Then
Cal woke with a start. A pair of beady, black eyes stared down at him.
Whiskers tickled his face.
A giggle.
“Veronica? Why is Twinkle Star on my face?”
Cal gingerly picked up the guinea pig before it could pee or poop on his face. It had already walked all over who knew how much of him with its pee-feet.
“He thought you looked tired and needed some healing.”
“Ah… yeah. I totes feel better,” Cal grinned.
Veronica made a face.
“What? Isn’t that what you kids say?”
“That was like before the spirepocalypse,” Veronica shrugged. “Also Aunt Nila said to wake you up.”
“Thanks, to you and Twinkle Star.” Cal eyed the guinea pig. He remembered something from years back. “Say. How old is he again?”
“He turns eight in twenty-three days.”
That wasn’t possible. Right? From what Cal knew guinea pigs maxed out around three to four years and Twinkle Star was already getting up there in age when the spires appeared. He should probably mention it to Remy. “So, how’s training going?”
“It’s pretty hard, but fun. I have to avoid Aunt Nila hitting me while I try to mess with her brain. It’s hard cause she moves so fast.”
Cal’s eyes widened. He hadn’t heard about that. Come to think of it he hadn’t gotten a chance to ask Veronica about her powers. He remembered a flurry of text messages from his brother and nieces describing some kind of electro magnetic pulse field or generation. He’d been too busy lately with the mauler stuff to get more details.
“Oh yeah. Maybe I can give you a couple of tips. So, tell me about your powers.”
“Dad says I can generate EMP’s. It’s like I just think about it and it builds up. And I feel a tingling in my head like when I drink soda too fast. Like all bubbly. Then I go boom,” Veronica threw her hands up. “And then I fry like phones and tv’s and dad’s X-Box. Also the car, but dad was able to fix it. The car. Not the X-Box, but it’s okay. Tessa got a new one from Best Buy, but then mom and dad got mad at her for going off by herself and looting. But like the monsters were the weak kind, so it wasn’t like a big deal.”
Cal wasn’t sure if he saw it the same way as his niece. “That’s a pretty cool power. So, you can use it on people.”
“Yeah, dad had an idea. We tested it out. It totally knocks people out. They fall and their bodies start just like moving and shaking. Kinda scary, but they’re okay after. Mom ran dad through one of those brain checking machines at her work. Said he’s fine.”
Cal nodded. Impressed and maybe a bit concerned.
“It’s harder to get people in the brain though cause I have to think about putting it in their heads and it’s hard when people move around a lot.”
“Right, which is why your aunt is helping you practice.”
“Oh!” Veronica brightened. “Do you want to help me too?”
Cal chuckled. No. “Yes! Sure, no problem!”
He followed Veronica down from the loft of his and Nila’s gym-turned-home. A preteen with the power to somehow short-circuit the human brain. A wide smile crossed his face. Hopefully it worked on monsters. Though there were still concerns some of the weight he had been carrying since the apocalypse began lifted off his shoulders. Now both of his nieces had abilities to protect themselves.
----------------------------------------
Cal, Bennett, and Omar walked into the police station to stares that were neither hostile, nor welcoming.
“Your business?” The officer on duty at the front desk’s tone was cold.
“Here to see Detective Ordonez. Like always.” Cal felt Omar poke him in the side. “And Omar here is going to need to do some research. Like usual.”
The officer tilted his head to the sign-in sheet on the counter.
Cal scribbled something indecipherable without taking his eyes off the officer’s. He had stopped trying to write his name properly a while back.
The officer handed them temporary badges. “No wandering around.” His eyes settled on Omar.
“Never do,” Omar said.
The officer went to the side door and opened it.
Omar split off at that point.
Cal and Bennett walked down the hall and found themselves headed toward a group of armed, hard-eyed, bearded men.
Bennett shrank back behind Cal.
Time to play chicken.
