Outlier: Reign Of Madness

by Daryl Banner

  “Halves is alive too, but …” His chin jerks down, eyes averted.

  “But what??”

  Gabel swallows hard, then turns his head completely, lifting one blunt, sorrowful eyebrow at her. “He suffered an injury at the hands of … well, it matters not. He has been in recovery at Eleven Wings.”

  “For how long?”

  “Since before Greymyn’s death.”

  Ellena feels herself turning white. Her gloved hands press onto the door. “That’s … That’s months. My son has been in recovery for months?? What sort of injury…? It must have been s-substantial.”

  “I’ve told you enough.”

  “Who did this to him?” Silence. “WHO DID THIS TO HIM??”

  Gabel turns and opens the door in one swift movement. Ellena backs away, startled by his abrupt change. The door shuts heavily at his back. “You will not raise your voice at me, Lesser. I swear it, I am doing a kindness to you by even allowing you this spare room to decompress from your day’s work and have privacy. I could chain you to that utilities room and work you from sunset to sunset. You heard me. From sunset to sunset. Twenty-four hours a day. Linens. Soap. Stains. Labor. Am I clear?”

  Ellena folds her arms defiantly. The thickness of the gloves makes her misjudge the motion and, for a second, she’s afraid she’s forgotten how to cross her arms at all. When she’s finally settled, she raises her chin and says, “I could’ve helped him. My own son.”

  “Silence, Lesser.”

  “I could have taken his wounds. I still can. Even now. I can walk up to my son, my Halvesand, and I can touch him and take away whatever injury it is that—”

  “A rogue slit his throat with a poisoned knife,” he cuts her off. “His Legacy stopped the knife, but kept the poison. He’s blind, I think. And mute. And his skin is sandpaper, last I heard. But alive.”

  Ellena’s mouth can’t close. Whatever smart little words she was about to throw at him, they’ve suddenly found themselves stuck to her stiffened tongue. Blind? She seems to have gone blind herself. Mute? Not a word seems capable of leaving her throat.

  “Lesser?”

  She moves to the window, utterly gutted by the information. She stares through its glass, unseeing. Halves was being attacked by rogues with knives and where was I? Sitting at my sister Cilla’s house? Sitting at home listening to Lionis go on about his latest read?

  And all this time that Halves was recovering, he was recovering alone. Even now, she can imagine the phone at their abandoned house in the ninth ringing, ringing, ringing with the call she never answered, the call that would have gently informed her of her son’s incident and resulting condition. I could’ve been there for him during the recovery. I could’ve been there for my Halves …

  Then she remembers that Forge and her had decided to sell the house phone so many years ago after she was released from her duties at the hospital. It was such a tough time for the Lessers. They were tight for money and everything was collapsing around them.

  Much like now.

  “Ellena?”

  She turns slowly. Gabel stands in front of her now, his eyes soft. She doesn’t say a thing; she only stares at his lips silently.

  “I’m sorry you had to hear it so plainly,” he says, sounding far more like a human being than a Guardian. “I … I may have been able to spill the information in a more sensitive, gentler manner.”

  Ellena only nods once, her gloved hands held protectively to her chest. She tries to imagine what Halvesand looks like right now. Is he up and about in the hospital, making new friends? Is he lying in a recovery room, bedridden, alone and afraid? No, don’t be so dramatic. Aleksand is with him. Aleks and Halves were inseparable growing up.

  Gabel slowly reaches for her. The gesture confuses Ellena until she realizes he’s taken her gloved hand. He pulls something off his waist, then moves it near her elbow.

  Click.

  The gloves fall off. Air as cold as ice swallows every inch of her hands and forearms. The skin prickles as it drinks the air, and Ellena sighs from the immediate relief. Somehow, this small act seems more capable of wringing tears from her eyes than the news of her son.

  “You did Atlas a favor.”

  Ellena lifts her gaze. “What?”

  “Taylon was rotten. Right to the bone.” Gabel’s eyes drift down to her lips. A certain look of pain seems to cross them, a pain that almost appears longing. “I think you took many wounds away from all of Atlas … with what you did.”

