by Lucas Flint
It disturbed me deeply to see Christina unable to say anything to Chaser. She always had some kind of response to anything anyone said to her, usually sarcastic and biting, but in the presence of Chaser, she was as tongue-tied as a shy schoolgirl. It almost made me feel sorry for her, because she had clearly not anticipated what would happen if Chaser confronted her over her treachery.
“And I believe Trickshot is on board your vessel as well,” said Chaser. “Correct?”
I stepped forward and said, “Yeah, Chaser, I’m right here. And I’m going to save Grandfather from you.”
“You mean Gregory, yes?” said Chaser. “Yes, I am aware that you want to save him. He’s still here, locked away as he should be. It would be perfect, if only we had the Trickshot Watch as well.”
I rested a hand on the Watch. “You can’t have it. It’s mine and it belongs to the McDonald family.”
Chaser laughed. “Oh, how ignorant you are, boy. If only you knew the truth behind the Trickshot Watch … but never mind. You aren’t going to live long enough to know the truth, not unless you agree to my demands, that is.”
“Demands?” Uncle Josh repeated. “What demands are you talking about?”
“The reason I called you in the first place,” said Chaser. “I could have easily sunk your submarine without even giving you a courtesy call first, but I decided I would give you five one last chance to survive. Give me the Trickshot Watch and I will spare your vessel. Refuse to give it to me, however, and I will sink the submarine with all five of you on it. And please, don’t try anything stupid, not unless you want to rest in a watery grave tonight, that is.”
CHAPTER TEN
I rushed over to the speaker and shouted, “Get lost, Chaser! We’re not giving you a dang thing after everything you’ve done to us. You can take your stupid offer and shove it right up your—”
Uncle Josh shoved me out of the way and, after shooting me an annoyed glare, said into the speaker, “What Jack meant was—”
“Oh, I caught his meaning quite clearly, Joshua,” said Chaser. “And I don’t think you’ll have any luck in convincing him to give up his precious, precious Watch. Hence, I will be launching three torpedoes directly at your submarine within the next five minutes. All three will strike at the same time, which ought to be more than enough to sink your sub. Bye.”
The speaker clicked off.
Almost as soon as it did, Christina threw her arm out toward me and an energy rope launched out of the palm of her hand and wrapped around her neck. She yanked the rope back and I fell to my knees, grabbing at the rope and gasping for air.
“Christina!” Uncle Josh cried in shock. “What are you doing?”
“Teaching this brat a lesson,” Christina snapped. She looked at me. “What the hell was that, kid? You didn’t even give us a minute to talk about it. What are you, retarded or something?”
Glaring at Christina, I rose to my feet and, grabbing the energy rope, yanked it hard. Christina stumbled over her feet and the rope dissipated just as she hit the floor where she lay with a stunned and surprised look on her face.
Dusting myself off, I said, “Chaser was just going to kill us all anyway, whether I gave him the Watch or not.”
Christina jumped up to her feet again and glared at me with intense hatred. “You’re not just a stupid kid, but also really, really suicidal, too. You don’t know Chaser. He’s going to kill us all and it’s going to be your fault.”
“My fault?” I said. “You’re the traitor here, not me. I bet Chaser is more upset about the fact that you quit Icon and are actively trying to help us destroy it than whatever I’ve done or said. He doesn’t strike me as the type who is very forgiving of traitors.”
Before Christina could respond to that, Uncle Josh rose from his chair and held up his hands, saying, “Stop fighting, you two. We can play the blame game later, after we survive this situation. Those torpedoes are not going to stop coming after us just because we’re fighting each other.”
“But how are we supposed to avoid them?” said Mack. “The Diver isn’t very elegant or graceful. With only a few minutes to spare, we won’t be able to dodge them effectively, if at all. If even just one of those torpedoes hits us, we’re going down for sure.”
“We’re not avoiding them,” said Uncle Josh. He sat back down at the controls and immediately began pressing buttons and flipping switches. “We’re going to shoot them down before they even get close.”
