The One Million Word Project

[csyphrett]

Ink Buttons

2010-

Ten year old Tanner Lerner smiled as he watched the night sky. He had spent a lot of

time picking out his spot. He planned to watch as much of the meteor shower that he

could before his parents came out to fetch him.

 

They encouraged his interest in the stars, but they had set a curfew they enforced. He

was not supposed to be out after ten on a school night.

 

He had picked his spot so they couldn’t find him easily when they came out to call

him in. He could put not responding down to having his earphones in while watching

the sky.

 

He thought that wouldn’t fly over well, but it would get him time to watch the stars

as the shower started.

 

“What you doing, Squirt?” His neighbor, Darla Huitt, approached from the base of

the hill. She was in the same grade as he was, and he thought he couldn’t get rid of

her easily.

 

“Star watching.” Tanner wondered what he could say to get her to leave him alone.

He didn’t need her to get in his way while he was making his observations.

 

“Are you allowed out this late?” She grinned at him. “Only big boys are supposed to

be able to get out of their play pens.”

 

Anger boiled in his system but he forced it down. He didn’t need the pest getting

close to his parents and getting grounded because he was not home.

 

“Don’t you have someone else to troll?” Tanner gritted his teeth. If he could hold on

for a few moments, then his project would fly.

 

“Not really.” She smiled. “All my homework is done.”

 

Great. She planned to hang out with him and drive him crazy. Maybe he should pack

it in and go somewhere else. Packing the telescope would be a pain, but he thought

about it and realized unless he went home, she would follow him around to tell him

how she felt.

 

And he didn’t care how she felt.

 

He looked at his watch. The shower was supposed to start in a few minutes. He

looked for the first streak heading across the sky. Once he had a visual bearing, he

could turn and focus the telescope on the meteors heading toward Earth.

 

He could ignore his cousin for the time to the shower starting. Maybe if he ignored

her, she would go away. He decided that wasn’t going to work. She would just get in

his way to keep him from doing that.

 

Maybe he should pack it in. There would be other meteor showers he could watch

without her interfering.

 

He didn’t want to give up his hill.

 

“What’s so cool about these meteors?” She covered her mouth as she yawned.

 

“They only show once in a century.” He realized that maybe talking to her might not

be a good thing and slowed things down. On the other hand, he might be able to

knock everything over with a grudge and set up somewhere else.

 

Tanner spotted the leading edge of the storm and smiled. He watched the flames with

his telescope. Concentrating on that would be better as a whole than watching for

someone who had a problem temper try to get him in trouble.

 

Why didn’t she move on? She didn’t have any interest in the stars as far as he was

concerned.

 

Why wasn’t she home?

 

“Parents fighting?” Tanner scanned the sky. One of the meteors seemed to be

wobbling. What was going on there?

 

“When aren’t they, Squirt?” She sighed. “They should just get a divorce and be

done with it.”

 

Tanner silently agreed. Uncle Bill and Aunt Jamie fought all the time. They never

seemed to say a nice thing to each other whenever he saw them together. It was

embarrassing to him. He didn’t want to take sides, but frequently they asked him an

opinion. His answers seemed to always make things worse.

 

And he could rarely extract himself from the situation without making both of them

mad at him.

 

One of the meteors veered out of the stream in the sky. He studied it with his

telescope. It seemed to be getting bigger. He looked at it with his naked eye. It was

coming down close by.

 

“We should get away from here.” Tanner looked at his setup. He didn’t want to lose

his telescope, but he didn’t have time to pack it up. He decided to move. If the meteor

hit and missed his telescope, he would come back for it. “Meteor hits look like

cannon shots afterwards.”

 

“What are you talking about?” She looked up at the approaching light. She smiled.

 

“Are you crazy?” Tanner grabbed her arm. He pulled on her to follow him. “We’ll be

killed if we stay here.”

 

“That’s fine with me.” She pushed him away. “It beats going back home.”

 

“We have to go.” Tanner pulled as hard as he could. She resisted, digging in her

heels. “It’s not safe.”

 

“Run if you want.” She punched him in the face. He went down. “This is what I

need.”

 

Tanner got to his feet. The light in the sky was closer. He looked at his cousin. Then

he did the only thing he could think of to do. He tackled her, pushing her down the

hill in front of him. They rolled from the apex, his cousin screaming in his ear. He

took a shot to the face as they hit bottom.

 

Darla unleashed a stream of invective as she tried to get to her feet. A fist to the face

didn’t slow her down. She retaliated with a kick.

 

Tanner clenched his teeth. The light from the stars hung above them as they wrestled

on the ground. An explosion picked him up and sent him tumbling to the ground.

He landed on his back.

 

He stood up. Darla lay on her face. She didn’t move. He wondered if she got her

wish. He decided to check on his telescope before he dealt with her. He had no

interest in getting involved with her parents.

 

He marched up the altered hill. He didn’t have to like astronomy to know he and his

cousin were lucky to still be in one piece. The top of the hill had been carved out. The

trees and his telescope were gone. He supposed they had been reduced to fragments

from the impact.

 

How was he going to explain losing that to his parents. First, he violated his curfew.

Then he lost his expensive telescope. And if his cousin said anything, he would be

grounded for punching her in the mouth.

 

He should punch her again to make it worth getting punished.

 

He walked to the edge of the crater. He spotted something glowing at the bottom of

the bowl. Maybe the meteor had survived impact. If it had, it would be worth losing

his telescope.

 

He took off his shirt and touched the edge of the glow with it. He smiled when his

shirt didn’t catch fire. The thing was cooling off fast.

 

If he could get the thing out of the hill, he could take it home and look at it. Maybe

he could call a museum and ask them what he could do with it. There might be some

money in the thing.

 

If there was a reward, he could replace his telescope with the money.

 

All he had to do was get the thing out of the crater and get it home.

 

He heard Darla moan at the bottom of the hill. He needed to grab the thing and head

home. He wasn’t going to share credit with her. She had almost got them killed with

her reluctance to flee.

 

He decided to wrap his shirt around the glow. If he could carry it away, he expected

it to cool while he ran home. It should be completely safe to touch by the time he got

it to his house.

 

Then he could come back for Darla, if he felt like it. If she didn’t know about the

thing, she couldn’t try to use it as some kind of lever for promises.

 

He wasn’t getting involved with her, or the rest of her crazy family if he could help

it.

 

Tanner started into the crater. He looked for the source of the glow as he spread his

shirt out to catch it. Once he had the thing covered, he planned to tie the shirt together

so he could carry it like a bag.

 

He dropped the shirt. He grabbed the edges and started to scoop up what was left at

the bottom of the bowl. Pain ran up his hands. He dropped the shirt.

 

He examined his fingers. Lines colored the pads, then spread up one arm as he

watched. He gritted his teeth at the thought he might be dead thanks to Darla.

 

He should kick her to get some revenge before he died from whatever he had touched

through his shirt.

 

He picked up his shirt. The shine was gone. He spotted two holes through the cloth.

Whatever had poked him in the hands had done it through the shirt. How was he

going to explain things to his parents?

 

What was this writing on his arm? It looked like buttons. He realized it looked like

a typewriter keypad. He could make things like letters out under the stars, but not

exactly what. How was he going to explain a big tattoo like that.

 

Things just kept getting worse for him.

 

He should kick Darla for what she had got him into. He sat down on the edge of the

crater and wondered what he was going to do. All of his options looked bad to him.

 

He should have known something bad was going to happen the moment she showed

up. He looked down the hill. What was he going to do?

 

Pain throbbed in his hands. He needed to have that checked out. He couldn’t let some

unknown fungus eat at him. He should get to the hospital and let them keep him from

melting, or whatever he was going to do now.

 

He stood up. At least Darla was safe until she got home. That had been his good deed

for the day. He might as well lord it over her as much as he could.

 

He got to his feet. He noticed a stream of glowing particles heading down the hill for

the first time. He grimaced. The stream headed right for Darla.

 

He rushed down to pull her out of the way. The last thing he needed was to get

blamed for a tattoo on his cousin.

 

He grabbed her shoulders and picked her up in a sitting position. He frowned. Two

squares had written themselves in at her temples. An eye disfigured her forehead. Too

late to do anything for her now.

 

He couldn’t carry her. He had to wake her up and get her on her way before anyone

investigated what had happened. He wasn’t explaining an alien tattoo to anyone if he

could help it.

 

He certainly wasn’t going to take Darla home and tell her parents that she had been

knocked out and some glowing stuff had pierced her brain.

 

He knew better to expect anything good coming out of that.

 

He slapped Darla’s face. That felt good. He did it again. She moaned.

 

“Wake up.” He slapped her again. “We don’t have time for this, Darla.”

 

“Don’t hit me again, Squirt.” She opened her eyes. They were the wrong color.

Tanner grimaced. How were they going to explain glowing yellow eyes. He decided

to let Darla handle it.

 

He didn’t want to look out for her. He didn’t need the hassle her parents would cause

him if he was reported to his own parents.

 

“Let’s go.” He got to his feet. “You took a bad hit, and I need to change my clothes.”

 

“All right.” Darla got to her feet. “I feel sick as a dog. My head hurts, and I’m craving

some pizza.”

 

“I’ll walk with you to your house.” Tanner pulled on his shirt. “After that, I have

to get home and clean up myself.”

 

“I don’t need your help.” Darla staggered toward her house five steps. She paused and

hung her head.

 

Was she going to be sick? Could she make it on her own? What should he do?

 

He decided the best thing he could do was help her if she wanted it. Then he had to

get home and take his punishment from his own parents.

 

He could take it. He was alive. He had saved his cousin’s life. He had been infected

with something, but the initial pain was over. He could live with that after he talked

to a doctor about it.

 

He needed to make the best of what he could do at the moment. He didn’t want to

be confined to the hospital, but if it helped him figure things out, then that might be

the best solution to the sudden focus.

 

Maybe the doctors could figure out why the thing resembled a typewriter. He doubted

that was accidental, but he had no clue on what it meant.

 

He walked behind Darla as she cut across several lots to her house. He watched as she

went inside. He hoped the tattoo on her face wouldn’t get her in trouble. He knew that

was forlorn. Her parents liked to fight too much for them to let it go.

 

They would be on her like rabid squirrels.

 

He turned and headed for his own house. He had to get home and sneak inside

without his parents catching him. He didn’t want them telling him that he had broken

curfew and he was going to be punished. Helping Darla would be seen as a plus,

but not mitigating. He shouldn’t have been out there to have to help Darla in the

first place.

 

He would figure something out while he was trying to sneak into his house.

 

At least his parents didn’t generally make things hard for him. He was thankful for

that.

 

He scratched an itch on his newly tattooed arm. Three of the buttons glowed. He

looked at the shining buttons. Then he felt himself shrinking down to the size of an

ant. He looked at his surroundings in horror.

 

How was he going to deal with this?

45789

[csyphrett]

Across the Divide

1969-

Bobby Benson looked out the window of his quarters. His arm didn’t hurt anymore,

but it was still withered from the last attack of his major foes. He supposed he was

lucky the beam hadn’t hit him head on like it had Will and Anne. He didn’t feel that

lucky.

 

Bobby wondered if his powers would allow him to heal the arm. He hadn’t found

anything in the scrolls. Cain had written down other applications of the Spark, but

healing seemed to be work for other people.

 

He could be the first user to use the Spark for healing. He just didn’t know how to

apply it yet. Something would show up and give him a clue on how he was going to

do that.

 

He wouldn’t mind it if he could just get more mobility in the thing without resorting

to becoming the Mark. That temporarily fixed things as he used the magic to turn into

his other self.

 

He doubted any doctors could fix it. And he wasn’t willing to lose the arm altogether.

That seemed like too much of a drastic solution for his tastes.

 

He heard a cry for help coming from the clouds outside his window. Maybe a call to

action was what he needed. It had been a while since he had done something

constructive.

 

The court had declared him innocent, but people were afraid of him now. They were

waiting for him to go on another rampage. He supposed they had a point, but he

didn’t like it.

 

He called on the Spark and changed. His jeans and workshirt transformed into a blue

suit with a green tie clip. He dove out of the open window. He was still the Mark, and

he still had a job to do.

 

He descended into a cloud. When he came out the other side, he flew over a city that

resembled New York. Some of the buildings seemed to be in the wrong place, and

Manhattan didn’t look like it did back home, but it was close enough to be

recognizable.

 

He headed for where the scream had come from to pierce his lookout. He wanted to

solve the problem and go back to his research. He had to figure out how to get his arm

back to normal.

 

He refused to believe that there was nothing that could help him. He had fought a lot

of mad scientists. He didn’t want to talk to them again about what had happened that

had led to their incarceration.

 

He found the source of the call. A woman backed from an alley. She held her hands

to her mouth. She turned to run from whatever was inside the lane between buildings.

 

Something charged out of the space after her. It had too many mouths and claws for

ripping. It sprinted on all fours to catch up to its intended prey.

 

Bobby swooped down and picked it up. It turned to claw at him with a few of its

arms. He threw it up in the air. He paused to check the scene. He didn’t want to leave

others like the thing running around to attack civilians.

 

He didn’t see any more of the things. He should be able to catch it and put it

somewhere it wouldn’t hurt anybody else.

 

He wondered if that shaggy coat would protect it in the Arctic. The danger would be

if it could move in the ice zone and decided to track back south to civilization.

 

He wondered if killing it was the right answer to this problem.

 

He noticed a glowing path in the distance. It seemed to be flying around the Statue

of Liberty. Maybe he should check that out before he went home. Maybe one of the

local heroes was having a problem he could help out with.

 

Bobby caught the furry monster as it fell back down toward the city. He headed out

to the Statue of Liberty. It wasn’t quite the copper beauty of his world, but he knew

it anywhere. He found a flying man flying around the head of the statue. Her hair

formed a green waterfall over a small tiara. A group of men in yellow overalls stood

on the hairdo. They shot at the flying man with blasters that seemed too advanced for

the rest of the city he had observed on the flight here.

 

“How’s it going?” Bobby caught two of the energy bolts with his free hand. The other

hand dangled the monster high above the sea. It whimpered as it looked down at the

ocean below.

 

“Who are you?” The flying man wore a costume of red and gold. A gold mask

covered the upper half of his face.

 

“I’m the Mark.” Bobby held up the monster. “I caught this thing attacking some

woman in the city. I was thinking of taking it to the Arctic, but then I noticed you

flying around over here.”

 

The flying man frowned at the explanation. It sounded too good to be true.

 

“A new hero?” That seemed to be the only piece that made things fit together.

 

“I’m visiting from the next universe over.” Bobby wondered if he would believe that.

He knew he would weigh it before accepting it. He had seen too many strange things

not to believe a story like that until it was disproved.

 

“Would you mind giving me a hand?,” the other hero asked. “I have two other

emergencies I need to handle at the moment.”

 

“Sure.” Bobby threw his captive into the air. Then he flew into the mass of shooting

men. He smashed into them, crushing equipment, punching enemies before they could

run. He flew up and caught the creature. It whimpered now.

 

“Thanks.” The other hero smiled. “The police are on the way to pick them up. I have

a guy demanding my presence at the airport, and some kind of monster on the Strip.”

 

“Which airport?” Bobby could handle both jobs by himself, but felt his power

allowed him a better chance of stopping someone holding a plane hostage.

 

“Nixon International.” The masked man pointed where Bobby knew La Guardia stood

in his home city.

 

“I’ll handle it.” Bobby smiled. “As soon as I’m done, I’ll help you with your

monster.”

 

“Thanks.” The masked man headed south toward New Jersey. He showed a lot of

trust in a guy he just met.

 

“Let’s go, Fangs.” Bobby streaked toward the airport. He noted the presence of police

helicopters on the way to the Statue. At least he wasn’t leaving criminals to escape

after the beating he had given them.

 

He grabbed some rebar from a nearby construction site and wrapped his captive in it.

He let it test its prison to make sure it couldn’t escape. Then he placed the cage on the

traffic control tower. He knocked on the window to get the controllers’ attention. He

pointed down to let them know he was heading for a landing.

 

A group of men in suits and uniforms met him at the door. They looked worried about

what was going on. A bevy of questions about Captain Spark led the way.

 

“I’m pinch hitting for him at the moment.” Bobby held up his hands. “He had some

monster to beat up. What can you guys tell me about the problem? I’ll be glad to deal

with it for you.”

 

“We got a guy in Flight Four Ten who says he’s got a bomb that he will use to blow

up the passengers and himself unless he sees Captain Spark in the next few minutes.

We have ten minutes to comply.” One of the men took charge. “SWAT says they

can’t get a clean shot. He’s in the cabin with the passengers and away from the

windows.”

 

“Call him up and tell him that Captain Sparks’s brother is coming down to talk to

him.” Bobby frowned. “Can one of you guys show me where the plane is?”

 

“He’s not going to like that.” The guy in charge frowned.

 

“Tell him to turn on the news if he can.” Bobby shrugged. “Captain Spark said he had

a monster to deal with on the Strip. Tell him I’m just going to keep him company

until the guy can get here.”

 

“I’ll tell him.” The man nodded. “If you can get him in the cockpit, SWAT say they

can take him out.”

 

“As long as he doesn’t detonate when he sees me, I can take care of this.” Bobby

smiled. “Which one is Four Ten?”

 

“Come with me.” One of the uniforms led the way across the tarmac. A rifleman and

aid took up a spot next to the building. Others were sprinkled behind cover. Bobby

noted them, but said nothing. There was no point in letting them know he could see

like an eagle. “There’s the plane.”

 

He pointed to a plane sitting by itself in the middle of a runway. No one was close to

it, and the authorities might be afraid to block it in if the guy decided he wanted to fly

out of there after talking to Captain Spark.

 

“Let me go out there and talk to the guy.” Bobby frowned. “If he doesn’t push the

button when he sees me, we have a shot. If he does, the hostages are as good as

dead.”

 

“What about you?,” the uniform asked.

 

“He needs a nuke if he wants to scratch me.” Bobby smiled. “That’s why I have a shot

at walking away.”

 

Bobby didn’t plan to let the man push the button. He knew the plane and he had speed

beyond measure. He wasn’t letting the guy know he was coming as a stall. He was

letting him know so he had to be in one of two places. One of those Bobby could see.

 

When he saw the hostage taker step into the cockpit, bomb on prominent display, he

launched from the asphalt. His flight bowled over the police as he flickered across the

field as fast as a bullet. The bomber knew he was in trouble when something had him

by the throat, while crushing his hand with the other hand. Then they were outside on

the runway.

 

“How’s it going?” Bobby grinned at him. “Are there more of you on the plane?”

 

“I’ll never tell you, pig.” The bomber tried to free his hand so the switch would fall

out of it. He couldn’t break the grip holding the detonator in place.

 

“I think you need to go for a swim.” Bobby launched himself in the air. He headed out

into the bay. He dragged his enemy through the water. The electronics stopped

working after the first minute. He knew this because the man dropped the detonator

and nothing happened.

 

Bobby returned to the airport. He dropped the man on the runway away from the

plane. Police and fire fighters had crossed the tarmac when Bobby had grabbed the

mastermind.

 

“Everyone is okay.” The uniform that had acted as a guide for Bobby smiled. “That

was a good job.”

 

“It’s backfired a couple of times.” Bobby pulled the bomb off of his victim with a

tearing of cloth. “Most people can’t even see me when I don’t want them to.”

 

“I believe it.” The uniform pulled cuffs from under his belt. “I don’t know why this

guy wanted Captain Spark so bad, but maybe he’ll tell us downtown.”

 

“Maybe the plane was rigged somehow.” Bobby shrugged. “He might still have

something in the cargo that could be triggered.”

 

“I’ll get the bomb squad to go over the thing to make sure.” The uniform waved at

two of his men. “The last thing we need is a disaster here at the airport.”

 

“Let me check in with the Captain, then I have to head home.” Bobby smiled. “I have

my own crooks to punch in the face.”

 

“Have a good flight,” said the uniform. He found that he was talking to himself.

 

Bobby picked up his homemade cage. The monster hissed at him. He nodded in reply.

Then he headed south.

 

He spotted the giant monster being forced off the gambling area by Captain Spark.

He wondered how he could stop the thing without knocking over a building. He

didn’t want to do more damage than he had to.

 

The monster in the cage started making the noises. It whistled and hooted. The bigger

monster paused to look at the cage. It roared in dismay.

 

Bobby flew up and held the little monster in front of the bigger monster. The little one

stretched out limbs for the bigger one.

 

“What’s going on?” Captain Spark looked at the two.

 

“I think this is the baby.” Bobby pulled the cage apart so the smaller monster could

climb out. He helped it over to the clutches of the big one. Hooting filled the air.

 

“All right.” Captain Spark nodded. “Thanks for the help. How do we get them back

to where they belong?”

 

“Got me,” said Bobby. “I guess I can fly the mother out of the city.”

 

The bigger monster turned and headed toward the sea. Her tail knocked out glass

windows as she passed. Her baby rode on her shoulder.

 

“It looks like our work here is done when the creatures head out to shore.” Bobby

smiled. “This worked out better than I thought.”

 

“I still have to help repair the damage to the buildings.” Captain Spark shook his

head. “At least the family is back together.”

 

“You can’t do better than that.” Bobby looked around. This Atlantic City was just as

off as the New York, but it still stood after a close encounter of a scaly kind.

 

He waved his hand as he headed for a cloud to get back to his window. He still had

to find a cure for his arm.

 

48090

[csyphrett]

Showdown in a Small Town

1969-

Part One

“Are we sure this is the place?” Doug Fleming looked out of the plane’s window

as it soared over a one horse town in the middle of nowhere.

 

“The readings say so.” Barry Nicklaus smiled. One hand checked the parts built into

his body. He would be ready to go by the time they landed. “If it isn’t, we’ll cross it

off our list and go to the next one like we’ve done before.”

 

“Doesn’t look like much.” Marty Morgan climbed up in the seat and looked out the

window over Fleming’s shoulder. “I don’t see a strip.”

 

“There probably isn’t any airstrips.” Barry checked his loads for his pistol. “We might

have to land and walk in.”

 

“All right guys,” said Daryl Honeycutt. “We’re coming in for a landing. Strap in.”

 

“You heard the lady, Marty.” Fleming pointed out seatbelts to their youngest member.

“You don’t want to be slammed around when we hit the ground.”

 

“Okay.” Marty took a seat and strapped in. 

 

“This is usually where the missile battery opens up on us.” Barry strapped himself in.

 

“Why do you say things like that?” Doug shook his head. “This should be a milk run.

Why do you have to tempt fate like that?”

 

“I like to give bad guys ideas so I can find them faster.” Barry smiled at the

expression on his friend’s face. “It makes it easier to punch them.”

 

“It makes easier for them to shoot at us.” Fleming shook his head.

 

He pulled on a flight helmet. He kept the visor up, but it would protect his head in

case something went wrong.

 

Daryl was a great fighter, but she liked to plop her planes down so someone would

start making trouble. The faster they got things sorted out, the better the group liked

it.

 

Hopefully Marley would keep her from being too reckless.

 

His mental abilities should bolster hers so she didn’t drive the plane into the ground,

or against anything solid.

 

“Going in.” Daryl reported. “Keep an eye out in case we need them.”

 

Marty hoped things went smooth. He didn’t want to fight for his life because

everyone else was thinking how great it would be. He would rather have an

uneventful look around rather than a search and destroy.

 

Search and destroy led to a lot of collateral damage that he didn’t think looked good

when you were supposed to be sneaking around as best you could.

 

The plane shuddered as Daryl touched ground. She rolled the plane to a gentle stop

on a country road. She cut the engines.

 

“Everybody out.” Barry undid his belt and stood. He rushed to the door and pushed

it open so he could kick the ladder from its niche. He liked to be the first person out

because his quasi-robotic body was generally tougher than the rest of them.

 

Bad guys liked shooting at Barry because they knew if they took him down, the rest

of the group would follow easier.

 

Doug and Marty joined him at the door. Marty held out a hand. A bird leaped from

it, flying away on gray wings. That gave him an eye in the sky while they looked

around.

 

“Let’s see how bad things are.” Barry dropped down to the ground. One hand rested

on his pistol. He didn’t draw it yet. There was still a chance they were wrong.

 

Doug slid down the ladder. He moved cautiously under the belly of the plane to look

at the other side of the road. He didn’t see anything. Maybe no one wanted to go to

a plane parked on the local road because they knew it was a lost cause.

 

He didn’t like it. It meant trouble of one kind, or another.

 

Marty climbed down the ladder. He looked around as he tried to follow the input from

his bird. It hadn’t seen anyone on the streets. Farming seemed to be out too.

 

“I don’t see anyone.” Doug didn’t like the fact that not even the crops were moving.

 

“I don’t see anyone either,” Marty reported. “Where is everyone?”

 

“Don’t know.” Barry took a bearing. “Maybe we should go into town and see what

we can stir up.”

 

Daryl dropped from the door and bounced to a stop. She took on a human form

wearing their uniform colors. She smiled slightly.

 

“Doesn’t look like anyone is home.” She shielded her eyes with a hand. “Which way

do we go from here, guys?”

 

“People are in the town. They are clustered in the diner.” Jim Marley drifted from the

door, keeping himself off the ground by two inches. “There is something there that

makes them afraid to leave the building.”

 

“Where is Cortez?” Barry knew his mental ace was working on that. They hated each

other, and tried to kill each other as soon as they spotted one another.

 

“I have a signal in the fields beyond the town.” Marley floated forward. “I don’t trust

it.”

 

“So how do we do this, Barry?” Doug cracked his knuckles.

 

“We need Jim to figure out what’s going on with the signal.” Barry grimaced. They

had lost the element of surprise. He knew that he should be expecting Cortez’s armed

forces and his lieutenant, but nothing was going on.

 

He didn’t like that at all.

 

It smelled like a trap.

 

“Doug, take Daryl and Marty and scout the diner. Jim and I will check out this

signal.” Barry hated dividing up their forces. He should have recruited more people,

but for now he had to make do with what he had. “If there is a problem, send up a

flare. We’ll try to rescue you if we’re not having problems of our own.”

 

“There’s going to be problems.” Doug waved at the other two to follow him. He

headed into town, scanning the buildings for sentries.

 

“I agree with Doug.” Jim floated next to his leader. “There’s going to be problems.”

 

“We have to make do with what we have.” Barry shrugged. “Let’s see if we can scout

our problem before we close with it.”

 

Barry drew his pistol. He pulled out a round from his arm storage and loaded it

in the only clear chamber. His designs required something sturdy without a lot

of moving parts, so he had opted for modifying a revolver to do what he wanted. He

checked the direction of the wind.

 

“How far to this signal, Jim?” Barry’s mechanical parts allowed him to hit anything

within the range of his pistol. Some of his rounds were modified with boosters to

carry them further than a normal projectile.

 

“A couple of miles that way.” Jim pointed. “I don’t think you can hit it from here.”

 

“I don’t think so either.” Barry sighted along the frame of the pistol. He checked the

windage again. “But I can put a bug in sight of the signal so we can get a partial look

at it.”

 

He pulled the trigger. The pistol puffed a cloud of smoke out the barrel. He waited for

the projectile to hit before he started moving. If it came down and was destroyed, he

would have to think of some way to get around what he would suspect was a

magnetic field.

 

His body would be rendered inert by any magnetic field strong enough. And Cortez

knew that.

 

“It’s giving me data.” Barry started down the road. “It looks like some kind of sensory

array. I don’t think it’s designed for radar, but I could be wrong. I’ll have to take a

closer look.”

 

Jim didn’t say anything. He let his senses range out to look for other things, or

people, who might be dangerous to them. Something was there at the diner. He didn’t

know what it was, but it was there. He hoped the others didn’t get in trouble while

Barry and he were investigating the signal in the field.

 

He had a feeling that the signal and the presence were connected. He didn’t know

what it meant. He needed to check the signal, then the presence. Maybe a closer

examination would tell him what was wrong with the picture.

 

He spotted the others heading toward the diner. They would be there before Barry

and he made it to the signal.

 

“We better hurry.” Marley sped up his floating. “The others are almost in position.”

 

“We’ll go faster but we have to make sure to still try to keep the direction we’re

traveling a secret.” Barry broke into a jog. He kept to the edge of the road as his

heavy body moved smoothly along.

 

Jim floated quietly behind him. He kept his scan going. Cortez already knew they

were there. All they needed was for him to attack.

 

Of course, he might have fled with whatever he wanted by now.

 

49557

[csyphrett]

Showdown in a Small Town

1969- 

Part Two

Marty skulked at the corner of a hardware store. He didn’t see anyone on the street.

 

His bird reported people sitting still in the diner. They weren’t doing anything else

to show they were alive. What was going on?

