Alpha Male (11 page)

"Why would I?" she asked. "I know he's the father. Besides, even if I didn't, look at all the other women suing for paternity. It hasn't really gotten them anywhere. He's not like us. He doesn't have to follow the same rules."

"That does seem to be the case," Dr Snyder said. "So, explain this attraction. You've never seen his face, you don't know anything about him beside what's in the press. What is it that draws you too him, and makes you want to jump off buildings to get his attention?"

"I don't know," she said. "It's like…He's…Look at him. He flies, he's strong, he's fearless; what more would a woman want? Before he came around, it was movie stars, and musicians, you know? They were larger than life, but they were human. He changed all of that. He's better than us." 

"And you think if you are with him, you'll be better as well?" 

"Why not?" she said, shrugging. 

"So, this is why you jump off the buildings? Just to get his attention?"

"You don't understand," she said. "We share something. The way he looks at me, it's special. We are meant to be." 

"You've put a lot of thought into this," he said, jotting down notes. 

"What else you gonna think about before jumping off a building?" she said, casting a slight smile. 

Chapter
Eleven.

"Thirty seconds," Xavier said, staring at the digital watch on his wrist. The ten men standing behind him in the dark sewer were all nervous, fidgeting around as the clock counted down. Each seemed lost in their own head as the anticipation of the coming minutes overtook them.

"Fuck," Keen said, pulling down his mask. "I'm not ready for this."

"Don't worry," Xavier said, still focusing on his watch. "We've got the big man with us."

A few feet away, Al stood in shadows, separate from the group with his arms crossed. A piece of black cloth with two eye holes was tied around his head and he wore a long-sleeved outfit of the same color.

"I don't like that guy," Keen said, glancing at Al.

"Fifteen seconds!" Xavier said. "You're gonna have to get over it, cause Eddy likes the bastard plenty."

"What if he goes apeshit and kills us?" one of the other men asked.

"I'm more worried about Alph—" another started, but his mouth was muffled before the words could come out.

"What are you, a fucking idiot?" Keen asked, staring into the man’s eyes. "You saw what happened last time. You wanna get us killed?"

The man's reply was nothing but a simple "nuh uh" from behind the cupped hand.

"Let’s go!" Xavier said, heading up the sewer ladder. He pushed aside the manhole cover, and crawled out onto the street. He turned back and looked into the hole. "You four stay here. Al, you're with us."

Al didn't even blink at the command. He just climbed the ladder and stared up at the big building before them. It was a massive warehouse surrounded by a tall chain link fence; the top of which was surrounded by menacing barbed wire. The place was lit up by safety lights, leaving few shadows for them to hide in.

"I'll handle this," Al said, holding up his hand, ready to use his powers to take down the fence. Xavier placed his hand on Al's shoulder and shook his head.

"We gotta do this quiet," he said, smiling as he brandished a pair of bolt cutters. He turned to two of the men and said, “I’ll get us through, you two stay here and make the hole bigger. We’ll need to move large pallets through it.” They nodded in agreement as he began cutting.

It took less than two minutes for him to cut a hole big enough for them to duck through. The men at the fence began their job, while the remaining four ran towards the nearest loading dock. Between them and the inside was a thick rotating lock. Xavier checked his watch and said, "Fifteen seconds."

"The alarm is going to go off as soon as we open this door," Xavier said. "Al, your job is to use your mind-shit to grab as many boxes as you can, and pass them off to the others. They will haul them away."

Al nodded, emotionless. The watch beeped and Xavier cut the lock. It fell to the ground with a clank, and they slid the door up. A loud alarm belted out as they ran into the building.

Al saw his objective and got to work. He lifted a pallet of boxes with his mind and carted it out to the fence. The waiting men cut the plastic and started hauling the boxes, one by one, to the sewer hole. He went back to get another pallet and saw Xavier and Keen tussling with an armed guard for his gun. They got the upper hand, and stepped away with the weapon pointed at the uniformed man.

"How many more of you are there?" Xavier yelled over the alarm, gun in hand. The guard, tight lipped, just glared at them both. Xavier took a step closer and cocked the revolver. "I will kill you!"

