Superluminary

by Olivia Rising

  Studio 2—on the other side of the wall—was safer, away from everyone with powers and targets painted on their backs.

  “Sarina, pay attention. We have to make a break for it when Tess is ready,” Ace said.

  Crybaby Sarina isn’t here. Not feeling addressed, Dancer fixed her eyes on the brunette host who had assumed a fetal position on the floor by the couch.

  Go over there.

  Dancer’s command injected her will into the fabric of reality surrounding the woman. The short-haired host flickered out of existence to reappear on the other side of the wall separating the two studios. A second later, the plump blogger made the same trip. Out of reality here, and back into it next door.

  The cameramen were the first to notice. One of them cried out, pointing at the stage.

  Ace whirled around to see what the commotion was all about. Seconds later, he turned to Dancer with a furious look on his face. “What the hell is going on?” he demanded.

  “We said no hostages,” Dancer said over the sound of electronic beats in her ear. She didn’t have the time to argue. She still had things to do.

  One of the guards disappeared next, causing everyone to stare at the empty space where he had stood. Dancer didn’t particularly care where he ended up, as long as he was far away. She got a fleeting impression of him dropping a short distance to the ground before his position in reality stabilized.

  Did I drop you? Oops.

  She was too busy to dwell on the thought. Yes, yanking people off to places that she had only seen as a blur of overlapping objects was probably a little dangerous. No, she couldn’t hop around the building in search of the perfect location for the hostages. The heroes out there were about to become a bigger problem than the guards were now.

  As the other guards scurried into motion, one of them rushed at empty space, unable to pinpoint his targets. The other two chose directions that brought them into the melee with Nameless targets. One tripped on Sunny’s outstretched legs while Jasper grabbed Snow’s arm to pull her out of the way, preventing the other guard from toppling over her. Snow’s cloak was dislodged and ripped from her shoulder as a result.

  The bald guard captain rammed straight into Ace, and the momentum of the impact was strong enough to send them both crashing to the floor. Moments later the guard was on top of Ace, and, even though he couldn’t see his target, he drew his fist back for a punch.

  Emboldened by the music pulsing through her, Dancer fixed her eyes on the man before Ace’s fist connected. One floor below, she commanded.

  The head guard disappeared before the guard who nearly crashed into Snow vanished the same way, out of the studio and into the room that was one level below.

  The guard who had tripped on Sunny struggled to his feet, but slipped and fell again. Another guard took a step back, choosing the direction that sent him tumbling off the stage with a surprised yelp. It looked like Ace was back in action, making their targets take the worst possible course of action.

  Now that the others joined the fight, and any immediate threats had been removed from the studio, Dancer called upon her life sense to check on the heroes outside the building. Her senses flared, transforming her surroundings into blurry, distorted shades of gray interspersed with the beacons of living beings. She sensed movement from most of the people within and near the building.

  One of the life lights in particular drew her attention because she recognized it as a powered individual. He or she darted around, relocating from one side of the building to the other in the blink of an eye, as if moved by self-psychokinesis. The movement was immediate, and it didn’t make any sense.

  Dancer’s mind raced to interpret what she was seeing. A teleporter? Impossible. The only teleporter she knew about had been shot a few days before.

  The EU hero team included Rune, Aura, Skyfire, and Crashbang. None of them were teleporters. Their leader, Rune, would only pose a problem to the Nameless if he got one of his area effects to stick or if he came into melee range with his enchanted ax. Aura was an Empath and would be kept out of combat. Skyfire’s homing missiles could incinerate a person in seconds, but she needed a visible target to lock on to. Crashbang was best described as a mobile flashbang grenade. He moved with the top speed of a motorbike, and any solid surface he punched gave off a blinding shock wave that would knock out anyone who was caught within its radius.

  Dancer watched as Rune’s life light rejoined the other EU heroes, who all waited in the same place sixty-five feet from NBE Britain’s front entrance. All except for the mystery teleporter, who flashed in and out of existence all around the building.

