I wasn’t disappointed; Lorenzo gusted at me as soon as he had a clear line of fire. He really let loose, too, gale-force winds that swept along the ground toward me.
Unfortunately for him, I was quite used to dodging gusts of wind from training with Reed. I know I’m biased, but Reed was a way, way better Aeolus than this guy.
I dodged above his two-fisted power gust and then dipped right back down. My fist met his jaw with terrible, bone-cracking force, and I claimed my first KO of the night. Benedetti’s eyes rolled up and he dropped to the ground.
His gusts went on, though, sweeping behind me and hitting the barrel of monkeys. Reporters went flying twenty feet into the air, like a pile of leaves in an autumn wind. They came down on my assailants, still blind and biting and scratching and clawing at anything that moved.
Finally, I found a use for these media assclowns.
Then I remembered that I was nominally trying to protect them, and quickly resolved to get the feral reporters away from my conscienceless foes, who probably wouldn’t share my qualms about killing them. Shit. And it had been so fun to hoist these a-holes on their own petard.
Janice Clary had shown her mysterious powers at last. Swollen up like a female bodybuilder, she was whacking the hell out of reporters that were blindly clawing at her, grabbing them and throwing them. I shot toward her and flipped at the last, smashing her with a kick to the jaw that caused her muscles to deflate from sudden, rapid-onset unconsciousness.
Two down.
A bolt of lightning raced past me, almost connecting as it caused the hairs on my head to stand up again. Thunder Hayes was ripping off lightning bolts as fast as he could charge his little cannon, and I was right in his way. It was kinda like horseshoes and hand grenades and nuclear warfare, in that all he had to do was get a bolt close enough to me and it’d bend to hit my ass. And the rest of me.
I halted as he tried to lead me with his next shot, and he grounded his attack almost harmlessly against Buck Clary’s metal self. (“Ow, dammit! I can feel that!”) His hand would glow as he built up a charge, apparently not quite practiced enough to just loose a bolt without warning.
I could work with that.
I froze, pretending to linger a second too long in one place, then started to move again. I did so at about half speed, counting on my reflexes and his little charge-up warning to save me. He was taking his time this round, though, aiming carefully, and I was looming in the foreground, only a couple feet off the earth, my hand glowing and ready to release a light net as soon as I was done with this dance.
Hayes unleashed the biggest burst of lightning yet, a bolt that would have easily put out 1.21 gigawatts. I shot backward as soon as he did it, grabbing the still-blind Terry by the elbow and shoving him in front of me. “Human shield!” I shouted as the bolt of lightning hit him, and he danced under the force of the electricity.
“Gosh,” I said into the stunned silence that followed. Terry keeled over, but I could still hear him breathing. Lucky bastard. “I hope they don’t blame me for that.” And then I blasted Hayes in the face with a light net so hard that he hit one of the brick pillars out in front of my office building and stuck there, completely restrained.
“You can’t beat all of us!” Junior said, striding out, all metal and face suffused with rage set in steel.
“I’m doing all right at it so far,” I said. “And you guys are bleeding talent.” I looked at the mess I’d already made of their little squad. “Well, I guess maybe ‘talent’ is the wrong word.”
“Our whole team ain’t even off the bench yet,” Junior said with a leer.
Something about that set off a warning in my head, but once again, it was too late. I started to zip away, away from these rogues, away from trouble, and away from the cluster of reporters that seemed stunned unconscious along with their master, Terry, but a gunshot cracked over the square, and I came tumbling down, landing face-first on the asphalt about a hundred feet away from the Clary clan.
I realized as the pain started to set in that I’d landed in the middle of the street. I’d cleared the parking lot, at least, but the pain that was racking my chest was not quite as bad as what had hit me earlier, when Borosky had shot my heart. This one had probably only gotten my lung, I realized as I coughed up blood, and my chest spasmed with pain.
“Get her!” someone screamed as I started to get to my knees.
Wolfe, I said.
Working. As fast as can be done.
