ALL NOVEL Chapter 29: Charlie.
Chapter 29: Charlie.
Sarcophagus Solomon was a stranger to me.
His demeanor was that of a petty socialite, constantly annoyed at how his surroundings defied his every whim and fancy.
He was someone who’d long ago discarded any pretenses of goodness or compassion.
Opting instead to treasure his sheer psychic might above all else.
His own strings were longer.
Brighter.
Woven into patterns much like those I’d birthed when confronting Granny Golden.
Within his core, [Sense Thoughts] and [Mental Map] were one, dancing to the same rhythm despite starting as different aspects.
The same had happened to his own brand of [Precognition], merging with [Premonition], [Meditation] and [Psychometry].
Those four made up a multicolored tentacle that pierced my, our, brain.
Strengthening our connection in spite of the impossibility of the situation.
Interestingly, he felt no remorse.
No disquiet over the weight of his sins.
That liberation left him free to pursue vengeance at his leisure.
To revel in the hunt for all those who’d dared to cross him.
His, our, [Domination] struck like a billion fishhooks.
Gripping every molecule of our duality. Using our memetic abilities to force an awakening. To push knowledge into me.
I experienced the present and the future melting under a baking sun.
He threw me deeper and deeper into paths not yet trodden.
Beyond days not experienced.
We were washed away together until we’d become someone else entirely.
A different seed in a different garden.
Not me.
Not him.
I’m not….
I’m…
I’m….
Charlie.
Yes. My name is Charlie and I’m happy.
This is heaven. Plain and simple.
I cannot possibly imagine a better feeling.
A sweeter rush.
Oh, yes. I am very much addicted to beating the stuffing out of goons.
I genuinely think I might need an intervention soon.
“You punk.” Growls the man beneath my foot. “You think you can get away with this? With messing with us? Before, I might have just killed you. After this, I’ll make sure you wish you were never born.”
Oh boy.
There it is again.
The laughter, the rush.
The stomping of my feet and the feeling of teeth coming loose.
Nothing quite like it.
I breathe in the crisp morning air, filling my lungs with fresh goodness.
Ha! Yeah right. I’m pretty sure I just inhaled a lungful of acidic fumes from the factory next door.
Not that I care that much at the moment.
All my problems have gone away, all my fears dissipated.
Its funny, in a way.
That being sent to a monster-infested cave would give me this incredible sense of liberation.
I command my screen to appear, checking my gains once more.
Name:
Charlie Soot
Psy:
342/430
Type:
Enhancer Level 36 / Projector Level 30
Enhancer Abilities:
[Enhanced Strength] 2 / [Enhanced Dexterity] 4 / [Enhanced Constitution] 2 / [Enhanced Stamina] 3 / [Enhanced Agility] 4 / [Enhanced Toughness] 2 / [Enhanced Reflexes] 4 / [Enhanced Concentration] 4 / [Enhanced Recovery] 3 / [Enhanced Vision] 3 / [Enhanced Flexibility] 2 / [Enhanced Hearing] 2 / [Enhanced Balance] 3 / [Enhanced Training] 5 / [Enhanced Respiration] 4 / [Enhanced Digestion] 2 / [Enhanced Circulation] 3 / [Sudden Strength] 2 / [Sudden Dexterity] 3 / [Sudden Constitution] 2 / [Sudden Agility] 3 / [Sudden Toughness] 2 / [Sudden Reflexes] 2 / [Sudden Concentration] 3 / [Sudden Recovery] 1
Projector Abilities
[Force Bubble] 2 / [Force Wall] 1 / [Force Bolt] 1 / [Accelerate] 5 / [Decelerate] 3 / [Local Regression] 3 / [Local Progression] 3 / [Local Stop] 3 / [Absorb Heat] 1 / [Absorb Radiation] 1 / [Absorb Kinetic] 1 / [Absorb Sound] 1 / [Resonance] 3 /
Ability Points:
0
‘Whoooooo!’
