Catharsis (Book 2): Catalyst

by Campbell, D. Andrew

  What do I do? The thought shoots through me like electricity. This is how I die? By this guy? I can try and punch my way through the wood and out to the lawn, but what if he reinforced it? What if I don't have enough speed or don't hit it just right and get stuck halfway through? And which is better, the door or a window? Which would he expect me to take and thus possibly booby trap even more?

  And then without answering any of those questions, I find myself turning sharply to the right and sprinting up the stairs to the second floor. If he's expecting me to go out on the first floor, then maybe that'll leave me a chance on the upper level. There's no way I can get back up through the attic in time, so I have to hope for an open and unprotected second-story window. I consider pulling up my memory from earlier and checking, but I fear any current redirecting of my energies may be more than I can handle. As it is, the cloud has already caught up to me (Stupid change of direction and stairs!). I've slowed down, and that loss of momentum was all it needed to overtake me. The fiery fog of destruction is all around me as I move, and I can feel my clothes and skin singeing with every step. Each breath I pull in brings with it a heat that tears my throat and lungs raw. I don't want to think about it, but subconsciously I know I am on fire as I run.

  Clearing the top of the stairs, I push even harder to get distance from the very air around me. A task that should be impossible, but I am determined to see it happen. Through the hazy cloud around me I can see an open rectangle of darkness at the end of the short hallway. I can only hope that it is an actual window in front of me, and not a cruel mirage or optical illusion (or knowing Chadwick, just a large painted black rectangle on the wall much like Wile E. Coyote used to do to the Roadrunner). Leaping for the lower section of the window, I turn my body so that my shoulder will hit the glass first. Holding what's left of my breath and hoping for the best, I close my eyes and wait for the inevitable impact. Minutes and then hours seem to go by as I sail through the air towards my target. And then I can feel sharp cracks of exploding glass around me and the sting of cold air as I realize I am flying some twenty feet above the ground, and I have no idea where I am going or where I'm going to land.

  Cracking my eyes open to get an idea of which direction I'm moving, I only get a brief warning before my body slams into the brick wall of Chadwick's neighbor's house. The impact knocks the wind out of me, and I can feel something in my upper body crack as the hard bricks refuse to give way to my flesh.

  As I start my slide down the rough-textured surface, I scrabble to find a place to dig in my fingers and get a grip. If I can grab onto a brick, then I can slow my descent and lower myself down without incurring further injuries.

  At least it seems like a good plan. Then a wall of enraged heat vomits out of every available opening of Chadwick's house and smashes me against the wall with more force than I have the strength to resist. The heat and flames continue to pound on my back and push against me so powerfully that it holds me in place while the building-shaped oven several dozen or so feet away charbroils my exposed flesh. And then the situation escalates and chunks of brick and wood and plaster begin to pelt the wall around me.

  It takes a second for me to realize the house I just escaped from is exploding in slow motion and pounding me with the debris. I made it out of the deadly inferno only to be caught in the ensuing aftermath. And I'm not strong enough to crawl away. All I can do is sit and suffer through it.

  And then something the size of a couch crashes into the wall next to me and punches a hole straight through the bricks taking me with it. My back wraps around one of the house’s support beams as I tumble and an excruciating level of pain radiates through every one of my limbs until I lose consciousness.

  The dark oblivion that swallows me is a relief that can't come too soon.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

  I'm alive! The thought relieves me as I blink myself awake in my resting place in a nest of rubble. Since waking up in that alley over a year ago I've not slept or lost consciousness often (still a strange side effect), so my having lost touch with the world for a little bit is a disconcerting experience. It takes a lot for the world to try and kill me, and for a moment there I was beginning to think that having a building explode around me might be the final straw. But I made it.

  And that thought is quickly followed with, "The pain! The pain! Ouch, ouch, ouch, ohmagawd, the pain!" My body is aching in ways it shouldn't be able to. My shoulder throbs from where something inside of me snapped upon impact with the wall, my skin stings with the burn of the feet of a thousand fire ants as it tries to mend itself after the flames ate most of it away, and my stomach is twisting in knots as the Dark Hunger begins to rear its head and demand a sacrifice. I've burned through all my energy stores that those guys in the Cadillac gave me. It's kept me alive, but just barely. I need to feed again if I'm going to heal from this.

  Finally, I also realize I don't know exactly where I am. I know I hit Chadwick's neighbor's house when I jumped, but I don't know which one. Or why I'm covered in large detached chunks of wall and smashed furniture.

  As I crawl out from under the debris covering me like a giant junkyard blanket, I notice that I'm standing in the remains of a house. Behind me there is still a fully-standing home complete with finished kitchen and half of a well-designed living room centered around a large flat screen television. A television that has several two-by-four chunks of wood piercing it like a target on an archery range. I hope someone was well insured.

  In front of me stands the smoking remains of half the house and a large, open area that appears to have once contained a building. I'm guessing that's where Chadwick Morrin's house once stood, but it is now just a toothpick-covered hole in the ground. There's nothing left of his place larger than my leg, and even the pieces that large are mostly just twisted chunks of charred metal. If there had been any evidence of his misdeeds in that place before, they are certainly gone now.

