Supers Box Set

by Kristofer Bartol

  Boy Cumulus pulls the wind beneath him, lifting himself higher, faster.

  Raze plummets back to Earth as Victor Charlie zooms past her and into Boy Cumulus, knocking him from his cloud and out cold. He, too, now descends like an earthbound ragdoll.

  Pharos takes Miss Bliss gingerly by the arm as Watchdog lifts her back to her feet, and the hairs on the back of Watchdog's neck stand. He looks skyward and shouts.

  Victor Charlie flies toward them as Raze and Boy Cumulus fall from on high.

  Miss Bliss pulls herself free from Pharos and strains her gaze, focusing on the two mortal meteors, but they're too far for accuracy. She beckons Watchdog and he kneels at her side.

  He takes her arm in his hands, holding it like a rifle, and he looks past her shoulder, down the length of her arm, as he narrows his sights on Boy Cumulus.

  “Call it shy of three and a half miles.”

  “Okay—tell me when.”

  He tracks the falling body. “Pull.”

  She spawns a portal—imperceptibly distant—and Boy Cumulus vanishes, only to rocket out of a hole in the ground and up, arcing over the jungle canopy, to fall gracelessly into the foliage. The branches slow his plummet, and he awakens on the ground.

  Miss Bliss breathes a sigh of relief as Watchdog aims her arm again—and she's quivering.

  “You need to hold still,” he tells her.

  “I'm trying.”

  “I got ya,” he assures. “Pull.”

  She spawns another distant portal but Raze still falls.

  “Missed—try closer.”

  She shudders and exhales.

  “Pull.”

  Raze continues to fall.

  Pharos wipes his palms on his pants.

  “Fuggin’ hell,” Watchdog cries, “closer, Bliss!”

  She inhales and holds.

  “Pull!”

  Raze falls, now tumbling; thrashing.

  “She's awake! Pull again!”

  Miss Bliss tries, lurching. Raze continues to fall.

  “Pull! Pull! Pull!”

  Miss Bliss shudders. Raze falls, and vanishes.

  She rockets out of a hole in the ground and up, arcing over the jungle canopy, to be caught by a weary, windswept Boy Cumulus—and he descends with her in his arms.

  Watchdog runs to them, taking the shaken Raze in his embrace and comforting her. Streaks of white run through her ruby-red hair.

  Pharos leans into Miss Bliss. “Nice shot,” he says, kissing her on the forehead.

  She smirks. He wraps his arm around her shoulders.

  Boy Cumulus steps off his cloud and approaches the twosome. “What happened to Victor Charlie?” he asks.

  She wipes her brow. “Not sure.”

  “Would've been easier,” Pharos muses, “had we still had Helios.”

  Miss Bliss pushes herself away from him, turning her gaze.

  “What?” the bad boy sneers.

  She glares back. “Please stop bringing him up. We all know how much we'd be better-off if he were here. We don't need a constant reminder.”

  Pharos flashes his eyebrows. “Yeesh.”

  Boy Cumulus turns his back on Miss Bliss, and he whispers to Pharos. “She took it hard, man, and not all of us are as ‘over it’ as you are.”

  “I'm not saying I'm over it, but—what?—we can't even say his name?”

  “It's a sore spot. For all of us.”

  “Grow-up, guys,” the bad boy announces, “just cos the sun god's gone doesn't mean we're useless. He's dead, and that sucks—let's accept it and move on.”

  Miss Bliss bares her teeth. “You're so insensitive sometimes!”

  He shrugs. “Yeah, well… at least I'm honest with myself.”

  “You don't care that he's dead! You never liked him!”

  “Sure, let's just make things up. Real mature.”

  “To be fair,” Boy Cumulus interjects, “we all were under the perception you didn't like him.”

  “You always talked shit,” Watchdog hollers.

  Pharos pumps the brakes. “Alrighty now. So he and I disagreed on certain things, but I didn't wish him dead.”

  “Would you have saved him?” she asks.

  “Huh?”

  “Had it been a different scenario, and you had the chance, would you have saved Helios?”

  “Yeah,” he shrugs, “I'd save any of y'all.”

  “But would you have saved him?”

