XGeneration 7: Dead Hand (XGeneration Series)

by Brad Magnarella

  Do you have an image of our positions you can send me? Shockwave asked.

  I do, Janis answered.

  When Tyler realized he was still holding her arm, he gave a small squeeze of reassurance and then released her.

  All right, Shockwave said after a moment. If Janis doesn’t mind giving me a tow, I’m going to be burrowing your way. Hang tight, everyone.

  The collapse of the underground facility had completed several moments before, but now a force vibrated through their burial chamber, like a series of small aftershocks. It grew more and more insistent until, within minutes, the shield in which he, Janis, and the henchman were encased lurched heavily to one side.

  “Thank God,” Janis said in an exhalation of relief. “Shockwave made us a tunnel.”

  Tyler fashioned a small orb of ball lightning, which illuminated their enclosure. Just beyond it, in another enclosure, the forms of Scott, Shockwave, and Minion glowed into being. Beyond them, Tyler was pleased to make out Jesse, half-sitting, half-slumped, in a final enclosure. Everyone except Jesse waved to one another, while Grease Ball squinted around in confusion.

  With another lurch, they followed Shockwave’s group down the tunnel he had created. They reunited with Erin, who appeared to have emerged into the main room prior to the explosions. Their line of protective pods veered left, Shockwave blasting open the rock and sand ahead of them. Before long, they broke out into the quarry, stars glinting overhead. Minion’s creatures, who had been pulling giant rocks aside in a noble exercise to reach them, stopped and stood back.

  Janis dispersed the shields and checked to ensure everyone was unharmed. Tyler did the same. Jesse, whom Janis had set down, was out cold. Tyler moved up beside Erin and wrapped an arm around her waist.

  “Glad you’re all right,” he whispered.

  She gave him a little hip check. “Buried alive? That would’ve sucked.”

  “All right, listen up, everyone,” Scott said. “Titan and the other mutants are headed to Oakwood. I’ve just sent an alert to Kilmer. We’re not going to get there before they do, so we’ve gotta hump it.”

  He took off running toward the switchback. The rest of the Champions followed, Janis towing Jesse behind them on a telekinetic plinth. They had parked a half mile from the quarry, but through their linkup, Tyler picked up an image of Janis starting the van and throwing it into gear. It would meet them at the rim of the quarry. Was there anything she couldn’t do? he wondered. Tyler only hoped Kilmer had had enough warning to get everyone to safety.

  “Hey, what about me?” a voice called from behind them.

  Tyler twisted his neck to find Grease Ball standing among Minion’s crumbling creatures, his boxers and T-shirt a pale glow in the night. Tyler wondered if it was just dawning on the man that the Scale held him and the rest of his goons in the same regard as chum bait, fit to be blown up and buried.

  Tyler turned back to the ramp, leaving Grease Ball’s question unanswered.

  32

  Pedal pressed to the floorboard, Scott made the trip back to town in under fifteen minutes. He was driven as much by the urgency of the situation as the unknown. Janis, still recovering from her effort to shield them at the quarry, could only sense that the assault on Oakwood had begun, that there were already casualties. Whether those casualties belonged to the Scale, the agents, or their own families, she hadn’t been able to discern. Scott had tried several times to bring up Director Kilmer on his communication system, but without result.

  He looked over at Janis, who was sitting up straight beside him, eyes closed in concentration, then to the rearview mirror. The rest of the team had removed their helmets, faces tense in anticipation.

  “All right, listen,” Scott said as he tore left through a red light onto Sixteenth Avenue. They were less than a minute from Oakwood. “Tonight was to be Prince Khoggi’s parting gift to us: destroying the Champions and then destroying our base, our neighborhood. He failed at the first—we retrieved our teammate, we emerged alive.” In the rear of the van, he could hear Jesse’s sonorous breaths. “And now he’s going to fail at the second.”

  “What’s the plan?” Tyler asked.

  “If our families haven’t been cleared from the neighborhood, that’ll be the first order of business,” he answered. “Getting them out. Then we’ll need to locate the Scale members and neutralize them. We’ll be facing at least two, maybe more. We’re all familiar with Titan, of course. The other is a fire starter and should be considered equally dangerous.”

