by Ekeke, C. C.
Erika steamrolled over him. “How dare you continue to bully new team members. Back off of Levi!” The order was firm and furious, just like Erika.
Greyson said nothing during the exchange, pretending to be aggrieved.
“Erika—” Bulldozer tried.
“Understand?” Erika demanded.
The giant man shot a venomous glare at Greyson before stomping off.
Only then did Greyson exhale the breath he’d been holding. Bulldozer’s paranoia had become a blessing.
Erika was visibly ill when turning to Greyson. “You okay?”
Best to not gloat. He raised both hands in contrition. “Sorry for causing any conflict.”
Erika immediately waved the accusation off. “This isn’t on you, okay?” She offered a commiserating smile, like they were in this together.
You have no idea. “Thanks, Erika,” Greyson said with a grateful smile. “You’re a great leader, by the way.”
Erika stopped smiling. “Tell that to the eight dead and fifty-five injured.”
Greyson flinched. That might have sounded too ass-kissy. “Right.”
Erika turned to leave, then stopped. “Levi?”
“Yeah.”
“Did you leak about Shattershot?”
“Absolutely not,” Greyson lied, meeting her stare unwaveringly.
Erika relaxed. “I just needed to hear that.”
“I understand.” After she left, Greyson closed his door wearing a Cheshire grin. Time to escalate the plan.
Chapter 23
The skies had darkened after almost three hours of searching.
And Hugo was losing his shit.
He’d flown in costume over downtown, Paso Robles, Atascadero, and the City of Wonder’s other suburbs listening for two distinct heartbeats.
Hugo had zoomed past Brie and Jordana’s favorite hangouts, his telescopic vision combing over anyone who looked familiar. Simon was tracking Briseis and Jordana by way of their school laptops and tablets. It was like they’d vanished off the face of the earth.
Now he floated miles over the city, stiff winds buffeting his durable frame. San Miguel and its suburbs was illuminated beneath him from the silhouetted mountaintops to the dark churning sea. The two girls he treasured weren’t in any part of it.
What made this harder to digest was that Hugo couldn’t find them.
The crackle of his comm channels startled him out of self-pity. “Hey, Bogie—” Hugo scowled. “Aegis on comms,” he snapped.
Simon drew a flinching breath. “Sorry…Aegis. Any luck?”
Hugo listened again, parsing through thousands of voices. None were Brie or Jodie. “I’ve searched Paso High, their favorite hangouts, everywhere.” He forced back tears. “What about you?”
“I found footage from a faraway traffic camera of Brie and Jodie parking at the riverbed,” Simon replied, employing Clint’s training to help. “No one followed, and they never left the car.”
Hugo fumed. “What the hell?”
“I’m cross-checking with Clint to be sure,” Simon hastily reassured.
That made this disappearance even more bizarre. His hypersensitive smell hadn’t picked up any scents in the car besides Brie’s and Jordana’s.
“Got off the phone with Ramon,” J-Tom declared on the comm channel.
Hugo’s heart leaped in eagerness. “What do you got?”
“That Aegis-bot wasn’t following just you.” Worry and fatigue encroached on J-Tom’s usual perkiness. “Ramon also found video footage and GPS stats of it following Jodie and Brie separately.”
Pure ice slithered down Hugo’s spine. Shit… The disclosure left him more violated. Whoever knew his identity had targeted his friends too. “Are more Aegis-bots flying around San Miguel?”
“Ramon checked with Vulcan,” J-Tom said. “He only built one.”
“Vulcan could be lying.”
“Ramon says Vulcan is truthful to a fault,” J-Tom pushed back.
“Then we keep looking,” Hugo countered.
“It’s been three hours,” J-Tom said. “If this keeps up—”
“Don’t say it,” Hugo barked.
“Aegis,” J-Tom spoke over him. “If Briseis and Jordana aren’t found tonight, we have to tell their families…and the authorities.”
Hugo squeezed his eyes shut. The failure sat like a pile of bricks in his stomach. Somewhere in this city, Brie and Jordana were scared or hurt…
Or dead.
And Hugo couldn’t save them. That reality was too agonizing to imagine. “Another hour,” he begged. “Please.”
