Action Figures - Issue Three: Pasts Imperfect (20 page)

“No. Frickin’. Way,” Sara
says.

“You didn’t know she
played?” I say. Sara shakes her head.

It takes Missy until the
final chorus to notice that she has an audience, and when she sees us, she
shrieks and flails backwards, tripping and falling head-over-heels over her
amplifier. We rush in to check on her, and before we can get a word out...

“OHMYGOD don’t do that why
were you watching me through the window that’s so stalkery don’t tell my dad
you saw me with this he’d freak out that was SO NOT COOL!”

“She’s fine,” I say, and I
help Missy to her feet. “Sorry about that, Muppet, we didn’t mean to scare
you.”

“S’okay,” Missy says. She
cradles her guitar like it was a baby, checking it for damage from the fall.

“Where’d you get that?” Sara
says.

“My uncle Seiji gave it to
me, like, three years ago. Used to be his but he didn’t play anymore and he
thought I might like it,” Missy explains as she puts the guitar back into its
case. We follow her up to her room, where she stashes the case and the amp in
the back of her closet.

“How come you never told us
you played?”

“I don’t know. It’s just
something I do for fun when Mom and Dad aren’t home. They don’t know I play
either.”

“Then how did you learn how
to play?”

“YouTube videos.”

“Really? Wow,” I say, duly
impressed. “Well, don’t worry, your secret life as a rock star is safe with
us.”

“Any other hidden talents
you want to drop on us? Like, are you an experienced mountain climber or an ace
fighter pilot or something?” Sara says. “Remember, we promised we wouldn’t keep
secrets from each other anymore.”

Sara means it playfully, yet
Missy shrinks into herself, a guilty look on her face.

“Um,” she says, but whatever
pending confession she might have for us is interrupted by her phone going off.
She pulls it out of her pocket, checks the number, rolls her eyes, and puts the
call on speakerphone. “
Konnichiwa, chichi
.”

“
Konbanwa, musume yo
.”
I’ve never heard him speak Japanese before, but I’d recognize Dr. Hamill’s
stiff monotone anywhere. “Missy, is your mother there? I’d like to speak to
her.”

“No, she’s working late,”
Missy says. “She said she probably won’t be home until, like, nine, maybe?”

“...I see. Then I need you
to do something for me. It’s very important.”

“Okay.”

“There’s a wall safe in my
office, behind my wedding portrait,” Dr. Hamill says. “The combination is your
birth date, reversed. Inside you’ll find an external hard drive with a red
casing. I need you to bring it to me.”

“Bring it to you? What, you
mean now?”

“Yes, I need it right away.
Call a taxi to bring you to the train station if you need to. I’ll be in my
office. You remember where it is?”

Missy sighs. “The Genetics
Research Center on Harrison, top floor, northwest wing, corner office,” she
says mechanically, as though reciting information she’d been forced to memorize
(which, knowing Dr. Hamill, is almost certainly the case).

“Thank you, Missy. I’ll see
you in a little while.” After a pause, Dr. Hamill swallows audibly. “I love
you.”

“Uh-huh,” Missy says,
hanging up with an annoyed sputter. “Great. Totally wanted to spend my night on
the stupid T running errands for Dad. Lots more fun than hanging out with you
guys.”

“Sorry,” Sara says. “You
want us to go with you?”

“No, no reason to ruin your
night, too,” Missy says. We reiterate the offer but Missy turns us down,
unwilling to relinquish any of the burden, noble little Muppet that she is, so
we head out and, after calling Stuart to bring him up to speed, decide that we
might as well call it a night.

“Not exactly a great way to
end the day, but hardly a disaster. All stressed up and no place to go,” Sara
says.

“Seriously,” I say with a
mix of relief and chagrin. Okay, so, lesson learned: Don’t listen to my
instincts. They don’t know squat.

SEVENTEEN

The bus slows to a halt, its
brakes hissing. Missy disembarks and re-checks her phone. Her Google Maps app
blazes the trail for final leg of her journey — a short final leg, mercifully; a
cold wind greets her as she rounds the corner onto Harrison Avenue, cutting
through her winter coat and the layers beneath. Missy hugs herself in a futile
attempt to hold the chill at bay, wincing as her father’s hard drive, tucked in
an inside pocket, jabs her in the side.

Stupid ribs. Heal faster
, she thinks.

The college’s Genetics
Research Center eases into view, like a child stealing a peek around a corner,
as Missy passes Boston Medical Center at a brisk walk. The center glows from
within, its interior lights shining vibrantly through a façade more glass than
stonework, and Missy has to admit: It’s an impressive building. A memory
springs up unbidden, of her father coming home — when was it? Two years ago? —
to announce that the construction phase was at last wrapping up, and his
research team would soon be able to move into the new center. He was genuinely
excited about the prospect, excited to the point of smiling — a rare sight in
the Hamill home, a sight that gave Missy hope she herself would one day give
her father cause to again smile like that.

That hope remains, but it is
no longer so strong.

Missy enters the complex’s
foyer, which reminds her more of a fancy hotel lobby than a building dedicated
to higher learning. She glances around, expecting to see a security desk
somewhere, someplace to check in, but the foyer — the entire building — seems
to be empty; Missy’s preternatural hearing picks up the whisper of the HVAC
system and that weird, almost subliminal hum electronics give out, but no voices,
no hint of movement.

She trots up the central
staircase, an open spiral that gives her a clear view of each level. The
hallways within view are well-lit, yet feel somehow dim for their emptiness.

