by Lucas Flint
Wrath sat in it, a smile on his face as he took a bite from a half-eaten apple. He wasn’t alone. Standing behind his right shoulder was a woman in dark robes, who I recognized from my memories as the woman who had altered my memories. I still didn’t know her name, but just the sight of her was enough to make my blood boil.
“Bolt,” said Wrath through a mouthful of apple. He swallowed and smiled. “You’re back, just as Hopper said you would be. How was captivity? I’ve heard that the G-Men can be rather … ruthless in their enhanced interrogation techniques.”
“Where is everyone else?” I said.
“Gone,” said Wrath. He tossed the apple from hand to hand before taking another bite from it. “Left hours ago. They left me and Alana here to welcome you home.”
“Left?” I said in shock. “Where did they go?”
“To save our mighty leader, naturally enough,” said Wrath. “A task, I might add, that you failed at. Of course, Cadmus Smith tried to trick us with that empty van, but he’s nowhere near as clever as he thinks he is.”
“But how?” I said. “When I was captured by the G-Men, I was told that only Cadmus Smith knew of the Visionary’s location.”
“Did you honestly believe him when he said that?” said Wrath with a laugh. “Cadmus Smith is a known liar and manipulator. The truth is, the true location of our leader was on Cadmus Smith’s computer, which Technical managed to hack into while you were captured. As a result, we managed to learn where he is and the others left to go save him.”
I didn’t know if there was any truth to Wrath’s words. Given how Vision had lied to me about everything already, I had a feeling that this was yet another lie on top of everything else they had told me.
On the other hand, it did explain the others’ absence. And with Cadmus listening through my earcom, I bet he was already sending someone to go and check on the Visionary’s actual location to ensure that Vision had not broken into the place.
“Well, isn’t that great?” I said. “I mean, our dear leader is about to be saved. I think that’s wonderful.”
Wrath tilted his head to the side, an unimpressed look on his face. “You’re not a very good liar, you know. I can tell that you aren’t exactly happy about it.”
“What do you mean?” I said. “I’m not lying.”
“Yes, you are,” said Wrath. “In fact, not only are you lying, but you also betrayed us. You turned to the G-Men and are working with them to arrest all of us. Right, Alana?”
The hooded woman standing behind Wrat nodded. “Yes. I can sense that his true memories have already started to return. He no doubt knows the truth by now.”
“See?” said Wrath. “So there’s really no need to pretend like you’re one of us anymore, Bolt. You’re not fooling anyone.”
I bit my lower lip. “All right. You got me. I know the truth, having learned it from Cadmus Smith, and most of my memories are already back. And yes, I am working with the G-Men; in fact, there’s a team of G-Men waiting in the woods around this Mansion right now for the moment to strike.”
“Thaumaturge, as usual, was correct to worry about this,” said Wrath. “I really will have to tell him about it later, after Alana and I finish with you.”
I looked at the hooded woman. “Her name is Alana? Who is she?”
“Just another member of Vision,” said Wrath. “She specializes in altering or suppressing the memories of other people. Right, Alana?”
“Correct,” said Alana, her voice monotone. “I can manipulate the memories of anyone around me, though the effects are usually not permanent unless I make a concerted effort over a long period of time. There was always a possibility that you would recover your old memories, which is why I am not surprised to learn that you have, since you were outside of the range of my abilities for too long.”
“Why?” I said. “Why would you manipulate me like this in the first place?”
“It was Thaumaturge’s idea,” said Wrath. He took another bite out of his apple, chewed, and swallowed quickly. “You’ve always been a thorn in the side of Vision, so when Alana joined and we learned what her powers were, Thaumaturge thought that it would be much sweeter to turn you over to our side and to use your powers and strength for our own uses, rather than kill you outright.”
“Well, that failed,” I said. “After all, we failed to save Sagan and now I remember everything. Soon, you and your friends will all be in jail.”
Wrath’s smirk grew even broader. “Oh, saving our leader was just one of our goals. An important one, yes, but not the only one. Alana, show him the article, would you?”
Alana—who I now noticed was carrying a laptop in her arms—placed a laptop on the table, opened its screen, clicked a few times, and then turned it around for me to see that it was a Neo Ranks article, with the headline reading ‘YOUNG NEOS LEADER SEEN AIDING KNOWN VISIONISTS IN ASSAULT ON WHITE HOUSE,’ with an image just below it of me, Incantation, and Sarah racing through the portal back to the Hanson Mansion.
I looked at Wrath again. “I don’t understand. It’s just a news report.”
“Just a news report?” Wrath repeated. He chuckled. “How naïve. Then again, you haven’t been watching the news over the last few days, have you?”
“Why should I?” I said. “I don’t really care what the news says.”
“You should,” said Wrath. “The current narrative in the news media today is that you have apparently turned into a supervillain. All over the Internet, there are arguments between your supporters and your enemies about whether or not you are even still a hero anymore or whether you have truly turned to the ‘dark side,’ as they call it.”
“So what?” I said. “Let people have their opinions. Once the truth comes out—that you guys were manipulating my memories to make me do bad things—then all of these arguments will go away.”
