Worm, page 164
We headed straight for the bedrooms. I wasn’t expecting to see what I did.
There must have been fifteen of them. Kids, none of them older than ten, some as young as four. There were three to a bunk, sitting up or lying down. Charlotte was with them, the eldest.
“Don’t be mad,” she said, in a small voice.
“Mad?”
She spoke quietly, as if the kids wouldn’t hear, “I didn’t know where else to take them. Sierra said we had to hide, that Mannequin was coming. I saw him killing people without even moving. He went after families, but he was focused on the parents, not the kids. He killed them and let the kids run—”
“Stop.” My voice was harder than I meant it to be. “I don’t want to hear it.”
This is my failure.
“I didn’t know where else to take them.”
“You did good,” I said. I sounded like Burnscar did. No emotion behind the words. “Someone else should have come here. A girl or a woman, probably with an escort.”
Charlotte didn’t answer, but moved aside.
Genesis.
Genesis slept on one of the bunks I’d set aside for my employees. Her face was contorted in an expression of concern. Average looks, if a little round-faced, she had long eyelashes, and her auburn hair was a mop.
She had to sleep to use her power. Could we afford to disturb her? If we tried to move her and she woke up, would it mean taking her out of the middle of a fight where she could do something to Burnscar or Mannequin?
“Where are the rest of my people?” I asked.
“Sierra divided us into teams and sent each of us in a different direction, telling us to get people to evacuate. I almost ran right into Mannequin. I hid and saw him attack.”
I felt out with my power, sticking exclusively to the building interiors, to avoid inadvertently barbecuing my bugs and frittering away my resources. I used the bugs in the area to try to get a headcount. The geography and the spread of people in this area was becoming familiar to me. Very few were still alive and in this area. Too many had died. How many bodies were there? Thirty? Forty?
I didn’t want to think about it.
“Charlotte, did you come in through the front door or the other entrance?” I asked.
“Front door. I was thinking about taking these kids and running for it, but I didn’t know if you’d want—”
“Secrecy is not that important right now. Take them down to the storm drain and stay there. It’s more or less fireproof, it’s not going to collapse on their heads, and it’s a better hiding spot than this.”
It seemed like getting orders invigorated her. “Okay. Come on, guys. Get ready, shoes on, this way.”
The kids began to get sorted and follow Charlotte’s instructions as she herded them out of the room, staying by the door to ensure nobody was left behind. There were no complaints and there was nothing like chatter or crying from the kids. How many of them had watched their parents die for them? They were so stoic, or shocked.
Grue looked at me, “What are you thinking?”
“They take cover, we stay. I’m going to try to use my swarm to get a sense of where Genesis is and how the fight’s going. The second things go south or this area gets too dangerous, we get her out of here.”
“You’ll need this,” Charlotte said.
I hadn’t noticed it with all the people in the room. At the foot of the bunk, in the corner of the room, there was a folded up wheelchair.
Can’t ever be easy.
“That might complicate things if we have to run for it,” Grue said.
I didn’t have a response to that.
Charlotte left with the kids, and we took the time to manage our wounds. I headed into the ground floor bathroom to run cold water over the burns on my legs and back. Grue sat on the toilet’s lid and began gathering the necessary things from the first aid kit.
My power found Genesis, but only briefly. She was big, some sort of flying pufferfish with a hard exterior and tentacles. It was a hard image to piece together. She floated slowly over the streets, and the bugs that I had on her died as Burnscar pelted her. I tried to send some bugs after her, but she disappeared into the side of a burning building as they approached. I tried and failed to find where she’d teleported to. Frustrating. Whatever her destination, it was a place my bugs couldn’t touch, so I had to wait for her to move away or start attacking from another vantage point.
Nearly half a year ago, I’d gotten my powers when I was trapped in a locker, wanting to be anywhere but where I was then. I’d reached out, my mind extending out for something, anything to distract me and draw my focus away.
