"Thank you, your highness." The man wore a neatly pressed suit and tie, courtesy of the palace tailors. His clean-shaven face gazed back at them. He looked relieved not to be a fugitive anymore. "Always nice to have friends."
Black Adam could not fault Szasz's manners. He appeared suitably appreciative of the lofty honor being bestowed upon him.
His associate, on the other hand, was a different story.
"Where is she?" Black Adam demanded crossly. The former policewoman was conspicuously absent, her medal unclaimed. "Or does Ms. Montoya mean to insult myself and my queen with her continued absences?"
Such conduct was inexcusable, even for an American.
"I'm sure no insult was intended to either of you, your highness," Szasz insisted. He awkwardly fingered the medal upon his chest. "Renee ... is going through a difficult time right now."
"She had no choice," Black Adam said impatiently. For once, a Westerner had shown the courage to do what was necessary; must she now sully that accomplishment by wallowing in useless guilt? Black Adam found her squeamishness just as foolish and infuriating as that of the Justice League. "The girl had a bomb."
Szasz shrugged. "Yeah. Well, let's just say she doesn't see it like that." He shook his head ruefully. "And she's coping in her usual way...
Empty bottles and discarded clothing littered the floor of the hotel room. Heavy curtains kept out the daylight. On the rumpled bed, which hadn't been made in days, Renee lolled atop the satin sheets with a cute Kahndaqi femme named Zalika. Sweat glistened upon the women's bodies. A ceiling fan failed to cool their ardor.
“Onq ihny, Renee," Zalika whispered in her ear as she laid atop Renee. Her exotic perfume smelled of sandalwood and jasmine. "S'alyai runs...."
"Got no idea what you just said, babe," Renee slurred. So far, the language barrier hadn't posed much of a problem. If anything, it made things simpler. "But I love the way you say it."
Drunk on cheap date wine, she sank limply into the sheets, letting Zalika take the lead. The local girl certainly knew what she was doing all right. Renee felt the room shake. Then, beyond the foot of the bed, the wall crumbled. Sunlight poured into room, hurting Renee's eyes. Wincing, she raised a hand to shield herself from the glare. Zalika yelped and rolled off Renee. She covered herself with a pillow.
What the hell?
Black Adam hovered in the air outside the fifth-story hotel room. Powdered stone and plaster caked the knuckles of his clenched right fist. A spar-kly medallion dangled from his other hand. He glowered balefully at the two women. "By the gods," he thundered, "what do you think you're doing?"
Zalika hid behind her pillow. Renee didn't bother. "Uhm," she mumbled tipsily. "You don't really want me to answer that, do you?"
"You continue to insult me?" Black Adam's face flushed with anger. He landed indignantly onto the Persian carpet. An empty wine bottle crunched beneath his boot. As usual, he seemed annoyingly full of himself. "Do you have any idea who it is you're speaking t—?"
"Oh, shut up!" Renee groused. She felt a hangover coming on, and Black Adam's booming voice wasn't helping any She sluggishly rolled out of bed and started pulling on her jeans. Squinting into the sunlight, she saw Isis carrying Vic through the sky toward the hotel. A worried expression showed upon the Egyptian woman's face as she and Vic touched down on the floor behind her husband. Vic smirked at the compromising situation Renee had just found herself in. She decided she liked him better when he didn't have a face.
"And you," she accused Vic, shaking a finger at him. "Man, what is it with you, Charlie?" A vivid memory, of a no-faced stranger intruding on her one-night stand back in Gotham, surfaced from her soggy brain. "Every time I'm getting some, you have to crash the party?" She clumsily wiggled into a black tank top, putting an end to the peep show. "You gotta crush on me or what?"
Uninterested in her argument with Vic, Black Adam spun Renee around to face him. "There was a time," he warned her, "when I would have cheerfully killed you for speaking to me as you have."
"Don't let me stop you, big guy." Once a killer, always a killer, she figured. The dead girl's face flashed across her memory. She remembered squeezing the trigger of her ray gun. Just like me.
Black Adam waved his goddamn medal in her face: "Renee Montoya, you were to receive the Order of the Scarab today A great honor." He fumed as she rummaged about the room, looking in vain for a bottle that still had a little booze left in it. "But instead of attending the ceremony, I find you here, drunkenly taking pleasure with one of my citizens."
