Catalyst: A Superhero Urban Fantasy Thrillride (Steel City Heroes Book 1)

by CM Raymond

  Every inch of his body ached.

  It wasn’t the only shortcut he took. He pulled this lecture out of his old files—and mostly out of his ass. It didn’t fit well with what they were currently studying, but several nights in a row of blacking out and waking up beat to hell didn’t do wonders for his class prep time.

  Once upon a time, it was his star opening lecture, back when he taught up in Boston. Elijah had given the same talk a thousand times to a hundred students at twenty schools. His adjunct career was diverse. He hopped from community college to private college to every campus of the UMass system east of Springfield. Most adjuncts were road warriors, and Elijah helped make up their ranks.

  “Most of you are freshmen, which means, if statistics hold, that nearly forty percent of you won’t be here next year.”

  And, nearly thirty percent of you are asleep right now, he thought.

  “Accounting, business, human services, elementary education…I don’t know which it will be, but this course will drive many of you out of history and into another discipline. Some would say that’s my job—to sift out the chaff.”

  Students lining the back of the nondescript classroom tapped away at their phones. A few in the middle napped unashamedly. But, there were three students sitting in the first row fastidiously taking notes. Julie, the girl who he had bummed a cigarette from, was also there. She tried to look disinterested, but, with a quick glance, he caught her eye, and she gave him a slight nod. Students like her fueled his love for teaching.

  The strange craving for tobacco returned.

  Her hand shot up. “Why are you telling us this?”

  Good question.

  Elijah sighed. The voice was still there, and not a fan of his lecture. It was like having a little brother constantly nagging you, but one that couldn’t possibly exist. And yet they’re nagging anyway. Elijah pushed on, trying his best to ignore the voice that he didn’t believe was actually there.

  But real or not it gave him a massive headache.

  “Good question, Julie.” He smiled, proud of himself that he remembered her name. “Because it’s my job to tell the truth. Most of you will wash out because you can’t take the workload. But some of you will leave because you love history too much.” Elijah paused for effect. “I’m standing here today to tell you that the worst historian is the one who loves history.”

  A student in the front row, a high achiever, jerked her head out of her notepad. A furrowed brow exhibited her disbelief in Elijah’s words.

  “You can revere history. You can admire history. You can understand the deeply important place that history holds in all of human experience. But you must not love her. She cannot be your mistress.” He watched a young man in the front row blush. “Or your master.”

  Julie looked at him like he was high. He barrelled on. “There’s at least one of you that is already disturbed by this. But here’s what I mean: sentimentality corrupts scholarship. The historian, above all else, must be detached. Separate. Objective. Any attachment to the discipline, any motivation other than cold analysis, will leave you writing great-man fanfiction or revisionist history. Maybe the History Channel will hire you.”

  He paused, letting that sink in. Then he looked at his watch and grabbed his bag. There was somewhere else he needed to be.

  “Class dismissed. I’ll see you all on Thursday.”

  He left in a hurry, smiling at the irony. The research he was about to embark on was anything but detached. It was personal. Deeply personal. Try as he might, he couldn’t erase the feeling that his life depended on it.

  It was time to learn the truth about what was happening to him.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT

  A cough came from the back end of the Subaru as he turned the key and pressed the gas. It had sat idle since he arrived. Between public transportation and his ride-alongs with Rex, Elijah didn’t have much use for his car. He was happy to let it sit. But he didn’t want to explain his injuries to the oversized driver or listen to sports talk radio.

  The thought of riding the bus again in his condition made him go weak at the knees.

  Something was happening to him—there was no use in denying it. The blackouts, the strange memories, the unexplainable bruises and burns. And of course, that bastard breathing down his neck with the strange accent. Whatever it was, he couldn’t shake the suspicion that it had to do with his research for the Alarawns.

  He hadn’t seen, nor heard from Brooke since their dinner. He thought about calling, but caution stayed his hand. Not yet. Not until he knew more. Not until he came up with a story to cover his quick exit from the restaurant.

