by Tim Lebbon
“You didn't fall in,” she said.
“No. Well, not quite. Almost.” Above him his birds were sitting on branches and circling higher above the trees. They seemed calm, watchful.
“But…” She did not know what to say, nor how to explain.
“You okay?” he asked. “I mean, you hit the ground hard.”
“Yeah, I'm fine. I think.”
“Sure? Feeling exhausted, maybe.”
“No,” she said, shaking her head, shrugging off his hands, standing. She actually felt better than fine. She felt energised. “I think I did something,” she said.
“We should keep moving.” Rook stood protectively close. “I don't like it here.”
Of course not, you died down there, Lucy-Anne thought. She started laughing, and Rook looked at her quizzically.
“Huh?”
Lucy-Anne shook her head, and the laughter faded as quickly as it had come.
“You're sure you're okay?” he asked again.
Lucy-Anne pinched herself, hard, but so that Rook could not see. “Yeah. I'm good. So which way?”
Jack stood close by Reaper, ready for the interrogation to take place. He wanted to see and hear everything, he wanted to be close to his father, and most of all he wanted to make sure that no one else died.
The surviving Choppers were being kept corralled inside a ruined clothing store, guarded by Shade and a couple of other Superiors, including the blind knife-thrower Jack had seen in action before. They looked nervous but defiant, and Jack wondered whether they were resigned to death. There must have been so much conflict and death in London since Doomsday. He had only been here for a matter of days and he had seen plenty already…but there was also the painful idea that he was responsible for much of it.
He hated the thought, but could not shake it. Fleeter had killed those Choppers to protect him. And these scenes now had been initiated by him. He looked at the Choppers huddled in the smashed storefront and tried to convey a sense of calm, but those who looked at him saw nothing of the sort. Fires still burned amongst the crashed motorbikes, and death hung heavy across the street.
“Scryer,” Reaper said. “She's all yours.” Puppeteer was standing close by, one hand raised slightly, and a female Chopper hung suspended with her feet a metre above the road surface. Her helmet had been ripped off, her blue uniform torn by the impact from when her motorbike had crashed into a pile of café tables and chairs, and an ugly gravel burn covered her left cheek and jawline. Her fear was obvious, but so were her efforts to hide it. Jack thought she couldn't have been much older than him.
Scryer stepped forward, glancing at Jack and smirking. But he could also sense her uncertainty. They had surely tried this before, and no Chopper had yet revealed the location of Camp H.
“What's your name?” Scryer asked.
“Kerri.”
“Where do you come from, Kerri?”
“Ottery, in Devon.”
“How many Irregulars have you killed since Doomsday?”
The woman frowned, lips pressed tight as she tried to fight the urges to speak and tell the truth. She released her breath with a heavy sigh, and then said, “Two. A man and a…a girl…” She looked away from Scryer, across to Breezer and the other three Irregulars waiting by the café. “I didn't mean…” she said.
“Where is Camp H?” Scryer asked. Her tone had not changed at all—calm, mildly inquisitive, almost friendly—but the atmosphere thickened as soon as she asked the question. Behind him, Jack heard Jenna whisper something to Sparky, so quiet that he could not make it out. Reaper shifted position slightly, taking a half step forward.
“I don't know,” Kerri said.
“You do know,” Scryer said. “And all you have to do is say.”
“Puppeteer,” Reaper said.
Kerri twitched in the air and screamed as both arms were tugged above her head. Jack heard a sickening stretching sound, and the rip of what he hoped was clothing. He grabbed his father's arm and squeezed.
Reaper looked down at his hand as he might a smear of bird shit across his coat. But Jack did not let go.
“No more killing,” Jack said. “No more torture. Haven't you tried all this before?”
“Do you think you can tell me—” Reaper began, but Jack delved down, grasped a star, and cut him off with a thought.
I used to love you. It was a silent shout, screamed from his mind into Reaper's. His father's eyes went wide, and for a moment Jack saw the man he used to know. It almost broke his heart.
