Emergence

by Various

  With a shrug, Daniel stumbled over to the clock, switched the damned thing off, and reveled in the sudden silence. His left leg ached like he'd twisted it and his ribs hurt slightly when he breathed. He felt like he'd been in a fight, not that Daniel really knew what a fight felt like.

  “Must have slept funny,” he said to himself as he stretched a little, feeling his ribs complain. He knew his implants would already be hard at work to fix the injuries and wagered he'd be right as rain before he made it to work, but that didn't stop him feeling awful now.

  He was tired too, though that was nothing new. Daniel was always tired. He never slept very well. He had long ago realized that his brain rarely switched off and that led to fitful nights. Even when he did sleep, he had terrifying dreams of chimerics and their monstrous powers.

  Daniel gathered up his bed sheets only to find more of the dust. He looked up at the roof but it seemed fine. It was possible he had gone to bed straight after a session in his workshop. He often worked until he was so tired he could barely remember his own name. He did think it was strange though, as he never worked with mortar. Metal and wires and flesh were his materials. With a sigh, Daniel threw his sheets into the wash basket and settled into his morning routine.

  After brushing his teeth and washing his face, Daniel was amazed at how dirty the water came away. He whipped up an energy cocktail of fruits and vegetables and drank it while charging his bionics and reading early morning news stories on the Internet.

  Some politician was arguing for a reform of the World Chimeric Census; that was nothing new. An old atomic-converted nuclear power plant east of the city had gone dark, yet there was little real information to be had. A new gang war had broken out in one of the slums and five people, including one cop, were dead. The Vulpes News headline was a big one. An undetermined death toll in La Futura as a high-powered being called Tantrum had decimated portions of the coastal city until finally stopped by some new female super group.

  He scrolled to local news. Two chimerics had battled it out in an apartment off of Lexrun Avenue. Daniel swallowed hard. That was mere blocks away. It seems the battle had brought down the entire west side of the building, and bodies were still being pulled from the wreckage. One eyewitness report said a teleporting speedster was involved.

  Daniel read the last article three times. He felt his pulse quickening with each read, thumping in his ears. A new chimeric in town maybe? A new threat to everyone. A new threat to him. He had no idea how he could possibly deal with a teleporter. None of the modifications he had made so far would be effective against such a power, not even the temporal displacement tracker he had stolen the designs for. With a shudder, Daniel determined it was time to once again break into the R&D computers and see what new designs he could incorporate. It was the only way he could hope to be safe against a possible attack from a teleporter who might also be inhumanly fast.

  Daniel finished charging his implants and unplugged himself. The modifications he had already made to his body were highly advanced and mostly ran off the energy produced by his own body, but many of them still needed a slight electrical charge. They could last for days without needing to be plugged in; still, Daniel always thought it better to be safe than sorry, so he recharged every morning before his workout.

  After an hour of exercises designed to strengthen his muscles around the modified implants, Daniel showered and selected a grey suit, a white shirt, and red tie from the wardrobe. He dressed and left his apartment at precisely eight-twenty A.M., leaving forty minutes (ten minutes more than he needed) to get to work.

  It was an easy bike ride, mostly flat and through the college town atmosphere and affluent Polito neighborhood. Daniel couldn't imagine living in the gang-ridden sections of the city. He couldn't even imagine visiting one. Human criminals were one thing, but it was well-known the gangs employed all manner of chimerics to further their crime. He had modified his body to protect against many chimeric powers, but he was far from complete. He was far from safe.

  The high-tech Biotiq home office loomed high in front of him, the company name branded in huge letters over the entrance foyer. It was a building designed to be impressive and achieved it with a flair. Its eighty-eight floors, some above and some below ground, where much of Biotiq's cutting-edge research took place, overlooked East Polito, including the Ravensforest Wilderness Preserve and the waters of Grand Bay just beyond.

