There’s no way I’m going to let Victor hurt Quinn’s family. We each have our targets, but will Quinn stick to the plan of destroying the reactor core first or will his emotions get in the way and screw everything up? And if they do, who will he try to rescue first?
I’m glad Agent Hartman thought I should be the one to rescue Keegan so Quinn could focus on Aren and leave Tim for Ana Maria. I also hope this mends my relationship with Keegan…but I have to allow him time to heal if it doesn’t. I really screwed things up with everyone. Now’s my chance to make things right…once and for all.
Quinn’s voice broke his concentration. “We’re getting close, switch to stealth mode.”
Both Quinn and Ana Maria faded from view as they became invisible and Blake lost their sense of proximity in his mind. He smirked and turned himself invisible. “One day you guys are going to teach me how to mask my presence from other superhumans.”
“Not a problem,” Quinn said. “But you showing up out of the blue is part of the element of surprise because it’s the last thing Victor will expect.”
Blake smiled wickedly. I know, it’s the best part of the plan.
5-18 | Welcome to Nightmare's Playground
Quinn
WHEN THE HEROES FLEW OVER the frozen Lower and Upper Richardson Lakes, Blue Spekter suspected something wasn’t quite right. The air around him felt unusually charged and the sky ahead looked uncharacteristically dark for the early afternoon. When they passed over the frozen waters of Mooselookmeguntic Lake, Blue Spekter knew in his gut that something was horribly wrong with the winter weather.
The skies over Rangeley were unnaturally dark and cloudy. The wind buffeted the three heroes as it swirled and whipped around them. With his super hearing, he heard a familiar electrical hum and as they crossed Rangeley Lake, the air felt saturated with orgone energy.
I remember that sound, it’s the same hum we heard when we first discovered the reactor core chamber. Whoa, what the heck is that thing?
Blue Spekter’s mouth—and the mouths of his peers—dropped open with surprise when their visibility improved and they clearly observed Orgonon. In the Cloudbuster array field ahead, directly over the reactor core’s domed roof, a brilliant, tornado-like column of rotating vapor flashed with blue and white electrical energy that pulsed and swirled from the ground to the aggravated storm clouds above. The thick, dark clouds enveloping the skies over Orgonon flashed with ferocity as arcs of lightning agitated the maelstrom. Thunder cracked and rumbled around them.
Oh my gosh, that’s the weapon; whatever they’re doing in Portsmouth, it all starts here.
Blue Spekter became visible and slowed to a stop. Helion and Catamount decelerated to a standstill and hovered near him. “We have to stop that thing,” Blue Spekter said, pointing at the insane convergence of the electrical and meteorological sciences.
“What the heck is it?” Helion asked as Catamount shifted to visibility.
“I’m pretty sure it’s the weaponized weather system they’re using to make everyone sick back home. It looks like they’re dumping raw orgone energy into the atmosphere and sending it to Portsmouth, but don’t ask me how.”
Helion shook his head. “I had no idea the reactor cores could do…that.” He pointed at the powerful storm ahead of them. “I didn’t even know the system was ready until New Year’s Eve.”
“Neither did I, but I don’t think it will be easy to stop at the moment,” Catamount said, jerking a thumb toward the storm.
What do you mean?
Blue Spekter followed her gaze and saw eleven distinct colors rising to meet them; the one in the center was bright red.
Oh, crap, are those…
“Super soldiers!” Helion shouted, confirming Blue Spekter’s fears. “It looks like Nightmare is leading the pack.”
Shoot, they must have seen us coming. Looks like our entire plan has already been thrown off the rails.
“What are we gonna do?” Helion asked.
❖
Ana Maria
“Strike hard, fast, and furious,” Catamount said, encouraging the boys. “Remember, just because there are more of them doesn’t mean they can use their powers as well as us.”
“Wait,” Blue Spekter said, raising one open-palmed hand. “I want to talk to him first.”
