by Colby R Rice
Turls pursed her lips apologetically. "Sorry, kid. We'd afford you some privacy, but we need at least one gun on you. In case you get rowdy."
"Yeah. Sure." Zeika muttered bitterly.
"Hey, one of you turn around." Turls snapped at the boys. "I said one gun."
Greg looked over at Johnny, grinning. "Wanna do a rock-paper-scissors on it, Juanito?"
Johnny rolled his eyes and turned his back on the scene. "Sorry, Z. This is something we have to do."
"YES!" Greg hooted. He grabbed his gun and aimed at her, looking on with a shit-eating grin. "Too bad we can't record this--"
"Shut up, Greg!" Turls and Johnny snapped in unison.
Zeika took a breath, peeled off her clothes, and slipped them through the bars as commanded. Turls picked the clothes up and handed them to Johnny, who handed her some folds of fabric in return. Johnny shook out Zeika's stuff, dug his hands in the pockets. He never turned around.
"She's clear," he said. He then walked out the room, hitting a switch on the console as he did.
The door to the cage opened.
"Hands up," Turls commanded. "Up and away from the bag. Step out. Greg?"
Zeika stepped out the cage, hands raised, and Greg approached her, taking the duffel bag from the floor, but still aiming. She watched him as he walked over to the right wall, where for the first time, she noticed a scanner. He put the bag on its conveyor belt, looking at her down the barrel of the gun. A green light flicked on at the top of the scanner as the bag went through.
"Homage is clear."
"Okay." Turls forced a smile as she pulled the medical gloves tight. "This'll only take a minute."
"Take your time, Turls." Greg said, admiring Zeika's figure.
Hands still in the air, Zeika flipped him the bird and looked away, indignant. Turls examined her, looking in her eyes, ears, mouth, under the tongue, all with a clinical professionalism. She then searched her, cavities and all.
Zeika gritted her teeth, suddenly flinching.
"Oops, sorry," Turls muttered. "Ran up against the cherry."
Zeika cleared her throat, feeling her face go warm. "Look, this is a search. No need to make any special announcements."
"Sorry," Turls giggled. She stepped back and pulled off the gloves, finally done. She handed Zeika a robe, thin and cheap, and Zeika hurriedly threw it on.
"You're all clear. You hungry? We put something in your room for you. It's small, but you shouldn't eat too heavy before you get to bed anyway."
Zeika hesitated. "That's-- that's it?"
"For now, yeah."
Creasing her brow, Zeika looked off to the side, puzzled. She'd half-expected them to blow holes in her, set dogs on her, something. Anything but a bathrobe and dinner.
"What?"
"Well, Franz and Davy said it would be a little-- I don't know-- harder to break in? That you guys weren't accepting recruits."
"Yeah. He's sort of right about that. Johnny made an executive decision. Don't get ahead of yourself. You're not in quite yet, and you came at a weird time. You just passed our preliminary check, but you still need to be approved by our progenitor cell. That's going to take work. If you want a place here, you've got to earn it."
"What's a progenitor cell?"
"Anyone 18 or older serves in progenitor cells, or P-cells, teams of five that serve as the main foot soldiers of Koa. Anyone 17 or younger is automatically assigned to a filial cell, or F-cells, who provide support for the progenitor cells. All ghosts-- like us-- are filial. Every P-cell is paired with an F-cell, and in order to get you initiated, our P-cell has to induct you."
"I see. And the homage?"
"For the P-cell. We don't look at it. They do." Turls turned, motioning to the corridor into which Johnny had disappeared. "I've got to put you in now, Zeika. Sorry."
Zeika nodded, following after Turls, noting that Greg was trailing closely behind, still aiming. They walked down a tiny hall, sparse, cheerless, but warm, and they stopped at the end of the hallway, in front of a barred room that Turls began to unlock.
"This looks like the prisoner's quarters," Zeika said.
"It is. It's our brig. Quinn won't have you sleeping anywhere else until you're officially initiated, so you'll have to get used to it. Lights out time for you will be 10:30 pm every night. Greg is the kitchen bitch, so he'll be bringing your meals to you."
