Sentinels

by Darius Brasher

  “There’s no need to worry,” I said. My voice was strangely calm. “I’m not going to kill you.” I raised a hand slightly. I pulled Mechano’s various severed limbs toward us. I piled them on top of his torso, where they landed with a wet clatter. The stack of wet robot parts looked like a madman’s art project. Mechano’s head swiveled slightly in what would have been puzzlement on a real person.

  I said, “I’m not going to kill you because I can’t. To kill someone means to take their life. You’re not alive. You’re just a collection of circuits and servos that pursues its agenda with no regard for how it impacts real people. You are nothing more than the phrase ‘the end justifies the means’ in mechanical form. Seer and Millennium will go to MetaHold. But not you. MetaHold is where they imprison Metahumans. You’re not human. You haven’t been for a long time.”

  I gathered my will. I surrounded Mechano and me in a spherical force field.

  “What are you doing?” I heard an emotion in Mechano’s voice I’d never heard there before: Fear.

  “Taking out the trash,” I said.

  I triggered my powers, reaching deep down inside of Mechano.

  Late one night, back when I had been in the Academy, I had felt the atoms of everything swirling around me, like an intricate dance set to unheard music. In my half-asleep state, the energy that had bound the atoms together seemed to cry for release. I had almost triggered my powers to unleash that energy, but fortunately had not. The next day I calculated I would have set off a massive nuclear explosion that would have incinerated the Academy, everyone in it, and taken much of Oregon with it.

  That was what I did to Mechano now. All at once, I broke up the molecules and atoms that composed his robot body.

  Mechano’s body disappeared, replaced by blinding light. There was roar, like that of countless erupting volcanoes. The energy unleashed was immense. Even with the Omega suit, I struggled to absorb it all. The nuclear explosions the Metahuman John Tilly set off in the Japanese cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki to end World War Two paled in comparison to this one. If I hadn’t erected the force field around us to contain the energy I had unlocked by breaking up Mechano’s body, I would have released a destructive blast the likes of which the world had never seen before.

  Now I am become Death, destroyer of worlds, came unbidden words to my mind. They were from the Bhagavad Gita, the Hindu scripture Truman had been reading in his office when I’d first met him. That seemed like a lifetime ago. It’s weird, the things that occur to you and when they occur to you.

  Finally, I sucked into my body all the energy released from Mechano’s destruction. My eyes, burning with barely suppressed energy, probed where Mechano had been. Nothing of him remained. Every iota of him was gone, as if he had never existed. The bomb he had planted had left no trace of Neha. It seemed only fitting to do the same to him.

  I dropped the force field around me. My entire being shook with the effort of containing all this energy. I was like an overcharged battery. I had to release this energy before my control of it slipped. During the Trials, when I had absorbed an explosion’s energy for the first time, I had vented the excess energy up into the air to avoid injuring anyone. With the kind of energy I now contained, I hesitated to vent it like that again. It was possible I would set the Earth’s atmosphere on fire.

  I hesitated, tempted. With the woman I loved dead because of me, the world seemed empty and without meaning. Would it be any great tragedy to watch it burn?

  I took a long, ragged breath. I tried to shove the selfish thought aside. I had sworn a Heroic oath. Unlike these three Sentinels, I intended to honor it. Mom was dead. Dad was dead. Neha was dead. My oath was the only thing I had left.

  Before I gave into the dark temptation which threatened to seduce me like a whore’s embrace, I sprang into the air. With all the power my body now contained, I punched through the solidly constructed floors of the mansion like they were mere soap bubbles. I rose in the night air, higher, higher, higher, and higher still, until I was well clear of Earth’s atmosphere. I turned away from the planet. Space was dark and cold as a tomb. I opened my mouth. The energy that had been Mechano vomited out of me. It raced into the lifeless void of space. The temptation to follow it until there was no air left in the force field that surrounded me was almost irresistible.

