AngelWatch Ch. 05

I wasn't around for this; I found out about it later, and I might not have all the details straight.

**

Windy sat on the table in an empty conference room, feet up on a chair. Behind her was a phone. To her left was a map of Great Britain, covering the entire wall.

She looked at a spot on the wall in front of her, where a window would have been, if this hadn't been a room used by an organization had a reason to avoid prying eyes.

She picked up her magnet for the third time, and turned it slowly in her hands. She already knew that I was nowhere nearby; that I knew where AngelWatch had offices and bolt-holes, and stayed well clear. But she could not help but look and hope.

She was aware of her fellow conspirators, around her in the building. Intermittently, some of them were aware of her. She was too tired to block their emotions, so she knew people were worried or sad. As a leader she'd have been walking the halls, encouraging people and offering whatever comfort she could. But Henry was leader now.

"Keiko, please..." she whispered to herself. "It's not your fault. It's my mistake. I'm not going to be angry. You're tearing my heart out. Please, Keiko..."

Someone was behind her, in the corridor. Susan. Windy poked at her, through the door, to let her know she'd been spotted and to invite her in. The door opened immediately.

"Windy, we really need to come up with some new signals. Poking at me to make me feel the sensation of eating ice cream, as a way of inviting me in... bad."

"You like ice cream. Everyone likes ice cream. And when I led, people sometimes have reasons to wish they weren't going to talk to me. I don't think I have to explain to you about positive reinforcement..."

Susan, a trained psychiatrist with years of study in psychology, chuckled. "No you don't, but I end up with ice cream cravings."

"Sorry."

Susan walked around the table, and settled next to Windy. "You're not blocking."

"Too tired."

"Then sleep. Or whatever you call that meditation thing you do."

"It's called hssss-clickclick-squeeee-takka in my native tongue. Except my current mouth can't make any of those sounds right. So sleep will do."

"There's a certain symbolism inherent, in being unable to express the word for sleep."

"I know."

"You're thinking of going home and sending in a replacement, aren't you."

"I can't. It's seven years to the next possible portal. Y'all are stuck with me."

"I'm glad. Windy... I don't have to tell you you're grieving. It's exactly the same in your species and mine."

"You know you're this planet's only alien psychiatrist, right?"

"It's something of an honor, really."

That got a small chuckle out of Windy. "Heh. Didn't people in your profession used to be called alienists? That's so fitting..."

"Please try to sleep," Susan smiled. "Sitting in an empty room, waiting for the phone to ring... this isn't healthy behavior for a female of any species."

"Mercy's sake, Susan, I'm not here for the phone. She's got my cell number."

"I'm speaking metaphorically. You're in an empty room with a silent phone, and you're waiting... such symbols have meaning. Take my advice... your bedroom is that way," Susan added, pointing.

"Not until the reports on Michael's death come in."

"They're in. They're ambiguous. It was a suicide, and there was semen involved. The police are puzzled by a few strange aspects; suicides usually seek solitude for the final act, but his door was open. To me that sounds like Keiko, but there's nothing like proof. He was seen with a pretty blond girl, mid twenties, an hour before. Nothing afterwards. Again, that could be Keiko. Or it could be anyone."

"Was he a rapist?"

"No evidence for it; but when something like seventeen in twenty rapes go unreported, it's hard to know who the rapists are."

"Any physical evidence at all? Fingerprints, anything?"

"The doorknob was wiped down, but badly. Probably, she used a tissue to open it on her way out, smudging any existing prints in the process. You know it's hopeless to pursue that line. Several of us have killed in plain sight of a dozen people, without a trace of evidence. She doesn't even have to be in plain sight. The police are going to see a rash of suicides. She'll never be caught unless she wants to be."

"I don't like the semen. She toyed with him before she killed him."

"Again, this could be awash with symbolism. Maybe she toyed with him. Maybe she forced him to feel a sort of re-enactment of a rape. Maybe it was a side effect of her control. Her sexual history is a mess, she might be using sexuality as her predominant path into people. It's what happened to her. Maybe she made out with him before killing him, sort of a condemned man's last meal. If she keeps at it, we'll know more, eventually. A pattern will emerge."

"True, I suppose. Well... I'm going for a walk-"

"Over my dead body," Susan said, pleasantly.

"As leader I -- oh, shit."

"Yup. Henry's already given orders. You're to get six hours of sleep a day at a minimum, and we'll use chains if we have to. Keiko is dangerous, and you aren't going to go looking for you if you can't even manage a decent block. You're coming with me."

