Anomalies: Control
Chapter 17

One apartment, one temporary office, one bank card to get an ‘appropriate’ wardrobe, and three days later, he was looking over the contract that would finalize his employment with the Department. He’d tried to limit what he’d asked, wary of pressing his luck and losing this opportunity. But the few things he had asked for were… big, to say the least. The Skye residents being left alone, for one. Being allowed to go to the older parts of the city to talk to the street Anomalies on his own without other government workers. And last but most importantly, he’d asked for Pierce’s old house to be deeded to Rune. He’d done some research and found out that since the big blow out when Rune and the boys had been taken, the house had never been lived in for more than a few months. He wanted to deed it as a peace offering to Rune. It might lessen the sting of his leaving, having that place and those memories back.

Surprising, but he’d been granted all of his requests, and the signing went quickly. Lewis was already prepared with files upon files of incomplete information for him to look over, to start organizing who he knew and who he could appeal to.

“There will be a public announcement on Friday. We’ll introduce you as our new protégé, and make the public familiar with you. It’ll put at ease some of the dissent over Anomalies. Wear a suit, look presentable. Your age will be a detriment, but we can lessen that as much as we can.”

He nodded, and Lewis left, leaving Cole alone in the office with his thoughts and a foot-high stack of files.

It was four days until Friday, but only two days later Lewis was slamming his way into Cole’s makeshift office, looking politely furious in the way of officials. He slammed a file down on Cole’s desk, and took a step back and crossed his arms over his chest. “I understand your desire to protect her, but you need to get a handle on Hannah if you want us to leave her and her little friends alone. Am I understood?”

He blinked in confusion and reached for the file and opened it to see a collection of pictures. A house, half demolished and fallen in on itself, half still standing, a piece of paper on the front door with red scrawls across it. A heavy pit settled in his stomach as he flipped through the pictures until he reached a close up of the paper on the front door. It was the deed to the house, the one he’d asked be given to her. In what looked like paint- but he knew her dramatics well enough to know was blood- she’d responded to his peace offering with a message: ‘You can’t buy their blood’.

Awesome. If this wasn’t the all-star of backfires, he didn’t want to see what could top this. “Mr. Lewis, I’m so sorry, I didn’t think she’d actually-”

“I don’t care what you thought. Fix this, Mr. Callahan, or I’ll write the order to have her arrested myself.”

Cole nodded, and immediately stood as Lewis barged back out of his office, reaching for his cell and calling Talia, who would hopefully still be at the apartment. Hers and Amanda’s was right across the hall from Cole’s, and the three had been spending most of his time since becoming an employee together. “Hey, Tal, can you bring the car to the office? I’ve gotta run to the house I gave Rue…. yeah, apparently she went berserk on the house…No, I have a suspicion that she’ll either still be there or waiting for me to be there. She likes to degrade me in person.” He laughed as she sighed and agreed to pick him up in twenty minutes.

The half-demolished house was still blocked off with police tape, and he told Talia to go do whatever she wanted and come back for him in an hour. He didn’t see Rune, but that didn’t necessarily mean she wasn’t around.

He had to argue with Talia for a minute about how safe it was to wait for Rune while she was in a house-demolishing mood, but he insisted she wouldn’t hurt him. Not too badly anyway. He listened as the engine noise faded to nothing, and ducked under the police tape to go into the house.

Half the house was mere rubble, but toward the back of the house, the walls at least were mostly intact, giving him a partial impression of what the house had looked like. He wandered the first floor aimlessly in the dying light of day for a while, trying to get a feel for the house that Rune hadn’t grown up in, but that had built her all the same.

It seemed a nice enough house, nicer even than Tech’s alternate safe house. It was odd: how could a handful of teenage Anomalies afford a house like this? Two stories, plenty of room, nice microdistrict. Even if they had jobs, they’d all have to work constantly to keep a house like this. And from what he’d gleaned, work wasn’t exactly a priority for Pierce and the others. Ten minutes turned to twenty, then thirty, then forty, and it had turned dark by the time he was close to calling Talia to tell her not to come get him yet.

“Hey Cole.” He spun to see Tech coming in through the front door he’d left open.

“Hey. Tech. I… wasn’t expecting you.”

“I know. She knew you’d come, and she… doesn’t want to see you.”

He felt his shoulders droop, even though he’d already started to suspect that she didn’t want to see him more than she wanted to ream him out for his attempt at peace. “Yeah, I was starting to see that.”

“She told me to come instead.”

“She told you?” he teased, arching an eyebrow and earning a chuckle from Tech.

“Asked. Sort of. In a very Rune-ish way.” The Mechanical went to sit on a broken wall, looking over at Cole, who took the hint and went to sit next to the other man. They sat in silence for a bit before Cole broke it.

“I was just trying to help.”

“I know. But Rune, she just… once she gets an idea in her head, there’s no changing her. And to her, anyone in the government is the enemy. And now that includes you, and she doesn’t know what to do with that, so she lashes out.”

He knew he should try to keep a straight face, try to seem sure of what he was doing, but with Tech really what was the point? He slumped forward, his elbows on his knees and his face hidden in his hands. “I’m not trying to be your enemy, I’m just trying to keep other people from being hurt like we’ve all been.”

A hand found his shoulder, heavy and reassuring. “I know, Cole. And she knows it too, but she doesn’t want to admit to herself that the only way to change things is to become a part of it. She just can’t get there. But Cole,” the man paused until Cole turned his bright eyes back up to him. “You are doing a great thing. Don’t let Rune make you question that. You are doing more for all of us than anyone has ever attempted before, and you are going to do great things. Rue won’t understand, and she probably never will, but you need to know that.”

It went a long way to making him feel better, but he hated the fact that he and Rune would be adversaries from now on, and all because he was trying to help her. “Thanks Tech.” He offered as much a smile as he could muster, and looked around them. “Can you, will you tell her to cool it on displays like this? Lewis is… beyond pissed. I can’t do anything if she kills my credibility like this.”

“She said you’d say that. And she said to tell you to go screw yourself.” Cole laughed, glad when Tech laughed with him. “But I’ll make sure she stays in line, don’t worry.” The Mechanical stood, brushing off his pants. “Be safe, Cole. Skye and the other street Anomalies may be vicious at times, but those offices aren’t much safer. They’re just better at the cover ups.”

He nodded as Tech moved to leave. “Tell her I’m sorry too? Everyone, actually.”

“A lot of them know you’re doing what you think is right. The others will come around.” And with that, he was gone, heading down the street until he disappeared into the shadowed streets. Cole didn’t make any move to follow him, simply sat in his spot wondering over and over if this was actually the right thing to be doing, even if Tech was on his side. He sat in morose silence until he heard the car engine pull up and idle, and forced himself to his feet to go join Talia.

She was out of the car, waiting and leaning against the passenger door for him, her face a mix of hopefulness and sympathy. “No one showed?”

He shook his head. “Tech did. He’s on our side, but he’s probably the only one.”

She reached out for him, and he took her hand and gave her a quick hug before rounding the car to hop into the driver’s seat. She settled next to him, obviously struggling for the right thing to say. “She’ll come around, I’m sure. She likes you, she has to come around.”

He shrugged, doubting it himself. “Maybe,” he allowed, not wanting to kill her attempt at enthusiasm. “What do you say we stop for food on the way back? We can get Chinese or something.”

“Amanda hates Chinese. Maybe Mexican?”

“I can work with that.”

“Perfect.”