The Post-Humans (Book 1): The League

by Bassett, Thurston

  “Quiet. We are starting the machine.” Dereck looked to his project manager again. “Cam! Bring out the sacrifices and turn on the gate. We want to give our new friends a warm welcome.” He smiled back at the monitors as a phosphorescent blue glow erupted behind him. “You can’t see our new business partners, I’m sorry, but I can. Welcome to a new age!” Dereck Lucas turned back to the blue glow of the opening gate, smiling in admiration as little flecks of electricity flickered across the ten foot high oval suspended between two high powered electron magnets.

  A grey skinned figure stepped out of the blue light onto the atrium floor, followed by a second. They were like gangly humanoids. They had no face and no hair and their naked bodies presented no definition of sex or muscle. The first one stared at Dereck with a blank featureless face, no eyes, or mouth or ears. Dereck smiled back at the creatures. “Welcome my friends, I promised I’d get you in.”

  Chapter 27

  “THEY’VE LOCKED THE bloody doors!” Brick said, as he thumped his fist against the metal door. “I thought there would be an army or a giant fighting machine or lasers or something sci-fi, not locked doors.”

  Brad smiled a little. It did seem slightly anticlimactic, but they were just humans, keeping other humans away from what they were hiding.

  They had followed the corridor for twenty metres and found only this way in, or a stairwell at the end.

  The stairwell, Brad surmised, would most likely take them to an exposed administrative area on a mezzanine, and that could be a benefit or it could be more dangerous. Odds were that Furnace, if she was here, was being kept on the bottom floor where trucks could load and unload equipment.

  “We get though here, people. We get to Furnace and hopefully she will have our back.”

  “Hopefully? You aren’t filling me with confidence, mate,” Brick said with some humour.

  Esther said nothing, she had been wide-eyed and quiet since seeing her friend die.

  “Got another putty bomb?” Brick asked stepping back from the door handle.

  “No, but I have a brand new Colt 45 from our dead friend back there, with five rounds left.” Brad stepped back and guided Esther back with him. He then aimed the officer’s heavy pistol at the door lock and fired.

  The sound rang in the corridor like thunder, leaving the door’s locking mechanism hanging in a mess from beneath the handle.

  Brad kicked the door open and ducked down, leaving his two companions standing hidden either side of the doorframe. He looked inside and saw a collection of massive glass enclosures on the far side, which he calculated would be the most likely place for any kind of captives. In front of those, there was a loading area and a few tables of equipment.

  To Brad’s far right were the massive roller doors at the front of the building, to the far left were offices and above them on a mezzanine, there were more. Brad’s mind organized the information at lightning speed to give him a fairly accurate floor plan of the space.

  Then automatic fire erupted around the doorway. Bullets bit into the swinging door and the walls around it, and several turned the concrete wall behind him into a ragged mess.

  Brad ducked back inside and Brick looked at him with worry in his eyes. He was looking for another ingenious plan.

  “That must have been from the mezzanine, Brick. I didn’t get a chance to see, but I found our friend, Furnace.”

  “Do you want me to go up the steps then?” Brick suggested. Brick was hoping he could change the situation somehow, but odds were they would be waiting for anyone attempting make that move. Footsteps coming down the corridor brought their attention to the doorway they had come through, and Shane appeared. He jogged down the passage to join them holding two of the security guard’s semi-silenced rifles.

  “What’s the situation?” Shane said passing one of the rifles to Brad.

  “We are pinned. They have automatic weapons covering this door, probably from upstairs. We aren’t sure. Our targets are on the other side of the facility.”

  “What should I do?” Shane asked.

  Brad was silent while he calculated.

  “Will these help?” Shane said nodding toward the rifle in Brad’s hand.

  Brad looked the weapon over and puzzled over its origin. For the most part the weapon was a carbon fiber casing, similar to an M16. The silencer was an interesting design and so were the additional add-ons like the net projection unit and the Taser.

  “Maybe we could use something on here, the net, perhaps. Shane, get to the top of those steps with that thing, kick in the door and use the net. Brick and I will be able to see how many there are and hopefully take them out while they are distracted.”

  Shane nodded, and headed for the stairs.

  Brick nodded too and readied his pistol.

  Brad stepped out nice and low, and aimed up toward the mezzanine.

  There was a loud bang as the upstairs door was kicked open, then two guards were ensnared in a wire net fired by Shane. The fine wire looked extremely effective, so it was no surprise to Brad, that it was used on Post-Humans.

  Two more guards collapsed on the steel grill of the mezzanine, as Brick fired, but a third person stepped out of the office and drew a gun of his own. Before he could react, Brad saw Shane tumble back through the doorway.

  The new comer swung his gun around and aimed at Brad. Then the man hesitated and smiled.

  “Apollo, I presume? Am I right, big shot?” The American man called out with a little surprise. “I thought you were the guy that hid in the office while your gang did all the hard stuff? What brings you down to our humble base of operations?”

  Brad hesitated. He had never met the man before, but he could see that he had an air of authority about him, possibly Post-Human.

  “Who are you?” Brad asked, immediately regretting not pulling the trigger.

