Apocalypse Jones And The Race Against Time
a local heroes story
by Al Bruno III
rev 1.0
Copyright Al Bruno III 2011
Smashwords Edition License Notes:
This free ebook may be copied, distributed, reposted, reprinted and shared, provided it appears in its entirety without alteration, and the reader is not charged to access it.
Cover art by Francis James Hogan
Apocalypse Jones
And The Race Against Time
by
Al Bruno III
Prologue
The End is The Beginning
River City hadn’t sponsored a New Year’s Eve celebration in fifteen years so the citizens had long ago resigned themselves to turning their attention across Hallenbeck Bay to their neighbor city of Megalopolis. Every year Megalopolis would put on a free concert and simulcast it on a dozen radio stations. A giant clock would be erected atop the world-famous Olam Tower to display the countdown. Then, at midnight, there would be a fireworks display so extravagant that it could almost be seen from space.
In fact on one occasion it had been seen from space and had nearly triggered an interplanetary war.
Thankfully the masked and caped heroes known as Guardian Force, those sworn protectors of Megalopolis and River City, had been there to keep things from spiraling out of control.
They were just as busy on this night struggling to contain a crime wave. Roy Ramses, Arachni-kid and Cheela of the Jungle were battling polyester-clad jewel thieves in the Megalopolis diamond district. Golem Girl, Dr. Obscure and the Peacenik were trying to protect an experimental space jet from an army of roller-skating gibbons.
That left ShadoMask on his own in River City and his long chase was reaching its conclusion.
The ShadoMobile and the getaway car had crashed into a brick wall leaving both men on foot. The Reddeath ran through the streets of River City, his crimson robes fluttering out behind him, his white mask catching his panting breaths. In one scrawny hand he clutched the crumbling, jagged edged stone that was the Tablet of Destiny.
ShadoMask pursued him. The caped hero was barely able to run. His silver and black costume was torn and bloodied but it still seemed to shimmer by the light of the full moon. His dark cowl covered the upper half of his face, the lower half was oale and bruised. He clutched at his side, experience had taught him that a broken rib had punctured his lung. He grabbed the remaining bolo from his utility belt and threw. The weapon sailed wide of the target.
Somewhere a radio blared, “...that was the band Atrocity Farm with their hit single ‘My Love Is A Unicorn’. I’m your host David Harris and this is the KT-106 FM New Year’s Eve party and we are hear to rock in the 80’s. I can see by the giant clock on Olam Tower that it is almost time for the big countdown.”
The Reddeath stopped running, he turned to grin at his arch enemy, “It’s time. How glad I am that you’re here. I always knew it would come down to us at the end.”
“...stop you...” ShadoMask’s voice was a pained whisper, “...stop you...”
“How will you do that old friend?” the figure in red grabbed hold of ShadoMask’s throat and lifted, “How can you hope to defeat me in my moment of apotheosis?”
ShadoMask kicked upwards his knee catching the Reddeath in the chin. Both men went sprawling. The Tablet of Destiny hit the asphalt of Greenwald Street and cracked in half.
“No!”
The masked hero dragged himself by his elbows, crawling for the stone fragments, the stone fragments that contained a formula that could undo the world. ShadoMask wished that one of the other members of Guardian Force were here to help him- even the Peacenick.
ShadoMask’s gloved hand landed on the top half of the tablet, he grunted, flipped over onto his back and threw. The five thousand year old handful of stone shattered as it stuck the wall of a tenement building.
“All right cats and kittens!” The voice of David Harris blared out from every television and radio for miles, “Let’s all countdown together and say goodbye to 1979!”
“No!” The Reddeath leapt to his feet and grabbed the surviving part of the tablet, “Not again! You won’t beat me again!”
“...10...”
Somewhere the sound of a siren began to fill the air, it was drawing closer. ShadoMask grinned, his son had gotten the message to the police after all. “Good boy,” he whispered, “good boy.”
“...9...”
Then the Reddeath was standing over him, stomping on ShadoMask again and again. The masked hero tried to fight but he could barely move, barely breathe.
“...8...”
Police cars were skidding to a halt a few yards away.
“...7...”
Uniformed officers began shouting for him to surrender but the Reddeath had turned his attention to the remaining part of the Tablet of Destiny. “Still enough...” he chuckled, “...still enough!”
