by Angel Lawson
“We’ve got him. On tape. Now leave!”
She flicks her wrist and the cuff splits into sections, uncoiling into a long rope of flexible steel. Atticus made them in his workshop under the gym, along with her entire suit that is made out of some kind of nerd-science indestructible fiber. Or so he says.
Astrid flings the rope like a whip, intending to wrap it around his ankles. Tink leaps at her and it only catches his one foot. He’s on her like a wild animal, knocking her to the ground. Testosterone, adrenaline, and Pixie Dust rage fuel his every move.
The landing is painful—a dozen times more than a normal human—and Astrid knows she’s in over her head. The padding in the suit didn’t work—not the way Atticus planned. But she also knows no one is going to save her ass so she needs to get it together. Tink fights to overpower her, yanking the cable from her hands. She works to free her other arm—use the other cuff that’s filled with containment gel, but he’s not stupid and he’s way stronger than he looks. Probably the paranoia and adrenaline mix.
Astrid struggles to get away but he grabs her by her boots, dragging her toward the alley between two pitch-dark houses. “I’m sending your fingers back to the gym one by one. Then the cuffs, and maybe your eyes.”
He’s got his blade out again, hovering it inches over her face. She can see everything about it. The brand. The nicks on the edges. The dried blood on the hilt. His breath is foul. His voice too loud. Atticus screams in the com, only making it worse.
If she could only get her cuff, she’d be fine. She wiggles and struggles and moves against the weight of his body until she hears a roll of thunder followed by footsteps—loud and heavy on the pavement. The heartbeat coming with it is barely distressed. The breathing is even, despite the pace. She fights against Tink and the blade, tilting her head backwards when she sees the man race around the corner.
Jesus, this is not what she needs right now.
Tink looks up at the man and snarls. He stops when the guy holds out his hands, palms forward and a wave of something…energy…power…force? Whatever the hell it is causes Tink to roll over her and the jolt knocks him three feet away. The hair on her arms prickles and raises. She panics and focuses on getting to the cuff, hitting the trigger. A stream of blue liquid shoots out, dousing Tink. Within seconds his body is surrounded with blue, stiffening goo.
“It worked!”
“What the hell…” she hears the man behind her say, and she spins, shocked to find him so close. She moves to punch him but he blocks her move.
“I had him,” she says to the guy, pissed that he interfered.
“Didn’t look that way to me,” he spits back. “You were on your back.”
He reaches for her cuffs but she jerks away. “What the heck are those things?”
What is she doing? Who is this guy and why is she still here. She glances back and sees that Tink is still incapacitated and moves to get around the man.
He stops her, and in a move fast as lightning, grips her hands in his.
“How…” she whispers, there’s a buzz between them—coming from him.
“Astrid?”
Astrid doesn’t fight. She’s frozen, just as much as Tink. Not because of the man’s strength. Not because he showed up at all—and she has no idea who the hell he is. No, Astrid stares at the man’s face and then at her hand, wrapped tight in his own, and feels nothing.
Nothing.
Not an echo. Not a sound. Not a feeling.
He touches the bruised spot near her eye, his fingers soft but rolling with that same electricity. She jumps to her feet and grabs him by the arm, skin to skin, and asks, “Who the hell are you?”
Chapter Three
Astrid
“Thanks for the call,” Agent Jensen says, following Astrid across the weight room. He’d given her a ride home after the police came to pick up Tink. “We had nothing on these dealers. No leads, no suspects. You saved a lot of potential victims.”
Astrid nods at the man old enough to be her father. “Maybe you should tell Atticus that. He’s a little pissed at the risks I took.”
Atticus and Jensen went to the FBI Academy together. They worked in a special profiling unit looking for people to train for specific departments. They needed fighters, good ones, and when Atticus stepped in as Astrid’s mentor and guardian, he opened the gym to help find the kind of agent the program needed.
