Ultrahuman 01 - Ugly

by Niall Teasdale

  ‘Is that his wife?’ June asked. She was still a little flustered over the whole ‘partner’ thing. ‘She looks… young.’

  ‘His daughter, Lena. She doesn’t leave their building much. This must be quite the treat for her. We need to keep an eye on both of them. If they split, you take the girl.’

  ‘Okay. You going to call Penny?’

  The ship’s horns sounded outside and the engine vibration in the hull increased. ‘Yes,’ Red said. ‘It’s show time.’

  ~~~

  ‘They’re underway,’ Penny said, keeping her voice low. They had landed on the north side of the island since Twilight was pretty sure that Your Name Here would be to the south.

  ‘Okay,’ Twilight said. ‘You head out and shadow the yacht. I’ll see if I can spot our sniper.’

  Penny gave a nod and lifted a couple of feet into the air. Then she stopped and looked back. ‘You be careful. This guy is a professional.’

  Twilight looked up at her, dark eyes cool, almost cold. ‘So am I,’ she said. Then she turned and loped away.

  Penny watched her go for a few seconds and then twisted in the air, heading off toward Deale Harbour and the yacht.

  ~~~

  June knew she had been spotted, so she just kept on walking toward Lena who was standing at one of the rails on the starboard side. The petite blonde watched her coming, a smile on her lips, but something else in her eyes. June was not good enough at reading people to know what it was. Suspicion? No… Longing?

  ‘You’ve been following me,’ Lena said as June walked up and leaned on the railing beside her.

  ‘Prettiest ass on the boat,’ June replied.

  Lena’s blush was obvious. ‘I’ll accept third. I saw you with Red Huntress earlier. Those gowns don’t leave much to the imagination. Poppa would never let me wear anything like that.’

  June took her time looking over Lena’s body. The dress she was wearing was tightly fitted, corseted, and white. It pushed her large breasts up and forward, and she was not going to be doing any dancing in the pencil skirt that ran down to her ankles.

  ‘He let you out in that.’

  Lena’s blush had got deeper. And she turned, looking outward in case her father walked past. ‘You’re flirting with me.’

  ‘Well… Red’s not handy to flirt with.’

  ‘Poppa doesn’t like me… talking to girls. No one’s even supposed to know I like to.’

  June raised an eyebrow. ‘That’s kind of an old-fashioned point of view.’

  ‘Poppa’s on old-school family man.’

  ‘Family? As in…’

  Lena gave a bleak smile. ‘I’m Lena Tonaldo. My father’s David Tonaldo. Bet I’ve scared you off now.’

  June turned, looking out over the water. A flicker of white just above the water’s surface, which could have been a cresting wave, told her that Penny was out there. ‘Nope,’ she said. ‘I’ve got angels watching over me. Takes more than a mob boss to scare me off.’

  ~~~

  Twilight crouched on the sea wall around the eastern edge of the island, scanning the darkened area around her. There was a half-moon, enough for her to see fairly well. She had exceptional night vision, one of the reasons she had selected her name: she worked well in the twilight.

  None of that was helping so far. She had expected to see something by now. The island was pretty flat with few places to hide. South and east there were trees that could provide cover and that seemed the most likely location to shoot from now she was here. Her opponent was a sniper, trained in camouflage techniques. He could have been good enough to hide somewhere more open, but it seemed unlikely.

  She looked out toward the yacht, clearly visible on the water. It was lit up like a Christmas tree. Even from where she was, without binoculars, she could see figures on the decks. He had to be shooting from here, but where was he?

  The trees seemed likely, but there was a jetty jutting out from the shore with a large, flat, concrete area on its southern end. She could check that out and then try for the woods. If he was in the trees finding him before he fired was going to be enormously difficult…

  ~~~

  Tonaldo had not noticed that Red was trailing him wherever he went. She had made a career of remaining unobserved by people, even wearing a ridiculous costume. Moving through the crowd with practised ease, never seeming to look at where the mobster was, she kept track of him as he chatted with the rich and famous.

