099 – Keyword

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An intense rush went over and through me. Hitting against my chest, forcing me to steel myself and keep an iron grip on the van’s cold, metal roof. A hard wind that sent shivers across my whole being.

It probably said something, that this kept my focus, centered me, to the point that I could get lost in it, because I had done that before. Danger, destruction. A void that I had come from and could easily slip back into.

The wind hit, and I shivered again. I smiled.

Speeding out of the alley, the vans immediately disrupted the oncoming traffic, tearing up the road and causing chaos. Cars swerved out of the way, tires screeching, people screaming. The drivers were good, they didn’t hit anyone or crash into anything, but they did leave behind a mess.

Over the initial wave of pandemonium, I yelled into the earpiece.

“We’re en route! The vans, or the hammers, are splitting up as we speak!”

I could hear D’s tiny voice in my ear.

“I can hear it from here. Could you not be so obvious about it, though? We need to leave through the same alley, too.”

The van drifted through an intersection, hardly losing any speed. I held on hard enough for the metal to bend.

“And you’ll get that, don’t worry!”

I almost heard the start of a whine, but a sharper horn cut through that, instead.

Cars practically leapt to safety, even if it meant endangering other people. The van I was on snaked between the different obstacles, sometimes just skirting past the metal of other vehicles, almost trading paint. It was so easy for this to go so wrong. A turn made too late, a driver panicking and skidding right into us… a collision would send me soaring before I crashed, myself. It was something I could walk away from, but that meant losing precious time, time that could be spent raising even more hell.

I wasn’t planning on staying on the roof of this van, however, I’d have to split up again. That was the point. But I needed more distance, we had to spread out more.

Another corner, turning even when the light was red. The squeals of tire on rubber pierced my ears as the van veered through everything and everyone. Another street.

The traffic was thinning out as we got farther away from the gala, moving through another part of the Eye. The metropolis still sprawled out, so we all had plenty of cover from buildings and alleys, back roads and some even improvised paths if we had to brute force it.

A benefit of being able to operate in the city, we were given a lot of room to work with. The vans and trucks would have the streets, while I had the rooftops. The verticality.

It wasn’t unlike having a canvas to paint on. We were in the process of making a picture. I had in mind a piece that Sarah had singled out, while we scoped out the gala ourselves. The image of anger, of broken fractals and harsh colors. Fire.

With the Fangs, I didn’t need a painting like that in my apartment. We could paint an even more vivid picture.

The van accelerated, and I didn’t budge or sway. I did, though, start to lift myself up, pushing so my feet were pressing more into the roof. My legs tensed, my arms tightened, my whole body coiling up and getting ready to spring.

I waited. People and cars scrambled to get out of our path, risking other lives to save their own, creating a sort of lawlessness that branched out and spread by itself, almost like a wildfire. The high pitched screams and squeaks were like the embers of a great flame.

One more turn, and then it was just us. The van, and me on top of it. The others were taking their own routes, forming their own branches. And I was to add to that, as well.

I yelled into the earpiece.

“I’m about to start! How’s Sarah and Lawrence?”

D answered.

“Same as you. About to start. The Fangs are right at the door, and Lawrence is about to signal them in. He’s got visual on at least one of them.”

Hearing that almost made me stumble off the van and onto the pavement.

“At least one of them?”

“The reporters. I can’t get anything else from Lawrence since he’s about to start. We’ll just have to make do.”

Words I didn’t want to hear so early on in this. We needed both reporters in order to consider this job complete, we couldn’t let either of them slip past us. And Lawrence only pegged down one of them?

I wanted to turn back and help Lawrence, maybe even protect Sarah if she’d need it. I wanted to, but I recognized that I couldn’t. That wasn’t what the job called for. If it was, I’d be there instead, hiding in the crowd, being another pair of eyes for Lawrence, bringing in some muscle if the situation called for that.

No. I could only help by doing my part, and that was here, away from the gala, leaving as much disorder as I could in the distance between us. And that distance was growing.

A lot of work to do.

“That’s fine,” I said into the earpiece, “We’ll make it work, we always do.”

“Do we? I’m kidding. Alright, cameras are on a loop and… there. Their communications will be all scrambly for a little. The Fangs are about to bite.”

Lawrence was looped into the call as well, but he couldn’t actively participate in our conversation. He was about to get on stage, ready to perform.

And so was I.

Now.

