Quantum wrath, p.9
Quantum Wrath, page 9
Lu managed to conceal the fact that she had no idea what the woman was saying fairly well. She glanced at me for direction, though, and I just nodded behind the woman’s back.
“Mmhm,” Lu said in a surly voice.
“Rotten luck.” The old woman nodded sympathetically, and then she stuck her thumbs into her mouth and promptly popped off her dentures. Her next words were muffled and toothless. “Well, if you don’t mind…”
Lu looked like she was on the verge of decking this old woman, and I cleared my throat as I loomed over her.
Her pink eyes narrowed, but she pursed her lips and nodded at the old woman. She gingerly took the dentures between her fingers. As soon as the old woman’s back was turned, Blondie flipped me off with her free hand.
I just smiled blandly and directed our path toward the city.
It looked to me like we had a perfect opportunity here. This whole setup seemed both new and hodgepodge enough that it was unlikely for some type of reservations to be made ahead of time for housing. That meant that plenty of places should be up for grabs. And the fact that I didn’t have tons of baggage hadn’t seemed off to this old woman.
The looming, tower-like buildings were built in connected clusters on all sides. Skybridges like metal railway cars bridged them at different heights overhead. In other places, buildings actually came together and met over the street. It was all very Tokyo, especially after the supers started flocking there for the best brand exposure. But with a dash of gritty, organized crime vibes, less attempt at looking shiny and new, and potentially some magic on top.
As we headed into one of these tunnel-like roads, I kept a close eye on the glowing plants overhead for any signs of them being carnivorous or otherwise hostile. They curled and uncurled in a lively but innocuous-looking way, and they seemed free of the thorns of Venus Flytrap-like blooms I had seen on most carnivorous plants.
“Which part of the city are you headed to?” I asked the old woman.
“Senior housing,” she replied, and she tipped her head to indicate the corner she was about to take. A wry smile turned up her wrinkled face as she glanced back at me. “At least the Unit does that much for us. What about you two?”
“Haven’t decided yet,” I said with a look at Lu. “This place isn’t too familiar to us.”
“Well,” the old woman hummed thoughtfully. “If you’ve got the money, the central district might be your best bet. They’re not exactly upscale, of course, but my nephew stayed there recently, and he said it was alright. He’s a tall fellow like you, although not quite so…”
The woman paused for a moment and puffed her shoulders out with her fists balled up like a gorilla.
Lu seemed to guess the meaning behind this gesture. She hastily stuffed her knuckles in her mouth as she shook with giggles, and I sent her an irritated look.
“Anyway,” the old woman went on quickly. “He said it was the only place where his feet weren’t hanging off the bed. Thought that might interest you.”
“Thanks.” I came to a stop behind the old woman and waited while she rapped her knuckles on an arched brass door.
A small slot in the door slid open, and I caught a brief glimpse of two green, spectacled eyes squinting out at us.
Then the door swung open.
“Evening,” a trim man in a gray suit greeted us. He smiled at the old woman but then shot me a hostile look. “Seniors only.”
“Right.” I heaved the old woman’s bags into his arms without ceremony.
I suppressed a snort of laughter as the man grunted and staggered. He slung the bags over his shoulders and managed to recover his dignified expression, but it went right out the window again when Lu shoved the old woman’s slimy dentures into his hand. Then she reached up and snatched the handkerchief out of his pocket to wipe her fingers with.
Now, my hands were free to accept the nuggets of what looked like palladium that the old woman offered me.
Simple enough. I could work with that.
“Thanks,” Lu said jauntily, which made the little old lady do a double take as she tried to suss out what language she was using.
I gave the old woman a brisk nod, grabbed Lu by her shoulders, and steered her away.
“Can you try to behave yourself for two seconds while I find us a place to stay?” I snapped.
“Hmmmm,” she said in a long, drawn-out voice.
I shoved her into a nearby ally and blocked her in with my body alone.
