Adam Christopher - The Age Atomic

Rad didn’t need to use the binoculars to see the problem.

The streets were filled with machine soldiers — the perfect, silver models that Rad and Jennifer had found hidden in Cliff’s warehouse. The King had activated his army, and red eyes shining in the night they marched slowly, in perfect step, towards the building on all sides.

Kane shook his head. “How many of them are there?”

The Captain lowered the binoculars, his eye patch flapping against his cheek. “Hundreds, certainly. Thousands, perhaps. The entire robot army may have awakened.”

“To get Kane back,” said Rad. “They need his power.”

The Captain nodded. “Indeed.”

Rad looked down the street, Park Avenue, heading south. Grand Central was a roadblock, the avenue splitting into two around it. In front of them was a square, into which jutted half a bridge, connecting Grand Central with thin air, the unfinished end coming to an abrupt halt one hundred yards out.

The square was filled with robots, as was the street that ran horizontally across the front of the square in both directions. If this was the southern aspect, then Rad imagined it would be worse on the other side of the building. They were totally surrounded.

“Can they get in?” he asked.

“No,” said the Captain. “Or at least not for some time. I had this building fortified, but I did not expect to face an army of robots.”

“What about the police? Surely they can’t have missed this?”

Carson tugged his beard. “As with the general populace, I imagine they are keeping well away. There were not many left. My fault, I’m afraid. So eager was I to change the city that I fear I may have weakened its defenses.”

Kane stepped forward and looked back at the building, leaning to see the dark sky directly above. The perpetual cloud was very high, barely visible, the cold almost pushing it away from the city. Kane pointed up. “Can we fly out in the Nimrod ?”

“Possibly,” said the Captain. “If they haven’t blocked the tunnel exit.”

Rad pulled at Carson’s shoulder to turn the old man around. Rad pointed at robots out in the street, the square. They were eerily quiet, just a low-level ticking and thrumming disturbing the cold night.

“We can’t stop them, can we?” said Rad. “Four people and one ghost against that lot. And even if we could get out, and gather up all the police and all the agents we could, we can’t deal with this. There is a whole damn army . We can’t face this alone.”

Carson frowned. “What are you suggesting, Mr Bradley?”

Rad sighed. “I mentioned Nimrod before, and you were going to say something. Do you know how to contact him, with the Fissure gone?”

Kane joined them. “What if Nimrod isn’t in charge anymore? What if my vision comes true? We’ll have two robot armies going to war.”

Rad waved a hand. “Maybe, but we don’t know for sure, do we? Not unless we can get through to Nimrod and find out. They’ve got resources, people. If anyone can help us it’s got to be Nimrod and the others in New York.”

Carson tugged his beard, and turned to Jennifer. She was leaning across the railing, scanning the crowd.

“You’re very quiet, Ms Jones.”

“I’m looking for him.”

“James? The real King of 125th Street?”

“Yes,” she said. “Maybe he’s here, leading his army. Maybe we can talk to him, make him understand.”

Kane shifted and folded his arms. He looked at Rad, and Rad had a bad feeling.

“Yeah,” he said. “Maybe. But let’s keeping work on plan A. Captain?”

Carson nodded, and was about to speak when a voice came up from the street below.

“Your new friends can’t help you, Jenny.”

Jennifer raced back to the railing, the others on her tail. In the street below, the robots parted in a clatter, forming a corridor between their ranks, allowing another of their kind: tall, silver and shining, new, different. Upgraded. Rad peered down at the machine.

“Is that Elektro?”

Jennifer shook her head. “No, it can’t be…”

The silver robot laughed, its voice reverberating around the streets until it came from every direction at once. It held its arms out as it addressed the group on the balcony of Grand Central. “Elektro was the first. He was a test, a metal man, my creation.

“I am James Jones, the King of 125th Street, and I am the second.”

They stood in the center of the Grand Central concourse, the four of them, as all around, from every door, every window, came the sound of the robots resuming their slow march on the building. Hundreds of perfect machine men, programmed for warfare, commanded by a man who had become like them.

The concourse was cavernous and Rad felt very small indeed. The sound of the chaos outside was an ocean of noise, echoing, reverberating around the hard marble surfaces of the giant room.

They were stuck. Rad sighed and rolled his shoulders.

“New York. Nimrod,” he said. “It’s the only way. Can you do it, Carson?”

The Captain hrmmed and glanced at Kane. “Mr Fortuna, how much functionality does the Skyguard’s suit have remaining?”

Kane looked down at himself, and raised his arms. The suit was really only the inner lining of the Skyguard’s original armor, a tight leathery jumpsuit with slots and catches where the rest of the suit was supposed to fit.

“It’s keeping me alive,” said Kane from behind the plain black faceplate. “The King — James — must have been using it dead, because it’s feeding off my energy now.”

Carson nodded. “And if you breached the suit… for example, near the wrist.” The Captain lifted one hand and flexed it, showing the heel of his palm to Kane.

Kane nodded. “If I breach the suit, then the energy of the Fissure would leak out…”

Carson smiled. “Indeed. A small gap, just so, and you could direct the energy.” The Captain glanced up at the constellations in the ceiling. “And more than that, if you concentrate, feel the power within you, understand how it flows… perhaps you could fly, without the rocket boosters.”

Rad watched the two of them with growing alarm.

“Mr Fortuna,” Carson said. “You are one with the Fissure now. If you concentrate, focus, you can control it. We need your help. Now .”

Kane nodded and took a step back, shaking his arms like he was about to do the clean and jerk. He held his head up and Rad could hear his breathing heavy behind the mask. As he watched, the familiar blue glow of the Fissure began creeping out around Kane’s body, forming a faint but clear aura. Rad glanced down, and saw Kane was floating an inch above the floor.

Carson clapped. “Capital, Mr Fortuna. We need you to hold the robots at bay, for just a short time. I have work to do. Do you understand?”

Kane nodded, and lifted a little further from the floor. Before Rad could say anything, Kane looked down, took a breath, and shot a full six feet in the air. He laughed.

“This is going to take some getting used to.”

Carson waved. “Off you go!”

Rad whistled. “You gotta teach me that trick someday, pal.”

Kane laughed as he bobbed in the air. “Sure thing. Teach you over breakfast tomorrow.” He gave a mock salute, and rose in the air in a graceful curve, so high he almost touched the star field on the ceiling. Then he dived down, and shot out through one of the great arched windows. The glass exploded, and the sound of the robots outside was suddenly so loud that Rad ducked instinctively. Light flashed outside the window: blue and white, the kind that made Rad’s eyes hurt. The power of the Fissure.

“You’ve turned Kane into a weapon?”