Disclaimer: Exalted is White Wolf's, Worm is Wildbow's (Don't forget to vote.) I'm just playing with their toys.
Black Nadir 6.1
I pulled Sundancer up, even as I felt - not odd, or sick - but incomplete. Like I had been supposed to say something, do something in that exact moment. Words, incomprehensible, were whispered from the darkness nooks and crannies around. So sibilant as to be silent, but I could just barely make them out.
I shrugged it off. I had more important things to take care of at the moment. The Endbringer, for one. Daphne, too. I could play with new powers later. I looked at Sundancer, debating whether or not to take her with me. She had been dealt a bad hand - something I could sympathize with - but had let it play out, until only a few minutes ago. She had to atone. I stretched out my wings, and walked the two steps that separated us. I wrapped my arms around her, and before she could complain, took off. She gripped my arms tight, surprised.
"We are rescuing Damsel, and then helping with the Endbringer," I stated, not taking any suggestions. She looked like she wanted to disagree, mouth opening, before she closed it, spitting out dust. Which was why I had made sure to speak close to her ear, and not use my mouth as an airborne vacuum. She had yet to learn the perils of flying head first. At least her clothing was sensible - supersensible compared to my hospital gown.
Even with the dust partially occluding the city, finding my way back to where the fight had started was all too easy. Several blocks, in their entirety, had been levelled. Numerous skyscrapers had either collapsed, or been outright destroyed. And half of the buildings in the city didn't have windows, from the explosion offshore. I followed the path of diminishing damage, and spotted the Deli sign, easily visible without any interfering lights.
I touched down in the street, letting Sundancer go. Before I could tell her to stay put, she said, "Let me go first. I can tell Jess to stand down. And tell her what happened to…"
She trailed off, looking a decade older in just an instant. Face ashen, lips pressed together, before her countenance shifted shades to a variety of greens. I had a very strong feeling that I knew what was coming, and I stepped back, out of her potential range.
Sundancer hunched over, emptying her stomach on her shoes. Emptying, literally, as she started dry heaving after applying a thick coat of vomit to her feet. Holding her stomach, she stood upright, and whispered, "Oh God. What did I do?"
I needed her, for the upcoming fight. She had destroyed half a car with a snapshot, and had turned an intersection into a field of ash and pavement goo. She had to keep it together, had to be ready for anything. She couldn't just give up here.
"You did the right thing," I said, as soothingly as I could. "You helped stop them, didn't you?"
Around us, my green glow intensified, as I laced my bullshit with my power. The giant spider was leaning forward, peering at Sundancer, its little tiny forelegs rubbing together. There was something different about that thing, but I didn't know anything about spiders. Another project to add to the pile.
"All those people. And I killed -" Sundancer choked up, hands covering her face. I debated touching her shoulder to show support. My mother had been more feely for lack of a better word, but I had never had the chance nor inclination to take that route. Emma, when she was faking being my friend, had never been one for physical contact, and I hadn't had the opportunity to have another friend. Maybe Daphne. Who was waiting up there, behind two of the Traveller's support team, from what I recalled from his briefing.
I'd love to know why the Number Man didn't consider a giant multi-limbed-thing that could make evil clones a notable threat. A topic for later musings, though.
"They were killing people," I said, touching her shoulder. "Hundreds, maybe thousands. If you hadn't stepped in, who knows how many innocent people would've died."
It was easy to twist the truth. To ease her guilt, to help her forget what she had kept secret, and let loose by negligence. I added, "And you can make up for it, remember?"
She nodded, weakly, and said, "I never wanted to be a villain. Or a cape, even. I didn't want to hurt people."
I gently guided her to the door leading up to the apartments above the deli. The Endbringer alarms punctuated our conversation with brief, sharp wails. I was wasting too much time here.
"You don't have to hurt just anyone," I replied, drawing on my own experiences, selectively. "If your power is so destructive, like mine, or Damsel's you just have to pick your targets. There are plenty of people who only live to hurt others, and that's who we stop."
I didn't mention killing Sophia.
"Yeah," she whispered, staring straight ahead. She didn't brush my hand off her shoulder, but she moved more confidently.
"Even in the Bay, I saw people's lives ruined by drugs, gangs, villains. And I always wanted to work outside the law to solve those problems," I lied. I just hadn't wanted to be in such an examined, well-known, and social group as the Wards/Protectorate. I just wanted to do good.
She didn't reply, and I didn't push her any further. With luck, she was not going to give up, and cost New York another cape to defend against the Endbringer. She pulled a key out of a hidden pocket in her armor, and opened the door. It swung open, and I followed her up the stairs to where I had previously been, not even an hour ago.
"Jess," Sundancer called out, followed by, "Oliver?"
I brushed past her, walking into the apartment, and heading straight for where I had seen Damsel. She wasn't there, but there were angry noises coming from one of the bedrooms. Not Noelle's. I cracked the door, watching carefully for an ambush.
Damsel- Daphne, since she was out of costume, was still trussed up, but on the bed. She was cursing, from the vehemence and speed of her mumblings, as she tried to pull her ropes off by wiggling. It wasn't very successful, especially with how they were tied behind her back and had an actual ball-gag in her mouth. I moved slowly, not wanting to startle her and get a face full of disintegration.
"Daphne," I whispered.
She stopped imitating a worm, and cocked her head as best she could in my direction.
"Daphne," I said, louder this time.
"Mmp-mpph?" She, well, said wasn't quite accurate, through the gag.
"It's Taylor," I agreed.
"Mp-mph!" She mumbled joyously.
"I'll be right back. I need a knife, if I don't want to injure you."
She made a noise of agreement, visibly relaxing. And she snuggled as best she could into a pillow, waiting. It was kind of ridiculous. Back in the living room, I ran into Sundancer
"They left," she said, slightly stunned.
"Oliver and the wheelchair girl?" I confirmed.
"They left me," she repeated, only paying the slightest bit of attention to me. She leaned against the counter, overhead fluorescent light giving her a washed-out look. I pulled a knife from a cutting block in the kitchen, and went back into the makeshift prison.
"Hold still," I commanded, even as I took the knife to the ropes around Damsel's wrists. A brief bit of sawing, and they came free, and rubbing her wrists, she gestured at her feet. Another knot was down there, and I gently cut it apart.
She struggled out of the ropes, tossing them to the side before taking the ball-gag out of her mouth. "Thanks for the rescue. But aren't you a little short to be Defiler?"
I rolled my eyes, not dignifying that with a response. She followed me out of the bedroom, cheerful. Until she saw who was in the kitchen, and they locked eyes.
"What's she doing here," Damsel snapped, hands pointed at Sundancer, who turned away.
"She's with us," I answered, seriously.
"What!?" Both of them shouted, Damsel angrily and Sundancer in stunned surprise.
"Your team abandoned you," I pointed out to Sundancer, her face darkening. "You don't have anywhere to go. And if you were serious about atoning…"
She caught the meaning of my trailed off words; That she wasn't serious, and with her skin turning blotchy red with anger, she retorted, "I was! Do you think I like being to blame for however many children just died? How many orphans I made? That I enjoyed killing one of my last links home?"
"No, I think you want to assuage your guilt. That you just want to give up, and say, 'I couldn't do any more.'" I said, honestly. And hurtfully. I knew what I was doing - it had happened to me, too many times.
She paled, both from lessening anger, and sudden shock. I had hurt her with my words, yes - but she needed to hear the unvarnished truth, no matter how painful it was.
I continued, "I think for all your power and abilities, you just want to be a normal girl. Even when you have the capability to help, you didn't, until I rubbed your nose in it."
"No," she whispered.
"And, you let something like that live. It wasn't the first time she had eaten someone, I'm sure."
"I didn't-" she pleaded softly.
"How many times, I wonder, did she kill people by just existing? People who had done nothing wrong, who where just in the wrong place at the wrong time?" I continued right over her objections, reaching down to pick up a discarded red cloth. .
She stepped back, hands shaking.
