West Pacific Supers: Rising Tide (34 page)

9:59 p.m.,
Tuesday, May 28th, 2013

Avalon One

Pacific
Ocean

“Why is the light
turning black?” asked Camille as she peered out the window at the QHRA’s
resonance beam. Before Dr. Brandeis could say anything there was an explosion
in the sky, likely the airship holding the QHRA, and the black light beam
disappeared.

“Well, I guess that’s the end of this
crisis,” said Camille, feeling relieved.

“I don’t think so,” said Dr. Brandeis
pointing out to sea, where a massive surge was rising from the ocean. As it
closed, it appeared to rise like a mountain around the platform. Camille
flipped the team channel on her headset. “Everyone - we have an incoming
tsunami! Secure yourselves!”

The tsunami closed faster than she had
expected, hitting the platform and the lower levels with a massive splash that
even flooded the top level. Staircases, communication towers, and other loosely
attached parts of the platform were ripped from their housings. The entire
platform listed to a perilous angle and then the tsunami continued on in the
direction of the coast.

Camille, who had actually fallen to the
ground when the tsunami rocked the platform, yelled on the team channel.
“Everyone report!”

“Rocking and rolling, literally,” laughed
Keystone. “Don’t worry, I caught
Pearcy
and his
camcorder before they went off the edge.”

“We have water in engineering,” said
Starfish. “You may notice a lack of power.” Now that he mentioned it, the
platform had in fact gone dark when the tsunami hit.

“Cosmic Kid, White Knight?” asked Camille.
There was no response. Camille went to the door that led to the outside from
the bridge, flung it open, and took to flight to survey the area. It was
nighttime, raining, and complete darkness… perhaps the worst conditions for
search and rescue.

Camille tapped her headset for the close
circuit channel to Ops. “Annie – I need to know where White Knight and Cosmic
Kid are.” All of the team had tracking devices in their
HoloBerrys
,
or in the case of White Knight, his power armor transmitted a tracking signal.
For security purposes, only Ops and the team leader could access the
information. As soon as she thought of this, Camille frowned in annoyance; she
was the team leader now.

“Check your HoloBerry,” Dr. Sterling replied
and Camille quickly examined the coordinates displayed there. White Knight and
Cosmic Kid weren’t far away, in fact, they were still on the platform not far
from the bridge. She turned back to look at Dr. Brandeis. “Don’t even think of
running, Dr. B. Stay here!” She flew up in a rush of wind and water, following
the make-shift map that Dr. Sterling was creating on her HoloBerry. There was a
mess of metal beams wrapping around the bridge that was the stairs,
communication tower, and other objects that had been ripped off by the tsunami.
She peered into the area and saw Cosmic Kid kneeling beside some of the beams
trying to move them.

Camille flew closer and saw that White
Knight was caught among the mass of beams. White Knight called out with panic
in his voice, “I’m pinned! I can’t breathe! Get me out of here!” Camille landed
next to Cosmic Kid and began lifting and heaving beams away from the area.
Starfish had also arrived and came over to help as well. Cosmic Kid suddenly
stiffened and yelled, “Cover!” Camille looked up in surprise and saw Erica
Wilkie
coming out of a hatch carrying an assault rifle.

Cosmic Kid threw a chakra in the direction
of Erica, but the distance was too great for accuracy and he missed. He dived
for cover just as Erica began firing wildly at the team. She hit Starfish and
just missed Camille who had taken to flight and was dodging in midair.

Then Keystone came into sight and ran
straight for Erica, who quickly switched targets. Bullets smashed into
Keystone, but did little harm as he closed the distance.
Pearcy
was running behind him capturing the whole thing on video. Erica sprang out
from the hatch, threw the empty assault rifle to the ground, drew her pistols,
and started shooting again at Keystone. He came up to her, swinging slowly with
his left fist. Erica easily dodged the blow, but then he moved incredibly fast
with his right fist, catching Erica in the chest. The sound of her ribs
breaking and possibly her lung being crushed echoed in the darkness. She
staggered back as Keystone connected with a full-speed left punch to the head;
they could all hear the sound of her neck snapping. Erica
Wilkie’s
eyes rolled back in her head and she just dropped to the ground.

“
Pearcy
, keep
filming! Let’s go rescue some bad guys from drowning down below!” said Keystone
who dropped down the hatch into the lower level with
Pearcy
doing his best to follow him.