Cal decided to be polite. He move to the right side of the hall. Leaving plenty of space on the left for the other men to move over. Instead, just as he expected. They didn’t deviate from their path. In fact one moved into the middle of the corridor.
Cal didn’t break his stride. He maintained a leisurely, unconcerned pace. Like he was just enjoying a stroll through a park.
As the two groups met. The man in the middle went for the good old, shoulder check. A time-honored tradition of generations of douchebags.
The man slammed his shoulder into Cal’s. He bounced right off and fell to the ground. Forcing his buddies to scatter. So much for having someone’s back.
Cal didn’t give, much. He had to at least a little bit, otherwise he would’ve actually hurt the dumbass. Probably pop his shoulder out.
“Really? It hasn’t worked for any of your bros. Why’d you think it’d work for you?”
Cal held his hand out to the downed man.
The man grabbed it and pulled hard.
Cal didn’t budge.
“That won’t work either.”
Cal pulled the man to his feet like he was picking up a toy.
“So you’ve got an enhanced strength passive. Still not even close,” Cal grinned.
The other men looked like they were about to draw their weapons.
“You’re going to start a fight? What do your orders say again? That’s right. Not only will I embarrass you and ruin your gear, but you will also get yourself on the shit list with your bosses.” Cal gave the men a mirthless smile. “I’m patient, but only with children. You might act like them, but you’re not.”
The men glared, but stood aside as Cal and Bennett went on their way.
“You’re not looking too good, Cruces,” Detective Ordonez said as soon as she opened her office door. “Headache?”
“That’s unnaturally perceptive of you,” Cal said. “My brain’s a little fried from training earlier today,” Cal grimaced.
Veronica’s EMP to the brain was as advertised. He might’ve made a mistake by taking it easy on his niece and letting her get her shots in. Nila had the right idea by doing everything she could to not get hit.
“Those Detective Skills of yours tell you that?”
“No. Just reading the look on your face.”
The detective’s face was unreadable.
“Suit yourself,” Cal shrugged. “What’s the plan for tonight?”
“I’ll get to that, but first I’ve got something to tell you.” Detective Ordonez didn’t look happy. Like she’d taken a bite out of lemon. “I checked out your claims.”
“What’s she talking about?” Bennett whispered to Cal.
Cal didn’t take his eyes off Detective Ordonez’s. “A while back her government gave me bad intelligence that might’ve led to some people getting hurt.”
“You’re telling the truth about that. The entire street that the Browning’s house is on was marked as empty.”
“How’d you find this out?”
“I talked to a few people. Got my hands on some documents. That’s the thing about government employees. They know how to cover their ass even in the apocalypse. There was a paper trail.”
“So, what about Flo’s family. You’re obviously implying that they were in their home that night we were fighting the gremlin alphas in their neighborhood.” Cal didn’t like where this was going.
“Nothing. All dead. Except that information has only one source and no one thought to confirm it.”
“Flo?”
Detective Ordonez nodded.
“Seems strange you guys didn’t vet her, considering how much power she has. I mean, look at how you treat me and I’ve never committed a crime in my life.”
Detective Ordonez snorted. “Everyone’s committed crimes.”
“That’s true. There are a lot of unenforced laws,” Bennett said.
“Nothing worth being arrested and charged,” Cal amended.
“I doubt that,” Detective Ordonez said flatly. “To get back on topic. I only have Flo’s word that her family is dead. No information on the specifics. How? When? Where? And from what I saw of the Browning home… I suspect that they died due to the damage your fight with the monsters caused.” She held up a hand to forestall Cal. “I acknowledge that you were given poor intel. However, and this is me speaking personally and not as an officer of the law, you can’t abrogate your responsibility.”
“Right,” Cal frowned. “Collateral damage isn’t a big deal when you do it, but when it’s someone you can’t control you get on your high horse about responsibility.”
“We are held to a high standard. Whenever we fire our service weapon we are expected to be always cognizant of potential harm to bystanders.”
