“Look,” I interrupted, “I know you’ve been on this jet for nearly three months, and you’re going a little crazy, but I need to rest. Recover. Groping a nineteen-year-old French girl with daddy issues isn’t at the top of my priority list.”
“I just figured, you know...after what happened in Argentina. You’d want to get out. Live a little.”
“I’m not going to talk about Argentina,” I said quietly, careful not to let my words travel throughout the rest of the aircraft. “And neither are you.”
“Fine, fine.” Mac smiled and returned to the cockpit. He took a seat and pulled a long red lever, bringing the powerful twin engines to life with a soft rumble. “Where are we off to now, ‘Mister’ Moxon?” He added the ‘Mister’ ironically, since he knew it bothered me.
“Fortress 23,” I instructed. “But first, we need to make a stop in Thunder Bay.”
“What’s in Thunder Bay?” he asked curiously.
“Another hospital.”
Mac glanced over his shoulder. He flashed a set of pearly-white teeth as he extracted a pair of aviator glasses from his jacket. “Mox, you sure how know to party.”
***
It took us just thirty minutes to cross The Great Lakes and arrive at our destination – a small hospital on the outskirts of Thunder Bay, Ontario. The sleepy, overcast city seemed particularly quiet, and the snowfall had accumulated far more than in the Toronto area. We touched down on hospital’s small rooftop hoverpad and I stepped out of the jet, landing ankle-deep in crisp white snow.
Valentina zipped up her jacket and followed closely behind, but I insisted she stay onboard and try to get some rest. I was still concerned about security, but a superhuman assassin seemed like overkill for a stroll through a small-town hospital. I had my wrist-com in case of emergency, and she wouldn’t be far away if I needed her. She grumbled and argued, but I insisted she stay. A consummate professional, she never let me out of her sight while we were in a public place. Part of me thought Valentina was just that dedicated to her job – and a larger part believed she was more concerned about the fact that her final paycheck might not clear if I were killed.
I wandered through the stark white hallways, passing the occasional nurse or janitor on the way. No one gave me a second glance. When I arrived at my friend’s room in the recovery ward, he appeared much like he had on the day after Arena Mode; pale, sickly, his breathing shallow and weak. A small rectangular monitor blipped quietly in the deathly silence, tethered to his chest by a series of thin silver wires.
Kenneth Livitski’s bleak hospital room was brightened by the abundance of cards, flowers and comic book paraphernalia that surrounded him. His parents and siblings lived nearby and visited on a daily basis, never arriving empty-handed. The private room I’d financed was the largest that the hospital had to offer, but was quickly filling up due to the constant influx of gifts. I might have to rent out the adjacent room just to accommodate his growing collection.
In the three months since he’d been in a coma, I’d come to visit exactly once. Wrapped up in my own bullshit, as per usual, I always came up with excuses why I couldn’t make the time. Since Arena Mode ended I had avoided Peyton, walked away from my best friend Gavin, and I’d barely given Kenneth the time of day since he’d landed here.
Living in denial was one of my specialties, but I never lied to myself about why Kenneth was in a coma: he was here because of me. Because I had convinced him, along with the rest of the world, that I was a superhuman before the tournament began. He believed that I’d have his back as much as he had mine, but when the fighting began and a sword pierced Kenneth’s abdomen, I panicked – I was sure he was finished, and I was sure that I was next. And I ran.
His family never blamed me for what happened, though I almost wish they had. The last interview I saw with Kenneth’s mother was a simulcast on CNN, where she prayed for not only her son’s recovery, but for my safety as well. When the reporter asked if she harbored any ill will towards me for fleeing when her son was stabbed, she smiled warmly and stated there was nothing that I could have done to help. It was all in God’s hands, and we’d have to wait for His plan to unfold. I don’t know whether it was innate kindness or just irritatingly powerful positive thinking, but she refused to lash out, and assign blame for something she had no control over. Her son was in a bad place, but she didn’t want anyone else to suffer just because he had.
