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Tigress’s back hit the wall of the dusty abandoned warehouse. She cursed. The operative in front of her grinned, spinning a knife around his fingers with ease. Tigress didn’t recognize him.
“Tigress, Tigress, Tigress,” he said. “I thought you were smarter. Betraying VILE at the height of your criminal career? We have a presence in every country in the world. You must have a death wish.”
Tigress had never regretted her choice of code name and weapons before now. She enjoyed having a steel claw on the end of every gloved finger, just like the big cat she named herself after. It let her get up close and personal with the pain she inflicted on her enemies.
Now, though, the face of a woman, eyes filled with hate and tears, flashed in front of her every time she struck. Maybe I should invest in a long-distance weapon, she thought grudgingly. She wasn’t trained to use a gun. VILE didn’t allow them. Too loud, too messy, too easily traced, and annoying to bring into any country but the United States, the Faculty’s voice echoed in her head. You are better than that.
Well, she wasn’t VILE anymore.
She pounced at the operative with a hiss. She swiped her clawed hands at his face, but he dodged and jabbed at her with his knife. Serrated edges, she noted as the blade hit empty space. Asshole.
“You dodged! No death wish, then?” The operative taunted. As they danced around each other, he ran a hand over his slick, dark hair. “Ah, you must want to share the glory of VILE’s number one most wanted. Tut, tut. Carmen Sandiego was the bad apple that spoiled the whole bunch. Where is she, by the way?”
Tigress flinched at the mention of the name, and her face flashed in her mind again. Carmen. “I’ll take the credit for my own betrayal, thanks.” She smiled sharply to cover the pang of regret and guilt. “I have no idea where she is. I’m not her pet.”
“Interesting.” The operative looked her up and down coolly, as if he could see her brain desperately trying not to think about Carmen. “Well, then. I suppose we’ll see if that’s true for El Topo and Le Chevre, too. Perhaps you can join them, and all plead your case together.”
He lunged again, and Tigress caught his wrist. The blade hovered inches from her face, but it was suddenly the least of her problems. El Topo and Le Chevre? What had VILE done to them?
El Topo and Le Chevre always did have a reputation for being more interested in each other than the job. They were inseparable. One was never seen without his pair on heists. El Topo especially was kinder than a criminal had any right to be and tended to befriend everyone he met, Tigress included.
They were loyal, though. VILE should have no reason to hurt them.
Tigress gritted her teeth and forced the knife away from her. Her claws slashed across the operative’s arm. He yelped and drew back with a glare.
“What do you mean, plead our case together?” Tigress flexed her bloody fingers, the now-familiar mix of adrenaline and shame pumping through her veins.
“There’s a leadership spot open since you took out the old Professor,” the operative said with a sly smile. “I suggested the whole band of you may be traitors, and the Faculty agreed. When those two idiots confess, the spot is as good as mine.”
No. Tigress’s mind snapped to the state she’d found Carmen in when VILE captured her. She was on death’s door, broken and bloodied. To think of her friends, the men she’d spent years training and thieving with, beaten to the same state made her stomach churn.
The operative lunged again in her moment of distraction. He knocked her to the ground and fell with her. He straddled her waist. She managed to catch his wrists before he stabbed her, and she dug her claws into his skin. His eyes were bright with pain, but his muscles shook as the blade inched closer to her eye.
A shiny black boot crashed into the operative’s jaw.
He toppled off Tigress, who launched to her feet. She stared at her savior, and her heart dropped into her stomach.
Carmen Sandiego looked worse than when she’d last seen her. Dark circles shadowed the warm brown skin under her eyes. Her auburn hair, far from its usual flowing mane, was tied into a hasty knot at the base of her neck. Her lips were chapped and lacked their usual bright red hue.
Unbidden, the memory of their last meeting burst into her mind at the sight of her lips. She silenced the thought before the red-hot of the image crept into her cheeks.
Carmen whirled on the operative, her gray-blue eyes chips of ice. She caught the arm that held the knife and wrestled it away from him.
Yes! Tigress leaned forward. He’s completely vulnerable. Stab him through the heart!
But Carmen tossed the knife out of his reach, pulled a needle from the inside of her coat, and jabbed it into his neck. In a moment, he went limp.
