Citadel (Book 1): Training in Necessity

by Clevenger, J.

He seemed to consider it. "I'll do that ma'am."

  "Thank you. Oh, and please remember, discretion is another valuable trait in an operative. I would be... displeased if anything we've spoken of, or anything you learn as a result of this conversation, became common knowledge in your class."

  * * *

  CHAPTER 12: INTERRUPTION

  * * *

  Sparring Field (Simulation Area)

  Kelly's body was a work in progress. He'd mastered the most basic structural changes Instructor Bruce had recommended. His bones were reinforced with diamond and his skin was laced with patches of carbon nanofiber. Vital organs were protected by a bone sheathe and he was getting better at making repairs on the fly. The only thing that could put him down and keep him down was a strong enough blow to the skull. He still reset to one of his social forms when he was knocked out. Bruce had designed a skull configuration that should help with that, but it was too complex for Kelly to reliably manage in the field.

  "Wow. No offense man, but you are creepy as fuck." Operative Glory said.

  Kelly cocked his head to the side. "How could I possibly not be offended by that?"

  "Sorry." She gave a shrug. "Aren't you a shapeshifter? I thought that might be what you were going for."

  "No, it's all functional. I've been working off suggestions from Instructor Bruce-"

  "Operative Richards? Shit, no wonder you look so... buggy, I guess."

  Kelly grimaced and Glory's eyes widened as she took a step back.

  "Sorry man, I'll try to keep it down. It's just, the guy has kind of a reputation. He sees everything in terms of combat, doesn't get the idea of peaceful resolution. Just... just try and keep it in mind. There's more to this job than how hard you can hit."

  Kelly nodded. "I'll do that."

  "Well, guess it's time to get started." She handed him a little device. It looked kind of like a hearing aid. "This is your field communicator..." Glory's brow furrowed, "um, it goes in your ear but..."

  He didn't have ears at the moment, just little holes with a protective flap of pale white skin. The color was a side effect of its increased calcium. It made his skin a little less flexible, but much more resistant to punctures.

  "I think I can manage." Kelly said, holding the communicator in place while he reshaped his ear canal.

  Glory's face fell as she watched but she turned away without saying anything. When he was done, she turned back and told him, "Just tap it once to activate."

  Kelly used one of the flexible, thickened tentacles that were serving as fingers on his oversized hands to do as he'd been told.

  "Protean, this is Hector Hive speaking for Analysis. Please confirm."

  Kelly blinked. "Wha- I mean, yes. This is Protean. Confirmed." They'd had a class on communication protocol, but for some reason Kelly couldn't seem to remember anything.

  "Protean, we have a situation in your area, probable Class Four, can you respond?"

  He looked to Glory, unsure what he should say.

  "Don't look at me Protean." She shrugged, again. "I'm not here unless something goes badly wrong."

  He shook himself and took a deep breath. "Hive, I'll take it. What's the location?" Even as Hector gave him directions, Kelly switched over to his flight form. He had to make a special effort to keep the new communicator in place.

  Kelly took to the sky, a little put off by the lack of air currents inside the oversized dome. There was a flash of light from behind and below him, presumably Operative Glory. Hector gave him a brief summary of the situation he was heading for.

  "It's a small bar, crowd of not more than twenty people. One of the patrons called nine one one. He stated that an Empowered, identity unknown, was drunk and belligerent. Description of events implies that the Empowered has some form of telekinesis, power level sufficient to move objects in excess of a hundred pounds. Range and further details unknown."

  Kelly saw the stone building with a sign that said, simply, 'BAR.' He dove and drew level with the ground, switching back to his combat form and breaking into a lurching run. Kelly had to repress a smile. That was only the fourth time he'd managed that without falling. At least he didn't break his legs every time he landed now, though that'd be pretty tough to do these days.

  He rushed through the bar's front entrance, shattering the thin stone door and healing the minor cuts it caused as he went.

