Supers - Ex Heroes 2

by Jamie Hawke

  At this point, Wendlor had turned back toward me, and my dogs came around the corner, covering my back.

  “How… how are you doing this?” he demanded in a bewildered voice. “I saw your code, this isn’t possible.”

  “What you saw was only part of the story,” I said, as I moved in on him.

  He tried to do something with his black screen, but instead of whatever he’d intended a flash went off and he went flying back, smacking into the wall behind him. I was there in a second, fist and stone raised, ready to strike.

  “Release them!” I shouted. “And get these off of me.”

  A roar came from deep in his throat as he lunged, hands out as if to choke me, but I slammed the stone into his arms and sent him howling to the ground in pain.

  “Do it,” I warned, but this time gave him proof that I meant business. I slammed the stone down and onto his foot, bones snapping as he let out a cry.

  “The panel, there!” he said, indicating a switch. “But yours are broken, I don’t know if it’ll work.” When my fist and stone slammed into his foot again, he shouted and said, “I’ll think of something!”

  “If the switch does anything other than what you just said, you’re in for a world of pain,” I said and hit the switch. Sure enough, Gale and Twitch were both freed. As for me, I turned and slammed the stone into the metal wall over and over, and a moment later I was free, too. Then I turned on the man again, ready to beat him to a bloody pulp.

  “Enough, enough!” Wendlor shrieked, hands raised in defense. “Ranger will kill me!”

  “For what?” I asked.

  “This… his powers…” Wendlor stared at the ground, then at his hands, shaking. “He comes when called to collect the new powers.

  “Let me get this straight,” Twitch said. “You collect the powers here, store them somehow, and then transfer them to Ranger?”

  Wendlor’s eyes looked distant when he nodded. “He wasn’t always like this, you know. He had one power… one simple power, not so different from my own.” When he looked at Twitch, he added, “Ours, I should say. You, me, and him… the only three I know of with such abilities.”

  “How?” she said. “How’d you bring them over?”

  “Not me. Us. We were always together, Ranger and I, back when he earned his name. He was a scout, you see, the two of us using our powers to adjust stars that were threatening to go out and affect their planetary systems, using our powers for all sorts of benefits to the Citadel and her fringe colonies.” His hands finally stopped shaking, and he seemed fascinated with this fact, turning them over and staring at his fingers, but then he explained why. “These hands, my hands right here… they were the first part of it. Playing with a code to stop a solar flare, when he thought he was supposed to, he entered a similar code, only his was meant to banish it while mine was to subdue—and they interacted in a way that collapsed space upon itself, bringing the worlds together. Only, it wasn’t the first time this had happened, we found out.”

  “You opened the rift between their world and ours,” Twitch said in awe.

  “I tried to close it!” he said in his defense. “But they knew our language, they said they were once like us, supers who had crossed over, who had learned much about the universe and could share this knowledge, give us great power… and Ranger stopped me. He accepted their offer. What choice did I have?”

  We all stared at him for a long moment, and finally I said, “You had a very big choice, a very obvious one. You could’ve stood up to him, fought back.”

  “You don’t know Ranger like I do,” Wendlor said, shaking his head, the shaking returning to his hands. “You don’t know…”

  “What happened next?” Gale asked, looking fascinated by the tale.

  “Next, by Oram? No. It’s too horrible.”

  She knelt down beside him. “But I’ve heard this part. I’ve heard a rumor, one of many, but maybe you can fill in the blanks. A rumor about a strange force coming for the Tier One supers, a darkness they couldn’t explain.”

  “No,” Twitch said, looking at me, but I hadn’t quite caught on yet.

  “It’s true,” Wendlor said. “The first supers they went after were Apollo and his ilk, but they weren’t able to take his power. They tried, but he proved too powerful, so they locked him away. The others though, so many others… Ranger wasn’t given the top tier powers, those were taken by the lead Nihilists. But he was given some strong ones, for sure. Given leadership over the supers, allowed to govern as long as he answered to the Nihilists, but always remembering who his masters were.” Wendlor turned to me, eyes pleading. “I don’t want to be part of this, I never did. Save me… save me.”