"But no, go away. Give up your costume. Don't do anything with your gifts. Let people be kidnapped. Let people be murdered. Let people be eaten," I said, voice rising to a crescendo, gesturing at her costume and the used one in my hand, tossing it away, before stopping and looking at her carefully. She was shaking, eyes wide and glistening, staring right at me. Her face could have passed for porcelain.
"Just go. It's what you want to do," I whispered.
"I'm coming," she said, hoarse.
I ignored her, feeling heartbroken. How many times had words just as hateful or damaging been thrown into my face? How many times had I cried, shaking, just trying to hide? How many times had I been so desperate to get away that I nearly lost my mind? And here I was, mirroring my tormentor's actions.
"I'm coming with you," she stated, louder, wiping away tears. "You are a vigilante group, right? No one will take me. But you will, right?"
I nodded. She mirrored me, and turned away, rubbing her eyes before turning back around, her eyes dry but swollen and reddened.
"We've got work to do," I ordered, and jerked my head to the side. I left the apartment, and took a step down the stairs, and was relieved to hear two sets of feet following. Relieved, and disgusted with myself.
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I left the building, carefully keeping my wings folded in the staircase, to keep them from snagging on something, followed by both Sundancer and Damsel. In the street, I turned back to them. How were we going to get anywhere, when only one of us could fly, and I didn't think I could carry both of them. Well, I had lifted Noelle, so it was well within the realm of possibility, but I had to be careful with Damsel -
Wait, wasn't she hurt?
"Damsel, weren't you knocked out in the hospital?" I asked, even more confused, as I noted that she was also walking unaided.
"Yeah, but they only did that when they figured I was Damsel. They slapped a needle full of something in my IV bag, and I was out," she explained, pulling up her pants leg to show her fully healed leg. Nothing but a faint scar remained, from where there had been bone poking out before.
"How'd you heal that fast?" I asked, somewhat irrationally jealous. I'd like to not have a skin like a bell foundry, even if it was just a temporary side effect from my healing power. Was that some application of her space-warping powers? How would that even work?
"No idea," she replied, shrugging. "I just woke up, dressed in a pair of sweats, bound and gagged, and with a fish monster telling me not to move."
"Fish monster," I repeated, "Do you mean Noelle? Did she try to, you know?"
"Who's Noelle? And what would she do?" Damsel quered, confused. She stopped looking at me, and at the street. The street, which had been the location for the beginning of Noelle's and I's rampage. Debris, from bricks to parts of cars, was scattered across the entire street. Huge dents in the pavement, from either one of us being slammed into the ground, dotted the road.
"What the hell happened here?" Damsel shouted, adding, "Did the Endbringer already show up?"
"Noelle," Sundancer and I both answered, in sync.
Daphne quickly glared at Sundancer, reminded of her presence, before she looked back at me and ignored Sundancer, even as Sundancer kept looking back at her. "Who's Noelle?"
"A long story, and we've got a bigger problem. The Endbringer," I answered, Sundancer nodding along.
"Endbringer, huh. I was hoping the alarm was a test. I've never actually fought against one," Damsel admitted. I didn't know her that well, truly, but even I could tell she was frightened. That she was a moment away from freaking out, or collapsing in panic. She shifted her weight, hands wringing, eyes downcast. She looked up at me quickly, before looking at her feet again.
"What," I said, impatient. "We've got to go."
She mumbled something, incomprehensible even at this short distance. The alarm's occasional bursts of sound didn't help make what she was saying any more comprehensible either.
"Daph- Damsel," I corrected myself, "It's already been several minutes since it went off, and we came up here to grab you. What?"
If anything, she looked even more guilty. Looking more like my junior than a woman four years my elder, she nearly whined, "I don't want to go."
"To help fight the Endbringer?" I asked, surprised. Maybe I should've been less surprised, considering that I knew she had been a villain rather than a vigilante, but even I knew about the truce between capes to fight Endbringers.
She shook her head, lips pressed into a tight line. And I could see she was terrified. The green glow had cast her skin into an attractive pallor, but she had gone ashen now. Her thin frame was shaking, ever so slightly, and not from the cold. She gave me a look, made of equal parts terror and hope.
"You don't have to come," I ventured. I wasn't going to force her -
She nearly jumped on me, arms clamping around my back to pull me into a tight hug. My shoulder, exposed through the hospital gown, started getting damp.
"Be safe, please," she whispered, trying to squeeze the air out of me.
"The apartment was bombed," I informed her.
She pulled away, surprised by my non-sequitur. "What?"
"The new apartment. It was bombed, so you will have to go to the old one. I don't have any keys either," I finished with a gesture at my lacking garments.
Damsel half-sobbed, half-giggled. "Way to ruin the moment. Be careful, okay?"
"You too. I don't know if the Mob found out about the first apartment -"
Sundancer interrupted, "Only the one by Central Park."
I continued, as if she hadn't spoken, "- but be careful, in case they have."
Damsel nodded, and ran off, one leg obviously a bit stiff. She yelled over her shoulder, "You better come back! I'm not moving your stuff!"
She turned a corner, out of our sight. Sundancer, now silent, looked over at my nearly torn gown. She glanced back and forth at it, and finally asked, "Do you want some of my clothes? I think we are about the same size. If you didn't want to fight in that, I mean."
"How long do you think the alarms have been going off for? We need to get to the assembly area before the Endbringer shows up."
"Seven minutes, since you picked me up, I think. Roughly twenty, overall." She said, after a brief bit of counting her fingers and whispering to herself.
"Pants," I blurted. I hastily corrected myself, "Yes. I would like some clothes."
"Whatever happened here, my stuff was untouched. Even when they left," Sundancer said, voice strained.
I grabbed her, and with a near instant flight, landed on the lip of the hole I had made shoving Noelle out onto the street. I set Sundancer down, and followed her in, wings nearly dragging on the floor. The hole was big, but fairly messy, with wood planks sticking out. I had kept my wings for nearly half an hour now, and I didn't want to have to regrow them. My reserves of energy for my powers were almost entirely empty, but for maybe a third of my lesser, inner pool.
Sundancer entered one of the bedrooms further in the apartment, nearly over what would be the entrance to the deli on the first floor. She came back, carrying a pair of jeans, a shirt, and underclothes.
"Thank you," I said, gratefully accepting actual clothes. She walked past me, and looked out the hole while I changed. I tore out the back of the t-shirt, to accommodate my wings, and held it out behind me.
"A little help, please."
Sundancer took the shirt from my outstretched hands, and after several aborted tries to get it over my wings, she finally just gave up. She walked away, doing who knew what in the kitchen, before dropping the shirt back in my hands. She had cut out a huge rectangle of fabric from the back, only leaving the seam at the bottom. It was cut too.
"Like a one-piece," she explained, motioning with her hands to explain.
"Ah." I slid my arms through shoulder holes, and let her handle the back. I could feel her tying the cut seam together, and then she stepped back.
"Good. Let's go."
I answered her by half-tackling, half-grabbing her, and jumping out of the apartment. Several swift beats of my wings later, we were rising, and I angled around, heading for Times Square. Where the PRT Headquarters was. The most likely place for everyone to assemble.
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I could see spotlights, shimmering pillars of light, appearing solid from the dust in the air. At least a dozen had taken up residence in Times Square, and even with the distracting brightness they let off, I could see several capes flying in, going down for a landing among the spotlights. A cordon of PRT officers, trucks, vans, and armored vehicles surrounded the HQ, leaving a small portion of the street open. It had a dozen capes, with a pair landing just as I saw.
I headed down, not as bright as the surrounding spotlights, but still catching the eyes of the crowd of capes standing outside. Volcano, familiar from both the other night before my swim, and as a more senior member of the local Protectorate team, waved me down. He didn't look angry, which was a nice change from being, 'Oh no Defiler!' Until I dropped Sundancer down, landing behind her. Then his face, and several others among the group twisted, hate showing.
"Why the hell is one of them here?" he asked, hands coming up, instants away from igniting. He was a combination of Blaster/Mover, a protege of sorts to Legend. Of sorts, because he would never come close to Legend, or surpass him, both in power and presence.
