Legacy (6 page)

“You tell me,” Lucas said. “I hear there’s a lot more to him than that.”

She looked at him; then she left the sink and went to the cabinet, reaching for the bottle of whiskey and a glass.

“Don’t do that,” Lucas said.

“If we’re going to talk … really talk, I’m going to need this.”

She put some ice in the glass and brought it and the bottle to the kitchen table.

“First off, tell me what you know,” she said, pouring the golden liquid over the ice.

“He came to the garage a few days ago and then kept popping up wherever I went,” Lucas said.

“So he told you he’s your father,” she said, taking her first sip.

Lucas nodded. “And the Raptor.”

“I can’t believe he did that,” his mother said with a gasp, setting her glass down before she could drop it.

“He told me, all right,” Lucas said, flashing back to his father’s display of power. “And he also told me he was dying.”

“Dying?” Cordelia asked in a concerned whisper.

“He said he’s sick and he needs somebody to carry on his legacy.”

Cordelia gasped again and raised the glass to her mouth with a trembling hand. “This is what I’ve always been afraid of,” she said, more to herself than to Lucas.

“What?” he asked. “What are you afraid of?”

“After learning who he was … who he really was, I was always afraid the lifestyle would somehow find its way back to you. That some bad guy with an attitude would put two and two together and come after us.”

She paused, drink midway to her mouth.

“After
you.”

“And that’s why you left Seraph City,” Lucas said.

Cordelia nodded. “I ran away. I was pregnant with you, and I couldn’t bear the thought of anything hurting you, then or ever … so I took off to the most out-of-the-way place I could imagine.”

She finished her drink and quickly poured another.

“You said he’s sick?” she asked. “How does he look?”

Lucas shrugged. He felt a little put off by his mother’s curiosity, but could he blame her? It had been close to twenty years since she’d last seen the man.

“He’s kind of thin and pale, but he’s still in pretty good shape”—he remembered the kick to the stomach that had sent him sprawling across the Hog Trough parking lot—“for an old guy.”

“I was always surprised he didn’t come looking for us,” his mother said. “But at the same time, I was relieved.”

She poked a finger into her glass, playing with the ice.

“Do you hate me?” she asked.

“I don’t hate you,” Lucas told her. “I just wish I’d known about this. Do you know how hard this is for me to wrap my head around?”

“I know, I know,” she said, nodding sadly. “But I did it to protect you.”

He was quiet for a moment; then a question came to him.

“Did you meet any of the others?” he asked her.

She stared with a confused expression.

“Any of the other heroes, besides the Raptor? You know, like Talon? Did you meet him?”

She shook her head and had opened her mouth to explain, when her words were cut off by a strange whining sound. It was coming from outside.

“What the hell is that?” Lucas asked, standing up. He tried to see through the blinds covering the window over the sink, but it was dark.

“Sounds like an airplane,” Cordelia said, heading toward the door.

Lucas didn’t know why, but he was suddenly nervous, frightened by the sound.

“Sit down,” he ordered his mother.

She turned and was staring at him in confusion when the first explosion hit, illuminating the kitchen in an eerie orange glow.

“Lucas,” she whispered.

“Stay here,” he told her, pushing her back toward the table.

He went to the trailer door, his hand on the knob for what seemed an eternity before he finally turned it and went outside.

The trailer park was under attack.

Strange vehicles that resembled ATVs without wheels floated above the park on what could only have been columns of air. They darted about like dragonflies, their pilots wearing jumpsuits and black masks with red goggles.

Lucas had never seen anything like it, except maybe in some crazy science-fiction movie.

Some of the trailers at the back of the park were on fire, and Lucas watched in horror as one of the vehicles flew over the Johansons’ place and opened fire with a weapon that sounded like the cracking of a bullwhip. A beam of red light shot from the barrel of the weapon and ignited the trailer’s propane tanks. The explosion tore apart the Johansons’
double-wide and sent Lucas stumbling backward. The heat rushed to fill his lungs and sear his eyes.

