Normal. She'd almost been there once. Zoey's step faltered. She recovered quickly and went to the office where she stashed the hard drives earlier that day.
"Zoey, you look...are you okay?" Eric asked, following her.
"I'll be out of your hair in a minute," she said mechanically.
"I'm concerned," he said. He placed a hand on her arm. "Especially after I saw the news about your school being hit by a terrorist attack."
"Terrorist? Is that what they're saying?" she echoed.
"Um, what else would they say?"
She bit her tongue to keep from responding.
"They said it was a disaster. The roads around there are blocked off. I'm glad you're okay." He sounded so sincere.
Zoey straightened from her place bending over. She met Eric's gaze. He was worried, a strange emotion to have when she'd fucked him up the way Declan did her. How did he have the capacity to care still?
"You've always been a much better person than me," she whispered. "If anyone asks, you haven't seen me." She stooped and swept up the hard drives. "Unless it's Vikki. If she comes by, tell her I'm where we met ten years ago. If she's with someone, tell her nothing."
"What's going on?"
"I can't say."
"Can you take a coat? You look like you're freezing."
She hesitated. Eric disappeared from the office and returned a moment later with one of his North Face fleece jackets.
"Thank you," she murmured, taking it. She felt like she should say more to him. But what was there to say? That she finally understood how badly she hurt him and she was sorry? That she hoped he moved on, when she never, ever was going to be able to do the same after Declan?
She said nothing and walked out of the apartment. She shivered, grateful for the jacket, and tucked the hard drives into the large pockets. Not wanting to give her body a chance to grow cold and stiff, she broke into a trot and made her way through the neighborhood. She ran away from the destroyed Sucubatti campus, Eric, Declan and everything else.
The park where she met Vikki ages ago was in a rundown section of DC. Zoey slowed her pace as she reached it. The equipment she recalled from her childhood had been recently replaced by a massive wooden jungle gym. She sought out a place to provide shelter from the rain and wriggled between wooden posts to the crawl space beneath one of the four slides.
Rain trickled through the wood boards overhead and pooled in shallow puddles on the mulch-like woodchips lining the ground of the playground. She sat huddled in Eric's jacket on a high point, away from the puddles. Shivering, Zoey wrapped her arms around her knees and waited for Vikki.
She couldn't wouldn't think of Declan. He hadn't tried to talk to her, and she didn't know if it was because he lied about how he felt for her or if he was simply too guilty. Instead, she focused on the hard drives in her pockets and the idea she and Vikki had been created together to create a group unassociated with anyone, one that wouldn't be funded by the Incubatti or under the operational control of the Sucubatti. The only real solution was to be truly independent from both societies.
She was done with everyone. No one protected humans to the extent Zoey knew she could, if she had the chance. She patted the hard drives in her pockets. They were the key, one she didn't know she needed, until she realized she had nowhere else to go.
"Miss Zoey?"
The unfamiliar, female voice made her tense. She cursed Eric first then the Sucubatti, uncertain of which had fucked her over this time. Drawing a weapon, Zoey crept forward silently, towards the voice.
"Um, my name is Chrissy. You um, rescued me last Friday, and I left you transformer shoes and a dress."
Hidden in the roomy crawlspaces of the jungle gym, Zoey leaned close enough to see between two boards. The figure was dressed in a rain jacket with her hood up, leaving it hard to determine who exactly it was. However, there was no sex magic; she wasn't a Succubus or a Halfling. She was human.
"Look, I know you're here. The watch I gave the Professor to give to you is a tracking device. I have a few plans for it that you might be interested in. The Professor called me tonight and said the terrorist attacks wiped out your home on campus. He said you might want to talk to me."
Zoey put her knife away and crept stealthily through the crawlspace, until she was able to squeeze free from the bowels of the jungle gym. Already cold and wet, she leapt from the wooden platform onto the ground.
"I remember you. What are you doing in the park?" Zoey asked.
