GRIT

by Elle Cross

  So the fact that she called me down here at all meant she had needed me here. And I planned on staying no matter what she said. She could be stubborn, though. Lucky for me, she blinked first and looked away. "Fine. But I'll keep Ruby around so...you know..." She made a sweeping gesture to indicate around my body.

  Empaths were known for reading emotions, and were generally considered more accurate with predicting overall behaviors than our telepathic counterparts. That was why empaths were often kept on retainer to consult for the police. We could see and feel everything a person saw and felt, sometimes even through inanimate objects that person may have touched.

  Of course, not everyone was too keen on being read like an open book. Cops, emergency crews, basically anyone dealing with public safety were taught the basics in guarding themselves against being read by most mind hacks. Almost all of them got tattooed with protective sigils. With some of the higher ups, wards were part of the perks of the position, along with their assigned car and service weapon.

  What was generally not known was that for every emotional skim, a trace of that person's emotions latched on to the empath, sticking to them and, if not dealt with, would eventually become a part of the empath's personality. Over time, the emotions could end up warping an empath's true nature.

  Years ago, waves of serial murders kept cropping up in what was once New England. The authorities attributed each wave to copycat killings. The killings continued until they reached just outside of upstate New York, a little too close for the Remnant God tribes here in the city. A high priestess divined that the empaths used in the investigations were becoming infected by the emotions from the original murderer.

  It was unclear which God tribe was responsible, but the serial killings stopped overnight. Soon after, a chafing desert spread throughout much of New England, following the same spiraling pattern as the serial killings. The residents left in a mass-exodus and resettled into surrounding territories.

  Now, there was a desolate no-man's land between here and Canada. At least most of Vermont and Maine were relatively untouched, but because of the desert, they became as cut off from the mainland as Alaska or Hawaii. They were now referred to as the Greens, and had begun a petition to be an independent country. Their request was still waiting for a response from the Powers That Be.

  So now there needed to be at least two empaths present when the police questioned a person of interest in connection with violent crimes. Another empath around helped to neutralize the collateral damage of siphoning emotions. It was kind of like how oils dissolved other oils: the empath could just lift and roll away sticky emotions from another empath's aura before they could permeate it and infect the first empath.

  Good empaths were able to siphon those emotions away without a trace. Better empaths knew how to detect and reject foreign emotions in the first place.

  I happened to be a better empath than most...the best as far as I knew. I could deflect unwanted emotions from me without a thought, though only a handful of people knew that.

  One of whom was in this room with me.

  "Vesper..." Corbin started.

  "Is someone dead? I'm assuming so since you're working the case."

  "Yes, but—"

  "Dammit, Corbin, you don't need to protect me. I make a pretty good living doing what I do." That was an understatement. I didn't need to make another dollar for the rest of my life. As my accountant told me last week, I could just sit pretty on the interest I’d banked. "You're the best at what you do right? Well, so am I! Let me do my job! Hell, I'll do it for free. I want to help you."

  I felt her resignation in her sigh. She didn't bother meeting my eyes again. She crumpled up the pizza box.

  The rich scent of golden aspens and cloves leaked through the cracks in her shield then. They signaled the lingering bits of her emotional dilemma. How she wanted my help, needed it for whatever the fuck made her stay here and work for her eighteenth straight hour. Hated knowing what she was asking of me.

  She needed a recharge before she went off to face whatever it was she kept from me. If she had trouble shielding now, she'd be a mess later. And, I didn't want Corbin slaying her dragons with broken shields.

  "I'll go make you more coffee."

  "I used up the last bit brewing some for you," she said.

  "Well, isn't it lucky that I thought to bring you some more?"

  "Show off," she muttered as we left for her broom closet of an office.

  Ten minutes later, I was in observation. Corbin had more grit than the average person, so I barely laid hands on her to reconstruct a tight aura around her body. Not that she would've noticed, the way she marinated in the new batch of coffee.

