Division Zero: Thrall (59 page)

Shani squirmed to look at him.
I’m sorry.

Stop whining, they’ll hear us.
He narrowed his eyes at her.

She nodded. The girl was quieter, but shook harder.

Evan let go, leaving a grimy, hand-shaped smudge around her mouth. She gathered her hair off her face and tucked it behind her ears. The sound of boots scuffing the hard floor drew near, and with it, the scent of burned meat.

The girl scooted behind him.
I’ll get the gun. You shoot him, you’re a better shot.

He gave her a pathetic stare.
This isn’t a video game. I don’t want to kill people for real.

Shani glared.
They’re trying to kill us! You won’t get in trouble.

Both kids froze as a charred man rounded the corner of an enormous air-handling unit. The September chill had it running; the mechanical thrumming drowned the noise of their breathing. His handgun glinted in the dim basement light as he searched. A patch of skin showed through a burned swath of shirt. Most of his hair was gone. One fuchsia spike was all that remained of a once- grand mohawk. Smoke still peeled from his leather vest and pants; a portion of his right boot had melted to his leg. Anger and frustration conspired to keep his face in a perpetual state of twitching.

He strained to see in the dark, facing right at them. Aiming left and right, he advanced while peering every few steps under a pipe or duct to either side. Shani’s fingers dug into Evan’s side. He held on to her just as tight, staring agape at the approaching thug. The sight of Nila throwing a fireball almost got him caught when he stood there gawking. She had told them to run: probably meant outside and keep going, not go to the basement.

He can’t see us
,
don’t make a sound and he’ll go right by.

Shani, hearing his telepathic voice, looked at him.
Okay.

Evan stopped breathing as the thug came within four feet of them, still peering into the dark. Shani stared at him, head on Evan’s shoulder. The man leaned forward, swaying his head from side to side.

“There you is. I see pink.”

Shani trembled.

He’s lying.
Evan’s firm grip told her not to move.
He’s trying to scare us.

Lips twisted to an anticipatory grin, twitched, then flattened into a sneering frown. “Little bastard,” he grumbled. “Yo, Roy, you got anything by the stairs?”

“Ain’t seen shit,” shouted a deep voice from far away.

“I know yer down here, ya little shits.”

“Yo, Parrot, hurry the fuck up before that freaky fire bitch gets here.”

The man less than three feet from Evan gestured to his side at the darkness with his gun arm. “Aww, man, don’t worry about her. The crew’s gonna treat her real nice.”

Shani squeezed Evan’s side, almost hard enough to make him yell. He turned his head toward her, eyes still on the ganger for all but the two seconds it took to send a telepathic message.

Your mom’s badass. These morons won’t hurt her.

Evan jumped as the thug took a step, boots peeling away from the sticky floor. When he had gotten too far to the right to see, the boy stood up and hauled Shani after him. He held a finger to his lips in the universal gesture for “don’t make a damn sound”, and crept out from under the pipe nest.

Evan gripped her hand as he led her along the outer wall through the shadow of the HVAC unit. He shuddered from the sensation of sticky chemical slime squeezing between his toes as each step peeled away from the floor. He looked down, cringing at the dark gunk on his feet. Shani, her face twisted with an expression of disgust, bit her lip.

Sorry for opening the door. Are you mad at me?

No, they would have kicked it down.
He looked right, left, and up.
We could climb up on top. They’ll never find us before your mom realizes where we are.

I don’t like it down here, it’s scary and eww.
She unstuck one foot from the floor.
We’re gonna get sick.

Evan leaned around the edge of the machine, trying to get a look at the stairs almost sixty meters away. He settled back on his heels in the dark and looked at his friend.
There’s a man with a rifle at the stairs.

If we sneak up on him, I can get the gun and pull down his pants.
Shani grinned.

He smirked.
Why do you think they’re trying to kill us already?

Police don’t stop being police because the bad guys get mad at them.
She stomped her foot and her expression said she immediately regretted the feeling of it.

