Black Tie: Book One of the Sparrow Archives

by Kieran Strange

  Dasilva quirked her eyebrow at the impossibly small and lean tuxedo cat, who was perched with impeccable balance on top of a stack of papers and magazines on the coffee table. Round, amber eyes were fixated upon her as if she might magically pull some sort of food out of somewhere on her person.

  “Is that why he’s trying to decide whether or not he could feasibly take me down?”

  “More than likely. HEY! BATCAT!”

  The proudly-positioned little black-and-white thing turned his head, peering at his owner over his shoulder. Cabe was poking his head around the corner into the living room, staring at him.

  “Leave Gabby alone, she’s immune to your feline charms.”

  “It’s true,” Dasilva said, more to the cat than to her partner. “I had four of you growing up. It’s not gonna cut it with me, kid.”

  Cabe smirked as the other Field Agent stubbornly locked eyes with Bruce Wayne, and the two of them stared each other down for several seconds. He would comment that she was a beautiful woman, but he wouldn’t want it to be taken as sexist. That being said, it was true; everything about Gabriella Dasilva was beautiful, both inside and outside, from her looks to her wits to the way she knew at least seventeen ways to kill a man thrice her size using only one hand. She was tall, wiry, and toned – five-foot-ten, with sharper abs than his own and thighs that could crush a person’s skull. Not that you would expect it when you looked at her; the Brazilian woman was graceful and refined in her movements, her ink-dark hair usually worn in thick, classy waves around her shoulders. It gave her a distinctively feminine appearance despite the things she was capable of. Most of the men they had to deal with wouldn’t take well to a woman who looked stronger and tougher than them.

  “Hey, so, question?” he called back into the main room, as he returned to the only bedroom in the small apartment to continue packing. A carry-on-sized flight case was open on top of the disorderly jumble of blankets and sheets, inside of which were several badly-folded T-shirts and the only two button-downs he actually owned that weren’t casual. As this assignment’s dress code for public was black tie, and for the rest of the time was formal, his luggage load would be relatively low; his weapons, along with the tailored suits and shirts Ronnie had ordered for him, would arrive with the car.

  “Is this a new development,” he continued, “or did Ronnie spend the entire time I was gone gradually carving out the new chip on her shoulder?” He went on stuffing clean boxer shorts and socks into the top section of the case as neatly as he was able to. He’d learned during his first year with W.A.R.D. that these kinda jobs tended to pile up one after another, for a reason he could only assume was that something within the fabric of fate hated them. Whenever he got a week off, he made sure to launder four different sets of clothes, to ensure he always had a clean set should he have only hours between long-term out-of-town assignments.

  “I hadn’t noticed anything while you were out?” Dasilva responded from the living room, where she was no doubt still engaged in an amused staring contest with his cat.

  “Maybe she missed me,” Cabe said with humor in his voice.

  Dasilva snorted a barely-audible laugh. “Don’t flatter yourself so much. Can you blame her for being sensitive? It’s a pretty touchy subject.”

  “Yeah, but she’s an agent handler now. She’s not an intern anymore.” Cabe appeared in the doorway again, folding a teal T-shirt against his broad chest. His expression was one of rare seriousness. “She shouldn’t let herself fly off the handle like that.”

  Dasilva arched one perfectly-shaped brow at him. “Coming from you?”

  “Hey, I said shouldn’t,” Cabe pointed out. “I don’t always practice what I preach. No reason she has to go down the same path.”

  “You’re a bad influence,” said Dasilva pointedly. “You can’t criticize her for acting exactly how you would’ve done if someone mentioned something you immediately related to Boone.”

  Throughout every set of muscles in his body, Cabe felt the tendons grow taut. He became more aware of the rhythmic drumming of his heart against the cavity of his chest. But, on the outside, he remained passive, unresponsive, except for to raise both eyebrows ever so slightly.

  “No, see, that’s the difference. I’m working, right? I know I gotta stay relaxed.” Cabe rolled his eyes. “Look, we all know I’m a hypocrite, okay? Can you please not start getting at me when I gotta leave for a job in like, half an hour?”

