Damsel[ed]: Some Rescue Required (#2 of the Damsel[ed] series)

Chapter Thirty-Nine: Owl's Plan

Gats.

"No." My fists tremble when I stand, my knuckles squeezed white. There's a shackle around my ankle, keeping me attached to my chair by five or so inches of chain. I hardly feel it. Hardly care. The room spins and I gasp to breathe. "No, no. No, no, no!"

Owl's office looks even blander now that I know the things she plots and schemes. The ugly beige of the stucco walls. The cheap brown furniture. The fax machine and the bird's cage. She leans back in her plush rolly chair, her hands tucked behind her head.

"No?" Her smirk is lazy as she flicks her dagger between her fingers. Legs up on the desk, grinning like a cat over a mouse-trap, I feel like prey in her sight. "Troubleshoot me here. What's wrong?"

"Wrong?" My voice is a strained whine. The inside of my throat is rubbed raw, every word a shock. Fear, exhaustion, and anger. The big three. All I can feel. I imagine them as slider boards. Slide one down and slide one up to create the corresponding emotion for the corresponding life-suck. Right now, the exhaustion slider sits at the middle of the board, the fear bounces from low to high, low to high, and anger sits cranked to the edge. I blink and yawn, but my heart pounds out of my chest and my now-full stomach smolders with a heat I've never felt before. "You can't do that! And you can't make me help you!"

Owl spins in her spinny chair, gliding over the carpet to the other desk. My cat ears twitch. The door is locked, her lasso sits on her hip, and if I made a run for it, I'd be dragging an uncomfortably heavy chair behind me. I press my hands into the table, the weight of Starlight on my shoulders. It is on my shoulders. Its fate anyway. "Sit down, boy."

"No." My teeth grind down, my breathing coming in harsh little puffs. Short inhales. Dizzying results. I squeeze the bridge of my nose and my jittery claws scratch my skin. She can't do this. Everyone hyperbolizes how terrible Syndicate is and Owl, their leader, how they probably want to take over the world and stuff, but their evil was so abstract. Like peering through the pages of a comic book. I never saw anything so concrete. Actual plans. Actual money allotted to the fight. Actual possibility it all could work. And now, I can hardly see straight. 

Owl glances back at me and combs her fingers through her glossy hair. When she smiles, her good eye is so black in the light it reminds me of one of Angel's. I'm shivering all over, shaking. Her words are like a branding on my mind, searing, shooting pain rippling through every muscle in my body the more I think about them. What she plans to do. What she plans to use me to do. "I could strap you to that chair, Felix, but if you prefer to stand, it makes no difference to me." Her smile twists into a knowing smirk. It looks pretty on her perfect face and I hate her all the more for it. Just looking at her shoves me brains into an odd sort of cognitive dissonance. It won't match up her beauty with the terrible things she's done and the terrible things she plans to do. "You already gave me what I want. You can play pretend defiance all you want, but I know I have your loyalty. How many people rat out their best friends for cookies?"

My jaw tightens, fingers quivering as she smooths a map over her desk. My claws sheathe and unsheathe, slicing the insides of my hand. She has me balled up tight in her super-strong fist. As she rummages for paperweights to hold down her map, I squeeze the bridge of my nose one more time and force myself to swallow down the growing lump in my throat.

I didn't mean to do it, not at first, but I told her everything. Everything she wanted to know. She pulled me out of the cage and I fainted in her arms. When I awoke she had sat me on the little corner bed with a fresh change of clothes folded under my hand and a grilled cheese sandwich set on a Dixie plate by the pillows. That and the cookie box. I ate so fast it all felt like a dream. When she asked questions, that felt like a dream too. I tried to tell her stories about Hev and Angel to buy time, and she listened to some of them. I told her about his good grades and how he can slow cook a mean alphabet soup. She laughed. I told her how he wanted to be a scientist and I saw a little glow light her eye and her expression melt, if only the smallest bit. 

But it wasn't enough. 

