My hand drifted to my pistol. Merely touching the weapon cooled some of my fury, focusing it. "I'm not getting into this with you again. I just stopped by to tell you I'm leaving."
The fire alarm blared to life.
I stood, wary. We were fifty floors up. I only liked fire when it didn't threaten me. "What's happening?"
"I don't know." Papai pulled up security feeds on his computer screen. Employees were filing out downstairs. The investors had boarded on the helipad, were about to dust off.
Papai assessed the feeds. "No sign of fire. Perhaps we should get to the safe room."
"Which one?" We had two--one at ground level for fires or natural disasters and one on this floor for an enemy incursion or attack.
"My instinct tells me to get low." Papai had a sense for such things. He glanced toward his bookcase. Behind it was the entrance to this floor's safe room and the private elevator. "We should chance the elevator."
I nodded. "Let's go--" Bam! Something had crashed into the glass wall.
A bird? It'd left a smear of blood and feathers. Then another one hit the glass. And another. Half a dozen birds had flown straight into it. "How weird." Above the blood, I spied brightness. "Papai, look!" The most beautiful bands of light wavered in the night sky. They shimmered green and purple over the mountains.
He turned to the glass wall and sucked in a breath. "Extraordinary." Side by side, we watched the lights.
I murmured, "I could look at them forever."
The Dragao copter with the investors had taken off and now hovered just in front of us, blocking my view of the lights, irritating me. I supposed the pilot was just as entranced.
Another copter drifted toward it. Those pilots were going to tangle if they weren't careful. They coasted even closer. The Dragao pilot made no move to evade. Closer. "Papai?" Closer.
He didn't answer, completely caught up in the lights.
Closer! "Papai!"
Their rotor blades snarled. Turbines whined as the copters pitched toward this building. Toward this wall.
One was coming in nose first, the other tail first. "Look out!" I shoved Papai out of the way just before the impact--
Rotor blades hit; glass shattered in a deafening crash.
Shards of it plugged the walls. One spike shot past me, missing my throat by a hairbreadth.
"Zara!" Papai had gotten to the door.
I was trapped between live blades! One copter's tail boom swung through the office, its smaller rotor like a mower. It chewed up anything in its path; paper and debris sailed in a vortex, my hair whipping my face and eyes. Can't see!
Something nailed my side. "Ahh!" The force knocked me off my feet--onto my front, punching the air from my lungs. A sharp stake of wood clattered to the floor beside me.
I wasn't gored? The wood had struck my gun! I flung myself over and scuttled backward till I met the wall.
All at once the air cleared--because that tail rotor was upon me! No time to make it to my feet. To run. Trapped.
As if in slow motion, the tail boom swept toward me.
"Zara, get down!" Papai yelled from the doorway.
I pressed myself flat on my back and turned my head a split second before the rotor blades floated above my face. Whirring metal skimmed my ear by millimeters. I screamed and screamed, my voice distorted by the rotation.
Then . . . clear. I stared in shock as the tail continued past me.
"Come, Zara! Run now!"
He held open the door with one arm, cradling his side with the other. Injured? Blood soaked the side of his button-down and streaked down his face.
I struggled to my feet, lungs heaving smoky air. The smell of aviation fuel reeked; the wasted blades still spun. I glanced at the bookcase, at our exit; blocked by the Dragao copter's fuselage.
Survivors were trapped inside. They yelled, begging us for help. They should be afraid--what was left of the blades might catch the floor and lever them out the window, like a tire jack. Or the engine could ignite all that fuel.
I lurched toward Papai, following along the wall. Shards of glass jutted from it like a porcupine's quills.
We limped away from the crash, heading toward the far side of the floor's soaring atrium.
"Are you hurt?" he asked.
"I'm fine." But he wasn't. "What happened to you?"
"Splinters from the desk." He looked me over. "How could you not have a scratch on you?"
I shook my head. "No idea."
With a last thunk thunk! those rotors finally caught and stalled. The men were screaming and pounding on the doors. Had the copter shifted to the edge of the room? Maybe they dangled. If not, they'd been lucky.
