Second Guess (The Girl in the Box Book 39)

by Robert J. Crane

  A deep breath seemed to bring her back to wakefulness, but the joy did not leave her. Scout's head felt...so full, in the most delightful way.

  ...Scout...? AJ's voice tinkled like it was run across crystal glass in the depths of her mind.

  “I feel you,” she said, the words seeping out past a lazy smile as she felt the sun kiss her skin. Her fingers were warm, the tingles spreading to her palms and up her hands and wrists. “I feel you, AJ...”

  I'm here, Scout.

  “I know. I feel you, baby.” Why had she said that? In that way? It didn't sound like her, she realized, dimly.

  Scout sat up. Dirt trickled off the back of her neck and her hair in a small shower down the back of her shirt. She blinked.

  AJ was dead, his eyes staring up into the endless blue.

  But I'm right here, Scout...

  “I know, baby,” she said, and again distantly, wondered where that had come from. Didn't AJ say 'baby' all the time? “And I'm so glad you are.”

  That shitstain that killed me? He's right over there, you know.

  “Oh, I know,” Scout said, and turned her head to look at him.

  He was there still. Face down in the dirt, not even twitching.

  Let's kill him together, Scout.

  Two so-called heroes, just lying there. Helpless. A malicious smile twisted Scout's lips. “Yeah. Let's.”

  CHAPTER SIXTY-FIVE

  Jamal

  I came out of it slowly, that hard knock against the wall of the building taking me out of the game for a few seconds. My head was ringing and I opened my eyes to some strange mix of shadowed darkness, cloudy skies mingled with sun and the ever-present smell of smoke.

  The Vaquero refinery control room looked like it had been hit by a tornado. Which it probably had; the rush of wind clued me in that Reed was somewhere above, doing his thing. Sienna lay against a wall, unconscious, a dozen feet or so from me, and I took her fallen form in as I raised my head and fought to keep my eyes open.

  Someone else moved in the wreckage, though, and that caught my attention before I was really ready to give attention.

  It was the lightning lady, and she looked like she was just about thawed out. Her shirt was still hanging open but now also dripping, and I tried to keep my eyeline north of her bra line because my head needed to be all in on this dangerous game.

  Her eyes flared lightning and it rolled over her body and out through her hands and feet, crawling across the metal catwalk floor. She glanced at the sky, then at me, sticking out a hand.

  Lightning flashed toward me and I caught it in my hand. “Oh, we doing this again?” I asked casually, letting it roll off me.

  The lightning lady stood there, staring at me, dripping. (Eyes up, Jamal, focus, she was literally just with another dude).

  Then she looked at Sienna, and her scowl turned into a smile.

  “Shit!” I flung myself forward, catching the bolt as she flung it. It burned a solid hole in the clothing over my belly, and I sent it right back at her arm, burning the sleeve off her blouse at the shoulder. “We just gonna play strip poker here?”

  She cocked her head at me, and her smile got a touch more malicious. “No. I don't think we need to. I want to play for bigger stakes, anyway.” And she unleashed on the catwalk, electricity crawling across the metal.

  “What do you think you're gonna do with tha...?” I started to ask, but faded halfway through. The room was vibrating with electricity; all the consoles had been destroyed, but there was more wattage bouncing around in here than inside an active transfer line.

  Because then I remembered.

  I wasn't alone in here.

  I whirled around to find Sienna sparking and jerking, the electricity running over her body as if someone had placed paddles on her and was shocking her to death. Smoke was already rolling out from behind her collar, and her eyes were rolling back in her head.

  If I didn't do something fast...she was going to die right here.

  CHAPTER SIXTY-SIX

  Scout

  Every step was like a new sensation. There was power coursing through Scout's hands, and her whole body hummed with a desire to use it.

  Let's burn them in half, AJ's voice cackled in her head. Do to them what they did to me.

