CHAPTER 29 - FISHER

With Sabra off to take on Taurine, Fisher knew he had to find some backup that might give her a chance of an even fight. Or more of one. Even with her spirit, he didn’t like her odds. But SOLAR was here, somewhere. He just had to find them.

But as the minutes wore on, the thought that he’d find the UN elite before Sabra’s confrontation ran its course seemed to grow increasingly desperate. In his mind’s eye, he saw Taurine hurling Sabra from the top of the Citadel, again and again. And, in all of them, he was standing at the base of the tower, knowing it was his fault.

Fisher left the armory behind and circled back through the administrative sections on the ground floor, listening for the sounds of battle. He heard nothing but his breathing and his heartbeat pounding in his ears, the near-silent sounds of his cybernetic knuckles working as he flexed his hands to try and quell the tension in his belly. He stepped into the lobby, stepped over a pair of dead APD officers, and could hear the distant tinny report of gunfire, tried to place the direction. Sounded like the hangar bay, and further up the tower.

The fighting must’ve started here. Someone had driven three trucks straight up the steps and into the lobby. Bodies lay all across the floor, spent shells scattered everywhere. But outside, everything looked so peaceful.

Someone had locked down the elevators, and someone else had wrenched them open. Had Taurine and her people tried to hit the secure facilities? It’d make sense. But what were they here for and, if they’d gotten down there, then why were they still around?

A dark-haired woman pulled herself over the edge of the elevator shaft. Just behind her came another woman with red-orange hair and a large pack on her shoulders. The first was clad in SOLAR armor, whereas the redhead wore the uniform of a Citadel tech. Fisher moved to give them a hand, but, by the time he had gotten there, both had cleared the ledge.

Wincing, breathing hard, the dark-haired woman scrutinized Fisher from head to toe. The word AEGIS was printed on her breastplate. She scowled at him.

“Who the fuck are you?”

Strange. It was like he knew her from somewhere, but in that distant way. Like he’d seen her on the feeds, heard her name on the news for something other than being in SOLAR...

“The name’s Fisher,” he began, “I—”

“Fantastic, Fisher. You see those doors over there?” She pointed to the exit of the lobby, at the daylight past the pillars. “That’s where you should be. You’re stupid, blind or deaf to be sticking around here, got it?”

Aegis was about his age, maybe a touch older. Had to be the leader of the SOLAR team that Sabra mentioned. That wasn’t why he recognized her, however. Whatever the reason was, it smoldered in the back of his brain.

“Guilty of the first category, at least,” Fisher said. “Listen, a friend of mine has gone to fight Taurine. She’s going to need backup. I know how dangerous that woman is.”

“Tell me something I don’t know. At this point, I think this whole tower knows how fucking dangerous she is. Figured you for a cape, what with those hands and all. That ill-fitting business suit is a horrible uniform, though.”

“I’m retired.”

“Great, I’m permanently one day from it. Okay, you’ve got a friend who’s going to tangle with Taurine. Where?”

“Don’t you have comms?”

“Got fried downstairs. So, where?”

Fisher spread his arms, shook his head. “I don’t know. She put on her armor and took off down the hall. Last I heard, Taurine was fighting her way to the top of the tower.”

“Fantastic,” Aegis said. “It’s a fucking big tower. Hey, you—Kelly, was it? Set the pack down.”

The redhead slipped the pack from her shoulders and pulled a case from it. Aegis popped the latches and withdrew a series of discs about the size of saucers. One by one, a dozen in total, they floated into the air. Kelly passed Aegis a hand tablet, and she began tapping commands.

“Okay,” she said as the drones burst off in different directions. “At least we’ve still got the drones.”

Fisher glanced at the screen. On it, there were twelve images, the feed from each of the drones. It was twelve different scenes of devastation. Wounded people and broken corpses. If there was a constant between the scenes, it was the bullet holes and blood splatter. A fire burning somewhere on the sixth floor. Great Barrier and Bushranger locked in battle with Taurine’s followers—a bullet struck that drone, stray or otherwise, and the feed dropped to eleven.

“What the fuck is going on?” Fisher asked.

“Good question,” Aegis replied. “Some fuckwit mercenaries shot their way into the command center and broke into the database. Don’t know what they were looking for, but we can figure that out later. First things first, we have to secure this complex.”

Fisher paused. “It wasn’t Taurine?”

“Fuck no. You think I’d be standing here if it was? She’s a diversion, and a bloody big one at that.”

“These mercenaries... Were they wearing black, with chrome helmets?”

“You know ‘em?”

“Long story,” Fisher said. “But if Taurine’s a diversion, then they should be your priority.”

