“I guess that’s one possibility,” he said. “Things did change after that. These days, being around dogs still dampens my powers, but it doesn’t completely negate them. I assumed I’d been wrong all along—I thought maybe my weakness was actually pet dander or something like that. I couldn’t experiment though, without alerting everyone to what I was doing.”
Would that happen to Megan too? Over time, would fire stop negating her powers? Her weakness still worked on her, but she could make the darkness retreat. Perhaps what Edmund experienced was the next stage.
I zipped up the pack and set it with the others beside the wall.
“Tell me,” Edmund said. “Why is it that, if dogs are my weakness, devices with power cells charged by my abilities don’t fail when they’re around dogs?”
“Hmm?” I said, distracted. “Oh, the Large Dispersal Rule.”
“What?”
“An Epic’s weakness has less and less influence on their powers the farther you get from the Epic’s presence,” I said, zipping up the fourth pack. “Like in Newcago—if Steelheart’s powers had been negated in all places where someone didn’t fear him, then he wouldn’t have been able to turn the whole city to steel. Most of the people in the city didn’t know who he was, and couldn’t fear him. There would have been pockets of non-steel all over the place.”
“Ah…,” Edmund said.
I stood up, setting the pack with the others. This hat was not working as well as I wanted it to—it was too front-heavy, and kept slipping down.
Needs ballast, I decided. I grabbed the duct tape and used what was left to attach a canteen to the back of the cap. Much better.
“Are you…all right?” Edmund asked.
“Yup. Thanks for the information.”
“You can repay me,” he said, “by agreeing to give me to another master.”
I stopped in place, the empty cardboard roll from the duct tape in my hand. “I thought you liked helping us.”
“You’ve grown weak.” He shrugged. “You can’t protect me any longer, David. I’m tired of hiding in this little room; I’d rather serve a High Epic who can make sure I’m cared for. I hear Night’s Sorrow is still dominant.”
I felt sick. “You can go free, Edmund. I won’t stop you.”
“And risk being murdered?” He gave me a thin-lipped smile. “It’s dangerous out there.”
“You’ve escaped the darkness, Edmund,” I said. “You stumbled on the secret before anyone else. If you don’t want to run off, why not come join us? Be a member of the team?”
He picked up a book, turning away from the screen. “No offense, David, but that sounds like an awful ruckus. I’ll pass.”
I sighed. “We’ll send you another supply drop,” I said. “Knighthawk might want you to charge some power cells for him though.”
“Whatever I am commanded to do,” Edmund said. “But David, I do think you’re wrong about one aspect of the powers. You claim my fear of dogs created my weakness originally, but before Calamity, I wasn’t so afraid of them. I didn’t like them, mind you. Might even have hated them. But this fear? It seemed to bloom alongside my powers. It’s like the powers…needed something to be afraid of.”
“Like water,” I whispered.
“Hmm?”
“Nothing.” That was silly. Calamity couldn’t have been watching me then. “Thanks again.”
He nodded to me, then switched off the mobile. I knelt down and went over the contents of the last pack, then set it with the others. Right as I was doing so, Megan peeked in on me. She hesitated in the doorway, looking at me with a befuddled expression, mouth half open, as if she’d forgotten what she was going to say.
The hat, I realized. Pull it off or play it cool? I decided to play it halfway, and reached up to yank my mobile out of the duct tape but left the hat on. I calmly strapped the mobile to my arm. “Yes?” I asked, ignoring the metric ton of silvery refuse hanging at eye level.
The hat slipped backward, now too heavy in the rear because of the canteen. I caught it and yanked it into place.
Yup. Smooth.
“I’m not even going to ask,” she said. “You done in here?”
“Just finished the last one. Had a nice chat with Edmund too. His experiences match yours.”
“So there’s no getting rid of the weakness for good.”
“Well, the potency of his weakness seems to have decreased over time.”
“That’s something, at least. We’re ready out here.”
“Good.” I stood, gathering up the packs.
