by David Bruno
Benny turned to Vanessa. “Do I get a chance to meet your dad, or am I not allowed?”
Vanessa laughed. “Of course you can meet him. Sorry all of this seems weird. He’s a bit of a loner like you. But he trusts me. Besides, he had you in his crosshairs the whole trip.” She raised her eyebrows and nodded, affirming the truth of the minor threat.
Benny gave a nervous smirk.
Vanessa leapt from her seat and said, “Gonna go freshen up a bit in Dad’s motor home. I’ll be back shortly.”
*****
Max fidgeted inside the RV waiting for his daughter to return. “Well? What did he say? What’s he like now that you’ve spent hours with him?”
“He didn’t tell me about any powers. He’s a genuinely nice guy. He’s been hurt badly though. His heart is broken. It’s sad. I think the time we spent together is the longest he’s ever spent with a woman. I really like him, though, Daddy. He’s deep and we have a lot in common.”
“I wondered about that. I’m not sure he’s right for you in the long run, but you’re a big girl. I know you can protect yourself, but please be careful. I know what he can do. You cannot hurt him. If he knew all about you, he could certainly hurt you if he wanted to.”
“Come on, Dad, no way that guy would hurt me. He’s completely infatuated. Are you sure we need to test him? What if he doesn’t have powers and I really hurt him? I don’t want to do that.”
“Yes, it’s time for him to know the truth. It’s for his own good. I am certain he’s like you, but his powers were created by accident. He needs to know where they came from, how to handle them, and what he can really do. We need to bring them out. That’s why I chose such a desolate place. Get ready. Go get your slingshot. The good one.”
*****
A short while later, Vanessa appeared from her father’s RV. She had a device mounted to her left forearm and wore yellow safety glasses.
Benny was sitting on a chair between the two RVs, nearly asleep. He’d extended his awning to give a little shade. “You were gone a long time. Everything okay?” He looked closer at her, confused. “What’s that on your arm, and why are you wearing goggles?”
“It’s my slingshot.” She used her middle and ring fingers to press a button on the palm of her left hand, which was connected to the device. The slingshot automatically snapped open, and the polymer tubing appeared from the fork.
Benny was bemused. “What’s that? Are you hunting varmints?”
“Something like that.”
Benny noticed that her endearing accent was gone. What’s going on here? Were his fears coming true? They couldn’t be. Why would she do that?
Vanessa pulled a few large steel balls from her pocket and loaded her slingshot. In the blink of an eye, she pulled back the bands and fired at Benny. There was no time for him to react. The shots struck him directly in the chest and abruptly bounced off. He turned pink as his skin became armored and his cells powered up.
He ran over to Vanessa and screamed in her face as he pulled back to punch, “Why?” Spittle flew from his mouth. She didn’t flinch and remained like stone. As he was not one to strike a woman, sense came over Benny and he pulled his punch, ready to strike the ground.
Vanessa screamed, “DO IT!” as a translucent blue shield sprang from her forearm. “DO IT!” she screamed again. Benny needed to release the energy and preferred a safer way. Vanessa angrily screamed, “DO IT!” a third time. Benny, oblivious of the shield and what it meant, finally complied and struck at Vanessa, hitting the shield in the center with all his might. The ferocious power of Benny’s punch was reflected in full back at him, energizing him even more. He was thrown backward and fell to the ground. Several agonizing seconds went by as Benny came to grips with what had just happened. He was groggy with the backflow of energy his body had been tricked into absorbing. Otherwise, he was unhurt.
As Benny looked up, he saw a shadowy man walk up to him, holding out a hand and calmly saying, “You’re the one.”
“You! What are you doing here?” It was Max, the man he’d worked with as a security guard. “What’s going on here? What do you mean ‘the one’? What if I wasn’t the one?” Benny turned and unleashed several punches unto the ground to unload before taking Max’s hand.
