I took a cautious step toward the frightening man with oil for blood.
“August, stay away from him!” Valora was too late to stop my advance and could only snarl and raise her fists a few feet behind me.
“This has to be a skit practice,” I objected. I came right up to the man and grabbed him to support his weight when he flung himself at me. He was probably in his twenties, but had every appearance of someone who had been through enough of a struggle to be ready to collapse. Everything about his performance felt genuine, as if he was about to audition for an acting role, and not just some cosplay skit later in the weekend.
“Please, can you two take me to see the sun?” His eyes sparkled in the dim garage lighting and his face shifted to a childlike glee during his question.
“Only if you promise not to end the world once you go topside.” I fought off a chill at my confusion over whether the man was a performing cosplayer or someone in genuine trouble. “You aren’t secretly a demon or a alien neko overlord?”
The man licked at his dry lips, revealing a tongue interlaced with black veins. It was a frightening detail of his cosplay that I hoped never to see again. He shook his head for a moment. “No, young man. I’m just someone who hasn’t felt freedom in a long time.” He inhaled deeply and his damaged lungs rumbled so hard I felt the sensation, again worried at the detail.
“Are you from a zombie game or anime?” I let the man prop himself up on my shoulder, at first concerning my cousin. “Because I gotta be honest, the levels you’ve taken with all that oily blood is creeping me out.”
The man examined his hands, revealing the black and gray veins inside his palms. “This used to be a pirate costume, but it’s so ripped up I probably do look like some sort of zombie.” He paused to sigh. “I can’t tell you how happy I am to see someone in mundane clothing.”
“Do you need my help to walk?” I delayed to assess just what I was dealing with. Valora already had her pepper spray hidden in her hands, standing next to the pirate zombie and ready to strike in an instant.
“I can probably manage on my own.” He took a labored breath as he pushed himself away from me and moved with stiff, painful steps.
“If that’s a pirate costume, what’s with the oil blood?” Valora walked close, right next to the man, and tensed her hands on her spray as she raised the canister near his head. “You’re acting like you’re not here for cosplay.”
“Last time I was here I was,” he stomped his foot and left small oil smears on the ground, “I was in Sacramento for a convention when they took me.”
I spun around, alarmed at how he worded his answer. Valora raised her spray canister to his face as an open threat. She looked like a cop about to take down a criminal, the way her determination showed in her readied posture.
The man folded his arms and tilted his chin down. “Three years in captivity. But now I’m finally free. And with your blessing I’ll finally see the sun.” He attempted to wobble forth but was in no condition to battle his dizziness. “Can you please guide me to the surface?”
I desperately wished he’d been cosplaying from a twisted show or movie because the notion there could be some real life emergency was about to induce a level of horror I’d never known in my life.
“Please?” His weary face flickered between hope and hopelessness.
I nodded and took a step toward him.
“No way, get away from him!” Valora pulled me back with her free hand. “The best we can hope for is this is some ornate cosplay stunt. But, well, just look at this.” She pointed at the oily smears leading to the haggard man.
The mysterious man attempted a grin through his hideous, cracked lips. “I know I’ll never get to go home. But please, just one look at the sun is all I want.” His face lit up as the elevator behind us dinged. “I’ve come too far to give up now.” Terror overtook his entire being when the door cracked open.
The man fell backward and scrambled away on his hands and feet, smearing oil in a panicked trail off toward the parked cars.
My cousin and I turned to see what could cause such a reaction.
A tall woman dressed in black rushed out of the elevator. Her cosplay was of excellent quality, but I couldn’t place what show she was from. I wanted to say some sort of mashup between The Matrix and Final Fantasy, but with more black leather and belt buckles.
She aimed a device at the scrambling man that would be convincing if it was from a sci-fi game, being a pistol grip merging with a few polished chrome canisters and a dart-like protrusion out the front.
I cocked my head and wished with all my heart that I was watching an ornate skit being practiced. Then my pulse chilled at the realization I was witness to something much different.
“This is freedom.” The scrambling man, despite his looming capture, pulled a small piece of chalk from his shirt pocket. “My home, my mind, my dignity. You take it all and want more.”
The woman sighed and caught up with her target. “You probably don’t remember anything, anyway, do you?” She stood over the man and aimed her unusual weapon at his head.
The dirty man raised his chin in defiance and pounded his chest. “I’ll always remember the feeling of warmth.” He lowered to all fours and scrawled a big wedge on the grime-splattered ground. “You’ll never take the sun.”
“Time for you to forget everything you learned all over again. ” The dart portion of the woman’s gun shot a blast of what looked like water and steam onto the man, though he wasn’t burned by the effect.
“Hey!” I raised my hands to object and took a step forward.
“Call the police,” Valora shouted the order and pointed at me as she raised her pepper spray and walked in front of me.
I appreciated the fierce protectiveness, but felt ashamed to be treated like a defenseless child.
The man winced in pain from the aftermath of the blast but continued to mutter fragments of words. There were no wires or projectors, but beads of water levitated around his soaked head. The drops that fell from his shaggy, oily hair instead floated outward to join the effect. “I escaped. My name is Willum of Crimson Corsair, and I escaped your cage.” He drew more with his chalk. “I got out. My name is. I’m. Whoever I am, I’m free.” He stopped drawing. “I’m?” The man huffed on his hands and knees as the woman pulled a collar device from her pocket and slipped it around his neck. A soft sob escaped his tightened lips and what looked like genuine tears dripped on the blackened ground.
