THE LED-STUDDED SPEED limits wink out. They’re replaced by a hundred stop signs. The cars ahead trundle to a halt. The Captain smacks his horn, shocking the tinnitus back into my ears. “No! Keep moving!”
But the authority of the lights overrules one angry guy in a Ford Fiesta. We get dirty looks from the drivers in front. Those looks only get filthier as the Captain locks the parking brake and kicks open his door. He darts to his trunk, popping the silver box within, muttering “fuck-fuck-fuck” all the way.
He passes two bell-nosed rifles out. One for Sherman, one for me. His hands only shake a little. “Jones? Remember everything I taught you about shooting to miss?”
“Yeah?”
“Be a darling and forget it?”
I’m not sure I can. But I have to try. I wobble out of the sidecar after Sherman cuts the engine. When I cock my rifle, the hum of the charge is lost to my damaged ears. Just gotta trust the Captain plugged these babies in before he set off this morning.
“Jav, Lyssa?” I say. “Stay in the car.”
It’d be quite the badass moment, if my head wasn’t swimming from the concentrated diesel fumes. I have to lean on the hood until my knees remember how to hold me up. Lyssa tries the door, but luckily, the Captain keeps the child locks engaged, and she’d have to crawl over Jav to reach the front seats.
“Plan?” Sherman asks the Captain.
“Don’t die,” he says, swinging his rifle up to lock against his shoulder.
“Real motivational.”
Around us, cars swerve into the highway’s outer lanes as the jet descends to a low hover, its shadow darkening to pitch. A panel whooshes open on the plane’s glossy underside, and two white-clad Supers leap from within.
Even at a distance, I recognize them. Tornadoes funnel around the Windwalker’s legs. They carry him to the earth, Crystalis clasped to his side. Her hair swirls, a nest of red snakes.
Sherman drags down her sidekick mask. It hides her eyes but not the daggers she’s glaring.
Car doors open, car doors slam. Civilians know better than to hang around, unless they’re looking to get gilded on the Superspotter app. A smart car demonstrates its small turning circle, chugging out the same way we came in, but most folks just abandon their vehicles and sprint for the emergency exit signs.
We don’t bother. We can’t run, not with Jav’s busted ankle—and no way are we leaving anyone behind.
“We could always leave your friend behind,” says the Captain. Sherman thumps his arm so I don’t have to. “Ow! What? They’ll chase you guys, who’ll be running in the opposite direction to me.” Despite his words, the Captain twists the dial on the side of his gun all the way up to full. Ghostly turquoise charge builds in the barrel.
We’re three hundred yards into the tunnel. The exit floats ahead of us, a glowing doorway in the dark. A gash in the fabric of space that leads to a world of sunlight and lies. Windwalker and Crystalis look minuscule from this distance. No news crews; they must’ve stayed at the bomb site. Our heroes stroll toward us, real leisurely, as if they have all the time in the world.
“Cooper!” I call. “We found out about Project Zero—you won’t believe what’s going down!”
“Oh, I know.” Cooper’s voice rumbles off the arched ceiling. “Brightspark told me everything, after I left the prison. The difference is that I saw the benefit in keeping my mouth shut.”
I grimace. So much for that.
When the Windwalker lifts his hands, the wind lifts, too. Fingers of hot, stale tunnel air pluck at my shirt, beneath my holographic uniform. “Last chance, henchmen. Put the guns down and surrender. This doesn’t have to end badly.”
“I’m afraid it does,” says Crystalis. “We can’t risk them talking.”
Windwalker’s chin does a wobbly thing. “Can’t we just bribe them?”
“Nope. Orders from above—they’ve caused too much trouble.” She smirks. “Don’t worry. I’ll take care of them if you’re squeamish.”
I pray that Windwalker’s gonna stand up to her. Tell her this is wrong, that they’re supposed to lower Sunnylake City’s homicide rate, not add to it. But he touches his chest, where a third star spangles, announcing his promotion to Team Leader.
Quite the feat. He’ll be the youngest in decades—history books will remember his name. They always remember the names of men like him.
“I’m not squeamish,” he insists.
A tiny cyclone lifts Crystalis’s red locks, making them float around her head like she’s underwater. She pats his nearest muscle. “Feel free to prove it. You take the Normies.” She smirks at Sherman: standing at the head of our triad, between me and the Captain. “The Super’s mine.”
