Blackjack Dead or Alive (The Blackjack Series Book 3)

by Ben Bequer

  “I know you don’t mean any of that, Blackjack,” Epic said. ”You forget we have friends in common. And for my part, I don’t hold any ill will about what happened on Hashima. Come on, man. This is going to get out of hand, and you know it. I’ll send everyone out, you and I can talk this out.”

  I laughed. It was my best villain laugh, and I immediately hated it. It was something that needed work. My voice was deep and baritone and trying to be both menacing and projecting to the whole room was an acquired talent.

  “Talk…My advice is that you leave. Now. You have these lovely women to protect,” I said, relishing Princess Armada’s death stare.

  Epic’s patience was waning, but he hadn’t engaged in my game. I could feel his frustration, which was part of the original plan, frustrate Haha and make him sloppy. The same plan should have worked on these dopes, in theory. Now I was winging it, hoping my creations were equal to the task. In fact, there was a sense of release, knowing that my chances of getting out of Castle Black were slim and thinning. Armada was a killer, as was Gryphonette. Either of them got me alone, this place would be my tomb.

  “Are you going to surrender, or not?”

  “You didn’t bring all these people, plus the ones outside thinking I was going to go down easy,” I said. “Forty heroes against little old me? It’s almost embarrassing.”

  Epic laughed, “The idea is to show overwhelming for-“

  “Oh, I know what the idea is,” I said. “The problem is that this place…” I waved around my hands, gesturing to my castle, “…is full of surprises. I tell you what. Take your people and fly off, go after a real threat, a crazy like Brutal or Murderman. Hell, take on Axis of Power or Baron Blitzkrieg if you want to flex your muscles. But leave me be, Epic. I have work to do.”

  He shook his head in frustration, lost in thought for the moment.

  “Jeff said you weren’t an asshole,” Epic said. “He thought we could talk this out.”

  “He should have talked you out of coming out.”

  The hero chuckled, “You’re going to laugh, but he seems to think you and I would get along…normally…if circumstances were different, that is.”

  “That dude is suspect,” I said, bothered all over again that Superdynamic would think Epic and I could be best buddies. Epic was a fop and a prima donna, more concerned with looking good than doing the job right.

  “But it doesn’t matter,” I said, getting to the point. “You’re outclassed, Epic. You’d best take your sexy babe team after another villain. Like I said, I have work to do.”

  “What is this all about, anyway?”

  “Oh, you want to talk? Chatty chat and whatnot? The girls are doing you wonders, Epic.”

  “I’m serious.”

  “This is a trap. The most elaborate contraption you’ve ever seen in your life. Think House of Fun meets a roleplaying gamer’s worst nightmare, and you morons are ruining it.

  As I spoke, I saw Coach extend a tendril, easing it the long way around the room and trying to come around behind me.

  “You made this to catch us in a trap?”

  “Not you, Ricky,” I said, recalling his first name. “Ever heard of that song, ‘you’re so vain’? Well, I think it was about you.”

  To his credit, he wasn’t playing the game, ignoring my insults and actually thinking about it. “You’re after…” he struggled to word Haha’s name and I rewarded him with a little knowing nod.

  Coach was busy, though, moving her tendril closer and closer. I flexed my fingers, feeling the bow heavy in my hands. Bubu was way ahead of me, monitoring the whole thing, and I saw the nozzle jets drop from the roof and start releasing a fine mist. It was so high that by the time it settled on them it was almost imperceptible.

  “Now do you understand,” I said.

  He shook his head, unsure of what to do, when something drew his attention - Coach’s tendril about to get me.

  I ignored it, firing an arrow directly at Coach. The warhead popped with an electrical charge that had a chemical reaction with the falling mist. The charge ruined the arrow’s flight path, and it spun out of the sky, falling to the ground at her feet. I smiled at her, knowing she would flash her tendrils at me now at full speed, all thought of stealth forgotten.

  “Get him,” Epic said.

