Ryan never thought he would bring a communist to Dynamis’ doorstep.
Enrique Manada’s waiting room was nearly silent, with only the sound of a secretary typing on her computer to break the monotony. Felix looked through the window, impatient to be done with the meeting, while Len’s fingers fidgeted uncontrollably. She had been in a sour mood since they arrived.
Ryan didn’t fare much better. His wounds still ached, and even his dazzling clothes couldn’t hide all the bandages beneath them. Even with a Genome’s metabolism, it would take him a few days to be back in top shape.
The courier’s eyes wandered to his adoptive sister. She had made an effort to dress well for the occasion, trading her jumpsuit for a white blouse tucked by the waist into a blue skirt. A discreet red ribbon completed the set. Though Ryan’s feelings for her had moved from romantic to brotherly over the last loops, he still found her lovely.
“Mr. Manada will receive you now,” the secretary said, causing Len’s scowl to deepen.
“You’re sure you want to come?” Ryan asked her. “I can take down the bourgeoisie on your behalf.”
“Yes,” Shortie said with a firm nod. “I need it, Riri.”
At least she had taken Alchemo’s meds before the meeting. As expected, the brain Genius had arrived yesterday with his own team, quickly confirmed Ryan’s time-travel story after analyzing his mind-map, and immediately moved on to secure the bunker. The courier trusted his allies to manage that part without him, especially with Livia at their back.
Ryan had convinced his girlfriend to delay the celebrations until they could cure Bianca though. Celebrating the Meta-Gang’s demise without her felt wrong.
The trio walked into Blackthorn’s lair, the secretary closing the doors behind them. Len paid more attention to the Japanese pond than the flowers decorating the office, while Felix glanced at the people behind the mahogany desk. Though Enrique Manada welcomed them sitting in a chair costlier than most houses, Wyvern sat right behind him in her human form, arms crossed.
“Felix,” she greeted her teammate politely.
“Wyvern,” Atom Kitten said while returning the nod, before doing the same with his other superior. “Blackthorn.”
“Atom Cat.” The superpowered gardener moved on to greet the others. “I am Enrique Manada, the Chief Brand Officer at Dynamis and Head Manager of the Il Migliore program.”
The man shook Ryan’s hand, but when he offered Shortie his own, she only responded with an icy glare.
“She respects your private property,” Ryan informed Blackthorn. “To each their own hand.”
“I see.” Enrique understood the message and moved on, the trio sitting in comfy leather chairs facing the desk. “I admit I am curious. Atom Cat told me you wanted to discuss a possible partnership with our organization.”
“I don’t see why you asked me to come as well,” Wyvern said, arms crossed. She alone refused to sit down, perhaps because she worried that the meeting might end in a fistfight.
“We wanted to have a meeting to discuss the collectivization of our economy,” Ryan declared. “The more, the merrier.”
“Uh-huh,” Enrique replied without emotion. “And the real reason?”
Len looked at the superhero manager. “Why?”
“Why what, Miss Sabino?”
“Why did you do this to my father?” Len asked harshly, venom dripping with every word. “For money? For power? Was it worth it?”
Enrique didn’t respond, his fingers interlocked into a diabolical mastermind pose. His expression remained hidden behind his mask, though the flowers around the office seemed to bristle.
Ryan searched for something under his trench coat, causing Wyvern to tense. Instead of a gun, the courier grabbed a folder and tossed it on the desk. Blackthorn made no move to read the documents inside it.
“Enrique?” Dragon Mom asked her superior, confused.
“I know what it holds,” Enrique replied calmly, though Ryan noticed an undercurrent of shame behind the stoic facade.
Wyvern frowned before glancing at Felix, who stared at Enrique with cold anger. She grabbed the folder and began to read the documents within, her skin turning as pale as chalk with the first lines. “That’s impossible,” she said as she turned the pages. “It’s fake.”
“It’s not,” Len insisted.
“You think I can believe half of what’s inside? That Dynamis turned a Psycho into a drink, or cloned me?” The superheroine shook her head. “False information spreads abound on Lab Sixty-Six and the Knockoff production process. I’ve heard all the conspiracy theories. Aliens, children’s bodily fluids...”
“Well, they’re half right,” Ryan replied.
