The Negative Man: Act 1

by Jeremy Croston

  “Of course Mr. Staley.” The phone went dead and I knew Becky was in good hands. With that taken care of, I went back to my research.

  Some more digging into the four other people in the photograph gave me names; Ervin Masters, Barbra Constance, Wendy Chalmers, and Nick Parson. Each had a very different background, yet one thing in common. Their birthdays were all around the time of the nuclear disasters. And just like that, I cracked the code of the SVIS.

  I thought I’d be happier about it, but I felt let down. Granted, I never considered them much of a threat to start with, but to find them all in less than five minutes seemed to be a letdown. This was just more proof this wouldn’t be a challenge, not like The Dark Lion. He was an adversary worth fighting, worth putting everything you had into.

  I printed off my findings and put them in my pants pocket. As I got up to go take a walk, two figures were walking around the top floor. I exited my office to greet them. “Well hello Becky, I see you’re making yourself at home.”

  The girl was a spitting image of her father. “Of course Jericho, I told you I’d keep eyes on you, to make sure you didn’t follow in his footsteps.”

  “I’m a man of my word.”

  The boy who was with her looked a tad older, maybe seventeen, eighteen tops. He looked really familiar too, but I couldn’t place it. He kept his eyes low and shook my hand rather politely. “I’m a friend of Becky’s. I hope it’s cool she brought me along.”

  Kids interested in technology warmed my frosty heart. “Of course it is! Make sure the two of you go check out R&D sometime today. I think they’ve got the newest game up and running for the Predator.”

  “We know you’re busy sir, but thanks for letting us look around.”

  I liked this boy, respectful and he had a thirst for knowledge written all over him. “You kids have fun. Come find me later if you have any questions.”

  I bid them a farewell and took the elevator down to Legal. Lunch and revealing the identity of the supers to Heather might get some excitement back. The Legal floor was buzzing, with copyrights and patents flying between offices for signatures and research. I found Heather in her office reviewing the patent for the game I told the kids about. “Jericho? We weren’t supposed to have a meeting were we?”

  “Nah, I figured I’d come save you from boredom with a quick lunch. Plus I have some files I’d like to go over with you.”

  She seemed happy for the chance to get out of her office. “You want to try the Chinese place two blocks over?”

  Everyone at Wonder-Tech knew the two of us were engaged in a relationship, but keeping it professional was paramount to me. I wasn’t running the company like John had, yet I found myself going back to the things he taught me. Was it weird to hold a dead enemy in such high esteem?

  The sun was high as we got outside. Thankfully my newest sunglasses were up to the task. Imbedded in the left lens was an interface that when activated gave me identification on anyone I passed. I’d been able to hack into the FBI’s facial recognition database and thankfully as corrupt as the government was, there wasn’t anyone who didn’t register. But I didn’t need that today. Just the superior UV blocking they provided.

  The Chinese place wasn’t very busy, as it was still too early for the traditional lunch hour. The waitress was happy to escort us to a table in the back and I appreciated the low lighting the restaurant provided. As soon as we ordered our drinks, I pulled out what I was hoping would excite her. “I found them.”

  She pulled the picture closer. “A bowling team?” Then she looked closer. “Is that Mike Blackfield?”

  “One and the same. Which means his bowling team must be the SVIS guys.” I sat back and folded my arms, victory in hand.

  She pushed it back over to me, happiness radiating off her. “With this, we can eliminate them in one swoop. We should go visit that bowling alley on Wednesday and put an end to them.”

  I didn’t know if they still had the team, but I got the feeling these four probably had nothing else to hold on to. Even so, I wasn’t about to go crazy in the middle of a populated area. “No, we draw them out and take them down in a very public fight. Since we know who they are, we can discover what buttons to push to lure them in.”

  “Does this mean I’ll be part of the fight?”

