Just Cause Universe 2: The Archmage

by Ian Thomas Healy

She nodded. Her broken goggles dangled loosely from nerveless fingers.

  “But if you notice any kind of ill effects,” he continued, “you make sure to check in with your own medical staff.”

  “Thanks,” mumbled Sally.

  A shadow fell across her face. She looked up to see Doublecharge standing over her. The older woman glared through her mask. “Okay, let’s have it,” she said without preamble.

  Insolence rose up in Sally. She swallowed hard and tried to keep control of her ire. Shannon’s attention to Jason and his apparent reciprocation had her so angry she almost couldn’t see straight. “You said speed was of the essence.”

  “I assigned you to a team.” Doublecharge’s voice was icy calm.

  “But nobody got hurt,” said Sally, “and somebody might have if I hadn’t gone in. One of the guards fired his gun.”

  “Yes, and it seems to have worked out well, but that doesn’t change the fact that you disobeyed an order.”

  “I ordered Sally to go inside and scope out the situation,” said Jack from behind Doublecharge. “I was worried about the possibility of hostages.”

  “I don’t recall hearing you give that order,” said Doublecharge.

  “My headset is damaged,” said Jack as he held up a frayed wire for evidence. “I didn’t notice until after our cowboy friends surrendered and I got my gear back.”

  Doublecharge considered Jack’s story. Sally could see she didn’t believe a word of it. “Very well,” she said. “I’ll include that in my report. See to the loading of the horse things.”

  Sally nodded. Jack flashed one of his famous radiant grins. “Of course.”

  Doublecharge headed for the Bettie to supervise Switchboard and Jason as they loaded the comatose prisoners.

  “Why’d you do that?” Sally asked Jack in a low voice as they went over to where the robotic horses still stood.

  “Didn’t figure you’d want to be in Juice’s office again so soon,” he replied. “What’s on your mind, sweetheart? You’re hardly your usual chipper self.” He walked around one of the horses and examined it from all angles.

  “I’m just… dealing with some issues.” She wished Sondra was off-duty; Sally could talk to her about anything.

  Jack whistled at the engineering of the horse. “I wonder how those zeroes got hold of these, and where they’re from anyway?”

  “I don’t know.” She watched as a Just Cause semi pulled up. They would load the horses onto it so technicians could examine them back on the base.

  “I wouldn’t expect you to. It was a rhetorical question.” Jack stepped up next to her and put his arm around her shoulders. Sally swallowed hard to keep from breaking down, but a single tear managed to escape onto her cheek nevertheless.

  Jack, for once, didn’t seem to have anything to say.

  Chapter Four

  “Love is a perky elf dancing a merry little jig and then suddenly he turns on you with a miniature machine gun.”

  -Matt Groening, Love Is Hell, 1994

  May, 2004

  Denver, Colorado

  Just Cause Headquarters

  “I’m not sure, but it certainly looks like the same technology,” said John Stone as he straightened up after peering into the inner workings of one of the robotic horses. The man who looked like a granite statue come to life leaned on a heavy titanium steel cane. Although his mind was as sharp as ever, sixty years of fighting against gravity in a body which weighed seven hundred pounds had taken its toll. He had been a heavy hitter for Just Cause back in the Sixties and Seventies and was now the Vice Principal of the Hero Academy.

  “You think these came from the same place that built the Steel Soldier?” asked Jack. The robotic horses were tethered in one of the hangars. They stood calmly where they’d been tied; indeed, they’d barely even moved when Jack and a couple of technicians had removed some of the plating from one of them to expose the internal machinery.

  “Possibly.” John Stone readjusted his hat, a fedora which had been his affectation and trademark for decades. “The technology is similar, but the components look brand new. It might be someone who worked on the Soldier program or had access to the blueprints. I suppose someone could have reverse-engineered the technology from the wreckage, except all the Soldier’s remains were lost on 9/11.”

