Well I've had a thoroughly exhausting week x) barely even enough time to write, it's ridiculous! Finals eat up literally all of your time...thank god I had time to update :D here you go!
CHAPTER 30: YOU ARE THE TRUTH OUTSCREAMING THESE LIES
March 21, 2014
Spaceland Rock Club, Battery City, California
3:14 PM
She almost didn't recognize him. His hair was stark blonde now, almost white, the opposite of the black she remembered seeing on him. There was a yellow mask over his eyes, and somehow, he looked very different in the blank gray light of Battery City instead of a dark, rosy sunset. But it was his voice, saying his codename, and it was definitely his warm, sparkling brown eyes staring out from behind the mask.
"Gerard," she repeated, more confidently.
"Lacey." He looked stunned.
She smiled softly. "You remember me."
"Of-of course I do."
A smaller girl stepped up to stand behind him, a massive grin gracing her face. "Poison?" she questioned.
Gerard seemed to snap out of his reverie. "Sunshine…we found Lacey."
Found me? Lacey wondered. Had they been looking for her?
"What…but how…Lacey, you're fine," he stuttered. "You…you're not on the pill, are you? Please don't tell me you're on the pill. Please."
Her face twisted into a grim smile. "We barely got away. I had to kill a Draculoid with a frying pan."
"You what?" he gawked.
"It's a really, really long story," she sighed. "But honestly, all that it comes down to is that we need your help."
"Anything," Gerard said immediately.
She bit her lip shyly. The sounds of the city roared around them, but she could hardly hear it through the sudden ringing in her ears. She was shocked to find she was nervous, when she had no reason to be.
"Remember last June, when you asked me to join the Killjoys and I said I'd think about it?"
He nodded. She hated the way she couldn't see his expression behind his mask.
"I thought about it. Me and Terry want—no, we need to join."
Gerard smirked. "Need is a pretty strong word."
"Well, this is a pretty strong need."
Sunshine was grinning at her warmly. She was absolutely gorgeous. Her hand was resting on Gerard's arm lightly, and to Lacey, it looked almost possessive. They're a couple, Lacey decided, and the thought confused her.
"Technically, I'm supposed to ask if you're a BL/ind agent first," Gerard said.
Those exact words. That was the exact same thing he had said to her so long ago, word-for-word. And it wasn't a coincidence. He was testing her, making sure it was really her controlling her mind.
"Do I look like a BL/ind agent?"
"Which is why I think it'll be fine to recruit you," he grinned.
She was trying very hard to resist the urge to hug him.
Sunshine glanced up at Terry. "Poison, you gonna introduce us?"
"Oh, right. Sunshine, meet Lacey—well, Recruit 1A for the next month, I guess. Lacey, this is Killjoy Screaming Sunshine. Sorry, I don't know you," he apologized, turning to her guardian.
"Terry Balsamo," the older man supplied. "I'm Lacey's…well, pretty much her father."
"He is my father," Lacey affirmed strongly as she caught hold of his hand. Terry grinned at her fondly.
"Nice to meet you, Terry. From now on, you're Recruit 1B. We'll explain more once we're somewhere safe," Sunshine told them brightly. She turned on her heel and started off down the sidewalk briskly, gesturing at them to follow.
Lacey shot Gerard a questioning look. "The city isn't secure," he explained in a hushed voice. "You never know who might be listening. Follow Sunshine, she'll lead you back to the car. I'll be right behind you."
She caught the quick movement of him unsheathing a brightly-colored shotgun from a holster at his hip, but Sunshine was rushing ahead with Terry in tow. She had to jog to catch up with them. Gerard was a few feet behind her, his heavy footfalls just audible to her hypersensitive ears.
The four took a roundabout route through countless rubble-filled and shady alleys, ducking into doorways at any mention of a Draculoid or Scarecrow. Once, Sunshine rounded a corner and swore before shoving Terry back. She fired her gun with a futuristic zap, and a minute later, they passed the body of a BL/ind employee face down in the center of the alley. The female Killjoy stepped over it and kept going as if she hadn't killed it only moments earlier.
Lacey glanced back every so often to look for Gerard. He was always there, a few feet behind her, on guard and constantly checking behind them. He seemed to have changed since the last time she'd met him—something out in the desert had toughened him from the loose-lipped, eager boy she'd first met into this cool, cautious rebel. The old him showed through too, though, especially when he smiled at her when he caught her looking.
