Full Metal Superhero Box Set [Books 1-6]

by Haskell, Jeffery H.

  “No, hon, of course not. If I had any clue as to Luke’s location, you would be the first person I told.” Kate reaches over with her organic arm, putting a comforting hand on my forearm and easing my anxiety with her whammy.

  “Thanks,” I shoot her a smile. “Tell me about this mystery villain you’re chasing. If it isn’t Luke, or the Armory, who is it?”

  Carlos glances at Kate, then me. “I know you have your doubts about how I became this way,” he says gesturing to himself.

  Right. Carlos was taken back in time by Pythia, the now-deceased construct or avatar of the ancient Greek God, Apollo. That sentence alone is enough to send my scientific brain to the asylum. I plaster a smile on my face and nod, doing my very best to put aside my rational mind and accept what my friend says.

  “I wouldn’t call them doubts,” I say with my fake smile.

  Kate straight up snorts in disbelief. “And I wouldn’t call Carlos hot,” she laughs… then puts her hand to her mouth as if she could pull the words back. Her face turns a shade of red I don’t think I’ve ever seen. I cock an eyebrow and tilt my head with a real smile now. She turns away, coughing as she reaches for her Coke.

  “Right, uh,” Carlos stammers. “Anyway, the person we’re tracking, we call him Tempus.”

  “Tempus? It’s Latin for ‘time,’ isn’t it?” I say.

  “Head of the class,” Carlos says with a smile. “We call him that because... well...” He trails off as if unable to bring himself to say it.

  “He can time travel,” Kate says, finally recovered from her faux pas.

  I stare at them for a second. My mind tries to wrap itself around what she said. Time travel? I have a million questions at once and they all pour out.

  “Wait,” Carlos says holding his hand up. “You practically accused me of being mentally unstable when I told you I went back in time, but now you’re just willing to accept this?” I don’t think the pain on his face is faked; I think he’s genuinely upset and hurt.

  “Uh, Carlos, I’ve had time to digest what you’ve said and while I can’t prove how you did it... I can’t disprove it...”

  He leans back giving me the eye as he folds his tree trunk-sized arms across his even bigger chest. It’s the same move he does when I beat him at Halo using trickery and deception. Of course, he sees right through me.

  I shrug helplessly. I don’t know what to say. A person with powers that allow them to time travel seems infinitely more plausible than a Greek god.

  “Right. Settle down you two. Carlos, you know who Amelia is, and you had to know the moment you showed up in ancient Greece to join Alexander’s army, she was never going to one-hundred percent accept what you went through...” Kate, ever the peacemaker, steps in and quells him before it gets too bad. Carlos and I don’t usually fight, but there are a couple of things we dance around. This is one of them.

  “See, you should just—”

  “And you, Amelia, you are his best friend. You should accept what he says without question,” she says, laying into me.

  Ow. That hurts. The truth often does.

  “Sorry, amigo,” I say, with suitably downcast eyes. I really do feel like a turd now. I should believe him. It’s just... accepting that Greek gods were real goes against everything I stand for.

  “Nah, no worries, Niña. I did know you weren’t going to be able to accept it. I just... I thought Pythia would be around forever, you know? I haven’t really handled her death well. I was barely the Protector for a month when she did... what she did. I’m rudderless now. I don’t know what to do or if I’m even living up to my potential. Which is why we're hunting down rumors of this time-traveling villain.”

  “I’m confused, what do Pythia and this guy have to do with one another,” I ask. Kate looks at Carlos, who looks back at her. An unspoken communication passes between them, and finally, Kate looks at me and speaks.

  “We want to go back in time and bring the Pythia from 500AD forward to our era.”

  I open my mouth to speak, but it hangs open for a good ten seconds before I finally find my words. “Oh... is that all?”

  155

  Thomas Anthony Shaw, for your meritorious duty and unflinching bravery in the face of overwhelming danger on the seventh of September of this year, the Great State of Arizona, awards you the Arizona Distinguished Service Medal.”

