by R J Johnson
“Yes!” Tate said, his energy renewed. “I’ll get started right away.”
“So ordered,” Kline said. “You won’t disappoint me?”
“Never again,” Tate said, still counting the money in his head.
Kline nodded and sat back at his desk, indicating that their conversation was now over. Tate turned as his smartphone vibrated in his pocket. He pulled the phone out and read the e-mail quickly. His eyes widened.
Kline leaned forward again. “What is it?”
Tate didn’t say a word; he didn’t need to. Kline’s eyes widened as he gave a broad smile. “Are they sure?”
“There’s a video attached,” Tate said. He handed over his smartphone, showing his boss the e-mail he’d received from the San Diego branch of Kline’s MARS security corporation. They’d been asked by local law enforcement to assist with what they were qualifying as a “terrorist incident.”
Kline watched the video of Collier murdering the police officers at the bank. As they burned up in front of him, Kline watched the video with unrestrained glee.
“Another stone?” Tate questioned.
“So it would appear,” Kline said.
“Intel they have says that this man Collier is holed up at the San Ellijo nuclear plant, holding the entire West Coast hostage,” Tate said as he finishing reading the e-mail for his boss.
“I like the man’s style,” Kline muttered. “Show me a map of the area.”
Tate turned and moved to the wall screen computer installed in Kline’s private office. He pulled out the keyboard and typed quickly to bring up a map of the area, pointing out the nuclear plant to Kline.
“Just outside of San Diego,” Tate said. Then, with a sigh, “It’s still a good 18 hours back to the mainland.”
“For you, perhaps,” Kline said as he stood up. He took the stone he’d liberated from Ododa’s dead body, looked at the map on the wall, closed his eyes, and then suddenly he was gone.
Tate watched his boss snap into the ether with a loud bang, then shielded his eyes from the bright flash. Alone in the office, he sighed and hit the intercom to the pilot.
“Change our flight plan to San Diego,” he said, looking around the cabin. “And change the manifest to list me as the sole passenger.”
“Sir?” the pilot’s voice came back confused. “Where did Mr. Kline go?”
“He stepped out to take care of some business,” Tate replied without a trace of humor.
He clicked the intercom off and went about the matter of putting his plan to stop Alex McCray into motion. If everything went as he designed, McCray would be a slowly cooling corpse in less than twenty-four hours.
Chapter Forty-Eight
He arrived at the San Ellijo nuclear plant right in the middle of the parking lot where they had set up the command center. Several soldiers shouted in surprise as Kline appeared in their midst.
One soldier snapped up his rifle, but Kline suddenly appeared behind him, grabbing it out of his hands. He then disappeared with the rifle, leaving the one soldier empty-handed and the rest of the men bewildered. Commanders began shouting at them, looking for answers, But the only man who had those answers was stepping through the gates of San Ellijo into the main complex.
Kline drew in a surprised breath. He could feel them. There were three other stones here, not just one. He smiled as he realized what that must mean. Mr. McCray had come here in some laughable attempt to stop Collier and take the stone for himself.
The smile quickly disappeared when he realized that meant that Alex had a head start on him, and that would not do.
He had to find this man Collier and take his stone before Alex did, but where were they?
He closed his eyes and let his stones talk to him as they guided him towards the stone Collier held. He pictured the man from the news footage, spraying downtown San Diego with fire. He turned, holding his arms out to his sides, dancing a slow pirouette around the abandoned nuclear plant.
He stopped his waltz as he faced south; the feeling of the stones pulled him the hardest that way.
He disappeared in a flash.
Chapter Forty-Nine
Collier watched the monitors as Alex, Emily and their friends ran through the corridors. His eyes narrowed and he concentrated on their darkened forms.
Fire erupted in between them as they dashed through the hallways, but none of it left a mark on any of them. He had to stop them, but how?
He smiled and decided it was time to put his plan into action. Concentrating on the hallway ceiling, he called down thick gobs of melted steel, which dripped all over the cement walls.
The hallway shuddered as the heavy beams Collier was melting collapsed, cutting Alex and Emily off from Christina and Scott.
He swore and tried his trick again in front of Alex, but it was too late; the man was right outside the doorway. He punched the screen in frustration, screaming as he removed his bloody hand. He needed more fire! Fire was the only thing that would protect him.
He whirled, looked at the reactor through the thick pane of glass, and made his decision.
His stone would protect him from whatever he told the reactor to do. The stone told him it was safe, that to reach into the reactor’s untapped potential was not only the right thing to do, it was the only thing left to do.
Something started ramming at the door. There was no more time to waste. Collier closed his eyes and was about to begin when he heard an unfamiliar voice.
“It’s quite the sensation, isn’t it?”
Collier opened his eyes and saw a tall, thin man with a narrow beard outlining his jaw standing in front of him. The jeweled ring on his finger flashed. Collier looked down at it, realizing what it was.
“There are more?” he asked the mysterious man.
“There are,” the man replied, his eyes looking covetously toward Collier’s stone.
“Then you won’t mind if I take a look!” Collier threw an intense flame toward the newcomer. His target instantly disappeared the moment before it touched him.
