Carmine: Rise of the Warrior Queen

by Alan Janney

  “Come with me. You can sleep in my bed. I promise.”

  “Chase comes too,” she says. “He comes to my bed too.”

  “Yes. Yes, Hannah. Chase comes with us.”

  “No,” Blue-Eyes says simply. “No he does not. Your little parlay is adorable, but the Outlaw leaves with me. Now. Hannah, sit down. Immediately.”

  The Cheerleader doesn’t budge, as still and as solid as marble, but her eyes shift to Blue-Eyes. They are tinged with menace.

  “Chase does not belong to you,” she says. “Chase is mine. Always mine.”

  Oh no. Oh no. It’s about to happen.

  “Sit down, Hannah,” Mary orders. Her voice and her scent are whips, thrumming with power. Does the Cheerleader not even feel it?

  “I hate you.” She advances on Mary, small deliberate steps. “You’re not nice. You take things which do not belong to you. You steal.”

  “Chase,” Mary calls. “Chase. Stand up now, please, and take your possessed ex-girlfriend away. Take her beyond the gasoline and destroy her.”

  No. Restrain him. He can’t control himself.

  Chase stands and sways. His eyes are bloodshot and they lock on mine. His face is blue like he’s holding his breath. “Help me, Katie.” A harsh whisper. “I can’t stop. Please.”

  I touch his face. His eyes close, and he presses against my hand, and he groans. I say, “Stay here, Chase. With me.”

  “Chase!” Mary shouts, verging on panic. “Now!”

  Two things happen at once, so simultaneously they might have been choreographed.

  Dalton, my sweet wonderful beautiful bodyguard, rises up from the fuselage of the plane dead ahead. Pistol in his hand. Fury in his eyes. He takes careful aim. At Chase.

  And Hannah tosses the lighter into the gasoline.

  “No!”

  Dalton fires. The locking mechanism on Chase’s collar shatters. “Move!” Dalton roars.

  The Zippo lands with a small splash in the fuel. There is no sizzle. There is no slow spread of flame. Instead, our entire world detonates. Heat unimaginable. Fire unquenchable. The nearest fuel truck doesn’t explode outwards; it explodes upwards, like a NASA rocket.

  Before the Zippo splash, Blue-Eyes had backed near the gasoline lake and fuel truck. The eruption emits something like a shockwave, and she is flung across our small dry island. She vanishes into a rising wall of fire.

  The collar at Chase’s neck emits an alarm. Mary released the trigger! It’s going to blow. One. “Chase!” Two. I rip the metal free and Throw it directly upwards. Three. Small explosives activate like a shotgun blast and the metal collar rends out of shape a dozen feet over our heads.

  Heat singes my skin. We’re going to die, possibly when the next fuel truck blows. Chase’s eyes are fixed on the spot where Blue-Eyes disappeared.

  “Chase!” I smack him in the back of his head. “Wake up! We need to go! I can’t carry you fast enough—”

  Something crushes me from behind. My collarbone, which is a reinforced chunk of of hard collagen, snaps in half, and I fall.

  The Cheerleader is transformed. No longer a nubile cheerleader, she is a volcano erupting. She is engulfed in fire, a brilliant camouflage of yellow and black. She burns and her flames lick ten feet in the air. Her pretty blonde hair twists and melts, and her skin crackles but does not dissolve. Her clothing burns to nothing.

  “Chase comes with me!” Her voices roars like air from a furnace. “We will transform, and we will be together!”

  “Chase!” I scream as loudly as possible, loud enough to burst mortal eardrums. “You big idiot, wake up!”

  He blinks his red eyes and looks around, as though only now realizing we’re stuck in an inferno. “Katie?”

  That’s not my name, but whatever.

  Hannah Walker, an embodiment of madness, a human-shaped torch, reaches to wrap Chase into a final embrace. A hug from which he won’t wake. To bake him alive inside a human oven.

  Stop her!!

  I am! I grab her calf and haul backwards. My shoulder grinds and screams, and the skin on my hands sears. Like placing them on a hot stove.

  The plane behind us shatters. Fire reaches its fuel tanks and the frame bursts. Chase and Hannah stagger from the blast. My eyes are about to melt. Chase is too close to the fire, and he’s falling. I release Hannah and grab the bottom of his vest with my good arm to prevent him falling into the flames.

