Project Northwoods (58 page)

“Your compatriots are losing, boy.” Arbiter took a large step toward him. “A few fight on, but most have been killed or captured.” The rain pattered between them as the implications weighed on Tim. “Give up and we shall be merciful.”

“Counterproposal: fuck you.”

Arbiter chuckled. “Quaint.” He took another step closer. “I offer clemency one last time, villain.”

“Just so you can kill me when I’m chained up?” Tim hunched down, preparing himself. “I’d rather die standing.”

Arbiter didn’t flinch when Tim threw himself at him, instead effortlessly dodging the blows with a sidestep, a duck, a jump. A wide punch was blocked by Arbiter’s forearm, and his free hand shot up, grabbed Tim by the neck, and lifted him into the air. The hero reared back and pounded him square in the gut, launching Tim backward and rolling him once again into the mud.

Tim recovered quickly and sprinted at Arbiter again, leaping with his foot extended. Arbiter caught his leg and swung him in a 360 before lifting him up and smashing him into the ground. The wind was knocked out of Tim, and the taste of blood flowed over his tongue as Arbiter lifted him out of the man-shaped hole and rocked his face with his fist.

The world was spinning. Tim felt terrible and nauseated as another blow slammed into his jaw, knocking him into the air. Hands wrapped around his ankles and he was brought up, over, and down, hard, into the ground again. He could feel his bones pop and shift under the assault. If this had been pavement, his sternum would have been shattered.

Thank goodness for small favors.

He heaved himself up, out of the mud, struggling to breathe as the sodden earth bled from his skin. Something glimmered near his hand in the artificial light of the courtyard. “It really is a plague, isn’t it?” Arbiter said, and he stomped down on Tim’s leg, the bones shattering as the villain cried out in pain. “The call of villainy… a disease which infects the mind.” Tim felt the bones immediately stitch back together, hurting more than the stomp. His hand worked its way toward the glint in the mud. Suddenly, Arbiter was in his face, pulling up on his hair. He was inches away, the heat from his breath washing over Tim. Whatever made the hero human was safely sequestered behind the helmet. “You disgust me. And yet… I pity you.”

Tim spat on his face, between the crevices of his helmet. Arbiter didn’t react as a smile crossed Tim’s face. “You’re defined by hate,” Tim grunted as his hands wrapped around the mud-caked object, feeling the heft and knowing exactly what it was. He pulled the revolver’s hammer. “I’ll consider this a mercy.”

The movement was so quick, so unexpected, that Arbiter didn’t have time to process it. Tim jammed the gun underneath his jaw and squeezed the trigger. Blood sprayed outward, the charred remnants of flesh spattering Tim’s face from the concussive force. Arbiter, the Lord of Justice, was sent reeling backward, releasing Tim as he toppled into the earth.

It took a moment for Tim to stand up, towering over the fallen hero. Around him, Enforcers stared in shock, Julia and Claymore amongst them. He looked at the emptied revolver, and threw it aside. “The High Consul is dead!” Tim cried out, his voice cracking. “It’s time to put an end to this!” The collected heroes backed off in unison, and Tim knew it wasn’t because of his sudden desire for peace. “Shit.”

The punch caught him in the lower back, pulverizing his kidneys and knocking him to the ground. Hands grabbed him and flipped him over before raining down on his face. Arbiter grabbed his hair and stood before slinging him into the air. The weightlessness was disorienting, and at the apex of Tim’s flight, Arbiter appeared, having leapt after him. His hands glowed red as he pulled them back, above his head. “
Judgement!
” Arbiter roared before smashing his fists downward, square on Tim’s chest, sending him rocketing back to earth.

Agony, the likes of which he had never felt, coursed through Timothy. The worst, by far, was in his jaw, the thunderous agony of pulsing torture setting every nerve on fire. The world had gone red, sapped of all color as even his eyes were now processing more pain than visual data. Someone was screaming incomprehensibly, and he was only dimly aware of the fact that he was the one doing it. It was a mix of extreme heat and cold, electricity and ice, and for that moment which passed like an eternity, all Tim wanted to do was die.

