Face the Change (Menopausal Superheroes Book 3)

by Samantha Bryant

  Jessica rose into the air, flew over to the stairwell and handed something to a blue-uniformed man with a military look to him and circled back, making a completely unnecessary but showy spin on her way back. The reporter hissed, “Please tell me you got that.” The cameraman gave a thumbs-up just as Jessica landed beside the reporter. The reporter did a good job keeping a professional demeanor, but Cindy didn’t miss the way she scooted back a couple of steps.

  “Thank you for speaking with us.”

  “My pleasure.”

  “What can you tell us about what happened today?”

  Jessica frowned, in that practiced, lip-pursing way beauty queens and actresses had, where they still managed to look attractive while showing their concern. “There’s a lot I’m not at liberty to divulge. The court system will have a lot to process over the next few months. But I can announce that the UCU has captured the last of The Six.”

  Cindy had no idea what that was supposed to mean, but the reporter seemed to understand. “The same group involved in the jewelry heist in Tall Oaks and several bank robberies in the area?”

  “That’s the one.” Jessica looked straight into the camera. “This is the kind of crime the UCU was created to fight. Sometimes ordinary police work isn’t sufficient, no matter how talented and dedicated Springfield’s police force is. That’s why we’re here.”

  The reporter looked around at the scene, and Cindy followed her gaze. The plaza was a wreck. The huge statue where she’d been meant to meet Helen was missing an arm. Nearly all the plants were scorched or burnt away. Some were still smoking. Several people lay on the ground and teams of paramedics hurried around, calling out to each other. A sick sureness settled into Cindy’s stomach like she had swallowed a stone. Helen had been here.

  Slipping out from her hiding place, Cindy ran into the park behind her. Coming here had been a huge mistake. She’d have to find a way to continue her work without access to her earlier research or the last stash of irradiated emeralds. She’d just made it to the fountain, emptied and dry for the winter months, when a voice called out, “Where do you think you’re going?”

  Cindy whirled around. It was Helen. She’d been sitting on one of the benches, and she stood up, moving heavily like her body was sore. “Helen?”

  Helen bowed. “So glad you could make it.”

  Cindy looked around. All the emergency workers were engaged in the disaster across the street. Not a single uniformed person in sight. Cindy sat down on the edge of the fountain, cursing her luck that it was dry. “I said I’d come.”

  Helen stood there for a long moment, like she waiting for something, or trying to decide what to do. Cindy’s mind played out scenarios for her, and she rejected them one after another. Helen’s hands lit up with flame. The few people in the area who hadn’t already left to check out the disaster across the street backed away. “You abandoned me.” Helen’s voice was steady and cold. “After everything I did for you, all our work together, you left me.”

  Cindy didn’t say anything. What could she say? It was true. Given the chance to get away alone or help the woman who’d fought to rescue her, she’d turned tail and run. Worse, given the chance to do it over again, she’d do exactly the same thing. “I’m sorry,” she said. It wasn’t much, but it made Helen pause and lower her hands again, her flaming fists lighting up the sidewalk in eerie patterns. “I—I thought you were dead. But now that I know you’re not, I can help you.”

  “Help me? Don’t you think you’ve done enough?”

  Cindy stood, taking a slow step forward like she was approaching a wounded animal. “We can figure this out. I can fix you.”

  “Fix me?” Helen looked down at herself, then raised a column of fire in her left hand. “Is that what you think this is about? I don’t need fixing. I’m not broken. But you will be.”

  Cindy curled into a ball, bracing for the searing pain she knew would come. What a stupid way to die, she thought. Here’s what trying to do the right thing gets you.

  Jessica Gets Smoke in her Eyes

  Jessica watched the scene from her perch on top the statue of a giant acorn. She’d followed Cindy from the plaza but had waited to intervene once she saw Helen was there, too. If they timed this right, they could capture both women. She couldn’t see Patricia, and that made her nervous, even though Patricia had orders to stay out of sight, waiting for her cue to act. Patricia could be a real loose cannon, and right now she needed someone who would stick to the plan.