“Are you sure?” Catamount asked, frowning under her cowl. “That’s one of the plans the generals suggested we avoid.”
“I know, but I also know that’s what Nightmare will expect, so let’s do it. Clearly, we have no idea what to expect since we didn’t know about that storm column, so this will give us a few minutes to assess the situation first. Then we proceed as you suggested. Let’s move closer.”
As they drew nearer, the overwhelming sensation of eleven superhumans appearing in her mind’s eye disoriented Ana Maria for a moment, but she kept her gaze fixed on Nightmare and slowed her approach with Helion and Blue Spekter.
Helion shook his head as the proximity sensations subsided. “Oof, that hurt.”
Both sides stopped and hovered in the air with only one-hundred feet between them. Behind Victor and his superhumans, the swirling tower of energy and water vapor churned relentlessly as thunder echoed across the valley.
“You can turn that off now, I am here,” Blue Spekter said loudly. They knew their super hearing would allow them to hear across the distance despite the chaos of lightning and thunder around them.
Nightmare scoffed. “I’ll turn it off when I’m good and ready.” Then, he tapped the side of his head and looked at Helion with astonishment. “Is that you, Blake?”
So, his proximity sense is not well-developed if he just sensed Blake…That’s good to know.
Helion grinned and waved with his right hand. “Surprise, asshole!”
Nightmare’s face wickedly twisted. “All the better. This time I will rip you apart piece by piece until there’s nothing left.”
“What is it you want, Victor?” Blue Spekter shouted.
“Victor? Why aren’t you going to use my government-issued name? I think it is rather fitting, don’t you?”
“He’s toying with you,” Catamount said, observing the ten superhumans slowly moving outward. “His men are trying to encircle us.”
Blue Spekter nodded. “Fine. What is it you want, Nightmare? Why are you attacking the city and why did you kidnap my dads and boyfriend?”
Nightmare swiped his arm through the air in front of him. “So the world will know I am not to be trifled with. Once I remove every trace of your pathetic existence from the planet, there will be no one left to stop me. That goes for you, too, Blake…and the mystery woman I’ve yet to meet. My technicians will have fun dissecting you…who shouldn’t exist.”
“My name is Catamount,” she replied, her eyes noticing the purple superhuman closest to Nightmare’s left had drifted up several feet above his peers. With her enhanced vision, Ana Maria watched a lightning bolt tear down from the clouds above while a second arc darted up from the ground. It connected with the man and a sharp clap of thunder exploded outward and rumbled across the snowy forest floor beneath them.
“Holy crap!” Helion exclaimed.
A small, swirling vortex of dust and ash drifted away from where the man once hovered as his limp corpse tumbled to the ground, blackened and burnt.
“That will work in our favor,” Catamount whispered. She looked at Blue Spekter and added, “lightning won’t hurt you and me.” Then, she looked at Helion. “But it might hurt you, like that guy. It might even kill one of us.”
The purple guy miraculously recovered from his fall and ascended back to his position near Nightmare.
“Stay away from the nasty, evil, killer storm. Got it,” Helion said.
“I’m totally going to use that to my advantage,” Blue Spekter said.
“It doesn’t matter who you are, pretty lady, because you won’t make it out of here alive. Destroy them!” Nightmare shouted.
❖
&n
bsp; Blake
Three of Nightmare’s super thugs—green, blue, and teal—broke off from the group and charged at Helion. Thankfully, they all wore black super suits so it would be easy to distinguish which blue superhuman was the villain and which was the hero.
Bring it.
As they approached, they reached for him as if they were going to grab him as they passed by and dragged him away from the main fight.
I don’t think so.
Helion pulled his arms back and swung an invisible baseball bat. Solid, telekinetic air cracked against their faces and Helion heard the awful sound of breaking jawbones. The three men collided together and lost some altitude as they clutched their faces and wasted precious seconds nursing their wounds.
