Scarecrow and the Rainbow Solution

Crimson had to admit that as suicide missions went, this was going pretty well.
She had been able to run and hide, the laser rifles and high powered rounds helping to take down the enemy before they really got a good grasp on where she was and so far they had entirely missed the room with the hatch while chasing her down three other corridors. They had managed to jump her only once, the bowie knife and some decent punches had got Crim out of that one although she was now sporting a nasty cut above the eye which was starting to swell and she knew that the ammunition wasn’t going to last forever.
She figured she was now about as far from the entrance as it was possible to get and still there were white suited figures around every corner. Some now had the other mask, the one that hid the still human features of the Scarecrow Units, they were harder to kill, more seasoned and not easy to get the drop on like the near bovine regular Drac. Crimson also knew that it meant if she was caught it would be a show trial in Battery City and a slow death.
For now she was hidden in a small store room, holding her breath and counting the battery packs and grenades still in the pack she had grabbed when they started the escape. It wouldn’t be nearly enough to make it to the surface in one piece and the gun turrets were now silent up above. She could hear footsteps outside and for the thousandth time she hoped it had brought Party enough time to get the others to safety.
Crimson slid down the door, deciding that hiding would be the best idea until the corridor outside emptied and she could put the next part of the plan into action. There was a small bottle of water at the bottom of the pack and she used it to wet her lips and splash the cut on her face clean. Vision in that eye wasn’t great, the swelling beginning to interfere and the pain in her arm and fresh blood told her that the stitches there were broken too. Of course, once she got out of here and found the gang again there was a reasonable chance that Party would blacken the other eye on principal. With a grin she remembered their conversation from the night before, long after physical urges had been satisfied and they were both stroking Kobra’s hair.
“Are you over that death wish Crim ?”
Party had been serious, he and Dr D had heard the stories of ridiculous risks from the girls adventures in Vegas. Risks which both men had put down to post traumatic stress from the time spent in Korse’s lab. Crimson in particular had been inviting death, literally hunting out the worst places to cause trouble despite her declaration of not dying in his war.
“Yes. If time away from you taught me anything its that I want to live.”
“So you’re not denying it was there.”
She had smiled, both of them were natural risk takers.
“It was there, you have to admit it spices things up.”
Party had pinched her leg and they had attempted to have a poke war both over and under Kobra until he had sleepily told them to shut the fuck up and go to sleep. It had been good, good to just lie there and feel even a little safe. As it turned out that had been somewhat premature and Crimson was aware that she might never hold him again.
Her face set in a sneer and she pulled herself up and started to strip off down to her underwear. The one thing that had made her believe that she could pull this off was also in the bag and she was about to use it to walk out the front door. The stealth suit felt like silk, the black panels gave no hint that once you activated it all anyone would see would be the light reflected back in a shimmer. They had tested it when Party had pulled it from the bunker shelf in five and the damn thing was nearly impossible to see. He had given it to Crim to hold and she had been carrying it ever since, the plan always in the back of her mind to use it if they got cornered.
She listened again, trying to figure out if the Dracs had moved on before pulling on the suit. She could tuck the gun inside, further ammo and the keys to the Camaro were tucked into her bra before she zipped the thing up. It was too big, having clearly been designed for a man considerably taller and heavier than Crim but that gave her more room to add a grenade or two into the inner pockets and still be comfortable. Pulling the mask on quickly Crimson hid her clothes and jacket into one of the empty boxes in the store room rack and pressed the switch on the suit.
There was a hum in her ear and she hoped it meant that the thing was on as she had no way of telling and no mirror in which to see. Going outside was going to be luck until she encountered a Drac, only then would she know one way or the other. Carefully Crimson slid open the door and stepped out into the passage. There was emergency lighting only, the corridor bathed in a thin red light that made it feel eerie and she fought to keep her breathing even and slow as she walked quickly back to wear a painted arrow pointed out the main passage and the stairs up.
