by Peter Darley
“These guys in robes and hoods came after her, and I told her to get into my van. After that, they came after us on the Golden State Freeway in an SUV. We were lucky to get away with our lives.”
Josie turned to the camera. “And here’s the police footage of the incident as it actually happened. It can now be revealed that the blue van you’re about to see was Woody and Ms. Addison.”
Phil and Dredo watched the action unfold—the chase, the impacts, the sideswipes, the police, the tanker truck explosion, and ultimately, the SUV exploding.”
After the footage ended, Woody continued. “Heather stayed at my place for awhile, and then we hooked up with her boyfriend, B.J., The Interceptor. He told us the disasters that have been occurring worldwide are the work of an apocalyptic cult we know only as C.O.T. Nobody knows what those initials stand for. We decided to set up our own movement to inform people about what’s going on. The website and blog is now up.”
“What’s it called?” Josie said.
Woody looked into the camera. “Firedrake dot US.”
“And who are the others you refer to?”
“My friends. I think one of them is watching right now. Artist, Phil Cole.”
Phil smiled as he gauged Dredo’s astounded reaction. “There you have it, sir. And I have a wealth of inside information. B.J. told us stuff that’s so obvious, but which none of your writers have ever considered in twenty-six-years.”
“What stuff would that be?”
“I’m sorry, sir. You’ll get all that when my name is on that dotted line.”
Dredo held his gaze for a tense moment, and then said, “All right, Mr. Cole. I truly appreciate you breaking the rules by coming to me in this way. You were right, and I was wrong, OK? You have the inside info, and your work is exceptional.” He touched the voice pad on his desk phone. “Marie, would you inform our illustrious competitors from West Fiftieth Street, New York, that I’ll be late for our meeting. And tell Vecchio to end his run on Interceptor with issue three-hundred-thirty-eight?”
“End his run?”
“That’s right, the end of the Cataclysm storyline. We have a new artist for the title. We’re taking it in a whole new direction. Ask Vecchio if he’d like to pick up Blowout from issue one-hundred. That should help soften it for him.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Thank you, Marie.” Westbrook stood and offered Phil his hand. “Welcome to Cosmic Comics, Phil.”
Phil grinned with overwhelming elation.
***
Deborah Beaumont ran frantically into Jed Crane’s office.
“Debs? What’s wrong?” he said.
“You should turn on your TV, sir. Channel 7, Los Angeles.”
Crane waved his hand over the holo-screen sensor and selected the channel via a touch sensor on the holo-menu. Within seconds, his face assumed a ghastly pallor as he watched Woody Schuster’s interview. “Oh, my God! What the hell is that idiot doing? Using his relationship with B.J. and Heather to put himself on the rise? He’s gonna get himself killed.”
“Is there anything I can do?” Deborah said.
Crane glanced at his watch. “Contact operations. This is an emergency. I need a jet flight to Los Angeles immediately.”
Forty-Two
Gotta Get Away
B.J. opened his eyes. Again. How many times had he fallen asleep and then awoken, only to see nothing ahead of him? It was pitch darkness. Initially, he thought he’d been buried alive, but his ability to wave his arms around proved that wasn’t so. It was a room of some kind. But where? Nothing was discernible. He felt lost in a void, a leaf in the storm. He couldn’t ascertain whether he’d been in this place for a day or a month. He touched the base of his skull and winced with the pain where they’d cold-cocked him. That indicated he hadn’t been in this place for too long, even though it seemed like an eternity. The bruise wouldn’t have felt as tender as that, even after a couple of days. There was no concept of time here. There was no concept of anything. Fear and dread were his only companions.
What were they going to do to him? Would he ever see Heather again? Her image filled his mind, consuming him with bitter sadness. He needed her so much in that moment—her inimitable beauty, compassion, and her feisty spirit.