I think the reason I avoided these visits was because I feared running into Kenneth’s mother. If she screamed, or slapped me, or cursed my existence I could deal with the sting. But I couldn’t bear the guilt if she let me off the hook.
I patted Kenneth on the hand, silently swearing to be a better person. To come visit more often, and keep pursuing every medical alternative to help him come out of this coma. Stem cell replacement and tissue re-gen therapy had kept him biologically alive; had he suffered that much internal damage even ten years ago he would have certainly died. But it was the blow to his head that was the larger issue. When the blade was extracted from Kenneth’s torso he fell, cracking the back of his skull on a curb as his body went limp. Medical treatments were advancing at an impressive rate, but there was still nothing available that could improve his condition.
I reached into my jacket pocket and pulled out a small vintage figurine I’d purchased in Japan. It was him. A limited edition Kenneth Livitski toy, complete with his ‘Living Eye’ costume and removable mask, identical to the one he’s worn in Arena Mode. I articulated the arms and posed the legs, carefully standing it on the end table next to his bed. It made me smile to think that if he woke up tomorrow, the first thing he’d see would be a plastic figure of himself staring back at him. For someone who loved comic book culture even more than I did, it would be like waking up in Heaven.
When I turned to leave a cold draft hit the back of my neck. It was powerful, as if someone had inexplicably turned the air conditioning on full-blast during a snow storm. I craned my neck upwards and that’s when I saw it – saw her. A swirl of blue mist materialized from the aether, touching down at my feet like a funnel cloud during a hurricane. I shouted and scrambled backwards, which was when she took form.
It was Brynja.
Chapter Four
The porcelain-skinned, blue-haired girl who stood before me was visibly shaken. She looked and sounded exactly how I remembered Brynja; her almond-shaped eyes, waif-like frame, the tattoo of a blue manticore emblazoned across her left arm – every discernible detail was identical. It was her...it had to be. I just wasn’t sure how it was possible.
She blinked hard and squinted, perplexed as she studied my face. “What the hell...Mox? Where’s your armor? And why are you wearing those clothes?” It took her a moment to realize that she was in a different time and place – which explained my change of attire. And it took her a moment longer to realize that she wasn’t wearing any clothing of her own. “What the hell!” Brynja threw her hands across her chest, pulling her knees together. “What did you do to me, you freak?”
“Me?” I stepped back, shielding my eyes with an outstretched hand. “I didn’t do anything! You died back in Arena Mode – or disappeared, I guess – and this is three months later, and...” I spread my fingers ever so slightly, sneaking one more glance (just to make sure I wasn’t hallucinating), “here you are.”
She tore the sheets from Kenneth’s bed, wrapping them around her torso. “I...died?”
“Well,” I replied, lowering my hand. “I guess ‘died’ would be overstating it, considering the fact that you’re standing here and stuff. You disappeared after the bolt hit you.” As I explained what I’d seen I could almost see the light bulb illuminating over her head: towards the end of the Arena Mode competition I was struggling to disarm a British swordfighter named Winston Ramsley. During the brawl his weapon discharged, firing several thousand volts of electricity into Brynja as she rushed to my aid. A moment later she blinked out of existence, never to be seen again – until now.
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She stared at me for what felt like an eternity, carefully studying every detail of my face. It was as if she was trying to figure out if I was real – if she was somehow dreaming, or hallucinating this entire experience. Or possibly even still trapped inside The Arena, under the influence of a powerful psychic.
And that’s when the door flew open.
Standing in the threshold was a squat, gravel-voiced orderly with a pile of muddy brown hair pulled into a bun. “I’m sorry, sir,” she grumbled, “but your escort isn’t permitted in here. She’ll have to wait downstairs in the lobby.”
Brynja cocked her head and raised an eyebrow, suddenly snapped out of her daze by the old woman’s accusation. “Wait – did you just call me an escort?”
“Yes I did, ma’am. It’s a classier word for ‘hooker’.”
Brynja actually gasped. “Hooker?”
