by Skye Knizley
“Which one?”
Lee entered and pointed at a box halfway up the left-hand wall. “Number 217, the wide flat one.”
Cadence spotted it and pulled it out of its slot. It made a loud metal-on-metal scraping noise and came loose in her hand.
“Why didn’t dad tell me any of this when he appeared to me?”
“He didn’t know,” Lee said simply. “He knew of the bunker, and made me agree not to tell you. But after the first visit with the Russians, I set this up, just in case.”
“Secrets. Gaia, I hate secrets,” Cadence muttered.
She placed the box on the floor and crouched beside it. The lock opened easily with her key, and she set the lid aside to peer within the box. On top were six folded stacks of twenty dollar bills. Beneath was a recent map of Sawtooth National Forest, an old key ring and a collection of black and white photographs.
Money, map and keys were stuffed into the backpack she’d brought along just in case, but she sat on the floor to look at the photos.
“Is this the best time?” Lee asked.
“This was your idea,” Cadence replied.
Lee hovered, nervously wringing his hands. “Not exactly. My plan was to get these materials and get out.”
“Hush,” Cadence ordered.
The photos were old, like the one she carried in her pocket. Most were of a group of men and women somewhere in Europe, and unless she was completely off her rocker, they were taken during World War II. She recognized Ethan in several of them, western hat and boots in place like always. The rest of the group was unfamiliar to her, save for her own face that appeared in several of the images. She, the other she, was wearing a tight uniform that zipped up the front. A few of the others wore similar outfits, and Cadence got the impression they were some kind of special unit.
“What are these, like, real life superheroes?” She asked.
“That is exactly what they are, yes,” Lee said. “They’ve been sponged from the history books, but you can find references if you know where to look.”
Cadence stuffed everything into her bag. “You knew all this and didn’t tell me?”
Lee studied the floor. “Yes. I… we, didn’t know what exactly to tell you.”
“You didn’t know? How ‘bout ‘CJ, we found some clues?’ or ‘I think you should see this,’ or anything that showed you gave a damn!” Cadence snapped.
“Cadence, that isn’t fair,” Lee said. “We didn’t know what… who, you were.”
“You didn’t know what I am? I was your patient and Phoenix’s kid!”
Cadence shoved the box back into place with enough force the whole shelf shook. On her way out, she kicked the vault door shut behind her and stormed back through the hole she’d made.
Lee followed, his brow lined with concern. “Cadence, of course, that’s true. But you were just getting back on your feet, starting to live again. Your father and I were afraid how it would effect you and thought it would be best to wait.”
He stopped in front of her and held up his hands. “We didn’t mean for you to learn about your past this way.”
Cadence didn’t slow, she passed right through him, ignoring the sensation of infinite cold that gripped her heart from his ghostly form. “Don’t you have a reward to move onto?”
She hurried up the steps, only pausing when she saw the light of his ascension and heard his distant voice, “I’m sorry, Cadence.”
“Me, too,” Cadence said to the universe at large.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
Miles rolled by under the Mustang’s tires, accompanied by the rumble of the big V8 and the patter of rain. Cadence was sick of the rain, it seemed as if it had rained constantly since Reno. When this was all over, she planned to take Nikki to the beach, somewhere warm and sunny where it wasn’t going to rain for at least a week.
She drove through the night, only stopping for fuel and the occasional bathroom break. By the time the sun was high over her shoulder, she was both exhausted and so caffeinated she thought her hands would start shaking at any moment. When she reached the turnoff for highway twenty, she couldn’t keep her eyes open anymore. She parked in the lot of an old gas station and dozed off to the music of the ever-present rain.
Fingers tapping on the window woke her a handful of hours earlier and she blinked at the officer standing beside the car. He motioned for her to roll down the window and she complied, hoping she wasn’t about to be arrested.
“Hi officer,” she said, stretching and smiling.
“Good afternoon, miss. Is everything alright?” The officer asked.
“Yes, sir. I just needed to get some rest, I didn’t want to have an accident. Did I do something wrong?” She asked.
“No, ma’am. The owner was just worried you were in trouble, he saw you sleeping out here and thought someone should look after you,” he said. “All the same, a young woman on her own, may I see your license, please miss?”
“Of course, officer,” Cadence said. She shuffled in the car’s glove box, pulled out her New Mexico license and handed if over.
“Cadence Phoenix, interesting name. What brings you all the way to Idaho?” The officer asked.
“I’m on my way to Seattle to visit my girlfriend.”
It was an honest answer, if not the whole truth. The officer’s eyebrows shot up, but he didn’t comment further. He handed back the license and tipped his hat.
“Thank you for your time, miss. You might want to get back on the road if you feel awake enough. Another thunderstorm is rolling this way,” he said.
Cadence smiled. “Thank you, officer.”
He nodded and strode back to his cruiser in the stiff-legged walk shared by patrolmen everywhere. The cruiser left a plume of dirt and gravel behind as it accelerated onto the highway and soon it was lost in the distance.