Someone kicked me in the face, and pain flew through me as my jaw cracked, and teeth came loose. I caught a brief glimpse of Denise Clary crowing in triumph as she slammed her booted foot into my face.
Sienna, Gavrikov said, we need to get out of h—
I started to launch into the sky, blood running down my chin, but as I came up something grabbed me by the leg, sharp and pointed, tearing into my ankle and calf, ripping me back down. Claws tore into my back, and strong arms slammed me back into the pavement.
Bronson McCartney, form of: bear. I preferred the raccoon, honestly.
I reached for Shadow, hiding at the small of my back, and pulled it. I had almost taken aim at Thunder Hayes, who was stalking toward me, apparently free from his net bonds, when something gleamed in the night and tore into my arm. There was a flash of blood and suddenly the limb ended at the elbow, and a smiling, snarling face grinned back at me as he shook my lifeless hand and Shadow dropped into his waiting palm.
Iron Tooth Michael Shafer, all woken up from his police-induced coma.
Someone slammed a metal fist into my belly, and I felt organs rupture. A steel face, a steel hand, filled with vicious satisfaction in the form of a furious grin as he pounded on me three times in quick succession, driving the air out of my body, making me choke up blood and wonder how I could ever breathe again.
I don’t think I’d ever seen Clyde Clary, Jr., look this happy. Just like his dad, he excelled in moments of cruelty, though.
“Let’s finish this fast,” Borosky said, walking up with her rifle in hand. Geez, Officer Gustafson, you could have at least kept her gun. She was pointing it at me, even though McCartney was sure to take the hit as bad as I did. “You prolong this, you give her a chance to—”
“I want to tear this bitch apart,” Terry said, hobbling up to the little mob that was poised to kill me. “Gimme a second to get my hold over those—dammit.” He looked over his shoulder. “They done run off. They do that, when they break free, get all spooked and go like a herd.” He gave me a furious glare. “Look what you done.”
I managed to get my surviving palm up, and blasted him over the head with another net before Buck Clary smashed me in the side of the head with a punch that felt like he’d beaten my skull in with a stone. I’d seen him lurking over there, but I hadn’t expected him to be the one to reply. “I just wanna …” I said, blood sliding out through my swollen lips, “… cover up that … awful bottle-blond hair … is that so wrong?”
“Just do it,” Borosky said coldly, and she lifted her rifle up so I could look down the barrel. McCartney’s claws were still tearing at me, holding me aloft while I was dripping blood, the little half-circle surrounding me uneasy, every single one of them looking like they wanted to leap in and do the job. “Now, before she can heal again.”
“She ain’t healing anymore,” Hayes said, and he hit me with lightning.
McCartney howled as he dropped me. “That hurt!” he said, voice muffled by his bear face.
One of the Clarys punched me into the ground. Pavement shattered, my face hit the asphalt and ricocheted back up, and I wondered how I could possibly still be alive. I couldn’t feel anything below my waist.
“You’re all idiots and chickenshits!” Borosky pronounced, and I heard her adjust her aim, hands rough against the wood furniture of her rifle. “Fine. I’ll do it.” I knew I had about a second before my skull emptied its contents all over the pavement.
But that was okay.
I didn’t quit, I
said to the voices in my head. I sounded weak, even to me.
You did good, Sienna, Zack said softly. I heard him swallow, and I knew the fear of what would come after that bullet blasted my brains out everywhere was filtering through him. It was coming, would be there in a second to take me away from all this. This hell.
I didn’t feel it, though. The pain was starting to fade.
Death was starting to set in.
And I was done.
No, came a small voice in my ear. It was so cold, autumn chill tingling across my flesh. Except … it wasn’t cold anymore … the numbness started to fade, my skin turning hot …
Not yet. The darkness around me started to fade to white, light oozing in around the edges of my vision, replacing the black that had started to claim me.
I blinked. The voice … it sounded … Russian. And like it was in my head. But there was only one Russian in my head, and his name was …
“Aleksandr Gavrikov,” I murmured. The world around me exploded in a torrent of flame and heat, washing away the night and turning it to day, as an inferno was unleashed around me.
