"I still don't see why we can't take him to a hospital," Schuldich muttered, sprawled lazily in the front seat of the car he and Farfarello were using for the night. It had a spacious back seat, which was a good thing, since the witch was back there with her friend's head in her lap, eyes closed in concentration as she put pressure on his wound.
"If we go to a hospital, the agents of The One will find us," she repeated, with a hint of sharpness in her tone. "And we won't survive the encounter."
"In that case, I don't see why we care." This was directed at Farfarello. The Irishman was driving the car. It had been he who had helped the girl get her friend into the back seat. It had been he who had insisted they bring the two American children back to Crawford for help. It was he who glanced now at Schuldich, the golden depths of his single eye as unfathomable as ever they were. Schuldich could have poked around in his head a bit, to see what the hell he was thinking, but he didn't venture into that abyssal pit unless he absolutely had to, or was just feeling adventurous (re: masochistic). So Farfarello's thoughts remained a mystery to him, which was how the Irishman liked it.
He did not have much trouble poking around in the mind of the girl in the back seat, but he didn't especially want to. Her concentration was amazing, and at present, her only thoughts were worry for her friend, Ray, boiling hatred at this One that surprised Schuldich with its strength, and the same words running through her mind over and over and over.
Goddess sacred, purest white, lend me now thy healing light.
Her hands were still glowing.
Schuldich hadn't noticed it until they were in the dark, confined space of the car, without quite so much direct light from outside sources. The girl was GLOWING, the space around her body shimmering if he looked at it just right, out of the corner of his eye. At her hands, where they covered the bullet wound, the glow was bright enough to see without visual tricks. It unnerved him more than a little. He had seen Healers during his time with Eszet, sometimes mere telekinetics who utilized their power at the cellular level to knit wounds and restart hearts. But this girl wasn't a Gifted, and he could sense that clearly. Her mind was somewhat organized like a Gifted's. She had Power and he could sense it. But she was not a Psion.
Farfarello parked behind their hotel and cut the engine, sliding from the front seat and yanking the back door open. Schuldich made an irritated sound and stood by as Farf and the girl struggled to get the unconscious boy out of the back, pulling out his lighter and a cigarette. The flame was a welcome smear of color against the blackness of the night. "Crawford isn't going to be happy," Schu said slyly, watching as the girl gave the boy up to Farfarello and let the stronger psychopath carry his dead weight. My, she was a trusting little thing, wasn't she?
"Why shouldn't he be?" Farfarello inquired dryly, turning toward the door and walking quickly as the girl jogged ahead to get the door, only to find that she had no pass key. Neither did Farfarello…. Schuldich was holding it. He made a tsking noise and sauntered up to them, taking his time and noting how the girl's eyes narrowed at him. He flashed her a blatantly seductive, devil-may-care grin before dropping his card into the slot.
The light turned green.
"We are bringing him another telepath," Farfarello explained as he slid sideways through the door and headed for the stairwell. "An unregistered one, isn't that correct? One Eszet hasn't touched. A gift."
"Eszet isn't GOING to touch him," the girl declared. She was grinning, but her eyes were hard and it looked almost more like a snarl. "You're with Eszet, then?"
"We're not Eszet," Schuldich told her, smirking as he opened the fire door onto their hall. "We're Schwarz."
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As predicted, Crawford was not at all enthusiastic about having a bleeding, unconscious boy on his couch. But when Schuldich informed him that he was an unregistered telepath, Crawford allowed explanations to wait and set about dressing the wound. When the girl stepped up to watch him, he gave her an odd look, a look of confused familiarity, but he said nothing, just stitched up the bullet hole as skillfully as he was able and wrapped the wounds.
"What happened to him?" he inquired flatly, pushing his glasses up his nose and standing up as he went to the kitchenette to wash his hands of blood.
"He was attacked by The One," the girl said matter-of-factly, her tone as coldly efficient as Crawford's. "They drained him. I don't know if I saved him in time or not, but I'm sure we'll all know in a few hours. If he doesn't come back..." She shrugged and Schuldich could feel her chest tighten in private grief. "I'll take care of him. You won't have to."
"What, exactly, is The One and how did they 'drain' him?" Crawford asked as the water ran red into the sink and he rubbed his hands together with methodical, practiced motions.
"That's a bit of a long story," she said quietly.
"Well, we have nothing but time," he pointed out, wiping his hands on a nearby towel. Then he stepped away from the sink and pushed his glasses up again, appraising her with just the barest hint of a superior smirk on his face. "Forgive me, I've been very rude. My name is Brad Crawford. This is my team, called Schwarz, and this is Schuldich and Farfarello."