“...6...”
He read the words, couplets of ancient Mesopotamian verse that were also complex mathematic formulae.
“...5...”
The moon seemed to swell, its illumination darkening to a deep red.
That red flowed across the sky, blotting out the stars and robbing the lamp posts and flashing lights on the police cars of their strength until they were little more than fading candlelight.
“...4...”
There was a sound like thunder. Voices began to cry out. The Reddeath watched as the policemens’ bodies began to shift and change. Their eyes turned black, their faces twisted into vulpine shapes. Their screams became howls and those howls were spreading through River City and beyond.
“...3...”
The Reddeath laughed at his victory, at the thought of a world that was his to control. Then he winced. A fiery pain radiated down through his body.
“...2...”
He held his pale hands up and saw they were twisting into black-furred claws.
“1!”
“Wait! Not me!” The Reddeath shouted with horror, “Not meeeeeeeee!”
Apocalypse Jones
And The Race Against Time
by
Al Bruno III
Chapter One
The Planet Of The 70’s
It had been December thirty first 11:59:59 PM for months.
That first, last New Years Eve the moon had gone red and any living person caught in its crimson light was transformed into a thing that was not quite a jackal and not quite human. Cemeteries shuddered and gave up their dead, shambling nightmares spilled out of every morgue and funeral home.
What began in River City spread across the world until every clock had stopped at one second from midnight and there had never been another sunrise. There were no stars either, there was only a darkness marked by the few hours the bloated, red moon crawled across the sky. That moon had become unchanging, it no longer had any phases and anyone caught out in its light would be changed into one of the jackal-things.
The only safe way to travel was in those hours that the moon had dropped below the horizon but the traveler still had to deal with a nearly impenetrable darkness as well as monsters both living and dead.
Policewoman Annabelle Jones steered her motorcycle carefully through the streets of Megalopolis. She was tall and black with regal features and a halo of kinky dark hair.
The motorcycle slalomed around the burnt out vehicles, sometimes riding along the glass strewn sidewalk, other times in the road. Up ahead a toppled power wire was sparking and snapping. Seeing that surprised Annabelle and she slowed to a stop. Why was there still electricity here? Were there refugees nearby?
Perhaps so but Annabelle didn’t allow herself to hope, not after she’d been on her own for so long.
Still though, she had to wonder where they might be.
A small group of shambling forms startled her from her thoughts. She hit the brakes and went into a controlled skid.
There were zombies up ahead of her and by the look of it they were freshly turned.
“So much for refugees.” Annabelle grumbled. She wore two belts of ammunition bandolier style. She kept a high-powered revolver holstered on each hip, they had been her only companions since the jackal-things had taken her family. She drew them and took aim, “Well girls, looks like its still just the three of us. What say we have a little fun?”
The first revolver crashed and one of the zombies crumpled. She fired the second and sent another one spinning backwards. A sound escaped her, it might have been laughter, it might have been a sob but what did it matter when there was no one left to hear?
She could have just gone around the slow moving things but she wanted to destroy something, she wanted to smell cordite. It made her remember those early days at the police academy. She had been proud to be accepted and determined to show her instructors that a black woman was more than a match for any other recruit.
Proving that hadn’t been easy, the instructors had made sure of it but she had endured and won their respect. They had found her marksmanship skills especially amazing. Fast on the draw and sure-eyed she could shoot the gun out of a man’s hand at fifty paces.
After graduation she made a name for herself as she patrolled the rough streets she had grown up on. Criminals called her ‘the sexy cop that wouldn’t stop’. They had given her a nickname too but it was a nickname nobody dared use to her face.
Even the superheroes of River City had shown her deference and respect. ShadoMask had been there when the mayor had awarded her the medal of valor. A week later she had been made an honorary member of Guardian Force.
Not that any of it mattered now. There no longer was a River City police department or a Guardian Force.
Once the zombies had been returned to death Annabelle dropped the spent cartridges from her revolvers and started reloading.
But she never got the chance to finish.
Something came at her from her right, moving fast and growling.
There was no time for Annabelle to react and the jackal-thing took her and her motorcycle down. There was a hiss as the header pipe scalded her skin through her jeans. One empty revolver clattered from her grip, the other she held on to.
