“Put that down!”
“Why should I?!” Chris yelled.
“Don’t make us kill you!”
“It doesn’t matter if you kill me!” the winged man snapped angrily. “You Commission pigs have killed thousands! I’m just returning the favor!”
“Leo! You’re up!” the officer called over the megaphone.
Everyone was in awe, even Chris, when a soldier leapt out of one of the helicopters with enough strength to push the helicopter off-balance as he flew through the air and somersaulted onto the roof, standing easily to face Chris.
“A soldier just jumped…easily over thirty feet from one of the helicopters to the roof…I have never seen such a feat…” the anchorwoman babbled over the live feed.
“Eyna…” Griffin breathed.
The camera zoomed in on the Machine of Neutralization and I could feel the tension radiating off the experiments in the communication room with me as they looked over his features. Having only seen him a few times, twice when he was heavily drugged, he looked different in the sunlight. He was wearing military pants and boots, but had only a simple black shirt on his lithe frame. He did not look overly muscular, but power radiated from his stance. The camera was too far away to see every feature in his face, but the hard lines in his jaw and brow made him look older than the experiment I had seen in the bowels of the Commission of the People.
He stood proud, opposite of Chris.
“Do you really think one soldier named Leo can keep me from tearing this building down?!” Chris barked with an incredulous laugh at the officer who had ordered Eyna to act. The winged man shook his hand with the detonator. “This building is already rigged to explode. And I don’t see any wings on your skinny little man to help him survive when this building goes down!”
Faster than even the camera could follow, Eyna leapt forward and landed a hard punch to Chris’ face. The reactions of everyone in the Communications room matched the reaction of the anchorwoman on the broadcast. Everyone gasped loudly and jumped, startled at how fast the experiment moved. Chris fell heavily to the roof, the detonator falling out of his hand as he tried to gain his bearings while the anchorwoman tried to comment about what she had seen.
Eyna walked over to the fallen device and picked it up easily, turning it in his hands to look at it before his head turned back to Chris. The other experiment had sat up, holding his face, his jaw hanging at an awkward angel.
“Did…Enya just break his jaw?” I hissed, my eyes wide.
“It would appear…” Clark breathed.
“Honestly, Chris is lucky the punch didn’t snap his neck,” Griffin breathed.
“Eyna’s that strong?” I gasped, flicking my eyes to Griffin before immediately looking back at the screen.
“He was that strong when I was in the Commission,” the large experiment murmured. “I’m sure he’s even stronger now.”
Eyna lifted his hand and began crushing the sides of the detonator box, watching Chris’ reaction as he mangled the box of metal with his bare hand. He then dropped the device to the roof, walking closer to the angel.
“Give it up, kid!” the officer called through the megaphone.
Chris looked around him at the helicopters, hesitating as Eyna stared at him. I waited, my breath held in apprehension. Chris had been causing havoc for months to frame us, and it seemed like it was too easy for him to be bullied into surrender with one punch on a rooftop. I had no doubt in my mind that Dana had told every news station to be ready to film the confrontation because he was going to make this into a spectacle.
“Put your hands in on your head and get on your knees!” the officer barked, the feedback on the megaphone almost drowning out the command. Eyna stood only a few feet away from Chris, watching him carefully.
The angel on the roof slowly lifted his hands, looking around at all the helicopters as his hands went into the air. Eyna took another step forward to grab his arms, but Chris turned sharply, his wing colliding heavily with the Machine of Neutralization and forcing him down. Then, with a powerful stroke of the white wings, Chris began lifting off from the roof. Eyna leapt up, grabbing onto Chris leg and trying to weigh him down, but the winged man kicked Eyna hard in the face with his other foot.
“Fire!”
The guns that had been pointed out the open sides of the helicopters began firing in rapid succession, causing screams to be heard on the cameras from the streets below and the live newscasters watching their own broadcasts. Chris managed to fly high enough off the building to force the soldiers to stop shooting. The other choppers were too close and limited where the guns could be aimed without firing at their own men.
Chris let out a triumphant shout, flying higher into the air before circling away from the choppers and descending back among the buildings.
“It would appear that the winged man is going to attack from the ground,” the anchorwoman commentated as the live feed tried to follow Chris, the helicopter moving while trying to stay out of the way of the other dispersing aircraft in pursuit of the experiment. “And the soldier…is…what the hell?!”
The camera went from trying to follow Chris’ flight pattern to locking on Eyna and everyone in the communications room went very silent, their mouths dropping open as their eyes went wide. I could feel the blood draining from my face and the way my heart stopped beating when I saw what he was doing. Eyna took a few steps to one side of the roof, his eyes locking on Chris as the angel flew between two of the skyscrapers, dropping lower and out of sight while the helicopters tried to coordinate.
The new experiment of the Commission ran to the other side of the roof, picking up speed, moving with the same rapid pace that made it difficult for the camera to capture his movements. With a single bound, he leapt off the roof of the building, crossing the wide expanse of the road and breaking through one of the windows on the skyscraper next to the one he had been standing on. Just as everyone around me was starting to recover from the shock of seeing the impressive feat, Eyna leapt out of the broken window, crossing the street once more and breaking through another window several stories closer to the street.
