Daniel Abraham - Inside Straight

Kate laughed. “She can build a bridge! She can build us a tower and no one could touch us!”

DB nodded thoughtfully. “Yeah. It’s pretty cool.” As usual, his six hands were tapping to an unheard rhythm. Sort of. The rhythm seemed a bit off tonight, as if he were distracted. He kept watching Kate.

“Just wait,” Ana said. “The next challenge will be at the top floor of a skyscraper. No dirt.”

“Well, aren’t you Merry fucking Sunshine,” Hardhat said.

Kate was now staring back at DB. The drummer’s patter faltered. “Michael, is something wrong?” Kate said.

“Uh—no. I was just—”

“I’m talking about the drumming. You’re all out of synch. I just wondered if something was wrong.”

DB froze. Too late, he started again, tapping a pair of hands on his knees, but it looked more like nerves than his usual accompaniment. Kate was tight—the beats were off. There wasn’t a rhythm, just noise.

Kate picked a throw pillow off the arm of the sofa.

“Oh no, no—” DB said, holding out all six arms in defense.

Kate hurled the pillow at him. It hit his shoulder with a thump, and DB glimmered, then disappeared, leaving Wild Fox curled up on the sofa. The illusion had been destroyed.

“Geez, Curveball! No fair! You totally suck in a pillow fight!”

She stood over him, a second pillow in her hands. “You’re covering for him.

What’s he up to?”

“I’m not covering. I just wanted to see if you could spot it. And…you can. So there.”

Wild Fox was not a very good liar.

Kate said, “I wouldn’t put it past you, but you’re way too nervous to be just pulling a prank. What’s the deal?”

Glowering, Wild Fox crossed his arms. “He said he wouldn’t vote me off next time if I covered for him.”

“So what’s he doing?” She wouldn’t let up.

“I don’t know, I didn’t ask!”

The phone by the kitchen bar rang. Wild Fox jumped for it, but Kate cut him off and beat him to the handset.

“Hello? Why, hello Cleo. No, Wild Fox isn’t here.” Kate was looking right at him. “I’d have thought you’d want to talk to DB. He seems more your…speed. Oh, you do want to talk to him? Yeah, he’s here.” Wearing a catty grin, Kate handed the set to Wild Fox.

Sullen now, Wild Fox shook his tail, and the illusion shimmered back into place. It was almost like a heat mirage, or a mist in the air. He rippled, then he was DB, all six arms and deep voice.

“Yeah?” he said at the phone and glared at Kate. After a moment of listening, he replied, “Yeah. Okay.” Then hung up.

“So he’s with Pop Tart.”

“I don’t know, I just said I’d cover for him. I’m supposed to say I’m going for a walk and then come back in five minutes with Wild Fox. I mean me.”

“Then you’d better get going,” she said. That catty smile was starting to turn vicious.

Wild Fox/DB left, almost running, slamming the door behind him.

Hardhat stared at her. “What the fuck was that all about?”

She just shook her head. “This is so high school.”

He turned to Ana for explanation, but she shrugged. “I don’t know, but I’m betting on fireworks in five minutes.”

“Then let’s bring the popcorn,” he said.

They all stood at the door, when DB and Wild Fox walked in, right on schedule. Kate, Ana, and Hardhat waited, leaning on the walls in the foyer.

DB froze when confronted with the faces looking at him. He threw a glance over his shoulder at Wild Fox.

The shorter joker grinned sheepishly. “Sorry man. I’d have pulled it off, but apparently I got no rhythm.”

Ignoring them, DB barreled through the foyer without a second glance. Kate followed him, calling, “Hey, Michael .

You get lucky, or what?”

He turned on her, and for a moment he really did look like a monster, filling the room, hunching his shoulders and bracing his arms like he wanted to punch rocks. Kate stumbled back a step.

“Yeah, I did,” he said. “Not that it’s any of your business.”

This was when the screaming match started. Kate liked him, Ana knew. But maybe not enough to let this go. Or maybe too much to let this go. Ana readied herself to tackle Kate if she decided to throw something. She had that look, like when she lost her temper at Hive. Except this was worse.

But Kate didn’t have anything in her hands. She didn’t get mad, didn’t scream, didn’t cry. Very quietly, very calmly, she looked square at DB, and her face was a mask. When she spoke, her voice was low, cutting, like a scalpel. “You really are just trying to get every woman here into bed before the show’s over, aren’t you? I had you figured out from the start.”

She walked out of the room.

The silence turned suffocating. Ana, Hardhat, and Wild Fox stared at DB like he was a train wreck.

Wild Fox said, “Dude, I’m totally sorry—”

DB went after her, where she’d fled to her room. “Hey, wait a minute. Kate!” His voice boomed.

Ana, in her turn, ran after him. She couldn’t hope to get to Kate before he did, but she tried.

DB leaned against the frame of the door to their room, six arms forming a cage around it. If Kate came out, she’d fall into his embrace whether she liked it or not.

“I don’t want to talk to you!” Kate’s muffled voice came through.

“Come on, what did you expect me to do? I wasn’t going to sit around waiting— ”

“Oh, please!”

“Maybe you’ll think twice about playing hard to get next time!”

Ana sidled up to the door. “Hey Kate, can I come in?”

After a moment, the door knob clicked, unlocked.

DB was tall, and Ana wasn’t. She slipped under his lowest arm and got in place to shoulder open the door. She turned the knob, but DB stuck a hand out, shoving the door, bracing it open when Kate tried to slam it shut from the other side.

“Stop it!” Ana turned on him, glaring.

His lips pulled into a snarl. “I’m talking to Kate here!”

“She doesn’t want to talk!”

He was immovable, a tree, a mountain. He could muscle his way in if he wanted, and they couldn’t do anything about it. He really seemed as if he meant to.

“This is our room. You can’t come in!” Ana said.

The plywood door cracked, then crunched as DB’s hand went through it.

“Hey!” Kate shouted from inside. DB stepped back in apparent surprise, six arms raised in a gesture of innocence.

Ana slipped in and slammed the door shut. She grabbed one of the chairs and pushed it against the door. Like that would keep him out.

But DB didn’t try to get in again. “Bitch!” he hollered instead. “Earth Bitch! ”

After that, the hallway was silent.

Ana sighed at the splintered hole in the door. Somehow, she found the edge of her bed and sat. She didn’t have any earth to use inside. She wouldn’t have been able to stop him if he’d really wanted to get in.

Kate was sitting on her own bed, looking as shell-shocked as Ana felt. Her gaze turned downward, to her hands resting in her lap.

“Maybe I should talk to him. Do you think I overreacted?” Kate asked. Ana automatically shook her head, though she honestly didn’t know. Kate ran her hands through her hair. “I fell for it. I can’t believe I fell for it. Big famous rock star hitting on me, and what do I think? ’Wow, he really likes me.’ I’m such an idiot.” She threw herself back on the bed and stared at the ceiling.

Ana’s heart was still pounding hard. She’d spent an hour in the backyard discovering how much she could do with all these fantastic powers. And now she was learning about her limits. Inside the house, she was useless. And she couldn’t say anything that would make Kate feel better.