I tried to follow but still had stability issues. After three steps, I was way off. I was more likely to run straight into the cement wall than make it to the doorway.
“C’mon healing. Kick in!” I thumped myself on the side of the head like that would help.
I felt a hand on my arm and looked to find Carina standing next to me. I’m pretty sure she was asking if I was okay, but that was just a guess from trying to read her lips. I nodded and pointed toward the room my family was being held. We needed to take care of the men holding them and get them out of there.
To my surprise, my dad, taking advantage of the distracted guards, landed a right hook on the jaw of one of Lindström’s security team. Another of the jerks lay on the ground curled in a ball with the twin brats jumping on him. Mom even kicked one between the legs. I felt a momentary swell of pride at the sight of my family kicking butt and not bothering with the names.
The feeling didn’t last long. It was taken over in a matter of seconds by extreme anger and the need to put a hurt on the person responsible. From what Lindström had said, there were many, many people in need of that pain, but he was a good place to start.
I pointed at my family again. “Can you help them?” I yelled.
Carina nodded and ran toward the room.
Once she was gone, I took a few tentative steps towards the door Lindström had disappeared through. I felt stronger with each step. The ringing in my ears lessened. All right, healing! Each step came faster than the last.
I burst through the door and found myself standing in another stairwell. Metal steps stretched up and down from where I stood. A slamming door from above told me which direction to go.
With most of my stability back—I stumbled and banged my knee only once—I practically flew up the stairs two and three at a time. I don’t know how many floors I went up, but I hit the top of the stairs within moments where I found a single door. I burst through it without a thought and the whole world went nuts.
Chapter 38
6:44 a.m.
Well, it seemed that way. I was blasted with a typhoon of wind and lights. I stood on top of the building. The early morning was still dark. It would have been, anyway, if it weren’t for a trio of bright red lights flashing from the building’s roof and a giant spotlight cutting a line through the dark sky.
Wind ripped at my shirt and hair. It roared deep inside my ears like I stood right smack dab in the middle of a tornado.
I raised an arm in a weak attempt to fend off some of the wind. For a moment, I had the sudden fear it might just be strong enough to blow me right off the building. That was a silly thought, though. It was strong but not that strong.
After the momentary sensory overload, I pulled myself together and things clicked into place. A loud whomp, whomp, whomp sound brought my eyes to the sky where I saw the faint outline of a helicopter, along with its little blinking lights, hovering over the building. Lindström’s escape plan. It was slowly lowering itself to a landing pad on the building.
If it was landing, that meant Lindström had to be around here somewhere. I looked around. Two dark figures stood on the other side of the building. One towered over the other.
In the few meetings I’d encountered him, Carina’s dad had always seemed so feral. Animalistic. He displayed some intelligence, but also seemed ready to rip my head off at any moment. I couldn’t help but think that’s the same way I felt sometimes. What kind of control did Lindström have over the man? No doubt, Marc was reigned in through the same audio controls as my friends and I had been. Maybe on a different wavelength. How did Lindström keep control of him when he was out of sight, though?
Nathen appeared at my side, nearly making me jump out of my shoes.
“Whoa!” he yelled over the helicopter wind.
“They’re over there.” I pointed at the two silhouettes. “We have to stop them. Give me the gun.” I held out a hand to him.
“I dropped it.”
“What?”
“I dropped it,” he repeated. “Back there.”
I ground my teeth and looked at the helicopter lowering to the roof. “Why in the world—”
“I can go back to get it,” he yelled.
“No time.”
“What are we going to… Yieee!” Nathen yelled as Marc appeared right in front of us.
Luckily, his swing was wild and mostly intended for me. He missed Nathen and I was able to bend out of the way. I recovered and took a couple of wild swings of my own. They landed on various spots on his body but didn’t affect him. It was like he stood and waited for me to finish my attack before swiping a heavy hand at my head. I dropped to a knee. The blow flew just overhead.
The conditions were less than optimal for fighting. Everything was dark except a flash of red here and there until the helicopter decided to add to the mix. Its spotlight flared to life and trained on Marc and me.
I fought the big man with desperation. Flashes of light would spotlight Marc hulking over me before everything went dark again. I would catch the flash of a swinging arm before it was lost in the early morning, leaving me to dive wildly out of the way.
I dove, tucked, and rolled until my back slammed painfully into a wall. Nathen stood there, rooted in the doorway, unsure of what to do.
“He gets bigger every time you hit him,” he yelled over the helicopter, which hovered over the landing pad.
“What?”
“Every time you hit him, he gets bigger!”