37.
I woke up and the world was on fire. I opened my eyes to a burning hellscape, in the center of a crater that seemed all too familiar for someone who had been here before. Many times. I took a breath and it was hot, the smell of brimstone and scorched earth all around me.
“Gavrikov,” I whispered as I came to my feet. I was as naked as the day I was born, and the cold autumn wind whipped through once more. I shivered, and lit my skin on fire in a leotard of flame, from toes to neck, as I looked over the vista before me.
My office building was burning. The windows were shattered, and flames were leaping out of every story. The grass was gone, blackened and scorched. Cars and news vans were on fire in the parking lot, roaring in the night like bonfires in the summer.
And all around me … stretching out from the crater where I’d awoken …
There was nothing but two piles of molten slag that I knew had been Buck and Junior Clary. Of all the rest of my foes … not a damned thing remained, save for a half dozen shadows scorched into the ground to mark their passage out of life.
“Gavrikov … What have you done?” I whispered. I was still shivering, but now that my skin was on fire, it had nothing to do with the temperature.
A siren’s whoop came from down the road, and I saw the black SUV coming. I knew who was in it even before it came to a screeching halt, knew who was going to get out even before Scott and Friday came piling out, Scott with a gun in his hand and a triumphant grin lit in the firelight.
“Sienna!” he shouted. “You’re under arrest!”
I didn’t have time to think before he fired. Four shots, at a hundred yards, and he peppered my chest. The 9mm rounds dispersed on my chest, melting to slag and falling to the earth to join the remains of the two Clarys.
I reacted without thought. Fight or flight, and this time, with the horror of what I’d just let loose, I chose flight. I soared into the sky and left Scott behind me, out of sight of him in seconds, out of the city in seconds more as I broke the sound barrier and turned west.
“What did you do, Gavrikov?” I asked, more to appease my troubled conscience that out of genuine desire to know.
The right thing, Wolfe said.
The smart thing, Bjorn said with a smirk in the darkness of my mind. I could feel the others agreeing with him, even Zack, although he seemed more reluctant than anyone else.
What I had to, Gavrikov replied at last, and with considerable more reserve than the other two had exhibited. What I had to do in order to save your life.
Behind me, I could see the hints of sunrise coming up in the east. I headed west and tried to outrun it, wondering how long I could hide in the dark before the light would catch me.
38.
I stopped in Sioux Falls, South Dakota, and broke into a hair salon. It sounds stupid, but I knew I needed to do it, smashing the front window and rummaging through, naked, until I found the hair dyes. I crossed town in a series of low-flying leaps, and took a page out of Terry’s idiotic book and bleached my hair in an alley. Then I took the pair of clippers I stole and buzzed the sides of my scalp, leaving me with a bleached-blond mohawk.
The next step was to color what remained of my hair a psychotic shade of pink. It wouldn’t have been my first choice, but when you’re naked and dying your mohawk in an alley in Sioux Falls in the middle of the night, you’ve already failed the test for good life choices. I gave up gracefully and just got the job done, my scalp burning from the bleach in a way that reminded me of a time Michael Shafer had thrown acid on me.
When that was finished, I flew further west until I hit Rapid City. I found a clothing outlet outside town and shattered a window. I picked stuff that I would never, in a million years, wear by choice, taking care to steal enough stuff that it wouldn’t look like someone—namely me—had broken in just to take one outfit. I modeled my look after J.J.’s girlfriend, Abigail, and picked up a pair of low rise jeans that were tighter around the cuff than hers, a pair of suspenders, and a tank top. I couldn’t shake the feeling that I looked a little like Leeloo from The Fifth Element, but that was all right. I wasn’t trying to blend in.
I was trying to look as different from Sienna Nealon, internationally known fugitive, as I possibly could.
The next stop was Boulder, Colorado. Now that I’d shed my flame leotard in favor of new clothes, I wasn’t a naked streak in the night sky anymore. I found an all-night coffeehouse and surveilled it from across the street. I saw what I was looking for and waited a little while. It didn’t take long, fortunately.