“You can take my blood if you want,” Shortie added, while Enrique remained as silent as a tombstone. “See for yourself.”
“Underdiver, I know you attacked Dynamis installations in the past, but spreading these lies are a new low and will not help anyone.” Wyvern put the file on the desk, a picture of a Knockoff transforming into Bloodstream slime slipping out of it. “Felix, don’t tell me you believe them?”
“I do,” Felix replied grimly. “I took this picture.”
Dragon Mom remained in denial. “You were deceived. And that part about Dynamis funding the Meta-Gang is the most ridiculous thing I’ve heard yet.”
This time, Enrique wordlessly glanced at the documents and examined them. He quickly reached the part about the Knockoff Elixirs deliveries to Adam, transcripts of Psyshock’s meetings with Hector Manada, and most importantly, the schematics of Dynamis brain-mapping machine.
“Where did you get these documents?” the corpo asked, doubt gnawing at him.
Len brought out a phone, activating it. The video showcased Agent Frank dutifully keeping watch over a pile of dangerous Marxist literature, trapped in an underwater prison. Wyvern immediately recognized this proud defender of democratic values. “Is that Frank the Mad?”
“This is a live feed,” Len explained, while Enrique watched on with sharp attention.
“We neutralized the Meta-Gang’s leadership, and currently hold most of their members in underwater cells,” Felix said. The video switched to Dynamis thralls being treated in an infirmary and to the Knockoff crates. “We have dozens of witnesses currently receiving medical attention. You can visit them yourself.”
Wyvern scoffed. “Felix, are you saying that you defeated the Meta-Gang by yourselves?”
“You can come to Rust Town, and check,” Len replied frostily. Her anger at Dynamis gave her confidence. “If you are willing to get down to earth and sully your clothes.”
The superheroine flinched, but quickly regained her composure. “I raided the Meta-Gang half a dozen times since they arrived in New Rome.”
“It changed nothing,” Len rasped. “Hundreds would have died if… if we hadn’t been here. Old people, children… they hoped you would come rescue them, but you never came.”
Tellingly, Dragon Mom didn’t attempt to say she did all she could. She had advocated Il Migliore attack the Meta-Gang in the past, and still wished her superiors took her suggestion to heart.
Speaking of her superiors, Enrique grabbed his own phone and started making calls. “I have been informed that some of our drones have gone missing lately, probably repurposed by the Meta-Gang,” he said, the picture of the shattered machines on the desk. “Do you confirm? Uh-huh, uh-huh… why wasn’t I informed?”
Wyvern glanced at her manager with worry. “Enrique?”
“Pack your things, you’re fired.” Enrique ended the call, and made another. “Yes, it’s me. I have been informed that Elixirs from the April production were lost, do you confirm? Uh-huh… what about the technicians from the robotic division, Team 7? Are they missing?”
“Enrique?” Wyvern asked again, more and more concerned.
Instead of answering, Dynamis’ CBO made a dozen phone calls in fifteen minutes, fact-checking every piece of information, following every lead. Ryan noticed that the flowers in the room grew more and more agitated as time went on, their petals dancing, their roots emerging from the earth. Wyvern noticed it too, and her doubt turned to horror.
In the end, Enrique put his phone on the desk, turned his chair around, and looked through the window. He couldn’t deny the truth before the overwhelming amount of evidence.
“Enrique, say something,” Wyvern demanded. “Please.”
Instead of answering her, the manager glanced at an empty spot to his left, near the window. “You can come out, Martel. I know you are here.”
Shroud became visible without warning, causing Wyvern’s eyes to shine with a green glow. Enrique stopped his ally with a nod before she could transform.
“You know me?” Shroud asked, surprised.
Blackthorn shrugged. “We have a file on you, and everyone in the Carnival.”
“Did you steal his private data?” Ryan asked mirthfully. “Dynamis should update its privacy policy charter.”
“I knew this day would come, Quicksave,” Enrique replied, while Shroud formed a seat of glass from his own armor. Blackthorn turned his seat to face the whole group. “I suppose that’s how you took down the Meta-Gang, with the Carnival’s help? Did Hargraves send you to arrest me? Or kill me?”
“No,” Len replied, though her tone didn’t soften at all. “I want answers.”
