WnW 4.24

My mind was reeling with the thought that my parents could be caught up in the conflict. I could tell them to leave but how could I convince them? I could think of one thing… Show them what you have become. Reveal my abilities and risk losing that connection forever. Just when I was making progress with my dad. And the thought of my mom’s horrified face when she saw my powers was too much. I just couldn’t.

“Well regardless, it is high time for us to leave,” Graham said. “B, pack up your drone as soon as possible.”

“Wait!” Vanessa said, standing abruptly. “We can still sabotage the printers.”

I eyed the crows nervously. They were getting louder, more restless. A few were making flying passes uncomfortably close over our heads. 

Graham shook his head. “We can’t risk staying here longer.”

“It’ll be fast!” Bailey said. “Vanessa’s online friends already told us about a vulnerability. I can spoof the printer’s update server with my drone and get them to download a modified firmware update. Anything they try to print will be garbage. Until they fix it.”

“How easy is it to fix?” Graham asked.

“Depends on a lot of things. Does it matter? We need to buy time. Any delay in their manufacturing is important.”

Graham took off his glasses and rubbed his temples. “Why do I keep agreeing to these extensions of stay? We could be discovered any minute…”

“I could stop them.”

All eyes turned to Nell.

My throat was dry. “What do you mean, Nell?” I asked. “There aren’t any plants nearby.”

She kept her eyes on the floor as she responded, “It’s not necessary.”

“Nell,” Graham started slowly, “I assume what you mean by that is that you would repeat what you did to the men downstairs?”

Nell nodded.

Bailey’s eyes widened, finally paying attention to the people in the room. My insides felt like they were being squeezed by a snake. This is going to be tough to explain.

“It’s justified,” Nell said flatly. “I can stop them. I can try to just immobilize them but my control over people who aren’t Nick isn’t very good. They’ll probably die, but isn’t that fine? If it means they won’t kill many more?”

I could feel the uncertainty radiating off of her.

Graham eyed her seriously. “Spoken like a true utilitarian.”

AJ cried out as a crow swooped low and scratched at him with its talons. Zola swiped at it causing it to retreat, protesting loudly. The other crows responded, as if emboldened by the first. Some began to hop along the ground, getting closer to us and the Crowman.

“Call them off,” Richard said, shoving his gun in the Crowman’s face. The man simply stared at him with one eye as his face was pressed to the ground, somehow managing to convey a promised vengeance without saying a word.

“If you aren’t lying, then do it,” Richard said to Nell. “Take them all out. Why did we do any of this if she could have just wiped them out from the start?”

“Nell, I…” I started, then reeled as I brushed against a different piece of Nell’s emotion. It felt like how I imagined it would be like to have a whale pass underneath you, the sheer scale of its weight and mass meaning any slight movement had drastic effects. Then it was gone and I was left struggling to identify what it even was.

“Sullivan wouldn’t be happy if we made such a brash move on our own,” Terry said. “We would practically be declaring war ourselves. Not to mention we would have the city’s eyes looking for whoever caused such a scene… unless you can get rid of the evidence?”

Nell shook her head.

“Nell, please tell me you aren’t seriously considering this,” I said. “Organ’s involved in this. They wouldn’t take this lying down. And if Sullivan revokes his protection, we’re screwed if Organ decides to deal with us.”

Nell finally raised her head. “You aren’t going to tell me it’s wrong to kill that many people?”

I raised my hands in frustration, gesturing at nothing. “How am I supposed to answer that? Yeah, it’s wrong. It feels wrong. But I don’t want to have to even go there. I’m not going to pretend I should be the arbiter for something so awful and monumental as weighing the lives of others on a scale. It’s enough just struggling with the ones that already happened. You shouldn’t have to worry about that. The easy answer is fucking don’t.”

“But what if I have to?” Nell said quietly. “I have to reckon with it.”

“Fuck that!” I said desperately. “Let’s drop it and pretend to be normal. We can go back to the library. We were interrupted last time, right? Why don’t we just forget about this for a whole week?”

Hearing those words seemed to get Nell to relax a bit. She unclenched her fists and breathed out.

“This is not the time for drastic decisions,” Graham said. “But I will agree to a sabotage plan if it can be done quickly and without risk.”

Bailey winced. “It’s definitely one of those things. I need someone to go turn the printers on and get them to connect to my drone’s network.”

“Impossible,” Graham said flatly.

“Hold on, Graham. There’s a way,” Terry said. He gestured to the Crowman. “He was leading a squad of the Jiezhi, with enough influence to make decisions on his own. We should use that.”

I didn’t think the Crowman could get any more furious, but he proved me wrong. His eyes bulged as he made noises through his gag that I could guess were threats of violence and other unspeakable things.

“You really think there’s a chance in hell he will help us?” Richard asked. “You’ve gotten dumber, Terry. Those dates aren’t polishing your skills like you think they are.”

