(Inspired by my accidental misreading of this post by @whumblr)
Whumpee has just gone missing. Caretaker is going through the contacts on whumpee's phone, one by one pressing call, trying to keep it together while they relay the facts... when one phone call takes a different turn...
"Hello?"
"Hi, uh, this is Caretaker."
"Oh, hello, Caretaker. What's up?"
"Um, whumpee... is missing. I - we - the cops I mean - don't know where they are. There are no leads. I... just hope they're okay..."
There's a long pause, and then Caretaker hears what almost sounds like a dark chuckle.
"They're going to be fine, Caretaker," the other person says. Their voice sounds so certain, Caretaker nearly sighs in relief. They must know where whumpee is, thank god.
Synopsis: During the Warring States Period, Li Haolan is forced out of her own home and sold as a slave despite being the daughter of the Public Censor of Zhao. Purchased by Lu Buwei, she is gifted to Ying Yiren a Qin Royal who is serving as a hostage to guarantee the armistice between the Qin and Zhao states. A dangerous battle begins as a result of their arrival and they must rely on their wits to survive. Will Haolan be able to rise to her own success to overcome the adversities in her life?
✨Had a lot of promise but didn't really deliver on a lot of the whump... Not really worth watching after the midpoint. Goes downhill a lot and most of the whump is in the beginning too. Took me 2 years to finish this list 'cause I kept procrastinating rewatching like 10 eps, lmao✨
⚠️Trigger Content: Usual historical cdrama CWs.
⚠️⚠️Some SPOILERS will be found, proceed with caution⚠️⚠️
Whumpee: Ying Yiren / Zichu portrayed by Mao Zi Jun
A/N: He has a yandere admirer and is a hostage prince so there's a lot of subtle whumpy moments with just context that aren't really worthy of/would be difficult to mention in the list (i.e. him living imprisoned, constantly being followed by what's essentially a jailer, soft threatened and pushed by the yandere, etc).
Ep 1 | None.
Ep 2 | Publicly humiliated and mocked | Sword held to his neck.
Ep 3 | Arrested (off screen) | In a cell.
Ep 4 | Still locked up, coughing, weak | Sentenced to death (off-screen), chained walking to his execution | Waiting to be executed, saved at the last minute | Pricked in the neck with a needle, threatened.
Ep 5 | Weak, gradually getting sick | Something dear to him taken and sold, distressed, upset, sudden headache, stumbles back, faints, concern for him | Asleep in bed, taken care of, coughing, still weak.
Ep 6 | Threatened | Upset | Concerned for ally | Knocked back slightly by explosion.
Ep 7 | None.
Ep 8 | Threated.
Ep 9 | Arrested.
Ep 10 | Imprisoned (off-screen), released | Weak | Concerned for loved one.
Ep 11 | Emotional, teary eyed.
Ep 12 | None.
Ep 13 | Concerned for loved one, distressed, caught in his escape. Bound by the wrists and made to walk back, saved, released | Apprehended again, locked in a room | Escorted into court, made to kneel.
Ep 14 | None.
Ep 15 | Caught escaping, threatened.
Ep 16-21 | None.
Ep 22 | Steps in-between loved one to protect her from a sword, grabs sword blade, bleeding, concern for him. Hand bandaged.
Ep 23 | Concerned for loved one, caught in the rain | Locked in his bedroom, harassed.
Ep 24 | Pushed off running carriage, uses himself as a shield to protect loved one, arrow shot to his chest, falls onto ground, clutching wound, collapses into loved one's arms, concern for him, taken away | Unconscious in bed, wound treated, blood staining white bandage.
Sick on and off after this point due to the injury. Lots of coughing.
Ep 25 | Clutching chest, coughing, weak.
Ep 26 | Emotional, weak, concerned for him | Coughing.
Ep 27 | None.
Ep 28 | Threatened | Coughing a lot, clutching chest, concern for him, given medicine.
Ep 29 | Threatened with a sword. Coughing, emotional, concern for him, faints.
