Out of the Box 7 - Sea Change (19 page)

“God doesn’t think he’s you,” Steven finished. “And Jesus actually was persecuted, he didn’t just fantasize it. You just—I don’t know, maybe your mommy put your diaper on too tight.”

“I’m not a kid anymore,” Redbeard said, his voice sounding dangerously unhinged. Now there was sound coming from down the tunnel, beyond the shadowed pile of rubble that lay just past him.

“I figured you were actually still wearing diapers,” Steven said. Redbeard took a threatening step forward, and Steven fired a shot, eliciting a grunt of pain from Redbeard, who paused and whimpered before steadying himself. “I have seventeen more rounds in this puppy. How much skin do you think you’ll have left by the time you get over here?”

“How fast do you think you can aim, smart guy?” Redbeard asked menacingly.

Steven fired twice more, bringing Redbeard back to his knees. A third shot seemed to do nothing at all, and Kat realized Steven had fired at Redbeard’s body, hoping to find it corporeal. No such luck. “This is an exquisitely designed target pistol,” Steven said, voice heavy with admiration. “I can fire it fast enough that you’ll be walking on bone if you take a few more steps.”

“I won’t stop,” Redbeard said, tired but with a thin reed of craziness run through it; Kat was sure he was telling the truth.

“Neither will I,” Steven said, and he moved his left hand, something else clutched in it where he’d had it pressed against the butt of the gun. “Want to see me do a combat reload? I’ve been practicing.”

“You’re an … actor,” Redbeard said, thin disbelief oozing out like the blood Kat could see him tracking with every step. “A play artist. A bro from California who couldn’t find his balls if they got served to you in the middle of a plate of foie gras.”

“I’m method, mofo,” Steven said, voice hard. “And I’m from Alaska …
bro
. I’ve skinned grizzlies twice your size, and they had less shit in their fur, too.”

The sound of faint rumbling in the distance was growing louder, and Kat eyed the water above uneasily. It was just hanging there, after all, and had been for long, painful minutes. Was Scott losing control? Was it going to come surging in any minute now, dropping down on them all?

No … this was coming from further down the tunnel, a low sound like metal on metal, like—

“Oh, God,” Kat said under her breath.

“Yesssss,” Redbeard said, the pain vanishing from his face in an instant, replaced by rough satisfaction, his canines bared like he was a vampire about to feast.

“What?” Steven asked, not taking his eyes off Redbeard, keeping his aim level and steady in the dark tunnel, unflinching.
Because he doesn’t know
, Kat realized.
Because he can’t hear …

That somewhere in the near distance, a subway train was barreling down the tracks toward them.

Scott was lost in the mist rolling off MacArthur Park Lake, coming off it in waves like the cloud of dust that had flown from the explosion earlier. This time, though, it was a steady rush of humidity, the heat of the Los Angeles day running through the damp air. It was surreal, dreamlike, reminding him of times he’d run through the misting machines that were designed to keep you cool on the hottest day. For him, they had always held an extra power; a dose of refreshment that he didn’t understand until he’d manifested his powers.

“Bro,” the voice from behind him said, “you’re wearing out. How much water you gonna move before you pass out?”

The world shook around him like someone was giving the world a heavy shake. “As much … as it takes …”

“Uh huh. Yeah. This little thing you’re doing here—it’s not going to be enough to impress her. You know that, right?”

The world swam in front of Scott’s eyes as he tried to stare down into the depths of the lake, but the mist was too thick. “Who … what?”

“Sienna. You know this won’t get her back, don’t you?”

The throbbing in his head was like a drumbeat, like someone had started pounding on it with one of those pedal drums, a steady cadence that caused his skull to expand and contract with each hard thump. “I don’t … know what you’re talking about …”

“Sure you do.” There was a flash, and suddenly Scott could see people in the water, like he was watching a docudrama projected in it.

It’s like you don’t even care anymore
, his own voice said, dripping frustration the way the air was dripping moisture around him.
It’s like you’ve given up on anything but doing the job, putting your head down and trying not to get called on the carpet
.

