SG: Innocent Bystander #3

[Whitney Taylor]

Episode 3: Ill-Starred Introductions


Jacksonville



Mina Westing reluctantly tore herself away from her phone. She had reached the end of her dashboard on M00slr, an app her little brother had recommended. It was for people to post their personal stories and recordings of Superguy activity, often acquired at great personal risk. At her brother’s urging, she had posted her audio of the ranting villain Malmechano, in exchange for the satisfaction of a few likes and comments. But that had been a week ago, and now it was time for her to go back to her job as waitress at the supervillain-frequented Middle Grounds Cafe.


After slipping on the sneakers she would have to change out of later, Mina reached for her duffle bag. For the last two weeks she had been in the kitchen washing dishes, and now, with a sigh, she removed the objects which represented the greatest privilege of that position: chunky heeled boots. These she placed reverentially under the bed before, with the greatest loathing, bringing forth the required footwear of the waitstaff of Middle Grounds: knee high stiletto heeled boots.


"At least," she said dully to herself, "I can use the extra height."


She jumped at a sudden knock. Tiptoeing to the door, she looked through the peephole. The balding, red-haired man behind it looked vaguely familiar. He looked much older than she remembered and had dark circles under his eyes; it took her a moment to place him as Ed Hinkle, an old acquaintance of her parents from more troubled times.


With a sigh, Mina pulled back and unlocked the door. "Why did Mom send you?" She regretted her bluntness when she saw the wounded look on his face.


"She just wanted someone to check up on you," said Ed, his strong Southern accent somehow making his words seem more reproachful. "She worries about you, I can understand that. She’s lost a lotta people and I have, too."


"Well," Mina sighed again, "Here I am, and I’m just fine. Sorry. I have to get to work soon, so I don’t really have time to talk."


He looked her up and down. It wasn’t creepy, more clinical, and Mina had to wonder if he thought he was going to see gaping wounds bleeding through her clothes as she stood casually in the doorway. He seemed satisfied though, for he said: "I’ll tell your mama you’re doin’ alright." He hesitated then, and she braced herself. "You know the forces of darkness run strong and fearless in this city and that they are for all intents and purposes unopposed by the forces of light?"


"I’ve heard something about that," said Mina, carefully.


"Well, you’ve got to keep a watch out, young lady. Body and soul. I’d like to lay a blessing on this here apartment, so the Lord can keep a watch out too."


Mina’s shoulders slumped a little. "How long will that take?"


"Just a few quick minutes."


"Well... okay then. But I do have to get to work, Mr. Hinkle."


She moved aside to let him in and then, suddenly mortified, scurried ahead of him to cram the stilettos into her duffle bag. But if Ed Hinkle had seen the scandalously uncomfortable footwear, he was being polite about it. He knelt on the floor, closing his eyes.


"Our lord and savior, I ask you to bless this house and to send Your holy servant Elvis to watch over the one who dwells here. Hunka Hunka Hi-lo-do-si-dosy-do Aha-ha hurry oh-oh-ho-houndog hunka..."


Mina slapped her forehead and suppressed a groan as the man tumbled onto his back in the middle of the floor, speaking in tongues. She really should have known better.


"....Fool fool fool hi lo dosidonbecruel I BANISH FROM THIS RESIDENCE ALL THE MINIONS OF SATAN T. LUCIFER JONES AND THEIR POWERS AND INFLUENCE AND FOX AND HIS POWER AND INFLUENCE AND ALL OTHER UNAFFILIATED POWERS OF DARKNESS in your name we pray amen."


In the midst of his convulsions, the man had flung himself back to his feet, his arms raised to the heavens, a bright glow surrounding him. Mina felt a light wind and heard a gasp--her own?--as the glow pushed outward and through her, fading as it passed the open door into the hallway.


Looking satisfied but twice as tired, Ed Hinkle dusted his hands off and straightened his clothes. "Best close that mouth before flies get in there," he chuckled as he walked out.