  I hate ceremonies in general; I really hate the award ones. They feel like they’re more for the people awarding the medals than those receiving them. At least today I’m in the crowd instead of my armor. Which, now that I think about it, is pretty weird considering the rest of the team is up on stage. When I asked them, the event coordinator told me, “This is for the team that was in Seattle last month.” Which made sense—but Kate is up there, and she was with me in Buenos Aires when the incident happened. I shrug; something to ask her about later.

  We’re at Civic Space Park in the amphitheater they usually use for concerts. At least a thousand people are here, including the mayor of Phoenix and the state Attorney General—who’s up on stage pinning Tony’s medal on him.

  Not that the medal isn’t well deserved. While Kate and I were fighting for our lives in Argentina, the team was in Washington trying to stop Mt. Rainier from wiping out the Pacific Northwest. Fleet, in particular, was invaluable. With his speed he saved thousands, not only sending out a warning by knocking on everyone’s doors, but by carrying people out of harm's way.

  The crowd erupts in cheers around me as the team bows. While Kate didn’t get a medal, she’s up on stage with them in their ceremonial costumes. Lux is practically jumping up and down next to me, clapping her hands far harder together than anyone else. As soon as the ceremony ends she takes off like a shot, up through the air and down in front of Tony, wrapping him in a hug followed by a kiss that’s probably a little more passionate than appropriate for the venue.

  I really hate crowds, so I wait for the people to thin before I try to make an exit. The team makes their way off the stage, mingling with the audience, shaking hands, and posing for pictures with parents and children alike.

  I pull up my left sleeve, revealing my wrist computer. This quantum computer built into the thick nanofiber bracer that covers my forearm isn’t as powerful as the quantum computers I have back at the Spire, or the computronium computers I have sprayed on my base armor. It does the job, though.

  I take a quick pic of the team and shoot it off to Tia with a message saying, “Wish you were here.”

  “Amelia Lockheart?” a man asks from behind me.

  I spin my chair as I go to answer. “That’s me—”

  A bucket of cold, red paint splashes against my face and chest, blinding me for a second as I sputter, trying to clear the gunk from my eyes.

  “That’s for all the innocent people you murdered with your abominable tech, you bitch!” Something else hits me in the face. I can’t see because of the paint, and the smell is just awful. It takes me a second before I realize he spit on me. “Who gives you the right to play god? The Th’un you killed, the Argentinians, when will it be enough for you?”

  I can’t answer because I’m too busy trying to keep from breathing in the paint fumes and fighting the panic in my heart. He’s just a protester, but I can’t believe he’s protesting the death of the Th’un... I mean of all the things I’ve done I’d think that one was pretty cut and dry. Before I can formulate a response, Kate appears next to me, already moving as she shoves the man away from me. I’ve got enough of the paint out of my eyes to see a blurry image of him pinwheeling backward before landing dramatically on his rear-end.

  “Assault! Police! Assault! You all saw it!” he yells at the top of his lungs. “You’re all witnesses.”

  “Your effing lucky all I did was shove you,” Kate growls. Someone hands me a towel so I can clear my vision. Once the paint is out of my eyes, I can see properly. There are three people, a girl and two guys, their shirts are painted with Justice for the Th’un in rainbow color
ed paint.

  The one who threw the red paint on me is on the ground, feigning pain as he continues to yell for the police. One of the girls holds up a picture of Rafael, with the word MURDERED written on it with a Sharpie.

  Kate starts yelling at them; she’s so angry the little vein in her neck pops out and her face starts to turn red. Fleet, who handed me the towel, goes into super speed mode cleaning off the paint.

  Light flares from behind me, casting us all in dark shadows. Lux appears above the downed kid, her blonde hair so bright it looks like wings of light floating behind her. She speaks in her ethereal voice that defies physics. “Amelia Lockheart saved my world, saved my people. Tens of millions of Lux are alive today because of her sacrifice and her actions. You are not fit to question her motives.”