Finally, they reached a compact white car parked at the edge of the city. There was a giant spiky spider splayed across the hood in black paint, a dead giveaway that this wasn't any regular car. Sure enough, Sunshine slid into the driver's seat and beckoned the two recruits in
"Welcome to the Trans Am," she murmured, twisting the key in the ignition and scanning the sidewalk for Gerard at the same time. "It's Poison's baby. He did the designs."
"Don't ya love 'em?" Gerard asked playfully as he dropped into the passenger seat. Sunshine shrieked and fumbled for her raygun before realizing who it was. She muttered a curse at her friend before peeling away from the curb, sending the vehicle shooting down the littered street.
Gerard let out a sigh and pushed his mask away from his eyes, displacing his white bangs. He swiveled in his seat to look at Lacey and Terry. "Alright, time for explanations," he requested. His eyes met Lacey's, and she launched headlong into her tale.
His eyes didn't leave her face at all as she talked. She found this strangely comforting as she relayed the wild and dangerous events of the past twenty-four hours, pausing every so often to let Terry fill in his part of the story. It sounded even more spectacular as they retold it, and the girl found herself wondering if she'd actually lived through that—the fight with the Draculoid, the miracle of re-finding the Killjoys' radio station, the mad dash to Battery City. It sounded surreal even to her. But the two Killjoys in the front seat seemed strangely okay with it, as if finding two near-strangers on the city streets and taking them home to their rebel headquarters was a daily occurrence. Then again, she wouldn't be overly surprised if it was.
She finished her tale just as they hit the edge of the old city. BL/ind hadn't repaired the outlying areas of Los Angeles yet, and so the streets there were dirty and rubble-filled. The Trans Am jolted over the chunks of asphalt violently, throwing the passengers from side to side, but Sunshine didn't seem fazed.
"I guess it's our turn to talk," Gerard commented wryly.
Lacey raised an eyebrow. "You believe it? Just like that?
"We've had worse," he shrugged. "We found Sunshine in the middle of an acid rain shower, pregnant and passed out in the desert."
"Pregnant?" Lacey gawked. She glanced at the girl again. Sunshine couldn't be a day over eighteen…
"You'll meet my fiancé and my daughter when we get to the warehouse," Sunshine grinned.
Now the new recruit was utterly confused. "So you're not…together?" She gestured helplessly at Sunshine and Gerard.
The revels turned to look at her simultaneously, then glanced at each other with revulsion. "No way!" Sunshine exclaimed. "That'd be like dating a brother!"
"Am I that repulsive?" Gerard grumbled.
Sunshine smirked. "Oh, you're not horrible. But Revolver's a thousand times better—no offense." She glanced back at Lacey, and her grin grew exponentially.
Gerard shot her a look that was a cross between an embarrassed grin and a warning. The black-haired girl mimed zipping her lips and turned back to the road, while he looked back at Lacey again.
"First of all: You know my real name, and I know yours' but we can't ever use them again. You'll be Recruit 1A until your training month is over and you pick your codename. I'm Killjoy Party Poison, nice to meet you." Lacey took his offered hand and shook it tentatively.
"There's a war in Utah, but we're fighting one in the Zones, too. There are Draculoids out there, and a new type of fighter. They're called Scarecrows, they're massive robots, and they're killing machines. If you see one, you run, no questions asked. Our mission? Keep the Zones BL/ind-free, keep our minds drug-free, and stay alive. In that order."
"Zones?" Terry questioned.
"Zones, the desert, No Man's Land, Killjoy territory. Whatever you want to call it," Gerard—Poison, Lacey reminded herself—elaborated. "The Killjoys are based out of an abandoned warehouse. We live in the warehouse, we train in the warehouse, and we protect the warehouse with our lives. We've got other bases scattered around the Zones, but that's our main one. There are fifteen of us and we go by codenames, except Grace. Grace is just Grace. We have to hide our identities from BL/ind—that's why we've got these." He tapped the plastic masquerade eye mask resting on his forehead. "You'll be trainees for a month while we teach you and monitor you. If you're trustworthy and don't get yourself ghosted by the end of the month, you join the Killjoys."
Lacey had a ridiculous amount of questions and no idea where to start. She looked to Terry, but he seemed just as mystified as her, although there was no way he'd ask Poison anything. He'd leave that to her.
"Does BL/ind know?" she asked.
Sunshine chuckled bitterly. "Oh, definitely. They send waves of drones to kill us on a daily basis. They just don't get it—they haven't beat us yet, and they're not going to. They've got technology, but we've got heart."
"You fight them? Like, actually kill Draculoids? With what?"