We’re not cops. We’re kids. If we get shot, my mom is gonna kill me.

A dull metallic clank made them jump. The thug had doubled back, perhaps hearing the faint pop of Shani’s gesture of annoyance. Evan clenched his hand around hers and sprinted through a patch of light where a passageway led between rows of steel behemoths. Noises from behind made him think the ganger gave chase, and he ran harder.

As he reached the far corner of the second machine, the substance on the floor went from sticky to slick. They lost traction and slid into a roll, tumbling into an array of spare pipes leaned up against the wall. Shani screamed at the shock of the sudden clamor of falling metal. Evan leapt on top of her to protect her, and took a falling pipe to the back of the head.

Pinned under a stunned boy and several dozen metal tubes, Shani could not resist the primal urge to scream “Mommy!” as loud as she could as the thug rounded into view and pointed his gun at them.

“Got you now, you little fu―” his words trailed off to a squeal as one of the pipes leapt up and smashed him between the legs with enough force to bend. The hit lifted him up on tiptoe.

The pipe clanked to the ground in the shape of a hockey stick. The ganger, gaping mouth drooling, landed on his knees. Shani looked at Evan, patting him on the cheek.

“Ev… Ev… wake up.”

“Ow,” he moaned.

She reached an arm toward the murderous thug, removing the gun from his weakened grip with ease. It spun through the air into her hand, and she stuffed it into Evan’s gut. He gathered it in a double-handed grip almost as a reflex, and pointed it at the man’s head.

“Leave us alone.”

The trembling ganger lurched forward, clapping his hand on the pipe that had felled him, glaring at Shani. “I’m… I’m gonna”―he gasped and panted― “take this fuckin’ pipe and I’m gonna jam it―”

Blam
.

A spout of blood sprayed from both sides of his right thigh.

“You got em, Parrot?” shouted the deep voice.

Parrot fell on his chin over the pipe, roaring and growling in a voice teetering on falsetto. “Oh, you little fucker… oh, I’m gonna… oh, yeah. So much pain. Magnitudes of pain. Infinite universes of suffering.”

Just for spite, Shani caused the pipe to whirl around and bean him. Parrot went to sleep.

Evan aimed high, and shot out a light.

“What are you doing?” whined Shani, sounding panicky.

“Hiding us.”

“I’m scared of the dark,” she whimpered.

He concentrated, trying to remember what Kirsten showed him. Within a few seconds, the world around him shimmered into a wavy sepia-toned nightmare version of reality.

Shani gasped. “Your eyes are glowing.”

“Shh!” Evan put his hand over her mouth again, lowering his voice to a whisper. “Don’t yell. Yes, they are. I can see in the dark. They’re right by the stairs.”

She grabbed his arm with both hands and pulled it down. “Won’t they see your eyes?”

This patch of floor was too slippery to stand on, covered in viscous fluid leaking from one of the machines. He crawled out of the mess of pipes, not bothering to attempt to get up until his hands found dry grit. After helping Shani to her feet, he shot out another light to darken the center of the basement. She jumped at the sudden bang.

“Parrot, what the fuck is going on?” The man with the deep voice moved away from the stairs, but only got two steps before someone came down behind him.

“The little bastard still down here?”

“Yeah, man,” said a deep voice.

“Where’s Parrot?”

“Yo, Zee. He’s searchin.’ He been shootin’ tho. Maybe he got em, maybe he just tryin’ to scare ‘em. Yo, I don’t like this, man. It ain’t right to do kids. What the hell did the little bastard do that you wanna pop him?”

Shani squirmed, trying to get her arm away from Evan’s crushing grip as he stared at the two men.

“Little fucker got me arrested. Do you have any fucking idea what that did to my rep, getting taken down by a fuckin’ little kid? I can’t show my face anywhere without getting god damned laughed at.”

“Yo, I’m just sayin’. You wind up in the tank again as a kid killer, you done. You only makin’ your rep worse.”