Helion lunged at the blue thug and used his mind to push him away from the teal and green super thugs, catapulting him into the atmosphere. Within seconds, his body disappeared from sight as it passed into the clouds. Lightning surged in the clouds around him, and Helion assumed nature had taken care of the man.
Turning around, he grunted as the green thug—who randomly smelled of garlic—tackled him in midair. Helion brought his hands up and boxed the man’s ears with his open palms, shattering the man’s ear drums. This caused his attacker to wail in pain and let go of Helion’s body and grab at his ears.
The teal thug saw through his distractions and rapidly hurled a swarm of massive icicles at Helion.
Oh, shit!
Helion found himself dodging sharp ice spears that whistled through the air as they passed by him. He extended his hand and thought about telekinetically bashing the thug in the face and kicking him down to the earth below, but his hand frosted over and became frozen in clear ice.
What the hell?
The forming ice traveled up his arm and seconds later, encapsulated his entire body and head in a growing block of ice.
Think I haven’t seen this before?
Helion superheated his body, but he discovered the ice didn’t melt as he expected it to. In fact, the bone-chilling cold around him quickly overcame his ability to generate fire and significantly reduced his heat output.
Crap, this guy has impressive skills, but so do I.
He looked through the ice and spotted the teal-glowing man, reached out with his mind, then pulled. The teal man jerked toward the ice that encased him and smashed face-first into the ice, cracking it. The man howled with pain and clutched his bloody nose.
With the teal thug distracted, Helion super-heated his body and shattered the melting ice prison. The ice exploded, hurtling chunks of ice in every direction.
“Enough of this!” a voice from above shouted. “Time to do what the boss wants.”
Helion looked up and saw the blue man fly down from the clouds, his hands arcing with electricity.
Oh, crap.
❖
Quinn
Air superiority belonged to Blue Spekter alone that day. He moved faster and with greater agility than his attackers could have hoped to. Combing super speed and rapid shifts between invisibility and visibility, he dashed through the air, landing punches or kicks whenever he could. To his attackers, he often appeared to be in two places at once and he used the resulting confusion to his advantage.
The trio of yellow, orange, and magenta evil super goons finally coordinated their attack and tried to tackle him, but Blue Spekter pummeled them from all sides as he danced and flipped through the air and thwarted them.
The angrier you get, the less focused you’ll be.
“Stop moving!” the magenta man yelled, unleashing a fury of fire and flame into the air around him. Blue Spekter dodged the elemental attack with ease and flew behind the man, kicking the yellow guy in the face as he moved. The yellow guy spun backward and slammed into the orange guy, a calamity Blue Spekter didn’t have time to watch. He grabbed the magenta flame-thrower by the ankles, upended him, and accelerated toward the storm and the column of dangerous electricity.
The goon’s eyes widened with fear when he realized what Blue Spekter was doing, and he begged for his life. “No, please, don’t!”
Sorry, buddy. Blue Spekter whipped around and tossed the flailing man into the storm. Certain the man would meet his end, Blue Spekter descended and spotted the other two goons zipping toward him with bolts of electricity dancing across their hands and arms. A sharp crack of thunder and a bright flash above them signaled the magenta goon’s demise.
When the magenta man’s proximity sense faded from their minds, the yellow man’s face became surprised and orange man’s face twisted with rage.
“You killed Kenny,” the latter shouted, then blasted Blue Spekter with powerful electricity. Blue Spekter extended his hands and absorbed the energy, much to the surprise of the orange villain.
“You bastard!” The yellow man yelled, grimacing. Then, he smiled wickedly.
Quinn became confused. What’s that about?
Something blunt, cold, and hard slammed into the back of Blue Spekter’s head, and his vision blurred for a moment.
Ugh, didn’t see that coming.
❖
Ana Maria
The brown, amber, and purple henchmen approached and then hesitated, hovering in front of her.
“Who the hell are you, pretty lady?” the brown-glowing leader asked.
She smiled but didn’t respond.
