He shrugged. “I guess so. I don’t put the files together… I’m just sorting through them for the board.” He saw my confused look and nodded to a corkboard that hung further down the wall. “The Most Wanted board?”
I followed him down the hall to see for myself. The board held photos, aliases, and other details for ten of the worst Black Hats to operate in the Free States.
“The Security Council has a digital version, of course, but Dean Bard likes to do some things the old-fashioned way. Carnage was number six. With him dead, we’ll add someone new to the board. Not the Queen,” he added. “She’s barely top twenty-five, unfortunately. I wouldn’t mind walking past her photo every day.”
Any other time, I might have kicked his ass for objectifying the subject of my own unrequited lust. This once, not even the Queen’s fantastic figure could hold my attention. I was too busy staring at the board.
With Carnage gone, there were only nine Black Hats posted. Eight had a wealth of details next to their names, along with images that captured their likenesses from every angle. The ninth one was different, represented by a single photo and an index card. The picture had been taken at night and from far away, but it showed a man of average height, average build, and thoroughly average appearance. There was only one thing that kept him from being completely forgettable.
He had eyes like copper pennies.
Even in the grainy photo, they glittered in the dim light of the street lamp above him. I’d seen those eyes before. They belonged to the man who had taken me from Mama Rawlins, the Finder who had set me on my path to joining the Academy.
I stared up at the photo of the man I knew as Mr. Grey, and looked at the index card pinned next to it. No powers, no aliases, no known associates.
Just a single name:
Tyrant.
Epilogue
In the conference room, Isabel, Macy, and Paladin debated the fate of Damian Banach, each of them making their cases to Jonathan Bard. The dean listened attentively, but his gaze couldn’t help but stray to the final member of the review board, the most powerful person in the room—if not the world—and the only one who wasn’t speaking.
At last, Dominion stepped forward. “I know you have your reasons for everything that you do, Jonathan, but I would love to hear why we’re having this trial.”
“What do you mean?” asked Isabel Ferra. “The boy’s presence at the Academy was contingent upon adherence to certain rules. He failed to—”
“Between sounding the alarm at the Hole and killing Carnage, the boy saved innumerable lives, Isabel. As terrible as our losses were, they would have been far worse if he had not been there.”
“And that justifies breaking the rules? And his word?”
“It does.” Dominion glanced at Bard. “But you already knew that, didn’t you?”
“I did.” The dean cleared his throat. “This university exists to train Capes and those of us who support them. Damian proved he has the makings of a Cape, and he did so in the middle of a battle that claimed the lives of vastly more experienced Powers. I’m not going to expel someone like that simply because he broke a rule. Even if it was my rule.”
“Then I’m going to repeat Dominion’s question. Why have the trial?” asked Paladin. “Some of us have lives that don’t revolve around your facility.”
“This was for Damian’s benefit, wasn’t it?” realized Macy. “The hearing, the judgement… it’s all just another lesson.”
“Exactly. The fact that I have no intention of expelling him isn’t the point. What matters is that he’s spent two days thinking about what he did and sweating our judgement.” Bard looked at the Powers arrayed around him. “The Academy isn’t just about training someone to use their abilities. It’s about teaching them to behave like a Cape. Damian needs to learn that he’ll be held responsible for his actions.”
“And how will he learn that when you’ve just dismissed any consequences for his action?”
“Did I say there wouldn’t be consequences?” Bard shook his head, smiling. “All I said was that I’m not expelling him. By the time I’m through with young Mr. Banach, he might very well wish I had.”
“Meaning what?” demanded Isabel Ferra. “You’re going to cut his food rations for a week? Maybe limit his Glass privileges? Or force him to spend more time bloodying his knuckles on our students’ faces?”
“Even worse.” Bard’s smile sharpened. “I’m going to give him a job.”
•—•—•
Much later, after Damian had been informed of both his reprieve and his punishment, after Isabel had departed, fury disrupting her usual graceful strides, and after Macy had gone for her nightly ultra-marathon sprint, Dominion, Paladin and Bard remained.
