Superhero Universe: Tesseracts Nineteen Read Online Free Page A

Jess would call “henchmen” or “minions.” They were probably civil servants. No more or less evil than that.
    Her mind registered a crystalline ping deep below her. Had to be Josh. Cold and hard as a diamond down there, somewhere.
    * * *
    “Been a while, Jess,” Josh said, his voice amused, his cobalt eyes furious. “Looks like you’ve been off your meds.”
    They had him in a full-body metal casing on wheels— like a combination canister/wheelchair. He could move his head: that was it. Jess knew they couldn’t hurt him without killing him outright, but Josh needed to eat, needed to breathe, needed to sleep, same as anyone else. They’d been at him, Jess could tell. Softening him up for her.
    For all that he looked surprisingly good, and defiant. His silver-grey hair had grown long around his shoulders since she’d last seen him. His lupine face was lined, but still vital; the eyes still piercing. He had lost the friendliness of his youth— that kind of serve-and-protect charisma that had made him their spokesman. He looked angry now, and threatening, despite his captivity.
    Jessica stepped to her right along the curved wall of the interrogation chamber. All along the curve, at a height of about ten feet, an unbroken pane of one-way glass encircled the space. Cameras and sensor equipment occupied hubs in the ceiling. A single chair and table occupied the middle of the room; she took off her parka and hung it on the chair back. The room was chilly, but she wore a long cream-colored cable-net sweater, heavy trousers, winter boots. She came round the table and sat against it, facing Josh in his holding can.
    “It would be better if you just told them what they want to know.”
    “Well, it would be smarter,” Josh grinned. “I don’t know if it’d be better.”
    She reached out with her mind, probing the weird facets and angles of his. By default, his body possessed some baseline degree of invulnerability, but it was his will that was the source of his real power. When he set his mind just so, bullets would bounce off his skin. When he decided to relax, he could shave. He was all about conscious intent.
    She could “hear” him framing his own thoughts in first-person, making himself opaque to her and deflecting her pulses up and out into space. She imagined her mental energy kaleidoscoping out of the room, at wavelengths invisible to the human eye.
    Not being able to read him unless he wanted her to… that’s what had drawn her to him all those years ago. Having to trust him — to make the choice to trust him, rather than just read him and see — that had been intoxicating once.
    “They want to know where everyone is,” Jess said quietly. She’d memorized the priority list. It was short.
    “I’m sure they do,” Josh said.
    “Where’s Jimmy Santana?” Jess stared as she asked the question, giving him what Josh used to refer to as her “gunslinger” eyes. “Where’s Cobain and his dogs? Where’s Donna Crow? Why aren’t they generating any data? Where did they go, Josh?”
    “Where’d Jessica Delaqua go?” Josh countered.
    “Where didn’t I go?” Jess said. “Montréal. Toronto. Calgary. Victoria. Points in between.”
    “Was it easier in small towns?”
    “Nope.”
    “I’m sorry about that,” Josh said, his voice softening. “Truly.”
    “What about the water installations? They know you’re planning to bomb them, or disrupt some of them, somehow. You wouldn’t poison reservoirs just to get at the water companies would you?”
    “What do you think?”
    “I don’t know, Josh.” That was honest truth, and she let him hear it.
    “Water belongs to every Canadian, Jess. It’s not private property. People’re suffering.”
    “They’re not interested in why you’re doing this. They want to know what you’re going to do, and when.”
    “I know. That’s their whole problem when you think about it. Not caring about why we do what we do.”
    Jess took a deep breath.