They call me "Stink." Not because I smell bad, mind you. Ugh, the bile rises in my throat just thinking that. No, they all-so-lovingly call me Stink because I can smell one from miles away. Just about anything else that smells, too. Sometimes I wish I had some other adaptation, something more flashy, but at least I'm useful. The nickname isn't too flattering, but I suck it up and take it, because it's sure as fuck better than my federal serial number.
"Stink! Talk to me! Where am I going?" Pound says, whispering harshly through my earpiece.
"Are you lowered?"
"Yes, through the floor. Now point me in a direction."
I breathe in through my nose. I filter through all the extraneous information, the pizza shop down the street, the sewer smells, the dumpsters, the sweaty apprehension of my team. There it is. Five different strains of crazed excitement from the terrorists in the building across the street, along with bitter fear from the three hostages. I need a few seconds for my brain to process, and then I have it. The mixture of grease, slightly burnt smelling steam, and electrical tang.
"They're down by the backup generator, in the basement," I tell Pound.
I tap the schematic of the building on my portable. The device syncs with Pound's, showing him the location. On my screen, I can track the dot indicating his location as it traces its way through the industrial maze. There are also three dots at my location on the screen: one for me, and one each for Squint and Tap. We are holed up in our stake-out spot. One more dot moves independently, closer to Pound's. That would be Kick, finding a better position. With them in the basement, there would be nowhere for the sharpshooter to get a bead on them, but he can work by drone. Pound, though he would never admit it, could use the backup.
"On my way," Pound says in my ear, and I can hear the irregularity of his breathing as he picks up speed. Typical Pound, gearing up for his human battering ram act. The team's dedicated surgeon will have her work cut out for her again.
Assisted by the sound from my earpiece and the map on my portable, my mind's eye shows me what's probably going on down in the basement. Pound, his over muscled form covered in countless scars, charges for the door to the generator room. He wears a minimal amount of body armor, but hey–it's his skin, not mine. Behind him a drone moves silently, a long barrel extending from its undercarriage. Kick, hiding on a higher floor, uses a headset and sensors on his long-fingered hands to control the machine with superhuman dexterity.
Pound blasts through the door. The terrorists freeze momentarily in surprise, their guns drifting just slightly from their hostages. Pound's momentum carries him through the aluminum door like it's cardboard, and he tackles the closest target. He grapples with the man, taking a shot in the leg before he can manage to seize the gun and toss it behind him. By this time, the other targets have recovered slightly, and two of them aim at Pound while the other two brandish their weapons at the hostages. Pound doesn't even bother reacting, because less than a second later their heads are basically mist. The drone at the end of the hall quietly reloads as Pound knocks out the man he tackled. As the dust settles, Pound searches the room.
"That was it, Pound," I say.
"Yeah, just gotta make sure."
I roll my eyes.
"I am sure, dumbass. My nose doesn't lie, and Kick doesn't miss. Grab the hostages and let's pack this up."
"You heard ST," Squint says, using his considerably less offensive version of my nickname.
Squint's standing at the window, staring at the warehouse entrance. His light brown eyes and darker skin, coupled with his demeanor, remind me of a golden eagle. Tap, her small thin form curled up on itself, is perched on a chair in the corner. If Squint is an eagle, Tap is a sparrow. At this point in the mission, she's basically just running communication reporting to the higher-ups. Not everyone gets to be the star all the time, but the quiet Tap seems mostly comfortable with her role.
Pound and Kick appear, ushering hostages out into the street.
"Goddamnit," Squint mutters, covering his mic. "Pound got shredded again. Broken scalp, broken ribs, serious tearing of the quadricep. We'll need to hold him back for a couple weeks. Just because he doesn't feel it… Shit."
I stand beside him, trying to make out the details he rattled off so casually. But sight is his adaptation, not mine. Pound just looks like his usual self, although with more red than his hair provides on its own. Kick, of course, is unharmed, and looks as different as possible from Pound, with his smooth gait, wiry frame, and straight black ponytail.
"All right, ST," he says, back on the open channel. "Let's get down there. Tap, get us a car. Good work everyone."
I feel like he lets only me see his vulnerable side, his frustration. To everyone else on the team, he's the perfect, calm, collected leader. It's that, more than anything else, that makes me feel respected by him. That, and the way he calls me ST.
A few minutes later we're in a van back to our temporary base of operations in the city where we'll pack up and fly back to D.C., to the FBI headquarters, which is really just another temporary home. Teams like ours, people like us, don't get to have a permanent home. Next week we could be shuttled off to an army base in Baghdad, or a police precinct in Chicago.
I leave those thoughts in my head and come back to the van, where my teammates are continuing an old argument. It feels like they pick it up at the same sentence they leave off at every time.
"I'm just sayin'," Pound says, casually picking at his bullet wound like someone else would pick a scab.
"Yeah, like you've ‘just said' it the last fifty times," Kick interjects from the front seat, rolling his eyes.