  Daniel locked his bike outside and said hello to the security before taking his pass from his pocket and scanning himself into the building. Next he passed through the chimeric detector. The device was large and looked a lot like a metal detector. It was also rudimentary and only worked about half the time. Part of the problem was that chimerics were so varied that there was simply no blanket way to detect them, there wasn't even a blanket way to define them.

  Passing through the detector without incident, Daniel thanked his lucky stars they didn't use a traditional metal detector. Most of his implants were made of a ceramic polyalloy that was as strong as steel, yet much lighter and nearly undetectable; still, there were modifications he had made to himself that simply couldn't be done without certain metals.

  Getting into the elevator, Daniel nodded his morning greeting to a few co-workers before pressing the button for fourth floor down. After a short wait he stepped out into the Advanced Prosthetics R&D lab. Security greeted him and his personal assistant was there just a moment later, coffee in one hand and a large document in the other.

  “Reports?” Daniel asked.

  “There were a few mishaps with the Crougar testing last night, Dr. Dust,” said Jason as he handed Daniel the cup of coffee.

  Daniel set a brisk pace as Jason filled him in on the night time's activities. The lab never slept. Even in the dead of night teams would either be testing or tending to and refurbishing equipment. Biotiq didn't waste hours, and neither did Daniel.

  As soon as he reached his office, Daniel sent Jason on his way with a number of orders, and sat down behind his desk. He filed some documents, replied to some emails, and waited. Once he was sure his team could continue their work without him, Daniel took a flash drive from his bag and inserted it into his computer.

  Biotiq used a number of high-level security algorithms and programs that Daniel couldn't hope to understand, let alone circumvent, which was exactly why he had procured the Mimic. It had cost him a lot of money, and also some things that money couldn't buy, but was well-worth everything it had cost him.

  The Mimic was a program designed to circumvent traditional computer security not by breaking in, but by slipping in. All Daniel had to do was select the files he wanted to view and the Mimic would pretend he was somebody with the required access. That was as far as Daniel understood and as far as he cared to understand. He was a bio-engineer and a mechanic, not a hacker.

  While his team worked on their current project, full bone replacement within a living appendage, Daniel searched Biotiq’s chimeric protection files.

  To the outside world, Biotiq was a company at the forefront of human adaptation research. They produced some of the most advanced prosthetics currently available on the market, and they also produced some of the most controversial drugs including SanAge, a drug that could delay the aging process by up to ten percent.

  Biotiq also had a military contract to research chimeric powers and develop what they termed 'neutralizers'. Devices and technology that were capable of letting normals go toe-to-toe with PwPs, or ‘persons with powers.’ With so many chimerics out there, with such a variety of abilities, the human race needed equalizers.

  Some of the files Daniel looked through had plans for experimental technology that was years away from any sort of human testing. Some of those technologies he already had in his body. If they only knew what he had already done to himself, he would quickly become a Biotiq lab rat.

  Daniel stopped as he came across a file. A year ago, Biotiq had received a chimeric by the name of Erin
Andrews. Erin had given himself over to be registered, and the military had taken immediate custody of him. They wanted to know how teleporters worked, how to detect them, how to stop them. It was exactly what Daniel needed to know.

  The tests performed on Erin had apparently not been kind. They had left him a broken shell of a man who couldn't even feed himself. In the end, the man could only move by teleporting, and the moment he had the chance, he teleported himself five hundred feet in the air.

  Daniel couldn't condone the way Erin had been treated, but he also couldn't argue with the results. Biotiq had detailed files on how the teleporters worked and, even better, they had labs working on counters to the power. Daniel pulled out a notepad and started jotting. He had to figure out a way to incorporate some of the technology into his body before a teleporter attacked him.

