The awareness of pain returns hand in hand with consciousness. Everything hurts, each individual discomfort vying to make itself felt. Her sense of smell returns shortly after and Anderson is quite sure that oblivion is the superior alternative to this particular state of being. She gags on the bilious smell of vomit, urine and other vile substances congealing together, fighting her heaving guts to submission. There's a squelch, a rustle of garbage and something tugs on her boot. She kicks out instinctively, unable to repress a hiss as red hot agony lances from her ankle straight into her brain. The shock pops her gummy eyes open, bringing her face to face with the biggest rat she's ever seen in her life. Shrewd black eyes glitter with an uncomfortable sort of intelligence behind incisors longer than her fingers. Being a rat's no defense against the radiation, she supposes, and if high levels of theta and gamma exposure can twist her brain into that of a psychic, why not alter the intelligence of a rat? With agonizing caution, she stretches for her Lawgiver, brushes her fingers against the empty holster and continues reaching south, straining her neck to hold the stare. Her fingers brush against the ridged grip of her boot knife and she sighs with relief. She frees the blade from its sheathe with a twitch, handle warm and reassuring in only the way that fifteen of inches of steel can be. Her sides protest as she sits up by inches, keeping the fifteen inch blade between her vitals and the animal. It won't be fun to fight a rat the size of a herd-dog with a knife, but it'll be a lot easier than trying to accomplish the same thing barehanded.
The rat breaks eye contact to study the new variable. Whatever conclusions it draws appear to be unfavorable, for it wiggles its scarred pink nose twice, shakes the boot vigorously, and then drops the offending limb. With its nose high in the air, it trots off disdainfully and disappears around a corner, long pink tail dragging out of sight. Anderson waits until she's certain it is gone before resting the knife across her lap and breathing deeply. She gives herself a fierce mental shake, focusing on controlling her hammering heart. She still has to deal with her current array of problems, and can't get hung up over all the potential problems a 90 pound rat would have entailed.
Awake and not facing any immediate danger, Anderson takes her time surveying the current environment. She sits just a few feet inside the mouth of an alley, uncomfortably close to the gutter that serves as an all-purpose waste dump. The heel of her boot dips into the cesspit and she scoots away on her elbows as the pile of garbage shifts ominously under her. A slightly more acceptable distance from the revolting gutter, she stretches out with her abilities, feeling for other minds. She can barely feel the shape of another person's half consciousness deep in the shadows of her current resting place, any semblance of thought or awareness long lost in an ugly chemical oblivion. Stretching out, past the constructed barriers of concrete and plaster, she finds constellations of minds, painted in the same patterns of fear and impatience or hazy with drugs and sleep. Almost fifty meters away, out of sight but not beyond her notice begins the sea of minds, blurring together in a soup of rage, anguish and mindless panic. It extends beyond the edges of her awareness, an endless wash of madness trembling with energy. If there are other Judges in range, for it's impossible that they would have retreated from their posts on the Barricade, they are lost to her too. The wind shifts, carrying the stinging smog to her eyes. She knuckles a few cleansing tears away with her good hand, studying the dark residue which had sealed her eyes while she lay passed out in the gutter. Not your best moment there, kid. Craning her neck she can make out the hazy orange glow of fire shifting around the buildings across the street. The rain from a few hours ago suddenly seems like an incredible blessing; a real firestorm would have difficulty spreading with all the garbage soaked through.
She's safe enough for now, but it would be stupid to linger. Anderson turns next to inventory the remains of her kit. Her weapon is gone, and she feels its loss acutely. It's a part of her, or is supposed to be, and is the third one she's been issued in her first year of service. That might be a new record, she chuckles bitterly to herself. That was definitely not the sort of notoriety she had been aiming for. Wishing won't bring it back, though, and with a bit of one handed fumbling she tugs the knife sheath out of the lining in her boot, secures the lethally sharp blade and wedges it under her protective vest. In her current state of reliance she wants everything close at hand. Not that there is much else available at her disposal, she finds. Her glove comm is crushed as thoroughly as her phalanges, her helmet is gone and with it all her access to the vast stores of data maintained by the Justice Department. The maps in particular, will be missed. At least her utility belts has survived the fall, more or less. The web of riot grenades is empty, either lost during the forgotten walk to her current location or stolen while she slept, though she managed to maintain her full complement of ammo. For all the good it will do without a 'Giver to shoot it out of. There's no reason to keep it, the custom bullets engineered to be useless in an antique firearm, but it seems heretical to get rid of the useless weight. The med-kit is not useless, even half crushed from her fall. Reaching across her body to fumble the catch, sticky with blood, open and reveal the contents inside takes a painful awkward eternity. To her absolute disgust the small doses of anesthetic have cracked, covering the soft tubes of disinfectant and staple gun in a clear film.
