The Twisted Future (Teen Superheroes Book 4) (7 page)

Chapter Sixteen

‘That was quite a ride,’ Chad said.

He had finished vomiting and was now shakily on his feet. Brodie had suffered a similar reaction from the tr
ansportation. She said to Taffe, ‘That’s quite an ability you’ve got there.’

‘Thanks.’ He motioned to a half-demolished building. ‘We have to take cover,’ he said. ‘Agency forces regularly patrol this area.’

They took shelter in the collapsed building. ‘So where the hell are we?’ Brodie said. ‘It seemed like we traveled miles.’

‘We did. We’re in Queens. Or what’s left of it.’ His eyes narrowed. ‘You’re not from around here, are you?’

‘How can you tell?’

‘You look too well fed. The only people that look as healthy as you are Agency operatives.’

‘We certainly don’t work for the Agency.’ Brodie briefly explained what had brought them here. She expected Taffe to laugh in disbelief, but he merely nodded.

‘I heard the Agency was developing a time machine,’ he said. ‘Looks like James Price finally pulled it off.’

Chad asked, ‘Is he as bad as everyone makes out?’

‘Worse. If you get a chance to change history, do it. You’ll be doing everyone a
favor.’

‘We really need to get back to Manhattan. Can you take us there?’

Taffe shook his head ruefully. ‘I wish I could, but I have a serious limitation on my power. It takes me a week to recharge after I’ve teleported. If you don’t mind waiting...’

Chad said to Brodie, ‘We can’t wait a week.’

‘We’ve got to track down the others,’ she said.

‘I have some friends in the resistance,’ Taffe said. ‘They can point you in the right direction.’

Brodie and Chad followed Taffe down a narrow street into a shattered building. He knew the area well. They navigated to the back where a piece of iron lay across scattered debris. Pulling it aside, Taffe led them down a set of stairs.

Brodie found herself blinking in the darkness. She could make out a basement with wine racks stacked to one side. 

‘Who’s there?’ a voice called from the gloom.

‘It’s Taffe. I’ve brought some people. We want to see Ellen.’

They heard the click of a gun being cocked. ‘Raise your hands and prepare to be searched.’

Two men separated from the darkness and searched them. Brodie felt a little uncomfortable, but remained silent. This wasn’t their world.
After the men allowed them to pass, they continued down another flight of stairs into an underground car park. Some vehicles were still parked there, but looked like they hadn’t been used in decades. Among them people sat cooking meals over small stoves, and cleaning weapons.

They weaved up more stairs to a gloomy room with windows boarded up on one side. A skinny woman, aged fifty, sat behind a desk.

Her eyes narrowed. ‘Taffe,’ she said, her voice surprisingly deep. ‘I heard you were taken by the Agency.’

‘I was.’ He introduced everyone. ‘I got free thanks to these good people.’ 

‘Lucky you,’ Ellen said, dourly. ‘I thought you’d been slated for execution.’ Her eyes shifted to Chad and Brodie. ‘How’d they get you free?’

‘We’ve got some tricks of our own,’ Chad said, producing a ball of fire in one hand and snow in the other. ‘We’re friends.’

‘I’m sure you are,’ Ellen said, looking completely unimpressed. ‘How do we know you’re not Agency spies?’

‘Because we’re not,’ Brodie said. ‘We need to get back to Manhattan. We have people waiting for us.’

Ellen gave a hollow laugh. ‘You’ll have to excuse me if I don’t believe you.’ She nodded to a space behind them. For the first time, Brodie saw people seated on torn lounge chairs around a table in the gloom. ‘We’ve got to test you.’

‘We’re not looking for trouble,’ Chad said, creating a circle of fire around him and Brodie. ‘We just need your help.’

The people stood up. They were blond, a brother and sister. One side of the girl’s face was terribly scarred; the letter
T
had been burnt into it. ‘Everyone needs help these days,’ she said. ‘It’s that kind of world.’

‘We don’t want to hurt you,’ Chad said.

‘You won’t,’ the girl replied.

