2.13

The cipher is absurd. Even dropping the classes I’m meant to do, I’ve only managed to decode bits and pieces. I think it needs a serial number, or a pass phrase or something to reference, but obviously I don’t have the author on hand and I know almost nothing about them. I’m trying to decode a personal cipher with next to no starting information, and it is not going well.

I thought having Rook on my ass about classwork would be worth it if I could get through the cipher, but. Well.

At the very least, I think I’ve determined the cipher must be a… a log. A record, of some kind, with notes in the margins every so often regarding the information presented. All the dates I’ve managed to decode are recent, and it seems to focus largely on current-day criminal activity.

Obviously, but I think it’s important to note. This isn’t just idle observation. Whoever wrote this notebook wanted something, and I can’t figure out what.

I’m legitimately considering turning the notebook in for professionals to look at when my pager goes off.

I think I’m starting to hate it.

It’s the whole team again, all of us piling into the fast elevator and desperately holding on to the railings as we plummet to the bottom of the USMC tower. We hit the bottom and jog over to the changing rooms, don our costumes, and meet out in the garage.

Crane is there waiting for us, next to the usual vehicle. Rook seems to be taking a more… hands-off approach, and has been for a little while now. Crane is officially our handler, so it makes sense.

I still think I hate him almost as much as I hate the pager.

“Welcome, Junior Division!” He says cheerily. “I hope you enjoyed your little outing?”

“I’d like to apologize, Mr. Crane,” Rory responds, stepping forward. “It was irresponsible of me to —”

“No no no, it’s perfectly fine, Rory. Focus on the present!”

“...Yes, sir.” He seems displeased, but it’s hard to tell under that mask.

“Anyway,” Crane continues, “you’ll be pleased to know that another one of those, ah… creatures popped up. In a mall, at the edge of the commercial district. This’ll be a chance for you all to do a little… detective work!” He steps back from the van as the doors swing open. “The USMW Containment Squadron will fill you in when you arrive. Good luck!” He ushers us inside.

By now, the trip feels routine. The buildings scrape by in a silky blur, while the tower shrinks into the distance. Not disappearing, not quite. I don’t think there’s anywhere in the city you can’t see it if you’re up high enough.

When we arrive at the mall, we’re greeted by the familiar sight of USMW vehicles and barricades, surrounding the old Westpoint Downtown Mall. It’s an old building, and usually a fairly empty one, only barely kept alive by what’s left of the city’s dribble of welfare that doesn’t go to repairing destroyed skyscrapers.

It used to be a hot spot for supervillain activity, back when the city was still new. I’d guess that’s why people stopped coming. Now it’s a stark, gray thing, perpetually empty and under construction.

We hop out of the van as soon as it screeches to a stop, and Rory — Shield Warrior, dammit — slams open the back doors. The van drives off, kicking up gravel that pings against the plates of my armor.

Shield Warrior moves to intercept the USMW representative that jogs up to meet us.

“Junior Division. Good to see you,” the rep says, tone flat. “There are around twelve hostages still inside the mall.” He starts, leading us towards the barricade. “You’ll need to rescue them. You have the authority to request resources from us if you manage to communicate with the reported perpetrator, but from what we can see, it’s…” He trails off. “Flies. Our sources report flies.”

Shield Warrior nods hesitantly. I think he’s been caught a little off guard. “Thank you, sir. We’ll do our best.”

The representative nods. “Good luck.” He touches the pad besides the door, and it slides open with a heavy mechanical clunk.

We enter the barricade, and walk up to the large rotating door set into the front of the mall. Rebound has to lean onto the glass with her shoulder to get the glass panels to creak and spin enough to let us slip into the wider wing.

“We need to get our bearings first,” Shield Warrior comments as we look around at the decaying storefronts. “We need a map. There should be one at the center intersection, at the end of this wing.” He pauses. “We may have to split up when we get there, cover the other two wings faster. Just recon, at least.”

“Maybe that’s unwise. We have no idea what the new… creature can do, yet,” Cooper — Gadget counters.

Shield Warrior nods. “Keep an eye out.”

And then we move. I try to watch through the rows of glass panels, glancing up to the second floor overhangs and further down the wing to where I think I can barely see a lonely terminal standing at the center of the intersection. The mall is quiet, save for the scuffing of our boots against the tile, and a faint… buzzing sound?

And with that sound on my mind, I find I’m noticing bugs dotting the walls, swarming between the tracks of broken escalators, the pillars holding up the overhang hiding insects crawling behind their girth.

It’s creepy. I can feel myself tense.

We reach the center of the mall in only a few minutes. It’s not a huge mall, only three wings arranged in a t-shape, with the wing we’ve entered in being one of the shorter ones.

The map details this pretty clearly. Gadget pulls out his phone and snaps a picture of it, causing the flies crowding the edges of the terminal to shift and writhe. The flash highlights a large black mass clinging to a spot on the map up on the second floor, right next to the big cheery star labeled ‘you are here’.

“What? What is that?” Rebound comments.

“It’s a bug dot.” Gadget clarifies.

“We’ll check it out,” Shield Warrior decides. “Rebound, follow me. The rest of you, take the escalator on the opposite side.” Then his voice gains a static buzz. “Switch to comms, stay quiet.”

We split up, Gadget leading the group with Jet and I following him close behind as we scale the silent escalators up to the second floor overhand. Shield Warrior and Rebound take the other escalator, one of the few working ones in the building, closer to the spot on the map. The bug spot.

Are we sure this is even related to the other monsters we’ve seen? So far it’s just bugs. And aside from the ones oddly clustered against the laminated plastic map board, they’ve been pretty normal.