  She spotted one woman just before Tonaldo did. A woman with a tousled mop of ash-blonde hair and a figure like an animated sex doll. She was dressed in a deeply plunging mini-dress, which showed off both incredible breasts and almost unnaturally long legs, and she just had to look at Tonaldo, one eyebrow slightly raised and a smile on her lips, to have him following her toward one of the doors.

  Something about her seemed familiar, but Red could not quite figure out what it was. Whatever, she was leading the target outside. Red lifted her bracelet to her lips and spoke into the concealed microphone it held. ‘It’s going down soon.’

  ~~~

  Getting to the platform was easy. Twilight crouched on one corner, eyes moving slowly over the surface. There was no one here, but somehow… Something felt out of place and she could not quite see anything that went with the feeling. The sniper was here. She could sense it.

  Now all she had to do was see it.

  ~~~

  Lena’s face went pale and she turned to face June. ‘Poppa,’ she whispered.

  June could see the man walking out onto the deck through one of the other doors. It looked to her as though he was following a woman: young, incredibly voluptuous, and barely dressed. As she watched, the woman came to a stop, leaning against the railing a bare ten yards away from where June was standing. Tonaldo stopped beside her and said something. The woman turned. Whatever she said back was inaudible, but it made the man smile.

  June saw Red moving up from behind Tonaldo. Her expression was worried.

  Then there was the voice in their ears. Twilight’s snapped statement. ‘He fired!’

  And then there was the flash of white, the glow of lights reflecting off Cygnus’ suit as she burst upward and into the air beside Tonaldo and the woman. There was a loud thud and suddenly the white-clad heroine was spinning out of the air and onto the deck, colliding with the mobster as she fell.

  ~~~

  Twilight pulled her pistol from its holster on her right thigh and pumped out three rounds at the indistinct shape where the sound had come from. She heard the scream of pain, and knew she had hit something with at least one of the 10mm bullets.

  ‘Give it up now,’ she snapped.

  She had not really expected him to comply, and she was right. He rolled, the odd, grey, unreflective fabric he had built his hide from was flung aside as he twisted and pointed a pistol in her direction. She registered a SIG-Sauer, a P226, and that his right arm was not moving just before he fired. He was dazed, barely aiming, and the shots went wild. She fired back, one square in the torso, the second in his left leg. His pistol swung toward her again, and she prepared to fire once more, but then, with a shudder, he collapsed.

  Keeping him covered, Twilight stepped closer and kicked the pistol away before checking his pulse. He was alive. Frowning, she unzipped the fatigues he was wearing to check the chest wound.

  ‘Huh,’ she muttered as she found the ballistic jacket under his suit. Then she activated her radio. ‘Twilight here. He’s down.’

  ~~~

  David Tonaldo was about to yell something unpleasant at the woman who had collided with him when the sound of the shot rang out over the water. It was followed by a barrage of further, quieter, detonations and the sound of running feet as both Red and June, and then Lena, charged toward him as fast as their heeled shoes would carry them.

  Penny climbed to her feet, rubbing at the back of her thigh. ‘That’s going to leave a bruise,’ she muttered.

  ‘What the Hell is going on?!’ Tonaldo snapped. />
  ‘Cygnus here just saved your life,’ Red replied. She looked at Penny. ‘Are you okay?’

  ‘Cosmetic damage at worst,’ Penny relied. ‘My partner’s got the sniper, Mister Tonaldo. You’re quite safe now. Perhaps you should get inside, however. We can handle things from here.’

  The mobster frowned. ‘Your partner?’

  ‘Twilight,’ Penny told him, lifting into the air. ‘I’m going to go check on her now. Someone sent a world-class assassin after you. I want to make sure she didn’t get hurt saving your butt.’ Twisting in the air, she flew off toward Poplar Island.

  A crowd was starting to form around them, including a scowling Andrew Donovan who pushed through the onlookers to stand beside Red. ‘What happened?’ he asked, barely contained anger in his voice.

  ‘Someone tried to shoot Mister Tonaldo,’ Red replied. ‘Everything’s under control.’

  The tall hero’s gaze followed the retreating white shape. ‘Cygnus?’