  This left Elijah only his research. He opened the manila folder in his bag—the storehouse for all he’d found to date. Sitting on top laid a copy of the photo from the old history text. Three grizzled steelworkers striking at the mill. The Alarawn’s medallion hanging from one of their chests.

  Elijah thumbed the medallion. It sat cold in his pocket, it’s weird curves and lines strangely comforting.

  A direct contrast to the unease the photo made him feel. That man with the medallion, Elijah knew him somehow. Like he was a long lost friend. Or enemy.

  The text didn’t list a name for the man with the medallion, but it did for the other two. It had taken Elijah the better part of the morning to make something of them. He combed company records, old city papers, and even membership lists from the city’s numerous fraternal orders, churches, and social clubs until he came across what he was looking for.

  The name of a daughter of one of the men. And an address.

  Elijah smiled, then pulled out of the parking garage.

  Traffic was light on I-376 heading out of town. Elijah missed Boston, but he certainly didn’t miss its congestion. He pulled a slip of paper out of his pocket and tapped Jelana Novak’s address into his phone. It was a stretch, but at this point, he had nothing more to go on. Stabbing blindly in the dark was better than hunkering down and waiting for his sanity to escape him.

  Twenty minutes, and almost a dozen wrong turns later, the Subaru eased up to the curb in front of a run-down two-story home in Homestead. Elijah leaned his weary body on the railing as he climbed the three steps toward the porch. He rapped his knuckles on the solid wooden door. While waiting, he took in the neighborhood. It was classic Pittsburgh: tight homes, Steelers flags, and chairs saving on-street parking spots. The sight made him homesick, though he couldn’t understand why.

  The door open behind him. The historian turned, surprised to find a twenty-something standing in the doorway. Elijah looked down at his paper and up at the numbers over the door. “Hi. Um, is Ms. Novak here?”

  The girl smiled as she looked him up and down. “I’m ‘Ms. Novak’,” she said with air quotes. “Everybody calls me Lainey. Can I do something for you?”

  The historian laughed uncomfortably. “I’m sorry. I’m looking for Jelana Novak.”

  She nodded as he spoke, rubbing her bare arms as goosebumps raised up on her skin.

  “Jelana’s my grandmother. She doesn’t live here anymore; this is my place. Something I can help you with?”

  Elijah glanced at his watch. “I’m kind of in a hurry. Do you know where I can find your grandmother?”

  The girl eyed him suspiciously.

  “Please. It’s important.”

  “Sure,” she said. “She’s at St. George’s. Been there for five years. But, I have to warn you, she’s not really with it, if you know what I mean.”

  Elijah pulled a notepad out of his back pocket and scratched the name of the facility.

  “Thanks, Lainey. I appreciate it.”

  “Sure. But I gotta ask, why are you looking for my grandmother?”

  “I’m doing some research on Alarawn Industries. I understand your great-grandfather worked there. Someone gave me your grandmother’s name as the person who could maybe fill me in on some things. I just want to chat.”

  She laughed. “I really did just waste your tim
e then. Grandma’s got nothing kind to say about that place.”

  Elijah smiled, his hand palming the medallion. “Well, it’s a good thing I know how to ask nicely.”

  CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE

  Chem paced the room as he reviewed his math for the hundredth time. Everyone else in the lab had left for the evening, their experiments resting peacefully in locked storage. Only Chem remained. He couldn’t leave, not yet. Not until he pulled the trigger.

  Thousands of hours of costly research, hundreds of failed tests, several dozen hopes raised then dashed to pieces all led to this moment, to this union of three innocent looking fluids.

  Chem’s solution. A cocktail of the chemist’s own making, forged over nearly a decade of work and designed to bypass the body’s natural defenses against tampering—a necessary step toward bio-chemical human enhancement. But what the mixture contained in elegance, it lacked in potency. The body would accept the solution, but on its own, it failed to produce results. What it needed, was a catalyst.