Chad’s circle of fire disappeared. He tried to make it reappear, but nothing happened. ‘How’d you do that?’ he asked. ‘Only a zeno emitter—’

The girl introduced herself as Sharla, and her brother as Drake. ‘You’re not the only one with powers,’ Sharla smiled thinly. ‘Not only am I a human zeno emitter, but I can also get the truth out of people.’

‘We don’t have anything to hide,’ Brodie said, clenching her fists.

‘Good,’ Drake said. ‘Then it’ll be easy.’

The girl raised her hand and Brodie felt her eyes closing. She struggled to keep them open, but she felt as if she had not slept for a year. 

When she opened her eyes next, she was floating on a raft on a black ocean. The sky was pitch black except for starlight from constellations unfamiliar to her. It was cool and quiet upon the ocean, but then she felt warmth on her back. Turning, she saw the sun rising on the horizon, except it wasn’t the sun. It was an enormous eye and it could see—

‘Brodie? Can you hear me?’

Brodie awoke. Chad was shaking her shoulder.

‘I hear you,’ she said, sitting up. She was on a lounge in the darkened room. Apart from Chad, only Ellen and Sharla remained. They were speaking quietly together at Ellen’s desk. ‘What happened?’ 

‘I think Sharla can read minds,’ Chad explained. ‘Whatever they found in ours made them very excited.’

Ellen and Sharla finished their conversation.

‘I apologize for the inconvenience,’ Ellen said to Chad and Brodie.

‘No problem,’ Chad said. ‘Nothing I love better than getting brain probed.’

Sharla smiled without humor. ‘Just be glad I was nice about it,’ she said. ‘Sometimes I’m not.’

‘We understand the importance of your mission,’ Ellen said. ‘Sharla will take you back to Manhattan.’

Chad and Brodie both breathed a sigh of relief.

‘But I should warn you,’ Sharla said, ‘we’ve got to cross the badlands.’

‘And that’s difficult?’ Chad asked.

‘It’ll make everything else you’ve ever been though look like a walk in the park.’

Chapter Seventeen

I woke
to the blaring of a siren in my ears and someone shaking my shoulder. ‘Come on!’ a voice growled. ‘We’ve got to keep moving.’

I felt like a bus had landed on my head, but somehow I got to my feet, completely disoriented. Then I remembered. Time Travel. Forty years in the future. Temporal resonator. Ebony—

She climbed over a pile of shattered machinery towards me. The crash had completely destroyed
Liber8tor
. Gaping holes in the bulk head showed a corridor beyond.

‘Security will be here any minute,’ Old Axel said, dragging me towards the exit.

‘Mr. Brown?’ His motionless body was slumped over the console. ‘Is he—?’

‘Dead. Let’s go.’

Then we were outside the ship and in a corridor. Broken metal lay everywhere. So did the bodies of several security guards. Old Axel checked his map and pointed ahead.

‘This way!’ he snapped. ‘Double time.’

Old Axel pulled a device from his side pouch. It resembled a memory stick, but larger. He approached a nearby computer and placed it to the screen. It gave a loud click and the image turned to static.

‘I’m glad that worked,’ he said. ‘It just changed this mission from impossible to barely survivable.’

‘What is that?’ I asked.

‘A scrambler virus. It was devised by the Agency some years ago. It’ll disrupt communications across the station for the next hour.’

We ran down the corridor. Glancing back to the ship, I thought about Mr. Brown. I couldn’t believe we were just leaving him behind.

‘Mr. Brown—’
I began.

‘You want to
bring him as a good luck charm?’ Old Axel grabbed the front of my shirt and slapped me hard across the face. ‘Listen to me! You must both follow every direction I give or we’ll die here! Do you understand?’

We nodded dumbly. He was right. Our chances of survival were almost
zero, and we couldn’t do anything to help Mr. Brown anyway. We reached a doorway that led to the next section as security guards appeared in the corridor ahead. 

‘Ebony!’ Old Axel yelled, pointing at the floor. ‘Oxygen!’

The floor beneath the security team dissolved and they fell as one to the level below. There was a sickening thud as they crashed, followed by screams of pain.

My future self grabbed me. ‘Fly us across to the opposite door.’