"I could beat you up..."

"Damnit, girl, I'm a doctor, not a punching bag."

Ten minutes later, Windy was "asleep". No one was supposed to know that she cried herself into stillness, but in AngelWatch, emotions were hard secrets to keep.

**

The next morning, there was a knock on Windy's door, and she peered out, blearily. Henry peered back, equally blearily, and stepped in.

"Sit," he said, somewhat firmly. Windy sat.

"It's bad, whatever it is," Windy said.

"You're not going to like it, but you need to know. You remember Keiko hacked us a couple weeks ago. We found the guy she used to do it."

"And...?"

"He's dead, Windy. He died of dehydration. He was sitting in a chair, and apparently never got up to drink. The police don't know what to make of it."

"Oh, Maker... Oh Keiko, no, why? Why?"

"I think I know why. I don't think she meant to kill. I think she just needed him quiet, and messed him up so he wouldn't talk. Maybe she thought he'd be discovered in a day or so. But... he was an academic, a bit of a loner, mostly living online. After a week someone online alerted the police."

Windy stood, and quickly rummaged in her closet for street clothing. In AngelWatch, where minds were often unavoidably laid bare, modesty concerning the body wasn't deeply valued, but Henry did the polite thing and turned his back as she changed.

"You'll never find her this way, you know. She'll feel you coming."

"I know. I'm not going out to find her. I'm going out to be found."

"If she wants you she knows where you live. And, don't go alone. She could harm you."

"She won't. She wouldn't. I don't care how broken she is, I'm the one person in the world that she'll talk to, and she needs to talk, even if she won't start the conversation herself. And she has to be out there, looking for rapists. There's only so much success you can have with searching, in a room with a computer, as we all know very well. So she's out there, reading guys, identifying targets. Clubs, bars, sporting events... I'll go where she's going. It's a matter of time."

"And if you provoke her? If you cause her to lash out in public in some visible way, or disappear from sight in front of a dozen people? How will we keep the secret then? Windy... I hate to say this, but we all might be safer if we just leave her be and let this run its course."

"Do you think I don't know that? Haven't thought about it? Let her take out the rapists. They are only rapists. They deserve to be punished. She'll give up eventually. You think we haven't all heard that in our heads? It's a whisper from Hell, Henry. Rape is bad, but a rapist can change his ways. Redemption is possible -- for the living. She's taking away the chance, however slim, that these people can be changed for the better. This is what I hate most about humans -- you're all way too prone to decide to pull the plug on someone who's gone off track. And anyway, what you propose is safer for us, yes, but it's bad for Keiko. The more she kills the more broken she becomes. It's not a damage that can always be healed."

"Not everyone can be helped. You know this."

"But Keiko will be. Excuse me, I'm going out."

**

You need to understand -- none of us are telepaths. We can't hold conversations mentally. Most of us can push emotions into other people, and almost all of us can read emotions. But reading words, coherent thoughts, out of someone's brain.... Well, Windy's managed it a few times, and I have once or twice. But in general, no. To talk, we have to talk.

So when I was sitting at a table in a bar, with a new girlfriend, I "heard" her come in -- people with our gifts tend to be very, very aware of each other -- but I didn't know what she was thinking. She'd picked a terrible moment to find me -- I couldn't just softly and silently vanish away, in front of Julie. I did the only thing I could... turned, stood, smiled big... "Wendy! Oh Julie, excuse me, I haven't seen Wendy in forever..."

"Wendy" and I got a table. We were both smiling.

"Wendy, I've missed you," I said. "I'm sorry I've been out of touch, but...well, I'm so busy right now."

"But, Kate... you know you're breaking hearts back home. Everyone misses you so badly."

"I know, I guess. But I have to do this. I'm making progress."

A flare of anger from her, her eyes nearly flickering in rage. She dropped her voice and leaned in, just another private tête-à-tête among girlfriends. "Just so you know. Doctor Amilheart is dead. We didn't find him in time."

I admit that got to me. "I'm... I'm sorry to hear it."

"Are you? You're broken, Kate. I can feel it. It gets worse over time."

"I'm fine."

"You think you can lie to me? The behavior you're following is addictive. You're wise enough to know it."

"This isn't up for debate. I have the gifts needed to do what I'm doing, and it has to be done. You're religious. What if I've been given these gifts to bring down justice on people who otherwise get away with it? Like Solomon Kane?"