I wasn’t trapped in a locker, but I felt very close to how I had then. Except it wasn’t the feeling that I was trapped. My power’s range hadn’t increased. It felt like that in a different way.
“We can’t do this,” I said.
“Hmm?” Grue had torn open his pants leg and was suturing one of the cuts.
“We can’t endure this. We won’t last.”
“We got unlucky and took the brunt of it. We’ll get a breather.”
“Will we? These guys are experts in preying on weakness! They’re going to target us and come after us until we can’t defend ourselves, they’ll kill us, then they’ll go after Panacea, or Armsmaster, or Hookwolf, or Noelle, and they’ll do the same thing!”
“Taylor.”
I pushed myself to a standing position. “They’re going to do the same thing they’re doing to us, and they’re not just going to win. They’re going to ruin everything while they do it!”
“Stop!”
I hobbled past him, and he grabbed my wrist. Between anger and the fact that my sleeve was wet with the water of the shower, I managed to rip my hand from his grip. “Don’t. Don’t do that.”
“What do you think you’re going to do?”
“I’m going out there. They’re just bullies. They’re powerful, they’ve got every advantage, but that’s all the more reason we can’t let them get away with this. I’ll bait them out, or find where they’re hiding. I can take Burnscar down if I can get the right bugs to bite her, or sting her enough times. I just have to do something. I can’t just stay here and let them get away with this.”
“You’re so hurt you can barely walk. If they find you, you won’t be able to run.”
“Sick of running.”
He stood and followed me. He got ahead of me despite the fact that he was probably hurt worse than I was. I ducked around him, and he pushed me against a wall. “Don’t do this. If you want to get revenge on those guys, if you want to help your people, you need to stop, rest, recover and plan.”
I struggled briefly, but the pain in my ribs and the burn on my back made that far more trouble than it was worth, and it was already pretty futile.
Hated this. Hated feeling weak, even if it was Grue I was comparing myself to.
My bugs alerted me to movement from Genesis. I didn’t say anything to Grue, and simply waited as she grabbed her wheelchair, unfolded it and transitioned into it, before wheeling out into the hallway.
“Did we wake you?” Grue asked.
“No. I can’t be woken by anyone except myself if I’m like that. It’s more like a coma than sleep. You were watching me?”
Grue and I nodded. He must have felt self-conscious, because he backed off, letting go of me. I did note that he positioned himself between me and the end of the hallway. I wouldn’t be able to run for the cellar or the front door without going past him.
It didn’t really matter. He was right. Maybe I would have gone on if he hadn’t stopped me, using my anger and frustration to drive myself forward until I got myself killed. Grue and Genesis had, in their individual ways, interrupted that. I felt simultaneously angry at him and embarrassed that he’d had to stop me.
“What happened?” I asked Genesis, trying not to look at Grue.
She glanced between the two of us. “Realized Mannequin was using a gas, got a form together to fight that and occupy him, like you recommended, but he wasn’t there when I reformed. Burnscar was.”
“Mannequin forfeited his turn. Burnscar went up next,” I explained.
“Ah.”
“You manage to stop her?” Grue asked.
“No. I wasn’t prepared to fight her, but she couldn’t really hurt me either. She left.”
“Can you get a body together to fight the fires?” I asked, hugging my arms against my chest.
“I’ll try. My reserves are low.”
“Thank you.”
“I’m sorry I wasn’t able to stop them.”
Grue got his phone out while Genesis retreated back to her bunk. I made my way upstairs to curl up in the armchair.
So many dead because I couldn’t save them. I felt doubly guilty because my reasons for regretting their deaths were partially selfish. It was a deathblow to my plans to seize my territory, earning Coil’s respect and make inroads into saving Dinah, one way or another.
I took off my mask and let it drop to the ground. My costume, I saw, was in tatters where it had burned.