“Don’t make me laugh. You killed random innocents every day back before the spires appeared. How many times did you guys shoot up the bad guys only to spray your bullets into their next door neighbor. Or what about the times you don’t even get the right homes? Break in the middle of the night and when the owner, who thinks they’re in danger fights back, you shoot them and pass the blame to them. I remember one case where you flashbanged a baby in his crib. It wasn’t even the right house.”
“Mistakes don’t tarnish the whole,” Detective Ordonez snapped.
“Doesn’t it though? Aren’t you just abrogating your responsibility just because it’s your side doing it. I’ve never gone to the apartment two floors down by mistake and then shot the actual owner of the place cause he surprised me. Can you say the same for your guys?” Cal was pissed.
The double standards had always bothered him. The powerful always got away with their malicious actions just because they had the might to enforce their authority. Whether intentional or through incompetence they hurt the people they claimed to protect and serve.
It hit Cal hard to realize that he may have been guilty of the same.
“Um…” Bennett stuck an arm in between Cal and Detective Ordonez. “Let’s remember that there is a murderous monster out there.”
Detective Ordonez gave a curt nod. “Fine. The sooner we catch the mauler the sooner I don’t have to look at your smug face.”
“What’s the plan for tonight?” Bennett looked nervously at Cal.
“We’re going back to the Browning’s neighborhood. There was something that bugged me about the place when I was checking it out the other day. It’s a gut feeling, but apparently that might be a tangible thing now. Thanks the spires.” The distaste was evident in the detective’s tone.
Cal bit his tongue. He counted to ten. “Just us three?”
“Gates is waiting downstairs and we’ll stop by the Capitol to grab Flo.”
“You think it’s a good idea to bring her to the place where her family probably died?”
“Something’s going on with her and this might be just the thing to shake her up.”
“And you said I’ve got a responsibility,” Cal laughed bitterly. “You’re cold.”
“There’s a murderer running around and the killings have gotten worst. From the evidence my list of suspects is short,” Detective Ordonez said flatly. “I have a job to do and as much as I dislike the idea… I can’t do it without you.”
Jake was indeed waiting for them in the station’s lobby. Flo was sitting on the steps of the capitol. She glared lasers at everyone, but she saved most of her ire for Cal.
The only thing he felt was guilt. Perhaps if he explained? No. If he was in her position then he knew that the only thing he’d want was revenge.
“We get a car today!” Jake grinned at the battered looking Toyota parked on the street. “Can I drive? Haven’t driven in years.”
“No.” Detective Ordonez grabbed the keys out of Jake’s hand.
“We’ll meet you there,” Cal said.
“We will?” Bennett looked longingly at the car.
“Yeah. We can run there quicker. Clear any monsters that might’ve spawned.” Cal knew there wasn’t going to be any monsters. He just didn’t want to be in an enclosed space with Flo. For some reason he had just experienced a spike of fear when they locked eyes. He had learned over the past four years to listen to his instincts.
“But we could’ve rode in the car,” Bennett complained as he struggled to keep up with Cal.
“Be ready, Bennett. I’ve got a bad feeling about tonight.”
----------------------------------------
The street was dark. The stars were bright and the skies were clear though. Not that it made a huge difference to the two men standing on top of a house.
Royal Road is the home of this novel. Visit there to read the original and support the author.
Cal’s night vision was a bit better than a normal human. While Bennett had been transformed by the spires into an actual creature of the night.
“Um…”
“Yeah, Bennett.”
“I don’t want to alarm you, but I’m smelling blood and quite a bit.”
“Fresh?”
“That’s what’s weird. I’m picking up a mix of old all the way to new-ish.”
“It wouldn’t happen to be leading your nose over there.” Cal pointed to the other side of the street.
Bennett nodded. “How’d you know?”
