The Wanderer (Book 2): Stranded

by Giancioppo, Danny

  Also, it could speak Code, the generic language most other intelligent species shared, which was always a rare one amongst the challengers; usually it was something like every one in twenty or thirty that were smart enough.

  “Wanderer!” it yelled again, this time catching sight of me.

  “Fur Ball!” I said in Code. “You’re here for me, I assume?”

  “Do not mock me, Wanderer! You are about to meet your end!” it threatened.

  “Right, never heard that before…” I muttered. “So, I know your people aren’t big on flying, I hope that you can manage.”

  “What?” it asked, confused.

  “Sorry, not your people in like, a bad way; I just meant like your species in general is against it,” I corrected.

  “This is not a game! You best not take it like o–!” it tried to threaten again. I always hated when they did that; I felt like such a bastard for cutting them off.

  I shot toward it, and lifted off into the air. It wasn’t a joke, by the way, the whole flight thing. Fur Beasts weren’t very good at jumping, let alone flying; their weight tended to play a heavy factor in their falling speeds, and with a surplus of fur-like substance rather than armor, it tended to end out kind of messy.

  “Put me down, immediately, and fight with honor!” it shouted, enraged. At least it didn’t seem scared, props to it there.

  “I… don’t… feel like it,” I said slowly. It scowled, and gripped the side of my head with its massive-ass hand. Its eyes glowed a little bit, and just like that, I felt knowledge slipping over to him.

  Right, so, one other thing I neglected to mention earlier. These things had the ability to give and take information similarly to how I could. Through touching someone with any of their extremities, they could sap out information; this was usually used to learn the weaknesses of their enemies, and exploit them in one way or another.

  And my weaknesses were… well, they were more in depth than you’d probably imagine.

  “You fear the loss of your loved ones. Sam, Alannah, Alex, Julia, Will–” the Fur Asshole read my thoughts aloud, all while steering me down toward the ground again. I tried to fight it, but it wasn’t easy.

  “Shut up!” I shouted, trying to pull his hand away. He had a strong grip though, and even with my strength, it was remarkably difficult to budge.

  “You fear the truth of your parents’ disappearance,” it continued. “That they were murdered, viciously. Savagely. No matter what you do, you’ll never be able to stop it from happening.”

  “I said shut up!” I yelled out, my eyes growing white.

  I grabbed the Fur Freak’s arm, and burned it with my cosmic energy. His grip loosened slightly, but he was determined to bring me down first. We were only a couple hundred feet above the ground, but I was still moving forward at breakneck speeds, at least for this chump.

  “Worse yet, they just abandoned you,” it pressed. “Left you at the age of two to survive on your own, because they simply didn’t love you enough.”

  I felt something snap in me with that one, I’ll be honest.

  I stopped dead in my tracks, and the Fur Beast flew off from the sudden change in momentum. It screamed in a panic, and tried to grasp onto any of the nearby buildings. Unfortunately for it, there was nothing tall nearby, as we were in my hometown, which was a suburban little community. Unfortunately for me, it would still probably survive, and right now I was in a seriously bad headspace.

  “Christ…” I muttered, gripping at my head. “Call Alannah,” I ordered the suit, then hearing a ringing in the helmet.

  “Jason? What’s going on? News says another alien attack?” Alannah answered, immediately getting to questioning me. The girl should be a reporter, I’m telling you. No nonsense.

  “Yeah, it got in my head,” I tried to explain. I could feel my breathing growing rapid, and heavy. My heart felt like it was beating out of my chestplate. “Messed with my head. I’m...I’m having a major anxiety attack.”

  “What!? How did it do that!?” she questioned.

  “Doesn’t really matter!” I insisted. “I just need you to talk me down right now!”

  “Okay…” she hesitated. “What did it do to your head? What are you freaking out about?”

  “Losing you, losing Sam; losing everybody…” I said, pausing for a moment.

