Storm Front

Chronicles of Vic & Pandora

Incursion

by:

R.L. Carmine

Richmond, Virginia

December 23, 1987

Thirteen-year-old Vic Tammins glanced around the store, eyeing the clerk, then checking the entrance to see the security officer standing by the food court. The mall was rather large, two story. He had seen bigger on family trips, but Regency wasn't anything to sneeze at. Glancing up at the top rack, he could see the item he wanted to page through, the December issue of Playboy. Christmas Gala issue. He grinned to himself, and when the clerk had turned his back, he reached up and grabbed it. The elderly lady beside him stared down at him in displeasure. He shrugged. "Mind your own business," he said. Stupid, wrinkly, stuck up, West End bitch.

She stuck her nose into the air with a "Well, I never…!" attitude and looked away. For a moment, she did nothing other than page through her year-end issue of Feline Sweater Knitting Monthly, but then she suddenly got a burr in her ass. Shooting him one last glance, she left the magazine rack behind and made her way over to the clerk.

He was busy ringing up a long line of customers, what with it being the holiday season and all, but when she barreled her way to the front of the line, he changed his focus from the register keys to her. She motioned over to Vic, and he moved to the side of his booth and looked over at Vic. "Hey, if you're not eighteen then put it back. This isn't a library for hormone charged kids."

Vic spoke, not looking up from the small breasts of one of the pictorial models. "So, I can go home and watch people get brutally massacred on network television, but I can't look at some naked girl in a magazine?" He was fixated on the brunette. There was something about small-breasted women that attracted him. Unlike his friends, he wasn't into the women with breasts bigger than their heads.

"Look kid, I don't make the rules, I just don't want to lose my job." He sighed. "I couldn't care what you do, just as long as it doesn't add any more crap than I have to deal with in these customers."

Fumbling around in his pocket, Vic fished out a couple of crumpled bills and tossed them up at the clerk. "That should be more than enough. Too bad they don't show penetration," he said as he walked out.

The old woman fainted.

From the opposite side of the store, she watched him leave. Standing against the rack of calendars, her foot up on the edge of the hardcover book rack, she licked her lips as she tasted the aroma of his raw attitude. Shoving her white hair from around her true white face, she moved off after him.

His footfalls were drowned out by the roar of the crowds around him. Young, old, middle aged, they were all there to shop for their loved ones, after all, it wasn't but two days until Christmas. He made his way past the clothing, music, and toy stores, towards the other end of the mall. The entrance/exit to the covered parking deck was just around the corner, and from there, it would be a good hour walk to get home. The snow would make it longer. Just before he reached the array of glass doors, a heavy hand took hold of his shoulder.

"Aren't you a little young for that magazine?" The security guard's voice boomed over the masses, and Vic turned around to catch sight of him.

Busted. He chuckled to himself. Why do cops always ask the stupidest questions? "I'm just a figment of your imagination, sir. Go back and do something useful, like arresting a shoplifter."

People entering and leaving the mall moved around them, rubbernecking at the scene the punk and the guard were creating. Sure, it wasn't a big scene, but that never stopped peoples' curious, voyeuristic attitude.

The man began to daze, almost taken in by the youth's words, but he shook himself free of their bond. "Come on back to the office, we'll call your parents and see what they think about your reading habits." Suddenly, the man's head jerked forward, as if he had been hit, and he crumpled.

The woman stood behind him, her fist outstretched, connecting with the air where the guard's head had just been. She couldn't have been more than seventeen, and she smiled so comfortingly. "Come with me, before his friends arrive." Taking his free hand, she moved towards, and through, the doors with him at her side. People began to gather around the security guard and someone called for a doctor.

Outside, even within the partial shelter of the covered level, the air was cold, and he could see his breath immediately after stepping foot into it. He glanced up at her. There was something nurturing about her presence, an all calm, a bliss. There was also something missing, something very odd. Though the pale woman was breathing, it did not show. It was if her body temperature was that of the outside air. "Who are you?"

"Your...guardian angel." Her black leather jeans squeaked as she walked, her leather jacket rustling. She looked down at him through Asian eyes, but green. They were an insane green, blazing aqua, florescent, almost hypnotizing.

There was the urge, and he huddled closer to her. Releasing her hand, he wrapped his arm around her waist. "My dark angel, maybe."

"Yes," she said.

They came to a stop, before a sleek black sports car. Reaching down, she pulled the handle and lifted the suicide doors. "Get in, I'll take you for a ride."

For a moment, he hesitated, but finally gave in. He climbed into the vehicle, felt the soft, blood red leather seats beneath him. His own leather jacket squealed against it, and he looked up as she closed the door.

Moving around, she opened the driver's side door, on the right hand side of the car. He was curious as to whether the experience for the passenger would be any different, riding on the side generally reserved for the driver. He kind of liked the idea, but then, he liked everything that had to do with this woman. He loved the smell of her leather, of her, of the car, the way she walked and the melodic quality of her voice.

"Where do you wish to go," she inquired.

He thought about it for a moment as he searched his pockets for the pack of Duris he had gotten from his big brother earlier that morning. As if reading his mind, she held one up before him, and he leaned forwards to take it in his lips. "You know where the Village shopping center is? On Three Chopt and Patterson. There's this place there I want to go."

"Dave's," she said.

He looked up at her, stunned. There was something between them, something older than the stars themselves. He nodded, dumbfounded.

With one hand, she turned the key, the engine roared to life. With the other, she produced a silver flip top lighter from her pocket and gave it to him. "Here."

Taking it, he noticed her fingernails were painted black. No, not painted, they were that way naturally. How odd. Flipping the lighter open, he flicked the wheel and a flame erupted from around the wick. He took a few puffs to start the hot-head on the end, and then held it back to her.

She just sat there, looking at him, her hands in her lap as if she were trying to warm them, but she wasn't. "No," she said. "You keep it." This was the closes she had ever been to him, the anticipation was coursing through her body like some sort of poison.

With that, he stared at it for a moment and then dropped it into his inner pocket. "Thanks."

She backed the car out of the place and shifted into gear. Within seconds, they darted from beneath the covering and out onto the partially salted road. The car slid as she yanked the wheel, but it caught. Like a rocket, it took off up the incline to the upper parking deck and towards the Parham stoplight. It was red, she didn't care, and the black vehicle slid out onto the street and took off down the road again.

Too young to be petrified at the woman's unruly driving, he sat back and smiled, rooting through her glove compartment box for tapes. Nothing. He closed the door to it and leaned back to smoke his cigarette and thumb through the Playboy.

