Myrikal

by Holli Anderson

  He interrupted before she could finish. “He… we don’t want you to kill anyone, Myri. But it can’t hurt for people to know that you easily could if necessary, you know?”

  She crossed her arms, her foot bouncing even faster now.

  “It’s about bringing back law and order to this world,” Branch said. “Some people will follow the rules of humanity just because they’re good people, like you and me.” He smiled. “But there are people out there who only follow the rules when they’re afraid of the consequences, like your father. He’s never had any consequences because there hasn’t been anyone enforcing any laws or rules or human decency in a very long time. Cascus thinks it’s time to change that. He believes in something he calls Ex Talionis. It’s the law of retaliation, where the punishment is like the offense in kind and degree. Law and order, Myri.”

  Thoughts of Branch’s former clan, screaming as their building went up in flames, filled her head. All those innocent people. Children. And her dad was responsible for far more deaths than that. That was just the horror she’d witnessed at his hands. What if she could help stop him? And others like him? She didn’t completely agree with this Ex talionis. Did killing killers just make you a killer? But could she, by her presence alone, stop others from doing it?

  Branch stayed silent while thoughts raced around inside her head like a school of herring. He now leaned forward and searched her goggled eyes. “Myrikal, what are you thinking?”

  A short, non-humorous laugh barked from her throat. “Too many scattered things to put into words that would make any sense.”

  “Summarize then.”

  She took a deep breath and loosened the grip of her crossed arms across her chest. “I won’t kill anyone. Not for you or anyone. Unless it’s the only way to save another life, I guess. But I see how this plan can be a benefit to building a better world and I’m willing to give it a try.” She remembered something Branch had said earlier. “You said ‘first phase,’ how many phases are there to this plan, and what are they?”

  Branch relaxed the tenseness in his shoulders and leaned back in his chair. “Just two, really. The next phase involves going outside of our little community and trying to establish some order in the rest of Manhattan. And someday, beyond.”

  “That’s a pretty ambitious plan.” The writhing, green, living fluid beneath Cascus’s human veneer popped into her head.

  “Cascus is a pretty ambitious man,” Branch said with a proud smile.

  Is he a man? What else could he be? Myri closed her eyes and leaned her head back on the couch. Maybe the problem wasn’t Cascus. Maybe it was her. Like an allergic reaction or something. Could she even be allergic to something? She had no idea.

  Branch leaned forward and took her hand. “And with you on our side, I think we just might be able to pull it off.”

  She smiled as his touch warmed her skin, but still, she shook her head. “I’m not a superhero, remember?”

  Those were some of the last words he’d said to her before he’d disappeared from her life a couple of years ago. He winced and let go of her hand, standing. He turned away from her and paced the short length of his small living area. “I was wrong to have said that, Myri. I was an angry, dumb kid.” He spun around and faced her. “I was wrong, Myrikal. You are just like a superhero. You have amazing powers and strength and, most important, you are a really good person.”

  It was her turn to wince. She certainly didn’t think of herself as a good person. She’d almost killed someone just because Russ wanted her to. She’d almost gone ahead with his plans for her to join the family business. A good person wouldn’t have even considered it. Plus, her dad’s teachings had molded her, hadn’t they? She’d learned to be paranoid and to not trust people. She thought about voicing some of these thoughts out loud, but Branch interrupted them.

  “Look, I know you just got out from under your dad’s rule and you’re still trying to figure things out. The fact that you left him is proof that you’re a good person.” He sat next to her, turned slightly to face her. “You don’t have to decide anything right now. Just observe us for a while if you want, see if what we do is something you can agree with. You can teach us self-defense and we can build you your own house. How does that sound?”

  The earnestness in his eyes tickled a smile onto her lips. “That sounds like a good compromise. When do we start? And can I choose where I want my house?”

  Branch smiled, his dark eyes sparkling. “We can start the training this afternoon. I’d like to train at least twice a day for a while, until the team has the basics down. And as for where you build your house… did you have a place in mind already?”

