by Ben Bequer
“This is crazy, Apogee,” I said, ignoring the trooper. “I can’t be here.”
“One second,” she snapped at the cop, and then back at me. “I can’t go without you, ok? I can’t.”
“Ok, both of you are gonna spend the night in jail,” trooper Donovan said, pulling out his handcuffs.
“Please,” Apogee repeated, and again I found myself helpless against her. And here I thought she was the one under some sort of mind control.
As I got out of the car, she turned to the trooper and said, “Officer Donovan I am Apogee. The super heroine. This is my associate. We’re here to help.”
* * *
I don’t know what it was that made him instantly believe her, because I know he didn’t recognize her face and she wasn’t in her costume. But there was something about her posture, about the way she thrust herself forward, eager to go towards the accident when everyone else was content to rubberneck or move past. And then she had the stance, with her arms cocked and fists buried into her hips, so confident and intense that you could almost imagine her in uniform, ready for action.
“I see,” Donovan stammered, also a bit put off by how big I was, coming around the car in his direction.
“Follow me,” he said and led us across the divider towards the accident.
I shadowed Apogee and trooper Donovan, trying to be as inconspicuous as possible. But it was only a matter of time until someone put it all together.
I had ripped my cowl off prior to the New York fight, and with all the cameras, my face was now known to the world. I’m sure Braxton had now spread the word that I had ‘kidnapped Apogee’ among all law enforcement. It was a miracle that Donovan didn’t recognize me when Apogee had introduced herself. I suppose it was late, and he was too preoccupied with the rescue efforts to refuse Apogee’s help, or to even consider her kidnapped or missing. Did super villains show up at an emergency scene to help out?
But I was still afraid of what would happen when they realized who I was.
Behind us, the helicopter’s engines roared to slow the hovering descent, and the skids touched down. Instead of a crack team of super heroes, a group of doctors and nurses jumped out and headed towards the crash. At least I didn’t have that to worry about.
The wreck was worse than I had imagined. A burgundy minivan lay upside down on the side of the road, and the tanker truck was draped atop of it, crushing it down into the mud. There seemed to be no way someone could have survived the crash. The truck’s cab was crumpled on the far side. The rear of the trailer had slammed into the back of the cab and it was likely the truck driver was also dead.
“Who is this, officer Donovan?” A plainclothes officer asked as we approached.
“She says she’s Apogee, Tim.”
Though he was much younger, Tim looked to be in charge.
“Is that a fact?”
I stepped forward, watching two officers talking to the survivors trapped inside the minivan. There was a child’s hand sticking out of the sliver that remained of a window and one of the officers, a young woman, held the little fingers trying to give some sort of reassurance. The driver and passenger’s side roof was crushed down, almost to the headrests, but also buried into the ground by the force of the impact, so I couldn’t see anyone there.
“I am,” Apogee said, moving past the officer in charge and me, and strolling down to the actual crash. “How many people in there?” she asked.
“Five,” Tim said. “A man and his wife, and their three girls.”
“God…”
“The husband’s either unconscious or dead and the wife has a broken leg. But at least she’s talking.”
At hearing the commotion so close to their car, the girl who’s had protruded from the car began to cry, and we could all hear more frantic calls from inside.
“And the girls?” I asked.
“They’re conscious,” Tim answered. “Bumps and bruises, I think.”
“What happened?” I prodded.
Donovan stepped forward, apparently one of the first responders. “It looks like the driver of the minivan either fell asleep or had a problem, because he stopped the car in the middle of the interstate. The truck came along and hit the brakes real hard.” He pointed at a long fresh tire skid illuminated by dozens of road flares.
“Thought those guys were taught to never hit the brakes when someone got in front of them,” I wondered aloud. “You know because the trailer submarines into the cab and kills the driver.”
Tim nodded wearily, looking up at the falling rain.
“Guess that’s what happened. He saved those girls though.”
