117.

  The sirens started only a few seconds later. Of course, they would be close; there’d been a shooting only a few hours ago less than a mile from here, and now more gunfire. I cursed myself for how stupid I’d been and felt sick to my stomach. I fled across the street, used my Grapple Cord, and my Jet Boots to fly up to the side of a building. Then I was gone, streaking across the rooftops. I paused after five minutes of intense running to vomit.

  I slumped down on the side of the building, scrubbing my sweaty face. The images of those corpses strewn about haunted me. How could I have been so fucking stupid and reckless? I’d put all this behind me. I didn’t want to be the Gutter Mage anymore, and in only a few days, bodies were dropping everywhere around me. This new level of violence and carelessness shocked me to my core. At least when I was fighting Brick, I was dealing with mercenaries, people who understood the cost of violence and the consequences of their actions. Now? These were just kids with guns, reckless and foolish. I thought back to that idiot firing his gun off in a crowded room of people in the dark. How could these people have such little care for human life? It made me shiver and want to puke again, but my stomach was completely empty, so I ended up dry heaving.

  I wiped my mouth and took deep breaths. I knew, no matter how disgusted and horrified I was, I couldn’t stop here. Danny had gotten away, and that meant he would keep selling guns. The police would have raided the G15 hideout and gotten all of their weapons. I destroyed the Lear Street Thugs' stash, but the Blood Brothers were still out there, and I wasn’t confident the Beth Boys would suddenly turn their backs on their criminal ways, especially now that G15 might be taken off the board. It just meant more space for them. If Danny was still out there, that meant there would still be weapons being put in the hands of teenagers.

  I spat bile over the side of the roof, pulled my scarf back up, and ran across the building, leaping to the next one. All I wanted to do was go home and shower. My nostrils were full of the smell of gunpowder and blood. There was nothing out here in the night for me. I just wanted to get back home and curl up in my flat, in my safe room, and process what the hell was happening around me.

  Still, questions flooded through my mind. Why was Danny doing this? Why was he supplying all these gangs and pointing them at the Mulberry Estate? Why would they be this reckless? Didn’t they understand the consequences of what they were doing, or did they just not care? I stumbled my way back south towards my home, sirens wailing in the distance behind me, the flashing blue lights making my heart race. I couldn't stop thinking about those cameras. Had they been active? What had they recorded? Were there any inside? Again, I cursed myself for my never-ending stupidity. The police might be watching the video of my attack right now, and they would have it all in HD video evidence of the Gutter Mage.

  Why didn't I stop and take the recordings? I didn't even think about it. I knew I'd destroyed the camera on the outside at least, but I had no idea if there were any cameras inside the club. I mean, it would make sense for them to be there, but then again, it was also a criminal hangout where I'm assuming crimes happen on a daily basis. Would they have CCTV inside? And what about DNA evidence? I was wearing gloves, but who knew what they could get—hair, blood, anything. The place was a murder scene. What about the coins that I dropped? Could they lift fingerprints from them? These thoughts buzzed round and round in my mind, and I became increasingly panicked the more I thought about how clumsy and stupid I'd been. I raced through the night desperate to get home.

  As I got closer to home, I suddenly felt a presence watching me. I skidded to a halt on the top of a roof, spun, and drew my Grandad’s bat, my heart thudding in my chest. But there was nothing there. I could hear whispers all around me. Something was close. I spun around again and again but saw nothing. I took a deep breath and forced myself to be calm. I was just being paranoid, I told myself. The violence of the night had gotten to me, that was all. I just needed to get home, where it was safe, where no one could watch me or track me or sneak up on me, where the whispers couldn’t even get to me. I just needed to get home.

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  I sheathed my bat, turned, and there was the cat. Its silver eyes twinkled in the moonlight, and I suddenly felt like I had been caught doing something very wrong. Shame burned on my face as the cat looked at me, and in its eyes, I could see disappointment.

  "I didn’t mean to," I blurted out, looking at the cat. "It wasn’t supposed to..." and then I faltered.

  Why the hell was I explaining myself to a cat? And why did that cat look so deeply disappointed in me? My shoulders sagged. The cat stood up, stretched its back languidly, its tail flicking left and right, and then it walked away and leaped off the side of the building. I felt like that was the ultimate judgment, that I wasn’t even worth its time. I didn’t blame the cat. For all my talk of wanting a simple, quiet life, the second I was given the opportunity to dive headfirst back into this world of violence and blood, I’d taken it with both hands. And now look at me, leaving literal massacres in my wake.

  “Shit,” I spat, looking over the edge for a sign of the cat, but it was gone.

  A part of me felt like it might never come back. Despondently, I continued on my way home across the main street, closing in on my part of the Mulberry Estate. The night was particularly dark. Even the moon hadn’t really come out. There were heavy clouds in the sky, and half of the streetlights that had been repaired over the last couple of months were broken again. The estate was bathed in darkness with only the neon glow of the ever-present billboards lighting my way. I never really paid attention to the billboards. Living in New London, you sort of learn to just phase them out, like the noise of traffic. They just become part of the background menagerie of life in an urban metropolis. But as I boosted past one of them, flying through the air, it suddenly caught my attention for some reason.

  I skidded onto the next building, turned, and looked at the bright, glowing pink billboard. There were two letters. All it said was "Hi." I stood there, bathed in the neon glow, confused. I’d never seen this advertisement before. I shook my head, turned around, and continued on my way, flying across gaps with my new Jet Boots that I’d never been able to traverse before. As I passed another billboard, I came to a screeching halt again, turned, and looked at it. It was a picture of a housewife doing some sort of cleaning task. The billboard usually advertised some sort of home cleaning product, but this time, it felt like the woman was staring straight at me, and she was mouthing something.

  Was she saying "Hi"?

  I stood and stared for a minute, and the billboard glitched suddenly. It went back to the usual looping image of a woman cleaning and then smiling and presenting a bottle of cleaning product. Was I losing my mind? I needed to get home. I was exhausted and probably had a concussion or something. I'd had my brains rattled pretty bad back in the nightclub. Maybe that's all it was. I was pretty tired as well and I couldn't remember the last time I'd eaten. I just needed to get home, put my head down. I turned and sprinted off, and just as I was closing in on home, I felt the relief that my room was just there. My safe haven was so close. I could lock myself away in there, turn the lights off, shut the blinds, and just pretend the rest of the world didn't exist.

  Then the billboard in front of me changed before my eyes.

  "You're not going crazy," it read in giant white letters. I froze and stared at it. "Hi Gutter Mage," the billboard read. My eyes went wide, and I looked over my shoulder. What the hell? I looked back at the billboard, and there, in giant writing, it still said: "Gutter Mage." Was it talking to me? "Yes, you," the billboard suddenly said, the writing disappearing and reappearing. "They're still here," the billboard said. "They never left. You didn't win." My mouth went dry, and I stood staring at the billboard. Then a single word began to type out on it, one letter at a time: S-Y-N-D-I-C-A-T-E. ‘Syndicate. They're still active. They never stopped. They just went further underground, and they're coming for you.’

  Those final words flashed in bright red.

  ‘They’re coming for you.’