“Shoot them down?” I said. “How are we supposed to do that?”
“The Diver isn’t entirely defenseless, you know,” said Uncle Josh without looking up at me. “It has laser cannons built into it for precisely these kinds of situations. I can use the Diver’s radar system to locate and take down torpedoes before they even get here. But I have to do it fast, because Chaser said we’ll have less than five minutes before the torpedoes hit.”
I watched as Uncle Josh frantically activated the Diver’s laser cannons. I felt so useless, but what was I supposed to do to help? I couldn’t just leave the sub and destroy the torpedoes myself, because water breathing was not one of my super powers. Ever since becoming Trickshot, I rarely felt useless in most situations, but this was one where I did and I didn’t like it at all. Based on how Mack, Gina, and Christina looked, they must have felt as useless as me. It was up to the one normal human to save us superhumans from destruction. Kind of ironic when you think about it.
“There,” said Uncle Josh as a row of red lights suddenly turned on in the center of the control panel. “Cannons activated. Let’s see what the radar can find.”
Uncle Josh looked at the radar screen next to the controls. So did the rest of us. For a moment, the radar showed nothing around us, which made me believe, irrationally, that maybe Chaser had been lying about shooting the torpedoes at us and that we might be able to get to Iconia in one piece after all.
But then three green dots appeared on the radar, three green dots that were getting closer and closer with each passing second. They all came from the same general direction, though their speed amazed me, because it sure looked to me like they’d be upon us in less than a minute.
“There they are,” said Uncle Josh. “Time to see if the cannons work.”
Uncle Josh pressed a button underneath the red lights. A second later, one of the green dots disappeared, leaving just two more hurtling toward us at high speeds.
“It worked!” Gina cried out triumphantly. “Yay!”
“Don’t celebrate just yet,” said Uncle Josh. “There are still two more.”
“Why didn’t you just shoot all three of them down at once?” said Christina. “Wouldn’t that have been better than shooting them down one at a time?”
“Cannons need to recharge,” said Uncle Josh. “Recharge only takes a few seconds, but it’s still annoying. Ah, it’s done recharging.”
Uncle Josh pressed the button again, and then I noticed the red lights went off when he did that, which I realized was the sign that the cannon had fired and was entering its recharge period.
Looking at the radar, I saw the second dot disappear. I also thought I heard something outside the sub, like some kind of explosion, but it was very faint and far away, so it might have just been my ears playing tricks on me or something.
“Two down, one to go,” said Mack. “How long until the cannons recharge?”
“Once all of these lights are back on,” said Uncle Josh, gesturing at the red lights I’d notice before. Three of them were on. “These lights monitor the status of the cannons. When all of them are off, the cannons are not operational. When all of them are on, the cannon is at full power. Pretty simple.”
“They’d better all turn back on quick,” said Christina, looking at the radar anxiously. “That last green dot is getting too close for comfort.”
For once, I agreed with Christina. The last green dot was getting closer and closer with every second. The fourth red light turned on, but there was still one red light to go an
d I feared that it would not activate in time for Uncle Josh to blow up the last missile.
“Just got to be patient, everyone,” said Uncle Josh. “Don’t panic. The cannons are nearly done recharging, and once they are, we’ll be okay.”
Uncle Josh’s voice was calm and even soothing, but I found it hard to remain calm nonetheless, because that green dot was getting closer and closer. It was almost to the center of the radar now, right where we were. I was now starting to worry that even if the cannons finished recharging in time, that it might be too late because the torpedo might be too close for the cannons to actually blow them up.
Then, abruptly, the final red light turned on and Uncle Josh immediately pressed the button underneath the lights again.
A second later, the last green dot disappeared off the radar. There were no more green dots left. It was completely clean.
“Yay!” said Gina, jumping up into the air and hugging Mack. “We’re alive! I can’t believe it.”
