Xenofreak Nation, Book Two: Mad Eye

by Melissa Conway

  Two armed figures stepped out of the hole, but Dillo called out, “It’s good.”

  When they reached the edge, she saw that the ground had been sliced away from around a huge drainage pipe. The two men guarding the entrance moved out of Dillo’s way in an almost deferential manner.

  Dillo waved for her to precede him.

  “Welcome to Edgemere, Porky.”

  Chapter Thirteen

  Scott had been waiting for an hour and darkness had fully fallen. He’d sat on the frozen sidewalk until his backside had gone numb, and then he’d gotten up and stomped around until circulation returned. Even with insulated gloves and boots, his hands and feet ached from the cold.

  He thought about going across the street and getting a warm beverage, but didn’t want to miss Padme.

  It had been four months since he’d last seen her. The xenofreak girl had just declared her love for him, or whatever passed for love in her devious mind. Then she’d ducked into the escape tunnel, leaving the rest of them to fight their way out of the conflagration she’d deliberately started in order to destroy Dr. Fournier’s secret bioengineering facility.

  Scott looked around for the hundredth time, trying to shove his hands deeper into his jacket pockets. The box Shasta had given him with the auto-injector took up too much room for his right hand to be comfortable. He wrapped his fingers around it with the intention of putting it in the back pocket of his jeans, but caught a slight movement out of the corner of his eye. He straightened up, staring into the gloom beyond the front wall of the blood donation center.

  “I’m alone,” he said.

  A dark-clothed figure disengaged from the shadows, but didn’t move into the light - or within view of the camera. Scott cautiously walked towards the small, shrouded form. When he was a few feet away, she lifted her hands and pushed her customary scarf off her hair, revealing a pale, serious face. The dim lighting emphasized the dark circles under her eyes.

  “Padme,” Scott said.

  “I knew you’d figure it out.” Her voice was low, as if she feared being overheard.

  “How are you?” Scott, too, spoke quietly, but only because he wanted to foster a false sense of intimacy.

  Her voice cracked on the one word she uttered, “Lonely,” before she slipped her arms around him and pressed her cheek against his chest. He pulled the glove off his right hand and slid his furred fingers into her hair, thinking how many times he’d wished he could do the same with Bryn.

  She lifted her head and the locks of hair framing her face fell back, revealing her xenograft, the upside down cow’s ears her uncle had forced on her. Her slightly parted lips begged to be kissed, but he couldn’t make himself do it. Instead, he pulled away slightly and asked, “Is this safe?”

  She shook her head. “Doubtful. Lupus has been much more...attentive since the fire. He’s kept me in isolation this whole time. He finally released me a few weeks ago after I got the nanoneuron program running again. If he finds out I snuck out tonight, I don’t know what he’ll do.”

  Scott grasped her shoulder, surprised at how frail she’d become. “Come with me. I can protect you.”

  He felt more than saw her reaction as her shoulders slumped and she seemed to curl in on herself. “I can’t.”

  “You said you wanted to turn yourself in. To make a deal with the XIA.”

  “That was then. Things have...changed.”

  “Okay, then, you don’t have to turn yourself in, just come stay with me. I’ll keep you safe.”

  It was a bold statement meant to disarm and further convince her of his sincerity.

  “I will never be safe from Lupus.”

  “What can I do to convince you?”

  “There’s nothing anyone can do.”

  The finality of the statement made him wonder briefly why she felt she had no way out, but he didn’t ponder it. He’d been hoping she’d mention Bryn, but it looked as if he would be forced to baldly ask about her. He knew he should attempt to manipulate the conversation around to the typhoid, but Bryn was his priority - even if he risked making Padme jealous.

  Very gently, he asked, “Where is she?”

  “Who?”

  “Bryn.”

  Padme was an accomplished liar, but Scott thought the blinking surprise on her face was genuine. “Is she missing?”

  “She and one of our agents were taken from a safe house today. We don’t know if they’re alive or what.”

  Padme took a step back and let her arms fall to her sides. “You care about her.”