It was a synchronized moment in three parts. The van took a sudden turn, Lawrence shouted, and I took to the air.

I heard it in my ear, over the wind as I through it.

A harsh, digitized burst of noise, like static. The single warning shot of a gun.

And then Lawrence.

“Ladies and gentlemen, we are your entertainment for tonight.”

His voice sounded a touch more distorted than before, when he was among the attendees, mingling with them, pretending. If I got the timing of everyone’s part right, one of the Fangs would have passed him his mask by now.

First a costume, now a mask. Was he trying to give me competition?

The question soon passed from my mind as I headed to terra firma.

I hit the ground running.

“We’ll be putting on an amazing show for you, and we’re about to get right to it. But, before we do, may I ask for some volunteers?”

I jumped again, clearing more of the street, until my feet hit the sidewalk, running and pushing through a small group of passersby.

I couldn’t remember the last time, if ever, that I had brought myself down to this level while I was in the city, in my costume. Wearing the mask, being active, being so close to people who couldn’t even comprehend what I was capable of. Alexis and Blank Face, maybe, but not me, not V.

I remembered the Thunders and the Royals, when I had made my debut as V. It was a show for EZ and Krown, and for Gomez, when his cops came to clean them up. A warning, that we weren’t to be messed with, that we’d play, we would play for keeps.

Now, we were going to send out another warning. This time, it was for everyone else.

Confusion gripped the men and women I knocked over, stunned at what was happening and what to do in response of it. Perfect. Cause a big enough mess, and people would take too long in making sense of it all. Reports would conflict, the point of origin would be harder to pin down, and first responders would be slowed by a significant margin, forced to tackle things at the edges of that mess, first. By the time the smoke cleared and the glass got swept away, it would take even longer to find what started it all, to find any connection.

Cause a big enough fire, and the source gets swallowed up, too.

Finding an alley, I dipped into it, jumping up a fire escape to I hauled myself over a building. I crossed the roof, then the street, then another roof.

Lawrence continued with the show as I moved.

“No one wants to step up? That’s… that’s quite alright, I can just call on you from the audience. Let’s start with, Alan Gordon!”

Lawrence started listing names. We didn’t have access to a guest list, but we didn’t need one. Sarah and Lawrence were able to pick out a few names from just talking with people, getting acclimated with that environment. They only needed a handful, just enough to make it seem random.

“Congratulations, Mr. Gordon, you’re the first to join us, but we’re not done yet. Do we-”

Lawrence coughed, the static fuzziness in his voice clipped.

“Do we have a John Cruz in here as well?”

As I ran, I kept an ear on Lawrence, and another on the city around me. Sirens, now, joining the growing cacophony. Music, really.

“And just a reminder,” Lawrence buzzed, “Please, no flash photography, getting up during the show, or talking with others during the show. We take your safety very seriously, so don’t make us put it in jeopardy!”

“Yes, Ellie, you are totally selling it.”

“Now is not the time for new nicknames, D.”

She groaned as I hopped another roof, maneuvering down the length of a street. I saw a structure in the distance, a building that hadn’t been fully constructed yet. The marker.

I plotted my path in that direction.

“Thank you,” Lawrence said, as if to address both his captive audience and D as well. “Back to the show. Still need just a few more lucky volunteers. Let’s see…  do we what have a Natalie Beckham and Oliver Morgan?”

All my attention started to narrow towards my earpiece. I was running without any conscious thought for the steps ahead of me, my body moving on its own. Muscle memory. I climbed over vents and metal railings, flew over alleys in a single bound. There was one building with people lounging on top, eating. Probably a rooftop patio. I ran along the edge, running harder. Before people could turn and realize who I was, I had already moved on.

People would catch glimpses of me, maybe enough to try and piece together a picture. But they wouldn’t get the full thing, they’d only have enough to make them scared.

“And Oliver Morgan?”

Lawrence asked again, then coughed again. Was Lawrence not able to find him?

I couldn’t get an answer. I couldn’t ask, the extended exercise of having to parkour across rooftops left me with little breath to speak. I’d have to stop, and I couldn’t.

The hollow husk of a building loomed overhead as I got closer.

Lawrence continued. The show had to go on.

“Alright, and just one more before we can start. Last but certainly not the least, Martin Bolland!”

My legs were pumping hard, muscles straining as I pushed myself to run faster. Lawrence seemed to be doing alright, D had things under control, and I needed to stoke the flames. I couldn’t let doubt slow me down, not at this juncture.

