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Author: Liz Effe

Chapter 45 – Too Bad We Don’t Have Superpowers

Liz, Five Months Before Impact Day

“This is impossible,” I moaned, staring at the mess of paper sprawled out across the table.

“I hate to admit it, but I think you’re right,” Aidan agreed.

Rachel glowered at the two of us, but there was resignation in her eyes. Her shoulders slumped.

“There’s got to be something we can do,” she said. “We can’t just give up.”

“I’m open to suggestions,” Aidan said.

“Even an army couldn’t take that place,” I muttered. “No wonder they’re the largest gang in the city.”

“What if we drop a bomb on it?” Rachel said. “Blow the whole thing to pieces.”

“Charlie would survive that?” Aidan asked.

“Almost certainly,” Rachel said.

“It’s designed to be bombed,” I pointed out. “Even a nuke wouldn’t get through.”

“I could build something bigger than a nuke,” Rachel said indignantly.

“Yeah, and you’d take half the state with it,” Aidan said. “I don’t think that’s an option.”

We all sighed, racking our brains for inspiration. None of us were willing to give up, but it seemed like an insurmountable obstacle.

“What would Charlie do?” Aidan asked.

“She’d try and punch her way through,” I said.

“She’s reckless but she’s not stupid,” Rachel snapped.

“I could try and buy her,” Aidan said. “But I don’t think there’s enough money in the world to get them to give her up.”

“It’s too bad we don’t have superpowers,” I muttered.

Rachel’s eyes lit up.

“What if we did?” she said.

“I’m not sure I like where this is going,” Aidan said.

“You don’t have some weird comic book power machine, do you?” I asked. “Because I don’t think I’m willing to take that risk.”

“Even I couldn’t build something like that,” Rachel said, sounding a little disappointed. “But I know of the next best thing.”

“Wendy,” Aidan said.

Charlie had tried to explain how Wendy was important, but neither of us had really put much stock in it. A weird video from an anonymous source did not prove that Wendy was anything other than a normal barista.

“I guess it’s worth a shot?” I said, not really feeling it.

“She already refused to help once,” Rachel said. “She might again.”

“At this point, I’ll try anything,” Aidan said. “Even if I am skeptical.”

“Do we have any proof she even can help?” I asked.

“My hunch says she can,” Rachel said. “And my hunches are never wrong.”

“We’re building a whole plan off a hunch?”

“It’s not like we have anything else,” Aidan said. “Why not try?”

I didn’t have an answer for that, so I just shrugged. Rachel gestured for us to stay put, and disappeared into the bedroom. A minute later, she emerged, holding an envelope.

“Charlie left this with me,” she explained. “Just in case.”

“A letter?” I asked.

“To Wendy. Said it might help convince Wendy to help, if something happened.”

“That’s… vaguely suspicious,” I said.

“You don’t give Charlie enough credit,” Rachel said. “She thinks things through, she’s just more willing to take risks. Especially when she has back-up plans.”

“What does it say?” Aidan asked.

“You want to read it?”

“Is there any reason why we can’t?” he asked.

“Not at all.”

She handed it to him, and he opened it. I read over his shoulder.

‘Wendy.
I know what the cracks mean.
If you’re reading this, it’s only a matter of time.
If they break me…
Well, I think you know better than I do what happens then.
Make your choice.
Live with the consequences.
After all, they don’t really matter, do they?
Help me, Wendy. You’re my only hope.
-Charlie.’

“What is she talking about?” Aidan asked. “What cracks? What consequences?”

“I knew there was more we weren’t being told,” I said.

“She didn’t want to tell anyone,” Rachel said. “She’s been seeing cracks that nobody else can see. Even I don’t know what it means.”

“And the consequences?” I asked.

“Wendy wouldn’t tell us,” Rachel insisted. “Just that she couldn’t help because there would be ‘consequences’. I think Charlie is calling her bluff.”

“So even you don’t know what this means,” Aidan said.

“Not entirely,” she said, shrugging. “But I think it’ll help.”

“So that’s it?” I asked. “This is what we have? A hunch that Wendy can help, a vague letter from Charlie, and your word?”

“A general goes to war with the army they have,” Rachel said. “This is what we have.”