  Dalton lands next to me. His pants are on fire and his arms are burnt. I would die for him in that instant. He has a grenade in each fist.

  Hannah regards him cooly from within her conflagration. But that changes when he releases both safety pins. Even a crazy person recognizes live grenades. Hannah may be immune to fire, but apparently not from shrapnel. “I’m here for Chase,” she says.

  “You wanna hug someone? Hug me.” He charges her. She hesitates. Would this man really commit suicide? Clutch her until the grenades tear them both in half?

  Sanity, for the moment, prevails. Hannah flees. She runs through the mounting wall of fire, and he plunges in after her. Gone.

  “Dalton!”

  A second fuel truck detonates. Chase and I begin to die. Smoke chokes out the sky, and our island of relative safety is baking. The air has to be over four hundred degrees and rising fast.

  “Katie,” Chase says. He kneels beside me. “You’re here.”

  “That’s not my name, you idiot,” I groan.

  He gathers me into his arms, like I’m an infant. “You came for me.”

  I will always come for you, Chase, as you always have for me. Katie is delirious with relief. I want her to shut up so bad. I say, “And your crazy ex-girlfriend broke my shoulder.”

  “I can’t remember.”

  “I know the feeling. Can we go now?”

  He kisses me, a soft brush of our lips, and says, “For you, Katie, anything.”

  I’m not a Leaper. I can’t leap buildings in a single bound. But he can, and we are Launched up and over the wall of fire. The air above is agony but it’s brief.

  Our touchdown is remarkably gentle. He carries us a safe distance and sets me on my feet. I’m exhausted and my shoulder throbs and I’ve ingested too much smoke, so I lay down and soak in the cooler air. He sits beside me and hacks hot soot from his lungs and tries to remember where he is.

  Dalton is alive. He staggers up and collapses next to me. More planes explode. Above us there is no sky, only ash.

  “Where’d she go?” I ask. “The Cheerleader?”

  “Don’t know, don’t care,” Dalton growls. He needs serious medical attention. Boils are rising on his neck and face, and he’s wheezing. “She ran. Fast. I threw the grenades and stop-drop-and-rolled. My ass is fried.”

  “And Blue-Eyes? Anybody see her?”

  “No sign,” Chase coughs. He’s shielding his eyes against the bright flames.

  “Let me know if you do,” Dalton says. “Still got some bullets left.”

  “She’s crafty. She’ll escape. Anyone she meets will fall in love and smuggle her out. We missed our chance.”

  “No thanks to you,” I say.

  He grins, which is weary and beautiful. “Yeah. No thanks to me.” He indicates the fire with a wave of his hand. “Samantha will be sorry she missed this.”

  “She’s over there,” I say. “A helicopter fell on her.”

  “A helicopter fell on Samantha?” He laughs, but ends up hacking again. “She’s going to be so pissed.”

  “Assuming she’s alive,” Dalton mumbles.

  “She is. It’ll take more than that to kill Samantha Gear.”

  “Both of you be quiet,” I murmur. “I need a nap. I’ve earned it.”

  Smoke rises over New Los Angeles, but for the moment the Kingdom is safe. So are we. In the distance, firetruck alarms are wailing. The Outlaw gently holds my burnt hand and we don’t move for a long time.

  - Seven -

  Somehow, someway, Walter, Blue-Eyes, and the Cheerleader all vanish. L
ike mist carried off in the breeze. The Priest and General Brown cast wide nets and search forty-eight hours straight but come up empty. I’m irate if I dwell on it too long. So close to victory, and yet so far.

  The terror of that awful day quickly subsumes under the work demanded by New Los Angeles. The Kingdom doesn’t care that we’re beaten and battered and burnt; chickens still need to be fed, children need tending, and borders need protecting.

  Three days after being carried from hell, my burns have faded. The following Monday, I remove my arm from the sling and experience no pain.

  Dalton will require much longer to mend, unfortunately. He is covered with second degree burns but refuses to take a day off. He sleeps on my couch and I bring him food and coffee in the morning, and I will cherish him the rest of his life, which he finds aggravating.