  The scent of Corbin's newly mended shields—orris root and lilac—lingered on my fingers, filled my nose. Good thing, too, since Ruby sat in her corner, wrapped up in shawls that she clutched with her bejeweled fingers. She was every stereotype wrapped up in a bright, gaudy package, reeking of boiled cabbage that I blessedly couldn't smell once I stepped away from her.

  I nodded at her when I came in, and she gave me her customary sweeping head to toe gaze, followed by a sneer. She liked to play at being the "aloof empath" who was above being read by the low-level ones. But I heard her loud and clear.

  She thought she could read my crystal clear aura and found me lacking. She thought I was the charlatan, which was only amusing since she couldn't sense what I hid in plain sight. I opted against sitting and stood close to the mirror and pretended Ruby didn't exist.

  Corbin entered Interview Room A, and threw down a fat manila folder. She paced on the other side of the one-way mirror. With her short, tawny hair ruffled around her head, she looked like a caged lioness, impatient, restless, and absolutely the queen of her domain.

  The door to the room opened again, and a man, wrapped in a blanket, and not much else, was helped into the room by two burly police officers. The man was clearly out of it. In another life, he would have been attractive. Pretty, even. He had a lean, muscular, swimmer's build, his longish hair that was maybe blond once upon a time, was held back by a leather cord. But his skin was grayish...and his eyes...

  For a moment I could have sworn they were glittering black pools, but then his head shifted, and they were a dull gray. Unfocused.

  The blanket shifted, and he was indeed basically naked under it. Well, naked, except for strategically woven black leather straps that covered his man bits. This get up did not look comfortable whatsoever.

  The officers sat him down, locked his chained hands down to the metal anchor on the table. He slumped in his chair. He was positioned to face toward the observation room, so I'd have firsthand testimony of his face and mannerisms.

  I wanted to see if Ruby was getting anything off him yet, or was told anything that I might not have been, but she was barely able to contain the drool leaking out of her mouth. I rolled my eyes.

  Aloof, indeed. The man was pitiful, obviously someone who needed to be cared for, not drooled over. Corbin wouldn't normally go through all this trouble for witnesses or persons of interest. And definitely not someone who looked like he'd be better off at a clinic. The chains just made him even more pitiful.

  Corbin rattled off her name, title, and badge number for the mic with a practiced ease that was comforting to hear. Then, she sat across from him, body open and relaxed, like she was about to order them a round of drinks at the bar before reciting the Miranda warning to him. "Do you understand your rights?"

  His face remained blank, jaw slack. He reminded me of an empty doll that needed to be wound up. Chills ran up my arms at the thought, and I buried myself in my coat to hide the involuntary shiver.

  There was something off about him. He needed more than a clinic. Hells, he needed full-on blessings from a temple.

  Corbin repeated her request, this time, more deliberate. It had an extra push to it, carried the metallic tang of her will being exerted. When he still wouldn't respond, Corbin's fingers drummed the table,
her non-verbal tell that she was both surprised and annoyed.

  "John Doe. Caucasian male. Approximate height six foot three. Approximate weight, 220 pounds. Contusions, scrapes all over his body, noted and recorded by the medical examiner. Found by off-duty Officer Fourney." Corbin spat out addresses, times, and other pertinent details with precision, a crystal clear account for the recording. I knew this drill of hers, knew that she was trying to provoke some kind of reaction from him.

  "Let the record show that Fourney is present in the room, and has submitted testimony that he found John Doe in this condition. John Doe is unresponsive and has been given medical assistance, as much as he allowed. Let the record show that before John Doe was processed, he kept repeating one phrase as witnessed by several officers and staff present in processing: 'I killed her.' When asked by police officers who he killed and where, John Doe rushed the officers before being subdued."

  I'd bet everything I owned that Corbin had been the one to subdue him. He would have otherwise been nothing more than brain splatter across the department's shiny floor. Corbin's fierce impatience singed the air, I could almost taste it. She didn't play politics well; hells she didn't care to learn the rules. All she would want to do now would be to find the dead girl, then find and bring in the ones responsible for killing her.