  Armada jumped in the air, her powerful legs were going to easily carry her to the balcony. Gryphonette transformed in an instant, the others moving to give her new girth room. In one huge flap, her wings carried her towards me. Slamma popped out of reality, a flash of light and an explosion of air rushing to fill the vacuum left behind by her body. Epic stood there, watching his team go into action and Bamma just spat her gum onto the floor, shaking her head.

  The only one of them not running headlong at me was Coach. Throwing her arms out, she said, “Look!”

  The mist was crackling, like crystals falling from Heaven, solidifying little by little, until a violent blowout, covered the room with the stuff, spreading and hardening until they were all braced by it. The crystalline mass spread fast, enveloping everyone below in an instant and those above as they neared me. Before I was caught in the effect, a floor panel beneath me gave way, and I slid through a long tunnel. An instant later, the panel closed obscuring my sight.

  “And it’s on,” I said over coms, hearing Bubu’s laughter filtering through.

  * * * *

  Things went wrong almost immediately. I slid down my rabbit hole and could feel the mechanism around me, churning and twisting the tube, changing my exit, and my fate.

  Instead of sliding into a central receiving room – with a soft mat to cushion my landing – I slammed into the hard floor of the first trap room. In theory, Epic and his people would gather themselves, run up to the top of the balcony where I had stood and find the hole, sliding down to the trap room I was now in.

  I turned back around, amazed at the realism of the place, which thanks to “borrowed” tech from Superdynamic was half holo, half real –a primordial bog straight out of the Cretaceous period. A few feet from where I stood the hard 3-D printed concrete ended and the muddy quagmire began, up to my knees in places, far deeper in others. Beyond was an overgrown marshland, replete with flora and fauna from the period – and I did my research, no 6 inch raptors. None of the denizens of this trap were friendly, especially the big bastard about 300 yards away from me, only coming online now as the floor sensors felt my arrival. The roof of this cavern was so high darkness obscured it, and only select lights, positioned to maximize the mood, would give my pursuers an idea of what they were facing. The only clue was a simple sign, posted at the edge of the mire, which read, “The only way out, is through.”

  It wasn’t a Tolkien riddle, but the only exit to the place did lay after making it through the floor and vine traps, mechanical monsters and holo-effects intended to diminish Epic’s party by a few members – either through injury or capture.

  Well, I had designed this for Haha and his people, hence the use of a marshland and so much water. I knew Blackjack 2.0 – if he still lived – was using some sort of suit, combined with undefined powers, and Haha was all metal and wires. He’d shown real apprehension about getting into the gel-like waters of that lake on Shard World, and I figured he wasn’t completely watertight.

  “Just a sec, bro,” Bubu said over my earpiece and I knew that he was already working on opening the emergency hatch near the main entrance. Through that hatch, I could climb about 500 feet to the same chamber I was supposed to fall into – a precarious climb in the dark up a ladder carved out of the rock.

  I heard a slight creak as the hatch sprung open, the computer controlled maglocks would force them to tear the door off its hinges. I didn’t move towards it though, my eyes squared on the tunnel’s exit. Without realizing it, I strung and an arrow, falling back into the rhythm of shooting, steadying my breath, relaxing my muscles.

  Slamma would be on point, she was fast and agile, her teleportation as deadly an advanta
ge as Apogee’s super speed. I had a special arrow for her, one that would neutralize her regardless of where she ported. Epic would follow, maybe she would bring him along, and for him I’d use a-

  “Bro, what’re you doing?” Bubu said.

  I shook my head, swallowing hard, the taut bowstring a faint pressure on my fingers, the shaft lined perfectly. “Hang on,” I muttered.

  “Dude, the hatch is open,” he said, and shaking my head, I noticed the flap lying open – only meters from the exit to the slide. I swallowed again, feeling a dry itchiness in the back of my throat, the pounding of the veins along the side of my face, my vision growing blurry.

  “I’m fine, Bubu.”

  “Not ‘I’m fine,’ bro. Get in the fucking hatch.”

  Bubu’s nervous tone snapped me back to reality, and I slipped the arrow back into the quiver, moving towards the hatch. I didn’t need to get steamrolled to understand that fighting six pissed off heroes was a not smart, especially when I had managed to lure them into the hornet’s nest. I’d spent a lot of time and money on this place, and though it would never serve its true purpose, it would still be put to the test.