I jumped again.

D, being Miss Director, directed things along.

“Better wrap it up soon, Ellie. Silent alarm has been tripped. It’s still gonna take the cops a while to get there, and Vivi is working to slow them down, but we can’t stick around for too long.”

“What she said,” I said. It came out strained.

I got over to the other side of the street and ran.

“Okay then,” Lawrence said, as if speaking to us and the audience, “Time to get on with the show. What we have for you tonight is a magic trick, actually. Watch closely as we make half this fucking room disappear!”

I smiled as I closed in on the building. Lawrence was really playing it up.

It was easy to see it in my head, the picture clear. Lawrence standing at the head of the exhibit hall, masked, with the Fangs spread out through entire space, controlling the crowd. Everyone else would be crouched or on their knees, not daring to try and pull any tricks of their own. Sarah, being an extra pair of eyes, wearing her complete outfit in that white blouse and fitting skirt. Easy to see how good it looked on her.

The people Lawrence called out would have been pushed together, forming a small herd, surrounded by Fangs. John Cruz. Natalie Beckham and Oliver Morgan both, hopefully.

Other Fangs were moving now, too, taking different paintings off the walls.

Someone would protest, despite themselves. One of the art curators. They’d risk their lives over some art.

“No, no, we can’t have that.” I heard Lawrence. “We already gave you a warning!”

Through the earpiece, I heard a more faint sound. A cry. Did someone actually try to fight Lawrence and the Fangs?

If I was there, I’d go for the hand, because they tried to take the paintings back, or maybe the leg, because they got up and ran. Break them, set an example for the rest, a further warning.

It was important, posturing in that way. The image of power was just as crucial as having it. Lawrence understood that more than anyone.

“My dear audience, it is time for the trick, and then we will close our show. I do hope you had a good time, or at least a memorable one. In any case, so long, and we vanish!”

“We’re starting the trucks now,” D said. “We’re open and ready to load!”

“And I’m almost at the marker!”

There was a courtyard tucked between some buildings, between me and a large, unfinished structure. A skeleton of a building. The marker. My real destination was just below.

I did a cursory check before I would drop down. I saw them.

Two groups, meeting at the fountain, in the middle of the courtyard. Two gangs.

Six to seven on each sides, the heads of each group were speaking to one another. Each indicated to a member behind them, and they went around to hand the leader a bag. After inspecting the contents between them, the bags switched hands.

Some kind of deal.

I knew the gangs that were just below. We moved them there.

One of the groups were decked out in blue, hoods that covered their heads. Styled after a long-abandoned identity, but it just made it easier to know where their loyalties would lie. Lawrence had already gone to them and held that meeting. Instead of paying back the funds they owed us, they’d work for us instead. Manpower over money.

Or pawns, really.

The other gang was in a similar position, but they wouldn’t get the same grace as the blue hoods. They were another gang that owed us, another set of pawns that we could move and manipulate.

The blue hoods would call the other gang, hoping to cut some sort of deal. Meet in a secluded location, discuss the details there. All from Lawrence’s suggestion. The blue hoods had no choice but to comply.

The pieces were on the board. I could move freely.

I moved.

Dropping down, I descended several stories, sticking a foot out. Several lampposts illuminated the courtyard, with one being directly above the two gangs, overlooking the deal as they proceeded.

I went at an angle. The heavy sole of my boot crashed into the lamp itself, casting the gangs in darkness and shattered glass. They fell back, shocked, as I pounced on one of them. The leader that wasn’t in a blue hood.

He went down, stayed down, without a fight. He didn’t even know there would be one.

I heard screams, I heard clicks. I heard gunfire.

Ducking close to the ground, I crawled over the man I had laid out flat, keeping low to avoid getting hit. Bullets zipped by, but they didn’t go anywhere near me or anyone else. Warning shots, to try and scare off the sudden ambush. But I wasn’t going anywhere. I was right where I needed to be.

With something as loud as a gun, it brought with it attention. Sirens were already incoming, I could hear them blare. They had been out, red and blue lights searching for a source of trouble, and I was able to lead some of them this way.

I just had to lead even more.

Springing back up, I tackled another in the ribs, feeling them crack. I rolled, keeping my momentum, stretching out that momentary shock as far as I could. Until it snapped.

Two were advancing on me as I got up, square on my feet. One was armed with a pistol, the other with a knife.