The jackal-thing straddled her, it’s yellow eyes feverish with madness and hunger. It slashed at her with its claws. Annabelle blocked the blow with her revolver. The creature’s nails sparked against the metal. She curled her empty hand into a fist and hit it alongside the head. It’s eyes rolled back and it toppled off of her.
Annabelle fought to catch her breath. She could hear growls moving towards her. More of the creatures were nearby. She fumbled to reload her remaining gun but she was still pinned under the motorcycle.
Would these last bullets be for those things or for her?
Before she could decide a man dropped out of the sky beside her. He was wearing what looked like a homemade deep sea diving suit but there were sleek wings attached to the back that looked like they had miniature jet engines attached to them.
The jackal-things were baying and barking. There were yellow eyes coming at them from the darkness, coming from everywhere.
The man in the rocket suit lifted her up, holding her in his arms like she was some damsel in distress. The wing engines roared to life and they shot into the air at a crazy angle.
Annabelle shouted with surprise and held on tight to her rescuer. She was close enough now to make out his features through the clear glass faceplate of his helmet. He was black with hair that was going gray and a thin smile. “I’m Sidney Tibbs,” he said, “and you are?”
“I’m...” Annabelle choked, her stomach heaving, “...airsick.”
Apocalypse Jones
And The Race Against Time
by
Al Bruno III
Chapter Two
Beneath The Planet Of The 70’s
“Peregrine?”
“What’s wrong with that?”
They were in a bunker deep beneath Megalopolis’ It had been designed to withstand a nuclear attack so keeping out the jackal-things and polyester-clad zombies was no trouble at all.
“Peregrine?” Annabelle Jones snorted, “Really?”
“Yeah well...” Sidney Tibbs shrugged, “Better than Hawkguy or Man-Bird or something like that.”
There were only forty people living here, a few civilians, a handful of soldiers, one superhero, one villain, a super scientist and a living legend.
Sidney was the super scientist, he had developed a jet suit for NASA but pulled all his research when he was pulled from the test flight in favor of a ‘less controversial’ choice.
And by that the brass meant they wanted someone that wasn’t black.
“I really thought I could make a difference,” Sidney said wistfully. He had motorcycle parts spread out across his workspace, he was trying to reassemble a Kawasaki Kz1000 motorcycle but was missing more than half the necessary parts, “Like ShadoMask or Amoeba-Man.”
“You don’t need to be a superhero to make a difference,” Annabelle said. She had finished inspecting and inventorying the munitions yesterday and was now cleaning and repairing the best of the lot. Colonel Rictus said they would need them soon, “But go on.”
Sidney groaned and shook his head before continuing, “The jet suit I made then was a lot nicer than the one I have now. I waited until dark before I took flight and it took me a while to find a crime in progress.”
“What kind of crime was it?”
Before he could answer her the sound of arguing filled the main room of the bunker. Frogman and Lady Indigo were arguing again, about ‘Plan Omega’ no doubt. Lady Indigo was dressed in shades of blue and violet, even her skin was that color. She was a powerful, megalomaniacal sorceress, a supervillain of the highest order but and she had promised Colonel Rictus she would help him save the world.
Then later on she would try to rule it.
Frogman had been the defender of Stone City, his costume was green, rubbery and topped with an elaborate helmet that looked like a frog’s head. For all his good deeds his career had been plagued by scandal, there were rumors he was romantically involved with his teenage sidekick and on two separate occasions he had been arrested for driving the Frogmobile while inebriated. Those scandals hadn’t dulled his popularity however, the citizens of Stone City loved him warts and all.
Annabelle found it funny that in the close quarters of the bunker the only thing the clashed more than those two’s color schemes was their personalities.
“It was an armored car robbery,” Sidney explained. He paused to examine a pair of spark plugs, one he threw away the other he kept, “It was tipped over and the guards had been thrown every which way. I had caught the thief red handed.”
“Who was it?” Annabelle asked.
“Crazy-Face.”
She looked up from the M16 she was cleaning, “You went after Crazy-Face?”
“He crushed my pelvis with his bare hands,” Sidney shook his head, “for a man with a lava lamp for a head he was surprisingly strong.”
“How did it happen?”
“He grabbed me out of the air and said ‘I don’t know who you are but I’m going to crush your pelvis.’”
Annabelle winced on his behalf, “And that was the end of your crime-fighting career?”
