“Yeah, and when I hit the car, it went flying,” he said, understanding her logic. “If this is where I lost the crystal, it should be somewhere between the two. Maybe a bit closer than the badge was.”
“You spun a little. I can see the claw marks on the pavement.”
Drake slowly pivoted until she called out that he was facing correctly.
“I had it over here,” he said, patting at the now-torn pouch just forward of his right hip. “If I turned to my right, it would have gone that way, too.”
“Got it,” Soundstage said. Drake drew in a sharp breath of surprise.
“You—”
“No, no, no!” she said, suddenly realizing just what her statement had implied. “I mean I got the directions.”
Drake muttered an oath under his breath.
“I heard that,” she said, though her tone was more playful than disapproving.
Drake forced himself to open his eye and scan the area. Everything was a shifting mass of colors above the horizon. The ground at his feet was a dark grey. If he concentrated, he could make out the tall shape of his companion where she stood, examining the area with whatever enhanced senses the suit granted her. He cursed again.
“That’s getting to be a habit with you,” she noted.
“Bad week,” he replied as he gave up trying to look for the crystal. He dropped to the ground and used his hands to feel for it.
“More than a week, I’d guess.”
“Yeah? You’d be right. How about a worse week, then?” he suggested.
“That works. So how’d you end up with the cure to begin with?”
“Long story.”
A sound that could have been a chuckle came from her position. “Look like I’m going anywhere for a while?” she asked.
“Fine,” he said, running a palm across some grass at the edge of the roadway. “Basically, I go where they point me. I got sent to pick up an old friend of Patriot’s and it all just went downhill from there. Fought some bolt-throwing chick, fought with Annihilator, fought with the government -”
“You fought Annihilator?” Soundstage asked suddenly.
“Yeah. Wasn’t anything big. Anyway, I got them to agree -”
“The Annihilator?”
“Yeah,” he repeated, stressing the word. “Know of any other one out there?”
“You just don’t hear from many folks who went up against him,” she said. “Most of ’em are six under.”
“Well, he’s different these days. Some kinda conversion or something. Lost the name. Calls himself Calder. Still kicked my ass, though. Him and the cheerleader.”
“Cheerleader?”
“Don’t get me started,” Drake said. “Hey, are you still looking or just standing there listening to me ramble?”
“I’m looking, I’m looking,” she assured him.
“So I wound up taking him and the girl to see this guy Karma. The one I said could do about anything he wanted? He says he can do things with magic. I gotta give it to him, the guy made Houdini look like a kid with seven thumbs. Turned the carpet under my feet into snakes. Well, he says he’ll whammy us up the cure if one of us stays behind to be his little pet monkey or some such shit. Calder volunteers, I wind up here. Blind and stupid, with nothing to show for it but a system full of painkillers.”
“Yeah? Ever occur to you maybe there was a reason he sent you here? I mean, if he could send you anywhere, and he chose Austin?”
“Oh, I’m sure there’s a reason. I’m figuring his ass is out there in his magic kingdom, looking at me like he’s watching Booster Squad Seven on an eighty-inch Sony. He gets Calder as a lab rat and makes me his damned movie of the week. Hell, he probably has some kind of magic control over the crystal, too. Slick-skinned asshole’s out there making it fly around my head or some shit, teasing me with it like I’m a kid.”
“Hey, we’ll find it,” she said, picking up on the exasperation in his voice.
“Yeah, that’ll happen,” Drake said, sighing noisily. “I’ll just keep pawing the ground until -”
“Found it!” she yelled suddenly. Three rushing steps later and she was at Drake’s side, pressing a cold object into his hand. He flicked open an eye, daring to hope. A cool blue glow met his gaze as he brought the item close to his face.
“Where…”
“It was over there,” she said. Her speech was a rush of excitement. “At the base of a road sign that got bent over. It was covered by some grass.”
