Yesterday's Heroes (Consortium of Chaos Book 1) (46 page)

Dauntless shook his head in pity
and disbelief.  “You just never could stay down could you?  Look at you!?! 
You’re a walking corpse!  I’ve already killed you son, you just don’t know it
yet.”  He kicked Wyatt in the stomach and Wyatt fell back, skidding into the
center of the street again.  “Your problem has always been that you lack
vision, Wyatt.  You can’t see the truth in my plans for the world, and you
can’t see that it would be best for you if you just laid still and let this be
over quick.”

He grabbed Wyatt by the front of
the shirt and offhandedly tossed him into the side of a panel truck.  Wyatt
flew through one side and out the other.  He slammed into the wall of a
building and heard something snap.  A broken leg.  Maybe two.  Well, no
matter.  It wasn’t like he’d be dancing anytime soon anyway.  He had at
BEST
another minute or two to live.  At this point, the less time he had left the
better.

He slumped to the ground.

Dauntless casually walked over to
him and bent down to pick him up. Wyatt formed an ax and swung it at him. 
Dauntless didn’t even bother to block it and the energy shattered as it
impacted his neck.  “Oh, would you STOP with that?  It’s not going to work, son. 
Give it up.  You’re embarrassing yourself; die with some dignity.”

He hauled him to his feet again by
his tie, and dragged him back into the street.  By this time Wyatt was having
difficulty seeing since both of his eyes were swollen shut and were covered in
blood.  He was having trouble breathing as he had a broken nose and several
broken ribs, and probably a punctured lung.  Couldn’t walk because his legs
were broken, and he still couldn’t use his right arm very well.  Yes. 
THIS
was more how he expected the fight to go.

Dauntless held Wyatt’s upper body
up off the street by the front of his uniform.  “I really didn’t want to do
this, you stupid little punk!”  He slammed a hand down into Wyatt’s face.  “I
WANTED to be inside thinking about how many of your new friends I’m going to
kill.”  He punched him again, and Wyatt felt a stream of blood and one of his
teeth fly out onto the street.  “I wanted to be thinking about the changes I’m
going to make to my city.  Protect it from villains like you and the Consortium.”

He punched him again and Wyatt
struggled to stay conscious.  He didn’t know why it mattered though.  Being
awake simply meant feeling this.  Better to just die now…

Dauntless shook him.  “
Don’t you
die on me yet!  I’m not done with you!”
  He punched him in the stomach. 
“See…this is
MY
town.  They’re going to build monuments to me.  Statues. 
Maybe even one right here.  Of this.  And a little plaque which reads: “On this
spot died a stupid motherfucker who pissed off the wrong guy!”

Wyatt’s vision suddenly snapped
into focus.  A smile slowly crossed his face, and then he started laughing; his
split bloody lips pulled wide into a genuine grin.  Fucking Peter, man.  He
always had the best ideas.

Dauntless frowned.  “What are YOU laughing
at?  What could POSSIBLY be funny about being beaten to death?”

Wyatt howled with laughter,
realizing that this was the end.  He had finally reached the finish line.  At last. 
“You want a statue so bad, asshole?  Do you?  Why wait…?”  Tears of pain,
relief and mirth streaked down his face.  “…
I’ll give it to you right now
!”

Wyatt focused everything he had…more….on
what he knew he had to do.  His head began to hurt from the concentration and
he felt something break loose, but he no longer cared.  The blood roared in his
ears and he gritted his teeth against the pain.  He pressed a hand against the
center of Dauntless’ chest.  The other man looked down at him.  “What in the
hell are y…?”

His words were cut off as he no
doubt felt something peculiar in his stomach.  He staggered back and dropped
Wyatt to the ground, but Wyatt kept his focus.  Dauntless looked down at
himself in shock and then back at Wyatt.  Wyatt smiled.  “Your skin may be
impervious to harm, but your insides sure as hell aren’t.”  He held out his
other hand and felt blood begin to pour from his nose from the strain.  He rose
up onto his broken knees in an effort to project more power into the other man. 
“You were right, Rog.  There is no ‘I’ in team.  And now?  Now
there’s no ‘U.’”

