Alex’s turn.
Two for two.
On the other side, Silver heads straight for the bar, but the others have already beaten her to it. Jax is trying, semi-successfully, to carry four beers without dropping or spilling any.
“You should keep a clear head,” Red mothers, having declined a beverage for herself.
“Please.” Jax snorts. “I can do this shit in my sleep.”
Silver grabs two beers off Jax—one for herself and one for Alex—and surveys the room. It’s packed, way beyond the limit of what any Sentinel District fire code regulations would allow.
She feels Alex move in beside her, and she hands him one of the bottles.
“You think these people would still be here if they knew the risks of contamination?”
Alex shrugs. “The virus is blood borne. You’d probably have to climb right down there into the pit with them to run any real risk of infection.”
Silver’s eyes are drawn to the fight pit in the center of the room. It’s surrounded by overcrowded tables, and rows of benches bowing under the weight of so many parked asses.
Something strange, though.
This pit, unlike the ones Silver’s used to, is surrounded by two wire fences. The external fence is about eight feet high and made from standard wire mesh. The other fence, about a foot closer to the edge of the pit, is electrified, and it reaches right up to the ceiling. It certainly didn’t look like that back in the day.
“Doesn’t that seem a little unusual to you?” she whispers to Alex.
“Everything’s felt a little bit unusual to me lately.”
“An electric fence, though? Who needs that?”
An approaching bookie circulates the room, taking bets on the impending fight, but a simple head shake from Silver sends him onward before he even opens his mouth.
Jax swings in behind Alex and Silver. “What’s the plan, ladies?”
Silver shakes herself loose; Jax stinks of paint.
“Hang back. Watch. Wait. Enjoy.”
“That’s my favorite kind of plan.” Jax gives them both a pat on the back and hurries to take a seat.
Silver scans the crowd for faces that might be from ECCO, but the room is filled with Omega personnel from the Hunter and Police Divisions. Some are in uniform, some aren’t. Some are dressed up, some are dressed down.
She does catch sight of one familiar face, though, and he clocks her instantly.
Jake.
Their crooked-nosed ex-Division contact, still alive and kicking.
He shuffles his way through a sea of faces to get to her, but once he gets close enough to recognize Alex he slows up and considers turning back.
Too late.
Alex has him fixed with a menacing stare, and to retreat now would only appear cowardly. At the sight of his cockeyed facial features, Alex smothers a cruel smile before it escapes.
“Sorry about your nose.” Insincere.
Jake keeps just out of arm’s reach, ready to make a break for it if he has to, should Alex decide to engage him.
Warily, “I guess an apology is still an apology, even if it comes a decade late.”
“It’s the best you’re gonna get.”
Wishing he could pop Alex in the face without being beaten to a pulp, Jake suddenly realizes something. “Aren’t you a little too far from home, Blue?”
Alex pulls back his sleeve to show his bandaged wrist. “I got an upgrade.”
“And you?” Jake turns to Silver. “How’d you get in here?”
Silver reveals the same enviable upgrade, and Jake considers the implications of that for a moment.
Conniving, “I guess our deal’s off, then?”
Every muscle in Alex’s body tenses, and Silver’s instant look of panic gives him little reassurance.
“What deal?” she asks, her eyes wide. “We don’t have a deal.”
Jake shrugs that off. “Not to worry. There are a hundred more customers in line behind you.”
A wink and he’s gone, and Alex swings Silver around to face him.
“What’s going on? What’s he talking about?”
Silver rolls her eyes. “You know how he is. He’s just jealous because I’m getting sprung. He’s trying to bait you, and look: it’s working.”
“Silver …”
“What, Alex? What else do you want me to say?”
They lock eyes.
Neither backs down.
Tired of waiting for her to come clean—or to present him with a more avid denial—Alex pushes his beer into her hand and shoves her lightly aside. “Excuse me.”
“What? Wait. Where’re you going? Alex, don’t.”
He doesn’t hear any of that. He catches up to Jake and throws him up against the wire fence. “I swear to god, if you come within a hundred yards of her ever again, I’ll kill you.”
Jake enjoys being able to get under Alex’s skin so easily. “You seem awfully protective for a guy who was happy to let her go without a fight six years ago. What’s the matter? Worried you won’t be able to pry her away this time?”
Crack!
The cartilage in Jake’s nose audibly snaps at the kiss of Alex’s fist.
Blood.
Everywhere.
Jake drops to his knees, and Silver pulls Alex away before he can do any further damage.
“Are you out of your mind?! We’re not here for this.” She steps in between him and Jake, both her hands pressed against his chest. “You have to trust me, Alex.” She reaches up and strokes her palm against his cheek. “This isn’t how it seems.”
She appears sincere enough, and Alex’s business with Jake is finished anyway. The last of his anger and frustration subsides when she takes his hand and tries to lead him away.
“Come on,” she urges, scowling at Jake over her shoulder.
Alex lets her lead them to a place where they can sit together, a few feet away from the rest of their group, and Red hands them back the beers she’s been babysitting.
Perfect timing.
As they sit, an announcer gets on the loudspeaker to call the first fight.
