Apex

by Robert J. Crane

  “We’ve seen worse,” she said, levelly. “The string of murders back in 2012, for instance, when your sister faced off with that … animal.” She shuddered lightly under her heavy coat; I knew she meant Wolfe. “The destruction of Glencoe. The battle over Minneapolis when your sister killed Sovereign.”

  Now she was leaving oblique references behind. “Funny that you should mention the common denominator there,” I said. “Because it seems like one person solved all those problems for you.”

  Her expression darkened. “Really? Because it seems to most, once they know the full facts of the situation, that all those problems had one common denominator.”

  “Then they should remember the old maxim about correlation not equaling causation,” I volleyed back, trying to be just as light as she was but probably failing.

  “Mr. Treston—”

  “I love it when someone calls me ‘Mister,’” I said. “I can always tell they’re about to say something either very respectful or very not.”

  “I hope we don’t see your sister,” Governor Shipley said, maintaining that straitlaced calm. “Because given the current climate, I’m about one step away from activating the Minnesota National Guard to help deal with this crisis. And if Sienna were to show up—”

  “I like how you still call her by her first name, even though you’ve totally disavowed ever knowing her.” My cheeks were burning. Bad sign. Usually a storm warning tended to follow.

  “—she’s the sort of incendiary element that would necessitate that decision,” Shipley finished, leaning back slightly to straighten her back. She looked like a pillar, standing there on the tarmac, snow at the edges of the concrete where it met the grass. “I hope we can resolve this peacefully.”

  “We’ll do our best,” I said, holding inside a lot of other, nastier replies that I could have fired at her. None of them were productive or useful for the task at hand, though, so what was the point? Other than the short-term emotional satisfaction of basting the woman in vengeful rhetoric about how my sister was innocent and persecuted and—

  Hell. No one was going to listen to that. I didn’t bother saying it to Sienna—because she knew—but the sum total of all of her bad decisions in the past sure had come roaring back to kick her ass with a vengeance when the Eden Prairie accusations came along.

  “How’s the view from the ground?” Scott Byerly asked, striding over to me from where he’d just disembarked the plane. Governor Shipley was striding off, her message apparently delivered. I’d certainly gotten it loud and clear: Deal with this— and heaven help your sister if she shows up to assist.

  “My view feels like it’s currently from under a bus,” I muttered, meta-low. “Or at least that’s Sienna’s current view.” I shook my head in a thinly veiled fury. “She does all these things to help the state, to save lives, and the minute things get a little dicey—boom. She’s persona non grata, no trial, no—”

  “Well, she didn’t exactly hang around for a trial,” Scott muttered under his breath. I gave him a daggered look and he shrugged. “I mean, I probably wouldn’t have, either, under the circumstances, but … no one’s told Sienna’s story, at least not anywhere someone like Shipley would have heard it. All she knows is the party line—Sienna blew up that corporate park in Eden Prairie, killed a ton of newly released prisoners that she apparently had a grudge against—”

  “That had shown up at our freaking offices with ill intent, Scott. Hell, two of them damned near killed me. That’s the part I don’t get about everyone’s reaction—do they think these people were just innocent souls out for a walk, by coincidence, by our offices, when the shit went down?”

  “Well, come on,” Scott said, looking around. Beyond a tall fence nearby, a road wended its way under the grey sky, light traffic passing. “You know how it was covered by the press at the time—that was when the bombs dropped about how Sienna killed M-Squad. And she already had all those other public image issues—beating the hell out of Simmons on that internet video, punching that reporter when he blindsided her—you start adding things together, maybe it doesn’t make it too hard for people to get the wrong idea, especially if they’re predisposed to believing that everyone Sienna put in the Cube was wrongfully imprisoned.”