  I did promise her that as soon as we found them, she’d be able to participate. “Yeah, which means I’ll probably need to design a battle suit for you. Even though they aren’t the sharpest knives in the drawer, they are still supers and can still deal damage. Plus we need to keep your identity a secret.”

  She clapped her hands together, very giddy about the chance to get a real super human suit. “After lunch, I’ll email you some ideas on what I want for a suit. Color scheme and materials, you know? A girl still needs style.”

  Her excitement lit a small spark in me. Also the chance to design a new battle suit from scratch intrigued me. I knew getting complacent was bad, especially with the Predator project closing in on its timeframe. I needed to be at one hundred percent when I began challenging multiple places. I needed to break out of this funk.

  After we ate and returned to the office, another idea hit me. “A lackey, that’s what I’m missing.” And the perfect candidate hit me. I went back on the web and dove in, searching for clues about the burglar known as Hammerspace. Knowing his M.O., I found a string of unsolved thefts that Grimes was chalking up to my new friend.

  I searched through photos, his image still in my mind’s eye from our encounter. Luck was on my side today, because for the second time, I got a match. Shawn Jordan, petty thief who disappeared from the scene three years ago. The same mischievous face that took my watch was on my computer screen. And thanks to the miracle of public records, I had a telephone number too.

  I emailed Heather Mr. Jordan’s number and asked her to trace it. A minute later she responded with an address – 1161 Crest Ave. I put up my out of office; I had a business meeting to attend.

  Chapter 5 –

  Tuesday Afternoon; The Grab N Grub

  It turned out my new favorite burglar worked as a line cook at a fast food restaurant. Talk about unexpected surprises. I went inside and the place was slammed, even a couple hours after lunch people were still grabbing burgers and fries to go. I wondered how the citizens of this city would feel knowing the guy making the food was not just a super, but one who enjoyed terrorizing them?

  I walked up to the front counter and placed an order for a milkshake. As I was paying, “Is there a Shawn Jordan that works here?”

  The girl taking my order pointed back to the kitchen area. “Yeah, he’s back there right now.”

  I put my credit card back in my wallet. “If you could tell him someone’s here to see him, that’d be fantastic.”

  She shrugged her shoulders and made my milkshake. “I’ll tell him, but he’s rude as hell. You’ve been warned.”

  I thanked her for the info and took my drink. Something about this guy told me as soon as he heard someone was looking for him, he’d run out the back. Little did he know that’d be playing right into my hand. So as I went around the building, sipping on the vanilla goodness in a cup, I saw the man who stole my watch quickly exit the back door.

  There was a power line running above us, giving me an easy supply of electricity to use. Tapping into the buzzing juice above me, I arced a fence around the sneaky little thief. He yelped as he almost ran into it and would’ve been fried before I even had the chance to reintroduce myself.

  His eyes were bloodshot and terrified as I approached. As soon as my face came into view, recognition hit him. “You! You’re a damn powered too!”

  “Not just any powered person Hammerspace, ‘the’ powered person of Pacific Station.”

  It was a thrill to see everything come together from his point of view. He dropped to his knees, looking like he was ready to beg for his life. “Please, I had no idea you were him.”

  He couldn’t even bring himself to say my
real name. “Come on, it won’t kill you to say The Negative Man. The name’s not jinxed or anything sinister.”

  “You kill people like me, every day!”

  It was true that I wasn’t a big fan of disorder. Lack of control was a surefire sign a civilization was no better than the animals in which we came from. “You mistake what I do. Don’t think of it as killing; I purge the city of the bad elements. If you can understand that concept, I think I have uses for you.”

  Whether it was fear or some semblance of understanding, he told me what I needed to hear. “I totally get it Mr. Negative Man sir. I know I can be useful to you and your cause.”

  I snapped my fingers and the electricity disappeared, freeing him. “Good. As luck would have it, I already have a task for you.”

  He seemed suspicious about that, until he realized again who he was dealing with. “Of course boss man, whatever you need.” I enjoyed his can do attitude, even if it was just for show. “Let me guess, you need something burgled…?”