  I reluctantly turned my back to space and the thought. Earth glittered like a jewel. Despite all that had happened, it kept right on spinning. The sun would rise in the morning. People would wake up, kiss their spouses and kids goodbye, and go to work. Because I carried the Omega spirit and wore a Hero’s cape, it was my job to make sure that what had happened to the people I loved did not happen to the people they loved.

  I did not want the responsibility. Before Dad died, I had not wanted to be a superhero. I sure as hell didn’t want to be one now. I just wanted to crawl into bed, pull the covers over my head, blot out the world, and dream of the people I had lost until I too was lost.

  But, like it or not, I did have this responsibility. It was clichéd, but true: With great power came great responsibility. Otherwise, you wound up behaving like the Sentinels had.

  Though I did not want to, I would try my best.

  Trying is all.

  CHAPTER 28

  I stood on top of the UWant Building. It was late. I was wide awake and alert despite not having slept much in the days since Neha died. The Omega suit made it so I got along just fine on a few hours of sleep. It was a blessing. I did not much like going to sleep anymore. Neha awaited me in my nightmares.

  I was perched on the roof’s ledge. My eyes were closed. My hands extended in front of me, like a maestro conducting an orchestra. My telekinetic touch was so acute now thanks to the Omega suit that I could monitor much of what was going on in Astor City without the bother of having to fly around on patrol. My silver white cape flapped in the breeze. It matched the color of the omega symbol on my chest. It was a silly affectation, letting this cape sprout out of the neck of the Omega suit. The cape served absolutely no practical purpose. And yet, wearing it made me feel more official somehow.

  It was a cold night. Colder than usual, even up this high up where it was always cold. Local weathermen said this coming winter would be an especially harsh one. If only the weather were the least of Astor City’s problems.

  Dad is dead because I refused to train in the use of my powers, I thought.

  Miles away, in Dog Cellar, five young men walked behind a shambling homeless man, whispering to themselves, egging each other on. The homeless man was dressed in rags, muttered to himself, and walked with a limp. He had nothing of value. The five following him must have known that. That did not prevent them from jumping him as soon as they all rounded the corner. My fingers splayed out. The men—no, the children, because that’s what they were in all the ways that mattered—were flung off the homeless man, yanked into the air by my powers.

  The homeless man cowered on the sidewalk. He looked up at the five in amazement through covered eyes, his eyes round through his fingers. The five hung in the air, yelping in surprise and confusion, their limbs sawing the air. Using a spray can from a nearby trash can, I quickly wrote a single word on the streetlamp lit sidewalk: “Run!” Then I smashed all five of them together like they were in a mid-air mosh pit, hard enough to rattle their bones. I shut off my hold on them, letting them fall heavily to the sidewalk. The instant they scrambled to their feet, they took off running away from the homeless man as if he were the Devil himself.

  The homeless man stared at the retreating five in awe. He got to his knees. His face turned up to the night sky. His hands were clasped in front of him.

  “Thank you Jesus!” he prayed aloud.

  Hardly.

  Hannah is dead because I was too naive to predict the consequences of using my powers.

  In Shangri-La, a ritzy residential subdivision in the northeastern part of the city, a masked man slid open a window on the first floor of the house of a family of
four. A young female and a young male were asleep in separate bedrooms. A man and a woman, presumably the parents, were asleep in the master bedroom. The masked man crept upstairs, into the dark bedroom of the young female. I had no idea how he knew which was her bedroom or how he had gotten past the house’s alarm system. Perhaps he had been stalking her for a while now.

  The man wrapped his hand around the female’s mouth, waking her. His other hand held a knife to her throat. He was aroused. My stomach churned. She had barely begun to develop, more girl than woman. She trembled in terror.

  I flung the man off the girl. She screamed as the masked man sailed through the air, slamming into the opposite wall. For good measure, I rapped the back of his head against the wall a few times until I was sure he was unconscious. The parents were now up, getting out of bed. I turned on all the lights of the house at once. The parents rushed toward the girl’s screams.

