“But,” she said, and her hands sank limply to her thighs, “it’s the Antithesis. It can’t be real.”
“I’m guessing it’s not.” Luca gave a small shrug. “Wishful thinking, maybe, but I’m not feeling prepared to take on the Oracle’s prophesied World-Ender. Besides, the Antithesis rumors popped up around the time the fearmongering started. The timing seems too good to be true.”
Wisp started walking again, her anxiety evaporating. “See, that’s why you’re my best friend. You’re smart.”
“Uh-huh,” Luca said noncommittally.
“Anyway, there hasn’t been any proof of an actual Antithesis, right? No withered forests, vanishing towns, burning rivers or anything like that?”
“A hole in the sky above Liverpool, apparently. A small one.”
Wisp squinted sidelong at him. “How small?”
He spread his hands in a helpless gesture. “How would I know? According to the rumors, its size is anywhere between a football and a football field. Take your pick.”
“Okay. That’s not too bad. Did any of the gossipers say that the Smog’s been creeping across the wall lately, or that people are now seeing it on the other side?”
“They did, actually. I didn’t mention it because I thought this was just another Smog newsflash someone made up for kicks.” He made a wry mouth. “Sorry.”
“It could be real this time. Smoker could have made it appear on the other side to support the fearmongering.” Wisp glanced at the bag Luca was carrying. “I’ve decided I’m not going to run. If anyone else wants to, that’s okay, not much I can do about it. I’d prefer if we all make a new start together, though. After saving Hannah and defending our city.”
Luca’s face remained blank, his tone impassive. “And how would you go about defending it, exactly?”
“That’s the thing, I don’t know … yet. I’ll figure it all out tomorrow. In the meantime, I’ll have to ask everyone to trust me. Especially you.”
He kept his eyes on the road ahead and said nothing. If he doubted her ability to free Hannah without giving in to the dark side and joining the bad guys, he at least didn’t show it.
They kept walking, making their way southwest along Budapest Street and back toward the Kurfürstendamm, the boulevard that had once upon a time been considered a melting pot of fashion and culture. Now it served little purpose other than to stake out the gang’s turf in theory and offer a convenient walkway back to the church square. The long trail of stores, restaurants, and nightclubs had been stripped of usable leftovers long ago, though the multi-level superstores still held enough edible food to sustain the Survivors for another year. Or they would have, if their neighbors stopped scavenging in Survivor territory.
When the bell tower came into view, Wisp glanced at her wristwatch to check the time. “Still an hour before dawn,” she said. “Think Max and Sara are still home?”
“Why wouldn’t they be?” Luca asked.
“They could’ve gone to check on things. Like, you know, you. Or me.”
“If you sent them a messenger, they should be back by now, waiting to hear the news from the source. Hmmm, I wonder how Sara’s gonna react.”
Wisp made a sour grimace. “I’ll be vague and mind my wording so she doesn’t have a panic attack. Besides, if Max figured out a way to contact the heroes, we’ll be in the clear sooner rather than later. If anyone can do it, Max is the man. I mean, he’s ten years older than Sara and pretty smart to boot.”
“Let’s hope he is. Come on, hurry up so we don’t get caught in any more of that Smog.”
Luca quickened his pace, and Wisp followed suit, eager to join back up with the rest of her squad and confirm that they were doing okay.
CHAPTER 6
Very few people outside of certain UNEOA circles know that Athena’s prime specialty isn’t actually drones. Or power armor. You’d never guess, so I’ll tell you. She has a particular knack for artificial intelligence and communication systems. Yep. Chances are this post is going to get deleted in an hour, tops. Is anyone else seeing disturbing parallels to what Data is doing?
-An anonymous Internet poster (2011)
Back on the church square, Wisp covered the last meters to the tower’s first-floor museum entrance in a flash, sending her spheres ahead so she could pass the heavy glass door without needing to open it first.