  Elijah Branton’s blood.

  Part human, part something else. Chem still couldn’t wrap his mind around what had happened to the historian, but the results spoke for themselves. Power, pure and simple pulsed through his veins. But with that power came danger and rage and violence, far too unwieldy to suit Chem’s needs. Elijah’s blood could light the fire but it needed something to sooth and sustain it. Something to cool things down. Which is where Chem’s newest chemical acquisition came into play.

  Thermo-icilin.

  A change agent that was experimentally used to raise core temperatures. It could work to stabilize the inferno churning in Branton’s blood, but in the wrong dosage, it could destroy someone. Chem stared at his three ingredients, waiting patiently to be united by the lab’s digital mixer in three-part part harmony to become the answer to all of Chem’s problems. The Fountain of Youth. The Holy Grail.

  The Vida Serum.

  Chem ran the numbers for the hundred and first time. And just like the hundred times before, they added up.

  Caution was a virtue rarely ascribed to the chemist. Nor doubt. Nor fear. But this was the closest he had come in a decade to fulfilling his mission. And at this point, failure was more than a setback. Chem knew what went into his own solution, so he could recreate it. The thermo-icilin was harder to come by. It took a few off the record conversations, a back alley transaction, and the rest of his cash. But he found it once, he could do it again. Elijah’s blood, by definition, was a rarity that could only be acquired in one place. And that place currently wasn’t on speaking terms with Chem. But there were ways around that too…

  It wasn’t the difficulties involved in procuring what he needed that held him back. Chem stood in front of his work, frozen by the sheer unknown of what would happen when he mixed the formula. He felt completely overwhelmed. Thermo-icilin was a stranger to him, and Elijah’s blood a mystery of potentially metaphysical proportions. All the theory in the world couldn’t erase the question—or the danger.

  “There’s no progress without risk,” Chem said. He wiped the sweat from his palms, then hit go.

  The machine hummed gently as the contents of three separate test tubes filtered into one. And then the fireworks started.

  Chem felt it before he saw it. The hair on his arms stood tall. His knees went weak. And then he was knocked on his ass.

  Sparks and glass rained down around him as the overhead halogen bulbs blew. Darkness filled the room, but before panic could set in, the darkness was replaced by something else.

  Chem climbed to his feet and stared at what he had just done. Cold blue light emanated from the corner of the room. He stepped closer.

  The mixer was fried, along with half of the adjacent equipment, but the vial holding his serum held strong, lighting his steps. He tried to assess the situation—data collection was crucial at this stage—but awe over what he had just created pushed all scientific training from his brain.

  The solution was beautiful. A pulsing, crystalline liquid, deeper blue than anything Chem had ever seen. He imagined the water beneath the polar ice caps wasn’t as blue as this, his final project. His Vida Serum.

  Chem wasn’t an artist, he was a scientist. Beauty wasn’t the goal, but results. The only question that mattered now was would it work?

  And yet, Chem couldn’t help but admire it. Be drawn toward it. Almost like the formula spoke to him. He could see it so clearly. It wanted to be tested. Wanted to come to life. He wondered what would happen if injected it into his blood.

  Chem hesitated, his hand halfway reaching for the glass. Instead, he grabbed a pair of tongs and carefully lifted the vial, transporting it to his locked safe on the other end of the room.

  He needed some distance, needed to clear his head. He was a scientist, after all. The formula needed to be tested, there was no doubt about that, but only in bad sci-fi movies did a scientist use his product on himself.

  But if not him, then who?

  Chem double checked that his safe was locked, then looked around the trashed room. He decided to bolt before security came to check in on the commotion he caused. Lab explosions weren’t exactly common, but with any luck, they’d blame it on an intern and have the mess cleaned up by tomorrow.

  In the meantime, Chem would get some air, and figure out what he was going to do with the serum.

  CHAPTER FORTY

  St. George’s smelled like antiseptic and death. Elijah straightened his tie as he walked with confidence toward the front desk. A good portion of research took place in the archives. But more often than not, he found himself trying to get into a closed meeting or land an interview. Confidence worked best.

