The Infected (Book 9): Proxy: War Day

by P. S. Power

  Brian could see that.

  "Brian Yi. I was just using her phone. She's out for the moment. Say, when you get a chance, call back and fill us in? I probably have to do all the paperwork on this thing." That would be fun. Possibly useful though, if it could lead him to Braid, or even her top people. Honestly, it was the kind of thing he should have been doing for a while.

  "Will do." The phone went to dial tone.

  Brian didn't really know what to do then, but got the basic idea of paperwork, if not the exact forms or protocols for it. He'd need to log the information he had, so that Marcia wouldn't be left scrambling when she got back. That got filled out on the computer. He couldn't get into everything, of course, since it was Marcia's computer. It had password protection on each file, except for the internet browser, and a word processing program.

  Honestly, he was a bit shocked that she let it be connected to the internet. She seemed more like the type of person that would have done the important work off line, even if it was a hassle. He'd have to recommend that too, in the future. If anyone was going to break into their computers they should have to come into the office to do it, like anyone else.

  Just as he finished the write up, trying to be as clear as possible the phone rang again. This time the voice sounded different. If the agent had been a bit scared, this woman was freaked out to the highest level possible.

  "IPB, Brian Yi. What's the situation?"

  The woman was hyperventilating, and hard to understand.

  "Crap! We have... I don't know, four hostiles here... Like giant house cats... Except... Fuck, they're killing people left and right. I can't even get out of the building!"

  Brian winced, since he really didn't know what to do at the moment. Four more of the things? That... Team Four was already fully deployed, he thought. They had a member that could teleport other people though, right? Lariat? He screamed then, for Wren again. She started talking, which got a voice to come back from her wrist.

  "Lariat here. I need a location. I can't find people without one." It seemed reasonable, to Brian at least.

  "Ma'am? Can you tell us where you are? We can send some help in, but-"

  "I'm... This is the NYPD office, in New York? I- they're coming this way."

  Wren stood there, wide eyed, as the voice, which sounded a bit southern, cleared his throat.

  "I don't know where that is. We need to go with another option. It will take too long to find her." That meant he could hear the woman on the phone.

  Probably a cop. That wasn't good news, but she was asking for his help, wasn't she? Their help.

  She got more panicked, and Brian, finally, felt himself start to tingle a bit. This time though, the space around him warping already, he felt more of what was going on. Understanding the process a bit. He was grabbing the right woman, and was going to stuff her away safely, in a space that was almost exactly where he was going. A pocket universe, after a fashion. At least a pocket of some sort. That it was going to form inside himself was interesting. He'd never really known where the people went before.

  The only problem there was that he knew, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that if he tried to fight the cat creatures that Braid had sent in, he'd die. The one time he'd faced one before that had been the case too, and he'd had to run for his life. It nearly hadn't worked. Against four of them...

  There was nothing he could do.

  Except that he had to protect this woman, didn't he? It was important, or he wouldn't be going to her now. Rather than simply hesitate, Brian got up and started running, moving toward the front of the building, screaming. It was more of a deep bellowing, he hoped.

  "Bridget! Get over here, now!"

  She was small enough, he thought, that he could wrap a field around her and go in. Maybe. He'd done it once before, with Tobin, and she was no larger than Goblin was. About the same size really. Plus, if he had a bit of time, maybe it would work to take her in without punching a hole into the space? It was too much to think about, but Impulse came at him fast enough that he didn't think she'd be able to stop in time. Followed by Quartz, and oddly, Doug, who was flying in faster than Marcia could run.

  It was tricky, but Brian focused, starting to try and wrap the woman on the other end up inside himself, while making a strong enough warping around himself to take the tiny girl with him when he went. Hopefully it wouldn't get them both killed, but there was no time to ask if it was a good idea.

  Speaking softly, he held out his arms. The space the girl had to be inside of was big enough for her. For more than one person, but there wasn't a lot of time. He yelled, trying to make himself heard by everyone around.

