They Promised Me the Gun Wasn't Loaded

by James Alan Gardner

  I get the job done. By the time I’m ready to go, Ninja Jane is peering through the hole in the caboose.

  I yell, “I’ve got the bazooka!” I don’t know if Jane can hear me over the pandemonium outside: pistol shots, the howl of the wind, and the myriad sound effects of Spark powers. (Crash! Whoosh! Sizzle!) But Jane should be able to read my lips. That’s a necessary skill for anyone who regularly takes part in super fights.

  Jane slithers through the hole and lifts a corner of Stretchkin enough to see the gun. Jane stares a moment, then nods. Holds a finger in a wait gesture. She slides to the hole in the wall and looks out, scanning with slow deliberation to check in every direction. When she’s satisfied that the coast is clear, she gestures for me to follow, then dives out the hole.

  I’m right behind her, hugging the girl and the gun. Their combined weight is something like 175 pounds. I may be as strong as that weightlifter named Boris, but this isn’t a featherlight load. It’s also bulky and awkward, despite my packing skilz. So maneuvering through the hole takes time—like getting a heavy sofa through a doorway. Before I get all the way outside, I’m already under attack.

  * * *

  IT’S THE OLD CHINESE guy, the bleached dude who could fly but had no other obvious powers. He swoops past the caboose as I’m halfway out the hole. Immediately, my clothes try to kill me.

  It’s so damned simple. Everything I’m wearing just shrinks. It feels like when the doctor puts a blood-pressure cuff on your arm: pump-pump, and your blood stops circulating. My shirt squeezes my arms, and my tights squeeze my legs. I can’t bend my elbows or knees. My hat clamps my skull, and my mask pinches my face as if it’s trying to drag the flesh off my cheekbones.

  And the codpiece … fuck! I knew that bulge was bad news. Like a weaponized thong. I ought to have my feet up in stirrups.

  Everything squashes tighter. Normal cloth would rip to tatters, but my outfit is bulletproof. It ain’t gonna shred anytime soon.

  I’m just lucky for that V down the front. My clothes don’t encircle my throat, so there’s no way to crush my windpipe. Even so, I can feel the shirt collar moving—as if it’s reaching for a better grip. If it finds one, it’ll squeeze off my carotid artery and cut the blood supply to my brain.

  Shit! My shoes are contracting! The bones of my feet grind against each other. It hurts like fuck. Strangling my arms and legs may partly immobilize me, but at least there’s a layer of muscle to absorb the compression. No big muscles in my feet—just a hell of a lot of nerves. They squeal like pigs as my bones and tendons and ligaments crunch together.

  I’m still stuck half in, half out of the caboose as Clothes Crusher flies by again. My clothes ratchet in another notch. Fuck, that hurts! Especially my feet. It’s like they’re caught in conveyor-belt gears. I can’t move at all now. But none of the clothing rips. The damned things have suddenly acquired super-durability.

  Ninja Jane flies close to me. She jerks her thumb hard toward the sky, with a get-going gesture.

  “I can’t,” I try to shout back. My lungs and diaphragm are so squished, I don’t have air for yelling. But my mouth still moves, even if my voice is just a wheeze. “Old bleached dude is giving me a lethal wedgie.”

  I’m an idiot. Instead of making a joke, I should have just said, “Stomp that bastard!” Luckily, Jane has smarts in her black-hooded head. Whether or not she understands me precisely, she’s caught the gist. She rockets toward Mr. Clothes Control with both of her daggers drawn.

  Thank baby Jesus, the guy can’t squeeze two victims at once. I feel the exact moment when he switches his attention from me to Jane. My clothes go slack; they feel like they’re going to slough off like fig leaves, but it’s only the sense of contrast. My outfit reverts to ordinary cloth, merely hanging instead of constricting.

  Now Jane is the one under attack—I can see it. Her ninja pajamas go taut around her, like the clingiest of spandex. But I doubt her costume is spandex or any other common fabric. Jane’s pajamas are likely bulletproof Cape Tech wonders like mine.

  All the stronger to strangle you with, my dear. Her hood grips her skull like a vice … and unlike me, her costume completely surrounds her throat. It’s close to garroting her.