  “I do,” she said with a mischievous smile.

  He cocked an eyebrow. “Well, you just need to submit your request to the compound planning team and they have to approve it. Where are you thinking you want to build?”

  “Our tree.” The words left her mouth before her mind had a chance to stop her. Too bad her “powers” didn’t include the disabling of her blush producer.

  Branch laughed. “The tree where we first met? It must hold better memories for you than it does for me. Not that meeting you isn’t one of the best things to ever happen to me. It was just the activities directly before that I’d like to forget.”

  Myri laughed, remembering younger, chubby Branch trying to talk his way out of further humiliation at the hands of the bullies who’d tied him to a limb high up in that tree. “And I want to build my house in the branches of the tree. Up high.”

  “Really? How come?”

  Her expression turned thoughtful. “I feel like I need to be alone, but I also want to be with people. Having a tree-house will give me privacy when I need it. Plus, I can see out into the city from up there.”

  “That’s going to be harder to build.”

  “I’ll do all the heavy lifting and most of the work. I just need someone to show me how.”

  He gave a quick chuckle and shook his head. “Of course you will. And I’ll make sure the team approves your request. If anyone deserves to be up where she can keep an eye on things, it’s you, Myri.”

  The self-defense training sessions started out a bit shaky. Only one of the participants had even the first clue how to block a punch. Or throw a punch. Or deliver a kick. Or take someone down. She started with the basics—stuff her dad had taught her when she was a toddler. Ya, the team member with martial arts experience, was a huge help.

  The building of the tree house went much smoother. The planning team approved her request with the stipulation that no one else would be approved to build up in a tree. With her strength, Branch’s remarkable skill at building things, and Alyssa’s occasional suggestions, her house was finished in less than a week. Alyssa insisted they furnish Myri’s house almost the second it was deemed complete. “The sooner you have furniture, the sooner I can get you out of my house. The static electricity you create is enough to drive me crazy,” she teased.

  So, between training sessions, Branch’s Defense Coalition shifts, and Alyssa’s assigned jobs, the three of them went out into the city to scavenge for furniture. And since Myri could get into places no one else could and didn’t have to worry about being crushed to death by falling debris, she was able to get some pretty nice stuff. The collapsed mattress store hid the best treasure.

  After an evening training session and dinner with Branch and Alyssa, Myri climbed up to her very own home and lay down to sleep on her own, never-before-used mattress for the first time ever.

  Myri and Branch worked side-by-side harvesting the ripe fruits and vegetables from the garden. The Defense Coalition had been patrolling for several weeks and the team members showed some real progress in the training sessions.

  The two of them pushed fully loaded wheelbarrows toward the storehouse where the food would be divvied out to eat fresh as well as to be canned for use during the colder, non-growing season.

  “So,” Branch said. “You’ve been observing DefCo
—that’s what we’ve been calling the Defense Coalition—for a while now. What do you think?”

  The team really hadn’t seen much action. The people that had been allowed into the COP were pretty obedient and just happy to be there. Minor infractions had been dealt with quickly and fairly from what she’d seen. Unless there were things going on that she wasn’t aware of—and she doubted that, she’d been keeping a very close eye on things—she felt that, so far, the Defense Coalition had been a positive addition to the compound. “I think you all are doing a great job.”

  “Does that mean you’re ready to officially join us?”

  She couldn’t think of a reason not to. “Yes. I think I’m ready.”

  Branch dropped the handles to his wheelbarrow and pumped a fist in the air. “Yes! Cascus will be so happy!”

  The smile on Myri’s face faded at the mention of the clan leader. She hadn’t seen him since the first DefCo team meeting. Not for lack of trying. She’d been wanting to at least catch a glimpse of him, to see if the weird visual disturbances and sickening odor returned. She’d been trying to convince herself that the two times it had happened before were just a fluke. A residual effect of the lightning. She had a sneaking suspicion he was avoiding her. “When do I start and what will I be doing?”

  “Let’s drop these off at the storehouse and then go to my place and discuss it.”

