The taxi jerked again. Bryce looked to the left out the soiled window and saw a black Infiniti FX45 speeding alongside them, the windows sliding down.
“Speed up! Speed up!”
The driver didn’t need any encouragement. The taxi lurched forward, throwing Bryce back into the seat. The driver wrenched the wheel and they cut across three lanes of traffic, jumping off the next exit. The taxi barreled down the exit then stopped.
“Get out!” the driver yelled.
Bryce’s eyes went wide. “What? No!”
The taxi driver turned his head, his grizzled face full of anger.
“Get the fuck out! I’m not getting killed over a fare!”
Bryce unzipped his back pack and took out a handful of money.
“It’s yours man, all of it. Just get me to…”
Bryce heard a crash and then he flew into the taxi shield, smashing his face against the plexi-glass. He fell back into his seat, dazed, his ears ringing from the explosion of the airbag. The passenger door opposite him flew off the hinges and a man in a black coat, black hat and feral eyes reached in and grabbed him by the collar. Bryce’s response was automatic; he reached into his back pocket, pulled out his straight razor and slashed, cutting the man’s wrists and neck in one fluid motion. The man howled as he fell back. Bryce reached back and opened the opposite door. He fell into the street; someone lifted him to his feet.
“You cut my friend,” the man said. Bryce was suddenly airborne, landing on the curb.
“Stop,” another man said. “We need him alive until we find out what he knows.”
Bryce rolled onto his back. The man was coming for him. He was dressed like the other man, possessing the same cat-like eyes. The man reached for him then jerked; a fountain of blood spewed from his hat.
“You wrecked my cab!” the driver shouted. He held a Glock in his trembling hands. He was spinning to his left when he was engulfed in white light, his body shaking and smoldering. The light dissipated and the driver collapsed in a smoking heap. Bryce looked to his right. A tall, pale man with red hair stood a few feet away from the driver, his glowing fingers smoking. The man looked at Bryce with a frigid grin and started for him.
He was impeded by another cat-eyed man. The man spoke in a language Bryce didn’t understand; the red-headed man frowned.
“Let’s go,” he said. He stared at Bryce for a moment, his fingertips glowing as he raised his hands. A siren wailed in the distance; the man lowered his hands and walked quickly to his dead companion. He lifted him like a broken doll, tossing him into the FX45. His companion appeared with the man Bryce had sliced and threw him inside as well. They jumped into the SUV and sped away.
Bryce didn’t have time to process what happened. The police were coming. He staggered to the taxi for his backpack, stuffing it into his heist pouch. He stripped off his clothes and donned Ghost, disappearing as Atlanta’s Finest exited off the highway.
Six
Kandace took a long drag on her joint, bobbing her head to Janelle Monae while DNA sequences mutated and twisted before her glazed eyes. Beyond the screen, a vat of nucleic acids simmered, prodded by minute changes in temperature. It was simple, but then again it wasn’t. Genetic engineering was almost like cooking with calculus. The thought – and the joint – made her burst out laughing. The laughter stopped when the new genetic codes emerged on the screen. Molecules twisted and turned in unfamiliar patterns, forming paths that almost blew her high. This was brilliance, engineering far beyond anything Bryce ever dreamed up. She realized her partner was an amateur compared to whoever developed the sequences spinning before her.
Her iPhone pulsed in her pocket and she answered.
“Get gone.” it read.
“Damn it, Bryce, what you done got into this time?” Kandace didn’t budge. If Bryce was in trouble he’d be coming to her. Their lab was in the safest place in “the A,” deep within an abandoned industrial complex and protected by the best thugs money could buy. They didn’t realize that the money they took was probably theirs, but they didn’t ask. If the guns didn’t scare anybody off, the smell did. Genetic engineering was a funky process, literally.
