The New Heroes: Crossfire

by Michael Carroll

  Kenya understood the rules, and she believed in them. If she wanted to visit friends outside the community, all she had to do was ask her parents. They would put in a request with the local security office, who would look up Kenya’s friends on their extensive computer database. It was an efficient system; if all went well, Kenya could expect a reply within a day. Two days at most.

  So even though she knew she was breaking the rules and that could earn her family several demerits, she tended to just climb the fence, retrieve the old bike she’d hidden under a footbridge and cycle into Fianarantsoa to see Alarice and Mialy.

  She’d been doing this every couple of weeks for months, and last time was the closest she’d come to being caught: Before she reached the front door she’d silently removed her jacket and boots and hidden them under the big bush on the front lawn. Then she’d opened the door as quietly as possible—it wasn’t locked—closed it behind her and tousled her hair before entering the TV room.

  “I can’t sleep,” she’d said to her father, who’d been hunched over the puzzle table painstakingly working on his three-foot-square, four thousand piece jigsaw puzzle.

  Without looking up from her book, Kenya’s mother said, “Have a cup of warm water. Not too hot.”

  Her father added, “And not a full cup, either. Otherwise you’ll be peeing all night.”

  But tonight, even before she reached the house, she knew that wasn’t going to work. Something was different. Something was wrong.

  She pushed open the door and her mother shouted, “Kenya? Get in here! Now!”

  Oh wonderful. How am I going to get out of this one?

  The door to the TV room swung open before she touched the handle, and her brother Eugene was beckoning her inside.

  “I was just out for a walk. I had a nightmare and I…” Kenya stopped, and looked around the room. Her parents were staring at the TV, which showed the Trutopian flag silently fluttering behind the words “Stand By.”

  “What’s happening?”

  “Where were you?” Her mother asked. “You know you’re not allowed out on your own after nine!”

  “Never mind that. Sit down, Kenya,” her father said, eyes still on the TV set. “It’s bad. Reginald Kinsella is dead. Murdered.”

  Kenya felt as though she’d been punched in the stomach. “No…”

  Reg Kinsella was the leader of the entire Trutopian organization. A tall white man; bearded, slightly overweight, not exactly handsome… But there was something about him that Kenya had always liked. Sure, he was a politician, but he’d seemed honest, and passionate about his beliefs. When he’d taken control of the organization there had been only a handful of communities throughout the world, but now there were thousands.

  Kenya dropped into her armchair and accepted the mug of coffee from Eugene without even noticing. “What happened?”

  “His plane was shot down,” her father said. “Yesterday. Somewhere over Poland.” He turned to face Kenya, and the knot in her stomach tightened when she saw the fear in his eyes. “We… We don’t live in Madagascar any more.”

  Kenya wrapped her hands around the hot mug and peered at her father through the steam. “What?”

  Eugene said, “We’ve seceded. Broken away. From now on, the Trutopian communities are one nation.” He shrugged. “I don’t know how they’re going to enforce that, but… The borders are closed. No one in or out. The whole world’s going crazy—there’s been attacks on Trutopian communities everywhere.” He lowered his voice. “You were lucky to get back in, sis.”

  At that, their mother’s head whipped around toward Kenya. “What? Where were you?”

  “Nowhere! I was just—”

  The image on the TV flickered. Now it was showing an empty podium that displayed the Trutopians’ logo. A dark-haired, pale-skinned teenaged girl emerged through a flood of camera-flashes to walk up to the podium.

  “Who’s she?” Kenya asked.

  “Shhh!”

  On screen, the girl stood before the podium and was silent for a moment while she adjusted the microphones. Then the camera zoomed closer, and she began to speak. “The governments of the United States of America, Brazil, Germany, Australia and Poland have all declared their intentions to invade Trutopian territory. We will not allow this to happen. I have a message to all the Trutopians listening. You all understand that what we’re building here is a utopia, a perfect world. But it’s not logical to build a perfect world on imperfect foundations. The old world has to be destroyed before the new one can begin.”