  “Or we could go to my place and discuss it.” She loved that she could say that. That she had a “place” to call her own.

  “Okay, let’s do that, then,” Branch said. “I’ll make you a salad.”

  “A salad?” Wasn’t that just a bunch of green stuff?

  “Yeah, don’t look so worried. It’ll be delicious. I just need to grab something from my house first.”

  Branch filled a bag with fruits and vegetables and they left the rest of the day’s harvest in the capable hands of the storehouse workers. They stopped at his house and he ran in to grab his secret ingredient. He had an extra spring in his step as they walked to Myri’s tree.

  He talked as he stood in her small kitchen area, cleaning the salad ingredients with water running through a faucet from a storage tank she’d placed on the roof. “We’ll be ready soon, I think, to take DefCo out into the city.”

  “How soon?” Myri asked.

  He tore leaves of lettuce into bite-sized pieces. “Within the next couple of weeks, we’ll take to the streets outside. That’s when your powers will really be needed. Until then, Cascus wants you to be seen inside the compound.”

  “I have been seen inside the compound.” She wrinkled her nose as he added different berries to the green-leaf mixture.

  “Not just seen, Myri. You need to show off your abilities, like we discussed before. People know about DefCo now and they know that our main objective is to keep the peace by enforcing the Code of Conduct. Now, we’d like them to see you as part of our team. And see your powers.”

  Myri nodded, her brow creased. “So they’ll think twice about fighting back against your authority, knowing what I can do and that I’m part of the team.”

  “Yes.” He pushed a bowl toward her and picked up the other one, stabbing the contents with a fork. “Cascus wants to reinforce the idea that you’re part of the team in other ways as well. I mean, everyone already knows you’re helping us learn martial arts, but that doesn’t necessarily translate into them knowing you’re on the team. Cascus says that a visual reminder is important.”

  “What kind of visual reminder?” Myri took a bite of the salad. It actually tasted much better than she thought it would. “What did you put on this salad?”

  He smiled as he chewed. “My homemade raspberry vinaigrette. Do you like it?”

  “It’s delicious.” She swallowed and stabbed her fork into a big piece of strawberry. “So the ‘visual reminder’?”

  “Uniforms. Cascus had uniforms made for the team. They have a lightning bolt on the chest and right sleeve that matches the ones on your outfit. The one you had on the day you came here.”

  “He wants me to wear that thing?” So much for blending in. She’d really been enjoying that for the first time in her life.

  “Yes, at least when you’re out in the compound and especially out in the city.”

  “The boots, too?” She looked down at the casual shoes Alyssa had helped her pick out. She liked them. A lot.

  “Yeah. Boots, too.”

  “I think I would have just lost my appetite if this wasn’t so good.” She shoved another bite in her mouth.

  Branch smiled. “Ahh, come on. It’ll be awesome.”

  Awesome? Or a little too much like living with her dad? Her paranoia melted a little as she caught sight of his dimple. “Okay. Let’s be awesome then. Should we start today?”

  “Yes. Let’s start today.” He shoved another bite in his smiling face.

  Myri sighed and gazed wistfully at her jeans and cute shoes one more time.

  The smell of the fresh cut wood used to build her treetop house filled her senses as Myrikal drew in a deep breath then stepped from the small platform built onto the porch. She dropped to the ground, some twenty-five feet below, and landed with hardly a sound, bending her knees to lessen the impact. A chicken, most likely escaped from the livestock area of the compound, squawked and flapped its flightless wings as it scrambled away, startled by Myri’s sudden appearance.

  Myri smiled, watching the tail feathers disappear into the tall grass. She walked at a leisurely pace, observing the activity all around her. The clouds, thin and scattered this afternoon, allowed the sun a rare, if dappled, appearance. The people soaked it in, their spirits lifted and their energy levels boosted. There was always a lot of activity in the compound, but it wasn’t always done with this much enthusiasm. Even though sunlight messed with her eyesight and the cold had no effect on her at all, Myri still had an extra peppiness in her step as the warm rays found their way to her back.