Wyvern slammed the mahogany desk so hard that its surface cracked.
Her violent reaction made everyone flinch, except Ryan and Enrique. The former, because he saw it coming; the latter, because he had expected it.
“Enrique, what’s happening?” The superheroine’s fist clenched, some of the documents falling off the desk. “Is any of this true?”
“All of it, as far as I can tell.” His voice was heavy with guilt and remorse. “All their evidence points to my father conspiring with Adam the Ogre to weaken the Augusti. As for our Elixir production process… I saw it for myself.”
By now, Il Migliore’s shining dragon was positively trembling. “Tell me this is a sick joke of some kind.”
“I wish it were.” Her manager let out a sad sigh. “The Knockoffs react violently to Miss Sabino’s blood samples. Her father put an unknown agent in her hemoglobin which removes the safeguards on our Elixirs. My brother Alphonse wanted her turned into a guinea pig so that we might remove that flaw, and perfect the production process. I put my veto on that, but—”
This time, Wyvern punched the desk and snapped it in half. Ryan quickly stopped time to save the folder and gather all the documents.
“You let Tyrano clone me? Turn me into a poison?” Wyvern asked, struggling to hold back tears. “Enrique, after all… after everything that happened between us… how could you do this?”
“Laura—”
“Your company infected this city’s population with a Psycho, Enrique!”
“When I learned the truth about how our artificial Elixirs were made, it was too late to pull the plug,” the CBO replied with remorse. “The Knockoffs had been distributed to the population. I was put before the Fait Accompli.”
“Better late than never,” Len replied angrily. “Why didn’t you just stop?”
Instead of answering immediately, Enrique slowly removed his mask and put it on his desk’s left corner.
He looked rather handsome, with perfectly groomed hair and a sexy Spanish mustache. He took a lot from his sire Hector, though with a leaner face and more skeletal features. While the father reminded Ryan of Pablo Escobar, the son looked more like a lanky Antonio Banderas.
Enrique glanced at Ryan and Len, before locking eyes with the latter. “For as little as it is worth, I want to apologize to you both,” he declared. “What my family did to yours is unforgivable, and you are within your right to hate us. I have a responsibility in hiding the truth from the population, but I never wanted any of this. This was done behind my back.”
“But you covered it up,” Felix accused him, while Wyvern wiped away tears of rage and betrayal.
“If I had revealed the scandal, Atom Cat, then Dynamis would have certainly collapsed alongside any hope of rebuilding Europe into something halfway decent,” Enrique defended himself. “Do you want Augustus to become the face of our future? We are not perfect, but at least we try to recreate society based on the rule of law. I cannot say the same for our opposition. Dynamis is the only remaining check on Augustus’ authority; the last barrier between Europe’s population and a deranged Genome suprematist.”
Enrique glanced at the window, and at Mount Augustus sticking out of the horizon. “That is why my brother lied to me and created the Knockoffs, Sabino. To try and knock these so-called gods off their thrones.”
“Yet your solution presents as great a danger to the world as Augustus,” Felix said accusingly. “Maybe even greater.”
“The Carnival didn’t give you the full reasons why we wanted Bloodstream gone to avoid a panic, and maybe we should have said the truth from the start. Our previous seer…” Shroud cleared his throat. “My mother predicted that Bloodstream would cause a worldwide disaster, if left alive. Our data proves that the risk remains even now.”
“My father…” Len’s hands fidgeted on her lap. “My father could go mad and… everyone who drank the Knockoffs…”
Ryan put a hand on her arm, and he could tell she was thankful for the emotional support. Enrique absorbed the news with gloom, while Wyvern looked fit to gag.
“Dr. Tyrano insisted that his vaccine worked,” Blackthorn said, though doubt had crept in his voice already. “That it would neutralize Bloodstream in case of a containment breach.”
“Don’t trust a reptilian to do a mammal’s job,” Ryan replied as he broke hand contact with his adoptive sister and extracted a beautiful sheet full of graphs from the folder. Blackthorn quickly grabbed it.
“Here is our plague doctor’s analysis report,” Shroud explained. “If put in contact with the blood agent in his daughter’s hemoglobin, the core of Bloodstream will regain its full power and automatically transform anyone who consumed a Knockoff into a clone of itself. And according to our simulations, it might gain the ability to do so on its own as it mutates further.”
