I got it. “But he wants me moved.”
She nodded, looked away. “He gave me through the end of the week with you, and then you have to go back… now that there’s no concern you’ll die on us.” She looked up at me. “I’ll keep arguing for it. But he’s not taking my calls. You still have more therapy to do.”
I shook my head. “We both know it won’t make a difference.”
“I’m the goddamn doctor here. The whole reason he hired me was to keep his team in top shape. Why he won’t just listen—“
“We both know why, Dr. Ali,” I said, meeting her eyes. “I piss him off. I don’t obey orders, and yet, he needs me, because though he has lovely powered people under his command, they can’t fight, or, if they do try to, they don’t do it very well. And he has people like you here because you have some level of power and you don’t know how to live in the regular world and he capitalizes on it.” She gave me a surprised look, but she didn’t try to argue. “I am the only actual weapon at his disposal. For now, at least,” I added. “It’s okay,” I said, trying to make her feel better. “It is what it is.”
“I’ve heard all about you. It’s not like you to just go along with something like this,” she said.
“I know when I’ve been outplayed,” I said. She checked my vitals for the last time before heading out, and then I settled into my bed, adjusted the angle so I could watch TV comfortably. End of the week. Friday transfer. I had two days to figure something out. Too bad I wasn’t all that brilliant to begin with, and it was likely that Maddoc’s little hug had left me short a few precious brain cells.
I settled into bed and started flipping through the channels. One of them was showing 9 to 5, a movie that I’d absolutely loved as a kid. I left it on and settled in, laughing as I watched Dolly Parton and Lily Tomlin’s antics.
It wasn’t until the credits started to roll that I had the beginnings of an idea.
I pulled the notebook and special pen I’d been practicing with from my bedside table. It was thicker than a normal pen, weighted a bit to help it stay on the paper, and contoured so I could hold it easier. I thought for a few minutes, then started writing a note. After I’d finished, I settled into bed and closed my eyes and tried to go through every way my little plan could go wrong.
So many ways. But it was the only chance I’d have anytime soon. I would have to count on others for help, which was something I’d never, ever thought I’d do.
The next morning, I drank my orange juice, took my pain pills, and waited for my daily visitors to check in on me. When Portia and Toxxin came the next morning, I showed them the note I’d written, holding my breath, hoping they’d play along, hoping they’d understand what I was trying to say, hoping they wouldn’t run screaming to tell someone I’d lost my mind.
Or, worse, tell someone what I was planning.
“Sounds good,” Portia said after a while. “We should be able to get these ingredients. You have some weird cravings, girl,” she said.
“I hope I don’t burn it. I’m awful at cooking,” Toxxin said.
“You’ll be fine. I really appreciate it,” I added. “Hey, can you send up my guard when she gets off work? She was asking to see me, and I’m always too tired.”
“Sure. Maria, right?”
I nodded. They left, and a while later, Maria entered the room with a smile.
“It’s good to see you!” she said. “I would have brought you some shitty spaghetti, but I figured you’ve likely suffered enough.”
I laughed. I was fully dressed for the first time since I’d regained consciousness, and I almost felt normal. Or, I guess, I felt my new normal, which would have to be good enough. “Thanks.” Then I met her eyes. “Did you see my new punching bag?”
She hesitated for a moment, walked over to it with me. I’d figured out that the cameras in my room were above my bed, above the door, and in the main, non-toilet part of the bathroom. The punching bag, for the most part, was out of the angle of the cameras. I hit it a few times, and she remarked on how nice it was that I was improving.
“Need your help,” I said softly as I punched, so it would cover the sound for any bugs in the room.
“You have it,” she said.
“That thing you can do?”
She gave a slight nod.
“I’m gonna fall down like I’m hurt. Bend over me and act like you’re taking my pulse. Do your thing to the band around my neck, big enough so I can slip it off. Okay?” I was punching the entire time, as quickly as I could.
“Yep,” she said.
I nodded, just slightly, then hit out again and fell, landing on my back.