Tigress stared at her, still wrestling with the memory of her lips. The pit of hunger that had so briefly been sated the last time she saw Carmen returned with a roar.
“Good timing. I didn’t peg you as a poison girl,” Tigress said breathlessly.
“I’m not.” Carmen turned to her. She didn’t smile, just looked Tigress over with something like disappointment. “You know I would never. It’s a sedative. He’ll be fine in an hour or two. Are you hurt?”
So, Carmen still galloped around on a high horse. It was the quality that made Tigress both love and hate her. In a world that wanted her dead, she refused to kill. Even when VILE’s leaders had tortured her, trying to get the name of the operative who had dressed her wounds after her first round of injuries, she had kept the word “Tigress” under lock and key.
She was selfless. Insufferably, impossibly, naively selfless. Even now, she wouldn’t do more than sedate the man who had just tried to murder Tigress. Tigress, who she’d once kissed like the world was ending.
“Sheena?”
Don’t say my real name. Not with this much worry in your voice. “I’m fine, Sandiego,” Tigress said flatly. She stared at the limp figure of the operative so she didn’t have to see the hurt blossom in Carmen’s face. “What are you doing here?”
I wanted to see you. I forgive you. You’re right.
“I heard there was VILE activity in the area. I didn’t expect to see you here.”
Of course. Tigress’s jaw clenched. The little candle of hope in her heart flickered and died.
Carmen cleared her throat when Tigress said nothing. “How are you?” she asked tentatively. Tigress wondered if their last meeting was playing through her head, too. Their fight. The kiss.
It probably wasn’t. Carmen had disappeared before Tigress even left the driveway.
“I don’t have time for small talk, Carmen.”
“Got a hot date?”
“No,” Tigress snapped. “Do you remember what I told you the last time we saw each other? What would happen if you kept up your Robin Hood shtick, refused to “steal lives” for the greater good?”
Tigress looked up. Carmen rubbed her forehead, an angry crease appearing between her eyebrows. “I had hoped we wouldn’t—”
“Do you remember what I said?”
“You said people would die. That—” Carmen paused, then stared into Sheena’s cold, blue eyes. “Did you hear something about El Topo and Le Chevre?”
“Oh, so your peaceful information network didn’t pick that up?”
“Sheena, please don’t do this now.” Carmen’s voice had a satisfying note of pleading braided into it. Tigress had half a mind to keep the information from her just so she knew Carmen needed her again. “What did you hear? Are they—”
“They aren’t dead yet.” Tigress wiped the operative’s blood onto her pants. “But VILE seems to think, because of you and me, that they’re traitors. And you know better than anyone what VILE does to traitors.”
Tigress looked steadily at Carmen’s right hand. It was not the hand of a pickpocket: it was shaky with crooked, knobby fingers, and only had smooth skin where a few fingernails should be. Carmen clutched the hand to her chest, right above the spot Tigress knew was branded with VILE’s symbol.
Oh, yes, Carmen knew VILE’s tortures better than anyone. Tigress had held her steady while Brunt, VILE’s most vengeful leader, had pressed the red-hot metal to Carmen’s skin. She’d watched Brunt hammer Carmen’s fingers until each bone was shattered. VILE did not let go of traitors until they were dead.
“If I don’t kill him,” Tigress continued, and jabbed the tip of her boot into the operative’s ribs, “he will alert leadership, and the boys will die before either of us can reach them. So, Carmen, whose lives do you value more?”
“We’re not having this argument this again.” Carmen dragged her hand over her face. “Especially not if El Topo and Le Chevre’s lives hang in the balance.”
She was right. A rehash of the fight that had torn them apart would only waste time. The heartbreak on Carmen’s face reminded Tigress, very suddenly, why she had tried to leave her last time with only a note.
“I’ll just knock him out and tie him up,” she muttered. “The rats will probably find him here before VILE does, anyway.”
“Like you ‘knocked out’ the operative the night we escaped Casablanca?” Carmen asked dryly.
Tigress carefully made sure not to let any surprise show on her face. “What do you mean?”
“You know exactly what I mean.” Carmen’s eyes glittered, daring her to lie again.
