Halfheroes

by Ian W. Sainsbury

  Then he glanced at the laptop and forgot Saffi was even there.

  "Holy shitbuckets."

  The President of the United States was sitting at the Oval Office desk, TV makeup taking some of the usual shine off his face, hair sprayed in place. Nothing unusual about that. What was unusual was the entourage. Besides the usual aides and advisers, three huge figures, ducking to get into the room, were taking their positions, one on each side of the President, the third a few paces behind. All three wore airforce-style helmets and flying suits, the American flag displayed on their breast pockets.

  "My fellow Americans," was the familiar opening statement. A few minutes of waffle about national security, the threat of terrorism, the misguided leadership of many other countries, and the inspired greatness of his own talents in that regard. Daniel couldn't take his eyes off the immobile figures who had accompanied him into the Oval Office. The dark goggles covered much of their features.

  The President got to the point.

  "Many of you will have heard the news about the death of the traitor Titus Gorman. He tried to crush our dreams, and the dreams of all who believe hard work deserve to be rewarded. His attack on the economic system of the free world has failed, as all who care about freedom knew it would."

  Saffi had told him about Gorman's Utopia Algorithm, which economists were predicting would take a generation to overturn. Daniel still didn't know if he hated or loved the idea.

  The President stood up, rounded the desk and gestured to someone out of shot.

  "The citizens of America owe this man a debt too great to repay. Despite his age, and failing health, the man I am about to introduce—one of our greatest scientists, a truly great, great scientist—not only defied Gorman, he undid the great damage he was doing and turned his evil work against him. In a desperate battle, he defeated the most heinous criminal our nation has ever known and destroyed the creatures called titans. He killed all of them. A great guy. A great, great guy. And he has brought the technology used to create those monsters to us so that our nation can use it to protect our high, and great, ideals. My fellow Americans, this man did what few others could have done. I could have done it, for sure, but the fact is that he did a great, great thing. Roger, step up here. Roger Sullivan."

  Daniel stared at the screen.

  "Roger Sullivan? Roger Sullivan?"

  Repeating the name didn't make it any more believable, but when an old man with a silver cane shuffled across the rug to shake the President's hand, Daniel accepted it. It made sense. Who else would know what had happened at Station? Almost all of them were dead. A shame this octogenarian sex pest wasn't one of them.

  On screen, the President was pinning something to Sullivan's jacket.

  The caption read: Scientist Roger Sullivan receives the Presidential Medal Of Freedom With Distinction.

  The two figures flanking the desk took their helmets off and, for a moment, Daniel thought he would puke. They were younger, more handsome versions of the president himself. Of course they were.

  Then the final helmeted figure moved to stand next to Sullivan, put his hands up to the helmet and waited. The President glanced around for a few seconds, then found the autocue again.

  "Our country is about to enter a new, unprecedented era of peace and prosperity. The man standing next to Roger Sullivan has returned from nearly forty years of wandering the globe to help make this happen. And he has chosen the United States Of America as his new home. My fellow citizens, may I introduce the leader of a new generation of superpowered peacekeepers."

  Even before the helmet came off, Daniel knew.

  "The Deterrent."

  He looked exactly like he did in the photos and the films from the eighties. Roger had used his own blood to bring back Abos.

  Daniel actually did puke then, everywhere.

  40

  Ten days later

  They held a memorial service for their fallen brothers and sisters. They drove until the lights of the city had faded, taking the highway east, then turning southeast into the mountains that lay between Albuquerque and White Sands.

  The night was full of stars. They drove in silence, Sara at the wheel of the rental pickup, Daniel beside her, TripleDee sprawled across the back seat. Saffi had been called back home. Her friend Nayla was in intensive care after a seizure. Saffi had promised to come back as soon as Nayla was out of danger.

  When they had stopped climbing, and the narrow road was snaking its way through the mountains, eight thousand feet above sea level, Sara touched Daniel's arm, and he woke up. He was still weak and drifted to sleep a few times a day. His body was healing rapidly, and his strength was returning. His right arm was in a sling, and, although he could walk again, it was with a slow, stiff-legged gait that, he knew, had all the elegance of a deformed duck.

  "How about here?" said Sara, bringing the pickup to a halt on the shoulder and pointing up at a small plateau. The silver light of the moon lent the scene an almost mystical grandeur.

  "Perfect," said Daniel. Then, after a few seconds, "Triple?"

  "Yeah. It's good."

  There were no graves to dig, no bodies to bury. Gorman's headquarters was now a military zone. Local television had been showing little else. As no statement had been released about what had been found there, reporters were either describing the vehicles going in and out of the facility or speculating about what was inside. At no stage was any mention made of any bodies. Daniel, Sara, and TripleDee had to accept that they would likely never find out what had happened to the corpses of the halfheroes.

  Sara stopped walking. TripleDee and Daniel joined her on the plateau. The Geordie drug dealer had slowed his pace to allow Daniel to keep up. Daniel didn't thank him.

  Sara spoke.

