Lafferty, Mur (15 page)

"She keeps the Academy's secrets." Peter said.

"That's bad." Alex said.

"But Keepsie…" Michelle said.

Peter sighed heavily. Every fiber of his body was screaming at him to go after Keepsie. But she was immortal, or at least she couldn't be killed. The Librarian was not, that he knew of.

"If we let them keep The Librarian, we'll be giving them another weapon. We've already given them too much," he said finally. "We have to split up.”

Michelle nodded. “Peter, you and I and Alex can go after the Librarian.

Alex has a cell phone. Tomas, Jason and Barry can go after Keepsie.”

“How do we find her?” Jason asked.

"Oh! Wait! I just got an idea!" Michelle said, and ran back inside Keepsie's bar. She came out a moment later with a pair of panties.

Peter blushed furiously. "What are you planning on doing with those?"

"I figured you should have some dirty laundry so you can track her better."

"Good Lord, Michelle!" he said. "Can't you get a dirty sweatshirt or something?”

Michelle made a face at him and went back inside the bar.

Jason grinned while Alex and Barry howled with laughter while Tomas looked puzzled. “Why does she have dirty panties in her bar?”

Peter willed the blood to leave his hot face, and felt close to normal when Michelle emerged carrying a rumpled tank top.

"That's fine," Peter grabbed the shirt and held it to his face, as much to get away from the laughter as to smell Keepsie. He nodded. “She is on her way back to the bar. I think all you guys need to do is wait here.” He stuffed the shirt into his back pocket, where it dangled like a white flag.

He fixed his gaze on Tomas, the tall Norseman staring at him impassively.

“Please protect her.” Holding the gaudy scarf to his nose, he jogged down the street away from Keepsie.

The Seventh City park was a masterwork of public planning. It was fifty acres alongside the Weaver River and had incorporated a naturally occurring large ridge that some city officials had wanted removed, but the planners said it could be part of the park, adding hiking to the draw of Seventh City.

It took on an L shape, with the large hill at the right angle. Underneath the hill were some fox holes that no one had ever worried about filling, as they'd wanted to keep the park's wildlife balanced. A couple of animal rights groups made some arguments on the rabbits' behalf, but not very convincing ones.

It was to the base of the hill and these foxholes that Peter tracked the Librarian and Doodad.

"In there," Alex said, his voice tinged with disbelief.

"Yes. They came here. The hill opens up somehow," Peter said, looking around for some sort of switch. Sparse bushes around the nearly hidden foxhole proved to hold no hidden switch, and there was no nearby tree with a convenient branch to pull on.

He threw up his hands in exasperation. "I don't know. But that's where she is."

"But we can't go down there, Peter," Michelle said.

"Yes, thanks, Michelle," Peter said bitterly.

"So now what?" Alex said, and as if in answer, the hill began to rumble.

They stumbled back as a round portal appeared in the side of the hill, rolling in and aside to reveal a dimly lit hallway.

Clever Jack peeked out. "Oh, what luck!" He exited the hill and stepped aside. An older man peeked out after him, and Michelle gasped.

"You told us Seismic Stan was dead," Peter said.

"Yeah, I lied about that," Clever Jack said, giving the man a hand out of the hill.

Stan was about fifty, the same age as Pallas, but he looked much older.

His hair was steel gray and his face was heavily lined. He wore a hard hat and a pair of goggles. He looked ridiculous, but his absurdity was more frightening than silly.

"Run," Peter said.

He'd barely made it ten steps when the ground turned to liquid and covered him in a wave. Dirt knocked him over as his legs gave way into the grassy, bubbling earth. He sank, flailing, and came to a stop when he was buried to his neck. His heart hammered in his ears as he tried to crane his neck around and see where the others were and if they had made it.

Michelle lay on the grass, unconscious. She bled from a head wound and Peter saw a rock nearby, also bloody.

Alex was buried similarly to Peter, glaring at their captors. Peter faced away from them and could only hear the footsteps by his ears.

Clever Jack squatted down. "Heya Petey. S'up?"