A shard of light appeared before him and a tray of food appeared through a porthole. He glanced to his left, aided by the fleeting light. He saw a toilet of some kind in the floor, but he knew he couldn’t afford to waste a second. He was so hungry and he needed food.
Scrambling forward, he attempted to grasp the sliding door, reaching for the light, but he was too late. His knuckle touched the tray and he tried to remember what he’d seen on it when the porthole was open. Was it chicken? Maybe turkey? He couldn’t be sure. He just knew he had to eat.
Wearing nothing but his shorts, the cold was getting to him, forcing him to wrap his arms around himself. He felt around for the food and feasted ravenously.
In total darkness, akin to blindness, he had to rely on his memories of the light from the porthole in order to gauge the room. His priority next time would be to look to his right to see what was there. Anything might be useful in this situation.
He’d never felt so alone. What was this terrible place? Never a subscriber to religion, he had to acknowledge it had all the hallmarks of the traditional Hell.
As he chewed on whatever it was they’d pushed through the door, he felt like an animal. He was in a menagerie. A living nightmare.
His fingers scrambled around the tray for the last of the food. What was it? Mashed potato? Sweet potato? Mashed carrot? When his fingers couldn’t detect anything else, he picked up the tray and hurled it into the darkness with a cry of rage.
He licked the dregs off his fingers and closed his eyes. The view was no different.
After a time, he succumbed to sleep.
“Son? B.J.?”
He opened his eyes and could see his father in the original Interceptor armor clearly, despite the darkness. He recalled one of his classes when he’d first joined EDID. Solitary confinement caused the brain to fill in the gaps left by sensory deprivation, in the form of hallucinations. He remembered the cult members vowing he would join them, minutes before he was taken. Now they were trying to break him. This wasn’t real. His father wasn’t really there.
He stood and gripped his head, despairingly. I’m losing my mind. “I don’t believe in you.”
“But I believe in you.”
His father stood beside him and removed his helmet. B.J. couldn’t resist looking at him.
“What do you have to lose by talking to me?” his father said.
“What do I have to lose? Are you kidding me? How about my sanity?”
“I’m saving your sanity.”
“I know who you are, Dad. You were a psychopath. How do I know I can trust you?”
“Yes. I did terrible things. But that wasn’t me, B.J.”
“So who was it? Who am I talking to now? The Scorpion? The manufactured persona my mother fell in love with? Or someone else entirely?”
His father looked at him with compassionate eyes. “I thought we’d come to terms with all that. Look inside your heart, B.J. You know who I am.”
“That’s my mother and her absurd, reincarnation delusions talking. I am not you. I am me.”
“Yes, you are, and you are about to experience your finest hour.”
“I’m in the dark, and I’m losing control. I don’t know where I am, and I’m talking to a ghost. That’s not my idea of my finest hour, Dad.”
“You’ve been fighting harder than most people do.”
“Yeah, and I’m not going to lose myself in bullshit. You’re not real. You hear me? You’re not real!”
“So how is it I know what’s on the other side of that door?”
“What’s on the other side of the door, Dad.”
“The shock of your life.”
Frustration raged in B.J.’s heart. “Why can’t you be more spec
ific?”
His father looked away.
“Ah-ha. See? You never tell me anything I don’t already know. You’re just a figment of my imagination. You can’t tell me what’s going to happen, ever.”
“You’re right,” his father said. “This is your own path. You have to discover it for yourself, otherwise it will have no meaning. No one should know their own destiny ahead of time. I’ve already told you more than I should.”
“Total cop-out. You’re just a manifestation of me being broken. I’m falling down and I can’t stop it because I don’t know what I’m into.”
“You will find your way, B.J. You’ll find it for both of us. You will save them all.”
“Who? Save who?”
“Everyone.”
B.J. clenched his fists in an attempt to get a grip on reality. No. This is sensory deprivation. I don’t have a narcissistic personality disorder. I’m no better than anyone else. I have to stay grounded.