  “I kinda love that idea,” Scout said, malice bubbling inside her. Her earlier reticence seemed to be gone. Why had she been hiding while AJ was having all the fun blowing things up? This was turning into a good time. Two of Sienna Nealon's besties were laid out on the ground, one unconscious, the other burned beyond the capacity to move, and she had just inherited a power that would let her deliver a coup de grace on them.

  Scout's hands flared to life, glowing impossibly bright blue. The air shimmered around them, and she could feel the heat. Feel it, but it didn't matter to her.

  You could put your hands right up to your face and it'd just turn your skin into plasma, AJ said. Burn your clothes off, make a blue, spectral goddess.

  “Like a female Dr. Manhattan,” Scout whispered.

  Uh...yea? I guess? Not really sure who that is, AJ said.

  “Don't worry about it,” Scout breathed. She put her hands together and felt the warm glow within them. Pulling them slowly apart, operating from instinct or some memory of AJ's, she funneled plasma, pure power and heat, between her hands, sculpting it into a ball of killing strength. She brought them farther and farther apart, making the ball the size of her head.

  Once it was made, she readied to throw it like a baseball. Lined up the shot; she could get both of these guys with one throw.

  Someone made a noise, and Scout wasn't sure who it was. Just a grunt. Didn't sound like the whining of the burned guy.

  Whatever. It was almost done. All she had to do was throw the ball and–

  A subtle vibration made her jerk in surprise. She looked down; something was moving at her feet.

  Dirt slammed into Scout's chin like a clenched fist, launching her into the air. Her body went limp for a moment in flight, then she landed hard and fast and heard something break.

  Scout! AJ's voice was loud and panicked and right in her ear. No, in her head. Wake up!

  But she didn't want to wake up. She tasted dirt, grainy and bitter on her tongue. Slitting one eye to look, she could see the burning tanks in the distance, and one that still looked whole, standing off to the side.

  And there, past her skinny, stretched-out legs, was the black guy again, up on his hands and knees, glaring at her across the fifty feet or so that now separated them.

  Kill him! Kill him fast! AJ screamed in her head.

  “Don't think...I can hit him...from here,” Scout murmured. Blood trickled out of lips and nose.

  Do something!

  Scout blinked, turning her head. She focused hazily on that tank that stood almost between them.

  Yes. Yes, do that.

  “I...I think I can...” Scout murmured, raising a hand.

  You can. I'll show you how.

  Plasma burned in the middle of her palm, a lesser heat, pleasurable like when she'd taken in AJ's soul. It fired off, particles racing across the gap between her and the tank, fizzling against the side. It glowed there for a second, like it had stuck in the paint, and then–

  WHUMP.

  The tank exploded, and Scout went flying again, hurled through the air, tumbling as if a giant had flicked her across the whole damned world.

  CHAPTER SIXTY-SEVEN

  Reed

  Flyboy rocketed at me with a girder like a knight charging across the field of a medieval tourney. The vibrato was strong, the shockwave through the air that told me he'd gone supersonic, ready to impale me to death with his weapon of choice–

  I cut the tornado holding me aloft, reversed it, pushing myself down and sideways–

  He caught me in the ribcage and the pain was nuclear, like someone had stuck a bomb between my ribs and set it off.

  Flyboy grinned. “No ole.”

  With a hurled hand, I
threw my fingers at him and he flew away, flung by my motion.

  I looked down; the girder clattered from my side to the ground below.

  Lightheaded, I felt myself go woozy.

  Needed to get away...from him...needed to get away before...

  I fell.

  Then...darkness.

  CHAPTER SIXTY-EIGHT

  Sienna

  I half woke to pain crashing through my central nervous system the like of which I could seldom recall feeling before. My every nerve felt as though someone had flayed my skin off, dragged the little fibrous bundles from my body, and was keying them in much the same way one would run a key along the surface of a car.

  It hurt, man. It hurt to an agonizing degree. My lungs were locked; my heart seemed to flop wildly in my chest.

