Firedrake Chapter 29

A hospital was not a place most people expected to see a dragon. The nursing staff of Floor Seven, which housed the Intensive Care Unit of Saint Michael’s, were no different than anyone else when it came to expectations. There was a brief shriek of surprise, followed by a hush so distinct it seemed to amplify every sound of the dragon’s footfalls, a steady series of thump-click, thump-click noises.

The feet were massive, the equivalent of a size seventeen, and each terminated in a set of heavy toes tipped with sharp ivory-colored claws that were the source of the clicking sounds. They supported powerful legs that were clad in military-style battledress utility pants in a tiger-stripe pattern. His chest was bare, and long plates of sickly yellow armor covered his torso, becoming a darker tone where they joined with the Kelly green scales that covered the remainder of his body. His arms, which were themselves highly impressive specimens of muscular development, supported black nylon webbing that connected to shoulder holsters, one under each arm, from which the butts of enormous semi-automatic pistols jutted. His hands were held down by his waist, taloned fingers curled loosely and thumbs tucked into the belt of his trousers. Behind him, large black wings that appeared almost leather-like arched upward to a point above his head, threatening to scrape the ceiling. A heavy, muscled tail danced in the air in his wake, its tip a foot-long barb.

Glittering yellow eyes bisected by coal black pupils swiveled beneath armored ridges, taking in every detail of the nurses’ station. Lips that ran the length of a massive snout curled back to reveal long sharp fangs that shone in stark relief against the dark green scales that covered the triangular head. A flash of pink appeared as his tongue flicked out to sample the air. He turned his gaze onto the terrified staff behind the Formica-topped counter, appearing as no less than a demon from the pits of Hell to their frightened eyes.

“Looking for Skye Webb,” he said in a rasping voice. The words echoed in the stillness of the ward, and he stood patiently for almost a full minute before anyone found a voice to reply.

“Security,” said the trembling nurse, whose nametag proclaimed her to be Julie Trocar, “is on the way.”

“Fine by me,” the dragon said, cocking his head to the side as he regarded her. “Maybe they can help me find this Webb character.”

“Look, there are a lot of people up here that are badly injured,” Julie pled, holding her hands out before her in supplication. “Please, don’t hurt them.”

The dragon turned his attention to another nurse, this one carrying an orange tray-style box brimming with IV equipment in her quaking hands. He smiled at her, a gesture that was lost on her as his fangs showed plainly and she promptly fainted, dropping the equipment to scatter noisily across the floor. No one moved to collect it. A sound that could have been a sigh escaped from the dragon, along with a puff of sulphurous smoke.

“I ain’t here to hurt anyone,” he protested. “My name is Drake. You were told I was coming here to see Skye Webb. I know you were, ‘cause I made the call myself,” he said, speaking slowly and distinctly as though addressing a group of five-year old children. He slipped his right hand away from his belt, exposing a gleaming badge and ID card.

“Department of Justice, Office of Metahuman Affairs,” he stated flatly.

“Oh my God,” someone whispered from behind the desk.

“Far from it,” Drake shot back, following the comment with a snorting sound. He reached out and tapped a sharp claw on the countertop in a physical gesture that clearly displayed his mounting impatience. “Now. Somebody’s gonna tell me where Skye Webb is.”

A moment passed.

“That ain’t a suggestion,” he added through clenched teeth. The tip of his claw actually broke through the surface of the counter, leaving behind a neat round hole.

The hands of every nurse pointed rapidly toward a curtain-screened cubicle marked with a foot-high number six. With a smile that almost managed to not be a sneer, Drake left them to their own devices and paced to the room, slipping through the curtain with only a minor problem as the filmy barrier caught on the tip of his right wing.

