by A M Kirk
The hand leaves his shoulder and Logan now finds the strength to turn round.
“You!”
The Daniels boy stands facing him, his gaze level and completely unafraid. Power crackles all around him like faint blue lightning. Not at all like the last time they saw each other. Logan’s terror intensfies.
“How? What have you done? How have you done this? What are you?”
Mark smiles, almost sadly, almost pityingly. “Goodbye.” And he vanishes, into the air. One second Logan sees him standing plainly in front of his face, not two metres away, and the next second there is no Daniels boy there at all. No bangs, no flashes, no weird sounds, just silence and absence.
Logan grabs the bars of his prison cell and begins to scream. An Italian policeman comes running to see who can be making such a noise.
37
It was a cold Saturday afternoon in late October, when Carrie visited the Soros ship. The sky above Central Scotland that day was a brilliant blue as a high pressure system settled itself over northern Britain. Hoar frost sparkled on wide fields and a light dusting of thin snow whitened the higher mountain tops visible from Touch.
Mark called on Carrie. Gin showed him into the lobby. Carrie’s parents stepped warily around the young man’s celebrity. Their initial dislike had now evolved into a more amenable toleration. Gin even smiled weakly at Mark and had almost started a conversation before Carrie called from the upstairs landing that Mark was to come up to her room. Mark shuffled awkwardly past and his distrustful gaze.
“Hey,” Carrie said as Mark joined on the landing. Her voice dropped to a whisper as she ushered him into her bedroom. “What do you bet one of them comes upstairs in a minute singing a Rolling Stones song to advertise their presence and to stop us from doing anything we’re not supposed to. Or they’ll come armed with tea and biscuits…”
“I don’t know what you’ve got in mind. I don’t know what I’m not supposed to be doing.”
“Oh yeah, Daniels? I’m going to pinch your ears – “
“Does starting to save the world count as something we’re not supposed to be doing?”
The door was now closed and they could kiss, so they did.
“Okay,” said Carrie, stopping for breath. “How does saving the world actually start? Do I need to pack warm clothing?”
Mark laughed. “No, nothing like that. Okay, stand close beside me. Yes, holding hands is good. Now, I just imagine a kind of protective envelope or skin surrounding us both – “
To Carrie’s eyes the room seemed to shimmer slightly around her.
“ – and then, hey presto!”
Carrie had the merest sensation of falling and then: “OH MY GOD!”
She blinked and found herself on the deck of the Soros ship. The transfer took less time than it took to take a breath. In the huge viewscreen space stretched out before her. The ship was turning gradually and Earth drifted into the field of vision.
“Hey – look, there’s Scotland! It’s still a nice day there, not a cloud in the sky. This is better than Google Earth! Can it zoom in?”
“It can zoom in, zoom through and out the other side. Look, here’s your house.” Instantly the screen seemed to flash towards Earth and narrowed down to the little town of Touch, then a red slate roof, then some kind of x-ray imaging facet kicked in, the roof became transparent and Carrie’s bedroom was clearly visible, just as they had left it moments before.
“Look at this.” Mark put slight pressure on the hand control in front of him and dark marks appeared on Carrie’s bedroom carpet. “I’ve enhanced the carpet indentations where we walked in your room. Those darker ones are our footprints you’re seeing. The ones that are less dark are your ones from earlier.”
“That’s pretty cool.”
“And you can check on what your parents are doing.” The focus shifted to the right and downwards and Gin came into view. He was at the foot of the stairs, looking up, clearly dying to know what Carrie and Mark were up to in her room – a concerned protective parent.
Sound kicked in.
He was humming “Jumpin’ Jack Flash”.
“How can it get sound? We must be a million miles away from Gin!”
“I don’t know how exactly the ship does most of the things it can do. Maybe it can interpret vibrations in the air – I just don’t know.”
Carrie reached out and touched the console with her fingers. “I can almost feel the power of this thing. It’s… vast!”
Mark nodded. “It certainly is. Look at this – “
Instantly the screen showed a bird’s eye view of an office building that, it became obvious, was the Headquarters of the CIS. The focus became Roberts’ office… his desk… his computer. His computer files came up on the screen.
“But – he’s not even there.”
“No, he’s at home right now with his family.”
“But – his machine’s not even switched on!”
“I know,” Mark replied. “It’s magic! There is very little the systems on this ship can’t let us access. So I know what the surveillance teams are up to… everything!”
“So how can we use this like I said?”
“Well, I was thinking about that. If we screen all the communications in, say Scotland, and listen for particular phrases – “
“Say… ‘drugs’,” suggested Carrie.
“My thought exactly. And then we just…”
It became clear after a few minutes of mobile phone intercepts that a shipment of drugs was being ferried across the North Sea at that moment in an old fishing boat. The captain had just called his contacts ashore to confirm drop-off point. The Soros ship had pinpointed the precise location of the fishing boat.
“What shall we do about that?” asked Carrie. “Notify the police? Tell Roberts?”
“Well, if we do that, they’ll start asking us all sorts of questions and that could get awkward.”
“Yes, you’re right.”