"She is with me," I retorted, moving in front of Sundancer, adding, "any other problems? Or can we get started before the Endbringer shows up."
"Fine," he all but spat out, "But keep this one on a leash. The city is already half destroyed, thanks to them."
He turned on his heel, marching into the PRT building. All but two of the capes followed, as we were apparently the last call. One of them, a woman, looked at us, studiously neutral, while the man, who looked like he had been rolled through a flatbed of rock candy, glared at us. Or just looked at us, it was hard to tell.
"C'mon," I muttered to Sundancer. She followed me into the lobby I had escaped from earlier in the evening silently. Upset, likely, after being blamed for Noelle, again. She had to atone, yes. And she was partially at fault. But she didn't deserve the lion's share of the blame, and those capes out there had no idea what had happened. That Trickster had been the one at her side - and they had to have known that, on second thought, if they were blaming Sundancer. They must have seen Trickster helping Noelle, and now were painting Sundancer with the same brush. She hadn't tried to kill, or even killed, any of the responding heroes. She had killed one of her former friends, or teammates, who had gone bad, and was now helping me.
They could go get brain surgery. With rusted chainsaws.
I whispered to Sundancer, as I held open the door, "Fuck 'em. We stopped all that mess, not them."
Her head whipped back, and she stared at me. Self-conscious, I shrugged. "If I hadn't, with help from Legend, killed Noelle, there would be a million clones out there. If you hadn't killed Trickster, and the clones with him, they could have kept destroying the city. We did what we had to."
She nodded, off-balance, and fell in behind me as we followed the capes from the landing area. We went up a flight of stairs - marble with extensive trim, leaving me to wonder how much they spent on this building -, and into a massive conference room. It was more like a movie theater, than a conference room. Conference room implied a single table and chairs. This was rows of seats in front of a platform and screen. Sundancer took a seat in the upper corner farther from the door, and I stood behind her. Wings and seats were a worse combination than wings and jackets. Nervous conversations, full of forced cheer and empty laughter, filled the auditorium.
Director Wilkins walked out onto the stage, sound dying to down to a minimum, and he clicked a little remote. The lights went off, except for mine. He coughed, exaggerating it, and looked at me. I shrugged, helplessly, and I was embarrassed. I wasn't going full blast, but I was still bright enough that I could serve as a desk light for half the room. I wish I knew how to turn the lights off with just a thought. He clicked the lights back on, and hit a different button.
The most feared woman in the world.
Or, most feared woman-shaped thing. The Simurgh, in a picture taken in broad daylight, took up the entire screen. White wings, uncountable, covered her body, with the biggest three fully extended. A storm of metal was swirling in front of her, forming a large ring.
"Ladies and gentlemen. Less than an hour ago, the Simurgh appeared over Canberra."
I had thought the room was silent - now it was a tomb. The Simurgh. Behemoth was feared as a capekiller, but the Simurgh was terrifying. To not know if you were your own enemy. To know that you could be turned into a guided missile. Everyone had heard the horror stories, of entire towns being quarantined because they had been affected by her.
And she was what I had to face. Injured, and running on fumes. Sundancer balled up, bringing her knees to her chest, hugging them. I had people to look after - Damsel, and Sundancer, somewhat. They both had been dealt a bad hand - and I could turn them, if not on the straight and narrow, at least in the right direction. And this was just the first step, but a critical one. Placing her life in between others and a monstrous threat, again.
I put my hand on her shoulder, in a gesture my mom had done a thousand times. I leaned over, and whispered, "We can do it. Can't be tougher than evil clones."
Sundancer snorted, either amused or disgusted. On stage, Director Wilkins continued, "At which point she constructed a device, using the parts taken from Canberra, and teleported. To Montreal."
Shouts of shock, and denial echoed through the room. My stomach dropped out from my body, and tried to reach Australia. Humanity as a whole had been surviving, not winning the fights with the Endbringers. And one of the primary reasons any layman could tell you for our continued existence, was that they only attacked a single place before retreating.
No longer.
The crowd, composed of veteran capes, was now divided into two camps. Those who were stunned into silence, like myself and Sundancer, and those who thought if they could make enough noise, the Simurgh would go away. The Director put his hands to his mouth, and whistled.
"Listen up! No matter what she did before, we have to stop her in Montreal. Teleporters are going to be coming to pick all volunteers up, after Chicago and Los Angeles send their teams. Anyone who isn't willing, I'd suggest you leave. The city can use your help outside, too."
Several people, dressed like villains, stood, but all three - two men and a woman - were pulled down by their compatriots, and engaged in low, furious whispered conversations.
"Good," Wilkins looked at his phone, and announced, "Teleporters in seven minutes. The cafeteria is behind us, and we have gear, if any cape needs it. Seven minutes."
He walked off the stage, meeting an assistant. I pulled Sundancer up, hungry. It could be my last meal. And I didn't want to face the Simurgh on an empty stomach as well as empty powers.
"How can you be hungry, right now?" She asked, still following me as we left the auditorium.
"I think I'm in shock," I remarked, candidly, "Maybe it's a coping mechanism."
"Defiler!"
Hearing my cape name shouted, I turned back around, looking at who had come out of the auditorium to talk to me. Maybe a gang member, who had lost someone. Or someone who had known Sophia. I probably wouldn't be able to eat, but that had just been something to do, really. Something to take my mind off the -
Battery. A cape from Brockton Bay, specifically, the Protectorate. What was she doing here?
"Defiler," she said, at a normal volume, walking up to me. She pulled out her phone, an identical model to the Director's.
"It's for you," Battery said, holding her phone out to me. I took it and held it up to my ear, waiting for the caller to talk first.
"Defiler," the Number Man said, "It's time. I am calling in the favor you owe."
"And I wanted to talk to you," I ground out, nearly crushing the phone in my hand. "You forgot to mention something."
"If you are referring to the last member of the Travellers, no I did not. You hung up before I could warn you that they were sheltering something," he replied, voice calm. Battery stepped back, out of hearing range, and waited, watching me.
"Usually, you put the biggest threat first. The one most likely to be a problem. That makes sense to me," I said, angry at him, and angry at myself. Mostly myself, for not being patient. For rushing off to rescue Damsel, without gathering enough intelligence. For making a bad situation worse. I... really had to stop doing that.
"My apologies. I will endeavor to make our communications more clear in the future. However, as I said before, I am calling in the favor I earned from supplying you with the information," he chastised, voice cool.
"And what do you want? I don't know if you're paying attention, but we have a slight problem. My schedule isn't clear," I said, irritated. The Simurgh was attacking Montreal, and could quite possibly go onto a third city. And the Number Man was calling in a favor now, and for all I knew he wanted me to go to the grocery store, or something equally inane. Even if it was something serious, it could wait, with the Simurgh attacking, right now.
"You will not fight the Simurgh," he ordered.
I saw green. I was furious. I sputtered, a jumble of words running into each other. He wanted me, who he had acknowledged as vital to fighting the Endbringers, to stand down? To not try? Everything I had done, since meeting him, had been for two goals. To stop the Endbringers, and to clean up crime in the process. The former had been the goal I had been striving to above all else. Fighting, and eradicating crime had been a nice diversion, and a beneficial side-effect to my actions. To prevent others from suffering as I and others, had. But fighting the Endbringers had been my atonement, meaning, and purpose. To get stronger, better, ready. Everything.
And he was telling me no?
"Fuck. No," I all but shouted, sending Battery and Sundancer back in surprise. Sundancer looked concerned, while Battery turned away, guilt showing on her face. She walked away, back into the auditorium, hands wringing. I was about to pull the phone from my ear, to let him know in no uncertain terms what I have thought of his plan, before he spoke.
"First, please don't hang up. Second, this time let me explain," he asked, unflappable.
"Fine." He had would either have to have the best explanation in the world, or give up on his ridiculous idea.
"You aren't ready, and I have a way that you can be of more help than just being a large rock with limbs."
"That's not a real convincing argument," I pointed out.
"If you will recall our first conversation, you are possibly immune to all known forms of precognition. It would be better to find out what that entails, now, when we can observe her reactions, than to find out you have no effect on her in that regard," he explained, his voice never wavering or raising.