Our enemies were good, they were smart. Mannequin had been toying with us, and we’d taken that advantage and beat him to the ground with it. But every action was calculated. Cherish was informing them, Shatterbird was apparently smart in other ways, and Jack was the brains of the operation.
Had Jack calculated things so everything would play out the way he wanted, like Mannequin was?
Grue appeared at the top of the stairs. “Bitch isn’t replying. We should go look for her.”
“Okay.”
“You okay?” Grue asked.
“Pissed.”
“Me too. Though I get that you have more reason to be angry.”
“I just—” I stopped, clenching my fists. “I don’t—”
I blinked back tears. Fucking contact lenses.
He wrapped his arms around me in a hug.
My face was mashed against his shoulder, his grip was too tight, my back was sore where his hand touched a spot near the burn. There was also that mess of awkwardness from when I’d confessed my feelings for him, that now seemed so minor and distant compared to everything that was going on.
“We’ll get through this.”
“No,” I said, pulling away, “Not like this, we won’t. We fight them every time they come, we’re going to be worn out, exhausted from always being on our guard, and if these past fights have been any indication, we won’t make it through eight rounds of this.”
“The way you phrase that, you don’t sound like you did in the shower.”
I shook my head. “No. Because I’ve realized Jack wants us to focus on each of his people, one by one, because he knows it’s going to play out like it has so far, and that we won’t make it through eight rounds of this. Let’s change that dynamic. We take out testers before they get their turn. We go on the offensive.”
“Offensive? Dinah said that a direct attack would be suicide.”
“So we go for the indirect attack. They want to play dirty? Let’s play dirty back.”
Snare 13.5
Bentley had been turned on his back, and Sirius had one side of Bentley’s ribs in his jaws, pulling. Bitch was holding the other side, tugging on it with her entire body in an effort to pull it apart. Bastard was chained to a streetlight, lying on the ground with his chin on his front paws. He had shrunk from the size he was before.
She’s alive. After Bitch had gone incommunicado, I’d worried Burnscar had gotten ahold of her.
The flesh of the bulldog’s monstrous form was decaying, sloughing off and putrefying into a liquid slop over the span of seconds. As the tissues connecting the bones disintegrated, they became loose, bending in place. Bitch was trying to get the ribcage apart before the remainder of the flesh collapsed in on the dog’s real body.
“Found her,” I spoke into my phone as I hurried towards her, my rain boots splashing. “Yeah. Contact the others about meeting.”
The pain in my legs made me gasp if I stretched my foot out the wrong way, and each gasp only triggered the pain in my ribs. The air was heated, though there were no fires in the immediate area. The hot, smoke-filled air combined with the pain in my ribs to punish even my shallower breaths.
“The fuck are you doing here?” Bitch asked.
I drew my knife and held it by the blade, extending the handle towards her. “Helping.”
She didn’t respond, but she took the knife and climbed partway into Bentley’s body to start cutting him out of the protective sac. I stepped in and used my shoulder to help leverage the ribcage open. My legs screamed with the strain, but I could deal with the pain. It would be better to suffer some pain than let Bitch get crushed inside Bentley’s chest cavity.
She climbed out with the bulldog draped over her arms, falling to her knees the second she was free. She laid Bentley down on the ground.
“Is he okay?”
She checked. “He’s breathing.”
“Good.”
Her eyes narrowed. “Don’t act like you care.”
“I do care.”
“Fuck you. You heard what that psycho whore said and now you think I like you. I don’t.”
“I’m not thinking anything along those lines.”
“You’re probably already trying to figure out a way to use it against me. Fucking hate people like you. Manipulative, two faced—”
“Hey!” I shouted, cutting her off. Sirius growled at me.
Bitch brandished my own knife, pointing it at me. “Do you know how much fucking simpler my life gets if I get rid of you?”
“It doesn’t. You might get the Nine off your case for a few days, but you’d be facing every test after that all on your own. Believe it or not, I’m on your side. I want to help you through this mess.”