“This is stupid,” I insisted.

“It’s not the strongest plan,” Aidan said. “But at least it’ll get us out. And who knows? Maybe it’ll work. Maybe it’ll lead us to something better. Maybe it’ll distract us for a few hours. But at this point, we have literally nothing to lose.”

“Fine,” I said. “Let’s go talk to a barista.”

“I could use a coffee, anyway,” Rachel said.

As we packed up and got ready to leave, I couldn’t shake the feeling that there was more Rachel wasn’t telling us. I made eye contact with Aidan, and he nodded.

If Rachel thinks she’s playing us, she’s got another thing coming. Once we’ve rescued Charlie, everything changes.

 

Next Week: Willing To Die For Her

Chapter 44 – We Could Make A Difference Together

Liz, Six Months Before Impact Day

“Rachel knows where Charlie is,” I said, as soon as we entered the room.

“That would have been nice to know twenty minutes ago,” Aidan complained. “How sure are you?”

“Sure enough,” she said.

“Apparently Vengeance have set up shop in some decommissioned military bunker,” I said.

“I didn’t even know we had any of those,” Aidan commented. “I’ll try to confirm.”

“Liz already figured out why it exists,” Rachel said.

“I don’t remember that,” I said.

“Don’t worry about it,” she said. “A rescue mission is gonna be next to impossible, so the three of us are going to have to work together.”

“How fun,” Aidan said.

“Aidan, we need every scrap of information you can get about that base. Also, you’re going to want to make sure your dad is safe, and we can’t be found. If they know who Charlie is, they’ll definitely go after friends and family.”

“On it,” he said, tapping away at his keyboard.

“Liz, until you’re recovered, you’ll be working on an infiltration plan. When you can, you’ll be doing intense physical therapy and training. We can’t afford to fuck this up.”

“Who put you in charge?” I demanded.

“Common sense,” she said. “Do you have any better ideas?”

“It’s easier not to fight her,” Aidan pointed out. “It’s only until we can rescue Charlie.”

“Let’s just hope that doesn’t take long,” Rachel said.

“And what are you going to be doing?” I asked.

“Building,” she said. “I’ve never had to break into a military bunker before. It should be interesting. I’m kind of looking forward to it.”

I rolled my eyes at her, and sat down beside Aidan. He smiled absently at me, and Rachel disappeared into the bedroom again, back to her old habits.

I glanced at Aidan’s screen, but couldn’t make any sense of it. Even if Rachel was right about what he was up to, I had no way of confirming it.

Did I even care? Gangs were a constant presence in this city, and at least I could trust him not to be an exploitative arsehole about it. It would be dangerous, but I could probably keep him safe, and he wasn’t exactly stupid. It might piss Rachel off, but who cared what she thought?

Why was I even suspicious of him, anyway? More likely than not, it was just some nasty mind game Rachel was playing, trying to undermine us, break us apart in one of her petty, narcissistic games. The important thing was focussing on rescuing Charlie, and that was something I had to believe we could do.

Breaking into a military bunker, though? That was so far beyond the scope of anything I knew how to do. Sure, my parents had given me all the training they could offer, but being an assassin wasn’t like being a ninja. It didn’t come with any supernatural abilities or make me capable of impossible feats of parkour.

Given the physical capabilities of Aidan and Rachel, it was likely I’d be headed in by myself. Somehow, I had to take on an entire army of well-armed thugs. Aidan might be able to fill me in on what to expect, and Rachel might be able to provide some gizmos, but at the end of the day, it was all going to come down to me.

If I could figure out a plan that let me guarantee every encounter would be one-on-one, I’d probably have a chance. Of course, the guns made it hard, but if I could maintain the element of surprise…

People are hard to knock out, especially when armed. Movies make it look easy, but a powerful concussive force to the head is likely to cause permanent damage. Cutting off blood or oxygen isn’t much better, and definitely more difficult to do.

Not that killing them would be any easier. Humans aren’t designed like video game enemies. Bodies try very hard to stay alive, and put up as much of a fight as they can. Slitting throats takes time and a lot of muscle. Breaking necks… not really feasible. Stabbing through the heart? Maybe, if they’re not wearing any armour, you have proximity and they don’t know you’re there, but it’s very risky and not guaranteed to work.

