A Change of Pace – Season 2 – Chapter 50

Daisy wobbled as she suddenly appeared in the middle of a parking lot. What was usually sparsely populated was now bursting with activity. There were enough patrol cars, with blue lights flashing, to patrol a small city. A few ambulances sat idle not far from the entrance, but unlike the majority of the police officers, the paramedics were hard at work on two individuals. Daisy ignored them for the moment. The first thing she needed to do in a clusterfuck like this was find the person in charge.

“Thanks for the lift.” She told the black-suited DVA teleporter, who nodded and vanished with a subtle pop.

She stood where she was for another minute until the vertigo subsided, and then headed toward the most likely source of authority. In a sea of law enforcement, it was a tried and true practice to find the group with the biggest vehicle, the biggest gun, or the most Heroes huddled around it. In this instance, that meant a converted mobile home with DHA painted in big letters on the side, and a few familiar faces idling around the front door.

“Seraphim.” Daisy nodded to the shifter as she approached.

“Reaper.” The other Hero replied stiffly. “Why are you here?”

“The same as you,” Daisy replied. The conversation ended there because another familiar face descended from the mobile command center.

“Everyone listen up and gather around!” Agent Phillips called out over a loud speaker to get everyone’s attention. Her words caused a mass shift as dozens of bodies began to push toward the large vehicle.

Daisy made sure to shoot a glare over her shoulder so no one crowded her. It also gave the local and state PDs the correct impression that she wasn’t the smiling, chipper, morning show visiting Hero. She was here to get shit done.

“Earlier today, at approximately six pm, Sheriff Douglas pulled up on a seemingly abandoned vehicle that turned out to have a single occupant. The sheriff quickly determined that the individual was lying and detained them for failure to identify. The subject made a stink about it, but came back to the station willingly. Attempts to ascertain the identity of the subject were unsuccessful due to equipment failure, and they were placed in lock up until such time as more resources became available. This was the subject.”

A screen unfurled down the side of the command center, and an unseen projector hummed to life to show a picture of the subject.

<Shit.> Daisy recognized the face of Seth Abney immediately. <What the hell are you doing Seth?>

Debora let the assembled lawmen and women take a good look at the picture before continuing. “The subject is Seth Abney, a HCP-trained broad spectrum elemental manipulator. If you locate Mr. Abney, do not approach. Call for backup and let the Heroes handle it. His intentions are unknown, but he recently escaped from a joint DHA police department detention center in Florida.”

Daisy had a hard time believing that Seth would really hurt any cops that found him, but he’d probably rough them up a bit so he could escape.

“At approximately 6:45pm a call came into the local dispatch.” Debora played the recording. The stupidity of it got a couple of cops to laugh, but Daisy knew better. She was ninety-nine percent sure who was on the other end of that line with the sheriff’s deputy. Debora seemed to be thinking the same thing, because next up was video footage from the police station standing on the other side of the parking lot. “At roughly seven, the individual from the call showed up here.” She played the footage and the laughter faded into silence as the car pulled in, a woman got out, hid her face from the camera, talked with the deputy, and teleported.

“Son of a…” Daisy heard a few of the cops inhale as the deputy went down and the chase between the second subject and the sheriff ensued.

It all ended with a spectacular explosion, and the destruction of two police cars. The cameras went out as shrapnel smashed into them. The sheriff survived, but he was definitely one of the two people getting treated by the paramedics right now.

“The woman who entered the station, disabled the deputy, teleported around the place, and released Mr. Abney before destroying public property with military-grade ordinance is this woman.” A mug shot of Wraith appeared on the screen. “The supervillain Wraith, aka Liz Aretino, and from recent intelligence we also believes goes by Lilly, is armed and extremely dangerous. She is a wanted terrorist implicated in the Orlando bombings earlier this year. She was tried and sentenced to life for multiple murders, and attempted murder on law enforcement officials. If you see her, do not approach, and radio in the Heroes.” Debora nodded at Seraphim and Daisy, but Daisy felt she really meant her.

“Lastly, we believe the third individual, the one that remained in the vehicle during the entire exchange, to be this woman.” A third person appeared on the projector. She looked like a half-starved junkie with crazy eyes, disheveled hair, and an unhealthy pallor to her skin. “This is Morina, no last name known, code name Blood Hound. She is a blood manipulator and convicted serial killer. She has a psychological compulsion, believed to be from a combination of her powers and traumatic experiences, to drain victims of their blood and bathe in it. Due to her abilities, this process seems to provide her with either some form of nourishment or refreshment. Make no mistake, despite how fucked up she is, she is an addict, and addicts make mistakes when they start jonesing for their drug of choice. Blood Hound was arrested after the ritual murder of more than two dozen people, sentenced, and locked up in Supermax until the recent breakout. It is believed that she met Wraith while in prison, and they befriended each other as much as there can be friendship between people like this.”

Daisy did a quick scan and saw a lot of disturbed looks on people’s faces. These were rural cops who’d never seen anything like this, and probably never would again. They’d be telling stories of ‘when the supervillain murderers came through town’ at the bar in thirty years, if they weren’t stupid and got themselves killed. Daisy refocused on Debora and saw someone was whispering in her ear. The look on the DHA agents face said it wasn’t good.

“Ok, we’ve got bodies people.” The statement sent a shock through the group. “A family of five was just found exsanguinated in a town not far from here. “Seraphim, I want you to lead a response team and secure the scene. You’re a fast mover and can get places quicker than we can in our vehicles.”

“On it.” Seraphim didn’t argue, which took Daisy by surprise. The Hero just jumped into the air and disappeared off in the direction Dispatch was directing her.

“Captain,” she turned to an older cop with an impressive mustache. You need to make sure you’ve got good communications with the roadblocks you’ve set up. Hunter is going to act as the quick reaction force to get on scene fast if someone encounters the subjects. Reaper, you’ll go with Hunter.”

“Yes, ma’am.” Daisy and the cop answered at the same time. She nodded to Hunter who stood at the top of the stairs to the command center before walking away. While everyone else was planning the ‘what if’ scenarios, she wanted to grab some intel.

She walked across the parking lot to the only people who’d interacted with Wraith in the last few days. “Sheriff Douglas?” She poked her head in the back of an ambulance, where a rugged man in a tattered uniform sat.

“Yes,” he had an oxygen mask on and there was noticeable bruising on his skin.

“Reaper,” she expended her hand. The pressure he exerted in return showed he was a super. “You’re lucky, Sheriff.”

“I know that now,” the man replied humbly. “I just thought it was some stupid kid as first, until the cars blew up. Now that I know who she was, I feel like she was toying with me.”

“What can you tell me about what happened?” Daisy sat down on the bumper.

“Well…” Coughs suddenly wracked the man, and he took a couple of deep pulls from the oxygen tank before he could speak again. “Sorry,” he apologized. “I can walk away from getting shot and a small explosion, but get enough smoke in my lungs and I’m just like everyone else.” His grin was charming, and Daisy smiled back politely. “Well…I came out to check on Emily, my deputy, something seemed off, and I found her down in the office. Then Wraith shot me in the ass with some sort of fancy stun gun. It hurt like hell, but I didn’t go down. I’m not HCP trained or anything, but I had great teachers at the police academy, and I know who to use my strength. I pursued, but it was like trying to catch the wind. Every time I got close she’d tag me once or twice with a real gun, and then vanish. I think I did get her once, but it didn’t slow her down. Now looking back on it, she was looking for the guy I brought in earlier. She got him out and led me away. I followed the bigger threat, and that’s when the cars blew up.” The sheriff shrugged, but Daisy could tell he was still upset about everything.

“You did everything you could.” She did her best to comfort him, but that wasn’t really her strong suit. What was, was identifying that Wraith was going for non-killing blows at first and only escalating when she knew the guy could take it.

<Apparently, Seth might be a good influence after all.> That went both ways though. Wraith had dragged him out of a promising HCP career and into a life of crime, so it wasn’t worth the tradeoff.

Next, Daisy talked to Emily, the deputy. She didn’t have much to add other than a description that matched Wraith. Then, Daisy walked the station to get a feel for what happened. Forensics had already been through, but she saw the yellow placards set where they found evidence like blood and bullet casings. It did seem like the sheriff grazed her, which was closer than Daisy ever got.

<Hell of a way to spend Christmas.> Daisy walked around the outside of the building to the check the burnt husks of police cars before returning to the command vehicle.

The fact with these types of manhunts was that they involved a lot of sitting around and waiting. The DHA had a teleporter and team standing by for when contact was made, but until then, a lot of the leg work needed to be done by local and state law enforcement. They knew what they were looking for, and what direction the three suspects had been heading from the security footage, but in this part of the country there were a lot of backroads to get around things like roadblocks.

Daisy really wanted to help, but there wasn’t much she could do. The DHA might have other resources they could put into play, but Daisy wasn’t read in on those, or aware if they were already in action. All she knew what her job was to stay by Hunter and go when they got word.

That didn’t stop the waiting from sucking, especially since the call might never come. With the person they were chasing being Wraith, Daisy had to place the odds in the fugitive’s favor.

Previous                              Next

A Change of Pace – Season 2 – Chapter 42

Isla was still shaking when she exited the tent where the pushy soldier had asked her questions. Only part of the shaking was due to the explosion that had ripped through the city, and the chaos that followed. A lot of her anxiety had to do with the recent questioning.

No one told her how to handle that situation. She had her SI requirements, but this wasn’t some collegiate administrator or other student bugging her for details about her Super status. This was the Army and the DVA. They weren’t fucking around, and she didn’t know where to draw the line. So, she ended up telling them everything.

The soldier hadn’t even blinked when she whispered she was a member of West Private HCP’s freshman class. He’d probably become even more intrusive. Isla’s eyes had scanned the room for help in those moments; begging and praying that Coach McMillian or Coach Meyers would step in and handle everything.

She noticed some people in the room from around the HCP, one or two members of her own class, and then a bunch of normal looking people who she guessed were members of the Orlando civilian population who just happened to be Supers.

“Isla?” A familiar voice called out her name.

She turned around and saw a small gathering of her classmates. Since Aiden was the tallest, he was the one she saw waving her over. She hurried over to join the group, which had a couple of sophomores present. A terrorist attack kind of threw the “don’t group together and draw attention” instructions out the window. People were more concerned with their own shit, and the group of young Supers was only drawing limited attention.

“Hey.” She huddled with the rest of the group, her body still shaking a bit.

“Do you want my jacket?” Aiden asked with a look of concern.

“I’m good,” Isla shook her head and lifted her chin up. She didn’t want the rest of the class to think she was going into shock from everything. She was training to be a Hero, and Heroes didn’t shy away from the ugly.

“Can you believe that shit?” Scarlett was standing near the center of the group and fuming. “They’re questioning anyone who isn’t one hundred percent human and grilling them about their ‘involvement’.” She put the last word in air quotes.

“They’re just doing their jobs.” Someone else commented, but Scarlett just gave them a dismissive hand wave.

“I’m telling…” Scarlett started but stopped suddenly and just shook her head. “I’m just saying it feels wrong, and I’ve got a better idea about how that shit world works than the rest of you.”

“Not all of us.” Kyoshi Schultz stepped into the conversation and ignored the glare Scarlett shot her way. “But Scarlett has a point. It’ll be better if we head back to school and discuss this stuff there.”

No sooner were the words out of her mouth than all their phones got a text message simultaneously. It was a campus alert from the school. It told everyone to return to campus, if possible, so the school could get accountability of their students.

“Let’s go.” Kyoshi took charge and started to lead the group of students toward the nearest bus station.

It was a ten-minute ride back to the edge of campus and then another ten minutes for them all to get back down into the HCP without drawing too much attention. They had to be extra careful to ensure that no one followed them from the bombing site and tried to blow their secret identities. A random person off the street claiming that someone might be a Super from what they looked like back at the bombing sites was one thing, making a claim on campus was another. Everyone hoped that no one’s cover was blown in the next few days. That would just be the icing on the shit cake.

One of the professors that Isla didn’t really know – a Professor Willis – gathered them together in the gym and started to check names of a list.

“Everyone needs to stay put until we know the status of all the students. There are refreshments in the corner if you’re hungry. Getting a little sugar in you after what you’ve seen might not be a bad idea. Others might want to be proactive, do something so they don’t feel useless.” The Professor wasn’t pulling any punches. “If that’s the case, then get into your uniforms and I’ll run you through an exciting training exercise.”

Isla wasn’t sure what she wanted to do, but the exodus of students to the locker room made the decision for her. She went in and got into her black uniform and hit the track for their five mile warmup.

It wasn’t until a few miles in that she started to feel better. Getting the blood pumping was keeping her from thinking about everything that could go wrong in the next few days, and what had happened in the last few hours. The rhythmic breathing of her running helped to clear her mind and focus it on the simple tasks right in front of her.

The rest of the class was the same way. Soon, their concerns about the bombing fell away as they got further into their workout. That was exactly what Professor Willis wanted. When he was sure no one was looking he glanced back down at his checklist. There were a few names that didn’t have a checkmark next to them, and the DVA was reporting that all Supers had been interviewed and evacuated from the immediate area. The old Subtlety Hero hoped they were in route or else their week was about to get a lot worse.

 

***

 

“Three…two…one…BREECH…BREECH…BREECH!”

Daisy listened for the go order before taking action. She already had the life lines of everyone in that building dialed in. All she had to do was squeeze. Thirty-one people went limp and dropped to the floor. She suspected at least a few would have collateral injuries from the fall, but that wasn’t a big concern.

Loud cracks of gunfire cut through the air as snipers took out windows. The blinds and curtains were drawn so no one could get a bead on Nightingale, but there was always a chance someone would get lucky, and with the civilians unconscious on the floor, the risk to innocent people was minimal.  That was only a secondary goal. The primary reason was for the SWAT members repelling down from the roof to have easy access into the building.

That was only one phase of the complicated operation. Usually, you wanted to keep an assault like this simple, but nothing was simple with a psychopath like Nightingale. They had to go in from as many angles as possible. Daisy dropping the civilians was just a small part in the plan. Right now, Hunter was teleporting SWAT all over the place in the building to cover as many different approaches as possible.

The plan was to contain her as much as possible before she could even move. Daisy might be out on the perimeter, but Hunter was getting in on the action. He still had his big gun and been in more than his share of fire fights.

Gunshots rang out and the radio filled up with chatter. Daisy gripped the side of her chair and squeezed. The groan of warping metal was drowned in the hurried reports and yells of agents and SWAT officers.

More gunshots rang out. “Man down!”

“Shit…she’s…” Static followed.

“Hunter, report.” Agent Phillips was at the center of the chaos trying to hold down the fort.

“We’re pinned, she’s got…” The staccato roll of a rifle on full auto rang out and crashes and curses could be heard over Hunter’s line.

<Fuck it!> Daisy pivoted, broke through the perimeter, and reached the front door in a few kinetically-powered leaps. People were screaming behind her, but she didn’t give a shit. People were dying and she was able to do something about it.

A SWAT member in black tactical gear was slumped over a railing on the first floor landing. Blood dripped from two holes right where his armor ended and his neck began. It was expert shooting, which made Daisy take a few deep breaths.

<I should have grabbed a radio.> She shook her head. Her leg still itched like a bitch and she was beginning to regret her impulsive action.

A three-round burst rang out above her followed by a scream. Daisy grabbed the dead SWAT member’s side arms before bounding up the stairs two at a time. More bodies and blood filled the hallways. They’d all been expertly targeted with shots where their armor didn’t cover them or was weak. A good few were still alive, but they wouldn’t stay that way for long without medical attention.

“Hold on,” she whispered as she continued to move toward the sporadic gun fire.

It sounded like it was getting higher and higher, so she kept up her pursuit. The first bullet fired her way was meant to keep her head down. It smacked into the wood hard a few inches from her head. Splinters shot toward her face, but her absorption made them fall limply to the ground.

The gunfire was no longer sporadic. Shots rang out every few seconds. Daisy didn’t need a radio to hear the SWAT teams talking with each other and converging on Nightingale’s position. The BOOM of Hunter’s rifle felt like it made the whole building shake.

“Push! Push!” someone yelled. Two SWAT officers appeared in the hall in front of her and started moving forward while methodically firing to keep Nightingale behind cover.

It didn’t work.

Daisy didn’t see how the supervillain had gotten her shots off, but both officers went down. One had blood fountaining from his neck, while the other one grabbed his leg and screamed. Daisy rushed up the last few stairs to the landing and reached for the nearest guy. He was only a few yards from the cover of the landing, but that still put her in the open.

The first round hit her in the shoulder just as she got a grip on the back of the guy’s vest. She expected the unbelievable pain of a gunshot wound to radiate through her body, but instead heard the soft ping of the bullet falling uselessly to the ground.

“Fuck!” Nightingale swore from down the hall.

Daisy didn’t waste any time. She gave the guy a mighty pull and he flew back into the cover of the stairwell. His landing wasn’t pretty, but a few bruises were worth not bleeding out. Another round flew in her direction as she dove back behind cover. It barely missed her, and this time she felt the twinge of a bullet dipped in Nightingale’s nullifying goo.

<She’s not always using her special ammo.> Daisy thought as she quickly ripped off the SWAT guy’s belt and made a tourniquet to stop the bleeding. <It makes sense.>

It would take time and effort to coat the bullets and load them into magazines, and time was something she clearly didn’t have as the combined effort of the SWAT teams drove her back.

“Reaper, what the fuck are you doing here!” Hunter darted out of the hallway to take cover next to her.

“Helping.” She answered simply as she checked the shot officer’s pulse.

She couldn’t see the other Hero’s face behind his mask, but she could tell by the tightness in his neck that he was pissed. “Fine.” He ultimately relented. “You already inadvertently helped us. You kept her away from the stairs, and that stopped her upward progression. We’ve got her contained on this floor for now.”

A BOOM way louder than gun fire made the whole building shake and loose pieces of plaster fell from the ceiling.

“Unless she has an exit strategy.” Daisy and Hunter looked at each other for a moment before sprinting back into action.

“Watch him.” Hunter yelled back to the still-advancing SWAT teams, but the two Heroes took the lead. No shots rang out as they approached. “I’ll go high you go low.” Hunter ordered.

Daisy brought up her gun and waited for Hunter to count them down. When he hit zero they burst into the room to find…nothing.

“What the…” there was a large hole in the floor and nothing else in the room.

The two Heroes approached it carefully. Daisy poked her head in and jerked it back quickly to avoid any fire. Nothing came her way, but she got a good look at what was below.

“Shit.” She lowered her weapon and took a deep breath.

Hunter poked his head down and let out a similar curse. Below them were two more holes that lead all the way into the darkness beneath the building.

“She’s in the sewer!” Hunter passed the information along so the cops could expand the perimeter, but that was asking a lot. There had to be a thousand manhole covers in the city, not to mention other outlets. Nightingale could pop up anywhere.

“How did this fucking happen?!” Hunter finished his radio call and then kicked a chair over in anger.

“My guess is that she had military-grade detcord wrapped around her body,” Daisy guessed, but it had been a rhetorical question.

The DVA and cops would do what they could. They’d deploy everyone. Try and secure everything, but Nightingale was a trained operative, and they couldn’t be everywhere at once. Plus, if Nightingale went one on one with a patrol officer at a man hole she’d win.

