Cherry Blossom Girls Box Set

by Harmon Cooper

  Only problem was, the sarcophagus was empty.

  “Gideon!” Dorian grabbed my arm and teleported away, just as Veronique unleashed several of her frag pouches. Nuts, bolts, thumbtacks, and nails buzzed around the room, assault weapons firing as Dorian and I appeared on top of the building.

  “Stay,” she told me, pulling out some of the frag pouches, and then she was gone.

  An explosion threw me off balance and cut holes through the roof, letting out the frenzied noises from inside. The building creaked as metal was stripped from the wall, as more men died, as more shrapnel tore out of the roof.

  I could now see into the chaos below, and what I could make out, mostly from muzzle flash, was that my team was winning.

  Dorian was teleporting mayhem, Veronique orchestrating metal chaos.

  From the north, another group of men were advancing on the compound, two black Humvees in their mix.

  Shit!

  Dorian reappeared and placed her hand on me, both of us teleporting away in a flash. We reappeared on the opposite roof.

  “More are coming,” I told her before she could disappear again. “There!”

  “Got it. There are just a few more left with Veronique.”

  “Keep one alive,” I said quickly. “And …” I handed her my backpack, “charge this, teleport next to the group coming from the north, and toss it.”

  Dorian licked a finger as she reached for my bag. It began to charge purple and pink and then she was gone in the blink of an eye, returning just a few seconds later.

  Fuck, I thought as an explosion rocked our quadrant of the base. I was behind the parapet now, and as I moved to look over the side, an incredible force struck me in the chest.

  I spun backward, Dorian’s hand landed on me, and we were gone before I could figure out what hit me.

  We reappeared on a different rooftop and I toppled over, gripping my chest.

  It felt like someone had smacked me with a baseball bat … like I’d been punched with an iron fist. I was still trying to catch my breath when Dorian took down two snipers, both of whom had turned toward us and pulled their handguns.

  To take them out, she’d appeared between the two snipers and tossed one over the side of the roof, disappeared to the other one’s right, and tossed him as well. She then charged two frag pouches and threw them down onto the men’s bodies as they hit the ground below.

  Most of that I pieced together after the fact.

  My chest was pounding; I’d never been in such pain. But adrenaline took over and I was able to ignore it some.

  A bullet, I told myself as I tried to catch my breath. If I hadn’t been wearing the vest, I would be dead by now.

  Dorian popped back beside me. “Stay here,” she said and flashed away again, my backpack in her hand, charging with pink and purple energy.

  Still trying to breathe normally, I peeked over the parapet just in time to see her reappear next to the incoming paramilitary forces, toss the backpack, and disappear before it could explode.

  The explosion vibrated in my chest. I had to turn away once it struck, not prepared to see the bodies fall and the people scream in pain. My hands naturally went to where I’d been shot, feeling the indention in the vest, again realizing that my life had just been spared.

  Before I could start doing some Hail Marys, Dorian reappeared, the vein on her forehead slightly visible.

  “Let’s go,” she said, grabbing me.

  “Keep one alive,” I reminded Dorian as we disappeared again.

  Our bodies reformed next to Veronique and I lost my dinner.

  “Sorry,” I whispered to them both. Vomit finished, I wiped my mouth and saw that Veronique had mopped the floor with the security detail that had been waiting to ambush us. The violence was almost something out of a Dark Horse comic with its stack of bodies accented by pools of blood.

  Grim.

  The room was lit by bodies that were smoldering – for some godawful reason – and the skylight that Veronique had opened up when she brought the ceiling down onto the rest of the men still standing.

  “Tell me you kept one alive,” I asked as the strength returned to my legs.

  “I did,” Veronique said, nodding to my right.

  Fuck me …

  A man was crucified to the wall with large metal shards, blood forming a straight line from his impaled hands and reaching all the way to the floor.

