Pumpking

Issue 31

I finished my hotdog with a happy smile, sipping more of the sweet monstrosity that he'd bought me, "Can I ask what the plan is?"

"Which plan?"

God that he asked 'which' should have worried me, "About the killer, Combustion, what does the Pantheon intend to do about him?"

"Stop him. Incarcerate him if possible. For the rest of his life."

"How?"

He looked at me over his hotdog, the sort of look that an adult might give a child who was misbehaving, "I don't know."

"So Whisper is running this?"

"Yes. He has the most history, the most information about this case."

"How do I fit in?" I held up a hand, stopping him before he could bullshit his way out of answering, "I mean, why is he after me? What does he want with me? Why me?"

He winced at that, no wiggle room, "Dion, I want to tell you; but... the truth is; I only have guesswork to go on. Phantom plays everything pretty close to his chest; it means that he never has information leaks but... sometimes leaves his comrades in the dark."

"Every time I try to talk to him about it, he distracts me- or gets me so riled up I forget what I wanted to know- I think he does it on purpose. Why?"

"Maybe he's afraid of your reaction to knowing," He shrugged and took a bite of his desert. His hotdogs had somehow vanished without a crumb left behind.

"It bothers me, Daystar."

"It bothers me too, Dion," He shrugged, "But that's Phantom. Half the time I see him he's ranting about microbes in the water, the other half the time he's playing chess with domino pieces while reciting Shakespeare to a computer- the man is barely sane."

"So you just put up with it?"

"There's always been a Phantom division in the Pantheon."

"Surely..."

"Always." His tone sounded ominous and final, "It used to be a whole department, twenty years ago, during the telepath wars, the department self-destructed; we had information leaks, traitors, terrorists; more trouble was started because of that department combusting than any other dilemma on this planet at the time. Three hundred heroes died in a civil war between the Phantom division and the Pantheon main core."

"So why not dissolve it?"

"Because Phantom—Ash Whisper—cleaned it up. It went from a full department to one man almost overnight. At present there is one Phantom department employee. Him. He does the work of fifty heroes with nothing but a personal assistant and god knows how much sleep. The Pantheon isn't perfect, Dion. Without him..."

"Your dirty laundry would be aired?"

"There are villains who the rest of us can't touch. Men who live in a society that lets them get away with crimes without getting caught, no dirty hands. Phantom finds the dirt. He finds the chink in their impenetrable armour; he unmasks snakes, hunts down the untraceable. I don't have the time to chase every murderer, I can't be in two places at once. He is a shadow, perhaps not the shadow I want, but the only shadow I have."

We sat quietly for a moment, me digesting the unspoken 'necessary evil' in that context, him perhaps mulling over the depth of his words.

"You're going to have to learn to stop with this patterned behaviour, Daystar. If I can predict your movements like this, others can too."

I all but jumped out of my seat, heart hammering in my chest with a sudden voracious thump.

Whisper slid into the seat beside Daystar, his suit was crumpled slightly, small smudges on his sleeves showed that he had been sorting through something dirty with gloves on. I could smell the faint powder of plastic forensic gloves on him; the sharp tang of orange soap, like he hadn't washed it off totally. He looked tired, actually.

"How the hell did you find us here?" Daystar looked startled too, he shifted over; letting Whisper take up more of the booth than he needed.

"Tracking device."

"You have me tracked now?"

"Not you, her."

Me? I looked down at my less than modest costume. "Where did you fit a tracking device on this thing?"

"Very small, Dion. In your hair. You look like shit, by the way."

Jesus; the suit might have been okay, but in my hair? I hadn't noticed anything like that. "Gee thanks. My house was burned down, thank you very much."

"I'll get to that stupidity in a moment- Daystar, a word."

"Phantom." Daystar sighed and bowed his head with a small sigh at me, "Excuse us a moment."

They walked into the men's bathroom. I sat back in my seat and started combing through my hair, irritated. It took a lot of searching before I finally found the leaf-thin small silver disc. I'd have never found it normally, but I suppose my hair was grimy from the smoke. God, I probably looked like a nightmare at the moment.

"I'm not leaving the planet right now- you asked for my help, the others can handle that situation!" Daystar's voice rose enough for me to hear and I snuck a glance at the girl behind the staff counter, she had earphones in, playing some sort of game on her phone. Well, I guess some people weren't affected by superheroes shouting in the men's toilets.

The two of them walked out, Ash looked annoyed, Daystar looked annoyed. I guess neither of them had gotten what they wanted.

"Dion, what you did tonight was one of the single most stupid things I have ever heard of."

"I had to know what had happened to Bob. And my neighbours." I swallowed back my desire to tell him that I'd thought that Bob might have taken out half the city in an explosion.

Maybe I should never have misjudged the over-large pumpkin, he'd always been loyal to me, he'd known how much that sort of action would hurt me and not let himself come to such an end.

"What part of 'insane psycho killer targeting you who can blow up whole buildings' missed your attention?"

"The part about who and why he is targeting me- so far, it's become apparent that this serial killer is working on an agenda that I don't see- his targets seem utterly random; his movements impossible to predict and for some reason I've come into his radar? What drew him to me?"

Whisper drew his fist down and slammed it into the table, hard, "Why do you ask so many questions, woman?"