<At least we’ve got Stal.> Iron Giant had made sure of that.

Daisy just hoped it was enough to get the ball rolling, reacquire Nightingale, find Wraith, figure out what the hell Abney was thinking, and ultimately put a stop to Seif al-Din’s plans.

With everything hanging over her head like this, the upcoming holidays were starting to lose some of their appeal.

Previous                                   Next

A Change of Pace – Season 2 – Chapter 40

“I hate this.”

“Of course you hate it.” Iron Giant was fully healed and sitting up on a cot in the medical tent the DVA had set up. Dr. Sanderson had outdone himself and stitched the wounded Hero up in record time.

Daisy wished her healer was as good. The hole in her calf was all patched up, but it felt like her bone itself had crabs. It itched like a mother, and this wasn’t an itch she could scratch without ripping open her leg. The healer confidently told her it would feel better in a few hours before walking away. Daisy had to grit her teeth not to drop the man on the spot. Even now she had to bite the inside of her cheek to give her mind something else to think about other than the persistent itch.

“You’ve always been a woman of action, and the woman that could be called upon to take the steps to resolve this type of situation. It frustrated you that you can’t be the one to end this.” Iron Giant stated calmly as he watched the TV screens.

The DVA had set up a tactical operations center in the tent next to theirs, and they had perfect seats to the unfolding operation. As Daisy had so painfully learned today, she was not the best Hero to deal with this situation. Her absorption didn’t work, and she was no better protected than the average cop when it came to a gunfight with the infamous villain. Not even John, as strong as he was, was a good fit.

Surprisingly, this was a less-is-more situation. The Orlando PD and the DVA were taking the lead this time. Nightingale strength was against Supers, not humans. To them, she was just a well-trained and well-armed hostage taker, and they had procedures in place to deal with these situations.

“There goes the power.” Daisy remarked as the lights to building finally flickered off. If it was the summer it would have become unbearably hot in the building within the hour, but this close to winter it wouldn’t do anything. The step would really work to the authority’s advantage in a few hours when the sun started to go down.

“Nightingale, this is the Department of Variant Affairs. We want to talk with you to bring this situation to a peaceful conclusion. We are tossing a cell phone to the front door. Please take it so we can talk.” Agent Phillips announced through a megaphone.

Three officers slowly moved forward toward the door of the building while the DVA agent spoke. Two had shields that they were using to cover them against attack. The third was crouched in the center of the protective shell and was holding the phone. They made it to within five feet of the door, stopped, and tossed the phone lightly so it landed in plain sight of the door. Then, they slowly moved back. Once they’d put enough space between themselves and the door, the door cracked open and a scared looking woman stepped out.

Nightingale wasn’t stupid enough to come into the open and grab the phone herself, so she had one of the hostages doing it. The villain looked like she’d caught the woman relaxing on the local half-day. She was in pajama pants, with bunny slippers, and a tank top with a bath robe thrown over it. She looked terrified, but there was a glint in her eye that Daisy immediately recognized.

“Shit! Don’t…” but it was too late. The woman pushed off and away from the door, making a break for safety.

She got about five feet before a loud POP cut through the air. Her body went instantly limp, and she fell forward hard, hit harder, and didn’t get up. Daisy couldn’t see, but feeds from officers’ helmet cameras showed a big, meaty hole in the back of the woman’s head.

<Fuuuuuck.> Daisy exhaled. <I fucking hate not being able to do anything.>

There was more movement near the door. Another person stepped out, a man this time. He looked at the woman’s lifeless body, Daisy thought he was going to puke for a second, but then he bent down, retrieved the phone, and walked back inside.

“That could have gone better.” Iron giant has a sorrowful look on his big, metal face. Most people would think that a man made of metal couldn’t be emotional, they’d be wrong.

Two DVA agents enter the tent and walk straight to them. “Reaper, Iron Giant, we’re here to escort you back to the HCP.”

Iron Giant just nodded and got up while Daisy gave them a hard stare. “Like hell you are.” She got to her feet and pushed passed the two men and walked the short distance to the command tent. She burst in ready to raise hell but everyone was silent and focused on Agent Phillips.

“Yes…Yes…Yes…We could do that if you let some hostages go as a gesture of good will.” The agent’s tone was calm and collected, but her face quickly wrinkled in fury. She calmly set the phone down and took a deep breath. “That fucking bitch.”

“So, I guess releasing hostages is a no.” Hunter stood off to the side. In another time or place the statement might have been funny, but no one was laughing here.

“She said she’d send them out in pieces if I didn’t do exactly what she wanted.” The DVA agent ran her hand through her hair.

“And those demands are…?” Hunter pressed her.

“She wants us to back up the perimeter two blocks, which gives us no line of sight except the snipers on the rooftops. She wants a teleporter she chooses to come in and take her away. After that, and only after that, will she release the thirty two…now thirty-one hostages,” she corrected herself.

“So, what’s the breech plan?” Daisy stepped fully into the tent.

“Reaper, you’re supposed to be out of here,” Agent Phillips looked passed Daisy at the two suited men who’d followed her in. One reached for Daisy’s elbow, but the look she shot him made him step back reflexively.

“I’m of better use here than anywhere else.” Daisy countered and plopped down next to the big table littered with diagrams of the building. It took every ounce of will power she had to not itch her leg.

“I’m not sure what use you’ll be. Your powers are useless against Nightingale.” Another DVA agent spoke up. He actually sounded like he was happy about that, so Daisy shuffled him onto her shit list.

“Her’s…yes…everyone else’s…no.” She smiled. “When shit finally goes down one thing that’s always a risk is having civilians do stupid shit, step into the line of fire, and just generally be a nuisance when we try to save them. I’m the perfect person to make sure that doesn’t happen.”

“She’s got a point.” Hunter stepped forward. “I can get teams into prepositioned places if we can get eyes in there and know where she is. We’ll be able to hit her hard and fast while Daisy drops all the civilians. We might have a few broken noses, but that’s better than SWAT shooting an innocent civilian.”

Daisy looked from Agent Phillips to Hunter, and knew she had them convinced.

“Fine. You can stay, but please stay out of my way.” Agent Phillips shot her a no-nonsense look.

“No problem.” Daisy leaned back casually in the chair and smiled.

Previous                               Next

A Change of Pace – Season 2 – Chapter 39

<Who knew muscles could be a bad thing.> Morina huffed as she dragged Seth across the ground.

Wraith’s final teleport had dropped them in the middle of nowhere, which was a good thing considering what they’d fled from. The location was a dirt crossroads with some signs pointing toward the nearest civilization. She had to wipe the grime off them to read, and it told her the closest help was ten miles away. That was good and bad.

It was good that people wouldn’t ambush them, and bad because Seth looked like he was going to die. The blood dripping from him was calling to her, but she fought against the temptation. Wraith would teleport her into a volcano if she exsanguinated her man. So, she did the only thing she could think of. She pulled them off the crossroads.

She did Wraith first because that’s what friends were for. After everything that had happened in the last few months, Wraith might be the only person she could call a friend. Morina had liked Nightingale, but she knew a predator when she saw one, and what that type of person was capable of. After all, she was one.

After she dragged Wraith over to the side of the road she went back for Seth. Wraith was fit and athletic, but she didn’t weigh more than a buck thirty. With her armor, maybe one-fifty. Seth was easily over two hundred pounds. He would be good at punching things and dragging other people, but dragging him was a pain in the ass.

<Come on tons of fun.> She heaved, slipped, and landed right on her ass; making the pain he was causing her literal.

She coughed from the cloud of dust thrown into the air by her impromptu sit, and waved her hand rapidly to clear it. It might be nearing the holiday season, and the rest of the country was starting to see chilly temperatures, but wherever they were in Alabama it was still hot and dry.

She gathered herself after the dust cleared, grabbed Seth under the arm pits, and continued her slow trek to the drainage ditch where she’d placed Wraith.

She didn’t hear the person approach over her own grunting and the scrape of Seth’s body against the ground, but she did catch the clink of the weapon being taken off safe and pointed at her.

<Shit.> Her power swelled inside her, but she held it in.

She might be able to stop the blood from leaking out of her from a gunshot, but that wouldn’t fix the hole and whatever internal destruction the bullet wrought. Instead, she dropped Seth and raised her hands.

“We’re looking for a healer.” She figured saying they needed help was better than attacking him.

The fact that she didn’t get shot was a good sign she was headed in the right direction.

“These two.” The voice didn’t have that southern I-screw-my-sister drawl that the movies always portrayed people from this area having. In fact, she thought she heard some New York swagger in the person’s tone.

“Yep. One got shot and the other is purely exhausted.”

“I can fix the girl up for five hundred, but the guy is going to depend on the damage. I only take cash.”

<Shit…shit…shit…> She didn’t have anything on her, but knowing Wraith, she did.

“My friend has the money. It’s in her pockets somewhere,” she explained. “I can get it for you?”

“No sudden movements or I put a hole in you too, and then if you’re telling the truth I’ll charge you double to patch you up.” The person replied. “Keep your back to me.”

They circled each other so that the guy had a clear shot and Morina would have to turn to engage him. She couldn’t attack what she couldn’t see. She had an errant thought that this healer might know who she was, or at least who Wraith was, but the fact that he hadn’t shot them or called the cops was a good sign.

Being a Super and having a medical practice out in bumfuck nowhere told her that this guy might have his own secrets. It was common knowledge that people in this part of the country weren’t as accepting of Supers. There tended to be more Super-related crime, less tolerance from the authorities, and more animosity between Supers, humans, and then both weren’t fond of Powereds.

<Yeah, this guy is definitely sketch.> She knelt slowly and started to rummage through Wraith’s pockets.

Her eyes were rolled into the back of her head and she didn’t budge as Morina practically felt her up to find the cash. There were a lot of pockets with everything from duct tape to spare magazines for her pistols in them. She stayed well clear of the holsters on her thighs, and eventually found what she was looking for.

A wad of cash was rolled up tight and held in place by a rubber band. The outside bill was a hundred, and judging by that there was either a few grand in here or the bills got smaller. She pulled off five bills and slowly extended them behind her. The healer’s boots crunched against the dry ground as he snatched the cash away without touching her hand.

“Take ten steps forward,” he ordered.

She complied and waited for him to do what he said he would do, or shoot her. At the moment, she wasn’t sure which way it would go.

“What the shit!” Wraith’s gasp broke the tense silent. “Awwwwww that hurts like a bitch!”

“Sorry, it’s a side-effect of my healing.” The healer apologized.

“Feeling like I’m about to have diarrhea made of fire is a side-effect. No wonder you don’t get much business.” Wraith snapped back, but the apparent discomfort quickly faded.

“Hello, can I look now?”

“Sure.”

Morina heard the click of the weapon being put back on safe, and she turned to face the man.

<Damn.> He wasn’t wearing blue-jean suspenders with a beer gut and straw hat.

The healer was in a professional looking three-piece suit minus the jacket. The sleeves of his white dress shirt were rolled up to his elbows, and he had some nice muscles too. The glasses on his face highlighted his hawkish nose, but Morina didn’t mind, and his hair was an unnatural white color. He had a sleek hunting rifle tucked under his armpit, and he was extending a hand out to help Wraith up.

A spike a jealousy ran through Morina’s mind before she stomped it out. She didn’t know this guy from Adam, she shouldn’t be jealous that he was being nice to Wraith and not her. Plus, Wraith had Seth.

Wraith smacked the guy’s hand aside and climbed to her feet. She stumbled a bit, put her hands on her knees to steady herself, and took some deep breaths. “Is the nausea common too?” she asked.

“Yeah, it’ll pass just as fast as your intestinal pain.” The healer took a step back and watched the two women casually. The weapon was pointed harmlessly at the ground, but the way he handled it said he knew how to use it.

“I’m good.” Wraith straightened up and took one final deep breath. “Now help him.”

“He needs more than just an influx of energy.” The healer didn’t move from where he was standing. “I need to evaluate the wound, and probably clean it before patching him up.”

“What type of healer can’t disinfect wounds with his healing power?” Wraith turned to glare at the man.

“The only healer that you’ve got, and one who’s willing to turn a blind eye to your suspicious circumstances.” The guy had a point, and Seth didn’t look like he was going to survive another teleport.

“Fine, where do you need him?” Wraith kneeled next to Seth and with a surprising amount of tenderness started to check his vitals.

“My office is a short walk this way.”

Morina looked where he pointed and saw a dirt road that she’d missed up until now. If she looked at it from the right angle she could make out a small building nestled in the trees.

“Ok, Morina, help me.” Wraith grabbed Seth under the arm pits and she grabbed the legs. Together, they carried Seth down the dust driveway and into a surprisingly modern and clean room.

The outside of the building was clearly disguised to look like a mix between a shack and small house. Inside, it had a small ground floor set up as an office, and a large basement that the healer seemed to live in.

The healer bypassed the small office and took them downstairs and to a big room in the back. He opened the door and they were standing on the edge of an operating room.

“Get him on the table and get those clothes off,” he instructed.

“Whatever you say, Doc.” Wraith led the way on striping down her boyfriend.

“Mazel tov,” was the only thing Morina could think to say when she saw his junk.

“Now out, I need to work.” The healer ushered them both out of the room and shut the door behind him.

“Now what,” Morina crossed her arms across her chest and looked around the living room.

“Now we wait.” Wraith plopped down and turned on the TV.

It didn’t take Morina long to figure out her friend wasn’t even watching the daytime soap opera on the high-definition plasma. Her eyes kept darting to the door, her foot kept tapping against the tile, and she kept having to stop herself from chewing on her cuticles.

Wraith was worried, and Morina really couldn’t do anything to help.

 

***

 

“SNIPER!” Someone yelled as Iron Giant hit the ground as John.

<No shit!> Daisy didn’t waste any time in reacting.

They knew who the sniper was, where she was, what she was armed with, and exactly how many hostages she was holding. Unfortunately, some people were a little trigger happy after everything that had happened today. Law enforcement started taking shots at the building Nightingale was holding up in.

“Cease fire! Cease fire!” The police captain and DVA Agent Phillips were screaming over the Dispatch link.

Daisy took the moment of cover the return fire provided and dashed into action. Her legs pumped kinetic energy into the street as she pushed herself toward John’s prone body. She stopped on a dime next to him, ignoring the whiplash it exerted on her body, and picked him up in a bridal carry. She’d never be able to do this with Iron Giant, but little old John Ditmar was a different story.

“D…D…” blood leaked out of John’s mouth, and Daisy’s uniform was already slick with his blood.

“Hold on!” She turned around, and nearly took a bullet to the head. The turn was the only thing that saved her, but she felt the air parting against the bullet right next to her face.

“Cover me!” She yelled.

A force field appeared between her and the building Nightingale was using as a sniper’s nest. Daisy pushed off at the same time the second round hit the energy barrier. The barrier shattered as the bullet dipped in Nightingale’s nullifying goo and cracked into the pavement just to Daisy’s right.

<Fuck!> this wasn’t the first time Daisy had been under fire, but it might be the first time the bullets could actually kill her.

She was tempted to jump to safety, but that was an amateur mistake. You didn’t have any maneuverability in the air, especially while you were carrying someone as fragile as the currently very vulnerable Dean of West Private’s HCP. The jump up might be quick, but once she reached the apex, and started to come back down, Nightingale would be able to pick her off easy.

She needed to make herself a hard target to hit, and to do that she need some help. “Jetwash, you pompous ass, create a distraction. Blind her with wind, kick up enough shit so she can’t see, or draw her attention!” Daisy screamed the order.

Unlike her, the wind manipulator could easily maneuver in the air.

“Force Field, keep throwing up barriers. I don’t know if they’re deflecting shots a little, but even an inch helps.” Daisy knew Nightingale was a top-notch shot, so the last miss probably had something to do with the barrier’s temporary interference. “Get a healer ready.”

Daisy was running in a serpentine as she said all of this. She tried to keep out of the buildings line of sight as much as possible, but with the way the street was designed there just wasn’t anywhere to hide.

The wind started whipping and dust was kicked up enough that it made it hard to see.

<Not me you idiot!> It looked like something out of those old dust bowl films rolling onto the street, but instead of focusing on Nightingale it affected everyone.

Daisy ran right into it, and her visibility was cut to nothing immediately. Even worse, the dust stung at her eyes and made it difficult to see at all.

“Someone talk me through this. I can’t see shit!” Daisy had slowed to a straightforward walk as the dust swirled all around her.

<God, I hope she doesn’t have some type of heat vision.>

That got answered soon enough. A round tore through Force Fields barrier at a different angle. Nightingale had compensated, but her aim still wasn’t perfect. Instead of punching into Daisy’s center of mass, or John, it went into and through her calf.

Daisy dropped John who went rolling away into the dust storm while she cursed up her own storm. <Don’t stop!> She knew a lack of movement meant death, so she started to crawl.

Opposite leg and arm went up and she pulled herself forward, and then the other two. Every other crawl pain lanced through her as her open wound scraped against the ground. She searched out in front of her with her hands until they finally made contact. It wasn’t John. It was someone’s boot.

“Reaper, Ma’am.” A man in a SWAT tactical uniform stepped in-between her and Nightingale’s position with a large riot shield. “This should give us some cover.”

More police officers rushed forward and made a shield wall to protect the two injured Heroes.

“Iron Giant first.” Daisy grimaced as two more officers helped her to her feet. “He’s hit a lot worse than I am.”

“We’re on it, Ma’am.” The first officer to arrive nodded to another team of barely discernable black blobs moving in the dust cloud only a few feet away. “On my command we move!” He yelled to the rest of his team.

On three, the team started to shift. More fire rained down on them from Nightingale’s position, but their riot shields did what Daisy’s power couldn’t. Rounds pinged off the shield but didn’t penetrate. The team moved slowly and cautiously. They were respectful of Nightingale’s skill as a marksman. The fact the villain was hitting anything in this storm was amazing. Force Field threw up barriers more as a way to light the way to safety than protect them. Finally, after a few tense minutes, the team rounded a corner, the dust died down, and they were out of the villain’s line of sight.

“Healer!” The SWAT commander yelled as a pair of costumed Heroes approached Daisy and John. Dr. Sanderson was one of them.

“I’ve got him.” Golden mist stared to pour off the good Doctor as he crouched protectively over John.

Daisy didn’t recognize the other Hero, but his method of healing made her itch like a motherfucker. While she was waiting for the sensation to claw her own leg off to pass, Agent Phillips found her.

“Reaper.” The woman’s tone and voice made it clear she was pissed. “How about we don’t run out into the middle of an open street during an active shooter incident, where your powers are useless, and then we have to put more lives at risk coming out to save you.” She took a step closer. “Plus, do you know how much shit I would catch from my brother if you didn’t get out of this alive.”

“I’m sure a ton.” Daisy just shrugged. “I couldn’t leave Iron Giant.”

The DVA agent didn’t try to lecture her there because she knew it wouldn’t do any good.

“So what now?”

“Now we wait for the hostage negotiator to arrive, we set up a perimeter, cut the power to the building, and try to get the hostages to safety. Anything you can give us there?” Agent Phillips looked in the direction of the building.

“Thirty-two people not including Nightingale.” Daisy relayed what she was seeing with her sixth sight. “Do you think she’ll come quietly?”

“With her record…not a chance in hell. If she gets caught she’s going back to Avalon, and I don’t want to think what the government there has in store for the old regime’s chief torturer.”

