It was just my luck, out of the frying pan and into the fire. It seemed like we were in for another awkward conversation. I was still shaking off the nerves from my heart-to-heart with Lily when this kid got on my radar. The wide-eyed girl was staring at us from behind the corner, stuck in the indecision of fight, flight, or freeze. We gave her a moment to make up her mind, and then we made it for her. Unsurprisingly. Our compassion was not well received. As we approached her, a decision was made, and she ran for it.
“Wait!” I cried, but she just kept going. “Shit, now what?”
“Scared her off,” Gabe mused, stopping to survey the area.
“Don’t tell me it was my face,” I scowled, crossing my arms.
“Nah,” he grinned. “You’re the nicest person I know, Lana. She’ll come around.”
He had a point; we weren’t quite out of luck just yet. The girl hadn’t left the area. Still stuck in indecision and straddling the fence, she’d decided to buy herself more time. For what? Who knows, but for our sake we were hoping it was to prepare herself for talking face-to-face with some big bad cops. Instead of disappearing down the street, she had chosen a new spot to hide behind; this time it was a large, neon sign adorning the side of a restaurant. Gabe was feeling lucky, and I was of the same mind. If we could lower her guard, she might come out on her own.
“What do kids like?” I asked. “Candy? I don’t have any.”
“Beats me,” Gabe shrugged. “When I was a kid, there was only one thing that got my attention, and that was nacho fries.”
“Why does this story change every time I hear it?” I asked skeptically.
The girl choked out a laugh from where she stood. Jackpot. That was exactly what we were going for.
“Look, I know we’re big and scary, but we don’t bite,” I called out. “Why don’t you come on out and tell us what you have to say?”
Slowly, she shuffled towards us with her eyes glued to the ground.
“What’s your name?” I asked, pulling out my badge to show her.
“Lexi,” she said, fidgeting. “Lexi Torres... I saw you at our school.”
“Yeah,” I said, softer now. “We were by. You were in the courtyard, weren’t you?”
She flinched.
“You remember that?” she asked, her eyes darting back and forth between us.
“Don’t worry,” I said. “You’re not in trouble or anything. We’re just good with faces. Comes with the job. Isn’t that right, Gabe?”
“Sure thing,” he echoed. “Would be a hell of a lot of trouble if we got the wrong guy, see what I mean?”
No dice. Other than for a slight loosening in her shoulders, she just stood there silently staring at her feet. Thinking better of it, I decided to take a more direct approach.
“Look, there’s something you want to say,” I said. “You wouldn’t have spent so long pacing around trying to build up the nerve if you didn’t. I know what it’s like when something seems so simple and it’s still the hardest thing you’ve ever done — at least for a moment. We aren’t going to judge you. If you don’t speak your mind, you’ll regret it. Trust me; if anyone knows that, it’s me.”
I shot Gabe a pointed look, and he gave me a silent nod and one of those all-too-knowing smiles.
I almost thought we’d lost her when, finally, she relented.
“I knew her,” she said. “You know, Cassie. She was in my class.”
“Was she a friend?” I asked.
“Not really,” she admitted. “I mean, I tried to talk to her sometimes, but you know… she almost never said anything back. Sometimes, I didn’t even know if she was listening. Do you know what I mean?”
She clasped her hands nervously behind her back, her eyes glued to the ground again.
“Yeah,” I said. “I think we’ve all known someone like that. Right, Gabe?”
“Comes with the territory,” he said. “Don’t let it fool you. The badge helps less than you might think, especially when it’s coming from somewhere after clocking out.”
“I tried to cheer her up, but I think I was the only one who did,” she said, grinning softly. “All the other girls thought I was wasting my time. When Cassie stopped coming to school, it felt like I was the only one who noticed.”
This might have been the breakthrough we were looking for. Then again, she wasn’t the first and wouldn’t be the last concerned citizen to ask us about a case on behalf of someone they only almost knew. Maybe it was the guilt or curiosity or just the aching pain of knowing that your goodwill wasn’t enough to save another life; you’d never know if you did enough or if any of them turned out alright in the end.
If you discover this narrative on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen. Please report the violation.
“Did you notice any strange behavior around then?” I asked.
“No,” she shook her head. “Other than that, she was spending less time at school… She always went to the robotics club after class… But if she was leaving early, then… Wait, is that important?”
“I don’t know,” I admitted. “But we’ll find out. Thanks for the help.”
She nodded and meekly disappeared down the street.
“Poor kid,” I muttered. “She doesn’t know anything.”
Maybe this could have led to some sappy heart-to-heart, but our Irises had other ideas. They went live with a clipped voice, both practiced and urgent. It was a distress call begging for anyone in the area to answer it; we were running low on personnel, and it showed. Once the details illuminated on our Irises, it was an easy choice.
“Looks like we’re the only ones in the area,” I grimaced. “Lucky us.”
“Yeah,” Gabe grinned. “Let’s get going; the party doesn’t start ‘til we get there.”
***
A few blocks later, we were staring down a bloodbath. A group of teenage boys was sprawled out over the plaza. Their makeshift weapons, sloppily cobbled together in some home-brewed fashion, lay scattered among them. Large, freshly ripped open gashes adorned their jackets, highlighted by blood. Youth often led to arrogance and a feeling of invincibility, but the size of your ego wouldn’t soften your fall when shit hit the fan. From my vantage point, it wasn’t clear if they were all still breathing. For their sake, I hoped that they were.
