William hung up the phone. He had an uneasy feeling in his gut.
CHAPTER 28
Jack sat on his back patio, enjoying the light breeze that was blowing through the apple and pear trees in the massive backyard. He watched the way the sunlight glimmered off the clear water of the pool to the right. He felt Heidi’s presence before she slid open the sliding glass door. She sat next to him in a patio chair and they were silent a while.
“That suit,” Jack said, “what is it? What is it made of?”
“A synthetic polymer that we couldn’t identify. It didn’t correspond to any element in the periodic table.”
“Where did you get it?”
She looked to him and then away. “Off one of…them. We found it conforms to whatever shape it happens to be covering.”
Jack was quiet. “I feel different.”
“Different how?”
“There’s a voice in my head. It’s much louder than it should be. It sounds like it’s outside of me but I know it’s coming from me. Yesterday, it made me do something that I wasn’t even aware I did.”
“What do you mean?”
“I mean I literally took actions that I didn’t remember doing afterward. I hurt…I hurt some people. Not bad, but I hurt them and didn’t know that I did.”
“Jack, I know this is all hard to swallow. Maybe I’ve been in this so long that I’ve grown desensitized to how bizarre it all is. But you were injected with an extraterrestrial hormone. The only other person that has done that is Agamemnon and we haven’t been able to study him. I don’t know all the side effects that’s going to have.”
Jack shook his head. “The voice was there before. I heard it for the first time in the hospital.”
“Oh,” was all she managed to say. After a few minutes, she said, “You were locked inside your own head for a very long time. I’m not a psychiatrist, but there has to be some sort of psychological impact from that.”
“Yeah.”
A phone rang inside the house. It took five rings to go quiet.
“I know where Agamemnon is.”
“How do you know that?” Heidi said, turning to him.
“I got the information from one of his men. He’s in an abandoned plant. It used to manufacture engine parts for planes and automobiles. I know where it is. I’ve been out there before. I’m going tonight.”
“Why?”
“Because I need answers. Colonel Finley showed up at my precinct today asking where I was.”
“Did he?” she said, glancing away toward the pool. “What did he want?”
“He wants you. And me. He says you’re dangerous.”
“Do you believe that, Jack? Do you think I’m a threat to national security?”
He looked her in the eyes. Her eyes were large and brown with thick lashes. “Of course not. I just don’t know how long we can last here.”
“You said you want answers. Is that all you want?”
“No.”
“Jack, revenge doesn’t just hurt the object of the vengeance.”
“They shot my niece and he took my legs. What would you want me to do?”
“Let’s go somewhere where Finley can’t find us. He has no jurisdiction in the Caribbean. Let’s go there. Let’s leave this whole mess behind.”
“I…we will. But first I need to find Agamemnon.”
“And what are you going to do when you find him? You have no idea how powerful he is. You haven’t even gotten used to your suit or your new abilities. He’s been living in them for years.”
Jack thought a moment. “You’re right. It’s not time yet.”
She exhaled. “Thank goodness you see reason.”
“But it will be soon. And when it is, Heidi, don’t try and stop me.”
CHAPTER 29
Reese Stillman stopped his Chevy Tahoe just outside the warehouse. Though it was the middle of the day, there was no one around for at least twenty miles. The warehouse sat on a stretch of land that used to be an Indian reservation on the California/Nevada border. Converted to open space in the 70s, there was nothing here now but abandoned buildings from a few foolhardy investors trying to rent out land bought on the cheap.
As always, Agamemnon was already here. He stood near the warehouse in his full, black suit. His eyes were closed and his breathing was deep and purposeful. Reese had seen him do this hundreds of time, sometimes numerous times a day. He was meditating. Though for what purpose, Reese could never tell.
Reese stepped out of the Tahoe with the five other men that were piled in. As he approached Agamemnon, the giant opened his eyes, a smile coming over his wide face.
“Were you followed?” he said in his unearthly voice.
“No,” Reese said.
“Excellent. Let us proceed.”
Reese scanned the area before pulling assault rifles from the back of the Tahoe. He passed one to each member of the crew before they began walking toward the building. The men spread out and circled the building, checking every inch for anything that could be out of place. A few cars were parked around the back, but Reese didn’t notice anything one wouldn’t expect at an abandoned warehouse.
“It’s good,” he said.
Agamemnon sauntered toward the building. Though his footfalls kicked up dust, for his height and weight, he made no noise as he walked. In fact, he was the most agile person Reese had ever seen.
Approaching the factory door, two of the men opened it and Reese went in first, the assault rifle slung over his arm, Agamemnon just behind him. The warehouse was dark except for the light streaming in from broken windows on the top floor. A staircase circled the building, leading to an entrance to the roof.
In the middle of the first floor was a rectangular table. On one side sat several men. Behind them were more men with assault rifles not unlike those that Reese had brought. Reese quickly counted the men: there were twelve. Three sitting at the table, and nine standing with guns behind them.
Agamemnon gently brushed past him and took his place at the front of the table. “Gentlemen. As-Salamu Alaykum. It is good to see you again.”