I had both on me as well, but I didn’t go for them. They were substitutes, tools as I wasn’t as intimately familiar with, having lost the originals during the initial raid of the church.

Still need to see if I can find them again. They should still be there. Another thing on the list I-

Cold metal slid right through my arm, tearing past the meat and getting caught in the bone. I winced, my thoughts escaping me, and I twisted around to avoid more hurt while still keeping some momentum.

Fuck. Got stabbed. Had to keep my priorities straight.

It was fine. I could keep going. Focus, focus.

I struck out, going for the guy with the gun. The other guy already lost his weapon, with it being stuck in me.

The gun got knocked out of his hands. I threw my arms forward, grabbing his wrists, twisting them until they couldn’t move again.

His screams gurgled as he went to the ground, arms still braided in front of him. More shock, more confusion. More momentum.

I went without my weapons because I didn’t need to kill. Maim, maybe. The message would be about the same.

That was about half of the other gang, already. I wasn’t tearing through them, not exactly, but I very well could, and everyone here knew that, now.

Before anyone could get their bearings again, we were flooded by red and blue lights.

Police yelled orders as they ran out of their cars, guns pointed. Everyone who was able to, scrambled.

I started to move, but I noticed one of the blue hoods. He was standing still, frozen, staring at me. The leader of his particular group.

For reasons I wouldn’t try to understand, this gang had decided to change their entire look around Blank Face. Whatever. I didn’t care.

But, he wasn’t running. The cops were getting closer.

Someone from the other gang was running, though, to him. He had a knife too, ready to slow another down in order to buy him some time.

I started to move.

It didn’t even take a second. In one smooth motion, I lowered myself and scooped up a handful of glass. I threw it.

The shards flew right into his face. He was down before I even fully crossed that distance.

I didn’t slow when I passed. I indicated to a path behind the blue hood, a way out through the courtyard.

“Go,” I said, “Don’t waste this chance I gave you.”

I wasn’t even sure if he heard me. I didn’t bother to check. I was already out of earshot. Running, but in a different direction.

Someone fired. The cops fired back. They tried to go after everyone. Me.

I could let them get close, but I wouldn’t let them catch me.

There was a short wall that divided the courtyard and the unfinished building on the other side. It only took a short jump to scale the thing. But it was more than enough for the cops to stop what they were doing and direct themselves to me.

Cars rumbled back to life. Sirens blared again.

I ran.

Bullets followed me as I went over the wall, landing in a patch of grass that stretched to the building proper. Maybe proper wasn’t the right word, since it wasn’t a proper building, yet.

I ran inside, or rather, I used the place as a cover.

The building was tall enough to see from a distance, so stairs had already been installed to get to the higher levels. I rushed over to them, the sirens and gunfire never that far behind.

I tripped over a stray brick, catching myself on the metal railing that wound up and around the staircase. Hasty.

The near fall gave me pause. I had to catch my breath. It was so loud.

“Updates?” I breathed.

“Everything’s been loaded in the trucks. D has supervising the art, and I’m keeping my eye on our passengers.”

“I wanted to be with you!”

“As if. We’ve already left the gala.”

“And the cops?” I asked.

“All part of the plan,” Lawrence said. “Got delayed in showing up, and they don’t have enough of a force to stop us, not with everything that’s been happening. Will happen.”

“You’re welcome. I think they’re converging on my position.”

“Good. Keep them coming. We’re almost… we’re almost home free.”

“Yeah, but I’m not.”

“Deal with it.”

“Thanks.”

“The hammers are loaded with enough firecrackers to make the new year come super early,” D said. “You’ll have an opening.”

Sounds were getting louder. Couldn’t stick around any longer.

“I hope it’s a big enough opening,” I said. “Better send one of them over to me now.”

“On it,” Lawrence said.

“Alright, I’ll catch up with you in a bit.”

“You can do it!” D cheered, so loud that it clipped.

I couldn’t delay another second, but I needed one in order to pull the knife out of my arm. It immediately went to healing itself. The wound sealed up, I saw as the individual fibers groped out across the gap to join back together, mending.

I pulled the sleeve back down. Did not to see that, right now.

I went back to getting the fuck out of here.

The stairs took me higher and higher up the building. Winding, spiraling. I grabbed the railing, using it to pull myself farther and hop over more steps. I lost count at how many floors there were, but it didn’t even take me a minute to reach the very top.