Schuldich winked and Farfarello just watched her mutely, eye narrowed in thought.
"There is one other member of my team, Naoe Nagi, whom you'll meet shortly if I'm not mistaken. And you are?"
She took this information in and nodded quietly, remarkably calm given her tender age and the fact that she had just killed three people and almost watched her friend die, had held his bleeding body to herself while throwing their survival to the whims of strangers. "I'm Sabbath," she said with clipped efficiency. "That's Ray. We're Inconnu."
Schuldich was confused, but Crawford nodded knowingly. "I see," he said, motioning her to a nearby chair. "Have a seat, won't you? And tell me this long story about the people who attacked you. I have a feeling I'll be very interested to hear it."
She let herself be herded and perched on the chair, legs folded beneath her, elbows propped on her knees as she watched them from between hunched shoulders. She was very, very lovely, Schuldich noticed, with classic features and large eyes that burned with life and intelligence. Her black hair was a dye job, but it didn't look at all out-of-place and complimented her flawlessly pale skin perfectly. Her eyes were outlined with black in the tradition of most Goths, but her lips were unpainted. She was slim and nicely curved, her hands small but with slender and dexterous fingers, all her bones finely structured. As she sat curled over herself on that expensive armchair, Schuldich was given the impression of a wolverine. Yes, she was small, but he had seen her explode in fury to snarl and tear and shred. Coiled power was written through the lines of her frame, barely-leashed violence in the depths of her eyes.
Sabbath.
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Sabbath.
It was such a delightfully sacrilegious name, he couldn't help but note, as he hovered next to the window, eyes turned outward, ears pricked for the sound of her voice. She was an alto. She had a way of speaking that was delightfully full-throated, that came from her chest, that seemed capable in a moment's notice of becoming a growl or a purr or that feral, coughing scream. Right now, her voice was cool and methodical as she watched Crawford from under strands of ebony hair and told her story.
"As I'm sure you know," she began, brushing at those strands and watching Crawford, who watched her evenly from behind his mask of apathy and tasteful glasses, "Inconnu are psychics and paranormals who refuse to ally with Eszet. Or, as we see it, we are the free ones, the ones who won't sell our souls for power. There are other sects, most of which fight directly against Eszet, but we don't want a fight. We just want to live and be left alone. Ray is a telepath. Others in our Cell include a healer, a technokinetic, a pyrokinetic, and another telepath of slightly different caliber. We're from all over America, come together for one purpose: survival. There is safety in numbers, or so we've always thought.
"We've managed to avoid Eszet's hounds until now, and they don't have enough people to waste trying to take us alive. We'll fight to the death for our freedom: that's the very point of being Inconnu. And we'll fight to the death for the freedom of our comrades. We thought Eszet was the only real threat to us, until some of us started to disappear, and a few who managed to escape snatch attempts came back to us with stories of powerful Psions who behaved like a dead men's collective, who could tear your soul away with a touch and who had no personality behind their eyes. We're a paranoid group; we have to be to survive. That's what saved us, I think."
She glanced at Ray, who's breathing had lost it's slight gurgle and steadied, and went on.
"We took the rumors seriously and started moving only in groups and trying to track down these elusive dead-Psions-walking. But always, someone would be arrogant or someone would get caught by fate, and that someone would vanish. And then one night, down at Hunt's Point, in The Bronx…." She looked up at Crawford, eyes narrowed as her lips pulled back in a delicate snarl. "They attacked a group of Psions. We think they pooled all their people. They had to, at that point, to outnumber the Black Dog Cell three to one. The Black Dogs fought with everything they had. The morgue has bodies to prove it. But they lost and they were absorbed.
"Once the Black Dogs fell, it wasn't safe even to move in groups anymore. Cells combined for the sake of strength, everyone lived in fear. And Cell after Cell fell to these Psions. We knew nothing about them and we couldn't defend ourselves, until one of our number took a huge risk. He was an Empath, a very powerful one, and he had a second gift: minor healing abilities. He set himself up as bait and let the dead-Psions get close to him, and then, while his Cell ambushed them, he made contact with one of the Psions and penetrated his mind. He managed to escape with the information he'd gotten, long enough to make sure it would be spread throughout our numbers, but his Cell was slaughtered in the struggle to let him escape. Once he'd seen his information safely into our hands… he committed suicide."
"Well, that was stupid," Schuldich said scathingly. "Was it that harrowing of an experience? One thing I can say for Eszet…. It gives us a spine worth mentioning."
She gave him a dry look. "Actually, his lover was among those slaughtered. He chose to be with him in death rather than try to go on without him."