"I'm sayin' it makes no sense, is all," Pound says. "I've seen the way this works in other outfits. Army, Navy, Marines, police, whatever. Rank is determined by experience, or ability. Hell, even nepotism makes more sense."
"Oh, big words for a ball of mobile scar tissue," says a wry voice from the back seat.
Pound wheels around.
"Shut up, Tap, at least your rank makes sense."
"Oh? What's that supposed to mean, huh?"
"Easy," the big man says, taking on an almost professorial tone. "If this outfit made any damn sense, I'd be the highest ranking–"
Tap snickers, but Pound continues undeterred.
"–Kick would be second, Squint third, Stink would be number four, and you, little Tippity-Tap, would be dead last. That would make actual sense. Toughest and most useful at the top, least powerful at the bottom."
Tap's snickers burst into outright laughter.
"Look, man," she says." I'm not claiming to be the best on the team, far from it–I'd be fine with bottom rank. But putting yourself before Squint? That's just fucking hilarious."
"Why?" Pound says." What the hell's so funny about that? Put the guy who takes point in charge, and the geeks in the back. Done."
"Because I don't want your rhino ass making any decisions! The second a mission requires anything other than 'beat up the bad men til they die,' we're so fucked."
The others started to crack up at Tap's impression, and now they're laughing too loud for Pound to get a word in. I smirk. That's about all I have energy for the moment. Pound grumbles, digs harder at his thigh, and tosses the recovered bullet back at Tap.
"OK, children," Squint says from the passenger seat. "We've got twenty minutes to be at the airstrip, so grab what you're gonna grab at the rooms and let's get back to DC."
Being back at the FBI is hell. They have us all crammed into a couple hotel rooms. The higher-ups got typically huffy when I made it clear I didn't want to room with the men or the women; I don't know why I even try anymore. I'm left with Tap, like usual. She's not that bad, really. I just don't relate. When I'm not sleeping in our room, I spend every possible second either training or wandering the city. It's supposed to be R&R time, but seriously fuck that.
I'm at the training hall, which is a grandiose name they gave a massive temporary structure on the grounds. Temporary, as in made from shitty materials. The stupid thing's been there since before I got dragged into this whole outfit.
The training hall is basically only good (for me at least) for working on filtering. I have a shelf of closed plastic drawers across from me. Every time I signal, an FBI rookie assigned to assist me swaps out the drawers for other ones in storage.
I run down the columns one at a time, sniffing for the droplets of chemicals on slides inside the drawers. Halfway down the second row, right after platinum chloride, I sigh and call the rookie over.
"Did you even bother to shuffle them?"
He looks embarrassed.
"Dammit–what's your name?–Collins. I am so serious right now. I need a sensory test, not a memory exercise. No, you know what? Fuck this, I'm done for the day."
"Wait, no!" Collin says, as I knew he would. “"You gotta finish 30 samples. Orders."
I'm so sick of this shit. I don't get mad often, but when I do it tends to make me do stupid things. Like right now. The weak voice in the back of my head whining about consequences fades away, and I focus. Hard.
Collins is walking back behind the divided curtain to get more samples. I raise my radio in a white-knuckled hand. I faintly feel my nose start to bleed. My voice comes out in the cold, crisp, mean monotone.
"From. Column four. Row five. Counting up to down, left to right. Dinitrogen pentoxide. Disilane. Disulphur dichloride. Dysprosium chloride. Dysprosium oxide. Dysprosium titanate. Erbium chloride. Europium chloride. Erbium-copper. Erbium-gold. Erbium-silver. Erbium-Iridium. Gadolinium chloride. Do I have to go on, or are we fucking done?"
He's frozen, just on the other side of the plastic division. I can see him staring at his rack of samples, at the labels I can't possibly read, and I see him shaking.
"D-d-d-dismissed, Oh-67."
"That's what I thought." I say, dropping the radio carelessly to the ground.
I walk out of the training hall, away from the FBI campus, into the city. I look up, and I'm in front of it. The smoke shop. The pungent tobacco scent is completely overpowering this close. I stare, like I always do. Minutes pass.
"You know, I don't believe something like that would work," says a voice from behind me.
I turn to stare dumbly at Squint.
"I was in a debrief. Saw you walking. I figured I might as well get here before someone else came to collect you."
Of course he did. I could never get past his eyes.
"I've seen you come here before, too. I've heard the rumors as well. I just don't buy it. Sounds like more normal person bullshit created out of fear of our power. If there were things they could do to equalize us, I think they'd have done them by now. I'm not saying you should go ahead and take up smoking. Just don't think it'll dull your sense at all."
I take a deep breath, shuddering slightly, to fight the tears. No good.
"It's OK to cry if you need to," he says. "You know I won't think less of you, ST."
I don't give in, but he does something so crazy I can't stay mad at him. He turns his eyes up, almost straight up. Right at the sun. He stares, for almost five seconds, then looks back at me, blinking away tears of his own.
