Chapter 158

  Alexander sighed.

  He hovered there for a moment, caught between the melancholy of what he’d discovered and the recognition that there was nothing he could do about it. Not really. These people had made their choice, desperate as it was.

  Honestly, if he were in their shoes, he probably would have come to the same conclusion they had.

  Flashes of light to the north caught his attention. He’d picked up their signals earlier while scanning the Scar. A cluster of superhumans, and based on their erratic movements and the sporadic bursts of illumination cutting through the darkness, they were fighting.

  There was no point in dwelling on what he couldn’t control and couldn’t change. Without a doubt, this sort of thing was occurring all over the world right at this very moment. It was just one of many dark changes the world was undergoing.

  Alexander adjusted his trajectory, angling toward the disturbance.

  The drones spread out further ahead of him, discreetly maneuvering to surround the area.

  The sounds of combat grew louder as he approached. Crashes. Shouting. The distinctive crack of concrete breaking under superhuman force.

  Alexander spotted a building that still had most of its structure intact. Five stories, probably an office complex before the Scar claimed it. The upper floors had taken damage, windows blown out and walls scorched, but the roof looked stable enough.

  He descended, touching down on the edge. The metal frame running within the concrete registered with his Metallokinesis. Solid. It would hold.

  Frowning, he looked down at a coffee shop on the other side of the road. He was picking up two stationary bioelectrical signals from within. One felt superhuman, awakened, while the other was clearly still human.

  Alexander shook his head and sat down, letting his legs dangle over the side. The ruined street stretched out below him, lit intermittently by the orange glow of burning barrels placed at intervals along what had once been the main thoroughfare. Shadows danced across broken buildings as the flames flickered.

  He tilted his head, curious. With a second look, he realized they weren’t actually burning. His enhanced sight revealed that those directly beneath him had nothing in them to burn. Which meant the flames were fake, illusory, or perhaps genuine but maintained by a power.

  Alexander glanced to the left, further up the street. The fight was moving in his direction. He counted twelve signatures and two distinct groups based on their positioning and coordination.

  Five against seven, if his read was correct.

  He settled more comfortably on the edge of the building, watching the tactical situation develop. The five were better equipped, with full tactical gear and shoulder-mounted lights that swept across the ruins as they advanced. Guild members, most likely. Professionals based on their teamwork.

  Alexander estimated they were all early Tier 2, though one of them was obviously more powerful than the others. Handling three opponents at once, pushing aggressively, relying on his teammates only to protect his flanks. Chunks of concrete hurled ahead of him. Invisible strikes landed. Enemy attacks deflected or caught midair.

  Telekinetic if he had to guess.

  The seven were in retreat, their gear mismatched and clearly salvaged. Whether they were gang members or independent villains operating out of the Scar was less obvious. It also made little difference to him. Though they had the numbers, their coordination was erratic at best.

  Still, he gave them full points for creativity. Though clearly outmatched, their escape route had been prepared and trapped ahead of time. Perhaps they were responsible for the barrels.

  Alexander watched as one of the seven conjured a firearm and shot a blazing bolt into a small pile of rubble on the side of the road. Something within exploded, sending shrapnel in every direction.

  None of it reached the heroes. The moment even the smallest fragment came close, it stopped in place, seized by invisible threads of Will.

  The others took advantage of the telekinetic’s focus being spread thin, launching a barrage of attacks. Elemental. Sonic.

  One clapped her hands, causing the side of a building to melt. The slurry crashed down onto the sidewalk and washed out into the road before the heroes could react. It hardened instantly, locking the heroes in place, drawing cries of panic from a couple of them.

  Then the telekinetic slammed his hands down with a shout, and the ground shattered.

  The villains used the disruption to their advantage, scattering and putting more distance between themselves and the heroes. They were getting close to the area beneath Alexander’s perch, moving with practiced coordination now despite their retreat.

  One of them triggered another trap. A barrel on the corner erupted, sending a wave of smoke rolling across the street instead of shrapnel. Some of the guild members still staggered back in alarm.

  The telekinetic swept his hand through the air, dispersing the smoke with a surge of force. But his gaze tracked further up the street now, scanning for more prepared obstacles.

  When one villain aimed toward another suspicious pile of debris, the telekinetic didn’t wait. He reached out and hurled the entire mass away before anyone could trigger it, sending rubble scattering harmlessly into an adjacent alley.

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  One of the heroes came to a complete stop. A woman, distinguished by an unusual backpack with three tubes jutting upward from it. She dropped to one knee, braced herself against the ground, and the tubes angled forward.

  The tubes fired.

  Three mortar-like objects arced through the air, trailing bright orange streaks before detonating ahead of the fleeing villains. The blasts forced them to scatter further, slowing their retreat, clustering them together as their escape routes narrowed.

  Alexander’s curiosity piqued. He reached out with his senses and found… nothing of interest.

  The tubes were just hollow metal cylinders. No mechanisms, no technology. She was generating the projectiles herself and using the tubes purely as launchers.

  A third hero made a strange gesture with his arms, hands weaving through the air in a specific pattern. Suddenly, all five guild members surged forward with increased speed, closing the distance the villains had gained.