Poison smiled and pulled his yellow raygun from his belt, swinging it casually around his index finger as he spoke. "We kill them, alright. With their own weapons. It's poetic justice."
"Poison's full of himself, just cause he's got the highest kill count out of all the Killjoys," Sunshine muttered.
"Is somebody jealous?" Poison teased.
Sunshine huffed. "Your brother says I'm way better at karate. Better than him, even."
"Kobra Kid is a geek who has no idea how to fight," he protested. "Karate is for—"
"And that brings us to our next point: alternative fighting styles!" the girl cut in brightly.
Poison stuck his tongue out childishly, but returned to the topic. "About a week ago, we decided we need better training. We're teaching each other as many different fighting styles as we can. My brother Kobra's teaching karate, Jet Star knows some sword fighting, Sunshine's fiancé Ghost Revolver wrestles, stuff like that. They put me in charge of shooting lessons, even though none of us really need them. I guess you will, though."
It was that comment that drove the point home for Lacey. This was real. It wasn't just a boy telling her the story of his rebellion anymore—it would be her fight, too. Lacey was going to learn to shoot. Lacey was going to kill Draculoids. Lacey was going to become a rebel.
"You kill them," she repeated slowly. "You kill Draculoids."
"We kill the Dracs, or the Dracs kill us," Poison said grimly.
That scared her more than anything else she'd heard.
Sunshine made a sharp turn, and suddenly, the highway was turning to dusty road under the wheels. The signs of the city were fading away beneath them. On the sides of the lone strip of black asphalt the dirt and broken buildings were being absorbed into endless waves of golden sand, punctuated by short, scrubby green trees.
"It's so bright," Terry mumbled. He shaded his eyes with one hand as he peered out the window at the rapidly transforming landscape.
"Welcome to the desert," Poison grinned. "None of us really understand why, but there's no sun in Battery City. There's been a constant cloud cover since BL/ind took over. It's only noticeable when you come out here, but it's a hell of a lot nicer."
Lacey pressed her nose to the window. Outside the thin layer of glass, the sand gleamed brightly in the afternoon sun. The sky was the purest shade of robin's egg blue she'd ever seen, hanging over the desert in a burst of color.
"This is gorgeous," she murmured under her breath. She didn't intend for anyone to hear it, but Poison spun around and smiled at her.
"Best place in California," he assured her. "BL/ind hasn't blotted out all the color. We've still got our Zones."
"I can see why you'd want to protect this," she answered. She pressed one fingertip to the glass, suddenly filled with the insane urge to touch that achingly bright sky.
Poison's gaze was directed out at the desert, too. "It's our home," he said quietly. "Everything I've really learned about life, I've learned out here. I can't let it go. I can't let them take the desert."
"Hey." Lacey reached around the seat back to lay a hand on his shoulder comfortingly. "They won't."
"Not while I'm around," he agreed.
A gas station slowly rose out of the horizon, then a motel a couple hours later. Sunshine acknowledged each landmark with an offhand remark about a radio station or fuel for the vehicles, but they shot past both without much thought. Finally, what looked to be a metal road sign painted over with a skull and crossbones appeared on the side of the road, and a moment later, Lacey caught her first glimpse of the venerated warehouse.
"Welcome to the base," Sunshine grinned.
The Trans Am stopped in front of the massive brick and corrugated metal building. Just like the rest of the desert, it was a concentrated blast of energy and color. The lower half was heavily graffitied with swears and crude symbols interspersed with more artistic efforts. One side was entirely taken up with a vivid mural of the desert, complete with figures clothed in neon jackets and holding rayguns. The lower left corner was signed 'Party Poison' with a symbol that seemed to be one of BL/ind's blue-and-white pills with a large red X underneath.
"You did that?" Lacey asked Poison curiously.
He blushed and scratched the back of his bleached head. "I like painting."
"You're really good at it," she murmured, running a finger over one of the figures. It stood back-to-back with a sandy-haired teen in a red jacket, their guns pointing out in opposing directions as they covered each other.
"That's me and my brother," he told her. "Kobra Kid. You'll meet him in a minute."
Lacey took one last look at the mural before following Poison back to the front of the building, where a set of ten-foot-high double doors loomed. Sunshine pulled at the handle, and they swung outwards with a rending creak, dislodging drifts of sand that had piled up against the doors.
"Hey, we're home," she called softly into the space. She beckoned Lacey and Terry forward, and they peered into the interior of the massive space, lit by a row of crudely-cut windows on one side.
"Sun?" A male voice called.
