by Wyatt Kane
“Tempest? Ty? Are you in there?”
Ty couldn’t help but give Tempest a quick, guilty look. She laughed at him and shook her head.
“We’re in here!” the blonde superhero called out. “Care to join us?”
Ty’s guilty expression became a rueful grin. He realized that he still hadn’t fully worked out how the dynamics of this relationship worked.
The bathroom door opened, and the deerkin wandered in. But instead of the open expression of temptation Ty expected, Dinah looked uncharacteristically serious.
It was enough that both he and Tempest sobered.
“What is it?” Tempest asked through the glass door.
“We have received a message,” Dinah responded, completely unfazed by finding them both in the shower. “It’s unusual. I think it’s from the Master himself. You’d better come and see.” For a moment, she eyed Tempest and Ty up and down, and her expression turned into one of regret. “I’ll meet you both in the screen room.”
◆◆◆
Like mist on a sunny day, the atmosphere of fun and frivolity within the shower evaporated. Ty and Tempest dried themselves quickly, climbed into their clothing, and made their way to the room with the wraparound screen.
As well as the deerkin, Gremlin was on the floor, standing protectively next to Dinah’s feet. Yet when Ty and Tempest entered the room, the cat approached Ty, purring loudly. She rubbed against his legs in a way that seemed almost apologetic, as if she was aware she had been ignoring him in favor of Dinah.
Ty grinned and picked the cat up. On other days, Gremlin would have struggled to get out of his grip, but this time she seemed content to stay put.
Dinah had grabbed a lollipop from her stash, but other than that, she was all business. The screen in front of them was mostly black. At first, Ty wondered if there was something wrong with it, but then he understood the blackness was an image partially obscured by lines of static.
Hidden behind the largest group of lines was a symbol that Ty couldn’t make out. Other than that, there was nothing.
“This appeared all over the news nets maybe half an hour ago,” Dinah began. “It was there for no more than a moment, then vanished again. Yet it was enough to catch people’s attention, in part because someone managed to pack in more than a minute’s worth of audio into this image. They meant it to be seen, to be understood, but not quickly.”
“What does it say?” Tempest asked, her voice flat and determined.
Dinah nodded and made a gesture with her right hand. Right away, the room was filled with a harsh, scratchy voice that was almost electronic in nature. It sounded like what an old, beaten-up trashcan might sound if it had a voice.
“You see it,” the voice began. It was a male voice, though distorted and electronic, and Ty was surprised at the amount of sheer malice it conveyed. “The grime, the foulness we live in. New Lincoln is not a city. It is a slum, a ghetto. Everyday people live their miserable lives down in the sludge, like rats in the sewers. Mega-corporations build their towers so high in the sky they can’t see the vileness, can’t smell the stench of the life down below.”
To Ty, the voice was harsh and grating. It jarred with him on a visceral level, and even the sound of it made him start to get angry. Dinah’s response was different. She looked despondent as if listening to the speaker made her sad. Tempest was just listening hard.
“The world we live in is broken. Corruption is par for the course, and virtues like honor and integrity do no more than keep you down,” the voice continued. “We are so mired in the filth of a civilization,” he sneered the word, as if implying that it wasn’t very civilized at all, “doing nothing. Even those with power, even those with the strength to stand up for what’s right can do nothing. They are blinded by foolishness and their vision is limited. They try to protect from within the system when it’s the system itself that is wrong. Hnnngh!”
The speaker’s spat his bile and venom as an inarticulate growl. “Superheroes my ass. Power without insight and vision is worse than no power at all. I say enough! It is time for a change! If those with power lack insight to use it effectively, then they do not deserve it!”
The voice paused for a while as if the speaker was consciously reining himself in. “To those who think themselves heroes, I offer a chance to prove it. If you have vision, you will sacrifice those at risk for the greater good. If not, you will sacrifice the technology that makes you who you are.”
Again, the speaker paused, and Ty wondered if he had stopped speaking entirely. But after a moment, he spoke again.
“Choose wisely.”
The grating voice stopped, and Dinah wasted little time. She made another gesture to pause the playback and took the lollipop out of her mouth.
“It’s pretty clearly directed at us,” the deerkin said. “It doesn’t sound like Bain even with the distortion, so I’m guessing it is the Master himself. It appears that our efforts have frustrated him. And with Ty’s shield around the building, he is looking for another way to get to us. He is looking to draw us out instead.”
Tempest nodded as if in agreement, but she looked distracted. She was chewing her lower lip, but not in the way Dinah did. With Tempest, it was a sign that she was thinking.
As for Ty, he had questions. “Bain was able to talk to us directly,” he said. “Why would the Master go to this sort of effort?”
Dinah shook her head. “I don’t know. Bain used his device to contact us before. Maybe this Master doesn’t have one. Or maybe he has another reason for choosing this method.” She shrugged. “I don’t know.”
Ty couldn’t help but feel irritated. “But what’s the point?” he said. “What does it mean?” Distractedly, as if it would help, Ty found himself patting Gremlin as he held her. The cat was still purring with an enthusiasm that was out of character for her.
