The Dragon's Return

by Stan Lee

  “Try not to die.”

  Malosi grabbed hold of Maxwell and leaped off the edge.

  Steven rushed after them, with Liam and Roxanne right behind. They reached the edge—then jumped back as a dome whizzed by, dangerously close. Steven fell to the platform, rolled over—

  —and saw the blazing form of the Dragon carrying two figures up and away into the night.

  Liam reached out a hand and helped Steven to his feet. “Think it’s too late to ask him to leave that dingus behind? The one with our powers in it?”

  “Should we go after them?” Roxanne asked.

  Steven stared at her. “How?”

  “Daddy issues,” Liam said, shaking his head. “Seems like I’m the only one without ’em.”

  “Never mind that,” Jasmine said, glancing nervously at the edge. “We need an extraction plan. And we need it fast.”

  “By the way,” Roxanne said, “has anyone noticed that Ox disappeared?”

  “Maybe he tumbled off the side,” Liam replied.

  “Or maybe he’s not so trustworthy after all,” Steven said, his voice dark.

  Liam didn’t answer. He crouched down, sweeping away the remains of some red dirt to peer through the bottom of the transparent platform. It was flying toward the front of the complex, the direction from which they’d first made their assault. The remains of the guard tower that Jasmine had destroyed loomed in the distance.

  And just ahead, building two was still standing. When Steven squinted, he could barely make out the tail of the Zodiac stealth plane, protruding at an angle from the dome’s still-smoking roof.

  Liam stood up. “The plane,” he said. “It might be salvageable.”

  “Great.” Steven stared at him in disbelief. “But how are you gonna get down there?”

  Liam grinned.

  “No,” Steven replied. “Oh, no.”

  Liam sprinted toward the edge. Steven followed, reaching out for him.

  “You’ve got no powers!” Steven cried. “You’ll be killed!”

  They reached the edge just as building two passed underneath. The plane’s tail jutted up out of the dome, not more than a few meters below. They were dropping dangerously fast.

  The platform tipped again, and they both stumbled back. When Liam turned, his face was very serious.

  “I guess we all gotta grow up sometime,” he said. “And Steven, if I don’t make it…”

  Steven swallowed. “Yeah?”

  “Tell the British Army I’m sorry.”

  He turned and dove over the edge.

  Before Steven could even cry out, a burst of acceleration sent him tumbling back toward the center of the platform. He whirled, thinking: Liam. Liam! I’ve got to see if he’s still alive!

  He crawled along the platform, squinting to look down through its surface. As building two flashed past, he thought he saw Liam shimmying down the plane’s fuselage into the hole in the dome. But he couldn’t be sure.

  The ground was passing very fast—and very close. Fires raged all across the complex. A smattering of jeeps and trucks fanned out from the base in all directions as the evacuation order continued.

  Another dome erupted in flames—Steven couldn’t make out its number. Up ahead, past the complex, red desert sand stretched out, broken only by the access road and a small half-wrecked guard booth at the checkpoint.

  “Oh, no,” Jasmine said.

  He turned to look. Toward the middle of the platform, Carlos was marching toward Duane, who still sat in the ruins of the shack.

  “Return of the mad scientist,” Roxanne said grimly.

  Jasmine frowned. “Next time I’ll hit him harder.”

  “Come on,” Steven said.

  They picked their way across the lurching platform. When they reached the shack, Steven stopped, shocked.

  Duane sat on the platform’s surface, surrounded by crystals and circuits. As Steven watched, Duane picked up a stripped wire, licked it once, and recoiled from the live current.

  But that wasn’t the strange part. Carlos stood over Duane, watching him calmly. They were having a discussion.

  “…picked up many of the principles of my work,” Carlos said pleasantly. “I’m impressed.”

  “Thank you,” Duane replied, not looking up. “As always, your conceptual leaps were the difficult part. The engineering is simple.”

  Carlos raised an eyebrow. “It’s not that simple.” He seemed slightly insulted.

  Steven watched in confusion. Roxanne and Jasmine stood with him, one on either side.

  “What is this?” Roxanne whispered.

