Two Days Later…
“And over here we have the archery range,” Lori Higgins said to Catherine Garritano and Special Inspector Andre Harris as they emerged from the hedge maze into an open area where a dozen young girls were firing arrows into targets.
Catherine took off her Penrose sunglasses and looked out over the archery range. “All this and a firing range, dojos, stables, a racetrack…one would think you were not just teaching young girls, Miss Higgins, but that you were training them to be mercenaries or something.”
“The Higgins School of Higher Learning For Girls is dedicated to teaching girls between the ages of 12 to 19 all the skills necessary to function in the 21st Century. Not only do we provide a comprehensive academic program, we also provide a full physical regimen where we teach practical skills that they will need to compete in what is still pretty much a man’s world.”
Catherine smiled radiantly. “I wasn’t criticizing your school, Miss Higgins. In fact, I heartily approve of everything I’ve seen here.”
Andre said, “Mrs. Garritano, I can’t think of a safer place for your sister to be. Many of the girls going to school here are the daughters of famous actors, politicians, industrialists and heads of state. The academic program is of college level. They’ll be getting the equivalent of an education they’d get in Harvard or Oxford. Every one of Lori’s instructors is highly trained in marksmanship and martial arts and they’re fully the equals of any professional bodyguard. Your sister will not only be training her mind, she’ll get training in how to use weapons and fighting skills that will give her confidence and self-respect.”
“Stop, stop,” Catherine held up a hand, laughing. “You’re preaching to the choir, Inspector. I’m sold. There’s just one other thing while I’ve got you both here. When do I get to meet Regency?”
***
Elise Garritano looked up from her Harry Potter paperback as the door of Lori’s office opened. She had decided to wait here while her sister toured the school. She’d seen it all already anyway. Regency had brought her here the night he’d rescued her and she had stayed there for a couple of days hanging out with some of the girls her own age that Lori had introduced her to.
The man who entered the office was tall, dressed in a sand-colored Armani suit with a matching fedora. He smiled rather shyly and took off his hat, revealing a head full of small, tight ‘locks. “Hi…Elise, right?”
Elise smiled back. “That’s right. If you’re looking for Miss Higgins, she’s not here right now. She’s out showing the school to my sister.”
“Actually, I’m here to see you. I’m a friend of Regency’s. My name’s Lowell O’Neal.”
“Regency! Have you seen him? How is he? Can you call him and tell him I want to talk to him?”
Lowell said, “I can’t call him right now. He’s a busy man and he stays on the move a lot. But he did want me to come by and tell you that he’s not going to forget you and he wanted you to have this.”
Lowell reached in a pocket and pulled out a ring of red and yellow gold that boasted a stylized R. He gave it to her.
“It’s so pretty,” Elise breathed and slipped it on her left index finger. “And it fits! How’d he know my ring size?”
Lowell shrugged. “How does he know any of the stuff he knows? Regency said to tell you that this ring means you’re under his protection. Anybody gives you a problem you show that ring to him or her and it’ll make it clear that Regency is your friend. And if they still don’t leave you alone, he’ll deal with them.” Lowell O’Neal put his fedora back on and headed for the door. “Enjoy your stay here, Elise. We’ll talk again.”
“Wait! How will Regency know I need help?”
Lowell O’Neal turned and gave Elise a devilish grin that looked awfully familiar to her…she had seen that grin somewhere before…on another face…
“He’ll know, Elise. He’ll know.”
***
“I want my sister enrolled here as soon as possible, Miss Higgins. Here, this is for you.” Catherine passed over a check. Lori looked at it and her eyes widened.
“You sure you got the right amount of zeros here, Mrs. Garritano?”
“Call me Catherine. I added something extra for you and the members of your staff that helped rescue my sister. I like you and I want you to put my sister through the wringer, you get me?”
Lori grinned as she slipped the check into the back pocket of her jeans. “I get you. Oh, here comes Lowell.”
Catherine turned to watch as Lowell ambled towards them, hands jammed in his pockets, fedora pushed back.