  “You’re beyond saving,” Gale said with a look of disgust as she stood.

  “Maybe… maybe.” The old man stared off into the distance, then looked at Twitch. “Our powers weren’t so different, you see. But they corrupted mine so that I could only do their bidding. They put a shroud on it all, somehow changing the coding of this dimension.”

  “Fix it,” she said.

  “Don’t you think I would’ve if I knew how?” he said, pleading for her to believe him. “I tried so many times, but all it did was make it worse. Each time, it was like a bit of my soul was ripped from me.”

  She stared, a darkness coming over her. She knew exactly what he was talking about.

  “There is no solution,” he said, hanging his head. “We’re doomed.”

  But I wasn’t so sure. I pulled up my skill tree screen again, looking at all my skill points and then scrolling to the Twitch screen with the troubleshooting skill highlighted. There was no doubt about it, this was our solution. Lamb or some force had sensed it the moment we entered this dimension.

  “I have the answer,” I told them, and then quickly explained. When I was done, Twitch was beaming and Wendlor had a new look in his eyes—hope.

  “There’s only one problem,” I said. “Levels. I need a few more levels. What do we do? Go back and fight the enemy some more?”

  “Leading them straight to us?” Twitch said. “No, I don’t think so. But we do need you to level up, and fast. It might be our only option.”

  “I might have a solution to this,” Wendlor said, sitting up a little straighter. “Are you familiar with the ways of Rome? The old ways, I mean.”

  “What part?” I asked.

  “Gladiators, the Coliseum, all of that.” His eyes sparkled, and a hint of a smile showed as he said, “We have something similar here. You can join the arena, prove yourself against others who are volunteering to fight you, and get the levels you need.”

  “You want me to… be a gladiator?”

  “No,” he said, and now the smile came. “You want you to be a gladiator. I just want to be there to watch.”

  I turned to Twitch and Gale, unsure.

  “It does solve the problem of getting the levels without letting the enemy in on our plan,” Twitch said.

  “And… it’s kinda hot,” Gale chimed in.

  I laughed, shaking my head. I couldn’t believe I was about to do this. With a nod and putting my hands on my hips in true superhero fashion, I said, “Fine, I’m in.”

  10

  While we’d come up with a plan for how to level me up and open the rift to the location where they had Charm, we still didn’t have a way out of this pyramid, and Wendlor’s face had just gone pale.

  “What is it?” Gale asked.

  “Ranger,” Wendlor answered. “He’s… supposed to make a stopover soon. I’m thinking it was today.”

  “Our chance to take him down then,” I said, relieved. “Honestly, if we’d known who he was back on the prison ship, I would’ve loved to end it right there once and for all.”

  “We knew, just not the full picture,” Twitch pointed out. “And if you’d tried, we’d all be dead right now. You did hear everything we were just talking about? You know, him having all those powers and whatnot?”

  “I especially heard the pa
rt where my real dad was involved,” I replied. “Meaning we should kill this guy, go see if this supposed dad of mine is someone worth meeting, and get it over with.”

  “You want to rescue your dad?” Wendlor scoffed. “It’s one thing to say there might be a way of shutting all this down, but the chances of going after your dad and succeeding are about as high as my chances of… well, I don’t know, but they’re low.”

  “Because he’s in the Nihilist world?”

  He nodded. “As far as we know, nobody’s ever gone there on their own and come back to tell about it.”

  “Nobody yet.”

  “If we could find a way,” Twitch chimed in, “that would be huge for the superheroes.”

  “I’m telling you, it’s not possible,” Wendlor said. “If it were, you think the thing about the prophecy would even matter?”

  “What prophecy?” I asked. “The one that involves my brother and the whole baby deal?”