  When it became clear Helen planned to end the fight with fire, Jessica tapped her headset. “Patricia, now.”

  She was too late.

  Helen raised a circle of fire around herself and Dr. Liu. The flames were waist high and heated up the night air. Jessica froze, hanging in midair. She saw Helen raise her hand to hurl a ball of fire at Cindy, but looked away, unwilling to watch it make contact. Rubbing her Franken-arm, she remembered the painful months of treatment and recovery after Helen had burned her. And she’d been lucky. Even Cindy Liu didn’t deserve to die like that.

  Time seemed to stand still. Then, Patricia thundered across the yard like a green rhinoceros charging and leaped onto the fountain wall, something red flashing in her hands. It was only when Patricia engaged the fire extinguisher, covering the scene in a white cloud of dust or steam that Jessica realized what she held.

  When the dust cleared, Jessica could see the two women curled on the ground, covered in white film. She held her breath, waiting to see signs of life. Helen sat up first, taking in a great whooping breath that began a coughing fit. Gasping, she moved to her hands and knees. Patricia stood holding the fire extinguisher at the ready. She shrugged a shoulder toward the still inert Cindy Liu, making her shoulder spikes waggle. “See if she’s all right.”

  Jessica floated over and landed gently in the white powdery grass. Following her first aid procedures, she checked for breathing and pulse and finding both, but not finding visible physical trauma, rolled Cindy gently onto her side. “I don’t think she’s even burnt.” Jessica clicked a pair of handcuffs around the unconscious Cindy’s wrists, dialing them in tightly. Just as she finished, Leonel came running back onto the scene. He stopped at the edge of the white-covered circle on the lawn and stared at each of them in turn.

  When Helen saw him, she pulled herself awkwardly to her feet, stumbling forward. Once righted, she tried to raise a flame in her hand again, but the ammonium phosphate that covered her flesh caused it to sputter weakly. Patricia swept the nozzle of the fire extinguisher across Helen’s hands and lower body again. “I wouldn’t try that if I were you,” she said.

  “Is she dead?” Leonel sounded wary. He had unconsciously taken a ready stance, and one of his hands was fisted.

  Jessica shook her head. “She’s breathing. We’ll need to get her to the hospital.”

  Leonel knelt and scooped the young woman into his arms. Pressed into his chest, skinny legs dangling, one filthy foot bare, Cindy Liu’s slender body hung limp. Jessica had to fight to remember this was no innocent child, but the scientist who had changed all their lives. “Get her to Driver,” she said, turning to Helen. “You’re coming with us.” She gestured to Patricia, reminding the woman of the consequences should she fail to cooperate. “Do you want to do this the easy way or the hard way?”

  Patricia smiled, the effect rather horrifying in her scaly alter-ego’s green face. “I always wanted to say that.”

  “Maybe next time,” Jessica offered as Helen dropped to her knees, holding up her hands in a gesture of surrender.

  Sally Ann Draws the Line

  Sally Ann suppressed a laugh when she walked into the small conference room—Dr. Liu wore such a perfect expression of teenage misery—but she managed to maintain her professionalism. Holding out a hand in greeting, she crossed to the table. “Dr. Liu, I presume?”

  Dr. Liu didn’t laugh. She didn’t stand either, but just stared at the hand until Sally Ann let it drop and took the chair opposite. So, tha
t’s how it’s going to be, is it? Two can play at this game. The person seated across from her wore a white spa style bath robe that was too large for her. The sleeves were rolled back three times, making a thick roll around the wrists that emphasized the smallness of the hands beneath. It was hard to look dignified in an oversized bathrobe, but Cindy Liu tried. She sat ramrod straight with her hands flat on the table top, immobile. Her chin was thrust out at an odd angle, and Cindy looked down a short, squashed grape of a nose at Sally Ann.

  Sally Ann did laugh then. She couldn’t help it in the face of all that forced solemnity. Hopping up on the table, she leaned on an elbow and reached up to flick at a piece of Dr. Liu’s hair. It moved as a clump, as if the strands had been glued together and made a thick and satisfying thwack sound against Sally Ann’s fingernails. The scientist breathed in sharply, obviously offended. “Guess they couldn’t do anything about your hair?” Sally Ann offered.