But he couldn’t deny the sense of comfort he found having his father for company in this terrible place. It was irresistible. He didn’t want him to leave. “Tell me about Snooky, Dad.”
“My bear?”
“Yeah.”
His father smiled. “Cute little thing. He was lost. He came to me when I was almost as lonely as you are right now. I fed him, I loved him, and he kept me going. He was all I had to look forward to every day, until . . . your mom.”
B.J. chuckled with disregard “Yep. Everything I already knew. That’s exactly what I expected you’d say, word-for-word.”
His father disappeared.
B.J. reached out into the darkness where his father had been sitting. He attempted to rationalize the visions. They started after he’d performed his first rescue—the first time he’d emulated what he believed his father used to do. He heard his father’s voice on subsequent missions when he thought he needed his advice. He heard it again when he needed answers after his mother told him the truth. But it was all in his mind.
There were no ghosts, and he didn’t share a soul with his father. Heather was right. All of those notions were outrageous.
He lay down against the wall. At least there was a semblance of freedom in sleep. Consciousness was the source of all torment.
Hours passed. Or was it days? B.J. opened his eyes to see his father sitting beside him again. “Oh, you’re back?”
“You’re gonna get away from here,” his father said.
“How do you know?”
“You’ll see.”
“Can you give me a clue?”
“Stand up.”
“What?
“Stand up.”
B.J stood. “Let me know if this tickles.”
His father laughed heartily. “You’ve got a good sense of humor, Son. Hold on to that.”
“Hold On! The Interceptor marching song, right?”
“You got it. Whether you’re you, me, or both, there’s one thing that’s undeniable, Son. You are The Interceptor. Close your eyes.”
B.J. complied, consciously humoring his own hallucination. And yet he could still see his father coming closer toward him until he became a blur. Then a shudder went through him, as though another force had entered his body . . .
He shot bolt upright, huddled in the corner of the dark cell. He’d been waning, but now he felt possessed of a strength he’d never known before, like a new fire in his blood. Yes. I am The Interceptor.
He stood and headed in the direction of the door. He punched it repeatedly until his bones stung and his knuckles bled, but he didn’t stop. In his mind’s eye, his fist was clad in the bonded, titanium alloy of the INT-Nine. It was a part of him. “I’ve gotta get away!”
Although barefoot, he pictured the armor upon his feet and kicked at the door with skilful precision. Using honed, karate techniques, he was sure he could feel the metallic door beginning to buckle. My new way is on the other side of the door. “Gotta get away!”
The porthole in the door suddenly opened. “Hey, take it easy,” a female voice said.
He stopped kicking. She sounds familiar. “Who are you?”
“Just hold on,” she said. “You are gonna get away. I’m getting you out of there.”
Forty-Three
Insider
“Come on in, sweetheart.”
Heather stood on the front porch of Faraday Ranch and stared at Belinda, distressed. “Please tell me Jed called you? I’d hate to have shown up here unannounced.”
“Yes. He called Ty, and Ty told me what had happened.”
Heather carried her suitcase over the threshold and put it down in the hallway.
Ty came out of the living room. “Heather.”
“Hi, Mr. Faraday. It’s been a long time.”
“Too long. Long enough for you to drop the ‘Mr. Faraday’ stuff. Just call me Ty. Damn, you look good.”
Emily, Jake, and David Spicer came out of the living room. After a heartfelt series of hugs, Heather glanced up the stairwell. “I think maybe I should drop my stuff off, and then we can talk.”
“I’ll take you up,” Belinda said. “Take B.J.’s old room.”
Heather ascended the stairs and stepped into the room with Belinda. She immediately sensed B.J.’s essence. It comforted and yet saddened her in the same moment. Tears came to her eyes, uncontrollably.
Belinda touched her shoulder. “Don’t be sad, sweetheart. He’ll be back. He always came back.”
Heather smiled, humoring her. Belinda was obviously still of the belief that B.J. was the reincarnation of his father, whom she believed was invincible. “I sure hope you’re right. I just wish I could be as sure as you are.”
