and spat the device into the litter box. After a few breaths, she curled into a ball and used her thigh to cradle her face.
“Shit. Ouch.”
Miranda lapsed into mild convulsions, face-down and flopping. When the fit subsided, she laid still and breathed hard.
Kirsten blinked off the pain, unable to hold her face in her hands or stop her eyes from watering. She flopped onto her back and stared through her legs at Miranda. “Well, what are you waiting for? I swear I won’t arrest you.” The sight of metal on her ankles lit the fires of rage. I’m gonna kill him.
“It hurts so much.”
Another attempt to break the cuffs with brute force failed. “Dammit, bitch, come on. Does it hurt more than a dagger in the heart? They’re going after my son! I swear I won’t arrest you for breaking in here, having a Loki, or whatever. Dammit, woman, I’ll help you rob the place myself if it saves Evan’s life!”
Miranda battled her way into a sitting position, legs straight forward, and closed her eyes as if meditating. Seconds later, she whimpered and gasped. A line of blood ran into her right hand as small Nano blades pressed their way a half-inch out of the skin on both sides of her wrist. The implanted mechanism pushed the transparent edges apart until they severed the metal restraint. She whined as she moved her arms around front, stretching.
“Come on, come on.” Kirsten rolled on her side and rattled her cuffs.
“I’m so sore; I’ve been chained for weeks. They never took them off.”
“Hurt later, free now.”
Using the tiny Loki Blade like a saw, Miranda hacked at the shackles on her ankles, whimpering. It did not take a lot of force to push the Nano edge through the metal, but she mewled and cried with every ounce of pressure. After cutting the binders from one ankle at a time, she held the blade over the cuff on her other wrist. A series of pitiful whimpers and gasps came out of her as she scraped her arm back and forth. Once she was free of all metal, Miranda kicked the chains to the corner and curled up in a shivering ball. Trickles of blood ran down her legs, dripping from her wrist.
“Ow. It’s s’posed to push against each side of the cuff. Not just cut things like a knife. Shit, that hurt. It’s like I stabbed myself through the arm and wobbled the knife back and forth.”
Kirsten rolled onto her belly and tugged at the elastic cord. “Please…”
It took Miranda a moment to gather the nerve to move. Eventually, she crawled over next to Kirsten. Droplets of warm blood patted on her back as Miranda knelt beside her. The elastic cord gave way with ease, and Kirsten stretched flat with a sigh of relief.
“Okay, now it’s your turn to stay still. This thing’ll go through your arm before I realize it.”
“Yeah, I know how Nano works.” Kirsten didn’t move as Miranda cut the cuffs off her arms. She rolled over and sat up, rubbing her wrists while Miranda worked the small blade through the binders on her legs. Streaks and smears of blood were all over both of them by the time she was free. Miranda held her right arm out and made a fist before the blades sank back inside, the faintest trace of a whirring motor audible. She slunk away and curled up in the corner, cradling her bleeding arm. Some seconds later, the blood stopped seeping.
“You okay?” Kirsten crawled over, examining the cuts.
“Yeah. It’s got nanobots to repair the skin. It didn’t do it all the way on account of me using it to cut so much. I tore the skin more than it would have just going on and off. Nano don’t usually make much of a hole, ya know?”
Kirsten held Miranda’s right hand in both of hers. “Thank you. I’m sorry you had to hurt yourself, but we are going to get out of here.”
Miranda stared in mute silence.
“Perfect. One step closer to out.” Kirsten went to the door. After a moment of stretching away the pain of spending hours stuck in a tight hogtie, the sense of being locked in a cage overwhelmed her. She tried to tear the bars down with her bare hands, thrashing and rattling the heavy barrier until she had to rest. Exhausted, she slumped against the cold metal, panting. “Well, now that I got that out of the way… we just gotta get this door open. Can you cut out a bar or two?”
Miranda whined. “No, they’re like an inch thick. The blade’s too short, and it will hurt like fuck.”
Kirsten paced. The need to get to Evan and the frustration at being trapped became painful. “You’re a thief, huh? Can you pick this lock?”
“Can you psionic me up something to pick it with? Oh, there’s some robes in the cabinet by where the mask was. They put one on the dude they had in here when they took him out.”
Where the mask was. The spot of wall lay bare. She forced the image of a mask-wearing Konstantin hovering over Evan’s helpless body out of her mind. Kirsten was not sure if she wanted to waste the ten seconds it would take to put anything on. She had to get to him. She would streak the city if it would save Evan. Streak the city… She sat still and closed her eyes. I’ll project and go to him. Wait, no. I’ll just see them, I won’t be able to save him as a projection; all I’ll do is waste time. Calm down, K. Stay professional. Remember Shani. Get emotional and someone’s gonna die. If they grab him, he will project and come home. He can lead me right to the bastards.
Her sudden spin toward Miranda made the other woman jump. “You said something about a gag before?”
