Other People's Heroes (The Heroes of Siegel City) (32 page)

I’m not entirely sure what happened next, things began to mush together in my head, but I am certain the following events occurred:

“
Please.
No time.”

I think he shook his head. “Of course. Which one?”

I told him and he left me alone in Five-Share’s apartment, shattered and bleeding.

The pain from my legs began lancing upwards and my temples started to throb.
Crap
, I thought,
all I need is a headache on top of everything else.

I slumped to the ground and my head rolled to the side. I was looking at the door, but I was no longer seeing much of anything. I thought about the Gunk and I wondered who would stop him, although even at that point I had no doubt that
somebody
would. I thought about Dr. Noble and hoped that the girl from Five-Share would have a chance to tell people what really happened before he got her. I thought about Annie, and I prayed that Tom and Hotshot would make sure she was okay, and I knew that they would.

Somehow I became aware of a pair of feet racing towards me and I felt something press into my right hand. The five points on the object jabbed into my flesh as I clutched it as tightly as I could. I poured every ounce of concentration I had left into that hand, and I felt a tiny jolt, and the very act of thinking that hard was enough to make the world finally go away.

RECOVERY ROOM

The first thing that came to mind when I woke up was, “
Ow.
”

The second thought was, “Why am I still alive?” immediately followed by, “Why am I
complaining
?”

Why I was complaining was actually pretty obvious -- I felt like I had been hit repeatedly by a soft, fluffy pillow that was duct taped to the front of a Greyhound bus. I sincerely hoped that every portion of my body ached, because if there was anything left that
didn’t
, the other body parts would likely gang up and beat it senseless out of jealousy.

My head pulsated like a snare drum. My lungs were on the verge of collapse and any attempt to lift my arms would have resulted in open revolt. My groin felt like the bottom of a mosh pit, my lip felt like I’d just attempted to play “Flight of the Bumblebee” on a sousaphone, and my earlobes hurt. My
earlobes
hurt. I didn’t know earlobes
could
hurt.

Most amazingly of all, my
legs
hurt. I’d heard about amputees feeling “phantom limbs,” but somehow I couldn’t fathom why, if my brain was going to imagine legs that weren’t there, it would imagine them feeling like they’d been run under a steamroller. With incredible effort, I opened my mouth and managed to vibrate my vocal cords just enough to convey the following sentiment: “Uuuuuuuugh.”

“Hey, hey,” said a deep, baritone voice. “Look who ain’t dead yet.”

Against my better judgement, I opened my eyes. Moving the lids proved to be an act akin to prying open a manhole cover with a popsicle stick. I was, however, grateful that I’d done it when I saw a warm, brown, grinning face over me. I felt the Rush coming down from him. “How you feelin’, bro?” Animan asked.

“I am never... moving... again,” I said.

“You just did.”

“After... this,” I forced out, and somehow we both managed to laugh. Whenever you turn up alive after coming that close to being dead, everything seems a lot funnier.

“Animan?”

“Yeah?”

“If I tried to look down, my head would probably roll off my body. Can you tell me if I’ve actually got
legs
?”

“Why don’t I let you see for yourself?” He went to the door and removed his full-length mirror, which he held over me. The mirror was narrow, but wide enough for me to see that I was clad in sky-blue tights with darker blue trunks and a cape clasped around my neck by a golden seashell. My face was obscured by a star-shaped, purple mask, and my fist was still clenching a tiny, wooden totem.

My legs...
God
, my legs. Where nothing had been before, they had grown back to nearly three inches below the knees. At the bottom of the stumps I could
see
the new flesh creeping forward. Even the blue tights were slithering down after the legs, clothing me as they crept along. The process was slow, but it was happening.

“Interesting
...
” was all I could say.

“Slick as all
hell,
” Animan chortled as he replaced the mirror. I realized, for the first time, I was in his quarters. Amidst the pain I managed to sort out an additional Rush coming from the Conductor, obviously in the next room. I wondered if anyone had seen him dragging me here from Five-Share’s place. “The starfish totem, man, how did you know it would save your crazy ass?”

“Reporter’s instincts,” I grunted. “Gotta be able to recall insignificant details at a moment’s notice. Like, for instance, if you cut off a starfish’s limb, it’ll grow back. Figured your starfish totem might amplify that ability.”

“Big chance.”

“Hey, if it didn’t work, I was dead anyway.”

He scratched his chin. “You know, I studied this crap while I was making that totem. If you cut up a starfish,
every piece
grows into an identical starfish.”

“There weren’t any pieces
left,
man,” I said. “Everything was vaporized.”

“I hope so,” he laughed. “
Last
thing we need is
two
of your ugly face bobbing around here.”

We both managed to laugh again and, while it did hurt like hell, it still felt pretty good.

“How long have I been out?” I asked.

“A few hours -- it’s the middle of the night.”

“What’s been going on?”

“Doc Noble is back.
And
full of crap. He swept in not long after I got you here and started telling folks that
you
killed
First Light and Five-Share, then you ran off.”

“Hey, when I went in that room only
half o
f you was there. You sure as hell didn’t look like the dude that
won
the fight.”

“You should have seen the
other
guy.”

“I
did.
Looks like you got in your share of licks before the doctor took you apart. So spill, man, what really happened out there?”

“Probably just what he said, with the roles reversed. He juiced up First Light more than she could handle, and she blew. Just like he did to Photon Man. I managed to shield one of the Five-Shares and myself -- well, kind of -- and then we lost the rest of them.”

Animan called Doctor Noble a string of names that he more than earned and then sat down at his work desk.

“I know,” I said. “I agree. But I should have
done
more, man...”