  Even with Alannah, I had never really talked about my parents. That always remained high up on the do-not-discuss list; Sam and his family were really the only ones that knew much about it, as much as I did anyway. That’s why they took me in at such a young age; they were family friends, I guess. Anyway…

  “And my parents,” I said, scared to even talk about it. “Why they disappeared. If it was murder or that they just…just didn’t want me, or… I don’t know…”

  I was flying, kind of toward the Fur Bitch, but my mind was racing, so I was going slow, and hardly paying attention to what I was looking at.

  “Jason…” she whispered, hurt to hear how hurt I was. “Sweetie it’s all going to be alright, alright? I’m fine, and Sam can totally take care of himself. Your parents… no matter what happened, it wasn’t your fault, and there was nothing you could do. You’ve still managed to have a great family in your friends, in Sam’s family, and even in the U.S.B. You don’t need to be afraid about all that, not now. You’ve always got us– got me– and we’re never leaving your side, I promise. I love you.”

  “I… yeah…” I tried to take it in, but something about that Fur Ball’s abilities stuck me with this impending feeling of dread. I knew I had to find it, and end this quick. My heart felt like it could literally give out from the growing stress.

  I spotted it, and unluckily for me, it was in fact still alive. Damaged bad from the crash, but still hobbling off in the nearby woods off to the side of a road.

  “Alannah,” I said quietly, “we’re going to get married, right?”

  “We are, yeah,” she replied, giggling a little. Damn… That helped. “We’re gonna get married.”

  “Wanderer!” it yelled.

  “You need to come up with new material…” I spat.

  I hardly had my normal wits about me, so I couldn’t really drive that one home with any expression. I just took off with him again, and went as fast as I could up into the air.

  “We’re gonna live together, and have kids, yeah?” I questioned Alannah further.

  “Oh at least two,” Alannah replied happily.

  “Two? I was thinking three, bare minimum,” I said, though my mind was still racing. It was all I could do to stay even somewhat focused on other, less painful thoughts.

  “Release me!” the Fur Ass yelled, trying to grip my head again.

  I flashed my cosmic energy back on, and blasted its arm off with a single touch. It howled in pain, and immediately tried to grip at me with it’s other hands and feet. I used my free hand to enforce gravity on them, keeping them pinned downard.

  “I…I know, too, what you should fear!” it howled through the pain. “The weavers! The universe will soon hear of your existence– they will soon hear! When they do, you’ll be helpless to stop them!”

  “Then I’ll deal with it,” I muttered.

  “You will lose,” it warned. “You cannot defeat the elder ones– life as you know it will be torn away before you can even comprehend it. They will destroy everything you–!”

  Suddenly, I heard something whoosh past me, and looking past the still-rambling Fur Beast, I saw a small pocket in the sky. It looked like… It looked like a small black hole.

  “What the hell…?” I wondered aloud.

  “What? What is it? What’s wrong?” Alannah questioned.

  “Wanderer, throw it in!” I heard a voice yell. I say a voice, it was Sam’s; I don’t know why I tried to trick you.

  Without thinking, I pushed it toward the small hole in the sky with my gravity manipulation, and watched it get almost immediately crushed and sucked away, howling in pain all the while. It was
… It wasn’t a very pretty sight.

  “Sam?” I asked under my breath, caught by surprise. All of a sudden, he shot right in front of me, suit on, and seeming… way more powerful.

  “Sam? Is he back?” Alannah asked. “Jason, what’s happening?”

  Sam closed the hole somehow with his hands, and then turned to me, bringing his visor down.

  “You alright?” he asked. “You sounded kinda freaked out.”

  “I was…” I tried to explain, though I was still finding it quite hard to come to solid words.

  I felt the unearthly anxiety start to slip away, and with that, I knew the Fur Beast was dead. I don’t know where it went, but it was dead.

  “Jason, what the hell is going on!?” Alannah asked. “Talk to me!”

  “Ana, I’ll… I’ll call you back,” I muttered, then hanging up the call.