Ep 30 | Locked in a cell and put in a carriage, paraded through the streets while people chant to kill him, wrists chained | Kneeling in public awaiting execution, protected, concerned for loved one, forcefully pulled away from loved one, forced to his knees, saved,
Ep 31 | Forced to meet whumper, caught in a trap, suspended in a rope cage with thorns all over it, threatened, grabs onto net and cuts his hand on one of the thorns, bleeding.
Ep 32 | None.
Ep 33 | Hand bandaged.
Ep 34 | Arrested and taken away | Arms bound together over his head with rope, hung from gate and used as a shield against his own soldiers.
Ep 35 | Hung for days, pale, weak | Released, protected | Concerned for loved one, distressed, crying.
Ep 36 | None.
Ep 37 | Tearing up, forced to part with loved one.
Ep 38 | Detained, distressed, sentenced to death by brother, saved, teary eyed.
Ep 39 | Forced to drink more alcohol than he can, spites blood (poisoned), concern for him, blood on his mouth, faints | Unconscious in bed, being treated, stirs awake, coughing, vomits blood, weak | Punched and knocked to the floor, forced to his feet.
Ep 40 | Clutching chest, coughs | Jolts awake from a nightmare, comforted.
Ep 41 | None.
Ep 42 | Teary eyed, concerned for loved one.
Ep 43-47 | None.
Ep 48 | Gasps, sudden chest pains, helped to stand | Told he's sick, distressed.
Ep 49-50 | None.
Ep 51 | Upset, coughing | Coughing again, hand on his chest.
Ep 52 | Sudden chest pain, clutches chest, quickly takes medicine so that loved one doesn't notice, coughing blood | (time skip) | Helped to walk, coughing | Coughing again.
Ep 53 | Upset | Angry, clutching chest, stepping back seemingly in pain, teary eyed, hurries after loved one only to be stopped by a sudden chest pain, spits blood, falls to his knees, faints | Lying in bed, concern for him.
Ep 54 | Angry | Upset, clutching chest, teary eyed, weak, spits blood, concern for him | Unconscious in bed.
Ep 55 | Recuperating in bed, helped to sit up, angry, clutching chest, helped to lie back down | In bed, coughing, weak, struggles to get up in search of water, head hurts, stumbles and falls onto the floor, helped up, weak, suddenly cannot see, panicked, sudden head pain again, falls back onto the floor, groaning (apparently some of this was pretend but I'm unsure of what) | Treated, distressed, upset, teary eyed.
Ep 56 | Chest pain during court, coughing, given medicine. Spits blood, faints, concern for him, unconscious | Lying in bed.
Ep 57 | Still in bed, wakes up coughing, concern for him | Coughing.
Whumpee: Lu Buwei portrayed by Nie Yuan
Ep 1-2 | None.
Ep 3 | Accused of being a traitor, arrested | In chains, locked in a cell.
Ep 4 | Still locked up | Sentenced to death (off-screen), chained, walking to his execution | Waiting to be executed, saved at the last minute.
Ep 5 | Slapped, kicked in the leg.
Ep 6 | Knocked back slightly by explosion.
Ep 7 | Pushed onto the floor.
Ep 8-12 | None.
Ep 13 | Caught in his escape. Bound by the wrists and made to walk back, saved, released | Kicked repeatedly, scolded (semi comedic) | Apprehended again, sword held to his neck, locked in a room, kicked | Escorted into court, made to kneel.
Ep 14 | None.
Ep 15 | Stabbed in the abdomen, falls onto the floor, clutching wound, swords pointed at him.
Ep 16 | Locked in a cell, clutching wound, in pain, concern for him, defiant and unwilling to have wound treated, scolded | Made to kneel, still in pain | Publicly humiliated x2, flogged a couple of times, saved, lying on the floor, in pain | Spanked (comedic), in pain.
Ep 17 | Scolded, pushed, yelled at | Threatened with having all allies killed if he leaves, threatened by his father that he will kill himself if he leaves
Ep 18 | None
Ep 19 | Concerned for loved one, kneeling for very long, in pain when getting up | Yelled at, scolded, concerned for loved one, holding loved one in his arms as they die, crying | Death of loved one mocked, angry, restrained, provoked more, shoved onto the ground | Grieving, crying.