The woman spun, the action causing her hood to fall away. Zoey recognized the human with a knack for designing useful gadgets. Chrissy was a gorgeous girl with cocoa skin and dark eyes.
"Looking for you," Chrissy replied. "Do you like your watch?"
"What does it do?" Zoey asked.
"Right now, it monitors your heart rate and sends it to a central point of my choosing," the woman started. "But when I'm done modifying it, it might be able to charge your cell phone or other small electronics."
"Really? Can it shock people, too?"
"That wasn't part of the original production plan." The woman smiled. "I can work on it, if you're interested."
Zoey hesitated, hearing the unasked question. Was she interested in bringing this poor human into her mad world? With skills like these, Zoey was going to have an incredible arsenal. She was standing in front of a small pot of gold at the end of a rainbow the first one that wouldn't turn out to be fool's gold by the end of the week. What did she do with it, when she was homeless, alone and probably hunted by Sucubatti and Incubatti alike?
"Look, whatever is going on, I don't have any understanding of it," Chrissy said. "You saved my life and probably the lives of a lot of girls doing what you do. Let me help you. Please."
The first act of kindness after such a horrible day left Zoey speechless. She was grateful for the rain that hid her tears. She nodded. She gathered her composure.
"Maybe you can find me again like, tomorrow? So we can chat out of the rain? I'm, uh, in the middle of something crazy right now," she managed.
Chrissy looked around the calm playground.
"Not here. I'm hiding out. Or was, until you tracked me down. The craziness is just ..." Zoey waved her hands around her. "Anyway, it's really weird that you're monitoring my heart rate. And following me."
Chrissy gave a nervous laugh. "I didn't mean it in a stalker way. I just really wanted to talk to you."
"I get it," Zoey replied. "Thank you."
"You need a ride or anything?"
"No, I'm good. Waiting for someone."
Though appearing dubious, Chrissy didn't press her for more information. She started to turn, hesitated, then asked, "Is eleven in the morning tomorrow good for you?"
"If I'm still alive, I'll be happy to meet with you," Zoey replied.
Chrissy nodded uncertainly and walked away, towards a car waiting in the nearby parking lot. Zoey watched her leave before returning to the crawlspace under the jungle gym. Thoroughly soaked, she sat, shivering and miserable, praying Vikki came. It seemed like hours passed before she heard the sound of someone walking through a puddle.
"Zoey?" Vikki's voice was soft. "I know you're here."
"Are you alone?" Zoey asked cautiously.
"Nope."
Her heart tumbled for the second time that night. She couldn't bear another betrayal!
"I'm here, too," Ginny said.
"And me, even though I'm new," Lydia echoed.
"Tiff wanted to come, but is stuck in Portugal or some shit," Vikki said. "I told her to get her ass back here."
Zoey's eyes watered. She heard one of them splash through a puddle nearby. A flashlight beam worked its way through the jungle gym, until it hit Zoey. A moment later, Vikki maneuvered through the wood beams to reach her.
"I got the message from Eric. I told you Tory was a bitch," Vikki started.
Zoey gave a half-sob, half-laugh. "Yeah, totally."
"So, what's the plan?" Vikki asked, settling beside her. "We're going out on our own, right?"
"You don't have to do this with me, Vikki. I can do it alone."
"Bullshit. We all came for a reason."
"Yeah, but you sort of have...a life." Zoey forced the words out. That morning, she thought she had a home. Now, she had nothing. "I'll totally understand, if you want to go home to Liam."
Vikki gave a tight smile and squeezed her arm. There was nothing but warm compassion in her gaze that made Zoey's tears start to fall.
"There's a ninety-nine percent chance Liam is tracking me," Vikki said. "Spill, because we all gotta split up in a few minutes."
Zoey smiled. She wiped her face and reached into her pocket to pull free a hard drive.
"Okay, so we have them," Vikki said. "What do you want to do with them?"
