“Okay,” I droned. “Now what about this world domination thing?”
Alpha Prime gave me a confused look. “What do you mean?”
“Well, you and the other League members said something about Mouse taking over the world yesterday, but you also admitted that you didn’t know what he’d removed from the Vault. Then, just a few minutes ago, you said something about Mouse posing a threat to the world. So what aren’t you telling me?”
My father gave me a serious stare for a moment, then sighed. “We weren’t completely honest yesterday. We didn’t know what Mouse may have taken, but the wall stack he was at? Ninety percent of what it contained are components for devices that can be used to destroy the planet.”
“So there’s a ninety percent chance that he took something capable of posing a global threat.”
“Actually, he took part of something that could pose a global threat, but in essence, yes.”
“So he did actually take something?” I asked, following which my father simply nodded. “Do we know what it was?”
“The inventory system is still a mess, but our tech guys have narrowed it down to three items,” he said. “And as you might guess, each of them is a fundamental element in some type of doomsday device.”
“So you honestly think Mouse is constructing some world-destroying weapon.”
“I hate to say it, but that’s what it looks like.”
I spent a moment letting his words soak in, plainly having a difficult time reconciling what I was hearing with the man I knew.
“Okay, son,” my father said, “what’s really bothering you about this?’
“Huh?” I murmured as his words cut in to my train of thought.
“No one wants to believe this about Mouse, but the evidence is irrefutable. Still, despite what you’ve personally seen, you can’t seem to get on board. So what’s holding you back?”
I simply stared at him for a moment, not quite sure what to say, and then I let out a deep sigh that actually seemed to deflate me both mentally and physically.
“He called me,” I muttered softly.
“What?” my father said, clearly not understanding.
“Mouse called me, asking for my help, a little while before the incident with the Construct. I missed his calls because I was off gallivanting on the West Coast – going to movie premieres, champagne brunches, and yacht parties. Mouse has always been there for me, the person I could always depend on, but when he needed me…”
I trailed off, unable to finish.
“You feel guilty,” Alpha Prime stated.
And there it was: the plain and simple truth. The truth about why this thing with Mouse bothered me so much. The truth about why I suddenly felt like it was eating me up inside. The truth about why I couldn’t just accept that my mentor had gone rogue.
“If I had just been there,” I said, “maybe none of this would have happened. Maybe Mouse wouldn’t have been exposed to whatever it was. Maybe we wouldn’t be hunting him now.”
My father laid a reassuring hand on my shoulder. “Son, this isn’t your fault. I was right there when it happened. That being the case, I’m more to blame than you, and I feel the same – like I should have been able to do something to stop this. But what happened, happened. Feeling guilty isn’t going to change that. All we can do is press forward and try to prevent any more damage from this situation. All right?”
I didn’t trust myself to speak, so I simply nodded.
“Good,” my father went on. “Now let’s get out of here.”
Without waiting for me to respond, he then flew over the edge of the building, headed towards the ground. I followed, and a few seconds later, we both touched down next to his parked SUV. Smokey was sitting behind the wheel while Electra was in the front passenger seat. Upon seeing me and Alpha Prime, they both got out, obviously expecting that everyone would go back to their original seats. However, they had barely exited before my father tapped the communicator in his ear.
“It’s me,” he announced. A moment later, a look of serious concern settled on his face. Looking at me, he stated, “It’s Mouse. He’s attacking again.”
“Where?” asked Smokey.
“HQ,” Alpha Prime answered. “The helipad.”
He then turned his attention to me. Knowing what was expected, I simply nodded and teleported the four of us.
Chapter 43
The helipad was located under a retractable dome ceiling on the roof of HQ. When we appeared, it was immediately clear that an intense battle was underway.
There were several blackened and charred areas on the rooftop – indicators that some type of explosive device had detonated in those places. Debris was everywhere, with smoke billowing from several large clumps of twisted metal, evidencing the fact that something (or some things) had obviously blown up. On the helipad itself was a large chopper, blades rapidly spinning as it seemingly prepared to take off through the open dome. Standing next to it, near the open door of the passenger area and dressed in his Alpha League uniform, was Mouse.
There were probably half a dozen members of the League present, but most of them were down – including Luna, who was on her hands and knees, and shaking her noggin in a way that suggested she was trying to clear her head. The only League member still on his feet was Feral – an imposing, eight-foot mass of fur-covered muscle who was probably exceeded only by my father in terms of brute strength.
We were still getting our bearings when Feral leaped at Mouse. The latter, seemingly expecting this, nimbly dove away just in the nick of time. Feral slammed into the helicopter, and the two went tumbling away in a twisted mash-up of man and machine.
Off to the side, Mouse rolled and came up on his feet. I quickly debated trying to teleport him and rejected the notion, recalling that it hadn’t work previously. Before I could consider anything else, a brilliant, blinding flash of light burst from the place Mouse was standing.