  “That’s such a load of bullshit,” I steamed, even though I shivered when a subzero breeze blew through. “You saw what some of these people did. You—”

  “Preaching to the choir, man,” Scott said. “I was in charge of the FBI squad that hunted criminal metas for a while, remember? I know what happens out there, even if it’s not exactly broadcast to the world.” He shrugged. “But good luck getting people who have seen the bad and somehow missed the good to change their minds now that they’re entrenched in their current position. Because I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but a common failing of humanity is a real failure to appreciate our own potential fallibility of judgment. You wouldn’t think so, given how many people have completely effed up their own lives, but—here we are. Personally, after evaluating how my life has not turned out the way I wanted, I might look around and think, ‘I don’t know if I have this figured out.’ But not most people.” He shook his head. “There is an awful lot of absolute certainty out there from people who have made terrible, awful choices that have brought their lives to ruin.”

  I took that in, and then smiled tightly. “Thank you for that simple truth, Scott.”

  “Don’t mention it,” he said, returning my smile. “And don’t despair. I’m sure we’ll get this thing cracked before Sienna shows up.”

  I stared over his shoulder. Blinked a couple times. “Yeah. We really will,” I said quietly, raising my voice to the point where it was audible to all. “One way or another.”

  He turned. Saw what I saw. His whole body tensed, like mine.

  Because the guy we were looking for? The meta who’d trashed the Chesapeake Bay Bridge, who’d attacked Jamie Barton in New York, who’d attacked Veronika and Kat in California …

  He was hovering over us, looking down at us all, cloaked in flames from head to toe.

  And beneath the fire, a dark line appeared where his lips would be—a shadowy smile that chilled me like the wind.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

  “Scott, cover!” I shouted as Scott sprang into action. He was already drawing moisture out of the air and pushing it in front of him, pulling whatever water vapor hadn’t frozen in the below-freezing temps and shaping it into a shield in front of him. I took position behind him, figuring if this guy was going to start tossing flame bursts, I wanted to have a little something between me and him while I started to work my magic with the wind.

  “Taneshia, Jamal!” I shouted and could see them already moving. Blue electricity sparked down their hands as they lanced bolts toward the villain hovering over us.

  A bitter wind ran over me, one that I wasn’t controlling, and something in the air seemed to change.

  “Oh, shit,” I muttered. But it was too late to do anything about it.

  Mr. Flaming Super Evil was grinning, a thin shield of water distorting the air in front of him. Somehow, he had Poseidon powers, too, and had done a much lesser version of what Scott had. It was thinner, covering him in a semi-spherical arc in front, but a thread extended from it across the space between us, into Scott’s forming shield.

  Taneshia and Jamal’s lightning bolts crackled along the surface of his impromptu shield as Mr. Flaming Super Evil darted back. The electricity sparked as it made contact with the water and then ran through it, lightning crackling—

  And ran down the thread connecting his shield with Scott’s—

  When it reached its end, the lightning jumped to the nearest target, trying to ground itself.

  And found Scott’s extended hand, only inches from the shield.

  Scott jerked as I leapt back, unable to do anything but keep from joining him in a shocking hell. Scott jerked and spasmed, lightning running through his body like Darth Vader at the end of Jedi.r />
  He stayed standing for a moment after the electricity had passed, and then the water shield he’d been forming splashed onto the tarmac, freezing as it landed. Scott toppled after it, smoking under his clothing, limp as though someone had just ripped his spine out.

  “That is one,” Mr. Flaming Super Evil said in an ominous Euro accent of the sort that villains in 80’s movies used religiously.

  “Full court press!” I shouted and blasted at him with all the wind I could summon. He formed a shield of his own, a smaller, less powerful screen of wind, and my attack rolled over him and to the side, toward the Gulfstream jet.

  I looked over and saw Greg Vansen next to the plane. He started to shrink, but the diverted wind caught him as he disappeared. He struck the plane a moment later, denting it and sending it skidding a foot, like the wind had blown it. The only reason I knew he’d hit it was because there was a bullet-sized dent in the side where he’d struck it, and a moment later he returned to his normal size and collapsed on the tarmac, limp as Scott.

