Friend?

Was Vanessa doing the same bit as Finlay? She didn’t seem like the type to bullshit like that asshole—oh, a fun play on words.

“Speaking of friends, where’s the blonde woman with you?” Vanessa’s tone was calm and amiable, and her face was relaxed with a slight smile. Totally not what I expected from someone I betrayed and barbecued.

“We split up in case this is a trap.” Hardly moving my eye, I scanned the room for the familiar that led me here. No other green besides Vanessa. It must be outside. Difficult to bring my puppet closer with it watching the corridor. And what could my puppet do against Vanessa’s mouth familiars? It’d be shredded in seconds. “But you already know that, don’t you? I bet one of your pets—familiars is following her.”

Vanessa’s cheeks moved, her smile widening when I corrected myself and used her preferred term for her excess body parts. “I’m keeping watch for her safety. Even with superhuman abilities, this place is still dangerous. She shouldn’t have gone on her own. But I’m also relieved she isn’t here so we can talk freely. I think you agree with me?”

I didn’t say anything. How much did she know about me keeping secrets from Deen?

“There’s a lot between us,” Vanessa said, “but nothing we can’t iron out with a sincere friend-to-friend conversation.”

“After what happened…” I trailed off, deciding it wasn’t a good idea to recount what I did to her. “I’m the last person you’d consider a friend.”

“You did what you had to do to survive.” She changed her expression into something like concern for me, an attempt to look empathetic. It didn’t fit with the situation. “Like me, like all the people on this planet do every day. I’d be a hypocrite if I got angry at you for it.”

The fuck? That wasn’t how that worked. She couldn’t just chuck what I did to survival instincts. Even then, she still should be angry at me. I was familiar enough with normal-people-thinking that I could confidently say revenge should be the first thing on her mind.

This bitch was scheming something.

As much as I wanted to ask about Mom, it was better not to. That’d give her the upper hand.

Vanessa knew I was an Adumbrae—I could always pretend I didn’t care for Mom’s safety if Vanessa dared use her as a bargaining chip. Not talking about Mom would sell that angle later. Better wait for Vanessa to bring it up.

For now, I’d look for the opportune time to shoot her. Finlay suspected my fingers were dangerous. If Vanessa spied on me all this time, she should be cautious too.

After a few seconds of silence, waiting for a reply that wasn’t coming, she said, “You’re probably wondering how I survived.”

I didn’t need to prod her because she seemed eager to tell me.

“Just like you,” she said, “we also die when our brain is destroyed.” She knew I was a real Adumbrae, in contrast to them. “Guess I don’t need to explain about that.” Vanessa closed her eyes, sighing. I pointed my finger, but she opened her eyes before I could shoot and looked straight at me. “Because you killed Dominic in a way that he couldn’t regenerate his injuries.”

Dominic? Can’t recall his face. Was he the guy I killed in the car? “You are angry at me,” I stated.

“I’m not. But recalling it… is painful.” She shook her head. “Where was I? Right. You also shot me in the head. I would’ve died if my brain had stopped. I guess my brain did stop. But not all of them.”

“The familiars,” I guessed. The eyeball thingy had a green outline. I vaguely recalled Vanessa explaining that they could act independently after being given instructions. They were probably like the tentacles of an octopus with mini-brains controlling each of them—random info from the Animal Channel. “You regenerated from your surviving familiars?”

“Not really that way. My mouth familiars dug themselves out of the caved-in tunnel, returned to their sockets on my arm, and helped me regenerate. It takes hours for a body to burn completely, so they had plenty of time to save me. ‘Resurrect me’ might be a better description of what happened.”

That’s one question I didn’t care about now answered. Mental note: I should stay for a few hours the next time I’d burn an Adumbrae. The frat guys Deen and I roasted were humans, though—none of them should be able to return to pester me like Vanessa here.

“That eye,” I said, recalling a weird detail after I returned to Deen’s house from Eve. “It wasn’t my imagination.”

“What do you mean?”

“Your eye familiar followed me after I—followed me to where I was staying.”

Vanessa raised a brow. “No. All of my eye familiars were killed by Skitters. Don’t you remember?”

How the fuck would I know that? And I didn’t believe her. A weirdo pet spying on me would explain a lot. “My condo was attacked—"

“I didn’t have anything to do with it,” she interrupted. “I know your face but nothing else. I don’t know how they found out where—”

“You expect me to buy that?”

“It’s hard to believe, but I really swear I didn’t know where you lived. Stella—she’s the leader of the group that attacked your condo—just showed me your picture, and I told them, yeah, you were the one I met. That’s it.”

Just like it was normal for me to kill her for my survival, as she argued, it should also be normal for her to exact revenge on me. So, why was she acting like she had no part in attacking my condo? What was this good cop bit for? I stared at Vanessa again, waiting for her to reveal more.