  Neha is dead because I wasn’t adept enough in the use of my enhanced powers to recognize the threat posed by the metal which bound her, I thought. I would never let something like that happen again. I would practice, practice, and practice some more until I was as well-versed in the use of my enhanced powers as it was humanly possible to be.

  Darkness was approaching, both Seer and the Omega spirit had said. I planned to be ready. I would not fail someone again. Too many had already died thanks to me.

  Downtown, not too far from the UWant Building, the Thug Three broke the high-impact front window of a high-end jewelry store. They clambered inside. They started smashing the store’s display cases. They stuffed jewelry into their pockets. The store’s alarm wailed, but it didn’t deter the crooks. This was just a quick smash and grab. The Thug Three no doubt planned to be long gone by the time the cops arrived at the scene. I had encountered these three hoodlums before when I was Kinetic. They were low-level Metas who used their powers to make quick scores to fund their drug habits.

  I threw a force field up around the store. When the Thug Three tried to climb back out the window they had broken, they bumped against my invisible field. They were trapped like bugs in a glass jar. I would hold them here until the police arrived.

  Beast, the super strong one of the bunch, tried to punch his way through my force field.

  Yeah, good luck with that.

  I sensed a presence land on the roof with me. After a while, with my eyes still closed, I said, “How long are you going to stand there staring at me?”

  “You’re perched up here with your arms out and your eyes closed, like a zombie gargoyle,” Isaac said. “I planned on staring at you until you become less creepy. I figure it might be a while.”

  I lowered my hands and opened my eyes. I turned to Isaac.

  “The Guild have any luck finding Millennium?” I asked.

  “No. No one’s seen him since he somehow escaped from the mansion. Now that the other Sentinels are back from Peru, maybe they’ll have better luck finding him. You’ve gotta hand it to him, managing to disappear despite what you did to him.”

  I thought of Millennium’s hands lying on the floor of the Situation Room. “‘Gotta hand it to him.’ You can’t help yourself, can you?”

  “It’s a gift and a curse.”

  “There still talk about arresting me for destroying Mechano?”

  Isaac shrugged.

  “You know how people are. Opinions are like assholes: Everyone’s got one, and most of them stink. Half the Guild thinks you ought to be charged with murder and locked up in MetaHold, languishing alongside Seer and Brown Recluse until this whole thing gets sorted out. The other half thinks you should get a medal and a ticker tape parade for exposing the Sentinels’ corruption. The only opinion that really matters in this situation is that of the State’s Attorney. Laura Leonard, the attorney Truman recommended, says the law is murky in this situation as it’s never come up before. It all turns on whether you can be convicted of murdering someone who’s not technically human anymore. Laura says she can make a good argument that you can’t be. Time will tell.”

  We were quiet for a while. I gazed out on the city, both with my eyes and my powers. I wasn’t worried about what would happen to me. I was worried about what would happen to the world. Darkness was approaching. Seer and the Omega spirit were right about that. Maybe it was the Omega suit, but I seemed to feel the encroaching threat in my bones, like when you felt a storm brewing. A day of reckoning was coming. I didn’t know from whom or from where, but it was coming.

  I had to be ready for it.

  With effort, I forced my mind back to the present. “What do you think?” I asked. “Do you think I did the right thing with Mechano?”

  “I wasn’t there. It’s not for me to say. The more important issue is what you think. You’re the one who has to live with your actions.”

  I nodded. His non-answer told me what Isaac thought.

  I said, “I think that, despite the fact he wasn’t flesh and bone, Mechano was a mad dog who needed to be put down. I don’t regret it.” Using the words “mad dog” made me think of Antonio, trapped in The Mountain. I had not told Isaac about that. Isaac would not approve. Just like he didn’t approve of what I had done to Mechano, despite Neha being his friend too. Just like he wouldn’t approve of me cheating during the Trials. He was a better person than I was in a lot of ways. But Isaac wasn’t the Omega. I was. I had to do what I thought was best. Things looked different when the weight of the world was on your shoulders.