The orderly nodded once again. “That’s correct, ma’am. A prostitute. A call girl. A wh—”
“I know what an escort is!” Brynja interrupted. “I’m not an idiot! But why would you think I’m a...” She trailed off momentarily, glancing down at her conspicuous lack of clothing. “Oh, okay – I get it. No, you’re confused. See, I arrived like this. I appeared here, from New York City where I was fully, totally dressed. And now, my clothes are gone. They were...” She paused for a beat, shrugging her shoulders. “Vaporized?”
The stoic orderly didn’t blink. “Of course they were, ma’am. Either way you’ll have to wait downstairs. It’s hospital policy: no nudity in the visiting rooms. And no fornication in, on, or around the coma patients. Again, hospital policy.”
“Fornication?” I repeated, not sure I heard the word correctly.
“It’s a classier word for ‘sex’, sir. Intercourse. Copulation. Fu—”
“Yeah,” I said, holding up a hand. “We got it.”
The orderly yanked a sleeve away from her swollen wrist, revealing a battered watch that looked older than she was. “You got five minutes to get cleaned up, and then I want you both out of here. Not a second more or I call security.”
“Wait,” I said as the woman reached for the door handle. “People bring escorts into the hospital so often that you have a policy against it?”
She nodded once more. “You’d be surprised, sir.”
I exchanged glances with Brynja and the orderly tapped the face of her watch with her fingernail. “Four minutes, thirty seconds,” she warned before slamming the door shut behind her.
“I guess that’s our cue,” Brynja said. “Maybe when we get out of here you can explain...you know, everything.”
Hands clasped tightly around the thin hospital linens, Brynja glanced around the room, apparently unsure of what to do next. She couldn’t walk onto a freezing rooftop wrapped in a sheet, so I searched through Kenneth’s clothing. His family was continually brining jeans, jackets and shirts to his room, hoping he’d wake to find all of his favorite outfits at his disposal. Judging by the overfilled closet and overstuffed drawers, it looked like they’d spent the last three months migrating his entire wardrobe to his bedside.
Brynja slipped on a black Buffy the Vampire Slayer t-shirt and a pair of oversized jeans, using a belt to cinch the sagging pants around her narrow waist. While slipping on some thermal socks she finally noticed who was lying in the bed. “Holy shit, is that Kenneth?” She raced across the room and embraced him. “I can’t believe he made it out of The Arena! This is amazing – and it explains why I’m here.”
I stared at her for a moment, creasing my eyebrows together. I wasn’t sure what was just explained, or how any of this suddenly made sense.
“His powers,” she replied, in a condescendingly slow cadence, “you know, that thing where he can create anything he wants?”
My memory had been on the fritz lately, but I don’t recall one of Kenneth’s powers being the ability to resurrect people from the dead. “All right,” I said with a heavy dose of skepticism, “so even if he somehow manifested you out of thin air, despite being in a coma, you’d be a recreation – like a physical representation of who you were – not you you...right?”
“No idea,” she replied casually, squeezing him once more. “You’re the brains of this team.” She pressed her ear to his heart and closed her eyes, smiling broadly as his chest rose and fell.
Kenneth Livitski had suffered trauma to his brain, but technically speaking it was still functioning. Not at a hundred percent, I was told – although evidently it was working well enough to trigger his abilities. Recent studies have concluded that coma patients do have control over their senses to varying degrees, with hearing being the most prominent. It’s possible he knew I was here, and that he manifested Brynja for some reason or another – though only one reason made any sense. “Brynja, you can still do that mind reading thing, right?”
“Sure, I can give it a try. Who do you want me to read?”
I glanced down at Kenneth.
“Oh, right. You think he’s readable?”
“Well he’s not brain dead,” I replied. “It’s worth a try.”
She moved in closer and brushed the chestnut-colored bangs from his forehead, placing a palm flat against his cheek. A moment ticked by and Brynja’s eyes widened, pupils dilating until the inky blackness nearly eclipsed the whites. She leaped from the bed and stepped back, clasping a hand over her mouth.
“What?” I shouted.
