Crawling From the Wreckage Read online

  Sara shows me where Pardo-En’s name is in the spiraling engraving. He’s right near the top, where he deserves to be.

  “Miss you, dragon,” I whisper, touching the unintelligible squiggle of his name. It takes me a while before I can tear myself away from the park. I don’t want to leave.

  Especially considering what I have to do today.

  ***

  Dennis asked if we could meet up in Kingsport. If we’re going to get together as a couple of civilians, he’d rather do it somewhere other than in his hometown. I’m a little too recognizable as Lightstorm for his comfort, he said, and I had to agree.

  He drives down after lunch and meets me at the little bakery and café on Main Street, the one with the awesome mocha-swirl cheesecake, so we can sit and talk over coffee and sugary treats. Sugar makes everything better. He gets a couple of brownies, massive chocolaty bricks with veins of caramel running through them.

  “Brownies are one of my go-to comfort foods,” he says, “and I get the feeling I might need some comfort.”

  “Good instinct,” I say. I grab a coffee and a double-wide slice of cheesecake, my go-to comfort treat (although I now have a bag of crunchies from the Plaza North sweet shop waiting for me at home in case the cheesecake fails me). We settle into a corner booth for a measure of privacy.

  “Hold on a sec,” Dennis says, sparing a moment to turn off his phone. “Rando’s in one of her moods,” he explains. “She’s all gung-ho about patrolling Manchester in case Vendetta shows their faces. She was not happy I was, quote, blowing off my responsibilities to the team and to the city.”

  “Did you tell her why you were meeting with me?”

  “This is about my family. It’s none of her business.” He braces his hands against the table. “Hit me.”

  “Just like that?”

  “I’m all for ripping the band-aid off fast. Sooner you tell me what’s up, the sooner I can deal with it.”

  “Okay. But keep in mind, this is only a theory.”

  “Understood.”

  “All right. Stay with me because I’m going somewhere with this. It has to do with Manticore.”

  Dennis starts. “Manticore?”

  “Yeah.” Deep breath, Carrie. Like he said, rip the band-aid off fast. “The last time I encountered Manticore was on September 11 of last year. I intercepted him as he was flying through New England. Military radar picked him up right before he crossed over the New Hampshire/Massachusetts border.”

  Dennis slumps back into his seat and stares at me in stunned silence. I know the feeling well. I give him the time he needs to process everything.

  “You think Manticore killed Kyle?” he says at last.

  “I’ll say it again: it’s only a theory, but it fits. A clandestine organization is outfitting wannabe super-villains with tech,” I say, counting off the first of many points on my fingers. “Someone provided your brother with a knockoff Concorde battlesuit. The organization isn’t shy about sending repo men to take their toys back. Manticore has done jobs for the organization before. He was spotted in the general vicinity of New Hampshire the night your brother died after falling three hundred feet from a bridge that’s only a hundred and thirty feet high.”

  “As if someone flew him out over the river and dropped him to make it look like a suicide,” Dennis concludes.

  “It fits,” I repeat.

  “Better than you know.” Dennis leans in. “The last entry in Kyle’s journal said, ‘I can’t do this. I won’t do it. I’ve done a lot of things in my life I regret and I’m ashamed of, but I won’t cross that line.’ Sounds to me like he was refusing a direct order.”

  “So the organization sent Manticore to take the Skyblazer armor back and punish Kyle for his insubordination.”

  “You know, you really need to come up with a better name than ‘the organization.’”

  “Dennis? Focus.”

  “Sorry. This is a lot to absorb.”

  “I understand.” I take his hand. “I’m sorry.”

  “You keep apologizing to me for things you didn’t do.”

  “I’m the one who dumped all this horrible news on you.”

  “You gave me a possible answer to a question I couldn’t answer myself. I’m sure as hell not happy about it but it’s a step toward getting some closure, you know? And that’s good thing, right?”

  “Yeah,” I say. “Yeah, it is.”