  Dasilva exhaled, dropping her eyes back down to the cat, who was still perched upon his little throne and was now grooming his ears with his paw. “Anomaly rights is a hot-button topic for a lot of people, Cabe. You know that. I mean, I called the guy a bastard just for being open and honest with the world about what he can do. Social stigma is in all of us, even if we don’t want it to be.”

  “I don’t think she was pissed off at you.”

  “Neither do I. But she was riled up enough as it is, and for all we know, she’s received three dozen text messages about Elliot Wright from her sister and her mother this morning already. We all need to make sure we’re being careful about what we say and how we word things… in the office, as well as on the job.”

  Cabe leaned against the battered wooden frame of the doorway, still holding the folded tee in his hands. “Yeah, but not everyone in the office knows about Ronnie’s sister. Not everyone’s gonna understand where she’s coming from with all that pent-up rage.”

  “Well, obviously it’s not my place to say,” said Dasilva genuinely, “but maybe more people should know. Charlotte Moss –”

  “Chuck, man. It’s Chuck. Or she’ll kick your ass, trust me.”

  Dasilva arched one eyebrow higher than should humanly be possible, smirking in a way that said no, she was opting not to trust him on that one. “Chuck Moss,” she corrected herself, “is pretty much the textbook example of the person we exist to protect. And to protect the general public from.”

  “How much did Ronnie tell you?”

  Whilst Cabe and Dasilva trusted one another with each other’s lives, they both knew that the bond between Ronnie and Cabe as agent and handler was something that also needed to be respected. Dasilva knew better than to lie when she responded.

  “Enough. We went for drinks a few months ago and admitted a couple of home truths. Why we joined W.A.R.D., why we stayed. That sort of thing.”

  “And?”

  An awkward beat passed between the two, before Dasilva shook her head.

  “I’m... it’s no secret around the office that my priority is to protect the innocent, everyday citizens of this country, by whatever means necessary. The people who didn’t sign up for this. And... I have to be honest with you, Chuck’s record isn’t good, Cabe. Arrested seven times in the last twelve months? Vandalism, trespassing, resisting arrest, assault, felony assault with a deadly weapon...”

  “Has anyone ever explained to you the concept of a shit sandwich?”

  Dasilva’s face broke into an involuntary half-smirk and, despite the awkwardness of the conversation, Cabe relished momentarily in the fact that every now and then he could actually catch the iron-willed agent off-guard. Not many people could boast that.

  “I’m getting to my point. Learn some patience.” The Latina woman stood up from the couch and motioned with both hands, ushering her partner back into his bedroom. If she didn’t keep him on-task, he might forget to pack altogether. “I’m saying that her record isn’t going to do her any favors, so her best chance at getting people on her side might be taking a more... peaceful approach to protesting.”

  Cabe nodded as he lay his shirt on top of the stack of several in his case. “I’m definitely not going to argue that with you.”

  “That being said,” she continued, leaning in the doorway, “I don’t believe she ever really stood a chance no matter how she reacted. She was one of the first cases when she developed her abilities, it was four years ago, and the idea of a woman who was able to do things like that was... it was unhe
ard of at the time.”

  “Even nowadays, you don’t meet many teenage girls who can juggle armchairs with their brains,” Cabe mused grimly.

  “So, what was she supposed to do? If she’d consented to medical study or arrest, who knows what might’ve happened to her.”

  “It sounds science fictiony, but yeah, pretty much.”

  As conspiracy theoretical as it all might have sounded to the uneducated ear, that sort of paranoia wasn’t exactly ill-founded. For the most part, the general population was split between those who believed Anomalies deserved to be treated as normal human beings, and those who believed they should be monitored or locked up for everybody’s safety. As of now, it was still perfectly legal in every state in America for businesses to refuse service to someone they believed to be an Anomaly, for an employer to fire an employee upon discovering they were an Anomaly, and even for voting booths to turn away anyone who had been officially labelled an Anomaly. If an Anomaly was involved in a crime scene, they were almost always charged with something, even if they had only truly been an innocent bystander.

  And sadly, all the while the prejudice and discrimination made the people of the fifty States feel ‘safer’ in their beds late at night, it would always be allowed to continue.

  Dasilva folded her arms loosely across her chest, pausing for a good long while before asking, “... does Ronnie know the extent of what happened to Chuck? While she was in custody?”