  “I think…” Steven paused. “It looks like a meeting of minds.”

  “Anyway, you can’t recharge that,” Carlos said. He didn’t seem to have noticed the intrusion. “The battery is fused; you’ll never get enough juice to the field generator.”

  “Not true.” Duane smiled and held up a large battery pack. “It’s a tricky conversion job, but this is all one system. I should be able to patch in the batteries used for the cell door lock.”

  Steven glanced at Jasmine. She stood perfectly still, staring at Carlos. She seemed to be in shock.

  Carlos was staring, too—at the battery pack.

  “That’s true,” he said. His voice was almost a whisper. “It’s possible. Why didn’t I see that?”

  “Perhaps your logic centers have been compromised,” Duane said.

  A hint of panic entered Carlos’s eyes.

  The platform swung wildly again. Carlos stumbled. Several of Duane’s components slid across the ground; he snatched them up easily, without hurrying.

  “By every objective measure, Maxwell is a danger,” Duane said. “To himself, the people around him, and to the world, as well.”

  He turned and looked up at Carlos for the first time.

  “Yet you served him,” Duane continued. “You helped him to achieve nearly limitless power. Does that not indicate a lapse of rationality?”

  “Rationality? No. No, my brain is rational.” Carlos shook his head, a wild look in his eyes. “That’s what my whole life is built around. It’s the essence of who I am.”

  Duane gestured at the sprawling circuits. “You designed all this, right?”

  “Yes.” Carlos nodded very fast. “With my mind.”

  “But you couldn’t see how to repair it.”

  “What is Duane doing?” Roxanne whispered.

  “I think he’s trying to fix a null-gravity generator,” Steven replied.

  “And a man’s mind,” Jasmine breathed.

  Carlos was shaking his head again. He looked down at Duane, almost accusingly. “No,” he said. “No, it’s not true. You’re lying. I am rational. Serving him, serving Maxwell, was a rational choice.”

  Duane worked furiously, connecting wires to circuits. “Maybe I’m not the person you’re trying to convince,” he said softly.

  “You’re lying,” Carlos repeated. “Lying lying liar. LIAR!”

  He whirled and ran off.

  Jasmine started after him but stopped as Duane said one word:

  “Seventeen.”

  Steven looked at him. “What?”

  “I’ve managed to steer us out into an open area,” Duane said, “but I can’t keep the platform from crashing. In about seventeen seconds.” He looked up. “Make that fourteen.”

  Roxanne, Jasmine, and Steven looked at one another.

  “I suggest you fasten your seat belts,” Duane said.

  Roxanne stared at him.

  “That’s supposed to be funny,” he explained.

  Surprisingly, Jasmine laughed. Then she reached out and pulled Roxanne and Steven to the floor. She scooted up against a half-standing wall that had been part of the shack, gathering the others to her like a mother hen.

  “No seat belts,” Jasmine said. “Just us.”

  Steven felt suddenly overcome with emotion. He closed his eyes, partly to brace for the impact and partly so he wouldn’t cry. Despite the danger, th
e loss of their powers, the fire and destruction, it was so good to be back with his friends again.

  Roxanne wrapped her arm around his shoulder. She was singing softly to herself, but he couldn’t make out the melody.

  “Hey, Duane?” Steven called out. Duane was still working furiously, manipulating some sort of makeshift joystick.

  “Yes?”

  “Still not so good with the funny.”

  Six seconds now, Steven thought. Maybe five.

  Duane laughed. “I know.”

  THE PLATFORM CRASHED down edge-first, shaking the ground and sending red earth jetting into the air. A squadron of soldiers jumped out of the way, then leaped into their jeeps and sped away.

  On the platform, Steven clung to Jasmine and Roxanne. The three of them slid across the surface, smashing into Duane.

  Duane grunted and looked up. He sat hunched over his equipment, frantically moving switches and manipulating his patched-together circuitry.

  “We’ve landed,” he said.

  Roxanne stared at him in disbelief. “You think?”

  Jasmine was crouched down, peering through the transparent floor of the platform. “Huh,” she said.

  “What is it?” Steven asked.

  “First thing I did when I got here,” Jasmine said, “was attack a guard tower.”