  Kayla doesn’t sleep much, but when she does it’s in my bed. My room smells like strawberries afterwards. She can’t remember much of her abduction, but the brilliance of her day-to-day life is diminished by the trauma. Mason even successfully railroads her into accepting a full-time bodyguard: himself, as often as he has time to spare, or Chris, his most trusted Falcon.

  Blue-Eyes is photographed a week later in Washington, D.C. wearing a hat. Most likely all of her hair was cooked off. No mention of her excursion to California is made by the news. She appears to pick up where she left off, slowly brainwashing the leaders of the free world into war. She and I will lock horns again soon.

  The Cheerleader has disappeared, though Tank reports that he caught her scent near Thousand Oaks. She hasn’t gone far, but she’s more of a thorn in Chase’s side than mine. We’re friends, so Hannah said. Friends who break each other’s collarbones.

  * * *

  Three weeks to the day after the Walter/Blue-Eyes attack, I climb the Bank Tower again. I’m not ascending the spire to spy on the Shooter this time. Nor am I climbing to pinpoint the source of any disturbance. All is quiet on our western front. Simply put, I need a moment of peace. My apartment used to be a quiet sanctuary, but no longer. The door hardly closes.

  I lay on the tower’s warm helipad and smile at the sun, eyes closed. Crisp sensual silence, the first I’ve experienced in days. For a moment I consider stripping down and sunbathing, however I’ve learned that a certain nosey internet hacker has no qualms invading privacy. The last thing I need is PuckDaddy emailing scandalous photographs to Chase.

  The Outlaw left an hour after firetrucks arrived that day at the airport. Samantha Gear wasn’t dead, but she wasn’t healthy either. He borrowed an ambulance and a medic and drove her twelve hours to the physician who’d treated him. I admire his loyalty, but I also miss him. He texted me that Samantha has already made a full recovery.

  My new collection of friends (the Outlaw, the Shooter, and PuckDaddy) are an impressive array of allies, even if they’re quirky and mysterious. They seem content to leave me in peace while I’m safely inside New Los Angeles. However, I know they’ll return immediately if I ask, so strong is their connection to the girl once known as Katie Lopez.

  I have no new memories of her, but I suspect Katie is discovering ways to influence me. I’ve read two Young Adult romance books during the previous two weeks, and nearly wept when Stanford issued their semester grades. I received a B in both classes. Hardly worth crying over, and yet I did. She grows increasingly chatty as days pass. Right now she’s happy. Enjoying the sun and the peace.

  After thirty minutes of resting on the helipad, I open my phone and scan news articles. Hostilities between the Federal Government and the Resistance boiled over into open conflict in Lubbock, Texas yesterday. The beginning of major bloodshed, experts forewarn. In other parts of the continent, a harsh winter pounds the population and this year’s flu is going to be particularly devastating thanks to the upheaval and lack of coordinated medicine; millions could die. Stock markets are frozen to prevent values from plummeting, and there’s a citrus fruit blight predicted. England has terminated diplomatic communication with America (or what used to be America) and all of EuroAsia withdraws into itself.

  Gloom and doom and more gloom, much of it caused by mutants. Evil Variants breaking the planet, giving the rest of us a bad name.

  Frustrated, I’m about to turn off my phone. But first I get a text message.

  >> lookin fly girl

  I smile and reply, Thanks PuckDaddy.

  But stop spying on me.

  >> never

  >> its what puck does

  >> in case i haven’t told u recently…

  >> thanks 4 saving kayla

  You told me.

  And you’re welcome.

  When will you come visit her?

  >> good question

  You better. She’s expecting you.

  >> stop it! u making puck all nervous!

  I smile, click off the phone, and shove it into my pocket.

  “Reading about yourself online?” the Outlaw asks. He is striding up the metal staircase. He’s wearing the vest but no mask.

  I sit up and wrap my arms around my knees. “You startled me.”

  “I’m sneaky.”

  “I never google myself. The articles are rarely positive.”

  “It’s not all bad. I read the beginning of some fan fiction that involves you and me trapped alone on a deserted island.”

  “Pervert.”

  “I didn’t read far. It got steamy in a hurry.”

  I ask, “What brings you to New Los Angeles?”