  I was at the hatch opening, ready to crawl through when a deep, booming thud echoed through the room. Bubu was in my ear before I could ask, “Bro, the heroes outside are punching in through the roof, more of them coming in through the front door. The other guys are tearing through the floor.”

  “Well, I guess they’re pissed,” I said and Bubu laughed over coms.

  “I’m sending you the drones we got weaponized. They’re just Tasers, but they may come in handy.”

  “Doubtful,” I said about to crawl through the hatch when the room filled with bright light and the sound of displaced air. I was half right. Slamma was there, but with her sister, not Epic. I could have run, sealed the hatch behind me and taken my chances, but the time for running was done.

  There was work to do.

  I stepped away from the door and waited for them.

  I should have expected them first. They were a duo long before joining Epic’s bloated crew. Slamma would have the easiest time navigating the crystal snare, and it made sense to grab her sister. One thing I noticed was that they weren’t team players; Slamma wasn’t popping off to bring the others, which would be the end of me. No, they were going to take me down and snatch the credit.

  Taking less than a second to get accustomed to the room, I saw Slamma touch her sister’s shoulder, teleporting behind me in a show of light and sound. I rolled forward, anticipating a teleport behind me, but as I came out of the tumble, I realized my mistake. Bamma came out of the teleport ahead of me, her opening punch caught me flush in the chest, turning the air in my lungs to fire as I flew across the room into a storage shed. I pulped the aluminum structure and my flight ended with a couple of skips before I connected with the far wall, embedded in the rough stone.

  I spilled onto the ground, intent on springing up, the arrow I needed ready to fire, but Slamma appeared next to me in a flash of light and a pop of displaced air that was akin to a fighter jet breaking the sound barrier. I had the arrow strung, but before I could fire, she touched my shoulder and with a cocky smile, teleported us.

  Into Bamma’s waiting punch, a jackhammer shot straight to the stomach. I doubled over, the previous night’s meal churning as I belched up thin wisps of saliva. The effect of teleportation were as nauseating as the punch, my senses struggling to adjust the jarring displacement. I was ready for the tactic, I knew Slamma’s power set, but the experience was more traumatic than I imagined. The floor wobbled as my eyes rolled in their sockets, and I couldn’t get my balance.

  Bamma didn’t relent, picking me up by the harness and throwing me like a cannonball back into the storage area. I crossed my arms over my chest, preparing to roll with the impact when the world flashed again. Instead of heading away from Bamma, I was racing toward her. Slamma had ported me to the other side of the room, my momentum carrying into another devastating shot. I fought the urge to vomit from the teleportation and clenched as she teed off on me, throwing everything she had into a double fisted tomahawk chop.

  I broke through the floor into the room below, which was cast in darkness. The sensors picked up my sudden arrival and the klieg lights slowly came on one at a time with a loud pop. I dug myself out of the grassy berm and looked up, spotting Bamma and Slamma looking through the open crevasse in the rock almost two hundred feet above me. They appeared in front of me, my already frazzled senses going haywire as they fought to keep up with the constant changes in perspective. It was like hanging upside down and backwards from the world’s most intense rollercoaster.

  “You’re pretty tough,” she said and threw a right cross that almost decapitated me. I felt the muscles in my neck creak with the strain, and tried to retaliate, but Slamma reached out and we were on the other side of the room. Instead of landing on solid ground, she teleported us about fifteen feet in the air, then let go of me. I crashed amid a regiment of Napoleonic-era French troops that were still dormant.

  “Oh, cool,” Slamma said teleporting next to me, her eyes on the rows and rows of man-sized toy soldiers. “Animatronics, huh?”

  I didn’t get to respond as she sent us back to her sister, who was ready with a nasty jab that rocked my head’ sending me staggering. It was a sharp pop right to the mouth and I felt my teeth almost give, my lip split and a splash of warm blood trickle down my chin. She was skilled, following up with an uppercut that spun me into a backward somersault. Mid-tumble, I saw her leap backwards, powerful legs carrying her away from my uncontrolled momentum.