"Let's get back, ST. I'm gathering the team. They're rushing us out on another mission immediately. Pound's basically useless still. Fuck knows how we'll manage."
He pats my shoulder, pushing me gently back towards campus.
The miniature 'conference room' where most of our briefings are held reminds me of the room I share with Tap: too small for the number of occupants, where I only go if I don't have a choice, that smells strongly of the types of chemicals normal people think makes things smell 'clean.' Our direct superior, an audire that goes only by serial number A-23, stands at the front of the room, by a screen. Squint and I join the others already sitting in the rows of chairs. I sometimes think they treat us like children to further remove our personal agency. As soon as we're seated, A-23 speaks.
"Hello, Team 67," he says. "I'm sorry to pull you off R&R, but you're needed. This is an extremely important opportunity for the reputation of the SURG. You will be allowed a Tier III extension of your leave afterwards, if you succeed in your mission."
"Sir," Squint says. "It would seem to me that sending a team out into the field with a severely injured member could cause a mission failure. If this job is so important, why take that risk?"
"Hey, fuck off Squint!" Pound barks.
"V-67," A-23 says, addressing Squint. "I must remind you again that this is not a forum for your opinion, and your authority only extends to mission-specific directives. I will not take time out of this meeting to explain the concerns of those farther up the command structure, so sit down and I'll initiate your briefing."
Our team settles. Our team has its own way of arranging itself. It comes down to the tensions between rank and respect. Squint sits front and center. Pound, who respects Squint's authority despite his griping, but still pushes boundaries whenever he gets a chance, sits in the second row, a seat away from me. I take the second row instead of the first because I don't like being that close to A-23. Squint insists I stay close, though. Kick and Tap share the third row, the only ones who sit next together. I guess it makes sense considering the on-again-off-again thing they've been in since we were teenagers just finishing up training.
"Reina Green, a house candidate from California, has been kidnapped," he begins, and brings up a photo of the victim on the screen behind him. She has pale seafoam eyes, curly hair, and tan skin. In this photo, she's in a skirt suit and she's standing with other formally dressed people in an obviously staged photo op. She's the only one who seems to be genuinely smiling.
"She's being held by an unidentified man. Her captor has released letters, manifestos, and video of Miss Green to the press through anonymous deliveries. No communication from him has made any mention of ransom requests. FBI analysts have come to the conclusion that the perpetrator is motivated by a white supremacist ideology, fringe religious beliefs, and a strong desire to destroy what he sees as Ms. Green's ‘reputation.' It's inconclusive so far whether the perpetrator intends to assassinate Ms. Green after he feels he's accomplished his goal, but we are operating under that assumption. The FBI has been unable to locate and retrieve Ms. Green within the standard 48 hour period, so it's up to your team now. Further materials are in this case."
A-23 hands Squint a briefcase.
"Good luck, Team 67."
With characteristic abruptness, A-23 exits. Squint stands, and takes the case forward to the small standing desk at the front of the room. Everyone else moves closer to the front now that the setting is less formal.
"OK, folks," Squint says. "We have a good deal of material to go through. ST, here are some samples of Ms. Green's personal effects, as well as the material sent to the press by our perp. You take it from here."
He hands me several evidence bags. I head to the back of the room with them and listen with half an ear while I get to work familiarizing myself with the scents. They're watching the videos of Reina Green. After listening for a second and almost vomiting, I do my best to block it out. I focus down as hard as I can on the items in my lap to escape from what that sick fuck is doing to her on the screen.
The first item I take out of its bag is her keychain which the tag says was recovered from under her car, her last known location and probable site of the kidnapping. Car key, house key, library card tab. Simplest keychain I've ever seen. It's perfect for me, though, because she's clearly handled it often, and I get a distinct and detailed sense of how she smells. She smells like her garden, and her cat, like leather, and deodorant. She smells like books, and copier ozone, like a gas stove, and cheap hand soap. She smells… like introversion, like intellect, like shyness, and like caring. An odd side effect of my adaptation–I always feel strong emotions about people for whom I get a sensory concept. The way I suddenly feel about this woman makes it even harder to stand what I know she's enduring.
The second item is a notepad from her home. The profile I get from its scent is basically the same, so I move on the three remaining bags, all containing envelopes from her kidnapper.
The moment I crack the first bag open to sense the envelope, I am overcome. All of the safety and care I felt under the influence of Reina Green's scent is crushed in an instant. Now I am drowning in sewage, bile, blood, and semen. The oppressive evil tries to force its way into every crevice of my mind. I seal the bag with shaking hands, scramble for the small airtight capsule on a chain around my neck, open it and hyperventilate through my nose.
Unfortunately, negative emotions always hit me harder than positive ones. The only thing that can beat a negative sensory overload is a worse negative sensory overload. The capsule of my father's tobacco, drops of his favorite cheap whiskey, and a piece of packaging from his brand of safety razor blades–it's a last resort. I've used it only three other times, only one time on duty.
