First storm, p.3
First Storm, page 3
“Is she still breathing?” I said, staring in amazement at Marie, who looked pretty good despite having been blasted straight out of the sky by my lasers.
“She seems to be,” said Rubberman, “but it’s hard to tell with her helmet on her face. Maybe if we remove it, we can see her face.”
Rubberman unwrapped one of his arms from around her body and reached out to remove her helmet. Just as his fingertips brushed against Marie’s helmet, however, her eyes suddenly flashed and she blasted him with an energy burst that sent Rubberman staggering. It also caused him to let go of Marie, but instead of attacking us again, Marie took off into the sky, flying as fast as she could away from us until she disappeared over the horizon toward downtown Golden City.
CHAPTER FOUR
Half an hour later, Rubberman and I pulled up in the Rubbermobile in front of the Golden City Community Center. That was a lot harder to do than you’d think. The community center’s parking lot, located between my suburb and downtown Golden City, was packed with cars from people who had fled their homes looking for answers and safety. Everywhere I looked, I saw frightened families huddling together or groups of people sitting around talking. There was a long line of people trying to get into the community center, which as far as I could tell was starting to reach max capacity already. Cars were even spilling out of the parking lot, being forced to park on the street or simply move on to look for somewhere else to hide. We were lucky we managed to find a parking space that didn’t require a five- or ten-minute walk to the community center.
Pulling up on the edge of the parking lot, I jumped out of the Rubbermobile and quickly scanned the growing crowd of citizens for James and my parents. I breathed a sigh of relief when I saw Jame’s truck parked near the front of the community center, although I didn’t see James or my parents. Maybe they had already entered the community center?
“Well, this is chaotic, isn’t it?” said Rubberman as he stepped out of the Rubbermobile and took in the scene in front of the community center. “Look at all of these people. Never seen so many at once at the community center.”
I pointed at James’ truck. “At least my family got here safely. That’s what I was worried about the most.”
Rubberman nodded, a deep frown on his face. “Yeah, but what happened back at your house? Where did Marie come from?”
I shrugged. “I don’t know. The Zero Knights somehow found out where I live, but oddly enough, didn’t know I was Beams. They thought it was either me or James.”
Rubberman scratched the back of his head. “That’s weird. I suppose their research must have been incomplete or something.”
“I guess,” I said with another shrug. “But how did you know I was in trouble without me calling you?”
Rubberman smiled grimly. “Before the energy barrier went up, another Squire, who called himself Orson, attacked my house before I even had breakfast. Even though I managed to beat him and send him packing, he mentioned that his partner, Marie, was going to your house to kill you, so I got to your house as fast as possible.”
“If they attacked your house, is the Elastic Cave no longer safe, either?” I said.
Rubberman shook his head. “No, the Elastic Cave is safe, probably safer than anywhere else in the city right now. At the moment, we need to focus on finding and defeating Mirar. Adams is back at the Elastic Cave to try to pinpoint Mirar’s location from his last broadcast, but I’m not sure how much luck he’s having. The Zero Knights appear to have technology advanced enough to hide their locations from even our advanced tracking equipment.”
“Meaning we might have to search the whole city for one Zero Knight?” I said in alarm. “In less than twenty-four hours, even? That doesn’t sound possible.”
“That’s because it isn’t,” said Rubberman, glancing up at the green energy barrier in the sky above. “And Mirar knows this. Remember, the Zero Knights are trying to kill everyone in the city. Making it easy to find and stop Mirar would go against their goals.”
My shoulders slumped. “So does that mean—”
“Rubberman! Beams!” came a loud, authoritative voice from behind us that made me jump. “Good to see you, lads!”
We both turned around to see Chief David Williams, the current police chief of the Golden City Police Department, walking up to us by himself. His normally carefully-maintained gray mustache was now somewhat messy, while his police uniform had clearly only been thrown on hastily. He also looked very tired and stressed out already, which I couldn’t blame him, given the circumstances.
