Wonder Heroes 4.0

by Ahlquist, Steve

  “You know, Jay,” said his father as Jay pushed away the tuna sandwich that was provided for lunch. His appetite vanished as his father continued, “If you come with me back to the Magma facility in Connecticut, we might be able to figure out how to get that thing off you, and onto a more suitable candidate.”

  “You don’t get it Dad, I want this,” said Jay defensively, “the gauntlet chose me…”

  “Of course it chose you. You’re exceptional, which is exactly why you shouldn’t be wielding it. When I said suitable what I should have said was expendable.” James Parker put on his best look of paternal care and added, “My son is not expendable.”

  Jay looked his father in the eye. What he saw was not the paternal care his father sought to project, but his father’s usual look of avariciousness. “Dad…” began Jay, but he got no further in the discussion.

  There was a terrible loud sound, like a ringing bell, that reverberated through the force fields that protected the Wonder Base. The sound seemed to take solid form as it tore through the ceiling of Wonder Base and into the first floor above those in the dining area. Jay watched as his father and Frances were thrown out of their chairs like rag dolls. With a shock Jay realized that his Wonder Gauntlet had summoned his Wonder Armor without his realizing. Nearby he saw Kalomo, also in full armor, holding onto his mother, who was holding her hands over her ears. The sound was like never ending thunder, loud and violent and overwhelming.

  Jay looked up, and saw that a hole had been ripped through the ceiling of the Wonder Base. There was a swirling black tube above him, the inside of which seemed to stretch to infinity. Blue electricity was being sucked out of the electrical sockets in the room and arced along the sides of the tube as paper and debris were sucked into the gaping hole above his head.

  “Kalomo!” Jay yelled through the comms, “Get your family to the lower levels!”

  The swirling tube above their heads seemed stable enough at the moment. Jay spared a glance at his father, who had rolled over onto his hands and knees and was checking Frances. She was bruised, but otherwise unharmed. Jay’s voice was lost in the terrible roar of the energy cyclone above his head so the only way to communicate was with gestures. James Parker did not need much encouragement to lead Frances to the stairs and away from danger.

  Jay stared into the funnel above his head. His visor indicated, without him having to look, that Susan and Theodore had arrived from the floors below and joined him in trying to analyze the danger.

  “What is it?” asked Susan.

  “I think it’s a Wonder Vortex,” said Theodore, “Cassiopeian technology for transportation over vast interstellar distances. It’s a wormhole on steroids.”

  Jay stared into the vortex with growing fear and said, his voice quavering slightly, “Is something coming through?”

  “Systems restored.” The Wonder Base Computer, temporarily knocked off-line by the power of the wormhole, cut into the conversation having successfully rebooted. The Computer’s calm, reassuring voice took on an urgent tone as it continued, “Danger! Fornaxian Vortex has penetrated Wonder Base!”

  “Fornaxian?” said Jay, “What do we do about it?”

  Theodore looked at Susan who shrugged her shoulders in response.

  The tube above them began to tighten, decreasing in circumference. The thunderous roar became a high-pitched squeal.

  Kalomo, having gotten his family to relative safety, joined the team as the vortex diminished to little more than a miniature tornado stretching up into the sky forever. “Is it going away?” he asked.

  “Negative,” answered the Computer, “the vortex is focusing.”

  Jay punched his right fist into his left hand. He was starting to get annoyed at the lack of answers he was getting. “Focusing?” he asked, “Focusing on what?”

  In answer to his question the Fornaxian Vortex coiled menacingly and then reached out and touched Jay like a whip crack. Faster than even the Wonder Heroes could react Jay’s body stretched like taffy out until he seemed to vanish into infinite thinness. Then the Fornaxian Vortex shot away, retreating into the sky with an explosion of violent thunder. In the next instant, before they could fully process what had happened, Kalomo, Theodore and Susan found themselves looking through a large hole in the roof of the Wonder Base and into the cloudless blue New Mexican sky.

  The immediate danger past, they looked at each other incredulously. Jay Parker, Wonder Hero Jet, was gone.