 

“How do you guys want to handle this?,” he asked into the radio built into his helmet.

 

“I don’t like it.” Doug was across the street. He used a column for partial cover.

“Where are the rest of the people?”

 

“One of us should try to talk to the people.” Daryl was on the roof of the local hotel

across from the diner. “I’ll do it. If it is a trap, I should be okay.”

 

Doug didn’t like that. Cortez had come up with weapons to handle their powers. The

diner could be one big trap designed to kill them.

 

They also didn’t have any move where they didn’t try to talk to the people in the

diner. They were victims and hostages, or they were in with whatever Cortez had

done. Someone had to talk to them.

 

And Daryl was the most invulnerable of them.

 

“Go ahead.” Doug didn’t like it, but it had to be done. “Marty, get ready to pull

something out of your hat if we have to get out of here.”

 

Marty nodded. He already had an elephant ready to call. Something came after him,

he was riding out on Jumbo.

 

Daryl jumped from the roof of the hotel. She hit the street and bounced to the roof

of the diner. She flattened out to keep from bouncing off the building. She dropped

down and swung in the door.

 

Doug scanned the street. He didn’t see anyone rushing to the attack. The diner wasn’t

turning into some death trap. What was he missing?

 

Where were the danger signs he expected from a villain like Emmanuel Cortez?

Where were the robots, and death rays? What was going on?

 

“How’s everybody?” Daryl’s mike sent her words to the others. “What’s going on?”

 

“You got to get out of here.” One of the diners waved a hand. “There’s something

under the town. We don’t know what it is, but this thing showed up and left it there.”

 

“Don’t worry.” Daryl tried to smile. “We’ll think of something. Is that why you’re all

here in the diner?”

 

“Yes.” A waitress spoke up. “We were warned if we tried to leave, the town would

be attacked and wiped out.”

 

“Buildings can be replaced.” Daryl looked around. There were a lot of people in the

dining room. “The question is how to get all of you out of here without letting any

of you get hurt?”

 

“I don’t think you can.” One of the farmer looking customers glared at her. “That

talking cat made it clear that if we try, most of us will be killed.”

 

“You can’t sit here for the rest of your lives.” Daryl frowned at them. “Eventually

you’ll have to do something. Otherwise you’re going to die anyway.”

 

“What do you want to do?” The old farmer bristled his eyebrows and mustache.

 

“We have a plane down the road.” Daryl thought about it. She didn’t really plan

things. “I can go get it, and fly you out of here while the monster is looking for you.”

 

“What happens if the monster doesn’t want you to load us up?,” asked another

customer.

 

“My friends will punch it.” Daryl smiled. “They are great at taking care of monsters.

You can believe that.”

 

“So we’re going with this stupid scheme?” The one customer, a woman with too

much weight, too much bleach, and not enough teeth stood. “This will get us killed.”

 

“You’re going to die either way.” Daryl shrugged. “My way gives you a chance. You

don’t want to spend the rest of your life trapped in a room will all these people, do

you?”

 

“Heck, no.” The farmer looked around the room. “What do you want to do?”

 

“My partners are outside.” Daryl threw a thumb over her shoulder. “I’m going to get

the jet and then I’m going to bring it into town. I’ll load you guys up and fly you to

safety. If the monster attacks, they’ll fight it off.”

 

“All right.” The farmer looked at the crowd. “How long do you think that will take?”

 

“It’ll take me a couple of minutes to get back to the jet, and power it up, then a couple

of minutes to fly back here to figure out how we’re going to do things.” Daryl smiled.

“Let’s say twenty minutes. If anything happens, jump into whatever car you got

and head off into different directions. It won’t be able to get all of you if you do that.”

 

“What happens if we do that?” The farmer looked at a truck pulled up to the curb.

 

“My partners will try to provide a distraction.” Daryl wondered how big a monster

they were talking about. What had Cortez made this time? “Just split up as much

as possible. If we can’t hold it, we don’t want it able to pick you off because all of

you headed in the same direction.”

 

“Got it, lady.” The farmer went to the door. He looked outside. “Go do you what

you got to do. We’ll be ready to move when you get back.”

 

“Keep an eye out.” Daryl opened the door. “If the monster is triggered by someone

leaving, get ready to run.”

 

Daryl stepped out on the sidewalk. She looked down the street, before walking to the

crosswalk. Nothing moved. The people in the diner looked out at her. The farmer

nodded.

 

She headed for the jet, bouncing along for speed. She hoped that she had came up

with a scheme that would get the people out of the way. Cortez didn’t mind killing

bystanders.

 

She reached the jet. She took a moment to check the locks before opening it up.

She climbed inside and bounced to the cockpit. She settled in her seat and went

through the checklist. She hoped she wasn’t making a mistake where she got the

townspeople killed because they overlooked something.

 

At least Doug agreed with her. He had his eyes on the town. He wasn’t happy with

civilians on the battlefield when they haven’t seen the boss himself.

 

Daryl poured power to the jet’s engines. She rolled to a take off and circled back

toward the town. She would have to set the engines to hover while she tried to get the

people up to the jet.

 

Marty should be able to help with that. He should be able to come up with an animal

that could lift people up to the roof of the diner. Then she could drop a ladder down

for them to climb up when she was over the pickup spot.

 

She smiled when she saw the diner straight ahead. All she had to do was bring it in

so she could hover above the place. Her instruments turned red. She turned away from

the town. The wings came off then. She saw the ground coming up as the plane went

into a spin. It hit a field and exploded.

 

“Daryl?,” Doug ran out in the street. He looked where the fire blossomed in the air.

“Daryl!”

 

“What happened?” Marty stepped out in the street. He looked at the fire in the

distance. He flung a bird at the site to see what he could do.

 

A giant eyeless head erupted from under the diner. It smashed apart the building with

one shrug of its smooth neck. Residents that had not been caught in the initial impact 

fled.

 

“Barry, we lost Daryl and the jet.” Doug called in his radio. He didn’t know if the

team leader could hear him. “We have a giant hostile thing on site.”

 

“Do what you can.” Barry sounded odd. “We have problems on our end too. Make

sure Daryl is okay.”

 

“You hear that, Marty?” Doug picked up a car. He threw it at the head. He needed to

keep the monster’s attention. Marty was a kid and nowhere in this thing’s league.

Even an elephant wouldn’t stop what they were facing. “Check on Daryl.”

 

“I got a bird on the way.” Marty frowned at the giant snake. “How can I help you with

this? I don’t think I have anything big enough to knock this thing out.”

 

“Daryl has to be rescued if we can rescue her.” Doug picked up another car. “Make

sure she’s okay and then come back to help me.”

 

Marty didn’t like that. Daryl was practically invulnerable, but fires could kill her.

Someone had to make sure she had escaped the jet.

 

He ran around the monster as the car flew. He called up a horse and pulled himself

on its back. He ordered it to run as fast as it could. There had to be a way to rescue

Daryl from the wreck if she was still inside.

 

Marty rode to the scene, sliding off the horse when he reached the edge of the fire.

His bird hovered over the wreck. It didn’t see Daryl anywhere. Was she alive?

 

He didn’t have anything to fight a fire. All of his animals allowed him to do specific

things, but firefighting was not one of them.

 

He spotted pipes for irrigation. Were they still running? He asked for an elephant to

rip up the pipes. Water shot out the open tube. He directed the animal to spray the

water on the fire.

 

He needed to get something inside of the wreck to see if Daryl was still inside. He

might be able to rescue her.

 

An explosion knocked him down. He looked at the burning mass. There was no

way he could get into that. How did he tell Barry he had failed?

 

What about Doug? He was still facing that giant snake by himself. He needed help

too.

 

“The plane is gone, Doug.” Marty called his horse again. “I’m coming back to help

you.”

 

“Don’t.” Doug sounded desperate. “This thing is too much. Don’t come back to town.

Hook up with Barry and Jim.”

 

“What about you?” Marty couldn’t believe his ears.

 

“I’m done for.” Doug gasped in his radio. “Find Barry and Jim. They’re the only ones

left. This was a giant trap from the start. Find them.”

 

Marty changed course. He held back tears as he urged the horse to head to where

Barry and Jim had gone to check.

 

They had to be alive. Barry had a ton of missiles and stuff. Jim had mental powers.

They had to be alive.

 

Marty rode to the edge of the field. It had been ripped apart by fire and flying metal.

He dismounted and walked into the broken stalks. He found Barry’s metal skull by

stumbling over it. All the flesh had been boiled off. He didn’t see the flesh and metal

body the skull should go with.

 

Marty found Jim in a cleared space. The mentalist took panting breaths as he watched

the boy draw closer. Blood seeped from his chest. One hand kept the wound closed

as much as it could. The other hand seemed to be missing.

 

“Trap, Marty.” Jim gasped the words. “Powers shut down. Ambushed.”

 

“Maybe I can help you.” Marty thought a spider could spin a web to seal the wound.

How much time did he have?

 

“Listen.” Jim panted now. “Cortez never here. The trail was laid by someone else

with access. Find that man, Marty. Find him. They took their dead. They didn’t take

all of their effects.”

 

Jim flopped his handless arm around. He pushed a ring into view.

 

“Whomever owns that ring did this.” He closed his mouth to concentrate on

something other than breathing. “Better run.”

 

Marty took his advice. He grabbed the ring and ran from the field, mounting and

riding his horse away as fast as possible. A column of fire marked the passing of his

friend.

 

He rode to a stop. The mission was a failure. The town was flattened. The civilians

had been killed, or fled if they were lucky. Fire marked the plane crash and Jim

Marley’s cremation. The snake monster lay dead. Doug laid next to it. Part of his

body was gone.

 

Marty looked at the ring. He didn’t know what the symbols on it meant. He would

have to look for it while pretending to be dead. The team had a couple of places that

no one knew about. He could retreat to one of them while he tried to work out who

owned the ring he now possessed.

 

The last survivor of the Hazard Scouts tossed his helmet down and rode away from

their last adventure.

 

51678

[csyphrett]

Happy Birthday

2002-

Henry Harkness punched a man in the face as his helmet phone rang. He punched the

guy again before he answered the buzz. He didn’t want to be distracted while he was

talking.

 

“Hello?,” said Henry. He looked around for more people to punch. Most of the

combatants were down. He nodded to himself. It looked like the job was almost over.

 

“Henry,” said his wife, Martha June. “I’m heading to Sloane. The baby is on the

way.”

 

“That’s great.” Henry looked around. “I’m in Midtown South. I’ll meet you at the

hospital. Can you get there on your own? I can call Pablo to give you a lift.”

 

“I’m taking a taxi.” Martha grunted. “I’ll see you at the hospital.”

 

“I’m on my way, June.” Henry smiled under his mask. “I can get across town faster

than a taxi.”

 

“Don’t waste time, Henry.” Martha made another noise. “I don’t think I have long.”

 

“I’m on my way.” Henry didn’t cut the line. He wanted to be on the air in case his

wife needed to talk to him. “Net gun, both arms.”

 

He fired the special ammo at the masked men he had punched out. They were just

thugs trying to score a quick pay day raiding a jewelry store. He had spotted them on

his patrol. Then the punching had started. Now they would be waiting for a while as

the police tried to figure out how to cut them out of the cocoons he was leaving them

in so he could race across town.

 

Sloane Hospital for Women was situated up in the Heights. He was down below the

central part of Manhattan. He would have to move fast if he wanted to meet his wife

at the door of the maternity ward.

 

He had no doubt he could do it. Swinging above traffic gave him an advantage of the

traffic stuck on the ground. He could cut through the city on a straight line as long as

he avoided the Park. The lack of buildings would hamper his speed.

 

Martha June boarded a taxi in his ear. He heard her giving her destination over the

open line. He was glad she hadn’t hung up. He wanted to be with her as she rode

toward the hospital.

 

“Line gun, both arms.” Henry ran as the mechanisms changed out ammo for him.

“Plot straight line to phone signal, and Sloane Hospital for Women.”

 

He ran up a wall to get to a roof where he could start traversing the city. Running

across roofs was easily done, and his line guns would pull him across any space he

couldn’t jump.

 

Henry leaped across spaces, using glider wings and his line guns to cover distance.

Washington Heights and Sloane Medical Center was across the city from where he

was. A voice command turned on a directional locator that told him which way to go

to get to his destination faster.

 

Henry dropped on the roof of a building overlooking Central Park South. The park

didn’t have enough buildings to provide him a clear route. He looked for something

to shoot for on his left.

 

His helmet picked up a call for help. He thought about disregarding it. He had to get

to his wife’s side. That person could wait for someone else to help out.

 

He spotted a man running away from an elderly lady. The guy had a purse in hand as

he sprinted from the confrontation. He grimaced but he knew Lydia would

understand.

 

He jumped from the roof. He extended his wings under his arms to catch the air so he

drifted toward the street. He steered to follow the purse snatcher. He landed right

behind the guy. He selected for net gun and webbed the guy up before he could take

two more steps.

 

“I don’t have time for this.” Henry took the purse out of the guy’s hand. “You’re

lucky all you’re getting is a cocoon.”

 

Henry jogged back to where the old lady was picking herself up off the sidewalk. He

handed her the purse.

 

“Thank you, Mr. Bug.” She hung the purse over her arm. “Thank you for stopping

that thief.”

 

“I have to go.” Henry looked around. Everyone else on the sidewalk was not stopping

to ask if she needed a hand. “Are you going to all right until the police get here?”

 

“I’ll be fine.” She nodded. “I will be waiting here when they arrive.”

 

“Thank you.” Henry made the call. He spent a terse two minutes on the phone before

hanging up. “They say they are on the way.”

 

“They’ll probably take their time.” The old lady frowned. “It’s not like their criminal

can run away now.”

 

“Take care, ma’am.” Henry jogged down the street. His pointer told him to take a

right. All he had to do was head north to the Heights, then zero in on the hospital. He 

needed to pick up speed. He wasn’t going to go fast on the ground.

 

Henry took aim at a building that was five stories tall. His line gun shot a line to the

top of the third floor from his forearm launcher. It reeled him upwards as he ran

toward the building. He leaped and the line yanked him upward which swung him to

the face of the wall quicker. He touched down and pulled himself up toward the roof

with the suckers in his gloves and boots. He cut the line from the crushed anchor head

before climbing the rest of the way to the roof.

 

Henry ran across the roof, and jumped from the other side. He glided across the wide

space to the next building. His pointer kept him on course. He wished that he had jets

like the other Scarabs. Then he could just fly to the hospital.

 

He put that down as something to talk to Pablo about after he was done dealing with

this problem. How close was Martha June to the hospital? He had to get there before

she did.

 

He aimed for a tall hotel as he ran across the roofs. If he could get to that roof, he

could glide down close to where the hospital stood in the Heights. Then he could just

change clothes. Martha June had made him hide a set there when she had started

seeing her doctor.

 

The problem was that the further north he went, the shorter and more residential the

buildings were. His course seemed to be pointing through Columbia, and the two

schools on the other side of that. If he could clear the campus, he might be able to use

the buildings beyond that to help him along.

 

He landed on the front of the forty story building and started climbing. He gritted his

teeth at the time on his clock. Martha June should be at the hospital by now. He had

to speed things up.

 

He reached the roof of the building and ran across it to the other side. He could see

the Lake and the Loeb Boathouse off to his right. He picked out several theaters and

museums, but his mask’s vision enhancements wouldn’t let him see pass the edge of

Columbia, or most of Harlem. Gliding from this height had to be faster than using the

line gun to swing along the streets between buildings.

 

He jumped from the roof, deploying the flaps to catch the air. He sailed across the

city. It wasn’t as fast as Pablo, but he was making time. All he had to do was steer

where his compass pointed.

 

He passed the familiar outline of the various schools in a few minutes. Harlem drifted

by next. He checked his height. He was going to hit the ground close to St. Cat’s on

the other side of Sugar Hill.

 

That was close to where he wanted to be, but not close enough.

 

He would have to use the line gun to cross the ten blocks to the hospital. The retractor

could pull him across streets in a flash.

 

Henry worked to coax a few more feet of lift. He wanted to hit a building on the other

side of Trinity Cemetery. He didn’t want to have to run across the graveyard to get

to the other side where he could start swinging along the streets.

 

He saw the Church of the Intercession, and nodded. He was going to hit the

Broadway Housing Community. He could start swinging from there once he gained

the roof. He focused on that roof. He had to make it so he could keep going without

breaking his stride.

 

He hit and rolled to a stop. He jumped to his feet and ran to the north side of the

building. He took aim with his line gun and shot an anchor across the alley beyond

trees growing in the gap between buildings. He pulled himself over the alley and

headed for 156th street.

 

He swung across the gap to reach the building next to Tee-Sack. He ran across the

roof and leaped to the roof of Rao’s. He landed lightly and ran and jumped to the

building behind the restaurant. He ran across the roofs to Broadway. He could hitch

a ride if he was lucky.

 

All he needed was something moving north. Sloane was at 168th street. Eight blocks

should be okay.

 

Henry jumped from the roof of the Little Caesar’s to the roof of an oncoming truck.

His boots locked into place and he dropped down to grip with his gloves. The

compass fed him directions based on the clock as he rode up Broadway.

 

The truck started to turn right at 165th. Henry flung a line at a building on the other

side of the street. He retracted the line and swung over the traffic to a landing on

the wall. He started climbing. Once he was on the roof, he could jump across the

barriers to get where he needed to be.

 

Henry paused. The wall he clung to belonged to New York-Presbyterian Hospital.

Sloane was part of the hospital complex. He climbed to the roof. He had hidden his

clothes up there somewhere. All he had to do was find his bag, change, then head

down to the admissions desk and find his wife.

 

He looked across the roof. He hoped no one had found his bag. He didn’t want to go

down to the maternity ward in costume.

 

There were too many people who would be glad to do things to his family to get back

at him for what he did as a Scarab. Showing up in his mask would give them an

obvious handle to use against him.

 

He spotted his bag’s hiding spot after a minute. He jogged across the roof and jumped

down to another roof. He pulled the bag from an alcove underneath an air-conditioner

unit.

 

He opened his bag. He pulled his clothes out and inspected them. They looked okay

to wear. He quickly changed, stuffing his Scarab suit in the bag. He zipped the bag

up and slung it on his back. Now all he had to do was get inside the hospital from the

roof and go downstairs.

 

Henry looked around until he found a maintenance door. He picked the lock with a

set of instruments he kept around in case he had to break into a place without his suit.

Being able to punch through a lot of things was faster than picking locks, but when

you couldn’t do that, you had to do what you could.

 

He got through the door and climbed down to the top floor of the hospital. He stepped

out in the hall and walked down. No one seemed to pay him any attention as he

looked for an elevator. Once he found one, he pushed the button. He stepped in the

elevator and pushed the down button for the first floor.

 

Henry stepped out of the elevator and headed for the information desk. He needed to

know if Martha June was at the hospital yet.

 

“How’s it going?” Henry tried to smile at the receptionist in her sweater and scrub

combination. “My name is Henry Harkness. My wife went into labor and she was

supposed to be headed to Sloane. Has she arrived yet?”

 

“What’s her name and date of birth?” The receptionist lifted her claw-like hands

to type in the information.

 

Henry gave the information, spelling the last name for her. He wanted to jump over

the counter and type in the search himself.

 

“She’s still in transit, Mr. Harkness.” The receptionist looked up from her keyboard.

“If you hurry, you might be able to beat the ambulance.”

 

“Thank you.” Henry ran for the doors. He hit the sidewalk and ran down the block.

He paused at Fort Washington Avenue before running across the street. He followed

the signs as he headed toward 168th. He smiled when he saw the entrance.

 

He slowed down to a walk, triggering the doors so he could enter. He went up to the

desk to let the nurses know he was there and waiting on his wife.

 

53874

[csyphrett]

Special Delivery

2015-

“How do you get into these messes, Rangifer?,” Rangifer Tarandus asked himself as

he hid behind a tree. He didn’t think it was an adequate shield for a man of his bulk

and head ornamentation. “How do I get out this time?”

 

“All we want is the package, Reindeer.” The voice drifted through the forest,

amplified by a vehicle’s sound system. “Drop it and walk away. We’ll let you live.”

 

Rangifer doubted that. He had dealt with the Black Wolves before this. They always

killed anyone in their way. As soon as he dropped the backpack he wore to the

ground, they would fill him full of lead.

 

The best thing he could do was keep moving and hope to sneak away like the coward

he was.

 

He looked for another tree to use for cover.  He had to keep moving. People were

counting on him.

 

Stupid Wolves. They always thought they could just take whatever they wanted. Most

of the time they got in his way while he was doing things for the locals.

 

He ran from his tree to another one further down the hill from his position. He had to

get to the bottom, and then try to cross a river to get to his destination. The swimming

part would be hard with the Wolves right behind him.

 

Bullets blasted by him. He felt a twinge in an antler. He ignored it as he dove behind

the tree in front of him. He scooted as much as possible behind the cover. Pieces of

wood drifted through the air around him as he waited for the firing to stop.

 

He reached up and touched his antler. He shook his head. One of his points had been

sheared away by a round as he ran. He would have to wait until next year for it to

grow back.

 

He grimaced. At least the bullet hadn’t hit anything important.

 

All this trouble over some medical supplies seemed to be too much. Had he been lied

to so he could be sent into a trap? Would the Mayor do that?

 

Rangifer decided that didn’t matter. He had been asked to deliver a package to a small

town on the edge of the Jostedalsbreen Nasjonal Park. He had run into the Wolves

while crossing the mountains.

 

Now he had to lose them if he wanted to make his delivery.

 

He used the tree as a brace so he could get to his hooves. He looked behind him. He

thought he saw black fragments moving along his back trail. He looked ahead. He

needed to keep moving, and keep the trees between him and them.

 

He ran to the next tree he marked out. He heard engines behind him. They were going

to try to run him to ground. He ran to the next tree. He grabbed the lowest branches

and pulled himself above people expecting him to keep running.

 

He climbed as quietly as he could. He didn’t want to give himself away with moving

tree limbs. He settled into a perch and waited. He hoped that he could fool the Wolves

long enough to ambush them and then make his escape.

 

Motorcycles buzzed to a stop below him. They spread out to search for his trail. All

he needed was to let them keep going. Then he would be behind them and able to go

off in another direction to get to where he was going.

 

One of the Wolves looked up at the tree he was hiding in. He started to raise his

weapon. Rangifer jumped down on top of the man.

 

The Black Wolf saw the antlered Reindeer descending in a mass of fur. He decided

to get out of the way. A fist of keratin fingers knocked him flat, sending his

helmet/wolf mask flying.

 

The other Wolves turned at the commotion. Quick reflexes brought weapons to bear.

He threw the motorcycle at the closest one before ducking behind the tree he had

climbed. Bullets chewed up the bark.

 

Rangifer didn’t want to climb uphill to escape. His destination was on the other side

of his enemies. He had to get through their line before they could surround him.

 

He had to keep moving.

 

He threw himself at a tree next to his. He heard bullets whistling close as he landed

behind the smaller tree. He threw himself behind the next tree in line. Then he had

bushes to plunge through to a rock exposed in its bed.

 

He peeked over the rock. Black figures were still trying to track his movement. It

looked like they still thought he was behind the second tree. Maybe he could sneak

away.

 

He backed away from the rock. He descended sideways down the hill. He slipped

through the trees. He thought he heard the sound of water. He was close to where he

had to be. He needed to make it to the river and swim across to the other side. The

Wolves would have to look for a ford to chase him if he could make it to the other

bank.

 

Rangifer kept moving. At least his fur helped him blend in with the surrounding trees.

He should be able to get away as long as he was quiet and moving slow. He followed

the sound of the water. He should have expected someone else would want the

medicine he was carrying. Robbing one man crossing the park should be easy for

professionals.

 

Too bad he was a one man hreinn.

 

Rangifer crept along until he could see the river. He shook his head. It was close. It

was also at the base of a cliff. If he wanted to get down to it, he would have to climb

down the cliff’s face. The only other way was to jump.

 

Maybe he could walk the edge until he found a path down to the flowing water.

 

Which way did he want to go?

 

If he walked to the north, he would be walking into the Wolves looking for him. If

he walked south, he would be going in the wrong direction.

 

He decided on south since he didn’t feel like getting shot. He would make up for lost

time once he was on the other side of the river. He could pick up speed if he didn’t

have to look for troublemakers on his trail.

 

A bullet whizzed by his head. He threw himself off the cliff, diving for the river far

below. He didn’t have time to chide himself for his instinctive reaction to the sudden

threat.

 

He hit the water and headed for the bottom of the river. He hoped they didn’t throw

explosives down after him. He swam into the current. Arms like a gorilla’s and legs

like a goat propelled him away from the danger.

 

He headed for the surface when he thought he was far enough away from his pursuers

that they couldn’t shoot at him. He looked back at where he had jumped from the

cliff. Black clad mercenaries stood at the edge of the cliff. He headed for the other

side of the river on a slant, using the current to propel him away from his enemies.

 

He exhaled a breath of air as he reached the opposite shore. He climbed up on the

rocky shelf at the edge of the river. Water rolled down his fur as he tried to decide

which direction he needed to get to his destination.

 

He jogged along the rocks. He hoped he had enough of a lead the Wolves would let

him go about his business without any more trouble. He doubted they would keep up

the chase when they had to find a place to cross the river themselves. He doubted any

of them would do what he had done.

 

No one in their right mind would do what he had just done. That was a quick way to

get killed, or injured so bad you might as well be dead.

 

He found a small chimney he could use to climb away from the river. He flexed his

hard fingers. He looked up at the top of the thing. He could do it if he wanted.

 

He slid into the chute. He braced his arms and back. He set his feet. He started up.

 

Rangifer dug in where he could. The stone allowed his random toe holes. He paused

to take a breath about halfway up. He pulled himself over the grassy lip of the lookout

a few minutes later.

 

He took a moment to figure out which he should be going. Then he headed along the

cliff to where he thought the path would be to head him toward.

 

He doubted the Wolves would stay on his trail now. They knew where he was going.

They could circle around on friendlier trails and roads. His only advantage was being

able to move directly across the landscape.

 

He found a trail into the forests. He smiled. Now he could pick up speed and reach

his destination faster. Once he was at the town, the Wolves might peel off and hunt

others. If they tried to raid the town, he had cover to use to fight back.

 

Rangifer jogged into the trees. His internal compass pointed him on a straight line to

the town he had to reach. He crossed the snow line and kept going. His hooves dug

into the snow and ice as easily as they moved across dirt and stone.

 

The town loomed above him. He spotted it through some trees. A mountain top

loomed behind the wooden and brick houses. He climbed faster.

 

He found a trail cleared of the snow. He turned on that and jogged in a small spiral

to the top of a flattened mountain peak. The village formed a circle of red and tan

around a brick plaza. He trotted towards the plaza, looking for the address where he

was supposed to deliver the package.

 

The residents didn’t look too friendly. Some of the kids called Krampus and hid

behind their mothers. He supposed that was fair. He looked like Krampus a little.

 

“Reindeer!” One of the men detached from the crowd. He wore a heavy coat and a hat

with flaps for his ears. “Thank you for coming. Do you have the serum?”

 

“Yes.” Rangifer took off the backpack he wore. “Can I ask what this is all about?”

 

“It is about sheep.” The man pulled off a glove. He smiled at his guest’s reaction.

“We have an outbreak here of something. We are trying to save the whole flock. I

asked my friend, Dr. Nillsson for help since vehicles of any type are fairly restricted

due to avalanches. When he radioed to say he had sent you, I knew things would be

all right.”

 

Rangifer opened the backpack and drew out the cushioned box inside. He handed it

over.

 

“Let’s see if this what we need.” The townsman led the way to where his patients

waited.

 

//55713

[csyphrett]

(A friend at work said I should write longer pieces for this, so I am.)

Blue Flames Over San Francisco 1

2015-

Mark Hadron looked out the window of the building he was thinking about buying.

San Francisco’s prices were sky high, but if he set up a headquarters, he needed it to

be around people to feed the defenses from monsters and ghosts his employees would

be facing. He didn’t like the thought that he might be sending more people to their

deaths.

 

“Dr. Hadron?” Patty Page peered through the open door, but didn’t come into the

room. “The place looks fine, I suppose. Are you sure you want to buy it?”

 

“Janie is insistent that you should be a functioning branch of the organization.”

Hadron didn’t turn away from the window. “Come in and sit down.”

 

Patty sat down on the floor near the door. She had insisted that her group of friends

should track Hadron down and get him to help them. This taciturn person was not the

same as the man wanting to send them to their doom, or the man she had listened to

after his group had done something no one understood.