Belinda walked over to B.J.’s bed and sat down. “So, tell me what happened?”
“I’m not sure. I wasn’t there. It’s all third hand. Jed told me B.J. received a message from the cult. They said they were going to destroy Washington D.C. unless he met up with them, so he took the armor and flew out there.”
“Where?”
“Somewhere in D.C. Apparently there was a fight, and somehow, they got him,” Heather said, choked.
“I am worried about him and what he must be going through. But I know he’ll escape. I just know it.”
“Let’s hope so. I just can’t believe they got him.”
“I lost count of the number of times they caught his father. He always got away. I saw him die twice. One time, we even gave him a funeral. He still came back. Those guys don’t die until they choose to, and B.J. is a long way from that.”
Heather stared at her, not knowing how to respond. Belinda’s serene demeanor seemed almost faith-like. She understood why Belinda believed as she did. She just couldn’t bring herself to share the same optimism.
“Still,” Belinda said, “it’s a trying time for the family. I can’t tell you how much it means having you here, Heather. We need you.”
Heather moved over to the bed and gave her a hug.
A voice came from the doorway. “Is everything OK?”
They looked up and saw Tyler standing there.
“I’m just getting settled in,” Heather said.
“Sure. Treat it like home.” Tyler walked over to the bedside cabinet and pulled the drawer open. “Let’s clear some of this stuff out so you can use it.”
Heather watched as he took out a few old cell phones and gadgets. And then she noticed him take out a very familiar comic book. “Wait.”
“Wait what?”
She moved over to him and took the copy of Interceptor #1 out of his hand. She studied the spine intently. There were a few small creases around the staples. But it still seemed very solid and tight to her untrained eye, probably just a notch below newsstand condition. “Ty, could you tell me where you got this?”
Tyler grinned, his eyes glancing fleetingly upward, reminiscence-like. “As a matter of fact, I picked it up in a place called Barstow, California, back in twenty-sixteen.”
“When this first came out, right?”
“Right.”
“OK, well it shouldn’t be left just lying around, trust me.”
“An old comic?”
“This isn’t just an old comic. Do you have any idea what Interceptor #1 is worth in this condition?”
Tyler shrugged. “No. Do you?”
She looked at the comic again. “I can’t be absolutely sure. I’m not a comic expert. But from what I do know, I’d say probably tens of thousands of dollars.”
He chuckled. “Nah. That’s ridiculous.”
“No, it isn’t. B.J. and I have a friend in L.A. Woody Schuster. He’s a comic book expert, and he has that same comic in some kind of official jewel case. I think he said the term for it was slabbed. It prevents the comic from degrading.”
Tyler glanced down at the comic with a look of astonishment. It seemed rather ironic. Tyler was a multi-billionaire, and yet the idea of a comic being worth thousands of dollars had taken his breath away. “Well, what should I do with it?” he said.
Heather pointed to the comic. “Slab it.”
***
It had just turned 2 p.m. Jed Crane stepped out of a cab and walked along the San Fernando driveway of Woody Schuster’s home. The California heat had struck him immediately after stepping off the jet.
A familiar, young, suntanned male opened the front door before Crane could even knock. Woody swallowed hard. “Y-you’ve come to arrest me, haven’t you?”
Crane felt a swell of pity go through him. It was blatantly clear this kid was not a criminal, but rather an invisible soul who was striving to be noticed. “No, Mr. Schuster, I’m not here to arrest you. If I’d wanted that, I’d have arranged for the FBI to show up here, so you can think yourself damn lucky. But I do need to talk to you.”
“What do you need to talk to me about?”
Woody’s trembling hands were an exhausting sight to behold. Crane feared the kid was going to suffer a cardiac arrest, and decided to show him his ID card. “I’m Director Jed Crane from the Emergency Defense and Investigation Division. I’m B.J.’s boss, so you can relax.”