“We’ve slept together before,” he said, keeping his voice low and looking over toward Dr. Perugini, who was still working on Kat. “And I kinda like what we’re doing now, with the dreams. It’s a pretty amazing feeling. I think it may be better than the real thing and I never thought I’d say that about…uh…that.”
“Well, I’m glad it’s good for you,” I said, trying to stay on the side of the line of sheer irritation I was feeling, “but it’s not really all that…for me, if you know what I mean. And I’m a little worried about that power of mine. We don’t know how it’s supposed to work. I doubt the main application is getting my boyfriend off without touching him.”
“Why not?” he asked. “Maybe it’s an adaptation to allow a succubus to keep a mate without being able to touch them.”
“I kinda doubt that,” I said. “In my experience, my powers are seldom that innocuous.”
“If you’re done with your little make out session,” Dr. Perugini said from beside Kat’s bed, “I can talk to you now.”
“Just tell me what you want me to do and I’ll do it.” Zack placed both his hands on my arms and kissed my forehead. “If you tell me to get the suit, I’ll get it and we can—”
“Well, since you’re so excited about it,” I said, almost snapping. “Forget it, we’ll talk about it later.”
“I’m sorry,” Zack said, and I saw the genuine contrition in his eyes. “I guess I just thought we had a good thing going on with the dreams—”
“ You had a good thing going with the dreams,” I said, and my voice rose higher than I intended it to before I lowered it. “Personally, I’d still like to be able to touch my boyfriend, to feel him against me, really against me, without having to dream it.”
He nodded and I saw a little retreat from him. “Okay. I’ll talk to Sessions.”
“Try and muster some enthusiasm about it or let’s not even bother.”
“No, really,” he said. “I just felt…intimate with you already. I’m sorry.”
“Let’s talk about it later.” I started toward Dr. Perugini.
“Oh, good,” Dr. Perugini said, looking up at us, her olive skin flushed as I arrived at Kat’s bedside, a snarl posed on her lips. “I didn’t mean to interrupt your personal conversation with my tedious medical report about the people who were injured on your mission.” She smiled, her every word a dagger. “Scott will be fine. Katrina appears to be fine, physically. They’ll both awaken in the next few hours, I expect. Katrina did some preliminary healing at the scene, yes?”
“Yes,” I answered, looking down at Kat’s face, which was drawn, almost as platinum as her hair.
“That saved us from serious problems, especially with Scott,” Perugini said, a clipboard positioned in front of her. “I can tell from the damage that his injuries were much more severe, that they have been healed considerably. Without that, he would likely have died.”
“He saved my life,” I said, looking back to where Scott lay on the bed. “Saved me from getting hit, pushed me down and blocked me with his body.” I shook my head. “That was a complete cluster—”
“And you were in charge?” Perugini eyed me accusingly.
“In charge, yes,” I said. “In control of the situation—sadly, not.”
“And whose fault is that?” she asked with more than a little accusation.
“What happened?” I heard a faint, groggy voice. I looked down to see Kat staring up at us, her curled blond hair lank and hanging loose around her face. Her eyes were open but only barely, the green of her irises peeking out at us from behind heavy lids. “Sienna?” She said my name as if trying to drag it out of herself.
“I’m here,” I said, and started to reach for her hand, but hesitated when I remembered how dirty my glove was. I only froze for a second and then I took hold of her hand and picked it up. “You’re gonna be fine, Kat. We’re back at the Directorate. What do you remember?”
“Directorate?” Kat asked, blinking at me. “What happened?”
“We were on a mission,” I said. “In Des Moines. We were supposed to keep an eye on an Omega safe house, and things went wrong. You saved us, Kat—you healed Scott and the others, kept them from dying.”
“Scott?” She scrunched her eyes at me. “I saved him?”
“You did,” I said. “He’s going to be just fine.”
“Oh.” She seemed to nod, but her eyes were distant, far away, glazed over. They came sharply back into focus, and found mine, and she squinted as she concentrated, trying to speak again. “Who is Scott?”
9.
Red and blue lights flashed in the Iowa night, casting their colors over the street. The streetlamps were out, and he was left to wonder if they had functioned in the first place. The house in front of him was blocked off by a line of police cars and officers, all of them out of their vehicles— and buzzing around like little bees , he thought. The news vans were out as well, and they were worse than bees—they were like flies that gathered around manure in a pasture, always gravitating toward the largest pile.
Residents were out, the damp street showing the reflected red and blue, the same refracting off the faces of the men, women and children who were on the scene with him, the crowd that had gathered in their heavy coats, trying to put anything between them and the cold autumn night. The wind picked up but didn’t blow the leaves the way it had in Minnesota only a few days earlier; here, everything was damp, weighed down by the wetness of a rain that must have passed in the morning but failed to dry under the cold grey sky. The smell of it was still in the air.
He pulled his own coat tight against the chill, not quite to the point of having to stamp his feet to keep warm, but only because of the crowd gathered around. He watched one of the news anchors, a pretty blond woman, delivering her palaver to the camera, after which she pulled some poor resident of the neighborhood over to answer her questions. “What did you see?” the reporter asked the woman.
“It was like there was a bulldozer coming through here or something, like I think maybe the gas line exploded?” The woman shook her head at the reporter. “I saw a car hit another car at one point, and there were people moving around, and lots of dust because the house came down…it was crazy. I think some of them were fighting.”
“The police are calling this a building collapse,” the reporter said, turning to face the camera, “that came in the wake of a gang battle. At least one vehicle fled the scene shortly after the collapse, and vandalism by the rival gang is strongly suspected as the motive for this bizarre activity. Whatever the case, this Des Moines neighborhood is still reeling from the destruction.” She stopped and seemed to relax. “That was good, right?” The producer next to her nodded. “Perfect.”
“Fools,” the old man whispered under his breath, but it was lost to the wind. He backed through the crowd, then turned from the scene of the chaos, and began a slow stride back down the street to where he had parked his car. His grey hair was cropped short, and he bore not even a limp from his seemingly advanced age. Eat, sleep, drink, and know nothing about your world. Deny all you see, and don’t bother to try to explain it outside the framework of your silly beliefs, he thought . His car was ahead, the old Cadillac he had picked up at a used car lot only a few days earlier—steel gray, this one, perfectly suited to his needs. He’d driven it down in the morning, when he’d heard the report that the safe house had gone offline. The drive was terrible, as all drives were, but it was necessary. As I knew it would be when I originated Operation Stanchion .
He felt for the key in his pocket, felt the loose jangle of the change, and suddenly he knew he was not alone. There were presences all around him, familiar in their intent. The police were just around the corner— but far enough away that it won’t matter . He felt himself tense slightly, and smiled. What a fine opportunity , he thought. He let his fingers go slack around the keys and turned, leaning his back against the car. “Hello,” he said, his voice sounding normal to himself, but probably drawing the same confusion from the youths that surrounded him as his accent seemed to with everyone else that he encountered on his trip. “It’s a fine night for a walk, isn’t it?”