by Lucas Flint
“Shut up,” Phaser snapped. “I already took care of the Edge brat. Now I just need to finish you and your girlfriend off, per Seth’s orders.” He raised a hand. “Red Tide may have been an incompetent loser, but he did manage to paralyze you for me. That will make it so much easier to kill both of you. I’ll leave the bodies, though. They’ll make a great warning to anyone who—”
Without warning, the glass opening above the warehouse exploded open and someone fell through it and landed on the ground nearby. Phaser had just enough time to look before the figure lashed out with a kick, striking Phaser in the chest and sending him staggering backward from the blow. The figure threw a punch at him, but this time Phaser turned intangible and phased through the ground before phasing up back onto the floor several feet away outside the range of his attacker.
“Who in the Devil are you?” said Phaser, looking at the newcomer in astonishment.
I also looked over at the newcomer, who was almost impossible to see in the darkness until Phaser flashed his light on the figure. My jaw would have dropped if I wasn’t paralyzed by Red Tide’s Toxins.
“Brains?” I said, barely eking out his name through my numb lips.
“Sorry I’m late,” said Brains. He cracked his knuckles, glaring at Phaser. “Took a little while to get everything organized, but I’m here.”
“But …” my lips found it hard to form words. “How …”
“Valerie called us,” said Brains. “Said you guys were ambushed by Red Tide and his pirates, so we came as fast as we could. She didn’t say anything, however, about Phaser being here.”
Brains said that while glaring at Phaser. The supervillain—whose face was usually stuck in a permanent smirk—stared at Brains with true horror on his features. That wasn’t surprising. After all, Brains was one of the first superheroes who could actually hurt Phaser. It didn’t help that Brains had been the one to kill Phaser the first time so many years ago, either.
Still, Phaser shook his head and said, with a very fake-looking smirk on his face, “Ah, Brains, my old friend. It’s been a very long time since we last saw each other. You look … older. How’s Mary doing, by the way?”
This time, it was Brains’ turn to smirk. “Why don’t you ask her yourself?”
Without warning, Vanish appeared behind Phaser, her pole staff in hand, and slammed it against Phaser’s side. Phaser cried out in pain and fell over into the floor, but then quickly reappeared on top of a crate well outside of the range of either Brains or Vanish.
Rubbing his side, Phaser said, “That was a … good hit, Mary. You seem to have gotten stronger since the last time I saw you.”
“Not stronger,” said Vanish, shaking her head as she twirled her pole staff. “I’ve just learned how to hit harder now. That’s all.”
Phaser snorted. “Even if both of you are here, that means nothing. Two against one are odds I like.”
“What about one against two dozen?” asked Brains.
Suddenly, doors and windows were smashed open as what appeared to be the entirety of the Showdown City Police Department burst into the warehouse, guns drawn and voices raised as they yelled. Through the hole in the ceiling that Brains had made, the roar of helicopter rotator blades could be heard and a bright spotlight suddenly shone down right on top of Phaser, who raised a hand over his eyes to protect his vision.
“Did you really think we didn’t come prepared?” said Brains, putting his hands on his hips. “Red Tide and his crew are wanted all over the world. Of course the police would mobilize once I told them about their presence in the city. You’re just a bonus.”
Phaser scowled. “Despite having grown noticeably older, I can see your mind is still as sharp as ever. It’s rather a shame we have to be on opposite sides of the law like this. In another life, perhaps the two of us could be best friends.”
“You don’t mean that, Phaser,” said Brains. “I hoped death might humble you a bit, but I guess there’s no changing a true blue sociopath, huh?”
Phaser’s scowled deepened. I half-expected him to jump down from the crate and try to fight Brains, Vanish, and the police anyway, but instead his body turned immaterial and he vanished through the crate and into the floor before anyone could react. He did not come back again.
CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
Half an hour later, Blizzard and I lay in twin beds side by side in the Braindome’s medical room. Both of us were hooked up to IVs and had been given loads of medicine by the Braindome’s medical staff to try to cure the toxins in us. Unfortunately, it turned out that Red Tide’s skin secreted a special kind of toxin that modern medical science had no cure for, so it looked like the two of us were going to be stuck here for now, at least until our bodies naturally got rid of the toxins by themselves. I was informed that Red Tide’s toxins were not lethal and that most people who got infected with them usually healed, although it could take weeks before we healed completely.
In some ways, I was relieved at the thought that we had to rest. This had been one of the craziest, most action-packed nights in my life, starting with the fight with Mixer in the city park and ending with the big warehouse fight against Red Tide and his crew. I was a strong superhuman, true, but I wasn’t invincible and I had my limits like anyone else, limits I was beginning to approach.
But in other ways, I was frustrated by this forced bed rest. Phaser had kidnapped Edge and taken him to who-knows-where, probably to wherever Seth was continuing his cloning operations. I felt helpless at the thought that Edge, who was just a kid regardless of what else he was, had gotten kidnapped under my supervision. Of course, I’d been paralyzed at the time and couldn’t save him, but that was hardly a comforting thought. It just highlighted my own failure, which made me feel even worse than I already did.
“Hey, Bolt?” said Blizzard.
“Yeah, Blizz?” I said. I couldn’t turn my head to look at her, although I managed to glance over at her briefly with my eyes.
“You’re off the hook on finishing that date,” said Blizzard. “Unless you want to consider this part of it, that is.”
I would have laughed if my body would have allowed for it. As it was, I just made a happy grunting noise and said, “Nah, this isn’t what I was envisioning when I promised you I would finish this date. I was more thinking about flying you around Showdown looking at all of the Christmas lights.”
“By the time we get out of here, Christmas will definitely be over and all of the lights will probably be taken down,” said Blizzard. She sighed. “Merry Christmas.”
As funny as Blizzard’s comments might have been, they reminded me of another failure of mine: Our date. I guess this really wasn’t my fault, seeing as Red Tide was the one who paralyzed us, but if we hadn’t gone to meet Edge, we wouldn’t have ended up paralyzed like this. Of course, if we hadn’t gone to meet Edge, we also would not have found out about Edge’s true nature and Seth’s real plans.
Yet how was any of that helpful, if we didn’t know where Seth and Edge were? Right now, Seth could be and probably was doing all sorts of horrible, evil things to Edge. He might even be killing him for all we know. Even if he wasn’t killing Edge, I doubted Seth was treating him well, despite being his clone. All I could do at this point was pray that Seth would spare Edge long enough for us to save him, but I wasn’t sure how much faith I had in that idea.
The door to the room opened and Brains and Vanish stepped inside. Vanish held in her arms Joey, their only son, who was apparently asleep, although it was hard to tell from my position.
“Hey, guys,” said Brains as he walked over to us, while Vanish took a seat on a chair at a nearby desk, rocking Joey gently in her arms. “How are you feeling? Any better?”
“No,” I said, unable to shake my head. “Still can’t move.”
“Still in pain,” Blizzard added with a grimace.
Brains sighed. “I wish there was some way I could help, but unfortunately we don’t have the medical expertise here to cleanse your bo
dies of the toxins. We’re going to have you guys sent to Hero Island tomorrow. Healing Touch might be able to help the healing process move along.”
“Tomorrow?” I said. “By then, Edge might not be alive by tomorrow.”
“I know,” said Brains, “but it’s the best we can do for now. I would have had Healing Touch come here tonight, but the NHA just suffered an attack from the Programmer, who took down all of Hero Island’s computer systems, including the systems keeping critically-injured patients on life support. Healing Touch has to be there to keep the critically-injured patients alive until the systems are back online, which probably won’t be until tomorrow morning according to what I was told.”
“Just our luck,” I said. “Out of all of the nights for Healing Touch to be out of action, it had to be tonight.”
“At least we got Red Tide and his crew,” said Blizzard. “Right, Brains?”
