The next thing I’m aware of, I’m on my belly, mask in the muck. Footsteps crunch and squeak in the slimy gravel by my head, and I whirl around with my feet primed to kick, but instead of Mr. Spiral, I find Kitsune instead.

She kneels down. “That was amazing,” she says, so softly it almost feels reverent.

My handiwork won’t last long – a huge mound of that slushy green oil melts in the night heat, slowly becoming the same molasses that made up Mr. Spiral’s body. Some of the apartment’s tenants wised up and hid inside, but a few still gawk at us from the balconies.

“He’s gone?” I ask, searching the alley with my thermal sense.

“He booked it, hot stuff. I tried to catch him but he knocked me flat again, and without you to intercept he got free. Plus, somebody had to give that lady CPR.” She gestures back to the woman who I felt lose her heartbeat, moaning and tripping out of her mind, but thankfully still alive.

Kitsune offers me another steel hand up, the second tonight. “Sorry about that. I hope he wasn’t your nemesis or anything.”

“No, but if I see him again it’s hands on sight, so I guess that makes him at least more than just a job,” I say. “He knew—” I stop myself, realizing I’m about to blab a whole bunch of information to someone I just met. “Wait, who the hell are you, anyway?”

“I told you-”

“You told me what you call yourself, not who you are.”

“Well,” she says, booping my nose out of nowhere, “I can’t just tell you who I am underneath the mask. Kind of defeats the entire point, right?”

Again, her total hotness catches me off guard. No other woman has ever struck me this way; there’s just something about her I find enthralling. The musical way she speaks, the devil may care attitude, hell, even her jab-cross was immaculate.

“Maybe we should continue this somewhere else. I think we’re outstaying our welcome.” Kitsune nods to the people on the balcony, some still watching us, but most murmuring a word salad at least partially comprised of “Call,” “the,” and “capes.”

“Nobody appreciates the blue collars out here,” I mumble. “Uh-” I look to Kitsune for guidance on where we should go. I can’t bring her back to Thanh’s… in fact, I’m a little reluctant to talk to him at all now that Mr. Spiral got away and this was connected to Pandahead.

Kitsune looks at the people, back at me, and down the alley. I feel that same radiance coming from her as before, a goodhearted playfulness and curiosity. “Why don’t you try and catch me before the capes do?” She teases me with a tap on my chest and jumps into the air, wires slinging from her hands to pull her into the Houston sky.

“Gabe, you shouldn’t go after her.” Megajoule, showing up once again to tell me that I’m stupid, and that I should ignore my heart.

“What makes you think after that little stunt that you have any say in what I’m going to do?” I shake my head and I leap into the air after her. I don’t need his engrams to go fast. Not when I have Home Run’s now.

Kitsune jumps across the broken rooftops, gliding over yards and back alleys by swinging along the buildings with her metal tendrils. She moves like a razor ahead of me, so quickly and confidently I can only imagine how practiced she is with this power. She dances over houses and rubble alike as quick as a chilly breeze, making no sound as she darts over shingles and pavement. Even her metal cables, punching into walls and ledges, don’t make a sound.

“You said you were new in town!” I call up to her. “Where are you from?”

“All over!” she answers. “I’ve lived in Denver, in Chicago, in Kansas City, even in Phoenix!”

“So you’re a drifter?” I don’t voice my other suspicion: she’s well connected somehow and travels a lot. Donning a mask is a crime, but capes have done it before for a number of reasons. I’ve heard about cape vigilantes taking on the mask to pursue people that they couldn’t officially go after. I’ve also heard of a cape busting up several mask gangs in Austin by infiltrating as a one of them.

She whirls around, giving me a thumbs up as she flies across another gap in the roofs.

I don’t get the sense that she’s lying, but it always pays to be cautious.

“Hey!” I say, pointing out drones in the sky. “We need to be careful.”

Kitsune stops and nods. “Where to, hot stuff?”

“There,” I say, pointing across an expanse of neighborhood to a broken bridge, one that used to cross the creek below it. Kitsune nods, grabs my hand, and then vaults into the air, pulling me with her. I’m so stunned I just let her carry me as she swings along.

#

We twist and turn in the sky together, two acrobats moving with inhuman grace, two dancers in perfect motion. We move like that’s all we were made to do.

She crosses the distance to the bridge with me in tow almost as fast as I could have, and we land among the supporting columns, all marked by years of graffiti. The bridge doesn’t quite finish crossing the creek – a depressed section in the middle hangs in a busted cluster of concrete and rebar.

I finally get a handle on the situation, scoff, and hold my hands up, exasperated. “Hang on. Why are you flirting with me? Where did you even come from? Were you following me?”

