"And I know who can work on it for us," Steve said, turning.
Takayasu was helping Shockwave to his feet. They stared at Lincoln and the two battered rogues on the floor. Shockwave seemed particularly pleased to see Silver Eyes in bad shape — he shot Steve an appreciative look, but Steve gestured toward the man responsible.
"Ensign, Shockwave, may I introduce our inside-man, Powerhouse..."
PARANORMALS
Edmond winced as he probed gently at his broken nose. If he didn’t have it set, he knew that it would end up looking like a question mark plopped onto his face, but McLane wanted everyone close by for now. At least he’d allowed Edmond to continue pulling monitor duty.
The storage complex was all hustle-and-bustle. The other rogues were still excited about the massacre over at the PCA headquarters. Rumors were flying that McLane and Khalkha were planning to issue an ultimatum to the President. Just what that ultimatum would consist of, Edmond had no idea ...
if
it were even true. He hadn’t heard it from the Big Man’s lips, and so he was taking it all with a grain of salt.
As he continued to trace the swollen mass at the center of his face, Edmond noticed absently that the employees of the photography shop upstairs next to the studio were apparently going home early. It was just licking at the edge of his awareness that the shoe store on their other side had
also
closed early today, but then he stroked his nose a little too firmly and the pain demanded his full attention.
Edmond was doubly glad to be tucked away in the computer room right now, because he would not have been able to join his fellow rogues in their exaltation. He’d first signed on with McLane because the man made a lot of sense. Edmond had lost many friends, and even his wife, when he’d gone paranormal. The rest of society was rushing,
not
to accept, understand, or integrate the paranormal community back into the American Melting Pot, but to isolate, contain, or control them — hence the Paranormal
Control
Agency. Edmond was too old to fight the whole world by himself, and so he’d thrown in with those who sympathized with his plight.
Until now, he’d been able to stomach the occasional deaths as "casualties of war." But
this
... this latest atrocity was just too much. The problem was that he had no idea how he was going to deal with—
Edmond glanced at the center monitor, looked away, and then sharply back again. It displayed the front entrance to the recording studio. He leaned forward for a closer look, his eyes wide.
Then he stabbed his finger onto the speaker system. "Emergency! Emergency! Powerhouse is coming back in, and he’s carrying
wounded
...!"
PCA
The lazy security guard jumped to his feet as Powerhouse stumbled through the front doors. He had Waid over his shoulder, the elastic Karen was an amorphous blob in his arms, and his jogging suit was splattered with blood — the way he was staggering, it seemed that the blood might actually belong to Powerhouse himself.
"Help ..." Powerhouse mumbled weakly before falling to his knees. Waid tumbled to one side and did not move. "Help ... Karen needs help, right
now
..."
"Oh, jeez!" the guard gasped, snatching up the phone on his desk. "Get Doctor Seymour, right away! The group’s back, and they’re all hurt!"
In no time at all — the guard had no way of knowing that Edmond had already sounded the alarm — Philip Seymour emerged from the back of the studio. He had his medical bag with him, and he began looking back and forth to see who required treatment first.
"Karen ..." Powerhouse slurred persistently. "Help her ..." He was on all fours now, having laid the lumpy heap that was Karen onto the floor. He kept his right hand squarely on her chest, however.
Philip kneeled in front of them. "Let go, Powerhouse," he ordered coldly. "I need to examine her."
"Can’t ..." Powerhouse insisted. "She’s been cut open ... I’m literally holding her together ..."
"Oh, man," the guard muttered, covering his mouth.
"I see," Philip responded. He looked her over as best he could. Whatever had happened to her, she’d really lost her shape — she was barely bipedal at this point, let alone humanoid. Still, he would have expected to see blood...
"Seymour," Powerhouse said, a little more clearly. Philip thought the masked rogue was addressing him until he continued, "Energy vampire. Works by touch. The guard induces overwhelming nausea..."
Philip’s eyes narrowed in confusion and suspicion. "Powerhouse, what are you blathering about—?"
"Hey," the guard suddenly interjected, "why is Waid all trussed up?"
Philip glanced over at Waid. He’d missed it before, but now he saw that she was blindfolded and handcuffed. "What the—?!"
Powerhouse finally moved his hand, and Karen unrolled like a blanket. Takayasu sat up and slapped a psi-jammer onto the doctor’s forehead. Philip jolted and trembled as the device pummeled his neural pathways. Shakily, through sheer force of will, he reached out, trying desperately to grab either the traitor or the P C Agent who should have already been dead by now twice over. If he could touch either one of them, just for a second, he might be able to ...
Philip Seymour collapsed. As he lost consciousness, he wondered idly if he would
ever
get the respect and deification that he rightfully deserved ...
Takayasu was already rolling to his feet and drawing his tazer, but he didn’t move quite fast enough. He was suddenly engulfed with the worst sickness he’d ever experienced in his life. He wanted to throw up, but he was so ill that his body wouldn’t even cooperate that far. And
this
was how he felt while wearing a protective psi-band — he couldn’t imagine what it would feel like to have no defense whatsoever.
Luckily, for the ensign, the guard was still so dazed by the sudden change of events that he hadn’t yet comprehended Powerhouse’s role. Lincoln backhanded the guard lightly, but the man would still be later diagnosed with a serious concussion.
The front door opened again. Four P C Agents threw protective wrappings over the four unconscious rogues — protection both
for
and
from
the injured — and quickly dragged them from the premises.
