CHAPTER 8 - SABRA
The first bullet took Sabra in the chest, followed by the second. She stumbled back a step or two, raising a hand to her chest on reflex, as the one-two impact echoed down the maintenance duct. It took her a moment to remember that she was in her armor, and she wasn’t hurt, and that it had all been her idea in the first place.
But Christ and Allah, who knew gunshots could be so loud?
It was like the impact kept ringing in her ears. Jamar flipped the safety on his handgun and squinted at her.
“Sabra,” he said. “Did you just flinch?”
Her cheeks burned. “No!”
“You did! Holy shit, you did!” Jamar laughed—deep and boisterous, from his belly. The way her father laughed. “Goddamnit, Sab. You know you’re wearing power armor, right? You don’t need to flinch! I don’t think there’s a gun on this island that could put a hole in that plate.”
She swiped vaguely at the air. “It was loud, man.”
“That’s even worse!” He laughed harder. “You flinched at the noise?”
It wasn’t like she hadn’t heard gunfire before. Growing up in Asclepion, you got used to it. Handguns, mostly. But there had been one time where she’d heard something like cloth ripping. Her father, his gaze distant, had said that was the sound of an assault rifle. But it’d never been so close, and never pointed at her.
“Whatever,” Sabra said. “Let me walk it off and we’ll try again.”
Jamar wiped at his eyes. “Sure thing.”
She went for a walk down the concrete duct, listening to the quiet hums and whines of her armor. She had to pull slightly against the systems of the suit, but that was fine. Even gave her a bit of swagger. A suit like this was supposed to move with her like it was an extension of her body, but that required a made-to-fit undersuit.
That, and the idea of the suit matching her had gotten under Sabra’s skin. The suit wasn’t doing the work; she was. So, after a few minutes of messing with the sensors and there—now she had to pull against the suit for a fraction of a second to make it work. It’d be a workout, sure, but a good one.
“You look like you’re getting the hang of it,” Jamar said, lit by dim maintenance lighting.
Asclepion was riddled with maintenance ducts. Even before Sentinel’s fall, the cape underworld had been making use of them. She’d needed a place to get shot at safely (what a thought) and Jamar had suggested the ducts.
Excepting Mike, Jamar was the only one who knew anything about her new double life. But even she had to keep things from him. Like that this wasn’t the first time in her suit. She’d gone to test it right after she’d plugged in the battery. Had decided to do something simple, like leap a building. Right jets flared, left hadn’t. She’d taken out a section of a rooftop in her mad scramble to avoid falling four stories.
She hadn’t told him about that. Couldn’t risk looking like she didn’t know what she was doing. Every superhero, prospective or otherwise, knew that brand management was vital. If you wanted to get anywhere, you lived—and maybe even died—on rep. As far as anyone else was concerned, she had been born to move in a suit like this.
She stomped her way back to where she had been standing. “Okay,” she said. “Let’s try again.”
“Right on,” Jamar replied, and raised his handgun. “We’ll go on three. You ready? One, two—”
He fired on three.
Only now, did it occur to Sabra how much of a risk this was. All it might take was one weak plate, maybe one bullet striking at just the right angle, and she’d be bleeding out. But if that was a risk, and there was a problem with all the work she had done, then it was better to find out here, with a friend, than when she was being shot at by bad guys.
Jamar fired and fired. Sabra lost count of the hits in a moment, couldn’t judge the slaps against her breastplate and pauldrons as numbers, just noise. A bullet struck her helmet and set her ears ringing—but that was all.
By Christ and Allah, she would not dare flinch against bullets that couldn’t hurt her. She took a step forward, like the shells were nothing but hail. And then another and another.
Yeah, she could take on the whole goddamn world in this suit.
Sabra laughed. “Holy shit, man—I’m a walking bulldozer!”
Jamar nodded. “That’s what I’ve been trying to say! ELE officers, I’ve seen them bust through walls in suits like that.”
She grinned. “We’ll have to test that out later.”
“Whatever you say, Sab.”
Jamar already had one foot in the shadier side of Asclepion—empowered or otherwise. They’d grown up together, gone to school together, broken into cars together. He was like the big Maori brother she’d never had. Given he already had one foot in that world, where was the harm in telling him that she was about to charge into it?