“Look, Astrid.” Jensen’s dark hair had wisps of gray now. He’d known her since she was a little kid. Back in the “hood” days, or so they called it. Back when Astrid wore a hat twenty-four hours a day and didn’t know how to handle the overwhelming sensations of the world around her. “He’s just worried about letting you get out there. It’s dangerous.”
“I’ve been training for almost ten years, Jensen. He can’t keep me locked inside forever.” She pushes the door that leads from the gymnasium to the back offices.
“No,” he agrees. “Just give him a break. He’s not used to you being an adult.”
“I’m twenty-four. He’s had six years to get used to it.”
Jensen sighs. She’s not sure if it’s at her or at Atticus. Probably both.
“Anyway, thank you. Hopefully Tink can lead us to the rest of his crew.”
Astrid wrinkles her nose. “You mean the Lost Boys?”
He stops. “Is that what they call themselves?”
“Probably. I’d keep an eye out for a Captain Hook, too.”
She doesn’t tell him what she saw in Tink’s head, the sheer size of their drug operation. It’s going to take a huge number of agents to take them down. People will get killed and she needed to figure out how to keep that from happening. She enters Atticus’ office without knocking.
Her mentor doesn’t look up when they walk in. Atticus is not what someone would expect behind a program like the Elites. He’s a brain—a nerd—not a fighter. He’s slight. Well-dressed. He comes from a background of money and academia. He’s not ex-military like many of the trainers that work in the gym. He’s a scientist that carefully analyzed the type of field agent the FBI was lacking and created a program to solve the gaps.
But that’s just on the outside, in this upper office, where things look legit and he receives government funding and visits by people like Jensen. Downstairs is where the real action takes place.
“Any new talent come in this week?” Jensen asks, sitting in the worn leather chair across from Atticus’ desk. The agent smiles at Astrid. “Not that we need anyone else with you out there.”
Jensen knows about the work Atticus does. Mostly. He’s aware that Astrid is a strong physical threat and that Atticus has armed her with the most sophisticated and newest gear, like Astrid’s cuffs. What he doesn’t know is about the home Astrid lived in as a child, what the doctors did to her, how she was already different and how they made her deadly.
No one knows that but the two of them.
Chapter Four
Before
Astrid had been at the home for three weeks and slowly coming out of her funk when she woke to the sound of a soft huff followed by a whinny.
A whinny.
She froze in her bed, hat tugged close over her ears, hoping that if she kept her eyes closed, whatever monster had entered the room wouldn’t notice her.
Strangely, the monster smelled of vanilla frosting and sugar.
The clomp of tiny hooves forced her to decide it was a dream and she slowly opened her eyes. She saw Demetria first, sitting in the narrow space between their twin beds. The girl was her opposite. Brown verses pale skin. Curly hair to Astrid’s stick straight. Her eyes were dark and lively—not a trace of fear--and Astrid’s heart lunged to her throat when she saw the figures on the floor. Unicorns, tiny ones prancing and moving about. Real unicorns—exactly like Demetria’s beloved dolls with shiny, rainbow-colored manes and symbols etched on their hindquarters. Her roommate spoke to them in a hushed voice while using her fingers to lure them into tricks.
Astri
d watched, fascinated--no, terrified--for hours as the girl played with the toys. Eventually her eyes grew heavy, as did Demetria’s, and the girl petted each one on the head before waving her hand in the air, creating a shimmer. The horses froze, losing their spark of life and returning to the dolls they’d been before.
When she woke the next day there was nothing different about Demetria or the dolls that lined the shelf over her bed, but Astrid knew better. She understood that she may not be the only one.
From that day on, Astrid kept an eye on the others in the home. The children. Rosalie. The doctors. Everyone seemed normal yet… no one made comments about Astrid’s hat or her gloves or the fact she went out of her way to not make any sort of physical contact. Just like she didn’t say anything about the one boy that lit match after match into the fire pit in the backyard. Or the kid who met with the doctors and came back different; taller. Stronger. He could help Rosalie move pieces of furniture. He stopped two others from a fist fight, taking a punch like a soft wind. It made Astrid wonder what was in his shot.