Carmen had been better suited to a hospital bed than a great escape that night. It was a wonder that VILE’s torture hadn’t killed her—but it was a miracle they escaped the city alive. It had been crawling with operatives, all looking for the two traitors who had taken down a leader on their escape from VILE’s island base.
Carmen had begged her not to kill an operative who discovered them, begged her not to take another life on her behalf. Carmen had been so fragile, practically half-dead from the torture, and she’d only trusted Tigress a couple weeks.
Tigress hadn’t wanted to lose that trust. That operative would have brought the entire city down on them.
“I’m not stupid, you know.” Carmen’s voice cut through the memory. “I was hopped up on painkillers then, but it was only a matter of time before I connected the dots.”
“We escaped with our lives because I killed him,” Tigress said. She hated the defensiveness that sneaked into her tone.
“I’m not going to lecture you like a child.” Carmen wrinkled her nose. “If you can live with blood on your hands, fine. I can’t. Especially not when you killed on my behalf. If you try to kill this man, we’re adversaries.”
Adversaries. For a moment, Tigress yearned for the days when they had just been enemies in a criminal war. Carmen Sandiego was just a target to be taken out, and Tigress’s only worry was proving to VILE’s leaders that she was better than their former model thief.
I could haul Carmen back. The leaders would forgive me. Almost as soon as the thought crossed her mind, she dismissed it. She’d killed the Professor helping Carmen escape the island. Not even a traitor like Carmen Sandiego could erase killing VILE Faculty.
I don’t want to erase it, she realized. I would fall in love and save her over and over again if I had to.
“Find something to tie him up with,” Tigress snapped out loud. When Carmen raised an eyebrow at her, Tigress jutted her chin out. “I’m not going to kill him, Sandiego. I couldn’t handle your whining if I did.”
The small smile that earned her lit a fire in her chest. She turned away quickly to hide whatever goofy look had surely just taken over her face. Idiot. Don’t do this again. You cannot change for her. It isn’t in your nature.
Carmen pulled a set of handcuffs from the inside of her jacket pocket and offered them to Tigress.
“Do you just carry those around?”
“You never know when they may be useful.” Carmen smirked. Tigress took the cuffs. She dragged the man to some safety railing around a dusty machine, half-covered with a tarp, and secured him to it.
“That’ll keep him. Now, I have to go,” Tigress said as she stood. “The sooner I get to VILE’s island, the better chance I have of saving El Topo and Le Chevre.”
“I agree,” Carmen replied. “I can charter us a jet to Morocco that leaves tonight.”
“Us?” Tigress parroted incredulously. “I don’t think so. I don’t need three maidens to rescue.”
Carmen’s eyes flashed like steel. “And how did you plan to drag out two? If they’re in the same condition I was in, you’ll practically have to carry them. El Topo is not exactly petite. You need me.”
Tigress hadn’t thought that far, but the thought of Carmen returning to the place Tigress had risked everything to save her from made her eyeballs itch. If something happened to her…
“Don’t you have PTSD or some shit?” Tigress sneered. “You’d collapse as soon as you stepped foot on the island.”
Carmen rolled her eyes. Tigress stalked up to her and jabbed a finger into her chest, right where she knew that bubbling burn in the shape of a “V” sat. Carmen winced. Good.
“I’m dead serious, Sandiego. I’ll do whatever it takes to get those idiots out of there. If that means murder, I don’t need you there crying about it.”
Carmen stared at her levelly. “You don’t have a choice. There isn’t a chance in Hell of you making it out with both of them, and there’s no one else you can turn to.”
Tigress wrinkled her nose. I could—no that wouldn’t work. What if—no, that wouldn’t work either. Ugh. It was annoying that Carmen got to be morally righteous and correct. She missed when Carmen needed her. Needed her to dress her wounds, to cut her chain, and to whisk her to safety.
It didn’t matter. If Carmen was on the island, she wouldn’t leave unless all four of them got out safely or she was dead. Tigress could do whatever it took once they were there.
“Fine.”
Carmen smiled the smile that made Tigress want to drop everything to look at her. “I’ll book us a flight.”
***
Planes were such an enormous part of working for VILE that Tigress had killed her fear of flying long ago. When she had to travel to a new country every few days, there was no avoiding them. Now, though, as she sat across from Carmen in the little private plane, that anxiety bubbled back up in her gut.
