The Broken Ones [Book 1]

by David Jobe

  Finally, it was Allison that brought him back to the realization that he had to go through with it. For one, he had yet to see her crime fighter outfit, and she had yet to see his. While he doubted that she would be impressed with his, he could only imagine how hers would look. Had she gone with sleek black leather, tight as a second skin? Maybe a two piece showing her thin stomach? He shook his head of the ideas.

  “Pervy,” he reminded himself and lifted himself up mentally toward the skylight in his room. Either way, he couldn’t back out now. That might be the final strike against him with her. He didn’t know how many strikes he had, but he was sure he wasn’t too far from being sent home a loser in this ball game, and he was far too tired of going home a loser.

  “Time to be somebody." He floated over to his closet and punched a few keys in the side panel nearest the corner. A small cubby hole opened to reveal a sleek black case. "The girl loves her accessories." He slipped the strap for the case over his shoulder and tightened it to hug his back like some large backpack. With that, he launched himself up and out the skylight in his room.

  For a moment, he floated above his home, feeling the cold night air brush against his face. Beyond the small estate that housed his father's large home, the city twinkled and winked at him. He had read so many comic books where the superhero felt a kinship to the city they protected. Truth was, Mac had always felt like an outsider to this city and the world. His father, though smart, was never around and even less helpful when it came to the complicated social interactions of teenagers. He wasn't stupid. This city knew no love for him, nor he for it. Tonight wasn't about saving the citizens. Tonight, he would seem as more than the waste of a large space that the high school kids had considered him.

  Tonight, he would make them notice him. Tonight, he would be someone.

  Chapter Four

  Allison’s house wasn’t a house, but a complex. They had already discussed the fact that he couldn’t be seen swooping in and grabbing her from her front door. That would lead them back to her, and then back to him as well. Their secret identities would be as flimsy as Clark Kent’s glasses. So, they decided that the best way to handle this was to have Allison hide on the roof of the apartment complex and Mac would land there without noise, scoop her up, and they would be off to whatever crime fighting they had to do. Mac’s arms were strong enough to hold her, and she was lightweight enough to make the task that much easier. This was something they had tested on a few occasions, and each night Mac wanted to test it one more time. Not because he was concerned that it wouldn't work. He just liked holding her in his arms.

  When he swooped down so that his feet grazed the shingled roof, he stopped his inertia with a thought and looked for her. Once again, he was proud of his choice in black clothing. It helped him blend in with the night sky. “Kitten?” he whispered, wondering if she had perhaps decided not to go through with it. For a moment his heart began to pound out a dizzying beat in his large chest. He hadn’t thought of that. What would he do if she had backed out? Would he go on alone? He was bluffing back at his house when he said he would go without her. He wanted her to help. No, he needed to be honest with himself. He needed her with him. This was as much for her as it was for him. So what would he do if she decided it wasn't worth it?

  As he was just about to shoot off into the air, he heard her whisper, “Over here.”

  Mac turned and his breath caught in his throat. It was like one of those scenes in a movie where the nerdy girl gets all spiffed up and starts walking down the stairs in an elegant dress. Only this had nerd fantasy written all over it. While it wasn’t a Princess Leia slave outfit, it was cheerleader meets steampunk. She was also in dark colors, though hers was a sort of sleek purple. It looked as if she had cut up several outfits of the same color and had melded them into a more form fitting outfit than the originals had provided. Mac imagined that he could see the cheerleader outfit in there. Her chest, of which he had stared at far too often, was encased in a tight-fitting outfit with a sort of shield logo fabric woven over the top of it. In a deep red were the letters F and K. The rest of her outfit reminded him of a diver’s outfit, but of a different material. Her long, beautiful, black hair was tied into a ponytail and at several points in the tail she had tied it again, making the whole thing neat. While she wasn’t wearing a mask, she had painted her face much in the way he imagined that a member of KISS painted theirs. He smirked as he recognized that she had in fact made her own variation of one of the KISS member’s iconic cat face, only hers was somehow made sexier by her lines and her face. It occurred to him that she had gone to great pains to hide her real skin color with the outfit and the makeup. No, one could tell what her ethnicity was. It was brilliant, and he thought himself a fool for not having thought of it himself.

  “How do I look?” she asked, stepping from behind a ceiling vent.

  “You are amazing,” Mac said in a tone that matched the sentiment. “Makes me want to do things other than fight crime.”

  Kitten laughed and waved off the suggestive comment. “I like your outfit, too. Suits you in a way.” She moved over to him and brushed a hand through his messy locks. “You might think about doing something with this when you have a chance. Maybe add a splash of blue for your eyes.”

  Mac laughed and shook his head, hoping the movement wouldn’t make her remove her hand. “I have tried everything. My hair has a mind of its own. I decided instead of trying to tame it, I will just own it.”

  Kitten nodded and smiled, dropping her hand. “What does the E on your chest stand for?” she asked.

  “Eclipse,” he said with a smile.

  Kitten frowned. “Isn’t that what the douchebags in school used to call you?”

  Mac laughed and nodded. “He’s so big, he blocked out the sun, they would say.”