She looked at him, saw the hint of disappointment, and reached over into the glove compartment herself. From where he had found nothing, she produced a handful of cassettes, and placed them delicately on his lap. "I'm in the mood for some goth, see if you can find something interesting."

The amazing actions of this woman were becoming almost expected, but no less a surprise each time she came up with one. He shuffled through the tapes and found one he liked, then inserted it into the deck.

They traveled for only a few more minutes, sliding around curves and blasting through stoplights, before they finally reached their destination. She pulled the vehicle into the center and slowed as it moved around to the back lot, pulling into a space near a rear entrance to the open air center's alcove stores. They sat there for a moment, looking at each other.

She broke the silence first. "You mind if I ask you something." She pushed a few renegade strands of hair back behind her left ear. He shook his head and she smiled the smile again. "Are you a virgin?"

Silence.

"You are, aren't you?" She looked at the bold youth as he turned the color of his hair. "I know whether you are or not, I just need you to tell me the truth."

He nodded, trying to pass the lump in his throat. Stop being a pussy, if she's interested, I get laid...or I get sacrificed...not that being sacrificed at her hands would be a bad thing. "Yes, I am."

She licked her lips. "Make love to me."

Scanning the car, he looked back at her. "In here? It's kinda' small, don't you think?"

Touching a switch on her armrest, her seat electrically moved back, enough to accommodate a man of six foot five. Another switch and the seat leaned back nearly all the way. She glanced over at him. "We have plenty of room, my love."

Vic leaned forwards, closer to her, killing the cigarette in the ashtray and allowing the magazine to drop to the floorboard. "Why do you call me that?"

"Reasons you have yet to realize, times you do not yet remember. Faith." Shedding her jacket, she pulled her black tank top over her head and tossed it over the back of her seat.

No bra, small tits. I could fall in love with her body. Her personality, what I have seen of it so far…OK, so she’s a little crazy. But God she’s hot. And then something struck him as he watched her slide her leather jeans down. "I, uh, I don't have a rubber."

"You don't have anything, do you," she asked playfully.

"No, of course not." He looked at her, raising his eye line from between her legs. "I just thought that..."

She leaned to him and placed her right hand against his cheek. "I haven't had sex in eons, you have nothing to worry about, trust me." He froze as she pulled his zipper down. Her hand snaked into his pants and took hold of him, she locked eyes with him. "You will remember this forever." She kissed him, and so it began.

---

I first met her when I was a boy...but I would later learn that she had been watching me since birth. She had been in the hospital, stood by my father when looking through the glass of the nursery. When I fell off the jungle gym in elementary school, skinning my knee, she had been watching, and when I got in my first fight, she was nearby. She was my dark angel...my love. I was destined for great things...and she knew that, for she was pulling the strings of the fates themselves.

---

Callian, Florida

December 6, 1995

The high pitched sound seemed to steal him from his dream. It was always the same, the events of ten months ago being played back in his head over and over again, night after night. Getting ready for graduation he saw someone outside, the bassist in a friend's band. He had moved down to Florida from Richmond to take a job with his uncle. Raise the money to get married to his love, Kem, back in Richmond. For a week he had come back to attend graduation and visit. But then the Earth-shaking news came. No one called, no one mentioned it, until the bassist, he never could recall his name, informed him of Tom’s death. He felt cold, the shakes, and another anxiety attack tightened around his throat. The tingling in his chest, the numbness in his arm, the claustrophobia he felt with the sensation the entire world was closing in on him.

Closing in, small. The room was too small for all the things he had crammed into it. Trash and clothes scattered all over the floor and furniture. The walls were littered with posters of punk rock bands that were so tattered that most of the names were illegible.

"Shit," exclaimed Vic as he rolled over in his bed, pulling a pillow over his head. "I can't decide whether I'm supposed to be happy that the dream's over or pissed that the damn radio woke me up. Boots, turn the radio off."

The black rottweiler jumped down off the bed and padded over towards the radio. Just as she was preparing to push the power button with her paw, the speakers squawked, causing Boots to bolt back onto the bed.

"This is the Emergency Broadcasting System. This is not a test, we repeat, this is not a test. Stay tuned to this station or your one of your local television station for more information."

---

The virus came in nineteen-ninety five. If you’ve read my journals you know that. It swept over the planet like some jet black shadow, enveloping almost all. For two days ninety-nine percent of the human population scrambled about in madness...some insanity unleashed by the unknown plague. I fought to get back to my hometown in Richmond, and made it...a changed man.

In the aftermath, countries fell, two point six billion lay dead, but those infected, that managed to survive, were miraculously cured of the ills they possessed before. Cancer, A.I.D.S., Systemic Lupus, even common colds, all gone. I wasn’t one of those infected, so whatever I may have had before I still possessed. I couldn’t worry about that, because there was a man out there, Wade Hanson, trying to take my city. It had drawn more from my being than I thought I had, just trying to keep those madmen in the Pentagon from coming in and instating martial law. Now I had to deal with that?

Then, it all came down. A silent night in downtown Richmond, turned into a firefight with Loomers, what we called the troops from the US military’s advanced technologies branch, Highpoint. They were backing Hanson, trying to give the Pentagon something to worry about in Richmond, so that they could divide their focus and overthrow the government. Most of my people, my closest friends, died that night, and so did I.

---

Richmond, Virginia

August 28, 1997

Codi moved solemnly up the escalator, his operating room comrades following close behind. The short blond hair that he had always tried to keep pushed neatly back, hung over his forehead, tangled. He shot everyone a quick glance, careful to make eye contact with everyone before letting his eyes fall on Kayne. "He's dead, we did all that we could."

Reaching out, Kayne took hold of the blond punk before there was a chance to react. The boy was lifted off of the ground and hurled through the air, into one of the enormous exterior windows. Crashing through, he fell amongst the glass and grass outside.

Shaking his head, he pushed unconsciousness away and saw a tree limb above him. Just about to grasp it for support, Kayne was on him again, whirling Codi about, and back inside.

In an attempt to assist his friend, Rage hurriedly advanced on Kayne's back, only to have Helena sweep his legs and send him down. Scampering to his feet, he was tackled by Nevada.

The other end broke out in violence, as the Tribe battled the Warriors, most of which were sworn Tribe as well. It had become a free for all, as if the insanity had come again.

Then, the power failed.

