by Wyatt Kane
The building on-screen, the one taking Concussion’s attention, was none other than the Concubine Club, where Ty used to work.
9: The Concubine Club
A million things went through Ty’s mind all at once. He knew with a sick feeling in his stomach that Concussion intended to bring the club down as well. While still early, the club would already be busy. Badger would probably be there, working the door. Martin would have started his shift filling the place with techno-punk music that set Ty’s teeth on edge. The rest of the staff would be there, of course, and dozens, perhaps hundreds of customers.
Ty wondered if he could reach the Concubine Club quickly enough to stop Concussion from destroying it. That was the only thing that mattered. More than the Master’s motivation. More than taking Concussion out of the game, more even than Ty’s revenge over Brad.
“Lilith,” Ty blurted, and that was enough. As Ty watched the screen, Dinah immediately started to make the call.
But it was already too late. As Ty watched, the villain who had caused them so much trouble paused in the street. He looked left and right, and his grin broadened. Then, with deliberate maliciousness, he swung his hands wide before bringing them together with a concussive clap that even the Hulk would have struggled to match.
The impact of Concussion’s power was dramatic. From the safety of Dinah’s communication room, he could see the shockwave erupt from the man’s hands and race to the building. But perhaps Concussion’s power wasn’t at its strongest. Perhaps the boost offered by the Master’s drug had started to fade. Instead of collapsing the building all at once, Concussion’s concussive blast merely shook it on its foundations.
Ty stared as huge cracks appeared in the building’s façade, and he hoped against hope that the building would stand. Perhaps those within it would have the chance to escape.
But Concussion wasn’t done. As Ty looked on in increasing horror, the man swung his hands wide again, and brought them together a second time.
Such was the impact that it seemed to reach all the way into the communications room. The image on the screens shook as if in an earthquake, and it took Ty a moment before he realized the camera Dinah had accessed had become unstable.
The main entrance of the Concubine Club couldn’t stand the impact. Pieces of concrete crashed to the ground, splitting against the pavement. And still, the monster on the screen wasn’t done.
Twice more, the man brought his hands together. Both times, the shockwave brought down more masonry, shaking the building to its core. Then once more, and the Concubine Club was done. Just like Ty’s apartment, the building came down.
Dinah hadn’t turned on any sound for the screens. Perhaps that was for the best. Even so, Ty imagined not just the horrible sound of the building collapsing, but also the screams from those trapped within.
He found that he was breathing in short gasps and that his stomach had formed a tight knot of shock mixed with an awful feeling he couldn’t name. Despair. Rage. Something combining aspects of each.
He found himself staring at the screen full of hate for the man who even now stood there with a shit-eating grin on his face. Concussion, Ty decided, was truly malicious, and Ty would do everything he could to jam his grin down his throat.
At the same time, he was vaguely aware of Dinah talking, arguing almost with Tempest and Lilith.
“This takes precedence,” she said. “Concussion is active. He has just collapsed another building. Time is crucial.”
Then, all at once, Lilith was there, appearing between Ty and Dinah with an audible pop and odor of ozone.
“We have just the one more to go…” the demon woman said, perhaps continuing the discussion with Dinah. Only her words dried up as she stared at the screen. “Another one?” she asked, but didn’t seem to need an answer. Instead, she looked at Ty. “Do you have what you need?” she asked.
Ty tried to get his brain to function. He had his crawlers, his healing nanites, and an EMP grenade as well. On top of that, he had his shield and would quite enjoy blasting the crap out of Concussion with his shield cannons.
It would be enough. He nodded. “Take me there,” he said.
Without another word, Lilith reached for him and held him close.
◆◆◆
Not even the cold of teleportation could compare with the roiling emotions Ty felt. It wasn’t enough for the Master to attack Ty’s apartment and put his friend’s life in danger. He had to attack Ty’s workplace as well. Sure, Ty had hated nearly every moment he’d spent under the thumb of Angie the Hutt. But that didn’t mean he wished anything bad to happen to those he’d worked with.
Even the club itself. It might have reeked of old vomit and piss and hummed to a beat Ty could barely abide, but for a lot of people, it was a place of fun and entertainment.
For anyone to bring it to its knees was an insult to the people of New Lincoln.
So when Lilith blinked Ty back into existence in the air over the ruins, he could quickly forget his abhorrence of being teleported.
Instead, he focused on his deep-seated loathing of the man who had done all the damage.
The man whom Ty could see even then admiring the results of his work.
“Drop me in front of him,” Ty grated. He knew that Lilith could easily handle Concussion all by herself, but Ty wanted his own crack at the man. Even before Lilith started to settle, he’d started to reach for the grenade at his belt.
But what Lilith said next caught Ty by surprise. “Will you be okay here on your own?” the demon woman asked.
Ty looked at her. Still in Lilith’s grip, he’d been staring about, assessing the situation on the ground, and hadn’t really been paying her much attention. But now he had no choice.
“Huh?” he said.
Lilith read Ty’s confusion correctly. “There’s one more survivor at your apartment. Tempest is on her way here. You know me. I’m not much of a fighter. Not really. But I can’t let that survivor suffer if I can help it.”