Ep 20 | Crying | Insulted, grabs broken piece of jade and squeezes until his hand bleeds | Hand bandaged | Sudden stomach pain.
Ep 21 | Held at knife point.
Ep 22-23 | None.
Ep 24 | Stabbed in the shoulder, hiding wound | Wound being treated, wound bandaged, pale.
Ep 25 | Punched a few times and pushed against door, hit on his wound, clutching wound, blood staining clothes | Wound bandaged | Ambushed in his sleep, fought, stabbed in the back, wincing, stabbed in the stomach, grabs blade, pushed off cliff.
Ep 26-28 | None.
Ep 29 | Falls off horse.
Ep 30-31 | None.
Ep 32 | Sword held to his neck | Fought, concerned for loved one | Fought, saved | Multiple swords held to his neck.
Ep 33 | None.
Ep 34 | Hands scratched and bloody | Arrested and taken away.
Ep 35 | Imprisoned.
Ep 36-45 | None.
Ep 48 | Falsely accused.
Ep 49 | Arrested | Falsely accused.
Ep 50-53 | None.
Ep 54 | Coughing, upset, about to get up but cannot due to sudden head pain, faints | Coughing, weak, hunched over, coughing a lot | Left behind and locked away with the rest of the sick (off screen) | Sick in bed, coughing, weak | Unconscious. Coughing, struggling to sit up | Somewhat recovered, helped to walk, coughing still.
Ep 55 | No appearance.
Ep 56 | Ambushed, saved | Falsely accused, sword held to his neck, saved, fought, saved.
Ep 57-62 | Wrongfully accused a couple of times but nothing noteworthy.
Whumpee: Prince Yi portrayed by Zhao Yi Qin
Ep 1-20 | No appearance.
Ep 21 | Briefly fought, pushed through a window and lands on the floor, groaning, hit in the side of the neck, kicked to the ground.
Ep 22 | Unconscious against the table, covered with a blanket, having a nightmare, calling out for his mother, wakes up startled and distressed, panting. Emotional, crying.
Ep 23-31 | None.
Ep 32 | Fought x3.
Ep 33 | Blood staining white clothes, concern for him.
Ep 34 | None.
Ep 35 | Protecting loved one from being stoned.
Ep 36 | Attacked, protected, chased, fell off carriage, concerned for loved one, barely saved, in shock, concerned for loved one, holds his brother as the latter dies, calling out for his brother, crying | Upset, told disturbing news, crying, screaming, falls to his knees, hitting the ground sobbing, collapses onto the ground.
Ep 37 | Weak from being poisoned, concerned for loved one, tries getting up only to fall to the ground, distressed, in pain. Concern for him, labored breathing, weak, helped to stand | Upset | Concerned for loved one, labored breathing, suddenly freezes upon seeing loved one dead, calling out for loved one, in denial, grieving, restrained by either arm and manhandled away, struggling, screaming, tearing up, frees himself, angry, restrained again, hit in the back of the neck, faints, carried away.
Ep 38 | Upset.
Ep 39-50 | No appearance.
Ep 51 | Ambushed, fought, shot in the back with an arrow, suddenly freezes, falls to the ground, in pain, apologizing, bleeding from the mouth, repeatedly stabbed, spitting blood.
hello, I got this random idea that I thought you might find cool but I'm unfortunately very underconfident to send it with my name...ehh anyways, I'll stop beating around the bush
I was thinking about a whumper and whumpee, not a whumper turned whumpee or vice versa but maybe A is someone who is supposed to torture/interrogate people and every time they don't retrieve satisfactory amount of intel, they get hurt instead...and much much worse than what they do to their victims.
I was wondering what your take on such a situation is, no pressure
Have a lovely dayy
Whumper who is also a whumpee (from now on called whumperee), to their own even more vicious whumper? Whumperee who is trying so desperately to get the results, but whose performance is getting worse and worse because of the pain they're in from their 'punishments'? Whumperee who is starting to question if this is all worth it, and sympathize with the people they're supposed to be interrogating?
Whumperee who sets their own whumpee free. Whumperee who is relieved when Whumpee comes back with their team to raze Whumper's place to the ground. Whumperee who expected it to be over for them, and is even more terrified when Whumpee commands that they be taken to holding because Whumpee wants to "deal with this one personally".