"Hey!" Greg snapped.
Zeika turned to face them, and she was met with faces that were surprisingly warm and soft. Even with Greg holding the gun on her, he looked decidedly bored about the whole thing. They looked nothing like the assholes who had attacked her lot just a couple months ago, and she briefly wondered if they were child soldiers at all.
"Convincing the progenitor cells to keep you is going to be hard, but obviously Johnny thinks you can do it." Turls continued. "Impress them, and I think you can earn your way into Koa. Sweet dreams." She opened the door for her, bade her goodnight, and then walked down the hallway.
"Cute, ain't she?" Greg snickered and wiggled his nose. "Look, I'll tell you what she's staying mum about. Things are about to get real hard in the Protecteds. That's why recruitment's been cut."
Zeika creased her brow, remembering Franz' words. War is coming. "Hard like how?"
Greg shrugged and looked at his watch. "Well. You'll find out in a few hours. You'll see." He pushed her into the brig, and closed and locked the doors. "But no worries." He smiled. "You're with us now. If you need anything, give us a holler."
He left, and for a few moments, the only sound was the lonely dripping of water in the far corner of the room. The darkness would have swallowed her vision completely if not for the single light bulb hanging from the ceiling.
Zeika was too tired think about what Greg meant, or to take the guided tour of her room, but it was hard to ignore the trunk-like size of the space. Between the twin-sized floor mattress, the basket at the head of it, and two small crates that formed some sort of eating and wash up place, the room had just enough space to turn 360 degrees. That was about it.
Kicking off her boots, she walked over to the two crates. One of them had some dry cereal, an apple, and a banana on it for her. The other had a large bowl on it, along with a sparse collection of toiletries, including a sliver of soap. She grabbed the apple and devoured it, considering the wash bowl as she ate. She felt gross and wanted to clean up; she had about ten miles of sweat, funk, and dirt on her that begged to come off, but fatigue won out. She collapsed on the piles of rags that formed her bed.
She shifted. Her mid-back was itching again, worse this time. The itch had spread to her lower back too, and she actually felt some kind of welt growing. Maybe an allergic reaction to the sewer mold or something. Fantastic.
She'd get some antihistamine in the morning. Aside from that, there was still so much to do: shower, then try to get info on her family. Koa had lots of eyes on the street, so maybe she'd be able to get a lock on them somehow. Not to make contact, but at least to check on them, make sure they were okay... assuming that Hollow 12's progenitor cell didn't try to blow her head off first.
One thing at a time. Tomorrow, she'd do it. For now, it was bedtime.
And that was the last thought that spoke to her before her consciousness dissipated, swirling away to a strange place of comfort she hadn't known for sixteen years.
Legato rumbles filled the city one after another, sudden and ear-splitting, and the wheels of Caleb's car actually lifted from the concrete. At the same moment, a screaming crowd of people rushed into the street--
"SHIT!"
Caleb slammed down on the breaks and swerved, sending the car into a half-donut until it screeched to a stop, barely avoiding the panicked bodies that broke like a wave around his car. For a few moments, he gripped his wheel, sat, and breathed, feeling only the hard pound of his heart. Terrifying, but at the end of it, he'd avoided killing anyone.
Not that it mattered much
.
He frowned. People were screaming and jumping over the hood of his car if not running around it, nearly killing each other in the process.
He had felt the earth heave, the shock waves rippling in cross-currents. Funnels of smoke, debris, and acrid ash whistled up into the air, some close by, others farther away. But the rumbles... explosions that were magnificent in power, giant claps of ear-breaking sound and silence, rolling over a 360 degree horizon.
What the hell was happening?
He got out the car and looked back, the air rushing from his body as he glimpsed the massive lock up behind him. Tons of people had abandoned their vehicles and were now running around them, pulling their belongings or families behind them. In the distance, the biggest billows of smoke had just rolled up into the sky. They were coming from the Converge.
One frantic businessman shrieked into his cell as he ran past, dragging his kids behind him. "They fell! They-- how many?! All of them!"