“No problem,” said Uncle Josh, though he wiped some sweat off his forehead. “Those torpedoes would have been a threat under any other circumstance, but they were no match for the power of our laser cannons. You should thank the Pinnacle engineers when we get back to base.”
I sighed in relief. I noticed that Christina also looked relieved. We’d all thought we were going to die there. I could just imagine how frustrated Chaser had to be that his great plan had been ruined by a few well-placed lasers.
All of a sudden, the speaker crackled again and Chaser’s voice spoke over it again. “You destroyed my torpedoes. Impressive.”
Uncle Josh, who was grinning like a maniac, leaned forward and said into the speaker, “Yeah, and we’ll destroy any more you send at us, too, you dumb jerk. We can do this all night.”
“Yes, you probably could,” said Chaser. “But that would be a big waste of time for all of us, I think we can agree. We should end this now, rather than drag it on for who-knows-how-long.”
“And how are you going to do that, Chaser?” said Uncle Josh. “Shoot more useless torpedoes at us?”
Though I couldn’t see Chaser’s face and didn’t even know what it looked like, when he next spoke, I could just imagine him smirking in a room somewhere all by himself. “Maybe I should have made myself clearer. The torpedoes were meant to be the distraction. Hence why I just sent three, rather than unleashing our entire arsenal on you and completely annihilating your sub.”
“The torpedoes were a distraction?” said Uncle Josh. “A distraction from what?”
All of a sudden, the submarine shuddered. Mack held Gina tightly against him to keep her from falling over, while Christina would have tripped and fallen flat on her face if I hadn’t grabbed her arm and pulled her upright at the last moment. Uncle Josh clung to the arms of his chair for dear life, his eyes wide with terror.
“What was that?” said Gina, her voice full of fear as she looked up at the ceiling. “Did we hit something?”
“Josh, how are the engines holding up?” said Mack.
Uncle Josh looked at the monitors frankly. “I-I don’t understand. The monitors show that the engines are still working and active, but we’re not actually going anywhere. It doesn’t make any sense.”
I let go of Christina—who glared at me as if I had just violated her privacy—and rushed over to the speaker. “Chaser, what happened? Is this your doing?”
“Perhaps,” said Chaser. “Or perhaps you hit a sunken ship. There are plenty of those around these waters. Easy to hit if you’re not familiar with the area.”
I was about to snap at Chaser for his sarcasm when Gina all of a sudden shrieked like a banshee, causing me to look over my shoulder at her. “Gina, what’s the problem?”
Gina was clutching Mack tighter than ever, but her eyes were locked on the ceiling of the sub. Her face was as pale as snow. “I saw a face. In the ceiling.”
“A face in the ceiling?” I said. All of us looked up at what Gina was looking at. “I don’t see a face in the—”
And that was when a ghost floated down through the ceiling, wearing a wide grin on his face and carrying a scythe in his hands.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
The ghost looked to be a black man in his thirties, wearing flowing white robes and carrying a long, wicked scythe in his hands. His body glowed a sickly green color, while his grin revealed crooked but oddly white teeth that gave him the appearance of a ghoul. He was completely bald, but he had an impressive goatee and seemed to be well-muscled underneath his robes.
“Holy crap,” said Uncle Josh, staring at the man floating above us. “It really is a ghost.”
“That’s no ghost,” said Christina with a gulp. “That’s Carl.”
I looked at Christina. “Who?”
“Christina!” the ghost bellowed, his voice strangely magnified in this small space. “I see that the rumors of your betrayal were true! I had hoped they were mistaken, but I suppose the Superior is never mistaken! Alas!”
“You know this ghost?” said Gina, looking at Christina in terror.
“He’s not a ghost,” said Christina in annoyance. “He’s a human like you and me. He can just turn intangible and stuff.”
“Indeed I can,” said the man. He put a hand on his chest. “I am Carl Hogarth, though I was better known as Black Ghost when I was a superhero in Detroit. With my powers, I can phase through any physical object and go where I please. Few have ever faced my awe-inspiring might and lived to tell the tale.”
