by James Maxey
“Shit!” said Blue Bee. “The gun’s still here!”
Smash Lass let out a loud gasp and fell to the sidewalk. “It’s gone! The ghostly fingers are gone!”
“I still feel hungry,” said Blue Bee, crouching over the Retaliator, EpiPen in hand.
I rolled to my back, looking up at the hazy city sky. “I can accurately say I’m hungry enough to eat a monkey.” I held my hand up, staring at how bony it looked. “But I don’t feel the same sucking sensation, like the calories are getting drained out. I feel stable.”
“I feel lousy,” said Smash Lass, sitting up, her hands draped over her knees. “You know, I never eat pizza, but I would totally punch a Domino’s guy right now and take whatever he had in that bag of his.”
“I’d eat the bag,” I said.
“This isn’t time for jokes!” said Blue Bee. She had her fingers pressed against Retaliator’s neck. “There’s no pulse. Definitely not breathing. Do you think he finished off Famine? Should I bring him back now?”
“Do it,” said Smash Lass, standing. “I’ll leave you to handle things down here. You know the Prime Mover is making his escape right now.”
Blue Bee said, “Yeah, but—”
Her objection was drowned out by the whoosh of Smash Lass jumping to the roof of a nearby building, at least thirty stories up. Then I saw her dark form leap from the roof to the smashed out window where the Prime Mover had been.
“She shook off the effects of the hunger pretty quickly,” said Blue Bee.
“Are you kidding?” I asked. “She must be feeling weak as hell not to get back up there in one jump.”
“Okay,” said Blue Bee. “The fact none of us are too weak to talk is a good sign. He must have gotten rid of the ghost.” With a grunt, she jammed the EpiPen into Retaliator’s thigh, then unzipped the mouth hole on his mask, tilting his head back. She bent low to breathe into his mouth when he suddenly jerked, gasping for air.
Without warning, he boxed her ears. She drew back cursing and he punched her, hard, right in the center of the chest. She flopped to her back, groaning.
Retaliator sat up, looking around, dazed. He saw Blue Bee beside him and said, “I apologize. Attacking you was a reflex action. Things are seldom clear when you come back from death.”
“No problem,” Blue Bee said through clenched teeth, still flat on her back. “You’ve been dead before?”
“A few times,” he said.
“So it worked?” I asked. “The ghost of the gun went with you or something?”
“No,” he said. “When I reached the other side, the gun was still in the material realm. I could see things here through a haze, but when I reached for the rifle, I couldn’t touch it.”
“So how the hell—”
“I could see the Third Horseman plainly,” said Retaliator. “He seemed more solid than anything in the material realm. So I beat him to death.”
“You beat him to death? In, like, thirty seconds?”
“I hardly think it required thirty seconds.”
“How the hell do you beat a ghost to death?” asked Blue Bee, getting back to her feet. “It’s already dead!”
“Vocabulary fails me,” admitted Retaliator. “Next time I see She-Devil I’ll ask what the proper term is for bashing a ghost’s brains out.”
“No matter what words you’re using, killing one of the Four Horsemen with your bare hands is pretty badass,” I said. “Anyone ever tell you you’re a bad mother—”
“Shut your mouth,” said Retaliator.
I was jolted out of my fanboy moment with Retaliator as the sidewalk a few feet away exploded in a spray of concrete shrapnel and dust. I clenched my jaw, wondering what the hell was attacking us, but when the dust cleared I saw Smash Lass standing in the crater she’d left in the sidewalk when she’d jumped down. She coughed, waving dust away. “Sorry for the mess. I used up all the gas in my airbag gloves giving Harry a safe landing. The Prime Mover’s gone. I tore the penthouse up. Didn’t find any secret rooms or hidden elevators. Can he fly?”
“No,” said Retaliator. “But given his technological and magical resources, he had a hundred ways of escaping.”
“Jesus, what a fucked up night,” said Blue Bee, resting a hand against a lamppost to steady her wobbly legs. “I’m still weak from hunger. Any of you have a protein bar?”