  “Or someone who’d seen the Soldier close-up,” prompted Sally, who’d tagged along with Jack. Normally she’d have been hanging out with Sondra, but after a long stretch in the Command Center, the winged woman had begged off for a nap. On one hand, Sally dreaded letting Jason out of her sight for fear that Shannon would be on him in a heartbeat; on the other, she didn’t want to smother him, and at some point she just had to trust him.

  “You mean Destroyer, of course. Or rather, the man inside the suit.” John Stone rubbed his jaw thoughtfully with a sound like cinder blocks scraping together. “Young Harlan Washington did repair the Soldier after the first time they fought. It was part of the bargain we struck with him in return for a lighter sentence. He certainly would have had the chance to learn about the technology, and he had the skills to apply it.”

  Jack and Sally watched as the techs replaced the armor plating on the horse. “Why horses? And how did these losers get them?”

  John Stone shrugged. “Horses are useful creatures and fairly simplistic compared to something like the Soldier. I imagine their central processors aren’t very complex. If Washington actually built these, he might not yet have reinvented the technology required for the higher brain functions of the Soldier.”

  Switchboard walked into what the team members were already calling The Stable. “Los Vaqueros—” He referred to the robbers, whose name meant The Cowboys “—said they bought the horses online, if you can believe that. Apparently they robbed several Guatemalan and Mexican banks to obtain the funds for them.” He held up a hand to forestall Jack’s interruption. “We’ve already checked. The website is gone, and the only cache we’ve found is of a password-protected entry page. Homeland Security’s got their computer division on it, but they’re not optimistic about retrieving much more than that. The seller covered his tracks very well.”

  “All right,” said Jack. “Let’s make several assumptions here, and yes, I know exactly what that means. Suppose these idiots did manage to acquire these highly-advanced devices using stolen funds. And let’s further suppose that they were in fact built by someone familiar with Steel Soldier technology. And just for kicks, let’s suppose it was Destroyer. My question is why? The man builds top-of-the-line battlesuits, using technologies far advanced over anything else out there. Why mess around with goddamn robotic horses?”

  “He needs money,” said Sally with a sudden insight. “We destroyed his last battlesuit.”

  “Well, technically it was you who destroyed it,” Jack reminded her. “Credit where credit is due.”

  “Ok, I destroyed it,” continued Sally, “but if he didn’t have a spare suit handy, he’d need to build himself a new one. That’s going to cost him big bucks. Why not build something quick and dirty and sell it for a big profit?”

  “Why don’t you think he’d have a backup suit available? The man is the king of contingency planning.”

  “It’s that contingency planning I’m thinking of,” said Sally. “Would he have a backup suit that was more advanced than his current ride? I don’t think so. Would he keep an old suit lying around when he could cannibalize it for the next model? Probably not.”

  “Good point,” conceded Jack.

  “And unless he’s already developed his next generation technology, he’s probably going to be spending a lot of time and money building the next suit.”

  “And when he does,” John Stone grumbled. “Everybody better look out, because it’ll be worse than anything we’ve seen yet. With the kind of mindset he has, you know he’ll come gunning for Just Cause again. Especially you, Sally.”

  “I’ll be careful, Mr. Stone,” she smiled.

  Jack bu
rst out in laughter. “Slow and cautious, that’s my girl.”

  She decided to give in to temptation and go check on Jason. Maybe he’d finished practicing and would be up for a little recreational exercise. She almost blushed at herself as she headed for the dorm. She let herself into the room.

  Shannon straddled Jason’s lap with her arms around his neck.

  Sally’s perceptions accelerated until the scene was a frozen tableau spread out before her. She could see every nuance of detail from the look of surprise on Jason’s face to the raw desire on Shannon’s. She stood helpless in the doorway with her mouth hanging open and her eyes wide in surprise for what felt like forever. A massive landslide of emotions crashed down onto her: fury, despair, jealousy, hatred, disgust.

  She ran.

  She needed space, distance, the feel of wind rushing past her. If she ran fast enough, perhaps she could outrun the pain.

  She tore down the hallway and left a vortex of scrambled air and a very confused janitor in her wake. In just a few seconds, she reached the perimeter fence. She ran along the edge until she spotted a break large enough for her tiny frame. She squeezed through the hole in the fence, which tore her t-shirt and scratched her face, and ran down a road bordered by trees on one side and open fields on the other.

