Legacy

  Lucas could hear Katie in the background saying “crap” over and over again. “What’s going on?” he asked.

  “There’s not enough time,” Putnam began. “I don’t know how to—”

  Lucas didn’t wait for him to finish. Pure instinct kicked in. He snatched up the box and leapt into the air, his boot jets igniting with a roar, propelling him upward on plumes of smoke and flame.

  “Lucas, what are you doing?” Putnam demanded.

  “The only thing I can do,” Lucas answered. “I have to get this thing as far away from the city as possible.”

  “Lucas, you know that armor isn’t strong enough to—”

  “I’m not stupid,” Lucas said as he felt the air growing colder. It was becoming harder to breath.

  He held the box out before him, watching the timer clicking down.

  Thirteen … twelve … eleven …

  He couldn’t decide if this was the bravest thing he’d ever done, or the stupidest.

  Ten … nine … eight… seven …

  He gripped the box, pulling back his arm, preparing to give it everything he had … the costume had … to toss the explosive as far away as possible, out of the atmosphere, if he could.

  The numbers ticked down in his mind’s eye.

  Six … five … four … three …

  Lucas threw the box high into the sky and gunned the rockets in his boots as he spun away, hoping to outrun the shock wave that could very well pummel him senseless.

  Two … one … zero …

  He pressed his arms to his chest and descended in a free fall, like a bullet shot from a gun, waiting for the explosion.

  An explosion that never came.

  He considered that he might have counted wrong, but he’d seen the clock. It was impossible that he’d been that far off in his calculations.

  He fired his retros, slowing his descent, and brought himself to an upright position, scanning the open sky for signs of impending doom.

  “Lucas?” Putnam called out tentatively.

  “Yeah, I’m here.”

  “What happened?”

  “There wasn’t any explosion,” Lucas said.

  “The bomb was a dud?”

  Lucas’s voice was grave. “I don’t really know what it was.”

  14

  Lucas dropped from the sky, his descent kicking up dirt and dry leaves as he touched down in the driveway in front of Hartwell Manor.

  “I still don’t think this is a good idea,” Putnam said in his ear.

  “I don’t care what you think right now,” Lucas retorted, walking up the marble steps to the front door.

  “The fight with the Raptor did some serious damage to that battle suit. You’re functioning at only forty-three percent efficiency.”

  “Better than nothing,” Lucas said, lifting his leg to kick at the heavy wooden doors.

  The doors flew from their hinges and sailed through the foyer, bouncing noisily off the walls. Lucas knew this would be where he would find him. His father.

  His enemy.

  “That was subtle,” Putnam commented.

  “Shut up.” Lucas stalked through the house to the elevator that would take him down to the lab.

  “How close are you?” he asked Putnam as he pushed the button, somewhat startled when the doors slid open to grant him access.

  “Should be there shortly,” Putnam answered.

  Lucas stepped into the elevator, looking around, expecting some kind of trap to be sprung. But nothing happened as the doors closed and the elevator began its descent to one of the manor’s lower levels.

  Down there was where Hartwell really lived. The upper floors of the mansion were just a mask, like the mask of humanity his father wore to hide what he had become.

  The elevator came to a stop, and Lucas braced himself. The doors parted and he tensed, holding his breath, but again nothing happened.

  Cautiously, he stepped out.

  Clayton Hartwell was slumped in his chair before the multiple computer screens. His Raptor armor was in pieces on the floor around him, and he sat nearly naked in his underwear and a bathrobe.

  It appeared the man was sleeping.

  Lucas moved closer and saw Hartwell jump as the heavy footfalls awakened him with a start.

  Hartwell turned, then smiled. One side of his face was badly burned and it looked incredibly painful. Slowly raising his hands, he started to clap.

  “What’s that for?” Lucas asked.

  “You’ve succeeded,” Hartwell said, his hands dropping back limply to his lap. “You passed with flying colors.”

  “The bomb was a fake.”

  “Oh no,” the old man said feebly. “It was very much the real thing.”

  “But it didn’t go off,” Lucas retorted.

  “Because I shut it down,” Hartwell said. “You achieved what you were supposed to. You found the bomb.”

  It felt like a hand of ice closing around Lucas’s heart.

  “But—but what if I hadn’t …?”

  Hartwell sighed, leaning his head wearily back in his chair. “Then Seraph would have been destroyed … all its evil finally purged from the earth.”

  The man seemed to drift off before speaking again.

  “For a while there, I must admit, I had my doubts, but deep down … deep down I knew you were the one.”

  Lucas felt the anger coming back, the anger that could very easily cause him to do something he would most assuredly regret later.

  “You would have murdered all those people … all those people you were supposed to be protecting?”

  Hartwell’s eyes snapped open, and Lucas stepped back from their intensity.

  “It would have been too late for them,” Hartwell snarled. “Without me … without somebody to protect them … the evil would have won, and I wasn’t about to let that happen.”

  He began to cough, and Lucas suddenly realized how fragile the man had become outside his costume. His skin was pale, almost glowing in the faint light of the nest, and he looked as though he might shatter if the violent coughing continued.