While Black Adam read Renee the riot act, Isis quietly procured a robe from the floor and draped it over Zalika. Keeping a wary eye on her irate husband, she escorted the trembling Kahndaqi babe from the room. Zalika kept her face turned away from Black Adam, no doubt hoping to escape his notice. Renee hoped she hadn't gotten the woman in trouble.
It's not her fault I'm bad news.
"I demand an answer," Black Adam insisted. He looked like he wanted to pop her skull like a balloon. "Do you mean to insult me and my new bride, or is there some other expla—?"
Jesus, Renee thought. Doesn't this jerk ever shut up? She angrily swatted the medal away from her. "Get that thing outta my face!"
Black Adam blew his stack. "You push too far, woman!" An iron fist clamped around her throat, cutting off her air. She grabbed onto his wrist with both hands, trying to pry his fingers away from her neck, but it was like trying to bend steel with her bare hands. He lifted her off the floor, giving her the full Darth Vader treatment. Her bare feet dangled in the air. "I am a changed man," he snarled, "but not that changed!"
"Adam!" Isis cried out. -
"Renee!" Vic blurted. He started to rush forward, only to be held back by Isis' superior strength. He strained against her slender arm. "Your highness, don't!"
A pitiful gurgle escaped Renee's Ups. Her hands fell away, her arms dropping to her sides as she abandoned her efforts to save herself. Starving lungs gasped for air. Darkness swiftly encroached upon her field of vision. Death was only moments away, but instead of her own wasted life passing before her eyes, she saw instead the somber face of the teenage girl in the courtyard, the girl she had burned a hole clean through. The crackle of the heat-ray echoed in her ears as, once again, she watched the deluded teenager drop lifelessly onto the pavement. Fresh blood spilled across Renee's tortured soul.
"That's right, go ahead...." she challenged Black Adam. Tears leaked from her bloodshot eyes. Maybe this was the only way to make the girl's face go away. "Just do it...."
But Isis would not let Black Adam put Renee out of her misery. The Egyptian queen stepped forward and placed her palm against her husband's chest. Kohl-lined eyes entreated him. "This helps nothing," she said softly.
The murderous fury fled his face, at least to a degree. Letting go of Renee's throat, he disdainfully flung her to the floor. Panting for breath, she lay sprawled upon the cluttered carpet. Vic helped her to her feet, and she plopped down onto' the edge of the bed. She cradled her aching head in her hands, emotionally and physically exhausted. Just my luck, she thought bitterly. The one time Black Adam shows mercy, it has to be with me.
Isis came between Renee and Black Adam. She gestured toward Renee as she spoke to her husband. "Her grief—and your anger—are both misplaced."
"Isis is right," Vic said. He dropped a gentle hand onto Renee's shoulder.
She looked up at him, despair written all over her face. "I killed a kid, Charlie."
"And you're going to be eating your liver—what's left of it—over that for years to come." His face and voice were more serious than usual. "But none of us are talking about why that girl was there in the first place." He turned to confront Black Adam and Isis. "And handing out medals, as lovely as they might be, or going on benders with the prettiest lass in Shiruta, doesn't solve the problem. It doesn't even address it." He paused for emphasis. "The problem is Intergang."
Renee lifted her head, taking an interest despite herself. She
remembered why she had come to Kahndaq in the first place. And who was ultimately responsible for the would-be bomber's death.
Vic spelled out the mystery for them. "On top of everything else, along with their monster men and high-tech weapons, why are they using kids?"
"A good question, Charles," Isis stated. "It must be stopped."
Black Adam nodded grimly. His simmering rage no longer seemed directed at Renee. His arms were crossed stiffly atop his chest. "Then let us stop it."
Sounds like a plan, Renee thought. A trace of Zalika's perfume still lingered in the room. Once I sober up, that is.
WEEK 19
CINCINNATI.
"It was, no lie, one of the greatest moments ever in high school football."
Daniel Carter sat in an easy chair in his cruddy apartment as he relived the high point of his life for maybe the one zillionth time. Old football trophies filled the wooden display case to his right. A framed photo of the Manchester High Spartans, circa 1991, was mounted on the wall. A stack of unpaid bills laid unopened atop a cheap particleboard end table.