Bodies littered the stairwells, her gaze dispassionately taking in the damage done by high explosive meeting flesh and bone. Laser was burned into the walls and the stench was starting to fill the confined space. Again she tried not to breathe and climbed the first flight of stairs. Halfway up she heard footsteps coming down and pressed herself into the wall. It was an agony to wait, every instinct screaming at her to run and hide or pull the gun while instead she no had to keep as still as possible and let the suit do the rest.
The drac walked right past, its gun drawn and its face moving back and forth as it hissed and whined. Crimson closed her eyes, the pain in her face making it harder to stay still but the thing showed no sign of having seen her, disappearing into the lower level as Crimson wasted no time in starting to move again. A second walked past her, then a third and a grim smile of victory flowed across her features under the mask.
I am going to do this.
There were more Dracs the further up she climbed, several of them almost seemed to see her before shaking their heads and she remembered that Kobra had believed the suit worked by creating an optical illusion, the fabric somehow making light curve around it so the wearer was not visible. Crimson herself wasn’t particularly bothered about how it worked, just grateful that it did and she decided that it was worth one last risk before she finally attempted the top levels and the Scarecrow unit up above.
The room she had shared with Party was on this level and Crimson carefully skirted around inside it. The few odd possessions they had left behind were now scattered across the makeshift bed, clearly the dracs had ripped the place apart while trying to find them. She looked around until she spotted her mask under a pile of blankets. It had been the first thing Party had made her when they had fled the city and it had been repaired and repainted several times since but still remained her good luck charm. Unzipping the suit just enough, Crim slipped the hood back and slung the mask around her neck before pulling the disguise back on. Now she could leave.
“I don’t care what it takes, FIND THEM.”
Crimson froze, the voice was all too familiar and it sent her mind back to the lab. The pain, the constant screaming of nerve endings and the promises of bliss and freedom if she would only talk…just talk….
News A Go Go hadn’t changed. Crim watched the elfin Japanese girl stride into the room, still barking out orders to the Dracs and staring imperiously around the room. The hidden woman was now gripped by rage, it would be easy to take them out from here, they wouldn’t know what hit them and then Crim could lay those ghosts to rest. She hadn’t told Party about the nightmares or the slight drug habit she had picked up and surely killing the woman in front of her would end all that.
“There’s a hatch in the basement. It’s wired to the grid. If you touch it, you get fried.”
“So they got out ? Can you not do one thing right ?”
Crimson grinned at her rage, nobody was going to follow her friends out that way. It had been fairly simple to rig, a trick taught to her long ago by Jet. She revised her previous idea, let News face Korse and explain her failure to capture the sitting ducks. Whatever punishment he would inflict would be worse than a laser blast to the head. Inching past, Crim left the room and headed up the final steps. It was harder here, many more enemy and almost tightly packed so that squeezing through them without arousing suspicion was getting harder. Several times one or more would turn as if they had seen her or felt a presence and by the time she was out into the desert air Crimson was shaking.
Outside was better, floodlights only right in front where the BLI vans were parked up. They were easy to avoid and it took Crimson less than ten minutes to sprint the distance to where the cars were parked and hidden. She finally unzipped the suit and pulled away the hood, taking in deep breaths of the dawn air and embracing the feeling of simply being alive. The Camaro trunk held a change of clothes which she pulled out before pausing and looking across at the Trans Am.
Party’s baby.
The one thing he probably loved more than her.
The one thing they were all forbidden to drive.
Crimson let the smirk spread across her face, tossing the bag of clothes into the back before sliding into the drivers seat. He would forgive her this once, even for hot wiring the car and possibly damaging the wiring. All she was doing was bringing two things he loved back to him rather than one. The car roared into life and she spun the wheel with relish, foot jammed against the accelerator as she slammed the car onto the road and headed out as far from the bunker as possible.
Turning on the radio Crimson waited for a clue to take her back home.

Notes