The Ascension: A Super Human Clash (9 page)

FIVE YEARS ago…

It was three thirty in the morning, and the lights in the airport's long-term parking lot illuminated only the roads: The parking spots were in almost complete darkness.

Sixteen-year-old Solomon Cord switched on his penlight as he crouched down next to the driver's-side door of an immaculate 1977 BMW E23. He put the penlight between his teeth, unzipped his jacket, and pulled out the long, slim strip of metal he'd had tucked into his sleeve.

It was a tricky lock—considerably harder than most—but he'd cracked one of these before. Once. On the fifth attempt, the door clicked open.
Finally!
Cord gathered up his tools and climbed into the car, then leaned over to check the ignition slot.
All right, this one I can do in my sleep!

Once he got the engine started, he reversed out of the spot, then drove quietly and smoothly through the airport's parking lot until he reached the Arrivals terminal. He parked the BMW in the passenger loading zone and honked the horn twice.

Moments later a tall man wearing an expensive-looking three-piece suit and a heavy overcoat strode through the exit, followed by a teenager about Cord's age.

Cord got out as the man approached. “When you want to shut off the engine, just pop it in first, take your foot off the clutch, and hit the brakes. It'll stall and cut out. But whatever you do, don't do that until you get where you're going, because you won't be able to get it started again.”

The man nodded and smiled. “Nice work, son. What do I owe you?”

“Two hundred, plus ten bucks for the cab home.”

The boy said, “Your ad says it's only a hundred.”

“It also says that after midnight's double,” Cord replied. “Triple-A would have done it cheaper, but you'd still be waiting for them to show up. And they'd probably just smash the window. Not what you want in this weather.”

The older man said, “Pay him, Max.”

The boy removed a thick roll of bills from his pocket, peeled some off, and handed them to Cord.

“And ten for the cab?” Cord prompted.

“Yeah, about that…,” Max said. “Why don't we just give you a lift? We're going your way.”

“I'm OK, thanks.”

The man nodded at that, then said, “All right. You provide a very valuable service, Mr. Cord. Thank you.” He reached into his overcoat pocket and pulled out a car key.

“So you found the key after all that?” Cord asked.

“Oh, we never lost it. This was a test. You passed.”

Before Cord could respond, Max said, “Get in the car.”

Cord realized that he actually
did
want to get into the car. It was warm, and it'd be a lot more comfortable than getting a taxi back home. He walked around to the passenger side and climbed in.

A few minutes later, as the car pulled out onto the freeway, Cord suddenly sat upright. “What the heck…? What was I
thinking
?”

The older man smiled at him. “Only an idiot would get into a stranger's car, right? Don't worry, you're safe. But you don't know who we are, or why you're here.” The smile grew wider still. “You're about to find out, Solomon.”

The young man sitting in the back leaned forward and said, “I'm Max Dalton. I'm a superhuman. I can read minds and sometimes even control them, for a while. That's what I did to you. The man in the suit here is Mr. Krodin.”

Cord began, “I don't—”

Krodin said, “Solomon, we've been watching you for the past seven weeks. All those aptitude tests your teachers have been giving you? That was at our request. You have an ordinary background, an ordinary education, and yet your intelligence quotient—especially when it comes to mechanical or electronic devices—puts you a considerable distance above the level of genius.”

“You've wondered about that, haven't you?” Max asked. “You're sure you're not a superhuman, but you know you're far from ordinary. Well, we can give you the answer to that. One of our colleagues—Casey—has a complete understanding of the superhuman powers. And that's why we want you.”

“A job?” Cord asked. “I'm not interested.”

Still keeping his eyes on the road, Krodin said, “Tell him everything, Max.”

Max said, “We're offering you the position of head of research and development. You'll be working with Casey. You'll have free rein and unlimited resources. Think about that, Solomon. Anything you want to build, you can do it.”

Cord shook his head. “Thanks, but I'm not interested. Pull over and let me out. Right now.”

“We can't stop on the freeway,” Krodin said. “Just listen to what we have to say, OK?”

“Not a chance.” Cord unclipped his seat belt and grabbed the interior door handle.

Krodin said, “Max?”