She stood amongst them, her role as the sinner looking for penance ready to be fulfilled. "Your petty bickering is destroying the only hope you have, the entire human species has, for survival." Quickly, she moved past Sy, shooting him only a quick look with her almost florescent eyes. Through the main group of people, and to the escalator, Boots moved along beside her as if she meant as much to her as Vic. Kayne stepped forward to block the woman, and Boots growled at him. Pandora turned, staring into Helena's eyes, into her soul.

"Y...you, from the red light district Hanson set up...on the old private school property." She placed her arm out before Kayne, and shoved him back. "She wants Vic."

"You're nuts." Codi pulled himself from the floor, his face bleeding. He ignored it. "His whole body's a test case in extreme trauma, he's deader than his leather jacket."

Pandora glanced back over her shoulder and in the direction she had entered from. "I have come too far to turn back now." She made her way down the escalator. "Come Helena, Boots."

They walked down the corridor together, yet there were only the echoes of one set of footfalls. It was odd, yet not something that Helena picked up on. The entire hospital was blacked out, and still, Pandora seemed to have no difficulties. Upstairs, moon and firelight filtered through the windows, making visibility possible. On the first level though, there were barely any, and none in the center corridors through which they tread. It was about as pitch as could be.

Shoving the doors open, they made their way to the table. There, Vic's unclad body lay before them, impaled time and time again on the ways of modern medicine.

"How long?" Pandora took the intravenous lines, and every other thing she deemed as nonsense, from him.

Moving to the other side of the table, Helena pushed the equipment cart to the side. "Seven minutes now."

"Seven is the divine number." She caressed is lips with her pure white fingertips. "A woman named Ishtar told me that once." Stripping her jacket off, as if she had been taken by the exact actions Codi had made earlier, she let it drop to the floor. "Please leave, Helena. Stand outside and keep your comrades away." She stared into the canine's eyes and smiled. "Yes, of course you may stay."

As Helena withdrew, Pandora leaned forward and licked the wound left by the C.V.P. line. "You and I will be together, intertwined throughout eternity, my love." Straightening up, she forced her middle finger into the hole. "And this can only be because in the minutes of our first encounter we recognized our love."

Jerking upwards, Vic's eyes flared open and purple sage light shot forth. Grasping her shoulder, he released a howl torn from the depths of his soul. His fingernails slashed her flesh, letting blood drip down her arm.

Outside, in the corridor, Kayne walked towards Helena, Sy and Codi on either side. "What the hell?!"

Taking a step back against the door, Helena drew her three fifty-seven from its holster. " Stay back Kayne. Sy, keep him there!"

The dreadlocked youth had no chance to even consider her command before Kayne took hold and swung him into Helena. They stumbled back, she fell to the floor, and Kayne pushed through the doors. Suddenly, he stopped, dumbfounded by what he was viewing.

Helena recovered. Reaching her feet, she took hold of Kayne's left arm and dragged him back, her gun now trained on Pandora. "I don't know what the fuck you are lady, but if you can save him, then do it!" The doors flapped shut.

Vic shivered violently in Pandora's arms. She stroked his mane of crimson hair and wept for him as the C.V.P. wound healed almost immediately, leaving only a pale circle of flesh, a scar. Pushing himself to sit, he slid off of the table and staggered into a wall. Leaning against it for stability, he slid down the cream colored tiles and to the floor. "I...I'm so cold." Slowly, he brought his one eye to catch sight of her. "I thought you had left me to die."

"So to speak," she remarked, watching his right eye socket flesh over. Dropping to her hands and knees, she moved towards him as if she were a cat, Boots padding along side of her. She touched the black heart drawn on his right cheek bone. "Never fear, my love, you are as I. We are two of the Chosen, and as I am yours, you are mine...forever."

---

Things changed for me that night. My view, my being...but not my purpose. The United States collapsed soon after, but as with any void, it was not lacking for long. A government, fronted by Highpoint’s commander sprung forth almost over night. Arcadia, the great. Arcadia, the loving. Arcadia, the fascist police state. Since its inception, I have endeavored to make myself as boisterous as possible, thus making an even greater target. No longer will I sit silent, hoping that someone else will make the world a better place for me. -Introduction to journal #4 of Victor N. Storms

---

Richmond, Virginia

October 29, 1999

Sitting amongst the late afternoon shadows, he capped his pen and tossed it into the dented metal trash can by the bed. It barely had enough ink left, purple, to finish his intro. One never interested in organization or history, he started almost religiously keeping journals of the events from the night the virus came. Three notebooks later, he was starting on his fourth, and concerned that the information would be lost if he didn’t get up off his dead ass and put it all on disk.

Something cold in the air. It wasn’t that it was winter, the solar panels and generators provided more than enough energy to power the complex that they had assembled over the years. To power the heating. No, this was the kind of tremor he felt the day the clouds rolled in. He had looked out across them and made an off hand comment to a store clerk about a coming storm. One that would be bigger than anything ever seen before. That night, the virus started claiming its victims.

“Death.”

The voice made him look up. It was Helena, one of his most trusted confidants, next to his wife, and their lover. His black glossed lips parted to speak words of question, but he didn’t get to start.

“You look like you’re remembering the dead.” She crossed her arms over her white dress shirt, thrown over a black turtleneck and left unbuttoned. Her shoulder length black hair fell around her face as she looked down, lost in the shadows draped across the floor. For a minute, she half expected them to come...The Wisp. “When I close my eyes, and I think back...like when I was on the roof and I thought you were going to kill your brother, I remember all the people I’ve killed. It’s like, you’re a screamer in a band, and all you’ve ever wanted to do was sing your own songs, but you end up singing covers. One day you wake up, and you don’t wanna scream anymore.”

“People die. Sometimes we kill them, sometimes they kill us...fact of life.” He reached towards his flannel pocket for his cigarettes, and realized he hadn’t put his shirt on when he touched skin. Force of habit. Dropping his notebook on the bedside table, he reached passed and took hold of the pack of Duri that sat precariously on the edge of the bed. “That’s what we are, killers.”

“No.” She shook her head fervently. “That’s what we are forced to do, not what we are.”

“Don’t kid yourself.” He found his Zippo inside the pack and flared one up. “We could be all peaceful and innocent down in the Tribe’s zone, letting Codi and Dani `tect us.” He drew the smoke deep into his lungs as he glanced over his shoulder, out the window and at the snow covered field. They were lucky to have gotten their crop in time. The first freeze of the year nearly caught them off guard. “We are humans, and humans kill people. That’s what we do...that’s what we’ve always done.”

“Untrue, love.”