“Don’t start
that
talk, J-Man. We both know you did everything you could and we both know it wasn’t your fault. This ain’t no soap opera. So what’s the plan, man?”

“Well, to start with, I’m planning to lie here until I have feet. After that, I’m getting a hold of some reinforcements.”

“Reinforcements?”

As we waited for my lower extremities to grow back, I told Animan the plan. He nodded most of the time, accepting every word and I breathed a sigh of relief, figuring that the shock of seeing me blown apart had broken him from the susceptibility field. By the time I’d finished, as slow as I was talking and with Animan occasionally breaking in with questions, it was four a.m. and my legs had grown back to about the halfway point of my calves. Much of the pain was beginning to subside and, in the portions where body parts were actually regenerating, I felt an odd, almost pleasant tingling. If it weren’t for the fact that it required the sudden, violent removal of my body parts, I wouldn’t mind feeling it more often.

“So let’s say Hotshot
does
manage to round up his boys. What good will that do? Won’t they just swap over to the Gunk’s side as soon as they enter the susceptibility field?”

“Not if they
enter
the field knowing Lionheart is a fraud,” I said. “I’m hoping that seeing the original LightCorps will dazzle everyone else enough to break them out of the trance. When everything hits the fan, there are two things we have to do. We’ve got to expose Lionheart as the Gunk, and we’ve got to take down the field.”

“And that means we’ve got to take down Mental Maid.”

“No,” I said. “Morrie.”

For a second Animan looked stunned, then his bamboozled expression gave way to a chuckle. “Damn,” he said, “Ain’t
anything
around here what it seems to be?”

We laughed again. We laughed pretty damn hard. We laughed right up until the door opened and Ted Ossian stepped in, yawning.

“Who’re you talking to, man? I’d think you’d want to get some sleep before we head out hunting again tomor--”

His eyes fell on me and he sucked in his breath. “Oh my God. That’s him, isn’t it? You took in that murderer and you gave him a
totem
!” He spun on his heel and leapt out of the room, hollering at the top of his lungs.

“Ted, wait!”

“I’ll get him.”

Animan snatched the wolf totem from its peg and charged after him. There was a snarl and a scream, and then the screaming stopped. A few seconds later Animan, as Wolph, stepped back into the room with an unconscious Conductor slung over his shoulder.

“This is beginning to turn into a habit, old boy,” he said.

“Hey,
you
ain’t the one chasing him down,” Animan said. “I’ll let him go if he comes to his senses. Which I’m not counting on.”

“What do you mean?”

“You haven’t seen the way Ted’s been acting since you left. He wanted to believe you were innocent, but he’s also got a pretty weak will. And after Morrie found out you escaped from him, Ted spent an hour in the office -- probably got an extra dose of susceptibility.”

“Weak-willed? He’s a Cape, isn’t he?”

“That’s just it. Ted always wanted to be a superhero growing up -- same as most people here -- and when he found out he had his quasi-telepathic powers he thought it was a dream come true. But he’s never been able to do any more with it than make a little music.”

“It’s not that bad a power.”

“Try telling
him
that. He’s so self-conscious that his will’s been whittled down to just about nothing.” He glanced around the room and realized there was nowhere left for him to sit. “Dammit... I’m going get a chair.”

He walked out of the room and I was left alone with Ted, out cold. My limbs were starting to feel a bit more fluid by now, so I stretched out my arms and the three-quarters I had of my legs. I put my head back and began flexing the muscles, trying to make sure the blood was flowing properly.

As I laid back, my head began to swim and I was afraid I was going to pass out again -- but it cleared almost instantly and I was back to normal.

And then I started hearing the voice in my head.

“
Josh? Josh, are you okay?”
screamed the voice. I recognized it immediately.

“Tom?”

“
Josh, thank God! I’ve been trying to find you again ever since... since...”

‘Since the big boom?” I offered.

“
Yeah...”

“It’s cool, Tom. I suffered a -- minor setback, but I’ll be fine in a couple of hours.”

“
Whew.”
Somehow, Tom managed to mentally sigh in relief.
“Where are you?”

“Back at Simon Tower. A friend is hiding me, for now, while I recuperate. Have you heard from Hotshot?”

“
Not yet.”

“How about Annie? Is she okay?”

“
She’s fine.”

“Good. Now why are you up so late? It’s past your bedtime, man.” He laughed in my head and I knew I’d calmed him down. “I don’t suppose I’ll be able to keep you from poking around in my head until this thing is over, will I? Just promise me you won’t try to come here, okay? No matter what happens, I don’t want you popping in.”

“
Aw, Josh...”

“No ‘aws,’ kid.
I
don’t even want to be involved in this, I’m
sure
not dragging
you
in.”

There was a stirring nearby and I looked up to see Ted lifting his head. “Who are you talking to?”

“Some guy who wants me to switch long-distance carriers. You okay?”

“Let’s see, my two best friends have me tied to a chair, one’s a suspected murderer and the other knocked me out -- I’m just ducky.”

“Ted, you’re not still on that kick, are you?”

“After you left, Lionheart and Morrie chewed me out for like an
hour
. Do you know what it’s like to be chewed out by
Lionheart
?”

“Lionheart
doesn’t
chew people out.”

“No use, man.” Animan came in with a folding chair tucked under his arm.

“Animan, how weak can his will possibly
be
?”

He shrugged. “When
he
had that thing for Annie for a while there, dude was nuts over her -- almost as bad as
you
-- but one dirty look from Doc S.O.B. and he acted like he’d never even
met
the girl.”

“Bite me
,
” Ted grumbled.

“You’re just mad because it’s true.”