Superhuman Nature

by Brandon Overall

  All of the people that blocked the exit to the building were now on the floor coughing. Many had thrown up, and most were unconscious. Neil held his breath and started walking towards the exit. He only made it a few steps when he heard a voice behind him.

  “Neil! You’re going to regret this!”

  It was Carl.

  Neil turned his head and said plainly, “No, you are.”

  He lifted off the ground and launched himself out through the entrance of the building, accelerating like a rocket. As he gained altitude, he searched his mind for the backpack containing his gear behind the library. He found it almost immediately, and ordered it to fly towards him.

  His thermal suit and motorcycle helmet unfolded and wrapped themselves around Neil, while he still gaining altitude. The bright blue sky was cloudless, and the sun silhouetted him against the ground.

  There was no doubt that someone had seen him burst out of the library door and soar into the sky, but he didn’t care anymore. His anonymity was already blown. He decided that his only protection from the government now was that everyone knew who he was. He was going to go public, and be known as the man who changed the world.

  Neil accelerated to the fastest speed he dared go at mach 1.5, and flew straight home to Michigan. He flew high enough that most people wouldn’t be able to see him, but that wasn’t a big concern anymore.

  While he flew through the air, leaving a shockwave of compressed air behind him, Neil constructed a plan of action. He knew it wouldn’t take long for the nameless men wearing suits to find him at home. Neil thought about his friends and family and wondered if they would be used against him. There was no possible way he could safely convince them to move somewhere safe.

  His only protection would be to go public. The government wouldn’t be able to kidnap his friends and family if he publicly predicted it before it happened. The media attention from a scandal like that would be disastrous.

  A frightening thought went through Neil’s mind. What if they already had people staged to conduct the pick up if things went sour in the library? If they were to kidnap someone to use as a bargaining tool, who would it be? It didn’t take long for Neil to come up with the answer.

  Emma.

  They knew about Emma. They would go for her first.

  Neil pulled out his phone and tried to call her, but either his altitude or speed was preventing him from getting a signal. He would be back home in just a few minutes – he would have to wait until then.

  Neil sped up. Time was critical. He had to get to Emma before they did.

  He didn’t bother following the highway. He just pointed himself in the right direction and flew perfectly straight. He made it home just half an hour after leaving the library. As soon as he touched ground in his back yard, he threw off his helmet and called Emma’s phone.

  ‘Calling Emma Snow’ appeared on the display of his phone. One ring. No answer. Two rings. Still no answer. Three.

  “Hello?”

  It was Emma’s voice.

  “Emma! Listen, I need to talk to you right away. Something happened. Where are you right now?” Neil could hear the panic in his own voice.

  “Neil! Hey, what’s up? I’m just at the library studying. You want to get lunch or something?” Her lack of urgency annoyed Neil, but he knew it wasn’t her fault.

  “No, I can’t right now. Stay there, I’ll be there in a minute.”

  “Okay! I’m going to go get a smoothie from the café here, do you want one?”

  “No I don’t want a fucking smoothie!”

  Neil had to calm down. It wasn’t fair to be taking his frustration out on Emma. She didn’t know the danger that could be coming her way.

  “Look, I’m sorry, it’s just that something bad happened, and I need to tell you about it in person. I didn’t mean to come off as a dick. Just stay there, I’m coming.”

  Neil ended the call and ran to get his bike chained up in the back yard. He thought about just flying there, but he didn’t want to create a scene when he landed. It took fifteen minutes for him to bike all the way to the library.

  Michigan State’s library was the largest Neil had ever seen. He realized that he didn’t know where in the building Emma could be. With three main entrances and different levels, finding her might be a challenge. He walked into one of the entrances and frantically jogged to the other side of the floor, scanning for any sign of her.

  Nothing.

  He reached the staircase and climbed up to the second level. Still no sign. Nothing on the third or fourth floors either, and there was no way she was in one of the basement levels.

  Neil remembered his phone conversation with her, and hit himself for not thinking about it sooner. She was going to the café – that was back on the main level. Neil ran down the three flights of stairs and ran over to the café. There were over a hundred people in the food court area due to the rush that always came before finals week. There was no sign of her.

  Neil couldn’t focus. There were too many people, and too many conversations going on all at once. He felt like he was having a panic attack. Some girl was talking about her dog on the phone, a guy was talking about how unfair his Biology professor was, a group of friends were gossiping about some girl that just got hauled off by the police.

  Neil froze.

  He listened in on the conversation about the police.

  “Yeah, I can’t believe they just marched right in and hand cuffed her. She wasn’t even doing anything wrong.” A brunette girl with thick glasses was talking.

  “Excuse me, what did you just say?”

  Neil approached her.

  “Oh, you didn’t see? The cops just came in and busted this girl who was just sitting there drinking a smoothie. She must have been a drug dealer or something. She looked so confused. She didn’t even put up a fight.”

  “Where did they go?!” Neil screamed.

  “Whoa, calm down man, they left like five minutes ago out that door.” A guy with curly hair and a backwards facing baseball cap was talking now. “Do you know her or something?”

  Neil didn’t answer. He sprinted towards the door. There weren’t any police officers or vehicles outside. He was too late. They had taken her.