“I’m lucky that wasn’t the end of my life!” he laughed. “Just as well, Peregrine is a pretty bad name.”
“You should hear what the punks in the neighborhood used to call me-” Annabelle caught herself.
“Oh really?” He looked up from his work, “What did they call you?”
“It wasn't a superhero name,” Annabelle felt herself starting to blush, “it was just something they called me behind my back.”
“What was it?”
“You think I’m gonna tell you so you can call me it to my face?” she gave him a little wink and hoped that would be enough to shut him up about the whole subject.
“But-”
“Attention!” The sound of a bullhorn echoed through the bunker, “I need everyone to the monitor room. Even you Professor Tibbs.”
Soldiers and civilians alike started streaming into the main hallway. Frogman and Lady Indigo brought up the rear, still oblivious to everything but their argument.
“I am never going to finish my work at this rate!” Sidney had been trying to attach a quantum fusion generator to a carburetor.
“Come on...” Annabelle grabbed him by the arm, “...it might be important.”
The monitor room was just that, a room full of sensors and video monitors. In a time of war it would have been used to track enemy movements and plan strategy, now all but the largest of the screens were dark and those screens only showed readouts and video from Skylab. Annabelle and Sidney joined the gathering crowd.
At the other end of the room stood a living legend from World War II- Colonel Rictus.
That wasn’t his real name of course, his real name was classified. He had earned his nickname because his face was permanently stuck in a war-like snarl, a consequence of his being injected with the Commando Compound. The Allied forces had hoped to create a squad of soldiers that were invulnerable and immortal. The man that came to be known as Colonel Rictus was the only test subject that hadn’t been killed by explosive dysentery within twelve hours of receiving the injection.
“Settle down everyone,” he said. His voice was deep and wintery, “I have some important news. Plan Omega is being moved forward.”
“What?” Sidney shouted, “We’re not ready. We’re not even sure-” “We don’t have time to be sure!” Rictus said, “The new readouts confirmed what we’ve already suspected. The Earth is in the process of turning itself inside out. We only have three weeks left before the end.”
Apocalypse Jones
And The Race Against Time
by
Al Bruno III
Chapter Three
Escape From The Planet Of The 70’s
Once, not too long ago, Megalopolis had been the most prosperous and beautiful city in the world. Travelers from everywhere had come for the fine art, high tech wonders, gleaming skyscrapers and of course its heroes. The most famous costumed avengers in the world had made Megalopolis and nearby River City their base of operations. That was why it had been nicknamed America’s Super City.
That was why it was chilling to see what it had become.
Fires had run unchecked through the streets leaving the glass and steel towers blackened ruins. Had it been a simple accident of the work of the jackal-things?
Of the jackal things there was no sign but the dead wandered everywhere but they had become bloated with rot and were relatively easy to avoid.
Every day for the last seven days Annabelle Jones had searched through the wreckage and remains trying to fill Plan Omega’s nearly impossible shopping list. Plan Omega was their only hope, their escape route.
Motorcycle parts. Volumes of forbidden lore. Transistors. Leather bodysuits. Gold, as much gold as possible. And most bizarre of all, the integrated circuits for a beryllium atomic clock.
Well, Annabelle had thought that last one would be impossible but here she was with Frogman on the outskirts of the city making her way up the steps to the Freemantle Institute.
The Freemantle Institute was a squat dome-shaped building and it had been the heart of Megalopolis’ scientific community. It had been built from space age metals and was powered by prism-like solar panels that had glittered like jewels. The fires hadn’t spared it and it seemed to Annabelle that some kind of an explosion had ripped a third of the building off its foundations. Annabelle took cover in the building’s ruined doorway.
“You wait here,” Frogman raised a green-gloved hand, “I’ll go in first.”
Before she could protest he drew the frogarang from his utility belt and hopped inside.
Hurrying after him Annabelle wondered if he was being smug or protective. He never took off his green helmet and the faceplate hid his every expression so there was no way for her to tell.
The stink of fire and rot filled her nostrils, by the time they had reached the heart of the building’s main it was strong enough to make her sick to her stomach.
It took a few minutes of shoving for them to shove open the door to the main stairwell. Frogman like to brag that he had the proportional strength of an amphibian but it was of no help to them here.
