The Sacrifice of a Hero

Wrathius aimlessly fingered the diamond earring on his left ear. It was new to him and he still wasn’t comfortable with it but it was a piece of his overall cover which allowed him to fit in seamlessly with the crowd.

Of all the cities he had been to, Wrath loved Austin the best. He’d always been a fan of live music and Austin was the Live Music Capital of the World, or so it claimed. Frankly, it had a lot going for it that led credence to that claim. It was something about the people that was just different. They seemed more friendly and eager to help a stranger get where he was going. The traffic, although not perfect, was just not quite as aggressive as other places and there were lots of accommodations for people who wanted to walk.

It was now late September and the Austin City Limits (ACL) Fest was in full swing. Crowds were flocking to outdoor concerts all over Austin and 6th street was alive with activity nearly every night of the week. APD was in full force keeping the peace although they weren’t needed for the most part.

His only lament was that he wasn’t here for pleasure.

He had been in the city for the last three weeks looking into an international drug ring. Although it was based in San Francisco, it had connections around the planet. The reason the Knights were called in was because this particular ring had used some meta-human muscle to heist a submarine from the US Navy. Normally difficult to locate, this particular sub was equipped with a sonar absorbing paint and caterpillar engine which allowed it to slip through sub-surface sonar nets with ease. On top of that, it had 3 nuclear warheads aboard when it went missing in the South Atlantic.

Gorthrop Nummond was called into the mix a month ago when 3 CIA agents turned up missing and the trail went cold. They offered the services of the Akkadian Knights, still on retainer.

Thanks to some good, old fashioned detective work by Bat MAn, a connection was found in Thomas Greene, a English national holding up residences in Spain, Turkey, and the Austin hill country. Ironically, it lead to a city whose mascot is a bat. Irony indeed.

Wrathius was sent to investigate and shadow Greene for a while. Undoubtedly he would lead to connections in the drug ring and, eventually, the missing submarine. Wrath had been studying investigative technique with Bat MAn for about a year and this was his first time on his own. He had sighted Greene about a week ago at Sam’s Boat, a local bar/diner and had kept a distant eye on him ever since.

They were now in the grounds of Zilker Park watching an alternative rock band play. Greene was about 60 feet in front of Wrath, but his exceptional vision and sense of smell made it easy to keep an eye on him. A large man dressed in a gaudy red shirt approached Greene and clumsily bumped into him, spilling beer on his head. Greene stood up quickly and looked as if he was going to tear into the large man, but held his tongue, smiled, and ushered him on. Sitting back down, he continued to watch the show.

Wrath knew enough about this man’s temper to know that he wasn’t afraid of looking foolish in a crowd. He’d seen him tear into a family in front of a police officer downtown because a child stuck a lollypop to his pants by mistake at a crosswalk. Something was off.

Wrath patiently watched anther 5 minutes. The band finished their number to a thunderous standing ovation. When they sat back down 15 seconds later, Greene was nowhere to be seen.

Wrath rushed across the park lawn to the parking area, looking for Green’s Lexus. It was still there. On a hunch, he began scanning the parking lot. He caught a glimpse of a rather large man wearing a red shirt some 400 feet away getting into an SUV. For a guy who had just bought about $50 worth of concessions, he was sure in a hurry to leave.

Wrath mounted his Harley and took off after the man. In England, his bike would have stood out like a sore thumb, but in Austin during ACL, he was completely lost in the crowd and easily missed.

He followed him East, down Riverside and out towards Del Valle. The man disappeared down a country road after a bit, turning off of the main motorway. Wrath decided that at this point his Harley could be more of a giveaway and he parked it at a convenience store nearby. He was faster in the brush on foot.

Traveling overland in Austin at that time of the year can be a little… sticky. The ground is covered in sticker-burrs and cacti, giving any trek overland more fun than your average hiker liked. It also made for effective natural barriers to defend ranch homesteads from would-be thieves. Wrath didn’t notice.

He slipped through the mesquite trees about a mile before coming upon a ranch secluded in the brushy forest. Mesquite wasn’t a large tree, but enough of them together can effectively hide a one-story ponderosa style home, which it had in this case. The SUV was parked out front.

Creeping up to the closest window, Wrath had no trouble hearing the heated discussion inside. To his surprise, he could clearly hear Greene conversing with the larger man.

“Were you followed?”

“No, sir, I was very careful. I set the motion alarms on the road behind me so we’ll know if anyone approaches.”

“Good.” Greene hesitated. “Call Smoke. I want the next shipment on the sub within the day.”

“He should be back in Peru by now.” Wrath could hear the distinct sound of a ringer and knew that the larger man was using a cell phone, but before he could hear the discussion, a cactus needle snapped behind him.

Turning around, he was faced with a rather large man, entirely covered in a metal sheen. “I find sneaky man. Brock no like sneaky man.”