“Chief Williams,” said Rubberman as Chief Williams approached us. “Surprised to see you here.”
“Well, I am the police chief,” said Chief Williams as he stopped before us. He gestured at the community center, where I saw several police officers trying to organize the mass of people trying to get into the building. “My officers and I have been doing our best to keep the crowds under control, but it is difficult because so many people are panicking. Everyone saw Mirar’s broadcast and everyone is looking for reassurance that everything is going to be all right. Was hoping you two might know more about where Mirar is so we can arrest him and put an end to this nonsense.”
Rubberman and I exchanged looks and Rubberman said to Chief Williams, “Well … we don’t know where Mirar is hiding any more than you do.”
Chief Williams’ eyes bulged. “What? But you two tend to be on top of this sort of thing. What do you mean you don’t know where he is?”
“It’s not like Mirar texted us his location so we could put it in the Rubbermobile’s GPS or anything like that,” I said, folding my arms in front of my chest. “He’s deliberately keeping himself hidden so we can’t stop him from killing everyone in the city.”
“Yeah,” said Rubberman, nodding. “We came here to regroup and figure out our next course of action, as well as to make sure people were safe.”
Chief Williams started to stroke his mustache worryingly. “Oh, dear. This is even worse than I thought. Do you think that perhaps Mirar was lying about his twenty-four-hour deadline? I mean, I don’t see how one man could possibly kill an entire city of people in one day all by himself.”
“Doubt it,” said Rubberman. “I fought one of his Squires earlier, who told me that the twenty-four-hour deadline is very real.”
Chief Williams already had a pale face, but his skin became pale as a corpse’s. “Are you telling me that we are all going to die and there’s nothing we can do about it?”
“Except stop Mirar,” I said, “which, I know, is easier said than—”
A tomato came out of nowhere and beaned me in the face. Luckily my helmet protected my face, but that just meant my visor got smeared with tomato juice. I wiped the tomato juice off my visor as Rubberman said, “Beams, are you all right?”
“Yeah, I am,” I said, grimacing at the smell of rotten tomato juice entered my nostrils, “but where did that tomato come—”
An apple flew out of nowhere at Rubberman, but he caught it with one hand and shouted back, “Hey, who threw that?”
“I did!” an angry voice snapped out from out of the crowd.
A middle-aged black man wearing a button-down short-sleeved shirt stepped out of the crowd. In his right hand he held an entire basket full of fruit that he was clearly planning to toss at us. He was a pretty skinny guy, with no visible muscle on his body, but he didn’t seem even remotely afraid of us. He glared at us like we had personally insulted his mother right to his face. Some of the people trying to enter the community center glanced at the man, but most of the people were still focused on getting into the community center.
“Sir?” said Rubberman, holding up the apple. “Is this your apple?”
“It is, but you can keep it,” the black man snapped. He pulled out a full-sized cabbage from his bag and held his arm like he was going to throw it at us. “’Cause this is all your fault!”
“My fault?” said Rubberman, exchanging puzzled glances with me and Chief Williams. “What are you talking about?”
The black man gestured at the green barrier in the sky above. “The barrier. The fact that we’re all gonna die in less than twenty-four hours. That’s y’all’s fault for killing that Slasher guy and pissing off all his friends.”
“Excuse me?” I said, stepping forward and glaring at the man. “Did you just say it was our fault that a supervillain has taken over Golden City and is trying to kill everyone here?”
“Yeah!” the man snapped. “I watched that broadcast. I heard Mirar say why he was doing this. He’s punishing all of us because of your actions. Therefore, it’s all your fault.”
The man was practically screaming now and his screams seem to have caught the attention of the crowd. Quite a few people were now looking at him. It was hard to tell the mood of the crowd, but half of the people seemed to support him while the other half seemed to think he was being unreasonable.