Now that was another voice all together. That soft, melodic tone of his soulmate. He turned back to take her Asian features, white hair, milk white skin, and aqua green eyes in. Her petite form made her look so much more youthful next to Helena’s slightly muscular, taller frame. “And here she comes, the woman that knows everything about the human species. Why? Because she created it.” He waved towards her and glanced back out the window. “You should have left us all in non-existence.”

“Now, now...you would have just come back in another form. Perhaps a Sainin, or a Vree, or maybe even a...well, you can’t really pronounce their name.” Pandora cocked her head and held her hands up before her face, gesturing as she spoke, as if they were rocking up and down on ocean waves. “It’s sort of like a hum and a whistle all at the same time.”

He shifted his eyes to Helena. “Did you call her up here?”

She shrugged. “This depression of yours is infectious. Everyone is beginning to question whether or not you’re fit for command.”

“Well, what am I supposed to do? I’m not a farmer, and now that the US is gone, and Hanson’s out of the picture, there isn’t anyone else for me to fight.” Vic threw his hands up in disgust. “Hell, I even shot all the Nazis in town.”

“Now that’s you’re short-sightedness.” With a crooked smile, Pandora shook her finger at him. The fishnet top shook across her form like ripples. “You should have saved some for a rainy day. Don’t take that out on them.”

He sat there and let her somewhat humorous words sink in. His crimson hair hung about his pale face, over the patch on his right eye and the black heart tattooed beneath it, over the cheekbone. A deep sigh escape his lips. “Who’s doing what this week?”

“Don’t ask me,” Pandora shrugged. “That’s Sy’s department.” She stepped away from the door and strode through the shadows, her leather jeans creaking as she knelt before him. “Why, what’ve you got in mind?”

Vic Storms’ glanced mischievously over at her. “Let’s start a war.”

“They’re back!” Sy’s heavy footfalls sounded. He was running, trying to put his foot down as fast as he could so he could take another step. “Ring just spotted Loomers out near Gayton and Patterson.” He burst through the door, almost knocking Helena aside.

A smile spread over Vic’s lips, the kind he used to hold framed in his face, before. Grabbing his lineworker boots, he slipped into them and began lacing the twenty-two holes up to just below his knees. “Did you do this? Pull the strings of fate to give me toys with which to play?”

Pandora shook her head. “Twas not I. The Arcadians must possess a purpose of their own.”

Slipping into a black shirt, the collar torn out, and the base ripped to make it almost midriff; Vic made his way over to them. “Well, I’m not exactly sure I like the sound of that. Sy, tell Ring to leave that area and then have Moira take over for you. Get her move back to the old Gayton Crossing shopping center and have her wait for us. Helena, find Norton and get prepped. I want all three of you in vests, or you don’t go.” Helena and Sy just stood there, watching as Pandora, who had reached over to the dresser, fastened a spiked collar around his neck. Sure, it was a little too much. Hell, the lipstick was a little too much, but he always was a little out there. “What’re you waiting for? They’re not gonna send out invites, and I plan to be en route in ten minutes, so move!”

Knowing not to wait around after that, the two spun about, almost bumping into each other, and padded quickly down the stairs. Attracted by the voices, Boots made her way from the office down the hall, where she had been sleeping, and up to his side. She moved around him, and then around Pandora, wagging her tail playfully before she pushed them apart and stood between them.

Pandora looked down at the animal. “Well, aren’t you jealous?” Boots wagged her tail harder in reply. So much so that almost the entire rear half of the dog was swaying back and forth. “She wishes to go.”

He shrugged. “She always has. I don’t plan on leaving her behind now.” The last bit. He plucked his navy blue leather jacket from the back of the door, where it hung on the knob, and slipped into it.

It had been a while since he had worn that particular outfit. Since she had brought him across, his tastes dropped to all black. Perhaps he had been observing a time for mourning the loss of his humanity, what little there was of it at the end of his mortal life. She let her hands run over the leather. Drawing herself closer, one of her nipples, poking through the net shirt, touched the cold zipper, and it excited her. “I remember the first time I saw you like this. Dressed like this, there was a fire in you. It was as if, after years of struggling to look and act a certain way, society’s way, you had discovered your true self.” She looked up at him, felt his hands slide up her body to hold either side of her head, white hair falling around his pale flesh and black nails. “I had thought that fire extinguished when I made you Chosen.”

“I just don’t see why, just to be Chosen, I have to be slaved to humans for the rest of eternity. I hate people.”

“That would be my fault.”

---

Removing themselves from their Jeep, the Highpoint unit moved off of Patterson, close to an abandoned YMCA, and into a nearby wooded area behind a church. They were just a small team of seven, not there for recon or assault, just recovery.

“So, what’re we looking for, captain,” Anders inquired, while trudging through the foot deep snow. “I thought the General Alamar would’ve stripped this place when he pulled his forces out.”

“The Pentagon was under siege, President Barrett’s Highpoint troops were storming the capitol, they didn’t have time to worry about that. He didn’t even have time to get his soldiers back upstate before the flag had fallen.” Karl Filmore studied the device in his hand, measuring the distance from the street and registering the beacon using an Arcadian satellite. No country would use the old United States satellites, renegades had pretty much hacked them. If there was one in orbit, if you could get passed the security protocols, you could change the access codes and have a satellite of your very own. They had brought a few down, but the hackers would just jump to using one they had on back up. The handlink gave out a shrill cry, and Filmore shut it off. “We have what we’re looking for gentlemen.” His eyes moved to fall on Parker. “And lady.” Kneeling down, the church within eyesight from their point, Filmore brushed aside some leaves, revealing an electronic peg pole in the ground. Flipping a cover up and pressing down a button inside, he deactivated the system. The ground in a three by three square meter field before them rippled, and vanished. The leaves, the grass, even the snow was gone, all part of the holographic display.

“I’ll be damned.” Moore glanced around at Ocante, Jansen and Herman. “It really is too bad Storm Front turned Commander Rooke against the president.”

This statement baffled Ocante. “Wait, I didn’t hear this.”

“That’s because you just joined. We’re the special guard. Highpoint, as you know, is like special forces. The longer you’re in, the more behind the scene stuff you hear.” A sound on the nearby street caught Moore’s attention. Scavs were chasing some woman. Everyone froze, and he watched them bring her down, crack her skull with a bat, and then start cutting into her. Dinner. “Anyway,” he started, turning back. “Harley Rooke was Highpoint second in command, when the US still was. She was also President Barrett’s lover. After the Storm Front brought Hanson down, they needed someone else to distract the Pentagon, so she sent Rooke to make a deal with one Victor Tammins...Vic Storms. Instead, they kidnapped Rooke and brainwashed her. Barretttook one of Storms’ people and made a trade, but never knew what had been done to Rooke.” He motioned towards the captain. “Would you like to end the story, sir?”

