Belle of the Ball
by E.E. Nalley
Edited
with the kind assistance of Janet Nolan and Holly Logan
Chapter Twenty
Just when I think my life can’t get
any more surreal, I get tossed a curve ball like this. I was already afraid of
Albert. I’d seen that he was capable of things that, so long as they fit
within his tight, but warped sense of ethics would have shocked a war crimes tribunal.
He was probably the most dangerous man I knew, genteel veneer not
withstanding.
I understand now that was nothing.
Now I could add parent protecting his
offspring to the mix. There’s nothing more dangerous in nature than that.
Albert was capable of anything in that mindset. Murder, wanton destruction,
you name it, so long as Ed was in some way the beneficiary, there was nothing
beneath him.
It should go without saying I
didn’t exactly sleep well that night. Now I was certain there was
something far deeper to this sudden change in his attitude and demeanor. Like
my beloved, the wheels of my brain kept turning as I tried to sleep, frantic to
figure out what it was Albert was after.
That morning dawned just as grey
and overcast as Saturday had promised. Still no rain as yet, the asphalt of
the parking lot of my apartment told me that. Judging by the jackets my
neighbor’s were sporting, it was probably still pretty cool. Not that I
noticed of course, but at least my sweater and miniskirt weren’t so out of
place.
As I got the Thunderbird started
and warming up, I did feel something of an ecological pang. I wasn’t going
that far and I could fly. But that would require sneaking out of my own
apartment, not to mention all the hassles I could get into along the way.
There are times being a super hero is not what it’s cracked up to be.
I dropped the car into gear, backed
out of the space and turned it towards HQ. Sunday was the President’s day to
mind the board and I owed it to Ed to sit with him as he had for me. More to
the point, and for no reason I could really explain, I felt safer next to him.
Silly, isn’t it?
Here I am, practically invulnerable,
fantastically strong and all that, but I’d rather be next to him. Does that
seem right to you?
Traffic, as I had become accustomed
to it being, was light on a Sunday morning so it didn’t take me long to get to
HQ. As luck would have it, I found a spot next to Ed’s truck. Strangely
enough, Ginnevia’s mustang was in the parking lot too. Of course, with her
being a teleporter, it wasn’t like she needed the car to get around.
My thumb print let me into the
building which was as quiet as a tomb. Most of the other offices, as I’ve
already stated, were government in nature, thus the good little government
employees had the weekend off. Well, except the ones who were charged with law
and order any way. I meandered up to the Round Room first, wondering if
perhaps Ed was there.
I found only the polished black
marble table that dominated it, each active member’s place delineated by a
carved, triangular shaped placard on the table in front of the chair. I
couldn’t help pausing for a moment to stare at my place, the intricately
engraved Southern Belle playing in the marble. Was that who I really
was? For three months now I had worn the name and the clothes, but I couldn’t
tell you for sure if that’s the name my soul curled up with at night.
The door opened behind me, causing
me to turn so as to take in the sight of Ed’s smiling face. “Hey you,” he
greeted with a smile.
“Hey,” I murmured into his chest as
he hugged me. Now that’s what I’m talking about. If I’ve got to do the woman
thing for the rest of my life, give me a man who’s solid. “Ah seem to
recall owing the President a babysitting seeing as how he helped me out that
way.”
“You are all that, you know it?” he
told me with a chuckle.
“Flattery will get you into mah
bed,” I told him. Both ears perked up at that.
“Cool,” he told me with a chuckle.
“As luck would have it, I’m not actually here alone. Ginnevia stopped by as
well. If you want to change we’re in the Situation Room.”
“Ah’ll be along,” I told him, as we
reluctantly let go of each other to go our separate ways. It didn’t take that
long to get back into the outfit, though I left the mask off. I was beginning
to really hate spirit gum, let me tell you.
The Situation Room was overwhelmed
by a plasma screen monitor that was the big brother of the one that took up an
entire wall of the Round Room. Currently, it displayed a map of Atlanta
showing the traffic pattern and the GPS position of all the police cruisers
around town and what they were currently doing.