Well, she has a knife, half a medical kid, six magazines of assorted LawGiver ammunition, non-standard flashlight, her armor, and a stolen cloak to cover it all. In ordinary circumstances it would be more than enough for any trouble she might get into on her way back. But these are definitely not ordinary circumstances and she hasn't even examined herself yet.
Start with the skull: painful, bruised certainly but hopefully not cracked; a cut above her left eyebrow the most likely source of the blood around her eyes, along with other minor facial abrasions. Gently she rolls her head from side to side and finds her full range of motion satisfactory. Her shoulders next: a moderate hyper-extension on the left side, largely irrelevant considering the extent of injury on that limb below the elbow. She takes another deep breath and steels herself to look at the shattered hand. She has endured the field medicine classes, had learned to cope with the gruesome distortions that flesh endures when the underlying structures were disturbed. It's different when it's her flesh, though. The black leather glove bulges outward, seams straining against the internal pressure. She can't fix this, can only hope to keep it stable and out of the way and get back to the excellent facilities in the Hall of Justice quickly. She might be back fully functional in a day or two if she does, and might never recover fully if she doesn't. A little extra incentive to focus on getting back.
It's a struggle to cut a strip from the ragged bottom of the cloak one-handed, and Anderson feels a small glow of satisfaction at the minute accomplishment. With a grimace, she bites the coarse fabric by her neck and begins winding the makeshift bandage around her broken bones. Wrapping her hand doesn't go as quickly as she hoped, and she can feel cold sweat spring out as she binds the ruined appendage as tightly as she can, knotting the loose end around the mangled remains of her comm. She takes several long minutes to rest and come down from the rush of neurotransmitters that had flooded her system in response to the self-inflicted agony. As the adrenaline drains away, her heart rate stabilizes, her breathing returns to normal, she stops trembling and continues her self-examination.
Her right arm holds an unpleasant surprise and she hisses, assessing the jagged tear in the reinforced leather and flesh that shears from elbow to wrist. With a functioning second hand she might be able to apply the appropriate disinfectants and staple the gash shut. In her current state it's futile. Better to save what she has than waste it attempting the impossible. However copiously she had bled earlier, the wound is scabbed over, congealed blood and dirt binding the edges of her skin together. There's a high probability of severe infection from all sorts of nasty things, but it's not inflamed right now and that will have to be good enough. Working her way down, she leaves her aching ribs, cracked or bruised and beyond the limits of her care. Her right leg checks out, and her left suffers from a sprain or twist in the knee or ankle, possibly both. A cautious wriggle of her toes confirms the hypothesis, but the pressure of her boot seems to be holding the swelling in check.
The next step is to stand up. It's unavoidable, something that has to be faced. It only seems like a monumental task because of the specific situation. You stand up all the damn time without a thought; this is the same thing. More or less. It's not a particularly useful monologue, and she leaves off the lecture to try and work out an alternative to her regular movement. Jumping to her feet is definitely not the order of the day. From atop her pile of garbage she can just about make out the faint wink of light off a slender metallic pole, half buried by an adjacent pile of rubbish. If it's long enough it might do as a walking stick or crutch. Cautiously she stretches out toward her goal, wiggling her hips to slide the along the loose heap. It sits just beyond her maximum reach, taunting her through proximity. Only by lying down on her side stretching to her full height and extending the sheathed knife does she manage to catch a spur of the metal and draw it towards her. The knife, her wonderful blessed knife, returns to its home under her vest and she tugs the pole free from the tangle of trash. It's lighter than she expected, coated in some sort of lubricant. She can't begin to guess what it's made of or what purpose it might have served, but it should suit her needs as a walking aide.