“You’re…not going to wear the hat on the mission, are you?”
I casually removed the hat—though I had to yank it hard, as the tape was stuck to my hair—then took a drink from the canteen. With the hat still attached to it.
I put the hat back on and tugged it into place. “Just testing some ideas.”
So smooooth.
She rolled her eyes as she left. I tossed the hat aside as soon as she was gone, then carted the packs out.
The team was gathered in the main room, lit by glowing mobiles in the waning light. This base had only one story. On either side of the large, round main room was a smaller room. Mizzy and Abraham wore our stealth suits, sleek and form-fitting, with heat sinks at the waists and goggled hoods that could be pulled up and over their faces.
“Team Hip, ready to go,” Mizzy said as I handed her and Abraham their backpacks, which were the heaviest.
“What happened to ‘Team One’?” I asked.
“Obviously not hip enough,” she said. “I considered ‘Team Black’ instead, but figured that was like, kinda racist or something.”
“Isn’t it all right if you call yourselves black though?” Megan asked, leaning against the wall, arms folded. “Since you’re both African American?”
“Canadian,” Abraham corrected.
“Yeaaah,” Mizzy said. “Maybe it’s okay if I pick the name? Honestly, I can never remember. Pre-Calamity folks cared a lot about race. Like, it’s good to remember that not everything sucks worse now than it did then. Some stuff sucked in those days too. It’s like, without the Epics, everyone had to find other things to argue about. Race, nationality…oh, and sports teams. Seriously. If you go back in time, do not bring up sports teams.”
“I’ll try to remember that,” I said, handing Cody his pack. I wished the things she mentioned were confined to the past, but the way Ildithians seemed to have segregated themselves indicated that even with the Epics, we were still perfectly capable of arguing about race.
Cody took his pack. He was wearing camo, his sniper rifle over his shoulder, and Herman—the crystal grower—attached to his belt. He would use it to create a hiding place out of salt for running ops from the top of a building near Sharp Tower. With the rifle, he might be able to give us some emergency cover.
I’d suggested myself as ops, but Mizzy and Abraham would need someone on ops who could dig into files and schematics and coach them on technological details. That left me on Megan’s team, which I wasn’t complaining about. We would be sneaking into the party, though we’d had to alter Tia’s plan, picking one of her backup options as our method of getting in.
I handed Megan her pack. “Everyone ready?”
“Ready as we can be,” Abraham said, “with less than a week to practice.”
“What about me?” a voice asked. We turned to find Larcener standing in the doorway to the hideout’s last room. He’d decorated it in his preferred fashion, though with fewer sofas. Some of the mass he could use in manifesting objects was dedicated to maintaining the tools he’d made for the team.
“You want to come?” I asked, surprised.
He glared at me. “What if someone shows up here while you’re gone?” he said. “You’re abandoning me.”
“Sparks,” I said. “You’re worse than Edmund. If someone shows up, project yourself into a decoy and lead them away. That’s one of your powers, right?”
“It’s painful,
” he said, folding his arms. “I don’t like doing it.”
“Oh for the…” I shook my head, turning to the rest of the team. “Let’s do this.”
SHARP Tower rose, a dark form in the night save for the top floors, which glowed from the inside. The salt was a dusty grey in this area, so that the top floors seemed somehow both light and dark at once. Like a black hole wearing a silly birthday hat.
Megan and I approached, packs slung over our shoulders, wearing new faces courtesy of another dimension. This sort of little illusion was easy for her, and she could maintain it indefinitely so long as I didn’t stray too far from her. I couldn’t help trying to work out the mechanics of it. Were these the faces of some random people? Or were they people who, in their dimension, were going the same place we were?
A large number of people gathered on the ground floor of the building. The old windows, made of thinner salt, had a warm glow to them, and several doors had been opened up to let the elite gather. I stopped, watching another group arrive, conveyed in bicycle rickshaws.