  Veronique didn’t say anything as she walked over to him. A downed female soldier gasped in pain, still alive. Veronique stopped before the woman and drained her energy until she shriveled up and died.

  “What are your questions, Gideon?” she asked, turning back to the man. Her hand flared red and he cried out in pain.

  “Where is she?” I asked, or more appropriately, I growled. It’s amazing how leverage can change one’s demeanor.

  “Don’t know … who you’re talking … about …”

  “Yes, you do,” I told him. “It’s the reason you were in this room. Now where the fuck is she?”

  “Honest, I don’t know!” the crucified man cried.

  “You’ve got to know more than that,” I said. I huffed out a breath. “All right, this is the last time I ask. If you don’t tell me where she is, I’m going to have her,” I gestured at Dorian, “teleport you to a point in the sky above the freeway. She’ll teleport away before you hit the ground or are killed by an eighteen-wheeler. I’m not fucking around. Tell me what you know, and we’ll let you live; you’ll get some type of severance, extreme combat package. Dunno, I’m not a mercenary, but I’m sure there’s something in it for you. Oh, and your life. You’ll keep that. It’s that simple.”

  I had to turn away for a moment. The person who’d just said that was not me, or better, was not the old me. This was the new me – the me that had decided to take everything into his own hands.

  What have I become?

  I gritted my teeth and turned back to the man. “Now, what do you know?”

  “You’re not going to make it out of here alive,” was his answer.

  “We’ll see about that.”

  “They’re waiting for you,” he said through gritted teeth.

  “Just like you were waiting for us. See how well that worked?”

  “Near the track, in Barrack A,” he blurted out. “That’s where they moved her. The helicopter should be moving them … now. Really soon. They thought you’d attack later. May have already gone … I have no fucking idea.”

  Veronique looked at me. “Leave him.” I turned my back to the man and approached Dorian. “You know where that is?”

  “We can take a point on top of a rooftop and then go from there.”

  Veronique stepped up beside me. “Good job,” I told her, taking one last look at the carnage. “Remember, we get Grace, and we go. And I drive until we see a gas station and then we get another car. In and out. I don’t want to take them on without Grace at full capacity.”

  The crucified guy cried out to us as we flashed away.

  We appeared on a rooftop, not far from where the snipers were. I was still surprised there were only two snipers, and I had a feeling we’d run into more.

  I still couldn’t believe I’d been shot. If I hadn’t been wearing the vest … I touched my chest again and gulped. It would leave a bruise, but shit, that was the least of my concerns.

  “Someone’s there,” Veronique said, pointing to someone at one of the cross streets.

  The streets separating the barracks reminded me of the ones in New Haven, not a lot of wiggle room on the side. Sure enough, there was a person sitting in a wheelchair at the intersection of one of the streets.

  “Are you two ready?”

  Dorian pulled two frag pouches out of her fanny pack. I saw that Veronique was running low, so I handed her several from my own pack.

  “You two are awesome,” I said as they both looked at me. “If I die tonight, I’m proud to have died by your sides.”

  Dorian grinned.
“You haven’t known me for that long.”

  Veronique laughed. “You’ve known me for a bit longer but … yeah, I’ll miss you too. If you die. Don’t die. Who will I shower with?”

  The two exchanged glances and started laughing.

  “Yeah, about that …”

  A pair of helicopters appeared in the distance.

  “Shit. To be addressed later.”

  Veronique grinned. “Taking down helicopters is fun.”

  “I’ll bet. Keep an eye on them. Once they get too close, see if you can use them to our advantage.”

  She snorted. “And I thought I was the one who had military training.”

  “I think it was both of us,” Dorian said.

  “Just trying to be helpful.”

  Veronique placed a hand on my cheek “Stay alive. You are most helpful to us alive.”

  After the two got in front, I touched their shoulders and we teleported to a spot just in front of the person sitting in the wheelchair.