Inside the cubicle, a tiny, frail-looking woman lay on a gurney, her eyes closed in sleep. Clear tubing snaked from various mechanisms surrounding the bed, most entering her body at visible points, although some were thankfully screened from view by the blanket in which she was wrapped. Her face was blistered, as though it had been exposed to a fire, and both eyes were blackened and swollen. A nasal cannula occupied space beneath her nose, more clear tubing running from it to an oxygen supply outlet in the wall. Most of her hair was gone, burned away by whatever force had damaged her flesh. Beneath the blanket, she twitched and writhed as tiny moans escaped her mouth. Drake grabbed a chair, turned it backwards so that he could sit in it without impeding his tail, and leaned forward to speak.

“Miss Webb?” he prompted, his voice surprisingly gentle in comparison to the gruff tones he had displayed outside the cubicle. He repeated himself, managing to rouse the woman from her tortured slumber. Her eyes flickered open and she gasped at the sight of her visitor.

“Federal Agent. Metahuman Response,” he told her quickly. “Colleen Hart sent me. My name’s Drake.”

She replied softly, and even then her voice was a pained croak of sound that was difficult to interpret.

“No one told me what, I mean, who to expect,” she said, correcting the minor detail with little difficulty, although Drake caught it. She licked at her lips with a swollen tongue and looked around herself, trying to lift her head. Drake reached across the bed and grasped a Styrofoam cup of water specked with a few floating bits of ice, holding it carefully before her so she could take the flexible straw into her mouth. She sipped at the cool water slowly, and he remained there, motionless, until she nodded that she had had enough.

“Can I get you anything else?” he asked.

“Yeah. You can get the bastard who put me in here,” she said, swallowing and letting her head fall back onto the pillow. Her eyes closed for a moment, then she sighed. “Sorry.”

“It’s okay. We’re working on it. Why don’t you tell me what happened?”

“Not much to tell,” she said, a touch of bitterness apparent in her soft voice. “I got my ass kicked.”

“Happens to the best of us,” Drake said, teeth flashing as he grinned. “So how did it start?”

“I was in church…” she began.

*****

The sermon seemed to stretch forever, and every word of it put Skye one step closer to dozing. The party last night had drawn too much of her energy, and she still felt slightly hung over. She brushed back a strand of her long blonde hair as the pastor droned on and on about something which no longer seemed connected to the topic with which he had begun the sermon. She rubbed her face and covered a yawn, pretending to cough quietly in order to avoid seeming impolite.

The large wooden doors at the rear of the church slammed open suddenly, the banging noise reverberating from the walls of the worship hall. Overhead, suspended lights shrouded in simulated stained glass shook in response to the force applied to the doors. The pastor fell silent, eyes widening as he took in the sight of the new arrivals.

The first was clad in a pair of denim jeans, faded and worn with age, that were tucked into the tops of oxblood-hued Justin cowboy boots. He wore no shirt, but his upper body was covered nonetheless, with a mass of black and red tattoos that seemed almost to move on their own as he made his way into the church, His stride was predatory, and he continually twisted himself from side to side, looking intently up and down the rows of parishioners. His nose, set above a black moustache and spade-shaped beard, twitched and flared as though he were sniffing for something. There was a palpable sense of menace about the man, and those near him shrunk back instinctively from his presence.

Behind him, a woman stalked into the room. If the man had seemed a hunting cat, then she was a lioness, brutal and yet sleek in the way she surveyed the room. Black leather pants bloused into matching boots that bore shining spurs, a grey silk blouse beneath a sleeveless tunic of chain mail, and studded leather gauntlets of the same ebony shade as the pants were her garments, though they were not as immediately striking as the presence of the sword on her left hip. Her hair, in direct opposition to the wild mane sported by the tattooed man, was cut severely short, serving to offset the brilliant blue eyes. She moved with a purpose, watching her decorated associate carefully as he scanned the faces in the room. She paused as she neared him, standing still and moving her right hand to the hilt of the sword as the man sniffed at the air.

