Cone of Silence Read online

  “Bright Spark can handle that, and transport is on the way for the prisoners.” Bright Burn smiled.

  They spent a few minutes discussing the prisoners, and Maira braced herself when Bright Burn handed her two insulated loops and lifted off. Maira slipped her hands in the loops and raised them high, wincing when the flyer took off with her dangling from the straps as they cruised toward the city.

  It wasn’t comfortable, but Maira was still wearing her helmet and leathers. The suit kept her warm as her Team One escort flew her through the sky.

  She was more than ready to go home.

  Maira was sitting on her porch and stroking her cats when the glider vehicle pulled up, and the door opened.

  Jianik stepped out and went around to the cargo area. “They want you to finish this.”

  Maira smiled as the huge picture was pulled out in its protective wrapping. “Put it in my workshop.”

  “Oh, and I brought another art fan who wants to talk to you.”

  Lorora poked her head out of the vehicle and looked around. When she saw Maira, she smiled, climbed free, and ran for her to give her another tremendous hug. “I have been wanting to thank you. My brother said that what you did was incredible considering your past. When I demanded to know, he got permission to show me your file.”

  Jianik called out from inside the house. “Lorora’s talent is data absorption, kind of like mine. She would have found out eventually, and this way, he was there to make sure that your survival was explained.”

  “Jianik, I had no idea you were gifted.”

  “You don’t think that I get to boss the teams around because I am charming. We both know I am not. I am getting some tea.”

  Maira laughed and stroked Lorora’s hair. “Hey. I am glad you are safe and sound. So, your brother is on a team?”

  “Team Two. He’s High Power. They were going to try and hold me hostage to get his assistance in some organized crime. Well, me and the other girls, all from team families.”

  “That makes horrible sense. Did it work?”

  Jianik came out with a tea set. “It worked once. That was enough. Thankfully no one died, but we had to step in and take care of the situation.”

  Jianik served the tea, and Lorora blinked and smiled. “I never imagined getting served by an investigator.”

  Maira smirked. “We don’t stand on ceremony here. If you are thirsty, get it yourself.”

  Lorora sat next to her and asked, “How did you survive it? The confinement, I mean.”

  Maira inhaled and then exhaled slowly. “So, you want to know. Right. Well, at first, I survived because he didn’t give me a choice. After, my body survived because it knew it could.”

  “The files are vague. How did you escape?”

  She wrinkled her nose. “Isn’t it in the file?”

  Jianik shook her head. “Nope. I left most of that stuff out, just in case someone wanted to use it against you. If I didn’t know that Lorora was completely trustworthy, she wouldn’t be here.”

  Maira grimaced. “It sort of went like this. I waited and waited for months for an opening. When he left me alone long enough for his control to waver, it was the first time. I had one chance to act, so I acted, jamming a surgical instrument that he had used on me into my ear until I could hear pain. Then, I did it again and resumed lying down with my own heartbeat the only sound in my skull.

  “I realized that waiting was stupid and I got off the gurney he had me on, and I crept down the hall to the room with the computer. I sent a distress call and confirmed my identity. I hoped that it was enough.”

  Lorora gasped. “What happened then?”

  “Oh, he caught me and hit me so hard I was dizzy. He then carried me back to the gurney and settled my body to his preferred arrangement.”

  Maira sighed. “He brought in another girl, and since my body was coming back under my full control when the Team burst in and he got control of two of them, I was able to lunge for the weapon and fire until he went down. Too bad it wasn’t a lethal blast.”

  Lorora blinked. “You wanted to kill him?”

  Jianik filled her in. “Records indicate that he has killed at least twenty-four women on different worlds after torturing them for weeks or months. He was incarcerated, and he escaped. They didn’t take our assessment of his gifts seriously, and someone let him talk.”

  Lorora sat back. “That is horrible. How did you take it, Maira?”

  “I was a little angry. I still am. I still wake up screaming, thinking that I am trapped in my body again. When I wake up and realize I am safe, I feel rage.”

  She sipped at her tea and exhaled as she focused on keeping herself calm.

  She waited and got to her feet. “I need to talk to the trees a little. I will be back.”

  Maira wanted to give Lorora time to process what she had said, and it was time to look after her orchard. The flowers were blooming, and they were lovely with a heady smell. Right now, she could almost forget the scents of her seven months of imprisonment. Almost.

  Chapter Six

  Lorora was crying, and she looked at Jianik. “Did I upset her?”

  “A little, but she knows that she upset you as well. She survived. You have to witness her pain. That is a difficult thing. So, tell me why you are here. What do you want with Maira?”

  She wiped her cheeks and took in a deep breath to calm herself. “I want to know about her and how she can find her way through pain to triumph. I am very interested in that process.” Lorora wove her fingers together.

  The understanding in Jianik’s eyes made the next words unnecessary. “Your sister.”

  “Correct. She’s gone, and I miss her, but she was a Team Four hero, and everyone seems to have forgotten about her. That isn’t right.”