“Do that again,” Reaper said, shaking Jack's hand from his arm. “Just do.” The threat was obvious, his voice heavy with potential. One little whisper, Jack knew, and his father could smash him to atoms.
“Breezer,” Jack said. “Who did you bring?”
“This is Rika.” Breezer touched a woman on the shoulder and muttered something to her. She nodded and then walked across to them, nervous and birdlike in her movements. When she looked at Jack, he had the feeling that she was seeing deep inside him, and she glanced away as if unsettled at what she saw.
“Jack,” Jenna said. He turned to his friends, smiled.
“I know,” he said.
“Next time they'll send everything.” She nodded up at the sky and he looked, already knowing that he'd see the drone again. He stared at it for a while and wondered whose eyes he was looking into at the other end of its reach. Miller's, perhaps. He cruised through the star-scape of his potential, but found nothing that might let him view through the drone's systems. He found that comforting. Having limits made him feel human.
Jack glanced at his father, the Superiors, and the other Irregulars, and knew that he need not mention the urgency here. The air thrummed with it.
The small woman, Rika, reached Scryer and the Chopper woman suspended above the road.
“You'd really like to hold my hand,” Scryer said.
“Yes, I would,” Rika replied. She held her breath, froze. “Don't do that to me. Don't you dare use your talent on me. You carry secrets as much as anyone, and some you wouldn't want revealed.” Her voice did not change at all, but the power of her words swung the balance of control. Scryer's smile remained, but it went from natural to pained. Whatever secrets she harboured, she did not wish them shared.
“Her, then,” Scryer said, nodding at the Chopper, Kerri.
“Yes,” the Irregular woman said. She and Scryer held hands.
“Ask,” Rika said.
“Where is Camp H?” Scryer asked.
The Chopper woman shook her head. She was frowning, struggling against Puppeteer's unnatural hold, sweat speckling her face even though there was a cooling breeze. “I…I don't…”
“You know,” Rika growled.
Jack gasped. Her voice had dropped and become much louder, deeper, and beside him he saw Sparky glance at Reaper. But it had not been him. Reaper was smiling with delight, and then Kerri began a long, low whine.
“Don't hurt her,” Jenna whispered. But Jack knew that this was now in the hands of Rika and Scryer.
“Keep asking,” Rika said, “and I'll go deep.”
“Where is Camp H?” Scryer asked again, and again. The Chopper woman shook her head. Rika growled. Some of the observers shifted uncomfortably, and when one of the Choppers shouted in protest, Shade knocked him to the floor.
Kerri's whine did not change, but after a couple of minutes Rika released Scryer's hand and walked back to Breezer, head bowed, her thin form barely casting a shadow.
Puppeteer let Kerri drop. She hit the road and sprawled, and Jenna went to her, kneeling by her side and checking to see how she was. Jack grinned at his friend and her caring nature, and he was proud that she had shown the others how human she was. The woman might be a Chopper, but she was a person as well.
“Well?” Reaper asked, his voice deep. Shattered glass clinked across the pavement, and along the street the flames from the burning motorbikes wafted in the breeze.
Rika whispered to Breez
er, and he nodded grimly.
“Breezer,” Jack said. “We're all in this together.” Breezer glanced from Jack to Reaper, then up at the drone silently circling high up.
“We know,” Breezer said. “Camp H isn't really a camp at all. It's located in the centre of a container park.”
“A what?” Jack asked.
“Transport containers,” Sparky said. “The big metal ones they use to ship stuff overseas. I've seen them stacked five high in yards the size of football fields.”
“Bigger,” Breezer said.
“They're hidden deep,” Rika said. “Confusing even for me to see.”
“And you know where it is?” Reaper asked.
“Yes,” Breezer said.
Reaper tilted his head and raised an eyebrow. Everyone in the ruined street—Jack and his friends, Irregulars, Superiors, even those Choppers fearing what the immediate future might bring—watched Breezer expectantly.
This is when all the victims of Doomsday form an alliance or go to war, Jack thought, and the others knew that too.