What do you want from me, Scott?
Sienna fired back. She was all done up, hair styled in a way that it never was.
We have this same argument all the time, and I’m a little tired of it. You made your choice—

I chose to have a life!
he shot back, hot indignation pouring out, hotter than any of the other times they’d argued about this.
You, though, you’ve chosen to give all that up in order to—to what? Be the world’s meta policewoman?

Someone’s got to
, she said bitterly, her arms folded in front of her as if to protect herself from his words.

It doesn’t have to be you
, he said, the anger fleeing, replaced by fear, like this was the argument he couldn’t lose—couldn’t afford to lose.

She had a dead look in her eyes, empty of feeling.
There’s no one else
.

“Yeah, that’s the stuff,” the voice came again from behind him as the figures in the water vanished.

“I don’t know … what this is …” Scott muttered, the pain in his head overwhelming. The air was so thick with clouds that he couldn’t see anything, and the world had a red tinge to it, like blood was pouring out, mingling with the water vapor.

“It’s the past, idiot. It’s the place you’d be living—if you could remember it.”

With that, the clouds opened up below him and Scott could finally see into the gaping hole that had opened up when the bomb had blown up somewhere between the subway tunnel and the lakebed. It was long, like someone had reached in and rent the earth, displacing concrete and dirt, opening a cavity into the ground below. “It looks like an open grave,” he whispered to himself.

“It looks like a fine place to be put to rest, doesn’t it?” The speaker stepped up finally. Scott felt a cold tingle roll up his skin, and it wasn’t from the chill mist that infused the air.

The person who was speaking was himself, dressed in a suit and tie, the uniform he’d worn when he’d worked for the Directorate—and later, the agency.

“In fact,” the other him, the suited him, said, stepping up to the edge, “I think this is where I leave you.” He crossed his hands over his chest like he was in already in a casket, and fell backward into the darkness, disappearing below.

Scott fell to his knees at the edge of the abyss, the pain in his head finally too great to fight any longer. He dipped toward the darkness, losing his balance, tumbling in, just as the sound of something roaring and distant came rumbling along below like a train …

The sound of squealing brakes was like a knife to Kat's ears, like a scream in the night, and it tore through her with all the resonance of a gunshot. It echoed down the tunnel, losing some of its power at the open area just before them where Redbeard stood, his arms spread wide, as insubstantial as the misty light around him, waiting for the train that was coming—

“Come on!” Steven said, yanking her by the arm and pushing her toward the darkness of the tunnel. He was already scooping up Sienna, lifting her in his arms like the movie star he was, running down the middle of the tracks without a care for Redbeard or what he was doing.

“See you later!” Redbeard screamed as the train bore down. “I’ll catch you! You know I will! Next time we’ll have an audience and you’ll—”

The sound of the train hitting the concrete and debris from the bomb site was unmistakable, metal smashing against tons of obstruction, the echo in the tunnel like a hammer banged against steel, again and again, raised by a meta hand and turned against something that wouldn’t yield.

Kat ran faster than Steven, her meta speed granting her the power to outpace him with greatest ease. She tore off down the tunnel in fear for her life, bare feet slamming against the hard concrete floor. Bullet wounds she could heal. Broken bones she could mend.

A train running her over, though? That was a career ender.

She sprinted even as the sound of the crash started to recede, the tangling sounds of metal splintering, of concrete breaking under impact, of glass shattering faded in the distance behind her. She ran like she had a fire at her back, like it was chasing her away, like there was a flying man following behind her meaning her harm.

She ran as though her life depended upon it, and she did not stop until she heard Steven Clayton telling her to do so from very far behind her.

“Stop!” His voice echoed. It was light, airy, so far away it was almost inaudible. The sounds of the crash had faded, lost somewhere behind the bend in the track. Kat stopped and turned. There were lights on the wall now, still lit, enabling her to see once more. She blinked at the circular tunnel, at the faintly illuminated tracks at her feet. She stared, perplexed, wondering how far she had gone.

Kat turned and looked back. Steven was at least the length of a football field behind her, just coming around the corner in the distance now. He looked tired, out of breath, struggling under the burden that was Sienna. He clutched her close to his chest, and with a last look back, he stopped, setting her down in the middle of the tracks.