So, somehow I had to make my way through dozens of thugs, basically armed soldiers, without raising an alarm, preferably without killing anyone, break Charlie out of some locked cell, and get us both out again.

Sure. Easy. What could go wrong?

Of course, even a simple mistake would end it all. One thug getting the upper hand in a fight. One stray bullet. One miscalculation. One piece of faulty information. One random bit of bad luck. I could get caught, maybe killed or tortured, and Aidan and Rachel would be no closer to rescuing Charlie, or me.

“I don’t know if we can do this,” I said, and Aidan looked at me. He rested a hand on my shoulder.

“Me either,” he said. “But I do know that we don’t have a choice. Leaving Charlie in there isn’t something either of us could live with.”

“Do you think it’s suspicious?” I asked, glancing over at the room Rachel had disappeared into.

“How quickly she found Charlie, you mean?”

“All of it.”

“I think that’s a dangerous train of thought,” he said. “I know you don’t trust her. Honestly, I don’t really trust her either. But I trust that she cares about Charlie, and right now, that’s the only thing I care about.”

“Is she right?” I asked.

“About Vengeance’s base? I haven’t been able to confirm yet. That’s not exactly easy information to come by, but I’m working on it. It seems likely, though.”

“I meant about you,” I said quietly.

“Do you believe her?” he asked, dodging the question.

“I don’t know what to believe. That’s why I asked.”

“I don’t have any sinister plans,” he told me. “I can see an opportunity, a chance to make some positive changes, in ways that Charlie won’t ever consider. She’s not the only one who wants to make a difference, you know.”

“She’ll try and stop you,” I said.

“She can try,” Aidan said. “But that’s a bridge we can cross once we rescue her. Maybe she’ll have a change of heart.”

“That’ll be the day,” I said, and we both laughed.

“We could make a difference together,” he said softly. “If you wanted.”

I looked him in the eye, those strangely captivating grey eyes, so bright they were almost silver. I saw determination, fear and pride, and I took his hand in mine.

“Together,” I said.

 

Next Week: Too Bad We Don’t Have Superpowers

Chapter 43 – Useless

Liz, Six Months Before Impact Day

“What happened to your leg?” she asked, the moment she saw me.

“Accident,” I said.

“Right. You, uh okay?”

“Dandy.”

“Cool.”

We looked at each other, awkwardly. I’d never seen her so frazzled, and for just a moment, I felt a pang of pity.

“Charlie’s missing,” she said.

“So you were watching her tracker.”

“I set up an alert if it stopped transmitting,” she said defensively. “Ages ago.”

“Right.”

“You were checking too?”

“She’s been gone for hours,” I said. “We were worried.”

“I take it you’re looking for her?” she asked.

“Aidan is. I’m…”

“Useless?” she offered.

“Fuck off.”

“If it helps, I know where Charlie is,” she said.

“What?”

She sighed, looked around, and lowered her voice.

“I don’t want to talk about it here,” she said.

“Then why didn’t you just come up?” I asked. “Do you have some problem with Aidan?”

“He’s dangerous,” she said.

“He’s really not.”

“Fine, whatever,” she said. “I still don’t want to be around him.”

“Where, then?”

“There’s an apartment on the third floor that isn’t occupied.”

“How do you know that?”

“I’m good at figuring things out,” she said vaguely.

“And how do you expect to get in?”

“You think a locked door is gonna stop either of us?” she asked.

Without waiting for an answer, she got up and started walking to the elevator. I hobbled after her, still frustrated by my lack of mobility. She held the door for me.

“You know you need a keycard to get to—” I began, but she waved something in front of the scanner and hit the button for the third floor. The elevator started moving. “Right.”

“Basic magnetics,” she said.

“Of course.”

When we got to the third floor, she led me to apartment twelve. I watched as she effortlessly picked the lock, impressed by her brazenness if nothing else. Within seconds, we were in.

“You’re a natural born criminal,” I told her.

“Poverty will do that to you,” she said with a shrug. “Blame capitalism.”

The apartment was largely empty, so she set up a laptop on the kitchen counter. I stood, trying to ignore the pain in my leg, as she loaded up what she wanted to show me.