  Corbin clearly didn't believe this John Doe did it, but she believed that he knew something about it. She got up from her seat and knocked on the mirror, my cue to go inside.

  The witness sat up straight all of a sudden, and I swore he looked right at me despite the one-way mirror. A susurrus rose above the normal din of the police station, permeating the very walls. Ruby and the other officers in the room didn't seem to hear it.

  A persistent stinging between my shoulder blades was my only warning. I only had enough time to bang my fists against the mirror once before John Doe opened his mouth and spewed a black darkness against it.

  Then, the screaming began.

  Waves of power rushed through the one-way mirror. I had less than a heartbeat to throw my hands up and shield when a force like crashing water slammed me down into a chair. The room spun around me, the air thick and liquid, stealing the breath from my lungs. I closed my eyes, but the vertigo remained.

  "Are you okay?" Ruby's voice sounded as if from afar, like she was trying to speak to me underwater.

  I couldn't spare a moment wondering if this thing had a hold on Ruby or anyone else. Whatever this power was, it was trying to get past my shields, get inside me and do Gods only knew what. I couldn't break my concentration. I retreated inward, focused only on my breathing and growing the frozen landscape of my inner mental walls.

  A buzzing down my spine signaled that something powerful was draining the tattoos at my chakra points. Power came at a cost. Whether the payment came from years of practice or taking a shortcut by offering your flesh and blood, payment always came due.

  Whoever or whatever could manifest a fucking cataclysm, unseen, from a distance outside of a warded precinct had an obscene bankroll on power.

  I kept my eyes closed. It was like trying to hold back an avalanche. At this rate, all the blessings tattooed on my skin would be tapped out, and I'd be left with nothing but scarred flesh.

  My only anchor was the vast frozen nothing inside of me. A no man's land. A null that I'd been patiently feeding and growing. At its center was an ice fortress, my mental construct that hid the heart of my power.

  Please.

  A cool breath crept up from inside me, frost tingling up my arms and radiating out from my palms. I let the cold slow everything around me, let it turn into the dead calm of outer space.

  I felt the lures of that unseen force fall away from me, tethers that had stuck to my shields and tried to burrow their way in. The release was almost immediate. I pitched forward, no longer fighting a force that was crushing against me.

  Someone grabbed me by the shoulders and started shaking me. Fire whipped across my left cheek. Then, my right. A whisper of wind and I instinctively ducked and blocked whatever was about to hit me.

  My vision suddenly cleared, and Ruby was standing in front of me, shock etched on her face. She gasped for breath, lips blue. I blinked and realized that I gripped Ruby's wrist. Hard.

  Bare skin to bare skin.

  I let go immediately.

  She cradled her arm like it burned.

  "Sorry," I muttered. I'd fix her later.

  Shouts came through, but the interview room was still bathed in black.

  I needed to get to the interrogation room. To Corbin. I struggled to get to my feet.

  Footsteps ran up to the door, and an officer popped his head in.

  "Ms. Tallinn! Detective Troy wants you out of here."

  I'd already started moving before he had opened the door. Relief washed over me when I heard Corbin, her commands to clear the room and sedate the witness clear and resonant.

  She had a way with Voice, I'd give her that.

  I fought against the dizziness, and stumbled past the officer to the interview room.

  "Wait, you can't—"

  I silenced him with a look. Then, I nodded to Ruby. "Stay with the officer."

  I lingered at the doorway to the interview room. The John Doe was shaking, eyes rolling back into his head, tongue lolling out. It was like he was being strangled by unseen hands.

  The two officers that had brought him into the room struggled to keep him still in his seat. Corbin pushed her weight on top of him, did her best to keep his mouth closed.

  "Do we have time to take him to a Temple?" one of the officers asked.

