“John! You made it!” Christine Dark said, leaning over him. “I sensed you were waking up. Glad to see your mind is in one piece, although I know something is worrying you.”
“Yes. We have a problem,” he said, sitting up. “But I’m glad to see you’re all right and among friends.” Cassius was there as well; he grinned at John as he walked up to him.
“It’s good to see you again,” Cassius said. “But there are a few things you should know…”
A number of people were crowding the room, including a man who looked eerily familiar and yet remained a stranger. Another one of the guests was hanging back, and as soon as John got a good luck at him, he knew why. “What the hell is this?” he growled; his muscles tensed, ready to pounce on his archenemy.
Hiram Hades looked back at him; his unflinching stare showed no fear, but lacked the feverish brightness that usually sparkled in the mad genius’ eyes.
“Wait, John,” Cassius said, interposing himself between the two.
“Not Hiram Hades!” Christine added. “He’s a clone and he tots disapproves of his creator’s life choices! For real, I scanned him thoroughly, and he’s not a bad guy!”
A lifetime spent controlling any sudden impulses and urges helped stay his hand, as much as the words of Cassius and Christine did, if not more so. He was Ultimate, and he did not act without thought; one of the symptoms of his induced madness had been the breaking of that covenant he’d made with himself long ago. The fact that he could stop himself was the best indication that he had finally been cured, and the rushing relief he felt helped staunch his initial burst of rage.
“Very well,” he said. “In any case, we all have more important things to worry about. I received a parting gift from Daedalus Smith before I woke up…”
Freedom Island, Caribbean Sea, March 29, 2013
“Do you think he was lying?” Ali Fiori asked John over the vid-com. The joy at seeing her friend up and about had been quickly doused by his announcement of yet a new crisis. “And why didn’t he give you the name of the vessel, or something useful?”
“I think he was being truthful, but he figured that devoting most of our resources trying to find the bomb will give him more time to hide.”
“Well, we’re going to try and do both,” Ali replied. “Interpol is looking for him, but he was right about one thing; we only have so many clairvoyants and psychics available, and we need to put them all to work trying to find the bomb.”
“It must be shielded from all forms of scrying,” John said. “Otherwise, all the precogs on the planet would have sensed the coming of a catastrophe of this magnitude.”
“PSI-INT is mostly a matter of quantity over quality. Now that we know what we’re looking for, between the Legion and MK-Ultra we’ll burn through their shielding sooner or later.”
“I’m worried about what happens if it’s later,” John replied. The Coast Guard and the Navy were stopping and searching every vessel on the shores of the Eastern US, a monumental task. “My worry is that the device may have been offloaded already; it might already be in New York. If Daedalus’ games result in the deaths of millions…”
“We won’t let that happen, John,” Ali said with more certainty than she really felt. “Meanwhile, we really could use you back at the Island.”
“Not quite yet, Ali,” John said. “I think I can do more good on my own right now, rather than jumping through bureaucratic hoops until I can fully clear my name. Once New York is safe, I’ll be happy to do all the paperwork. You’ll be fine; you handled the crisis better than most regular Councilors would have. I wish you’d joined the Council sooner, and come next election I’ll be happy to endorse you.”
“Just what I always wanted,” Ali said, rather unconvincingly. “But you’re right, all that crap can wait. Just try to save the world without getting yourself into more trouble.”
“I will. Take care, Ali.” John hung up.
Ali got back to work. They had a bomb to find and two thirds of the Legion, including most of its intelligence assets, were still halfway around the world thanks to the now-cancelled Third Asian War. That had clearly been part of the plan, and even with Daedalus’ warnings, the plan had a good chance of success. If the bomb had arrived to New York, it could go off at any time.
Time was running out, if it hadn’t run out already.
Catskill Mountains, New York, March 30, 2013
Adam Slaughter-Trent listened and considered a course of action.
“Thaddeus Twist,” Lady Shi said. “He’s at the very least one of the leaders of the Foundation.”
