Several of the ASH team wandered around, doing their best “I’m a badass” impression. I counted eight total. Six had those new hoversleds I’d been reading about, which made up for the missing flying superheroine. The other two rode around in a Promethia armored van, because that’s what looks cool.
Dozer and Discus also arrived on those hoversleds. I’d heard that the East Coast team was using them, but this was the first time I’d seen the Gulf Coasties with them.
I tried not to be nervous, figuring that my new harder edged attitude on life and death would have gotten rid of the jitters.
It didn’t.
Preferring to put my plan into action slightly more rested, I considered letting them go on their merry way, but it came back to the old saying of “shit or get off of the pot.” I’d gotten more than my fair of shit, so it was time to give a little back.
I flew from the abandoned waterfront warehouse to the entrance of a bank about two miles from where they were. My guess was that the ones in the van would drive over, but the rest would run or use their nifty little Promethia issued toys. They’d been checking out the other crime scene for a couple of hours and would be getting bored, or hungry. I figured I’d make them run a little, spread them out a bit, and take them in manageable chunks for a while, because twelve against one seemed a tad unsportsmanlike.
Kicking in the doors, I watched the lunchtime line scatter as I walked up to the teller windows. They had a nice big sheet of bulletproof material separating us. I reached under the little slot with one hand and yanked. The owners of the bank hadn’t sprung for the armored suit proof glass and a whole section of it came away.
Pointing my hand and making the discharge nozzle of my force blaster glow, I pointed at the nearest teller, a man, and tossed him a bag.
“You! Fill! Now!”
He caught the bag and looked sufficiently frightened. I pointed at a female teller. “You, get your purse and toss it in the bag.”
The woman looked confused. “Why?”
“Because, if J. Crew here tosses in a tracking device or a dye bag, I’m going to need to come and kill someone. I’ve selected you. Old J. here looks pretty heroic and I’m sure if I told him to toss his wallet in, he’d do it, but you’ve got a ring, probably a couple of rugrats, and look friendly enough; he’s not going to sign your death warrant. Are you J. Crew?”
The horrified man dumped the bag out onto the floor and I watched the dye pack explode all over his khakis and the cash.
“Smart kid,” I said. I waited another minute while he filled and the woman brought her purse.
“Just your wallet ma’am. I don’t need the whole thing; don’t want your cell phone or the GPS inside of it. All this goes well and I’ll drop it in the mail in a couple of days. If it goes poorly, well, then I’ll return it in person. Neither of us wants that now, do we?”
It was actually kind of fun inspiring this kind of fear. I gave it a minute more before saying, “Alrighty, that’s enough! I figure my friends a few streets over will be here soon, so I need to go and greet them.”
Grabbing the bag and dropping it in the cargo pod, I guessed I had between thirty and fifty grand, lame really, but it seemed wrong to walk away empty handed. If the place had bought one of the magic trackers, it would be in the vault, because the drawers in the front would only be given to run of the mill armed robbers. They’d get dye bags and electronic tracking devices, not the voodoo that youdoo.
Jogging out through another one of the windows, I added to the property damage and ran over to the cars stopped at the light. I pushed a Ford F-150 over onto the hood of a VW and, so the people on the Chevy side of the Ford versus Chevy rivalry wouldn’t feel left out, I roughed up a Tahoe as well.
Fair is fair, I figured. Watching people flee.
I also figured that at least one of the Coasties would stop to check for injuries, like the predictable heroes they were. Patterson’s crowd was probably instructed to ignore any civilians and proceed to the target. They were here to test weapons and not save lives and I got that, but wondered if the do-gooders understood the distinction. Somehow, I didn’t think so.
My onboard systems detected the first three flyers inbound and pulled the grenade launcher off my back and sent a few rounds of tear gas into traffic to add to the confusion, finding that people milling around made this more interesting. The launcher was one of those six-round types that the police and military, along with the criminals, have. It was disposable as far as I was concerned and the serial numbers had long since been removed.
The first three flyers circled about thirty feet from me. They wore standard Promethia security garb that consisted of a protective vest, with an internal forcefield emitter, over coveralls and a kevlar helmet. It cut down on their mobility, but offered a decent amount of protection. It looked like they could drive the sled with one hand while the other operates a weapon from a pintle mount. The arrangement didn’t exactly allow for the greatest amount of accuracy, but they looked fairly comfortable doing it.
Whatever they were shooting was colorless. The impacts on my shields were registering something and that bothered me, so I stayed on the ground, but began dodging and tossing some force blaster shots to make them interested.
What are they shooting at me? Surface temp is spiking. I swept the low end of the spectrum first. It’s not radioactive, or infrared. Wait! Got something around two point five millimeter wavelength and one hundred and sixty-five gigahertz. MAZERS! They’re trying to nuke me with microwaves? Oh, hell. No!
I couldn’t picture Patterson coming up with this bucket of nastiness. That meant Joe was angrier than I thought about the thing with his house; like he really spends time there anymore! I reinforced my shields, deciding not to let them cook me alive and began returning fire in earnest.
Clipping one of the sleds with a level three burst, it yawed wildly, but had shield generators of its own, probably calibrated specifically for my force blasters.