J-Tom said nothing for several seconds. “I’ll buy you as much time as I can.” Empathy laced her voice.
Hugo opened his eyes, grateful for the reprieve. “Thanks, Jenny.”
She exited the comm channel.
“Simon, you still there?”
“Yeah.”
“Is this my fault?” Hugo tried to sound strong, but his voice cracked at the end from holding back tears.
“No!” Simon denied immediately.
A sad half-smile pulled at Hugo’s lips. Of course Simon would say that. That didn’t erase the contradicting evidence. “Dr. Michelman is missing. Some android attacks me in public. Now Brie and Jodie get kidnapped…” The tears flowed, and Hugo didn’t stop them. “How is this not on me?”
Simon remained silent while Hugo regained his composure. “Working with Dr. Michelman probably wasn’t smart. But you were fighting a greater threat,” he decided, firm yet tender. “And I see how careful you are with your secret identity. You never intentionally put them in danger.”
“They still got kidnapped,” Hugo pressed, his voice quivering, “because they know me.”
“We’ll find them, uso,” Simon encouraged. “Don’t lose hope.”
Again, Simon Han revealed his quality. If Brie and Jody were found unharmed, Hugo promised to be a better friend to him and everyone else. “Thanks,” he whispered. The call ended shortly after.
Hugo was about to resume flying around San Miguel, looking and listening.
He turned his attention on downtown San Miguel’s dazzling skyline miles away and the one skyscraper rivaling the OWE Tower. That ugly Paxton-Brandt spire stabbed into the sky like a bloody spike. Extensive scaffolding still enclosed the foundation as its smaller business centers underwent reconstruction.
Hatred clung to Hugo’s skin while he glared at Paxton-Brandt’s HQ. That hatred was urging him to punch a real hole into the building and demand answers.
Then you’re the bad guy, a voice said, sounding like Annie. And what if they didn’t have Brie and Jodie?
Hugo slowed his ragged breaths to just think. There was a path he hadn’t tried. One that his mother would’ve suggested.
Steeling away any ego, he tapped the right side of his hood. A list of contacts appeared on his eyescreen. After scouring the list, Hugo made the call.
“Hi,” he greeted, thankful that she answered. “I need your help.”
“I was just calling you,” Lady Liberty replied. “It’s about your two missing friends?”
Hugo’s shock quickly became dark fury. “How do you know that?”
“The person who has them reached out,” his former mentor said, calm and collected as usual. “Both girls are unharmed.”
Hugo couldn’t describe the monumental relief he felt contrasted to his cold hatred for the kidnapper. “Who has them and where are they?” he demanded.
“Meet me at Ragged Point,” Lady Liberty requested. “We’ll get your friends back.”
Chapter 24
Hugo found her floating over the craggy coastline of Ragged Point, a picturesque town at northernmost San Luis Obispo County. Moonlight peeked through the clouds, illuminating Lady Liberty’s iconic red costume and her long legs in knee-high gold boots.
Accepting her help made Hugo sick, but he had no choice. She turned when he drifted a few feet away. Lady Liberty smiled. “Your flight form keeps improving.”
Hugo had been watching footage of other fliers—even Lady Liberty—continuously applying their techniques with his own. He didn’t know how to respond kindly, so he just nodded.
Disappointment dimmed Lady Liberty’s smile. She turned and flew down over Ragged Point’s stretch of inns, homes, and gardens. They landed in front of a small lighthouse, white-walled and unlit. Totally ordinary—which was the point.
Hugo’s eyes narrowed. No matter how much he focused his hypersensitivity on this lighthouse, it might as well have been part of the rocky outcrop.
A cloaking array, he realized. “A Vanguard safehouse.” It wasn’t a question.
Lady Liberty nodded. “Follow me.”
Hugo followed her down to the grassy terrain around the lighthouse and entered. When the door slid closed behind them, a red laser scanned Lady Liberty head to toe.
Like Dr. Michelman’s hideout, Hugo noted as the floor beneath them zipped down two levels.
This narrow passage had gunmetal walls all around, ending at a round vault-like door.
Hugo pointed. “Behind there?”
When Lady Liberty nodded, he marched forward off the elevator. His thirst for vengeance grew with each stride. “I’m ripping this asshole’s head off.”
