Surely not.
I spent a full minute standing in place and staring at this storage unit with the W sprayed across the otherwise white door. The League was only a couple of blocks away. The chances I would come across this—if it was even what I thought it was—it just didn’t make sense.
Although the whole thing would open like a normal garage to allow a vehicle in, there was also the outline of a more normal sized door on the left side. One that was padlocked.
A sigh rattled through my re-breather filter. What could I really do except try the key and see? Out from my pouch and into my hand it came. I stepped over to the smaller door and lifted the padlock to inspect it. Nothing unusual, although I was sure I could do some breaking and entering if I wanted to—ignoring the fact that it would make quite the scene in broad daylight.
I placed the end of the key into the slot and pushed it all the way in. With a twist, it clicked and unlocked. Fuck.
Selectloader pushed in a Tazer cartridge, as it was a little less suspect than jamming a mag in. With my breath held, I pushed the door open and stepped into the darkened space. My hand went up and felt for a light switch—which was just on the left wall where I had entered. Although I had a flashlight somewhere on my person, stumbling like that sounded too horror-movie-adjacent for my liking.
With a hum and series of clicks, the wide overhead light flickered on, bathing the space in pale white illumination. Revealing that the storage unit was completely empty, aside from one thing.
Near the back of the room, a dusty white sheet covered something. Approximately four feet square, at a guess. I pulled the door closed behind me, feeling my muscles tense up. The key had been given by my skeletal arm, hidden beneath my house. While it was unlikely that the rest of my skeleton was stored away here, I felt the prickle of unease running down my spine.
The walls were plain brickwork painted white at some point in time. They appeared dusty and slightly grimy in the corners—but otherwise held no surprises. Both the floor and ceiling were light gray, probably poured concrete. Cheap, simple, and functional. Unfortunately, that meant there was little to distract myself from the sheet and whatever it was hiding.
I sighed once more and stepped over to it. It didn’t look like something I’d need to shoot, but I was ready for it, just in case. I gripped at the sheet and pulled it away as quick as I could, causing a brief cloud of dust to swirl and cloud the area. My eyes went straight to what had been revealed.
One of my least favorite storytelling mediums. A diorama.
I allowed my lungs to empty as I lowered my gun-arm. On the surface of it, what was displayed before me was simple enough to understand. My stomach swirled as a heavy weight bore down on my soul.
There were ten pegs shaped roughly like people standing on a square board. Tapered wooden triangles with a small sphere on the top of each to represent the head. The way in which they were arranged… two stood opposite each other, a small distance between them, while these opposing figures then had four peg-people, each standing in a row behind them.
A split.
I crouched down to get a better look at the two groups, and immediately wished that I hadn’t.
The single figure on the left had two green dots for eyes. I stared blankly as it as dark shadows and muffled shouts echoed around in the back of my mind. The betrayal. Was I the betrayer, though—or was it the other? My focus went past the small Bard peg to look at my accomplices. Three of them had red crosses painted on their faces, but were otherwise ordinary.
I switched my gaze to the opposing group. Other than three of their back line having red crosses, there were no other details on them. Of ten, four yet remained.
There was a story here, but I could tell it wasn’t the full picture. A falling out between two factions within our squad? I was able to buy that, considering the work we had to do. We were clearly more than just yes-men, given how much power had been stocked into us. Could things have gotten bad enough that we had clashed, and a fight killing six of us broke out?
[If only I wasn’t being drip fed the past.]
I grunted and stood back up. The arrangement meant that I could have a living ally, but given the state I recovered, who knew how they had fared. There was something else that didn’t quite feel right about it. I wasn’t being deceived, but this wasn’t the entire truth. It was barely anything at all, really. More detail surrounding the apparent betrayal and breakdown of the squad, but…
My brow furrow and I took a step back from the diorama displaying the at-odds pegs. Beneath this table, on the otherwise plain gray floor, was a hatch. Odd, considering we were at ground level… these storage units didn’t have a basement, surely?
The fact that it was hidden entirely by the table, positioned deliberately, was mentally exhausting. I lifted the table gently and moved it off to the side. Secrets upon secrets.
I kneeled down beside the hatch to check it for traps or if it had any markings or locks on it. Other than a handle set into the metal, there wasn’t anything strange about it. Perhaps it was actually something mundane, and I was getting too far ahead of myself. Still… my curiosity had been piqued.
After stretching out my shoulders to loosen them up, I grabbed hold of the handle and pulled. There was some brief amount of resistance, and then it popped from the setting and opened up wide. Dust danced in the light that shone down into… darkness. From my tactical vest, I took off the flashlight and switched it on.