There was a hipster-looking dude wearing a hoodie and big, black-rimmed glasses just sitting in the front window, finishing his tea. I watched him until he gathered his things to leave, alone, still staring at his smartphone as he meandered off, taking a shortcut down an alleyway.
Pro tip, kids: Don’t be staring at your phone when you’re walking around. It makes you prey.
I came up on him from behind and slapped him in the back of the skull. Not too hard, but hard enough to make him collapse. I whacked him in the belly so he would curl up in pain, then I stole his glasses and his hoodie, and ran, not flew, off. A couple streets away, I put the hoodie on, popped the lenses out of the glasses, taking particular care to dumpster them, and put them on.
Now I’d crafted a look that practically guaranteed everyone would at least glance at me, but no one would realize who I was. The only way I could possibly have disguised myself any more effectively was if I could somehow have sprouted Wolfe’s tufted beard from my cheeks and chin. But even if that were possible, it was a step too far.
I made it to California before the sun came up, scouring the suburbs of San Francisco from the sky, trying to match the darkened earth below with the map I’d seen on my phone hours earlier. Kat had sent me her location, and I’d memorized the address, but I didn’t have a GPS to track it down, so I had to do it by careful study, trying to remember exactly what the place had looked like from above.
I found the right neighborhood just before sunrise, and managed to make my landing and walk the streets as the sky was turning the new color of my hair. I knew I couldn’t outrun the light forever, especially given how much time I’d spent dyeing my hair and stealing clothes and stalking a hipster to steal his glasses and hoodie. It smelled funny, too, which wasn’t a huge surprise given I’d gotten it in Colorado.
I walked through the neighborhood, all stucco and very Italian-villa-looking to my eyes. There was a sameness here, but the houses were large, and the lawns were medium, and I put my head down and buried my hands in my pockets and walked, looking for the address I’d memorized on that phone.
My thoughts had reached a slow bubble, days of no sleep followed by near death exertions finally taking their toll. I was cold, cold all the way to the bone, and weary, and probably paler than usual by several shades. I just wanted to find my friends, to c
ollapse in a bed, and hope that everything that had happened tonight had been a terrible dream. I wanted to wake up in my hotel room in Bloomington and have it all turn out to be a cable-news-induced nightmare.
I turned at the right street, breathing a sigh of relief. The house numbers were steadily increasing as I wended my way up a slight hill. I didn’t care that I wasn’t moving at meta speed anymore. I didn’t want to show myself, didn’t want to reveal who I was. I just wanted to hide, to find a bed, to hug my friends, and then sleep for days. My soul felt burned, everything felt burned, as though Gavrikov had scorched off a layer of my emotions when he’d taken control and exploded.
The addresses rose and rose, and I crossed the street when I realized I was on the wrong side. A mailbox ahead proclaimed in brass, curvy numerals that I’d reached my destination, and I breathed a sigh of relief.
A sigh of relief that evaporated when I saw the front door to the house was wide open.
I stalked up the steps, breath catching in my throat. I hadn’t seen Colin on my approach, blurring around, but I’d attributed that to him needing to sleep. Neither had I seen a sign of Phinneus, but I wouldn’t have seen him, would I? He would have picked a vantage where he could watch unobserved.
I stepped into the darkened hallway. “Hello?” I asked. My voice sounded small in the entry, and I took a few steps in. “Is anybody here?”
I clenched my fists, my heart pounding in my ears. There was a living room just ahead, and I peered around the wall. The TV was on, but muted, and there were signs of someone having made a bed on the couch, tangled sheets that were now draped over the flowery upholstery, like it had been slept in but pushed aside for people to sit on.
I tiptoed forward, not sure why I was bothering to tiptoe. I found the kitchen, empty, but there was food laid out on the counter, a pizza half-eaten, the box open, cheese cool to the touch, grease congealed. It had broccoli on it. I put aside my disgust temporarily and moved on.
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