Between the wall, her good leg, her good arm and the pole, Anderson is able to ease herself upright though her muscles clench unhappily at this unusual effort and her vision blurs. It's all worth it in the end, especially once she can find a balanced position that feels almost natural. She could have just as easily died on the trash heap in the alley, never woken up from the concussion and blood loss, or had her throat slit by an enterprising looter looking for a new pair of boots and been eaten by giant mutant rats. She's alive and she's mobile, and it's time to go home.
The first steps are the hardest as she hobbles slowly out of the alley, gaining speed as she acclimates to the awkward movements. She pushes herself for several blocks, then hesitates at an intersection trying to make out the faded writing on the street signs. There are designated crossing points scattered across the length of the Barricade, but with the fires and the crowds, it's not certain that she'll be able to get close enough to access any of the gates.
It's an ugly choice, to hobble along parallel to the Barricade in hopes that there's a cross-point that isn't mobbed or try and wait the riots out. She finds the first highly unlikely, if unbreachable sections of wall are mobbed then the areas that can be crossed must be under assault from the crowds of people trying to get at each other. The second alternative seems no better. She can't just sit and wait it out, not in her current situation, not lacking any means of contacting the Department of Justice. There has to be a suitable third option, if only she could just think of it…
The sound of voices distract rudely from her considerations. Specific words are indistinct, implying that some distance separates the speakers from Anderson's current location, but growing louder slowly. A few loud thumps, the sound of glass breaking, and she can hear the laughter then, young, male, and thoroughly nasty.
"Hey, look! Check it out!"
"Sweet, man, throw it here! Ooh lookit me I'm Mister Fancy Pants Wanker Shopkeeper."
"Hey, you're getting all the good shit, bastard!"
"Shit head!"
"Dick breath!"
"Cunt!"
More laughter, more sounds of squabbling: looters. Anderson grimaces in disgust. It makes perfect sense that there are plenty of low life creeps eager to use the diversion to go on a spree of theft and outright terror. A brief and terrible civil war takes place in her gut; fifteen years of indoctrination demanding that she step in and rain justice on to the creeps. Survival instincts put up a powerful counter-offense; just because she's expected to give her life in the line of duty in no way means it ought to be done now, given so cheaply. There will be plenty of time in the future to bring the reign of law back to this part of the sector, but it's not a task suited to a single, half crippled Judge.
Unhappily she turns her back on the jeering and whooping and trudges off down the street. Lacking alternatives, she considers trying to seek out Turn-Key block. The haunts she abandoned fifteen years ago must still be there. She could take shelter there, visit the apartment of her childhood, maybe Pennywise Alley with the junkyard that had doubled as a recreation area for the block's youth. It's a stupid idea, misguided desperation bordering on insanity. It's a one in a million chance that she could even find the ugly cement structure without a map, and just naïve to think she might be welcomed there. She had been nothing and no one, there would be nothing for her there. So Cassandra Anderson walks forward, one awkward hobbling step at a time, skirting brown puddles and trash heaps, taking her cautious time crossing gaping potholes that long ago rendered the road impassible by anything larger than a handcart. Meditating on the near-lawlessness of this area distracts her from the physical and emotional discomforts of her situation. It seems that the localized anarchy is ultimately due to the roads. Where Judges patrol is limited to where they can force a LawMaster through. So many miles of road have been left to fall into decay; it's inevitable that pockets of lawlessness would spring up. Of course the structural and intellectual contamination would spread around. She grimaces at a broken building; roof caved in and wall bulging crazily into the street, blocking her further progression.
A sigh of frustration escapes as she considers her options. She's not crazy enough to try and edge around the crumbling building, certainly not without knowing what the rest of the street looks like. That leaves trekking through an ostensibly empty lot repurposed to a general purpose public dumping ground or following the street back towards the Barricade. The sounds of chaos emanating from the warzone down the street capture her attention for a moment. Muted shots and cries of pain and rage call to her on the deepest, most primal level to rush to the scene of violence as an emissary of justice and peace. She hobbles a few steps in that direction before catching herself and shakes her head at her foolishness. Recovering from that lapse of self control, she becomes unhappily aware of the return of voices and footsteps behind her. She cranes her head over her shoulder, peripheral vision obscured by the hood of the cloak, and is perfectly displeased to see four youths saunter out of a building down the road, toting bulging duffels between them. With a push from her crutch, Anderson steps away resolutely. Maybe the hooligans would prefer making a getaway with their loot over harassing a dirty cripple. She smiles bitterly at that thought, there's no way her meager sliver of luck will push to that.