The stairway itself was pitch black. Annabelle switched her walkie-talkie for her flashlight. “Put it back,” Frogman flicked a switch on his utility belt and a cone of illumination shone from the buckle. It was brighter than a spotlight, it left Annabelle momentarily blinded.
The masked hero leapt down the steps as she tried to blink the dots from her eyes. When she could see again she hurried after him.
The atomic clock was secured behind a vault door. They had brought explosives to blast it apart but the door was already open.
Flickering light shone out through the doorway. Twin bonfires burned in the center of the chamber, thick clouds of smoke crowded against the roof.
Both Annabelle and Frogman recognized the eyes gleaming at them from the shadows and firelight.
Jackal-things. Annabelle drew the second revolver from her belt, At least a dozen of them.
“The Ogodad said you would come,” a voice growled from the darkness.
“Who’s there?” Frogman swept his utility belt’s spotlight across the room resulting in some unfortunate pelvic gestures, “Show yourself!”
A jackal-thing approached them, it was albino-white, “The Ogodad said you would come so we waited and you came.”
“Who are you?”
“I am Serbe,” with a sweep of his white-furred arm he urged the other jackal things forward, “and you have come here to die.”
“That so?” A dangerous smile settled onto Annabelle’s face. She fired. The revolvers crashed like thunder.
Two jackal-things fell, the rest charged forward. Annabelle fired again and again. Each shot was a perfect kill. Frogman leapt at Serbe hitting him three times in rapid succession with the kind of spinning kicks only a master of the art Hop-Fu could accomplish.
The revolvers emptied Annabelle retreated as she reloaded. Her fingers moved with practiced dexterity. One of the jackal-things got close enough to grab at her. She hit it across the snout with a freshly loaded revolver snapping the cylinder back into place. The she fired point blank.
Serbe cried out and suddenly the monsters began to retreat. Annabelle fired again and again catching a last few in the back. “Frogman!” she cried over the din, “Are you OK?”
He leapt to her side, “I’ve got the part Professor Tibbs asked for.”
“Good,” she said as she reloaded again. She couldn’t shake the feeling there was still something glaring at them from the darkness, “What about the leader?”
“He got away,” Frogman said, “we should get out of here too- just in case.”
“Amen sugar.”
As they left the Freemantle Institute Frogman turned to look at her, the green metal of his helmet had become dull and scratched over the weeks.
Why won’t he take it off? Annabelle wondered.
“That was good shooting,” he said. “of course back in the old days I wouldn’t have approved of a superhero using guns.”
Annabelle laughed, “I’m not a superhero.”
The military all terrain vehicle they had taken here was waiting for them. The soldier standing guard over it was visibly relieved by their return, he saluted.
“I heard differently,” Frogman commented “Professor Tibbs said you had a superhero name but you wouldn’t tell him what it was.”
She groaned, “Not this again.”
Apocalypse Jones
And The Race Against Time
by
Al Bruno III
Chapter Four
Conquest Of The Planet Of The 70’s
Time has stopped, 90% of the Earth has been destroyed and we may be the last human beings alive. Annabelle Jones thought, And here I am modeling a gold bodysuit!
It wasn’t just any bodysuit, it had been designed using Professor Tibbs’ gospels of science and Lady Indigo’s principles of sorcery. In theory the skintight weave of leather, kevlar and alchemically treated thread would protect her from eldritch magic and hard radiation.
All that and it comes with a helmet and goggles.
“I feel ridiculous.” Annabelle said. She was in the Laboratory, a part of the bunker that had been set aside for Project Omega. It was a chaos of computers, engine parts and mystical tomes.
“Hold still,” Lady Indigo’s azure features were set in a scowl. She was hard at work making last minute adjustments to the suit, “I have no patience to play at being a seamstress.”
“Sorry, this is all just a little strange to me.” Annabelle ran her hands over the fabric.
“I felt much the same way the first time I gave birth to myself.”
“Wh- what?”
“How are you girls doing over there?” Professor Sidney Tibbs called to them from a tangle of circuits. He was hard at work putting the finishing touches on his own part of Project Omega. The technically and mystically modified Kawasaki Kz1000 was only a part of it. The motorcycle was inside of a giant sphere of white metal and glass that was bordered on either side by giant Tesla coils. Professor Tibbs had christened his device the ‘Photon Sling’ but everyone else in the bunker called it the ‘Celestial Treadmill’.