“Sir, I know you’re upset about this, but trust me, we’re even more upset than you are,” said Rubberman in a calm voice I’d never heard him use before. “We are trying to fix this situation as quickly as possible, but—”
“Yeah, right!” the man shouted. “Y’all don’t care about us! I heard you say you don’t know where the hell Mirar is. No way you can find him in a day. That means we’re all gonna die because of your actions!”
“Yeah!” a Hispanic woman from the crowd suddenly shouted. “Some superheroes you guys are, putting all of our lives in danger like this! My kids won’t even get to see their father, who’s out of town on a work call, tomorrow because of you!”
“Hey, it’s not their fault,” a young teenage white guy who stood next to the Hispanic woman snapped. “In case you hadn’t noticed, lady, Mirar was the one who sentenced us all to death, not Rubberman and Beams. They’re actually trying to help us.”
“He’s right,” said a middle-aged woman with her hair in a bun, holding hands with a man I assumed was her husband. “Rubberman and Beams have always kept us safe before. Yelling at them about something outside of their control is unfair.”
Suddenly, the entire crowd of people began yelling and screaming at each other, everyone calling everyone else names and trying to put the blame on whoever they could. There was no violence yet, but I could tell that the temperature of the crowd was heating up and it was only a matter of time before an all-out riot exploded among the people.
“Citizens!” Chief Williams yelled, trying to make his voice heard above the arguing crowd. “Please, calm down! We are doing our best to handle the situation, but—”
An ear-shattering honking sound suddenly blared through the air, the sound as loud as a cannon going off. It was loud enough to drown out the screaming people, causing them to look around to try to locate the source of the sound.
It was easy enough for me to find, though, because it came from the Rubbermobile, which I was standing next to. Rubberman was holding up the Rubbermobile’s key fob, his thumb on the button that made it honk, a serious frown on his face as the now-silent crowd of people looked at him.
“People of Golden City,” said Rubberman, raising his voice to be heard by all, “I know that this is a very stressful and tense situation for all of us. Indeed, this might be Golden City’s darkest hour. It’s certainly the darkest hour I’ve worked in Golden City since I started working here six years ago. All of us are stressed out, both by the knowns and unknowns about the situation. I even understand if you are angry at Beams and me for not doing enough. Trust me, I get where you’re coming from.”
Then Rubberman lowered the key fob to his side. “But I can assure you that we are taking this situation seriously. We will make sure not only to locate and stop Mirar, but also ensure that no one dies today. We will ensure that every single citizen in Golden City today will live long enough to see not only tomorrow, but every tomorrow afterward. I ask only that you keep calm and don’t fight among yourselves in the meantime.
“We’re all citizens of Golden City here. Some were born here, some moved here. Regardless, attacking each other is exactly what Mirar wants. But in times of fear and uncertainty like today, what we need to do is pull together as a community and stand strong, not point fingers and call each other names.”
“Yeah, but it’s still your fault,” the man with the fruit basket snapped. “If you hadn’t killed Slasher—”
“Lots of people would have died,” Rubberman responded, still keeping his tone calm. “In case you’ve forgotten what happened back then, Slasher killed tons of people and would have killed even more if we hadn’t stopped him. Despite being superheroes, our powers don’t include the ability to see into the future. There’s no way we could have predicted this, but if you can, perhaps you can spend less time yelling at us and more time using your clairvoyance to help us figure out how to find Mirar and save the city.”
That shut up fruit basket man pretty quick, though I could tell he was still annoyed with us.
“But I’m not asking anyone here to like me or Beams,” Rubberman continued. “I’m only asking that all of us stand together. Regardless of your opinion of me, I think we can all agree that fighting among ourselves is the least productive use of what little time we have left to solve this situation. Please respect your fellow citizens as much as possible and try your best to remain calm and upbeat. Again, we are working on stopping Mirar, but it’s easier to do that if we know that our fellow citizens still love each other and support each other in times like these.”
