The Vigilante Book 1

Chapter 15

I knew they'd turn on me. I start to figure out what is going on and they call treason and conspiracy instantly. Dale seems to be in the same boat as me though, maybe now he'll finally open up some. Either way, once I get out of this I am done with these people. They will pull my string no longer.

I refuse to be a puppet.

We boarded the helicopter with no escort, just Dale, the pilot of the helicopter, myself, and a young man in an army uniform sitting beside me, handcuffed. I noticed him as the soldier who had not attacked me outside of Jack's bunker when my abilities had first been activated.

"Why are you here Agent Richardson?" he asked.

"Little bit of government trouble," Dale replied with a sigh, "But what are you doing here?"

"The leader of the squad made some trumped-up charges against me so that I would get off of the team," he replied, "This helicopter was redirected to pick you up before it dropped me off,"

"Sounds a lot like why we were taken in," I commented.

"I'm sorry to hear that," Dale replied to the young man.

"By the way, I'm Arnold Wilson," he said, introducing himself, "I'd shake hands but-," he said, rattling his handcuffs.

I waved my hand over them and made the cuffs shake on his hands. I stopped briefly and tried again, this time to only move the the lock itself instead of the whole cuffs. After several long seconds the metal clicked and the cuffs fell onto the floor.

"Much appreciated," he said, moving his hands of if they were cramped.

It seemed that Dale and I took priority over Wilson as the helicopter never did drop him off and simply began its long flight across the country. Arnold had drifted off to sleep after we stopped for a refuel that night.

"Dale?" I asked.

"Hmm?"

"What's goin' to happen to us?"

"You'll probably be put on trial for publicity, but they've already made their decision, they had with Bryant,"

"He told me that you testified against him at his hearin',"

"I did, and I'm not going to with you, you haven't done anything wrong,"

"What happened with Bryant?"

"He killed his superior officer, then five other men and tried to escape, but he then turned himself in, hoping that they would forgive him but they didn't and he was sentenced to death. As you would imagine, that didn't sit too well with him and he fled. He had some crazy theory and explanation for it all but they never would listen, I don't know if there was a good reason for what he did but he slaughtered those men without remorse. Then...the government engineered me to fight him,"

"You were made to kill Bryant?"

"Yes, I was. But they didn't make me powerful enough to be nearly invincible like Bryant was. I couldn't stop him, and since I had 'served with distinction in the face of danger' I was kept in service, and only a year and a half later, they decided to create you to end Bryant forever, but you were activated too early. You enhancements should have come into being once you had fully matured around nineteen or twenty years old. For some reason, your powers came into being much sooner than they should have, and that's what led us to where we are now,"

"So you think they've already made up their minds?" I asked.

"Yes, I do, but I think that we at least have a chance. And I'm going to fight this all the way,"