They were dressed like people in Newcago: short, sparkling 1920s-style dresses and bright lipstick on the women; pinstriped suits and sharp hats, like in old movies, on the men. I half expected them to be carrying tommy guns in violin cases. Instead, their bodyguards were armed with Glocks and P30s.
“Darren?” Megan asked, using my fake name.
“Sorry,” I said, breaking out of my thoughts. “Reminds me of Newcago.” Memories of my youth carried a lot of baggage.
The guests were being entertained on the ground floor while they waited for their turn in the elevator up to the party. Music poured out of the lobby, the type Mizzy would have liked: lots of thumping and rattling. It seemed at odds with the elegant formalwear. Martinis and caviar were being passed around, more signs of favor and power.
I’d never even tasted a martini. For years I’d assumed it was a brand of car.
Together, Megan and I took a sharp right outside and rounded the building toward a smaller door at the back. Instead of trying to fake our way up the elevator with the rich people, we’d decided to try an avenue where we’d be under far less scrutiny. Tia’s plan had included a backup option of sending Team Two up with the servants.
With the images in Tia’s notes, we’d been able to fake an invitation here—and a quick check with the Stingray Clan verified that they weren’t going to be sending anyone to this party. They’d be expected, but were too busy with their preparations to leave the city.
That left a hole we would hopefully be able to wiggle through. Around the rear of the tower, we found a less privileged class of people gathering to be carted up a smaller service elevator.
“Ready?” I said.
“Ready,” Megan said. Her voice was echoed by those of Mizzy and Abraham, who spoke over my earpiece—I had it tucked up under the illusory hair Megan had granted me. Knighthawk was confident our lines would be secure; Prof had bugged our phones in Babilar, but he’d needed to physically place those bugs in the actual handsets, and we’d replaced that equipment.
“Engaging,” I said.
Megan and I started running. We jogged up to the crews working the back door and pulled to a stop, struggling to catch our breath as if exhausted.
“Who are you two?” the guard demanded.
“Cake decorators,” Megan said, proffering the invitation—which for workers like us was more an order to appear. “Stingray Clan.”
“About time,” the guard growled. “Get searched and I’ll put you on the next load up.”
Loophole loved fancy cupcakes. The Stingrays always sent a pair of cake decorators, even when they didn’t send Carla or other important people to attend the party.
My heart was thumping as we stepped over and relinquished our backpacks. A stern woman began unzipping pockets.
“Step one, pass,” Megan said quietly into the line as the guard pulled out our electric mixers and placed them on the table with a thump. Various cake-decorating paraphernalia followed. I didn’t even know the names of most of the stuff, let alone how it was used. All of this had taught me one thing: cake decorating was serious business.
After a quick frisk, we repacked and were ushered ahead of other workers into a dark, salt-walled room with an elevator shaft. The shaft didn’t have doors, which seemed terribly unsafe.
“We’re in too,” Abraham said, “one floor up.”
They’d snuck up using the rtich—Abraham had created steps out of mercury up to the second floor—then they’d melted their way in through a window using a specialized pressure washer that delivered a small jet of water strong enough to cut stone. They had used it on one of the windows turned to salt.
Megan and I were loaded onto the elevator, which was a small, ramshackle thing lit by a single lightbulb. The two of us were joined by three other workers, servers in white uniforms.
“Go,” I whispered.
I thought I felt our elevator shake as Abraham and Mizzy latched on to the cables above. They zipped up the lines, using the devices Larcener had made for us.
A few seconds later, some distant machine started whirring, and we began to rise. The climb was slow and tedious, with nothing to see—most of the levels still had doors on them, indicating the floors weren’t used. Mizzy and Abraham would have to slow their climb before each of the upper floors to peek out and make sure nobody was in the hallway beyond.
The elevator quivered and shook, occasionally grinding against the sides of the shaft, gouging out chunks of salt. What if Mizzy’s or Abraham’s device slipped, and they fell? What if they spotted someone in one of the upper hallways—where the elevator shafts didn’t have doors—and were forced to wait while the elevator approached, threatening to push them into the open? I wiped my brow, and my hand came away grimy with salt dust and sweat.