  “I’m gonna tear you a new super hole, Euro-trash!” Guy Friday screamed, leaping over me, swole like a … I dunno. ‘Swole’ is not a word that comes easily to me, because I know it’s new, and it just—anyway, he leapt over me like an idiot, clearly planning to attack our enemy midair.

  “No!” I shouted.

  But it was too late. Friday didn’t even get close to target; Mr. Flames dropped a couple feet, and the wind kicked up just behind his shield, catching Friday mid-air and sending him sideways.

  Friday slammed into the Gulfstream, completely wrecking the wing and spilling jet fuel everywhere on the tarmac. I looked over to see Olivia and Tracy getting into position near the plane, along with Jamal. They were planning something and I might have been eager to see what it was if not for …

  Our enemy grinned, and launched a tiny little spark of flame.

  I shouted again, in anger, deaf because of the winds roaring furiously around me as I assaulted him.

  But it was pointless. Too late.

  The flame hit the spilled jet fuel, and it exploded with a thundering fury that blew me sideways. I went end over end like some angry Hercules had hurled me, landing in a melted puddle of slush that ran down my shirt, down my back, frigid water awakening me more effectively than any alarm clock I’d ever owned.

  I rose, trying to look at the damage. The plane was on fire, burning furiously.

  And my team …

  My team was down.

  The only good news seemed to be that the explosion’s force had flung my team away from the burning plane. I did a quick count over the ringing in my ears—Friday, Taneshia, Jamal, Scott, Greg, Tracy, Olivia … all down.

  Where was—

  “Looks like it’s just you and me,” Augustus said, staggering up to me, ears slick with blood. His shoulders were covered, too; the force of the explosion had destroyed his ear drum on the side closest to the plane. He was also bleeding from some wounds on his side and arm, and a few incidental scrapes on his forehead. He looked like he’d been in a whole entire action movie, one like Die Hard where the hero ends up half dead by the end, not like he’d been in a ten-second confrontation with some supervillain on the tarmac of MSP airport.

  “We are getting our asses kicked,” I said, trying to speak over the ringing in my ears. It was angry, persistent, the sound of bells, klaxons, something. “This guy has way too many powers.”

  “You think he’s like Rose?” Augustus held a hand up to his ear, staggering a couple steps. I guessed his inner ear had been affected by the big boom that had knocked our asses over.

  “Don’t know,” I said, trying to find Mr. Super Evil. My head was swimming, like someone had gonged it with a little extra fervor.

  Oh.

  There he was.

  Hovering over us.

  “Shit,” I said as Augustus got wiped out by a blast of water. His head cracked against the tarmac and he slid, coming to rest in a pile of snow, blood seeping off of him and turning the muddy slush red.

  “Strength,” our villain said as I roared toward him, launching off the ground with the wind at my back. He dodged out of the way swiftly, his flight powers engaging as I used my slower, more unwieldy winds to chase after him.

  He was rising into the air now, and I hurled wind after him, furious, unstoppable winds. He dodged out of the way of every gust, rising further and further.

  Which fit perfectly into my plan.

  I chased him up, up into the sky. His laugh found its way back to me on the wind, and he soared higher and higher, willing me to chase him.

  I did.

  I wouldn’t let him get away now.

  Not until I stopped his ass.

  The air grew colder the further I rose, chasing him like a bull after a red scarf. His laughter was a taunt, a goad that just burned me further, my blood heating up like I’d opened a vein over the burning plane.

  “This—this is the way,” he called back to me, disappearing behind a cloud bank.

  “Hiding isn’t going to do you any good,” I shouted and blew his cloud away. It disappeared in a puff like it had never even been there, and for good measure I cleared the skies around us, giving us a cold battlefield of empty air in which to settle this.

  The sun shone down and Mr. Super Evil stopped, looking back at me. The bastard was still smiling, that black and hollow smile beneath his flame shield. “You are strong,” he finally said, seeming super pleased about that.

  “You’re not going to be nearly so happy about it once I cram enough air pressure up your nose to explode your lungs,” I said, readying myself to do exactly that.

