Hostile Territory

by Tom Andry

  I looked at John, "We need to go."

  John fired again, but the super hopped out of the way without difficulty. John cursed, jerked the gun back into the sword shape, and slapped it back down on the side of the bike. He grabbed me by my arm and hauled me over the back seat. I wasn't in the correct position so the armor didn't activate. At the same time, another volley of missiles launched from John's back.

  The super at the far end of the street simply said, "No," and all the projectiles were either knocked off course or destroyed by the wave of sound.

  "Go, go, go!" I slapped John on the back with each word.

  Walker's bike roared into motion, but we hadn't made it ten feet before I felt the force of the super's voice again.

  "WALKER!"

  If I hadn't had my mouth open to scream a warning to John, I'm sure my eardrums would have ruptured. Draped over the back of the bike like a sack of flour, I couldn't help but see the wave coming. It deformed the air in front of it. Every structure in its wake shivered and shook, and two crumbled to shaved ice as it passed. I grabbed onto the bike as hard as I could, but it didn't matter. The wave hit and sent us, and the bike, tumbling end over end. It didn't feel like my Dampener had any effect at all, though it was hard to tell.

  For a moment, the world was a blur. Mostly blue and white. And then there was a crushing pain. The back of my shoulder. I was on my stomach, in the ice. It should have felt good on my burns, but I couldn't feel anything. Breathing was hard.

  I winced and turned toward the pain. The motorcycle had landed on me, with what I'd call the handlebar resting on my shoulder, blood seeping out onto the ice.

  I glanced back at the super. He was walking forward calmly, a grim smile on his face. I turned back and saw Walker at least twenty feet away on his stomach. There were no fluids seeping from him. At least, none that made it through the armor.

  The super stormed passed me, making a beeline for John. "I've got you now!" He gloated. "Oh, you think you're too good to take out? That you and your toy can outdo a real super? I don't think so, delivery boy."

  As he uttered the last word, four more missiles fired out of the launchers on Walker's back. The super yelped, creating a visible wall of sonic energy in front of him. Still, he was hurled twenty feet into the air and onto the roof of a nearby building.

  I shook my head to clear it and started to try to push the bike off of me. But I stopped as I heard what sounded like a belch. I turned to see the super flying backwards through the sky toward us. He rotated in midair, just at the top of his arc, and started humming. His trajectory was true and he landed, surrounded in a rippling sonic field, only a scant few feet from where John was now sitting. Somehow, the armor-clad super had managed to roll over. But his head was rolling around like a child trying to stay awake during a long car ride.

  The sonic super paced over and kicked Walker in the chest. His shoulder-mounted launchers angled his upper body so that he could have been relaxing in front of a TV on a bean bag. The only clue to his real condition was how his head hung back off his shoulders and the way his legs were splayed uncomfortably. The sonic super started to inhale, an intake that lasted much longer than normal. Much. His chest expanded like a bullfrog looking to attract a mate. He opened his mouth and I winced.

  A huge crack shook the ground. The super stopped and looked around. He was still inflated, his chin completely obscured behind all the protruding skin from his neck and back. He spun around, looking in every direction and then down at me. I froze, looking as unthreatening as I actually was. His eyes narrowed for a moment, but finally, he shrugged and turned back to Walker.

  Another huge crack. This one followed by falling debris. The sonic super slowly looked up and I followed suit. Above, the ceiling of the glacier was cracking and splitting. The super looked at me, then at John, and finally turned and bolted, belching himself into the air.

  I continued to try to get the bike off of me. It was no use - way too heavy. I heard more cracking over my head along with larger and larger chunks of ice hitting the ground all around me. Luckily, the pieces that managed to fall on me were either too small to hurt me after their momentum was absorbed by my Dampener or had fallen to the side. I could have easily been crushed under a larger piece, even if the initial impact was averted. Whatever was happening up there was big.

  With a resounding smash, I was bathed in a pool of light. I looked over my shoulder and saw that most of the glacier ceiling had been removed. Ripped off. By something. It just wasn't there anymore. In the center, however, was a figure. Floating. Hands on hips.