For the moment, the behemoth of a man seemed to have lost me in the dark. I studied him as the spotlight passed over him. Nathen was right. He did look bigger. His clothes were near to the point of bursting off of him. Veins and muscles bulged in his arms and neck.
“So, he’s getting stronger?” I asked.
“Yes! But how much can he take?”
Marc yelled at the helicopter in frustration. There was no way the pilots could hear but that didn’t seem to matter to him.
What was I supposed to do? How could I take down a man who only grew stronger with every blow I landed? It was felt like a lost cause. Maybe I should just grab Nathen and drag him back down those stairs, get Carina and my family out of there. Could I do that? Could I let the man responsible go just like that? Could I…
And then it hit me. I realized what Nathen had meant. But how much can he take?
Marc yelled one last thing at the helicopter then turned a circle, looking for me.
How much could he take?
“Can you stop that helicopter?”
He looked uncertain for a moment before his jaw set in determination. “What? You kiddin’? I’m on it.”
I nodded and leaped at Marc just as he spotted us standing in the doorway. I didn’t think about what I was doing. I just acted on instinct.
I jumped around like a cat. I lashed out with a fist, landing a blow with every opening he presented. They didn’t hurt him, of course, but every one of them enraged him more. He lashed out wildly. I managed to avoid the punches but just barely.
His clothes stretch across his body as he grew. Every one of my blows that landed felt like hitting a sidewalk. With his growing girth, his movement slowed. That left more openings for more hits.
My fists hurt, my arms felt heavy, and I was breathing hard by the time. I kept pushing forward. Kept swinging at any exposed part of his body.
A punch to his side.
A kick to his kidneys.
A knee to his thigh.
Three quick rabbit punches to the back of his head.
I don’t know how long we fought, but he finally staggered back after I landed a solid, arm-numbing punch to his sternum.
His face bunched in confusion. He looked down at his own body, now a mass of muscle. It was like he couldn’t figure out how he had grown that big.
Then a low rumble shook the building. I felt it vibrate under my feet.
Whomp.
I felt my bones shake deep inside my body.
Whomp.
I had to force myself to not clench my teeth so they wouldn’t rattle right out of my mouth.
Whomp.
The whooshing vibrations began to hurt.
Whomp.
Marc swelled even more.
Whomp.
I clamped my hands over my ears and glanced around.
Nathen stood just outside the landing pad, his hands half-raised and spread out like he was inviting the helicopter in for a hug.
Whomp. Whomp. Whomp.
The sounds of the helicopter’s rotors roared louder and louder.
I took a few steps back, trying to escape the sound, but it pushed in on me from all sides, echoing around the rooftop. It felt like the deep rumblings of explosions going off everywhere. I pushed the palms of my hands against the sides of my head to keep my brain from melting to a gooey, pink liquid.
I had Marc on one side and the helicopter on the other. I knew Nathen was taking care of the copter, but I couldn’t shake the burning need to get at the man responsible for the whole mess. The hammering sounds kept me rooted to the spot as well as shackles, though.
At first, I thought my eyeballs were rattling in their sockets as I stared at the helicopter, but realized it was the machine vibrating in midair. It wobbled and veered off course. A piece of its side actually fell off and clattered to the rooftop. It lost all control and swerved to the right. It went over Nathen’s head and tilted straight for me.
I panicked and stumbled back against the stairwell wall. I dropped down just as the twirling blades sliced overhead, digging into the wall and showering me in brick chips.
The pilot jerked the helicopter away from the wall. It swung past the immobile Marc as he stood watching it dumbfounded and slid across the rooftop on its landing skids with too much momentum. It tipped over. Its rotors dug deep into the rooftop before breaking off and flying off in all directions. Nathen and Lindström hit the deck while Marc stood there, uncomprehending or uncaring.
Sparks flew before the whole rotor ground to a teeth-clenching stop near the edge of the building. The roof top fell silent.
Before I could regain my senses from my near decapitation, Marc had me by the throat and lifted me off my feet. I hung suspended in the air for only a minute before he slammed me to the roof.
He kept a hold of my neck. Somewhere through the haze of stars that sparkled in my vision, I felt his fingers clamping tighter around my throat. I grabbed his wrist with both hands but couldn’t break his grip. I dug my fingers into his wrist tendons. He squeezed harder.
A loud crack rang out. Marc’s brows drew together as I watched the skin on his face grow tighter. Another shot. He slowly turned his head to the side and I clawed at his arm until my figures closed over something metal on his wrist. I rolled my eyes to see a little, black box strapped there.
It hit me. That’s how Lindström was controlling him. I pinched the box between my fingers and squeezed. At first, it didn’t budge, but it finally gave under the pressed and crushed.
