I Am Phantom

by Sean Fletcher

  But I was lost.

  The high buildings on either side of me made it nearly impossible to see the Queensbury campus where I had come from. I had never been to this part of the city and definitely not at night. I needed a better vantage point.

  Thinking clearly (because that’s what I was doing best at the moment), I latched on to the nearest fire escape. It was ten stories to the top of the building. There was a lot of fumbling and nervous swaying side to side and the monk’s robe was nearly impossible to lift my legs in, but I finally made it up.

  At last, a good view. I saw the campus behind me. I had come out above the thin layer of smog and dirty streetlight below. Dark faced glass sidings and vacant rooftops surrounded me. Lights from the tops of buildings and cell phone towers looked like stars and I leaned back and felt my skin prickle as I got close to the edge and a rush of wind brushed up the side of the building. A lot of the buildings were about the same height. Perfect for Parkour.

  Probably shouldn’t try it when I’m buzzed, but still perfect for Parkour.

  I made a mental picture of which way I had to go to get back to campus and started climbing down the other side of the building.

  Man, the guys in the alley were quiet.

  I mean, I’m a quiet guy, but they made no sound at all. They had formed a little Congo line from the rear of the building I was climbing down all the way to a truck, turned off and dark. There were five of them. At least I thought there were; my head was spinning again.

  I let go of the fire escape and promptly stumbled over. The men kept handing boxes to each other, completely oblivious that I was there.

  Maybe I should try to stop them, I thought. Wait, what was I doing? I had no idea who these people were or why they were here, or even if they were doing something illegal. Maybe they were being all stealthy and secretive and loading boxes in the dead of night because…okay, that did sound illegal.

  But what was I supposed to do about it? I should just walk away and call the police. They would be able to take care of this, this was their job. And yet, I had to do something. It was if I just let them continue doing whatever they were doing then I would be no better than Sykes. He had said we were the same, at least in abilities. I still wasn’t willing to believe him. He was right and yet he was wrong. He had chosen what he wanted to do with his powers. He wanted to kill and cause fear. It was time for me to choose what to do with mine.

  The guy at the rear of the line, the one moving boxes from the back of the building, finally noticed me.

  “Hey!” He immediately dropped the box and pulled a gun on me. “Who are you?”

  I…I just kind of stood there. At least part of my brain was making a plan of attack, imagining where and how I could take each one down. But I was a little slow on the uptake.

  The other men turned. They also pulled guns. Guns. Another sign this was probably illegal.

  “Hands up, freak show, or I’m putting one between your eyes,” the man near the truck said.

  “You can’t see my eyes,” I said disbelievingly. I could reach him pretty quick.

  “It’s just some bum,” another said. “Give me the next box and get him out of here.”

  “What if he tells someone?” the man near the truck said, keeping his gun on me.

  “He won’t know what to tell anyone if you shut up,” another man snapped. “He’s probably all shot up anyway.”

  Both men lowered their guns a bit.

  And that’s when I moved.

  Holy CRAP was I slow.

  And by slow, I mean everything was at normal speed; for them, anyway. I really hated that punch.

  Speaking of punch… the guy near the building took one to the face and down he went. I spun, ducked under another man’s arm, elbowed him in the sternum and threw him against the wall.

  One of the other guys dropped his box and tackled me in the side. We tumbled into a dumpster. I rolled on my back (slooow) and, with all my strength, kicked him off. He hit the fourth guy and by then I was up again and hit both of them beneath the ribs in a sweeping punch that would have made Sonam happy.

  Now for number—

  Click

  “I don’t know what you’re game is but it’s over, punk.”

  Punk? This guy didn’t sound too old himself. But he was holding a gun and that meant he made the rules. I felt so sluggish right then I didn’t think I could twitch before he shot me. I turned towards him. He was shaking just a bit but the gun leveled at my chest was completely steady. It was strange. I felt no fear having it pointed at me, knowing that at any moment I could be shot and left to bleed out and die. Was it the fact that I struck fear into the man? Was it a high?