"Hey, lookit that! A cripple out for a walk! Wait up, gimpy!" The raucous laughter echoes through the empty street, and the speaker bounds after the lone figure, comrades following at top speed.
Of course creeps like this wouldn't back down from such easy prey. She can't outrun them with her disobedient leg, and Anderson settles for putting her back to the wall and faces her opponents with resignation. The four are young and male, probably armed and definitely intoxicated. They form a loose semi-circle around her, as though to prevent her from running off. It's an irrelevant gesture; if she could run away she would have done so before now. The only option left is fight.
The one who had initiated the pursuit drops his bag by his feet and smirks, creasing the shiny radiation burn covering half his face. "Think we got someone edging in on our territory, boys. Someone here hasn't learned to stay the fuck outta the Spades' way."
"Well that's what we're here for, innit?" The biggest of the trio, on her far left asks with a cheerful twinkle in his grossly mis-sized eyes. "So how 'bout it, brother? Find anything here worth getting your ass beat over?"
When Anderson fails to respond, the burned instigator takes an aggressive step forward. "Don't be rude to my friend, gimpy. Answer the fuckin' question. Find anything good?" When his victim fails respond to the repetition, Radiation Burn rolls his eyes. "A tardo and a gimp; amazing."
"A tardo, gimp, ana girl." The badly hunched beanpole on her right sneers.
"Bullshit, man, no one's that dumb to let a girl wander in here by herself." Eyeballs contradicts his ally, bulbous eyes rolling heavenward in disgust.
"Maybe no one cares about this 'un." Beanpole smiles nastily.
Radiation Burn looks at his flunkies with frustration. "You two are so fulla shit. We gotta focus here, man. Look here, just-AUCK!" A length of tarnished metal jabs out of nowhere, finding his throat with astonishing precision. Clawing at his neck and gasping helplessly, the boy falls back over the bag by his feet.
Anderson returns her crutch to her side, holding her weight on her good leg as comfortably as she can. To be anchored in place, unable to lunge forward or shift side to side is a significant handicap she hasn't entirely figured into her strategy. The strike of opportunity had been the best she could hope for, her enemy's lapse of attention enough to firmly remove him from the inevitable confrontation.
"Oh you stupid bitch," Eyeballs almost manages to sound sorrowful as he lifts the hem of his shirt and pulls a rust-eaten machete out of his waistband. "You really, really shouldn't have done that."
Beanpole snickers, "Oh, I dunno, mate, I think it's more fun this way." Leisurely he shakes a short length of chain from his pocket and slides a lovingly maintained straight razor from his sleeve.
Light glints along the sharp edges in horrific promise of blood and pain, but Anderson forces herself to seek out the silent fourth member of the band, mid-charge with a crude looking club raised to strike. There's nothing she can do in the face of such momentum except drop to her knees and roll with the energy of the strike, shrieking as her weight rests briefly on her broken hand. Adrenaline overrides the agony, carrying her back to her knees in time to deliver a vicious swipe to Eyeball's knee as he advances. He stumbles but the follow up strike is foiled by Beanpole's chain entangling her improvised weapon. He tugs the chain and in spite of being a scrawny kid he almost manages to drag Anderson off balance.
A club whistles through the air and Anderson throws herself forward, closing the distance between herself and Beanpole, twisting to absorb the impact on her shoulders and kicks up catching him in the stomach. The skinny thug exhales a giant whoosh of air in surprise, but the club thuds into her unprotected thigh, tingles of shocked nerves adding to the storm of discomforts playing through her body. In all of this, she has lost track of Eyeballs until a huge boot makes contact with her side. The kick drives the air from her lungs and she releases her grip on the crutch, pulling her arms and legs into a fetal position and rolling onto her side. Fumbling for her knife and cursing herself for half-lying on the sheath, she feels the heavy machete make contact against her side, shearing through the cloth cloak, scraping against the heavy protective plates of her vest, and definitely cracking ribs.