  “You were talking to Alannah? While fighting?” Sam questioned. “Why? What’s up, man?”

  My wits were coming back to me now though, so I knew better– or worse, depending on how you look at it– than to just answer Sam’s questions.

  “Where the hell did you come from?” I asked. “Were you watching me? I just called you like five minutes ago and got no response, and now you show up out of nowhere, making black hole… things, acting all macho and stuff? What the hell is that?”

  “I needed time to myself, and I got it. In that time I was able to try and hone in on my abilities, and with that, I learned I had another one: matter manipulation,” Sam explained.

  Well, that was not good.

  “That’s… good…” I said, simultaneously trying to act as though I had no idea. Thank God my face was still sealed up, because I was not selling it.

  “Why were you talking to Alannah?” Sam asked again. I shook my head, and then lowered my visor. We were high enough in the air where nobody could get to us. Not even planes went this high.

  “That thing was called a Fur Beast–” I tried to explain.

  “Seriously?” Sam scoffed. “Fur Beast?”

  “I don’t come up with the names, I just translate them,” I defended. “It has the ability to tap into its enemies psyche, and mess with their head. It finds your weaknesses, and exploits them; makes you think about them.”

  “So, like an anxiety attack,” Sam surmised.

  “Yeah, but on a wicked strong level,” I said. “Mine were about you, about Alannah, and…and about my parents…” I trailed off. Alien or no alien, that was never fun for me to bring up, let alone think about.

  “Oh…” Sam said, understanding my discomfort. “Are you… I mean are you alright? I know that that’s kind of–”

  “I’m alright. I mean… I will be, hopefully,” I assumed. Again, even if I wasn’t under some kind of spell or whatever, it sucked for me to think about them; it was the source of almost all my nightmares, as both a kid and an adult.

  “Okay, good, because I decided I need your help with something, and soon,” Sam pitched. I looked at him questioningly.

  “With what…?” I asked.

  “We’re going to go to the news, and tell them who we are,” Sam said.

  It froze me up, I’ll be honest. All this sudden anxiety is really no good for my heart.

  “Excuse me?” I said. “You want us to tell the news… who we are?”

  “That’s right,” Sam said. There was an odd glint in his eye; it was like there was a new kind of confidence behind them, and a blinding one, seemingly. “Look, now that I can literally control matter, we can do anything! We can literally be gods to the world! They’ll have to love us then! We’ll finally be real heroes. And I won’t do it without you; they might be mad at you right now, but we can change that, I promise.”

  “Sam, are you insane!?” I asked, letting go of any censorship. He stared at me, half hurt, half confused.

  “What are you talking about?” he asked back, defensive. Maybe even aggressive. “Why would you say that? I’m trying to help you–”

  “Sam, people cannot know who we are!” I repeated for what felt like the thousandth time, in some format or another.

  “Why not?” he yelled, now very plainly upset with me. I didn’t care. I couldn’t let this fly.

  “Sam, people are already starting to figure out who you are! A man came into our apartment with a knife, because he knew it was yours; he almost caught me out of my suit!” I argued.

  “What did you do with him?” Sam questioned, only showing slight remorse.

  “I…I put him in jail.”

  “Jail? And you don’t think he’s gonna talk there?”

  “It was a Chinese jail.”

  “A… what?”

  “It doesn’t matter– look Sam the point is that these people, they will never see us as heroes, okay? Much less gods! You know why?” I argued. He said nothing. “Because human beings are afraid of what they can’t understand, and even more so of what they can’t control. The ocean, the dark, death, and us. They don’t know what we are, or how we are– much less you than me.” He seemed more hurt at that than I’d intended. Still, the point had to be made. “Nothing that you do will change what they think, man,” I insisted. “You need to let that go.”

  “And do what? Hide? Hide the rest of my life? Pretend that I don’t exist, and the Ranger is all that’s left? So what, people are mad at you right now– people can’t even remember my name!”

  “Sam, who cares about that!? It doesn’t matter!”