“Get me out of here!” yelled White Knight.
The rest of the team turned their attention back to their teammate, who was
struggling as the claustrophobia of his situation was clearly overwhelming him.

“Don’t worry White Knight, we’ll get you
out,” said Camille in as comforting a voice as possible.

“Screw it, helmet off,” said White Knight
and the suit disengaged the helmet. It hung loosely, but he couldn’t get his arms
freed to take it off. He just started shaking his head and then the helmet fell
off and hair was everywhere. Long black hair, and then she shook her head to
clear the hair from her face - it was Gabrielle Fox.

“Damn it, stop staring and get these beams
off me!” yelled Gabrielle.

Starfish just stood there gaping and then
muttered, “but…but you’re supposed to be
Matteo
.”

“Sorry to disappoint, but I swear if you all
don’t get me out of here now—” hissed Gabrielle.

“Starfish, pull it together and help me get
her out of here!” said Camille, who picked up the pace in hefting off beams.

“So do you have to be naked to wear the
power armor suit?” asked Starfish. “Just scientific curiosity.”

Cosmic Kid stifled a smile and put his back
into helping move beams. At that, Dr. Sterling’s voice came over their
headsets. “Alright everyone. Coast Guard helicopters will be arriving soon. We
have an incoming tsunami and the lower neighborhoods are being evacuated. We
need you all back in the city to help with disaster relief ASAP. It’s going to
be a long night.”

12:09 p.m.,
Tuesday, June 11th, 2013

Oberon
Avenue

West
Pacific, CA

Blue
Star was enjoying himself for the first time in weeks. He was on patrol with
Camille and she was a damn good flier and not afraid to show off, which forced
him to keep up with her, especially since he was still recovering from the
injuries he’d sustained taking down Ian
Roache
. He
had always considered himself a good flier, but as the two of them threaded
their way through downtown West Pacific he was having trouble narrowly avoiding
the various obstacles from streetlights to power lines that crisscrossed the
roads. It was exciting and a nice break from physical therapy, not to mention
the incessant meetings and phone calls he had to handle as team leader,
especially in the wake of the
Avalon
One
debacle. Plus it took his mind off the nightmares. He should be
used to those by now considering how many years he had been relying on occult
healing to stay in the field. They made his nights hell, but it was a small
price to pay to be back on his feet so soon.

His biggest
complaint at the moment was that Dr. Sterling seemed to be constantly finding
ways to remind him that she really ran the team, even if her title was only
operations director. She should be catering to him, not vice versa. But
whenever he tried to exert authority over her, she’d bring in her trump card:
the team president, Dr. Hodges, who trusted Dr. Sterling implicitly and would
never listen to a word against her. Blue Star was beginning to think that Dr.
Hodges, who occasionally seemed a bit senile, was really just a figurehead for
Dr. Sterling, who had managed to gain subtle or outright control over most of
the team and staff, and a lot of the Governing Board. It was like she was
running some god dammed shadow government. He knew that he needed to sit down
with her and hash the situation out, but that was a battle
royale
that he was not relishing. At his age he should have known better than to take
the team leader position without investigating further, but he was too stubborn
sometimes, even with himself.

“Lunchtime!” said
Camille over the headset as she dropped down to a café along Oberon Avenue,
which ran through the revitalized downtown. Oberon was lined with small restaurants
and stores, including two movie theaters, one a big stadium theater with
OmniMax
and a smaller one which played artsy movies. It was
a very trendy area in a forced sort of way.

“Alright,” said Blue
Star awkwardly as he landed behind Camille with a sloppy three and a half-step
landing, nothing like Camille who could casually stop even when she had been
going close to Mach 1 the second before.

He had to admit she
was the type of super he would have been chasing 30, hell 20, years ago. She
was good-looking, nice body, good hair – though her hair was a little too
short. Thank God she was not like a lot of
superheroines
who were often more plastic than flesh nowadays; she was solid, not fat, but
solid. He couldn’t understand supers who were skinny, that was just another
word for brittle. He saw in the news a few days ago some super in New York,
Glorisa
or something, a little stick-figure girl who was
broken into kindling by a few of the Knights of Misery. Sickly was not a
turn-on.

Of course, Camille
was married with a kid, besides being a member of his team, so to even be
checking her out was some breech of etiquette. This was why he would never have
a psychic on the team. He was basically a dirty old man and it was best if he
kept that to himself.

