I didn’t know biology.
But I knew fear.
The mask’s vocalizer taken up to eleven in a confined space, lights in my eyesockets glaring red, arms spread wide, I gave challenge. Glass cracked, metal tanks shivered, and the three closest to me stumbled backward, clamping their clawed hands to their scaly heads.
Behind them, Alpha darted away. As the echoes died my own audio sensors kicked back on. I’d bought him seconds to escape.
I’d bought myself a few seconds too. And unlike the last time I was up against monsters, I didn’t particularly care about collateral damage to the area.
A volley of concussion micromissiles to start things off, followed by particle beams at sixty percent charge. These things looked on par with the last critter I tangled with, and I’d measured its resilience pretty well. Sixty percent wouldn’t kill, but they wouldn’t be shrugging it off, either.
Scales flickered through the dust, green and brown and I beamed down the one in the lead, sent him flying through a wall. I stepped forward, arms up, palms out as I blasted again and again, blowing apart metal, sending monsters flying, shattering glass, and spilling fluids of all colors through the grating of the floor.
It was the alpha that got to me, charging as its brethren fell, twisting and darting with speed it shouldn’t have for something its size. It slid inside my arms, clamped hands on my shoulderpads, and belched gallons of high-velocity acid, hosing me down like pressurized jets in a carwash.
I smiled, and counted. Three, two, one...
Steam. The world turned to superheated steam, as the acid ate into the neutralizing agent I’d built into the armor since my last encounter. The creature reeled back, howling, and I snapped punches into its midsection, advancing as it stumbled backward, trying to get away. A final backhand sent it flying into the wall, stumbling back toward me, until a snap kick put it on the ground. It lay limp, and I laughed, laughed long and hard.
My warning system shrilled, and I snap-fired in the direction of motion without breaking my bout of maniacal laughter. Sixty-five percent on the particle beam and the one charging me from the side flew, bounced off the floor, scattering sections of grating as it went.
The neutralizing agent had worked perfectly. “DIRE DOES NOT MAKE THE SAME MISTAKE TWICE.”
“Is that why you’re here, then? Come to finish what you started?”
I turned, sodden, melted remnants of my cape shredding and falling behind me as I did. Across the room, behind what had to be two-foot-thick glass, stood Professor Vector. He was shaking, from fear or rage I couldn’t tell. Didn’t matter, in the end. Either would suit my purpose.
“THAT,” I said, picking my way toward him with supremely unhurried steps, “IS UP TO YOU.”
“Bystanders are clear. I’m playing keepaway with Mr. Big,” Acertijo reported.
“Good,” I whispered back. “Alpha?”
“Boss, we hit the motherlode. They have quadchip blade servers here.”
To Vector’s trembling gaze, I was advancing step by implacable step, inscrutable under my armor. To my allies on the vox channel, I was suddenly laughing and bubbling with joy. “What? The good shit? Oh holy hell, he did have an awesome setup here. Alpha! This means you can spawn!”
“Squeeeeeee!” Alpha declared.
“Please never do that again,” Acertijo said. A sudden WHUMP drifted over his channel. “Whoops, busy.”
It meant that more minions were in the cards. Those quadchips would be usable brainboxes to make more Alphas. “Right, salvage those,” I decided. “Not like he’ll need them anymore. Keep them safe, and be ready to teleport out the second we’re clear.”
“Stay back!” Vector yelled, voice amplified by the intercom. Cute, but if he was looking to compete with my volume, he was pretty outgunned.
I kept moving. Implacable, unhurried. “YOU HAD SUCH POTENTIAL, VECTOR. HOW MUCH DID HE PAY YOU TO GIVE UP YOUR DREAMS?”
“What? What are you talking about?”
“PRIDE, VECTOR. OR SMUGNESS, IN HIS CASE. SHE KNOWS YOUR SINS.”
“Then you know you’ll never leave Britain alive.” Vector sighed. “You did me a favor once, I’ll return it. Leave now, and I won’t pursue. I can’t speak for the others, but...” He pulled over a desk chair, slumped into it. I stopped my forward walk. Fear, not rage, then. A slightly softer approach seemed most efficient here.
“YOU DIDN’T ANSWER THE QUESTION. WHAT PRICE DID YOU TAKE FOR YOUR DREAMS?”