Information, I’m sure, most would
be felons would trade body parts to have access to. Ed was just in the process
of forwarding the alerts to his pager as I entered. Ginnevia was in that
leather for lace outfit of hers that looked like it would be more at home on a
club haunting Goth than a super hero. We shared a guarded nod, despite the
massive come clean session we’d gone through the other day, we were still very
much unsure of each other.
It was hard to quantify how I felt
about my ex-girlfriend.
In one way, I was still annoyed
with her for her chicanery both in my professional and private life. Yes, I
could understand the how and the why, I just wasn’t sure I was comfortable with
the right or wrongness of it. “My two favorite women, lovely,” Ed announced with
a grin, playing the clown to get both of our attentions back to him and off our
checkered past. “I have something I want to bounce off you two.”
“Oh?” asked Ginnevia with something
of a smirk. “Well, I’m up for a threesome if Red is,” she announced.
“Er, not quite what I had in mind,”
Ed replied with a flush darkening his skin noticeably. File that one away for
have a long talk with my man about later. “Follow me,” he said, walking
purposefully towards the bank of elevators out in the lobby.
“Since when are you so kinky?” I
demanded of her as we followed Ed. She just wiggled her eyebrows at me and
said nothing. The elevator arrived and we took it to a level that required a
key to get access to. The key Ed used was on a ring I’d gotten used to hauling
around, weighting down my purse. They were the President’s keys to the
building.
“My third fight with the
Irregulars,” Ed started as the elevator hummed its way down. “We fought a real
space cadet by the name of Millennium. This guy was crazy with a capital C,
kept babbling on about the coming doomsday and claimed he’d come back from a
devastated future to try to stop it.”
“Like that future Sovereign and
Precog keep going on about?” I asked, grateful for somewhere for my thoughts to
go besides wondering about my lover and my ex-girlfriend doing this and that.
Ed shook his head.
“No, this one was supposedly a
nuclear doomsday. What he was really after were nuclear war heads. But, the
one thing he had that always made me think about was this.” The elevator came
to a stop and opened onto a short hallway that ended in a bank vault door that
would have looked at home under a casino in Vegas. It was labeled,
surprisingly simply, Trophy Vault.
“What’s this place?” I asked,
somewhat intrigued.
“The Trophy Vault,” replied
Ginnevia with a chuckle. “This is where we keep the doohickeys we take from
bad folks that we can’t otherwise turn off or deactivate.” Ed punched in a
code to the pad beside door, causing it to click ominously and slowly slide out
of the way.
You’ll have to forgive me a bit of
geek out here.
The Stone Mountain Irregulars were,
after all, my home grown super team. Well, in the sense that everyone who
lives within an hour of Atlanta tends to think of it as their home town. I’d
been following their exploits since I was about five.
Once upon a time I’d had all the
posters of the various members, the photo books of their more spectacular
battles, the trading cards, pretty much the whole shebang. In here, neatly put
aside in display cases were the kind of memorabilia that would make the High
Museum down town sick with envy.
There was Thunderbolt’s costume,
still crackling with electricity despite some fairly major grounding cables
that were attached to it. Beside it was a three panel photo spread of the
American Eagle fighting him, ending with the big lug getting fitted for
bracelets.
On a pedestal, illuminated by
infra-red beams was Doctor Destruction’s Atom Smasher Rifle, the barrel still
bent to forty five degrees from when Cavalry had snatched it from him. The
power meter still read full and that was a little disturbing.
The Queen of Sheba’s long cape
twinkled in a fairly hypnotic pattern from its case changing even as I stared
at it. In the folds of the psychedelic fabric I saw myself making eggs and
being hugged by Ed as he was getting a cup of coffee before I forced my eyes
away. Yes, there was a definite reason this stuff was down here.
But dominating the vault, glowering
from its corner was a wedged shaped, aggressive looking craft that floated off
the floor. The sleekness of it was spoiled somewhat by the circular dais that
ran the entire length of the craft, decorated with more than its share of
chrome. “Oh mah God,” I breathed in awe and reverence. “The Time Runner!