The building's power flickered; emergency lights blinked to life. The alarm stuttered, going to an intermittent buzz.
A scorching gust of wind rocked the building, filtering in through that missing wall to reach Papai and me. The glass ceilings and walls of the atrium groaned all around us.
Though the air was hot, I got chills across my nape. "Listen. What is that?"
"The alarm?"
"No. Louder." I heard a . . . roar?
The sky grew lighter and lighter. Neighboring high-rises swayed in the wind. Beneath my feet, this floor trembled. Papai and I shared a look. We were at the very top of the tallest structure in the city--in a glass atrium.
As the focal point, we'd proudly staged our latest-model copter in the air; it swung above us.
Papai murmured, "Meu Deus," yanking my attention from the copter.
What looked like a giant laser was coming for us. A shock wave blasted the windows of other buildings as it approached. "Papai?"
"It must be a bomb. We have to reach the ground! Head for the stairs!"
As we ran past the door to his office, I glanced over. The survivors frantically kicked at the copter's door; just as we crossed, the wreckage was blown against the doorway. The fuselage crumpled like a tin can; blood splashed the windshield interior. The copter plugged the doorway hole, but the impact still rocked us, tossing Papai and me to the floor.
Behind us, the atrium shattered.
We crawled down the gallery toward the stairwell. "Keep going!" he said from ahead of me. "Do not slow! And do not look back at the light."
The building quaked. Beside me, a bronze statue of Papai toppled over. I scrambled forward. Never make it. I braced for the impact--but the opposite wall had buckled, catching the statue's head! Like a crumbly pillow. The length of bronze was suspended right above me, held aloft by that failing wall.
I scurried; the statue dropped. Boom!
I gazed back in shock. It'd landed centimeters from my feet. "Did you see that?" I asked Papai. The odds of dodging that must be a million to one.
"Keep going!"
We reached the stairwell door. He levered himself to his feet, then grabbed my hand to pull me up.
When our skin made contact, his eyes widened; mine narrowed. We'd both felt some kind of energy pass between us.
"What was that?" I asked.
He blinked, staring into my eyes. "I-I don't know." He helped me inside the stairwell. "We have to keep moving."
"I'm waiting on you." I took off.
We dashed down the stairs. He was in shape, keeping up with me despite his injuries. We'd made it down three flights when the building quaked again. The stairwell seemed to contract on itself, walls cracking.
A ceiling tile popped open above Papai; electrical cords and wiring dropped--just in time to snare his neck!
I cried, "Papai!" I attacked the sparking wires, unraveling them to free him.
Pale with shock and confusion, he rubbed his throat. The building continued shaking, vibrations beneath our feet. "Just . . . just keep going! We won't be safe till we're on the ground." He shoved me ahead of him. "Go!"
A few more flights down, another quake rocked us. This time the stairwell expanded with an eruption of wall fissures.
A piece of metal swung from the ceiling, arcing just
past my ear. Sprinkler pipe? I turned back, saw it crash into the fire-extinguisher cabinet. The loosed extinguisher dropped directly on his foot.
The building seemed bent on destroying him!
"Porra," he yelled in pain.
"Let me help you!"
Limping forward, he snapped, "Go." He gritted his teeth, using one leg and the railing to hop down the stairs.
We descended dozens more flights without problems. Finally we reached the last one.
"We're here!" Three steps from the bottom, I stopped to wait, keeping an eye on him above.
"I'm right behind you. Head for the safe--"
The railing broke loose, tumbling over. I screamed as he plummeted past me. The railing edge brushed my jacket, missing me by a whisper.
He landed on the steps with one leg tangled in the bars, groaning in pain.
I scrambled over to him. "Papai!"
His face was bloody, his eyes dazed. Blood seeped from his side, oozing down the steps. "Think I broke my leg."
I strained to lift the railing. Too heavy. I attempted again, barely budging it. "You have to help me--we have to free you."