“I haven’t given up my dreams,” Vector insisted, folding his arms, hugging himself. “I just charge a hell of a lot more money for them, these days. People paying for the privilege of being experimental subjects. Balanced out by charity work, treating refugees and heroes and victims of other villains. I’ve got the only facility in the country capable of treating radiation poisoning, and mitigating exposure, did you know that? Now we’ll have to get clear and set up shop somewhere else, because of you. Excellent job breaking it, Dire. Five stars.”
“RADIATION TREATMENT? HEROES? OH YOU POOR FOOL. DID YOU HAPPEN TO NOTICE ANYTHING STRANGE ABOUT THOSE SO-CALLED HEROES YOU HELPED?”
“No, because they are heroes. We have to follow strict protocols. I never get within visual range of any of them, I just delegate it to a few flesh-puppets and diagnostic models. You should know what happens if you stumble onto a secret identity. Jesus woman, come on now.”
“ALL THESE PROCEDURES. PUT IN PLACE AT MAESTRO’S SUGGESTION, SHE SUSPECTS. THE MONSTER.”
“Go to hell!” Vector snapped, before I could finish talking. “Maestro’s great!”
He’d snapped from weary fear to hot anger in a heartbeat. If that wasn’t an implanted trigger, I’d eat my mask.
“Enough. Whatever you’re trying to achieve, I don’t have time for it,” Vector decided. He stabbed a finger into the console. “The Mark Three can take care of you.”
“SHE HIGHLY DOUBTS THAT.”
“Mr. Big’s disengaging,” Acertijo whispered in my ear. “Heading your way!”
Vector smirked. “Well, even if it can’t handle you, I don’t care. It’ll slow you down, and that’s what matters. Good bye, Doctor.” Metal slabs rolled down behind the glass, walling him in an armored box.
I watched through voltaic vision as the circuitry around him shuddered, and started to drop down.
“GOT TO ADMIT, THAT WOULD HAVE BEEN AN EFFECTIVE ESCAPE PLAN,” I said, angling my gauntlets carefully. “IF SHE HADN’T JUST USED THE LAST FORTY SECONDS TO STUDY THE WORKINGS OF IT.”
Three high-powered blasts, and the escape elevator shuddered to a halt as molten metal sizzled and cooled. I’d had to put some mighty big holes in the floor, but eh. Wasn’t my floor.
“Look out!” Alpha yelled, and I turned to see Mr. Big step into the room—
—and go flying as a blue and gold suit of power armor slammed into him, knocking him head over heels.
The Human Harrier. The power-armored avenger, war veteran, and best pilot in the hemisphere. And also, the first responder of Queensguard. Which meant that I might have gotten stuck in a bit tighter than expected, here.
I’d expected heroes to show up, counted on it, even.
And as the shadows unfolded with a ripple of translating energy, and figures stepped out, I realized that I had gotten my wish, and then some.
CHAPTER 8: HEROES HAPPEN
“We knew we were up against a major threat, with Dire. We also knew she wasn't unbeatable. From what we'd seen before, footage from Icon City, if we used caution and ground her down we could get her to the point where she'd cut and run. I had something to stop that, but as it turned out, getting her to the point of running was easier to say than it was to do...”
Miss Maskelyne, leader of Queensguard, testifying to a private MI9 review board
Queensguard.
I’d read up on them. I’d expected to run into them before I was through and done in Britain. I just hadn’t expected them to arrive so early. But then, they were known f
or fast-response to threats on their soil.
I could teleport away, but that had two drawbacks. They had an inventor with them, and if she was running any sort of passive or active scanning, they’d pick up the trace particles left behind. The particles would fade after a minute or two, but with them right here I couldn’t take the chance. Detection could lead to them cracking my teleportation methods, finding ways to track or shut down my easy transportation. I wasn’t willing to lose my best mobility option just yet.
The other drawback was that I hadn’t achieved my objectives yet. I needed to get Vector in hand, and though I had him trapped, there was an awful lot of machinery and metal between him and me. Couldn’t just blast it apart, or I’d risk killing the guy, and if I tried to clear the way by hand, it’d mean turning my back on the heroes. Bad idea.
“Acertijo, we might have a problem,” I whispered into the vox.
“Busy. Talking with Thrush and Leo now,” he whispered back. Oh, great, the gang was all here. I hated it when heroes worked together. Team-ups. Nothing worse than team-ups.
Still, I had an ace up my sleeve. “Alpha? See if you can get down to Vector without drawing heroic attention.”
And then there was no more time, as the last of Queensguard stepped out of the ripple in reality that had brought the team here.