Sabra pulled her helmet off. “Thanks for the Mike hook-up, by the way.”
He rolled his broad shoulders. “It’s nothing. Me and him go way back. I figure if you’re serious about this then you could start networking early, y’know? He’s a good dude—there’s a reason Sentinel never stomped him out, yeah? But be careful.”
“Why? Did the two of you have a falling out or something?”
“Nah,” Jamar replied, gathering up the shell casings. “I never actually ran with him. I just know people. Met him through his boyfriend, actually. But if you ask me, Sab, I think it’s time to be getting out of this business, not getting yourself into it.”
“What’s up?”
“Hard to say. Little things. There’s a lot of tension going around. People going missing, borders shifting. Heard someone put a bullet into one of Hailfire’s lieutenants. And a lot more stuff that I hope is just talk.”
“Well, I’ve put way too much work into Tess here—”
“Wait,” Jamar said, “you named it?”
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“Well, yeah. That’s what they’re called, with the acronym letters...”
“No one’s ever called their badass walk-through-fire-death-and-devastation combat suit Tess!”
“Anyway!” Sabra said, louder. “As I was saying, I’ve put too much work into everything just to stop. Gotta go out there now. Otherwise, how will I ever join SOLAR?”
Jamar laughed. “It’s important to have goals, huh? Unfortunately, Sab, you need to have a superpower to be a superhero.”
That was a problem with her plan, yes, but she’d figure out how to cross that ravine when she came to it.
“Aim high, strike true,” she said. “That way, you only need the one shot.”
“Well, remember us all when you’ve gone and made it big in Geneva.”
“Speaking of,” Sabra said. “Wanna call the guys up and we’ll go shoot hoops?”
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“And Kasembe lands an easy three-pointer from downtown!”
Sabra dragged her shirt up and over her head, just to drive the point home. “And the crowd goes wild!” She raised her arms, threw the horns up, and luxuriated in her imagination for a few seconds more—or tried to.
Even her imagination was burdened by the reality of it all. It hadn’t been much of a game, really. It certainly hadn’t been a contest. She had height on Hisae, experience on Jamar, and sheer athleticism on Derrek. Even if all three of them had teamed up to try and stop her, she still would’ve bet on herself.
“Damn, Sab,” Hisae said, taking a moment to get her dark locks back into their tail. “Take it easy. Some of us don’t run every day.”
Sabra tugged her shirt down. “And some of us don’t have such great hair,” she replied, pointing to her buzz-cut. Long hair had gotten in the way of her helmet, so off it had gone.
“I thought this was a friendly game,” Derrek said, scooping up the ball.
Hisae planted her hands on her hips. “How are you, of all people, not familiar with Sabra’s idea of friendly play?”
“Oh, I’m familiar. I’ve run myself ragged for a grand total of, uh, zero points. And Sab, you’re on?”
She considered. “Call it an even three-hundred and sixty-seven?”
“Oh, bullshit. Well, Jamar, assuming she’s right, can you catch that?”
“Fuck no,” he said. “I’m on twelve. Don’t worry, she’ll run out of luck.”
“Not luck,” Sabra said, scooping up her water. “All skill, man.” A friendly game wasn’t about winning, of course, but she preferred it to losing. And if you were going to let someone win, then what was even the point of playing?
“Shall we go wander the market?” Hisae asked.
Sabra shook her head. “Wish I could, but I’ve got to get my butt to work.”
Derrek passed the basketball over to her, and Hisae added, “No problem. Still on to see Sorcerous Chameleon tonight?”
“Maybe,” Sabra said. There was still so much technical work she had to do. “I’ll let you know how I feel after work, okay? Have fun!”
“You’ve got it!”
Sabra watched them go. It was funny, really. It was the same basketball court she’d visited the night before, but it all felt so different. The local plaza down the street was humming with activity—the smells, sights, and sounds of the weekly market. Sabra walked off in the opposite direction, brushing her fingers against the chain-link fence as she did. It was a little ritual, like her way of connecting to this part of the city.