Hadn’t been expecting that! Let’s see how they...what’s that?
The two newly arrived sleds were making a beeline toward me about twenty feet apart. My scanners picked up a sizeable energy mass directly between them, some kind of energized net and they were releasing it!
I didn’t take the time to consider if it was a suit style taser or something worse. Instead of triggering my jetpack and trying to fly up, I did my best powersuit belly flop and triggered a four second burst from my flight system.
It definitely scratched the paint job, but the net hit a tree and exploded. Plasma web, not a taser then. They’re definitely trying to kill me.
“Surrender now, villain!” Discus’ voice boomed.
“Your buddies don’t look like they’re interested in my surrender, Graham!” I yelled pulling myself off the ground. The microwave assault began anew. “You might want to ask them about Patterson’s orders.”
I didn’t wait for him to answer and went airborne, wondering what the top speed on those sleds happened to be. The two who’d tried to drop the plasma net of doom were hovering and connecting a second net to their sleds.
Let’s see if their shields can handle this! Maximum burst!
One of the pilots saw my torrent of energy coming at them and jumped. That’s when I realized these two didn’t have shields or had to drop them to hook up their net. The blast ruptured the magnetic plasma bottle and that willow tree from a minute ago was avenged in style. Both sleds detonated. The one who saw it coming was blown onto the upended Tahoe. His partner was vaporized. I high tailed it toward the warehouse near the waterfront. Things were a bit stickier than I’d hoped for and it was time to bring in my assistant.
Guess I can’t hide behind the—I’ve never killed anyone defense anymore. The other one’s not moving either, scratch two. Screw ‘em. They’re practicing for the Overlord. He wouldn’t show them any mercy.
The final hoversled arrived on the scene as I departed. It had a dish mounted on the front of it. Care to gu
ess where it was pointed? My ECM systems screamed missile lock and my scanners detected a launch farther back.
“Missile launch detected,” Vicky’s voice said in my ear. It was one of the few sound bites she’d recorded for me. She’d giggled, trying to stifle a laugh when she did. It wasn’t the way I wanted to hear her again.
Must’ve come from the van. Launching missiles in the middle of a city. What could possibly go wrong here?
The sleds weren’t as fast as I was, but the missile was gaining on me—something I wasn’t too keen on. I skimmed the rooftop of a building and used my blasters to blow up the air conditioning unit on top of the building sending a hail of improvised chaff skyward.
Something caught the warhead and the weapon exploded. I felt sorry for the people who might be in the offices just below us, but considering the wash of the detonation tossed me off course and took a ten percent chunk of my shields with it, I was more concerned about myself, thank you very much.
Regaining control, I flew toward the warehouse and decided that the sled with the tracking gear was my priority target.
Flying into the open skylight, I rocketed to the far end and landed on the rafters to wait for my quarry to arrive. From there, I sent the activation code to my understudy. Tweedledum waited in the center of the warehouse, poised for a fake last stand. He had some decorative plastic injection mold armor over top of his frame that made him look decidedly like the Mark II armor. His “force blasters” were just plasma pistols modified to look like my weapons. They might even be more effective against the shielding the hunters were using.
I cut my systems and only had to wait about thirty seconds as my stand in moved toward the entrance. The missile sled arrived first with the microwave ones right behind. Patterson’s people obviously had more practice on the sleds than the superheroes, or the Gulf Coasters stopped to help people like the good little protectors of society they are.
Dum fired away, to little effect. He did score a couple of hits. They probably think I have some kind of double barreled action going on in my gauntlets.
The robot was holding up pretty well against the microwave attack. His internals were less susceptible to cooking than mine. Even so, I guess I should have used something more sturdy than plastic.
“Missile launches detected,” Vicky’s voice said once more.
Dum didn’t try to dodge. Instead he stopped firing and turned his head toward me and I felt a momentary pang of regret for putting him there.
When that half of the warehouse went kablooey, I felt a little sad, but relieved at the fact that I was still alive and able to feel that way about an oddly defective robot.
It’s almost tempting to just fake my death and slip away. Patterson would think his anti-armor weapons were da bomb.
“Maybe some other day,” I growled and kicked on my systems. On my comms, I heard the ASH team calling up the van so they could confirm the kill over an open channel. Discus was ripping the man a new ass for using that kind of weaponry over a populated area. Strangely enough, I agreed with him.
I went out through the broken ceiling and used the smoke cloud to cover my approach. Thermal imaging was a bit of a wash, but I could make out roughly where they were.
Like an avenging angel, well I guess I can’t really say that term would apply; I broke through the wall of smoke and found myself staring into the disbelieving eyes of the guy who’d fired three missiles at me today. He was hovering and that was the last mistake he’d ever make. I rammed him. Sure, the shielding helped and did a number on mine too, but the impact separated him from the sled and he did the three story two and a half twist into the pavement. I gave him points for sticking the landing, because he didn’t make a big splash.
The others were screaming over the open channel. “He’s still alive! Negative impact! Hunter One is down!”