“Then my daughter would be a murderer.” Max asked Benny to sit down and have something to eat and he would explain it all. “You must be famished.” He knew Benny would be hungry after releasing his energy.
How could he know that? Benny wondered.
Vanessa disappeared into her dad’s RV for a few minutes as Max and Benny began to talk and eat. Benny was indeed famished and listened attentively to Max’s story. Max explained that Benny was not the only one with these kinds of powers. He said he had previously worked for a secret division of the U.S. Department of Defense called the Agency.
Benny was aghast. “Excuse me for saying so, but why have I never heard of any of this? How can I believe any of it? I’m just a freak, an accident, not part of some clandestine government program!”
“You are far more than that, Benny. You and Vanessa are very special.”
Just then, Vanessa returned. Instead of her typical attire, Vanessa was dressed in a unique makeshift superhero outfit: tight black leather pants, military-grade all-terrain boots, and a tight-fitting, sleeveless high-neck top with long black gloves that extended up past her elbows. This arrangement allowed her to pull the bands of her slingshot unencumbered and protected her forearm. A gold Y was sewn onto the front and back of her top and looked like a slingshot. It had a blue ring around the intersection of the Y that looked something like the shield she’d demonstrated to Benny minutes earlier. She wore special goggles that shielded her eyes in case the slingshot band snapped. They also provided some anonymity. The wide strap wrapped around the back of her head, where her blonde hair was pulled through it in a ponytail. She had a pair of pouches on a utility belt that held ammunition for the slingshot. Above her utility belt was another cloth belt tied in a knot. This was an old-school slingshot but looked more like a fashion accessory.
Benny gulped. “Oh, my God,” he said. “You’re so… so… ” He could not look away from Vanessa.
“Hey, that’s my daughter you’re eyeballing, pal,” Max said sharply. He continued. “I’d like you to meet Aegis, my daughter, the superhero. She’s a protector and the result of the Agency’s experiments. When she’s in uniform, you will address her as Aegis. Anonymity is paramount. Her task is simple: protect the innocent and defend what is right. Sounds a bit cliché and old-fashioned these days. But the country and the world need someone like her. We need more like her, in fact. That’s where you come in.” Aegis leaned against the door frame, her leather pants stretching over the contour of her hips and legs. Her top pulled up slightly above her navel giving a glimpse of her taut abs. Benny’s eyes bulged and the air left his lungs.
Max insisted that both Benny and Aegis go back inside and sit while he explained their origins. This was a story with which Aegis was familiar. Benny was not. Benny thought the information had better be convincing or he would get out of there fast. It was a shame, really, because he’d started to care for Vanessa. Then he remembered what his father had told him. He needed a purpose. Maybe this was it and he needed to listen. If not, he was more than capable of taking care of himself. Benny decided to hear Max out.
Max took command of the situation—a stark contrast to his subordinate role in the Agency. “Okay, kids, I’m only going to say this once. It’s the truth whether you believe it or not. The Agency that I worked for is so secret that it wasn’t given a real name, just a cryptic line item on the government budget. It was so secret, I never really knew who we were accountable to. I was told the president, but I think there were other powers at play. My girlfriend Veronica and I both worked for the Agency. We wanted kids and couldn’t have them on our own. So we volunteered for an experiment knowing our children might grow up to have superpowers. We believed in the mission a
nd thought we could help our country. We were patriots. So now you may be wondering: ‘How were they going to do this?’”
“Don’t patronize me. If I don’t like what I hear, I’m leaving,” said Benny.
Max explained everything about the Agency, from the meteor to Victor and Vanessa. “It all started with a meteor that landed in Canada decades ago. The radiation was the key. Veronica and I knew the potential dangers of the radiation treatments but chose to proceed. We thought the risk was low, however. To our surprise, the low doses were still enough to cause… undesirable side effects.”
“Like what?” asked Benny.
“Cancer. Veronica died of multiple forms of cancer almost immediately after giving birth. We couldn’t treat her without sacrificing our children. She loved our children so much that she gave her life for them.”