"Love," Schuldich snorted, but a look from Crawford silenced him.
"Please," he said politely to Sabbath. "Go on."
She nodded. "The dead-Psions called themselves The One. Cheesy 'Matrix' quote, we thought when we first heard it, but it's more than that. These people have no individual personalities; they have no souls. Have you ever seen Star Trek?" she asked Crawford, who nodded. "They're the psychic version of the Borg Collective. And they even do assimilation, 'resistance is futile' speech and all. They can absorb you by attaching their mental collective to your mind. On the weaker psychics, they can sometimes do this from a distance, but for the Inconnu, who have learned by necessity to be strong, they have to be close enough to touch. Here," she said, laying a slender finger on her forehead, above the bridge of her nose. "The Third Eye, the seat of psychic power. Once they touch you, they begin to drain you of your will, of your personality. The only thing left is your power and your body, to be used by the Collective (as we've started calling them) as they see fit. Once they start the drain, your body seizes up, paralyzed. Otherwise believe me, there would be no One because we would have kicked their asses into the harbor the instant they dared to lay hands on us." She shook her head in chagrin.
Crawford absorbed that information with his usual grace. Farfarello, standing by the window, heard what he was certain Crawford did not. There was something about The One that struck him as truly evil, truly base. It wasn't the malicious, gleefully wicked evil of Schuldich, or the fiery, raging evil of Farfarello himself. It wasn't the sleek and collected evil of Crawford, or the power-mad evil of Eszet. This was an evil that was cold, dead, insectile in its behavior and rotting in its plots. It was like a corpse staggering free from a grave, infecting other corpses. Like a collective of psychic vampires of European legend.
It was insidious. He did not like it.
"In any case, the rest of us have pretty much gone into hiding. The entire group, we've discovered, is strung together with telepaths and empaths, with their most powerful telepath serving as a 'core', or to continue the Borg analogy, the Queen. Hell, it's been postulated that by destroying the Core, we would send the Collective into a sort of frenzy in which they would easily be picked off, but we don't know where their base is or where their Core is. Only that there IS a Core. Rasce made that very clear before he died."
"This Collective," Crawford said silkily, fingers entwined in front of his mouth. "Do you think it poses a significant threat to Eszet?" His eyes flickered toward Schuldich, and Farfarello knew what the American was telling the German: scan her mind, tell me if she lies.
Sabbath shrugged. "At present, no. Eszet is a world-wide organization with Power the likes of which these bumblebees couldn't hope to challenge. But there has to be some intelligence behind them. They've only been going after Inconnu, and it has to be because they know we have NO resources and no real numbers to amass against them. They're picking us off to swell their ranks. Once that is done, it would make sense if they went after the smaller splinter sects and then, finally, took on Eszet."
Schuldich's cat-like eyes narrowed, and Farfarello turned away again, not needing to see the telepath to hear his voice echo.
She's not lying. That doesn't mean she's right, since she's just speculating, but she believes in her speculations.
"In any case," Sabbath continued, "we've been trying to keep our telepaths away from them. A telepath's mind can only support so many connections, so the more telepaths they gain, the more growth they're capable of. Ray here… is one of the last left in the city."
"If he's so valuable, what were you doing at that club?" Schuldich inquired suspiciously.
"Crystal Meth," she replied flatly. "Some of our Psions are strong enough that their powers are literal torture; the drugs are the only things that can give them a bit of relief from the torment."
Farfarello felt Schuldich stiffen slightly and his eyelashes dropped. Schuldich had sold his soul to Eszet for silence in his head, or so he often claimed. He knew life had been hell on the telepath before he was taught to shield his mind, driven constantly insane by the mental chatter of thousands of people that he simply couldn't block out.
"I took Ray along because our cash was running low. As you know, telepaths can often mess with people's minds besides just reading them, and we needed him to… convince… the dealer to give us a better price." She gazed bitterly at the prone body on the couch. "If he dies, we paid far too much."
Schuldich stepped forward and searched the boy's pockets and loose jacket, and found several bags of small, clear crystals. He held these up to Crawford, who nodded at him to replace them and leaned back, crossing his legs and eyeing Sabbath like the god who could grant all her wishes.
Crawford was just as power-hungry as god. Sometimes, Farfarello thought he wanted to BE god. Foolish, since God's downfall was imminent. The Liar just didn't know it yet.