“Good point.” Daisy suppressed a shiver.

<Things are about to get interesting.> She looked over at where John was transforming back into Iron Giant. <Or at least more interesting than a few minutes ago. It’s been a while since I’ve been in on a hostage negotiation.>

Previous                                                        Next

A Change of Pace – Season 2 – Chapter 30

It felt good to be back in the suit. This wasn’t some emergency situation thing while the latest shitstorm was passing through town. Daisy was legit back in the show now, even though her Hero certification hadn’t been technically restored yet. There were more tests for her to take at the D.C. office when she got the free time, but the Protectorate was able to get around that right now by having her temporary status extended indefinitely until her certification reactivated. She was in team’s rotation part-time for the time being, and right now that meant she was the Hero on call.

She’d had customized fatigues ordered and delivered within twenty-four hours. They were a hell of a lot better than the crap they’d issued her for Mr. Morningstar’s detail. The fabric was lightweight and breathable while still being made of a ballistic material that would stop most small caliber ammunition. It was nothing like her old uniform that could hold together under artillery fire, but things were different here in Florida. She’d die of dehydration in that material down here, and it didn’t matter much for a kinetic absorber what caliber round it could handle. What did matter was them being top-grade fire-retardant material. She’d nearly been burned alive once in the last year and she wasn’t planning on going for two.

She’d dug her old domino mask out of her things, strapped it on, and immediately discarded it. It didn’t fit the circumstances. Shit was sliding sideways fast, and she didn’t need something to convey that. Her full-face shield came in with the rest of the uniform. The designer, a go-to for any serious Hero, had styled some red accents onto the metallic-black material that gave it a little devilish flair. On top of it went her black patrol cap. She’d had to slap it against her leg half a dozen times to get all the dust off of it, but it fit just right, and she wasn’t willing to get a new one. Her short hair went into a ponytail and through the open space at the back, and she was Reaper again.

Despite that, it had been a long time since she’d been on a call like this. <At least ten years.> She thought as she lifted the thin, yellow caution tape that made a horizontal barrier across the door of the apartment complex.

Even when she’d still been an active Hero, Daisy had usually been brought in for scorched-earth missions or things deemed serious by Iron Giant or the DVA. John was well aware of her short temper back then, so he didn’t waste her time with minor league shit. She was a different person now, and KaBoom was a different leader, so she got the same assignments as everyone else.

The neighbors were out in the hallway and their eyes went wide as she strode confidently down the hall to the gaggle of whispering detectives. She didn’t know if they remembered her from a decade ago, or if they just thought she looked bad ass. She didn’t pay them any attention other than a quick scan to classify them as non-threatening. What she was trying to figure out was the lead detective’s name. She’d seen him around the precinct before, and Topher had even introduced them once.

“Detective Martinez,” she gave herself a mental high-five when the man turned to regard her.

The next few interactions were crucial. Even though she wasn’t a new Hero in Orlando’s scene, she was new to the routine calls, and that meant she needed to carefully cultivate a relationship with the rank and file of the OPD. How she acted here with Detective Martinez was going to be spread around through the force. She was pretty sure the SWAT guys and a few uniforms that worked on the raids might have some stories, but Martinez was going to be the first to interact with her like this.

“Reaper.” He acknowledged her with a head nod and a look that said ‘I don’t really need you here, but I’ll take the help I can get’. It was a hell of a lot better than ‘Who the fuck do you think you are, and why do you think you can walk right into my crime scene and run the show?’.

“What have we got?” She decided to play it business-like for now.

“Nothing.”

She did a double take and got confirmation when Martinez shrugged.

“I’m not even sure why we’re here.”

“You’re here because I asked,” Daisy turned to see Debora striding down the hallway. She had her pant-suit jacket pulled to the side to show her DVA badge to the officer who looked like he was going to move to block her.

“Agent Phillips.” Reaper gave her the same tone and nod she did Martinez. Local vs. Federal beef was something she did not want to get in the middle of.

“Reaper.” The DVA agent returned the nod and strode past her and the detectives to the room where a man with CSI in big letters on his back was taking pictures of a perfectly clean apartment.

Too clean.

<Badge and gun on the table…no sign of forced entry…nothing looks like it’s been taken…> Daisy might not have done this in a while, but she remembered the basics.

“Do you mind telling us what the hell is going on?” Martinez asked as he followed Debora into the living room. Daisy brought up the rear.

“This is the apartment of DVA Agent Simmons. She didn’t report to work this morning, she didn’t call in sick, and no one has been able to get a hold of her since she left the office last night. This is atypical behavior from an agent with stellar reviews and perfect attendance.”

“So…she went on a bender and hasn’t crawled back out of the bottle yet.” Martinez suggested as he accepted a pair of gloves that Debora was handing to everyone. Daisy’s outfit came with gloves, so she walked into the kitchen to take a look around while everyone pulled on the latex.

All Daisy could think of was butt inspections when she heard the snap of the plastic and the weird squeaking sound of them being adjusted. She quickly pushed the thoughts aside and looked around the kitchen. She opened the fridge and found a dedicated agent’s contents: half a carton of eggs, milk that was about to go bad, and take-out that was either fresh or had been in there way too long judging by the noxious fumes wafting into the air. It didn’t tell her much about the agent other than she was a workaholic.

“Agent Simmons is a young, talented agent. She did not go on a bender. She is missing.”

“Unless things have changed, someone usually has to be gone at least forty-eight hours to officially be classified as missing,” Daisy said her piece and didn’t bother looking at Debora. She could feel the heat of the DVA agent’s glare on her back.

“Normally, yes, but there are exigent circumstances in this case.”

“Which are…?” Martinez asked as the group made its way into the bedroom.

Daisy scanned the living room before following. The bed room looked just as clean, but the bed’s comforter was missing. <Weird,> she wondered if anyone had checked the washer.

“Agent Simmons was part of a two-person team that captured an individual assisting the supervillain known as Wraith yesterday.” No one needed any further explanation.

They all split up and started to do their detective thing, and Daisy went over to the CSI guy. He was a little star struck and stumbled over his answers. It was what she’d already surmised. They’d dusted for prints and everything, but so far they’d come up with diddly. The evidence was pointing more and more in the direction of the bender theory.

“Do you mind?” she asked as she grabbed the UV light from the CSI guy’s kit of tools.

He didn’t, but he said he already took a look at everything and didn’t find anything. It didn’t matter. She had a hunch. It wasn’t a lot to go on, but she couldn’t buy that the breakout from the supermax prison and anything Wraith did from now on was coincidental. There had to be a reason, and so far every prisoner except one was accounted for. She’d read the file and knew what to look for.

While everyone else poked around the bedroom, she shut herself in the bathroom and closed the door. She flipped on the UV lamp and watched as the blueish glow washed over everything. The tile was clean, too clean, and the CSI guy probably noted that in his report. She also bet that aside from the food in her fridge, Agent Simmons was a classic neat freak. The orderly apartment suggested it, so that cleanliness would be written off.

Daisy wasn’t willing to assume that. She waved the light and looked into all the nooks and crannies. There was nothing behind the toilet, anywhere in the back of the closet, or under the lip of the sink where someone’s foot might accidentally leave residue. She waved it over the tub and it was just as immaculate. She was about to move on when a momentary shine caught her eye.

“Someone get me a screw driver!” she called out. Less than ten seconds later Debora had one, and had squeezed into the dark space with Martinez.

Daisy unscrewed counterclockwise and the drain cover popped off. The top of it didn’t show any residue, but the underside was shining like a beacon. The drain itself wasn’t too bad, but there were still some flecks of brightness. Normally, they would be swabbed and sent to the lab with the lowest priority since there still wasn’t any real indication that Agent Simmons was missing, but the bottom of the drain cover was the smoking gun.

“I’d bet you a month’s pay that if you swab and test this blood you’ll get a positive DNA test for Agent Simmons.” Daisy wasn’t happy she’d made the discovery.

“Shit,” Debora cursed and seemed to deflate in front of her.

“How the hell did you know to look there, and how do you know it’s blood?” Martinez was squinting at the bright underside of the cover.

“Bloodhound.” Daisy replied.

“What?”

“The only prisoner missing from the prison break in Colorado was a woman named Bloodhound. Her MO is to kill people, drain their bodies of blood, and bathe in it. My guess is that some of it leaked out while she was bathing, or she tried to drain some of it, or maybe she even forgot to put the stopper in when she cut her victim’s throats. I don’t know, but I do know that blood is thicker than water and doesn’t drain like it. She cleaned up after she was done, but she missed this bit.”

“Victims?”

“It’s just a gut feeling, but judging by the level of cleaning that went into this, and the amount of blood the human body has in it, I’m guessing two or more people were drained into the tub. I suggest we canvas the neighbors and see if anyone else didn’t show up for work this morning unexpectedly.” Daisy felt the weight of guilt settle onto her shoulders.

This was the part of the job she didn’t miss: the feeling that she could have prevented this if she was here or had done something different in the past.

<You didn’t do this. Wraith and Bloodhound did. Concentrate on that.> She took a deep breath, composed herself, and got to her feet.

“Get CSI in here and get the evidence. Then you can make this an official homicide case and get the resources that you need.” She looked at Debora. The DVA agent couldn’t see behind the mask, but Daisy’s face was pained. “Sorry for your loss, Agent Phillips.”

Debora didn’t say anything. She threw open the door and started yelling orders to everyone.

 

***

 

The last few freshman of West Private’s HCP shuffled into the auditorium just before the scheduled start time. The rest of the classes watched them without judging. They knew everything those first semester freshman were going through, and the last thing anyone wanted after a workout session with Coach McMillian was to sit in the auditorium for an announcement from the Dean.

Mason, Kyoshi, Becca, Anika, and Angela were sitting together and all hoping this would be quick. The grumbling of stomachs in the room was nearly as loud as the side conversations.

“Thank you, everyone, for coming on such short notice.” Dean Ditmar stepped out onto the stage with a hurried look on his face. The stress was something his students were not used to seeing. “I just wanted to gather everyone together this evening to discuss what has occurred and will be occurring.”

Several people in the crowd – mostly freshman – shifted uncomfortably. It didn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out where this conversation was going.

“Not long ago, the Hero community and this city lost an icon.” The Dean’s tone was somber. “I have personally known Mr. Morningstar for more than half a decade, and his reputation preceded him long before that. He was a good man, a great Hero, and an asset to this city. As all of you know, he lost his life fighting against people who have attacked our city and our nation. Due to the media coverage, it was a very public death. Most Heroes who die in the line of duty do not get the moment captured on national television, but how his death was broadcasted does not affect his relevance as a Hero and guardian of this city. If anything, it shows everyone: Hero, civilian, and HCP student just how important the daily battle for peace and justice really is.” The Dean stopped to take a sip of water from the bottle on the podium.

“Most of you also know that his murderer is still at large, and once masqueraded as a student at this college.”

All of the eyes in the room pivoted in Mason, Kyoshi, Becca, and Anika’s direction. A few then moved down toward Isla in the front row, but none of them found what they were looking for.

“The public funeral and private ceremony for Mr. Morningstar are being held tomorrow starting exactly at noon. The city is pulling out all the stops. A funeral procession of Heroes and local law enforcement will escort Mr. Morningstar’s body through the city to the church. Once there, only close friends and families, transported by teleporter, will be present for the actual service. Members of the public may be inclined to stay and follow the procession to the cemetery where Mr. Morningstar will be laid to rest.”

Becca’s hand shot up the moment the Dean finished and he pointed for her to ask the question everyone was thinking.

“Can we attend?”

“That’s why I called this assembly.” The Dean smiled back with a hint of sadness. “Members of the West Private HCP are more than welcome to attend as civilians. The secret identity clause of your contracts still applies. You may not reveal what you are or what you are doing at West Private, and that is important because the threat level for tomorrow is high.” The Dean’s face grew serious. “As I mentioned, Wraith and the others who attacked the prison are still at large. If their goal is to continue to hurt this city then attacking the funeral will be at the top of their agenda. The DVA and over a dozen Heroes are tasked specifically with security, but no defense is perfect. That is a good lesson to take away from this meeting today. Several very powerful people will be there tomorrow, and there is still a chance for things to go very wrong. I can’t stop you from attending, but you all need to keep that in mind if you do go.”

“Are you on the security detail?” An overzealous freshman asked.

“No, but I will be attending the funeral and will do my duty if called upon. I’m an asset in reserve for the authorities to utilize.” The Dean looked around for any more eager question askers. “As the Dean of the HCP, your safety is my top priority and we will be ensuring accountability of all students throughout the day tomorrow. The whole city, including the school, has established tomorrow as a half-day in honor of Mr. Morningstar. It is as much a security concern as anything else, but I encourage all of you to take advantage of this time to train and learn.” The Dean looked around again for any raised hands. “If you are planning to attend tomorrow, please see Professor Livingston and she will give you the relevant information.”

The Dean stepped away from the podium and the classes took that as a sign of dismissal. Everyone gathered their things and started to either stream out of the auditorium or to the Focus professor. Surprisingly, despite the danger, more students headed to the teacher than to the door, but a few made a beeline straight to the Dean.

“Dean Ditmar,” naturally Becca got to him first, “have you seen Seth? He wasn’t in any of our classes today and we’re worried about him. He’s been a bit off lately, and with his probation we just wanted to check in.” Anyone who didn’t know the petite speedster would have thought she was giving the Dean puppy-dog-eyes, but it was just her natural expression.

“Mr. Abney has been temporarily removed from the program until the criminal charges against him get sorted out. How the issue is resolved will determine if he returns to this program or not.” The Dean didn’t elaborate before leaving the stunned sophomores.

“He’s gone?” was all Becca was able to say.

“Oh man,” Mason sighed as his face fell.

Anika kept her mouth shut and Angela just shrugged. Their eyes met briefly and they could both tell the other Super thought Seth was better off somewhere else. Neither thought he had the current mindset to be a Hero.

“Hey, have you guys seen Seth?” Isla walked up to the small group with the same concerned look on her face. The look only deepened when she heard the news. “I don’t understand?”

“It’s not difficult.” Angela started off, but softened her tone when Becca shot her a withering look. “Seth is obviously going through something, and with his legal problems the staff is probably correct in assuming he’s not ready to be a Hero now, so why would they waste resources training him?”

“It’s just…” Isla stopped and struggled over what to say. “Nevermind,” she sighed and walked away back toward the rest of the freshman who were gathered around Professor Livingston.

“What should we do?” Mason asked once they were alone again.

“Nothing,” Anika replied. “If he’s out then the HCP is going to wipe his memory so he can’t expose the rest of us. The Dean gave us the whole spiel last year. For all we know, Seth doesn’t even remember who we are right now.”

That sent Becca over the edge. She sniffled and headed for the door with Anika following after her apologizing. Angela agreed with the sentiment with a simple nod and followed the two other Supers out. That just left Mason and Kyoshi.

“I can’t sense him in the building, but we can drive by his place if you want?” She could tell Mason was taking it hard. It was always difficult to see someone you’d fought beside gone like that without even a goodbye.

“Sure.”

Kyoshi intertwined her hand in Mason’s and the two large Supers carved a path toward the exit. They’d both get with Professor Livingston tomorrow morning to confirm they’d go to the funeral.

Previous                                         Next

A Change of Pace – Season 2 – Chapter 29

“Three…two…one…breech!” The shape-charges on the warehouse doors warped the metal beyond recognition while blasting big ass holes in them. Flash bang grenades capable of crippling a mid-range strongman followed the explosions, and a few seconds later two SWAT teams stormed the building through the front and rear entrances.

KaBoom had led his team through the wall while Jetwash came in through the upper skylight. He controlled the fall of the glass with his aerokinesis. A field of flying glass daggers hung suspended in the air around the Hero as he took an overwatch position, and it was his aerial position that saved a bunch of lives.

“Everyone out!” He yelled over through the earpiece that was linked through Dispatch to everyone on the assault team.

The team hadn’t advanced far enough to see the laser trip wires the bag guys had planted near the collection of stuff at the center of the room. They could have placed the explosives at the doors, but they likely would have been triggered by the breeching charge and resulted in fewer casualties. Luring the cops and Heroes in before blowing the place to hell ensured a lot more carnage. Unfortunately for the bad guys, they’d been in a rush and forgot the skylight.

Jetwash had an eagle-eye view of the room setup and was able to direct the bomb squad in dismantling the explosives, but it took time. Everyone from the DVA to Hunter was chomping at the bit to get into the room. Any clue, even a small one, which could lead them to Wraith would be worth it.

“Clear!” The bomb squad called out and Hunter teleported to the middle of the room.

“She was here,” he informed immediately. “I need a circle of caution tape here.” He walked the perimeter of an area and the crime scene investigators quickly marked the area.”

As they did, Hunter put his hand out and felt the tear in space-time that Wraith’s teleportation created. It would be the easiest thing in the world to follow, but he’d learned his lesson last time. As much as he disliked the thought, he needed to rely on good old-fashioned police work to find her this time.

“I know you’re thinking about it.” KaBoom stepped up to the edge of the tape. Stepping across it wouldn’t do anything to the kinetic absorber, but it would alter the readings and taint their admissibility in court.

The DVA was already carting in big boxes of tech to document the rupture and confirm that it was Wraith who did it. It was the equivalent of a teleporter’s finger print; each one’s was different.

“What else can you tell me?” Hunter had only been briefed on the operation five minutes before it kicked off.

“We grabbed Seth Abney talking to her downtown, traced the phone call, and here we are. We threw it together in twenty minutes, and it shows just how good the local coordination between agencies has gotten in the last few months.”

A year ago, if the Fist was acting up it would have taken an hour for the cops and Heroes just to get on the same page, and there was no way in hell the DVA would even stick their nose into it.

“Do you think we’ll get anything?” KaBoom looked around at the massive amount of resources being expended.

“Maybe.” Hunter shrugged. Half his attention was still on the space-time rupture. “They’re smart, but we caught them with their pants down. They might have expected anything incriminating to go up in flames, but now that we’ve got it we might find an advantage.”

“Jesus Christ!” A cop stumbled backward out from behind a curtain and proceeded to empty his stomach all over the floor.

“Get him out of here!” The DVA agent in charge stalked over and did everything short of kicking the guy in the ass to get him moving.

“Agent Phillips,” Hunter nodded to the woman and then toward the curtain.

“Looks like a serial killer’s Disney Land in there.” The DVA agent’s face was a little green.

“Nightingale,” KaBoom and Hunter said in unison.

“Stripped the person’s skin off, extracted organs, and cut off some pretty important bits.” The DVA agent stopped there, but having read Nightingale’s file they both knew the torture expert did much more to that poor bastard.

“If you ask me, our best bet is going to be Abney. I knew there was something up with that kid.” Agent Phillips continued.

Having met both Wraith and Abney when they were together, Hunter didn’t buy the agent’s story one hundred percent, but he had to conclude that Abney had gone and monumentally screwed up his life with a single phone call.

“I say we dangle him as bait and wait for Wraith to bite.”

“He and his lawyer will never go for it.” KaBoom played devil’s advocate.

“It’s that or he rots.” Phillips’ shrugged. “I got the word from the brass in D.C. and the shit he pulled is covered under the Patriot Act. We can charge him as supporting terrorism. That’s hard time in a get fucked in the ass federal prison. Once we drop that bomb I think he’ll take the deal.” The agent was smiling.