  #

  The Other stalked the Arkwood City streets from a distance. He preferred to stick to rooftops and fire escapes, to stick to the shadows. His dark blue suit held tight to his skin. It was strong yet flexible and provided him with an almost full range of movement. There were vulnerable areas, mostly in the joints, but that was unavoidable. Long ago, when he first realized he was a chimeric, he decided he needed a suit in order to fight crime. He even designed a lightweight helmet with a mask incorporated. It made him look less human, almost gargoyle-like, but it provided excellent protection, especially against chimerics with psychic abilities.

  The Other kept a keen eye on his displacement wave tracker. He knew he still had no real way to deal with Blink, but she was out there. She was free and she was dangerous and he was the only one who could deal with her—even if, thus far, he hadn't dealt with her. Unfortunately, there was no activity from the tracker tonight. If Blink was in town, she was taking the night off. That didn't mean there wasn't other crime to stop, it didn't mean there weren't other chimerics to stop.

  Arkwood City, a Port Haven peninsular district populated by almost ninety-thousand souls, stretched out below the Other, painted in myriad grays and blurs of color as vehicles sped through the arterial streets. He perched high on the lip of the Church of the Sacred Heart, just another of the cathedral’s grotesque gargoyles. He could feel something was about to happen below. It was often that way, almost like the air became charged and only a cathartic act of violence could settle it.

  A block away, out of an alleyway between Century Theaters and an Old Spaghetti Factory, stepped a group of individuals. Some were large, some were small, all wore a yellow scarf tied around their left arm. They were a gang, one of the many that plagued the streets of Arkwood. The Other easily descended the church, then leaped a good thirty-five feet across to the rooftop of a three-story apartment building to get closer. Judging by the giant at the back of the group, the gang had at least one chimeric. That moved them from just another gang, to adversaries of the Other.

  A shrill whistle floated up to the Other's perch, and he looked down the street. Another group of individuals, these ones with an angel patch on the backs of their coats and jackets. Another gang fighting over turf. The Other looked around for cops, but he saw none. They would likely wait until the worst of the fighting was done. It was police policy in Arkwood City to let the gangs wipe each other out, and then move in to clean up the survivors. It was a smart way to deal with an out-of-control criminal population, only it often ended up with numerous innocent casualties.

  The Other couldn't see any obvious chimerics in the second gang. That didn't mean there weren't any. He would have to play the situation carefully. He was strong and fast and his body healed quickly, but he wasn't impervious to bullets, and there would soon be a lot of those flying about.

  The street quickly cleared of civilians, those who could. Some lived or worked nearby and had nowhere to escape to. All too soon the gangs spread out and took cover behind vehicles or post boxes, stairways, and trashcans. All too soon the bullets started.

  The Other selected the second gang as his first targets and sprang across to another rooftop, speeding along until he was behind them. Shouted insults floated up to his ears, punctuated with the occasional pop or spray as the gangs fired upon each other. These were not trained marksmen, though, they were thugs who carried weapons to empower themselves.

  A lot of the gunfire was blind, men or women waving guns from behind cover and pulling the trigger with no thought of what they might hit. The Other spotted one fool holding his pistol sideways as he streaked from behind one car to another.

  Screams echoed around the street, some from the odd gang member who someone had managed to tag with a stray bullet, and some from civilians who just wanted it all to end.

  The Other stopped a few meters behind his first target and leapt over the ledge of the rooftop. Metal reinforced nails in his gloves dug into the brick wall and he leaned into it, raking gouges in the brick work. His descent slowed a little, just enough so he wouldn't injure himself upon impact. When he was just a few meters from the ground, he leapt, flattening the first gang member.

  The woman, unfazed, rolled onto her back and tried to bring her pistol up. The Other stamped a boot into her wrist and punched her hard in the face. The gang member fell back, limp and unconscious. The Other raced to his next target.

  It was a small stretch of open ground. Bullets flew both ways. There was always a chance of getting hit, and the Other knew just how much bullet wounds could hurt. He sprinted over towards a red car that looked a lot like a box on wheels. A large man with a sub-machine gun was hiding behind an opened door and occasionally popping his head out of cover to fire a burst down the street.