A brick tunnel that went straight down for a good twenty feet before there seemed to be a turn in the passageway. Could just be… a maintenance tunnel? Or access to the sewer system or something. Head still reeling from how the morning had gone at the League, there was never any question over whether I was going to go down there. Of course I was.
I mentally unclipped my new rappel, and the small cylinder slid out of my trenchcoat over my wrist, the cable unspooling slightly. Once it was long enough to touch the floor, I activated the foam, and it expanded quickly into a chunk roughly a foot cubed. It solidified and hardened, briefly becoming like concrete, melded to the floor. I pulled on it just to test it out. It didn’t budge.
Before I descended, I put a timer up in my lense. Ten minutes. The foam should last twenty before deteriorating, but I wanted to be out way before that eventuality. This close to the League, I was sure I could call on someone to drop by and save me if something happened, but I’d rather not look like a lost puppy who had fallen down a well.
With my feet braced against the edge, I leaned back into the hole, allowing the wire to extend slowly. There wasn’t a great deal of room and I had to have my gun-arm point nearly straight up to avoid having it scrap along some of the brick walls.
A modest amount of grunting and shuffling, and I paced my way down the wall with no incident. Stepping down onto the floor, I realized that I couldn’t disconnect the rappel. It wasn’t necessarily made for climbing up places. Turning my eyes to the opening in the passageway, there was a slight corridor before a closed doorway. Assuming it didn’t go much further than that, I’d be fine to walk it—I had thirty feet of cable to go before I’d be stuck.
The door itself was something unexpected, as it looked like it would be more at home in some manor or stately residence. Ornately carved wood, lacquered and polished. I flexed my fingers as I stepped slowly toward it. The flashlight didn’t pick up any traps, cameras, or anything out of place. Which was more worrying than anything.
I placed my hand on the brass door handle and pushed, surprised that it wasn’t locked. It moved smoothly on its hinges, a light flickering on automatically in the room beyond.
My V-Force drive spooled down as I took in this new place. For all intents and purposes, it looked just like a lounge that would be behind such a door. I switched my gaze from the soft chairs and faux fireplace, over to a desk that held a computer. The tower was open, and important guts long torn out. There was a shelf half full of books, an open cabinet that looked as though it might have held liquor bottles, and a plain door on the opposite side.
Inside my head, gears whirred away, struggling to gain purchase on any thoughts that made sense. This was… a place that Boss had been staying? So close to the League, as well. It was briefly overwhelming. Was Boss one of the other pegs without a cross? My one squad ally?
I shook away the questions, unsure if that sounded realistic, even if it was plausible.
There didn’t seem to be anything obvious in the room. Perhaps I wasn’t meant to be down here. That said, Boss had always amused himself by stringing me along with things. I had just enough wire to explore the room, although I wouldn’t be able to use the bathroom. With my eyes scouring the surroundings, I stepped across the carpeted floor slowly and pushed at the toilet door with my gun-arm.
My flashlight illuminated a basic throne, the usual amenities and consumables expected. I didn’t question how the plumbing worked down here. Par for the course.
I left it be and returned to the surprisingly comfortable lounge. As I stepped over to the fireplace, I lifted the wire up so that it didn’t catch on the chairs. There was a switch on the side of the brickwork to turn it on—just as I had first thought. It was just a fake fire. A radiator with the necessary lights and a holo-screen to give the appearance of flames. Whoever Boss really was, he certainly knew how to relax.
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Not much of detective, I flicked the switch and suffered whatever consequences came my way.
The flames and sounds of crackling wood appeared immediately, but a hollow clicking noise that repeated three times before going silent told me that the heating element of the fireplace was either broken or disabled. I furrowed my brow, expecting the hologram to change into a video message, or for a secret compartment to open up and deliver me some exposition.
There was nothing so cliche.
I switched it back off with a grunt and stood. Perhaps I’d check out those books instead—being cautious of how much time I had left down here. As I turned and stepped over to the shelf, the wire caught on one of the chairs, tipping it forward. I rolled my eyes and looked at the underside of the chair, expecting there to be something hidden. Maybe I was getting too used to Boss popping up where I least expected it, that I was turning him into some mythical trickster.
Back to the books, and I was unsurprised to find that there were ten of them. Wincing at my lense, I instead decided to open up one of my pouches, which folded out to be a carrying bag. Gently, I placed each tome into it, leaving the shelf bare. A coincidence was a possibility, but given the rest of the room had been stripped of anything worthwhile, I knew better than to disregard the chance.
The remaining cupboards, cabinets, and desk drawers were all totally empty. I even checked the undersides of everything, and for any secret compartments or switches. Nothing.