"Oh," I replied, stunned. That made sense. I should have thought of that. He had even said that, that night.
"Yes. I do have a good reason for not wanting you to engage the Simurgh," he chastised, "but you will still be playing a vital role, to help negate her precognition."
"How? What sorta vital role?" I asked, my anger sputtering out into curiosity.
"I have arranged the services of a teleporter. He will take you in a to-be determined pattern, across the continent. In addition, I would like you to stay in contact, over this phone."
"Ah. Wait, if I'm being sent all across America, how can I contact you," I pointed out. By now, embarrassment had eclipsed any lingering feelings of anger.
"It is a PRT phone, and it can connect, after a brief adjustment time, regardless of your location in North America. And, as I am certain you are concerned with the actual fight, with the Simurgh, I have confirmation from reliable sources that Eidolon and Alexandria are already on the scene."
I was relieved. Two of the Triumvirate, and the third was coming. That was plenty of cape-power. I knew, academically that the Simurgh was dangerous, but knowing the entire Triumvirate would be there was a great comfort.
"Who's the teleporter?" I asked.
"You can call him Portal. The number has been programmed into the phone. Just call him, and the phone's tracker will let him know your location. However, as a condition of his arrangement, you must not be seen, at least by capes. And it is my belief that you will distract the Simurgh, at what could be a critical juncture. "
"I'm not entirely pleased, but I can see the benefit. I'll do it," I agreed, somewhat torn. If I could distract the Simurgh when she was about to be blasted by Legend, it would make running away from the fight that much more palatable.
"Thank you. Good luck, Defiler," he said, genuine, and hung up.
"What?" Sundancer asked me impatiently as the call ended.
How to break it to her? The only reason she wasn't a mess, or more of a mess, was that I had given her purpose. To stop Simurgh, from attacking NYC. Maybe I had been mistaken where the Simurgh was original, but she was still out there, and we could still help.
I'd have to phrase this delicately, "I've been given a way to possibly make a significant difference against the Simurgh."
Her eyebrows furrowed, as she tried to digest my words. She asked, "Isn't that why we are here?"
"Yes," I equivocated, "But more than ineffectually pounding at her, before Scion can show up, or the capes can drive her off. A way that could reduce casualties, significantly."
"Where?"
I paused, wetting my lips. She was giving me a hard stare, evidently not amused by what could be interpreted as running away.
I revealed, "I can block or disrupt precognitives. Someone called in a favor, and offered up a new plan. If I move across the country, frequently with the help of a teleporter he contacted, it could disorient or at least distract the Simurgh."
"Oh," she said, eyes wide. She stayed silent, thinking. She ran a hand through her blond hair, troubled by her thoughts. Sundancer shook herself, and looked me in the eyes. "This will definitely hurt the Simurgh?"
"Yes," I lied. I didn't add the, 'probably.'
"I'm coming with. I owe the Simurgh, a lot," Her voice hardened, and I could see her resolve stiffen.
A door across from the auditorium caught my eye, and I motioned for Sundancer to follow me, quietly. That hall was empty, and I didn't want to be seen running away. Or appearing to run away, as I knew that this might matter more than what a pair of capes could do on the front lines. I checked the entryway of the auditorium, and see that everyone was clumped together in their own groups, not paying attention to the hall, I went for the room behind me.
.
I opened the door, looking in. An actual conference room, a single long table flanked by a dozen chairs. I tried to lock the door, but it only had a smooth handle, without a lock. I pulled a chair over, and propped it against the door. Sundancer pulled another one as I flicked through the phone's contacts, selecting 'Portal'. Two rings later, it was picked up.
"Portal?" I asked, after waiting for several silent moments.
No one answered me.
"I need a portal?" I tried. Nothing.
"Alakazam?" Zip.
"Click my heels?" Sundancer added, leaning against the table, faintly amused.
"Me and Sundancer in Las Vegas?" I joked.
"Who's gonna be Hunter Thompson, then?" Sundancer pointed out, smile breaking through exhaustion.
Answering her, a pale rectangle had appeared, and additional rectangles folded out from it, exponentially expanding. In a few seconds, it went from the size of a playing card, to almost half the wall. Revealing a parking lot lit by pale yellow lights. A collection of cars half-filled it, and I could see bright lights in the distance.
"This is cape country," Sundancer said, half-sarcastic, half-serious. She walked through the portal, and then shouted, "It's Las Vegas!"
I followed her through, and with a whoosh of displaced air, the portal closed.
xxxxxxxxxx
Las Vegas was hot. Easily twenty degrees hotter than New York City, and much more pleasant, to my T-shirt clad arms. Especially with the lack of humidity that was so ever present throughout the East Coast.
"So, we just keep getting portals to places, and then what?" Sundancer asked, looking around the parking lot.
"Yes, but I have a better idea," I said, distracted by my thoughts. If I was a disruptive influence to precogs, how could I maximize my effect? All my information had come from secondhand sources, of non-absolute reliability. I couldn't be sure of anything, until I had tested it or observed the Simurgh's reaction myself. So, I was flying half blind. Time to fix that.
I didn't know much about precognition; 'future reading' was about the extent of my knowledge. But if I was a disruptive influence, or a blank spot, each time I affected something, I would throw off the future that had been seen. I was the problem on the back of a test, throwing off expected grades. And if more people were involved with me, and then they in turn involved more people, and so on and so forth, I would create huge swaths of blindspots. All I had to do was get everyone's attention that I could, and then leave. Rinse, repeat.
Easy.
"Step back, would you?" I asked Sundancer, shooing her with my hands.
"Have a plan? Any good?" she queried, as she complied, sitting on the hood of a parked sedan. Her black and red costume blended into the black finish of the car, acting as a sort of camouflage.
"Yes," I said, adding, while omitting my lack of knowledge," Do you know anything about precognition?"
"Not much, aside from the basics. You can see the future?" Surprised, she jumped off the car, and gave me a flat look. "Do you have enough powers, or is this going to be a thing?"
"Yes." I answered with a grin.
"Yes, to what?"
"I have a cunning plan. If I am correct, I block precognitive abilities. And if I interfere with anyone, a precog's prediction is thrown off by my presence. I'm a blank spot, so anything a blank spot touches becomes an error. Now, hold my phone, and are you with me so far?" I explained, looking around. Not a half mile away, a line of neon lights and tall buildings designated what had to be the famous Las Vegas strip.
Gambler's paradise, or it had been, at least until Scion had appeared. Gambling was all but impossible nowadays, especially when your mark could have the ability to change the numbers on a die, or worse. So instead of being driven out of business, Las Vegas had rebranded itself as the entertainment capital of the world: The casinos, back when they were on the verge of going out of business, had according to 'rumors' employed some of the first Thinkers to appear and used their abilities to make obscene amounts of money. With that, they bought out contracts, concert halls, studios, everything. If you wanted to see the vast majority of large live events nowadays, you had to go to Las Vegas. At this time of night, it had to be packed full of people.
"Yes. So you are going to go up and talk to people?" she asked, confused, taking my phone, and then following my motions to move back. She stepped around a car, at least half a dozen yards away. Far enough.
"Not exactly. Think a bit bigger, actually." I took a deep breath, steeling myself. I had just enough energy for this, and then I would be tapped out, again. But, if I wanted to affect the most people, I had to be as visible as possible.
My energy - a bubbling torrent of power, always eager to be used - could change me, especially when I used more of the outer reservoir. It made me feel like I was more, but when I had fought - killed - Sophia, I had used it to physically become less frail, less weak, less imperfect. Every time I went from the glare of a headlight to a roaring bonfire around me, eerie green light letting everybody know who I was, I changed. But if the outer pool could make me glow, why couldn't the inner part of my reserves, all I had left, not light me up as well? It only made sense- the first third or so of energy was non-glowy, but why couldn't I make it so?