“Believe me, I only knew about what happened at your condo afterward.” She took one step forward. “Then I convinced the organization to leave you alone. No one attacked while you were at your friend’s house, right? You fought Auron and the others only because your group interfered with their plans. If it weren’t for that, you would’ve been safe. Because of me.”

“That’s…” Some truth in her words.

“After you killed Auron, no one came after you.”

Auron’s dead? Woohoo! Some good news from this crappy night. And Vanessa’s making a good point. But it still didn’t make sense looking at the big picture.

She stepped closer. “Remember the bracelet?"

"Bracelet?"

“The diamond bracelet you took from me. Maybe you assumed it was lost, buried in the rubble of your condo building along with your other things.”

Holy. Fucking. Shit. I forgot about that! While Vanessa explained how her mouth familiar excavated the ruins for days to find it, I cringed at the realization that she knew I stole from a dead body. Her body.

Awkward.

I thought of collecting ‘trophies’ from my fun escapades, copying what the people on true crime documentaries did to their victims to see how it felt. But it didn’t click, whatever was so great with it, so the bracelet just slipped out of my mind. Must’ve chucked it in a drawer and got covered by junk.

“I was giving you the diamond bracelet back,” Vanessa said.

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Where did I put it after I found it again? More awkward if I misplaced it. “I, uh, thought it was a different bracelet that someone dropped. I mean, I did think I lost it forever.”

“It’s supposed to sign that I’m fine with you keeping it. Yeah, also a sign that I’m alive.”

“I really find it hard to believe you’ve forgiven me this quick—”

“Not forgive. That’d mean you wronged me.”

“But I did. And you should be angry with me.” It was grating that she wasn’t behaving as I expected her to.

“You might not believe me when I say this… but rather than anger, I pity you.”

Pity me? What kind of mind games was she playing? Though I did agree with her. I was looking for a relaxed night of being a supportive daughter to Mom’s speech, a typical night hanging out with my best friend, and I ended up in this situation. Poor me.

“I chose this life.” Vanessa gestured to her right arm covered in metal. “But you didn’t ask for yours. People hate Adumbrae, real ones, thinking they chose to betray humanity. I know the truth. And I pity you because you didn’t have much of a choice.

“Me? What happened—what you did to me, I think it’s the Mother Core’s punishment. Plenty of people died—continue to die, for my sake. For my choice. You already know how Mark and Big Marcy’s operations work, am I right?”

“The brains of innocent people,” I said with emphasis. Did her own brain not regenerate properly? Was she seriously thinking that her intense sauna session was some sort of divine punishment? She probably went cuckoo and tried to use her death to clear her conscience. “What about your friends? I killed them,” I pointed out. Come on, gloat that you have my Mom for revenge.

“I’m sad that Dominic and Rob—Rob was the alias I gave you, right? Really sad they’re gone. But I would’ve done the same thing in your position. The same as them if they were in yours.”

“This doesn’t make any sense,” I blurted my thoughts.

“This isn’t a trap, Erind. Even if it was, you don’t have anything to worry about because your real body isn’t here.” Her eyes glazed over as if she was staring something past me.

“Are you also observing my real body?”

“Finlay is trying to get it, but your other friends back at the Greaves building are doing a good job escaping him. So far. If Finlay succeeds, I’ll pay Legba to divert the teleportation to somewhere safe.”

“Divert? You’re not working with Finlay?”

“Not really. That’s what I want to talk about with you. I wasn’t supposed to approach you yet, but circumstances changed.”

“Approach me about what?”

“I’m inviting you to join our side.”

Internal conflict? Finally, something that I could understand. “Let me guess. The brothers are fighting. Which side are you?”

“Big Marcy’s side. He wants to take over the—”

Big Marcy? Wasn’t he the bastard at the docks? Too bad I wasn’t able to kill him because I was berserking. “What did he offer you?” Their in-fighting didn’t interest me. It certainly had an unoriginal and boring reason.

“He offered me to keep you safe,” Vanessa said. My eye probably wiggled in disbelief because she added, “I know how weird that sounds, but I want to keep my friend safe. We have a bond. I can feel in my heart you’re the only real friend I can make now that I’m… this.” She rapped at the metal bands on her arm.

This bitch is nuts. “And what can he offer me to take his side in something I don’t care about?”

“Anything that money can buy.”

“That’s not enough to convince an Adumbrae.”

“Research. You know we’re experimenting on Adumbrae. If we’re successful, we can help you, um, maybe take full control of your body and—”

“That’s a huge maybe.”

“Our techniques for keeping the Adumbrae in our mind at bay. Maybe—uh, we can try—”

“Big Marcy’s brother can also offer that too.”