Piecing together the puzzle that was the Humanity Foundation had taken them two hours. Condor’s computer system had been a big help, even after getting access to the Legion’s own networks. The vigilante’s files covered some areas where the Legion’s intelligence had been inadequate – or possibly deliberately altered. But Lady Shi had been the most helpful asset they had. The former Smith operative had acted as a courier and go-between for Daedalus. After comparing notes there was little doubt who their target was.
Thaddeus Twist. His Kenneth-self had met the man personally several times over the years. The billionaire had been a very active philanthropist, and the two of them had run in the same rarefied circles. Twist had always been an unabashed anti-Neo bigot, although his activities had always seemed to be legal and non-violent. In a way, the connection was so obvious it almost rang false, until you added the suspicious coincidences: several deliveries of intelligence documents and Neo devices had occurred at times and places where Twist had been nearby. Chastity Baal’s hard-earned information, obtained from the Dominion’s own computer systems, also showed links to Twist-owned subsidiaries and deliveries linked to the construction of the flying fortress that had attacked Freedom Island. It all fit.
Legally, it would be impossible to touch the man, however. The paper trail linking the suspicious activities to Twist himself was circumstantial at best, even discounting the dubious provenance of the information itself. A halfway-competent lawyer would get the accusations laughed off any court. Passing on the evidence to the US government would be unlikely to produce any results, not in time to do any good. Twist had too many friends there: not among the party currently in power, nor with the Neo US President, but with the permanent government, the men and women manning the diverse agencies and departments; those underlings would drag their feet and warn Twist of the accusations against him. His Kenneth-self found himself facing an impossible set of choices.
Kenneth Slaughter was only half of who he was, however.
“Where is Twist now?” he asked.
Condor had the information at his fingertips. “He’s in D.C., as a matter of fact. His schedule is not a matter of public record, but it’s out there in several poorly-secured systems, including his secretary’s private calendar. He’s got a meeting with some lobbyists on K-Street until… oh, twenty minutes from now. What..?”
Jump. The Word became reality, and Adam vanished into the dark before Condor could finish his question.
Washington, DC, March 30, 2013
Something had gone wrong. Thaddeus Twist kept up with appearances and hoped whatever it was wouldn’t derail the final stage of the Plan.
His silent partner had suddenly gone from renowned Legion leader to wanted fugitive, and had dropped off the face of the Earth. That knowledge wasn’t public yet, but quiet bulletins had gone to the Interpol, FBI and MK-Ultra, and Thaddeus had contacts within all three agencies, all of which were full of humans who resented the false gods who’d usurped their rightful place. He’d read copies of the bulletins within minutes of their issuing. Daedalus was suspected of murder, terrorism, conspiracy and a myriad other charges. He’d been named as a co-conspirator in the murder of Doctor Martin Cohen, the man that Ultimate had been accused of killing, which meant the Invincible Man would soon be exonerated. Close scrutiny of Smith’s activities might link him to Thaddeus and his own secret conspiracy. It would only tak
e one mistake along the way, and it would all come out; it was all but impossible to completely erase one’s tracks in today’s age. Even more worrisome, Mr. Night had not returned any calls for quite some time now. He feared the worst.
Hopefully none of that would matter. The device would be ready within the hour. A casually-worded readiness report, hidden in an innocuous-looking e-mail, had confirmed things were on schedule. The wheels of justice couldn’t turn fast enough to stop the Plan, not when its fulfillment was mere minutes away.
Daedalus Smith had connived at the destruction of his own kind. The Neo had met with him some years ago, and confirmed everything Thaddeus had feared: parahuman numbers and power levels were growing at increasing rates. Sooner or later, they would destroy the world, by accident or design. Such an eventuality was all but inevitable, unless something was done to stop it. Daedalus was willing to risk his own life to avert such an outcome.
They had agreed to a plan designed to cull Neolympian numbers by instigating a Third Asian War. As the plan progressed, however, Daedalus had revealed he’d discovered the location of the Source, the alien artifact that had created the Neo Problem in the first place. He suggested that a nuclear device set off in proximity to the Source would temporarily shut it down, buying them some time, if nothing else.