Wrath moved quickly and slammed into the, well… whatever he was, with all the force he could muster. Brock, as he had called himself, had a physique like a Neanderthal, complete with large protruding forehead and massive arms. Although he hit the ground, it was like hitting granite. The commotion must have caught the attention of the men in the room because it all went quiet. This couldn’t be good.

Brock stood back up and shook his head, “that was not smart little man.” Behind him, Wrath could hear someone coming out the front door and, turning his head, he could see the man in the red shirt on the porch. Looking down at Wrath, he smiled and his hands lit up in bright orange flames. This was not looking good at all.

Brock barreled into Wrath clumsily. For all that obvious strength, he wasn’t very dexterous and Wrath deftly avoided his lunge. A bolt of fire shot past his head as the man on the porch began shooting one fireball after the next. Wrath jumped to the side, picked up the nearest cactus, and threw it at him. The man in the red shirt caught the first one in the air and incinerated it with a well aimed ball of flame, but the smile faded from his face as the next three followed closely behind. Seconds later he was running the other direction with 6 cacti sticking out of his rear.

Brock lunged again, this time making contact while Wrath was busy throwing cacti branches like Frisbees. The blow caught Wrath off guard and sent Wrath to the ground seeing stars. Wrath cleared his head quickly and shot to his feet. A psychic dagger jetted out of the back of his wrist. Moving swiftly, he ran straight up to Brock and shoved the dagger up under his chin. Brock’s eyes lit up a bright pink and his head shot back.

He smiled. “That tickle! We fight, not play fun…” He lifted his arms up and smashed them down onto Wrath’s shoulders. Wrath crumpled on the ground like a rag doll, the force of the blow actually sending his feet into the ground. “Brock not has much mind to hurt with toy attack.”

Brock reached down and grabbed the stunned hero by the throat, keeping him pinned on the ground. Wrath fought back, but could feel his mind spinning for lack of oxygen. “Brock think it beddy-bye time for little man.”

Before blacking out, Wrath could only hear guttural laughter out of his adversary.

Somewhere in the South Pacific…

Wrath woke up bound and gagged in a very dark place. The gentle swaying of the container he was in gave away the fact that he was on a ship of some kind. It was possibly a cargo ship. He sat up and rested his head against a metal wall. He could smell salty air and rust. His eyes began to adjust and he could see small pinpoints of light entering the container he was in at the seams and corners. Although dark, it didn’t take long for him to gain focus and see that he was in some kind of cargo container used to transport items via cargo ship.

Truthfully, he had been in this box for a few days as it was transported out of the States. With his heightened senses, he could detect vibrations of all kinds around him. He didn’t need to stay here, and could have escaped very easily, but it was necessary so he endured it. The worst part about it all was that he hadn’t had that damn earring out in four days and it was itching like all get out.

That did it. Time was up. He started to power up an energy attack to burn through the ropes binding him when he heard motion outside the container. Oh well…

He powered down and waited as the door opened. Four men entered the room. While the first two roughly picked Wrath up by the arms, the other two stood by with weapons trained on him. By the looks of it, they were nothing more than AK 47s, a weapon that was particularly useless against Wrath. He kept his cool and played along. This was leading somewhere and he intended to see it through to the end.

The deck hands roughly pushed Wrath along towards a steel hatch and through into a room with about a dozen men lining a table. Two of the men looked familiar, one being Greene and the other being the man in the red shirt. Upon seeing Wrath, the man in the red shirt rubbed his rump and his eyes lit up a bright red.

“Calm yourself Ralph. You’ll have your fun later.” Turning to Wrath, Greene narrowed his eyes. “So, what do we make of you? You’re obviously not CIA any other government agency. You have some meta-human traits, but aren’t part of the Columbian Cartel’s team either. Tell us, stranger, who are you working for?”

One of the deck hands untied the gag around Wrath’s head. When he did, the blood rushed back and his head started pounding. On top of it all, he had a headache now. The same deck hand untied his hands and he used one to rub his neck. This was most annoying. He looked back at the assembled room, stood up and dusted off his shirt. “Seems to me the fact you don’t know is the only reason I’m alive.”

“Oh, my dear stranger, you might be an enigma, but you are most definitely an expendable one.” The man to his left, a large brute, shifted shape and took on the form of a large werewolf. The man behind him, a diminutive specimen wearing thick glasses, began growing and changing color to a silver sheen until he became Brock. Across the table from Greene, one of the men took off his overcoat to reveal that, instead of a normal body, he was nothing but tentacles from the neck down.

“Tell us who you work for and we’ll make your demise as painless as possible.” Greene was smiling at that thought. “Silt here will help you jog your memory.” With that, the squid started slithering across the floor towards him.

“Look, I’m nobody. I was just casing your house looking for a quick buck.” Wrath put on a terrified look and backed up until he was up against the two large deck hands barring the doorway out. With one deft motion, he grabbed each one by the collar and threw them over his shoulders at the assembled men in front of him. While everyone ducked, he bolted out the door onto the deck.