Annabelle called back, “We’re fine, just talking about you.”
He chuckled and went back to his soldering iron.
“How sweet you two are,” Lady Indigo said.
“Sweet? What do you mean sweet?”
Lady Indigo raised a painted eyebrow, “If it was the end of the world and there was a handsome man watching my every move I would have shared my body and true name with him by now.”
“It isn’t like that.”
“Isn’t it?” There was an air of exasperation in the blue-skinned woman’s voice. “now for the rest.”
Annabelle retrieved the gloves, goggles and crash helmet from the table behind her. She put on the goggles first and blinked as the whole world seem to become a a little sharper. The goggles had been specialy treated and with them she could see in the dark yet never be blinded by a flash of light.
So much work for a one way trip. Annabelle put on her gloves, like the boots they were the color of gun metal. Then she pulled the gold plated crash helmet over her head and fastened the chin strap.
Lady Indigo held up her left hand, the second and fifth fingers glowed momentarily. “Perfect,” she said, “as perfect as possible under such conditions.”
“Can I take off the helmet now?”
“Yes,” the blue skinned woman, “I am done here.”
Before Annabelle could say anything else Lady Indigo was walking out the door. At first Annabelle had found the woman’s brusque behavior infuriating but now she understood it was just her way. In her old life Lady Indigo had surrounded herself with apprentices and servants. She didn’t know how to win friends and influence people, and she really didn’t care to learn.
A new suit, a new motorcycle and a new gunbelt, Annabelle smiled to herself as she pulled the helmet and goggles off. With a get up like this she could actually be a superhero. She wondered what it would have been like to zoom through the streets of River City. That would have been one way to live up to the ridiculous nickname she’d been given by the gangs and mobsters.
Her hands settled on her holsters then she remembered they were empty. “Where are my girls?” she called out.
Sidney was putting the finishing touches on the Photon Sling’s main hatch, the hatch that would allow her to climb into the device when the time came. “They’re over there,” he pointed vaguely, “on the workbench.”
“Where?”
“Right by you.”
“I don’t see-” Annabelle began but then she saw her revolvers. What she saw made her shout, “What the Hell did you do?”
“Oh that.”
“Yes that!” Thick wires had been embedded in the grip of each firearm, they gave off a dull glow that pulsed like a heartbeat. The chambers had been altered too, strange rounds had been welded into place, they were gold and throbbed in time with the wires on the handles. “You’ve ruined them!”
“Not at all.” Sidney put his work aside and approached her.
“Then what did you do?”
“I installed Schrödinger bullets,” he took one of he revolvers from her hand and examined it.
Annabelle wanted to reward that comment with a withering glare but just couldn’t. She slipped the other revolver into her right holster “What the Hell does that mean?”
“Simply put, each of these chambers is empty and loaded at the same time,” he placed the other revolver in her left holster, “you’ll never need to reload again... but fifty percent of the time when you pull the trigger nothing will happen at all.”
She just stared at him.
“It has to do with quantum physics,” he began to blush, “you see-”
“Your hand-” she spoke softly, “-is still on my hip.”
Now he was really blushing, “Oh! I’m so sorry!” He pulled his hand away and retreated a step.
“I didn’t say you had to move it.” Annabelle grabbed Sidney’s hand and drew him close for the kiss they had both been waiting for.
Apocalypse Jones
And The Race Against Time
by
Al Bruno III
Chapter Five
Battle For The Planet Of The Seventies
Three days before the estimated end of the world the jackal-things attacked. Under the leadership of the white-furred Serbe the creatures used wave after wave of zombies strapped with dynamite to bring down the thick metal door that had protected the bunker for so long.
*
The laboratory's blaring alarms startled Annabelle Jones and Sidney Tibbs awake. They scrambled out of the rickety cot they shared. Annabelle had retrieved her revolvers in the time it took her lover to struggle to his feet.
“What is it?” he asked blearily.
“They found us,” she said.
Still in their underwear Annabelle and Sidney both ran to the laboratory door, slammed it shut and bolted it.
*
Soldiers and refugees alike were slow to recover from the initial wave of shock and panic. Sirens and alarms filled the air. Lady Indigo and Frogman met the enemies as they streamed into the facility. At first her magics and his expertise of the obscure martial art of Hop-Fu held the jackal-things at bay.
