I am too damn old to be waking up in tears because I can’t have a guy in love with me. Why can’t I get my brain wrapped around being grateful to have Djinni as a friend? Crying about being a half cripple, though . . . that was probably reasonable.
If this kept up, she’d have to feed herself through a tube, because she’d either rot out her stomach with coffee, or her stomach would decide it was never going to hold anything solid again.
Just as she was trying to figure out if coffee or green tea or a nicotine lozenge would be the best option to gain herself one more precious nightmare-free hour—
All her magic-senses exploded with overload. Though her Overwatch room was always dark, it flooded with golden light. And she suddenly felt—crushed. Not emotionally crushed, but as if the room had suddenly acquired a second occupant that was much too large for it.
The normally cold Overwatch room also turned warm, and the air filled with the scents of sandalwood, vanilla, and cinnamon.
And all of her arcane senses shrieked Kneel! Bow down in the Presence! as her gut knotted with awe and terror.
She didn’t even bother to look; she knew what this was, she’d encountered it once already, and she followed her instincts. She slipped from her chair to her knees, eyes squeezed shut, head abjectly bowed.
“Oh. Bother,” said the voice in her head and her ears. “I am sorry. It is much easier to get your attention than certain other blockheads.” The Presence and the awe and terror faded, replaced with an aura of kindness and compassion. Cautiously, Vickie raised her head a little, and cracked her eyes open.
It was the Seraphym, all right—the first time Vickie had seen her, except at a distance, since the Invasion. Fire-wings folded neatly, body clothed in flame, hair like a bonfire and eyes like embers, she was not the sort of thing to inspire welcome or pleasure in a pyrophobic.
And yet that all-enveloping blanket of compassion managed to keep Vickie where she was, and not running for the door. She squeaked, cleared her throat, and finally managed to croak, “Wh-what—how can I—h-help you? Eldest?” All the while thinking, Either I have lost my mind completely and I’m hallucinating, or she’s really here, and any second now the last nerve I have left is going to fry, or she’s going to give me some quest or other, or . . .
“You have earned a boon, magician.” Those ember eyes regarded her with sympathy. “And you are at the end of your strength. What is it you need? Ask.”
Oh, she knew this story. It began with “Be careful what you ask for . . .” Every magician knew this story. The greedy and the thoughtless got exactly what they deserved, and she could ask for just about anything, but if it was selfish . . .
Tears of exhaustion trickled down her face. This was a bad, bad time to be given such a decision, because she was sure to make the wrong choice. Words were power . . . words were spells . . . oh, don’t ask for Red to love you, that will only end in tears. And don’t ask for your old self back. Uncle Bela will really come after you and everyone around you then.
Finally . . . “Rest?” she whispered. “Please? If that’s . . . all right? Just a little rest? But not if I’m needed, not—not if someone is going to be in trouble if I’m not available—”
“Enough. Your need is great, and your wish pure.” The Seraphym smiled. “And your understanding is sound. From this moment, you shall sleep peacefully, and rise rested, little magician. No more nightmares. Those dreams of the past that cause you grief, and those of longing, though you may have them, you shall not recall them on waking. You shall have rest. Go.”
She waved an arm and a wing at the door, and Vickie rose and stumbled past her, pausing only with her hand on the doorknob. “If I’m needed—” she said, turning.
But the Seraphym was gone, and it was all she could do to make it to her bed before blessed, empty sleep, sleep flooded with gratitude, claimed her. And she never noticed that, as usual, her hand closed around the fragment of Djinni’s claw she kept under her pillow.
* * *
With Bulwark back, Red had taken a back seat on training the new recruits. Bull had been to limbo and back, and the docs couldn’t find one good medical reason to keep him off active duty, which the huge man had immediately seized upon. The way Red heard it, Bull had snapped off the monitoring tabs they had stuck to his body, climbed into his uniform and simply walked out. Bella had tried to talk him down, of course, scolding him about needing emotional, if not physical, rest. Bull would have none of it, and had simply marched into the barracks, selected a team of new recruits not yet assigned a trainer, and had gone to work.