Whumpee who doesn't know how they feel. Whumpee who hates Whumperee for what they did to them, but also was perceptive enough to catch on to the clues that all was not well. Whumpee who goes to Whumperee's cell to start an interrogation of their own....
...but was not expecting Whumperee to be kneeling, shirt off, prepared to take whatever punishment Whumpee decreed they deserved.
Unhealthy Coping Mechanisms // Healed Wrong // "It's not my blood."
This one is kind of inspired by the prompts but not about any one of them? It’s in the rules, ✨it’s allowed✨
*~*~*~*~*
Hero didn’t stop until they were far enough away from Villain until they slowed and allowed themselves to catch their breath. They pressed their back flush against the brick wall, gasping out a hiss of pain as they grabbed the shaft of the arrow sticking out of their stomach, just above their hip.
Villain’s arrow was lodged inside and with every step Hero took it rubbed against their hip bone and sent jolts of pain ricocheting up their spine, every movement serving to further aggravate it. Hero released the shaft with a grunt, and went for the arrow in their shoulder first.
They bit their tongue to stop themselves from screaming as they snapped the fletchlings off the ends. Hero couldn’t help the whimper in the back of their throat at how painful even that slight movement was, but they couldn’t stop now.
Hero braced themselves and stepped away from the wall, huffing out a few laboured breaths before they pushed the arrow through their body. Hero stomped their foot, their neck muscles tense as they glared at the sky, letting out huffing breaths of pain and whining in the back of their throat until the arrow fell to the ground on the other side.
The wound started pooling blood but Hero tried their best to ignore it, staunching the bleeding with the wad of cloth bandages they kept on them at all times. It would have to do.
Hero side stepped to the corner of the alley, peaking out around the corner, expecting Villain to appear at the end of the Warehouses with their bow poised and ready, already aiming at Hero’s head, but… it was quiet. Silent.
Eerily so.
Hero glanced down at the leftover bandages, considering if they should even try to do anything with their hip but… no. They should wrap it tight and then continue out, looking for cover. They weren’t going to be able to fight Villain again like this, they were too crafty, too cunning and unpredictable, and unlike Hero, they could fight from the shadows and still devastate Hero with their arrows.
Hero wrapped the bandage around their hip, crossing and pulling it tight but not too tight, and tucking the end into a strip before they straightened again, scanning the warehouses across from them. If they could get between the next two warehouse, they would be home clean if they could make it to the street. Hero could lose themselves in the narrow streets instead of running through the wide open space, that only really gave Villain any advantage in the fight.
Hero waited, listened, and when they were satisfied they heard nothing, Hero stepped out of the alley. They had to be quick. They walked with strong steps, careful not to put too much pressure on their injured leg, even if every step no matter how light sent new volts of agony spiking through their body.
Halfway across.
Hero was doing good.
Then the warehouses turned, and Hero frowned and the ground rushed up to meet them. Hero shot their hands out and cried out when they took their weight on their bad shoulder, barely suppressing a scream.
What?! What happened? Did their leg go from under them? Hero pushed themselves up but the world spun again and they felt like they were going to get sick. The strength left them as they tried to push themselves up again but fell face down, and this time they did scream when the arrow lodged in their hip was pushed further inside them.
All energy had been zapped from them, the world dizzying, turning over itself and in and out of focus as Hero tried to blink. Had they lost too much blood? What was—
Loud, echoing footsteps sounded through the warehouse strip, deafening the closer they got to Hero. Hero saw them, Villain’s legs, their bow handing by their side.
“Hero, Hero, Hero,” Villain tsked, the words running together and echoing off Hero’s skull. Villain stopped beside Hero and crouched, slapping Hero’s cheek. Hero whined in reply. “Still with me, hmm?”
They could feel Villain’s eyes roam over them, but they couldn’t tell what they were thinking, what they were observing. Hero tried to speak but their tongue felt fat and heavy in their mouth so all they could do was whine.
A sharp slap to the shoulder and Hero cried out into the darkness, but they couldn’t move, they couldn’t struggle away. Thinking became too much of an effort and they had no idea what was happening to them. They flexed their fingers but only their pinky twitched in front of their face.