  "Great." I muttered, "What now."

  "Bob?" A female voice boomed out, "Bob Moore!"

  The figure soared down and came to a spot just over the top of me, "Bob?"

  "Gale?" I smiled weakly, "Hey, how'ya doing?"

  She raised her hand and the pressure on my shoulder was suddenly gone. Gale's eyebrow arched, her white fabric costume wrapped around her like a mummy, the stylized 'B' planted directly on her chest, "Did you know your ass is hanging out?" Behind her, the bike slowly lowered to the ground on a cushion of air.

  I tried to look back at my shoulder, but couldn't because of the pain, "No. No, I didn't."

  * * *

  Chapter 15

  Gale landed at my side, wincing at the state of my skin. A cushion of air picked me up gingerly and held me upright in front of her. I was a mess. My jacket and most of my slacks had completely dissolved. The handlebar of the bike had landed on my right shoulder and my right arm would move from the elbow down, but the shoulder would only respond slightly and with mind-numbing pain. The back of my head hurt and my hand was covered with blood when I touched it. In general, everything hurt. Moving hurt. Breathing hurt. It seemed like even blinking hurt.

  "Gale."

  The voice was soft, but distinct. I turned and on the top of Snow was a super in an all-black costume. Only the lower half of his face was visible and he wore two gold stripes at the top of his boots, the end of his gloves, and across his chest. The only other decoration was a golden 'B' on his chest. It looked different than Gale's 'B'.

  "Shit," Gale muttered, "we don't have time for this."

  "Is he a member of the Bulwark?" I whispered.

  "No," Gale responded and then added, louder, "and he knows he isn't allowed to wear a 'B' without permission."

  The super laughed, "Come and take it off me then."

  Gale put out a hand, "You can't attack. I'm yellow."

  She was right; she and Walker were surrounded by a faint yellow field. Mine was still red. I looked down at my USB and, once again, tried to change the color. It didn't respond. So it wasn't just a heat of battle thing; it really was stuck. But why?

  Ted. I thought the name like a curse. Was this one of his stupid devices messing up again? I usually tested everything he gave me thoroughly, but I hadn't had time with this one. Plus, he'd indicated that he was wearing one. He was generally more careful with his own stuff.

  I remembered the bar. Ted had been tapping furiously on the table and then he'd disappeared. What had he been doing? Checking on the engines? But he kept glancing our way. Could he have done this?

  "That may be true," the super responded, "but he's not," he pointed at me, "and he gave permission to disregard the yellow," he pointed at Walker, now standing.

  Walker moved toward us, shaking his head as if to clear it. "We've got to go. Gorgon is going to be pissed you broke his cube."

  "I could give a shit," Gale hissed. "Can you travel or am I going to have to carry you as well?"

  Walker straightened, "I'm fine."

  "Arrrggggghhhh!" the cry shook the entire ice structure. From the hole Gale created, a super jumped through. He was huge, with blazing blue eyes, and nearly twice the size of any man I'd ever seen. His whole body was completely covered in frost. He wore nothing but a fur loincloth and held a scepter made of solid ice topped with a massive, blue, diamond. He landed just twenty or so feet in front of us
, his forest of blue dreadlocks sounding like wind chimes from the myriad of embedded jewelry.

  Gorgon pointed the scepter, "Defilers!" he screamed, his voice seeming to come from everywhere at once. He spun his scepter in a circle and the entire ice city - the walls, the buildings, all of it - shattered. Shards as long as my arm flew toward the frost-covered super. He jumped into the air and they coalesced below him, pushing him further up. Soon, he was towering over us, his lower half encased in a ball of ice easily ten feet in diameter. Behind him, more balls of ice, just as large, waited.

