by Adam Oster
“Sure thing,” she said, disappearing and reappearing with a pair of jeans and a white T-shirt in her hands. “Although, I have to say, I prefer this costume.”
“Uniform,” Buddy corrected as he dressed himself.
“Okay, so, did we win?” Alexa asked.
“Damon and Jeff are restrained for the moment, so it seems to me that Ryan could use the Mind Wiper and we can call it all a day, right?”
“I'll go tell him,” Alexa frowned before disappearing.
“So,” Buddy said, looking at the rock monsters in front of him, “you guys from around here?”
“Gerawf chulnk!”
“Hey Buddy,” Alexa said, returning in a cloud of dust. “Ryan says it's not working.”
“What's not working?” Buddy asked.
“The Mind Wiper. He says it can't get a lock on either Damon or Jeff, like they're almost not even here.”
“Well, that's impossible, isn't it?” Buddy asked, looking at the rock Talmadge had said was named Mapu.
“He says that the only person he can lock onto in this mess is you.”
“What?”
“There's one other thing,” Alexa continued. “He said that when he tried to lock onto you, he got some really weird readings, almost as if there was more than one person's worth of memories in your mind.”
“Well, I do have Damon's memories up there from our last battle. Heck, I've still got all the memories from the big Mind Wipe from back in the day, right? He wouldn’t be the first person to tell me my brain is all screwed up.”
“He said he thinks Damon and Jeff are actually in your mind; that they left their physical bodies behind so they could hide inside you.”
“That’s insane,” Buddy laughed.
“Is it?”
“Isn't it?”
“You’re the guy who’s had the memories of a genocidal maniac stuck inside your head for the last six months and you’re calling this weird? Even after all we’ve been through just today?”
“Wait!” Buddy exclaimed. “If he can see me on that device, and he can see that Jeff and Damon are in there, couldn't he, you know, remove them from my mind? Wouldn't that get rid of them for good?”
“Maybe, but I’m still not sure that--”
“Nevermind,” Buddy said agitatedly. He crouched down and looked at Alexa. “I'll tell him myself,” he said as he shot up into the air.
Buddy landed ten feet away from Ryan, who yelled in surprise at the sudden, unannounced arrival of the leader of The Defenders. “Buddy!”
“Okay, so, Alexa and I came up with a plan.”
Alexa appeared at Buddy's side. “I had nothing to do with it.”
“Okay, fine, I came up with a plan. You can see me on the device, right, and Damon and Jeff inside me?”
“Yeah,” Ryan said, looking questioningly at Buddy.
“Great, so, delete them.”
“Delete them?”
“Delete them, remove them, erase them, wipe them, whatever you want to call it, remove their memories from my brain.”
“You know, I’ve been thinking about that, and I’m not sure--”
“I've already told him that, he doesn't seem to care,” Alexa cut Ryan off.
“I don't care what it means; get them out of my head. Damon's already been in there for far too long and the idea of Jeff being in there a moment longer absolutely disgusts me. Get them out. Now!”
“I’m sorry, Buddy, but I really don’t think I can be respons-“ the device in Ryan’s hands suddenly lit up brightly.
“See, look, you barely had to try,” Buddy smiled.
“I didn’t do anything, Buddy. This thing’s running on auto-pilot.”
A flash of light escaped the orb and Buddy fell to the ground.
CHAPTER 30
“I absolutely won’t do anything of the sort, Mr. Flores,” the reverend spoke firmly. He stood in his rectory wearing a black robe as Arthur Flores stood in the doorway.
“Too bad for you it doesn’t matter what you want to do,” Flores grinned as he pressed a button on the silver orb in his hands. A flash of white light filled the room.
Damon Memphis stood, wearing a large D on his chest, in a line with Buddy, Zero, Oscar, and several other costumed fellows. Before the group of brightly clad individuals was a man on a ladder holding a camera. The group appeared jovial as they posed in their most playful of superheroic ways.