Instinctively closing my eyes, I groaned slightly in pain at the hurtful light, and I heard Smokey and Electra doing the same. I shut down the requisite pain receptors and opened my eyes, but couldn’t see anything. Suddenly feeling vulnerable, I quickly cycled my vision through the light spectrum until I could finally see again in a manner approximating normal.
Glancing around, I saw that everyone else still seemed to be rubbing their eyes or otherwise trying to shake off the effects of the light-burst. Looking to where I’d last seen Mouse, I noticed that he was gone. There was, however, what appeared to be an exhaust trail leading up through the dome and out into the open air. Without hesitation, I flew up into the air, following it.
As I cleared the open dome, I telescoped my vision and immediately saw that the exhaust trail was coming from what appeared to be rockets in Mouse’s boots. Turning on the afterburners, I swiftly began closing the distance.
Whether he did so out of caution or because he somehow sensed my presence, Mouse unexpectedly glanced in my direction. A moment later, he was pointing his fist towards me, and I saw that he had once again donned the brace I’d seen in the video.
Something like a pulse of electrical energy suddenly shot out of the brace in my direction. Unbothered, I phased, preparing to let the energy pass harmlessly through my insubstantial form. Unfortunately, nothing like that happened.
Instead of the pulse passing through me without effect, it hit me like a sledgehammer to the chest. All of the air in my body was suddenly, forcefully, and violently expelled, like someone had squeezed it out with a vise. I suddenly found myself not only gasping for breath, but falling; the shock of the blow had been so powerful that my body had seemingly shut down my flying ability in response.
I put all my energy into clamping down on my pain receptors, which thankfully only took a second. I then focused on stopping my free fall and came to a halt in midair a moment later. Next, I focused on expanding and contracting my lungs with my shapeshifting ability, thereby forcing the intake of air. At the same time, I scanned the s
ky for Mouse, but the exhaust trail abruptly came to an end high above me, as if the rockets had simply shut off in mid-flight. Mouse was gone.
Chapter 44
Smokey, Electra, and I spent roughly the next hour in the infirmary getting treated. Although I was given a clean bill of health almost immediately, my friends didn’t get a green light to leave until their sight came back and they both passed a vision test. While waiting for them, I devoted a lot of time to thinking about the most recent tussle with Mouse – specifically, the weapon he’d used on me.
Upon leaving the infirmary, we retreated to the Alpha League’s teen lounge. It was essentially a break room for members of the League’s teen affiliate, and as such it contained – among other things – a billiards table, video game consoles, and dart boards.
Of course, since it was a school day, there was no one else there. However, it brought to mind the question: why wasn’t Electra in school? Smokey and I were no longer attending formal classes, but Electra definitely was. (And I had been so focused on the situation with Mouse that I hadn’t even thought about the fact that she was missing class. If the absence of people in the teen lounge hadn’t shined a light on the issue, it probably would have escaped my notice completely.)
“I called in sick,” was her answer when I finally put the question to her. “Did it while you and Alpha Prime were inside at DTG.”
“I thought parents had to call in stuff like that,” I remarked.
“I’ll need to take a doctor’s note when I go back in order for it to be an excused absence,” Electra stated. “As long as they get that, the school administrators don’t really care about anything else.”
“Well, that shouldn’t be a problem,” Smokey interjected. “If temporary blindness isn’t an excused absence, I don’t know what is.”
I didn’t disagree with his conclusion, but I found the thought of Electra missing school troubling. The League already had two truants in the form of me and Smokey. We didn’t need any more – and I especially didn’t like the notion of Electra becoming one. The last thing I needed was her dad thinking I was a bad influence.
Thankfully, we didn’t dwell on the subject, as around that time Alpha Prime entered the lounge. We didn’t have to ask how he’d found us; each of us had a tracker in our phone.
“Great,” he said. “You three are in here unwinding. That’s good. It’s important that you don’t dwell too much on things like the attack earlier.”
“If I’m being honest,” I countered, “I’m still thinking about it. Basically, nothing hurts me when I’m phased, but Mouse was able to. It’s hard for me to just put that out of my mind.”
“You’re going to have to try,” my father stressed. “Just put some effort into learning from it, so you’ll be better prepared next time.”
I nodded in response to his comment as if it were sage advice. Frankly speaking, however, it sounded like anemic psychobabble, but I recognized it as an attempt to help me deal with what was bothering me.
“So exactly what happened on the helipad?” Smokey asked.
My father seemed to ruminate on the question for a moment, then said, “The three of you already know that Mouse took the component for a destructive device from the Vault yesterday. In an effort to throw a monkey wrench in any plans he might have, we were going to move some of the other items he might need to disparate locations. Somehow he found out and staged an attack as we were loading them on the chopper.”
“And the rest we essentially know,” I interjected. “He foiled the League’s plans, took the components, and got away clean.”
Alpha Prime nodded. “That essentially sums it up.”
“So what now?” asked Smokey.
“Mouse still doesn’t have everything he needs – at least, according to our experts. We still don’t know exactly what he’s building, but we know he doesn’t have all the pieces to the puzzle yet.”