  ‘Yes. She’s good at being where she needs to be. Come on, let’s get inside, Tonaldo.’ She walked past him to where June was standing and held out an arm, her eyes scanning the crowd.

  ‘The woman Tonaldo followed,’ June said quietly, ‘I can’t see her.’

  ‘No. Whoever she was, she’s good at vanishing when she needs to.’ Louder she added, ‘Perhaps we should head back to port, Andrew. I’d imagine the police will be waiting for us.’

  ~~~

  The bullet was resting beside Your Name’s customised rifle. Twilight picked it up, turning it in her fingers. The inscription carved into the bullet was very carefully and neatly done, but it would make the round unstable in flight, useless as a weapon. She placed it back down where she had found it just as Cygnus came in to land on the jetty.

  ‘You okay?’ Penny asked.

  ‘I’m fine,’ Twilight replied flatly. ‘Caught him by surprise. He didn’t get a bullet near me. Tonaldo?’

  ‘Unhurt. Ungrateful.’

  Twilight swallowed and walked past Penny to stand on the edge of the pier. ‘You expected a bouquet of roses? The man’s slime, a total bastard. We saved a man who’s killed… too many people.’

  ‘To stop a war which could have cost a lot more lives.’

  ‘Don’t kid yourself. They’ll get their war. We may have delayed it, we might have reduced the body count, but we haven’t stopped them from trying to kill each other.’

  Penny stepped up beside her. ‘Then we work together and take both sides down.’

  Twilight snapped a look at her. ‘Us? Working together?’

  ‘We did it well enough tonight, didn’t we? I’m not talking about patrolling together, just… We share information, go after big targets together. I’m the muscle, you’re the stealth. We’ve both got talents the other lacks, right?’

  ‘I work…’

  ‘Alone? Except you didn’t tonight so you can obviously do it, and we got the job done. We captured an assassin who no one else has been able to even identify. I’m a total rookie and… look, no offence, but you’re younger than me, you can’t have been doing this that long. Together we’re damn good.’

  Twilight was silent. Andrea knew her more flamboyant colleague was right, but Twilight worked alone. She had been doing it for almost a year… That was another thing Cygnus was right about; Twilight did not have much more experience than Cygnus, though Andrea had started training earlier from the looks of it. With all that training, Cygnus still had better contacts. She was more social and that had advantages. Aside from anything else, it would give Twilight the chance to remain in the background.

  ‘All right. We give it six months and see how we’re doing. Two things, though. I’m your partner, not your friend. Don’t start wanting to hang out on the weekends and host sleepovers.’

  ‘I’ve never done a sleepover in my life. What’s the other thing?’

  ‘You take all the glory. I work better if no one knows what I can do, or what I look like.’

  ‘But…?’

  ‘People aren’t so keen on sneaks with weapons anyway. If we win, I’ll do a press conference, okay?’

  ‘Okay… I guess I can live with that.’ Penny turned at the sound of a helicopter. ‘Cops are coming. Going to help me…’ Something made her look back as she said it. She frowned. Twilight was gone, just like that. No sound, no movement. She was just not there anymore.

  Sighing, Penny turned back toward the oncoming aircraft. ‘I guess not.’

  28th September.

  The voice was in the room this time, but its owner was still not visible. It did mean he was louder. ‘A total failure! Not only is Tonaldo alive, not only is Your Name Here in custody, but this… whore gets her name all over the news again.’

  ‘We will need to take care of the sniper,’ Kopf said, ignoring the raging figure in his midst. ‘He may be able to give some clues regarding his employer.’

  ‘I’ve already made arrangements. Now you deal with Cygnus. I want her humiliated, thoroughly, before she’s killed.’

  ‘I have also made arrangements. However, she is proving most difficult to track. I believe that a trap may be more effective. I… will put some time toward planning something suitable.’

  ‘Good. Ghostfire cannot wait to see her put in her place.’

  Part Three: Fire, Light, and Bullets

  The Fortress, nr Roswell, NM, 8th October 2013.

  The walls were a foot thick, the doors a dense, laminated construct of steel and plastic. There were no windows and the only light came from electroluminescent panels in the ceiling. Anyone who found themselves in a cell in the Fortress was supposed to stay there.