Caleb locked his car, careful to avoid getting stampeded by the frantic crowd. He pulled out his phone and dialed the police station number, frowning when the busy signal bleated into his ear. Not good.
Stay cool, Rai.
Whatever had "fallen", he definitely wasn't going to find out by just standing here. He popped the trunk, grabbed his bag, and closed it again before breaking out into a jog towards the Demesne Five Headquarters.
It took about thirty minutes to get there, but the scene wasn't any more comforting there than it had been on the streets. The station was half-emptied, and the other cops that remained were in complete chaos. He'd only picked up bits and pieces of info on his jog over, but it had been enough to figure out that there'd been a terrorist attack. Bombings, at different places in the city. The cops that remained at the Headquarters barely even noticed when he walked in, they were so frantic, tight-lipped, pale with terror. Some were trying to contact their families, others were trying to contain the former scene at the Headquarters: the robbery by the rogue Alchemist. Many of them had barely recuperated from the internal hit, much less being prepared for the terrorist attack.
Caleb didn't even try to get information from anyone. No one looked composed enough for a debrief. So he headed to the rec room where the tv was already blaring, transmitting a melee of news footage overlaid with a news reporter's voice.
"This just in, you are looking at live footage taken from various security cameras in all three Protected Demesnes at bridges, tunnels, and many of the commuter routes. We have unconfirmed reports that large groups of unidentified Civilians simultaneously launched mass suicide bombings at key entry points to the Protecteds. Police, firemen, and medics are currently rushing to the sites for Civilian rescue..."
"My God."
Caleb shook his head in disbelief, unable to tear his eyes away. On the tapes, dozens of bodies were meandering their ways through the streets of the three Demesnes, like packs of k-heads, crawling, climbing, slithering, until they laid down at their destinations-- and had begun to convulse.
Sweet Susies.
He watched with clenched teeth, remembering the info Cotch had given him on the flash drive. Footage from the Converge showed nearly thirty decaying bodies climbing down the side of the bridge that led into Demesne Seven. One by one, they squeezed themselves in between the metal reinforcements, slowly and deliberately. Then the camera fuzzed out in a blast of static snow, which marked the time of detonation. From what he'd heard, the already creaking bridges at the Converge had never stood a chance. They had fallen, and now, wide gaps of nothingness stood between each bridge and each of the Protected Demesnes. Whichever demesne you were in when the attack hit, you were stuck there.
That had just been the beginning. Reports were already pouring in from various hit points, citing massive damage. Worse still, the hits had blocked the Protecteds not only from each other, but also from the rest of the world.
The grave robberies.
Dead bodies being reanimated and used as bomb carriers. He should have paid closer attention before, but so many things had been weighing on his mind. On all their minds, actually. The hunt for the Ninkashi. Sal Morgan's murder. Zeika. All in addition to their regular patrols, lives, families. Once the Ninkashi appeared, most of the precinct's efforts had gone into tracking them down, not to mention the extra strain that curfew-enforcement had put on them after the repeals.
True, law enforcement in the Fifth had been screwed from the beginning by incompetent and uncooperative officers. Over the past few weeks, though, Caleb had started to understand the burn-out. There really just weren't enough resources: no funding, no manpower, nothing. Whether through genuine poverty or tightfisted money-hoarding, the Civic and Alchemic Orders had crippled law enforcement, practically handing the Protecteds over to Koa on a platter. And now, they were trapped here.
"Well, don't you look pretty?"
Joseph pulled up to him, and he didn't look good. The coffee mug in his hand vibrated, his hair had come all out of place, and his eyes flitted around their sockets.
Caleb lit a cigarette, refusing to take on Joseph's affliction. He offered him one. Joseph took three.
"Smoking's not allowed in here, but fuck it, right?" Joseph laughed nervously, lighting the cig. "Fuck everything, really."
"You all right?"
"Hell no, man. What kind of question is that?"
"Just being polite," Caleb muttered, grinning. "Do you mind catching me up on the robbery?"