  “Then why on Earth would you choose that as your name?”

  “It was my ‘fuck you’ to them. Imagine one day we are famous, world renowned superheroes, and as they always do, we get unmasked. Then I will be on Sixty Minutes with Katie Couric and she will ask how I came up with this name. And I will get to say that it was to spit in the face of every bully who thought he was better than me,” he smiled, his eyes gleaming with the imagined future. “Can you imagine Shane at home, soaking up another beer in his trailer of bliss, watching TV, and seeing me world famous and basically flipping him the bird.”

  Kitten laughed a beautiful laugh. “That would be awesome.”

  “What about you? What is the F.K. stand for?” Mac asked, tapping each letter in turn and thinking himself lucky to have been allowed to do so.

  “Fantastic Kitten,” she said with pride.

  Mac frowned. “Um, isn’t that the name of that cartoon cat on the kids network?”

  “Yup,” she smiled.

  “Um, I’m sure that is copyright infringement, and you could get sued.”

  Kitten laughed. “They have to find me to sue me, and plus, I like it. Makes me kid friendly.”

  “That outfit says otherwise,” Mac joked.

  Again she laughed, and Mac found that he didn’t care if her name broke the law. It said something about him as a person, but again he did not care. He was just happy that she allowed him to continue with this crazy scheme of his.

  “Are we going to actually do this?” she asked, placing a gentle hand on his shoulder.

  “We better before I lose my nerve.”

  "Did you bring it?" Her tone was always breathless when she brought up the thing.

  He laughed. There was no way she couldn't see the thing on his back. He was huge, but the case was a good two feet long and one foot wide. The corners of it were peeking over his shoulder. Slipping the case from his back, he handed it over to Kitten.

  "You might want to assemble it now, just in case."

  Kitten snatched the case from him and dropped to her haunches to begin dialing in the locking code on the case. With a slight intake of breath, she lifted the lid and started with marv
el at the contents.

  "It’s a thing of beauty."

  "You are prettier."

  "Liar." She smiled up at him and then took out the sleek black pieces and fit them together. "You painted it?"

  "That silver would have made it glint. The point is that it remains unseen. Don't you like it?" He found himself worrying.

  She smiled at him as she clicked the handle into place with expert skill. She had spent quite a few days in his living room assembling and disassembling the thing over and over again until it felt like second nature.

  "I love it."

  "Look at the barrel."

  She ran a thin finger over the barrel and smiled. In a deep purple that was barely visible in the low light, she could read that it said, R.O.A.R.

  "Roar?" she asked.

  "Kitten's Roar,” he smiled at her, trying hard not to show the butterflies that fluttered in his stomach.

  She looked at him for a moment, her eyes starting to glisten. Then without warning, she jumped up and kissed him hard on the cheek, smearing some of the white makeup as she did.

  "If I knew guns did this for you, I would have built you an arsenal by now."

  She stepped back and smiled, "My dear Ma–” she cut herself off, "Eclipse. This," she held up the large weapon, "is not a gun. This is art. This is beauty."

  The gun was a good four feet long, once assembled, and had a split barrel that was interwoven with crisscrossing blades that served as a sort of chamber for the round once it was shot. Only this gun did not fire bullets like a normal gun or rifle. It was an energy acceleration weapon much in the ilk of a rail gun. More accurate over long distance than the best sniper rifle on the market, black or otherwise, and it could punch a hole through a tank at both ends. Since it fired pure energy, it did not leave a bullet, nor were there casings for the rounds. The only downside was that it took a few seconds to recharge and after about six shots, the battery would overheat to the point that it took hours to cool down. Mac still worked on building a second battery, but this was a device of his father's design and he still hadn't cracked the secret behind the battery.

  He laughed, "That's a hell of a lot of firepower."

  Kitten smiled and asked, "Are we still talking about the gun?" Then she winked at him.

  "I am not sure which is more dangerous."

  "I am." She stepped in close, strapping the gun across her back. "We better get going before there is no need for a superhero and sidekick."

  Eclipse wrapped an arm around her and drew her close. He loved the scent that rolled off of her. "You aren't a sidekick."

  She wrapped her arms around his neck and held tight, whispering in his ear, "Who said you were the superhero?"

  "I can fly, remember?"

  "Shut up and show me then."

  Chapter Five

  Golem’s face wasn't well designed, and that could be blamed on the boy that created him. Golem’s face looked like little more than a rough sketch of a face that had simple expressions. Happy and sad were the only ones he could pull off with any certainty. Scared, angry or confused just came across as constipated. It was the lack of eyebrows that hindered the true expression. Right now, he wore one of those constipated looks. He wasn’t sure if he was angry, scared or confused.

  “What do I do?” he whispered to Miss Fire.

  She had slid to hide behind a large SUV. She was slender and short enough that he wasn’t even sure the police knew she was there. They sure knew that he was there, though. All manner of weapons were aimed at him from behind car doors, hoods, trunks, and anything else the police found that they considered cover. She was right, the police had rushed into the parking lot, sirens blazing.

  “Throw something at them,” she whispered back. “Just not the truck or the bag,” she added on a second thought.