  My turn to move. I should probably go after Clothes Control Dude, but then he’d throttle me again. I don’t want that to happen; my feet are in agony, even if they’re no longer being crushed. They’re like two bags of bone chips swimming in blood. I won’t be able to walk till I regenerate. And if that’s not bad enough, the only obvious way to stop Mr. Dressup is to gut him with my swords.

  Nuh-uh. Sherwood Forest has only one medi-tank, and it’s reserved for my poor Stretchkin. I hug the girl to my chest and fly toward Ninja Jane.

  * * *

  JANE FLIES UPWARD ON the trajectory she was traveling when her clothes started shrinking. It occurs to me that our jet packs are controlled by our skullcaps. Can clothes-crushing affect a cap made of metal? Or has the cap simply been squeezed too hard by Jane’s ninja hood and is no longer working? One way or another, Jane doesn’t seem able to change course. Otherwise, she’d be trying to ram Clothes Dude in the kidneys.

  I rev my jets to catch up with her. When I get close enough, I match her velocity. She might be screaming, but I can’t tell for sure. Her ninja mask covers her mouth with a strap of unbreakable fabric.

  I can fix that.

  With one arm holding the Stretchkin-bazooka bundle, I draw a sword with my other hand. Hack, hack at one of Jane’s sleeves. A lesser sword wielder might have trouble slicing the cloth without cutting Jane, especially since the fabric clings so tightly to her skin. But hey, I’m the best, blah blah blah.

  It’s like that moment when you break the package of Poppin’ Fresh dough: Jane’s arm flesh bulges out of the gash. Then the tensions in the cloth go past critical and the whole sleeve rips itself to pieces. Before it’s finished unraveling, I split the other sleeve, too, releasing both of Jane’s arms.

  She’s not out of the woods yet. Jane’s still being strangled, and cocky though I am about precision cuts, I’m reluctant to take a swing at the cloth on Jane’s throat.

  But I don’t have to. Jane still has her daggers and now she can move her arms freely. Lightning fast, she makes a scalpel-like incision down the clothes garroting her neck. She makes another cut down the length of her hood, from the top of her head to her jaw. The cloth snaps like an elastic band and splits down the middle, revealing the true face of Ninja Jane.

  It’s Marian.

  A thinner version, like the “after” weight-loss picture on one of those magazines that haunt grocery checkouts. Jane’s a good 150 pounds lighter than Marian. Still she has the same freckled cheeks and the same ill-chosen haircut as the original.

  Quelle surprise. But I’d never seen them together, had I? And if the explosive death of Byte Bitch turned Vernon into Robin, why couldn’t it do the same to Marian?

  Multiple forms and personalities. Different identities. Except that I’d guess Marian has more control over the switch than Vernon does. Marian can become Ninja Jane when she wants to, not just when she’s knocked out. As Marian, she’s a Mad Genius; as Jane, she’s just plain mad.

  Jane clearly realizes I’ve figured out the truth. She gives me a furious glare, but doesn’t have time to do more in the midst of a battle. Instead, she gestures angrily, pointing up to the open sky: Get the bazooka out of here!

  Without waiting to see if I obey, Jane goes back to slashing her clothes. Their squeezing must hurt like hell. I know from experience.

  Within seconds, Jane is naked, wearing nothing except the skullcap controlling the jet pack. She rolls in the air and zooms off toward Clothes Crusher Dude. He has no way to hurt her now … and as soon as Jane catches up with him, he won’t bother anybody again.

  I turn away quickly. Some things, I don’t want to see.

  * * *

  I FLY UP AND away from the train. After several seconds, I remember to signal that I�
�ve got the gun. As soon as that thought crosses my mind, a flare erupts from my jet pack, whistling like a banshee. It goes off like a multipack firework, spilling red and green bursts into popping cascades. At the very end, there’s an earsplitting bang, all the louder because it’s only a stone’s throw away from me.

  Note to self: next time, keep your distance until the flare finishes doing its thing.

  But one nice part about being deafened is the quiet that follows immediately. My eardrums bleed and my inner ears hurt, but I’ll heal.

  In the meantime, I’m several thousand scenic feet above the countryside. The air is frigid, but I don’t feel cold. After all the exertion of combat, I’m as warm as if I’ve just finished a five-kilometer run.