Thaddeus had decided to up the ante, of course. If a mere multi-kiloton device could cause a disruption, why not try for a more drastic result? He’d used a significant percentage of his fortune and combined human and parahuman technology to build the most powerful bomb in history, a bomb that would be used as the trigger for a channeled energy discharge that would pierce the Source with astronomical levels of radiant energy. Given how little they knew about the alien creation, it was anybody’s guess as to whether the explosion would permanently destroy it, but at the very least the disruption might last long enough for humanity to wipe out the weakened monsters and try to figure out a permanent solution.
It was all over, he thought as he walked toward his limo, flanked by a small army of bodyguards and protected by the best wards money could buy. He would hole up in his hotel and wait for word of the disaster. The US and the world would need strong leaders in the tribulations to follow, and he would step forward to play a role in the healing process – as well as to point a finger at the Neolympian threat as the ultimate culprit. Then he…
A sudden darkness enveloped him, cutting him off from everybody and everything. His wards flared and died, overwhelmed by a greater power, and between one eye blink and the next he found himself somewhere else, a swampy wasteland with abandoned buildings in the background. He vaguely recognized the place as an old shuttered facility not too far from D.C. – there’d been environmental impact hearings about it – but far enough that nobody would see or hear anything that transpired there.
A man in a black and bronze costume faced him. A gravelly voice emerged through the stranger’s face mask. “Thaddeus Twist. You will tell us where the bomb is.”
He had been discovered after all. So be it. Thaddeus had planned for this eventuality, and his tormentor wouldn’t find him as easy to brutalize as he’d expected.
Hidden under his immaculately-tailored suit, a Sigil of Power inscribed into his skin came to life at his mental prompting. All of the leaders of the Humanity Foundation had acquired those Sigils, a gift from Daedalus Smith; the Neo Genius had managed to reproduce the Imperial marks that granted Neolympian powers to mere humans. The process had several glaring drawbacks, however: for one, unlike real Neos, who became virtually immortal after acquiring their powers, those gifted with a Sigil didn’t live very long after activating them. The real Celestials enjoyed a few decades of power before the toll to their bodies caused them to burn out and die; the copies Daedalus produced were even less durable. Kuo Wei-Fang, the first and only member who had activated his Sigil, had barely survived a fortnight. Thaddeus didn’t expect he’d live out the week.
For now, it didn’t matter. Power flowed through him; his aging, weakened joints became strong again, and he felt more alert, more joyful, more alive than he ever had. He was young, invincible; he welcomed the prospect of a fight with a shocking eagerness. So this was what being a Neo was like; he could almost forgive the freaks’ arrogance now that he’d experienced their power first-hand.
All this transpired in the span of a second. He smiled at the masked man and moved as fast as a pouncing tiger. He’d taken martial arts lessons back in his youth, and his body seemed to remember the old moves. He lashed out with kicks and punches, seeking to kill or be killed.
He was superhumanly fast, strong and durable – and utterly outmatched. The masked man blocked or avoided the flurry of attacks and knocked Thaddeus down with a single punch. Ignoring the pain and the ringing in his head, he tried to rise to his feet, but a stamping kick pinned him to the ground; he felt ribs crack under the impact, and the brief hopes he’d harbored vanished.
“It’s happening soon, isn’t it?” the stranger said in his raspy voice. “Talk. Or suffer.”
“Fuck you.”
“Suffer, then.”
His feet and legs were suddenly pulled, crushed, rent by invisible forces. The pain was unimaginable, unbearable. His feet were gone, but the agony was still there, running through the remains of his lower limbs into his body. He dimly felt his bladder let go, the humiliation the least part of his torment.
“When you grind a man into a paste, the best way to do it is from the feet up,” the merciless voice reported in a neutral tone. “It’s going to feel much worse when I reach above the knees. And of course, there is that nerve cluster around the groin area…”
Thaddeus tried to resist. He made it until the rending force crept to his mid-thigh.
After that, he talked. Talked, and died hoping only he’d lasted long enough.
Chapter Eleven
Face-Off
New York City, New York, March 29, 2013
“That’s the place,” Christine said. “Now that we’re close, I can feel the wards.”