“Gut feeling.” Cal didn’t say that he had sensed a confusing set of emotions emanating from one of the houses. There was malice, hunger like any monster. Two things gave him pause. One was the strength. It was stronger than the gremlin alphas and it wasn’t close. The second was that part of it felt like a human being. There was an undercurrent of fear, loneliness and longing. What he picked up signaled a monster and human, but he was certain that the source was one being. “I’m checking it out. You should probably stay here.”
“I wasn’t planning on doing anything else, but shouldn’t you wait for the others.”
Cal shook his head. “It might run away. I can’t let the mauler escape again. Too much blood on my hands already.” He jumped down from the roof and sprinted across the street.
“Great,” Bennett muttered. “I’ll just wait here for the others. Alone… in the dark.”
A god damn vampire afraid of the dark. Cal was annoyed. Although it was probably better than the alternative. A vampire that went all in on the prince of darkness, blood sucking thing.
Cal stopped on the sidewalk. He recognized the place. There were the telltale signs of a violent and destructive fight wherever he looked. The guilt welled up again. He pushed it down.
He tried to ignore the partially collapsed houses. The broken streetlights and fallen trees. Each one was a silent witness to his mistakes.
He focused with his telepathy. It pointed him right to a dirty, white-colored house with metal bars at one of the second floor windows. A quick check confirmed that it was the only window with bars over it and if he wasn’t mistaken there were bars on the inside as well.
“Well that’s not suspicous,” Cal said. “Should’ve looked first.” Perhaps he was over-reliant on his telepathy.
The front door was locked. He broke it and stepped inside. All of his senses were heightened. He smelled something coppery. Blood and other things that reminded him of the monster lairs he had the dubious pleasure of venturing into. It was promising. Had he found the Midtown Mauler’s lair?
The first floor was surprisingly clean. As in someone had obviously gone through effort recently to sweep and tidy the place up. Furniture was intact. The windows weren’t boarded up. He noted that there weren’t any photographs on the walls or tables. It felt artificial. Like a model home or an Ikea.
Cal made his way up the stairs to the second floor. Right away he saw that the single closed door had a makeshift door from what looked like wrought iron bars crudely bent together to look like a jail cell. The wooden door behind it was covered in tiny claw marks. What was odd was that they appeared to be made from the inside.
The iron door was fixed into the walls, floor and ceiling with an almost comical amount of thick chains and locks. There was only one other person that he knew of that was capable of bending metal with her hands.
The picture was becoming clearer and Cal had the terrible urge to turn around and come back with his brother. It’d be fairer that way. Wouldn’t it? Did he really want to fight a two on one battle?
He heard a car approaching from a long distance away with his superior ears.
There was a scuffling sound from inside the room. Claws on the wood floor. Almost like an animal, but only just.
He had maybe three minutes before they arrived. The detective, Jake… Flo.
He realized that they were all in danger. By coming here they’d marked themselves for death. If he wasn’t already marked. As soon as they set their eyes on this door and what was inside there would be no stopping the Midtown Mauler from coming after them.
Cal had to act quickly. His only hope that his suspicions proved true. However, deep down he wished that he was wrong.
He reached to grab the iron door. Thought better of it. He took a step to the side and readied his ax in one hand. The other hand he held out to the wall.
One deep breath to focus.
A blast of telekinetic force knocked a large hole into the room.
The smell hit Cal like a physical force. It had been bad in the rest of the house, but the inside of the room was leagues worse. He could almost taste the rot and death.
There in the middle of the room, chained to the four corners of the room was the mauler or at least what he took to be the mauler.
The same, small white monster that he had failed to kill.
It snarled and snapped at him, but the chains held it in place.
Cal raised his ax.
It was so small. Malice and hunger came off it with palpable weight. Except they weren’t alone. There was something else there. Just as strong. Fear, sadness.
A child.
Cal realized that it, no, he, was a child. Somehow the monstrous creature before him was a child, not only that, he was human or was once human. The thought of it was almost too much to take.
“How is this possible?” Cal whispered.
He lowered his ax.