  Kenya felt the flesh raise on her arms, the hairs on the back of her neck stiffened. “Oh no…”

  Eugene dropped down next to her, put his arm around her shoulders. “It’ll be all right.”

  The girl on screen said, “It’s clear that the rest of the human race is not interested in living in peace. We’ve tried to make them understand, given them every opportunity to join us. They have refused. They have attacked us, time and again. No more. Now it’s time to stop talking about peace, and start making it happen. Some people say that fighting for peace doesn’t make a lot of sense… They’re wrong. It makes perfect sense.”

  The girl stared into the camera, and Kenya—somehow—knew that the girl was speaking directly to her. “You will fight and kill anyone who is not a Trutopian. You will keep fighting until we are triumphant.”

  Three weeks later…

  Kenya screamed, kicked and punched as the six burly soldiers threw themselves at her, forcing her to the ground. One of them managed to wrestle the now-empty pistol from her grip, but still she didn’t stop. Another soldier, a woman—lying face-down across Kenya’s stomach while her colleagues struggled to hold onto the girl’s arms and legs—yelled out, “We need some help here!”

  Others came running, some breaking away from their task of corralling Kenya’s friends and neighbors.

  Kenya jerked her left arm free and slammed her elbow into the side of the woman lying across her.

  She grunted in pain, but held on. “You stupid little fool—we’re trying to help you!” Another blow to the kidneys, and the woman screamed. “She’s only a kid! How can she be this strong? Someone—get the tranquilizer gun!”

  “I’ll kill you!” Kenya screamed. “I’ll kill you all!”

  Kenya felt something sharp stab into her left calf, and the world began to swim. The pressure on her limbs and body seemed to ease, but she could barely move. Her eyes flickered closed, the noise around her suddenly seemed muffled and distant.

  She knew she was blacking out, and tried to fight it.

  A faraway voice said, “What’s wrong with her skin? All those scars… How could anyone take so much damage and still be moving?”

  The woman’s voice: “No wonder she gave us so much trouble. We should have known. Get on to the base. Tell them we need help ASAP—we’ve got a superhuman prisoner. Tell them to contact Sakkara.”

  Chapter 1

  Danny Cooper shielded his eyes against the early-morning sun as he looked up at the cracked, bullet-riddled statues mounted on the top of the Brandenburg Gate.

  “Oh man… Look at that. Herlind said it’s been here over two hundred years. Two world wars and it’s still standing.”

  “Three world wars,” a soft voice said from behind him. “If the Trutopian war doesn’t count as a world-war, I don’t know what does.”

  Danny turned to see Mina Duval sitting cross-legged on the ground in the middle of the plaza, absently picking at a small scab on the back of her hand as she stared up at the gate. “Taking another break?”

  Mina smiled back. “I’m conserving my energy, centering my focus. Or focusing my center. One of those.”

  “Don’t take too long about it.” He turned around slowly, surveying the damage, and the extensive repair work that had begun the day after the war ended and was still a long way from completion.

  On the northern side of the street, a builder carrying a scaffolding pole on his shoulder turned to answer a
shout from one of his friends. The rear end of the rusty pole swung around, on a direct path for the back of the supervisor’s head.

  Danny slipped into slow-time and walked over to them. He recognized the pole-carrying man as Wolfgang. He was tall, slim, permanently cheerful, and—Danny had quickly concluded—not the brightest. On their first meeting Wolfgang had extended his right hand to shake Danny’s, then quickly pulled his arm back when he realized Danny didn’t have a right arm of his own. Wolfgang had blurted an apology in German and then in English, and, when Danny told him that it wasn’t a big deal, no harm done, the cheerful young man said, “So we’re cool? Friends forgive friends, right? All is well.” Then he’d extended his right hand again, and blinked happily and patiently at Danny while he waited for his hand to be shook.

  Now, Danny walked slowly around Wolfgang. The man had his hi-viz jacket on inside-out, one of his bootlaces was untied, and when Danny passed behind him and ducked under the pole, he saw that Wolfgang’s jeans were way too big for him: they had slipped down around his waist revealing to the world that he had tucked his t-shirt into the back of his underwear.