Kitsune lifts up the bottom of her mask so I can see full lips framing an absolutely pristine smile. It’s the kind of striking smile that makes me ashamed of my own teeth. “Well, it’s not every day you get a chance to flirt with the most wanted mask in the city. If you want me to stop I can—”

“No!” I say a little too fast. Shooting from the hip never wins duels. I mentally slap myself and say, “No, I don’t mind it.”

“I get the sense you don’t get flirted with often,” she says. “Which is a shame. I can just tell you’re smoking under that mask.”

I groan. “Smoking, really?”

Kitsune grins and laughs. “Plus, I like a man who appreciates my sense of humor.”

“She hasn’t answered the question about following you,” Megajoule whispers.

I try not to actually scoff out loud. First impressions and Megajoule’s paranoia aside, she’s a real mask. Not a thug or a gang banger, but a real honest to goodness mask. Still, best to get a feel for who she is beyond that. “So, you were stalking me.”

Enjoying this book? Seek out the original to ensure the author gets credit.

“Stalking is a strong word.” She offers an apologetic smile this time, and honestly, I’d do just about anything to keep them coming at this point. “No, I wasn’t following you specifically. I was looking for trouble and I found it.”

“I don’t buy it,” Megajoule says, but I wave my hand and dismiss him. Luckily, Kitsune just takes that for a dismissal of what she’s saying.

“Hey, I’m telling the truth. Not stalking you.” Kitsune crosses her heart. Which, coincidentally, tells me she isn’t lying with its steady, even beat. Likewise, Her Affect betrays nothing, which means she’s very good at guarding her emotions, not whether she’s lying or telling the truth. Much like the empaths I know. I’m gonna have to learn how to do that.

“Fine. You’re not stalking me. Maybe.”

“Well, I mean, could ya blame a gal if she did?” She puts her hands on her hips and leans back to check me out.

Flustered, I say, or at least try to, “Yeah and I guess I wouldn’t mind in your case either.”

“That was almost adjacent to flirting!” Kitsune slaps me on the shoulder. “You know, maybe I can help with that.” She leans in very close, so close I can feel her breath on my mask. So close that if my mask weren’t there, I’d only need to tilt my head down for our lips to meet. “Help Home Run not strike out. They say practice makes perfect.”

I can’t even stammer.

She puts her hand on my shoulder, her fingers close to caressing my neck. The metal is gone from her hand.

“Where’d the steel skin go?” I ask.

“You like that trick, huh? Here.” She holds out a piece of shiny steel no larger than an inch in the palm of her free hand. The telltale vinegar vibe of Affect flux hits the air, and the metal melts, coating her hand. This second skin grows across her arm, up her jacket, until it covers her neck, too. “I can control metal that touches my body.”

I marvel at her ability. “That’s how Mr. Spiral didn’t affect you.”

Kitsune pockets the metal in her jacket. “It’s nifty. Nowhere near your power.”

Actually, at this point, we’re a lot closer than she thinks. “Well, your power was definitely better than mine for fighting Mr. Spiral.”

“I’m sure the great Home Run would have figured him out eventually.” Kitsune elbows me playfully.

“Thanks for the help, either way.”

Kitsune does a little mock bow. “To be honest, I wasn’t sure which one of you I should kick, but he seemed to be winning, so I went for him.”

Even though she can’t see it under my mask, I throw her a dirty look.

“I’m kidding,” she laughs. “You were obviously the good guy. He was literally dancing over two people freaking out and talking about somebody named ‘Pandahead.’” She tilts her head at me, I suppose feeling a cocktail of emotions from me over that name. “Who is he?”

I sigh, not sure if I should even open that can of worms. Trusting her with this information is risky. I want people to know about Pandahead. But telling her about Pandahead requires explaining. “He’s why I’m the most wanted mask in Houston.”

“I kind of thought that had more to do with killing a cape.”

“I killed Danger Close because he wanted to murder a kid I saved from Pandahead’s warehouse. Or he wanted to murder me for even being there. I don’t know. I’m still trying to figure out the details.”

“Why do you think he wanted to kill you, not just bring you in?” she asks.

“Hundreds of .50 cal bullets don’t scream ‘you’re under arrest,’ do they?”

Kitsune puts her hands on her hips, nods a couple of times as she processes that. “Nope.”

I shake my head and continue. “He was working with Pandahead, who I’ve since learned is a slaver. I tricked him into admitting it.”

“A slaver.” There is a moment of uncertainty bundled up by the hot evening breeze where Kitsune scrapes her foot against the cement, a single errant strand of golden hair floating outside her mask. The simple fox face staring at me reminds me of a cork on a bottle that’s close to exploding from the pressure inside. Perhaps it’s the striking uptick in the heat in her face or the soft exhale of warm breath as she sighs. “He really said that?”

“Said he wasn’t going to get shut out of his cut.”

“Metis,” she swears. “So you’re trying to stop Pandahead?”

