Hero Types

Chapter 16

Gran came home, and that made things a little better. She could protect Kit. The thing was, she only would do it when she felt like it, which wasn't as often as Kit felt she needed it.
    It was mid-December by the time Manhattan saw its first snow day. Kit's phone alerted her, and so, after glancing at the white flakes pattering on the glass on the other side of the house, she drew her blankets tighter around her neck, curled her toes up to her chest, and went back to sleep.
    She was awoken by a weight on the foot of her bed. She sucked in a breath and opened her eyes. Her father squeezed her ankle and pressed his lips in a smile.
     He said, "Morning, sweetheart."
    She said, "Fuck off."
    He squared his jaw, and she half expected to be admonished for her choice of words. He sighed.
    "Listen—"
    "I don't care."
    "You're being very immature about this. I expected better from you."
    "She's like one year older than me."
    "Zoe is—"
    "Dad, I'm literally nineteen in two months."
    He didn't say anything for a minute. She wished that he would go. She didn't want to talk about it now. She didn't ever want to talk about it. She wanted to pretend that it had never happened, and that nothing ever would happen. It was just easier that way.
    "Zoe's acting like an adult."
    "She better be, she's having your baby."
    "Kit, I'm trying to explain."
    "Explain?!"
    He shook her shoulder in what was supposed to be a comforting gesture, but she flinched away. "Kit, I had a connection with Zoe—"
    "Jesus, I know! It's gross!"
    "Do you have a boyfriend?" he asked. She was going to answer, but then she wondered if he was trying to shame her.
    "It doesn't matter."
    "You don't understand yet. Someday, you'll feel a connection with somebody and you'll know—"
    "Maybe my somebody won't be born for another twenty years."
    "Someday you'll understand."
    "You're like a pedophile."
    "Okay, Kit." He patted her ankle and got up. "Good talk."
    She hid under her covers till his footsteps vanished, then she grabbed her phone off the bureau and tried to forget. She had a new text message from Jersey.
    "Station at ten."
    She texted back. "But it's a snow day."
    "Lucas wants us down there."
    She groaned, but secretly she was glad. She pulled on yoga pants and her winter jacket on over a sweatshirt and grabbed a power bar on her way out the door. She caught the nine o'clock downtown and was at the CAA forty five minutes later, ears burning from the cold.
    "What's going on?" she asked when she walked by the front desk. Howe muttered something that she couldn't hear and didn't look up from his book, so she walked down to the Center, which was completely empty.
    She ventured into the training room, and there she found Jersey and Mickey on the floor, looking at their phones.
    "Hey...?"
    "Kit!" Mickey patted the floor beside him, so she went over and sank against the wall.
    "What's going on?"
    "Mad scientist shit," Jersey said.
    "Some guy in a lab," Mickey elaborated after a moment. "Building robots or something."
    She nodded, rubbing her cold shins. She should have worn thicker pants. Her phone was in her pocket, but she was fairly sure that it was almost out of battery. Mickey leaned over and showed her his phone.
    "Is that—"
    "That's my team, Kit, yes."
    She started giggling, probably because she was exhausted and for whatever reason he cheered her up. He faked disappointment and looked away, shaking his head.
    "Honestly, remorseless."
    Her chuckling subsided. She wiped her nose and smiled. "I'm sorry your team got defunded."
    "You'd better be."
    He went back to scrolling on his phone. She glanced at the top. Nine minutes. Lucas was always on time, and never a minute earlier. Kit thought about what Dave had said that morning, and how if she every found someone that she had a connection with, they probably wouldn't be very punctual at all. Opposites only attracted to a certain extent.
    They waited quietly. Jersey's phone was loud and he hadn't disabled his keyboard sounds. She wondered how many people he was texting, because it sounded like a lot. Whenever she glanced at Mickey's phone he was just scrolling through headlines. A few times he pointed out ones that he liked to her.
    "Ten-o-one," Jersey said.
    "Did you hear a car?"
    "No," Mickey said.
    "Huh," Kit said. She put her head back and waited.
    At 10:04 Lucas walked in the door. Before she or Jersey could open their mouths, he blurted, "Sorry I'm late, I had a date."
    He ran down the hall to get something. Her and Jersey made eye contact, and then she frowned at Mickey. It took him a moment, but then he cocked his head and nodded.
    "At ten in the morning?" Jersey called. They heard him laugh, but when he reemerged with his bag slung over his shoulder he was straight-faced.
    "Come on, let's get this show on the road."
    They climbed into his car. Kit sniffed for perfume, and she couldn't detect any, but then Lucas tended to wear a lot of cologne anyway.
    It was good that he was dating. She worried about Lucas sometimes. He didn't get out much, and he was busier than she was. He was a sweet guy who'd never broken a law in his life, so it was about time a lucky girl latched on.
    She only noticed that Mickey was sitting next to her when his breath was in her ear.
    "Fitz misses you."
    "Did he tell you?"
    "Yeah, yeah, he drooled all over my sock."
    "Doesn't that mean he likes you?"
    He thought for a minute. He shrugged at her. "Dogs are very complex creatures."
