Another day at the job

“You are not gonna believe what I’m seeing here!” The voice broke through, all filled with the static of a bad cell phone reception.

“Listen, Steve,” Byrne replied patiently. “I’ve been doing this long enough that I think I can believe pretty much everything.”

“The Memorial Bridge just came alive.”

“…”

“You copy that? The bridge just came alive and is rearing up like some fucking caterpillar!”

“… I will admit I did not see that one coming.” Byrne put his pencil down very carefully and spun his chair back to the screens.

“You’re telling me.”

“Where are you? Who’s on the scene?” His fingers flew over the keyboards.

“I’m on Interstate north! If the morning traffic hadn’t been bad I would have been on the damn thing! I think they might have closed it off before it happened, it’s hard to get a bearing from back here…”

“Who is on the scene? There must be someone, right?”

“Gimme a break, I am trying to get on the roof of my car so I can have a look.”

“Traffic’s jammed solid then?”

“The bridge just scuttled across the bay, so yeah, good guess. We ain’t going anywhere”

“You see any SCT choppers in the air?” He had a negative on alerts for the Special Control Team so far, but you never knew.

“And how am I supposed to tell them from the traffic ones?”

“By doing your job. They look nothing alike.”

“No choppers yet… but there’s… I’m not sure, but I think it’s the Idealist?”

“Paydirt! You be safe, get online, get a trajectory on this thing so people can stay back.”

“I know my job, Byrne.”

“Then go do it.”

—-

Cape-Chasers were perhaps an inevitability of the age of heroics. What had started out as a loose collection of thrill seekers and people eager to spot a real live superhero had eventually turned into a community of people determined to make a difference.

Denny had started out filming the Operator when he was fighting the MegaDon on a rampage through his neighborhood back when he was still in high school. He had been standing there, terrified in the face of these forces of nature as he watched them rampage through his viewfinder, blind to the fact that this was his neighbors’ houses being wrecked, his street being torn to bits before the battle moved on. His hands had been shaking, but he had sold the tape to a local news station, earning him a brief mention as ‘local boy, Denny Washington.” He had been hooked, both on the sudden windfall of money and the sense of importance as he saw his pictures across the news.

So he moved to Link City, because that was where the true crazy happened, where the skyscrapers were giving the sky the middle finger, and where superheroes zipped between them. He got online, got into the networks, tracked information and traded rumors. Where would the next incident be? Was the Society of Truth stepping up its war on lies? Did the scattered spottings of the Nihilist really mean something? They were the weathermen of the bizarre, investigating occultism and mad science with equal enthusiasm, because it didn’t matter if it was true. What mattered was that the people out there believed it to be. Who cared if someone came from a different dimension or his mom’s basement? As long as they had the power to level a building you didn’t ask any questions. You just needed to figure out when they would do something, so people would move in to stop them. All that mattered was the thrill of getting close to the heroes, close enough to film them, to catch the fights on tape.

And then Carbonvale happened.

Something changed in you when you saw dead people. Suddenly all the excitement, the thrill of the chase… suddenly all that turned to ashes in his mouth. And not just for him. There had been over a dozen chasers there that day, all converging on the quiet suburb. What happened when heroes failed? When they made mistakes, and not the funny ones that could be sold for good money to the news like the time Protectron got stuck inside a Chevy? People died, that’s what happened. People were caught out, incinerated, crushed under broken buildings. He had seen dead people that day. Had walked the streets, camera in hand, and when he had spotted the first smoking corpse he had not even realized what it was. It looked so… stiff. Like a log, shaped like a man, still smoking from the UnOrb’s deadly gaze. The fighting had moved on by then, the air was still. Maybe it would have been easier if there had been screaming.

But there were only the dead.

Carbonvale changed things for the Chasers, suddenly the act of just getting out there to catch a glimpse of awesome seemed shallow, to just get money for the footage seemed cheap. Little, by little, the focus shifted. Suddenly the same people that had jealously tracked Capes to get exclusive footage were sharing their findings. They were giving people the time to take cover when the authorities were hesitant to blow the whistle in case nothing happened. They were giving people time to get out. And then they began to get organized. A former Channel Five, Action News! reporter set up the hub, and people begun connecting. Personally, Denny thought that H. Robert Byrne was a cantankerous asshole, scarred by whatever accident had sent him on his crusade. But he couldn’t argue with results. Byrne might have stirred the drink, but it was a glass they were all sipping from now, providing them with better predictions. Forecasts. Warnings.

Because that was the horror of it all. Nobody in charge wanted to take the risk of getting things wrong. If the city ran the sirens and nothing happened, people would begin to ignore them. It would be like the tsunami warnings in Japan having gone off dozens of times and then, when it finally happened; a lot of people had stopped listening. Not to mention that the property values would go down if people understood the risks, willing ignorance was part of life here in the crazy west. They Cape-Chasers couldn’t stop the disasters or the fights; in the face of the storm they were as helpless as ants. But they could make sure fewer people got hurt because they knew what was coming. And if they made money from selling the pictures, running the sites, making the TV-shows… well, at least they could also justify this by pointing to the lives they had helped saving. To get the word out in time.

So, Denny wasn’t surprised when his phone beeped, Byrne’s voice waking him from where he lay wrapped around his boyfriend. Just annoyed.

“Washington here,” he mumbled, keeping his voice down even if Neil was already stirring. “I thought today was going to be calm?” There had been nothing on the web, no rumors of heists, no prophecies of occult doom, no sniff of giant monsters. The scryer that Byrne had set up a deal with had not twigged to anything wrong, so he had decided to sleep in.

“So did we. Suck it up kid.” Byrne’s voice was harsh, even on the phone. “You live close to the docks, right?”

“So what if I do?” Denny gently freed himself from the entangling arm, shuffling out of bed in boxers and slippers.

“Pop the blinds.”

