No Master Plan Here (Madness Runs in the Family)

by Joel Burdick

  As Kay and Anansi approached, the drones parted without a verbal command, stepping out of the way of their master. When the last group of drones already on the stairs had gone through the teleporter, Anansi stepped forward onto the platform. Kay stood back, her holographic form would only cause interference with the energy transfer. “See you on the other side,” Anansi said with a smile. The platform began to glow beneath him.

  “See you on the other side,” Kay said as Anansi disappeared into the light.

  Chapter 2

  March 5, 2014

  Off the coast of Oregon, far enough into international waters that it was the only thing within sight all the way to the horizon rested the Sanctuary. At first glance, it appeared to be a cargo ship, and once it had been, but that time was past. The decks were empty of shipping containers, and nobody walked the decks.

  Anansi stood on the bow of the Sanctuary, the wind blowing through his short brown hair. He shivered, despite wearing a thick brown coat and black pants. He felt as if the wind was cutting right through him. He stared off into the distance in the direction of land. His glasses displayed the shoreline as viewed from a camera on a buoy. He sighed, considering his next move.

  Behind him, he felt the air crackle as Kay manifested her holographic form behind him. She stood behind him silently, watching him, watching the scene he was watching, and watching all the goings on inside the ship all at the same time. Anansi let her stand there for a little longer before he disabled the feed from the buoy camera and acknowledged her presence.

  “Evacuation and shutdown of the Sierra Nevada base is complete. We can head to sea at your leisure.” Anansi nodded and pulled up the weather reports for the course he had set. He made a slight adjustment to avoid what appeared to be a forming storm, then transferred the plan to Kay.

  “Any messages?” he said, still looking towards shore.

  “One from your older sister from a discreet account. Rose approves of your assassination and says that the congressman was a dick. One from your mother. Carol asks if you will be home for the holidays.” Kay displayed the messages in a corner of Anansi's view in full. Anansi nodded, dismissing the messages and filing them away for later.

  “No responses for now. I'll do that later. Don't let me forget Mom's.” Kay nodded as Anansi turned around and started walking towards the bridge. He accessed the ships systems, sending wireless commands. The engines set to full forward. The rudder turned, sending the ship's nose out to sea. Anansi walked across the deck and eventually down into the hull. The white walls had cameras spread at even intervals along the catwalks that hung over the length of the expanded cargo area of the hull. The crew areas had been removed to make room for storage rooms and laboratories. Occasionally, Anansi would pass a spider drone scurrying along, but for the most part, the ship was still.

  He took a turn that led him to a stairwell and followed it up and into his quarters. Bookshelves lined the walls where screens or an oak desk did not. A bed and nightstand took up much of the space in the center of the room. A mental command turned off the lights and the screens, plunging the room into darkness. Anansi walked by the light shed by Kay to his bed, stripping off his clothes as best he could with one arm. Kay stood by the door, watching him, arms crossed over a datapad. “Would you like some sedatives to help you sleep?”

  “No, I'm fine. It only hurts when I breathe.” Anansi laughed and rolled into bed, hissing at the pain when his shoulder touched the covers. “Actually, yes. Standard dose of Percoset.” He settled into bed as a spider drone scuttled into the room, a tray with a glass of water and two pills held aloft in a pair of legs. It hopped onto the bed without spilling the water, presenting it to Anansi. He took the pills, drank the water, replaced the glass, and the drone scurried away.

  “Wake me if anything happens. We begin work on fixing the arsenal tomorrow.” Anansi laid his head back on the pillow and closed his eyes. Kay winked out and the door shut as she did. Anansi took off his glasses, set them on the nightstand, and let his mind wander until he finally went to sleep.

  -~-~-

  April 10, 2014

  “With the attack last month that took the life of Congressman Richard Lowe, the public has asked “Who is Anansi?” and “How was he able to attack such a heavily guarded area?”” The anchorman paused for effect as the camera angle changed. The headline beside his head stated “Dangerous Supers” in white with a black helmet with white circles over the eyes superimposed over a red background. The anchorman's suit looked new and expensive, his hair grey and full, the sort of full that spoke of hair loss prevention.

