XGeneration 7: Dead Hand (XGeneration Series)

by Brad Magnarella

  The blow lifted Jesse from his feet. He grunted for air as he flew backwards, Titan’s figure disappearing behind a wall of rain. Something broke against Jesse’s shoulder blades, and in the next moment, the rain stopped and he was staring up at a ceiling running with smoke. Apple-red fragments of a front door littered the carpeted floor around him.

  Jesse coughed and pushed himself to his feet. Titan ducked beneath the waterfall pouring off the eave of a front porch and squeezed into the house. He shook his head sadly.

  “It didn’t have to come to this,” he said, his voice suddenly loud.

  “Yeah, it did,” Jesse replied. He lunged forward with a looping left hook. But after months of inactivity, not to mention a shoddy cerebellum, his timing was off. Titan leaned away from the blow and brought a fist smashing up beneath Jesse’s chin—his weak point.

  Creamy white light swam over Jesse’s vision, and he felt his legs stagger. He lost his drunken fight to stay upright, but before he could go over, a pair of hands seized his shoulders.

  “I thought you understood the stakes,” Titan said from inches away, his puckered socket clenching and unclenching. “Thought you were on board. Instead, you had to go and get cute. So now I got my orders—level this place along with everyone in it. Including you.”

  Jesse searched Titan’s good eye. The man meant what he said. Whatever humanity he had shown a few days earlier, whatever paternal feelings he’d felt for Jesse, however small, were gone. Maybe he and Jesse were alike in that way. Maybe the man couldn’t abide betrayal.

  Before Jesse could struggle from his grip, Titan shot his head forward like a piston. Jesse felt his chin crumple beneath Titan’s brow. This time, the creamy white light blotted over everything.

  Scott waded into the culvert, water pouring around his ankles, and squatted to peer inside the cement cylinder that ran beneath the street. The last time he had been down here was when he’d retrieved the voice-activated recorder from Mr. Leonard’s phone, a year and a half earlier.

  Finding the short length of cylinder empty, Scott moved the gun from beneath his arm, fell to his free hand and knees, and crawled inside the storm drain until he was at the T-intersection. Water poured against him from both sides, the rushing sound echoing from the cold walls of the cylinder.

  Let’s see who’s down here, he thought, reaching into a pocket inside his suit top and retrieving his glasses.

  Sliding the glasses up his nose, he squinted the far end of the storm tunnel into focus. Where the cylinder opened into a vertical space at the street corner, and a bit of street light seeped down, Scott thought he could make out someone. But the water draining from his hair made it hard to see, and there was nothing with which he could dry the lenses.

  He removed his glasses, shook them out, and peered down the tunnel again. Still blurry. He looked from the indistinct figure to the gun in his own hand. He not only had a poor shot, but he didn’t know who—or what—he would be shooting at. And if he missed, he’d forfeit the element of surprise.

  Gonna have to get closer.

  One hand bracing the curved wall, he crab walked forward. Though the Scale had outsmarted them, and their neighborhood was burning, Scott drew courage from the idea that they had extracted Jesse and returned before those dearest to them, their families, had been touched. Now it was just a matter of taking out the mutant to tilt the advantage back in their favor.

  But as Scott drew nearer, he saw he was not bearing down on a mutant, but an agent. One of their own. Clad in black armor, the agent was seated against the back wall of the cylinder and grasping his right shoulder. Scott guessed he had crawled down here for refuge.

  When Scott emerged into the space beneath the street corner, he peeked into the three cylinders extending off in the other cardinal directions—all black—before returning his attention to the agent.

  “Hey,” Scott said, shaking the man’s leg. The water cascading from the lip of the drain broke over Scott’s back. “Are you all right?”

  The agent turned his helmeted head. When the man didn’t speak, a horrifying thought occurred to Scott. This wasn’t an agent of the Champions Program. It was the mutant, disguised to look like one of theirs. The gun rattled in Scott’s grip as he pointed it at the man.

  “Who are you?” Scott demanded.

  The man threw his good arm up. “Whoa, whoa, whoa!”