  “Oh no, there’s nothing you can steal that’d be of use to me, at least not yet.” I pulled the paper out with the SVIS names and pictures. “No, what I need is just some recon work. Find out as much as you can about these four people and report back to me in a few days. That should be pretty simple.”

  He took the paper and looked it over. “Anything in particular about these four that strikes your interest?”

  “Yes and no, but nothing you need to concern yourself with. But if you find something interesting,” I pulled a stack of hundreds out of my back pocket, “and don’t get caught, you’ll find yourself a few dollars richer.”

  Greed, the ultimate motivator. “You got it. Where should I meet you when you’re ready for my findings?”

  “Don’t worry my new friend, I’ll find you.”

  ****

  As I was walking back into Wonder-Tech Tower, Becky and her friend were on their way out. “Did you guys enjoy the visit?”

  “Yeah, the stuff you’re coming up with is amazing.” With kids it’s hard to tell if they’re blowing smoke up your ass or being serious. “Those games look almost as good as the next gen console ones.”

  “I’m glad I continue to amaze you Miss Walker.” I waved once more at them as they wandered off into the street. Part of me was curious as to if she’d become a super like her dad. I hadn’t seen anything that confirmed anything, but each person’s development is unique.

  I felt good about Hammerspace being on the job. Getting intel on those four would be easy and if he handled it well, I could move him on to the mysterious Titan. An actual smile formed on my face, not one of those forced ones I use when talking to people. Feeling alive again, I reached my office, ready to keep the good vibes going.

  As I pulled my chair out, I found a manila folder underneath on the floor. That was odd, I never used them, so it couldn’t have come from my office. I picked it up and opened it. There was a bunch of faded papers, littered with notes everywhere.

  At first, I didn’t really pay much attention as I breezed through the stuff. It looked like equations and other gibberish some scientist had been working on. About three quarters of the way through, a name hit me, one I hadn’t seen in a very long time: Dr. Leonard Cooper.

  For a long time Dr. Cooper was in charge of my growth. As a child, I’d been trapped in that research facility and experimented on. The only person who gave two shits about me was Dr. Ellison Staley. I respected him so much I even took his last name. My mother, ashamed of her involvement in the electron generator explosion, never wanted me to live in the family’s shame.

  But Cooper, the man was an agent of evil. He tried desperately to get them to terminate me on a number of occasions, only to be stone walled by Dr. Staley and the government agents. When that didn’t work, he attacked the facility. Many people died during his raid – he used hired contractors as his private army. In the end, I was lucky to escape thanks to the only man who ever really cared about me.

  It was all for naught though. A few years later Cooper found us. In cold blood, he killed Dr. Staley and left him for dead. Then like a coward he ran, not even sticking around to face me like a man. Fate, and me, would catch up to him a few years later. And when I did, I made sure his sins were paid in full.

  Cooper had always been afraid of what I could do, how I could harm this country’s way of life. What he never understood, even when I found him years later and exacted revenge, is that he created the monster he feared. If the foolish man hadn’t gone out of his way to treat me like dirt and murder my only friend, he might still be alive and The Negative Man wouldn’t be here. So actually, I should’ve thanked him. Without his hatred, I never would’ve embarked on this quest to save people from themselves.

  Seeing his name on the research caused me to dig a little deeper when reading. From the looks of it, he was trying to work out a formula that involved an attack that broke the sound barrier. All of his hypothetical experiments ended in failure until the very last one. What I read, I couldn’t even believe.

  He wagered that if one super was fully charged at one hundred percent and was hit by an attack that broke the sound barrier, both powered people would die. He went deeper, deducing that this was the only way to effectively kill a powered individual who contained an extraordinary amount of negative energy. Only by using an attack that fast would it disrupt the electrical signature and cause his body to explode. The fall out would leave a path of destruction for miles, almost like a nuclear bomb – only the energy released would arc out in the form of lightning. He called this effect ‘The Stormfall.’