  "What the hell!?" a glowing green man shouted, presumably the drunken Empowered. He was hard to look at, just a vaguely human shaped figure surrounded by a bright green glow. The same light surrounded three kegs that were orbiting just above his head, as well as a stream of liquid that was moving from one of the kegs to his mouth. A group of civilians were scattered around the room, cowering in booths or behind the bar.

  The green man hadn't shouted at Kelly. Glory had followed him in and she looked... different. Her hair and clothing had been replaced with shining silver light. Her skin shone golden. Two great, white feathered wings stretched from her back and she carried a sword of flame.

  Kelly, the green man and the two dozen or so other occupants of the bar were all staring at her.

  "Back to the exercise, trainees. I'm not here." she snapped.

  Kelly shook her head and turned back to Green. "Citadel. Put the beer down and turn off the lightshow."

  Green had to make a visible effort to look away from Glory. "You're naked."

  Kelly pulled back his lips, baring his jagged shark's teeth, and cocked his right arm. He started putting pressure on it as he answered. "Shut it down or I will use force."

  "No. I paid for this beer and I'm gonna drink it. Go away." The flow of beer from the keg sped up. How was he still standing?

  Kelly looked around. "Who's the bartender?"

  One of the civilians behind the bar raised his hand.

  "Is he telling the truth?"

  The man shook his head. "I- I cut him off after twelve and- and he said he wasn't stopping till he'd had enough. He started glowing and-" He was cut off as one of the kegs, the one Green had been drinking from, crashed into him.

  "No!" Kelly cried out. Hector- the bartender, had been crushed by the impact. His broken body started glowing and rose, along with the thrown keg, to join the others orbiting Green.

  Kelly's arm snapped out with a crack, louder than thunder. The heel of his hand crashed into Green's chest. Well, the short bone spur that jutted out of the heel of his hand did. The other guy flew straight back and crashed into the bar. The glowing kegs and the dead Hector followed him. That hadn't felt like flesh, more like some sort of forcefield

  With a wordless cry, Kelly leapt forward. He landed over Green's fallen form and wrapped his tentacle hands around him, the left covering his face and the right pinning his arm. Kelly opened his mouth as wide as he could, enough to fit a watermelon, and bit down onto the top of Green's head. His jaw muscles were modeled on an alligators. He was frantically raking at him with the diamond tipped, titanium claws on his feet.

  None of it got through the protective forcefield, though Kelly could hear Green's panicked screaming. It was muffled by Kelly's tentacle hand, squeezing his face as hard as he could. The glowing kegs, and Hector, slammed into Kelly. It wasn't enough to dislodge him, but the hits did send him and Green rolling to the side.

  The broken sections of the bar, dislodged by Green's impact, started glowing and joined the storm of objects crashing into Kelly. He opened his mouth, stopped worrying it against the top of Green's head, and cried out, "Run!"

  The 'civilians' didn't do anything.

  "I said run!"

  That got them moving.

  The glowing objects flew away from them and into the rest of the room. They destroyed tables, chairs and chunks of the wall. Every piece of debris they created gained the same green glow and joined the storm. They flew back and forth, striking Kelly then flying back out to strike something else, creating more debris and more weapons for Green.

  It was escalating, he had to shut it down quic
k.

  Kelly shifted his grip, wrapping his arms and legs around Green in a crushing embrace. His feeble struggling wasn't enough to stop the shapeshifter. He pushed Green's face into his chest and reshaped it. His head sank into Kelly's body and he expanded. He had to concentrate to keep the change in effect but it was enough to hold Green in place, and maybe suffocate him, as well as freeing up one of Kelly's arms. He cocked it back and began straining, preparing another of what Instructor Bruce insisted on calling 'Mantis Punches.'

  "Stop!" Glory commanded. "Calm down, both of you."

  At her words, a silver light washed over the room and, just like that, everything changed. Kelly really was calm. He pulled back, letting Green go. The floating objects settled to the ground and the glow faded. His previously green opponent turned out to be a guy in his twenties, with short blond hair and a trainee's uniform.

  "Everything okay guys?" Glory asked.

