Little Hunter

They went to the side of the building where several rooms connected together. The structure was a kennel. A place for keeping dogs. One Hellhound seemed to stop using at some point, given what Nanku overheard.

Nanku wondered why she was coming back.

A folding table was set on the floor with chairs. There was little food, but Cassie left to get 'pizza.'

Nanku sat on one side of the table with the Twins. Weaver on the other with Tattletale. Hellhound and her dogs—slowly shrinking—stood behind them.

The room wasn't silent, but crossing the divide was… The Yautja had a very narrow concept of social graces.

"It's fine," Hellhound complained.

"Just let me see." Annette Hebert checked at the bandaging and eyed Dusk and Dawn warily.

Nanku thought to comment but wasn't sure what to say.

She'd never been in this situation before.

It was awkward, and while not silent, it was eerily quiet.

In it, she noticed her odd instinct rearing up. All three women triggered it. Tattletale. Weaver. Hellhound. They all sent her hackles rising, and Nanku was starting to suspect why.

She'd been away for so long—where there were no capes—she'd simply never noticed.

Tattletale blinked.

Nanku's eyes fixed on her. "What?"

"Nothing," the girl said.

"Tattletale," Weaver warned. "What?"

The girl scowled, her smile vanishing to show a face Nanku found more believable. Disgruntled and annoyed. With more than a little vulnerability. A completely different disposition from Hellhound.

"Not something that needs discussion right now." Tattletale refocused on Nanku and asked, "So why'd you murder our guy?"

"I haven't murdered anyone."

"Come on, it's just us gir—" She stopped and tilted her head. "Huh."

"Tattletale," her mother repeated, face paler.

"She hasn't murdered anyone," the blonde said curiously. "Well, that's horseshit. She definitely killed J and at least two other guys, but she literally doesn't conceive of it as murder. And I don't mean she doesn't recognize murder as murder. She knows what murder is and thinks it's repugnant, but she very literally does not see killing J or his—definitely two—buddies as a murder."

Nanku stiffened and frowned.

"J was undercover with the Pure, wasn't he?" Weaver looked in the direction the girls had taken Alabaster. Through two walls where the man was calling out in his bindings while she pestered him with mosquitoes. "You're targeting the Pure? To protect me?"

"Bad bloods are bad bloods," Nanku said.

She didn't know who J was, but Nanku guessed. One of the three men she hunted on her arrival. The one with two phones, perhaps. An undercover agent operating as a bad blood, or a bad blood who'd chosen to try and redeem himself?

Both thoughts left Nanku unsettled.

The man gave up, and that was pitiful, but if he wasn't a bad blood she'd slain him on false pretenses.

"Seriously?" Tattletale shook her head. "Now you feel bad?"

Nanku chose to relent. She could clean up any mess later if needed. Information was more important while she could get it. "I didn't know."

"Most people don't kill the first—what was it, bad bloods?—they see. Never mind the irony of killing a Nazi on the grounds that his blood was bad."

What was her power? She was—Psychic.

Nanku turned her wrist quickly, the implication immediately coming to her mind.

Pe'dte and the clan. She could keep their secret through silence and small omissions of truth. But someone able to read her min—

"Whoa!" Tattletale jumped from her seat and raised both hands. "I'm not psychic!"

Nanku cocked her head to the side.

If she wanted to announce herself as a liar, then everything she said was probably untrue, and it would be—

"Seriously?"

"What?" Weaver asked as she moved between them.

"She wants to kill me"—Hellhound immediately inserted herself between Nanku and Weaver—"to protect some secret that's really important to her, and she thinks I'll read her mind."

The dogs moved, reacting to their master. Nanku directed Dusk and Dawn to do the same.

"Stop!" Weaver snapped. She pushed Tattletale back and Hellhound to the side. "Tay—Nanku. Tattletale can't read minds."

"What she gets for lying," Hellhound commented. Not that she moved out of the way.