For some reason, Bull had avoided Red who, with the exception of the occasional recruiting run, had found himself with little to do. He was still working with Victrix, making sure she kept to her training schedule on the parkour course and overseeing her marksmanship on the range. At least Vix was improving, though she still didn’t seem able to acknowledge it . . .
Vix. When had he started calling her Vix? It seemed important for some reason, like it crossed a vague but certain line between colleague and friend. He found he was calling on her more and more these days. She was really the only person there he could call a friend. Most of the people at Echo still avoided him. He was a bit of a jerk, he supposed.
Of those left, well . . .
Scope and Acrobat were still AWOL, and things just got weird around Bella. The Rebel Alliance, or whatever they were calling themselves this week, had kept her pretty busy. Right now the best hope lay with Ramona and Yankee Pride and their administrative coup, or hostile takeover, depending how it went. If it worked, it would be mostly bloodless. Not that anything involving Verdigris was going to be completely bloodless. The man was vicious. Bella had the unenviable task of keeping on top of him, all the while keeping up the appearance that she was a blundering idiot, completely over her head and lost in the details of running Echo Medical. The few times they had run into each other, the awkward pauses were brief as she was rescued by yet another emergency. They seemed to follow her around these days.
She was also spending a lot of time with Bull. Red understood. Bull would be vital to that plan; no one knew and understood strategy, tactics, administration and bureaucracy like he did. He could sure see where Bull would be more useful to Bella and Pride than he was. Bull had been skating his way around petty bureaucrats to keep doing things his own way for . . . probably as long as he’d been in the military, much less Echo. There were other reasons, of course. When he had tagged a ride with the Seraphym, Red had become privy to a lot of things he probably shouldn’t have been, including how Bull and Bella privately felt about each other.
He came to the sudden realization that he was feeling sorry for himself. They worked, anyone could see it. Still, that could have been him—and if they weren’t facing the meltdown of the universe, by god, it would have been him.
Face the truth, you’re holding a one-man pity party. You need to get your mind off the girl, and him, and keep your mind on—
Red gave a shrill yelp as he missed his footing and tumbled off the high beam. His arms flailed as he tried to get a hold of something, anything, to keep him from plummeting down from the highest point of the parkour course. He missed a handhold by mere inches, and let his body go limp as he rolled and bumped his way down the steep slope, shouting curses, to land in a heap on the dirt.
I just fell, and of course there’s no way no one saw me do that . . .
“Nice dismount,” Bull said. The big man was leaning up against a wall, where he would have been just out of Djinni’s line of sight, his arms crossed over his chest. “I particularly enjoyed the alliterative f-bombs.”
“Well, you know me,” Red groaned as he forced himself to a sitting position. “Tell you what, next time I’ll do my rendition of ‘The Aristocrats’ on the way down.”
Bull strolled over and helped Red to his feet.
“Thanks,” Red said.
“Need a word,” Bull replied. frowning slightly. “I know you’
ve been taking over the training of the new recruits while I was . . . gone. But I’m certified as back, and I’ll handle it from now on.”
“Well, duh. If you haven’t noticed, I haven’t lifted a finger with the recruits since you got back. And I’ve been busy . . .” Red hesitated.
“Falling off obstacle courses?” Bulwark suggested.
No, Red thought. Avoiding you and Bella.
Bull shook his head. “I was talking about our Miss Victrix. She wired me up yesterday, which allowed me to get a good look at her. She looks like hell. You’re pushing her too hard, she’s going to break, and she’s the one component we can’t do without.”
Red clenched his jaw. What, was she whining now? “She hasn’t complained to me. What’s her beef? If she has one, she should be talking to me.”
“She didn’t say anything, but she looks like she hasn’t slept in a week.” Bulwark frowned. “And I looked over the schedule. Two-hour runs on the course, twice a day, and an hour on the range?”