  I could kill them all, and that would be the end of it. The thought sent a shiver through her. I could lift them up above the road and drop them. She wasn’t in love with the idea, but, since she had the option, holding onto it was intoxicating. The power rush flooded her mind with countless possibilities, but she didn’t want to choose any one of them. For as long as she held on to them, she was at the center of a torrent of potential, and it felt amazing.

  “Sarina!” Jasper’s voice called from somewhere far away. She wanted to ignore him, but he was persistent enough to interrupt her power rush and pull her mind back to the studio. As his hand pulled the cord of her earbud, the device dislodged from her ear and the music was cut off.

  Dancer’s life sense faded in an instant, shrinking her reality to fit within the four walls again. The loss of the music didn’t bother her, but the lost potential did. She might have found a way to deal with those damn heroes if the petulant wuss hadn’t snapped her out of it.

  “Stop distracting me,” she hissed at him.

  Jasper winced and staggered back as if she had hit him.

  Dancer ignored the guilt inside her. She wasn’t in the mood to deal with his puppy dog complex right now. Don’t you fucking guilt trip me, Crybaby Sarina, she snapped at her other Self. I’m saving our asses here.

  Since her perception was already there, Dancer scanned the studio. The cameramen cowered in a corner, and the three remaining guards had collapsed. A small metal orb sat on the floor between them, emitting a faint blue glow. Dancer looked up to see Tess standing near the door to the production studio. So you did something to help, after all.

  “What the fuck was that?” Ace snapped at her, clasping Sunny’s hand, pulling the boy to his feet. “Removing those two women put the guards into kamikaze mode. A little warning would’ve helped, don’t you think?” It wasn’t a question.

  “I was dealing with those heroes. Don’t yell at me. You should get out of here,” Dancer snapped back, shoving the dangling cord and earbud into her pocket. She didn’t need the player anymore.

  I AM HERE, and I’m staying until this situation is dealt with.

  Tess bent down to retrieve the electric orb. “I’ll be ready to go in a minute. I’ve got to pack up my stuff first.” Dancer watched her run back into the side room where she yanked cords from sockets and stuffed her duffel bag in a hurry.

  “You better get a move on,” Dancer said. “The heroes out there have a teleporter.”

  Ace’s eyes narrowed behind the eye holes of his mask. “Sunny, is that true?”

  The boy managed a strained nod.

  “Sarina, how did you know?” Jasper asked.

  “I can sense people in my range. There’s someone outside who changes location every few seconds.”

  Ace’s shoulders tensed, and he turned his masked face to the closed glass door which led out of the studio. More guards took up position in the corridor beyond while shouting directions at one another and relaying information through shoulder radios.

  “You still got this, Sunny boy?” Ace asked the boy, who looked weaker by the minute. “We just need to stay out of sight for a few more minutes, that’s all. We’re gonna be out of here before you know it.” His breathing ragged, Sunny leaned into Ace for support. The boy pushed up his mask, his eyes out of focus and his skin glistening with sweat. “Maybe … the EU … shot
… the Traveler … to get … his power,” he rasped.

  “Maybe,” Ace muttered. “Time’s ticking, Tess.”

  “Fifteen seconds!” Tess called from the other room.

  “Do you think that’s possible? The EU team shot the Traveler?” Jasper asked. He looked steady enough, though he avoided Dancer’s gaze. Still sulking, she assumed.

  “Whoever shot him couldn’t have known where his powers would show up,” Ace said. He was about to say something else when Sunny slumped against him. The boy quickly collected himself, but it was clear that he couldn’t maintain the team’s camouflage much longer.

  “Can you get us all down to the car?” Ace asked Dancer.

  “Only if you want to risk broken bones,” she said. “You’re better off getting out of here another way. I could keep the heroes busy for a little bit, but I’ll have to stay here to do it.”