  Scott reached forward and retracted the man’s face shield. He recognized the dark eyes. It was Agent Saldana. Scott exhaled and lowered the gun. He’d come really damn close to squeezing the trigger.

  “Sorry,” Scott said. “I couldn’t tell who you were.”

  “Think my shoulder’s broken,” Agent Saldana muttered.

  “Sit tight. We’ll get you some help soon. Have you seen anyone else down here?” He peered down the black tunnels again.

  “The pain…,” Saldana said. “Been sort of in and out.”

  Scott nodded, wishing he had something to give the agent to help him. He looked from Saldana to the crescent-shaped opening, where rain continued to hammer the asphalt beyond.

  The agent was probably who Janis had seen earlier, which meant their mutant wasn’t beneath the street. His gaze drifted back to Saldana. Deep in problem-solving mode, it took Scott a moment to realize the agent was staring past him, the hand of his good arm groping along his duty belt.

  Scott pivoted and nearly hollered.

  The creature was pale and inverted, sharp knuckles gripping the top lip of the cement tunnel. A band of eyes ran the length of his hairy brow—six, if Scott was seeing straight. Their pupils, slit-shaped and horizontal, were set in dirty yellow orbs. The mutant, Scott thought numbly.

  The creature blinked his six eyes and reared back, breaking the spell.

  Scott hoisted the pistol and squeezed. The pistol’s striker hit the same cartridge in a series of wet smacks. Gunpowder’s waterlogged, he thought in horror, won’t ignite. He had time to throw his arm up before the mutant sprang forward, his lipless mouth unhinging to reveal several rows of spiny brown teeth.

  34

  Daggers of rain struck Tyler’s face as his helmet came off. A hand swept the hair from his brow and patted his cheek. Erin’s strong eyes were peering down on his. With her help, Tyler raised himself to a sitting position. He winced, the skin underneath his suit feeling as if it had been doused in boiling water.

  “Are you hurt?” she asked.

  “Not badly,” he lied. He let her pull him to his feet. “Managed to pull back at the last second.” But still managed to shock the hell out of myself, he thought. That’s never happened before.

  “Not sure if it’s the mutant we’re chasing,” Erin said, “but someone’s screwing with our powers.”

  Tyler nodded, wondering what it meant for Janis and the others, who had been squaring off against Titan. It didn’t change the equation. They still had to stop their mutant before he incinerated the command and control center and everyone inside. Tyler peered down the empty street.

  “C’mon,” Erin said, pulling him into a painful jog.

  They descended the hill toward the cul-de-sac that marked the end of the Meadows. Down to the right, the plain white columns of the house that sat atop the command and control center showed through the storm. Rain was already sweeping over its gray-tiled roof. That might protect the house from the fire starter, Tyler thought, but would it protect them?

  As they approached the cul-de-sac, they slowed to a stop.

  “He’ll probably wait for the storm to abate before trying to torch it,” Erin shouted, nodding toward the house. “Gunmen are posted at the windows. He can’t get close. Which means he’s probably hanging back somewhere, hiding.”

  “Can you keep the storm up?” Tyler asked.

  “Like I said, it’s out of my control. It should hang around till it’s spent, though.”

  Buys us time anyway, Tyler thought. But he didn’t like the idea of waiting out in the open. He looked around until his eyes fixed
on the one-story across the street. Large bushes hid most of a front porch that ran the width of the house.

  He hooked Erin’s elbow with a hand and shouted for her to follow. They were halfway up the front walkway when something made Tyler peek back. Beyond one of the windows of the command and control house, something had caught fire. It burned vertically, like a dried-out Christmas tree. Another flare went up beyond the adjacent window.

  A sudden sickness roiled Tyler’s stomach. “Christ,” he muttered.

  The fire starter was incinerating the agents. He tugged on Erin’s arm before she could turn and see, desperate to get them to the porch, out of sight, out of danger. Erin staggered and fell to her knees.

  “Something’s happening,” she said, her voice quavering. “My insides feel like they’re … cooking.”

  With a scream, she doubled over.

