The Indestructibles (Book 4): Like A Comet Read online

  "That's my sword, she's holding it, and you're getting your coat," Doc said.

  "Bring Sam. Bring Alley Hawk!"

  "Sam isn't up to it, and Alley Hawk's gone radio silent since he captured the Vermin King," Doc said. "Kate's been checking in on him. You're up, sunshine. Coat."

  Henry sighed, shoulders sagging dramatically.

  "Fine. Is he still… " Henry trailed off.

  "Bring a warm coat," Doc said.

  As the two older heroes argued, Bohr gestured to Emily and to the glove she still wore.

  "How did that work out for you?" he said.

  Emily turned her gauntlet-encrusted hand back and forth a few times, inspecting it.

  "Could use some adjustments, but it got the job done. Ka-blammo," she said.

  Bohr held out his hand and she pulled the glove off and handed it to him. He flipped open a control panel near the wrist and studied it. "We might have some better options for you if you—"

  Before Bohr could finish, Doc interrupted.

  "Em, Henry and I have to step out. Tell Jane to stay on high alert in case the prisoner decides to try to escape," he said. "I know she wants to try to reason with them, but I don't want anyone taking any chances."

  "You realize you just asked the least responsible team member to rein in the most responsible team member, right?" Emily said.

  "Desperate times call for desperate measures," Doc said. "We'll be back."

  He shot Bohr a vaguely threatening look.

  "We can talk tech when we get back. Not before," Doc said.

  Henry waved an apologetic hand at Bohr, seemingly to say—do as he says, sorry.

  Doc turned back to Henry.

  "Coat."

  Henry sighed heavily again.

  "Office. Fine. It's in my office."

  The two veteran heroes walked away, leaving Emily standing beside Bohr in the hall.

  "Hey Doc, you forgot your…" Emily started to say, then held up her empty hands. The sword had disappeared. "Curses. Foiled again."

  She smirked at the suddenly anxiety-riddled Bohr.

  "You said you had other toys I could test out?" she said.

  "That man scares me," Bohr said.

  "Doc? He's a teddy bear," Emily said.

  Bohr just blinked nervously at her.

  "Fine," Emily said. "Gimme my glove back. I need to go tell our best-behaved Indestructible to behave herself."

  Chapter 29:

  Good cop, bad cop

  Kate watched Jane from the shadow of a half-opened door in the Labyrinth's detention area. Jane had pulled a pair of sweatpants with the Department's log on the leg over the leotard of her battered uniform and replaced her one remaining boot with a pair of inmate-issue socks, then sat in front of a set of monitors, cameras trained on their captive in his holding cell.

  The massive creature sat perfectly still, curled up on the floor with his knees pulled to his chest. The parasite clinging to him seemed to breathe at a different rate than the host body did, both creatures inhaling and exhaling slowly. The host's eyes barely blinked as he stared at the door of his cell. He looked like a warrior, whatever he had been in his previous life, before being enslaved by the Nemesis parasite—craggy brow, scars across his entire upper body, a chipped fang visible in his jutting lower jaw. It made sense, Kate thought; if the Children of the Elder Star were working, knowingly or not, to build better host bodies for these aliens, it would be logical that they took with them from previous worlds they'd destroyed the strongest and most resilient examples of those species. Kate envisioned the approaching fleet filled with a rainbow of aliens, all the most violent and powerful versions of their civilizations. All coming here, prepared to battle.

  As much as I love a good fight, Kate thought, I really don't want to see them get here.

  Kate pushed the door open the rest of the way.

  Jane didn't turn to greet her.

  "Hello, Kate," she said. "You could've come in five minutes ago."

  "You knew I was there?" Kate said.

  "My super-senses are getting stronger," Jane said. "I could hear your heartbeat."

  "That's… disconcerting," she said.

  "Try realizing you can hear individual heartbeats and then we can talk about things being disconcerting," Jane said. She finally turned her eyes to Kate. "How are you?"

  "How am I?"