  The fight is over. Far below, the outlaws battle their way to freedom. Anyone in trouble will get rescued. Scores will be settled, and Robin will showboat to get it out of his system. He’ll smile at the people in the passenger cars and blow kisses to any woman who smiles back.

  I’m not part of the fun. I’m all alone with the bazooka and a girl I’ve probably killed. A teenage kid I whipped through a wall, just to see if something was behind it.

  Why did I do that? I have a perfect eidetic memory, but I still don’t know what I was thinking.

  16

  Epigenetic Inhibition *

  THE OTHERS EVENTUALLY JOIN me. Robin slaps me jovially on the back and delivers a lengthy speech. I can’t hear him over the wind. I could read his lips if I wanted, but I don’t.

  Marian-slash-Jane hovers nearby without speaking. She’s borrowed a cape from another outlaw; it’s a swath of coppery silk, which she’s wrapped around herself like a bath towel. It covers her from breasts to thighs, but doesn’t hide the blood spatter speckling her shoulders and face.

  Clothes Control Dude was bleached. His blood wasn’t.

  I wonder about the mental conjunction between Marian and Jane. Is it the same as between Vernon and Robin? Vernon knows everything Robin does, even if Vernon doesn’t experience it directly. Does Marian know what Jane gets up to? And how does Marian feel about that?

  Then again, how sure am I that Marian and Jane are mentally different? The whole “Jane never speaks” routine could just be an act, a trick to make Jane seem more spooky. Marian and Jane could be no more different than “me as Jools” and “me as Ninety-Nine.” Or “me as Willow Scarlet.”

  As I ponder the question, Jane flies up to me. She points at Stretchkin, whom I still cradle in my arms. Jane shakes her head violently, then jerks her thumb to indicate, Get rid of her.

  I say, “I want to put her in the medi-tank.”

  Jane shakes her head again and jerks her thumb.

  I look around at the other outlaws. They’re widely dispersed across the sky, but none of them looks seriously injured. A few gashes, some burns, and Sinquisitor seems to have broken his arm, but nothing immediately life-threatening. I tell Jane, “No one else needs the tank. This girl does.”

  Jane glares at me furiously. Then she grabs the cape she’s wearing and loosens the knot that holds it around her. Jane’s body balloons, muscles being replaced by fat as she adds on 150 pounds.

  The cape can’t go all the way around her anymore. She does her best to hold it in place, at least to cover her front … but it’s a losing battle. She scowls in exasperation, then rolls her eyes and gives up. She turns to me and says, “There’s nothing my medi-tank can do for that girl. Just leave her.”

  No doubt she’s speaking in Marian’s soft nursery-school voice. I can’t hear it over the wind and the sound of our jet packs. But I can read her lips.

  “The girl might not be dead,” I say. “After the mess in the Transylvania Club, you thought I was dead. But the tank saved me.”

  “You weren’t bleached,” Marian says. “The tank can’t do anything about bleaching.”

  “But it might still heal her physically.”

  Marian says, “Think, Jools. This girl is a Darkling mind-slave. It’s magic. Cape Tech can’t fix magic. So if the medi-tank heals her body, what’s the point? The moment the girl leaves the tank, she’ll attack us. We’ll have to bash her unconscious again. Keep her locked up forever. Sooner or later, she’s bound to escape—Sparks always do. Then she’ll rat us out to her masters, and the next thing we know, Sherwood Forest is under full-scale attack from Darklings thrilled that they’ve finally found us. Even if we drive them off, our secret base won’t be secret anymore. We’ll be attacked over and over until Sherwood is blasted to pieces.”

  I start to object, but Marian continues. “The Darklings might find us, even if we keep the girl completely under wraps. I’ll lay you odds that the bleaching process creates a permanent magical link to her—similar to a vampire’s blood bond. If we take her back to Sherwood, the Darklings may be able to use her as a sorcerous homing beacon.”

  I want to argue but can’t. Enchantments do have a habit of establishing sympathetic connections. Bleaching likely produces a magical Find My Phone app.

  “Leave her,” Marian says. “She’s as good as dead anyway. We’re doing her a favor.”

  I don’t respond. I simply do nothing as Marian gestures to Mistah Kurtz. She must be saying something to him using her comm implant, because the big hulking dude flies over to us.

  Kurtz grabs the girl and bazooka out of my hands. He pulls little Stretchkin off the gun and tosses the girl aside.