Kat ran back, hesitantly at first. What if Redbeard was waiting? What if he’d changed his mind? What if he’d decided he wanted to finish her anyway, was coming back even now to do the job?

Well, then she probably wanted to be near the guy who had the gun, didn’t she?

She ran back to Steven, who was hunched over Sienna now. She felt it when his demeanor changed, when he realized that something was truly wrong. Kat increased her pace, broke into a nervous run, her bare feet slapping as she ran, a sting of pain in her toes. She was leaving a trail of blood behind; she’d run holes in her feet and hadn’t even noticed in the rush to get away.

Kat closed on him, was ten feet away when Steven put words to the struggle he was going through. He was shaking Sienna, roughly, jarring her, trying to wake her, putting his hands on her cheeks and—

“Don’t do that!” Kat said, shouting at him like she was warning a child away from a hot stove. “Her skin!” He did not look up. “If you touch it, it’ll—”

Steven’s head snapped up, and she shut her mouth at the mere look on his face. It would have been enough to silence someone more forceful than her; anguish and fear rolled into one with more emotions lurking beneath the surface. It was pain, pure pain, of a sort that she recognized even at this distance, and it told her what he was going to say a second before he spoke, before he delivered the knife right to her soul.

“She’s not breathing,” he said, voice numb with shock. “She’s … she’s dead.”

The train crash was pure pleasure: the sound rattling off the walls of the tight tunnel, the screaming of metal and the crash—oh, yes, the crash itself—it was pure joy, the best present he’d gotten in years. Karl didn’t really think of happiness as an achievable possibility for himself at this point, but the sound of the wreck was as close as he could recall feeling it in so very, very long.

When it came crashing through, smashing aside the debris that his bomb—carefully left in the strata just between the tunnel and the bottom of the lakebed—had dropped into the subway, the train had jumped up and hit the remainder of the ceiling. It had been coming kind of fast out of the station, but not nearly fast enough. It hadn’t been exactly the kind of high-speed impact he’d hoped for, and when it came to rest, he was standing right in the middle of the first car, buried up to his chest in the floor.

The air in the car was damp, the mist pouring in from somewhere above—he still wasn’t sure what was going on up there, but that damned idiot Scott Byerly was responsible somehow, that much he knew. The train had lost a few windows, and the white clouds were coming in, giving the wreck a dark, moody atmosphere as the mist caught the reflection of the flashing red emergency lighting. The sound of water tapping against the roof was unmistakable.

“What … happened?” A woman asked from a few feet away. She sounded dazed.

Karl was standing with his hands parted, no part of him solid except for the bottoms of his feet, which hurt agonizingly from where he’d been shot. He’d clearly left too much of himself exposed, and that shitty actor had shot him for the mistake. His face throbbed where Sienna Nealon had smashed his nose and eyebrow, and he could taste blood mingling with the mist coming into the train car. “You wrecked,” he said simply.

The woman blinked at him in surprise, taking him in, all of him, from the waist up. “Are … are you all right?”

Karl looked right at her and smiled as he reached for his phone. “I’m fine.”

She looked around as though she were just waking up. Down the seat from her, a mother held her child tight to her chest, praying under her breath. Karl couldn’t hear the language being used, but the intent was clear. There were probably twelve people scattered around the car, minor scrapes, little injuries. Survivors with a story to tell of a harrowing experience.

“But this is so …” Karl lost the words, unsure of what he wanted to say. “Placid? Disappointing?”

“We’re all alive,” the woman said, staring at him, clearly not putting together what she was seeing with regard to his chest sticking out of the flooring. “We should be thankful.” She looked around, her dark hair almost black in the flashing red light. “Is everyone else okay?”

“There should be horror,” Karl said, thinking it through out loud. “Revulsion. Fear. We need to turn up the volume.”

“What?” The woman fixated on him, her eyes narrowed in the dark like she was trying to see him. “Did you hit your head?” She staggered to her feet, unsteady, like a baby horse, the floor tilted at an angle. She came over and peered at him, realizing for the first time that his body just ended at the floor. “What …?”