Blackthorn sank deeper in his chair as he read. “Thousands…”
“Millions would die in the best-case scenario,” Shroud replied.
“You’ve got to stop this,” Felix insisted.
Blackthorn returned the document to Ryan. “You came to destroy Lab Sixty-Six.”
“They wanted to come in guns blazing,” the courier admitted, “but I convinced them to try finding a compromise.”
“Why?” Enrique asked dryly. “Out of all the people in this room, you should hate us the most.”
“Because although you look like a Saturday Morning Cartoon villain, I know you are anything but.” If anything, Ryan had come to see Blackthorn as the other side’s Livia, an internal reformer doomed to fail without outside help. “You’re the only hope Dynamis has of reforming into something actually good for the world.”
“We have found a treatment not only for the Bloodstream infection, but for the Psycho condition,” Shroud explained.
Though skeptical, Enrique looked willing to entertain the possibility of a cure. “Do you have proof of what you say?”
“Of course.” Ryan put a hand on his chest. “Thanks to our Psychocare policy, my administration is currently curing the Meta-Gang’s members. You can come see it for yourself.”
“But we will need resources to cure Psychos across Europe,” Shroud said. “Resources that your company can provide.”
“I… I want to try the treatment on my father. To try and heal him… and if it doesn’t work…” Len cleared her throat. “If it doesn’t work… I want to end his suffering. This is all I ask. I… I don’t even want revenge. I just want him to find peace.”
Enrique tensed up. “My father and brother will never agree—”
“They won’t,” Ryan agreed. “Which is why we’re asking you to do the right thing, Jiminy.”
Though he remained as stoic as ever, the courier’s words affected Blackthorn. Ryan could see it in his body language, how the plants in his office shifted. A part of him truly believed in the superhero propaganda he pitched to his customers.
Deep down, Enrique Manada desperately wanted to make the world a better place.
“I’m resigning,” Wyvern declared with a hardened voice. “I can’t stand by this. And neither should you, Enrique.”
“No, I should not,” the manager conceded. “But if we reveal the truth and arrest my father, then my brother Alphonse is in charge. He won’t let his life’s work vanish without a fight. He has gambled too much on this project to stop now.”
“Even knowing the risks?” Felix asked, aghast.
“Even so. My brother dreams of a world where everyone is a Genome, and thus equal. He would rather die than abandon it.”
“Then we’ll stop him too,” Atom Cat locked eyes with his manager. “You remember the day I first came to this office, Blackthorn? What did you say to me back then?”
Blackthorn let out a heavy sigh. “That even if your family was in the wrong, you were right to take a stand for what you believe in.”
“Start practicing what you preach. Or was that just a slogan?”
Wyvern put a hand on Enrique’s shoulder, making him freeze. The superhero and the corpo exchanged a glance, full of conflicted emotions. Past intimacy, pain over past lies, regrets… a tiny bit of hope. They had been so close that they could probably understand the other’s thoughts without saying a word.
“Even if it’s all for naught, Laura?” Enrique asked Wyvern.
“Even if it is all for naught… Someone has to try, Enrique. Or nothing will change.” She gathered her breath. “Please.”
Enrique’s hand rose to touch Wyvern’s, but she backed away from his shoulder before he could make contact. For the first time since Ryan had met him, the courier could see the pain and loneliness behind the Manada’s stoic facade.
“Suppose I help you.” Il Migliore’s manager faced his guests. “Even if by some miracle Dynamis survives the destruction of our main lab, our loss of credibility, and my brother’s inevitable retaliation, the company will be a shadow of its former self. Easy prey for Augustus. Unless you intend to take him down after cleaning up our house?”
“You have a secret weapon against Augustus,” Shroud pointed out. “The Gravity Gun.”
“An untested weapon,” Enrique pointed out. “You of all people should understand why we’re unwilling to take a gamble, Martel. Your organization’s last encounter with Augustus ended with half of your members dead, Martel; ours, with Malta sinking beneath the waves. When humans dare the lightning to fall, they die.”
Ryan felt a sharp pain in his chest, right where Lightning Butt struck him in the past loop. “We have another option,” he said. “Mechron tech. Its efficiency has been proven.”