Collier felt the man reappear behind him and grab him by the throat, in a perfect position to snap his neck.
Instinctively, Collier grabbed his attacker by the cuff of his suit and set his arm ablaze. The man screamed and stumbled back, letting Collier go. Collier whirled to see the man in obvious pain, but more than that, in a state of surprise, as if he’d never experienced such pain before.
Pressing his advantage, Collier hurled a wall of flame at the burning man. The man vanished again and reappeared across the room, his clothing still on fire.
Something huge began ramming into the door on the other side. The man in the suit looked up at Collier with disgusted hatred, more of it than anyone else had ever shown him. “You tiny little nothing…”
Rage boiled up from Collier’s gut, and he hurled a fireball right on target, catching the uppity asshole right in the face. He screamed as his flesh peeled back, his hair catching fire.
The door to the command center burst open — for a rhino. Behind the creature, Collier spotted Emily, who for the moment seemed more scared of the man in the suit than she was of him.
“Alex! It’s Kline!” she screamed.
Alex shifted back into his normal body and looked at the burning man on the floor, whom Collier assumed was Kline. Then he turned his back on Kline and faced Collier, taking on a fighting stance.
Collier smirked and unleashed another fireball, aiming straight for Alex’s head. Alex ducked underneath as the inferno flashed white hot above him. He then stood and brushed himself off, advancing on Collier step by step. He had the kind of confident stride Collier hated to see in other people, the kind that always came with a pitying glance or a mocking word.
Collier hit him with everything he had, letting blast after blast of flames hit his body which only made him stumble somewhat.
But Alex refused to be stopped. It didn’t matter what Collier threw at him. This had to end now.
He took bla
st after blast full in the chest, but only stumbled a bit. He could heal from anything Collier had left, and he knew it.
Alex stepped up and hit the man as hard as he could on the jaw. Collier’s glasses flew off and cracked against the command console.
Collier fell, but grabbed a nearby chair to keep his footing. Alex stalked him slowly, thinking of all the people who'd died for the man’s greed and jealousy.
For money he didn’t have.
For recognition that would never come.
For reassurance that Emily loved him.
Alex stopped when he thought of that. Maybe he and Collier had a lot more in common that he wanted to admit. All those problems that had driven Collier to madness were exactly what Alex had been desperate to escape when he’d joined up.
After he’d stolen the money with Ash, he’d been forced into working for the people he’d sworn to fight. Good, bad, they were all the same to him after his time as a mercenary. He’d tried to rationalize it away, of course, but there was no lie, no story, no truth that would ever clean away his past. His soul and Collier’s had the same kinds of scars.
Could he avoid becoming the kind of monster Collier had become? He’d already been that way without a stone. What would it mean now that he held two, or three?
Or all twelve?
He might become the awful god Kline said he would, no matter what his well-meaning father had said about his heart at the Mesa. Maybe his father had been completely wrong. Maybe he didn’t have a good heart at all.
But he was trying.
And that’s what made him different.
Collier looked up at him weakly. “I…”
“I know,” Alex said sounding tired.
With a scream of pain, Kline got up from the floor. “You fool!” he hissed. “Don’t let him live!”
“Kline!” Alex whirled around and shouted a warning. “Don’t do it!”
Kline disappeared in a loud flash, then suddenly appeared in front of Alex, grabbing for the healing stone around his neck. The stone flashed and began to heal the billionaire of his burns.
At the same time, Kline attempted to jerk the necklace away from Alex, but stopped when a bullet slapped him in the side of the head.
Emily stood there holding the .45, spraying bullets. Another shot tore through Kline’s suit and slammed into his kidneys. He staggered back and let go of Alex’s stone, roaring in pain.
He then caught his breath, popped over to Emily and swatted her across the room, nearly tearing her head off her body. A scream filled the air. Not Emily’s. Colliers.
“NO!”
Collier filled the room with flames. Alarms screeched as the generators spun up faster and faster, far faster than they were ever designed to move. Even the dual loop couldn’t arrest the momentum of the nuclear chain reaction, and it swiftly began to run away.
Fireball after fireball flew from Collier’s fingertips, swarming toward Kline. The billionaire looked up in panic at the oncoming wall of flaming death, phasing in and out of existence all over the room, still looking for a chance to get Collier’s stone.
Ignoring the dueling pair, Alex ducked over to Emily, touching her hand and healing her. She groaned as she regained consciousness and looked over to him.
“Help him,” she said weakly. Alex nodded.
He shifted into the grizzly bear Siobhan had once used and turned toward the two opponents.
For his part, Kline was beginning to hold his own. Collier had managed to hit Kline several times and had even burnt off most of Kline’s perfectly tailored suit. Kline stood there, his chest bare and blackened, dodging through the endless chain of flames and waiting for Collier to falter.
Noting Kline’s fear of fire, Alex decided to charge through it.
Unfortunately, Kline saw him charging and had time to throw a punch at his grizzly face. It was a glancing blow, but with Kline’s massive strength, even that was enough to break the beast’s jaw with an echoing snap. Healing instantly, Alex shook off the punch and sank his massive teeth into Kline’s right forearm.