  “Time is running out,” Hartwell wheezed. “My body is degenerating far faster than I anticipated. Decades of strength-enhancing drugs are finally taking their toll.”

  “If only you could hear yourself,” Lucas told him. “I think they’ve also made you completely insane.”

  Hartwell’s eyes opened wide and he pushed himself up in his seat. “I did what had to be done!” he yelled. “I knew I would never be strong enough, and only the strongest will survive what is coming.”

  His expression started to soften, a smile gradually forming on his sickly features.

  “The strongest is you,” the old man said. “The city will never be denied its protector … its Raptor. You’ve earned that title.”

  “No,” Lucas said, shaking his head. “I don’t want it. The name is dirty now! It’s covered in too much blood.”

  Hartwell sadly nodded. “You’re right,” he said. “Too much blood indeed.”

  With some exertion, he turned the chair toward one of the computers, trembling hands reaching out for the keyboard.

  “I’m not going to fight you anymore,” Lucas said. “It’s over.”

  His fingers poised above the keys, Hartwell glanced over his shoulder at him. “So true,” he said as he quickly typed.

  “It’s done.”

  * * *

  Silently Lucas cursed himself for once again letting his father get the best of him.

  He fully expected clouds of poisonous gas to fill the Raptor’s nest, a shrieking alarm bell warning of imminent self-destruction. A pack of robot dogs trying to tear him apart would have been interesting as well.

  But only a faint hum came from one of the many computer modems, and then nothing but the usual nest noises.

  He was about to ask his father what he had just done when the cavalry arrived.

  Or at least Putnam and Katie.

  Putnam, using his crutches
, didn’t look all that bad, considering what he’d been through that afternoon. Katie, for her part, was holding a nasty-looking pistol that would have put the blasters in Star Wars to shame.

  “Where is he?” she asked as they joined Lucas.

  “He’s over there.” Lucas motioned toward the monitors. “Don’t worry, I think he’s pretty much harmless now … but he did just do something on the computer.”

  “Oh, great,” Putnam said, moving around the boy. “What insanity are you responsible for now, Clayton?”

  Lucas noticed that the old man had retrieved one of his armored gauntlets and was now wearing the heavy glove.

  “Nothing to concern you, my friend,” Hartwell told him. “Just making sure the recipient of my legacy will have all he needs to continue the battle, now and into the future.”

  He swiveled in his chair toward the multiple monitors. “It’s all his,” he said. “To the only surviving heir of the Hartwell empire … He owns everything.”

  Lucas felt as though he’d been kicked.

  “No way,” he said.

  Standing beside him, Katie looked as stunned as he did.

  “I—I don’t want it.”

  “But you’ll need it to face your future,” Hartwell said. He seemed to be getting weaker, his breath coming in short gasps.

  “You keep talking about my future,” Lucas said.

  “It … it is something … you will need to … face on your own.” The older man struggled with his words. “It’s too late for me now,” Hartwell said, slowly starting to raise his gloved hand.

  Putnam moved back, not sure what the old man was up to.

  “Just want … want you to know how sorry I am … it all turned out this way …,” he said. “And how proud I am … to have been … your father.”

  Hartwell grabbed his own throat with the heavy metal gauntlet.

  “What are you—” Putnam began.

  “Time to go” were Hartwell’s last words as he activated the weapon built into the glove, unleashing the full effects of a concussive-force blast at very close range.

  Ending his life by his own hand.

  They found an old sheet in a corner of the workshop to cover the body.

  Lucas was still in a state of shock.

  He was sitting with Katie at the back of the nest while Putnam busied himself trying to figure out what Hartwell had done on the computer.

  “Are you all right?” she asked softly.

  “Yeah.” He had removed the Talon helmet and was holding it in his hands. “I never wanted to be a superhero,” he explained. “I doubt that anybody coming out of high school decides this is what they want to do with the rest of their lives, y’know?”

  She nodded.

  “The only reason I put the costume on was to get even with the guys who killed my mother.”

  “And you’ve done that … kind of,” Katie said with a shrug.

  “Yeah, I have,” he answered. He was still staring at the helmet. It was damaged, some of the black paint scraped away.

  “Now what?” he asked, looking at her.

  The girl shrugged. “I guess that’s up to you.”

  Putnam came over, swinging his body forward on his crutches.

  “It appears he’s been planning this for quite some time,” the man said. “By entering that command into the system, he got the ball rolling. Everything has been signed over to you as his last living heir.”

  Lucas was still in shock.

  “Congratulations,” Putnam said. “You’re probably worth billions.”

  Lucas’s eyes were drawn to the sheet-draped figure still in the office chair across the way. “What are we going to do with him?” he asked.

  Putnam looked toward the body as well. “That’s been taken care of too. We’re to bring the body to his room and wait for a funeral home to come and pick him up.”

  “Isn’t how he died going to cause some problems?” Katie asked curiously.

  “Like I said, it’s all been taken care of. The medical examiner has already signed off, and the funeral home is extremely discreet. The undertakers will take it from here.” Putnam shook his head in disbelief. “It appears he thought of everything.”

  They were silent then, each of them alone with their own thoughts.