"ST!" Squint shouts. He knows what this means, and in two long strides he's at my side.
"I'm–gasp–fine."
He sees the bags of envelopes on the floor and snatches them before tossing them to Kick.
"Get those out of here," Squint says. "I'm taking ST to the airstrip. I want nothing more now than to catch that son of a bitch."
There's no arguing, no joking. Through the haze of terrible memories and tears, I see every set of eyes in the room set in grim determination. They have their flaws, but lack of compassion isn't one of them. If one of their own is suffering? The person who caused it doesn't stand a chance.
When I next take stock of my surroundings, we're in the air. Squint's next to me and I see he took my capsule away. His expression is haggard. On the table in front of our seats is the case of materials, sans envelopes, with briefing materials laid out in front of Squint. The higher-ups take advantage of Squint's lead rank to save on paper, apparently–the print is practically microscopic. I'm more interested in the keys and notepad. My gaze is drawn to them, and I realize that my hand is too. I take the bags, open them, and hold the objects close to my chest. Squint glances at me as I do, but doesn't say anything. As I sit in the protective bubble of Reina Green's scent, I grow calmer.
The others are bickering again.
"Give it a rest, Pound," Kick says. "This organization doesn't make sense sometimes, but you're just being annoying now. If rank was assigned by charisma, you'd be on the bottom rung according to every scale known to man."
"Hey, what the f–" Pound says.
"–and to woman," Tap adds.
"Hey!"
"And other," I can't help but chime in.
"For the umpteenth time, what the fuck does that even mean?" Pound says.
"Don't worry about it," I say.
"Yeah," says Squint, with a less playful tone. "Don't worry about it."
I can always count on him to defend me. He's been on my side basically since day one, despite my misanthropy, and my identity, and all the other reasons people don't like me.
There's nothing like picking on Pound to bring the family out of a squabble, I guess. The mood has lightened, even if we can't really forget the tension of this job. Squint is the only one left with a completely grim face. He has to bear the responsibility of the case, when it comes down to it.
If you find this story on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen. Please report the infringement.
I'm still clutching Reina's things. I feel like a naughty child rather than an investigator as I gently open the notepad. My weak justification is that I might learn something important, as if the dossier Squint's holding doesn't hold a complete profile, timeline, and catalog of relevant information.
Mostly it's normal things, at least for someone in public office, and about to start down the campaign trail. Speeches, meetings, doctors appointments, brunch with a friend. When she leaves town for work she has her neighbors feed her cat. The longer I read, the longer I smell, and the more solid and real Reina becomes in my mind. After a few minutes, I'm left staring at the page of the date of her kidnapping. She returned some books at the library, went out to dinner with some of her staff… Then vanished. I stare at that page for a long time. I don't feel the horror and panic of smelling the envelope, but this page reminds me that those things are still there in the back of my mind, and out there in the world.
"Find anything?" Squint asks quietly.
"Oh, uh, no," I say.
There's a pause before he speaks again.
"You're lost in her, aren't you?"
This time, the silence is mine and I can't bring myself to break it with a false denial.
"Be careful, OK?" He says. "This job is important, and it's essential that you care, I think. That all of us do. It makes us work harder. Just… be careful, ST."
After we land, we're shuttled to the local building the FBI's set up for us. Another temporary home. Squint has everyone settling in, but I'm restless. I drop my stuff in the room I'll be sleeping in, setting Reina's things carefully on a table. Squint absolutely knows I'm lying when I say I'm going out to grab something to eat, but he lets me go anyway. The silent look he gives me says to call the second I feel anything–that's what he always says.
Down on the street, I just start walking in a random direction. It doesn't matter. All that matters is that I'm in the open air. I breathe giant breaths. The air smells terrible, overall, full of gasoline and other city gunk. I don't care. As long as there's open air between me and Reina, I know I can find her.
After a half hour, it's clear she's not in the open. It's not bragging to say that I've sensed everything I possibly could in the city, to a radius of about 15 miles. Ironically, I actually am hungry. The Indian place six blocks back has a good vindaloo, so I head back. Locking onto a scent like this and following it is very relaxing. I still have to pay a little attention to my immediate surroundings not to get run over, but I generally just get to run on autopilot until I arrive.
The food is good and cheap, which is about all I can ask, and something with these intense aromas was exactly what I needed. I finish it quickly, eating with relish. As I'm cleaning up, putting my tray on top of the trash can, I get a hint of something unmistakeable through the cacophony of scents. My eyes go wide. In a flash, I'm out on the street. If I was on autopilot before, now I'm a self guided missile. I race through the streets, barely staying out of the way of screeching cars. My hands are pumping at my sides instead of grabbing my portable to call Squint like I promised. I don't care about anything but speed now.
The moment I smelled it, I knew she was out there. Everything else can go to hell. I can find her. She's not that far now, maybe ten blocks, and she's not going anywhere at the moment. I push myself to my limit, and the only reason I don't eat shit is because of the insane conditioning all of us are forced into.
