Gods of Manhattan

by Al Ewing

  Lomax stared back at him. "It was a trick question, dummy. You're not going to kill me, and it's not because of any principles or moral imperatives or compassion or any of your usual high-minded bullcrap. It's because you physically can't do it. You can't kill me." He grinned, showing his teeth. "But I can kill you. And I'm going to make it slow."

  Then he charged.

  Sword raised, El Sombra crept into the tiny cell that had, for almost three years, been the home of the man calling himself Timothy Larson. He wrinkled his nose in disgust. The place stank.

  It stank of the noxious chemicals that had spilled from the dozens of ruined beakers and shattered test tubes that lay among the debris of the furniture. It stank of the fresh piss of the man who still sat trembling in one corner. It stank of the sweat that clung to the never-changed sheets on the filthy mattress. It stank faintly of opium, smoked late at night, half to keep up the illusion and half to alleviate the boredom that came with waiting endlessly for a chance that never came.

  And underneath it all, it stank of madness.

  El Sombra knew what it was to hate, to hate so hard and so long that you knew nothing else, to hate so strongly that it crossed that line into something beyond reason. He knew what it was to try to bring a government to its knees, to plan the end of a nation at the hands of a single man. He recognised something in Lars Lomax, some twisted reflection of his own feelings. If Doc Thunder had been a child of the Ultimate Reich - and El Sombra had an idea of how close Thunder had come to being just that - El Sombra would never have rested until he was dead, no matter what it took. He wondered what had happened to Lomax to make him what he was. Was it similar to that apocalyptic day of fire and nightmare and eternal shame that had created him? One massive explosion that had fractured his personality for good? Or had it been a constant drip, drip, drip of a thousand tiny incidents, eroding the rock of his sanity until finally it wore down to nothing?

  El Sombra shook his head. It didn't matter. Perhaps Lomax had spared his life through some recognition of their similarities, but El Sombra wasn't about to make the same mistake. El Sombra had never deliberately killed anyone who wasn't a Nazi before, but there were exceptions to every rule. And speaking of which-

  Crane made a whimpering sound in the depths of his throat as the masked man turned to face him. Tears coursed down his cheeks, and he clutched his legs, rocking gently in place. "Please." He sniffed, shaking his head. "Please don't let him find me."

  El Sombra raised an eyebrow. "I guess you saw him turn into that thing, hey? One minute he's that skinny guy with the beard, and then he turns into that giant diablo monster... right before your eyes..." Crane shook his head, screwing his eyes tight shut and gritting his teeth. A low moan of torment came from between them. El Sombra sighed. "You were already pretty crazy, getting crazier, but now... you're gone, aren't you, amigo? Gone for good."

  He lifted his sword, resting the blade in his palm for a moment, considering. Crane only stared, weeping and making his soft, mad noises. El Sombra sighed, shaking his head. "You know, I don't know if I can kill a guy who's already dead. Even if he is one of the bastards."

  He lowered his sword, looking around the wrecked laboratory, eyes narrowing. "Hey, you got any glue here?"

  Lomax charged, barrelling towards Doc Thunder like a freight train. Doc stood his ground, eyes narrowed. He knew a punch from Lomax's fists could take a normal man's head right off at the neck - what it would do to him, he didn't know, but it wasn't likely to be anything good.

  He was used to using his strength, and that wouldn't work here. For one thing, he was too used to holding back, to measuring and rationing his great power for fear of turning every fight into a bloody execution. For another, even if he did manage to overcome his phobia of his own power and attack with all of it, would it actually work? Could he actually put Lomax down for good? Could he even injure him? What if he swung with all his strength and only succeeded in making him angry?

  No, strength wasn't going to be the answer on its own. Doc had one advantage as far as he could see. Lomax was so enamoured of his new physical power, that he'd forgotten where he'd got it from. He'd forgotten that the greatest weapon in his arsenal had always been his mind.

  It wasn't possible to out-punch him. But it was possible - more possible now than it had ever been before - to out-think him.