Trailing in behind the other two, and seemingly content to let them lead the way, was a third man. He was handsome in a cultured sort of way, and carried himself with the bearing of one who is accustomed to being respected, or at the very least obeyed. He wore a business suit of charcoal grey with minute pinstripes of silver. A white carnation added a touch to the breast of the jacket, but it was the book he carried that seemed to draw the attention of those in the church. The man knew the reaction well and raised the book above his head in one powerful hand.

Bound in soft blue leather, and with an outward flare of the pages indicating many hours of use, the book was a copy of the Holy Bible nearly the size of a Yellow Pages. The man held it up for a full minute as the crowd waited expectantly for someone - anyone - to do something.

“Brothers and Sisters!” the man suddenly shouted, his voice a dozen times more powerful than that of the pastor, even when the latter was using the microphone in his pulpit. The shout was so surprising that many of the parishioners jumped or even cried out in shock.

“Brothers and Sisters,” he repeated, a bit more subdued this time, but with a fervor in his voice that was guaranteed to rivet attention on him. “Excuse the interruption in this time of worship, but it has come to our attention that one among you is not what they appear. There is one among you who hides, who conceals their very nature!”

Skye felt her heart sink at the last statement, and turned away from the man to find herself staring into the wild eyes of the tattooed man, who now stood less than ten feet away. His arm was outstretched, finger extended and pointing directly at her. Those seated near her drew away in horror.

“And, lo, she is revealed,” said the man with the Bible. His eyes settled on Skye and a faint smile ghosted across his face. “You are the one they call Blacklight, yes? The one who prowls at night, bringing the swift justice of the Lord to the heathen creatures of this fair city?”

The world shrank away, becoming a dot in her vision. Men and women Skye had known for years looked at her now as though the man had uncovered a ravening monster in their midst. She shivered at a sudden sense of loneliness.

“How could you -” she began, but the man cut her off mid-sentence, his voice raised again in a trumpeting pattern that would put the greatest of tent-revival preachers to shame.

“Find you?” he asked, completing what he wrongly imagined to be her thought. A grin spread wide on his face and he gestured at her with the Bible in his left hand, cocking his head and laughing softly as he did so. “Why, that’s the job of Witchfinder here,” he said, nodding his head at the tattooed man, who sketched a bow in response, right hand tucked neatly at his waist. Skye noted that through the entire maneuver, his eyes remained on her. The gaze he directed on her was frightening in its intensity.

“He sees the patterns in you, he does,” the man continued. “The patterns put down by God Almighty. The ones that make you different. Make you special. Make you like us. You are one of his angels, Sister! Rejoice, and know that He has smiled down upon you!”

Skye stood from her position on the pew, legs quivering as the enormity of the situation truly hit her. Years, decades, of careful planning and effort to maintain her life separately from her existence as Blacklight were simply ripped away from her in a heartbeat at the whim of this man. Her family was at risk now, her friends, even acquaintances from work. She was unable to speak, though her jaw worked in random twitches as she tried.

“It’s all right, Sister,” the man continued, waving his arm in a gesture that encompassed the entire congregation. “These people need to know that God has put us here to protect them, to save them from themselves, to battle against the sin that has taken hold and threatens to destroy this very world. The time of the Apocalypse draws near, and we have been chosen to sit at the right hand of God. We are His arm, with which He wields the terrible swift sword that will put Satan back into his pit! He has chosen us, and He has gifted us with abilities not seen in two thousand years! Not since the Savior Himself walked the earth have there been people like us!”

There was an audible gasp from the parishioners and the pastor slammed his fist on the pulpit. His face reddened as he shouted a question.

“How dare you? How dare you compare yourself, or any other, to our Lord?” he demanded, eyes narrowed in fury.

“Look around you, Brother,” the man replied, not in the least disturbed by the outburst. It was almost as if he had been expecting it. “He has given us the ability to summon the lightnings of His wrath, to heal the sick, even to walk upon the water. Did He not say that there would be the chosen of His people? Who are we to deny what He has made us? Why should we hide and cower in the dark when He needs His troops to take His word to the world?”