  “I feel responsible for her.” It wasn’t a denial, but he hoped she’d take it that way. “You of all people should understand that.”

  Laughter from a group of diners across the street distracted her and she looked in their direction. “Look how normal they are. They have no idea what’s coming.”

  Scott didn’t want the topic to veer away from Bryn, but Padme’s cryptic words gave him his other opening. “You mean the typhoid?”

  She nodded slowly and took another step back. “You found this place,” she glanced at the blood donation center, “so the XIA must have some indication of what’s been happening.”

  Scott sensed she was on the verge of bolting. He had so many questions, but needed to ask the most urgent of them. “Fournier. How can we stop him?”

  “Give him what he wants,” she said dully.

  “He hasn’t made any demands.”

  “None that you’re aware of.”

  “What does that mean?” He reached a hand out, but she shook her head.

  “I have to go.”

  She turned and began to move back into the shadows, and he let her go. She was like a skittish horse, and if he tried to stop her, he knew he’d lose the best source of information in his limited arsenal against Dr. Fournier.

  “I want to see you again,” he said.

  “No, you don’t.”

  He struggled to think of the perfect thing to say to convince her and decided to play upon the one emotion she seemed to understand - jealousy. “If you go back to Lupus, I will kill him and take you from him.”

  There was no reply. She was gone.

  Chapter Fourteen

  The first thing Bryn noticed was the smell. Unlike the Warehouse, which reeked most foully, the odor permeating Edgemere reminded her of slightly moldy coffee. The drainage pipe itself was made out of the eco-friendly building material biopolycrete, and the inside was so wide that even a tall person could walk upright with room to spare. Lining the curved sides were six rows of shelves filled with white plastic sacks the size of a package of flour. Growing from the top of the sacks were mushrooms; thousands upon thousands of them. A clear acrylic tube about six inches in width was mounted to the ceiling. It ran the full length of the pipe and curved back around again at the opening, so it seemed as if there were two tubes instead of one. Inside the tube was a greenish, glowing liquid that provided sufficient ambient light to see where they were going.

  As they walked, the end of the tunnel beaconed, lit even more brightly with the same green glow. Bryn stepped out into a truly astonishing world. Construction on the underground mall must have been nearly complete when Poppy hit. She’d expected some kind of cavern, but the vast space confronting her wasn’t cave-like in the least. The central area was open to the ceiling far above them, but the long sides of the rectangular area consisted of two levels of what would have been storefronts eventually, but now were merely bare bones steel and concrete. They appeared to be occupied by people using them as living space. The entire place was lit with same glowing tubes of different thicknesses, lining the walls in bright stripes and curves. Along the far wall, huge sections of lightweight biopolycrete drainage pipe were stacked five high in a near pyramid, reminiscent of a chunk of honeycomb Bryn had once eaten as a child. Cinder blocks were laid on the ground to prevent the lowest pipes from rolling away and the entire structure crashing down.

  “Trippy, huh?” Dillo said, waving a hand to indi
cate the lighting. “Our resident bioengineers designed it. It’s a complicated system, but basically the light comes from special bioluminescent bacteria that feed on human waste. Not only does it eliminate the need for a sewer, it produces methane as a byproduct, which we then use as a heat and cooking source.”

  “It’s...amazing. Why haven’t I heard of this place?” Bryn asked.

  Dillo shrugged. “You’re not a Mad Eye...yet.”

  Bryn looked at Jason. In the green glow, his face took on an almost evil cast. She wondered, not for the first time, what he’d gotten her into.

  In case Dillo noticed the distrustful look she’d given Jason, she tossed out, “It smells like coffee.”

  “Well, I doubt you’ll find a decent cup anywhere down here,” he said with a chuckle. “The smell comes from the discarded coffee grounds we use to grow the mushrooms. Just as an FYI, don’t attempt to eat any of them, okay?”

  They began walking across the main square, where there were other sources of light besides the bioluminescence. One of the lower level store areas was lit from within with what looked like plain halogen office lights. Another had dozens of camping lanterns hanging from wire strung between the support columns.

  “We get some electricity down here from solar fabric,” Dillo said. “You may have noticed it up top.”