 

“This place is almost perfect for a home base.” Hadron tapped the glass in front of

him. “Once we install a major lantern, the city will power it until something happens

to the alignment. That should be years down the road.”

 

He turned to face her. His one eye glared at the room in general. The empty socket of

his other eye made her wish he wore a patch over it. He sat down across from her.

 

“You guys will need a place to stay away from your homes in case of troubles. You’ll

need a place to work on your equipment. You’ll need a home base that will provide

a shield against some of the things you’ll be facing.” Hadron clasped his hands

together so she couldn’t see the hole in one of them. “I’m going to show you how to

track down Crenshaw, but then you’ll have to monitor the city on your own. This

place has to be robust enough to let you do that without a problem.”

 

“You’re not going to stay?” Patty didn’t like that. She doubted she could hold her

friends together in the face of mortal danger.

 

“New York is facing a rip.” Hadron didn’t put on a pleasant face to smooth things

over. “Janie is putting a group together while I’m out here. If things keep climbing,

we might lose Manhattan.”

 

“What do you mean by losing Manhattan?” Patty hoped he wasn’t talking about the

center of New York City sinking into the ocean.

 

“The energy scales are going up.” Hadron made a gesture to indicate the normal

versus what was going on. “Once it gets in the 80s, an extradimensional rip is in the

offing. Something is trying to open a door from another place to here.”

 

Patty frowned. She hadn’t expected that. She had hoped to handle one ghost for the

excitement. Now she was going to have to worry about the world ending when she

had asked to defend it.

 

“I still have time to deal with that.” Hadron smiled. “I’m going to buy this building.

Equipment is going to be sent here. I’m going to need you to help me set up

everything. Case books will be assembled so you guys will have some grounding.

Then I’m going to show you how to build and use the weapons that you’re going to

need, as well as the lamps. The big lamp will be the worse because it will have to

protect the whole building from attack.”

 

“Crenshaw?” Patty wondered how the ghost pirate would take his old enemy being

in the same city with him.

 

“We’re going to track him down as soon as the parts and equipment get here.” Hadron

nodded. “I was hoping to do a solo run, maybe call in some help from a couple of

guys I know. Now I have you trainees to act as my meat shields. It will be a great way

for you to get your feet wet.”

 

“I don’t think I like being described as a meat shield,” said Patty.

 

“No one does.” Hadron smiled. It didn’t make his face look more open. “Just

remember to keep your guys covered. They don’t run off on their own when you are

looking into something. They don’t do anything without thinking about it. Once you

guys are set up, it will be up to you to make sure they don’t make the same mistake

we did.”

 

“I can’t lead anybody.” Patty held up her hands. “Why can’t you stay?”

 

“I have to head back to New York as soon as you guys get through your training

period.” Hadron smiled again. “It will be up to you to hold the line here until things

settle down.”

 

“All right.” Patty bent her head. Meeting Hadron in person had shattered her dream

of following a new Lamplighter team from afar. She hadn’t expected to be a member

of a new Lamplighter team.

 

“Don’t look so down,” said Hadron. “It’s obvious the other women think of you as

their leader. All you have to do is make sure you don’t get them killed. You can do

that.”

 

Patty put on a smile at the encouragement. She didn’t think things would go as

smooth as Hadron implied.

 

“Let’s have our first staff meeting.” Hadron stood. He moved creakily like a much

older man. He extended his unwounded hand to help Patty to her feet. “That way we

can hammer out some of the starter problems and get the mission objective out of the

way.”

 

“Is this how the original Lamplighters started?” Patty brushed off her pants.

 

“I built the original lamp.” Hadron walked from the room. “Milton got us the money.

Dyson and Harry helped with the machinery we needed to operate. We set up the

company charter over pizza and beers.”

 

“And then you started selling your services?” Patty remembered stories that had hit

the papers that been unconfirmed until the Mark had paused long enough to tell a

reporter that the Lamplighters had saved the day.

 

“It took a while before people realized we were serious about what we were doing.”

Hadron started down the steps to where an open lobby had been almost put together

before the place shut down.

 

The other three women waited in various spots. They didn’t seem eager to start a new

career of chasing monsters and ghosts. He didn’t blame them.

 

“I am going to buy this building for your franchise, ladies.” Hadron put his hands in

his pockets. “Equipment will be ordered and installed. I’m going to install a big lamp

upstairs to help with security from the local ghosts. There will be a small amount of

training so you can fix the batteries, or weapons, in case of trouble.

 

“The Lamplighters didn’t have a training set up. We learned on the job. This is going

to be new for me also. One rule that will go in effect is no one goes off alone on an

investigation. You will buddy up and watch each other’s back. Radio and cell

communication suffers in high energy situations, but I expect you to keep them on so

warnings can be passed back and forth when possible.”

 

“You’re not going to send us after this ghost pirate right away?” Lin Qu smiled.

“That’s a relief.”

 

“I think you should at least read the casebooks that will be coming,” said Hadron.

“Then you can make your own decision about whether you want to quit, or not. What

the Lamplighters did was a lot more dangerous than ghostbusting. I will understand

if you want to quit. A small dorm will be set up here for you so you can live out of

here instead of having to commute during emergencies once we get started. I want

you guys to walk the building to get used to it as it is, so when we start changing it

around, you’ll know how you want to change it.”

 

“You’re only doing this because your secretary said so.” Jean Lopez glared at him

with her dark eyes. Her denim jacket hung over a shoulder.

 

“You’re right about that,” said Hadron. “I’m only doing this because my only friend

in the world said it was necessary.”

 

His single eye was a glaring cube of ice in his face. He blinked and the mask was

back in place before he did something he regretted.

 

“I’m going to take a walk.” Hadron checked his watch. “Go ahead and look things

over. If this is going to be a base of operations, it should be as much of a home for

you as it can be.”

 

“What about exercise equipment?” Kathy Baker wore a green tracksuit. Her

fingernails glittered as her hands moved.

 

“Sort it out.” Hadron shrugged. “You’re adults. You can do it.”

 

“Enjoy your walk, Dr. Hadron.” Patty waved a hand at the other three women. “We’ll

have a list of things by the time you get back.”

 

Hadron nodded. He headed out of the building, pushing on the glass and metal door

with a shoulder. He turned at the sidewalk and headed out of sight.

 

“Is he serious about buying the building for us?” Lin went to the door. “That’s crazy.”

 

“Yes, he’s serious.” Patty nodded at her friends. “He already has a room picked out

for a lamp to help protect the building. He said the original Lamplighters didn’t have

any training in what they did. We’re the replacements and a test case. If we do well,

we might spark more Lamplighters across the country. Also we have a problem that

you should know about before we go any further.”

 

“What kind of problem?,” said Jean. She rubbed the palm of her hand on her leg.

 

“Once we get set up, we’re on our own.” Patty pursed her lip. “New York City is in

danger, and we’re going to have to hold things down here, or be ready to head out to

the East Coast to join in.”

 

“What do you mean New York City is in danger?” Jean looked at Kathy and Lin.

They shared her expression of disbelief.

 

“I don’t know.” Patty shrugged. “He said the ambient energy is climbing. It indicates

an invasion of some sort. We have to be ready in case we’re needed to stop it.”

 

“This is getting out of hand, Patty.” Lin fiddled with the fake buttons on her suit

jacket. “We can’t stop anything like an invasion.”

 

“We can’t do anything without the lamps and guns we need.” Kathy shrugged. “We

have to do well with them before we can be considered good enough to blow

monsters away.”

 

“Let’s get our list together.” Jean waved at the others. “We can’t sit here gawking at

an empty place if we want to be heroes.”

 

“Do we want to be heroes?” Lin frowned at her friends. “What are we getting into

here?”

 

“This Crenshaw is going to keep attacking,” said Patty. “No one else can stop him.

We have to do it. I understand if you all want to leave, but I’m not. I am going to hunt

that monster down and take him out. He’ll never hurt anyone else.”

 

“Let’s get our list together.” Jean waved at the others to go ahead. “Baby steps.”

 

Patty covered her face with a hand. She hadn’t meant to let that out in the air. She

should have kept it in.

 

She followed her friends as they examined their headquarters and made plans.

//57739

[csyphrett]

Blue Flames Over San Francisco

2015-

2

The new building didn’t feel right. Patty walked the halls and through the rooms. It

had a waiting aura about it. What would it be like when they got going?

 

She paused at the lamp room. Dr. Hadron and Jean were surrounded by pieces of

circuitry and wiring. Mechanical casing leaned against a wall. He directed her where

he wanted pieces soldered together with a small torch. She nodded as she went about

her business.

 

Lin and Kathy had decided to set up a small gym on the second floor. She paused as

they looked at the boxes of parts that made up most of the equipment Kathy wanted.

Dr. Hadron had put it on the company dime.

 

The bell rang. She headed downstairs to get the door. They kept things locked down

since they didn’t want people wandering around and looking at things.

 

She looked through the peephole. It was another delivery man from UPS. She opened

the door with a smile.

 

“Miss Page?,” said the delivery driver. He held an electronic clipboard. A plain

brown box sat at his feet.

 

“That’s right.” Patty smiled. “I’ll sign for it.”

 

He handed her the clipboard. She took the stylus from the top and wrote in her name

in the signature screen with a flourish. She handed the thing back to look at the box.

What had been ordered this time?

 

She picked up the box and looked at the label. The sender was Lamplighters, INC in

New York City. Janie must have sent something to Dr. Hadron. Her name was on the

receiving line. She frowned. Why would Janie send her anything?

 

She took the box inside as the brown van rolled away from the curb. She locked the

door. Her eyes scanned what would be the lobby of the building. She winced that only

one chair had arrived so far. The desks and the computers were still in transit.

 

So were the parts for the weapons. She admitted she would feel better if she had

something to stave off a monster at hand.

 

She sat down in the chair. She placed the box in her lap. She worried at the tape

holding it close with a thumbnail. Finally she had enough to pull on so she could open

the box. Notebooks rested inside.

 

She pulled out the first notebook and looked inside. Pages of reports and news

clippings mixed together. She opened the others one after the other. They were all the

same. She smiled. These were the copies of casebooks promised for them.

 

She put the three copies aside. She noted each one had a different name on the cover.

She smiled. Janie was still looking out for them.

 

She picked up the one with her name on the cover and started reading. No one needed

her at the moment. And Dr. Hadron wanted her to know what it meant to do what they

proposed to do.

 

Each report was a dry recounting of what the call had been about. Pictures of the

scenes and graphs of the ambient energy index had been included. Several cases had

taken months before something showed itself. Progress reports were included as the

group tried to figure out what was going on.

 

Patty smiled. She had followed the Lamplighters from afar for a long time. They

weren’t powered like the Mark, or the old Hazard Scouts. They were just some guys

trying to save the day against strangeness. She had cried for two days when the news

came out that they had been decimated.

 

Then Crenshaw had appeared. It was the same kind of event the Lamplighters chased.

That was what had led her to heading for New York to ask for help. If someone could

handle the ghost pirate, it would be a Lamplighter.

 

Dr. Hadron’s reaction had been the opposite of what she had expected. It didn’t take

a genius to see how angry he was. She had thought he was going to punch her when

he answered the door.

 

He might have if Janie hadn’t said what she had. She had been thoughtful and invited

her group into the building. A meal and coffee had not warmed Dr. Hadron to their

presence, but he didn’t seem as inclined to let them kill themselves as he had stated.

 

She put the casebook aside. The cases swam in her head, the monsters pushing at her

resolve. Did she have the gumption to stand up to the Kansas City Twister Sister, or

the Jersey City Root Man, or the Los Angeles Cliff Dweller? Why had she gotten

involved in this?

 

She frowned. She checked her watch. She had spent hours on the casebook. Her

stomach growled to let her know of its disapproval. She had to fix that.

 

She wondered how the others were doing. She hoped they hadn’t noticed her slacking

off. She should be helping instead of reliving events she had watched from a distance.

 

She picked up the casebook and put the rest back in the box. She picked up the box

in her free arm. She headed upstairs. She could ask the others what they wanted to

eat, while giving them the casebooks. Maybe they would want to read them while she

was getting food together and bringing it back to the building so they could eat.

 

She looked in the room that was going to be Kathy’s gym. Kathy and Lin had put

several of the machines together. They were trying them out. Kathy gave instructions

as they rode on what looked like regular exercise bikes to her. She shifted position

and saw that screens on the front of the bikes showed pretend scenery to ride through

instead of the blanks walls around them.

 

“You guys want anything to eat?” Patty put the box down. “I thought I would get

some takeout for us.”

 

“Sure.” Kathy smiled. “Can you get me a salad?”

 

“Where are you going, Patty?” Lin let the wheel of her bike spin down.

 

“I hadn’t considered where yet.” Patty smiled. “I was thinking maybe getting

everyone’s order and then picking up something from somewhere local and bringing

it back.”

 

“I would like some chicken and rice, maybe some soup.” Lin swung a leg over the

seat of the bike and touched down on the floor. “See if they will give you some

seasoning packets.”

 

Patty pulled out a pen from her pocket. She wrote salad, then chk r won ton under

that, on the palm of her hand. She put the pen up.

 

“What’s in the box?” Kate pointed at the package in her friend’s hand.

 

“The casebooks arrived.” Patty held the box out. “Your names are on the covers.

They’re the same as far as what’s in them.”

 

“Really?” Lin stepped forward. She took her notebook. She took Kathy’s and handed

it over. “Is there anything bad in them?”

 

“Just cases.” Patty shrugged. She didn’t want to scare off Lin. Mentioning the

Lamplighters’ last case would do just that.

 

“Scary cases?” Lin looked down at the front of the book. Her expression said she

didn’t want to look inside.

 

“The scariest.” Patty shook her head. “Don’t be scared. It’s just a book.”

 

“I’ll read it with you,” said Kathy. She stopped peddling and dismounted from the

bike. She cut the power to the screen and dashboard. “How bad could it be?”

 

Patty smiled before moving on. She paused at the room she planned to use for an

apartment. She put the casebook on a window sill. She carried the box to the lamp

room. Jean and Dr. Hadron should still be fixing the lamp and trying to get it online.

 

She found the two of them talking about what they needed to do next. The lamp’s

base was put together. She could see the lens glittering in the middle of the rig.

 

“I’m headed out on a food run.” Patty took the last casebook out of the box and

handed it to Jean. “You guys want anything?”

 

“A couple of hamburgers and a shake would be good,” said Jean. “Do you want me

to ride along?”

 

“I got it.” Patty wrote down the order under Lin’s order. “Dr. Hadron?”

 

“Anything is good.” Dr. Hadron turned his eye on her. “What are the local restaurants

like?”

 

“Same as New York,” said Patty. “Some are good, some are bad, most are average.

It’ll take me a bit to get back. We should have set up for snacks so we could have

something between meals.”

 

“The refrigerator will be here in a couple of days.” Dr. Hadron almost smiled. “We

need a couple of parts to finish the lamp. There’s not much more we can do tonight.”

 

“I’ll be back as soon as I can.” Patty nodded. “Are we breaking up after dinner?”

 

“I don’t see why not.” Dr. Hadron checked his watch. “Anything else we need to

do can wait until tomorrow.”

 

“All right.” Patty smiled. She checked her hand. “I might go by my place and

bring some chairs back. Maybe I can get a coffee table we can use until the official

stuff gets here.”

 

“Do you want any help?,” Jean asked. She wiped a spray of ash off her forearm with

a thumb.

 

“I got it,” said Patty. “I still have that thing Kevin’s mother gave us for our

anniversary. I have been wanting to get rid of that table forever.”

 

“Go ahead.” Dr. Hadron waved his hand at her. “We’re not going anywhere without

you.”

 

Patty headed down to the exit. She stepped out on the street. At least the fog wasn’t

coming in off the bay. She walked down to the parking lot next to the building. She

raised the gate with her pass key and walked to her car. She smiled when she settled

behind the wheel.

 

She decided to get the table first. She would pick up the food on the way back from

the restaurants. She shook her head at the different orders. She thought she could get

Kathy’s and Jean’s from the same place while picking up Lin’s last. She made a note

to pick Dr. Hadron up something.

 

She pulled out of the lot, watching the arm come down as she turned on the street.

Her place was across town. Getting the table out of her living room should be easy.

Maybe she should have brought Jean along.

 

She drove through the streets, nodding as she turned into a residential neighborhood

made up of condos converted from old houses. She turned into a driveway that wasn’t

meant for her to park in. She got out and let herself inside the main door. She walked

up to her place and let herself in. She cut on the lights. The place didn’t welcome her

like it used to do.

 

She took the pictures off the oval table and put them on the floor. She lifted the table

and put it outside. She cut the lights and locked up. She carried her wooden prize

down to her car. She opened the trunk and slid the table inside. It didn’t quite fit.

She searched inside the trunk and found two old bungee cords. She used them to

pull the lid down as much as she could to keep the table from falling out on the street.

 

She went through a drive-thru and got Kathy two of the salads, a couple bottles of

water, Jean’s burgers and milkshake, and Dr. Hadron a kid’s meal. She added a bigger

burger for him. Then she headed for one of the Chinese places to get Lin’s order on

the way back to the Lamplighter building. She pulled into the lot. She gathered the

food up and carried it into the building.

 

“Thanks, Patty.” Kathy took the food and divided it out. “Didn’t you get something

for yourself?”

 

“I have some donuts in the car.” Patty smiled. “Let me get the table. I’ll be right

back.”

 

“Let me help you with that.” Kathy dusted off her hands and the women walked out

to get the prize.

 

//59572 

[csyphrett]

Blue Flames over San Francisco

2015-

3

Patty looked around her room. She had added a chair, a small foldout couch/bed, and

a table. Her laptop rested on the table. She had one finger marking her page in the

casebook.

 

The knocking sounded again. She put the casebook down in the window sill, and

stood. She went to the door and opened it. Dr. Hadron didn’t quite glare at her with 

his single eye.

 

“I need a driver.” He put his hands in his pockets. “Everybody else is doing

something.”

 

“No problem.” Patty picked up her jacket from the couch. She shrugged it on. “Where

are we going?”

 

“I don’t know yet.” Dr. Hadron turned to head to the elevator. “I’ll know it when I see

it.”

 

“Thank you for the casebook.” Patty followed, hiking shoes silent on the concrete

floor. “It’s interesting reading.”

 

“You noticed our mistakes in the reports?,” asked Dr. Hadron, pushing the call button

for the elevator.

 

“I saw a couple of instances where the monster, or ghost, hadn’t been taken care of,

or came back.” Patty fished in her pockets for her keys.

 

“The lamps diffuse the energy that creates ghosts, and stops some monsters.” Hadron

stepped inside the elevator. “Sometimes that isn’t enough. Then you have to figure

out something else and use that.”

 

“That’s why you used the giant fans on the Twister Sister?” Patty boarded the

elevator.

 

“The lamps by themselves weren’t doing the job.” Dr. Hadron pushed the ground

floor button. “We decided that mixing up the air currents she was using would hurt

her enough to get rid of her.”

 

“How long does a spirit stay confined?” Patty couldn’t remember a lot of repeat

business from the casebook.

 

“It depends on what we can use as a prison.” Dr. Hadron shrugged. “A lot of these

things are created by waves in the world’s energy lines. Sometimes you can force

them back into the lines and they are buried again.”

 

“And they never return?” Patty wondered about Crenshaw. He seemed to have fought

the Lamplighters more than once.

 

“Most don’t,” said the doctor. “The creation process appears to be unique. Sometimes

the process happens again and again so you have to change the area of the source to

redirect things.”

 

“Crenshaw?,” asked Patty. The door opened to let them out of the elevator.

 

“We dealt with him a couple of times.” Hadron led the way. “We could never figure

out how he kept coming back. We think it has to do with the ocean somehow.”

 

“I don’t understand,” said Patty. She fished out her car keys as she followed him.

 

“Specific ghosts, or spirits, who keep coming back from being used by the lamps are

unusual.” Dr. Hadron paused so she could unlock her car for him. “The lamp’s flames

eat up their energy when we use the weapons on them. Some are resistant so we have

to use alternative means. Most of those are above the twenties. Harry and I theorized

that Crenshaw kept coming back with his lower number because of something

surrounding his death, or where he died. We could never prove it because we couldn’t

track down anything other than he had been killed by the Spanish during the Age of

Piracy.”

 

“Maybe where he was killed has something to do with it?” Patty unlocked the doors.

She got in the driver’s seat. “I assume he was hanged.”

 

“No.” Dr. Hadron got in the passenger seat. “He was killed at sea. His ship was sunk.

The Spanish pirate hunters let some of his crew escape, but no one knows where that

happened.”

 

“So even if we take him down, he might keep coming back to take his revenge.” Patty

frowned as she started the engine. “Maybe I made a mistake starting this.”

 

“The threat exists.” Dr. Hadron closed his eye. “I’m going to help you beat this one.

After that, you girls will be on your own.”

 

“That makes me feel better.” Patty backed out of the slot. “Where do you want to

go?”

 

“I have some things coming in from the docks,” said Dr. Hadron. “I figured we could

go down and pick them up.”

 

“All right.” Patty pulled out of the lot after waiting for the gate arm to get out of the

way. She headed for the ocean. “The building looks almost like a workplace except

for our quarters.”

 

“I still have some things to put in.” Dr. Hadron watched the city roll by. “A range

would be good. Practicing with the weapons has to be done. You don’t want to go out

on a job, and hurt yourself.”

 

“What do these weapons actually do?” Patty hadn’t seen any specifications in the

casebook, just names.

 

“They drain spiritual energy.” Hadron checked his watch. “A person might be able

to survive a hit, maybe two, but it can be just as fatal as a real bullet.”

 

“That’s good to know.” Patty winced at the thought of hitting a bystander and sucking

them dry like a spider to anything it caught in its web.

 

“Don’t worry,” Hadron smiled. “If you do get hit, and it doesn’t kill you, chicken

soup will fix you right up.”

 

“Really?” Patty didn’t believe that.

 

“Yep.” The doctor nodded. “We accidentally tested it. Chicken soup and football built

the energy back up. It took a couple of days, but no lasting harm was done.”

 

“But we shouldn’t put it to the test.” Patty almost smiled at the idea of recovering her

energy by eating soup and watching sports.

 

“Exactly,” said Dr. Hadron. “Let’s drive down to those docks there. I think I see my

friend.”

 

Patty followed his finger to a boat tied up to a dock. It was painted white and blue

with a green stripe down the side. She frowned at the name. She thought she should

know the name “Sea Ranger”.

 

It would come to her eventually.

 

She pulled in a parking space at the end of the dock and cut the engine. She got out

with Dr. Hadron. She wondered what was going on. Did the Lamplighter know

people on the West Coast?

 

Of course, he knew people. The Lamplighters had fought monsters everywhere. Some

 of the people they had met would be contacts later in case something else showed up

that needed to be put down.

 

Dr. Hadron led the way down the dock to the boat. He didn’t seem worried about

any problems that might be waiting for him onboard.

 

“Who goes there?,” said a voice from the boat. Patty couldn’t see the owner.

 

“Mark Hadron, and guest.” Dr. Hadron almost smiled. “Is Stan onboard, Mini?”

 

A dice-sized block of blue metal sprang into a humanoid figure next to the rail. A

wide grin split his features. Pipestem arms ending in three-fingered hands held the

rail.

 

“How’s it going, Dr. Hadron?” Mini saluted. “Seen any ghosts lately?”

 

“Still chasing what’s his name?,” said Dr. Hadron. “It’s been years.”

 

“He’s gone to ground again.” Mini shrugged. “We almost had him in Shanghai,

but he created some kind of giant lizard to get away.”

 

“Is Stan onboard?,” asked Dr. Hadron. He looked around the dock.

 

“Come aboard.” Mini pushed out a gangplank of steps. “The survey you wanted was

pretty easy.”

 

“Hopefully, it will help us track down the ghost we want to deal with.” Dr. Hadron

climbed the three steps and stood on the deck. “Patty, this is Miniature. Mini, this is

Patty Page.”

 

Patty gained the deck and smiled at the blue face. It smiled back at her.

 

“Pleased to meet you,” said Miniature. “Welcome to the Sea Ranger.”

 

“Thank you,” said Patty. She kicked herself mentally for not recognizing the name.

The Sea Ranger was the mobile of the Robot Rangers. Everyone knew who they were.

 

Six robots created by Dr. Stanley Craft to face threats no one else had thought were

possible had won prizes for their work and exploration into places humans couldn’t

go. They had even flown to Mars to do a survey for NASA at one point.

 

“The doc is below.” Mini pointed to the hatch. “He’s still trying to make sense of the

stuff you wanted.”

 

“Thanks, Mini.” Dr. Hadron led the way to the ladder heading below decks. Patty

followed, noticing the ranger had shrank back to its small height to keep watch on the

dock.

 

“You know the Robot Rangers?,” whispered Patty. “That’s cool.”

 

“Don’t act like a fangirl.” Dr. Hadron paused at the bottom of the ladder. “Stan

doesn’t need the massage to his ego.”

 

The two walked into a hold full of equipment. A man with thinning curly white hair

sat hunched in the middle of things. Information danced on the screens in front of

him. He hummed as he nodded at the numbers.

 

“Anything interesting, Stan?,” said Dr. Hadron. One hand hovered over a machine

beeping to itself.

 

Craft jumped at the words. He shook his head as he settled back in his chair.

 

“Give a guy some warning the next time.” Craft took a breath. “I about had a heart

attack.”

 

“How did the survey go, Stan?,” asked Dr. Hadron.

 

“Pretty well.” Craft pointed at one screen. “This is the coast. Your scanner lit up

several places that may be the lair of your ghost.”

 

“Crenshaw won’t have a lair.” Dr. Hadron bent over the screen. “He’ll have a place

to store whatever he steals, and whomever he kidnaps so he can do whatever he wants

to them, but it won’t be a lair. These places are native places of things that are already

here. They might be stirred up when we take Crenshaw out of the picture.”

 

“We?,” Craft turned his attention to his other visitor. “Stanley Craft. How do you

do?”

 

“Patty Page.” Patty held out a hand. “It’s great to meet one of my heroes from

when I was little.”

 

“Thanks.” Craft shook her hand. “Lamplighter?”

 

“She’s in training.” Dr. Hadron tapped the screen with a finger. “Do you have a

printout of this, Stan?”

 

“Yep.” Craft looked around his cluttered lab. He produced a stack of papers and

handed them over. “You’re back in business, Mark?”

 

“Nobody issued a warning.” Dr. Hadron looked the papers over, thumbing through

them gently. “Janie is trying to put together a team back home. Patty and her friends

volunteered to deal with Crenshaw. I was hoping to enjoy my retirement, but it looks

like I’ll have to put it off a little bit longer.”

 

“How bad is this warning?” Craft sat back in his chair.

 

“I don’t know.” Dr. Hadron turned his one eye on his friend. “The turbulence is

high. I expect the Mark and his kids will be busy with every mad magician and

psychic in the tri-state area coming out of the woodwork to try to take advantage.

The spectral activity might climb off the charts, but so far things were calm according

to Janie.”

 

“So you’re putting together two teams to deal with this?” Craft nodded. “You need

any help?”

 

“I don’t know yet.” Dr. Hadron folded the papers and tucked them under his arm.

“The numbers are high and close to a rip. We might need the Rangers to help us out.”

 

“We lost Hasick just before you called.” Craft rubbed his chin. “He might head to

New York to take advantage once he knows something is in the air.”

 

“If you want in on this action, Stan,” said Hadron. One hand made a gesture

resembling a what can you do. “You’re welcome to sit in. If I see Hasick, I’ll add him

to my to-do list.”

 

“Thanks, Mark.”

 

//61684

[csyphrett]

Interrupting this story to say I loaded up The General of Smoke on my webpage

CES

[csyphrett]

“All right, ladies,” Dr. Hadron appeared while they were eating lunch together in the

common room the quartet had set aside. “We’re going to do some practice shooting

before we try a little case.”

 

“It’s about time,” said Jean. “Crenshaw has been running the police scared the last

couple of weeks while we have been holed up in here.”

 

“Patience.” Dr. Hadron held up the hand with the hole in it as a stop sign. “You can’t

expect to hunt the big game if you can’t shoot a gun.”

 

Patty wiped the egg yolk off of her plate with a piece of toast. She felt a thrill of

anticipation run through her spine. It was nearing the time they would be actively

doing their future jobs. She silently agreed with Jean. Crenshaw had been running

around town, stalling the police and some of the local vigilantes with his sharks and

musket.

 

It was time he was run out of town.

 

“As soon as you’re done eating, please join me on the roof.” Dr. Hadron retreated

from the room.