“Say cheese,” said the photographer as another flash lit up the scene.
Two young boys sat next to each other on the front steps of a dark blue farm house.
“Say, Art,” said the boy on the left, “can you imagine what it would be like to fly?”
“Do you want to fly, Denny?” asked the boy on the right.
“Yeah, don’t you?”
“No, but I’m going to make you fly.”
Another bright flash of white before it all faded away to black.
*******
“Buddy!” Alexa shouted as her face came into view.
“Hey,” Buddy said, jumping in response to the sudden noise, “relax already. I'm fine.”
“God, you had us scared there,” Alexa said, sounding out of breath. “What happened?”
“I, um, I don’t know,” Buddy answered, looking confused.
“You collapsed and have been out for over half an hour,” Ryan answered.
“So, it worked?” Buddy asked.
“How the hell should I know?” Ryan asked. “I didn’t even tell it to do anything. Do you feel different?”
“I don't know. I mean, the only reason I ever knew anything was off before was because I’d have flashbacks,” Buddy answered.
“Well, did you have any flashbacks?”
“I don’t know. Actually, I, I really don’t know. I’m trying to remember what any of those flashbacks were. I think it might have worked.”
“Awesome,” Ryan cheered.
“What about Damon and Jeff, you know, the real Damon and Jeff? See anything of them since I was out?”
“Mapu and Pachu are still in position on top of them.” Talmadge answered from his position several feet away.
Buddy looked off in the distance, surveying the smoking remains of the south side of Sun City. Over five square miles had been flattened into nothing more than smoking ash. “How many people do you think died in that?” he asked.
“In the fire?” Alexa asked.
“Yeah. How many?”
“Don't worry about that, Buddy,” Ryan responded. “It will only--”
“Well, based on the space and the fact that it's a residential area, and that the fire occurred during the early evening when most people would be at home, I would have to guess that--”
“Talmadge,” Alexa interjected. “Shut up.”
“Okay, fine.”
“So, what do we do now?” Buddy asked.
“I'd say the first step should be that we go and check in on Damon and Jeff, see what happened to them,” Alexa answered.
“Does the device give us any ideas of what might have happened?” Buddy asked.
“I’ve been looking at it ever since it went out,” Ryan answered, “and here’s what I’ve come up with. For whatever reason, it had a default program that ran, based on some sort of timer within the device itself.”
“Artie,” Alexa groaned.
“That’s what I’d guess,” Ryan answered. “All the same, it seemed to have had a focused effect, seeing as Buddy was the only one of us it knocked out. Perhaps it really wasn’t all that bad, if it took Damon and Jeff out of your head.”
“If it’s Artie,” Alexa replied, “it’s bound to be bad.”
“So,” Buddy replied, “I guess that just leaves us with checking in on Damon and Jeff to see what might have happened to them, right?”
“That’s as good of an idea as we’ve come up with,” Ryan answered. “I should probably mention something before we do that though. This device has gotten a lot of use over the years.
Like, I mean, looking at the logs, I’d say it’s been used over a hundred times easily. I don’t know if that--”
“Sounds like a great question, but one that should wait until later,” Buddy answered. “Right now, the top of my priority list is making sure that the world’s not going to be melted into slag.”
The group cautiously made their way toward the last known location of Damon Memphis. The ground had mostly hardened now, but there were areas that appeared brittle with little underneath to hold them up. As their feet fell, they heard the earth shuddering nearby in response to their weight, sounding as though a step in the wrong direction could cause the whole thing to fall apart.
When they arrived at the side of the Cherufe, Talmadge stepped in front of the group and closed his eyes.
“Barg har fleem buggle doop.”
“Same to you,” Buddy said.
Mapu, the largest of the rock people, stood up, revealing the small frame of the man who had been brightly burning only an hour before. The Cherufe stomped off loudly, making use of a nearby newly created sinkhole to return to their home underground.