Marc swung his head back around and stared down at me. If he was confused before, he was completely baffled now. He looked at his hand around my throat, then off to the side again. His fingers slackened. I punched his forearm, but he didn’t seem to notice.
He let go and stood. I thought he might just stomp me into a mush, but he turned and ran. I rolled to watch as he bounded to the side of the building. He leaped over the railing and disappeared.
“Dad!”
I whipped my head around to see Carina standing several yards away. She held the gun limp in one hand. She dropped it to the roof and ran over to where her dad jumped over the side.
Another movement caught my eyes and I turned to see Lindström dashing for the open doorway. I ignored the pain and queasiness that rose up in me and pushed myself to my feet. I caught him just before he made it to the door. And by caught him, I mean I tackled him without mercy. We flew through the air and landed hard on the roof with me on him. We actually skidded a foot or so, too. I bet that hurt.
I rolled him onto his back to find him with a nasty case of road rash on his face. He wheezed to catch his breath. “You think…” Wheeze. “…this is over?” Wheeze. “We’re only one company of many.” Wheeze. “We are powerful.” Wheeze. “Do what you will.” Wheeze. “Lawyers will have me out in—”
His head snapped to the side. Blood shot from his mouth and nose. Okay, so I might have hit him a little harder than I intended. I was probably a little exuberant, but I didn’t feel sorry. He could show off his newly broken nose to his cellmates.
Chapter 39
Day Zero
7:01 a.m.
I stood over Lindström’s unconscious form. I felt like giving him a few extra kicks but walked away before I could follow through with it. I passed the helicopter pilot and co-pilot as they climbed from the wreckage and ran for the open door. I could have stopped them, but at that point, I didn’t really care. I walked toward the edge of the building where Carina sat on the lip, her arms crossed over the bottom railing and legs dangling over the side.
My stomach turned. Marc had killed himself. Or, maybe I killed him. I tore off the wristband that had controlled him. Had he realized what he had done—killed all those people, beat the mess out of me, hit his own daughter—and killed himself? If he had, it was my fault. I shouldn’t have ripped that band off his wrist.
Carina turned to look up at me briefly before turning back to the brightening city below us. “He’s gone.”
“What?”
“My dad. He survived the fall.”
The man had taken a pounding from me without flinching, but had he really survived a multi-story fall like that? I stepped to the edge and hesitantly looked down. The last thing I wanted to see was a dark smear on the pavement below if Carina was just in denial. Luckily, I didn’t. In the growing light of morning, there was no sign of her dad. No body. Nothing. I breathed a tentative sigh of relief and sat down beside her.
Somewhere to the west, the sun made its daily climb up the side of the mountain, lightening the sky to announce its pending arrival. Down below, still giving the Lindström building a wide berth, the mass of teens raved and threw things fruitlessly.
“So.” I sat beside her. “Now what?”
Carina shrugged.
“You two are straight up nuts!”
Carina and I turned to see Nathen standing a few yards away. I smiled at him and patted the spot next to me.
“No way! If you two slip and fall… well, she’ll probably do more damage to the sidewalk,” he said. “And you’ll probably land just fine on all fours.”
“I’m not Catman or anything,” I said with a half-smile.
“Yeah, well. I’ll stay right here. When you two love birds are done watching the sunrise, lemme know.”
I looked at Carina and she smiled. I thought I might just be able to lose myself in that smile, but another thought bullied its way in.
“My family.”
She put a hand on mine to stop me from jumping up from the edge of the building. “They’re fine. I told them to stay where they were after we cuffed those guys guarding them.”
I forced myself to relax and noticed she kept her hand on mine. It was warm and soft.
“What are you going to do now?” she asked.
“I don’t know. First thing’s first, turn whatever evidence we have on the psycho,” I jerked a thumb toward Lindström’s prone form, “to the police. After that…” I shrugged.
“I need to find my dad and help him.”
I nodded. “There’s more out there like us. He’s been controlling them.”
“We can track them down.”
I liked how she said we. “Not just here in Salt Lake. The way he was talking before I accidentally hit him too hard, it sounded like there were other companies out there who did the same thing as his.”
“Then we’ll do what we can do,” she said. “Nobody should have to go through what we have. Or these poor kids.” S
he waved a hand at the mob below. “Do you think we can help them?”
“If we can find and help your dad, I bet he’ll be able to help with that.”
She nodded. “Then it’s off to save the world?”
“Road trip!” Nathen yelled. “Hey. Hey. Hey! If we’re going to run off, gallivanting around the world like superheroes, we’re definitely going to need superhero names!”
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