by Ford, Lizzy
“We’re working on jamming his communications channels,” Igor replied quickly. “It might not last long, so our window is tiny.”
Kimber glanced back the way he’d come, not interested in facing the other half of General Savage’s army on his own.
“Sorry, Doc, but you gotta move,” Officer Ford said. “Drag that shit up the mountain.”
Kimber rested his foot on the ground and leaned. His leg felt as good as new. “I’m on it,” he said and trotted around the wreckage of the truck to the trailer.
The hitch was mangled from having the truck wrenched free. Kimber bent the metal unto a handhold and then faced the direction he was headed. He began to walk, dragging the explosives behind him. To his relief, the trailer went easily, because the load was on wheels that hadn’t been hurt by flying debris.
“Reader, tell your ninjas to move faster,” he said, optimistic about his chances of meeting his original deadline. “I’m coming in hot.” He began to jog and then run, towing the trailer behind him.
Kimber kept his eyes trained on the road ahead of him. He didn’t glance up until he rounded the curve and spotted the last of the ninja army disappearing around another curve, half a mile away.
He ran, pacing himself and steadying his breathing as he closed the distance between the henchmen and him.
Keladry’s ninja army stayed ahead of him, and he sprinted to catch up.
Five minutes later, Igor spoke. “The General got a message out. His henchmen are coming.”
“You’ve got three minutes at most, Doc, to reach the entrance and another ten before the second wave figures out where you are,” Officer Ford said.
Urgency lit Kimber’s blood, and he lowered his head and ran faster.
He reached the cliff wall running alongside the road where they’d decided the fortress was weakest. Kimber dropped the trailer and darted forward.
“Here,” he said breathlessly.
“The wall is five feet thick here. It’s the narrowest point. Smash into the tunnel system, and you’re set,” Officer Ford said.
The sun had set, and dusk rendered his surroundings grainy. Kimber placed the charges he’d been given for this task at the base of a random point of the wall and then dashed away.
“Hit it, Igor!” he exclaimed and ducked down behind the trailer.
Five seconds later, an explosion sent rock and dust everywhere. Kimber sprang to his feet and returned to the wall. The explosives had taken out a large chunk but failed to break into the inner corridors.
Kimber picked up a massive boulder jarred loose from the explosion and began slamming it into the crater. Several minutes later, he paused and turned to see how far he’d gone.
“Um, guys, I’m at least ten feet in, and there’s no tunnel,” he said.
“I’m checking the schematics,” Igor said. “Reader, this is the right point, isn’t it?”
No response.
Holding the boulder against the wall, Kimber wiped sweat from his brow.
“Reader?” Igor called again.
“Hey, Reader. Speak up!” Kimber seconded.
No response.
“Her earpiece must be out,” Officer Ford said. “My team is headed to the base of the mountain, Doc. We’ll hold off any of General Savage’s henchmen that make it to us, but you gotta hurry.”
Without waiting for Igor to respond, Kimber returned to his task of smashing through solid rock to reach the tunnels. He half-listened for Reader to say something, concerned about her. Aware he was holding the critical piece of the puzzle, he pushed onward. At long last, a solid fifteen feet from the road, his boulder went straight through the wall before him and landed in a hallway.
“I’m in!” he exclaimed. Kimber cleared the space away, so he could haul the explosives through, before hurrying out of the path he’d created.
He whipped off the restraints securing the explosives to the trailer and pulled on a harness Igor had sewn that would allow him to pull a long sled directly behind him into the mountain.
Kimber loaded the sled with explosives stacked higher than he was tall and began to pull. He cleared rubble and stones from his path as he went so as not to slow down the sled.
“We’ve got company,” Officer Ford reported.
Fuck. General Savage’s forces were reacting faster – and holding out much longer – than anyone had expected. Kimber was a full twenty-five minutes behind schedule. He stopped pausing to clear his path and instead, bulldozed through the five yards of mountain standing between him and the interior of the fortress.
“Reader’s captured,” Igor whispered.
Kimber’s heart jolted at the news. He surged into the hallway and started to unhook his harness. “I’m going after her!” he said.
“We need those explosives in place first,” Officer Ford countered.
“You can’t, Kimber,” Igor said simultaneously. “If we can’t take down the fortress, she definitely dies, and so do the rest of us.”
Kimber paused, hearing the truth in Igor’s words.
“Her father will keep her alive to use against you. He’s never been satisfied to kill – he wants to break people,” Igor continued. “If I were him, I’d torture her in front of you. She’s not safe but she’s alive for now. Stay on task.”
Wiping sweat from his face, Kimber gazed in the direction leading up into the main fortress before turning away and facing the direction headed down, towards the pillar he had to destroy. His fingers shook as he strapped the harness back in. Silently, he vowed to find Keladry, no matter what, once the explosives were in place.
“Heading to the pillar,” he said quietly and began hauling the sled of explosives down the hallway.
Alert for any sign of opposition, his mind was nonetheless on Keladry, enough so, he lost track of his next objective. Kimber slowed and checked his hand.
“Are we sure it’s two hundred feet down the hallway?” he asked.
