Meta Zero One

by Moss, Martin J

  “God yes, the tits on her, I've never seen anything like it, especially in that metallic low cut outfit she wears, and believe me I've seen thousands. But that woman really should have shaved her underarm hair, drank less beer and ate less garlic. Jesus how she stank. I could smell her a mile away, literally, the thought of sleeping with her, making her more and more sweaty. No way on this or any other planet.”

  “Oh,” Margaret suddenly became aware of her own body, her own odour.

  “Indeed,” John Smith smiled again, evilly, “you stink less than most I have to say Margaret, take that as a compliment. So imagine, if you can, living in a world where almost everyone around you makes you gag. Imagine that you can hardly bear to look at your wife or your friends, where you can hear every burp, every gurgle, and where you can't shut it off.”

  “I can't imagine how that would feel.”

  “No you can't, so don't even try to stretch your extremely tiny little intellect on the problem. You just need to know, it’s started to drive me more than a little mad recently. But I digress, so going back in time a bit, as I said before, I came here in 1934 or so I am told. I was carried here in a tiny spacecraft for billions of miles and millions of years. Held in stasis until the craft found a world where the inhabitants were biologically similar enough to make procreation at least a viable if not necessarily pleasant option. The landing, or more accurately the crash landing, in a field in Nebraska, was witnessed by a passing steelworker from Pittsburgh and his wife. They found me, and with the help of some judicious lies about a dead sister and an adoption, they brought me up.”

  “What happened to them?”

  “They died, I killed them of course.”

  “Bloody hell!”

  “Yes, indeed, bloody hell, how British of you. I didn't murder them, if that's what you are thinking; no I didn't murder them, well not directly anyway. No, I was 13 when my powers first manifested and unfortunately the first one to develop was my laser vision. I flash fried both of them over the dinner table, between the beef casserole and the apple-pie. God how I hated mum’s apple-pie. Perhaps that's why the laser vision manifested then, to stop me having to eat that vile slop. I sat there for a while, starring at their blackened crisped bodies. I wasn't sure what to do you see. So anyway, I just sat there for three hours before the government agents who had been seemingly, following every stage of my life until then burst through the door and took me away.”

  “They took me away, covered up their deaths, blamed it on a house fire I believe. So from then on I was brought up on a military base, by a team of scientists, soldiers and other highly trained Government operatives, or, spies to you.”

  “That must have been hard for you,” Margaret said.

  “Hard, no, it wasn't at all, it was great. Whatever I wanted I got, drink, food, sex, whatever I asked for, it was just brilliant. And if the odd hooker was crushed before I learned to control my powers, then tough, the government covered it up. I spent thirty five years drunk and shagging whatever I wanted, it was every teenager’s wet dream. After a while I did covert work for the government, assassinations of dictators, taking down Russian spy planes, even some stuff on American soil. So I got to fuck pretty girls, kill people and blow stuff up, it was great.”

  “Then?”

  “Then it was the 1980's, big hair and shoulder pads you're too young to really remember it. The cold war was pretty much over and I was terminally bored, so I left. I was 55 human years old looked 25 and getting sick of it all. To be honest I wanted some freedom, I wanted to be normal. I was stupid really, normal, I could never be truly normal, but that's what I thought I wanted at the time. I told them I wanted to leave, and since the government is terrified of me, they agreed, in the end anyway. They took some persuading of course and I had to kill a few people to make them listen to me, but it was well worth it in.”

  “A few?”

  “12,365 in truth, it was one hell of a wild afternoon. But it persuaded the powers that be, that I could pretty much do what I wanted, and that they couldn't stop me even if they wanted to. That they were better being on my side than against me.”

  “And what did you do next?”

  “Got me a life, bummed around a bit, saw a bit more of the world. I lived a normal life or at least as much of a normal life as I could for a few years. The government always kept track of me and eventually they set me up with a job as an accountant, and I settled down. I met my wife and tried to get on with being a normal everyday human being.”

  “What happened then?” Margaret knew that she was hearing a story that no one else on earth had ever heard, so she listened hard, desperate to get her notebook but not daring to move.

  “It was about then that I got into the hero business, so would be about six years ago. It was more by accident than any design on my part. Samantha, my late wife, she was a journalist, I hardly knew her to be honest. My firm just did her papers’ accounts. She was coming back from a story when her helicopter crashed on the roof. Typically she fell through the door and was hanging on by her fingertips. I happened to be walking past the building, it was random chance really. Before I knew it I'd covered my face with a scarf and was flying up at super speed to save her.”

  “She gave you your name didn't she?”

  “Yes, in the paper the next day she called me her Guardian and the name just stuck. I don't know why but I just carried on, I got a suit made, and started saving people. Then I couldn't stop.”

  “Why, if you hate us so much, if we are so beneath you, why did you carry on saving us?”