That Denny did, feeling his jaw hurt as it hit the floor. Out in the bay, the Memorial Bridge was rearing up on pillar legs, cables twisting like angry snakes. He couldn’t see any details from here, but he thought he saw a streak of crimson flash down from the skies, sending a cloud of concrete dust in the air.

“Is that the Idealist?” he asked numbly.

“And the fact that she is fighting the bridge isn’t what you’re asking about first?”

“I was hoping I was imagining that part.”

“Well, you are not.”

“Jesus, Byrne, how come we didn’t see this one coming? And why aren’t the sirens going?”

“We’ve reported it in, they should be on within minutes, for now, get your ass in gear because I need eyes out there.”

“Putting on my pants as we speak.”

There wasn’t even a goodbye, just a click in his ear as Byrne hung up, most likely already making more calls, bitching at officials. They had taken to calling him ‘dispatch’ behind his back. Joke about their ‘boss’.

“Was that the boss?” Neil mumbled from the bed, scratching his chest.

“Yeah. Sorry to wake you. But bad shit is happening, and it might be coming our way.”

“Do I need to get out?” That had woken Neil up alright; already out of bed and scrambling for clothes.

“I think the Idealist will probably keep it away from the city. Waves might get here though; we’d better get sirens on the waterfront. If that thing crashes down it might get ugly.” Denny pulled on his jacket, grabbed the equipment and leaned in for a quick kiss.

“Never a dull moment with you, mm?” Neil still looked sleepy and ruffled.

“Never. You’d get on the net and make sure the word goes out in case the emergency department drops the ball?”

“The word of what, exactly?”

There was a pause there, windows rattling as the first sonic boom reached the city. Both of them turned to look at the window, where the battle raged on.

“That the Memorial Bridge has woken up cranky.”

—-

The waters in the bay were rough and choppy, but Denny wasn’t new to boats, and Caitlin was the best driver he knew, car or boat. Who also happened to be Neil’s sister, which was how he had met him.

“Wow, there’s something you don’t see every day,” she said as the bridge adopted increasingly abstract stances in its rampage.

They circled the edges of the battle, riding the waves as the bridge twisted. One minute it looked like an enraged caterpillar, the next it was more of an angry praying mantis. The idealist was a blur of red, one of the more annoying heroes to film in battle. Too fast. Too tiny compared to the creatures she fought. And she never gave interviews.

“How are you supposed to fight a bridge anyway?” Denny braced against the waves, the bridge was thrashing, and the boat nearly capsized more than once.

“I dunno?” Caitlin said, fighting the sea. “Usually they collapse because soldiers blow them up or boats ram them.”

“We’re gonna need a bigger boat then.”

“Very funny Wash.”

“I hate that nickname.”

“Don’t be a dick then.”

“Keep the boat steady and maybe I won’t be.”

“Complaints, complaints… shit!”

The bridge had shifted, part of the roadway dipping under the sea, sending up a bigger wave. Much bigger. Big enough to dwarf them, to crush their little vessel and push them to the bottom of the ocean. Denny held his breath as he prepared for impact but kept filming. Sorry, Neil, he thought to himself.

Then the boat jostled, he found himself grabbed hard, breath lost, flailing in the air. Held tight, him and Caitlin, up and away, through lashing cables and screeching metal. Flying. So this was how it felt.

“Hey there!” the Idealist said, a big smile over her surprisingly young face, “Nice day for it, huh?”

“Wh… let me down!” he protested, nearly dropping the camera. His feet kicked empty air, but he ignored it. The camera still whirred, and he realized what was happening. “Wait, never mind that. Turn this way! Can I get an interview?” He tried to ignore Caitlin’s arms digging into his ribs, or the fact that they were speeding towards shore fast enough to steal his breath away.

“Uh. Not right now?” The Idealist replied as she put them both down on the edge of the docks. “Bit busy trying to figure out how to beat up a bridge.”

“Figure out? You mean you don’t know?” Denny could have sworn the hero looked embarrassed, scratching her hair. How old was she anyway? Sixteen?

“Um,” she said, “Well, no. I mean. I don’t make a habit of fighting…” she shook her head and turned away, looking back to the ocean, “This is a stupid conversation. Unless you have a better plan, I’ve got to get back to punching that bridge-looking thing.”

“Why are you punching it?” Caitlin asked, rubbing her ribs.

The Idealist looked slightly sheepish, “‘Cause that’s sorta what I… do?”

“Yeah, but that’s not how you bring down a bridge,” Denny broke in, because he had been thinking about the same thing. “I mean unless you have a huge boat to ram it with, you can explode its supports like they do in war movies or set up a vibration to shake it apart like it did in Tacoma. Haven’t you seen the videos? It’s not like it’s not on YouTube or anything.”

“I… don’t really have time for computers. Angry bridges. You know how it is.”

“Hang on,” Caitlin interrupted, bringing up her phone. A quick search later, and she held up the small screen, watching the look on the Idealist’s face as she watched the Tacoma Narrows Bridge be destroyed by nothing more than a strong wind.

“Huh,” went the Idealist.

“Whatever you’re gonna do, you’ll better do it fast,” Denny interrupted. “Not that the footage ain’t great, but it’s getting a little close for my tastes.”

The Idealist nodded decisively. “Look, just. You be more careful where you go from here on in, guys.”

“Denny Washington,” he replied, and part of him was flushed with excitement that he got to tell the Idealist his name.

“Caitlin Bell,” Cait added with a happy smile.

“Then you be more careful, Denny, Caitlin. See you in the funny papers!”

“What’s that supposed to mean?” Denny asked as he watched the red streak fly off.

“Hell if I know,” Caitlin said. “I’m just glad I have insurance on the boat.”

“I can’t believe how young she looked.”

“You’re a regular spring chicken yourself,” she snorted.

“Oh shut up old woman.” There were maybe five years between them, but since Denny had started dating her baby brother, those years seemed like decades. “I’m calling this in.”

“Tell Mr. Byrne that he owes me a deductable.”