"Leverage," Zoey replied. "I marked these when we were stealing them. This is the boring one with historical shit. Take it to Liam and tell him to leave a stockpile of weapons and equipment some place where we can find them."
A smile spread across Vikki's face.
"I'm gonna plant myself at an internet cafe and print off some stuff we can use to blackmail Olivia," Zoey continued. "There's gotta be enough dirt here to play both sides, I think."
"I like this plan," Vikki said.
"Well, that's as far as I've gotten," Zoey admitted.
"The idea is what?" Ginny asked, squeezing into the space. Lydia followed her.
"To form our vigilante group, separate from everyone's influence," Vikki replied.
"Is the information you have supposed to get us shit or keep them away?" Ginny asked. "Because I know my dear husband is going to hunt me down."
"We can handle them," Vikki said with a sloppy smile.
"Both, I think," Zoey said. "We can use the information to get equipment, weapons, supplies and tell them to back the fuck off. We had an investor, but fuck him. I won't be tied down to anyone. Ever!"
The three exchanged glances, but said nothing, as if they already all knew what happened. Zoey pushed the emotion away.
"We're going to do what we always said we would: kill Cambions and protect girls like us," she continued. "Now that I know what Sucubatti do to Hunters once they turn twenty-two, I think we have a new goal, too. We can protect our own kind from the Sucubatti."
"What do you mean?" Lydia asked, frowning.
"Yeah, I haven't told Lydia that part yet," Vikki said. "Later, Lydia. Let's focus on getting our shit together first, and we can plan out how to do it. These hard drives have a ton of good stuff on them. We know the Incubatti want them badly. I can bet if that's the case, Olivia won't want us to turn them over."
"No need to go to an internet cafe, Zoey," Lydia said. "You can stay in my foster sister's basement. She lives in Virginia, about thirty miles west. We'll use her computer."
"That's awesome. I'll drive, though, so we can chat," Vikki said.
"Want to follow me there?" Lydia asked.
Vikki nodded.
"Olivia doesn't know about Tommy yet," Ginny added. "I can carry a message to her with our demands. We better make it good, though, because I'll probably burn that bridge by doing so."
"Let's meet at Lydia's sister's in a couple of days," Vikki said. "Zoey can pull stuff for us to use, and Ginny and I will lay low."
"I'm headed that way," Lydia said. "I was supposed to meet Wes." She cleared her throat. "This rite stuff is gonna be even rougher on me now, isn't it?"
"Yeah," Zoey said.
"My gut says Liam and his brothers will be here soon," Vikki said. "Text me tomorrow with a place and time to meet about thirty minutes before. I have a feeling Liam's going to be peeking into my mind to find out where you are. I don't want to give you up."
"This is really happening, isn't it?" Zoey asked in a hushed voice.
No one spoke for a long moment, nothing but the sound of rain interrupting the silence.
"We can totally do it," Vikki said at last.
"Definitely," Ginny seconded.
"Yes!" Lydia added.
Smiling sadly, Zoey leaned forward to hug her best friend. "Thank you," she whispered.
"We'll show 'em how it's done," Vikki promised.
"Hurry, Zoey. Wes is about to find out I'm standing him up," Lydia said cheerfully.
"Text me, too," Ginny said. "I've gotta figure out how to outmaneuver Tommy's mind tricks."
Zoey accepted Vikki's hand, and her friend hauled her out from under the playground equipment. She gazed at her friends, grateful they weren't abandoning her, when it seemed like everyone else had.
"Come on!" Lydia urged and started away at a trot towards a vehicle in the parking lot. The lights were still on and the car running.
Vikki flashed Zoey a smile, and Zoey saluted Ginny, before she followed Lydia.
Cold, wet and homeless, Zoey had never been as hopeful as she was that moment. Or as devastated. She wanted to curl up in the rain and weep. The ache at her core and in her heart were almost overpowering; there was nothing in this world that could fill the hole caused by Declan's betrayal.