Damon coughed loudly and sat up. Buddy ran to his side and placed a firm grip on his arm.
“Damon,” Buddy said strongly.
“No,” Damon said, “I'm Murphy, remember?”
“You've tried that one before,” Buddy spoke. “Tell me what happened to your wife.”
“My wife?” Damon asked, his eyes wild with fear. “Did something happen to my wife?”
“This is pointless,” Alexa shouted. “Asking him questions isn’t going to prove anything. If this is Damon, I’m guessing he’d be lighting up like a supernova already.”
“According to the MWD, he’s registering as Dennis Murphy,” Ryan added. “For as much as that means.”
“To be honest, the fact that we aren’t already frying like bacon makes me feel pretty confident that we’re safe here,” Buddy joined in.
“Okay, perfect. So, if he’s Murphy, what happened to Jeff?” Alexa asked.
The ground rumbled beneath them again.
“Unless that’s Salachar again, I think we may be about to get the answer to your question,” Buddy said with a hint of fear in his eye.
“Hey,” Ryan disagreed, “it could be the Cherufe coming back.”
“Nope,” Talmadge said shortly.
The rumbling grew louder, culminating in a crash as the earth exploded and a figure erupted from within.
The figure laughed loudly as it stretched out to full size. It continued growing well above the heights of the trees that used to be in this area, effortlessly reaching the heights of the sky scrapers in the distance.
“Artie?” Alexa screamed. The figure stopped and turned its attention directly onto the group below.
“Ms. Rose!” Arthur's voice boomed through the air. “Surprised to see me?”
“It can't be!” Buddy exclaimed. “I saw him die.”
“Oh, but you did, Mr. Jackson,” a large toothy grin appeared on his enormous face. “But thanks to you, I have been resurrected!”
“This isn’t possible!” Alexa screamed.
“Oh, but it is, Ms. Rose. You see, one of the greatest benefits to having a son who is able to change his form into that of whatever he wishes, is that you don't have to change your outward appearance when you take over his body.” Arthur laughed as the outline of his body shifted, melting and reforming into that of Jeff. His cackle grew larger.
“I don’t get it,” Buddy replied.
“It’s simple,” Ryan answered. “He’s the reason the MWD went off on its own. He pre-programmed it to re-write Jeff’s mind with his own, essentially making his son’s body the new body of Arthur Flores.”
“You killed your own son?” Talmadge asked.
“Oh, his body is very much alive,” Arthur said as he returned to his normal form. “It just serves a new master.”
“But why?” Alexa asked. “I know you and Jeff never got along, but surely even you aren’t capable of this type of—“
“You have absolutely no clue of what I am capable, Miss Rose,” Arthur cut her off. “You know nothing.”
“I think I know an awful lot about—“
“You were nothing more than a pawn in the game I’ve been playing to ensure my own supremacy. You were a necessary evil to keep the one man who managed to avoid my rewriting of history from suspecting what I was truly up to. And speaking of Oscar Reed, you see, he wasn't the only one suffering from a life-threatening disease. I too saw the end of my life nearing, saw it coming a great many years ago in fact, and had to prepare.”
“So you chose to steal your son's body?!” Buddy screamed. “You're a monster.”
“You have no idea,” Arthur grew in size again, reaching the height of over one hundred feet tall. He reached down and swiped his hand at the group, lifting them all up into the air on his palm as he brought them to his face.
“You won't get away with this, Arthur,” Ryan threatened.
“Oh, won't I?” he giggled. “My idiot son’s ability could have allowed him to be the most powerful person to have ever walked this planet, even stronger than Dominion could have ever hoped to be. But he was too dull, too dumb to understand his true potential. All he cared about was garnering my favor and taking over the family business, a business that existed only to allow for this precise moment. He was too simple-minded to understand how easy it would be for him to control the entire world.”
“You're a madman,” Talmadge yelled.
“And you're nothing,” Arthur yelled back. He brought his other hand up and flicked Talmadge with his pointer finger. Talmadge flew off into the evening air.
