John Ridley - Those Who Walk in Darkness

Wait for the opening, Soledad coached herself.

Eddi came on, fists pumping for Soledad's head.

Wait…

Every blow meant to break Soledad, to batter Soledad. Every one of them meant to beat her to bloody death.

Wait for it…

Eddi, possessed and puppeted Eddi, tried to throw a kick at Soledad's throat. With her bad knee it was like trying to use a busted tree limb as a whip.

What Soledad was waiting for. She took Eddi by the leg, took hold tight. Pulling, putting her weight into the move, she spun, spun Eddi around until the girl left the ground, took flight, sailed in Soledad's grip, guided straight toward one of the vertical supports in the room. Eddi's chest took the impact, caved in as her torso wrapped around the beam. A hurricane of air rushed from her crushed lungs; body armor the only thing that kept her rib cage from shattering. Eddi fell out all over the floor, unconscious and free of the telepath's control.

Soledad felt the rain of perspiration sliding over her, down her arms. She felt each drop that clung, that clung to the ends of her fingers, then fell away from her.

A hand to the girl's throat, Soledad checked Eddi's pulse. Weak. Breathing shallow. Her leg, where her knee was snapped, was all twisted up. Maybe it wasn't as bad as it looked. Maybe, Soledad thought, doctors would be able to hack it back together in a way Eddi wouldn't be stuck with a limp for the rest of her life. Assuming there was to be a rest of her life. Eddi, banged up and knocked out.

Vin, doped up, torn up. At the moment their fates and futures very much rested entirely with Soledad.

Soledad looked around the room, saw her gun lying in a pool of light. She laughed. Was that supposed to mean something? She crossed to the gun and picked it up, swapped out the clip for another marked with a clear band.

In a loudly spoken voice: "I'm coming for you, you son of a bitch!" Soledad said to the telepath: "I'm coming to kill you!"

Right here!" Soledad screamed."I'm right here, freak!" she ranted. She'd been on a rant since she'd left Eddi and Vin in that back room and wandered out into the building. She ranted, yelled. She breathed verbal fire. Soledad did everything but think. Lack of thought, rage as a blind to her designs, was her only defense. In her hand, her gun. That was her only chance."You scared, freak? Got no more little girls to hide behind; do your fighting for you."

The sun cast odd shadows through half-boarded windows. Broken glass bent light into colors. And there was the metal and the auto parts. All still and lifeless now. They'd stay that way.

Then Soledad got with a thought: What if it wasn't just the metal morpher backing up the telepath? What if it had other flying or radiating or freakishly powerful friends?

Then Soledad got with another thought: Other than her family, Ian, cops who'd go 'cause they had to, her funeral was going to be a lonely event. She wondered if Gayle would show.

Too much thinking.

"I'm going to put a bullet in your freak head! Put a hole right in it and let your freak brains come spilling out!" Keep ranting.

It was close, sucking on Soledad's fear like a crackhead on a pipe.

Just keep ranting."What kind of freak head you got anyway? One of those big fat Star Trek heads to keep your mind-reading freak brain in?"

Close. Soledad could almost feel him. Almost. Was that the mutie trying to work its way into her brain?

"Shooting that thing is going to be like popping a balloon. Come on out so I can stick a pin in it."

Nothing. Very suddenly there was nothing. Literally no sensations at all. Soledad saw nothing, could see nothing. There were no sounds, smells. She had no feeling of the ground beneath her. There was no up or down, or sense of space. There was only an endless, endless white. A pale night without limit. Soledad closed her eyes to shut it out. Thought she closed them. The white was still there. She screamed. Thought she screamed. The silence was as undisturbed as before she'd tried to make a noise. Soledad was in a vacuum, aware of nothing except her own swelling terror.

From the center of the emptiness, from everywhere, came a voice.

More than that.

Words weren't spoken. They simply existed.

And the words were: That easy. It's that easy to take everything away from you just like you took everything from me.

Soledad was flying.

As quickly as sensation had been replaced by nothing, she found herself outside on an LA hot day flying on a pair of wings that sprouted from her back. Below her was the street: Olive Street. And there was a sinkhole, and a crowd of people pointing up. Pointing at her. Their faces, clear at a distance, full of revulsion. And there was a cop in uniform: tall, thin. Slight, but at the same time imposing.

The cop said: "This how it was? The sinkhole would've killed how many? Couple dozen people?"

This wasn't real. Soledad knew she wasn't outside, that she wasn't flying. She sure as hell didn't have wings. This was not real. Unreal as it was, Soledad could feel the air on her skin and taste the smog she floated through. The telepath had taken her own memories, built a stage and set a scene. But that was all it was: sleight of hand done with thoughts and remembrances. This was not real. Soledad tried to convince herself as she turned her head to shield her eyes from the too-warm sun.

"Michelle saved them." He didn't shout. But the policeman had no trouble making himself heard to Soledad way above him."She knew she could get sent to prison. She knew she could get…" His voice slipped and caught."But she saved all of those people anyway. And you…

"How'd you feel when you killed Michelle, when you murdered my wife? You feel special then, Bullet, huh? You feel invincible? Powerful? Did you even feel anything at all, or was shooting her no different than stepping on an ant? Lemme show you something." The cop, the telepath, put a hand to the gun in his holster."Lemme show you how Michelle felt."

The cop drew the gun.

Instinct made Soledad want to fly off, put as much distance as she could between herself and the cop.

Pointless.

She wasn't flying anyway. She couldn't move any farther away than the freak would let her. The thing was just working her; pumping up her fear because it could.

Thought it could.

Soledad wasn't playing. She wouldn't try to escape what couldn't be escaped. She wouldn't let herself be afraid of what didn't exist. Children were afraid of monsters in the dark. Soledad wasn't a child.

Below on a street that wasn't there the telepath took aim.

It's not real, Soledad told herself.

It, the freak, Vaughn, fired the gun.

She told herself: What's not real can't hurt you.

The bullet struck Soledad in the chest. The pain it ignited consumed her body. She looked at herself, saw the wound. Not too big. Not hardly big at all. How could something so small hurt her entirely? Sky and earth traded places. Soledad went into an ugly tumble for the ground; in turn the sun speeding away and the street rushing closer. No way to judge the distance and no way to prepare for the impact. No time for either.

She hit.

She hit the ground hard. Sounds poured into her ears: The slap of a body on asphalt. The endless crackle of shattered bone. The slurping of punctured lungs as they filled with blood. All this gift-wrapped in a new and complete agony that shoved the comparatively small hurt of her bullet wound from Soledad's mind.

The cop walked for Soledad. As it did, its uniform faded back into civilian wear. The street melted and turned to floor. The people, the gawkers, first became transparent images then dissolved to nothing. Soledad was back inside the building at the salvage yard, on the floor; back where she'd always been. The only thing that stayed the same was the pain.