Aegis smiled proudly at the confirmation of her mother’s love for her and her brother.
“Both of our children were normal by baseline human standards until their early teen years. Victor developed severe problems when his powers emerged. His powers were to emit energy from his eyes. But he couldn’t control them and was killed by those same abilities. Vanessa was given the power of an energy shield. She can project it instantly to protect herself and others from danger.
“I was fortunate to be able to quit the Agency when their mission changed. At some point, their vision went from one of national defense to creation of an army of superpowered people for the purpose of overthrowing our duly elected government and eventually the other world powers so they can implement their own brand of fascism. They want no borders and a totalitarian central government under their authority. I could not be part of that and wouldn’t let my children be part of it either.
“I raised my children to value themselves and their country. They learned what it means to be American. They understood our freedoms and their responsibility to defend them. Many of those freedoms are under assault these days. Aegis has gone up against those forces before. College wasn’t a pleasant experience for her. Fortunately, she was able to defend herself and other innocent people from an attack. She was punished for it. These days, it seems defending innocent people is protected only if those people think the ‘right’ things.”
He continued. “People saw her and her powers. She was branded a vigilante and even expelled from school simply for defending others. Personally, I don’t care if she shot some idiot punks with her slingshot. They deserved it. The worst part is she was never able to finish school. No other school would accept her because word had gone out. She peed in their sandbox, so to speak, and they couldn’t have that.” Benny straightened up. Their story mirrored his in many ways. He, too, had been kicked out of school because he used his powers.
Benny chimed in, “That much makes sense. My dad taught me the virtues of our country and what makes it so special too. But why did you allow your children to be born as experiments to begin with?”
“Initially, I thought the Agency was doing good work and wanted to be part of it. Veronica and I needed help, and it seemed like the right thing to do. I was a different person then, too trusting. I hope that my actions since then have made me a better man and father.”
“Continue,” demanded Benny. He was starting to understand the reasons for the link he felt with Vanessa. She was part of something big—larger than herself. Perhaps this was his chance to be part of it as well.
“While at the Agency, I was aware of experiments on others. These included a batch of castings made with the meteoric alloy at a foundry known as JBMelting. That particular foundry sometimes had military contracts which helped with deniability of this program.”
Benny shook. His eyes widened and his face reddened. “That was my foundry! But I’m sure you already knew that.”
That the Agency had a direct link to Benny’s family was new information for Aegis as well, and grabbed her attention.
“Yes. Back in the mid-1990s, we—my boss and me—contracted JBMelting to make highly sophisticated castings which included trace amounts of the meteorite. The castings were made with various amounts of powdered meteorite metal to allow the Agency to use them for genetic modifications in humans. By exposing people to specific castings, they could track DNA changes in people or embryos. What they hadn’t counted on was that most of the radioactive elements of the meteorite came out in the slag, not the castings. The castings were wasted. So the Agency procured as much of the slag as possible and continued their tests.
“We eventually learned that your dad, JB, had a piece of the slag, which he made into a ring for your mother. By giving your mother the ring, he unknowingly exposed her and the whole family to prolonged low doses of that unique extraterrestrial radiation. The Agency was aware of this, since they were tracking JBMelting employees and their offspring.”
Benny contemplated the magnitude of what Max was saying. “How do you know all this?”
Max paused and stared at Benny and Vanessa. He was stuck. The lies need to stop. I need to finally tell the whole truth. “Because I’m the one who found out the secret of the slag, and I’ve been watching you since before you were born, Benny, guarding you.”
Benny leapt up in a rage. “Guarding me? From what? You’re a monster! I was a child and should have been guarded from you. You killed my family! All of them!” Benny rushed to Max and landed a powerful blow to his face. It stunned Max and broke his lip. Blood ran from his mouth. Benny was not satisfied but backed away, wanting to know more.
