The Indestructibles (Book 2): Breakout

by Phillion, Matthew

  Kate, meanwhile, had learned that she wasn't limited with Dude's alien abilities to simply throwing laser bolts at her enemies. She was able to use the defensive shield protecting her as a sort of weapon as well, allowing her already deadly kicks and punches to have a superhuman oomph to them. Each blow splashed blue-white light as it connected, accompanied by a thunderous boom.

  The shielding worked remarkably well also, she thought. Blows that would have leveled her ordinarily were shrugged off with relative ease.

  "I'm beginning to see why Billy is so careless," Kate said.

  Why is that, Kate Miller.

  "Because he can't get hurt. He's in a suit of alien bubble wrap," she said. "Why be careful when nothing you do can hurt you?"

  Kate was engaging the male sentry now, who seemed to have a decent background in close combat fighting. He was smart enough to not let Kate grapple him, where she might be able to find a weakness in the suit. Rather, he forced her to keep hitting him, building up his suit's power and keeping her at arm's length. The sentry took a swing at her and she aimed her open palm at his face, launching a blast of light into his eyes. She kicked him in the center of his chest and sent him flying just in time to see Bedlam pummeling her opponent. Bedlam's target punched the cyborg with enough force to cause her to collapse a police car on impact, yet Bedlam popped back out, laughing maniacally, throwing a running punch at her enemy so powerful Kate was certain she saw the air around them both vibrate.

  "She's a lunatic," Kate said.

  Some might argue your other companion is as well, Dude said.

  Kate turned her eyes on Titus, who was kneeling on the edge of the battle, soaked through by Valkyrie's pouring rain. With the enhanced vision Dude's powers gave Kate, she could see clearly enough to watch Titus's skin knitting back together from a horrific case of road rash he'd picked up during the last fight.

  "This is taking too long," Kate said.

  We could try another way inside, Dude said.

  "Is that a hypothetical suggestion, or is that hinting you know another way inside?"

  Logically speaking, there is always another way, Kate Miller.

  "That is incredibly unhelpful, Dude," Kate said.

  She flew at the female sentry, hoping to change things up a bit, and knocked the woman off her feet. Bedlam picked up on Kate's idea and sucker punched the male sentry in the back of the head and then started throwing a series of mechanically enhanced quick jabs at his facemask.

  "How much longer we gotta hold these guys off?" Bedlam said. "I'm getting bored!"

  As if on cue, Titus pounced onto the male sentry's back and latched on with teeth and claws. Bedlam stepped aside to admire the ferocity of the attack, but Kate could also see the precision of it.

  "He's trying to find gaps in the armor," Kate said.

  He has been finding gaps in the armor, Dude said. I have been watching his progress. It is slow, but deliberate and between his claws and his weapons he is making headway.

  "It'd be nice if he could make faster headway," Kate said.

  Kate was starting to worry about the Alley Hawk, too. Where was he? They'd decided on radio silence to make sure his activities inside the Labyrinth went undetected, but he'd been inside a long time. Did he get caught? Did something happen? Did he injure himself in those alien tunnels underground before he even got to the secret entrance to the prison he'd been heading for?

  The Alley Hawk has always been reliable, Dude said. Give him time.

  "Stop reading my mind!" Kate said, just as she turned to deflect a glancing blow from the female sentry, who had somehow knocked Bedlam into an armored police transport vehicle which the cyborg was now having trouble extricating herself from. Even though she'd managed to dodge most of the punch, Kate felt it rattle her bones. Those suits are getting ridiculously strong, she thought. I wonder if they max out? Will they burn out if we hit them enough times? Or will they just become so strong that they can break through Dude's shields, tear Bedlam limb from limb, and hurt Titus severely enough his magical healing abilities won't be able to recover?

  Kate saw Titus slammed brutally to the pavement, sending a geyser of rainwater gushing when he skidded along the blacktop. Amazingly — Kate was actually stunned at the forethought and agility it took — Titus scooped up his discarded spear from the ground and hurled it straight as an arrow into the air while still prone on the ground, a brutal overhand toss utilizing only his arm strength.