“Paralysis poison,” Villain supplied, as if reading Hero’s mind. Hero’s body suddenly ran cold with terror. Villain chuckled darkly. “Oh, don’t worry. I didn’t put it inside you, and it’s not permanent, no.”
Villain grabbed Hero’s shoulder and turned them onto their back none-too-gently. Hero could only glare up at them as best they could. Hoping they were threatening, bur probably not.
“See, Hero,” Villain said, walking their fingers down Hero’s neck to their shoulder and pressing in until Hero cried out. “I know all about your little habits, your frankly, unhealthy habits, because we’ve been fighting for so long. I know you take two sugar in tea with a dash of milk and you like the croissants on fifth for breakfast.”
If Hero could, they know their body would be trembling, but their body may as well have been stone with how still it was. Villain continued walking their fingers down from Hero’s shoulder to their hip. Hero let out a low whine of protest that sounded pathetic even to their ears.
Villain’s amused eyes met Hero’s terrified ones. They wanted to shake their head and beg Villain not to touch that wound. To their surprise, Villain didn’t touch the arrow, just prodded at the wound around it until Hero sang with screams of pain.
“And I know that you would rather disappear into the night, and live to fight another day when you’re bested, so I adapted. You probably didn’t notice in your pain, but I coated the shafts of the arrows with a paralysis poison that turns your muscles off for about an hour or two, long enough for me to hunt you and let the poison take effect.”
They dug their fingers into the wound until Hero was practically growling their screams were so guttural.
“Now, one arrow, sure, maybe you touch it, maybe you don’t, but two?” Villain whistled. “Two points of contact to deal with while running? I know you would rather have one weakness, so I coated them both and waited until you exposed yourself. And hey presto, here you are, and here I am.”
Villain leaned in closer to Hero’s face, smiling down at them with a cruelty creasing their eyes. “And this time, sweet Hero. There will be no running away. I’m taking you home with me.”
Villain laughed at Hero’s blank expression except for their wide, terrified eyes. “No? Okay, tell you what. If you object in the next five seconds, you can walk free. Is that fair? Ready? Five.”
Hero whined in the back of their throat, trying to make any other noise they could that would signal a protest because they couldn’t go home with Villain!
“Four.”
Nobody… Hero… what if they had more of the paralysis poison and just left Hero like this to do with as they pleased?
“Three.”
Hero tried to pant out sudden, sharp cries. Villain grinned wickedly down at them, running their gloved fingers over Hero’s cheek.
“So eager for me, Hero. Don’t worry, I’m eager two.”
Hero screamed and all that came out of their mouth was a whimper.
“One. No protest? Okay then. If you insist.” Villain slung their bow across their back, fastening it to the quiver before they scooped Hero up, one hand across their upper back resting on Hero’s injured shoulder to the shrieks of Hero, and the other under their knees. “Oh, I can’t wait until I get you home, Hero. You don’t know how many things I want to do to you.”
Hero screamed at their body to struggle, to wiggle free, to do anything, but the only part of themselves that Hero could move were their eyes that were fixed staring up at Villain as Villain carried them away. They glanced down at Hero, smiling with a terrifying glee.
“You really shouldn’t have been so predictable, Hero, otherwise I wouldn’t have been able to catch you. And now that I have you…” Villain trailed off, stopping in front of a car. They clicked a button and the boot of the car raised. Fear shot through Hero as sudden as being dunked in an ice bath when Villain put Hero into the boot. Villain reached a hand down to stroke Hero’s cheek. “I am never letting you go.”
Chapter 1 of Obscure, novel-length interrogation whump about a rebel leader who can erase memories with a thought, an interrogator who can see inside his subjects’ minds… and the connection they share that neither of them suspects.
Masterpost | the Mind Games universe | Read the completed novel on Patreon
---
Elias
Even deep under the orchard, the sterile filtered air of the bunker still held the faint sweetness of the coming apple harvest. Elias breathed in the scent of comfort, the scent of home. He needed that comfort.