  The protesters go silent for a moment, only a moment though, before the girl yells back. “We only have the word of an alien for that. Go home,” she screams. The girl leaps forward throwing a tomato at Lux. My angelic friend vaporizes it in a show of force that isn’t lost on the crowd.

  The irony of people protesting the death of aliens and then dismissing the word of an alien as to why they are wrong isn’t lost on me.

  “Kate,” I say trying to get her attention. She’s busy pointing her finger at the paint thrower and laying into him like an elementary school teacher.

  Beyond them, the crowd is beginning to circle, murmurs ripple through the area and an ugly feeling takes over as random people from within the crowd start echoing Kate’s sentiments.

  “You’re gonna get more than a shove,” a young woman says.

  “Maybe you should meet a Th’un and see how they treat you?” An elderly man asks with a snarl on his face.

  “Did you lose an arm fighting them?” A little kid yells at the top of her lungs.

  Behind all of them, I see a man with a five-o’clock shadow dressed in a worn gray trench coat and sneakers looking on. He has a notebook out and writes furiously in it as things happen.

  “Kate,” I say again, louder. When she doesn’t respond, I focus hard on my panic, letting it run wild until I’m hyperventilating. It’s easy to do considering the situation is scaring the crap out of me.

  Kate’s pheromones are whipping the crowd into a frenzy; she’s gonna start a riot if I don’t get her out of here. I don’t want to open a quantum gate and armor up or use the light version of my armor installed in my wheelchair; that would just escalate the situation.

  The panic does the trick. Kate’s head whips around, sending her black hair flying, and she sees me. I silently plead with her to take me out of here. She nods, moves to my side and places a hand on my shoulder.

  “Fleet, get to the Spire,” she orders. He nods and vanishes in a blur of speed. A trail of dust and flapping clothes are all that’s left to tell which way he went. We’re only a few miles from home, and he’s there in seconds. We vanish a moment later—

  White light flashes by as we move nearly instantly through quantum space, followed by a wave of nausea that disappears almost as fast as it came.

  —Then we’re outside the Spire, next to Fleet, who’s holding the door open for us. I smile at Tony as Kate pushes me through. We’re across the lobby, past all my employee’s who are noticeably concerned about the scowl on Kate’s face and the remains of the red paint.

  She doesn’t speak as she pushes me through the lobby to my private elevator. With each step, I feel her aggravation and anger fading. Finally, we’re in the elevator, and as the doors shut, she turns to me.

  “Are you okay?” We ask at the same time.

  “Jinx,” I say with a smile.

  “Amelia, how can you be smiling, those people were horrible,” she says, her fingers curl into a fist as she talks.

  “Kate, it’s okay. Opinions are like IQs. Everyone has them, some are better than others,” I tell her with a smile.

  “That’s not how I heard it...”

  “Well, I’m trying to be a role model. I’m an adult now, can’t have people hearing me swear.”

  She grasps the chair as the door slides open to my apartment and she pushes me in. “Where to oh wise one?” she asks.

  “Shower, definitely shower.”

  As she pushes me toward my bedroom, I ask her the thing that’s been bothering me. “Why wasn’t I asked to be on the stage? They told me it was because I wasn’t in Seattle, but you were up there.”

  She lets me take the wheel as I go into my custom bathroom with adjustable height counters. I can’t see her from in here, but I can hear her just fine. “Epic, shower please, hot.” The shower springs to life as my companion responds.

  The shower is nothing more than an empty stall in one corner of the bathroom. All the sharp edges and corners are covered with durable padding. Most accidents happen in the shower after all. My chair pulls its transforming trick, lowering to the point where I can easily slide off of onto the floor.

  Kate hasn’t responded yet, so I shout out to her. “You still there?”

  “Yes,” she says leaning against the door. “I was just trying to figure out why they would tell you that...” She has her phone out, sadly not the super advanced one she used to have. All that tech went up in smoke with Category-7.

  “Amelia, have you been watching the news? Not the local stuff but the national media?”

  “Ugh. I think my clothes are a total party wipe,” I say.

