“So tell me… why didn’t we follow Dan and Ginger?” Mike’s voice sounded
irritated to Matt, and he supposed it was. It certainly didn’t surprise him.
What had surprised him was that Mike hadn’t gone, that he had actually
stayed.
The only answer that occurred to him was instinct, plain and simple. He’d
talked to Mike before and found he was a guy who didn’t rely much on
thinking ahead. Yes, instinct seemed like the correct answer… not that it
really mattered.
“We need to think this out, decide what to do before we start in on it,”
Matt explained, feeling as though it were unnecessary.
Shadow nodded agreeably. “I wanted to leave but… I felt that it wouldn’t do
us any good. I mean... to go out there without knowing what we were doing?
It seemed… I don’t know, sort of foolish, I guess,” she shrugged, having
made her point.
For what she had said, Matt felt his respect for her growing. She wasn’t led
away by her anger… God, that just reminded him of someone who was, someone
he wished wasn’t.
He realized that both were waiting for him. Taking a deep breath, he let
himself talk, not exactly sure of what he’d say but confident he’d find out.
“You both saw what Felicity did up there.”
They nodded, and Mike commented, “How could we miss it?” Yet again, his tone
suggested a weak attempt at a joke.
“Before this happened did you…” he paused for a moment, putting together the
right words. “Did you ever think she would do something like this?”
“No,” Shadow shook her head. Mike agreed with her, and she added, “Except…
except maybe to someone for her job. But this is different!” Her voice had
taken on a slightly higher, more distressed tone, and Mike looked at her
with a sort of comfort in his eyes.
Understanding where she was coming from, Matt nodded solemnly. He’d seen
Felicity before, seen how she’d retained herself… The only difference was,
he had known something about her. Something that had been known when she was
hired. Something she had promised was done with.
He had doubted that, doubted it deeply. Hell, he’d even gone so far as to
tell Giovanni about it, though it hadn’t done any good. As he’d said, if
there was trouble, someone would see it. There had been a lot of people in
the organization, after all.
Besides, he figured that they had taken precautions. No one had said
anything to him, but he had suspected someone was giving her some sort of
drug… The Rockets did plenty of that, after all. What would stop them? Who
would stop them?
So without the drugs, the sort of disease had been replenished. Without the
team, no one had spotted it in time. The result was that she had killed.
And that was only the beginning.
He knew what would come next, what would happen. He knew all too well for
his own liking, and wanted to forget, but couldn’t.
“Matt?” Mike’s questioning voice cut through his thoughts. “Did you?”
Of course he had asked that question. Matt had expected it. He had hoped for
it, too, because it was a good enough way to tell it. “Yes. In fact, I knew
she could do it.”
Shadow and Mike looked at him swiftly, their eyes locking with his. “You
did?” they asked in unison, without noticing.
He nodded slowly, sighed, took another breath, and spoke again. “Yes. When
Felicity was hired, I got a look at her records. You know, criminal,
physical…” he held the sentence for a moment before finishing it.
“…Medical.”
For a moment his gaze shifted to the doorway, than back to the two who were
staring at him attentively. “Her medical records revealed that she suffered
from a streak of mental illness. It didn’t seem too terrible at first until
I saw what sort of streak it was. Murderous. Even that in itself would have
meant little to me had I not previously researched the topic. I had, and
knew what it meant. I knew it could mean all hell for the team.
“That certain streak of insanity is unstoppable once it starts, and is one
of complete confusion. The afflicted finds themselves with a need to kill,
even a DESIRE to kill. They will find anyone a good victim, though their
anger is usually targeted. In most cases it has to do with something recent,
something they experienced only a short while ago. His or her main ‘targets’
are, on most occasions, anyone who was part of the event.
“Apparently, Felicity promised that she had herself under control, that she
would pose no direct threat. Giovanni doubted that, so he had her take drugs
to control the illness. At least, that’s what I figured. When I heard of her
condition, it began to nag at my mind, constantly telling me something would
go wrong, and it would blow up in our faces.
“So I went to see Giovanni. I told him what I believed, what I knew could
happen, and he said he knew. I was shocked, but he said there was something
I didn’t know, something on our side. Apparently, when a person begins to
fall into insanity, the disease begins to show through in the early stages,
and can be caught. He figured that there were enough people around to spot
anything. I told him it was a risk, he told me she would be a good agent.
“And she was, I myself have seen her work, and now we’ve seen it on Trae.
While working for the Rockets, she remained under control. The control was
the key. As long as she was stable, we were fine. Still, I worried about
what could happen, what my mind still told me would undoubtedly happen.
“So than the organization broke up, and she came to live here with you guys.
It was fine at first, but than she began to sink. There were no drugs to
keep her off the edge, nothing to keep her from passing the border. And no
one knew to look for signs, to see anything strange. So she fell slowly,
nearing that point of insanity, watching it grow closer and closer until
finally, tonight, she hit it.”