  I looked around. Where there was once a fairly large ice town, there was now a wasteland of water and rock. The ice had crushed all the original buildings and the weight had pushed them all into the rock below. The entire area was depressed from the surrounding so that we were standing up to five feet lower than the ground that hadn't been encased in the ice. Around that lip were a number of supers, probably the flame-based ones that I'd seen trying to melt it earlier. Most of them were still picking themselves up off the ground, knocked down by the shattering glacier.

  Gale sighed, "Well, that's convenient."

  With a wave of her hand, the flame-types, even the ones still on the ground, soared into the air and landed between Gorgon and us. Most looked confused, but a few had kept their wits about them. They called out to their compatriots and started firing at the ice super. The ball under him immediately started melting. Gorgon reached back and the waiting balls converged on him, feeding the ball at his feet. He fought back with shards of ice, but the flame guys were holding their own.

  "You forgot about me, didn't you?" The super from the roof was now on the ground, less than five feet from us.

  Gale stepped toward him, placing herself between him and me, "Biggs, you don't want this."

  He smiled, winking, "You know I do." The super grunted and in the space of a few breaths, doubled in size. And then tripled. More. He kept going, getting larger and larger. Soon his foot was the size of my car and his shadow plunged us into darkness.

  "Well, at least his costume grew with him," I averted my eyes as we pretty much only had a view of his crotch.

  Gale called out, her voice amplified by her control over the wind, "I'm telling you, Biggs, you don't want this."

  "Gale," his voice sounded like a bell - deep, dark, and reverberating, "we've danced for months. It's time for your final dip."

  I ignored the horrible analogy, "At this for months?" I whispered.

  "Sparring," Gale shook her head. She raised her hand, palm up. The wind howled around and pushed the large foot in front of us a few inches off the ground.

  "Ha!" the humongous super laughed, "not this time, Gale!" He reached down and jammed his fingers into the rock. "This time, I lead!"

  Gale turned her back to the oversized super. She nodded at Walker, "You ready?" The super returned the gesture. "Let's go."

  "Um..." Gale was carrying me along in a cocoon of wind. I struggled to crane my neck around to watch Biggs and Gorgon. Gorgon was struggling with the fire supers, but it looked to me like he'd eventually win. Biggs, on the other hand, had regained his balance and had his free fist over his head.

  "Gale? Shouldn't we do something about...um...Biggs?"

  I heard Walker's bike start as Gale sighed, "Not really." The fist came down so fast it whistled. It bounced off some sort of shield that I could neither feel nor see. It was stopped high enough that my Dampener wasn't even activated. Gale turned back to Biggs, whose fist had bounced back, and struck him in the face. "I told you to stop." She looked at me, her eyes tired behind her white eyemask, "These new supers. They all want to spar with you, but if you beat them down too hard they sulk for months. Write poems about their feelings, drink coffee all night long. It's infuriating. But if you don't put them in their place every once in a while, you eventually get this," she motioned to Biggs.

  Gale squared her shoulders to the oversized super as I glanced around. I'd been so busy running and getting crushed by futuristic motorcycles that I hadn't noticed. They were all kids. Every one of them. Not a one appeared much over eighteen...twenty, tops.

  I should have realized. Sure, not every super on the planet was at the games but there were far more supers in the Super City than I would have expected. Where would all these supers come from after The Raven? Kids. They were the only ones not at the Tournament. They were the only ones who would be old enough, technically, to fill in. No wonder Gale wanted all the supers up in this City; angsty teens with super powers running around trying to stop crime? It'd be a public relations disaster.

  Gale called out one last time, "Okay, Biggs. You want to try to lead? You think you can waltz all over me? Think you're ready to tango with a Level 5 citizen and a charter member of the Bulwark?" She put out a hand and motioned him forward, "Bring it, boy. It's time to change the tempo."