I had to admit even I was surprised by Rubberman’s impromptu speech, as he usually didn’t do this sort of thing. It seemed to work. The crowd of people, even the ones who hated us, looked a little ashamed at their prior fighting and arguing. No one said anything, but they started to file back into the community center anyway, following the directions of the harried-looking police officers. Some of them were muttering or talking amongst themselves, but the crowd didn’t seem nearly as stressed out or angry as before.
Fruit basket man, however, stayed where he was, glaring at us like he was trying to make us die from sheer hatred alone. Then he spat on the ground and rejoined the crowd, though based on the way he kept shooting death looks at us, I could tell Rubberman’s speech hadn’t done a thing to change his opinion of us.
Chief Williams sighed in relief. “Thanks for the speech, Rubberman. That situation could have ended so much worse.”
“No problem, Chief,” said Rubberman. He sighed as well, though in a more tired and defeated way. “It doesn’t really change the situation much, but—”
“People are just stressed, like you said,” said Chief Williams, taking off his hat and scratching his balding head. “I wouldn’t take anything they said personally, myself.”
I bit my lower lip. The people of Golden City generally liked Rubberman and me, so getting yelled at like that was a new experience for both of us. I knew that not everyone liked us, but it seemed that some people had decided to blame us for all their problems. I wondered if Mirar had intentionally mentioned that this was retaliation for Slasher’s death to turn the people against us. Wouldn’t put it past him. He seemed like the kind of person to do that.
The radio communicator in my helmet suddenly crackled and Adams’ Scottish voice could suddenly be heard, saying, “Mr. Pullman, Mr. Fry, are you there?”
“Yeah, we’re at the community center, Adams,” I said, putting my hand up to my ear. “What’s the matter?”
“Warden Garcia from the Golden City Penitentiary has called,” said Adams. “He has requested your presence at the prison. One of the prisoners would like to speak with both of you.”
Rubberman and I exchanged mystified looks. Golden City Penitentiary was the city’s main prison. It was full of criminals that Rubberman and I had put behind bars over the last year and a half, so we had a lot of enemies there who wanted to see us dead. It made me wonder who, out of all of our enemies, wanted to talk to us, especially now.
“Can it wait until later, Adams?” said Rubberman. “Beams and I are kind of busy dealing with Mirar.”
“Actually, it’s related to this whole Mirar business,” said Adams. “According to the Warden, the prisoner says she knows how to help us destroy the barrier.”
“She?” I said. “Who is it?”
“That’s the concerning part,” said Adams. “It’s Shawna Kenneth, Mr. Pullman. That is to say, the Necromantress. Your ex-wife.”
CHAPTER FIVE
Despite our skepticism, a five-minute drive down the nearly-packed streets of Golden City found us at the Golden City Penitentiary. The Warden, Richard Garcia, a portly middle-aged man with a goatee, met us at the entrance and led us directly to the Necromantress’ cell, which was located deep within the prison. We passed by many occupied cells on our way down, including more than a few prisoners I recognized. There was ZZZ, wearing a weird-looking metal collar, lying on his cot and glaring at us. We also passed Three Fingers, who was sitting on his own bed reading the Bible. He didn’t look up when we passed, but I sensed that he was aware of us anyway.
Like everywhere in Golden City, the air in the prison was tense. And not just because it happened to be home to Golden City’s most dangerous criminals, either. According to Warden Garcia, the prisoners had rioted when they saw Mirar’s broadcast, but the prison guards put an end to that pretty quickly. Of course, most of the prisoners had already assumed they would die in prison anyway, so there was a sense of resignation among most of them that there was no point in even attempting to escape from their cells. Perhaps that was a good thing—the last thing we needed was for the entire prison population of Golden City out on the streets—but somehow it also made it more urgent than ever that we stop Mirar.
“Here it is,” said Warden Garcia suddenly, stopping in front of a large metal door at the end of the hallway simply labeled ‘PRISONER 04.’ “Shawna Kenneth’s prison cell.”