“No signal down here.” I mashed my phone’s redial command and backed away from the scene.
“Get to the stairwell.” Valora jogged to stand between the strange woman and the pillars of concrete that surrounded the stairwell up to safety.
I nodded and took a step in the right direction, but felt terrified for my cousin and Willum. Even if I could talk myself into leaving a stranger behind, there was no way I could abandon my cousin.
“Now for the would-be cowboys. How many?” The woman’s voice was more irritated than angry. “Just the two of you?” She adjusted a dial on the back of her gun-like device and pointed the needle at Valora.
The woman and Valora took calculated steps toward each other with their weapons of choice drawn. With more than ten feet between them, it was difficult to tell which weapon would be more accurate.
“Cousin, get up those stairs and call the cops, now!” Valora darted her eyes toward me for only a split second before she shifted her attention to the woman. “You, don’t even think about harming either of us!”
“This place and its people are so pathetic.” The woman’s soft yet cold tone resembled a snake coiled to strike with absolute certainty she could catch her prey.
“Back away!” Valora’s fingers tensed up on her canister.
“Go ahead, I’ll let you have this last chance to do your best.” The woman clicked her tongue twice before she pursed her lips. “As expected, little priss.” Her device shot a thin jet of liquid at my cousin’s face with two yards between them.
Valora grunted and fell to the ground, unable to do anything as her pepper spray rolled away from her hands. “What’s happening?” She snarled but didn’t get up from the prone position.
I looked to the frozen Willum, then back to my downed cousin. I had no idea how terrified I was until my phone shattered on the ground next to my feet. Nothing could hide the fact my hands shook like the coward my cousin believed me to be.
“A little hard to run off and make a call when your limbs don’t work, right?” The woman in black chuckled and brandished her weapon. “Almost like you forgot how to use them. I hear the sensation is terrifying.” She approached my cousin to point the needle-like weapon at Valora’s head and threatened, “Would you like to know the horror of forgetting how to breathe?”
I gave a sad nod to Willum and rushed to my cousin’s side, attempting to pull her up from the ground. She was only three years older than me, but she was tall for her age and I short for mine, making it an impossible challenge. The next thoughts that flashed through my imagination were of kicking the weapon out of the strange woman’s hand.
“The worthless sidekick?” The woman sneered and adjusted her weapon before shooting me in the face. “Just who is this person to you?”
I let the heavy girl slide off my shoulder and set her down on the ground. I wiped away the blast of water from my face and focused on the question as beads of water orbited around my head. Whoever she girl in the green costume was, she looked familiar. She looked a lot like my aunt, except younger. “I don’t know who these people are. I just know I need to help them see the sun.”
The girl in green looked up with a look of horror and pain, as if she was someone important to me.
“I’m the person who can take away the sun.” The woman holstered her gun and tapped a device on the back of Willum’s collar. A flash of white light filled the parking garage, then Willum was nowhere in sight. Only a large chalk wedge with a scalloped bottom and eyes to resemble a crude ghost was left to note the man had ever been present. The levitating drops were also gone, replaced with small water splashes on the ground.
“August, run! Get out of here and call the police!” The girl in green snarled and stared at me with terrified eyes.
I stood an considered the girl’s plea. “Aren’t you two friends?”
The green girl roared in pain. “I can’t use my arms. August, listen to me. I’m your cousin! Get out of here now.”
A migraine more painful than anything I’d ever felt in my life flashed through the back of my head. Fragments of moments accompanied the pain and I realized the girl was indeed my cousin, even if I couldn’t remember her name. “That’s Val. Valerie? You need to get away from her.” I raised my fists and approached the dark-robed enemy.
The woman in black focused on me with an icy stare in her chrome, steampunk-like, disc glasses. “That’s a surprising level of resistance you have there. But you’re as pathetic as ants battling a forest fire. Besides, both of you have seen too much.” She made another adjustment to her weapon and shot me before I was able to formulate exactly how I’d attack her.
I slammed on the ground, unable to use my arms and legs. Unlike my cousin, the effect was more pronounced and I could only flop around rather than stay prone like the green girl. “Don’t you hurt my cousin.”
“Who?” The woman shot again.
I watched with simplified curiosity at the beads of water that danced around my head as if gravity was never real. Anger and fear slid away and I wondered why I ever felt those emotions. There was nothing to worry about and the floating water was something I could watch for hours. If only I could sit up to get a better look.
“Now that you’re both neutralized, time to join the show.” The strange woman yanked out another collar device from her pocket.
I felt instant fear, as if I knew something else was going on, something much more sinister than the wonderful water beads. I wanted to gulp down my fear, but every fiber of my being was frozen in sudden terror. The woman slid the flexible loop around my neck with blinding speed.
Everything I knew welled up around me like a dark tempest. I wasn’t sure if I was conscious in the darkness, but I was sure my eyes were open. I didn’t know my own name, where I was, or what I was doing, but I was certain the darkness that enveloped me was comfortable, so I gave in to its embrace.
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