Brains nodded. “Yeah. The Showdown City Police Department arrested every last member of his crew. They’re going to transfer the supers to Ultimate Max while sending the normal ones off to normal prison. I think we can safely say that Red Tide is done.”
That made me feel a little better, but in all honesty, Red Tide was never the main threat here. Seth was, and he was still free somewhere out there, doing who knows what to Edge.
“There’s gotta be some way for us to be healed tonight,” I said. “Isn’t there?”
“Like I said, we don’t have the medical expertise to heal you two just yet,” said Brains. “I am sorry, but that’s just the way it is.”
“Wow,” said a female familiar voice from the doorway. “That’s really unfair.”
Everyone in the room looked over at the open doorway to the hall outside to see a familiar dark-haired woman, a G-Man patch on her right shoulder, leaning against the doorway, her arms crossed in front of her chest and a frown on her face.
“Shade?” I said, barely able to utter her name through my lips. “What are you doing here?”
“How did you get in here?” Brains demanded. He looked at Vanish. “Honey, were we expecting a visit from the G-Men tonight?”
Vanish, who was holding Joey protectively against her chest, shook her head. “No. I don’t know how she got in here.”
“I just let myself in,” said Shade nonchalantly. She smiled at Joey. “Oh, what a cute baby! I mean, I don’t want any kids myself, of course, but I always love seeing other people’s kids. They’re just so adorable.”
“Get out now,” said Brains, pointing a finger at her. “Before I throw you out myself.”
Shade just smiled. “Tough words coming from you, Brainiac. Could you even lift me with those stick arms of yours?”
Brains tapped the side of his head. “I could make you leave yourself if I have to. It probably wouldn’t be good for your mental health.”
“Oh, that sounds like fun,” said Shade. She pushed herself off the doorway and the darkness around her seemed to tense. “I’ll finally be able to practice all those mental defense techniques Cadmus taught me. He said they would be useful someday, so let’s see just how useful they are.”
Before a fight could break out between the two, a hand fell on Shade’s shoulder and someone behind her said, “Shade, let’s not get into any fights now. You remember Cadmus’ orders. We’re here to talk, not fight.”
Shade frowned, but then shrugged and said, “You’re right. Still, I’m sure Cadmus would understand if we did get into a fight.”
Fingerprints suddenly stepped into view beside Shade, a disapproving frown on his face. “I think he would understand that we directly disobeyed his orders and further damaged our already strained relationship with the NHA, something we were explicitly told not to do.”
“Okay, okay, fine,” said Shade, raising her hands. “I won’t attack four eyes here, or his wife. Mostly because of the baby, though. It’s not a good idea to expose babies to violence. Otherwise they might end up like me … wait, where was I going with this?”
“You were going to shut up and let me do all the talking,” said Fingerprints without looking at her.
“Right,” said Shade, nodding. “I am now shutting up.”
Although Shade did shut up after that, I thought the damage had already been done. Brains looked like he was just about ready to bodily throw both of the G-Men agents out of the Braindome, while Vanish was glaring daggers at Shade. I wasn’t feeling particularly friendly toward them, either, and this time it wasn’t because of my inherent bias against the G-Men in general.
Fingerprints clasped his hands together and looked at us. “Apologies for barging in like this. I must also apologize for Shade’s comments. She is not usually sent on missions that require diplomacy, you see.”
“Yeah, I see that quite clearly,” said Brains in a dangerously low tone.
“Indeed,” said Fingerprints, who kept his tone as cool and calm as ever. “Now, the reason we are here is because we wish to speak to Bolt.”
“Why?” said Brains. He gestured at me. “As you can see, he’s not really in any position to talk.”
“We can see that,” said Fingerprints with a nod. “But we wish to speak to him anyway. It is about Fisticuffs.”
That made me try to raise my head, but unfortunately, my paralysis kept me from doing even that much. “Fisticuffs? What about him?”
Fingerprints looked over Brains’ shoulder directly at me and said, “We’ve found him. He’s still alive.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE
Although I didn’t gasp or do anything else, I still stared in amazement as Fingerprints. “You’re joking.”