“Uhh… yeah. I thought you weren’t into―”
“I’m not!” yelled Kirsten. “What did you mean?”
“The creep they have watching us wants us to stay quiet. First day I was here, he said he’d gag or drug me if I didn’t stop screaming.”
“So if we make too much noise someone will come in here?”
“Yeah.” Miranda wore a face like a child about to be scolded. “But you don’t want ‘em to.”
“ Perfect.” Kirsten grabbed the cell door, and shouted at the top of her lungs.
ands clasped on the bars, Kirsten rattled the barrier. Ten minutes of shouting had thus far produced no effect other than echoes, and Miranda giggling at insults that ranged from juvenile to crass as desperation increased. Frustrated, she let go and paced for several s
econds before flinging herself at the door for another try at tearing it down. Their prison was not getting any warmer, but at least fruitless exertion took the sting out of the chill.
Miranda put a trembling arm around her from behind, attempting a hug. “Hey, calm down.”
Kirsten tensed at the touch. Oh, please don’t let Theodore find me now.
“Sorry. I’m just freezing.”
They huddled together against the wall, shivering.
“So, who are you to him?”
“What?” Kirsten glanced at her for an instant before attempting to stand for another round with the bars.
Miranda clung. “The old man. Konstantin, I heard him tell the guards you were not to be killed under any circumstances. He said something about keeping ‘it’ where he wanted it, and if you died, he’d have to go out and find the next one.”
How could he know that? Kirsten blinked. He doesn’t even know I’m a suggestive, or he would have blindfolded me. “It’s a long, complicated story. Some entities from the next world want me to help them.”
“Oh.” Miranda shot her a look as if she was nuts.
“You don’t have to believe me.” Shit, I can’t just sit here and wait.
Frustration at being separated from Evan manifested as tears. She had to do something other than nothing. Trusting him not to do something stupid, Kirsten concentrated on Dorian. The sense of power emanating from her mind unwound like a thread from deep within her skull. She beaconed, calling to the astral realm for him. After she was sure the message went out, she relaxed her power, but grew worried. Please let him be careful.
“Umm, what the hell was that? Your hair just moved like there was a breeze and your damn eyes just glowed behind your eyelids.” Miranda disengaged from their share of body heat.
“I have a ghost friend. I just tried calling him.”
“What’s he gonna do? Scare the bars open?”
“No, but he can take a message to my captain.” Kirsten tolerated idleness for less than twenty seconds before leaping to her feet. “Oh, goddammit! I can’t take this. Wait, I got an idea.”
“What?”
“Something an old spirit once annoyed the shit out of me with. When I was little, I tried to ignore them so I didn’t get punished.” She grabbed a fragment of the handcuffs and raked it back and forth across the bars while shout-singing Henry the Eighth.
“Stop it, that’s annoying.” Miranda covered her ears.
After two verses, a distant slam echoed from the basement. Kirsten got louder. Stomping approached, and Randall Morris rounded the corner of the boxes and stared down the short hallway to the cell. His missing arm had been replaced with a common civilian prosthetic. Flesh-toned plastic approximated the shape and contours of an arm, separated into visible panels by gaps that left the black metal interior visible. He froze.
“Hey, what the hell are you two doin’ loose?” He pulled a pistol off his belt and aimed at them. “Put those damn cuffs back on.”
Kirsten dangled the broken thing. “Sorry, we broke your toys. Now be a good little boy and Unlock the door.”
Randall recoiled as if punched in the head. The gun clattered to the ground as his arms went limp. He tottered around the stacked crates out of sight. Miranda ran up behind Kirsten, clinging to her from behind. Kirsten sucked air through her teeth, tensing at the awkwardness of a naked hug.
“Was that some kinda psionic shit?”
Kirsten’s knuckles went white on the bars. “Yeah.”
Miranda clamped tighter, resting her chin on Kirsten’s shoulder. “I swear if that psionic stuff gets us out of here, I’ll stop hating ‘em.”
“Gee, thanks.”
“Where’s he going?”
Kirsten shifted left to try and get a better look at the shadow creeping across the ceiling. “To get the key, I imagine.”
“Oh.”
Miranda’s grip forced much of the air out of Kirsten’s lungs when Randall appeared at the corner, zombie-walking to the cell with his right arm held forward. He stopped, six feet away when he stepped on his pistol. He looked down at it and broke out in a cold sweat. Veins rose out of his forehead as his face turned purple. He bellowed and threw the key behind him. Kirsten stared at the gleaming metal, tracking its bounce into a patch of shadow by a wooden crate painted with Cyrillic letters.
“Bitch!” Randall fell on his knees, seizing the pistol in both hands.
Kirsten planted her feet in a wide stance, still holding the bars. Her overwhelming need to protect Evan coalesced into the energy of a mind blast. Disgust at Konstantin and humiliation at her current incarceration added to it. She may have tried to say something coherent, but the noise that came out of her was more akin to a roar.