Kline howled in pain and dropped the teleportation stone as he struggled to get away. In his primal fury, Alex tried to tear the man’s arm off, but couldn’t; he’d happened to choose the arm that held Kline’s ring of strength. The man in the burnt suit cried out and tried to wrestle with the massive creature, smashing its blubbery body against the concrete walls. But Alex absorbed every hit, clenching down with his teeth and refusing to let go.
Seeing his chance, Collier leapt back up to his feet and concentrated, calling up a huge ball of flame throwing it directly at the bear.
Alex looked up in panic as he saw the incoming flame and involuntarily released Kline’s arm. In that same split second, Kline dropped to the floor and grabbed the teleportation stone. As his fingers clasped over it, he disappeared from underneath Alex’s massive bulk, reappearing right behind Collier.
“Max! Look out!” Emily shouted, but she was too late. Kline waved his hand at the ceiling. A huge coolant pipe burst through the ceiling, falling through Collier, slicing neatly through his shoulder and cleaving his body down the side.
Collier looked down in horror as his bloody insides began to spill out all over the formerly spotless command center floor. More blood trickled from his lips as Kline leaned down to claim the stone of fire.
“NO!” Emily screamed. She raised her pistol and fired at Kline.
Kline cursed as the bullet stabbed him in the chest, causing him to stumble back several times. Emily kept pulling the trigger, each round smacking heavily into Kline’s torso, hammering him further and further back. When the hammer finally fell on an empty chamber, she threw the gun at him with a wail of grief.
Alex used Emily’s distraction to tackle the billionaire, using his considerable weight as a grizzly to pin him to the ground. As the billionaire’s back hit the floor, Alex drew back a massive paw to take his head off.
The billionaire disappeared in a flash of light, and stayed gone this time. Wherever he’d fled to, he’d clearly had enough for one day.
Alex shapeshifted back into his normal body. He limped over to the dying Collier, picked up the discarded fire stone and held it tightly in his hand. He immediately felt the power of the runaway chain reaction. Instinctively, he concentrated, willing it all to slow down.
For her part, Emily ran to Collier, who was still bleeding everywhere. He choked on the blood in his lungs, watching as the life spilled out of him. She looked down at him, her face twisted in pain.
On his face was sadness. Failure. The crushing weight of having failed her.
“I’m sorry…” he whispered as he faded. He was looking for something in her eyes. Understanding, maybe. Forgiveness.
“I’m sorry…” he repeated. His fingers touched her face as he said it, as if he were trying to give her the words, give her more than the words. As if he wanted to give her everything she deserved, everything better than what he’d become.
“I’m sorry…” He said it over and over again until the words lost all meaning, until the light faded away. Every ounce of his energy was focused on her and how she deserved better than what he had become.
“Alex!” she screamed, “Alex, come help him!”
But Alex could not hear her; he was too focused on saving everyone else. His eyes were squeezed shut as his mind examined the runaway chain reaction. He felt for the right combination of energies, the one that would slow the process and put everything into an automatic shutdown. Then everything clicked; the temperature, the motion, the math. He willed it all to come together, and at his command, it did. He slowly breathed in and out as the plant began to shut down.
He heard the generators begin to slow, the noisy racket fading as the building ceased its violent vibrations. Sparks flew out of the consoles, then died away. Alex sighed in relief. For now, they and the rest of southern California were safe from the threat of a nuclear holocaust.
“Alex!” Emily wailed, and his con
sciousness snapped back behind his own eyes. He looked over at Emily and rushed to Collier, putting his arm out to try to bring the man back.
He was too late. Collier lay motionless in Emily’s arms, his eyes vacant, his body impaled and torn. Nothing could bring him back now.
Alex sat down slowly in defeat. He’d been trying to save everyone else. How could he have…?
He raised a shaking hand to touch Emily, but she shied away from him, snapping her eyes toward his with an accusing glare.
He wasn’t sure if he could blame her.
“We have to go, Emily,” he whispered.
“We have to take him,” she insisted, trying to stand up while holding Collier’s body. “We have to!”
“We can’t…” Alex started, but stopped when he saw the look on her face.
“If we leave him, all they’re going to do is try and find out what allowed him to control fire. They’ll butcher him and take his body apart for evidence. I can’t let them do that, no matter what he was when the stone got ahold of him.”
She looked up at him, her eyes pleading her case. “Please Alex, I know what he did was wrong, so tragically stupidly wrong, but he doesn’t deserve that. No one does...”
Scott and Christina burst into the room, apparently having finally found a way around Collier’s cave-in. Breathless, they took in the scene in shocked silence.
While Scott finally drew in a sharp breath, Christina rushed to Emily’s side. Emily clung to her friend like a life preserver.
“Jesus,” Scott said, unable to tear his eyes from Collier’s body. “We missed it.”
“Be glad you did,” Alex said mournfully as he nodded to Emily.
“Is she okay?” Scott asked, sidling up to Alex.
He shook his head. It was too soon to tell, but he could do something about helping her heal. He made his decision and shifted into a beautiful Arabian horse.
Scott jumped back in surprise, then looked at Christina and Emily. Emily looked at him with tears still fresh in her eyes. “We have to take him.”
