Out of the Box 7 - Sea Change (18 page)

She bumped against the cold concrete wall and ran her palm over the rough surface texture as she tried to rein in her breathing. She couldn’t hear over the sound of her frightened breaths, coming one by one, ragged, as she stared into the dark unknown. That lone light had winked out suddenly, and all she could see was that the tunnel curved somewhere ahead.

Her eyes played across the dimly lit ground, the sunlight fading the deeper into the tunnel she looked. The raised rails were evident, but somewhere ahead had to be—

She saw the shadowed lump on the ground, the human-sized figured draped across the tracks, and she started to move without thinking it over first.
Sienna
, she thought, recognizing the wider hips of the body turned on its side, draped over one of the rails, insensate—

She heard the sound of a foot scuffing across the concrete just in front of her a second before Redbeard landed a punch to her temple that sent her staggering sideways. Kat’s cheek hit the rail. What little light there was faded out, going black as she slipped unconscious.

Scott was pretty sure he was going to break something, and soon. He wasn’t exerting any actual muscles to keep MacArthur Park Lake from draining into the giant abyss that had opened underneath it, but it felt like he was at serious risk of being dragged into the ground by the sheer volume of the weight of water he was holding up. From where he stood on the concrete quay, he had a feeling that that the ground beneath him wasn’t exactly stable, but he felt so drained, so taxed by what he was doing that the thought of even walking a few steps to get the hell away from the sucking hole in the ground that led into the tunnel below seemed impossible.

“Nice lift, bro,” someone said from behind him, and Scott wondered if it was Guy Friday. The sky was bright, and yet the world was dark around him, like the exertion was causing him to squeeze off the blood vessels in his brain. “What is that, like a hundred thousand gallons?”

“Something … like … that …” Scott muttered through lips he could barely force apart. The entirety of MacArthur Park Lake wanted to rush out to find its level, which was down in those tunnels. He couldn’t hold all that water, no chance.

But he could hold the foot or so at the giant gaping hole in the lakebed, pressing the molecules so tightly together that only a trickle could slip through into the tunnels.

Maybe.

It felt as though he was lifting, though, didn’t it? Like he had a train on his back, as though he was testing his meta strength by physically lifting a car. His head felt like it was going to explode, like it was going to blow off—like that guy Sienna had kicked in the back so hard his skull blew up. At the time, Scott had sort of admired that—from a strictly detached point of view, of course.

Now, though, he had a certain newfound respect for that poor bastard.

“What are you gonna do, bro?” the voice asked again. It felt like someone was reaching into his chest now, squeezing his heart, like Redbeard had come up here, unnoticed, and just put a hand through his chest and was casually giving it a hard clamping. “Kind of a big concrete pond here. That’s a lot of water. You think you can lift it all?”

“No,” Scott murmured, feeling the water pressing tighter as gravity fought against his efforts. It was just so much water. So much water. An ocean, practically. And if it had just been a normal pond, with banks that went right up to the edge in a gentle slope, maybe he could have made it rise up the bank a little. But, no, MacArthur Park had to have a nice little concrete edging all the damned way around, a whole drought-induced foot of empty space that he’d have to make the water climb if he wanted to move it out like he’d done—hopefully—to the subway tunnel.

He had done that. He could feel it. He’d reached in and scooped the water out, impossibly, like he’d turned back the tide at the ocean’s edge—which was a thing he’d never tried, but was pretty sure he couldn’t do.

Or could I?

Scott felt the rising pressure, like the whole ocean had settled on his shoulders, and he knew what he had to do. Water always found its level, and it was damned sure trying to go down right now. He could feel the pressure, the exertion, and knew that somewhere down there, below the water he was barely holding back, were Kat and Sienna.

How do I hold back this water?

How do I … get rid of this water?

“You look like you’re ready to collapse,” the voice said. Scott heard it clearly even as the world seemed to fade around him, and he was not entirely sure he wasn’t talking to himself. “What are you going to do, bro?”

“I need to … get rid … of this water,” he said, eyes fluttering as he struggled to stay conscious. It felt like everything was slipping out of his grasp.