“Don’t bother. Go, leave.” The knife didn’t waver.
“I’m not going anywhere unless you’re coming with me.”
“Getting cocky because you think I can’t cut you. Don’t forget that you can be chewed.”
I gave Sirius a glance, making sure to keep my head still so I didn’t give off any sign of hesitation or doubt.
“If you were going to hurt me, you would’ve done it while Burnscar was threatening you.”
“I don’t like being told what to do, so no, I wouldn’t have.”
I doubt that, I thought. You don’t like being told what to do by a stranger, maybe, but I’d bet you could be happy if you had a stable environment and consistent leadership. “If you carry out their tests and join them, they’ll be telling you what to do for the rest of your life.”
“I don’t care about the test!” she shouted. I could see Sirius tense, ready to attack. “I just want to be left alone!”
“I know the feeling.”
“You don’t know anything!”
“Screw that!” I jabbed a finger in her direction. “Maybe my life hasn’t sucked as much as yours did, but I’ve been there! I’ve been hounded every fucking day by people who only wanted to make me miserable! Every day, getting so tense that I’d feel like throwing up in the shower before leaving for school, and I’d have headaches before noon! I spent weeks hiding in the bathroom during lunch breaks because they wouldn’t fucking ease up on me!”
“Boo hoo. I could tell you what I put up with.”
I shook my head, and took a deep breath. I forced myself to calm down before I spoke. “I’m not interested in a pissing contest, Rachel.”
“Because you’d lose.” She poked the knife in my direction, as if to punctuate her statement.
“Because this isn’t a competition, and yeah, I’d lose. I’m trying to tell you that we’re not that different.”
She scoffed.
God, my legs and feet hurt. My ribs weren’t exactly sunshine and rainbows either. I felt like I had to do something to distract myself. If it hadn’t been my legs that hurt, I would have wanted to pace back and forth, or run, or something. I tried to focus on Bitch. “Fine. Don’t believe me. Here’s the nitty-gritty facts, then. You’re a member of our team. We need you, and whether you like it or not, you need us.”
She scowled. “I—”
“Don’t say you don’t. Don’t say you could manage on your own. You’ve seen these guys, and you’re not stupid.”
She looked down at Bentley, putting one hand in front of his snout, as if to check he was still breathing. “All you’re spewing out of your mouth-hole are words. You only want to help yourself.”
I wished there was something I could have hit, something I could have thrown. I settled for an enraged groan. “What’s it going to take to convince you!? Why can’t you understand that I can and have put myself in harm’s way for you? That despite all the shit between us and everything we’ve gone through, you’re my friend?”
“You are not my friend,” she didn’t look up at me as she uttered the words.
“Fine! I’ve accepted that. But you’re my friend, even if I don’t like you half the time. You’re my teammate. We’re similar. The only difference is that you went through your shit years ago, and I just got through dealing with mine a few weeks after I joined this team. We’ve traveled down the same paths. Whether you like it or not, we’re kindred spirits. We both struggle with the social—” I trailed off.
Bitch had reacted to something I’d said towards the end there, flinched, almost.
I sighed. This isn’t accomplishing anything. I looked at my territory. The plumes of smoke had turned the sky a gray-black in color, some of which glowed faintly orange with the reflected light of the fires. The occasional spark floated through the air from one of the fires that burned around a nearby corner.
She broke the lingering silence, “Coil told me that people would leave me alone if I got powerful enough. If I had allies, if I had money, if I scared my enemies enough.”
“When was this?”
“Before I joined the Undersiders. He didn’t tell me who he was. Left me a phone with some cash, then called me a while later. Fucking words that sounded good. Learned my lesson.”
She’d spent years on her own, on the streets with only the company of her dogs, running any time a cop or cape came after her. I itched to ask her if she’d suddenly had an increase in the amount of trouble she faced before she came to Brockton Bay. Trouble that could be precipitated by a certain ambitious supervillain?
