"No need," Castle said. "I contacted Rook on the way up. He's two minutes out."
"Rook?"
"Be careful," Ronnie said. "This place is probably still swarming with cops handling the scene from earlier."
"At least that means no employees down here. Can you—?"
"Run interference? Sure, why not? I'm already tied to you with a massacre in the tunnels. So why not distract my own people and let the city's most-wanted vigilante get away?"
"Look, Ronnie…"
Her eyes glistened with a blend of grief and anger. "It's Captain Banks when you have that helmet on, Vigil. And this is the last favor you get from me. You saved my life; now I'm saving yours. We're even, got it?"
He swallowed his protest and nodded. "Got it."
"Good. I'll go upstairs. Wait five minutes, then do your whole getaway thing." She gave him a final stare, and for a moment, he thought she would say more. But instead, she whirled around and headed for the stairwell. He stared after her for a moment before dropping his head. Tapping a sequence on his holoband, he patched a homing signal to the Stingray.
"All right, Castle. Let's go."
The truck backed up into one of the cargo doors. They stepped out in the humid air, gently placing Raven on a portable stretcher and setting her inside before entering themselves. The driver kept giving Vigil strange looks before returning to the front to drive the truck away from the hotel. Spitfire rode in the passenger seat with him. The sky was darkened with heavy clouds, rumbling with the threat of rain.
Vigil kept a hand on the stretcher to keep it from rocking. He glanced at Castle, who once again removed his helmet and attended to his shoulder with a medkit.
"Raven is going to need a hospital soon, Castle."
"We're on the way. Already called it in as a robbery and attempted murder. Happens all the time on this side of town. You know the girl?"
"She's the daughter of a Minister Donte in the Warrens. I thought it was him in the suit the whole time."
"I'll send him an anonymous call. She should have family around when she wakes up."
"What about you?"
Castle harrumphed. "Hurt myself worse working in the garden. I'll be fine."
"Why are you doing this, Castle?"
He looked up, keen-eyed. "You're playing a dangerous game, Vigil. I know a little bit about it, so I figured I'd try to keep you alive. If that's possible."
"That's not an answer."
Castle injected himself with a syringe and sighed, leaning against the wall of the van. "I'm weak."
"What?"
"I'm weak. I swore off giving a damn, and then you came along. I think you got something, kid. You got the fire. But that smug bastard Harrington was right about one thing: you got nobody looking at the big picture. And that will get you killed quickly, mark my words."
"I have Incognito."
"Arthur?" Castle barked a laugh. "The kid might be smart, but he suffers from delusions of grandeur. Not to mention an unhealthy obsession."
"Obsessed with what?"
"Unworthiness. He considers himself a failure, thinks it was his fault the original Vigil quit the game. He'll do anything to redeem himself, and that will get you killed, too. He might feel sorry about it afterward, but it'll be too late by then. No, what you need is a coalition. Allies on the ground. People keeping an eye on the big picture. And while I still got time, I figure I do something meaningful."
"Like aid a wanted vigilante?"
"Exactly." Castle jabbed a finger at Vigil. "But today's vigilante can be tomorrow's hero if he plays his cards right. Don't be telling Arthur about none of this. It's our little project, got it? Best if the right hand doesn't know what the left is doing for now. It'll keep your enemies off-balance when it all hits the fan. And trust me, it will."
"Yeah, I guess." Vigil was silent a moment, watching Raven struggle to breathe. Her eyelids fluttered, but she remained unconscious.
"Was he right?"
"Who?"
"Harrington. We lost down there, Castle. He won. And I have to know whether or not he was right about being better than me."
"Better than you? You bet he was, this time. Sometimes you gotta take a punch to the face to get woke up, kid. It happens. But is he right? Hell, no."
"Just like that?"
"Exactly like that. Harrington's a megalomaniac, not to mention a raging narcissist. If you look past his silver-tongued delivery, it was nothing but a move straight from the dictator playbook: eliminate your opponents to seize power. With no one around to stand against him, he'll shove his utopian dream down the public's throats at the cost of their freedom and civil rights. First, he'll target the low-hanging fruit — criminals and lawbreakers. Gotta get tougher, lock more people up, build more prisons. Protesters will be labeled the next criminals in the name of law and order. Fringe religions and minority groups will follow, then the press. After that, it'll be anyone who dares to speak up. Mix it up in any order you want. Point is, Harrington's not some idealist with a dream of unity. He's a man of vision who will stop at nothing to achieve it. The only reason he didn’t kill us in there is that he plans to use vigilantes as the next scapegoats to pass freedom-restricting enforcement laws."
"Unless we stop him."
"That's right."
The van slowed to a stop. Castle looked around, tapping the com in his ear. "We're not at the hospital, Rook. What gives?"
Rook's voice buzzed over the intercom. "Uh, I got a vehicle blocking the street. Looks like a flying… shark."
"That's my ride," Vigil said, standing. He took a last look at Raven. "Take care of her, Castle."
"You got it, Vigil."
He opened the rear doors and leaped out, striding toward the hovering Stingray. Spitfire exited the passenger door and silently joined him. They clambered onto the Stingray, where Vigil hesitated.
"Take the wheel, Spitfire. Take us home."
She nodded, sliding into the front of the cockpit. As she hit the thrusters, he crammed himself into the back, glancing down as Castle's vehicle sped down the isolated street. Rain droplets hit the canopy glass, gliding across the smooth surface as the Stingray picked up speed. A deluge of rain followed, showering from dark thunderheads that smothered the sky. The streets and buildings steamed, the haze rising into the air like smoke from a raging inferno.
Chapter 21: Ashes
Ronnie Banks sighed as she exited from her RCE aerodyne into the pouring rain. Isaac's home was a place where time stood still — same curb appeal, same décor, same furnishings. She found his remains inside of his medical pod. With the remote link destroyed from the backlash of the Geryon's psionic attack, his brain didn't survive the trauma. He flatlined, mind finally succumbing to the fate that had destroyed his body years ago.
She stood beside his bedside, tears streaming down her face when she looked inside at her partner. His body was shriveled and wasted, already like a mummified corpse. At long last, she understood why he longed for things to come to an end. He recognized before she did that what he experienced wasn't living. It was just an extension of his torment, a limbo that held him prisoner and kept him from the rest that was just out of his reach. She laid a hand on the cool surface of the glass.
"Rest in peace, partner. You deserve it."
The funeral was quickly arranged. There was no need for a grand affair when so few attended. In the end, only four others showed up: Abraham Clark, Jett, Captain Moore, and to her surprise, Sergeant Brooks. They listened to the words of the hired pastor who gave the final rites, but each seemed lost in their own thoughts, standing under black umbrellas in the downpour.
After Isaac was lowered into the ground, Brooks turned to Ronnie with a regretful look.
"I'm sorry for your loss, Captain."