  "Creatures, four of them. Class four, but nothing I can beat. Designed to take me out, personally, I think. In ten... nine..." The girl stopped, and hugged him as he moved to pull the nine that Lancaster had given him out. Except of course that he foolishly had left it on Marcia's desk. Not that a gun would do anything for him, but it was better than nothing. Well, he could find something. Maybe.

  They were in the right place a moment later. Painlessly. That nearly shocked him into not moving, but Impulse was a good bit faster than that. He could feel the woman he carried inside his personal space though. She was frightened, but still at the same time. There was no time in there really. Not much. Probably a good thing, since there was no heat or air either.

  Brian was pushed back, as the tiny, but incredibly powerful girl used his body weight to shift directions and hit one of the creatures in the eye with a spinning back fist. He didn't wait to see what she did though, since another of the things was coming for him. In fact, as he fled, running as well as he could, he noticed that two of the things, totally ignored everyone else and made a b-line for him personally. It did kind of show that they were designed to take him down, personally.

  Yay. He was popular.

  Jumping over a desk, he rolled, and nearly hit a brown desk chair on wheels. The occupant was in a suit, and had a douchey little mustache that reminded Brian a bit of the cop that had tried to beat him to death that one time. Short hair, and about the same age, so in his thirties somewhere. This man was terrified, rather than homicidal however.

  Not the same person either. Just a man that was about to die.

  Brian didn't speak, feeling what was about to happen so clearly that his body just reacted. A large and deadly paw swiped at his back, aiming to rip his spine open. To avoid it, he had to lay flat in the air, and spin at the right time, then push off the thing's chest. It would clip his left leg, but that couldn't be helped. Then, if he could bear the pain... He had to bash into the detective, take his gun, then finish the spin and come up firing at the thing.

  That would buy them about four seconds. It wasn't enough, of course, but it was all he could do, the thing in front of him being too well armored for something as small as regular bullets to handle.

  He just did it, and tried not to react as his left leg was nearly removed at the knee by the claws of the thing. Getting the gun was harder than it should have been, the officer not getting that Brian had to use it for a while, but as it fired, taking the thing directly in the face, it did move back a tiny bit.

  Then, when the weapon was empty, he threw it. It did about as much as he expected, but bought them an extra half a second, as the thing looked at him. It didn't have a real expression, but really, if it wasn't thinking he was a moron for doing that, then it didn't have a brain at all. Then, for some reason, he ducked, covering the man on the floor with his body, just in time for the things head to explode in a flash of white.

  Pain washed over his back and side, as bits of bone stuck into him.

  He really missed his armor suddenly.

  Impulse was there about three seconds later, her voice excited. "We got them. There are only four? I got four." She looked at him, and then nodded, not seeming too shocked. "Medic! Help, over here!"

  That got the man Brian was on to push him off, and take his own belt off. It went around Brian's leg
, as a tourniquet. It worked, but he wasn't able to sit up, since there was too much blood loss already. Luckily he didn't need to.

  "Come... Here..." The trade out was about to happen anyway, so it didn't take too much more for him to wrap Bridgie up and take her back with him. That landed them in front of the trailer, to find that Marcia and Doug where still there.

  Thankfully, so was Phoebe.

  "Fucking dog farts!" She was pretty loud, and her exclamation oddly on point for once, but ran to him and started making out instantly. Kissing him, using enough tongue that it would have made him feel guilty in most situations. It made his mouth tingle, especially as she found his tongue with hers and pressed deeper inside him. Almost like they were friends or something.

  He got the idea though, even as it happened. The healing factors she was passing were being secreted by her mouth. It wasn't some kind of psychic healing, but an advanced and rapid drug therapy. Probably one tailored to the individual. At least he noticed that the taste of her mouth on his became different after a moment. Slightly more bitter. Then his leg stopped hurting, and she backed off, working on the belt that he'd stolen from the other man. It was leather, and had a long black stapler twisted through it. As soon as the pressure was let go, he started to heal though. It wasn't instant, but he could feel his leg knitting back together.