  “Looks like he’s already warming up,” Shockwave said.

  Scott turned his head. The van was descending a hill toward the entrance to Oakwood. Above the woods that surrounded their neighborhood, the midnight sky glowed orange-brown.

  “Great,” he muttered.

  Running the van over the median, Scott began a long, squalling turn into the neighborhood. Beyond the landscaped entrance, he almost collided into a barricade of squad cars. He slammed the brakes, fishtailing to a stop. Scott lowered his window as one of the Program’s agents came running up. An acrid smell of smoke and chemical agent seeped into the van.

  “We’ve got a situation,” the agent said.

  “Janis picked it up,” Scott said. “What are you doing down here?” Far up Oakwood’s main hill, where the three subdivisions began, flames shot from rooftops; automatic gunfire chattered on and off.

  “We need to keep civilians and first responders away,” the agent answered, “for their own protection as well as the Program’s.”

  “Our families…?” Janis asked, leaning forward.

  “We got them out of their houses by way of the corridors. They’re in the command and control center.”

  Scott tapped the side of his helmet. “I can’t bring up Kilmer.”

  “We had to kill the comm system. The enemy was using it to home in on our positions.”

  Suspicion spiked through Scott as he eyed the swarthy agent outside his window. Margaret had compromised agents before. His thoughts fell back to the interrogation room at Viper Industries.

  No, they’re themselves, Janis said. They haven’t been compromised. I don’t feel that Margaret’s even here.

  Scott could hear the relief in Janis’s voice. The thought she might have to face her sister had been gnawing on her mind ever since she’d learned that Oakwood was under attack.

  “Anything you can tell us about our visitors?” Scott asked the agent, nodding toward the main road.

  “Yeah,” he replied. “They’re deadly. Be careful.”

  The agent backed away and signaled toward the barricade. Scott steered the van through a temporary opening and immediately pulled over. “Jesse will be safer here,” he explained. “Helmets on, everyone.”

  Doors banged open and Scott and his teammates emptied from the van and onto the verge of a war zone.

  As Janis lifted her teammates into flight, power surged through her like a high-voltage stimulant. Twenty minutes earlier, the strain to keep the thousands of pounds of rock and debris from crushing her teammates had nearly exhausted her. In the past that kind of exertion would have required days of recovery, but here she was, as energized as Richard Simmons with a massive chip on his shoulder. The light lines of the astral plane bloomed around her.

  At the top of Oakwood’s main street, the melee came into focus. Henry “Titan” Tillman was standing amid burning houses, wrecked cruisers, and sprawled-out agents—and laughing.

  Spread out and hit him with everything you’ve got, Scott ordered.

  Janis lowered her teammates to the street. Titan’s back was to them as he hefted a cruiser overhead. A dozen agents held their positions, firing automatic weapons and canisters of gas, neither with apparent effect.

  “Get back!” Janis yelled to the agents.

  A Scott-Spruel laser blast slammed into the giant’s low back at the same moment Tyler lit him up with electricity. Titan roared inside his helmet as he wheeled with the cruiser, his suit seeming to absorb
the energy. As he flexed to heave the car, Shockwave nailed it. The vehicle detonated in Titan’s arms like a large bomb, the sound ringing deep in Janis’s ears. She grunted as shattered glass and flames washed over her telekinetic shield.

  Titan hugged his arms to his stooped-over body but quickly reared up again. Janis was waiting. Her psionic blast pierced Titan’s helmet in an eruption of circuits and shuddered through his gray matter. He held his hands out like a drunk as he staggered in a circle.

  Do you have him? Scott asked her.

  Janis nodded as she seized Titan in a telekinetic fist and lifted him from the street. Titan writhed in her grasp, arms pinned to his side. A part of Janis gloried at the ease with which she now controlled him.

  At that moment, more rooftops burst into flames, sparks spiraling into the night sky. It was the fire starter; he was moving deeper into the Meadows—Scott’s and Janis’s subdivision, where the command and control center was located. Where their parents were hidden.