  The sun had already dropped behind the mountains. She ran east at a hundred miles per hour and left civilization behind her. Dark fields whipped past as she kicked up a dust cloud in her wake. Burning pain wracked her feet suddenly and she tripped as one of her shoes came apart. She skidded off the side of a dirt road into an irrigation ditch. She’d run the soles right through on her off-the-rack cross-trainers.

  As Sally sprawled in the damp reeds of the ditch, her feet blistered and aching, the image of Shannon and Jason arose fresh in her mind and nausea washed over her like a bucket of icy water. She tasted bile at the back of her throat and vomited. Her heart hammered as she wiped her mouth with the back of one shaky hand. Dry heaves racked her body again and she moaned as her stomach and throat muscles quivered. She dragged herself out of the ditch and sat on the bank and had a good long cry.

  After what felt like hours, she ran out of emotional energy. Her tears stopped and she just sat, miserable and hurting. Her feet burned and she wondered how badly she’d damaged them in her incautious sprint. She felt weak and foolish, and she had no idea where she was except a dirt road in the middle of some fields. The stars came out one by one overhead until the sky was filled with a hundred times more than she ever saw in town.

  Sally got to her feet and nearly fell as the world spun around her. She felt lightheaded and terribly thirsty. She hobbled along the road until she came to an intersection of a paved road. She turned south in the hope that she might find her way to the interstate. She could see distant lights that must have been farmhouses, and near the horizon a line of lights that might be a freeway on-ramp. As she walked closer, she saw the bright lights of an all-night diner attached to a truck stop. She limped the rest of the way there.

  Sally staggered up to the door and pushed on it stupidly for a minute before realizing she had to pull to open it. She stepped inside into a world of dim light bulbs coated with ancient grease, neon signs featuring popular brands of beer, and a comforting smell of coffee and French fries. There were a few patrons inside, mostly truck driver types in t-shirts, tight jeans, and baseball caps. They all paused in their eating or conversation as she took a hesitant step forward.

  “My God, are you all right?” cried a heavyset black woman with her graying hair coiled into a bun.

  Sally nodded. “I’m okay,” she mumbled. “I just need to sit down for a minute.”

  The waitress, whose name tag read Hazel, took her to a booth and sat her down with a glass of water. “You sure you’re not hurt, hon? You need me to call somebody?”

  Sally sank onto the bench. “I’m fine. I just went for a jog and… and I got lost and fell in a ditch.”

  “All right, sweetie. What can I get for you? How about a cup of hot chocolate?”

  “Please,” said Sally. “And some ice and a towel?”

  “Sure thing, hon. I’ll be right back with that. You let me know if you want something to eat or need anything else, all right? It’s just me out front here tonight, so you just give me a wave or a yell if you need me.”

  Sally sat and stared at ancient water rings on the surface of the table in front of her. The scene of Jason and Shannon replayed in her mind over and over again, as if taunting her. She was so lost in her own thoughts that she jumped when Hazel set down a glass of ice and a steaming mug of hot chocolate topped with whipped cream.

  “Take your time with that, hon. It’s plenty hot,” the waitress said.

  Sally nodded without really hearing. She poured some ice into the towel and began to ice her feet. They were bruised and scratched, but she hadn’t damaged them as much as she’d feared. Years of running, even with her special boots, had toughened the skin with thick calluses. She hated her feet and thought they were ugly, but had to take special care of them nevertheless. Even her ministrations couldn’t distract her from her thoughts.

  “Honey, that chocolate ain’t so hot anymore and you haven’t touched it,” said Hazel. Sally started and looked up into the waitress’ kind face. “You look like you got something heavy on your mind. Want to talk about it with a complete stranger?”

  Sally smiled sadly. “That’s okay,” she said, taking a sip of her lukewarm chocolate. “You’ve got other customers and stuff. I’ll just finish this and be on my way.”

