Just doing my job
folder
Original - Misc › Superheroes
Rating:
Adult +
Chapters:
25
Views:
2,355
Reviews:
4
Recommended:
0
Currently Reading:
0
Category:
Original - Misc › Superheroes
Rating:
Adult +
Chapters:
25
Views:
2,355
Reviews:
4
Recommended:
0
Currently Reading:
0
Disclaimer:
This is a work of fiction. Any resemblance of characters to actual persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental. The Author holds exclusive rights to this work. Unauthorized duplication is prohibited.
Road Trip
I’ve never liked teleportation.
Maybe it’s because I can’t do it myself, but I don’t like the idea of being instantly stripped down to my component atoms and transported immense distances in the blink of an eye, but I’ve never liked it.
But this time was different: when my vision returned from the second flash I was looking at someone I thought was dead.
“Hi Nathan.” Ren smiled, sitting on the bonnet of a beat up 4X4 in the middle of a desert, “Sorry we took so long, but there was no way we could get inside. We had to wait for you to get out somehow.”
“We?” I asked, still in shock at seeing her alive and well.
“Meet Artemus, an old friend of mine from my Paris days.” Ren explained, pointing at the short, dark haired man who was standing behind me, “Artie doesn’t talk much, in fact, hardly ever, but he’s the best thief alive.”
The man bowed, a smile on his face.
“What the hell happened?” I asked, still confused, “I thought you were killed by the blast.”
“Almost.” Ren held up the chaired remains of Dr. Lang’s teleporter, “Elegancy escape system: it detected the blast and bounced me half way around the world back to France. Wasted the power pack. Lang never told me about that little trick, and it makes me wonder what other secrets he had.”
“You’re complaining?” I asked with eyebrow raised, “Where the hell are we anyway?”
“New Mexico, about 100-miles outside Albuquerque.” Ren walked over with a bottle of water in her hand, “You look like you could use this.”
“How did you find me?” I asked, taking the bottle and pouring half the water over my head.
“A little luck and a lot of time spent on the internet: there are only so many places you can hide a large underground military complex, and the conspiracy theorists know about maybe half of them.” Ren smiled, walking back to the car, “We’d better get going before they come looking for us: we’re not that far from the base.”
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
The 4X4 bounced around as Ren drove at just under the speed limit, her eyes constantly scanning the horizon for signs of pursuit. We’d crossed the border into Arizona on some dirt track somewhere in the middle of nowhere, heading for a safe house Ren had set up in Flagstaff.
I’d questioned the logic of driving when we could have flow in a fraction of the time, but Ren had insisted that they’d be looking for a flyer, and that the best place to hide was in plain sight. By her way of thinking, the last place they’d look would be in a 10-year old 4X4 that looked like it had taken part in one too many destruction derby’s.
The crazy thing was, she was right.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Ren’s safe house turned out to be an abandoned warehouse on the outskirts of town. She’d somehow come up with fake ID’s that could pass all but the most stringent tests, but I’d long since stopped being surprised by what she could do.
“So, do we have a plan?” She asked, finishing off the pizza that had constituted our evening meal.
“No, not really.” I looked down at my plate: I didn’t feel hungry, yet somehow I was full of energy, “Take what we know to someone who can do something about it?”
“Like who?”
“The UN? It’s got to break half a dozen treaties.”
“You really think these guys couldn’t control the UN?”
“The Press?”
“They OWN the Press.”
“Luna.”
“Huh?”
“Luna. We get up to Armstrong City and take it to the Council. Lang was one of them, so they’re going to want some payback.”
“You really think they’ll be able to do anything?”
“The Luna Council is made up of ten of the most powerful superhumans alive.” I pointed out, dumping what remained of my dinner into the rubbish, “If they can’t deal with it, we’ve already lost.”
“But how do we get there?” Ren asked, opening a bottle of water, “Arty can’t teleport us that far.”
“Star City.” The Artemus said from behind the book he was reading.
“Huh?” I blinked, shocked at the first words I’d ever heard him say other than Yes or No.
“Star City, the Russian space-centre outside Moscow.” Artemus put his book down, “The security is less stringent than Florida or Australia. Our ID’s would probably get us through.”
“He’s got a point.” Ren nodded, “That’s how I got up to see Lang.”
“So all we have to do is get out of America un-noticed, sneak across the Pacific and into Russia, then across several time zones until we hit Moscow.” I asked, “This something you do often?”