  Their teamwork was interesting. The telekinetic providing offense and defense, the mortar woman controlling the field, and now someone providing enhancement. They coordinated well.

  The fight was almost directly below him now.

  The telekinetic reached out and seized a rusted sedan that had crashed into a wall years ago. With a grunt of effort, he ripped it free and hurled it across the street with brutal force.

  The villains saw it coming. They threw themselves to the sides, hitting the ground hard as the car sailed over them.

  It continued across the street.

  Straight into the coffee shop.

  The impact tore through the remaining wall structure. Concrete cracked, support beams twisted, and the ceiling began to collapse.

  Alexander frowned. The two inside remained in the same place.

  He sighed quietly and reached out with his right hand. Metallokinesis responded, seizing the metal framework threaded through the concrete, holding the roof in place even as debris crumbled away from the structure.

  This was the problem with going out. He just didn’t have it in him to ignore things like this.

  The villains scrambled to their feet, already trying to put distance between themselves and the heroes.

  The woman who’d melted the side of a building earlier clapped her hands again. The asphalt beneath the guild members’ feet liquified instantly. They sank ankle-deep into it before it hardened around their boots like quick-setting cement, trapping them in place.

  The telekinetic ignored it entirely. He cocked his arm back and threw a punch at empty air.

  One of the villains rising to his feet folded like he’d been hit with a baseball bat. The invisible force launched him down the street, skipping like a stone before sliding to a stop, completely still.

  Another hero reached into the air above his head. Light coalesced in his grip, solidifying into a massive warhammer easily twice the size of his torso.

  He brought it down hard onto the ground.

  The road shattered. A shockwave rippled outward from the impact, tearing through asphalt and tossing the villains like rag dolls, while simultaneously freeing the heroes.

  As the heroes surged forward, the remaining villains broke. Struggling to their feet, they ran without looking back.

  The telekinetic turned his attention to the fleeing group. He reached out with his right hand and, with a yell, began tearing the entire concrete facade off a nearby building. Rebar shrieked as it was ripped free. Dust exploded into the air as the massive section came loose.

  Then concrete shattered apart in his invisible grip, fragmenting into deadly chunks. He hurled them like a shotgun blast at the retreating villains farther down the street.

  Most of them managed to dodge or deflect the worst of it. One wasn’t fast enough, and he went down hard, not moving.

  The guild members pressed their advantage, launching more attacks as they gave chase. The woman with the mortars fired another volley, explosions blooming ahead of the villains to cut off escape routes. Another threw a chakram, bouncing it off the walls of the buildings. It pursued its target with uncanny accuracy.

  The fight moved down the street, the sounds of combat growing more distant as they rounded the corner, out of sight.

  Alexander tracked them with Hyperawareness as silence settled over the ruined street.

  He maintained his hold, keeping the ceiling stable. The two people inside still hadn’t moved.

  Alexander waited, certain they’d leave now that the fight had moved on.

  A minute passed.

  They were probably just being cautious. Making sure nobody was coming back.

  Time continued ticking away.

  His eyebrow twitched.

  With a low growl of annoyance, he launched himself off the edge of the building. Metallokinesis flared, oscillating and managing his descent with finesse despite only having his boots and cybernetic arm to manipulate.

  It was definitely a good thing he hadn’t needed to get involved. His armor and belt remained in the backpack hanging from his shoulder.

  He touched down gently on the sidewalk, glancing left and right, but the street remained empty. No heroes. No villains. Just flickering barrel-fires casting orange light across broken pavement and ruined walls.

  Alexander chuckled quietly to himself. Trusting his eyes over even his superpowered senses remained instinct, even after all this time.

  Alexander walked into the coffee shop, stepping over chunks of concrete and around broken furniture. The rusted car was visible through the hole in the back of the building.

  He approached the counter and leaned over it, looking down at the two people huddled against the wall below.

  “Are you two stupid? Get out—”

  He stopped mid-sentence.

  They were just kids.

  The one on the left was huddled against the wall, arms wrapped around her knees. Torn clothes stained with grime and dust. Dirty face. Alexander was no great judge, but he couldn’t believe she was older than sixteen.

  He turned to take in the other one. A boy. Similar appearance. Similar grime-streaked features. Siblings, clearly, but perhaps a year older than his sister.

  Then the girl screamed, hands snapping toward him. “Leave my brother alone!”

  Alexander reacted faster than conscious thought, his cybernetic hand coming up to defend his face.

  Brown and green erupted from the very skin of her palms. Roots and vines bursting forth with incredible violence. The undulating mass slammed into his cybernetic arm with shocking power, shooting him back out through the ruined storefront and into the street.

  His mind stuttered for a moment, certain that children couldn’t have powers.

  Before he hit the road, Alexander seized hold of himself. He just stopped. Hung there in the air, horizontal and awkward, frozen mid-trajectory as if someone had paused reality.

  He stayed like that for a long moment.

  Processing.

  A kid had just used a superpower on him.

  Somehow, that made everything much, much worse.

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