“He’s getting away,” Brendan said.
“I know.” Charlotte went to the car and got out the tablet. Both drones went zipping forward in Torben’s direction. Charlotte got into the car.
“Come on.”
Brendan picked up Tina, being careful with her head. She was still unconscious. He worried moving her was a mistake, but there was no one around who could help, and he couldn’t leave her in the street. He set her down on the steps near the crumpled security guard.
Charlotte was honking the horn. Brendan bristled. He took a moment to look down at Tina. Her slack face. All the blood. Her getting involved in this entire affair was his fault. If he had left it all alone, she would still be in some student lounge rooting for whatever villain of the day was trash talking the latest supers wannabe. He pushed her hair out of her face.
“Brendan!” Charlotte called.
“Sorry ’bout this,” he said to Tina. Then he got in the car.
Charlotte didn’t wait for him to get his foot in before accelerating. The engine was still steaming from under the hood, and the car made a tortured rattle and whine.
“We’re not going to get very far,” Brendan said.
“Duh. Check the drones. Are we heading the right way?”
Brendan looked at the tablet. Both drones had Torben in their sights. “He’s at the hyperloop terminal.”
Charlotte drove down the center of the street, weaving around two double-parked delivery trucks while a couple of uniformed drivers stood and watched.
“Why would he go there?” Charlotte asked.
“Orientation. Vantage point. With the gate in the nurse’s pool, maybe he’s heading that way. Could there be another gate by her house in this world?”
“Not necessarily. Each Earth is off by a little. Your Earth is off from this one by just a few inches. Remember the headmaster’s office? It was almost perfectly aligned. But some of that might have to do with my father’s machine.”
“But you said he could sniff these things out. Is it possible there’s no gate in this world?”
“Yes, it’s possible. I still don’t know why there’s a gate in Nurse Dreyfus’s pool. Whether it was a side effect of my father machine or something someone else did, I haven’t figured it out. So there could be more of them, and Torben might know how to find one. The nurse found it. It’s also possible there are many more gates unaccounted for.”
“How many?”
Charlotte pulled up to a row of concrete traffic barriers in front of the entrance to the hyperloop station.
“Even one permanent one is too many.”
“Your dad really messed things up when he invented his machine.”
He got out of the car before she could reply.
21. The Size of the Fight
The drones buzzed overhead. Their cameras looked down at Torben, who was standing at a platform and considering the long hyperloop rail that swept in either direction atop its tall gray pillars. These pillars made up the stone jumble on the devastated Earth. Here it was all standing, and Torben appeared confused. The large man was putting his face to the air as if trying to detect a scent. If the underwater gate in the pool had a smell it would be impossible to know it.
But Torben’s sense of purpose worried Brendan.
He took the steps two at a time, trying to ignore the agony in his wrist. Charlotte kept up. A frantic woman in heels carrying a laptop ran past them, almost stumbling down the stairs. At the top, Brendan and Charlotte found themselves between a pair of long platforms. A nearby row of ticket kiosks were covered with information posters. Dual tracks separated the platforms. No pods were in sight.
Torben was out beyond the overhang and looking out at the town below. Brendan and Charlotte approached him. Charlotte picked up a metal trash can. Brendan tapped at the tablet.
Attack, he told the drones.
Torben held a defensive hand above his head as the drones sailed in. The black machines bounced off him, but he didn’t move. Then a drone struck his head. He turned in Brendan’s direction and started towards him. Charlotte flung the garbage can. He caught it and threw it aside. Brendan and Charlotte kept their distance from the warlord. A drone streaked in, and he caught that too and smashed it between his hands.
“Just one of your toys left,” he said. “I’m losing patience with this distraction.”
Torben ran to the end of the platform and jumped down to the tracks, his attention again on the town. A station alarm rang. Torben ignored it. He jogged forward along the track with purpose, the single drone still harrying him. He kept a hand raised to ward it off.