Technically true, though he left out the gory details.
“Nothing is ever certain with Augustus, but I suppose this is true for all things in life.” Enrique seized Ryan’s folder. “I will analyze these documents in detail. If you are correct about the potential for an Elixir epidemic… if you are correct, then I will contact you again.”
“And the Gravity Gun?” Shroud asked.
“I will send you the data.” Enrique looked away, avoiding Wyvern’s gaze. “Go now.”
Not yet. While Shroud vanished and his other allies moved to the door, Ryan turned to Wyvern and spoke one word.
“Jasmine.”
Wyvern flinched. “What, Jasmine?”
“It’s not too late for you and her,” Ryan said. “All she wants is an apology and recognition.”
“Apology for what?” Dragon Mom asked with a confused frown. “I never did her harm.”
“She wants you to apologize for never paying much attention to her, and letting her live in your shadow,” Ryan said. “That’s all she wants in the end. Recognition for her achievements, and being treated as an equal. It’s really that simple.”
Wyvern’s eyes widened, and the courier could see the gears turning in her head. “Is that another prophecy?” she asked, Enrique squinting at the courier with suspicion. “Are you a precognitive Genome too?”
“Sort of.” Ryan shrugged. “It’s not too late to help her turn her life around. But it won’t be possible without you.”
“I… I see.”
Hoping that she would take his words to heart, Ryan walked out of the office and left the two corpos alone. They were locking eyes as the courier closed the office’s door behind him.
Though Ryan could tell that not all hope of patching things up was lost, flower and dragon had many couple counseling sessions ahead of them.
“What was that for?” Len asked on their way out of the building.
“I made a promise to a girl once,” Ryan said, remembering his Jasmine lost to time. “I owed her that much.”
Ryan drove the Plymouth Fury on the way back home, but the group didn’t move to the Junkyard immediately. “Here,” Atom Kitten said at a key crossroad. “To the southeast.”
The courier immediately recognized the way. “Family, or friends?”
“Friends,” Felix said.
After half an hour of travel and avoiding two traffic accidents, Ryan parked his car in front of Jamie’s house.
The occupants were already waiting outside, even before the courier and Felix even stepped out of the car. Ryan noticed Ki-jung’s rats in the grass around the house, and tossed a swiss cheese piece at them. “Why do you carry cheese on yourself?” Felix asked in confusion.
“Why wouldn’t I carry cheese?” Ryan answered, while Len remained in the car. Though she was improving, she didn’t do well with new people. Baby steps. “I have milk too, if you’re thirsty.”
“Only if we drink from the same cup,” his sidekick replied, before facing his old friends. Jamie looked as tense as a bear caught in an ambush, while Ki-jung appeared torn between joy at seeing Felix again, and worry.
As for Lanka...
“Look at that, a suicide bomber,” Lanka said while opening a beer can. She glanced at Ryan and Len, her eyes hidden behind her sunglasses. “Are they your new team? Come to blow yourselves up together?”
“Sort of,” Felix replied.
Ryan put a hand on his sidekick’s shoulder. “We found your cat erring on the road, and adopted him.”
“Ain’t our cat anymore,” Lanka replied before sipping her beer. “He ran away, so you can keep it.”
“Felix, why are you here?” Though he asked the question with calmness, Jamie couldn’t suppress the worry in his voice. “Are you returning back into the fold?”
“I’m not coming back,” Felix replied, before choosing his next words carefully. “But… I realized I might have treated you a bit too harshly. I hoped we could stay friends.”
“Funny, I remember you saying we were done,” Lanka replied, unimpressed. “Among other colorful things.”
“I still believe them,” Felix replied bluntly, causing Ryan to sigh. Atom Kitten was about as diplomatic as a prison door. Still, the courier hung back, as it was a private matter between former friends. “Staying with the Augusti is wrong, especially after you saw the damage they caused first hand.”
“Felix, you will always remain our friend,” Ki-jung said softly. “I remember all you did for me, and Jamie too. You will always be welcome among us.”
“But by coming here, you’re putting everyone in danger,” Jamie declared. “If Pluto learns you came…”
“You’ll die.” Felix sighed. “Guys, you’re going to die if you stick with them. Even if you don’t do anything wrong, Augustus will be the death of you. You will retire in coffins.”
