Beth gritted her teeth as her Volvo crept through the streets of Harrisburg's Midtown. The area had an old, almost Victorian feel, with quaint Queen Anne-style homes and storefronts, and tall trees hanging over the streets. Visitors packed the uneven brick sidewalks, hurrying under large eaves and past shops selling anything from clothing to handmade bars of soap. Their frozen breath formed clouds above their heads, giving the air the look of a hazy industrial park. Cars clogged the narrow road in front of Beth as drivers slowed to search for open spaces closer to their destinations.
A fall festival was in full force at a park just two blocks away. Hundreds of people had braved the unseasonably cold temperatures, bundling up for the walk to the park. Local businesses were open, taking advantage of the influx of people. Television vans were out, their crews sending puff pieces over the airwaves.
Beth chastised herself for not researching the day's events before leaving the hotel. The Fizzure Technology building sat at the very edge of the midtown area. She had planned to park her car in the same place John had parked a night earlier, and stay out of sight. The current crowds made that unlikely.
With a mutter of annoyance, the young woman pulled over by a fire hydrant and opened the maps app on her phone. After a few moments she found a spot far enough from the festival, but still offering a direct and discreet approach to the Fizzure building.
The young woman edged the Volvo back onto the street, navigated to the next stop sign, and turned right. After another right she found a parking spot. From it she spotted an alley that ran parallel to the street she and John had traversed the previous night. The street was quiet.
Beth didn't exit the car, instead squeezing the steering wheel and staring straight ahead. This was surreal. On a normal Saturday she would be in her college town several hours away, sleeping in. Now she sat in her car with a shimmering costume hidden under her coat, getting ready to break into a building to help save her boyfriend's life.
The costume. Beth looked down at herself, her blue eyes focusing on the coat instead of the gleaming blue material peaking through the front it. The coat couldn't get in the way again, and she couldn't afford to lose another one. She would leave it in the car and sprint to the building so she didn't freeze.
As she removed her jacket, her cell phone rang. Beth picked it up and looked at the screen. Ethan Moore. John's best friend, who had also become a close friend of hers. Beth gave her forehead a light smack. She should have called him, too, from the hospital. He and John were like brothers.
Ethan deserved to hear about John, but not now. With pangs of guilt tugging at her, Beth silenced the phone and reached to slide the device into her pocket. She stopped, realizing her tight costume had no pockets. She had nowhere else to carry the phone, either. The USB drive Stanley had given her barely fit into the back of her boot. Her phone would never fit, and her keys wouldn't either.
Beth locked her phone in her glove box and gripped her keys in her gloved hands. After taking a deep breath, she made sure the way was clear and jumped out of the car. The scantily clad girl winced, waiting for the cold air to blast her through the thin material of her costume. It didn't. She felt fine. As fine as sitting in her warm car.
It had to be the necklace. The temperature hadn't suddenly shot up forty degrees. The necklace had given her strength, quickness, and invulnerability to bullets. Why not protection from the elements?
Beth cast aside thoughts of the weather and sprinted up the sidewalk toward the alley. She reached it within seconds. It stretched toward the next intersecting street, with another alley intersecting it half way there. Several fire escapes were bolted to the buildings on either side, and a handful of dumpsters rested against the structures.
She hurried to a dumpster and moved behind it. Beth placed her key chain on the ground and extended a graceful leg to nudge it under a metal lip extending out from the bottom of the dumpster. It would have to do.
After again making sure the way was clear, she rounded the dumpster and sprinted down the alley. She slowed as she approached the intersecting street, before darting across the street and into the alley on the other side. One more block to go.
As Beth hurried down the alley, her eyes were drawn to movement at a dumpster ahead of her. She stopped as two men and a woman walked into view from behind it, laughing and oblivious to her presence. One man was tall and the other short, but both were scrawny with pasty white skin, and wore black ski caps on their heads. Their jeans were fastened by belts below their buttocks, and their short coats had seen better days. The woman wore tight yoga pants and a thin jacket, and her lips trembled in the cold. Her makeup was excessive and her features exaggerated.