There was only one boy left who refused to stay down. His eyes were dead set on the thing standing before him. It was almost a girl, slender and short in stature, if not for the glossy white shine of her hard outer shell and the blood dripping from her painfully small hands. Undeterred by his struggle to stand, he lunged to get one last hit in, eager to avenge himself and his friends.
“No!” I cried to deaf ears; red crimson bloomed across his chest.
His electrified bat clattered to the ground before the rest of him followed suit. There was no time to think; we moved on autopilot. My arm made contact with her hand before she had the chance to strike again. I just needed one clear shot. Point-blank. I thought it’d be simple, but I was wrong. It was the face she didn’t have; the void where her eyes should have been mirrored the one I knew too well. Once again, I was floating in the dark space inside the light. Yin and Yang. Bang. One shot. My finger pulled the trigger, and the shot ricocheted off the side of her skull.
“Lana!” Gabe shouted.
His voice echoed, foggy and stretched out until it snapped back into focus. Then, for the first time, I saw her clearly. Her short black hair, cut into a messy bob, framed her missing eyes. The android jerked to the side with the impact of his body, and down we all went, sprawled out together with the boys already there before us. Two shots point-blank — that was all it took. Gabe’s gun smoked, the tip still resting against the outer shell of her chest. His bullets exploited a crack in her protective shell, and once they were in, they weren’t coming back out. The dents burst out of her from the inside out, slicing to her hardware until she went limp.
In her last moments, she flickered in and out of visibility, like the color changing of a chameleon as it took its last breaths. She was intangible, and, in a way, it was mesmerizing and almost beautiful. I was transfixed. Where had I seen this before? Part of me wondered if this wasn’t just a trick of the light.
“Your arm,” he huffed, back on his feet.
“What?” I asked.
“That thing almost tore it off,” he said, glancing back at my sleeve.
“I’d take a look at that,” Ethan chimed in over our Iris. “It doesn’t matter if it’s fake; you’re stuck with it now, whether you like it or not.”
I hadn’t felt a thing. Distinctly, the same way I had heard Gabe’s voice, there was a crunch or maybe the whine of cold hard metal, but there were no sparks and there was no pain. My arm was like a stranger to me, which was now both a blessing and a curse.
“Think it’s bad?” I asked, gingerly pulling back my sleeve. “That thing must have triggered my fail-safe; maybe I should be grateful.”
Gabe stood watch over the android, but I stayed where I was.
“Shit,” I hissed. “That’s not something you see every day. I should charge for admission.”
There was a deep well in my forearm in the shape of five tiny fingers, wrapped around and imprinted deeply into what should have been my skin. It would have been red-hot pain, broken bones, and gushing blood if not for the fact that Zenith, or should I say, Dylan Hearst, got to me first.
“Damn,” Gabe muttered. “Never seen an arm do that before.”
“Good thing it’s not my arm then, isn’t it?” I asked, tapping on the thing with my left knuckles. “It’s practically a fancy tin can.”
With two fingers to my temple, I transmitted my feed to Ethan.
“Ethan, are you seeing this?” I asked. “Looks familiar, doesn’t it?”
“Yeah,” he said, through gritted teeth. “I’m starting to think you’ve got a nose for trouble.”
“Always did. Did it take you this long to catch up?” I quipped, but Ethan was too lost in thought to play our usual games, so much for lightening the mood.
“There’s no doubt about it,” he said. “That has to be the same print you found in the junkyard. Take it in; I want to be thorough.”
The upper half of the android's face had been cleaved away, and underneath her faceplate was a mess of exposed wires. The damage to her body was extensive, but it was hard to say what was old and what was new. Just to be safe, Gabe gave it a good kick. It barely moved, settling back into its previous position. Whatever it lacked in size, it made up for in weight. Ethan would have a field day picking it apart later, but one thing was for certain; it was going to stay down. I released a breath I didn’t know I was still holding.
“I can’t believe I missed,” I muttered. “This isn’t my day, is it?”
“Nah, don’t be like that,” Gabe said. “If you never let me have a shot, I’d get rusty. Think you did me a favor.”
I was a better shot than Gabe; that’s why he drove and I handled the gun. There were times I had to take shots out the window using the side-view mirror as a guide. You didn’t make a lot of friends when your job was to ruin someone else’s fun and drag them in dead or alive, whatever was easier. Gabe played it safe and pinned the thing down, but it shouldn’t have gotten that far. I should have taken it out first.
“It’s probably fried,” Ethan continued. “But I’ll see what I can do.”
He paused.
“And, Lana,” he said. “We’ll talk later.”
“Are you going to make me explain myself?” I asked, finally rising to my feet.
“Depends,” he said.
“On what?” I asked.
“On what you have to say,” he replied.
Ethan always had perfect timing. There was a part of me dreading the talk, but a bigger part was relieved — the part desperate to get caught. As it turned out, my little trip to Silver Reach High might have been more than a funny story. I’d seen her last night. It’d been a long day, but there was no way she could have been anyone else. The way she flickered was unmistakable; she turned practically invisible, just like a ghost — my ghost. If there was a time to come clean about why I’d been such a mess, it was now.
The sound of ambulance sirens wailed through the air. Paramedics rushed out to tend to the boys, who were hopefully still breathing.
“Looking forward to it,” I grinned. “Turns out I do have something to tell you too.”
What button would you press? (Meme in post-chapter note)
