Recap: After making it back to the Wanderer and breaking the news of Ryan's death to Tyler and Susan, Brandon learns that the world knows about super-powered beings, and his fight in Las Vegas has been seen around the world. The government has called Brandon a terrorist, and has shown off a few of their modified agents as heroes. The question now is what does the team do next...
Winning Choice: We share the truth with the world online. Let's see what happens when Donovan, Corrales, and their bosses can't control the information anymore. Let's give those fan sites something to cheer about.
I clear my throat, and really wish I'd brought some water. I'm nervous, really nervous. I've done a lot more dangerous stuff than this, right?
But there's always that little part of your brain that sits there and tells you everything that could go wrong with what you're about to do. Like how if I screw this up I could become a laughing stock, or get people arrested or killed, or start an international incident or something. See? Right there. That part of my brain. ARGH!
Maybe I really need some vodka instead of water.
I adjust the tablet again, making sure it won't slide down while I'm giving my talk. The teleprompter software on it has the speech we've written. It's propped up on a box right behind the wireless camera up here on the rooftop of a large office building.
We're pirating a wifi signal from the offices below, which will mean they're going to get an interesting visit in a few hours, but by the time things get sorted out I'll be long gone. The gear will be untraceable to us when they find it.
"Can you hear me okay?" I ask.
"Loud and clear," says Tyler in my earpiece. "You sound great on your headset, but the web stream is a little tinny. I knew we should have put a mic on you."
"You want to rent a whole TV studio for this?" Susan asks him. "We could really get those production values up." Susan's normal snark-factor has been operating at an all time high for the past few days, but then we've all been on edge. Cooped up in the Wanderer the past few days while we relocated it was not exactly a staycation at the spa.
"Five of the fan sites responded to the email," he says, ignoring Susan. "That should be plenty. They'll tweet and share out the stream, then download it as soon as it's done and spread it around. I'm sure Agent Corrales will order it taken offline, but it'll be too late."
"The internet never forgets," says Susan.
No, it sure doesn't. I lick my lips, and adjust my mask. I'm supposed to fly away at the end of my talk to prove it's really me, that car-catching guy from Las Vegas. It's also for drama, but I think we'll have enough of that by the time this stunt is done.
Though I doubt any drama could match what went into trying to write this little speech. Susan wanted us to "Tell them we're coming for them, and they can't hide. No person should be a slave, in body or mind, to another. We will take the government down."
As mad as I am at Agent Corrales, Sideburns, and everyone else, that's a bit more than I'm comfortable with.
Tyler's take was to "Challenge them to come forward and fight us. They can't win. People will rise up and stop it."
As much as I want this madness to stop, I can't see it being that easy. Tyler sees the world in black and white, in bad guys and good guys, and things are so much muddier than that.
As for me, I'm still not sure what I want to say. We debated back and forth and finally cobbled together the speech that's on the tablet in front of me. It's a compromise that's part rant, part mission statement, part threat, and part challenge. It just doesn't feel right for some reason, but maybe that's the mark of a good compromise.
Now I sit on a rooftop, staring into the shiny black eye of a camera, and behind that eye the entire world will be staring back.
"Are you ready?" asks Tyler in my ear.
Not remotely, I think to myself.
"Sure," I tell him.
"Three... two... one... you're live," he says.
I stare at the eye. I start to read.
"Hello, world. I'm here to tell you the truth about what happened in Las Vegas, and set the record straight on a few things."
The text on the tablet screen scrolls along.
"I am not a terrorist. I am an innocent person who was captured, experimented on, and given incredible abilities. Since then I've been attacked and had almost everything I cared about taken from me. I'm here to tell you...
The tablet scrolls. "I'M HERE TO TELL YOU THAT I AM A VICTIM OF THE VERY GOVERNMENT THAT HAS BEEN TELLING YOU LIES."
I stop reading. The tablet stops scrolling.
Victim. As I'm about to say the word I realize that's where I've been stuck on this whole speech.
Am I a victim?