  He smiled broadly at the bored receptionist. “Hello. My name’s Dr. Branton, I was just over at Jelana Novak’s house for an interview. Her granddaughter told me I could find her here.”

  “Do you have an appointment?” the receptionist asked, barely looking up.

  “An appointment?”

  “Yeah. We don’t let just anybody walk in and talk to our residents.” She stared at him over a set of bifocals.

  “Oh, right. Pretty good policy, I guess. Kinda bites me in the ass right now though,” Elijah said with a grin.

  Thankfully, the receptionist grinned back. “If her granddaughter calls and gives you permission, I’d be happy to see if Ms. Novak would want to see you.”

  “Oh, yeah. Let me give her a call. Can I have your number?”

  “Honey, if I had a dime for every time a young guy like you asked me that…”

  Elijah grabbed the scrap of paper from the woman and turned, cursing under his breath for not asking Lainey Novak for her number. He walked away from the receptionist and came up with a longshot.

  The phone rang five times before he heard the voice. “Elijah, where the hell have you been?”

  “Brooke, hey. Sorry, I’ve been dodging your messages, it’s a long story. But I need a quick favor. I’m chasing down a lead, and I’ve hit a little obstacle. I know this sounds weird, but I wasn’t sure who else to ask. I’m standing in St. George’s Assisted Living. Apparently, I’m going to need permission from a relative in order to get in.”

  Silence greeted him on the other side. He fidgeted, waiting for her response.

  “Okay, need me to have Rex do something?”

  “No. Actually, I need you...”

  Elijah heard a laugh on the other side. He hoped it was a good one.

  “I’ve been waiting for those words from you, Dr. Branton. Okay. I’ll play your little game.”

  Elijah smiled; he was starting to like having Brooke Alarawn as an ally. “Okay, here’s all I have. Jelana Novak was a secretary for a company called Alarawn Industries. Have you heard of them?”

  “Rings a bell,” Brooke said. Elijah could picture her smart smile.

  “Her granddaughter’s name is Lainey. I assume it’s Jelana, too. But I’m not quite sure. I figure your job taught you to make up shit on the fly.”


  “Learned that in college. You know, a bunch of asshole professors.”

  “Funny. You got this. Here’s the number.”

  The phone at the receptionist’s desk rang. Elijah took three steps back and held his breath. The receptionist talked, then smiled, and laughed. Brooke was good. The woman jotted a few notes on a yellow legal pad. Finally, she pulled the phone from her face and hung up.

  “That girl’s funny,” the receptionist said with a snort.

  Elijah shrugged. “I just met her. She seemed nice.”

  “Let me give Ms. Novak a call. I’m sure she’s probably free. She doesn’t get many visitors.”

  CHAPTER FORTY-ONE

  In the lounge, a group sat on a tattered old couch watching reruns of “Golden Girls.” A foursome played bridge in a corner at a table. And one man in a long blue terry cloth bathrobe stood by himself taking the whole scene in. His lips moved periodically but nothing came out.

  Elijah sat on an overstuffed chair across the coffee table from Jelana Novak. She looked out of place in her perfectly pressed pantsuit. She held an air of confidence about her that the others lacked.

  “You know Lainey?” she asked the historian.

  “We only just met. I found your name online, on the Internet…”

  “I know what the Internet is,” the woman snapped.

  Elijah forced an uncomfortable smile. “Right. Of course. So, I want to ask you some questions, about Alarawn Industries. Alarawn Steel.”

  Jelana pursed her lips. “I worked there for years. But that place, that place is no friend of mine.”

  It is the place of the damned, the now-familiar voice echoed in Elijah’s head. He squeezed his eyes closed, trying to push it away.

  Opening them, he nodded and focused on Mrs. Novak. “Actually I think that’s what I want to talk to you about. Your father, he worked there in the early part of the century, right?”