Kevin was tying the sleeves of his coat to the door. He let out a hiss, then said, “The guard’s coming. We’ve got about 30 seconds.”
Jane produced her own lockpick and had their door open in the first of those seconds. The three girls spilled out, Karen unwillingly – Marie had her by the elbow. I think she was still a bit fuzzy from the drugs.
“Kevin, get out here,” said Jane. “Can you lift that machine? I want to take it with us.”
Kevin started over towards the machine, which was the size of a large desktop laser printer. I hefted one end. It seemed possible, though I wouldn’t want to carry it far, and I nodded to Kevin, who said, “Yes.” Nobody except him was looking in my direction. They were all still forgetting I existed.
“Grab it, then, and let’s get going,” said Jane.
“The guard’s nearly here!” he said.
“Then grab fast…” began Jane, but at that moment the guard appeared in the doorway, skidding to a halt – he’d obviously broken into a run and was panting. He checked himself with his shoulder against the door pillar and levelled his rifle at Kevin, who was crossing his line of sight to get to the machine.
I felt a spurt of intense fear that seemed to come out of nowhere.
I didn’t see exactly what happened next. Something came from Marie’s direction and hit the guard, who convulsed and dropped the gun. I had already pushed off from the table, I think with the idea of tackling Kevin out of the way of a bullet or something, and rocked the rickety platform enough that the lantern fell off and smashed on the floor. It was suddenly almost pitch dark, just a bit of dim light coming in from the corridor. I cannoned into Kevin and bounced off, but he grabbed me and kept me from going down.
Over the guard’s moaning, Kevin shouted, “Everyone stay still for a second! OK, I know where you all are. Just let me guide you. Marie, reach out to your left and grab Karen. Jane, Karen’s in front of you. We’re both over here in the middle of the room. I’ll come over your way and then I’ll guide Marie to the door.”
“What about the machine?” wailed Jane. It was as emotional as I’d ever heard her get.
Kevin let go of my arm, took two steps in the darkness which rang on the concrete floor, huffed, and came back. He nudged me. “Take the other end, mate, this is heavy,” he said. I fumbled for it in the dark, got an end, nearly dropped it and then managed to stabilize it. Towed by Kevin, I stumbled across the room, back towards our cell, I had to assume. He took me on a slight detour to avoid the guard, who was still incapacitated, and I heard him kick something – by the sound, likely the gun. It skittered off further into the room.
“All right,” he said, speaking a little breathlessly – the machine was heavier than I had realized. “Marie, take one small step to your left and then a medium step forward.”
There was a moment’s pause, and then, “Marie!” he yelled. “The other guard is coming. Snap out of it, you’ve got to get us out of here.”
“Sorry,” came her voice out of the darkness, and a confused noise of shuffling feet as the three girls, clinging blindly to each other, lurched towards the door. I heard a small squeak from the hinges, and then there was a light. She’d opened a door back to our home base.
Kevin and I hurried as best we could in the wake of the girls, who rushed through the door. Marie stood to one side, holding it, and slammed it behind us just as a portable light came bobbing along the corridor outside our former prison. We half lowered, half dropped the machine, and I shook out my hands, which had been cramping.
“We’re well out of that,” said Kevin.
“What did you do to the guard?” I asked Marie, but she ignored the question until Kevin repeated it. “I found something in my pocket all of a sudden and kind of – fired it at him,” she said. “I… do you think he’ll be OK?” She held out a small yellow-and-black device in one hand.
“As long as he doesn’t have heart problems,” said Jane. “That’s a taser.”
“You tased him?” asked Karen. She reflected for a moment, then added, “Good. He looked at me in a way I didn’t like. Like I was… good to eat or something.” Her eyes turned inward. Marie’s expression went from worried to dangerous. She took a couple of steps towards Karen and put an arm around her, upon which Karen melted down and started sobbing and clutching Marie. Marie led her off gently, opening a door into a room with some couches where they could sit down.
Kevin and I looked at each other awkwardly. Jane had ignored the whole incident and was clucking over the machine like a hen with one chicken.
“I could miniaturize this,” she said. “Small enough to wear.”
“Great,” I said. “I might be able to be visible from time to time.”
She ignored me, but with Jane that didn’t necessarily mean a lot.
“You know,” Kevin said, “I felt a surge when the machine went off. Like my power came back stronger than ever. I knew that other guard was coming, and I’d only glanced at him in passing. I usually need to have at least a conversation with someone before they show up on the radar.”
“Maybe that’s why Marie could pull something out of her pocket without a door,” I said.
“Is that so?” said Jane, still ignoring me. “That’s very interesting. If suppressing the effect temporarily makes it surge up stronger afterwards, that would imply… hmm. Help me carry this downstairs to the lab.”
Mike Reeves-McMillan lives in Auckland, New Zealand, the setting of his Auckland Allies contemporary urban fantasy series; and also in his head, where the weather is more reliable, and there are a lot more wizards. He also writes the Gryphon Clerks series (steampunk/magepunk), the Hand of the Trickster series (sword-and-sorcery heist capers), and short stories which have appeared in venues such as Compelling Science Fiction and Cosmic Roots and Eldritch Shores.