"A ninety-eight-yard touchdown run put me just over the all-time national rushing record. Half the state came that night to watch me make the history books, and I did." He sipped from a can of Lit Beer before getting to the next part. "And I didn't even get to score with the head cheerleader after." He winced at the memory of a three-hundred-pound linebacker slamming him to the ground. "Broke my leg in four places. Blew my knee and my scholarship." Even after fifteen years, the unfairness of it all still stung. "But not all was lost. I grew up to be Evergreen Insurance Company's fifth best term-life salesman." He cracked a bitter smile as he held up five fingers. "Fifth. Out of six."
“it could have been worse,” Skeets observed. The talking robot floated in front of Daniel, “you cduld have ended up a janitor at a
SPACE MUSEUM.”
What the heck? Daniel thought. "Uh, that's a pretty specific reference."
“IT’S THE PATH YOUR DESCENDANT FOLLOWED. WILL FOLLOW,”
Skeets corrected himself, “after a gambling scandal ended his own
FOOTBALL CAREER.”
"See, I thought just coming home and finding a bippity little robot going through my mail was creepy enough." In fact, Daniel had been out of town on business since dropping in on Booster Gold's funeral two weeks ago, only to find Skeets waiting for him when he got back. This is why I never called that number he beamed into my cell phone. Everything about this business is too weird. He took another swig of beer. "Dude, unless this is the greatest sweepstakes reveal in human history, and you're really a TV camera, I promise I am not the droid you're looking for." Part of him kept expecting this whole deal to be some sort of practical joke. "I'm sorry that Booster Gold guy is dead, but he and I were not related. No one in my family was a super hero."
“yet,” Skeets pointed out. “booster—michael jqn carter—was
YOUR DESCENDANT. WE CAME TO YD U R ERA IN PART BECAUSE WE BELIEVED ITS EVENTS TO BE A MATTER OF HISTORICAL RECORD.” The
shiny golden robot certainly looked like he came from the future, “but that
ISN’T SO. SOMETHING IS AWRY IN THE TIMESTREAM. BEFORE HE DIED, BOOSTER AND I INFILTRATED THE LAB OF A CHRONONAUT NAMED RIP HUNTER TO INVESTIGATE THE CAUSE OF THE ANOMALIES.”
Despite himself, Daniel found himself caught up in the bizarre narrative. "What did you find?"
“I’M not certain,” Skeets admitted, “my presence was required
TO KEEP AN ATOMIC TIME LOCK OPEN WHILE BOOSTER WENT INSIDE. HE CLAIMED NOT TO HAVE SEEN ANYTHING OF SIGNIFICANCE, BUT I’M
wondering if he didn’t OVERLOOK something.” Daniel saw his own
face reflected in the robot's metallic sheen, “you are one of booster’s
ANCESTORS. YOU WILL KNOW.”
"This is crazy talk," he protested. "When does Sarah Connor show up to stop me from inventing Terminators?" He lurched out of his chair and headed for bed. He had wasted too much time on this screwy sci-fi crap already.
“daniel!” A note of urgency entered the robot's electronic voice. He followed Daniel across the living room, “it’s vitally important that i
REGAIN ACCESS TO THAT LAB. ITS BIOMETRIC SECURITY SENSORS ‘KNOW’ BOOSTER NOW, AND YOU’RE ENOUGH OF A GENETIC MATCH TO FOOL THEM.”
He kept on walking away "Can't help you," he said, wondering if it was possible to get a restraining order against a robot. "I have plans this weekend that don't involve breaking and entering."
“i know,” Skeets declared, “a dentist appointment and a weekly
POKER GAME WITH SOME OF YOUR OLD HIGH SCHOOL BUDDIES. PRETTY EARTH-SHATTERING STUFF. SUPERMAN WOULD BE JEALOUS.”
Daniel had never realized that a robot could be so sarcastic. "What, did you read my date book too?" He spun around to glare at the hovering golden orb. "Nice salesmanship, spy guy" He nodded toward the door. "Get lost."
“BUT WHAT IF I COULD PROMISE YOU A MORE THRILLING EXISTENCE, daniel?” Skeets caught up with Daniel, “what if i told you i
COULD, USING BOOSTER’S DNA, BIOENGINEER A SUPER HERO IDENTITY foryou?” The robot was only a few inches away from him now, Skeets'
glowing sensors practically staring into his eyes, “what if, in return for
YD U R AID, I OFFERED YOU A CHANCE TO RELIVE THAT MOMENT OF FOOTBALL GLORY OVER AND OVER AGAIN FOR ALL TIME?”