Suddenly, she's right there. I can tell she's right in front of me, but I just can't see her. Then I smell her blood, and my own freezes solid. I filter out everything else even more, and wander around this little area. Her scent is diffuse, as though parts of her have been spread around. I won't let myself even consider what that might mean. I find the blood, trickling from the base of a basement window at ground level. The glass is broken, and I can see smears of blood on the glass. I kneel down, careful not to touch the shards, and peer into the the basement. Right below the window, Reina lies in a heap. She isn't moving, and blood is still flowing slowly from her hands.
I get up, and search the area for something I can use to clear the glass. In dumpsters around the place, I find things like her clothes, bloody bandages and rope, and unmentionable things. I'm just relieved she's all in one piece. Now I have to get her out of here. I don't find anything very useful. I could just use some debris to break the glass the rest of the way out of the window frame, but I don't want to drop any on her if I can avoid it. I take off my flannel, leaving just my tank top. I wrap the thick shirt around my hand, and kneel down again to reach in and start breaking the glass outward, away from Reina. I hurry as much as I dare.
When the frame is as clear as I can get it, I sweep the glass away from the opening, discard my shirt, and start to ease my way into the basement through the small opening. I'm not tiny, and I have some good muscle on me, but I'm still small enough to get through the window. It looks like Reina will fit as well. Once inside, I push off from the wall to land on the other side of the unconscious Reina. A chair is next to her; she must have been standing on it to break the window. There are scraps of rope on the chair, and bruises on her wrists. I search around the room, trying not to be overwhelmed by the feeling of being in his space. My urgency gives me focus. I spot a container of bandages like the ones I'd seen in the trash outside, and I quickly take some and wrap her hands as best I can. I wish Tap was here. She's a genius at first aid, and I am certainly not.
I set the chair back upright, and lift Reina. Without Pound or Tap around, I'm doing more work than I ever have in the field. As stressed as I am, I can't help but feel proud that I can do this much on my own. Will you still think I'm just a geek now, Pound? I have Reina in a fireman's carry, and I get up on the chair. Here's the really hard part. I try to get her up closer to the window, but I'm reaching my limit.
The breeze shifts outside, and I catch a fresh breath of his scent. Close. Coming closer. Adrenaline surges in my veins, and I heave. I practically throw Reina through the opening, and I drag myself out of the window behind her. The smell is getting stronger. Still driven by fear, I lift Reina again and start moving away from this cursed place. Three streets away, I take the risk of stopping and setting her down. I pull out my portable, initiate a call to Squint, and clip it to my pocket. I grab Reina again and start walking. When Squint's voice speaks in my earpiece, he doesn't waste time.
"Where?" He asks urgently.
"With me," I say.
"Tracking you. Be there in four minutes."
"She's lost a lot of blood."
"I'll get Tap working on acquiring what we need for a transfusion."
The siren starts about ninety seconds later.
"It's gonna be OK," I tell Reina, even though she can't hear me.
When the van pulls up, Squint is the first out. He doesn't ridicule me for any of my transgressions of protocol. We get her into the back of the van, and pull away. I describe the last half hour in as much detail as I can, making especially sure to give an accurate location of the hideout. They'll head back there soon. With Reina gone, I can't imagine he'll sit around and wait for our team to come get him, but there could be usefull information left behind when he flees. I'm not as worried about catching him now that I've got Reina safely away from him. I have to admit that I'm running my mouth to stay busy, fearing that if I don't concentrate on something I'll get lost in her scent. It's intoxicating to have her so close to me. It fills me with anguish, however, to smell him on her. His influence is like smoke in a garden. She's so sensorially beautiful, but in order to get to her I have to get past his evil.
Once we're back at base, we take Reina to a room where she can recover. Tap is there, set up for the transfusion. I offer my help, and while the others are clearly concerned, they realize that having the whole team in there won't do much good. They prepare to head back to the hideout. Tap gets Reina connected to her IV and gets the transfusion started. Once everything's in place, it's simple enough that I can keep an eye on everything while Tap goes with the rest of the team.
"Mark that location on your nav and park the drone at the rooftop," Squint says in another room. "Let's go."
He checks in on me as they leave.
"ST, keep a channel open; we'll stay in touch."
Once they're gone, I grab a radio and flick it on. In the van on the other end, there's silence but for the road noise. I clip the radio to my belt.
After about five minutes, Reina starts to stir. I panic for a second, not sure how to make her feel safe.
"Reina?"
She opens her eyes and looks at me. I can see a moment of fear, and then relief. I guess I'm managing to appear reassuring.
"I got away?"
"Yeah. You managed to break free of your bonds and break the window."
"But--I fell."
"Yes. I found you, and I got you out. You're safe now. I'm with the FBI."
How did you get me out? The door was… You carried me?"
Her eyes go wide. I just smile and shrug.