  Pharos stares back at Miss Bliss, who crosses her arms with impatience. He notices that Watchdog, Raze, and Boy Cumulus, too, are waiting with expectation. He snorts. “Guys, come on.”

  “Answer her,” Boy Cumulus pleads. “Like you said, you can be honest with yourself.”

  “Jesus, fuck,” he groans. “What do you want me to say?”

  “At this point,” Miss Bliss fumes, “anything would do.”

  “You're not saying much,” Boy Cumulus adds. “Quite evasive for someone who stands their ground so much-”

  “Okay!” he hollers. “Would I have taken a bullet for the golden boy? Probably not! Would I have pushed him out the path of a train? No!—he could handle himself! And if he couldn't, well, he had a fucking handicap! His clock was ticking.”

  “What a bag of bullshit,” Miss Bliss spits. “Just cos he came from abject royalty an-”

  “And he was a prissy asshole for it! A fuckin’ fancy-ass queer who—”

  “Hey!”

  “—thought himself God's gift; mister do-no-wrong!”

  “Alright!” Boy Cumulus interjects. “He had faults; we all have faults—but, if anyone, he could afford to be a little haughty. He laid his life down more than any of us ever had. I'd say dozens of times.”

  “As if he ever had good intentions. He was a fame-whore, always on the prowl for another nine days of glamor.” He scoffs. “You know what?” he nods, smirking. “I don't miss Helios. Not a damn bit. Hell, ya might even say I'm glad he's-”

  The smile falls from his face as he notices Miss Bliss with her hand raised, shimmering; pointed right at him.

  “Woah—dollface,” he stutters, “what are you doing?”

  She adjusts her aim, somewhat higher.

  Pharos spreads his hands, palms up. “Babe, hold on.”

  Watchdog rises to his feet. The hairs on the back of his neck stand, and so does Raze.

  Pharos smirks, sweating. “Babe… come on.”

  Miss Bliss flicks her wrist and Pharos flinches. A great gust of wind blows over him, rippling his leather jacket and tossing his hair over his face. He turns to notice, behind him, one of his lover's portals disapparting.

  He turns back, perplexed.

  Boy Cumulus mounts a cloud and ascends above the toppled cargo truck. Raze and Watchdog follow in pursuit. Miss Bliss looks to the sky, snapping her wrists with diligent concentration.

  Above the canopy, Victor Charlie careens through the open sky, trying in vain to escape the predictive succession of portals that keeps him more or less stationary.

  Miss Bliss closes the gap between her portals, forcing the herculean slope to cover the same short distance, ad infinitum, lest he be caught partway through a crossing.

  With a sudden lurch, she redirects one portal to the toppled truck, and Victor Charlie crashes into the remains of its cargo hold.

  Raze expels two twisting streams of flame from her hands, smothering the truck in oxygen-depriving fire. From above, Boy Cumulus summons a bone-rattling cone of lightning, and the electric current dances around the torn canvas, leaping betwixt its iron ribbing.

  Watchdog stares through the chaisse. “Keep on him,” he advises. “He's cookin’.”

  Pharos saunters over to the toppled truck, joining Miss Bliss in spectatorship.

  He takes a step closer to her.

  The truck thrashes about, rocking side to side. Howls from within become screams.

  Pharos switches his gaze, glass-eyed, to Miss Bliss. He gingerly drapes his arm around her shoulders.

  Sh
e crosses her arms, and he releases.

  He looks at his feet.

  She huffs, rolls her eyes, and takes his hand in hers.

  “I’m glad you’re okay,” she whispers, “but you're still a fucking asshole.”

  He grins.

  “And if you keep bad-mouthing Helios—or any of us, for that matter—well, next time a freight train comes barreling down your tracks, you’ll be on your own.”

  “Yeah, yeah,” he assuages. “I love you, too.”

  She snorts and sighs. The racket within the truck diminishes.

  ( II | III )

  “You didn’t mention you were the Candyman’s son!”

  “I, uh, didn’t know he was a Candyman.”

  “Shit,” Sgt. Greene grins. “Outta the loop, huh?”

  “Yeah, well,” Pvt. Page shrugs, “you could put it that way”

  “Does this make you the Candy Boy?”

  “I’m fine with Private—”

  “Candy Boy!” chimes PFC Sullivan.

  “—Private Page, or Michael.”