  Ellena’s breath catches in her chest. This is coming from the man who is holding me here for my eventual trial … which may never, ever happen … a trial for the murder of this rotten Marshal he speaks of.

  “His mother must have failed him,” says Ellena darkly. “Should have … mothered him more. I killed a child.”

  “And saved a city.”

  “What brought this on?” she asks, attempting to keep her mind about her and not be distracted by the heat coming off his body the closer he draws to her. He has strong arms, like Forge. They can crush me worse than the bone bending did. That fact should not turn me on, but it does. I want him to touch me. Is this what grief looks like? Is this me grieving, craving his touch? “Why the change of heart?”

  “My heart hasn’t changed.”

  “You’re standing too close.” I wish he’d stand closer.

  “Am I?” His words fall on her face in hot tufts of breath.

  “Y-You’re young enough to be my son.” And full of energy. And full of power. And full of steam. I’m losing my mind.

  “I’m twenty-five.”

  Still far too young. “I have a husband.”

  “He’s dead.”

  “Then that makes me a widow. A widow who must mourn. A widow who must … who must …” And I have a body that hasn’t been touched in ages. And a soul that’s been broken worse than my bones were. And a desperate need to be held … or invaded, or consumed …

  “I had a woman,” he tells her so close to her ear, his voice sends a shiver down her neck and arms. Ellena starts to tremble. “I lost her too. Not a day goes by that I don’t miss her.”

  “I need … I need …” Ellena can’t even form a thought.

  “We both have a need,” he finishes for her. “The same one.”

  Then his mouth is on hers, and she turns into dough in his big, strong arms. His hands slide up her supple body, rushing to cup her neck and hold her in place as his mouth consumes her. Ellena’s mind turns clear as a Lifted Lady’s sky as her own hands—freed from the wretched gloves at last—cling to his chest, feeling everything with such detail that she has not known for weeks. His muscles flex and pull as he works her, and she admires and worships each and every movement. It’s a very pleasant landscape for her hands to enjoy, the first true thing they’ve touched in so long.

  “I shouldn’t …” she hisses when their mouths enjoy one short reprieve. “I … I love Forgemon. I always will. I c-can’t—”

  “This isn’t love.” His words fall on her face in warm bursts of breath. “Love your man, forever and always, just as I love my lost woman. All I want is a fuck.”

  “Fair enough,” Ellena decides, and then their mouths find each other again.

  0150 Tide

  This … is … the … fucking … best.

  Tide Wellport can’t believe his eyes when he finishes tying the rope around Wick’s leg, binding his unconscious body to the chair. Anwick Lesser, the cocky smell-boy with the wimpy pink puppy of a brother, is under his control. For once in his life, Tide feels deep pride in his accomplishment. Every little scolding and dark word his father threw down upon him all those years in that ugly apartment at the edge of ninth, those dark words mean nothing now. Even that old tired bastard would be proud of me.

  Tide turns his head to observe the other one, whoever he is. Probably Wick’s latest butt boy. He’s bound similarly to a chair by his legs, arms, and neck. Tide took his short sword too, impressed by its sharp, serrated edge. He smirk
s, turning the blade over in his hand as he inspects it.

  “The fuck you tie them up for? We need to kill them.”

  Tide scoffs at his partner, who’s apparently just come into the room. He doesn’t bother turning around to face the fool. “Fuck no. I want to enjoy this. You have any idea who we just caught?”

  “Doesn’t matter. The Queen only needs their eyes.”

  “I’d love to remove his friend’s while he watches,” Tide muses.

  “The Queen removes them herself from their cold dead corpses. You know the orders. Kill ‘em and bring their heads.”

  “I know the orders. Once this one wakes up, we’ll take the head of his friend and call it a day. I want him to watch.”

  “So why are you taking your time? Slap him awake! Or are you thinking of giving one of them a suck job while they’re out?”

  Tide snorts at that. No. This Wick bitch would enjoy it too much, he jests to himself. “I grew up with this one, here. He went to my school in the ninth, him and his stupid pink brother.”

  “Pink?”

  The word “pink” suddenly sends Tide’s heart racing as he thinks about all the glow marks on his skin beneath his armor. He still can’t remember how he got them. One minute he was at a Weapon Show. The next minute, he was running for his life.