 

Patty put her plate in the sink. She washed it off, but left it in place. She could wash

it later.

 

She headed for the roof, climbing the stairs. She heard the others clattering around

behind her. She had helped put the equipment together. She already knew how they

were supposed to work. She just wanted enough practice to get on the job and do

something other than work on their proposed headquarters.

 

Patty pushed through the roof access door. She stopped after she crossed the

threshold. A target range had been put together with targets on ropes at one end, and

a table to mark where the shooters should stand. Some of the Lamplighter weapons

had been assembled and plugged into small lamps. Dr. Hadron stood at one end of the

counter.

 

“Is this safe?,” she asked.

 

“As long as you don’t hit anything alive.” Dr. Hadron gestured for her to take a slot.

 

She picked one of the smaller weapons, a rifle that resembled a small flamethrower.

She went over it to make sure it would shoot when she wanted to shoot. The last thing

she wanted was to be caught trying to use a weapon that wasn’t ready to be fired.

 

The others arrived and Jean whistled at the shooting gallery.

 

“Ladies, pick a weapon so we can get started.” Dr. Hadron gestured at the counter.

“I expect you to pick this up fairly fast. If you guys are good shots, we’ll move on to

your practice case before the sun goes down.”

 

“How good do you want us to get with these?” Lin picked a weapon close to what

Patty had picked for herself.

 

“Let’s say three hundred.” Dr. Hadron walked to one of the targets and pointed to a

general circle close to the center of the thing. “Say ten shots inside this ring.”

 

“And these are harmless against people?” Lin gestured to the rifle in front of her.

 

“Mostly harmless.” Dr. Hadron put his hands behind his back. “One shot might be

survivable, but multiple shots will drain a normal human of their life energy until it’s

gone. If it’s weak in the first place, you might kill the person accidentally.”

 

“Why are we doing this?,” asked Lin.

 

“We’re the only ones who can.” Jean shook her head. “Who else is going to protect

the city? No one else can do what Lamplighters did.”

 

“If you want to walk away, Miss Qi, it’s okay.” Dr. Hadron’s one eye squinted

slightly as he spoke. “I’ll have Janie cut your contract, and access.”

 

“He’s right, Lin.” Patty picked up the rifle. “What we are about to do will be really

dangerous. No one will fault you for leaving.”

 

Lin froze in indecision. She could make excuses and bow out after the hard work she

had put in. She didn’t need the money as much as the others, and could go back to her

old job in a heartbeat. Did she want to leave her friends in a lurch when they needed

her?

 

Did they really need her?

 

She picked up the rifle and checked it over. She didn’t want to do anything

dangerous, but she didn’t want to let her friends down.

 

Jean nodded as the moment of dissent passed. She picked up a weapon with a rotary

barrel assembly and made sure all the connections were in place. It felt as light as a

Nerf gun to her.

 

Kate picked up the last gun. She smiled at the design. It was a copy of the Fireflash

Hadron had tried to dump on them when they had met in New York. She placed the

stock to her shoulder and sighted down the long barrel. The targets jumped closer as

she readied for a shot.

 

This was a weapon she had at least held before this small exercise.

 

“All right, ladies,” said Dr. Hadron. “When I give the word, commence shooting at

the closest target. The weapons will tally the hits for me. As soon as all of you hit

three hundred, we will move on to field testing.”

 

“I can’t miss with this gatling gun.” Jean smiled. “I’ll see the rest of you downstairs.”

 

“We’ll see about that.” Kate readied her own weapon.

 

“Go,” said Dr. Hadron. He pulled a lever at his end of the counter. The targets started

dancing across the roof at the trainees.

 

Patty opened fire in short bursts. She reached her three hundred points before the

others could open fire. She stepped back when she heard the loud ding from the

computer. She put the weapon down on the counter, and switched it off.

 

Everyone looked at her in astonishment.

 

“Kevin showed me how to shoot when we got married.” Patty shrugged. “Go ahead.

Get your points so we can move on.”

 

“You heard her, ladies.” Dr. Hadron waved a hand at the closing targets. “Go ahead.”

 

The others look longer to reach their goal. Lin took the longest, carefully trying to

line up shots instead of hosing the targets like Jean and Kathy. The rotating barrel hit

the same target five, or six, times as the paper swung out of the way. Stray shots hit

the building behind the target in a rain of blue light. Kathy rapidly blasted her targets,

but only one at a time.

 

Dr. Hadron twitched his lips when the group had amassed the passing points. The

look was not quite satisfaction at a job well done, but it meant they could move on to

the next step.

 

“Pack up your gear, and meet me downstairs.” He headed for the roof door. “We’ll

get started on your case.”

 

He vanished through the door as Patty shut off her lamp. She found a carrying case

with padded insets that looked like it would match the pieces of her weapon. She took

the pieces apart with a few twists of her hand. She pulled the cable connectors that

held the weapon to the lamp. She put the pieces and cable in the box.

 

She looked up. Jean already had her weapon packed up. Kathy was halfway there. Lin

hadn’t been able to do anything but shut the lamp off.

 

Patty walked over. Lin looked up. She blushed slightly.

 

“Let me help you.” Patty turned the weapon off so it could be taken apart without

discharging.

 

She pulled the cable loose, then broke the weapon down into pieces. She put the

pieces in their carrying case. She noticed that a number was inscribed on the lid of the

case. It must be the number of the weapon so they knew what they were grabbing to

put together if they came under assault from a monster.

 

“Are you okay, Lin?,” asked Patty. “You can sit this out if you want.”

 

“I’ll be okay,” said Lin. “I just keep thinking about the risk. The casebook didn’t

help.”

 

“I know.” Patty picked up the case. “Luckily, San Francisco is quieter than other

cities. Once we take care of Crenshaw, the next ghost will be easier.”

 

“You’re humoring me,” said Lin. She took the case. “We both know that’s not true.”

 

“I know that you don’t think we have a chance.” Patty picked up her own case. The

others had gone ahead. “But we do. We can protect the city if it needs it, we can

protect the whole state if we have to do that. We can’t do anything if we’re afraid of

the future. We can do this. We’ve done worse.”

 

“I don’t remember doing anything like this ever.” Lin pushed open the roof door so

they could go downstairs. “I think that I would.”

 

“You saved that guy on the bridge.” Patty led the way down. “This is the same thing.”

 

“I don’t agree.” Lin shook her head. “I didn’t intend to help that man. I acted without

thinking and grabbed his shirt before he could jump.”

 

“You still saved him.” Patty smiled. “You got a commendation from the mayor for

bravery.”

 

“It was sheer luck, Patty.” Lin frowned. “We both ran to stop the guy. I got there first.

That was why I got all the credit even though we both tried to help.”

 

“This is the same situation.” Patty held the door open so they could step into the top

hall and ride the elevator down. “We’re going to be helping people who need the kind

of help only we can provide.”

 

“I don’t like the fact we could get killed instead of leaving things alone.” Lin pushed

the button for the doors.

 

“It’ll work out.” Patty shrugged. “We have to make sure that we’re textbook as much

as we can so we can avoid dangerous things happening.”

 

“I don’t think there’s a textbook that big that could keep those things from coming

this way.” Lin paused as the doors opened. “Maybe we can divert some of the bad

things on other rails.”

 

“I’ll protect you as much as I can.” Patty smiled. That was an easy promise to make

since if something went after Lin, it would probably also be trying to kill her too.

 

The ladies found Dr. Hadron pulling on overalls over his clothes. He zipped the front

up as he walked to a van parked in their lot. A blue flame decorated the hood of the

vehicle.

 

“I got this second hand.” He pulled open the back door. “Place your cases here and

we’ll head out.”

 

“Do we get overalls too?” Jean placed her case in the van.

 

“Yes,” said Dr. Hadron. “They should be arriving in a few days. It takes a while for

them to put in the kevlar panels I like.”

 

“Cool.” Jean took the other cases and stored them in the space at the back of the van.

 

“Let’s get going.” Dr. Hadron walked to the passenger side of the van and climbed

into the shotgun seat. “We’ll want to look the field over before the sun goes down.”

 

The ladies piled in, Patty getting behind the wheel. She started the engine.

 

“Where to, Dr. Hadron,” said Patty. She glanced in the mirror to make sure the others

strapped in before she pulled out of the lot.

 

“Here’s the address.” He worked on a GPS and showed her the destination and route.

“This is your test case site.”

 

“A haunted house?,” said Patty. “How hard can that be to clear out?”

 

“Depends on how much the ghost wants to stay in place.” Hadron leaned back in his

chair. “We’ll see how it goes when the chips go down.”

 

“This is cool,” said Jean. “We might see a real ghost.”

 

“We might have to fight it,” said Lin. “It could be dangerous.”

 

“That’s even better,” said Jean.

[csyphrett]

5

“The first thing on a call is to look at the target structure.” Dr. Hadron pulled a hard

hat from behind his seat and placed it on his head. “How many exits, where are the

exits, who else is in the building with you? Then you can start your survey.”

 

The target in question was a squat house in the middle of a row of houses pushed

together on the way up a hill. There were no alleys to go down the sides of the place

to get to the back. If the ladies wanted to take a look around back there, they would

have to go through the place, or go around the block.

 

“Is there anybody home?” Kate went to the door, looking up and down the block.

Nothing moved on the street as far as she could tell. She rang the bell.

 

“No one is home.” Lin didn’t move from the van. “The house is empty.”

 

“So we can’t go in.” Patty put her hands in her pockets. “We don’t have permission

to enter.”

 

“We can still look around.” Jean pursed her lips. “Let’s look at the back.”

 

“We’ll have to walk around the end of the block.” Kathy smiled. “Time to get some

exercise, ladies.”

 

“Jogging?” Patty made a face. “I can do without that.”

 

“Come on, lazy bones.” Kathy jogged down the steps and headed down the hill. “It’s

all downhill to the end of the block.”

 

“You do need to work out a little, Patty.” Jean followed Kathy, running easily in her

boots.

 

“I’m walking.” Lin suited actions to words, placing her hands in her pockets as she

strolled after her friends.

 

“Miss Page?,” Dr. Hadron frowned at her. His one eye gleamed slightly in the setting

sun.

 

“I’m not walking around to the back of the place.” Patty took a bag holding a set of

picks from her pocket. She opened up the locks in a few seconds.

 

“Is this legal?,” Dr. Hadron almost smiled.

 

“Only if Lin is right.” She pushed her way into the row house, pausing on the

threshold before moving further inside the house.

 

Dr. Hadron followed quietly. He paused to take in the house before taking the next

step and doing a search. Patty stood on the other side of the house, checking things

out.

 

“Are you going upstairs?,” asked Dr. Hadron. He didn’t move from the welcome rug.

 

“Not yet.” Patty moved to the kitchen. “There’s a lot of dust here. No one lives here,

do they?”

 

“Check the refrigerator.” Dr. Hadron crossed his arms. “That usually tells you

something about the tenant.”

 

“Empty.” Patty looked around the open kitchen after closing the refrigerator door. She

tried the faucets for the sink. Water didn’t drop into the sink.

 

“All right.” Patty brushed her hands together. “We have two exits, plus five windows

on the bottom floor. Steps going upstairs. I’m going to say no one lives here.”

 

“All right.” Dr. Hadron smiled. “I’ll wait down here while you search.”

 

Patty walked upstairs. The bedrooms and baths had been stripped of anything from

the owner. She put aside the question of why she was searching an empty house. It

was a test. There might not be anything horrible in the house at all.

 

She doubted there was nothing there. Dr. Hadron had been all over the city while

setting up their new quarters. He probably had already broke in and done his own

search of the place.

 

“There’s eight more windows upstairs,” Patty said as she walked back down to the

ground floor. “Nobody has lived here in a long time. What’s next, Doctor?”

 

“You get the scanner and reader to examine the place’s energy output.” Dr. Hadron

waved her through the door. “Go ahead. The others will be in the back yard in a few

minutes.”

 

“In the van?,” asked Patty.

 

“Yep,” said Dr. Hadron. “It’s under my seat.”

 

“I’ll be right back.” Patty headed for the van.

 

Dr. Hadron walked to the back of the living room. He looked out glass sliding doors

to the small yard behind the house. A fence blocked his view of yards on either side,

and the alley behind the house. Another row of houses stood on the other side of the

back fence.

 

Kathy vaulted over the fence. She looked around the yard. She turned and helped Lin

over the wooden boards. Jean climbed over with a small amount of grace.

 

Dr. Hadron waved at them from behind the glass doors. They frowned back at him.

 

He opened the glass door. The women walked toward the house.

 

“How did you get in there?” Kathy waved at the house.

 

“Miss Page didn’t want to take a nature walk.” Dr. Hadron stepped aside. “The house

is empty, but you might want to familiarize yourselves with the layout in case of

trouble.”

 

“Are we getting into trouble breaking in?” Lin squinted at him.

 

“No, Miss Qi.” Dr. Hadron smiled. “No one lives here.”

 

“So we didn’t have to climb that fence?” Jean crossed her arms.

 

“Nope.” Dr. Hadron smiled at her.

 

“You are too young to be so cantankerous,” Kathy pursed her lips. “You don’t have

to be so uptight all the time.”

 

“Thank you for your opinion.” Dr. Hadron stepped out in the back yard. He looked

around, sniffing the air.

 

“The place is empty.” Jean turned around in a circle in the living room. “What kind

of ghost would haunt this place?”

 

“A level six morph with attendant psychic energy.” Dr. Hadron paused to look at a

half-empty shallow pool in the middle of yard.

 

“What does that mean?,” asked Jean.

 

“It means that we could get killed if the thing shows up and we’re not ready to deal

with it.” Kathy touched her friend’s shoulder. “I think we need to get our weapons

and see if there are more hard hats in the van.”

 

“I totally agree with that,” said Lin. “I don’t want to be caught without some way to

defend myself from anything that shows up.”

 

“Hey guys,” said Patty. She put down two cases. “It looks like this place might be a

bust. No one has lived here in while.”

 

“Breaking in, Patty,” said Lin. “This could be trouble.”

 

“Only if we get killed while we’re looking around.” Patty smiled. “Let’s see if there

is anything here that needs Lamplighters to deal with before we worry about what the

police will do when they catch us here.”

 

“Okay.” Lin didn’t look that convinced about the logic.

 

“We got the guns.” Jean and Kathy plunked the weapon cases down. “Let’s put them

together before things get crazy.”

 

“You don’t have to tell me twice.” Lin went to her box and opened it up. She put the

small rifle together in a few seconds. She lit the lamp and plugged the weapon into

its power source.

 

Patty opened the two boxes she had brought in. One held what looked like a laser

distance reader. The other thing was something with a dish and what looked like a

smart phone. She took that out of its padding and found a cable to hook the dish to

the box.

 

“These two things are the most import equipment you’ll need to use other than the

guns.” Dr. Hadron came in from the back door. He took the dish and phone from

Patty and plugged the pieces together. He pushed the button to turn the device on.

“This is a scanner. It looks for activity.”

 

“That’s good.” Jean made an eyeroll at the explanation.

 

“So the basic energy from this empty house is a one or less.” Dr. Hadron pointed the

dish at Kathy. “Miss Baker has a three plus. Anything stronger than that will be in the

superhuman or metaphysical range.”

 

“Sounds reasonable,” said Jean. “So what does the other thing do?”

 

“Take it out of the box and turn it on.” Dr. Hadron handed the scanner to Lin. He

smiled slightly.

 

Jean picked the yellow device up and flipped the switch on the side. A small light like

a flashlight beam shot out. She waved the thing around.

 

“What is it supposed to do?” She frowned at the offending machine.

 

“You put it up to your eye.” Dr. Hadron gestured with his hand at the empty socket

next to his remaining eye.

 

She put the device to her face, finding a scope to look through. She made a noise as

she looked. She pulled the device from her face.

 

“That is not good,” she choked out. “What did I see?”

 

“It’s the way the world interacts with the past.” Dr. Hadron held out his hand. “A lot

of people can’t deal with what goes on beside their reality.”

 

“I don’t even want to know what that means,” said Jean. She handed over the light.

 

“Some things don’t just exist on this part of reality.” Dr. Hadron took the light to the

back door. “They touch other places too. That’s what creates the reading on the

scanner, and what we call turbulence.”

 

“So the overlap causes turbulence.” Jean shrugged at the other women. “What does

that mean for us?”

 

“It’s what makes ghosts and evil spirits.” Dr. Hadron used the light on the back yard.

He made a sound as he looked through the finder. “Miss Qi, please point the scanner

out there.”

 

Lin did as he requested. The numbers climbed up to a six before leveling off. There

was some wiggling, but she decided that six was the number she should have from

the screen.

 

“How bad is a six?,” she asked before letting the device point at the floor.

 

“It’s doable with you four.” Dr. Hadron let the light fall from his face. He thumbed

off the switch. “Do you think you can handle it?”

 

“Yes,” said Kathy. She had her own rifle ready to go. “How long do you think we’ll

have to wait before it shows up?”

 

“Not long.” Dr. Hadron put the view finder back in its case. “Someone is in the house.

That should give things a jolt.”

 

“It’ll come after us because we just happen to be standing in an abandoned house next

to where it lives?” Lin put the scanner down on a counter between the kitchen and the

open living and dining area.

 

“Yep.” Dr. Hadron smiled at her. “Get ready. This should be easy, but things can

happen in the middle of a roundup. This is where you guys should talk over what you

are going to do when the thing shows up.”

 

“Kathy and I will take one side of the room.” Patty pointed to where she meant. “Jean

and Lin will take the other side. Jean and Kathy are our firepower. We need them to

shoot the thing with their weapons. Lin and I will try to keep it in the door with our

smaller weapons until the heavy weapons can do what they need to do.”

 

“Sounds good.” Dr. Hadron retreated to the front door. “Remember to keep an eye on

your lamps. You don’t want the ghost to overpower them and blow them up.”

 

“Right.” Patty put her rifle and lamp together. She nodded when she heard the

weapon hum to life. “We can do this. All we have to do is pin it, and then chew it up.

How hard could that be?”

 

“There are so many ways this can go wrong,” said Lin. She took cover behind the

kitchen counter. Jean followed her. They used the counter as a rest so they could

shoot at the door without worrying about tiring their arms before the thing showed

up.

 

“It won’t,” said Patty. “We can handle a six. If we can’t, there’s no way we can

handle Crenshaw, or anything else that has to be put down.”

 

“That doesn’t quite follow,” said Kathy. She shrugged at the look she got. “Just

saying.”

 

“Don’t be afraid.” Dr. Hadron stood beside the front door. One of his hands rested on

the handle. “Everything will go really smooth.”

 

The scanner made a sound like a barking dog and a hissing cat meeting each other in

a dark alley. The women glanced at the device before turning their attention back to

the door. A mist floated outside, blocking out the setting sun.

 

“That doesn’t look good.” Jean took aim at the door. “What do we do if it won’t come

inside?”

 

“We’ll have to go out there and get it.” Patty tried to relax. “We’ll cover one side

while you guys cover the other. We should be able to catch it between us and put it

down.”

 

“We should let one team move up first.” Jean looked around to make sure nothing

was trying to sneak up on her. “The other team moves up after the first team settles

into position.”

 

“We’re the first team.” Patty walked forward, lamp banging against her leg. “You got

the heavy duty firepower.”

 

She eased against the wall to look out in the yard. She felt Kathy getting behind her.

All they needed was a target.

 

//65822

[csyphrett]

Blue Flames Over San Francisco

2015-

6

Green mist covered the yard. It seemed thickest around where the pool had been.

Maybe something was producing the stuff from the bottom of the hole. Patty doubted

it was coming from the bay.

 

“I don’t see anything moving in the fog,” said Patty. “Kathy and I will move forward.

Jean, get ready to shoot over us. Lin, I’m going to need you to hit anything that Jean

misses.”

 

“Why are we going out there?,” asked Lin. “Can’t we wait for it to come in after us?”

 

“It might not.” Patty grimaced. “If we can’t take it right now, we might have to come

back if we can figure out when it shows up. That might take months. We can’t wait

that long. Kathy has the big gun, and I’m a pretty good shot. Once we get it out in the

open, you two can wrap things up for us.”

 

“It sounds okay,” said Jean. “Make sure to duck. I don’t want to kill you by accident.”

 

“Good point,” said Patty. “Right, or left, Kathy?”

 

“I’ll take the right,” said Kathy. She gestured at the corner of the yard next to the

house. “That will put me in the triangle so Jean can’t shoot me in the back.”

 

“All right,” said Patty. “Let’s do this before I decide to run.”

 

Patty ducked around the door. She slid down the wall to the left corner formed by the

house and fence. Kathy jogged to the opposite corner, long rifle pointing at the

disturbance in the yard. Jean and Lin pushed to the edge of the glass doors, taking a

side and bracing against the frames as they waited.

 

Patty looked around. Nothing moved in the yard. She frowned. Something had to

happen so they could get to business.

 

She move forward, rifle ready to shoot. She had quick reflexes as far she thought

about it. She doubted she was a quick draw like Wild Bill Hickok. She didn’t have

to be. She just had to lure the thing out so the others could take care of business.

 

The mist doubled up, cutting into her line of sight. The edges of the fence vanished

in the green fog. She decided that what they were trying to take care of was doing it.

What did it plan to do now that she was in the yard with it?

 

She realized this was what the scanner and lens were designed to deal with. Too bad

they were still in the house. Nothing to do about it now. She had to go with what she

had at hand.

 

She paused when she reached a point next to the pool. She couldn’t hear anything in

the fog with her. She didn’t like that. Why had the others stopped talking?

 

What did she do to move this forward? Why was nothing happening? Shouldn’t there

be a ghost threatening her at the moment?

 

“Do you want to talk?,” asked Patty. She looked around. She couldn’t see anything

in the fog. “We were wondering why you were producing this green fog?”

 

A low growl filled the air around her. She waited. Her rifle felt cold and slick in her

hands. She decided that she should have worn gloves because of the sudden sweat in

the palms of her hands.

 

Could the others see her? She doubted it. She might have to drop once she started

shooting with her pop gun. She didn’t want to get shot in the back.

 

“I just wanted you to know that we’re setting up as Lamplighters,” said Patty. “You’re

going to have to quit haunting this house and move on to some other spot.”

 

Growling answered her words. She looked around. Spots floated in the fog.

 

Was she standing in the middle of a wolf pack? What did she have to do to get out of

this? Maybe she should have sent Jean out with her cannon.

 

She smiled. Jean wouldn’t like this.

 

“What comes next?,” asked Patty. “I don’t have all night. Dr. Hadron seems to think

we should deal with you and move on to the next training exercise. I think you can

clear up out of here if you don’t mind.”

 

The sparks multiplied as she turned in a circle. It sounded like buzzsaws all around

her. She decided that maybe she should retreat. She couldn’t see the house. She

decided that it would be good to have a wall to her back.

 

She decided that a wall wouldn’t stop a real ghost, but it would make her feel better

while she was defending herself.

 

“This is my last warning.” Patty started backing away from the pool. “Don’t make me

light you up.”

 

Things with too many teeth appeared to match the glowing sparks in the fog. They

glared at Patty as they slowly advanced. It was time for food. This one should last for

months.

 

A shape emerged from the pool. It was another wolf, but ten times as big. Teeth jutted

out of its muzzle the length of Patty’s forearm. Its growl shook the yard as it looked

at Patty retreating from the pool.

 

“I guess we can’t be friends.” Patty pulled the trigger on her rifle as she backed up

from the crowd.

 

The lamp bouncing against Patty’s leg glowed brighter with every shot that connected

with a target. The struck pack member vanished partially from the impact. She

understood Dr. Hadron’s warning as she backed up.

 

The weapons turned their targets into energy that fed the lamps. Trying to absorb too

much would blow the lamps up.

 

She had to get back to the shelter of the house if she wanted to keep working as a

Lamplighter. The things were trying to surround her. She couldn’t let them cut her off

while she was out in the open.

 

She heard a whine and smiled. Jean was getting into the action. That was good.

Maybe the big gun would give her cover to get back to the house.

 

Light streams of blue fire ripped through the green mist. They didn’t seem as bright

as Patty’s own, but there were so many of them cutting the air. She backed up as the

spray sliced across the yard. The wolf pack rushed the house to cut off the hose.

 

Kathy shot the biggest one with her rifle. The beam lit up the yard as the wolf howled.

The pack paused at the sound of pain from their leader. She fired again as the green

monster plunged toward her. The blast sucked the wolf into the ether as smoke drifted

around the long gun.

 

Patty fired bursts as she broke out of the fading fog. She looked around. The fog was

streamers fading away. She shot the pool as she hit the wall. A column of water

blasted up from the bowl in the ground.

 

She wiped the sweat off her face with the back of her hand. That hadn’t seemed so

tough. She hated having to put down dogs, but she didn’t want to be bit by something

resembling Cujo.

 

Kathy smiled as she cradled the rifle in her arms.

 

“You vanished for a few seconds,” said Kathy. “We don’t separate during future

jobs.”

 

“Sounds like a good rule to me,” said Patty. She slung her shorter rifle. “Did we get

them all?”

 

“I hope so.” Kathy walked to the back door. “I could feel the snapping of teeth and

bad breath when I shot the big dog.”

 

“You shot the brain.” Patty smiled. “That was a good call.”

 

“There’s an aiming lens on the top of the rifle.” Kathy indicated the piece of

equipment. “It helps screen out some of the weirder stuff so you can shoot at

something.”

 

“I don’t have one of those.” Patty sniffed. “Why do you get all the cool toys?”

 

“Cause I’m fabulous.” Kathy grinned at her friend.

 

“Someone might want to make sure the area is clear.” Dr. Hadron stood with his

hands behind his back. “We don’t want something attracted by the firefight to try to

take up residence now that the old resident is stuffed and cuffed.”

 

“I got that.” Jean smiled. She grabbed the psychic lens and headed for the door. “I’ll

be right back.”

 

“Go with her, Lin.” Patty smiled. “She might do something reckless without you

around to keep her in check.”

 

“Keep her in check?,” Lin said as she jogged after her friend.

 

“All right, ladies.” Dr. Hadron picked up the scanner. “I have to do some readings

before we go. You’ll have to write the experience up when we get back to base. I’ll

send the reports back to Janie in the morning.”

 

Patty unslung her rifle as she followed him into the yard. They had stopped something

in the enclosed space. Was it permanently gone? Would they have to keep coming

back to deal with the problem?

 

Dr. Hadron pointed the scanner into the pool. He studied the screen with his one eye.

He squinted at the reading.

 

“Hold this.” He handed the unit to Patty. He pulled a knife from his pocket and

opened it. He knelt and probed the bottom of the bowl with the point. He pried up a

small emerald gem out of the concrete. He placed the gem in a small plastic bag and

put it into his pocket. He put the knife away.

 

“What’s that?” Kathy stood behind Patty and Dr. Hadron. She indicated the gem with

a finger.

 

“I think it’s the cause of the wolf problem.” Dr. Hadron held out his hand for the

scanner. He looked at the screen and nodded at the number. “The background

radiation is down. It looks like our job is done here.”

 

“How did you get onto this, Doc?,” said Kathy. One eyebrow was higher than the

other as she waited for an explanation.

 

“A friend of mine did surveys for me.” Dr. Hadron carried the scanner into the house.

“This place was marked out on his readouts as a likely source of energy. The fence

helped keep the wolves in, but anyone walking into the yard might have triggered

what we saw.”

 

“How dangerous were those things?,” asked Kathy.

 

“Who knows?,” said Dr. Hadron. He put the scanner in its case. “Basic research

indicated a lot of pet deaths when residents were here.”

 

“So we could have been killed,” asked Kathy.

 

“Yep.” Dr. Hadron nodded. “Good thing you weren’t. Janie would be mad as a hatter

after all the work we did to get you set up.”

 

“That would be too bad,” said Kathy.

 

“I know.” Dr. Hadron walked out of the house with scanner case and empty box in

hand. He paused to look for Jean and Lin.

 

“It couldn’t have been that dangerous,” Patty said. She looked down at the rifle and

lamp. “He didn’t draw a weapon for himself.”

 

“Or he’s gone crazy since...,” Kathy waved her hand at her face. “You know.”

 

Patty nodded. The reports on the last case had been written by Janie Hillsmierer after

the fact. Dr. Hadron had been in the hospital, getting over losing his eye and part of

his hand. It looked like he had never gotten over losing the eye.

 

She didn’t blame him for trying to scare them off after facing something that could

have been extremely dangerous and killed them before they got started.

 

“Let’s stow this gear,” Patty said. “We’ll have to write our reports about this and I

don’t know what to say.”