"Your story is very concerning to me," Crawford began, and Farfarello pressed his cheek to the cool glass pane, tuning out the rest of his speech. He caught the important parts; Crawford thought that the issue was grave enough to prompt Schwarz's involvement. He would check with Eszet for permission. No, of course he wouldn't mention her name. He would attempt to honor the secrecy of her friends, since there was a larger threat to deal with here, and he wanted cooperation on both sides. Yes, they would be vigilant over her friend and do all they could to help him. She should stay with them tonight, so that she could be assured that her friend was in good hands. She could use their phone to call her friends to tell them where she was, and tomorrow he, Crawford, would accompany her to deliver the highly important drugs to those who needed them.
At this, Sabbath protested. "No," she said quietly. "No offense, but we have few enough safe houses as it is, and while I'm indebted to you and grateful, I don't trust you. My comrades' safety comes first."
"You can't go back alone," Crawford pointed out, and she nodded.
"I know." Black eyes raised and Farfarello felt them light upon him. He turned and met her gaze, stroking the window as though it was a pet cat of which he was fond.
"Send Farfarello with me," she said firmly, turning back to Crawford.
"You trust him?" Crawford seemed deeply amused.
"He's the only one with interest in this situation beyond his own well-being," she pointed out. "He's also the only one here who doesn't look at me as though I'm a tool just WAITING to be used." She glanced at Schuldich and smirked. "Or exploited."
"Well, he's insane," Crawford said matter-of-factly, but he nodded. "As you wish. Farf will accompany you and make certain you aren't harmed. I'll send for a cot so you can stay with your friend," he offered generously.
"Thank you. That's very courteous."
Farfarello noticed she did not say "kind". As it was, her choice of words was chillingly appropriate. Farfarello had never seen Crawford be 'kind', though he suspected that Nagi, once in a while, had.
As Crawford went to request a cot from the front desk, Schuldich made a snorting sound and went to the refrigerator to retrieve something carbonated. "You're all insane and I still don't see why any of this matters to US," he said scathingly, smirking at Sabbath as she tilted her head and smirked back at him. "America's problems aren't Tokyo's, and aren't Schwarz's."
Sabbath snickered at Schuldich. "You don't believe that. This is a world connected by wires and radio waves. A butterfly beating its wings in Brazil causes a typhoon in India. Everything everyone does affects everyone else, and if you think this problem is too small to spread, I could introduce you to a few cancer victims who would set the record straight."
"All of our problems are all of our problems," Farfarello told him sagely.
She shrugged and nodded. "In a word… yeah."
Schu shook his mane of fiery hair and snorted. "Yeah, the web of life, isn't that the phrase? You New Age fanatics are all fucked in the head." He sauntered off toward his room.
"Says the sensation-junky telepath?" Sabbath shot back at him, rolling her eyes. "Pot, kettle, black."
Schuldich's slamming door was the only reply.
Sabbath drew in a slow breath and let it out, dark eyes focusing on Ray's comatose body as she sat hunched in her chair. His chest rose and fell steadily, but he didn't look peaceful. His face was drawn in pain. He really was handsome, Farfarello noticed, like the classic portrayal of an angel. Thick platinum hair, such clear blue eyes, tall and muscled and purely wholesome-looking. Not at all like Schuldich. It seemed impossible that the two had the same power, suffered the same torment. There were no needle tracks on the boy's inner arms, he noticed. This one didn't use drugs. Perhaps he wasn't a powerful telepath, or perhaps he had somehow taught himself to shield his mind. The silence stretched into cold infinity, and Farfarello finally broke it, padding silently over to stand behind Sabbath's chair. She jumped when he spoke to her and drew in a quick breath… such a human reaction.
"Why did your parents name you Sabbath?"
She raised an eyebrow at him, then snorted. "My parents," she said scathingly, "were snake-handling Southern Baptists. A bit far north for them – I was born in Cleveland – but that's what they were. I was born on Sunday, so I suppose they thought that was spiritually significant. You know, born on the Lord's Day? So they named me Sabbath." She shook her head knowingly. "I mean, it must have gone right over their heads that millions of babies are born every Sunday, and that Sunday isn't even the Sabbath – Saturday is the Sabbath. So I'm nothing special."
"If you're Gifted, you are special," Farfarello pointed out, but she shook her head.
"No," she said, confirming what he'd thought of her from the beginning. "I'm not Gifted."
"Because you are a witch," he said slowly, watching her as she twisted to drape herself over the arms of the chair.
She nodded. "My power is different. Magick is real, Farfarello. I like your name, by the way. Taken from Dante's 'Le Comedia Divina', isn't it?"
He nodded slowly.