Filmore winced at the topic. “Rooke, announcing herself as Nicole Storms, shot and killed President Barrettjust after we raised the Arcadian flag over the capitol. She then shot the guard and escaped through the window.” He rubbed his gut. “I was the guard.”

---

Pandora held herself, as Vic had stepped back to take her in, and smoke a cigarette by the ashtray. She had some explaining to do. “As you know, existence, not just this universe, or this reality, goes through spans. It’s like an existential change of seasons. I am from the first span. It was there we were lovers on a world not unlike this one in its warring mindset. Technology was not as advanced as this, however.” She dropped to the floor, controlled, to sit amongst the shadows, where she was comfortable. “When I was a young girl, of what would be fifteen years, a man twice my age rallied in our township. His name was An Seike, and he, like many of our people, were tired with the Jogren. They had conquered our country and were mistreating our people. Though my father forbid it,” she smiled, and glanced over at him; those eyes of hers shimmered in the darkness, “I joined him in his plans, and we went off to overthrow the temporary government that the Jogren had installed.

“There was not much time to rally and organize, for the personnel that would take over and establish the common government were on their way. We had a year at most before they made landfall, and just weeks after that before they arrived. We worked feverishly, and An often fell ill from working all but endless hours, and attending to those in the most squalid of conditions.” Her eyes began to well with tears that swirled darkness, like ink dripped into water and stirred. “Finally, the night for the attack came, and we were a thousand strong. Though silent about it, I had fallen in love with him long before I left my town, and I stayed by his side throughout the entire battle, listening to the sounds of the dying. The music the swords made when they clashed against each other and struck armor, drowning out any chance I had to speak with him. We stormed the castle gates, and nearly a third of our compliment was lost when those on the ramparts began firing arrows down upon us. But still, in the end, we were victorious.”

Vic had fallen back into his chair, and could only see her from the collar up, over the bed. The cigarette was nearly out, and he had all but forgotten it. Killing it in the ashtray, he ignited another. “Then what happened?”

“Given not only symbols, for no woman had ever fought in combat until I, but a grand triumph to stand upon, they chose us to lead them, and we were coronated. An impoverished farm girl and a lout had become queen and king of a realm they only fought to protect from brutality. We marshaled what remained of our forces, and with the victory, many more joined our armies...at least half were women. When the Jogren landed at Canteri on the Northern shores, we were waiting for them in the armor of their own slain warriors. They had no chance, and we drove them back into the sea, without their ships. We had won.

“For a year the land that An and I struggled to save lived peacefully, and the kingdom was flourishing. That’s when it happened. We were poisoned one evening at dinner, by a Jogren sympathizer, and he died in my arms minutes before the poison overwhelmed me as well. A machine man, Niavidar, showed not long after to make us Chosen. Soon enough for me, but too late for An. If he had been but minutes sooner, An would have lived, and I would not have spent billions upon billions of years alone.” She rose from the foot of the bed and climbed onto it, amongst the sheets and blankets, and towards him. “You were An Seike. When I learned about the spans, I knew. Soon the first span would be over, the starfire would grow cold, and the consciousness of all being in existence would coalesce into one god-thing. That’s when the Chosen, such as myself - those that had not learned and grown enough in our being to coalesce - would be sent out in grand craft, to seed the universe with entire species like us, and those that were mixes. The Coalescence might have been able to do such, but that was part of our learning process.

“I found out that you, like so many others that were taken before their time, would return. I discovered Earth, and gave birth to the human species, with other Chosen such as myself. Aries, Ishtar, Frela, Bokranna, Niseer, we were the parents of humanity. I knew you would return, and I would be damned if I let you grow up in a world without technology, after all the good I had seen it do.” She looked down. “Though the myths say it was Prometheus, I was the one that gave mankind fire, and for that, I risked its existence. Niavidar, the commander of our ship, was going to destroy the fledgling humans, and the only way I could get him to stop was to promise my allegiance to the species. To make sure that, because of my actions, humanity would never become extinct.” She placed her head on the pillow and looked down into the shadows between the bed and the table. “All I wanted was for you to be born unto a world that was not cold, and uncaring. Instead, that was exactly the kind of world I made it.” Again, she began to tear. “If they die out, Niavidar will return to kill us both.”

He had never seen her cry before, and now she was doing it twice in only a matter of moments. He was not concerned with her last words, or the thought a Chosen could actually be killed. “Don’t cry.” Setting the cigarette in the ashtray, he leaned forward and touched her cheek. “Love, I couldn’t imagine living without you. If, in order for us to be together, we gotta make sure this species, as shitty as it may be, survives to the next span, then so be it.” Climbing over, he came to lay beside her, wiping the tears away with his fingertips and then licking the dampness from them. “And if this tin-man shows looking to scrap, I’ll send his ass back to Maytag in boxes.”

“Hey, people.” Sy leaned into the room, his dreadlocks hanging over his Caucasian, yet tanned, face. “Think you might want to zip it up and join us?” A pillow flew across the room and knocked him back into the hallway.

---

Leaving the surface behind, Filmore and his troops made their way through the darkness of the concrete surrounded stairwell. “Alright people, spread out. Ocante, find con and see if you can get the main power core on-line. Expect to find dead people here, no one’s been down here since ninety-five.” Coming to an intersecting corridor, he glanced to the left, into the darkness. “Moore, Parker, come with me. We have to find the gas, or this entire mission would be worthless.”

“Gas?” Herman looked up.

“What did you think we were doing here, having a picnic?” He shot Herman an angry look. “We find the gas, like President Raynor wants, and we can avenge the death of President Barrett by wiping out everyone in Richmond...and most of the state. There is no way Storms will be able to escape it.”

---

Emerging from the tunnel between the basement and the bomb-shelter-turned-underground-staging-area, Vic glanced around at the faces of his troops. His friends. Moira, Helena’s sister, was about to speak when he raised his hand to silence her.

“I’ve made my decision. Helena, Sy, Pandora, Norton...” he looked down at Boots, who nuzzled up against his leg. “And Boots are the only ones going with me. Everyone else, hold down the fort, as it were.” Reaching into his jacket, he removed a silver pocket watch, given to him by Sy on his last birthday. Great gift, he always wanted one. Unfortunately, being raised in the digital age, it took him forever to figure out what time it was. Usually he did it for show. “If we’re not back in two hours, contact Codi and Kayne and have them pull together a search party.” He’d learned to count on his older brother’s crew, but Codi and Tribe Darkfall...they were usually better at picking up the pieces. Sy made for his car. “Ott!”