  Corbin spared him a cutting look. "Do you think we have time, officer?" Her voice was a deadly quiet, like a knife blade brandished in the dark.

  The officer gulped in answer and added another hand to keep John Doe's mouth closed.

  John Doe's face contorted then. It was like something unseen grabbed the back of his head and pulled the skin back tight against his face. The bones of his face contorted, lengthened and snapped back. His eyes bulged until they looked like they would pop out of their sockets. The veins under his skin bloomed, swelling like captured balloons.

  The sounds of popping joints and sliding flesh made my skin crawl.

  "We should've detained him in the Basement like I'd wanted!" Corbin said through gritted teeth.

  "He wasn't lucid, Detective. Policy—"

  John Doe's chest expanded, like he managed to swallow a barrel.

  Corbin stumbled back a few feet. "Spare me your by the book, policy bullshit!" Then she pulled her baton out.

  I stepped into the room and John Doe's gaze found mine. In that moment, we were the only ones moving. The others' movements were impossibly slow.

  A montage of his life flickered before my eyes. I felt every joy, heartbreak, triumph, and defeat. And then there was nothing but terror. A kaleidoscope of gore that my mind refused to comprehend.

  "Please."

  I wasn't sure who had said it, if it was even said out loud. But, the entreaty was clear in my mind.

  In the next blink, the room devolved back into screeching chaos. Corbin ordered her men off John Doe so she could stun him. John Doe bowed his back again, more black smoke spewed from his mouth.

  I rushed forward, compelled by instinct. Corbin's orders thick with Voice rolled over me, but it was too late. It no longer mattered anyway.

  I held his hand.

  I was much too young when I first realized there was such a thing as "bad touch" and "good touch."

  I was the new little girl in the school. My first day.

  When it was time for recess, I had been the last one to join the other girls outside. Even with their poofy dresses, they still ran and played.

  I tugged at my dress. The crinoline scratchy against my waist where the seam was coarsely stitched together. I hadn't known to wear a slip under the dress.

  Raised voices like the screech of frightened birds had risen from beneath the jungle gym. />
  I hadn't known what compelled me toward the noise rather than away from it, like a few of the older girls who had run for help. Or put distance between them and what had happened.

  I had crunched my way across the gravel underneath the jungle gym. Knelt by the little girl whose sweat drenched face was ashen, eyes scrunched closed, breaths shallow. The required name badge was twisted under her. Her little arm bent in an impossible way next to her body.

  "What do you think you're doing?" A blonde girl had broken apart from the circle of frozen onlookers. Chloe, her name badge said.

  "She's hurt."

  "Yeah. And that's why someone's getting Mrs. Strong." Righteousness dripped from her every word. She reeked of overripe fruit, left out too long in the sun.

  The broken little girl on the ground hadn't made a sound. She was conscious. Her pain pricked at me like nettles and burrs. I hadn't known how to keep them from poking at me. And her fear was suffocating, though at the time, I only identified it as the stench of rotten eggs.

  "Why did you do this?" I asked.

  Chloe tossed her pretty blonde mane behind her shoulder, crossed her arms. It was a practiced move, one she mimicked from the older girls on the other side of the school, and took pains to imitate in front of her mirror. The image of her doing so had wavered around and behind her like ripples in a pond.

  "I didn't do anything. And everyone here saw how she" —pointing to the broken girl— "was showing off."

  But I had known. I had seen it plain as day moving over her like a movie. I didn't know why she had bothered lying, or why anyone else had believed her. Chloe had been jealous of this girl's lithe body, of how she was able to flip around the bars. She had thrown a rock at the girl so that she'd lose her balance and fall. None of the other girls did anything to stop her, a few even laughed as the girl desperately kept her footing.

  Until the fall.

  I had touched the broken girl then. Filled myself with her pain, only her pain. But then it was too much. I hadn't been specific enough about what to pull, hadn't known to be specific. Only that I needed to pull. I couldn't stop it.