Matt fell silent and he looked at Shadow, whose eyes had doubled in size,
and Mike, who was leaning so far forward he was barely sitting on the couch
at all. In the back of his mind, Matt thought it was a wonder he hadn’t
fallen onto the floor yet.
Finally, Shadow managed to speak, though her voice sounded dry. “Oh God… How
dangerous is she?” There was an unbridled terror rising in her voice, and he
realized she was thinking of Dan.
“Very. Think an enraged alligator and multiply the damage by ten,” he didn’t
want to get her hopes down, but was forward with the information anyway.
“This woman is missing a few screws.”
“A few?” Mike’s voice sounded half-upset and half-amused. “Try a whole
bucket full!”
"Ehhh… sure,” Matt looked at him strangely. “Call it what you like, but she
IS dangerous.”
“Than we’ve got to get out there!” Shadow was standing in a second, turning
towards the door.
“Wait,” Matt rose, and Mike reached out for Shadow’s shoulder as he too
stood up. “Do you have a weapon?”
Shadow looked at him for a moment, than shook her head. “No…”
“You might want one,” Matt’s voice was colder than he had intended it to be,
but he didn’t care. He walked towards the door and pulled it open, stepping
out. “Come out here.” -
As if frozen, Shadow just stood in the doorway. Mike grabbed her hand and
she blinked, than shook her head. “I… I almost went out after her unarmed…”
“It’s okay,” Mike led her out the door and closed it behind him. Shadow felt
grateful that he had gotten control of her; she hadn’t felt she could do it
herself. “You were worried.”
“I let it get to me,” her voice shook slightly, both with anger and a
shaking fear. “I shouldn’t have…”
“Don’t say that,” Mike shook his head sadly, than walked with her over to
the driveway, where Matt was rummaging through a bag in the back seat of his
car.
Shadow felt tired suddenly, it hit her at an amazingly unexpected speed.
“No, don’t…” she told herself. “Not now…”
She couldn’t, not when Dan needed her. In her heart she feared for him, for
what Felicity could do. Now that she knew what was plaguing the woman’s
mind, she felt even worse. It hurt her to think of what could happen. Hurt
her badly, even more than it had hurt to see Trae’s bloody carcass.
In her mind, she was glad she hadn’t run off. Now she had an advantage over
Felicity… She knew something about her. Or at least she hoped it was an
advantage. And she would have a gun.
A gun. Did Dan have a gun? Her mind searched frantically for a pathway that
led to a positive answer, but couldn’t find one. Dan had never carried a gun
in his life, why would he have had one? And Ginger… she had her knife. That
was all.
A knife against a revolver. Shadow shuddered openly at this, and she
accepted the words of comfort from Mike readily. “It’s okay…” he reassured.
Simple words, but helpful.
Matt turned towards them, holding out two handguns. “Take them,” he
motioned, and Shadow and Mike each grabbed one.
At the feel of the cold metal in her hand, Shadow felt herself tighten. She
was holding a murder weapon, holding something dangerous. Yes, she had held
a gun before, but never felt anything like that. Never felt that sudden wave
of… of murder.
She hated it, hated it because of what she had seen. Yet at the same time,
she found herself liking it. Liking it because of what it could do to
Felicity.
“Let’s go,” Matt motioned towards the sidewalk, and Shadow felt another
sort of fear inside.
“How do we know where they went?”
“We follow the trail,” he replied. When she looked at him quizzically, he
added, “Believe me, it won’t be difficult.”
Shadow wasn’t sure she wanted to know what he meant by that.
Felicity’s pace was leisurely, as if she was taking a simple walk in the
park. That is, it was leisurely until she reached the main portion of town,
where the roads ran closer and the cars flew by more often. There she
quickened her pace slightly, taking it up a few notches.
Mainly, this was for precaution. She didn’t want them to catch up with her
until she was good and ready, waiting for them, in fact. She wanted to be
the one laughing while the other side failed miserably.
The other reason was the car. She had seen Matt’s Prix, and didn’t know if
he’d be driving it. If he was, she didn’t want to be anywhere near. Despite
the voices of logic in the back of her mind, she didn’t think he’d catch her
if she walked fast enough. Luckily for her, Matt hadn’t taken the car.
She strode down the sidewalk, a woman losing the last of her sanity
quickly, a woman who was set to kill. Her mind wasn’t totally gone, however,
and she managed to disguise her insanity only by making herself appear to be
in a hurry to get somewhere.
Where someone would be going that late at night in such a hurry, she
couldn’t imagine. It seemed to work, though. Anyone she saw simply glanced
at her, than looked away in the trivial act of glancing around.
Felicity’s spirits were high, and she took in the cool night air gladly.
Killing Trae had been easy, she had found. All she’d done was sneak in and
attack. Sneak in and murder the girl.
Murder. She tried to find a sort of pity inside for what she’d done. It
wasn’t unheard of to feel. In fact, she’d heard that nearly everyone felt
pity, guilt, or some other depressing emotion.
Without surprise, she realized that she felt one. Never had, and probably
never would. She’d killed before, never Rockets, but what was the difference
in the insanity of the world? Or her mind?