“But if you’ll excuse me for a moment…”
Mark vanished.
“Hey! Get back here, Daniels!” Carrie thumped the console. The screen suddenly showed a zooming in image of the fishing boat. As the boat loomed larger on the screen a dark figure appeared at its stern, out of sight of the two-man crew in the small cabin. Carrie could feel the rise and fall of the boat on the swelling waves. Mark appeared to sink into the wooden deck. He was in the hold. He found the cargo – a big one, a fortune in heroin. He reached out with his right hand and touched the cases that held the drug. Energy flowed from his fingers and at the molecular level began to work a different kind of magic.
Seconds later he reappeared at Carrie’s side.
“What did you do?” she demanded.
“I turned it into sugar.”
“Sugar?”
“Yeah – there are going to be some pretty upset people later on today. Shall we push this a bit further?”
“Okay, but take me with you this time. Don’t go flying off all by yourself.”
“There’s a container ship, a big one, heading for Hull. One of the containers has another shipment – cocaine this time. Shall we…?”
“Let’s do it.”
They transferred aboard the ship, holding hands. Carrie could feel the vibration of the vessel’s engines under her feet, and smell the salt in the air mixed with a rusty metallic oiliness. Large cargo containers painted in various colours loomed above and ahead of her. “Do you know which container it is?”
“Of course I do.”
“Of course you do. Shouldn’t we take cover… hide?”
“No need. The infra-red scan is showing that there’s no one around.” Mark led the way down a narrow passageway between piled high containers, each ten by five metres and three metres high. “It’s this one.” He touched it and its rusting doors parted. Inside Carrie could clearly see pack after pack of white powder.
“If you change it into flour,�
� she mused, “they might still make some bread out of it.”
“Ta-dah! My side-kick, folks, the Joker!”
Carrie nipped Mark’s arm. He touched the container side and the energy flowed from his hand again, entering into the molecular structures of the drug, shifting electrons, changing essences.
“It’s done,” he said. “As simple as that. Let’s go.”
They entered a leafy suburban street, but the air was filled the nasty smell of a house-fire. People were shouting and screaming. The lights of several fire engines and ambulances flashed.
“What the hell is this?” asked Carrie.
“We’re in Manchester. I picked up a message from one of the fireman’s radios. He’s inside that burning building. It’s a care home for the elderly. Someone is trapped in that room – “ He pointed to a third floor window – “and he can’t get through. You should wait here for this one.”
“I’ll wait here. Be careful!”
She watched as Mark walked quickly into the gathering crowd then faded from view. The home was a large one, converted from an old red-brick Victorian mansion. Unsightly fire-escape stairwells marred the outside of the building. Firemen were moving on these, escorting people slowly and carefully down to waiting paramedics before going back up. The fire seemed to be most intense towards the rear of the building. Emergency staff spoke urgently into the small mikes beside their mouths, attached to helmet radios. More ambulances threaded their way through the people that had interrupted their Saturday afternoon to come and watch or help.
Minutes passed.
Carrie began to appreciate the implications of Mark’s power. Now she understood with perfect clarity why he had to hide the truth about his capabilities. If people knew what he could do, he would be in constant demand to set things right. Stop this bank robbery, catch this burglar, rescue this cat. Or, if the military got hold of him, well, she had seen enough movies and TV documentaries to have formed the opinion that the military, despite the kindness and consideration shown to her from those she had met during the summer, were not always working from the best of motives. Britain still had forces posted in trouble spots around the world – the Burmese conflict, the mess in the Middle East and the Afghanistan situation rumbled on. It was not impossible they could try to use Mark to ensure success in these areas. After all, from what she now knew, he could go places no one else could; he could access any data, anywhere; and with that protective shield he used when teleporting, he could be unstoppable.
Some of the crowd near the front of the building began softly applauding and cheering. Carrie stood on tip-toe to see. A civilian in the long coat was emerging from the building. Mark had been carrying an old lady in his arms and was in the act of setting her carefully back on her feet. She appeared dazed, but effusive in her thanks of the young man. A grim-faced fireman had followed them out of the now fiercely blazing interior and now led the woman over to a paramedic unit, but not without giving Mark a very strange look as he passed. Carrie saw Mark nod at the fireman, touch the woman briefly on the shoulder, and turn back towards the crowd. Hand patted his back as he made his way towards Carrie.
“Well, that was interesting. Come on, before they start taking photographs.”
“If we get behind that ambulance over there we’ll be able to disappear,” suggested Carrie and Mark nodded agreement.
Once back on the Soros ship Carrie said, “I could use a cup of tea. What are the facilities like on this tub? And is there anywhere to pee?”
“Ah – good question. I think there are toilet areas of sorts…”
“’Of sorts’? What does that mean?”
“They’re not really intended for humans, and certainly not dainty girls like you.”
“Do you actually enjoy being nipped?” Carrie asked, nipping him.
“We should maybe get back to your room. Your mum’s on the way up the stairs with that tea and biscuits you mentioned.”
Carrie opened the bedroom door just as her mother reached it and was about to turn the handle. “Thought you might be needing a snack, dear,” Bitter said, peering into the room over her daughter’s shoulder. She edged past. “What have you been up to?”