  And Wick was there, running alongside him.

  Wick and his stupid smirk.

  Or was Wick there at all? It’s so frustrating, not being able to remember the simplest thing. There was the guy with the black around his eyes who gave a big presentation on the stage about a retractable knife that went back to his hand after he threw it, like a boomerang. How did that guy always manage to catch it by the handle instead of the blade? And then suddenly there was blue writing and drawings everywhere on the domed ceiling of the Weapons Show arena. ‘Let It Rain,’ he remembers reading in that blue ink.

  Rain. Why does that word unrest him as deeply as “pink” …?

  “Tide.”

  Tide jerks at the sound of his name. “What?” he growls.

  “You went away again.”

  “Pink,” Tide says, pulling himself out of his head. “Pink because his brother was …” But the word keeps stinging him, and the simple joke he’s trying to make doesn’t come. Am I scared of Wick? Does he know what happened to me? I haven’t seen him since that day …

  “I don’t care about his brother,” says the partner. “You kill that one, who you obviously have a boner for. I’ll kill this one.”

  Tide faces him, alarmed. His partner, Scorp by name, is a skinny guy with a bushy path of hair running down the middle of his scalp from his forehead to the back of his neck, the sides shaved smooth. He never wears shirts, showing off all the coils of ink that decorate every inch of his torso, and his black pants are so tight, Tide wonders how the idiot breathes. Scorp is a Morph, but his Legacy is useless; he can form bumps and lumps anywhere on his body, then make them go away at will. Tide calls him Lumpy behind his back.

  “You’re so dumb. We only need one more head,” Tide argues. “We’ve gotten nine in the bag already. She only asks for ten.”

  “So we’ll bring them eleven. One less we gotta get next month.”

  Scorp’s logic is sound, but Tide feels particularly argumentative right now. Maybe it’s due to the vigor he’s feeding upon from having caught one of his schoolyard nemeses.

  Or maybe it’s because the thought of actually ending Wick’s life makes him terrified. I don’t want to kill him. I just want him to suffer. “Maybe they only ask for ten for a reason, dumbass. What if we bring the Queen eleven and get her all pissed off?”

  “So what are you proposing? Kill one and let the other go and run back to his friends, warning them of us and sending an army of ninth ward rats over here to retaliate?”

  Tide’s about to respond, then finds himself caught. I didn’t think about retaliation. He stares off with his mouth parted, thinking.

  And it’s in the middle of his thoughts that he hears the first groan. He looks up to find Wick lifting his head, blinking in the dim warehouse lighting. The wimpy, messy-haired idiot groans as he slowly peers around, taking in his circumstance. He gives his arms a tug, discovering them to be bound to the chair. He jerks his legs too, then lifts his chin and brings his startled gaze to Tide’s.

  The sight of Wick’s opened eyes revives Tide’s vigor. “Yeah,” he grunts, proud. “I caught you, you fucker.”

  “Tide …? That’s … really you?” Wick can’t seem to believe his eyes, blinking countless times. “What … What are you doing?”

  “You’re my prisoner now, dumbass,” Tide grunts back, crossing his big arms. He gives the other guy’s chair a kick. “Don’t know who that idiot is.”

  “You damn well know Juston’s name,” grumbles Wick, glaring at Tide. “Or should I say Noisy Boy?—your nickname for him? The fuck is wrong with you? I thought we got past all this bullying shit.”

  Tide blinks. What the fuck is he talking about?

  His partner nudges him. “What’s this dude’s Legacy? I want to know what I’m dealing with.”

  Tide snorts, shrugging off Wick’s words. Don’t let him use all his dumb smart-boy tricks on you. “Oh, you’ll laugh,” he promises Scorp. “You’ll fucking laugh.” Tide can’t wait to say it, the chuckles dancing around in his throat as he speaks. “This little shit, Wick, he can smell stuff.” Tide lets out a hearty guffaw, enjoying the look of bafflement on Scorp’s face. “Like, feelings and shit. That … is his Goddess-given gift. Fucking smelling.”

  It’s Wick who exclaims: “Smelling?? The fuck, Tide?”