“And that is where it should have remained,” declared a powerful voice from behind the pair. They both whirled to face the speaker, though all Drake made out was a tall humanoid shape in dark clothing. There was a shorter shape beside him to the man’s left - crouching, Drake figured - and a thinner standing form to his right. Sunlight gleamed off the torso of the second.
“What the hell do you freaks want?” Soundstage demanded in a harsh tone. The amplification of her voice made it reverberate from nearby buildings. Drake winced at the volume.
“We have come to see you, sister.”
“I ain’t your sister, pal. You got business here in Austin?”
“Federal Agent,” Drake said, breaking the tension as he displayed his credentials. He made sure they stayed in his hand long enough to go back into place on his belt. “Someone wanna clue me in here? Like why you people think you can walk into my crime scene?”
“We are simply travelers in search of our kind,” said the speaker. Drake pegged the voice as that of a man accustomed to public speaking. The voice was beautifully-toned and fairly dripped with self-confidence and charisma. “We have come just in time, it seems. I heard the two of you speaking. That…thing you are carrying. You say it was made with magic?”
“That’s what the guy thought that made it,” Drake replied. “Why?”
“That smacks dangerously of deviltry, my friend.”
Drake ignored the implied danger of the man’s statement. “So I’m your friend now?” he asked.
“Certainly,” the man said, and Drake could practically feel the smile lighting up their surroundings.
“But Soundstage here, she’s your sister. Huh. Figures I’d get pushed to the back of the bus again. I’m your friend, she’s your sister.” He shook his head sadly and pushed out his lower lip as though he were pouting. When he continued, he put on his best hurt tone of voice. “It’s…it’s ’cause I’m green, isn’t it? It’s okay, you can tell me. I can take it.”
“Now, I never said -” began the man, backpedaling. Drake cut him off, all pretense dropped. His voice was cold and hard-edged.
“Yeah, yeah, they never do. All right, enough of the bullshit. All three of you take a hike before I bust your asses for interfering in a Federal investigation. I got plenty of cuffs to go around.”
“You cannot hope to cure the ills of this world through the works of the Devil,” the man said. “That stone should be destroyed.”
“Had your shot, slick,” Drake said with mock sadness. He shrugged wide shoulders and reached back to slip a pair of durite cuffs free from his belt.
“We will leave,” the man said. His shape raised its hands and began to back away, as did the other two. “We will meet again, Agent, soon, and in much different circumstances.”
“I’ll be the green one,” Drake reminded him. He waved at the departing group as if they were his dearest friends.
“That was close,” Soundstage said quietly after a few minutes to ensure that they had actually been left alone.
“Could’ve been worse,” Drake said. He replaced his handcuffs.
“There were three of them. Could have been messy, especially with you having the vision problems and all.”
“Naw. If they wanted to hit us they’d have done it right off, while we still had our backs turned. Coming in all at once like that? They figured the show of force would be enough to accomplish what they wanted. When it didn’t go the way they wanted, they left. No big deal. I think he wanted the chance to p
reach a sermon at me. Last time someone tried that, it didn’t go real well. Now we need to get back to the hospital. Justice’ll be sending someone there, and besides, my eyes itch.”
Soundstage flew them back to the hospital and they wasted little time getting him back into the laboratory. Drake reclined on the table, ignoring the wrinkling of his wings and clutching the crystal protectively to his chest. He laid his free hand across his face, using the tips of his fingers to massage at the areas around his eyes.
“Are you going to be all right?”
“I’m fine,” Drake said. “Just aching. Probably from the strain of trying to see who we were standing up to out there.”
“Lay still,” she said. “I’ll watch your back ’til your people get here.”
“Thanks,” Drake said. “Don’t let me go to sleep, though.”
“You need rest,” she protested.
“Not until they get this thing back to the Man,” he replied, waving the crystal.
“Fine. Whatever. Just close your eyes and settle back on the slab,” Soundstage ordered. Soft music seemed to come from nowhere, and when Drake’s ears perked up, she spoke again. “A benefit of the suit. I’ve got radio receptors. Helps keep you from going crazy in the quiet times.”