  Neil collapsed to the ground. He wanted to cry, but he was too angry. He had only known Emma for a week, but he had never felt that way about anyone else before. Every second they spent together was better than flying above the clouds for Neil. He couldn’t believe he had let them get away with her. He had more power than anyone else in the world, but he couldn’t prevent someone he cared about from getting kidnapped by the government. Guilt overwhelmed him.

  Neil thought back to what Carl said as he was leaving the library. The scene flashed into his head.

  ‘You’re going to regret this!’ Neil remembered the promise he made to Carl. ‘No, you are.’

  He was going to keep that promise. One way or another, he would find Emma, and he would have revenge on the people that took her. Neil started imagining all the ways he would hurt them, when he heard his phone ring.

  It was Emma’s number. He answered it.

  “Who is this?” He asked angrily.

  “Hello Neil.”

  The voice wasn’t Emma’s, but he didn’t know who it was.

  “If you hurt her, I will kill you. Do you hear me? I will rip the flesh off of your bones and tear out every nerve in your body before I let you die.”

  Neil was furious. He had never hurt anyone before, but having this power had changed him. He was willing to do terrible things if it meant keeping Emma safe.

  “You should have taken Carl’s offer, Neil. Things didn’t have to go this way. We didn’t want to make things difficult. You are too valuable for us to just let you fly away. You will work for us, or Emma will die.”

  The voice on the end of the line was cold. Neil believed that whoever it was had no trouble with killing. He believed what the man was saying.

  “You son of a bitch
. This isn’t over. I’ll do what you ask, but when I find you, you’ll regret fucking with me.”

  Neil no longer had control over his life. Just a day ago, he had everything he could ever want. He threw it all away just because he didn’t want to have to keep his secret any longer. This was his punishment.

  “Good, I’m glad to see you’re thinking clearly. This is what I want you to do. Find Lieutenant Colonel Steele. Tell him to call this number on a SIPR line. Are you ready for the number?”

  What did Steele have to do with all of this?

  “LTC Steele, as in the Professor of Military Science of my ROTC program? Also, what the hell is SIPR?”

  “Yes, that’s the one. He’s going to be your babysitter while you do us a few favors. After you do that, we’ll return Emma to you unharmed and you can go on your way. Don’t worry about SIPR, he’ll know what it means. Now, are you ready for that phone number?”

  Neil copied down the number.

  “Good. Now go find him and have him call. You have 24 hours to get him to make the call.” The voice on the other end said.

  “Or what?” Neil asked, challenging the man.

  “Goodbye Neil.”

  The call was ended.

  It was the weekend. LTC Steele wouldn’t be in his office at the ROTC department. How the hell was Neil supposed to contact him? Neil remembered the phone roster that his instructor had handed out at the beginning of the semester. If he still had the sheet, it would be in his room sitting in a stack of papers somewhere. He had to rush home to check.

  Neil biked home, pushing his legs harder than they were designed for. Several people sent confused looks his way. Most people weren’t used to seeing a bike traveling twenty-five miles-per-hour up a hill.

  He threw his bike to the ground and rushed inside when he arrived home. Bryan was sitting on the couch playing video games, as usual.

  “Hey bro, you going out with us tonight? We’re gonna get drunnnnnnk.” Bryan asked.

  “I can’t, Emma was kidnapped by a secret government organization and I have to go help them out with a top secret mission or they’ll kill her.”

  It sounded like something Neil would say to get out of a party.

  “Ok man, maybe later.”

  Neil searched through the grotesque stack of useless papers up in his room. Towards the bottom of the stack, he finally found what he was looking for. It was a phone roster for all of the Cadets and Staff in the ROTC program. On it was LTC Steele’s office and cell phone number.

  He thought about what he would say. The Colonel wouldn’t be happy about being called on a weekend. If Neil wanted to meet with him, he had to give a good reason. Telling him that his girlfriend was kidnapped by the NSA to strong-arm Neil into working for them would only succeed in making Steele hang up and order a ‘random’ drug test for Neil. He had to get creative. Neil thought out his plan and made the call.

  “Chris Steele here.” He sounded annoyed.

  “Sir, it’s…it’s Cadet Hitchens. I’m sorry to bother you on a week–” Neil was cut off.

  “Hitchens? Why are you calling me on a weekend? Listen, I’m eating dinner with my family right now. Whatever you need to talk to me about can wait until Monday, roger?”

  Neil wasn’t a very good actor, but he put forth his best effort to cry over the phone.

  “Sir, I need to talk to someone. Something happened last night. Captain Michaels invited me over to his house for dinner, and he…well…we had a few drinks...and...I didn’t want to but he -”

  Captain Michaels was one of the instructors at the ROTC program. Ever since the military’s policy on homosexuality was repealed, the Cadets noticed a particular change in Michaels’ voice and mannerisms. It didn’t take long for the rumors to start circulating. Even the staff made jokes about it.

  “Jesus Christ, Hitchens, are you saying what I think you’re saying?”

  Steele was yelling now. It wasn’t out of anger. He was a former Drill Sergeant before he transferred over to the Officer side. Whenever he got worked up, so did the volume of his voice.

