REND

Everett (Emcee)

 

Everett gripped the steering wheel firmly as he drove. The sirens of a firetruck made him grip it even tighter, causing it to creak because of his strength. The firetruck came into view, weaved through the sea of cars, and blew past him. Only then did he realize he was holding his breath. He was as tense as the time they went out on their first mission against the Adumbrae. Perhaps even more now…because they had just set fire to a mall full of innocent people.

His side mirror reflected the flashing lights of the firetruck getting further and further away, heading towards a pillar of heavy smoke rising to the skies. The mall was no longer in sight, covered by all the other buildings of the business district. Which was good news. Everett wanted to put as much distance as possible between them and the scene of the crime.

His crime.

Another source of stress, and perhaps more concerning, was Barb and the problem she had brought upon their group. Everett adjusted the mirror to check the backseat of his car. Two women were sleeping.

The one on the left had long blonde hair and wore intimidating corporate clothes. Everett had no idea who she was. All he knew was Barb wanted to kill her and another girl. Barb did scream it had something to do with Kelsey. No clue about that one either.

Blank didn't mention anything about it. He knocked out this gorgeous lady with his mind blast when they saved her from the rampaging Barb, and told him to take her with them. He was going to do it anyway. Otherwise, she would've died in the fire. Everett didn’t want the death of an innocent bystander, a beauty at that, on his conscience.

He tried to drive away the thought that he might've injured, or worse, killed someone with the fire he started.

This was all the fault of that idiot Barb.

Compared to the peacefully sleeping girl beside her, Barb was twitching in pain, pale and sweating profusely. Everett shuddered to think what monster could've taken a chunk of Barb's flesh just like it was biting a cookie. He knew first-hand how tough Barb was.

When they tested their powers, she could survive through his firestorm. That was not his full power, but he could cook normal humans with it. He had also seen Barb shrug off bullets and even point-blank shotgun blast to the chest when she had her spiked armor plate on.

There was something wrong with her now. Her healing was oddly slow.

As a temporary measure, he heated Barb’s open wound. He planned to cauterize it and prayed he did a passable job. Hopefully, Oberon could patch her up later. Then they could all beat up Barb for endangering them.

If they were exposed, they would be surely executed on the spot, whether it be by the Corebrings or the BID agents, whoever would find them first.

His phone rang. Not his normal one—the secured phone Blank provided for them. God knows where he got these. “Hello, Oberon,” Everett said. Finally, the lazy bum checked his phone and called back. “We have a situation. And it’s bad.”

“8 messages and 12 missed calls,” Oberon’s sleepy voice answered. “You guys could've stopped after I didn’t answer the first two calls. You know I just put this phone on silent. Getting a call from you guys doesn’t do me any good.”

“How many times we told you not to put it on silent! You’re our support. It’s bad enough you try to skip out on our missions.”

Oberon sighed dramatically. “What is it this time, Everett?”

“Don’t call me by my name. Use the codename we have.”

“Fine, fine. Emcee then. So, what’s up, Emcee my boy, my good old chap, Emcee?”

“Uh, how do I put this? Barb was trying to kill some people. I don’t know who they are, don’t ask. And we stopped her.”

“What the fu—”

“She shot her spikes everywhere. We were at Sanders mall parking area, by the way.”

“Wait, wait, wait. You guys are the ones who started a fire at Sanders?”

“Huh? How did you know?”

“It’s all over the news. My notifications keep popping up. I shouldn’t have subscribed to all this shit.”

Everett punched his dashboard, frustrated. Barbs moaned in pain at the back. He checked her, his stare lingered guiltily at his handiwork on her wound. What else could he have done? Barb’s regenerative powers weren’t doing anything to close the wound. Maybe it was infected with something dangerous. He had no choice but to burn the wound shut and hope she could take the pain.

“Blank’s ok with that?” Oberon said. “And why the fuck did you have to burn the mall? I was planning to take my girlfriend to a new restaurant that opened there.”

“We had no choice, okay?” Everett’s usually calm voice was rising. “We can’t go around pulling out all the spikes! And if we did, the cars full of holes will raise questions. It was an in-the-moment decision. And Blank and I decided on it. There might be fibers of clothes or hair or some DNA specimen of Barb that was left there so we had no choice. We couldn’t exactly comb the place.”

“So you burned it? That doesn’t sound like a good alternative. Let’s see, suspicious spikes or suspicious fire.”

“Either way, it’s gonna look suspicious. At least with this, we burned away any evidence Barb could have left. And may I remind you that any trace of Barb isn't going to look human if examined.”

“Fine, man. So let’s meet up at our hole of a hideout?”

“Yes, please. Thank you very much.”

 

---

 

It was a long drive to their hideout. An abandoned uncompleted building on the northeast side of La Esperanza. It was supposed to be the premier business district of La Esperanza but the developer and the landowner had a dispute. It didn’t help matters that the patriarch of the family which owned the developer corporation fell to the Adumbrae temptation. He was carted off by BID agents and his children were locked in litigation among themselves and against the landowner for years, bringing any planned projects in the area to a standstill.

A perfect place for their group to hide.

All along the way, Everett fidgeted in his seat and incessantly tapped the steering wheel. He wanted to turn on the music because he couldn’t take hearing Barb groaning in pain. But it also assured him that she was still alive.