 Around him, water was defying gravity, lifting into the air in droplets and repelling the falling rain. He was only dimly aware that Arbiter had landed, hand outstretched, controlling his suffering. The hero spat something next to Tim, a flattened bullet landing in a splat of blood beside his hand. “Next time, make sure you aren’t using rubber bullets,” Arbiter said, sticky blood falling from his mouth. No doubt the wound had already healed, save for tougher-to-mend fragments.

All Tim could do was scream and try not to beg him for the sweet release of death, even though he had never wanted so much in his entire life. No… there was something else…
someone
else.
She
was something he wanted, needed, more completely than he could articulate. Through the haze, he saw flashes of her smile, heard her laugh, and he began to rise. Arbiter stared at him in shock as he, still wincing, got to his feet and rocked, returning his gaze with a steely resolve. “Stand down,” Tim ordered through gritted teeth.

Arbiter’s hand dropped to his side, and it was like someone had cut marionette strings above Tim. He immediately slumped and staggered, but remained upright. “Your resolve is… impressive, villain.” The hero sighed, a rumble more than anything else, as someone moved from the crowd toward him. “I have matters of state to attend to. I can no longer afford to deal with you.”

Striding past Arbiter was a man cloaked in red steel, wires and circuitry glowing in the night. Slender tubes of blue liquid ran from jet-black gauntlets to his wrists. His bare face smiled wickedly at Tim as penetrating green eyes studied him, the rain trickling off his militarily short sandy hair. He recognized him instantly, the face of Ariana’s mother’s killer… Arbiter may have done the deed, but with his features exposed to the world and the bloody remnants of his hands, it was Erich Constantine who had become the poster-child of the event.

Constantine’s eyes did not leave Tim. “Zealot, reporting for duty, sir.”

“Deal with him,” Arbiter said dismissively. He leaned in to Constantine’s ear and whispered something.

Those horrible eyes were still on Tim, unflinching. “I make no guarantees.”

Arbiter grunted, then leapt out of sight, beyond the battle and into the night. Constantine and Tim regarded each other. Tim still felt ripples of agony running through him, but most physical damage had been healed by now. He had gotten dangerously close to the point of no return. But he was alive, and that’s all that mattered.

Tim cracked his knuckles. “So, Arbiter’s sending his page to do his dirty work?”

Constantine’s smiled grew larger. “How funny.” He started to circle Tim, the other man moving along with him to keep him in sight. “I am Zealot, Arbiter’s protégé and bearer of the legendary Gauntlets of Zealot.”

Tim scoffed. “Legendary? Purgatory’s Inventor was legendary. You’re just a homicidal fuckup.” He paused, giving the insult time to sink in. “But I guess ‘legendary’ has a better ring to it.”

The smile did not fade. “Insolent villain.” He brought his hand up, then formed a fist. “I was ahead of my time. And now… now… the same gauntlets used to let an un-Bestowed do battle with super villains will allow me to resume my rightful role in history.” His other hand squeezed shut. Blue strands of electric light danced above the knuckles until he slammed his fists together. With a burst of green static, the gauntlets flared with a crackling charge.

“Your rightful role is in a coffin, motherfucker,” Tim growled.
Not the best one-liner, but certainly not the worst.

Zealot charged him and Tim side-stepped, ramming his hand into the back of the hero’s skull. The blow staggered him, but he responded quickly, straightening and shifting his shoulders. He spun to face Tim as an armored mask rose from his suit and covered his face while the back of his head was sealed behind a second metal shell rising from between his shoulders. With a hiss, the helmet locked in place as a slender visor regarded the villain ominously.

Tim swung a fist into the armor only to have it rebound off violently. “Do you like it?” the tinny-voiced Zealot asked before slamming a punch downward into Tim, the blow splattering green sparks on contact as Tim fell to the ground. It was strong, stronger even than Arbiter’s blows. “My armored suit is based on the vibro-principle,” Zealot mused as Tim struggled to his knees. An uppercut rocked into Tim’s jaw, sending him flipping over and onto his back. “Only… new and improved, thanks once more to Purgatory’s Inventor.”

