Marrow

by Preston Norton

  “You stole Nero’s power?”

  “Ripped it right out of his smug little brain right after he tried to rat me out to you and your friends.”

  I couldn’t believe it. Nero was not only comatose, but he was powerless. Everything he had worked for—gone. I couldn’t feel any of the resentment I used to have for him. I only felt sick.

  “But that was just a little something to tide me over,” said Fantom. “Even collecting Oracle’s power—which is immense, I might add—is small in comparison to the true fruit of my reckoning.”

  I didn’t want to ask. So naturally, I did. “What’s that?”

  “The Cronus Order,” said Fantom. “The largest gathering of Telepaths the world has ever known. Like Nero, my reason for using Oracle had dual purposes. Can you imagine? All that power in one location.”

  “But…their powers were just taken by the Cronus,” I protested.

  “The first batch, yes,” said Fantom. The corners of his lips twitched, fighting another sadistic smile. “Well…supposing that the Cronus works like I said it does.”

  Oh no. This was bad. This was really bad. As if the Cronus Order wasn’t horrible enough on its own…

  “What do you mean? What does the Cronus really do?”

  “Oh, it takes their powers alright,” said Fantom. “However, it’s not so much a machine as it is…oh, what’s the word? An amplifier? You see, below the Cronus, there is a centralized compartment cell designed specifically for me. The Cronus only works if Gaia and I are powering it with our cerebral energy. And when that happens…”

  The chamber beneath the Tartarus! Oh crap. Oh crap crap crap crap crap.

  “You steal their power,” said Flex.

  “Like candy from a baby,” said Fantom. “And baby, it’s Halloween. Nero actually found the compartment cell, the little snoop. That’s when I decided to revoke his brain privileges permanently.”

  “And Whisp,” I said. “You stole his power too?”

  “The animal whisperer? Funny you should mention him. I actually made a special effort to target him and secure his power. Oh boy, do I have plans for that power!”

  I didn’t even want to know. I was slightly more terrified about the rest of the power he was absorbing.

  “Top that off with Oracle’s vast power and the telepathic energy of over a hundred other Telepaths…” Fantom breathed in and sighed blissfully. “Have you ever tried on glasses or contact lenses for the first time? Well…I haven’t. But I’d imagine it’d feel similar to this—on steroids and multiplied by a billion. And hey, that’s just the appetizer. While the Cronus Order is still in effect, there are still thousands of more minds to come. And believe me, I intend to absorb every telepathic mind in existence.”

  Fantom yawned, interlocking his fingers and stretching them behind his head. He turned to glance at a clock hanging on the wall and shook his head.

  “Oh, would you look at me,” he said. “Monologuing again. I apologize about that. You have no idea how maddening it is to have a perfect plan like this and not be able to share it with anyone. And here we are now. You two know everything, and now I have to kill you. I was really hoping to somehow break past these mental barriers of yours, but the more I think about it, the more impractical it seems. Even with all my new power, it could take weeks for me to penetrate them. Maybe longer. And I obviously can’t keep you quiet for that long without arousing suspicions. Such a shame too. Marrow, you would have made the perfect follow-up villain to Spine. You have the motive, the power, the tainted reputation… everything. It would have been beautiful. Poetic, even.”

  Fantom pulled his gaze from me, focusing instead on white-eyed Sapphire who hadn’t budged.

  “But alas…I’ll just have to settle for your girlfriend, you, and Flex killing each other in a Mexican standoff. I’m sure the police will concoct their own viable motive. They always do.”

  Even telepathically pinned to the wall, my body tensed.

  Fantom turned to the water fountain. The knob pressed down and water sprayed from the faucet. But instead of arcing back down into the fountain, the water redirected horizontally in a concentrated stream, slithering toward us like a liquid snake. The knob popped up again, shutting the water off, but the levitating stream was already several feet long. Sapphire raised her hand. As the water reached her palm, it reformed and solidified into an icy javelin, pointing at Flex.

  My own hand raised as well—the one with inch-long bone spikes still protruding from my fingertips—pointing at Sapphire. Flex’s arm raised, stretching towards me.

  A force wrapped around my throat. My windpipe closed off.

