Faith Is Unavailable

Kobra Kid, Mikey Way, frequently dreamed back to the old days. The beginning of the war when he met Stryker.

It was back before rayguns existed outside the BL/ind laboratories as the standard weapon.

He remembered the neon green belt that carried her ammo and matched her shoulder length hair perfectly. The orange plastic goggles she wore in constant that she said made it easier to look at the Scarecrows when all she saw wasn’t black and white.

He missed her every day, down to her weaponry, her gun that housed and fired the bullets so perfectly, the katana she had strapped to her back just in the unlikely event that she ran out of ammunition.

The day the Scarecrows nabbed her in the middle of a fight was the day that he lost the only thing that made him happy in the hellish world in which he lived. All he could do was hold on to his hope.

Stryker was now called by many different names. Suspect 1 was what Korse seemed to call her most, Amy Smith was what everyone else called her.

Something about that name didn’t sit right with her, she never understood it.

Her simple grey skirt suit wasn’t at all intimidating until you noticed the black katana strapped to her back engraved “Stryker” on the handle.

She couldn’t for the life of her remember why “Stryker” would have any significance.

While Amy was left alone considering what one word meant to her, Kobra Kid was sitting alone musing about her. His eyes were cast up at the bright sky remembering how she loved it. After a while he had to look away so his eyes didn’t burn.

Party Poison came up on the roof to find his brother. Kobra Kid saw the stressed look on his face and he knew what it was about. There had been many times he had seen his brother’s face like this, he seemed to be getting much too old too fast.

“Come on. We’ve thrown together an emergency meeting at the insistence of Sands.”

“Be right down. I need a moment before I can walk into the lion’s den.” Kobra sighed.

Poison nodded and headed back down the ladder. A few minutes later Kobra followed him and entered the diner.

It had been an all out war between Suspect 12 and Silver Sands for the past two weeks. More and more dirt had been dug up than anyone knew what to do with. Not even Show Pony could joke or even laugh about the things that had been brought up.

Party Poison had finally had enough of everything and had called a meeting like Sands had been demanding. Now everyone was circled around a table. Sands and Twelve had been placed next to each other. Girl was sitting next to Jet-Star looking anxious. She didn’t quite understand what the problem was between the two women, but she understood that Sands was Korse’s daughter and Twelve was allegedly Korse’s spy.

Party Poison was flipping through the various kinds of tangible evidence -photographs and documents- trying to figure out what was real and what was forged. Show Pony was toying with the back of Dr. D’s wheelchair and Dr. D was asking the questions. Pony had been playing with Dr. Death’s hair before but he had been swatted away.

“And what can you say that will make us believe that you’re not a spy for Korse, Twelve?”

“Do we really have to ask that? I mean look at me! Do I look like someone from Battery City. Do you think with my history I would be his informant? I’m with Jet-Star for God sakes. Do you think I would do that if I was lying to you and secretly planning your deaths?”

“Just cuz you’re ‘with’ someone doesn’t mean shit.” Sands said shooting a glare Twelve’s way.

“Yeah, and just cuz you ran away from home what should make us believe that you’re not just as crazy as your father? It’s probably genetic.” Twelve shot back quickly.

“What about these?” Party Poison asked tossing all the photos and documents pertaining to Twelve on the table.

“Doctored. Sands doesn’t want me around and she has a sister that she still talks to that feeds her information. You saw her with your own eyes talking to Viktoria that night you had to rescue Star Killa and Fun Ghoul. I heard the story.”

“True.” Star Killa agreed.

Fun Ghoul grabbed her hand and squeezed as if to tell her not to say anything right now. He wasn’t the kind to take sides and he didn’t want Star Killa to take sides either.

“True that we did see them talking, I mean.” Star Killa corrected. “I don’t know about the other stuff.”

Twelve wanted to bring up Sands and Viktoria’s recent attempts in the past two weeks to have her killed, but she knew no one was going to believe that. They weren’t working together, but they were both unknowingly doing the same thing. Maye it was genetic. That kind of accusation would just throw the whole meeting into chaos. She did look at Sands and Sands seemed to know just what she was thinking. Sands smirked knowing just the position that Twelve was in as if she was saying ‘you don’t have the guts, little rat’.

Party Poison sighed and pushed the photos around on the table and stopped when the one of Twelve and Korse locked at the lips over his desk was at the top. Jet-Star looked away and sighed. He didn’t want to believe that Twelve was anything other than what he wanted her to be, but it was kind of hard when that photo was in his face. Girl pushed it away and took Jet-Star’s hand.

“What are you trying to prove with all that paper shuffelin’?” Twelve asked quietly while looking at the photo on the top of the pile.