  "We've hardly had a chance to say hello to each other since you came back," Jane said. "I missed you."

  "Nobody misses me," Kate said.

  "Well, it was weirder without you here," she said.

  "That sounds more accurate," Kate said. She tapped one of the monitors. "Has he done anything?"

  "Nothing at all," she said. "I can't tell if he's catatonic, he's meditating, or he's trying to put us into a false sense of security so we'll make a mistake…"

  "We should talk to him," Kate said.

  Jane gave Kate a doubtful look.

  "I don't think he speaks English," Jane said.

  "I speak four languages."

  "Or French or Japanese or… what's the fourth one?" Jane said.

  "Spanish."

  "Or Spanish," Jane said.

  "What's the worst that can happen?" Kate said. "He attacks and kills one of us? Let's speak to him."

  Jane paused as if she were going to say no, but she got up out of her chair and headed for the door.

  "If this goes at sixes and sevens I'm telling everyone it was your idea," Jane said.

  "Why wouldn't you?" Kate said. "It was my idea."

  * * *

  The cell holding the alien prisoner was larger than most in the Labyrinth. One of the technicians had made an off-handed comment when the team brought the creature in about this cell being "designed especially for" something or someone, but Henry Winter made a gesture across his own throat at the tech and the young man went silent. Kate wondered what threat it had originally been crafted for, and if it was, in fact, strong enough to hold the being now locked inside.

  The door she and Jane used to enter, however, was still normal sized. It opened with a heavy thud, letting the greenish interior light spill out. Next to the entrance, a Labyrinth guard who had introduced himself as Two-Ton Tony warned them to make for the exit if things seemed to be getting out of control and they'd pump the room full of anesthetic gas.

  The alien inside, however, seemed anything but out of control.

  Tall enough that sitting on the floor he was nearly at the same level as both Kate and Jane, the creature did not react as the women walked up to him, not even with his eyes. Kate observed those organs with curiosity. Funny that we both have eyes, she thought. Not that we can see, or that we have optical organs, but that we have two spheres, in our heads, pointed forward, to observe the universe with. It seemed like a stretch that human and alien would be so similar. But then Jane had described the aliens she and Emily fought in the desert who hadn't been nearly as human-like, and the parasites themselves were so strange they didn't seem to fit firmly into a category of animal or vegetable, and had no outward indications of how they took in information around them. Maybe the Nemesis creatures preferred to find aliens who were like humans. Maybe they sought those species out specifically.

  Kate waited for some sign from those eyes. They certainly did not look human. Yellowish, and made up of rows of circles inside rather than a single iris, Kate found herself curious what the design differences meant. Did he see dozens of her? Did those circles provide some sort of extrasensory peripheral vision? Or were they just cosmetic? The art of biology?

  Jane knelt down in front of the alien to better look at him.

  "I don't know what you can hear and what you can understand," Jane said. "But I want to talk with you. I want to communicate with you. Is there any part of you inside there who understands me?"

  The alien remained impassive, unmoving.

  "We don't want war. We just want to be left in peace. Is there anything we can do to make that happen?" Jane said,
again with no response.

  Kate wanted to judge her, to be annoyed by her desire to talk with this killing machine, but she found herself strangely inspired by it. Someone still needs to have a little bit of hope, Kate thought. I certainly don't have any. But this is Jane's job. To be the best of us. To look for that one remaining peaceful option. But Kate studied this creature's skin, the scars, the thick knuckles of its fists, and saw a being who had been through many battles long before the Nemesis fleet destroyed his world. This was a warrior. There was no surrender there. Kate imagined that his world, much like her own, refused to go quietly into oblivion. She thought about what it would be like to be like him, to be taken over, to have some alien parasite commanding her every move.

  She'd shared her mind with the Straylight entity for a little while, and Billy's Dude, while pushy and judgmental, had not been controlling. Never did Kate feel like she was no longer in charge. But these aliens… they looked defeated. They were like domesticated beasts.