“No reservoirs for miles. Just lots of houses, stores—you know, places where people live, schools, all that. You start pulling the water out and rolling it down Wilshire, you’re gonna see a lot of people drown. Cure’s worse than the disease, bro.”

“Stop calling me bro,” Scott said, and he hit his knees, the concrete hard, echoing in dual shocks of pain down his shins as the weight of the water threatened to drag him into the abyss. It loomed below, so dark and inviting. All he had to do was take a step off, into the water’s loving embrace, and it’d be done … “I need help.”

“I dunno, bro. This town’s pretty dry. Been a long time since the rain, you know what I mean? The
air
doesn’t feel like it has a drop of moisture anywhere in it …”

“Reed,” Scott whispered, a faint idea forming somewhere in there, at the mere thought of the name.
If Reed were here, he could help me …

…
help me …

… how could Reed help me? It’s water, not …

… there’s no water in the air.

0% humidity.

But … air can take water.

And I can—

—if I can take water from the air, maybe I can—

He came to his feet in a rush, dragging in a breath as he pulled water from MacArthur Lake into his fingers, into his skin, and expelling it out a little at a time in a mist through his mouth.

Too slow
, he thought.

Way too slow.

But maybe I can—

Can I …?

No way to know unless you try.

And slowly, painfully slowly, Scott lifted his hands and watched the first layers of moisture start to lift off MacArthur Park Lake like a fog, rolling over the edges of the concrete basin that kept them contained, as easily as if Reed himself were steering the moisture away.

“Looks like we’ve got a Kat-a-comb here,” Redbeard said in a low, whispered voice right into Kat’s ear as she woke up, catching his little pun as she stirred back to motion. She stiffened as she realized her danger, and he punched her in the back, a hard fist to the kidney that drove her face into the ground, bloodying her lip from the impact. “Ah ah ah.”

“Ow,” Kat said, a faint gasp in the dark. The light was occluded from above now, like clouds had moved over the sun, blotting out hope with it. She could feel warm, sticky blood on her forehead, at the beginning of her hairline and rolling down her temple as if syrup had been poured down her face.

“Did I hurt you?” Redbeard asked. He didn’t sound sorry. “Good. You should feel it.”

“What did I ever do to you?” Kat asked, her voice shaking more from pain than fear. She’d helped face down the world-ending threat of Sovereign and his hundred lackeys, after all. This guy was a punk with an aversion to shaving.

“What didn’t you do to me?” Redbeard asked, yanking her to her feet, twisting her arm and forcing her up painfully. “What didn’t you and your kind and your friends—what didn’t you do to me?” He spun her around and shoved an invisible hand through her throat. “You took everything, that’s all. You heroes. That’s what you think you are, isn’t it?”

“I’m not a hero,” Kat said, swallowing, as though she could feel the intangible presence of the fist that was passing through her skin as easily as if it had no mass at all, as if her throat were not even present to stop it. “I’m just a—”

“You’re right about the ‘not a hero’ part,” Redbeard said with a snort, his foul breath hitting her in the face. His face was a mess, blood dripping down and making dark spots in his beard and mustache. “But people think you are, don’t they? In World War II, you know how many celebrities joined the army? You couldn’t even count them all, and I’m not even talking about Audie Murphy. It’s not like that anymore, though, is it? You’re all cowards, safely lecturing behind your podiums in your air conditioned rooms and benefit galas and Twitter accounts, and if you go overseas to see how the rest of the world lives, it’s with a dozen bodyguards to protect you from the locals.” He sneered. “How many little girls are watching you now? How many want to be you? They look around the world and they don’t see Malala Yousafzai and look to her for example—they look at you, you hog. You sun-blocking cancer—”

“Sunblock prevents cancer,” Kat said evenly, unwilling to give Redbeard the satisfaction of thinking he had her in any way rattled.

“They think you and Kim Kardashian are the way, the truth, and the damned light!” Redbeard said, pushing her against the sloped wall of the tunnel. “You sell yourselves like whores, open up your lives and present what you do as some glorious version of reality when really, you’re selling them a bill of goods. You and Hollywood, you’re all false, liars, holding up ideals you don’t espouse, your perfect lens and your Photoshopped pictures making everyone think you’re flawless and great when really there are no heroes left out here in Hollywood—”

“Step away from her!” The shout echoed down the tunnel, and Kat turned her head to see Steven Clayton with a gun his hands, standing just down the tunnel, a million gallons of water over his head, a little dribbling down on him like he was filming a scene in the rain. His pants were covered in dust and behind him in the dark she could see a small mountain of debris where the tunnel had fallen in on the tracks.
He must have climbed it
, she thought.