Tonight, as on every other bunker night, he was walking a tightrope. Across the orchard, in the drafty, too-big farmhouse, Laina could wake up at any moment to find her husband out of bed in the middle of the night. And there was the other risk of discovery, the deadly risk, not from the woman he loved but from the enemy.
He had never fallen off that tightrope yet. He was under no illusions that it meant he was safe.
The bunker was a twenty-by-twenty space, as welcoming as he could make it. A cot in one corner, made up with a quilt handed down from Laina’s grandmother. Laina had never liked the quilt or the grandmother, so she hadn’t shed any tears when he had told her it was lost.
A bookshelf in another corner held a smattering of dog-eared bestsellers of yore, scavenged from yard sales and thrift stores. A mini-fringe, regularly restocked, held enough food for a week—assuming the guest rationed it carefully. That was the longest he had ever needed to keep anyone down here.
Behind him, the air filtration system let out a constant hiss. Across from him at the square vinyl table, the woman with the hood over her head drew in a ragged breath. Her hands trembled in her lap.
She was afraid. They were always afraid. Afraid of him, at first—the way he had to operate made that unavoidable. And afraid of the enemy. He wouldn’t try to talk her out of that latter fear. She needed it. It was one of the few things he would leave her when she left.
He pulled the hood off her head, slow and gentle. He folded it on the table next to him as he settled back into his seat. Then he rested his hands on the table so she could see that he had nothing to hide.
He schooled his face into a fatherly expression. Not a smile. She wouldn’t trust a smile, not after the way she had come here. The hood, the car ride to parts unknown, the assurances his associates would have given her that they were there to help—unconvincing with no accompanying explanation. An unavoidable problem.
He met her eyes, his face solemn but soft. He tried to look both unthreatening and utterly in control. Like someone who could be trusted. Like someone who could take care of everything. Most of all, like someone who had no reason to be afraid.
It had been a long time since he had been anyone’s father. But he remembered it had felt something like that.
Especially the lying. In truth, he had never been in control. He had always been afraid.
Her eyes belonged to a rabbit trapped in a hawk’s gaze. Her shaking didn’t stop. “This is a mistake.” Her trembling voice lacked conviction. It told him she knew it was no such thing. “I don’t know what you want from me.” Even less convincing.
“I’m not who you think I am,” he said. “You asked certain questions online. One of my people found you before someone worse could.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.” But even if she had been a decent liar, he would have noticed the way her eyes widened when he mentioned her online activity.
“The fact that you suspected those questions might have placed you in danger puts you ahead of most people,” said Elias. “Have you had an encounter with them before?”
She visibly weighed further unconvincing lies against her curiosity. Curiosity won out. She shook her head. “But that’s how it always goes in stories, isn’t it? When there are people like us, there’s always a them.”
He made a vaguely affirming noise and waited for her to ask what she wanted to ask.
It didn’t take long. “You said ‘one of your people,’” she said. “What does that mean? Who are ‘your people’? Who are you?”
“Soon,” said Elias. “But I’m going to need you to prove yourself first. Prove you’re one of us.” He shot her as an apologetic smile. “I’m sure you understand.”
It wasn’t a foolproof test. The line between us and them was even blurrier than the line between good and evil—he had more reason than most to know that. But in the absence of someone who could literally sniff out a lie like a bomb-detecting dog, it was what he had. And he hadn’t had someone like that since he had watched a loyal man bleed out in his arms years ago.
She tensed. If she did what he wanted, she was risking nearly as much as him. She had no way of knowing he wasn’t a liar, either. But she was also the one who had been abducted and brought to an underground bunker, and if the enemy wasn’t in here with her, then they were waiting for her aboveground.
So she chose to trust him. He saw it happen, saw the moment when her shoulders squared with resolve. He heard her let out a defiant breath, like she thought it might be her last.
She held one of her hands up over the table, palm facing the ceiling. She closed her eyes. A small, perfect ball of flame appeared, hovering half an inch above her skin.
“Is that enough?” she asked, her voice still shaking. She met his eyes in challenge, daring him to throw off the pretense of helping her.
He only nodded. She closed her hand around the flame with no sign of pain. The fire winked out.