He decided to stick with Barb’s suffering.

The first floor of the building they used as their hideout was mostly open with only a few stretches of walls completed and the support beams and columns in place. Everett drove into the building to hide his car from sight.

Oberon was already inside. Even in the partial darkness, Everett could pick out his features. A long oval face, proud eyebrows, and lengthy black hair tied in a ponytail. They always argued that this hairstyle was conspicuous, but Oberon stuck with it. Something about connected themes with his power. He leaned on the vintage motorcycle his grandfather used to own as he smoked a cigarette.

Everett pulled up his car next to him.

“Got you something,” Oberon said. He held up a plastic bag full of cheeseburgers from BeefGalore. “As apology, and to show I’m a caring and thoughtful person deep inside despite contrary reports.”

“Thanks a lot,” he replied, his gratitude genuine. “I actually forgot I was hungry. You had time to get these?”

“Yeah. I know a lot of shortcuts, plus my baby here can fit through traffic.” Oberon patted his motorcycle. “What’s up with your cargo? Barbsie Doodle in mortal peril as usual and, woah, a hot chick? An unconscious hot chick. I won’t be an accomplice to your crimes Evere—I mean Emcee.”

“She’s one of the people Barb was trying to kill. We can think about what to do with her later when Blank’s here. Help me with Barb first.”

“Where’s Blanky boy, by the way?” Oberon said as he helped Everett carry out Barb.

“He went to find the security room of the mall to wipe the recordings of the CCTV cameras. Might take him some time to get here because he doesn’t have a ride.”

“Oh, yeah. Barb totaled his car when we attacked that drug den. Let’s bring her to the room below?”

Everett looked at the blonde woman asleep in his backseat. “Let’s do it here,” he said. He pointed at her. “I’m not going to bring her down along with us and I'm not going to leave her there on her own.” He started to lower Barb on a flat piece of ground dotted with grass, and Oberon had no choice but to follow suit.

“What? I’m not going to do it here. It’s so open!”

“There's no one around.” Everett took out his backpack from the trunk of his car to use as a makeshift pillow for Barb as she lay on the ground.

“Exactly! So, leave that woman there. No one’s here to kidnap your kidnappee, counter-kidnap you, or some shit.” Oberon’s eyes darted around, trying to find any intruders. He always got antsy if he had to use his powers in an open space.

Everett pulled out a burger, unwrapped it, and began chomping on it. Only then did he feel a wave of hunger overcome him. And boy, did the beef taste good with its juices running down the sides of his mouth. He said to Oberon, “Look, I’m already refueling myself. I promise I’m not going to let anyone get to you.”

“Like the time I got shanked at the bathroom of the Baccarat.”

“I swear I'll protect you, even if I have to burn my own body as fuel.” That seemed to get to Oberon because he simply nodded. Oberon wasn’t the most trustworthy guy around but he was there when it mattered, and he could differentiate when it was time to clown around or to get serious. Everett always counted on this fact when the going got tough.

Oberon took out the thick black knee pads he kept in the inside pocket of his leather jacket. He put them on and knelt on the dusty ground. With hands outstretched as if in prayer, he closed his eyes and began to chant. Gibberish was all it was to Everett, and the words probably didn’t have any meaning at all. 

With nothing else to do, Everett decided to sit on the ground and continued to eat. The cheeseburgers satiated his grumbling stomach. He used up his massive breakfast, morning snack, as well as the light lunch he gobbled on the way to Sanders to fuel the fire power he'd used earlier. Terribly inefficient, but Blank assured him he was multitudes more efficient than a coal plant at extracting energy from mass. Energy which he could only turn into heat.

The burgers Oberon bought were a welcome gift. Everett lived in constant fear of accidentally using his own body as fuel.

After ten minutes of chanting, Oberon suddenly fell silent. The temperature of the air plummeted and the wind seemed to blow from every direction. He opened his mouth and singing filled the air as if childish cherubs serenaded the emptiness of the abandoned building. But it wasn’t him singing.

Everett had seen Oberon’s power manifest several times already but it was so mesmerizing he couldn’t help but stop and stare each time.

Green light poured out of Oberon’s mouth. A small green head peaked out and looked around. It had vines for hair, pointy ears, emeralds for eyes, and a frolicky smile. Fluttering its tiny wings, it flew out of the mouth and landed on Barb. The fairy then got to work healing her.

‘Oberon’, the name of the fairy-king in that one Shakespeare’s play. Everett couldn’t remember which one. He was certain Oberon didn’t know either. He probably just searched on the internet and picked the coolest sounding name related to fairies as his codename.

But it was a fitting name.

So far, Everett had seen four types of fairies come out of Oberon’s mouth, and there were surely more to come as their powers developed.

It would take maybe half an hour for the green fairy to heal Barb to full health given the severity of her injuries. In that time, Oberon would remain in his kneeling position, unconscious. However, before the time was up, their blonde captive—she was a captive, right?—would've already woken up. Everett didn’t know what to do with her. He supposed their only choice was to wait for Barb to regain consciousness.

Only then would they have answers why she attacked this girl, and who attacked her, since he barely caught a glimpse of their enemy before he heated the corridor and made it burst in flames. He looked at the bag of cheeseburgers, having eaten four of them.

Maybe he should leave two for the blonde girl.