She smiled. “Yes. We were both made Epics at around the same time.” She watched me. “No surprise at hearing he is an Epic? So you do know. I had assumed he was still maintaining the act.”
“Do you know,” I shot back, “that if an Epic stops using their powers, they revert to their old selves? You don’t need us to kill you, Regalia. Just stop using your powers.”
“Ah,” she said, “if only it were so simple …” She shook her head as if amused by my innocence, then nodded toward the waters out in Central Park Bay. They rippled and moved, small waves forming on the surface and changing as quickly as the expressions on the face of a child trapped in quicksand made of candy.
“You took well to that device,” Regalia said. “I watched the other man practice, and he required far longer to accustom himself to its power. You are a natural with the abilities, it seems.”
“Regalia,” I said, stepping forward. “Abigail. You don’t have to be like this. You-”
“Do not act as if you know me, young man,” Regalia said. Her tone was quiet but firm.
I stopped in place.
“You have killed Steelheart,” Regalia continued. “For that alone I should destroy you. We have so few pockets of civilization remaining to us, and you bring down one that has not only power but advanced medical care? Hubris of the most high, child. If you were in my court, I’d see you locked away for life. If you were in my congregation, I’d do even worse.”
“If you hadn’t noticed,” I replied, “Newcago is running just fine without Steelheart. Just like Babilar would run fine without you. Isn’t that why you’ve forced Prof to come here? Because you want him to kill you?”
She hesitated at that, and I realized I might have said too much. Did I just give away that Prof knew her plan? But if she really wanted him to stop her, she’d expect him to figure it out, right? I needed to be more careful. Regalia was not only an Epic; she was also an attorney. That was like putting curry powder in your hot sauce. She could talk rings around me.
But how could I get information from her without saying anything? I made a snap decision and jumped off the rooftop, engaging the spyril and jetting through the water of Central Park Bay. I burst from the water a few minutes later, landing on another roof far north of the one I’d been on before.
“You do realize how ridiculous you look doing that,” Regalia said, stretching up from the water, speaking even before her new shape fully formed.
I yelped, pretending to be alarmed. I left this building and splashed farther northward until I was at the very northern edge of the bay. Here, exhausted, I broke from the water again and settled onto a rooftop, water streaming from my brow.
“Are you quite done?” Regalia asked as her chair formed from the water just before me again. She picked up her cup of tea. “I can appear anywhere I want, silly boy. I’m surprised Jonathan didn’t explain this to you.”
Not anywhere, I thought. You have a limited range.
And she’d just given me two more data points that would help Tia pinpoint her true location. I slipped off the roof into the water, intending to take another swim and see if I could get her to follow one more time.
“You are good with the device,” Regalia noted. “Did you ever know Waterlog, the Epic in whom those powers originated? I created him, you know.”
I stopped in the water beside the building, frozen like a beetle who’d just discovered that his mother had been eaten by a praying mantis.
Regalia sipped her tea.
“What did you say?” I asked.
“Oh, so that interests you, does it? His original name was Georgi, a minor street thug down in Orlando. He showed promise. I made him into an Epic.”
“Don’t be ridiculous,” I said, laughing. Nobody could make Epics. Sure, once in a while new ones appeared. Though the vast majority had been here since about a year after Calamity’s rise, I knew of a few notable Epics who had only recently manifested powers. But no one knew why or how.
“So certain in your denial,” Regalia said, shaking her head. “Do you think you know so much about the world, David Charleston? You know how everything works?”
I stopped laughing, but I didn’t believe her for a moment. She was playing me somehow. What was her game?
“Ask Obliteration next time you see him,” Regalia said idly, “assuming you live long enough. Ask about what I’ve done to his powers, how much stronger they are, despite what I have taken from him.”
I looked up at her, frowning. “Taken from him?” What did she mean by that? What would she “take” from an Epic? And that aside, was she also implying she’d enhanced Obliteration’s powers? Was that the reason for the lack of cooldown on his teleporting?
“You can’t fight me,” she said. “If you do you’ll end up dead, alone. Gasping for breath in one of these jungle buildings, one step from freedom. Your last sight a blank wall that someone had spilled coffee on. A pitiful, pathetic end. Think on that.”
She vanished.
I climbed up onto the rooftop and wiped some water from my eyes, then sat down. That had been a decidedly surreal experience. As I rested I thought on what she’d told me. There was so much that it only grew more troubling the more I thought it through.
Eventually I jumped back into the water and swam to the others.
26
Two days later I lingered in the library of our underwater base, alone, looking at Tia’s map. The points where I’d seen Regalia were marked with red pins and little exclamation points scribbled right on the paper. I smiled, remembering Tia’s excitement as she’d placed those pins. Though the math of what she was doing here wasn’t particularly interesting to me, the end result certainly was.
I moved to walk away, then stopped myself. I’d done well enough in my mathematics training at the Factory, even if I hadn’t enjoyed the subject. I couldn’t afford to be lazy just because someone else had things in hand. I wanted to know for myself. I forced myself to turn back and try to figure out Tia’s notations. From what I eventually worked out, my points had helped a lot, but we needed more data from the southeastern side of the city before we could really determine Regalia’s center base.
Feeling satisfied, I left the library. With nothing to do.
Which was odd. Back in Newcago, I’d always had something to occupy my time, mostly because of Abraham and Cody. Whenever they’d seen me looking idle, they’d handed me a project. Cleaning guns, carrying crates, practicing with the tensors-something.
Here, that didn’t happen. I couldn’t practice with the spyril down here-and I could only go up above to practice during certain preplanned excursions. Besides, my body ached from the hours I’d already spent power-swimming around the city. Prof’s forcefields kept me from getting battered, but they didn’t protect my muscles from strain.
I peeked in on Tia-her door was cracked-and I knew from her look of concentration and the six empty cola pouches by her seat that I shouldn’t disturb her. Mizzy was in the workroom with Val helping her, fixing one of our boat motors. When I stepped in to talk to them, I got an immediate cold scowl from Val. I stopped dead in the doorway, chilled by that stare. Val seemed to be in an even worse mood than normal in the last few days.
Mizzy gave me a little shrug, wiggling her hand and making Val pass her a wrench. Sparks. I turned around and left them. Now what? I should be doing something. I sighed and headed back toward my room, where I could dig into my notes on Epics yet again. I passed Tia’s room and was surprised when she called out.
“David?”
I hesitated by the door, then pushed it open farther. “Yeah?”
“How did you know?” Tia asked, head down over her datapad, typing something furiously. “About Sourcefield.”
Sourcefield. The Epic we’d killed just before leaving Newcago. I stepped forward, eager. “You found something more? About her background?”