  ***

  We spend the afternoon trying to figure out where we go from here — which, we conclude, is nowhere. Manticore is notoriously elusive; he’s been operating for years, and no one’s come close to figuring out where he disappears to between jobs. We’d have to wait for him to show his ugly metallic face, but then there’d be the challenge of beating him so we could question him. Granted, I have a whole load of new tricks up my sleeve, but that’s not an ironclad guarantee I could take him in a fight — not before he could activate his nuclear failsafe, anyway.

  All this adds to Dennis’s load of simmering anger. He puts on a good front, but it’s not fooling anyone; he’s pissed. Why wouldn’t he be? Kyle was in all likelihood murdered, and for all his flaws and faults, he was still Dennis’s brother.

  “Can I ask you something?” Dennis says over his fourth plate of brownies. As he predicted, he’s needed a lot of comfort.

  “Anything.”

  “You said you encountered Manticore right after he killed Kyle. Why didn’t you take him out?”

  It comes off as an accusation. I don’t hold it against him.

  “He dropped a nuke in the middle of Boston.”

  Dennis’s jaw drops. “Seriously?”

  “Seriously. It’s a nasty trick he pulls whenever he’s cornered. He sets the weapons system in his tail assembly to overload, essentially turning it into a small nuclear bomb, and drops it in a populated area.”

  “Oh my God.”

  “Yeah, he’s stalemated me with that one three times now. The man takes sore loserdom to epic extremes.”

  Dennis mutters an F-bomb under his breath. “I knew Manticore was a major league badass, but I had no idea he was so...”

  “Insane?” I suggest. “Cold-blooded? Soulless?”

  “I’ll go with D: all of the above.”

  “And you’d be right. Manticore doesn’t need his suit to be a monster. He’s by far the most dangerous person I’ve ever faced. He’s vicious, calculating, ruthless, fearless...”

  “A real predator,” Dennis concludes, but it’s the wrong conclusion.

  “I wouldn’t call Manticore a predator.”

  “Why not? Sounds to me like he fits the description.”

  “He doesn’t, at all. Do you know what a predator actually is?” I say. Dennis shakes his head. “It’s an intelligent coward. Yes, they might be strong and fast and ferocious, but when animals like lions or sharks hunt, they go after easy targets like the old and the weak and hit them with sneak attacks. A predator doesn’t want to get into a fight; Manticore isn’t afraid of a head-on confrontation.

  “Now, the King of Pain, he was a predator in the truest sense. He went after super-heroes dealing with heavy personal issues because they were vulnerable to his psychic tampering. He’d stalk them, get in their heads, amplify every negative emotion, and let them self-destruct while he watched from a safe distance. He avoided fighting super-teams and never messed with anyone he thought would fight back because he knew he couldn’t handle it.”

  “Huh.”

  “Sorry, that was way off-topic.”

  “That’s okay. It was educational.” He smiles. “I’ve learned a lot from you. I want to keep learning.”

  “I think I can accommodate you.”

  “Cool.”

  The clerk on duty gently prods us to finish our food so she can close up. Wait, we’re getting shooed out? How long have we been here?

  “Oh, wow,” I say, checking my phone, “it’s almost five.”

  “Is it? Time flies.”

  “When
you’re having fun. I don’t know if this afternoon counts as fun.”

  “Close enough.”

  “You’re weird.” We leave so the nice purveyor of sugary treats can clean up and go home. “See you Tuesday?”

  “Sounds good,” he says, then he makes that funny face guys make when they’re pretending to be coy. “Unless you’re not doing anything tomorrow. I’m up for a little extra training if you are.”

  “I’m not doing anything tomorrow. Usual time, usual place?”

  “Cool. See you tomorrow, then.”

  I stand there on the sidewalk and watch him drive off, and even though it’ll make me late for dinner, I decide to walk home. It’s a nice evening for it.

  SEVENTEEN

  Right off the bat, Dennis established himself as a good student. He listened to me, didn’t dispute my critiques or take them personally, asked a lot of questions, and worked his butt off. He had focus, drive, and dedication.