“If she comes for him.” Hunter stated.

“Then we take her down.” The smile that crossed the agent’s face showed just how much she wanted to do that.

“Easier said than done.” Hunter added his two cents.

“Details boys. With big strapping Heroes like you two how can we fail?”

Both heroes knew from plenty of personal experience against Wraith that there were several ways to fail. For that matter, Agent Phillips did too, but it was hard not to feel some hope with this break in the case. Finally having something Wraith wanted couldn’t be overlooked.

“Let’s bet on it. Fifty bucks Abney takes the deal and helps us bring Wraith in.” She held out her hand for someone to make the bet.

“I’ll take that.” KaBoom shook on it.

“Even if we get Abney to cooperate we’re going to need more firepower to take her down. She won’t be alone.”

“We’ll bring in the big guns,” the agent smiled. “I heard Reaper is back on the job.”

“She is, but we’ll need more.” KaBoom’s statement surprised the agent. “We aren’t going to go into a close fight when we can bring overwhelming force to bear. Is Seraphim free?”

“I’ll have to check. She’s been operating along the southern border doing drug interdiction lately,” Hunter replied. He’d have someone else make the call, because if he did they’d probably get a big fat no from his estranged wife.

“Good.” Agent Phillips clapped her hands loudly. “Let’s get the scene tagged and bagged. We’ve got a busy weekend ahead of us. Mr. Morningstar’s funeral is already a logistical nightmare with most of the city wanting to attend, and now with word that Wraith is in town HQ is going to want us to throw everything including the kitchen sink at this thing. This funeral is as much about honoring a fallen Hero as it is about showing the world that Orlando is back on its feet.

Both Heroes bristled at the comment, but they’d been in the game long enough to know the reality of the situation. The funeral was going to be a big deal, and they needed to be ready, which meant they were in for some sleepless nights.

 

***

 

Agent Simmons was having a great day, and she felt guilty about it. The biggest bust in her career had occurred right in the middle of one of the shittiest weeks of the year, maybe even the decade: a prison break which was a mass casualty event for the prison’s staff, criminals unaccounted for, and the death of a legend. She knew she could feel proud of her accomplishments and still feel the pain of the last week like everyone else, but they were tough emotions for her to rectify. She wanted to celebrate her role in catching the Abney kid red handed, and play it up to her boss so he’d remember when it came time to write her evaluation. She’d been at the lowest field agent grade for the last year and she wanted to get promoted. Her bust was the key to that.

She pulled her small, gray Nissan into her assigned parking place at the apartment complex. Part of her being so low on the totem pole meant she couldn’t afford anywhere better to live. The neighborhood was ok, but after Seif al-Din’s attack it had kind of gone downhill. Her car had been broken into twice and she always carried her gun when walking around. Most of the people in the complex knew she was law enforcement, so she’d ended up the head of their new neighborhood watch. She hadn’t actually participated in a nightly patrol, but from what she’d heard it mostly involved twenty-something-year-olds sitting around and drinking while looking through a set of binoculars she’d loaned the group.

It was late when she arrived and the two watch members on duty gave her a wave. Judging by the cans in their hands, her impressions of the group weren’t that far off.

<Community activism is important in public safety.> She reminded herself as she waved back. As long as they didn’t rope her into standing guard all night with someone else she was ok with it.

Like most of the people in the complex, she was a late twenty-something-year-old, fresh out of an enlistment in the marines, and looking to work her was up the ladder in her new career. Judging by the amount of times guys came up to randomly talk to her she was fairly attractive, but she had a hell of a right hook, which intimidated some guys and kept them at bay. She was single and would be ready to mingle when she found the time, but right now her life was her job, so she wasn’t going to get shit faced with some junior banker in the middle of the night when she had to be at the office at six am.

One of the watchmen started making his way toward her, but she held up her arms full of files and shrugged. The guy took the meaning and made a “call me” sign with his finger and thumb. She smiled politely back with no intention of calling him. Then she was out of sight and heading up the stairs to her second floor apartment.

On the neighbor front, she’d gotten pretty lucky. The guy upstairs was never home because he was a night manager somewhere, and the couple downstairs didn’t bother her at all except for the occasional sounds of them humping or their Chihuahua barking. Often the two occurred at the same time.

Tonight the upstairs guy was gone and there was no humping or barking downstairs as she unlocked her door to the dark apartment. She did a quick customary scan of the space. The marines and DVA stressed situational awareness, and it was something someone in her line of work needed to succeed.

Everything was clear, so she closed and locked the door behind her, placed her keys on the table and headed to the bedroom. She stripped off her blazer, removed her holstered weapon from her belt, and placed it on the nightstand.

<I’ll close my eyes for five minutes and then I’ll get to work.> She had dozens of files to go over, but she needed a moment to unwind before diving into them.

She flopped down on the bed and…

“AH! What the fuck?!” she screamed as tiny daggers dug into her back, arms, legs, and neck.

She jumped back to her feet to see her white comforter stained red. She flipped on the light and the comforter started to glisten.

<Glass?> The sheet was covered in glass.

Her instincts screamed that something was wrong and she listened to them. She lunged for her nightstand and removed her pistol from its holster and pivoted to do a three hundred and sixty degree sweep of the room. She hadn’t even done one hundred and eighty degrees before she realized she wasn’t alone.

Two people were in the room with her. Her finger moved instinctually from where she’d rested it parallel to the trigger guard to the trigger. She line up a shot on the taller of the two people who was dressed in black with a mask she’d seen hundreds of times in files like the ones in her living room. She squeezed the trigger with the soft part of her finger between the tip and first knuckle…or at least that’s what her brain told her body to do. Her body did not comply.

She tried again…nothing.

“Look, Morina, it looks like someone has performance anxiety.” Wraith chuckled as she walked forward and easily disarmed Agent Simmons. “But where are my manners?” Wraith placed the weapon in her coat’s pocket. “My name is Wraith and this is my close personal friend, Morina. You have a lovely home, so lovely that we let ourselves in while you were running around ruining other people’s lives.”

Simmons tried to speak but her throat wasn’t working.

“You are Agent Claire Simmons. You were top twenty percent of your class at the DVA Academy with a distinguished record and honorable discharge from the Marine Corps. Plus, you were all state in high school field hockey if I’m not mistaken.” Wraith smiled as she walked in a circle around the frozen agent.

<What do you want?> Simmons could only think her response.

“What was that?” Wraith held her hand up to her ear and leaned in real close to mock her. “What’s the matter, blood manipulator got your tongue?”

Simmons wanted nothing more than to spit right in Wraith’s face, but like the rest of her she couldn’t work her mouth to gather the saliva. In fact, she was beginning to drool down the side of her cheek.

“My friend will give you the use of your mouth back so you can answer a few questions. Answer them truthfully and we’ll let you go with a minor ass whooping. Answer untruthfully and I’ll leave you to my friend.”

Simmons didn’t know who Morina was off the top of her head, but there had only been a few confirmed blood manipulators since Supers made themselves known. They went on of two ways: medical professionals that helped a lot of people, or deranged psychopaths. Since Morina was with Wraith, Simmons was betting on the latter.

Wraith turned and nodded to Morina. The iron grip that had seized Simmons vanished from the neck up.

“AAAAA!” She got half a scream out before the grip clamped back down on her.

“Stupid bitch,” Wraith’s haymaker hit Simmons across the side of the face. Her body reacted by toppling to the floor like a frozen statue. Luckily, she didn’t shatter on impact. Unluckily, she was pretty sure her jaw was fucked up.

“Keep an eye on her.” Wraith left the room, and Simmons heard her going through the files in the living room.

<Shit.> Most of the stuff was mundane, administrative crap, but a few were more sensitive documents.

“Look at what we have here.” Wraith’s feet came back into view and she bent down to shove the paperwork in her face. “Are those the security plans for Mr. Morningstar’s funeral?”

It was a rhetorical question, and Simmons tried her best to spit in the villain’s face again.

“Geeze, they’re going all out for that old fucktard. If I would have known killing him was going to get him a big-ass funeral, then I might have just shot his dick off as my revenge. The guy wasn’t that great. He didn’t do that much. Morina, can healer heal a dick that’s been shot off?” She turned to her partner in crime.

The blood manipulator shrugged. Her eyes were fixed on Simmons, and there was something in them that made the DVA agent’s blood run cold.

“Oh well,” Wraith pocketed the documents and squatted down so she was fully in Simmons’ eye line. “Let’s get back on topic. I need you to tell me all the latest upgrades to the Protectorate’s HQ. I’ve got the layout up here,” she pointed at her head, “but I need to know what new tricks they have up their sleeves.” She nodded and Simmons felt control of her mouth returning to her.

“FUCK YOU!”

A relatively light slap sent her reeling in pain, but Morina had already reasserted control. On top of the broken jaw, the slap nearly made her black out.

“I’m going to ask you again. What are the defensive countermeasures the DVA has in…”

Three repetitive knocks on the door brought the villain up short. Both Wraith and Morina looked in the direction. If she hadn’t been effectively paralyzed, Simmons would have made a move to escape, but all she could do was drool and bleed onto the faux wooden floor.

A second round of knocks and two people called her name. She hadn’t spoken with them much, but it sounded like the couple from downstairs. Wraith rose to her feet and pulled two sleek looking pistols from shoulder holsters.

“Coming, just give me a second!” She yelled into her arm to muffle the response, but still loud enough for the couple to hear.

Simmons wanted to scream a warning to her unsuspecting neighbors but she couldn’t do anything but watch as Wraith left the room. Simmons heard the sound of the door unlocking and being opened. “Hey…” was the only word spoken before two sizzles were quickly followed by two thumps. She heard more footsteps and something scraping across the floor before the door closed and locked again. Wraith reappeared dragging the young couple toward the bathroom.

“I’ll leave these two for you,” she said to Morina. “I’ve got a promise to keep.”

Once the couple was dragged into the bathroom, Wraith squatted back in front of Simmons. “Tell me the plans.”

They went back and forth for several hours. Simmons refused to talk and Wraith beat her some more. She cut off three of Simmons fingers’ on each hand, both of her big toes, and was getting ready to pull finger nails off of what remained when Simmons finally broke.

She knew she was going to die at this point and she just wanted to get it over with. Pain was a powerful motivator, so she gave Wraith everything and then some. Some things were true, others were lies, and a few were even elaborate fantasies. She was laughing and crying by the end of her recitation. The pain had frayed her grip on reality, and she’d given Wraith the biggest middle finger she knew in her explanation. The villain wasn’t getting any more out of her. She’d just have to verify for herself what was true and what wasn’t.

“She’s gone,” Wraith stood up and stretched her back. “She’s all yours.”

Morina had been steady for most of the interrogation, but she’d started to tap her foot and scratch her forearms the longer she sat there watching Wraith work. Now, the biggest smile split her face as she grabbed the DVA agent by the feet and dragged her toward the bathroom.

Wraith knew what would happen next. The blood manipulator would drain the three people of their blood, bathe in it, and do whatever her ritual was. Serial killers always had rituals, and although Wraith got along with Morina, that didn’t stop her from thinking the ritual was creepy as fuck.

While the blood manipulator worked, Wraith wiped down the apartment of forensic clues and studied the files. She had two missions coming up: the funeral and Seth. If she was lucky, she might be able to execute both in the same day.

<Use one as a distraction for the other.> It was pretty straightforward, so the Heroes would be prepared for that. <And I need to parcel through the bullshit she gave me.> Wraith knew a new energy cannon that sped up the passage of time within its confines was unlikely to be real, but it was going to be hard to verify what was the truth.

She’d be as well prepared as she could be, but there would be some risk involved. There was always risk in being a villain.

Morina emerged from the bathroom forty-five minutes later with perfect skin, a smile on her face, and a skip in her step. Wraith didn’t even ask. She just grabbed the blood manipulator’s hand and teleported them and the necessary files to several locations before finally returning to their base of operations.

Previous                                                               Next

A Change of Pace – Season 2 – Chapter 14

<This place isn’t that bad.> Scarlett Vaan thought idly as she typed away on her keyboard.

Homework had never really been a problem for the young woman. She followed along in class, took good notes, applied herself in exercises, and that led to a solid ability to grasp concepts quickly. All of that made her a good student, and being a good student got her accepted into West Private’s Doctoral Program.

The key difference between being an undergrad and being a doctoral candidate was the quality and quantity demanded of her. Her whole life was supposed to be this doctoral program. She was supposed to completely dedicate herself to the study of the human mind.

<But I can’t.> She mentally sighed. <Because someone has to pay the bills.>

Even with all the grants and work-study programs she participated in through the university, the tuition was still expensive.

“Good evening, Ms. Vaan.” A voice greeted from behind her that made the young Super tense.

She took a deep breath to get control of herself and then plastered a confident smile on her face. “Agent Phillips. I didn’t expect to see you here.”

“Here” was a nice, recently renovated coffee shop. It was pretty modern, but Scarlett could still see remnants of its hipster past poking through. It was packed nearly to capacity with college students. Some were doing work like Scarlett and others were hanging out, joking, and all together annoying the people trying to work.

“We like to keep an eye on people around campus now-a-days.”

<That’s very Big Sister of you.> Scarlett didn’t speak her thoughts out loud. Instead she tried to get a look at why the DVA agent was here.

Her attempt was met with a static sound. The DVA agent couldn’t keep all of her thoughts away from a skilled telepath, but she had decent defenses. That, and Scarlett still needed training to hone her gift and wasn’t going to poke around too deep. That wouldn’t do her any good.

“I’m honored.” The younger Super answered dryly. “What can I do for you? I assume you’re making contact to ask a favor of some kind.”

“It’s not a favor when we fund your college tuition, room and board, and give you a sizable stipend on top of an offer of future employment once you’ve finished your degree. It’s called an assignment.”

She had Scarlett there. The DVA was footing the bill for everything in return for her working for them after she graduated. Not as a Hero though. There was no way in hell Scarlett was going to finish four years of the HCP. If she really wanted it she was confident she could, but she didn’t want it. She was just here for the basic training and then it was all about school until she was a Ph.D.

“What’s my assignment then?”

“Who. Who is your assignment.” Agent Phillips corrected as she slipped a folder across the table.

It was plain manila and would have looked commonplace in any office in the country. Scarlett took it like it was no big deal, because doing a shady handoff would draw a lot more attention than two people seemingly exchanging notes. She flipped it open causally and studied the first page of the dossier.

“Cute.” She stated. “I’ve seen him around.”

“Good. We want you to keep tabs on him. Gather any information you can by extraordinary means.”

<She means using my ability not enhanced interrogation.> Scarlett just wished these government types would be a little more straightforward sometimes.

Part of Scarlett knew she could only do passive surveillance on anyone the DVA wanted her to, but a part of her wanted to be a little more active. She was still experimenting with her powers and starting to combine them with the knowledge she was gathering in her academic studies. She had a few ideas about techniques she wanted to try, but she need a human mind to do it. Her powers didn’t work on anything else. She assumed the HCP and DVA would frown on her hiring some stoner at minimum wage to pry around in his brain.

Right now, she could only think of one way to use her abilities.

“I also wanted to speak to you about your ranking.” The agent lowered her voice.

“What about it?” Scarlett did the same and had to stop from smiling at how ridiculous they must look.

“We would appreciate if you put forward a little more effort. At least give it the good old college try.”

“Thanks for the advice.” Scarlett smiled.

<Yeah, like I’m going to take HCP advice from a human who’s never been in one. I like my facial structure the way it is. I don’t want to take the chance and get my ass kicked all for the sake of someone’s report back to HQ.> She scoffed internally.

“Good.” The agent scanned the room. “We’ll be in touch.”

Just like that the government agent got up and walked out. One of the servers looked a little upset that she hadn’t ordered anything, but it was busy enough that she quickly faded from memory.

Scarlett on the other hand had one more thing on her plate.

<I get why they want me to watch Seth Abney, but they seriously can’t bring in another telepath to sit around and listen to his thoughts. I’ve got shit to do.> She also knew why the DVA wasn’t going to spend the cash to do that. They’d already bought her. Why would they shop around when they already had someone in place to do exactly what they wanted?

For the first time since signing that contract with the DVA before school, Scarlett wondered what exactly she’d gotten herself into.

 

***

 

Seth sat at the bar sipping his drink. He had a small pyramid of shot glasses piled up in front of him that he’d purposefully stopped the bartender from collecting multiple times. The place wasn’t too busy yet. It was still early. He liked to get a jump on the evening’s festivities. This place was pretty common with the college students. It didn’t serve underage kids knowingly. Seth looked like he could be in his early twenties and his fake ID was perfect. There were some people walking around with big X’s drawn in permanent marker on their hands, and that number was steadily starting to grow. Despite that, people were avoiding the drunk guy at the corner of the bar.

<Good.> Seth knocked back another shot and savored the burn of the alcohol going down his throat.

The sensation made him feel alive in a time when everything else was bullshit.

<How the fuck did she escape?> He wasn’t the only one thinking that. He was pretty sure the entire DVA was working on that.

Honestly, he didn’t really care about the how. He cared about what was going to happen next. Something deep inside him really wanted to see Liz again. He wanted to see her walk through that door like she owned the place. He wanted to see her hips sway and the way her smile seemed to dwarf everything else around her.

He knew he shouldn’t want it. It was like an addict knowing they wanted to get high but knew it was killing them. Liz was his drug, and he was pretty sure the feeling wasn’t going away any time soon. He was also scared. He was scared she was going to show up. He was scared she was going to walk through that door with her smile and bring a shitstorm down on his head.

He hadn’t done anything wrong. He’d never done anything to help Liz in committing her crimes. He’d just been a good boyfriend, or at least he thought he had. Now he wasn’t so sure. <What kind of person lets a person like her live right under his nose and never senses anything?>

It was the question he’d been asking himself for months, and he was no closer to an answer.

He waved his hand and another shot slid down the bar towards him. He caught it with a grace that seemed to ignore his blood alcohol level and downed it smoothly.

“Whoa, slow down there, champ.” A woman sat down next to Seth. The first to take the chance. “Save some for the rest of us.”

The woman was certainly cute, but Seth wasn’t in any state of mind to put in any effort to get laid. “Seat’s taken.” He replied sullenly.

“Yeah, I know. My ass is on it.” She ignored his surprised looked and ordered a shot of what he was drinking.

She just sat there after that. She didn’t say a word or even make eye contact with him. At one point she did sweep some of her loose silver hair behind her ear, but that was about it. She looked like her attention was somewhere else.

<Weird.> He shrugged, and continued his mission to build the boozy pyramids of Giza in front of him.

He only had two up when another person came running up to ruin his solitude.

“Hey, Seth!” Izzy was dressed for a night out and a group of girls followed behind her.

He appraised them quickly and thoroughly. He’d have sex with any of them any other night. Even if they were freshmen.

“I’m solo drinking, Izzy. This better be important.” He spun around on his stool and nearly toppled onto his face. She caught him before he fell, and he saw her blush from the physical contact.

She quickly let go as he righted himself.

“I just wanted to say hello and see what you think.” She modeled her outfit for him.

It took a minute for him to recognize it was some of the clothes he’d bought for her when they went shopping a few days ago. They really did look good on her.