  “Now get out of here before I—”

  A trash can toppled over at the entrance of the alley and the guy glanced over his shoulder for a millisecond.

  Big mistake.

  I came under him, low, with my center of balance strong, and hit just below the armpit.

  The guy’s arm crumpled and I hit him again in the jaw and he was out, leaving me in a silent alleyway with five incapacitated guys who had been doing who knows what. I needed to get out of there before somebody saw. But I lingered. Partly in shock, partly to let my lethargic brain process what I had just done. I should have been scared but instead I felt more alive than ever before. A feeling of purpose and possibility settled on my shoulders. It was a good feeling.

  My adrenaline was pumping by then so I moved a little faster. I Parkoured it back to the dorms, leaping over fences, slipping through back yards and weaving through neighborhoods and vacant streets.

  I managed to make it inside the dorm without seeing anybody except a couple guys and a girl far down my hall. Only when I was completely alone in the darkness of my room did I let out a pent up breath.

  What had I just done? Short of assaulting some guys who were probably—okay, were—doing something illegal.

  I pulled off my robe and stared at it all crumpled in my hands. My head was killing me, but in the undercurrent of the pain I felt purpose. Not extreme guilt as I had the first time I had hurt somebody, those guys who were car jacking. There was rightness to it, too. I had stopped those men, they had been criminals, and I’d stopped them. I had made a difference. It wasn’t much and it wasn’t legal, but it had been good. Those men had been stopped. Because of me.

  That was as much as my tired brain was going to reason. As soon as my head hit the pillow, my weary body steered me off to sleep.

  Cody’s text woke me up. Thank goodness it was Saturday because I had no intention of using my brain any more than was absolutely necessary to grunt and breathe.

  I grabbed my phone, ignored my headache, and read:

  Meet at Lab. Something you need to see Our code is 1994

  That sounded ominous. Against my fatigued body’s wishes, I cleaned up and was in the Lab elevator almost half an hour later.

  The bell dinged and the doors opened. The clear glass windows leading my way revealed vacant rooms with projects hidden under white cloth. There was nobody there except in the last one.

  “This had better be good,” I said the instant I stepped inside. Cody lay facedown on a table, sleeping. Matt and Melanie were both seated in chairs beside him, gazing intently at Matt’s laptop.

  I walked over and shook Cody. “Hey, what did you want? I’m about to pass out from lack of sleep.”

  Cody grunted and pointed at Matt’s laptop. I tried to go look but Melanie stood and held her hands up to stop me.

  “Where did you go last night? After you left the party?”

  It took me a moment to remember what I had done last night. A party and then I left and then—oh. “Uh, you know. I wandered around campus for a bit and then went back to the dorm.”

  Melanie lowered her chin. “Where did you really go?”

  Last night’s consequences were real go-getters to have caught up with me already.

  “That’s where I really went.”

  Melanie st
epped aside and I finally got to see the computer screen. The video looked like it was from some grainy security camera but what it showed didn’t lie:

  Me, or at least a shrouded figure dressed in a robe suspiciously similar to mine, beating up five guys in an alley. Some news channel woman narrated:

  “Officials say the unknown figure has not been found though police are urging anyone with information to please step forward.

  “Dolborn INC. representatives have released a statement saying that the goods recovered from the scene do match those stolen from one of their supply shipments earlier this week. Back to Christie.”

  “There are all kinds of phantoms about around Halloween, aren’t there?” the anchorwoman said, chuckling. “Looks more like a lost trick or treater who’s been playing too many video games.”

  Matt paused the video.

  “Was that you, Drake?” Melanie asked. Boy, she didn’t beat around the bush. “Cody told me what you did to those car thieves. I know you could do that.”

  “It’s not me.”

  “It is you,” Matt said. “I followed you from the party after you left. I was there in the alleyway. I accidentally—”

  “Knocked over a trash can,” I groaned, the memory trickling back. “That saved me.”