“You’re Enhanced,” he said. “At least, that’s the most common term. There are others, but that’s the one they use, so it’s the one I use. You make fire. Some people read minds, or make objects move, or see into the future or to places they’ve never been. The number of potential abilities is as vast as the number of people on this planet. Those are some of the most common.”
“And you?” Her voice shook a little less now. “What can you do?”
“You have a special gene,” he said, instead of answering. “It’s been present in humanity since the dawn of history, at least as far as the current research can tell. But until sometime in the 1970s, it almost never became active. The gene requires environmental exposure to certain substances in order to activate. Pollutants in the air and water have turned people like us from the demigods of myth to something almost ordinary.”
In some rare places—if any of those places still existed—it truly was ordinary to have powers. The places where people like them came together to live among their own kind. As always when his thoughts found their way back to his childhood, he felt a pang deep in his gut.
And as always, he turned his thoughts away.
“If we’re so ordinary,” the woman said, “why haven’t I heard of anyone else who can do… this?” She opened her palm and stared down into her hand, as if searching for the remnants of the flame.
“Because it benefits us to keep ourselves a secret,” Elias said. “It benefits them, too—all the different thems out there. Governments and scientific facilities around the world know about us. Criminals, too. High-level corporate types. They all see ways to use us to gain an advantage, and the more secret they keep us, the more of an advantage they think they’ll get.”
“Because they’ll be the only ones who know about us that way?”
Elias shook his head. “They all know they aren’t the only ones. But if they were to do their business aboveboard, they’d have to follow rules. More paying salaries for the kinds of work we can do for them. Less locking people up in secret labs to breed the next generation of supersoldiers.”
A tremor ran through her, a lingering echo of her earlier shakes. He hadn’t realized until then that her shaking had stopped.
“We stay hidden so they can’t use us,” Elias said. “And the ones like you, who activate on their own and start asking questions before they figure out all the advantages to keeping their mouths shut… well, it usually doesn’t take long for someone to find them and shut them up. If they’re lucky, it’s me, or someone like me.”
“So you’re here to shut me up,” she said.
“I’m here to save your life.”
“Those men… they kidnapped me. They gave me something…” She stared down at the crook of her arm, at the small red needle mark.
A sedative. So that was how his people had stopped her from turning them into living torches. He had wondered.
“They did,” Elias agreed. “I apologize for that. But the work I do has to stay secret. If I or my people had reached out ahead of time, you might have told someone. A friend. Family.”
“My family will be looking for me anyway. They’ll go to the police, and the police will—”
“No, they won’t,” said Elias. “We’re good at what we do. We have decades of practice. Not to mention a lot of natural advantages.” He tapped the side of his head.
Another shiver ran through her, even though he didn’t mean he had an advantage over her. She could set him on fire right now if she wanted to.
“So what is it you do after you kidnap people?” She shot a glance around the small bunker. “How does this save my life?”
“I get people new identities, and I help them run. In a few days, there won’t be any way to connect you with the person who asked those questions.”
“There shouldn’t be any way to connect me now. I didn’t use my real name.”
“Nothing is ever truly anonymous,” he said gently. “If we found you, so could they.” Any number of theys. The woman had sent up a flare advertising herself as defenseless prey, and there was a world full of predators out there. But there was one they in particular that always came to mind first for Elias. Call it personal bias.
Call it experience.
“Then you’ve done this before?” Her glance around the bunker was slower this time. Maybe she was imagining all the people who had sat at this table, who had slept in that bed, under that quilt.
“Many times. My network is small, but I do what I can.” It wasn’t that small at this point, but he preferred people to believe that. Anyway, it felt small to him, even now. He didn’t compare it to what it used to be. He compared it to the size of the opposition.
“Your network?” She gave the first word a slight emphasis. It took him a moment to figure out she was asking whether he was in charge here. Maybe he didn’t look the part, with his grandpa glasses and his weather-lined hands.
He nodded. “Yes, I created this. I’ve been at this for more than a decade now. You’re in expert hands, I promise.”
He hoped she wouldn’t ask what had happened two decades ago. Some of them did. He was used to pushing the memories away when the questions came, and the grief along with them. But the taste always lingered later, a soft bitterness at the back of his throat.
“So you’re in charge here,” she said, asking the question straight out this time.