Missy reaches the top floor,
pauses to orient herself, then heads for her father’s office. The hallway is
lined with sturdy wooden doors, each accompanied by a nameplate identifying its
occupant and his or her role in the scheme of the genetics department. The
titles become ever more impressive with each new door, and thus lend an added
air of importance to the final nameplate: DR. K. HAMILL – DIRECTOR – GENETIC
RESEARCH.

She knocks. Always knock,
never just walk in on Daddy when he’s working.

Or ever.

“Yes?”

“Daddy, it’s me.”

“...Yes. Come in.”

Missy digs the hard drive
out of her pocket and enters, hesitating in the doorway upon realizing that her
father is not alone. He looks at her impassively, yet she senses a strange
tension in his posture, the way his hands are clenched together atop his massive
desk.

“Missy, hello,” Dr. Hamill
says, his monotone flatter than usual. He nods at the girl sitting across the
desk from him. “This is one of my students. I’m...assisting her with a
project.”

The girl twists in her seat.
Missy cannot stop herself from gasping. The girl in turn squints at Missy
quizzically.

“Do I know you?” Buzzkill
Joy says.

Missy responds with a
snap-kick that dislodges two molars.

Joy reels from the blow and
collapses into the desk. Dr. Hamill flings himself out of his chair and presses
into a corner as Missy pounces, claws bared. The impact knocks the desk several
inches out of place.

“Daddy, RUN!” Missy shrieks,
but the plea goes unheeded as raw terror seizes Dr. Hamill, freezing his limbs.

Joy throws a blind jab. Pure
luck guides her fist into the wounds she herself inflicted on Missy days
earlier. Missy cries out and staggers back, giving Joy ample room to deliver a
crushing flying tackle that carries them out into the hall.

Their screeches, eerily
catlike, fill the building as they trade punches, kicks, slashes. Joy rakes at
Missy’s face. Missy ducks, but too late to avoid the attack entirely; she feels
lines of wet fire open high on her forehead. A kick to the chest throws Missy
onto her back, leaving her too dazed to stop Joy from sitting on her abdomen.
Joy drives her knees into Missy’s arms, pinning them in place.

“Hey, cupcake,” Joy says,
spitting blood at the floor by Missy’s head. “Didn’t recognize you without your
cool ninja PJs.”

Missy hurls a curse at Joy,
who cuts off any further backtalk by closing a hand around Missy’s throat.

“Girl, I got no time for
your mouth,” Joy growls, extending her claws to add weight to her admonition.
“I want that hard drive. Give it to me and you and your professor daddy get to
walk out of here.”

“You’re lying,” Missy
croaks.

“Yeah, maybe, but you don’t
have a choice, do you?”

She does have a choice, one
that might save her life, but the cost...

“Let her go.” Missy twists her
head to see her father standing in the doorway, ashen and bathed in a cold
sweat. He stoops to retrieve the fallen hard drive, then holds it out to Joy
with a trembling hand. “Here. Take it and go, but please, leave her alone.”

“Bring it to me. Slowly,”
Joy says, squeezing Missy’s throat to coax a whimper.

Dr. Hamill inches into the
hall, one hand remaining against the wall for support. Missy tries to call out,
to warn her father off. Joy tightens her grip in response. The world spins, the
lights seem to dim, and her pulse thunders behind her eyes.

“Please don’t hurt us,” Dr.
Hamill pleads.

“I won’t,” Joy says, and
even as the world fades to gray, Missy can sense the lie in her promise.

The dark thing inside Missy,
the monster that is always whispering in her ear and fighting for release, it
starts to surface. It wants out. It wants blood.

No. Not today.

Missy jerks her legs up,
driving her knees into Joy’s kidneys. The impact throws Joy off-balance,
relieving the weight on Missy’s torso. Missy pulls an arm free and grasps the
hand at her throat, sinking her claws deep. She twists it off, then reaches for
Joy’s face, claws bared. Joy screams.

Joy stumbles to her feet, a
stream of profanity pouring out of her. Missy flips onto her hands and knees,
every muscle tensing as she crouches low. A growl, thick with fury, rumbles
deep in her throat.

Dr. Hamill utters a
horrified moan at what he beholds: His daughter, poised to strike like some
impossible animal teetering on the edge of a feeding frenzy, her dark eyes
stark against the mask of blood flowing down her face.

“Oh my God,” Dr. Hamill
says. “What have I done to you?”

“Same thing you did to me,
you bastard,” Joy says.

Her hand flashes. Dr. Hamill
drops the hard drive, bringing his hands up to his throat. He swoons, and
something warm oozes through his fingers.

“DADDY!”

“Huh...isn’t this familiar?”
Joy taunts. “So what’s it going to be, cupcake? Him or me?”

She doesn’t wait for the
answer; Joy snatches up the hard drive and sprints away, leaving Missy to catch
her father as his legs give out from beneath him, and the world vanishes in an
all-engulfing fog of darkness.

A raspy voice yelling
“FIRE!” and a blast of cannonfire jolts me awake. Mental note: Change Stuart’s
ringtone from “For Those About to Rock, We Salute You” to something less
jarring.

As I reach for my phone, I
catch sight of my alarm clock: 11:04 PM, well past when the gang turns in for
the night.

Something’s wrong.

“Stuart, what is it?” I say,
hoping and praying I’m being a panicky idiot and everything is fine, just fine,
but no, the way Stuart clears his throat before speaking tells me the universe
isn’t going to let me off that easy.

“I just got a call from
Missy. She’s in the hospital,” Stuart says, and before I can officially freak
out, he jumps in to assure me “she’s okay, mostly, but her dad...”

Stuart lets it hang there
for a few seconds. I can’t bring myself to ask what happened.