  "Ye- yeah." Kelly stuttered a bit. Green, the other trainee, just nodded as he got shakily to his feet.

  "What the heck was that?" he asked Kelly.

  "Hm?" Kelly didn't know what he meant.

  "Yeah kid. I thought you were ranked more or less in the middle of your class? That was fucking vicious."

  Kelly just shrugged, unsure what to say. He'd gotten a lot better in a fight, but he didn't think he was anything special compared to the higher ranks.

  "Help me." The voice in his ear was accompanied by a burst of static. It wasn't Hector's.

  * * *

  Jorge was finally done with the Stop Soon's new security system. It was almost two in the afternoon and he could barely keep his eyes open. That might not sound late, but he normally worked nights.

  The boss had told him it would be a routine job, just updating the security system in some little Kwiki-Mart style place after a robbery. No big deal, Raccoon Security did a hundred just like it every week. Turned out, the job summary had been missing a few details. Whoever hit the place had done a number on their security system. It looked like the guy had taken a bat to their recording equipment as well as the back-ups. At least he'd left the cameras alone. Weird though, it was usually the other way around.

  Jorge turned up the radio in the company van; he needed the noise to keep him awake. The last thing he needed was a fender bender keeping him from meeting his little girl after school.

  He couldn't get his mind off the job. Everything about it had been weird. Those little stores were usually family owned, barely getting by, so they watched every penny. But not only had they demanded he replace the old system with a top of the line model, complete with offsite data storage and a monitored video feed, the owner had been staring over his shoulder the whole time. He'd asked questions every step of the way.

  The wife had been almost as bad. She'd been running back and forth, working the register, talking to some insurance guy on the phone and jabbering at her husband in bad Korean. Jorge's neighbor had been born in Seoul and still liked to speak his childhood language sometimes. Jorge hadn't learned enough to call himself fluent, but it was enough to let him know the lady wasn't a native speaker. Weird.

  He hit the gas, sped up just enough to get through the light before it went from yellow to red. No way was he gonna be late.

  It couldn't be the first time the place was hit. Those little stores were called stop and robs for a reason. Even with a body, the owners shouldn't have been so freaked out. They'd been so... so on edge. Jorge reached for his phone, determined to call the boss and ask him if he knew anything else. Maybe they should take another look at the Soons' insurance claim.

  The trashed system was physically protected by a metal cage with a combination lock, not any good if the guy holding a gun to your head told you to open it... But maybe they'd been careless, left it open? Insurance might not cover the damage if they'd been negligent. No, that didn't make sense. That new rig he'd put in had been way too expensive, the Soons had to be paying the majority of its cost out of pocket.

  His cell phone went off in his hand. At the same time, a burst of static came from the radio. He looked down at the cell phone then shifted to the radio, confused. The two words that followed the static, echoed by his phone, kept his attention off the road for just long enough.

  The light was green so both he, and the oncoming car, were going at full speed. The other driver drifted out of his proper lane and right into a head on collision with Jorge. His seat belt worked, the air bag deployed just fine and he didn't see the crash coming in time to tense up. Other than some rather severe bruising across his chest, Jorge would be fine. The same was not true for the other driver, Christian Turam.

  Jorge wasn't thinking about that. He wasn't thinking about the risk to his job if he was found to be even partially at fault for the collision. He wasn't thinking about the lost wages or even his daughter, waiting for Daddy to show up. All he could think about, the only thing that registered through the pain and the confused shock, were those two words, repeated over and over.

  "Help me."

  * * *

  Sparring Field (Simulation Area)

  "Help me."

  Kelly had to work harder than he should've to resist smashing the communicator. They'd all been saying the same thing for ten minutes now.

  "Help who? What do you want?" he asked, frustrated.

  "All Citadel operatives capable of high speed, long distance travel are to report to the Hub at once." Hector said, distantly. His next statement was more personal. "It's okay, Kelly. They... I think they've got it under control. Director Graham is getting everyone organized. It shouldn't take long to figure out where this is coming from."