  Jasper finally spared her a glance, shoulders slumping a bit. No one objected. Dancer couldn’t tell whether they agreed with her suggestion or if they didn’t hear it. Tess strode out of the control room with her bulging duffel bag. “Done!”

  “Okay, gang, now’s the time to move,” Ace barked. He turned to Dancer. “You say you can sense people’s life lights, huh? Which way down has the fewest of them?”

  “The corridors are full of guards,” she said, remembering what she had seen moments before. “A few of them are heading outside, maybe escorting staff members out of here. Most of the other rooms should be deserted by now.”

  “We won’t use the corridors.” Ace looked at Snow, who was sitting on the edge of the stage with her arms wrapped around her cloaked knees. “Snow. We need you to get us out of here.” He pointed to the wall on the left side of the stage, partially concealed by a folding panel, hidden from the guards who were lurking beyond the glass door.

  Snow followed his finger and straightened to stand. But before she could get to work on the wall, the studio’s intercom system crackled to life.

  “Jasper Davis and Sarina Baumann,” a male voice boomed over the loudspeakers. “Step away from the villains.”

  “What the bloody hell?” Ace muttered.

  Dancer froze. She felt Jasper’s puppy dog eyes on her, but made no move to meet his gaze.

  “You will both be offered safe passage and fair treatment if you comply,” the intruding voice boomed. “The on-site heroes are authorized to use lethal force if you fail to comply. You have one minute to make up your minds.”

  And by lethal force, you mean grenades? As far as Dancer knew, Crashbang’s explosive aura effect stunned and disabled anyone caught within its blast radius, but it wasn’t lethal. She wondered whether the authorities knew who the other Nameless were, or if the higher-ups even cared that they threatened to obliterate a thirteen-year-old boy.

  Before she could give it too much thought Ace stepped right in front of her which made it impossible to ignore him. “You know anything about this?” he demanded.

  Crybaby Sarina insisted on sending that stupid goodbye text, not me.

  “No,” Dancer lied, matching his tone. She refused to meet his glare, instead focusing on the escape route that Snow was creating in the wall. “Time to go. The teleporter could drop Crashbang on us any moment. If we get caught in his radius, then goodnight.”

  “Fine. We’ll talk about this later, though.” Ace visibly swallowed his anger. “C’mon gang, we’re outta here.” He grabbed Dancer’s arm, pulling her through the gaping hole in the wall.

  She yanked her arm away. “I’ll meet you at the car. Someone has to stall the heroes.”

  “Let’s go, Ace,” Tess said, her voice betraying her concern for the boy. “The girl’s in crazy mode again, she won’t listen. We’ve got to look after Sun.” At that point Snow had erased a man-sized section of the wall to reveal one of the empty rooms they had passed on the way to the studio. Tess put her free arm around Sunny and half walked, half dragged him to the opening in the wall.

  Ace was smart enough to realize that they didn’t have the time to argue. “We’ll wait by the car. Be careful, Wondergirl,” was all he said.

  Jasper wasn’t ready to give in. “You have to come with us,” he pleaded.

  “No, I don’t as long as you get the hell out of here,” she said. “You’re dead weight. I don’t need you here.”

  For the second time since shit had hit the fan, Jasper looked as if she had slapped him.

  You’re not going to cry, are you? Pull yourself together already.

  When it became obvious he wasn’t going to leave her, Dancer used her power to wish him into the room beyond the wall gap. Now that her view wasn’t obstructed, it was easy enough to do. She witnessed his safe landing in the other room.

  “Sunny won’t be able to hide you for long, Wondergirl. You better hurry up,” Ace called over his shoulder as he followed Snow, Tess, and Sunny through the gap.

  “Whatever,” Dancer murmured.

  “This is the last warning for Sarina Baumann and Jasper Davis to reveal themselves,” the voice boomed over the loudspeaker.

  “Sarina!” Jasper called through the gap.

  Dancer rolled her eyes as she caught sight of him rushing back to the hole, presumably to come and retrieve her. He was beginning to grate on her nerves. Close the gap, she willed the reality around her.