  "We don't know the names of many of those who died. We know little about them, their backgrounds, their childhoods, what use they made of their powers. But we all connected back there in Gorman's prison. During that time, we knew each other, I believe, in a deeper way than any human being has ever experienced."

  Sara reached into her bag and brought out a miniature spade—the kind a child might take to a beach—and a small book. She held the book up so they could see it. It was a concise American English dictionary.

  "This is all I have left of Gabe. He gave me this so I could learn to speak English the way he thought it should be spoken."

  Daniel half-laughed, half-cried. Sara continued.

  "I worked with him for nearly a year before Daniel joined us. We both felt Daniel completed the team, although he would never have admitted it."

  Daniel nodded, not speaking.

  "I'm sorry, Gabe," she said, looking at the dictionary. "I don't think I'll ever speak the language properly."

  They buried the dictionary there in the mountains under the star-speckled sky. There were no more words. They stood in silence for a few minutes, the children of The Deterrent. Long after they were gone, the mountains would remain, and on certain nights, the moonlight would once again paint the same scene silver and blue. Life, in its infinite forms, continued.

  They drove back to the hotel without exchanging another word. There was a sense of release, the human need to mark important events satisfied. Whether the improvised ritual had done anything other than try to make sense of the senseless, they neither knew nor cared. It had worked. They could move on.

  Daniel, Sara and TripleDee watched the President's next press conference in the hotel bar. They were only a block away from some drinking spots with live music and other, less salubrious forms of entertainment, so they had the place to themselves.

  TripleDee put three bottles on the table and sat down.

  "Gnat's piss, but at least it's cold gnat's piss."

  Daniel took a mouthful, barely tasting it. He had been in the bar all afternoon.

  He had been thinking about Cressida Lofthouse. How she'd been the key to unlocking Abos's mind back in nineteen-eighty-one. Despite being brainwashed, Abos had never f
orgotten her, visiting her twice. Her influence had been so strong, she had reached through the haze of drugs and connect with the being she knew. Was it love that drew The Deterrent to return to her? Was it love that prompted her to tell him the truth? Did it even matter? Would Daniel be able to reach Abos in the same way, given the opportunity? If Cress could do it, there was a chance. Abos was Daniel's parent, and the bond between them had deepened and strengthened during the year and a half they had spent together.

  Abos needed to remember who she was. Who he was. Whatever.

  And only Daniel could make that happen.

  Over the past week, America had reversed its recent fortunes in dramatic style. Its seat at the head of the top table in world governance had looked untenable for a while after the Utopia Algorithm took effect. The US banking system had been affected more than most, with the super-rich hit the hardest. Economists had predicted a devastating re-assessment of America's economic might, barring a miracle. The miracle had occurred, but the world was still smarting from the social, and economic, fallout. The rich may have made the most noise about their losses, but the poor had enjoyed a brief respite from worrying about how the rent might be paid, or the children fed, and they weren't quite ready to go back to how things were. Titus would have his legacy, although it was too early to say what it might be.

  The immediate legacy was plain enough: America had The Deterrent and, now that Shuck and Susan had joined the existing group, an unstoppable team of ten titans under the President's command. North Korea and Iran had found their nuclear capabilities forcibly curtailed, their military resources crippled as the superbeings buried bases under thousands of tons of rubble.

  China and Russia were left alone, the American President speaking warmly of the friendship between them. Both countries explored new ways of cementing their relationship with the United States. The balance of power had shifted and, while every other world leader was looking over their shoulder for titans, it looked unlikely to shift back.

  Daniel drank his beer and wondered how he would get to Abos. He was no closer to a solution than he had been when he first saw the face of The Deterrent on Sara's laptop, back in his hospital room.

  The press conference was beginning. The world would be watching.

  Daniel muted the sound and put the subtitles on. He couldn't bear to hear the voice of the man who, when presented with the knowledge that a new, intelligent species, had been discovered, chose to bury that information and continue brainwashing Abos and his kin. He could hardly bring himself to look at the screen, but he knew he must.

  After the usual introductory remarks, the President of the United States announced it was time America celebrated the beginning of its new golden age. There was a montage of footage showing the titans—all of whom, apart from The Deterrent—were still younger, taller versions of the President himself. They performed various acts of heroism, demonstrating their powers. There was no need to threaten unfriendly nations when a few minutes of film said everything necessary.

  When the montage ended, the President spoke to camera. Daniel turned up the sound.

  "Next month, our nation celebrates Thanksgiving. This year, there is more than ever to be thankful for. Instead of our usual parade in New York City, we will hold a bigger, better, parade the day after Thanksgiving. It'll be the best parade ever, a great, great parade. We will officially welcome The Deterrent and the titans, now American citizens, to our great country. Let us celebrate our many blessings. Let us look to the future with a new sense of hope and confidence. And, my fellow Americans, let's party."

  The press conference over, Daniel muted the television.

  "I have to get close to Abos," he said. I can reach him if we're face to face. We have to try. I'm not going home without her. Him."