“Listen,” I growled in a low tone. “You do not know this place, which means how they react to your language, your mannerisms, even your fucking tone of voice could draw the wrong attention to us. And before you tell me you don’t give a shit what they think, keep in mind that I can turn around, ditch your ass, and let you rot here at the drop of a hat for the rest of your life. So right now, what I think matters a hell of a lot. And I think you need to pipe down, keep your mouth shut with the locals, and let me figure out what this place is about. Understood?”
Lu pursed her pink lips and crossed her arms indignantly, but then she looked at my face and sighed in agreement.
“Since you asked me nicely,” she huffed. “So, are we headed to this central district?”
“Maybe.” I looked around as I took us back into the street and further into the city. “God, it smells horrible here.”
The smell was getting stronger the further into the city we got. When I glimpsed a cluster of dull, domed structures through the nearest buildings, I knew we must be near some sort of factory or plant.
I had no idea exactly what it was these people used for power, but it smelled like ass.
“Yeah, we’re cutting around this area,” I decided. “We might as well see some more of the city anyway.”
Lu nodded with a relieved expression, but it changed to wariness at the sound of footsteps pounding down the street ahead of us.
A reedy man barreled into the street we were on.
“Watch out!” he barked.
He dived behind me and then peered around my shoulder to see if he was being followed.
I resisted the urge to punch him in the face as I tensed and turned to see if there was a good escape route. Behind us, the street narrowed and took a sharp turn to the left.
But personally, I preferred to see what was chasing me before I decided to run from it, so I stayed light on my feet and gripped Lu’s arm like a vise while I waited.
She shifted her weight restlessly, but she kept her pink eyes glued ahead as well.
Then a thick black cloud of bugs came whirring around the corner. Green light from the plants winked off their iridescent, plated bodies as they descended toward us, and the acid-green stingers that dangled below them were horribly visible.
A collective quiver ran through the roiling dark cloud, and it descended toward us with a sound like a thousand tiny helicopters.
Chapter 6
I turned and sprinted down the street at top speed with Lu at my side.
A few people cowered and leaped out of our way as we hurtled around the bends. The others turned tail and ran, too.
Apparently, seeing a hulking dude like me running from something convinced people that it must be something they would prefer not to encounter at all costs.
None of the people were anywhere near a match for our speed, and I allowed myself to feel powerful for a brief moment as we raced past them like a pair of fucking cheetahs.
I stopped us after a ways and leaned against the wall to orient myself. Next to me, Lu paced like a caged animal.
“What the hell do you think that was?” she demanded.
“No idea,” I muttered.
The fastest of the other runners eventually caught up with us. It was two lanky teenage boys and a woman who appeared to be their mother, and they were all panting profusely.
“Fucking Gnashers,” one of the boys groaned as he collapsed against the walls.
“Gnashers?” I repeated with a frown.
The woman turned to me with a slightly intrigued look.
“Another northerner?” she murmured. “I swear to Zellyx, you’re coming in by the truckload… Gnashers are the little drones that are– or were, I guess– the Unit’s master scheme for getting rid of the burrowing wasps. They did get rid of them, but now they’re an infestation of their own. They burrow right into the pavement and metal and then eat it from the inside out like some type of godforsaken termites.”
“This place is going down the shitter more and more every time we come here,” one of the boys grumbled.
“Only place that’s really safe from the Gnashers at this point is anywhere near the Screaming Peaks,” the woman went on. “But those places are dangerous in their own way. The Peaks are dormant, but they haven’t been that way for long. Any day now, that whole place could turn to a pile of cinders. You’ve never been here before, eh?”
I debated on just ducking out of the conversation, but it seemed like a good opportunity to acquire some more information about this place, so I decided to play along.
“Nope,” I said with a glance at the city around us. “Sure seems like a shitshow so far, though.”