Randall Morris twitched, his eyes rolled back into his head, and he fell over backward like a plank. A rancid smell wafted by a few seconds later. Kirsten set her forehead to the cold metal bars, trying to ease the throbbing migraine forming in the wake of so much power. Her legs went slack; Miranda’s arms around her middle held her up for a moment before letting her slump to kneeling.
“You’re bleeding!” cried Miranda, wiping her hands at Kirsten’s face.
“I never had so much power go through one blast before. I feel like I got hit in the face by a PubTran bus.”
“Pretty sure he got the worse end of the deal.” Miranda went up on tiptoe to peek for a second, then sat on the floor next to her. “I think you killed him.” She shivered. “I smell shit. Umm, remember when I made fun of you when you said you weren’t helpless. You know, when you were rolling around. I take it back.”
“Thanks,” said Kirsten, not bothering to conceal the sarcasm.
“So, yeah. Asshole is dead and we’re still a pair of locked-up bitches. That worked.”
“You know, for a psionic-hating religious idiot, you sure don’t have much faith.”
Miranda pouted.
Kirsten rubbed her eyes, shook off the headache, and crawled back to the bars. When her vision adjusted to the light, she stared at the key and focused on the want of it to come toward her. I can pull grenade pins, so I can drag a damn key across a concrete floor. She slid a hand through the bars, reaching for it.
“What”―Miranda’s words stalled as the key twitched and pivoted to point at the cell. She leapt on Kirsten’s back, head right next to Kirsten’s to watch. “Are you doing that?”
“Thanks for drilling my skull into the bars. Yes, I’m doing that. Don’t shake me, I suck at telekinesis, but I should be able to move a key.”
“What’s uhh, telekinesis?”
Kirsten, holding onto cell door, glanced at her. “You are terrified of psionics to the point you hate them, but you don’t even bother to learn what they are?” She scowled. “Typical.”
“I’m sorry.”
Kirsten focused on the key again, willing it toward her.
Miranda squeezed Kirsten in bursts of fleeting joy as the key moved closer in a series of sporadic jerks and skids. When Kirsten thought about Evan screaming for her, it sailed into the air and went over their heads. Miranda let go and scrambled after it, not caring it landed in the tray of kitty litter. She ran back to the door, reached through the bars, and after a moment of fiddling, unlocked it.
Kirsten shoved the door open and vaulted Randall’s body. Miranda stopped to grab the pistol and tugged at the dead man’s coat, too weak to move the cybered-up corpse to get it off him.
“Hey, wait. Help me get his coat.”
“I gotta find my son.” Kirsten kept running.
“Wait! We can’t run outside naked. There’s robes.” Miranda scurried to one of the metal cabinets.
“I’ve already lost too much time.” Kirsten ran for the exit.
“Hey, there’s a picture of you over here.”
Kirsten stopped with a hand on the doorknob. Curiosity, or perhaps a need to understand what happened to her, muted her haste. She jogged over to Miranda. On the altar, beneath where the mask had
been, a sheet of plasfilm bearing a photo of her lay beneath an ancient wooden bowl that contained several strands of blonde hair as well as ashes of something burnt. To the right, an old book was open to a drawing of an ouroboros, surrounded by writing she could not decipher. The fancy box was empty; Konstantin had his knife as well.
Son of a bitch. She swiped the hairs out of the bowl. Her hair.
Miranda pulled the cabinet open, revealing several black silk robes on hangers. The door behind them slammed into the wall. Kirsten whirled as a man in a black suit and blood-red shirt ran through it, heading right for them. He raised a stunrod, but never made it close enough to use it.
Kirsten’s eyes glowed pure white. A stream of erratic images and thoughts crashed into the charging giant’s brain and shut it down. He went from full run to sliding on his chin in the span of an eye blink. One hand slid to the side of his head, lacking even the coordination necessary to put his hand on his face. Kirsten ran to the stunrod, stooping to pick it up and thrusting it into his neck in one fluid motion.
The large man convulsed, and went still.
Miranda’s face emerged from black silk as she let the one-piece robe fall around her. She grabbed another one. “Kirsten, here.”
Before she could turn to catch it, the large man’s body swelled. His suit split open down the back seconds before a gory explosion of blood splattered into the ceiling and all over Kirsten. Miranda screamed, dropped the extra robe, and jumped into the cabinet. Dark vapors coalesced upward from the cavernous hollow in the corpse, forming into a chitinous humanoid figure that resembled a skeleton with a crown of short horns.
Glowing red vapor welled out of its eye sockets; dry crunching ran down its spine as limbs solidified and it set its shoulders. Kirsten squinted up at the eight-foot demon and folded her arms.
“I don’t suppose you’d give me a minute to put something on before we start this?”
The polyphonic voice reverberated through the basement. “I shall rend the flesh from your bones and drink the essence of your suffer―”
Division Zero: Thrall Page 37