  Melanie crossed her arms. Matt stared at me in his own unnerving way. Why would it hurt to tell them? They were my friends and I hadn’t technically done anything wrong except assault some criminals.

  “It was me,” I said.

  Cody rolled over on the table. “We know. We wanted to hear you say it.”

  The admittance hung between us, as unsure of what to do as we were. I shifted awkwardly from foot to foot, not wanting to fully accept what I had done. I took a deep breath.

  “Matt, can you look up something called Project Midnight for me?” Matt gave me a quizzical look and then began typing on his laptop.

  “I’m not coming up with anything. It doesn’t exist.”

  “It does,” I countered. “It’s why I’m…” Different. A freak. “Not normal,” I finished lamely.

  Melanie shot a look at Cody and Matt. They all looked as though they had talked about this before. Without me.

  “Why did you lie to us?” Melanie said.

  “Because you wouldn’t believe the truth.” The video of me taking down the men in the alleyway kept playing behind Matt. It was hard to draw my eyes from it.

  “We’ve all seen what you can do,” Melanie said. “When you saved those people from having their car jacked—”

  “Fighting at the gym,” Cody added.

  “In the alleyway,” Matt finished. Cody shrugged as in ‘see, told you’.

  “The truth about…whatever this is can’t be that bad.”

  “It’s not you I have to convince,” I said softly. “I’m different. It started when I was fourteen and gotten stronger. I’m,” I gestured to the screen. “faster, stronger. I can learn fighting techniques like that.” I snapped my fingers. They were all silent. Cody didn’t look like he had a headache anymore.

  “How?” Matt said.

  “Project Midnight,” I said. “I think. I don’t know.” I threw up my hands. “I know it exists but…I don’t know, maybe he was lying.”

  “Who?”

  “Sykes. He’s just like me. Superhuman. I met him after he escaped and he showed me something called Project Midnight. Sykes said they were the ones that did this to both of us. I don’t want to believe him. I don’t want to believe we have anything in common.”

  To their credit, if any of them were surprised or horrified that I had met with an escaped psychopathic killer in my down time, they didn’t show it. Maybe they were too shocked and the repercussions would come later. Or, since they had seen what I could do, maybe it wasn’t much of a shock anymore.

  “I’ve never heard of Project Midnight,” Cody said. Matt was clicking away again, probably annoyed that something had escaped his all-powerful search. “You?”

  “Nothing. However,” Matt turned his laptop towards me. “Give me some time and I could probably find it through this.”

  Numerical figures, pictures and words scrolled across the screen too fast for me to get it all. It was the same thing he had showed me before.

  “You still have the live stream going?” Melanie said incredulously. “You told me you stopped that!”

  “What kind of privileges do they give you kids?” I asked.

  “Too many,” Melanie mumbled. “And I’m not going to tell any one, Cody, no matter how much I disagree with this. This could mean federal prison time.”

  “You’re a saint, Melanie,” Cody said.

  “How will that help me?” I asked. “What does it do?”

  “With the live feed and info I can triangulate points of interest, people, places, given enough time. I may not be the best at sports or…socializing or any of those wastes of time, but I am always one step ahead. I like knowing everything about anything I’m involved in. This didn’t take me too long to put together. I’ll find out something on Project Midnight. I can assure you of that.”

  Melanie looked like she was thinking hard. “Drake, what do you plan to do? I mean, what is it you want?”

  That question had been haunting me for a while. And until now I hadn’t been able to really put a finger on what it is I wanted to do about Sykes or Project Midnight or even my abilities.

  “I want answers,” I finally said. “And I want to stop Sykes.”

  “Let the police handle Sykes,” Cody said. “He’s got nothing to do with you.”

  “He’s got everything to do with me!” I said. “Sykes is kind of like me. He can tell me all about what’s going on with me.”

  “The police will stop him,” Cody said. I shook my head.

