The Adventures of Kid Combat Volume One: A Secret Lost

The Adventures of Kid Combat

Volume I: A Secret Lost

Christopher A. Helwink

Published by Wheatmark at Smashwords

Copyright October 2007

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Helwink at Smashwords.com

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Introduction

Evil. Corruption. They were everywhere in
Elmcrest. The once-quiet town found itself consumed with greed,
decadence, and a hunger for power. The town’s destructive ways were
led by one man, Phillip Arthur Jones, whose ultimate goal was to
own the town.

The only thing in Jones’ way of total
domination was a small band of friends led by Kid Combat. This
group had two goals. The first was to stay hidden from the public
eye. The second was to rid the town of Jones and all the evil that
followed him…

Chapter One:

The Escape

9:30 pm

He stood there in the shadows of a room on
the first floor. Tired after a long run, he breathed heavily as
sweat glistened off his forehead. Inside his three piece suit, his
heart raced as he frantically looked for a way out.

Many thoughts came into Kid Combat’s head as
he stood there in the corner of the room, trying to get out of this
hostile environment. The most important one was whether or not this
mission was so important that he was dropped into the belly of the
beast, alone, with no back up plan. There was no second option, no
contingencies. This was it.

There was, after all, no time to plan for
this mission. Time was of an essence. Kid Combat and his crew knew
this. They knew they had to get in here now- not later- or lose
their secret forever.

The room he found himself in was nothing more
than a greeting room for guests of this mansion. Twice as long as
it was wide, it was decorated with no paintings or artifacts.
Instead, the walls were made of a patterned concrete. Outlines of
large black squares, triangles, and rectangles filled in by gray
cement dominated the walls. The odd walls gave the room a dark, wet
feel. The smell of stale cigar smoke lingered.

Blasted
! Kid Combat thought to
himself. He could still feel his heart pounding underneath the
layers of clothing. The ten-year-old super genius stood in the back
corner of the room, examining the wall thoroughly. His thin body
moved from side to side as his hands searched every square inch. He
could have sworn there was another way out; everything he and his
secret alliance studied of the mansion had brought them to this
conclusion. Blueprints, photographs, and drawings all pointed to an
exit on this back wall. Upon inspection, it didn’t take him long to
figure out that he was wrong. Kid Combat pressed a button on the
small communicator attached to his outer ear, radioing for
help.

“There’s no door, Gears,” Kid whispered.

“Checking …” came the reply to his earpiece,
followed by silence. A few anxious moments went by, and Kid Combat
began to sweat again. He knew getting caught would bring an end to
his secret identity. He looked over his shoulder—he was safe for
the moment. But that moment was fading fast.

“Come on, Gears, I don’t have all day!” Kid
said in a panic, which was unusual for him. He was usually pretty
calm in situations like this. It just showed how important this
mission was.

One floor up, someone else’s panic was just
as great …

Hissing and crackling over the speaker of a
portable radio transmitter was all that could be heard. The loud
static rattled the black speaker that a thin gray mesh cover
honeycombed over. A nervous man dressed in black stood in the
middle of the room, holding the unit with one shaking hand. A dozen
security guards ringed the office, silently waiting for
instructions.

“Find him!” a man’s voice finally boomed over
the speaker. The strength of his reply shook the radio unit to its
core.

“Yes, sir. Right away, sir,” the man in black
said into the radio, pushing the button on the side. But the
instructions didn’t end there.

“Don’t disappoint me again. You are in charge
of this operation. At all costs, find him and that envelope!”

Wasting no time, the man spun around and
spouted directions to his crew. Comprising twelve men, the crew
wore matching dark gray uniforms. Gray pants with a solid black
stripe down the sides matched the dark gray jackets with black
buttons. A gray hat, which resembled a baseball cap with a smaller
bill, outfitted each henchman’s head. Across the front, the letters
“J I” ran diagonally down from left to right. The same letters were
over the right breast of each uniform.

