by KT Belt
Next to the man was a three-dimensional depiction of the mall. The large, pulsating red dot, she assumed, was Artemis. As he said, there were about a half-dozen smaller green dots right next to her.
“There are at least forty other souls holding in place throughout the mall. They have not moved since the asset began her attack, but considering their position, they had no direct contact with her,” he continued.
“Can they be evacuated?” someone asked.
The man shook his head. “That has been discussed and deemed too risky. Even if we had enough TC2s for ourselves and the team performing the evacuation”—Carmen had no idea what TC2s were, but she filed it away for later—“the asset would sense immediately if anyone was removed from the mall, which could prompt an attack.
“That brings us to our next problem,” he said after a short pause. “Where the asset positioned herself is close quarters. We can’t fire in there without risk to the hostages. We have to lure her out in the open. Here,” he said, pointing. “The main foyer. Most of Crystal Palace is glass, so she will see us coming. It will have to be weight and angle of fire. I previously mentioned our Clairvoyant support,” he said, glancing at Carmen. “They will be the second line.”
They? Carmen wondered.
“Is there a dead man’s switch?” someone asked.
“Not this time. The threat to the surrounding population and property is too high. No birds this time.”
“How do we lure her into the foyer?” another person asked.
“Good question,” the man replied. “Artemis,” he said, voicing her name for the first time, “has been at the facility for almost twelve years. We have all read her psychological evaluation cover to cover more than once. This is not our first encounter. She’s belligerent, aggressive, and arrogant. …We ask her to come to the foyer.”
“Ask her?” someone muttered in disbelief.
The man nodded. “It’s quite likely she’ll take it as a direct personal challenge and will choose to confront us without harming the hostages.”
“We’ll have her right where she wants us,” Carmen heard someone say under their breath sarcastically.
The man looked slowly around the room several times but said nothing. No one else said anything, and eventually he gave a sharp nod.
“Gear up. Undoubtedly she knows we’re here and is waiting,” he said.
The group stood hesitantly but with quiet resolve. The man who had led the briefing gave several members of his team pats on the shoulder while saying words of encouragement. He walked right toward Carmen as he did. She took a step forward, all thoughts about Kali or anything else dropped.
“Edge, I’m glad you decided to help us,” he said. “I am Captain Logos.”
He wasn’t much taller than her, making him somewhat below average height for a man. She was surprised to see streaks of silver in his hair. She rarely interacted with the members of the suppression teams; the only time they had been used on her was when she attacked Janus. She certainly never talked to any of them. She had always assumed they were the youngest, fittest, most foolhardy brave men and women that could be found. He was quite fit. She didn’t know if he was foolhardy. She could sense fear, but it was controlled. She never would have guessed, however, that any of them were middle-aged. The other members of the team were also older. In his eyes, however, she could see the serious focus of experience, and it began to make sense.
All the same, she noticed something else about him. Now that he was away from the rest of the team, his fierce confidence seemed to erode. It wasn’t worry, at least not personal worry, nor was it worry for his team or even the hostages, but there was a mounting concern that she wasn’t able to place without reading him.
“What’s wrong?” she asked. She didn’t like reading someone if she didn’t have to.
His eyes grew wide as he looked at her. She couldn’t stop herself from rolling her eyes in turn. Even people who trained to fight Clairvoyants were surprised when a Clairvoyant was clairvoyant.
“There’s something you didn’t say in the briefing,” she elaborated.
Captain Logos took a deep breath. “You’re right. There is,” he began. “There are aspects about this attack that don’t fit the pattern.”
Carmen looked at him quizzically. “Pattern?”
“We’ve been training Clairvoyants for about twelve or thirteen years. When an asset runs away or kills someone, they are usually random events, like an outburst.” She nodded slowly as she thought of when she flew to the forest, as well as when she attacked Janus. “Assets have killed handlers before. It’s not uncommon. But if this attack fit the pattern, she would have left the mall. She knows we would hunt her and would have tried to escape.”
She considered it for a few seconds but could come to no definite conclusions. “So, what does that mean then?” she asked.
Logos took another deep breath. “She killed her handler in the mall. Most assets kill or attempt to kill their handlers in the facility. They even had an altercation when he was signing her out this morning, but she did nothing. After she kills her handler, she doesn’t leave and even takes hostages. If she didn’t have hostages, it is very likely we would just kill her by destroying the building.”
“I don’t know what you’re implying,” Carmen said.
“I think she planned this,” Logos explained. “As I said in the briefing, I think she wants to confront us directly. I don’t know why, but it’s the only thing that makes sense.”
She thought about it and agreed with a nod. She looked at Kali, and her handler’s features were grim.
“It’s just a guess and not really worth much. Anyway, there are two people I want you to meet,” he said, changing the subject and waving her forward.
Carmen nodded again and immediately saw who he was referring to. Both people were devastatingly ugly. Their hair was trimmed to just above their scalps, and unlike the members of the suppression team, they were wearing civilian clothes. Tattoos just peeked out from their shirt sleeves, and they had small ones on the side of their necks. It was only after a time that she realized they were women.