I created a flying wing out of compressed air and got us across. Old Axel closed the door behind us. ‘Turn this door to titanium,’ he told Ebony.

She looked puzzled, but complied. Old Axel produced a small box from his pocket. ‘Hold onto your hats,’ he said, smiling.

He pushed the button. An instant later we heard a
wumpf
, the entire station shook and we were thrown to the floor. A new alarm started as Old Axel dragged us to our feet.

‘What the hell was that?’ I asked.

‘A nuclear device I installed on
Liber8tor
.’

‘A what?’

‘It’ll keep the Agency forces busy for a while.’

I stared in horror at the titanium wall. If it hadn’t held—

‘Let’s go!’

Another team of guards came charging out of a side passage and I knocked them out with a blast of air. We turned down a side corridor where another two guards appeared. Before I could react, Old Axel had shot them both in the chest, killing them instantly.

I’m a monster
, I thought.
This world has turned me into a monster.

We turned another corner and this time doors opened on both sides of the passage. This was all happening so fast. I couldn’t focus. Couldn’t concentrate. Guards charged through with guns raised and Old Axel shot them.

He stopped to consult his map. ‘This is it,’ he said. ‘We need to go up a floor.’

Looking upwards, I created a cyclone of air that I slammed into the ceiling. It dented—but held.

‘Again!’ Old Axel yelled.

I fought back an angry retort. I wanted to smash
him
. Instead I focused, driving the hurricane force into the ceiling again. After three more attempts, a crack appeared and we stepped back as green liquid dripped down.

‘Take us up,’ Old Axel ordered.

I didn’t bother to argue. I levitated us through the hole and entered a chamber more like a swamp than a room on a space station. Trees, vines and parasitic plants were everywhere. Dirt and muddy pools covered the floor. A rotten egg smell choked the air. Moss grew across the ceiling. The only illumination was the glow of the purple ceiling.

‘My God,’ I said. ‘Where the hell are we?’

‘The biological experimentation centre,’ Old Axel explained. ‘We’re almost there. We’ve only got one final obstacle to overcome.’

A scream came from something behind me and was hit by the stench of putrefying flesh. I saw a mighty tree stretching from floor to ceiling.

Something appeared from behind it. Something with a multitude of eyes...

Chapter Eighteen

‘It’s called the Hydra,’ Old Axel said.

‘How nice,’ Ebony gulped, her eyes like full moons in the purple light. ‘It has a name.’

The Hydra was the size and shape of a small house, with blue-green scales covering most of its body. Supporting it were four stumpy legs that ended in clawed feet. It had a dozen tentacles about ten feet long. Suckers, similar to those of an octopus, covered every inch of them. Each sucker was ringed by spikes; a single swipe would cut a person in two.

Scattered, seemingly at random across the length of the creature, were hundreds of red eyes, tinged with green. It the midst of this madness lay a mouth, a jagged rip that contained a double row of sharp teeth.

But possibly the most disgusting thing about the creature was its lips. They were strangely human, almost delicate.

I wondered how best to attack the monster. A burst of air would drive it back. Then maybe Ebony could create a steel blade—

Old Axel raised his gun and pulled the trigger. A single laser beam cut through the Hydra. It shuddered, its eyes opening in shock—and died.

What the—?

‘That’s it?’ I said. ‘It’s
dead
?’

‘I said it was the final obstacle,’ Old Axel said. ‘I didn’t say it would be hard to kill.’

Ebony laughed, but it was flavored with hysteria.

Old Axel consulted the map as we crossed the swamp. Glancing back at the dead creature, I shivered as I remembered its eyes, tentacles, lips...

‘Oh no,’ I said. ‘That creature...don’t tell me it’s...’

‘Human? It was—once.’

Ebony’s mouth dropped open. ‘It was a person? What the—’

‘Just be glad he’s dead,’ Old Axel advised. ‘For all our sakes.’

Reaching a slime covered wall, he told me to make a hole. Seconds later we climbed into a pristine corridor, sucking in lungfuls of fresh air.