  She thought, at least a little bit, that she might understand them.

  "You wish to be free," Kate said quietly. The alien didn't react, but she continued. "These monsters put a yoke on you and won't let go. I imagine this is worse than dying. You would have rather died fighting them than become a part of them. I understand that."

  The parasite twitched. And for the first time, the alien host blinked. No other movement, no other reaction, just a blink. But Kate could tell he was listening.

  "I'm sure you don't understand my words, but I bet that creature on your chest is translating my tone. And I'll say this. We'll set you free when this is over," Kate said. "I promise you that. Whether it's true freedom or just an honorable death, we'll do everything we can to help you."

  The alien blinked once more. The parasite pulsated faster, beginning to glow red inside, just slightly, softly.

  "We might want to step outside," Jane said.

  Kate nodded.

  "I know you can't help us," Kate said, not moving as Jane stood up and put a hand on her shoulder. Out of the corner of her eye, Kate saw Jane gesture to the cameras that Tony should open the door for them. "But if we survive this, I'll make sure you don't have to suffer any longer."

  The creature's entire body shivered, just once, as if it caught a chill. Jane pulled gently on Kate's arm, and Kate allowed herself to be led out of the cell. She looked back once and saw the alien's bright yellow eyes watching her. No longer blank, she thought. There was something there, behind them, some thought, some intelligence. Maybe it understood what she said. Or maybe the creature just found her voice annoying. Kate didn't know. She realized she never would.

  Kate and Jane stepped outside the cell and, as the heavy door closed with a loud metallic thud, Kate felt tension she didn't know she'd had release across her back and shoulder.

  "What just happened in there?" Jane said.

  "I have no idea," Kate said.

  "Well, something you said got its attention," she said.

  Kate shrugged, noncommittal.

  "We'll try again later," Jane said.

  Kate nodded. Before she could answer, their earpieces chirped simultaneously, Neal's voice filling their heads.

  "Designation: Solar, are you available?" Neal said.

  Kate and Jane exchanged a worried glance. They'd had the AI monitoring the skies for another incursion, and neither wanted to face a second round of enemy ships.

  "Go ahead, Neal. Is it another attack?" Jane said.

  "I do not believe so, Designation: Solar," Neal said. "I have picked up something you should be aware of however."

  "Don't keep us in suspense, Neal," Jane said.

  "Something is entering the atmosphere right now," Neal said. "I at first thought it was just a small meteor, but I noticed a unique energy signature."

  "Neal, spit it out," Jane said.

  "The signature matches that of a Luminae, specifically Designation: Straylight," Neal said. "But the object is not responding to my requests to identify itself. I suggest someone investigate."

  "Billy is falling out of the sky right now?" Jane said, her voice rising.

  "That is entirely possible, Designation: Solar," Neal said.

  "Where?" Jane said, her expression incredulous. She waved a perfunctory, polite goodbye to Tony at the controls of the cell and started walking away. Kate followed, curious.

  "The object, should it continue on its current course, should crash in… well, the City's downtown district," Neal said, sounding almost amused.

  "I'm on my way," Jane said. "Emily, are you online?"

  Emily's voice crackled in the earpieces.

  "Where are you? I'm over near the cafeteria. Nobody knows where you are."

  "I'm heading up to the surface. Meet me there. Hurry," Jane said.

  "OMW," Emily said.

  Jane shot Kate a worried look. Kate read everything there in the other woman's eyes—fear, concern, and most of all, a distinct request: do not go back inside the cell without me.

  "Go," Kate said.

  Jane nodded and broke into a run, her hair turning to flames behind her.

  Chapter 30:

  Trust/Fall

  To someone on the ground, walking through the City, they might have looked up into the sky and seen a shooting star cutting across the twilight, a white streak of light hurtling toward the earth, silent and harmless.

  Turning to the left, they might then see something even more unusual, a streak of fire, its trajectory putting it on a collision course with the shooting star. A meteor, burning up in the atmosphere? Something more nefarious? What were these things falling from the sky?