  Branch and the other DefCo team members stood in a loose circle in the Central Square in front of Cascus’s dwelling. Branch looked up and smiled. “Myrikal, you look great.”

  The others stopped their conversations and straightened their shoulders at her arrival. Myri eyed their uniforms. They weren’t so bad, at least they looked like normal clothes. She looked down at her flashy unitard and rejected a wince that tried to streak across her face. Why couldn’t she just wear what they were wearing? She knew why. She had to stand out. That’s what her dad wanted and that’s what Cascus wanted. Is that what she wanted? Definitely not.

  “Well?” Branch interrupted her thoughts. “What do you think? We look all official and stuff, huh?”

  Myri nodded. “Yeah, you do.”

  Either he chose to ignore her emphasis on the word you, or he didn’t notice it. “Let’s get started. We’ll break up into pairs and check on the border guards first.” He glanced at Myri. “You’re with me and we’ll take the north quadrant. Connor and Donna, east. Ya and Bryan, west—”

  “I thought for sure you’d give me east,” Ya broke in. “You know, ‘cause I’m Asian.”

  Everyone stared blankly at him.

  The older man—Myri guessed late forties or early fifties—spread his hands out and raised his eyebrows. “Because Asia is considered an eastern continent? Does no one look at a globe anymore?”

  Branch shook his head and continued. “Aaron and Miguel, south. And, Vicky and Sandeep, central. And, remember, if you need Myrikal’s help, shoot a flare into the air.”

  “You have flares?” Myrikal asked.

  “Yes, we do.” Branch pulled a metal tube from his belt, twice as big around as a pen, and showed it to her. “Cascus helped us design them. They are single use only and shoot sparks into the air, along with a loud bang.”

  She squinted at the object in his hand. “How do they work?”

  Branch flipped the tube sideways and pointed to a button near his thumb. “You flip the cover and push the button, the spring releases and hits a firing
pin into a cartridge with gun powder in it and that ignites some chemicals and shoots it up into the air.”

  “Yeah,” Donna pushed Connor’s shoulder. “As long as you aim it towards the sky, huh, Connor?”

  Connor’s skin flushed red, but he smiled. “I didn’t know it had a cartridge in it.”

  Donna turned to Myri. “Missed me by an inch. Singed the hair on my arm.” She pulled her sleeve up to show Myri the patch of singed hair.

  Myri smiled briefly then spoke with a serious tone. “My father always taught me to treat every gun as if it were loaded. Sounds like a good idea with these flares, too.”

  “Yeah.” Connor nodded. “I definitely will from now on.”

  “Okay,” Branch said. “Let’s get going. We’ll meet back here in one hour.”

  The sky darkened a bit and Myri glanced up at a large cloud now passing in front of the sun as she and Branch walked toward the front entrance. The sunlight had been nice while it lasted. “This really isn’t going to take a whole hour. I mean, this place is big for a compound, but it isn’t that big.”

  “I know. We want DefCo to be seen and interact with people. We’ll take our time and talk with people on our rounds,” Branch said.

  Great, Myri thought. Interacting with people is definitely not one of my strong suits.

  They continued walking to the main entrance where two “guards” leaned against the cinderblock wall on opposite sides of the opening.

  “Hey, Morgan,” the male guard stood straight. “What’s up?”

  “Hi, Gill.” Morgan reached out to give Gill a fist-bump. “We’re just doing rounds. How have things been at the main gate today?”

  “Pretty uneventful.”

  “Yeah.” The female “guard” stepped closer. “Except for that weird guy that came poking around about an hour ago.”

  “Oh?” Branch’s voice rose in interest. “What did he want?”

  “I’m not exactly sure,” the girl said. “That’s what made it so strange. I asked him what business he had here and he said, ‘Uhh, none.’ He kept asking us how many entrances we have. He didn’t look either of us in the eye the whole time, just kept peering around us, looking into the compound.”