“It's in the Docklands,” Breezer said. “A big distribution centre.”
Reaper did not smile, but Jack saw a slight relaxing of his shoulders.
“We have to be quick,” Jack said. “Element of surprise.”
Silence fell over the street. It was a strange silence, one loaded with promise, and Jack felt himself circling the bright points of his talents, both those already known and those he had yet to touch. He felt one step removed from everything.
Reaper gestured across to where Shade was guarding the Choppers. “Get rid of them.”
“No!” Jack shouted. From the corner of his eye he saw Breezer and the other Irregulars tense, but none of them came forward. They had nothing with which to stand up to Reaper. “No!” Jack cried again, louder and more determined.
Reaper turned away, not even looking at him.
Not long, not long, I don't have long…
Jack closed his eyes, felt through his inner universe, and let a star explode.
In the clothes store where seven Choppers were about to meet their end, a bright light bloomed. It grew and grew, and Shade stood out silhouetted against the light, his arm thrown up and hands pressed against his eyes. The light seemed to bleed through him as if he was not entirely there, and when it began to fade, he slumped to his knees and leaned slowly forward until his forehead touched the ground. Shade had been illuminated.
Reaper turned and started back towards Jack, thunder in his eyes.
“Oh, for fuck's sake!” Jenna shouted. She stood beside the fallen Chopper and held up her hands, palms out, in pure despair. “Are you all so stupid? This isn't a ‘who's got the biggest dick’ contest, is it? Jack said it to Breezer—we're all in this together. We've come together and found out something that no one has been able to find out before. Not even you!” She pointed at Reaper then turned her back on him, dismissive. “And the best way to move on from that is…what? More murder? More killing?”
“Stay out of this,” Puppeteer said, and he raised one hand. Jack tensed, ready to do something, anything, to prevent him from hurting Jenna. But right then he could find nothing. Countless stars were around him, but he floated in the deep spaces in between.
“Oh, grow up,” Jenna said.
“That's my girl!” Sparky laughed out loud. “That's my Jenna!”
“Seriously,” Jenna said. She looked down at the woman at her feet, then walked across towards the clothing shop. The Choppers there were gathered against one wall, drawn back from where Shade knelt slumped down on the floor. He had yet to look up, but already he was looking less there to Jack. Fading back to the shadows.
“Can't we lock them away somewhere?” Jenna asked. “Or, like…freeze them, or something?”
Reaper stood on his own in the middle of the street, expressionless, motionless. Jack knew that he could probably kill every surviving Chopper with one shout. But there was something going on behind his eyes that Jack recognised.
His father was thinking.
“Breezer?” Reaper asked after another few seconds.
Breezer shook his head, shrugged.
“I can do this,” Jack said. “Sparky, Jenna, give me a hand. If everyone else can just make sure they don't try anything?”
He and Sparky approached Jenna and the shop, and as they drew close Jack grinned at his friend. She raised an eyebrow and propped a hand on one hip.
“So what are you going to do, Superman?” she asked quietly.
“Just watch.”
Ten minutes later they had split into three groups again, after arranging where to meet to execute their assault on Camp H. It had to be quick. It had to be soon. And Jack knew that his mother and sister's lives depended upon whatever plan they all came up with being a success.
“That was pretty cool,” Sparky said.
“What, locking them in the basement?” Jack and his friends had ushered the Choppers down into the shop's basement, and Jack had melted the hinges and lock mechanisms of the two sets of doors between them and the staircase. They'd break their way out, given time. But Jack's final words to them, telling them that if they did break down the door there would be something waiting for them in the darkness, probably doubled the amount of time they'd stay down there.
They might be Choppers, but they were also people. They valued their lives as much as anyone.
“Huh?” Sparky said. “Oh, that. The doors. Nah, that wasn't cool, that was just heat. I mean you!” He leaned into Jenna and slung a hand around her shoulders, and she giggled like a schoolgirl.
“I've got to admit, you're right,” Jenna said. “I was pretty cool.”