“But...” Sy looked back at him.

“There are six of us, it’s snowing, we take two cars...and not one of them is the nine-eleven.” He motioned for the Jeep. “You and Norton are in Helena’s ride, Pandora and I are taking my car.”

“You know,” Sy stepped back from his car, taking his hand from around the handle. “...Sometimes you really suck.”

“And I even swallow on occasion, but you still have a problem believing that I’m bi. What’s it been now? Eight years since I told you? ” Vic slipped his hands into his gloves as he made for his car. “Alright, who here doesn’t believe that I’m bi?”

Sy dropped his face into his hands. “Do we really have to make this part of public discussion? I’m straight, you’re straight...we’re all one big, straight, happy family.” Vic stopped by Sy and flared up another smoke, a laugh welling up within him that was so fierce, he could barely keep the flame on the end of the cigarette to light it. “And would you put that damned cigarette out?!”

Within minutes, they had made it to their cars and were on their way up the ramp to the surface. Good, hydraulic system that Vic had paid a few engineers and workers to put together in turn for feeding and clothing them for five years. They made it through the gate, Vic’s nineteen seventy, calypso coral Boss 302 Mustang sliding a little when he put his foot down.

“You enjoy pestering him, don’t you?” Pandora leaned back in the passenger’s seat, her foot up on the dash. A cigarette hung from her lips as she loaded her pistol.

“You know the answer to that, love. It’s part of the relationship. He’s my best friend, he bugs me about smoking, I bug him about everything else. It’s a good balance.” He leaned forward and picked the hands free headset from the hook under the dash. “Wheel.” Taking his hands off of it for a moment, he slid the headset on while she steered them from the passenger’s seat. “Thanks.” He took control back as she went for her own headset. “Oh mister straight edge.” She looked at him out of the corner of her eyes, stifling a laugh.

“Can’t you just leave me alone,” Sy’s voice came in over the speakers loud and clear. “Radio check...colors.”

“Green here.” That was Helena’s voice.

“White...lily, of course.” Sy.

“Gold.” Norton.

“Black.” Pandora.

“Red,” Vic finished out. “Wizard, you there?”

Static for a second, then Moira came on-line. “Wizard here.”

“Grab me an uplink through Mako’s people and see if you can get them to give you codes for a sat with a good thermal imaging system.” He looked out at the snow, the car fishtailing a little as it pulled out on Patterson. “With this weather, they should be lit up like a forest fire.”

The Mustang led the way down Patterson, moving West, Jeep following. The sun had vanished, and the snow’s reflective surface produced a calming blue-white light from the moon that seemed to cast itself on almost all. Engines notwithstanding, all was still, even the trees were not interested in even the slightest bit of sway, and it was near-impossible to comprehend that this world was one of chaos.

---

The lights flickered for a moment before coming up. There were bodies, just like Filmore had predicted. Most of them had been hidden by the darkness, but the stench of mildew and corpses was unmistakable. They had killed themselves. Even down in a sealed underground facility, there had been no escape from the virus.

Her gun in her lap, Parker looked up at the source of the illumination, and then back down to Filmore as his fingeres played over the keys. A loud metal “klang” and the locks drew back into their housing. The thick metal door retracted, and Moore walked over to stand beside it, waiting for it to finish.

“Go on, it’s in a thin, circular containment pod,” Filmore said as he motioned towards the open door. “I’ll monitor from here.”

Moore raised an eyebrow and smiled. “Oh, yeah...make me the guinea pig.”

“Hey, I’m the commander of this mission...you go first.” He snickered to himself.

“So,” started Parker. “What do you wanna do when you when you get out, captain?”

Whirling around, Filmore glanced back at her and smiled, his arms crossed. “I’m a lifer. I’m not going anywhere.” He checked the monitors. “What’re you going to do?”

“Thinking about being a teacher. Grading papers late at night, dealing with little kids running around the room and throwing spitballs.”

“Really?” He looked back at her. “A teacher? What about a family? A husband?”

A mischievous smile appeared on her lips. “Is that a proposal?”

He chuckled to himself. “I don’t think I’d make a good husband.”

“Yeah, well on my side, not too many guys are interested in marrying a woman trained to kill with her bare hands.” She looked off. “Just one of those things. You make one decision and it negates thirty more.”

“Stop that. You’re more than a catch. Any sane man would be happy to have you.”

“Well, in that case...” She looked back at him. “Care to go out this weekend?”

He pointed at her and nodded his head. “You, lieutenant, have a date. Off-book, of course.”

“Got it.” Moore held it up before his chest, in plain view. “Thing’s cold as hell...and it gives me the shivers in more way than one.”

Reaching to his collar, Filmore took a little black circle between his thumb and forefinger and pulled it up. The mic wire extended. “Alright people, we have the package, withdraw. Cobra, stay in position.”

Moore cocked his head, his face overcome by curiosity as he handed the pod to Filmore. “Cobra?”

“Insurance.”

---

The images lighted up the twenty-five monitors around her. They were all either television sets or computer monitors attached to a net of black painted, welded grillwork.

There were views from security systems around the walls, inside the buildings, even down the streets. Moira keyed in the sequence and pulled up an old sat that had been quietly put in orbit for the SDI project. They may have never brought it to fruition, but they placed enough satellites in orbit to be of use before the project had been shelved for political reasons. On another monitor, she came up with a three dimensional image of the city, and the locations of the satellite she wanted. “Lovely.” A few keystrokes and she had the coordinates. Now she just had to alter the attitude.

Blues and reds coursed over the screen. This was realtime...she could see the Mustang and Jeep moving through the snow, the bodies in the cars, the heat from the tracks, engines, and exhaust systems. The adrenaline started pulsing through her. “This is so cool,” she whispered. With the track ball, she adjusted the focus of the image and drew back to give herself a wider view. “Okay...” Patting herself down, she found a piece of grape gum and unwrapped it, popping it into her mouth as she pulled her headset up.

There was nothing as of yet. She could see the two cars moving up and down the hills of Patterson, although from that far back, she really couldn’t tell they were hills. But there was no one else, it was as if... “Gotcha.” She zoomed in on a heat signature, far lighter than the rest, moving up Patterson directly towards Vic and the others. “Why are you so pale a sig?” She mulled that one over for a moment, chewing her bottom lip. “Unless...you’re prepared for us to have access to this kind of tech.