Max and Sara waited on the other side. They had spread out a plastic mat on the floor, and Sara sat cross-legged on it, her anxious face painted marigold by the light sphere. The sparse lighting made her look even more fragile than she usually did. In contrast, her brother stood with strong arms crossed over his broad chest, sporting a frown so deep it joined his eyebrows together.
“There you are,” Max said. His frown eased but didn’t disappear completely. “We thought something bad happened when your little friends came flying toward us.”
“Something a little bad did happen,” Wisp admitted. Behind her, the door swung open and Luca stepped through. “I figured out a thing or two about what’s going on in the city. Let’s talk in the tower.”
“The tower?” Sara jumped to her feet, visibly alarmed. “It’s still two hours until dawn…”
Luca took position behind Wisp. “It’ll be easier to talk if we don’t have to watch the clock. We need another brainstorming session, and this one’s going to take a while.”
It wasn’t the whole reason for going there, but Max and Sara accepted it easily enough. Sara quickly rolled up her mat and collected her obligatory bag of snacks.
Max grabbed a big canvas bag from atop one of the display cases and slung it over his shoulder, causing something heavy to shift inside. “We got news for you, too,” he declared with a self-satisfied grin.
“Does this have something to do with contacting the heroes?” Wisp asked.
“Hell, yes, it does.” Max patted the bag with his hand. “And I’ve got a bigger and better surprise than whatever Luca’s hiding in his big duffel bag, I bet.”
“My duffel bag actually,” Wisp said. “I went home for a bit. Dug up Dad’s old stash and found some nifty stuff, like this.” She gestured to the Desert Eagle strapped to her hip.
“Oh.” Max paused in front of the stairwell. “Sorry, your hips are like a blank to me. You know, since you don’t have any.”
A boyish little snicker from Luca drifted down from the second floor. She gave Max a jab in the ribs.
“What’s a Desert Eagle?” Sara piped up from the back of the group, climbing the steps at a snail’s pace with her rolled up mat.
“It’s a gun,” Max explained over his shoulder. “One of the more powerful handguns, actually.” He turned back to Wisp. “Are you sure you can handle the recoil? A Desert Eagle kicks like a spring-loaded mule.”
“Not sure at all,” Wisp said. “If things heat up, I can at least fire a warning shot. The recoil can’t be as bad as what would happen if C’s thugs debunk my other gun as a dud.”
Max shrugged. “Good point. Take practice shots first though. I’ll help you get familiar with the basics. If the others are okay with it, you can use the top of the tower for a half hour before we sleep the day away.”
“Fine with me,” Luca declared from the floor above.
Sara pulled a face. “Is it as noisy as Max’s gun?”
“Noisier, probably,” Wisp said. “Sorry. If everything doesn’t go sideways tomorrow, I won’t have to use it at all. Make sure you wear the earmuffs when we tell you to, okay?”
“Okay. If Max gets the heroes to fly in and save the day, you won’t have to use it.”
Sara seemed to believe that her brother could conjure a perfect Hollywood ending, but Wisp remained skeptical. Comic book villains never quite measured up to the resourcefulness of real ones, and heroes weren’t exactly shining beacons of selflessness and virtue, either. Even the good ones like Radiant screwed up sometimes. Still, she was curious to see what surprise Max was carrying around in his bag, and a smidgen of hero support
would certainly bring about better results than having none. The Survivors lacked the firepower and expertise necessary to take on a worldwide crime syndicate and live.
Having reached the top of the tower, Wisp glanced at Luca, who was already sitting on one of the stone ledges. The duffel bag rested on a crate beneath his feet, joined by the multitude of tools and everyday necessities the Survivors stashed up here. He hadn’t opened it. Obviously, that was going to be her job. As was the ‘explaining why we might even need gas masks’ part.
She waited for Max and Sara to come up after her and clear a seating space for themselves. Having settled more or less comfortably, they looked at her expectantly.
Wisp pointed at Max’s bag. “You first, because whatever’s in there is poss-maybily going to change everything I was going to say, anyway.”