  Cabe decided to use the fact that he was in the middle of zipping his case shut as an excuse not to answer for a couple of seconds. It wasn’t because he was planning to lie, because he wasn’t; it was because the question in its bluntness had genuinely thrown him off.

  “I don’t think so,” he said eventually, straightening up to look at the other agent. “If she does, she’s lying about it much better than she can usually lie about stuff. And if she doesn’t wanna talk about it that much, I’m definitely not gonna pry.”

  Dasilva nodded, her lips pressed together tightly. Cabe had never really had any real reason to fear Anomalies for what they were; yes, they were unpredictable at times, and they had caused a great number of accidents and unsafe environments in public spaces that had led to civilian casualties...

  But he hadn’t been burned like Dasilva had. Which was why even though their opinions and beliefs could vastly differ at times, he was able to empathize with and respect her point of view. He was in no position to judge her.

  “Does she have much contact with her sister at all?”

  Cabe shrugged. “Eh. Here and there. All I know about her is that she’s still doing the whole activist thing, but A.R.M. are trying to be a little less... erm, let’s go with ‘aggressive’ with their protesting.”

  “A.R.M.? That’s the one she co-founded, right?”

  “The Anomaly Rights Movement, yeah. Heh, poor Ronnie. Between her mom and her sister, she’s literally being torn in two totally opposite directions.”

  “She’s a tough cookie. You told me that, remember? Quoth the Sparrow?”

  “I guess,” he sighed. “I’m just…”

  “Worried about her?” Dasilva finished with a smirk. “I know. And so does she. She appreciates it.”

  “You think?”

  The dark-haired woman nodded. Bruce Wayne jumped in with a chipper, energetic miaow of agreement from somewhere around her feet, and the Latina agent knelt and extended a hand to scratch behind one of his ears. Cabe was grateful the little tuxedo liked her and Ronnie’s company so much, considering it was often one of the two of them who fed and kept him when Cabe was away on an extended assignment.

  “I think that whole pretending-to-be-a-loner thing might finally be causing you some irreversible brain damage,” she said, an unusual warmth to her tone as she continued to pet the cat with her hand. “I know you’ve felt like an island since what happened to Boone, but… Cabe, you’ve got a family here. You’ve got us.”

  Cabe nodded, dropping his eyes to the fake hardwood floors. “Yeah… yeah, I know that. But thanks, Gabby… it means a lot.”

  “I know that too,” his partner responded warmly. “Now make sure you’ve got everything, Pigeon: you’ve got a billionaire to babysit starting this afternoon.”

  Cabe rolled his eyes as the woman retreated from the room, leaving him to gather the last of the few items he would be taking with him. His conversation with Dasilva, as per usual with her, had set his mind on the topic of the delicate political minefield his team would have to navigate over the coming weeks. With the current state of affairs in the world – with the safety of the homeland being everyone’s top priority in preparation for the looming election next Fall – it was hard to imagine any circumstances where someone of Elliot Wright’s social status would want to admit so boldly and openly to being an Anomaly.

  He had no idea what he was about to walk headfirst into, but whatever it was, he had a feeling there wasn’t going to be anything good about it. At least, not for the poor, poor bastard who was going to have to spend the foreseeable future as a goddamn glorified au pair.

  Three

  Downtown Portland was every bit the iconic hipster’s paradise one would expect it to be. Huge, bold murals made huge, bold statements on the exterior walls of various buildings. Tile sidewalks reminiscent of ye olde cobblestones bordered the busy streets lined with trees, buskers, and the occasional bizarre art sculpture. For a good three or four minutes, his car tailed a light rail tram as it weaved its way between stations, collecting passengers from businesspeople in office attire to artful-looking bearded individuals, and everything in between. At one point, he passed a bright-pink donut shop that’s name struck a chord in him somewhere, and he couldn’t help but think someone had recommended it to him if he ever happened to visit the City of Roses.

  It sounded ridiculous, considering he lived three hours away, but when he wasn’t working, he was sleeping. He wasn’t the type who chose to travel when he didn’t have to. He’d spent his entire adult life uprooted, and he was quite happy to be settled in Seattle.