“More often then you’d think.” Ren smiled, “We should get some sleep: tomorrow’s going to be a long day.”
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Ren hadn’t been kidding when she said it was going to be a long day.
By the time the sun cleared the horizon the next mourning, we’d crossed the border into Utah and where passing through the Zion national park on our way to Interstate 55 and all points north.
I’d taken over the driving duties from Artemus, allowing him some sleep in the back seat. Ren was already dozing in the passenger seat, her head resting on a folded up jumper pressed against the window. There was a faint smile on her lips, and she shifted occasionally, apparently dreaming.
I smiled myself, and concentrated on driving.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
We crossed into Idaho without any apparent problems; Ren’s fake ID’s doing their job on the border crossing.
The car started spluttering just as we entered Burley, a ‘city’ of some 9,400 people. The mechanic at the garage we took it to tried to fix it, but in the end declared that it was a lost course and recommended we found alternate transportation.
For want of anything better to do, we found a bench in a nearby park and sat.
“We could fly.” I suggested.
“No.” Ren shook her head, pulling out the map, “We’re too close to the air base as Mountain Home: they will have radar that could track us.”
“Can you teleport that far?” I asked Artemus, but he just shook his head, holding his hands as far apart as he could. The distance was obviously too great.
“I say we buy another car.” Ren opened her backpack and pulled out a roll of $100-bills, “Nothing fancy, just something that’ll get us to Seattle.”
“Then what?” I asked.
“Slow boat to Russia.”
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Ren somehow managed to exchange half our cash for a relatively sound Cadillac convertible. We could have gone for something cheaper, but she said that style was important and wanted to ride with the roof down.
How the car ever got across the mountain and into Washington Sate I’ll never know, but we finally found ourselves in the outskirts of Seattle a little over a week after setting out from Flagstaff. I hadn’t been on such a long car journey since I was a kid, and it was a very strange experience for someone who was used to moving a little faster.
Yet another of Ren’s safe houses, this one set up very recently, provided us with fresh clothes, some more money, and a chance to rest after too long cooped up in the car.
I was beginning to get a little worried about my health: ever since what ever happened in the underground base had happened, I felt like I was running on full charge, but I’d hardly eastern a thing, and I was sleeping less than normal. Under normal circumstances I would have gone to one of the doctors as SIU, but now I was a hunted man, I had no such recourses to call on.
I didn’t know what was going on, and that frightened me.
To Be Continued…
Maybe it’s because I can’t do it myself, but I don’t like the idea of being instantly stripped down to my component atoms and transported immense distances in the blink of an eye, but I’ve never liked it.
But this time was different: when my vision returned from the second flash I was looking at someone I thought was dead.
“Hi Nathan.” Ren smiled, sitting on the bonnet of a beat up 4X4 in the middle of a desert, “Sorry we took so long, but there was no way we could get inside. We had to wait for you to get out somehow.”
“We?” I asked, still in shock at seeing her alive and well.
“Meet Artemus, an old friend of mine from my Paris days.” Ren explained, pointing at the short, dark haired man who was standing behind me, “Artie doesn’t talk much, in fact, hardly ever, but he’s the best thief alive.”
The man bowed, a smile on his face.
“What the hell happened?” I asked, still confused, “I thought you were killed by the blast.”
“Almost.” Ren held up the chaired remains of Dr. Lang’s teleporter, “Elegancy escape system: it detected the blast and bounced me half way around the world back to France. Wasted the power pack. Lang never told me about that little trick, and it makes me wonder what other secrets he had.”
“You’re complaining?” I asked with eyebrow raised, “Where the hell are we anyway?”
“New Mexico, about 100-miles outside Albuquerque.” Ren walked over with a bottle of water in her hand, “You look like you could use this.”
“How did you find me?” I asked, taking the bottle and pouring half the water over my head.
“A little luck and a lot of time spent on the internet: there are only so many places you can hide a large underground military complex, and the conspiracy theorists know about maybe half of them.” Ren smiled, walking back to the car, “We’d better get going before they come looking for us: we’re not that far from the base.”
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
The 4X4 bounced around as Ren drove at just under the speed limit, her eyes constantly scanning the horizon for signs of pursuit. We’d crossed the border into Arizona on some dirt track somewhere in the middle of nowhere, heading for a safe house Ren had set up in Flagstaff.