The voice of Dougie MacLean came from Carrie’s music pod. “Oh, I remember that!” Bitter exclaimed. “That’s Jimmy MacLean. He was great, back in the eighties.”
“I know, mum,” said Carrie helping herself to a biscuit, “I borrowed it from your collection, remember?”
“Yes, dear. Have some tea, Mark. Have you been smoking, Carrie, or burning something in here? I can smell smoke.”
“No, mum, you know we don’t smoke – no one does. And does it look like we’ve been setting thngs alight? I can’t smell anything. Excuse me – must go to the loo.”
After Bitter had gone back downstairs and Carrie had freshened up, Mark said, “So – you see the difficulties?”
Carrie nodded.
Mark ran a hand through his hair. “I can’t keep on stepping in and being the local bobby or fireman or whatever. I’d be on call twenty-four hours a day. And the ship picks up everything, every broadcast signal all over the world and it can translate every language. That’s one of the things the Soros were working on when they spent that first year on earth. Right now there’s a train broken down in Kazhakstan, a British Army unit has gotten lost on an operation in the Burmese jungle, a ferry boat is sinking in the China Sea, there are floods in Columbia – oh, excuse me…”
Mark suddenly disappeared, leaving Carrie open-mouthed. She closed her mouth. “Well!” she muttered. “That’s almost rude.”
He reappeared a minute later. “Sorry, that had to be done.”
“I don’t suppose that was a toilet break.”
Mark laughed. “No. Some guy with a samurai sword was hurting people in a shopping mall in England. There were mums and toddlers. I – “
“ – had to stop him. I know.” Carrie hugged him tight. “I know.”
“But I have to figure this out. I just can’t be helping everyone like that.”
Carrie said, seriously, “You know, I’m not a big expert on superheroes, but in the comics and films all they ever do is stop petty crime or tackle crazed lunatics who also have strange powers and are trying to do something weird. But they never actually do anything to make the world better. And we’re not comic strip characters. It’s like I said to you the other night. But how do you do that? What do you do?”
They looked into each other’s intelligent eyes.
“I think,” said Mark, “we’ll figure something out.”
Carrie smiled. Mark could not help but kiss her.
38Reports…
Chris Roberts sat back from the interface and stretched out his legs. His fingers touched in a gesture resembling prayer but indicating speculation. These were strange days.
An hour before he had been in video conference with General Locke and Andrew Talbot. They had been in contact frequently as a result of on-going enquiries and investigations. Locke had asked about Mark.
“Chris – is this boy telling us the truth? Has he lost his powers? You know him best. What do you think?” Locke had asked.
Roberts had smiled. “I honestly don’t know. He seems to be leading a quiet life again, sticking in at school. He’s not top of his class but he’s very bright. I think, on balance, he’s not Superman. Just like he says.”
Talbot agreed. “His mother – Janette – is doing everything she can to bring normality back into their lives. They’ve had counselors, the lot, to help get them through this post-traumatic period, and now they just want to be left alone. And luckily the media are playing along with our requests to virtually leave them alone. In return we give them access to any new developments the scientists come up with from the Soros technology. They accept that their viewers and readers are more interested in that than in the confused monotonous mumblings of a schoolboy.”
Locke grunted. “Well, we’re drawing complete
blanks with the search for the mother ship. We’ve got all the Hubble telescopes sweeping the solar system for any trace of a twenty-five square mile hunk of metal and so far nada. Talk about a needle in a haystack! One of our analysts speculated the other day that the boy had it hidden somewhere. We’re actually sending a probe round the dark side of the moon - can you believe that? – just to verify he hasn’t hidden it there. And the landing craft isn’t exactly proving to be the find we all hoped. So many of its systems appear to require some kind of telepathic input. It’s infuriating.”
“I know,” said Talbot. “We have learned a lot – the metallic structure, the holographic technology, but a lot of it’s like window dressing. Thus far and no further. Like some bloody game. The boffins have taken the ship up, of course, but they don’t really know for sure exactly how it flies.”
“We’re like monkeys trying to drive a goddam bus!” barked Locke.
Roberts laughed. “Give it time, General, give it time. It’s early days.”
“All right, Chris, I’ll be in touch.”
“And we’ll keep monitoring the boy at this end,” added Talbot. The conference ended.
Now, Roberts’ interface displayed reports and case notes from various crimes and investigations covering the last few weeks. He clicked back on to one he had read a few minutes previously: a fishing boat bound from Holland to the north-east coast of Scotland had been boarded by Customs officials who had very good reason to believe it carried an illegal cargo of cocaine. Sure enough, hundreds of kilo bags of white powder had been found, but when the chemical analysis came through it proved to be sugar. The smugglers were taken into custody and questioned ruthlessly. They seemed as surprised as the Customs people. They had been released and a few days later were found dead in a flat in Edinburgh, presumably murdered by their “employers” for bungling a million euro deal. The murderers were also now in custody, the plane on which they were trying to leave the country having encountered mysterious engine failure as it tried to take off from Edinburgh Airport. Strange events.