  Jesse returned to consciousness to the sensation of being dragged by the collar of his Champions uniform. His trailing legs, capped by a pair of giant boots, blurred in and out of focus. As the floor smoothed from thick carpet to tile, he groped for the hand holding him.

  “Oh, no you don’t,” Titan said.

  The collar cinched Jesse’s throat, and in the next moment, he was being slung around. He smashed into a row of kitchen cabinets, doors splintering beneath his weight. When he came to a rest, a drawer landed on his head, dumping its contents onto the white and black tiles.

  Fluorescent lights flickered on.

  Jesse tried to push himself up, but the bottom of Titan’s boot landed against his chin. The room swooned. When Jesse blinked it straight, he realized he’d been laid flat again.

  “I could pound you till I was blue in the face,” Titan said, “but there’s no guarantee I’d finish you off. Not with the way you’re built. So, I’m gonna improvise. Then I’m gonna take care of your friends.”

  Titan was standing with his back to Jesse, bowed over what looked like a cooking range. Hisses sounded, one after another, and before long the smell of rotten eggs hit Jesse’s nostrils: gas. Titan turned from the eight-burner range, their valves opened wide.

  “You may or may not believe it,” he said, “but I had big plans for us.” He spread his large hands sympathetically. “But now…” The muscles of his face tensed downward as he stomped Jesse’s jaw again.

  The six-eyed mutant landed on Scott, knocking him into the wall of the storm drain. Scott’s head cracked against cement in a light burst, and the two went down into a frothing pool of rainwater.

  The mutant’s mouth had closed around Scott’s forearm, and now Scott felt the needles of his teeth puncturing his suit, his skin. He drew a wincing breath and choked on water. Gagging, he tried to flip his attacker, but the mutant, whose bony fingers were gripping Scott’s other wrist and a fistful of wet hair behind his head, wouldn’t give him the leverage.

  More water pushed over Scott’s face, and he choked again. A bruising pain lodged deep in his chest as the mutant’s face swam in and out of view. Even as Scott struggled, the analytical part of his mind was trying to make sense of the creature. Had the same mutations that had engendered them all with supernatural abilities deformed this person’s physical cells as well?

  The mutant forced his head under the water.

  Scott struggled in his grasp. Can’t let Janis and the others down, he thought desperately.

  The teeth sunk further into his flesh before suddenly relenting.

  Scott lifted his drowned head to find Agent Saldana standing over them. He had driven a combat knife into the mutant’s side and was preparing to thrust again. A mewling shriek burst from the mutant’s lungs, and in a pale flash he sprang from Scott and clamped his teeth into the agent’s neck.

  The two toppled over.

  Scott splashed to his feet, coughing up water. He pawed around the pool for the knife that had fallen from Saldana’s hand, but he couldn’t find it. Turning his pistol butt-out, he began hammering the mutant’s bony back. But no matter how hard Scott struck, the mutant wouldn’t release the grunting, gargling agent. Fatigue began to weigh down his arm.

  He’ll kill him, Scott thought, out of breath. Then he’ll turn and do the same to me.

  35

  Tyler knelt and wrapped his hunched-over girlfriend with both arms. He could feel the heat spiking from her. The fire starter was trying to ignite her, but something was frustrating his efforts, perhaps Erin’s own mutant cells. Regardless, it was only a matter of time.

  “Excruciating…,” Erin said between her teeth.

  Tyler managed to get her standing, and together they hobbled toward the corner of the house where Tyler had spotted a metal downspout running from the roof’s rain gutter. He tore it free so the water poured from the drop outlet above. He removed Erin’s helmet, then positioned her beneath the shower to keep her saturated. The water broke over her copper-blond hair.

  “Stay here!” he shouted.

  Tyler wheeled in search of the fire starter. He didn’t have to look far. Standing in the backyard, at the verge of the dark woods, someone was staring back at him, his large face a gibbous moon. Even through the heavy rain, Tyler could make out the blue network of veins throbbing over his bulbous scalp.

  “Hey!” Tyler shouted, running toward him.

  The mutant didn’t move. Instinctively, Tyler began gathering electricity to his hands before remembering what had happened the last time. He let the energy go. He was going to have to rely on his close combat training.