"Kane was fiction. And on my world, claiming the right to murder in the Maker's name is punishable by death."

"It's not, here. It's been pretty common, actually."

"Your species' problem, not mine. And I'm not here to debate interspecies theology."

She paused, to stare down a guy that was approaching our table. I felt a flicker of something as she did something to him... he moved away, suddenly.

Outside, it started raining. It happened a lot in London, and I still hadn't learned to carry an umbrella.

"Good. Because I believe what I'm doing is right."

"If it was right, Doctor Amilheart would be alive. Look out the window, Kate."

I did. The rain turned red.

Blood.

"I'm a big believer in symbolism," she continued. "You can take what you're seeing a number of different ways. The simplest: you're raining blood on this city, scattering it everywhere. The blood you scatter falls everywhere and marks everyone, not just the people you have your vengeance on. Your victims will have family, work, friends... what you do affects more people than you want to think about. It could even fall on A-W, making us visible. Worst of all..." she picked up my drink, and it was blood. "It falls on you and gets into you. So drink this."

I smiled crookedly, took the drink from her and drank it down. She didn't get the flavor quite right, but it got the point across. She continued as I set the empty glass down.

"There's another way to look at red rain. The scattering of blood is a major symbol in one of your world's major religions. Two, actually. A sacrifice is killed and his blood poured out, and the blood represents healing and forgiveness for others. That blood can fall on anyone who wants it. Now, A-W can't claim to be in the business of saving mankind, but we follow the same business model. We put our lives on hold, sacrificing our time and maybe our sanity, to bring whatever healing we can to others. We do it poorly and imperfectly, but we do it because we can and because it needs to be done. Come on, we're going outside."

"I don't have an umbrella."

"You're missing the point, if you want one." She stood up. "It's only rain, Kate. It won't kill you."

She walked out. I followed her. We stood on an empty street in a cold, stinging rain of red blood that no one else could see. We were blood streaked in seconds.

"Which is it going to be, Keiko? Are you going to dedicate your life to raining down horror and pain, in some confused attempt to punish someone who is already dead? Or are you going to pour yourself out in an attempt to bring mercy and healing to a world that could use your help? You can be either; you can't be both."

"Maybe neither," I told her. "This isn't blood, it's water. Look, you're dragging in symbolism from Christianity and Judaism, but I'm not really into that, you know? I have to follow my heart. I felt what that girl felt, when the rape stated. It's what I should have felt when Ink was abusing me. But I was powerless even to feel that. I'm not powerless now. So let me show you my symbolism."

The rain turned clear, then a steaming greenish-yellowish.

"Acid," I whispered. Around us, the buildings hissed and were quickly streaked with unnatural whiteness, and Windy's flesh and mine were scorched and scarred. "I'm not about mercy and healing. I'm about cleaning. I'm going to destroy what needs to be destroyed, and what's left will be purified. My plans aren't a grand as yours. I'm only going after rapists. But when I'm done, men will be afraid to rape."

Windy held up her compact mirror, and in it she made me see my own face, ruined by the acid as well. I laughed.

"I know, Windy. I won't survive this. But no one gets out of life alive, and I'm going to go out enacting a vengeance that women have been crying for centuries uncounted. You like symbols? Let's try this one."

Clear, warm rain poured over our mouths, and it was salty.

"Tears. A city drowning in tears. I felt her cry, Windy. Her and thousands of others. I'm going to put an end to it."

"No," Windy said. "You won't. Tears are a natural fate of your species, just as laughter is. You've turned Iconoclast. And Iconoclasts always fail."

"But I'll go down trying. Let me show you my vision of things to come, Windy-"

I pushed to change her perceptions again, but her eyes flashed in rage and she blocked it. "No. I'm not going to look at that. It's evil and twisted and I've seen enough twisted things in my life."

"It's not. It's beautiful."

"Fantasy always looks beautiful, but it so rarely really is. Goodbye, Keiko. I'm going to walk home in this rain of tears you've given me, because it's as perfect a symbol of what I feel right now as there ever could be. We'll speak again. Once at least."

"Oh, don't put it off. Kill me now. I know you can." I said.

"I'll do anything to help you -- except become as you are now. I suffer enough, I don't need more misery in my life. I won't kill you."

"Then I win."

"You have no idea how wrong you are. Goodbye for now."

She walked away.

I didn't feel like explaining to my new friend in the bar why I'd spent time in the rain with Wendy, so once I was sure Windy was out of sight and sense, I walked home, fading from sight.