“Got a thing about silence, don’t you?”
“Yeah. I don’t like it much. I can be absolutely quiet if I have to. I set the suit right and it actually modifies the frequencies of my surroundings so I make no sound whatsoever. That’s good if you’re trying to sneak up on someone, but it’s got no substance to it. No style, you know? I like sound. Always have. I was the loudest kid in the nursery, sang in the choir, played three different instruments in the band, you name it.”
“I got some rental property just across the flight path from LAX, if you’re interested,” Drake quipped, managing a smile. “Gotta get in a sensory deprivation tank to get any sleep.”
“If I was a West Coast type, I’d take you up on it,” she said, her suit once more emitting the strange chuckling sound.
She began to tell Drake a long, rambling story of one of her past exploits. Five minutes into it, and he had drifted into a peaceful sleep, his resistance to the narcotics in his body completely gone. He awoke to a gentle shaking of his shoulder by one of her metal-clad hands.
“Huh? What? Did I…?”
“Yeah,” she said. “Your friends are here.”
Drake sat up on the table as he heard a familiar voice.
“I’m going to start charging you mileage.”
“Hart,” he said, and for once his voice was relieved rather than spiteful.
“Right in one. Now where is the cure?”
“Oh, hey, I’m fine, lady. Thanks for asking.”
“You will heal, Agent. The cure?” she repeated.
“Step off, chica,” Soundstage commanded. “He’s been through Hell and back. Cut him a little slack.”
“Agent Drake is fully cognizant of the demands and risks of his profession,” Hart snapped in response, unaccustomed to anyone opposing her. “Patriot needs the cure and he needs it yesterday.”
Drake held out the crystal. “It’s chill, Soundstage. She’s right. I’m not important here. This is.”
“Guess again,” Soundstage countered. “You’re in Austin, which means you’re in my turf and under my protection. That means she gets to show a little respect.”
“I have no time for this,” Hart said, accompanying the words with a noisy sigh. “Agent Drake, you have done an exemplary job and you will be rewarded for such. Your actions may well have saved the greatest hero of the world. There. Is that better?”
“Much,” Soundstage said, sounding satisfied despite the obviously mechanical and unfeeling delivery of the words by Hart. Drake felt the looming presence of the metallic booster move away from his side. Hart grabbed the crystal from his palm. Through his open right eye, he could see her wipe her hands on a cloth before she continued.
“Thanks,” Drake said. “Glad to see I’m as disgusting as ever.”
“As always, Agent, dealing with you is a pleasure that will be quickly erased from my mind.”
“Hopefully with a power drill,” Drake responded in overly-sweet tones.
“I am beginning to think I should have sent Vertigo along to see you.”
“She getting on your nerves already?”
“Hardly. It is simply that Warp Runner can only carry one person at a time through his portals. It took us some time to arrange one here, and I felt it prudent that I be the one to come through. Once we arrived, your doctors were kind enough to point us to your room.”
“Not like you to put your own ass on the line,” Drake noted. He dropped the attitude that kept the two of them at each others’ throats. “Situation that bad?”
“Worse. Doctor Marks feels that Patriot’s condition has worsened. Time is of the essence.”
“Then why are you standing here arguing with me?” Drake demanded. “Shouldn’t you be gone already?”
“Warp Runner takes time to build his spatial portals. The amount of time it takes him is directly proportional to the distance traveled. In just a moment or two, he should be -”
The room lit brightly and a crackling sound that reminded Drake of cooking bacon filled the room.
“That would be him finishing,” Hart explained as she stepped away from the table. “Agent Drake, I look forward to…right,” she said, stopping herself before the pleasantry could be finalized. Rather than say anything further, she stepped into the light and it promptly vanished, along with the sound.
“I take it she’s gone?” Drake asked.
“Yep. She and the guy she called Warp Runner. Kind of a hot-looking guy, if you ignored the really cheesy tats and the open shirt,” Soundstage said.