He had to get help, and get it fast. Digging deep into his pocket, he searched for his phone but found only some change and his truck keys. He must have left the phone on the table in the kitchen! He spun around but was stopped by the sound of someone calling his name.

Mrs. Taylor was coming out of her trailer, clutching Fluffles in her arms.

“Go back inside!” Lucas called out, running toward her, waving his arms.

The old woman didn’t listen, instead heading toward him in a frantic shuffle.

Lucas chanced a quick glance down to the end of the park. The flying machines were heading directly for them now, destroying all the trailers in their path with shots of devastating red light.

It was like being in the middle of a war zone, or at least what he thought a war zone would be like.

A
slaughter
was more like it.

Mr. Niles made it out of his burning home and was aiming a shotgun up at one of the floating craft. He didn’t get even one shot off before he was riddled with blasts of laser light that cut him to ribbons.

Mrs. Taylor was screaming, and Fluffles was trying desperately to get away from her. Lucas grabbed them and practically dragged them toward his place.

But Fluffles scratched Mrs. Taylor’s face in panic, forcing her to loosen her grip, and the cat sprang from her arms. The old woman let out a cry of dismay and pulled away from
Lucas with a sudden burst of strength, toddling after the fleeing cat.

Neither made it very far.

“No!” Lucas screamed as one of the vehicles fired on Mrs. Taylor and her beloved cat. Pure instinct kicked in then, telling him to run for his life, but he remembered his mother, still inside their trailer. He turned and felt his blood freeze as he saw her standing in the doorway, a look of horror on her face.

“C’mon!” he screamed over the sounds of destruction, motioning for her to join him.

He could hear the ear-piercing whine of the hovercraft engines as they came closer, and the screams of the dying.

They had very little time. He reached out, roughly grabbing his mother’s arm, and yanked her down the steps.

“What’s happening?” she cried, her voice raised in panic. “Why are they doing this?”

Lucas didn’t answer. There wasn’t time for questions, only action. They had to get to his truck if they were to have any chance of escape. He dragged his mother with him, not bothering to turn around. He didn’t want to see how close they were to dying.

The truck was hit with a beam of red, exploding in a ball of flames that threw them backward. Multiple craft buzzed above their heads like flies over a rotting carcass. Lucas could hear his mother’s moans beside him and it just about broke his heart. He’d always hated to hear her cry, it made him crazy, but now, it drove him to action.

He didn’t know where the strength came from. Before he could even think about what he was doing, he had risen to his feet and picked his mother up from the ground.

“I’m going to get you out of here,” he promised her over the humming sounds of the sky vehicles.

“I love you, Lucas,” she cried.

He didn’t answer, knowing in his heart he would have the time later to tell her how he felt. They would still have all the time in the world together.

Lucas was running now, beams of red light following him, striking the dirt. He darted among them, marveling at his newfound strength. He was certain he’d never felt this strong or fast in his life—although nobody had ever been trying to kill him before either.

But that wasn’t entirely true.

Racing for his survival, Lucas suddenly remembered Richie Dennison and the feel of the knife blade in his stomach.

Lucas had somehow survived that. He decided he would survive this as well.

Two of the craft dropped down in front of him, blocking his way, kicking up clouds of choking dust.

Lucas spun around, running back the way he had come, toward the only home he had ever known. Two more of the futuristic vehicles zipped close to his head, and he stumbled and fell. He felt his mother struggle beneath him, pushing away his arm to get to her feet.

“Mom!” he shouted, his voice clogged with dust.

“Save yourself,” he heard her yell as she ran straight for the futuristic craft.

“Don’t!” he screamed, scrambling to his feet to go after her.

It all seemed to happen in slow motion. The machines fired at her, beams of crimson light blasting first through the
corrugated steel of their mobile home and then through the fragile form of his mother. Lucas opened his mouth to scream as he watched the woman he loved, who had sacrificed so much for him, cut down.

He fell to his knees before her, dragging her lifeless body into his arms. He started screaming, begging the ones who had killed her—and all his friends at the trailer park—to kill him as well.