  In the history of super fights, this had to be one of the most painful. Not physically, though I'm sure there was plenty of pain, but emotionally. Biggs had barely made a move before he shot up off the ground like he had rockets tied to his shoulders. The hand he had buried in the ground tore up a huge chunk of rock as he soared up. Gale barely flinched as she sent him slamming into the top of the red dome and pinned him up there. If he hadn't been so large, we probably couldn't have seen him at all. She tilted her head and he flew into one of the sidewalls, skipping over the top of one of the larger buildings. She tilted her head the other way and he flew back the other direction, through the building he'd skipped over, and into the sidewall. She turned her back and he slammed again to the ceiling. She motioned to Walker and we started to move, at quite a leisurely pace, toward one of the exit tubes. The first time a super tried to challenge us, Gale brought Biggs down on them like a huge flyswatter.

  I was amazed. I had been there at the start, when Gale was first exploring her powers. She was so impressed when she could float a pillow, blow out the candles on her cake, raise or lower the temperature. And now? I shook my head; I'd never seen anything like it. The party line was that the Bulwark members were the most powerful on the planet. Now I was seeing what they meant.

  The glacier had covered one of the entrance tubes. When we arrived, security was rushing to take up positions. Apparently they'd had a skeleton crew since the ice had provided an adequate barrier. Before we passed through, Gale brought a sobbing Biggs down from the ceiling.

  "Now," she said curtly, "who leads?"

  The super's head was huge and it would probably only take three or four tears to fill up my tub. They plopped on the ground and exploded in a shower of salty water. "You...you...do," he croaked, barely able to speak through the wracking coughs.

  "Damn straight, I do." Gale released him and he hit the ground with a thud. It may have shaken the ground as well, but Gale still had me suspended. "Now," she continued, "go grab your guitar and write a few songs about sadness or whatever. Just," she turned and put a finger in his face, "don't start cutting yourself again. That's just so...juvenile."

  He was shrinking as she spoke and continued to nod and cry. Gale turned and rolled her eyes, a smile creeping across her lips.

  I managed to keep a straight face, "So, you've taken up dancing, have you?"

  She stopped and glared at me, "Bob..."

  I pulled up my shoulders in spite of the pain, "Hey, all I'm saying is that I can dance too."

  "Shut up, Bob."

  "I'll even let you lead."

  She stepped past me and I bobbed along behind her in her cocoon of air, "See," I called out, "you're leading now."

  She threw her hands up as she pulled me through the red security field. As I passed through, the color of my USB changed from red to yellow.

  Gale noticed the color change and glared at me, "You and I? We're going to have a talk."

  I smiled, nervously, "Yes, honey."

  * * *

  The journey back to the League complex was fairly uneventful. Gale dropped me on John's bike and she, and a number of supers
I didn't recognize, returned to Proving Ground. She promised to meet me back at my suite. I called Chris and Leon and told them to do the same.

  When I arrived, two green-hued supers were waiting. They were covered head to toe in white costumes with red crosses on their voluptuous chests. Only their eyes and their fingers were left uncovered. They didn't look like they could have an ounce of body fat between them. Their costumes were certainly tight enough to reveal any.

  They led me to my bedroom and striped off the tattered remains of my clothes. They slowly examined my body, placing a finger or hand on each of my wounds. As many of the worst burns were on my legs, they spent a lot of time down there. Fortunately, I was lying on my stomach on the bed as they worked so they couldn't see my reaction to their feather-light touches on my thighs and buttocks.

  It'd been a really long time.

  I couldn't help thinking of Gale. She and Rod on the rocks. What did that mean? She hadn't been as nice to me in...well, since the divorce. Why now?

  This wasn't helping my "condition" and I had to think about boring stuff like boron, accounting, and baseball.

  Eventually, they turned me over and addressed my shoulder from where the bike landed on it. It was both worse and better than it looked. It would have healed on its own eventually, so the two supers informed me, but the scarring would have been extensive and I may have had nerve damage. Nothing was broken, though. They both had to place their hands on the wound to heal it, placing their chests just over my head. I turned away, trying to think of anything but the spandex being pressed into my cheek.

  The girls talked lightly as they worked. They spoke of supers I didn't recognize, wondering which was the cutest or most powerful. They giggled. They gossiped. It was like overhearing a couple of high school girls.