Aegis shook her head. “No. Data’s one thing, and I’ve got an asset running them down as we speak, but we can’t restore the dead. For now, our objective is to secure the tower and contain this clusterfuck. If the mercs escape, then so be it—there’s only so far they can run on an island.” Her eyes narrowed further, and she indicated the display with her chin. “There. Is that your friend?”

One of the drones had spotted Sabra, locked in battle with Taurine. The drone was too far away to get a precise look, but, to Fisher, it seemed like they were evenly matched—for now. The drone turned about, as if trying to place their precise location.

Fisher felt his breathing hitch as Taurine threw a haymaker, Sabra slipping past it — but only barely. “That’s her,” he said. “In the armor.”

“No shit,” Aegis said. “Right, they’re on floor eighty-four.” She raised a hand to her ear. “Blueshift, status.” She caught herself, frowned. “Right, fried. Give me a second to route everything through the drones.”

“You’re not worried someone will hear?”

“Letting a few pissants in on how badly we’re going to kick their asses is hardly a problem to me. Blueshift, respond.”

A voice came back through the tablet. Fisher couldn’t place the accent.

“Captain, always a pleasure to hear your voice.”

“Cut it,” Aegis snapped. “Status?”

The narrative has been illicitly obtained; should you discover it on Amazon, report the violation.

“I’m dealing with about a dozen individuals with firearms, two wounded capes and a gaggle of terrified civilians. Fighting here is like fighting with my hands tied behind my back.”

“You’ll live. Some kid in a set of shitty power armor has gone up to fight Taurine. I need you to get up to the eighty-fourth floor and decide the engagement for us.”

“Understood, Captain. I’ll be on station momentarily.”

Fisher kept his eyes on the feed. Felt like he was watching a 3MA bout. Not something he had ever really enjoyed, and he enjoyed it less when they were flesh and blood, and less still when he knew the combatants.

Sabra delivered a cross to Taurine’s right eye socket, then a sharp jab to her throat. The sort of violence one needed to employ to have even a chance of slowing Taurine down. But she wasn’t putting her down, and she was barely slowing her.

He couldn’t put it from his mind that Taurine knew about their connection, that she was toying with him by toying with her again, that she knew he was watching.

Fisher caught himself chewing at the inside of his cheek, and didn’t stop himself.

Taurine countered Sabra’s next blow, pulled her into a grapple. The pair fell, Taurine on top, and it was all a ground game then. The floor went out from under them and, following through the hole, the drone caught a glimpse of Taurine head-butting Sabra. Sabra managed to kick her free, sparks flying as Taurine ripped something from her suit.

“Eighty-third floor, Blueshift,” Aegis said.

Sabra kicked out again—a tricky move in a suit like that—and her foot spat fire. The blow caught Taurine on the jaw, seared her down to the bone from chin to brow, and brought space for her to get up. Taurine rose to meet her, half her face missing.

The drone circled Sabra like a curious hummingbird. Closer, Fisher could see that Sabra was hurting—her armor was dented, plates torn free, sections of chassis exposed. One of her hands looked broken. Then the feed was spinning round and round, bringing Taurine into view just about every half second, closer and closer with each revolution. Then it went black, and Aegis switched to another.

She threw the fucking drone at her.

He felt a surge of something like pride at that.

Give her hell, kid. Fight smart.

But Sabra was ebbing, waning. It felt like a final show of defiance, and his thoughts sounded like an epitaph.

The second drone circled the combatants like a news chopper, as if it had learned from the fate of its predecessor. Taurine stomped the previous drone under her foot, just in time for Sabra to charge her. Fisher caught Sabra swinging a fire extinguisher for Taurine’s chin, a devastating upward sweep. The blow was straight, and it was true, and Taurine fell back, her spray of blood and spittle mingling with the wide arc of chemical foam that splatted across her eyes. But with only one arm, the wild strike had left Sabra over-extended.

Taurine was already wiping the foam from her eyes. Taurine, the worst combination of vicious and experienced, was already capitalizing on Sabra’s gutsy play. She lashed out, raining blows down on Sabra’s head and shoulders, roaring.

“You are nothing to me!”

Her voice was tinny over the connection, and yet it still had all the menace and rage it needed to send Fisher a decade into the past. He held firm, eyes wide, as Taurine shifted her stance and slowed her strikes. Now she was putting all of her strength into each one. Her arms were like two seismic pistons, her fists like meteors—slow and powerful, inevitable and inexorable and final.

Sabra recovered, launched herself forward, and Taurine caught her by the visor. Hefted her up and slammed her against the floor. Hauled her up to do it again, and again. Sabra’s arms and legs struggled to retaliate, nothing but misses and glancing blows.

“You think you ever really had a chance?!” Taurine snarled, punctuating each word with a fist.