Cadence climbed out of her vehicle, stretched and looked at the forest in the distance. According to Lee’s map, the bunker he and Phoenix found was out there, somewhere. She had time to check it out and still make the rendezvous in Seattle, if that was the path she chose. Her biggest concern, aside from Nikki, was why they’d given her so much time. Obviously they knew she had to drive and it would take a full day to get to Seattle, but something told her there was more to it than that. Nothing was ever simple, especially when Specter was involved.
The smell of burgers and hotdogs rose from the grill outside the convenience store, and she decided to have something to eat and fill up the Mustang’s tank before heading up the state highway into the forest. Whatever was out there was important enough for Lee to die to protect, the least she could do was check it out. What if he was right and there was something inside that would help her save Nikki? She had no illusions that Specter would let either of them live, she could only hope that Nikki wasn’t dead already.
With her stomach full and the gas tank topped up, she drove. The road was in good repair and she made good time winding her way through the foothills and into the mountains. Mile after mile of cracked pavement rolled past until she was on a rutted dirt road deep in the wilderness. She followed Lee’s directions until the road stopped at an impossible blockade. A rusted sign read ‘US Property, Trespassers Will Be Shot.’
“It’s amazing how many of these old places are scattered across the country,” Cadence muttered. She grabbed her pack out of the car, locked everything and headed down the path into the woods. Night fell as she walked, and the nocturnal creatures along with it. She whistled with the night birds and continued through deep foliage and trees that blotted out the night. It was so dark and the night was so full of life, it almost felt as if she’d walked from Idaho into some primordial forest, untouched by the hand of man. Only the old wooden posts marking the path told her that wasn’t true.
The moon was up and casting shadows across
the path before she stepped into the clearing that had once been a hidden military base. There wasn’t much left, some concrete pilings that once supported buildings, a pair of wooden watch towers, some rusting barbwire and the doors to the bunker set into the mountain.
Beside the door was a metal breaker box lit by a single yellow bulb. Cadence pulled it open, wincing at the squeal of rust and old metal. Inside was a simple lever with two settings, open and closed. It took some effort to rotate the handle to the open position, but it slotted into place and the doors began to open with a distant grinding noise. She let them open far enough to pass through then moved the lever to the middle.
The inside of the bunker wasn’t what she’d expected. For one, the entryway was almost empty. It was clear the room had once been a garage or bay of sorts, with two mechanic’s lifts and massive racks for tools, but the vehicles and equipment were long gone. All that was left was a disused half-track that didn’t look to have been started in thirty years and piles of rusting, disuses parts.
A lever identical to the one outside was placed beside the doors, and she shoved it to the closed position before turning on the electric lantern she’d brought with her. She hadn’t seen anyone on the five hour hike, but that didn’t mean no one was there. She was still being tracked by a hybrid, if he could follow her through rain he would have no trouble with the forest.
Several doors led out of the garage into different sections of the bunker. Lee’s instructions led her through the southern-most doors and down a flight of stairs, past research facilities and empty, abandoned laboratories to a door marked ‘MK-Alpha Personnel Only.’ Beside it was a high-tech palm scanner that no longer worked, and an emergency release lever that was already set in the open position. Cadence pulled on the door and it slid open on greased cogs. The moment she saw inside the next chamber, pain thudded through her skull and she fell to her knees, reeling from memories that rose unbidden in her mind’s eye. Images of this room filled with men in white coats, all watching as she and others whose names she couldn’t quite remember were subjected to the MK-Alpha serum, memories of the pain that came with the changes to her body, the training that followed…
In a daze, she walked through the room, past the armored sensory deprivation chamber where the serum was administered, the examination rooms that still held polished exam tables and the incinerator that was used to destroy the failures. It was like a dream, not quite a nightmare, but horrifying all the same. So much pain and loss, tempered only by the hope of turning the tide of evil rising in Europe.
She ascended a flight of metal steps and walked past several empty state rooms, one of which she knew, somehow, had been hers. But that wasn’t her destination, she was drawn to a room at the end of the corridor, where five glass cases stood, lit by flickering safety lamps. Two were broken and empty, containing nothing but clear plastic mannequins. Three, however, contained uniforms. They were obviously intended for soldiers, with United States Army markings on the shoulders and Air Corps wings on the left breast, but there any resemblance to normal uniforms ended. These were form-fitting with molded armored plates, fingerless gloves and high boots.
Cadence peered through the glass at the first two, which were both designed for men, before opening the third. This one was designed for a smaller woman, about her size. To her surprise, it smelled new and she realized the case was built to protect the uniform against the effects of time.
She collected the uniform and sat on the floor, running the heavy material through her fingers. None of this made sense. She knew this was hers, she could remember wearing it, remember how it felt odd against her skin, but she also knew she’d never seen it before. Not with these eyes.
“This must be what going mad feels like.”
Her own voice startled her and she looked around to reassure herself she was indeed alone. The chamber was empty, a lonely relic to a failed experiment. The only sound was from the machinery, ticking over just enough to pump oxygen through the abandoned corridors, and old metal creaking in the night.
She knew that the uniform was impervious to small-arms fire, small blades and high temperatures, which would work far better against Specter than her street clothes, but it would also attract attention. It looked like the sort of thing superheroes wore in old comics. Wearing it in public was likely to cause comment, or worse, she could end up on the news.