“Tell him yourself, or better yet, find us another boat,” Denny had his phone out, pressing the speed dial. He’d call in, but the battle was still going.

“I was hoping you’d say that,” Caitlin laughed and saluted him as she ran down towards the water.

“Of course I would,” Denny muttered as he waited for the hub in their wheel to answer his phone. “It’s never a good story unless you get the end!”

…

[For the other side of the story, read ‘Fly Trap’.]

Unmei no Ketsueki

“It has to be some sort of bug.” The technician frowned at the blinking red light on the panel in front of him. It had appeared out of nowhere one lazy Friday afternoon, at the same time as the Unmei no Ketsueki terminal unexpectedly printed out a duplicate death prediction for the control booth. He’d never had that happen before, but luckily his supervisor hadn’t left for home yet. Sometimes it was nice not being the one that had to make the calls.

Especially after he had read what was printed on the card.

“The UNOKE doesn’t get bugs, you know that,” his supervisor said, looking at the card as well. “If it did they would have already been sued six ways ‘til Sunday. The predictions might be a bit erratic at times, but they have never been wrong.” At least not that the company admitted. Luckily it wasn’t up to him to try to analyze the data, just to supervise the operation. A person would enter the booth, prick their finger and let their blood be drained by the terminal. The Japanese had always suspected that their future was written in their blood, counterintuitive though that might be, and in the end they had been proven right. The ketsueki-gata blood type horoscopes had eventually evolved into the Unmei no Ketsueki (Blood destiny, commonly called UNOKE abroad) prediction system, which could forecast love, fortune and death with a staggering amount of accuracy. The fad had spread, and was now a multi billion dollar industry selling peace of mind to the morbid and the curious.

“But if this isn’t a bug, what then?” The question hung there in the air, demanding an answer neither of the men wanted to give.

“Damned if I know,” the supervisor said at last, “but it’s not our job. The alarm went off, that means we slap a flag on it and notify the WHO. Let them deal with this mess.” 

…

Read more

Bupkis [Wreckage 7]

The air in the small cabin was stiflingly hot, the single round window opening up to overcast skies seeded with storms. The old man on the narrow bunk smelled of sweat, even stripped to his shorts the metal walls hummed with heat. Air conditioning was a privilege, and he did not have many of those left.

Funny how things changed.

The roll of the waves was hardly noticeable, but the sound of the door was impossible to ignore thanks to years of salty air and lack of lubrication.

“Are you still awake?” asked the young girl that peeked inside, face peeling from her tan.

“There’s a storm coming. An afternoon nap is the furthest from my mind right now,” the old man replied, scooting to the edge of the bed. “I thought you weren’t supposed to come and visit anymore.”

“You’re my grandfather, and besides, I like your stories.” She sat down on the edge of the bed. “Even if what they say is true,” she added with a frown.

“Isn’t that funny.” The old man shifted on the bunk, scratching his greying stubble. “They think they know the truth. Ignorant morons.”

“They say you caused the ground to quake? The cities to fall?”

“They are idiots, Pumpkin. That’s not how it happened.”

“But isn’t that why they keep you down here? Mom says you tried to destroy everything she had worked for.”

“Your mother is a very troubled woman. And you don’t want to hear this; they’ve locked me on this ship for a reason.”

“I want to know. They say that the coast used to be lined with cities, all steel and light until the ground rose up against them.”

“The ground rose up. That’s almost poetry. But alas, this has turned fairy tale on me, and not the ones with kind fairy godmothers.”

“I still want to know. And not the fairy tale, I’m too old for that now.”

“You are too old I suppose. But don’t expect any knights or dragons here.”

“I won’t.” She sat down on the bed, crossing her legs as she watched her grandfather sift words from the still air in the cabin. 

“I used to work in the diet industry,” he started, chuckling wryly. “It seems funny now, but back in those days there would be so much to eat that some people just could not stop. As the bodies grew fatter, the ideals grew slimmer, until this was one of the most profitable places to market new drugs.”

“So mom was right, you did make drugs for fat people.”

“I’d like to think I gave people a helping hand losing weight, because they couldn’t do it on their own. Do a little good for humanity, get a bigger bonus. And I wasn’t alone in that, and with the latest metabolic boosters it was a race to hit the streets first with a patent, so instead of submitting it to full testing as a drug, we released it early as a dietary supplement. Far easier to get approved.”

“This was before I was born, right?”

“Yes, about a decade before the quake. Back when we were the ones that thought we knew something. But we didn’t. That there were side effects came as a no shock to us, but the nature of them was a different story. There were deaths, unfortunate ones, enough that it could bring the entire company down, except that in some the metabolic changes resulted in weird and wondrous transformations.” 

“Transformations? Like mom? Like me?”

“Not at first. They were far weaker, but this had never happened before and suddenly we had a woman that could set things on fire with her mind on live television, and a man that could levitate like the magicians of Las Vegas. But for real. Even as they came to close us down and prosecute us, the grabbed everything they could about our research and went to work.”

“They? You didn’t help them?”

“I was in jail at the time, Pumpkin; they didn’t think they needed me. They had the active compound after all, and they purified and tweaked it until they had a drug strong enough to kill most men. But the few survivors were far more than they had been.”

“Like mom and me?”

“Still not quite. It was still in its raw form, far too volatile. I could have told them what would happen, but who would listen to an old man? Even when he knew what he was talking about? The drug was banned of course, declared illegal almost immediately. Too many dead for every glorious success. How could anybody even think of injecting something that had a roughly 95% chance of killing you or turning you into a cripple for life?”

“I don’t know, it sounds pretty stupid.”

“It does. I never expected that it would catch on so. But there were people there willing to pay for it. The dreamers and the desperate, the thrill-seekers, the greedy and the plain insane. The manufacture had to go underground of course; I think a lot of it moved to Mexico. Things were quiet for a little, and then I suppose the nature of humanity reared its ugly head once more. The part of us that wants to play God.”