‘Yeah baby!’
‘That’s what I’m talking about!’
‘Two months!’
‘Two months was all it took to turn my life around!’
‘To go from some victim nobody looked at twice, to a champion of justice!’
I gaze down at the poor sod gurgling on his own dentures.
I remove my foot from his face and turn him over, allowing him to spit and breathe unimpeded.
Well, okay, not unimpeded, he was breathing in coal dust just like me, but it was an improvement.
Debauched vigilante I might be, but the sisters at the orphanage didn’t raise a murderer.
“Hack, I’ll. Kill. You. Dead.”
‘Yes, my boy! That’s what I like to see! This would all be so boring if all of you started whining about how much pain I put you through.’
“Brave words for someone who just got crippled in a fight. Along with all 15 of his friends. I don’t suppose there’s anyone else I can vent my frustrations on? Maybe your boss? Mr. Whitmer, was it? I don’t suppose you can tell me where he is?”
“Just you wait you little rat. We’ll find out who you are. We’ll cut your fingers off one by one. In front of all the people you love. Before we do it to them too. I’ll make you regret every single time your heart keeps beating.”
“Oh, I don’t doubt it, sir.” I respond in good humor. “I just wonder if you’ll be able to manage that without fingers of your own.”
“What?” The stupid bloke asks, right as my boot crushes his right hand.
I revel in the power behind that movement.
A mere human foot being able to leave a small depression on solid concrete.
The hand is gone, of course.
There is absolutely no way he was keeping that.
Not after threatening the good sisters back at Lord Grimes’s Orphanage for unwanted brats.
I mean, who threatens nuns and expects to keep their hands?
Its ridiculous.
Case in point, I move my boots over to his other hand, repeating the process until I feel satisfied with my own handiwork.
Oh yes.
That does look quite nice.
A fitting opening for my grand story.
The tale of poor young Charlie, who braved all odds to oppose corruption and save the good people of Greenwell from the oppressive, dirty grip of Mr. Whitmer and his band of drug-peddlers.
Why, I almost felt sorry for the fat bastard.
Almost.
He had picked a fight with me first.
I would have been content to ignore the whole operation a few months ago. Everybody else did. No sense in stirring up trouble when you stood to lose life and limb.
All right, maybe not content per se. No one in this city was content.
Ever.
It was a den of misery and filled with people trying to drown their troubles away with cheap swill. But hey, that was life.
I had just kept my head down and studied, going through all the heavy lifting and all the paperwork, doing errands to keep the sisters happy and all my siblings fed. All of it had paid off, I’d received my apprenticeship as a steelworker, securing me a steady paycheck and a way to avoid starvation without dirtying my hands.
I had made the sisters proud and shown that I wasn’t the cretin they all said I was.
I wasn’t going to end up dead in some ditch outside of town.
I was going to earn a decent wage.
Enough to afford a flat and a family to share it with. All because I put in the effort.
It had all gone according to plan.
Until the latest draft came.
I wasn’t chosen, thank heavens, but Whitmer Junior had been.
Now, the little pervert was faced with a choice.
He could have taken the oath and went across the channel to fight the Romans and the Carthaginians in the stupid war, all for the glory of Boudica, our sweet motherland.
Or he could try and find someone to take his place.
Mr. Whitmer, being the upstanding gentleman that he was, had sent men with word that I, scroungy waste of skin that no one would miss, would have that honor.
If I knew what was good for me.
I closed my eyes and remember the feeling of that night.
Being chased down and beaten, feeling the knife at my neck.
Hearing the whines as Peppers bled out next to me. The old stray that always pestered me for leftovers. One of the only creatures that cared if I lived or died.
My friend.
They’d left me with just a scar then.
Giving me the chance to think about my choices.
About how many fingernails could come off before they put me down. About all the helpless little children I’d be putting in danger back at the Orphanage.