Tigress had fought this woman with intent to kill, once. Carmen Sandiego, VILE’s lost lamb, was always the standard for every VILE operative. They had to be better than her, faster, stronger. Even Tigress, the most dangerous operative in a decade, hadn’t been able to defeat her.
But someone managed it, and VILE caught Carmen like a mouse in a trap. Suddenly, there wasn’t anyone left for Tigress to prove herself against. There was just a bloody pulp of a woman in a VILE cell and Tigress’s conscience, something she thought she’d long-since lost.
“I don’t understand you.” Carmen’s voice broke her out of her reverie.
Tigress lifted her head to stare at her and removed the hand from her churning stomach. “What do you mean?”
“You have friends on both side of this fight,” Carmen said slowly. “And you’re still willing to kill anyone who gets in your way. What would you have done if, when I switched sides, I decided to kill every VILE operative I met?”
“You should have.” Tigress snorted. “They all wanted you dead.”
“You would have preferred I kill you? Crackle? El Topo and Le Chevre?"
Tigress hesitated. “That’s different.”
“It’s not. Just because I had the chance to know you all as friends doesn’t make everyone else less valuable of a person.”
Carmen sat back in her seat and stared out of the window. “Never mind. I don’t want to bring this back up. You’ve made your position clear. We should be landing soon.”
Sheena grabbed the puke bag and buried her face in it, mostly to hide the look on her face.
***
Tigress heard Carmen get more fidgety every minute they drew closer to VILE’s island. It was pitch black out here on the open ocean, especially since they’d motored away from Casablanca’s glow. Carmen cut the engine a couple miles from the island and used the trolling motor to approach it quietly. With only the lap of waves against the boat’s side to break the quiet night air, Carmen’s bouncing feet and tapping fingers were loud.
She’d mostly been trying to spite Carmen with her taunts about PTSD, but she was worried now. Carmen had left VILE’s island last time with a concussion, a broken nose, broken arm, shattered hand, internal bleeding, and skin that was more bruise than it was brown.
“Calm down,” Tigress whispered harshly. The movement stopped instantly.
“I’m calm,” Carmen replied after a second. “Just ready to go.”
“If you freak out on me, I’m throwing you in the ocean.”
“I don’t freak out,” Carmen hissed. “I’m an international superthief. I would be in prison if I freaked out.”
“Or dead,” Tigress replied shortly, “which is still very much an option if you get us caught out here.”
“I’ve spent half my life fighting VILE. I will die before I fail tonight.”
Tigress put a hand on the first aid kits stashed in the boat to reassure herself. That wouldn’t happen. Tigress shoved a pair of bolt cutters into the bag on her back.
The boat eased quietly up to the island’s shore. Both of their knowledge of the island allowed them to slip the boat past VILE’s security with ease. It landed quietly on the shore, and they both jumped out.
The island was silent. It was in between seasons when VILE brought in new recruits to train, so the island should only have guards and the leaders.
The leaders. Tigress remembered the slippery feel of Maelstrom’s intestines in her claws from their previous escape. She hoped it wouldn’t come to that, for Carmen’s sake.
They crept silently across the stones. Carmen had been imprisoned in a small, separate building near the shore. They headed toward it.
It was silent, dark, and unguarded. Tigress glanced back at Carmen. She was stock-still but for a small tremble, silhouetted against the faint starlight.
Tigress nodded, and she nodded back. The lack of security either meant the boys were being held somewhere else, VILE thought every traitor was off the island, or there was another trap.
Carmen skulked up to the lock and picked it. Less deftly, Tigress noticed, than she had when they were in training. The injuries dealt to her hand must have slowed her down.
The door swung open silently. The building was empty.
“Damn it,” Tigress cursed quietly. That meant El Topo and Le Chevre were being housed somewhere else—somewhere much more difficult to access. “Let’s go.”
She turned to find Carmen staring into the room where she’d been beaten to a pulp. Her fingers flexed in and out of fists.
“I—” Carmen’s voice trembled.
Shit. “Sandiego,” Tigress said, loud as she dared. “I told you not to freak out on me. Let’s go.”
Carmen didn’t move for a harrowing moment. Then, she turned slowly and silently trudged up the hill toward the main building.