  Blue flashes danced in front of my half-opened eyes. My muscles gave no sign of responding to my brain, which was fine because my skull was on fire, the gray matter inside being slammed repeatedly by a burning whack-a-mole mallet. I opened my mouth to scream but nothing came out but more blue flashes, and the only sound I heard was the rushing of blood and the clattering of my bones wrenching against steel as my muscles danced me across metal grates.

  “Sienna!” someone shouted. I was wet all over, stinging sweat dancing along with the pain, my body jerking along with the blue flashes that ran over my body. “You have to wake up!”

  I didn't realize I was asleep, being in nearly the most agonizing pain I'd ever been in. My eyes were locked back, my teeth clenching together, and on a particularly violent spasm, I caught a glimpse of my tormentor.

  Punk Rock Chick. She was a giant shadow, her face lit blue by malice and electricity. She was the one hurting me, and all I wanted in my limited, lizard brain was for the pain to stop.

  She was the cause of my pain. Therefore I needed her to stop.

  Die.

  I needed her to die.

  I jerked under the influence of the blue flashing, so hard that my feet flipped into view. My boots were seared, burned, and I could see little spots of skin through the charred leather. Skin so black it might have been put in an oven and crisped for hours, but still–

  Something clicked in my brain beneath the screaming, hammering pain.

  Burned.

  Fire.

  My feet spasmed into my field of view again, shadowing Punk Rock Chick's face and body.

  Fire.

  Flame.

  Gavrikov, Brianna whispered in a voice racked with pain.

  Gavrikov.

  My left foot leapt into view again, and my boot burned off like carbon paper catching a flame. As it fell again, I felt something release as my toes clenched–

  A scream sounded, loud and agonized, as the pain seemed to dissipate. It didn't disappear, but neither was it at full force and effect, fiery nails being hammered into my every nerve.

  I heaved to a stop, my muscles all contracted and locked, my breathing wheezy and slowed.

  W...Wolfe, Brianna whispered. She sounded just about as knackered as I was.

  “Wolfe,” I agreed, thinking of the hairy, serial-killing beast.

  The pain receded another touch, and I lifted a hand in front of my face. Blackened spots on my skin puckered and turned pink, healing from the electricity that had danced angrily across them only moments before.

  “Sienna!” Jamal's voice intruded on my moment of healing. His face surged into my view, and I felt his hand against my shoulder. “Are you okay?”

  “Am I...?” I smacked dry, cracked lips together as the pink welts disappeared from my hand, replaced by new, pale flesh. Lifting my head and looking down at myself, I found my clothing crisscrossed with burn spots, white skin visible beneath. “Ow.” I reached under my shirt and ripped out my bra. It flaked apart as it came out, the underwire snapping under the force of my pull. As I tossed it out, I realized it had conducted the electricity across my torso, setting the material on fire. “God, you men just have it better in every way, don't you?”

  “We don't get to carry boobs around all the time, so that's a downside,” he said. My returned glare must have been fearsome, because instead of pressing that, he went back to his previous question. “Are you all right?”

  “Ish,” I said, sitting up and feeling a little like Frankenstein's monster lurching to life. Punk Rock Chick was whimpering softly ahead, clutching her knee–

  No.

  Clutching the stump below her knee, where her leg suddenly ended in a charred, steaming bit of flesh.

  “Yeah, you launched a fireball at her,” Jamal said, following my gaze. “Cut her off at the knee.”

  “Whoops,” I said, and caught a puzzled look from him. “I was aiming for her chest.”

  “Let me go subdue her,” Jamal said.

  “Uh uh,” I said, summoning to mind Eve Kappler again. I readied my fairy light bindings, preparing to stick her to a wall this time, or better still, the ground, where all the electricity in the world wouldn't do her a damned bit of good. “I'ma–”

  With a flash, Mr. Composure appeared, as though he were a speedster popping in for just a second. He had snaked an arm under Punk Rock's rib cage, flashed me a smile, and said, “Arrivederci.”

  Then, with another flash, and before I could spin his ass to the wall with light bands...

  ...He was gone.