The two remaining sleds tried to reposition. I hit one with a level five and his shielding collapsed. His sled went down, with him fighting for control. I circled around and engaged the remaining ASH, who had turned to flee back toward where the Guardians were.
I clipped him and forced him to land on a building near where the first missile had nearly gotten me.
As he ran for the door leading back into the building, I landed between him and it.
“Don’t do it, Stringel!” A bolt of electrical energy smacked against my shields and Discus leapt off his sled, executing a nice little combat roll. He came up between me and the ASH agent, already creating a pair of protective energy discs.
Nice move! Almost makes me wish I’d taken up gymnastics, I thought before saying, “Are you regretting taking Patterson’s help yet, Graham? This isn’t going to look good on the six o’clock news.”
“You bear as much responsibility for what just happened as they do,” he replied and threw his discs. I dodged one, but his aim was too good for me to stop both.
“Yeah, but I’m the villain. You need to ask yourself who they are,” I shot back, both with my answer and a level three at the ASH running toward the fire escape. Predictably, Discus jumped in front and ate my blast with a freshly created set of discs. It still had to hurt. As cool as Graham’s power was, it meant getting hit way too often. I’d still take his abilities if I had the chance. Combined with my armor and my shields, I would be unbreakable.
Continuing, I said, “I’ve seen all I needed to see here. Patterson’s weapons aren’t much better than anything else out there. Send them back with their tails between their legs and I won’t...”
From out of nowhere, She-Dozer landed on top of me and hit me...hard. It was so hard, it knocked me off the side of the building. I’d gotten cocky and arrogant. Bad things usually happen at those times in my life and this was no exception.
Activate flight system! I directed the suit over the warbling of the master alarm. Silence master alarm.
Checking my almost depleted shields, I flew back over top of the building. Discus was climbing back on his sled and Sheila dropped into a fighting stance, daring me to come at her.
I started to and stopped myself. My internal monologue sounded a lot like Vicky. What the hell are you thinking, Cal? The suit is already dinged up.
“We’re done here for today, Guardians,” I announced. “Next time you won’t be nearly as lucky.”
I flew away, knowing that I’d already done too much damage to the armor for one day and that I should’ve gotten more than I did from that bank. I’d also lost Tweedledum, which meant a little more work around the junkyard for me until I could steal a replacement. Patterson’s suit hunting weapons couldn’t really be turned back against him—at least by me. I didn’t have a team and a mobile launching platform to go after Ultraweapon. The microwaves were a neat trick, but I could solve that by installing a variable frequency output module on my shield generators, so I could shift it against attacks calibrated for my shields. My guess is Patterson’s suit already had those.
The only good to come out of all this was my ruse would make Joe, and his boss, believe those weapons were less effective than they actually were. The deaths and property damage would be blamed on me, but Promethia would take a hit in the public eye and I couldn’t picture the Gulf Coasters being so willing to let Lazarus send another team of hired thugs down here.
• • •
Arriving back at my base, I sent Paul West a quick note asking if he’d been able to pull his head far enough out of his ass to catch my performance today. I added that if his people wanted my footage of Patterson’s weaponry from the battle to make me a decent offer.
Today, I’d killed several people. The first two had been mostly by accident, but the third one was intentional. I thought it would be some major revelation, that I’d come out the other side a different person. Instead, I seemed to be pretty much the same apathetic asshole that I’d been this morning.
Truth be told, I was more upset about losing Tweedledum and it made me wonder if I was a guy in a powersuit, or a set of powered armor that
had to spend most of his time in a human suit.
Had I checked out on the human race?
Vicky probably could have helped me through it. All those jokes about a rolodex of hitmen made me wonder how many times she’d put it to use. But she wasn’t there to help me reflect, so I just went on about my business and wondered if I was on the verge of becoming a homicidal lunatic like Eddie.
Two hours after I sent the message, I saw a new one in my inbox. It wasn’t from Paul though. It was from Major Disaster, the spokesman for General Devious. It appeared that I was back on the hiring radar faster than I’d imagined.
Mechanical,
Congratulations on your fight with the Gulf Coast Guardians and the Promethia team augmenting them. As you may know, I am the aide de camp of General Devious. The General has decided that it is time to take the fight en masse to the superheroes once and for all. HORDES, or, Heroes Overmatched by Rampaging Destructive Executioner Squads, is intended to be an army of supervillains and you are being offered a place in it. Based on your capabilities and the mutual dislike of Lazarus Patterson you and the General share, she wants you to be part of the team that attacks the West Coast Guardians.
I overlooked the slight on my name and continued reading with interest. The message went on to list the fee I would be paid. It was decent, but I was already sold on the idea. With a team at my side, maybe I could bring down the mighty Ultraweapon once and for all!
Chapter Fifteen
HORDES Spelled Backwards is FAIL
It took two months for Devious to actually assemble her army. When most people think about villains, they believe we’re more organized and always have our next plan ready. They actually believe that the reason we are more successful is that we don’t have all the red tape following us around.
That’s a load of crap if ever there was one. Yeah, there’s less bureaucracy, and God help me if I ever have to deal with what heroes have to deal with, but our side of the fence has problems of our own!
Origins of a D-List Supervillain Page 22