  Janis turned toward her teammates. Can someone…?

  “I’m on it,” Erin said, taking off into the Meadows. Tyler went with her.

  The wind picked up suddenly, and the first droplets of rain spattered over Janis’s helmet. Erin was using her control over atmospheric pressure to summon a storm, one that would tame the fury of the fires.

  Janis returned her attention to Titan, who was suspended several feet above the street. With a thought, she pried off his helmet. A red, straining face and mussed head of gray hair appeared. His eye patch had come off with his helmet, revealing an angry, puckered socket. His good eye winced.

  “Where’s Prince Khoggi?” Janis shouted.

  She relented her grip enough for Titan to speak. His thick lips stretched into a grin as rain blew against his face. “Guess you know about your sister now,” he said. “At least one of you’s got good sense.”

  Janis squeezed again, digging into his throat and solar plexus until Titan grunted.

  “Where is he?” she repeated.

  “Inverse!” he said.

  Inverse?

  In the next instant, Janis’s world went topsy-turvy, as though her cerebral polarity was undergoing a seismic shift. The world around her seemed to rock. When she recovered her footing, Titan was slipping from her grasp, returning to the street, and she was being squeezed. When she redoubled her grip, her insides felt as though they were being mashed into jelly. She relented with a cry and splashed to her hands and knees on the street.

  Titan reared back his head and shook with laughter.

  “Think that’s funny?” Scott asked, preparing a laser blast. But instead of leaving his visor, the pulse flashed inside his helmet. His face shield shattered, and his hands flew to his eyes.

  “Scott!” Janis cried as her boyfriend fell to a knee.

  Shockwave leveled his arms at Titan and was blown backwards with devastating force. He cracked against the side of a burning house and disappeared into a blackened cluster of azalea bushes.

  Stop! Janis shouted through their linkup. But it was as though she had screamed into an echo chamber, her own voice lancing her head from a dozen different angles.

  “There’s another mutant!” She fought to raise her voice above the pounding storm. “The mutant is inverting our powers, somehow! Making them operate against us!”

  Minion, who was standing nearby uttered an “uh-oh.”

  Janis followed her gaze. Six of her creatures had already sprouted from the lawn across the street, earthen fists swelling to the size of wrecking balls. Minion shouted a series of incantations to disperse them, but they started into a heavy march in her direction. The creatures strode past Titan, as though he wasn’t there, prompting more quaking laughter from him.

  “This oughta be fun,” he said.

  Janis looked from the lead creature to her teammates. Scott and Shockwave were still down, Scott half-blind and struggling to remove his helmet. They were all vulnerable, including Minion, who hadn’t moved.

  Janis pushed against the weight of the rain and regained her feet. In four sodden steps, she plowed into Minion, knocking her from the descending fist of one of her creations. The agents, who had retreated at Janis’s earlier order, returned now, peppering the earthen creatures with automatic gunfire. Mud flew from them, diverting their attention from the downed Champions. A small blessing. The creatures turned and began advancing on the agents.

  Titan grunted. “Guess there are some jobs you have to get done yourself.”

  Janis stood and pulled Minion to her feet. Helpless, they backed away as Titan approached through the thick sheets of rain. Janis knew that anything she attempted—mind blast, telekinetic force, even a simple shield—would rebound on herself. Like with the mutant who had dazzled her and Scott’s senses, she was going to have to find this inverter and put him or her out of action.

  Titan stooped over Scott.

  “Leave him alone!” Janis cried.

  Titan chuckled. “Who do we have here?” He hoisted Scott by an arm.

  Before Janis could run to Scott’s aid, a fist appeared through the rain and slammed into Titan’s jaw.

  Titan staggered backwards, dropping Scott.

  “A friend,” the emerging figure replied.

  Janis let out a gasp. Jesse, whose powers were physical and couldn’t be turned against him, heaved into another punch. This one knocked Titan from his feet and out of Janis’s view.