  Kalomo rushed to the infirmary to check on his family. He was relieved to find that minor cuts and bruises were the worst of the injuries. His brothers were huddled around his mother, as his father stood nearby. Susan’s mother sat in a chair, uninjured but staring off into space. James Parker was comforting his assistant Frances, all pretenses at professional distance between the two dropped.

  Kalomo’s father crossed the room and said, his voice too loud, “What the hell happened up there, son?”

  “I don’t know,” said Kalomo, “the Computer’s still analyzing the data.”

  “Kalomo!” said a voice in his ear, “we need you in the conference room.”

  Kalomo hugged his mother and his brothers and turned to leave the infirmary. His father caught him at the door and asked, “Kalomo, if we’re not safe here, then why give up our lives in Texas?”

  Kalomo had no answer for his father. He paused at the door but did not turn around. “Dad, please, I have to go.”

  Kalomo found Susan and Theodore in the conference room. Theodore was accessing the Wonder Computer at a terminal, using his gauntlet for a direct interface. Everyone was armored up, minus their helmets.

  Susan was pacing the room. “My mom’s a complete wreck,” Susan was saying, “she says that my becoming a Wonder Hero has doomed her.”

  “She seemed okay,” said Kalomo helpfully.

  “Fortunately my mother slept through the entire thing.” Theodore was waving his hands, dismissing and sorting little hologrammatic figures. “I don’t think I’ll ever tell her about this, or that she’d completely understand me if I did.”

  “What the hell was that thing?” asked Kalomo, “I thought Wonder Base was supposed to be impregnable.”

  Theodore did not smile. “Apparently it can be pregnated.”

  “The Fornax Collective is one of the three or four alien societies we know of with technology greater than or equal to the tech given to us by the Cassiopeians,” Matt said, entering the room. His presence reassured everyone. Matt was wearing his Wonder Armor.

  Susan felt relief as Matt pointed at a wall in the conference room, summoning a picture of a Fornaxian Warrior. “Sorry you had to come in Matt,” she said.

  “No big deal,” said Matt curtly, “Cassie’s with her grandparents.” Matt took his place at the head of the table and got back on track. “We, I mean me and the old team, we’ve dealt with the Fornaxians before. They’re a very old race, and fancy themselves great warriors. They’re on the short list of aliens we don’t mess with.”

  Theodore looked up from his research. “Why did they take Jay?”

  Matt indicated the wall display he had summoned upon entering the room. “A couple of years ago we dealt with a young Fornaxian named Klotax, who came to Earth to challenge our greatest warrior in battle. To make a long story short Jeff, the original Wonder Hero Shadow, ended up fighting Klotax in arena combat half a billion light years from here.” The Wonder Computer revealed some coordinates in a nearby galaxy. Matt pointed, “Right there.”

  General Rumpole and James Parker entered the conference room as Matt said, “Let’s go rescue that idiot before he plunges us into a war we can’t win.”

  Matt saw the look on Susan’s face and turned to see Jay’s father frowning at him. Parker said, “That idiot is my son, Matthew.”

  “I’m aware of that, Mr. Parker,” said Matt without apology, “believe me, that’s the only reason you’re allowed even a visitor’s pass to Wonder Base.”

&n
bsp; Susan, Theodore and Kalomo exchanged glances. Whatever history James Parker had with the Wonder Heroes, it was not good.

  “Gentlemen,” interrupted the ever diplomatic General, “let's simmer down. We have a situation here. Why did the Fornaxians attack us Matt?”

  Matt thought a second and said, “Best guess? Jeff negotiated a peace after he won his combat, a peace that lasted until his death a couple days ago. A new Wonder Hero wielding Jeff’s gauntlet means new combat and new peace terms.”

  With James Parker in the room the General could not say what he was thinking out loud, but Matt was on the same page and said, “Let’s face it, Jay is not the best person to be championing the Earth in single combat, or well suited to negotiating peace terms.”

  “My son can handle himself,” said Parker with an edge in his voice, “he should be leading this team.”

  Matt shook his head and said, “Computer, power up the Wonder Vortex, and warm up the Ultra Fist.” He looked Jay’s father in the eye and said, “Relax, Mr. Parker. We’ll get him back.”