“As soon as she disappeared, I tried hacking into city infrastructure,” she told me. “Unfortunately, Melbourne doesn’t have the level of omnipresent traffic cameras I was hoping for, so my original plan of just following the car via video didn’t work.”

“Okay.”

“I tried writing a predictive algorithm based on the type of vehicle they’d have needed, the time of day, and possible locations to take her, but I didn’t have enough data.”

“Can you just skip to the point?” I asked.

“Charlie likes it when I explain my process,” she muttered. “Fine. Using a combination of technical genius and general investigative brilliance, I narrowed down the location, then sent out a drone to confirm it.”

“Of course you have a drone.”

“They’re not exactly hard to build,” she said. “Anyway, the good news stops there.”

“Because…”

“Because we’re never gonna get in,” she said. “Vengeance have set up their base of operations in a decommissioned military bunker. It’s underground, heavily fortified and guarded by ex-military gangsters who are armed to the teeth.”

“Charlie would love that,” I said idly.

“She’d probably love it a lot more if she weren’t a prisoner,” Rachel snapped.

“Right.”

“So here’s where I need your help,” she said. “There’s no way I can get Charlie out of there alone.”

“You think I can help?” I asked. “I mean, I’ll obviously do what I can, but even if I wasn’t injured, I’m not exactly…”

“I need you to think about this like an assignment,” she said. “A job. I can provide schematics, external footage, predictions based on likely defensive patterns. I can probably build tech to get through most major obstacles. It might take us a little time, but… Well, that’s the one thing Charlie has.”

“You know I’ve never actually assassinated anyone, right?”

“I know you’re trained and you have the desire to save Charlie. I was hoping that would be enough.”

“We should get Aidan’s help,” I said. “He can probably get us more information about what’s inside, and resources—”

“You realise he’s just as bad, don’t you?” she asked. “He’s using Charlie, using all of us.”

“He’s helping.”

“He’s building his own gang.”

“It’s an information network,” I insisted. “It’s what we need.”

“I can’t tell if you’re naïve or just have a warped perspective,” she said. “But fine. For Charlie, I will work with your boyfriend.”

“He’s not my boyfriend,” I snapped. “I’m not even…”

“Straight? Whatever, I don’t care.”

“Do you hate me because you’re insecure?” I asked.

“I trust Charlie,” she said.

“That’s not a ‘no’,” I pointed out.

“I’m not that petty,” she insisted. “Do you really want to have this conversation?”

“I want to save Charlie,” I said. “Neither of us like each other, but we do need each other.”

“Fine.” She sighed. “You’re more attractive than me, you’ve known her longer, you have such a close friendship, she doesn’t have to lie about you. Her friends and family clearly adore you. Am I jealous? Sure. But I don’t hate you for that.”

“Why, then?”

“Seriously?”

“Just say it,” I said.

“You’re rich, spoiled, and you act like you’re better than me,” she said. “You live in a mansion and go to a fancy school because your parents are literal murderers, and you have the gall to look down on me. You act possessive of Charlie but won’t support her. You don’t even really understand her, but you think you have some right to her affection, and some entitlement to her trust. You think you can dictate her actions based on your own moral code, your own values, but most of all, when you met me you acted like a possessive girlfriend instead of welcoming me.”

“Is that it?”

“You make me uncomfortable,” she said. “I don’t feel safe around you.”

“Great. Do I get a turn now?”

“Knock yourself out,” she mumbled.

“You’re reckless, you enable Charlie’s incredibly destructive behaviour, you encourage and abet criminal activity, and yes, I know how hypocritical that sounds. You place your relationship with her above my friendship with her, and expect priority in all things. You act so smug because she confides in you, and instead of trying to help her, you act like you’re the only one on her side. You manipulate her into trusting you, and pushing us away. You hold me responsible for the crimes of my family, but won’t apply the same vindictiveness to yourself, and worst? I think you might actually be a sociopath. You’re definitely a narcissist.”

“Well,” she said.

“Feel better now?”

“Surprisingly, yes,” she said.

“Actually, me too.”

“Great. Let’s go talk to your boyfriend,” she said.