Dinah glanced at him and nodded. “That’s what I wondered as well. And with this popping up everywhere, there are a lot of others trying to figure it out. The dominant theory is that it’s a viral marketing effort. Perhaps for a film or game of some kind. But there was more than just the audio file embedded within it.”
Before Ty could ask what she meant, Dinah gestured at the screen and expanded two different images to other parts of the screen.
The first was a simple countdown. A timer, with slightly less than forty-five minutes to go. To Ty, that was ominous enough. But the other image made it considerably worse.
It was just a static image. A photograph someone had uploaded.
New Lincoln was a vast, sprawling city. It was a grim and largely desperate place under the thumb of politicians who were intent on lining their own pockets and that of mega-corporations that treated everyone as no more than a source of profits. Yet within its confines, there were a number of parks, stadiums, theatres, and at least one of every other type of attraction Ty could imagine.
One of those attractions was an old amusement park.
Built before Ty was born, it was a monument to happier times and had seen better days. Yet it was still surprisingly popular. On any given day, several thousand people would enjoy the rides, often lining up for some time for a seat on the park’s main attraction: a huge pendulum ride that could take more than forty people at a time.
Once, when he was still a child, Ty had been lucky enough to visit the park. He could still remember the excitement and terror he’d felt at the time and knew that the park was still popular at least in part because it helped people forget their real lives for a while.
All this made it the perfect place for the Master to target.
“Scare Kingdom,” Ty said, naming the park. The image on the screen was as recognizable as anything in the city. It showed the pendulum ride in full cry, and might have been one of the park’s own publicity shots.
Ty could barely believe it. The message, the images on the screen, the whole experience was surreal. This type of thing didn’t happen in real life. Strange messages hidden in files s
pread throughout the nets were the stuff of comic books or movies. Maybe the work of an arch-villain in a video game.
But it was not a comic book story, a movie, or a game. The threat was real. In less than forty-five minutes, something was going to happen at Scare Kingdom.
And it was up to them to stop it.
32: Comparisons
“We have no choice, right?” Ty said. “We’re not going to sacrifice the lives of the strangers just because this Master is threatening us, right?”
Dinah gave Ty a broad smile. It appeared that she was in total agreement. “I don’t see any choice. This Master has obviously got something planned, but if you don’t turn up, it tells him that all he needs to do is threaten us and he can do what he wishes.”
That was how Ty read it as well. If Gremlin hadn’t been still purring in his arms, Ty might have clenched his fists. As it was, he nodded and turned to Tempest.
“Let’s go,” he said.
But the blonde superhero surprised him. Normally the first to suggest direct action, she stayed where she was and glared at the screen as if it angered her.
“Do we have a sound recording of the Architect’s voice?” she asked.
Ty was confused. He didn’t understand how that could matter at this moment. Nor was it usual for Tempest to refer to the first superhero as, “the Architect”. She normally referred to him as her father.
But Dinah barely batted an eye. “Of course.”
Grimly, as if speaking through clenched teeth, Tempest asked, “Can you compare it with what we’ve just heard?”
This time Dinah was confused. “Sure,” she said. “But why?”
Even though it appeared to pain her, Tempest explained. “Because the Architect has been missing for so long, and Bain wears his device. And now we have this disembodied voice, this puppet master pulling strings in the shadows. Who do we know who works like that? Like a spider in a web? Who do we know who could have told Bain where we live? Who do we know who would go after our devices?”
As Tempest spoke, it became clear to both Ty and Dinah what she meant. Yet it needed to be said out loud.
“The Architect,” Dinah murmured.
Tempest looked as if she was facing an impossible challenge. She seemed somehow fragile, which Ty found deeply unsettling. Tempest was the strongest person he knew, both in physical strength and demeanor. It worried him to see her looking so brittle, almost desperate.
“Meow,” Gremlin said, although whether just to be part of the conversation or if she had picked up on the atmosphere, Ty didn’t know.
Ty wanted to reassure Tempest that it couldn’t be, but in truth, he just didn’t know. Nor was that the type of comfort the blonde superhero required.
Dinah understood this intuitively. Without another word, she turned back to her screens. “Archival search. Audio file. The Architect. Search.”
Right away, a number of results appeared on the screen. “Vocal signature application,” Dinah said. When the asked-for application appeared, Dinah gestured at the screen to select the files she wanted. “Compare.”
Ty sensed Tempest holding her breath. Even he felt the tension. He didn’t know whether to hope that it was the Architect, or to hope that it wasn’t. If it was, then at least Tempest’s father was still alive. But the implications weren’t great.
Why would he have stayed away from her for so long? And what was he doing?
He needn’t have worried. The vocal signature app displayed the results on screen. “No match,” it said, and it showed a graphic representation of the two files in waveform as further evidence.
The two files were quite different.
But Tempest wasn’t satisfied. “The voice sounded metallic. Raspy, as if he was speaking through supplemental electronics. What if something happened to him that damaged his voice?”
“I don’t know how I could allow for that,” Dinah replied. “But there may be another way.”
As fast as thought, the deerkin brought up another application. Ty didn’t fully understand what it did at first, but it also concluded that the voices didn’t match.