Vanessa watched as Benny assaulted her father. She was stunned at the new information her dad was sharing. Was it possible that her whole life was based on half-truths and lies? Could he also be responsible for all the sorrow in Benny’s life?
“Daddy! How could you?” she shouted.
Benny turned to Vanessa, still trembling with fury. “Did you know? Did you?”
“Of course not! Dad, you still work for the Agency, don’t you?” she demanded.
Max stared blankly before coming clean. “Yes, and the Agency knows you’re here. You two need to destroy them. It’s not just what they’re doing and their plans. They’re also responsible for Victor’s death. That was no accident.”
Vanessa could barely breathe. “You lied to me all my life! They killed Victor too? He just wasn’t good enough for your super-army? We were just experiments to you! Did you ever love us? My brother died because of you!” Tears ran down her cheeks as she put her head in her hands.
“You’re my daughter and of course I love you—more each day. I loved your brother too. Before you two, I didn’t think I could love anyone, just my work. I knew my work was dangerous and the agenda of the Agency wasn’t what I had thought I had signed on for, but I couldn’t leave, even after Victor. They would have killed me—and you, Vanessa. They broke my knee when I tried to leave. You remember that day. So I capitulated. That was my sin. But if I hadn’t, you wouldn’t be here today, neither of you.” He met Vanessa’s eyes, pleading with her to understand.
“At first, you were an experiment, and I didn’t even think you would reach adulthood. None of the other children did. When the Agency saw that you would, they had plans for you. You were perfect leadership material. You were to be the leaders of the army they are creating to take over the world. You, my angel, are perfect and they know it. You are too, Benny. Both perfect in your powers—a prize for the Agency. I was cautioned not to become attached to you since you would be taken anyway. You’re the reason I’ve changed my heart—from the first moment that I held you and your brother.”
Vanessa shook as she tried to speak. “And my mother?”
“She was a woman we rescued from an abusive relationship. We promised her security and an opportunity to help her country. She agreed.”
“Did you love her?” Vanessa asked through her tears.
“We spent a lot of time together. Yes, I loved her. She loved you and your brother too,” Max said quietly and put his head in his hands and shook his head. But s
he didn’t love me. Who can blame her?
“What’s your endgame, Max?” asked Benny. He pulled his fist back as if he was ready to strike again if he didn’t like what Max said.
Max pulled his head from his hands and looked at Benny. “I was supposed to hand my daughter over to the Agency after she matured. But I love her and refused. So I negotiated an option to find someone in exchange. All these years I’ve been tracking you, Benny, hoping to exchange you for my daughter. They want you to lead their new army to enact their agenda.”
Again, Benny flew into a rage. “Oh, my God, I can’t believe this! If you think I’m going to be handed over to a bunch of fascists, you’ve got another thing coming. I’ll kill all of you before that happens!”
“No, Benny. It’s not like that, not anymore. You are the pinnacle of achievement for the Agency and they know it. Never before have they been able to create your armor power on every square millimeter of skin. There have always been gaps which cause exposure and weakness. We think it’s because your powers were created more ‘naturally.’ Your power is superior, even compared to Vanessa’s. You have both offensive and defensive powers. You are a treasure. When I made the deal, it was to save my daughter. What choice did I have? Don’t condemn me for wanting to protect my child. But as the years went by, I changed because of both of you. Who do you think kept the police away from you when you killed those guys? Me! Who kept the weight of the Agency from just coming to take you at their leisure? Me! I care about you, Benny, and you don’t deserve the tragedies life has given you. I accept responsibility for all of them, and I am truly sorry. I am not the man I was, and will not hand you over, Benny. Instead, the world needs both you and Vanessa to destroy the Agency. I ask you to do this of your own free will. Nobody is safe as long as they exist.” He stared directly eye to eye with Benny.
Oh, my God, Benny is a killer, thought Vanessa. My dad let me be alone with him. Should I be afraid of him—both of them? There has to be more to it.