Things fell into place. The detective had mentioned that the Brownings had three children. Flo and two younger boys. Was this one of the younger Browning boys?
Did it matter?
It, he had already killed so many people. He was a threat that needed to be dealt with. That was what the Quest had said. Kill the Midtown Mauler.
And here he was. A frightened child. A victim of the spires’ wretched system. Of Cal’s own carelessness.
Perhaps there was another option. Transformations need not be one way. The spires ran a game-like system. Wasn’t it likely that there were ways to reverse changes?
Perhaps the answers lay within the child’s thoughts. If only Cal could see how the child was changed. There was only one option. He feared it for what it did to his own thoughts.
Cal reached out to the mauler, the child, with telepathy. He formed a closer connection than he had ever dared before.
It was a mistake.
In an instant Cal knew everything. No. He experienced everything. The child was him, he was the child.
Cal lost himself.
----------------------------------------
Roughly one to one and a half years ago
Floyd’s unblinking eyes stared at Flo while she carried Freddie and held him to her chest. At least little Freddie had finally stopped crying. The only thing she could hear from him were the occasional whimpers as his tiny hands periodically grasped her sweater.
“Shhh. It’s okay, Freddie. They’ll find us. There’re superheroes now. They’ll save us. After they stop the monsters. They’ll come for us.”
I don’t think anyone’s coming, Flo.
“No, that’s not true.” Flo’s voice wavered. Her throat was dry from all her crying.
Hours had passed since her— everything had happened. Or had it been only minutes. Time had gone weird for Flo. All she could focus on was the crying, her’s and Freddie’s. Along with Floyd’s bright blue eyes gone dim and flat.
“Flo… I want mommy.”
“Mom’s… mom’s…” Flo broke down into tears when she remembered.
Time passed. Flo couldn’t tell. It was dark in the basement, but it was always dark down there even during the day time. The only light was from the small lantern on the floor near her. Her knees hurt from being on the cold, hard concrete. Her arms and back were stiff from holding Freddie. Mercifully, he had cried himself to sleep at some point.
Flo was numb.
Floyed stared at her.
No one is coming, Flo. You have to fix this. You’re the oldest.
“Okay, Floyd, don’t be a butt. I know.”
Flo groaned as she stood. Freddie stirred and whimpered.
She used her foot to push the lantern’s light away from Floyd’s sightless face and to the other side of the basement. She saw a lawn chair against the wall near the stairs to the side exit. She gently placed Freddie in the chair and grabbed an emergency blanket from her family’s earthquake kit to cover him.
She had to get to work. Freddie still needed her.
The first thing she did was move Floyd, Floyd’s body over to the furthest and darkest corner away from her and Freddie. She covered her brother with another blanket. There were no more tears left in her to shed.
She shined the light up the stairs into her house and saw that—
She grabbed some boxes and used them to block what remained near the top from sight.
There were plenty of supplies, food, water, medicine and toiletries. Even an emergency toilet. The water heater for hot water if necessary.
Thanks to her dad they could last for several weeks. Longer if they rationed. She wracked her memories for all of the lessons her dad had taught her and remembered that he had printed out a set of instructions for a variety of emergencies and had left it in a binder on the shelf.
Flo tried not to think of her parents and Floyd. She had to focus on Freddie. He was completely dependent on her.
All they had to do was wait. The government people would come and find them. Those superhero people that her brothers were so excited about. They had to come. They were fighting out on the street. There was no way they’d miss her and Freddie.
Everyone forgot about dad, mom, Floyd. Forgot about Freddie. Forgot about me.
----------------------------------------
Now
Cal’s brain was on fire. All of his senses were overloaded. He couldn’t understand what his team was yelling at him. There was only one thing in his eyes. The cloaked woman.
“Mother… Madrigal.”
The words slipped from his lips.
He roared and spat as if he wanted to get the taste out of his mouth.
The noise surrounded him. It was discordant and harmonious. A symphony that touched him deep down in a profoundly disturbing way. Every note he heard stripped away just a little bit more of the man he was.