  A second later, I felt that gust of air and Slamma had collected me, and we were teleporting again in what must have been their signature tactic. What air remained in my lungs was ripped free as Bamma’s boot squelched my guts against my spine. The abrupt force put an end to my rotation, but sent me straight up, the ascent eerily similar to the effect of lifting off in flight.

  I had a second to wonder what would happen if I activated the rocket boots before the ceiling put a halt to anything resembling conscious thought. I felt every muscle in my back spasm at once as the solid rock ceiling shuddered with the impact, dust and pebbles knocked free racing me to the ground. The floor waited to greet me, and I was too groggy to do anything but use my arms to absorb the brunt as I walloped into the grassy plain of Waterloo.

  Maybe Apogee was right, choosing a losing battle for the villain, in this case Napoleon, might have been an error.

  I was only to my knees when I heard the thump sound of Slamma’s teleportation. A second later, she was on me, grabbing my arm and spinning me over her shoulder with a Judo maneuver I didn’t fully understand. Mid-whirl, she ported away – up into the sky – finishing her spin and sending me flying down at her sister.

  Bamma was coiled like a viper, right arm reared back, face clenched in anticipation, digging deep for the power to hurl at me in a haymaker that sent me soaring over the battlefield to the far side of the mile-long room. I slammed into one of the side mosaics, designed to give the impression of a vaster battlefield, colliding with a drawing of Hougomont, and crashing into the grassy floor below with half the wall falling atop me.

  Four disparate versions of the world merged back into the one that found me stumbling to my feet, tiles and dust falling to the floor to join the rest of the rubble. No Slamma. Without questioning the momentary respite, I ran, my gait an uneven shamble. Every foot fall was painful, but I needed some distance. Finding a small shadowed alcove, I activated my camouflage and hoped it was effective. The contacts read full power to the suit’s systems; the power systems were wired into the belt and also fed off the reactors in the Asskickers. If it worked, the camouflage would hide me, as long as I stood still. Within the shadows, I should be near impossible to see. This was going on the theory that neither of them had a sensory power, could read minds, or had gear similar to mine. A lot of ifs, but better than getting pasted.

  Still no S
lamma, something had changed.

  I switched the contacts to infrared and scanned the area. I found them across the length of the room, a pair of red points nearly a mile away, and zoomed in. They stood huddled together Slamma’s arm on Bamma who was hunched over. My bow was long gone, but this might still be my only chance to turn the tables, Slamma first, then her Mack truck of a sister. Engaging the rocket boots, I made my way to them.

  Bamma was doubled over, cradling her right arm; her sister was leaning over her, concerned.

  “I’m not through with you,” I said, surprised by how full of rage my voice sounded.

  Slamma turned back to me as I walked up on them, suddenly frightened, and I saw what was wrong. Bamma’s forearm bone, the radius, had shattered, and a slivered shard jutted out of her arm in a nasty compound fracture. A trail of blood stained her leather racer suit, staining the white stripes, and her arm quivered as she fought back the obvious pain.

  She had broken her arm on my face.

  I laughed.

  Bamma clenched her teeth, and swung her left arm at me in a back fist, saying, “I still have one good arm.”

  I was fast enough to put both my arms up, but I caught the blow flush. She threw all her fury into the shot, sending me tumbling through the earth, churning up the grass and dirt as I came to a rest.

  Two sisters talked a moment as I stood, and then I saw Slamma port again. I expected her to appear next to me, but instead she appeared and disappeared all around me, faster than I could register – or even react to. With every teleportation, the air around her exploded, sending a shockwave in my direction and the aggregate of dozens – maybe hundreds were similar to being teleported, only worse. The light had a strobe effect, adding to the disorientation to create a stomach churning violence. I dropped to my knees, the contents of my stomach escaping.

  The worst part was I couldn’t breathe, and it wasn’t affecting her at all. Slamma poured it on, porting even faster, and soon all I could see was a blinding flash before my eyes. She wasn’t just vacating the area of oxygen, choking me to death, the vacuum somehow emptying my lungs as well, and now it felt as if they were being forced out of my body, as if the negative pressure was turning me inside out.