"Hey, Ghost." Sunshine grinned widely as a man rose from a couch and walked rather quickly towards the door. He held something cradled in both his arms, and as he got closer, Lacey realized it was a baby.
Sunshine ran forward to meet them and flung her arms around his neck, pressing a kiss first to the man's lips, then to the baby's forehead. She stretched up on her tiptoes to whisper something in his ear before taking the child from his arms.
"Recruits 1A and 1B, meet my fiancé, Ghost Revolver, and my daughter Grace," she announced.
Sunshine's family was one of the happiest sights Lacey had seen since Day Zero. Both parents were completely focused on their baby and each other, and the mother's face had transformed the moment she caught sight of them. Grace was simply adorable, with wide, curious blue eyes and a tuft of curly brown hair on her forehead. She gurgled at Lacey and grinned a toothless smile.
"Recruits?" Revolver asked, surprised. "Where'd you come from?"
"Ger—um, Party Poison found us in the city," Lacey explained. She noticed him raise an eyebrow when she nearly mentioned his real name. "I knew him from before—he wanted me to join up earlier."
"It's a long story," Poison cut in. Lacey wasn't aware he had followed her in; she faintly wondered how long he had been standing behind her.
Sunshine grabbed Revolver's hand with her free one. "C'mon, let's go get the rest of the Killjoys," she murmured. A strange look passed between her and Poison, and she added, "1B, do you want us to show you around the warehouse? I'm sure Poison needs to talk with 1A about…logistics."
"Alright," Terry agreed easily. He followed the teenage couple towards a ladder at the back of the warehouse, and suddenly, Lacey found herself completely alone with Poison.
"How did you find me?" she blurted out.
He turned to look at her, confused. "Find you?"
"You're not in the city every day. Sunshine said so. There's no point risking your lives going in. So why were you at Spaceland today?"
Poison sighed. He had moved so he was standing right in front of her, staring down at her intensely. She absently noticed his eyes weren't as pure brown as she'd thought. They were flecked with hazel and gray, giving them a more serious look.
"Poison?" she asked again.
"Would you think I'm crazy if I told you I felt you?" he said finally.
"Felt me?"
"Felt your presence. It's…God, I'm sounding psychotic. How do I describe this? It's like…I had this feeling. Sunshine kept asking about you after I told her about potential recruits. She thought we should go back into the city to check. I didn't want to, but then…I just got this instinct, that I had to go back. It was like you called me or something."
"That's freaky shit," Lacey muttered.
He frowned and dropped his gaze. "I know. You think I'm out of my mind."
"No, I don't. I totally get what you're talking about." And she did, because she'd had a similar feeling before—like a presence. Maybe she and Gerard had forged a psychic link last June or something.
"It was mostly Sunshine. She convinced me. We wouldn't have been in the city if it wasn't for her."
"Well, it's a damn good thing you were," Lacey murmured. "You saved us, Poison. You and your Killjoys."
"Jesus, Lace, don't give me a complex," he smirked. The nickname fell from his lips naturally, as if he had been saying it all his life. Then he suddenly snapped him mouth shut in horror.
"You guys really are high security here, aren't you?" she asked as they began to walk in the direction Terry, Sunshine, Revolver and Grace had disappeared to a few minutes ago.
Poison rolled his eyes. "We try to be. Most of the time none of us really care about the codenames—well, Revolution Rage, who you'll meet soon, does because he's got a conspiracy complex. But we'll probably up security for a month because you and Recruit 1B are potential security leaks. Not necessarily because we think you're spies, although we can't rule out that possibility of course, but you could have trackers or cameras on you without you knowing. It's happened—one of our guys, Bulletproof Angel, came home from a Zone sweep and left straight for the motel. A swarm of Dracs ambushed it. Took us weeks to clear it out, and we still try to use it as little as possible."
"Shit. Really?" Lacey swept a hand down her arm, subconsciously checking for anything unusual.
Poison nodded seriously. "Kobra and Detonator Threat will sweep you once Sunshine gets them. Till then, we can't say too much."
"Haven't you already said too much, then…?"
"Nope." The blonde man shook his head. "No locations, no names, no sensitive information. We lied about most things in the car—sorry about that. You'll learn more over the month. It's easier and safer than just telling you."
"This is complicated," the girl grumbled.
He smiled apologetically. "I'll help you learn, don't worry. I'll be your Killjoy mentor."
They'd stopped walking again, this time in front of a metal ladder, and Poison was standing rather close to Lacey. There were only a few inches between the fingers of their hands. Hot, stale air swirled around them. Lacey felt like the entire desert was electrified.