“Oh, shit! Are you okay?” she asked, and then she bent over me, put her hand to my pulse point. At first, nothing seemed to be happening, but then I felt the band loosen, heard it as it clanked against the floor.
“How long does that last?”
“About two hours unless I specifically make it go back,” she whispered as she helped me stand up.
I grinned. “Perfect. Thank you.”
She helped me back to my bed, then hugged me, wishing me luck, and left.
Phase one, done.
Chapter Twenty-One
I picked up the phone on my bedside table, clumsily hit Jenson’s extension.
“Yes, Daystar?”
“Hey, Jenson. I know I’m supposed to be transferred in a couple of days. Think you can get me in to see the boss sometime today, so I can make my case for why I shouldn’t go back in?”
There was a pause. “Don’t tell me you’re going to play the humble servant now, Daystar,” she said.
“Well. There’s a first time for everything, right?”
“So there is. He has no meetings scheduled today. I’ll have Portia walk you up.”
“Much appreciated.”
“Good luck,” she said.
Portia walked into my room a couple of minutes later, and she took my hand. “Okay if we just walk? I don’t know if my stomach can take the whole whiz-bang teleporter thing,” I told her.
She hooked her arm with mine. “Wuss,” she said, small smile on her face. I laughed a little. We took the elevator up to the top floor. A few seconds after we were in, I had a coughing fit and bent over double, letting my hair fly forward.
“Jesus! Are you okay?” Portia asked. I felt the dampener slide down over my head, down my hair, and I caught it, barely, before it clanked to the floor. Before I straightened, I turned a little, away from the cameras, and tucked it under the edge of my shirt, holding it there with my hand, obscured from view, but still holding on to it.
I straightened. “Fine. My throat still acts up sometimes,” I said with a shrug. She gave me what I guess was supposed to be a pitying look, and then the elevator dinged and the Jenson at the desk nodded us toward Alpha’s office. I thanked her and we walked in and closed the door. I caught a glimpse of Toxxin, who was in there already.
“I just wanted you to know. She saved my life, Alpha, sir. I really hope you’ll consider letting her just serve her time on the team,” she was saying. Alpha stood at the windows, giving her a stony glare.
“Duly noted. Ah, Daystar,” he said, glancing up as Portia and I walked in. “You two can leave us,” he said to Portia and Toxxin. They left, closing the door behind them, and I took a deep breath.
Now I just had to count on them doing what I’d asked them to do.
“I’ll save you some time. You’re here because you want a reprieve from the detainment facility. You think the fact that you bagged Maddoc, that you sustained injuries, bought you some level of freedom.”
“Well. I also saved three of your people, so…” I shrugged. “I was hoping you’d consider it. I mean, we screwed up Mayhem’s plans that day, and they’re in hiding, at least for now. We caught Maddoc, despite the fact that your need to keep me dampened hindered us—“
He laughed then. “You really think I give a flying fuck about stopping Mayhem? I don’t care that you caught
Maddoc. I just regret that he didn’t actually manage to kill you.” He gave me a sneer, then turned away, looking out the windows. “Eleven years, I’ve never had anyone question my leadership. You turn up, and all of a sudden, I can’t do anything right.”
“To be fair, I think you were a fuck up before I got here. Sir,” I added, and I was pleased to have retained my smart ass attitude. Brain damage can’t take everything, after all.
He turned back and glared at me.
“And really, it’s kind of obvious that you don’t care about actually fighting any of the bad guys, because if you were, you’d have your team trained. You’d have someone like Portia in charge, because she actually knows what she’s doing. I think you actually prefer having them lost when they’re out in the field.”
“Well no shit, genius,” he said, rolling his eyes. “I never claimed to be a humanitarian. But I am a business man. A good one.”
I nodded.
“And you’re going to spend the rest of your life, whatever there is left of it, in confinement. No more little jaunts to the outside world unless there’s a threat that I can’t throw enough people at. Maybe it will finally end you. If not, you’ll waste away to nothing. You’ll rot here, and not a single person will remember the name Daystar.”