Ah didn’t know ya’ll kept it!”
“It was the only real safe place,”
replied Ed as he took in the craft’s lines for a moment before turning back to
us. “No one would think we’d keep a time machine. More to the point, even if
someone did think we had it, this vault is probably the safest place in
the State of Georgia.”
“Why hasn’t anyone taken us down
here before?”
My question brought a dark laugh
from Ginnevia. “Because most people don’t know it’s here and Geoffrey likes it
that way. The fewer people that know, the fewer potential break ins. Truth be
told, we’re not supposed to be here. The Vault is president access
only.” She planted her hands on her hips and turned back to Ed. “So, why are
we here, Ed?”
My lover sighed one of his ‘I’m about
to come clean’ sighs that immediately got my attention. “This is one of those
ancillary reasons I was talking about, Belle,” he said finally, with a gesture
at the Time Runner. “Geoffrey has done a lot of research on this
thing. We can’t turn it off, but, the one thing we have been able to ascertain
is that it really is a time machine. We don’t think that Millennium was
actually from the future, but like a lot of mad scientist types, he did know
his engineering. As he worked on coming up with his ‘identity’ which he traded
for his sanity, he actually managed to build the real McCoy.”
Ginnevia and I closed the distance
with him, both I think, drawn by what he was saying and wanting to be close
enough to stop him if he decided to do something foolish. “What do you need a
time machine for, Ed?” she asked him softly.
“Well,” he drawled, “if I had one,
then I could stop Albert from experimenting on me…”
“That would also mean killing
yourself, love,” I whispered. That brought both their eyes to me. “Ah had a
little visit over coffee with Albert yesterday. He told me why he did what he
did to you.”
Ed planted his hands across his
chest, his entire body dripping his building denial of whatever I had learned
from his erstwhile father. “And you believed him?”
“Ah may be new to this spandex
social, sugah, but Ah can damn sure know when a fanatic is spouting his version
of the Truth. Ya’ll have Downs Syndrome, love. Albert infected you so that
you could live. There were all kinds of birth defects that would have probably
ended with you being still born. And yes, Ah believed him because nobody is
that good of a liar.”
He considered this for a long
moment before he said anything. “Even if that’s true,” he finally announced.
“I think that my life for my mother’s is a pretty fair trade.”
“Ah don’t!” I growled at
him.
“A sentiment I most heartily concur
with,” purred that evil voice from the vault door. Three heads snapped around
to take in the view of Sovereign, back in that outrageous out fit of his
standing in the open doorway, the black clad form of Trapdoor behind him.
“While I applaud your sense of honor, son, sacrificing yourself to correct my
mistake is something I cannot allow.”
I could feel the three of us tense
up for the coming battle, probably the same as Sovereign, who held up a gold
colored orb, about the size and shape of a hand grenade. “I wouldn’t,” he
cautioned. “Nor would I advise you to think about mentally snatching this from
my hand, either, Miss Brown. The pin is out.”
“What…?” I started, somewhat
confused.
“It’s a suppression grenade,”
supplied Cavalry from his fighting stance next to me. “One of Doctor
Destruction’s nastier toys; it works like a power inhibitor, only area effect.
Do I want to know where you got one?” he snarled at Albert. The villain tapped
his fore head, the grenade’s pin rattling from where he wore it, ring like on
his finger.
“Never let it be said you can’t
learn things in prison. And as I’m evidently the only person here who brought
a gun,” he said with a chuckle as Trapdoor drew the pistol he wore and cocked
it ominously. “I would like everyone to remain still.”
“So you can do what?” sneered
Ginnevia.
Albert seemed to think that rather
funny. “Why, so I can steal the Time Runner of course! It is the
answer to the problem I’ve been grappling with for twenty years. What I told
Jennifer yesterday is the truth, son. A truth I’ve worked very hard at
keeping from you, but hopefully, this close to my goal it won’t matter if you
know.”
“If I know what?”