  “It matters to me! It should matter to you!” Sam yelled back. “I thought we were brothers…”

  “Don’t do that,” I tried to stop him.

  “I thought you’d always have my back, no matter what,” he continued.

  “Sam, stop it,” I said. “You know that this is a totally different situation than any of that! It’s because you’re my brother that I’m trying to protect you!”

  “How? We’re in the same boat, Jason! We’re both like this! You made me like this!” Sam countered. “You wanted me to live, now I’m trying to do something about it!”

  “You’re trying to be the people’s champion! The great hero! You’re not, Sam! You need to get over that!” I shouted back. “You need to get that there’s more to life– a second chance at life– than recognition!”

  He paused, and glared out at the open sky to our side. I knew he wasn’t going to listen to me– if he had he would have weeks ago– but I still prayed he’d just listen to what I was saying, and slip past his own hubris.

  “I’ll prove you wrong,” he said. “If you decide to stop being such an asshole, then maybe we can work this out, because… people shouldn’t hate you, either.” Then he took off.

  He was much faster than he used to be. He was almost as fast as me. How did he learn so quickly?

  More importantly, where was he going? What did he even mean, ‘work this out?’ It was a lot to try and process at once. Still, I had a pretty good idea of what his plan entailed, if his speech was anything to go by. I just needed to stop him.

  What made things more aggravating, really, was his lack of understanding over the gravity of this situation. Like, I’m being an asshole? Maybe we can work it out? This wasn’t some kind of friend-fight we were having; it was a life or death situation. For us, for others, for everyone. To him this was still some kind of young-adult drama. And honestly? That was the scariest part to me. Sam had no idea just how serious things were about to get.

  14

  Plans Made, Days Ruined

  “I hate to say I told you so…” Bell chided, though his face was one of seriousness.

  “Yeah, well he’s not Malek, so you kind of didn’t,” I said. “He’s Sam, he’s just… lost in his powers.”

  “Like I said though, that’s still dangerous,” Bentley interjected. Always had to be about him…

  “Look, no matter who or what or when, we need to deal with this,” I pointed out. “He’s clearly learned about his matter manipulation, but I don’t think he knows how to
fully control it; all he did was make a small hole. If he knew how to do more, he probably would have. Teleporting and monument building; things like that.”

  “Monument building? Sounds like the work of an egomaniac,” Bentley said. “Like you.” Okay, ouch.

  “Thanks,” I replied coldly. “Look, my point is, he isn’t a hundred percent in tune with his abilities, so I still have an upper hand.”

  Then, even though I did nothing to call him out, Ox shot out of my chestplate, and into view of the room. It took everyone by surprise: Bell and Bentley because they still weren’t used to seeing him all that often, and me because the dude showed up out of nowhere, uninvited.

  “To be fair, Jason, it seems as though you too have yet to reach your true potential,” Ox explained.

  “What the hell are you doing here?” I asked, jumping back a bit.

  “This is Ox, right…?” Bell remembered, calming down a bit. I nodded. “Good to see you again, sir.

  “And you, Director Bell,” Ox replied.

  “Ox, what were you saying?” I asked. He turned to me.

  “We’ve run diagnostics on your body, via the suit, and it appears you haven’t hit your bursting point yet. When you fought Malek, four years ago, you had a moment of transcendence– one that none of us have ever reached. You were briefly almost equal to Malek, a weaver– one of the eldest entities in the universe.”

  “So you’re saying he can get like that again? Stay like that?” Bentley tried to understand.

  “Not forever, but perhaps temporarily,” Ox answered. “Perhaps in more ways than one.”

  “That took a massive toll on me, Ox. I was out for days!” I argued. “Plus, thinking clearly is pretty damn hard to do when I’m facing off against my best and oldest friend!”

  “Perhaps, but you simply need time, and training,” Ox assured me.

  “Well, we don’t really have time for training,” Bentley said. “If Sam is seriously going to go to the press and make some kind of statement about his identity, new powers and all, then we have to move quick.”