  I gasped when I saw it was Grace, her hair covering her face, her skin sagging off her chin. She was naked, her body in spasms, unable to do more than silently nod at me. I could see that her eyes were completely white, shining through the shadows cast by her long hair. And just as I was about to scream her name like an idiot, Angel zoomed down from the sky and landed behind her, Mother in his arms.

  The standoff had begun.

  Angel let Mother down, and she dusted off the front of her black bodysuit, similar to what Veronique wore when she first came after us.

  One of the helicopters’ spotlights landed on Mother, giving her the stage.

  “Gideon Caldwell, you have quite the reputation.” The choppers were high enough in the air that we could hear her speak, but I had to strain a little. “You actually got out of here, and then you came back, now for a third time. Had I known you’d be so resilient, we wouldn’t have kicked you out of the program all those years ago.”

  I glanced at Veronique. Out of the program? Damn, I wished she could read my thoughts! Was this why my picture was on Grace’s drive? It had to be!

  Mother continued. “You are now responsible for the death of … I don’t know how many American soldiers you killed back there.”

  “They’re from a private security company,” I told her through clenched teeth. “Not quite soldiers, so don’t try to guilt me there.”

  Dorian lightly touched my wrist. She was on edge, but if Veronique was as well, I couldn’t tell. She’d actually stepped forward, valiant as ever as she sized Angel and Mother up.

  “They are whatever we say they are,” Mother finally said, her expression souring. “And you’ll be charged with their murders. Dorian Gray, I really thought you were one of our more unique creations. But you aren’t. The ones on the East Coast, they are. And the one in my womb she is.”

  She’s pregnant? Mother had mentioned during our interrogation that she was planning to create others, but those were test tube babies, according to her. I didn’t think she was actually pregnant, especially because she’d specifically said she wasn’t. But now I could see it, especially because of how tight her outfit was. She had a slight motherly bump, just a hint, maybe four months pregnant or less.

  “You got your mom pregnant?” I asked Angel. “Damn, man.”

  I knew he could crush me in an instant. But for some reason, seeing his greasy long hair covering his perfectly chiseled yet slightly burnt face just got to me. If I’d had a chance to go back and make the joke better, I would have said something about how we were in Texas, not Arkansas, where inbreeding and child marriages were accepted, but I always had better jokes in retrospect.

  Angel ignored me as Mother continued speaking.

  “Dorian and Veronique, you both disappoint me, and you will both be retired after this, but not before we do some experiments on you. I would really like to watch you suffer. Especially you, Veronique. And I know it’ll be a little hard considering your power, but we could just let you starve. That may be the way to go; lock you in a plastic room and let you starve.”

  Grace! I called to her in my head. Are you okay? Focus on my words!

  I’d heard enough of the supervillain bullshit talk. I didn’t think what she was going on about would actually happen in real life, but it seemed like every time Mother came around – or Angel for that matter – they wanted to talk about their evil plans or how inferior I was.

  If there ever were real supervillains, they would just kill everyone and not say anything about it. There would be none of this banter, and there wouldn’t be any movies about superheroes either because the villains would kill all the good guys.

  Mother rambled on and on about how I was inferior and how Dorian and Veronique were doomed, and as she finished her diatribe, I began to think about my book, How Heavy This Axe.

  Damn, that was a good cover, and damn, people really should have gotten into that one more. But I mean, transgendered dwarves were still a controversial topic, and no one liked to see the Hero’s Journey upended. Still, maybe I should republish it with a forward and an updated cover …

  From there, I thought about a spin-off of Mutants in the Making that I’d call Hot Mutant Adventure.

  Talk about keyword stuffing.

  I would make it a harem because, let’s be honest, sex sells, and guys like to think that having control over multiple women somehow ups their masculinity.

  And shit, I didn’t even like most of the harem books or anime I’d consumed. Too corny and unbelievable, and the covers on the books! How many times do I have to see a guy surrounded by two impossibly beautiful semi-nude babes to get past the sexual undertones and see the book for what it really was?