Buddy looked at Alexa. “I don't think I'll be fast enough.”
“On it,” she said and immediately disappeared.
“And then there were two,” Arthur giggled further.
“You know what, Arthur,” Buddy asked. “I've dealt with the likes of you before.”
“Oh yeah?” Arthur laughed further. “And what did you do with them?”
“You're about to find out.” Buddy looked over at Ryan and whispered. “Do you think you can keep him distracted for a few minutes while I do my thing?”
“Of course.”
“Do it.” Ryan lifted off into the air and shot directly toward Arthur's eye. Arthur leaned back instinctively, swatting at Ryan as he would a fly. Buddy jumped out of Arthur's hand just as it began dropping. He landed on the shoulder as Ryan shot up the man's nose. A light flickered inside the cavernous nostril as Arthur yelped in pain. Buddy jumped up onto Arthur's ear lobe, took one final look out and stepped inside.
“Flores,” Buddy yelled into the long tunnel ahead of him. The room shook violently as a finger began poking at the entrance. “Don't like getting bugs in your ears, huh?”
Arthur said something, which reverberated through the fleshy walls, but was too muffled to make out.
“No clue what you're trying to say, so I guess this will be a one-sided conversation. I'm going to make this simple for you. Give up, or I start breaking things in here. The last time I did something like that, well, let's just say that the recipient of that attention didn't last long.”
More muffled talking from Arthur.
“Oh, and one more thing, I would highly suggest not shrinking down while I'm in here. It could give you quite the headache.”
The finger moved away from the ear canal and Buddy stuck his head out in an attempt to hear Arthur's response.
“I'll never give in to the likes of you, Buddy Hero. Don't you understand? I'm invincible. There is nothing you can do to stop me. Do you understand? Nothing!”
Buddy casually walked back into the ear canal and came across a thin piece of skin stretched from the top to the bottom of the tunnel. Buddy smiled. “I'm not much for human anatomy,” he said, “but I'm pretty sure this is what doctors like to call the ear drum. I was also never a very good drummer, but I have to imagine that the acoustics in here are
too amazing to not give it a try.”
Buddy began rhythmically pounding on the membrane, filling the tunnel with a deep booming noise. At the same time, the room began rocking wildly from side to side, a muffled howl joining the percussion. Buddy grinned brightly.
“Give up yet?” he yelled into the taut membrane. The tunnel tilted down, away from the interior of the canal, causing Buddy to slide away from the inner ear to the daylight. He caught hold of some nearby residue as the entire tunnel shook violently in its attempt to expel him. Buddy dug his hands into the side of the canal and pulled himself toward the ear drum before finally using his might to fling himself into the thin membrane separating him from the inner workings of Flores' auditory system.
Buddy hit the membrane and broke right through into the inner ear, landing just on the other side. The ear drum resealed immediately behind him. He looked around in the dark region of the interior of Arthur's head, remembering the interior of the android’s head from not so long ago.
“Talmadge,” Buddy spoke out loud, hoping the kid could still hear his thoughts. After a moment's pause, he decided he wasn’t being heard. He found himself wishing there were some sort of computer system inside this room, as it would seem much less complex than what he was really seeing, not to mention that it would provide some light.
Then Buddy remembered he was still carrying his cell phone and pulled it out of his pocket, pressing the button on the side which caused it to light up. The room illuminated brightly with the small screen's light. He found an intricate system of tubes and bone systems running through the small room he was in. Some looked moderately familiar from an ages old anatomy class he took, others seemed almost other-worldly in their design.
Buddy considered what the ear was designed to do, how he remembered it was used for more than just hearing. After a brief moment of consideration, he came across the memory of how it was also involved in balance. Of course, with Arthur's ability to heal any damage Buddy made to his system, he would have to act smarter than just destroying everything in sight. That would also mean he would need to know exactly which area to attack to cause the greatest immediate response.