  “The investigation on the latter is still ongoing, but the former has been answered.” An image replaced the headline. The details were fuzzy, but what could be seen was a man with brown hair and glasses, wearing a long black coat, pants, and boots, carrying a bag over one shoulder as he approached a security checkpoint.

  “This image, taken by security cameras set up near the checkpoint into the area backstage of the fateful speech, shows us the face behind the mask of Anansi as he approaches a checkpoint manned by an FBI agent in disguise. He was then led to a room containing five highly trained policemen and two supers chosen from the Airy City Defenders chapter for their competence and skill sets believed to be best suited for disabling the villain without needless damage or ruckus.”

  The image beside the anchorman's head changed to that of the building in question, showing a hole in the wall and debris scattered out onto the grass.

  “After containment failed, the entire team disabled in a brutally efficient manner that sent all seven individuals involved to the hospital for broken bones, lacerations, concussions, and shrapnel wounds, Anansi is presumed to have teleported or moved by invisibility underneath the stage, where he planted two explosive charges.

  “But who is Anansi?

  “To answer that question, we go back to the photo before the rampage began. Facial recognition software was able to identify the man in the photograph as one Jacob Redpath.” The image changed to a picture of the man in a collared shirt and slacks. The higher quality image shows him smiling, looking young and happy. He stands with a shorter woman, her red hair cropped short to the shoulders, her eyes the same as his, but with an appearance of intensity that his do not have.

  “Jacob Redpath is the younger brother of Rose Redpath, CEO and founder of Blue Steel, Inc. The two are elder siblings to Tom Redpath, better known as Shockwave, lead singer of Murderous Rampage, Rick Redpath, known as Metallurgy and part of the Los Angeles Quick Repair team, and Lily Redpath, known as Blink, a licensed vigilante out of Baltimore, Maryland. His other siblings, Daisy and Edward, have not publicly displayed any powers.

  “As a representative of the Redpath Family, Rose Redpath issued the following statement to the press.” The image changed to a full screen view of the red-haired woman from the earlier photo. Her hair is longer and she is older, but her eyes bear the same intensity. She wears a dark suit that brings out her pale complexion as lights from cameras flash about her. Nobody speaks, her withering gaze silencing the reporters.

  “Yesterday it was revealed that my younger brother, Jacob, was the man behind the supervillain Anansi and responsible for the attack that took Congressman Lowe's life. My brother has worked as a freelance designer for Blue Steel since its founding and holds the patents for several of our more advanced designs. His actions, however, do not represent Blue Steel at all, and are entirely his own.”

  She nodded to one reporter who raised a hand. The man adjusted his tie nervously before saying “How do you feel about the attacks? Do you feel Congressman Lowe got what he deserved?”

  Rose smiled slightly, teeth bared like an animal. “My personal opinion of Congressman Lowe is that the man was pushing unconstitutional and unfair legislation out of fear of what a minority of the public was capable of. Do I approve of my brother killing him? No. Legal means are much better to solve these sorts of issues.” Another reporter raised a hand and was
acknowledged with a nod.

  “With the release that your brother has powers of at least Maker Type Class three, a rumor has surfaced that you or others in your family may possess hidden powers as well. Do you have a statement in response to that?”

  “Despite the increased likelihood of having powers when a family member, especially a parent, possesses them, the odds of that happening in four out of seven in a single generation are ridiculously small. Are you going to presume to tell me that more of my siblings are supers based on some notion that because the majority of us are, that we all are? As Jacob would say it, I find it astronomically improbable that I or any of my other siblings possess powers, especially of any strength.”

  Rose nodded to the audience and turned to leave. The image returned to the news anchor. His smile was a fraction of a second late.