The pilots of the flying machines were more than happy to oblige. They flew in a buzzing circle around him, opening fire, striking him, as well as igniting the two recently filled propane tanks connected to the back of his trailer.

Both he and his mother were consumed in an explosion of hungry fire.

Lucas awoke to the acrid stink of burning metal.

He panicked immediately; he and his mother must still be in danger.

Sitting up, the boy realized he was outside, surrounded by multiple infernos. Everything began to fall into place. He remembered the attacks and what had happened to his mother. The air was thick with oily smoke that obscured his vision, and he crawled on his hands and knees, calling out her name.

He hoped—prayed—that he was wrong, that what he now recalled hadn’t actually happened.

That she was still alive.

He found her body in the twisted remnants of their mobile home. She had been badly burned in the explosion. Tenderly, he reached down to take what remained of her body into his arms, but parts of her crumbled to ash.

Lucas screamed. His voice was a ragged roar. An impossible strength flowed through his body, and he tore pieces of twisted metal from the ground, hurling them into the air as if the wreckage weighed nothing, as if the superheated metal burning in his grasp was nothing more than a minor irritant.

How am I still alive?
he asked himself. Nearly all his clothing had burned away, and his skin looked different—
felt different
—the only sign he had survived a fiery explosion being the pinkness of his flesh.

When he should have been dead—or at least near death—he felt only a pulsing strength.

As well as an incredible hunger, gnawing in his belly.

He remembered feeling like that after he had been stabbed. The hunger had been almost overwhelming.

Total panic began to sink in.

He started to run blindly, his hands out before him, waving away the choking smoke.

“Help!” he cried, certain the authorities would have arrived by now. “Help me!”

He sensed he was no longer alone and stopped short, listening for signs.

“Hello?” he called out. “I—I need help … please. …”

Something moved within the smoke, growing more pronounced as it loomed closer.

What if it’s
them
? What if the ones that killed my neighbors and my mother … and tried to kill me are still here? They must be searching for survivors
.

Eyes darting around for a weapon, Lucas found a broken piece of metal piping lying on the ground and snatched it up.

If he was going to die, he was going down fighting.

A figure emerged from the smoke. It was clad in the colors of darkness and blood.

Lucas immediately recognized the man.

“I was afraid something like this would happen,” the superhero said grimly, standing before Lucas like some fearsome demon warrior.

It was the Raptor.

His father
.

Lucas let the heavy section of pipe fall from his hands.

“Who—who were they?” he asked. He suddenly felt incredibly dizzy, his stomach hurting as if he had been gut-shot. He dropped to his knees.

“They’re an evil I’ve been fighting for a very long time,” the Raptor said, the flames from the burning trailer park reflecting off his black, metallic mask. “Evil beings who will stop at nothing to achieve their goals. …”

The Raptor looked at Lucas, his eyes burning with a mixture of anger and sadness.

“An evil I’m no longer sure I’m strong enough to fight.”

And with those words, the Raptor began to cough. For the briefest of moments, the costumed warrior didn’t appear quite so fearsome.

Lucas doubled over in agony. He felt as though he was dying.

“Why did they do this?” he gasped, on his hands and knees, looking around at the flaming remains of the trailer park. “Why did they have to kill everyone?”

“To hurt me,” the Raptor said. “They believe that striking at the things I care for, the things I love, will weaken me all the more.”

The Raptor coughed again, his body wracked with convulsions. Through pain-clouded eyes, Lucas watched the man drop to one knee beside him.

“They may have been right,” the Raptor said, struggling to catch his breath. “I’m not sure I’m strong enough to take them on.”

They were silent then, the only sound the crackling of the fire as it burned away the only home Lucas had ever known. And suddenly he knew what he was going to do. What he
must
do.

“Teach me,” he said, his voice weak from hunger.

The Raptor looked at him. “Do you know what that means? What that truly means?”

Lucas slowly nodded. “There has to be someone … someone to stop them from hurting innocent people.”