*
They used whatever they could to barricade the laboratory door. As they worked they heard the sounds of battle beginning.
“Go on,” Sidney ordered, “get ready. I’ll power up the Photon Sling.”
Annabelle felt her stomach flutter.
*
Lady Indigo was the first to fall, a lucky slash of monster’s claws reduced her beautiful azure features to a crimson ruin. Then they were on her in a frenzy of snarls and snapping teeth. She didn’t even have time to scream.
Frogman tried to save her, wading into the thick of them.
*
The gold jumpsuit was on, the zipper drawn up to Annabelle’s chin. In her rush she had become clumsy, it took her five tries to fasten her gunbelts. Gripping her goggles in her teeth she began hopping on one foot so she could pull a boot onto the other.
The Photon Sling began humming with power. Sidney was busy at the bank of controls and switches. He was still bare-chested and in his boxer shorts but he had put on his white lab coat. They both caught a glimpse of each other and shared a moment of frantic laughter.
*
The bunker’s lights flickered and went red as the backup generators kicked in. Everyone knew that meant that Project Omega was going live and the Celestial Treadmill was powering up.
Colonel Rictus rallied the soldiers and survivors. They armed themselves, took up defensive positions and opened fire with their rifles and assault weapons. Dozens of jackal-things fell to the rain of bullets.
Frogman fell with them. No one had seen him until it was too late. The bullets had made a ruin of his helmet and the head beneath but there was enough of him left for the survivors to finally understand why he had never taken it off.
*
“Now make sure you keep the throttle down,” Sidney helped Annabelle fasten her crash helmet. He was talking so fast she could barely understand him, “You shouldn’t flip over this time. Not with the new inertial overrides I’ve installed.”
“Wait,” she followed after him, “Us... we don’t have much time. I need to tell you-”
*
Smoke, gunfire and roars filled the air. “Hold your ground!” Colonel Rictus shouted but the survivors were beginning to panic and abandon their positions. Some retreated deeper into the complex, others just ran in a blind panic. One of the jackal-things reached Colonel Rictus and he snapped its neck. Another dove at him but he shot it with his sidearm. The red fog of combat descended over his consciousness, just as it had during the Battle of the Bulge. He never even realized that he was the last of the survivors standing. He never felt the blow that killed him.
*
“If this works-” Annabelle began.
Sidney cut her off, “It will.”
“Then we’ll never see each other again.”
“I know.”
“Worse than that, we’ll never have known each other.”
“I love you Annabelle,” he said as he practically shoved her through the main hatch of the Photon Sling. The motorcycle was there, waiting. “But we need to do this- You need to do this.”
What else was there to say? She kissed him and then climbed onto the motorcycle.
“Go on now.” Sidney Tibbs said, “Go save the world.”
*
The white-furred jackal-think called Serbe did not walk around the bodies of his minions and his enemies. He strode over them. He had obeyed the Ogodad’s wishes and soon he would be rewarded. All he needed to do now was the stop the last few survivors from unmaking the world.
He called forward his last two remaining zombies and lit the fuses on the explosive vests they wore.
*
Professor Sidney Tibbs secured the hatch to the Photon Sling just as an explosion tore the laboratory door off its hinges and sent the barricades flying in all directions.
A piece of shrapnel caught Sidney on the shoulder cutting him to the bone. The arm went limp and his knees nearly buckled from the pain. He managed to reach the control panel. The jackal-things swarmed onto the laboratory. He activated the right switches in the right order. The Tesla coils flared and bolts of energy arced above the Photon Sling.
The jackal-things leapt over the control panel. Some smashed the rows of blinking buttons and carefully labeled toggle switches, others tore Sidney limb from limb. His last sight was the bright blue glow of the Photon Sling tearing a hole through reality.
*
The moment the temporal rift appeared Annabelle gunned the motorcycle’s engine and sped through it. The madness that spawned between moments howled with outrage and set after her. It was a living, all-consuming wave of temporal energy and if it caught her then it would all have been for nothing.
Annabelle urged the impossible motorcycle to go faster and faster as she raced against time.