“Not anymore,” Sherman snarls, and dashes forward.
We all know how this goes. One no-holds-barred Superpowered slugfest, coming up. Crystalis emits a laugh as high as my tinnitus, summoning a broadside of frozen oxygen spears to greet Sherman’s mad charge. Sherman bellows a war cry, her shield bursting out between them, the tunnel lights pinging and sparking above. We’re talking IMAX levels of awesome—until I intervene.
“Stop!”
Icicles shatter to nothing. Sherman turns to me, as do Crystalis, Windwalker, and the Captain.
“What?” asks Windwalker, a little peevishly.
I point to the car. “My sister’s got nothing to do with this. She doesn’t know what’s going on!”
“Damn right I don’t!” comes Lyssa’s weedy voice, floating through the open window.
I raise my hands, gun pointing at the ceiling. “Don’t kill her for my mistakes. Please.”
Windwalker and Crystalis engage in a brief, silent conversation. It utilizes only their eyebrows, which waggle furiously, distorting the lines of their masks.
“It’s too much of a risk,” Crystalis says, after Windwalker shakes his head. He shakes it harder. “The mayor said no survivors. You heard her.”
“I don’t care. I’m not killing some Normie kid.”
“But you will kill my sister?” Lyssa yells. “Ugh! I can’t believe I liked you!”
Windwalker sighs. “Get out and get moving.”
I have to open the door, thanks to the child lock. Jav cowers in the footwell, having propped her swollen ankle on the seat in a contorted yoga pose. Lyssa clambers over her. She emerges from the car, slow and shaky. The dial of her Hench mask catches the gleam of the overhead lights. She must’ve been scratching at it; her neck’s a crosshatch of raised red stripes. “Come with me, Riley.”
“I can’t.”
“I’m not leaving you!”
“Yeah, you are.” Still, I pull her in. Wrap myself around her like a crash cushion that puffs up to protect her from the slamming weight of the world. “You have to.”
“That’s enough,” Crystalis snaps. “The kid goes now or not at all.”
We’re out of time. I breathe instructions into Lyssa’s ear and draw back from her, cupping her little face. “You’re gonna make your daddy so proud.”
“Uh, no; he’s gonna kill me. And you. So you gotta promise me, okay, Riley? Promise me you won’t die here. Dad’s got dibs.” Her voice is a Velcro scratch. She scrubs her damp cheeks, breath hitched on a sob.
Windwalker rubs the back of his neck, averting his eyes. I don’t care if this will keep him up at night. I don’t care if he’ll need therapy. We’re still gonna be dead, and I’m still gonna break my promise to my sister.
Crystalis could cut our throats with no remorse, but that just makes her a monster. Cooper’s a rational guy. He weighed up the pros and cons of joining Project Zero, and decided that the Captain, Sherman, Jav, and I are expendable collateral. He’ll kill us so he can nail that pay rise, rub elbows with Brightspark, boast about the shiny new star on his chest. Nothing I do, say, scream, will ever change his mind—so I don’t bother. I just kiss Lyssa’s forehead and lie.
“Course I promise. I’ll see you real soon.” Lyssa nods. I smooth her hair back from her face, tuck it behind her little brown ears. “You remember what I told you?” She nods again. “Good girl.”
“Love you, Riley.”
“Love you, too, goober.”
I turn back to Windwalker. I might not be able to square off against him in a fair fight. I might be nothing more than a Normie with a nonlethal gun I was never taught to shoot straight. That doesn’t matter. This is one battle he’ll remember for the rest of his days. I’m gonna put a scar on that pretty face.
“Lyss?” I call.
She pauses. “Yeah?”
“Tell your dad I’m sorry.”
Lyssa’s sniffle echoes around us. “He’s your dad, too, dumbass. Tell him yourself.”
Then she’s gone, aiming for that slice of blue sky, her phone in her overalls’ pocket. Strength bursts inside me as I watch her trudge toward the light. The Captain moves to flank me, Sherman standing ahead. This is us, saying yes, we are nothing. We are dust. But we’re the dust this city is built on, and we’re taking it back.
Or, more likely, we’re gonna die trying.