Shedding Light On The Shadows ch 5
Jessie pushed harder on the accelerator, glancing nervously at the speedometer. Eighty . . . eighty five . . . ninety. . . . she hit the brake to twist around a curve, then pushed back down on the gas as the car straightened out again. In the passenger seat January held on to the door handle with one hand, squinting into the dark night and trying to see if there were other cars on the road. Dana had to be somewhere around here.
The phone rang and January fished it out of Jessie’s backpack, leaving the other girl free to drive. “What?” she said sharply, still scanning the street ahead.
“You have Dana yet? We have more problems,” came Hadji’s voice over the phone.
January scowled. “We’re in pursuit. Have you contacted Jonny and Feb?”
January could almost hear the shake of Hadji’s head on the other side. “No. They’re not answering the phone. Something must be wrong, and we’ve got trouble here too. Come back as soon as you can.”
“Wait wait,” January said before Hadji had a chance to hang up. “Lemme see if I can get a hold of Feb myself.”
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February looked nervously at Jonny, who sat next to her in the back seat of the plain black Sedan. “What now?” she mouthed. Jonny shrugged. They’d been pulled over some time back by two of the three FBI agents that had come to the door earlier, told that the agents needed some questions answered, and then promptly were loaded into the back of the car. There wasn’t much the teens could do about it either, except hope these two were on the up and up.
Feb? came the hesitant voice in the young woman’s head. She breathed a sigh of relief.
Here, J. What’s wrong?
Hadji’s been trying to get a hold of you, and we got worried. We’re after Dana now, so please turn back and go home--it sounds like Hadj could use your help.
February smiled humorlessly, earning a questioning look from Jonny. “It’s my sister,” she mouthed. He nodded. J, I can’t head home right now. We may be in some trouble ourselves--we were pulled over by those agents and they’re taking us somewhere for questioning. Isn’t that illegal if we’re underage and our parents aren’t here?
She could feel the mental shrug travel down their mental link. I don’t know. Maybe, if it’s something that could harm you in any way. But I don’t know. There was silence for a minute, then holler if you need help.
I will, February answered, and broke off the contact. “They found Dana,” she mouthed to Jonny. He nodded again and settled back.
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Dana was almost sitting on the handle of the door as she did her best to stay away from the Madrox thing. He, for the most part, ignored her completely. Which was fine with Dana. She turned to glance at him and got glared at. She looked quickly away as her terror mounted further.
So far her luck didn’t seem to be getting any worse--though it wasn’t much better, either. They were driving through a city, which she supposed was good, but there had been no chance for escape. Call her crazy, but she didn’t relish the thought of jumping out of a moving car. Though her options seemed to be getting rather limited, and she was scared to death.
Madrox frowned as cars started pulling off the road to the sound of sirens, and he pulled over himself. Swiftly he glanced at Dana, but she seemed too horror-stricken to make a move.
As the car rolled to a stop, however, and the ambulance raced past, Dana suddenly found the courage Madrox had thought her lacking. Her fingers already on the handle, all she had to do was pull it and throw her weight on the door, flinging it open. Her sharp claws made quick work of the seatbelt that held her in, and she leapt out the door and onto the sidewalk even as the ambulance was racing away. She tripped on the frame of the car, but caught herself gracefully with her hands and was up on her feet in no time at all.
The agent shouted at her, having trouble getting his own seatbelt off and opening the door as Dana ran past startled pedestrians. Madrox vaulted over the hood of the car, racing after her and shoving people out of the way.
Dana glanced back once, saw him gaining and started screaming.
Madrox swore as a crowd started to gather, hindering his path. “Someone stop that girl!” he finally shouted, pulling a fake badge, “she’s a wanted criminal!” At that people started clearing a path for him, though no one tried to get in Dana’s way.
She kicked off her shoes as she ran, feeling the concrete with her small, padded feet. The tiny claws on each foot slid out, gripping the pavement even more and allowing her greater leverage. “Help!” she screamed, terror adding a tremor that couldn’t be faked to her voice. “That man is my--my uncle,” she stuttered, twisting around to stand in the midst of teenage boys, “and he beats me and he wants me to sell my body and I don’t want to, and--” she sobbed, the story fake but the fear radiating from every pore real.
As she had hoped, the boys surrounded her, forming a shield against the Madrox clone.