  Xenos were everywhere. To Bryn, the atmosphere felt more like a carnival than anything. Like the Warehouse, there were people hawking goods - mostly food, it seemed, but over by one storefront, a woman guarded a rack of clothes, and over by another, a man had laid out garage-sale-type items on the ground. A shirtless man in the center of the square with a crowd of people around him suddenly spewed fire from his mouth in a bright yellow stream. The crowd applauded and encouraged him to do it again. That was when she noticed the children. Unlike the Warehouse, which was largely populated with homeless adults, this place had more of a commune feel to it, with what looked like whole families ensconced within its glowing walls.

  They passed a group of four armed men sitting on the cement lip of a circular structure that looked like it was meant to be the pool part of a fountain. The men were playing dice until one of them caught sight of Dillo and said something. Each man straightened up and stood at attention. Dillo made a ‘come here’ gesture to one of them, a bald man who reminded Bryn of a Neanderthal with his wide nose and heavy brow.

  The man started to sputter excuses, but Dillo cut him off. “Save it, Junk. There’s some boxes out by the holly trees. Go get a dolly and bring them to the queen.”

  The man named Junk nodded and trotted off.

  Dillo continued on, leading them in the direction of the stacked, beehive-like drainage pipe sections. People seemed to be giving the pipes a wide berth; the area in front of them was deserted. When they were about ten yards away, she saw that all of the pipes were sealed off except the centermost one, and it had heavy black curtains covering the entrance.

  Without warning, an old woman with long white braids came from behind them and placed herself in Bryn’s path. Her wrinkled face creased in a toothless grin, and with slurred, barely discernible words, she said, “Oh, my Dog, it is you!”

  Jason grabbed Bryn’s arm and tried to steer her past, but the old woman persisted, grasping her other arm with gnarled fingers and declaring loudly, “Look! Esmie knew! It’s the Bryn! The girl-girl with the XBestia head!”

  “Leave off, ya crazy old hag!” someone yelled.

  Bryn looked for the source and spotted a man who could only have come from inside the center pipe. He had very light hair, so light it must have been white-blond under the sun, and wore a leather jacket that hung to his hips. He stood there with his legs spread in an aggressive stance, and the rifle in his hands only emphasized that aggression. As soon as the old woman saw him, she let out a squawk of alarm, released Bryn’s arm as if it burned her, and scuttled away.

  The ambient green lighting made it difficult to make out specific colors, but Bryn thought the blond man’s jacket was red. Whatever color it was, the cut was similar to the jacket worn by the dead man in the silo. Were they both part of some paramilitary group within the Mad Eye gang? She met Jason’s gaze and understood the warning there. He kept hold of her arm, but instead of offering support, she sensed he was staking a claim over her. She had no argument with that.

  The blond man just stood there with his head cocked to one side, watching them. Dillo didn’t move forward or try to go around; he seemed to be waiting for something. After a minute or so of silence, a hand appeared at the opening of the black curtain shielding the interior of the center pipe. The curtain was swept aside and a tall woman stepped out. She was dressed all in dark leather that hugged her slim body, and much of her height came from the stiletto-heeled boots that rose up and flared past her knees. Her hair, like the man’s, was blindingly blond, but much longer than his, sweeping down to a point that brushed her lower back.

  With a slow, regal stride, she came closer. Bryn was considered tall, so the few times she’d had occasion to wear heels, she’d kept them low. Even so, she’d never gotten the hang of them. This woman had walking in high heels down pat. Her ensemble, and the confident, sinuous way she moved, told Bryn she was in the presence of the ‘queen’ Dillo had mentioned earlier. Bryn wasn’t sure what it was, but something about the woman told her maybe Dillo had left off the ‘drag’ part.

  Again, the green lighting made exact color identification impossible, but Bryn noticed the woman’s right eye was different from the left. Not only did the iris seem to have a reddish tint, but the pupil had that strange reflective quality she’d seen in old flash photographs. She’d heard it termed ‘red eye.’

  “How is it, Dragila,” the woman said, “that you were arrested this morning, but are now a free man?”