One by one, the man in black sent the men in
every direction of the mansion to seek their prize—Kid Combat, the
small boy who broke inside just minutes ago. They were given little
description; all they were told was to find “the kid.” Frantically,
the men dispersed as the man in black, still holding the receiver,
walked off in a direction of his own.

“The plans look to be inaccurate,” a voice
finally said into Kid’s ear. Still examining the wall, Kid rolled
his eyes, disgusted by the answer.

“Tell me something I don’t know.”

Kid turned away from the wall as he heard the
racing footsteps of three men outside the room. The mansion was
crawling with henchmen, and places to hide were becoming scarce.
Somehow, Kid had made his way through the entire mansion without
being seen when he first arrived. It might have been luck, and if
it was, Kid Combat was the luckiest kid in town. More likely, it
was skill. He excelled at missions like this—they were his calling.
Only now he’d hit a definite dead end.

Kid looked around again. The room’s darkness
was his ally. It provided excellent cover for the
ten-year-old—that’s why his team had chosen it as his exit. They
just hadn’t counted on faulty blueprints.

“Kid, I detect heat signatures all around
you. You need to get out of there right away!” Gears said. “The
twins can pick you up, but you gotta make it outside!”

He heard the footsteps getting closer. The
thought of making a run for it dashed into Kid’s mind. Maybe he
could get out of this dead end. Maybe he could find another way.
But before he could spin around and take a step, it was too
late.

In a small dark room far from the mansion,
Gears, a member of Kid Combat’s secret alliance, huddled over a
monitor and saw the three heat signatures enter the room with Kid.
His eyes bulged, and a wave of terror washed over him. The mission
looked to be a failure.

“Oh no,” Gears groaned.

Kid pounded the wall once in aggravation as
the three men entered the room, blocking his only escape route.
Trapped in the corner like a rat in an experiment, his heart raced
even faster as he turned his head slightly and saw the men
entering. There was no way out, but there was no way he was letting
go of his secret now.

“All right, little boy, you stay right
there,” one of the men said. “You’re not getting outta here that
easy.” The speaker and his two cohorts chuckled as they
approached.

“Let’s radio for backup,” the smallest of the
three said. He reached for the radio attached to his belt. Then,
suddenly, the biggest of the three struck his shoulder.

“No!” the muscular man said as he pointed his
big stubby finger at the smaller man’s face. “I want to bring him
to the boss myself. I want to be the one who catches the mysterious
‘Kid Combat.’” The man boasted at the other men, then shot a grin
in the small boy’s direction.

The men weren’t complete fools. They heard
the rumors circling the town about this Kid Combat, but no one knew
his real identity. What they did know was that he was a hero among
the kids in the small town of Elmcrest. What they also knew was
that their boss wanted him caught at any cost.

“Now, put it down, Kid Combat,” the large man
continued, referring to the envelope in Kid’s coat pocket. It was
the envelope he stole from the upstairs library not more than a few
minutes prior.

“Yeah, there’s nowhere left to run,” the
third man said, finally speaking up.

As Kid pondered the man’s request, his hands
began to sweat, which he found odd. Why was he so nervous? It was
only three guards, and they were too stupid to radio for backup.
Surely he, Kid Combat, could handle this.

No, it’s not because of the guards, he
thought. It was because of the envelope, safe and secure in his
pocket. Well, secure for the moment.

Inside the envelope was a coded letter, a
letter that referred to an organization of kids—Kid Combat’s
organization of kids—and its secrets. It mentioned no names but
detailed Kid and his missions to protect the children of the town.
The mere implication for Kid and his team was strong enough that
Kid himself chose to go in and retrieve it, alone, to avoid
endangering the organization as a whole. After everything he had
just gone through, Kid wasn’t giving the envelope back to them
now.

He never answered the man but continued
facing the wall to avoid recognition. A few more tense seconds
passed.

“Don’t make this harder than it needs to be!”
the man’s voice rang out clearly. The three men were about twenty
feet away now. Walking in unison and approaching Kid slowly, they
waited for him to make a move. He never did.

The room fell nearly silent as the men got
closer. The only sound was their boots hitting the hardwood floor
with each step. Clump, clump, clump.