  “Name’s Boothe, Mr Lewis.” The bald man named Boothe turned and called over his shoulder, “Mr Floyd! We got someone here for you to play with.”

  Brad pulled the trigger, but the man was quick to evade the shot.

  He had expert training, military.

  Boothe returned fire with a couple of shots that narrowly missed Brad’s head and shoulder. The man had called out to Mr Floyd, and there was only one Mr Floyd that Brad knew: Terrance Floyd, codename Cal. Former member of The League, and once a good friend of Brad Lewis.

  The shots had ceased and Brad took the chance to peek over the large steel contraption that stood just out of the doorway giving him cover.

  Boothe was gone.

  “Hey there, little bug! My boss reckons I should break your arse in half. I might even enjoy the exercise.” The voice boomed out from the open facility floor.

  It was Cal.

  Brad scanned the scene and noticed at least four other guards with guns trained in his direction.

  His team was seriously depleted, hiding in the doorway; Only Brick and Esther remained. Shane lay crumpled and twisted at the foot of the stairs.

  “Sir, how are we going to tackle this?” Esther hissed from the doorway.

  “Balancing the playing field; I remove the guards,” Brad whispered, “You be ready.”

  Cal stood like a massive stocky statue waiting for Brad to come out and face him. “He must not remember anything about his past. It’s as if he thinks I don’t know his strength, and is waiting to surprise me when I face him man to man. I fear Athan may have been right.” Brad muttered. “The only way I’m walking out of this is if I face him with a gun. I don’t have a chance with my fists. If he doesn’t remember that I know his strength, I may have a chance.”

  Brad a friend of Cal for many years. He knew his strengths and his weaknesses. He needed to know these so that he could effectively strategize for missions back when he directed The League. Normal humans would not survive a fistfight with Cal, his re-enforced bones and thick muscle was too strong. It would be like being hit by a car, repeatedly.

  Though, shooting him was sometimes ef
fective, it depended on where he was shot. Otherwise electrocution, drowning or acids were all viable options.

  “Come on little bug!” Cal hollered from factory floor.

  Brad decided to take a challenging approach. “My name is Apollo, what makes you think I’d be scared of a big lout like you then?”

  Cal smirked back at him. “Come over here and find out…”

  Brad had the Colt 45 in the back of his belt and the silenced Beretta still in the holster at his side. In his hands was the guard’s rifle. He hoped he was holding enough firepower to be able to survive a clash with Cal.

  “Let us dance then, big man.”

  “’Bout time, boy. You don’t need them toys,” Cal said with a snicker as he glanced back at the guards around him for approval. “He’s mine.”

  Brad marched forward with the rifle at the hip pointed at Cal’s torso.

  The big man waited.

  “Where do you come from?” Brad asked, hoping to string out the conflict as long as he could. If it lasted for long enough, maybe the other group would break through the front entrance and cause some kind of distraction. “What are you doing working for these scum bags? Huh?”

  “What you mean scum bags? These are my guys, son. I should get ‘em to put a nice bullet in you just for bein’ here, but I’m givin’ you a fightin’ chance you see? You should be thanking me.”

  “Maybe I should, but I won’t.” Brad moved toward the big man slowly. He had to get close enough to draw the attention away from Brick and Esther.

  Cal looked like a regular person, but beneath his tidy dark blue suit, there was a body like stone. He wasn’t that fast, but if Cal managed to land a blow it could smash bones to pieces.

  Brad couldn’t risk being hit, he also couldn’t kill his old friend.

  The other two hiding in the corridor were ready to shoot when he made his move.

  He took a deep breath.

  If he needed to be able to move faster than a normal person, it would be now.

  He closed his eyes and tried to centre himself. He needed to move like lightning or this man would kill him and it would all be for nothing.

  Now or never.

  Brad concentrated hard and fired the net.

  It worked, the wire net coursed through the air toward Cal, who was still and wore a confused expression.

  Time was standing still for Brad again.

  The world had become a slow moving dream.

  In all his years of knowing his Post-Human abilities, he had never been able to do anything besides absorb information like a sponge. He was grateful for it, but this made him feel like he really was one of The League.

  The net wrapped around Cal’s body and outstretched hands, some of the wire net cut into the skin of his hands on impact due to the short range.

  As Cal began to open his mouth to object, Brad fired the Taser, which spiraled through the air and hit him in the chest. The jolt from the Taser was something that Cal was not invulnerable to, and it sent him reeling back stumbling.

  This should buy me just enough time…

  Brad felt a bullet streak passed him, then another.

  The guards were trying to take him out.

  He pumped the rifle trigger a few times in Cal’s direction, sending the bullets screaming through the air into the brute’s stomach and legs, which fountained some blood spray into the air. He tossed the rifle aside, now it was empty, drew his Beretta and aimed for the closest guard, which happened to be a woman firing her net caster in his direction.

  He could see it streaking through the air and beginning to balloon out in slow motion.

  He dodged sideways behind a stainless steel fermenter and stayed low as he appeared on its far side. The net clattered against the fermenter and went spinning across the concrete floor where it finished at Brick’s feet.

  Seeing Brick was a relief, he and Esther had responded effectively.