  The ball of fire, of course, was Jane, fist extended in flight, her eyes never wavering from the falling form she knew to be Billy. She could hear Titus on the earpiece trying to get Billy to respond, saying his name over and over again, receiving no response. He plummeted in a steady arc, not his usual playful darting about, and the closer Jane got, the more she thought the worse was happening. Why was he falling? Was he dead? Unconscious?

  "Come on, Billy Case, wake up," Jane said.

  She poured on the speed, getting close enough to make out Billy's shape within the ball of light. His limbs dangled loose, his shoulders slumping forward, head lolling against his chest. She pushed herself even faster. Now she could see the looseness of his hands, his closed eyes. Falling. Straylight was in free fall.

  "This game again, is it?" Jane said, aiming herself at the prone hero in front of her.

  "What was that?" Titus said into her earpiece, but Jane ignored him. She focused on one place: Billy's wrist, somewhere to grab hold of, to keep him from crashing. What would happen if he hit the ground? Jane thought? Would his shields hold, or would the impact kill him? Would the crash hurt anyone there in the City? What if he hit something explosive?

  Closer now, almost there, her hand outstretched, fingers extended, but he was falling so fast…

  "Em, where are you," Jane said.

  "Where are you?" Emily responded through the earpiece.

  "In the air, above the downtown," Jane said, gritting her teeth as she reached for Billy and missed.

  "Are you serious?"

  "Em I need some help here," Jane said.

  "I'm moving as fast as I can!" Emily said.

  Jane knew she was on her own, picturing Emily's tugboat-like flight puttering toward them. Once more she willed herself faster, felt a burst of fire explode forth from her feet, and she was there, reaching Billy, grabbing hold, catching his forearm in her grip. She lifted, feeling the tug of his weight against her shoulder, feeling his body shudder as it stopped falling too suddenly, his bright white aura mixing with the gold of her flames.

  She felt his hand grab hold of her wrist in response and looked down.

  His face was gaunt and hollow, the color under his eyes bruised. There were broken blood vessels across his cheeks. But he was smiling.

  "Hey, you," he said weakly.

  "Look what I fou
nd," Jane said.

  "You caught me," Billy said.

  "Just returning the favor," Jane said.

  "Pretty good aim considering I just fell from the moon, I think," Billy said. "I think my shoulder's dislocated."

  "I did that," Jane said, swerving around to start flying them back toward the Labyrinth. "You find what you were looking for out there?"

  "Jane," Billy said. "The stuff I saw out there."

  "Good? Bad?"

  "Everything," he said, still dangling from Jane's grip. "Good, bad, and everything in between."

  Chapter 31:

  Empathy Emily

  Bedlam couldn't believe she was getting bored already. Couple of near death experiences, fight a few aliens, and suddenly some hours in a quiet, secure location and she was ready to start climbing the walls.

  So she paced the Labyrinth, wandering wherever the signs and corridors would take her. She spent a little time looking over research with Titus, but then they got wind that Straylight was in trouble and everyone scrambled into action.

  So Bedlam hung around. Alone.

  Not quite part of the team yet, am I? she thought.

  She decided to head down to the infirmary, where she'd heard Jane had taken Billy after the rescue. Might as well get a look at him, see how things went. She was curious what he'd come across.

  When she got there, though, Emily sat in the waiting area, arms folded, as if expecting her.

  "Hello, Bedlam," Emily said.

  "Hello," she said, echoing her melodramatic tone.

  "I thought I might see you here," Emily said, with cartoonish suspicion.

  "Oh really," Bedlam said. "You a detective now?"

  Emily did a spot on impersonation of Benedict Cumberbatch's accent as Sherlock Holmes.

  "Consulting detective," she quoted. "Only one in the world. I invented the job."

  "You are so weird," Bedlam said.

  "We have to talk," she said.

  "About what?"

  "About the Billy thing," Emily said.

  "What Billy thing. There's no Billy thing."