“What’s the trailer hauling?” Apogee asked.
“Potable water,” Donovan said.
“What are you going to do?”
Apogee studied the crash for a moment.
“If I can lift the tanker,” she started, “Perhaps you can get those people out. Water you said?”
Tim didn’t know what to say, he looked at me, and at a few of the other officers that were gathering around. Word was spreading that a super was on the scene.
“Tim, can we clear the area?” the newly arrived doctors said, shaking the officer’s hand and motioning to the crowd that was gathering.
“Hang on, Walt. We got a super here that’s gonna get that truck off the minivan.” Tim said, pointing at Apogee.
She turned back and saw the doctor.
“I’ll have these people out of here in a moment. Get your teams ready.”
And she went to work.
Apogee figured that the best way to get the tanker trailer off the van was to lift from the rear, and toss it aside. She strolled down into the mud and got a good handhold and strained, lifting as far as she could. The trailer came up as far as her reach, drawing some shocked gasps from the crowd. But she didn’t have a sufficient base to lift the heavy trailer. As she bore more and more of the weight, it buried her feet into the mud. The truck’s top railing was still wedged against the minivan’s twisted under carriage. Screams of excitement and roars of adulation grew as she raised the many tons, but they died down when she was forced to lower the trailer again.
I couldn’t bear to see the helpless shame and frustration in her face, so I decided to help her.
“Do that again,” I said, bounding down towards the minivan. She lifted again, and I wedged myself beneath the trailer, behind the upside down car. I got the best handhold I could and put all my strength to bear, ripping the tanker off the minivan.
“Ok, let’s toss it away from the road,” Apogee said.
I heaved the tanker twenty paces away from the minivan the crowd cheered, amazed at what they had witnessed. Apogee hauled herself out of the mud and came towards me. “Get back away from the door,” she said to the girls inside and ripped the door off.
She stepped aside as the emergency personnel moved and took the girls out one by one in blankets towards the helicopter. A woman then crawled out, still in shock, and was led away from the crash.
Though there was a throng of EMTs and cops between me and her, I heard the woman lamenting that her husband had suffered a heart attack, and didn’t survive the crash.
Apogee stood in the middle of it all, shaking the hands of every officer, paramedic and bystander that wasn’t immediately attending to the injured girls and woman. It wasn’t too hard to imagine her in uniform, patrolling the city, protecting the innocent and helping the weak. She was bashful; almost embarrassed by all the attention, but you could tell she dug it. She enjoyed the feeling of being helpful, of being important to the lives of others.
I let her savor the moment and walked over to the truck’s demolished cab. A state trooper and an EMT stood around it, peering through gaps with flashlights, but they didn’t look immediately concerned. After all, the driver was dead.
“I can get that open for you,” I said motioning for them to step back. I ripped off a huge chunk of mangled fiberglass and aluminum, revealing the bloodied body
of the driver. After bending a few pieces of metal to free his body, he slipped down towards me, and I caught him before he fell to the floor.
And I couldn’t help but hold the man.
He was a young guy, no older than Cool Hand, and as thin, wearing a blood-stained flannel shirt and sporting a week old beard growth. I could imagine him driving down the road, listening to his favorite music, when suddenly he spotted the car stopped in front of him. Maybe he had seen the van earlier, seen the girls sleeping in the back, illuminated by the lights placed high on the cab. The driver was in his twenties, his future all ahead of him, but something made him go against all his training, a decision that would cost him his life; and save the lives of three children and their mother.
I placed his body gently on the floor and stepped back as the EMT covered it with a yellow tarp. I felt someone behind me, and turned to see Apogee there.
“Are you ok?”
I didn’t answer, looking back at the covered truck driver.
“We’d better go,” she said, leading me by my elbow towards the car. We moved past Tim and Trooper Donovan, who were recounting our amazing deed to other officers.
“There they are,” Tim beamed, and shook my hand. Donovan also gave me a hearty shake and slapped my shoulder.