Eyeball's sound of surprise is lost in the crack of gunfire and Anderson rolls to her knees, finally yanking out her knife, as her assailants freeze and turn towards the new threat. She spares a glance for the large man hurrying towards them with an antique rifle on his shoulder aimed at Eyeballs. Reaching out for a brief instant is enough to assure her that, at least for the time being, the gang members are his priority.
It's a pretty good distraction, and she takes ruthless advantage of it to hamstring Sneaky Fucker. He screams and collapses as she lunches at Eyeballs, still goggling at the red gouge on his leg. He sees her coming, tries to move the machete defensively, but it's poorly suited for such a move and Anderson slashes at the unprotected arms, collides with meaty legs and pushes up.
Outnumbered, with three of his mates maimed or dead, Beanpole turns on his heel and runs, heedless of the bags of loot or Sneaky Fucker's keening wail. Anderson shuffles on her knees to turn and face the newcomer, tugging her knife free with a wet sucking sound. She can feel his cautious analysis as they size each other up, gauging potential strengths. Anderson doesn't particularly care for her odds against this new man. Unlike the kids who had tried to assault her, he's huge, tall and muscled and much better armed. Other personal details call her attention: the soot streaks covering him from hair to boots, his concerned expression, and carefully mended clothes.
The man frowns at the hunted girl still crouching in the street and slings his weapon back over his shoulder. Holding his empty palms up, he crouches down to the battered woman's level. "I thought you'd be chopped in half by those psychos. That's some crazy luck you got there…" He cuts himself off and takes a deep breath to slow the breakneck pace of his words. "Here, are you okay? Do you need any help?"
"I'll let you know in a minute." Her voice surprises her; sound emerging weak and rough. Her hands tremble as the rush recedes and she stows the knife, taking great care to not fumble the slippery, sticky weapon. She grimaces at the stains of gore on her glove and scrubs it against the equally dirty cloak with disgust. As she tries to brush away the worst of the mess, the stranger retrieves her crutch where it had been abandoned and, disentangling it from the chain, offers it back. Wearily, Anderson nods in thanks and plants the walking aide against the asphalt firmly, leaning into it and trying to find the residual strength to stand.
The stranger reaches down, offering down his hand. "This is a bit of a rough stretch for anyone out on their own."
Anderson studies the offered hand for a moment before accepting the assistance. The man's intent still seems straight forward enough to allow him to help her to her feet. "Thanks," She tries to smile at him; it comes out as a grimace instead. "I'm just a bit lost…" Wedging the metal pole under her elbow, she grasps the offered hand tightly and bracing for the pain to come. Instead of dragging her forward, the man grips her elbow firmly and lifts her weight straight up, giving her an opportunity to get her feet arranged under her. The decency of the action surprises her and gives her enough time to fix the crutch under her arm before releasing her grip on him.
He doesn't release her, craning his neck to stare towards the Barricade with a sudden look of fear. His fingers tighten on her arm as the faintest whine of engines resonates at the edge of hearing. "We have to get out of here; can you run?" At her defeated laugh, he frowns, glancing over his shoulder one last time and lifts the small woman over his shoulder before moving down the street at a brisk trot.
Every jostling step is agony for Anderson. She's past caring where she's being carted off to, the entirety of Mega-City seems hell bent on killing her today and strength and stubbornness are at their limit. She hovers at the edge of a dark pit of vertigo as the man below her picks up his pace as the sound grows to fill the air around them and the sound of metal canisters bouncing off pavement from a hundred foot drop adds a nerve-wrenching counterpoint to the man's heavy footsteps. Her apparent rescuer turns a corner sharply and with one last desperate sprint carries them through a door along one side of the street. It's dark inside, a dusty, ill used foyer, and Anderson is dropped rather unceremoniously beside the wall. The man grabs a shiny plastic tarp from the corner and begins furiously stapling it over the locked door. He checks the seal, wiping his hands on dirty jeans and looks down at Anderson apologetically.
"Sorry about that; didn't mean to hurt you too badly."
Anderson studies her forceful host cautiously. "What's going on out there?" In spite of what could only be called 'forceful abduction' she still can't find any trace of malice or even unpleasant intent. It's downright weird, almost suspicious behavior that is easiest to explain as a cover for something more sinister. It would be nice to think that if there was any evil intent lurking in the stranger before her, that she would be able to discover it before it came to action, yet there is nothing there. It's puzzling.