“I also wanted to see if you were up for another drive sometime.” The words rushed out of her mouth so fast they nearly strung together. Then a panicked look came over her face. “I mean, you don’t have to buy me anything…unless you want to. I’m not opposed to it, but I really just want to get behind the wheel again.”

Seth was sure there was a sexual innuendo in there somewhere, but he bit his lip.

“Izzy, I…” He stopped not really knowing what to say.

Her face dropped, and he felt bad for her.

“Izzy.” He took a deep breath and tried to clear some of the alcoholic daze out for a moment. “You’re a good person, and I’m an asshole. You’re just getting your first year started, and you’re doing pretty well from what I hear. Third in the class?” He referred to the combat rankings.

She nodded, blushing again.

“Rumor is that you’ve got some serious talent, so I’m going to give you some free advice. Don’t hang out with people that are going to drag you down. Focus on school and your extracurriculars. You really don’t have time for anything else.”

Seth would have felt all noble if it wasn’t for the look of rejection on the younger girl’s face. His stomach rebelled at the sight, and he didn’t think it was totally from the booze.

“I’m just trying to be nice. You’re a good guy underneath all this whatever you might think.”

“You’re not my mother, Izzy.” The words were out of his mouth before he could stop them. “I don’t need you telling me who I am, what I’m capable of, and I don’t need a pity party thrown in my honor. I’ll be fine.”

Izzy looked shocked for a second before her face grew hard. It was a look he’d never seen before on her.

“Sometimes you’re an ass, Seth.” She spun, her styled black hair splaying around her as she marched away.

“Finally, we’re in agreement.” He muttered to himself as he turned back to the bar.

The silver-haired girl was gone, but another woman in his life was approaching.

“I can hear her mental grumbles about you being a stubborn bastard all the way over there.” Kyoshi took the seat next to him.

Her and Mason were here for the karaoke, not the drinking. The pair actually made a good duet.

“It’s better this way. She was getting attached to a suspect in a DVA investigation. That wouldn’t have done her any favors. They’re probably already watching her because I bought her some clothes.”

“Maybe,” Kyoshi shrugged. “But don’t ruin any chance of happiness because you think people will get hurt being around you. You are training to be a Hero.” She dropped her voice low. “And so is she.”

“If I didn’t know any better I swear you were trying to fix me up.” Seth shook his head, but couldn’t hide his smile.

“I know by now that Seth Abney doesn’t need any help in that department.” She smiled back.

“Damn straight.” A beer arrived for Seth and he took a long pull from it.

“How about you stop drinking for tonight and come sit with us.” Kyoshi pointed over toward the tables gathered around a small raised stage.

“Is it just the two of you?” His vision was blurry enough that it was harder to see. “No Anika or Angela.”

“Just me and Mason.”

“Good.” Seth got to his feet and walked in a remarkably straight line toward the strongman sitting alone at one of the tables. “Because I can’t deal with anyone bitching to me right now.”

Despite the momentary distraction, Liz was always on his mind.

 

***

 

“So, what do you think?”

“What do you mean what do I think?”

Daisy and Debora were sitting next to each other at the dinner table. The Phillips family had moved the meal outside because of the comfortable weather. The porch was still screened in to deal with all of the bugs but aside from that they were as close to nature as they were going to get. Topher and Debora’s mother was helping cart dishes from the kitchen outside, and their father was judging Topher’s grilling.

“Abney?” Debora gave Daisy a small glare and she pitched her voice lower. “I don’t trust the kid.”

Daisy thought carefully about what she said next. “Abney might be a douchebag, but I don’t think he’d ever knowingly support someone like Wraith. He’s probably conflicted about everything that’s happened, but we need to put a little bit of trust in the guy. He is a sophomore in the HCP.”

“If he helped Wraith at all it was indirectly: money, influence, or some abstract us of his power maybe. And then there is the report of the assault and tree.” Debora continued.

“From what I understand he has a solid alibi for Wraith’s escape. Probably the best one of any suspect ever. He was in the middle of an HCP subtlety class with one of the most renowned spies in the southeast. As for the other two. The guy was confirmed DUI at the scene by Campus Police. He says he got in a fight with a guy matching Abney’s description, but he also could have walked into a pole for all we know. Concerning the tree, we live in Florida. Sink holes swallow peoples’ homes down here. It’s not outside reason that a tree just fell over without elemental manipulation.”

Debora frowned. “Whose side are you on?”

“I’m on the side of catching Wraith. Not just catching anyone or accusing them of stuff without solid evidence.”

“Well, one guy got what he had coming.”

Daisy had gotten a picture of the crime scene photos. One of the guards had tried to get Wraith out and he’d lost his head because of it. Daisy had a pretty good idea about who could make a cut like that.

“Yep,” Daisy sipped on a glass of sweet tea. “Don’t team up with supervillains.”

Mrs. Phillips slid into the seat beside Debora and the conversation ceased. Soon the chicken was done and they were all happily enjoying a well-cooked meal and each other’s company. Daisy lathered BBQ sauce on her chicken and took a healthy helping of greens to get her vegetables for the day.

“So, Daisy,” Mrs. Phillips suddenly turned her attention on the younger-looking Super. “When are we going to get to meet your parents?”

Topher’s fork stopped hallway to his mouth. “Mom…”

“No, it’s ok.” Daisy patted him on the knee. “My parents aren’t around anymore. They died when I was younger.”

“That’s terrible.” And it looked like she actually meant it. “It’s awful when disease takes a parent so young. It leaves an impression on the child too. Was it cancer?”

<Old age.> Daisy told the truth in her head.

“My Dad was wounded in the war and that eventually caught up with him.” Daisy covered.

“Vietnam wasn’t fun.” Mr. Phillips got a sad look in his eye for a moment before shaking his head and taking a bite of chicken.

<Neither was World War II or Korea.>

“Where are you from, Daisy?” Mrs. Phillips followed up by shifting the conversation.

“Mom.” Topher grumbled. “What’s with the interrogation?”

“What? I can’t ask my son’s serious girlfriend about her life. We hardly know anything about her.”

Daisy smiled at the serious girlfriend part, but still caught the backhanded snark at the end. Even if what Topher’s mom was saying was true. They didn’t know a lot about her for national security reasons, but there were some basic facts she could tell them without compromising herself.

“Originally, I’m from Savannah, but I’ve lived and worked in a lot of places.”

“Where?”

“Mom…please.” Topher knew she couldn’t go into too much more detail.

“Before here I was up in New York City.”

“Topher used to be with the NYPD. You two might have even run into each other before.”

“Mom, there are millions of people in New York City and we didn’t even live in the same part of town.”

“Where did you live before the city?” His mom ignored him and continued on with the polite interrogation.

“After I graduated college I worked in LA for two years.”

“Tried the whole acting thing? I thought about it when I was young, but never took the leap and moved out there.” Mrs. Phillips focused on something in her past and that gave Topher the opportunity to shoot his dad a warning glare.

“No acting for me,” Daisy shrugged, “but I did meet some famous people.

<And was the famous person.> LA in the sixties and seventies had been crazy.

“How about you, Debora. How is your work going?” Mr. Phillips took his son’s cue and changed the direction of the conversation.

That was how dinner went. Mrs. Phillips tried to get more and more details out of Daisy about her life, and was more and more disappointed when she didn’t have much to give. Having no living family earned Daisy some pity points, but they wouldn’t last long.

“Wow, protective mamma bear alert.” Debora chuckled as she and Daisy started washing the dishes inside.

“What?”

“Mom thinks you and her baby boy are getting serious enough to start digging through your life looking for dirt.”

“Is that a good or a bad thing?”

“Hmm.” Debora scratched her chin with a soapy hand.  “It’s good that she’s finally seeing you in a similar way to Topher. Being on the same page is important for them. On the other hand, there isn’t much dirt for her to find.”

“Because all of that dirt is hidden behind firewalls at the DVA.”

“That…and you’re really old. Oh god,” a spark of something flashed across her face. “I just realized your older than my mom.”

Daisy hoped she’d gloss over that little fact.

“And you’re dating my younger brother…ewww…your code name should be Cougar.”

“Fuck you.” Despite the cursing both women were grinning.

“After dinner drink?” She asked. “Dad and Topher are going to have a man talk. Safe sex will probably be on the agenda, so it’ll do us both some good to get some alcohol in our system. Where does my bro keep the good stuff?”

Daisy gave her directions and she came back a minute later with a nice bottle of scotch. She opened it and poured a healthy helping for them both

“To being one of the family.”

Daisy didn’t drink it, but she didn’t want to be rude and ruin the moment. The comment still took her by surprise. “Whoa now.”

“I’m just saying.” Debora winked and took a big swig. “Ahhh that’s good shit.”

The conversation didn’t turn back toward Daisy’s past or the unusual courtship her and Topher seemed to be in the middle of. Mostly, Debora just got tipsier, didn’t notice that Daisy never touched her glass, and told stories that Daisy would use to blackmail Topher in the future. The best were the ones when she made her little brother dress up like a girl and sit in on her tea parties. Daisy didn’t know what was more surprising about that: that Topher had been forced to cross-dress, or that Debora had tea parties.

Unfortunately, all good things eventually came to an end. Daisy called Debora an Uber to get her back to her hotel. The parents retired to the guest room around nine-thirty, which left her and Topher alone.

“Did I pass?” Daisy cut right to the chase. “I’ll have to review my cover story when I get into work on Monday, but I’m sure I didn’t say anything that would give me away.”

“Sorry about that.” Topher polished off his last drink. “Mom does that sometimes.”

“Sometimes being when you’re getting serious with someone.” She got up from her seat, sat down in his lap, and gave him a quick kiss. She didn’t want to taste the alcohol on his tongue.

“Sorry.” He apologized again.

“Don’t apologize that we’re getting serious.” She gave him a stern look. “I’m not.”

“Me neither.” He kissed her back, and they spent a couple of minutes like that.

They couldn’t do any more while his parents were staying there. Neither of them was willing to risk that awkwardness.

“Let’s go to bed.” Topher meant it in as much of a plutonic way as he could after making out with her.

“I’ll be right behind you. I just need to grab something.”

Topher climbed the stairs as she walked back into the kitchen. She needed her laptop to check on any recent updates concerning the Wraith case. There was a good chance the supervillain would come back to town, and the HCP needed to be ready.

“Reaper.” He codename was whispered right next to her ear.

If she hadn’t been a seasoned Hero she probably would have blown the circuit breaker. Electricity flashed across her body, enough to stun a strongman if he was standing too close. Some of that electricity coursed into her brain and heightened her perception. She spun, ducking down into a crouch as she took in the room. Her eyes searched for the enemy but found nothing.

“Reaper.” The voice repeated itself, but no one was here.

It was only Daisy, the kitchen light, and the natural darkness that was permeating the rest of the room.

“Meet me.” The voice asked before reading off an address.

“That’s a big fuck no.” Electricity still crackled along her skin as she marched around the room double checking every nook and cranny. It was always possible someone had planted a microphone somewhere.

“Not even as a favor for an old friend.”

That stopped Daisy in her tracks. <No one is here but someone is speaking to me.> The number of people who could do that and would call her an old friend was a very short list. Under the circumstances, only one made sense.

“Night?”

“Meet me.” The voice repeated the address but sounded amused this time.

“Fuck me.” Daisy huffed, but didn’t get a reply.

If she didn’t know any better she would have thought the old gang was getting back together. Which begged the bigger question of what the fuck was going on?

Previous                                                 Next

A Chance of Pace – Season 2 – Chapter 12

“Target acquired.”

“Moving into position now.”

<A phone.> It was almost comical how the DVA had caught back up to Wraith. <A find my phone app. Wow.>

Seth watched it all unfold from his seat in Dean Ditmar’s office back in Florida. The DVA agents still flanked him, and occasionally shot him looks, but everyone’s eyes were on the large screen on the Dean’s wall. They’d been able to set up a VTC with the operation’s tactical operations center across the country.

They weren’t the only ones. Most of the HCP deans and half of the players in Washington were watching the operation unfold.

<Geez, she’s just one woman.> Seth knew it wasn’t just that, but still the amount of resources being allocated seemed extreme.

He knew Liz needed to be caught for what she’d done. She’d killed people, helped with a terrorist attack, and done a bunch of other stuff he didn’t want to think about. He also knew that the Feds needed to place all of the bad shit that had happened at someone’s feet. Without Seif al-Din, it was Wraith’s burden to bear.

That was why local and state police, SWAT, DVA, and a full Hero team stormed the apartment building when the signal was given. Seth wouldn’t be surprised if God himself was piggybacking on this assault with the amount of firepower that was being shoved into a single apartment.

They had access to the body cams the Hero team was wearing for the op, so they saw it all unfold in high definition.

“Breach in three…two…one.”

Some Hero with a type of explosive power put his hand on the exterior of the building. One second the wall was there the next it was like someone had glued TNT to the exterior. Plaster, drywall, and smoking wood obscured the footage while the assault team burst into the apartment.

There were three people inside, and Seth heard the Dean’s breath catch at the sight.

Some guy was wearing old OD fatigues from the Vietnam era and an obscuring mask. It would have looked ridiculous if he wasn’t a walking arsenal of guns, knives, and even a freaking sword were visible through the rapidly clearing debris. The second guy was short and looked like some type of tech villain. He couldn’t have looked more like a computer as fear flashed across his face.

But Seth lost focus on everything else when he saw her. She was standing in the middle of the group. The other two villains had a hand on either of her shoulders. Despite his best efforts, Seth could still remember those chocolate brown eyes staring into his after one too many drinks. Those perfect lips kissing him. Those hands doing all sorts of stuff that he didn’t want to tell the lovely DVA agents about.

She looked…harsh though. He features were more defined, she’d lost a bit of weight, but none of it where it counted. Her eyes were blazing though, and as the Heroes moved into the room a smartass grin formed on her lips, one that he’d seen on her more times than he could count.

She raised a hand, extended her middle finger to the swarming Heroes, and then was swarmed by darkness. The camera feeds went black and calls for SITREPs and for members of the team to sound off flooded the radios. Slowly the darkness leaked away, and when it was gone there was nothing there.

“Target’s vanished.”

“Son of a bitch.” The DVA agent who brought Seth in growled, while the Dean just shook his head sadly.

Seth didn’t know what to think. Emotions rushed though him that he had trouble understanding. He was angry. Angry that Liz had escaped after everything she’d done, but he was also impressed. She’d taken on a full assault by a Hero team and everything the local law enforcement could throw at her, and she’d literally vanished right in front of them. Underneath all of that was a speck of happiness that conflicted with his anger. No matter what she’d done, she’d been the first girl Seth really considered committing to. That was a big deal for him and those feelings didn’t just go away.

Those feelings were rearing their ugly head at the worst possible time. Seth’s heart ached a bit after seeing her. She looked different. Prison had done a number on her, and she might even be a little unhinged from the experience, but she was still Liz and he couldn’t help but have an ember of love for her.

All of that played across his face and he wasn’t able to hide it. He looked over and saw the female DVA agent watching him closely. He tried to school his features, but it was too late. Whatever she was going to take away from that brief show of emotion she’d already done it.

Really, Seth didn’t have anything to hide. He hadn’t helped Liz at all in her escape or at all since she’d been captured. The DVA would find no connection between him and his ex, but that hardly mattered. The look in that DVA agent’s eyes said that they had a suspect, and that suspect was him.

“Are we done here?” Dean Ditmar seemed more tired than usual.

“Are we, Seth?”

“Lawyer.” He stated simply for the hundredth time. After what he’d just witnessed he wasn’t saying jack shit to anyone about anything without legal counsel present.

The powers that be were going to be searching for another scapegoat and that sure as hell wasn’t going to be him.

“We’re done. For now.” The DVA agent drove that point home with her eyes. “This goes without saying but don’t go anywhere, Mr. Abney. We might have some follow up questions at some point.”

“You know where to find me.” Seth stood up, shouldered past the two agents guarding him, and headed for the door.

He needed to get out of the HCP. He needed fresh air, and above all he needed a drink. It was close enough to the end of classes that he didn’t think the professors would care about him skipping out early. Well, that wasn’t exactly true. They would care. He just didn’t, so he changed out of his uniform and headed out.

The lift came quick since he was the only one using them right now, and it took him up to the student’s center. It was packed, but he ignored the throng of people moving around him. He needed a quiet place to think. There really wasn’t a quiet place on a big campus like West’s, but he found a free bench out on one of the school’s many quads. He gave a quick looked around for campus police before removing a flask from his backpack and took a swig. The liquid burned pleasantly on the way down. It was a little uneasy settling in his empty stomach, but he didn’t care. He took a quick second and third swig before hiding the flask back in his bag.

Then he shut his eyes, turned his face up towards the setting sun, and tried to relax. The booze helped a little, but it wasn’t enough to dull his thoughts. He remembered when he’d first met Liz. He’d just beaten up a drug dealer at a party – he hated drug dealers with a special passion – and one pulled a gun on him. Liz came out of nowhere and knocked the guy the fuck out.

It was instant attraction. Not just because of the tight yoga pants she was wearing, but because of how confidently she took out the piece of shit. Confident people being attractive worked for guys just as much as for girls, and Liz had confidence coming out her ass.

<Such a nice ass too.>

The memories made him smile, but there was a dark tinge to them now. He saw them all through the scope of someone trying to worm her way into his life. It made him feel upset and violated. That was where the booze helped a bit to numb those feelings. He only wanted to remember the good times.

Seth didn’t know how long he’d sat there, but when the warmth of the sun left his face he got to his feet and went to grab something to eat. The dining hall wasn’t as packed as it was during lunch, so he grabbed his taco and found an empty table in the back of the room. The shell was soggy and the meat probably had been a different type of meat at some point, but it helped settle the booze in his stomach and that was all that he cared about.

He ignored everyone, didn’t make eye contact, and stewed in his own thoughts and memories, which was why it was such a surprise when someone walked up and sat down at his table.

“Hey,” the short freshman girl he’d met at the party had triple the number of tacos he did along with all the fixings.

“Um…hey, Izzy right.” Seth felt annoyance tinged with curiosity shoot through him.

He was definitely giving off a “do not disturb” vibe, so either she wasn’t that smart or she didn’t give a shit.

“So I learned all about you from your friend.” She started devouring her taco with the exuberance only possible after an HCP physical training session.

Seth mood immediately soured. “Becca needs to keep her nose out of other people’s business,” he snapped.

Izzy recoiled slightly, but shook it off. “She’s just worried about you.”

“She should still mind her own business.” That left them in an uncomfortable silence as they both munched on their tacos.

“Um…I want to ask you something, but I don’t want you to take it the wrong way.” Izzy began hesitantly.

“Which rumor is it this time that’s making it through the freshman class?” he scoffed.

“They said you got pulled out of class and arrested by the DVA today. That true?”

Seth could tell she was trying to be cool about this, but there was a burning desire to know that was clearly visible in her body language.

“Not arrested. They just wanted to ask me some questions.”

“About Wraith.”

The emotions threated to overwhelm him when Izzy spoke her villain name. He gritted his teeth and gripped his fork tightly as he tried to bury and lock it back inside himself.

“Holy crap.” Izzy looked around wide-eyed.

Seth didn’t even realize it, but the ground was shaking slightly. <Shit.> He took a few deep breaths and the tremors faded from the ground and himself. <I can’t lose control like that.>

He knew he couldn’t, but he really wanted to at the same time. A vision of him bringing down the whole building flashed through his mind, which he immediately suppressed.