“Well, I do get to meet Regency after all…”
Andre said warningly, “No, Mrs. Garritano…you’re meeting Lowell O’Neal.”
“But you said that he and Regency…“
“I know full well what I said. But he’s not Regency now. He’s Lowell O’Neal and that’s what you’ll call him and nothing else.”
Lowell joined the little group and stuck out his hand. “Catherine Garritano, right? I just met your sister. I’m glad my friend could help get her back.”
“Yes…Mr. O’Neal…I thank the…both of you for everything you’ve done. Maybe you and I could have dinner some night soon? Or maybe Regency would be available if you’re not free?”
Andre’s phone beeped for attention and he said, “Excuse me” and stepped away a few feet to answer it.
Lowell answered Catherine smoothly. “I can’t answer for Regency, Mrs. Garritano. Due to the nature of his work, he’s very secretive about his activities. But I’ll be happy to accept.”
Catherine looked up in his handsome, smiling face and wondered if he was putting her on or what. She opened her mouth to ask him point blank about Regency when Andre said urgently, “I’ve got to get back to Denbrook. There’s a situation.”
Lowell asked, “How bad?”
“Hostage situation in City Center. Twenty men; all armed; all claiming to have the entire joint wired to blow up if their demands aren’t met in two hours.” Andre looked hard at Lowell. “Sure would be nice if you could get in touch with Regency and ask him to help out.”
Everybody looked at Lowell, who said mildly, “Well, I suppose I should go see if I can roust him up, then. If you’ll excuse me…” Lowell turned and rapidly walked away.
Andre looked at Lori. “You want in on this?”
Lori grinned and said, “Why the hell not. Let’s go.”They hurried to catch up to Lowell. Catherine Garritano watched them go and could only think to say, “Have fun!”
It was Lowell O’Neal who turned and waved and called back, “We will!”
BRIANNA’S INTERLUDE
Jeffrey Bolden
“Do you know who that is!?” The flashes of memory of watching Bri stand up for me ran vividly through my mind. I remembered sitting in the backseat of that Accord, draped in darkness, watching this small Hispanic girl stand up to her own people defending a little black man like me. I remembered the tears nearly stinging my eyes as she pointed at me yelling, “That is a poet! An author!” I loved that woman in that moment; loved her more than anything I could remember loving anything. She was my paragon of love, and I saw God in her. And it was that night she was taken from me, and a fire in me was born.
The same fire blazed in me as I barreled forward, with eyes gleaming, toward my sister, Kara, trying to pull her boyfriend, Thomas, out of his defiant stance. But he stood strong and firm in front of the drawn police issued pistols aimed at him.
“Stand down, boy,” the lead police officer shouted with his finger trembling on the trigger.
I saw the fear in the police officer’s blue eyes as I ran toward Kara and her Thomas.
The wind picked up, carrying the curls away from Kara’s fine features. The lines of her face furrowed in diagonal scars of pain stretching over her diamond visage as she screamed at the policemen standing in front of her much taller boyfriend.
“Tell that bitch to shut up!”
Thomas stepped f
orward, ready to defend his girlfriend just as Brianna had defended me. He stood with his chest broad and his shoulders squared. Through gritted teeth, Thomas growled, his own visage twisting into a demon’s mask as he said, “Don’t talk to her like that!”
“Fuck this…” I watched those tiny pink lips form the words, that wrinkled finger press down on the trigger and all I thought about was the last time I saw Brianna. The last words I told her.
I really like you, and I hope this ain’t the last time we get to chill together. We shared a smile and I stumbled to my house not realizing that would be the last time I would ever see her. It was. And now I knew what it was to stand in her shoes, defending someone else as I pushed Thomas out of the way, not knowing where the strength came from. I widened my stance and spread my arms out as bullets seared through the polyester of my favorite blue blazer and pierced my chest, my abs, my shoulder. I felt like an inferno was blazing through my thigh as another bullet ripped through my fitted blue jeans, knocking me into Kara’s arms. She screamed, “Nooooooooooo,” but all I could do was smile as I put my hand to my heart, pulling it away to see the dark blood coating the beige cracks in my palm as Kara whimpered one question into my ear. “Why?”