“Of course I have protein bars,” said Retaliator, reaching into a pouch on his belt. He tossed us all bars. We gobbled them down the second they hit our hands. I honestly have no memory of even unwrapping mine.
“I always wondered what the hell you keep in those pouches,” I said, wiping my lips.
“I change it around but I always pack cuffs, grapping lines, gas grenades, snacks, and water,” he said, pulling out a canteen, taking a swig, then passing it to Blue Bee. “And, from now on, a crucifix.”
Chapter Seventeen
Dangerous Gamble
Echo’s Story
My clone and I stared at Prodigy’s hand. Neither of us knew what to say. Before he died, Brain Boy had hinted that he had plans to transfer his consciousness from his failing body into a computer network. But, when he’d died, he hadn’t been near any computers. Watching him die had been one of the most haunting moments of my life. Could he really be alive?
Before I could even figure out what questions to ask, the whole tower shook, and my clone and I grabbed hold of each other to keep from getting thrown from our feet. The room where we’d crashed the ship had been lit by a uniform glow that came from every direction, robbing the room of shadows. A few seconds after the shaking died off, the room went dark.
Prodigy’s hand clicked and whirred in the darkness and a beam of light shot from the center of her palm. “I’m guessing Golden Victory and Arc disabled the power source,” she said. It sounded like her voice again, and her lips were moving. My clone glanced at me with a furrowed brow. She also noticed the change. Prodigy wasn’t as stiff as she’d been when Brain Boy had been in command, and her face looked alert. Two seconds ago, she’d reminded me of a sleepwalker.
Prodigy knelt over Anyman. In my shock at finding myself talking to Brain Boy, I kind of forgot we were supposed to get him onto the ship. Prodigy checked his pulse and opened his eyes, shining her palm light.
“Pupils are reactive. Pulse is steady. I think he’s safe to move.”
“I’ll grab his feet,” said my clone.
I knelt and slid by hands under his shoulders. As I did so, he groaned. His eyes fluttered open.
“Did we win?” Anyman whispered.
“The battle, at least,” said Prodigy. “The verdict is still out on the war.”
My clone asked, “With your speed, how did they even touch you?”
“Just stupidity,” said Anyman, holding up his hand to show off bloody knuckles. “When I ran into the aliens, they were completely frozen by my time field. I’ve done crowd control on humans using Tempo’s powers and it’s easy. I tie people’s shoelaces together, or pull their shirts over their heads, unfreeze time and, boom, everyone’s tripping and stumbling. But these aliens didn’t wear clothes. So, I decided to punch one. This works okay on people; they don’t feel a thing while they’re in stasis, but once I release time they’re usually in a lot of pain, since it’s really easy to punch someone directly in the nose or the ear when they aren’t moving. I took my time and studied these aliens up close, and saw a few places where they might be vulnerable, like just beneath their chin. I did a few test pokes with my finger and it felt soft, but when I actually took a swing I bashed my knuckles right into the sharp, hard plate on the edge of the jaw. The pain broke my concentration, I flickered back into real time, and before I even realized what had happened I got trampled.”
“You think you can walk?” I asked.
“Yeah,” he said, as I helped him stand. “I just need a few minutes to shake off the dizziness.”
I blinked, and he was about two inches to the left of where he’d been standing. His fa
ce had more color to it. His injured hand was wrapped in a bandage. He said, “Okay. I’m fine now.”
We got back onto the spaceship just as the aliens that Golden Victory and Arc had taken out started stirring.
“Those guys better hurry,” said my clone, but the end of her sentence was muffled by a loud whoosh as Golden Victory zoomed back into the room, carrying Arc.
“Let’s go!” Golden Victory said, racing onto the ship. We all followed.
Prodigy ran to the controls. “What did you do with the power source?” she asked.
“Grabbed it,” said Arc, holding up a black sphere that looked like a golf ball.
Anyman’s eyes went wide. “You’re holding a black hole?”