Brendan and Tina dropped to the tracks. The hyperloop went two ways, and each track was a raised metal rail with narrow concrete on either side. Running along it proved awkward. Brendan was careful to keep both feet on one side of the rail. He didn’t see any high-voltage signs and had heard enough about it to know there wasn’t a lethal current in the track, but he didn’t want to test his knowledge. Plus, the drop to the streets below was dizzying.
Ahead, Torben stopped. He was smelling the air again.
Charlotte pounced forward with no reservations about stepping on the track. She was quick, faster than Brendan had ever seen her move. Torben swiped at her, but she ducked at the last moment. The remaining drone nailed him with a loud smack between the shoulder blades. He spun, hands chopping at the air. Charlotte lunged at him and drove a fist into Torben’s side. More blows connected. He stumbled away from her, trying to stay balanced. She kicked at his feet. He tumbled and fell onto the track.
A loud two-tone chime came over the station speakers behind them. Automatic messages began to play in a crisp voice: Hyperloop pods incoming. Running lights along the track flashed white.
A trio of pods raced towards them.
Charlotte and Brendan jumped to the neighboring track. Brendan held his arms wide to keep his balance. The drop down seemed even greater than it had just moments before. Torben sprang straight up into the air. The pods raced past beneath him, and he landed back on the track. The rush of air buffeted them all.
“We need to hit him at the same time,” Charlotte said. “Knock him off the track.”
Torben was moving. He jogged along to the next pillar and they followed. The track was definitely higher here than at the station. A breeze picked up, the moving air creating the illusion that the railway was swaying beneath Brendan’s feet. A car passed along the street below them. Brendan could see homes and businesses. They weren’t far away from Nurse Dreyfus’s house.
Torben had stopped. He was nodding, his back turned to them. The drone made another pass but he knocked it aside. It dropped low beneath the tracks and flew up and around in a wide loop.
Torben peered across the houses and then pointed. “It’s close. I can smell it like a spring breeze.”
Brendan didn’t see anything.
“Now!” Charlotte shouted as she lunged at Torben. But Torben was ready for her. He caught her with a snap kick, stopping her charge. He drove a high fist down on her shoulder, sending her to the track and uttering a triumphant “Ha!”
As he raised his fist again, Brendan leaped onto him. His hurt right wrist made that arm next to useless and could only manage a crude hold around the warlord’s neck. He struck the warlord with his left fist, landing a series of blows that he immediately knew were too weak. Torben grabbed him and pulled him off.
“You’ve made this far more amusing than I would have imagined,” Torben said. “A shame you couldn’t meet your potential in service to me.”
Brendan headbutted Torben in the face. The smack sent the warlord lurching back. He dropped Brendan and stumbled over Charlotte, grabbing at her as he went over the side. She screamed, her hands gripping the slick concrete and not finding purchase.
The track lights lit up. Both tracks. Pods were coming from either direction even as Charlotte struggled not to be pulled over. They had seconds before the pods would streak over the rails. Brendan k
new he might make it if he jumped up like Torben did, but the warlord had Charlotte by the legs. She would be pulverized.
With his good hand, he took her under a shoulder and leaped forward just as a single pod blew past, another pair of pods heading by on the opposite track. Brendan was flying. Falling. Torben clung on until Charlotte booted him in the face. They all sailed forward and down as gravity worked its magic.
Brendan and Charlotte struck a flat rooftop, hard. It knocked the wind from him, and after striking his head against a metal vent he tumbled to a stop. His wrist exploded in fresh pain. It took a moment for the world to stop spinning.
Should be dead.
He got up on wobbly legs and tried to keep his stomach from emptying. Charlotte had a hand on the metal vent. She wasn’t quite able to stand. Her pack was still slung to her back, and she had blood flowing from her nose. Looking dazed, she said nothing until he opened her pack and found her glove.
“Don’t,” she said. “The only thing you can do is open a portal to your world. You can’t let him go there. We have to finish him here.”