It was almost time. Kandace struggled out of her chair and staggered to the edge of the pool. The skin was taking shape, its crinkled form rising from the muck. She had no idea what it would be capable of; Bryce fed her the formula this time, so she had to trust him. Thinking of Bryce reminded her he hadn’t showed up yet. It had been at least an hour since he called. Bryce was never late. Suddenly her high was gone. She paced, rubbing her hands together.
“He’s in real trouble; which means I am, too!”
She ran back to the control board. Thirty more minutes before the skin was ready. She slipped into the back room and changed into a pair of baggy jeans, big shirt, huge jacket and a Braves hat. She was going butch for the next few days until she found out what was going on with Bryce. She reached into the back of the closet and took out a backpack heavy with bills. Further in the back was her FN-P90 pistol. She secured it under her jacket and trotted back to the pool. The skin was as ready as it was going to be. She took it out, her nose crinkling with the smell, then stuffed it in a small plastic bag. It took her fifteen minutes to dump the pool and shut the lab down. Her thugs appeared as she emerged from the steel door.
“Here.” She handed them a backpack. “Nobody comes in here unless they’re with me. There’s another one for you when I get back.”
They took the bag and stepped aside. Kandace rambled down the metal staircase and disappeared into the night.
Seven
Leif Thorvaldsen looked out the canopy of the private chopper as it descended on the platform surrounded by stunted evergreens. He hated Albania but understood the logic in locating Vanguard headquarters in the decrepit country. As the poorest country in Europe, the government was easy to persuade and eager to ignore anything that seemed questionable.
He glanced to the rear of the chopper. Two body bags filled the small space. His surviving assassin watched over them, his face showing little emotion. This was a botched operation, two prototypes dead and nothing to show for it. There would have to be modifications.
The chopper landed and was met by a military style truck with no markings. Two men in Vanguard security uniforms ran out to meet them.
“Sir,” one said to Leif. “Mr. Constantinedes wishes to see you immediately.”
“I’m sure he does,” Leif replied. “I brought the bodies back. Take them to the lab for autopsies and genetic analysis.”
The man glanced at the remaining assassin. “What about him?”
Leif looked at the surviving assassin and frowned. “He’s defective like the others. Dispose of him.”
No sooner than he gave the order did the other man extract a handgun from his jacket and shoot the assassin in the head. Leif nodded and went to the truck. Another vehicle emerged from the woods, a Black Hummer with chrome wheels. Leif entered and was taken immediately to Vanguard HQ. The squat gray building hid under a clump of old oak trees surrounded by a triple barbed wire fence. Observation towers rested at fifty foot intervals. The facility resembled a prison, and in a way it was.
After an extensive security check they entered the compound. The Hummer worked around the main building to another building in the rear, a two story structure that resembled a traditional office. Lucy Lundy, Leif’s assistant, met him at the door.
“How did it go?”
“Terrible. I need you to pull up the genetic sequencing on my computer. Ask Himmel and Stryker to link up as well.”
“Modifications?”
Leif glared at Lucy and she took a step back. She was brilliant, but sometimes she angered him with her naive questions.
“I’ll see to it right away, sir,” she said and hurried away.
Stephan Constantinedes, a rotund, olive skinned man with fading black hair, waited at his desk when Leif entered his office.
“What the hell, happened, Leif
?” he snapped.
Leif sat before answering. “The prototypes failed.”
“You failed,” Stephen corrected.
Leif ignored the jab. “The prototypes performed well, physically. The problem is mental capacity. We need to increase their decision abilities.”
“That will make them more difficult to control.”
“If we plan on using them as assassins it’s a risk we’ll have to take.”
Stephan leaned back in his chair. “Maybe we could implant a destruct module.”
“We would have to.”
“What about the man who escaped?”
Leif frowned. “Apparently he’s a man used to trouble. He had a plan, which caught us off guard. I contacted our inside people. Apparently he has a friend that recently resigned from Deep Intel. We’ve informed the friend of Bryce’s situation. We expect him to lead us to him.”
“Don’t screw up,” Stephan warned.