Cord suddenly realized that, more than anything else, he really did want to stay in the car and hear them out.

“The world is in a mess,” Krodin said. “The governments like people to think that they steer their countries, that things happen because they want them to. But that's a delusion, like a kite believing that it controls the wind.”

“And you think you can do better?” Cord asked.

“We can.”

From the backseat, Max said, “What if there was a world leader who couldn't be assassinated, who was totally incorruptible, and who would never die? Sure, the people would no longer be able to vote for who would lead them, but that wouldn't matter if their leader always put the good of the people ahead of his own needs. What do we have then? We have a world with equality for all, no poverty or war or hunger. Utopia. Peace on Earth, forever.”

Cord chewed on his lower lip for a moment. “Every empire falls. Democracy isn't perfect, but by its very nature it permits change. So you're starting from a flawed premise. Nothing good ever comes from that. No thanks.”

Krodin sighed. “I said you wouldn't be able to reason with him. Max, do your thing.”

Later that morning, as Cord was walking to school, he felt an elation—a sense of pure contentment—that he had never experienced before. He was quitting school today, and by tomorrow morning he'd be part of Krodin's team. Together, they would reshape the world. And that could only be a good thing.

Sure, Max Dalton had the ability to control people's minds, but Dalton had assured Cord that he wasn't doing that to him.

JAMES KLAUS STOOD hidden among the small copse of trees that backed onto his house in Maple Towers, Mid way, listening to the leader of the squadron of Praetorian guards that had been interrogating his mother and stepfather, Rufus.

“He was last seen making his way back to Midway. You see him, hear from him…you even hear anything about him, you contact us. Immediately. Understood?”

Rufus's voice said, “Of course, officer. Absolutely. But I don't understand how he could have gotten from school all the way to his father's farm.”

James heard the soldier's boots crunching down the gravel drive, but his step was awkward, uneven, and James knew that the man was walking backward. “
That
is not your concern, Mr. Halliburton. This is a matter of national security. You will speak of this to no one.”

“Sure, no problem,” Rufus said, his voice thick with barely masked fear.

James listened to the distinctive hum of the Praetorians' vehicle as it drove away, and then the only heartbeats inside the house were from his mother and Rufus.

He was about to scramble over the fence when he heard his mother say, “I
knew
there was something strange going on, the way Faith phoned out of the blue like that.”

James cringed to hear his mother almost spit the name.
What has Mom got against Faith? Dad didn't even meet her until after Mom threw him out.

“She didn't say what she wanted?” Rufus asked.

“No.”

There was a hint of amusement in Rufus's voice as he added, “You notice they wouldn't tell us how he managed to escape from them? I mean, on a
skateboard
? Where did he even get something like that?”

There was a short pause, then his mother said, “There's no way he'd have just left school. He's too scared of getting into trouble.” She sighed. “It's my fault. I should never have fought Darrien for custody.”

Rufus said, “Honey, the kid's trouble. Always has been, you know that. The way I see it, whatever's going on it's for the best. If he's up to something, the Praetorians will straighten him out. If he's not, well, maybe it's time we enlisted him in the Youth Corps. That'll toughen him up. Either way, he'll be out of our hands before too long.”

James decided he'd heard more than enough. He left his skateboard under a bush close to the house and walked away.
So this world's versions of my mom and Rufus are still jerks. What a surprise.

Ever since his powers appeared, James had known what Rufus and his mother really thought of him—what they really thought of everyone. They were a bitter, sullen couple who seemed to be happy only when they were gloating about something bad happening to someone else.

This was why James never brought friends home and did his best to keep out of Rufus and Shawna's way. He'd always known that Rufus didn't like him, but it had been a huge shock to overhear his own mother describing him as a “lanky, spotty waste of space.”

James had learned a lot about his neighbors too. He'd learned that Mrs. Gascoyne, who lived two doors down, spent at least an hour each day phoning all the betting shops in town and placing dozens of tiny bets on pretty much every major sporting event in the country. He knew that six-year-old Denny Van Hove across the street—who looked like the sweetest little kid in the world—had to be constantly watched by his parents because his favorite pastime was a game he'd invented called “Let's see how fast this thing catches fire.” He knew that Kenneth Leyden and Namita McConnach, who lived next door to each other, had been secretly dating for the past eight years.