With my questionable bounty secured, I returned to the way out. As the mechanism on my gauntlet wound the tense wire back in, I pressed my legs against the wall and awkwardly walked back up. Difficult when one arm was raised with the cable, and the other was a weapon that couldn’t really grip onto anything.
But I made it to the top. Quite done with the day, I shut the hatch and brought the table back over it. My synapse connection allowed me to activate the antidote in the rappel cylinder, causing the foam to rapidly deteriorate and melt away. Once it had returned to my arm, I picked the discarded sheet up and covered the diorama. It would be obvious that someone had come through here to those in the know, but I wanted to cover my bases.
Stepping out into the daylight, I closed the padlock and made sure it was secure again. I glared around as I did so to see if I had been watched. Other than a few civilians and light traffic, it was pretty quiet.
I took a deep breath and took my troubled mind off to see if my vehicle was ready.
----------------------------------------
It turned out that seeing Roy do a good deed this morning had energized the body shop into doing the job at record speed. Having famous friends had some benefits. I had almost forgotten to grab some ice-cream, but other than a quick stop at a store, I went straight home. I’d earned myself a bubble bath.
As I pulled up closer to our house, my brow furrowed out to the wastes just beyond the reach of our properties. Some of the rocks there seemed to be on fire somehow, and there were wide patches of charred ground dotted about the place.
I stopped at the workshop and hopped out; the super was sitting on a deckchair in her hero outfit with her eyes closed, but as I got closer, she didn’t open them.
[Are you… okay there?]
She looked terrible. My heart leaped into my neck as I realized her neck and face were burned—a similar worn, pinkish color to when she had exerted her power through her arms.
“I think I fucked up a little, Dubs,” she said, barely whispering.
[You didn’t burn out your eyeballs, did you?]
“No.” She exhaled and deflated. “I can’t open them for a while, though.”
I shook my head and looked back out to the apocalyptic state of the wastes just outside our living area.
[What happened to keep it to your arms only?]
She squirmed and seemed uncomfortable with both my question and how the movements felt to her damaged body. “After seeing Roy this morning… I know we’re getting the band back together. I wanted to… I need to catch back up.”
[Since you can’t see me, just imagine I look disappointed. A reckless leader is a short-lived one.]
“Piss off.” Roxy smiled, wincing as the burns hurt from the muscle movement. “You’re the one who put your balls on the table in front of Kingston.”
[It didn’t go that far, fortunately.]
She groaned in lieu of a short laugh. “Give me the details, you ass.”
So I did. Told her about how I didn’t really give away much information, only that I knew that they knew things about me. They’d keep us safe with some assumed technology. In return, I’d fit the role they were trying to push me toward on the sly. Roxy groaned again at this point, knowing that some of what we wanted was to break away from the League eventually… but we had to play the long game.
As middling B-Rankers, we weren’t shifting any needles. If we could ascend and get more power and influence… it would widen the doorway, even if only a crack.
I then told her about the storage unit, and the fact that the key fit the lock.
She was so surprised she briefly opened her eyes before squeezing them shut and hissing from the pain. “Fuck. What did you find in there? More power? Answers?”
[Hmm. My squad seemed to have a falling out, perhaps with two sides. I… might have been the proponent of one of the groups. One other from this group still lives.]
“Yeah?” Roxy was silent for a moment. “That means you have… two potential enemies, still?”
I shrugged, which she didn’t see. The truth of it was that I didn’t know. If they had survived whatever civil war had turned most of us into fertilizer, then maybe they’d had a change of heart and were living decent lives. Would I even know any of them if I saw them? I was probably unrecognizable, something Boss had intended.
[There are many more than just two who want me dead, I’m sure. It’s something for me to mull over, but doesn’t immediately point me to anything… I have nothing to gain from chasing shadows just yet.]
“Did he… even want you to see that? I guess the diorama was for showing off, huh? If I was Boss, I’d have more than one place to stay. Especially if the League was after my ass.”
To have it so close to their headquarters, though… Either he was confident in his ability and being obscure enough that they had no clue, or there was another connection that made them not a threat. I held up my hand and flexed my fingers. The puzzle pieces were becoming clearer, but I wasn’t much closer to clicking them together.
I had worked for the World Government as an engineered super solider to deal with those with actual super powers. After my chat with the Director, it sounded like the Gov was probably trying to get a wedge into the Goldarch territory and wanted something that could deal with the League’s potential army of demi-gods. Some argument had come up within the squad, leading up to something where we had been killed off.
Four managed to survive. I was found by Boss, who twisted me into being a secret ticking bomb. Probably knowing that I would eventually break through the walls he had placed around me for… safety? Was the amnesia even natural or something he had forced on me? Plus, if he was backing my corner all this time… then who was he to even want to rescue me and go through all this trouble?
