The woman laughed.
“Please,” she said. “I think we both know that it’s in each of our best interests to keep our names to ourselves, Mr. ‘Not Wind Runner’. But I do hope to see you again, when I’m not so busy.”
She leaned forward to brush off her shorts, giving Malcolm a cleavage filled view down her shirt. He cleared his throat and tuned his attention back to his beer, waiting until the woman had disappeared up the stairs before letting out his breath.
CHAPTER 9
When Malcolm finally left Terri’s Tavern, he turned in the direction of his hideout, the streets were silent. He pulled on his mask, just in case he saw anything that required his assistance, but he doubted that he would see much. It was a foggy night, and seeing anything beyond a single block into the distance was like trying to listen to music underwater.
And that was exactly why Malcolm ended up being caught so off guard. A single car pulled onto the sidewalk in front of him, blocking his way. The blue lights and siren flared for a single instance, just long enough to announce their authoritative presence, and two men jumped loose of the vehicle.
“Freeze!” shouted the one nearest to Malcolm. “On the ground!”
Malcolm was almost surprised enough to do it. It took a couple of seconds before it dawned onto him why the police were there, and how they’d found him. The girl in the clothing store had been offended enough by his rejection to call them.
That made sense. The police knowing his location, however, did not. The fact that they were there, at all, with the city government on the verge of total collapse, was ridiculous. The guns they had pointed at him… well, those did make sense, in an “erring on the side of caution” kind of way.
Malcolm dove into a nearby alleyway. Bullets roared, and sparks danced off the concrete where he’d been standing a second earlier. He fought the urge to push off into the air and use his wind manipulation to get far, far away but decided against it. He’d be an easy target for the police, even with the fog.
So instead, Malcolm sprinted down the alley. It was tempting to stand, and make an attempt at fighting, but in that scenario, he’d be accepting his role as the bad guy. The police would report back to their superiors, back to the media, and his public image would sink further into the ground.
Hmmm… In the ground. I think I just had an idea.
Another round of bullets rang through the air, one of them whizzing less than an inch over Malcolm’s head. He cut across the street at the end of the alley, pushing himself forward with his wind manipulation to make it to cover behind a parked car.
He heard the screech of tires, and knew that one of the officers was now back in the squad car. Malcolm cursed under his breath and tried to keep his head low as he ran toward another alleyway. Another shot ricocheted off a building, missing him by less than a foot.
He ducked and rolled into another dirty alleyway, and knocked over a trash can as he stood. He cringed at the commotion the can made as it rolled away, but breathed a sigh of relief as it revealed what he’d been looking for: a manhole cover.
It was far heavier than Malcolm had been expecting, and even using his wind manipulation to push from the inside up, it took him several moments to wiggle it loose. He could hear footsteps approaching. Malcolm took a deep breath, trusting that the smell and limited light conditions of the sewer would be enough to throw off pursuit.
Another gunshot roared, though Malcolm felt it, rather than heard it. The bullet tore through the same shoulder that Tapestry had shot him in, adding another hole an inch lower than his previous wound. Malcolm gasped, his head pulsing with pain as he fell forward through the open manhole.
If not for the unexpected injury, he’d likely have been able to keep himself from landing directly into the unsavory stream of refuse. The putrid liquid splashed up around him, and Malcolm knew and understood the disgusting desperation he’d been reduced to.
His shoulder aching, he crawled from the sewer onto the walkway. The new costume he’d been carrying with him was lost to the muck. His body was coated filth, and one of his shoes had slipped off, now somewhere at the bottom of the slow moving sludge.
Malcolm wanted to scream. He wanted throw fireballs against the walls of the sewer tunnel in rage, and only didn’t after remembering why the gasses involved in such a place would make that a terrible idea.
The police weren’t following him, though they must have known where he was. Malcolm tried to orient himself as best as he could and started walking. He ran his thoughts in any direction he could, desperate to distract himself from the pain of his shoulder and the shame of his life.
The police came after me, the Gifted Vigilante, and left Multi, a self-cloning suicide bomber, to do his thing.
Of course they did. The more he considered it, the more sense it made. They didn’t have the manpower to go up against Multi. And the Gifted Vigilante was rumored to avoid killing, an awfully convenient trait to have in a wanted criminal.
They must have known he was at Terri’s Tavern, and had been waiting for him to leave. Malcolm resolved to be more careful coming and going.
He followed the sewer tunnel for what felt like hours. Not knowing exactly where he was, he decided he probably had gone far enough. The sound of rushing water greeted him as he pushed a manhole cover loose and pulled himself to the surface. He looked around. He didn’t recognize the building he was standing in, but he knew by the smell where he was: the water treatment plant.
Desperate to clean himself off, he looked around. There were numerous pipes emptying their contents into a large vat in the center of the enormous room. Most of the pipes contained contents similar to what he’d just trudged through, but one, on the far corner of the room looked clean, or at least it wasn’t a suspicious brown. He figured it was rainwater runoff and stood beneath the spout.
Malcolm washed himself off as completely as he could. He had to bite his lip to keep from crying out in pain as he tried to wash out the bullet wound. Thankfully, the bullet had gone straight through his shoulder, but he would have to make sure to use plenty of antiseptic when he got home.
The pain of the injury didn’t abate with the shower. By the time Malcolm arrived back at his hideout, his shoulder almost hurt too badly for him to focus. He took ragged breaths, and let out a small, defeated cry as he landed next to the warehouse.
He ditched his soiled clothing in a disused dumpster, keeping only his mask. Back inside his hideout, Malcolm sacrificed a shirt. Ripping it into bandages he carefully applied the rest of his antiseptic and wrapped his aching shoulder. He wished he had something stronger as he shook out a couple of over the counter pain killers into his hand and washed them down with half a bottle of water.
He sat on his bed, feeling forced to contemplate what had just happened. This was his life now. Even on his nights off, he ran the risk of being shot at, and having to choose between the putrid sewers and a cold jail cell.
I gave up everything I had for this. To be a super vigilante, and serve a city that doesn’t appreciate me.
Part of him had hoped that Rose would be waiting for him. She was the only other person, besides himself, who knew the combination to the lock on the hatch. The only person who could have been waiting for him. Malcolm sighed at the thought, feeling a raw bleakness at how alone he’d become.
He missed Tapestry, too. The thought brought a smile to his face as he considered the throbbing pain of his shoulder, the last gift she’d given him. He’d be lucky if he kept full mobility in his arm once it healed. He missed Tapestry as a friend, as a lover, and also for more selfish reasons, for her regeneration which would free him of the pain.