On his third pass across the street as he descended to the road, Griffin leaned back in his seat, shaking his head.
“Fuck…”
“This is something straight out of action movies,” another man hissed. “But this is live television…”
“If Eyna is seen as an asset to the army, then—”
Griffin’s sentence was cut off by Eyna leaping across the street one more time only to be intercepted by an enraged Chris. The two collided in the air, causing them both to drop the remaining distance to the ground, sliding along the pavement, their clothes ripping as they came to a stop.
Chris managed to pull away from Eyna quickly, trying to take to the skies once more, but the Machine of Neutralization leapt up, ran after him, and leapt off one of the cars parked on the street to grab Chris’s waist, pulling them both back to the road as people screamed and continued to flee, being ushered away by nervous army soldiers trying to clear room for Eyna to work.
“I cannot believe what we are witnessing here on live television,” the anchorwoman gasped. “I think we also have a camera on the ground. Do we have a camera there? Can we get closer?” After several long seconds of silence where the distant footage of Eyna and Chris fighting angrily against the pavement could be seen from the news helicopter, the woman spoke once more. “Yes, we are going to our live camera on the ground.”
The image changed to an unsteady camera closer to the action, barely ducking behind a building in a poor attempt to stay out of sight. Between quick figures running in front of the camera as the army ushered everyone away as quickly as possible, I could see Eyna fighting with Chris, constantly trying to keep the winged experiment in his grasp only to have Chris strike him with one of his wings or slam him into a nearby car long enough to stun the stronger experiment and allow Chris another attempt at escape.
H
owever, when the street was cleared of civilians, Eyna let out a sound that I had never heard a human being make before. It was like a screech, a human scream, and a roar mixed into one bone-chilling sound. Eyna launched at Chris and brought him to the pavement, flipping him over onto his belly with ease, before grabbing one wing in his hand, hooking his other arm below his hand, and pushing hard enough against the bone to snap it loudly.
Chris screamed in pain as I flinched away from the screen, closing my eyes tightly, horrified by the image of the wing giving way and the sickening snap that accompanied it. Clark also recoiled and Griffin also flinched, grimacing in empathetic pain. Mark, on the other hand, took a careful step closer, watching the screen intently as Eyna sat on Chris’ back, pushing the broken wing aside and staring down at the other experiment with the intensity of a predator staring at injured prey.
“It would appear that this soldier is part of the Commission of the People’s new modification testing,” the anchorwoman said, her voice quieter and shaking as everyone remained still, watching to see what Chris and Eyna would do. I wanted to scream at the anchorwoman to shut up, since I knew that the project was not new and it was certainly more dangerous than anyone knew. Seeing how easy it was for Eyna to leap from building to building, and how fast he could move, and how quickly he could recover from the strikes of Chris’ wings, which would have knocked anyone else unconscious, I was beginning to wonder just how much damage Eyna could do if not properly controlled—and how much damage multiple Machines of Neutralization could do if Dana wanted to mass-produce them.
While most of America was seeing the very public and very impressive capture of the experiment they believed to be from the Central Angels and feeling relieved that the dangerous man was captured, I was feeling even more horrified that the capture of Chris would cause people to turn a blind eye to the monster that Dana had created in the Machine of Neutralization.
In an instant, I understood Mark’s growing concern that he had mentioned before the broadcast. We had not seen Dana’s hand in a while, and he had done so on purpose. He was building fear in the American people, making them see the horrific damage that Chris inflicted, and the number of people he had killed, so that when the Machine of Neutralization was released to the American people, their relief would completely overshadow their understanding that something more powerful than Chris had been created.
I cast a quick glance at Mark, who was still watching the news worriedly, his eyes sharp on Eyna’s face as the camera remained fixed on the two experiments in the street. There was a strange look in Mark’s eyes, as if he was finally understanding something he had been trying to figure out for months.
Soldiers barking orders and moving to surround Chris with their guns trained on him brought my attention back to the broadcast. Eyna’s eyes finally left the winged experiment and turned to the soldiers around him. He stood, allowing Chris to breathe more easily, even though the winged experiment was cringing, his broken jaw distorting his entire face.
“Hands on your head!” several soldiers snapped as they approached Chris. He cringed, trying to comply, though his broken wing clearly made it difficult for him to move his left arm. When the soldiers saw that, they began taunting.
“Yeah, how does that feel asshole?!” one of them sneered.
“Try to fly now, birdie!”
As the taunting soldiers drew closer to him, one of them lowered his gun in order to reach out and grab Chris’ wrist. However, in an instant, the winged experiment turned his hand, grabbing the soldier’s wrist and yanking him closer, lifting his unbroken wing to collide with the soldier’s face. Everyone barked at Chris and the soldier, but Chris used the confusion to his advantage, pulling the soldier to the ground, laying on top of the soldier and pressing the biggest joint of his unbroken wing to the soldier’s throat.
