by Matt Blake
It was pitiful, seeing an ULTRA who had been so strong now so bereft of powers. Really, she was nothing more than a weak girl now. But that’s what she’d always been, too. Just a weak kid who’d suddenly found her strength when she discovered her powers. The world deserved stronger than her. The people deserved it.
“How does it feel?” Adam asked.
He walked up to her and stood over her. He didn’t say anything to her, just looking down at her as she lay in front of him.
“To have everything you care about taken away from you. How does that feel?”
“You won’t win,” Roadrunner gasped.
Adam tilted his head to one side. “Oh, really?”
He stretched out his arm and turned Roadrunner’s head to face him. He looked right into her eyes, and he saw tears. But not just tears of upset or disappointment. Not just tears of fear.
Adam saw tears of anger, too.
“Kyle’s strong,” Roadrunner said. “The Resistance, they’re all strong. They’ll come back. They’ll find a way to defeat you. And they’ll get me away from here, too.”
Adam sighed. He chuckled a little.
“What’s so funny?” Roadrunner gasped.
“Nothing, nothing. Just find it amusing that you’re so confident you’re even going to be here to save.”
He saw the shift in Roadrunner’s face then. He saw her look of defiance change to a look of confusion. He saw the subtle dilation of her pupils. “What—”
Adam nodded at the follower beside him.
They tightened their fists.
Roadrunner’s eyes rolled back into her skull.
She fell face flat onto the roof, and she went still.
Adam sighed. Then he turned around and looked back up into the clouds at his disappearing armies, the chants of the people surrounding him.
He was going to stop Kyle Peters.
He was going to let the will of the people speak.
And, most important of all, he was going to take control of this world.
He wasn’t going to let anyone or anything get in his way.
It started now.
17
This time, my teleportation worked.
We landed in the middle of the Amazon rainforest. I was immediately hit by the humidity of the place, even though I’d visited here before. The tall trees were all around me, thick and suffocating. They were either good places to hide or terrifying prisons. I still wasn’t sure exactly.
The sounds of the rainforest were even more terrifying. I could hear the constant chattering of birds and reptiles that I didn’t recognize as familiar by any stretch. Sure, I had powers, and I could deal with whatever creepy crawlies came my way. But I was still a normal guy underneath the Glacies guise. I still didn’t want any damned spiders crawling on me.
I rested my sweaty hands on my shaky knees and re-gathered my composure. My throat was dry, and the thick, humid air wasn’t exactly easy to inhale. I stood there and I closed my heavy eyes. I didn’t want to think of anything right now. I didn’t want to dwell on any of what had happened. Sure, I knew we needed a plan. But right now I just wanted to lay low more than anything. Regroup.
“So what’s the next step?”
Ember’s voice dragged me from my moment of solitude. I looked at him, then I saw Stone, Vortex, and Cassie beside him. Behind them, a few more members of the Resistance, Thunder, who could influence the weather, and Detonate, who could create little bombs in her hands and throw them at her enemies. There were a few others, too, but all of them blended together right now.
All of them were looking at me for answers.
“Well, we obviously need to fight back against Adam.”
“And how do we do that?” Stone asked.
I swallowed a lump in my dry throat. “That’s what we’re here for. We’re here to figure it out.”
“There’s no time to figure anything out,” Thunder said. He was black, and wore a sparkling white Adidas shirt with dark skinny jeans. If that was his “look,” then it was hardly the most superhero I’d ever seen. “Adam’s got Roadrunner. We need to—”
“There’s not a lot we can do for Roadrunner,” I said.
I wasn’t sure where those words came from. I didn’t like them, either. Because I knew they were true.
“What?” Ember asked.
“Roadrunner,” I said, continuing. “She’s had her powers taken away. There’s not a lot we can do for her.”
“We can at least try and help her,” Vortex said.
I heard the discontent surrounding me, and I felt everything falling apart at the seams. “Look, I realize what the situation is here. I know what we have to do.”
“Then tell us,” Detonate said. “Tell us what your plan is.”
“I…”
“You don’t have one, do you?” Ember said.
I sighed and looked to the ground. “We’ve fought Saint. We defeated him. The most powerful ULTRA in existence and we stopped him. We can defeat this joker.”
“But how?” Vortex asked. “How are we supposed to defeat him if we can’t even get near to him?”
It was a fair point. And as much as the discontent amongst the ULTRAs upset me, I knew the concerns were perfectly legit. “We’ll figure that out.”
“What, now?” Ember asked. “We’ll figure it out right now, will we?”
“I’m doing my best here.”
Stone snorted. “If this is your best, I’d hate to see your worst.”
I saw then that every single ULTRA here was looking at me with disappointment. Like I’d been the one to bring this on. “You blame me. Don’t you?”
Stone shrugged. “All I’m saying is, if you hadn’t gone all batshit reckless, then maybe people would respect you a little more.”
“Cassie? What do you think about all this?”
My sister wasn’t looking at me. Just at the rainforest floor.