  Doc waited. He waited until the last possible moment, when Lomax was almost on top of him, when he was swinging those bony knuckles back, his teeth already bared in a grin of sheer, animal triumph.

  Then he threw himself flat on the floor.

  Lomax's feet slammed into Thunder's prone body, sending him flying forward, unable to correct himself. The man-monster slammed hard into the tarmac, his face grinding up big chunks of roadway and gravel, leaving a trench behind him.

  Doc rolled to his feet. Hitting Lomax wasn't going to work. He could kick him in the head with enough force to flatten a wrecking ball into a metal pancake, and all it was likely to do was break his foot. He could aim a cobra strike directly to the man's testes hard enough to create an imprint of them in what was left of the concrete and the absolute best it would do would be to make him angry. He was under no illusions about his ability to play Lars Lomax at his own game.

  But Lomax was too overconfident in his new body. Just because he was stronger and more resilient, he assumed there was no way for Doc Thunder to defeat him in a fight. Just as in their previous battles, he'd assumed that he would win because he was smarter and had fewer morals. Doc Thunder almost smiled. As always, Lomax's complex, intricate, almost Rube Goldbergian plots fell down because he'd missed something simple. Something as simple as the weak plaster in a Parisian ceiling.

  As simple as a wrestling hold.

  Doc didn't know that much in the way of judo - an omission he was cursing himself for - but he knew some basics, and had to hope that Lomax, who'd rarely if ever fought hand to hand before now, knew even less. Quickly, he grabbed hold of Lomax's wrists, forcing them up behind his back in a double nelson before he could lock his arms, while at the same time pinning Lomax's legs at the backs of the knees with his own. Lomax struggled, but so long as Doc could keep a tight hold on him, he could keep him in this position for quite some time. The next step would be to put him down for good.

  Another policeman would be on the scene soon, carrying a .38, or maybe even a shotgun. At which point, Doc would instruct him to shoot Lomax through the eye at point blank range, maybe more than once. At the very least, that would cause a massive brain hemorrhage. He wasn't happy about the necessity, but he was out of options, and he had a sneaking suspicion that Lomax would heal from even that injury in time.

  He had a sneaking suspicion that Lars Lomax would never die. But if he could only hold him a little longer-

  - suddenly, Lomax relaxed.

  "Oh, why fight it? When you've gotta go, you've gotta go. You win again, Thunder. I'll go quietly to my cell, like a good little felon. I'll rehabilitate. I'll prop up the status quo for you. I'll be a hero too and have a shirt just like yours! Yes sirree, you've shown me the error of my ways!"

  He was laughing. Doc frowned, keeping his grip tight. He couldn't let himself be suckered now.

  Why was he laughing?

  And then the tail wrapped around his throat and squeezed.

  "Psyche!" Lomax bellowed, and suddenly Doc realised that this time he was the one who'd forgotten the simple thing. The tail. It wasn't an affectation, it was something Lomax had designed into the serum because he saw exactly this scenario coming. And now he was choking Doc to death with it, and the only way out was -

  - let go of one of Lomax's wrists.

  Doc tore at the clutching tail with one hand, and that one hand was the undoing of him. Lomax grabbed hold of a fistful of tarmac, tearing it right up from the road and slamming it with all his strength into the side of Doc's head, knocking him sideways. Then Lomax was back up on his feet as though nothing had happened, moving straight into
a kick at Thunder's belly that sent him up like a football, followed by a two-handed blow to the rising body that knocked him right back down and made another crater in the ruined road.

  It had all happened so fast that Doc Thunder barely even knew where he was. He reached up and touched his mouth, and the finger came away bloody. Dear God, thought Doc, he's actually hurting me. He's strong enough to take me apart with his bare hands.

  I'm going to die.

  And in that moment, he was glad that El Sombra had run away.

  Crane had been no help. All he did was whine and moan and occasionally scratch his face and neck, drawing blood. El Sombra didn't know what the final straw had been, but any sanity he'd once had was long gone now.