Max blinked slowly. “Huh. Since you have so much faith in my ability to overthrow your plans, fine. Let’s have at it.” He rolled up his shirtsleeves as if to issue a challenge, then pulled open the canvas bag with deliberate slowness, his grin broadening with each motion.
“Oh, come oooon.” Wisp dropped onto a folding chair and rolled her eyes. “You don’t have to make this into a big magic show. Just show us the goods already.”
Sara seemed to agree because she pinched him in the waist. “We already know you’re the best. You don’t have to be so snooty about it.”
“Fine, fine. Check this out.” With a final flourish, Max pulled the bag open and reached elbow deep into it. At first glance, the object he pulled from the bag looked to be some kind of metallic … soccer ball?
Wisp stood and inched closer, commanding her spheres to orbit the object. The added illumination did nothing to change her initial impression. The thing, now sitting on Max’s outstretched palm, refused to appear as anything but a metallic soccer ball. The size and shape looked about right. Wisp wasn’t sure what exactly she had expected, but Max’s grand announcement had inspired hope for something with a more obvious connection to the heroes.
While she chewed on her disappointment, Luca asked the question in her stead. “Just what is that thing?”
“I know, but I’m not telling!” Sara fidgeted with barely contained excitement.
“This, my dear friends, is one of Athena’s drones. One of the older models that was shot down before the Covenant stopped trying to do airspace surveillance around these parts.” Max tilted the silvery sphere, revealing a blackened compartment and the twisted mass of wires emerging from it.
Wisp and Luca perked up when the heroine’s name was dropped.
“Where’d you find it?” Wisp asked.
“In the trash,” Max said. “Actually, it was on top of one of those derelict buildings near the train station that’s been used as trash dumps since the beginning.”
“We spotted it months ago,” Sara added. “Max always wanted to try and get it, so he could take it apart, but it was in a really bad spot and the building could have collapsed underneath him, so he left it where it was.”
Max held up a finger to indicate himself. “This time, I had the motivation to bring a ladder.”
Wow. Wisp stared intently at the drone, her previous skepticism evaporating. Athena is one of the good ones. If this thing works, it could change everything.
“There must have been more than one of these laying around,” Luca said. “I remember a bunch of them zipping around not long after the Breakdown. Those things looked different. Smaller and painted in UNEOA colors.”
“Yeah, that’s why I didn’t recognize this one,” Wisp said. “What happened to the other surveillance drones?”
Max turned his attention back to her. “If I had to guess, I’d say the Shadows collected them all and sold the parts on the black market. Even a shitty little battery sells for a grand if an Evolved Technician made it. For top of the line gear like Athena’s, feel free to tack on a zero at the end.”
Wisp gave a soft whistle. “But they didn’t find this one. Or maybe the underpaid henchmen C dispatched to search our territory couldn’t be miggled to bring a ladder.”
“That makes so much sense!” Sara’s eyebrows shot up. “Those guys always look so grumpy. As if Constantine took their lunch money instead of paying them.”
“I wouldn’t put it past him,” Wisp said, playing along. “I bet money’s the reason the drones got shot down in the first place. Jog my memory – they were active for what, a week?”
“Something like that.” Max traced the metal sphere with his fingers. “Athena’s standard models for surveillance are usually much smaller and near impossible to shoot down. I heard they made these bigger so they’d be easy to spot by ‘distressed survivors’ like us. The Covenant has clearance to spy on bad guys, but the average Joe is off limits. Joe has to at least see the drone coming.”
Sara frowned. “I don’t get it. Why didn’t the heroes come punish whoever destroyed their drones?”
“Probably because our government declared southwest Berlin a no-go zone,” Wisp ventured. “No one was supposed to stay after the mass evacuation. Why waste resources on a district no one’s supposed to live in?”
“The real question,” Luca interjected, “is does the drone work? More to the point, how can it help us?”
“Just the cue I was waiting for.” Max flexed his fingers. “I did a quick checkup before the two of you showed up. For the most part, the little cogs and wheels that made it tick are too far gone for me to fix them, but I think I can get two of the main features working.” He placed a finger on top of the sphere. “There’s a concealed camera lens here. It was obviously sending image data straight to Athena. Once I get it powered up, the radio link should still be working.”