  “No, but she had the skill of invisibility, so she was often overlooked. We can look into adding her to the memorial. I can definitely put it forward, though her own investigator should have done it.” Jianik scowled.

  “Redmon couldn’t be bothered. He said she was off duty when she died and that cut her out of the memorial.”

  “I will bring it up. Translucent will have her memorial, I promise.”

  Lorora nodded. “I want to learn how to deal with frustration and pain. I think Maira can show me that.”

  Jianik looked out at the trees and the woman slowly caressing the bark of each tree while flower petals lodged in her hair. “She can teach you about recovery, and she can prove to you that your sister was a hero.”

  Lorora looked into the orchard, watching the woman in question slowly return to them. “I have seen a hero in action, and it suddenly made a lot of sense to me. Kliadra was a hero, every minute of every day, and then, she went home and did it again the next day. Being on a team was what she did, being a hero was who she was, as much a part of her as breathing.”

  Jianik smiled slowly. “She definitely was.”

  Lorora nodded. “And I can teach her how to make the most of herself. Those punches were good, but they could have been a lot more effective if she had some combat training.”

  Jianik chuckled. “It was generous for you to offer to train her.”

  Lorora tensed her lips. “After our sister passed, my brother was obsessed with my being able to save myself. It seems that he didn’t foresee the situation with the kidnappers. My training didn’t help me, but it might help her to help someone else.”

  Maira stopped near them, covered with tiny petals and looking like the embodiment of spring. “You will teach me to fight?”

  Lorora looked at the slightly older woman who had an eternity of pain in her eyes. “I can teach you. Blades, fists, feet, staves. I can make you combat ready in two months. Are you up for it?”

  Maira cocked her head and smiled. “I will if you will, and I can indoctrinate you into the arcane mysteries of art restoration.”

  Lorora extended her hand with a bright smile. “Deal.”


  They clasped hands, and the deal was struck.

  * * * *

  Any small doubts that Maira had about Lorora’s ability to teach were wiped out after the first day of her trying to land a punch on the young woman.

  That had been her entire assignment, and she hadn’t managed it.

  Lorora smiled at her over dinner. “Tomorrow, I will teach you how to get behind my defenses. I am very good at direct combat, but you have to learn to see the physical weaknesses in your opponent.”

  “That doesn’t sound very friendly.”

  “It isn’t.” She grimaced. “You end up looking at folks with an analytical eye the moment that you see them. I knew that guy at the museum was trouble, but when my friend invited him along, I couldn’t just ignore him. Appearances have to be maintained at all times.”

  “Is that a team rule?” Maira laughed.

  “Yes. You have to blend in, or folks will either become sycophants or enemies. Both are not ideal.”

  “Oh. Well, that sucks.”

  “It does. Did you have any heroes living on your world?”

  Maira thought about it. “I think Diad is from my world.”

  “He’s nice. Team Five. He splits into two people, male and female.”

  Maira nodded in confirmation. “Yes, I am pretty sure he is local.”

  “Well, do you ever hear of him when he is out of uniform using his power?”

  Maira frowned. “No.”

  “That is because he is bound by one of the team agreements. He will only act in a manner authorized by his investigator. Anything outside that authorization will be considered an illegal action, and no assistance will be offered from the teams. None of the teams.”

  Maira leaned back. “Your sister.”

  “My sister. She was born to be a hero. She isn’t... wasn’t as strong as our brother, but she had a heart that couldn’t be beaten.”

  Maira leaned forward. “What happened?”

  “There was an accident. There was a flood, and a dam-based power station lost control of its turbines. They exploded and sent a power failure through the grid. The other stations couldn’t handle the sudden demand and began to fail.”

  She knotted her fingers again. “My sister went to the main routing facility and offered her secondary skills to keep power to the hospitals. She was skilled at invisibility, and that was how folks knew her. They didn’t know what her limits were, so they took everything she had.”

  “Translucent. I read about that. There was a scandal that the power for several dozen estates had been added to the burden of the hospital power.”

  Lorora’s face grew dark. “They tried to hide it, but enough of the data had already gotten out. I am surprised you heard about it here.”

  “We love gossip, and we have a high level of gift development in our population. Our downtown areas have attack shielding and shelters. Most of the gifts are not dangerous or even powerful, but they are everywhere around here. When a hero is drained to death in the service of her people, we hear about it.”

  Lorora smiled. “It is good to hear it. It is actually...”

  Maira waited while her friend sniffled into her napkin.

  “They may have forgotten by now, but for three days, this world was alive with the knowledge of the death of Translucent and the contempt that had been shown for her life.”

  Maira put her hand, palm up, on the table. Lorora clutched her hand and hung on tight.

  Two days later, after a day of having her butt kicked by a teenager, Maira made some calls. She might not be able to live with her family, but her father and brothers had some skills. Legal skills.

  She told them the story, gave them the links to the data she had been able to discover, and she told them who to contact. The rest was up to them.

  Five weeks after she had talked to her family, Lorora was watching the evening news, an ice pack over her eye. Maira was rather smug about that.

  “Maira! Come here. You have to see this!” Lorora looked at the screen, and her eyes were shining with tears.