Zealot smashed his foot downward, onto Tim’s stomach. He worked the heel in a twisting motion, the powered suit and gauntlets fooling his body’s natural ability to heal. Tim had been hit by trucks before which left no lasting damage… but this… this was killing him.

The hero knelt down and slammed his fist into Tim’s face, dazing him. Then, he was being lifted out of the ground and set harshly upright. A flurry of fists pounded into him, over and over again, in the chest and gut. Tim felt his bones splinter, his organs shake with every strike. It was agonizing, less than Arbiter’s psychic Retribution, but physical and, apparently, permanent. Tim darted backward, then swung in with his right hand.

Zealot parried with his own punch, their fists slamming into each other with titanic force. The bones in Tim’s arm shattered from finger to shoulder on impact. He had just barely registered what happened when the hero grabbed his left arm and yanked him around before pulling the limb taught. An arm wormed above and under his armpit, locking him in place as Zealot’s grip on his wrist held firm. With a subtle, violent motion, Tim’s elbow broke across the other man’s chest. He was released and he stumbled forward.
Heal, damn it, heal!
he thought, turning toward his assailant. A final wind-up, and Zealot unleashed a wide-arced, smashing haymaker, the high, sweeping fist cracking into Tim’s head and snapping his neck around violently.

Tim collapsed to the ground, ready to concede to the darkness pulling at his eyes. He was being gathered up. His right elbow had mended together enough for him to paw weakly at the hands grasping around his throat, burning into his skin and searing his muscles. The fingers started to squeeze.

Zealot started to laugh, childlike but malevolent. “He took my hands… my ability to touch, to feel, anything.” Tim tried to claw at the hands, but they didn’t budge. “But now… I’ve been given a new lease on what was stolen from me.” He lifted Tim into the air by the throat, the shorter man’s legs dangling above the earth. Zealot’s free right hand extended outward and he unfolded his fist, revealing, with a hiss, blue liquid pouring into a chamber in his palm. It pooled, then was sucked into one of the tubes connecting his artificial hand to his body. Zealot seized up for a moment, then relaxed. “It’s mostly an adrenal and dopamine mixture… the only thing keeping me alive after Purgatory’s Inventor took my hands.” His voice was soothing, yet somehow
wrong
. “Bio-feedback loops in these wondrous gloves give me sensation where there was none, villain.”

The hand on Tim’s neck tightened, slowly. “I can feel your pulse weaken. In your death, I glimpse peace… the universe makes sense.” Tim lost his ability to fight against his attacker. He limply dangled as the world dimmed. He didn’t notice that Zealot’s helmet had retracted, nor did he see that tears joined rain droplets in streaming down his face. “To feel again… to know the world is right… there is no greater joy.”

A final squeeze and, with a wet crunch, Tim’s world faded into nothing, before what was left of him was thrown by the wayside to be buried in the mud.

INTO THE NIGHT

SOMETHING BUZZED IN ARTHUR’S EAR,
aggravating the pounding headache he was going to have to thank Tim for when he saw him again. He had long since regained consciousness, able to thoroughly enjoy the bumpy, unpaved road back to civilization in all its profoundly rocky glory. The rain was finally stopping, a small comfort considering that all the villains inside the ambulance were already soaked through and through.

Mat grunted. “Someone’s having trouble with the earpiece.”

It was the first time he had heard anyone speak since coming to. The words seemed alien in the air around them, unwelcome visitors disrupting an uneasy peace.

Catalina brought her hand up to her ear. “Whoever is sleeping on their communicator, please stop.”

The buzzing continued for a moment longer, then stopped. “… Is the Bearorist, the champion has fallen, the remaining villains are fleeing.”

Arthur perked up immediately, his hand snapping to his ear to open a line between them. “What do you mean, ‘the champion has fallen?’”

A hiss, then a crackle. “The leader of the last stand has been killed by Zealot. The three of us left are trying to escape.” A pause. She was clearly out of breath, running away from a mass of Enforcers.