Lady Liberty caught up and spun him around. “No, you’re really not.” His strength and four-inch height advantage aside, her presence loomed large.
Hugo was in no mood for lectures. “I don’t take orders from you.”
Lady Liberty stood unmoved. “And your fists are better solutions? My way won’t get anyone paralyzed.”
Anger boiled beneath Hugo’s skin. But right now, he needed Lady Liberty. He gestured for her to pass.
“Travis?” Lady Liberty called out once they reached the rounded entrance. “I’m here with Aegis.”
Hugo perked up. “Travis who?”
When the rounded door slid open, he understood why.
At the door was a lanky young man, pale-skinned, his costume a shoddy army-green color.
Travis Carter, aka Polymer, a metamorph from the Warguard, The Vanguard’s training squad.
Him? Hugo fumed.
Polymer’s lean face shifted upon seeing Lady Liberty. “Thank God. You’re here.” He turned to Hugo. “Aegis, I—”
“Shut up,” Hugo snarled in his Aegis voice, bowling Polymer over to get inside. The compact room had rocky ceilings and spare décor save the high-tech consoles. In a conference room across the chambers, Hugo spotted a V-shaped table, smaller than the one at The Vanguard’s main HQ. Under normal circumstances, this might’ve been awesome. But not tonight.
Hugo turned to Polymer. “Where are they?”
The metamorph jabbed a finger at an opaque windowed room to their left. “In there.”
Hugo dashed forward and wrenched the door off the hinges. Inside a small medical bay, he found them.
But something was wrong.
“Jordana? Briseis?” Hugo called out in normal tones, not caring if they recognized him. Both girls lay unconscious on parallel slabs side by side, Jodie in a Mets jersey and jeans and Brie in crimson Paso High tennis warmups. They looked so young.
Hugo circled the slabs, listening for heartbeats and breaths, sniffing for traces of poison. Their scents were off, squeezing his heart with worry.
He saw Polymer at the door. “What did you do to them?”
The ex-Warguard member entered, hands raised in surrender. “I kept them sedated.” Contrition dominated his face. “They’re unharmed and don’t know about you—AGGGH!”
Hugo reached him in half a heartbeat, holding Polymer by the throat against the wall. He squeezed Polymer’s neck, which felt like rubber. “Why did you kidnap them and steal that Aegis android?”
Lady Liberty watched from the door with steely eyes, making no move to stop this.
Polymer gagged and flailed his limbs. “I didn’t kidnap anyone or steal that robot!”
“I’ll beat answers outta you.” Hugo drew his fist back, eager to make Polymer beg for mercy and offer none.
When Polymer gave Lady Liberty a desperate look, she just shrugged. “Start talking.”
“I didn’t kidnap your friends,” Polymer repeated. “I used this safehouse for their protection.”
Hugo squeezed tighter in spasming rage. Polymer’s eyes bulged. “From who?”
Polymer was purpling from Hugo’s grip. “I don’t…know. I only agreed to watch them.”
“And the android attack?” Lady Liberty asked.
Polymer’s visible shame convicted him before his words. “I was controlling the Aegis android remotely to watch and study your movements. I mistakenly activated the attack protocols and couldn’t figure out how to stop it. Sorry…”
Hugo loosened his grip but still viewed Polymer as an enemy.
Polymer breathed deep and continued. “Briseis’s and Jordana’s lives were in danger. The android was supposed to rescue them in your stead, if needed. But after it was destroyed, we had to improvise.”
Hugo glanced at Lady Liberty, who also seemed confused.
“We?” she inquired.
“The person who stole the Aegis android, then kidnapped your friends,” Polymer threw back. “They warned me about the threat on their lives and tasked me to guard them.”
Hugo needed more. He jerked Polymer closer. “WHO?”
“Saracen.”
The room temperature plummeted to sub-zero. Lady Liberty gasped.
Hugo dropped Polymer like a sack of dirt. Part of him didn’t want to buy this. The enemy behind Brie and Jodie’s kidnapping was a known terrorist who wanted to burn the government down—and knew his secret identity. “Yeahbuthuh?” This world got much scarier.
Lady Liberty loomed over Polymer. “You’re working with Saracen?”