It wasn’t much of a roof, rather just another floor with nothing else above it. Steel beams spiked up, exposed, cement blocks and other building materials were strewn about. I had to be careful to not trip over anything.

I ran until I got to the edge of the surface. It was a long fall to the bottom.

I turned, and I waited.

The building was unfinished, there were only so many available means of getting up here. The stairs, in turn, became a choke point. The cops would be forced to take them. I left them with no other choice.

I gripped the knife, tight. The one I had pulled out from my arm. I gripped it even tighter.

My heart was beating heavy and hard. My knees were shaking, my ears ringing. My head.

That doubt seeped back in, again. No, not again, it was more like that doubt reminded me of its presence. That it never really left.

There was a chance that I wouldn’t make it back. I might die instead.

I could see how funny that was. I could laugh. I almost did.

Instead, I settled with a wide smile. It’d give the approaching police a more startling image, at the very least.

Everyone converged at once. The footsteps of the gathered police force came as a stampede, and I was basked in a sudden, blinding light, with a hard thrum that droned overhead.

It was a sensory overload, but I wouldn’t let it overwhelm me. I couldn’t let it. Doubt held me, but I had to fight to prevent it from seizing.

Ah, I want to get back to Sarah.

A flood of people came rushing from the stairs. Bigger guns and bigger equipment. Armor.

They saw a chance, and they were going take that shot.

Taking their formations, the SWAT team circled around me. They were fast, no surprise there.

I expected them to start barking orders, screaming for me to put my arms up, put them down, drop my weapon, to not move, get on my knees. They didn’t. They were silent.

As a collective, they took one large step forward, closing the circle. They took one more. They should have known that this wouldn’t go their way, but they tried, regardless. I could admire that.

I stood my ground. Just another second. Just long enough that they thought they could stop me. The more time they spent being here, the bigger the opening for the Fangs. Less of a force available to go after them.

One more step. One more second.

The circle tightened.

I swallowed.

Strangling.

Now.

It was my turn to rush them. Forward, to the stairs I had just came from. Fast enough that I caught them by surprise.

I had a few moments before they could respond. I used that, throwing the knife. The blade spun, striking the one of the SWAT team members in the faceplate. It didn’t break through the hard plastic, but it did hit hard. The man was knocked back, falling into the men behind him.

There wasn’t a moment I wasted. Running into that part of the circle, I pushed further, flattening him. The effect rippled to the me around me.

I had to squint as I glanced around. Bright.

Everyone leaped into action. I did, as well.

Again, I ducked low. I was surrounded by armed men, they were basically soldiers. They were trained, unlike random gang members, they wouldn’t shoot when the target was among their own. I used that against them, hid among their numbers. It bought me a little more time.

Getting lower, my hands touched the ground, searching for anything else I could use. The knife again, maybe even shards of glass, somehow. My hands found something else.

I picked it up, felt the weight of it, and swung.

The metal pipe was twice my height, and it wasn’t light, and I didn’t have much room to actually toss it around. I powered through it, though. Literally.

My arms tensed as I swung a complete arc, using the pipe to clear out a circle. I relied on sheer strength more than speed, pressing them down rather than a push. I didn’t waste time to breathe as I threw the pipe itself, the horizontal bar slamming into the another part of the group across from me.

And then I booked it.

I bought them enough time. Sarah and D and Lawrence would make it out okay. Now I just had to do the same for myself.

Bullets flew past me as I went straight to the edge of the roof.

“That hammer better be here already!” I could barely hear myself over the gunfire.

“It’s-”

I wasn’t sure if that was D or Lawrence. The sound that swallowed the rest of it.

The sound came first, then the fury. A deep rumble that shook the foundation of the building. It was enough to make me stumble.

A bullet caught me in the spine.

Fuck.

I stumbled, the ledge only a step away. I lost any momentum I might have had, and I plunged, instead.

The wind hit, and I couldn’t move. I was paralyzed.

An out of body experience, it felt like, as I fell deeper and deeper. I couldn’t feel anything, couldn’t hear much outside of the wind that whipped past my ears. I was watching my body as it tumble, my limbs lazily dragging around me.

A fall that could very well kill me.

I would have smiled if I could.

Instead, I just crashed into a fire escape attached to the building across an alley. It broke my fall into the alley itself.

I wasn’t moving. Couldn’t. My healing kicked into high gear, my entire body overwhelmed by an intense warmth. Bones came back together, cuts sealed, bruises lost their color.