“Protection! Many people want a real Adumbrae. Even Mark! Big Marcy can protect you.”

“Hmm…” Big Marcy also wants me, I thought.

“Not only that. Cover, disguises, and whatnot. Everything you need to live comfortably among humans. An island with a mansion to hide away as an Adumbrae if you like. Whatever the group you’re with is providing, we can do it ten times better.”

Did she mean Dario and the others? I asked, “I suppose you want me to surrender them if I join you?”

“You don’t know much about them, do you? Information. Big Marcy can also give you information about what he thinks they are. He has investigated the Supplier and suspects that your friends are connected to him. They’re not the allies you think.”

“The Supplier that’s helping your organization is also helping them?” That’s news to me. I knew there was something sketchy with Dario, but this was on another level of insanity.

“Big Marcy knows about it,” Vanessa said. “You can talk to him later. Sorry, I’m a bit unorganized in presenting our side. I really didn’t expect to do this now. What else? Um, your mother.”

I kept my tone even, easy to do with a robotic voice. “What about her?” I nonchalantly asked.

“We have her. Like the Tea Party has her, but I might be able to get her for you. What do you want to do with her? We can make her disappear so you’ll have an easier life—”

“No! Uh, no, I want her returned to me.” This is why Vanessa wasn’t using my Mom as a bargaining chip? So funny. I relaxed my voice. “It’ll be a hassle if she dies. Best if she’s alive, and I can continue with my normal life until I no longer can. It helps control my sanity that I’m still living as normal Erind.”

“Got it. I understand you. I really do.” She extended her hand as she approached me—a friendly gesture, especially given that she used her left hand. Etiquette dictated the right was for handshakes, but that housed the mouth familiars. “Join us.”

“Is this like a villain convincing someone to join the evil side?”

“Evil?” She stopped about five feet from me, still holding her hand out. The left tip of her mouth curved up and formed a sly smirk. “You’re the real Adumbrae. I know I’m evil, not making excuses, but I think most people will say you’re eviler between the two of us. To be honest, I’m scared of you.

“But I also know that deep down, you’re also scared of your new life, just like I’m with mine. If we met in some other circumstances, we’d instantly bond. If nothing else, I offer friendship. You felt a connection between us, right? I know I’m not the only one who did.”

I wasn’t buying Vanessa’s story, even if it was on a promo discount. I wouldn’t buy it even if she threw a free cookie bag with it. Two people I nearly killed wanting me on their team? Bullshit.

Though the 2Ms fighting for control of their organization sounded like a good reason Big Marcy was willing to forget what I did—if I were in his place, I’d want a real Adumbrae on my side. And Vanessa’s point that they could’ve continued attacking me if they really wanted to was a good one.

Looking past that, their offers weren’t all too attractive, other than freeing Mom.

The biggest benefit I could think of by joining them was being part of a criminal organization. Mafia movies were pretty cool—imagine a black limousine with muscled bodyguards wearing black tuxedos picking me up from university or something.

I stared at her hand, mulling things over. She’ll keep it up? Was she going to force me to take her hand through awkwardness? “Do I have to decide now?”

“Preferably,” Vanessa replied. “I don’t want to rush you, but there’s this thing… Finlay would eventually know that I saved you.”

“Can’t you cover it up?”

“We might have to kill Finlay for that. It’ll be a huge mess exposing Big Marcy’s plot to topple Mark.”

“I see…” Having Finlay killed should’ve been on top of the list of their offers. Would’ve preferred it if I could rip that asshole’s asshole myself.

“And your mother, too,” Vanessa said. “Saving her might mean killing a few Tea Party people because they’re holding her hostage along with other Greaves corporate officials for their own thing. I don’t know what their plans are. I just know that if we get your mom, it’ll be messy.”

“I should choose now, so it’ll be worth it for you guys to burn bridges?”

“Uh. I’m not putting it that way, but Big Marcy won’t put himself in danger for nothing. So, yeah. It’s best if you choose now.”

Join them now to get Mom and leave future problems for future Erind? Sounds like a good plan to me. Then I realized something. I grabbed her hand. Vanessa jolted in surprise, not expecting me to accept her invitation.

“You’re joining us?” Her eyes sparkled with happiness.

“Yes,” I confirmed. “Not just that. I can also offer something to you in return. How about I do the burning of bridges?”

“What burning—?”

Oops, I shouldn’t mention anything fire related. “You can direct the portal?” Vanessa nodded, puzzled about what I was getting at. “I want my real body here,” I said, “and Mom through that portal to safety.”

“For what? Why are you coming here?”

“Just leave everything to me.” I wasn’t just going to cover their betrayal. I was going to flatten this whole fucking place! A test. If Vanessa told the truth, they shouldn’t mind if I destroyed everything here. The danger… this is going to be so much fun.