The next morning, during breakfast, Whyte called for everyone to assemble in one of the laboratories. Mark dropped by his room and grabbed the detonator and grenades, hoping such a large assembly would give him the perfect opportunity to escape.
Sullivan and Yonkers stood beside Whyte in the lab, each with triumphant smiles. Mark guessed the news he had for them before he said it. Whyte lifted a syringe, filled with a purple-pink liquid.
“Ladies and gentleman, I give you the future of Overwatch! A formula to give anyone super-strength and invulnerability!” He received polite applause and lowered the syringe. “After months and months, we’ve finally done it, and within the next few weeks, we will be manufacturing Rooke’s accidental concoction en masse. Let’s give a big hand to the geniuses behind it.” He stepped aside and led another applause for Sullivan and Yonkers, who both bowed and thanked them. “And our special guest, Lydia, who provided us with the crucial piece for this breakthrough. Sadly, she couldn’t make it to this meeting.” A few people chuckled and clapped for her.
“So,” Whyte asked, “who’s first?”
Several hands shot up and Oliver jumped to the front of the crowd, pushing anyone in his way aside. “Oh! Oh! Pick me! Pick me!”
Sullivan coughed into her hand and took over the speech. “I’m afraid we haven’t been able to make it compatible with BEPs quite yet. Only unaltered people for now. Sorry.”
Oliver was crestfallen, as if he had been told he couldn’t have any ice cream for dessert. Whyte picked out one of the mercenary volunteers and injected him with the formula. The effect was instantaneous. The mercenary dropped to the floor, rolling around in agony and clenching his entire body. His skin turned beet red and frothed at the mouth as he yelled incoherently. Mark wondered if the pain was amplified since the mercenary received both powers.
After a couple of minutes passed, the pain subsided and two other mercenaries helped the volunteer stand up. His face was pale and drenched in sweat, and he was gasping for air, like a fish out of water.
Yonkers brought over a chair and they set the mercenary down in it. “Now, let’s test it, shall we?” Whyte asked one of the mercenaries for a knife, and they passed him a long, sharp blade, bright and gleaming. He admired it for a moment, then stabbed it directly into the man’s forehead.
The blade stuck at the tip, never breaking the skin.
Whyte pushed and pushed as hard as possible, but the knife couldn’t penetrate. He handed the blade to the altered mercenary, who snapped the steel in two like a twig and crushed the pieces in his fists. All without an ounce of pain to his body.
The formula was a success. Once the rounds of applause and cheering settled down, Whyte returned the broken knife and asked for a pistol instead. “Now, although we have unlocked the formula,” he said, “it isn’t full strength. The results have varied. So while this one can stop a knife…” He trailed off, aimed the gun at the mercenary’s thigh, and fired. The bullet went through clean and the volunteer howled, grabbing his leg and toppling off the chair. “It won’t stop a bullet.”
A couple of mercenaries dragged their friend away to the infirmary. “There are still plenty of dangers, whether invulnerable or not. Can’t have you becoming too complacent,” he said. But the real reason was as plain as day: he could create the actual, full formula anytime—if he unlocked it. Yet if anyone had a mind to betray him, he could kill them as easily as a normal person this way. After Mark’s own stunts with Heather, he shouldn’t be shocked that Whyte would do this.
“Maybe we’ll even figure out something to prevent drowning or choking. Eh, Mark?” he asked him. The boy avoided his gaze and Whyte rounded on Yonkers. “The next test, please.”
Yonkers left for a minute and returned with a spotted, snowy beagle and a tabby cat. Whyte’s own pets. “These two have already been injected with one of our stronger formulas.”
In other words, max strength, Mark thought. The full formula.
“Observe.” Sullivan handed Whyte a bone and he wagged it in front of the dog’s face. Mark didn’t even want to know where it came from. Or from whom. “Come on, Snips! Come on!”
The dog barked and lunged for the bone, sinking its teeth into it. It actually jerked Whyte around before tearing the bone in two. It snatched the remaining piece out of his hand, then gnawed on both ends on the floor.
“Whew! She’s a vicious one!” Whyte laughed and scratched the dog behind the ears. Then he climbed a ladder provided by Yonkers and, once at the top, Yonkers passed him the cat. He placed it in a tall, rectangular glass container with air holes, held on either side by what appeared to be a large vice. Underneath were five rows of five tubes apiece, which poked inside and covered the width and most of the length of the container.