I turned my hand over to see Bri’s name tattooed on the outside of my right hand and I smiled, having my answer right in front of me. I whispered with a haggard breath, “Because it was the right thing to do,” and then I closed my eyes happy that the last thing I saw was the name of the reason I strove to be great.
***
“So what exactly are you working on, again?” Berna watched the calculations whizzing at a whirling speed on her thin monitor, numbers reflecting on her gold-rimmed reading glasses as she lowered it from her face and spread her fingers further at the bottom of the light-rimmed screen. With a flick of her arm, the petite Hispanic woman, dressed in a flowing white labcoat, brought up the image of double helices forming and an endless array of calculations flowing through the strands. Probabilities ran down the side bar of the image.
Savannah, Berna’s best friend, stared at the screen, her youthful, sand-brown features forming a mask of malleable confusion.
“You know what you’re looking at?”
Savannah’s mouth hung agape, her dark brown eyes wide as they moved slowly in Berna’s direction.
“This is the future, Vannah,” Berna shouted, jumping up and down with her black Converses pounding against the linoleum floor, eyes alight with excitement and a large, bowing smile emphasizing the dimples underneath the sharp angles of her cheeks.
Savannah looked back at the enlarged screen, shaking her head as Berna walked around her unkempt laboratory.
Berna thrust her hand into a stack of papers and retrieved a novel of white sheets. She pulled the paperwork toward her face. Berna pinched the gold earpiece running alongside her temples, lowering the glasses over the straight bridge of her nose, eyes narrowing as she examined the figures she scrawled across the paper. “Everything is working exactly as I thought it would. My molecular machines have finally applied the correct calculations to build new DNA from scratch. I implanted the serum and science I used to manifest your powers into the DNA,” Berna said as she spun on the heel of her sneaker and pinched the air in front of her glasses, bending at the knees as though she was readying her little body to take flight. “And it perfected itself!”
Berna bounded in the air, bouncing among the random trinkets and miniature cranes constantly fixing exoskeletons and robotic figures Berna had built in her spare time.
“Boosie,” Berna shouted with child-like excitement pointing at the bulb protruding from the ceiling, light blue cumulus clouds forming in the half-sphere as it came to life. “Music!”
A computerized sing-song voice echoed throughout the spherical laboratory. The machines all around the girl genius’ laboratory moved to a melody all of their own.
“What would you like to hear, Berna?” the half-sphere asked.
“Aaliyah! No…Selena! And no sappy shit! I want some happy music,” Berna said with arched eyebrows furrowing.
The half-sphere chuckled, the blue clouds lightening into a deep pink and light blue. “Your wish is my command…”
Berna smiled at the thought of the amount of time she spent coding just so Boosie could replicate happiness, her smile spreading that much larger at her success as Selena’s Donde Queira Que Estas began thumping through the speakers of the laboratory. The video of the late great Selena spread from the center of the enlarged screen that once held all of Berna’s calculations until all that was seen was a Hispanic boy band dancing alongside the angel that was once Selena. Berna began mimicking the 90’s choreography and Savannah just stared, trying to stifle laughter as she crossed her arms over her chest.
Just then, a great beam of golden light cascaded in the middle of the movement of Berna’s laboratory, trumpets signaling the arrival of Thomas. Both Berna and Savannah looked up to see a being bathed in the same golden light descend upon them.
A melodic voice wafted throughout the lab. “What are you doing?”
The golden light receded, revealing a chocolate man with a strong chin and long, braided dreadlocks framing his leonine features before falling over his taut torso. He was a compact man, but his golden tinted angel wings added an undeniable girth to the aura of power that surrounded him.
Savannah felt herself paralyzed under the weight of his dark and judgmental gaze. “I smell an abomination…”
Offended, Berna’s disembodied voice filled the expanse as she shouted, “What the fuck!?”
The music video scratched out and TJ’s dark eyes cut in Berna’s direction as she stomped over the linoleum with her fists against her hips.