  “Daisy Redpath, who is the head of Human Resources at Blue Steel, was not able to be reached for a comment, nor were Edward or Lily Redpath, whose whereabouts are not currently publicly available. Andrew Redpath declined an interview. Tom Redpath was approached by reporters and paparazzi while at a luncheon with his fiancee. Tom, notorious for his dislike and blatant mistreatment of members of the press, used his sonic powers to destroy the cameras and recorders of the reporters before flying away with his fiancee.”

  Chapter 3

  June 9, 2017

  A chime accompanied by a blue-green light hovering over his face woke Anansi. He groaned and sat up, muttering to himself and wondering what time it was. It felt like some time in the very early morning, which would mean he had only slept for a couple of hours. He had spent most of the night working in one of the labs on a request, and had finally gotten it working at around two in the morning before going to bed.

  The light moved off from the bed and resolved itself into Kay's form, worry etched into her face. She was clutching the datapad she held like it was a lifeline. Not for the first time, Anansi wondered how the artificial intelligence managed to seem so human. It wasn't anything he had written in her programming, but it didn't really matter. He liked her like this.

  “Apologies for waking you at this early hour, but there is an infiltration team that has managed to bypass all sentry devices and is currently en route.” Anansi took his glasses from the nightstand and put them on, connecting them to his neural implant via a cable at the base of his skull. He watched the infiltration team Kay was talking about through the camera feeds. There were six of them, and they were moving through the stairwell, ignoring the floors beneath him, which meant that somehow they had blueprints of the ship, along with knowledge of its crew, or lack thereof. They wore no insignia or identifying marks, but they moved like professionals. A small bit of Anansi took pride in the fact that they did. It meant whoever it was took him seriously. “Your extraction systems have already been disabled. You have about two minutes until they arrive. I'm sorry.”

  Anansi nodded and walked to his desk as if in a stupor. He knew that Kay was already saving what data she could and destroying anything that couldn't be jettisoned and could be stolen or used against him, the data being encrypted and dispersed into drives on submersibles that would be sunk deep enough that they could not be recovered by normal submarines and would only then scatter across the world to preserve the data.

  Even with the backups, the loss of physical experiments and laboratories was a loss of months, years in some cases, of work, and the weight of it dragged Anansi down into his chair. He drummed his fingers against the wood, focusing on the feel of it to ground himself. He had planned for this a million times, but the fact that it might eventually happen hadn't really ever crossed his mind. What had gone wrong?

  Kay cleared her throat behind him, shifting nervously. “Is there anything I can do while you wait?”

  Anansi nodded, snapping out of his haze. “A cup of cocoa and whiskey, then get yourself out of here. If they get you, then I've got nothing. Oh, and send a message to Rose. Tell her she wins this round.” Kay nodded and winked out. The light on the desk flicked on, revealing a steaming mug of brown liquid that smelled exactly right rising from a circular hole in a corner. Anansi picked up the mug and turned his chair to face the door, enjoying the taste of his beverage as he waited. “Damned shame, really,” he muttered to himself, considering an appropriate response to whoever was behind this. His glasses' display winked out as Kay severed the connection to the servers and initiated the jettison sequence, sending a shudder that was felt throughout the massive ship. With a sigh he disconnected the cable from the port on his glasses, allowing the cable to reel back into his neural implant.

  As expected, the team did not keep him waiting long. The door exploded inward, slamming against the wall so hard it left a dent and knocked several books from the shelves nearby. The team filed in, all wearing black armor and masks, holding submachine guns. Anansi noted that the armor looked to be something he had come up with, but wasn't entirely certain. They cleared the room before the leader stepped forward, aiming the gun at Anansi's head.

  “Jacob Redpath, also known as Anansi, you are under arrest for crimes against the United States government, to include murder, arson, assault, and illegal use of superpowers against government officials. If you do not surrender, we are authorized the use of lethal force.” He stepped forward, still keeping the weapon trained on Anansi's head. Two of the others took a step with him. “Do you have any questions?”