  Maira sat next to her, and they watched the image of some exceptionally wealthy people being cuffed and led away by Teams Five and Six.

  “In local news, it has been found that a bribery scandal during the Nahunan blackout was the direct cause of the death of our beloved hero, Translucent. In an unprecedented move, those victims of crime who had been saved by the Team Four hero banded together to seek justice for the woman who tried to use her secondary gift of energy to save lives and ended up being drained of that power by the wealthy elite. Today, they have been called to account for their crimes and the self-involved arrogance that led to the death of one of our world’s beloved daughters.”

  Lorora’s shoulders were shaking.

  “An investigation into the dispatcher of her hero team has been begun as well, as, after her death, there was no examination of the events, nor has Translucent been added to the Team Memorial. I believe that that is about to change.”

  Lorora clapped her hands together, and her grin could have lit up the room. “This is amazing!”

  “Will your brother be upset?”

  “No, I don’t think so. He is tied by his Team contract. He can’t speak out against his administration. He risks imprisonment if he does.”

  “That is horrible.”

  “I know, but I am guessing that they are wanting to keep the teams under control. They are dangerous people who could be more dangerous on their own.”

  Maira nodded. “A little training goes a long way.”

  “Yes, but you won’t ever have to worry about that.”

  “Why not?” Lorora smiled. “You are getting your training before you become a hero. They can’t hold you hostage with your own skills.”

  Maira blinked. “Me? On a team?”

  “Eventually. That is Jianik’s long game. There has been another team authorized, and the investigators have all gathered to line their own group of heroes up. The thing is, this team is going to be a little different and the folks that they need to recruit have to show potential to become a force that can be called on when none of the others have the skills or inclination for the work.”

  Lorora smiled. “The team needs to be able to wade in without political affiliation or worry about having their budget cut. The gifts and skills in action won’t be flashy, but they will be effective.”

  Maira closed her mouth with a snap before saying, “So, how do you know all of this?”

  “Oh, I have been brought on board as a consultant after the kidnapping. Jianik is a very honest woman when she can be. She is completely closed mouthed at other times. However, she is also the best investigator I have ever met, and she has allowed me to apply for a position as her apprentice if she gets her chosen team into play. I can do it when I complete my schooling.”

  Maira blinked. “Wait. School? Are you hiding from something right now?”

  Lorora laughed. “No. I am off for the summer holidays. I have another two weeks, so we need to make it worth it. I want you to focus on your follow through when you use the swords. You are stopping when you hit the target, and that will just get your blade stuck. You want to slice your opponent into pieces. Don’t hesitate.”

  “Yes, Instructor.” Maira grinned as her mind went over what she had learned. So, Jianik had an ulterior motive for seeing her through her recovery. It wasn’t surprising; in fact, it made Maira feel better. She wasn’t being pitied, she was being trained. That was a far better situation. She was wanted in a professional and active capacity. She was going to kick ass.

  Chapter Seven

  They were sparring with live blades in the middle of the orchard when Jianik’s black vehicle glided to a halt.

  A young man with golden brown hair and eyes that were electric blue, even from a distance, left the vehicle and came toward them.

  “Don’t drop your guard, Maira.”

  The blade cruised through the
spot that Maira’s head had just occupied and thudded into a tree.

  Maira kneed Lorora in the abdomen, knocked her down, and held two blades to her throat. “Your brother just showed up.”

  Lorora made a strangled sound, and Maira released the pressure on her chest, letting her get to her feet.

  “What the hell are you doing to my sister?”

  Lorora feinted and kicked out, catching Maira in the knee. She dipped but didn’t go down.

  “Lorora! Stop; what you are doing!”

  Maira grinned when her friend called out, “You have interrupted practice. Stow it.”

  He stopped, and they continued. Hand to hand, kicking, punching. Maira finally got Lorora in a headlock, and they slowly sank to the ground with her kicking.

  A light chime rang out, and Maira let go. Lorora inhaled deeply, wheezing as she got to her feet. “Good session.”

  Maira laughed. “I have the advantage of height.”

  “Yes, but I am faster.” They clasped hands, and Lorora’s brother was still staring at them.

  Lorora walked over to him, and he wrapped her in a hug. His confused features looking over the area before returning to his little sister.

  “Who are you?” He looked befuddled.

  “Oh, right. You didn’t properly meet. Maira Ada Lefs, this is my brother, Kekoro Worksin. This is the woman who saved me. She kept me company, called for help when she had a location, and disabled the vehicle and the kidnappers.”

  Maira stuck out her hand. “Pleased to meet you.”

  He looked at her hand and back at her. “Why is my sister here?”

  Maira looked at Lorora and quirked her lips. “Why are you here?”

  Lorora leaned back and stepped out of her brother’s embrace toward Maira. “I am here to learn from her how to be a hero. She has nothing to gain, no reason to put herself at risk, but she followed me for hours and talked to me the whole time. She could have left me when she had the location, but she didn’t. Our sister was a hero like her, and I want to be one as well.”