With a sigh, I pulled my hood back and picked my goggles up to rest on my balaclava. Then I rubbed my eyes. What a day.
“You sound stressed, babe.” Roxy stuck her leg out off the side of the chair so she could jab me with her toes. “Gonna take it easy for the rest of the day?”
[I was planning on running a bubble bath and coercing you to join with a tub of ice-cream, but it looks like I’ll have to fly solo.]
“Nooo,” she squirmed and tried to open her eyes again, which she immediately regretted. “Motherfucker! Feels like I rubbed nettles in my eyes.”
[Are you sure they will recover fine?]
Roxy nodded, hissing again as her neck burns crinkled. “Don’t ask how I know, but I do.”
I looked down as she retracted her foot to see that it was burned as well.
[How much of your body did you do?]
It took her a few moments to respond. “My… whole body.”
[You turned… your whole body into lava?]
A brief nod was the only response. It didn’t take me long to imagine how much agony she must be in just sitting there. Aside from her forearms, she had been burned all over. Slowly healing it over, but it was still reckless.
[I’m surprised the super suit survived the process.]
“No. This is the third one. I had to run back to the house twice to change after they shredded and made me half naked.” She smirked, despite herself.
[I was going to ask why you keep doing this when I’m not here, but now I’m demanding I’ll be present next time.]
Roxy exhaled through her nose. “Flirt. You’ll see it all when I’ve healed over. I’ll need you to check thoroughly to make sure I’m all good.”
Any further greasing the squeaky wheels was put on pause as I brought my goggles back down at the sound of a notification.
//Clara: Gunquake. I tried to message Rockslide, but she didn’t respond.
//Clara: If you’re both busy fornicating, then respond when you are able.
//Clara: I’m sure it will be a while, but I’m patient.
//Dubs: I am here, Clara.
//Dubs: Roxy is resting from training a little too hard.
//Clara: I’m sure~
//Clara: Just wanted to let you know I am staying late again today.
//Clara: I am this close to getting a suitable mechanism for a grapple sorted.
//Clara: It will be worth the wait, Gunquake. I don’t mean to tease.
//Dubs: Understood.
//Dubs: I tested the rappel briefly today, no complaints.
//Clara: That is comforting to know. We’ll talk soon.
[Clara is back late. Working hard on more tech for me.]
“Oh, yeah?” Roxy bit her lip. “Just you wait until I’m healed up, fucker. You should have heard the maniacal laugh I did when I reached full lava. Despite looking like a zombie right now, I am amped the fuck up.” She squirmed to prove the point.
[I am already naked.]
Her eyes opened before snapping shut, an immediate grimace on her face. “Asshole! Now that’s just mean.”
I sat beside her and held her hand in mine. Any ire at my trick sank away to just annoyance at the pain she had put herself in. We had discussed how the League said I could skirt the edges of the law to get things done if it was for the benefit of them and Goldarch.
Right now, Roxy was the weakest and most vulnerable I’d ever seen her. This was probably the best chance I’d ever get of killing her. My eyes looked her over as she continued to face out to the wastes with closed eyes. Given that we had an assassin on our doorstep last night, the fact that she had blinded herself and was unable to fight efficiently when alone was a little more reckless than I could ignore.
It was the type of self-inflicted danger that would make her a liability to the squad. I lifted her hand up to press it against my re-breather. Her aching lips turned up into a soft smile.
“I really needed that kiss, Dubs. I’m glad I have you around to guide me through all this. It’s overwhelming, but the way you’ve herded the fucking cats, it’s helped me find my footing as well.”
[Of course, Roxy. I love you. I’ll be by your side through thick and thin.]
“Good. With us together, the world won’t know what hit it.”
I looked out to the city. It wasn’t really a place I saw as being home. I’d protect it when my job required it, and do what I could to make things better for people… but it wasn’t part of my soul. But this was. I turned my eyes to the sore super and the odd collection of buildings around where my shack used to be. This was home.
And today I had done what I had to, to defend it. Made it our place of safety. With Ren’s gift of ownership of the land, and the League promising to protect us, we could truly have a life here. Unconventional as shit, but sometimes love worked that way.
It was with some warmth inside me that I shook my head. Some worries had lingered within my skull, a concern that Bard had been on the wrong side of whatever split the squad had. But knowing how I cared and drew people to be better together… I found it hard to consider myself anything but a…
I paused, as something blinked through my lense.
Adrenaline rushed through me as I turned and spun on my feet, putting myself in front of the super.
“What? Everything okay, Dubs?”
Overcharge spooled through my gun-arm as I ejected the unspent Tazer shot and loaded in a metal ball.
[Somebody is approaching us from the wastes.]