  The rest of his notes were random remarks trying to find someone with the skill to create such an attack. His final reasoning was if someone either could fire off a projectile from a short range or gifted with extraordinary reflexes, that those would be the two best candidates. Reflexes like The Dark Lion possessed by my guess. And even he couldn’t do something like that, right?

  I fell into my seat, shocked at what I’d read; Cooper had created a surefire way to destroy me. At least it was a very well-constructed hypothesis on how to. I got the feeling someone knew who I was and left this behind as a way to taunt me. I looked out the window on to the city. Any one of the people walking around had the knowledge to kill me. Maybe I should’ve been scared, but the idea of death made me feel alive again.

  Chapter 6 –

  Tuesday Night; St. James Cathedral

  “Jericho my son, this isn’t normal behavior.”

  Father Reigart wouldn’t understand of course, but he was my confidant. And this night, I needed someone to speak with. “I know it’s not normal Father, but the thrill is back, a zest for life. There’s someone out there who willingly taunted me, who knows how to kill me.”

  I couldn’t tell if he chuckled or sighed, maybe a bit of both. “You act is if you’re almost immortal.”

  “I am.” Well that was a bit dramatic, but to date no one had been successful in ending my life. “Can I die from old age? Most likely, but the energy inside me protects me. Even when I’m on the brink, the spark never dies.”

  There was no mistaking the gasp the kindly giant of a man gave this time. “You’re telling me if I shot you in the head, you’d survive?”

  It was a valid question, one I couldn’t answer. “I’ve been beaten up by supers, taken their full power and yet here I am today. Most people thought Jericho Staley should’ve died after the beating The Aces laid on me last year.”

  “I had read about that. They were barely able to revive you, were they not?”

  That was the same night I killed Deputy Mayor Martinez. “That was a stretch, but yes, I wasn’t in the best of shape, yet I still was able to assassinate my target.” By doing so, I was also able to hide my quick recovery. The doctor’s assumed the attack that killed Martinez miraculously helped heal me. “In the end, I was in no danger of dying, my powers made sure of it.”

  It was times like this where I knew the good Father was questionin
g his oath of silence. He probably was wishing he could tell the police everything, yet due to his religion the oath stood firm. It was sort of amusing to know I could share everything with no repercussions. “Jericho, I know I’m bound by my ethics never to reveal what happens in confession, yet the more we talk, the more I worry about you.”

  “I’m not sure why you’re worried Father. Worst case, The Negative Man dies and the city goes back to the hellhole it was before me.”

  He came close to the window dividing us. There were wrinkles around his eyes, worry lines. “I know you’re a good man, a good man who has chosen the wrong way of expressing it. It’s not too late to seek change.”

  It was my turn to smile as my time with him was coming to an end. “I’m not a good man Father, but thanks for lying to me.”

  ****

  Heather was out with a few people from Legal, maintaining her normal lifestyle. Somehow, I found myself in Waves Park, standing in front of the memorial dedicated to The Dark Lion. Hell if I could tell you why I came here, but something pulled me to this location. I stood there, staring at the stone figure of my mentor.

  At the bottom of the memorial was a touching tribute to the man who died protecting this city from me. Whoever had made this statue did an excellent job; everything from his cape to the goggles on his head was spot on. It seemed fitting for us to meet again like this.

  “I don’t know that I believe in the afterlife John, but if there is one, I hope you’re at peace.” There weren’t any clouds in the sky, yet off in the distance heat lightning danced across the black. Maybe that was a signal from him. “I’ll never regret my actions, especially against a foe as worthy to me as you were.”

  Across the park, another flash caught my eye. This wasn’t heat lightning, yet it was producing a lot of light. Curious, I ventured into the trees and tried to get an up close view of this new spectacle. The closer I got, I began to hear something similar to whirling gears. It could’ve been mistaken for one of those electric cars.