"I thought so. But anyway, yes. Psychic power is scientific; it can be measured, controlled through means of chemicals and charts, it's passed on through genes. Magick isn't like that. Sometimes we get mixed up, but I'm a witch and no Psion. The One can still absorb me, make no mistake about that, but once they did that, they would just have a body with no Power to go with it." She let out a slow sigh. "And they can't combat magick. Which would be a great thing if there was more I could DO against them. But spell work takes time, and spells are subjective, and I can't throw a fireball down the street. I work in coincidence, in twisting the threads of fate, and it's hard to direct that power in combat. Nearly impossible. Takes creativity."
She was rambling but he did not mind. There was a simple frankness in her voice that he liked. His parents and Sister Ruth had always spoken of witchcraft as though it was highly mysterious and taboo, as if speaking the word "witch" could make you a witch. In all the Bible, witchcraft was the only sin never pardoned or forgiven. But Sabbath spoke of it like Crawford spoke of his precognition: with reverence and comfortable familiarity.
"You can heal," he pointed out, eyeing Ray, but she shook her head.
"No. Any doctor would look at what I did and say it's impressive, but coincidental. His bleeding stopped…. well, he must have a high metabolism and responsive immune system. He came out of physical shock quickly – same reason. I sped nature along, infused him with some of my strength, but that's all I did." Her voice took on an exhausted tone. "And I'm half afraid that if I go to sleep, it'll fade."
Before he could respond to that, Crawford opened the suite door and wheeled in a small mattress on a rolling cart, the cot he'd promised for Sabbath. She stood, the rings and buckles on her pants making quiet metallic music as she did, and he pushed the cot to the arm of the couch. "Please make yourself comfortable," he offered. "I'm going to bed." He gazed meaningfully at Farfarello, who turned and headed quietly toward his room, where he knew his straightjacket awaited.
The cot creaked behind him. Crawford was at his elbow.
"Do me a favor and stay where you're supposed to this time," the Oracle said a bit testily as he jerked the buckles tight, binding Farfarello's arms to his sides with criss-crossing leather straps. "Schuldich will only get you into trouble if you continue to follow his lead. He's irresponsible and he has absolutely no concern for our integrity as an organization."
Farfarello let him scold, not even listening. And as Crawford finished binding him and he flopped onto his bed, he didn't hear the shouting match that began in the next room as Crawford took his differences up with Schuldich. He focused his senses and heard only the quiet humming of a female voice. Before too long, the shouting match ended, and because his room was closest to the main room, he could hear the singing. She had a nice voice, if not a wonderful one. Accurate in pitch, full in tone, though she struggled a bit to switch from chest voice to head voice where the song required.
"Satan, you know where I lie….Gently I go into that good night. All our lives get complicated, search for pleasures overrated, never armed our souls for what the future would hold, when we were innocent…."
He wondered if the use of such a gift as singing, which was meant to praise God, to shout his glory to the heavens… how like an arrogant God, to create beauty of voice purely so that it could be devoted to his pleasure… caused God pain when used in such a way. He didn't recognize the song. Schuldich would, Schuldich loved American music and listened to it constantly along with guttural German techno that Farfarello found gave him a headache.
"Angels, lend me your might! Forfeit all my lives to get just one right…. All those colors long since faded, all our smiles are confiscated. Never were we told what the future would hold when we were innocent…"
Innocence. He contemplated it, bundled into his restraints, cast aside on a fully-dressed mattress. He was not innocent. He'd given up his innocence long ago, in every sense of the world. He lived to hurt God, existed to take revenge on The Liar for the deaths of his family in which he had been an unwitting accomplice. Schuldich's entire life, even his name, was a blatant bird flipped to the concept of innocence. 'Schuldich'. 'Guilty', in German. Crawford? He let out a soft chuckle at the very idea. No, only Nagi still possessed a bit of that innocence. He believed that the boy on their couch still did. There was innocence and angelic light in his face.
"This prayer is for me tonight…. This far down that line and still ain't got it right…."
And Sabbath, the pretty, shadowed witch? There was a certain innocence, he felt, contained in her passion. In the way she hid nothing and was, in no way, false. All her feelings were there to read in her eyes, all her intentions. No, that wasn't innocence. That was… honesty. The quality for which Farfarello hungered most, and had never found.
"And while confession's not yet stated, our next sin is contemplated. Never did we know what the future would hold, or that we'd be bought and sold when we were innocent."
He decided that he liked the song. He decided that he liked Sabbath. And as the dim lights of the city, which eclipsed the moon, filtered in through his window, he decided that in a way she was symbolic. As a once-devout Catholic, Farfarello placed high value on symbols.
He fell asleep and dreamed of demons, dancing in summoning circles with witches, and of the fires that consumed the enemies of God.
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