"But I'm so heavy…" She mutters.
"Pff, you're what, 150? Like a feather."
She's silent for a time.
"Thank you."
I can't think of anything to say, but I try.
"Um, you're welcome."
"What's your name?"
Now I really don't know what to say. What will she think? I can't bear the thought of her seeing me the way most regular people do. I see if I can avoid the answer I don't want to give.
"You can call me ST."
"What does ST stand for?" she says curiously.
"Stink, that's what most people call me."
"Why?"
"When people don't know how to categorize you, they make shit up."
"What categories don't you fit?"
There's an inquisitive light in her eyes now, brightening her previously haunted face. Normally my hackles would rise if someone asked me this many questions, but with her I don't mind.
"I'm not a dude, and I'm not a chick, and it drives them nuts," I say.
"Oh," she says.
She's quiet, and I can almost hear her thinking. I get nervous again. I knew I was worried about her finding out about my adaptation, but maybe she won't even be OK with my identity. I have all these feelings for her already; it's so hard to remind myself that she doesn't even know me, much less feel the same way.
"Do you prefer that to your name?"
I don't say anything.
"And why Stink, anyway?"
I need to make her feel safe, and even if she doesn't accept me knowing more about me might make her feel more secure. Even people who don't think of us as fully human still trust us to do our jobs, after all.
"Everyone's nickname in our unit is–some more tenuously than others–related to our adaptation."
Her eyes go wide.
"You're aesthetes?" she asks.
"Yep. I smell, so therefore I stink, apparently."
"That's absurd, you're the cleanest-smelling person I've ever met."
As soon as she says it, she gets a look on her face that says she's embarrassed to have blurted it out. I'm just thinking actually I have a drop of curry on my pant leg and it's driving me insane. During the gap in conversation, the only sound is the faint chatter over the radio. Before the silence can get awkward, I say the first thing that comes to mind.
"My team leader, Squint, started calling me ST instead."
"That's better, I guess, but it still doesn't fit you."
After a pause it's her turn to fill the void.
"So, Squint, he's called that because he's a–what's it called–videre?"
"Yeah."
"And that tiny woman, she's a soma.”
"Tap, yeah. Then there's Kick, the guy with the ponytail, and the giant guy with the scars is Pound."
I could just tell her about their adaptations, but it's fun to play the guessing game. I feel like she needs a little fun right now.
"Kick sounds like he's physical… proprius?"
"Good guess," I say. "You know a lot about my kind."
"You make it sound like you're a whole other species."
"Maybe we are. People sure treat us that way."
Her face darkens temporarily, then she smiles.
"What the hell is Pound, then?"
"Nocere. He can take a pounding and keep on going. He seems take his role as a knuckle dragger very literally, considering how many times the surgeons have to reattach–"
"–ST," Squint's voice says clearly amongst the background noise that's been coming through the radio.
"Yeah, Squint?" I say, bringing it to my mouth with the talk button on.
"We swept the perps hideout. He'd skipped out of course. We picked up some pieces of evidence, and a couple of Reina's possessions that he kept."
I glance at her. She's lost a little of her cheer and is staring numbly at the radio.
"We're coming back to pick you up. We'll comb the city with you to see if we can get a fix on him. Ms. Green's in the room with you, right?"
"Yeah."
"Ms. Green, we'll be able to protect you best if you come with us. If you prefer to stay there, I can get some regular agents come to guard you, but I'd rather move out quickly than wait."
She's leaning into the radio, and to my surprise she reaches out without looking and touches my knee. No, she's holding on faintly. She locks eyes with me as she answers.
"I'll come with you all."
"I swear I'll keep you safe," I say under my breath.
She gives me a smile tight with anxiety.
In about five minutes, we head down to the street, and arrive at the curb just before the van, which barely stops to let us in. As we pull away, Reina's grim expression crumples briefly into a half smile. I raise an eyebrow and she leans in to whisper in my ear.
"I just got an image of you hanging your head out the window like a dog; I'm so sorry."
"Too close to home," I say, shaking my head slowly.
I reach above my head and flip a lock on the ceiling, push up on a panel and stand. My shoulders and head are above the roof but I keep my hands in a bar set there to stabilize me. I look down at Reina, embarrassed, and she's hiding a smile with her hand.
I settle myself, and take the first of many deep breaths. We take a winding route through the city, staying approximately the same distance from the hideout of our target.
After half an hour, Squint calls up to me.
"ST, talk to me."
"He's all over the place, Squint. Faint, though. Fucker gets around, apparently."
Reina speaks up.
"He went out a lot, even in the days he had me."
I glance down at her. I would think talking about it would leave her a wreck, but her jaw is firmly set.
"We found a lot of food waste at his hide out," Squint adds.
"Oh, I'm getting that. I'm smelled him on half a dozen restaurants, meat packing plants, and hydroponic farms since we started. Take a right up here, please."
Kick takes the van to the right, and the trail gets warmer.
"Push it, Kick. This way."