  “You guys haven’t seen what he can do. I know I’m the only one who can stop him. Right now he’s out there doing who knows what in the name of his justice. I need to stop him. He thinks we’re the same. That I should kill whoever I feel like because I think they wronged me in the past.” I stopped squeezing the table, which had began to dent. “I want to prove I’m not like him. For everything bad he does I’ll do good. That way I won’t turn into him.”

  “What do you mean ‘turn in to him’?” Matt said.

  I met their eyes. “Go crazy. The same thing that gave Sykes those abilities also drove him insane. I don’t know if that will happen to me but…” I shrugged. “We’ll see. I need to find out what he knows. Find if there’s a cure.”

  The silence that left was overwhelming. Then Matt, ever the sensitive one, said, “That’s cool.” Melanie turned on him.

  “That is not cool, Matt. I can’t believe you’d even say that.” I had to agree with her. I hadn’t exactly thought of the prospect of going insane as hip.

  “You two are talking about Drake who, in case you missed it, isn’t a super spy or Navy Seal or whatever. He can’t just go around beating up people who have guns and could kill him. What you’re talking about—normal people don’t do that.”

  “I think we already established that I’m not normal,” I said.

  “But you can’t go running around the city. People would see you and…just, no.”

  “I think I could help with that,” Cody said, rolling sluggishly off the table. He looked me in the eye. “You really want to stop Sykes?”

  “Yes?”

  “And you really want to find answers?”

  “Yes…”

  Cody clapped his hands together. “Great! You see, I seem to be lacking an end of the year project to show the Lab.”

  “Our water molecule materializer—” Matt started.

  “Matt buddy, the only time you let me touch that thing was when I stopped it from falling over. With Drake I can design a new costume, maybe even weapons.” He waved away our incredulous looks. “You want a way to move around the city, do some good, find Sykes and this Project Midnight thing? You can’t do that wearing jeans and a T-shirt.”

&nb
sp; He went over to a notebook next to Matt’s laptop and started scribbling down some notes, tearing out sheets and pasting them to the wall. “The Lab will give us the materials, you know that. I’ve already thought of a bunch of things I want to do and I can pretend I’m making it for military application.”

  I turned in disbelief to Melanie for confirmation and she shrugged in a ‘he’s right, believe it or not’ kind of way.

  “You can do that?” I confirmed.

  “I can,” Cody said. “Give me a week. I wrote the schematics this morning well before any sane person should of had get up, but Matt insisted when he saw what you did last night, Drake.”

  “Matt, you can help me with the info? Try to find out more about Project Midnight?”

  Matt didn’t answer since he was so absorbed in his computer screen. I took that as a yes.

  Melanie didn’t look nearly convinced. “Does this really mean that much to you?” She asked, but it didn’t sound accusing. It sounded like she already knew the answer but still wanted to try to dissuade me.

  “This is about who I am, Melanie.”

  And me? Was this really what it amounted to? My path to resolution and peace? Would Sonam be proud? Would he consider this a good use of my talents?

  And just like that the guilt vanished. Already I felt different. I had a new sense of purpose and right. I could make a real difference using my abilities. I could take what made me an outcast and use it to be a hero. I wouldn’t become what Sykes thought I would be.

  It was a glorious feeling.

  “Three down. Rutherford should be around there somewhere.” Matt’s voice crackled in the earpiece Cody had made for me. It was a risk going out without a legit costume (not to mention I looked stupid with a monk’s robe and ski mask on). But as I leapt off a wall and kneed a guy in the chest it felt well worth it.

  The rest of Rutherford’s men spread apart, making it much harder for me. It’s funny how easily I slipped into my new role as a vigilante. Almost as if it had been waiting for me all my life. It wasn’t the physical challenges I had to get used to. I’d been doing most of these things for a while now with Parkour. Running up walls? No problem. Jumping across buildings? Piece of cake. Hurting people who deserved it?