  "What is it? I mean, hacking the Citadel system can't be easy. Who'd do that just for a joke?" asked Jacob Orbit, the boy he'd been thinking of as Green.

  "It's not a virus." Glory said, holding up her wrist. Next to the large cross emblem sown into the collar, Kelly could see an old fashioned digital watch. The display just showed a bunch of eights, and it was blinking on and off at random. "I don't know morse code, but if I did I bet I know what it'd say."

  Kelly looked to Hector but he just shook his head before she could ask.

  "Nope. I'll add it to my list but I don't know it either. She's probably right though. My car radio's doing the same thing. TVs, light bulbs, nothing's working right. Even... even medical equipment."

  All of a sudden, Kelly could feel his heart pounding. She was up and out of her seat, wrapping her arms around the closest Hector before she could think about it. Hector didn't talk about his mom often, but he'd let enough drop that she had a good idea what that last comment might mean.

  "Is... is she okay?" she asked.

  Hector nodded, returning the hug. "Yeah. The only thing she really needs are the meds. She spends most of her time hooked up to a vital stats monitor, but... it's just to track her progress. I hope this is under control soon though."

  Glory and Jacob were staring at her. They both looked a little freaked out by the sudden gender swap.

  "He looked like he needed a hug and guys aren't allowed to do that with other guys. It gets all weird and stuff." she explained. They didn't reply but they did settle down. Kelly went back to her seat.

  Hector's voice went distant again. "All Citadel personnel not required to assist, please return to your regular duties."

  Glory gave a deep sigh. It might have been relief. "Good enough for me." she said, looking from one face to the other. "Where were we?"

  A bit hesitantly, Jacob answered. "I think you were about to tell Trainee Protean that hi- er, her, her attacks were a bit overboard? For a training exercise I mean. I've got the strongest defense in my class and I was still terrified. If she'd gotten through with just one of those..."

  Glory nodded. "Well Kelly? Trainee Orbit is right about that. We can go over the rest of your performance in more detail later, but I'd like an explanation first. Why were you so damned vicious?"

  Kelly blinked, not sure what to say at first. "I...
was it really that bad?" she asked Jacob.

  He gave a slow nod.

  "Wow." she said softly. "Sorry, I thought I was still being pretty careful, what with Instructor Glory being right there."

  "Operative or Healer," Glory cut in, "I'm not an Instructor. I was just asked to help out because I'm at the Hub on my leave rotation. I'd have said no but I was getting a little antsy."

  "Sorry. Operative Glory was right there and she said she could fix anything short of death..."

  "Your first hit… that was harder than anything I've ever felt." Jacob told her, seriously. "It almost took my shield down on its own. If it had, and if you hadn't just smashed my heart, you could have broken my neck or my skull when I hit the bar."

  Kelly tried to explain as best she could. "No no no, it would've been fine." She hadn't really been thinking about it at the time, not consciously, but after the last months of training she knew how much punishment a body could take. "If your field hadn't stopped my hit, this would've slid right in." She shifted her hand to its combat form, showing them the spike at its base. She'd have to thank Jim for that this weekend when they went out for burgers again.

  "It would've messed up your chest pretty bad, and wrecked your heart, but you wouldn't have been thrown back. All the energy would just have gone right through you!" she tried to be as reassuring as possible. When he wasn't pretending to be a drunken idiot, Jacob seemed pretty nice.

  "It would've taken at least a minute for your brain to start suffering from oxygen deprivation. Same thing with the rest of what I was doing. I was squeezing hard enough to crack bone but not shatter it. Your skull and brain would've been intact enough for Operative Glory to fix up. And with the bite, it was a slow, steady pressure so I would've felt it when your field went down and not done too much damage." Instead of relaxing, Jacob's face just got paler and paler.

  "And the claws?" Glory asked, speaking real slow and careful.

  "Huh? Those were pretty much just for show, a distraction. I mean, even without the field, all they would have done was disembowel him. That really hurts and it makes it hard to fight, but it's not dangerous. Not unless I catch a big vein and my foot claws aren't long enough to really do that."