Her shot made her skin tingle. Much more than normal. It made her wear two hats on her head and gloves even at dinner.
“What is it?” she asked one day as she stared at the sharp needle. The doctors’ office was the only place she traveled. School was at home. Groceries were delivered. No visitors came or went.
A man picked Astrid up twice a week in a black SUV and drove her to and from the square brown building with no windows.
The stainless steel needle gleamed in the fluorescent lights. This doctor was a woman. She had blonde hair and behind her glasses her eyes looked nice. “It’s a test.”
“What kind of test? Am I sick?”
“No, not at all.” She swiped the cotton over the inside dip of Astrid’s elbow. “Actually, do you remember the last time you were sick?”
Astrid tried but nothing came. That was common since the accident. No memory—not about the little things. No matter how hard she tried, she couldn’t conjure up memories of chicken soup or thermometers or even her mother taking care of her.
“I don’t remember.”
“Maybe you didn’t get sick?” the woman’s voice was calm as she pushed the needle into Astrid’s pale arm. The pain was searing, her skin already on fire from being exposed to the room and the doctor’s gloved hands. She smiled sympathetically and withdrew quickly, slapping a Band-Aid over her skin. The area instantly itched.
“Maybe not.”
She vaguely recalled a flu outbreak at her elementary school. Paul Deaver puked all over his library book. Every kid that sat within radius got it the next few days. Everyone but Astrid.
“If it’s not a test for being sick, then what is it?”
The doctor smiled again, this time with no teeth. A flash of something dark crossed her eyes. “We’re trying to find out what makes you special, Astrid Petta.”
That was exactly what Astrid was afraid of.
*
The Elite Training Center is a gym. And, more than a gym.
It’s Astrid and Atticus’ home. It’s also where they work. They practice and invent. Most of all, they wait.
“No more wigs,” she says, tossing the mass of black hair at her mentor now that Jensen had left. They’ve moved to Atticus’ real office, the one three floors down and behind a door of solid steel. The area is more than an office, though. It’s a workshop filled with high-end tech Atticus uses to build the gear Astrid has started using on the streets. Atticus jokingly calls it his lair.
He read wayyyy too many comic books as a kid.
“I agree. Henry recognized you right away. If you’re going to keep going out there, I’ll have to come up with something better.”
She’d kept the panic down after the guy that saved her ass ran off, and she had Atticus call Jensen. Since she’d used the bonding agent, the police couldn’t be the first on the scene. Someone had to explain away the material and it sure as hell wasn’t going to be her. Honestly, as far as the police or any public records are concerned, she’s nothing more than a ghost. She doesn’t exist. She hasn’t since July 18th, 2005.
The day the group home exploded into a million, shattered pieces.
“What happened out there?” Atticus asks. He steps around the worktable and reaches for the disguised camera. It fried during the electrical wave the guy shot over her to take out Tink. He shakes his head, drops it to the desk and moves to inspect her cuffs. “One minute you were fighting and the next…zap! The camera and com were down.”
“A guy interfered with the takedown.”
“A guy?” His gray eyes snap to hers. Suddenly he’s worried.
“Yeah, I mean, he must have had a Taser or something? There was a jolt of electricity. Not at me but on Tink and he just…crumbled.”
“What happened to the guy? What did he look like?”
“Too dark. I didn’t see him.” That sounds farfetched. Asrid’s eyesight is superior. Literally superior to other humans. She adds quickly, “He had on a hoodie and things were moving really fast.”
“And he didn’t say anything?”
“Not a word.” But he’d seemed familiar. Felt familiar.
“Maybe just a good Samaritan that got in a good hit.”
Telling Atticus what happened out there—what really happened--was on the tip of her tongue. The whole thing. How he stopped Tink—with electricity so intense it knocked the drug dealer off his feet and short-circuited her systems.
But she didn’t.