“The veggie gyros
here are great,” said Camille, taking a seat at a table outside of the café.

“If it doesn’t have
meat, then it isn’t worth eating,” said Blue Star.

“Heathen, this is
California – the land of vegans and fruitcakes.”

“I’ll take fruitcake
then and let you be the vegan.”

Camille laughed.
“Nah, I’m not quite vegan. I can do vegetarian, but that’s my limit.”

A family that had
been walking by stopped as their two kids were pointing at Blue Star and
Camille. The father looked appalled, but the mother came over with a determined
look.

Camille smiled and
whispered, “fans at 11 o’clock.”

“Good-looking fans?”
asked Blue Star.

“You can do better,
plus she’s with her husband.”

“Hello, I’m sorry to
interrupt your lunch, but my son, Ethan, is a huge fan and well, could we get a
picture?” asked the mother. Ethan was stunned and his younger sister was hiding
behind their dad, who clearly wasn’t happy with this plan.

“Absolutely,” said
Camille, getting up to pose next to Ethan. She glowered at Blue Star, who
reluctantly got up and put himself into celebrity mode as he stood next to the
boy. The mother took a picture. Then she had the sister come up for another
shot. She was about to do a family photo, but Camille interrupted her.

“I’m sorry, but we
need to get back to lunch. We’re planning how to deal with some supervillains,”
said Camille with a wink to Blue Star.

“Really?” asked
Ethan. “Who?”

“I can’t say – but
watch the news,” said Camille turning back to the table. The family moved off
and Blue Star was relieved. He was tired of dealing with people.

“Why so glum, Blue
Star?” asked Camille as she sat back down.

“What? Sorry, just
team leader stuff and all that,” said Blue Star. He was in a bad mood, but what
he needed instead of a talk were some villains to knock around. He should have
been thrilled that the team had survived
Avalon
One
, but the fact was that he had missed out on what might be the
biggest crisis of the Season. It might have been his absence that allowed the
tsunami to be created and the city flooded, which had dropped the team ranking
to #8.

“Crappy job, isn’t
it? West Pacific goes through team leaders like you wouldn’t believe. Mr.
Awesome was team leader the longest and that was only seven years. I only had
to do it for the last two weeks, thank God. It’s like a revolving door here.”

“Revolving door on
supers as well,” said Blue Star, thinking about Keystone’s pending trade to the
High Rollers.

“Yeah, it was for
me,” said Camille quietly.

“Sorry, I didn’t
mean… I mean, if I was you I wouldn’t have come back here,” said Blue Star.
“You were treated unfairly.”

“Probably, but we’re
all treated unfairly the day we’re born – my goal is to just try not to treat
anyone else unfairly,” said Camille with a shrug.

“How’s that working
out for you?”

“Crappy, Jules
really worries about me,” said Camille looking off sadly.

“As he should. I’m
haunted by a lot of ghosts and will no doubt be haunted by more.”

“Man, you’re
depressing,” said Camille with a laugh. “Though I know what you mean, since
coming back here I feel like I’ve been walking with ghosts of the past as well.
I feel like Sarah should be here – and she died a decade ago.”

“It’s not the time,
it’s the connection. I actually met Supersonic Cat a year before she was
killed. She was tapped for a mission to deal with an alien incursion in South
America. Operation Silver Riposte.”

“I remember that. I
was so pissed that Supersonic Cat got to go and I had to stay here minding the
fort. You know, I don’t think I will ever be tapped for the President’s Team,”
said Camille with a sigh.

“The current
President, bless his soul, doesn’t like me,” said Blue Star.

“I thought you were
a Republican?” asked Camille.

“I am, but we have a
history. It doesn’t matter about political affiliation; there’s an independent
commission which names the 12 members of the team, but the President has to
sign off on each one of them. I’ve been on the President’s Team during three
administrations, but won’t be on the current one.”

“So what happened?
Failed to rescue his only daughter or something?”

“No, I knocked him
unconscious back when Legion attempted to possess Congress. President
Carlington
was a member of the House of Representatives at
the time. Needless to say, he wasn’t actually possessed, just really pissed,
but you know how those two can look alike.”

“That was like 30
years ago! You’re telling me the President still has a grudge against you since
then? Seriously, I didn’t vote for him, but he does seem more reasonable than
that.”