Technically, yes, I was the victim of a crime. I've been the victim of several crimes if I wanted to fill out a scorecard, but there is much more to the word "victim" than the technical definition. If you're not careful it can become an attitude. A view that things are out of your control. A belief that the world owes you something for being wronged. A focus on everything that you've lost.
For all the effort I've put into finding out what Agent Corrales and his team are up to, put into dismantling Area 51, put into stopping the insane crew in Las Vegas, I still keep focusing on what was taken from me. How much I've lost.
"Brandon?" says Tyler, with a bit of panic. "You ok?"
I snap myself out of it. I take a deep breath and start again. I need to go back to what I know.
"I'm here to tell you... a story," I say.
"Once upon a time there was a super-secret group of people who discovered how to do some amazing things. Think of them as... wizards. These wizards discovered a way to reach inside someones very bones and change them. They could transform someone so they became taller, stronger, healthier, or smarter. These wizards had a lot of faith in their own wisdom and thought they could make people better, make people happier. They knew better than everyone else."
As much as I detest Mandeville, calling his team wizards probably isn't too far off the mark. Plus it's a lot less offensive than the terms that usually come to mind.
"What happened next is what always happens: some people got jealous and scared and greedy. One group of warlords became jealous of the wizard's power. That's the thing about warlords; they always want to be the strongest ones around. They figured if they kept the discovery for themselves they would be so mighty the could keep the world safe entirely on their own. Or at least that's what they told themselves as they destroyed peoples lives and made powerful mutant creatures to command."
"There was also a group of incredibly rich bankers who saw what the wizard's created and were overwhelmed with greed. They calculated that there was no one more deserving to have this new power, and began using it to build their own workforce of genetic duplicates. People who were given enough power to be useful, but had all those pesky traits like originality and independence stripped away."
I take a deep breath, and hope this making sense. The teleprompter on the tablet is frozen where I began going off-script, the word VICTIM still staring at me.
"Along the way I got caught in their crossfire. I became a rogue knight. I can fly. I can run incredibly fast. I can smell what you had for breakfast. And, as a lot of you have seen, I can catch a car. Some people online called me a superhero. These abilities make me super, but none of it makes me a hero. I'm not sure what it makes me, to be honest, other than the world's ultimate GMO."
"You might think this is pretty cool, but I didn't ask to be this way. It cost me dearly and it's hurt a lot of people... many of them very close to me."
My voice catches a bit as I think of Nicole and Ryan, and my mask feels tight against my face.
"These wizards, warlords, and bankers say they need these discoveries to keep you safe. Safe from whom? They say they will use it to make you better. Better than what? These are things nobody should decide for you. If you give someone power over you because of fear, insecurity, or greed, they will never give that power back. They will use it to keep taking from you. Forever."
"Even if they could honestly swear on a stack of Bibles that they have the best of intentions, it wouldn't last. It never does. It never has. Maybe that's part of the reason I was chosen for this, because of what I've seen in my own life and in the pages of history."
I realize that's probably true. If Mandeville is out there watching somewhere, he's probably smirking to himself.
"Now I'm being hunted in the name of safety and security, but I won't let them lock me up. I won't let them control me with fear, or threats, or brute force."
"I realize you may watch this video and think it's a hoax or some sort of stunt. Maybe you believe it when they say I'm a terrorist. Maybe you're just scared of how much your world has changed in the past week, and how crazy it's become."
"I'm not going to try and tell you what to feel. Or what to think. Or what to do."
"What I will do is show you what is happening. I will expose their secrets, but I realize I can't do that while having giant secrets of my own. I can't do it behind a mask."
I grab my mask and slide it off. I look into the camera, squinting against the unfiltered sunlight. In my earpiece I hear Tyler gasp and Susan swear.
"My name is Brandon Stamp. I'm a librarian."
"Now I have no secrets left. I'm off to continue fighting against the wizards, the warlords, and the bankers. I'm going to tear their power from them."
"What you do next is up to you."
I take off, floating backwards, then turn and rocket up into the sky. Everyone in internet-land can see me go, and I hope it looks impressive.
"That was... incredible," says Tyler over my headset as I retreat.
"That was not the speech we agreed on," says Susan. "But it was pretty good."