 

“I know what mine is going to say,” said Kathy. “Patricia Page triggered ghost wolves

that the rest of us had to shoot for her so she wouldn’t be mauled to death.”

 

“I don’t think it was like that at all.” Patty shrugged. She led the way out of the house.

“I think that they were protecting their range, whatever that was.”

 

“If you say so,” said Kathy. She went back inside to check if the back door was closed

before coming back to the front and locking the front up so they could leave.

 

“All right, ladies.” Dr. Hadron took the range finder from Jean and packed it up.

“You’re carrying a charge from all the ghost energy you drained. If you turn off the

lamps, the ghost wolves might escape to go back to hunting.”

 

“So what do we do about it?,” asked Lin. She looked down at the lamp burning at her

hip.

 

“Disconnect the weapons and pack them up.” Dr. Hadron gestured with a hand.

“Hand over the lamps.”

 

The assembled lamps were put in the van. Green fog mixed with the blue flame inside

the plastic faces. Dr. Hadron inserted each lamp one at a time into a bigger lamp he

had taken from its spot between the front seats. The green fog rushed into the bigger

lamp and lit it up.

 

“This lamp gets loaded into the big lamp back at the building.” Dr. Hadron locked the

lamp down in the van floor. “Never carry ghost energy longer than you have to. If you

think you’re going to be on a big job, bring as many of the storage lamps as you think

you’ll need and dump your working lamps as often as you can.”

 

“Will they overload?,” asked Patty. She started taking her weapon apart to be stored.

 

“They’re made to hold one twenty, so you can store a lot of the smaller numbers

in one lamp.” Dr. Hadron indicated the top of the lamp. “If this strip turns read,

don’t put any more ghosts in the storage lamp. Get a new one.”

 

“That’s good to know.” Jean looked at the house one last time. “Was that it? Will

the house be clear from now on?”

 

“You’ll have to do a survey later, but I think I have the culprit here.” Dr. Hadron

showed her the jewel he had dug up. “I have a feeling this was acting as some kind

of booster.”

 

“So there might be someone behind the wolf pack.” Lin grimaced at the thought.

 

“A monster making monsters.” Dr. Hadron put the jewel away. “Hopefully you ladies

have crimped up his plans.”

 

They finished packing up so they could drive home and work on finishing the rest of

the duties involved with their job.

 

//68203

[csyphrett]

Blue Flames Over San Francisco

2015-

7

Patty paused at the stop sign. She looked both ways. The street was empty. Where

were the glowing lines that should be there? Shouldn’t she be able to see even a

spark?

 

“This survey stuff sucks,” said Jean. She had the passenger seat pushed all the way

back and the seat back lowered so she was almost lying down. “There should be a

faster way to track spooks down than triangulation.”

 

“We’re almost done checking things over.” Patty smiled. She turned right. “The wolf

pack was a good first test. We cracked them in record time.”

 

“Hadron hasn’t figured out how that rock works.” Jean pulled her shades down to

cover her eyes so she could drowse in her seat when they weren’t talking. “I’m glad

he put it in a lamp in the vault. Who knows what would happen if it wasn’t kept away

from air.”

 

“It would probably put another pack out in the middle of the building.” Patty slowed

as she inspected the street. Nothing stood out to her.

 

“At least we don’t have any other ghosts secured yet.” Jean turned her face to the

door. “They might band together to take us on.”

 

“Do you think Dr. Hadron is right?” Patty paused at the next stop sign. “Do you think

we can beat Crenshaw?”

 

“We have to get to one of his targets before he can evaporate.” Jean shrugged. “He

doesn’t need a base, or transportation. That limits the way we can do things.”

 

“These surveys don’t seem that useful.” Patty turned left. She was working her way

down towards the water. Crenshaw had hit several places along the waterfront. That

seemed natural since he was a pirate.

 

The scanner buzzed in the back seat. Patty pulled to the curb to look at the reading.

She frowned at the six on the screen. Crenshaw was rated an eight. This couldn’t be

him. She looked around. They were in a small part of the city dealing with jewelry

and money. One of the stores was named the Pearl.

 

“Let me have the range finder, Jean,” said Patty. She held out her hand for the device.

“We have something we should check before we move on.”

 

She took the lens and stepped out of the car. She looked through the device and

smiled. The strange lines and mist didn’t bother her. She spotted a shark fin cutting

the air before sinking out of sight as if it was submerging in water.

 

Patty nodded. This could be the place.

 

Patty held the lens to her eye again. Lines of force flowed along the street. Some of

it washed against the stores and their doors. The lines turned away from places that

looked shoddy and unkept.

 

She decided that was Feng Shui in action. She didn’t know how to help the ailing

businesses. That was out of her hands. She had to worry about the one store that

Crenshaw might have interest in.

 

She handed the lens back and went to the hatch on the back of her car. She opened

it and extracted her work overall. She slipped that on, glad she had worn her tennis

shoes instead of the slippers she preferred.

 

“What are you doing?,” asked Jean from the front seat. She straightened her seat and

looked through the car at her friend. “Are you getting your gun?”

 

“This is the place,” said Patty. She opened the case holding her rifle. She opened the

case for the lamp. “Call the others and tell them to come over here.”

 

“Are you sure?,” asked Jean. She got out of the car. “Why here?”

 

“Because it’s a pearl.” Patty smiled. She put the rifle together with minimum effort.

She plugged it into the lamp, and lit the flame. Blue fire danced in the cylinder. “We

need those hard hats Dr. Hadron promised.”

 

“Are we really going to set up an ambush at this place?,” said Jean. She pointed to the

small shop.

 

“Yes,” said Patty. She slung the rifle so she had free use of her hands. “Please call the

others. Crenshaw might show up at any time.”

 

“Let me change first.” Jean pulled her folded overall out and put it on. She opened her

weapon case and twisted the pieces together. She hooked the multiple barrel weapon

to its lamp and draped the sling over her shoulder. She hung the lamp from her waist

before pulling on gloves. “The Pearl?”

 

“Yes,” said Patty. “He might not show up today, but he’s coming. His sharks are in

the air.”

 

“Sharks.” Jean pulled out her phone. “What is it with pirates and sharks?”

 

Patty shrugged. She closed the hatch on her car and shut the doors. She walked across

the street to the store. She doubted that professional courtesy was involved in any

personal relationships.

 

She inspected the outside of the store before going in. If they missed Crenshaw,

maybe the type of building was a clue in where he was picking his attacks. Was he

going after particular places by anything other than the loot they held? The flow she

had noted might be what he was using to make his selection.

 

She noted the Pearl had bars over the doors and windows. She pulled on the door. It

was locked to keep people like her out of the building. She rang a doorbell to be let

in.

 

The manager might not want to listen to her. The best she could do was warn him. If

Crenshaw attacked, normal people didn’t have a chance against him. His sharks

ripped things in half with their bites.

 

The door buzzed to let Patty in. She stepped inside and looked around. The two men

looked at her with the sure knowledge that they weren’t going to sell this woman

anything from the cases.

 

“Hi, I’m Patty Page.” She smiled to put them at their ease. “I’m a new hire for the

Lamplighters. We’re trying to find the Shark Thief and I think your place is the

perfect place for him to strike.”

 

The explanation didn’t improve the two men’s expressions. They frowned at her in

silence for several seconds.

 

“I know it sounds incredible.” Patty frowned. How did she break through to them?

“I think you’re going to be hit next.”

 

“I think we should call the police, Phil,” said one of the suits. “That should keep

our shop safe.”

 

Phil reached for the company phone on the counter. Patty frowned. They were

calling the police on her. How did she change their minds? The buzzer went off.

 

Jean stood outside, waving the scanner. She pointed at the screen. She indicated her

rifle next.

 

“Gentlemen, you might want to go in the back.” Patty unslung her rifle. “Crenshaw

is coming.”

 

Mist crept across the jewelry store floor. It seemed to be seeping from under the front

door. Fins appeared in the air as the three humans watched.

 

“Get out!” Patty rushed to the front door. She pushed it open to let Jean into the store.

 

“Kathy and Lin are on the way.” Jean pointed her cannon at the mist. “How do you

want to handle this?”

 

“We got to get Crenshaw out of here without wrecking the place.” Patty frowned

as more and more fins appeared in the mist. “The place is too small for a fight.”

 

“Let’s see what happens when I open up.” Jean sprayed small streams of blue fire

into the green cloud. Some of it dispersed under the fire. “Not much.”

 

“We have to wait for Crenshaw to show up.” Patty fired into the cloud to punch a

hole for her to move through. “Take cover behind the counters.”

 

Jean jogged to the closest counter and hopped over the top without breaking the

glass top. She dropped on the other side and ducked down. She kept her cannon on

the cloud as she waited.

 

Patty pushed through the opening in the counters to get to the other side. She let the

lid slam down while waving the employees out of the way. She didn’t have time to

make them believe now.

 

“The scanner’s going crazy, Patty.” Jean put the box away. “It won’t be long.”

 

“We just have to keep him busy until the others get here.” Patty frowned. The sound

of the sea hitting the beach drifted to her ears. “Aim for the sharks. We don’t want

them thrashing around in here and wrecking things.”

 

“Got it.” Jean took aim with her cannon. One trigger pull would spin the wheel of

destruction into the cloud.

 

Crenshaw appeared on the back of a shark. His out of date clothes were made from

streamers of fog wrapping around his skeletal frame. Wild hair was forced back from

his face by a bandana. Parts of flesh hung on to the skull as he looked around the

room, laughing loudly.

 

Sharks formed around him, swimming in the air. Giant chompers gnashed as tails

brushed against the counter tops.

 

“Take everything,” ordered Crenshaw, pointing at the counters with his sword. “The

trove demands more tribute.”

 

“Take this.” Patty blasted away with her blue flame, hoping the counter would protect

her.

 

Jean opened up with her own weapon from across the room. The crossfire sliced

through the swarming sharks, dragging parts of them into storage as the fire swept

through the sales area.

 

Crenshaw laughed as he ducked away from the trail of fire. He dropped from the back

of the shark as it went up in mist and smoke.

 

“Lady Lamplighters?” The pirate couldn’t stop smiling. “You should know better

than to try to get in my way.”

 

Patty fired at him as Jean worked her way through the sharks. Once he was in the box,

the rest would break up. Then his spree would be over until he broke out again.

 

Crenshaw waved his sword. The sharks started taking bites out of the counters,

charging the two Lamplighters for a piece of them. Patty dove to the floor as a ghost

fish ripped through the counter above her. Jean backed up, firing into the ghosts.

They forked around her as the blue flame ate at them.

 

“Hadron should have known better to send amateurs after me.” Crenshaw advanced

on the counter that had been butchered by his minions. He shook his head. “I think

I’ll give you something to remember me by.”

 

Patty rolled out of the way as his sword punched into the concrete floor. She blasted

him with the rifle at point blank range. Part of the pirate vanished under the blue

flame.

 

He fell back from the blast with a howl.

 

Jean ducked around the frenzied sharks to fire her cannon at the pirate. The flames

ate at the ghost as she smiled. The guy was going down on their first fight. It didn’t

get better than that.

 

Crenshaw threw himself through the window of the store. He looked down at his

fading body. He shook his sword at the women before calling a shark to carry him off.

 

“He’s getting away with the loot.” Patty blasted at the sharks to clear them out of the

way as she rushed to the door. “We have to stop him.”

 

Jean followed, firing to clear some of the beasts out of her way. She stopped when

she was directly behind Patty. She joined the other woman on the street.

 

Crenshaw faded from sight, shaking his fist at his new enemies as he went. The

sharks followed him. As the last tail vanished, the fog evaporated into the open air.

 

“We had him, and he got away.” Patty gritted her teeth as she tried to get her

emotions under control.

 

“Not all of him,” said Jean. “Some of him and his fish are in the lamps.”

 

“That doesn’t do us any good if we can’t use it to track him down.” Patty slung her

rifle. “We screwed up. We had surprise on our side and he still got away with the

jewels and gold.”

 

“But he didn’t kill anybody this time.” Jean shook her head. “That has to be more

important than goods.”

 

“He’s a ghost.” Patty frowned. “What does he want with that stuff anyway?”

 

“We’ll ask the Doc when we get back home.” Jean brushed back her short hair with

a gloved hand. “We don’t know how much of a kink we put in his plans, but at least

we know we can chase him off.”

 

“Unless we trap him for good, or find out where he’s buried, he can keep coming

back.” Patty walked to her car. She opened up the hatch. “We need to do better the

next time we run into him.”

 

“So you’re not giving up?” Jean smiled.

 

“Heck no.”

//70323

[csyphrett]

Blue Flame Over San Francisco 9

2015-

The four recruits assembled in the conference room set up in the Lamplighter

building. Dr. Hadron had already taken the head of the table. He had a tool kit and

a jumble of parts in front of him. The police had held Patty and Jean for a few hours

over the destruction of The Pearl jewelry store.

 

They had finally let the women go after reviewing the video tape from the store’s

camera. The standard warning not to leave town had been applied.

 

Patty had fumed over the delay, but she didn’t have a next move. At least the scanner

and lens finder had worked. They just had to be close enough to target before they

could confront Crenshaw and his sharks.

 

“What did we learn?” Dr. Hadron slipped a memory card in place before applying

a welder to another part of the thing he was working on.

 

“Crenshaw’s sharks have to go,” said Jean. “They draw fire, get in the way when we

shoot at him, provide him transport, and can bite through brick.”

 

“They divert the blue flame.” Patty slumped in her chair. She brushed her brown hair

back from her ear. “If we shoot at him, he spreads the flame out to the sharks.”

 

“So what do we do now?,” asked Dr. Hadron. He started putting the pieces of his

work together carefully as he waited for his employees to suggest things.

 

Three of the women looked at the dejected Patty. She looked back without a clue.

She paused before speaking. What could they do against Crenshaw?

 

“Let me get a drink from the fridge.” Patty stood. “You guys want something?”

 

The group no caused her to nod before she left the room.

 

“That lens worked great.” Jean smiled. “Patty said shark fins were in the air before

Crenshaw attacked.”

 

“Riding the ether.” Dr. Hadron nodded. “The city is full of energy. Spirits and certain

types of monsters can use it to move invisibly along the lines. Some of them

use dead end pools to feed themselves on negative emotion. The more turbulence

between positive and negative, the more things can materialize in our world.”

 

“How does that apply to Crenshaw?,” asked Kathy. “He’s using these lines to surf

across the city?”

 

“And as cover.” Lin looked down at her small hands. “As long as he is inside the

dragon lines, we can’t get at him, and he can’t affect the real world.”

 

“So we have to catch him in the real world, without the sharks.” Kathy made an eye

roll. “That sounds like a tough row to hoe.”

 

“If we catch him on the ground, he already knows he can roll over any two of us

pretty easily,” said Jean. “The Gatling chewed his guys up, but they still kept

coming.”

 

“So we have to upgrade our weapons, find Crenshaw, catch him in the act.” Dr.

Hadron closed his one eye as he considered. He had hoped his employees would

come up with a scheme on their own. He wouldn’t be there to hold their hands

forever. He had his own ghosts to fry in New York.

 

“Can you get us a helicopter?,” said Patty from the doorway. She sipped from a can

of orange Kickstart. “I have an idea we can use to get things done.”

 

“What’s the idea?,” asked Dr. Hadron. His fingers packed up his tool kit.

 

“The lens finders and scanners will show us where the sharks are.” Patty sipped her

drink. “The helicopter will let us search the city so we can track him down faster than

driving across the city in our cars.”

 

“How do we catch him?,” asked Lin. “He’s stood up to our weapons.”

 

“He’s only stood up to two of us.” Patty finished her drink. “Not all of us. We need

concentrated fire on the sharks while the rest goes into Crenshaw.”

 

“How many sharks are we talking about here?,” asked Kathy. “He might be able to

overwhelm the lamps if he can pull up more ghost minions than we can safely drain

off.”

 

“We need a way to hold as many of the sharks as we can, which means bigger lamps

than the ones that go with the weapons we carry now,” said Patty. The idea had

seemed workable when the first drop of energy had hit her brain.

 

“We can rig extra storage capacity in our storage lamps.” Dr. Hadron folded his hands

together. “Then all we have to do is put Crenshaw in one of them.”

 

“Scanners and lenses?,” asked Patty.

 

“They can be tweaked for range.” Dr. Hadron nodded. “We still won’t be able to

attack Crenshaw while he is in the line.”

 

“We don’t need to.” Patty smiled. “We just have to all be there when he does attack

which we will from the scanners. The helicopter will allow us to patrol and watch the

lines from the air. The only obstacle I see is how do we get down once we see a

robbery happening.”

 

“The helicopter will have to be able to land unless you ladies know how to rappel

from anchor points.” Dr. Hadron looked around. Kathy smiled at him. “Of course

you know how to rappel.”

 

“Top of the class,” Kathy said.

 

“Let’s take another look at where he hit and what he took,” said Patty. “That will help

narrow down the targets.”

 

“All right,” said Dr. Hadron. “Anything else?”

 

“Can the weapons be tweaked like the scanners?,” asked Patty. “The carbine didn’t

do that much.”

 

“Miss Lopez and I will work on that.” Dr. Hadron stood. “She’s going to need to be

able to do that when I’m not around to show you how it’s done.”

 

“I guess the three of us will hit the Internet and see what we can do to predict where

Crenshaw will hit next.” Patty shrugged. “I need another Kickstart.”

 

“Where would I go if I was a dead pirate?,” said Kathy. She stood. “Maybe I would

head upstate, or across the line into Oregon.”

 

“Really?,” said Lin as she stood. “Why?”

 

“So I can enjoy the surf,” said Kathy.

 

“Let’s go.” Patty smiled as she headed for their workspace. Computers had been set

up for them to use for research. She doubted they would stumble over something

useful, but it was better than doing nothing while they waited for Jean and Dr. Hadron

to get done.

 

“We need a white board.” Kathy indicated the clear wall. “That way we can write

something down for everyone to look at while we’re working on a case.”

 

“I’ll get us one.” Patty nodded. “Maybe we can rig up a big television so we can put

our monitor stuff on the big screen.”

 

“That would be great for movie night.” Kathy turned her computer on. “That would

be better than the tiny television I have at home.”

 

“I could work on courses from here.” Lin almost smiled. She flipped the switch for

her station. “I could get my license.”

 

“I could look at dirty pictures,” said Patty. She turned her on desktop on.

“Unfortunately we have to stop our marauder before he does something permanent

to some bystander in his way.”

 

“He wrecked that place good,” said Kathy. “You guys did something good to run the

guy off.”

 

“We lucked out.” Patty shook her head. “At least Jean blew some of the sharks up

with her cannon.”

 

“All right,” said Lin. “The newspaper has a list of places Crenshaw hit. Some of them

deal with exotic jewelry from the descriptions.”

 

“How exotic?” Patty searched for The Pearl. How unique was the shop?

 

“They claim to deal with material from the ocean.” Lin frowned at the screen. “Gold

and silver are recovered from the Pacific and refashioned into new jewelry.”

 

“Sounds like a scam to me,” said Kathy.

 

“The Pearl’s web site says they specialize in pearls and sea stones,” said Patty.

“Crenshaw is hitting places that are dealing in things from the ocean.”

 

“How many stores are left?,” asked Kathy. “That might be just what we need to set

our trap.”

 

“Three here in the city, then other branches in other cities.” Lin rubbed an eyebrow

with her finger. “This is a pretty niche thing right now.”

 

“This reminds me of the animal smuggling ring busted by the Mark Girls.” Kathy

leaned back in her chair. “Remember, those goofs were bringing in giant otters as

pets.”

 

“Then they went on a rampage.” Patty nodded. “Is Crenshaw robbing places to find

something pulled up from the sea? It’ll be hard to prove with his record.”

 

“Doesn’t matter, Patty,” said Kathy. “He tried to kill you and Jean. He has to pay for

that.”

 

“Let’s have those three shops.” Patty walked over to Lin’s machine. “He’s going to

hit one in the next few days. We have to be ready to take him when he does.”

 

“Do you think we can?,” asked Lin.

 

“Yes, we can.” Patty smiled. “We just need an edge.”

 

“Let’s see if Jean and the Doc have our guns ready to go,” said Kathy. “We’ll need

them to handle our business.”

 

“You’re right.” Patty shut down her station. “Let’s get this done.”

 

Kathy and Lin exchanged a look. They followed Patty from the room. They went

down to the shop quietly. Dr. Hadron and Jean had their things in pieces on the work

tables.

 

“We think he’s going to hit one of these three places.” Patty held up the folded piece

of paper. “How long do you think we have?”

 

“At least until dawn.” Dr. Hadron twisted a screw in place. “That’s when the lines

will surge.”

 

“That’s when he can come back to reality?,” asked Kathy.

 

“The lines will lend him enough to manifest.” Dr. Hadron put the carbine back

together with short moves. “The extent of his power will be impossible to gauge until

we put a scanner on him.”

 

“We’ve added bigger gauges to the barrels.” Jean smiled. “Once we light Crenshaw

up, he will have holes punched through him as big as watermelons.”

 

“What about the sharks?,” asked Lin. She didn’t seem enamored of the bigger

cannons.

 

“They’ll fry,” said Jean. She tapped her baby with one hand. “They’ll blow up on

contact.”

 

“The problem is how much can Crenshaw divert to the sharks to keep from being

drained and imprisoned.” Dr. Hadron fitted a new electronic piece to Kathy’s long

gun. He weighed it with his hands. “He’s learned some new tricks since we put him

down.”

 

“How did you catch him the last time?,” asked Lin.

 

“We set up and caught him in a crossfire,” said Dr. Hadron. “Dyson had an

experimental grenade launcher that ripped Crenshaw apart. We burned him before

he got away from being blown up.”

 

“No idea how he got out on the street?,” asked Kathy. The question implied the

Lamplighters had not been as thorough as they had thought.

 

“No,” said Dr. Hadron. “We think he is able to use the lines to resurrect himself when

he is captured.”

 

“That means he can get away from us if we stop him,” said Lin. “I don’t like that at

all.”

 

“How long between resurrections?,” asked Patty.

 

“Five, six years,” said Dr. Hadron. “If we knew where he had died, we could do

something to get his bones and bless them.”

 

“You think that will do anything?,” asked Jean. “The guy likes siccing his pets on

people.”

 

“It’s the best shot at stopping him for good instead of throwing him in a jail he can

get out of when the stars are right.” Dr. Hadron put the next weapon together with

practiced ease.

 

“But that is out of our reach,” said Patty. “We have to concentrate on what we can do

here in the city. Maybe we can ask Dr. Craft to search for Crenshaw’s bones with his

Robot Rangers.”

 

“Stan would like a challenge.” Dr. Hadron almost smiled. “Finding a wreck in the

middle of the Atlantic would suit his sense of history.”

 

“Let’s test these babies and see how they do.” Jean put her own weapon together.

“We want to make sure they don’t blow up when we go to work.”

 

“They won’t,” said Dr. Hadron. “The lamps will blow up before the rifles.”

 

“We need to work on the storage lamps next.” Jean slung her Gatling.

 

“That will be easier than adjusting the rifles.” Dr. Hadron picked up a square carbine

and slung it over his shoulder.

 

The group grabbed lamps and headed for the range on the roof. They plugged the

weapons into the lamps and the range computer. Dr. Hadron hit the switch. Patty

jumped out ahead, but Dr. Hadron was right behind her snapping off shots with ease.

The others chased after them. The range computer dinged rapidly as they reached the

three hundred mark.

 

“That’s a lot better than the first time you guys tried out.” Dr. Hadron unplugged his

carbine from its lamp. “Let me work on the storage lamps, then we can set up on

those stores.”

 

“We won’t be able to get a helicopter, will we?,” asked Jean.

 

“Nope.” Dr. Hadron shrugged. “We’ll have to come up with something else.”

 

//72507

[csyphrett]

Blue Flames Over San Francisco

2015-

9

“We should be at Fluke’s,” said Patty as she drummed her fingers on the dashboard

of Kathy’s Chevy. “Crenshaw isn’t going to attack here.”

 

“How do you know that?,” asked Kathy. “We have a one in three chance of being in

the right place.”

 

“He’s going after Fluke’s.” Patty shook her head. “And Dr. Hadron snatched that up

from us.”

 

“So you think Crenshaw is going to hit Fluke’s?” Kathy raised an eyebrow. “If you

want, we can drive over an check on the old man to make sure he’s okay.”

 

“Let’s do that.” Patty frowned. “I know I’m right. I can feel it.”

 

“He’s going to be mad if Crenshaw hits this place while we’re driving across town.”

Kathy started the engine. She pulled away from the curb and joined the push of

traffic.

 

“The air is too clear.” Patty waved her hand. “He’s not hitting here. Not today.”

 

“If he were hitting, you would see something?” Kathy went around a slower moving

truck. She wanted a light to put on her dashboard. That would help clear traffic out

of her way.

 

“The air gets foggy.” Patty frowned. “There’s a wind effect.”

 

“I think you should tell Jean and Lin in case we need them.” Kathy turned right and

paused the car at an elderly woman in the road. She started driving as soon as the

woman followed her walker out of the way.

 

“You’re right.” Patty pulled out her phone. “If we can get them moving now, they’ll

be in time to back us up.”

 

“If Crenshaw doesn’t hit either one of our locations while we’re following feelings.”

Kathy sped up to get through a hole left by slower moving automobiles.

 

“I would have felt better if we could have gotten something faster than cars,” said

Patty as she triggered the call function.

 

“Go ahead,” said Jean. She sounded bored.

 

“We’re heading over to the Fluke’s,” said Patty. “Anything going on at your spot?”

 

“We’re clear.” Jean didn’t sound bored now. “I don’t see a cloud in the ether.”

 

“Hook up with us at the Fluke.” Patty brushed hair out of her face. “I think that’s

where Crenshaw will attack.”

 

“All right.” Jean didn’t say anything else before the line went dead. 

 

“I have shark.” Dr. Hadron’s voice broke in over their phones. “I have one shark fin.”

 

“Okay, so your feeling was right.” Kathy poured on the gas, cutting traffic off as she

blew through lights. “I need a siren for this.”

 

“Don’t kill us.” Patty reached behind her. She grabbed her carbine and lamp. She

plugged the weapon in as the buildings flew by in a blur.

 

“Get mine ready.” Kathy caused a lot of horn blowing as she sliced around a slower

moving van. “I need to be ready to go.”

 

“Got it.” Patty pulled the long gun out of the back and plugged it into its own lamp.

The ready light on top turned green.

 

Sirens warned them that the police were not happy with their speeding. Kathy glanced

in the mirror. She shook her head.

 

“Don’t stop,” said Patty. “We don’t have time to explain things.”

 

“We’re going to have to do something,” said Kathy. “They’ll try to pit us eventually.”

 

“Let me call Jean.” Patty pushed the contact button. “If we stop, we have to make sure

someone is helping Dr. Hadron.”

 

“It won’t matter if we can drive three blocks.” Kathy pointed. Blue flames lit the sky.

“That’s our doc.”

 

“We’re almost there, Jean.” Patty looked at the trails of flame. “Where are you?”

 

“About a mile out.” Jean sounded strained. “We’ve hit a traffic jam. Lin is looking

for another way around on her phone.”

 

“We’ll try to hold him until you get there.” Patty hung up. “It looks like we’re on our

own.”

 

“Let’s see what we can do.” Kathy veered into an alley, cut across a lot, and slid

around a car double parked on the street. She turned right and hit her brakes. “We’re

here.”

 

“This is bad.” Patty jumped out of the car. She slung her carbine over her shoulder

so she wouldn’t lose it. The lamp hung from her belt on a carabiner. Its blue fire

danced fitfully.

 

Kathy got out the other side, dragging her weapon with her. She hung her lamp on her

belt as she looked at the scene.

 

“This is kind of worse than I thought it would be.” She raised her rifle. “It’s been nice

knowing you.”

 

“We’re winning this.” Patty raised her rifle. “Shoot the sharks.”

 

“No problem.” Kathy smiled as she cut loose at the school of glowing green fish.

Some of the ghosts, the smaller ones, popped like bubbles under the surprise

onslaught.

 

Patty took a moment, looking for the right thing to shoot.

 

The company van sat across the street from Fluke’s. Various cars hugged the curb on

both sides, giving cover for both sides at the start. The front of the store was missing

some of its brick and glass. The van had holes chewed in it. Dr. Hadron blasted away

while he used the driver door as a partial shield. Pedestrians fled in all directions.

Crenshaw hovered over the battlefield on the back of a shark, directing his minions

with his sword. He laughed at his enemy’s certain doom.

 

The laughter stopped when Kathy started shooting. He turned to glare at the two

women. He could still fight on two sides.