"Nanku." Her mother turned to her. "Stop."

"You do not command me anymore."

"You're twenty years old. You're not a child. I understand. Stop. Now!"

Nanku still felt like that was an attempt to command her.

"I'm not psychic!" Tattletale insisted. "Okay? I have super intuition. Like Sherlock Holmes—How do you not know who Sherlock Holmes is?"

Nanku stared.

Super intuition? Heightened instincts?

"Yeah. That."

Nanku started to advance. "Liar."

"Slow down! It's all body language. Context clues. Putting pieces together. Especially stuff most people don't even think about!" Her eyes narrowed. "You're a bit weird, though. Foggy or something?"

"Touch her," Hellhound dared.

Nanku snarled, unsure.

"Look, here is all I know." Tattletale looked to Weaver. "She didn't survive on her own. Someone helped. I don't know who. I don't why. She's been living with them the past ten years and came back for who knows what reason."

Tattletale crossed her arms over her chest.

"And I'm not digging any deeper than that. Scout's honor."

Liar.

The door opened abruptly.

"Wow." Cassie kicked the door closed behind her. "Making progress, I see."

She carried long, flat boxes in her arms and a pair of plastic bags with bottles inside. The girl set them on the table, and the smell of something filled the air. Salt and grease.

Dusk and Dawn clapped their jaws.

The dogs wagged their tails.

Cassie pursed her lips. "Least someone appreciates me. We've got veggie. Pepperoni and mushroom. Ham and pineapples and meat lovers. And soda."

"Tea?" Tattletale asked.

"Yup." Cassie pulled a small can out from among the bottles. "Paper plates."

Nanku grabbed one of the boxes at random. "Which one?"

"Um. Meat lovers?"

Good enough.

Pulling her knife from her belt, Nanku sliced the box down the middle.

"Dusk. Dawn."

As she spoke the names, she pushed each half to opposite sides of the table and released the creatures to chase their meals. Not as good as other things, but they'd be fine. Nanku could always let them eat Alabaster for a bit. Might be worth keeping the worthless sack of blood alive if he was a useful food source.

Given how his power seemed to clean up after itself, Nanku doubted that would work, but she didn't mind trying.

The twins scrambled and snatched the boxes, which they promptly tore into.

"Nice pets," Tattletale said, taking the same chance Nanku saw to move on from business they'd settle later.

"I don't keep pets," Nanku replied.

Hellhound gave her a slight huff of approval.

"Not to be insensitive"—Cassie shirked as the twins ate—"but those aren't the bugs that killed all those kids, right?"

Nanku's eyes darted to her, and she shirked again.

"I said not to be insensitive!"

"No," her mother said firmly. "They aren't."

It was a start. Nanku would take it. "You've seen them?"

Her mother had removed her mask, and without it her face was plain. Tired and excited all at once.

"Yes," she answered. "But only in glimpses. It's the way my power works."

Nanku decided against pressing certain questions she wanted to ask. No reason to give her mother any reason to dig deeper.

"Oh?" Tattletale grabbed a slice of 'veggie' and narrowed her eyes. Unlike her mother, Tattletale had retained her meager, useless, mask. "You were so curious a moment ago."

"Those creatures were different," her mother insisted. "Though those two"—she watched Dusk and Dawn warily—"are something."

"They're mine," Nanku warned.

"Thought you didn't keep pets."

"I know what I said."

"They don't look like something Nilbog created," her mother said, with a nervous eye on Nanku.

And Nanku found herself at a sudden crossroad she'd not considered.

Her mother thought she'd avenged a dead daughter and all the others who died at the camp. She'd investigated. Found her fiend. Hunted them down. Killed them by whatever means she could. Surely, she found peace in that.

…

Her peace was a lie.

"Nilbog did not create the R'ka."

Her mother flinched, and Tattletale's brow rose.

"R'ka?"

"It means 'fire.' Their blood is acid."

