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

Chapter Forty-Three: Dark

Angel.

I hit the ground with a cry in a kicking, rattling heap. "Ugh." The pain is fresh once more, and I decide I ought to keep count of my injuries. Like in a scrapbook or something, so I can tell my kids about my reckless teenage years. I'm a walking PSA. If I had just resisted peer pressure and stayed off that roof. . ."Can I go home now?"

"Shut up," the drug guy says.

"Okay." No sass to be found here. When I blink up and the ringing clears from my ears, my vision is still splotched with black, blurred by a red and green afterimage. In a breath, my father coils into a ball and springs up from the ground. It happens so fast I think I imagine it, but he kicks up flecks of dirt into my eyes and I know I can't at least be making up that. He curses and leaves me on the ground to squirm, my head tucked into my wrists. Flashes of white light sweep the floor like lighting and I can't help but duck.

"Fallout, sir?" the girl asks, staring at the torn patches of her sweater as if she can stitch them back together by looking at them. After one last tug on her part, the sleeve drooping over her wrists slides free and plops to the floor. "Your health?"

"I'm fine," he says. His boots drag on the ground as he paces. Click. Click. Cliccck.  I narrow my eyes and watch as the long white scratches bobble up and down his shoes in the dark. He holds his head high and clasps his hands behind his back.

 My neck throbs. I have to tilt my head to watch my father move, though I'm learning to see better one-eyed. 

"Happens sometimes when you get up in age," he continues. "You would know."

"The first life cycle is always the worst," the drug guy says as the voices echo above our heads. They come in savage screams and hisses that make me chilly inside. Metal clangs on metal. Glass shatters. I hear it all as if it were in a distant dream, soft and murky. The drug guy whistles as he preens his fingers through his wispy black hair. When he tilts his head to smirk at my father, I notice a pink scar drawn down his chin. His wrist flicks as if he is drawing a lance and offering to dual. "Health is always frail for a super. Madeline?"

The round-faced girl with the orange hair grunts. Standing cross-legged between the men with a polite smile forced on her face, she gives up tugging her sweater and lets the crumpled pieces slide down her lanky arms. The skin around her eyes crinkles, and she looks like she's in pain. "Yeah, yeah. Lots of dizzy spells and arthritis." With a toss of her hair, she sinks to the floor beside the drug guy. He's propped up on his side, a fist punched on his hip. All the while my father continues to pace. The two supervillains glance up and shoot each other knowing smiles. They don't even try to hide them from my father, their eyes half-lidded like lounging cats looking out a balcony window.

"You are so young," the drug guy says, tapping his temple with a spindly finger.

"Agreed," the girl says. When she rubs the corner of her lips her fingers return bloody in the low light. She spits over her shoulder and I wince as a red glob splats the wall behind her.

My father punches his fists into his jacket pockets and says nothing to his allies' claims. Instead, he stands tall as they shift on their elbows to make themselves comfortable on the cold concrete. "Suggestions?"

The drug guy makes a 'pfft' sound from the side of his mouth, his eyes rolling back like marbles. "You're the leader, here." He throws up his arms and slams them on the floor, his back cricking into a perfect bow. "Your wish is my command, sir."

My father's jaw twitches, his balled hands trembling in his pockets. My eyes flicker back toward the stairs. The cuffs leave bitter cold traces on my wrists, digging at the touch. Fallout paces in deliberate strides as he closes around the perimeter of the room.