Dauntless screamed as the telekinetic
object inside him got bigger and bigger; Wyatt scream joined his as the pain in
his head got more and more intense.  The object inside Dauntless became one
inch…then six…two feet…four…

There was a terrible ripping sound and
the larger man literally exploded; his torn flesh and blood cascading around
the street and coating the nearby cars and buildings, as the object inside him
burst forth from his body.  Wyatt fell backwards in relief as he no longer had
to focus, and stared up at the large statue made of telekinetic energy which
had erupted from the Captain’s form.  A life-size depiction of himself and
Peter standing over Dauntless’ body, with a little plaque that read: “
On
this spot died a stupid motherfucker who pissed off the wrong brothers.
”

He reached a shaky, no doubt broken
hand into his pocket, and tossed a wrinkled bloody card from Peter’s memorial
service onto the monument.  He reached in again and pulled out the last letter
and squinted down at it. 
“You run a hell of a race, Rabbit.  Good job, and
thanks for always being there for me.  Later, P.”

And it was done.  It was finally
done.

Wyatt smiled and tried to pull
himself to his feet, but found that he couldn’t.  He focused again and created
a pair of crutches and tried to walk away.  He got two steps before collapsing
onto the street and the darkness took him.

Done.

The
Beasts of the field and forest had a Lion as their king.  He was as gentle as a
king could be.  During his reign he made a royal proclamation for a union of
all the birds and beasts, in which the wolf and the lamb, the dog and the cat,
the tiger and the stag, the dog and the hare, should live together in perfect
peace.  The hare said, “Oh, how I have longed to see this day, in which the
weak shall take their place with impunity by the side of the strong.”  And after
he said this, the hare ran for his life.

Wyatt came to with his face in the
gutter.

Well…that was interesting.  He
hadn’t actually
anticipated
waking up at all.  He had figured that he
was a goner.  An unexpected, but very much appreciated surprise.  At least now
he might get to see Angel again and…  His vision cleared…Wait….nope…..scratch
that.

Ahead of him, half a dozen heroes
walked out of the building, moving some sort of huge machine behind them.  They
stopped and stared at the new statue sitting in the middle of the street. 
Wyatt frowned.  Odd that his creation had remained there.  He wasn’t thinking
about it anymore, so he had NO idea why it was still around.  Weird.

The heroes caught sight of him and
stalked forward.  He swore and pulled himself to his feet.  He winced at the
intense pain from his broken legs and leaned against a stack of moving pallets sitting
on the sidewalk.

The lead hero pointed at him…Wyatt
frowned as he realized that he didn’t know that guy.  Must be new, or some sort
of hero scab that the Freedom Squad had brought in from the dregs of the city’s
Cape community to fill a void that the series of arrests had caused.  Damn.  If
the Squad was up to full strength again, this was
not
going to be a good
day.  Not that it had really been stellar before, but now it promised to get
worse.

“I’m going to KILL you!  That man
was like a
father to me!”

Wyatt limped into the street again,
his legs feeling like jelly and his eyes almost swollen shut.  “You get…get
used to being an orphan, kid.  I did.”

“You’re beat to fuck, man.”  The other
man’s fists began to glow.  “Even at a hundred percent you were never a match
for me.”

Wyatt sighed, already playing this
fight out in his head.  Nope.  Kind of ironic that he killed the world’s most
powerful man, and now he was going to die fighting these nobody assholes.  It
would almost be funny…except it wasn’t.  He reached for a letter, but then
remembered that he had opened them all.  His brother wasn’t going to be
providing him with help, ever again.  The thought almost brought him to tears. 
Or it might have been the pain from his punctured lung.  Whichever, he felt completely
alone.

Wyatt hacked flecks of blood out
onto the street and tried to form some sort of weapon.  He couldn’t concentrate
though, and the knives her fashioned kept disappearing.  He frowned.  Fuck it. 
He bent down and picked up a bottle and broke it on the hood of a car.  His
eyes narrowed as he prepared for the end…again.  “Yeah, that’s what your ‘
Dad’
thought too, and look what I did to him.”  He gestured at the man to come
closer.  “
Let’s go.
”

Then, he heard the familiar sound
of high-heeled boots behind him. 
Oh, thank God
.  He collapsed to the street,
again.  Harlot was here, and she’d save him.  He had no doubt that she was
capable enough to kill all these jackasses if it came down to that.  He’d seen
that girl in action, and had always suspected that she could kick
his
ass
if she needed to, so this should be no problem for her.  Which was good,
because he was about to pass out.

************

Harlot hurried up the street
towards Wyatt just in time to see his legs go out from under him.  The hero
with the glowing hands continued towards him.  She yanked out her grappling
hook gun and pulled the trigger; the hook shot out and caught the man in the
face, breaking his nose.  He tumbled backwards onto the street, swearing.

She closed the distance between
herself and Wyatt, and looked down at him.  Oh God!  Oh God he was dead! 
She
was too late!