"Thanks," Takayasu said as the awful nausea finally passed. "How do we get down below?"
"There’s a freight elevator all the way to the back. And some stairs."
"Any way you can get us down there faster?"
"You got it."
Powerhouse slammed both fists through the floor. He ripped upward, widening the hole, then gathered Takayasu up in his arms. The ensign did not argue. Powerhouse stepped over the edge and dropped to the storage space directly below.
"Cover us," Takayasu told him. He crouched, allowing the big man to bend over him protectively. Takayasu then ordered into his radio, "We’re ready, Shockwave ..."
PCA
".... bring the house down," both Shockwave and Vortex heard.
"Here it comes," Shockwave warned, then tossed the radio aside. He and Vortex emerged, side by side, from the parked van. "Clear!" Shockwave called out, although he knew that the twenty or so P C Agents were already tucked away in anticipation.
"You ready?" Shockwave asked Vortex.
The vigilante nodded. "You go right, I’ll go left."
Without another word, the two men lashed out — Shockwave with his kinetic energy, Vortex with a repulsion wave. They aimed wide and gave it everything they had. The entire business complex — which had been completely evacuated not even five minutes ago — was swiftly demolished.
"Well," Shockwave mused when they ceased fire, "I suppose that’s a
little
payback."
"Want to go in for some more?" Vortex asked.
"I like the way you think," Shockwave answered with a smile before calling out, "Cover every exit! They’ll have to dig themselves out, people, but if any of them make it,
fry’em
!"
Of course, it remained to be seen whether some of those rogues
could
be fried with the weapons and equipment they’d been able to gather. But that was just another reason why he and Vortex were joining Takayasu and Powerhouse below — to clean up shop.
PCA
Giving the devils their due, McLane’s people reacted quickly. Their initial panic at suddenly being trapped beneath tons of rubble didn’t last as long as Michael had hoped. He and Powerhouse dusted themselves off and moved inward, but before they’d even departed the first room, two rogues were on them. Neither hesitated even for an instant, and neither seemed surprised by Powerhouse’s treachery. One of them had a huge, gaping mouth of shark-like teeth, and the other had leathery skin like an alligator. Michael’s tazer tagged the reptile-man in the lower torso, but his thick hide protected him.
Lincoln intercepted piranha-face just before he reached the ensign. His hideous incisors clamped down on Lincoln’s forearm with so much force that they almost drew blood from even his nigh-invulnerable flesh —
almost
. Lincoln braced his opposing hand against the rogue’s chest and wrenched his arm free, cracking and breaking the man’s huge teeth in all directions. But, like a shark, there was another row ready to take their place. Lincoln didn’t want to kill anyone else if he could avoid it, but if the man didn’t back down, what choice would he have?
The hole in the ceiling that Powerhouse had created suddenly cleared once more, and Vortex and Shockwave dropped through. Steve landed with practiced skill and precision — Shockwave slowed his decent with his new pseudo-flight trick. Steve saw that Takayasu was barely holding a reptile-looking man at bay with a steel truncheon, while Powerhouse had his hands full with a nasty biter. Like Powerhouse, Steve wanted to avoid causing more harm than absolutely necessary. At least, until they found McLane — the jury was still out on
that
one. Moving toward Takayasu, Steve jumped in from the side, landing a solid kick to the reptile’s head. The rogue recovered, but Steve did not let up. He kicked, jabbed, kneed, and finally just hauled off with an old-fashioned roundhouse to the nose. The man stumbled back, at last dazed, and Takayasu hit him again with the tazer, this time in the throat — down he went.
Mark felt exhilarated, adrenaline shoving his previous fatigue and pain to the wayside. He was feeling less charitable than Powerhouse and Vortex, and so finished off the big-toothed guy with a pair of shockwaves to the face and torso — if the bastard didn’t mind having his large teeth detached, then maybe he’d pay closer attention to some broken ribs. The shot worked, and the four found themselves standing alone.
"Everyone all right?" Michael asked. When he was answered with a circle of nods, he waved everyone forward. "We need to spread out. I don’t mind losing a few of these rogues, but McLane
cannot
escape."
"The layout isn’t too complicated," Lincoln reminded them, "but it’s long and has lots of doors. We’re almost dead center of the place. What sucks is that I’ve seen McLane hang out at
both
ends of the complex."
"Great," Steve muttered. "Whoever finds him first better give me a yell or I’ll be royally pissed."
"I hear ya," Mark agreed. "If this Kaliki-whatshisname that Powerhouse mentioned is here, we’ll need to back each other up."
"Move out, people!" Michael urged impatiently, rushing for the open door. "Shockwave, you’re with me." He leaped through the doorway, diving to the opposite crevice on the offhand chance that a rogue or two were waiting in ambush.
It was a smart move. It turned out to be only a single rogue, but she was enough. Jets of flame emerged from the woman’s fingertips, brushing across Michael’s back before he rolled to the floor and inadvertently, but luckily, snuffed the smolder out before it could fully catch. Michael’s eyes bugged out and his heart was suddenly racing —
fire!
He might be slowly coming to grips with Jason’s death, but the sight of this woman spouting fire towards him suddenly brought him to a panic. All the long months of anguish from his skin-grafts rushed back to him — he ducked away from the woman’s next attack, but the concept of shooting back at her had temporarily fled his mind.