“More or less.”
Kimber rolled his eyes. He unsnapped his harness hastily and returned to the hole in the wall. He counted two hundred feet and then marked the spot with a block of plastic explosives. Returning for the sled, he strapped himself in and hauled his load to the point before removing the harness again.
He removed a pickaxe from his belt and began smashing into the wall.
Fortunately, this part of their blueprints was far more accurate. Kimber smashed three feet through solid rock into a hallway running parallel to the one he was in. He dragged the sled through, walked to his next point and did the same.
He pierced the layers of rock around the fortress’ core like he’d stab an onion. Each layer he penetrated brought him closer to the pillar.
“Our line just broke!” Officer Ford cried. “Kimber, tell me you’re –”
“Just went through layer seven!” Kimber replied.
“Two more,” Igor said. “Make it quick! I’m moving Reader’s army around. Stay where you are, Ford. I’m sending a few teams down to protect Kimber.”
“Have them blow the tunnel I created,” Kimber suggested. “They can’t reach me then.”
“You can’t escape fast, either,” Igor pointed out.
“I busted my way into the mountain. I can bust my way out. We have to take out the pillar, no matter what.”
No one spoke.
Kimber smashed through the next layer and five minutes later, the final layer, which led him from the lighted hallways into the cave at the very center of the mountain. He peered in briefly to ensure no one was present before dragging the explosives into the cave and unsnapping the harness one last time.
Sweat trickled down his neck and back, and he breathed hard. Craning his head back, he looked from the top of the pillar holding up the fortress to the bottom. In his mind, he’d imagined something like a pillar at a bank – tall and slender, resembling a tall tree. The sight before him was far different. It was as thick as a small building and forty feet tall.
“I hope we have
enough explosives,” he murmured.
“You made it?” Igor asked hopefully.
“Yeah.” Kimber began unloading the sled and stacking the blocks around the base of the pillar.
“The ninjas have to blow your tunnel.”
“Go for it.” Kimber grunted as he tripped over the uneven flooring of the cave. “Any word on Reader?”
“None.”
A trickle of fear raced through him. Kimber started to ask where she’d gone missing, so he could find her after he was done, when the hair on the back of his neck stood up.
I’ve got company. And not the good kind of company, if his superhero senses were to be trusted. Startled by the intensity of the sensation, he straightened abruptly.
“I’ll admit, when the Supervillain Council approved you, I was less than impressed.”
Kimber whirled to face the supervillain standing in the doorway of a secondary entrance to the cave some twenty feet away. General Savage wore his supervillain smirk and mask, and his hands were clasped behind his back.
“Seems I underestimated you,” he said.
Kimber glanced from him to the explosives, only half of which he’d positioned so far. “Igor, start the countdown,” he whispered.
“Two minutes,” Igor said. “Get out of there, Doc!”
Kimber drew a deep, shaky breath. “You’re about to lose, General Savage,” he proclaimed boldly. “In two minutes, your fortress comes down. Surrender now, and we’ll make it out of here alive before it does.”
“And if I don’t?”
Kimber hesitated. “Then I guess we both die here.”
“If it were just us, I might believe you.” General Savage stepped aside. One of his henchmen dragged in a familiar body dressed in black and dropped it at his feet. The henchman retreated, closing the door behind him.
“Keladry!” Kimber started forward. The supervillainess was bloodied and bruised, rasping as she breathed and struggling to sit.
“Stop right there!” General Savage snapped. “Unless you want her blood on your hands.” He whipped out a gun and pointed it at her head.
Kimber froze, eyes on Keladry. “Igor, delay the countdown,” he said, uncertain how else to save her life.
“Kimber, our signal is jammed. We couldn’t set the explosives off if we wanted to,” Igor replied.
Kimber glared at General Savage.
“I’m guessing they just told you they can’t get a signal through the mountain,” the General said, smile widening. “You got nothing, Doc. If you surrender now, I’ll kill this bitch quickly.”
Thinking furiously, Kimber’s gaze dropped to Keladry again. He had the urge to wrap his arms around her, as he had last night, and steal her away from this mess once and for all.
“Do it … Doc,” Keladry whispered. She lifted her eyes to his. Her face had been sliced up in a way that made his heart wrench inside him. She tilted her head towards the pillar.
“Shut the fuck up, Reader.” General Savage backhanded her hard enough she dropped and groaned without trying to get up.
I can’t lose her. Kimber stood in indecision for a split second before he went to the pillar. “Let her go, and I won’t bring the entire mountain down on top of us!” he snapped at the supervillain.
“You’d give your life but not hers,” General Savage retorted.
Kimber lifted both fists – and smashed them into the stone face before him. Chunks of rock flew away as he decimated an entire foot of the behemoth pillar. Pain ricocheted through his body, and blood streamed down his hands. He ignored both, aware the damage would be gone soon enough.
“I’m calling your bluff, Doc.” General Savage shook his head. “You don’t have the guts.”