  With that thought the studio wall flickered and rippled, reshaping itself more or less according to her will. Soon she was staring at a newly refashioned length of wall consisting of a multitude of colors and materials. Though her creation was bumpy and uneven, there weren’t any gaps.

  Her room makeover didn’t go unnoticed by the guards. “They’re using powers again!” came a shout from the other side of the glass studio door.

  No shit, Sherlock. She set all thoughts of the guards aside. She had bigger fish to fry. As she considered whether or not she should shift her focus to ensure that Rune wasn’t circling the building again, two people who had been teleported there by whomever she sensed before appeared in the center of the studio.

  Dancer immediately recognized Crashbang’s skintight yellow costume with its red sunburst on the chest. She didn’t have a chance to look at the other new arrival, but she saw the flash of his black-and-white costume before the teleporter disappeared and Crashbang charged at her.

  5.7 Escalation

  Liverpool, England

  Tuesday, the 12th of June, 2012

  4:58 p.m.

  The instant she saw the hero charging, Dancer blinked out of the studio to relocate herself to the flat-topped roof. Having miscalculated the distance she appeared in midair beneath the overcast sky, hanging there for a brief instant before dropping three feet to the rooftop. She landed hard on the asphalt near the huge white satellite dish crowning the top of the building.

  A loud bang came from below, followed by a flash of white light through the hole Raven’s crew had left behind. The shock wave of Crashbang’s high velocity impact with the studio sent a tremor throughout the building. If Dancer hadn’t made it out in time, she would have been blinded, stunned, and possibly struck unconscious like the poor stage manager and the cameramen. She didn’t remember if anyone had evacuated the television staff.

  You’re not going to like that, Crybaby Sarina, Dancer thought. We’re the terrorists now.

  Ignoring the irritating ache that pulsed through her ankle, she recoiled from the edge of the roof to take cover behind the satellite dish. She didn’t know whether Sunny’s power still covered her, but she was aware that a sniper could take her out in an instant.

  Another powered flashbang, louder than the first, shook the building. Dancer turned her face away from the blinding light, counting the seconds until a third shock wave. Nothing. After a half minute of silence, she emerged from her cover to look through the hole into the studio below, keeping her head low so the police snipers would not consider her a target.

  “I’m on the roof,” she called down.

  No response. Sunny’s
power is still working on me, she concluded.

  Dancer lay flat on her stomach to peer through the opening. She couldn’t see the hero, but she heard him talk and move around the studio. He kept his voice so low that she could only make out a few words.

  “…not in here … maybe … getting away … perimeter…”

  Shit. The heroes are going after Jasper and the others.

  She had to distract Crashbang—and his team—long enough for the Nameless to get to the safety of the station wagon.

  Message on the floor, she commanded. The studio’s cement floor responded to her power, rippling and warping like the wall she had mended a minute before. Crooked, but readable, letters appeared on the floor in bold blue strokes.

  ON THE ROOF.

  Another flash came through the hole, followed by a thundering bang. She pulled back, her hands flying up to shield her eyes from the inferno of brightness.

  Can’t you read, dumbass?

  Once the light had receded enough for her to see the top of the roof again, Dancer shifted her focus to check on the life lights of her friends as well as the uninvited visitors. The intoxicating feel of her power engulfed her, absorbing her, and filled her up with the dazzling beauty of the life lights that beamed all around her.

  She sensed Crashbang in the studio below. He stood near the dim presences of two individuals who lay sprawled on the ground. They must be cameramen who were caught within the shock wave of his power, she assumed. Others now flooded into the room, but none of them had the distinctive glow of powers around them. She assumed they were security guards.

  The Nameless had already made it through a few rooms and were stopped short at the top of the stairway that they had used earlier. Dancer wondered why they hadn’t used the fire ladder before realizing that the boy was in no shape to climb. Why are they stopping? She suspected that it wouldn’t be long before the EU’s mystery teleporter moved Crashbang there.