ElyriasEcstasy (15 page)

“See for yourself.” Not gruffly said, but also without much
hint of pity.

Arvra Finean understood. Her brother had been in this
condition for quite some time now.

She went to the bed at the far end of the dim room. She had
told Urna last night about how she’d gotten her scars. Why she’d done that
still wasn’t clear to her. She should’ve just made something up rather than
reveal a thing so intimate. She had also told the Weapon about her brother, how
she had intervened when he was being beaten by a Guard captain. But she hadn’t
told the full story. Hadn’t mentioned the state that that assault had left her
brother in.

Frank Finean’s bed was just a soiled mattress but it was
better than nothing. He had blankets and people who cared for him, keeping him
fed and clean. Frank couldn’t do much for himself anymore. His eyes were open
as Arvra neared the bed. But his gaze was unfocused. His limbs stirred beneath
the blankets, but these were just random twitches. He couldn’t walk unassisted.
It had been months since he’d put together a string of coherent words. Mostly,
he was just like this.

Arvra knelt alongside the mattress, deliberately in his line
of sight. The eyes showed no recognition, not even an awareness of her
presence. That captain’s baton had come down on his skull several times, hard,
brutal blows. Something had gotten damaged inside that head.

She brushed a strand of hair back where it had fallen over
an eye. Frank didn’t even blink. She felt a single tear gather, then make a
tiny warm track down her cheek. But that was all. She didn’t wail, weep, rend
her clothes, didn’t curse the Guard at the top of her lungs. She’d tried to
save her brother, and she had gotten carved up for her trouble. And she hadn’t
prevented
this
.

Frank was lucky to have enough friends to tend to him this
way. He had been a vivacious individual, generous, daring. His raids into the
Unsafe had benefited a lot of people. The salvaged gear he had brought illegally
back had improved the lives of a number of people in this border town. He
hadn’t thought of his scavenger operation as a business. He’d seen it as a good
deed, a positive act on behalf of the people.

Noble ideals. And now he was as useful as a cabbage.

Arvra stood, wiping her cheek. Too bad Frank Finean didn’t
have a
real
friend, one who would open up one of his arteries and sit
with him while he quietly bled his way to a merciful death. Too bad he didn’t
have, say, a sister who would show him that kindness.

“Okay, Gator,” she said. “I’m here. You can go.” She looked
around the dismal room. Once, it had been cheerier, but her brother’s presence
in this house was almost more oppressive than the Black Ship hovering over the
town. She had grown up here but she had to struggle to conjure up happy
memories of the place.

“Arvra.”

She turned. Gator was gazing at her. The weak candlelight
danced across the stubble framing his face. He had wavy black hair, and eyes
the same shade. Normally his was a blunt sort of face, without much flicker of
emotion. But at the moment evident sympathy shone in those dark eyes. He had
gone with her on her own salvage forays into the Unsafe. He was a dependable
man, good when the heat was on.

He took a step toward her, hesitated. “Somebody’s already
coming to look after…” Instead of uttering his name, he made a small gesture
past her, at the makeshift bed. “We didn’t know when you’d be back.”

“He’s my brother. I’ll take my turn.”

Gator looked away, then his shoulders stiffened and he returned
his gaze to her. “Why don’t you take a break? Come with me. I’ve been saving up
water for a bath. You can have it. If…you want.” This last came out with an
adolescent shyness, even though Gator was nearly thirty years old.

Arvra blinked at him. The offer was unexpected. And not at
all, she realized after a brief contemplation, unwelcome.

A knock sounded on the door. The same coded one she had
used. It was a leftover habit from when Frank’s scavenging operation was still
going. They’d used this place to store some of the goods.

“That’s Kapak,” Gator said. “Right on time.”

Arvra gave him a nod. “Okay. A bath. That sounds real nice.”

The second sequence of raps sounded. Gator went to unlock
the door.

* * * * *

While he was led like a good dog, Rune allowed his mind to
wander. Normally he would have been marking his steps, counting them. Using his
super-mortal sense of direction to map the path so that, should the need arise,
he would easily be able to find his way back here. It was a standard drill. Only,
he already knew the way. And also he had this Guard to follow, so rather than
reflexively exercising his powers, he paid little attention to his own feet,
which was oddly freeing. It wasn’t the journey that interested him anyway, but
the destination, and what awaited him there.