“Wait.” Wisp gave him a wide-eyed look. “Are you telling us you can establish a direct comm link to an actual Covenant heroine, and talk to her through this thing?”
“No, that’s not what I said. The drone was never built to support two-way communication. It followed a pre-determined patrol route and transmitted image data. It’s not a phone. You can’t talk through it.”
“Oh.” Wisp deflated, sinking back onto her folding chair.
“It’s far from useless, though.” Max waggled his eyebrows. “Once I retrieve the camera and link it up to a power source, you’ll be able to take pictures and send them straight to Athena. I’ll add a trigger button, so you can decide when and where you want to take a snapshot and send it through the wire. Just make sure it’s something a Covenant heroine would be interested in.”
Wisp grinned, rubbing her hands in anticipation. “Think a local supervillain would qualify?”
The announcement earned her puzzled looks from Max and Sara.
“A supervillain?” the younger girl asked. “Do you mean the Smog ghost?”
“Yeah, that’s the one. Guess it’s time for me to spill the beans, too.”
For the next thirty minutes, Wisp told the others all about her freaky encounter with Smoker but left out a few details pertaining to what Luca had discovered.
“So,” she said, “I decided I’m not gonna puss out and run. At least not without raining on C’s parade. He’s not just messing with the Smog, he’s messing with Hannah and our city, and it doesn’t look like the heroes know about of any of it. If the bad guys found a way to weaponize this stuff, someone in charge needs to know.”
“They can’t make more Smog, can they?” Max raised an eyebrow.
“That’s a really good question,” Wisp said. “I don’t know. I guess I could find out. Maybily.”
Luca nudged her duffel bag with his sneaker. “How about you show us what you brought? It’ll be easier to come up with an action plan once we know what’s available.”
“Right.” Wisp stood and unzipped the bag. The pile of clothes spilled out in a wrinkled heap. She dug through the pile until she got a hold of the gas mask.
“Tadaaa!” she announced cheerfully, holding the gas mask up. “Behold our ultimate gadget of self-defense. Our Exc
alibur or something like that.”
An awkward silence ensued.
Sara wrinkled her nose. “I don’t get it.”
“This is just Wisp doing her thing,” Luca said. “Trying too hard. She means well, sure, but didn’t we just agree to tone down the dramatics?”
Wisp filled her cheeks with air, shaping her usual expression of comedic disapproval. “You guys are total downers today. You could at least ask about the idea behind the drama.”
What she didn’t say was that the dramatics might very well be the gang’s last chance to recreate the mood and atmosphere of the gang’s early days, back before scavenged supplies became scarce and sickness was on the rise. That feeling of unity and light-hearted optimism she had struggled to establish and worked hard to maintain throughout the year. There had been a time when the Survivors felt like the kings of their own country, free and unbound by outside authority, capable of changing and shaping their own world.
If they had now reached the point where they’d stopped believing in themselves and their ability to forge their own destinies, they had already lost.
Fortunately, Max came to her rescue. He tugged on a rain jacket from the duffel bag’s spilled contents and pulled it closer for inspection. “I think I get the idea. You only brought stuff made from PVC and synthetic fiber, yeah?”
“Well, duh,” Wisp said with a slight smile.
“Right.” He slipped his hand into the blue jacket sleeve. “Given enough time and duct tape, we could fashion all of these into one or two makeshift hazmat suits. Good enough to protect your skin from the Smog for five, maybe ten minutes.”
“Oh!” Sara flashed a girly grin. “Now I get it.”
Wisp glanced at the bag. “But, um, it’s only enough for one or two suits…”
Luca swept a hand to indicate the others. “There’s four of us. Five with Hannah.”
“I know. We only have three gas masks. I mean, protecting your skin would be pointless if you’re letting the Smog in through your face holes.”
Gift of Light_A Powered Destinies stand-alone novel Page 12