First through the breach was a figure clad head to toe in broken green plate mail, with wood and plants poking out between the cracks. He held a wooden axe gripped in two gnarled gauntlets, and wooden leafy horns poked from a dented helm. The Green Knight, regenerator and not entirely human.
Then came a slender woman in a red and gold harlequin’s outfit, body tensed, bare hands pointed toward me in some sort of martial stance. Punching Judy, probably the most dangerous of them at close quarters. Even I’d have to worry about those hands, or more accurately, the mystical chi energy behind them.
Next was Human Harrier, pilot and commander of a sleek and fast suit. He had my armor beat for speed, and an interchangeable weapons loadout that could scale up as needed. Not my match in raw power there, but enough to cause some serious damage, given time and depending on what he used. Currently he had his shoulder-mounted guns shifted into a gatling configuration.
And then the last of them, the most dangerous in the long-term, and problematic overall. Clad in a suit jacket, with short-cut blonde hair above her domino-masked face, she looked me up and down and smirked. The inventor and heir to a legacy of stage magic as well as supergenius-grade mechanical engineering; Miss Maskelyne.
Yes, she was related to that Maskelyne, the famous magician of Tesla’s era.
There is a fifth one in their team, but he wasn’t in sight. If I was very, very lucky, he was incompatible with the technology that brought the others here. He’d either be a headache or a pushover if he turned up, there was no in-between.
“Well. Slumming now, aren’t you?” Miss Maskelyne asked.
Banter. Good. This would give Alpha time to work.
“SLUMMING? ONLY FOR A LITTLE WHILE.”
“What’s wrong?” Harrier’s voice crackled through a low-grade voice modulator. Shoddy work, and I sniffed in disgust to hear it. “Empress-for-life not work out for you? Decided to leave the Dictator business? Oh wait, I forgot. The Yanks kicked you so hard you put the pond between you and them.”
“THE PROPER TITLE, WAS ‘TYRANT’.”
“Well, at least yer honest,” Punching Judy sounded about seventeen. Didn’t look it, and that form-fitting spandex indicated a higher age. She was probably just being cutesy, just part of her persona. I wasn’t fooled. Wouldn’t underestimate her. “Right fair turned my stomach, them things you did to those poor innocent people.”
“AH YES, LIKE IMPROVING THEIR INFRASTRUCTURE, ENDING A CIVIL WAR WITH MINIMUM BLOODSHED, AND DEPOSING A DICTATOR WHO LIKED TO CUT OFF PEOPLE’S HANDS AND PUT THEM IN JARS.” I’d never been able to verify that last part, but the things I had verified were worse. “HOW DARE SHE DO A HERO’S JOB. OH WAIT, LIKE MOST OF THE WESTERN WORLD YOU DIDN’T GIVE A SHIT UNTIL SHE TOOK OVER. YOUR HYPOCRISY RINGS AS HOLLOW AS THE CRIMES YOU CHARGE HER WITH.”
Maskelyne’s eye twitched in annoyance. “You can tell that to the jury, love. Whatever you did or didn’t do, what you’re doing now isn’t good.”
“THIS? SMASHING AN ILLEGAL BIOLOGICAL HORROR LAB RIGHT IN THE MIDDLE OF YOUR HOME COUNTRY? DAMNED RIGHT IT ISN’T GOOD. IT REFLECTS POORLY ON YOU, FOR LETTING THIS HAPPEN UNDER YOUR NOSES. FORTUNATELY, DIRE WAS HERE TO CLEAN UP THE MESS YOU DIDN’T.”
My HUD flared an alert, as the Human Harrier locked onto me. I glanced his way, and mid-motion, saw movement behind them.
Oh. Oh ho ho... well wasn’t that interesting.
“Enough,” Miss Maskelyne said, flicking her vapestick to the ground. “We’re taking you in, and sorting this out. I know you won’t, but I’ll ask you to come quietly.”
“YOU’RE ASKING THE WRONG QUESTION.”
“And what’s the right question?” Harrier ground out.
“WHAT’S A MARK THREE?”
Miss Maskelyne sighed. “I’ll bite, fine, if it gets this over with. What, pray tell, is a Mark Three?”
“DIRE HAS NO CLUE, BUT IT LOOKS LIKE THE MARK THREE WAS FAKING THE FIRST TIME YOU PUNCHED IT OUT.”