“She’s the one that wanted the second parkour session!” Red objected. “Dammit, Bull, don’t put it on me that the woman drives herself harder than I could!” Vix had turned into a self-motivated machine. Red might have even admitted he was proud of her. True, she did look like hell lately, but he didn’t think it had anything to do with the training sessions. In fact, he got the feeling the sessions gave her relief from—something.
“As a trainer, you should know her limits better than she does.”
Now he was just being difficult. Bull didn’t reveal much, he never did, but time spent with the man in missions and on the training field had taught Red a few of Bulwark’s tells. He was never unreasonable, nor did his voice get any louder than it needed to, unless he was bothered about something. This was quite the opposite. Bull was too quiet, too controlled, and it screamed overcompensation. Red considered Bull’s posture, the exaggerated stiffness in his stance, the careful, even tones of his voice. He was trying too hard. He cared about Vix, sure, they all did, but this was more than that. It was as if a new tension had risen between them . . .
Bella.
She must have told him, about their kiss, about those few shared moments when something seemed to click between them. Red could read it in the way Bull was not threatening him in his usual passive aggressive way, was not issuing commands, was not being his general, overbearing self. Instead, he was picking a fight in a very un-Bull-like way. He was telling Red straight out, that he was unfit to do his job. Red didn’t bother with the jests, or with any innuendo. If the Jarhead wanted to have it out, that was fine. Red had some pent-up anger over the whole mess to vent out too.
Red made a dismissive gesture. “Fine. You tell her. You’re the team lead. It’s not my fault you pick women that are more mule-stubborn than you are. And don’t be surprised if she tells you to go to hell.”
Red hesitated again, confused. Amethist, Bella . . . and now Vix. Bull didn’t see it, but suddenly, Red did. Three women, and Red could’ve made that statement about any of them. Three women, far more alike than he had realized until this moment. All three of them could be worse than a hog on ice when they got the bit stuck in their teeth—to truly mix metaphors. Red had lost two of them to Bull, and now the big man was out to take his friend as well? To hell with that. He might think of himself—maybe subconsciously—as the head stallion of the herd, but there was no way Red was going to play omega dog to his alpha. Hell. More scrambled metaphors.
“I’ll tell her,” Bull promised. “And given your history with her, I think you would agree she may be better off with my support rather than your abuse.”
Now Red was starting to fume. “My history . . . about which, you know absolutely nothing. You were playing stand-in for a store mannequin while I was working with her. Did you even bother to ask someone about that? I’ve been the one that’s been her main support while you’ve been gone. I’ve been the go-to guy, not you.”
“Yes, while I’ve been gone. And now I’m back.”
“How about if you act like it and get yourself properly briefed first, then.” Red seethed. “Actually find out what’s going on instead of assuming you know what’s best for the girl. If I know her, she just might give you a slap upside the head for that kind of attitude.” Was Vix listening in on this? He couldn’t imagine her not giving both of them a piece of her mind if she had been. She never held back when she was the disembodied voice, yet there was nothing but dead air on his earpiece, and Red had to admit he was a bit relieved. The last thing he wanted right now was someone to hold him back, not when he was enjoying some much needed release.
“Unlike you, Djinni, I do not take pleasure from being beaten up by women,” Bulwark said, with just the faintest twitch of his lip. “But I think you overestimate her anger. She has never been anything less than cordial to me. Perhaps she values the respect I have for her, or perhaps she has none for you.”
“Oh, that’s your take on it, Miss Cleo? I dunno, Bull, seems to me your powers of observation have taken a hit of late. Maybe you aren’t as good at figuring people out as you think you are. I mean, you really missed all the signals with Harmony, didn’t you?” Red applied another turn of the knife. “Didn’t see what was behind the big lovelorn eyes, did you? Or maybe you just didn’t want to?”
Bull didn’t answer; his lip twitched some more. That was a warning sign, but the Djinni was relentless. “Or maybe you just didn’t notice, you were distracted, while you were giving it to her . . .”