*****


A coherent packet of air ballooned through the door and splashed against the opposing wall, propelled by the force of the spell. The controlling spirit was almost propelled out of its aerial form and straight through the plaster, but it held itself together tenaciously. Advancing again, it tried to press through the open door. No dice. Fine, it thought, it didn’t really care anyway. It had visited the girl several times since it had become aware of her existence, and this was the first time it had seen anything interesting happen. The wraith drifted out of the way of the red-haired man--Hinkle, wasn’t it?--as he walked out of the apartment, and then turned to follow.


*****


Mina was still trying to shake off her daze when she arrived at work. It was not helpful that the first thing she saw when she walked through the back door into the breakroom was Rezo, dressed in a flowing black jumpsuit of his own (much more flattering with his black hair than her mousy brown) and towering over her in chunky high-heeled boots. She stopped in her tracks. Behind him, she caught a flash of the cook Amy Sunderland moving about the kitchen, a ferocious scowl on her face.


The henchman flipped a lock of hair out of his bemasked eyes. "Oh, it’s you, Westing. I was just about to take a smoke break."


"What are you doing here?" Mina demanded. "Don’t tell me you *work* here now?"


He nodded. "Yeah, the old boss is lying low from catgirls, and he wasn’t giving me any hours. So I got Ms. Sunderland to let me work here for a bit, ‘cuz she and I had that business deal, so I didn’t fall behind on any payments."


"Student loans?" guessed Mina, softening. She got a dejected nod. "Happens to all of us, I guess."


She watched him clump out the door. At least he was not more graceful than she was in heels.


*****


Whispering and giggling as they approached, the young man and woman fell silent as they pushed through the front door of the cafe. Though they tried to be surreptitious as they took in the crowd, among which could be seen brightly colored costumes poorly hidden under trenchcoats and hoodies, their awed looks were starting to draw attention. The woman fumbled in her purse, starting to draw forth her phone, but the man made a "shhhh!" noise and put his hand on her arm. Towards the back, a tall woman in a black jumpsuit and nametag frowned, then began to start over.


Another, much more striking couple was sitting at a table by a streetside window. The woman, her dark red hair tumbling past the seat of her chair, her skin a shade or two lighter than pitch black, wore a pale pink pantsuit in a loose flowing fabric over a minimal dark red top which presented an expanse of impressive chest. The man, skin and long hair just a shade short of albino, wore much the same thing with only the colors reversed.


The woman dangled in her elegant fingers a single bright green card. The man, a fan of red cards. Before each of them lay a neat stack of green. The woman placed her card on the table face up with a *sssthk* of finality. "Antediluvian" was printed upon it.


The man considered this offering carefully, then drew forth from his hand a red card with the word "Obelisk" written along the side. With a solemn nod, the woman pushed her green card over to his side of the table.


"Don’t you need more than two people for that game?" The exclamation was a little too loud, and the pair at the table looked up. When the newcomers realized that they had been noticed, the young man stepped forward. "See, you need more than one person with red cards, so the judge can have some options to..." He trailed off under the pressure of two pairs of gray eyes, darkening to black the longer he held their gaze.


"Yes, more people." Smiled the woman.


"To judge," said the man.


*****


Mina was taking the Mad Beekeeper's order for an iced dirty chai to go when she noticed her coworker, Simone, stiffen up and hurry towards the front of the cafe. By the time Mina had a free moment, though, Simone had returned to the counter. There had been no sounds of an altercation, but the other woman looked a little spooked.


"Trouble?" Mina whispered.


Simone, a tall, elegant young woman with freckles scattered across her light brown cheekbones, shook her Afro’d head. "Some normies came in to sightsee, I think. Sometimes it happens. We leave them alone if they’re quiet about it, but... Anyway, these guys are being... Well, we don’t need to worry right now." Her gaze flicked to the front window, then back.


"What’s happening to them?" Mina asked in alarm, following her gaze. There at the window she saw that creepy pair in pink, where they normally sat playing chess. They seemed to be up to something different now, with cards. And two more players? Something off about the way they were sitting. Mina stepped forward, trying to get a better view.


Simone grabbed her arm. "Just let it be," she hissed, "You know we’re not even supposed to look at those two!"


"Why aren’t they playing chess, like usual?" Mina wondered, absurdly.


