It’s not even very loud. Mostly there’s just the sound of air whooshing, and a faint cry from their mother. It’s probably not hers, Gert reminds herself.
Then two loud thuds. Which there shouldn’t be, not when Jonah, his son, and their hosts went more or less the way half the world did. Gert lets go of Molly and whirls back around. Her sister follows.
Their mother is on the floor in front of them, barely propped up on her elbows, looking completely lost and terrified. She doesn’t look much like the alien they’ve been fighting. The other thud was Mrs. Minoru, who is sprawled out on the floor, her head at an angle that tells Gert everything immediately, even before Xavin speaks:
“Mrs. Minoru died instead. She had to, to make sure the Magristratress did, but it has kept Mrs. Yorkes alive as well. Now she is the one to survive possession.” Karolina has already bolted over and taken a hold of the dead woman’s wrist, but she clearly can tell without actually even checking for a pulse.
That means that in all likelihood only two of their parents are still alive. They didn’t all deserve to die like that, Gert thinks absently. And noone deserves to be taken over like these two women were; that’s a kind of violation that goes beyond anything.
Even so, when her mother tries to stagger to her feet, Gert raises the Fistigons and stops her. She looks up at her and asks, “Are you going to kill me, Gert? It’s the only kind of punishment I can get, you know. They…we…made sure of that. The only two members of Pride that still could’ve been prosecuted both died in jail. I think.”
“What do you want to do, Gert?” Karolina asks softly, and when Molly says nothing, Gert knows the decision’s going to be completely hers. Not that she’s going to kill her, but she still has to figure out what to do with her instead.
Has what she’s been through been punishment enough? If she’d done less, maybe it would’ve been. But not much can balance out multiple murders. And it’s very hard for Gert to forget what she did to poor Old Lace, and to Gert herself-what she’s just said indicates that wasn’t just Jonah’s wife doing that, not entirely.
“I can help get you to safety, Molly,” she offers. “You and Karolina both. I know everything about what’s going on; you two aren’t safe.”
“We don’t need your help,” Molly growls. “We’re unidentified and could probably just cross into Mexico if we had to.”
Or take sanctuary in the Church of Gibborim. Among the things Molly’s occasionally done at night is even lead superpowered people there. Mrs. Dean’s running it again, trying to quietly lay the foundations for it dying out. She’ll probably spend the rest of her life doing that. It’s better than she deserves, but at least she is genuinely doing the world good.
She could potentially do with some help, and by someone who remains a genius scientist. Maybe Church services could provide her with the therapy she really should get, if only because anyone who’s suffered her kind of trauma should be allowed that. But Gert’s not sure they should trust the two of them together in a place where they can’t watch them much of the time.
No, right now, there’s only one thing they can do with her, until such time as they can have a minimal trust in her at least.
Besides, they do have a jar of dust there that Xavin swears came from Old Lace. Someone ought to examine it, the remains of one of the dead, just to see if they can get any information out of it at all.
“Cover her eyes,” she orders. “We’re taking her back home with us.”