“Here to warm you up tonight, T-Rob versus Blue Collar Bob!”
Sounds of cheering and applause echo throughout the room.
“Let me hear you! Five, four, three …”
The enthusiastic crowd counts down to zero, and a wooden gate at one end of the fight pit opens up to reveal a starving, angry Chimera. It bursts out of the gate, the name ‘T-Rob’ spray painted on its back.
“Let’s give it up for T-Rob!”
Whoops from the crowd.
“And appearing for the first time tonight …”
Another wooden gate at the opposite end of the fight pit slides open, and a second spray painted Chimera crawls out.
“Blue Collar Bob!”
More whoops.
A loud gong announces the start of the fight, and the two hungry Chimera begin to circle each other.
Alex leans in to Silver, casually putting his arm around the back of her chair. “My money’s on Bob.”
Emotionlessly, Silver analyses various physical attributes of the opponents and comes up with her own judgment of the situation. For one thing, T-Rob has deep slash marks all over his back.
“They whipped T-Rob before he came out, and probably starved him for a week. He’s hungry and angry—he’s a winner.”
She takes a sip of her beer and leans back in her chair, watching the fight. Either she doesn’t notice—or doesn’t mind—that Alex’s arm is around her.
T-Rob tears into one of Bob’s feet and rips it clean off, running into a corner to eat it. The crowd springs alive, cheering, booing and throwing empty beer bottles into the fence to startle the Chimera.
While T-Rob is distracted from the fight, the mauled foot in his mouth, Bob launches an attack and brings him down to the ground. T-Rob loses grip on the foot and it lands a few feet away. Bob sees it and goes after it—a frantic and desperate attempt to eat his own
flesh.
The fight goes on for minutes more.
The foot is reduced to bone, and Bob becomes weaker with each scuffle. When, eventually, only one living Chimera remains, the gong denotes the end of the fight and the announcer gets back on the loudspeaker.
“Is everybody warm?!”
The crowd cheers.
“Is everybody ready?!”
More cheering.
“Then bring on the main attraction!”
The crowd erupts as T-Rob—the winner, of course—is shot with a tranquilizer dart and removed, while what remains of the body of poor, dead Bob is scraped up from the ground.
The crowd stomps eagerly on the floorboards, clanging drinks against tabletops and hurling garbage at the fence, until the wooden gates are opened up again.
Silver leans in to Alex. “Do you have any idea what’s going on right now?”
“I think Omega just upped the ante.”
The wooden gates rise and reveal two men. One is dirty, and wears ill-fitting clothes. Perhaps he was picked up from the streets earlier that night. He looks cold and afraid, but the other man looks clean, angry and ready. When he looks up to see the crowd, all peering down upon him, his violet eyes gleam in the light.
“Oh, my god …” Silver stands up in amazement.
Alex joins her.
“I think we just learnt what a Fusion Chimera looks like.” He turns to her. “And your life just got a little bit more complicated.”
The Fusion man gives a loud and fierce war-cry before the fight begins. From several rows nearer the front of the audience, Jax and Oz turn toward Silver to witness her reaction: shock and horror.
Red drops her head. Although she can’t see, she can smell well enough. Frozen in disbelief, Alex can’t take his eyes off the fight. It’s already clear which competitor is going to win, since the Fusion is effortlessly ripping the human man to shreds.
Fusion.
Silver mentally processes the term for the first time. Chimeran and human traits … a fusion mix.
“This is unbelievable,” she whispers, half to herself and half to Alex.
Around the Fusion’s neck, something shimmers against the bar’s artificial light: an electronic collar.
Silver points it out to Alex. “You think that’s a fashion statement?”
That’s not the only thing that catches her eye either. On the other side of the room, a man in a hooded jacket tries to keep his face hidden and watch the fight without being noticed.
Silver nudges Alex. “Does that guy seem a little out of place to you?”
A half-shrug. “It’s not that unusual. Some folks just don’t want to be recognized in the morning. You know how it is. Guilty pleasures and all.”
The fight ends and the crowd erupts in a standing ovation. People are holding up their betting tickets in the excitement of winning, or throwing their fists down on the tabletops and smashing glasses at their loss. In typical post-fight fashion, a brawl breaks out in the corner of the room.
In the chaos, Silver has difficulty keeping her eyes on the hooded man. Winding his way toward the exit, he bobs through the crowds of jostling people, with Silver shoving her way through the masses after him. She tries to maintain a low profile, but she has to struggle just to keep up with him.
Alex is hot on her heels, though the rest of their group is stuck still trying to pinpoint exactly what’s going on. Sensing that something’s up, the hooded man hesitates at the far back of the room and turns around, locking onto Silver immediately. She freezes, but it’s too late: she’s blown.
He bolts through a doorway and she scrambles the rest of the way as fast as she can. On the other side of the door is a hallway, lined with people waiting to use the washrooms.
No sign of the hooded man.
Silver points to the men’s washroom, motions for Alex to check inside, and he follows the order without hesitation.
No sooner is he gone, and from the corner of her eye, Silver notices a fire escape doorway click shut.
Gotcha!
