John Ridley - Those Who Walk in Darkness

But…

There was the telepath. There were two ways to stop it: by ending its life or by, maybe, it ending Soledad's. And could she share that with Ian? How would he take, how would anyone take, the person they love going kamikaze with their life? And if she hid it from him this time… call it what it was. A lie. If Soledad lied to Ian this time about the whys of her life, what was to keep her from lying next time? The time after? What was going to keep her from protecting him from her life same as she felt she had to do with her parents as long as she was MTac?

Nothing.

But…

But that was a discussion to have with herself later. In a day. If she was still alive.

Now?

There was responsibility. For whatever her reasons, there was obligation. No matter how the cause was viewed, right or wrong by any sense, any form of measure, Soledad was at the start of Vaughn's rampage. She was at the start, so…

"I have a thing I have to finish first."

"Soledad—"

"Just one, and then we can talk about—"

"I don't want to wait. Let's go now. Let's you and me get up and go and keep going and never talk about our lives up till now again."

"You said you weren't afraid anything was going to happen to me."

"I'm not."

"Then please let me finish this because…" Now her hand was taking his, holding it strong."Because there's no other way except for me to finish things."

Ian looked to Soledad, looked her in the eyes: determination as solid as his disappointment. He mouthed" Okay" but didn't really make a sound.

He and Soledad went back to eating their salads. She hurried her meal because she just wanted to get home and get in bed with Ian and hold on to him until four in the morning when she and the rest of the element would assemble to serve a warrant on the telepath. And when they were done eating, this time, going, Soledad left enough cash to cover what she'd taken for free.

Soledad had a pair of Bushnell's focused on the salvage yard. Junked cars, junked appliances, plain junk piled all around. A rambling shack, built on piecemeal over the years, until it was a study in sprawl. Part wood. Part sheet metal. All quiet.

"See anything?" Yarborough asked.

"Nothing."

Different than their last call, different than most, the four MTacs were head-to-toe in full reg body armor. Fritz helmets, Kevlar, Nomex, knee and elbow pads… Part of the return to by-the-book dress was in response to Eddi accidentally just about putting down Vin. Part was in response to the fact they were going up against something that could real easily make them try to kill each other.

"Maybe the freak's standing right in front of the place," Eddi pointed out,"and it's just puppeting us not to see it."

"Except," Soledad said,"none of us are bleeding out the nose."

Vin: "Or maybe it's just making us think none of us are bleeding."

"Or maybe we're all on a beach in Maui and he's just making us think we're outside a junkyard in North Hollywood." Yarborough was heavy on the sarcasm."Getting paranoid does us no good. When you get puppeted, you know it. There's a few seconds of queasiness, light-headedness, and you get the nosebleed just before" — he touched the scar on his temple—"the freak takes over. Feel any of that, let one of the others know before it's too late."

"So they can do what?" Vin asked.

"So they can shoot you before you take out the rest of us."

Soledad was pretty sure Yar was being hyperbolic. Sort of sure.

"You all knew the deal, and we all took it. We're alone on this, and we got better than our usual bad chances of not walking out. If you believe we're good as dead, however things happen, you won't be disappointed. Going against a telepath, best we can hope for now, one of us dies last."

Pep talk over.

Yar gave the sign and the element moved on the building, paired off and keeping low. It was Yarborough and Soledad, Vin and Eddi.

The closer Yar got to the building, the more clearly he recalled the night he'd mixed it up with a telepath: Three other cops put bullets in themselves. The feeling of being trapped in his own body, buried alive, the muzzle of his gun pressing against his head. Thought it would feel cold. It didn't. He remembered that very much: the warmth of the metal on his flesh. Then Yar felt nothing. Then he woke up in a hospital. The doctors told him, miracle, a slug had passed through his brain and done no damage. See, Yar had joked. Pays not to use your brain. Or sometimes: Pays to be stupid. Sometimes he said: All the beer I've drunk, didn't have any brain left to damage. In public he joked like that. Attitude was his cover. In private, when he thought about the incident, if he was lucky he made it to the bathroom. Otherwise he just puked on the floor.

Yarborough asked: "Soledad, any chance you figured out a bullet to take care of one of these mind-control freaks?"

She answered, flat: "There is none."

The convergence was measured but not tedious. Slow going only in the care and caution the pairs took. Movements forward followed by moments of stillness, of listening and looking. Looking for something that could strike without showing itself. Self-analysis for bouts of nausea or dizziness. When all that came back negative, the pairs would move again, then stop and one more time run their checklist.

On the metal side of the building Soledad and Yarborough made a window. Vin and Eddi arrived at a door around a corner perpendicular to it. The window was unlocked, the door open. Both parties gave a serious visual check to the inside of the building, then eased their way through the ingresses.

"Nothing," Yarborough said, hushed."Probably got himself holed up near the center of the place."

Eddi, fast: "Let's check it out." She caught herself giving orders. Caught Soledad giving a look.

Yar didn't own a lot of ego, but he had earned SLO, and he'd earned the respect that went with it. Most likely, from anybody else, he wouldn't've cared for orders getting tossed past him. To Eddi all he said was" Let's," and threw her a confident smile.

Out the door of the room was a hallway. Long. Lined with the sheet metal of the building. Two by two in a covering formation the MTacs made their way toward whatever waited.

What.

What was certain. How was the unknown. How things would kick off and how things would end. How, and how many of them would leave the place alive.

Soledad tried not to think of Yarborough's question: Did she have a bullet for a mind-controlling freak?

And Soledad felt… fear. She had a thought of death, and it made her afraid. Not of dying. Dying was nothing. But… Ian. With Ian in her life the thought of death made her realize how much there was to be lost in life. A future, a family. Possibility. That's what Ian gave her, and that's what she was suddenly afraid of losing. When there is no possibility, living or dying, what's it matter? An existing emptiness versus an eternal emptiness. Variations on a theme. But when you stand to lose all the possibilities of all the days that you are owed, that's when life becomes precious and death becomes significant.

Death, for Soledad, had become monumental.

Bad time for it.

Vin: "Hold up."

Everyone held.

"Thought I heard…"

Soledad did a quick look around. The hallway was narrow, tight and poorly lit. Bad place to be when bullets started flying. Too hard to hit the target without hitting one of your own. Maybe, Soledad thought, that's just the way the freak wanted things.

Soledad: "We've got to move."

Vin, again: "Hold on."

"You feeling something?"

"No, but I—"

"You getting scared?"

"Hey," Yarborough said, voice soft.

"I thought I heard something, something moving. I don't want to run into a trap."