"The Gourmand came in earlier and mistook the pieces for novelty chocolates. Leda dug that game up instead."


"Are those the normies? What’s wrong with them?" She could only see the woman’s back, arrow-straight and unmoving. The man appeared to be smiling, or at any rate, his lips were turned up and he was showing teeth.


"Nothing. I mean, they’ll probably still be alive at closing and the owner will come talk to them and they won’t come back again. Which is less work for us and that’s all I care to know."


"Probaby?" Mina squeaked. She watched the normie woman’s arm reach robotically to take a red card from the pile. The woman shuddered.


Just then, they were interrupted by a call. "Hey, toots! How about a refill!" A trenchcoat-clad man, the brim of his hat failing to conceal a glowing cybernetic eye, waved his empty coffee cup.


"Just do your job and let it be, Mina!" Simone squeezed her arm hard and made for the coffee pot.


"Do my job, huh?" Mina squared her shoulders. "All right then, I will!"


She marched resolutely up to the front of the cafe, the clicking of her stiletto heels providing an unexpected confidence boost, donning her brightest, most unnatural customer service smile as her only armor. "Hi!" All four pairs of eyes snapped up to her, but she made herself focus on the two normal humans. "Welcome to the Middle Grounds Cafe! Is there anything I can get you?" The pleading looks in their eyes suggested that yes, there probably was something she could get them.


She waited, heart pounding, for one of them to say something, but instead she heard a "hmmmm" from the other side of the table. Then the exotic, pink-clad man said: "I think... yes, whoever put down ‘my parent’s disappointment’ takes this round." Mina involuntarily looked down at the table, where four cards were arrayed: a green card labeled "Humiliating", and three red with "high school prom" "my parent’s disappointment" and "the failure to consume all of my offspring" written on their respective faces. She looked back at the two tourists. The young man reached forward haltingly to claim the green card, his eyes never leaving Mina’s.


"You’ve never offered to get us anything before," The red-haired woman lilted, "Is service improving here? I would complain about our lost chess board, but someone found us this diverting substitution."


Mina made herself turn around. "I’m happy to hear that you’re satisfied, but if I got you a new chess board, maybe these folks could go on ahead with their order?" She tried not to stare too hard at the dark, serene face. She had never seen these customers up close before. They were hypnotically beautiful.


The man "hmmm"ed again. "But it is good to get outside of our box. We are learning so much in such a short time."


"Maybe I could get you a different game?" Mina asked through a growing haze. The woman was gazing at her, head cocked to the side, the dark gray of her eyes spilling out to fog the room.


"We could play this one with three," the voice of the pallid man wafted through the vanishing room to reach Mina’s ears. This was a mistake, she thought. Why hadn’t she listened to Simone, who had been here longer? The whole room was gray. Now her whole body felt gray. She was falling into herself, becoming aware of some inner force fighting, fighting, then pleading...


Which was humiliating. The sting goaded Mina into using her last fading drops of will, and she twitched her head violently to the side, breaking the dark woman’s gaze.


Abruptly, she was surrounded by sunlight, the scents of food and drink, and the sound of whispered conversation punctuated by the occasional mad laughter. "...Could all play," the pale man was saying, "Five is considered an auspicious number..."


Mina made herself look down. From the periphery of her vision, she could see that the dark woman had not moved at all, her head tilted curiously as if she were still examining Mina. "Or perhaps another time." She interrupted. "We have kept this interesting young lady from her duties for long enough."


"...We have."


"Yes."


"We do not wish to speak with the manager?"


"Not this time. We like her as she is."


"Very well then. I suppose we should let the others go, as well."


Mina turned her head to see the two normals, who had been so still she had almost thought they had left. Slowly they started to move their limbs, their faces twisting out of their paralyzed smiles into much more natural and less creepy expressions of horror. She watched as they stood up, their movements arthritically painful, and stumbled out the door, leaning on each other.


She was becoming aware of her own feet, stock still in stilettos for much too long.


"We do look forward to seeing you again." said the man.


"Just ask us if you need any help." said the woman.


In unison, the two rose upward and out of their chairs, floating through the door so easily they might have been levitating.