"Jays probably got sick of the protesters kicking sand and decided we'd had our fun. Bastards didn't have to carpet the entire fucking Sector."
She doesn't have to be a psychic to see the frustration and anger bubbling up. As naturally as she can, Anderson secures the robe covering her street uniform. "It didn't look like fun." Please don't let him be an anarchist or a dissident.
He snorts at that, "Yeah, no shit." He breaks off, brooding, before straightening up with a game attempt at a warm smile. "Here, let's get you taken care of. Those bangers sure did a number on you, uh…" He trails off questioningly.
"Cass." Anderson supplies after an instant of deliberation.
"Cass? That's really nice. I'm called Kristof." The smile glints with a flicker of sincerity. "Sorry again about the hurry getting here, but I didn't want to get caught out in that and I bet you didn't either. Life's hard enough without getting brained by a gas can. You can wait here 'til the wind blows the streets clear. Just, don't go blabbing, okay?"
A film of suspicion layers over his thoughts, and Anderson twitches at the unnaturally loud thunk of a projectile falling just outside the door. She nods quickly, not wishing to be abandoned in this dismal ante-room or cast into gas filled streets.
Kristof smiles and offers her his hand once more. "Glad to hear it, let's go."
Her legs have stiffened during the brief rest, and she accepts the offered assistance with as much grace as she can muster. Tottering awkwardly, she snatches her makeshift cane from his offering hand and situates it under her arm with a grunt. "Thanks."
"Don't mention it," Kristof scrunches his face as Cass's sudden movement spreads the rank sewer fumes through the enclosed space. "Whew, that's… something else. You mind leaving your coat out here? We've got space for you to clean up a bit."
"Ah," Anderson waffles in indecision. She does stink, while the breeze outside had dispersed the worse of the effect, nothing could hide the fact that she had gutter filth all over. In the warm room, it hung around her like a sickly fug. But stinking might be preferable to exposing herself as a Judge. Kristof has already displayed some uncharted animosity towards her profession; this seems like a poor time to antagonize the man.
"Hey," Kristof cuts into her endlessly spiraling train of thought quietly. "It's okay. Whatever you've got underneath, I've seen worse. Nobody's going to judge you here."
The gentle understanding in his voice puts Anderson on edge, and she grips the collar of her cloak tightly as though it might be ripped away from her. "I'd rather not," She shakes her head.
At her withdrawal, Kristof steps back and puts his hands up in a show of submission. "Well… that's your right, of course. I don't want to make you uncomfortable. Maybe I could find something a little cleaner for you while you're here? Would that be all right?"
To have someone be so carefully accommodating is an alien experience, and Anderson isn't entirely sure how to respond. It seems like a suitable compromise, and if there are alternatives to smelling like a latrine, she would gladly accept that alternative. "Okay."
He smiles, warm and at ease, and pushes past the heavy canvas curtain sealing the ante-room from the rest of the building. Within a minute, he's poking his head and shoulders back into the room where Cass waits. "We're in luck." He passes over an armful of worn dark material.
Anderson leans her back against the wall and shakes the new garment out. The synthetic fabric is well worn, carefully patched and fashioned into a rudimentary robe. When Kristof retreats to the space beyond the foyer, she takes time for one last, meaningless, second thought. As far as really excruciatingly dumb ideas go, this one is a real contender. It's one thing to be forced to hole up in a derelict building while waiting for the streets to clear. It's quite another to accept hospitality from unknown strangers who might easily prove to be hostile. She could have the tarp down from the door and be out in the street in seconds, it's unlikely that Kristof would chase her. It's an exhausting possibility to consider. It's hard to see how running into the street during a gas attack will improve her odds of survival over gambling on the intent of her hosts. The worst case scenarios are about the same either way. Decisively she tugs the ties holding the cloak over her shoulders, letting the befouled material sag down and pile around her feet. The new garment is donned, excess material tucked under her arm or wadded under her belt until she has something satisfactory. With the tip of her crutch, she pokes the discarded fabric into a pile by the door and settles the pole back under her arm. "Alright, I'm done"
"Come on in."