Before the soldier was in serious danger, Eyna was on him again, grabbing the wing and snapping it like small twig before hauling the winged experiment back to the asphalt and forcing him to put his hands behind his back. One soldier stepped forward, handing the stronger experiment restraints that he quickly snapped on while other soldiers, news crews, and anyone watching from windows above or around corners cheered excitedly.
Eyna stood straight, allowing the human soldiers to go forward and grab Chris, pulling him upright to take him where ever Dana had instructed, though the young man was screaming in pain at his broken wings dragging heavily on the ground.
I watched in fascination as the Machine of Neutralization walked over to the solider on the ground and offered his hand out.
“Are you alright?” he asked.
It was the first time I had heard his voice. Even though it was quiet, the power in it made me feel as though I was standing right in front of him. The voice was calm, yet strong, as though it bespoke the wisdom of a thousand lifetimes. I was not sure whether his voice was comforting, or if it made me feel insignificant.
Eyna helped the soldier to his feet as the man coughed, rubbing his throat.
“Thanks…”
Eyna merely nodded.
As if the nod was a cue, the news crews lunged forward, invading the street and surrounding the soldiers. The shaky camera focused on Eyna as the soldiers began walking away from the area, presumably to return to their vehicles. Eyna looked different than when I had last seen him. He appeared older, more mature, and far more calm than I imagined. Even with the large holes in his clothes from sliding along the pavement and the blood coming out of his wounds, he seemed unbothered.
“Sir, sir, what is your name?” one man from another news station called to him.
“He goes by the name Leo,” one soldier said shortly. “To protect his real identity we are only using his code name for now.”
“How were you able to do all that, Leo?” another woman asked.
“He’s the first to volunteer to test a new training regime and genetic alteration that the Commission of the People designed to help us take down this menace.” The solider motioned to Chris, who was behind the front soldiers being interviewed.
“How do you feel about all this?” a man asked. “You must be proud that you were able to take down this winged man so easily.”
For the first time, Eyna spoke to those asking the questions.
“Easy?” he barked a laugh, causing the others to laugh around him. “I would not call that easy.” He looked behind him at the cringing and groaning Chris. “My only mission today was to be sure that he was no longer a danger to the people, and I accomplished that with the help of the American Military and the Commission of the People.”
The soldiers pushed past the press as they tried to ask more questions, but when they hastened their pace, a new focus came on camera. The cameras all drew closer to Chris, giving everyone a gruesome close-up of the damage done to his jaw and the various lacerations on his face that stained his skin red. He was cringing in pain, his broken wings dragging uselessly behind him as his pace became weaker with each step.
“The threat to Central has been quelled,” the anchorwoman in the studio said over the broadcast. “The winged man known as the symbol for the domestic terrorist group the Central Angels has been captured.”
“Eyna can’t possibly be loyal to Dana after everything Dana has done to him,” I said sharply, pointing at the screen as my eyes turned to Griffin and the others. “Did you see the way the other soldiers answered for him.”
“But he did say that he had a mission and he was pleased he accomplished it,” Clark pointed out with a shrug. “It’s possible that, with the completion of his testing, he fell under Dana’s spell.”
“I don’t know…” Griffin murmured, shaking his head. “Eyna never kept it secret how much he hated Dana. And he has to know that he could overpower anyone and everyone around him. I mean, you saw the way he jumped across the road and how quickly and easily he broke Chris’ wings. He’s extremely strong.”
“Fear is probably what keeps him in line,” I said
strongly, turning briefly to the screen to see the anchor woman’s head next to a still shot from the video showing Chris’ features, even with his broken jaw, as she talked about what had happened. “Dana must have a way to control him otherwise he would never let Eyna out. Not with so much potential for things to go wrong.”
Mark shook his head, grabbing his notepad and writing another note.
“It’s probably the same thing he did with me.”
It took me an embarrassingly long time to remember that the only way Dana found to keep Mark from turning against the Commission and be obedient was to keep Eun as collateral for his loyalty. I remembered Dana putting the vote to the Commission to start the same genetic alterations to Eyna’s sister.
“Shit,” Clark breathed, shaking his head. “You’re probably right.”
“I wonder if Eyna’s spectacle today was also to make us nervous…” Griffin murmured. “Maybe Dana expects us to panic now that we see the Machine of Neutralization finished, thinking Dana is going to put him on our trail.”
“That’s probably true,” Cory agreed, chiming in next to me. “But the thing is Dana also will follow through with that and we’re actually about to have a very powerful mutant human after us.”
I looked at Mark once more, and was once again startled that he was staring right at me, an indiscernible emotion in his eyes. My heart had already been pounding, but it began slamming against my ribs so loudly I was sure that Mark would hear it and know something was wrong.
It was clear I had even less time before I had to give myself over to Dana. Seeing the display of the incredible strong Eyna and everything he was capable of—not to mention that he was apparently loyal to Dana for the time being—forced me to realize that we were even more powerless than ever. If Eyna were to come after us, we would certainly all die, and our diminishing numbers did nothing to protect us. I needed to get myself to Dana and beg him to spare my friends.
Inside Page 166