*****


"Girl, what did I tell you?" Exclaimed Simone as she pushed Mina into the tiny break room. Mina turned around to confront her, and something on her face seemed to calm her coworker’s fury. "Okay, okay, sit down. I’ll get you some tea. Rezo," she addressed the man as he passed the kitchen door, "Make a cup of tea, I know you can handle that. Sit down," the last addressed to Mina.


"I’m okay," said Mina, but she took the opportunity to get her boots off.


"If you say so," the other woman said, then burst out laughing, "I thought you were a goner for a second! I guess I should say good job getting those normies out of here, but you know we have to report this, right?"


"Do we?" cried Mina. "Oh, yeah, altercation with a customer with potential vengeance outcome, I guess..."


"And with those two, of all people!"


"Who are they anyway?"


Simone shook her head. "I don’t know that much. I prefer not to ask questions, but you can try Leda if you want it that bad. Or the owner, if you’ve got a death wish."


At this point Rezo walked in and handed Mina a mug of cold water with a Lipton bag in it. "You shouldn’t ask questions," he advised, "not unless you think you’re on the trail of some good blackmail material."


"Do you know anything about those pink people who always sit by the window?" Mina asked, bypassing his point entirely.


"Don’t be messing with that eldritch shit!" Amy stuck her head in, scowling. "Stick with good, clean technos. They can’t curse you and their stuff is easier to fence, to boot. Rezo, get your ass back in here. You still gotta earn your keep."


"Eldritch? You mean they're..." Mina trailed off, "Oh, never mind."


*****


Hours later, Mina was blessedly back in her sneakers and headed out. Behind the cafe was a stretch of gravel bordered by strip mall on one side and kudzu on the other. She watched her surroundings under the harsh, intermittent sodium lights carefully as always as she made her way to her chained up scooter.


There was not even the slightest noise as the cat fell upon her from above. There was only a sudden weight bearing her to the ground and the stinging of her palms and knees as she caught herself. Then a dizzying twist, a crunch of metal against gravel and she was facing the sky, the armored body of the catgirl beneath her back and the sharp nails at her throat.


"Do nnnnnot try to move," husked a familiar-sounding voice in her ear, "Even if yooou could escape me, my comrrrrades surround us."


Mina placed the voice. "Maow," she gasped, "what? Why?" Her mind provided a fact painstakingly gleaned from innumerable internet videos: cats liked to fight on their backs because they could kick with their hind legs. Her mind then helpfully supplied an image of the catgirl’s unclad rear paws. Had those claws really been so long?


A rumbling sigh. "Pleeease don’t pretennnnnd ignorance. Yoooouu were the last onnnne seen with ooouur prize beforrre it disappeared."


The mind control device invented by the villain Malmechano, and coveted by the contentious pack of humanoid cats. Of course. "I don’t know where that is. Really." It was technically true. Of most of the device, anyway. She had taken a part from it, along with what was apparently a high tech laser pointer. Mina regretted their current inconvenient location (under her bathroom sink) as she saw other feline figures begin to appear in her line of vision.


A strange, soothing vibration began to infuse Mina’s body from below. Was this furry psychopath *purring*? "Cannnn you really sssay you know nothing? It would be goooood for you to give mmmmy friends sommmme intelligence."


The biggest catgirl stood over Mina now. She was the one-eyed Minyang, and her fur poofed helmetless in a halo about her snarling face. "Nnnnno more time wasted. Wwwwe have lost time hunnnnnting you and now we haaave you. Tell ussss where the machine issss that we won, ffffair and square. Tell usssss or you will be caannnceled."


"But I don’t know!" Mina protested. She knew who did--but she didn’t want to get Amy in trouble if she could help it.


A texture like wet sandpaper scratched her temple. "I thinnnnk you know sommmmething," Maow said, "I woooould rather not see you canceled, sssso cough it up please."


"I--"


"Perssssssssuasion," purred Minyang, claws unsheathed.


"Wait!" protested Maow. "Persuasion with claws is prrrroblematic and yields questionable rrrrresults!"


The squabbles of the catgirls had worked to Mina’s favor in the past, when she had not been trapped bodily between two participants. She tried not to squirm.