“Stand back,” Whyte said, joining the audience. “You’re about to see how much this can really withstand! Whenever you’re ready, doctors.”
Sullivan pressed a button on a panel below the vice, and Mark inhaled a whiff of ash. A burning smell. He registered what was happening and clamped his teeth. They couldn’t be. Not this. But as the tubes started to glow hot like Oliver’s eyelids, he knew it to be true.
Maybe Whyte had solved that weakness? That didn’t stop Mark’s feet shuffling backward into the crowd as everyone pressed closer to watch.
The flames leapt out, engulfing the cat in the middle. Whyte’s face fell. He already sensed something was wrong. Had he done this to expose Mark then?
The tabby cat screeched and moaned, throwing itself against the glass and scrambling for the too-high edge. The dog raised its head, abandoning its bone, and barked. “Shut it off,” Whyte said.
Sullivan was distracted by the unnatural death throes of the cat as it tried to put out the flames. Her stretched smile fell into a forced grimace as the ball of fire tumbled back and forth.
“Shut it off!” Whyte yelled louder.
Sullivan powered down the tubes, but it was too late. The cat was little more than a furry lump caught in the blaze. The fur reeked and everyone held their noses, passing worried glances all around, while Whyte stared at what remained of his pet.
By the time Whyte approached the glass and pressed a hand against it, Mark was at the edge of the crowd. He couldn’t see his face, but the man’s hand curled into a fist. “Mark!” he bellowed.
The boy dashed for the door. Only Roy stood beside it and he made a grab for Mark. A lame, slow grab that Mark deftly avoided. As soon as he was out of the room, he dropped a grenade and sprinted down the hall as fast as he could. “Grenade!” someone yelled. A few seconds later, an explosion rumbled the floor, but Mark kept running. Security would be on high alert now. The front entrance was out of the question. He had to hide and set off the C4 before the assembly recovered, then hope to sneak out during the confusion.
“Come back here!” Someone was already after him? He chanced a peek over his shoulder and yelped at Lionel, closing in behind him. “Stop now or I’ll make it worse, you maggot!”
Wherever Mark hid, Lionel would slip in. Mark could think only of the back room. It would seriously alter his plan. However, it was his only shot and his feet took him there. He almost stumbled down the sloping hall, and when he reached the room, he threw the door shut and dove into the black pantry. Moments later, he heard breathing and smelled that ashy scent that clung to Lionel like bad aftershave.
“Didn’t think you had the gall to let Whyte burn his pet to death.” Lionel gave a cursory once-over of the room and honed in on the pantry. “Interesting little weakness you have though. Maybe you and Whyte can hash this out. With Oliver there as a mediator.”
Mark backed into the far corner, his rear sinking into one of the shelves. Lionel’s frayed edges entered the pantry, and he swept his eyes across the room until they landed on Mark. He sneered and blocked the door.
“Too afraid of the dark?” Mark asked in a shaky voice.
“No, deciding whether to kill you here or bring you back to Whyte.” He lingered long enough for
Mark to inhale and jumped in with his breath, already squiggling down his throat.
Mark pulled the detonator from his pocket and dropped, or fell while gasping, under some of the shelves. He hit the button and the C4 exploded in the pantry and the room, blasting the ceilings and shelves apart. Blocks of stone crushed what remained of the middle shelves and mud and water rushed in, pounding his face like a waterfall.
Lionel swore and leapt out of Mark’s throat, cursing the boy at the top of his lungs. “You idiot! What did you do?” But Mark barely heard him over the deafening roar of the lake emptying its bowels into the room. Already the water was knee high in the pantry and more gushed through the holes, with no end in sight.
Rolling over the destroyed shelves and pushing against the rollicking water with all his might, Mark crawled and scrambled for the door, dragging himself out of the pantry. He was almost carried away with the water, but he latched onto one of the filing cabinets and used it as a crutch to break through the current. In the pantry, Lionel’s legs had been lost to the waves, dissolving into the surface of the water. The rest of him huddled near the ceiling, moving with great difficulty around the inpouring tide.
A mercenary opened the door, caught sight of the situation, and shouted, “Close the emergency door!” He and a few others promptly rushed up the sloping hall. Mark focused on the open door. He had to reach it before Lionel, and before the water rose too high. He waded through the waves, holding to the wall as much as he could, but the water was waist high and it was like walking through molasses. A desk floated nearby, with a computer monitor still perched atop. Mark leapt out for it, his head submerging for a moment, but his fingers grabbed the wood. He climbed aboard and kicked the monitor off.