“Oh, well, now I wish I could have seen,” Drake said, swinging a fist through the air in front of him in a gesture of mock frustration. “Nothing I like looking at more than a topless guy with bad ink.”
“You need to lie back down.”
“Yeah, right. We need a television, so I can see Hart take all the credit for finding the cure.”
“She wouldn’t.”
“She will,” Drake corrected. “She’ll say something about how it was due to the tireless efforts of Metahuman Affairs, never letting anyone forget that she’s the Director of it, of course. Then she’ll make veiled threats about how we need to get more funding or else the Department might not be there to save the world next time.”
“That’s a little cynical,” Soundstage said.
“Like they say, this ain’t my first rodeo. I’ve seen her make the same basic speech many a time, and it always works. Thing is, look around her. The press conference will be held in an enclosed room, with minimal or no ventilation, unless it’s coming from behind her position. Never, and I mean never, will you see her at an outdoor press event. See, Hart’s a pheromone manipulator. By the time she finishes her little talk, those reporters are gonna think she’s the greatest thing since canned haggis. They’ll write their stories and tell the world how important the Department is. Folks wind up thinking that they can’t exist without us there to protect them.”
“Yeah, well, we know who did all the hard work. That’s gotta count for something, right?”
“About the same as it always does,” Drake said with a nod.
“Well, I tell you what. You get some rest. Let them eyes heal. I’ll come back tomorrow and see if you’re up to a whirlwind tour of Austin’s hot spots before you head out.”
“I ain’t much for the whole dinner and dancing thing,” he said. “Tail keeps snagging on tablecloths, wings knocking drinks in the floor… it’s kind of a mess.”
“Damn, and here I was thinking we’d make quite the high society couple. You knocking over tables, me shattering champagne glasses with the frequency generators…”
Drake grinned widely, letting his head fall back against the table as fatigue and chemicals washed over him. “Ma
ybe that would be fun after all,” he murmured.
Thank you for reading the first in this series. If you enjoyed it, won't you please take a moment to leave me a review at your favorite retailer?
Thanks!
T. Mike
ABOUT THE AUTHOR:
T. Mike McCurley lives in a small city in Oklahoma, where indeed, “the wind comes sweeping” and all that. He began writing superhero prose on a whim one day, and found it enjoyable enough to continue. His short stories soon formed the backbone of what became known as the world of The Emergence, describing events and players in a world of metahumanity that began in 1963 and has continued to grow since. From there came the stories of the metahuman cop known as Firedrake, which has now filled three books, with a fourth in the works. He is a founding member of the Pen and Cape Society, an online cabal of authors of superhero prose, and his Emergence setting will soon be featured in Lester Smith’s D6xD6 roleplaying game.
In another (non-writing) life he has been a radiological monitor, an emergency medical technician, a private investigator, a videographer, a certified GLOCK armorer, and a dozen other things too varied and goofy to list in one space together.
His works can be found linked at www.tmikemccurley.com and at the Pen and Cape Society, www.penandcapesociety.com .
Also available from the author:
Firedrake Volume One: Meet Francis Drake – your average seven foot dragon cop with an attitude, sent to hunt down the worst of the metahumans known as geneboosters. Drake is the one the government calls to do the jobs no one else wants, and he’ll keep on doing them because every mission completed means more time spent with his brother, a booster in his own right — but in government custody. Follow along as he battles criminals, meets legends, and pisses off his boss in spectacular style.
Firedrake Volume Two: Drake returns to service in this second volume, standing beside the legendary Patriot to crush a riot at the annual Lady Justice Day parade, fight the racist members of Humanity First, and become a television star. Since nothing good can happen to Drake without the universe kicking him, a metahuman brawler places a worldwide bounty of Drake’s head, and the worst of the worst are out to collect! A trip to a shopping mall proves problematic when you’re a dragon, as our hero finds out.
Firedrake - Volume 1 Page 16