“Steven,” Kat breathed a sigh. “Where did you come from?”

“MacArthur Station,” he said, taking careful aim at Redbeard. “Back away from her.”

“Lol.” Redbeard actually said, like it was a word. “Where’d you get that? The prop department?”

“I said step away,” Clayton edged a little closer.

“Or you’ll what?” Redbeard leered. “Shoot me?”

Clayton’s features were barely visible in the dark, but his lovely mouth was a hard line. “Yep.” He dipped the gun barrel low and fired a string of shots that made Kat jump in fear, the flashes lighting up the tunnel and echoing with deafening noise.

When the sound and light faded, Redbeard was on the ground, grunting in pain. “You … son of a …!” He was fumbling for the bottoms of his feet.

Steven fired again, one last time, a seventh shot, and Redbeard screamed in pain, his shoulder bleeding profusely.

Kat stared down at him, watching him writhe, the bottoms of his feet bleeding from circular-shaped wounds that tore right through the soles of his shoes. “How’d you know?” she asked Steven, but he was already snaking his way down the tunnel, taking a wide dogleg around Redbeard.

“Move away from him!” Steven said, beckoning her. He was moving steady, his gun still clutched in one hand, the slide racked back. It was a small one, smaller than the full-sized ones she had used when she was with the agency. He picked his way carefully over the rails and hurried down the tunnel. Kat followed him, not daring to be left behind with Redbeard, who was stretched across the tracks, writhing and crying softly in pain.

“Where did you get the gun?” Kat asked, catching up to him as he stopped in the middle of the tunnel.

“What?” Steven’s head snapped around and he glanced down at the pistol in his hand. “Oh. I don’t have bodyguards, and I got a stalker threat last year, so I got a permit.”

“That’s yours?” Kat looked at him in disbelief then turned to look back down the tunnel at Redbeard, who was on his knees now, hand pressed against his chest.

“Yeah, it’s a .380,” Steven said, kneeling down. “Doesn’t exactly have the knockdown of the 9mm, but I was worried about a crazy lady from Fresno who thought we were supposed to be together forever and couldn’t understand why I had a date with Taylor Swift. I didn’t think I’d be going up against a metahuman.” He fumbled in the dark, and she realized he was crouched over Sienna, running his hands over her. He stopped as he found what he was looking for. “This, on the other hand …” he squinted in the dark. “Ooh, CZ Shadow II. Fancy.” He stood and brandished Sienna’s gun, pointing it at Redbeard in the dark. “It’s even got the tritium sights. I’m surprised the government sprang for one of these; I was thinking about getting one after my next movie gets done, sort of a reward thing. You know if she rolls with hollow points?”

“What?” Kat stared at him with her mouth slightly agape.

“Hollow points,” Steven said, keeping the pistol leveled at Redbeard, who was now almost back to his feet, though he was still clutching at himself. “You know what? Never mind.”

“You know what?” Redbeard said with a rasp. “I never liked your films.”

“That’s a really chilling insult from a guy who goes around trying to murder women he doesn’t even know,” Steven said, looking down the sights with both eyes open. “That’s the sort of review that’s going to haunt me for hours. I’ll be taking a shower and it’ll be like a PTSD flashback—remember that time the guy with the crazy red ’stache and beard told me he didn’t like my movies? Way, way worse than that time my best friend died in a crab fishing accident.”

“I’m going to kill you now, too,” Redbeard said calmly.

“I’m gonna fill your feet with enough holes that you won’t be able to confuse them with the marks of crucifixion anymore,” Steven said sharply, “you ginger loser. Your martyr complex is so staggering that the old joke applies—you know what the difference is between you and God?”

“Shut up,” Redbeard warned, standing a little limply, the water still suspended over his head. Kat prayed for Scott to drop it, all at once, just to wash him away.