  Scorp studies Wick appraisingly, his eyes squinting. To Tide’s annoyance, Scorp doesn’t seem amused; instead, he looks intrigued. “Is that true?” his partner asks, his voice soft, as if doubting the truth, or working it over in his head. “Can you smell thoughts? Feelings?”

  “He couldn’t smell his own fart if he tried,” Tide mocks him, as if trying to impress the dumbness of the Legacy on his partner. “We’re all capable of smelling things. It’s one of the five basic senses, obviously. So damn dumb. ‘Smelling’. Hah! This idiot has a power that’s totally fucking useless!”

  “Useless …” mumbles Scorp, still studying Wick.

  The longer he stares at Wick, the angrier Tide gets. “Useless talents runs in his family’s blood,” he goes on, trying to steal back his partner’s attention. “His brother can turn things pink.”

  “Pink as the glow under your armor?” interjects Wick.

  Tide’s blood runs cold at Wick’s words. His mouth goes dry as he gapes, staring at Wick hard and stonily, his eyes wide and his fingers beginning to quiver. How the fuck does he know that? Did he do this to me? Did he put these marks on me?

  “Or is your glow purple today?” Wick continues, his face ripe with that insufferable cockiness Tide can’t stand. “Or orange?”

  Tide keeps his face as blank as he can manage. He can’t stand Wick knowing something that he doesn’t. Especially when the thing directly pertains to a mystery that has plagued Tide for months.

  And then Scorp draws an interesting conclusion. “Oh! You can actually smell them??” he asks Wick, curious. “The glow marks?”

  Wick’s eyes flick back and forth from Scorp to Tide, baffled. His face slowly softens, and it seems Wick is beginning to draw his own conclusion about something. “Oh …” he breathes, then says nothing more at all, his expression utterly changed.

  Tide can’t stand a second of whatever the hell is going on in Wick’s head. “Think you’re so smart, do you?” Tide barks. He nearly snarls as he steps back, admiring Wick in his predicament. “I wonder if you can smell your own fear, Wick boy. What’s the scent like of your own imminent beheading?”

  Wick lifts up his chin. “Don’t know. All I smell is a big dumb troll who needs a shower.”

  Scorp laughs, at last amused, but not by the one Tide intended. Wick smirks, appearing proud of his own joke.

  Tid
e covers the distance between them in one single stride and knocks Wick across the mouth with one forceful, backhanded slap. The hit takes the smirk right off his face, Tide’s knuckles stinging with the sheer satisfaction of meeting Wick’s insolent smirk.

  “Your life is mine,” growls Tide, despite the pang of worry that lives in his stomach. “You better know that, Wick Lesser.”

  “Enough.” The word comes from Scorp. “We gotta get to taking care of them. The other one’s waking already.”

  Tide doesn’t bother to watch him come to. His furious eyes are piercing into Wick’s, threatening him without words, making dark promises that he hopes the sting of his backhanded slap helped Wick understand. I’m in charge. The anger boils inside his belly. You are powerless, Lesser. You’re powerless and I am in charge now.

  “Who’s this other one?” Tide growls, deadly deep, still glaring at Wick with his face reddened and his body so close, he can pick up the scent of Wick’s sweat. “And what is his Legacy?”

  “Tide …” murmurs Wick. “Do you … Do you really not …?”

  “Shut up.”

  Scorp draws his sword, which was belted to those ridiculously tight pants of his. He aims the sword at the other’s chest just as the boy seems to have gained his full consciousness, blinking rapidly and assessing his situation with mounting alarm. “If you make any sudden movements,” Scorp warns him politely, “then this blade is going to come out of your back.”

  The boy’s eyes flit back and forth between Scorp and Tide, fear flashing in them. He says nothing.

  “Tide, listen to me …”

  Again, Wick trying to appeal to him. “You want something else crunching against your face?” Tide offers acidly. “It’ll be a fist next time. Possibly two.”

  Scorp sighs, his patience lost. “It will obviously bring you deep and powerful satisfaction to put an end to that boy’s life. Here.” Scorp fetches the serrated blade he’d taken off the other one when they had knocked them out. “Take his friend’s weapon. Clean cut right across the neck. We’re already late. The Queen’s waiting.”