Tigress followed, trying to identify the emotion welling in her chest. Fear? No, not any more than she’d already felt at the prospect of breaking into the headquarters of the organization that wanted them both dead. Anger? Maybe. Anger that Carmen wasn’t handling this?
No. She searched further as they slunk through shadows and hid from passing guards. Anger toward the people who had made the bravest woman she knew afraid.
They made their way inside undetected. The cells on the island were usually used for no more than separating rowdy, fighting trainees for a night to cool off, or for practice picking heavy-duty locks. If VILE wanted a prisoner, they didn’t bring them back to home base.
The unmistakable sounds of pain grew louder and louder as they approached.
Wham! The meaty sound of fist hitting flesh echoed down the hallway. It was followed by a cry of pain, and a different voice’s cry of distress. Carmen and Tigress tucked themselves around the nearest corner to the cells. Carmen pulled out a small mirror and angled it around the corner.
The door to the block was guarded by two burly guards dressed in VILE’s standard uniform: cargo pants, a tough vest over a dark shirt, and a helmet. They each held a crackle rod. Fortunately, they were more focused on a bored game of rock-paper-scissors than they were the hallway.
Carmen silently handed Tigress a dart and a small blowgun from the inside of her jacket. She produced an identical set for herself.
I’ll hit left, you hit right, she mouthed. Run and catch so they don’t fall hard.
Tigress stared at her incredulously. Carmen rolled her eyes.
Loud, she added.
Oh, Tigress thought. It hadn’t been impossible to think Carmen didn’t want the guards to bruise their pretty faces when they fell asleep.
Don’t miss, Tigress mouthed. She loaded the dart into the blow gun and waited for Carmen’s nod.
They peered around the corner simultaneously and fired. Good as their training, their darts each buried into the flesh of their respective guards. The effect was almost instant— the guards looked down at the dart, lost consciousness, and their heads continued the trajectory to the floor.
Carmen and Tigress sprinted out to slide underneath the falling bodies. Tigress caught her’s with a grunt. He was heavy. She managed to lower him quietly to the floor. She helped Carmen get out from under her mark, and they both turned to face the door.
It was easy at this distance to recognize the voices. El Topo cried out over and over, each scream following a meaty thud. Le Chevre begged, sometimes in French, sometimes in English. His voice crescendoed after ever hit.
“Please, please! Il a dit la vérité— stop, please, hurt me instead! Coach—stop, arrêt, arrêt!”
“Of course it’s Brunt,” Tigress muttered. She flexed her claws.
Carmen grabbed her by the arm so tightly it hurt. Tigress stared at her. She was pale. Sweat rolled down her temple, and her other hand had gone to the brand underneath her shirt.
“I don’t think—” Carmen’s whisper wobbled and broke. “What if—”
“No. Carmen, no.” Tigress gripped her by the shoulders and hissed as loudly as she dared. “I won’t let her hurt you again. Don’t leave me now, Carmen. The boys need our help. Both of us. You can be angsty about having been tortured later.”
Carmen eyed her wildly like a panicked horse. “I don’t want to—I can’t control—my body is afraid, and it’s stronger than me. Sheena—"
“Pull it together, Carmen. You’re stronger.” She pulled the bolt cutters from her bag and pressed them to Carmen’s chest. “Get their restraints off. I’ll distract Brunt.”
After a second, Carmen nodded. She gripped the bolt cutters like a lifeline.
Tigress didn’t want to wait to see if Carmen’s nerve held. She grabbed the crackle rod from an unconscious guard and pushed open the door.
Brunt, enormous and muscular, stood over the limp, bloody body of El Topo. His silver hair was slick with sweat, and his powerful arms lay at odd angles. The pool of blood he laid in was even more alarming than the one Tigress had found Carmen in the first time. Le Chevre was chained to the wall, as close to El Topo as was possible. He, too, was bruised, but seemed more distressed than he was hurt.
Good. He can help us carry his boyfriend.
“I thought I said we were to be left alone,” Brunt said. She wiped her brow, straightened, and looked at the door impatiently. As she spotted Tigress in the doorway, her eyes widened with surprise, then narrowed with glee.
“Well, well. The traitor returns,” she said. She strode toward the door, shaking out her bloody knuckles. “Come for the rest of your band, did you? How’d you make it this far?”