Adam had come back with the bomb’s location. He didn’t tell us what he’d done to Twist after he was done talking. I figured the billionaire wasn’t a problem anymore.
The place was a construction site on Third Avenue, hidden behind boarded-up metal scaffolding. Ads for the next big Broadway play (The Linda Lamar Story: A Musical) were plastered all over the boards, and I hoped the city would be around for opening night.
“I’m on it,” Ultimate said, opening the side door of the Condor Jet and flying out. Janus and Adam teleported away a moment later. Show-offs. I almost stayed in the Jet and let the heroes take care of the problem. They were going to get all the credit, anyway.
“Let’s go!” Christine said, and we went. The Jet was hovering a hundred feet above the street. It was about nine p.m.; the streets weren’t teeming with people but weren’t exactly deserted, either, and plenty of passers-by saw Ultimate fly out the partially invisible Jet and crash into the construction site, followed by Christine and me. I saw people running, people taking pictures and videoing us, even a few people cheering. “Bomb!” I shouted at them. “Get out of here!” That did it; everyone took off running. Of course, if the bomb went off there was nowhere to run.
The world didn’t blow up as we followed the Invincible Prick into the construction site, so maybe the cavalry had arrived in time to save the day.
Unfortunately the anti-Neo bigots had been ready to receive the cavalry.
Behind the boards, the construction site was a city-block sized hole in the ground, a good forty feet deep. Much of the space was taken up with concrete foundations, iron girders and other building materials and equipment, but a large cleared area was filled with arcane-looking Neo-techy crap, including a big fat metal cylinder, set up at a downward-aiming angle. About a dozen men were clustered around it.
Adam, Janus and Ultimate had stepped into a force-field of Outsider energy. They were struggling through a web of disruptor beams. Ultimat
e hadn’t fallen unconscious for a change – the tough guy had taken a dive pretty much every time I’d seen him in action – but he was moving slowly through the dark web, as if he was swimming in a pool of molasses. The other two weren’t even moving; they had taken the brunt of the attack when they’d teleported in.
The whole area was surrounded by the disruptor field. The only way in was through it. A frail-looking Asian guy was typing on a keypad on the side of the cylinder, and I was pretty sure it wasn’t his ATM code.
“Fly us through, Christine,” I said, holding her tightly. She nodded and did what she did best. She went from zero to five hundred in a nanosecond, crashed through the disruptor field, which hurt like a motherfucker, and took us to the other side.
We hit another force field, this one a standard energy shield, a few feet away from the bomb.
“It is finished,” the Asian guy said as we hammered at the force field; it went down in a couple of seconds, but that was a couple of seconds too long. The old guy stepped between us and the bomb, and he was Neo strong. I could tell, because when I punched him, I didn’t turn him into exploding hamburger soup, but merely crushed his skull and sent his lifeless corpse flying off to one side. Not that it mattered; if the bomb was about to go off, killing him only sent him to hell a few seconds ahead of everyone else.
While I killed the Asian guy, Christine hit the bomb with a psychokinetic blast.
I wasn’t sure that was the proper procedure to disarm a bomb, but I didn’t get a chance to make a comment about it.
There was a big boom.
* * *
“That’s how those things work,” Christine explained as we extricated ourselves from the ruined building. The explosion had been actually pretty big, demolishing most of a city block, but to us big Type Three Neos it’d been like getting punched in the face – not something we’d like to make a habit of, but nothing to write home about, either. “Nuclear devices are actually very delicate, thermo-nuclear ones even more so. If the explosive shell around the fission trigger doesn’t go off in just the right way, there’s no fission process, and without the fission explosion, there is no fusion process, and no big H-bomb blast. There’s going to be radioactive material scattered all over the place, though; thank God Condor just told me Janus and Dad can vacuum up most of it in a few minutes, so we won’t have a big radiological disaster in our hands. But yeah, I managed to blast it just before the bomb went off, causing the explosives to go off out of sequence, which was enough to disrupt the chain reaction. It was literally a matter of micro-seconds.”
New Olympus Saga (Book 3): Apocalypse Dance Page 15