  Stretchkin falls like a sheet in the wind, carried away on the breeze. She’ll flutter for miles before she reaches the ground. Maybe she’ll get caught in the branches of a tree and hang there for who knows how long, gradually turning into unidentified tatters.

  A street kid whom nobody cared about.

  My eyes are so full of tears, I don’t notice when Lightning the Wonder Horse takes me back to Sherwood.

  * * *

  THE OTHERS ARE BOISTEROUS. I’m not.

  I got their fucking gun for them. I only had to kill a kid to do it.

  I don’t even care about the gun. I want to go home.

  And I want my memory erased … if there really is such a machine. At this point, it wouldn’t surprise me if Marian’s memory wipe is actually performed with Ninja Jane’s daggers and a cremation furnace.

  But that’s my anger talking. Marian, Robin, and the rest aren’t utter monsters. They aren’t even villains. They’re adrenaline junkies.

  Takes one to know one.

  They’re all in the mead hall now, getting rip-roaring drunk. Me, I still can’t stand the thought of alcohol. And unlike before, I’m happy that I don’t want a drink.

  So there, I’ve discovered the cure for alcoholism. All you have to do is murder someone. Then you absolutely don’t feel like carousing.

  It’s no challenge to slip away from the celebration. Robin tries to paw me up a little, but I slap his hands and he gets the message. I worry that maybe Marian will keep a watchful eye on me, but she’s distracted. She can’t stop looking at Diamond’s bazooka.

  The gun sits proudly on the mead-hall table. Everyone wants to take selfies posing beside it. The outlaws won’t let Marian take it away to her lab, so she tries to examine it right where it is. She gets so caught up trying to figure out how it works, she forgets about me completely.

  I know what you’re going through, sister, I think, as I sneak unnoticed out the door.

  It’s night in Sherwood. Down in Waterloo, it must be late afternoon, but the forest operates on a different schedule. Or maybe there is no schedule. Maybe Robin and/or Marian arbitrarily decide when it should be day or night. Getting drunk goes best with darkness, so they’ve turned off the simulated sun and fired up the mead hall’s hearth. Flames crackle under dark rafters: the perfect party ambience.

  Outside the forest is full of the sound of crickets and nonexistent owls.

  I race through shadow toward the lab. Pockets of mist are forming—likely through artificial means because I can’t think of a natural explanation. Maybe Robin requested a fog-laden a
tmosphere, and Marian made it so.

  What Robin wants, Robin gets.

  I reach the lab and go inside. (No locks on the door—we’re all friends here.) I retrace the route I took with Nana, the one that was supposed to lead me to my comm ring. I go down the ramp to the viewing gallery that looks out over the world … and here, the sun still hangs in the sky, with more than an hour till dusk. The ground is hidden by clouds a long way below us. We float in stratospheric sunlight, disconnected from the world.

  If I find my comm ring, will it even work? We’re twenty-five kilometers above the nearest cell-phone tower. But I have to believe Invie’s rings don’t use the conventional grid. For all I know, they can transmit through all of space and time like the phones on Doctor Who.

  I leave the viewing gallery and go through the door I saw earlier in the day. It leads to a Cape Tech clean room, sealed off and isolated, which explains why it’s so far from the main part of the lab. It’s actually outside the shell of Sherwood Forest, like a barnacle clinging to the ship’s hull. I’ll bet it’s completely detachable. If something goes wrong—if a virus gets spilled or a robot goes berserk—the room can be ejected before the problem spreads. When the jettisoned room has fallen a safe distance from Sherwood, incendiary bombs will likely go off to purge the place clean.

  And this is where Jane put my comm ring? Well, as I thought before, it’s not a bad place to cache treasures. Who would go snooping through a lab full of cholera?

  Unsurprisingly, the door has a lock—you don’t want anyone wandering in by accident. But the lock is controlled by a standard Singatec security pad. It’s a Model 3L as opposed to the 3C I dealt with two nights ago; it locks and unlocks the door, as opposed to just setting off an alarm. But details, shmetails. I take off the faceplate, yank the right wire, and knuckle-punch the chip.

  Hope I didn’t just release a zombie plague or a rogue AI.

  Oh well. Omelets. Eggs. Human civilization. These days, nothing is built to last.