  “Michael the Candy Boy!”

  Pvt. Page sighs. “No.”

  “I like it!” hollers the Candyman, yards away.

  The squadron erupts in boisterous belly-laughs. Page rolls his eyes, shoulders his rifle, and walks off.

  PFC Zagorac leaps to his feet and—still grinning like a bobcat—chases after the private. “Come on, Page; think of it as a term of endearment.”

  “I’m not his protege,” Page bleats. “I don’t wanna be a ‘Candy Boy’—I have my own name.”

  “Whoa, bessie.”

  “So y’all can either call me Private Page or just… Michael.”

  “Well, alright, ‘Just Michael.’”

  Pvt. Page turns back to the road.

  “Hey, don’t wander-off too far; the jungle is thick with-”

  “Yeah, yeah,” he hollers back, “let me guess, There’s charlie in the bushes?”

  PFC Zagorac blinks, and then, “Well, yeah.”

  “I’ll be fine. Call it a patrol of the perimeter.”

  “Alright—but don’t get yourself killed, Just Michael!”

  Page signals a thumbs-up without looking back.

  He walks down the escarpment, veering off the well-trodden path and towards the treeline. He surmounts a makeshift rock wall and drops into a hedgerow. The palms envelop him.

  Slivers of sunlight stream-in through gaps in the canopy, filling the air like canted curtain rods. The treetops echo with chirps, chortles, and caws as dozens of birds flit from branch to branch.

  Pvt. Page strides through the understory—the dense growth of saplings and stalks—where the warmth of the summer sun hangs thick in the moist air.

  He wipes the sweat from his brow, but only succeeds in smearing it.

  The snap of a stick. He turns on his heels; rifle raised at his hip.

  His eyes scan the greens, of which there are innumerable.

  He strafes, quietly; stepping with his toes like the Iroquois.

  The underbrush is still. Only the canopy rustles; only the birds chitter.

  He blinks, and pivots, turning to face a wide-eyed gook and an AK-47.

  He leaps back, gasping; his rifle raised and failing to fire.

  The gook remains, inactive; deceased.

  Private Page decompresses, collapsing his shoulders with an exhale. He lowers his gun, checking the inside of the stock: the fire mode was set to ‘S’ for ‘safety.’

  The birds above cackle. He shudders as he breathes deep, recomposing himself. His heart pounds like a war drum—a performance unheard since he last had monsters under his bed; now the antithesis to his composure.

  He leans back against a tree and closes his eyes. He slows his breathing, deeper and longer; in through the nose, and out through the mouth. He listens to his heartbeat, slowing; slowing; steady—and nothing else.

  Absolute silence.

  The birds, too, are quiet.

  Unsettling. Unsettling. Unsettled.

  His eyes flick open with alarm.

  “Out for a hike?” asks a voice, startling the greenhorn despite its familiar, gruff tenor.

  He pivots, lurching; stumbling.

  “Woah, son—new legs?” the voice laughs.

  Pvt. Page looks beyond his resting post: the Candyman approaches.

  The grizzled veteran spots the molting gook. “Huh—am I interrupting?”

  Page rolls his eyes. “You scared the jeepers outta me.”

  “Oh—oh no, ‘the jeepers,’” he feigns. “Sorry about your dungarees—or is that smell coming from your friend?”

  Page looks behind him at the decomposing gook. He turns back, “I don’t know him.”

  “This is a strange conversation and I’d like to end it.”

  “What are you doing out here?”

  “Coming to ask you the same. Is that cliché?”

  “I’m on a patrol.”

  “With your safety engaged?” he points.

  Page looks at his stock again, switching the mode to ‘A.’

  “That’ll do you better.”

  “I don’t need you standing over my shoulder.”

  Candyman nods in disagreement. “Yeah you do, boy. That’s why I had you assigned to my command.”

  “Wait—you drafted me?”

  “No, dumbass,” Candyman winces, “your number was pulled, and I got a call about it from a colleague, so I made sure you’d be deployed to the safest zone of operations: right beside yer dear ol’ dad.”

  “What?” Pvt. Page yelps. “Couldn’t’ve been West Germany? Or Tokyo?”

  “I can’t guarantee your safety in Germany, and who knows how many Nazis are still running around there?”