    She snorted. He giggled and dropped his face on her shoulder to hide it. He sat up, chuckling, and checked his phone again. Jersey was eyeing her through the rearview mirror, and she shrugged and looked away. She closed her eyes and enjoyed the peace.
    They broke into the lab, which was actually an old warehouse, and they snuck down to the basement. They found it piled high with crates, none of which were stacked in accordance with the arrows stamped on the sides. It was dark, and it was dead silent.
    "Split up and look around," Lucas whispered. He walked off in the other direction before she could ask any questions, and before she could do anything else Mickey grabbed her elbow and pulled her away.
    "D'you think it smells funny?" he asked, threading his way down the isles of mysterious crates. She shushed him and followed, craning her neck and willing her eyes to adjust to the dark.
    The only light they had came from Mickey. She frowned at the glowing wires in his arm as they walked, the spots through his chest, that which leaked through the panels on his throat.
    "Can you see in the dark?"
    He was examining a crate. "What do you mean?"
    "Like," she stepped over and squinted, "night vision?"
    He seemed to think for a second. Then he said, "Oh," and chuckled. He patted his chest. "This is really all just to keep me alive, nothing fancy."
    He went back to examining the crate, and she kept looking at him. At last he noticed, or stopped ignoring her. He sighed and leaned against it. "What?"
    She shrugged and pushed her hair back. He glanced down the isle and raised an eyebrow at her. "Want to see it?"
    She nodded.
    He checked over his shoulder and pulled up his shirt. She stepped closer. Where his heart belonged there was a slab of metal full of glowing blue slits. She put her hand there and it was curiously hot. On his left hip there was also evidence of metal and nonorganic parts, creeping up almost to his ribcage. She almost moved her hand there too, but that seemed weird.
    "Wow."
    "Watch your fingers there, gets hot." She dropped her hand and he pulled his shirt down, shrugging. "Yeah."
    "Why..." she didn't want to sound rude, and she trailed off.
    "Why am I like this?"
    She shrugged. He opened his mouth, and then there was a loud crash from the other end of the room. The floor shook. He batted her shoulder.
    "Tell you some other time, okay?"
    They raced around the corner and into the open. There were multiple crates spilled on the floor and cracked, revealing metal parts and wires like thick black snakes that wriggled on the floor. Lucas was shooting balls of electricity at several small, hunched robots that skittered over the floor.
    A row of black darts hissed toward her face, and she ducked.
Boom.
    A blast of blue energy smoked over the rubble of a tower of crates and the twitching legs of several robot gnomes. Kit ran over to Lucas. She pulled him out of the rubble, receiving a static shock when she gripped his hand.
    "Nobody's here." They both jumped as Jersey appeared out of nowhere. He jerked his thumb toward the door. "They're probably a defense mechanism. Our guy's long gone. Watch it!"
    He pushed Kit down, and Lucas shot a bolt of electricity at the thing that leapt over her shoulder. Mickey fired at the group by the wall and helped her up as they ran. She clung onto his sleeve and stumbled in the dark. He stopped at the doorway and she ran into him.
    "Duck your head."
    She obeyed and he cupped his arm over her to be safe, and another flash of blue light lit the walls. It was silent after the blast, and they took off.
    "Did you get them?" Lucas asked as they loaded in.
    "I think so," Mickey said.
    "It was quiet," Kit said.
    "Good enough for me," Jersey said, and Lucas backed out of the empty lot.
    Jersey drove her home from the CAA. They didn't speak much at first.
    "We'll have to catch that guy later," she said.
    "Lucas is probably already on it."
    "Probably." She turned to him. "Who do you think he's dating?"
    "I don't know."
    "No, I mean, like, what kind of girl?"
    "You're assuming it's a girl."
    She was quiet for a minute, pondering that. She frowned. "I'm pretty sure Lucas is straight."
    "The man wears polyester boots."
    "Are you hoping?"
    He scoffed. "Not my type." Traffic was light, but slow. They waited at a light while pedestrians sloshed through the road sludge ahead. He glanced at her. "You have a type."
    "What?"
    "I'm not actually blind."
    "I don't—"
    "Mickey."
    "What?"
    He lowered his voice like he didn't want to embarrass her. "You were kind of ogling his ass back there."
    "No I wasn't—"
    "Jesus Christ." He snorted. "Back there in the parking lot. You looked really thoughtful, actually. I mean, I get it, he's gotten pretty hot, as far as robots go. I just think it's funny."
    "Why's it funny? And I didn't—"
    "You're talking to him now. What's that about?"
    She stared at a woman in a big furry hat, searching for her words. She felt angry. "You know what, you and Lucas—"
    "I didn't say anything about Lucas."
    "Neither of you is being fair," she said. "He's just being nice. It's been weird, and he's actually been—not...terrible."
    He looked at her, eyebrows raised high. "Wow." He shook his head, turning back to the road. "Who are you and what the fuck happened to Kit Folly?"
    "Haha." She glared at him and turned back to the window. "Anyway, he's not my type either."
    "Oh, no, of course not. I'm sure you've never pictured him naked."
    She frowned.
    "And I'm sure that's not why you're blushing."
    "Jersey!" She hid her face in her hands and turned away. "Just take me home. I think I have homework."