I stretched, focusing. Willing myself to become more. Letting every bit of resentment and anger I harbored out. Burning away my imperfections, my form that was unsuitable. A corona of flames marked my transformation, igniting the front of the sedan Sundancer had sat on. I stood, taller, stronger, and made of stone. The green light had died down to the mark on my forehead, but I had willed, twisting the energy from inside to mirror that of the outside. It was full noon, in the parking lot, but for the green. The car alarm added its protests, weakly, as I had evidently partially melted its mechanism.
"Jesus Christ!" Sundancer gasped, flinching back from the flames. "Warn me when you do that!"
I looked up, Sundancer doing the same, and -
My bronze spider-image was doing the two-step.
I opened and closed my mouth, unable to articulate my thoughts. If that spider was a manifestation of my subconscious mind or something, I didn't think I could live this down.
"...what is that?" Sundancer asked, pointing up at the spider.
"I have no idea," I admitted, keeping my words vague. "It just shows up when I use some of my power sometimes."
"Uh-huh," Sundancer retorted, adding, "Did you need to turn huge?"
I gestured at her to come close, and she dithered, raising her hands.
"What?" I asked, irritated at her taking her time.
"Be careful with those claws. They look way too sharp, and I don't want them snipping my head off," she said, stopping right before me, "And, plan?"
"I'm huge and glowing. I'm going to be an oversized butterfly that knocks into all the people who can see me. Since I'm a precognitive disrupter, each person will be knocked out of what was predicted, right?"
"Butterfly theory then? And did you mean that metaphorically or-"
"Metaphorically. I can't turn into a giant butterfly," I dryly remarked, "and hold on."
I reached forward, gently grasping Sundancer, careful to not poke her with my claws. A bit of maneuvering, and I had her secured between my cupped palms, with her legs folded into them.
"Ready, so long as we just scare people. No hurting," She said, bracing herself.
I spread my wings, and leaped. I flapped, once, twice, and thrice, before gliding. A line of cars, a mile long, stretched below and in front of me. Huge buildings; stadiums, concert halls, and hotels lined the street, and I could see people walking all along it. Well, they would have been walking. But a giant creature of stone glowing bright enough to eclipse all but the strongest lights was very attention grabbing, and those that weren't too busy fleeing were instead occupied taking pictures and videos of my little public flight through the Las Vegas skyline.
"Landing!" I shouted to Sundancer.
I dropped onto an empty bus stop, sending pieces of its plastic frame scattering across the sidewalk. People nearby stumbled back, or turned to run at my sudden stop amidst them. A few brave souls stayed, and I needed them to spread. Something to make everyone run. Several people, cars jammed behind other cars, had gotten out of their vehicles to try running. More got out, leaving all but a few of the cars, including cabs, empty.
I picked a cluster of three, all abreast, and inhaled. Air ignited in my mouth, as I let out a stream of unintelligible profanities. Anger worked well, but I was nearly out. Rudeness would work for now. A green stream of flames lanced through the cars, lighting their interiors on fire. Glass melted, and the seats caught flame.
I stomped forward, kicking an abandoned motorcycle out of the way. It skidded across the pavement, trailing sparks, and I tried kicking it again. This time, it landed on top of a bus, breaking half of its windows.
"Music!" Sundancer yelled over the din of my impromptu scrapyard, pointing to my left.
I stopped, cocking my head. Over the sounds of the now emptying Strip, I could hear what had to be a live concert.
"Call Portal, we are going to need an exit soon," I ordered, before choosing a city. "Seattle."
"When we land again," she replied, waving the cellphone, before storing it back in her armor.
"Round Two," I remarked, causing her to tense up in anticipation. I fulfilled her expectations, flinging myself into the sky. She slammed back against the base of my hands, gripping my fingers like handrails. I followed the noise, and could see the lights of an open air concert. I had never been to one, as they usually required friends to go with.
"My first concert," I shouted at Sundancer as I hovered over the concert. She said something inaudible over the din, before shrugging. She pointed down, signaling me to drop. I closed my wings, and dropped. Halfway down, I flared them out, braking. Two-thirds of the way down, the singer on stage saw me plummeting towards him on a course that could be easily mistaken as directly at his head. He screamed, reaching an impressively high pitch, before diving away and off the stage into the crowd.
"MOTHERFUCKER!" I could finally hear Sundancer scream, right before I landed.
Wooden boards shattered under my weight, as I broke right through the stage. I used my arms to bleed Sundancer's momentum, keeping her safe from the impact. Splinters pinged off my stone skin, forming a halo in the lights of both the stage, and my own green glow. Lasers, mounted behind me, fired, highlighting me even more. As one, the audience, composed primarily of girls my age, screamed and started rushing for the exits.
"Time to go," I rumbled over the sound of thousands of panicking people.
Sundancer reached into her armor, pulling out the phone, as I extricated myself from the stage. I gently, well, as gentle as I could while twenty feet tall and made of stone, walked backstage, hiding behind the curtain.
"Seattle," Sundancer said into the phone. An instant later, the wall behind the curtain gained a tiny rectangle of light. It unfolded, rectangles exiting rectangles, becoming larger and larger, before revealing the back of a restaurant, identifiable only from the empty cardboard boxes of food stacked along the wall.
I stomped through, and realised that I was hearing two sets of noise now - one from behind me, in Las Vegas, and one in front of me from a stadium not even a block away.
xxxxxxxxxx
I could hear sirens, horns, and heavy machinery, along with the Endbringer alarm, mingling with the sounds from the ruined concert behind me. Until the portal closed, inaudible over the racket.
"Lucky we keep showing up next to the big groups," Sundancer remarked, raising her voice to be heard over the noise from the stadium.
"Luck, or something else. We're ditching the phone after this."
It only made sense - the phones the PRT and Protectorate used probably had untold heaps of classified information on them. Everything from heroes' real names and those of their families, to the evacuation plans in case of Endbringers. I was certain that someone with less scruples than average would try to rob a shelter.
Either it was bugged, or was set to record conversations that didn't enter a password or match the owner's voice. Maybe both. And that raised a more pertinent question: How was Portal listening in? Was he a Protectorate cape? Or was he a Tinker, using some super-technology to create portals, and neatly explaining his ability to infiltrate the PRT's networks.
But no matter the reason, I was going to get rid of it, at least once the Simurgh had been driven off.
"If we can hit at least three more cities, in close succession and location, that should be enough," I mused out loud. If I had sent at least a thousand people - probably more, but a minimum of a thousand - fleeing, they had probably called people. Called the police, their families, friends, everyone they knew in order to talk to them. They had been where they shouldn't have been, had I not shown up. A butterfly effect, on a massive scale, sending a portion of the city out of the Simurgh's prediction, and then expanding as they interfered with more people.
"So Las Vegas, Seattle, and then? If I understand correctly, your precog blocking should already be working on New York City. Maybe Los Angeles? It's an easy fifteen million," Sundancer suggested.
"Fifteen? Maybe back in the nineties," I said, confusion lacing my gravelly words.
"What? It's still huge, even after that - Oh, right. Much smaller, I forgot," she interrupted herself, voice dropping down from a shout to a barely audible murmur. How did you forget that living in cities was the most likely way to meet an Endbringer. I didn't say as such, but filed it away for future reference. She could have memory problems.
"Anyway, still a large city. Toronto's a good choice, as it's close. And Chicago is further away, but still close," I plotted, almost counting off on my fingers. I didn't though, remembering that I would have dropped Sundancer if I had.
She didn't notice her near preliminary disembarkment, and nodded her acceptance. I spread my folded wings, and jumped, catching the cool sea air beneath them. I could see the phone in her hand, lit more from my green light then any of the artificial ones, and replied in my rough voice, "Be careful with that. I don't want to have to fly back to New York."
"Yeah, yeah. I -" her reply was cut off as I banked, and she gripped my hand to steady herself. Her folded legs were in the cup formed by my hands, but the rest of her frame was out, leaving her unable to rest comfortably.
Below me, the row of bars or restaurants turned into a parking lot the size of my school. Emergency vehicles - fire trucks, police cars, and ambulances were parked in clumps in the emptying lot. Lines of cars were exiting the lot, heading in all directions, and more importantly, I could see people walking away, presumably heading to shelters. Already, people were pointing at my green glow, which had been easily visible despite the line of buildings blocking their sight.