  “Or you,” he replied. “As in it could go either way, you or him. But yeah, the whole reason it was specified as seventeen years was the amount of time it would take to travel, based on best estimates. But when we get there, we get there—the portal super is already on his way, so the longer the baby takes, all that stuff means we might be more or less ready. If there are complications, it could all change. But for all we know, the closest dimensions we could access without getting Ranger involved again would still be one level away from their actual location. What we’re calling dimensions is actually just space folded on itself, and how many layers of folds does it take to get there, and what are the chances of finding the same spot that we did?”

  “But we don’t really need all that,” I said, ignoring his tone of hopelessness. “All we need is to follow them back, to find some way—”

  “That’s assuming they can go back too,” he interrupted. “As far as I know, they aren’t. They’ve been conquering spots in the in-between, forming new colonies and enslaving the people there, if there are any.”

  “Wait, but if you’re saying they might not be able to go back either, without taking seventeen years or so to do it, isn’t it entirely possible that my dad is much closer than we realize?”

  Wendlor considered this, then nodded slowly. “Actually, so much of this is speculation… That makes sense. The only thing we really know is that he’s gone. Everyone assumed he was taken back, but that might all be wrong.”

  “So we have a chance,” I said, beaming.

  “Breaker,” Twitch said, and she had a hand on one of my arms, Gale taking the other. “As much as we’d like to find your dad, it sounds like a wild goose chase.”

  “We can’t just leave him out there!” I protested. “I’m his flesh and blood. Shit, even my adoptive dad tried to break me out when I got the death sentence back on Earth. You—”

  “Wait, what?” Wendlor asked. Twitch leaning forward expectantly.

  “Yeah, when I came here, there was this whole thing with him attacking the prison transport, a crash, and then the I was taken here, right at the last minute. Well, to the prison ship anyway.”

  “That wasn’t your dad,” Wendlor said.

  “I know, I said my adoptive dad.” I frowned, looked from him to Twitch, who seemed to be hiding something. “What is it?”

  “Your codes show me things like this, too,” Twitch said. “It showed your recent history, and… sorry, I thought you knew… a group of supervillains had recently come very close to capturing you.”

  Wendlor nodded, confirming that. “I wasn’t part of the mission, but I was aware of it. Some of our best were sent for you, to intercept the prison transport and bring you to the side of the supervillains. Either to castrate you, or try to make a baby for our side, I wasn’t sure exactly what the plan was. ”

  “Xin got to you first,” Twitch said, smiling. “Luckily for everyone involved.”

  “Castrate…?” Gale said, shaking her head. “That would’ve been a crime against humanity.”

  I laughed nervously. “Thanks, Gale. And yeah, I’m at the top of the list for being glad that didn’t happen, but sorry, this is a bit much to process. Okay, so supervillains tried to take me, Xin interfered before they could. Meanwhile, we have no idea where my real father is, but… what about Charm?”

  “The girl they took?” he smiled, finally. “You can get to her if we move fast… I think. I’m honestly not sure how fast they can travel.”

  “And how do we follow them?” Twitch asked.

  “It all comes back to the plan, what we were talking about before. We have to fix the code, get you through the door.”

  I agreed, but before I’d had a chance to speak, I saw that Tarupis was regaining consciousness, which reminded me of the other incoming enemies he’d spoken of.

  “We have to get to it then,” I said. “We save Charm, we figure out the rest later. But I’m not going to abandon my dad, even if he did abandon me.”

  Twitch shot me a sympathetic look, but then turned to Wendlor and said, “Get us out of here.”

  He nibbled at the corner of his pinky nail, then glanced over at Tarupis. “Please, I know I gave you no reason, but… trust me.”

  “Trust you?” I said. When it came to listening to his explanations I was all ears, but did this guy expect us to put our lives in his hands? He’d had us locked up only minutes ago!

  “I know, it’s a lot to ask. But I know what happened was wrong… and I want to make amends, somehow. I can start by helping you.”

  Gale looked as skeptical as I felt, but Twitch seemed to be considering it. “Go ahead,” she said, motioning for him to do whatever it was he had in mind. Before Gale or I could protest, she held up a hand and said, “He’s good for it.”