  “It's simple; have you ever felt real gratitude, real un-questioning love Ms Mason?”

  “I don't know, I think so, I've been in love, is that the same thing?” she asked.

  “It may be, well love, it's addictive, it's the greatest rush in the world and saving someone's life that's what you get in return, it feels fantastic. Once you have felt it you want to feel it again and again.”

  “So you are saying you became addicted to what, saving people?”

  “To the way it made me feel, yes. At first it was people falling off buildings, being mugged, car accidents that sort of thing. Then other heroes started appearing, with super villains as well, and the rush got bigger and better. It was almost like the world had been waiting for my arrival; waiting for me to appear and then it started creating powered heroes and villains all around me. They started cropping up all over the world, hundreds of them. As you know we formed the League of Heroes to deal with the bigger threats, and I carried on saving people day-to-day. For a while it was great, wonderful, every day I would get the unquestioning adoration of hundreds of people.”

  “Then?”

  “The first faker I know for sure was about two years ago. Some nut job jumped off a building and called out for me to save her. I heard her as I always did, and raced in. Because she was some distance away I only just caught her in time but still I managed to stop her head inches from being crushed onto the pavement. She didn't even say thank you, just complained that I’d taken my time, and that she’d nearly died. Over the next few years it just got worse and worse, until in the end I was saving hundreds of people every week that didn't need saving, they just wanted me to save them. They wanted to meet The Guardian, to be saved, to have the near death experience.”

  “And you can't stop saving them, even though you know they are faking it.”

  “That's right, I can't, or couldn't until now, every single day, every single minute of every day. It's a constant pressure. And it used to feel so good, I have to keep going to keep that feeling, that emotional rush. Anyway if I stop they'll all die, so what choice do I have. There’s no way to tell the real from the fakers, they are all falling to their deaths after all. But as a result I never get a minutes peace. I can't watch a film, I can't eat a complete meal, I can't even go to the toilet without having to break off two or three times to save some stupid slob who should know better.”

  “But no more,” the
re was such finality in John’s words that it shook Margaret to the core. She was, she knew witnessing something remarkable, a fundamental change in American life. This was the end of something momentous.

  “So just stop,” she said.

  “I can't, it's not that easy, 239 people have now died since we started talking, and I wanted to save them all. It’s like a physical need within me, if I stay here I'll sooner or later give in to it. It's like putting a junkie in a room full of cocaine and expecting him not to dive in, it's just not possible. Even if I went away somewhere, to another planet perhaps, I would be drawn back into it eventually, it's too much for me, I hate it, and I want it to be over for good. I want to die.”

  “That's not possible though is it?” Margaret said. The Guardian was to the best of her knowledge invulnerable.

  “Well, it is actually, it not easy sure, but it's definitely possible. My skin is invulnerable yes, I'm supper fast, super strong, have X-ray eyes and so on.” He looked her up and down and leered unpleasantly, “That’s nice underwear by the way; the purple suits your skin colour, it’s very sexy. But I'm a bit surprised you don't treat yourself to a more expensive brand with the amount you charge per hour, but perhaps you spend your money on other things. Anyway, I digress everyone knows that I am pretty much the most powerful being in the universe, but...”

  “But?”

  “I have a weakness,” John Smith took another bullet from his pocket, this one glowed slightly in the light, it was silvery, reflective and it somehow looked dangerous. He carefully loaded it into the revolver, and smiled. “My skin is indeed pretty much impenetrable, nothing anyone has tried can get through it, but the truth is not everywhere is that tough. There are places on my body where a specially constructed bullet, where something made from the hardest substance known to man, for example could probably penetrate.”

  “And that's such a bullet is it.”

  “Yes, it cost me $35 million to have it made, and it's the only one in existence, that I know of anyway. You see there’s a place at the roof of my mouth, where the skin is particularly thin, and probably not as strong as the rest of my body. Also, there's only a thin layer of bone and flesh between it and my brain. With any luck the bullet should pass through easily, and, since it won't be able to exit through the top of my skull, through the impenetrable bone and skin, it should bounce around quite nicely. I believe that it should shred most of my brain, killing me and I hope not make a mess of our lovely office.”

  “But John,” Margaret said, “can't you think of any other way? It seems a bit extreme, a bit final, surely there has to be another way. I can help you get over it, it'll take time yes, but I can help. Surely this is not what you want.”

  “Sorry Margaret, but it is, it's what I want. You're all on your own now, and to be honest I hope you all rot in hell.”

  With that, John Smith, The Guardian, the most powerful superhero ever to have walked the earth, put the pistol between his teeth, jammed it hard against the roof of his mouth and pulled the trigger.