“It is,” the woman said grimly. “We’ve been here a few times already. Alvari’s practically right next door, so there are more Unit bastards here than most places, but they’re not so violent as they are in other cities, at least. Still, they come out in force and make life hell for people whenever they see fit. Watch out for them. I s’pose The Peaks are safe from the raids and whatnot, too, but if you ask me, it’s not worth having your face melted off by lava.”
Next to me, Lu tensed all of a sudden.
“Those freaky bug things are coming,” she hissed.
I tilted my head and listened, but I didn’t hear anything for a good ten seconds.
Then a menacing, droning hum reached my ears.
A few seconds later, it seemed to register with our companions, too.
“Nice meeting you!” the woman hollered over her shoulder as she took off running.
Lu and I swept past her in silence, and I didn’t slow down until we were a good five blocks away. The crumbled areas of the road had faded, and the buildings looked less corroded here. I could only vaguely hear the drone bugs in the distance, along with the frantic screams of citizens, and I sighed as I shook my head.
This place was a shit show.
“What was that all about?” Lu asked as she nodded back toward the people we had passed up.
I relayed the information to my devious companion. When I got to the part about the volcanoes, she responded with an unbelievably peppy grin.
“A dangerous volcano, you say?” she repeated. “Oh, that won’t be a problem.”
“What did you mean?” I asked.
“My power isn’t limited to just my voice,” she said with an insufferably smug look. “My hearing is incredible. Seismic stuff is no big deal for me.”
I guessed super hearing did make some amount of sense– Lu had heard the hum of the drones well before I had.
But still…
“If your hearing is that good, then how are you not driven insane by ordinary noises?” I frowned. “And, like… the nauseating sound of your own voice.”
“Don’t ask me.” She shrugged. “That’s just how my zenith developed. I do spend a lot of time tuning out sounds, though. It’s just a habit to me at this point. But seismic waves, even the super low-frequency ones, are definitely on my radar if I want to tune into them. That’s how I lived in Cali for so long without dying– I could hear the earthquakes coming way ahead of time.”
“Ohhh, ‘Cali,’” I snorted, and my eyes rolled so hard I thought they might exit my skull. Then I gave her a measuring look. “Why should I trust you on this volcano shit, though? Stronger supers than you have overestimated their own powers.”
She sighed dramatically.
“I’ll prove it to you,” she insisted, and then she lowered her voice to a whisper. “Right this very moment, there’s someone following us. No, don’t stop.”
“Why the fuck didn’t you say something before?” I growled softly as I continued walking.
“And take all the excitement out of things?” she asked innocently. But then her playful expression flickered. “I learned a long time ago not to be too paranoid. Otherwise super-hearing loses all its fun. They might not reeeally be following us. Y’know? It doesn’t pay to be looking over your shoulder constantly.”
My hands clenched into fists, but I slowly uncurled my fingers and walked on casually. I kept my weight on the balls of my feet, though, and every one of my senses was on the alert.
“I’d say it’s someone pretty lightweight,” she guessed. “Wearing some type of boots with thick soles. Watch, I bet they’re going to try and take us in this alley.”
We were approaching the alley in question at a brisk pace, and I decided we might as well go inside. So far, I’d seen no signs that the people here had senses parallel to ours. We’d probably be able to see a hell of a lot better in the dark alley than any attackers would, unless they happened to have some tech on them that we didn’t know about.
But again, rolling the dice was fun like that sometimes.
We were about five steps into the alley when the sound of footsteps finally became audible to me. They were light and shuffling, but they turned into quick, heavy thuds as our pursuer got closer and abandoned their caution. They were right on us now.
I did a swift turn at the last second and jammed my knee into the attacker’s gut. Lu had been right about it being someone lightweight– the guy would’ve flown back like a ragdoll if he hadn’t snatched onto my coat.
His breath smelled foul like rotten eggs, but with a cloyingly sweet element that almost made my eyes roll back in my head. I bit back the urge to recoil and drove my fist into his nose instead. Bone snapped under my knuckles as easily as tissue paper.