  “So?”

  “So I think we just landed on it.”

  Steven stood up, and together they walked out to survey the scene. The platform was unsteady, wobbling atop the smashed remains of the guard tower. Dirt had settled across its surface, painting everything a grimy red.

  Duane had managed to land the platform at the front of the complex. Behind them, fires raged and small explosions rose up from the remaining domes. Trucks fanned out all around them, heading into the desert.

  “They’re evacuating,” Steven said. “All of ’em.”

  “Carlos?” Jasmine looked around the platform, almost frantically. “Where’s Carlos?”

  “Steven? You better get back here.” Roxanne said.

  He cast a worried glance at Jasmine, then walked back to the wreckage of the shack. Roxanne stood over Duane, who sat surrounded by jury-rigged machinery.

  “Curious,” he said. “I don’t believe I can move.”

  Steven and Roxanne crouched down together. As Roxanne moved Duane’s jacket aside, Steven gasped. A shard of crystal from the circuitry protruded from a blood-crusted wound in his leg.

  Duane looked up at them. His eyes were unusually wide.

  “Ah,” he said, pointing calmly at the crystal. “That explains it.”

  “He’s in shock,” Roxanne said. “Should we move him?”

  “We can’t stay here,” Steven said. “We’re sitting ducks for any twitchy Vanguard soldiers who haven’t left yet.”

  “Not my best landing,” Duane continued. There was a little blank smile on his face. “But considering the state of the…uhhh…equipment…I think I did all right.”

  Roxanne helped him to his feet. “Come on, brainiac,” she said. “We gotta bounce.”

  Steven helped her drag Duane across the tilted platform. Duane seemed pliant, willing to be led. Like she said: in shock, Steven thought.

  A motion caught his eye. Jasmine was running across the platform, toward the far side—the side that was tipped up a meter or so off the ground. She was heading toward another figure….

  Carlos. He sat on the raised edge of the platform, his legs dangling over the side. He was clutching his head.

  “Come on,” Steven said.

  As they approached Carlos, they could hear him speaking. The words were low, almost like a chant.

  “Doesn’t work,” he said. “It doesn’t add up.”

  Jasmine took a half step toward him. “Carlos?” she called. She sounded scared.

  She really loves him, Steven realized. This must be killing her.

  Carlos turned. His eyes were manic, terrified. He cast a quick look at Steven, then stared up at Jasmine. Slowly, he held up a hand and started counting compulsively on his fingers: One-two-three-four-five, over and over again.

  “Doesn’t add up,” he said again. “Every move has been rational, every step I’ve taken. Yet the outcome is wrong. It’s all wrong.”

  Roxanne approached, with Duane limping after. He seemed more alert now.

  “His mind is rebelling,” Duane said, gesturing at Carlos. “The conditioning—the brainwashing Maxwell gave him. It’s destroying him.”

  Duane stumbled and winced in pain. Roxanne placed an arm around his shoulders to steady him.

  Jasmine crouched down and held out a hand. “Carlos,” she said. “It’s okay. Come with me.”

  He stared into her eyes for a long moment. His expression flashed from terror to hatred, then back to fear.

  He shook his head, turned, and leaped off the platform.

  Jasmine started after him, but Steven grabbed her arm.

  “We can’t,” he said. “We have to go. We don’t have our powers anymore, remember?”

  When Jasmine turned toward him, there was a new kind of desperation in her eyes.

  “I can’t,” she said. “After all this…I can’t abandon him. I just can’t do it.”

  Steven opened his mouth to argue. Then he remembered Horse and Dog. He’d run off on them in the tunnels, left them to be taken by Maxwell’s guards. That guilt had been weighing on him ever since.

  Can I do that again? he thought. And with Carlos—a friend? Even if he’s been brainwashed, turned violently against us?

  “I don’t care about powers,” Jasmine continued. “I don’t even care what happens to me. I can’t leave him.”

  An energy bolt sizzled over their heads. Steven whirled to see a squadron of soldiers on the ground nearby. They were pointing up at the figures on the platform and aiming their weapons.