  "I know," said Sara. "I've been thinking about nothing else. I've looked at every piece of information about the titans I could uncover, I watched every news story over and over. The titans are kept in a secret location, and when I say secret, I mean I can't find a single clue."

  On screen, the news anchor was speaking over a graphic showing the planned route of the parade through New York.

  TripleDee drained his beer. "So Daniel needs to have a chat with the hardest to get to being on the planet, right? How do we make that happen? There must be a way? Sara?"

  "If there is, I haven't thought of it. I have no idea."

  They sat glumly, the empty bottles on the table between them. Then a voice spoke from the doorway, and they all turned.

  "I have an idea."

  41

  Saffi looked older. Tired. Worse than that; exhausted, wrung out. Daniel stood up. He put a hand up to the eye patch he had worn for the past few days. Despite his impressive healing, the hole where his eye used to be was doing nothing for his looks. He wondered how she would react. He was already half-convinced that the relationship he had imagined developing between them was just that: imagined.

  She watched him limp across the room. He stopped a few feet away, and she looked at his face, taking in the black patch.

  "Arrrr," she said. "Jim lad."

  They smiled at each other, he tentatively, Saffi sadly. Then she dropped her bag and stumbled towards him.

  He held her. She put her head on his chest and wrapped her arms as far as she could around his bulk. She didn't speak, and, after a short time, he realised she was crying. He stroked her hair

  "How's Nayla?"

  She pulled away then but didn't wipe her eyes. Her usually immaculate hair looked half-combed, her mascara was running, and she looked ten years older. Daniel thought he'd never seen anything so beautiful.

  "She's dead."

  They turned the television off and TripleDee brought another round of drinks over. The usual expressions of condolence were offered and accepted. They had all experienced so much death Daniel was surprised to find their sensitivity to it had not been dulled. Perhaps the human capacity to mourn was as limitless as the human capacity to love. Not, Daniel mused, that he had experienced much of the latter. There was no self-pity in this admission.

  They gave Saffi time to gather her thoughts.

  "IGLU is finished," she said. "I was expecting it, but... well. We're on our own."

  No one was surprised. How could IGLU function, with the halfhero population decimated, and Nayla gone?

  "I was nearly too late," said Saffi. She was looking at the table. "For Nayla, I mean. I went straight there from the airport and she died half an hour later. She was waiting..."

  Her voice trailed off, and she sipped her bitter lemon, still looking down. No one spoke.

  "She was waiting for me. Waiting to die. She was in such pain, but she hung on, she fought against it until she could see me. And when she did, when I held her hand and said her name, she didn't talk about her life. No regrets, no bitterness about her illness. She had nothing negative to say. She spoke about her final vision. When she had finished, she said she loved me. I listened to her breathing slow down. Then it stopped."

  The hotel bar was silent. Even the bartender had picked up on the atmosphere and taken ten minutes.

  "When I walked out of the hospital, I saw them - her parents. I was getting into a taxi. They didn't see me. I wanted to go to them. I wanted to grieve with them. Since my parents died, they've always been so good to me. But I got into the taxi to the airport because that's what Nayla had said to do. She described this scene - here in this bar. It was the first part of her vision."

  She stopped again. He looked at the others, each acknowledging, in their own way, the death of another halfhero.

  Saffi finished her drink and looked up.

  "Nayla knew who Abos was. I don't know how long she'd known, and I didn't have the chance to ask. She told me she had seen Daniel and Abos. She said the vision was hazy, unclear. It means it might not happen the way she saw it. It's possible, it's one outcome, but there are no guarantees. Everything has to fall into place for it to occur, but she couldn't tell me
how. There was one clear image, and she said everything depended on it. I will describe it as she described it. I hope it means something to you because it doesn't to me."

  She took a few deep breaths. Daniel reached out for her hand, and she gripped his fingers. She closed her eyes, remembering.

  "She is looking at Daniel. Daniel standing on top of a glass building in a city. High up. It's night time. Daniel isn't moving. It's as if she's looking at a photograph rather than a real scene. But she feels a definite sense of scale, and if it is a photograph, then it's an enormous photograph, because she has to look up to see the top. After the image fades, she sees Abos, The Deterrent, from Daniel's point of view. Daniel is holding out his hand, Abos is about to take it. That's it."

  The silence that followed this description was partly due to no one quite believing the vision was so short. And rather less helpful than they'd hoped for.

  "Um." TripleDee was the first to speak. "Is that it, like?"

  A little more blunt than Sara or Daniel might have been.

  "There was one other thing, but it makes no sense," said Saffi.

  "And the rest did?"

  "Shut up, Trip," said Sara.

  "Sorry."

  Saffi shook her head. "She hummed a tune. Well, part of a tune."

  "Part of a tune?" TripleDee's eyes were wide. Sara shot him a warning glance.

  "Go ahead, Saffi."

  Saffi hummed four notes. They stared at her. She repeated them. Three descending notes, then one higher. A regular rhythm. She did it a third time.