As they sat, quietly talking amongst themselves, they seemed completely out of place compared to the suppression team loading rifles and cross-checking equipment. These women, by contrast, looked like they were waiting for a parade. But they were both Clairvoyants. They noticed Captain Logos and Carmen approaching and stood. They dwarfed almost everyone in the room.
“Edge, this is Lt. Kennedy and Lt. Ridley of Space Force,” Logos said.
“I thought you said Space Force couldn’t be here for hours or days?” Carmen remarked to Kali.
“We were on leave here and found out about the situation,” Kennedy said. “We offered our services and the mayor accepted.”
Carmen nodded.
“I can trust her to your capable hands?” Logos asked the two Space Force officers.
Kennedy nodded respectfully.
“Kali?” Carmen muttered softly, glancing back at her handler.
“Edge, this is out of my realm. Stay safe. I’ll see you after,” she replied.
Carmen said nothing but swallowed hard when she looked at the two women. They eyed her up and down several times. She didn’t like their collective gaze. It made her feel like a piece of meat.
“The equipment you requested is in the next room. You can change in there,” Logos said.
“Thank you, Captain,” Ridley said back.
The three women then walked into the adjoining room. Carmen gave her handler one last look before the door closed. Kali returned her apprehension with a calm, determined nod. Kennedy and Ridley nonchalantly walked to the center of the room where a table had clothes piled on it. Carmen could only lean against the door. What am I doing? she wondered dismally.
“You’re a mousy little thing,” Ridley said, noticing Carmen. The woman already had her shirt off. “They told us you were formidable.”
Kennedy laughed ligh
tly. Carmen said nothing and walked toward the table as they continued to undress.
“What is this?” she asked as she picked up one of the sets of clothing.
It was a bodysuit dark blue in color. It had nothing to cover the head, but it did encase the hands and feet. As she held the suit in her hands, she noted it was a little heavy.
“Body armor for Clairvoyants. Heat resistant mostly, with some bullet resistance. We can’t be hurt by lasers; our bioelectric field makes them bend right around us,” Kennedy said.
“I’ve never been shot by a laser,” Carmen remarked softly.
“And I’ve never been prom queen. Hurry the fuck up,” Ridley snapped.
Carmen pursed her lips but gave no reply. She turned her back to them and began undressing. She could feel them watching her. She didn’t long for the attention.
“Hey, San, remember that girl they asked us to put down on that cruise liner a while back?” Ridley asked.
Kennedy laughed again. “Yeah, the whole place was covered in shit and entrails. Half the trooper squad behind us threw up. When it was all over, she was lying there, dying, crying for her mother. Dumb bitch…. That was the first person she took out! All that over a fucking cookie.”
“They should make normies take classes,” Ridley said. “If your brat is a Clairvoyant, give them whatever they want. It’s like that punk….”
Carmen no longer listened to them. She closed her eyes and took a deep breath as she slowly put on the body armor. Why am I doing this? she wondered again. To her considerable surprise, the suit fit her perfectly, almost as if it was made for her. Its weight went unnoticed after only a few seconds. She rolled her shoulders a couple times and did a quick low kick. The suit didn’t restrict her movement whatsoever. Air was more encumbering.
“Shit, it’s too small,” Kennedy groaned loudly.
Ridley walked over to her and made a show of trying to force the suit on.
“Ow, that hurt, bitch,” Kennedy said after playfully slapping her counterpart in the face.
“Told you you ate too much cake,” Ridley said back. “Forget it. I’m surprised they were even able to find these suits.”
“Easy for you to say,” Kennedy muttered as she hastily put back on her civilian clothes.
Ridley ignored her and walked closer to Carmen. “I can burn your hair off, if you’d like. Don’t want hair like that in a fight.”
Carmen looked at the two of them watching her intently and then looked at her hair. “I’ll keep my hair,” she said softly but firmly.
Ridley shrugged the comment away and walked back to Kennedy, who was finished dressing. They held each other by the shoulders and looked each other intensely in the eye.
“You ready for the fight?”
“You know it!”
“You ready to get nasty?”
“Absolutely!”
Then they roared loudly before ending the ritual by smacking each other hard in the face. Neither flinched. Ridley then walked toward Carmen with her hands held wide, presumably to do the same with her. Carmen’s eyes narrowed slightly before she raised her chin and walked to the door.
“Priss,” Ridley muttered, easily loud enough for Carmen to hear. The one-percenter ignored her.
Carmen was first into the next room. The suppression team was waiting for her. Their battle dress was a little more elaborate than hers, but it was nothing she hadn’t seen before. She saw no foam cannons this time. Every member of the team was armed with rifles. She also didn’t see Kali.
“Everyone move out,” Captain Logos commanded when all three Clairvoyants were ready.
The suppression team broke out in a slow run. They were out of the makeshift command post in seconds. She was right behind them, and Kennedy and Ridley were right behind her.
“Oh, I see them now,” she heard a newscaster say. “It’s the suppression team from the local training center. They are joined by two Clairvoyant officers from Space Force who were luckily on leave in the area. There is another Clairvoyant with them. We don’t know who she is; we will check our sources.”