It was like sunlight made her kinder to the city. Or maybe it was the people, the illusion of what could be—the dream her parents had. Or maybe it was just that it was her city, and that was why she had to give them a hero worthy of the title.
Now that was a thought. Sabra pulled her phone out of her pocket and skimmed through the news feeds. Europe was commemorating the twentieth anniversary of the Twelve Champions—something about saving the continent from a rogue supercomputer, ancient history, boring. Over in New York, The Speaker had shown up, but the harm from the event was minimal...
What was she doing? She had to look closer to home. Asclepion... Reports about increasing gang violence, opinion pieces trying to figure out if the Australians were doing more to help the city than harm it, an editorial decrying the fact that Sentinel—one of the last independent capes who had surely done more good than evil—had been taken away by the IESA’s thugs.
Nothing about her.
She couldn’t help the frown, as stupid as it made her feel. She hadn’t really expected to see anything about her there—not really, not if she was honest. But it would’ve been cool. Like a secret that only she knew the truth of.
Well, herself—and perhaps one other. Whoever it was that she had clashed with on the night itself. She didn’t have a name, but a rudimentary browse of the IESA database—what little of it she could access as a civilian—didn’t find anyone close to a match, anyway. Sabra figured them for a newbie like her, and the thought put a spring in her step.
She’d settle for that as enough of a win. After all, every superhero needed a nemesis.
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Sabra stacks shelves.
Splendid Sabra stacks shelves.
Stunning Sabra stacks shelves solidly.
Shockingly spectacular Sabra stacks shelves stupefiedly.
Sabra paused mid-movement, halfway between taking a carton of milk from its crate and setting it in the fridge. Was stupefiedly even a word? Stupefied definitely was. She contemplated her problem for a few more seconds, tossing the carton from hand to hand, but didn’t quite come to a conclusion. She’d have to ask her father. He’d know.
When he woke up.
Either way, actual word or not, Sabra was sure it was accurate. Word games could only go so far when it came to taking her mind away from the rampantly monotonous work of shelf-stacking. She had to admit it—she was bored. And to Sabra, there was nothing worse than being bored.
Her mind bounced around, from the night before to the armor test just a few hours ago, and she knew why. She’d had a hit of adrenaline at the plant, and now she wanted more. Not just any adrenaline—kicking in the jump jets was old now—but she needed the good sort. The heavy shit. The stuff you got from defying death and mocking a superhero in the process. How many people could do what she had done?
She had to be careful, though. She was in this to do good. She couldn’t let the intoxicating cocktail of pride and adrenaline drag her down the path of selfish exuberance. It was one thing to enjoy it, and another to make enjoyment the point of it. She was in this for her family and for her city and, perhaps, for the whole of the world.
She just had to get to Geneva.
Sabra finished stacking the refrigerator and dumped the crate out behind the store, for the recycling workers to pick up in the morning. She wandered her way back through the store, looking over the various shelves, and found them all stocked and fully stocked at that. And on the one hand, that was good, because Sabra didn’t particularly enjoy her work.
On the other, it only made her more aware of how bored she was.
Sabra made her way over to the front counter and slouched against the wall behind it. The late afternoon shift was always dead. If people wanted things, they went downtown. Where it was prettier and nicer and you were less likely to get stabbed.
This couldn’t be her life. Rearranging shelves that no one was browsing. Fiddling with things that no one was buying. But she had to do it, because Asclepion paid her to do it. It wasn’t much, but ever since the geothermal stations had been closed down, her family had been a single-income household—and a nurse’s stipend only went so far.
That was another reason she hadn’t told her parents. Maybe the truest one. She didn’t want them to think that she was in a hurry to abandon them. To leave them behind in decrepit Asclepion while she enjoyed fame and fortune in Geneva.
She thought of another sequence in her time-killing word game.
Stupid stubborn Sabra stupidly stacks stupid shelves sensibly.
The front doors hissed open, and Sabra turned her head up to catch a look at—of all things—a customer.
He looked lost. He wore a charcoal-gray business suit with a black shirt, hands in his pockets. His brown hair was graying at the temples. Even watching him out of the corner of her eyes, Sabra could tell that the old man had gone through a lifetime of losing.
“Hey,” he said. “You got any cat food?”