Usually they didn’t harp on that. Usually they found the acknowledgment reassuring and moved on. He frowned. “Yes, I am.” He paused. “Does that bother you?”
“It seems dangerous. The person in charge of the entire network, meeting with people like me personally.” Her sharp eyes studied him.
She was suspicious, but he didn’t know of what. If he did, he might have known how to ease that suspicion. “Because no one else can do quite what I can. I have a unique power that helps people like you stay hidden—and eases their minds, besides. I—”
Then he stopped, because those sharp eyes were still watching him, like she was waiting for something. Her fear was gone, along with her shaking. Now she held herself perfectly still, coiled tightly in tense anticipation.
He had seen a lot of fear over the past fifteen years. That wasn’t fear.
The sharpness in her eyes changed from waiting to wariness, and he knew she had seen the change in him.
He held her gaze and quested out for her mind. He sought her out on the thread of her fear. But that fear had never been real. She had never shown him anything except her power—and that was strength, not vulnerability. Her mind was closed to him.
She stood, unfurling her hands. Twin balls of flame came to life.
He dodged as the first shot toward him.
It hit the air vent behind him. The fire alarm gave a startled shriek.
The woman raised her wrist to her lips, and he saw too late that her watch wasn’t a watch. “Confirmation that Elias Kitzner is the leader and central point of contact for our unknown network.” Her voice was crisp and professional, without the slightest hint of a tremble. “Do you have my location?”
In other circumstances, he might have been impressed. It took skill to lie well. It took more skill to pretend to be a bad liar.
A tinny voice issued from the watch. “We are at your location. Standing by.”
He reached for her mind again, even though she was no longer looking at him. It was more difficult without direct eye contact, but not impossible. And although she had never given him anything real, he had made himself vulnerable in front of her. A one-way connection was sometimes enough.
But a compact ball of fire whizzed close enough to his ear to singe his hair—an intentional miss, he was sure—and his concentration evaporated.
And then the people on the other end of the watch poured down the ladder like an infestation of ants, human-sized ants in gleaming white hazmat suits with opaque face masks. There were too many of them to fit in the bunker, like a clown car in reverse.
Too many for him to ever fight off on his own.
He didn’t carry weapons. None except the one in his head. It was too great a temptation, he had always maintained. You can tell yourself all you like that violence is the last resort, but the easier you make violence for yourself, the sooner it will become your first resort.
He understood the temptation to use whatever weapons he carried. Only a childhood around parents and surrogate parents who understood powers had trained him early out of the temptation to use his natural weaponry to smooth his path through life at the expense of everyone he encountered.
He had never regretted his stance on weapons until now.
He was stronger than he looked. Laina liked to tease him about his professorial looks. There was no bite to her words; quite the opposite. She loved it. In reality, his skinny frame held hidden muscle from his work in the orchard. He hired help during the harvest season, mostly people who were in need of under-the-table work the way he had once been in need. But he preferred to do most of the work himself. Every person he let into his life represented another danger.
But strength didn’t make him a fighter. And the invaders had a taser that sent him sprawling to the concrete floor with a cry of pain, and a needle that sank into his arm before he had regained control of his body. His vision went blurry. His muscles turned to rubber.
“Target captured,” he heard the woman tell someone who wasn’t here. “En route to PERI headquarters.”
He knew the name. His mind, rapidly filling with static, found room for one final thought—a wordless burst of satisfaction. The enemy that had come for him was the enemy he had started this work to fight. Full circle. It was only right.
On the other side of the orchard, in a farmhouse Laina had always said was too big for two of them, Laina slept in peaceful ignorance. She wouldn’t know anything was wrong until the next morning, when she would oversleep because her husband’s never-quiet-enough morning routine hadn’t forced her to drag herself out of bed before dawn along with him.
When she called the police, they would feed her the reassuring words PERI had told them to say, and set the wheels in motion for the manufactured disappearance they had planned weeks ago. A burned-out husk of a car on the road between the farmhouse and the bar he visited on the rare occasions when he needed a few hours of oblivion badly enough to lie about his whereabouts. An equally burned-out husk of a body, identifiable only through dental records. The records would match.