  Fortunately, El Sombra had found what he was looking for. A tube of fast-acting rubber cement, left by the sink after some long-forgotten bit of mending. Carefully, El Sombra spread the cement over the very tip of the sword, then took the thing he'd been saving in his pocket and attached it, holding it in place for long minutes until he was sure the cement had set.

  "Don't let him in here." murmured Crane, his eyes wide.

  "Shhhh. I won't let him in," smiled El Sombra in response, trying to be reassuring. "You'll never have to face him again. I promise. It's okay, amigo. It's okay."

  It was strange. He knew he should feel hate for Parker Crane, or whatever his real name had once been. It was Djego's job to bear things like pity and doubt, to feel sorrow and shame. That was Djego's role in their team of one. El Sombra was there to take never-ending revenge and to laugh and to never look back. But to know that his murder of Heinrich Donner - his righteous kill - had resulted in so much harm coming to so many... and now to see the leader of Untergang, the man he'd come to New York to kill, just an empty, broken madman, a shell of a person...

  El Sombra wondered if he was changing.

  Experimentally, he prodded his sword at the steel door, and the thing he'd fixed to the end slid into the steel as if it were made of butter.

  Good.

  "Don't." whispered Crane, a tear rolling down his cheek. "Don't let him back in."

  El Sombra smiled, placing a hand on his shoulder. "It's okay, amigo. I'm going to go and make sure nobody ever needs to see him again. And I couldn't have done it without you." He squeezed lightly. "You didn't mean to, but you did some good. Remember that."

  Then, gently, he pushed the tip of the sword through the front of Crane's skull and into his brain.

  He was not incapable of pity, he knew. But he was who he was, and he did what he did.

  And broken or not, the bastards had to die.

  Doc's head snapped to the left, then to the right as the massive red fists slammed into his jaw. Blood flew from his nose and his split lip. One eye had swollen to the point where he could no longer see out of it.

  "You know," Lomax grinned, "I've tried a lot of ways to get rid of you over the years. I've tried bombs, I've tried bullets, I've tried poisons. I've tried to create superhard metals. I've tried to dig up radioactive elements. You know what I've never tried? Beating you to death."

  He laced his fingers together and then swung his joined fists up in an arc underneath Thunder's chin, sending him flying back with a crack that sounded like bone breaking.

  "It's incredibly satisfying." Lomax laughed, that terrible rockslide laugh. "If only I'd thought of it sooner!"

  Doc shook his head as he picked himself up, trying to concentrate, or at least to stay conscious. Lomax's serum was still working. He'd gained at least a foot in height since the start of the battle. Doc doubted he'd be able to pin him again, even if he could somehow circumvent the tail. The best he could do at this point was survive; as long as Lomax was concentrating on him, he wasn't endangering innocent lives. Every moment Doc managed to stay on his feet was a victory.

  Of course, Lomax was getting stronger all the time. The fact that he was making Doc bleed now meant that his punches were as strong as exploding shells. How long before they were strong enough to tear his head right off his body? And was Lomax ever going to stop getting stronger, tougher, bigger? Would he eventually become too big and heavy to move, or would he continue his rampage even as he outgrew buildings or even cities?

  Lomax smashed another punch past Doc's defences, slamming his jutting bone knuckle into Doc's open eye, and in the white-hot flash of pain, Doc had a nightmare vision of Lomax, the size of Manhattan itself, using the city as his throne and issuing orders like a dictatorial Gulliver among Lilliputians. The absurdity of the image only made it seem more terrifying.

  Another blow snapped Doc's head back, and he found himself sinking to his knees. He needed a few minutes to heal, and it was clear he wasn't going to get them. Blackness crowded his vision, and his heartbeat was a drum pounding constantly in his ears. He waited for the blow that would finish this unequal combat and set the monster Lars Lomax loose on an unsuspecting world.

  It never came.

  Instead, he heard laughter. Laughter like rocks tumbling down into a quarry. Lomax's laughter.

  For a moment, Doc thought the laughter was directed at him. Why not? Hadn't he failed anyone who'd ever counted on him or cared for him? Wasn't he dying because he'd committed one inexcusable act of stupidity after another? Because he hadn't seen what was right under his nose until it was too late?