“Well… I was also
dating his only daughter at the time and we broke up a few months later,”
muttered Blue Star.

Camille roared with
laughter. “You’re nearly as bad as Count Courageous!”

“I’ve never bitten
anyone I’ve dated,” retorted Blue Star.

“That you’ll admit!”
laughed Camille. “So who’s your current poor quarry? I’ll warn you that going
after Gabrielle is a bad idea. I mean, I thought she was scary before and now
I’m sure she’s insane.”

Blue Star shifted
uncomfortably for he had entertained the idea, but nixed it as it would be the
height of unprofessional to date her. “I’m actually holding off on dating for
the time being.”

“Oh my god, you were
actually thinking of dating Gabrielle! You are such a cad!” laughed Camille.
“You and Keystone are going to give the team a bad name.”

“All my faults are
off the field,” said Blue Star. “I would never leave the team hanging during
the Season for contract negotiations, let alone switch teams mid-Season.”

“So what about
that?” asked Camille. “I still can’t figure out why he’d move to Las Vegas
after coming off the sidelines for
Avalon
One
.”

“Yeah, well, I guess
the whole reason he got off the bench was to prove to the High Rollers that he
was worth the salary he was demanding. And he made his point; from the tapes I
saw, I don’t think that fight would have been as smooth without him. The final
straw apparently was when the tsunami hit – his house was one of the ones that
washed away. From what I hear, he signed with the High Rollers the morning
after. Still he’s been with the team awhile, nearly six years.”

“I’m not sad to see
him go,” snorted Camille. “He’s the one they brought on to replace me.”

“Ouch,” said Blue
Star.

“Hey, life’s looking
good right now,” smiled Camille. “With you and Starfish back on duty, Keystone
finally cut loose, and the PGZ investigation wrapped up – well, of course,
Seawolf is still on Injured Reserve and we haven’t solved the Boardwalk attack
yet… ”

Blue Star frowned.
“No we haven’t and the longer that hangs out there, the more… ” He glanced
around; this really wasn’t the best location to be discussing the attack on the
team. “At least we’re down to only one member benched.”

Camille grinned.
“And I haven’t been on Injured Reserve yet! I’ve always been healthiest with
Annie as my Ops director.”

“Surprising, since
Dr. Sterling seems to want to kill off the entire team in training exercises.”

“Not really,
actually, she’s been pretty tame with the new team.”

“You’re kidding –
she used live ammunition in the last session,” said Blue Star.

“Yeah, low-caliber
stuff, Annie has mellowed over the years. You wouldn’t believe—” started
Camille before she was interrupted by several flashes from a camera.

Coming up to them
was a man loaded down with camera equipment. He was wearing jeans and some t-shirt
with writing on it that was obscured by his gear, which Blue Star realized
included an audio-receiver that could be used to listen in on conversations.
The man had superazzi written all over him.

“So does the happy
couple have any comment?” asked the man as he filmed them with a video camera.

“Please, we’re
eating lunch and would like some privacy,” said Camille calmly.

“Not bad, Blue Star,
not bad, a nice piece of ass – though Nova Girl you should never have given up
the mini-skirt,” said the man.

Blue Star jumped up.
The surrounding temperature dropped ten degrees and the man noticed it and took
a cautious step back. “Listen dumbass, you apologize to Camille or I’ll…”

“Whoa, Blue Star,”
said Camille, getting up and grabbing him by the arm. “Come on, just ignore
him.”

“Yeah, what are you
going to do Blue Balls? It’s good you have Nova Girl here to protect you,” said
the man, who was capturing the entire exchange on video. “So you’re after both
your public relations director and Nova Girl? At your age you’re supposed to be
slowing down. I imagine…” The superazzi took a quick step back from an angry
Blue Star and slipped, crashing down hard on the ground and the ice that formed
beneath him.

Blue Star was
pissed. Partly because the guy was an ass and really deserved a good thrashing
and partly because the idiot superazzi was somewhat correct about him.

“Look at the ice!”
yelled the man. “That’s assault! I was attacked by a super! My back!”

“You want to be
attacked by a super? I can arrange that!” snarled Blue Star who was sizing up
the guy for how much he could take without serious injury. Camille grabbed his
arm and pulled him back. He had forgotten how strong she was; she nearly lifted
him off the ground and dislocated his shoulder in the process.