 

Patty shot him in the head. She barely had to aim before she pulled the switch. The

ghost lit up like a cartoon electrical shock gag before he hit the ground in a cloud of

smoke.

 

“Keep shooting the sharks.” Patty blasted two aiming for her before they could try to

veer away from her blasts. “We have to make sure he can’t gain strength from them,

or spread the damage around so he can keep fighting.”

 

“Got it.” Kathy shot through a cascade, bagging a few with that one blow. Her lamp

ticked a little to indicate it was getting full. She might have to dump it in the middle

of the fight if she kept blowing up her enemies.

 

She hoped she didn’t lose her car over this. The sharks would try to bite through the

metal and plastic to get at her. She didn’t plan to let that happen.

 

Patty stepped forward, shooting holes through any of the sharks in her way. Some of

the bystander cars suffered wounds as the fish reacted in a frenzy. Some of them

turned on her with empty eye sockets. She kept firing to give them something to chew

on.

 

Dr. Hadron kept to the van. Every shot cleared a phantom away from him. He reached

into the van and pulled out a set of eight storage lamps with one hand. He put that on

the ground as he waited for the right chance to drop Crenshaw.

 

“I’m tired of you meddlers.” Crenshaw stood. He grimaced as he floated off the

ground. “You should have stayed in New York, Hadron. It’s time for you to join your

friends.”

 

“You’re going to have to deal with me first,” said Patty. She shot at him, but one of

the sharks dove in front of the bolt. It kept flying, but there was a hole through it.

 

“I don’t see why not.” Crenshaw pointed his sword at her. “Have at her.”

 

All the sharks turned to face Patty as they cruised through the air. Rotten teeth

revealed themselves. They swarmed in with mouths wide open.

 

Patty backed up, firing as she went. Holes appeared in the ghosts as they came on.

She was going to get her head bitten off. She could see it. Maybe she shouldn’t have

persuaded the others to help her get the real Lamplighters involved.

 

Dr. Hadron fired from the side, punching hole after hole, busting smaller fish. He

hefted the lamps in one hand as he walked over. His other hand held his weapon and

pushed the activating button without too much trouble.

 

Kathy fired from the cover of her car. She wasn’t leaving it to be chewed up by

Crenshaw’s fishes.

 

She still had a year’s worth of payments on it.

 

Sirens preceded the appearance of four of San Francisco’s finest. They got out of their

cars with guns drawn. They looked at the flying sharks and took cover.

 

Some of the sharks broke off and smashed through the light bars and roofs of the

police cars. One of the policemen stared at the damage and burst into screaming

expletives in the air. He turned and shot at the sharks with bullets. Nothing happened

except one of his targets turning to do a charging bite on his head.

 

Kathy blasted it with a half turn and trigger pull.

 

“Get out of here!” Kathy waved her hand at them. “Go write tickets.”

 

A SUV arrived at the other end of the street. Jean jumped out from behind the

steering wheel. She turned. Lin handed her the multiple barrel device she had picked

as her weapon. Blue flames cut through the air.

 

Lin dropped down behind her. She grabbed her own carbine and shot at any shark that

came close. Their surprise appearance cut a swath through the school.

 

Crenshaw grabbed one of his sharks by the dorsal fin. It carried him along. He

whistled for the rest of his monsters to join him in retreat.

 

“You don’t get to walk away.” Patty shot his ride until it found itself confined in her

lamp. “I’m done chasing your dead butt around the city.”

 

She walked forward. Blue flames drove the sharks away from her as she advanced.

Crenshaw jumped to his feet with his sword in hand. He stabbed at her as she pulled

the switch on her blaster. His sword broke into pieces as the fire ate at his body.

 

Patty ignored the sharks around her. They weren’t important. Their leader was. He

had to go to stop the damage they caused incidentally to their robberies. She poured

on the blue flame, soaking him in it.

 

Other streams of blue energy joined Patty’s. They ripped Crenshaw into pieces as he

was converted into psychic energy and captured in the various lamps. He screamed

as he went.

 

The green fog lightened as the Lamplighters readied to deal with the remaining

sharks. The glowing fish slipped out of sight, becoming one with the ether. The mist

boiled away.

 

“Which one of you want to explain this to the cops?” Dr. Hadron gestured at the

policemen still hiding behind their police cars.

 

“I’ll do it.” Patty slung her rifle. “How hard can it be?”

 

//74281

[csyphrett]

Blue Flames Over San Francisco

2015-

10

Patty sat in her room at the office. She looked out the window. A picture of her

husband, Kevin, sat on the sill. She supposed she should get dressed and get

something to eat. She decided it was better not to move. Eating didn’t seem that

important right then.

 

Someone knocked on the door. She didn’t look at it. Maybe the knocker would go

away.

 

“Miss Page?” Dr. Hadron’s voice pierced the door. “Can we talk for a moment?”

 

Patty frowned at the door. She pulled her light blanket around her and walked to the

door. She cracked it so she could look out at her employer.

 

“Yes, Dr. Hadron?” She noted he was wearing the business casual he affected when

he wasn’t working on something. “What’s going on?”

 

“I just wanted to let you know I’m heading out.” Dr. Hadron’s lip twitched in what

might have been a smile. “I’m handing everything over to you.”

 

“Hold on.” Patty pulled her blanket tighter. “You can’t do that. You’re the boss. I’m

not really a boss type person. I’m more of a background person.”

 

“You led the others to New York, you picked out where Crenshaw was going to strike

twice, and you kept the police from throwing us in jail, as well as handling the D.A.

and court.” Dr. Hadron indicated his points with the fingers of his holed hand. “And

you’re the one the others look up to to keep them out of trouble.”

 

“I don’t think I can do it.” Patty frowned. “Your backing and weapons did most of the

work. The others did the rest. Mostly I loafed around and stayed out of the way.”

 

“You’re the leader, Miss Page,” said Dr. Hadron. “Your friends won’t follow anyone

else. Without a crew, this office space will be for nothing. And I have other jobs to

look at. I can’t stick around to hold your hand. You wanted to stop Crenshaw. Now

it’s time for you to stop anything else bumping in the night.”

 

“I guess so.” Patty rubbed her nose. “Are you leaving now? The others are out

celebrating not being in jail. Don’t you want to wait for them to come back?”

 

“No,” said Dr. Hadron. “You might want to hire an office manager to help file your

reports. Janie will keep an eye on the finances from her end. Any equipment problems

that Jean can’t solve, just call me on the lab computer.”

 

“Let me get changed. I’ll drive you to the airport.” Patty closed the door. She

exchanged her lounge around sweats for jeans and a flannel shirt. She pulled on her

jacket. Running shoes were last.

 

“Do you really think the city will give us a license?,” asked Patty.

 

“We already have a license.” Dr. Hadron picked up his carry on. “They just don’t

want us to break traffic laws again from what I read. You did a good job talking them

down.”

 

“Kevin’s friend is a lawyer,” said Patty. “He did the negotiating. The city wanted us

to work for free. Jerry got them to agree to a steady retainer and some tax breaks. I

sent Janie the paperwork for her to look at and sign.”

 

“Never do anything for free,” said Dr. Hadron. “They’ll want you to take care of

anything that closely resembled hunting.”

 

“You’re going to need help in New York.” Patty led the way to the elevator. “How

long do you think you have?”

 

“I don’t know.” Dr. Hadron pushed the call button. “A couple of years, maybe. Right

now the turbulence is slow and steady. Ghosts and monsters will start appearing in

mass, then whatever is behind it will show up. I expect it will be bad when it does go

down.”

 

“We’ll handle it.” The elevator doors opened so they could step in. Patty pushed the

ground floor button. “How many recruits has Janie gotten?”

 

“One so far.” Dr. Hadron closed his eye. “Most of the people she talked to can’t pass

the mandatory tests.”

 

“What kind of mandatory tests?,” asked Patty. She and her friends hadn’t taken any

tests.

 

“They can’t pass the eye exam, or the drug test,” said Dr. Hadron. “You can’t use the

weapons if you can’t pass the eye exam. And you don’t want to be high when you are

dealing with some of things we deal with during a job. That will get you killed, or 

turned into something that isn’t quite human anymore.”

 

“What about us?” Patty wondered how they had avoided that.

 

“I did a scan the first night we met when you barged into my place.” Dr. Hadron

shrugged. “You were all twos and threes.”

 

“What about the drug thing?,” said Patty. She remembered the scan. He had tried to

pawn them off with a single copy of the long gun Kathy had selected for herself.

 

“Since I didn’t expect Janie to butt in, I skipped a drug test in the hopes you would

go home and not get in the way,” said Dr. Hadron. “Who knew Janie was such a

mother hen?”

 

“You did,” said Patty. “She’s the only one you listen to. Everyone knows it.”

 

“Really?” Dr. Hadron’s eyebrows lifted. “What makes you think that?”

 

“If she wasn’t, you wouldn’t have helped us set up.” The elevator door opened so

Patty could lead the way out of the elevator. “You would be all frowny, and I can

handle everything, and all that.”

 

“You think so?,” asked the doctor. He switched hands for his bag as he walked.

 

“Extra frowny.” Patty smiled at him.

 

“You know me so well.” Hadron almost smiled. “I commend your observational

skills.”

 

“The high number on the scanner means we’re psychic, doesn’t it?,” asked Patty.

 

“You’re touched,” said Dr. Hadron. “Something caused your brains to flex. I doubt

it was your first run-in with Crenshaw.”

 

“How reliable is this touchiness?” Patty raised her eyebrow.

 

“I wouldn’t bet my life on it.” Dr. Hadron covered the empty socket where his eye

used to be for a second. “Depending on it could get you killed.”

 

“But it could be useful if I knew how to use it.” Patty smiled. “I could work on it so

I could be the next Mark.”

 

“Number twos will never be able to match the Mark.” Dr. Hadron shook his head.

“Better start smaller. Maybe you could be Positive Man.”

 

“Positive Man is dead.” Patty opened the doors on her car. “Didn’t he get bitten by

a giant snake?”

 

“Exactly,” said Dr. Hadron. “You have to work up to the giant snake before you can

take on the strongest man in the world.”

 

“Okay.” Patty got behind the wheel of her car. “I get it. I’ll work on reaching the giant

snake first.”

 

“Good.” Dr. Hadron put his bag in the back seat before settling in the shotgun seat.

“Don’t call me. I don’t like snakes at all.”

 

“They’re cute,” said Patty. “Constrictors make the best pets.”

 

“I’ll take your word for that.” Dr. Hadron looked out the window as Patty pulled out

of the lot. “The things I have dealt with have turned me off snakes for good.”

 

Some of the things in the casebook were shining examples for the need for animal

control in the spirit world.

 

“Which airport are you flying out of, Doctor?,” asked Patty. San Francisco

International was south from the office. Oakland International was across the Bay.

 

“SFI,” said Dr. Hadron. He checked his watch. “I’m scheduled for the five, but I like

to get there early. If we get there before the departure is called, I’ll buy you some food

from the hot dog place there.”

 

“I don’t really like hot dogs,” said Patty. “Maybe a hamburger would be okay.”

 

“Why did you come to talk to me in New York?,” asked Dr. Hadron. “Why the

personal interest in this?”

 

“I don’t understand.” Patty nearly hit a sidewalk but quickly pulled back on the road.

 

“Okay.” Dr. Hadron closed his eyes. He had a long flight ahead of him. He didn’t

have time to pry a story out of an employee.

 

“I came to you because of Kevin.” Patty found a place to pull over so she could talk

without driving into a wall, or another car.

 

“Kevin?,” asked Hadron. “Your husband?”

 

 

“He’s in the hospital.” Patty refused to start crying. “He’s in a coma.”

 

“This happened during the first attack.” The women had arrived with a video of an

attack by Crenshaw to get him interested in chasing down the ghosts.

 

“That’s right,” said Patty. “A piece of the building fell on him. No one knows when

he’s going to wake up if he does wake up. He suffered extreme damage to his brain.

Even if he does wake up, he won’t be the same man.”

 

“What are you going to do?,” said Dr. Hadron.

 

“There’s nothing I can do about it.” Patty pulled from the curb. “A ton of specialists

have looked at him. They say he doesn’t have any hope. He’ll be a vegetable, or

mentally disabled, for the rest of his life.”

 

“After you drop me off, take one of the empty lamps and leave it in your husband’s

room.” Dr. Hadron glanced at her. “It might help him out some.”

 

“Because of the flame?,” said Patty. She dipped her head in understanding. “Does that

actually work?”

 

“Sometimes.” Dr. Hadron looked out the window. “It’s a chance. Even if it doesn’t

work, he doesn’t have anything to lose, does he?”

 

“You’re right.” Patty nodded. “Thanks.”

 

“If he comes out of it, he might need the lamp for the rest of his life.” Dr. Hadron

shifted in his seat. “The aura might be enough to keep him going.”

 

“It’s better than what he has now.” Patty nodded. “We’ll be ready when you need

us in New York.”

 

“Good,” said Dr. Hadron.

 

The car rolled through traffic until the signs for the airport pointed Patty to the

terminal. She drove up to let the doctor out. He looked at the terminal with his one

eye before he grabbed his bag out of the back.

 

“Remember to hire someone to handle the paperwork.” Dr. Hadron leaned down to

talk to Patty through the opened passenger door. “You’re not going to want to

wrangle your friends over administrative stuff. Call Janie if you need anything else.”

 

“Be careful,” said Patty. “Thanks for the idea about the lamp.”

 

“It might not work.” Dr. Hadron straightened. “Good luck.”

 

He shut the door and turned away. He walked into the terminal without looking back.

 

Patty rubbed her eye with the back of her hand. What did she do now?

 

She made up her mind and headed back to headquarters. She didn’t have anything

else to do. She might as well try Dr. Hadron’s idea out.

 

She didn’t have anything to lose.

 

Patty pulled into the lot slightly faster on the trip back than on the way to the

airport. She opened the building and went up to the workshop part of the lab.

She glared at the storage lamps still holding Crenshaw in pieces as she looked for an

empty lamp. She smiled when she found one.

 

She tested it to see if it worked. The blue flame danced merrily inside the case.

 

She shut the place back down before getting back in her car. She drove to the

hospital. She hid the lamp in a gigantic hand bag. She smiled at the size of the thing

before she locked her car up and walked into the main building for the hospital.

She had been there enough that the guards let her by with a wave. She rode the

elevator up to Kevin’s floor, and walked down to his room. She walked in and looked

around.

 

The nurses wouldn’t be happy with an open flame in his room. She needed to hide the

lamp so it could work without interference. She opened the closet and put the lit

lantern on the shelf. She closed the door on it. It should be okay there.

 

She sat down beside her husband and took his hand. Would he ever wake up again?

She hoped so.

[csyphrett]

Revenge of the Scouts

1979-

1

Marty Morgan looked over the field where he had left Jim Marley to die. He turned
in a circle. The damage had been repaired, some kind of grain stretching out of the
ground. He would have never known that all of his friends had died around this site
if he hadn’t been there.

He still didn’t know what he was going to do about it.

In ten years, he was no closer to who had killed his friends than when Jim had given
him his only clue. An ornate ring meant nothing if you didn’t know who made it, or
whom owned it.

What was he going to do about it? The place had no new clues to offer him. The town
had repaired what it could. They turned the giant snake that had killed Positive Man
into a tourist attraction. It was the central exhibit of the Hazard Scouts Museum.

Plaques for the dead citizens Positive Man hadn’t saved were also housed in the
museum. They lined a wall next to the stuffed snake exhibit.

Maybe he should look at the exhibits again. Maybe they would tell him something he
had missed over the years.

He didn’t have any other options as far as he could see. Mr. Robot and Mental were
the detectives on the team. They knew how to track things down, and how to figure
out what a clue meant.

He had been a kid then, and hadn’t learned enough in the ten years since to be a good
detective. His talents had allowed him to get by in case of trouble. The legacy from
the team’s trust had taken care of most of the rest.

Marty summoned a regular horse to carry him into town. He climbed on its back
and let it run while he thought about the events of that day.

The Scouts thought they had a lead on a long time enemy, Cortez. They landed the
plane and scouted some around the then much smaller town. Mr. Robot and Mental
had split from the group to investigate the field where Marty had found Mental
afterwards. The giant snake had been under the local diner. Positive Man and Bounce
had hoped to bring in the plane to rescue the civilians.

The plane had been sabotaged. The engines blew up. Bounce landed in a field not far
from the other field where Mr. Robot and Mental had been ambushed. Positive Man
had ordered Marty to check on her, and then the others. He found Mental wounded
near what was left of Mr. Robot. He had returned to help Positive Man. He was too
late to help out. He rode away before something happened to him.

Marty spent the next few years trying to survive. The team’s foundation had
supported him. He had educated himself as much as he could while living in a bunker
away from the team’s headquarters. As far as he knew, it still sat untouched.

He doubted it was safe to use the base. Whomever was behind the death of the team
was probably watching it like a hawk. He was surprised that he was still walking
around sometimes. When were they coming after him to finish the job?

He supposed as long as he wasn’t close to finding the man who owned the ring, he
didn’t have to worry about being attacked.

When he did have something, then he should worry about another giant snake being
in his future.

Marty rode up to the museum and dismounted. He dismissed his horse after looking
around. He didn’t need anyone connecting him to the Scouts while he was trying to
look around.

He walked inside the building. His eyes tracked the central opening floor. Displays
about the team’s old cases were everywhere. He headed toward where the giant snake
sat in his stuffed glory.

Marty paused when he entered the room. The museum attracted people from all over.
A small group followed a guide from display to display. A young man in black
studied the snake.

He walked around to the other side of the display. The jaw had been broken in the
battle. Whomever had stuffed it had fixed that along with the broken bones that had
been inflicted on it.

“Mr. Morgan?,” said the man in the black. “Can we talk?”

“I guess.” Marty called his talent. If things went down, he was prepared to summon
something to do things to this stranger. “What can I do for you?”

“My name is Ren.” The young man smiled. “I am the apprentice for Doctor
Toubanhei. I have to solve a mystery to graduate from my service and set up my own
detective service.”

“So you want to know what happened to the Hazard Scouts?,” asked Marty. “I don’t
know what happened to the Scouts. What do you know already?”

Ren gave him an outline of what happened. It was missing some facts that no one but
Marty knew. The picture was almost right.

“How is the Doctor?” Marty had worked some cases in Japan. He remembered a gruff
man in a black suit like Ren wore. He seemed to have his thumb on the criminal
world around Kyoto and Tokyo when the Scouts visited that country.

“He is well.” Ren smiled. “I didn’t know you had met.”

“It was a long time ago.” Marty put his hands in his pockets. He had joined the
team a few years before the final case. His encounters with Toubanhei were almost
fifteen years in the past.

“Would it be all right if I ask you some questions?,” asked Ren. “The more
information I am able to gather, the quicker I can solve this case and locate the
murderer.”

“Getting out on your own means that much?” Marty felt one eyebrow go up.

“Doctor Toubanhei is training several other apprentices.” Ren made a gesture to
indicate that didn’t matter to him. “He wants to make sure that someone is there to
defend Japan as much as possible. If I can graduate, I will be able to pick the district
I work in. I will be able to solve cases without having someone looking over my
shoulder all the time.”

“I understand that.” Marty had been the youngest of the Scouts. His ability didn’t
seem that great at the time. He had worked on it in the years he had been on his
own. He could do things he only dreamed about doing then.

He supposed he wouldn’t have pushed so hard if the others were still around.

“Can you find out things about jewelry?,” asked Marty. “I have a ring that I need
researched.”

“I can do that,” said Ren. He smiled. “It might take some time.”

“I don’t have anything but time.” Marty smiled. “Let’s go over to the diner. I’ll buy
some lunch.”

“Did you see anything on that day?,” asked Ren.

“Not really.” Marty headed for the front door. “These people were trapped in the
diner. Daryl had gone to the jet to fly over so we could try to save them by lowering
a ladder from the air and moving them out of danger. The plane crashed. Doug asked
me to try to get Daryl out but the plane exploded before I could do much of anything
to help. I went to find Jim and Barry, but I only found Jim. He was barely alive. He
told me that his powers had been shut off for the amount of time it had taken to
wound him. He wound up burning up his body to prevent it from falling into the
wrong hands.”

“Doug?,” asked Ren.

“Positive Man.” Marty realized the road was better paved than it was on that day.
“He died fighting the giant snake they put on display in their museum.”

“What about Mr. Robot?,” asked Ren.

“I saw Barry’s skull,” said Marty. “I didn’t see the rest of his body. Maybe the
murderers took it with them.”

“Just the skull?,” asked Ren. “That’s unusual. I would have expected that to be gone,
and the body left behind.”

“I didn’t think about that.” Marty paused in the middle of the sidewalk. “I thought Jim
had blown himself up. Maybe I was wrong. Maybe the skull had been some kind of
bomb.”

“Seems likely.” Ren nodded. “Something had to be done to cover their tracks.”

“I admit I wasn’t a good detective, and didn’t learn much.” Marty led the way to the
diner. It looked better than it had the first time he had seen it.

“You were the Animal Boy, weren’t you?,” asked Ren. He paused at the door leading
into the diner, inspecting the place before he walked in behind Marty.

“Yes,” said Marty. “My powers were useful for rescues, especially at sea.”

“I see.” Ren settled in a booth away from the door. He looked the place over as he
waited for a waitress.

Marty was forced to sit down where he had to twist to look out the window if he
wanted to keep an eye on things.

“Doctor Toubanhei said he had not seen any progress on what happened.” Ren
frowned. “Professional detectives had learned nothing new after the first reports
went out.”

“I didn’t think about it at the time but I left Doug’s body when I should have buried
it,” said Marty.

“I’ll find out what happened to it.” Ren shrugged. “We need to know that if we
want to construct a full picture of things.”

“Do you think you can find out what happened?,” asked Marty.

“I have been trained to unravel the thread of stories,” said Ren. “This is a problem
that I feel that I can solve given enough time and information.”

A waitress approached their booth. She put two menus down in front of them. She
pulled out a pad and pen.

“Do you know what drinks you want?,” she asked.

“I’ll have water,” said Marty.

“I’ll have tea, please,” said Ren.

“I’ll be back in a few minutes,” she said as she wrote down the drink order on her
pad.
“I have a lot of questions when we are done eating,” said Ren.

“I don’t have a lot of answers.”

//78006

[csyphrett]

Revenge of the Scouts

1979-

2

Marty and Ren walked back to the field. The former Scout pointed out where the
plane had come down as best that he could remember. He admitted that the town had
covered all traces of the incident as it had grown out and around the former farms.

Ren nodded as they went. His dark eyes took in the landscape as if almost seeing
what had happened ten years before. He raised his hand to shield his eyes and they
seemed to glow in the shade.

 

“About here is where I found Jim, and Barry’s skull.” Marty looked around to make
sure. “The ground had been burned and cratered from the explosion.”

 

“I’m going to do a hypnotic trick.” Ren looked around, dark clothing making him
almost a shadow on the ground. “I want you to close your eyes and count back to one
from ten.”

 

“All right.” Marty did what he was told. When he opened his eyes, he stood in the
past. His younger self stood a few feet away. Jim Marley, wounded and dying, lay on
the ground. “This is crazy. I can see everything like it was.”

 

“Doctor Touhanbei taught me this so I could question witnesses with better
accuracy.” Ren stepped into the illusion. “This is where your comrade was?”

 

“Yes.” Marty turned. “Barry’s skull was there. The only reason I thought it was his
was because it was metal. Could I have been wrong?”

 

“I don’t know.” Ren made a gesture with his hand. The scene sped up, matching to
Marty’s memory. A column of fire erupted from the skull, taking Jim with it into
destruction. “It certainly killed your friend. They weren’t taking chances he might
have gleaned something to tell you.”

 

“If Doug had lived, he would have never given looking up for who did this.” Marty
spread his arms at the static scene in the air. “I never could find a lead on my own.”

 

“It might been your friend’s skull set to explode.” Ren folded the image and put it in
a wrapper. He put the paper square into a small bag at his hip. “It might been a fake.
I don’t like they took his body and left the rest of him.”

 

“At the time, he had the most advanced robot body in existence and was always trying
to make it better.” Marty shrugged. “That was the sixties. Ten years might have been
enough time to make robot bodies better than that.”

 

“I saw some things in the scene that I need to look at later.” Ren took one more look
around the scene. “Let’s look at the plane crash and where Positive Man died. Maybe
that will give us some more clues we can follow.”

 

“You saw some things we can use?,” asked Marty. “What did you see?”

 

“I don’t know,” said Ren. “I will have to take the scene apart after we finish our
lookaround. If I have something useful, we might be able to advance.”

 

“What if you don’t have anything useful?,” asked Marty.

 

“I will come up with some other line of attack.” Ren frowned at the other man. “I
assure you that I will not fail.”

 

“Okay.” Marty wondered if he had insulted the other’s pride enough that they would
come to blows. He decided not to test it. It was too early in the partnership.

 

“Let’s look at the plane crash,” said Ren. “That might tell us something about what
happened to the jet you used.”

 

“I’m pretty sure the engines blew.” Marty walked toward where the jet had crashed.
It was close enough to walk, but far enough away that it hadn’t impacted what was
going on with Jim and Barry.

 

The impact wouldn’t have hurt Daryl at all. Being set on fire would have cut through
her defenses and destroyed her rubbery body. The plane had went nose down into the
field. That wrapped the metal body around her so she couldn’t get out of the trap.

Then the aircraft had been blown to smithereens by the blast. It had been a miracle
that the plane hadn’t killed anyone when it went down.

 

It was the perfect trap for a rubbery woman.

 

“Jim had been right.” Marty went through the ritual to look at the plane. Watching it
crash into the ground and explode froze him in place. He felt depression overwhelm
for a moment. He seized control of his mind and directed it to push on. “It was a trap
from start to finish.”

 

“You didn’t get a look at the snake killing Positive Man?,” asked Ren. He set the
scene aside like he did the first one. He could unwrap them and look at them again
when he needed to do that.

 

“They were both dead when I got back from watching Jim blow up.” Marty walked
toward the crowded streets. “The diner where we ate was where the snake was
nesting.”

 

“Let’s look at the memory of that,” said Ren. “Then we can get out of here. The town
is just the starting point. The masterminds don’t live here.”

 

“I suppose you’re right.” Marty spotted the diner in the distance. “No one sets a trap
in their backyard. Other parties might want to know what happened.”

 

“And if someone got traction in an investigation, you didn’t want them wandering
around looking for your base.” Ren nodded. “Someone might be here to keep an eye
out for anybody like us.”

 

“I doubt it’s worth it to try to figure out who the lookout is.” Morgan shrugged. “We
can save that for when we’re really desperate.”

 

“Or if we know enough that we can use it trap the lookout so he gives up what we
need when do find him.” Ren nodded. “I favor that approach myself.”

 

“This is the diner.” Marty studied the building. “Now that I’m looking at it, it looks
different.”

 

“They probably had to add on to it, so they could keep their business moving at a
regular speed.” Ren looked around. “Is this where Positive Man and the snake killed
themselves?”

 

“Yes.” said Marty. “I should have buried the body, but I just walked away.”

 

“It wasn’t in the museum.” Ren raised a hand. “Close your eyes and count. Maybe
something you heard will give us something to look at here and now.”

 

Marty did as he was told. When he opened his eyes, he saw the snake sprawled and
flicking its tail around. Its jaw had been broken like he expected. Doug had two fang
wounds in his chest. He sat against the still standing wall of the diner. He dug a hole
in the ground with one hand as he talked to Marty on his helmet radio. He pulled
something out of his chest and placed it in the ground. He pulled a rock over the hole
and scooped dirt around it.

 

“What did he bury?,” asked Ren. He matched the scene to the new landscape. The
rock stood in place.

 

“Probably his engine.” Marty asked a mole to dig down and unearth the item. The
animal returned with something in its talons. It vanished when the ex-Scout took the
item from it. “Yeah, it’s his engine.”

 

“His engine?”, asked Ren. He examined the metal cylinder. “What does it do?”

 

“Doug had some kind of machine in his body.” Marty brushed dirt off the cylinder
and put it in his jacket pocket. “He dialed up the amount of force he needed using the
engine. It made him stronger and faster than a normal man.”

 

“So we have an array of motives, and personalities to investigate.” Ren folded up the
scene and put it in his bag with the other two. “We might find more clues after
examining the scenes better. We certainly shouldn’t do that here.”

 

“We can rule out Cortez.” Marty looked around. He didn’t see anyone paying
attention to them. That didn’t mean anything. “We were trying to find him when this
happened. Jim got a look at the goons involved. He said everything was a trap by a
guy with access to our report network.”