I cocked my head back, keeping my mouth away from Sundancer, and let loose a jet of flame. It reached a further thirty feet above me, a fountain of fire that, despite the bright light I had brought along with me, was eye-searingly bright in itself.
People panicked and screamed, dropping to the ground or fleeing as we passed overhead. It was a swarming hive of humanity, disrupted from their orderly evacuation into an all out mindless mob. I could only imagine what I looked like, green, stone, and flying over them while causing as much chaos and confusion as possible. And I could only imagine what sort of press I had just bought with my interesting actions tonight.
"I think it worked," Sundancer yelled, as deadpan as possible.
I didn't dignify her with a response, because I had noticed something flying towards us, pushing off the ground into a leap. That was on course to reach us, flying several hundred feet off the ground.
"Hold on!" I shouted, louder than a slab of stone hitting the ground.
I pulled her closer to my chest, pinning her there, and then rolled. Wings tucked, I spun two times, before opening them again, a good hundred feet away from where I had been. The woman, dressed in a lurid pink outfit, futilely tried to reach me by waving her arms. She would have failed, had she not briefly glowed red and shot forward at incredible speed.
I dropped to the ground, falling, before catching myself out of the air with a nearly shoulder breaking stop. I was learning how to fly, and fly well, but the learning curve was a bit much. Squished up against me, Sundancer's left hand made the gesture representing a cell phone.
"Out of sight," I whispered, roughly equivalent to a car backfiring. She nodded, as best as she was able to, and I landed, ducking down to fit into one of the stadiums exits. The long narrow concourse was empty but for scattered trash, but I would have that cape coming after me soon regardless. I set Sundancer down, and she shook out her leg.
"Fell asleep," she explained, before dialing our temporary lifeline. "Los Angeles."
The portal unfolded like a softly glowing 2D flower, obstructing the front of a concession stand proclaiming, - ngs, Only $5. Faintly, I could hear the sound of waves, even as the two Endbringer alarms almost synchronized, just far enough apart to be supremely irritating. To someone without my nightvision, the ocean would have been a black mass, sucking in light from the city behind it. I could see it perfectly. A line of poles interspaced themselves in between myself and the ocean.
The portal went underneath a pier? Odd, but on second thought, I doubted anyone would be near one, right now. Sundancer jogged through, and I followed, ducking my head to stop it from scraping the pier itself. I picked her up again, silent, and lumbered out from below the pier. And the beach was empty, naturally. The streets lining the beach were empty of all but parked vehicles, and I couldn't hear any of the sounds I associated with a city. Where could I go to interact with the most people?
And why had Las Vegas not been evacuated? My bet was on money - why disrupt everything if it's not coming there? Or some other reason I couldn't fathom, but apparently made perfect sense to someone else in charge. It didn't matter now, but it was something to keep in mind to ask the next Protectorate hero I got a chance to talk to.
I tried to jump into the air, gaining initial altitude, but only sunk into the sand after a quick hop. I stepped out gingerly, trying not to get stuck. A concrete parking lot, up next to the road paralleling the beach would be a hard enough surface. I gently walked off the beach, cursing my weight, and its impact on my timing. And then I cursed Portal for putting me here.
"I don't think anyone will be out, anymore," Sundancer pointed out, as my footsteps turned from sounding like a hundred snakes hissing with each step due to all the sand shifting, to a series of crunches as the concrete broke.
"We have to try. If we can distract or disorient the Simurgh, anything is worth it," I said, reasonably.
"Yeah. My feelings exactly," she quietly agreed, before pointing deeper into the city, "Just a fly-over, to let anyone who can see the light, and then move on?"
I didn't agree verbally, but my actions certainly did. I jumped, this time successfully, my wings catching the cool sea air as it met the heat of the city. I swirled up, taking long lazy circles to reach a higher altitude, only disrupted by a flock of seagulls who had strayed in front of me. The equivalent of flying into a stone wall wasn't good for them, and I had earned a score of red and white marks across my body. Sundancer had been shielded from my impromptu attempted stowaways, but still had to brush bloody feathers off of herself.
By the time I was high enough that the cars started looking like toys, I could see the vast majority of the city, and was informed that it was nearly fully evacuated. Entire sections went dark, lights turning off, for what I assumed to be prevention of downed power lines injuring people.
I began my descent, not so much disappointed as irrationally irritated. The shelters and evacuations would help protect people, if on the small chance the Simurgh came here. But if I could just keep her off-balance, we could potentially kill her. But they only had themselves to worry about, so I couldn't blame them.
I landed along a railroad track, gravel spraying away as I skidded to a stop. Warehouses, and further on the track, houses surrounded us. I stomped through a chain link fence, pushing it aside with my hips as I broke it, and walked between rows of forklifts, heading deeper into the yard.
"I don't think that worked as planned," Sundancer remarked as I set her down, before asking as she dialed the phone, "Where to then? If LA is already evacuated, I bet cities closer will be the same by now too."
She was right, despite my misgivings. I couldn't do anymore, here, or in any other city. Well, all but one.
"Montreal."
Her eyebrows rose, before she gave me a small smile, and repeated into the phone, "Montreal."
The storage yard gained a floating square, hovering above a trailer, which tessellated into a doorway, showing me the interior of a car dealership. Rows of new cars, and too-large windows were all to evident. Sundancer followed me through, and I watched the portal close behind us. Out front in the street I could see a bus, turned on its side.
"Here we go," I said, and walked through the glass, making a hole for Sundancer.
Glass crunched under my gigantic feet, and I could hear Sundancer's much smaller feet knocking shards about, unable to break them with her much lighter weight. Cars - some damaged, others pristine - filled the car dealership parking lot. One notable silver sedan had a stop sign, distinguished from its southern cousins by the the word 'Arret' above the 'Stop', plunged right into the hood, standing up right.
"Where is she?" Sundancer hissed, searching the sky as I looked over at her. Sundancer's hands were tensed, held out in front of her, ready to start forming her - Sun, orb? I couldn't be sure what she called it, and now wasn't the right time to ask. I looked up as well, noticing the red glow of fires in the distance, hard to see with my green glow smothering my vision.
"Fire, that way," I pointed out, adding, "We can see better from the air."
She didn't answer, only stepping closer to me, ready to be picked up. I did so, cradling her against my chest, and took a running start. I lifted off, keeping low to the ground. I didn't want to be blasted out of the sky by the Simurgh, and staying low, both to keep out of sight and to keep the distance down if I had to land, was the best plan at the moment.
Only one flaw: how would I get Sundancer to safety if we were attacked while I was carrying her? I could set down hard, landing on concrete or steel, but she would be smooshed, where I would just be irritated. I decided to glide down, heading towards the ruined skyline of Montreal. Fires sputtered out of buildings cut in half, tops taken clean off. I could see the shattered remains of the removed tops, spread all over the adjacent buildings, collapsing a significant portion of the affected area. Even several of the top-less buildings had been completely destroyed - I could see parts of the cut-off portion, spires and antennas resting in the piles of rubble that had been buildings.
How many people had been in those buildings?
Where was the fucking Simurgh?
I touched down in the middle of an intersection, crosswalks beeping at me in a repeating four-note tune. Abandoned cars littered the street, doors open and half with their lights on. A few even still had their engines running.
"Why'd we stop?" Sundancer asked, stepping out of my hands.
"I didn't want to be shot out of the sky, carrying you," I pointendly replied.
"Ah. Right," She said, her tension replaced temporarily with embarrassment, "I can't fly, " she added a moment later, pointing out the obvious.
"Were you able to see the Simurgh?" I questioned, expecting a negative answer. Her head shaking 'No,' confirmed my suspicions. Had the Simurgh fled? I couldn't see any explosions, or other bright lights, near or far, that would generally signal an ongoing Endbringer fight. Had she moved on to a different city? Had I distracted her? Or merely caused her to change targets, with her now following my path, tracing my steps?
Had I just made everything worse?