Still hovering in the air above the ruin, Lilith seemed to plead with Ty to understand. “There will be similar work to do here,” she said. “And I’ll be back for that as soon as I can. I’m just hoping the fight will be done by the time I return.”
All at once, much of Ty’s loathing and rage faded away. He understood Lilith completely. He knew she would fight if she must—she’d demonstrated her ability to do so in the past—but it wasn’t something she particularly enjoyed. Helping those in need, however, was different. That was her focus, and it showed just how good a person she truly was.
It also forced Ty to re-evaluate his own priorities.
He couldn’t help himself. Despite the carnage below, he let out a brief laugh. “You said Tempest is on her way?” he asked. The demon woman nodded. “I’ll be fine. Just lower me to the ground, and you can go. Save the last person.”
In his mind, he knew there was no other option. Even if the last survivor wasn’t Brad, they would be important to someone. To postpone their rescue in favor of battling a villain might not make sense given how many other lives the villain might place in danger, but it was still the right thing to do.
With apparent relief, Lilith drifted down to the ground, and Ty reached instead not for the EMP grenade, but for his pokeball full of crawlers instead. As soon as they touched the pavement, Lilith reached up and kissed Ty on the lips.
“Call me if you need me,” she said. “And I’ll be back as soon as I can.”
With that, she disappeared once again, leaving Ty all by himself with the ruined Concubine Club on one side and Concussion in front of him.
“You!” the villain said. Perhaps he’d recognized Ty from their previous encounter. More likely, it was his mode of arrival that attracted the man’s attention.
Either way, Ty ignored him for long enough to flip the pokeball onto the ruins and activate the crawlers within. He tried not to think about the people caught in the collapse. Not even Angie the Hutt deserved to have pi
les of concrete land on top of her.
Then Ty activated his shield, noting with a detached sort of interest that it worked just fine even with the projector discs having been absorbed into his flesh. Only then did he reach for his EMP grenade and turn his attention to the man with the clap.
10: Concussion
Ty stared at Concussion across a distance of perhaps forty feet. Other than the two of them, the immediate area was strangely quiet. The man’s efforts had chased away most of the passers-by, and as yet none had returned to try to aid those caught in the rubble.
As for the destruction the man had wrought, the immediate collapse was finished. Ty could hear some of the victims moan, and he heard someone call out in the dust for help, but the sounds of sundering concrete, metal and wood had faded to occasional rock falls and small noises.
In a way, it felt to Ty like an old-fashioned stand-off, with two combatants facing each other in a western town, awaiting a signal before pulling their guns and doing their best to kill one another.
Except that Ty saw no reason to wait. He wasn’t a gunfighter. This wasn’t the Old West. And this wasn’t a duel.
Instead, it was about a loathsome villain who’d brought the roof down on Ty’s friends and workmates, and might well have murdered his best friend as well.
All that mattered was that Concussion had to be stopped.
With deliberate intent, Ty pulled the pin on his EMP grenade, and threw it as hard as he could at the man with oversized arms. He intended to charge in as soon as the grenade went off and hammer at the man with his fists. Then, when Lilith was done with her last rescue, he would get her to take Concussion back to the mansion. Maybe they would have to restrain him somehow until another cryo chamber turned up. Or maybe Dinah could simply sedate him. Either way, it was Ty’s intention to get him off the streets once and for all, and then to turn his attention to this newest pile of rubble.
Unfortunately, it didn’t work out that way. Concussion had seen Ty’s EMP grenades before. The loathsome man had lost his first device when Ty had used one the last time.
Perhaps the Master had told him not to let Ty do the same thing again, or perhaps it was his own choice. Either way, Concussion proved more than a match for the grenade.
Before Ty’s best weapon had reached even halfway to its intended target, the man aimed one of his concussive claps and let rip.
The shock wave caused by the man’s power knocked the grenade off target, to explode harmlessly in the air away from anything it could damage.
Ty swore out loud. Even though he was safe in his shield, he caught the edge of the man’s power. It felt like exactly what it was. A shock wave going right through him.
The vile man uttered a laugh, and Ty charged toward him.
As fast as thought, Concussion brought his hands together into an almighty clap, and Ty understood what it was like to feel the full force of the man’s power.
Ty’s shield had been designed to mimic Tempest’s strength. It made him durable, and he’d tweaked it to give him an element of the blonde superhero’s strength. In addition, it came with its own weapon, an unleashing of energy that was akin to the most powerful blaster.
With his shield, Ty could have survived inside the Concubine Club as the ceiling collapsed onto him. He could survive a fall from any height, and blaster fire meant little to him. Ty had also withstood the full force of a punch from Tempest herself, although that had indeed knocked him on his ass.
The only thing Ty’s shield had proved ineffectual against was the ability to heat the air around him, and Lilith’s unified field control.
It also proved to be proof against Concussion’s shockwave.
Almost.
While the blast didn’t exactly hurt Ty, it was powerful. Powerful enough to tear through the concrete foundations of an apartment building. One of Rubio’s minions, a man Ty thought of as Massive, might have withstood the force of Concussion’s power. Massive had the power to increase his personal density to an astonishing degree. He had cracked concrete simply by walking upon it.