  Matt nodded at the General and lead the team out of the conference room. In the hallway Theodore almost ran to catch up to Matt. “The Ultra Fist?” he asked, “I thought all that stuff didn’t work, what with Danielle Walker gone missing and all…”

  Matt never broke stride as he answered, “The individual units all work, except for the Kick-Blade, and without that, we can’t summon the Wonder Giant.”

  “Yeah,” said Theodore, “but, like, I could take the Golden Kick out for a ride if I wanted?”

  Matt shrugged. “Yeah, I guess you could. You’re Wonder Hero Gold, it’s your ship.”

  The elevator took the Wonder Heroes deep into the bowels of Wonder Base, to Level Six, and opened onto a vast cavern, where six large vehicles, each colored to correspond to a different Wonder Hero, waited patiently. At one end of the cavern stood an opening to the outside world, where the afternoon sun could be seen in the West. At the other end was a gigantic archway built into the rocky foundation of the mesa, an archway that led nowhere.

  The Ultra Fist was a very large, boxy blue vehicle with short wings and aerilons for stability in the atmosphere, and gigantic engines for localized space travel. As the Wonder Heroes approached, the ship came to life, humming with power. The ship seemed to stand up straighter on its landing struts at Matt’s approach. Theodore dragged behind, unable to resist taking a long look at the Golden Kick, parked across the way. The Golden Kick and the Kick-Blade were the fastest ships here and like the rest of the ships had full FTL abilities.

  At the door to the Ultra Fist Theodore brought this up to Matt. “Shouldn’t we take the Golden Kick? I mean, your ship only does point ninety-nine light speed.”

  “The Kicks are good for ten to fifteen light year jumps,” said Matt, motioning Theodore up the stairs and into the ship, where Susan and Kalomo were belting into seats behind the pilot’s. “We need to be half a billion light years from here, and fast. For that we use the Wonder Vortex.”

  As if in response the gigantic archway to nowhere began to fill with a rainbow of swirling colors, and a tunnel formed, leading to infinity. The tunnel was not too different from the Fornaxian Vortex the team had experienced less than ten minutes earlier. This vortex was rainbow colored where the Fornaxian vortex was black. Theodore hastily strapped in next to Susan as the Ultra Fist lifted effortlessly off the ground.

  Susan smiled at Theodore, who looked like a kid at Christmas denied his favorite new toy. “Don’t worry, you’ll get your chance to fly your ship,” she said.

  Theodore nodded and said, “You bet I will.”

  The Ultra Fist rose into the air with an elegance that belied its unwieldy bulk. The archway was aswirl with colors and energy. With a roar of acceleration the Ultra Fist flew across the large cavern and entered the Wonder Vortex. In a flash the ship was gone, and the vortex closed, leaving only silence behind.

  Half a billion light years from Earth, Jay was on his hands and knees, shaking his head to clear it. If it were not for his Wonder Armor, he would have never survived the trip through the Fornaxian Vortex. As it was, his armor and his body were nearly ripped apart. Self-repair had been initiated, and one by one his armor’s systems were coming back on line. He could almost feel the nanobots in his bloodstream, repairing the torn ligament in his shoulder. Jay shook his head. He felt like he should have a headache, but the armor sensed these changes in pain levels and corrected them. What Jay felt instead was the acute absence of a headache earned.

  Jay could hear chanting in the room, and he stood up. He was in the center of a large arena, surrounded on all sides by humanoid aliens: insectoid creatures with shiny black exoskeletons. They chanted words Jay would not understand until his Wonder Armor’s self-repair systems fixed the translation matrices.

  Jay saw that the aliens here ranged in size from two to four feet in height. They were seated around him, and organized by height. The smallest, whom Jay assumed to be children, were all seated closest to the arena, the largest were further away. Jay assumed they kept the best seats for their youngest, and assumed he was to be the focus of some sort of lesson.

  The translation matrix came on line. The chants were suddenly revealed to be “Combat! Combat! Combat!” but Jay was already sure they were saying something like that, so he was unsurprised.

  Jay raised his hands, and instructed his armor to broadcast his voice. He had no idea what the protocol of something like this was, so he took a shot. “My name is Jay Parker, Wonder Hero Jet of the planet Earth! We are a planet dedicated to peace, and have no wish for combat!”