  My mind had wandered. I realized Isaac now looked at me intently.

  “If you don’t regret what you did to Mechano, why do you look so upset?” he asked.

  I hesitated, reluctant to admit the truth out loud. The cold, almost emotionless fury I had felt when I confronted the Sentinels had thawed when I heard fear in Mechano’s voice for the first time. At the sound of his fear, my fury had transformed into something else. I remembered how I had looked, standing over Mechano’s body. I had seen my distorted reflection in his shiny torso. There had been a grim smile on my face when I destroyed him.

  I thought of what Mad Dog had said to me. About how I was just like him.

  “I’m not upset because I destroyed Mechano,” I finally said. “I’m upset because I enjoyed it so much.”

  The End

  If you enjoyed this book, please leave a review on Amazon. Even a simple two word review such as “Loved it” helps so much. Reviews are a big aid in helping readers like you find books they might like.

  If you haven’t already read Caped and Trials, the first two books of the Omega Superhero Series, you can check them out here:

  CAPED: THE OMEGA SUPERHERO, BOOK ONE

  TRIALS: THE OMEGA SUPERHERO, BOOK TWO

  Click on the link below to sign up for Mr. Brasher’s e-mail newsletter for release information about the upcoming fourth book in the Omega Superhero Series and other new books as well as for bonuses given exclusively to newsletter subscribers:

  DARIUS BRASHER’S NEWSLETTER

  If you liked this book, you’ll probably enjoy Mr. Brasher’s Superhero Detective Series, which is set in the same world as Caped where Metas must be licensed to legally use their powers. In fact, Avatar’s murder is investigated in the fourth book of the series. These books feature Truman Lord, an uncostumed licensed Hero and private eye who uses his powers to solve crimes. The books in the Superhero Detective Series can be found on Amazon here:

  Book One: SUPERHERO DETECTIVE FOR HIRE

  Book Two: THE MISSING EXPLODING GIRL

  Book Three: KILLSHOT

  Book Four: HUNTED

  Follow Darius Brasher on Twitter at www.twitter.com/dariusbrasher or feel free to drop him a line at darius@dbrasher.com.

  Turn the page for an excerpt from Superhero Detective For Hire, Book One of the Superhero Detective Series.

  EXCERPT FROM SUPERHERO DETECTIVE FOR HIRE

  Late one afternoon about a week and a half after David Hoff was killed, I returned to my office building after standing up for tru
th, justice, and the American way. Actually, that’s not true. Upholding truth, justice, and the American way was above my pay grade. I let world-renowned Heroes like the Sentinels and the other Heroes who flew around in tights worry about such things. My daily concerns were a lot more prosaic: doing the things my clients hired me to do. If truth and justice were a side effect of that, so much the better. What were truth and justice anyway? I might not recognize them if I tripped over them. I was a Hero, not a philosopher.

  Unfortunately, as far as my client Eileen Rothbury was concerned, I was doing a pretty lousy job so far of doing what she was paying me to do. I still had no idea of who killed George Chase. By that point I had spoken to a slew of the women George had slept with and blackmailed. I had not even gotten to all of them yet. George had been quite prolific in his bedmates, and there were still women I needed to interview. I had also interviewed some of their husbands and the people who could attest to their alibis. The ones who had alibis, that is. I had also spoken to some of my contacts in the underworld to see if they knew anything about George’s death. I had consulted with the police. I had a bunch of facts and leads and things to follow up on. It was times like this I wished I had a staff to help me. Or, at least a young male sidekick who wore tights, exclaimed “Holy Toledo Truman!” periodically, and with whom I could have homoerotic tension.

  I knew a lot, but not the thing I was most concerned about: Who had shot George Chase? I had so many details and facts from so many different people I felt like I was drowning in them. The more I learned, the less I knew. But, that was how it was in an investigation. You gathered information and facts and eventually, patterns began to emerge, and what you were looking for fitfully revealed itself. I hoped for my sake this would happen in George’s case before I was old and grey.