  "Where did he learn to do that?" Kate said.

  He is very different, is he not? Dude said.

  "Yeah," Kate said, letting the conversation drop when the spear did the impossible, piercing the male sentry's suit at the leg and digging into his thigh. The sentry screamed, as much in surprise as in shock, and he stared at the wound in awe.

  Titus roared a challenge at his adversary, who then yanked the spear out of his own thigh and launched himself off his one good leg to tackle Titus to the ground. The men rolled around in the inch-deep puddles, pummeling each other. The sound of those kinetically charged fists thumping into the living flesh of Titus's body made Kate wince. Before she could rush in to help, the female sentry engaged her again.

  And then the miracle they were waiting for happened: the gates to the prison began to open with mechanical slowness.

  Kate held onto her sentry's wrists, feeling as if the woman could yank Kate's arms right from the sockets with all the built up strength her suit was pumping into her movements. Kate wanted to let go and push the sentry away, but she knew if she did release her she'd be giving up the one advantage she had.

  A steady pounding sounded, metal on pavement, and suddenly there was Bedlam standing over her; one hydraulic arm wrapped powerfully around the female sentry's waist and yanked her off Kate.

  "We got this, chief," Bedlam said, throwing her a madwoman's wink. For the first time, Kate noticed that Bedlams's eyelashes were deep blue, contrasting strangely with her red mechanical eye and her deep brown human one. "Go on!"

  We may not get another opportunity, Dude said.

  "You're going to give me a lesson on not being sentimental?" Kate said, but she watched Titus a moment too long, one big mass of bruise and fur, fighting tooth and claw with an enemy armored in invincibility.

  Dammit, she thought. She looked at Bedlam.

  "Do what you can," Kate said.

  Bedlam tossed her a loose salute and returned to the battle with her sentry.

  Kate took a deep breath, let Dude's powers of flight take hold, and darted into the prison in a flash, a streak of light in the darkness.

  Chapter 46:

  Everything has an off-switch

  I thought we determined the Dancer had no advanced abilities," Rourke said from his perch looking over the shoulder of one of the techs in the Labyrinth's main command center.

  Prevention's response was about as pleasant as expected.

  "What?" she said, storming over to join him.

  The battle played out on screen, the Dancer and the werewolf joined by what appeared to be a punk rock cyborg. On the upside, the Distribution suits were more than holding their own, but the kids were putting up a long-winded fight and Prevention wanted them in custody and off the streets a lot sooner than this.

  And why was the Dancer glowing like Straylight?

  "Oh you have got to be kidding me," Prevention said.

  "Her power signature matches that usually associated with Straylight," Rourke said. "You don't think . . ."

  "The bloody Luminae went and got the one person on the planet with a bigger grudge against us than he has," Prevention said.

  "Our psyche profile on Dancer says she'd never allow a symbiotic creature to work with her like this," said Rourke. "You think this was forced?"

  "I think she recognizes a good deal when she sees one," Prevention said. "I assume the other three are still trying to head toward the infirmary?"

  "They are," the tech said.

  "Okay," Prevention said. "I want you
to use the mouse trap protocol and corral the escaped prisoners in their direction. If their friends are going to be a nuisance outside, we'll put the three of them to work tying up the villains they probably let escape in the first place."

  "Yes ma'am," the tech said.

  "Straylight is depowered and we bet Solar is running on fumes," Rourke said. "Are you sure you should pit them against someone like Golem? We don't actually want them dead, do we?"

  "The way this day is going, Rourke, I really don't care," Prevention said.

  "Ma'am?" the tech said.

  "If you call me ma'am one more time I'm going to melt your brain," Prevention said.

  The tech stared back at her, too intimidated to speak, which just infuriated her more.

  "What?" she barked.

  The tech just gestured to the screen. Prevention watched in absolute fury as the doors creaked open.