Arc nodded. “It’s in some sort of shielding. I’m not certain what this stuff is. It’s not made of ordinary matter, or I’d be able to feel the electrons moving within. It’s also not a force field, since there’s no magnetic signature, though I can feel the magnetic waves of the black hole within. Whatever it is, it seems to compress the black hole’s event horizon.”
“I’ll figure it out later. Everyone hold on,” Prodigy said, putting her hand on the gear shift. “We’re going to jump back into our reality in three… two… now!” Nothing happened when she moved the gear shift.
“What went wrong?” I asked.
“What do you mean?” she asked. “We’re back. This is our reality.”
I looked out the window. We were no longer in the tower. Instead, we were floating beside the tower, and it looked completely intact. “But the tower’s still standing. I thought that removing the power source in the parallel earth would destroy it.”
“Removing the power source removed the state of interdimensional flux,” Prodigy said. “This tower is no longer linked to the other one. It can’t shift the moon out of phase with our reality without that link.”
“Are you certain?” asked Golden Victory.
“Certain is possibly too strong a word,” said Prodigy. “I doubt that any of you possess the background in hyperdimensional calculus needed for me to really explain the probabilities, so you’ll have to take my word that the link is broken.”
My clone gave me another knowing glance. Even though Prodigy was the one speaking, the arrogance and condescension reminded us both of Brain Boy. Was Prodigy nothing more than his puppet?
“I can keep up with the math,” said Anyman, “but, even better, I can explain the risks in terms everyone can understand. First and foremost, why are we assuming that the aliens only relied on one power source?”
“We aren’t assuming,” said Arc. “I could see the tower’s energy fields.”
“These things are a spacefaring race. They really go out travelling between stars without a backup power source?” asked Anyman.
“Why not?” asked Golden Victory. “Earth spacecraft don’t have back up engines. And this thing was well guarded. Without Arc magnetically disrupting the force fields protecting it, I would never have been able to break through. When we yanked the power source, the whole place went dark. I did detect back up batteries kicking in to sustain life support, but nothing that could put out enough energy to move the moon.”
“We can’t take any chances,” said Anyman. “We need to destroy this tower.”
“That’s easier said than done,” I said. “I noticed the tower seemed to be able to repair itself.”
“Let’s also not forget the aliens inside,” said Golden Victory. “We can’t just kill them.”
“It would be an act of self-defense,” said Anyman.
“When I put on this costume thirty years ago, I vowed never to take a life,” said Golden Victory.
“That’s not a rational position,” said Prodigy. “If anything, it’s an elitist attitude that reflects poorly on you.”
“Not killing people reflects poorly on him?” I asked. As part of the Red Line, I was complicit in more deaths than I could count. For this and many, many other reasons, I didn’t always sleep well at night. I envied Golden Victory’s clean conscience.
“His invulnerability makes it impossible for him to truly comprehend mortal danger,” said Prodigy. “He has the luxury of never getting hurt, so he can find time to capture his opponents rather than killing them. For people who are a little less likely to survive bullets or bombs, lethal force to ensure the survival of innocents is a perfectly ethical choice.”
“Prodigy’s right,” said Anyman. “These aliens came here to kill us. Killing them to save our world is completely moral.”
“But we don’t need to kill them,” said Arc, pressing his hand against the window. “We just need to get this tower off our moon. It’s obviously got its own life support systems. Now that I’ve gotten used to looking at this alien metal, it’s easy for me to see how far down it goes into the bedrock. I can guide Golden Victory down to the base. He can uproot it and push it into orbit around the sun until we can figure out what to do with the invaders.”
“On it,” said Golden Victory, zooming out the airlock. He flashed past the window, a golden blur.
“This is a dangerous gamble,” said Anyman, crossing his arms. “It would be safer for him to tear this tower apart.”
“This is why he’s our leader,” said Arc. “He doesn’t choose to do what’s easy. He chooses to do what’s right.”
“Can he really pick up that whole tower?” I asked. “How much can it weigh?”