  Page blenches. “Dad, the Third Reich fell some twenty years ago. You were there!”

  “Oh, I was there,” his eyes narrow, “and I can assure you we didn’t get ‘em all… Eichmann, Mengele, Rudel; Himmler! They all fled to Brazil! Hell, I heard der große Teppichfresser himself was spotted in Argentina!”

  “The who?”

  “Der Führer, Michael. Criminy. How often did you skip school?”

  “I- d-” his throat clamps, “Whaddya talking about—I went everyday! And then I went to college!”

  “Oh—so you’re ‘Mister Diploma’. Well con-grat-u-la-tions.”

  “Um… thanks,” he says flatly.

  “Michael, my boy-”

  “No—not your boy. There’s not a single photo of us together when I was a boy.”

  The corner of Candyman’s mouth twitches and turns down. His eyes look to the distant dirt as his brow pinches and settles low.

  “Aw, jeez,” Michael frowns to grimace, “what is it?”

  “I, uh,” he shifts his weight, “I do regret missing most of your youth… I feel bad about it.”

  “Yeah, well… It happened. I’ve moved on.”

  Candyman nods, stewing in his sorrow. “Say,” he looks to his son, “do you know Heather Claremont?”

  “Who?”

  “She, uh, goes by the name Calypso.”

  “The super?”

  Candyman clicks his tongue to accompany the point of his finger.

  “I know of her, but I don’t know her, obviously.”

  “Do you know if she has a kid?”

  “No?” Michael furrows, “Like I said, I don’t know her; I know of her.”

  “The kid would be about, like, four, or five.”

  “Dad, I don’t know.”

  “I just- it would be nice to know if I had another chance—you know—to raise a son.”

  “Oh,” Michael mews, “that’s… that’s actually quite touching.”

  “Maybe I could be involved in his upbringing, you know? Maybe teach him a few things about life.”

  “Yeah, that… that could be a nice redemption for you, dad.”

  “Maybe I could make sure he was strong, and brave, and not such a little dipshit like you.”

  Mic
hael stares.

  Candyman grins.

  “Fuck you, dad.”

  “Atta boy.”

  ( II | IV )

  “It’s not an issue of ‘should we’—we don’t have that luxury. It’s of ‘when should we.’”

  “Then when fuckin’ should we?”

  “Yesterday,” Candyman growls, chewing on the end of a cigar, “when we had the jump on ‘em.”

  “Isn’t ‘right now’ the closest we have to ‘yesterday’? Shouldn’t we get in there? They’ve had all night to-”

  “I’m not running this pony show, and I’m just as well not breaking the line if it’ll get my ass beat. When the advance is called, we’ll play it smart, but—for now,” he sighs, “we wait.”

  “Guh—I’m getting antsy.”

  “That’s adrenaline. Your primitive brain is telling you to either run away or get in the fray.”

  “Yeah? And which should I do?”

  A flare streaks into the dark sky.

  “Run—into the fray.”

  The reverberant rumble of suppressive gunfire shatters the silence as over a hundred men pour out of the thickets and palms, trickling through the underbrush toward a concrete body in the morass of a lonely stream.

  The bunker erupts, wreathed in sharp staccatic starbursts and a crackling cavalcade of thunderclaps, bangs, and blasts; a commotive exchange that illuminates the jungle clearing, transforming dawn’s glow into daylight.

  The wave of American bodies crashes upon the ravine, plunging into the cold stream—freshly engorged with rainwater—and slogging; their knees high and pumping; their rifles cradled in their arms. The interchange of automatic gunfire washes over them, like bathwater, leaving them as frustrated and exposed as bison treading a mire.

  Candyman directs his platoon around the slaughter, fording the stream at a bend behind a hillock. They rout the mound and down an escarpment—still damp from the evening's downpour—into a sodden gully.

  Sgt. Greene leads his squad—a daisy chain of men, olive-green and dirtied—through the mud-slicked channel. Moving in file, Greene, Page, Price, Sullivan, Dyer, Hudson, Bender, Zagorac, and Miller snake the gully, with Candyman and Radiation Brother close behind, leading the platoon.

  Death hisses and snaps overhead. The branches of listing trees crack and crumble, raining twigs upon their heads.