25. Chapter 25

The warehouse is dark and cold and decidedly empty when they walk in.

“Shit,” Steve mutters. “Wrong one?”

Billy arches an eyebrow.

“You said this chick’s got powers like Jane, right?” he says. “She can make you see shit?”

“... Yeah?”

“So,” Billy says, lighting a cigarette. “If she’s got powers like that, why wouldn’t she be able to make us not see shit? Like, trick our brains into not seeing her.”

Steve’s face scrunches up unhappily.

“Shit,” he says. “This is gonna be way harder than I thought it was gonna be.”

Billy shrugs, pulling deeply from his cigarette.

“Maybe not,” he says. “I mean, like, it’s not like she can’t see us, right? Or hear us.”

“If she’s even here.”

“Well, guess we’ll have to take that chance, huh?” Billy flicks his cigarette and straightens his shoulders.

“Hey, Kali!” he shouts. “We’re friends of Jane’s, and she asked us to come check on you!”

The warehouse is still and silent. Billy sighs and tries again.

“Hey, Kali!” he tries again. “Goddess of death and destroyer of evil, right? Cool name. Did they give it to you, or—”

Something sharp presses against his throat, and Steve stiffens beside him. Billy’s eyes flick to the side, and he looks into the brown face of a girl who looks very scared and also is holding a knife against his skin.

Dark-ringed eyes bore into the side of his face, and he forces himself not to smile.

“Who are you?” the girl who must be Kali demands. “How do you know Jane?”

Billy tries to shift, to look her more fully in the face. The knife presses and cuts his skin, causing Steve to squeak and Billy to go still again.

“She’s friends with my sister,” he says, tilting his chin up just slightly. “I babysit her sometimes, when she comes to hang out with the kids.”

Kali stares at him.

“She is safe?” she asks.

God, Billy thinks to himself. She’s only a little bit younger than he is.

“Yeah,” he says. “Yeah, she’s fine. She lives with a cop, and— and I’m gonna teach her piano, when I get back. She’s got an ear for it.”

Kali looks at him like she doesn’t quite believe him, like she wants to press that knife just a little bit deeper.

“Who are you?” she demands.

Billy swallows.

“Uilliam McCloud,” he says. “Jane said you were in trouble, and asked us to come see you since we were in town. That’s Steve, over there. Steve Harrington. He babysits Jane too, sometimes.”

“Kali, I swear, we’re not here to hurt you—” Steve starts.

“Steve, shut the fuck up,” Billy says. He doesn’t dare look over, doesn’t dare to take his eyes off of Kali.

“We don’t care about how you got in trouble, we’re just doing Jane a favor,” he says. “But I swear to God I will haunt your bobblehead ass if you kill me before I see my sister again.”

Kali stiffens at the slur, anger flashing in her black eyes. Billy hisses as she presses the knife again, giving him another, small cut.

“Billy—”

“I don’t like you,” she says. “I don’t leave people I don’t like alive.”

“If that’s the case,” he says, and this time he presses forward into the blade, giving her a blank, razor-thin smile. “Let me give you some advice. The jugular’s messy, and I’ll be able to scream the whole time while I bleed out. If you’re hiding from someone— and people like us are always hiding— me screaming might draw attention. You know how echoey old, abandoned buildings can be. So, to stop me screaming, you should cut into the carotid artery— right here.” He brings his hand up, carefully poking at the correct spot. “Stab there, and then pull down— that’ll sever my vocal chords, and if you dig deep enough, stop blood from going to my brain. I’ll be dead in minutes.”

“What if I want you to suffer?” she asks. “I always make them suffer.”

Billy ignores Steve’s muttered Jesus Christ and lets his smile broaden.

“Wouldn’t be anything new,” he says. “You’re the one with superpowers, sweetheart. Can’t you read my mind?”

Kali’s head tilts, and she drops the knife, stepping back.

“You’re not like me,” she says. “You weren’t in the labs.”

“Nope,” Billy says. “And if I could, I’d nail each and every one of those fuckers that touched Jane to the floor by their balls.” He pauses, looks over her, the knife in her hand, and then, slowly, over the rest of the warehouse, which is no longer as empty as it had looked, but rather lived in, in its way, complete with a corkboard covered in pictures and string.

Oh, okay.

“... Something you’ve clearly been working on yourself,” he says, arching an eyebrow. “‘Destroyer of evil forces’, in the flesh. Nice to meet you.”

Kali inclines her head, looking between him and Steve like she doesn’t dare be hopeful.

“Jane sent you,” she says. “And she’s safe?”

Billy glances over at Steve, but Steve seems to be on the verge of fainting, hands clenching and unclenching in an effort to keep calm.

Billy looks back at Kali.

“She’s fine,” he says. “She went to a middle school dance, right around Christmas, and she sees her friends every week, because they play Dungeons and Dragons.”

“And she lives with her policeman?” Kali asks faintly.

“The Chief, yeah.” Billy stomps down on the rage that bubbles up his throat. “She doesn’t go to school yet, but I think he’s working something out for her for next year.” Something Jane had mentioned to him with wide, hopeful eyes. She gets lonely when she has to sit home alone all day while her friends are at school.

Kali swallows.

“He did it?” she says. “He made a deal— he actually did it?”

Billy has no idea what she’s talking about, but whatever.

“Guess so,” he says. “I don’t actually have the details, but yeah. Jane’s doing good. Right, Steve?”

“Y- Yeah,” Steve says, fumbling. “Really great. Awesome.”

Billy rolls his eyes.

“You’ll have to excuse him,” he tells Kali. “He’s a bit of a nervous Nelly, if you know what I mean.”

Kali snorts, and then frowns, like she maybe didn’t want to do that.

Billy does his best not to let the win get to him and flicks his cigarette in an approximation of unbothered.

“Anyway, we came here because Jane asked us to look in on her sister, because her sister was in trouble,” he says. “You’re her sister, so: are you in trouble? Do you need help?”

Kali’s shoulders slump, and suddenly, she’s a lot younger than Billy.

“We were caught,” she says. “My— my friends, most of them were taken. I don’t know where. I think they’re dead.”

Billy winces. Shit.

“Most?” he asks.

“I got Axel before they could take him,” Kali says. “But he’s hurt. I can’t take him to the hospital.”

“Hurt how?”

Kali bites her lip, looking uncertain.

“His ribs,” she says. “I think they’re broken. I don’t know.”

Billy takes a deep breath, then looks at Steve.

Steve throws up his hands.

“How should I know?” he asks, sounding annoyed and scared. “Apparently you’re running this show.”

Billy grimaces at him and turns back to Kali.

“Can I see your friend?” he asks. “I’ve got experience with broken ribs.”

“I know,” Kali says. “I can see.”

Well, Billy sure as shit doesn’t like the sound of that. “‘Course you can.”

Kali stares at him a moment, then nods, turning on her heel and striding towards the stairs.

“Follow me.”