The men replied in greeting and Agamemnon sat cross-legged in front of them. Even sitting, he was taller than any of the men there.
“I trust you have what I asked for,” Agamemnon said.
One of the men at the table, the one seated at the center, looked to the other two and then back to Agamemnon. “We have it.”
“Excellent,” he said, joy in his voice. “I will arrange the wire transfer immediately. It seems, gentlemen, that business was concluded and yet you still insisted on meeting in person. So I assume there is more you wish to discuss.”
“There is,” the man replied.
Agamemnon quietly waited for the man to continue. The man wanted Agamemnon to ask him what it was, putting him in the weaker negotiating position—at least for appearance’s sake—but Agamemnon simply stared at them until the man grew uncomfortable and spoke again.
“We feel there are many unnecessary risks taken that we do not approve of.”
“A legitimate concern.”
“We saw an image of you in the newspapers. Stealing from a bank.” He shook his head. “This type of thing is unacceptable. You are a link to us.”
“I see. And what remedy do you propose for this situation? It cannot be the two snipers you have on the top floor, can it?”
The three men looked stunned. Reese glanced up. He couldn’t see anything on the top floor other than old cardboard boxes and a few pieces of machinery.
“You are a liability,” the man said. “We cannot risk you exposing us. Our nation is an ally to the United States and if this were to get out…”
“I understand your meaning perfectly, Abraham,” Agamemnon said. “You are correct: one of us must perish in order to safeguard the other.” He stood to his full height. “But you are incorrect as to which one of us that will be.”
Silence filled the space for a good five seconds. Reese’s he
art was pounding in his chest as he slowly brought his weapon off his shoulder and into his arms. The silence was suddenly broken by the muffled sound of rifles firing down from above.
Agamemnon seemed to fly through the air as he leapt to the top floor of the warehouse. Reese swung his weapon around and began to fire. All the men in front of him scattered as his crew did the same, using the storage units and machinery as cover. Reese hid behind a forklift as shots bounced off the metal frame. When there was a pause, he would lean out and fire a few shots and duck behind it again.
As he did this, he caught a glimpse of Agamemnon. He was on the top floor with a man in his hand, lifting him into the air. He crushed the man’s head into a pulp and threw the body over the railing. Reese saw that another man lay close to him on the warehouse floor.
The ground shook as Agamemnon leapt into the middle of the gun battle. He lifted the table the men had been sitting at and used it like a baseball bat, slapping away two of the armed men before the table broke in half.
One of the men began firing at Agamemnon’s exposed face and he covered himself with his arm, the slugs bouncing off his suit and clinking on the floor. Agamemnon leapt into the air like a puma and landed on the man’s shoulders, crushing him into the floor as if a semi-truck had landed on him.
Agamemnon quickly dispatched the others, swatting them away as if they were fruit flies. He lifted a metal storage unit and flung it aside, revealing the man he had been speaking to cowering underneath.
“Please,” the man said, “I have a family.”
Agamemnon grabbed him around the waist with both hands and lifted him in the air. “Then I’m afraid you will not know whether I decided to pay them a visit as well.”
“No! Please, listen—”
Squeezing with both arms, the man’s back crunched and snapped in several places. Agamemnon lifted him over his head and threw the lifeless body against the wall, watching as it slid down to the floor. He then walked over to a conveyor belt and reached inside the chute where whatever product they dealt with here used to come out of. A man screamed as Agamemnon pulled him out by his ankle.
“No, please. Please, for the love of Allah. Please!”
“You will tell me where to find what I seek. Yes?”
“Yes, yes. I will.”
Agamemnon smiled, dropping the man. “Speak.”
CHAPTER 30
Jack stood outside his sister’s home and stared into the windows. It was well past ten and the moon was out. Though he wanted to see Autumn, he didn’t know how she would react and thought it best to wait until she was put to bed.
Though he wore slacks and a coat, he had the suit the doctor had given him on underneath. He reached into his sleeve and felt the material. It was scaly, not unlike a lizard or perhaps a shark when one’s finger touched it against the grain. It seemed to breathe with him, growing slack as he inhaled and constricting when he exhaled. He wondered if it really was indestructible as Heidi had implied.
He walked to the door and knocked, waiting almost a minute until someone answered.
Nicole appeared older, though it’d only been a little over a year. She had more gray in her hair and a little more weight to her. But her eyes were the same. Large and full of love, even for someone that had hurt her in such a powerful way.
No words came to Jack. He simply looked down, unable to look her in the eyes, and said, “I’m so sorry.”
A pause before she threw her arms around him. They held each other under the moonlight until she pulled away.
“William called me the other day to prepare me,” she said.
“I know. I wanted to come straight here. But I thought I should give you some time. How’s Autumn?”
“She’s doing well. She has a scar now but all her friends think it’s cool so she’s not too shy about it.”
“Scars can be good. They show us that we’ve actually lived.”
She was silent again a few moments and then said, “Why don’t you come in so we can talk?”