He took the glove and slipped it on, realizing as he did how fragile it was and that if it was damaged, he wouldn’t be able to go home. At least if Torben was on Brendan’s world they’d all be one step closer to home. Perhaps the warlord would be a little weaker and could be contained.
Looking over the edge of the roof, he saw they were on top of a body shop. A dozen vehicles crowded a fenced-in driveway. Torben had crashed into a stack of metal bumpers. He wasn’t moving.
Charlotte got up. “We have to kill him.”
The distance they had dropped from the track should have killed him, so the one-story drop to the ground was nothing. He swung over the side of the shop and jumped down onto a convertible white Cadillac with its top drawn up. Although he smashed in the car’s aluminum and vinyl roof, the landing was soft enough. He climbed out of the car.
Torben was pushing metal away from himself. The last drone descended on him, but the warlord slapped it away and continued slowly extricating himself from the pile of parts. The machine paused midair as if it had lost its bearings. That thing’s battery has to be depleted by now.
A siren started wailing. It sounded like it was getting closer.
Charlotte landed on a car next to Brendan, a controlled drop onto the metal that dented with the impact. She vaulted forward and stood in Brendan’s way. He could see that she wasn’t going to let him past. She raised a hand for him to stop before turning to Torben. Torben had gotten up, but the drone flew in and knocked him back. He struggled to rise as the bumpers shifted under his weight.
Charlotte picked up a metal quarter panel with ease. She swung it like a bat and knocked Torben down, crushing him into the bumpers with a loud clang. He moaned. She repositioned herself, the now-bent panel over her shoulder. She was about to swing it a second time when Brendan caught it. She pulled it free from his grip and turned in his direction.
“If you won’t help me, that’s fine. But don’t get in my way.” He took a step closer. She looked at the glove on his hand. “And don’t you dare use that. You don’t know what you’re doing. You’ve caused enough trouble sending him here.”
“I’m figuring this out as I go,” Brendan said. “But I’m finding out that you don’t have all the answers. You’re enjoying the power boost being here just as much as Torben is. It’s heady like a drug and it’s clouding your judgment.”
“I am nothing like him,” she said, her anger barely contained.
Torben was getting up again. He appeared dazed, but his attention was on the air above him. Brendan looked up. Except for the circling drone he saw nothing. But then he made out something further up, a shimmer like heat rising from a hot roadway. A certain smell hit Brendan’s nose, like the damp air after a thunderstorm. It was a gate, hanging midair. Torben had found it and it was right above them, an easy leap away for anyone from an upstream Earth.
Charlotte pushed Brendan.
If it had been an ordinary push from an ordinary girl it would have set him off-balance. But Charlotte didn’t hold back. All of her upstream strength came to bear and Brendan went tumbling. He slammed into a dumpster. His head spun and his wrist throbbed angrily. At that moment he felt like putting his head to the oil-stained pavement and just passing out.
“Ow.” He grabbed the side of the dumpster and pulled himself to his feet.
Charlotte had positioned herself above Torben. She held a chrome bumper in her hands. But before she could strike, Torben swung a piece of metal at her backhanded and knocked her down. She lay still and he struggled to rise. The drone came in and he saw it coming. He swung the piece of metal again and knocked the drone back over the fence in a wide arc.
No more drones. Charlotte was down. Brendan stumbled forward. It was him and Torben.
The warlord pointed at Brendan. “That contraption you wear. It’s what sent me here.”
Belatedly, Brendan realized he didn’t have a weapon.
Torben tapped the piece of metal on his palm. “That glove is something we could use. Hand it to me and I’ll not tear your arm off.”
He charged. Brendan tucked and dove, rolling under Torben’s swing. He spun and kicked, tripping the large man. He grabbed the piece of metal Torben had been holding and yanked it away.
Torben got himself up again, wiping blood and dirt off his chin.
Brendan brought his weapon around in a high swing and down on Torben’s head. The vibration shot up Brendan’s arm, but the warlord just stood there. Brendan had taken a step back before he saw a dazed expression cross Torben’s face. Torben dropped to both knees and then fell forward.