Normal, except they’re fucking everywhere. As we emerge onto the overhang, just behind Shield Warrior and Rebound, the flies settled on a thick layer against the tiled floor, walls, even the escalator railings begin to stir, and I’m suddenly very glad for my full-body suit.

In the middle of this little atrium, positioned just above the central map area, sit five people, kneeling down on the tiled floor. Their clothes are disheveled, their hair unkempt, some of them have tear tracks staining their faces. All of them are absolutely covered in a thick layer of flies from the neck down.

Not — not in the horror sense, from my position by the escalator I can’t exactly tell, but I don’t think the flies are hurting them. They’re just crawling and writhing, against the hostages and along the tiled floor, up to a foot away from each of them.

A deep sense of unease permeates the air, even as Shield Warrior and Rebound shake off their hesitation and move to help.

The hostages, noticing our arrival, look up, panic in their eyes.

I double-take. Panic?

Shield Warrior jogs up to them, a large flat board manifesting in a flash of light, like a paddle, and just as he reaches out to the hostages, and they collectively lean away —

Before I can call out a warning, voice my unease, a huge, insectile limb tipped with a vicious-looking talon emerges from behind the closest hostage, extending up in anticipation.

And then it moves. Shield Warrior notices just in time, swinging around the paddle to catch it with his other arm and giving him the leverage to hold up as the talon slams down on him, cracking the construct with a harsh snap.

While Shield Warrior holds the talon in place, struggling and sliding back against its seemingly immense strength, Rebound hesitates, static and distortion peeling off of her in waves. Then, she leaps into motion, stepping forward with a hook that blasts the taloned limb into pieces with a ripple of noise.

Shield Warrior turns, like he’s about to give an order, before the mass of flies covering the floor shift and another talon, warping and twisting into place, rises from the ground behind him.

“Rory!” I call out, taking an instinctive step.

He twirls, forming a shining crude blade in his hands with a sharp yellow flash and slicing the limb off at its base. The end falls to the floor and dissolves into a mess of writhing insectile flesh, buzzing and lifting off the ground in waves.

The mass shifts again, and I hear a crackle over the comms.

“We need to protect the —” Shield Warrior starts before he’s tackled by something that lunges at him from under the forming mass of flies. It’s about the size of a large dog, all talons, and spines, and it knocks him back into a nearby clothes rack as a spiked shield snaps into existence between them. From then on, all I can hear over the comms are strained grunts.

Rebound makes an about-face and rushes to help. Gadget, Jet and I all break into a run as well, but a quick glance at the swarm of flies congregating around the hostages spikes the unease settling in my gut, and I make a decision.

I turn and run towards the hostages instead, shouting over the comms. “Jet, over here! We need fire!”

She stops suddenly, and hesitates. But only for a moment. With a burst of orange flame, she corrects her course and speeds over to the hostages, flies curling and buzzing away from the puffs of smoke and haze of heat emanating from her hands. She catches up, and we turn to face the mass of flies holding the hostages.

Near the tangled mess of clothes that Shield Warrior’s struggling against, I watch Rebound stop again, releasing waves of distortion, and after a moment she swings with a heavy downward strike, cracking the tiles and sending out a shockwave. The force has Shield Warrior’s opponent scrabbling, chunks of insectoid matter sloughing off and buzzing erratically before dissolving completely.

I stop just short of touching the hostages, while Jet leans in, emitting a constant, low-level stream of flickering yellow heat, distorting the air and making the bugs curl and shrivel. They skitter away in a loose swarm, some of them faltering and dropping out of the air from the heat.

While Jet heats the area up, I try to ignore the stifling warmth, stepping around behind her to try and see where the flies are headed. From what I’ve seen so far, they can form from basically anywhere there’s enough —

I pause. The flies aren’t organized, but they’re all heading —

I tilt my head just in time to see a huge mass of chitin drooping down from the steel girders lining the ceiling, just above Jet. I spin, grabbing her by the torso and pulling her around and out of the way as the spiked mass of insect launches itself straight at the ground, cracking tile in a large crater around it and sending shrapnel flying in all directions.

“Fire!” I shout, dropping to my knees in order to avoid the inevitable heat.

Jet slaps her hands together in front of her and cranks up the force, bracing herself against an enormous blade of flame that carves through the creature in seconds. The air boils around us and leaves a blackened mass of carapace smoking on the floor, flies streaming out of it at its edges.

The flame cuts out.

And just as Shield Warrior gets to his feet and the swarm of flies skitters away from the blistering heat, I already see two new lumps of chitin bursting from the mass consolidating in the shadow of a nearby checkout terminal.

“Keep the heat going, I’ll play defense,” Shield Warrior crackles over the radio. He moves to step in front of us.

A small, metallic object sails across my vision. It clatters against the hard floor, disturbing the flies crowding around it. It beeps, once, twice, and then emits a harsh shriek. If I wasn’t wearing a helmet, I would follow the others’ example and clap my hands over my ears.

The forming lumps immediately dissolve, and the swarm scatters, filtering out through the nearest vents, doorways, any opening they can find in a speckled stream of insects.

The device’s shriek cuts out, and the storefront is silent save for the faint sobs of the small group we saved.

No bugs. No creatures. Just blackened dots and a faint layer of soot.

I hear a breath from back near the escalators. “Sorry. Took me a sec to recalibrate it,” Gadget says, clutching a complex looking tool in his left hand.

“You got any more of those?” I huff.

He looks apologetic.

We all groan in unison.