“Dammit,” he snarled, holding his gun at his side, “She’s lying. She’ll do anything to keep from going to jail.” If at all possible, he didn’t want to shoot the kids. That would cause too much of a ruckus.
Dana stood behind six of the boys, the three others holding her back and trying to calm her down as she sobbed hysterically.
“You don’t want to be charged with aiding and abetting a criminal, do you?” he snapped, watching with satisfaction as a few of the boys seemed to waver.
Then Dana got louder, frantically pulling at the three boys’ shirts and trying desperately to make them believe her. “No, no that’s not right, I didn’t do anything I *didn’t*! You can’t let him take me you can’t please don’t he’ll try and kill me, oh God please don’t let him take me--” she cried, her voice carrying a clearly heard edge of hysteria.
The few boys who had started to waver changed their minds, Dana’s own plea far more heartfelt then that of the “cop.”
Madrox clenched his jaw as it became clear that the teens weren’t going to let him get to Dana. Quickly he brought his gun up, firing at the nearest boy and hearing Dana scream. He hadn’t counted on the area he was in, however, and the other boys pulled out their own guns and fired.
Madrox went down with three bullet holes in his body, landing close to the teenager he’d just shot himself.
The eight boys left looked around quickly, sheathing their guns and running off, pulling Dana along.
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“What happened here?” January asked, pulling up behind the ambulance that sat there, spreading blood red light on the ground.
“Some guy was trying to take a girl, and there was a shoot-out. The man’s still alive, barely, and the kid he shot is already on the way to the hospital,” a man answered quickly. “I know, I saw it all happen.”
January looked at him in slight disgust. He was proud of the fact that he’d been near trouble and hadn’t helped.
“What did the girl look like?” Jessie asked, elbowing in between the man and January.
“Pretty, from what I saw. Black hair, long. Skinny little thing, absolutely terrorized.”
Jessie turned to look at January. “That sounds like Dana. Long black hair, skinny little thing.” She turned back again to look at the man. “Where did they go?”
He pointed down the street. “That way.”
Jessie nodded and ran back to the car, buckling her seatbelt as January got in the other side. “How do we find her? You know she could be anywhere by now, especially if she’s scared,” Jessie asked, frowning.
January shook her head slowly. “I don’t know. Start driving that way, I’ll get out and start trying to follow her scent as soon as we hit a spot where she could have turned.”
Jessie nodded and started the car.
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Hadji looked down from the rail atop the lighthouse, eyeing the army of Jamie Madroxes below. “This is very, very bad,” he said quietly.
Risk licked her lips and finished moving a desk in front of the stairway door. “Nah, really?” she asked sarcastically. The “agents” had managed to find where the teens were and had come pouring in, sending Colin, Kit, Hadji and Risk running for the stairs, and upper rooms. Now the men were both inside and outside the building, and there were hundreds of them.
Hadji grabbed the phone, punching in the number for Jessie’s phone with shaking fingers. “Jess? January, we need you back *now*. We’re in huge amounts of trouble here,” he said, watching as the door shook with the force of fists pounding against it.
“We’ve almost found Dana, Hadji. Can’t this wait?” January snapped back.
“NO! January, we’re about to be killed!! We need help *right now*!” Hadji shouted, covering his other ear with his hand.
There was silence for a minute, then “All right. We’re coming back now.”
Hadji was almost ready to stomp on his turban in frustration. “January! You’re not listening! There’s no time to drive back here! We’re locked in the upper room of the lighthouse and there’s an army of men outside wanting our blood! We are going to die unless you get over here--shadowport!”
Risk reached over and snatched the phone from Hadji, aiming her gun at the door the whole time. “January. I estimate there are about three hundred men outside. All they want is us. All we have to defend ourselves are two cats and one gun. We need backup.”
January nodded, even though they couldn’t see her, and looked over at Jessie. “You keep driving. Meet me at the bottom of the cliff.” She closed her eyes briefly, and was sucked back into the shadows. The phone dropped to the seat.
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“I have to put it down,” Dane said, her hands on her knees as the metal bubble descend and then slowly melted apart.
“How . . . how did you do that?” Benton asked quietly, looking around at the Italian landscape--though where in Italy they were he wasn’t sure yet.