  Cindy grabbed her hair with both hands, pressing it down against the side of her head. “It’s the fireproofing,” she snapped. Looking at the old woman in a child’s body, Sally Ann flashed to the old movie Freaky Friday and had a hard time keeping her amusement to herself. She liked the idea of some old Chinese lady out there on a skateboard, but Cindy Liu hadn’t changed bodies. Instead, she’d altered the one she had. It was amazing. And terrifying.

  Sally Ann rolled off the table and pulled a yellow legal pad out of her bag. She uncapped a pen with her teeth and smoothed the top page, poised to take notes. “Let’s get to it, shall we?”

  Cindy’s prepared speech fell out of her mouth in one rapid flow. “I’m asking for sanctuary and protection for myself and my father. In return, I offer my surrender. I will willingly submit to questioning and provide what information I can about the events of the past few months.”

  Sally Ann looked up, folding her hands on the pad. The silence stretched for long seconds, but Sally Ann didn’t flinch. Liu needed them more than they needed her. The girl shifted in her chair. “Look,” she finally said. “I don’t know what you already think you know about me, but I never planned to hurt anyone. I was reckless, yes, but my intentions were good.”

  Sally Ann snorted. That was a good one.

  The girl’s eyes narrowed. “You don’t believe me?”

  “I don’t care what your intentions were. Remember what they say about the road to hell? You think you’ve got something to offer us, something worth a reprieve from legal consequences. What might that be?”

  There it was again, that look like a puffed-up rooster. Cindy Liu must have been one pompous old biddy, and it was even more insufferable in the guise of a child. “My research will change the world. Surely the Department will want in on my innovations.”

  Innovations? That was quite the word for it. “There are those who wish simply to see you behind bars.” Or swinging from the nearest tree.

  “Behind bars?” She seemed genuinely shocked by the idea. “What purpose would that serve? My place is in a lab.”

  “So you want more than just a safe place. You want resources.”

  Cindy bowed her head. “The Department could do great things with discoveries like mine.”

  That’s what Sally Ann was afraid of. “What about your father?”

  Cindy looked down at her own hands spread flat on the table top. When she lifted them, they left sweaty imprints on the surface. “My father was a genius. He has lost his way, but he is still my father. I don’t want to abandon him out there, without resources. But if it comes down to it, I will always choose me.”

  Now it was Sally Ann’s turn to feel uncomfortable. She hadn’t expected familial obligation as part of the pitch. The truth was, the science team was eager to get their hands on both these scientists if only to understand better the nature of the damage they had inflicted on the world with their irresponsible and dangerous experimentation. If only to get some answers for Jessica, Patricia, Leonel, and the other Liu-vians that kept popping up around Springfield.

  Sally Ann turned the pad to face Liu. She pointed at the line about sanctuary and protection. “What exactly do you want us to protect you from?”

  She didn’t hesitate. “Helen Braeburn.”

  Sally Ann picked up the pen. This should be interesting. “Go on.”

  “Are you saying you don’t know who she is?”

  “I’m not saying anything yet, Ms. Liu. I’m listening.” The “Ms.” was a dig. Big degree people always wanted their titles. From the look of it, it hit the mark.

  Cindy blew air out through her nose, rather like a bull in a cartoon, but Sally Ann could see she was working hard to contain her anger. “Fine. Helen Braeburn took one of my products, a pill for hot flashes I sold through co-op markets in the area. In her case, for some reason, it had a very unusual effect. She gained the ability to turn her heat externally and produce fire. I was working with her to try to understand and control her new ability.”

  “But now she’s a danger to you?”

  “When things went south at the college, I thought she was dead. I saw Patricia and that man fighting her. I saw her get thrown into a wall. I left.” She jerked her chin up defiantly. “There was no reason for me to get myself taken in, too.”

  “But she wasn’t dead.”