"Zara, wh-when this attack ends, take the long-range copter. Fly north. Get to my brother in Texas."
"I'm not leaving you!"
"The building will come down. Rescuers will find you. But it will be too late for me."
"Don't talk like that, Papai!"
His face was tense from pain. "I must confess to you. . . . I have robbed you."
"What are you talking about?"
"The Olivera clan. Bento Olivera found out something I'd done. . . . I-I wronged him first."
"What did you do?" What could Papai have done to warrant my mother's murder? I knelt beside him, impatient for his answer as he struggled to speak.
"They took your mother because . . . I kidnapped his wife years before."
Olivera retaliated? "Why did you? For money?"
He nodded, then winced with pain. The rumors of Papai's criminal background had been true. "The woman fought me . . . I didn't mean . . . the gun went off. Bullet in her spine."
The breath whooshed from my lungs. I'd thought Bento had selected Mamae out of a thousand wealthy women in the city. I'd never been able to wrap my mind around the randomness--as if my mother had been betrayed by chance, as if her life had ended when her luck had run out.
But she'd been targeted. "Why would you let me hunt them? Without telling me?"
"I wanted to, so many times. But I didn't want you to hate me. The lie took on a life of its own."
This revelation stunned me as much as anything else I'd seen tonight. "I believed they'd taken her because they were greedy pigs!" And so I had gutted Bento's sons like pigs. After I'd tortured them.
"No. Revenge."
The Oliveras never would have stopped. Because of my father. Fury surged inside me. "You started this--because you were greedy. My mother is dead because of you! Her parents are dead because of you!"
"And I will go to hell for my sins." Almost to himself, he said, "Parted from her forever."
I still would have gone after the Oliveras, but I wouldn't have toyed with them. That family had only been avenging a loved one.
As I had been. Their crime was the same as mine. "I wanted to punish the one responsible for her death." My fists clenched. "Why should I not kill you?"
He murmured, "Think that will happen all on its own, daughter."
Another quake. This one was louder and more intense than the previous ones--and it was mounting.
"Leave me," Papai ordered. "Get to the safe room!"
The ground shook so hard, I tottered on my feet. I turned toward the exit, but the door wouldn't open. The frame was skewed, wedging the door shut.
Stone cracked; metal groaned. I swallowed, gazing up the stairwell. The stairs swayed. Because the building was swaying.
It shifted side to side, more and more violently, until suddenly it wobbled and . . . dropped.
Oh, meu Deus, the entire fucking thing was coming down!
A cloud of dust and debris exploded downward like an avalanche. I hunched, covering my head.
Full dark.
As the rubble settled, stones knocked against each other. A stray crack! sounded. The air was thick with dust, my lungs filled with it.
"Papai?" I coughed and pulled my shirt over my face, breathing through the fabric. "Papai, answer me."
Nothing. I fished my phone out of my pocket and clicked on the flashlight. I gaped at what I saw.
Rubble had piled up all around me--even above me--a perfect cocoon.
Except for the sole rock that had breached it.
The one that had bashed in my father's head.
Somehow I was . . . untouched.
The Fury (XI)
Spite, She Who Harrows
"Blood will tell. Blood will run. But the tears of the damned always taste sweet."
A.k.a.: Justice
Powers: Acid spitting and flight. Superhuman senses, strength, and healing. Infrared vision. Her fireproof wings can blend into surroundings, camouflaging her.
Special Skills: Concealment.
Weapons: Razor-sharp claws that tip her wings and a scourging whip.
Tableau: A blindfolded, winged demoness, holding a steel-studded whip in her upraised right hand and weighing scales in her lowered left hand.
Icon: Navy-blue scales.
Unique Arcana Characteristics: Her eyes are yellow instead of white, with green keyhole pupils. She has long retractable claws and batlike wings. Prior to striking an enemy, her wings will vibrate, the sharp claws tapping each other to make a rattling sound.
Before Flash: Daughter of Egyptian museum curators, in the States for a long-term exhibit.