Polymer fought up to a crouch. “Saracen knew things about me. About you.” He focused on Hugo. “He knew what losing Brie and Jordana would do—ERRGH.”
Hugo stepped on Polymer’s chest. “What does Saracen have on you?”
Polymer was in tears. But he didn’t defend himself. “I didn’t get blackmailed. Saracen wanted to protect your friend, and I was recruited to help.”
A hand on Hugo’s shoulder jarred through his anger. “Get your friends home,” Lady Liberty offered. “I’ll handle Polymer.”
Hugo struggled with this suffocating terror. Saracen knows who I am. He eyed Brie and Jodie, two sleeping beauties. “How do I wake them?”
“Hethapren 12 is in there.” Lady Liberty waved to the cabinets at the other end of the room. “It’s like coffee injected into the bloodstream.”
Hugo dashed across the room, finding plenty of Hethapren syringes. He snatched two, stashing them in a suit pocket. From there, he slung Jodie and Brie over either shoulder.
Lady Liberty typed the elevator access code so Hugo could leave.
He soared back to Jordana’s car near the riverbed. Sliding Jodie into the driver’s seat and Brie into the passenger’s seat, Hugo strapped both in so neither would slump forward. There were several calming breaths to still his hands before he injected each girl with Hethapren.
Within seconds, the two stirred.
Hugo’s relief was so profound, his eyes watered. He closed both car doors, then flew a mile up.
“Guys,” Hugo stated, smiling fiercely when he called Simon and J-Tom. “They’re safe.”
“Thank god!” J-Tom exclaimed.
“What—?” Simon began asking.
“Later,” Hugo cut in, hearing Jodie’s breaths shift. “When they’re home safe.”
Jordana woke up as soon as he ended the call. “Mmmmmm.” Her breathing shifted and quickened, like her heartrate. “Brie? Brie, wake up.” Clothing rustled as Jordana was shaking Briseis awake.
Briseis’s yawn sounded musical to Hugo. “Whoooa.” Her pulse jumped. “When did it get dark?”
“Guess we passed out.” Jodie sounded fuzzy.
“Seems like,” Brie murmured
. “Wow! My cellphone’s blown up.”
“Mine too,” Jordana remarked. “Let’s reply to everyone before driving back.”
Hugo heard relentless tapping and clicking from inside the car as the girls texted family and friends. Whatever Polymer had injected them with them had no apparent side effects.
Minutes later, a text scrolled across Hugo’s eyescreen. He’d linked his regular phone to his suit in case either Jodie or Brie contacted him.
Jordana: Hey, papi. Just woke up from a nap. Driving home now.
Hugo chuckled when speaking his reply. “Good. Text me when you’re home.” Once his suit converted the audio to text, the response went to Jordana.
Jordana: Of course, baby.
Twenty minutes later, Jordana’s car hummed to life and left the riverbed.
Hugo followed from several miles above. He wasn’t letting these two out of his sight until both were home safely. The car soon reached Rancho Huerhuero, the ritzy neighborhood where Brie’s dad lived.
“About the thing earlier.” Brie sounded like she was in pain. “Why did you force me to admit that?”
“I wasn’t trying to hurt you, Breezy,” Jordana replied in equal distress.
“I’d never risk our friendship again,” Brie half-sobbed, “no matter how I feel about him.”
Hugo’s eyes bulged. Brie admitted her feelings for me…to Jodie? He kept listening.
“I know you wouldn’t.” Jordan’s voice trembled. “I…I just needed you to admit it.”
“But why?” Brie demanded.
“For me. And you.” Jodie’s voice gained strength. “You bottle things up until it erupts. After what you’ve been through, I won’t let that happen again.”
Old guilt weighed on Hugo’s neck. His and Jodie’s romance nearly ended her friendship with Brie.
“Love ya, boobs,” Brie professed.
“Love ya, bitch.” The smile in Jodie’s voice had Hugo smiling.
Jordana pulled up to Brie’s condo. “So,” the latter girl said, “when are you telling Bogie about…ya know?”
Hugo hovered above, heart accelerating.
“I almost told him at the carnival,” Jordana replied. “Then he got grabbed.” Her voice grew emotional. “Saying anything felt asshole-ish that night.”