  "Thanks. That really helps." The method was a bit strange, but nothing he couldn't live with. Now that he wasn't bleeding to death. The bits of cat creature even started to fall out of his body, rather than grow into place. That was good, since they were probably poisoned or had trackers embedded. Braid would have thought of that, he didn't doubt.

  Marcia was by his side, her cool white hand on his arm. Her brown eyes shone a bit, but she forced a smile. "They were only class fours and nearly killed you? How did that work? You kicked Tesseract's butt more than once and he's a class eight."

  Bridget made a little sound that seemed annoyed.

  "Class nine. He can get more than one of himself to meet up at a given point in time and each one has his full powers."

  Brian hadn't heard that one before.

  "Seriously? Crud. Anyway, these things... I think they were designed to beat me, personally. Bridget just killed them, but there was nothing I could do to them at all. That, or they're meant to be too much for anyone but a class five or above to take out. Either way." He'd nearly died, and would have, if it hadn't been for the others backing him up. Bridget and Phoebe had saved him. In different ways, but both girls had done very well.

  "Good job, everyone. Hey, Doug, give me a hand? We need to get this all down on the computer and be near the phone in case we need to send in more people. Next time I'm taking you too, Marcia. You can stand in front of me while I run away like a scared little girl." He grinned about it, his voice a bit dark sounding. Scared, but hiding it. He relaxed though, and patted her hand as she helped him up, trying to take most of his weight.

  His leg wasn't healed yet, but from what he could see it was still working away at it, and not bleeding anymore. They all followed him in, as if he were in charge. That, or they thought he was going to fall down. No one stopped, just crowding into the office space, letting him have the chair in front of the computer. Marcia grabbed a regular chair from along the wall, and Bridget scowled, then got two gallons of oil out, handing one to Quartz as she sat.

  "Meal time. I need to stay fueled up, and you do too, Marsh." They drank the things as he and Doug looked on.

  Phoebe shuddered a bit, "gross. Do you want me to go and get some real food for you?"

  Brian blinked, because now she sounded sweet, actually concerned for them. "Cunts."

  That part ruined the effect a bit, but Marcia looked at the girl, and shook her head.

  "Not yet. We'll drink this for now, since it's faster. Tibs, you're on phones. Wren, what's up with Team Four?"

  The beaked young lady with her pretty blue feathered hair and big eyes was in the room with them about ten seconds later, holding her hand out. The spider spoke to them, but the voice wasn't one he recognized.

  It was female, for one thing.

  "We've secured the location here. All the hostiles are dead. We don't know if there will be further attacks. Should we come in or..."

  Brian felt a bit slow, but thought he got the idea. This woman talking to them over the spider, wasn't real. She was an energy projection, pretending to be a person. She wanted to know if they were needed for the time being or if they should go away, so Rigs wouldn't be burning massive amounts of energy to keep them going all the time.

  He spoke, trying not to be pushy, but getting that if they weren't needed it would be worth it to save them for later. If only in saved food costs.

  "Go back to base. We can hold things here." It was a bit obscure, but after a bit of hesitation, the voice answered.

  "Understood. We're going back to our sub-station then. Out."

  It was all very official sounding.

  Then the phone rang. This time the attack was just a group of anti-Infected bigots that had decided a young mother who looked a bit like a lizard shouldn't be allowed to shop with the normal people. They had guns, but it was being called in by the store manager, and Brian noticed that he wasn't going himself. After a moment, he nodded.

  "I think this one is about PR, not death. So..." He nearly asked Bridget to come along again, since that had worked pretty well a moment before, and then looked at Wendy, who was sweet and gentle... but also funny looking. That just felt wrong, this time. Like it would set things off in a very bad way.

  Finally he waved at Doug.

  "Let's go and have a chat about manners?" Brian stood on his own, and then had to focus for a while, trying to find the right situation. There were a lot more than one, he realized. Things going on that called to him, all the time. None of them were going to end in death at the moment, so he made himself ignore them. Not that it wasn't important. Each one was, and called to him. The thing there, he realized, was that this had to be happening all the time. He'd never noticed it before, but it wasn't special or different, just like an itch that he'd stopped paying attention to.