“Weird.” Izzy looked around without making the connection between Seth and the mini seismic activity.

“So…”

“Yes her.” Seth cut her off, and his tone indicated that was the end of the line of discussion.

Izzy might have missed the use of his power, but she didn’t miss the look on his face.

“Cool, no problem.”

She tried to act relaxed, but he could see the nervousness building inside her. He could tell she was going to ask him something else.

“One more question and I swear I’m done.” She crossed her heart like she was seven and making a promise to her BFF.

Seth took a deep breath in through his nose, slowly let it out through his mouth, and steeled himself. “What?”

“What’s it like to have money?”

Seth couldn’t stop himself. He busted out laughing. If anything, that seemed to piss Izzy off.

“I’m sorry.” Seth could feel the tension leaving his body as he continued to chuckle. “That’s just a really random question, and if you want an honest answer it’s kind of a pain in the ass.”

“Wow. Money equals a pain in the ass to you. Spoken like a rich guy I guess.”

“Hey,” Seth glared back, his anger rising again. “You asked a question and I gave you an honest answer. When you have money that’s all anyone seems to be concerned about in my experience. That or getting more money. People stop thinking of people as people. My family isn’t even a family. My dad’s more worried about the family name than the people that actually have the name. My mom self-medicates herself into a coma, and my brother and sister are world class dicks. Money hasn’t done anything for my family except ruin it. It’s more like we’re a group of people that share chromosomes than people that care about each other.”

It all came pouring out in a rant that took Izzy and him by surprise. By the end of it Izzy was looking at him slightly differently.

“But at least you have a family.” She said after a few moments of silence. “I’ve never known my parents. I never got new clothes, a car for my sixteenth birthday, or even a going away party for graduation. I got legal documents saying I was now an adult and to take care of myself.”

It was Seth’s turn to be thoughtful for a moment.

“I’d still trade you.” He ultimately concluded.

“You wouldn’t say that if you were in my shoes.”

“And if you’d been in my shoes you wouldn’t want to be in them anymore.”

“Then I guess we’re at an impasse.”

“I guess we are.” A smile played on both of their lips.

“But if you want to live the good life so bad then I’ll give you your dream.” Seth blindsided her.

“What?” Milk practically squirted out of her nose as she caught something Seth tossed underhand across the table.

Seth laughed as she looked down and her eyes bulged.

“These are keys to a Porsche 911 Turbo S Cabriolet.” She cradled the keys like they were made of gold.

“So.” Seth shrugged.

“This is a two hundred thousand dollar car.” Her eyes continued to bug out.

“So.” Seth repeated with a smug look.

“So…SO!” She suddenly didn’t know what to do with her hands. “So…I can’t drive this.”

“Why not?”

“Because…”

Seth sighed, but he enjoyed seeing the look on her face. “Do you have a license?”

“Yeah.”

“Is it suspended in any way that would legally restrict you from driving a motor vehicle.”

“No, but…”

“Then let’s go.” Seth interrupted her as he got to his feet.

She didn’t move as he walked away.

“If you don’t come with me I’m going straight to campus police to say that you stole my car.” That got her moving.

“But…but…” She was at a continued loss for words as he led the way out of the dining hall and down the street to where the car was parked.

“Where are we going?” she asked as he hopped in the passenger seat and reclined it back to a lounging position.

“You said you never got new clothes, so we’ll hit the mall.”

“You’re letting me drive your super expensive car and you’re going to buy me clothes.”

“It’s only money.” He replied simply as he shut his eyes and waited for the car to start.

It didn’t, so he cracked his eyes to look up at her.

“You’re drunk aren’t you.”

“A little bit,” he smiled.

She nodded her head like everything was falling into place. “You want me to be your chauffer.”

“You drive me around tonight and in return I’ll let you drive a car you seem to be salivating all over, and I’ll buy you clothes. Seems like a pretty good arrangement to me.”

“You’re an ass.” She said, but started up the car anyway.

“Glad you finally see the light, Iz.”

“I’d prefer you call me Isla or Izzy.” The engine rumbled as she put it into drive and pulled into the street. It jerked forward as the powerful engine took her by surprise.

“And I’d prefer if you kept it down, Iz, I’m trying to sleep off a bit of my tipsiness before we get there.”

He couldn’t see her with his eyes closed, but he could feel her eyeroll as she finally reached an open road and opened it up.

Her scream of delight was a welcome change to the toxic feelings and constant suspicion that he’d been enduring from everyone else today.

 

***

 

Kyoshi stifled a yawn as she took the lift down into the HCP. It was finally Friday, and she couldn’t wait to be finished. This first week had been wearing her down from the beginning, and it wasn’t just the academic and physical rigors. Seth’s meltdown and drama was beginning to get around. People were starting to notice what was wrong with her friend.

<Then the DVA hauled him in for questioning.> She shook her head as the soft chime announced she’d arrived. <All anyone is doing is pushing him away. He needs us, he needs his friends, we need to bring him back.>

She tried to put that aside as she walked down the sci-fi-esque corridors and toward the locker room. Today was a big day, without having to deal with Seth.

Kyoshi was beginning to get a feeling for the classes she was taking, and all the extra work she’d have to put in this semester. The above ground classes weren’t really a concern. She’d always been good at school, and she was confident she could maintain a 3.5 or higher GPA this semester. It was the HCP classes that were going to consume her energy.

Focus quite literally did that. It was mentally brutal work. The exercises that Professor Livingston started putting the class through on day one were harder than anything she’d personally given Kyoshi to work on last year. Every day she left that class with her brain feeling like it had spent five minutes in a microwave.

Close Combat was basically an extension of physical training, and a continuation of what they’d started last year. Although, the previous year had been all about learning to fight. For someone like Kyoshi who had multiple martial arts backgrounds it wasn’t too difficult, but that wasn’t the focus this year. This year’s goal seemed to be to put the class in the most unpredictable or shittiest scenarios possible. She understood that Coach McMillian wanted to make them ready for anything, but showing up to a two-on-one fight where your power doesn’t work on one of the people isn’t exactly fair.

<Fair has nothing to do with it.> She remembered the Coach’s words perfectly. <It’s about you saving civilian lives and continuing to breathe. The rest doesn’t matter.>

Focus left her mentally exhausted and Close Combat left her physically bruised, so the healing class with Dr. Sanderson was actually one of the best parts of her day. He’d jumped right into it without waiting any time. They were in the middle of getting CPR certified with plans to move onto operating AEDs next. She really took that class to heart – literally.

She smiled to herself and she pulled on her gray uniform and entered the gym. Before she could get on to those specialty classes she had to go through good old-fashioned physical training, and that always started with pullups.

She grabbed the bar and knocked out ten easily. They were up to doing twenty every time they entered or exited the gym, but she hadn’t done as much upper body training as she should have on summer break. The last ten were a struggle, and she had to throw her legs up on the last two. If Coach McMillian had been watching he would have yelled at her for poor form.

She quickly joined the rest of the class that had already arrived. A quick peek at the clock on the wall and the Coach started.

“I told you all it was coming so I hope you gave it some serious thought.” He scanned the crowd trying to get a read on if people pondered his statements from the beginning of the week. “This year’s focus is teamwork because Heroes often work as a team. Sure, people work solo, but you can bring the full resources of a team to bear on a problem and solve it more quickly and efficiently. Heroes and the DVA both promote team formation for Heroes to combat our lack of numbers and to better coordinate with state and local agencies where we operate. Your training in this starts today.” He looked down at his clipboard.

“We will have four teams of seven. Today team captains will be announced, the teams will be picked, and the workout will be a team one decided by the captain. You can do whatever you want for the remainder of class, but I suggest you use your time wisely. There will be monthly exercises to test each team, and we’re already a quarter of the way through this month. Your first trial will be in a matter of weeks, so if I were you I’d start preparing today.” He cracked a smile that made Kyoshi nervous.

It was never a good thing when the close combat instructor was excited about something.

“The four team captains are: Angela Martin, Jason Cook, Kimberly Goodman, and Erin Fisher.”

<That makes sense. They are the top four in the class.> The rest of the class seemed to agree because not many people commented on the captains. Although, having Erin as a captain was a bit weird. She’d always been a bit off.

The captains stepped forward and spaced themselves out in front of the rest of the class. They all kept a straight face, except Erin who looked like she was in her own little world, but Kyoshi saw their minds calculating the best picks. Just from a basic surface read, Kyoshi could tell that Angela and Kimberly were better at this sort of thing than Jason and Erin.

“Captains, you have five minutes to think then you will choose in the order I selected you. No longer than one minute can pass for you to make your selection. We will continue until everyone is picked and then you’ll get to work. Time starts now.”

Kyoshi listened in while the captains looked over team possibilities. Once the five minutes was up Angela didn’t hesitate to make her first pick.

“Kyoshi Schultz.”

<What?!> Kyoshi didn’t move at first. <That’s got to be a mistake.> Angela hadn’t been thinking about picking her at all.

In fact, it was literally the first time she’d been picked first at anything. She was a giant, clumsy girl who also happened to be an easily identifiable Super. Back in high school that didn’t win any popularity contests.

“Move it, Ms. Schultz.” Coach McMillian pointed for her to fall in with Angela.

<I picked you because you’re the best advanced mind in the class. Not only does that give us a tactical advantage on the battlefield, but it gives me an advantage here and now. What are the other captains thinking?>

“Anika Kemps.” Jason made his selection.

<He kind of had the same idea you did. Anika is still learning her gift but she’ll at least be an early warning system and she had the added power of her speed and strength. She was probably the better first pick.>

Angela ignored the last part and asked for info on Kimberly.

<She wants a power team.> Kyoshi could easily decipher the blaster’s motivations.

“Anna Fletcher.” Kimberly made her pick, and Anna strutted over to her new team.

<Erin… it’s hard to tell what she’s thinking.>

“Mason Jackson,” Erin called out in her far-off, detached voice.

Despite the slim chances of being on the same team, Mason getting picked by another captain still hurt. Their time was going to be a commodity in short supply and it would have been nice to see him during team activities.

“Alexander Webb.” Angela didn’t hesitate.

She’d wanted Mason, but Alex was another good person with superior strength she could leverage.

Jason didn’t hesitate to snatch up Teresa Shaw. Kimberly added to her powerhouse team with Casey, and Erin went with Lorelei Gilford to complete the second round. The selection went pretty quick after that. Teams got picked roughly going down their rankings depending on what the captain was looking for. Angela did make a surprisingly big jump down to grab Fiona the only teleporter in the class. After their dealings with Liz, they knew not to underestimate or undervalue a teleporter.

As time went by it became more and more obvious that one student high in the rankings was being left out. Seth, who looked like he’d been in a decent mood, got surlier and surlier as the selection continued. Kyoshi was willing to bet the man was not used to being picked near the end for anything. It surely didn’t help when he was picked dead last by Erin.

“Those are our teams.” Coach McMillian pointed to a wall when they were done and everyone’s names appeared on it. “The rest of the class is yours, and please take the time to come up with an interesting name. There might be some extra credit in it for most inspiring.”

Kyoshi wasn’t sure if he was telling the truth so she went back to studying the board.

 

Team 1

Angela Martin, Kyoshi Schultz, Alexander Webb, Fiona Richardson, Natalia Romanoff, Oliver Carpenter, Blake Rhodes

 

Team 2

Jason Cook, Anika Kemps, Teresa Shaw, Liam Garrison, Emilia Scarborough, Danny Mason, Janet Ibsen

 

Team 3

Kimberly Goodman, Anna Fletcher, Casey Williams, Rebecca Whitfield, Jacqueline Eton, Carson Long, Richard Gibson

 

Team 4

Erin Fisher, Mason Jackson, Lorelei Gilford, Simon Skylar, Ashley Bates, Rowan Michaelson, Seth Abney

 

<I hope Angela has a plan.> Kyoshi frowned, because just by looking at the board she didn’t think her captain had picked the best team.

If anything, Kimberly’s looked like the team to beat.

Previous                                                           Next

A Change of Pace – Season 2 – Chapter 10

Today was the day. <Or at least it better fuckin’ be.>

Lilly had trouble sleeping that night. She tossed and turned trying to ignore the restlessness, but that only made it worse. She got up in the middle of the night and started to workout. It was something to try and burn through that energy. It succeeded in making her body sweaty and tired but not her mind. She stripped out of her BO-filled prison jumpsuit and climbed back into bed.

If everything went as planned then she wouldn’t have to see this cell again.

Prison was like having an irritating itch that you could never scratch. You had to do everything everyone else told you all the time, which was not how Lilly was programmed. Then, even in your private time, you were confined to a small cell. So if you wanted to do anything to relieve that itch it got broadcasted in the security booth upstairs.

She was sure they’d watched her impromptu workout closely and wondered why she was up in the middle of the night. She wouldn’t tell them even if they asked nicely. That was another way that she was programmed.

With no sun or moon to pass the time all the prisoners were constantly at the mercy of the guards. The guards had watches which told the time. When Reggie came by she had to assume it was morning.

They went through the routine. She stood against the wall, he patted her down, and she politely instigated sexual banter which he dutifully refused. Usually he didn’t talk much at all aside from the standard commands, but today was a little different.

“You nervous?” His question caught her off-guard.

“What? Me? I’m touched Reggie, I really am, but I’m actually innocent. This is all just a big misunderstanding.” She felt the restrains go around her wrist and ankles and could practically see the strongman rolling his eyes.

He led her around the ring of level 3 and stopped at the bathroom. A female guard stood inside the door and did not look happy to be there.

“Clean yourself up, Wraith. You need to be presentable for the judge.”

There were some basic toiletries available, but nothing she could use to kill the guards and escape. The female guard watched her like a hawk as she undressed and entered the open-room showers. A dozen nozzles lined the walls and she took one in the middle. She scrubbed off her workout’s BO and did all the personal hygiene expected of a lady. Wrapped a towel over her chest and gathered her hair in another one. She brushed her teeth and gave herself one last look over.

She looked a little thinner than she’d like, but there was no getting rid of her award-winning face and priceless personality. She gave the mirror one of her thousand-watt smiles before shrugging into a clean prison jumpsuit. She’d requested a pretty dress and some heels, but they’d said no. The heels were a stabbing hazard, and they were right.

“Let’s go.” The guard grabbed her roughly by the arm and dragged her into the hall where Reggie was waiting. “She’s clear.”

Reggie made sure with another pat down before re-shackling her and heading to the surface level of the prison. Outside there was a caravan of vehicles waiting along with two Heroes.

“So much attention for little old me?” She smiled at the color-coded pair. “You shouldn’t have.”

One of the Heroes approached her, and for a second she thought the woman was actually going to take a swing at her. <I probably killed someone she cared about.> She managed to think before she placed a hand on her shoulder.

The world spun a little bit and Lilly staggered, but she shook her head and her vision came back into focus. When it did, she gave her head another shake, because she was seeing three of her.

“What the fuck?”

Outside the prison there were three naked Lilly’s. They all just stood there like statues trembling slightly in the cool breeze. The other Hero produced three different colored jumpsuits. The real Lilly was currently wearing white while the rest were dressed in orange, red, and black.

“Did you think we wouldn’t find out?” One of the Heroes got all up in her face. “Did you seriously think you were going to break out of this place under my watch?”

Lilly had no idea who this chick was, but she wasn’t about to let her see her hope shattered like a broken mirror. Instead she leaned closer and took an audible whiff.

“Hero-chick,” she took another whiff. “You stink girlfriend. You should use some mouthwash after you suck dick. Just a friendly piece of advice.”

The Hero blushed, raised her hand, balled it into a fist, and then brought it within an inch of Lilly’s face. Lilly didn’t even flinch. She just gave the woman her thousand-watt smile. “Chop chop Jeeves. I have someplace to be.”

Needless to say, the female Hero didn’t ride in the SUV with the real Lilly. That was good, because the fact that they knew something was up did not bode well for her. It was a decent trek from the prison to the federal courthouse where she was going to have to face a jury of her peers, but that gave her plenty of time to think and plan.

She knew the woman was some type of duplicator. Those were always a pain in the ass to fight, especially when you didn’t know what type of duplications she made or what her secondary powers might be. The other Hero was a complete unknown, and she hadn’t gotten any type of read off what he was. Then there was Reggie and the other three guards who came with her last time. They rode in her car. They were all low-class Supers mostly with physical enhancements. She had plans to deal with them.

All of those plans came to a sudden halt when her SUV took a right while the other three kept going straight.

“Hey, where are we going?” She turned to look at the street behind her. “Don’t get all rapey on me now Reggie. I’ve got a court time to meet.”

“You’ll make it.” Reggie hadn’t dropped his usual strong and silent mentality, so whatever was happening was part of their plan.

<Another countermeasure.> She felt that broken hope begin to seep away.

She didn’t know what her rescuers’ plan was, but they were going to have to improvise on the fly, and that was if they could even find her.

The SUV came to a halt at what looked like a water treatment facility. Her guards got out and led her inside, and down into the bowels of the city.

<Ahhhh.> She got it now. She was being brought in under the radar…literally.

They walked the subterranean passageways of the city for fifteen minutes until she felt the earth tremor around her. The radio on Reggie’s hip went insane with chatter, which he quickly turned off.

“The convoy got hit by an IED.” He announced to the team, who all drew their sidearms. “We’re to proceed to our secondary location for pickup and transport back to the prison.” He turned and gave Lilly a hard stare.

“Hey, don’t look at me. You’ve had me under lock and key for months. I’m not doing anything.” Her lips only turned up slightly at the corners.

“Let’s move. Time is of the essence.” Reggie turned to drag Lilly back the way she came.

“I agree.” One of the other guards, Lilly didn’t know who he was, turned and shot another guard point blank in the head. The guard was dead instantly and fell like a downed tree.

To his credit, Reggie didn’t hesitate. He was a professional and good at his job. He grabbed the gun as it turned toward him and crushed it in his hand. Metal screeched as it warped under his powerful grip, but it gave the traitor time to counter. His fist found Reggie’s head and the strongman stumbled back as electricity exploded around him.

Lilly made a note that this guy was some type of absorber.

With Reggie off balance and the other guard advancing on him she saw her chance. There was just one guard in the way. The guy looked to be on the younger side, and whatever his ability was it wasn’t keeping his eye on the ball. He was too busy watching the other guard and Reggie that he didn’t see Lilly coming. She lashed out with her foot and aimed for the guy’s groin.

The problem with the attack was that her ankles were shackled together. She knew that and was prepared for what she had to do. The shackles didn’t have enough give for her to reach the guard’s babymakers, so she let the force of her blow lift her other foot off the ground. It was incredibly awkward and reduced the force of her kick by about half.

But hitting a dude in the junk was still hitting him in the junk. She caught him with his legs open and totally unprepared. His eyes practically rolled into the back of his head as pain coursed through him. He collapsed and started to dry heave on the ground.

She had a moment to revel in his misfortune before gravity became her problem to worry about. She’d sacrificed her footing to land the blow and the price for that was landing hard on her back. She tried to roll with in, but she still got the wind knocked out of her. She pushed through the lung spasms and struggled to her feet.