Albert released a heavy sigh,
weighted, I think, by his own conscience. “I didn’t kill your mother with my
alterations of you, son. My experiments saved your life, I couldn’t have been
happier with both how they and you have turned out. You’re a fine young man
I’m proud to call my son. Of course I regret the difficulties your appearance
have put you through, but had I been allowed to keep you they would have been
remedied. That’s not what is important.” He walked over to the Queen of Sheba’s
cape and looked at it. “See for yourself,” he told us.
The fabric of the cape changed to
take on his memory, filling with a delivery room and the blonde haired woman I
had seen in the photograph. Her face was pale from her labor and the sweat was
drenching her hair to her scalp. “It hurts,” she wailed, causing a
shudder to run down my spine.
“Push,” the dream Albert instructed
her, one hand rubbing her knee in encouragement. “Push honey! Push, that’s
it.” A flood erupted from her suddenly that shocked me with its volume. “Your
water’s broken!” he told her excitedly.
“Albert,” she breathed with a
chilling stillness. He looked up at her, worry beginning to paint his face
even as the machines of the room began to wail. “Albert I don’t feel well.”
“Oh, God,” he breathed. “The
amniotic fluid…it must be contaminated with MS. I didn’t realize…”
I wasn’t sure what all the alarms
on the machines surrounding Sara meant, but the only think I could be certain
of was that they couldn’t be good. She shuddered as her labor increased, as
though her body was trying to purge itself of the infection that was racking
her being. The wail of an infant cut through the noise of the alarms as Sara
smiled her last smile. Her son was held up so could be her last sight on this
troubled world. “Edward,” she breathed as her eyes slipped shut.
The vision of the grief stricken
Albert faded as his living counterpart turned back to us, an unholy fire in his
eyes. “Now I have the power to undo that mistake. Stand aside,” he ordered.
“You don’t honestly think,” started
Ed, his own eyes more than a bit teary as he heard his mother’s voice for the
first time. Albert neither answered, nor allowed him to continue. With a
softball toss, he released the grenade towards us.
A second or two after it had left
his grip it exploded in a blinding flash of light. A nauseous wave passed
through me and the departure of my vision gave me a heightened sense of
feeling. I lost my balance on the heels of my repaired boots and fell, for the
first time in three months, banging my arm painfully on the cold concrete of
the vault floor.
Two things immediately leapt to the
forefront of my awareness. First that I was uncomfortably cold, in a way that
I had not been since I had gotten the face full of Spirit Wolf’s blood that had
changed my life forever. The other, which quickly overrode the first, was that
my arm was in agony.
An agony I had forgotten I was
capable of feeling that roared back with an overwhelming vengeance. I became
worried it might be broken. There was a confusing jumble of shouts and other
sounds, then the whine of a motor spinning up.
A second wave of nausea passed
through me causing me to empty my stomach of its contents before the stars
finally began to clear from my vision. The whine of the motor was growing
distant but it was still uncomfortably bright. “Are you alright?” asked
Ginnevia’s voice over a hubbub of sound around me.
“Ah think mah arm might be broken,”
I was able to gasp out.
“Police!” an unknown, male voice
shouted. “Nobody move!”
“Ah can’t see!” I shouted back in
the direction of the new voice. “And mah arm is broken!”
“The rest of you stay still,” the
male voice ordered. “Alpha fifty one, Radio”
The speaker of the radio the still
unknown voice was using crackled to life. “Go ahead Alpha fifty one.”
“10-14 at Tenth and Holly, as well
as 10-21 three at gun point.”
“All units stand by; Alpha fifty
one is requesting 10-21 three at gun point.”
Yep, this was obviously not going
to be one of my better days.
* * *
By the time the ambulance arrived
my vision had returned, letting me see that, obviously we weren’t in the vault
any longer. Ed and Ginnevia had managed to talk Alpha fifty one into believing
that we weren’t going anywhere and his gun was finally back into his holster.
The paramedics told me I had gotten off with a really nasty bruise that would
probably hurt for several days, but that my arm wasn’t broken.
That was pretty much where the good
news ended.