  Jesse rotated his head toward her. “I can handle Titan,” he said. “Stop the other ones.”

  Janis nodded quickly and went to Scott, who had gained his feet. The visor inset in his face shield was splintered and burnt. His fingers scrambled to unclasp the helmet from the neck of his suit. Janis unplugged the power source, and together they lifted the helmet off his head. Rain drenched Scott’s hair and poured down his face. Red streaks ran from where he’d been cut around his eyes.

  “I’m all right,” Scott assured her, grasping the hand she’d extended toward him. “The tube exploded is all.”

  “There’s a mutant somewhere,” she said, “turning our powers against us.”

  Together, they peered around. The wreckage of vehicles loomed through the torrential downpour. Beaten down flames glowed from houses. Minion, whose creatures had been reduced to piles of mud, disappeared through the rain to check on Shockwave. From the far side of the street, Janis could hear the grunts and thuds from Jesse and Titan’s melee.

  “The mutant wouldn’t be in any of the houses,” Scott shouted through the rain. “They’re all aflame. Car or van, maybe?”

  “They’re all trashed,” Janis shouted back.

  But she saw that Scott was thinking along the correct lines. When Titan shouted for help, the mutant had been close enough to hear him. And the fact her powers still felt screwy meant the pounding rain wasn’t having an effect on the mutant. Or the mutant wasn’t in the rain.

  Janis’s gaze fell to where water was pouring along the curbside and into a storm drain on the street corner. Beyond the broad, crescent-shaped mouth, something moved.

  “The mutant’s beneath us,” Janis said to Scott.

  She watched his eyes flick to the same street corner, even though he could barely see without his glasses. She sensed his mind working, though. Scott leaned toward her helmet’s earpiece.

  “Stay here,” he said. “Keep the mutant focused on you. I’ll enter through the culvert, try to take the inverter by surprise.”

  “You don’t have any offense…,” she started to say.

  But Scott was already crouching over one of the Scale’s fallen henchmen. He pulled a pistol from the man’s holster, tucking it into the crook of his arm to keep it from getting even more saturated.

  He stood and nodded at her, hair matted to his scalp, before splashing down the street toward the culvert.

  33

  The rain pounded Tyler like a hard surf as he sprinted with Erin deeper into the Meadows. Though the rain was dampening the flames around them, fre
sh fires kept springing up ahead, each one closer to the house that sat atop the command and control center. Tyler squinted through the downpour. About two blocks away, he made out a fleeing figure, the head atop his wire-thin frame freakishly large. Tyler wondered if it was an illusion cast by the street lighting.

  “Think I see our man up ahead,” he called to Erin. “Can you pause the storm, give me a clear shot?”

  She shook her head. “Something’s going on. Can barely control it anymore. When I go to push, the storm pushes back.”

  Tyler wasn’t sure what she meant, though it couldn’t be good. He put all his effort into pumping his arms and legs, but it felt increasingly like running toward an industrial-strength fan, buckets of water dumped onto the blades. He couldn’t close the distance to the fire starter.

  By the time they had topped a small rise that looked over the final length of the Meadows, Tyler’s breaths had turned ragged. Once more, he glimpsed the large-headed figure.

  Might not get a better shot, he thought.

  Electricity crackling around his fists, he focused between the rivers of water pouring down his helmet visor. Now. He shot an arm forward. But instead of emitting from the electrodes of his gloved-hand, the white-hot electricity lit up his cells at once, detonating with an ear-splitting crack.

  He flopped to the street as smoke filled his helmet.

  Jesse made a visor with his hand to keep the rain from his eyes. Stepping from the street onto a lawn, he searched around. His last punch had sent Titan airborne. But though he could see the torn-up chunks of sod where Titan had landed, the big man was nowhere in sight.

  “Lose something?”

  Jesse pivoted toward the voice in time to glimpse a light pole swinging toward his head. He ducked, but not soon enough. A dull pain spread over his right temple, where the pole snapped.

  “Dunno why you’ve gotta make everything so damned difficult,” Titan said, driving the splintered end of the pole into Jesse’s stomach.