Stronger: A Super Human Clash, page 12
CHAPTER 16
TWENTY-FOUR
YEARS AGO
IF THE BACTERIA-BASED adhesive in the concrete had been a type that set faster, I would have escaped the pit easier: I’d have just kept on top of it as it poured into the pit. But Misseldine had chosen his glue carefully. The heavy mixture clung to my skin, weighing me down, making me too heavy to jump. I tried to climb up the walls, but the dirt crumbled away in my hands.
Within a minute the concrete was up to my waist.
“It’s clear they chose you for your size and strength,” Misseldine shouted down. “If you’d had any intelligence, you’d have destroyed enough of the Trifoliate Orange to allow your friends to get through.”
Quietly, I said, “Harmony, can you hear me?”
“Just about.”
“I’m trapped. I—”
She interrupted me. “I heard. And I can see it too. There’s a camera in your goggles. Can you see a way out?”
“No.” The concrete was creeping up my chest. Already I could feel its great weight pressing against me from all sides. “Getting harder to breathe!” I had my arms above my head—I knew that if I let them get dragged down into the mixture, then moving them would be close to impossible.
“Stay calm, Brawn. Fill your lungs, then take rapid, shallow breaths. Don’t expel all your air at once.”
“The colonel who picked me up from the plane … Tell him to go ahead.”
“Go ahead and do what?”
“He knows.” I formed the fingers of my right hand into a point, then pushed my hand deep into the packed dirt of the wall. I did the same with my left hand, forcing it through the dirt a couple of inches away from my right. Then, keeping my arms straight and using all of my strength, I pulled my hands apart.
A mini-avalanche of soil and stones collapsed down on top of me, but I kept going. Pushing my hands into the dirt, pulling them apart.
More and more dirt spilled over me, and I was thankful for the goggles keeping it out of my eyes.
The spill of concrete competed with the collapsing wall of dirt, but I was digging faster than the concrete was being poured.
The soil covered my head, and still I kept going. I wasn’t making much forward progress, but that wasn’t the idea.
Then I could no longer move my feet: The gray mixture was setting from the ground up. My knees locked next, then my waist. The concrete set around my chest, and I could no longer breathe. Not that I’d have wanted to, because I would have been breathing in dirt.
The soil pressed down on me, but better the soil than Terrain’s concrete-and-bacteria mixture.
Harmony kept me informed as I waited. “It’s working, Brawn. The colonel’s men sprayed a large section of the bushes with the kerosene. It’s burning fast. They’ll have more than enough room to maneuver now. If you can—”
Then her voice was cut off, but I had no way of knowing whether that was because the signal couldn’t get through or because the weight of the concrete and soil had crushed the electronics wired into my leather helmet.
By now the bacteria-concrete mixture had completely solidified. I was still able to move my arms through the soil. If I hadn’t knocked all that dirt down on top of myself, I’d have been totally immobilized by the mixture. But I was afraid I’d left it too late. I could feel my lungs burning, felt my head growing light through lack of oxygen.
I jerked my arms down on either side of me, slamming my elbows hard into the concrete. White-hot pain juddered up my arms, and if I hadn’t been locked into an upright position, I might have fainted.
I slammed my elbows down again and again.
I don’t know how many times I did it. It could have been a dozen, two dozen … a hundred times. But eventually the concrete cracked.
With some difficulty I forced my hands into the cracks and pulled. There was no movement at all on my left, but on my right a large chunk of the concrete broke free. Then another, then the section enclosing my chest shattered, and it was all I could do to remain calm and not suck in a deep breath.
I was able to turn to the right a little, enough to allow me to use both hands to pummel the concrete.
When enough had been smashed away, I was able to plant both hands on it, palms down, and push.
With a loud, trembling crack the concrete around my legs crumbled, and I was free.
Moving blind, I used my legs to push off against the half-shattered concrete, forcing myself deeper into the soil beneath the gymnasium.
I was moving at a painfully slow speed, swimming up through the dirt, but at least I was moving.
After what felt like forever, my outstretched hands collided with something solid and unyielding. I quickly probed it with my fingers, but couldn’t find an edge. No way past.
And then, in the oxygen-starved haze of my brain, I realized that it was the underside of the gymnasium floor.
I pulled back my right fist and punched upward. A second punch and I felt something splinter, but I couldn’t tell whether it was the floor or my knuckles.
On the third punch my hand burst through.
I grabbed the edge and pulled, felt the floor brush the top of my head. Two more punches, left and right at the same time, and the floor above me shattered, upward and out, and the blackness beyond my goggles suddenly turned to blinding light.
I heard a voice say, “It’s him!” and then a small hand was grabbing mine. In seconds, more hands were on me, taking my arms, pulling me up.
They weren’t being nearly as much help as they thought they were, but that wasn’t the point.
I collapsed onto the ground, head down, coughing and gasping, filling my lungs over and over with air that tasted sweeter than honey.
“Everyone back, give ’im space!” The colonel crouched down next to me. “Tough day at work, son?”
I coughed. “I’ve had better.”