“Red, this is Wizard; we have Loomers trying to put the make on you, but I don’t think they know it yet. Five miles West of your current point.” She checked out the image, and zoomed again as they grew closer. “Looks like they’re tracking for the I.”

---

“I’ll be damned if I’m gonna let them get to the interstate,” he said to Pandora, covering his mic. “You better hold on tight.” She nodded as he accelerated, the rear wheels spinning violently, tossing snow out in all directions as they struggled for the traction they desired. Caught. The Jeep accelerated as well, yet maintained a safe enough distance to avoid an accident should the car spin out.

They were close, and as the Mustang moved up the steep hill towards the point where Patterson intersected with another main road, Parham, Vic switched his lights off. The Highpoint Jeep, however, was the first to reach the top of the hill, and it began its turn across the lanes inhabited by Vic and his people.

Vic slammed his foot down on the brake and yanked the wheel, sending the car sliding through the snow sideways. There was a bone-breaking crash as the Boss was hit broadside by the Highpoint truck. Pandora, not wearing her belt, was thrown into Vic and her gun went off, blowing a hole in the windshield as the two vehicles separated and spun off from each other, coming to rest nearly nose-to-nose.

A groan. Not one of pain, but one of anger. “Never a traffic cop when you need one.” Kicking the door open, Vic stepped from his car and pulled his pistols, a nickel-plated forty-five he had taken from a gun shop on his way to Richmond, and a blued forty-five his uncle had given him before he died. Jumping onto the hood, he walked across and hopped up on the hood of the Jeep. With Anders in the seat beside him, impaled on the barrel of his rifle, Moore had slumped against the steering wheel, shaking himself from unconsciousness. With the nickel-plated pistol, Vic rapped on the windshield. “Knock, knock?” Slowly, Moore took hold of the wheel and started to push himself up. Locking eyes with Vic, he knew he was doomed. Pressing the barrels to the windshield, the crimson-haired youth let loose a pair of rounds from each. “Never mind, I see you’re sleeping.”

“Vic!”

Glancing back, he saw Pandora holding Boots in her arms, the animal’s back twisted in a horrifically unnatural manner. There was the shock. The silver veil quickly followed by black that covered his vision; flecks of stars as his breathing became erratic. He couldn’t think straight. “Help her!”

“I can’t!”

He sprung from the hood and walked over to stand before Pandora. “Help her damn you, or I’ll...”

“You’ll what?!” She looked at him, her eyes glowing fiercely. “All I have left is enough for one. If I bring her across, I can never do it again. No Sy, no Helena, no one!”

He pondered that for a moment. Helena and the others pulled up just as the back of the Highpoint jeep burst open, Filmore and the others jumping out. “Do it,” he yelled, as he spun around.

Norton jumped down from the back of the Jeep, the mini gatling gun weighing heavily on him as he fought to keep from slipping. He let off a burst that ripped across the back of the Highpoint Jeep, cutting Ocante almost in half. Filmore dropped to the ground and trained his pistol on Norton, putting him down with a relatively quick shot to the skull.

Everyone scattered. Helena and Sy picked their targets and went after them. Sy unleashed a multitude of rounds from his Mac-10 as the snow fell around them. The shots caught Jansen across the back of the left leg, which gave as he placed all of his weight on it, and he went down into the snow. His gun skittered away, vanishing beneath the shelf of white powder as Sy quickly made his way to stand over the man, and emptied his clip in Jansen’s back.

Pulling the clip out and tossing it aside, he quickly reloaded and glanced around to see Helena take a shot in the shoulder. She stumbled back, giving him a clear line of fire at Herman. Suddenly, Boots lunged from nowhere and set her teeth full into Herman’s side. The man fell to the ground and trained his pistol on the animal. So close that he could press it against her skull, he pulled the trigger and Boots was thrown back and through the snow. Oh shit... That was the first thing that entered Sy’s mind, and he glanced around to see if Vic or Pandora had seen it. They had, and he knew he was in trouble. Instead, he was stunned to see them clapping. Insane. The dog had been killed, people were dying all around them, Parker and Filmore were escaping, literally behind their backs, and they were clapping. He brought his eyes back to Boot’s body. Or rather, where it had been. A quick visual search and he could see the source of their apparent joy. Boots was up and on her feet, tearing at Herman, who was doing all he could to shoot the beast. It was then that Sy knew she was now like them.

Vic spun around and darted after Filmore, pistol in hand. Sure, he could’ve just shot him, but he was carrying the containment pod for the gas out in the open. Vic, for one, was smart enough not to shoot in the direction of anything of apparent military origin that he had yet to identify. Pandora went after Parker with the same zeal, but more to get answers from a living subject should her love get over enthusiastic, as he sometimes did. Springing forth, Vic brought Filmore down, but the man kept his hold on the pod, clenching it tightly against his chest. He fought with his feet, kicking Vic’s blued pistol away and giving him a good shot to the face with his steel-toed boots. Scrambling for his gun, Vic released Filmore, allowing him time to get to his feet. Marking it as a temporarily lost cause, Vic drew himself upright and brought forth his other pistol.

Far enough away to feel safe, Filmore let go of the pod with one hand and brought his own pistol forth, blowing a hole through Vic’s chest and knocking him off his feet. Smiling to himself as the Highpoint officer turned back around to continue his escape.

“Oh yoo-hoooo.”

Stopped in his tracks, he started to glance over his shoulder in time to see Vic rise up behind him. “Damn...” Not even a vest would’ve done any good against those rounds, he thought, as his pistol slipped from his grasp.

“`Scuse me for sounding stuck up...” Vic looked up at him, staring from the top of his eye, a grin so fiendish that he should have had it trademarked spread over his black painted lips. Pandora was standing behind him, holding Parker by the neck, with one of her arms bent around behind her back. “It’s times like this...” Raising his right index finger, Vic pressed it into the hole in his chest and wiggled it around. “...That make me feel a little holier than thou.”

“Shit.” The words barely made it past Filmore’s lips, and he did nothing but watch as Vic took Parker from his love and pulled his other gun.

The bodies lay all around, the Highpoint Jeep in flames, scorching the Mustang as they moved closer. Vic looked up, Parker in his arms, his pistol pressed tightly from behind, against the flesh over her left kidney. “Toss the containment pod over here,” he ordered, eyes fixed on Filmore. “Do it and I’ll let you walk back to Arcadia alive.”

