Quietly, Chara crouched down, removed the napkin from the doorframe, and closed it. Then she stood and walked across the lobby, down into the open maw of the hall.
Though she indulged in a lot of wistful looking, Chara had never been one to chase after heroes. She spent most of her time at home or in the studio, so she’d never happened upon a villain fight when it was still ongoing, before the police barriers had been set up some ways down the street. Still, as she moved steadily toward the tumult, she found that she wasn’t as frightened as she should be. She already knew how to measure a safe distance from the edges of an argument, how to walk quietly and keep unseen.
She couldn’t quite remember if Joseph had explained anything about the building’s layout, and she hadn’t had time to stop and read the map. Luckily, the conference center had not been built to be confusing. There were plaques at the corners with arrows indicating which way the stairs and the elevators were, and for a while it was easy enough to follow the noise.
When she got to the back half of the building, she realized that the fight was moving too quickly for her to keep pace with. It seemed to be happening a floor or so above her, but if she went up the stairs, she might not be able to keep out of the way. Would it be better to wait here and listen? It wasn’t impossible that someone would burst through the floor. Still, the fight had been happening for a minute or two already, and the structure didn’t seem to be compromised yet. Maybe Irradiance was holding back a little.
Something crashed above her—louder than the fight had been so far. Then, all too soon, the sounds of the scuffle petered out.
Chara bit her lip. She didn’t particularly want to run into Irradiance when she didn’t have some other enemy to occupy her. A little disappointed, she started back the way she had come, moving closer to the wall so she would be harder to spot.
Before she made it to the first corner, she heard footfalls.
Quickly, Chara retraced her steps, backed into the open door of a dark room, and hid behind the wall. Then she had time to think. They hadn’t been true footsteps—there was no gait to them. It had just been the two thumps, one after the other, the sound that came when you slipped out of bed onto the rug.
She could still see out into the hall. That should mean that whatever was coming could see her too.
The quiet broke—real footsteps started up around the corner, slow and uneven, but drawing closer.
She should duck farther back. That would be the smart thing. She didn’t move.
Zephyr stepped out into the hall.
The air turned to ice—that’s how it felt. For a moment Chara couldn’t breathe, and the world hung suspended on the edge of a precipice. Then Zephyr stopped in the lee of the corner and set his shoulder against the wall. Something about the way he was holding himself—balance uncentered, one arm over his abdomen—tipped her over the edge. The ice shattered, and she fell out on the right side of shock. She could act again.
Chara crept out into the hall. She half expected Zephyr to turn and stare her down, that the way she’d learned to roll her feet wouldn’t stand up against someone experienced in spotting sneakers. But Zephyr still had his cheek pressed against the corner, watching for the shadow that would mark an approach. He didn’t move until Chara was close enough to touch. She reached out and tapped his shoulder.
Zephyr jolted, nearly falling back out into the hall.
Chara caught his arm—it was just like any other arm—and held him so he didn’t slip. Then she set a finger up against her lips.
It was hard to tell what Zephyr was thinking. His costume had a smooth face plate under the hood. It must have been transparent from the other side, but for Chara it was opaque, the same purple gray as a sunset. She could see the fluorescent lights above them reflected in it. It was like being stared down by a robot.
Faintly, a door latch clicked, and another set of footsteps followed them. Chara could tell by the direction and the weight that somebody had come out of an upper hall into the stairwell, that they were coming down the stairs.
Quickly, Chara pulled Zephyr’s arm and tugged him back the way she’d come. They made it into the room where she’d been hiding, and Chara started to think she might have been imagining things. Zephyr was moving easily enough. Then she brought him across the room and stopped to slowly open the door of a closet, and she felt the air stir, the tension in his arm going limp.
The footsteps reached the end of the stairs and evened out. Another door opened.
It was the strangest sort of languid rushing. Chara got the latch pulled in, swung the door open—pressure even so that it wouldn’t creak—and caught Zephyr as he fell through the open doorway. It was a near miss. She wasn’t sure she’d have been able to drag him if he’d collapsed any sooner. And in the dim light from the hall, she could make out a mop and bucket in the corner—usually a janitor’s closet like this would have been locked.
There wasn’t time to consider it. Grabbing the end of Zephyr’s cape, she threw it over him to clear the threshold. Then, carefully, she grabbed the door again, ready to close it. Her head turned with the motion, and she looked across the room—and the janitor she’d seen earlier was walking down the hall adjacent to them, shadow passing over the open doorway.
Chara held her breath. The janitor stopped walking directly in front of the door. But she was still staring down the open hall—she hadn’t seen them yet.
Suddenly, Chara had a crazy thought. Stepping back into the closet, she reached up over a shelf until her hand closed over a spray bottle. Then she rushed back toward the hall—remembering just in time to turn her run into a self assured stride—and approached the janitor.
The woman heard her and turned. There was a crease in her forehead—the slightest hint of confusion.
“Excuse me,” Chara demanded. She couldn’t give the confusion room to settle. “What are you doing here?”
“Miss, are you—”
Forcefully, Chara thrust the spray bottle into the woman’s arms. “I can’t believe you’re wandering around when there’s work to be done. Have you seen the state of the coffee bar? Someone’s been dumping out their drinks in the little grate!”
“Miss,” the janitor said, voice a little firmer, “I’m sure someone else will—”
“Tell me your name,” Chara demanded, pulling out her phone, “I’m going to call your manager.”
The woman reached to grab her wrist, but Chara yanked her arm away.
“I’ll tell your manager!” Chara shrieked, “I’ll tell them who you are and where you are and what you’ve done! Absent from your station, refusing even to clean up a single spill—why, I had to come all the way back here looking for that spray!”
“Please!” the woman said, holding up her palms, “I’ll clean it, alright? Where is it?”
“In the lobby,” Chara said, pointing back. “You’ll see for yourself.”
Sighing, the janitor adjusted her grip on the spray with a quick efficiency. Then she turned and stalked off.
Chara waited until she had rounded the corner, until her footsteps had receded, then she darted back to the janitor’s closet.
Zephyr was still there, sitting propped against the wall. There was a tear in his costume, across his abdomen, singed at the edges.
“Get up,” Chara demanded, holding out her hand, “We have to leave now.”