The curtain is pulled aside as Anderson approaches and then falls shut behind her, abruptly terminating the dirty light source and leaving the pair in total darkness. Without light, she's left navigating by the feel of the mind in front of her. Habit guides him around the twisting passages, this is a journey he's made so many times before that Anderson can trace the path of intent deep into the center of the building. It's disorienting to balance her physical steps against the morphing map spilling out of his head. After stumbling several times while distracted, she resigns herself and reaches for the man directly before her. The contact surprises and flusters him, sensations tickling in her awareness, but his big hand engulfing her unharmed fingers willingly. The connection helps her focus on navigating around the obstacles scattered through the hall. After an untold amount of time, a gentle tug on her arm indicates that they stop. He drops her hand and she can hear heavy footfalls advance a pace and come to a halt. There's a series of rasps of metal grinding against metal and then the squeal of hinges. A sudden flare of brilliance spills through a crack, casting stark shadows over the pair and they exchange one last, measuring stare before Kristof pulls the door all the way open and ushers Anderson in.
It's a large room, gently lit by a generous scattering of electric lamps, with tables and chairs in miniature organized neatly around the room with several much larger tables and chairs at the front. A half dozen young children scatter around the room, solitary heads bent over desks or huddled in pairs. One head pops up to stare at the new arrival with unabashed curiosity before breaking into a snaggletooth grin at the sight of her companion. As she watches, the little boy carefully sets his crayon beside the dirty scrap of paper he was hunching over, stands and pushes his chair into the table before hurdling over and wrapping his arms around Kristof's legs.
"Nuncle Krissy! You came back! I saw-"
Kristof ruffles the knee height mop of hair and swings the boy up easily. "I know, kiddo. It's okay. Where's your Uncle Chucky gone to?"
The boy mumbles something incoherent into Kristof's shoulder, and gives Anderson a sidling look under dark eyelashes. "Who's she?"
"A guest in our house, be polite." Kristof chucks the child under the chin and sets him down gently.
Carefully, mindful of her discomforted leg, Anderson bends down to smile at the bright eyes fixed on her face. Up close she can see the harsh flecking of scales showing through under a film of baby smooth skin. "Hello, there. I'm Cass. What's your name?" Something pushes at her mind, a violating, alien sensation. The pressure increases and instinctively she pushes back, something deep inside flexing in a new and exciting way.
A girl with uncombed red hair falls back with a wail, pressing inhumanly long hands against her mouth to stifle the moans. The children break off their activities to run to her side, twittering voices filling the room.
"That's quite enough of that." A gentle voice cuts through the trilling, and Anderson turns with the children to a youth easing through a door at the front of the room. "Back to work, kids, let me have a look at Jeanie." With a few loping strides he crosses the room and disperses the small cluster. Carefully he takes a pulse, listens to the young girl's breathing and checks her eyes. "How are you feeling? That's rather extraordinary, isn't it? Okay, sit up now, that's my girl." As the girl sits up, he pats her shoulder. "Now you know, eh?" He returns to his feet, dusting his hands on his pants and crosses to Kristof and Anderson. "Welcome back, Kris. How is it?"
Kristof slaps his hand on the younger man's shoulder briefly. "It's bad, dude, really bad. The Norms lost their shit and the Jays spooked and now I'd guess the casualty count is going to be hundreds if we're lucky. The streets are gassed. It's out of anyone's control now."
The young man's face falls, "That is sad to hear. No one will be happy with the outcome." He shakes his head. "Such a tragedy and I fear it will fix nothing…" He trails off and fixes Anderson with a sudden look. "Excuse me, miss, these are heavy times." He gives Kristof a pointed look of inquiry.
"Charlie, this is Cass. Found her wandering around lost outside and this isn't exactly a good time for anyone to be out and about. I figured..." He trails off with a pointed look at the other man.
Charlie's expression morphs slightly, and Anderson can hear a code when it's being spoken in front of her. Before she can try to decipher the words that aren't being said, another feeling, softer and more cautious nudges her. NO. She resists the urge to shove this time, focusing on the total rejection of the intrusion. NO.
"I apologize, Cass." Charlie winces and gives Anderson a rueful smile. "You must think we're awful people here. I didn't mean to offend you; will you permit me a slightly more civil introduction? I'm Charles." He extends his hand.