“I know about you. You brainwash delegates of peace and have them kill their commanders. You slaughter all those that don’t agree with your dogma!” Filmore pressed his hand against the triggering mechanism, prepared to unleash the gas and kill them all. “You’ll never let us leave here alive!”

“I do not lie,” he said sternly. “Give me the pod and you have freedom, or don’t give it to me, I kill her slowly, and then you kill us all. Your choice.” He shrugged. “But if you don’t think fast, I’m just gonna pull the damned trigger to get this all over with.”

He hesitated, then flipped the mechanism off and held his hands up. “Okay...okay, damnit.”

Vic pulled his gun from Parker’s back. “Count of three...two...one.” Simultaneously, he shoved Parker towards Filmore, and Filmore tossed the pod to Helena. Smiling, Vic holstered his pistol and waved them off. “Go on. Go home to a warm bed.” Watching him carefully, Filmore began to back up, holding Parker close by his side. They went about this for a moment before turning about and running off. “Wait a minute...” Vic raised his hand, and although they could not see it with their backs turned, they froze. “...Silly me, I said you could go free, not the woman.”

Pandora’s eyes flared and she raised her hand. No words, just movement. The Wisp rose from the darkness around Filmore and Parker. Ancient beings, existing long before even those of the first span, they were the shadows themselves. Shapeless, save when summoned, whereupon they took the form of hulking, hunched beasts...the things of nightmares. They tore Parker from Filmore’s tight grip, and proceeded to rip at Parker, rending flesh and splintering bones, until she was scattered about them, red stains and meat on the fresh snow. His mind shattered, Filmore stumbled back, running as fast and as hard as he could in any direction he though The Wisp would not be.

She shifted her eyes to fall on him. “He won’t stop until he drops dead. Running that fast, in this weather, his lungs will...”

“I know.” He smiled. “Doesn’t it just make you all warm to think about?”

Sy shook his head. “Sometimes you two are really fucked up. I mean really-really fucked up.”

“Why Sy...” He turned around to gaze upon his friend. “What a kind thing to say.”

“C’mon,” Pandora said, trudging back towards the car through the snow. “Let’s get Norton loaded into the Jeep before he freezes up like road kill. We still have to stop by Gayton to get Ring...poor thing’ll catch her death if she stays out all night.”

The spotlight came up, and Cobra, a Highpoint gunship, rose up over the trees and buildings down Parham. The light played across them as the chain guns rattled off rounds. Sy grabbed Helena and dragged her off through the snow and across a guardrail, dropping down into a parking lot just off to the side of the steep hill. There was a small, open-air mall, most of the stores long-since looted, left as burnt out shells.

“Let’s go!” He pulled on her harder, but she was fighting him.

“What about them?!”

He stopped for an instant and looked up at the gunship hovering almost directly overhead. “They can take care of themselves. If anyone needs protecting, it’s us.”

“I’m not leaving them. I’m not leaving him!”

But as she pulled free, he took a deep breath of the frigid air and grabbed her by the shoulder. “Helena, wait.” She turned back around, and he brought his fist burning across her cheek. She crumpled, leaving him to shake out his hand. “What do you know...a glass jaw.” Wincing, he continued working his bare fingers in the cold. “Felt like stone, though.”

Above, the snow was thrown into the air in clouds as the bullets rattled across the ground. Both Vic and Pandora took more than their share of shots of the high caliber rounds, lifting them into the air and hurling them backwards. They struck the ground, meters away.

“Tell President Raynor that we have a positive ident on Vic and Pandora Storms. They are both dead.” This the pilot announced into his mic as he manipulated the control stick to bring the helio around. His new focus was Sy, who was dragging Helena towards a broken carpet store. It, too, had been looted, and the pilot couldn’t help wondering to himself who would steal carpet samples. “Moving in on targets Sy Martone and Helena Black. Prepare to scratch two more, base.” His co-pilot tapped him on the shoulder and then motioned across his chest in their previous direction. The pilot’s eyes widened as he brought the gunship back around.

With Pandora coming to her feet not far behind him, Vic lunged into the air, over the long drop to the parking lot below and towards the gunship, pistols blazing. The sairs canopy couldn’t withstand the temperature and the close-range shots together, and it shattered like fine crystal.

“Well,” said Vic, as he held the co-pilot back with his foot and pressed his pistol into the pilot’s chest. “...This just isn’t a good day for Highpoint, now is it?” The pilot sat there, afraid to move; his smug attitude was gone. Vic moved closer to his face, as if he were going to kiss him. Instead, he just licked his lips and brought them closer to the mic. Meanwhile, the helio jerked up and back, sweeping over the parking lot and the buildings, over the trees and out of control. “Command, this is Vic Storms. Tell Milton Raynor ‘hello’ for me, and say good-bye to these fine young pilots.”

“Please,” the pilot stuttered. “I have a wife.”

“No,” Vic began, pulling back the hammer, “you have a widow.”

Pandora watched the gunship vanish from sight behind the trees, and shortly thereafter, balls of flame and smoke climbed skyward a hundred feet.

It took a good ten minutes - his leather in tatters, not that such hadn’t happened before, and his hair was hanging haphazardly about his face - before he made his way back to the car. Pandora had backed it away from the Highpoint Jeep, Helena and Sy were gone, having taken Norton’s body.

He stopped by the back of the Mustang and lit up, Boots laying in the snow and Pandora sitting in the driver’s seat, door open. “It’s days like this that make me feel all warm and tingly inside.”

Pandora raised a playful eyebrow and pointed to his smoldering jacket. “That’s because you’re still on fire, love.”

He shrugged. “You wanna drive?”

“I would if the car would start again.”

A frown fell across his face. “Engine died, huh?”

“Yes.”

“And in billions upon billions...”

“...Upon eons,” she added.

“...Of years, you haven’t figured out how to fix a car?”

Now it was her turn to shrug. She motioned at Boots. “I live almost indefinitely, I resurrect people, I’m one of the few, including yourself, with the ability to contact The Wisp.” She shifted her focus to him. “What do you want from me? Miracles?” She snapped her fingers and the shadows came alive nearby. When they had receded, a black sports car, had been brought into view.

“Charlie Sheen would be envious.” He had seen the car before; the first day he met her, during his thirteenth year. He lost his virginity to her in that car, and had seen it destroyed and reappear more times than he could count. He wasn’t sure, only speculation, but he was rather certain that the vehicle was comprised of technologies and metals one would not find on Earth. Call it a hunch. “So, we gonna get Ring?

“It’s going to be cramped,” she said, pushing herself upright. “She sits in your lap.”

“Fine with me.” That grin again.

“I know...”