Why? Astrid couldn’t answer that question. Or, rather, wouldn’t. She didn’t have many secrets from Atticus but there was something about this one that made her hold it close. It scared and thrilled her. If he knew there was someone out there immune to her abilities, it’s likely he’d never let her out again.
She slips the cuffs off her wrists and hands them over for him to inspect closer. He takes them and studies her closely. “Are you okay?”
“I’m just tired,” she says, stepping behind the curtain to change. She removes the specially made outfit and tugs on an Elite Training tank and then sweatshirt and leggings. Pulling the hood over her head she sighs, feeling stabilized. The mirror reflects Astrid, the woman, the fighter, and gym manager. White-blonde hair. Bright blue eyes. Her body is fit and muscular, honed into a dominant machine.
There’s another woman inside of her. The one that wears the suit—the costume. Astrid picks it up and knows it reflects someone else. Atticus calls that person Echo—for the empathic memories she can sense. She turns and lifts her shirt, checking her backside in the mirror. No bruising—if there had been any, she’d healed already—but she did feel a slight ache from the landing. “The cuffs worked great, until he had me pinned down. That’s when things got touch-and-go.” She opens the curtain and tosses Atticus the suit. He catches it awkwardly. “There needs to be more padding in the butt.”
He holds the leather up and studies the butt area. “Really?”
“Yes, really.”
He looks at her over his glasses. “Anything else?”
She shakes her head and approaches the desk Atticus reluctantly agreed to let her shove in the corner. She reaches in the top drawer for a bag of chips, ripping the top and smelling the salty deliciousness inside. Leaning back and propping her feet on the desk, she plucks one out.
“You know there’s no food down here,” he says.
“I’m starving. I worked hard tonight.”
He sighs and rolls his eyes. He hates her eating habits. And the fact she’s a total slob. But he doesn’t push it and adds, “You did a good job tonight, Astrid.”
“I got one dealer off the street. This operation is big—really big—I don’t think they’ll stop for a second with Tink in jail.”
“That’s not what I’m talking about—not really. You did a good job getting out there—testing your abilities in public. I know it’s hard for you to expose yourself like that.”
“It’s time,” she says. “I’ve
spent years training and preparing to do this. You’ve developed this amazing gear that is going to help a lot of people. Someone needs to protect the citizens of Crescent City, and we both know the police and agencies are too tied to rules to make a difference. I have to do it.”
He drops the suit and walks over to her, taking her gloved hands in his. “You owe no one, not me or this community, a thing. Do you understand that?”
Astrid smiles and nods, pretending she agrees. But deep down she knows why she’s willing to play superhero for Atticus. Her goal is to find out who killed her family—who destroyed the home—and ultimately exact revenge on the people that made her this way.
Chapter Five
Before
With her pink hat pulled tight over her ears, Astrid sat on the back steps and pet the black and white kitten. His fur was soft and nothing, not the smallest hum, echoed off the animal when she touched him.
The animal had begged at the screen door of the back porch and Miss Rosalie finally caved, filling a tiny blue bowl with milk. He’d come back every day and when she could get away from schoolwork and chores, Astrid spent time with him on the porch. She’d named him Harry because he was fluffy. Also, after the boy with the softest-looking hair on the music group posters in the older girls’ room.
But Astrid wasn’t only out here to pet the cat. She was positioned so she could also watch Devin, a boy a few years older than her, stare at the small pile of sticks he’d gathered and placed in a ring of rocks.
He stared, she watched.
The other children were inside. Demetria probably closed off with her unicorns. Another boy, Quinn, had flicked the electricity on and off all day, setting off alarms and restarting clocks, to the point of such annoyance that Miss Rosalie nearly cried in relief when the black SUV arrived for him for his trip to the doctor.
Over the weeks and months after her arrival at the home, Astrid realized that all of the kids were different. It wasn’t just her. Demetria brought toys to life. Quinn played with electricity. A kid, who answered to Junior, was strong like Superman. Astrid could hear Junior now, lifting weights in the small shed in the backyard. The constant clink of metal as he slid weight after weight on the bar.