  “Flex was so upset that Marrow left him for me, he decided to kill his former sidekick,” said Fantom. “Sapphire reacted instantly, attacking Flex. And Marrow, who still cared for Flex, tried to stop his girlfriend at any cost. All three died instantly. Oh, this is good.”

  My suffocating gaze darted between all the sharp edges that were aimed to collide. I desperately tapped into my skeletal structure, struggling to retract my claws, to break free of Fantom—to break free of Flex’s chokehold—but Fantom’s telekinesis was impenetrable.

  “It’s been a pleasure, fellas,” said Fantom. And then he winked. He actually winked. “Oh, and Marrow, tell your mom I said hi. She was a babe.”

  The room was blurry. Fading. I gasped, choked, wheezed, as my starving lungs crumpled. Sapphire reared her icy javelin back, aiming at Flex. I flew at her—dangling from Fantom’s telekinetic strings—my claws aimed at her heart. They would both be stabbed simultaneously.

  And me? I had already breathed my last breath.

  CHAPTER 35

  This was it. We were dead. My whole life became an instantaneous slideshow of flashing images. Unfortunately, it was very short and slightly depressing. I squeezed my eyes shut, hoping that it would all be over quick.

  Fantom screamed.

  I opened my eyes and several things happened at once. Sapphire veered off course, stabbing her icy javelin into the wall beside Flex. Flex and I dropped to the floor, barely managing to land on our feet. Fantom backed against the far corner, staring at his hands in horror.

  Or what was left of his hands.

  They were melting. His hands were like wax, bending and dissolving—dripping onto the floor.

  That lasted for only a brief moment. An instant later, his hands were whole again. Fantom blinked, looking at his hands, front and back.

  Nightmare materialized out of nowhere. Swinging a massive gorilla arm, he nailed Fantom in the face. Fantom spun a full 360 degrees before hitting the floor.

  Nightmare was still wearing the same weathered trench coat and ugly face I remembered. But he also had a strange but familiar metal helmet clutched in his massive grip.

  A mind cuff.

  “You ugly-as-butt, monkey-faced Neanderthal!” said Flex. His gaze was still riveted on the icy spear in the wall. “What took you so long?”

  “A thank you will suffice, you greasy hippie-troll,” said Nightmare.

  “Whoa, what?” I said. “You two know each other?”

  “Long story,” said Flex. “CliffsNotes version: I was in jail when he did his weird hallucination thing in my head, except mostly he just showed me that he and Spine were the good guys Fantom was a power-sucking, villain-creating, Omnipotent psychopath. So I broke out of jail.”

  He made it sound like he shoplifted candy out of Wal-Mart.

  “You just broke out,” I said, somewhat mockingly. “Just like that.”

  “Dude,” he said. “I’m made of rubber. I squeezed through the bars.”

  Sapphire blinked several times, snapping out of her mind-controlled daze with confused blue eyes. She glanced down at the icy spear her hands were still gripping, jutting from the wall. “What? What just happened?”

  Then she turned to find Nightmare standing over Fantom who was sprawled on the floor.

  And then she screamed.

  Nightmare didn’t waste a mom
ent. Approaching her, undeterred, he shoved the helmet on her head and latched it shut. He then whisked her off of her feet and tucked her effortlessly under his arm.

  “Hey!” said Sapphire, kicking and flailing. “Put me down!”

  Nightmare ignored her, redirecting his determined gaze to me. “We need to get out of here. Now.”

  My brain seemed to be frozen as a gazillion questions battled through my mind at once. All of those questions seemed to diminish as Fantom rolled on the floor and groaned.

  “Yeah,” I said, nodding anxiously.

  Nightmare, Flex, and I bolted out the door, racing down the long, bleak hallway of the Control Tower while Sapphire continued to scream.

  “Why didn’t you put the mind cuff on Fantom?” I asked.

  “He’s too strong,” said Nightmare. “His mind would break through and he’d just rip the mind cuff off telekinetically.”

  “Well why am I wearing this stupid thing?” said Sapphire, fumbling with the strap. “I don’t have mind powers!”

  “Mind cuffs work both ways. They don’t just keep mind powers in. They keep mind powers out as well. From a distance, this should keep Fantom out of your head…mostly. I hope. We have to protect ourselves from him.”