Red saw it coming, but even then he could hardly believe it. Bull reared back, his lips beginning to curl over clenched teeth, and drove a heavy fist up into Red’s exposed jaw. It was a spectacular hit, and Red flew up and backwards, knocked skyward as Bull’s kinetic shield flared to life with the blow.
I’m falling again, Red thought. Twice in one day. Of course, this time I’m falling up . . .
He spun around and caught himself on an exposed girder, twenty feet above the ground. He hung there for a moment, then looked down to see Bulwark standing below him, his hands clenched, his shield pulsating in fury.
“Foreplay, I love it . . .” Despite his aching jaw, Red reveled in his soiled triumph.
Bulwark stared up at him, face going flush—then abruptly turned on his heel and stalked off.
Red hoisted himself up on his perch, and watched Bull walk away. He had to admit, he felt better now. That punch was a long time coming, he knew, just as he knew that Bull was feeling anything but good about himself. Still, there was nothing like a solid strike to the head to get a little perspective, and through the regret and sadness of this whole fiasco, Red was experiencing one of those moments of absolute clarity.
“God, I really am a jerk,” he said.
* * *
Pike ran up the slope towards the parkour course, excited to finally have a reason to talk to the Djinni. Ever since his rescue he’d secretly hoped to be assigned to Red Djinni and his team of trainees, but for some reason the Djinni had stopped his training exercises abruptly, except for his daily sessions with that Victrix woman. Pike couldn’t say he liked her very much. He still remembered the way she had dropped him into a sewer. There was something in the way she had done it, something that he took for disdain. He would remember it. He had a way of holding grudges.
He stopped a moment to adjust the Echo trainee suit they had given him. It didn’t fit right, being a bit too snug across the chest and shoulders and far too loose in the undercarriage. He wondered about its previous owner and what sort of out-of-shape loser it had to have been to stretch it out in such odd dimensions. He could have fixed it, he supposed, and willed his body to fill it out in the right places, but the thought disgusted him. Things would change, soon enough. And if they didn’t, he would adapt. He was very adaptable, and he had a way of being patient when the need arose. The universe would provide, after all. It always did.
As he crested the hill, he came to a stop and smiled. Good. He didn’t have to search for the
Djinni, or run him down on the course. His quarry seemed to be taking a breather, resting on an exposed girder just a few levels up. He waved up at him, but the Djinni didn’t seem to notice. He was, in fact, slumped over with his head bowed. He looked troubled. How curious.
“Mister Djinni, sir?” Pike called up.
Red’s head snapped up at this unwelcome intruder.
“Do me a favor, kid. Don’t ever call me that again.”
Pike hunched a little. “I’m sorry, what should I call you then?”
The Djinni shook his head. “Red. Just call me Red. And you’re . . . ?”
“Pike. You saved me from Blacksnake, remember?” Of course he would remember. The event, if not the person he had saved.
The Djinni peered down at him. “Pike. Yeah, sure. What can I do for you, Pike?”
“I’ve got something for you, Red.” Pike grinned. That felt good, to be on a first name basis with this man. It felt like an accomplishment, a milestone. “Uh . . . think you might want to come down from up there?”
“Not especially,” Red answered. He leaned back, stretched, and settled down on the beam in a lazy sprawl. “Tell you what, Pike. If you’re able to get your ass up here, I’m all yours.”
Pike glanced from the Djinni, to the girder, to the chaotic skeleton of metal bars and jagged concrete that made up this leg of the course, and nodded. He took a running start at a sharp incline and used his momentum to power a backflip away from the stone base, towards a small handhold at the foot of a rusty ladder. He swung there for a moment, his feet dangling a good eight feet off the ground, when he hefted his legs up and locked them in place through the rungs of the ladder. He righted himself, climbed a bit, and with a short leap he landed next to Red in a crouch.
“Well, that backfired,” the Djinni muttered. “All right, kid. Not bad. Now what’s so important you had to run all the way from HQ to give it to me?”
Pike shrugged. “Not important, really. They haven’t placed me with a trainer yet, so for now they’ve mostly got me running packages across campus.”
Revolution: Book Three of the Secret World Chronicle Page 25