Yes, Felicity was vaguely aware of what was happening to her. She could
feel her sanity breaking apart, slowly crumbling beneath itself. She had
known the feeling before, though almost never at that intensity.
The last time she had felt it was just before she had joined the Rockets.
She had almost broken down completely, and had been saved only by being hit
by a car. The shock had caused her mind to start working again, to let her
regain her old self.
Than, when she had joined the criminal organization, she had been given
special drugs to keep her mind from flying out of whack, to keep her
chemicals balanced perfectly. They had worked, too, and for awhile she had
been happy.
Of course, once the team had fallen apart, it had been ‘goodbye!’ to the
drugs, and ‘hey there!’ to her old friend madness.
It had never bothered her that she was inflicted with mental illness. She
took it as normally as she took breathing, and had accepted it easily.
Inside, she had known it meant terrible things, known it from the moment
that doctor had told her she was unstable…
That had been awhile ago, when she was younger, somewhere around eleven
years old. Her parents had been concerned about her for the first time in
her life. Looking back on it, she figured they had been more worried about
their status than her own welfare. God forbid they have a crazy kid in the
house.
They’d taken her to a shrink, an asshole who’d thought he was funnier than
hell and made far too many tasteless jokes for her liking. They’d talked for
a long time, him asking questions, her answering. She remembered feeling as
though she were in an interrogation.
After that there had been other sessions. Her parents hadn’t liked it, had
never liked being obligated to do anything for her, but had taken her there
once every week for three months. At the end of that time, the shrink had
called her parents into the room and began his final meeting with them, not
even bothering to ask Felicity to leave the room. Apparently, she had become
unimportant once more.
What he had told her parents was, simply, that they had a daughter with a
problem of instability, one that had the potential to reach extreme
conditions. Her mother had cried, saying their life was ruined, and her
father had asked if they could lock the girl up. Felicity remembered this
indifferently, feeling nothing at all.
In the end, they had given her drugs. She suspected they were the same ones
the Rockets had later given her. With all the drugs she had had, she was
surprised she had become addicted.
Than, when she had fled from her parents, the disorders had begun. She
would sink down to the depths, beginning the process of falling off, than
climb back on by some sort of twisted fate. That was how it had been for a
long time, it seemed, as long as she had been on her own.
Now the insanity was back, plaguing her internally. She had felt its
oncoming, had known she would fall if nothing caught her. She was pretty
sure nothing was going to catch her.
She knew what would happen if she wasn’t stopped. Eventually, she’d kill
herself. In the blind madness, she’d simply slit her throat or shoot
herself. Before she did that, Felicity wanted to take a few people out.
That, too, was the madness, wanting to kill for no real reason. Again, she
felt nothing, didn’t care. Because she accepted it, had accepted it ever
since that day in the shrink’s office where her father had wanted to put her
away.
It was the madness that had caused her indifference, the madness that had
turned her towards the path she had taken. The path of hatred, the path of
danger, the path of death.
She knew this, too. Yet again, she didn’t care. Nothing mattered to her.
Well, nothing except her goal of murder.
With a bit of startled recognition, Felicity found herself at the edge of
the inner city, and was slammed back into reality. She slowed her pace
slightly, hoping she hadn’t traveled too fast for someone to catch up with
her.
“Because it’d be a pity if they were too slow to catch their own death,”
she laughed coldly at that, than froze immediately at the sound of footsteps
behind her.
Whirling around, she found herself looking into the face of a drunk looking
young man with bloodshot eyes and a pale complexion. “What did that mean?”
he asked. He may have looked drunk, but he didn’t sound like he had had
anything.
Felicity’s mind immediately sparked, and she found something in it she
couldn’t name. It was relief. Relief that she hadn’t completely lost it yet.
So he had heard her… Immediately, her own suspicions were aroused. Did the
man know what she meant? Her first instinct was to kill, her second was to
ask questions. She decided to go with the second first. After all, killing
could come after questions.
“I’ve got a few questions I’d like to ask you,” she looked at him gravely.
He looked confused for a moment, than shrugged indifferently. “Shoot.”
Felicity’s face twisted in puzzlement for a moment, than brightened, and
she nodded. “Well, I was going to wait, but if you insist…”
Quickly, she pulled the revolver out of its holster, shoving back the
hammer and pulling the trigger as soon as it her arm was raised at the level
of his forehead. His eyes widened momentarily before clouding over as his
chest disappeared in a red cloud of death.
His body tumbled to the ground with a thick tearing sound as it nearly tore
in half. Unfazed, she shoved the revolver back into the holster, looking
down at him, once again feeling nothing. Blood rolled over his crushed
ribcage in torrents, and small pieces of innards lay around him in mashed-up
piles.
Shaking her head, she laughed quietly, than continued down the sidewalk,
stepping over the sprawled carcass. Soon enough, someone would find it. Than
they’d know where she’d gone.
Up ahead, she saw the path that opened into the forest and smiled with an
unearthly sadistic sort of coldness. That was where she wanted to go. She
wanted them to meet their end over there.