He doesn't put the siren on; we don't want to alert this guy. He picks up speed as much as he can. The scent is getting harsher, and again its mixing with food. My stomach, slightly full still, turns over. I call down a couple more directions, leading us towards… We pull past the point where the trail is strongest, and then it immediately goes dead. I swing my head around wildly, trying to catch something.
"What is it, ST?"
"Nothing, Squint, that's the problem. He was here, maybe twenty minutes ago, right here. He went inside, then came back out for a second, then... The trail just cuts out."
"Damn."
We get back to our meandering route, but I'm pessimistic. He must have gotten into a car, very quickly, and gotten pretty far away from here. He's most likely still driving. Nothing I can do but wait and hope. I push it, probably a little too hard. A drop of blood runs down my lip, and I thoughtlessly lick it away. My grip on the stabilizer bar tightens. My whole stance must be tense, because Reina touches my leg, just for a second. I draw strength from that. I don't pull back from the brink, but lunge forward. My consciousness ranges the city, sweeping along on the wind. The phrase 'mind's eye' is fairly poetic, but 'mind's nose' isn't really. I don't like to think of it like that anyway. When I strain this hard, I no longer think of it as a mental concept, or a sensorial concept. I feel like I'm drawing the whole city, everything swirling chaotically, into my lungs. I take it all inside myself, and lose track of the boundary between me and the world. I don't 'see' it or 'feel' it, I am it, all of it.
Suddenly, he's there, and he's not far. I'm so tightly strung, so thinly stretched, that it feels like an intrusion, like a physical blow. I brace myself against a second wave of nausea, then swing down into the van just long enough to give Kick a heading.
"Two blocks, slight right, three blocks, left, four blocks. Punch it."
I'm coming down from the peak of my exertion, and I register the looks on their faces as they see me. I wipe a sleeve across my face, which comes away bright red, and get back above the roof. I'm not hiding, I tell myself. I'm not hiding from Squint's stony not-quite-reproach, or from Reina's concern. I'm not.
I zero in on his location, broaden my sense a little, and take in what's around him.
"What the fuck?" I say, apparently loud enough for Squint to hear.
"What, ST?"
"I'll get back to you in a sec."
After we turn the last time, I'm more certain.
"Squint, I think he's at the police station. Yeah, there he is!"
A moment later Kick pulls over and we pile out, with Reina protectively surrounded.
"Please tell me he's the one in the cuffs," Squint says as we approach.
"Yeah."
The monster is being walked across the station parking lot towards the doors by a pair of cops.
"Officers!" Squint calls.
They pause, we catch up, and Squint shows his SURG ID.
"We believe this man is the object of our investigation."
"OK," one cop says. "You can have him after we're done with him."
"I don't think you understand," Squint says. "We have the authority to take him from you. We would be much obliged if you'd take him to an interrogation room for us, though."
Squint flashes a smile, and the cops shrug at the matters clearly above their pay grade. They lead us in with the cuffed bastard.
"We picked him up for raiding the kitchen and trash of a fancy restaurant uptown. Crazy fuck was eating the stuff right there in the back room. Didn't respond when anyone approached him, but if they tried to take away any of the scraps he lashed out. To be honest, we're glad to be rid of him."
They drag him to a seat behind an interview table, and snap his cuffs to a lock. Pound, Kick, and I take Reina into the adjacent chamber while Squint and Tap replace the cops across from the evil smelling man. I take a moment to size him up, seeing his physical self for the first time, after getting such a clear and horrifying picture of him from his scent alone. He's scrawny, his skin is oily, his hair matted and thinning. His eyes dart wildly. He licks his lips often, sometimes leaving his tongue out, lolling like a dog’s. He doesn't say a word. Doesn't make a sound. He's full of nervous energy. He makes my skin crawl.
They start to question him after the door closes. Once we are fully separated from him, I see I've been holding onto my capsule again with white knuckles. I try to relax and pay attention with the others.
"What's your name?" Squint says.
Tap has her fingers laid across the area around the man's jaw and throat. He turns his head and sticks his tongue out as if to lick her hand, but she grabs his hair and jerks his head back into place. Squint repeats his question. The man still doesn't speak. Tap speaks for him, her fingers on his jaw and throat.
"Something... Numbers? Not a name."
"That makes sense," Squint says.
"How?"
I find I know the answer before he speaks, and I mouth it along with him.
"Because he's a rogue aesthete. A gustus."
Reina is silently crying and clutching her stomach queasily.
