unOrdinary: An Old Friend Returns

A Midnight Ride

Speeding down A-10, I let the roar of my Suzuki Hayabusa drown out the sounds of traffic on my way back. I decide to take the scenic way back and since it is now close to midnight, the streets are fairly empty so my superbike with a 1340 CC four-cylinder 16-valve liquid-cooled engine can be let loose on the streets.

My bike has a story as well. The word Hayabusa is named after the Japanese word for the peregrine falcon, the fastest bird in the world. Reaching speeds of over 200 mph (321 kph), this bird of prey is also one of the most adaptable, allowing it to thrive in urban as well as rural areas. When I had saved enough money, I had felt this powerful desire to fly free of everything. The previous owner, a rich man who had been going through a midlife crisis before he realized he had tachophobia. In layman's terms, the man had a fear of speed and yet he had purchased one of the fastest motorbikes produced by Suzuki.

Looking back on it, I was extremely lucky to have made the acquaintance of his son on one of my outings as Poison Ivy. As compensation for saving his teenage son, and heir of his company, from an unfortunate splat at the bottom of a canyon, he had gifted me the Hayabusa. From then on, the bike and I had raced to stop many more miscreants, but my favorite pastime was going on long midnight rides.

Tonight was a particularly good night, the full moon bright overhead now that the clouds had dispersed after the storm. Making my way along the sloping roads, I pondered what my next steps should be regarding EMBER. The way I had been approaching things had not been working. I did not wish to draw their attention by allowing myself to act as bait and my strategy of interrogations had not been fruitful.

EMBER was too smart to let its operations be revealed to drug-addicts like Bob/the Great Dragon. I had taken a blood sample from Bob, tucked into the inside pocket of my leather jacket. I would do some tests on it once I obtained access to a chemistry lab at Wellston. But what I needed was access to the drug before it was injected into their bodies. I spurred my bike onward, speeding up to over 100 mph, in frustration at being unable to make progress.

I was missing something! Something important, something right in front of me. As I leaned to my right, to take a sharp right turn, I knew what my next step would be. Remi! She was Rei's sister, so maybe she knew what he had been up to or knew something more about his death.

It was grasping at straws because after Rei's death, I had called up my old friend Techie and asked him to hack into the coroner's office to get the medical examiner's report. The official cause of death was blunt force trauma to the occiput. Other listed injuries included extensive second and third-degree burns and lacerations of depths of up to two inches in critical areas like the abdomen. The graphic pictures left little to the imagination.

But the cruel truth was that X-Static/Rei was not the only one. Behind a tarp in my storage unit, I had a crisscrossed map covered with locations where superheroes/vigilantes had been murdered. I kept trying to see a pattern that would lead me back to EMBER, but the only clear link is that the more visible a vigilante you become, the more likely you are to find yourself dead. That's why I never stuck around, I showed up, took down the evil-doer, and disappeared. Teaming up with other vigilantes had only burned me in the past. Without a clear plan to defeat EMBER, I could not risk forming such close contacts again. X-Static's dead-eyed look still causes me to wake up in a cold sweat.

Finally, as my eyes begin to slowly close due to drowsiness, I head back towards the city. Tomorrow is a big day, and I need to get some well-earned rest. I return my bike to the storage unit through the back, sneak back over the gates, and climb up the tree back into my bedchamber.

I take off my clothes and hide them under the floorboards. With no further energy remaining, I fall asleep on the bed instantly in just my underwear, my pajamas lay forgotten under my pillows.