  The thug noticed the Other coming. He raised his gun but the Other was too fast, inhumanly fast. He grabbed hold of the thug's gun arm and wrenched, punching the man in the kidney at the same time. The gun flew out his grip and clattered to the ground. The Other delivered a hard elbow to the man's face and let the thug drop to the ground unconscious.

  The next two saw what the Other had done and turned toward him to let some bullets fly. The Other ducked behind the car for a moment, then dug his fingers into the car door, tearing it from the chassis and hurled it at them. He followed the slab of metal with a burst of speed.

  A large man with a large forehead took the thrown car door in the face. The second managed to roll away and came to her feet swinging. The Other blocked two wild punches, then swept her legs from under her and finished with a hard kick to her face.

  The gang member who had taken the car door to the face groaned, so the Other punched him, making sure he was out cold. Some of the other gang members were down with bullet wounds; there were only three left on this side of the street now.

  The Other heard cheering over the sound of gun fire and looked up to see a teenager watching him from a second-story window, shouting down encouragement.

  “Get down and hide,” the Other roared at the dumb kid.

  The window of the blue sedan he was crouched behind shattered as a bullet hit it. The Other scurried around the car and tore the driver side door open, releasing the handbrake. He moved behind the car, put his back against it, and pushed. It slowly started to move.

  Gaining momentum, the Other kept behind the car as it closed in on the first gang, the ones with the yellow kerchiefs around their arms. Only two gang members wearing the angel patch remained and as the sedan passed one, the Other grabbed a small stone from the road and hurled it at the man. His aim was perfect and it struck the thug's temple, collapsing him in a heap.

  The last remaining angel patch ganger stood from his hiding spot and aimed a large pistol at the Other. Three bullets tore into the ganger's chest, and he dropped to the ground. The Other let out a curse, he preferred to do things cleanly, no deaths, but that wasn't always possible. Putting his back into the blue sedan, he pushed even harder and felt the car pick up speed.

  Bullets hailed around him, the sedan filling with holes and lead. He crouched down behind the car and then the sedan crashed against anot
her car. The Other streaked out to the left, charging in a low crouch at inhuman speed. He took two of the gang members in a full body tackle as they fired on him. He felt at least one bullet ricochet off his armored suit. There was no pain, so he guessed the armor had saved him.

  With both gang members stunned, the Other grabbed them and ducked behind a silver truck. More bullets struck the ground where he had just been. He rendered the two jackasses unconscious with a series of furious strikes, then he waited for an opening.

  He heard the click of an empty magazine and a curse from a gang member.

  “I'm out,” the ganger cried.

  “Me too,” said another.

  The Other poked his head up for a look and saw only two gang members remained, both had thrown their guns away and drawn knives. The Other stood and walked around the truck. Both gangers moved to flank him.

  “Who the hell are you meant to be?” one of them, a man with a bloody sash around his head, asked.

  “I'm the Other.”

  “The other what?” said the second gang member, a man with a lightning bolt tattooed under his bottom lip.

  The Other looked at the bloody sash gang member, then sprinted towards the man with the lightning bolt tattoo. Blocking a stab, the Other punched the man twice in the chest, fast and hard, before turning and throwing him into his approaching comrade. Both of them went down and the Other advanced upon their crumpled forms.

  A feeling crept up the Other's spine, a feeling that something bad was about to happen. He turned to find the giant gang member behind him, swinging a metal baseball bat. The bat looked small in the giant's hands, and it crunched into the Other's ribs. He flew sideways, crashing against a nearby stairwell.

  Spitting blood and clutching one arm to his midsection, the Other struggled to rise. His powers would heal him soon enough, but not before this fight was over. The giant advanced, baseball bat still clutched in a meaty, over-sized hand.

  The Other stood and stretched, feeling his ribs twinge in pain.