Ty was far less dense. Concussion’s shockwave picked him up and tossed him back backward like a tumbleweed in the wind.
Ty skidded and bounced across the pavement, his shield protecting him from any actual damage, until he came to a rest. He was rattled but unhurt, and immediately sought to scramble to his feet.
But Concussion’s power gave him an advantage. If Ty had been facing him in one of Brad’s games, the man’s attack would have shown a number of stats. Power was one, but another would have been the time it took before he could use it again.
That time turned out to be almost instantly.
Before Ty could get to his feet, Concussion clapped again. And again. And once more, each shockwave hitting Ty bang on target, shunting him backwards and giving him no chance at all to recover. From one moment to the next, Ty was on his back, bounced sideways, then facing into the dirt, and then he was upside down against a wall. Even then, Concussion wasn’t done. He clapped again, and Ty and the wall collapsed around him, half burying him in rubble.
Ty cursed out loud. He didn’t want a second building to collapse, so in between one clap and the next, he launched himself with superhuman effort in a different direction. With a sense of relief, Ty saw that the building he’d been almost forced through was still standing, albeit a little worse for wear.
He continued to curse. He wanted one clear shot at the man with his blasters. Perhaps he had the power to withstand it, but perhaps he did not.
Yet it didn’t seem like Ty would get the chance. Concussion was cagey. He followed Ty at a steady stalk, keeping him in range but never approaching close enough for Ty’s own weapons to be brought to bear even if he had a moment to do so.
It was infuriating. It was like one of those fighting games where a six-year-old opponent had found the perfect combination of buttons to create an un-defendable kick, and they just smashed those buttons repeatedly until they won the fight.
Nor was that the worst of it. The loathsome man seemed to have no qualms about tearing the city apart to keep Ty off balance. Again and again, the man clapped his hands, and Ty could do nothing but swear.
In a way, it was a stalemate. Ty understood that while Concussion could rattle him, he couldn’t really get through his shield. And while Ty could withstand the man’s ongoing punishment, the repeated shockwave prevented him from returning the attack.
Yet he didn’t give up. All he needed was one slip, one pause, and that would be enough. As each shockwave left him, Ty did what he could to regain his feet, to skitter to one side, to do whatever it took to buy himself some time.
All he needed was a second or two, and that would suffice. Ty just hoped the damage to the city would be minimal in the meantime.
Again and again, Concussion used his powers, sending Ty tumbling and collapsing structures around him.
And then, all of a sudden, everything changed.
Lilith had mentioned Tempest was already on her way. The distance between Ty’s broken apartment and his place of work was no more than a few miles. And Tempest could travel at supersonic speed.
It happened very quickly. One moment, Ty was weathering an ongoing assault from Concussion’s sequence of shockwaves, and the next, a new player had entered the game. Tempest approached from somewhere behind Ty and flew toward the man at full speed.
Her timing was perfect. Concussion was able to release his shockwaves at a speed of one every second. But Tempest was fast enough to get to him without any risk to herself.
The fight was over.
The blonde superhero stood over the prone, groaning form of Concussion, looking every bit the embodiment of power. To Ty, she was magnificent. As beautiful as any Hollywood star, as powerful as a locomotive, able to leap at least moderate sized buildings in a single bound. Like a threat made real, she exuding vitality and strength all at once.
“You leave my boyfriend alone!” she shouted down at the man, and
Ty almost burst out laughing.
Yet Tempest’s anger was real. Her fists were bunched at her sides, and Ty was sure that if Concussion had been able to make any move at all, it would have been the wrong one.
With a sense of relief combined with pride for Tempest and a touch of humiliation for himself, Ty finally managed to pick himself up off the ground.
In his mind, the battle was done. Now Lilith could return whenever she wished and deliver this villain to Dinah. Then they could get to work on the ruins of the Concubine Club, and save any who needed to be saved.
He was completely taken by surprise when Bain stepped out from a side street, looking as vast and powerful as ever before.
11: Bain 2.0
“Ha!” the monstrous villain sneered. “A tag team matchup!”
At the man’s words, Ty’s blood boiled in his veins. When last they’d confronted Bain, it had seemed decisive. Ty had hoped it would be the last they saw of him, but now he was back, larger than life.
In the past, Ty’s life had never been about fighting. Sure, he’d taken a few martial arts classes when he was young, and in recent weeks he’d put them to more use than he ever expected. But when it came down to it, he still lacked the basic instincts of a born fighter.
Instead of assessing the situation, deciding on a course of action and immediately acting upon it, Ty gaped at the monstrous man who had just stepped out of the shadows.
Bain. The bane of Ty’s existence. A monstrous villain second only to the Master himself in terms of the enmity he had created. It was Bain who’d murdered Zach in the alley, Bain who had fought Tempest in Ty’s apartment, Bain who had abducted Dinah, and Bain who’d kept Lilith prisoner.
Everywhere Ty turned, it seemed that Bain was there. The charade that led to the Master testing his AZT-407 drug had been orchestrated by Bain. Even the attack at Scare Kingdom had included Bain at its core.