She bursts through the fire escape and finds herself in a cluttered parking lot. It’s a mess of household garbage, smashed up cars and random trash people have thrown there. Somewhere in the darkness there’s a muffled cry, and Silver draws her gun.
Following the sound around a corner …
Damnit.
There’s a man lying on the ground with a knife in his chest and blood pooling everywhere.
“Shit.”
Silver stops to check his pulse, but he no longer has one. She looks around, waiting for movement. Almost instantly, something draws her attention and she spins around.
Aha!
A short distance away, the hooded man turns and looks directly at her, frozen like a deer in the headlights of a speeding car. He waits a moment, and then darts into the darkness before Silver’s gun is even properly aimed.
She fires a shot, but fails to subdue him. She tries to catch up to him, but he’s too fast.
He’s gone.
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
Indiscretions
The mood inside the truck is a somber one.
With Oz behind the wheel, Jax rides shotgun, her feet resting up on the dash. As always, there’s a cigarette between her lips, but with somewhat uncharacteristic consideration, she tries to blow the smoke out of the window instead of letting it circulate inside.
Red is in the back with Alex, trying to teach him how to play poker with her special deck of Braille cards. Alone, Silver sits and gazes absently out of the window for several blocks, before suddenly leaning forward in between Oz and Jax.
“Pull over.”
Oz obliges. “Why? What’s here?”
Without answering, Silver opens up the door and jumps out, slamming the door shut behind her.
Leaning into the driver’s side window, “Go back to the theater.”
Alex almost gets up to follow her, but he can feel her tension and he’s not in the mood to be rejected. “What about you?”
She offers him nothing more than a cursory glance. “Don’t wait up.”
In a second, her slender figure vanishes from sight into the Fringe District shadows, and Oz drives away. No sooner is the truck gone from her view than a loud crack of thunder heralds a sudden downpour of rain.
Awesome.
She sighs at her own misfortune, thankful she only has to walk a couple of blocks. Nevertheless, she’s drenched by the time Maydevine’s car stops to pick her up.
“You’re late. Get in,” he grumbles.
*************************
Back at the theater, Dylan and Alice sit across from each other, in silence on the couch, munching on peanuts. Dylan tosses one at her head. It bounces off and startles a nearby rat, scavenging for crumbs on the dirty floor. The rat steals the peanut and scampers away with it, victorious.
“I’m sorry I made you angry,” he offers.
Alice shrugs and bites into another peanut. “You’re entitled to your opinion.” Forced cordiality.
He flicks another peanut at her, this time hitting her in the face.
She tries hard to appear irritated.
“Stop that.” She checks an invisible watch—Silver’s quirk rubbed off on her. “Where are they? Shouldn’t they be back by now?”
Dylan starts throwing peanuts into the air and trying to catch them in his own mouth. “It’s still early.”
“It’s after midnight, I’m sure.”
He temporarily discards the peanuts and sits up, leaning in towards Alice. “Like I said: it’s still early. Besides, if any of the stories I’ve heard about her are even remotely true, then I’m pretty sure she can take care of herself out there. Am I right?”
“More than likely.”
He leans back again, relaxing and making himself comfortable.
More peanuts.
“Okay, then. So you’re a fool for worrying about her. At least we can agree on that.”
She throws a peanut in his
direction, but misses him completely. “I already told you it’s complicated. And you don’t even want to try and understand.”
Dylan sighs. “Look, I understand your situation, I just can’t say that I agree with it.” His tone comes off holier-than-thou, and that causes instant offense.
“Don’t say it like that.”
“Like what?”
“Like you think you’re better than me.”
Dylan inspects a moldy peanut. “You’re misunderstanding me.”
“Wanna bet?”
“I think you give too much of yourself to her, and for all the wrong reasons.” He discards the unsuitable peanut. “That’s all.”
“That’s quite the judgment for someone who’s only known me for a day.” She chomps on another peanut. “You think I don’t care for her? Is that it?”
Dylan shakes his head. “I didn’t say that.”
“You think it’s not logical?”
“That’s more the point, to me. Logic has no place among feelings.” He hesitates. “Not for humans.”
Saddened, Alice seems lost in thought, her eyes drawn down into the bottom of the peanut bag, seeking answers.
Silence.
Then, “You’re right. She’s going to leave me.”
“I didn’t say that. Why would you—?”
“Because she’s human.”
A single tear emerges, and her sudden emotion makes Dylan feel instantly uncomfortable. Unsure of what to do, he reaches out to pat her on the shoulder, giving her three surly, it’ll-be-okay taps.
“She won’t let anything bad happen to you.”
“I don’t want to be alone.” Sniff.
“You won’t be.”
She looks up at him, teary eyes obscuring her vision. “You mean you’ll take care of me?”
Dylan’s tongue stumbles over words he doesn’t know how to speak. “I …”
Alice moves slowly in closer to him, pushing him back against the couch. He looks unsure but doesn’t stop her. His heart pounding, he anticipates a kiss.
Denied.
Instead, she rests herself down on top of him and lays her head against his chest, listening as his heart rate kicks up from seventy to eighty-five.
His body reacts to her close proximity.
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