“Nanny says that’s what we are doing, playing God. That one day he will reach down and punish us for what we have done. That is why the quake happened, to wipe the world clean of sin.”

“God? God is an outmoded authoritarian entity. There is no greater goodness out there that, as long as we follow the rules, will take care of us. How many prayed and died as the ground cracked around them? The only reason that we are alive is thanks to our own actions. No gods here. Just men. Religion is nothing but socialism for the soul, if one believes that either of those concepts exists. There is no God, just us.”

“Mom says this will be a grand new age of gods and monsters.”

“Not gods. Narcissistic men wanting to be more than human, the bank-robber’s mask turned into the villain’s horned helmet. If you can call down lightning it is not a big jump to calling you Lord of Thunder after all.”

“Are we monsters then?”

“Maybe, my dear. They would certainly call us that. And in your mom’s case they might be right.”

“Mom’s not a monster,” she protested, mouth turning thin and stubborn. “I love her.”

“Of course you do, Pumpkin, she’s your mom.” There was a sigh there, as he decided to compromise his principles one more time. “Come here and give me a hug. You’re right, Grampa knows bukpis about these things. Your mother would tell you that. And does so repeatedly I’ll bet.”

Sometimes even true stories needed a fairytale ending, and sometimes even monsters loved their daughters.

Inconceivable [Wreckage 6]

Rocks fall, everybody dies.

That old tired phrase popped into Ortega’s head as he ran for it, throwing himself out of the way of the falling concrete. Time slowed, tucked itself into greyscale freeze as he saw the entire wall topple, impossibly large, impossible to dodge.

…

Twelve years old, he tossed his dice at Marek, bitterly complaining. 

“That’s not fair!”

“Who said I was fair? You were stupid enough to take the trapped goblet, so now you die!” the annoyed GM replied, children playing games where consequences on paper turned into real emotional wounds.

…

Air was forced out of him as Jake slammed him to the ground, massive armour covering him as bricks and concrete pelted them both. Ortega curled up, tucked in his arms and legs, waited for the pain, waited for the blackness. But the world stilled, filled with dust and echoes.

“Are you alive down there?” Jake asked, his voice a hollow ring through the armored suit. Metallic. Yet the worry was impossible to miss.

“Alive and pissed off,” Ortega coughed, trying to move but they were trapped under the rubble. For a brief moment he panicked, immobile, trapped, memories clawing to the surface.

…

Twenty-two years old, he tossed the cup of pills at the nurse, complaining bitterly.

“That’s not fair,” 

“Life is not fair. You will never walk again, you had better get used to that,” the nurse replied, used to the pain, used to the denial. Used to the tears that followed.

…

“Can you move?” Ortega asked, because this was different. He wasn’t trapped in bed, he could move his feet, and if only Jake would get off him he would be free. But there was just no budging the half-ton of combat armor.

“I can, just thought it would be in our best interest to stay down a moment, come up with a plan.” 

“A plan? God, he took down Ayesha with a single blow, I’ve never seen anything that big move that fast.” Ortega coughed, half choking on the dust..

“You’re faster,” the armored man replied. “You’re the only one that can get close.”

“Getting close?? What happened to standing back and shooting him full of rubber bullets? You’ve got tasers for chrissake!”

“His skin is too thick, he’s got scales, for fuck’s sake he tore down a wall on us, you think he’s gonna care about tasers any more than rubber bullets??”

“Point taken. But we still don’t know if my implants works, it’s all theoretical…” He clenched his fist, feeling the conductive plates ringing his palms, flexible hexagons connected to the base of his spine. It had been something he never asked for, he had just woken up one day and they had been there, resting innocently in his healing flesh. making him into some sort of weapon. It was inconceivable. Really. And it scared Ortega shitless. 

…

Twenty-three years old he tossed his hands in the air, complaining bitterly.

“That’s not fair.”

“I’m not lying to you. You should be able to do it easily, the same generators that power your spine can be used for touch range electrical discharges. A lot stronger than any taser.” Dr Burton sounded annoyed, as if she thought that Ortega was faking. And maybe he was.

…

Maybe he was just afraid. Those tiny plasmic generators were the things that kept him mobile after all, kept him on his feet, faster, sharper than he had ever been. They were all that kept him from the wheelchair, and the thought of using them like that… honestly? It scared the crap out of him. What if they overloaded? What if they shorted out? What if he got killed?

Christ, when had he started thinking that? He lived for the danger, that thrill of the jump, the whirr of the camera, the moment in the spotlight. But this was a different kind of danger, not glamourous and suddenly so very real. 

“Pop us free Jake, and try to distract him.” There was no wavering of Ortega’s voice just accepting the inevitable. Really. “Just give me a shot at getting near him.”

“Don’t make me regret this,” Jake replied, the motors in his armor powering up. 

The rubble shifted, and they pushed free, Ortega scrambling for his feet. Covered in dust and bruises he felt less than impressive as he coughed, spitting brown on the ground in front of him. Maybe wearing this much white hadn’t been the best idea after all. In the distance, the scaled beast that walked like a man turned to focus his ire on Jake as the armored man sent another volley of inefficient rubber bullets his way. Ortega could see the creature stumble, then steady itself for the charge. Clawed feet dug into broken concrete as sharp fangs parted in a roar and off it went.

So fast.

Faster than him? Doubtful. But most certainly faster than Jake. Who seemed to be bracing for impact. Would it help? Doubtful.

Ortega sucked in a breath and ran, as fast as he could, fast enough to feel his feet slip on the rubble. The scaled beast hit Jake head on, sending them both skidding along the ground. Ayesha had been taken by surprise, Jake was ready and braced, but metal groaned loudly in protest and there was a popping, hissing sound, like fuses blown in the wake of a tornado.