"Oh, fuck," Pound says, a little too loudly. "You mean he put his tongue all over her? Not that I can really blame him though, right? I mean she's smo–"
I'm on him before I know it. My fist connects with his jaw with all the force of my rage, fear, anguish, and stress concentrated on one point. He folds a little, but not a satisfying amount. He may be injured, but his adaptation is like a force field between him and how much pain I want to throw his way. I don't let up. He can block out the pain, but he's too weak right now to actually fight me. I aim a thrusting heel kick at his thigh, and his numbness can't stop his injured leg from folding. His head is now at my chest height, and I unload an elbow at his mouth. My skin breaks, but I hear a satisfying faint series of clicks on the metal floor. Maybe I'll pay for this down the line, but he won't be getting that tooth back. He looks up at me with his dead eyes, and even though his expression is masked, I can see hints of hatred, fear, resentment, and--respect. Pound is a simple animal. I think I just earned my place above him in the pack.
Back in the interrogation room, Squint is staring at us.
"If you're done...?" He says impatiently. "Ms. Green, can you positively identify this man as your captor?"
As Reina answers faintly in the positive, she cuts off with a whimper. Tap has recoiled from the gustus, and he's staring wildly at the one-way mirror. He's salivating profusely, dripping onto his lap.
"She's here?" he slobbers. "Ahhhhhhhh...."
All eyes that can see her are on Reina. I reach out slowly and mimic her gesture from earlier, holding her upper arm. She flinches at first, but she sees it's me and puts her hand over mine.
"That's him," she says, voice wavering, but clearly enough.
He's raving now, straining at his cuffs. Squint signals to Pound and Kick, who move into the room to guard the insane aesthete. The rest of us leave the interrogation area and head to the front of the building. As we walk, Squint calls in to headquarters.
"Sir, we have Ms. Green," he begins. "Yes. Her captor was a rogue gustus, Sir. No, he's completely animalistic. I think that's best. He'll be at the police station at our current location. The precinct has cooperated completely. Yes, Sir, I'll leave him in their custody until the crew arrives."
He finds the nearest officer, gives them a rundown of the situation, and continues on his way. I follow him, but I'm looking at Reina. The tension in her body lessens steadily as we get both physically and metaphorically more distant from the one who hurt her. I'm well aware that trauma takes a long time to heal. However, she's making a strong start.
The higher-ups are surprisingly penitent about breaking into our sanctioned R&R time. They give us that extra time off, with the opportunity for some leave away from headquarters. I'm making good use of their generosity. The "freedom" of Tier III only feels good in comparison to Tier IV I suppose, but I'll take what I get. I'm seeing the others off at the airport this morning. They're a ragged bunch, especially Pound, who hasn't really recovered much in the short time. Those new bruises are his own damn fault anyway. They're all squabbling again even as I try to say goodbye.
"Oh, come on," Pound says to Tap. "What kind of name is Pound? Makes it sound like you're making fun of my weight."
"Yeah, and look what I got stuck with," I say.
"We might have to figure something else out for you, ST," Pound says.
I'm speechless.
"Oh, stop staring," Pound says, showing off his new gap toothed grin. "Makes me want a rematch."
"Be nice, and maybe I'll forget that you started calling me Stink in the first place. Anyway, you have a flight to catch. I'll miss you all, for some reason."
"We'll miss you too, ST," Squint says, looking up from his report. "And good luck tonight."
"Thanks. See you soon."
"See ya," everyone calls as they head towards the plane.
Now that I'm alone, the nerves set in. I head back to my room, which I requested to keep for the next couple days. It's strange to see one of our temporary bases almost completely empty. I pull out my spare change of clothes and get dressed. They're only slightly better than my outfit from before, but a little cleaner. I feel silly trying to get dressed up but ending up in dark jeans and a t-shirt. Oh well. It's not like it's a date anyway. Right? After what she's been through, that would be stupid of me… I can't shake the giddiness, though, whatever tonight is.
I realize that I'm ready 5 hours too early. Typical. I try to think of something to do to kill time, and the first thing that comes to mind is the library on Reina's card. I feel a little lame, but I've never been one to spend time at any place considered even slightly cool.
I spend the afternoon reading to pass the time. Wandering the shelves, it's impossible for me to ignore the books that Reina recently returned. I page through each of them, focused equally on her lingering presence and the actual content of the books. When the time comes, I make my way downtown. I take the opportunity to breathe in the scents of the city. I've been so focused on tracking that I haven't explored much. There are the usual obnoxious city scents, but if I seek out the hidden sensory treasures, there's a lot of beauty here. The food, the people, the parks...
I'm in front of a restaurant, and I'm nervous as hell. After spending a minute frozen I manage to say 'fuck it' and go in.
She's already here. My eyes follow my nose, and I see Reina. She's looking so much better (and, I'm relieved to see, she's dressed casually).
The host appears that my elbow and asks if he can help me. Reina calls out.
"They're with me."
Fuck. My heart skips a beat. What is this, acceptance day?
The host drops me off at the table. I don't even turn to her as I say 'thanks' and sit down. I don't quite care enough about not seeming like a weirdo to take my eyes away from Reina for even a second. Again I'm swept away by the sensation of being enveloped in her presence. I'm drowning, and that's completely fine with me.
"Hi," I say faintly.
She reaches out and gives my hand a quick squeeze.
"Hi."
To Be Continued