Al looked at the gun, examining it. His eyes traced the slide, the trigger, and the barrel. Without notice, he removed it from Xavier's hand with no show of effort. It floated in the air, flying off towards the back of the warehouse. "No, you won't," Al said.

"Fuck man!" Xavier said, looking at Al with severe anger. "Don't do that! Just…don't!"

"I will not let you kill this man," he replied.

The guard ran, ducking around some boxes to escape. In the distance, sirens howled and the faint red and blue lights of police cars could be seen.

"Fuck. It's time to go," Xavier said. “We'll finish this later. Hopefully, our boy in town is keeping the hero busy. Al, wait ten minutes, then cause a ruckus."

Al didn't respond. He just watched as the rest of the men disappeared into the sewer.

*****

Alpha Male stood in the middle of the First District Bank, surrounded by the scared bystanders, all huddled against the walls as a young masked man held a gun to the head of a terrified bank teller. The woman, a bleach blonde with her hair in a bun, cried as the steel of the automatic pistol dug into her temple. He didn't speak as he gripped her. He just held her tight, and examined his surroundings.

Outside, a group of police officers held their guns ready, hunched down behind the safety of their cars.

"Let’s talk about this," Alpha said, with both hands up, palms out. "You called me here for a reason, so put down the gun, and we'll talk."

The man chuckled a bit, and tightened his hold on the woman. She cried out as he did. "I'm not stupid," he said, behind the ski mask.

"No one said you were," Alpha said, taking a step closer. "Let her go, and we can figure out a way to get you out of this with minimal time spent. We both know you're going to jail, one way or another. Let’s not have any blood spilt today."

"That's where you are wrong," he said. "I'm not going to jail."

"You have no other options," Alpha said. "As long as I'm here, you aren't getting away."

The armed man checked his watch, and began to back away, pulling her along with him.

"Ma'am," Alpha said. "I promise you'll get out of this safely. I won't let him hurt you. Do you understand?"

All the poor woman could muster was a simple nod. Alpha began to follow one slow step at a time, when his phone went off. Slowly, he reached down and grabbed it from his belt. It read "Rose" on the display, and he clicked it on.

"Alpha, we've got bigger problems I need you to see to," she said. He turned his head and saw her looking at him from behind one of the police cars. "It's our friend. He's back. You have to stop him."

"God damn it, why now?"

"Just get to the Morrison packaging factory on the south side of town!" She said. "We can handle this asshole."

The robber gave a sarcastic wave as Alpha backed away. The hero didn’t stop until he had stepped through the large double doors that led from the main lobby and out onto the sidewalk. He glared at the criminal standing between the two deposit stations with his frightened hostage. The man was shuffling backwards as Alpha tightened his fist.

Taking off, Alpha soared south, following the large neon sign that read The Island Rag. Within seconds, he could see the plume of dust rising up in the air with the blue lights of the police cars bouncing off of it.

He landed in the parking lot of the demolished warehouse. The building was like road kill, flattened in the middle with its insides pushing out of both ends. He exhaled a deep sigh and approached, passing between flipped police cars. The responding officers stood around, disoriented from a battle that had already passed.

"Where is he?" Alpha asked a nearby officer.

"We don't know," he said, rubbing his arm, wincing from the pain. "The bastard did all this, then ran off about a minute before you got here."

Alpha surveyed the damage, shaking his head in disbelief. The whole area was wrecked. The fence was bent back on itself, the concrete was cracked to pieces, and the power lines hung down, sparking as they touched the ground.

"I'll find you, you piece of shit!" Alpha screamed. "You can't hide forever."

Chapter Twelve.

A big smile came over Reedy’s face as he looked down at his new desk. The small slide-in nameplate read "Reedy" and he gave a slight, almost imperceptible nod in excited agreement. Placing his briefcase down next to his desk, he removed his jacket and hung it over the back of his chair. He sat down and looked at the wooden surface before him. There was a computer monitor, a precinct desktop calendar, a phone, and a mesh cup that was full of blue capped pens.

"Most of us hang our coats on the rack," came a voice from behind him. Reedy turned his head and saw a white man with short blonde hair leaning back in his chair. "Of course, no one's telling you what to do…"

Reedy looked up and saw the coat rack in the corner, a lush tree of grey, black, and blue.

