by Lucas Flint
“Please, just call me Barriers,” said Barriers in a false modest tone. “As to how I intend to save the hostages, I don’t want to spoil anything just yet. It will be far more interesting if you see what I do, rather than hear me explain it. Besides, I don’t want any criminals watching this to get an idea of my tactics before I actually use them.”
“Yes, I understand completely,” said Jenna, nodding quickly. “We’re all rooting for you both here and at home, Mr. Barriers.”
“Thank you for your support,” said Barriers, putting a hand on his chest. “Without the support of the people, we superheroes couldn’t do even half of the things we do. Rest assured that in ten minutes, all ten of the hostages will be safely rescued from the Three Fingers and the Three Fingers themselves will be hauled off to jail, where scum like them deserve to go.”
Chief Williams and I exchanged odd glances.
“Is that normal for him?” asked Chief Williams in a low voice.
I shrugged. “No idea. I literally just started working for him today.”
In truth, my words didn’t convey just how disturbing I found Barriers’ conversation with the reporter. It looked less like a reporter reporting on a crime scene and more like an interview meant to publicize Barriers. It was probably just the way that Barriers talked, but it almost seemed like the reporter, Jenna, was in on it, too. All I knew was that I didn’t like it.
Barriers suddenly turned and began walking toward the entrance to Jim’s Burgers. He gestured for me to follow, so I ran over to him and was soon walking by his side up the street toward Jim’s Burgers, police moving out of the way to make a path for us.
“What’s the plan, boss?” I said, looking up at Barriers as we walked.
“Easy,” said Barriers. “We’re walking through the front door.”
“But didn’t you hear what Chief Williams said?” I said. I glanced at the armed men visible through the front windows. “He said that we’d get riddled with bullets if we just walked in. And those Three Fingers guys look like they mean business.”
“Did you forget my powers already?” said Barriers with a snort. “My barriers are bulletproof. We’ll be perfectly safe no matter how many bullets they shoot at us.”
“What if they try to kill the hostages instead?” I said. “Once they realize they can’t kill us—”
“Don’t worry,” said Barriers. “Not a single hair on the head of any of those hostages will be touched by the time I’m done with the Three Fingers. Really, I could probably do this without you, but for marketing purposes, it’s always better to go into these kinds of highly publicized situations with a sidekick at your side than not.”
“Marketing purposes?” I said.
“Uh, I mean for backup,” said Barriers, avoiding my questioning gaze. “After all, I would not have hired you as my sidekick if I did not think you had the heart of a true hero.”
My eyes narrowed, but I said nothing, because we reached the front door of Jim’s Burgers, which had apparently been left open, maybe to trick unwary police officers into entering. I kept expecting the Three Fingers members to start shooting at us, but they didn’t. Maybe they didn’t want to shatter the windows and give the police another way in. They did, however, raise their guns and aim them at us. I stepped behind Barriers, because even though my suit was bulletproof, I didn’t want to test that right now against so many guns at once.
Barriers stepped forward and raised his arms in a dramatic fashion. “Hello, evildoers! You may not recognize me, so allow me to introduce myself. I am Barriers, Golden City’s newest superhero, and I am here to save the hostages from you cowards, like a real superhero would!”
Barriers practically shouted when he said that. I figured he was putting on a show for the news cameras, which were now focused on us. The police were also watching us intently, ready to jump in and help if necessary, although I had a feeling we wouldn’t need their help to deal with these guys.
“But like all superheroes, I believe that justice should be dished out in a court of law, not on the streets!” Barriers continued. He pointed dramatically at the Three Fingers. “Therefore, I will give you all one last chance: Put your guns down and surrender now or else face my wrath.”
I looked at the Three Fingers. Not a single one of them looked even remotely intimidated by Barriers’ threat. As for the hostages, I couldn’t see them. I assume they had probably all been herded into the back room where one of the Three Fingers gunmen was keeping an eye on them. Something about this situation seemed off to me, but I couldn’t put a finger on it.