Charlotte moaned. “Finish him,” she whispered.
He stood over the big man, the metal club poised to strike.
Torben pushed himself up to a prone position, his muscles trembling. Blood seeped from a split lip and between his teeth.
“You can be one of us,” Torben said. “I’ll show you how to be strong. Help me, and I’ll see to it your world gets spared.”
Brendan backed away as Torben rose.
“It’s not an offer I’ll repeat.”
Torben didn’t wait for a response. With catlike speed, he crouched and jumped. Brendan sprang forward at the same time, knocking Torben off course and sending them both into the wall of the body shop. They landed hard. Brendan ignored the pain, ignored Torben’s hand as it clamped on his shoulder and began to crush it. He drove a knee forward into the warlord’s stomach. Torben’s grip slackened and he slumped against the wall.
Brendan took the glove off and laid it on the ground. Then he slammed his fist into the warlord’s face, again and again. Pain shot through his fingers and hand, but he didn’t relent. His rage was something he had kept bottled up and controlled. Now he released it, savoring the bitter pleasure as he pounded the murderer before him down.
Torben wasn’t moving.
Brendan was poised to strike again but he stopped. He was breathing hard. Tears flowed down his cheeks. A wordless sound came out of his mouth and he screamed down at the man. He raised his hand but unclenched his fist when he saw his knuckles were split and wet with blood.
Charlotte placed a hand on his shoulder. “It’s okay,” she said. “He’s down. You beat him.”
He shrugged her away. “I can’t kill him,” he gasped. “I won’t.”
“You don’t have to. I know I have to do it. It’s my responsibility. I’m owning up to what my father has started. Nobody has any idea how much guilt I feel. And if you take him back where he was, he’ll find the gate to your world and many more people will die. I can’t take that chance. Letting him go will cost many more their lives. Your world will be next if he makes it back.”
“You don’t know he’ll find it, and it’s not your option anymore. It’s my world, not yours. I’m taking responsibility for this decision.”
As a police car pulled up just outside the body shop, Brendan took the glove and p
icked up the warlord. He jumped to the roof, the giant man held awkwardly over one shoulder.
***
Charlotte followed at a distance as Brendan approached the house that he knew as Nurse Dreyfus’s home. It looked different, painted a terracotta color with sage-green trim. A well-manicured front yard featured decorative lava rocks and cacti. Brendan knew his time was limited. Torben could wake at any moment and his own strength was flagging. He went through the side gate to the backyard. There was no pool. And unless there was a gate between worlds underground, the backyard had nothing special in it.
But he could make a gate back to his world. He began to fiddle with the glove.
“You’re doing it wrong,” Charlotte said.
“Then tell me what to do.”
“Hold the knuckle button down for five seconds then release. Keep your hand straight out.”
The gate opened next to where the pool would be on his Earth. Charlotte watched in silence as Brendan adjusted the load on his shoulder and prepared to go through.
“Is the glove water proof?” Brendan asked.
Charlotte nodded. “You know he could drown when you take him through the cave.”
“So could I if I have to swim with him alone. Help me with him.”
They stepped through together.
22. One Way Home
An ambulance and a highway patrol motorcycle were parked in front of city hall. Tina sat on the curb with a blanket around her while two EMTs attended to the injured security guard inside the back of the ambulance.
Charlotte and Brendan were both still dripping wet as they approached her. Charlotte hadn’t said anything since they dropped Torben off. They’d left him on the sand by the pool back where he had come from. He had still been breathing when they left him. The swim both ways through the cave had proven easier than before, even with having to drag Torben along. Knowing the layout of the pool helped.
Brendan’s right wrist was inflamed and hot with pain. He sat down next to Tina. Water seeped from his pants, leaving a growing wet mark on the curb. She looked at both of them with a puzzled expression.
The Supervillain High Boxed Set: Books One - Three of the Supervillain High Series Page 41