She dragged the information she wanted out of me soon enough. Mostly about Heaven's superpowers and dead parents, some about her coma and Snare's role in her recovery. A lot about us. Hev and me, I mean, our friendship and relationship. I told Owl I loved Hev. She scoffed. "Don't waste your heartache, child. Superheroes only care about themselves." After she jogged my mind for every detail I could remember, she gave me twenty minutes to shower and change. She left the room whistling.

"Don't rub it in," I step forward to try the chain. My pulse beats in my fingertips as I lay my hands down on the map. "You can't take Starlight." My jittery claws rip holes in the paper and the look Owl sends me leaves me weak at the knees. "We have superheroes to—"

"James has been taking care of those, it seems. And since our feared Galaxy is only a little girl..." The look she gives me softens. Not anger, not a look that says he can rip me to pieces. And that rattles me even more. I am not a threat. I never was a threat, but now she sees no need to scare me. Death isn't in the cards for me. I played my part, right into her hand. I let her toy with me and I told her all she needed to know. For that, she'll let me live.

But she'll never let me go.

She took me her prisoner and made me her pet. She tore down my willpower in hours. A bullet wound, time alone spent writhing in agony, peering into the memories of her victims. We have children. I almost whimper. Instead, I stand up for Heaven. "She turns seventeen April first. She isn't a little girl. And even so, she's stronger than you'll ever be."

Owl cocks an eyebrow. "Stronger than you'll ever be..."

I blush. "Ma'am."

She rolls her eyes and clicks a pen from her drawer. It's shiny and gleams silver. My claws slide back into their slits, and I clutch my face in my hands just so it doesn't look quite so obvious I'm rubbing away tears.

 Poison spilled everything about Angelos, Jaylin, and Heaven being at this old abandoned mall to make some deals. Apparently, Poison captured Angelos but wanted Heaven. The girls would only negotiate if I were brought back into the picture. But Poison planned to scam them. He was going to use me as bait to capture Jaylin and hand her over to Owl. Owl agreed to trade me in the morrow, but her plan was much different, one that included a wicked surprise.

At dawn, she's going to attack. She's going to take Poison hostage and force Fallout to engage. Her henchmen will destroy Snare. In forty minutes, she'll take her army through the city, seize the mayor's office, and have Starlight under her thumb. This is phase one of the plan, the easy part. She needs to use me as a lure. Sweat breaks on my clean face. "Why now?"

"My followers are on the brink of mutiny and I need a victory. The time has never been better. These plans were made years ago, the projects tools to execute them."

"You didn't seem to find Angel that useful. You'd think you were more interested in executing him." My ankle begins to throb.

"I thought I couldn't control him. But I seem to be mistaken. I do have a way of controlling him. And the superhero."

"Yeah?" I try to hide the fear in my voice. The very air feels like it's crushing me, heavy with traces of wood scent and ink, Owl's musky perfume dizzying. "What's that?"

She pokes my chest with the tip of her pen. I'm wearing a silk dress shirt, since Owl seems to like dressing fancy here, and she dots the fine material with ink. I stare down at the pen, her dove cooing and cooing. Nothing deserves to live in a cage. I feel a stab in my side.

"You, of course."

I forget about the lasso, the shackle, the locks on the door. I make run for it. It's almost a reflexive thing, like my mind's bumbled for too long and my body has decided to get me out. The chair drags, toppling over and cutting off escape long enough for Owl to throw her lasso. It catches my waist, target practice, and she yanks me back. The chair comes along for the ride. "Felix," Owl huffs. I force back frustrated tears, hands torn from my claws digging into my fists.

"I don't want to be a part this," I tell her, beg her. "This is my city and they're my friends."

Owl shrugs. "That's too bad." She raises her voice just enough to sound threatening, but she's still half-grinning. Toying with me. "I guess I wanted to feed you again, but if you won't cooperate—"

"No!" I shake my head, palms raised. Oh, please forgive me Hev, Ang. "On second thought, that sounds like a plan."