“Less than the asteroid Sterngeist threw at Charlotte,” said Arc. “Golden Victory couldn’t stop that, but he did slow it, reducing the impact and saving countless lives. There he was fighting the asteroid’s momentum and the pull of gravity. Here, the moon’s gravity will be less of a barrier, and he’s starting with a static weight instead of pushing against a body in motion.”
It sounded so reasonable when Arc explained it that way. It almost seemed reasonable when a cloud of dust formed at the base of the tower as Golden Victory raced around it. The tower’s automated defenses unleashed a barrage of missiles in his direction, pulverizing the lunar stone, loosening the base of the tower. Despite part of me still not believing it was possible, when the dust kicked up by the last missile settled, there was a pit around the tower several miles deep, and slowly but steadily, the whole tower was rising higher.
I wasn’t as amazed by Golden Victory’s willful disregard of physics as much as I was by the lengths he was going to not to kill anyone. I mean, the whole reason I’d joined the team was to find out who’d killed my progenitor, Cut Up Girl. I knew Golden Victory was heavily involved with the Butterfly House and committed to keeping it secret. Though I had no evidence, Golden Victory had been one of my top suspects. I had an instinctive distrust of wise and kindly authority figures, probably because my father turned out to be a supervillain and for several of my teen years most adults I interacted with were complicit in my kidnapping and attempted brainwashing. For me, it was a given that no one could be that good, and that anyone pretending to be a saint had to be hiding a sinister motive. But if Golden Victory wasn’t willing to kill aliens, what were the odds he would have used lethal force to silence Cut Up Girl? What if his good guy persona wasn’t an act?
“Uh oh,” said Prodigy, looking at twin blips flashing on the monitor before her. “Incoming.”
“More missiles?” asked Anyman.
“Something far worse,” said Prodigy, pointing toward a view screen. “Magnify.”
The background stars zoomed, but at the new resolution I still couldn’t see anything.
“Zoom again,” said Prodigy.
Now the screen had two blurry smudges. My clone and I leaned in for a closer look.
“What the hell are we looking at?” my double asked. “I mean, it almost looks like two guys on horseback.”
“Exactly,” said Prodigy. “War and Pestilence, two of the Prime Mover’s horsemen.”
“Please tell me somebody has She-Devil on speed dial,” said my double.
“Why the fuck are they here?
”’ I asked. Arc gave me a scolding look. I know these old school superheroes disapprove of profanity, but if you can’t say a few bad words when the horsemen of the apocalypse turn up, I’m not sure why these words are even in the dictionary.
“The Prime Mover has always worked to bring about the end of the world,” said Prodigy. “Maybe he wants the aliens to win.”
“I’ve never actually fought any of the horsemen before,” said Anyman. “How screwed are we?”
“War is a fallen angel bonded with an intergalactic bounty hunter who wears armor forged in a neutron star foundry,” said Prodigy. “His super-dense armor makes him stronger and tougher than Golden Victory. Pestilence is the ghost of a South American shaman who was killed by conquistadors centuries ago. What looks like his body is actually an adaptive force field containing a cloud of every virulent disease you can think of and quite a few science hasn’t even identified. Fortunately, the vacuum of space isn’t a great medium for transmitting airborne diseases.”
“Great,” I said. “So we only have to worry about the one that stronger and tougher than the man who’s currently lifting an alien tower into orbit with his muscles?”
“Worry about both,” said Arc. “The Prime Mover wouldn’t send them on a whim. Everyone get your personal propulsion systems on. Prodigy and I will take on Pestilence. My ability to disrupt force fields should make this an easy fight. Doppelgangers, you’ll be with Anyman, stopping War.”
“What the fu… heck am I supposed to do against him?” I asked.
“If I understand your powers, the longer your double remains incarnate, the bigger the explosion.”
“Yeah,” I said. “And she’s been around for long enough to make a pretty big boom, but nothing that’s going to put a dent in this thing. I mean, I used to keep doubles active all night long and could still muffle their explosions in the ocean.”
“Which is why you’re with Anyman,” said Arc. “With Tempo’s powers, he can accelerate your time field relative to the Horseman. Hold out longer than you ever have before.”