"Counterrrrpoint!" squalled a calico at Minyang’s side, "Perrrrrsuasion with claws is fffffun!"


"Good kitties, bad kitties. Run along."


"Find another mouse to play with."


The voices chilled Mina’s hot panic into cold dread in an instant. Defying the claws at her neck, she craned her head around, trying to see. Maow growled, but loosened her grip. The other catgirls had startled, and were looking around them with saucer-wide eyes, hissing. They saw the interlopers before Mina did, so she couldn’t tell where the pink-clad pair had been hiding. She saw them advance, their sandals crunching the gravel, black as night and white as bone.


Minyang turned to face them, the other cats arraying themselves around her. Mina was pulled to her feet by Maow, who was now thankfully aiming her claws outward.


The catgirls were all growling now. Minyang was in front, holding the intruders in her gaze--but if they were trying to hypnotize her they were having no success. "What do you want?" She asked. "Why do you interrupt our business?"


"This child is under our protection," the woman said. "An employee of our favorite establishment."


"No claws, no cancelings," confirmed the man.


Minyang crouched, claws curving out. "Nnnnno amount of nnnepotism--AYEEEEOWOW!" She jumped backwards, apparently from nothing, but as Mina focused her gaze she thought she could see a faint, out-of place shadow imposed upon the scene like a bad photoshop. The other catgirls were starting to hop around too, attacked from different angles. Maow spat something which didn’t sound like English but sure did sound like a curse word, jumping backwards and pushing Mina away so hard she fell down again. Looking back, Mina met frightened blue eyes for an instant and then the siamese was gone. All of the catgirls were scattering now, as noisy in retreat as they had been silent in ambush. In seconds, Mina was left alone with the mysterious mauve duo.


"Very interesting."


"Was unsure if that would even work."


"I hope she isn’t injured."


"The uniform is torn."


"Oh no! But we can pay for a new one."


They were walking towards her, solicitous expressions on their faces. Mina was beset by the horrifying impression that they were going to offer her a hand up, and hastily scrambled to her feet before they could get close enough.


"The poor thing is trembling! Maybe a new coat, too."


"It isn’t very cold, but I see you’re right."


"Thank you," Mina burst in, "Really, I thought I was cat food."


"Oh we’d never let them harm you." The man’s smile certainly looked the way a reassuring smile was supposed to look.


"We *like* you!" declared the woman.


"...thanks?"


"For your uniform." The woman held out a wad of cash. Mina was really starting to feel like an ungrateful cad.


"If you ever need anything." The man was holding out a business card.


Mina took both offerings politely. Amara Night and Zayd Mortis, the card read. There was no number. "Are you some kind of superheroes?" But she remembered two pairs of eyes, glazed and pleading...


"For you? Whatever!" The woman laughed as the two strolled away, arm in arm into the night, leaving Mina wondering what had just happened and if she had, in fact, been rescued.


*****


Savannah



The Electric Eye pushed cautiously through the door of the old house, the leggy blonde clutching his arm and still fretting. "Watch out! I don’t know what kind of traps they have--I was always blindfolded when they brought me--"


"Got it, toots," the detective drawled, his Eye scanning every dust mote of his surroundings for traps mundane or magical. Mostly magical--he knew the nature of this beast by now. The whole house glowed with it, readouts popping up over particularly intense spots. The most intense reading came from below--which was funny, since they were on the lake and a basement would be nothing but indoor swamp. There were a surprising number of electronics upstairs, though. "You just stay close, and don’t put those pretty feet anywhere I haven’t stepped."


Up or down. "Where did they take you?"


"Downstairs," she gasped, "There should be a staircase straight ahead."


"Thanks." He advanced slowly down the dark wood-paneled hallway, paying special attention to the dark and light gray tiled marble floor. Something nasty could be camouflaged by the background glow from underground. Laylah followed close. When the Electric Eye sidestepped a set of tiles he didn’t like the look of, the woman was startled. She stumbled in her stiletto heels, and he cursed, seizing her by the arm and yanking her towards him just before a flash of light blasted the space where she had been. Laylah clung to him, trembling. He was starting to wish she had stayed in the car--the way she pressed against him was something he would prefer to enjoy in a more relaxed atmosphere.