I massaged that same scar now, feeling the spot where skin had opened and bled. I look for the man that gave it to me among the stunned and broken fools. I repeat the earlier motions, reveling in his screams.
“Let’s see how you earn a living without that pretty knife of yours.” I whisper in his ear, seconds before I grab his skull and smash it into the pavement.
Blackened teeth fly in all directions following the impact, sharp cracks denoting their departure.
I move along to each of the remaining men, asking the same questions.
No one talks.
Big surprise.
But I get the satisfaction of ending their criminal careers early in exchange.
I’m about to leave when I start to re-live the memory once more. The whines. The blood.
I turn around and break that guy’s legs as well as his arms.
Twisting his ankles into impossible positions for good measure.
I take my time as I work him over, making sure I’m not hitting anything too important.
Ribs, face, hips, toes. All the places he struck when I was helpless.
When he thought he was above reprisal.
Above the consequences of his actions.
Yes. Consequences.
That’s what this is all about.
Tit for tat.
I want him to live.
I need to know that he’ll wake up every morning from now on and feel these consequences.
Knowing that all his previous misdeeds came back to him.
That someone cared enough to do something about it.
That no one was invincible.
Some time passes before I stop.
My mood has been somewhat soured by this point.
I thought getting payback would feel cathartic.
That it would make that night less awful.
But it didn’t.
I feel, oddly hollow inside.
Like none of this was worth it.
‘Well, maybe I just need some time.’
‘Mr. Whitmer is still out there after all. He too needs some schooling in the ways of the world. I might find him today. I might not.’
‘Doesn’t matter.’
‘There isn’t any kind of hurry yet.’
‘I’ll go back to the Labyrinth in a week.’
‘Back to the place where I reforged myself into the man I always wanted to be.’
‘If I find the big boss man before that time?’
‘Great.’
‘Goal accomplished; siblings saved.’
‘If not?’
‘I’ll be back after this next cycle.’
‘Another two months of building up my abilities.’
‘My power.’
‘Let’s see what these guys think of me then.’
With that aspiration firmly set in stone, I start to jog through the city.
‘Speed. What I really need is more speed. That’s always the answer. Punch them bugs to death and dodge them bulls before punching them to death too. Smash the eels, smash the moles, smash the stupid gnomes. Its easy if you target the joints. So easy, and so satisfying. Rewarding too. All thanks to [Enhanced Training]. Man, I love that ability. Practically cheating all things considered.’
A goofy child-like smile dawns on my face as I think of the gain from that investment alone.
Regular enhancement abilities gave me a passive boost to the way a certain aspect of my body operated, while the sudden abilities gave me temporary pushes that drained my Psy.
The trick was in the numbers.
Getting a five from the passive perks cost 15 points in total. Meanwhile, I could get the same effect by spending 6 points to get a passive to level 3 while using half that to get a sudden to level 2. That would save a whopping 6 points to spend elsewhere.
In other words, I could get the effects of much higher personal strength for cheaper by mixing things up. That left room for other, more specialized abilities that didn’t have a ‘sudden’ version.
[Enhanced Training] was like that and it was the best. It took that cost-saving to a whole new level.
Somehow, passively increased the gains I got from training my body.
Nothing more. That’s all it did. Underwhelming on the surface.
The real beauty of it came once I realized that all my new powers worked their magic off what my current body was capable of.
Which meant every point in every ability was worth more if I grew bigger muscles or improved my natural endurance. Benefits I was already getting from all that fighting and running and eating eels raw.
Truly a brilliant loophole.
Humming escaped my lips as I jogged along storefronts and shipyards, sailors and dockworkers beginning their day with prodigious hangovers.
Nearly all of them wear sour expressions, as if the dawn itself had offended them.
The me from back then would have had that expression too. Hard to avoid after a few shifts lugging crates for next to nothing as recompense. If you were lucky.