“Doesn’t matter, it’s not like I’ll even remember your name when I’m through with you,” the leader said. The three men shared a lecherous snicker and then charged at her.
The corner of her lip went up, and she telekinetically lashed out and batted the brown leader down. Bones snapped and popped as the man tumbled to the ground, too stunned to react.
The other two men abruptly stopped in bewilderment and watched their comrade fall. Then, they glared at her and snarled. “We’ll teach you not to mess with us!”
“I doubt it. You’re not very imaginative. It takes more than brute force to knock a good woman down.”
The charred purple guy sneered. “I’m more than happy to oblige, bitch.”
A moment later, Catamount was surrounded by blackness. Not darkness, but an impenetrable blackness no light could penetrate. She spun around and looked for a way out, but all she heard were shrieks of laughter.
She screamed as an energy assault of some kind cascaded across her suit and tore through her body, making her muscles convulse and spasm. Hands grasped at her and pulled her downward. She looked where she felt hands—specifically her breasts—but saw nothing but blackness surrounding her.
She felt her body spinning, but her brain didn’t compute because all she saw was the confounding blackness. How do I absorb this? How can I counter against something I cannot see? I can still sense them in my mind but…
A moment later her body hit the ground, her ankles and left hip breaking as the two villains landed on top of her.
“Nightmare can’t wait to see what makes you tick, honey, and personally, I can’t wait to see either. Maybe I’ll have a little look-see right now!” A gruff voice said. It sounded like the brown guy, but she wasn’t sure. Although two hands pinned her arms down, her broken bones popped into place as they healed.
Oh no you don’t…
❖
Blake
The three attackers regrouped around their blue leader, who whispered something to them. Then, they rushed toward him.
Helion brought his hands out in front of him and then clapped them together. The green and teal thugs grunted as Helion caught them in a telekinetic slap and slammed them into the blue thug in the middle. Momentarily disoriented, his attackers quickly regained control of their flight and the blue thug accelerated and caught Blake, wrapping his arms around his torso as if tackling him on an American football field.
Helion grunted and repeatedly bashed the man’s back, causing blue and orange sparks to erupt from his strikes. The green and teal guys caught up with him and the three men overpowered him and drove him into the snow-c
overed frozen ground, taking a few pine trees out along the way.
In his ear, he could hear Blue Spekter and Catamount engaging their combatants. Blue Spekter shouted, and Helion glanced in his best friend’s direction.
Crap, that was a mistake.
In less than a second, the blue thug rapidly punched Helion’s face while the other two guys held his ankles and wrists to the ground. Blue and orange sparks sizzled into the air every time the man struck him.
Since when is three-on-one even close to fair? I guess I should have expected this, coming from Victor…
Helion began to super heat his body but his attackers had already anticipated his defensive strategy. His arms and legs felt incredibly cold and he realized the teal and green thugs were freezing him in place.
Shit, not again.
Then, the blue guy pressed his left hand against Helion’s neck and squeezed. He felt a sinister coldness seeping into his body.
Aw, crap, it’s the life drain thing…
“What are you going to do…kill me?” Helion choked out, knowing his teammates would hear the conversation in his ear comm.
“Oh, no,” the blue thug said. “Nightmare has plans for you. We’re just the…welcome wagon.”
“Change of plans,” Blue Spekter said in his ear comm. “Go with them, Blake…let them think they’ve won and get to my dads and Keegan. We all know you can take them out once you’re inside the facility.”
Helion frowned. This wasn’t supposed to happen…but I suppose it…
“Night night, punk,” the blue thug shouted. Then, arcs of electric skittered across his right hand and arm as he placed his hand onto Helion’s chest.
Helion gasped and struggled to shout as the electricity passed through him and overloaded his neurons. Focusing with the strength he had left, he grunted as his body spasmed and went limp—a feigned response to the electrical assault.
I hope he stops soon or I’m really going to pass out.
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