Vanessa Minnows

“I got your mom away from the man guarding her,” Vanessa Minnows said, rapidly blinking. Each time she opened her eyes, the view changed—peering through grates, peeking from behind a box, perched on top of a stack of crates, moving at floor level—she tracked the journey of Erind’s mother through the Tea Party base.

If Erind’s mom went the wrong way, a mouth familiar was there, snapping its powerful jaws and scaring her back to the right track. If someone were en route to intercept her, they’d meet the mouth familiars along the way. Vanessa coordinated her familiars to protect and drive the white-haired woman to the right door.

Then she switched to the view of the eye familiar, watching the guard her mouth familiar attacked. The man squirmed on the floor, hitting the giant almond-looking creature latched on his leg like a leech with the butt of his gun. Blood everywhere. The eye familiar couldn’t hear sounds, but it could see the man’s mouth wide open, shouting in pain.

Only bite! Don’t swallow! Vanessa firmly repeated the orders to her mouth familiar. The metallic taste of blood overcame the disgusting saltiness of the fabric, masking the bland flesh. She struggled not to vomit, focusing on reining in the ferocity of the mouth familiar. After Erind’s mom had run some distance away, Vanessa ordered it to return to her.

“Everything clear so far,” Vanessa said. She closed her own eyes, reorienting herself, before looking at Erind standing beside her. Erind didn’t seem too concerned for her mother’s safety, though it was hard to gauge from her metal dummy face. “Your distraction must be working,” Vanessa said in a louder voice, hoping to get a response.

“It’s something they can’t ignore,” Erind replied.

Vanessa switched to her eye familiar shadowing the man Erind had taken over. A puppet, Erind had called it.

Bigger than Slinky, skin red from bursting veins, torn open in place due to bloated muscles growing out of control—the man looked more of an Adumbrae than most of Adumbrae at Red Island. The muscle monster demolished a storage room with canisters holding the experimental parasites. Guards came from all directions, trying to kill Erind’s puppet to no avail. The beast leaped at the men, squishing them like dough. Many parasites escaped the broken canisters. Some attacked the incoming reinforcements; most slithered off to cause havoc elsewhere.

How many abilities does Erind have? Vanessa wondered. This reinforced the fear and respect in her mind for a true Adumbrae. There was the giant werewolf that attacked Eve, and now this metal body that could control people. Vanessa spared a glance at Erind before returning to following her mother.

Erind’s form reminded Vanessa of her godfather, Rob—the alias Vanessa jokingly gave him, the name of her favorite cartoon character. He could absorb any material and turn it into armor. He protected them when they escaped from the tunnels underneath Eve, chased by BID combat drones, absorbing metal as their shield. Ultimately, he couldn’t last against the Skitters’ heavy weaponry.

If only he were as durable as Erind’s metal form. Vanessa saw Erind fight Red Head, an enforcer of the Tea Party. Red Head tore Erind apart, but she put herself together as if nothing had happened. Her pieces didn’t have any scratches from the claws and fangs of the humanoid lion Adumbrae.

Can Red Head scratch diamonds? Vanessa’s thoughts returned to that fateful night, zeroing in on the moment she threw the diamond bracelet to Erind to pass to Rob. Vanessa was cycling through her eye familiars, but that scene was the only thing she could see. Erind gave something else to Rob, not the diamond bracelet. Rob made his armor out of a different material and was killed by the endless stream of bullets from the Skitters.

That was why Erind played dumb about the diamond bracelet. She was avoiding the topic of Rob’s death… of killing Rob.

Erind didn’t know that Vanessa was thankful it happened that way. If Rob caught the diamond bracelet and made an armor of diamonds from it, he’d still die, and Vanessa would be tormented with guilt. She had tested shooting a diamond ring her mother gave her with a gun—it simply shattered.

Thank you, Erind. One less thing to feel guilty about. Vanessa had more than enough that she might break apart if Rob’s death was on her too.