I lumbered forward, keeping my speed down to let Sundancer catch up. She was certainly in better shape than I was, but my size offered me a distinct advantage. I only had to go roughly above half-speed to outpace her.
"Did you see her?" Sundancer huffed out in between deep breaths as she ran behind me.
"No, but I'm heading towards the biggest mess. They could have pinned her down," I rumbled, pushing a car out of our way. Metal screeched on pavement as the car skidded back, rocking back on its side.
"'Kay," Sundancer answered, conservering her breath for running. Another intersection, and this time I noticed a street sign, reading 'Sainte-Catherine.' It would have been helpful, had I ever been to Canada before, or had a map on hand. But I could still use my eyes, and could see how close we were to the center of the city.
"Halfway there," I shouted to Sundancer. I didn't hear a response, but I could still occasionally hear one of her footsteps, over my much louder ones.
We were silent, no longer talking - myself by choice - the rest of the way, streets going from the occasional car in the road, all the way to half-full as we got closer to the site of the collapsed skyscrapers. A faint cloud of dust hung in the air, dropping visibility as we got closer. Would I be able to help? I was at near-empty, and had been up all night, fighting for most of it. I could feel myself nearly slipping into a daze, eyes opening and closing as I plodded along. I nearly stomped on a heavily damaged computer monitor, that had to have been flung from one of the collapsed buildings.
I stepped over it, and then crushed a body underneath my other, several times larger, foot. I stopped, stunned, looking at my bloody foot. And at the body, which was thankfully dead. I hadn't killed an injured or comatose person. I shook my head, ridding myself of my momentary tunnel vision.
"Is he - dead?" Sundancer cautiously asked, hands raised above her head to ease her breathing.
"Was," I curtly responded, not liking her insinuation that I had killed him.
She made a noise of agreement, looking around at the debris from the skyscrapers. I could see a dozen bodies, along with office equipment and clothing. What had hit them, to send everything in the skyscrapers flying across the city?
A man screamed, not far away, and both of our heads whipped around, so fast that I thought they would crack. By unspoken agreement, we both moved as one, stepping over debris and closing in on the man. He wouldn't stop, and his screams turned to loud sobs as we closed. A partially undressed man, wearing only pajama pants, was cradling himself, sobbing. He stopped only to mutter something, before going back to making distressed noises.
Sundancer looked at me, gesturing at him. I shook my head, and repeated her gesture. Her head shook much more rapidly, and her gestures turned more enthusiastic. Fine.
I reached out, using the flat of my hand to steady him. And keep him from rolling over, and seeing me in all my glory looming over him. Twenty feet of stone monster wouldn't help a man who had just lost his family, or something along those lines.
"Do you need help?" I whispered - or tried to, as it came out as a growl. It was hard to modulate my voice into anything not similar to a dump truck pouring gravel.
He whispered something, curling further into a ball.
"What? I couldn't hear you," I responded, as gently as I could.
"Kill me," he whispered, showing me his face. His face was covered in bloody lines, from where his fingers had clawed his face. His eyes were now empty red sockets, bleeding freely.
I recoiled back, stunned. Sundancer gasped, hands coming up to her mouth. He reached out for us, hands trying to clasp us, and whispered, "Please, kill me."
I took a step back, Sundancer mirroring me, and he must've heard, because he begged, "Please! I can't do it - but I can't keep feeling - "
He broke off into sobs, convulsing.
Sundancer turned and ran, back the way we had come, and I followed her into a storefront. She jumped over the shards of glass at the bottom of the window frame, landing on a clothes' rack. On my hands and knees, I followed her. I stopped, sitting down, staring at her.
"I think the Simurgh is here," I shakily said.
"Yeah," Sundancer replied, face bloodless.
xxxxxxxxxx
The man's sobs died down, tapering down to all but silence. Sundancer untangled herself from the pile of long-sleeved shirts, kicking the few off that had wrapped around her legs. She scrambled to her feet, and started running through the store, heading to rear counter, and the door behind it. I shook off mental cobwebs, and without a look back, followed. Sundancer pushed through the door, holding it open for me, and I ducked down, trying to get my substantial bulk through the tiny frame.
It didn't work. Sundancer ran back into the metal racks, full of clothes, as I obliterated the wall, sending fragments of cinderblocks flying, and the door skidding across the ground.
"Jesus!" Sundancer hissed, "Keep it down!"
Outside, over the sound of landing masonry, the man started screaming again. I whispered back, "It's a small door! What the fuck was I supposed to do?"
She winced, and waved me off, conceding the point. Validly, in my opinion. I was several tons of rock, and the size of an SUV. 'Small' wasn't a descriptor that could be applied to me, or only in comparison to anything the size of a house. Sundancer carefully stepped over chunks of concrete, moving out of my sight, and I waited. She had to be looking for a door - I couldn't break through the wall, and let her out, without dropping half the ceiling on her. Working with someone experienced enough to not only keep a cool head but know what to do in any situation was very nice. If only she hadn't come with such a steep price.
I heard a door open, then slam closed. I lowered my shoulder, and charged. Shelving, made of thin metal, nearly buckling under the weight of rows upon rows of shoeboxes, collapsed as I plowed into them. They didn't stop me, and I hit the back wall. It was easily thrice as thick as the interior had been, and my shoulder protested from the concrete's desire to stay upright. I shot out of a cloud of grey dust, paint flecks sticking to my stone skin. Shoeboxes crumpled underneath my feet as I strode over them, rising to my full, temporarily greater height.
The man was still screaming. Sundancer was already running across the employee parking lot, and I caught up, quickly, longer legs providing a serious advantage over her fleshy-normal legs. My footsteps crunched as I ran, my full weight cracking pavement beneath me. As I drew even with Sundancer, I slowed my pace to match hers, and rumbled out, "Let's find the Simurgh. She's still here, if…"
I trailed off, not wanting the reminder. Sundancer nodded, and slowed from her all-out sprint. She breathed out, motioning with her hands, "Time to go up. We can see better from up there."
Good plan, I thought. I repeated as much, and scooped her up again, keeping her close to my chest. I took off, and left the street behind as we gained altitude.
"There!" Sundancer shouted, pointing to where I could see the tallest buildings in the city. A large cloud of dust - eclipsing the fine details of the buildings - was expanding, from a recent collapse, or from the actions of a cape. I looked around, turning in a quick circle, to make sure. Nothing else in the city could be the Simurgh. A collection of fires dotted the city, and plumes of thick black smoke rose from some of the larger ones.
"I can't use my power with you so close! It would burn you!" Sundancer yelled over the wind whistling past us as I descended, gliding down on outstretched wings. I set down on a boulevard outside the brown smudge of dirt, not wanting my vision to be immediately impaired. Sundancer hopped out of my hands, landing in a crouch. A handful of abandoned cars littered the sides of the road, but it was mostly empty - the majority of people driving when the alarm had gone off had sensibly fled. But the eerily empty street wasn't what grabbed my attention the most. It was the perfectly smooth trench, glassy surface gleaming dully. It was barely three yards across, but it stretched from where we had landed, into the dust cloud.
"Who did that?" Sundancer asked, quiet.
"The Simurgh," I guessed, before adding, "Or Legend, maybe."
She let out an unladylike grunt, and stalked into the dust, hands up to protect her eyes. I stayed back, keeping a dozen yards between us. My bigger eyes could probably see through more gunk, from what little I knew about biology. Well, biology, and my weird powers. Or maybe not weird - illogical was more accurate. I raised giant clawed stone hands, mimicking Sundancer and stomping into the cloud.
Faint shouting was heard in the distance to my left, and metal was crashing on metal to my right. In front of me, Sundancer moved forward, slowing as she had to step carefully. Rubble, trash, and varying detritus littered the streets. A pink stuffed bunny coated in blood stood out as I walked, balancing precariously on the edge of the trench, and I made sure to walk away from it as I didn't need to see anymore dead bodies. Especially children's bodies. The rest of the mess was quite possibly from the most recently collapsed building though, but there could -hopefully- be a cape with the power to create junk nearby, even though I knew that hope was pretty much a bad joke at this point. With one final bang, the metallic sounds stopped. I took two quick strides, and keeping my voice down, for a given value of 'down', said, "The noise that just stopped. Hopefully someone trapped the Simurgh, or buried her in metal. Follow me."