  Cabe had passed part of the three-hour drive (because he liked to avoid flying any time he was able to) reading through the case file Ronnie had given him several times, brushing up on all of the finite details. He was going to have to develop two highways of thought running simultaneously alongside each other whenever he was in Elliot Wright’s company: one which kept an eye open for anything his charge could be hiding from the world or planning behind the scenes, and one which was fully aware of how much he was supposed to know and be aware of, and could keep up the facade of being just a bodyguard.

  For the rest of the journey, he’d moved between dozing lightly with his cheek pressed against the taut seat belt, and scrolling through news feeds and various social media channels. The Washington and Oregon chapters of A.R.M. were apparently planning a rally in downtown Portland that afternoon, but all of WrightTech’s main feeds seemed to be more focused on advertising holiday deals than promoting what their C.E.O. was up to. About an hour out of Portland, Elliot Wright’s personal accounts suddenly paused posting, and his Ask Me Anything questions were starting to pile up. More people were reading the news and chiming in, and it was no doubt all just serving to inflate the bastard’s ego even more. If he was this arrogant online, Cabe had to wonder exactly how much of a diva nightmare Elliot Wright was going to be in person.

  “This is it, Agent Sparrow,” the driver (one of W.A.R.D.’s other agent handlers) said, crunching against the leather seat as he turned around to face him. “The glass one here.”

  Cabe turned his honey-blond head to peer out of the window. Immediately, he saw himself and the sleek black vehicle reflected in the side of the WrightTech building, so sharply it may as well have been a video screen.

  “I’m dropping your bags off at the back of the building. The front desk is just through there.”

  “Okay. I’m taking the 19 on me,” he advised the handler, patting the side of his suit jacket which easily concea
led the small Glock handgun against his person. “So don’t freak out if it’s missing.”

  The handler nodded and reached back for the case file, which Cabe was already passing him. It would need to be hidden away before either of them made contact with the company or Cabe’s charge. Taking a cleansing breath to reset his mind and focus fully on his assignment, the Field Agent shoved open the back door of the car and stepped out onto the street.

  WrightTech was one of those irritatingly prolific companies that could completely and deliberately neglect to put its name on the front of the building, and everybody would still know exactly who owned it by the brightly-lit, hexagonal logo hanging over the large glass doors. The centre of the logo was striped horizontally in white, and was recognizable worldwide as the symbol for the technology and software giant, which appeared uniformly on all of the hardware and electronics they sold.

  The tall, angular skyscraper sparkled blue in the low December sun, its hexagonally-framed windows stretching up like a strange, technological waterfall cascading down from the clear sky. The ground floor served as a storefront – the flagship storefront, with its infamous, clean, minimalistic atmosphere consisting of beechwood floors and polished white tables. Its Christmas decorations were conservative and tasteful, which was more than could be said for other retailers at this time of year. The tables boasted the latest in WrightTech innovation and development, some of the leading electronic products on the consumer market. Cell phones, tablets, laptops, headphones, portable speakers and music players, cameras, televisions, and a whole host of other wares sat with astronomical price tags, which various demographics of customer seemed happy to shell out for the best and most popular equipment money could buy. Even at three-thirty on a weekday, all of the purple-shirted sales attendants were currently occupied.

  Thankfully, Cabe had been instructed to use the business entrance. The high-rise building sat on a street corner in downtown commercial Portland occupying just under half a block on each side, with the larger south doors open to shoppers and the west doors serving as a much more private entrance. The car pulled away as his dress loafers clicked over the damp sidewalk, carrying him into a vast, spacious lobby that continued the clean and minimalistic WrightTech brand. The glossy floor was constructed of large black hexagons, the walls tall and white and offering high-definition screens which flipped between colorful, intricate images to show off the quality of their displays. In the far left corner was a tremendous, somewhat excessively-sized Christmas tree, adorned with black, white, and lilac baubles, and tiny warm orbs of light. Between the Christmas tree and a trio of elevator doors, a gorgeous scarlet-haired receptionist stood behind a glass desk that did nothing to hide her tight purple blouse and black pencil skirt. Next to her was a uniformed security guard a good two inches taller and two dozen pounds heavier than Cabe, wearing a tie that matched the receptionist’s shirt color almost too well.