  “Apparently not. I don’t know what happened in the meantime, but she’s out for revenge now. And I’m not equipped to fight her myself.”

  That’s obvious. Though showing up soaked in a fire-retardant goo had been a good move. “So that’s what you want us to do for you.”

  She nodded slowly, holding Sally Ann’s gaze.

  “There are those within the Department who think we ought to let you burn. That it’s no more than you deserve.”

  “Jessica?”

  Sally Ann didn’t respond, letting Liu make her own assumptions.

  “I was desperate.” Liu stood and gripped the back of the chair. “You see what has happened to me.” She gestured at her own body. “I am sixty-seven years old. I was losing years by the day, and I had to make it stop. Studying Jessica would have helped me understand.”

  It still would, Sally Ann was sure. She didn’t like the idea of letting this woman anywhere near Agent Roark. Still, she shouldn’t let the opportunity for information go by.

  “Why Jessica?”

  “The cancer. My formula. It’s derived from cancerous cells, repurposing the virus to reactivate senescent cells in the body and counteract the debilitating effects of aging. Jessica is a survivor, and I believe that’s why my tea gave her flight. Her blood could hold the key to understanding how it works and how to control the reaction.”

  Sally Ann shuddered with revulsion. She knew she was supposed to bring this woman in, that the Director saw her and her work as a valuable resource, but the more she considered the idea, the more she thought it was a mistake. There might be great things to learn from her work, but there were demons within this woman. Cindy Liu would bring them down from the inside if they let her.

  Sally Ann pulled the pad of paper back to herself and doodled in the margins, thinking. She didn’t say anything as her pen traced random symbols across the page. It helped her think sometimes, to let her pen wander the page while her subconscious processed things. She could hear Cindy’s huffy breaths across the table, but she ignored them, trying to give herself space to think. In the end, it was her mother who decided for her. Her advice echoed in Sally Ann’s memory: “Keep your friends close, and your enemies closer.” She would do what she’d been sent to do.

  Putting down her pen, she smiled. “All right, Ms. Liu. We’ll take you in. The exact terms of your incarceration with us will be worked out in the next few days. There are quite a few branches of law enforcement with an interest in what happens to you, including some that don’t officially exist.” She pulled some documents out of her bag and laid them on the table, knowing full well that contracts were more about symbolism than legal defensibility in an area like this. Liu’s fear was evident in how
quickly she signed. She didn’t even read the papers.

  After she signed, she pointed at Sally Ann’s legal pad. “What is this?” Sally Ann looked. Liu was pointing at her doodle. To her, it looked like some badly cartooned sushi rolls, and then some smooshed ones with ugly black centers. The smooshed ones looked malevolent somehow. Under them was a series of honeycombs and letters. It was a meaningless doodle, an image that had flashed into her brain. She didn’t know what had Liu so worked up. But the woman-girl was shaking.

  “Where did you get this?”

  Sally Ann shook her head, unable to answer. Liu’s face was red and panicked. She thrust a slender finger at the legal pad, landing on the honeycomb drawing. “This is my formula.”

  Sally Ann backed away from the table, her hands held in what she hoped was a soothing and calming gesture, though her body was already tensing for a fight. “Ms. Liu, I have no idea what you are talking about.”

  The girl standing quaking in front of her seemed to go completely still. She pulled the legal pad toward her and ran her finger over the honeycomb grid as if she were drawing it with her finger. She let out a low hiss, but when she met Sally Ann’s gaze again, she seemed calm again. Analytical even. Cocking her head to one side, she seemed to take in Sally Ann fully. Sally Ann didn’t like the way the look made her feel. There was something predatory in it.

  “I hadn’t taken you for one of us.”

  What is that supposed to mean? One of who?

  Liu went on. “You seem young to have used my products, but so was Jessica. Is it the tea?”

  Sally Ann laughed. “Sorry. Anything freaky about me came straight from Mom and Dad, Ms. Liu.”

  The woman-girl looked disappointed. “But you can read thoughts?”

  Sally Ann shook her head. “Good God, no. That sounds terrible.”