Suburb of Chicago, Illinois
Day 0
Look at the lights! The newscasters had talked about these right before the channels all cut out.
Lines of purples and pinks and greens rolled like waves in the night sky. So beautiful I could cry.
I heard others on my street oohing and aahing. Most were American hipsters; all of them behaved as if I didn't exist. Nothing new.
My parents did as well.
But tonight I didn't ridicule my neighbors as usual--because I actually had something in common with them.
We were all basking in these lights.
No one had told me I might see the aurora borealis this time of year. I could stare at it forever. I adjusted my thick glasses and wondered if my parents were watching from their ritzy uptown patron party.
As usual, I was babysitting my little sister, Febe. I thought of her solemn brown eyes, plump cheeks, and eight-year-old lisp, and considered heading back to our rented house to get her. She was in the basement playing video games, would never see the sky on her own.
She was the only one in the world I loved, the only one who didn't view my usual expression as sneering or vindictive. She had never called me the nickname that somehow followed me from country to country: Spiteful.
I exhaled. Still staring over my shoulder, I headed toward the house. But when I had to walk under a tree, I couldn't bring myself to lose my view of the lights--
Pain flared, shooting across my upper back. What was that?
Ignore it! All I wanted to do was look at the sky. . . . Another jolt ripped through me. My legs gave way, my knees hitting the sidewalk.
I managed to cry, "H-help me!" to my closest neighbors, but they were captivated by the lights.
My skin felt as if it was being stabbed, but from the inside. It was . . . it was ripping open!
I heard wet sounds, like something being born. A wave of nausea swept through me, and I vomited black liquid all over the pavement. Cloth was tearing somewhere nearby--and then these bloody, gooey black things flapped in front of me. I shrieked, scrambling away from them.
They followed me! I'd never outrun them; I cowered down--and they stopped. Then quivered when I timidly started to rise. Because they we
re . . . attached to my body? Ah God, they'd sprung out of my back!
My lips parted with shock. The things unfolding around me were . . . "W-wings." They were huge and shaped like a bat's, just like the ones that had haunted my dreams ever since I could remember.
But the lights in the sky . . . must look at them!
Those wings opened wide, blocking the view above, the only thing I wanted to see. Just as I realized I was losing my mind, the wings enfolded me tightly.
Like a shroud.
I wanted out! These stupid things were keeping me from the lights! I raked my nails against the velvety surface to get free; more pain shot through me. Were my nails getting sharper? The grayish flesh on the underside of these wings was as sensitive as my fingertips.
I punched them, wrestling against them. After struggling for what must have been an eternity, I accepted that I couldn't escape.
The appeal of the lights had lessened, anyway. Now I was overwhelmed with the need to get to Febe. What if she went upstairs and realized she was all alone?
I mentally willed my new appendages to retract. . . . Nothing. I was trapped, a caterpillar in her cocoon.
And like a caterpillar, I began changing.
Molting.
Even in the enclosed darkness, I could somehow see--in fact, my glasses no longer helped my vision, actually obscured it. So I crushed them in my palm. Seeing with perfect clarity for the first time, I watched my nails grow into long sharp claws and my skin thicken into scales.
I wasn't as shocked by these changes as I would've expected.
My mind turned to a memory from eight years ago, when I'd been Febe's age. I'd watched a teenage boy from my neighborhood stroll hand in hand into the forest with a girl--though he'd already been in a relationship with another one.
I'd followed the couple, hiding in a tree. When they'd started having sex, I'd thought of his betrayed girlfriend and imagined the pain his unfaithfulness would bring her.
Bile had risen in my throat. I'd wanted so badly to punish him that I'd gnashed my teeth and my body had begun to shake. I'd fallen, dislocating my shoulder.
They'd called me Spiteful (as usual) and left me there.
Getting to a doctor had taken forever. The pain in my shoulder had faded after a while, replaced by a dull feeling of wrongness.
Now, as I witnessed my body evolving, I realized my new form was rightness. Something wrong had finally clicked into place.
For all of my sixteen years, my life had been dislocated. I understood that now.