“Mark!” As Lionel escaped the pantry, more of its roof caved in, and he just cleared the water. The new downpour robbed him of a forearm and hand, now wet ash, which drifted away like everything else caught in the tide.
The desk smashed into the wall, and Mark kicked hard off of it and to the open door, sailing through it. Ahead, at the bottom of the sloping hall, a large metal door lowered from the ceiling. Lionel kept coming for him, although dropping down with every surge forward, like he was crawling in midair. He snatched at the desk, and his fingers brushed the water, melting the tips. They tried to return to Lionel and reform but slid off once more.
Mark was a few feet out of the room when the metal emergency door shut with a boom!, sealing off the flooded room. He fished out a grenade, pulled the pin, and chucked it at the door. A geyser of water shot up, spraying him, but the explosion caused no damage to the door. He rolled off the desk, into the water, and swam to the emergency door, searching for a way to open it. Nothing. He scraped at the bottom, jamming the tips of his fingers under it, pulling hard, and hoping against hope. It didn’t budge.
He was caught in his own trap and would die down here. He hovered in the water, wishing he had stolen more C4. Then he could blow a hole in—
Hole. He turned to the hole in the room’s roof. The water had almost filled the room and pantry to the top. Which meant the water would even out and be calm soon. He kicked his feet and swam into the room. The current was weaker and he could move easily. He headed for the surface to take a last, large breath.
A black shape appeared in front of him. Lionel. Mark screamed as his hand swatted the boy’s nose. But as quickly as he came, Lionel faded into the water and scattered apart. Whether dead or not, Mark didn’t wait around to find out. He had inhaled some water and his lungs burned for air.
By the time he got to the surface, he had only a second for air before the water filled the room completely. He sucked in a quick gulp, not nearly enough, but made for the exploded hole, squeezed through, and swam upward. The separation between the base and Lake Superior was short enough, but the distance to the lake’s surface was longer. He was farther above the very bottom of the lake, near the shoreline, yet it was still a good distance. He could see the sun shining through the water and prayed he could make it.
His chest ached and he was tempted to breathe, but he pushed down that feeling and kept putting one hand in front of the other, kicking his legs. Left, right, left, right.
He closed his eyes, pretending he was almost there. He could make it, he could make it.
His vision dimmed. A tunnel closed in around him. Black shadows moved about here and there, and his lungs screamed for air.
Mark broke through the surface.
And stared directly into a hovering helicopter.
Besides the missiles primed to fire on him, Oliver, Emerl, and Whyte stood on the landing skids, ducking their heads beneath the rotating blades. Oliver had his fingers poised on his sunglasses, lifting them an inch as a warning. At the edge of the lake, mercenaries lined the shore, armed and aiming at him.
Mark didn’t have the strength to make a fast getaway underwater, and he couldn’t reach his last grenade fast enough, so he raised his hands in surrender, coughing and hacking up water. The helicopter moved closer, and Oliver and Emerl hauled him onto the floor of the helicopter.
“Lionel?” Whyte asked Emeryl. The mercenary peered over the edge a moment, then shook his head. Whyte’s face twisted with malice and he directed it at Mark while Oliver whistled “Smoke on the Water.” “Shut up,” Whyte said, and to Mark’s surprise, Oliver buttoned his lips.
The helicopter took off and brought them back to base. Not a word was spoken until they landed. Mark sat on the floor, shivering, dripping wet, and gulping down air.
Once inside the base, Whyte held Mark tight by the scruff of his shirt and dragged him to the laboratory. He threw him against the glass case, where a ball of burnt bone and charred skin that used to be a cat simmered. “I asked for three things,” he said. “Three things. Do you remember what they were? Loyalty, which you’ve betrayed; competence, which you’ve proved you lack; and honesty.”
Whyte bashed Mark’s face into the glass until all he could see was the cat remains. “I was this close to having an unstoppable force. Now, I’m left with a fatal flaw and a dead cat, one I’ve had for years. But no, that wasn’t good enough for you, was it?” He smushed Mark harder into the glass until he couldn’t see anything. Then he threw him into the glass, caught him, and smacked him to the ground. “You had to kill one of my people, too!”
Mark coughed and sat up. “Why do you care? He was one psycho. You got a lot more,” he said, sneering. “Kind of redundant if you ask me.”
Whyte raised his hand, but Emeryl stopped him, slapping his radio into his palm. “We got a problem,” he said.
