Carrie Vaughn - Dreams of the Golden Age

Despite all the news cameras that had shown up at Horizon Tower, the dozens of citizens who’d snapped cell phone pictures, the images that had been grabbed from traffic and security cameras, the only photos that appeared on any of the stories were generic shots of the building, of the glass-strewn street after the windows on the top floors had shattered, the swarm of police cars, and the aftermath: the Delta supers being led away morose and in handcuffs, Majors himself strapped to a gurney, taken away in an ambulance. Dr. Mentis gave a statement, and pictures of him appeared along with the usual quotes about Commerce City being safe once again. People observed that he was no longer the intense young man who’d been a member of the Olympiad back in the day. He was middle-aged, tired, and most concerned, he stated, with returning Celia West to her daughters.

The Trinity and Espionage remained as mysterious as ever, and some reporters murmured that police Captain Mark Paulson had a hand in that. Rumors said that unlike his predecessors, he might be working closely with the young superhumans, who might even be a new, secret arm of the police force. The idea intrigued many, who agreed that with villains like Danton Majors, the Executive, in the world, these new young superhumans might do well to protect their identities.

Majors spent a month at Elroy Asylum being treated by some of the best doctors in the world, specialists in various personality disorders related to megalomania and narcissism. Prosecutors brought charges against him and his entire team. The four members of his team, however, escaped prison when Monica Brooks—aka Sonic—shattered the walls of the city jail with her hypersonic power, freed her colleagues, and vanished. Notably, they did not try to rescue Danton Majors. Presumably, they fled back to Delta. Warrants for their arrest were issued, but no news was forthcoming.

Horizon Tower was disarmed, condemned, and torn down to make way for the city’s new development plan, recently voted on unanimously by the planning committee and spearheaded by West Corp.

Life in Commerce City goes on.

Anna steadied herself before entering Sam’s hospital room. She’d been told what to expect. She knew the sight of him would shock her, no matter how much she prepared, no matter how much she thought she knew what she was going to see.

Celia came with her and kept a hand on Anna’s arm, a comforting pressure. Anna thought about asking her mother to wait. Then she thought better of it.

“Ready?” Celia asked softly, and Anna nodded.

His parents, George and Melissa Stowe, were there, sitting near the bed, talking quietly. They looked up, blinked in confusion that never really went away, even when recognition dawned.

“Is it all right if we come in?” Celia said, courteous, always so deft in these awkward situations. She always knew exactly what to say. She’d replaced the wig and looked almost normal right now. Except that she was losing weight—Anna could see her growing skeletal. The Stowes wouldn’t notice it.

Sam’s father quickly invited them in, reached to shake Celia’s hand, thanked them for coming, et cetera. Anna drifted to the bedside.

“He’s getting better,” Mrs. Stowe said. Her smile was taut and her eyes red from sleeplessness and crying. “The ventilator came out yesterday. He’s woken up a few times since then. Now he just has to heal.”

Lew and Eliot had saved him, had cushioned his thirty-story fall enough so that it didn’t kill him. But he’d crashed into the side of the building on the way down, collapsed to the concrete below with too much force, even with Eliot breaking the fall. Eliot had been strong enough only to slow him down and catch himself, not stop them both.

Sam looked tiny lying on the bulky hospital bed, connected to what seemed like a million tubes and wires. A monitor clipped to his finger, IV tubes taped to his arms, oxygen tubes in his nose, sheets piled in messy folds around him. A plastic neck brace immobilized him, and his face was covered in cuts and bruises, swollen and purple. His left arm and leg were broken, his pelvis had cracked, his ribs had broken. His spine had survived, he wasn’t paralyzed, but several vertebrae in his neck had cracked, and once he was more healed he would need surgery to repair them. He’d arrived at the emergency room with a head injury, a cracked skull, and excess fluid in his brain, but he’d gotten there quickly enough that doctors had been able to mitigate the worst of the damage. They hoped.

Sam would get better. Everyone said so. But it would take awhile. Anna gave a heavy sigh. She’d been holding an unconscious breath. This could have been any of them. Thinking about that made her numb.

“Can I touch him?” she asked, and Mrs. Stowe nodded. Anna lightly brushed Sam’s hand, squeezing his fingers. Maybe it would help. His skin felt cooler than she expected.

“Mr. Stowe, Mrs. Stowe, I have some information that I think you need to hear,” Celia said in her steady, calming voice. “Do you have a minute?” They did, they agreed. Would here be all right? They liked to be here for the moments Sam woke up.

“Mr. Stowe—”

“Call me George, please.”

“All right. Your father is Gerald Stowe, yes? Do you remember him ever talking about a job he had when he was young, at Leyden Laboratories?”

“No—he had a lot of jobs when he was young. Kept bouncing around, you know?”

“This was a lab owned by my grandfather. The scientist in charge was Simon Sito, the Destructor, and there was an accident. A kind of radiation that affected everyone who was there, including my grandfather. Over the years we’ve found that the children of those affected have about a forty percent chance of displaying some kind of superhuman ability. I know you were probably asking yourself why this happened to Sam. Well, there’s a reason for it. I bear some of the responsibility for this, I’m afraid. I’ve been tracking the families descended from those who were in the lab. Indirectly, I’ve been encouraging some of them to use their powers. Including Sam. Including my own children.”

“Wait, what?” George Stowe furrowed his brow, baffled. “But I never—”

“No, but your nephew is Justin Raylen, yes? Breezeway? And you might ask your younger sister how much she really knows about Earth Mother.”

“ Margaret? ” he exclaimed. “Margaret is Earth Mother?”

Celia put a finger over her lips. “You should probably keep that quiet, since she never went public. I’m trusting you with this information, George, because of Sam. You deserve to know. But it’s not for public consumption. You understand, yes?” The Stowes nodded emphatically. “Also, all Sam’s medical bills will be paid for. It’s coming out of the Compensation Fund for Extraordinary Damages, the trust my mother established. Your family won’t have any financial concerns, if that’s all right with you.”

“Yes. Thank you, yes.”

Sam’s fingers twitched under Anna’s hand. His eyes were open, and he managed a smile with his swollen lips.

“Hey,” she said. “How are you?” What a stupid question.

“Crappy,” he murmured, his voice barely a scratch. “We won?”

“Yeah. But this … this sucks.” She blinked fast to keep the tears back.

“Yeah,” he said, the air going out of him in a sigh. He squeezed her fingers, but his eyes closed, and he slipped back into sleep.

This did, indeed, suck. But she finally believed he’d get better. Blaster would return.

Celia touched her shoulder. “We should probably get going, let him rest.”

“Okay.”

The leave-taking was awkward and drawn out. The Stowes seemed more stunned than when they arrived, not less, and Anna felt washed out. Just seeing Sam like that was exhausting. But she had to be thankful that he hadn’t died. How much more awkward, to be standing at his funeral?