  "The entire building is gone, Ren." I say out loud for his benefit so he knows what just occurred. "The explosion leveled the place. All those pictures are burnt up. I’ve got nothing now."

  When he doesn't immediately respond, I glance down at my legs and see why. Most of my clothing is gone. What little I have left on my body is blackened and frayed. I look like I just walked out of the carpet bombing of London in the 1940's.

  Ren probably thinks I'm dead, I realize, and then, Heck! I probably should be. Any normal person would have died in that.

  Not wanting my only friend to worry or think that Chadwick got the better of me (or wait around for the authorities to figure out what just happened and scoop me up for questioning), I stumble through the last few yards of ruined living room and make my way out to the house's backyard. It only takes me a moment to orient myself and figure out which way I had left my bike (Thank goodness I had had the foresight to not park anywhere near the house. It should still be in one piece and waiting on me.), and I begin jogging the moment I stop the world from spinning around like an apocalypse-themed carousel.

  Halfway across the now littered backyard I stumble to my knees, and my first thought is that I tripped over some random piece of brick or wood that I hadn't noticed. But resting on my knees and looking back over my shoulder for the culprit, my stomach clenches into a knot and I fall to my side on the grass. My energy is waning as my body mends itself, and the expenditure is outpacing what little reserves I have left. Rolling back over to get to my feet, I concentrate on slowing my body's healing process so that I don't burn myself out before I get back home.

  And then the aroma of meat and food and nourishment creeps its way into my nostrils and my ability to focus wavers even more than before. Looking around desperately for the source (Whether it is to identify it or feed on it, I'm not immediately sure.), I see the two police officers that had been stationed outside Chadwick's house crossing the street towards me and yelling something.

  My inability to figure out what they're yelling both brings to my attention my ina
bility to hear anything except for a non-stop ringing due to the explosion and the fact that I need to get very far away from here very quickly. Because if I don't put some distance between me and them in the next few seconds, then there is either going to be one less officer in the world or one more petite Hispanic girl on the police’s BOLO list. And I don't want either of those to happen.

  Refocusing on pushing my energy away from my burnt skin and instead down into my legs and lungs, I crawl away from the two officers and then move up into a stumbling run as I regain my balance. By the time I'm hurdling the back fence, I have my feet underneath me and I'm increasing my speed enough to keep the two Boys in Blue at a safe distance.

  Running up to the house where I had parked my bike, I see my ride just where I had left it. Thanking fate for at least giving me some small reprieve, I climb on and whip my helmet into place. As the soft fabric envelopes my cheeks and forehead, the relief I feel at having entered a sensory cocoon is almost debilitating. The caustic smells are blocked from my nose, the ringing in my ears is muffled and even the darkened visor helps shield my eyes from some of the harsh lights I had been subconsciously squinting against. It's akin to the behavior change that happens when a puppy is put back into its kennel at night. The sweet embrace of the familiar and safe is both calming and uplifting.

  Pushing the starter button on the Zero, I lean forward with my weight and pull down on the throttle hard enough to feel it shudder and nearly lose control. Nearly, but not quite. Sitting back down on the cushioned seat, I do my best to keep as much of my weight centered as possible to prevent the bike from popping a wheelie or wobbling uncontrollably. At the first intersection I come to, I lean left and take the corner at full speed so as to put as many angles as possible between me and the pursuing officers. I want to kill their line of sight to me and prevent them from radioing in any identifying information.

  "What happened back there?" The speakers in my helmet screech once I’m moving, and my surprise at hearing Ren's voice almost undoes all my careful work I'd put into escaping. "You're mic died suddenly, you stop answering me, and I intercept a call over the police scanner about a house explosion. What did you do back there?"

  On the bright side, I guess my hearing is returning. Although after listening to that tirade, I'm already missing the blissful silence that nearly busted eardrums brought.

  "Wasn't me Renny," I say through gritted teeth. "It was Chadwick. He booby-trapped the place. I was wrong about him." I pause as a wave of pain squeezes my insides like an irritated boa constrictor trying to work the fight out of a downed monkey. It's all I can do to not close my eyes and just give in to it. "I'm hurt bad. Real bad. I'm going to need the reserves. Get 'em ready. Can't talk anymore." My last few words come out in a mumble, but I'm sure he was able to pick up on them. He knows me well enough by now.

  I can continue to hear his breathing and the constant clacking of keyboard keys as I drive frantically towards the warehouse, but at least I don't have to concentrate on his words. And the soft sound of his breaths helps keep me focused on where I'm going. A place that wouldn't exist without him.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

  The fact that Ren is smart enough to keep an industrial-sized fridge at the warehouse partially filled with "donated" blood is just one of the reasons why I owe him more than I can put into words. That's something I either never would have thought about doing, or I wouldn't have the patience to set up and follow through on. But he does. And its existence has saved more than one life tonight.

  If I hadn't had a supply of blood waiting for me, then I might not have had the strength to ignore the police officers who chased me on the way home. Or the pedestrians I passed in alleys as I rocketed down main streets to get back here. The pull I felt to stop and indulge the Dark Hunger was only assuaged by the knowledge that guilt-free sustenance awaited me here. My morals and conscious were boosted by those plastic bags sitting chilled behind quietly humming metal doors.