“We won’t. We’ll be using normals on this operation.”
“I want you there personally.”
Leif nodded. “Of course.”
Stephan waved him away. Leif held his composure until he was out of the office, then his hands began to smolder. Of course he would go on the operation. He had a score to settle with this Bryce character.
Eight
Bryce sauntered down the cargo ship gangplank, his relaxed gait disguising his fear. His eyes darted back and forth as he searched for anything suspicious. He managed a laugh as his feet touched the concrete. He was home, but not the way he imagined it. He dreamed of stepping out of first class to the admiration of his relatives, a rude boy done good. Instead he was slinking back incognito, hiding from whomever it was trying to kill him. It was just the way his grandma told him it would be.
The docks swarmed with people but the three he expected stood out among the rest. They were dressed simply; blue jeans and t-shirts, each shirt representing a different American baseball team. They wore shades, their dreads spilling from under their baseball caps. The tallest of the three walked up to Bryce and shoved him.
“So, you come back now, huh cousin?” he said.
Bryce shoved him back. “Yeah, me come back.”
“What trouble you got?”
“Deep trouble.”
His cousin grinned. “I guess you need to go deep, then?”
Bryce nodded. “As deep as I can.”
“No problem.” The men turned and walked away, Bryce trailing behind. They led him to a battered Toyota extended cab. Bryce climbed into the cab with his cousin. The other two jumped in the truck bed.
“Grandma said you’d come back like this.”
“Shut up, Nathan,” Bryce barked. “Where you taking me?”
“To the countryside, up into the mountains. I got some Maroon friends who will keep you company for a while.”
“I need you do something else for me.” Bryce gave Nathan a piece of paper.
“He’s a friend of mine. Tell him where I am. When he gets here bring him to me.”
Nathan looked at the paper. “I don’t know, cousin. If he ain’t blood you can’t trust him.”
“Just call him. He’s the only one that can get me out of this.”
Nathan shook his head. “You must be in some deep shit.”
Bryce rubbed his forehead. “Yeah cousin, I am.”
***
The black Lexus SC400 cut across eight lanes and streaked up the West Peachtree exit. Five cars spun as the car zipped down the one-way street the wrong way, then cut over to Spring. The wild drive ended at the parking lot of the W, the young valet dropping and shaking his head, his dreads swishing from side to side.
Kandace stepped out of the Lexus in an outfit that labeled her either an actress or a stripper. The valet’s humor was shut down by his hormones.
“Damn, girl! How much?”
“Shut the fuck up and park my car,” she spat.
The valet shook his head. “Why you got to be like that, K?”
“Because I can. Now park my damn ride.”
Kandace strutted through the entrance, happy with the commotion she was causing. After three weeks waiting for Bryce to contact her, she figured he was in too deep. Whoever was looking for him was probably looking for her, too. But she wasn’t about to spend the last days of her life hiding in the hood. If she was going out, she was going out right. She jumped on the elevator with a tall young brother sporting an indigo silk suit. She’d seen him a few times in the building, and now he was seeing her. Every inch of her. He looked her up and down a few times and frowned.
“A little over the top, don’t you think?”
Kandace grinned. “You criticizing me and you don’t even know my name.”
“Kandace, I believe,” the brother said. “My name is Jaleel.”
“Well, Jaleel, I was about to ask you to come by tonight for a drink, but since you think I’m over the top I’m sure you wouldn’t want me on top.”
Jaleel grinned. “I can always make exceptions.”
“I bet you can.”
Kandace stepped off the elevator. “Nine o’clock. Take your vitamins.”
The first thing Kandace did when she entered the room was check her cell. She didn’t know why; maybe from force of habit. There were no calls. Bryce was still M.I.A. The second thing she did was go into the hall bathroom to check on the skin. It hung over the bathtub, swaying with the air conditioning flow.