  The Dennis of the last two days makes the Dennis of the previous week look like a total slacker. I had to make it a point to schedule breaks into our sessions so he wouldn’t work himself to death. We took to sitting atop the Notre Dame Bridge and engaging in the fine art of conversation, and once we started talking about relatively normal stuff, he’d forget about training long enough to recharge his batteries.

  (I myself had almost forgotten how important rest is, but once I figured out that I sleep better in my bed back on Kyros Prime? I actually feel somewhat human again, she said ironically.)

  Over the course of our chats, I learn a lot of cool things about my star pupil. He’s an okay cook but has a knack for baking (gourmet brownies, of course, are his specialty). He can affect any number of foreign accents with impressive authenticity. He’s a hardcore Magic: The Gathering fiend. He plays the drums and loves telling bad drummer jokes.

  What do you call a drummer who’s broken up with his girlfriend? Homeless.

  How do you get a drummer off your front porch? Pay him for the pizza.

  What do you call a drummer in a suit? The defendant.

  “Wow, harsh,” I say, laughing.

  “Thank you, I’ll be here all week,” he says with a little bow. “What do you say? Ready to get going again?”

  “We can afford a few more minutes. I like our talks.”

  “Me too,” he says, smiling, “but I want to get back to work. I feel like I’m in a real groove and I don’t want to lose it.”

  “I understand, but the candle that burns twice as bright burns half as long.”

  “Deep.”

  “Don’t mock. It’s true. If you’re exhausted your judgment suffers, your reflexes suffer, you can’t absorb information as well...learning this stuff is a marathon, not a sprint.”

  “Okay, all right, I need to pace myself, point taken. Can we talk theory, then?”

  “Sure. What theory in particular?”

  He thinks for a moment, then says, “You’ve taught me about basic air combat tactics, you’ve shown me how to evade a faster, more agile opponent, but what about turning defense into offense? I can’t always run away, you know.”

  “That’s entirely dependent on the situation. Sometimes running is the only smart play.”

  “But what if I’m backed into a corner and have to fight my way out? If I absolutely had to take down, say, you, and —”

  “You couldn’t.”

  “But if I had to?”

  “You couldn’t. That’s not an empty boast, Dennis; I am saying you are incapable of beating me. I told you, there will always be someone out there stronger, faster, and just plain better than you, and you need to come to terms with that. Otherwise it won’t be your lack of skill that gets you killed, it’ll be your pride.”

  “I don’t believe that. No one’s invincible,” Dennis says, seething. “No one.”

  “Ohhh,” I sigh, “I am such an idiot.”

  “What?”

  “The extra training, the sudden intensity, wanting to learn more about offense — you don’t want to up your game for the sake of becoming a better super-hero,” I say, and now it’s my turn to seethe. “You want me to show you how to beat Manticore.”

  Dennis’s face tightens. “Yes.”

  “Dammit, Dennis! We went through this already! Manticore would tear you apart!”

  “Not if you show me how to beat him.”

  “I don’t know how to beat him! I can’t teach you what I don’t know!”

  “Then let’s figure it out together. Come on, Carrie, we can do this. We can find him and we can take him down for good. Don’t you want that?”

  Every once in a while, I experience disturbingly vivid phantom pain in the palms of my hands, right where Manticore sliced them open so he could steal my astrarma. The wounds long ago healed over, but sometimes I swear I can still feel them. Times like right now.

  “You know what really hurts?” I say. “That you felt you had to trick me into helping you.”

  “No, Carrie, I wasn’t —”

  “We’re done here. If you’re going to do something stupid like go after Manticore, you’re doing it on your own. I’m not going to be responsible for getting you killed.”

  I power up and take off before he can get another word in. I’m not interested in hearing whatever lame excuse he planned to feed me. Screw that. Screw him.

  At least now I’ll have something to talk about with Bart this afternoon.

  ***

  I arrive to an empty office; Bart’s receptionist is nowhere to be seen.