  CHAPTER SIXTY-NINE

  Augustus

  I wanted to bury my face in the dirt, but I really couldn't.

  That succubus had blindsided me, knocked me into senselessness (my momma would argue I've been senseless all along), then tried to burn Scotty and me to death with her newly stolen plasma powers.

  I was insensate, but in spite of what Momma and Jamal might have thought, I wasn't senseless.

  Hammering that girl with a rock uppercut was a desperation move, but it worked. She got jacked so hard in the jaw that she went flying. I caught her landing through blurry eyes, and she looked damned near out of it.

  The boom of the nearby tank still had my head rattling, but I lifted up, preparing to deliver a coup de grace of my own. If I could just drive enough sand up into her sinus cavity, I could finish this murderous chick off before she hurt anyone else.

  That'd put the score at Augustus 2, Bad Guys 0 – so far as I knew.

  With a wavering hand, I reached out. Grains of sand began to snake over her. I could feel her outline through them, dirt crawling up the sides of her face and–

  Something flashed into existence beside her.

  It was a man. A blurry, smiling man.

  I stared as he scooped her up into his arms, then rocketed into the sky with a sonic boom that rattled my teeth.

  The grains of sand went with her, and I could feel them for a few minutes as they climbed, ever higher, into the sky.

  But eventually, they receded from my senses, and I was left there, lying next to a moaning Scotty, trying to get my head back together enough to stand.

  CHAPTER SEVENTY

  Sienna

  “His breathing is steady,” the EMT said, standing next to the gurney with my brother on it. “Pulse is a little elevated, blood pressure a little low.” He was checking Reed out, making sure things were copacetic, as I waited, on tenterhooks, so close behind him I was just about giving him a prostate exam by accident.

  “He's going to be okay,” Jamal breathed, letting it out on my shoulder. He sounded a little rough, but then, he'd been through a little bit today.

  I stared at Reed's unconscious form. “He just keeps taking these hits for the team.” I brushed a hand against the front of his shirt. He had a terrible gash in his side. They'd found a bloody girder next to him, and it didn't take much imagination to put two and two together. The EMT gave me a nod and started to roll him away to the ambulance. I didn't have the heart to stop them, because after the last two hits he'd taken, I was starting to worry he really did need medical attention.

  “How's your brother?” I asked, turning to look.

  The Vaqu
ero refinery was another ecological disaster area, but it had the virtue of still standing in spite of the best efforts of the Frenetic Four. Which was as good a name as I felt they deserved. Firefighters were working on the exploded tanks in the outlying part of the complex, and EMTs had already discovered Augustus and Scott, both wounded in their own ways, but alive. They'd been moved to us, but they were both conscious and speaking...

  ...Unlike Reed.

  “He got clobbered in the head,” Jamal said, nodding to a distant ambulance. I could see Augustus standing over there, a crusty scar across the top of his head. “Probably took worse hits during his high school football career.”

  “This little war of ours is not going so well,” I said softly.

  “I don't know about that,” Jamal said. “Augustus says he got the plasma dude. Don't know if you noticed, but their AK got left behind in the control room in all the hubbub. Lady Lightning lost a leg–”

  I laughed. “I've been calling her 'Punk Rock Chick' in my head.”

  He paused to consider. “Not bad. She rides the borderline between 'punk' and 'goth,' but I think the tattered jeans and doing that flying guy on the electrical console puts her pretty soundly in the 'punk' category.”

  “Yeah,” I said, tensing up again.

  Jamal looked at me with great amusement. “You kinda froze back there.” When I didn't respond, he apparently felt the need to go on. “You know, during the villains' nude scene? We had 'em dead to rights, and–”

  “That was not a mere nude scene, Jamal,” I said. “That was a full-on sex scene.” I clenched my fists, then unclenched them. “And yes,” I said, in a much smaller voice, “I froze.”

  “What's up with that?” Jamal asked. He didn't put a hand on my shoulder, fortunately, or I would have probably jumped ten feet, I was so wired. “I thought you've seen...like, everything, at this point.”