“Hey, pal, I’m not an angel!” Skye shouted, her words blasting above even those of the man. She stamped her foot on the floor, then pushed her way past those in the pew. Her face reddened more as she realized they were recoiling from her presence. Putting their reactions out of her mind, she stepped into the aisle to stand beside the man with all the tattoos. She noticed first that he smelled horrible, as if he had not bathed in months. A moment later, she was shocked to realize that the ‘tattoos’ were, in fact, moving. Slowly but surely, the designs oozed from place to place on his skin, twisting and turning with a life all their own.

“And neither is he!” Skye continued, pointing an accusing finger at Witchfinder. “You people don’t get to decide that!”

“Sister, you wound me,” the man said, pressing his hand mockingly to his heart. “The Lord has spoken to me, and you would be wise to heed the words which He has spoken. Stand with us in His glory, and be not against us in the armies of Darkness.”

“You see, there’s the thing,” Skye said, chuckling and gifting the man with a half-smile as an inky field of blackness surrounded her hands. She held them up for him to see, allowing arcs of the dark to leap from fingertip to fingertip like streams of electricity. “Darkness I know. You I don’t.”

“I am called Inquisitor,” he declared.

“How cute. Looks to me like you’re just another booster with delusions of grandeur. You can take your Crusade and shove it,” she said, sneering at the man. His expression hardened and he shook his head slowly from side to side.

“You are making a grave mistake here. I will give you a single warning. It will, of necessity, be a painful one, and there are few more qualified to deal in that particular currency than our own Sister Thrash. Sister, if you will?” he finished, directing the words to the mail-clad woman. Her mouth stretched back in a grin, muscles twitching madly in a way that made it look as though it was an expression fairly foreign to her face.

“Tasty, tasty,” Thrash muttered as her sword slid from its sheath with a quiet ringing sound.

Skye did not hesitate, expelling a bolt of darkness from her hands that blasted the sword free of the woman’s grasp and carried it to the opposite side of the church where it stuck, quivering, into one of the timbers that supported the building. Witchfinder bounded after it, his legs carrying him in a wide, loping gait that closed the distance with astonishing speed.

“Not in here!” Skye ordered in a shout. “There are too many people!”

“Not my problem, slitch,” the woman hissed in reply, advancing in a semi-crouch. She held her gloved hands out and flexed them in a gesture of beckoning.

“Well, it’s mine,” Skye said flatly, leaping from her position at the pew. She completed a somersault in the air, seeing the woman reaching up for her, and landed on her feet a yard behind Thrash. Snapping her body forward, she began a series of acrobatic flips down the aisle with the woman in pursuit. Once clear of the main auditorium of the church, Skye took to her feet once more, running full-tilt down the hall toward an exit door. Calling upon her innate powers, she fashioned a shield of absolute blackness that hung behind her to protect her should they try to hit her from the rear as she ran.

“And He shall smite them down with lightning from Heaven!” shouted Inquisitor. The air around Skye seemed to change consistency, and she felt the ends of her hair dance as the strands stood away from her head. The hallway around her lit with a stark brilliance and she felt an impact that began at her head and traveled through her entire body, the pain worse than when she had collided with the moving Mack truck a year before. Her vision went black as the world seemed to explode with a deafening crack of sound. Ahead of her, windows blew out into the parking lot. Skye tumbled loosely down the corridor, arms and legs flapping without control. She skidded to a stop, face pressed against the dirty carpet near the exit door. Her heart seemed to skip beats at random, and she gasped for air as she wondered what could cause it to malfunction. The carpet on which she lay was smoldering, and a distant part of her felt the heat of small fires beginning to lick at her skin.