“She’s going to fucking kill her,” Aegis hissed. “Blueshift, I need you on floor eighty-three yesterday.”

“He won’t—” Fisher began, but the words caught in his throat. The fight had taken maybe twenty or thirty seconds and, in ten more, it would be over. And Sabra would be dead.

She was going to kill her—that stupid girl with her stupid urge to go out and help people—and it was all because of him, because of his own stupid attempt to think he could set the past right.

He had to do something. But he couldn’t. He couldn’t do anything. He was a failure, and the only thing he’d ever done was compound it. Now, a young girl was going to die because he had the audacity to think he could teach anything but failure.

Taurine grabbed at Sabra’s shoulders and yanked her up, to her knees, putting her helmet at the perfect height for her brutal follow-up. Taurine turned on her heel, driving her other heel into Sabra’s helmet, and sent her to the floor in a heap.

The blow would’ve killed anyone else, of that Fisher was sure. It still might have—even with the helmet. Sabra wasn’t moving. Smoke curled from her suit. Something sparked and popped in the back of her armor.

“Get up,” Taurine growled, stepping back, getting distance. Letting Sabra think she had space to rise and a chance of winning. “I said: get up.”

And Sabra did. Slowly, tortuously. Her head hung low and her hands—open, unprepared—didn’t even reach past her belly when she raised them. Taurine stalked forwards and Sabra’s posture didn’t change. She wavered on her feet, obviously punch drunk.

Taurine drew her right arm back, readying her fist, her arm, her shoulder, her whole hellish body and countenance for her coup de grâce, and let it fly.

Sabra stepped past it, turning like she had seen it coming.

Next to him, Fisher heard Aegis curse out her disbelief. His focus was too sharp on Sabra to make out the specifics. Fisher began to count.

One, two.

Taurine’s killing blow had left her over-extended, and Sabra was somehow, impossibly, exploiting it. She put an uppercut into Taurine’s jaw with her good hand and all of her jets. Taurine stumbled, and Sabra whirled on her heel, kicking out with her jets burning, armored foot colliding with Taurine’s knee.

Taurine’s leg snapped at the joint, bone jutting like a spear through thready flesh.

Three, four.

Taurine fell back, forcing her broken leg back into position so it’d knit together. It was already healing before Fisher’s eyes. In a few seconds, it’d be whole again—but a few seconds was enough to put her on the defensive.

Taurine snarled, pushing to regain her momentum, and walked right into the punch that broke her nose. And then up and back and around—and Sabra had split her right horn from her brow, sending it sailing across the room.

Fisher watched, caught somewhere between horror and disbelief. Not even Miss Millennium had ever managed to injure Taurine so visibly, and so easily. And there was Sabra, meeting Taurine strength for strength. Every strike was a step, and every step was a strike. Taurine howled and kicked out and caught nothing but air.

In reply, Sabra took Taurine’s other horn—and then crashed her armored forearms into either side of Taurine’s skull.

Taurine’s face distended.

Seven.

Taurine staggered away, shaking her head. Already, her form was healing, adapting. Sabra didn’t give her an inch, and threw her shoulder against Taurine’s chest, sending her stumbling backward.

Eight.

“Smart girl,” Aegis said, at the exact moment Fisher saw Sabra’s plan for what it was.

Sabra surged forward, engaged her shoulder jets, and planted her armored boot on Taurine’s chest—just as the supervillain hit the nearest window, and kicked her through it.

Nine.

For a moment, it was like Taurine hung there in the air, surrounded by shards of glass, like she was in one of those old cartoons—and then fell. Sabra stepped back, wavered, stumbled, and collapsed in a heap.

Ten.

“There’s your win,” Fisher murmured, and let go of his cheek.

Eighty-three stories. Taurine wouldn’t be dead, not after such a prolonged melee, but she’d be incapacitated for a minute, if not two, from a fall like that. That would have to be enough.

“Blueshift, ground floor,” Aegis said. “Apprehend Taurine and then assist SUNDOWNER in apprehending the mercenaries.”

“Understood.”

Something was amiss there, but Fisher wasn’t sure what. “Those mercs are the key,” he said. “A month ago, they were barely a blip on the radar. Now, they’re teaming up with a Golden Age supervillain and pulling off sieges. Someone’s armed them and pointed them at Asclepion.”

“Got it in one,” Aegis said. “Let’s see if you can figure out the next part.”

“Who armed them.”

“Two for two.”

Another mystery. But, as much as he hated that gap in his world, this one could wait. Fisher set off towards the elevators.

“Where the hell are you going?” Aegis called out. “Elevators are staying locked until the tower is secure.”

“Well,” Fisher said, frowning. “Then I guess I’m taking the stairs.”

Someone had to get Sabra, after all.