“Well, we got ’em. Every one. And no fatalities on their side or ours. Misseldine’s already on his way to the nearest lockup, and we got some of those hostage-negotiator fellas coming in to talk some sense into his followers.”
Slowly, with bursts of pain flaring through every muscle and every joint, I sat up.
The colonel was looking up at me. “Don’t feel bad, son. That was a good idea about burning down the bushes. So yer mission ain’t a total failure.”
I pointed down at the hole through which I’d emerged. “Failure? Do you have any idea what I’ve just been through? I had to—”
He raised a hand to cut me off. “Listen, kid, I been in the forces fer thirty years. There’s nothing ya can tell me that I ain’t heard before. Yer alive, ain’t ya?” He slapped me on the arm. “Whatever doesn’t kill ya makes ya stronger.”
* * *
The following afternoon I was lying on my bed reading when I received a visit from Harmony and Dr. Tremont. It was the first time I’d seen the doctor since I’d discovered that he was controlling the whole operation.
“That was almost a disaster,” Tremont said. “They could have killed you.”
Harmony said, “Norman Misseldine is talking about bringing charges against you. For trespassing, destruction of property, endangering the lives of his followers.”
I threw my history textbook aside. “But you told me to go in!”
“I know. I’m just making a point.”
“Which is?”
Tremont said, “Misseldine is smarter than you are, Brawn. He won’t be the only one. You have to do better. A lot better.”
Harmony nodded at that. “We’re taking away your TV set. You’re going to have to start really studying. We’ll be setting tests that you had better pass. From now on, you’re on basic food. Pizza is for winners. The better you do in the field, the more privileges you’ll receive.”
I jumped to my feet. “This is totally unfair!”
“Wrong,” Tremont said. “It’s perfectly reasonable.” He reached into his jacket pocket and pulled out a sheet of paper. “Your schedule.”
I snatched it out of his hand. According to the schedule I would be getting up at six every morning. Exercise for one hour, then I was allowed fifteen minutes to shower and eat breakfast. This was followed by studying until noon. I had a half-hour lunch break, then more studying until five. I was sure I could handle the basic math, English, history, and geography, but that was just the morning session: The afternoon session covered espionage, military history, world politics, and basic computer skills.
I stopped reading there, and looked up. “I’m not doing all this.”
“Yes, you are,” Harmony said. “If you refuse, we’ll take away your bed. See how you like sleeping on the concrete floor for a few weeks. Brawn, you have to catch up. You’re way behind everyone else your age.”
“And whose fault is that? Yours! You’re the ones who locked me away in the Antarctic for a year!”
Dr. Tremont shook his head. “Don’t blame others for your mistakes and failures, Brawn. That’s just pathetic. It’s childish.”
I knew I was being manipulated again, but I still couldn’t quite see how. If you looked at it from their point of view, everything they said almost made sense. Almost.
I had the feeling that no matter what path I chose, it would end up being exactly what they wanted me to do.
“Don’t call me Brawn. I have a real name, you know. And if you want to give me a code name, I want it to be Hercules.”
“That’s not going to happen,” Harmony said. “We’ve discussed it, and the name doesn’t track well. Hercules was a demigod, the son of Zeus and Alcmena. He was manipulated by the goddess Hera into killing his wife and children. That’s not the sort of image we want to present when we go public. We feel that the name Brawn works much better. It’s simple, it’s a word most people already know, and it has no religious or mythological connections. We’ve been thinking—”
“I’ve been thinking too,” I said. “I’m leaving.”
Tremont tutted. “That would be unwise. There would be repercussions.”
“Right. You’ll kill my parents.”
“You don’t want that to happen, do you?”
I sighed. “No, I don’t. But here’s something for you to think about. If anything happens to my folks, I’ll know who to blame.”
The silence stretched out as they glared at me.
“What exactly do you mean by that?” Harmony asked.
“What do you think it means? You’ve got them under surveillance. That’s good. You can make sure that no harm comes to them, because your lives depend on their safety.”
Tremont took a step closer. “You are actually threatening us? Are you insane as well as stupid? Brawn, we control the entire—”
I grabbed hold of his arms and lifted him straight up. “Go on. I’m listening.”
“Put me down!”
“Why? Give me a reason I shouldn’t just squeeze my hands together and crush you like an empty soda can.”
He choked out the words, “Your … parents …”
“No, you’re not getting this, Doctor. If you kill them, there’s nothing to stop me from destroying your entire operation, starting with you. You gotta stop thinking of my ma and pa as leverage against me. Think of them as my conscience. They wouldn’t want me to tear your head from your shoulders. I can do that. It really wouldn’t take much effort.” I opened my hands and let him drop to the floor. “How do you like that, huh? Not so much fun being on the other side of a threat, is it?”
As Harmony helped the doctor to his feet, he said, “You wouldn’t do it. You’re not a killer.”
“How do you know? Just because I never have killed, that doesn’t mean I never will. But maybe you’re right. Maybe I wouldn’t kill you. But I could very easily ruin you. I could go to the newspapers and TV stations, tell them everything you’ve done. I could explain to them that you spent eight and a half billion dollars of the taxpayers’ money tracking down an escaped prisoner who was only thirteen years old at the time.”