Where we were was the sidewalk by
the Georgia Institute of Technology, down town. What we were was a massive
piece of traffic congestion just in time for the evening rush hour between the
ambulance, the Hazmat Team that was called out because of three new, obviously
MS positive spandex types, about a half dozen cop cars, two AEGIS vans and most
of the Stone Mountain Irregulars.
The problem, of course, was when
we were.
And when we are, as supplied by the
seemingly perpetually frowning face of the Surge, President of the aforementioned
Super Hero group; was Sunday, the 17th of March, 1985. As Doctor
Beckett might say, “Oh, boy.” Actually I was getting a chuckle from reading an
editorial in the Journal/Constitution that the medic shared with me while he
was tending to my arm. It was written by the inestimable William F. Buckley of
all people and was entitled; Face It- Soviet Goals aren’t going to change.
Well, maybe not for about six years, Will…
“Now, let me see if I’ve got this
straight,” the Surge was saying, bringing me out of the fears of the Cold War.
“You three claim to be members, from the future?”
“Well, it sounds so ridiculous when
you put it that way,” groused Ed.
“And you were all admiring a Time
Machine, in the Vault, which one of your chief villains stole, catching you all
in the field of its effect. Do I understand that right?” He took in our
somewhat sullen collection of nods, shaking his head. “Well, that wasn’t very
bright, was it?”
“Oh like you’ve never gotten caught
with your britches down,” I told him. “We got played, that’s all. No need to
rub it in.”
“They’re all positive for MS 1,
Surge,” one of the Paramedics told him as he stood from a field tester. “Except
for her,” he said with a gesture at me. “She’s got some weird variant the tester’s
never seen before.”
“That doesn’t mean they’re from the
future,” he said evenly. “And this Sovereign, was it? This Sovereign
conveniently flew off with the time machine, after some how suppressing all of
your powers, right?”
“If ya’ll need some kind of
detailed proof, call Southern Belle,” I told him. “Once we get some place
discrete Ah’ll be happy to take you both down memory lane and she’ll be able to
vouch for all it.”
“Right, you claim she’s your
mother,” he said.
“Funny she happens to be knocked up
just now, huh?” I growled at him.
“That would be something you and
the rest of Atlanta know about,” he replied with a firm crossing of his arms
across his chest.
“Mortagain, would ya’ll mind?” I
asked her.
Go ahead, her mental voice
told me.
Her real name would be
Marie Cooper-Anderson, husband Jonathan James Anderson, currently employed at
Lockheed Martin, formerly US Army, Ranger, I mentally told him, forcing as
much anger into the thoughts as I could. We certainly didn’t have time for this
kind of stupidity.
We had been plenty stupid today,
thanks.
Surge’s face told me my facts had
finally hit home and he was beginning to take us seriously. “Alright,” he said
after a moment. “Let’s say I believe you. What is it you people are going to
do?”
“First thing,” Ed told him, “is
stopping Sovereign. Once we have control of him, then we’ll be able to get the
Time Runner and get back to where we belong, hopefully without
disrupting history any more than we already have.”
“Do you even have any idea what it
is he’s trying to accomplish here?”
“I can guess,” growled Ed.
“Guessing is a good way to get
killed,” fired back the Surge. “So, what’s going to happen is you’re all
coming with me back to HQ where we’re going to sort this whole mess out.” He
turned to the paramedic that treated me. “Is she ok to travel?”
“Sure, just take it easy on that
arm for a little bit,” he told me. “It should probably stop hurting once this
inhibitor you talked about wears off. Until then, take it easy.” I nodded as
I got rather shakily to my feet.
What ever was I thinking buying
high heeled boots?
Ed caught me as I began to teeter
over and swept me up into his arms. “Did you forget how to walk?” snapped the
Surge.
“Actually, Ah never bothered to
learn. Mah mistake.”
The Surge rolled his eyes. “Life
in this job is never dull.” Ed carried me over the van covered in SMI logos
and helped me in. After the others clamored aboard and the van was headed
north once more I couldn’t help thinking furiously over how we would get out of
this particular situation.
More importantly, what ever was I
going to say to my mom?
* * *
Continued in Chapter 21
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