"I’ll take you back and come in alone," he offered. But the woman only shook her head.


"No--I have to do this!" she breathed tearfully.


Well, she did feel nice on his arm. He led the way forward again, stopping before a panel on the wall beneath the upward stairs. His Eye scanned the intricate carvings which seemed to cover all the wood in this house. He reached out, tracing his fingers along a particular pattern until a small hidden slat the size of a credit card popped open. He knelt before it, drawing forth his lockpicking kit. Behind him, the woman prayed under her breath.


When the big wooden panel slid outward, he turned to the blonde woman  one last time. "You sure you can handle this? I don’t need you fainting on me." The Eye examined her. She still glowed faintly from the aftereffects of the mind control she had been under. The readouts showed her state of physical stress as she drew herself up and nodded. She certainly believed she was ready to confront the evil mage who had taken over her life and business. He doubted if she would be of any practical use, but the way her tearful eyes gazed trustfully up at him sure was a confidence booster.


He drew his gun and descended. The stairs were clean and dry and descended about twenty feet, which implied some magic must be employed to keep the water out, or else a great many pumps. They emerged into a low, wide room paved in granite and lit unnaturally. Immediately ahead was an archway, carved roughly from a single stone leading apparently to nowhere. In front of the archway was an altar, of the standard human-sacrifice variety. The whole area glowed so brightly with magic that the detective had to shutter his Eye, using mundane vision to make out the physical details.


Laylah cried out, flinching against him. He turned to see a humanoid figure of coiled metal and sharp edges. He almost emptied his clip into the thing, but its lack of movement checked him. When he unshuttered his Eye to look at it, it was empty of either magic or electrical energy. He chuckled from relief. "Relax, sweetheart. It’s a dud." It was barely more than a stick figure, in fact, lacking even gears to move its parts. Some kind of modern art crap. He'd thought this mage at least had taste.


"Over here." Called a cool, strange voice. He turned, cocking his weapon. Another spot of sourceless light had appeared in a corner away from the altar, illuminating a figure in flowing gray-green robes, hood pulled back to reveal a hairless, androgynous head.


"So you’re the one the mages call Homunculus. You hide yourself pretty well."


"Thank you." He--she?--spread their arms wide. "But now you have found me. What do you intend to do now?"


"First I’d like to inform you about the bullets in this gun. I’m a bit of a mage myself, and I made them to blow through shields," He paused, then added, "Sugar." to see how the endearment worked on the androgyne.


A slight frown. "Noted."


"Secondly. You owe this lady an apology."


"I deeply regret the inconvenience, Laylah."


"Max... I..."


"Thirdly. You've been noticed. Honey. I’ve got a guy wants to talk to you about the shit you’ve been up to in Jacksonville." He paused. "You go by Max? Would that be Maxine or Maximillian?"


The click of a step behind him and the whoosh of movement were just enough warning for the Electric Eye to turn his head before a shining blade lopped it off. The fraction of a second--not enough to save him--showed him the scrap metal stick figure come alive with magic and motion. Then the world was turning around and around, and he heard the sweet silvery voice taunting: "That’s for not having any manners."


*How*? He thought, coming to a rest. He could feel nothing below--he could feel nothing. The thing had been completely inanimate. He was facing the altar, blinding-bright to his cybermagic eye. A magical spirit could have hidden behind that glow. A dozen of them, and he would have been none the wiser. He heard Laylah--poor, lovely, Laylah so frightened--but now she sounded exasperated to his fading ears.


"We have a deadline, Elemental!"


"Touching loyalty," added Homunculus, drily. "But inconvenient. What will Daemon say?"


"It’s true though! And I don’t think we could have used *him* anyway!"


The melodic, metallic voice, sounding petulant now. The sculpture, inanimate until possessed. He tried to turn for another look, but of course he could not. There was more conversation, muffled by the darkness closing in on all his senses. Only the cybermagic eye remained steadfast, sending its vision to him and through him and onward.


*Elvis damn it*, he thought to his employer, *get these slippery bastards!* And then all was darkness.
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