They moved quickly, descending from the streets and travelling between Underground stations. Twenty minutes later they were a mile from Covent Garden, and they had an hour to wait until their rendezvous with Breezer and Reaper.
They sat on the old station platform, darkness around them made deeper by the flashlights they'd lifted from a station office. None of them felt like eating, and Jack could not shake the notion that they were wasting time. But they could not risk another confrontation with a larger, heavier-armed troop of Choppers.
Time ticked by, the darkness loomed, and they chatted about lighter, happier times.
“One thing,” Jack said to Reaper when they met again that afternoon. “Why did you let Miller live?”
Fleeter accompanied Reaper, and Sparky and Jenna were with Jack, as always. Other small groups of Superiors and Irregulars were moving towards their rendezvous point three miles to the east, from where their assault on the container park would commence. They hoped to leave it to the very last moment before giving away their presence.
Jack had reluctantly admitted that it was Reaper's people who should lead the assault. They were the ones with the most disruptive, destructive powers, and there was no telling how long it would take to find the relevant containers.
“I told you before, he interests me.” Reaper and Jack were in the lead, but it could not be said that they walked together. Even if they were shoulder to shoulder, Reaper's dismissive aura would have meant he walked alone.
“It seems like a strange sort of mercy to me,” Jack said.
“It's not mercy. I have none for Choppers, and less so for the monster who leads them.”
“They why? You had him kneeling before you, defenceless. Yet you let him live, and allowed him to pursue me and my friends.”
“I knew he'd never catch you,” Reaper said.
“What?”
Reaper glanced over at Jack, and a ghost of something passed from his face, leaving only his brutal expression behind. What the hell was that? Jack thought. It sounded for a moment like he cared.
“Miller is a man obsessed,” Reaper said. “London is his playground, and Irregulars are his test subjects. You know all that. He yearns to get his hands on Superiors, too. See how different we are.” Reaper tapped his head.
“He's never caught
one of yours?”
“Some. They haven't been seen since.”
“Probably dead, then,” Jack said coldly.
Reaper shrugged as if unconcerned. “As to why I left him alive? London is much more my playground than his. And he is one of my toys. Get rid of Miller, and things around here won't be as…exciting.”
“You mean that,” Jack said. “You really mean it.” Reaper walked on ahead and Fleeter followed, walking close to the tall man in black. She touched his arm, slid her hand down, and for the briefest moment they entwined fingers. Then Reaper shook her off, and Fleeter hung back to let him walk ahead.
Jack looked away. That was his father, with another woman. A deep sadness engulfed him, for his mother and Emily, and also because he was not surprised. Reaper projected himself as a heartless, superior man, but he drank whiskey like water, and now it appeared he and Fleeter might be an item. The more Jack saw brief flashes of his father in Reaper's expression and demeanour, the greater the distance seemed between them.
“What about this time?” Jack asked. “Will you kill him now?”
“That's down to Miller,” Reaper said without turning around. “It always is.”
They walked on, following the course of the Thames. Fleeter flipped now and then to scout their way ahead, and once she told them to change direction and divert around the charred remains of a school. She did not say why, and Jack and his friends did not ask.
Sparky and Jenna walked close to Jack, hand in hand. Their togetherness pleased him, but also made him feel more alone. Jenna could smile and Sparky could give him the finger, but they all knew that things could never be the same again.
Close to East India Dock Road, Reaper called a halt. They entered a hotel through its smashed front door and waited in the reception area while Fleeter did her thing. For several minutes Reaper sat separate from Jack and his two best friends, barely acknowledging their presence. Sparky perused the hotel's guest book, and even when he became quietly excited when he found a rock star's name, Reaper did not react.
Jack sat back in a comfortable chair and closed his eyes. His father was as much an enigma to him now as he was when he'd first clapped eyes on Reaper. Perhaps somewhere deep down he was helping because of Emily and his wife. But perhaps not. If he was not prepared to open up and reveal which, then Jack would have to step away. He'd done all he could to get his father back.