The Skitters tracking her eye familiars in the tunnels, leading the combat drones to their group…

Telling Stella about Erind’s identity…

“Is there something on my face?” Erind asked.

Vanessa didn’t realize she was unconsciously staring. “Uh, no. I was going to say your mom is only a couple more corridors away. No guards in sight.”

They couldn’t use the door of the holding cells of the hostages because it was a sliding door that opened with a keypad. Legba’s power only worked with a doorknob or a latch, something a person could hold and operate to open the door. Same reason why Erind was teleported far from the room where Vanessa met her. Only the doors in the older section of the Tea Party’s base had door knobs—most were touchpad operated or locked.

“Good.” Erind nodded. “The sooner my mother escapes, the sooner we can transport my real body here. He can make only one portal something at a time, right?” She nudged her head at a tiny old man, not much bigger than a fifth-grader, sitting cross-legged on a wide pushcart in the middle of the room.

“Yes, I think so…” Vanessa hesitantly glanced at Legba. The old man didn’t move, his eyes hidden behind the hood of his cloak. On his lap was a large handbell with an aged wooden handle.

All this time, Legba hadn’t said anything to Vanessa, much less nod or make any other gesture of communication. She hadn’t seen him talk to anyone else, just following the woman named Euphonia—an eccentric Adumbrae with four large robotic arms attached to her back. ‘Follow’ might be the wrong term. Euphonia carried Legba with her mechanical arms. If Vanessa hadn’t seen the old man shake the bell, she’d have thought he was a garden gnome.

When Vanessa first talked to Legba, offering to bribe him to teleport Erind to a different door, he waved his bell once as an answer. Vanessa gambled that meant yes. The other half of her considered killing the old man to cover her betrayal if it turned out that he wasn’t on board. Fortunately, Legba transported Erind to the correct door.

Several minutes ago, Vanessa sort of kidnapped Legba from the control room, killing the Tea Party guards there and putting Legba on the cart to transfer him into a room several doors down the parasite storage area. Erind had to be near it to command her puppet to create a diversion to save her mother.

Legba waved his bell once after Vanessa explained the plan, so she assumed everything would be fine. How am I supposed to pay him later?

Vanessa blinked again. “Erind, your mom is nearing the door. We’ll transport her to a building near the Greaves center where the Tea Party gathered before the attack.” Vanessa picked that spot because Legba wasn’t answering when asked if he could connect to any other location in Las Vegas. That was the only place, besides the convention center, where Legba teleported the Tea Party. Vanessa didn’t know if he had portals in other areas. “Don’t worry,” she told Erind. “It’s safe there. No one—”

“It’s fine,” Erind nonchalantly said. “Just get Mom out of here so we can move on to my real body.”

“I’ll try to get an eye familiar at the convention center over to that place to watch her.”

“Is she out already? My puppet won’t last long. Several augmented men and, I think, an Adumbrae showed up.”

“Not yet. She’s running to the door now.” Vanessa turned to Legba. “Can you, um, do as we planned?”

From the long and baggy sleeves of Legba’s cloak emerged his frail hand, his bony fingers were unnaturally long like tree branches. When he grabbed the bell’s handle, it began to glow bright gold. He swung it once; beautiful ringing started, the sound coming from all directions. Vanessa might be imagining it, but the sound was like waves washing over her.

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“Thank you,” Vanessa said, unsure what else to say. She bowed to him as an afterthought. It probably wasn’t all that respectful to put him on a pushcart.

“My real body,” Erind said. “It’s still at the basement parking of the building?”

“Yep, still there with your friends,” Vanessa said, blinking to check it. “They’re safe… for now. They’ve destroyed Finlay’s ceramic soldiers, though more should be coming soon. I think they’re trying to find a tunnel to get out.”

“How’s the rest of the building?”

“It’s a battlefield between the police, BID agents, and the mutants the last I saw. I don’t have eye familiars left to watch—she’s through. Your mom’s through the door.”

“Okay then,” Erind said. “I’m not good with directions. Up two floors, then the men’s restroom near the emergency stairs?”