Taking the radio and ordering two mercenaries to watch Mark, Whyte stepped outside with Oliver and Emeryl. From the window, Mark saw the three men hovering around the radio. All appeared deep in thought, with Whyte grinding his teeth. He did make out Whyte asking, “How long?” to the radio and being unsatisfied with the answer.
They returned shortly afterward. “We’re leaving right now,” Whyte told the mercenaries. “Grab as much of the formula as you can and load up. We don’t have any time to waste.”
“What about Lydia?” Emeryl asked.
“Leave her. She’s no use to us anymore.”
He jerked his head to Mark. “And him?”
Whyte looked beyond Mark at the glass case and a sick smile spread across his lips. “Put him in there.”
All five men grabbed Mark, each to a limb or his head, and carried him to the case. Mark kicked and jerked at them, but they threw him high over the edge and into the case. Catching onto the edge with his fingertips, Mark tried to climb back up, but Oliver shot a jet of fire at him. He released, falling onto the cat’s remains, and rolled off the sticky, crumbling mess. He jumped for the top, but his fingers barely grazed it. He bashed his shoulder into the wall, but it held firm.
“Turn it on,” Whyte said.
As Emeryl flipped the switch to start the flames, the tubes hummed and immediately sputtered and shut down. “Explosion must’ve knocked out
something,” he said, shrugging.
“Then who has a grenade?” The mercenaries checked their equipment but were fresh out. “Perfect. And Yonkers already put away the ladder somewhere.” He looked around the room for something high to stand on and found nothing.
“If you need a grenade,” Mark said, taking out his and slipping a finger in the pin, “you can have mine.”
The mercenaries raised their guns. “Cute. Except we can move out of the way. And what will that do for you? Hm?” Whyte asked. “You could try to blow that case up, but as we’ve already seen, that might not end well for you, would it? What if you miss and the grenade falls back in there with you?” He sucked on his teeth. “Bad way, going to pieces.” Oliver laughed and raised his hand for a high-five, which he never received. “Even if you got out, Oliver could cook you alive.” Mark fumed at his logic and let go of the pin. This case was all that kept him from being brutally murdered. He couldn’t risk it.
“Too bad Lionel isn’t here,” Oliver said, almost wistfully. “He would love to do this.” He resumed whistling “Smoke on the Water.”
Heaving a sigh of relief, Mark slumped down. He was safe for now.
Whyte stopped in the midst of an eye roll and raised a finger. “No, fire is too quick for you anyway. I want something slower. Something that will drag out. Open the emergency door and let the water in,” he told Emeryl, and then leered at Mark. “It’ll help take care of everything.”
“I can go grab a grenade,” Emeryl said.
“No, I’d prefer this,” he said. “Hurry and open it. Grab everything and let’s go. Have a detachment stay behind to destroy whatever we can’t take with us. Then have them cave in the front door and follow the rest of us. The water will finish the job.”
“Yes, sir,” Emeryl said.
Whyte turned to Mark and waved. “Say hello to Heather and Frieda for me.” They left Mark alone, and he almost wished they had set fire to him. That would be quick. That he had prepared for. But not this. He rammed the glass wall again and again, hoping to loosen it. He thought he heard splashing water outside already. He hit harder, harder. Thoom. Thoom. He couldn’t die, not like this.
The lights went out, making him jump, and trampling footsteps echoed down the hall. There was moving furniture, gunfire, and several explosions, which rumbled the case. This couldn’t be the end. Fear squeezed his heart in its clenched fingers, and he kept banging on the glass to stave off the prickling tears and from hyperventilation taking over. He wanted Heather, his mom, anyone. Anyone to give him a way out. “Help! Help!”
Nobody was coming back for him. No one was coming to save him.
###
Thank you very much for purchasing and reading my first sequel. I greatly appreciate your support and time you have given to this trilogy and ask that you please take a brief moment to leave a review at your favorite retailer.
Thank you once again,
Dustin Martin
Other Books by Dustin Martin
Halfway Heroes Trilogy
Halfway Heroes
About Dustin Martin
Dustin Martin is a lover of science fiction and fantasy, as his writing usually reflects, and loves all kinds of plots, from grand adventures to character-driven stories. He draws much inspiration from authors in these same fields and his Christian faith.
Dustin holds an English Major in Technical Writing and works at a software company that provides products to higher learning institutions. When he isn't writing or daydreaming new stories, Dustin is often listening to music, playing games, or enjoying a book.
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