When they started to grow close, an unpleasant memory came
unbidden to him. It was of the last time he had felt ill, which to his
recollection had been one of the rare times in his life that that had occurred,
outside of a few unfortunate incidents where he’d mistakenly been administered
a double dose of some medication or another, early on in his days as a
Shadowflash.

They’d been on a mission, he and Urna. Miles into the
Unsafe. Further than they’d ever gone at that point in their military careers.
Further than they needed to go, but Urna had been insistent.

“I want to kill one more,” the Weapon had said.

Rune could hear him even over the whine of wings’ engines.
“We’re late already.” He adjusted his report in his mind automatically, taking
this deviation into account. They had cleared out a specific sector. Now they
were supposed to be heading back, but Urna had banked off and flown in the
opposite direction.

“Just one more.” Urna pushed himself onward, out into the
moss-dark of the Black Ship’s light. Rune, who had necessarily blindfolded
himself again while airborne, was forced to follow, lest he lose track of his
Weapon. He must always keep Urna inside that perimeter. The sacred space
wherein Rune could hear everything—every step Urna took, every deep and
desperate breath. If he concentrated, Rune could smell the Weapon above
everything else out here. Over the fetid rust and the mold of decaying wood, he
could smell the ketones on Urna’s breath that told him the Weapon was hungry
for something. The Weapon was flying quite low and Rune continued to follow.
“One more.”

“It’s too far!” Rune suddenly cried, much louder than he
meant to. A mistake. He shouldn’t be revealing his emotions to his partner
while they were on assignment. “Stop,” he hissed, quieter, composing himself.
“Come back now.”

They had left behind the ancient, ruined city that was their
mission target. They were out in the countryside now, a cheerless place, empty
of vegetation, cut by a crumbling roadway upon which were strewn the aged,
corroded skeletons of vehicles.

Suddenly, Urna dropped to the ground. Automatically, Rune
alit behind him.

He heard Urna start to say something, but the words were cut
off by the new wave of sound that intercepted them. The unmistakable noise of
the Passengers, the scrape of their claws, the whistle of chill air streaming
over their bodies, their hoarse breaths. This was a large group. More than the
two of them had ever faced at once in a single sweep. They were coming from one
side of the derelict road, where the Weapon and Shadowflash had landed.

“Urna!”

“Here we are.”

Rune opened his eyes. He didn’t remember ever closing them.

Aphael Chav stood poised before the door that led to Urna’s
room, or what had been his room. Aphael was attended by two of his personal
aides, but even with this escort he looked profoundly out of place in the
corridor. The Lux leader did not often deign to walk among those who served
him, including those he supposedly valued as highly as his prized Weapon/Shadowflash
teams.

The Guard who had escorted Rune fell into place beside his
comrades while Rune stood at attention. Aphael appraised him with the marked
coolness Rune had come to expect from the man.

“Shadowflash Rune.” He started with the title, reminding
Rune of his position. Rune lowered his gaze with what he hoped passed for
humbleness, noting as he did the hole in the thick plaster beside Urna’s door.
The size of a fist. Not large, but it would have required a powerful blow to
make it. “I understand your mission last night was unsuccessful.”

Again, just reminding him. Of course it had been
unsuccessful. Rune nodded, once, not rising to Aphael’s goading as Urna himself
might have done on one of his particularly manic days.

“It’s true. I was unable to determine the location of the
missing Weapon,” Rune agreed, then continued without quite meaning to, “but I’m
confident I’ll bring him back today. Perhaps, if given more fuel, I can—”

“That will not be necessary,” the white-haired Toplux
interrupted. His eyes snapped cold fire at Rune. “I’ve decided your skills,”
mild disdain in the word, though no sneer touched his features, “will be put to
use elsewhere for now. I plan to utilize you in a different fashion than you
are accustomed to. I hope you are prepared.” He passed a nod to the smartly
attired aide at his right and the man pushed Urna’s door open without the use
of a key. “See what you can make of it.”