Dinah gave Tempest a grin. “The Master is not your father,” she said. “Even if he damaged his voice somehow, his word choice, sentence structure and diction would remain the same. This shows that whoever the Master is, he does not have the same way of speaking that your father did.”
For a moment, Tempest just stood there. It was as if she was trying to see any flaws in Dinah’s logic. Finally, she nodded, and seemed to relax.
“Thank you,” she said. “I was worried. Ever since you mentioned someone pulling the strings in the shadows, I couldn’t help but wonder. It seems like his way of doing things. And how did Bain get his device?”
The deerkin gave Tempest a gentle smile and shrugged her shoulders.
Tempest took a deep breath and pushed the worrying thoughts aside. “Can you contact the park? Tell them that there’s been a threat? Maybe we’ll get lucky and they’ll close it down.”
Dinah nodded, and Tempest looked to Ty. “Are you up to this?” she asked. “You know it’s going to be a trap of some sort. He’s going to come after us with everything he’s got.”
Surprising even himself, Ty was able to smile. “It’s what we do, isn’t it?” he said.
Tempest looked at him with eyes that were sparkling with pride. “I guess it is,” she said.
◆◆◆
As Tempest carried him through the air, Ty found himself enjoying the blonde superhero’s strength and close presence even more than usual. It wasn’t hard to figure out why. Their last journey through the skies together had been an experience Ty would look back on fondly for the rest of his life.
At the same time, he couldn’t help but feel unprepared. He had his mesh suit and modified blaster, and he’d brought his police baton with him as well.
But he didn’t know what the Master had planned for them. The shadowy villain knew Tempest’s strengths well, and even if he didn’t fully understand the nature of Ty’s abilities, the mercenaries he’d already fought would have reported back. They knew he was durable within his shield. Would they have come up with some way to counter that?
With his talent, Ty could effectively change his stats, leveling up at need. He could give himself strengths and abilities beyond those he currently possessed, and that could prove decisive.
He could be the ace in the deck, but only if he did the work needed to get there.
At the same time as enjoying the flight with Tempest, Ty worried that he hadn’t found time to work on his shield. He hadn’t found a way to prevent fall damage. His durability was good, but his strength and stamina were no greater than normal.
He hadn’t yet done any of the things he meant to do.
As Tempest started to drop toward the expanse of the park beneath them, Ty promised himself that should they survive whatever was to come, he would do that work as soon as possible.
Tempest’s usual habit was to find an out-of-the-way place to land, often an alley or vacant lot. But this was different. There were still several minutes to go before the digital timer was due to run out, but that didn’t mean they could take their time. They didn’t know what the Master planned.
So, Tempest’s first option was to circle the park from above. It became clear right away that Dinah’s message hadn’t got through, or hadn’t been believed. Tempest swore quietly to herself at all the people on the ground.
“See anything?” she asked in Ty’s ear.
Ty was also disappointed that the park hadn’t been shut down. To him, it looked the same as normal. A busy place filled with people, many of them children running about with candy floss and hotdogs in their hands.
The park was spread over several acres, and as well as the mighty pendulum ride in the middle, there was a rollercoaster at one end, a Ferris wheel to the side, and multiple smaller merry-go-round type rides for the youngsters. There was a haunted house, a house of mirrors, and a line of fairground
attractions and booths where the sharp eyed and coordinated could perhaps win a prize.
Everywhere Ty looked, there were smiling, happy people, just going about their day at the park as if there was nothing amiss. To Ty, it was like an oasis of good cheer within an ocean of gloom that defined the rest of the city.
“No, nothing,” he said, shaking his head.
“Me neither,” Tempest replied. “Time for a closer look,” she said.
With that, she picked a spot behind the row of booths where few would see them and came in for a landing.
A random customer looked at them in surprise and confusion, but Tempest and Ty ignored him.
As soon as Ty found his balance, Tempest let him go. “We should split up. Look for anything suspicious. Mercenaries, your friend Lilith, whatever. If you see anything, contact me right away, and I’ll do the same.”
33: Scare Kingdom
Ty knew they didn’t have long before the Master’s time limit ran out. With increasing worry, he made his way through the park, looking for anything out of the ordinary. But he didn’t even know what shape that might take. What did, “out of the ordinary” look like? What would the Master have planned?
“Think like a villain,” Ty said to himself. “What is his plan? Why are we here?”
Yet all he could think of was maybe a bomb in one of the trash cans, and that just didn’t seem spectacular enough.
The shadowy villain wanted to put enough lives in danger to flush Ty and Tempest out. What he would do after that was secondary. The Master’s primary goal was to attract their attention. Would a bomb in a trash can fit the bill?
If it did, then how could he or Tempest find it in time?
He wondered if he should just start firing his blaster in the air and yelling at the top of his lungs for people to run. But he knew that would just create panic and perhaps do more harm than good.
And maybe that was what the Master wanted, anyway. Maybe he wanted Ty and Tempest to be the threat to the amusement park. To get them in trouble with the authorities while he sat back and laughed as his men engaged in some other scheme entirely.