Twenty-four years old, Ortega felt gravel under his knees. He had tripped and slid and suddenly he was pressed against a body smelling sourly of bad leather. He pressed his palms against the smaller scales of the naked stomach, willing his muscles to make the connections needed for implants to fire. Nothing happened.

It wasn’t fair.

And then the air exploded in a power flash smelling of ozone and steak. Time unthawed, turned from grey to color once more. The scaled body toppled backwards, chest smoking. His palms hurt, like he had put them on a hot stove.

It had worked. It had actually worked. He could still move. The scaled man did not. Just twitched a little. Ortega looked down at his smoking hands, clenching and unclenching them.

That whole human weapon thing suddenly didn’t sound so inconceivable after all.

“What does narcissism have to do with me?” [Wreckage 5]

The hangar was flooded with lights, the air filled with the sharp, acrid stench of spray paint. In the middle of the floor loomed a massive suit of armor, a decommissioned military model with the weaponry removed and replaced with non-lethal varieties. It still towered over the head of the two people eying their handiwork, facemasks pushed up now that the worst chemicals had dissipated.

“Looking good,” the tall woman said, hair tightly tied down by a shawl to protect it from the paint.

“A work of art,” Ortega agreed, pulling his gloves off. 

The armor said nothing. Without a pilot to bring its cybernetic systems to life it was looped in standby mode, ready for action at a moment’s notice. A small light started to blink on the helmet, reacting to the presence of said pilot.

“Uh oh,” Ortega said, just a moment before Jake barged past, pushing them both aside so he could get a look at his baby.

“I can’t believe you did this!” the former soldier complained, about to touch the armor before he realized that the paint was still wet. “How could you?”

“It wasn’t easy. Luckily Ayesha rigged us up a sandblaster so we could get down to the plasteel.” Ortega gestured to the tall woman and tried to continue to explain, because it had been a lot harder than he had anticipated. But Jake interrupted.

“That’s not what I meant! My poor armor… it’s blue.”

“And gold,” Ayesha supplied helpfully.

“We thought about white, but decided that would get dirty right away.” 

“You’re wearing white,” Ayesha pointed out.

“That is because I am smooth,” Ortega preened. “And it’s mostly blue.” 

“You are so full of yourself. You just want to stand out the most.” 

She laughed and hit Ortega on the arm, something which made him wince. Unlike the men, she did not owe her status on the team to technology, but to drugs. And in that particular lottery of death or debilitation, she had hit the jackpot. Stronger than a bull, faster than a striking snake and able to take a point blank shot and be able to complain about it afterwards.

“No, I swear, it’s a theme,” he defended himself, rubbing his arm. “Lightning is sort of bluish white, and I run on electricity so…”

“Excuses, excuses, you’re such a narcissist Ric.”

“You painted my armor?” Jake finally managed to get out, having completed a full circle around his suit. “Why for the love of God would you do such a thing?”

“Because we’re not military,” Ortega said, their old arguments coming back for another round, the military man and the thrill-seeker, united for a common cause. “We have to look the part. We can’t walk in like paramilitary forces and expect us to be treated like proper law enforcement.”

“Hence the police blue,” Ayesha supplied.

“The gold is pure flash though. We can’t just be cops. We have to be more.” Ortega had spent a lot of time thinking about this, thinking about what impression they had to make. He had talked about it at length with Marek, and as the filmmaker had said, they couldn’t allow themselves to be goons. They had to be more. They had to be heroes.

“It was a perfectly sensible camouflage.” Jake kept walking around his armor, the helmeted head shifting slowly in response to his actions, close enough for the sensory weave to pick up his distress.

“We are supposed to be seen, not hiding.” Ayesha stripped off the coveralls that covered her own suit, a protective nanomesh weave of the kind that had been used as the basis of space suits before earth became too much of a problem to be able to afford such flights of fancy. It was boldly blue and red, as much of a statement as the woman herself.

“Face it Jake, you’re not in the military anymore.” Ortega couldn’t help it; the look on Jake’s face was just too funny. Of all the indignities his friend had expected to endure here in their improvised base, having to deal with a repainted armor was apparently not one of them

“And you are not the leader of this merry outfit,” he snapped, poking a finger in Ortega’s chest. “I can’t believe Marshal Burke authorized this.”

“Authorized it? He thought it was a brilliant idea. Even the code names.”

“Codenames?”

“You’re Sergeant Steel, Ayesha is Anathema and I am Charge.” Ortega wasn’t too happy, he’d spent last night tossing names back and forth with Ayesha, but none had really seemed to fit. This would have to do for now, maybe he would grow into it.

“How come I get the cheesy name?” Jake asked, momentarily distracted from his armor.

“Ahah!” Ayesha said, sliding up next to the man, looking like a lioness leaning in for a bite. “I told you he’d come around to the idea. Do you want to be named something else?”

“I… don’t want to be named anything at all, we could have proper codenames.”

“Nobody is going to ask Bravo-6 to get a kitten down from a tree.” To his credit, Ortega managed to say that with a completely straight face,

“There are no kittens in trees here anymore,” Jake argued. “The city is wrecked!”

“My point still stands.”

“Fine. I suppose it will have to do.”

Capitulation at last, and it was all that Ortega could do not to rub his hands. Marek had been right; the lure of being something grander than what they really were was a seductive one. Why be a peacekeeping force, or government watchdogs when they could be heroes? Why have utilitarian outfits like the military when they could be larger than life? They were after all, all of them changed into something more than human. Enhanced.

It wasn’t narcissism, it was just common sense.

Coprolite [Wreckage 4]

The road was gravel and asphalt jammed between cracked concrete slabs, a Frankensteinish patchwork formerly known as the I15. The truck that was parked beside the road was unmarked, military grey against greyer ruins, the yellowish dust coating everything the same shade of dirty. Ortega cleared his throat and spat on the ground between his booted feet, trying to come up with something clever to say. He didn’t have much luck with that.