“I might as well,” she said. She stripped off her clothes and donned the skin. It hung loose for a moment then slowly fitted itself tight against her skin. She felt like she had a bag over her head then the feeling dissipated. But the real shock hit her when she looked into the mirror. She was invisible.
“Damn,” she whispered. She reached out at the blank mirror and a bolt jumped from her fingers. The glass shattered.
“What the hell?” A wave of fatigue hit her; she was suddenly famished. She peeled the skin off and stumbled naked into the kitchen in a desperate search for food.
“This skin ain’t right,” she said as she dumped a box of corn flakes onto a plate and ate with her hands.
“This ain’t right.”
Nine
The cargo plane landed with a thud on the dirt runway, miles away from the tourist destination of Montego Bay. Malik jostled in his seat, but his expression didn’t change. He was destroying his life for a friend. He could still see the look on Tisha’s face when he announced he was leaving and refused to tell her where he was going, why he was going and how long he would be gone. The words that spewed from her mouth were meant to hurt and they did.
His response was clichéd. “Trust me, baby,” he said. Even he didn’t believe them when he said them.
The cargo plane taxied to a stop before a tin metal building. Malik gathered his things then walked toward the cabin. The pilot, a scruffy looking, red faced German, looked back at him with a sly smile.
“Should I wait?” he asked.
“No. I have another ride,” Malik replied.
“All you have to do is make it worth my while,” the man said with a wink.
Malik sneered. “If I see your plane here five minutes after I leave I’ll come back and kill you with my bare hands.”
He reached into the duffle, took out a stack then tossed it at the pilot.
He went to the rear of the plane and climbed out. The pilot was off the ground and gaining altitude before Malik reached the shed.
“I’ll be taking that from you now,” someone said.
Three men emerged from behind the shed, guns in their hands. They wore jeans and t-shirts, their heads crowned with dreads. The man in the middle, a short, wide man with bulging muscles, stepped toward them.
“Drop the bag and put your hands behind your back,’ he ordered.
“This is a shitty way to treat a friend,” Malik remarked as he did what he was told.
“You’re Bryce’s friend, not mine,” the man replied.
One of th
e other men stepped behind him and tied his hands together. The other came with a blindfold.
“Come on,” Malik said. “Really?”
“Shut your mouth,” the short man said. The lanky man tied the black fabric over his eyes. They led him to a vehicle then hoisted him in the back. He lay on a bed of straw.
Malik didn’t know exactly where he was but he knew which direction they traveled. He was trained to know such things. They headed west following a winding road that climbed into the highlands. They were either headed to Maroon country or somewhere near. Bryce was making a good try at not being found.
The truck halted after two hours. Malik heard the truck door clang.
“C’mon boy,” the short man said. “My cousin been waiting for you.”
Malik slid to the edge of the truck and was helped to the ground. His hands were freed and his blindfold removed. He stood in the middle of a camp surrounded by marijuana fields. There were four buildings; one serving as some type of office while the others were warehouses for the illicit harvest.
“Man, I ain’t never been more happy to see you!”
Bryce ran to him from the office and they bear hugged.
“I didn’t think you was gonna come,” he said.
“I may have lost my marriage over you,” Malik said. “But we’re boys, so I’m here.”
“Come on in, man,” Bryce said. “You must be tired.”
The office was neat and orderly despite its remote location. Bryce was a stickler for organization. A man with secrets had to be organized to remember them all.
Bryce sat in a huge chair then lit a blunt.
“I’m in some deep shit, bruh. Some real deep shit.”
“So what’s new?” Malik replied.
Bryce extended the blunt to Malik but Malik waved him away.
“I figured it must be serious. I’ve never seen you run from a jealous husband.”
Bryce shook his head. “I wish that was all it was. I think it’s got something to do with my job.”
Malik sat up. “What did you do, Bryce?”
“I was working late and came across something that was interesting. I downloaded it.”
Malik was puzzled. “You work for a mom and pop lab. The worst they can do is fire you.”
Black Power- The Superhero Anthology Page 8