  “So, Lucas,” Putnam finally said. “It would be a real shame to see all this … technology go to waste.” He gazed around at the crowded nest, which was overflowing with machines. “What are your plans?” he asked. “Are you going to leave crime fighting behind you, or are you seriously considering taking up the mantle?”

  Lucas stood and set the Talon helmet down on a crate of machine parts. Without a word, he turned away and headed for the elevator.

  He stopped as the doors opened to admit him, and turned.

  “If you’re interested, I’m going to need a new costume,” he said, and glanced down at himself.

  “This one’s looking a little rough.”

  epilogue

  Four Months Later

  Lucas was tempted to drink the champagne.

  How many fancy crystal glasses of the stuff had he been offered, only to leave them scattered, untouched, around the various dining establishments and rooftop parties?

  Lucas Moore was Seraph City’s newest celebrity, the previously unknown heir to the Hartwell fortune. Clayton Hartwell had been one of the city’s most fascinating individuals, and while most people were very sad to hear of his passing, they now had someone new to occupy their thoughts.

  Tonight was a party in honor of Lucas—another party in his honor. It was the third this week. He had to wonder if the wealthy had anything to do with their time other than plan parties.

  A man approached with two glasses of golden liquid and ice. He offered one to Lucas. “A real pleasure to meet you, Lucas,” he said with a smile. His skin was perfectly tanned, his hair stylishly messy. “We’re very sorry for your loss.”

  Lucas smiled sadly and shook the man’s hand.

  “Thank you,” he said. How many times had he uttered those same words in the last four months? How many hands had he shaken, and how many cheeks had he kissed?

  Too many.

  “All right, you might want to pay attention to this one,” Nicolas Putnam said in his ear.

  Lucas was wearing a small, nearly invisible communications device that Putnam had just recently perfected. It was something Hartwell Technologies was planning to put on the market by the end of the year, but until then, Lucas was giving it a test run.

  He was also wearing special contact lenses with built-in microcameras that allowed one of his tech specialists back home at the nest to see exactly what he was seeing.

  “This is Stephen Oxford, and his company, Ox-Tech, is currently under suspicion for secretly selling biological-weapons technology to the highest bidder. Needless to say, the buyers aren’t the nicest of people,” Putnam finished.

  Lucas was still smiling falsely and shaking the man’s hand.

  “You should come by the marina,” Oxford said to him. “We’ll take the yacht out for a spin, make a day of it.”

  “That would be awesome,” Lucas lied.

  The man left. Lucas watched him go, pretending to drink from the glass of scotch.

  “What a scumbag,” Lucas muttered so only Putnam could hear.

  “Welcome to the world of movers and shakers, my son,” the former sidekick commented. “These are the sharks you will be swimming with for a long time to come.”

  “Great,” Lucas sighed, already tired of the whole party scene.

  He set his latest untouched drink down on a table. He glanced around to find that others had seen he was standing alone and were starting to make their way toward him, like predators zeroing in on their prey.

  “I hate this,” he said, preparing for more mind-numbing conversation with the city’s supposed elite.

  “Then you might want to consider getting out of there,” Putnam commented.

  Lucas’s heart d
id a little flutter. “Why, what’s up?” he said, already moving toward the nearest exit.

  “Just eavesdropped on a police call to a convenience store on Madison. Looks like we’ve got an armed robbery that’s escalated into a hostage situation.”

  Lucas smiled and waved at the predators as he ducked out the rooftop door and headed for the stairs and the lobby of the swanky hotel.

  “Does Katie know?” he asked, strolling past the security desk and through the revolving doors.

  “On her way,” Putnam said.

  Lucas had just reached the curb when the shiny black limousine pulled up. The window on the front passenger’s side came down with a mechanical whine.

  “Need a ride, mister?” Katie called out.

  Lucas couldn’t help smiling as he opened the rear passenger door and climbed into the spacious backseat.

  “How was the party?” she asked as she pulled the limo into traffic.

  “Same as all the others,” he said. “They blend together after a while.”

  He removed the tiny earpiece and stuck it in his shirt pocket. There was a metal carrying case on the seat beside him, and he opened it. Lucas felt a tingle of excitement, as he always did these days when he looked at its contents.

  “That’s hot off the presses,” Katie said. “Nicolas and I just put the finishing touches on it this afternoon.”

  “Cool,” Lucas said, reaching inside the case.

  “I guess things are getting pretty tense over on Madison,” Katie said, leaning her head back slightly to speak to him through the open rectangular window between the driver and passenger areas of the limo.

  “Then we should probably hurry,” he said, starting to unbutton his shirt. He could see she was still watching him in the rearview mirror.

  “I’ll never get used to seeing that,” she said.

  “What, me taking my clothes off?” Lucas asked.

  “No, watching a real-life superhero appear before my eyes.”

  “Now you’re just trying to embarrass me,” he said, reaching out to close the partition.

  “Party pooper,” Katie said, her voice now coming over the speaker system in the backseat.

  Lucas was amazed at how good he’d gotten at this—getting undressed and putting on his costume in the backseat of a moving limousine.