Next to him, Marek shifted his weight a little where he sat, a short stocky man having a drink at a roadside diner, talking with a friend. Nothing strange there, except that the diner had quake-cracked walls, a roof that was pondering collapse and an enterprising crew of four that had just walked in one day and reopened it for business. Some souped up Grätzel Solar panels, a diesel generator for emergencies, and a truckload of supplies later, and suddenly you could get a decent chili and beer that had aspirations on being cold. An achievement these days west of the Cascades. Just don’t ask exactly what was in the chili.

“Being back here makes me think.” Marek sipped his beer, five times the price of what it would have cost half a state over, but out here things like this were priceless.

“About what?” Ortega could think of many things. The lives lost, his own near death, the fact that the Walk of Fame now housed the ghosts of more than the famous. But mostly he was glad that Marek had broken the silence between them.

“About what the future’s gonna think.” Marek emptied his beer, tossing the can over his shoulder. The air was still and smelled of exhaust fumes, the diesel trucks that headed past them working hard at recreating the legendary smog.

“That we’re idiots to go back to the place where we got our asses kicked?” Ortega suggested, because to him it was insane to decide to set up shop in the ruins of Los Angeles, even if it was the safer areas and not the downtown disaster. But he had no choice in the matter, just had to trust that the people in charge knew what they were doing.

“Oh no, not about that,” Marek laughed, opening another beer. “About the shit.”

“What on earth are you talking about?” 

“That ravine over there? That’s where the new sewage treatment plant used to be. Power for the people from the waste of the people.”

“No shit,” Ortega said, looking over to where the ground had cracked open, leaving steel and pipes dangling over the edge like vines. A sign leaned drunkenly against it’s single remaining pole, the LACSD symbol still visible under the dust.

“You’ve got that right. No shit anymore. Not here anyway.” Marek got a faraway look in his eyes. “Now it’s all down in the depths of the earth, slowly solidifying. Can you imagine that? All the shit of the greater Los Angeles area slowly coalescing into one giant turd; fossilizing deep inside the earth. Maybe in a hundred thousand years it will rise to the surface once more and alien archaeologists will find an enormous coprolite, speculating on what a terrifying creature this ‘man’ might have been that once ruled the earth. Metal rusts, concrete turns to sand, but shit apparently survives the ages. Explains politicians at least.”

“You are without a doubt the weirdest man I know,” Ortega said with a laugh.

“Is that why you called me once you got out of jail?”

“It wasn’t jail, it was a military hospital. And I didn’t call you first.”

“Jail, prison, add military to it and it’s not much of a difference. And why didn’t you call me first? I thought we were best friends?”

“I called Anne first, but she’s with the rest of the crew in New Zealand, and Del got deported back to Canada so… yeah, you are apparently my third best friend,” Ortega nodded sagely.

“I am wounded. And still here, so apparently I am a sucker as well.”

“I can’t believe you went back. I thought you were kidding when you said you could meet up with me in Los Diablos.”

“Well, after being tossed in jail once for trespassing, can you blame me for wanting to go back now that the gates are flung open? I’d take a guided tour of hell itself if that offer ever came.” 

This Ortega did not doubt one bit. “There’s a lot more people moving back than I thought.”

“It’s like the gold rush all over again, except this time the gold is freedom. Or, well, that was actually what gold was in the old days as well, but this freedom is of the more abstract kind. The freedom to live your life as you chooses.”

“Which includes squatting in dilapidated buildings and eating armadillo chili?”

“Don’t knock it until you’ve tried it. Besides, I’m getting paid to do this. There’s enough people wanting footage from the desolation that I’ve made a pretty penny so far.”

“Footage of what?” Ortega looked around; the scene so uniformly boring that he wondered what had drawn his friend here.

“Oh you’d be surprise what’s going on in the more populated areas. Fights mostly, no need for them to go underground now, and there’s plenty of people wanting to watch that.”

“Cage fighting? Really?”

“Oh not ordinary people. Enhanced. Druggies. Boosts. Who wants to see a fistfight when you can have pyrocasters and steelslingers duking it out with power armors and chainsaws?”

“You have got to be kidding me,” Ortega said, shifting a bit, quite conscious on the hardware wired into his own body.

“What do you think the government is setting up your little team for?”

“I figured we would mostly be a figurehead, discourage looting and keep company property safe.” When he put it like that, Ortega had to admit it sounded pretty lame for the money invested in him and the others.

“Oh the corps have renta-cops for that, no, you’re here to deal with the crazies I bet. The kind of people that puts on a horned helmet and declares themselves the Duke of Hollywood.” Marek made a grand gesture, throwing back his imaginary cape.

“Now I know you are pulling my leg.”

“As if. I had drinks with him once. He’s a nice guy until he gets pissed off. And when he does? I saw him run straight through a wall without breaking a sweat. Not to mention that he’s nearly eight feet tall. And I’m not sure the horns are on the helmet.”

“You had drinks with a horned giant claiming he was the Duke of Hollywood?”

“I sure did. And that’s not even the strangest thing I’ve done since coming here.”

Ortega shook his head, looking at the dusty horizon. “You know what, Marek? I think I’m gonna like it here.”

Three little words [Wreckage 3]

“We’re going back, you know.” Jake held up the pads so Ortega could throw another punch.

“Going back where? Panama?” Ortega punched and shifted his balance, the soft whirr of his implants nearly imperceptible. Or perhaps he was simply getting used to them. The scars had faded to an angry red by now, and his body was adapting. Good as new. No, better than new.

“Hell no, I hope not. Los Angeles.” Jake Tanner was a veteran of Panama, and in the military hospital for much the same reason as Ortega. A broken body fixed by state of the art technology, the difference being that Jake was military through and through, and Ortega was here because his father had pulled some favors.

“Don’t you mean Los Diablos? That’s what everybody calls it these days.” 

