Velvet Dogma About 3300 wds (28 page)

But with each of these, Rebecca slid out of the way. When Kumi came down, she threw a hard right to Rebecca's head. Moving her head imperceptivity, Rebecca used
Fair Lady Works At Shuttles
, blocked the punch with her left hand, let it slide down the arm to the elbow, grasped Kumi's shirt, then stepped through so that Kumi slammed into the ground. Rebecca closed the move with a knee to the chest, but Kumi managed to roll away before being pinned.

Back on her feet, Rebecca wind-milled her arms to create distance between herself and her opponent, then returned her arms to the ready guard. Kumi eyed Rebecca's stance, then began to circle. She'd moved only a few feet before attacking, leading with a kick to the knee and a right cross. The kick creased the side of Rebecca's knee enough to send her back a foot. But as Kumi followed through with the punch, Rebecca leaned in, twisted, grasped the wrist throwing the punch and urged Kumi in the direction of her momentum with
Carry Tiger To The Mountain
. Kumi hit the wall, bounced off and turned.

Kumi wobbled a moment as her eyes cleared. Indignation and rage was quickly replaced by fear as it dawned on her that Rebecca hadn't released her. Using Kumi's wrist, Rebecca jerked the woman into her, then shoved her away. Unable to keep up with the movement, Kumi's knees buckled. Rebecca pressed Kumi to the ground with the inside portion of her forearm. "Parting of the Wild Horse's Mane," Rebecca explained in a tight clinical voice. Rebecca's knee smashed into Kumi's abdomen and her breath left her in a rush.

Stunned disbelief flashed from Kumi's eyes as she gasped. "How?"

Rebecca adjusted her stance until she straddled the smaller woman. "I've had twenty years of practice."

Kumi stared at her, blood trailing from the corner of one eye. Her lower lip had taken the brunt of the fall to the floor earlier and looked like mangled sausage. Blood soaked her teeth, staining them the color of merlot. She was suddenly a lot less formidable and more like the young Asian girl who'd introduced herself to Rebecca in the retro-faux apartment where they'd first met.

"Why didn't you let me go?" Rebecca finally asked.

"I
can't
."

"I thought I was free. I thought you said I'd served my time."

Kumi tried to push Rebecca off, but didn't have the leverage. "You'll never understand this world, Rebecca."
 
She gave up in exasperation and stared with hate-filled eyes. "There's so much going on that you don't know anything about. You're too naive to survive."

"Is that why you killed my brother?" Rebecca spat.

"He died so we could get you away from the police."

Rebecca's eyes widened as she realized the meaning of those words. "But how could you have him killed? You
work
for the police."

Kumi explained with all the disdain she could muster. "I might work for the police, but that's not who I am. We would have killed a hundred more people if that's what it took. We needed you and there was nothing that was going to stop me."

"Me? Why me?"

"To save my father," Kumi said, the words delivered in a reverent whisper.

"Your father?"

"He's dying. Through some quirk of genetics, you're as near a match as they come. Without your organs, he'll die."

"Without my organs I'll die," Rebecca said trying to reason with the absurdity of the situation.

Kumi shrugged and turned her face away. "This is my father I'm talking about. If there's any chance at all, I have to try to save him, no matter what it takes. I'm sorry it turned out to be you, Rebecca. I liked you as much as one like me can like another."

"You sure have a lethal way of showing it. First my brother, and now me. Was it you who killed him?"

Kumi regarded Rebecca. "Do you mean did I wield the instrument that killed him? No."

"But you were involved."

Kumi didn't speak but the answer was in her eyes.

Catastrophic emotions of murder and revenge swept through Rebecca. She wanted nothing less than to kill Kumi. The part of her that had raised the little boy named David wanted to exact retribution for his death as an adult. Rebecca felt her humanity sliding away with each heartbeat, as desires to rip and rend the other woman sent tendrils of control through Rebecca's arms and legs. She couldn't help herself. She reached out quickly and snatched the nearest baton from the ground. In one angry move she placed the working end against Kumi's left breast and pressed. The effect was instantaneous as the current shot through both of them locking them in a jittering dance, teeth gnashing, tendons rippling, muscles clenching. Even if Rebecca had wanted to, she was unable to let go.

Kumi rocked and rolled beneath her, eyes bulging and spittle flying from her mouth. The agony being electrically etched onto the once beautiful woman's face was almost payment enough for David's death. But nothing would be enough. Nothing would ever bring him back. Not even her own death. The current had an irredeemable hold on each of them and would not let go. Kumi screamed first, her voice ragged with pain, screeching beginning from deep inside her that rose in decibels until Rebecca joined in, hers a wounded tenor of loss and regret, scraping past each death on the way out and reopening the wounds. Their voices merged into a fantastic song of agony, every rising, ever ragged.

Then Rebecca was flying through the air. She landed against the wall hard enough to dislodge the baton from her grip, but she felt no pain. Her body was still abuzz with electricity, the power short-circuiting her nerves as it coursed back and forth through her nervous system.

Through blurred vision she saw Andy kneeling in front of her. "Rebecca, speak to me."
 
He smacked her cheek with the back of his hand. "Rebecca, are you okay?"

She tried to answer but her mouth ignored her command.

"Jesus."
 
Andy wiped her forehead. "What have you done to yourself? Are you crazy? You could have died!"

"Don't care," Rebecca managed to say through cracked lips.

"Bull. I know you care. You're just pissed off."

"
Pithed
," she said, her tongue refusing to lift from the floor of her mouth. Pain climbed from her spine, then spread into her limbs. She arched her back and moaned. "Owwww."

"What is it?"
 
Andy's eyes searched hers.