 

“Makes sense,” said Ren. “How else would someone send you into a trap if they
didn’t have that access?”

 

“I have one more thing to show you in private,” said Marty. “Then we can look
at the radio logs, if they are still there.”

 

“All right,” said Ren. “I have a room at the hotel. We can go there to plan our next
move.”

 

“Are you sure you want in on this?” Marty remembered that the hotel was a few
streets over. The way the town had grown, there might be another hotel he didn’t
know about.

 

“I have been trained for a long time to solve mysteries.” Ren smiled. “Doctor
Toubanhei has said I am almost as good as he is. I have to learn more through
experience, but to leave his service, I have to solve a case that no one else has solved.
I assure you that I can solve this with some time and patience.”

 

“Even if there is trouble down the line?,” said Marty.

 

“Especially if there is trouble down the line.” The apprentice nodded his affirmation.

 

“All right.” Marty nodded. “Let’s see how good a detective you really are.”

 

The two of them walked across that part of town, heading for the three story Quality
Star hotel. The place only had twenty rooms, but it did have a kitchen and dining
room on the ground floor. Ren got his key from the desk. There was no mail for him.

 

“I got a room on the third floor so I could see most of the town from my window.” Ren headed for the steps. He started up the staircase.

 

“Elevator?” Marty pointed at the cage a few feet away from the stairwell door. He
started up the steps a little slower.

 

“Don’t trust them.” Ren shrugged as he kept moving. “I have had some bad
experiences with elevators. It’s better to use the stairs.”

 

“All right.” Marty used the hand rail to pull himself up the staircase.

 

“I do have one question,” said Ren. “Why are you taking this meeting at face value?”

 

“I’ve met Touhanbei before. I think I have met you before but you were a lot younger
then.” Marty paused to search his memory. “You were like his sidekick, but he didn’t
want you talking to us. Barry did the most talking when we worked together.
Touhanbei didn’t want you mixing up in our business. I think he didn’t like me
tagging along but Barry spoke up for me.”

 

“I wore a mask then,” said Ren.

 

“I know,” said Marty. “It was some kind of bird mask.”

 

Ren nodded as he pushed open the door for the third floor. He walked down the hall
to his room.

 

“If something happens to me, please notify Doctor Tanbouhei.” Ren opened the room
door. “I am sure he will take over for me.”

 

“I don’t have a problem with that.” Marty examined the hall before following Ren
into the room. “This is better than I expected.”

 

“I made some improvements so I could work,” explained Ren.

 

The single room should have a bed, chair, television, and drawers, and one end table.
A bathroom and closet should be separate doors side by side. Instead the room had
been turned into a space with a large table to write on, chairs, and a shelf of books
taking up a small section of the wall.

 

“Does the hotel know?,” asked Marty.

 

“They can’t see what I have done.” Ren smiled. “You said you had a clue other than
your memories.”

 

Marty pulled out the ring he had been carrying for the last ten years.

//79964

[csyphrett]

Revenge of the Scouts

1979-

3

“Sir,” Oscar Woz stepped into the office. It looked like most of the other offices
Oscar had been in. The only thing that made it different was the occupant behind the
desk. “Subject Animal Boy has found an ally.”

 

“After all this time?” The man behind the desk leaned back in his specially built
chair. “He hasn’t approached any of the other heroic community before this. Who
has he been seen with this late in the game?”

 

“We don’t know.” Oscar winced at that admission. He should have couched it in
doubletalk to show they were on top of their game. “The observer was only able
to radio a visual contact. Pictures were fogged over.”

 

“That’s interesting.” The occupant rubbed a metal chin plate with a metal hand.
“Completely fogged over?”

 

“That is what the observer said.” Oscar winced at that admission. “The description
is of a young Asian, dark hair and eyes, black suit, black shirt. Estimated height is at
five feet, five inches. Weight at one hundred thirty-thirty five pounds.”

 

“That could be anybody from China to Hawaii.” The occupant closed his eye. One
had been replaced with a camera plugged into his brain. “Do we still have contact
with the three potential recruits?”

 

“Yes, sir.” That was safer ground to walk on. “We have bases and support networks
locked in. We can take them any time we want.”

 

“Have the Squad get ready.” The man behind the desk nodded at the decision. “Pick
up all five. I want them in cells and ready for assimilation as soon as possible.”

 

“I’ll pass the order along, sir.” Oscar turned to leave.

 

“Deploy some of our forces with the Squad,” said the occupant. “We want to
make sure we take them all and have them under our thumb. We can’t have them
looking for us while we are trying to plan another kidnaping for them.”

 

“Understood.” Oscar left the office. He paused in the hall outside of the office and
wiped the sweat off his face with a handkerchief. He hated dealing with his boss. He
always feared the wrong word would put him in a box.

 

The Squad was just as bad in their way, but he didn’t fear them as much as he feared
his employer. If something bad happened to him while dealing with them, he knew
things would be done to repay them for what they had done.

 

There were rules for things, and the boss expected you to follow those rules. That was
why he had the best network in place, and was standing off the Deathworm, and
others with similar business dealings.

 

He had engineered the deaths of heroes across the world and no one knew about it.
The Hazard Scouts hadn’t been the only victims of his schemes. They had just been
most out in the open. And nothing led back to the organization after it was all over.

And now their tagalong kid was poking around the scene of the battle again. Every
time they had lost him, he had returned to the battlefield to look around again and
again.

 

This was going to be the last time. Once the Squad was done, he would be using his
powers for the organization. No one would even know he had been taken and
assimilated to use against other heroes interfering with the boss’s plans.

Oscar walked the hall until he reached an elevator. He pushed the down button
to call the cab. The Squad’s quarters were down at the bottom of the facility. If
anything less than an attack by the Mark happened, they were to retreat down to
those quarters and use the Squad’s powers to fight their way out.

 

If anything more powerful than the Mark showed, they were to flee as best they could.
Nothing could stand up to his power range. Anything close to that would be more
powerful than what they had.

 

Oscar rode the elevator down to the bottom level of the facility. He hated being away
from the offices on the top. The amount of dirt over his head made him
uncomfortable. He didn’t like the thought all of that could be collapsed and there was
nothing he could do about it.

 

He stepped off the elevator and walked to the bulkhead keeping the Squad separate
from the rest of the place. It wasn’t for anything other than show. Any of the powered
minions could punch through the bulkhead if they wanted to enough.

 

Oscar tapped the code number on the keypad to open the door. The metal aperture 
slid out of the way so he could enter the set of rooms beyond.

 

The Squad had a common room they could eat together, watch television, socialize.
There was a gym that led off to the other side of their quarters where they tested their
powers. Their rooms formed a semi-ring between the other door and the door to the
gym.

 

Oscar only saw one of the members as he walked in the room. He looked around.
Where were the other members?

 

“They’re exercising in the gym,” said Thingamabob. He sat at their common table.
Electronic parts littered the table top as he inspected them with his magnifying
glasses. “What can I do for you, Oz?”

 

“You have a mission.” Oscar didn’t sit down to face him. He wanted to be able to try
to run away if he had to.

 

“What are we doing this time?” Thingamabob starting putting the parts together like
a man putting together a jigsaw puzzle.

 

“Pick up mission.” Oscar made sure to keep his hands away from his body as he
watched the process. “We have five targets we want you to pick up.”

 

“No problem.” Thingamabob snapped the last piece of his puzzle in place. He pressed
the button. He smiled at whatever the hum of the device told him.

 

“I don’t how long you have to complete the mission, but there can be no witnesses.”
Oscar hated to order that. It led to a lot more collateral damage than was necessary.

 

“No problem, Oz,” said the gadget user. “I can snatch a baby out of a crib at a
hundred paces. This will be just as easy.”

 

“Auxiliary troops are to assist your team.” Oscar saw the argument coming on, and
held up his hand. “Those are the orders from on high. I would appreciate it if you
would get your team together and have them come up to the mission briefing room
while I get your army to report to the briefing.”

 

“I’ll get them there, Oz.” Thingamabob stood up. “Is this a one on one thing, or a
mass at the same time thing?”

 

“I think that will be your call, Bob.” Oscar turned to leave. “The boss said don’t miss,
whichever tactics you use. He doesn’t want the targets trying to hunt us down.”

 

“I’ll see what we can do about that.” Bob turned to walk toward the gym. He held his
gadget ready to use.

 

Oscar retreated from the room. He had to get a platoon together, and have their
officers at the meeting. He hoped he wasn’t asking for his assigned help to wreck
everything they see.

 

He walked out of the quarters and headed upstairs. He had to get the support together.
He didn’t want to send the Squad on a mission without someone watching over them.

He hoped he wasn’t getting his private soldiers killed. He hated thinking what would
happen if they got caught in a crossfire between the powered forces.

 

Oscar rode the elevator up to the sixth floor. He stepped out in what was a wide space
where bunks and lockers had been set up. Men exercised at the end of the hangar. A
shooting range was set up beyond that. A small office set aside for the officer on duty
stood in a square of walls one side of the bunks.

 

Oscar walked across the space to the office. He looked inside. Mr. Mercer sat at the
desk, reading a book. The soldier looked up from his book without saying anything.

 

“We have a mission,” said Oscar. “I need you to come down to the briefing room.
You will be supporting the Squad on this.”

 

“All right,” said Mercer. “I will come up there to see what the circus is about.”

 

“Don’t call them that.” Oscar grimaced. “The Squad is as dangerous as they come.”

 

“They haven’t had a real fight yet.” Mercer put his book down on the desk. His face
of acne scars held two different colored eyes, a busted nose, and small scars across
his chin. “Eventually they’re going to run into someone they can’t beat. That will
really set your plans back.”

 

“That’s why your men are being asked to come in as a support unit.” Oscar put his
hands in his pockets. “The boss wants to make sure the mission is expedited, and
carried out free of complications.”

 

“There’s always going to be complications.” Mercer stood up. “We’ll do what we can
to keep the complications down. Targets?”

 

“They’re powered.” Oscar winced at the grimace that earned.

 

“That will make the going harder,” said Mercer. “We’ll handle it.”

 

“I’ll go over everything at the briefing,” said the aide. “I’ll have the information ready
for you.”

 

“I’ll have munitions and weapons drawn,” said Mercer. “When is the briefing?”

 

“As soon as the Squad gets there.” Oscar shrugged. “Go ahead and get whomever
you need to help plan things and come up to the briefing room.”

 

“We’ll be there in twenty minutes.” Mercer frowned at the job ahead. Powered
fights could be really messy.

 

“Right.” Oscar nodded. “I’ll go up and get the files ready.”

 

Oscar walked across the space back to the elevator. He pushed the button and waited
for the doors to open. He went up to his office and grabbed the files from his desk.
His observers had compiled as much information as they could.

 

He hoped they hadn’t missed something obvious. It would be embarrassing to send
the Squad in against people that hadn’t been measured completely.

 

He took the files to the briefing room. He pulled the photos to load in the projector.
The three subjects looked harmless in their pictures. He knew that was a lie.

He added an old picture of Martin Morgan to the others. Animal Boy had been
dangerous as part of the Hazard Scouts. He probably hadn’t lost any of those skills
wandering around on his own.

 

The only one he didn’t have was of the black clad unknown helping Morgan at
Idaville. He frowned that the unknown was the wild card that could spoil their plans.

They couldn’t be prepared for him if no one knew what he could do.

 

The Squad would have to use overwhelming force on the unknown so he couldn’t
turn the fight against them.

 

He didn’t like that. He didn’t want to take responsibility for a failure based on lack
of information.

 

Oscar gathered the files and went over them as he waited for his assault elements to
arrive at the briefing room.

 

He hoped nothing went wrong.

//81824

[csyphrett]

Revenge of the Scouts

1979-

4

Martin Morgan handed over the ring. He wondered briefly if he was doing the right
thing. He decided that Touhanbei had been a good guy. His apprentice should be just
as good.

 

“This is the ring Mental gave you?,” asked Ren. He examined the ring with the naked
eye. He pulled out a loop, and examined the thing once more. “There might be
something there I can use.”

 

“I dusted it for prints when I could, but there weren’t any,” said Marty. “All I could
find were smudges.”

 

“Don’t worry about that,” said Ren. He took the ring over to his table. “I can make
it say a sentence I believe. That should be enough to give us another toehold.”

 

“So you can find the owner?,” asked Marty.

 

“If I can’t, the next step is to check your old support network to see who could have
set up the trap.” Ren took a dish from his shelf. He dropped the ring in it. “And if that
fails, we can go back to the memories to see what more we can glean from them.”

 

“That sounds reasonable.” Marty stepped back. He didn’t want the process to blow
up in his face.

 

“Trust me,” said Ren. He took two different bottles from his shelf. Marty could have
sworn they hadn’t been there before he picked them up. “At the very least, if the man
is still alive, I can turn the ring into a compass to find him.”

 

Marty liked the idea of a pointer showing him where to go. He had lived with being
the sole survivor and knowledge that someone out there still might want him dead.
Being able to lay hands on one of the men responsible would be great.

 

Then he would make the man pay for his part in what had happened.

 

Ren poured the samples of the liquids into the dish. He capped them and set them
aside before grabbing a lid for the dish. He covered the ingredients and ring as smoke
filled the tiny space. He stepped back to let the chemical reaction do its thing.

 

A face appeared on the inside of the transparent cover. Ren replaced that lid with
another. He took the marked lid and put it on a stand to look through. The other lid
kept the smoke in the storage plate.

 

“I don’t recognize him,” said Marty. “Any way to identify him from the picture?”

 

“Not really.” Ren put the lid on a piece of paper. “We’ll have to see if he has a mug
shot somewhere.”

 

“That might take a while.” Marty doubted anyone would listen to him now. His
clearance as a Scout must have been revoked. Maybe there was someone he knew
who could speed up the identification process. He couldn’t think of anyone off hand.

 

“Either way,” said Ren. “We’ll still have a way to track the man down. His ring will
give us that.”

 

“I don’t understand,” said Marty. “How will it help us?”

 

“I need to add a third chemical to the dish.” Ren went to the shelf and produced the
bottle. “When I add this, the ring will want to go after the former owner.”

 

“I don’t believe that,” said Marty. “Nothing does that.”

 

“Watch.” Ren took the second lid off the dish. He poured the liquid in the third bottle
into the fog. He closed the lid down on it.

 

The ring had a jewel in it. That jewel pointed southeast of where they stood. Ren
picked up the dish and turned it. The jewel kept reaching for the same direction.

 

“So we have a compass,” said Marty. “That’s neat.”

 

“If we can’t find out the identity of the man through normal channels, we can use this
to find him.” Ren smiled. “It’s always good to have a fallback.”

 

“Okay,” said Marty. “Where do we get started?”

 

“Let’s start with the radio network.” Ren put the picture and ring in his bag. “If we
can find the leak through ordinary means, we might not need the memories we have
stored.”

 

“The Scout headquarters is closed.” Marty looked at his hands. “The Foundation is
keeping the land maintained. Everything should still be there.”

 

“Let’s go and take a look at things.” Ren frowned at the hotel room. “Let me pack up
and we can take the train up there.”

 

“Take your time,” said Marty. “I’m going down to the diner and get something to
eat.”

 

“All right,” said Ren. “I will be down to join you in a few minutes.”

 

“Okay.” Marty opened the door. He headed downstairs. He took Ren’s warning about
elevators to heart and used the stairs. They were looking for an unknown enemy that
had ambushed a seasoned team of powered humans. There was no telling what the
bad guys would do to the two of them.

 

He crossed the street to the diner. He didn’t like the fact that his enemy could be
anywhere. He wondered how long he had before they came at him.

 

He had no doubt they would come at him once he showed he was making progress
in finding out what was going on. They had ambushed his friends and killed them.
There was no doubt they would try to do the same to him once he got close enough.

He needed a back up plan in case something happened to him and Ren. He didn’t
know what he could do about that. He had been on his own for a long time.

 

He stepped inside the diner and went to the table where he and Ren had eaten earlier.
How were they going to get down to the base? He had transportation for himself
worked out. Maybe he could lift two men the distance to Scout headquarters.

 

He ordered coffee from the waitress as he thought. Maybe he could lift them home.

He had been working on new animals to call. One of them should fit the bill.

 

Working on the network should be easy. He had learned a lot of the basics from Barry
and Doug. And the equipment had not been updated in the ten years since they died.

He should have thought of that. He had abandoned everything to dust. He should
have done better than that.

 

The fact that he had been twelve didn’t seem much of an excuse.

 

He wondered what his adopted family would have thought of him.

 

He spotted Ren crossing the street. Once he finished his coffee, they could fly down
to the base and get started looking around. Now that he had help, maybe he could
finally get things done.

 

He should have thought about asking a detective to help before this, but he didn’t
know anyone that fit the bill. The Mark might have helped, but he was too busy
saving the world.

 

Ren stepped in the diner. He nodded to the staff. He settled in his old seat.

 

“I’m ready to go,” said Ren. “I thought we could take the train up north.”

 

“I got the transportation covered,” said Marty. “I figured we would fly.”

 

“Fly?,” asked Ren. “I didn’t know you could fly.”

 

“I have some animal friends that I can call that should be able to carry the both of us,”
said Marty. “The time won’t be as fast as a jet’s.”

 

“I would like that,” said Ren. “I have never been able to fly on my own power.”

 

“I always wanted to, but being able to ride through the air is almost as good,” said
Marty. “Only Jim could fly on the team. The rest of us were ground bound.”

 

“I understand.” Ren asked for a glass of water. “Doctor Tanbouhei has only showed
me how to glide. It’s not the same as true flight.”

 

“Let me finish my coffee.” Marty sipped from his cup. “Hopefully we will find a clue
at the old place.”

 

“We have multiple lines now.” Ren smiled. “I am confident we will net someone, if
not the head plotter before things are done.”

 

“We will have to prove everything in a court of law,” said Marty. “How do we do that
with old memories.”

 

“I am sure that by the time we are done, we will have more than old memories to hand
over to a prosecutor,” said Ren.

 

Marty finished off his cup. He stood. Ren followed suit. Marty paid for the coffee
before they stepped out of the diner.

 

Marty concentrated on his summons. He had been working on his powers the whole
time he had been on his own. He could do more than simple animals now. His steed
sprang into existence, lifting him up in a natural saddle at its shoulders. It called out
its impatience as talons dug into the asphalt around the diner.

 

“Is that a griffin?,” said Ren. He stepped back from the lion bird looking him over.
“I didn’t know you could do that.”

 

“It’s an animal. Calling animals into existence is what I do.” Marty extended a hand.
“Climb aboard. We have places to go.”

 

Ren used the hand to settle into a spot behind the former Animal Boy. He secured his
traveling bag to his body. The griffin made a noise half lion roar and half eagle call.
It jogged down the street while beating its wings. Then it was in the air and flying
smoothly across the sky.

 

“This is wonderful,” said Ren. “I love this. I wish I could do this.”

 

“It works for me,” said Marty. “I used to not be able to do anything this big. I practiced using a book from the library.”

 

“A book?,” said Ren. “What book?”

 

“It was full of monsters,” said Marty.

 

“Ah,” said Ren. “The library is full of things like that.” 

 

“I know.” Marty pulled out a pair of goggles out of a pocket. He pulled them over his
eyes. “We should be at the old place in a few hours.”

 

“I haven’t ridden anything like this before,” said Ren. “We might need to land
sometime to give us a break.”

 

“Okay,” said Marty. “We’ll aim for a place about halfway between where we are, and
where we want to go.”

 

“Excellent,” said Ren.

 

Marty closed his eyes as he rested in the saddle. The bird lion would wake him if it
needed him.

 

It gave a call as it headed down for the ground. Marty’s eyes snapped open. He shook
his head to clear it.

 

“It looks like we’re going down,” said Ren. “The griffin seems to need to rest.”

 

“Good,” said Marty. “I need to stretch my legs.”

 

“This has been really great,” said Ren. “I have never had such a journey that felt this
good.”

 

“It looks like we’re going to land in that parking lot ahead.” Marty pointed at the
clear spot. “Good job, Feathers.”

 

The griffin touched down, and shook its head. It faded away as its riders dismounted.
Marty stretched kinks out of his back as he looked around.

 

“I see what you mean,” Ren put his travel bag down. He rubbed his legs with his
hands. “I didn’t consider how a long ride would affect me.”

 

“You’ll be sore in the morning.” Marty pointed at a gas station across the lot. “Let’s
get some water, and something to snack on. Then we can get back on and finish
the ride.”

 

“I believe it.” Ren nodded. “I am sore now.”

 

“Can you walk?,” asked Marty.

 

“Yes,” said Ren. “I can manage.”

 

Marty led the way across the lot. His mouth felt dry. He smiled at himself. His power
seemed to make him thirsty the more he used it.

 

A Gatorade would fix that.

 

He opened the door of the place. Two shelves of food went to the right, pointing
to cooler doors. A middled aged clerk with wiry gray hair and too much weight stood
behind the counter on the left. Glasses perched on her round nose.

 

“Hello,” the clerk said. Her voice was scratchy from too many cigarettes. “How’s
it going?”

 

“Fine.” Marty looked over the small selection of drinks. He found a shelf of Gatorade.
He pulled one out. “How’s it going with you?”

 

“Great.” She smiled. “One drink?”

 

“I think I need some crackers too.” Marty picked up some Nabs. “Do you know
how the weather is up northeast of here?”

 

“It’s supposed to rain later.” She rang up the drink and crackers as Ren walked in.
“Then sunshine for the next few days.”

 

“Thanks,” said Marty. He opened the bottle and took a sip. “I appreciate that.”

 

Ren staggered into the store. He smiled. He walked back and pulled a Coke from the
cooler. He added some cookies and a bag of chips.

 

“Is this all,” said the clerk, as Marty moved out of the way.

 

“I think so,” said Ren.

 

//83961

[csyphrett]

Revenge of the Scouts

1979-

5

Thingamabob checked the readouts from his gadget once more. They had decided to
go after the most powerful of the targets on their list first. If they couldn’t take down
this girl, they probably couldn’t handle the rest of the targets either.

 

He didn’t want to report a failure to the boss. The man was not know for his forgiving
attitude.

 

“Everybody ready?,” Bob asked his radio. A chorus of affirmations came back. He
hoped they weren’t taking this lightly. His crew had some problems. He didn’t need
them cropping up in the middle of a mission.

 

“We need to attract her attention.” Bob hated this part of the plan. If things took too
long, other variables might crop up. “Go with Clown Girl.”

 

Clown Girl cartwheeled out in traffic, causing a collision between two cars. Others
piled on, unable to stop in time. She seemed to have vanished under the pileup.

 

“Target is powering up,” Gaze reported. “She’s coming in at three o’clock high.”

 

The reading on Bob’s instrument echoed the statement. The target would pass his post
in a few seconds. He hoped the power nullifier worked. Otherwise it was going to
come down to brute force.

 

He hated to use that option, but the target had to be taken. If the nullifier didn’t work,
his guys would have to earn their money.

 

“I’m going to try to neutralize the target,” said Bob. He took aim at the halo of light
approaching. “If it doesn’t work, Troop and Puff are to move in and distract the target
until a plan b can be put in place.”

 

“Ready,” said Puff. Subvocalizations played over the radio as he talked to himself.

 

Bob commanded the nullifier to fire. The beam sliced across the sky. It hit the halo.
The light went out as the girl generating it turned and used the last vestiges of her
power to crash into a window. The glass broke inward as she hit the floor inside the
office she had crashed into.

 

“She hit the twenty fifth floor,” said Gaze. “Power is out. It looks like she can’t do
anything.”

 

“That won’t last long.” Bob checked his tool. It still had most of its charge. “Go,
Troop and Puff. Take her out.”

 

“I’m already theeeeerrrreee!,” said Puff. Smoke blasted into existence across the
street from where Bob stood.

 

Troop formed a living ladder to cross the space. He resembled a gorilla stuffed in a
suit of camo, and boots. He drew all of his duplicates together on the other side. He
vanished in the darkness inside the office.

 

“Emergency responders are on the way, Bob,” said Gaze. “We don’t have a lot of
time.”

 

“We need you, Clown Girl,” said Bob. He gave her the address of the building.
“Hurry it up.”

 

“I’m going in, Gaze,” said Bob. “Keep an eye on things. If the police get close to the
building, let me know.”

 

“All right,” said Gaze. “This girl is still strong and fast, Bob. She’s heading for the
stairs.”

 

“Got it.” Bob pressed a button on his belt. He sprang across the space between his
lookout and the smashed window on a trail of air. He landed lightly and took stock.

The layout was a two room suite. The boss sat in the office with the window. The
secretary sat outside. The boss’s office had been partially destroyed by the flying
target.

 

He hastened out of the office. He still had a job to do.

 

Bob stepped out in a bullpen of desks. Some of those desks and the furniture that
went with them had been used as weapons, and shields. He couldn’t expect Puff or
Troop to keep things in hand. They were brute force incarnate. He heard noises across
the bullpen through a hole where the door to the hall should have been.

 

He jogged across the battlefield. They had to take care of this fast. He didn’t want to
have deal with cops on top of this woman too.

 

He pushed open the door to the stairs cautiously. He didn’t want his own guys to take
him out. He shook his head. Troop had gathered his duplicates together because of
the space restriction in the stairwell. Puff was nowhere in sight. The woman was
trying to strangle the simian-like villain with her bare hands. He considered his next
move after the pause in disbelief.

 

Puff appeared in a cloud of smoke with Clown Girl. His dark purple suit and coat
swirled around him as he flung his colleague down the stairwell.

 

Clown Girl bounced off a railing in her baggy pants and striped shirt. It was hard to
tell if she was really smiling under the makeup smile on her face. She wrapped her
legs around the target’s neck and spun around. The woman lost her grip on Troop and
went down.

 

Bob pointed his gadget and commanded it to fire. A small dart hit the target in the
arm. Electricity surrounded her for a brief second. She collapsed.

 

“Police are at the front door of your building,” reported Gaze. “You guys might want
to exfiltrate from the scene.”

 

“Take the girl, Puff.” Bob pointed at the target. “Make sure Mercer’s boys lock her
down. We don’t want her coming to, and we don’t want her coming to and trying to
shake off the nullifier’s effect and powering back up.”

 

“You don’t have to tell me twice.” Puff slung the girl over his shoulder. He muttered
about taking a few punches as he went up in smoke.

 

“Back to the window.” Bob turned and jogged across the wrecked office area. A little
collateral damage was to be expected, but this was much more than he thought
possible when someone’s powers went away.

 

“Troop, take Clown Girl across,” said Bob. “I’ll be right behind you.”

 

He noticed how the duplicator rubbed his neck. How strong was their target? Could
they have taken her in a straight up fight? Did he really want to know that answer?

He decided that someone manhandling Troop with her bare hands was someone he
didn’t want to meet in a dark alley.

 

Troop threw himself across the gap between buildings. He grabbed Clown Girl and
yanked himself over to the other side. He placed Clown Girl on the roof of the other
building as he pulled himself together.

 

“We’re bugging out, Gaze,” said Bob. “Go ahead and head back to base.”

 

“I’m heading out right now,” Gaze said. His channel turned to static as he cut his
radio.

 

Bob leaped across the space between the buildings with his belt jets. He landed
lightly. He walked after his comrades, scanning for enemies. With his lookout gone,
he had to be extra vigilant until they were clear of the police activity.

 

“Transport One to Procure One,” said Mercer. “Ready to move.”

 

“Take the material home.” Bob smiled. The job was done. If anything happened now,
it would be on Mercer’s head. “We are moving to the next target area to set up.”

 

“Understood,” said Mercer. “Transport One out.”

 

Bob jogged after Troop and Clown Girl. He hated running, but he didn’t want to have
to face the cops and draw the attention of some mask who thought he could take them
on.

 

No one wanted to draw the attention of the Mark. A sighting was rare, but no one
took him on and won.

 

The fact that he had buried two of his enemies under a mountain on Mars, threw
another one into the Sun was not lost on Bob. And the fact that the nullifier might not
work on him did not encourage Bob to experiment and find out what would happen
if his team took on the World’s Strongest Man.

 

Being ripped limb from limb was not something he wanted to try out in person.

 

“Where are you, Puff?,” Bob said into his radio.

 

“Riding with Mercer,” said Puff ten times. “I am ready if the girl wakes up.”

 

“Head to the next target as soon as the target is secured,” said Bob. “Got me?”

 

“I will be there,” said Puff.

 

Bob caught up with Troop and Clown Girl as they waited to jump across to the next
building. From there they could run to the next building in line, or cross the street to
the block of buildings on the other side.