“Should’ve said yes,” Thrash whispered into Skye’s left ear. A studded gauntlet slammed into Skye’s left kidney with steam hammer force. She felt something inside of her give way under the assault. “This was your warning, girly. Next time, you join us or you die.”

Skye lay face down on the floor, barely able to hear the footsteps of her assailants as they stalked away from her prone form. Hot tears ran down her face and the taste of blood was strong in her mouth. It pooled in her throat and she coughed, staining the carpet beneath her face. She could smell a sickeningly sweet scent like roasting meat and knew without question that it was her flesh. Consciousness faded as she felt gentle hands cradling her head and the voices of dozens of men and women joined in fervent prayer.

*****

“I woke up here,” Skye said to Drake, accepting another drink from the cup. “Pastor Holly had called the police, and they sent an ambulance for me, I guess.”

Drake nodded, neck scales making a sound like sandpaper as the enormous head moved up and down. He looked away for a moment, tongue tracing across a fang as he contemplated his next statement. He turned back to look at Skye, winking.

“Yeah, they called an ambulance. Word came from the local cops to us, and Hart sent a crew out to check on you. Your friends there at the church,” he said, twisting the word as though it did not feel right in his mouth, “they care about you. I’ll tell you this much: you did good trying to take the fight outside. Probably kept a whole mess of folks from getting hurt, or worse.”

“Pastor Holly told me,” she said, voice subdued.

“Look, this isn’t the first time this Inquisitor monkey has shown up. We don’t know much about him or why he’s doing what he’s doing, but near as the Department can figure, it was him and his crew what hit in Seattle a few months back. Tried to recruit a flying hardcase named Retribution. He declined too. Robbed some armored cars to get the cash so he could disappear. When they found him again, he took out half a mall trying to get away from them. Needless to say, he didn’t care about innocent bystanders getting hurt the way you did. Word’s out on this Thrash chick. She’s a hitter down from Canada, used to do some muscle work for the Tattaglia mob. I guess she found religion or some such. As far as the one he called Witchfinder, he sounds a lot like a guy we used to know as Mikey the Eye.”

He paused to drag a folded and dog-eared sheaf of papers from a thigh pocket. Rifling through them for a minute, he paused as he reached the correct one and read from it.

“Mikhail Gabrilovich. He’s an anomaly. Somehow he can see who is a booster and who isn’t - even when it’s not obvious,” he added with an ironic gesture at his own reptilian form.

“Anyway,” he continued after seeing the weak smile that graced her ravaged features. “Big Brother is watching for them. We’ve got a few men stationed downstairs to protect you, and Hart sent me along as insurance.”

The comment brought another smile to Skye, and she managed a soft laugh for a second before it turned to a groan of pain. “You’re my insurance?” she asked, closing her eyes tightly as pain lanced through her.

“Yeah, well, I ain’t the guy they call when they wanna sell cookies,” Drake said, mouth twisting in a smirking grin. “I’m not the type to play nice. I’m pretty much an asshole - oh, sorry,” he said, hastening to cover up the slip. Skye waved him off with a weak flap of one hand.

“I’ve heard worse,” she assured him. “For that matter, I’ve said worse.”

Drake made a huffing noise that seemed to be laughter, leaning back slightly in his chair. His tail thumped noisily against the wall and he brought it forward to drape over one shoulder. The massive barb at its tip lay across his chest like an arrow pointing to the heavy pistol under his left arm.

“Anyway, here’s the deal,” he continued, pausing to allow her to yawn. “We’ve got a few agents downstairs now, and I’m up here. When you’re ready to get out of here we’ll take you on out to a safehouse. You’ll have round-the-clock security until we get this mess sorted out.”

“Can they…are they norms?” she asked, changing the question mid-sentence. Drake scratched at one pointed ear, then sniffed.

“Yeah,” he finally said, his tone flat. “They’re norms. They’ve got the best equipment the government can buy, but they’re still norms. No point lying to make you feel better.”