The three strangers looked up, finally seeing the stunning woman before them. Their eyes widened, and the taller man let out a low whistle.
"Hot damn, what do we have here?" the shorter man said, his eyes traveling up and down Beth's body. "Those are the best set of legs I've ever seen."
"Ray, leave her alone," the woman interjected as she put a hand to the man's chest. He swatted it away, and both men stepped toward Beth.
Beth stood calmly in place. Her reaction surprised even herself.
"You fellas need to step aside," she said.
The two men laughed.
"Who is gonna make us, little girl? I think you're gonna be a little late to your Halloween party."
"Ray!" their female companion yelled. They ignored her and advanced toward Beth.
"Come on, Rita, why else would this hottie be here if she weren't here for us?" one man said over his shoulder.
As they raised their hands and reached for Beth, words from one of her self-defense instructors came to the petite woman. Hit hard and hit first. Beth whirled with a graceful kick at the shorter man, striking a glancing blow to his midsection and doubling him over. On her follow-through she backhanded the taller man, sending him sprawling to the ground.
A grin crossed her face as she moved toward the man. Putting punks in their place was fun. She reared back, ready to swing with a massive punch at the taller man. The punch never landed as the shorter man grabbed her arm from behind and pulled her to him.
She gasped in surprise, her blond hair and white skirt twirling about her. His fist stopped her momentum, crashing into her face. Her head snapped back, and she staggered into the arms of the taller man.
The goon seized her from behind in a chicken wing, hoisting her slim, lightweight frame off the ground. Her feet dangling, the costumed woman couldn't get any leverage. The shorter man swung a fist into her trim stomach, and Beth grunted as air shot from her lungs. She sagged in the man's grasp and let out an involuntary whimper.
"Let's finish this bitch," the man behind her said, as she felt his breath on her neck. She had been overconfident, she realized, and ignored the few techniques she remembered from her self-defense classes. But she also noted how quickly the pain in her stomach was fading. The necklace again.
The shorter man reared back again as the petite woman hung in the tall man's grasp. Before the attacker could deliver his blow, Beth lashed up and out with her feet, slamming her heels into his chest and catapulting him backward. Her feet touched the ground on her follow-through, and she heaved the man holding her, flipping him over her head. He tumbled through the air, colliding with his partner. They both went down in a tangle of limbs.
The lissome woman rushed toward the men, her skirt swirling about her hips. Beth mashed her knee into the face of the tall man before he could climb to his feet, flipping him onto this back. She lunged toward the other man and landed a blow to his face. He crumpled to the ground.
Both men were down and made no move to get up. A smile crept across Beth's face. She still needed to learn and practice, and avoid overconfidence, but this had gone well. Not that it mattered, of course, since this was a onetime thing.
The tall man had received the worst of her attack and lay writhing on the ground, holding his face. Beth's smile melted into a cringe. She hadn't meant to hurt him so badly. She glanced over at the other man, who was on his hands and knees a few feet away. He held up a palm.
"Okay, okay, girl! We're sorry! Damn! Don't hurt us no more!"
Beth glanced from one man to the other, and to the girl, Rita. Rita stood wide-eyed, her jaw hanging open. Beth turned her attention to her.
"You don't need to hang around with pigs like this."
Rita didn't speak for a moment.
"Who are you?" Rita asked, her words barely more than a breath, wonder in her eyes.
"That doesn't matter," Beth replied. "But guys like this will only drag you down."
Rita looked between the men on the ground and the beautiful woman in front on her. She finally nodded.
"You're right," she answered.
Beth didn't have time to continue the conversation, so she nodded at Rita before rushing down the alley. Before she got too far, she glanced over her shoulder and saw the girl slinking away from the two men, who remained on the ground. A thin smile crossed Beth's face. Perhaps she had made a difference in Rita's life.