  It was patently obvious that the woman’s naturally low voice was deliberately pitched higher to sound female. Her accent gave her country of origin away: India.

  “Technically,” Jason replied, “I’m a wanted man.”

  “Yes, well, that’s beside the point. Oh, wait, you weren’t talking about me, were you?”

  Jason laughed in his throat. “If I ever swing ‘round to your way of doing things, you’ll be the first to know, Maddy.”

  Bryn kept her chin down and her face blank, but had a hard time not reacting to tough-guy Jason flirting with a transgender woman. He hadn’t struck her as a particularly tolerant man, but this insight gave him a boost up in her estimation.

  Maddy’s glossy lips formed a quick, affectionate moue in Jason’s direction, but she turned her attention to Bryn.

  “Well, well, well. If it isn’t little Miss Bryn Vega, in the flesh.”

  It seemed as if everyone was waiting for Bryn to respond, so she said, “Hey.”

  Maddy turned to the blond man and laughed. “‘Hey’, she says! How quaint.”

  Her merriment disappeared as swiftly as it had arisen. She laced her fingers together in front of her abdomen and addressed Jason, tone tinged with disappointment. “Why did you bring her here?”

  Bryn saw Jason’s eyes flicker to the blond man, who’d moved to stand at Maddy’s shoulder. The bright hair wasn’t the only thing Maddy and her henchman had in common. Although her face was heavily made up and her boots gave her a height advantage, Bryn recognized a distinct resemblance between the two. They were clearly related, and in this light at least, could be mistaken for twins.

  “She helped me escape,” Jason said. “I owe her.”

  Bryn wished that Jason had used the time during the drive down to brief her on whatever cover story he’d come up with - unless it hadn’t occurred to him to make one up and he was winging it now. All the Mad Eyes had to do was ask them separately what happened and they were done for.

  Maddy regarded Bryn for a long moment. “She doesn’t look like she’s capable of properly tying her shoes, much less helping you escape, but if you say she’s trustworthy...”

  Her strange eyes shifted ba
ck to Jason. “One bunk or two?”

  Bryn was glad the lighting hid her blush as Jason said shortly, “One.”

  Maddy lifted her chin. “I see. Well, color me jealous.”

  She spun gracefully on her heel and with a flourishing wave of her hand, indicated they should follow.

  Chapter Fifteen

  Scott had just started his motorcycle when he felt his holophone vibrate. He took it out of his pocket, looked at the display and sent the call to his helmet. A holo of Shasta appeared to float in front of his visor.

  Her head went back and she looked irritated. On her end, his image would be a night-shot close up of his face. “You’re not driving, are you Agent Harding?”

  “No, ma’am. I just met with Padme.”

  “How’d you manage that?”

  He told her how he’d lured Padme out.

  “Anything to report?”

  “She doesn’t know where Bryn is. She was a bundle of nerves. She did say something odd, though.” He relayed her comments about the typhoid and Scott not being aware of any demands Fournier had made.

  “Interesting.” Shasta’s brow creased as she considered his words, then her face cleared and she said crisply, “We’ll talk about it later. Unger got us access to the silo. I’m sending the coordinates. Meet me there.”

  “Got it.”

  He called up the map and sent it to the upper right quadrant of his visor. A female voice began gently giving him directions. The silo safe house wasn’t close to his current location, but he thought he had enough electrigas to get there and back.

  He felt an overpowering sense of urgency, but was forced to drive more cautiously on the treacherous roadways than he wanted. All the way there, he ran and reran the facts through his mind, always coming to the same frustrating conclusion: Bryn was missing, but Padme had no knowledge of it.

  There were seven vehicles on site, including Shasta’s shiny green BMW. Scott parked his motorcycle next to the CSI van. The side door to the van was wide open and a high-res holo camera was just sitting on the nearest seat. Scott looked around, realized he wasn’t being observed and picked up the camera. Quickly, he scrolled through dozens of evidence holos until he got to the shots of the bodies. One had been shot in the head, recently, as far as he could tell, but it was the other body he focused on.