  “Yes, Sir. I just really need to talk to someone about it. Privately.”

  Neil could tell his plan was working.

  “Sonova…Ok, Hitchens. Let me finish my meal and I’ll be over at my office. Be there by the time I get there.”

  Steele ended the call.

  Neil checked his pocket to make sure he still had the phone number written down for Steele to call. He passed Bryan and Alex on his way out the door. He wondered if he would ever see them again. There was no way to know what was going to happen after Steele made the call.

  After a ten minute bike ride, Neil arrived at the ROTC office and sat on the ground outside the room labeled ‘LTC Christopher A. Steel, Professor of Military Science’. It took half an hour for the Colonel to arrive. Without speaking, Steele unlocked the door and motioned for Neil to come inside. He sat in a chair across from Neil, instead of the one behind his desk.

  “This is what’s going to happen. You’re going to tell me the entire story, exactly as it actually occurred. Start with Captain Michaels inviting you over.”

  Steele had a notepad and a pen out, ready to record Neil’s story.

  “Sir, you’re going to be mad, but Captain Michaels never invited me over. I just needed to get you to agree to meet me in person. I promise it’s important, but you wouldn’t believe me if I told you over the phone.”

  Steele leaned back in his chair and put his hand up to his chin. He looked as if he was trying to figure out what to say without strangling Neil.

  “So let me get this the fuck straight. You called me on a weekend, told me that one of my Officers put his pecker in your rear end, all so you could have a little chit-chat with me about something ‘important’? This better be fucking good, Hitchens, or so help me God.”

  Neil’s heart started beating faster as soon as he realized the situation he had gotten himself into. Steele wasn’t exactly the type of person you wanted to piss off. His physical appearance was enough to intimidate anyone, even when he wasn’t yelling. At 6’3, and with an efficient, athletic build, Steele looked like he could run anyone down and then break them in half. His stern face and white hair in a high-and-tight cut gave off the impression that he had spent a lot of time in the business of killing.

  Normally, Steele was the type of person you could sit down and have a pleasant conversation with. Usually he would make sure he didn’t let anyone walk away from a conversation without imparting a few points of wisdom upon them. When things turned less than pleasant, though, there were few people Neil had met that could make someone’s asshole pucker up quite like Colonel Steele.

  “Sir, I really am sorry that I had to lie to you, but it’s important. I talked to someone from the government. They said I needed to get you to call them on a SIPR line within 24 hours, or something bad would happen.”

  Hearing himself speak it aloud made Neil realize how ridiculous the story sounded.

  “What the hell do you mean, ‘someone from the government’? What do they want with me?”

  “I don’t know, Sir, but it’s important that you call them on a SIPR line. They said someone could get hurt if you don’t. What’s a SIPR line?”

  “It’s a secured network that the Army uses for classified information. That phone there is connected to it. The only time I’ve ever needed to use it was when there was some serious shit going on. If someone from the government really told you I needed to call them, then this must be one of those ‘serious shit’ moments.”

  Steele pointed to a phone on his desk with a red sticker on it marked SECRET. Neil pulled the piece of paper out of his pocket and handed it to Steele.

  “This is the number they told me to give you, Sir.”

  “706, that’s a Fort Gordon area code. Why the hell does someone from Fort Gordon want to talk to me?”

  Neil remembered when Carl told him about the NSA building being in Fort Gordon. If Steele didn’t know
anyone at Fort Gordon, then he must not have met Carl before.

  “Ok Hitchens, I’m going to make this phone call. Wait outside the office until I finish.”

  Steele walked over to his desk and picked up the phone with the red sticker. Neil stood up and went out to the hallway. There was no use trying to listen in to the conversation – the door was too thick.

  While Neil waited outside for the Colonel to finish his phone call, he thought about Emma. The speed with which she was abducted was unsettling. It couldn’t have taken longer than fifteen minutes between when he talked to her on the phone and when he arrived at the library. Did they hear her talking about the library from the phone call somehow? Or, did they just have people tailing her, waiting for the word to pick her up?

  He wondered where they might take her, and what they might do to her. Would they tell her about Neil’s ability, or possibly try to convince her that Neil was some sort of terrorist?

  He tried to think of a way to use his ability to locate her. He had never tried locating an object from far away before. While he closed his eyes, he pushed out his influence to try to find something that felt like Emma. He located every item in the building he was in, and then the surrounding area. He felt the cars on the nearby road, and the people driving them. His perception of the people outside was too hazy to determine who they were. He could feel the shape of their bodies, the length of their hair, and the beating of their hearts. Without seeing what they actually looked like, though, there wasn’t enough information to actually understand their physical appearance.

  Even if he found Emma in his influence, he wouldn’t know it was her. With more practice, he might be able to understand the information better from each person’s signature, but at the moment it was like trying to feel someone’s face with his hands while his eyes were closed.

  The deep muffled sound that came from Steele’s office was unintelligible. Neil tried to pick out words to guess what the conversation was about, but it was no use. He had no idea how much Carl was going to tell the Colonel about Neil’s ability, if at all. He didn’t even know if Carl was the one on the other end or not.