Fingerprints shook his head. “No, we’re not. We’ve finally found him, although we haven’t actually caught him yet.”
I bit my lower lip, trying not to look too excited, although I probably failed. Fisticuffs was the alias of a clone of my uncle Jake Johnson, who was the only clone successfully created in the first phase of Project Revival. The last I had seen him, Uncle Jake had been swept out into the ocean while unconscious, and that was after I beat him in a fight. Although we did not search for the body, I had always assumed that Uncle Jake had probably drowned at sea or something. Yet if Fingerprints was telling the truth, then Uncle Jake’s clone was still alive after all.
“Where is he?” I said. “You said you haven’t caught him. What do you mean by that? Is he on the run or something?”
“We’re not sure,” said Fingerprints, lowering his hands in front of him. “You recall, of course, how Fisticuffs’ body was lost when Seth Richards’ yacht sank a couple months back.”
I couldn’t nod, but I said, “Yeah, I remember. We thought he died, although we didn’t look for the body.”
“You didn’t, but I did,” said Fingerprints. “When I returned to the main G-Man office in Washington, I managed to convince Cadmus to send out a team to look for his body. We were unfortunately unsuccessful, which made me think Fisticuffs was gone after all, but as it turned out, he’s still alive.”
Fingerprints nodded at Shade. Shade raised her phone, tapped on the screen a few times, and then held it out. A hologram appeared over her phone, depicting a tall, red-haired man wearing a dark jacket walking down the main aisle of what looked like a grocery store. His face was not looking up at the camera, although he seemed to have a short beard from what I could tell.
“This is video footage from a Marty’s Grocery store in Littlefish, Montana, taken approximately one week ago,” said Fingerprints. “We believe that it is Fisticuffs because the man has the same hair color, general build, and facial structure as him.”
“The beard is new, though,” said Shade, “but I kind of like it. Makes him look like a lumberjack.”
I didn’t dispute Fingerprints’ theory. The man in the picture definitely looked like Uncle Jake. “Maybe he grew out the beard to hide his identity?”
“Perhaps,” said Fingerprints, folding his arms in front of his chest. “The problem, of course, is that we don’t know how he s
urvived or where, exactly, he’s going. We’ve been tracking his movements for two weeks now, ever since a G-Man agent stationed in Louisiana saw him arrive in New Orleans.”
“How do you know he’s going anywhere?” asked Brains. He looked a little less upset with the two G-Men agents now, although I could tell he obviously wished they would leave this place. “Maybe he’s just wandering aimlessly.”
“His movements have been too deliberate,” said Fingerprints, shaking his head. “He’s very clearly been making his way north for some time now, specifically northwest. We think he’s looking for something in Montana.”
“Montana?” I said. “Why Montana?”
“Exactly,” said Fingerprints. He glanced at the hologram. “We don’t know why he’s there, either.”
“If you guys have been tracking him this entire time, why haven’t you caught him yet?” I said.
Fingerprints grimaced. “Cadmus did send a handful of agents to take him down, but he proved more … elusive than we first thought.”
Shade giggled. “Poor Iron Horn is going to spend weeks in the hospital getting his legs repaired. And honestly, I was shocked Blood Boil could still breathe given how his face looked like mashed potatoes. Disgusting.”
I found it disturbing how much joy Shade was deriving from the pain that some of her fellow agents had obviously experienced, but perhaps it was just her nerves making her laugh. Then again, knowing Shade, there was an equal chance she was as happy about it as she looked.
“That is why we came to you tonight,” said Fingerprints. “Cadmus has determined that the G-Men are unable to recapture Fisticuffs. So we would like to ask you to help us do that instead.”
I would have frowned if the corners of my mouth weren’t paralyzed. “Why do you think I would have any more luck capturing Uncle Jake than you?”
“Because you’re related to him,” Fingerprints pointed out. “He’s your uncle. We think that if he sees you, he might be less hesitant to attack his own nephew.”