  “I will be happy regardless,” he said, pausing in place.

  And somehow … in spite of the conditions, in spite of the war we’d just been through on the ground …

  I knew he was telling the truth.

  This … freak … was happy just to be here. Fighting me.

  “What the hell are you?” I whispered, preparing my last attack. I reached down, lifting a fragment of the Gulfstream’s burning wing and raising it into the air even as I assailed him with unceasing winds, buffeting him around, trying to trap him in place for my coup de grâce. It wasn’t going to be pretty, slamming tons of metal into him over and over in a controlled windstorm. I figured it’d be like an improvised blender, and I expected him to come out the other side like he’d been through a real one.

  And I was fine with that. Grinding up my opponent like chum, only in this case, I was the shark.

  “Why are you doing this?” I asked, shouting in the maelstrom of wind I had created. The plane’s burning wing was rising to us now, zipping toward its rendezvous point with his back as I trapped him in place. His command of wind was like mine before I’d been enhanced by Harmon’s serum. No match for me now.

  He met my gaze across the distance, flames blowing in the wind. “Do you not feel it?” he asked, electric look in his eyes, as though Jamal and Taneshia’s blast had run through him.

  “Feel what?” I asked. Just a few more seconds. Let him connect emotionally with me until my sneak attack connected with him and made a smear of him.

  “The call,” he said, staring right at me, almost through me, his eyes were so alive. “Do you not feel it? The need to … ?” He let off there, waiting.

  “What the hell are you talking about?” I threw that question into the tornado of furious wind between us. “Do I feel what?”

  “It,” he said, as though that explained it all. He stared into my eyes, and—

  A flash of a raven in my sight caused me to lose concentration—just for a moment, as my senses were scrambled. I’d been hit by this before, this feeling. Sienna had possessed it until Scotland, the power of an Odin-type, and she called it the Warmind.

  She’d hit me with it dozens of times, maybe hundreds, but this time …

  Something about it was … different. Stronger.

  It caught me like a visceral slap to the face, a slap to
the consciousness, and my muscles locked as the raven cawed like a scream, louder than my mind could process. It was a hideous noise, one that seeped into my arms and legs and paralyzed them, locking me into place in the middle of my tornado.

  A thousand unnamed fears crashed in on me in that raven’s caw, like needles of death stabbing into me. I felt paralysis, a heart attack, screaming panic infusing my every muscle group as I shuddered in the air.

  The wind stopped around me, and I was becalmed, my footing disappearing like melting ice beneath my feet.

  I dropped, the ground roaring up to greet me, clear now that all the clouds were blown away. I saw it rushing up, the tarmac screaming toward me, my heart thundering faster than it had ever run before. I couldn’t breathe, couldn’t think, and it was coming so fast—

  Something stopped me a second before impact, a harsh grab at my ankle that kept me from splattering on the concrete below. The whiplash sent all the blood to my head, though, and all I was left with was fear as I snapped into the darkness.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX

  Sienna

  We passed through Kentucky quickly, and on into southern Illinois about an hour later. I was at the wheel and not hating it, surprisingly. I’d never been a huge fan of driving, preferring to let others just chauffeur me around like I was a big shot. It wasn’t as though I weren’t capable of driving. I was reasonably smart, possessed the dexterity of a superpowered person, and had reflexes that would have rivaled an AI-guided machine.

  But there was just something about driving I didn’t care for. Maybe, as a total control freak, it was one of the few opportunities I got to just yield control and trust the person next to me to not get me killed. Which was a big ask in some cases. Admittedly, it was pretty funny that I, being such a deeply in-control person, would want to surrender control in such a way, but—

  I blinked as I thought about that. Had I known that about myself before Rose had ripped out those memories? Maybe. I couldn’t recall actively thinking about my control freakery before. And certainly not as it pertained to driving. It was a strange thing, trusting people so little in other ways and yet immediately trusting them to take control in the instance of basically the number one cause of unnatural death in the country.