  "Who is doing this?"

  "It's coming from level ten," the tech said.

  "Winter," Prevention said. She pointed at Rourke. "Send a team after him. He's a crippled middle-aged scientist. I want him dragged back to a cell with no electricity until this is over, and then he and I are going to have a talk."

  "You got it," Rourke said.

  "Ma'am — I'm sorry!" the tech said.

  "What now?" Prevention said.

  "She's inside," the tech said.

  "Who? Who is inside? Who are you talking about?"

  "The Dancer," the tech said.

  He replayed the footage of Dancer lancing inside like a bullet.

  "Oh good," Prevention said.

  "That doesn't sound like a 'good' good," Rourke said.

  "She's inside. She's alone. I want to strangle her with my bare hands," Prevention said. "Now — is the disruptor rifle charged?"

  "Yeah," Rourke said.

  Prevention walked over to a wall toward the back of the command center; it was covered in lockers. She swiped her security card on one of the taller lockers and drew out a long, silver rifle, like something out of an old Buck Rogers cartoon, and checked the power levels. She slung it over her shoulder.

  "I'm going to go find this little Dancer, blast her new alien best friend out of her guts, and then put her in her place," Prevention said. "You have the command center, Rourke. Get Winter, and . . ."

  "Agent!" the tech said.

  "What! Now!" Prevention said.

  "The suits appear to be losing power."

  "The Distribution suits?" Prevention said.

  "Yes, ma' — Agent."

  She grabbed Rourke by the lapel of his suit coat.

  "Find Winter, get those doors locked, get those suits recharged, and either lock up those two remaining misfits or kill them. I really don't care which one you need to do," she said. "I'm going to go shut down Dancer. Don't disappoint me."

  * * *

  It took longer than anticipated, but Henry Winter was finally able to locate a backdoor command to the Distribution suits and shut them down.

  The Department had used his redesign to improve on the previous iteration, and his suggestion that they not leave such a glaring Achilles heel in the power storage component in version 2.0. But, Winter had been on the receiving end of some rampaging super-suits in the past, so he'd also made sure to install a failsafe to shut them down remotely. The kinetic energy in the suits would have to dissipate, which meant that the young heroes in the court yard still had to contend with powered up guards for a while longer, but if the pilots were smart, they'd see their gear's juice was depleting and retreat before they got themselves killed.

  Unfortunately, the shutdown took several minutes, because Winter had also designed the security system protecting that failsafe, so he watched the monitor out of the corner of his eye with anxiety as the kids outside continued to take a serious pummeling from the Distribution suit pilots.

  He also watched the gates open up before he had a chance to issue the command himself, which told him someone was already on the inside working on their behalf.

  "Who is your little mole, I wonder," Winter said. Out of curiosity, he traced the command for the front gates and found it coming in through a source below the twenty-first level of the structure — where, at least officially, nothing existed. "Well, that's interesting."

  Winter was speculating why they had decided on a two-pronged assault when a violent knock rattled the door to the server room he was hiding in.

  "Come on out, Mr. Winter," a man's voice said. "We're under orders to bring you in."

  "There's no one in here but us mice!" Winter said in a falsetto, quickly packing up his gear and looking for a place to stash it.

  He heard a heavy sigh and the sound of someone swiping a security card through the lock several times. Then the smashing came as whoever was on the other side of that door finally decided that kicking it in would be easier than hacking the code.

  Winter suddenly very much regretted not stopping to get his Coldwall suit before he had begun playing undefended computer genius in what amounted to little more than an oversized closet.

  The door caved in — Winter pondered why the building was designed to hold super-criminals inside but somehow didn't think it was important to install quality doors on its storage closets and server rooms — and three agents from Prevention's retinue streamed in, guns drawn.

  "Dammit, Winter, stop playing games," the lead agent said.

  Winter held up his cane like Zorro.

  "En garde," he said.

  "Guys, cuff him. Prevention is going to kill us if we don't have him back upstairs before she gets back," the agent said.