“Who do you think you are, coming down here and passing judgment on my shit!?”
“I think,” TJ said with an air of smug calm, “I’m the person that helped stop the Armageddon…”
Air whistled out of a pocket in Savannah’s cheek as her forehead smacked against the palm of her hand. “Here we go…”
“What,” TJ asked with an eyebrow raised, his lip poking out from his jutting chin as he spoke.
“Don’t you ever get tired of reminding everybody of that,” Berna asked, walking closer to TJ as he descended onto the floor.
His eyes darted toward the myriad of mechanics being created through automatons – wonders built out of nothing and life created out of whirs, sparks, and air. “Don’t you get tired of playing God?”
Berna’s eyes narrowed before the words, “You would know, huh, Golden Boy?”
TJ shrugged his shoulders as Savannah inched closer to Berna, placing her hand on the shoulder of Berna’s labcoat before narrowing her own eyes and asking with disdain dripping off of every word, “What are you here for anyway, Thomas?”
TJ shrugged his shoulders, rolling his head as his dreadlocks waved to the melody of his own voice. “I’m just here to try and convince you that you are making a mistake bringing this abomination into the world.”
Berna’s fingers formed fists, trembling as she glared at TJ.
Savannah tried to whisper calming words into Berna’s ear, grasping both of her shoulders with comforting hands. But Berna was too far gone in her own rage. Berna took one step forward and barked, “And what happens when I tell you to fuck off?”
TJ said nothing, merely raised his hand flat toward the sarcophagus-like object, pale blue light glowing from within. A crooked smile appeared on TJ’s smooth features before he said with whispered malice, “Then I’ll simply have to be more convincing,” as a sphere of golden flame began to form in the palm of his hand.
“You fucking better not!” Berna grew red as the sphere above them gave birth to a brewing storm, complete with lightning crackling, thunder pounding, and black clouds forming in the glass half-ball.
“Stop, TJ,” Savannah screamed, but TJ’s smile stretched with malice, pointing at the corner of his mouth before the ball of golden flame exploded toward the
apparatus that contained Berna’s greatest achievement.
Berna’s teary eyes followed the blaze.
“No,” Berna whimpered as she watched the ball of golden flame crash into the chest of an oversized pink and white jersey.
Savannah’s eyes widened as she realized just who it was TJ had struck. “Bailey…”
The flame burned away the polyester of the jersey as a petite young woman stood before them with a snarl on her face and her eyes whited out. Red kinetic energy crackled around her taut and tawny frame. Her curly afro mane billowed like the red flames dancing around her pink and white hi-tops. Her tiny fists shook with contained rage. Berna trembled at the sight of Bailey as a translucent ruby angel wing bloomed from her right shoulder. “Thomas,” Bailey growled as she lowered her gaze at the angel that stood wide-eyed and petrified.
Only one word escaped Thomas’ lips in a whisper. “Sorry,” he said uncertain whether or not that would appease Bailey’s rage.
In a flash, Bailey flew toward TJ before striking him with a crippling blow against the strong planes of his cheek. TJ collapsed to his knees, his hand slowly rising to greet the pain thumping in his jaw before he met Bailey’s furious eyes with a dark and beady gaze of his own, his expression stoic.
“Stop!” Savannah stepped in between the two with her fists balled.
TJ glared at Savannah as she stood in her power skirt and blue blouse, looking down at TJ with shame painting her expression flat.
“Stop what?” TJ shouted before standing up with trembling fists. He pointed directly at Berna’s chest. “She opens up the gates of hell and you tell me to stop? She dabbles in God’s realm of creation and you order me to stop?” TJ reared his curled fingers back, gearing for another attack, as golden flames bloomed inside of his hand. “I won’t…”
“TJ,” Savannah raised her hands flat before her, voice filled with warning, as TJ extended his hand out toward the apparatus building Berna’s greatest achievement.
“Not until…”
Berna screamed, rushing from her lowered stance toward TJ with her hand extended. Lightning began to crackle in the half-sphere as the lights of the laboratory flickered on and off.
Black Power- The Superhero Anthology Page 32