She nodded, and I twisted, sprinting towards the noise. My footsteps were silent, but shards of concrete and pavement sprayed out as I crushed whatever I stepped on. Chunks pinged off debris, echoing in the canyon of buildings. I looped around a plaza, fountain crumbling as I crushed it underneath my feet. An inch high wave of water spilled out from the broken lip of concrete, and I didn't like that it was tinged slightly red. Or that if I focused on the rubble around us I could see bits and pieces what looked like parts of torn and mangled flesh. The building the plaza was ringing was at least twenty stories tall - too large to plow through, and I didn't want to be in the air this close to the Simurgh. My maneuverability wouldn't be as great, but I had buildings to hide behind if I stayed on the ground. Lining the opposite end of the plaza were trees which blocked my view somewhat, but I couldn't see anything large enough to be the Simurgh.
An APC - a slab of metal with a dinky turret on top, was embedded, upside down, into the front of lobby we were circling. It had broken through the line of floor to ceiling glass windows, gouging through the stone floor. I could see its rear door, opened but a crack, and the noise started up again. Someone inside was trying to open it, likely with the butt of a rifle or a crowbar. I loped towards it, and knocked on the rear door with a huge knuckle.
"Stand back, and I'll rip the door off," I ordered.
Someone inside shouted something unintelligible. They possibly couldn't understand me, but I had a solution for that. I stuck the tips of my huge claws into the crack the occupants of the APC had already worked open, and slid them in, slowly. If they didn't notice those, there was no helping them. I jammed them in as far as I could, and then braced myself, and pulled as hard as I could. The door protested, metal whining, before it popped off and I had to stop myself from falling with a hasty step back. Sundancer, catching up to me, stumbled to a stop by my side.
A man jumped out of the back, and looked at Sundancer. "Thank you-."
He stopped talking, as he looked at my legs. He had been expecting two people of normal proportions, it seemed, and was rather surprised. His mouth dropped open as he craned his neck to look at me, before he shook his head and shouted over his shoulder, "All clear, Sarge."
Three more men dismounted out of the APCs, two covered in blood. All of them were dressed in camouflage, and clutching rifles. The oldest one, who was presumably the highest ranking, nodded at me. "Thanks for the help. We've been stuck in there for nearly half an hour. Leftenant's dead, and we can't get the base on the radio. Where's the Simurgh?"
I shook my head, and said, "Can't see her. We've been looking. Shouldn't you have evacuated?"
He spat out a wad of blood, wiping his mouth on the back of his gloves. "We were evacuating. Sergeant Dudley, Royal Canadian Hussars. We're based here, so we were getting everyone out of the city, right as she hit."
Behind us, the faint noise of people - presumably shouting - abruptly ceased. As one, both Sundancer and I turned our heads to look. Nothing but silence, eerie silence.
"What?" the Sergeant asked.
"We could hear people, way back there," Sundancer said, jerking her thumb in that direction.
"We'll follow you," he said, and I faced him again. All four of them had their rifles up, and he added, "You know where to go, and will be more of a threat to her than we will. Maybe we'll get lucky."
I nodded, silent. I didn't have words for that. Going up against an Endbringer with just a gun. I started walking, taking relatively tiny steps to let them keep up, back to where I had heard people. The four men spread out on my flanks, as Sundancer trailed in my footsteps. We crossed back through the plaza, water lapping at our feet in puddles from the broken fountain. Behind me, I could hear someone whisper, "No."
I almost brushed it off as orders between the squad, but the Simurgh was on the field. I turned to look at the offending soldier, asking, "Is there a prob-"
Gunfire thundered out, as he unloaded his rifle right into my chest. Stone chipped off me as the tiny hammer-blows dotted my body. I raised my arms, reflexively, to block my face, and could feel a pair of tiny red pinpricks hit my arm. The remainder flew over my head, and I dropped my arms, ready to immolate the backstabbing bastard.
"Wilson! What the fuck are you doing!" the Sergeant shouted, even as the other man on the now named Wilson's side tackled him to the ground. Wilson screamed, finger still pulling the trigger as he waved his rifle around. The other soldier pinned him down, and the last of the three came to help. The Sergeant, still standing, watched the three men struggle, stunned.
"The Simrugh," Sundancer yelled, trying to be heard over Wilson's repeated, "Get away! Get off me!"
"Shit," he breathed. As we watched the spectacle on the ground, one of the two men restraining Wilson stiffened.
I lunged forward, trying to interpose a clawed hand, even as Sundancer shouted, "Him!"
The soldier gripped his rifle, slung in front of him like a life-line, before he depressed the trigger, screaming like a madman. I was too slow, and was treated to the horrendous sight of a man, surprised to see someone he knew turn on him, die. His disbelieving face disintegrated under the hail of bullets. The click of an empty gun was followed by a quieter gunshot. The Sergeant's smoking pistol was aimed at the second man, and I could see his shoulder starting to darken. The man - influenced man - ignored it, and scooted back, desperately pulling the trigger. He whimpered, "Please, please, let me go."
"Capes, run!" the Sergeant ordered, his pistol wavering between the two affected men. He must have interpreted our looks well, as he added, "If you get this, you'll wreck the city! Run!"
Sundancer and I ran away. It galled me to do it, but he was right. If I went mad - a second time, a treasonous corner of my mind whispered - I would deal more damage then Simurgh. Gunfire erupted behind us, the slower shots of a pistol mixing into the sharper reports of a rifle. I looked behind me, as we fled, and could see both of the remaining men sagging, collapsing from being shot. At the far end of my sight, a young man and woman watched, peering around a corner. I couldn't see their expressions, but I knew they would be horrified.
And I couldn't help them. I picked Sundancer up, and launched myself into the air. She shouted, clearly upset, "What about the Simurgh!"
I had to shout as well to make myself heard over the air rushing past as I flew as fast as I could, "Imagine what you would do if you were like that!"
She paled, before nodding. "Portal home?"
I landed on top of a shorter, maybe two story building, and set her down. Gravel sprayed as I touched down sloppily, and I dug a trench through the roof. "Call Portal. We are only making things worse."
"Yeah," she replied, quietly. "We are making things worse."
She pulled Battery's cellphone out from a pocket on her costume, and I put my giant head in my giant hands. I couldn't run my hands through the crown of stone spikes that had replaced my hair, but this was good enough to express my exasperation, exhaustion, and depression. We were fleeing. With good cause, but it ate at me. I wanted to help, but I couldn't. I heard plastic hit the gravel coating the roof, and looked down. Sundancer had dropped the phone, and was shaking uncontrollably. Oh no.
"It's all my fault," she whispered, before she crumpled like a puppet with its strings cut.
I rushed over, looking down at her as she lay at my feet. Her eyes were wide, brimming with tears, and she started to hyperventilate. No no no! I leaned over Sundancer to reach the dropped phone, flipping it up carefully with one claw. Below me, Sundancer whimpered, hands covering her face as she started to cry in earnest. Between her sobs, I heard her say, "What've I done?"
The phone hadn't dialed. On the screen, I could see the green telephone icon, right under the name, 'Portal.' As gently as I could, I tapped the call button. Whatever material the PRT issued phone was resistant enough that the screen didn't shatter from my claw's tip. I watched it dial, listening to Sundancer blame herself for everything. Seconds passed by like minutes, before the call connected. I shouted, "New York City, now!"
An air conditioning unit next to us was obscured by a rift in the air opening, showing a row of trees. I didn't tary, taking Sundancer with me, along with chunks of roofing material from my sloppy scoop up, and ran right through. Dusty air changed to fresher air, and the sounds of a city replaced the silence. In my arms, Sundancer fell silent, eyes fluttering shut.
Behind me, I heard the portal close.
Author's Note: Well, hello! New job, new apartment, new state. Took some time, but I'm back. The other half of 6 is in the works~