Mister Big leaped out of the corner, grabbed the Human Harrier, and carried him screaming through a glass tube full of blue chemicals.
“YEAH, YOU SHOULD PROBABLY DO SOMETHING ABOUT THAT.”
Miss Maskelyne shouted orders and her team fell in. The Green Knight charged after the two combatants. But Punching Judy stayed put, and started circling around, eying me up as her fists lit up with golden sparks. Miss Maskelyne started strolling the other way. She pulled out a pair of white gloves, snapped them onto her hands with two quick flourishes.
I’d gotten the two more dangerous of the group, I thought. Just as their exploits had been public domain and available to me for perusal, my own excursions had doubtless been reviewed during their own analysis and training sessions.
Which was why I constantly adjusted my suit configurations and armaments. And why Maskelyne, like so many inventors, never relied on the same trick twice in a row.
We were pretty evenly matched, here. I’d have to do something about that.
Alpha’s voice whispered in my ear. “Found a vent. Too small for people to fit down. Thank goodness you built me thin.”
“It’ll have defenses,” I warned.
“Yeah, I’ve already gone through some stuff that’s probably nerve gas.”
“Just don’t get cocky,” I warned. “Busy for a bit.”
And even as I could finish the sentence, Punching Judy moved.
I knew it was coming. I knew she was fast, faster than any normal human could ever hope to match.
I was counting on it.
And just as quickly as she moved, she rebounded as white energy flared around me.
She’d moved fast as a bullet, triggered my forcefield, and paid the price as she flew across the room, arms and legs flailing. Somehow she slowed her arc as she hit the wall, arms first, shoved against it, and flipped to land on her feet below. It was an awe-inspiring bit of acrobatics, but I couldn’t afford to pay attention to it as I whipped a gauntlet around to Miss Maskelyne and tried to blast her back to join Judy.
Tried, and failed. With a soft ‘wham!’ of air entering a vacated space, she teleported before the beam could hit her, ended up a good five feet away from the crackling golden energy.
We both had automatic defenses, it seemed. She’d gone for avoidance rather than resistance.
“Force field, Judy!” Maskelyne called, spreading her hands as playing cards made of blue energy riffled out between them, danced around her arms. “Based on velocity, looks like. Try a slower approach.”
Gods, it was like fighting Tomorrow Force all over again. At least this lot didn’t have a precognitive reality adjuster.
Judy came back in for another round, and
I popped open my shoulderpads, sprayed her with concussion micromissiles. But Maskelyne made throwing motions, and blue cards sped out to form a barrier as Judy skidded to a stop and went prone. The blasts shattered the few glass tubes remaining in the room, sending chemicals spilling out and mixing together.
“UNWISE,” I rumbled. “BY HER COUNT, THERE ARE TWO PEOPLE IN THIS ROOM WHO DON’T HAVE AN INTERNALIZED AIR SUPPLY. ARE YOU SURE YOU WANT TO BREATHE THOSE FUMES?”
Maskelyne fell back, digging in her coat. Judy cartwheeled over to her, and the air around them sparked with faint particles, drifting like dust. “You’re asking the wrong question, dear Doctor.”
I read her smile, and saw how Judy’s eyes narrowed as she glanced behind me...
...and I jetted to the side, just as Mister Big swung a girder through the space I’d occupied half a second ago.
They’d been going for heroic irony. Cute when you can pull it off, but I’d been on the other end of that sort of shit long enough to know how these things usually go.
Mister Big, presumably upset at missing, chased after me. I sped around the ruins of the room, using the support pillars for cover. But he didn’t care, swinging the girder right through them, and I winced as I calculated his strength. I could take a few hits, maybe, but if he cornered me my suit would be spare parts and I’d probably be tenderized meat.
“Heads up!” Acertijo announced. “We’re coming in to back up Queensguard.”
That changed things.
Leo was mostly a non-factor. Except he wasn’t, because based on his prior tactics, he’d leave beating me up to the people who could do it and go looking for ways to cause mischief. He might detect and give Alpha some trouble, and I didn’t know if Alpha could handle him.
Lady Thrush was a problem, and a pretty big one.
I dodged another girder swing from Mister Big, and another support pillar went goodbye.
The ceiling groaned, ominously, and ideas sparked in my mind, at a speed unmatched by human intellect. Calculations checked and double-checked, engineering analysis and estimates rolled by as I analyzed every conceivable variable.
DIRE:SINS (The Dire Saga Book 5) Page 9