Robert Crane - Untouched

Arizona Campus? I made a mental note to ask Zack about it later. Kat seemed to vibrate as she stuck out her hand for me to shake. I did, feeling the pressure of her grasp through the leather of my glove. “So glad to meet you,” she squealed, and I could tell she meant it. “I don’t know that I could have done what you did, facing off with that monster.”

I pulled away as soon as I could, not wanting to find out if I could drain her soul through my gloves. “Thanks,” I said, with as much sincerity as I possessed. “I’m surprised that everyone’s talking about me in pleasant terms. It was my understanding that I wasn’t very popular around here.”

“Well, you’re certainly popular to talk about,” Kat said, almost gushing, “but I would have to say that the overall tone hasn’t been terribly flattering.” She looked a little chagrined, as though it was her sad duty to inform me that people hated me. “But it’s difficult being the new kid in town, I know.”

“Oh, you’ve had people say nasty things behind your back and send you a letter telling you that they hope you get raped to death, literally?” I kept my tone light and wore a smile, even as her face fell. Dark clouds gathered around Zack’s eyes, and even Scott looked taken aback.

“Who did that?” Zack’s voice was a low, strained murmur.

“I don’t know. Does it matter?” I said.

“Yes. I want to know who it was,” Zack said. I looked back at him, and his face was dark, as though he was in shadow.

“It wasn’t the sort of work that the author would want to be associated with,” I said.

“I wrote it,” Scott said. “And it didn’t say anything about anyone hoping you got raped to death. It said we all hated you for hiding while people were dying and we’re rooting for him to turn you inside out.”

I saw the punch coming, and I suspected that if Scott Byerly had any power as a meta, he did too. Zack took a long windup and swing that connected with Scott’s jaw. The meta fell back, landing on his rump, his hand cupping his jaw lightly. “You done?” he asked, unconcerned.

“Maybe.” Zack’s hand quivered at his side.

“I didn’t have to tell you.” Scott sat on the floor, not bothering to get up.

“Which raises an interesting question,” I said. “If you’re so proud of what you did, why admit to it now when you left it unsigned before?”

“I’m not proud of it,” he said with a shake of his head. “My aunt and uncle lived in Minnetonka. They got killed by that maniac while he was trying to root you out. And like I told you the last time we talked, I knew a lot of those agents that died for you.”

“Which time?” I asked, voice laced with bitter irony.

He looked up at me, and I could see the loathing, the intensity with which he looked at me. “Both times.”

“I was there.” Zack’s reply came out in staccato bursts, his whole face twitching with rage. “Sienna saved my life. I wouldn’t have come out of that basement if she hadn’t carried me out. I’d have been another body for Wolfe to torture.”

It would have been so fun , Wolfe said in my head.

“Yeah, and?” Scott vaulted to his feet with the speed and agility of a meta. “There were a lot of other guys that didn’t get carried out. Guys that we’ve known for a long time. Then she finally goes after him and miraculously kills him?” He smirked and I resisted the urge to give him a punch that I could guarantee he wouldn’t see and would feel. “Why didn’t she kill him sooner?” He threw his hands out. “Hell, HOW did she kill him? That’s what I want to know—and nobody’s saying a word about that.”

“You want to see how I killed him?” There was enough menace in my voice that Byerly actually took a step back. “No? Then mind your own business.” I wondered how much of his willingness to back down was based on the fact that I looked like I’d already been through at least one fight this morning.

I steered past him, guiding my tray toward the table in the corner that we’d been heading to before our detour. I sat down, my back to all of them, and started to attack my food with more violence than was necessary. It wasn’t as if the eggs were going to stage an uprising and attack me, but I speared them on the end of my fork with enough vitriol to be certain.

Zack’s tray hit the table in front of me a minute or so later. I’d heard him make a modicum of peace with Scott, enough that it sounded like they’d be on speaking terms but not enough that they’d be greeting each other like they did when we entered the cafeteria. He sat across from me and ripped into a strip of bacon with displaced anger. I didn’t find it funny enough at the time to overcome my irritation with (still) being the most hated person on the campus.

“Amateur bullshit,” Zack pronounced after throwing his bacon strip back on his plate.

“Excuse me?” I was halfway through a mouthful of eggs.

“When we take on the job of being an agent, it’s understood that we’re going up against metas. Most of them aren’t that powerful. Some of them are.” He stared at me, his eyes smoldering. “Policing metas is a dangerous business; especially since we have no powers and no way to know if we’re up against an innocent person who’s never done a violent thing in his life or the next psycho criminal who’ll be glad to gut you and serve you for dinner.” His eyes darted left and right. “It’s a hazard of the business. Scott’s got no right to take you to task for those guys dying.”

“Maybe,” I said, noncommittal. “You didn’t have to deck him for it.”

Zack licked his lips. “He didn’t even feel it, did he?”

“Only a little,” I said. “Why’d you do it?”

“Frustration.” He let out a muted exhalation combined with an exasperated sigh. “I wanted to knock the crap out of Reed, too.”

“Good job showing some restraint. If Reed really is a meta, he would have pummeled you, unlike your friend.” My hand left my fork behind and I rubbed the bridge of my nose. “What happened in South America?”

“I went to find M-Squad.” He put his hands on the table. “I found them.”

“And a flaming metahuman in a casket.” I stared him down and he tried to play it off but failed. “What happened? You got sent to retrieve them, but they were gone a long time; longer than Old Man Winter thought they’d be gone.”

He concentrated, as though he were bringing up details of a story. “They were sent to our facility in the Andes Mountains.”

“How many facilities does the Directorate have?” I crinkled my nose, trying to make it seem like an innocent question.

“Six in North America, two in South America, two in Europe, four in Asia, one in Australia, two in Africa.” His eyes darted back and forth, looking up the whole time, as though he were trying to recall. “I think that’s it. Anyway, they got sent down to the Andes facility—”

“For what?”

“Because the facility went dark. Completely offline, radio blackout, silence, dead air, all that. And we hadn’t even had the facility that long—”

“What?” I frowned. “Was it new?”

“No, we took it over from someone else. Are you going to stop interrupting me so I can finish my story?”

“Sorry.”

“So anyway, it went offline, and Old Man Winter had a suspicion he knew why, so he sent M-Squad down there with that coffin contraption after telling them about Gavrikov.”

“I thought you said they went offline?”

“They did. Somehow he knew it was Gavrikov.”

“How—”

“I don’t know,” Zack said, exasperated. “Because it’s Old Man Winter, and he knows all kinds of things he shouldn’t theoretically know. Do you want to hear the rest of the story?” I nodded, and he went on. “Gavrikov was there for some reason. He had come to the facility with something in mind. He killed the entire staff—about fifty people, in case you were wondering—and set up shop. Well, M-Squad started playing feint-and-parry, trying to get him boxed in so they could force a confrontation, but he wouldn’t engage them directly.”