“Stick to polishing your gun, Richard,” Terry fired back. “I don’t mean that we should use him. We should use his identity.”

The Crowman struggled again and the crows’ cawing intensified. I couldn’t tell how close we were to inciting another storm but I didn’t want to find out.

“Nell, let’s try that thing we used against the Goblin.”

She looked surprised. “You sure?”

My nausea swelled at the idea of drugging another unwilling victim, but the alternative must have scared me more. “Go for it.”

The flower on my shoulder began to shift, growing in size. I felt the petals change shape against my skin. Then came the cold sensation of the fluid, running through down my arm and out into a hollow spike of bone. I acted before I could psyche myself out of it. Leaning over the Crowman, I stuck the needle into his shoulder. There was much less liquid this time, Nell no doubt accommodating for this man not being as large as the Goblin. I pulled away and watched the man’s eyes grow wide and after a few moments, unfocused.

Terry watched, his mouth slightly open.

I reached for the gag.

“What are you doing?” Richard hissed.

“Trust,” I responded quietly while holding a finger up to my lips.

I removed the Crowman’s gag. He coughed, eyes swimming around before they managed to focus on me. The murderous hate in his expression was gone, replaced by confusion. He was blinking rapidly and his chest rose and fell in quick, short breaths.

I sat down beside him and picked up his radio. “Hey,” I said gently, despite my beating heart and tense muscles.

He sat up slowly and looked at me with a confused expression. “Why did you release me?” he asked.

“What do you mean?” I asked, showing him the radio in my hand. “They are asking us to report. I woke you up so you could tell them we’re fine.”

He was visibly sweating. “We? You’re not on my side.”

I could feel sweat trickling down my own back. Would he call his crows on us? “What are you talking about? You don’t recognize me? We took care of the bastards who attacked us.”

His eyes unfocused and he shook his head fiercely. “No.. That- I was captured.”

I glanced at Richard, who was frozen in shock. “Momentarily, yes. They hit you pretty hard, are you sure you are okay?”

His eyes refocused and I could see the resolute look on his face. “You are not my friend.”

I didn’t let any emotion show on my face. Instead, I straightened my back and looked down at him. “You are right. I am your superior. And now I am ordering you to respond to our allies on that radio.”

“Right…” He muttered and reached out to the radio. I handed it to him. He held it up to his mouth, then paused. He looked at me with clouded but narrowed eyes. “Why are we not speaking Mandarin?”

I was so close. He needed one last shove. Terry provided it, leaning in and speaking smoothly in Mandarin.

The tension went out of the Crowman’s shoulders. He nodded and spoke into the radio. The crows were calming down, seeming to mirror his reduced agitation.

A response came back from the radio and Terry nodded in satisfaction.

“Good,” I told the Crowman. “You’ve fought well, but you’re tired, aren’t you? Get some rest.”

The Crowman’s eyes fluttered and his head lolled. I backed away quietly as he seemed to drift off into a fitful dream.

“Magnificent,” Terry said, eyes gleaming. “You do have a knack for this, Nick.”

I could feel Bailey’s eyes burning a hole in the back of my head. Now is not the time to address that.

“How do we use his identity?” I asked Terry.

His smile widened at the question. “You hold the key. The malleable skeleton key that every spy-loving kid dreams of.”

“We’re on a time limit here,” I said nervously. “Spit it out.”

“With his face, we could infiltrate easily.”

I connected the dots and the picture was horrifying. “No,” I said. “No way. We’ve never even tried something like this.”

Nell cocked her head. “I don’t get it. What haven’t we tried?”

Terry shrugged. “Altering Nick’s face to look like this man laying here. I teach him a few phrases in Mandarin and we’re in and out in a flash.”

I felt sick. “It’s my face we’re talking about.”

“Oh, I see.” Nell said. “That actually sounds doable. Are you worried I couldn’t reconstruct it? Because I’m pretty confident I could.”

I rounded on her. “How certain are we talking?”

“I mean I’ve never done it before, but I don’t think I’d forget a single detail,” Nell said, brimming with confidence. “It’s like a blueprint in my brain. I promise. Besides, are you really that concerned?”

My skin felt like it was buzzing with electricity. “What do you mean?”

“Just… nothing, we can talk about it later,” Nell said, glancing at the people around us. “Besides, I’ve healed you perfectly so many times now. I’ve got a resume.”

She did have a good track record. I guess I hadn’t thought about it, but even with the most serious injuries, I’d always come back the same, even my birth marks were still there. While I was immediately resistant, when I stopped to actually consider why, I couldn’t come up with a good reason. Were you really that attached to your face in the first place? I stopped pushing out my anxiety towards Nell and let her confidence soothe me. “Fine.”

Nell turned to the Crowman. “Getting his face right, however… I’m less confident in.”

Terry grabbed both of us by our shoulders and guided us to the unconscious man. “I’m sure it will be easy, like tracing a picture.”