“He’s also a huge pervert,” said Christina. She looked at Carl. “I know you like to use your powers to spy on the female Icon agents in the shower, Carl.”
“Perish the thought,” said Carl. He raised his scythe above his head. “As Black Ghost, I’ve used my powers for good, but as an agent of Icon, I use my powers for the greater good, indeed the greatest of all. Few understand just how wise and intelligent the Superior is in all his ways. And even fewer understand what it is to experience the full wrath of his unforgiving might.”
I didn’t quite know why Carl spoke like he was writing bad poetry. Maybe he was just really full of himself. “What are you doing here? Are you the reason our sub stopped?”
“You are correct, young Trickshot,” said Black Ghost. He gestured at the ceiling. “Whilst you and yours were busy fending off the Superior’s torpedoes, my crew and I aboard our own sub sneaked up on yours and attacked it when you weren’t looking. We’ve used the massive magnet on the outside of our own submarine to connect both vessels together, thus ensuring you shall not escape us.”
“And what are you doing here?” I said. “Just to gloat to us about how screwed we are?”
“There will be time for gloating later, my young friend,” said Black Ghost. His grin became absolutely psychotic. “I’m here to slaughter the Superior’s enemies, as he desires. Your blood will paint the interior of your sub red and become a monument to the arrogance of those who challenge the Superior’s authority, especially traitors like Christina.”
Black Ghost turned physical and dropped onto the floor before us. He swung his scythe at Christina, who ducked to avoid getting her head cut off. I threw a couple of disks at Black Ghost, but then he immediately turned intangible and vanished through the floor before my disks could hit him.
“Damn it,” I said, looking around wildly for him. “He got away. Where’d he go?”
“No clue, but he’s probably going to be back soon,” said Mack. “Josh, is there any way to free the Diver from their sub’s magnet?”
“We’re already operating at near peak speed,” said Uncle Josh. “If we tried to go any faster, we’d blow out the engines.”
“Meaning you can’t go any faster,” I said. “This is not good.”
“You think?” said Mack. He shook his head. “Josh, what should we do? Try to break free of their sub anyway or surrender or what?”
Uncle Josh’s fingers thumbed against the arms of his chair frantically, like he was thinking hard about wha
t to do. I couldn’t blame him, because this was a terrible situation to be in and I couldn’t imagine the stress he was undergoing as he considered all our options.
Finally, Uncle Josh looked at the rest of us. “We’ll need to abandon ship. We can’t save the Diver and also reach Iconia at the same time.”
“Abandon ship?” I said. “But isn’t that the same as surrendering?”
“Hardly,” said Uncle Josh. “We can still complete the mission. The Diver has three escape pods, which can take us and the bomb to Iconia.”
“But there has to be someway to save the sub,” I said. “Isn’t there?”
“No, there isn’t,” said Uncle Josh. “And the sub isn’t important. What matters is completing the mission, no matter what we have to sacrifice. I always suspected something like this might happen, but Chaser has forced our hand. Better all of us get to Iconia, even if we get stranded there, than go down pointless with the Diver.”
I still didn’t like the idea of running, but I had to admit that Uncle Josh’s reasoning was sound. “All right. But we can’t just let them have the Diver.”
Uncle Josh grinned evilly. “When did I say we were just going to let them have it?”
Uncle Josh turned back to the controls and flipped open a covered switch I had not noticed before. Loud alarms suddenly began blaring throughout the sub while all of the lights on the control panel suddenly shut off.
“What did you just do?” I said, raising my voice to be heard over the blaring sirens.
“Activated the self-destruct sequence!” Uncle Josh shouted. “In about ten minutes, the Diver will blow up and destroy everything aboard. Should give us enough time to get out of here using the escape pods!”
“Self-destruct sequence?” I said incredulously. “You really are prepared for everything, aren’t you?”