“You going chickenshit soft on me now, CB? Too many burgers?” Zee patted the man on the potbelly with three loud claps. “I’m gonna saw that little son of a bitch’s head off and mail it to his cop mommy with a camera drilled into his forehead so I get to see her face.”

“Man, you fucked up,” said CB.

Evan whirled and ran back into the basement, pulling Shani along.

“I hear you runnin’, brat.” The sound of Zee stomping forward echoed over a momentary pause in the air handlers. “Wanna make a deal? How bout I let your little girlfriend live if you come over here right now.”

Evan slowed to a jog, glancing back.

“You’re a liar!” shouted Shani, pouncing on Evan’s back.

The boy ran through a maze of passages, stepping over and around debris he had no trouble seeing. Zee chased; the strange echoes of him tripping and colliding with things giving little clue as to how close danger was.

A thick jumble of pipes connected a large cylindrical tank to the wall in a corner; creating a safe-looking refuge only a small child could fit in. Evan tugged on Shani’s arm, guiding her among the pipes before scooting in after her. She clung to his left hand as he kept the borrowed handgun raised and closed his eyes to hide the glow.

He cried. Fear mixed with the imagined reaction of his new mother finding him dead―if she was still even alive. Before the drug dealer and his men showed up at Nila’s apartment, he had been sick to the point of vomiting about Kirsten. Such an awful feeling of worry had taken him he could barely contain it. The image of the darkness devouring her wouldn’t go away.

Boots crunched in the dark. Shani’s face pressed into the back of his neck; she tried to use his shirt to muffle her breathing. Evan wanted his mother. A point of energy throbbed at the tip of his brain. He ignored the confusion and pushed at the thought.

Mommy! Help!

The clatter of a rifle striking the ground made him jump. He opened his eyes as a reflex, startling Zee who was only ten feet or so in front of him.

“What the fuck is that?” He squinted, aiming. “Oh, you little sneaky fucker. You’re one of them psionics, aren’t you?”

Zee, terrified, raised the gun at the kids. The look in his eyes said he did not want to give them any chance to do something to his brain. Shani snarled, causing Zee to lurch forward with a tug at his weapon.

“Ain’t fallin’ for that shit twice. I know your damn tricks now.” Zee showed off a metal forearm brace to which he had bolted the weapon, and then plucked at suspenders made from chains. “Time to die.”

Growling, Shani clawed her little fingers through the air. Zee’s arm wobbled as she pushed his aim off to the side. He shot the ductwork. His face swelled red with blood and inflated veins. A series of exertive grunts slipped through his teeth, mixed with a liberal amount of curses. Zee grabbed his forearm with his left hand and strained to bring the weapon to bear. He overcorrected, putting a bullet into a fan motor on the other wall.

Evan took aim. For a half-second, he pondered giving Zee the opportunity to surrender. The murderous rage in the man’s eyes directed at Shani scrubbed the thought from his mind. He squeezed the trigger. Three shots slapped into Zee’s chest, staggering him. The hard metal clack of bullets hitting the concrete followed a trickle of blood from the corner of the thug’s mouth. The force pushing his arm away added to the shock of his armored vest taking three rounds. Zee whirled in a full three-sixty, almost aiming at the children again before Shani pushed his arm straight up.

She sniveled from the exertion as well as terror.

Evan shot him again.

Clack
. The ricochet hit distant pipes, clattering and clanging.

He aimed up, trying for a head shot, but missed due to trembling hands.

Shani panted, shaking. Zee growled, bringing his arm down, overpowering her. As the drug dealer’s aim leveled off, Evan slid in front of Shani.

“Don’t look, Shan…”

A streak of green light burst through Zee’s chest, igniting the armor as it split open. Another pierced his head, leaving two smoking points. Shani’s now-unopposed effort flung Zee onto his back. Nila moved out of cover and jogged over, lowering her E-86. She shot Zee once more through the chest. Smoke poured from his dead mouth.

Nila aimed at the corpse. “Drop it, asshole.”