  There were electronic locks which were engineered to be unpickable, and surveillance everywhere which covered even normally invisible spectra. The outer wall was six-feet thick, and there was a half-mile of minefield between the outer patrol road and the perimeter laser fence. Every cell was covered by a Neurotronic inhibitor field which stopped Ultras from using their powers.

  In short, the Fortress was the only prison in the United States designed specifically to hold Ultrahumans convicted of a crime. In Europe and Australia they dropped them into deep mines, in the Soviet Union they sent them off to gulags in Siberia, but America had gone for the technological solution. It always sounded good on paper.

  The problem was the bleeding-edge technology required to run the place. ‘Experimental’ was the name of the game, and that kind of thing went wrong once in a while. The real problems happened, however, when something went wrong and no one noticed.

  On the 8th of October, 2013, guards entered one cell to discover that the Neurotronic field had been inactive for several days. The occupant of the cell was called Barry Travis and he had been convicted of multiple murders, but had never been viewed as a significant threat since he could, if required, be taken down by normal weapons. He had the power to create, and resist, enormous amounts of heat, and that was how he had, over the course of several days, made the concrete in the walls brittle enough to smash through, but using his bare hands to do so would likely have hurt. That was why he incinerated five guards and set three other prisoners free to help with his escape.

  The report went out through UID channels at midday that Barry Travis, aka Thermite, had escaped the Fortress.

  New Millennium City, MD, 11th October 2013.

  June had come up with a way for Penny to patrol and then turn up at the Huntress’ Den for some relaxation afterward. The bouncers seemed to appreciate her turning up at the door in her costume with a wrap-around skirt over it and Red had said her outfit was suitable. As she walked through the clubbers the expected looks of general attraction sometimes came with added recognition. She was starting to get a reputation with people in the city.

  The bar was crowded, but she found Red and June where she expected them to be, near the end, and apparently they had a visitor. The woman they were talking to was six feet in height, easily, with a distinctly womanly figure. Wide hips and a narrow w
aist were evident from the back view Penny was getting, as was the cap of blonde hair with a hint of red in the crown. She was dressed in a black leather corset and skirt, and laced and buckled thigh-high boots with six-inch heels.

  June spotted Penny walking toward them and her eyes lit up. She waved her friend over hurriedly, and the woman turned to look at the newcomer. The front was more womanly than the back, featuring an incredible pair of breasts barely contained within the corset, which came with mesh inserts to show off more flesh. The woman’s face was strong. She had a firm jaw and sunken cheeks, and blue eyes which almost seemed to glow. And the reason for June’s enthusiasm was suddenly obvious as Penny recognised her.

  ‘Ah,’ Red said. ‘Cygnus, I don’t think you’ve met Dominika Zuyev, Svetilo. Dom, this is Cygnus, one of the city’s newest heroes.’

  ‘I have heard of this one,’ Svetilo said. She had a Russian accent, fairly thick. ‘One’ came out as ‘von.’ She stepped forward and offered her hand. ‘The pictures on ACPN do not do you justice. We should get you some publicity stills.’

  Penny laughed, but June was nodding quite seriously. ‘That’s not a bad idea. You could do with a good picture for UltraNet, and there’s the public-facing network to think of. You’re going to have fans soon.’

  ‘Assuming you don’t have them already,’ Svetilo said. ‘The coverage of your exploit with the escape car was… very exciting.’

  ‘Well… I just…’

  ‘Flew in after a speeding car, grabbed it while they shot at you, and then lifted it off the ground. That would be impressive for me.’ She lifted her right arm and flexed the muscles; they were impressive. ‘You are such a slight thing, slender, delicate.’ The grin she gave Penny was… predatory.

  Red had apparently noticed it too. ‘Down, Dom. Cygnus has a boyfriend. You remember Zephyr?’

  ‘Ah yes, so you are the one who has been keeping Bobby happy recently.’