This was her chance to escape and she wasn’t going to miss it. She’d never get another. If they caught her they’d throw her in the darkest hole they could find and throw away the key. She wouldn’t even have Reggie’s well-sculpted ass to look at every once in a while.

She grabbed the wall for support and started to shuffle down the hall. <I should have grabbed a radio. Shit!> She screamed at herself as she picked up speed as much as possible. She felt like a walrus trying to run in these shackles, but it was the best she could do. She could still hear the sounds of a brawl coming from behind her, so whoever the mysterious guard was he was buying her precious seconds. She rounded the corner and continued her flight to freedom.

The only problem was that she was in an underground labyrinth of pipes and the only exit she had was back to the water treatment plant. The workers there would find it highly suspicious if she came back out in her prison jumpsuit, handcuffed, but without the guards.

<I need something to get this shit off.> She started to look for something small enough to pick the lock with.

In addition to the many wonderful things her father had trained her to do, lock picking was one of them. It was actually pretty easy to get out of standard handcuffs as long as you had the right equipment, and thankfully the underground tunnels were bountiful. Someone left their tools out and she was able to grab some stiff wire to shove into the slot. She started with her feet and thirty seconds later she was sprinting away like her life depended on it. She entered the treatment plant as stealthy as possible and found the locker room. She stole a dude’s jacket that was way too big for her and hoped it hid her white jumpsuit from a casual glance. She pulled the collar of the jacket up high to hide the collar around her neck and walked right out the front door. The pocket of the jacket had keys so she stole the guy’s car too.

And his phone. The phone was key. She dialed a number from memory and it picked up after the first ring.

“Who the hell is this?” the voice was rushed.

“Don’t tell me you forgot about me already, Uncle Curtis.” She put on a pouty face even though no one was there to see it.

“Yes!” She heard him cheer. “Nano, Plan B worked.”

<Mika’s with him.> That caught her by surprise.

There was a ruffled sound of the phone changing hands before Mika’s voice came over the line. “Hey, Shadow!” He still sounded like the kid he was. “Glad you made it out.”

“Me too. So what’s the plan?”

“The plan if for you to get to this address.” A text appeared on the phone with the location. “But you need to get to a hardware or grocery store ASAP.”

“Why?”

“Your collar has a GPS tracker embedded in it. Right now I’m screwing with their systems, but they’re close to kicking me out. Find some aluminum and wrap it around your neck. It’ll help block the signal so you can get to the rendezvous undetected. Once you’re there I can get that thing off you.”

“Aluminum, gotcha.”

“And…hurry.”

There was a pause in the statement that she didn’t like. “Nano?”

“The aluminum will block the GPS and it’ll also stop them from detonating the explosives in the collar. If you want to keep your head I’d find some soon.”

Lilly’s foot pushed the pedal to the floor and the beat-up truck she’d stolen lurched forward.

She didn’t care how stupid she’d look with aluminum around her neck. It was infinitely better than having nothing left but a bloody stump.

“I’ll call you back in five.” Nano handed the phone over to Armsman.

“Stay safe, kid.” He cut the line.

That was exactly what Lilly intended to do. She wasn’t going to die today.

 

***

 

Seth sat in front of the computer like everyone else and waited. The small, slim, brown-haired man marched in front of the rows of computers and looked them over individually. It was kind of creepy, and Seth was not getting the best vibe from subtlety in general.

“Don’t confuse subtlety with James Bond.” Professor Willis started off the class. “Being a secret agent has nothing to do with this specialty. If anything, we’re the exact opposite. We’re the guys in the background making sure that the sexy secret agent man gets all the right information to step in and save the girl.”

Seth rolled his eyes. He really didn’t give two shits about girls right now. He’d originally said no to this class because of a girl, but then he changed his mind. What better way to discover a lying cheating bitch than to beat her at her own game. That’s why he was taking subtlety. To make sure nothing like Liz ever happened again.

“Now that I’ve wiped any illusions of subtlety grandeur from your minds, if anyone wishes to leave please feel free. I won’t hold it against you and the other professors are still accepting transfers until the end of the week.”

Seth thought about giving up, but then just shrugged. He didn’t have anything better to do. If he became a Hero this wasn’t going to be his major anyway. He just wanted to learn enough to know when someone was playing him. <I’ll stick it out. I just need to pass.>

“You need to do more than meet minimal grading requirements to pass this class.” Professor Willis continued to parade in front of them like a general marshalling his army. “You need to impress me, or show me that you have the spark of something greater inside you. Anyone can punch a wall down, but it takes a different breed to think of a way through that wall without the bad guy knowing while getting his social security number.”

<This is going to be a long class.> Seth got the feeling Miles Willis liked to hear himself speak.

“With all of that being said, today we start with the basics. That begins with an aptitude test of my own design and a simple question. What are the different types of intelligence gathering?”

A hubcap-sized hand went up from the back row. “Human intelligence and signal intelligence.”

“Very good, Mr. Jackson. Those are two of the eight types of intelligence gathering. HUMINT is what people most traditionally associate with espionage, and SIGNINT is what all of those new movies are about. Intercepting data and discovering the secrets within. Anyone else? …No…It seems pop culture is limited to those two. The other six types of intelligence gathering are: geospatial intelligence, measurement and signature intelligence, open-source intelligence, technical intelligence, cyber intelligence, and financial intelligence.”

<Shit that’s a lot of intelligences.> Seth didn’t even know the majority of those existed.

“We’ll cover each of these in some depth during the semester, but today is about finding out what you know. Please turn on your computers.”

Seth did as instructed and a blue screen with a logon appeared.

“Your first test is to figure out the password. Open the drawer to you right. There is a mix of crap in there. Somewhere buried in that crap is the password for your computer. Everyone’s is different. Piece together the puzzle and log on. You have ten minutes.”

<You’ve got to be fucking kidding me.> Seth really just wanted to light all of the crap on fire, but that wouldn’t go over well, so he got to work.

Figuring out the password wasn’t simple. He tried the birthday of the ID he found and got nothing. He looked for common trends in the drawer. One of those was cats. Whoever this imaginary person was, Seth thought they were an old cat lady who would live and die alone before being eaten by said cats. He tried the cat names he found, but none of those were good. There was a planner in the drawer as well, and he went through that trying a number of passwords. None of those worked. Eventually, he found a tab marked passwords in the planner.

<No, it can’t be that easy.> He opened to the page and several alpha-numeric combinations were written neatly and orderly.

He found the one marked Comp. ID and plugged it in. The computer booted up and brought up a screen with a giant picture of a cat’s face. There were icons on the left but he left them alone and waited for the ten minutes to elapse.

“Time!” Professor Willis called. “And what lesson did we learn today?”

<People are stupid.>

“People write down their passwords and keep those numbers close.”

“Yes. Thank you, Ms. Scarborough. We learned that the average person doesn’t have the patience or memory capacity to remember all the various passwords for logging onto their various electronic accounts. You will most likely find someone’s passwords written down somewhere near their computer. Now, our next test is going to be using the same items in the drawer to find a bit of intelligence on the hard drive. Click on the top right icon to begin. You have another ten minutes.”

Five minutes in Seth had the information. The cat lady had used the same password for half of her stuff and the security questions had been pretty easy with all the information in the drawer. Seth wasn’t by any means a computer geek, but the last two exercises told him was that he was pretty good at figuring stuff out about people. All it did was make him angrier that Liz had been able to get through his defenses so easily.

<Apparently, all you need to get by me is a rockin’ bod and to know your way around the bedroom.> It was a realization he’d come to before, but it still sucked to think about it.

“Anyone who hasn’t succeeded in their task please raise your hand.” There were a few but not many.

A year of fighting other people gave you some skill at reading them. This was just an extension of that. Seth was in the middle of wondering whether this was HUMINT or SIGNIT gathering when the door to the classroom banged open.

“Excuse our interruption, Professor.” A woman in a black suit stood in the doorway flanked by two men.

“It’s quite alright, Agent Phillips. What can I do for you today.”

“Is Mr. Abney present?”

“Yeah, I’m here.” Seth stood up and waved at the DVA goons. “What do you want?”

“Please come with us.”

Seth had his fair share of meetings with the DVA over the summer. Most of them had a lawyer present at them, and he hadn’t said much.

“I’ll need to contact my attorney if we’re gonna keep playing this game.” Seth sighed.

“No need, Mr. Abney. Please come with us.” The two big guys started moving toward him.

“Yeah, fine. I’m coming.” Seth started to move before the guys could haul him out of the room. That would just do wonders for his reputation.

“Return to class once you’re finished with the lovely Agent Phillips.” Professor Willis was laying the charm on thick. “There is a homework assignment. It would be a shame if you missed it.”

Seth didn’t give a rat’s ass about homework. He wanted to know why the DVA was pulling him out of class. The three agents were tight-lipped until they reached the teachers’ offices and they passed through a door at the end of the hallway with the Dean’s name on it. Inside Dean Ditmar sat talking with Hunter and Abyss. Seth recognized both Heroes from last year. Hunter was the one who brought in Liz; on top of being Angela’s father. Absence was a nullifier who’d come to speak to the class. She’d also had dealings with Liz when she was Wraith.

It wasn’t hard to put two and two together.

“What happened with Liz?”

The Dean’s eyes turned to regard Seth, and the young Super couldn’t puzzle what the older man was thinking.

“Please, Seth, have a seat.” He gestured.

“I don’t want to sit.”

“Fine.” Agent Phillips rounded on Seth, ignoring the three Heroes in the room. “If you want to be questioned standing that’s fine by me.”

The three Heroes might have neutral expressions, but Agent Phillips looked pissed.

“Less than an hour ago Lilly Noel, aka Liz Aretino, aka Wraith escaped from federal custody. I’m here to see if you had anything to do with it.”

“Oh.” Seth involuntarily took that seat after all. He didn’t know it was possible to feel unbelievable joy and unbearable sadness all at once.

“Mr. Abney, where were you forty-six minutes ago? Where is your personal computer and cell phone? What have you been doing since your last interview?”

The initial shock of Liz’s escape was washed away as the DVA agent dug into him. His resolve hardened and he glared back at her. “Remember that who lawyer thing? It’s in the Constitution and just about every state charter. Yeah, I thought so,” he stated when the agent’s eyes flashed with anger. “We’ll wait for my attorney to arrive, and then we’ll talk.”

“That will take time, and clearances to get him down here. It’s time we don’t have if we want to reacquire Wraith.”

“Well then, I suggest you use one of your teleporters and we take this meeting above ground because I’m not talking without counsel present.”

“Mr. Abney has rights, Agent Phillips. Please respect those in my school.” The Dean came to Seth’s defense even though he looked conflicted about it.

The DVA agent seethed for a moment before regaining her composure. “Hunter?”

“On it.” The man disappeared.

“Let’s take this meeting upstairs then.” Agent Phillips motioned for him to get up and move toward the door.

The two other DVA agents walked much closer to him this time. The only thing saying he wasn’t in custody was the lack of handcuffs around his wrists, and if Liz got away he didn’t know how long it would be until they tried to slap those on.

Seth hadn’t done anything to help Liz escape. He’d been in class forty-six minutes ago and he’d spent the summer drinking his liver into oblivion and fucking random chicks.. He wouldn’t even get out of bed to pay the pizza delivery guy much less help the woman who broke his heart. But that was all when Liz was in custody. Now that she was out, the government would be looking for scapegoats.

Seth had been around enough people with power to know they were going to pin the tail on anything related to her crimes, even some kid who was thinking with his dick more than his head.

<They aren’t going to get me.> Seth’s family had one of the best attorneys in the county on retainer since this all started, and his father would use all his influence to ensure Seth didn’t sully the family name.

Seth wasn’t going down for this bullshit. If the DVA wanted a fight they’d get a fight, and it all started now.

Previous                                             Next

A Change of Pace – Chapter 101

<Twenty-fours spent doing nothing but sitting on my ass.> Angela silently fumed in her little corner of the gym.

Her negative emotions hovered over her like a black thundercloud. People sensed it and kept away. The teenage shifter was pretty sure she’d aced her finals. She’d been stern and unyielding when needed but also considerate and compassionate. She knew a Hero required both, and she’d delivered.

And then the real deal happened. The city had gone to hell in a hand-basket, and she’d been given a mask in case she needed it. It felt like every fiber of her being tingled when she touched that small piece of comfortable plastic.

<This is what I’m meant to do.> No matter what anyone told her, she knew this was the life for her.

And then she’d sat on her ass while it all happened.

Roads and bridges turned to rubble. The power plant blown up…again. TV and radio stations hijacked or demolished so the enemies’ message of fear and hate could be spread. The airport was a flaming wreck with the smoking skeletons of 737s still lying dead on the tarmac. Lots of people had died too. Civilians caught in the crossfire all over the city, hundreds of them. The Orlando PD had done their best, but they’d taken their own losses. A few dozen cops killed in the line of duty. The department was reeling.

The DVA was on scene and investigating in force for the time being. They were bolstering the PDs ranks and sharing some of the burdens until the next class graduated from the police academy at the end of the summer. But even then, there would be a lot of rookies with fewer veterans to show them the ropes than any time in recent memory.

The DVA was also looking into what was being called Lander’s Crucible and seeing if the two attacks were related. So far, there didn’t seem to be any link between the Sons of Progress and Seif al-Din’s terrorist organization, but they were still digging.

They also had to look into their deployment protocols. Even on different sides of the country, with totally different circumstances, Lander’s attack pulled a disproportionate number of Hero responders compared to Orlando.  Granted, some of it was due to the chaos and breakdown in communication. Lander had just dropped off the grid and that was a clear red flag. Orlando had rapidly descended into chaos, but the city’s leadership had been slow to make the distinction between possible gang violence and a terrorist attack. The Protectorate and DVA having their hands full didn’t help getting information to the right people.

Despite the needs for improvement for the local authorities, there was no denying that the bad guys had planned things perfectly. They’d dispersed the local defenders all across the city. They’d started a natural disaster up north, and all so when they found Seif al-Din they only had a small strike force that wasn’t able to take him down.

They were also looking into that because lethal force had been authorized but not used. A lot of people wanted to know why.

While all of that was important, none of it mattered to Angela because she’d been stuck underground the whole time. And now they weren’t even being allowed to help in the clean-up.

“Everybody turn in your masks.” Coach McMillian was making the rounds to collect the school property.

She saw him watching everything closely. A lot of the students thought he was the good cop to his and Coach Meyers’ good cop bad cop routine. They thought he was the one that would go easy on them, and he might just do that, but there was always something going on behind the speedster’s eyes.

Coach McMillian was sharp, and she could tell he was watching all the students and evaluating how they went about giving up their first piece of almost real Hero action.

“I heard the students at Lander got to help.” Angela held onto her mask when the coach came by.

“Where’d you hear that?”

“People talk.” She left it at that.

“Yeah, they got to help, but it was a different situation.”

Angela bit her tongue and nodded. Arguing with the close combat coach wouldn’t do her any good. But, like always, the man noticed.

“They were directly under attack. They were the targets of the Sons of Progress. We were not. The terrorists specifically left us alone, for the same reason the Sons should have left Lander alone. Most of the terrorists and most of the Sons that participated in the attack are dead now. They might have showed that an HCP could be attacked, but they also showed that an HCP would fight back. With no backup, and no intel, Lander’s professors and their students took down several enhanced Supers. It was a pretty big show of force. Something we didn’t need here.” The coach’s eyes were thoughtful but stern.

“I just wish I could have done something to help. “Angela tried to recover.

“Don’t be so eager to jump right into things, Angela. Lander’s students got a taste of what the Hero life was like, but they got a taste of the good and the bad. They lost someone.”

Angela didn’t know that, and she thought about what she would be feeling right now if they’d run off to help and Becca had been killed.

Dr. Johnson would be proud of how she handled herself. She approached the problem, admitted what she was feeling to herself, came to grips with that, and figured out a way past it. All while taking deep breaths and keeping her emotions in check. If this had been a few months ago, she probably would have just started punching something.

“Ms. Martin.” Dean Ditmar stepped into the gym for the first time since this whole ordeal started.

The HCP leader looked tired, like he’d been fighting bad guys all day, and cleaning up all night. But there was still a smile on the older Super’s face, and she took that to mean everything was ok.

“Please come with me.”

<Anything to get out of sitting here for one more minute.> She jumped to her feet and worked the kinks out of her legs and neck as she crossed the distance to the gym’s double-door entrance.

She followed the Dean through the maze of sci-fi corridors that didn’t look any different than the first day she walked out of the lift and into this life. She followed him all the way to the entrance to the library where an all too familiar woman was standing.

“I’ll give you to a moment.” The Dean smiled and left Angela with her mother.

The both stood eyeing each other for a minute before Angela final spoke. “Jesus, Mom. What happened?”

Sophia Martin was in a worn pair of jeans and a t-shirt. Her eyes were red, she wasn’t wearing any make-up, and she was favoring one side.

“Rough day at the office.” The unshifted Hero Seraphim chuckled before taking a step forward and wrapping her arms around her daughter.

Angela froze for a minute, ready to counter any grapple the Hero tried to pull on her, but none ever came, and she slowly relaxed into the embrace. “What happened?”

“The bad guys weren’t exactly better than us, but they were better prepared. We walked right into their ambush and we lost some people. I made it out, but just barely. The DVA healer patched me up, but he’s not HCP quality, so I’m on medical leave for the next few days.”

Then Sophia did the impossible, she hugged Angela even harder. Angela returned the gesture and felt something in her chest. It wasn’t a heart attack, she was too young for one of those. It could have been from all the stress, or her irritation about this whole situation up until right now. Either way, she’d have to ask Dr. Sanderson about it. But for the moment, she just wanted to be content. She couldn’t remember the last time her mother hugged her like this.

“Well.” Her mother’s voice shook like she was holding something back. “I’ve got one more thing to show you before we go home for summer break.”

“You’re taking me home…” Angela waited for the “but”, but it never came. For some reason her mother was taking the exact opposite approach than what she’d decided to do when dropping her off at the beginning of the year.

<She wasn’t the one that dropped me off.> Angela shut that line of thought down hard before it could fester. Things were going really well with her mother, and she didn’t want to ruin it.

“In here.” Sophia pushed open the door to the school’s library and waved her through, but didn’t follow. “Third aisle on the left. I’ll be here when you’re done.”

Without another word, her mother closed the door behind Angela with a hint of a smile on her face.

<They’ve got to have her on pain meds.> It was the only explanation.

She walked down the few dozen feet to the third aisle and turned left like she’d been instructed. There was somebody else there. A large somebody who was preoccupied with running their hand underneath one of the shelves. Whoever it was didn’t notice her at first, and she wasn’t sure what to do.

<Just asking some random somebody if my mother just set us up isn’t exactly what I thought this was all about.> Really, she had no idea what was going on.

The person sat there for a few more moments, running their fingers underneath the shelf before standing up. They were bigger at their full height, at least half a foot taller than Angela, and it was obviously a guy. Angela’s thought process went from possible set-up to possible ambush in a nanosecond. Her eyes scanned the rest of the library looking for more threats when the man started to laugh.

<Wait…> Angela froze. Despite all her training, everything she’d been taught for eighteen years. She still froze like a deer in headlights when she heard that familiar laugh.

“Don’t worry, Angela, it’s just me.”

Before she even knew what was happening she was sprinting toward the hulking figure and throwing herself into his open arms. She couldn’t speak. She was laughing, she was crying, and she was just trying to wrap her mind around what was happening.