On the other hand, if she got into a fight at the Seattle Needle it might be a good idea not to look like herself. The uniform came with a mask that would cover her eyes and a hood that would cast shadows over her face, making her harder to identify.
She chewed her lip, mulling it over, then folded the uniform and shoved it into her pack before grabbing the boots and slinging them over her shoulder. She was grateful that they didn’t have heels like they did in the comics. Fighting in heels was stupid.
Back in the corridor, she paused outside the stateroom that she knew was hers. It was late and she was tired, it made sense to get a few hours of sleep rather than trekking through the forest in the dark.
The door opened easily; the room beyond was small, with nothing but a narrow bunk and a desk. The government had spent their money on MK-Alpha, not creature comforts. The bunk would be more comfortable than the bare ground, though, and she flipped the mattress over so she wouldn’t be sleeping on half an inch of dust. There was also a pillow in a pink case, which she tossed aside. The pillow by itself would suffice.
Lying on the bunk was a strange experience, like sleeping on a submarine. Metal creaked and banged around her, accentuated by the hush of the cooling system and the hum of dying electric lights. Cadence found it hard to sleep and she opened her eyes, staring at the shelf above her. It took a minute before her eyes adjusted and she realized there was something stuck to it, she could see the corner sticking out from the edge where the shelf met the wall. She pulled on it and a photograph slid out. It was yellowed with age and one corner was torn, but it was her standing in front of some kind of restaurant. She was wearing a white dress and holding the hand of a younger girl, also dressed in white, while people walked past behind them. Written on the bottom edge of the photo in flowing script was ‘CJ and Harmony, NYC ‘41.’
“Harmony,” she said aloud. “I had a sister named Harmony. Why can’t I remember her?”
She cleaned the photograph as best she could and slipped it into a pocket. She was grateful for every clue she found, but she was getting tired of them. She wanted answers, and they were out there somewhere. She was going to rescue Nikki and, together, they were going to find them.
Lost in memories she wasn’t sure were hers, she rolled over and went to sleep.
***
The forest was cold, with an almost clammy feel made worse by the mist that clung to everything. The pre-dawn light wasn’t much, but it was enough to see the path leading from the bunker to the road, and Cadence hurried, jumping over fallen trees and pushing through underbrush, not caring if she made noise. She’d slept longer than intended and only had until midnight to reach Seattle.
A patch of old pavement made a convenient spot to rest and drink from the canteen she’d filled at the bunker. She estimated she was halfway to her waiting car, which meant she would be in Seattle by nightfall. Plenty of time before the deadline.
The water from her canteen had a metallic taste, but was better than nothing and she took another long drink before sticking it back in her pack and shrugging into the straps. She was adjusting them when a sound, the crack of a twig or branch, caught her attention. She didn’t turn, she pretended to be struggling with the straps while listening intently. Her danger sense warned her that someone was nearby; her ears told her they were to her right.
“I know you’re there,” she said. “You might be an excellent tracker but you suck at sneaking. Come on out.”
There came another rustle of bushes and cracking twigs,
then the hybrid stepped out of the underbrush. He still wore his hat and oversized leather coat, but he’d shifted to his wolf-man shape. It was exactly what Cadence expected, he looked for all the world like a classic monster movie brought to life, complete with short muzzle, fur-covered body and razor sharp claws.
“I’ve been hunting you a long time,” he said.
Cadence half-expected him to sound like a talking cartoon dog, but his voice was deep and resonant.
“Now you’ve found me, what are you going to do?” Cadence asked.
Bishop bared his teeth. “I found you back in Lobo, girl, but I was made to wait. Starr knew you would lead me here. Once you’re dead, we’ll take the bunker to replace the facility you destroyed. The secrets within outweigh your usefulness.”
Cadence dropped her pack, freeing her arms for the fight about to come. “Where’s Nikki?”
“Your girlfriend? Disgusting. If you must know, Vasily has her. She’s scheduled for the procedure, we have a new serum that needs testing,” Bishop said.
“That will kill her!” Cadence yelled.
“It might. You can wait for her in hell!”
Bishop charged, spreading his arms wide, claws and teeth bared. Cadence let him come, bracing one foot before the other. When he was almost upon her, she conjured her shield and let him run into it full speed. There was an audible snap from Bishop’s breaking nose and he backed off, howling in pain.
“You aren’t real bright, are you?” Cadence asked. She’d felt the impact and her head ached from the effort of stopping him, but she was too angry to care. “Where did you take Nikki?”
Without a word, the werewolf lunged again, punching and clawing at her shield. Cadence blocked each blow and waited, looking for an opening. When Bishop’s flurry of attacks slowed, she spun and kicked him with her heel, then pushed him with her shield, sending him sprawling back to the ground. To her surprise, he rebounded and slipped one long leg under her; it was her turn to go sprawling to the ground. Bishop gave no quarter, he pounced, trying to lock his jaws around her throat. It was all Cadence could do to keep her shield between them and one arm under his jaw. She knew she could kill him, but she needed information first. If they weren’t taking Nikki to Seattle, there was no point in going. She had to be certain.