Skye fell back onto her pillow with an audible groan. This time, it was not of pain. “They won’t be able to stop them, will they?”

“They aren’t meant to,” Drake answered casually. “There’ll be a half-dozen Agents there at all times, all ready to do whatever they have to in order to slow down anyone that comes after you. Meanwhile, there’s a driver and a gunner assigned that’ll be with you. Anything happens, you jump in a car and go. Just go. They’ll take you someplace safe and we’ll go from there. Trust me. We know what we’re doing.”

Letting her eyes flutter closed, Skye nodded. “Okay.”

“You get some rest,” Drake urged, standing from his seat. “I’m gonna go check in with the boss and see what the progress is. Don’t wanna use this in here with all the equipment,” he added, holding his cell phone up and waggling it.

“Are you coming back?”

“Oh, yeah. I’ll be here until you’re ready to go home. Don’t worry about that.”

She nodded and visibly relaxed, pulling her blanket up tighter and settling into place. Drake stood in the doorway and watched her until she drifted off. Quietly, he slipped from the room and walked past the nurses’ station, ignoring the frightened glances that still came his way from the staff. Once in the waiting area, he flicked open the cell phone. Using the tip of a talon, he pressed a speed dial button. A series of beeping noises emanated from the device as it dialed a preset number.

“It’s Drake,” he said a moment later. His eyes flicked from side to side, ensuring that he was alone. “Yeah, she’s okay. As okay as she can be after what happened. Those assholes did a number on her, that’s for damned sure. What? No, she can’t move right now, not without a medical team. What do you mean, what do I mean? What the hell do you think I mean? They’ve got her hooked up to machines and tubes and everything. We try to move her now and something goes wrong, then what?”

He paused and listened to a long speech from the other end, his expression darkening as every second passed. His teeth gnashed horribly and he made a snarling sound.

“Damn it!” he said, pulling the phone from his ear and shaking his head. His offhand clenched and he took a deep breath. Returning the phone to his ear, he continued. “Who says? That prick? He’s wrong half the damned time anyway. Yeah, yeah, I know, that means he’s right half the time, too. What’s Psi Division have to say? Well, shit! Ask them! Oh, yeah, ‘cause, you know, I was planning a trip to the beach or some shit,” he added, slamming shut the phone as he muttered to himself.

“Stay right there,” he said, mocking Hart’s voice.

He reached over with his left hand and loosened one pistol in its rig, then used the same hand to rub across his face. He spotted a soda machine and headed toward it, digging in his pocket for change. As the machine rumbled and disgorged a cold bottle of Coca-Cola, he brought the phone back into play. He hit a second speed dial setting with enough force to scratch the cover off the button. Uncaring, he mashed the phone against his head and waited for the person at the other end to answer. When he spoke, his tone was tight and sharp. Wisps of smoke emerged from his mouth and nostrils with every word.

“Matthews, it’s Drake,” he said, snagging the Coke from the machine and twisting off the top with the cap clenched between his teeth. “You and Breckenridge come up here now. Yeah, abandon the front door. I don’t care if you do have other orders, slick! I’m in charge right now, so do what I say or I’ll put my foot in your ass. Both of you get up here and do it now. Bring the biggest, meanest guns you have in the van. I wanna see you here in three minutes. Yeah, that’s right. So do it now. Wait, wait. Call for backup first. Save me the trouble.”

Swallowing half of the Coke in one prodigious gulp, he paced back down the hall, ignoring the nurses yet again. He slipped into the room where Skye Webb lay sleeping.

“Wake up, Skye,” he said, just loud enough to interrupt her slumber. She opened her eyes and managed a weak smile that faded as soon as she saw the dark look in his eyes.

“It’s not good news, is it?” she whispered.

“We’ve had better.”

“What?”

“Word’s out that we came to see you. The team that was running surveillance on Thrash hasn‘t reported in. The bigwigs upstairs think she might be headed here to finish the job she started.”