  Danny slipped back into real-time and put out his hand to stop the pole from colliding with the supervisor’s head. It thumped against Danny’s palm, and Wolfgang turned his head around to see what the obstruction was.

  “Hey-hey, Daniel Cooper.”

  “Hey-hey yourself, Wolfgang.” Danny nodded his head back toward the woman as he led Wolfgang away from her. “You almost decapitated your boss.”

  The German man cringed for a moment. “Ooh. Danke. That would have been bad.” He nodded and continued on his way across the street.

  The crew’s supervisor, Herlind, said, “Ah, Mister Cooper.” She consulted her ever-present clip-board. “We are making fine progress.”

  “There’s still a long way to go,” Danny said. “I thought London was bad, but the Trutopians really did a number on this place.”

  “This is not the first time the German people have had to rebuild their cities.” She shrugged. “But the Trutopians can’t be blamed. They were under the control of that superhuman girl. They…” Herlind hesitated. “No. I should be honest, with you if no one else. We. Not they. We.”

  “You were a Trutopian?”

  Herlind looked around, and, her voice low, said, “I can remember everything. Some people say they were in a trance, and have few memories of the war. Perhaps for some, that is true. Not for me. I wanted to kill everyone who was not a Trutopian. It was… a need so desperate that it consumed me. I was filled with fury and a madness that made sense at the time.” Without looking at Danny, the woman added, “I was lucky. I didn’t kill anyone. But I wanted to, and I tried. Then the message came that we should stop fighting. If it had come a few minutes later, I would have had the blood of many people on my hands.”

  Danny didn’t know what to say to that.

  “So now we work to repair the damage we caused. We can do no less.” Herlind smiled, and tapped him on the shoulder with the edge of the clipboard. “You and your friends saved the world, Daniel. You should not have to also clean up the mess afterward. But we are grateful. Your friend Mina is very useful.”

  They looked over to where Mina was still sitting on the ground, and Herlind added, “Much of the time. Now, go. Back to work. You understand of course that what I have told you is private?”

  Danny nodded. “Sure. We’ve all done things we’re not proud of.” He gave the supervisor a nod as she turned away.

  He slipped into fast-time and returned to Mina.

  “Got it!” she said as he approached. Mina had successfully removed the scab from her hand and was now holding it up on the tip of her index finger. “That hurt a bit, though.”

  “If it hurts, don’t do it.”

  “Wise words. Saw you saving the dipstick from getting into trouble again. That’s you all over, Danny.” Mina rolled back heels-over-head and landed on her feet. “That’s what Renata says about you. You can’t not help people.”

  “So you and my girlfriend talk about me behind my back?”

  “Yep. Well, we’d be stupid to do it in front of your face. She said that Colin said that you were like this back home, too. Always taking responsibility.”

  “Yeah, but what’s wrong with that? If you can help someone and it won’t cost you anything, but you choose not to, well, then you’re just a jerk.”

  Mina spread her arms and turned around slowly on the spot. “Um, hello? I am helping people?”

  “I don’t mean you specifically.” Danny looked at the civilians helping to clear the rubble and drag the burnt-out cars off the street. “Lot of them still blame us for all this.”

  “They blame you,” Mina said. She shrugged. “Sorry, Danny, but you’re just going to have to live with that. You can’t change most people’s minds. All you can do is, like, tell them the facts and hope they figure out the truth for themselves.”

  The radio clipped to Danny’s ear beeped, and Warren Wagner’s voice said, “Dan? You’re needed. Gunfire. Kulturforum.”

  Danny hit the button on the radio’s microphone. “Got it.” To Mina, he said, “Now Warren needs help. Where’s the Kulturforum?”

  Without looking, the girl pointed to the left. “Potsdamer Platz. Southwest. About a kilometer.” She jumped to her feet. “Go. I’ll carry on here.”