Normally, I would have let the healing go through its motions, get as close to better as I could before I got going again.

Didn’t have that luxury.

Through the pain so hot it was like I was on fire, I crawled, weak. The bullet was still lodged in my back, the bone and muscle feeling like it was massaging itself in order to push the foreign object out. Until then, I had the relative strength of a child learning to walk for the first time.

My fingers found a tiny thing of plastic. My earpiece. It had fallen out when I crashed landed.

I pressed it into the side of my head, not being ginger with it at all. Everything hurt so much it was as if I couldn’t feel a damn thing.

I gurgled. It was the only sound I could produce.

“V?”

Whoever that was, it sounded like a test.

I couldn’t answer.

My healing finally started to turn things around. I was able to move a bit better, crawling on my knees, then dragging myself over to a dumpster, using it to pull myself up. I leaned against it, catching my breath. My mouth was filled with a nauseous stench from the trash beside me.

I coughed.

“I’m… still alive, somehow.”

“Oh my god, you totally had me freaking out, there.

“Sorry, I just need to stop getting shot in the back.”

I took a breath. Sour.

“I don’t know where I am.”

“Where are you, then?”

No. I wasn’t being pursued at the moment. I checked my surroundings.

On another side of the unfinished building. The SWAT team had stationed themselves through at different levels of the construction site, mostly near the stairs. Most of their force was dedicated to the building itself, not the narrow sides where most cars couldn’t fit through. I was in the clear.

For now.

They saw where I had fallen. A helicopter’s spotlight was searching down the alleyway behind me. It would find me if I didn’t move.

I moved.

Bones popped into place as I put my weight on them, cracks disappearing. I had a limp, but it lessened as I tested my body.

I was healing, but I was becoming thirsty.

Checking for the spotlight behind me again, I saw what had caused that deep rumbling. Or what was left of it.

At the foot of the building, where the front entrance would have been when the thing was completed, a hollow shell of a van burned, smoke billowing out. It was among the gathered police force, near their vehicles, burning as well.

Accelerating until it couldn’t be stopped, the van careened right into the police blockade, exploding with enough of an impact that I could have felt it from all the way at the top. The police were nails, and that was our hammer.

“Christ, D, those are not fireworks,” I whispered.

“It’s fine,” I heard her say, even when it clearly wasn’t. “The driver aimed the van and got out in time, and if the police were smart enough to realize they couldn’t stop it they were smart enough to jump out of the way. Where are you?”

I answered while I limped.

“East? No, west. Dizzy. Side alley by the marker. Blue hoods brought in the bait, now that’s two gangs that know not to mess with us anymore. Cops should be sufficiently distracted by now.”

“Yes they are,” Lawrence said. “The other hammers went down, so now their forces are divided again to try and clear up all the smoke. Now’s your chance.”

“Right! Yes! The driver got picked up already, so I’ll tell them to go your way and you get out of there already.”

“Will do,” I said. That intense rush was still there, and I sensed that focus still guiding me. Just had to use that to guide me that back to the base.

“Once you’re secured, everyone’s home free. Good work.”

I was walking now. I actually smiled.

“Too soon to be talking like that,” I said.

“Fair,” Lawrence replied, as I found a window in the alley. A storefront. Clothes and stuff.

Surreal, that after everything that had happened, this was the easy part. I broke the window, letting myself in. I picked and switched clothes as I moved, bundling up my costume into my arms. It didn’t take long to find my ride.

By the time there was a spare police officer who could investigate the break-in, I was already gone.

—

I was the last to get to St. Elizabeth. The Fangs already had everything set up, so it was just a matter of me getting back, and getting the updates.

I strolled down the main aisle to reach the altar.

“You’re late,” Lawrence said. On the altar, he was sitting where the priest would. Leaning back, slumped. D was seated in the chair next to him, arms hugged tight around a teddy bear.

“I’m fashionably… whatever. I’m here now, I’m ready to go.”

“You sure, Wendy? D told me you took a pretty nasty fall.”

Sarah was here, too. It was so easy to find her. Standing by Isabella.

Seeing her made me feel more relaxed and not, all at the same time. A weird feeling to properly parse.

“Yeah,” I said. “Still feel some lingering aches, but I can still walk.”

Sarah frowned. Her concern over me made my stomach twist up.

“If you ever need a massage, just hit me up.”