“Just bringing up all the facts.” He said just as quiet.

Party Poison wanted to leave this one up to Dr. D but the man was silent. Everyone was silent. Twelve could feel everyone just staring at her, judging her. She took that as the hint that no one was believing her. She nodded to herself and then stepped away from the table without a word.

Twelve picked up her jacket from the chair it was resting on and walked out the front doors of the diner. She had decided that if no one was going to believe her then she might as well go to the one man who knew everything and saw her for who she was.

Jet-Star got up to chase after Twelve but Sands stopped him.

“If she leaves, she’s guilty.” Sands said.

“If she leaves it’s because no one here trusts her. I trust her, Silver Bitch.” He spat as she pushed Sands from blocking him and went out after Twelve.

It was too late. He could already hear the motor of her bike running. He knew he had a small chance of stopping her now, he had to move fast. Twelve saw Jet-Star run towards her but she didn’t kill the bike. She only waited for him to get closer.

“Don’t go.” Jet-Star said loud enough to be heard over the roar of her bike.

“Why? So you can just sit there and not stand up for me some more?” She spat.

“Twelve, I just-”

“You choked up and fucked up. Revealed what you think about me.” She said before kicking up the stand and revving the engine.

She tore out of there and headed straight for the City. She didn’t care if that confirmed their beliefs or confused them. As of that moment none of them were really her family because none of them voiced their thoughts against what had been spoken... if they had any. Not even the man who claimed to be in love with her.

There was quite a bit of time for her to think on what this meant and if she ever planned to go back while she drove to the City. She came in the main entrance and the Dracs tried to stop her but she ignored them and ghosted a few others that shot at her.

Once she was at the Scarecrow Unit tower she hid her bike away and entered. The secretary only nodded at her as she was now used to the ragged woman storming into the building. Only this time Twelve wasn’t storming in, she was quite solemn.

“Korse in?” She asked.

“He just left. He should be back in an hour or so though. He is not expecting you today. In fact,” the woman said looking at her calendar, “you are a week early.”

“I know. I’m going to his office. Let him know I’m here if you can reach him. It’s about the mission.”

“I will.”

Twelve got into the elevator and punched the top floor button. Half way there it stopped and the doors opened. She almost gagged when she saw Viktoria standing there. She looked as she always did, hair pulled severely back into a bun, heavy black eye make up, and dressed in all white. Twelve wondered why she was always in white. She certainly didn’t have the right to wear the color.

“What are you doing here?” Viktoria asked.

“Booty call.” Twelve shrugged.

“That is a lie. Father is not even here.”

“He wants me here for when he gets back.”

“Go to hell.”

“Save me a seat, Princess.” Twelve said stepping out as the doors shut.

She chose to take the stairs instead. It was only ten more floors anyways and she knew she was capable of it. She probably would be faster than the elevator.

Korse’s office was empty just as expected. Twelve walked past it knowing that would be the first place Viktoria would look for her and she really didn’t want to deal with that at the moment. She just wanted to go sulk before she had to pretend that everything wasn’t as bad as it was.

She went into a broadcast room and fired up the radio equipment. She didn’t plan on radioing in to Dr. D or anything but she wanted to listen and see if he was on. There was music, Mad Gear and Missile Kid so she turned it up and just sat in the corner of the room on the floor.

After about twenty minutes Dr. D came on and Twelve perked up.

“Bad news from the zones, Tumbleweeds.” He sighed out into the microphone. “It looks like Jet-Star and the Kobra Kid had a clap with an exterminator that went all Costa Rica and, er, got themselves ghosted. Dusted out on Route Guano. So it’s time to hit the red line and up-thrust the volume out there. Keep your boots tight, keep your gun close, and die with your mask on if you got to. Here is the traffic.”

Twelve sighed knowing exactly what that meant as Dr. D went into a report about Resurrection Road. They wanted to appear as if they were down in their numbers and were tossing around ‘ghosted’ and ‘dusted’ to throw off the lackeys that listened to the radios at all times. She would be sure to correct that in her report to Korse.

What she didn’t expect was that she had started crying. She hadn’t felt it before but by the wetness on her cheeks when she wiped it away she judged that she had been crying since Mad Gear had come on.

She felt kind of stupid for crying but at the same time it felt like the right reaction. It even felt good to cry so she let it happen. She leaned her head back against the wall and tried to relax and not think about what had happened.

The only thing that she couldn’t get off her mind was Jet-Star. He hadn’t stood up for her at all and he claimed to love her. She knew she loved him and she wasn’t lying about that, but she knew that she loved him more than he loved her. Or at least that was how it seemed to her now.

