Hero Stalker

Part Fifty-Nine

The only reason I knew I wasn't dead was that my whole body hurt.

Last time this happened, I'd been fourteen and flipped my bike going over a pothole. I'd woken up in the hospital. Mom had sat next to my bed all night. She'd stroked my forehead and told me I'd be okay.

Having my arms and legs trapped in plastic sheaths that pinned me to a tabletop wasn't quite as reassuring.

With the angle the table was tilted at, I could see the concrete floor. But the circle of light cast by the single bulb above my head didn't extend to the walls. "Hello?" I shouted. My voice echoed over and over. Wherever they'd taken me, it was big.

I extended my blades and couldn't find anything to cut. Not that I'd expected to. Pain shot down my spine with every move I made. The back of my costume had ripped—I could feel the cold metal of the table and the warm gooiness of clotting blood. The tree. I hit a tree. The front of my costume had torn as well. Deep, ugly bruises poked through the holes. My left knee had swollen up and hurt like hell. The outside of my green boots had melted in the heat of Harpy's jetpack.

"I know you're watching me!" I shouted. Of course, I didn't, but he'd never know I yelled if he wasn't. Harpy. But last I'd seen of Harpy, he'd been falling to his death as a building collapsed on him. If he'd done this, I'd take back everything rude I'd ever said to the alien conspiracy nuts on The Worldley Fewe. "Show yourself, you son of a bitch. Come on. You've got me tied up and you're still afraid of me? Coward!"

"If I'm the coward, why are you the one who sounds so afraid?" asked a soft male voice. A familiar voice.

I stiffened.

Cypher walked soundlessly into the ring of light, his face devoid of emotions. My stomach sank. The schematics. You naïve fool. I should have focused on them, not investigating the properties of cryothene. At least Slasher knew about the schematics as well. When he realized I'd vanished, Cypher would be the first person he'd track down.

"I told Femme and Slasher I was taking you to my private doctor to treat those cuts on your back. They're dealing with the press right now. If they wonder about you, they'll call me. I took the liberty of temporarily deactivating your radio."

Shit. Metalhead, Part Two. This time, no one else would bail me out. He'd kept me alive for a reason. Probably for information. If he'd just come close enough to my blades . . . I'd almost stuck them in Harpy. Why not someone else?

A TV screen flickered to life in the darkness behind him. Chad Cornsworthy spoke as the camera hovered over a massive pile of rubble in the parking lot of Our Lady's Will. The byline read 'Supervillain Harpy Confirmed Dead After Hospital Attack.' Below it, in smaller type, 'Nineteen civilians killed in shooting; forty-seven injured including Centurion Shadowcat.'

We got him. The man who'd killed almost thirty people and terrorized the whole city had been squished like a cockroach. No matter what happened next, at least I'd die a full Centurion. I should have felt at least a little relieved. But this clearly wasn't over. Not with Harpy's superweapon still missing and not with me strapped to a table. "What do you want?"

"I think you know. You're very good at fooling people. Femme's a trained spy and Slasher's the most cynical bastard I've ever met. You got them both. You even fooled me. People lie. Data doesn't. You know where we are?"

Row after row of lights flickered on above me, illuminating a vast concrete bunker. Black Centurion jets lined one wall. Stacks of canned food and jugs of water filled a corner. Grappling guns, netting balls, knock-out needles, bo staffs, handcuffs, and other Centurion tools hung from the wall. All painted black. A stack of computer servers like the one in the Tower sat in the middle of the football-field-sized room.