“We’re safe,” Abraham said into our ears. “No problems. Unhooking on the sixty-eighth floor.”
I relaxed with a sigh. It took us another few minutes to pass the open doorway where Mizzy and Abraham had climbed out, but we saw no sign of them. They still had a couple of floors to climb before reaching their target on the seventieth floor, but Tia’s plan indicated this floor would be less likely to be guarded, something Larcener had confirmed.
I let out a prolonged breath as light flooded us from the seventy-first floor. An old restaurant filling the top of the tower, and our target.
We piled out, the servers rushing to join others who were already delivering trays of food to the partygoers. Megan and I carted our packs into the kitchens, where a veritable legion of cooks used hot plates and skillets to prepare dishes. Large lamps had been clipped to parts of the ceiling, bathing the place in sterile white light, and they’d set out plastic over the floor and most of the old countertops. I wondered what they did when they wanted to salt a dish. Scrape some off the wall?
It was all powered by several thick cords that ended in a set of overtaxed power strips. Seriously, there were a ton of them. To plug in something new, you’d have to unplug two other cords, which I was pretty sure violated some law of physics.
Megan tried to get information out of a passing server, but was interrupted by a call of “There you are!”
We turned to face a towering chef who had to be nearly seven feet tall. The man stooped as he walked, to not bang his head on an old salt light fixture. His face was so pinched, he looked like he’d been drinking a lemon-juice-and-pickle smoothie.
“Stingrays?” he bellowed.
We nodded.
“New faces. What happened to Suzy? Bah, never mind.” He grabbed me by the shoulder, dragging me through the busy room to a smaller pantry on the side where they’d set out ingredients. A helpless-looking woman in a small chef’s hat stood here, overlooking a single tray of unfrosted cupcakes. Her eyes wide, she held a small tube of frosting in sweaty hands and regarded the cupcakes as someone might a row full of tiny nuclear warheads, each labeled Do not bump.
“Pâtissier is he
re!” the lurchy chef said. “You’re off the hook, Rose.”
“Oh, thank heavens,” the young woman said, tossing aside the tube of frosting and scrambling away.
The tall chef patted me on the shoulder, then retreated, leaving the two of us in the little pantry.
“Why do I get the feeling there’s something they aren’t telling us?” Megan said. “That girl was looking at these cupcakes like they were scorpions.”
“Yeah,” I said, nodding. “Right. Scorpions.”
Megan eyed me.
“Or tiny nuclear warheads,” I said. “That works too, right? Of course, you could strap a scorpion to a nuclear warhead, and that would make it even more dangerous. You’d have to try to disarm the thing, but wow—scorpion.”
“Yes, but why?” Megan said, setting her pack on the plastic-topped counter.
“Hmm? Oh, Loophole has executed three different pastry chefs so far for creating substandard desserts. It was in Tia’s notes. The woman really likes her cupcakes.”
“And you didn’t mention this because…”
“Not important,” I said, getting my own pack out. “We aren’t going to be around long enough to deliver any pastries.”
“Yes, because our plans always go exactly as they’re supposed to.”
“What? Was I supposed to take a crash course in decorating?”
“In fact,” Cody said over the line, “I’m not too bad at cake decorating, if you must know.”
“I’m sure,” Megan said. “You going to tell us about the time when you had to fix cupcakes for the Scottish high king?”
“Don’t be silly, lass,” Cody drawled. “It was the king of Morocco. Cupcakes are too dainty for a Scotsman. Give him one, and he’ll ask why didn’t you shoot the wee cake’s parents instead and serve that.”
I smiled as Megan unhooked the side of her mixer and quietly retrieved the pair of Beretta subcompacts hidden inside, along with a pair of suppressors. Her mixer wouldn’t work—its innards had been sacrificed to give us storage. That had seemed a reasonable risk to Tia, since the team doing the searching down below wasn’t likely to have access to electricity.