  “You.”

  “Took you long enough.” I’m smiling and that’s okay. I’m happy he’s here. I won’t pretend otherwise. The new Carmine can take over the world and admit she likes boys.

  “I can’t stay, though. Only passing through. There’s going to be trouble in New Mexico. Santa Rosa.”

  “Blue-Eyes sending soldiers to start fights with the Resistance?”

  He grins. “She’s been in a bad mood for almost a month now. I wonder what ticked her off.”

  “Probably getting half killed by a simple cheerleader.”

  “We may have accidentally started World War Three.”

  I’m relieved I decided not to sunbathe. It would be challenging to dress frantically and maintain my dignity. I stand and slap the dust from my pants and shirt. From up here, the line of traffic into Downtown is visible, vagrants flocking to New LA by the thousands. I ask, “You’ll fight at Santa Rosa?”

  “Maybe. Samantha Gear and I go to prevent the fights. If we show up, the other side often backs down. And if not, we operate like a special forces unit behind enemy lines.” He moves closer and takes my hand. The faint headache behind my eyes dissipates and Katie begins to hum. “You’re still wearing the red ribbons.”

  “My joints still hurt.”

  “Have you missed me?”

  “Have you missed me?”

  “I asked first,” he says. Our faces are close.

  “I’ve missed you.”

  “Good.”

  “You’re thinking about kissing me. A real one.”

  “You’re correct.”

  “We’re not kids, you wimp. We’re allowed. Just do it.”

  Kiss him kiss him kiss him.

  He asks, “What’s your plan? What happens next in your Kingdom?”

  “Expansion. I want San Diego.”

  “You’re never satisfied. Katie would be happy with Los Angeles only.”

  “I’m not Katie.”

  He asks, “Are you dating Tank?”

  “I am not.”

  “Are you two just friends?”

  “Kinda. It’s…complicated.”

  He kisses me. Finally. But it’s more powerful than a simple kiss. We collide like two planets striking and breaking and melting into one. I experience the swirl of emotion, a powerful vortex of pleasure and memory. Katie surges into my hands and wraps my arms around his neck.

  The Outlaw loses control over his tightly bottled strength. He relaxes and his power radiates into my pores
and nostrils. His disease is so strong. He’s an alpha male beyond imagination, but Katie doesn’t care; she strengthens her grip and so does he. I’m terrified of him, but I think I’ve decided that’s okay. He’s a terrifying man, but he’s good. And he loves me.

  Eventually he presses me away and holds me at arms length. Katie is out of breath, but not as much as him.

  “Your Guardians are coming,” he says.

  “I know. A lot of them.”

  “They’re climbing the tower stairs.”

  “And up the exterior walls.”

  He brushes hair out of my eyes. “Your protective watch dogs. They don’t seem thrilled that I’m here.”

  Tell Chase I love him.

  “Katie wants you to know she loves you.”

  “And you?”

  “It’s…complicated. But I’m crushing pretty hard. And I hope you return soon. When you can stay.”

  He walks to the edge of the helipad and hops the short distance to the retaining wall. I’m not afraid of heights but his precarious perch makes my stomach flipflop. “I won’t be gone long. You’ve pissed off some powerful individuals. We’ll face them together.”

  “We can do this.”

  “You’re right. We can.”

  The penthouse door crashes open and febrile Guardians rush through, like angry german shepherds searching for an intruder. Others come pouring over the wall. Chase is spotted, and they howl and converge.

  “I love you, Katie. And I always will,” he calls, and he allows himself to fall backwards into nothing. The Guardians don’t reach him in time. He plummets several hundred feet, engages his black wing-suit, and begins a majestic curve to the north.

  “That’s not my name. My name is Carmine.”

  The End

  Epilogue

  The girl once known as Katie Lopez wakes early on a Thursday. In December, the sun rises at 6:55 but she is gone by then, having stepped across a man sleeping on her floor and slipped over the exterior wall.

  She walks her motorcycle from the parking garage, straps on an extra canister of gas, and motors south on the 110 as Cooks began serving breakfast to Shepherds and Farmers. To be safe, she refills her tank at a manual pump in Long Beach and eats a grilled fish at the Queen Mary market.