“I have to go somewhere. Can I come over tomorrow?”
“I’d like that.”
Jack leaned in and kissed her on the cheek. He walked away, glancing back once to see a little figure in the upstairs window staring down at him from the dark. She waved and he waved back.
Jack parked his car in the lot of a restaurant. It was empty and he quickly took off his clothes—wearing only the suit—and pulled the mask over his face. He suddenly felt free. Somehow just having anonymity was enough.
Okay, how do we start this?
He stood by his car a long while, wondering exactly what he meant to do tonight, when he heard someone shout, “Hey, dude, it’s not Halloween yet.”
He looked over and waved. “Thanks. Yeah, I know. Thanks.”
When the people went away, chuckling, he walked through the parking lot. The noise of the city was overwhelming. He could hear conversations from inside the restaurant. A young man was yelling at his girlfriend in an apartment across the street. An elderly couple was watching an episode of Alf in the unit next door. All the way down the block, a man was hitting on a woman as they waited at a bus stop.
Jack stopped and held his hands up to his ears to dull the noise, but it didn’t help. He could see the U.S. Bank Tower, the tallest building in the city, not far from here. He began walking across the parking lot again, and then jogging. The more effort he exerted the easier it became. He was in a full sprint in a matter of seconds. A car pulled out in front of him and he leapt over it like a hurdle. He jumped up onto the row of parked cars and ran across their hoods: his footfalls barely making a whisper.
Adrenaline and excitement rushed through him. He jumped over a six-foot fence and ran to the nearest building. Leaping as high as he could, he scaled two stories. He tried reaching for a window ledge but missed and began to fall to the pavement below.
He straightened himself out and landed on both feet, cracking the pavement of the sidewalk underneath him. He didn’t move for a moment, testing to see whether he’d broken his artificial ankles or legs. But everything felt fine. He rose and looked up the height of the building.
He ran for the side and sprinted upward. His legs were moving so fast he couldn’t see them, but he didn’t feel any burning like he should have. Suddenly gravity didn’t seem to apply to him.
The sprint didn’t last long before he was at the top of the ten-story building. Dashing across the roof, he leapt to the next building and climbed its façade. Feeling invincible, he let out a yell as he leapt to another building and then flipped over to the roof of a smaller one.
Within minutes, he was at the Tower. He sprinted up its side, alternating between crawling up on all fours and straightening into a run, all the way to the top. He then turned and sat on the ledge, looking out over the sparkling lights of the city. He was breathing deeply but he wasn’t out of breath. His muscles, especially his legs’, felt warm and the tips of his toes were on fire. He had to reach down and feel them to make sure the metal was still there in place of the flesh.
Standing to his full height, looking down seventy-three floors below him, he could hear things far off in the distance. People, cars, televisions, computers, pets…they were all there. He deciphered them as one would decipher many voices in a crowded restaurant. He closed his eyes, and listened.
The city was a mess of sound but he began sifting through it, pushing aside those things that didn’t interest him and focusing only on what he was looking for: a test.
Women were arguing, a couple was having sex, a man used a power saw in his garage, two men discussed a sexual encounter from the previous night as they walked out of an office building…and then he heard it. A scream.
A woman was begging and crying. No other voices were around her. She just kept saying, “Please don’t, please.”
Jack looked down. Normally, heights were not his favorite thing in the world. But he felt no fear.
“JUMP.”
The voice wa
s there again.
“No,” Jack said, unsure if he had said it out loud or not.
“JUMP AND I WILL TAKE OVER.”
Jack closed his eyes and took a deep breath. His body was nearly falling over the edge itself, not giving him a real choice. He opened his eyes, and leapt off the building.
The air rushed over him but he didn’t feel it. Somehow the suit was equalizing the pressure from the external world. Jack twisted and flipped, shouting with pleasure at the sensation of pure freedom.
At the last moment before impact with the ground, his body jerked to the right and he was flung through the air, landing in an alley between two buildings. He fell as if he had jumped out of a car, the momentum carrying him forward, until he lost his balance and began flipping head over heels until he dug his fingers into the pavement to stop himself. Disoriented, he checked himself for injuries: there were none.
He stood up and ran. He ran so fast that when he glanced over into traffic, he saw that the cars were unable to keep up with him. Pushing himself, he ran faster. To the point where he could leap and the momentum would carry him high into the air and over several dozen feet. He continued to push himself and jump higher and higher until he finally leapt so high he was looking down at the buildings rather than looking up. He was above the city now and he shouted as one would shout on a wild rollercoaster. The moon was out and he bellowed at it like a wolf.
The woman’s voice grew stronger as he flew through the air and landed at the back of an apartment building. It was muffled, but strong. Crying, pleading for help. Jack closed his eyes. He could hear the voice off to the right. Scanning the area, he saw movement underneath a car.
A woman was pinned on her back as a man pulled her by her legs. She screamed and he slapped her and covered her mouth with his arm. Pulling out a gun, he shoved it into her neck and said, “Scream again.”
The man began tearing at her clothes.
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