I walked toward him, wobbling on my legs, and I noticed his look of disdain.
“Besides, you’re useless,” he muttered, looking disgusted by me.
Just one. One good punch. Please.
I lifted my hand as if I was going to straighten my shirt, and ended up shifting position at the last minute, giving him a decent uppercut. Not as good as I would have once upon a time, but Alpha wasn’t exactly used to being confronted. He fell back, knocking his head against the thick glass that looked out over the city.
“What the fuck? Why isn’t your dampener working?” he asked, blood leaking from his mouth. Toxxin and Portia walked in, closing the door behind them.
“You mean this dampener?” I asked, pulling the metal ring from beneath my shirt and letting it dangle from my finger.
“Get her!” he shouted to Toxin and Portia. Both of them disappeared for a moment, and then reappeared next to Alpha.
“Sweet dreams,” Toxxin said, gently touching the side of his face. He slumped over, and Portia caught him, settled him on the floor. I smiled at them and placed the dampener over his head.
“Search him for the controls for the dampeners,” I said, and Portia started going through his pockets while Toxxin looked on his desk, in the drawers. “Did everyone hear what he was saying?” I asked Portia.
“Yep. Everyone from the prison levels on up.”
“Excellent. Thank you.”
“Thank Jenson. I didn’t even have to tell her why.”
I nodded, and Toxxin let out a little squeal and held up what looked basically like a phone. I recognized it from the time he’d flaunted it after they’d first captured me. Portia took it, groaned.
“We need a password.”
“It’s ‘boobs4me,’ Jenson said as she walked into the room.
“I— are you serious?” I asked.
“Unfortunately, yes,” she said, crossing her arms and looking at Alpha, still slumped where Toxxin had knocked him out, unconscious. Portia put in the password, muttering “I feel gross just typing that,” and then she nodded.
“It worked.”
She fiddled around with it for a while. “Each unit has its own controls. Dampening, tracking. Is ‘install’ what makes it stay on them?” she asked Jenson, and Jenson nodded.
“Okay. I guess this is Toxxin’s. Let’s try it,” Portia said. I kept an eye on the door.
“Caine and Forge are currently keeping Nightbane busy,” Jenson said, and I raised my eyebrows at her. “Figured it couldn’t hurt,” she added.
“Genius,” I told her, and she nodded her head in acknowledgment.
“Okay, try taking it off,” Portia said to Toxxin. Toxxin took a deep breath, then grasped the two sides of the tracker around her neck, and they came apart, easily.
“Yes!” she shouted.
“Can you install my tracker on him?” I asked Portia and she nodded.
“Done,” she murmured a moment later. “Shall we take him to the detention center?”
I nodded, and in the next moment, Portia, Toxxin, Jenson, Alpha and I were in one of the cells on the men’s floor of the detainment area. Toxxin and Portia lifted Alpha into the chair, secured the manacles around his wrists and ankles.
“He should be awake any moment now,” Toxxin said. I glanced at Jenson.
“These cells are not soundproof,” I said. She held up a roll of duct tape, and I grinned.
After taping Alpha’s mouth shut, I stood around with my three accomplices.
“You know we could be in a whole lot of trouble if we don’t handle this right, right?” I said after a few minutes.
“We were in a whole lot of trouble already,” Toxxin said. “I’m free for the first time in seven years. No noose around my neck.”
“Same,” Portia said.
I glanced at Jenson. “I never liked the smarmy bastard,” she said. “I have believed for a long time that he was up to something shady, but I still can’t figure out what it was. And then what happened with the whole Maddoc thing just cemented it. I don’t want my legacy to be that I stood by and did nothing while he imprisoned and killed people who didn’t deserve it.”
I nodded. They all had much loftier reasons for doing this than I did. But, it worked for them, so what did it matter to me?
Alpha started groaning, tried to talk, and I guessed he realized his mouth was taped shut, because his eyes flew open and he looked like he was panicking.