I really, really wanted that, but now wasn’t the time.

I nodded. “Of course.”

I stepped up to the altar, meeting her there. Turning to Lawrence, I asked, “Are they in there?”

Lawrence tilted his head. A half-gesture. Not a nod, not a shake.

“Not they, just she.”

She.

“Natalie? Where’s Oliver?”

My stomach twisted again, but not in a good way.

“I wanted to wait until we were all here to talk about it. I didn’t see him at the event.”

“There were a lot of people there, maybe you didn’t-”

“I did, I was thorough. Ask your girlfriend. She didn’t see him there, either.”

Sarah gave the same half-gesture.

I felt like I had to dispute that other comment, but there were more important things to discuss.

“We need both of them,” I said. “That’s the job we were given.”

“And we’ll get them both,” Lawrence said. He pointed to a section of the altar behind him and D. “Tied and stuffed her back there, in the… confessional, I think it’s called. We’ll just ask her.”

Could have done that before I got here, I thought, but Lawrence probably wanted to do this as a team. Nothing behind any of our backs.

I frowned, guilty.

“Sure,” I said.

I headed to the confessional. Natalie was in there, at least. We were halfway there.

Lawrence started to get up, but he faltered. He went to his knees, and it didn’t look like he was trying to pray.

“Shit…” he muttered.

D jumped out of her chair to help him stand. She tossed her bear to the side.

“Ellie…”

Lawrence stiffened, but he didn’t push her away. “Stop calling me that, will you? Fuck…”

I walked over to Lawrence instead. Sarah did too.

“Is everything alright?”

A quick look told me it wasn’t. Up close, Lawrence was sweating, and it wasn’t because he was in a suit. The inside of an abandoned church wasn’t known to be keep warm in the early months, and yet his skin glistened.

Lawrence shook his head.

“It’s just… it’s just my painkillers. I usually take them at a certain time but… had that whole art heist thing. Kind of got in the way.”

“That’s why I told you to taper off of them already,” D said, berating up.

“I don’t want to hear it.”

“You look like you’re about to pass out,” I said. “D, go with him, make sure he gets some rest.”

“No.” Lawrence tried to stand again, but he fumbled with it.

“I bet you can’t even stand without assistance.”

“I am fine, I just need to catch up on my dose.”

“I can handle this part. D, listen to me and go with Lawrence.”

D, still holding Lawrence, craned her neck to look at me.

“But I don’t want to go. I don’t want you to-”

I raised my hands. “I won’t do anything drastic until I’ve discussed it with you both. But right now, Lawrence won’t be able to walk or talk if he pushes himself any more. Sarah?”

“Voss?”

“You go, too. Make sure D listens.”

“Okay.”

Sarah went to D, helping Lawrence get to his feet. Reluctant, he put an arm around Sarah. Not so much D, considering the height difference, but she did stay by his side as they got down from the altar, walking across the aisle.

D looked back at me. I raised my hands again.

That seemed to be enough for her, but already made her reservations clear. They were ringing in my head.

We can’t kill them.

On that thought, I turned, to the confessional. Isabella joined me.

“You know you’ll have to,” she said.

I didn’t respond.

One side of the confessional was propped open. The other wasn’t. I slid into the empty booth and closed it.

The space was limited, but it wasn’t uncomfortable. A wood box, like a coffin I could sit in. Eerie, in that respect.

Vague connections made themselves known. I’d been here before. Alexis. Except this time, I was sitting on the other side. I wasn’t the one being questioned.

“Natalie Beckham,” I said.

There wasn’t an answer. But I knew she was there. Through the cross-shaped pattern and faint black mesh that divided us, I could make out a woman’s outline. Natalie was here.

“It all depends on you, Natalie, but you could either see the sunrise in peace, or in pieces. All up to how you want to play it.”

“Play, huh?”

“Hm?”

“This is all just a game to you, isn’t it? Playing at the hero, now the villain. Pulling off fake heists just to get to me. It’s all pretend, there’s no truth to what you’re doing at all.”

“I assure you this is all very real,” I said.

“Where are the others? The paintings, John Cruz?”

“No,” I said. “You don’t get to ask the questions, here. And it’s precisely why you were asking about John Cruz that got you into this predicament in the first place.

There was a pause.

“That may be the case,” Natalie Beckham said. “But now I’m in this predicament because of something I find much more interesting. The one I really want to talk about is you, Alexis Barnett.”

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