“KILL HIM!” Greene shouted over the commotion and the villains piled out after Wrath. Gunfire was erupting all over the place. Bullets were bouncing off of Wrath as he picked up a crate and threw it at Brock. Although it knocked him off his feet, he shrugged it off quickly and resumed his charge. The tenticular man lifted up in the air and began shooting bolts of lighting at Wrath. One caught him in the leg and shot him up in the air. Ralph shot him in mid flight as if he was shooting skeet and Wrath hit the deck hard. Wrath responded with a bolt of plasma energy that caught Ralph in the chest and shot him into the cargo hold.

Wrath had no clue how Brock had snuck up on him before so easily until now. Brock opened a quick dimensional doorway from 40 feet away and took one step to be right in front of Wrath. He made a ponderous haymaker, missed as Wrath dodged below his arm, and punched a hole in the steel container behind Wrath. Brock found his arm stuck in the wall and made a vain attempt to grab Wrath who had moved behind him. Of course he missed and went back to trying to free his arm.

Another bolt of electricity hit Wrath and sent him to his knees. From the cargo hold to his left, a massive fireball erupted and a large hand reached up over the side. It was followed by the head of a massive creature comprised almost entirely of fire. As it rose, Wrath came to realize just how large it was. Its head crested the containers nearby and, standing in the cargo hold, it towered up at least 30 feet above his head.

One more bolt of lightning lit him up and he turned to Greene, who was descending a stairwell towards the lower sections of the ship. This was starting to really hurt. “Greene… thanks for brining me here.” With a wink, he reached up and pulled off his diamond earring. Crushing it between his fingers, activating a beacon inside, an audible pop could be heard in the air above him. Bright light poured over the ship from the cloud cover above and the combatants covered their eyes.

As it vanished, in its place, The Akkadian Knights team floated in the air above the ship. Caledonia lowered her hands, having successfully teleported the entire team in. Eron looked down with a smile. “Hey,Wrath. Having trouble?”

“What took you so long?” was Wrath’s half-hearted retort as he sat back on the deck and rubbed his neck again. “You’ll find what we’re after below decks. The hum of a nuclear engine is pretty unique and being in a metal box for a few days gives you an appreciation for your tactile senses.”

Quan positioned himself directly over the flaming monstrosity and began sucking off energy. The beast hit him with one bolt of flame and heat after the next, each one hot enough to melt steel to slag, but none of which phased the elemental. Within moments, the beast shrank until it resembled a man again lying in the cargo hold.

Caledonia raised her hands to the sky and brought down a torrent of lightning on the flying squid the likes of which the meta-human had never seen. His coat burning brightly, he fell to the water and was lost underneath the waves. In the process, she cleared the upper decks of any straggling seamen attempting to “hold the fort”.   Most of them just cried like little girls and ran for cover. Caledonia loved making grown men cry. It brought a smile to her face.

Brock freed his arm just in time to turn and see Vexator and Zildoran floating behind him. “Good! Brock like fight!” Vexator grinned, “if you like to fight my friend, we aim to please!” Poor Brock didn’t stand much of a chance.

Cassandra gave Wrath a helping hand up and started working on his wounds. “You know you could have gotten yourself killed.” Wrath just smiled. Wasn’t that what being a hero was all about? He looked around, “Where’s Bat MAn?”

Below Decks…

Greene knew that the submarine docked below the ship should have a crew, but knew that it was sophisticated enough that he could do it alone if needed. Given the current state of affairs above, it was wise to be prudent. Better to live and fight another day.

He opened the hatch leading to the tube that would take him down into the sub below and was met at the door by a shadowy figure. A quick right hook to the chin and Greene was on the floor. Greene went for a pistol stashed in his coat and a metal shard in the shape of a bat pinned his arm to the bulkhead. The pistol fell to the floor. “I’m afraid this belongs to someone else.”

Greene looked up at Bat MAn, “So it appears.” Greene’s body shifted and faded away, leaving a coat pinned to the wall. A teleporter--that explains a lot, thought Bat MAn. It was clear now why it was so hard to nail this guy down. Moving above decks, he found the Knights rounding up the remaining crew. Eron walked over to him and Bat MAn explained what happened.

“Any chance he teleported into the sub?”

“Doubt it. If he could, he would have instead of walking downstairs. My guess is that they composite steel hull contains something he can’t go through,” Eron said.

“Let’s hope you’re right. We have some Navy SEALs coming from DC now to pilot this bad boy home. They ought to be here in an hour.” Eron turned to Wrath. “Good job bud.” Bat MAn merely nodded in assent.

Wrath was busy rubbing his ear again. It itched like hell. “Next time, you get your own damn ear pierced!” Cassandra laughed and started work healing his ear.