  Then again, maybe it was better to lean into it, really get that shit going. Hot Mutant Adventure: A Superhero Harem Adventure.

  ‘Adventure’ twice? I thought as Mother kept yammering about the different ways she was going to torture us. Change it to thriller. Hot Mutant Adventure: A Superhero Harem Thriller. Circle jerkers, we have a winner! Wannabe alpha males rejoice!

  “I’ll get Grace, and then I’ll come for you,” Dorian said suddenly, interrupting my train of thought. “Cover yourself.”

  “What?” I asked.

  Dorian was gone in a flash. She appeared in front of Grace, grabbed her, and disappeared again. Veronique tossed her frag pouches at Mother and Angel, just as I dropped to the ground to cover myself.

  Veronique was full-on raging now, trying to cut one of them down before Angel could reach her or before Mother’s powers could take effect.

  Predictably, Mother won.

  Just as Veronique was about to throw one of her circular blades, her eyes flashed, and she staggered forward.

  “Veronique!”

  “Get down, Gideon!” she managed to get out before her eyes turned white.

  Angel, who had just protected Mother from a barrage of shrapnel, shifted his weight to his heels and burst into the air, bits of metal and blood flying off his body as he tackled Veronique.

  But Veronique wasn’t finished.

  Even as Mother tried to control her, she lifted a hand to Angel’s throat, and the flying motherfucker suddenly started losing steam. Veronique’s hand flaring red, the energy moved up her arms as she overpowered him.

  Damn, I wished I could do something. Damn it all to hell! But I had other problems, including the fact that Mother was approaching me, now ignoring the struggle happening between Angel and Veronique.

  The thing was, when Angel hit her, they flew about forty feet to the right, but Mother had naturally focused her attention on me during this time.

  A stupid move on her part, bad luck for me though.

  The mangled symphony of screams began in my mind again, whirling waves of neuronal debris scraping across my brainscape. It felt like Mother had put my head in a microwave. My knees were curled to my chest, and I spasmed, trying to break free from her hold.

  Then the twisted orchestra grinded to a halt.

>   Gideon.

  Grace! I knew it was her, and even though I was on the ground twitching like a beached eel, just hearing her voice sparked courage in me. I pushed myself to my feet just as Mother stepped over me.

  My god, had she taken every move out of the supervillain playbook. She actually lifted me by the throat, holding me in the air, a sinister smile on her face as she began to squeeze.

  “You’ve have made it far, I’ll give you that.”

  Dorian popped into view behind Mother and punched her in the back of the head with one of the circular saws. It was clear she hadn’t charged it, evident by the fact that Mother’s head didn't blow off. But the attack did take her off guard, and she dropped me.

  By the time I hit the ground, Dorian was next to me, her hand on my wrist.

  We reappeared beside Grace, who was sitting with her back against one of the buildings, her head hung low, hair in her face.

  “I have to get Veronique, and then we need to get out.”

  “Yes, yes,” I said quickly. “Be safe!”

  She was gone just about the time Mother screamed out. We weren’t very far away, maybe a hundred yards, and it wouldn’t take Mother or Angel long to reach us.

  I heard the sound of metal being pulled from the building and the whir of the helicopters being operated by clearly confused pilots, since they hadn’t started shooting – because who do you shoot at?

  One of them lifted to try to find where Dorian had taken us.

  I pulled Grace into my arms, aware that it wouldn’t do anything but needing to feel like I was helping and protecting her in some way.

  Gently, I wiped her hair out of her fucked-up looking face, saw that her skin had sagged along her jowls, that the middle line of her face was now a different color than the rest, that one of her eyes was open, flickering white and black, and one of her hands was two times as large as the other.

  “You’ll be fine,” I told her. “We’re here now, dammit, we’re here now. So just stay with us; we’ll be gone soon.” I kissed her forehead. “Just stay with us, Grace, I know you can do it.”

  Her head sank forward, and I tried to speak with her telepathically.