I’d questioned the logic of driving when we could have flow in a fraction of the time, but Ren had insisted that they’d be looking for a flyer, and that the best place to hide was in plain sight. By her way of thinking, the last place they’d look would be in a 10-year old 4X4 that looked like it had taken part in one too many destruction derby’s.
The crazy thing was, she was right.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Ren’s safe house turned out to be an abandoned warehouse on the outskirts of town. She’d somehow come up with fake ID’s that could pass all but the most stringent tests, but I’d long since stopped being surprised by what she could do.
“So, do we have a plan?” She asked, finishing off the pizza that had constituted our evening meal.
“No, not really.” I looked down at my plate: I didn’t feel hungry, yet somehow I was full of energy, “Take what we know to someone who can do something about it?”
“Like who?”
“The UN? It’s got to break half a dozen treaties.”
“You really think these guys couldn’t control the UN?”
“The Press?”
“They OWN the Press.”
“Luna.”
“Huh?”
“Luna. We get up to Armstrong City and take it to the Council. Lang was one of them, so they’re going to want some payback.”
“You really think they’ll be able to do anything?”
“The Luna Council is made up of ten of the most powerful superhumans alive.” I pointed out, dumping what remained of my dinner into the rubbish, “If they can’t deal with it, we’ve already lost.”
“But how do we get there?” Ren asked, opening a bottle of water, “Arty can’t teleport us that far.”
“Star City.” The Artemus said from behind the book he was reading.
“Huh?” I blinked, shocked at the first words I’d ever heard him say other than Yes or No.
“Star City, the Russian space-centre outside Moscow.” Artemus put his book down, “The security is less stringent than Florida or Australia. Our ID’s would probably get us through.”
“He’s got a point.” Ren nodded, “That’s how I got up to see Lang.”
“So all we have to do is get out of America un-noticed, sneak across the Pacific and into Russia, then across several time zones until we hit Moscow.” I asked, “This something you do often?”
“More often then you’d think.” Ren smiled, “We should get some sleep: tomorrow’s going to be a long day.”
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Ren hadn’t been kidding when she said it was going to be a long day.
By the time the sun cleared the horizon the next mourning, we’d crossed the border into Utah and where passing through the Zion national park on our way to Interstate 55 and all points north.
I’d taken over the driving duties from Artemus, allowing him some sleep in the back seat. Ren was already dozing in the passenger seat, her head resting on a folded up jumper pressed against the window. There was a faint smile on her lips, and she shifted occasionally, apparently dreaming.
I smiled myself, and concentrated on driving.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
We crossed into Idaho without any apparent problems; Ren’s fake ID’s doing their job on the border crossing.
The car started spluttering just as we entered Burley, a ‘city’ of some 9,400 people. The mechanic at the garage we took it to tried to fix it, but in the end declared that it was a lost course and recommended we found alternate transportation.
For want of anything better to do, we found a bench in a nearby park and sat.
“We could fly.” I suggested.
“No.” Ren shook her head, pulling out the map, “We’re too close to the air base as Mountain Home: they will have radar that could track us.”
“Can you teleport that far?” I asked Artemus, but he just shook his head, holding his hands as far apart as he could. The distance was obviously too great.
“I say we buy another car.” Ren opened her backpack and pulled out a roll of $100-bills, “Nothing fancy, just something that’ll get us to Seattle.”
“Then what?” I asked.
“Slow boat to Russia.”
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Ren somehow managed to exchange half our cash for a relatively sound Cadillac convertible. We could have gone for something cheaper, but she said that style was important and wanted to ride with the roof down.
How the car ever got across the mountain and into Washington Sate I’ll never know, but we finally found ourselves in the outskirts of Seattle a little over a week after setting out from Flagstaff. I hadn’t been on such a long car journey since I was a kid, and it was a very strange experience for someone who was used to moving a little faster.
Yet another of Ren’s safe houses, this one set up very recently, provided us with fresh clothes, some more money, and a chance to rest after too long cooped up in the car.
I was beginning to get a little worried about my health: ever since what ever happened in the underground base had happened, I felt like I was running on full charge, but I’d hardly eastern a thing, and I was sleeping less than normal. Under normal circumstances I would have gone to one of the doctors as SIU, but now I was a hunted man, I had no such recourses to call on.
I didn’t know what was going on, and that frightened me.
To Be Continued…