“Well,” he said, putting his arms against the back of his head as he leaned back. “Maybe next time.”

The man gave a quick chuckle and sat up. He spun around, grinning as he offered his hand for a shake. Their grips meet and the man said, “I don’t know why that cracked me up, but it did.”

“I don’t know why that cracked you up either,” Reedy said, with a wide eyed jester's smile.

“I’m Vaughn,” the man said.

“Nice to meet you,” Reedy said.

“I’m gonna show you around.”

“A tour?” Reedy asked.

“Nah, I’m basically your partner for now. Look, we all heard about what happened. That’s some crazy…stuff.”

“Stuff?” Reedy said. “You mean shit?”

“Yeah, shit,” he said, raising an eyebrow. ”My wife, she’s trying to weed that habit out of me. She says I embarrass her when we go out.”

“My wife cusses like a sailor,” Reedy said.

“Hey, Vaughn,” said a short haired man standing over his desk.  He tossed a pointing thumb towards Reedy. “This the new guy?”

“Yep, this is Reedy,” Vaughn said. Reedy leaned up in his seat to shake the man's hand.

“Nice to meet you,” Reedy said, as they shook.  

“You too,” the man said.

“Oh shit, sorry,” Vaughn said.  “This is Phillips.”

"I brought you guys a present, straight from the boss’s desk," Phillips said, holding up a cream colored folder. He tossed it down on Reedy’s desk and Vaughn got up to watch as Reedy flipped it open. The first page was a photograph of himself in the hospital bed. Tubes and wires twisted and snaked in and out of his mouth and nose. He had to force himself not to look away.

"Yeah," Reedy said with an intent glare and small angry eyes. "Tell the boss I said thanks."

"She says you can't confront him," Phillips said. "None of us can. If you find him, you call Alpha Male direct. His number is in the back of the folder. You two got some reading to do."

*****

Rose looked down at the growing crowd of protesters and inhaled deep. The thick smoke from her cigarette bit the back of her throat as it went into her lungs and she closed her eyes to enjoy it.

“Maybe I need a new costume,” Alpha said with a slight smile. He was leaning against the railing looking at her.

“You’re sense of humor sucks,” she said, exhaling again, almost chewing the smoke as it came out. “It’s not your costume. People are just scared.”

“You’d think they’d take comfort that I’m here!” He said.

“They are looking for someone to blame, and right now it’s you,” she said, stamping out the last of her cigarette before turning to him.

“I didn’t see this coming,” he said, turning his attention down. “When he showed up, I figured it would be a lot different than this. That maybe they would remember why they loved me before.”

“Look, you’re the only super person they’ve known, and now this guy has shown up out of nowhere. They see that connection and now it’s your fault he’s here. We see this shit all the time with the police force. There’s always some anti-fucker trying to preach his police state bullshit as we drag him into a cell. You just need to thicken that invulnerable skin of yours.”

“Do you ever watch the Alpha channel?” he asked, still looking down.

“Uh, yeah,” she said. “That damn cartoon is ridiculous. People don’t talk like that.”

"The people that do that channel told me they have higher ratings than any other station. By a large number at that," he said.

"What's your point?"

"I think I've just grown used to that," he said. "You know?"

"Yeah, I know," she said. I can't imagine what it's like to be you. I'm ashamed to admit that I watch that damn channel often. Let’s be honest though, so many people are watching your shit, the other channels don't really have much good stuff on anymore. It's like they stopped trying."

"If things stay like this, there might be plenty of things to watch soon," he said.

"Catch this guy and they're yours again," she said. "It's as simple as that. Be their hero again, and they will be swooning over you in no time."

"Yeah, until they find something else to hate me for. So, what happened last night? After I left."

"I don't want to talk about it," she said, sparking another cigarette. She turned to him with angry eyes. "Fuck. Sometimes, I hate you. Things used to be simple. Easy, almost. That fucking…asshole got away. There was an old grate in the basement. He dragged her down there and got away with two bags of money. About a hundred thousand in cash. The bank manager chewed me out for it. Said we shouldn't have let you leave. Like somehow that insured cash was more important than a god damn supervillain."