“Eyes front, Priss. Pay attention,” Ridley said.
Carmen did as she was told, though not without rolling her eyes. That wasn’t the only newscaster, though. They ran by a gaggle of them before they could even see the police barricade. News aerocars floated in the sky. Curious civilians were everywhere she could see, but when they saw the team, their reaction was not what she expected. They actually cheered, and the roar of the crowd drowned out all else. Carmen could feel it in the pit of her stomach. She didn’t know about anyone else, but the insanity of the moment struck her with all the intensity of a bolt of lightning. For the first time ever in her young life, people were actually happy to see her. Not only that, but they also cheered her on like she was their savior.
She thought back to her time in the Space Force recruitment office, to now, and to every other period in her life. If she was well and truly a monster, and there were many times she was quite certain she was, the only difference she could see between being cheered for today and reviled every other day was that here, now, she wasn’t just a monster. She was their monster. Carmen remembered what Janus said. She was a monster meant to give other monsters pause. She didn’t know what he meant then and wasn’t completely sure now, but she finally had to admit that perhaps her time at the facility had more purpose than she ever before realized.
The cheers were near deafening at this point, and as she heard them, the idea of joining Space Force or whoever seemed more and more appealing. She dug her fingernails into her palm and tried to ignore the praise.
“I won’t forget,” she whispered softly to herself.
The team was at the barricade now. The police made way, and the team entered the parking lot of the mall. Logos dramatically slowed. Then he gave a hand signal that made the team spread out with the selfless unity of a school of fish.
“TC2s switch on,” he said.
One by one, she could no longer sense the suppression team. She was looking right at them, but they may as well not even be there. She no longer wondered what TC2s were.
She could still hear the crowd at her back as the team bunched up at the glass doors of Crystal Palace. They moved past the obstruction quickly and entered the mall proper. Other than some soft background music that the mall always played, but which she never noticed till now, there was silence.
Carmen had never been in an empty mall before. Her footsteps, and the rest of the team’s, echoed throughout the establishment. She could sense people, but they were nowhere to be seen. Food still left in ovens and on grills smoked and smelled terrible. Clothes that patrons had been sampling before the incident were left on the ground. There were shoes left here and there that had fallen off in the mad rush to escape. Indeed, there were some spots of blood from unfortunate individuals who had gotten trampled. So silent was the din that the sound of water from the fountain far below could be heard even on this level.
She looked at the level where Artemis was supposed to be. She could sense the wayward Clairvoyant, but there was nothing to be seen.
Captain Logos gave several hand signals, and the suppression team broke into multiple smaller units. They quickly but quietly ran to strategic positions on their current level and several above. Logos and Carmen watched their progress, though she did so more out of curiosity than anything. Kennedy and Ridley paid the team no mind. The Space Force officers casually scanned back and forth, periodically pausing for a time. Carmen knew they were looking at the hiding spots of the mall patrons who were unable to get away. None of them could be seen. Their fear, however, hung in the air, almost thick enough to walk on. Carmen was unable to ignore it, despite her best efforts.
Eventually, the pitter patter of the members of the suppression team moving into position stopped. Logos didn’t give away their positions by looking at them; he simply took a deep breath and gripped his rifle more firmly. Then he looked at Kennedy and Ridley.
/> “Priss,” Ridley started. Carmen hated her new name but came to attention nonetheless. “Pick a spot out of sight. We’ll take her first. Then you attack when she’s off guard.”
Carmen nodded and then began running. A holoprojector store caught her eye, and she made a beeline for it. It was as much a fortress as it was a starship, but the entire front of the store was glass, giving her an unimpeded view of the foyer. She ducked down behind a store display to put herself out of view and waited.
Once again, other than the soft music of the mall and her own quickening breath, there was silence. Logos quietly discussed something with the two Clairvoyants before they moved off, but she paid them no attention. Something else caught her eye.
“I know this,” she said softly to herself.
The holoprojectors were silently demoing several movies. She didn’t know them—she was never shown any at the facility—but this one was different. It was old. There is a ball at the castle. The prince grabs a servant girl’s hand seemingly by mistake. Both the prince and girl are surprised, but they start dancing anyway.
“I know this,” she said again.
She knew it another lifetime ago. She could barely remember it—she didn’t remember it—but it was still part of her all the same. As she watched, she began to move in time with the dance. She didn’t miss a step.
“Artemis,” Captain Logos called loudly, breaking Carmen of her reverie. He stood valiantly in the center of the foyer, all alone. “Artemis,” he called again.
At the sound of his voice, there was a soft whimper from the back of the store. Carmen walked toward it with an eyebrow raised. She sensed someone was close but didn’t think to look till now. She searched with her eyes and Clairvoyant senses, and both came to rest on the cashier’s counter. Two young women about her age shrieked when she peeked over it.
“I won’t hurt you,” she said softly. The girls looked oddly familiar, but she couldn’t place them. “Is anyone else here?” she asked. She didn’t sense anyone, but it didn’t hurt to be absolutely sure.