“Will they?” said Wrath. “People aren’t rational. A growing number of people—including people in the superhero community itself—are starting to believe you are voluntarily working with us. It doesn’t matter whether it is true or not; what matters is that the entire world has been allowed to believe this for the last few days, with nothing concrete to counter that notion, meaning that it will soon be considered an unquestionable truth, on par with the idea that the Earth is round, within the next couple of days.”
“At that point,” said Alana, causing me to look at her, “your reputation will be ruined. People will be calling for your arrest. Or your head.”
“President Plutarch will pardon me,” I said. “He’ll know I wasn’t myself when that happened.”
“Oh?” said Wrath. “I wouldn’t be so happy about that. Most of these people will see it as you gaming the system. They’ll think that you have escaped justice just because you are on friendly terms with the President. That will just make more people believe that you are evil and lead to more people demanding your arrest.”
“Then those people will be wrong,” I said. “The facts are the facts, regardless of what other people think about them.”
“But perception often matters more than facts,” said Wrath. “And if the public perceives that you are a traitorous criminal who can get away with anything by virtue of having friends in high places … well, I wouldn’t be surprised if that idea trickles into the general superhero community, maybe even causing the NHA to fire you and make your friends hate and distrust you.”
“My friends would never believe that,” I said. “They know I would never become a villain or commit any crimes.”
“Do they?” said Wrath. “I don’t know. They might keep believing in you, or maybe there will be a seed, a tiny seed, of doubt. After all, you were friendly with Incantation and the others before you found out their true nature as Visionists; they might think you never truly hated us.”
My hands balled into fists. “You don’t know them. You don’t know my friends at all.”
“However true that may be, the fact is that the rest of society won’t be
quite as understanding as your friends,” said Wrath. “Whether you beat us or not, the truth is that your reputation will be permanently smeared. And that is victory for Vision, regardless of what else happens.”
“I don’t care,” I said. I pointed at Wrath. “I’m going to beat you two. And not only that, but the G-Men will help. There are twelve elite G-Men agents surrounding the Mansion, so you’re screwed no matter what.”
“Are we?” said Wrath. He looked at Alana. “Do you agree with that, girl?”
Alana shook her head. “No, I don’t.”
“What does it matter whether you agree or not?” I said in exasperation. “I’m just stating a fact.”
“I disagree with it because I’ve already beaten them,” said Alana.
I stared at Alan in shock. “Already beaten them? What are you talking about?”
“I altered their memories,” said Alana, gesturing toward the window. “People don’t need to be within my vision for me to affect their memories. When I sensed them arrive, I changed their memories so they would forget that they are G-Men. That way, even if you send them a message for help, they won’t obey the order because they won’t understand it.”
“Cadmus, is that true?” I said into my earcom.
“It appears so,” said Cadmus in an annoyed voice. “I tried to contact the leader of the team, but she said she doesn’t know who I am or what I’m talking about and told me to stop calling her.”
I looked at Wrath and Alana again. “You bastards.”
“I did it for the Vision,” said Alana. “And it won’t last forever; it is much harder to suppress the memories of a dozen people rather than one person for a long period of time. But by the time they remember what they’re here to do, you will be dead and we will be long gone.”
“So you’re going to kill me?” I said. “Not try to manipulate me to join your side?”
“Of course not,” said Wrath. “You’ve done everything we need you to do. Keeping you alive, even under our control, would mean that there will always be a chance you will rebel against us and defeat us at some point in the future, and that is a risk that not even I am willing to take.”
“How are you going to kill me?” I said. “You do know that I could run over and smash both of your heads in without even thinking about it, right?”
“Just because our powers lean more toward abstraction doesn’t mean that they are useless in battle,” said Wrath. He tossed his apple aside and stood up. “For that matter, you’re assuming that you already know all of our powers, which you don’t.”
Wrath’s hands balled into fists and his chest started heaving in and out. His eyes bulged, a guttural growl emitted from his mouth, and his body and muscles started to grow. Alana stepped back as Wrath grew larger and larger, until he soon stood a head above me and Alana. His robes ripped around his massive body, until he was left only in a pair of stretching shorts that he apparently wore underneath his robes.
“What the heck?” I said. “Did you just hulk out?”
Wrath flexed his huge muscles and said, “It’s one of my powers and why I am named Wrath: Anger gives me power and allows my body to grow in size and strength. I now have enough strength to turn you into paste.”
“Not unless I turn you into paste first,” I said.
I launched through the air toward Wrath, pulling back my fists to punch him. But Wrath raised his fist and punched me solidly in the jaw, the blow sending me flying off course.
I crashed through a wall and rolled across the floor until I slammed into a sofa. My senses dazed, I shook my head in time to see Wrath flying through the hole in the wall toward me.
He landed on top of me, his huge weight squeezing the air out of me, and then stomped his foot on my chest, making me gasp for air again.
“Hanson will probably be pissed when he sees the hole in the wall of his Mansion, but once I finish you, I’m sure he won’t give me any crap about it,” said Wrath. He pulled back his fist. “But, of course, you will not live long enough to see that.”