Nanku always assumed that's why her family used the word, though she'd never asked. Kiande amedha. That was another word. 'Hard meat.' Though, the Yautja used that word for things that weren't the R'ka as well.

"How did you survive?" Cassie asked.

Nanku spun her knife and held her arm out. Without hesitation, she ran the blade along her skin, ignoring Cassie's shout and her mother's soft protest. She took no injury from it.

Once she'd demonstrated that, she turned the blade toward the table and dropped it.

The edge was so sharp it drove right through the table to the hilt.

Her mother blinked. "Your skin. When you cut your hand before…"

"My skin is armor," Nanku declared. She retrieved her weapon. "And I had a knife."

Her mother's expression was a maze.

Nanku's expression dropped.

She took no pleasure in shattering the woman's illusions, though she wondered if it even mattered. Weaver went after the culprit of the massacre to avenge her daughter. Taylor did die in a sense, but Nanku lived. She bore no grievance anymore.

The only grudge left to settle over the camp was her own.

And her mother was a thinker.

Nanku reached for her belt and produced the scrap of paper. "This is all I know."

She laid it out, showing the 'QC' logo.

"No." Her mother shook her head. "It was Nilbog. Who else would—"

"Bad bloods," Nanku said bluntly. "They unleashed the R'ka, but I don't know who they are except for this."

"And how did you come by this piece of evidence?" Tattletale asked.

"It was given to me."

"I'd ask more, but I'd hate to be summarily not-murdered."

"You obsessed over the camp," Nanku said. "I saw in the news on the Internet. Does this mean anything?"

Her mother looked at it, but her expression was more confused and worried than when the subject of Danny Hebert came up. Less guarded.

Nanku needed no answer. Her mother didn't know.

"You're saying,"—the woman drew a ragged breath—"the cape, or capes, who killed the kids at the camp are still out there?"

"I want them."

She took the note and pulled it back into her fist.

"Your enforcers had their chance. I will take mine, and I will solve it my way."

Her mother flinched, and Nanku realized the insult.

"Is that all?"

Hellhound scoffed and reached for one of the pizza boxes. She said nothing else. She grabbed a plate and proceeded to feed herself while the dogs watched on enviously. She wore her disinterest plainly, ignoring the looks from Tattletale, Cassie, and Weaver.

"Not that I'm above murderous revenge"—Tattletale turned back to face her—"but we can't have you running around town killing everything that catches your fancy."

"If I wanted to kill everything, you'd be dead," Nanku warned.

"How the hell is that not murder in your eyes?" The girl flinched. "Huh. You're looking at—How did you even notice?"

"I'm not stupid."

Tattletale reached into her shoe and produced a small handgun. A tiny thing. Easily the least threatening gun Nanku had ever seen.

"So what? Anyone with a weapon is fair game in your eyes? Bit of that 'he who lives by the sword dies by the sword' logic?"

"Huh." Cassie looked back. "She did demand I drop a knife earlier."

Nanku had no interest in justifying herself. She didn't expect them to understand. Humans had a self-centered perspective on the universe. They thought they were special by right. It wouldn't make any sense to them.

Nanku needed years to understand.

"Damn, you're foggy." Tattletale set the gun down casually. "Like some of your body language just doesn't translate to anything my power is looking for."

That felt like less of a lie, but Nanku didn't intend to be so easily swayed. Or distracted. "I will deal with whoever unleashed the R'ka. They're my prey, and so is who killed my father."

Her mother's brow twitched, and she repeated her previous question.

"What will you do if you find him?"

"Not murder."

"By our definition or yours?" Tattletale asked.

"You know something," Nanku accused. It was plain on the woman's face. "Tell me. I deserve to know."

Her mother's expression hardened.

"I cannot allow you to kill people because you're angry." And softened again just as fast. "I've been down that road, T—Nanku. I know where it leads."

"Is that why Iron Rain hates you?" Nanku asked. She could change the subject too. "Because you were angry?"