“Relax. Breathe,” I said, standing in front of him. The look in his eyes went from panic to rage, and he moved, tried to lunge at me, tried to fight the manacles holding him into the chair. “Those chairs are strong. And I know,” I said, nodding. “I tried breaking them. Almost managed it, too. We won’t make that mistake with you, though.”
He struggled for a few more minutes, and I waited it out. When he finally seemed to tire, he just looked at me like he wanted to destroy me. I crossed my arms over my chest. “Things are going to be different around here,” I said, and he rolled his eyes.
“We can take the tape off if you like. But if you start getting loud, it’s going back on,” I said, and he nodded. Portia went to him and ripped the tape off of his mouth, not bothering to be slow or gentle about it, and he cried out.
“Ah ah ah,” I cautioned him, and he clamped his mouth shut, still glaring at Portia, who just stood by, looking bored.
“It was really, really shitty of you, letting Maddoc pound on me like that,” I said, pacing back and forth in front of him, arms crossed. “Really shitty. I mean, you’ve gotten the reports. Brain damage. Loss of both certain gross and fine motor abilities.”
“Worthless superhero,” he sneered.
I shrugged. “Yeah, I guess. The thing is, I never set out to be a hero.”
“You can’t keep me down here forever. I pay for this place. I have connections. People will want to meet with me—“
“Have you ever seen the movie 9 to 5?” I asked him, and he looked like I was speaking a foreign language. “Come on, man. 9 to 5. Dolly Parton, Lily Tomlin, Jane Fonda. Who was the guy? I always forget his name,” I asked.
“Dabney Coleman,” Jenson said, and I nodded.
“That’s it. Dabney Coleman. Thanks.” I turned my attention back to Alpha. “The story goes, Dabney was a terrible boss. Treated people like crap, and one day, Dolly, Lily, and Jane just got fucking fed up. Of course, first, they thought they maybe killed him by accident, and then they realized he wasn’t dead—“
“But they thought he’d think they did it on purpose, so they locked him up,” Toxxin put in, and I nodded.
“Exactly. And so they imprisoned him. Kept him tied up in Jane Fonda’s house. Or was it Dolly’s house? I can’t remember
. It was a cute house though,” I said, and he was giving me this wide-eyed, confused look as if he was having trouble following me. “They had him sign the checks and work orders and shit like that, and made excuses for why this very busy man just couldn’t find time to meet with anyone himself. And they ran the company,” I said.
“And they kept his busybody assistant or whoever she was busy, too,” Toxxin said.
I nodded. “Roz.”
“Yeah, Roz. Nightbane is totally Roz.”
“And they did such a good job, that people actually liked coming to work,” I said.
“They did too good,” Toxxin said.
“Well. We won’t go that far,” I said. Then I looked at Alpha again. “To be clear, you’re Dabney Coleman.”
“I think Daystar is Dolly,” Toxxin said.
“Can I please be Lily Tomlin? That’s all I want to know,” Jenson said, and I grinned.
“What the fuck are you dumb bitches talking about?” Alpha shouted.
I shook my head. “That wasn’t nice,” I said softly, with maybe a little bit of a singsong quality to my voice.
“Another movie I always loved was Misery,” I said a moment later, and he blanched. “Ah. I guess you’ve seen that one.”
“It won’t work, you psychotic trailer trash,” he said. “You think this place can survive without me?”
I smiled. “Oh, but it won’t. You’ll be… right here,” I said, gesturing around the cell, “the entire time. And Jenson was the one holding it all together at the back end. I’m good at handling money, as you undoubtedly know. Portia is the only one here capable of leading an actual team. You will cooperate.”
“Nightbane will stop you. Crystal will stop you.”
I noticed Jenson tapping the pad she always carried with her. “Yes, well. About that,” she said, holding up the tablet. On a split screen, both Nightbane and Crystal struggled in their own chairs, manacled.
“Please be sure to get a dampener for Nightbane,” I said to Jenson, and she nodded. “Where did we get the one for Crystal?”
“I had an extra in the supply closet,” she said. “I gave it to Beta when he went to meet with her.”
A New Day (StrikeForce #1) Page 20