Whoever chose to rename Los Angeles after the Big One was not far off. The quakes had ripped the entire west coast to shreds. Cities burned, millions died, and when the smoke had cleared the name had stuck. Los Diablos. At first the government had tried to rebuild what had been lost, but as the aftershocks continued and the years passed, a crashing economy forced the politicians to focus on salvaging the heartland and the east. 

How the west was lost. Not a catchy title for a movie in a country used to winning. 

“Yeah, whatever smartass, hit me harder. I know you can.” Jake clapped the pads together, then held them up again.

“Quit giving me orders, I’m not in the army.” Ortega hit the pads despite his complaints, because it felt good. It felt good to move, to be able to sweat and train and not be looking forward to a lifetime in bed.

“Might as well be, I know how these contracts work. The military own your sorry ass now. Unless you want back in that chair.” 

“No way.” Hard punches, sweat stinging his eyes.

“Then you play ball.” Pads removed, a towel tossed instead.

“I never was much for playing ball.” Ortega wiped his face with a grimace.

“So I’ve been told. They’re gonna offer you a shot at joining the team anyway.”

“What team?” Ortega asked, by now actually curious to what the other man was angling for. “Not football I hope.”

“I wish,” Jake said with a laugh. “No chance to join the league for us Mods.” 

“Ugh, I hate that nickname. Modified humans. Makes me feel like a car or something, and you still haven’t told me what you’re angling for.” He dropped the towel, popping his neck a little. The cybernetic joints still felt slightly off, but he was moving smoother by the day.

“Not me. Them. The Government. They’ve dropped the quarantine, and are renaming the areas affected by the quake the ‘Free Territories’.”

“A catchy name is not going to make people move back there. Last I saw, there was not much left standing.” Last thing he had seen had been a fabulous sunset from the Hollywood Cliffs, the ruined skyscrapers leaning drunkenly against the encroaching sea.

“Oh it’s more than a catchy name. It’s free of government control. Free of taxes. Free of police. Free of pesky environmental regulations. The new west, like the old west if you believe the slogans. I hear companies are already moving into the less destroyed areas. And with companies come roads, electricity and jobs.”

“Jesus,” Ortega said, looking at Jake as if he couldn’t quite believe his words. “It’s gonna be dog eat dog out there.”

“It sure will be. But with the economy crashing and unemployment being what it is, there’s enough people willing to take a chance that they can build a future for themselves. It’s the American dream after all. And with Asia finally regulating things, there’s few places left where anything goes.”

“They sure got you drinking the Kool Aid. And what were you talking about before? About the government and joining teams?” 

“Companies ain’t gonna bother with things like police or firemen, there’s going to be private security forces for their facilities and to hell with the rest. The military’s been asked to help put together a special task force of people charged with keeping the peace.”

“Because military rule has always been such a grand idea.” Ortega walked over to the treadmill, striking up a steady pace. He was still getting used to the new weight of his body and the way his implants handled. Maybe he was more like a sports car than he liked to admit.

“I said the military’s been asked to help.” Jake leaned against the wall, settling for watching. “It’s gonna be an autonomous organization, deputized directly by the president. More like the Marshals of old than navy seals.”

“And they want me in? Forgive me if I sound a bit disbelieving.”

“Oh trust me, if the military had a choice, this would all be staffed by trusted officers, but the President is keen on making this an independent organization. He wants civilians too. And you’re already sort of famous after your daredevil exploits. You’re a perfect candidate.”

“Yeah, right,” Ortega said with the deepest of cynical looks. 

“I’m serious. It will be a team consisting only of Enhanced, don’t tell me you’ll back away from a shot at being a legit hero? And it will get you out of here.”

Ortega stopped jogging, catching his breath. He was covered in sweat and far too out of shape, but he knew that would change in time. He wanted out of here any way possible, and if this was a way out without living in crippling debt for the rest of his life… could he afford to refuse? He’d never really considered any real career in life if you didn’t count crazy stunts, but living on the edge meant you had an expiration date, and this… he hated to admit it, but it spoke to the twelve year old in him. The part of him that thought it was fun to fling oneself off tall buildings for sport. What did he have to lose anyway? Except his life, and he was already prepared to risk that on a daily basis. Had nearly gotten killed more than once. And this? A shot at respectability? At fame? At a limelight far shinier than he could ever have hoped for before?

“What the hell,” he begun, shrugging a little. “I am in.”

Three little words. Changing his future.

When you pray, move your feet [Wreckage 2]

The wind howled murder in Ortega’s dreams, tonight like every night.

“Come on Ortega, move your feet, the day ain’t getting any younger.” Marek was all smile and camera, and there was no turning back now. He had to make the jump.

There was a feel of crumbling rocks beneath his feet as he threw himself off the edge of the cliff, the ruins far below greeting him with concrete teeth. Base jumping was a thrill, the first moment of freefall a kiss snatched from death’s cold lips. He knew he should have prayed, but he’d left all faith behind him long ago. These days, his gods were ones of preparation and caring for your equipment. 

Behind him, rocks cascaded down the uneven cliff face, a stampede of debris racing him towards the ground below. 

Falling.

Weightless. 

The wind roaring in his ears and his heartbeat so loud it hurt.

And then the chute snapped open, tearing him sideways, away from the cliff, away from the falling rocks, away to safety and a glorious descent and a rush of adrenaline that nearly dampened the pain as the wind slapped him in the face and smashed him into the rocks.

That day death hadn’t been satisfied with just a kiss, she had wanted to go second base. And Ortega had ended up broken and trapped in a bed, surrounded by wheezing machines, waking from dreams recapturing his last moment of freedom.

…

“Move your left toe, please.” Dr Burton said the words blandly, like she had a dozen times before, leaning over the man on the table. 

He was lying limp, like a filleted fish, the healing flesh on his back parted to reveal the grafts all along his back. Titanium fused with plasteel, faintly glowing cords and connections burrowing into the bone to make up for neural connections lost in the accident that had smashed so much of his spine. It was a work of art and wonder, military cybernetic technology adapted to a less lethal use. If only she could make it work.