  “What about you?” I said. “Don’t you need one?”

  “I have my own mental defenses. He can enter my head, but he’d be crazy to try. There’s some scary stuff in there. Other Telepaths have tried and ended up needing serious therapy afterward.”

  I believed it.

  “That was a pretty good hallucination,” I said. “Melting hands. Glad you never used that one on me.”

  Even as we ran, Nightmare shot me a wide-eyed stare. “You saw that?”

  “Of course I saw it. Why wouldn’t—”

  I didn’t even finish. The words fell dead in my throat.

  “Your mental barrier is collapsing,” said Nightmare. “Fantom’s more powerful than I thought. I’m surprised he didn’t realize how close he was. One more nudge and he would have been inside your head. If he finds out…”

  Nightmare didn’t finish his thought. He didn’t need to.

  I was one step away from being Fantom’s next headline Supervillain.

  I swallowed hard. Nightmare still had no idea just how powerful Fantom really was now. He didn’t know how powerful he would become if we didn’t stop him.

  “So what’s the plan?” I asked.

  “For the most part, it consists of running really fast. And maybe, if we don’t die, we’ll rescue your father.”

  “Fast,” I said, nodding vacantly. “I can do fast.”

  We were just rounding the corner to the stairwell when the entire wall around the surveillance room door exploded. Shards of wood and broken debris sprayed the opposite wall, swallowed in billowing dust. A red cape flared amid the smoke.

  “Faster,” said Flex, hurtling down the stairs. “Gotta go faster.”

  “Let me go!” Sapphire insisted, pounding Nightmare’s thigh with her fists. “I have legs, you know!”

  “Sure you do,” said Nightmare. Flying down the stairs two steps at a time, he clearly had no intention of putting her down.

  “Fine,” said Sapphire. “You want fast? I’ll give you fast.”

  She reached her hands up, pointing her blue fingernails to the top of the stairwell. A water fountain rattled on the wall. Fantom stepped directly in front of it.

  “You!” he growled. “I’m going to kill—!”

  Whether it was intentional or not, the water fountain exploded, erupting in a concentrated blast that threw Fantom down the stairs as water flooded down the steps. Just as it was gushing past our feet, threatening to throw off our balance, it froze. The stairwell became an icy slide, rounded up on the tight curves. Nightmare lost his grip of Sapphire and all four of us spiraled downward. Fantom’s body was lost behind us, frozen in the ice.

  “Seeeeeeeeee?” said Sapphire as we slid. “This is waaaaaaaaaay faaaaaaaaaasterrrrrrrrrr!”

  “You’re insaaaaaaaaaane!” said Nightmare.

  “Heeeeey, at least I took care of Faaaaaantom, riiiiight?”

  Even though Fantom was far out of sight, frozen somewhere between the third and second floor, a reverberating crack resounded from above, followed by the sound of shattering. We hit the bottom floor running.

  “Not so much,” Nightmare muttered under his breath.

  Sunlight splashed across us we dashed outside, cutting across the long Specter Estate driveway.

  “Can’t you use your hallucinations on him again?” I asked.

  “Not like that,” said Nightmare. “He’ll be expecting it now. The only way I’ll trick his mind now is if I take a more subtle approach.”

  “Subtle?” said Flex. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  “Don’t worry. I have a plan.”

  “Screw that,” said Sapphire. She glanced anxiously back at the Control Tower. “Where do we run?”

  “Good question,” said Nightmare. “I don’t know.”

  “WHAT?”

  “Nightmare,” said Flex. “I just want to take this moment to let you know that I hate you.”

  Nightmare ignored him. “We’re supposed to be rendezvousing with someone here,” he said.

  “Who?”

  A subtle whoosh drew all of our attentions. We all turned to find an all-too-familiar black man who easily matched Nightmare in size standing near the base of the Control Tower. Like Sapphire, he was also wearing a mind cuff and seemed especially glad to have it

  “Havoc!” Sapphire and I exclaimed simultaneously.

  Just as Havoc was turning around, the bottom of the ice-covered Control Tower stairwell exploded in chunks of wood, sandstone, and ice-turned-slush. Fantom emerged from the smoldering rubble, wafting the smoke from his face.