"Thanks," I reply. "Everything go okay technically?"
"Like a dream. Viewers were climbing like mad every single second you were talking. Every cable network just broke in live, and all the news websites across the world are melting down. Congrats, man, you've just gone mega-viral!"
"Lucky me," I say.
"I wiped the camera and tablet remotely, so all the data is gone and they'll be untraceable. It'll take them a while to find them, though. Your connection was routed out of L.A., so that's where they think we are."
"At least for another ten seconds," I remind them. The buildings below me quickly open up from busy streets to an immaculate expanse of grass. I reduce my speed and hover for a moment, turning in place to admire the view, before drifting slowly down.
It's incredible to be here in real life. I've seen it a million times, as has probably every other person in the industrialized world. I never got to visit due to a lack of time and money, but I always wanted to. When I did, I never dreamed it would be like this.
I touch down on the South Lawn of the White House, and all hell breaks loose.
I raise my hands up to show I am not a threat, but not over my head to surrender.
Secret Service agents pour out of the bushes, automatic weapons trained on me, yelling for me to get down. I see a flurry of activity on the roof, where I'm guessing snipers already have me locked in their sights as well. They get very crabby about things like this.
"Get down on the ground, right now, hands behind your head," yells one of the agents.
I keep my hands up and slowly turn to him. No fast moves. "I won't be doing that, I'm afraid, but you're not in danger. I'm here to speak with the President."
"That's not going to happen," the agent says, advancing. "This is your last warning." A dozen agents are now visible, all with their weapons trained on me.
A bunch of tourists walking by on the road outside have stopped to take video. There are police and secret service out there already, too, but the crowd is growing.
"You don't want to shoot," I tell him. "It won't hurt me, and it could injure someone outside. Just tell the President-"
"He doesn't take visitors," snaps the agent.
"Maybe if you told him who I am he might make an exception," I explain, trying to remain calm. This guy is about to try and shoot. If his friends join in this is going to get unpleasant.
The agent blinks, confused, then touches his radio on his shoulder. "Sir? Repeat." He hears something else over his earpiece, and I try to make it out but it is too muffled. "Yes, sir," says the agent and lowers his weapon. The other agents do the same.
A grizzled, tan, buzz-cut agent trots out from between two trees. He's wearing a dark suit, dead-black sunglasses, and has a small radio in his hand. I don't see a gun on him, but somehow I think he is just fine without one. He stares right at me with confidence and complete lack of amusement. He's uptight, tough, and obviously in charge. The other agents move out of his way, keeping their eyes on me.
"What do you want?" he asks, simply.
"You know who I am?" I ask.
"Yes. What do you want?" he repeats.
"I want to see the President."
"Not going to happen. President isn't here," he says.
"No fibbing," I tell him, waggling a finger. "He's here today." We checked his schedule before planning this stunt since we didn't expect the Secret Service would have taken a message.
"Let me clarify: he's not here for you. You can leave, or you can escalate this. If you wanted publicity, you already got it." He jerks his head towards the crowd. "Now leave. Trust me, that's the best option here."
"Radio chatter is off the charts," Tyler says. "We're scanning for keywords, but can't listen to it all. I can tell you they're calling for reinforcements of some kind. Not sure if it's just bigger guns or something else."
I look at the lead agent, and he looks back at me with a calmness that's a bit unnerving. I would not want to play Poker with this man. This is a man who has seen things.
"Well," he asks. "How are we going to play this?"
1. "I don't know about 'we', but I'm going to see the President." I race up the lawn at full speed, heading for the door to the White House.
2. I shift into super-speed and disarm the agents, leaving their guns in a broken pile in front of their boss. I stop in front of him and smile. "We're going to have a conversation. One without shooting or fighting for a change."
3. "I don't think you have any interest in playing," I tell him, and fly over the fence to the crowd gathering on the street. They spread out, making room for me, and I land on the sidewalk.
Author's Note: Yes, I combined two of the options from the previous chapter. :) The vote was so close and some of you made such a good case for it that I decided to give it a try. Hope you like it, and thanks for the inspiration!
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