Bard looked to Dominion. “With everything that’s happened, we haven’t had the opportunity to talk. How are you holding up, old friend? I know how close you and Tempest were.”
“Everyone I know dies,” said Dominion, his voice a quiet rumble. “That’s just the way of the world… but it shouldn’t have been her time. Not yet.”
“The whole tragedy should never have occurred,” said Paladin. “I’m told the Security Council wants to take a closer look at everything that happened. Up to and including the president’s decision to open the Hole in the first place.”
Bard shook his head. “President Weatherly and I are far from friendly, but I find it hard to believe he intended any of this to happen. There’s already been talk of impeachment. What if the escape plan had actually succeeded?”
“It wasn’t a total success,” said Dominion, “but it wasn’t a total failure either… and it cost us far too much either way.”
“Has there been any sign of Fallout?”
“None,” said Bard. “But a certain department whose name we’re not supposed to say has dispatched their agents to hunt him down. I hear Midnight is among them.”
“Good hunting to her,” said Paladin, voice firm. “The sooner that whispering bastard is put down, the better.”
“As dangerous as Fallout is—and in some ways, he is a greater threat than Carnage ever was—I think he is the least of our concerns,” said Dominion. He shook his head slowly, a great sigh buffeting the furniture in the room. “I keep returning to the escape plan and all the work that went into it. Someone with access to inmate records was not only able to identify the perfect blend of low-security prisoners to spring the real targets… they were able to track down the relatives of those inmates, bribe them to participate, and supply them with Legion tech. They were able to locate Carnage, persuade him to join a larger assault force, and then somehow bring that entire army to the doorstep of the Hole without anyone noticing.”
“We made that last part easy,” said Paladin with a frown. “Most of the Capes that would have been scouting the area had been dispatched to deal with the other crises.”
“Which is the element that concerns me most,” said the old Cape. “Two large-scale disasters occurred on Remembrance Day, a thousand miles apart, each requiring widespread Cape intervention… intervention that resulted in security being pulled from the Hole.”
Paladin went as white as his costume. “The wildfire is one thing, but… Tezcatlipoca’s attack must have been a coincidence. That creature doesn’t have allies; he has minions or enemies.”
“And yet his attack came at the worst possible time.” Dominion shook his head. “I don’t believe in coincidences like that.”
“Which means someone out there,” said Bard, voice quiet, “was not only able to engineer the bloodiest battle in recent Cape history… they were also able to forge an alliance with our neighbor to the south.”
“And we have no idea who they are.”
Bard shivered. “That puts this little trial of mine in perspective, doesn’t it? Suddenly, I’m far more worried about our country than I am about whatever Damian might do next to make my life difficult.”
“I’d worry less about what Walker does next, and more about
what he’s already done,” said Paladin.
Dominion nodded. “You see it too.”
“See what, exactly?” asked Bard.
Paladin shook his head, his expression troubled. “I’ve fought Carnage three times. Every time, I had other Defenders with me, and every time, Carnage escaped. Twice, we were the ones who ran. And your eighteen-year-old Crow kills him? With a touch?”
Dominion nodded again, his face pensive. When he finally spoke, his words were soft.
“There is no way that boy is just a Three.”
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Chris began life as a gleam in someone’s eye, but birth and childhood were quick to follow. He’s been fortunate enough to live in Spain, Germany, and all over the United States of America, and is busy planning a tour of the distilleries of Scotland.
A graduate of The Johns Hopkins University’s Writing Seminars program, he put that degree to ill use for twenty years as a software engineer, but has finally circled back around to the idea of writing for a living.
Chris currently lives in Nevada with his angelic wife and ever-expanding whisky collection and occasionally ventures outside to peer upwards, mutter to himself about ‘day stars’, and then scurry back into the house.
See These Bones is his first novel and the beginning of The Murder of Crows trilogy. Chris frequently shares new content, including some complete short stories, on his author website at christullbane.com.
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