“We’ll see each other again soon.” Vanessa intently stared at Erind’s single eye.

Erind placed her fingers beneath her chin, along her jawline. “Vanessa… Sorry for what I did to you. And, yeah, see you later.”

“Don’t apologize for—” Before Vanessa could finish her sentence, Erind disappeared.

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Imani Nanda (Tove)

They had shaken off the clay bastards. Some breathing space.

Imani Nanda didn’t know where they were, but it seemed to be some mechanical room. Maybe? There were large machines. Could be generators. And there were lots of pipes. They went down here, hoping there was a large enough pipe for them to pass, maybe something connected to the sewer system.

She stared at her hand. Her palm was covered in blood—not hers. She had plenty of bruises from brawling with the clay men, but she was sure this blood wasn’t hers. She felt it with her fingers to make sure it was real.

Rough. It had already dried.

But it was real.

“No way,” Imani whispered, turning to examine Erind’s face. Imani had propped Erind in a sitting position against the wall while they—including the other people they rescued—waited for Jubjub’s return, scouting for a way out.

Erind’s eyes were still shut tight. No air flowed in or out of her nose, and her chest wasn’t moving. Imani had assumed Erind was dead and thought of leaving her body, maybe hiding it in a cabinet to retrieve later for a proper burial. But she didn’t.

Imani touched Erind’s skin. Warm. They’d been running for so long that Erind should’ve gone cold if she was really dead. Imani felt for Erind’s pulse on her wrist. There was nothing. Next, Imani raised Erind’s arm and slightly shook it. It was limp. Rigor mortis didn’t set in.

Erind seemed dead, but she wasn’t.

Lastly, Imani turned Erind to the side to look at her back. A patch of dried blood stained the lower part of Erind’s shirt. Imani clenched her teeth, remembering her stupidity. She was carrying Erind on her back as she ran away from the Tea Party men—could be human, could be those clay puppets—shooting at them when a bullet managed to hit Erind.

Imani lifted Erind’s shirt. She had checked the wound earlier but wasn’t sure, or rather couldn’t believe, what she saw. She couldn’t take a closer look because the Adumbrae was chasing them.

She scratched away the dried blood to reveal smooth, pale skin. No hole, no scars, no hint of any wound. It wasn’t a hallucination when she saw the bullet getting pushed out of Erind’s injury before it healed.

When Snark stole Erind’s phone to set up a situation for Imani to step in and save the day, Erind could keep up with Snark’s running speed despite his leg-augs. Snark also mentioned that he nearly got the wind knocked out of him when Erind punched his stomach. Imani assumed Erind was augmented. Reasonable to think, given that Erind’s mother worked for Greaves.

Imani missed the mark on that one. Erind has an artificial Core.

Jubjub told them that only Amber Deen had an artificial Core in her. Erind was supposed to be a normal human. Either Jubjub purposely lied to them, or she didn’t know—maybe the latter case, as Jubjub had suggested leaving Erind behind too.

Was Erind an even bigger secret than Deen’s power? Was this why the Adumbrae wanted Erind?

He called himself Finlay—an Adumbrae with the power to create clay puppets masquerading as humans. Those clay puppets also led the black goo monsters to them. He told them to surrender Erind, and he’d let them escape. Of course, they didn’t believe him. He wasn’t that powerful of an Adumbrae, but Jubjub couldn’t kill him because he could transfer between his creations.

“Is Erind okay?” Tesh limped up to her.

Imani allowed herself a smile seeing Tesh’s ridiculous look. The sleeves of his dress shirt were torn off; one arm sleeve was used to wrap his wounded leg. I shouldn’t smile here. Wearing a straight face, she said, “Yes, she’s fine. Just a small wound. It’s not bleeding anymore.”

“That’s good.” Tesh looked around the room. Kiera was tending to an old man with a wounded arm. Tesh’s other sleeve went to that wound. They had picked up several more people during their escape and lost a few when Finlay attacked. “Everyone’s fine so far. Still alive.”