  Other than the soft phut of the silenced pistol, there was no outward sign that the bullet had had any effect at all. The huge man sat in his chair for at least 30 seconds, then his eyes glazed over, and then he toppled slowly forwards. He ended face down on the carpet at her feet.

  A small amount of liquefied brain matter and blood leaked from his mouth, presumably though the hole created by the passage of the bullet.

  Margret sat for a full five minutes, starring at the figure by her feet. Then she got, up, went out to reception, poured herself a strong cup of black coffee with five sugars, smiled at her pretty but stupid receptionist, and walked back into the room.

  Sitting down, she watched the body. She half expected John to get up, for his huge power levels to somehow drag him back to life or for her wake up, that this had all been dream.

  Margaret Mason was a highly driven individual, a star performer at both school and college, she had approached her life with a certainty that had been single-minded in the extreme. It had cost her friends, lovers, and contact with family members, but had got her to the top of her profession quicker than anyone she knew.

  She had always known what to do and always acted on her decisions.

  But for the first time in her life she was stuck. What do you do, she thought, when the hero of millions, the man who gave hope to the world, the man who stood up for truth and justice against all odds, the man who epitomized everything that's good and noble about humanity, what do you do when this man comes into your office, tells you he hates you, that he's not human, that he's a junkie, and then kills himself?

  What the fuck do you do?

  Chapter 3 - Elroy steps in something nasty

  Elroy Cockram's expensive black leather shoes were sticking unpleasantly to the bedroom carpet. Every time he moved his feet there was a loud, unpleasant squelch as the blood which had soaked into the fibres welled up under the pressure of his weight. He left red footprints everywhere he walked, and he had the horrible feeling that his socks were becoming damp as the blood seeped through the leather.

  Looking down he saw that his new grey suit trousers had dragged in the blood as well, and were stained dark red at the hem.

  “Shit,” he said with distaste, “shit, shit, shit.”

  In his line of work he was used to blood. He was used to dead bodies, he was used to the multitude of unpleasant and unexpected causes of death.

  He had on one memorable occasion mopped up the sloppy remains of an entire football team, cheerleaders and all, when Graviton’s powers had gone haywire one sunny Sunday afternoon.

  Blood was almost a daily feature of his life.

  As the Division Head of the FBI Superpowers Task Force he had seen more than his fair share of blood over the years.

  He had seen more than his fair share of collateral damage.

  Collateral damage, now there was a euphemism he had grown all too familiar with. The phrase had come into common parlance during the first two Gulf Wars, describing innocent people who were killed or injured accidentally. A phrase used to describe the unintentional victims of military action.

  Collateral damage, these were the two words which had become his life’s work.

  Two words which in no way encompassed the sheer enormity of the tasks he had to cope with on a daily basis. In the Gulf War he had handled seeing children with their arms blown off and woman so badly burned that their faces cracked as they screamed. So when he left the army and joined the FBI he thought that he had a good grasp of just how nasty life-and-death could get.

  And when he was offered a place on the Superpowers Task Force he had again felt extremely confident. He’d thought that he had seen the worst life could throw at him.

  But he’d been wrong.

  Covering up for the collateral damage caused by superheroes and reining them in when they stepped over the line had taken him to some very dark places indeed. Whenever there was a death, whenever there was anything thought to be Meta Powers related they called him and his task force in.

  He had, over the years literally been to hell and back.

  What made it harder to cope with was that where the line was drawn depended largely on who you were and how the government felt at the time. There were no hard-and-fast rules.

  If you were a major power, who had, like The Guardian or Lightspeed saved the world more than a few times then you got a lot of slack. If you were a more minor power like say Bear-Paw, or The Stilt-Girl, well, they were treated pretty much like everyone else, or even worse sometimes.

  The prison cells were full of half-baked superheroes who had not watched the background when letting loose with a heat blast, or had crash landed on some poor unfortunate passerby squashing him flat.

  But, he had to admit this probably a new low.

  Standing in this bedroom, watching the blood drip from the ceiling, hearing the screams and moans from downstairs were bearable.

  He had seen blood before, heard th
e screams of the dead, dying and their killers before, the noise no longer reached his soul.

  The beautiful woman, lying naked and dead on the bed, her stomach ripped open, the contorted look of terror on her face, was bearable as well. It was nothing new, it brought no new nightmares, and he had enough old ones to contend with to bother with replenishing the stock.

  Even the sight which he knew awaited him in the child's bedroom, the sight which would bring most men to tears was bearable to Elroy Cockram, he’d seen so much that he doubted anything new would shock him.

  What brought him to the edge of sanity, made him almost shake with anger, was the fact that he had forgotten to put on protective overshoes, and he knew that his $500 leather shoes were effectively ruined. He knew from years of experience that you could never get the blood out of the creases, or the smell out of the leather. His brand-new shoes would be going in the incinerator before the day was out.