 

“We have to get away from here,” said Bob. “Puff is riding with Mercer and his boys.
I sent Gaze ahead. We need to escape any cordon and catch up with Gaze.”

 

“No problem, Bob-a-roony,” said Clown Girl. “We can jump across the street, and
head down to street level so we can use a car to drive away.”

 

“Really?,” said Bob. “What do you think, Troop?”

 

The simian pointed across the street.

 

“Let’s go,” said Bob. “The faster we get away from here, the better I’ll like it.”

 

Troop hurled himself across the gap on one of his living bridges. Clown Girl ran
across the bridge as lightly as if she were on the ground. It was a good thing they
made her give up the oversized shoes. Bob just jumped across. Troop pulled himself
together and they headed down a fire escape to get away from the sirens and lightbars
converging on the chaos they had caused.

 

Bob didn’t glance back as they reached an alley and walked out on the sidewalk. He
pointed his gadget at a nearby car. The engine turned on and the doors unlocked.
They had a long drive back to their base at the Quality Inn. Then they had to fly out
to where their next target lived and get started rounding it up.

 

The file said it was some kind of machine. His gadget should shut it down pretty
easily. The last target should be just as easy. The file said that target was a martial
artist. Troop could wrap that up by himself.

 

Not many normal people could stand up to his gorilla-like strength.

 

Bob got behind the wheel. He waited for the others to get in before driving away. The
car would be left at the hotel for the police to find. By that time, they would be
packed up and long gone.

 

He debated splitting up the team to take out the next two targets. He decided against
it as he drove along. Corona had been almost naturally strong enough to take on
Troop with her bare hands. If these others had hidden resources, they would need
the full team to take care of business.

 

He definitely didn’t want to get caught flatfooted and lose because he had
underestimated the people he was chasing. Overkill was better than having to face his
boss with one win out of three.

 

Letting the masked community know they existed would be the same as losing in
the opinion of his boss. The targets had to vanish with no clue left behind. Heroes
who became interested in their business was trouble one way or the other.

 

And if things escalated enough, that would attract the attention of the Mark. And no
villain wanted that.

//85818 

[csyphrett]

Revenge of the Scouts

1979-

6

Marty directed his griffin to land in front of the small building buried in the middle
of a small forest of trees. He dismounted and looked around. He didn’t see anything
moving.

 

“It’s smaller than I thought it would be.” Ren tried to stand on weak legs. He looked
around also, gauging what he needed.

 

“This is just the top,” said Marty. He waved his hands around. “These trees used to
have cameras mounted with hidden guns everywhere. The catapult for the jet was
over there somewhere. And the land area is far away from anyone trying to get up
here.”

 

“Do you think anyone has been up here in the last few years?” Ren nodded when he
felt his legs would carry him.

 

“Doubt it.” Marty walked toward the door. “The Foundation was supposed to
maintain property rights until the Scouts were declared dissolved. As that last
member, I’m the only one who can declare that. And I haven’t.”

 

Marty flipped the lid up on the scanner next to the door. He put his hand on it. The
door slid out of the way. He walked inside the darkened greeting hall.

 

“Secretary?” Ren pointed at the dusty desk in the middle of the room.

 

“Not really,” Marty paused at the desk. He hit a switch. The lights came on. “Barry
used this as a checkpoint for the defenses. He liked to direct fire at anyone trying to
get up here without permission.”

 

“Really?” Ren frowned at that information.

 

“Barry created the Scouts from this place.” Marty hit another switch. Screens lit up.
“First he recreated himself so he would be stuck in a bed for the rest of his life.”

 

“This is where he created the parts for Mr. Robot?,” said Ren. “That’s beneath us?”

 

“Yeah,” Marty nodded. He flipped another switch. “He had a lot of money, and
bankrolling his research was easy for him to do. Building this place happened before
he had his accident. Afterwards, it was his lab and workplace to get back on his feet,
then it became home to the Scouts. I am kind surprised the place hasn’t been looted.
I haven’t been here in a while.”

 

“Your foundation probably didn’t send anyone out.” Ren looked around for another
door. “If it was locked up when you left on your last mission, that should be good
enough.”

 

“All right,” said Marty. He hit another switch. A panel slid out of the way. “Let’s go
down and see what’s left of the place.”

 

He led the way into an elevator. He pushed a button to descend. Ren looked around
at the metal bullet.

 

“No stairs?”, Ren asked.

 

“They’re on the other side of the building,” said Marty. “This is the fastest way down
into the guts of the place.”

 

“What happens if the elevator fails?,” asked Ren.

 

“I don’t know,” said Marty. “It’s never happened.”

 

“That is not really comforting.” Ren closed his eyes as the cab dropped from under
his feet. He held on to the rail provided in the cab at waist height as his feet left the
floor. Then the bullet slowed to a stop. His shoes settled to the ground just before the
elevator announced its arrival.

 

“Don’t worry,” Marty waited for the door to slide open. “If anything happens, you’ll
be stuck in here for a while.”

 

“That’s what I am worried about,” said Ren. He followed the other man out of the
elevator. “I suppose we should look at any recordings related to your flying out to
Idaville. You do have recordings?”

 

“I think so,” said Marty.

 

Marty led the way to a room full of complicated machinery. He blew dust off the
equipment. It had been sitting there a long time in the hopes that someone would
come back and use it. He looked around until he found a log book. He flipped it open
to examine the contents.

 

“The last call to be logged in was Idaville from someone in the Department of
Defense,” said Marty. “I should have looked at this log book years ago. A Mercer is
put down as the primary.”

 

“Primary?,” asked Ren.

 

“When a call came in, the person who sent the call was the primary,” said Marty. He
handed over the book for Ren to examine. “Secondary sources are people on the
ground calling when we got to the scene. The primary is usually a source inside some
other organization needing help.”

 

“Did Mercer have enough pull to fake a trail of evidence?,” asked Ren. He ran his
finger down the column, reading the names of the other primaries. “This was his third
call. The other two were for Pearl Harbor and Midway.”

 

“Pearl Harbor was some kind of theft,” said Marty. He closed his eyes as he tried to
remember a case from eleven years ago. “Midway was some kind of monster.”

 

“Why the calls from the Department of Defense?,” asked Ren. “I assume they have
their own response teams to handle problems.”

 

“I don’t know.” Marty searched his memories. “I don’t remember why we were
called.”

 

“Can you find out?,” asked Ren. He went back to the names. Mercer was the only one
with only three calls. The rest of the names were repeated multiple times across the
country. Most were emergency situations they thought the Scouts could handle better
than the local force on the ground.

 

Another name called from the Department of Defense more than Mercer. Why was
there a change in the caller? That might be something. How did he find out?

 

Would the man take a call from Marty after all these years? Maybe that was the way
to go if he wanted to follow this line of inquiry. He checked the phone number. It still
might be in use.

 

He noted that it was different from the one Mercer used. Different offices? Different
departments handling the same kind of problems? Would the other man know what
was going on?

 

Was Mercer really an official in the Department of Defense? That was a key question.

The earlier calls might have been to build trust. Then they lured the Scouts into the
trap with that established rapport. It sounded right in his head. How did they prove
it?

 

He knew they were on the right track. He wondered if the man had used his own
name to build that trust in him. That would make things easier for them.

 

“Okay,” said Marty. He had left and came back while Ren had been looking at the log
book. “I found the two other cases that Mercer called in.”

 

“Can I?” Ren handed over the log book for the files. He went through them slowly.
He didn’t think the scale needed the heroes. They were small crimes involving service
personnel.

 

He made some notes in a pad before handing the files back. He considered what he
had learned. Everything seemed straightforward. He just didn’t have a motive other
than hatred for the Scouts. That didn’t narrow the field.

 

“Does your phone work?,” asked Ren. “I would like to call and see if Major Ricther
is still in service.”

 

“I don’t know.” Marty picked up receiver. A dial tone emerged. “Looks like the
Foundation kept that up too.”

 

“Good,” said Ren. “I feel like this Captain Mercer is the key to our mystery. If we can
locate him, then we can find out the rest.”

 

“No magic?,” asked Marty.

 

“We still have that to fall back on.” Ren took the phone. “I would rather use more
mundane methods that can be proven in a court of law so I don’t have to try to
explain how I charmed something to work for me. People still tend to frown at magic
use.”

 

“I can see that.” Marty leaned against the counter holding the equipment off the floor.
“Powers are treated the same way.”

 

“Objectively subjective testimony tends to be flawed,” said Ren as he dialed the
number from the log book. He didn’t expect anyone to answer, but if they did, it
would make his confirming questions easier to ask.

 

He listened to the bell at the other end. Someone picked up. “Major Richter’s office.”

 

“I am hoping to ask Major Richter some questions,” said Ren. “I’m looking into the
death of the Hazard Scouts.”

 

“Hold on,” said the voice. A switch sounded to show the line was being changed.

 

“This is Ricther.” This voice sounded more precise. 

 

“My name is Ren,” said Ren. “I am helping Martin Morgan look into the deaths of his
fellow Hazard Scouts. I noticed that there is an entry for a Captain Mercer as a
contact. I was wondering if you knew him.”

 

“A Captain Mercer from ten years ago in this department?,” said Ricther. “First
name?”

 

“It’s not listed in the log book,” said Ren. “He had two earlier calls about problems
on Pearl Harbor and Midway. They concerned a joint project with Watson Security.”

 

“That narrows things down a bit,” said Ricther. “Do you want to hold on, or let me
call you back?”

 

“I imagine it will take some time to verify what I have said,” said Ren. “We’ll be here
at the Scouts base for a bit longer before we move on to follow up on other leads. Do
you still have the number?”

 

“Yes, I have it,” said Ricther. “I’ll call when I have something.”

 

“Thank you, Major,” said Ren. He hung up the phone. “Major Ricther said he hadn’t
heard of anyone named Mercer. He is hoping to look him up in the personnel files for
us.”

 

“Do you believe him?,” asked Marty.

 

“Did he believe me?,” said Ren. “He has no reason to help us on the basis of our short
conversation. I expect him to call back with something, or send someone out here to
talk to us in person.”

 

“I see what you’re saying,” said Marty. “We might have a unit of infantry coming to
confirm our identities.”

 

“If he calls back, we might have something we can use,” said Ren. “At the very least,
he can confirm or deny that Mercer worked in his branch of the government. That will
give us something.”

 

“You think Mercer wasn’t a real government official?,” asked Marty. That would go
with everything else they had discovered so far.

 

“There are various possibilities in play,” said Ren. “We have to rule some of them
out. Confirming a government connection will help us narrow down our suspect
pool.”

 

“What happens if he wasn’t government?,” asked Marty.

 

“Then we’ll have to trace down this alias until we hit a dead end,” said Ren. “Then
we fall back on the more obscure evidence that we have already gathered.”

 

“So everything depends on this Major believing you are who you say you are,” said
Marty. He rubbed his forehead.

 

“Yes,” said Ren. “I think he will help.”

 

“Why would he?”, asked Marty.

 

“His name is in the log book the most right before the Scouts were ambushed,”
explained Ren. “I feel that he had enough of an arrangement with your partners that
he would want to know what happened to them.”

 

“All right,” said Marty. “That makes sense.”

 

“Now I am going to take a nap and meditate about everything we have learned.” Ren
nodded at his partner. “If Ricthner has something, I am sure he will call back in a few
hours.”

 

“There are some guest rooms.” Marty led the way to a set of stairs. “They’ll probably
be dusty.”

 

Marty headed down the stairs. He stopped in a hall like any of the other halls they
passed. He went down until he reached the fifth door. He pushed it open. Dust
covered everything, but the bed didn’t have a sheet or blankets.

 

“I’ll get you a blanket from the closet.” Marty turned and walked down the hall.
He opened a door and grabbed a blanket off the shelf. He shook it out, and carried
it back. He handed it over. “This should do for the amount of time we’ll be here.”

 

“Thank you,” said Ren. “I appreciate it.”
//87832

[csyphrett]

Revenge of the Scouts

1979-

7

Thingamabob rubbed his face as he waited. Corona had been dangerous because of
her natural energy powers. The guy they were after now was dangerous because he
was more machine than a living creature. He should be easy pickings for Bob’s
gizmo, but if they were wrong, things could get out of hand quick.

 

He went over the plan in his head. He didn’t see any flaws. That didn’t mean
anything. There were always flaws in plans. You found them when you tried to put
the plan in motion.

 

Hopefully his comrades would compensate and get things done. He didn’t need a
lecture from the higher-ups.

 

“I got contact, Bob,” reported Gaze. “Target is below us in the sewer.”

 

“Give us direction, Gaze.” Bob nodded at the others. “We’re going to have to draw
him out so we can deal with him.”

 

“It looks like it’s just hovering in place.” Gaze sounded bothered. “This thing looks
like a flying octopus. Are you sure this is the target?”

 

“Yeah,” said Bob. “Let me have a second before we go after this thing. I need to
think.”

 

The attack on Corona had been simple. She flew patrols over Detroit. They were
regular, and out in the open. It had been easy to track her back to her starting point.

This machine hid out under Chicago. There were literally miles of tunnels and other
things since the new version of the city had been built on the old versions of the city.
If they went into the tunnels after the thing, they would be letting it have home field
advantage and losing the element of surprise.

 

Did he want to roll the dice, or go to target number three and hope she was easier to
take than a flying metal octopus?

 

“This is the plan,” said Bob. He hated the solution he saw to his problem. It involved
a lot of personal risk he didn’t think should be taken by him. “Puff is going to drop
me on the target, or as close to the target as he can. I shoot the target with the EMP.
The target is down. Puff gets Troop. Troop carries the octopus to the closest exit and
turns it over to Mercer. Any questions?”

 

“What happens if the EMP doesn’t work?,” asked Clown Girl.

 

“Then we have to slug it out with this thing until it goes down, or the police show
up.” Bob didn’t like that. He wanted things to work smoothly and quickly. If they
were engaged until the police showed up, that ran the risk of exposure.

 

“All right,” said Gaze. “It’s moving. It’s headed our way.”

 

“Puff?,” asked Bob. He readied the EMP built into his gadget.

 

“I have to get a look at the lay of the land. I can’t just blow in there blindly. That
would be bad. I don’t want to lose a limb. I don’t want to lose my head. I like my
head, Bob,” said Puff. He didn’t pause between sentences, but the others were used
to his rapid fire speech.

 

“Don’t tell me about it,” said Bob. “Do it.”

 

Puff vanished in a cloud of smoke. He returned a moment later. He smiled.

 

“I have a spot ahead of the thing. I don’t know if it saw me. It might have, but I was
only there for a second. It might think I was some kind of echo. Ready to go?,” said
the teleporter.

 

“Yes,” said Bob.

 

Puff grabbed him and the world vanished in a haze of fog. The cloud pushed out of
the way and he was standing in the dark. A light hovered in front of him. He didn’t
hesitate. He commanded the gadget to fire.

 

The beam struck the machine as it raised its many arms, cylinder of a head turning to
orientate on the new threat. It crashed to the floor of the tunnel.

 

“Get Troop.” Bob aimed his device at the machine and took a reading. He saw that
the machine was trying to power up. “Hurry up.”

 

Puff vanished. He reappeared with Troop in his grasp.

 

“This thing is trying to come back to life,” said Bob. “We need to get it in the cage
before it does that.”

 

Troop multiplied down the tunnel until he reached a ladder leading up on the street.
More of him grabbed the downed robot and he began to pass it along the line as fast
as he could.

 

“Gaze,” said Bob. His radio crackled with static. “Puff, have Gaze guide Mercer to
wherever the exit is. He needs to be ready with the cage quick.”

 

“Got it, boss. You can count on me. Be there in a jiffy.” Puff vanished.

 

“If that thing wakes up, Troop,” began Bob. “Bash it if you have to. We can’t let it
have an idea who we are and then let it escape.”

 

The simian at the end of the line next to Bob nodded in understanding. He doubted
he could do that much against that many arms, but he had a lot of arms himself.

 

One of the tentacles started twitching. Bob followed the line of Troops, using his
gadget to keep an eye on the readings from the machine. They were cutting it close.

 

The manhole cover flipped out of the way as Troop started handing the machine up
the ladder. Human soldiers stood around the opening in the street. They pulled the
thing through the hole with some work.

 

Troop grabbed Bob by the waist and handed him down the line as the duplicates
shrank to a single simian strongman. They handed him up to the street before pulling
themselves up out of the tunnel and into one creature.

 

Mercer’s mercenaries had the thing in the specially designed cage in the back of a
moving truck. They pulled a switch and the cage was bolted down between two
magnetic walls. If that wiped the programming, that would be too bad. Reports
showed the thing was too dangerous without something set up to keep it at bay.

 

Bob was glad it was loaded in the moving truck. That meant for him, the mission was
over. He had to move on to the last target.

 

If Mercer lost the machine, that was on him. The Squad was free of any
responsibility.

 

“Load up,” ordered Mercer. “We have to get this thing back to a proper cage.”

 

The door on the truck closed with guards mounted inside the load compartment.
Mercer watched as the driver and the last guard got the truck on the road and headed
south. A black jeep rolled up to pick him up. A black SUV rolled behind the moving
truck and kept pace.

 

“Tell the guards to keep an eye on that thing,” said Bob. “It was trying to shake off
the EMP discharge while we were getting it out of the tunnel.”

 

“That can’t be good.” Mercer climbed into the jeep. “I’ll let them know. I’ll call you
when we get to the last target site.”

 

“I’ll be waiting for it,” said Bob. He nodded his head as the jeep rolled away after the
other vehicles.

 

“That went better than I thought,” said Gaze. Puff dropped him on the street with Bob
and Troop.

 

“I didn’t expect the reset,” said Bob. “It was almost like it wasn’t a robot at all.”

 

Puff dropped Clown Girl with the others. He vanished. He reappeared with a cup of
soda in his hand.

 

“Let’s head back to the hotel,” said Bob. “We have to head to Seattle to plan to pick
up our last target before we can take a vacation.”

 

“This Finch doesn’t look so tough. I bet Clown Girl can beat her. Do I really have to
go? I want a vacation now,” said Puff. He sipped his drink loudly.

 

“That’s the job,” said Bob. “Now let’s get a car and get moving. We can’t stand here
looking stupid all our lives.”

 

“All right,” said Puff. “I’ll get a car. I do all the work around here anyways. I am the
greatest.”

 

“I think I can take this Finch,” said Clown Girl.

 

“We’re not going to do anything like that.” Bob made a face. “If we have to fight her,
then we have failed the mission.”

 

“And I don’t think we want to give her a fair fight,” said Gaze.

 

“Who fights fair?,” said Clown Girl, smiling.

 

Troop made a hand gesture. His eyebrows wiggled.

 

“Shut it, you damn dirty ape,” said Clown Girl with a grin.

 

A van rolled up. Puff rolled down the driver’s window. He waved a hand for them
to get in.

 

“Move over,” said Bob. He pulled open the door of the van. “I’m driving.”

 

Puff vaulted into the shotgun seat. He muttered to himself as he strapped the seatbelt
down.

 

The rest of the Squad got in the back.

 

“We’ll pack up and check out of the hotel.” Bob drove leisurely away from the
battle scene. “Then we’ll catch a flight out to Seattle, settle in, and figure out
where we can ambush Finch.”

 

“Can’t we get some sleep first?,” said Clown Girl. “I would like to take a night to
relax before we have to chase down some other power for the boss.”

 

“I agree with Clown Girl,” said Gaze. “There’s no point in setting up when we have
to wait on Mercer to escort our prisoner back to base.”

 

Troop silently nodded.

 

“What about you, motor mouth?,” said Bob. He looked over at Puff.

 

The man in purple fell silent for a second. He shook in his chair for a second.

 

“I think we should take five. I think we need to be on the top of our game. This Finch
might be better than us. She might be able to knock all of us out,” said Puff. He
shrugged. “A night off before we take her on couldn’t hurt us by relaxing.”

 

“All right,” said Bob. He didn’t need them balking when he needed them working.
“We’ll take the rest of the night off and fly out tomorrow.”

 

“Thanks, boss,” said Clown Girl. “I knew you would make the right decision.”

 

“What if I had made the wrong decision?,” asked Bob. He didn’t know if he wanted
to hear the answer.

 

“I have a bag for that,” said Clown Girl.

 

Puff made a throat cutting gesture while trying to keep it from the people in the back.

 

“What was that?,” Clown Girl asked. Her voice had a querulous tinge to it.

 

“Nothing, nothing,” said Puff. “I wouldn’t say anything. You are a beautiful human
being.”

 

He turned to look out the window of his door. He made the throat cutting gesture
again.

 

Bob smiled slightly.

 

“That’s what I thought,” said Clown Girl.

 

Bob turned and headed for the hotel.

 

The Squad were silent except for Puff. He muttered to himself as he watched
the scenery go by. Bob pulled into the underground garage of the hotel. He parked
close to the door so they could get to the elevators and stairs with minimum exposure.

Puff vanished before the others could get out of the van.

 

“He talks to himself too much, Bob,” said Gaze.

 

“I know, but we need him,” said Bob. “We wouldn’t have handled the robot as easy
as we did without him.”

 

“One day he’s going to snap,” said Gaze. “We might have to put him down ourselves
if that happens.”

 

“When we get done, I’ll have him sit down with the Docs,” said Bob. He got out
of the van. “If the boss pulls his plug, that’s what we will do.”

 

“Okay,” said Gaze. “I’ll keep my eye on him.”

 

“Right,” said Bob. “Let’s go up to our rooms and get some sleep.”

 

“Yes,” said Gaze.

 

The Squad crossed the garage. They headed up the stairs. They didn’t want to
explain themselves to passengers on an elevator. They climbed up to their floor.

Gaze had the room next to the stairs. He slipped inside his room, pulling back his
hood as he shut the door.

 

The rest walked the hall, separating as they reached their hotel doors. Bob was last
as his room was at the end of the hall next to a window looking out on the city.

 

He pulled off his green costume and packed it away before heading for a shower.
He planned to be asleep afterward.
 

[csyphrett]

Revenge of the Scouts

1979-

8

Marty inspected his work. He smiled. He had not thought that he could get animals
to help with basic cleaning chores, but it had worked out well. The base looked better 
after the time put in to get it back in shape.

 

Between chores, he had gone down the mountain and picked up some supplies. He
didn’t know how long they were going to be at the base, but the ten year old food
stored in the larder for the team couldn’t be safe to eat.

 

It was better to get fresh stuff and throw the old stuff in the incinerator. The food was
a waste in any case. He should have returned before this, but had kept moving around.

Occasionally he would stop in a safe house for a night, or two. Then he would move
on.

 

Ren had taken over one of the empty labs while they waited for the Major to call
back. The apprentice had set their evidence out in a display on a table. He walked
around it, studying it while they waited for the phone to ring. It looked like a giant
puzzle with more than a few pieces missing to Marty.

 

“If we had a motive, things would be clearer,” Ren said as he walked around the
table.

 

“It seems like someone paid Mercer to make the call to lure us to Idaville,” said
Marty. “If we knew who that was, maybe the motive would come.”

 

“I doubt it was anyone in the government,” said Ren. “The Hazard Scouts produced
good publicity whenever they arrived on the scene of a disaster.”

 

“That still leaves half of the world.” Marty shook his head. “The only one we can rule
out is Cortez. Jim ruled him out at the attack, and he hasn’t been seen since the last
time we dealt with him.”

 

“That seems odd,” Ren frowned at that bit of information. “Are you sure?”

 

“Yes,” said Marty. “He hasn’t done anything since we crashed his volcano explosion
scheme. That was one of the reasons we went to Idaville in the first place. Mercer said
he had contact with Cortez’s forces there.”

 

Ren added that information to his puzzle. It formed a block with years marked on it.
He would have thought Cortez would put any scheme in action with the deaths of his
nemesis.

 

The phone rang. Ren nodded as he went to the old style wall unit at the door to the
lab. Maybe this was more pieces in the puzzle.

 

“Hello,” said Ren. “How are you?”

 

“Fine,” said Major Ricther. “I did some digging. The Armed Services never had
problems like you described at Pearl, or Midway. But there was a company leasing
facilities that matches Watson Security. The owner is William Watson. I don’t have
any background on him. I talked to the base commanders that were stationed at those
places during the emergency calls. One of them identifies one of the men he dealt
with as a Captain Steven Mercer who he believed was bounced from the service. He
was surprised to see the man in with the rest of the detail he saw.”

 

“Can you find out why Captain Mercer was discharged?,” asked Ren.

 

“I already did,” said Ricther. “He was caught using his troops as a band of pirates and
mercenaries.”

 

“That’s interesting,” said Ren. “Do you know where he lives?”

 

“No, I don’t.” Ricther sighed into the phone. “We don’t keep track of people once
they are discharged. I can give you the last known address in his file. Other than that,
I don’t know how much more help I can be.”

 

“That would be helpful,” said Ren. “We will track him down and ask our questions.”

 

Ricther gave him the address listed for Mercer. He wished them the best of luck, and
hung up.

 

“I doubt he is there at that address, but I would like to look at it all the same.” Ren
hung up the phone and crossed to the table. He added another chip for Mercer with
the calls and the trap line to Idaville.

 

“So Mercer got our emergency line number, created some emergencies, and then
lured us into a trap,” said Marty. “And then made sure the trap sprung shut.”

 

“Being there in person is what gave it away to Mental.” Ren adjusted his table
displays slightly. “That’s how he lost his ring.”

 

“How do you want to handle this?,” asked Marty.

 

“We’ll go to the address and see if we can pick up his trail,” said Ren. “If we can’t,
we will resort to the ring and see if it will take us to where we want to go.”

 

“Sounds good to me,” said Marty. “We won’t have to use the griffin either.”

 

“We won’t,” asked Ren. “Why?”

 

“Because the Scout van is still in the hangar.” Marty smiled. “I already looked it over
and it still runs.”

 

“So we can drive instead of flying,” said Ren. “That’s great. Griffin flying is hard
on the butt.”

 

“I know,” said Marty. “When do you want to go?”

 

“Let’s get something to eat,” said Ren. “Then we can get started.”

 

“Sounds fine to me.” Marty led the way to the kitchen. “What happens if Mercer
won’t tell us anything?”

 

“He’ll tell us something, whether he wants to, or not.” Ren rubbed his hands together.
“Every criminal leaves a trace, whether they know it, or not.”

 

“So this Watson could be the mastermind behind everything?,” said Marty. “How do
we prove that?”

 

“I don’t know yet,” admitted Ren. “I’m hoping that talking with Mercer will give us
enough to figure out Watson’s goals and if he went after the Scouts. A motive will
present itself when we know for sure he was involved.”

 

“He’s involved,” said Marty. “We need to know more about him, but I don’t know
who to ask for the information.”

 

“I don’t have extensive contacts to check on him,” admitted Ren. “I doubt he will
be in the newspapers.”

 

“Let’s ask Mercer,” said Marty. “Then we can check on what he says through the
newspapers. Maybe we can find a connection that way.”

 

“Maybe,” said Ren. “Let’s eat, and forget the mystery for the moment. Maybe
something will present itself after we are done.”

 

“All right,” said Marty. “I can do that.”

 

The two fixed themselves food from the supplies, talking about other cases. Marty
talked about the time the Scouts had helped put out a forest fire in California. His part
was creating firebreaks with an elephant. That had been his biggest animal at the
time.

 

Ren told him of a mystery he had worked on with his mentor. Someone named Nachi
was smuggling women into Japan to use as slaves. They had tracked the ring down,
and busted it. The women were returned to their own countries.

 

Nachi had tried to hide behind contracts. It was quickly proven that the contracts
didn’t entitle him to kidnap people from other places.

 

Marty cleaned up his mess after he was done. He shook his head after the story. He
had dealt with similar people. They didn’t think anything was wrong with what they
were doing. Other people didn’t matter.

 

This case might be of the same stripe. He didn’t like that. It meant his friends
had been killed for some nebulous goal instead of some personal animosity.

Personal animosity seemed better in his mind.

 

When he found Watson, he planned to show him how he felt about it.

 

Ren cleaned up his own mess in silence. His mind seemed to be on his own past
dealings with criminal masterminds.

 

“I have to use the bathroom,” said Marty. “Then I’ll get the van ready to go.”

 

“No worry,” said Ren. “I have to make sure I have all I need when we talk to
Mercer. I doubt he will tell the truth if we ask him questions without some kind of
threat.”

 

“I would hope I’m threat enough,” said Marty.

 

Ren shook his head.

 

“I have threatened people before,” said Marty. He left the room to head to his old
quarters.

 

Ren went back to his evidence room. He wanted to use the truth as leverage. If he
had to use one of Marty’s animals, he would.

 

Learning the truth had become paramount.

//91285