“Daddy!” She buried her face in his chest and never wanted to let go.

“It’s ok, honey. I’m ok. Everything is going to be ok.” He pulled her close, and the feeling was mutual.

 

***

 

“So that was kind of a bust.” Mason handed in his white mask and stood their awkwardly with his hands in his pocket. He’d been dreading this moment since he wrapped up his last final.

“Better a bust than us being called out there.” Kyoshi didn’t look happy, which meant she was hearing things from everyone around them and not liking it.

“You’re right,” Mason chided himself and put a lid on his disappointment.

<Us going out there would mean the brown stuff was well and truly flying everywhere. That’s not what this city needs, and that isn’t what we need. We forget that we’re still kids.> 

Kyoshi turned toward him with a smile as she dropped her own mask in the container that Coach McMillian was passing around. “Let’s not dwell on the bad, but think about the good.” She wrapped her arms around his neck.

To date, she was the only girl he’d ever dated that was able to do it.

“So…summer break?” Mason didn’t look her in the eye, but he was sure she could read his thoughts like an open book.

The title of the book would be “Mason doesn’t want to spend three months away from the woman he loves” in all caps with a hundred exclamation points at the end.

Kyoshi smiled as she read as much off him. She didn’t really need to read his mind as much as his face and body language, because hers was a mirror image of his. She didn’t want to spend time away from him either.

“What are you planning?”

“Honestly, I want to keep training. I know I did well enough on the finals that I think I’ll make it back, but I need to be stronger. Strongmen are a dime a dozen. If I want to make it into junior year I’ve got to be at my best and figure out new uses for my ability.”

“Mason.” She placed a hand on either side of his face to make sure he was looking at her. “If you don’t get to become a Hero then none of us should.” She meant that with all her heart. “You are kind, considerate, compassionate, strong, courageous, and a selfless person. There is no better future Hero out there than you.”

“Except you.” Mason’s reply made Kyoshi blush scarlet.

“Let’s just agree to disagree on that point.” They both smiled at each other.

“But the summer?” Mason brought them back on point.

“Well, you need to see your grandmother,” Kyoshi stated.

“And you need to see your parents,” Mason reminded her of her own commitments.

“You have to drive back home in that beater and I’ve got to fly.” Kyoshi outlined their travel arrangements.

“That’s right.”

“So how about this.” Kyoshi adopted a thinker’s pose. “Let’s road trip up the east coast to Brooklyn. We can take our time, see some sites, and spend quality time together. Once we hit New York, we’ll stay for a few weeks and spend time with your grandmother. You can introduce me to your boxing coach and I can build on my hand-to-hand skills by training with a new opponent. Plus, I’ve got a technique I want us to try out that could be really cool.”

Mason nodded fervently. Any extra time he got to spend with his girlfriend was time well spent in his mind.

“After we do some time in New York. We’ll fly out to see my parents. If you want a strongman to train you and teach you some new tricks there is no one better than my father. Don’t worry.” She saw Mason pale a shade or two at the mention of training with the famous German Hero. Of all the boys I ever brought home he likes you the best.”

“You brought a lot of boys home?” He didn’t get an answer, just a coy smile.

“Well, sound like a plan?” She raised an eyebrow, daring him to come up with something better.

“Nope, you’ve always got the best ideas.” Mason settled for hugging her close and thinking about how the next few months could go.

It could be awesome. They could learn more about each other, their families, and how they were together outside a school environment. Of course, it could also be awful, but he highly doubted it. He’d never met a woman quite like Kyoshi Schultz, and he knew how to hold on to a good thing when he had it.

“Ok, it’s a date then.”

“A three-month date.”

They both smiled and exchanged a brief kiss as the double doors opened and they were released for the summer.

 

***

 

“Becca!”

“Ani!”

The hospital hallway parted like the red sea as the two teenage Supers made a beeline for each other. They collided just beyond the crowded nurses’ station. Arms and lips locked while tears flowed freely.

“I thought I’d never see you again.” Anika held Becca tight and squeezed. If Becca had been human she probably would have broken a rib or two.

“I just woke up and you were gone.” Becca chuckles were mildly hysterical, and she kept stroking Anika’s arms to convince herself she was real.

“I’m never going anywhere ever again.” Anika gripped her even tighter.

“I’m sorry to say, but that isn’t exactly true,” a familiar voice spoke from just behind them.

Despite the relief, both women were on edge, and both rounded on the voice determined to protect the other.

“Easy there,” the woman held up her hands to show she had no bad intentions. “I’m the DVA agent assigned to get Ms. Kemps home safe.”

“Wait, you’re the one who talked to us after Angela…” Becca let the sentence trail off. If this was the woman then she knew why she’d been there.

“Yes, I’m Agent Phillips.” She pulled out her badge for good measure.

“You’re taking me home?” Anika repeated with a raised eyebrow.

“That’s what my plane ticket says.” The agent flashed two plastic slips.

“Why?”

“You’re a smart girl, Ms. Kemps.” The agent pocketed her badge and the tickets. “You were the target of all of this.”

Like someone hit the unmute button on a TV, Anika and Becca suddenly realized what was happening all around them. There was organized pandemonium. A constant stream of victims with everything from minor lacerations to burns covering a large portion of their body were everywhere. Beds with groaning patients were starting to stack up in the hallways. The nurses all looked harried and frantic, and the doctors had noticeable stress lines. This was a hospital after a disaster.

“I didn’t want all of this to happen.” Anika unknowingly grabbed Becca’s hand and squeezed. “I just didn’t want to go back.”

“Don’t let your mind go that way.” The agent took a step closer and placed her hand on Anika’s shoulder. “You were a victim of this just like everyone else.”

“But all these people. And the bad guys?” Anika looked to the DVA agent for some sign that they’d captured her psychotic father.

“We put down most of the terrorists. Captured a few, and a few got away. I’m sorry Anika, but that’s why I’m taking you home.”

“Can’t you pump the ones you got for information. You’ve got all those interrogation techniques. Find out where that butthead is and get him.” Becca’s face was fierce as she thought of any plan to save her girlfriend.

“That’s not how it works. We can’t just…”

“Did you get her?” Anika cut the agent off.

“Ms. Kemps…”

“Did you get her?” Anika asked again forcefully.

The DVA agent looked around like she was making sure no one was eavesdropping. “Yes, we got her.”

“I want to talk to her.”

“Absolutely not.” Agent Phillips put her foot down. “We’re still building a case against her. Lawyers will come by for your testimony, but until then you will not be seeing Wraith.”

“You guys caught Wraith. Awesome!” Becca squeaked in delight. “What did she do in all of this?”

“She’s the one that drugged you and kidnapped me.” Anika stated before Agent Phillips could tell her to zip it.

“Drugged me…But there was no one else there but you, me, and…” Her eyes went wide. “OH MY GOD!”

Agent Phillips gave them both a stern looked that in no uncertain words told them to shut up, but Anika still managed to mouth, “I told you so” to Becca.

<Always trust your gut.> Anika would never make that mistake again.

“We need to get going.” The DVA agent looked at her watch. “It’s a commercial flight out of Daytona since Orlando is pretty much a smoldering wreck now. So we’ve got a drive and then a long set of flights ahead of us.”

“What about our stuff.”

“Your stuff will be shipped to the new address.”

“My stuff?” Anika asked.

“New address?” Becca followed up.

“Ms. Kemps.” The DVA agent lowered he voice. “Like I said before. You were the target. The DVA is taking all necessary measures to protect you going forward, and that means WITSEC is moving your whole family to a new location.”

“And…” Becca wasn’t reading between the lines because she considered herself practically family.

“Ms. Whitfield will not be able to join us.” The older woman finally had to spell it out.

“The hell I ain’t.” Becca looked ready to speedily put her foot up someone’s ass.

“Hey.” Anika touched the blue-haired speedster’s arm and she relaxed a bit. “They just want to get me moved and get me settled. Then I’ll call you and we can meet up.” Anika glared at the DVA agent, daring her to say that even that wasn’t allowed.

Agent Phillips put up her hands again in a clear “I’m not getting in the middle of this” motion.

“But what about our summer of plaid?” Becca deflated, and new tears threatened to leak from the corners of her eyes. “We had it all planned out.”

“It’s going to be the half-summer of something new.” Anika tried to make the situation better. “Maybe it’ll be sun dresses. Maybe it’ll be copious amounts of SPF 50. Maybe we’ll have to get you some stylish parkas.” Anika smiled as Becca giggled at that one. “Whatever it is, wherever I am, I’ll be with you soon. I promise.”

Anika pulled her smaller girlfriend closer and locked lips for an explosive kiss.

“I’m going to hold you to that.” Becca replied breathless some undeterminable amount of time later.

“Count on it, babe.” Anika gave her one last hand squeeze and turned to Agent Phillips.

“Ok, lead the way.”

The still unclassified teenage super wasn’t looking forward to spending half her summer packing and moving out of Montana and into a new identity, but she’d do anything to stay away from her father.

<And anything to keep Becca safe.> There was that too, because what happened between her, Becca, and Liz was never going to happen again.

 

***

 

A black SUV with thick tinted windows had driven up to townhouse 117 and asked for Seth to come with them. It wasn’t as much a question as an order, and Seth had been in the HCP long enough to know when to just say yes and do what he was told. He didn’t know the two guys in suits who accompanied him on the ride back, but they both had pistols in holsters on their hips.

“Any chance you can tell me what the hell is going on?” He just got a shake of the head from the suit in the passenger seat.

The drive from West Private University downtown didn’t show a lot of what had gone down. For the most part, things didn’t look so bad. There was a lot of smoke in the air from the fire that was now under control in the north, so everything had a haze to it.

Occasionally, they’d come across a building or structure that looked like it should be in the middle of a Syrian warzone, not Orlando. They were ridden with bullet holes, had all their windows blown out, and large chunks of masonry missing where something a little stronger than 5.56 rounds had smashed into it. And those were the lucky ones. A few buildings were nothing more than a pile of rubble.

The driver seemed to be taking a round-a-bout way to their destination, because they seemed to pass by every building like that. Finally, they ducked into a garage next to a building identified as police headquarters, and went underground into a full motor pool full of everything from more SUVs to armored vehicles.

The vehicles looked like they could use some TLC. Some were covered in dust or ash depending on where they’d been deployed. Others had bullet holes, and a few looked like they’d had to been towed back here. A big vehicle with SWAT written on the side of it in white looked like its whole front end had exploded.

<Is that blood?> Seth didn’t have time to ask before the two suits walked him over to an elevator and hit the button for the top floor.

They emerged into a madhouse. Phones were ringing off the hooks, people were yelling into those phones, yelling for other people to shut up, running around with paperwork stacked up to their shoulders, or running in full tactical gear to get somewhere. Seth had to flatten himself again a wall as a squad of SWAT officers ran past looking ready for war.

“This him?”

Seth didn’t even see the man appear. He was old, exquisitely dressed, and wearing a mask. But most importantly the suits deferred to him.

“Yes, Sir.”

“I’ll take it from here.”

The man didn’t grab him and haul him away, which Seth got the impression he wanted to do, but he pointed impatiently toward a steel door across the room.

“My name is, Mr. Morningstar. I’m the leader of the Protectorate, the…”

“I know what the Protectorate is.” Seth cut him off. “Galavant came to talk to us earlier this year.”

If the interruption made the man angry he didn’t show it. “Very well. Follow me.” Without any pomp or circumstance, he pushed open the steel door and led the way into a dark room.

“Back for more, Morningwood.” A half-crazed voice laughed. “For a veteran Hero, your attempts have been pretty pathetic so far. How’d they let someone as incompetent as you run this joint?”

“I have my moments.” Mr. Morningstar replied calmly, but Seth saw his posture tighten at the insults. “Like right now. I brought you a guest.”

“I don’t want to see anyone.” The other voice immediately became wary. “Take them away.”

“You don’t make the rules, Wraith.”

<Holy shit they caught Wraith!> Seth’s eyes bulged and he looked at Mr. Morningstar.

The man waved Seth forward. He wanted Seth to see.

Seth couldn’t lie, this had tickled his curiosity. After writing a paper about the villain there was a certain amount of natural intrigue. Seth wanted to know all about this recently famous villain.

He stepped up to the cell, he hadn’t noticed this was a jail until Wraith’s name had been brought up, and the lights of the cell flickered on. The villain was sitting with her back to him. She had tucked herself into a corner and was showing no signs of wanting to interact.

“Hello, Wraith.” He saw his voice made her visibly stiffen.

“Go away!” The villain grunted.

“I’ve got to say I never thought they were going to catch you. I wrote a paper on you.” He left the HCP part out. “I thought you had them all outsmarted. No one knew who you were, or anything more than you were female between the ages of sixteen and twenty-five.”

He got no reply.

“So how’d they catch you? Please, I’m dying to know.” A little bit of haughty swagger had crept into his voice.

“Go away!” she grunted again.

“Now…now…Wraith. Where are your manners? Engage with the boy. He wants to know all about you.”

Somehow, things seemed to have flip-flopped in the last few minutes. For some reason, Mr. Morningstar held the power now, and he literally had the villain cowering in the corner.

“Go away!” This time it was a feminine scream, not a grunt, and something about it tickled his memory.

“No, Wraith. You brought this on yourself. Or should I call you…”

“NO!” The woman whirled around and threw herself against the barrier.

She bounced off it like a rubber ball hitting concrete and sprawled on the floor temporarily dazed. As soon as she got control of herself she rolled back onto her stomach.

But not before Seth caught a glimpse of a familiar cheekbone, an eye he’d looked into most nights over the past six months, and lips that he’d kissed a thousand times before.

“There is it.” Mr. Morningstar sounded cruel as Seth stumbled backwards in shock. “Now you see the truth.”

“No!” Liz threw herself against the barrier again, fully revealing herself, and the metal collar they had locked around her neck.

“L…Liz.” Seth felt like a strongman had sucker punched him in the gut. His legs gave out and he conveniently collapsed right into a waiting chair.

A chair on wheels which was then immediately rolled right up to the barrier and his crying girlfriend.

“No, Seth. No!” She was frantically pounding on the barrier trying to get to him.

“Yes, Seth. Yes.” Mr. Morningstar squatted just to his right. “Ms. Aretino here has been infiltrating the HCP since the day you met. Earlier today, she drugged Rebecca Whitfield and kidnapped Anika Kemps on behalf of the man who attacked this city. She killed two ForceOps soldiers that we know of, fired rocket propelled grenades into a residential neighborhood, and led Heroes into an ambush that resulted in death and serious injuries to members of that team. My team.” The Hero’s voice had dropped to a predatory growl by the time he finished.

“No! Don’t listen to him, Seth. That’s not the whole story. It isn’t all true. Please! PLEASE!”

Seth didn’t know what to think. But he knew he was in shock. All he could do was look into Liz’s wet chocolate eyes. Eyes that looked so different and yet so similar to the eyes he’d gazed into as they made love.

“Why?” He managed to mumble after a minute.

Liz seemed to have an emotional breakdown at the word. She cried, kicked, screamed, and tried to tear the metal collar from her throat. She alternated between threatening Mr. Morningstar and profusely apologizing to Seth. It just made things more confusing.

“I can’t be here.” Seth finally got up and looked around for the door.

“Please, Seth. PLEASE. He’s trying to turn you against me. I love you. I’ve always loved you. Nothing in the world can change that. Please, just please don’t give up on me. Don’t listen to them. I LOVE YOU!”

Seth couldn’t listen anymore. He half walked, half stumbled toward the door. His chest felt tight and his head was swimming. He barely made it out of the room before he puked all over the floor. There were a few startled gaps as people took evasive action to avoid the filth, but everyone was too busy to stop, or even ask if he was ok.

“I’m sorry you had to see that.” Mr. Morningstar emerged behind him. Cutting off Liz’s continued screams as he shut and sealed the door.

“No, you’re not.” Seth straightened up, feeling a hollowness in his stomach and chest.

Mr. Morningstar didn’t reply.

“You wanted me to see that. You wanted to break her. You used me. At least give me the courtesy of being truthful.”

“We need to break her down so we can get all the information she knows about other very bad people. You’re training to be a Hero, Mr. Abney. This is part of the job.”

Seth didn’t know how to answer that. “Can I go now? I’ve got things to pack before I head home for the summer.”

“Yes,” Mr. Morningstar straightened his tie. “Congratulations on completing your first year. The gentlemen who brought you will take you home.”

Whatever townhouse 117 had been, it wasn’t home now. Seth had just had everything he knew and loved turned on its head. He hoped this was all a bad dream and he’d wake up in bed with Liz, preferably on some tropical island midway into their summer break.

He waited for it, but nothing happened.

So he took one step, and then another, and then a third toward the door. He didn’t know what the fuck he was going to do, but he didn’t want to be here, and he didn’t want to be sober.

All he wanted to do was forget the last ten minutes had ever happened.

 

***

 

The smoke from the fires had cleared just the other day, so the sun was able to rise into a cloudless sky. It was going to be hot. Spring had officially become summer, and summer in Orlando led to swamp ass and proliferous BO.

<I wouldn’t trade it for anything in the world.> Daisy stood at the entrance to the hospital and took a deep breath.

She thought about where she’d been a year ago, and where she was now. She’d been practically a homeless vagabond, drinking herself to death and not able to do what she had been born to do. Now she was back in action. She was teaching the next generation of Heroes, and she was still able to help this city when it needed her.

New York City would always be home, but this place wasn’t too bad. And a big part of that had to do with the man inside this building.

She exhaled the deep breath, and marched into the build. The nurse at the desk waved her through before disappearing to be anywhere else. Doctors scattered at her approach. She had a reputation in this place.

She smiled to herself as she found the room and knocked softly. If he was asleep she didn’t want to wake him. She popped the door open a tad and looked in.

Topher was sitting on his bed, his chest wrapped tight, and watching the boxy TV hanging from the wall. He looked over at her and smiled that smile that made her heart flutter.

“Please tell me you brought a hamburger. This hospital food is going to kill me.”

They both grinned at each other as Daisy pulled a paper bag from behind her back.

“That’s my girl.”

Topher had faced his own difficulties during the terrorist attack. He’d been in a raid against a jihadist strongpoint that had left another cop dead and two more shot. Topher had taken a round to the vest. His vest had stopped it, but the AK’s 7.62 round broke three ribs in the process.

“Wait.” She pulled the bag away from him and put a finger to her lips. “Payment first.”

She leaned down so he didn’t have to strain himself, but the kiss was anything but restrained. Topher even worked his hands around to her butt.

She playfully slapped it away and got a dramatized grimace for her trouble.

“Shut up and eat your hamburger.” She handed over the bag, and he dug into it like a little kid trying to find the hidden toy inside.

<Life could be worse.> She took her customary seat next to the bed, their hands found each other’s, and they spent the afternoon watching the TV and talking.

Despite everything that had happened. The detox, the adaption to a new environment, getting her memories back, being slapped on the wrist by the DVA not once but twice, being given back temporary Hero authority for a bit, and nearly getting killed by Seif al-Din after he stated he wanted to make god-like babies with her.

<It’s been a hell of a year.> But sitting in the hospital room with Topher was worth it. <So much for a change of pace.>

She wondered what would happen next year.

End of Season 1

Previous                               Next