  The shirt is sticky with drying paint, and I manage to get that off easy enough. Lucky for me, I don’t wear jeans. Wet jeans are the worst to remove, and a hundred times more so when wrapped around paralyzed legs.

  Once I toss my clothes in the corner for housekeeping to take care of, I ‘hand-walk’ into the shower. The hot water feels heavenly.

  “I’m sorry, what did you ask?”

  “Have you watched the national media?” she asks.

  I shake my head, letting the water do its magic. It’s weird seeing all the red swirl down the drain. Last time I saw that much I had broken a few ribs and was coughing up blood. The funny thing is, I can’t seem to remember when that was?

  “Epic?” Kate asks.

  Yes.

  “Have you been monitoring the news?”

  While I can monitor and review many streams of information, I am not omnipotent. I have algorithm's that tell me when things are important and... oh.

  “Oh? Oh isn’t what I like to hear from my AI,” I say.

  I apologize, Amelia. I have been busy with the new suit designs and updating our security here at the Spire, and our ongoing search for Major Force. I have several updates pending that I have not reviewed. Doing so has revealed what Kate speaks of.

  “And?” My annoyance is climbing to new levels. What are they dancing around?

  “I’ll tell her, Epic,” Kate says with a sigh. I can hear her just fine, but with all the steam I can’t see her.

  “Tell me what?”

  “Somehow, and I can’t be sure how or pinpoint when, but...” Her voice trails off like she’s trying to figure out how to tell me something I don’t want to hear. Like my dog died or something, but I don’t have a dog.

  “Spit it out, Kate.”

  She sighs again. “Amelia, the press has villainized you over Argentina, the Th’un, even the attempted coup in DC. They aren’t calling for your arrest, yet, but I don’t think it will be much longer.”

  Despite the hot water, my blood runs cold. So that is what the protesters were on about? They can’t be serious, can they? I mean I record everything I do, sometimes in three-dimensions. Epic uploads the vast majority of it to the DMHA or now the FBI, I guess. How could they think I’ve done anything wrong?

  Kate, as always, is in tune with my thoughts. “It’s not that you did anything wrong, Amelia. We all know if it weren’t for you we would be welcoming our Th’un masters right now. No, it’s that they need someone to point at and blame. They need you to be bad so they can feel better about themselves.”

  I shut the water o
ff, taking the towel she hands me and wrapping it around myself several times.

  “But... I didn’t do anything wrong?”

  She shakes her head, a sad smile playing on her lips. “I don’t think the truth has anything to do with it.”

  156

  I try—I really try—to ignore what the press thinks about me. With Luke vanishing last week, the mess at the award ceremony and everything else going on, I just don’t need this. I really don’t. Even here in my lab, my normal safe space surrounded by my computers, armor, and Coke machine, I still can’t shake my anger and frustration.

  “Epic,” I say between clenched teeth. “How could they possibly think we could ever sign a peace treaty with the Th’un? Lux risked everything to bring her warning to us in the hope we could help each other. Now they’re saying we provoked the Th’un?”

  Revisionist history. You know people will twist what has happened for their own gain. Hitler did not start World War Two; the Germans were the only ones responsible for World War One, the Civil War was not about slavery, it goes on and on.

  No one at any time during the Th’un invasion suggested a peace treaty or non-aggression pact was possible. Armchair generals after the fact are now saying it could have been possible. If it could have been possible, then the war with them was unjust and—

  “If the war with them was unjust, then they can try to hang me as a war criminal.”

  They do not actually hang people anymore.

  “Know-it-all,” I say with a smirk.

  Takes-one-to-know-one.

  I wheel around the central computer station that looks like it belongs in a cheesy sci-fi with its octagon shape and multiple monitors. It’s just easy to move around is all. Currently, I have my MK VII combat Suit splayed out on the bench. It’s engineered with a unique double thick version of my titanium alloy, extra kinetic manipulators, and enough power to put me in orbit. It’s not as fast as my other suits, which is the trade-off. It’s my anti-Armory build I’m working on. Something to really mess with them when they come back at me. Next time I won’t be the one taking the beating.