Fight or flight?
The instinct in all animals when faced with mortal peril.
But he wasn’t an animal. Was he? No. He rejected that. He thought. He had will.
He pushed back the music. Dulled it just enough for clarity. However tenuous.
The battlefield suddenly became clearer.
He didn’t need to look back to know that the corrupted, along with Gyxdor and the other special types rapidly approached.
In front of him the cloaked woman still hadn’t moved. She was a statue blocking the way to freedom.
“Honor! Honor!”
Adahn’s voice.
“Unidentified hostile is emitting… I do not know what it is, but it is overwhelming our auditory protections!”
The Threnosh’s voice was high and almost hysterical.
Cal grit his teeth.
“Get ready to run.”
Cal sprayed the woman with the last of his rifle’s ammo. The projectiles did nothing. He punched out with his telekinesis. A force that could send cars flying merely made the woman take a few steps back, off balanced. He jerked her toward him with a pull, while sprinting forward, ax in hand.
The ax chopped down.
The woman’s cloak opened with startling speed.
Cal felt his arm jar as the ax was stopped short of the woman’s chest.
Several delicate-looking hands had caught the ax head and handle. They were all left hands.
It took Cal a second to understand. What had looked like clasps along the inside edge of the cloak were actually hands. The cloak was…
“Impossible,” Cal whispered, horrified.
The cloak wasn’t clothing. It was a part of the woman. A cloak of skin.
Now that he was up close. Cal got a good look at the woman. She was gigantic. At least fifteen feet tall. She was nude. Her flesh was pale. The hood was also a part of her body. It hid her face in a dark shadow that was unnaturally impenetrable. Her legs and feet. If she even had any were hidden by a skirt of skin.
Six hands at the edge of one side of her skin cloak held fast to his ax. The other half dozen on the other side reached out for him.
Cal barely held them back with his telekinesis. He tried to pull back, but her grip on his ax was stronger.
A sinewy arm, as long as he was tall struck out.
Cal was too slow to react. He went flying. His grip on the ax was wrenched away.
Sparks flew as his armor skidded against the metallic ground. A spiderweb of cracks spread across his face-plate. He rolled up to his feet and looked up.
The woman was almost on him.
Cal shoved hard with his telekinesis. It stunned the woman momentarily. He threw her into a building on the left side of the street. Without moving a hand he threw a handful of grenades at her.
The explosions rocked the street, but the woman was unharmed aside from black scorch marks on the outside of her skin cloak.
Cal sent his knife blades flying at her. They cut into her fleshy cloak, but there was no blood.
A sound like a violinist accidentally snapping one of their strings struck Cal like a punch to the side of his head. A rising crescendo was followed by blow that knocked him into a building. His body cratered the metallic wall.
Cal was slowing losing his grip. The pressure on his mind was overwhelming. He didn’t have the time, nor the opportunity to concentrate on pushing back with his telepathy.
The discordant song coming from the Mother was somehow disrupting his efforts.
Cal screamed in frustration.
The Mother loomed over him as it seemed to glide across the street.
“Honor, you require assistance.” PJ15’s voice crackled in Cal’s damaged helmet.
“Negative, I told you guys to get out of here.” Cal’s voice was hoarse.
“Adahn and Unseen are withdrawing.”
Bright light flashed from down the street along their path of retreat.
The Mother raised her skin cloak to protect her face from the barrage of glowing yellow flechettes.
A shadow descend from above. A gray tentacle with a spiked club on the end struck the Mother in the head. It caused her to stumble.
Cal pushed off the wall and flew straight at the Mother. At the last moment he stopped and went straight up. He pounded her into the street with pure telekinetic force.
The Mother was forced to her knees under the equivalent of dozens of tons of weight. The metallic street beneath her buckled.
Brightstrike ran closer and sprayed more glowing yellow flechettes at the sitting duck from a hard light version of the Threnosh recoilless rifle in their hands.