  Neither of us could be sure how she knew this or why she was taking the leap of faith, but she pulled up her screen and his appeared, and it seemed she was removing the effects of what she’d done to his code.

  “Twitch…” I nudged her. “Are you sure about this?”

  “I have a reason to believe he has a vested interest here,” she replied, and then clicked the screen to make it vanish. Turning to him with a smile, she said, “What’s the plan?”

  He hesitated, then put a hand on the slowly awakening form of Tarupis, pulling up his screen with the other. “Smart. Also smart that you didn’t kill this one.” With two quick motions and typing on his screen, he stood and backed away, then waited.

  “What’re we doing?” Gale asked.

  “Grab him,” he replied. “Think of a place, not too far.”

  I was thinking I’d rather break Tarupis’s skull open, when he opened his eyes, popped up, and said, “Kill them, now!” He initiated a portal, only as soon as he did the portal expanded to cover the whole room. I lunged, grabbing him and focusing on the first location that came to mind. Before he could get off a ‘What the fuck?’ we were all sucked into the portal.

  A moment later, we were standing in one of the warlord huts that we had seen earlier, on the outskirts of the pyramid compound. We’d been here before, I realized, recognizing the crack in the corner wall. It was the house the warlord had taken us to, where we’d gone through the tunnel.

  Coughing sounded, and I realized that Tarupis was next to us, scrambling for the door.

  “Now you can break his skull open,” Wendlor said, motioning for me to go after him. “Be quick about it.”

  “Wait,” Tarupis said, backing away, cursing. “You can’t blame me.”

  I hesitated, and at that moment he ran.

  “Dammit, he’ll alert everyone within miles!” Wendlor said, and Gale went to the doorway, thrusting out her hands—but it was no good. She shook her head. He’d gotten away.

  “I don’t want to kill needlessly,” I said.

  “Maybe you weren’t listening to the point about Ranger coming?” Wendlor said, his whiskers shaking in rage. “Or is it that you’re too dense to realize that, the moment he lands, that piece of trondol shit will tell him exactl
y where we are if we’re still around?”

  “Then we’d better make sure we’re not,” I countered, feeling like a complete fool.

  “What the hell is going on back here?” a booming voice shouted.

  Shuffling of feet sounded and then the warlord himself appeared, bread in his hands. He took one look at us, but then his eyes settled on Wendlor. For a long moment they stared, then the warlord stepped forward and hugged him in a deep embrace.

  “You’ve returned,” the warlord said.

  “I’m sorry, Renowt,” Wendlor quavered. “It wasn’t me, it wasn’t… I’m so sorry.”

  They pulled apart and were beaming at each other. Finally, Renowt turned to us and thanked us each individually, stopping at Twitch last. He bowed, took her hands and kissed them, and then I finally understood what they’d been talking about in the tunnel when he’d led us out of there the first time.

  “Do you have a ship?” Wendlor asked us. “What am I saying, of course you do. But where?”

  “No worries,” Renowt said, beaming. “We have one we can use. It’s old, but it flies.”

  “Gale?” I asked, turning to her.

  “If it has wings, count on me,” she said.

  We followed Renowt again, him leading the way as he helped Wendlor walk and motioned us on so as to go unnoticed. He and Wendlor took turns explaining that they’d been best friends before Ranger came along and started pulling Wendlor away. Renowt had tracked his old friend here long after learning about Ranger’s true nature, figuring the man must have somehow corrupted his old friend’s mind and had been in contact with the Citadel before it fell, trying to work out a way to save Wendlor.

  “In a sense, I owe you my life and all the gratitude that comes with that,” Wendlor said, clapping his old friend on the shoulder. “All of you.”

  I moved ahead to Twitch and Gale’s side, letting the two of them catch up on what they’d missed from each other’s lives. We found the ship and made it out of there without any more hassle, and Gale was actually enjoying this one more than the previous—especially since it was better stocked with food and water. Everyone found their places and soon the villages and rocks and pyramids were lost from view.