  There, and irritating, but ignored.

  It wasn't that hard to find the right place though, being a tense standoff in a grocery store. If a woman holding a gallon of milk to her chest and looking scared while ten people threatened her with weapons could be called a stand-off.

  Brian put a hand out toward Doug, but didn't need to touch him. They just needed to be close enough together that they were both in the warped area when it thinned to let them through. He hadn't noticed it happening, but when they got there, under the cheap florescent lights, on the white tile of the place, he found Bridget right next to him.

  Doug too, on the other side.

  Glancing down, he was covered in blood, with a scabbed over area on his leg that was still mending. That made him limp a bit, even though it didn't really hurt.

  He spoke, making his voice light. Friendly even.

  "Seriously folks, what part of work together aren't you getting? Put the guns away and help this women get food for herself and family. Don't be jerks."

  That got most of the weapons to be pointed at him, but no one was going to shoot. He could sense that. Just like he knew, if for a different reason, that none of these people would just put their guns down because he'd suggested they were being assholes.

  Bridget nodded, really fast, her face serious.

  "Yeah. This lady isn't going to hurt you. Really look at her. You're all acting like monsters, and she's scared, but just trying to get some grub." It was true, but she had a weapon pointed at her too. The woman holding the shotgun seemed pretty terrified too, suddenly.

  "God. It's Impulse!" Everyone there looked at her. Because she'd been the one to kill thousands of people in the last weeks. It used to be that they would have stared at him, but no one even seemed to care he was there.

  That was an improvement. For him at least.

&n
bsp; Doug nodded, moving forward himself. He wasn't bullet proof, and didn't know that no one was going to shoot, but he did it anyway, moving in front of the lizard woman. The only thing that showed were scales being her face and arms and otherwise she wasn't all that strange seeming. A pretty turquoise color, too. Actually, Brian realized, taking a good look, for all that she was funny looking, she was also kind of hot. Like a model, almost.

  Not that he was checking her out, but that kind of thing was pretty rare. Most of the Infected that looked different were kind of homely, because of what made them special. This woman had something going on that really worked for her.

  "So, again, stop acting like morons, and let's take care of things here. Someone get a cart." He gestured at a man that looked upset, but not homicidal. "Will you do that please?"

  It took a bit, but the man put his little pistol away and actually did it, which got Brian to ignore the others with their weapons, as he started to fill the thing.

  "Ma'am, what do you need today?"

  The woman, who hadn't spoken at all, sounded shaky, nice too though. Almost a bit sexy.

  "Some milk, and I was going to get some rice? I don't have a lot of money. I haven't worked in a while."

  That could be hard, Brian knew. Most Infected didn't have jobs at all, and either had to be on state assistance, or if they couldn't get that, and it was pretty difficult to do, they had to be involved in some kind of crime in order to stay alive. He didn't ask how this woman was making it. From the state of her clothing, the answer was just barely.

  "No problem. I'll cover that today. Or, better yet, everyone pony up. The idea now is to defeat our real enemy by working together. Does anyone here have a job they need filled?" It was a long shot, but he was just being conversational. Oddly enough, the man that had gotten the cart made a face and looked away.

  "I... Can you answer phones? I could use someone at the lumber yard. Filling orders." He glanced at Brian, and then Bridget, but finally shrugged. "Sorry about... All this. We're just scared. All the killing lately, and... I know it's wrong, but we... Have to protect ourselves. Not by going after people that just need a job though. Or some food. This is crazy. Proxy is right, we need to work together. What we've been doing isn't working anymore. I don't think it ever was." He brushed his hand over his short graying brown hair, and glanced at the others that had come with him. They didn't seem as convinced, but one of the women, the one scared of Bridget, seemed to get that she wasn't about to die, so pointed the shotgun at the floor.