  The mutant continued to stare, rain glistening from a skin-tight black jumpsuit, bone-thin arms at his sides. When Tyler was ten feet away, something seared his insides. He crumpled to the wet grass, the heat stabbing through him like red-hot pokers, shocking in its intensity. He curled onto his side. The pain obliterated all other sensations, all thoughts, all will. An image of Tyler’s father, charred and smoking, flashed through his head.

  No, dammit, he thought, clawing up fistfuls of grass. Not gonna happen.

  With everything he could summon, Tyler gathered the electricity back into his hands. He twisted an arm toward the staring mutant. It could well backfire again, he thought, but it was either fry or be fried.

  Have to take the chance.

  Squinting, he fired.

  Cheek to the cold, kitchen floor, blood bubbling from his lips, Jesse watched Titan’s receding boots. Whether from the stomps or the nauseating gas or a dizzying combination of both, the air seemed to shimmer.

  Jesse tried to pull himself after Titan, but couldn’t.

  Four solid shots to his weak spot had blurred the synapses between brain and body. He was immobile, a sack of dirt, and now he was going to asphyxiate on frigging cooking gas.

  That was Titan’s plan.

  Jesse’s eyes roamed the littered floor, touching on a spill of twisty-ties, coupons, a roll of Scotch tape, a pair of scissors—and then something else. He managed to inch his hand forward and close his fingers around it.

  “Hey, Titan,” he croaked.

  Titan stopped at the far door and twisted his neck.

  With a sharp snick, Jesse thumbed the wheel of the Bic lighter. A flame shot up.

  Titan’s eye cannoned wide before the kitchen blew apart.

  The boom that came from street level shook the storm drain. Scott staggered for balance. The mutant released Agent Saldana’s neck and peered around, horizontal pupils narrowing in the crescent of light from the drain opening. Blood glistened from his spiny teeth.

  Scott was rearing to land another blow when he felt something cold being jabbed against his free hand. He looked down to find Agent Saldana trying to give him something dark and oblong—a fresh magazine.

  Scott seized it, released the waterlogged magazine from his pistol, and rammed the new one home. The mutant saw what was happening. With a cry, he twisted from Agent Saldana.

  When Scott squeezed, the powder ignited: Blam! Blam! Blam!

  The mutant fell against him, the furry skin over his eyes wrinkling, as thoug
h trying to comprehend what had happened. A moment later, a stale breath emptied through his mouth, and the light seeped from his many eyes. Scott pushed the mutant off him. He landed on his back and sloshed in the gray water, blood spreading from the holes in the stomach of his jumpsuit.

  Scott raised his eyes to Agent Saldana, who was sitting against the back of the cylinder, hand clamped to his neck.

  “Keep pressure on it,” Scott said. “We’ll get you out of here.”

  Cupping his hands to the sides of his mouth, Scott turned toward the opening of the storm drain and called for Janis. With the mutant dead, her powers should be back online, he thought. But an explosion had just sounded. Had something happened to her? To the rest of his teammates?

  “Janis!” he called again.

  The manhole cover above them lifted with a dull scrape. A moment later, a force grasped Scott and lifted him through the opening. Janis set him on his feet beside her. She then removed Agent Saldana, whom Scott helped to the curbside. Scott turned to Janis through the tapering rain.

  “What happened…?” he started to ask, then looked past her. The two-story house that had occupied the corner lot lay in a smoking heap, as though a bomb had been dropped on it.

  “I’m not sure,” Janis said, “but Jesse was inside.”

  Through the searing pain, Tyler thought he heard a distant explosion. But he maintained his focus on the large-headed mutant. For an instant, Tyler’s electricity broke through his own cells again. Bursting, blistering pain. In his weakened state, he couldn’t draw it down, much less absorb it.

  But like a switch being thrown, the electricity reversed, shooting from his outstretched hand. A river of white light lit up the mutant, and he shook as though in the throes of a seizure. The vessels in his head burst. The mutant collapsed backwards into the woods, smoke drifting from his body.