Then he coughed and proved that he
was still alive…SOMEHOW.  She had never seen anyone beat that bad.  His split
lips slowly smiled at her.  “…My…my hero…Knew you’d never…miss Prom…”

She laughed in relief, blinking
back tears.  “Jesus, Wyatt.  You look TERRIBLE, baby! 
Look what they did to
your beautiful face!”
  She glanced around.  “Where’s Dauntless?  I’m going
to KILL him for this!”

His sharp laugh turned into a
series of coughs.  “
Think…think I still got some of him on my shoe…”

She laughed again and kissed his
forehead.  “Good.  Good job.”  She glanced over her shoulder.  “Don’t worry. 
I’ll get you out of here, and we’ll go home and everything will be fine. 
You’ll see.”

His breath started to come out in
wheezes.  “Yeah…Everything’s fine now…”  He smiled.  “…Wan…wanna help look for
my missing tooth…when you get the chance?”

More heroes helped their fallen
companion to his feet and they stalked towards them.  There were FAR too many
for her to fight on her own, even if she HAD powers, which she obviously didn’t.

“Well, thanks for the rescue.”  He
coughed again.  “Would have…would have probably been better if…you had a plan
on getting us OUT of here, but hey.  You’re new to heroism, and it’s the
thought that counts.”

She kissed his forehead.  “I
always
have a plan, Wyatt.”

“God…you sound so much cooler when
you say that than I ever did.  From now on, I’m putting you in charge of all
our heroic missions.  Provided we actually survive
this one
, that is. 
My brilliant plan involved getting the shit kicked out of me by a maniac, and
then dying in the street.  Something tells me that your plan is going to work
better.”

“Well, it would be hard for it to
work
worse
, honey.  Suicide is pretty much the bottom of the barrel as
far as plans go.”

“Hey!  It worked, didn’t it?”

“Oh yeah.  Worked perfectly.”  She
smoothed his rain soaked hair from his bruised forehead.  “Worked like a
charm.”

The heroes advanced on them.  She
stood up and braced herself in front of Wyatt’s fallen form, preparing for a
fight.  Wyatt tried to sit up some and reached for a broken piece of wood lying
nearby.  She smiled down at him.  Had to hand it to him; he never gave up.  He
was seriously going to try to take on a dozen super-heroes with a broken leg
from an end-table, even with his dozen shattered bones.  The man really was a
hero.

Their opponents surrounded the area
in front of them.  The man with the glowing fists laughed at her as more and
more heroes joined the crowd.  “You gotta be like the toughest little bitch in
the world if you think you can take all of us.  Fabricator’s
done
. 
You’re in this ALONE girl.  All alone.”

Suddenly there was a loud explosion
and the hero with the glowing fists all but detonated, the remains of his body
were propelled into the side of a parked car ten yards away.  All eyes turned
to an alleyway to her right where Poacher was stepping out of the shadows,
casually reloading his elephant gun and training it on the remaining heroes.  “Whoever
said she came alone?”

He father appeared behind her,
alone with several dozen members of the Consortium and the Excessive Force.  He
jumped up onto a car parked in the middle of the street, and raised his voice
to address the faces visible in the windows of the buildings around them, and
to the TV camera a reporter had trained on them.  “I am Commodore Cruel,
confidential cognomen: Carl Calvin Ceigh.  I chat with you to confirm that the
current caste in charge of our civilization is a corrupt cancer, and must be
challenged.  Consequently, my civilized companions and I have chosen to change
things!  We currently champion the cause of caring, not cruelty; commiseration,
not a consecution of crooked capers; and that will cut to the core of this
conundrum.  These conceited counterfactually ‘courageous’ creeps and their
cunning, caped and crafty, completely
consciousless
Captain, have
concealed the correct circumstances from this city, and I shall communicate
them to you with considerable candor.  That confederacy’s conation is to
control you and your children!  They seek a clean sweep of all clear
considerations, and to capture you in the crippling chains of conquest, by
cooking up a calamity and conferring themselves carte blanche to crush and
consume your convictions.  This I confess, I cannot consent to.  Thus, the
Consortium of Chaos comes to a crossroads and our classic calamitous creed is
cast aside, and this cosmopolitan county’s conservation crosses into the
coverage of OUR charge now, and if anyone cracks its couplings, it shall be MY
company which commits the crime; not these contemptible cowards!  We lay claim
to the complete cosmos; its citizenry and constructions.  This is currently OUR
city, and we certainly shall cherish its contents and not contaminate it like
these callow cheats.  Citizens; collect your chattels and clasp those closest
to you, because there’s going to be a confrontation!  Cohorts; create corpses
of our competitors, and cast them to the carpet for the carrion collectors!  We
shall conquer or crumble!  Carry the course or be condemned to life’s
conclusion!  Let the crusade of carnage commence, comrades! 
Charge!
”

The group of villains charged the
group of heroes, and the sounds of battle filled the intersection.  Wyatt coughed
and pointed to her father.  “You…you HAD to notice it
THAT
time!  There
were…like a hundred of them!”