Chapter Twelve
I instinctively grabbed Wrath’s foot and pushed back, causing him to stagger off me and swing his arms in order to regain his balance. I scrambled to my feet, breathing in as much air as I could, but I didn’t have a chance to do much else before Wrath ran at me again.
Again, I reacted instinctively, raising my hands to catch his fists before they could hit me in the face. But then Wrath headbutted me, which temporarily knocked me off balance, allowing Wrath to lift me above his head and throw me away.
I crashed into several bookshelves, sending books raining down on me, and they were big, heavy books, too. I shoved the books off me and rose to my feet just as Wrath came charging at me.
Instinctively, I flew into the air, dodging Wrath at the last possible moment. Wrath smashed into the bookshelves, knocking off what few books had managed to remain on them, as I landed behind him.
I fired lightning bolts at Wrath’s back, but he rolled out of the way, causing the lightning bolts to strike the bookshelves and make them explode, sending chunks of wood flying everywhere. I aimed at him again, but Wrath grabbed my wrists and yanked my arms upwards, causing my next blast of lightning to strike the ceiling, which made chunks of plaster and wood fall on both of us.
Then Wrath raised me by my arms and slammed me down on the floor. The impact of the crash created a small crater in the floor in which I lay, dazed, before Wrath raised me above his head again and hurled me at the ceiling.
I smashed through the ceiling, hit the ceiling in the room above, and then fell onto the floor again. But I recovered quickly, getting to my feet as Wrath’s huge fingers appeared on the edges of the hole, a sign that Wrath was trying to pull himself up.
“Cadmus, I need backup,” I said, walking backwards from the hole that Wrath was trying to climb through. “Like, right now.”
“The team isn’t listening,” Cadmus said, frustration in his voice. “Alana’s amnesia is keeping them from remembering who I am. Several of them have told me to do rather inappropriate things to myself.”
“Maybe if I beat Alana, their memories will return and they will be able to help me,” I said.
“That’s as good a plan as any,” said Cadmus. “If you can beat her, do so. Otherwise, you’re on your own for now.”
“Gotcha,” I said. “I’ll—”
Wrath’s head broke through the hole in the floor and the Visionist pulled his whole body through it, widening the hole as his bulk pulled up onto the floor. He noticed me immediately and smiled, which looked psychotic and scary on his huge face.
“There you are,” said Wrath. “I’m getting tired of beating you. Why don’t you run?”
Wrath waved one of his hands. All of a sudden, a severe, intense fear shook through my whole body, making me shudder. It felt like I was facing the scariest thing in existence, but I couldn’t even think clearly enough to figure out what was making me so scared.
I took a step backwards, but my rational mind told me to stop. It was incredibly difficult, though, and took all of my willpower to stay, because I was so afraid of Wrath that all I wanted to do was run away and hide under the blankets of my bed.
Through the fear, I recognized that Wrath was just using his powers of emotional manipulation over me. Even so, that didn’t help me fight it. If anything, that just made it even harder, because I knew that as long as Wrath kept using his power, I would never be able to gather the courage to fight back.
“Yes, I can see the fear on your face,” said Wrath. “Let the fear consume you. Let despair make you unable to fight back.”
Wrath ran at me. There was no way I could dodge or block his attacks. All I wanted to do was run and hide, not for any reason other than I was really, really afraid.
All of a sudden, Cadmus shouted in my ear, “Bolt, snap out of it!”
Cadmus’s voice—strong and angry—broke through the fear clouding my mind. It cleared the fear away just long enough for
me to think clearly, which was all I needed to do, because Wrath was now upon me and was throwing his fists at me again.
But I moved faster than him. I charged my fist with electricity, sending sparks flying everywhere, and dodged Wrath’s blows. Because I was smaller than him, I was able to move in and punch him hard in the gut, combining my super strength and electricity in the strongest blow I could muster.
When my fist connected with Wrath’s body, I felt electricity drain from my body into his. At the same time, I heard a crack come from somewhere within Wrath’s body and he was sent flying, sent flying so fast that not only did he break through the wall of this room, but also broke through the walls of the next two rooms, until he smashed into what sounded like a glass cabinet full of precious china, which crashed down on him with an earsplitting crash.
I waited for him to get up and resume fighting, but I didn’t even hear him stir. Not only that, but the overwhelming fear that I had felt earlier had completely worn off, making me feel tired and exhausted.
“Bolt, I heard what sounded like an electrical explosion go off,” said Cadmus in my ear suddenly. “Are you all right?”
“Yeah,” I said. I looked down at my fist, which was no longer sparking. “Wrath is down. Probably not dead, but will probably have to spend the next few months in the hospital.”
“Excellent,” said Cadmus. “Now you need to find Alana.”
“Right,” I said. “She was in the dining room last I saw. I wouldn’t be surprised if she took advantage of our fight to flee, though, but I’m going down just to make sure.”
“Good,” said Cadmus. “Do it quickly, because she is far more of a threat to our operation than Wrath was.”
I nodded and flew through the holes in the ceiling and walls until I returned to the dining room. Landing on the floor, I looked back toward the end of the table, where Alana had been standing, only to see that she was missing.
“She’s gone,” I said. “And I don’t know where she is.”
