Horror, Humor, and Heroes

by Jim Bernheimer

  Less than a minute later, amidst ground shaking explosions, the behemoth topples into the side of the building and disintegrates in a flaming mass of destruction. I emerge from the wreckage and, for the first time, understand what I am truly capable of.

  #

  Inside the base, Hestia, the remaining Olympian, proves to be little trouble, but we know that she sent out the alarm. The clock is ticking. We’re down to one fully-functional Cyber Dude and Andy. Hermes is looking downright awful as she speed-eats, replenishing her energy. Already two bugs have tried to land on her and suffered a shocking demise. Athena’s damaged armor lies in a useless pile at her feet. She’s dressing in thick clothes to protect her from the bugs.

  I’m connecting fresh powercells from the Olympian’s stock when Athena issues the orders. “Stacy, get Andy and Stringel into the vault. The rest of us will buy you time, so make it work!”

  The Olympians’ vault – for a technogeek like me, is like Christmas come early. I could spend a full week in here just looking around. The throne is the easy to locate. Size and image mattered a great deal to the General. I’m already running cable to the base power supply while Andy and Stacy search for the Wireless Wizard’s telecommunications gear and the Overlord’s Mindwiper.

  The good news is that Hestia, who maintains the base, is an obsessive compulsive type. Each display is meticulously labeled. The bad news is that there are an awful lot of them. Athena and Hermes deploy the few remaining Type “B” robots to keep the normals out of the way, but when the big dogs get here, they’ll make short work of them, and we’ve taken out all the other defenses.

  “How’s it coming?” Athena’s voice comes over the announcing system, “We’ve already got incoming. Looks like WhirlWendy and a few other Guardians.”

  “The chair’s powering up, maybe ten minutes before it’s charged. Stacy’s getting into the Wizard’s suit. She’s going to need time to figure out how to use it. Andy’s still looking for the Mindwiper.”

  “I don’t need to tell you that time is of the essence.”

  “You just did.”

  “Bite me, Stringel!”

  “If you run out of energy spears, don’t forget the stick. You can use that too!”

  Athena breaks contact in a huff as Stacy glowers at me. She’s trying to fit gracefully into a suit clearly made for a three hundred pound man, “Cal, what did I tell you?”

  “I was only trying to be helpful and give her a fall-back strategy. Andy, while you’re looking for the Mindwiper, see if you can find something using a standard power cable. The General’s throne has a second interface. We can get it powered up faster with another cable.”

  “Don’t ignore me, Cal.”

  “Sorry, there are people in this world who don’t get along. Holly and I are two of those people.”

  She pauses for a moment, bunching up the fiber mesh of the suit and connecting it to the backpack with the satellite dish attached. “You do know that you’re going to have to make a better effort to get along with my best friend if you’re serious about being my boyfriend.”

  Despite the obvious danger of approaching superheroes and the time crunch surrounding us, that phrase stops me in my tracks. I sputter, “Come again?”

  “Hopefully, yes,” she grins at me.

  “Are you serious?”

  “Why not? But let’s work out the details after this whole save the world thing, okay?”

  Andy interrupts my stupor by shoving a power cable into my hands and I gather my wits about me. I scramble to get the cable connected to the throne and load a code-breaker into the keypad. Given that they’ve had this chair for a few years, my cracker should break it in less than five minutes.

  I’m off the chair and back by Stacy helping her with the backpack. “Looks like the interface is on the left wrist. Activate it and tell me what you see.”

  “It’s mapping out the nearby sites for the Three-Oh-One and Two-Oh-Two Area Codes. Wow! I can use the cell towers to see, sort of. Oh no! Apollo’s chariot is inbound.”

  “Andy! Get her in the chair. I’ve got a minicomputer attached to the keypad breaking the code. When it finishes, punch it in and lower the headgear. I’ll go see if I can buy you a few minutes more.”

  Stacy looks worried. She motions for me to open my helmet. When I do, she leans in and kisses me. “Good luck, Cal.”

  I scoop up the mini-gun and head to the door. “I’m counting on you to save the day, Aphrodite. I’ll concentrate on saving the next five minutes. Seal the door behind me.”

  Opening the door, I charge out, trying to banish childhood memories of Newman and Redford running out to fight the entire Bolivian Army.

  The sight before me makes me wish for a plain old army – I might have a chance against that. Instead, I see Ares hoisting Athena over his head like a rag doll while some flying hero I don’t recognize rips the clothes away with his claws. A swarm waits close by and a bug immediately jumps on Holly Crenshaw.

  Hermes is still sprinting around, but she’s slowing down and going to be overwhelmed any second now. Athena stops struggling and points an accusing hand at me. Oops! Someone just told everyone about our little scheme. I zero in on the crowd around Ares. Fire all concussion grenades! Activate sonic generator!

  The high-pitched piercing whine and the detonations of forty millimeter grenades at least show that I’m going out with a bang. Maybe I should go e-mail the Spartans, because my last stand is going to be on the steps of Mount Olympus. I swivel the business end of my energy mini-gun around and cut loose.