“So there’s going to be another attack?” I concluded.
“Bingo,” Alpha Prime said, pointing at me.
“So we don’t necessarily have to find him,” I surmised. “He’ll come to us.”
“True,” said my father, scratching his temple, “but we’d still rather go on the offensive.”
“So you want to keep looking for him,” summed up Smokey.
“More specifically, we want Jim to keep looking for him,” Alpha Prime stated, then looked at me. “After all, son, you know him better than anybody. Your insight about the bug-out bag shows that.”
I shrugged. “Maybe, but I’m all out of ideas in the Mouse-hunting department, to be honest.”
“Well, as I keep saying, try to relax,” my father said. “Play some video games, hang out with your friends, throw some darts… Give your mind an opportunity to unwind – to rest – and maybe something new will occur to you.”
My instinctive reaction was to shake my head in disdain at the thought. Maybe relaxing at the end of the day (the way we’d played board games the night before) would be sensible, but it wasn’t even noon yet. Hanging out and playing games with my friends now, when I needed to be looking for my mentor, seemed…I don’t know – callous, maybe? I looked at Smokey, my expression making it clear his opinion was welcome.
“Doesn’t sound like a bad idea,” Smokey asserted.
“Plus, you’re putting yourself under a lot of pressure because you feel you owe Mouse,” Alpha Prime added. “But if you don’t do something to occasionally ease the strain, you’re going to wear yourself to a frazzle and burn out, and that won’t do him or you any good.”
“It might already be happening,” Electra chimed in. “You’ve practically passed out the last two nights.”
I spent a moment looking at all three of their faces, then said, “It feels like I’m getting ganged up on here.”
“Well, there’s an easy way to avoid that,” Electra declared. “Just take our advice.”
She then looped her arm into mine and, smiling, began dragging me to the billiards table.
Chapter 45
Unsurprisingly, hanging out with Electra and Smokey served its intended purpose and helped me relax. It wasn’t long before we were laughing and joking – much as we would have been doing if we weren’t in the middle of a crisis.
After a while, we broke for lunch. I volunteered to teleport to Jackman’s – a grill that was one of our favorite places – to pick up some burgers and fries. Smokey, however, insisted on treating so he came with me. Upon our return, the three of us went to one of the tables in the lounge and quickly dove in.
“So,” Smokey droned as we began eating, “where do you suppose Mouse might be?”
“I’m really not sure,” I admitted. “The thing with the bug-out bag raises a lot of questions.”
“Well,” Electra said, “maybe that’s–”
The sound of my phone ringing cut her off. Pulling it out of my pocket, I saw that it was Kenyon calling. I was tempted to let it go to voicemail, but he was responding to a request that I had made, so it didn’t seem right to blow him off.
Standing up and stepping away, I hit the Answer button and said, “Hello.”
“Good afternoon, sir,” Kenyon greeted me in response. “I trust you’ve been well?”
“I have, Kenyon – thanks for asking. And you?”
“Well enough, sir; well enough. Anyway, you asked about the alarm. Fortunately, the paperwork giving me authority to speak for you is still on file with the alarm service, so they were happy to answer my questions.”
“So what did they say?”
“As far as they could tell, there was no glitch. According to their analysis, the system was explicitly activated during the time frame you asked about – meaning that someone turned it on – and a few seconds afterwards, the alarm was tripped. However, the system was properly deactivated just a few moments later, before the alarm went off audibly.”
“Wait a minute,” I said. “What do they mean the alarm never went off? It was blaring at ful
l volume when I got home.”
“Not according to their data, sir,” Kenyon retorted. “If they had registered the alarm going off, they would have called to make sure everything was okay.”
“Right,” I said, suddenly remembering. “They’re supposed to call if it goes off, and then I’m supposed to give them a code word to indicate that everything is okay.”
Mentally, I kicked myself. I had completely forgotten all of that.
“Yes, sir,” Kenyon confirmed. “That’s standard operating procedure.”
“Well, what about the system being set in the first place?” I asked. “You said it was activated right before the alarm was tripped, but I was nowhere near the control panel.”
“The alarm company says it was activated remotely using the primary code.”
“Remotely?” I echoed in confusion. “That can’t be right, because I’m the only person with the primary code or remote access, and I didn’t do it.”
“I’m not doubting you, sir,” Kenyon insisted. “I’m just reporting what they told me. Is it possible you did it by accident?”
I spent a moment contemplating. I didn’t recall fooling around much with my phone on the night in question. However, people butt-dialed each other all the time these days, and I did tend to keep my phone in my pocket.
“Hang on,” I said.
A moment later, I hit the Mute button and then navigated through the bevy of apps on the phone until I found the one for the alarm system. I had recently installed the latest upgrade, so now it not only told me whether the alarm was off or on, but also logged whenever it was activated or deactivated.
From what I could see, no recent activity had occurred remotely. In fact, nothing related to the glitching that we were currently discussing appeared on the log for the alarm, and I conveyed as much to Kenyon after navigating back to the phone app and unmuting him.
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