Workplace safety was more of a punchline around these parts than actual guidelines. It was normal for some sorry newbie to lose bits of himself if he wasn’t careful.
Got too close to the boiler? That’s a burn.
Overseer yell at you to get the gears unstuck? You better pray your arms doesn’t go with them.
Doze off after a measly fourteen hour run in the cannery? Time to pick up your thumbs and go home.
Nobody has time for layabouts.
Thankfully, today seemed to be decent.
The sea breeze carried the smell of cigarettes and fresh fish from the pier, momentarily banishing the blackened clouds from the nearby factories and tanneries.
Seagulls flapped their merry little wings in the sky, pilfering a snack or two from the unobservant. Rats scurried around corners, little noses peeking out to scout out the immediate area.
They were wary of predators at this hour.
Fearful that they might be scooped up and devoured by something much bigger like a cat or a weasel.
Or me.
I chuckled.
‘Not anymore, my furry friends. Those days of near starvation are over for this fellow. Only the finest fit-for-human foodstuffs will serve going forward.’
A scene catches my eye then, making me slow down and focus my senses.
I see Johnny Clown-Shoes badgering old Mr. Forrester for pennies again, that slimy smirk sticking to his face like maggots on a corpse. He’s leaning into the counter, opening his coat so that the codger can see the switchblade’s handle, a thousand threats passing in silence.
Normally, I wouldn’t care. Mr. Forrester could be a right prick on the best of days, and had stiffed me on wages for honest work more than once. He should also know better than to have gambling debts in this part of town.
Not to mention his tab.
Whoops, easy mistake there.
More like, tabs, as in plural.
I’d be surprised if there was a pub in the world where he didn’t owe someone money.
But that whole perspective has been thrown out the window today. Good old Clown-Shoes is one of Mr. Whitmer’s most industrious employees, as he himself will attest. Number one collector of outstanding payments in the whole of Boudica, to hear him tell it.
Time to test the legitimacy of those claims.
My feet move with blinding speed. Psy invigorating me further than normal as all my boosts come alive. They roar like hungry lions inside my heart, setting my veins and arteries on fire.
A good fire.
That feels really, really great to have.
BOOM!
Johnny goes for some flying lessons as my kick lands on his bottom. His screams are as loud as they are hilarious, bursting out alongside the explosive sound of his hips breaking and his bowels loosening. All at the same time.
The muscle he had as lookouts take a few precious seconds to process what I just did.
Rookie mistake. Really shows their lack of professionalism.
Why, someone ought to teach them a lesson.
[Enhanced Reflexes] and [Enhanced Concentration] allow me to sense the world at a faster pace, their movements appearing sluggish to my eyes, as if they were covered in molasses.
I’ve already brought down 3 with stomach punches before the final 2 get their weapons out.
A club approaches me from the side, trying to catch my right leg and bring me down. I catch it mid-swing, putting power into my hands as I squeeze.
CRUNCH!
Oh.
My.
Goodness.
The look on his face is so unbelievably funny.
His eyes are trying to escape his skull, popping out like balloons at the fair.
‘Watch out Mr. Knuckle Head. You really don’t want loose splinters in your peepers.’
I sweep his legs out from under him as I try to get my laughter back under control.
The last fellow was far smarter than all his pals combined. He legged it as soon as he understood the way the winds were blowing.
There’s someone next to him.
Someone he’s dragging along. Someone chubby and oddly out of place with his fancy clothes and his silly hat and…
Wait a second.
Is that?
It is.
Whitmer Junior.
In the flesh.
This day just keeps getting better and better.
A few leaps is all it takes to overtake them.
From there, its only a matter of breaking their kneecaps and elbows. The goon tried to fight back at least, even as he was vigorously pissing himself.
Junior, not so much.
He was crying and wailing about how his dear old daddy was going to have me killed. How he was going to bury me alive along with anyone I ever loved. How this was the worst mistake I’d ever made.