  Havoc—our ticket out of here—was now sprawled on the stretch of parking lot between us and Fantom, scraping himself off the asphalt.

  We flew toward him.

  I resisted tapping into my skeletal power, keeping pace with Flex, Sapphire and Nightmare’s desperate sprinting. At this point, Fantom had regained his bearings and narrowed his furious gaze on us—only a few yards from Havoc who was now staggering to his feet.

  Fantom blasted towards us, cape flaring behind him like a trail of fire.

  Havoc only now realized his precarious position and extended his arms out to us. Nightmare, Flex, Sapphire, and I all lunged, arms reaching to grab any part of his body.

  We collided in a tangle of flesh. I was only focused on Havoc’s leg, which I clung to desperately as gravity became a vacuum through space and my insides flattened against my ribcage. I closed my eyes before they could get sucked out of their sockets.

  I never hit the asphalt of the parking lot, but our final destination made up for that. When gravity was back in force, I landed stomach-first on a solid tile floor. I dared to open my eyes. The first things I saw past Havoc’s heavy boot were the wheeled legs of a hospital bed. A broad, hanging arm was handcuffed to the bedframe. The thick, calloused fingers with chipped, claw-like nails were unmistakable.

  Dad…

  My thoughts didn’t make it far past that point. There was a sickening smack of flesh, and Havoc’s leg whipped out of my grip, kicking me in the face. I didn’t even have a moment to register the pain. An invisible force seized me from the inside, placing special pressure on my throat, Darth Vader-style. I lifted off of the ground, kicking and grasping at my neck in a futile effort to stop the choking. It wasn’t until now that I noticed Flex, Sapphire, Nightmare, and Havoc levitating with me in the same dismal predicament. Everyone was gasping for air except for Havoc who was completely unconscious, dangling like a puppet on strings. Together, we formed a swaying circle around Fantom. Behind his mask, his manic gaze was concentrated on Nightmare.

  With so many of us crowded together, the hospital room was a claustrophobic, stale little cave of white surfaces and sharp edges. My gaze shifted past it all, settl
ing on my father. His scraggly hair was a tangled mess over his beaten face—cut, bruised, and swollen. And yet, despite the damage, his unconscious expression was so peaceful. Serene.

  “You fools,” said Fantom. “Did you really think you could stop me?”

  Nightmare gritted his teeth, fighting to breathe. “There’s no way…you’ll get away…with this…”

  “Get away with it? I’ve already gotten away with it. I’ve been getting away with it for decades! All of you are just pawns. My puppets. Spine, Oracle, every villain who’s ever been worth front page news. Heck, I’m even inside the head of the President of the United States! I control whatever I want. I kill whoever I want! And do you know why? Because this is my city. Cosmo City belongs to me! I’m not just an Omnipotent, Nightmare. I. AM. GOD.”

  Nightmare didn’t respond. In fact, it looked like he was crying. His face was so red—practically purple—that it wasn’t until several seconds later that I realized he wasn’t crying at all.

  He was laughing.

  “Oh great,” gasped Flex. “Nightmare’s lost it.”

  “What’s so funny?” said Fantom. “Do you think it’s funny that you’re about to die?”

  “I’m sorry,” said Nightmare, wheezing. “That was just…too perfect. I couldn’t have…scripted it better.”

  “Huh? Scripted…what?”

  The entire room around us crackled and distorted. The walls shifted and expanded, growing transparent. Everything around us dissolved. Even my father on the hospital bed. Several sleek machines with blinking lights and computer display screens materialized in the open space. We were soon swallowed in a vast blue glow. A school of orange and white fish swished in unison overhead. We were underwater, encompassed in a spacious chamber of honeycomb glass panes forming a sphere—merely one in a visibly circular infrastructure of spheres. At their center was a rock formation emanating a glowing green mist.

  We were on the Tartarus.

  That was only half the shock. Where Spine’s bed had been, there was now a crowd of people. Not just scientists. News reporters. Camera men. An army of police officers who were in the process of escorting men, women, and children clothed in hospital robes and mind cuffs. All of them were frozen in place.