“Remember those people with powers we were talking about?” Jamie asked seriously, though his yo-yo was wound around his head and dangling in his face.
Benton refrained from smiling as he answered “Yes.”
“Well, Lorna’s one of the most powerful mutants--er, people with powers--around. She can manipulate anything metal. Heck, she can even manipulate the electro magnetic waves!”
Benton thought about that for a minute. “I imagine,” he said at last, “That I would be quite frightened to live in a place where a common drug store robber might be able to send the Earth crashing into the sun with just a thought.”
Rahne nodded sadly. “Aye, many people are. They’re tryin’ ta kill all the mutants.”
“I don’t think we would go quite that far,” Race said dryly. Benton nodded emphatically.
“Could we cut the banter?” Lorna said wearily. “We need to find a way home.”
“Where are we?” Benton asked, looking around.
“Sicily.”
“Then follow me,” Benton said, stepping out of the heap of molten lead and striding purposefully away.
Jamie shrugged and also strode purposefully away, imitating Benton’s walk and then some. Rahne giggled and followed.
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“Give me your hand!” January shouted, appearing just inside the upper story of the light house, where Hadji, Risk and Colin stood. The door was splintering, sending spikes of wood inside, and many hands were reaching through. One of them hit a wall, and suddenly there was a man inside the room. Risk turned and shot it coldly, and it fell dead to join the others on the floor.
“I can’t ‘port all of you at once,” January said, yelling over the din of shouting and pounding. It sounded as if all the dead had come back to seek revenge on the living, and she was reminded of all the old black and white horror movies her sister so loved.
“Take Hadji, then come back for Colin,” Risk shouted, shooting another man.
January nodded and grabbed Hadji, pulling him through the blackness before he had time to protest. Utter silence filled her head, drowning out all the other senses. No noise, no light, total blackness, no feeling--she couldn’t even feel where she held on to Hadji’s arm. Then suddenly they were out in the light again, the nighttime stars bright on her over sensitive eyes.
Hadji fell to his knees, what was left of his dinner coming up to land on the concrete. January laid a hand on his back, scratching it lightly. He was highly susceptible to sickness after Ôporting, as some people were. January suspected it had something to do with closer ties to the earth then most people, but she wouldn’t swear to that. Her own ties were to machines, things you could predict and make work.
Finally Hadji sat back, taking deep lungsfuls of air.
“I’m off to get Colin,” January said, disappearing. Hadji didn’t know how she did it. Every time he did it he got horribly sick--and she did it all the time! For the first time he looked up and around, eyeing where they were. After a minute he smiled. How January did love her computers. He got up and walked to the one she had “personalized,” sitting down at the seat before it. For himself, he’d rather be anyplace else then the computer room at school. Well, anyplace but where he’d been before.
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“Your hand!” January said, shouting. She reached out and grabbed Colin’s fingers, then disappeared into the shadow behind her. Risk watched them leave dispassionately, knowing she was going to have to stay alive until they got back. And Kit--she needed to get him down so that he could be taken with January too.
The door shattered, sending all the things that had been holding it closed flying across the room. She felt something enter her thigh and gasped, but quickly stifled it. She didn’t need them to know she was hurt. Of course, she thought, looking down at the stake of wood that stood out, It’s fairly obvious by itself. She clenched her jaw, ignoring the people who where streaming in the door, and pulled the wood out before darting back toward the window.
“Where are the others?”
“I dunno, I don’t see Ôem!”
“Do you?”
“No, you?”
“I don’t!”
“What about her?”
“Grab her!”
“I got ‘er! I got ‘er!”
Risk stumbled backward out onto the balcony, praying Kit would stay put and January wouldn’t ‘port into the midst of them. Searing pain rose up through her leg as she stepped back on it, and she ignored it as well as she could. Raising her gun she fired, feeling the backlash whip up her shoulders and down her spine. One of the men went down, taking another with him. Then she felt a hand on her arm and swiveled, shooting again. But they were multiplying even as she shot them down, and Risk knew there was no way she was getting out of here alive.
She licked her lips, firing again, and again, and again, and then . . . she heard the telltale “click” of an empty gun. Without missing a beat she turned it around, hitting whoever came close enough with the butt of her pistol.
And then there were hands on her legs, arms, waist, shoulders, throat. . . . Risk bit down on one of them, and prayed for January to get back.
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