Cal suddenly found himself looking down into the Mother’s hood-shadowed face. Even though her body was positioned with her face to the ground.
“Not possible…”
The abyss looked back at him. It strengthened the discordant song that had already slithered its way into his thoughts many months ago. The realization caused Cal’s grip to slip further.
The Mother stood and threw the invisible weight from her shoulders.
PJ15 struck at her with a spiked tentacle from their position clinging to the side of a building wall near the roof. The blow snapped her head to one side.
Brightstrike shot more flechette’s into her shrouded face. The darkness within her hood swallowed up the brilliant yellow light.
Cal alighted on a roof on the other side of the street. He felt tired and weak. The stabbing needles in his brain were almost an afterthought under the Mother’s unrelenting assault.
Suddenly, the Midtown Mauler appeared next to the Mother.
The mauler’s too-wide jaw opened in a toothy smile. Then it leapt at Cal.
He sent out a wave of telekinesis to knock it out of the air. As soon as he felt it hit the mauler vanished.
Cal blinked. For a moment he forgot where he was. When he was.
The Mother looked at PJ15.
The surface of the Threnosh’s power armor erupted. The tendrils on their back flailed wildly. Spikes emerged and receded like a maddened puffer fish.
PJ15’s eyes widened and their mouth opened in a wordless scream. Their hands went to the sides of their helmet. As if they were trying to cover their ear holes. The Threnosh’s feet detached from the wall and they plummeted to the ground.
Cal dived off the roof. His gauntlet-clad fists crashed into the Mother’s back. He used his telekinesis to brace his feet as he rose up to punch the her in the back of the head.
His fists blurred. At the same time he enhanced his punches with added telekinetic force. The impacts came so close together that it sounded like one continuous, booming explosion. The shock waves pushed PJ15 back against the building wall. Brightstrike, who has over fifty yards away, was bowled over.
The Mother turned and swiped at Cal with a backhand.
Cal dipped under the blow and grabbed the edge of her fleshy cloak in between two of her extra hands.
He had the sudden urge to surrender to its warm embrace. The thought sickened him.
“Get out of my head,” Cal rasped.
He flew higher. Dragging the Mother with him. He spun in a circle and flung her to the ground a hundred yards distant. Right in front of Gyxdor and the other corrupted.
“You dare defile the Mother with your touch!” Gyxdor bellowed. “I will grind you to dust!”
Mother Madrigal rose to her feet with quiet dignity and grace. Her presence silenced her awed children. Even the hulking behemoth seemed smaller.
Cal bit down. His thoughts were no longer reliable.
The Midtown Mauler. Both big and small lurked around the edges of the gathered corrupted.
Cal couldn’t trust his eyes either.
The past and present blended together.
The pain in his head grounded Cal.
“PJ15, Brightstrike?”
“Yes?”
“You guys are really here, right? I’m not imagining you?” Cal’s voice was shaky.
“I do not understand your words,” PJ15 said.
“I am present. Why would I not be?” Brightstrike said.
“Good… good. This time you’re going to follow my orders and run.”
Gyxdor roared a challenge and charged. Thunderous steps shook the ground. The corrupted added to clamorous noise as they too charged.
Mother Madrigal stood as still as a statue, while her children flowed around her like a roaring river.
Cal reached out with his telekinesis to gather the dozen or so knife blades scattered around the street to him. They floated, but wavered in the air. His grip continued to slip. At this point he was only hanging on by a few fingertips.
“Go… Run!”
“We cannot,” Brightstrike said.
Cal’s head whipped around. He saw it immediately. Behind them, engulfing the street was an inky black cloud.
“Damn it!” Cal let loose with a frustrated shout.
“We can go above the cloud,” PJ15 said.
“Right, right.” Cal blinked. It was like he was seeing the Threnosh for the first time. “You can carry Brightstrike… do it. Now!” he snapped. “I’ll run interference.”