“Cassie?”
She looked up. “I think perhaps it’s time we… we took a different route.”
“A different route?”
“You deserve a break. A chance for… for fresh leadership.”
Cassie’s words hurt me more than any of the others. I felt like a javelin had pierced through my chest. Fresh leadership. In a polite way, she was telling me exactly what the rest of the Resistance were telling me—that this was my fault, and it was time for someone else to take the reins.
“I just try to do the right thing,” I said. “I just… I just wanted what’s best for everyone all the time.”
“And that’s respectful,” Vortex said. “But I think perhaps your sister is right. You are the enemy in the eyes of the people. As long as you’re leading us, we’re all the enemies. But if we can start again, maybe…”
Vortex might’ve continued talking, but I didn’t hear her.
I just heard the rustling in the trees right behind the Resistance.
I put a finger to my lips and walked towards the source of the rustling.
“What is it?” Cassie asked.
“Didn’t you hear that?”
“What?”
I narrowed my eyes and looked all around. I didn’t want to use my powers and draw attention to us. “I thought I heard something. I thought I…”
When I turned back around, there was a man looking right at us.
He was dressed in a green T-shirt and wore a camo cap on his head. Beads of sweat covered his narrow face. He narrowed his eyes at me, then looked at the people around me. He didn’t look happy that we were on his land.
I raised my hands. “I apologize.”
He narrowed his eyes even more—like he didn’t understand.
“For coming on your land,” I continued. “We’re just looking for safety. For shelter. But we’ll leave now. We’ll leave.”
“You don’t have to leave.”
The voice surprised me. The man spoke fluent English.
I narrowed my eyes. “What do…”
He pul
led out a gun and fired at me.
Before I could resist it, I felt paralyzing electricity cover my body.
I fell to my knees.
I couldn’t fight back.
18
I woke up.
I had no idea where I was. My vision was blurred. I wondered if I was back home lying in bed. It wouldn’t be the first time I’d had a nightmare like this. I often had nightmares about the darkness. Sometimes, I’d see something in that darkness. The cities of the world burning. People screaming. Running away from… from something. I didn’t think much of it at the time, but those visions seemed so real. I felt the warmth of the flames against me, and the screams made my skin crawl. I could smell the charred flesh, which brought the taste of vomit to my mouth.
Then I woke up and I’d be in my bedroom and within a few minutes, the dream would be forgotten.
This time though, the darkness didn’t disappear as I opened my eyes. I tried to shift my hands, but I was trapped. I felt like my wrists and ankles were tied to something. My head throbbed like I’d got some kind of hangover from using my powers too much. I remembered what Orion once told me about using them. They age you. I hadn’t shown many signs of that yet, luckily. But with the amount of times I’d used those powers in the last year, it wouldn’t surprise me if I started showing those signs of aging sometime soon.
I felt a sharp pain in the middle of my chest when I tried to use my powers, radiating from my ankles and my wrists, and I realized I must be tied down with electromagnetic bands, which must’ve been bought off the black market or something. Shit. I could handle them if I put all I had into it, but I wasn’t sure how much all I had was right now, or whether it was enough.
And then I remembered the rest of the Resistance.
My memory of what’d happened was blurry. I knew someone had walked out of the woods. But then he’d whipped out an electromagnetic gun before I had the chance to acknowledge what was happening, and then he’d fired at me.
I’d fallen to the rainforest floor. But I had no idea what’d happened to the rest of the Resistance.
To my sister.
I struggled harder against the ties around my wrists and ankles, but they were just too tight and too repressive. I felt the dread build inside my stomach. There was no knowing what might be happening to my sister and my Resistance family right now, only that it couldn’t be good.
I thought of Roadrunner, and I felt guilt all over again.
She’d fallen down.
She’d had her powers taken away from her.
And then we hadn’t even gone back to help her because we were too worried about losing our own abilities.
I hoped that wherever she was, she would be okay.
I prayed that at some point, when we got a plan together, we’d be able to help her.
But right now I was trapped, and there wasn’t a lot I could do about it.
I held my breath and tried to teleport myself out of these ties.
But then the electricity frazzled my skin, and I felt even weaker.
I gritted my teeth. I couldn’t give up on the people I cared about. They might’ve given up on me, but if anything, that only drove me even more to prove to them they were wrong about me.
I could lead.
I could have control.
I could—
“Yeah. Yeah we’ve got Glacies. You want him? Yeah, well there’s something we want too. No. No, no deal. This is how it is. This is how it’s gonna be.”
I closed my eyes and held my breath as the footsteps walked around in front of me. It didn’t take a genius to figure out this guy was trying to bribe Adam somehow.
“I get it. I know. But that’s how we’re gonna play things. You give us abilities, we’ll give you Glacies. You still there? Yeah. Yeah, I’m here. I’m… Look, you better think carefully how you play this. We won’t keep him alive forever.”
I heard a bleep of the guy putting a phone down.