I don’t feel like I need to explain myself, though I still do. “He kidnapped my friend. He’s a slaver, and he’s taking Affected people, masks or not. And the kid I found. The one Danger Close wanted to kill. He endured months of torture and slavery under this guy. Ripped from his home, his dad dead, everyone around him massacred. This guy’s evil.” I don’t bring up the lab, even though it’s on my mind. If I find Pandahead, maybe I find out more about who made me.

Kitsune folds her hands and balances on one foot, gazing just over my shoulder from behind her mask. “You care about that?”

“Yes. Always.” My brothers demand it. Mateo and the other children Pandahead abuses demand it. Children always get forgotten. Teenagers to toddlers, people make a good effort of looking like they’re helping kids, when they’re actually letting them flounder.

“You sound like a cape.” The wind changes direction as she turns to me, and I pick up the scent of cherry and alcohol.

“Well, I’m obviously not one,” I say.

“But you talk like one and you have the power of one.” Kitsune pokes at my arm. “Maybe you’re one in disguise.”

“I can’t be. If I walked into the Houston Shrine I would be arrested. Maybe even killed.” I shrug, feigning indifference, although I’m sure she can feel the actual resentment underneath.

Kitsune tilts her head to the side. “Are you a cloak?”

I hate that word. It’s just a cape’s word for a mask that got competitive with them. “I’m just me.”

“So say I wanted to see ‘just you’ again in the future,” Kitsune says.

My first instinct is to say no, but Saw Off and the Front have shown me there are masks out there that can be trusted. Kitsune fought with me. That has to count for something. And damn it, she is a genuine pleasure to talk to and be near and look at. “Uh- you know the abandoned church?”

Kitsune smiles again, nodding. “Do you go there every night?”

“No. Maybe once or twice a week,” I say.

“Wednesdays and Sundays, then.” She tilts her head.

“Fine,” I say. “Wednesdays and Sundays. Sometimes. Not every Wednesday and not every Sunday.”

“Well, I suppose a gal will just have to hang around until you come calling, then.” I can practically feel her wink at me through the mask. “Actually, tell you what, what if we swapped phone numbers?”

“No phone,” I say, holding my hands up.

“How do you live?” she asks, shaking her head. She rummages in her pocket and pulls out an old brick of a device, a piece of plastic and green glass that looks older than the world. “Here.”

“I’m sorry, you just happen to have a phone for me?” Now I’m wary. “What, is that a GPS that’s going to track me down?”

“I don’t just happen to have it, it’s mine and I’m giving it to you. It’s an old burner running off the PK guild network instead of the Templar network,” Kitsune says. “The capes can still read the messages, if they feel like it, but they often don’t get reports for an entire month. So, I use the burner phone for a month and then replace it. And you can rip it apart if you want, but there’s no tracker on it.”

I take the phone from her, hold it in my hand like a sword. “How do you know all that?”

Kitsune hesitates to answer me. Finally, she hangs her head, hands on her hips. “Promise you won’t be mad?”

“No one who’s ever asked that has believed the other person won’t be mad,” I say, half-joking, half-preemptively pissed off.

She sighs and says, “I used to be a big hot-shot cape. Not anymore. Now I sit at a desk and watch things get worse while no one does anything.”

Well, yep, I’m now a little pissed off. But I knew it was a possibility. If she’s not actually fucking lying, she’s one of those capes that put on a mask because they couldn’t handle the red tape and the books. Everything she said prior to this is now suspect.

But… if she was out to get me, wouldn’t she have just lied and not said anything about being a cape at all? “Why tell me that? You know I killed one of your own.”

“This Pandahead thing. I believe you, hot stuff, and I want to help. I’m obviously not doing things above board now.”

It’s dangerous territory, talking to a former or current cape that used to be a well-known hero. I shouldn’t agree to meet with her again. I should melt this phone to slag and forget I ever met her. Every part of me is saying I should leave now and not look back. But there’s something in the way she speaks that makes me feel she can be trusted. I don’t know what it is. I really hope it’s not just that she’s hot.

On the other hand, maybe I can use this to my advantage? I can leave the phone somewhere away from home. But having a contact who has an in with the capes means I might be able to glean some things about what they’re doing in Houston.

“Earth to Home Run?” Kitsune asks. “Are we cool, or you planning on how to take my head off?”

I eye her one last time, mostly as a tease, and then I hold my hand out. “I think we’ve established that we’re both hot, not cool.”

“Now that was flirting.” Kitsune smirks and takes my hand. We stand there, awkwardly shaking hands for a few seconds until grins at me. “You have nice hands. Very warm.”

“Is this goodbye?” I ask.

“I can find my own way back from here. Not ready for you to walk me home yet. That’s second date material.”

“Second date?”

But she’s gone, swinging off into the night sky.