They jumped aside as I strode toward the oversized door. “Find someone else to do your dirty work for you. I’m leaving. If anything happens to my parents, I’ll find you and kill you all.”
Then Dr. Tremont suddenly blurted, “We need you! The world needs you!”
“Maybe it does,” I said. “But it sure doesn’t need you.”
CHAPTER 17
TWENTY-THREE
YEARS AGO
IT WAS THREE O’CLOCK in the morning, and I was climbing out through the hole I’d smashed in the wall of a convenience store, carrying two canvas bags stuffed with food, a large bag of tortilla chips between my teeth, when a woman’s voice said, “Stealing from the 7-Eleven? That’s just pathetic!”
I peered around the barely lit parking lot, but couldn’t see anyone.
“Up here, genius.” The voice came from above.
I looked up to see a vaguely familiar woman floating down toward me. She was wearing a red-and-purple costume.
I dropped my ill-gotten gains: I wanted to have my hands free just in case she was there to fight me. In the previous five months I’d had four battles with other superhumans: two with Titan, one with Paragon—though that one wasn’t really a fight, he just flew away—and one with a skinless strongman who called himself Muscle.
“Still,” the woman said, “at least this time you had the sense to choose a store that didn’t have an alarm.”
“You’ve been following me?” A few days earlier, in a different store in another town, I’d barely escaped from the cops after the store’s alarms brought them running.
“Brawn, you’re not hard to find, are you?” She hovered in place about eight feet above the ground, so that we were eye to eye. “It’s not like you can disappear into a crowd.”
I picked up the bag of chips and opened it. “Sorry. Haven’t eaten real food in days.” To myself, I added, and if we’re going to fight, I’ll need to keep my strength up. I poured half the bag into my mouth, then opened one of my stolen bottles of cola to wash down the chips.
The woman began to drift away into the darkness. “Come on, before someone sees you.”
“I have to find a phone first,” I told her.
“What for?”
“To call the cops.” I pointed to the hole in the wall. “I don’t want someone coming in and completely looting the place.”
She raised her eyes. “Even more pathetic.”
“I took only about twenty bucks’ worth of stuff. That and the cost of repairs won’t set the owner back too much. But if he lost all his stock …”
“Well, the cops are already on the way. I can hear the sirens. Come on.”
I scooped up my groceries and followed her out of the parking lot and into a quiet side street. “So why have you been following me?”
“Curiosity, mostly. There aren’t a lot of people like us, and most of those I’ve met are suffering from the delusion that they’re special. They want to be heroes.”
“And you don’t?”
The woman laughed. “I’ve got enough to do without worrying about public adoration.” She looked down at my bags. “So what did you steal? Don’t tell me, it’s the four Cs, right? Cookies, candy, cola, and chips.”
“Yeah. I can eat anything—grass, trees, anything organic—but sometimes you just have to have chocolate, y’know?”
She floated over the wrought-iron fence into a small public park, surrounded on all sides by new apartment blocks. I stepped over the fence and followed, still wondering whether I was going to have to fight her.
She stopped in the middle of a bunch of trees and sat down. “Pass me some of those chips, then.”
I tossed her an unopened bag and sat down opposite her.
As she opened the bag, she said, “I might have a job for you, Brawn. It pays well, and you’ll have a place to live. Hot food too. When was the last time you had a proper meal?”
“It’s been a while.”
“I’m guessing you didn’t choose to be on the wrong side of the law. Circumstances working against you, is that it?”
I nodded, and fed a handful of cookies into my mouth. “So what’s this job?”
She made a face as she flicked crumbs off her costume. “Please don’t talk with your mouth full. No, I can’t tell you what the job is until you agree to do it.”
“Then I’m not interested. I’ve had enough of that sort of thing. Anything top secret or illegal, or both, can go take a running jump.”
“What, you like the way you live? Sleeping in forests, eating out of Dumpsters, hiding all the time—that’s your ideal life, is it? Get a grip, Brawn. You’re bigger and stronger than any human. You shouldn’t be hiding from them—they should be lining up to worship you. People like you and me, we’re better than everyone else. In another age we would have been gods!”
“But this isn’t another age. This is now.” I finished my third package of cookies and drained the last of my soda, then stood up. “Been nice talking to you, but I think we should go our separate ways. What’s your name anyway?”
“The media calls me Slaughter. It’s not a name I’d have chosen for myself.”
A chill ran down my back. “I’ve heard of you. You’ve got every cop in the country searching for you. You’re a murderer.”
She shrugged. “They were only people.” Still sitting with her legs crossed, she floated up into the air. “You’re not thinking of trying to turn me in, are you? I’m a lot faster than you are.”
I didn’t want to get involved, but this woman was a killer—I wouldn’t have been able to live with myself if I’d just let her go and then she’d killed again.
I lunged at her, my hands outstretched, but she zipped away.
“Like I said. Pathetic. If you weren’t such an idiot, you’d have asked me my name first. Then you might have had a chance to catch me.” She began to circle around me. “If you won’t join me, then you’d better stay out of my way. You get me? You think you’re invulnerable, but you’re not. Not against me.” Then she threw her head back and let out a long, loud scream.