Tigress didn’t bother to respond. She sprang at the woman, claws aimed directly at her eyes, and swung the crackle rod with the other hand. Brunt’s gargantuan fist caught her and slammed her down to the floor. The rod clattered the ground with her and rolled out of her reach. Tigress clawed furiously at her hand, and Brunt retracted with a snarl.
Brunt’s back was turned to the door. Tigress watched Carmen slink in, put a finger to her lips, and get to work breaking Le Chevre’s chains.
“I came for vengeance!” Tigress howled. She hoped to make enough noise to cover Carmen while she figured out how to knock Brunt out.
“Vengeance!” Brunt laughed. She punched Tigress in the gut. She wheezed. Blood pooled in her mouth. Tigress scrambled to her feet and tore at Brunt’s arm. Flesh tore satisfyingly under her claws, but Brunt practically shook her off.
Brunt laughed. “You’re dead, sugar.”
Brunt’s fist connected with her face. Tigress’s head spun. She looked desperately for the crackle rod and dropped to crawl toward it.
“What the hell was your plan?” Brunt chuckled. “Free these—”
Brunt turned and fell silent. Le Chevre crouched, unchained, at El Topo’s head, desperately caressing his face. Carmen crouched over the manacle around El Topo’s ankle and hacked away at the metal.
Carmen’s eyes widened. She froze.
“You,” Brunt said. Her lowered to a dangerous snarl. Tigress, wheezing, lunged at the crackle rod, but Brunt grabbed Carmen by the neck as quickly as a rattlesnake.
Carmen choked. The bolt cutters fell.
Tigress grabbed the crackle rod and whacked Brunt across the back of the head. The woman dropped Carmen. Tigress dialed the voltage up and fired.
Brunt convulsed under the electricity and collapsed, the ghost of her rage still etched in her motionless face. Tigress watched her for a moment, panting.
Her chest rose and fell.
Tigress flexed her fingers and stalked toward her, gaze fixed on Brunt’s neck. It was vulnerable. She would make her pay for what she’d just done to Carmen.
Carmen. She glanced at her. Her gray eyes were fixed pleadingly on Tigress. Tigress heard her voice though she didn’t speak.
Don’t. Please.
If Tigress killed Brunt now, Carmen would implode. They would never get out of here. If they did, Carmen would never trust her again.
Tigress looked from Brunt’s still form to Carmen and back again. She dropped the crackle rod and knelt by Carmen’s side.
“Are you okay?”
Carmen nodded. She breathed heavily, one hand at her throat, but she looked at El Topo and Le Chevre.
Le Chevre had unchained the other man and was trying to lift him to his feet, but El Topo’s barely stirred.
Tigress and Carmen stood. They helped Le Chevre get El Topo to his feet, and each took a side.
Le Chevre stared as though he wanted to say something to Tigress, but he shook his head. “Let’s get out of here,” he said hoarsely. “Assuming, of course, that you aren’t planning to steal a helicopter again.”
“We have a boat this time,” Carmen said croakily. “Can you walk?”
“Yes.” He glared at Tigress until she moved to let him support El Topo. “Quickly, now. He’s—” His voice wobbled. He stared at the bloody mess that was his partner. “He needs help.”
***
Tigress guided the boat through the dark waves. Le Chevre sat with El Topo. He’d starkly refused to let anyone else patch him up. Carmen sat at Tigress’s feet, carefully watching the two boys.
“Thank you,” Carmen said.
“For what? Failing to knock Brunt out until she’d already hurt you?”
“For not killing her,” Carmen said quietly. “You could have. I know you wanted to.”
Tigress was quiet for a moment. Her hand tightened on the helm. “I decided to love you more than I hated her,” she muttered.
The sun peeked above the horizon, just barely. They would need to get out of dodge before VILE had enough daylight to find them.
“Thank you,” Carmen said quietly. “I thought…I thought I wasn’t enough to change your mind.”
“Well, seeing you get hurt made me switch sides the first time,” Tigress muttered. “I guess it does something to me that makes me change my mind.”
“I’ll keep that in mind,” Carmen said. She smiled.
The gnawing pit of hunger dissolved slowly from Tigress’s gut, and she let herself relax in the dim light of sunrise.