Korse had been informed that Twelve was in the building and he was anxious to see her. She was never ever early and she was never late-besides the first few times. This had to mean that something was wrong with the mission or with her. He had almost cut his previous engagement short to go to her but he knew that was impossible.

When he didn’t see her in his office he was more worried. He headed down the hall not even pausing to put his briefcase down or check his desk for other messages and reports. Twelve was all he could think of.

He heard the radio and knew where she was. He opened the door and found her in the corner lying on the floor curled in a ball. As soon as he was near her he dropped to his knees-though it hurt him to do it-and lifted her face up to look at him. His briefcase toppled over where he had dropped it.

“You weren’t supposed to see this.” She sobbed.

“It is okay. What happened?” He asked as she sat up and leaned against a wall.

He sat next to her against the wall wishing he could do more than just sit there but today the pain from the Leukemia was worse than usual. He was starting to feel it in his bones.

“They kicked me out. They don’t want me. They don’t love me. I was wrong.”

“You have to tell me what happened, Twelve.” He said stroking her cheek.

“Party Poison called a meeting. Dr. D was talking about everything me and Sands had brought up about each other. Party Poison threw all the photos of me and you and the documents on the table. No one stood up for me. Not even Jet-Star. I left because they didn’t want me there.”

“Just give it some time to level out. Jet-Star will miss you and that will be your point of re-entry when you are ready to go back.”

“I don’t want to go back. I want to stay with you.” Twelve said putting her head on his shoulder.

“For a while that will be possible. We will of course have to stage some sightings of you in the Zones living on your own so they cannot assume that you are in fact a spy and are here with me, but other than that we will be together for a time.”

“Can you just skip the rest of the day? Can we just go to your home? I don’t want to be here. I don’t want to remember what I am or that I’m a human being.”

“I would love nothing more than to make you forget who you are, but today is a very busy day. They picked a bad day to kick you out.”

Twelve just nodded and sat up to wipe her eyes. “What can I do to help?” She asked.

“Nothing. Not in this state. You need rest. Go home and I will see you tonight.”

“When you say home...”

“To the apartment you have been provided with. I will call when I am home and then we will figure out what to do with the rest of the evening.”

“I guess I’ll be here for a while.”

“At least a week.” Korse said confirming her guess.

“I suppose I can take a shower then. That’ll make you happy.”

“Do what makes you happy.” He said leaning over and risking the pain to kiss her cheek.

Twelve smiled and stood up from the floor. She helped Korse up knowing that the pain was bad today. She knew it was worse than normal when he willingly let her help him and seemed very grateful. She didn’t fail to notice he had a slight limp as they headed towards his office.

Korse sat behind his desk and Twelve took the couch. She felt entirely too exhausted to do anything other than lie down. She made herself comfortable by kicking off her boots and tossing her jacket over herself before crossing her arms on top it. Within seconds she was dosing and the hours started to pass.

For a while Korse was able to work with Twelve quietly asleep on the couch. He only glanced at her every once in a while to make sure she was still asleep. He worried that she wasn’t resting enough or that she was not getting all that she needed to be healthy. It was certain that she wasn’t getting all she could from Battery City. To him she looked much thinner than when she had first left but he knew that she was still very strong.

When the sun started to go down and the golden-red rays caught Twelve’s cheekbones Korse couldn’t tear his eyes away from her. She looked so perfect to him in that light and he was afraid that if he looked away the illusion would be gone. Long after the sun had gone down he was still looking at her lost in thought.

Realizing that he had lost much of the time he needed he got up from his desk and knelt next to the couch. He gently rubbed the exposed skin of her stomach and waited for the sensation to wake her. Twelve opened her eyes and smiled happy to see Korse. The next thing she noticed was how tired and beat he looked despite his smile.

“You look bad.” Twelve said lazily stroking his face.

“You should talk.” Korse laughed.

“I’m not joking. How bad is it?” Twelve asked, concern coloring her voice and features as she continued to touch his face.

“It is nothing I can not handle. Please, go take care of yourself. I have some work to finish up and you would just be a distraction.” Korse did his best to smile and make Twelve believe him hoping she couldn’t see the pain through his eyes

Twelve waited until he was seated in his chair again and comfortable before grabbing her apartment card key off his desk and kissing the top of his head and leaving. She wasn’t comfortable leaving him but she knew he would be okay if something happened. Zone Sickness was a bad disease to have and no one knew how to cure his particular strain. At lest that’s what he had told her.

But she turned to the fact that she had a week with Korse rather than focusing on the fact that he was in pain. One solid week except for a few minor appearances in the zones that she could do while he was bogged down with work. Maybe being kicked out wasn’t such a bad thing.