‘Ebony,’ Old Axel said. ‘Turn the floor of the biological chamber to oxygen.’

That would cause the entire swamp, including the Hydra to drop to the floor below.

‘Won’t that crush—’

‘—anyone beneath it. Yes,’ Old Axel said, ‘that’s the idea.’

Ebony looked like she wanted to argue, but Old Axel’s instructions had helped us to survive this long. Ebony knelt and reached for the floor.

She stood. ‘No,’ she said. ‘I’m not doing it.’

Old Axel looked furious. ‘This is—’

‘Let’s go,’ she said. ‘Let’s just get these temporal...thingies...and get out of here.’

We continued down the corridor. The door at the end slid open and we entered a workshop with
computer parts cramming the benches. Old Axel’s eyes scanned the room until he focused on a door set into the wall. I opened it by expanding the molecules of air in the lock. It swung free.

‘Bingo,’ Old Axel said. Pieces of equipment filled the shelves. He shook his head sadly. ‘Some of these weapons would give the resistance such an advantage...’ Checking two cases, he found the same devices we had seen on the time machine. ‘Still, if this works we’ll never have to worry about the Agency again.’

He handed a bag to me before snatching a beehive-shaped device off the shelf.

‘This’ll come in handy,’ he said. ‘Let’s go.’

I glanced at a computer terminal and saw it was still filled with static. The communications systems were still scrambled. Rounding a bend, we entered a room with a metal pad in the center of the floor. Three men worked at consoles. Old Axel started firing at them.

‘No!’ I yelled.

But I was too late. Within seconds they were dead. I felt like grabbing my older self and shaking him, but there was no time. He read one of the consoles.

‘Good.’ He tapped a few keys. ‘This is going to work.’

‘What is?’ Ebony asked, looking sick.

‘These are transportation mats. They can be used for short range teleportation.’

‘Teleportation?’ I said. ‘You’ve got to be kidding.’

‘I told you James Price was brilliant. Get on the mat.’

We climbed onto the metal platform while Old Axel manipulated the controls. He pushed a button and the platform began to hum. Taking a running jump, he landed next to me—

—just as everything started to shimmer. The world divided into cubes. Then they divided into smaller cubes. And again. They continued to sub-divide. I couldn’t move. White light surrounded me. Then I saw tiny cubes reassembling into small cubes. Larger cubes. Blocks.

Except now we were standing on a metal mat in a completely different place, a maintenance area surrounded by vessels. A man worked on a landing strut. I knocked him out with a bolt of air before Old Axel could kill him.

Adjusting the beehive shaped device he had stolen from the vault, Old Axel set it on the matter transporter. He activated the transporter and the device disappeared.

‘That should keep them busy.’ We raced up the stairs of a fighter craft. Five times the size of an Earth fighter, I was seriously impressed, but we had no time to appreciate it. We scrambled onto the flight deck where Old Axel slid behind the controls.

‘How can you operate all this technology?’ I asked.

‘Correspondence course,’ he said, starting the engines. ‘You remember I said we’ve had information leaking from the Agency for years. I’ve studied every schematic I could lay my hands on. Besides,’ the vessel lifted off the ground, ‘this ship isn’t so different to the old flex craft. It’s just larger.’

The entire station shuddered as we heard the distant rumble of an explosion. Old Axel gave a satisfied grunt. ‘Right on time.’ He aimed us at the nearest bulkhead. ‘Let’s hope the weapons are operational.’ He flipped a switch, a missile roared away from us and the wall exploded into shrapnel.

Atmosphere erupting through the gap, we entered the void of space, the Earth beneath us. As Old Axel poured on the acceleration, I looked back at the space station. The space dock at one end was ruined. Another segment was open to space. It looked like the station was about to break apart. Bodies and pieces of metal were being blasted into the vacuum of space.

I felt sick. Slumping into my seat, I tried not to think of the multitude of people we had just killed.

‘We did it,’ Ebony said, collapsing next to me. ‘We’re alive.’

Old Axel shot me a rare smile. ‘We’re a resourceful person,’ he said. ‘Those who have wronged us will live to regret it.’

Whatever that meant.