“I will take your silence as a no,” said Barriers. “Very well. I and my trusty sidekick have no choice but to beat you into submission. Prepare to go to prison on a stretcher.”
Barriers walked through the front door. As soon as his foot crossed the threshold, gunfire exploded from within, but Barriers just summoned a glowing blue barrier between him and the bullets. The bullets bounced harmlessly off the blue barrier, although the gunmen didn’t seem to notice because they were so busy firing everything they had at him. The sound of so many guns being fired continuously and at once made me cringe, but Barriers just advanced into the restaurant, kicking aside overturned tables or chairs as he walked.
The Three Fingers gunmen must have finally realized how useless their guns were, because all of them stopped shooting. A few of them rushed Barriers, pulling out large knives from their belts, but Barriers dodged their attacks easily and took them out with a solid blow to the gut each. The two gunmen fell to the floor with cries of pain, but another Three Fingers member had somehow sneaked up on Barriers without him noticing. The Three Fingers had a knife in his hands, which he brought down on Barrier’s back.
With a yell, I jumped into the restaurant and fired my lasers at that attacker. My lasers struck his hand, sending the knife flying out of sight. The attacker shouted in pain and grabbed his wrist, but then Barriers whirled around and punched him in the face. The attacker immediately collapsed onto the floor, leaving only two Three Fingers members left.
“Nice job, kid!” said Barriers, giving me the thumbs up. “That one would have gotten me for sure if you hadn’t shot his knife out of his hand.”
I opened my mouth to say thanks, but at that moment, one of the remaining Three Fingers popped out from behind the cash register and fired several bullets at us. I ducked behind a table, while Barriers summoned another energy shield around himself, which protected him from all of the bullets.
“Foolish criminal,” said Barriers with a chuckle. “Forget about my shields already? Despite being a member of such a notorious crime gang, you sure are stupid.”
Then Barriers rushed toward the Three Fingers member, who was still firing round after round at him. But thanks to his shield, Barriers didn’t slow down at all. He launched himself over the top of the counter, grabbed the neck of the now-visibly frightened Three Fingers member, and slammed his head against the counter. He dropped the shooter onto the floor behind the counter like so much trash.
Damn. Seeing Barriers take care of these Three Fingers members made me rethink my opinion of him. He might have been a greedy bastard who cared more about money than doing the right thing, but he was also a good fighter. I was glad I didn’t have to fight him.
The sound of someone attempting to force open a door caused me to look over to the right side of the restaurant. The last remaining Three Fingers member—a black man with dreads—was desperately trying to unlock what might have been the back door, no doubt trying to make a quick escape. I rose from behind the overturned table and fired my lasers at the doorknob. My lasers hit his hands, causing the criminal to scream in pain and jerk his hands away from the now-smoking doorknob.
His scream caught the attention of Barriers, who vaulted himself over the counter, rolled across the floor, and then got to his feet and pinned the last criminal to the wall, slamming his head against it hard enough to make the walls shudder and cause a picture of the owner standing wi
th the mayor of the city to fall onto the floor nearby.
“Not so fast, criminal,” said Barriers, his face just inches away from the criminal’s. “I won’t let you get away that easily, at least not until you tell us where the hostages are.”
“In the kitchen,” said the criminal through trembling lips. He nodded at the kitchen door behind the counter. “We herded them all into the kitchen because we thought it’d be easier to keep an eye on all of them there. No one’s back there, by the way. You took down all of us.”
“Thank you for your cooperation, criminal,” said Barriers. “Now go to sleep.”
Barriers pulled back a fist and threw it directly at the criminal’s face. Just as Barriers’ fist was about to collide with that guy’s nose, I heard the sound of snapping rubber and a stretched arm came out of nowhere and caught Barrier’s fist by the wrist, stopping it not even an inch from the criminal’s face. The criminal had closed his eyes when Barriers tried to punch him, but opened them when he didn’t feel Barriers’ fist crash into his face.