  “Right,” Golem said, eyeing the police and the vehicles around him. But what to throw?

  “Put your arms in the air!” one of the police officers shouted with a bullhorn. Golem couldn’t quite tell which one it was because several of the police cruisers had used their searchlights to focus on him. Now he felt like a stupid puppeteer on a Broadway stage. “No sudden moves or we open fire!” the faceless voice threatened him.

  “Here goes nothing,” Golem told Miss Fire. He leaned down and, with a sharp jerk, ripped a tire from a Honda Civic. Even as he began to lean down, the guns of the police officers erupted. He could feel each bullet slam into him, some powerful enough to blast out of his back, taking scatterings of dirt and mud with them. But, for each bullet that tore away a chunk of his building material, another ten helped replace it by becoming lodged in his body. It didn’t hurt and the boy behind the monster was only aware of them, not inconvenienced by them in the slightest. As long as they didn’t blow away a sizable portion of his body, he was unfazed by the barrage of bullets. With a powerful throw, he sent the wheel at one of the lights trained on him. His throw was off, and the wheel slammed against the side of the cruiser, closer to the trunk than the front door. The sheer power behind the throw was enough to flatten the tire on impact, and it pushed the cruiser back a few feet, knocking down several police officers. There the rim stayed, embedded in the metal of the side panel.

  Golem frowned as much as his face would allow. Ripping the other rim off the Civic, he launched it, trying to put even more power behind it. This one hit its mark and shattered the searchlight that was trained on him. The rim sheared off the searchlight from its place on the car, and continued on, slamming into the chest of one of the police officers. Golem didn’t need superior hearing to hear what kind of damage the sharp edge had done to the man. The wet sound of bones breaking and the high pitched scream that ended as soon as it began was enough to let Golem know he had just killed a man. Another man. Part of him recoiled in horror at the concept. He had seen many people die in the various video games that he played, and each was done in by the simple mash of a button, of the twitch of a joystick. A simple thought from the boy, and a life was snuffed out forever. The part of him that recognized this was the real deal, and not a video game had shut up, and locked itself away in the back of his mind. The rest of him pushed its way forward and relished in the idea that he could wreak so much havoc with his monstrous beast.

  “Fun,” Golem said aloud, the boy having not even recognized he said anything or had let the words transfer to his creation. This time, the passenger side door was launched, but the police officer it was intended for ducked seconds before and now hid behind the cruiser.

  It was then that the gunshots stopped. The whole mood of the scene had changed. It was apparent in the screams and curses coming from the police that they were no longer secure in their smugness of having overwhelming firepower. They were ants before the giant.

  The monster that was Golem swiveled its thick head to look at Miss Fire, “Why are you missing out on all the fun?”

  She nodded at him, looked for all the world like a leather bound ninja. With that, she curled her hand and set her beautiful gaze upon it. In her palm, a small, pulsating, purple ball of fire began to expand, starting as first a simple glimmer, and then rolling in upon itself again and again until it grew into a tiny purple sun floating inches above her leather-clad hand.

  “Make a big boom,” Golem cooed at her, chuckling with his gravelly voice.

  Miss Fire sprung up and launched the ball at the furthest of the cruisers ranged around them. Golem didn’t understand why she wouldn’t have aimed at the closest, until the ball fell a couple feet short and landed on the parking lot pavement.

  The resulting explosion devastated the surrounding area.

  The sheer force of the blast knocked Golem back a few steps, shearing off several layers of dirt as it did. The intended target police cruiser was launched into the air like a kid’s toy being kicked across the yard. It spun and flipped in the air until it slammed home in the parking lot of a fast food establishment. The impact alone turned the already twisted metal into a larger than life fragm
entation grenade. Metal shards flew everywhere, and since the explosion was behind the police officers, they were unprotected from the blast. Several screams erupted as metal lacerated skin, and even one larger shard that looked like a piece of the hood sliced cleanly through a female police officer’s leg. In a fountain of blood, she fell to the ground, screaming for help and god all at the same time.

  Again, that part of Golem tried to speak up to tell him it was wrong what he and Miss Fire were doing, but again, it was shoved away by the part of him that had grown up on this kind of carnage on television and in the movie theaters. All around him police were scrambling, trying to find ways to get to safety from the unprecedented attack. Golem ripped up a handicapped parking sign, and with a twist of his hands, turned the sheared metal at the bottom into a sort of corkscrew. He leaned back, drew his arm back, intending to turn the sign into a spear. He focused in on one officer, who looked to be trying to sneak his way to the fallen female officer who still pleaded for God’s help in this. The stealthy officer turned and saw that Golem glared at him. The officers eyes widened in fear as he looked into those dark caverns that played at being eyes. He tried to back-peddle behind the cruiser, but Golem lunged forward and let the makeshift spear fly. The police officer tried to move, and the spear missed his chest by only inches, burying itself instead into his abdomen. The corkscrew tip of the sign drove hard into the concrete, turning the police officer into one of those bugs in a collection, skewered and locked in place. Rich, red blood poured from the police officer's mouth as he tried to say something to Golem, but Golem continued looking at what else he could use to cause even more damage.