James spent a long time listening in on Rufus, hoping to catch him doing something illegal, but Rufus had turned out to be extremely law-abiding. A total jerk and a bully, but not actually a criminal.

James strode through the woods—a cocoon of silence around him so that he didn't have to worry about stepping on fallen branches and alerting anyone to his presence—and emerged on the tree-lined road that led south into Midway.

Usually at this time of day there would be an almost constant stream of traffic heading into and out of the town. Now there was no sign of human activity.

How does this work?
he wondered.
If people aren't allowed out except to travel to and from work or school, then how does anything get done?
On the journey from his father's farm he had seen less than a dozen vehicles—not counting army patrols—and each one had been a delivery truck of some kind.

He'd passed factories where work was clearly in progress, but no open stores. The Schaeffer Mall, one of the largest and busiest in the county, was completely devoid of life, yet it didn't look to have been abandoned.

Maybe there's one day a week when the curfews are lifted and the people are allowed out to buy food and stuff.

By the time James reached the start of Betancourt Avenue, which crossed the top of Main Street, he'd seen only twenty-two people—he'd counted—and they'd all been walking in silence, head down, not taking any notice of anything going on around them. Not that there had been much going on at all.

The only thing out of the ordinary was one of the Praetorians' flying craft that came silently zooming in over the city.

Then a few minutes later James rounded the corner onto Main and realized that he'd inadvertently kept up his cocoon of silence after he left the woods.

 

The surveillance cameras tracked Abby as she raced along the centerline of Farnsworth Avenue. The cameras were fitted with powerful spotlights—visible even in daylight—that activated as she passed.

The sidewalks on either side of the road were still lined with pedestrians, most of them not even looking in her direction.

What happened to Cord? How could he just leave me like that?

He's not a coward—either he's planning something or he's got his own problems.

She spotted a gap ahead between two tenement buildings and raced toward it. So far, there hadn't been any sign of pursuit—but with the cameras tracking her and the lights giving away her position, she knew it wouldn't be long before the black-clad men found her.

Abby could see only one camera covering the alley, attached to the wall close to the roof—she quickly nocked an arrow and fired: The arrow shattered the camera and its light, showering the alley floor with fragments of metal and plastic.

She took a moment to rest, leaning her back against the featureless brick wall. Like everywhere else in this bizarre version of Midway, the alley was almost spotlessly clean. There was no litter, and the only sign of graffiti was the faint outline of a band name that had long ago been almost completely scrubbed away.

OK, which way do I go now? If Sol hasn't just run off, then he'll be expecting me to find him. So that means he'll have picked somewhere we both know…. And it can't be the apartment, so it has to be the diner.
She quickly figured out the quickest route to the diner—and then dismissed it. When she broke cover, the cameras would spot her again.

But the cameras are watching only the streets!

Abby collapsed her bow and clipped it back onto the quiver, then withdrew two arrows.

Holding an arrow in each hand, she leaped at the alley wall. She slammed the right arrow deep into the brick work, used it to haul herself up, then swung her left hand at the wall. With the second arrow in place, she pulled out the first.

She climbed quickly, hand over hand, leaving behind a staggered trail of holes and shattered bricks. As she passed the broken camera, she retrieved the arrow that had pierced it and slipped it back into the quiver. At the top Abby swung herself onto the building's roof, six stories up.

She didn't waste time sightseeing. Whoever was monitoring her through the cameras would by now have alerted the patrols—and the broken camera was a sure giveaway that this was where she had disappeared. She ran across the rooftop, vaulted a low wall between this building and the next, dropped down onto the lower roof of another building, and kept going.

The rooftops weren't quite as neatly kept as the streets below: They were peppered with ducts and vents, cables and pipes, and on one flat roof she passed a collection of weather-stained lawn furniture that clearly hadn't been used in years.

When she reached Main Street, there was nowhere left to run—Abby knew she could jump much farther than a normal human, but the street was just too wide. Below, dozens of people walked silently, heads down.

It's like all the joy has been ripped out of their lives.