  “Surely you do not mean to forfeit this challenge, Jay Parker?” Jay turned to see one of the insect creatures approaching, the largest of the creatures he had seen so far. It held a long staff in its spindly hand, and had painted ceremonial red stripes across its forehead and chest. “Your planet might not survive such a dishonor.”

  Jay found himself circling the alien, who seemed to radiate a confidence Jay did not share. “Why me? What is this about?”

  The multifaceted eyes of the alien sparkled in the glare of the arena lights. “You might recognize my name. I am Klotax Midibarion.”

  Jay shook his head, then remembered that nonverbal gestures do not always translate well and said, “Never heard of you.”

  Klotax seemed dubious. “Surely your planet must reverberate with tales of the victories of the Wonder Heroes. Surely you must have heard of Jeffrey Stillman’s victory over Klotax, warrior of the Fornaxian Collective?”

  Jay shrugged his shoulders and said, “The Wonder Heroes did a lot of stuff. It was tough to keep track of.”

  There was a snickering sound heard from the audience, and Jay heard the smallest Fornaxian present let out a high pitched laugh. As if on cue laughter rippled through the crowd.

  Jay was not an expert in reading Fornaxian facial expressions, but he could see that Klotax’s mood was darkening. “Perhaps the people of Earth will remember this day, then, the day that Klotax reclaimed his honor, and defeated their hero.”

  “I don’t want to fight you Klotax,” said Jay, sounding braver than he felt, “but if I have to, I won’t lose.”

  The tiny Fornaxian yelled out, “Ha! Spoken like a true warrior!” Approval rippled through the audience.

  Jay looked at the smallest Fornaxian curiously and asked, “Hey Klotax, what’s with the kid?”

  A hush came over the crowd. Klotax spoke carefully. “You speak of our sovereign, the most-low Fornax Dwarf.”

  “Your leader is a little kid?”

  The Fornax Dwarf stood stooped in his chair, then jumped into the ring. He sauntered towards the center of the arena, where the two combatants stood. “I am no child! I am the greatest warrior in the Fornaxian Collective!”

  Jay bowed his head and backed away a step, realizing that he must have just committed a huge social faux pas. He raised his hands and said in as conciliatory a tone as he co
uld muster, “Easy there big guy,” Jay said, “I meant no offense.”

  The audience was shocked. The Fornax Dwarf positively seethed with rage. “Big guy? BIG GUY? I. Am. Diminutive!”

  “Stand aside Klotax,” the Fornax Dwarf moved to step past Klotax and approached Jay, who continued to back away, “I am invoking my right to combat.”

  Klotax did not move, but glared and presented his staff. “This is my combat, father, my chance to reclaim my honor.”

  Jay looked from the Fornax Dwarf to Klotax and back again. He wanted to be anywhere else in the universe right now. He backed away slowly.

  The crowd was filled with hushed whisperings. Though the relationship between Klotax and the Fornax Dwarf was well known, for a disgraced warrior to publicly acknowledge the relationship was a severe breach of etiquette. Wonder Hero Jet was all but forgotten as Klotax and the Fornax Dwarf now circled each other.

  “Bah! This challenge is a mockery. You will be defeated now as easily as you were cycles ago.” The Fornax Dwarf looked up at his son with contempt, then shook his arms in a dismissive and insulting gesture. “You are an embarrassment. You are not worthy to be in this arena!”

  Klotax seethed. Anger coursed through him and he spun the weapon in his hand and then fell into a warrior’s stance, aiming the weapon at his father. “Combat!”

  The Fornax Dwarf raised his fists in the air and stared in to the multiple eyes of his son. “So be it!”

  Klotax immediately fired an energy blast from the end of his staff like weapon, but the Fornax Dwarf leapt over it and ran up the length of the staff, moving to counterattack. Jay ran for cover as Klotax flipped his staff and threw his father up in the air. The Dwarf fired poison tipped darts from the tips of his battle gloves, but Klotax sidestepped them. Before the Fornax Dwarf landed Klotax swung his staff like a baseball bat and swatted at his father.