"Uh," Is about all Anderson can manage, her head spinning from the allusions. For a lack of options she grasps the offered hand awkwardly. The touch of flesh provides a startling insight, the young man, still in the grip of his teenage year, is a wellspring of power. It glows, it sings, in her mind's eye until she releases the grip, flexing her fingers curiously. "You're psychic."
Charles mirrors her motions, studying her with a new light in his eyes. "So are you, well damn… Please, sit down, Cassandra. Make yourself comfortable. Kris, you can go fetch the kit, she's more than welcome to any hospitality we can offer." He leads his guest to the front of the room and pulls a chair out beside a full sized table. He waits until Kristof shuffles off before sitting himself, dragging his chair close to Anderson's to better lean in and speak quietly. "I'm glad you're here, Cass, but please be gentler with my students. They're young and they're still learning; Jeanie didn't mean any harm."
Anderson's eyes go wide. "Students? This is a school? For psychics?" He voice cracks on the last word. "Oh my Drokk…" It makes sense that a place like this would eventually spring up in the Mutant sections of Mega-City out of necessity. Just because the population was separated from the educational systems available to the Civilian population didn't mean the parents here cared any less about their children's education and upbringing. The only education available to Mutant children would be whatever the local offering was, why wouldn't the few Mutants with preternatural abilities offer to share their knowledge with their peers?
Charles barely stifles his surprise at her reaction. "A school for all Mutants, yes, or what's left of them. It's better for them to have a disciplined environment, peers who understand them. I teach them what I can and try to help them experiment with their capabilities in a safe place. We were having good results, they had such promise…" He trails off and watches his pupils with a sad smile.
Anderson is too caught up in rapturous daydreaming to immediately pick up on her host's melancholy. She had never even considered that a school designed for Mutants might exist. Is Charles the only instructor? How did he know how to teach children with different abilities? What might her life have been like if she had come to an institution like this instead of being swallowed up by the Academy? That consideration has a sobering effect on her fantasies; Mega-City would be a little less safe, there would be a few more creeps in the world than there currently are. She pushes the silly thoughts away and returns her focus to the morose boy in front of her. "What happened?"
Charles studies his hands folded on the table with great interest. "The children started disappearing. Once in a while we'll lose one who's frustrated by the effort, or missing their family or something in kind. Not to put too fine a point on it, but it's obvious what their intentions are and was never a surprise when they failed to turn up. But then a few weeks ago there were good, happy students disappearing. Parents kissed their kids goodbye in the morning, sent them over to us, and then never saw them again. I've sent out messages to the surrounding sectors, tried tracking them. It's like they vanish into the air." He looks up at her squarely. "I heard back from my fellows around the City; it's endemic. Something is targeting the Mutant population. There were talks of organizing a forum with the authorities, but that was derailed by the riots. I don't suppose you're the envoy from the Enclave?"
It's an ugly story, but fits well with her recent interaction with the Mutants out of bounds. "I'm afraid I'm just passing through." Briefly, she considers telling this boy about the simultaneous disappearance of Norm children, and then shrugs it off. It's an oddity, nothing more, and probably of no interest to a Mutant community ensnared in their own problems.
"I'm sorry to hear that," Charles sighs. "We need all the help we can get; it might be you they snatch up next.
Feeling horribly callous, Anderson shrugs lightly. "I'm sorry but I can't stay."
"Not even for a little while? We need all the help we can get and you're so strong. Anything you could teach me would be a huge thing."Sensing some underlying doubt, he smiles at Anderson slyly. "You ought to wait until the streets clear at least and let Kris take a look at you. I understand if you have other places to be, but you might as well do something to kill the time."
It's hard not to smile at the boy's persistence and well intentioned attempt at flattery. In spite of herself, she does want to help this tiny battered organization scratch out a living in this sea of lawlessness. Structure and discipline for Mutant children at the early stages of their life, stability and guidance, could have powerful long term benefits for the city as a whole. Given control over their abilities, fewer Mutants might end up languishing in cubes or running riot with dangerous criminals. Maybe someday, in the distant future, it could be a resource for training other gifted Judges. She shakes her head at such wild fantasy, daily it seems more and more likely that her status is a fluke, a one time thing never to be repeated. "I'll stay, but no promises."