“What the hell?” said Barriers. He looked in the direction from which the stretched arm came. “What is the meaning of this?”
I, too, looked over at where the hand had come from and was surprised to see someone standing in the doorway who I had not expected to see here: Rubberman. His right arm was stretched the entire length of the room, having caught Barriers’ fist before it could smash into the criminal’s face. Even though Barriers was strong, Rubberman didn’t show even the slightest sign of exertion, which made me wonder just how strong he was.
“Rubberman?” said Barriers in a slightly strained voice. “What are you doing here? And why did you stop me from breaking this criminal’s nose? Can’t you see I’m in the middle of saving a bunch of innocent hostages here?”
Rubberman said nothing. Instead, he yanked his arm back, causing Barriers to stagger backwards. Barriers tripped over a chair and fell onto the floor with a crash, while the criminal who he had been threatening just sank to the floor, absolute terror obvious on his features.
“Rubberman, what’s the deal?” I said. “Barriers was trying to stop a criminal. Why are you helping a criminal?”
Rubberman looked over at me and I was surprised at the sheer anger in his eyes. I’d only seen him that angry once before, when he had faced Fro-Zen a month or two ago. “I should be asking you the same question.”
“What are you talking about?” I said. “I’m not helping any criminals. I’m trying to stop them.”
“What Beams said,” said Barriers as he scrambled to his feet, dusting off his armor. “As I said, we’re in the middle of saving innocent hostages here. You are not helping.”
Rubberman chuckled. “Hostages, eh? You mean the ones whose lives you put in danger?”
“What?” I said. “Rubberman, what are you talking about? Do you mean—”
“I do,” said Rubberman. He gestured at the terrified criminal sitting on the floor. “This entire situation is a sham, a show put on to make Barriers look good. Barriers hired the Three Fingers to put the lives of innocent people into danger for his own benefit … and I’m here to stop him before he hurts anyone else.”
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
The silence that fell upon the restaurant was as heavy as fog. I looked from Barriers to Rubberman and back again, wondering if I’d heard that right. Rubberman did not repeat or correct himself. He just stood there, his arms crossed in front of his chest. As for Barriers, his hands had balled into fists and were even shaking, as if Barriers was trying to keep himself from shouting.
But finally, Barriers laughed. It sounded like the same laugh he’d made yesterday when James and I visited him, except now it sounded forced, even strained. Rubberman didn’t smile or join in the laughter, and neither did I. The two of us just stared at Barriers as he continued to laugh like someone who had told a terrible joke and was trying to make other people laugh at it by laughing uproariously.
“Ha, ha, Rubberman, that’s a good joke,” said Barriers with a chuckle. “Me, working with the Three Fingers to create a hostage situation that I would solve, just to make me look good … your sense of humor has always been a little wacky, but this is just hilarious.”
“But true,” said Rubberman. “You’re just laughing in order to make it seem more ridiculous than it is.”
Barriers suddenly stopped laughing. His green eyes became cold. “Or maybe it is because this is the stupidest conspiracy theory I’ve ever heard. Your paranoia truly knows no bounds if you think that I would collaborate with such lowlife scum just to make myself look good. I would never put the lives of innocent people in danger just to benefit myself. I am not heartless.”
“But you are broke,” said Rubberman. “And broke men are desperate men. And desperate men are willing to do anything not to be broke anymore.”
“Rubberman, what are you talking about?” I asked. “You’re making all of these wild accusations against Barriers but you don’t have any proof. Have you lost your mind or something?”
“I’m perfectly sane, Beams,” said Rubberman. “And so is Barriers, which is what makes his fall from grace so tragic.”
“I’ve not fallen from anything,” said Barriers. “You are just babbling. Seems like all those years of conspiracy-mongering have finally rotted your brain.”
Rubberman shook his head. “My brain is perfectly fine. Yours, on the other hand, might not be, although you’ve always had this tendency of projecting your own flaws onto others.”