About four hundred yards to her right, on the opposite side of the street, was the diner—or what used to be the diner. Its windows had been neatly boarded up, as were the windows of most of the stores on Main Street.

She walked along the edge of the roof, wondering how to get across the street without being spotted. The cameras were positioned on their posts a few feet lower than the roof, so for now she was safe.

Maybe I can jump right onto one of the posts, land above the cameras…And then what? There's no way I'd be able to jump to the next one.

Or I could take them all out with arrows—but then that would just give away my position.

Abby stepped over a bundle of cables as thick as her arm and stopped at the corner of the building. It looked easy enough to climb down.
If I'm fast—really fast—maybe I can get across the street before whoever's watching spots me.

She sat down on the edge of the roof, swung around so that she could lower herself over the edge before she dropped—and again spotted the bundle of cables.

The bundle emerged from a narrow vent in the building's roof and snaked across the rooftop to the edge, where it split into individual strands, each one leading to the surveillance cameras monitoring the street below.

Abby grinned.
Bingo!

She hauled herself back up and returned to the cables, grabbed hold of the bundle, and pulled, reeling in the slack until it was taut against the vent. Then she dug in her heels and wrenched as hard as she could.

The bundle snapped a lot more easily than she'd expected, and Abby almost stumbled backward. On the street behind her the cameras powered down.

She leaned over the edge and shouted down: “Hey! You people down there! The cameras are off-line—you're not being watched. You can do whatever you like now!”

Some of the people momentarily glanced up at her, then continued walking as though they'd heard nothing.

Oh man…What's
wrong
with them?

A movement to her left caught Abby's attention. A flying vehicle was approaching from the east, coming in low over the rooftops. At first she thought it was a helicopter, but the craft was the wrong shape—squat and wide—and moving in almost complete silence.

There was nowhere for Abby to hide, and it would take too long to climb down the side of the building.

She unclipped her bow, snapped its limbs into place, and nocked an arrow to the string.

The craft came to a stop and hovered thirty yards away, directly over Main Street and only a few yards above the web of cables. A hatch in the side slid open and an amplified voice called out: “Drop your weapon. Lie flat on the roof with your hands above your head. This is your only warning.”

Abby turned and ran back across the rooftops.

Stupid, stupid, stupid! I shouldn't have snapped the cable. Cord was right: That just told them where I was!

A volley of red-tipped darts peppered the rooftop around her. She vaulted over a five-foot-high vent and crouched down on the other side of it.

OK, think! It'll take them a few seconds to get to me….

She quickly looked around for some way to escape. It was only when she looked down that she noticed two of the darts protruding from the heel of her left boot. Over her shoulder she saw that a third dart had struck the strap of her quiver.

Whoa…That guy's a good shot!

On the next rooftop she spotted a closed, plastic-covered skylight.
There!

She broke cover just as the craft came into view, dived over the low wall separating the roofs, and launched an arrow at the skylight as she ran.

The arrow fractured the plastic and Abby jumped again, coming down hard—feetfirst—onto the skylight. It shattered under the force and she dropped through.

She landed heavily on a dining table, her right foot cracking a bowl of chicken soup. A family of five—mother, father, three kids—stared openmouthed at her.

The mother began, “What…?”

“Sorry!” Abby jumped off the table and called back, “Enjoy your meal!” as she ran for the apartment's front door.

The corridor outside was bare, dimly lit—and empty. She raced down the stairs three at a time, jumped the last six steps to the floor below, then vaulted over the rail and landed lightly on the next stairwell down, and kept going.

Can't just go straight out onto the street—they'll be expecting that. Have to find another way out.

But…They'll know that
I
know they're expecting that, so maybe they
won't
have the street door covered.

On the ground floor she burst out through the door with her bow loaded and ready, hit the ground, and rolled, but the narrow side street was empty. She looked up—no sign of the flying craft or the soldiers.

Abby kept close to the wall as she quickly ran toward Main Street. At the corner pedestrians passed her by without paying her much attention, as though they saw a girl with a bow and arrow every day of the week.

Then she saw her chance: Trundling along the street was a large delivery truck—it would pass by very close to her, and it was even heading in the right direction, toward the diner.