"Yeah, might as well. We're not going anywhere, right? Shit is fucked. More fucked than a two-dollar whore on Black Friday." Joseph sniffled, downed the rest of his coffee, and refilled from the rec room pot. "This rogue Azure came in here and regulated on us hardcore. You see the footage?"
"Not all of it. But I heard. From fabric to metal."
"And back again. With a glare that could kill, man. This kid, whoever the hell he was, is dangerous, and he knows it."
"Did he say anything?"
"Not much. I mean, he basically didn't have to."
"Let's check it out."
They went to the security room where the guards played the footage for them. As Caleb watched the figure move around in the weapons cage, everything inside of him screeched to a halt. The ghost had cut a dark look at the camera, and then had started to work. He turned one of the rifles sideways, looking down the chamber as he did.
His eyes widened. What if I run out and start blowing Azure heads off? Zeika had said. She'd turned his rifle sideways to examine it. Are you willing to shoulder that kind of responsibility, detective?
"Caleb? CALEB!" Joseph barked, snapping his fingers in front of Caleb's face. "Yo man, you've been hitting the bottle lately? What's with you?"
Caleb blinked, coming out of his memory and refocusing on Joseph. "Huh? Oh sorry. Yeah, I've been kind of washed out..." He never took his eyes off the screen. "He knows his stuff. Look at the way he's navigating the gun cage and evaluating each firearm. Checking the chambers, doing rubs for rust and blueing." He watched the ghost turn the guns into some sort of canvas-like material before packing them. He shook his head, stunned. "We need a SWAT team. And a new arsenal."
"Why? So that little bastard can come back and raid us again?"
"Koa's thrown down their cards. Our attempts to quell the rebellion in the Protecteds has failed, and now at least one of their hollows has a fresh supply of arms, with us locked in with them. It's only a matter of time before the hits get worse. When that happens, do you want to be stuck here with just that?" Caleb motioned derisively to the pistol in Joseph's holster.
"No. I don't want to be here at all. Fuck this, I quit."
"Quitting to go where?"
Joseph threw up his hands. "I know. IknowIknowIknow-- I mean, I don't know, man. This shit is wild, fuckin' wild." As Joseph raised the mug to his lips, tremors rippled through his coffee. His hand was shaking harder than a kunja addict's. He had to use both hands just to keep his grip steady. He st
uck another cig in his mouth and lit it.
"Maybe you should switch to decaf." Caleb smirked.
"Hey fuck you, all right? You were off in lala-land while we were getting owned and now you got jokes." Joseph wheeled in front of him. "I've never seen alchemy that advanced in anyone but a Vassal. This kid walked in like he owned the place. Mute. He just looked at you and you were stone, man. A statue. In broad daylight."
"Yeah, I got the point, Joseph."
"But why? Why not just lay low? He knows the Order'll be comin' after him, so why even show his face?"
"It was an initiation." Caleb creased his brow. "But it was a little too grand. He could have caught Koa's attention some other way. Whoever it was that robbed us was pissed, and he didn't only want Koa to know, he wanted the whole world to know too."
"This is serious. What if he hits all the other precincts? Can you imagine what it'll be like with no armory anywhere?" Joseph repeated Caleb's warning without realizing it had already been said. Guy really needed to put down the coffee.
Caleb shrugged, humoring him. "A better world, maybe."
"To hell with you and your nonviolence Ghandi bullshit, man. After what Koa just did, you think you would have gotten some common sense by now. Me? Give me guns over peace talk any day of the week and three times on God's day, and fuck the rest of it."
"Caleb!"
Both Joseph and Caleb turned around as another cop poked his head into the security room. "Your Vassal wants to see you. Your office."
Caleb nodded and put a reassuring hand on Joseph's shoulder. "Try to get some sleep, and lay off the fucking coffee already, all right? Your eyeballs can barely stay in one place."
Joseph sneered, pouring himself yet another mug as Caleb left to head down to his office.
The open armory space, still crammed with desks and cops, was now a wasp's nest. The gauntlet of angry APs that had seared him on his first day had now dispersed, the sleeping drones stirred to life by the giant stick Koa had smacked them with. So sad that it had taken this much for them to care...
