Fighting Crime Doesn't Pay

Chapter 7

I land hard on the metal floor inside the robot's head. I stand up and and see Welman. She runs from the control panel to the far wall and starts reaching for her gun.

         "You're too late! This city is doomed." She says as she gets the gun out. I turn on the speed and I'm on top of her just as she fires. The bullet flies through my skull and I hit the ground. 

                                                                                          ......

                                                                                         .......

           My eyes open, I look to see the bullet a few inches behind my head. Apparently I was right, I can't be killed. I'll dwell on that later. I get up and run for her. She doesn't have time to shoot again before I'm on top of her. I pick Welman up by her collar.

        "Where is he?!" I scream. Suddenly she's not so tough.

          "Please don't hurt me! I can stop it." She cries. I slam her hard against the wall.

          "WHERE IS HE?!" I scream louder. I slam her again.

         "In there!" She screams pointing to a metal door in the other wall. I don't let her go. I contemplate killing her. It would be easy, a single punch or slam against the floor would do it. I put her down for a second. I'm not going to kill her. "Oh thank you!" She cries. I reach down and snap her legs, first the left then the right. She screams in pain as her bones poke their way out of her skin.

         "Now you can't run away." I say as I walk to the door, ignoring her cries. I wait a second, let the rage cool before I open the door. God, I hope he's ok. I swing the door wide open to see a bruised, battered Mark huddled in a closet. "Mark." I say hesitantly. He turns to looks at me and his tear stained face lights up.

        "I knew you'd come. I knew you would. Oh God, Andy." He says collapsing into my arms and sobbing.

        "She hurt you." I say quietly. I couldn't kill Anna Welman, but that doesn't mean I won't leave her here while I destroy the robot.  He doesn't respond. I don't think he can. He's too thin, I don't think he's eaten since he was taken, if he did it wasn't enough. I grab his shoulders and stand him up.

         "Ok. This thing is still moving we have to stop it." I say. He nods. I walk him into the control room, holding him up. There's no one controlling the robot anymore, but it seems like if you take your foot off the gas, it's still moving forward. "Can you stop it?" I ask, knowing that I'm asking a lot of him considering what he's been through. His eyes are fixed on Anna, still screaming in a pool of her own blood.

          "You did that." He says. It's not a question.

          "Yes I did. Can you stop this thing?" I admit and ask again, grabbing his shoulders and turning him around.

         "Yeah. I put in a self destruct. She didn't know about it." He says. My eyes widen with fear.

          "When you say self destruct, is this whole robot going to blow? Cause that might be worse than what we have right now." I say. He nods slowly.

          "It'll only blow the circuits, maybe a small explosion in here. And this thing could fall over." He explains, slowly again. I think that's the only speed he can work at right now. "Andy, you can't leave her here." He says quietly.

          "What? Why? She deserves whatever she gets!" I yell. I regret it immediately when he recoils.

        "Trust me. I wouldn't mind her dead. But you shouldn't do it." He says. He leans back into me.

            "Ok. You wait here. I'll take her down and when I get back we blow this bitch." I say. He nods. I walk Mark over to the control panel and he leans up against it, he's barely able to stand without me. I walk over to Anna and pick her up.

       "Don't think this means you're off the hook. Next time your life needs saving I won't be there." I say to her. I fly through the broken window down to the street and hand her to a very shocked looking officer standing by Daniels. He looks at me. "This thing is going to fall over. Is everybody out of the way?" I ask.

         "As far as I can tell. What happened to her?" He asks me. I think about it for a second and decide not to lie.

"I happened." Before he says anything I take off back toward the robot. I land back in the head and see Mark leaning heavily on the console messing around with the buttons and switches. "You got it?" I ask. He turns and nods.

'"It'll blow in thirty seconds." He says. He steps towards me and stumbles. I pick him up, cradling him in my arms and fly out the broken windscreen. We get about a hundred feet away when the circuits blow rather loudly. For a second the robot just stands there and then it slowly topples over backward. I don't hand Mark off to the paramedics immediately, instead I hover looking at the fallen metal beast that almost wrecked the whole city. Then I look down at the man in my arms, my best friend, the only person I've ever been able to count on. And in that moment I realize that I've been lying to myself for a long time, all I cared about was saving Mark, making sure he was ok. His eyes are closed, but his breathing is steady, I just think it was all too much for him to stay awake any longer.

"I love you." I whisper to him, knowing he can't hear me. Then I fly down to street level and hand him to the waiting paramedics.