Peter was done being diplomatic with Clever Jack. He was a villain, and there was nothing Peter could say that would make things better for him.

"Where's the Librarian?" he asked. He sounded very impotent.

"Wow, you tracked her here? You're impressive," Clever Jack said, losing the tone of superior amusement. "Come on, we'll take you to her."

Where the Academy's cellblock was the epitome of technological superiority, the villains’ caves stank of medieval torture. To be fair, it was the heroes that had tortured Peter and Keepsie, and not the villains, but their hobbit-hole of a hideout was complete with iron-gated cells. Clever Jack led them down the narrow tunnel, the silent and glowering Stan following them.

"That one's White Lightning's," Clever Jack said, leading them down underneath the hill, pointing at a cage. "That reinforced one is Pallas's. See that hole over there? That's where The Crane is going to go. Stan dug us a really deep pit for that stretchy bastard. There’s a puddle of mud at the bottom." He chuckled. "You guys, you're going in with the Librarian. You wanted to see her, and I'm nothing if not accommodating."

"Then he must be nothing," Alex whispered to Peter, who was still trying to remove the dirt from his ears.

Doodad stood outside a cell with apparently no door, only iron bars. The Librarian sat in the corner, her pristine hair still knotted into its bun and her clothes immaculate. Peter wondered if part of her power was to look the part of the librarian as well as have super informative powers. He wondered if now was perhaps not the right time to ask her.

Doodad placed his hand on the bars and there was a low rumbling and a soft clink, and the bars parted. The Librarian looked at each of them in turn and did not move.

Clever Jack ushered them inside. "Your new home! Dinner is at six. I hope you like pizza." The villains walked back up the hall.

The Librarian addressed each of them in a wooden and disinterested voice. "Peter Ross. Olfactory knowledge of people. Michelle Cooper. Unable to lose balance of a loaded bar tray. A very detailed power. Alex Cardon. Healing power in the area of one square inch at a time, which drains you terribly."

Michelle snorted. "And you are?"

Her glasses glinted in the firelight. "I am the Librarian. I store and retain all knowledge given to me."

"You’ve got all of the Academy's secrets?" Alex asked.

"Yes." She sat down and leaned her head against the dirt wall.

"So, no magical digging powers?" Michelle ventured.

"None. Seismic Stan, previously thought to be dead, is to date the only known human who can manipulate the land," The Librarian said.

"And he is unlikely to help us," said Peter, sitting down beside her.

“How did he catch you?” Alex asked.

“I was hiding at Heretic’s apartment. I thought she could keep me safe, but Doodad found me after Dr. Timson called Heretic away to fight… the newest threat.”

“And the new threat would be?” Peter asked.

The Librarian shook her head. “That is classified.”

Michelle ran her hands along the bars, pulling at them. "Well guys, it seems our rescue effort failed."

"Well, it's nice that our days are having consistency," Peter said. "We might as well wait for pizza."

"I hope it's vegetarian," Alex said. Peter looked at him for a surprised moment and then started to laugh. Michelle joined them, and for a moment, it really did seem funny.

Keepsie regarded the chaos around her with a sick disinterest. She knew it was her fault. There was no "almost" here. Entirely her fault. Although they may be pigheaded torturing bastards, heroes did keep the city free from harm. And the villains clearly did not.

She had headed away from the Academy and the bar, first, wanting to clear her head without being met with her responsibilities.

Where was Pallas? The strongest of the heroes should be here to deal with everything, but she was gone. Keepsie hadn’t seen her in weeks. She was probably the one hero Keepsie could stomach.

Of course, Pallas hadn’t caused all this damage.

The heroes still battled the glowing girl, and it didn’t seem as if she were fighting back. They were high in the air, on the outskirts of town, away from the wreckage of the Academy. The Academy Keepsie had helped wreck.

She shook her head slowly, and started walking toward it.

The chaos got worse closer to the Academy. What had looked like simple mayhem on par with something Bugs Bunny would do was now into serious violence. A storefront burned brightly with no promising sirens in the distance.