Apocalypse Jones
And The Race Against Time
by
Al Bruno III
Epilogue
The Beginning Is The End
The citizens of River City rarely looked up in the sky anymore. If one of them had looked up they would have seen a flying man. They might have noticed the silver costume he wore and likened it to something the astronauts from 2001: a Space Odyssey had worn. Their eyes might have been drawn to the glowing bird-shaped insignia on his chest. They would have noted that he wore a helmet of metal and tinted glass that was deliberately avian in design. They might have gasped at wonder when they saw the rocket-mounted wings of metal strapped to his back. None of the citizens of River City noticed any of this because they had learned long ago that it was better to watch your back than to bother with the stars.
When the flying man was at street level he began careening through the alleyways and side streets until he came to the intersection of Miller and Fifth. That was where an armored car had been tipped over on its side. The doors had been torn off the vehicle and the guards were unconscious. There was a figure of monstrous proportions rooting around inside the armored car. The flying man recognized the villain known as Crazy-Face.
Crazy-Face’s body was grotesquely muscled and his head was a rounded cone of liquid that slowly bubbled and frothed. Inside that fluid parts of a face shifted this way and that, taking on one impossible arrangement after another. He grabbed two bags of cash from the armored car and turned just in time to see that flying man speeding towards him.
The villain threw one of the bags of cash at the flying man and knocked him out of the sky.
The flying man hit the pavement and skidded into the side of a parked car. Fifty dollar bills fluttered down around him.
“I don’t know who you are,” Crazy Face dropped the other sack of cash, “but you just made a big mistake.”
“I’m Peregrine,” the other man pulled himself to his feet. His helmet was dented on one side and the tinted glass had cracked. He fired a bolt of concussive force from his glowing chest insignia, “And I’m bringing you in.”
The blast knocked Crazy-Face backwards but he stayed on his feet.
Peregrine increased the force of the concussive force but the villain push towards him with all the ease of a normal man walking through a windy afternoon.
Wing rockets roared to life as Peregrine tried to reclaim the high ground. He felt the familiar force of areal acceleration begin.
Then it stopped and he hovered in place. Peregrine looked down to see Crazy-Face had grabbed hold of his leg.
The villain laughed and threw him into the underside the armored car.
A muffled crash filled the air but neither man noticed. Crazy-Face was too busy having fun. Peregrine was too busy trying to get back into the air.
The rocket wings roared to life again. They sputtered and coughed before tearing off the back of his costume and careening into the night.
Peregrine watched them go and mumbled, “Well fuck me.”
Then Crazy-Face had him, lifting him off like he was no more than a child in a dime store Halloween costume. He said, “I don’t know who you are but I’m going to crush your pelvis.”
“I told you! My name is Per-” Then would-be superhero began to screamed.
Click.
Click.
Boom!
At first Peregrine thought the sounds were just a figment of in his head but then the pain stopped and something warm and oily splashed over him.
The sounds began to make sense, the crash of gunfire and the dry crack of an empty barrel. Suddenly he was dropped to the ground. Sparks danced before Peregrine’s eyes and when they cleared he saw Crazy-Face lying beside him. The top of his lava lamp head had been shot away.
“Sidney!” a voice called, “Sidney?”
He sat up, too dazed with pain to panic at the thought of his secret identity being compromised already. There was a woman running towards him. His gaze went from the gold jumpsuit she wore to the revolvers she carried. She was wearing a crash helmet and goggles but there was no hiding the beauty of her dark, aristocratic features. “Are you all right?” she asked.
“I think... I think so.”
The remains of Crazy-Face’s head fluid was running down the street to the storm drain, carrying the villain’s lips, nose and right ear along with it. Peregrine was too busy staring at his rescuer to even notice. Before today he would have said that love at first sight was a charming notion and a biological improbability. Now he knew better.
“Can you walk?” the woman in gold put Perigrine’s arm over her shoulder and gently lifted him, “By the way what year is it?”
“Uh...” His legs were wobbly, the woman in gold was almost carrying him, “March... 1971.”
She laughed as they made their way to a nearby alley.
“Did I say something funny?”
“I think the joke is on both of us Sidney,” there was a complicated-looking motorcycle parked near the alley wall. It was smoldering slightly.
Peregrine pulled away from her, wobbled for a moment and then steadied himself on a Dumpster, “How do you know my name?” he demanded, “Who are you?”
“They call me Apocalypse Jones,” her grin became mischievous, “and I think you and I are going to be seeing a lot more of each other in the future.”