“Her ‘associate’ she says,” the trooper laughed. “He damned near lifted the whole thing himself. No offense, ma’am,” he said, trying to soothe Apogee, but she was smiling, enjoying watching me struggle through the adulation.
“Hell of a job, sir,” Tim said, shaking again, and a few others took their turns, saluting me and giving me praise.
But another officer was staring at me. He was a trooper, like Donovan and almost the same age, but heavy set, and I noticed a pistol in his hand. He was nervous and his eyes were wide with apprehension.
“Tim, this guy’s Blackjack,” the trooper managed.
I was still swarmed by people wanting to shake my hand, but Tim took a step away.
“What did you say?”
The trooper pointed at me. “If that’s Apogee, then this fella here is Blackjack. It was all over the news, Tim.”
“Blackjack? The villain guy?” Tim asked.
“The guy from the New York City thing the other day. Same fellow that killed some super in L.A. last week.”
“That so, mister?” Tim asked. “You Blackjack?”
We stared at each other, not moving a muscle, and I didn’t know what to say. This was a massacre waiting to happen with all these cops around me. When the shooting started, no one would bother to notice that the bullets weren’t affecting me, but were hurting their friends around me.
“Is he Blackjack?” Tim inquired of Apogee, getting a curt nod in return.
Tim, more than the others, understood the calamity of the situation. I was a super, and there was nothing these folks or a hundred more like them could do to stop me. The only people that were going to get hurt were those that stood in my way.
Then I noticed Apogee. She was watching me, studying me. I think in a way, she was waiting to see what I would do, testing me.
“Maybe we can let cooler heads prevail,” I managed, but it was a feeble thing to say. It only encouraged them, emboldened the officers. One of them put his hand on his holstered pistol.
“Tim. Your name is Tim, right?” I asked him and he nodded. “I don’t want any trouble tonight.”
Tim was scared, as were all the others, but he stood his ground. “You kidnapped her, isn’t that right?”
I looked at Apogee, “She’s free to go wherever she wants, Tim. Right?”
Apogee didn’t help me at all.
“Why’d you help us?” he demanded. “If you’re a villain then why’d you help?”
“Tim, take it easy.”
“I want to know, mister.”
I sighed, “I helped because they needed help. Because she asked me to,” I motioned to Apogee.
“I guess there’s nothing we can do to stop a big shot like you, huh? You’ll kill all of us like you did that guy in Los Angeles.”
“I’m not going to hurt anyone.”
“I think you will,” he retorted. “What if I tried to arrest you right here?”
“I’d rather if you let me go on my way,” I said. “She can stay with you folks, for all I care.”
Tim turned to Apogee and said, “If you fight him, we’ll back you up.”
“She can’t fight me, Tim. Dr. Zundergrub, one of the guys I was with, you know who he is?” he nodded in acknowledgement. “He did something to her. She can’t fight me. And I didn’t kidnap her, damn it. It’s all part of what Zundergrub did.”
“So it’s you against us,” he said, but I couldn’t tell if he was growing brave, or trying to find a reasonable way out where no one would get hurt.
“I think the best thing for all involved here,” I looked around at all the officers, making sure to get eye contact, “Is that I get back in my car, and drive off. You guys can report me in to the NAS and let them handle me.”
“That would be us not doing our jobs.”
“Maybe,” I admitted, feeling like I was losing this battle. “I think enough people have gotten hurt tonight.”
“That a threat?” one of the other officers asked, and more nervous hands went to rest on their pistols.
I looked at the man who had asked that, “I didn’t mean it like that. I’m not going to hurt anyone. I just…”
Tim studied me for a few seconds.
“That was a hell of a thing you did back there,” he finally said and turned to Apogee. “Ma’am, I plain don’t know what to do here.”
“Leave him to me,” she said, satisfied with me. Tim nodded and motioned for his men to step aside as Apogee led me away from the throng of officers back to the car. I slid into the driver’s side and turned the car back on as she slammed her door.