A woman lay on the hood of a car, blood caked and tacky around her, shattered glass indicating she'd been dropped. Her legs and neck bent at odd angles that made Keepsie light-headed to look at, but she didn't turn away.

The drones still hovered in the sky above the Academy, diving in and out of the thick smoke that billowed from the formerly white building. More proof of their carnage littered the streets in the form of dead dogs, cars lying on their sides, and more burning buildings. The walk to the center of the city seemed shorter than usual, as walks usually did when one was about to face something unpleasant at the end.

She stood in the middle of the street with her bar on her left and the Academy on the right. The eerie silence that had engulfed the previous blocks was now gone, replaced with the buzz of the drones.

They surrounded the Academy, smaller ones rooting around inside, larger ones clearly guarding it. As she approached, they clacked toward her, raising their weapons. She backed off and they returned to their posts.

She wondered if anyone had been trapped inside. She considered her options.

She could run in there and die. She could go home and go to bed and let more innocent people die. Or she could go back down to her bar and talk to her friends. Peter would have an idea what to do, and Michelle would back him up, if she didn’t think the idea was stupid.

“They went where?”

Tomas patiently repeated himself. “To rescue The Librarian, a hero you apparently encountered at the Academy.”

“But why rescue a hero? Why not let the other heroes do it?”

“The heroes are otherwise occupied. The villains seem to be gathering resources, and The Librarian holds the secrets of the heroes.”

“Oh crap.”

Tomas nodded.

Barry brought Keepsie a soda. “You back with us, Keepsie?”

Keepsie grinned at him, enjoying the paternal-like attention.

“I’m OK. I could be better. We need some more reinforcements. Did Michelle manage to call anyone?”

“I think she got through to Colette, who was going to try to find some other people. She said she’d be here soon. She’s bringing her car.”

Keepsie took a deep breath. She had several doubts about her plan, especially considering her previous attempts at getting involved. She was an ant trying to meddle in the affairs of giants.

She went to the kitchen and grabbed a bag of chips, and became aware of an increasing need for more food. She turned the knob on the grill and went back out to the bar.

Underneath the counter was a Rolodex of emergency numbers; people Keepsie felt she could count on. She hadn't been able to get to them yesterday, but now she felt more grounded with the numbers available.

The first one she called was Wanda, the waitress with the perfect memory.

"Wanda, it's Keepsie Branson."

"Holy shit, Keepsie, bad time to talk to me about that job. Have you looked outside? The shit's coming down," came the deep feminine voice on the other end.

"Well, I'm not exactly calling about that job, Wanda," Keepsie said patiently. "But I do need your help."

"Sure thing, kiddo, as long as it doesn't require me to leave home. And where the hell are the heroes, I ask you?"

Damn. "They’re fighting a big bad, Wanda. There’s shit going down everywhere. You can stay home. I just need to ask you some questions about some phone numbers and some powers."

Silence at the other end. Then Wanda said, "You know, kid, when you asked me to catalogue all of that stuff years ago, I thought you were just getting your kicks spying on your customers. I didn't actually think you'd ever use it."

"I didn't think I'd ever need it, sorry to say," Keepsie said, blushing a little. It had made her feel sneaky to keep track of everything she knew about her customers, but Wanda's memory banks were infinite, as far as they could tell, and she didn't mind loaning a bit of her space to Keepsie.

"So what exactly do you need?" Wanda asked, her voice getting the waitress-matter-of-factness she used at work.

"Names. Phone numbers. Powers. And anything you know about any Third Waves that I didn't tell you."

"Right. OK. There's you, Laura Keepsie Branson, who can't have anything taken away from you. You place anyone who attacks your personal belongings in a full stasis mode, whatever that is, and anyone robbing something of yours that is not on your person is trapped with the offending extremity, usually an arm, held until you free them. Ian Smith, also known as Feculent Boy, who can shoot feces from his fists. Totally gross," she added.

Keepsie clamped her teeth together to avoid interrupting her. Wanda had her way of regurgitating information, and didn't appreciate being interrupted even if her information was useless. Once she had gone through Keepsie's closest friends, she started giving useful information, and Keepsie started to write.