Then I heard him walk right up to me.
I kept as still as I possibly could as the guy walked up to me. He pulled the blindfold that was over my head away, so behind my eyelids, there was light. I wanted too much to open my eyes and get a good look at it. But I knew I couldn’t risk this guy finding out I was awake. If he did, he’d give me another big dose of that electromagnetism, enough to knock me out. He thought the current level was enough. I had to let him believe that.
He leaned right up to my face. I felt the warmth of his skin, smelled the sourness of his breath. “What the hell are we gonna do with you, huh?” he said. “What the hell are we gonna—”
I blasted my powers inwards.
The electromagnetic bands exploded, sending a spark crashing against the guy and knocking him onto the grass.
I leaned over him, my breathing weak and my body shaky from turning that energy inward. But I didn’t have time to mope. I leaned over the guy and pressed my hands to his neck. “Where the hell are they?”
He didn’t say anything. And truth be told, I wasn’t sure it mattered. I’d find my friends and family if it were the last thing I did.
I tightened my grip as the man struggled to breathe some more. “Tell me. Where the hell are they?”
He struggled more, then he smiled. “The end’s coming. Traitor.”
I looked up at the trees. I knew the rest of the Resistance had to be nearby. “I’m sorry for this. Truly.”
“What—”
I blasted a small ball of energy into the man’s chest.
A wormhole sucked him up and spat him to somewhere else on the planet.
I didn’t know where.
In all honesty, I didn’t particularly care.
I looked up at the trees and held onto the man’s phone.
Then I walked towards the woods.
I was getting the Resistance back.
I wasn’t giving up on them.
19
Adam stood on the corner of the dimly lit Staten Island street and looked through the window very closely.
He’d heard rumors that she lived here. She’d moved house after the showdown with Saint, of course, for her own protection more than anything. And outside the apartment block, there were well-built bodyguards. But they’d be no problem for Adam. Not with an army behind him.
He heard horns honking all around him. He had his hood pulled up to cover his face. He didn’t want to reveal his identity here, not yet. He was a national—international—overnight sensation. As much as he enjoyed the attention, this wasn’t a time for drawing attention to himself.
This was a time for planning the next step.
He rubbed his tongue against his furry teeth and tasted a little blood on his gum. He’d got it from Kyle when he’d fought back against him. The little shit had actually resisted the magnetic force of his ability to take powers away.
Bless him. It was just a temporary victory for him.
If word from the rainforest were true, they’d soon have him back in their possession anyway.
He thought about the call he’d got from that group in the Amazon. They’d told him they had Kyle and the rest of the Resistance, and that they would only hand them over if Adam promised to give them advanced powers of their own. Of course Adam had agreed. But that didn’t mean he was going to stand by his word. He had a group of his newly converted followers on their way over to the Amazon right now.
And diplomacy wasn’t exactly top of the agenda.
Adam was drifting from the whole purpose of his visit when he saw movement behind the window.
She was just as he remembered from the footage at the battle with Saint. Slim. Wore cute glasses that perched right on the edge of her nose. She looked quirky. Exactly Adam’s kind of girl.
And maybe she would be his girl when he finally got Kyle Peters out of the way.
Because Kyle Peters was nothing more than a distraction for her. Kyle Peters was not as strong as he liked to think.
Kyle Peters was a lie.
And Adam was going to exploit that lie for all it was worth.
He saw Ellicia Williams look at him as he stood there on the sidewalk, and he looked right back into her eyes from underneath his hood. He saw her chocolate brown hair. Those thick-rimmed glasses sitting on top of her nose. Her beaming blue eyes.
She held eye contact for a few seconds, and Adam worried that maybe he’d freaked her out. Maybe her guard would be up.
Then she looked across the street elsewhere.
She didn’t look concerned.
She had no idea.
She disappeared back inside the apartment.
Adam took a deep breath of the humid air.
Then, he walked towards Ellicia’s home.
20
It didn’t take me long to find the compound where the Resistance were being held prisoner.
The scorching Amazonian sun burned down on the top of my head. Around me, classic Amazon rainforest things, like… well, trees. A hell of a lot of trees. I could hear birds singing and feel the humidity as I breathed in the sweet air. Sweat dripped down the back of my neck. No matter how much I tried to cool myself down with my icy abilities, it was still pretty damned warm.
The compound stuck out like the proverbial sore thumb in the middle of the Amazon rainforest. It was an ugly metal structure, with wire fences and barbed wire around the top of it. I could hear dogs barking in the distance. Beside the compound, I could see people picking something from the plants that I assumed had to be some kind of illegal substance.
Standing at the door were many armed guards.
They weren’t just armed with the usual machetes and guns. They had those electromagnetic weapons, too. I figured it made sense that gangs had got hold of those weapons, which had the abilities to neutralize ULTRAs. It gave them a sense of power. They were cropping up all over the world, sold on the darkest corners of the internet. Once a weapon like that got into the hands of the public, they weren’t too easy to get off the streets.