Daniel hesitated. He knew he should probably drop-kick Skeets out the nearest window, but what if the robot could actually deliver what he promised? Daniel glanced around his dinky apartment, frowning at the chintzy furniture and high school mementoes. Preserved beneath glass, his old football jersey (#52) hung upon the wall. The jersey, trophies, and other souvenirs seemed to mock his pathetic existence. Thirty-two years old, and what did he have to show for it? Just a dead-end job and a roomful of reminders of what might have been. Sure, I’ve fantasized about being a super hero, he thought. W7io hasn't? Skeets' offer was tempting ... still, he couldn't help remembering that the robot's last partner had ended up dead. Did he really want to go the way of the late Booster Gold?
"I don't know," he said skeptically. "I'm being asked to entrust my future to a flying toaster. That's a pretty huge gamble."
An electronic chuckle emanated from the robot, “gambling runs in
THE CARTER BLOOD.”
.
ARIZONA.
Three days later, Daniel found himself baking beneath the hot desert sun. Buzzards circled overhead as he faced a pair of ominous steel blast doors. I can't believe I'm really doing this, he thought. Sweat trickled down his back, and not just because of the oppressive heat. He was starting to wish that he had never heard of Booster Gold. I used up all my frequent-flyer miles for this?
“how does the visor feel?” Skeets asked. The chatty robot had made all the travel arrangements to get them here. A rented jeep was parked outside the chain-link fence behind them. The massive concrete bunker didn't look very welcoming.
Daniel adjusted the gold-tinted goggles. "Featherweight," he admitted. "My contacts are more trouble than this." The goggles and attached blue headpiece only heightened his resemblance to the real Booster Gold. He wore a jacket and jeans over the hero's spare uniform. "You can see through them too. Right?" .
“and hear,” Skeets confirmed. He inserted a metal probe into the atomic time clock. The dense metal doors slid open, exposing the dimly lit stairway beyond.
Daniel gulped and started down the steps. "What did you call this Rip Hunter guy again?"
“A chrononaut,” Skeets said. “A time-traveler.”
That's what I thought, Daniel thought unhappily. "Just checking." He muttered to himself as he descended the stairs. "What the holy living hell am I getting into ... ?"
Suddenly, selling life insurance didn't seem all that bad. He wondered if he should have taken out a bigger policy on himself.
The ruined laboratory at the bottom of the stairs did nothing to ease his apprehension. The abandoned b
unker looked like a bomb had gone off inside it. A huge crystal bubble had broken into a million pieces. A toppled globe had graffiti all over it. Dozens of dead clocks were stopped at 12:52. A dusty blackboard was filled with loony scribbling. Time is Broken? What the heck does that mean?
Standing in the center of the trashed lab, he slowly swept his gaze over the wreckage, giving Skeets a good look at the place. He hoped the robot was getting more out of this than he was. "And this would be ... ?"
“HARDLY ANYTHING BOOSTER DESCRIBED ACCURATELY.” Skeets'
voice came to him via a receiver concealed in Booster's headpiece. It sounded like the robot was floating right next to him. “scan everything, leave
NOTHING TO BE PROCESSED BY MY IMAGINATION. BOOSTER TOLD ME NOTHING OF THIS, AND IT’S ALL CRUCIAL.”
Was it just his imagination, or did Skeets actually sound a little pissed off at his former partner? Daniel started to get a seriously bad feeling about all this. Maybe becoming a super hero was not such a great idea?
“there!” Skeets said emphatically, “the north wall, move
CLOSER.”
Daniel saw what Skeets was looking at. The wall in question had been covered with graffiti, apparently by a single individual. Daniel was unpleasantly reminded of Jack Nicholson in The Shining, typing the same phrase over and over again, right before he started hacking people up with an axe. A chill ran down Daniel's spine and he looked around nervously, just to be certain that he was all alone in the bunker. Had this Rip Hunter dude gone off the deep end too?
“what does the writing say?” Skeets asked.
Daniel leaned forward to get a better look. " 'It's all his fault,' " he read aloud. "I don't get it." Scratching his chin, he squinted at the repetitive scribbling. "Whose fault?"
A magazine cover was taped to the wall. Hand-drawn arrows pointed at a cover photo of Booster Gold. "It's all his fault," a Post-it note insisted. But was the arrow pointing at Booster, or the robot floating inconspicuously above him? It struck Daniel that his new partner hadn't said anything for a couple of moments now. "Skeets?"