  "Back from where?" Winter said.

  "No idea," the agent said, blissfully unaware, Winter noticed, of the enormous Labyrinth prison guard walking up behind him. The guard knocked the lead agent out with a single swing of his baton and disarmed a second agent with the backswing. The third remaining agent drew his gun to fire, but Winter — I still got it, he thought — snapped his walking cane down on the man's wrist, turning his fingers numb and forcing the gun from his hand.

  The guard apologized.

  "Sorry, man," he said, and knocked the agent upside the head before he could even raise a hand to defend himself. He almost looked too surprised to fight back as it happened.

  "You," Winter said to his savior. "You're Two Ton Tony."

  "Actually, my name's Jerry," the guard said. "I've got no idea how I got the nickname."

  "Because you're seven feet tall?" Winter said.

  The guard shrugged.

  "Look, the kids are in it deep down on level 13," he said. "And the boys and I have a feeling that maybe we're on the wrong side of things right now if we don't help them."

  "I've been thinking the same thing, Jerry," Winter said.

  "I've got ten guys and working knowledge of most of the complex," Jerry said. "How can we help?"

  "Well for starters," Winter said, "I've got a very high tech suit of crowd control armor warming up on level ten . . ."

  Chapter 47:

  The man of clay

  Emily was humming a bland pop song from the eighties while she rode an elevator to the thirteenth floor with Billy and Jane. Billy, worn out and leaning heavily against the wall of the elevator, coughed out a half-laugh. "Let me guess," he said. "Elevator music?"

  "Got it in one, cowboy," Emily said.

  "I can't believe you really did open up a bunch of cell doors," Jane said.

  "I can't believe you really didn't believe me when I said I opened up a bunch of cell doors," Emily responded. "Why would I lie about something like that?"

  "Thought you were kidding," Jane said.

  Emily gave her best Kate impression, letting her voice get low and gritty.

  "I never kid," she said. "I am the night."

  "I just hope we didn't get anyone killed," Jane said.

  "And by we you mean me."

  "Sort of," Jane said.

  "Just checking," Emily said.

  Jane turned to l
ook at Billy, taking in his hunched shoulders, the bruises around his eyes.

  "How are you holding up, hot shot?"

  "What about you?" Billy responded back. "Doing okay?"

  "Still feeling indestructible," Jane lied.

  Truth was she could feel every injury from the fight downstairs. Nothing had broken her impenetrable skin, but Billy looked — worn down, exhausted, like he was running on fumes.

  "I'm fine," Billy said. "No force fields, no flying — my best buddy is no longer hanging out somewhere behind my cerebellum, I'm doing just great."

  Jane smiled.

  "You did an excellent job downstairs, coming up with that plan."

  "Guess I'm not so useless in a fight after all," Billy said. "I'd be more useful with Dude back."

  "What's it like in there without him?" Emily said.

  "In where?"

  "In your brain, bozo," Emily said.

  "It's . . . is it weird if I say it's lonely? I mean, at first it was always invasive," Billy said. "Dude knew everything I was thinking, but he's been there for so long it seems like I lost half my personality."

  "Clearly, you have," Emily said.

  "Thanks," he said.

  "That's me, your resident ego boost," Emily said.

  The elevator dinged softly when it arrived on level 13, and Billy walked confidently out into the hallway.

  "Gotta admit for a guy with no superpowers I'm holding my own, huh?" Billy said.

  And then a giant grayish hand grabbed Billy by the shoulder and tossed him down the hall like a ragdoll.

  "Billy!" Emily yelled, and Jane jumped into action, leaping into the hall to see the massive, blocky shape of Golem waiting for her there.

  She threw a series of punches at the monster, who was nearly big enough to block the entire hallway, but it was useless — she felt like she was punching wet clay, leaving small dents but no lasting harm as she watched her fist-shaped marks heal and disappear. Golem swatted her aside easily, and Jane limbs went watery.