Two months ago, when he’d first met Keladry, Kimber would’ve agreed. But knowing what he did of the supervillain and how much harm a single man had wrought upon an entire city, Kimber couldn’t help feeling angry that he’d ever allowed selfish reasons to prevent him from standing up for what was right. He was the only one in the city who could protect the residents of Sand City, and he wasn’t going to let himself fail anyone ever again.
“Watch me,” he said through gritted teeth.
Thirteen: A superhero has a moment when he must accept what he is to make a difference
Facing the pillar again, Kimber smashed his fists into it, over and over, turning the stone to dust with the power of his fury and anger. He thought of his weakness in Chicago, of the overdose that did nothing but cause suffering to those he loved. His humiliation had driven him out of Chicago and to a city and people who challenged him to become the person he feared being, to live up to potential he didn’t know he possessed. He remembered meeting Keladry, her brother blowing up half the hospital to get to him, and every single time that difficult woman made his life a little more miserable. He went over every failure he’d made as a superhero, every moment of fear and hesitation, and every life that had been lost because of him.
And then he thought of Igor’s blind faith, of Officer Ford’s hope, of the way Keladry looked at him sometimes and made him think he was the only person in the universe she had every truly loved. Sand City was the only place where he felt like he belonged. Keladry once told him there was a difference between fighting and fighting for something. He began to understand that now and acknowledged he was fighting for something so much greater than himself or the failures of his past.
Emotions made Kimber’s eyes blur with tears, and his fists tear into the stone before him with ferocity that left him numb to the pain shredding his body. A strange roar was in his ears, and it took him several minutes of blind rage before he realized he was shouting out his emotion as well as beating it out.
He fought the pillar until he was too breathless to continue and then stopped and flung his head back, not caring about the tears on his face or his shattered hands.
Never again. He would never again be weak in the face of himself or when confronted by the evil of the world. He would never again balk to make a difference out of fear. He would never again allow himself to fail, no matter what the personal cost of success.
The cave’s trembling pulled him back from the brink, and he stepped back, startled by the amount of damage he’d managed to inflict in the frenzy of his emotion. He’d smashed away twenty feet of the pillar, leaving a perilous five feet as all that was holding up the mountain.
“Thought so,” General Savage purred.
Kimber whirled. “Is this what you want? To die right here with me?” he demanded. “Because if my death is what it takes to stop you, I’m happy to comply!” he started towards the villain, knowing no one could combat his super-strength.
General Savage shot Keladry in the back.
Kimber stopped in his tracks, fear for her life penetrating the haze of his anger.
“One more step, and the next one goes through her head,” General Savage warned.
Kimber didn’t know what to do. He meant what he said about dying here, if he stopped General Savage in the process. But Keladry?
The ground beneath their feet rumbled and dust sprinkled down upon them from above.
“Kimber.”
He jerked. Keladry’s weak voice was in his earpiece, not emanating from the unconscious woman before him.
How is that possible? He thought. I’m looking straight at her.
“How far are you … from my father?” Keladry asked with effort.
“Keladry, where –”
“How far?”
“I don’t know. Twenty feet. Are you –”
“He’s an illusion.”
Kimber fell silent.
“Whatever he’s showing you, it’s not real. His superpower is to … create illusions,” she continued. “You can … block us … but only if you’re within fifteen feet.”
Her words hit Kimber hard, and the reason behind General’s decoy suddenly snapped into clarity.
Kimber started forward.
“Stop!” General Savage barked
. “Or I’ll shoot her again!”
Ignoring the warning, Kimber reached the five-yard radius just as General Savage pulled the trigger. He flinched but continued on. When he reached the two figures, he was able to walk straight through them both, as if they were projections. They flickered and faded.
“That son of a bitch!” Kimber breathed. “He was trying to trick me into bringing down the mountain on my head!”
“Yeah,” Keladry said with a breathy laugh.
Another rumble, and Kimber looked up. It wouldn’t take explosives to bring this place down after the damage he did. He’d be surprised if the fortress survived the night.
“Where are you?” he asked. “Are you safe?”
“My father has to be close,” she replied. “If the illusions fade, he’s within fifteen feet.”
Kimber smashed through the door behind where the illusions had appeared and marched into the hallway behind it. He punched the henchman guarding the door and then began to run, this time choosing the hallway sloping upward.
“Keladry, are you okay?” he tried again.
“Don’t worry about it.”
“Of course I worry about you!”
“You shouldn’t.”
“When you love someone, that’s what you do,” he said with some exasperation.
“Then don’t love me!”
“It’s not a choice! I love you, and you love me, and nothing is going to change that!”
“Just because we’re fucking, doesn’t mean I love you.”
“Stop being so fucking stubborn!” Kimber snapped.
Someone cleared his throat. “Um, open line, guys,” Officer Ford said.
“Aw, but it’s so romantic,” Igor murmured.
Kimber snapped his mouth closed. In addition to representing the exact opposite of everything he was supposed to stand for, Keladry was also the most frustrating woman on the planet. It was just his luck he fell in love with her.
“I’m not seeing the General,” he said, starting to grow concerned. “If any of you are on the mountain, you need to leave now. This place is going to fall apart at any time.”
On cue, the ground beneath him bucked hard enough that he was forced to catch himself against the wall.