  Anansi watched them. His glasses, which moments before could have told him their pulse rates, linked them to databases of government agents and given him their names and whatever other information was on the net on them, and the best moves to capitalize on their positions to take all of them out using just his mug and hand to hand skills, remained inert. It felt like a part of him had been cut off, and while he didn't absolutely need it to fight, it tipped the odds in his favor enough that he might be able to win. Anansi laughed.

  “Do you gentlemen mind if I finish my drink first? I think it will be the last one I have in a while, and when I'm done, I'll go quietly. No fuss, no mess, no escape attempts.” He held his mug up, allowing the team leader to inspect it. The man looked warily at the cup, like it was about to explode, and when he seemed to decide it was harmless, he nodded, lowering his weapon. The two behind him did not.

  “You get two minutes.” The man turned to the others, talking quietly. Three stepped outside, leaving just the two still aiming their weapons at Anansi and the commander in the room. Anansi took a drink from his mug and smiled at the two. He couldn't see any physical features of the two in front of him, but he could read into their stances. The one on the right, a lanky man who had the appearance of wry muscles was very nervous. He was tense, like a bowstring ready to snap. The other was calm, ready but not relaxed enough that his reaction wouldn't be quick. Anansi took another drink. Halfway through his mug, and he was already thinking about how long it would be until he had another like this.

  “First time catching a super, then?” he said, breaking the silence. He smiled at the lanky man. “It's got to be a bit anticlimactic, doesn't it. It's gone too smoothly and you're waiting for the other shoe to drop.” Anansi smiled and took another drink as the man adjusted his grip on his weapon. Anansi imagined he could see the man sweating through his armor, though it wasn't true.

  “Shut up,” the tense man said. His voice sounded young, with a slight hint at a country drawl. American military, probably.

  “You don't even really get to tell stories to your buddies about me, probably, because my security systems suffered a mysterious shut down. Just walked right on in here. Did you know that? That one of you is a cape?” Anansi sipped his drink and eyed the last bit lingering at the bottom of his mug before downing that as well. He enjoyed the feeling of the heat from the cocoa and the bite of the alcohol in his system on the way down. The tense man grew further rigid. Anansi smiled inwardly. He had hit a nerve and pegged the man right on the head. A norm who was a cape-hater. That was interesting, especially
on a mission like this one.

  The commander stepped up behind the young man and set a hand on his shoulder. The man twitched, turning to his commander, who shook his head and gestured towards the door. Anansi noted the tension in the man's shoulders as he left and took satisfaction in that. He set his mug down on the desk and stood, offering his hands to the commander.

  “Ready to go.” The commander stepped forward and placed a pair of zip-cuffs over Anansi’s hands and tightened them down until it was slightly uncomfortable. He gestured for Anansi to proceed him through the door, the last man following behind him. Anansi walked through the empty halls of his ship, two men behind, one ahead, and couldn't help but wonder how they had bypassed his systems on Kay's watch. It would take a super, he felt. That or cloaking tech that he wasn't aware of, which would likely be made by a Maker type super, like him. He made a mental note to check to see if any invisibility field generators were in the black market, if he ever had the opportunity.

  As they stepped out onto the deck, a black helicopter was just touching down. It looked like a Chinook, but not quite right. The length was right, but the body was shaped more smoothly except where a pair of nodes protruded from the rear. Anansi craned his neck to get a closer look but was pushed forward and onto the helicopter before he could get a good look at it. Then he noticed what was wrong about it. There was no sound of the rotors outside of the helicopter. That was very impressive. A stealth field like that would certainly allow them to bypass the perimeter defenses, and it was probably thermal and EM shielded. As the pieces clicked into place, his abductors strapped him into a seat, secured themselves, and the helicopter took off. Anansi spared one last look at Sanctuary before they closed the doors, wondering if he would ever see it again.