  “I let her have the rest of the day off,” Bart says. “I wanted to afford you as much privacy as possible.”

  “Thanks, but what’s the point?” I say. “Everyone in the world knows I’m Lightstorm.”

  “That isn’t what I meant.” He gestures toward his office. “After you.”

  Bart joins me after locking the front door. He closes the office door, too, which seems like overkill, but whatever. His office, his rules. As I sit, I notice a brand-new box of tissues on the little end table between his chair and mine, and a second, unopened box next to that.

  Bart sits and gets right down to business. “How are you doing, Carrie?”

  I come out of the gate strong with a massive dose of withering sarcasm, because that always helps. “Oh, fine. Just peachy. You?”

  “I’m good. I’m a little concerned for my friend, though. Something seems to be bothering her and I’m hoping she’ll tell me what that might be.”

  “For starters, she’s bothered by how patronizing that was. I’m not a damned five-year-old.” I groan and bury my face in my hands. “I’m sorry. I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to bite your head off, it’s just — I’m sorry.”

  “It’s all right,” Bart says with a gentle smile. The man has the patience of a saint. “It’s just what?”

  I almost hesitate to drag Dennis’s baggage into my session, but then I remember: screw him.

  “I think Manticore was responsible for Kyle Antar’s death.” Bart sits back and listens intently as I detail the events forming the foundation of my theory.

  “It’s plausible enough,” Bart says. “How did Dennis take the news?”

  “That’s the problem. He has it in his head I hold the secret to beating Manticore and he wants to know what it is.”

  “What did you tell him?”

  “That it’d be suicide and I don’t want any part of it. I won’t be responsible for sending anyone else to his death.”

  Bart’s brow creases. “What do you mean?”

  “I mean I refuse to help Dennis throw his life away.”

  “Not that. You said, ‘I won’t be responsible for sending anyone else to his death.’ What did you mean by that?”

  For a moment, I lock up, physically, mentally, and emotionally. “Nothing,” I say, but of course Bart doesn’t fall for it because he’s not, you know, a blithering idiot.

  With a sigh, he says, “Carrie, I respect you, and that’s why I’m going to be frank he
re. Edison won’t clear you to return to full active duty until I do, and I won’t clear you until I’m convinced you’re fit to return, and I won’t do that until you tell me what’s going on in your head.”

  “You’re the mind-reader, you tell me.”

  “Carrie —”

  “I don’t know what to do! Dennis isn’t ready to take on Manticore, even if I do train him! And if I don’t, he’ll just die faster.” I slump into my chair on the verge of tears. “No matter what I do, his death will be on me.”

  Bart pushes the box of tissues over toward me. I push it back.

  “After you recovered from your first encounter with Manticore, what did you do?” Bart asks.

  “What do you mean, what did I do?”

  “What did you do?” he says again, emphasizing each word as if to clarify his meaning (which, for the record, it doesn’t).

  “I had nightmares for weeks afterward.” I shrug. “That’s it. I didn’t really do anything.”

  “You didn’t go after Manticore?”

  “Of course I didn’t.”

  “Why not?”

  “Because he would have kicked my ass is why not. I wasn’t ready for another fight with him.”

  Bart smiles. I missed something. He made a point, and I totally missed it.

  “You’ve set up a false dichotomy in your mind: don’t train Dennis and he dies, or train him and he dies anyway,” he says. “There’s a third option: help him understand that he’s not ready for this fight. You knew that instinctively. You were cognizant enough of your own capabilities that you understood on a gut level you weren’t ready for a rematch with Manticore. Dennis might not have that level of self-awareness but he is a smart kid, and I think he’ll listen to you.”

  “And if he doesn’t?”

  “That is a possibility,” Bart concedes, “but you can’t hold yourself responsible for what are, ultimately, his decisions. All you can do is talk to him as a peer, openly and honestly, and let him make his own choices.”

  “And if it’s the wrong choice?” Bart then does something completely unexpected and wildly inappropriate: he chuckles. “What? What could possibly be funny about this?”