  “Eat hot plasma!” Of course no one can hear me over the sonic generator, but that’s not the point. I concentrate my fire on the ones that come charging, heedless of the ear-splitting pain.

  The crowd pushes me in through the opening where the doors once were. It actually works to my advantage, limiting the people who can kick my ass at any given time to only five or six. The mini-gun is ripped from my arms and I resort to flailing limbs, electrical discharges and bolts from my helmet blaster.

  I stand my ground, giving much better than I'm getting and fighting like a bear surrounded by wolves, but I can’t hold them for long! Shields begin to falter and an uppercut from a visibly bloody Ares sends me flying into the wall and triggers a warning klaxon in my ear.

  Suit power at six percent! I fire the last shot from my helmet blaster and struggle to stay on my feet. It doesn’t work. The view from down on my knees is better anyway.

  That’s it! I’ve done all I can. The heroes, most driven to the brink of sanity by the loss of their bugs, close in.

  I’m watching my life flash before my eyes, trying to fast forward to get to the parts involving the love goddess when the doors behind me are blasted off their hinges. The hairs on the back of my neck rise as the air around me crackles with power.

  A bolt of energy washes down the hallway over my head knocking everyone back. Andy comes out with what must be the Mindwiper in his hands and starts zapping everyone in sight. He drops a pair of fresh powercells at my feet.

  The energy boost gets me back up to thirty-five percent, allowing me to bypass damaged systems. Standing, I cast a glance over my shoulder and see Stacy. She's bathed in light and glowing like the goddess she truly is. I stumble forward and grab the mindwiped Ares.

  He opens his eyes and I help him up. “What’s happening?”

  “Invasion of the mind controlling bugs, Olympian. Welcome back to the right side.”

  “Who are ... I don’t feel so ...” he doesn’t finish, but manages to power puke all over my suit.

  “That’s it, get it all out and go guard Aphrodite. Make damn sure no one gets close to her! I’ve gotta go protect Andy.”

  #

  Days later, the infirmary is full and the corridors are littered with the walking wounded suffering withdrawal from a drug they can’t remember. Everyone has lost the last three months of their memories except for me, Stacy, Andydroid, and a few busted Cyber Dudes. We were even forc
ed to zap Holly and Keisha after they were reinfected.

  Stacy hasn’t left that throne except to eat and go to the bathroom in two days. I stop by to see her, as often as I can. When she isn’t speed dialing through the area codes and making international calls, she’s broadcasting thoughts of happiness and peace to areas already cleansed of the vermin. I wouldn’t want to pay the Olympic-sized phone bill they’re going to have after this. They’re supposed to be getting her some damn help any day now. She’s been working her ass off for them as it is.

  Naturally, being one of the few fully functional supers, I’m already on riot duty and putting out fires all over Washington DC and the surrounding area. Every few hours, I feel Stacy’s empathic wave pass over and everyone is calm for a short time and then the shit starts up all over again. It’s worse than any war zone imaginable.

  By the end of the first week, I’m almost convinced that we should have just let the bugs win. If it wasn’t for Stacy, I’d go back to my base and hide out until all this was over.

  Landing, I go to pickup fresh powercells and start connecting them. There’s a crowd out front, so I go in through the roof entrance. Andy nods to me and waves. Most of the other heroes are uneasy in my presence, unsure of what to make of me. The still convalescing Poseidon is especially wary after learning that his stint in the infirmary was at my hands.

  “If it isn’t my favorite dispatcher, how are things, Andy?”

  The remarkably human-looking mechanical being hooked to the telecom board blinks several times, processing hundreds of phone calls. “It’s not good out there, Cal, but you know that better than I do. They’re mindwiping St. Louis, Kansas City, and the Dallas/Fort Worth area today, but we’re still behind schedule. Entire cities are burning.”

  “Yeah, people figured out how to cut out the bug glands and extract the drug from them. Now they are fighting over the dead bugs as well. That’s only made things worse. What’s with the crowd?”

  “The President is giving his first speech and trying to do what he can. Are you not supposed to be en route to the riots in Richmond?”

  “Low on energy,” I answer looking at the big screen and see the gaunt and tired face of our President. There’s Stacy right next to him and next to her is ... Ultraweapon.

  “My fellow Americans and citizens of the world, we are climbing out of the abyss. Every hour brings us closer to putting this dark time behind us. We are diligently working to get more the memory erasing units out to all the countries. One hundred units alone today left for Europe and another two hundred are heading to Asia. Three additional empaths are now on duty and our heroes are providing around the clock infusions of positive energy. Things will get better! These are surely our darkest days, but the light of hope is on the horizon.”

  I tune the stuffed shirt out. Considering my felon status, I couldn’t have voted for him even if I wanted. Instead, I’m staring at how close Ultraweapon is standing to Stacy.