The man screamed, and a blast of nightmarish breath overwhelmed me.
Then the sound of mad giggles filled the alley. The man let out a choked grunt as Lu’s foot hammered into his kidney. There was a soft swish as she yanked her knife from its sheath and held it to his throat.
“Slow down,” I growled and dealt her an elbow to the ribs.
I shoved the man into a cross-choke and ignored the horrible stench of his breath.
“What the fuck do you want?” I snarled.
“T-tress,” he rasped. His eyes were glazed over, and his lips were cracked and bleeding. Blood trickled from his broken nose and into his slack mouth. “Need… Tress… Or… water…”
I gave the man a quick once-over. He was dressed in rags, and he was practically skin and bones. Now that I looked more closely, I found myself surprised that he’d even had the ability to mount any kind of attack at all.
Why had this scrawny bastard decided it was a good idea to attack the biggest, scariest dude in the street?
His eyes glazed over even more as I held him there, and he started to nod off like he was falling asleep. Despite how weak he was, one punch shouldn’t have had him swooning. I’d technically held back a lot.
What the hell was going on with this guy?
I took the time to glance down at his bare forearms. I’d been to a dimension called Sytactus where drug addiction had been just as rampant as obsession with advanced technology, and people had been willing to do anything to get their hands on the addictive shit. Maybe this ‘Tress’ was something similar.
I didn’t spot any track marks on this guy like I had on those people, but then again, there were plenty of ways of ingesting drugs. And even with needles, you couldn’t always tell. Well-to-do people in Sytactus had taken to shooting up between their toes to avoid any visible marks.
But I wasn’t about to give this fucker a full-body inspection, so I just shook him roughly and got up in his face.
“What the fuck is Tress?” I asked.
He shook his head and groaned blearily.
“Fine,” I said shortly. “Time for you to fuck off.”
“Or else we’ll make you,” Lu told him with a cryptic smile.
I shoved the man away. He stumbled to the ground and laid there with his back against the wall.
“So, you were telling the truth about your hearing,” I said as we reentered the light of the glowing plants.
Lu shot me a gloating grin, and I rolled my eyes.
“Also…” I added with a dark look. “Do you really have to giggle like that every time you’re in a fight?”
“Yes,” she said stubbornly. “It creeps the fuck out of people, it’s one of my signature calling cards. And anyway, it helps me sense people better in the dark. I can see well enough– I am a super, after all– but my echolocation is like, next level.”
“Echolocation.” I came to a stop and stared at her with disbelief. “Are you shitting me?”
“Nope,” she sang. She snatched my hands and lifted them to her temples. “Feel these?”
I grudgingly allowed her to press my fingers against the soft skin there for a moment. Underneath it, I realized there was something that protruded slightly, but it shifted and wobbled under my hands.
“Uhhh.” I pulled my hands away. “I guess. What, you have magic jawbones?”
“Those aren’t bones,” she said in a voice of utmost patience. “They’re special bursae that help me echolocate. So when I’m laughing, or making any noise, really, it’s sending signals to me, and–”
“But giggling, though?” I asked with a snort. “Why can’t you just click like a goddamn dolphin or something?”
“Click?” Lu furrowed her brow at me. “That would be so boring. And like I said, it’s my calling card. It’s appropriately terrifying for a villain like me to have a signature move like that, and I honestly don’t think I could help it if I tried. Hunting people, it just gives me this…”
“Evil, maniacal glee,” I finished.
“Right.” She smirked. “So, I think a better question is, why wouldn’t I giggle?”
“Yeeeah,” I exhaled.
On some level, this was actually sort of fascinating. The mechanisms behind most supers’ powers weren’t too well-known. I wondered how Lu had discovered this. On her own, or under the coercion of some Bureau researchers? Maybe her past was darker than I’d thought.