“Junior, please.” I stammer in between suppressed giggles. “Its so hard to keep myself from laughing as is. I’m going to wet my only pair of pants if you keep this up.”
“You! You are so dead! I don’t know who you are or how you escaped the madhouse. But mark my words! I’ll rip out your tongue and feed it to my dogs! You, mangy piece of…”
I threw him over my shoulder and took off running towards the woods.
They were still a good few miles away, but that was no real impediment, even with piggy straining against me.
I wasn’t worried about any more gang members per say, but the coppers still carried pistols and they all practically worked for the Whitmer estate in these parts.
I might be able to shrug them off.
I might not.
I’d never heard of anyone being able to do the things I was doing before the labyrinth, so I had no frame of reference.
Better to err on the side of caution.
My body relished the feeling of air slamming against my face as I ran.
Onwards and onwards, faster than motor cars, faster than galloping horses.
The spoiled brat on my shoulder screaming for help the whole way.
Some officers did try to respond midway through, chasing us on bicycles, carts and steeds. They kept yelling the same thing over and over and over.
“Stop!”
“Halt!”
“Don’t make things worse for you!”
“Stop running if you know what’s good for you!”
‘If you know what’s good for you.’
Those words still irked me. Still sent me back to how helpless I’d been. To how scared I felt, suffering their beatings. To my dog.
Watching as the knife came closer and closer.
My fury grew.
I reached out as I jumped over a hastily improvised barricade of officers too cowardly to fire and risk hitting Junior.
My hands clasped a drawn baton one of the idiots was waving about.
I yanked it free.
My superior dexterity makes it so that the throw is spectacular, even from an awkward position. Even while in motion.
The projectile hits my target with untold ferocity. Ribs shatter like cheap glass as the lawman in question is thrown from his horse. His head hits the cobbled streets and makes a sound akin to ripened fruit falling from a tree.
I keep running. Rousing [Accelerate] and allowing it to explode. Multiplying my velocity several times over.
Trying to ignore what I just did.
The screams that followed.
The implications.
Tall buildings and smoke-filled streets soon give way to fields and farmhouses with my newfound alacrity. All it takes is a few leaps over fences to lose the last of my pursuers. That leaves me alone with Junior, surrounded by wheat that stretches on and on in every direction. I keep going in case someone is being stubborn, and make it to the woods.
My flight takes me down darkened trails and across fog-filled ponds. Further and further into darkness.
The passenger at my shoulder hasn’t stopped screaming this entire time, his face red and his breath ragged.
His corpulent mass drops to the forest floor with a thud.
I kneel over him and notice all the indignation is gone. His eyes are filled with abject terror, staring at me as if I were about to eat him whole.
His words barely escape his mouth through hoarse, desperate sobs.
“P, please. I beg you, spirit. I don’t know which pagan idiot made the sacrifice, but I can give you more. Please don’t kill me. I’ll sacrifice as many people as it takes! Give me a number and you’ll have it! I can get you anything you want. Anything at all. Please, please just let me live.”
“Shut up.” I tell him.
All mirth gone from my voice.
He doesn’t do as he’s told.
Instead, he keeps blabbering on about how rich his father is and about how much he can give me. How many people he’s willing to kill in order to prolong his miserable little life.
“I told you to shut up.” I repeat, kicking a boulder near us to make my point clearer.
This time, I’m actively feeding Psy to my legs. The boulder’s surface shatters, a web of cracked stone spreading from my foot.
Junior finally quiets down.
“Thank you. Now listen to my words. Very carefully. The whole reason all of this happened. The whole reason you’re in this predicament, is that rotten attitude of yours. That whole view on life that makes you think its okay to use and abuse anyone you want, any way you want. This is the consequences of your actions catching up to you, Junior. You’re feeling what all your victims felt. What they all suffered because you wanted something.”
He tried to interrupt me then, no doubt having some smart words to slither himself out of my shadow.
I kick the boulder again.