“Thanks,” I said.
“You too.”
Tim watched us get in the car, arms crossed; no doubt frustrated that he wasn’t able to put a bad guy in jail. Beside him, another officer was talking into his radio reporting our make, model and tag number.
As I drove off, I caught a final glance at a swath yellow that lay on the floor. The tarp that covered the corpse of the truck driver who had given up his life for a bunch if people he had never known.
* * *
We didn’t talk much after that. I drove on to the nearest town and swapped cars then took a junction north of the interstate and drove on until morning. The sun was breaking when I found a small, roadside inn. I had put three-hundred miles between us and the accident scene, and I figured we were safe enough for a brief pause.
It was an inexpensive place, one floor and parking outside your room, and she didn’t complain that the room was tiny and had only two twin-sized beds.
I took to a dusty arm chair and tried to doze while Apogee went into the bathroom to shower, but I would tense up with the lights of every car that passed, expecting a confrontation with Braxton and his people. I should have kept driving but I was bone tired, and before I knew it, I fell deep asleep on that uncomfortable chair.
“Blackjack,” Apogee called to me, making me wake and jump out of the chair.
“Huh?”
It felt like I had fallen asleep a second ago, but the judging by the volumes of steam coming out of the bathroom, her shower had taken some time.
“You were in a really uncomfortable position,” she said, moving past me while wearing only the towel around her body, and another draped over her head to dry her hair.
Apogee dug into my pack, took out one of my plain black t-shirts and put it on over herself. She turned away from me and unwrapped the towel beneath the shirt throwing it on the sink. For a second there, I saw the small of her back and muscled buttocks which faded down into her toned legs.
“You’re staring again,” she said sitting on one of the beds and drying her hair with the second towel.
“Sorry,” I muttered get
ting up and moving towards the other bed. “I’m tired.”
“Shower first, you ape,” she snickered the second before I was going to hurl myself on the bed. I stumbled to stop, and losing my balance I had to catch myself with one hand.
“You’ll sleep better if you’re clean,” she added.
I leaned back and looked at the door, then back to her.
“I can’t go anywhere, remember?”
“Fine,” I said and took off my shirt and boots, tossing them on the floor. My pants were covered in muck and blood, so I stripped them off and folded them, intending to wash them as I showered. I had no choice, as I had nothing else to wear.
I was about to take off my boxers when I caught her looking at me.
“Oh my God, what is that gray stuff on your stomach?” she asked, forgetting about my partial nakedness and noticing the dark goo that had healed my stomach after the oil rig fight. It was flaking and starting to come off.
“The world’s most advanced Band-Aid.”
I picked at it, revealing more of a huge reddish scar across my stomach.
“Looks like it hurt.”
“It did,” I said and went into the bathroom to shower.
The water was icy cold at first, and it stung all my bumps and bruises. Thankfully, it warmed up fast, and stayed hot for a long time. The scalding water soaked my body, washing away filth and scabbed blood, washing away the pain of aching muscles and joints. It only hit me at that moment, watching the black grime swirl down the drain; I hadn’t showered in days.
I thought of the boys; Cool, Mr. Haha and Zundergrub racing through the Solar system on Dr. Retcon’s rocket ship. I guess that was a million dollars I was out, but to be honest, I hadn’t even checked with Sandy or my bank to verify the funds for the earlier missions. Besides, it wasn’t about the money for me.
In a way, I trusted Retcon. There was something about him, a sense of knowledge and purpose that was addictive, a greater goal. It was all smoke and mirrors for now, but the promise of mind-blowing adventure is what had sold me, even before I met the man. And meeting him had only cemented it in my mind. Retcon was known for the many evil deeds in his career but I saw something else. He was a sober, thoughtful man, not the terror you’d read about. Retcon had a cool demeanor, as if nothing in the world could threaten him and few things actually could.