“Still nothing,” Ortega said, watching the floor. 

Not dirty. 

Nothing here was dirty. 

He hadn’t seen a speck of dust since he had woken up here, no doubt thanks to his father pulling strings. Again. Patching up his wayward son. Trying to make him walk once more. They had an awkward reunion after he had regained consciousness, his father looming in the background, impassive in his uniform. Such a shield it was to hide behind. His mother had been on her knees by the bed, praying, thanking the Lord for saving her son’s life.

In his opinion, the Lord had little to do with it. It was his friends that had managed to get him down and keep him alive until help got there. He’d asked what become of them, but they had been found in a restricted area. Los Angeles was in ruins after the Big One and anybody who came there without permission were trespassers. Possible looters. Maybe his friends were let go. Maybe they were doing jail time. He had no way of knowing. Nobody would even answer his questions. His friends were as lost as his own mobility.

…

His spine whirred, and that was a sound a body was not supposed to make. Standing up hurt, every muscle ached as Ortega leaned on the handrails, forcing himself to stand.

“Move your feet,” Sammy said, his physical therapist refusing any other form of addressing him. “It’s not that hard.”

“Says the man without the metal eel pretending to be a spine.” No, Ortega thought to himself. An eel was the wrong word. His first thought when he had seen the spine all rolled up on the table before him was that it had been a snake, ready to strike. And now it had, inserting itself into his flesh, bonding with his bones, theoretically making him all that he had been and a lot more.

Freak. 

Experiment. 

Military property.

“You’re only going to tire yourself out if you keep standing there.” Sammy placed a hand on his shoulder, making Ortega flinch a little. “I know it hurts. I know things need time to heal. But you need to start moving for that to happen.”

“Bit too valuable to be left in the bed now, am I?” There was a hint of bitterness to his voice as he moved his left foot forward, letting his weight come down on it.

Blinding pain shot through his body, but his knees didn’t buckle. The whirring shifted in tone, and his body held. The next step was easier, the spine adjusting, microscopic chipbrains memorizing stance and weight. It hurt, but he could walk. He actually could put one foot in front of the other again.

Right then and there, that moment that felt like a bigger achievement than any of his many jumps.

A prologue [Wreckage 1]

“So, you gonna piss over the edge of the world?” Marek put down the camera and unzipped his jeans, balancing precariously at the edge of the cliff. Below him stretched the broken plains of Los Diabolos, ruined buildings flattened by the Big One.

Ortega laughed and shook his head, tightening the straps of his parachute. The wind bore down from the sea, tearing at the small group of people that had assembled at the top of the cliff. Behind them, the remains of giant letters creaked in the wind; double O’s overlooking the proceedings. The massive quake had torn apart the coastline, but Los Angeles had not sunk beneath the waves. Instead the coastline had wrinkled and torn like the side of a car when the Pacific plate scraped against its North American neighbor. The geologists still debated exactly what had happened, but the people of Los Angeles couldn’t care less. Those that could fled, and those that had no choice remained behind and renamed their ruins Los Diabolos.

“Come on man, when is the next time you’re gonna have a shot at this? They say the Hollywood cliff is gonna crumble in a decade at the most.” The Hollywood Hills was part of the ground that had got shoved sharply upwards, leaving a sheer cliff face facing southward that just begged to be jumped.

“The wind’s shifting, you’re going to end up pissing all over yourself,” Ortega said. “Better get the camera ready instead.” Nobody had jumped this before, at least nobody with a crew and camera. They would be the first, a golden ticket to fame and glory in the specialized world of extreme sports.

“So you’re afraid to piss, but are still gonna jump the damn thing?” Marek shook and wiped his hands on his jeans, ignoring that his boots were now somewhat damp. 

“He’s got a point,” Anna agreed, putting on her helmet, the small camera mounted on it looking like a third eye. A worried third eye. “He’s a disgusting little prick, but I don’t like the way this feels. Too variable.” She was the most experienced of the jumpers; usually Ortega would follow her lead, even if he wouldn’t admit to it.

“My prick is not little,” muttered Marek. “It’s the wind.”

“Hey, Del, do you think the wind is going to die down any time soon? Should we just hang back and have few beers until it calms down?” Ortega looked back at the tall Canadian where he was hunched over his laptop.

“Don’t think so,” the man replied. “It’s now or never, it’s just going to get worse. And we’ve got a cold front coming in from the pacific; if it rains we’re not going to get back up here any time soon. Or down in a real hurry.”

“I’m not ready to play slip and slide on those trails,” Marek said. “I’m here to shoot some awesome footage. So I guess this is it Ortega, either shit or get off the pot. I can’t speak for the crew down there, but I’m freezing my ass off.” 

“Let’s do it,” Ortega said after a look at Anna. Her nod was hesitant, but it was all that he needed. “We’ve come this far. Who jumps first?”

“I call heads,” Anna said, looking at Marek who flipped the coin with his usual flourish.

“Tail, sorry sweets, but Ortega gets to be the first to make history.” Marek brought the camera to life, panning over the two jumpers, then out over the edge of the cliff. “What a view, sometimes I love my job.”

“You always love your job,” Ortega said, making sure that the camera on his helmet was rolling. He’d debated whether to use a wingsuit or not, but the drop was too short, and the cliff steep enough to deal with regardless. He hoped.

“Damn right I do,” the short man replied, holding the camera steady despite the wind. “Don’t break a leg. You nearly killed me with your moaning last time you were laid out in the hospital.”

“I don’t like bed-rest, prescribed or not.” He stood at the edge now, the panoramic enormity of Los Diabolos spreading out beneath him. This was what he lived for. These moments when he stood alone at the edge of a drop, waiting for the fall to begin. In the past he’d done it all, skydiving, extreme sports, parkour… anything to get that feeling of unreal immortality. As if he was one with the world, as if nothing could ever hurt him.

And then he jumped.