  Danny nodded, and started to run. Some of the other members of the New Heroes didn’t care for Mina, but Danny liked that she wasn’t afraid to say whatever was on her mind.

  Mina was fifteen, a little younger than Danny, and her ability to always be able to tell when someone was lying meant that a lot of the adults at the New Heroes’ base kept their distance from her. It didn’t help that Mina and her sister Yvonne were clones of a man called Casey Duval, who—using the name Ragnarök—had been one of the world’s most dangerous superhumans.

  Danny raced through the rubble-strewn streets so fast that the people working to clear them seemed as immobile as the statues on top of the Brandenburg Gate.

  To his own perspective, he was moving at normal speed—barely a quick jog—but that wasn’t how his powers worked. Speed is simply distance over time: Danny knew he wasn’t actually running at hyper-speed, he was altering time around him.

  In real-time, from anyone else’s point-of-view, he covered the distance from the Brandenburg Gate to the Kulturforum in less than a second.

  He spotted Mister Wagner crouching behind the mud-clogged tracks of a yellow bulldozer with three other adults—all businessmen wearing crisp dark suits that were now dusty at the knees and elbows—on the main plaza.

  Danny shifted into normal time as he crouched down next to them, and three businessmen jumped back, startled, but Warren Wagner simply glanced at him and nodded. He pointed to a three-story brick building. “Near as we can tell they’re holed up there. The, uh, the Kupfer…”

  One of the German men said, “Dem Kupferstichkabinett. The museum of printing.”

  “Right,” Warren said. “Internal security is still down. We don’t know how many, or what they’re carrying. You can handle this?”

  Danny nodded. “What do you want done with them?”

  Another businessmen—short, with a heavy build and obviously dyed hair—said, “No, you cannot send this boy! He is…” The man looked sheepishly at Warren. “He lacks the… He is not the one to… We need the other boy. The one called Power.”

  “That’s my son,” Warren said. “He’s back in the States. I promise you, Danny can take care of this.”

  The man didn’t seem convinced.

  Danny sighed, then patted the stump of his right arm—missing from just below the shoulder—with his left hand. “This bothering you? You don’t think I can do it because I’ve only got one arm?”

  The short man looked offended. “Certainly not! I’m saying that you should not be the one to take on these bandits! You are only a boy. You can’t even grow a proper beard yet!”

&nb
sp; Warren said, “Yeah, you might want to shave that off tonight at the hotel.”

  And that’s another couple of days, Danny said to himself. He was so tired of people telling him to shave that he had secretly vowed to only shave when he managed to get through two whole days without anyone bringing it up.

  The German man continued. “You don’t have the necessary training. This situation requires an experienced negotiator!”

  “Yeah? Well, Colin’s younger than me, and he doesn’t have that much more experience than I do.”

  “But they are armed and your friend is bullet-proof, yes?”

  One of the man’s colleagues flinched at that. “Please, don’t let there be gunfire!”

  “Yes, the museum contains many, many priceless—”

  Danny shifted into fast-time, and strode towards the building.

  They just don’t understand, he told himself. But he didn’t blame them for that. Even some of his fellow superhumans couldn’t fully grasp the extent of his powers.

  When Danny was moving in fast-time, everything else was stopped, or moving incredibly slowly. He could pluck a bullet out of the air. He could switch off his bedroom light and read an entire comic-book before the room grew dark. Once, in Havana, he watched a flock of hummingbirds drifting with glacier-like speed through a field of flowers, each one seemingly frozen in the air as though they were intricate, delicate statues that were somehow exempt from the laws of gravity.

  The main door to the print museum was open just enough for him to squeeze through, and for that he was thankful. At the speed he was moving, if he had to push open a door the impact might shatter the glass, warp the metal and possibly ignite the wood. Not that he would even notice—he’d be long gone before the effects became apparent.

  Danny explored the museum at what was for him a sedate pace. He looked at the paintings and watercolors fixed to the walls, and attempted to read some of the plaques next to them. But the plaques were mostly in German, and his own grasp of the language was barely enough to enable him to buy a soda from a store.