The color drained from Brynja’s face. She stared blankly at Kenneth’s body, dazed and unfocused. I offered her a seat but she refused to take it, waving it off absently with one hand.
“What did he say?” I asked again, lowering my voice. “Is he all right?”
“He’s just repeating the same words over and over,” she said softly. “He wants us to pull the plug.”
Chapter Five
I made my way to the rooftop with Brynja in tow, who was buried beneath one of Kenneth’s brightly colored ski jackets. Not the most fashionable choice of attire, but it was a better alternative than catching frostbite. My jet wasn’t permitted to remain on the hoverpad since incoming emergency aircraft could arrive at any moment, so Mac circled overhead until I sent him a signal that I required a pick-up. A moment later the jet landed, and the entrance ramp lowered to invite us aboard.
“Moxon!” Mac greeted me with a wide smile and a pat on the back, peering over my shoulder at the blue-haired girl who accompanied me. “The man wanders into a hospital and comes out with some arm candy. I guess this trip wasn’t a total waste of time after all.” He offered to take Brynja’s jacket as he flashed her a grin. “I’m Captain MacBride, but most people call me ‘Mac’. What do I call you, sweetheart?”
Valentina, who was resting comfortably in the cabin, glanced over the top of her book – just long enough to roll her eyes at Mac’s abrasive first impression.
Brynja shook her head and refused to respond.
“So Mox, is she DTF?” Mac asked, making no attempt to lower his voice. “You gonna introduce her to the mile high club once we take off?”
Brynja’s lips curled into a seductive smile and she stepped towards him.
Fearing for what might happen next I stepped in the opposite direction.
She leaned in and placed both hands on his chest. “There is a club I’d like you to join: it’s called the mile down club.”
“Sounds hot,” he replied without missing a beat, “Tell me about it, Blue.”
“Once we get a mile in the air,” Brynja breathed, slow and smoky, “you set this bad boy on auto-pilot. Then you and I sneak downstairs...and once we’re alone, I smash you in the face and throw you out the cargo door.”
Brynja shoved Mac hard against the cabin wall, turned, and stomped towards the seating area, heading directly for the bar. She helped herself to the spiced rum, twisting off the cap and gulping straight from the bottle.
Valentina glanced at me and smiled wider than I’d ever seen. “I like her.”
***
It was
less than an hour into the flight and we’d all settled in. Valentina had retired to a private room for a nap, and Brynja, who had borrowed some of her clothes, looked measurably more comfortable. Business casual wasn’t her style, but at least the white dress shirt and pleated pants seemed to fit.
I assumed that Brynja would want an opportunity to rest, or at least lie down, but she was unnaturally energized. Sitting at one of the cabin’s interactive tables she incessantly opened holo-screens, scanning and scrolling through four windows at once. She read articles, activated video clips, and searched every newsworthy simulcast from the last three months. It was as if she was trying to fill her brain with every bit of data that she’d missed out on, and couldn’t consume it fast enough.
My wrist-com blipped to life as I was pouring myself a drink, signalling an incoming call. The name ‘Jacob Fitzsimmons’ blinked into view and I accepted the transmission. Appearing on the holo-screen was a narrow, thin-haired man with a boldly aquiline face, clad in a meticulously tailored charcoal suit – the only color I’d ever seen him wear. Fitzsimmons was always direct, never one to waste a moment of time; so as per usual, there was very little small talk. My lawyer pointedly asked if I’d ‘heard the news’, to which I replied ‘what news?’ So many outlets were covering my every move that I couldn’t keep track of them all. I assumed that if something truly significant surfaced, one of my lawyers would call and fill me in on the details.
He notified me that an incoming video was about to play. I darkened the cabin lights and projected a full-size screen into the air, where an image of a beautiful woman appeared. Dressed in a stylish black coat, with her shoulder-length hair tucked behind her ears, the woman stood in front of Moscow’s Kremlin; the multicolored onion-dome roofs were clearly visible in the distance. Her expression was hard, colder than the weather surrounding her.
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