"Who's the chick?" someone asked, breaking the fragile silence.
Lacey and Poison jerked their heads around in sync. A smaller boy had climbed nearly all the way down the ladder, and he was looking down at her curiously. He skipped the last three rungs and landed lithely on his feet in front of the couple.
"Do I know you?" he asked. "I feel like I've seen you before."
"Erm…I think so?" Lacey recognized him too. There was something about his face that was familiar.
"You've met," Poison affirmed. "Recruit 1A, this is Fun Ghoul. He was with me at Spaceland when we met."
Fun Ghoul's jaw dropped. "You found her?"
"We found each other," Poison modified quietly.
Lacey watched as two more boys joined Fun Ghoul in front of them and swiftly moved to the side to make room for Terry, Sunshine and Revolver to climb down. The taller boy seemed to have a perpetual lazy grin, while the other couldn't have been older than sixteen and was constantly pushing his glasses up his nose.
"Jet Star," the taller announced immediately. His large, muscular hand enveloped hers in a strong handshake. "Call me Jet, though. Welcome to the Killjoys."
"That's Kobra," Ghoul added, jerking a thumb at the boy with the glasses. "He doesn't talk much."
"Shut up," Kobra grumbled. He shot a small, distracted half-smile at Lacey before glancing back to his feet.
The group continued to grow, a seemingly never-ending stream of people following each other down the ladder. A flurry of names and face flew past Lacey—Sinister Surgeon, a cheery Korean man; Rust Wolf, a lean, muscular brunette; Gravity Crash, a pale man with a mass of curly hair like an afro; Black Adrenaline Raygun, an energetic, wild-eyed older guy. The list went on, but the faces and names began to blend into a blur of dangerous words and colorful masks.
Finally, the diminutive man with the forest green mask that had introduced himself as Doctor Death Defying quieted the group and let Lacey be led away by Kobra and Detonator Threat, who had a wiry and devious look about him and a shock of ginger hair. Kobra awkwardly patter=d her down, blushing furiously the whole time, while Detonator swept some futuristic-looking rod down her body before declaring her clear of trackers.
"You can have her back now, Poison," Detonator called jokingly as Lacey instinctively gravitated back to his side. Both blushed and shifted away from each other as if the other was burning. She moved to stand next to Terry, who was talking with Revolution Rage, an older serious-looking blonde.
"Hey, Killjoys. Shut up," Doctor D yelled above the chatter of voices. The sixteen people gathered around him fell silent, all except Grace, who continued to gurgle quietly in her mother's arms.
"We've got recruits for the first time in four months. I know it's been a while, but the rules still hold—no real names till the training month is over. Recruits 1A and 1B are probationary members. Treat them like it. Both of them need a training mentor…Sunshine, you can cover 1B, right?"
The girl nodded and grinned at Terry warmly.
"1A, you seem to get along with Poison, so he can train you."
Lacey gave a small start and looked back at Poison. He didn't seem at all surprised by the assignment, and winked at her with the eye not covered by his fluttering white-blond bangs.
Doctor D clapped his hands briskly. "Otherwise, business as normal. Be on guard at the motel, and make the broadcasts good. Keep your boots tight—"
"Keep your gun close, and die with your mask on if you've got to," Ghoul recited under his breath along with the leader.
The older man's eyes crinkled as he smiled. "Killjoys, make some noise."
The group began to disperse, but Doctor D caught hold of Poison and Lacey before they could follow Terry, Sunshine and Revolver back up the ladder. "Do you two know each other from before?" he asked quietly.
"Yeah," Poison and Lacey answered in sync.
"From before the apocalypse?"
Both of them began to speak at once, then stopped awkwardly. Lacey felt her face heat and gestured to Poison to talk.
"I tried to recruit her in July at a Xero show. She got in trouble with BL/ind, she remembered me, she went back to Spaceland and I found her. We're, um, acquaintances I guess."
"I see." Doctor D raised an eyebrow. "So you just assumed it'd be safe to bring them back?"
Lacey stared down at her feet. Her fingers twisted in the hem of her t-shirt as she tried to make herself invisible.
"She needed our help. I wasn't going to turn her down—anyway, we need recruits. You know that," Poison protested.
"Well, I trust your judgment," Doctor D told him simply. Both Poison and Lacey smiled in relief.
"Train well, and don't let your, er, feelings get in the way of Killjoy duties. 1A—welcome to the Killjoys."
"Thank you, Doctor Death," Lacey grinned.