Barriers’ hands shook even harder. “You are obstructing justice. The police—”
“Won’t help you,” said Rubberman. He gestured over his shoulder. “Look out the window and tell me what you see.”
I looked out the front windows of the restaurant. The police were crowded around the entrance, but none of them were looking at Rubberman. Instead, they were looking at Barriers, who stepped backwards, which looked like an involuntary movement.
“Don’t think about trying to escape through the back door, either,” said Rubberman. “The police have it covered. Actually, they’re already evacuating the hostages, because I warned them that you might become violent if you felt cornered.”
Barriers chuckled again, but this one sounded so forced that it sounded more like he was choking on something than anything. “So you’ve managed to get the police on your side. I guess the police of Golden City must be dumber than I thought.”
“No, they just trust me,” said Rubberman. “More importantly, they trust evidence, of which I have plenty, of your wrongdoing.”
Rubberman held up his smartphone. Its screen displayed what appeared to be a long chain of emails, all under the same subject line: ‘RE: Re-debut plans.’
I looked at Barriers. With his helmet on his face, I couldn’t see his expression, but Barriers’ eyes had grown so huge that they looked like they were about to fall out of their sockets.
“How did you get those?” said Barriers in a low, frightened voice.
“It was thanks to Beams here,” said Rubberman, nodding at me. “Remember that flash drive you stole from Takeshi? The one we were trying to hack?”
I nodded. “Yeah. Were those emails in it?”
Rubberman nodded. “Yep. We discovered an entire chain of emails detailing the back and forth between Barriers and his marketing manager at Munroe Acquisitions. The earliest is from six months ago, when Barriers first started working for the company and they started to plan his ‘re-debut’ as a superhero.” He looked at Barriers. “Including the suggestion that you staged a hostage situation in order to make you look like a real superhero and give you a nice publicity boost right from the start.”
Not only were Barriers’ hands shaking, but his whole body was shaking. “Liar. Those emails are fake.”
“Do you want to prove that in court?” asked Rubberman. “Because I’m willing to go to court over this if I have to. I’m sure the judge would be more than happy to hear how these hundreds of emails ar
e fake. And these Three Fingers gang members would be more than happy to testify that I’m a lying liar who lies, right?”
One glance at the terrified Three Fingers gang member on the ground was enough to cast all doubt from my mind about the truthfulness of Rubberman’s claims. I had no doubt that that guy was ready to squeal.
Barriers gulped. “I’m not … I mean … this is ridiculous.”
“Ridiculous, maybe, but true,” said Rubberman. He lowered his smartphone to his side. “Even that reporter—Jenna Marbles from Channel Nine News—is in on it. You needed someone to catch your heroism on film, so your marketing director managed to arrange Ms. Marbles’ appearance at the scene of the ‘crime’ when it happened. That’s why she’s not here anymore, by the way. She ran away as soon as I showed up, though I expect the police to arrest her, too, once I share this information with them.”
Barriers said nothing to that, which made him look guilty beyond a shadow of a doubt.
Rubberman looked at me. “Beams, this is the reason I was trying to call you earlier. When Adams finally cracked the encryption, I realized that you were going to be in a world of danger if we didn’t contact you right away. If you had just answered your phone, I wouldn’t have felt the need to come here, although given the seriousness of this situation, maybe I would have anyway.”
I suddenly remembered Rubberman trying to call me earlier. Now I felt embarrassed for not answering it when I should have. Maybe this situation could have been averted earlier than it had.
“The only thing I haven’t been able to figure out is why you did this,” said Rubberman to Barriers as he put his smartphone back into the pocket of his costume. “I assume it’s due to your greed or maybe your jealousy of me, because your emails state that one of your goals was to replace me as Golden City’s top superhero, but I sense there is more to it than that. You’ve always been a greedy, selfish jerk, but this is a new low even for you. What’s the deal?”