  “... and I’d like to thank the people up here who were directly responsible for our salvation from science gone awry.”

  “What the hell?”

  Everyone in the command center makes an effort to avoid looking in my direction.

  “Screw it! I’m going out there!”

  Zeus and Apollo stand up and move in my way. The lord of lightning says, “You’re not going anywhere. You’re supposed to be in Richmond anyway.”

  I flip my mini-gun around and spin the barrels making my intentions clear. Hermes shouts, “No one do anything! I’ll be right back!”

  From the corner of my eye, I spot Hermes speed into the screen and whisper into Athena’s ear. They immediately exit stage left. The hothead and the lightning rod look ready to rumble and I’m quickly getting into a mood to oblige.

  Andy’s head swivels a full one hundred and eighty degrees and says, “May I request that this fight not occur so close to the fragile equipment of the communications center.”

  Crenshaw storms into the room, “Stringel! Stand down!”

  “You’re on thin ice, Crenshaw. Choose your words carefully.”

  “Look, be happy you’re getting a pardon and a paycheck. You want someone to blame, I made the call.”

  “Why?”

  “I see no reason to act like we’re buddies. Here’s the deal – the world is still recovering and it needs the reassurance that the heroes were looking out for them.”

  “Even if it’s a lie?”

  “Damn straight! They don’t need to know that the only reason we’re free is because some petty crook was too scared to get out of his armor and got lucky.”

  “So this is how this hero gig works. The guy who caused all this gets lauded for the greater good and the guy who fixed it gets a knife in the back!”

  “Just hold up your end of the deal, Stringel. You’ll get your money and a pardon. Then, you can get the hell out.”

  Somehow, her words fail to have a calming effect. The only thing that stops me from cutting loose is Stacy walking into the room with Ultraweapon.

  Her eyes immediately light up. At least someone’s happy to see me, “Cal! You’re here! I thought you were stuck in Richmond.”

  “That’s where they wanted me.”

  Her gaze shifts between Athena and the armored warrior standing next to her. “I see we’ve been busy making backroom deals, while I’ve been stuck on that damn throne.”

  “Stacy, be reasonable...”

  “What’s this all about?” The Love Goddess cuts to the chase.

  Ultraweapon points at me and says, “You’re serious about this clown?”

  “Yes. I realize that you’re missing the last three months of memories, but I’m not. Here's the short version. We broke up. It was mostly your fault. I’ve moved on. Deal with it. The person I’m really disappointed in here is you, Holly. Seriously, what are you thinking?”

  I put a few things together and my mouth starts working before I have the full picture.

  “It’s Patterson. He’s not going to play nice with the rebuild unless he gets the girl. That's why I was sent on my merry way. You know what? I just thought of something, how long was it after you two broke up did billionaire boy and his wondersuit go after the Overlord’s base? I'll bet my pardon that Patterson was trying to prove something to Aphrodite.”

  Suddenly, I feel like less of an obsessive dickweed. He’s way out of my league when it comes to that. His mask hides his expression, but I know the truth.

  Athena says, “It’s nothing of the sort.”

  “Sure it isn’t.” I fire back.

  Several things happen in the next instant. Stacy turns on Athena and they both start shouting. Ares steps in carrying a pallet of freshly constructed Mindwipers. He sets them down to rubberneck at the blossoming catfight and Ultraweapon grabs one. Time freezes as I shout for Stacy to look out, but I’m too slow.

  The aura hits her and fades. Ares grabs Patterson’s wrist, yanks the device out of it, and pins him to the wall.

  Stacy looks all around. “What’s going on? Why am I in this getup? Holy shit! What happened to my hair?”

  Athena immediately rounds on Ultraweapon. “Patterson! What the hell did you do that for?”

  From inside his high-tech mask, he cackles, “If I can’t have her, I’m sure as hell not going to let some cheap knock-off have her! I never lose! Do you hear me?”

  I barely hear him; I’m still staring at Aphrodite. She’s not Stacy anymore, or at least my Stacy. I start forward, but Athena, Zeus, and Apollo jump on me to hold me back.

  “Let me go!” In close quarters, all his gadgets are practically worthless. I've already learned that lesson.

  Ultraweapon taunts me even though he’s still firmly in the War God’s grasp, “Sure let him go. The chump thinks he can take me.”

  Athena slaps her hand over my helmet force blaster. “Stringel, let it go! Stand down! Not in here, dammit! Ares, get that piece of shit out of my headquarters. Patterson, you get your slimy ass back to the west c
oast. You want to play power games with your company? We’ll make sure the press gets wind of your involvement in this whole mess.”

  Patterson shakes off the Olympian’s hold and addresses us. “You don’t want to go there, Holly. There might be consequences. Enough! I’m going. I said, I’m going! Stringel, anytime you want to bring that sorry excuse for a suit out my way, I’ll be happy to kick your ass, punk.”

  “You’ll never see me coming, bastard.” I hiss.