  “Suit yourself, hon, but you’re the only one left and all I got left to look forward to is doing dishes… and I’ve done enough of them in my life to know they ain’t in any hurry to get done any sooner.”

  Sally looked around to see that sure enough, she and Hazel were alone in the diner.

  “You mind if I sit down for a few minutes?” The older woman slid into the seat across from Sally without waiting for an invitation. “Lord, that feels good. I been runnin’ all day and this is the first chance I get to sit. I recognize you from your picture in the paper. You’re the one named after a song. What’s it again?”

  “Mustang Sally.”

  “That’s right. I always liked that song. Well, Miss Sally, what brings you all the way out here to the middle of nowhere? Let me guess… man troubles.”

  Sally lowered her eyes. “Is it that obvious?”

  “Believe me, I’ve had enough of my own to know what they look like on someone else’s face.”

  “I caught my boyfriend cheating on me.” Sally’s voice quivered a little as she admitted aloud what she’d seen.

  “Hmmm…” she said. “Well he must be blind or stupid, because anyone could see you’re a real peach.”

  For some reason, the term struck Sally as funny. “Got any words of wisdom for me, Hazel?”

  “Honey, I could write a book with all my words of wisdom. Problem is, folks who really need them ain’t bright enough to buy a book and I’d still be waiting tables here.”

  “Oh, I don’t know,” said Sally. “You’ve got a way with words.”

  “They ain’t none of them that haven’t been said a thousand times before.” She smiled confidently. “For example… if you love someone, set them free. You heard that before, right?” Sally nodded. “And if he returns, he’s yours forever. If he doesn’t, he never was. That’s plain and simple. Took me a couple of husbands before I took that one to heart.”

  “So I should just let him go? Let him get his jollies with someone else?”

  “This boyfriend of yours… how old is he?”

  “He’s almost twenty.”

  “Then he’s young enough he don’t know what he wants yet. He probably won’t know when he’s twice that age. Boys that age ain’t thinking with their brains, if you catch my meaning.”

  Sally smiled a little. “I can be guilty of that myself.”

  Hazel burst out laughing. “Oh, honey, we’re all guilty
of that! That’s something the Lord gave us to remind us we ain’t much better than the animals. But He gave us the ability to control it, and that’s what makes us human.”

  “I guess so.”

  Hazel leaned forward. “Listen, hon. In any relationship, one person is always begging the other. You can be the one doing the begging, or you can be the one in control. Took me a couple more husbands to figure that one out.”

  “So you’re saying I should make him beg?”

  “What I’m saying is that if he truly loves you, you won’t have to make him beg. He’ll do it all on his own. You just have to give the boy some time to understand his own mind. Now do you want him back?”

  She thought for a few seconds. “Yes,” she decided. “Yes I do.”

  “Then you just give it a little time and see what happens. Let him go. He’ll decide whether he wants to beg for you or not. And if he’s got a smart bone in his body, he’ll beg.”

  “Because I’m a peach.” Sally chuckled. She didn’t feel very much like one; to borrow one of Jack’s favorite vulgarities, she felt more like ten pounds of shit in a five pound bag.

  “Exactly.”

  She finished her chocolate, which was very good in spite of not being warm anymore. “Thanks, Hazel. I guess I did need someone to talk to.”

  “Well… we ladies got to stick together,” said Hazel as she leaned back. “I was like you once, Miss Sally—young and in love. I even have a little power of my own.”

  “Yeah?” Sally perked up, interested.

  “Oh, it ain’t nothing so fabulous as yours.” Hazel held up a finger, concentrated, and an ice cube leaped out of Sally’s glass and skated across the table. “Not much good for anything, ‘cept if I drop my pencil.”

  “It’s still a parahuman power,” said Sally. “More than most people will ever have. Didn’t you ever try to do anything with it?”

  “Lord, no. This is my life, hon. I never wanted more than what I have, and I’m perfectly happy with what I do have. I’m a waitress, and damn good at it. And at the end of the day when I go home, I know I’ve been the best waitress I can be. I can’t even imagine myself as some kind of superhero like you, hon. Can you imagine me trying to squeeze these hips into a Spandex suit?”