Rebecca clenched her fists, then her toes. She shook her head and flexed her shoulders and the pain returned like a freight train and slammed into her. She gasped, but when Andy sought to hold her more tightly, she pushed him away. "Need to breathe," she finally managed to say.

A scream erupted from the hallway. Other fighting had occurred while their drama took place. Pitched battles still raged in the hall. Andy glanced hurriedly towards the doorway, then back at Rebecca. "Come on, Bec. We need to get out of here."
 
He shook her shoulder. "Snap out of it."

"All right."
 
Rebecca managed to shove him aside as she tried to get to her feet. Using the wall she made it on her second try.

She looked down at her hand. Where she'd gripped the baton, the skin had blackened and peeled back; beneath was raw red oozing muscle. Reaching down, she ripped a piece of material from a sheet pinned to the floor by the overturned bed, then wrapped her hand. She wasn't going to get it fixed anytime soon, but at least she could keep it from getting any worse.

Ready, she turned towards Andy, who stared at the floor across the room. She followed his gaze and noted the empty space. Kumi was gone.

They looked at each other and read the fear in each other's eyes. Based on what Kumi had said, she wouldn't be done with Rebecca until she was dead. There was no telling what Kumi was planning, or whether she'd already regrouped and was coming back with reinforcements. They needed to get out of there.

"What's the plan?" Rebecca asked.

Andy ripped his POD free from his waistband and noted the look from Rebecca as he began to place it over his eyes. "This was shielded from the EMPs."
 
He set it in place and flicked the switch. Ten seconds later he removed it and reattached it to his belt. "Good news or bad news."

"What?"
"Do you want the good news or the bad news?"

She'd noticed that the sounds of the fight had died down to almost nothing. No, they had completely disappeared. What happened to everyone? She had a bad feeling. "Give me the bad news."

"The police have the building surrounded and are mounting a charge. Here, give me a hand, will you?"
 
Andy dragged the door that had been ripped from its hinges over to the corner of the room. Pushing Rebecca into the corner, he placed the composite polymer barrier across the two walls, effectively blocking her in. "Get down and wait for me."

Rebecca did as he said, the agony in her hand rendering her incapable of arguing. She tried to cradle her hand, but the pain raged from within. Nothing she could do could make it stop. She tried to think of something else. Anything. She placed her hand ever so gently on her lap, then asked through clenched teeth, "What's the good news?"

"Thought you'd never ask," came his response from the other side of the door. "The good news is that we don't have to go out. We need to go
down
."
 
He ran and leaped over the door, all but falling on her as he struggled to turn and bring his hands and arms over both their heads.

"What are you—"

An explosion jarred the room, stealing the air from Rebecca's lungs, leaving the rest of her question unasked. Debris and dust ricocheted off the walls and the ceiling, raining down on them, coating their skin and getting into their lungs. She coughed and managed to suck more dust into her lungs. After a few seconds, Andy pushed the door away and stood. Helping Rebecca to her feet, he hurried to the gaping hole now in the middle of the floor. As Rebecca joined him and looked down, the face of a Day Eater came into view, laughing eyes above a black and white plaid face scarf. Another joined the first, each of them holding a blanket between them.

Andy coughed into the crux of his arm, then gestured towards the hole. "You first."
 

She didn't hesitate.

She jumped.

R
unning as fast as they could, Rebecca and Andy couldn't keep up with the Day Eaters whose loping gait ate up the loose dirt path in front of them. The fresh dirt of the tunnel gave way to concrete, and as they passed a needle-shaped construction machine with its halogen lights pointing the way they'd come, Rebecca saw how'd they'd moved the earth beneath her prison—some kind of underground earthmover capable of creating burrows and tunnels.

But they passed this and kept going, deeper beneath the city where the subways used to run. Over cracked cement, and across great spans of cobblestone floor, with Rebecca struggling to keep up. Twice she fell, waving Andy off and getting back to her feet herself. After twenty minutes the two rag-clad men generously paused for a rest at an abandoned subway turnaround, a single rail continuing into the earth like the spine of some great beast. Rebecca and Andy fell to their knees, gasping for breath.

When Rebecca had recovered enough to speak, she asked Andy, "Did you hear what she said?"

"She killed David."
 
Andy accepted the water passed to him from a Day Eater, took a drink, and passed it on to Rebecca. As she drank, he continued, "She was after you from the beginning. The Black Hearts. The police."
 
He shook his head. "She even tried to make you believe I was after you."

Rebecca finished and passed back the water flask. She shrugged as she spoke. "She manipulated me well. I'm sorry Andy. I should have believed you in the first place."

"I don't know about that. She was good at what she did."

"Did you hear what it was about?
Organs
. She wanted my organs for her father."
 
Rebecca rubbed her eyes. "I
hate
this world, Andy. I hate the fact that our bodies don't belong to us."

"Maybe we can change all of that, Bec."
 

She didn't reply just peeled back the bandage on her hand.

"Let me take a look at that."
 
Andy got the water back and doused the wound liberally, cleaning away debris that had found its way past the bandage barrier. Rebecca hissed as the liquid hit the wound and made it throb all over again. When he was satisfied, he rewrapped her hand. "We need to get this taken care of when we get there."

"Where's
there
? You haven't told me where we're going. Don't we have Panchet to save?"

Andy grinned. "Panchet doesn't need saving."

"Why were we looking for him, then?"

"We wanted the police to think that he'd gone missing and that we didn't know where he was. Truth be told, he left for Mammoth Cave three days ago to put the finishing touches on the hardware. We needed to confuse the powers that be. The last thing we needed is for them to find out about Mammoth Cave."

"And you didn't tell me because—"

"You had enough stuff to deal with already. Plus you would have found out when we got there anyway."