Without further instruction, Rune stepped forward into the
small space.

Urna’s room was of the exact dimensions that made up his own
and contained a similar spread of furnishings. There was the bed, a clothes
storage crate and four walls, but the place had been ransacked. The mattress
rested crosswise over the bed’s frame, the storage locker overturned in the middle
of the floor, spare clothing scattered.

The most striking feature of the room was what lay upon its
walls. All those scribbles and scrawls, the crazed graffiti.

It wasn’t the first time Rune had been in here. Hardly.
Often enough, he and Urna had stolen away, sometimes to here, sometimes to
Rune’s quarters at the opposite end of the military facility. How often—really,
how
many
times—had he and the Weapon come here, eager for each other’s
bodies?

Aphael Chav, stepping in behind him, said, “I’m certain that
given your special connection to the Weapon, you’ll be able to tell me what all
of this means.” His eyes flickered over the walls, indicating what he meant.
“If Urna has left some clue behind here, any indication of his current
whereabouts, you are to report it. Am I understood?”

Rune could have assured Aphael then and there that no such
clue
would be found among the mad scribblings that covered every inch of Urna’s
walls. If Urna had been planning his escape, had not just run off on a whim or
through some impulsive desire to test his own abilities, he would not have left
a trail for Rune to follow. Certainly not one that could be deciphered from
these walls by anyone Aphael had in his employ. And while Weapon and
Shadowflash had undoubtedly been close, it wasn’t as if they were making up
secret codes to pass messages back and forth while hunting down killers in the
dark.

But when Rune tried to speak, he found he could not.
Already, without even concentrating on opening his senses, Rune was being
assaulted. He could smell Urna here, his sweat on the sheets of his bed. The
sex he’d had shortly before he’d left, and something sharper, laced with
sodium. Tears, but not belonging to Urna. Rune forced himself to nod again,
barely registering the Toplux’s parting words as spoken to the young Guard.

“Stand post. When he’s through, bring him to the training
facility. He’s to give a full report to the entire division, before the team
that’s to replace him and Urna leave on today’s sweep into the Unsafe.”

Rune snapped his head around, found the Toplux’s eyes level
with his. He’d evidently expected this statement to capture Rune’s attention.
“Surely you knew this would happen, Rune. The top Weapon and Shadowflash team
has been compromised, disgraced, but the extermination of Passengers must go on
as usual.”

“It’s not disgrace if I bring him back before the public
gets wind of this,” Rune said before he could stop himself, adding just a
second too late for protocol, “sir.”

Aphael grinned. A sinister thing.

“We’ll see, won’t we?” He turned again then paused, speaking
back over his shoulder as if these were words he might normally have held in.
“You disappoint me, Rune. You’ve failed to keep account of your Weapon and
subsequently failed to collect him. That’s two failures in one night, and I’ve
relieved soldiers of their positions for far less. Because you are still
somewhat valuable to me, you have been granted reprieve, but were I you, I
would make certain I had something useful to report when next we stand face to
face.”

Rune was silent for several seconds until his heart rate
evened out and he was able to speak without fear of his voice shaking. He told
Aphael Chav that he understood and the man left, followed by his escorts. Rune
knew that Aphael, by telling him he was valuable, had also just threatened him.
Without Urna, Rune’s sole value was his fame. To dismiss him would demoralize
the populace, and the Lux would never risk damage to their position by doing
that. But there were always other ways Rune could be made to vanish.

More so, the idea that other, clearly inferior
Weapon/Shadowflash teams would be assigned to his and Urna’s dangerous sweeps
was rage inducing. And all of this, the shame and humiliation Rune was feeling,
was Urna’s fault. Urna deserved to be punished for that, as much as for his
flight.

Yes. That thought would make this easier.

Rune peered closely at the walls, as he’d never bothered to
do before. Every bit was covered in some manner of vandalism. Rune wondered how
Urna had been allowed to get away with this. Certainly Rune had never thought
to decorate his own space in such a fashion. Perhaps it shouldn’t have been a
surprise to anyone that Urna had no qualms about running away. He believed
himself immune to punishment, untouchable, while Rune was just another tool.