She frowned.  “Hundreds of what?” 
She looked up at her father.  “I think he’s hallucinating or something, Daddy. 
He’s not making sense.”

The Commodore hopped down from the
car and looked down at Wyatt’s broken form.  “Considering the circumstances,
your condition is considerably less
cadaverous
than I contemplated. 
Congratulations!”

Wyatt coughed and was silent for a
beat.  “You know, Sir, talking to you really makes me wish you were in charge
of writing those
Wheel of Fortune
puzzles.  I could win every time
simply by guessing one letter.”

The Commodore shook his head sadly. 
“I find you constantly confusing.  I have a crack at conversing, and you
consistently convey curious comments in all our conversations.  What do they
connote?”  He rearranged his hat and looked down at her.  “Cupcake, you have
chosen a charming chap, despite the customary challenge of his continuing
craziness.  I celebrate your courtship.”  He pulled out his cutlass and stalked
down the street to help out the others.  “I must clear out to cut those cads
down.”  He kissed her forehead.  “
Be careful, children
.  Ciao!”

She smiled at him.  “You too,
daddy.”

She began trying to deal with the
most serious of Wyatt’s wounds as the battle continued.  Several members stood
watch over them as she tended to him.  Poacher continued looming in the
alleyway, and fired off another round from the elephant gun; a flying hero was
blasted out of the sky and fell onto a hot dog cart.

There was deafening roar and
Redline joined the fight.  Now that Dauntless was dead, he was the powerhouse
of the Freedom Squad team; a giant crimson monster of scales and claws.  He
barreled through the line of officers of the Excessive Force, talons slashing.  A
civilian car came around the corner and screeched to a stop in front of the
creature.  A man stumbled out and stared up at the monster as it barreled down
on him.  Mauldin swore and raced from the alleyway towards the man, waiving her
hands for him to get back.  “MOVE! 
For god’s sake move your ass!”

The monster continued charging
towards the bystander.  Maude arrived a split second before he did, and pushed
the man out of the way to safety.  She turned in an effort to defend herself,
but it was too late.  Redline kicked out one clawed foot and slashed her open,
propelling her body into the side of the man’s car.  She slumped to the
ground.  Made a soft gurgling sound.  And was still.

Harlot was too shocked to say
anything.  Maude was…dead.  She’d never been overly close with the woman, but
she was still a friend.  She blinked.  Jesus.  She…was dead.  There was nothing
Harlot could do.  Holy God, Maude was dead…Harlot felt like throwing up…

The man in the car struggled to his
feet and began trying to give his dead rescuer first aid.  He was wasting his
time.  The girl had already bled out.  The man was still frantically trying his
best though, despite the fact that there was no hope.  No hope…

She looked down at Wyatt’s injuries
as all of this all became very, very real.  Wyatt was right.  People were going
to die; were ALREADY dying.  Her family was dying.  She willed the tears back
and tried to hold it together.  Now was not the time to grieve.  Keep it
together…keep it together…

Redline continued his advance and
zeroed in on Poacher.  Sydney eyed him coldly and loaded two more cartridges
into his elephant gun.  He took aim at the monster’s face…  Just as he was
about to pull the trigger though, a hairy man burst out of the sidewalk in
front of Harlot and Wyatt.  She screamed, and started to drag Wyatt away from
the attacker as more and more of the street fell away beneath them.  The hero’s
clawed hand appeared and started striking at them.  It tore a gash down her
leg, and Wyatt kicked him in the face.  There was silence for a second…and then
a deafening rifle report as the hero’s head was blown apart, and his body fell
back into the open hole.

Wyatt turned to give Poacher a weak
wave of thanks but before he could, Redline charged.   Sydney took aim with his
remaining barrel as the monster raced towards him, but there wasn’t enough time,
and Redline was on top of him in the blink of an eye.   He swung out a huge
clawed paw and knocked Poacher clean off his feet and through the wall of a
nearby building.  The elephant gun skidded down the street in the opposite
direction.  Debris rained down as Sydney crashed into the structure and disappeared
into its interior.  Redline sprang through the hole which Poacher’s body left
in the façade of the building, searching for his prey again.  He let out a
vicious growl and there were more dull thuds from what could only be him attacking
Poacher’s fallen body, followed by muffled grunts as the fight continued.