  Then a flaming piece of debris slammed down right behind the soldiers, knocking them off their feet. Steven couldn’t tell what it was—a hunk of one of the domes, maybe? The soldiers dropped, their weapons clattering to the ground.

  “Lucky break,” Steven said.

  Roxanne looked around, her arm still around Duane. “We gotta find shelter,” she said.

  Jasmine pointed. “There.”

  Steven followed her gaze. In the gloom, he could just barely see Carlos running toward the access road.

  “Come on,” Steven said.

  He and Jasmine jumped off the platform.

  Steven touched down awkwardly, almost twisting his ankle. The Tiger usually helps me land, he realized. I’m not used to being normal!

  He recovered quickly. By the time he caught up with Jasmine, she had a finger to her earpiece.

  “Roxanne, you copy?” Jasmine said. “We’re in pursuit. I think Carlos is heading toward that smashed-down checkpoint station, at the curve in the access road.”

  Suddenly, Steven remembered something. “There’s a tunnel there!”

  “You get that?” Jasmine said into her earpiece. “No?” She turned to Steven, annoyed. “Where’s your radio?”

  “Maxwell kind of took it. Along with my phone. And the rest of my stuff.”

  “Great,” Jasmine said.

  She repeated the information about the tunnel into her radio.

  “I have an oracle bone,” Steven said weakly.

  “That’s very nice.”

  “And, uh, Rat gave me a flip phone.”

  “Rat?” Jasmine repeated. “We’re gonna have a talk about that.”

  A few scattered soldiers passed in front of them. Steven and Jasmine dodged sideways, staying in the shadows.

  Up ahead, Carlos had almost reached the checkpoint. Before the assault, it had been a small booth with windows on all sides, marking the entrance to the Vanguard complex. Now it was a cracked mass of plastic and metal. A guard’s limp body lay draped over the remains of one wall.

  “Carlos!” Jasmine called.

  Carlos didn’t look back. He picked up the guard a
nd tossed him aside. The man landed on the road with a faint moan.

  Then Carlos lifted up a hatch and disappeared into the ground.

  They reached the tunnel entrance. It was open, leading to a dimly illuminated cavern below. Steven hesitated, remembering his previous experience in the Vanguard tunnels.

  “You coming?” Jasmine asked.

  He followed her down, past the rusting pipes in the ceiling, along the dripping stone walls. They landed in a wide area leading to a narrow tunnel that curved rapidly out of view.

  Jasmine peered down the tunnel. “You’ve been down here before?” she asked.

  “Yeah,” he replied. “But I came from the other end. Didn’t make it this far.”

  “Well, there’s only one way he could have gone.”

  She sprinted down the tunnel. Steven followed, stumbling once and glancing off the curved stone wall. Their feet splashed through puddles, the way lit only by old incandescent bulbs spaced at uneven intervals along the walls.

  Slowly, the tunnel widened out. As before, they passed artifacts, stolen treasures crowded into the tunnel for storage. A carved wine server from ancient China. A full-size Egyptian sarcophagus. A pile of very old coins.

  From above, an explosion shook the chamber.

  The whole complex is collapsing, Steven thought. We better find Carlos quick.

  Jasmine pounded forward, staying a few steps ahead of him. She stumbled over something and almost fell. As she stopped, Steven looked down and saw it was a Vanguard soldier, lying unconscious.

  “Huh,” Steven said.

  Jasmine shrugged, turned, and started running again.

  They passed two more soldiers, both out cold on the tunnel floor. And then something familiar loomed up ahead. A huge Sherman tank, wedged in so tightly that it almost blocked the passageway.

  “I’ve been here before,” Steven began. Then Jasmine stopped dead in front of him, so suddenly that he almost slammed into her.

  Carlos stood in front of the tank. His face was dirty, his eyes wide with madness. He raised a Vanguard energy rifle.

  “Stay back,” he said. “Stay away.”

  Jasmine took a step forward. “Carlos,” she said.

  “My brain,” Carlos said. “Its components are faulty.”

  “No,” Jasmine said. “Not the components.”

  “But it doesn’t work.” He shook his head rapidly, as if trying to knock something loose.