“Yeah, still alive.” Erind included, probably?

“You think we can trust her?” Tesh asked. “The shadow woman?”

“Yes, we can,” Imani said. “I can feel it.” When she reunited with Jubjub, the latter decided it was best that they pretended not to know each other. “It’s not like we have a choice.”

“You’re right,” Tesh said. “She saved our asses many times. We’d be dead without her.” He looked at Erind. Imani could guess what was on his mind. A few of their group wanted to give up Erind to Finlay. Tesh opened his mouth but was interrupted by the rattling in the vents overhead.

The others also jolted in surprise. And fear. A few tried to hide behind the large machines.

“Don’t worry!” Imani called out. “I can see the shadows! Jubjub’s back.”

Dark liquid, not unlike the black goo from the parasites, just not smelly, gushed through the metal slats in the ceiling. It formed into a large puddle that congealed into a blob. Then that blob took on the form of Jubjub, dressed in all black, with dark straight hair covering half her face.

“Bad news, and badder news,” Jubjub said.

“What is it?” Kiera asked, stepping forward.

“Those clay men are back with a few monsters in tow. Few, but huge ones.”

“Large enough to break the door?” Imani already knew the answer from Jubjub’s face. Jubjub nodded. The others gasped and exchanged worried looks. Imani scanned the frightened people before asking, “Is that the worse news? No?”

“The sewers are a no-go,” Jubjub said. “There’s no way for us out of here. We have to barricade—”

“You can get out of here!” shouted a man wearing overalls with a Greaves logo on his chest. “We’re the ones who can’t get out. You lead us to a trap!”

“Hey, shut up,” Tesh growled. “She saved you back there.”

“Barricade the doors,” Jubjub said. “I’ll try to delay them.” She liquified into a dark sludge, zooming across the floor to a part of the room covered in shadows.

“She’s gone again!” the Greaves employee said. “I was right. This is a fucking trap!”

“She might even be an Adumbrae,” said another person.

“Yeah, definitely a trap. The black goo. So obvious.”

“We shouldn’t have trusted her.”

“Go out if you don’t want to be with us,” said Tesh. “Everyone else who prefers living, grab something to—”

“And who made you the leader?”

Another shouting match erupted, reminiscent of when they were held in the conference room several floors up. Why couldn’t people just get along? It seemed so obvious that everyone should work together for the best chances of survival. But scared people do stupid things, hoping to save themselves at the expense of others. Imani couldn’t blame them because she was also afraid… as usual, as expected.

What made the feeling worse was knowing that Jubjub could escape the place on her own while leaving the rest of them to die, just like the guy in overalls said. If only Boojum and Snark were here. Where did they go? As morbid as it sounded, life and death situations were made better if suffered as a group. Imani could draw from Boojum’s confidence in the face of danger or Snark’s sense of humor even when staring at death.

Fear crept into Imani’s mind. What if Jubjub was on her way out of the building? Imani looked at Erind’s body. Somebody shouted what she was thinking.

“Let’s just give the Adumbrae that girl!”

“No one’s giving anyone to an Adumbrae!” Kiera rushed to Erind’s side, shielding her. Tesh took his place in front of his wife, fists raised.

Imani shook her head. What the hell was I thinking? She wasn’t this weak! She stood beside Tesh. “How dare you offer up someone to an Adumbrae? Have you no shame?” The last line was also meant for herself.

“We’re all going to die if the tentacle creatures get in here!” a woman wearing corporate attire cried out.

“Just give up that girl!” someone piled on.

“One life for ours!”

The others were closing in. Imani was confident she could fight them off, but she’d rather they prepare to defend this room.

“You idiots!” Tesh shouted. “The monsters are coming, and you want to do this?”

“We want to live!”

“Give up the girl!”

“Ah… so noisy…” It was only a small voice, but everyone quieted down. Erind was awake. “Can’t get some sleep around here. Too noisy. I’m going out.”