  But if nothing had awaited me at home? If I had simply been running from that explosion in a hope to make it here so that I could sit and fester in my own pain, then I would have eventually succumbed to the seductive song of the hunger and left the confines of the warehouse to seek my fill. And in my current state I can't swear that I'd be able to stop myself from going too far. Or if the drive were strong enough, then I might even seek out an easier target here at home. A target whose blood I know is poisonous to me, but if the choice is between impending death and possible future death...

  I shake my head to clear the thoughts, and turn my body in my reclining chair so that I can see Ren typing away over at his computer console. He was right again about tonight. About Chadwick. Really, about everything.

  "Thanks," I mumble quietly to the back of his head. He doesn't respond nor does he stop typing, but I do notice he slightly shakes his head back and forth. I’ll just have to accept that that's the best I'm going to get right now.

  "So how many of them did I go through?" I ask even though I know the answer. It's just an easy topic to broach that is neutral enough to hopefully not bring on a lecture. I want to talk about what happened, but I don't want him to tell me what all I did wrong. I'm not ready for that yet.

  "Six bags so far," he says without turning or stopping what he's doing. "You'll need more, but I want you to rest and let your body heal without trying to digest anything. I think it'll be safer for you."

  I nod in agreement even though he can't see me. His voice was tinged with more worry than anger, and I hope that's a good sign. I don't want him mad at me, even though he has every right to be.

  "So what's the word out there now?" I ask cautiously. "Are they looking for him? Or for me?"

  He continues typing and glancing back and forth between two monitors as he speaks, "One moment Cat. Let me finish this first. Not all of us are superhuman and can do everything at once."

  His words sting at first as an attack on me and my impulsive need to take on more than I can handle, and then I hear the smile in his voice and detect the lack of any hostility coming from him and I realize that it is just my own insecurities asserting themselves. I don't need to be defensive with Ren. He's the only real friend I have right now.

  Laying back down and looking around the mostly empty warehouse, I replay as much of the evening as I can in my head without it hurting too much (Both physically from exerting the energy to tap into those abilities, and mentally from the knowledge of how badly I screwed things up.).

  The cartels are ramping up their pursuit of me. I imagine the men I ran into tonight are a good indication of what my future escapades are going to be like. They are prepared for me, well trained and resolute in their desire to see me killed. This is no longer going to be the easy pickings of me showing up at a drug house and just roughing up some random pill pushers and street thugs. I'm now going to be running into hired assassins - or worse, if such things exist - that are willing to die to make my threat to their livelihood disappear. I am going to have to become remorseless in my pursuit of them. Or, I guess, just give it up completely and move on. They are going to require either all my attention or none of it. If I try and face them again while I’m distracted like I was tonight, then I won't be the one walking away from the fight next time. That won't be an option any more.

  Those men and the drugs they bring into this city were my original motivation to keep living once I figured out who I was and what was happening to me. But does that mean that still needs to be true? Is it worth pursuing if it means my death? Or can my abilities be used better elsewhere?

  And what about Chadwick? That man is evil. And smarter than me. Much smarter.

  I was gone from his house for no more than six hours, and in that time he went from having no idea that I even existed to being able to identify not only who I was, but also my name, and he devised a way to counter my abilities and cripple me. All that without leaving his house at any point. Or at least without anyone knowing that he had left his house. How am
I supposed to beat someone like that when all I have are some heightened senses and a trumped up metabolism? He nullified everything I could throw at him, and he was willing to destroy his own house in an attempt to kill me. That's more than I can do. He's a better opponent than I'm ready for.

  "He's a genius, but he's far from perfect." Ren's voice startles me so much that I jerk myself into an immediate sitting position and gape at him.

  "How'd you know?" I begin as he just smiles at me. "I was just thinking about him."

  Ren smiles and leans back in the chair he's brought over next to my recliner (How'd he get that over here without me even noticing? Was he quiet or am I that distracted?). "Relax Catarina," he says easily. "I don't have any superpowers like you. I was just watching your face and how much you were frowning and grimacing while you laid there. After tonight, I figured there was only one person who could get that kind of a reaction from you."

  I shake my head slightly and stare at him. "Still impressive, though," I say softly.

  "I'll accept the compliment, but my abilities are still far from what you can accomplish. I’m simply a Sherlock Holmes to your Superman when it comes to crime fighting." He watches as I shake my head back and forth after his kind words. I don't deserve them right now.

  "Don't dismiss what you did tonight so quickly. You got beat. That's not the same as being beaten. I know you're upset about Chadwick getting away and his getting the better of you, but don't just focus on the negative, Cat.

  "You had an impressive strike against the cartels. There were four men in that vehicle who fully believed they were prepared to handle a threat like you, and they failed. Epically. You removed three from the immediate battle, left one to tell the tale and managed to get their vehicle destroyed along with any weapons that may have been inside. You did all that singlehandedly. Plus you accomplished it without the police having the slightest clue that you were either there or that you even exist. That's not a small feat."