  Brad could hear Brick fearlessly hammering shot after shot towards the guards.

  He wasn’t the most accurate shooter, but his courage made up for it.

  One guard went down, critically hit and another held back using cover.

  They were actors in slow motion.

  It was all buying Brad the time he needed to get to the enclosures behind the plastic screens.

  One of them had to be Furnace.

  A bullet ripped through the protective pants he wore. It was a glancing hit; he had been too late seeing it gliding towards him. It broke through the skin, and Brad watched with fascination as the dark cherry liquid splashed out in a fan of tiny droplets.

  He knew that some stage soon he would feel the pain, but he couldn’t afford it now.

  He took this chance to make another run, this time, to the area with the big plastic curtains. He was moving so quickly that the steel equipment and computers all looked like simple objects blocking his way, only the things that moved were of any real consequence.

  Brad slid over a table and then behind the white plastic screen that divided the area from the rest.

  To his surprise there were big glass cases with a bed and a collection of computers and other equipment.

  In the bed of the first glass case was an Asian girl, he couldn’t tell if it was Kiranda through the glass.

  Then his attention was drawn to a dull thud, which echoed strangely in his heightened state of perception.

  It came from the next cell.

  He saw a second figure beating on the front of her glass prison. The cell was the second in a row of three. He couldn’t make out the third cell’s occupant, but the second was definitely Kiranda. She could hear the gunfire on the other side of the screen no doubt and was trying to get help.

  “Yoooouuuuuu!” The word blurred out of the air somewhere behind him, even in his heightened state, he had no time. There was someone after him now, he had no chance of reaching the cell before he was attacked, especially if it was Cal. There were still over ten metres between him and the cell.

  He pulled the Colt 45 from the back of his pants. If ever he needed accuracy, it was now. He aimed the handgun at the glass and steel latch of Kiranda’s cell and pulled the trigger once, then again. As he squeezed the trigger a third time he felt his body being shoved to the floor and a pain roared up his back.

  The floor rushed up to meet him and everything went black.

  The world came sparkling back to life, first with the white glow of the fluorescent lights above him, then the echoes of gunfire and the crashing of steel. There was Kiranda’s face looking desperately down into his.

  It had been a long time.

  “Can you walk?” she pressed, laying a hand on the wound on his leg and cringing. Kiranda was still an attractive girl, but her time in captivity and made its mark. She looked tired and a little under nourished, but her expression softened by relief.

  “Maybe…” Brad tried to sit up, and felt a horrible pain erupt through his body. “Aaaah… Dammit! What was that sound?” he groaned.

  “Someone’s driven a truck through the front.” Kiranda gestured with her head, the direction of the front of the facility. “Someone started World War Three out there.”

  Brad half smiled.

  Cleary’s group have made their dramatic entrance.

  “I invited them to the party.” He tried to reach the sore part of his back to check the damage. “Shit.”

  “Got you good I guess. He clocked you with that over the back.” She pointed to long dented pipe on the ground. “Then I did my thing and he ran off like a little girl.”

  Brad saw the burning computer consoles and black scorches on the concrete.

  “Cal?”

  “Cal? No, that American tosser. The bald one with the smug look on his face.”

  “I was wondering where he got to.” Brad looked at the other glass cases and the broken hatchway on the side of the one that Kiranda had been inside. Then he looked back to Kiranda who knelt in a paper gown.

  She smiled at him, like
old times, but two bullets ripping through the plastic screens broke the moment.

  Brad pulled himself up “I’ll free the others, you get us out of here.”

  “What? I thought you were rescuing me!” Kiranda protested, but he knew she was joking.

  “Trust me, lives have been lost to get us this far. And Cal is out there. The humans, they don’t have a chance.”

  “Cal,” Kiranda said, frowning, “son of a bitch is brainwashed.”

  “No kidding. Do what you have to do. The guys in black are friends.”

  She nodded, suddenly all business.

  Brad stumbled over to the first cell to let the prisoner free. The girl was strapped to the bed. Brad realized she was the probably the Indonesian Post-Human Seeker.

  Kiranda walked with bare feet across the concrete floor to where bullets were flying in all directions.

  There was a girl close to her, hiding behind a fermenter.

  She was in black, so Kiranda figured she must be one of Apollo’s agents.

  The girl looked over and relief came over her face. It had been a long time since Kiranda had seen that kind of look.

  There was a clanging on the steel walkway above her, and through the grill she could see the khaki uniforms, the same ones she had been seeing every day since she had been caught.

  It was time for them to fry.

  Kiranda closed her eyes and let her feelings take control.

  The tingle and throb erupted in her head and she could feel it rushing like water through her arms and legs. The goose bumps made her skin feel like it was someone else’s, somehow alive.

  She looked at her hands and saw the shimmer of yellow and blue. It rippled up from her hands over her torso and through her legs. The paper dress began to darken, then it erupted in flames, leaving her naked with shimmering flames licking her body.

  Don’t hold back, she told herself.

  And then she concentrated.

  The flames grew a little larger then exploded up into the mezzanine and out across the floor.

  The guards above began to scream as their clothes and skin burned and the air was ripped from their lungs.