“He’s not—”

“Don’t care.”

 

Next Week: We Could Make A Difference Together

Chapter 42 – Maybe Everything’s Fine

Liz, Six Months Before Impact Day

After several hours, Aidan and I started to get worried. Neither of us could get a hold of Charlie, and it wasn’t like her to just disappear on us.

“Maybe she’s with Rachel?” Aidan offered, without hope.

“Does she still have Rachel’s tracking chip in her?” I asked.

“She should,” he said, “but that seems kind of invasive, don’t you think?”

“She said she was just going out for a walk. What if she got attacked or something?”

“It is better to be safe than sorry,” he said. “Alright, fine.”

He opened his laptop, and a few rapid keystrokes later, we had Charlie’s tracking data on screen. It wasn’t good.

“How did she just disappear?” I asked, staring at the screen.

“Some kind of signal blocker?” Aidan suggested. “Seems like the sort of thing Vengeance might think of.”

The thought sent a shudder down both our spines. The idea of what they might do to her, what they probably would do to her…

“What do we do?” he asked, not even trying to hide the desperation in his voice.

“I don’t know,” I said.

What could we do? My mind was already whirling, trying to figure out what came next. We had to find out where she was, then figure out how to get her out. If whoever took her knew to block the tracker, how much more did they know?

“I’ll try to find out where they’re keeping her, but I have no idea how long that will take,” he said. “I know you’ve wanted to avoid this, but do you think your parents—”

“No,” I said sharply.

“Okay. I’ll see what I can do. You…”

“I’m going to look for her,” I said.

“Dude, you can barely walk.”

“I have to do something.”

“What if they take you, too?” he asked.

“Maybe everything’s fine,” I said, not really believing it. “Maybe the tracker ran out of battery, or she went into a tunnel, or…”

“Liz.”

Frustrated, I slammed my fist into the table. I knew something like this was going to happen! I tried to warn her, but she wouldn’t listen to me, would she?

Why did it have to be this? Why did she have to be so obsessed with being a comic book hero? Why did she have to go after the people who paid for my house, my school, my wardrobe? Why did I have to feel guilty about that?

Why didn’t she trust me with any of it? Why does she have to put herself in danger? Why doesn’t any of it make sense?

Why did she have to choose Rachel?

I shook my head, trying to throw out the negative thoughts. I needed to be focussed, needed to think about how to help. Charlie needed me.

I looked at Aidan, already desperately tapping away on his laptop, no doubt organising deals and messaging people and doing whatever else it was he did. It didn’t feel right that he was helping and all I was doing was feeling sorry for myself.

I massaged my leg, wishing I hadn’t been so clumsy. It was sloppy, and I should have been better. Now I needed it, and I was handicapped. It was so unfair.

All I ever wanted was a normal life. I wanted to forget about all my training, all the blood on my family’s hands, all the dark secrets I knew. I wanted to go to university, get a degree, get a normal job. I wanted to live my life without ever having to think about any of this again.

Charlie was always going to drag me back in, though. I knew from the moment I met her that she was going to shatter the fragile peace I was trying to build for myself. I just didn’t care.

She had this incredible gravity to her, this inescapable energy that nobody understood, but everyone felt. You couldn’t feel neutrally about Charlie, you either loved her or you hated her. Sometimes both.

And if you were lucky enough to get noticed by Charlie, you couldn’t help but feel like you were special, too. Like she was going to elevate you into greatness, or drag you into chaos, and whatever it was, you were happy to be taken along for that ride, because whatever happened, it just seemed right.

Or maybe that was just me.

I felt a buzzing in my pocket, and pulled out my phone. A message from Rachel. Already? Seemed suspicious.

Meet me downstairs, it said.

Okay, I replied.

“I’m just going downstairs,” I told Aidan. “Apparently Rachel is there.”

“That’s weird,” he said.

“She’s probably been obsessively watching Charlie’s tracker, like a weirdo,” I said.

“Maybe she can help.”

“Ugh,” I said.

“Liz.”

“Fine, fine, you’re right,” I said. “I’ll see what she wants. For Charlie.”

“Be careful,” he said.

“What’s the worst she could do?” I asked.

 

Next Week: Useless