Cracks spread and grow.
“Now then, I consider myself a morally upstanding person. Sure, I have my rough edges and I let practicality or my temper win sometimes, but I try. I really do. I don’t hurt people for no reason. I don’t steal unless I’m starving. I don’t push around those weaker than me. I don’t like bullies.”
I pointed a calloused finger at him then. Marked by a life of odd jobs and a childhood spent laboring in the mines.
“The way I see it, you’re the opposite. You hurt people without them having done a thing. You steal despite being bloated with food and you love pushing the weak and poor around. Both you and your father. I see it every day. I see your boys, peddling death to the workers, giving them pills and powders that leave them dead or worse. I see your hooded men take children off the streets and ransom them for all their parents are worth. I see what you do to the orphans, the leftovers of the people your family has murdered. I have been forced to stand helpless and bear witness to all of it. On every street of this filthy, insignificant town we both call home.”
I stepped closer to him, watching closely as more color drained from his face.
“But no longer. I’m not going to kill you, Whitmer Junior. But I’m going to set you right. You will never bully anyone else. Not ever. I’ll make sure of it.”
I lean closer to the rancid wastrel and begin administering my medicine.
The following hours pass by in a blur.
Looks like Mr. Whitmer will get his wish in the end.
No way the king’s armies will take someone that broken.
I let the bloody rags I’m wearing fall to the floor. Leaving them in a bundle next to his unconscious body
I run.
Relishing every step I take away from the scene. Back towards that blasted city.
‘My new power will not betray me. It will not falter and leave me vulnerable on some factory floor.’
‘I will make my way up. Make enough money to live a decent life. Then I’ll get married to a fine woman and have a whole litter of kids in a house I bought with honest earnings.’
‘Most important is the justice I will get. For me and all the others too weak to fight for it. There are more Whitmers out there. Going by different names and getting up to different shenanigans. Hurting anyone they want. Expecting and receiving no punishment for all their misdeeds.’
‘That all ends today. No crime lord will be safe from me. Not a single one. I swear on the people that raised me and all the people that have helped me get here.’
‘Yes.’
‘That is the future I choose. The road I will pave for myself. It is all I ever wanted. And if anyone tries to hurt me or the people I care about, I will make them wish they were never born.’
I keep going. Dashing all the way to the orphanage.
There, I find some of the crooks I broke in the morning. Being held up by their healthier peers. Behind them is a building on fire.
“That’s him!”
“That’s him right there!”
“He beat us down! He took Junior!”
“Watch yourselves! He’s a witch!”
“He moves faster than horses!”
“Shoot him!”
“Shoot him now!”
“Nobody is doing anything.” Declared Mr. Whitmer. “Until I know what became of my son.”
He angles his head in an inquisitive manner. Retaining the posture and bearing of someone too good to be seen around these parts.
“Well?”
“What happened to the sisters and the children?” I ask in turn.
“Dead. Obviously. You disappearing was one thing. Only had to take another urchin in your place. But this disrespect? Going after my employees? Come now. There was nothing else to be done.”
He pulled a thick cigar from his coat and lit it. Dragging out a plume of smoke before resuming his threats.
“Now then. Bring Junior over and I promise, on my honor, that I’ll only torment you for a day or three.”
I would have laughed, if the fury hadn’t taken hold of me. Oh goody. I really need to get it under control.
Later.
The cobblestones beneath my feet were sundered as I bolted forward. All my sudden boosts came alive beside [Accelerate] and [Force Bubble]. I was expecting bullets to fly at once, but the lazy peons couldn’t even draw in the time it took me to reach the fat bastard.
My fist didn’t just hit him. It went through his ribcage. Both front and back. Pulped crimson sprayed everyone behind him.
His face barely had time to twitch before the light faded from his eyes.
I couldn’t say how many were yelling at first. A couple dozen? Half a hundred?
It didn’t matter.
No one escaped.
No one.