She flinched at the name. "That's why you grabbed Alabaster. To interrogate him."

"Sure."

Tattletale winced. "Shit."

Nanku was getting tired of seeing her react.

"Weaver. Call in. Now."

"What? Wh—"

Tattletale jumped to her feet. "Now. We need to figure out what she did."

Nanku snarled. They could simply ask, but both Thinkers took their phones and rose from the table. Her mother looked conflicted and torn. She hesitated for a moment, and Nanku wondered if she would ask.

"I should call in any way," she said. "If we go too long without calling in, the PRT starts searching the phones. They'll ask why I was here."

Nanku leaned back into her seat and waved her off.

She supposed the woman couldn't change that much, but Nanku wanted to. She restrained herself despite her anger and said nothing. She still had a few tricks, and if her mother wouldn't be honest, then Nanku would get creative.

Hellhound ate quietly, one eye watching Nanku.

The dogs watched their master enviously.

Dusk and Dawn finished their own food off and shook the grease from their jaws.

"You're not going to feed them?" Nanku asked.

"They're just begging." She paused, mid-bite. "And don't be stupid. Dogs don't eat pizza."

Dusk and Dawn ate just about anything, but their species were omnivores even on their home world. Nanku had yet to find anything they couldn't scarf down, preferences for raw meat aside.

There was a time Taylor wanted a dog. She never got her wish.

Nanku was content with her Twins.

Dusk and Dawn returned to her on their own, Dusk settling into her side while Dawn tended to her cracked shell. Nanku took the chance to inspect the wound.

Hellhound frowned. "She hurt?"

"No," Nanku answered. "How'd you know Dawn is female?"

"Looks like a bitch."

If she said so.

Nanku listened in to Tattletale and her mother's conversations. Tattletale's was hard. She was quiet. Near whispering. Her mother spoke more loudly, but most of her words were 'yes' and 'no' while someone on the other side of the phone spoke. Whoever they were, their words made her mother stiff. Tattletale took a few glances over her shoulder with a wary gaze.

Nanku scowled at her.

"So." Cassie stood stiffly. "Here we are. Again."

"I've noticed," Nanku grumbled.

The girl looked back and forth, clearly uncomfortable with the silence.

"So. If Nilbog didn't do it, who did? The camp, I mean?"

"If I knew that, I'd be where they are."

"Well, why would anyone do it? Nilbog was crazy, but if it wasn't Nilbog—"

"If I knew that, I'd know who did it!"

"Yell at her again," Hellhound warned between bites. Her one-eyed hound snarled.

Nanku met her gaze, and Dawn unfurled her wings. "Will you hit me with your good arm?"

She gave no immediate response, which Nanku found more impressive.

"But you're here for revenge?" Cassie asked with a placating wave of her hands. "Not to see your mom?"

"I don't need a mother anymore."

"You're going to need this one," Tattletale snapped.

She spun, red-faced and with her phone in one hand. "Thirty-seven. You've left thirty-seven corpses in less than forty-eight hours?!"

Her mother stiffened at the words, still listening on the phone.

Great.

When she didn't want the Enforcers to move fast, they noticed her trail—

"Oh, you're lucky as all hell"—Tattletale pointed—"they don't know it's you! Far as anyone who knows you're running around knows, you're some weirdo tinker with a stealth specialization. Not a walking arsenal of high-tech gadgets with a pair of super hornets."

…

Well, Nanku wasn't going to correct them.

"Best not." The blonde inhaled sharply. "They find out it's you, and Weaver will be powerless to run any sort of interference."

"Why would she?" Cassie asked.

Nanku's mother turned slowly.

"Of course she is," Tattletale grumbled, leering at Nanku. "The woman's not going to just hand her daughter over to a Birdcaging, no matter how many Nazis she kills."

"They're Nazis," Hellhound said bluntly.

"And maybe if she fucking stops right now we can salvage this situation for everyone before it blows up in all our faces!"