They know, Ryan thought, as he observed their reactions. Lanka and Jamie seemed to have accepted it as inevitable, while Ki-jung stared down at her own feet.
Felix waited for them to answer, before clenching his fists at their silence. “Guys…”
“We can’t leave,” Jamie said, while his girlfriend looked away.
“After dragging Ki-jung into this mess, you’ll keep her in it?” Atom Cat accused him.
Jamie’s expression turned into one of disgust, his voice brimming with cold rage. “Drag her into this?”
“Jamie was against me joining the Augusti,” his girlfriend said while observing her rats in the grass. A dozen of them stopped fighting over the cheese to go back to their mistress, surrounding her like an elite rodent guard. “But we had little choice. I stole from the organization, Felix. They wouldn’t have let me leave New Rome alive.”
“Pluto wanted her dead, to make an example for those who would dare to steal Bliss shipments,” Jamie explained grimly. “There was no other way to mollify the leadership. What else could we do?”
“Run away together,” Felix said, unimpressed. “Flee to another country, or join Dynamis. They could have protected you.”
Something in his voice made Jamie’s expression turn into one of suppressed anger.
“Felix, if we had abandoned the family as you did, Ki-jung would be dead.” The mobster crossed his arms, his face grim and sullen. “I would be dead, Lanka would be dead, and everyone we ever cared about would be dead. The only reason you’re still alive is that your parents and ex-girlfriend have Augustus’ ear. Without them?”
Jamie locked eyes with his old friend.
“You would be buried in an unmarked grave in Rust Town.”
Felix flinched, as the words hit close to home. Ryan didn’t blame him. He had seen firsthand how far Lightning Butt would go in the past loop, and how so few could hope to escape his grip alive.
“Alright, I see I was a special case,” the young superhero confessed, less sure of himself. “But let’s assume that the Augusti leadership collapses.”
“They won’t,” Jamie replied with cynicism. “They can’t. Nobody can defeat the Olympians, let alone Augustus.”
Ryan shrugged. “We can, and we will.”
“I don’t believe you,” Jamie said with defeatism.
“But if we succeed?” Felix asked. “Just imagine that we succeed, that Augustus and his cronies are gone. Would you leave? I’m not asking you to join us, Jamie. Only whether you will simply step aside.”
“Leave the family?” Jamie was aghast. “I… that would be betrayal. I owe them everything. If it were not for Mercury, I would be a nob—”
“Yes.”
Everyone glanced at Ki-jung.
“Yes,” the vermin controller repeated, first hesitantly and then more firmly. “Yes, I would leave. I would leave and I wouldn’t turn back.”
“You’re sure?” Jamie asked with a worried frown.
“I… you saved me, Jamie. But each time I look at Bliss…” Ki-jung’s arms trembled, her gaze haunted by the memories of darker times. “Each time, I feel the urge to fall back into it. As long as this drug exists, I will never be free of it. You saved me, but… how many others suffer, with no one to help them? If we can escape that poison… if we have a chance, we should take it.”
Her boyfriend considered her words, doubt gnawing at his heart. He might owe the Augusti everything and felt he belonged nowhere else…. but Ryan knew that he intended to marry Ki-jung and start a family with her.
A real family forged in blood and hardship, rather than a false one built on drug money.
“Jamie?” Felix asked, a hint of hope in his voice. “What would you choose? I have to know.”
The mobster put a hand around his girlfriend’s waist, pulling her closer. “I would choose her,” he said, Ki-jung resting her head against his shoulder. “Wherever that leads.”
Felix let out a breath of relief, before glancing at Lanka. “And you?”
“Sorry, Bomberman, you won’t get a diabetes feast from me.” She shrugged her shoulders, tossing her empty beer can away. “I won’t say a word about this meeting, but I just can’t imagine a world where Augustus ain’t killing you one day.”
Ryan put his hands behind his head. “Lightning won’t strike him this time.”
“And how would you do that?” Lanka snickered. “There aren’t any lightning rods big enough for the marble guy upstairs.”
“We’ll put Lightning Butt in a bottle and toss him where he belongs,” Ryan promised. “With the clowns.”