  Then he realised Lomax was laughing at someone else, and a chill shot through him to the pit of his stomach.

  El Sombra was about to die, and there was nothing Doc Thunder could do about it.

  Lars Lomax couldn't help himself. The laughter just came tumbling out.

  El Sombra had run out of the chapbook store and now he was standing there with his puny little sword, pointing it at Lomax as if it would actually do any good at all.

  "Really? Seriously? You thought, 'Oh! There's Doc Thunder, the most powerful man on earth, getting his hide handed to him by someone much bigger and stronger than he is! Wow, he needs some help! I know, I'll run forward with my little toothpick and wave it menacingly in the bad guy's face! That'll help!' Oh, you kill me, you really do." Lomax almost bent double, laughter exploding out of him. "I might even have you stuffed."

  Then he saw what was cemented to the end of the sword, and the laughter stopped instantly.

  "No." He whispered the word, taking a step back, shaking his head. "That - that won't work. My skin's too tough. The cement won't hold."

  "Won't it?" El Sombra grinned.

  Lomax snarled, moving forward, pulling back an arm ready to smash El Sombra with a single blow, hard enough to pulverise his bones and liquefy his flesh, to turn him into flying specks of red jelly just as if a bomb had hit him at point blank range. And at that moment, El Sombra thrust forward and up.

  The augmented tip of the sword slid effortlessly through the crimson skin of Lomax's chest, between his ribs, piercing his heart in one swift motion.

  Lomax gasped, blinked, and took a step back. He coughed, once.

  "You can't..." Black blood trickled from his mouth. "You can't plan for things like that, can you?"

  Then, the look of disbelief froze on his face. He toppled backwards, hitting the tarmac hard enough to fracture it.

  The red eyes closed.

  Doc blinked, slowly getting to his feet. The blackness was clearing from his vision. He was already starting to heal, but he couldn't quite believe what he was seeing. "How... how did you..."

  Wordlessly, El Sombra pulled his sword from the man-monster's body. Glued to the end of his sword with rubber cement, still glistening in that strange, alien way, was a single bullet of inexorium, as sharp and deadly as it had been when it was fired, as indestructible as it had been when the masked man had dug it from one of the marble pillars in Grand Central Station with his sword. He smiled.

  "A bullet in the right place can change the world, amigo."

  And quite suddenly, Doc Thunder had nothing to say.

  Epilogue

  One Fine Day in New York City

 
"...and so, once again, we can thank Doc Thunder, America's Greatest Hero, for safeguarding our fair city from the machinations of those who would destroy our very way of life."

  A cheer went up from the crowd, and Mayor Ambrose adjusted his tie, smiling genially. "Although Doc has asked me to point out that the final blow against the nefarious Lars Lomax, the most dangerous man in the world, was struck by a brave Mexican hero -"

  More cheers, a cry of "Viva El Sombra!" from the back of the crowd, then a wave of spontaneous clapping. Ambrose smiled genially, and motioned for silence.

  "- a brave Mexican hero who has requested to remain anonymous, lest the worldwide reporting of his deeds interfere with his quest to rid the globe of a certain other enemy of the USSA, who I will likewise refrain from mentioning by name..."

  The crowd grumbled.

  "...though I understand he only has one ball."

  A riotous cheer, a few hats thrown into the air, and another surge of applause, this time lasting for a full minute.

  "Naturally, we wish him all the best, and hope his success will lead to Untergang's final exit from the world of terror. I have of course issued a full pardon for any, ah, crimes of violence he may have committed while a guest of our city, and hope that, should he ever complete his task, he finds his home here in Manhattan, where he will always have a place among our heroes."

  Another surge of clapping, more "Viva El Sombra!" from the kid at the back.

  "Only next time, please, use the flat of the sword."

  Polite laughter, some of it uneasy. Damn it, Darren, the crappy joke goes in the middle, the good joke goes at the end. Jesus. Learn to write a damned speech, why don't you. Despite his thoughts, the Mayor's smile never faltered. Okay, time to open it up.