the revenge of the fallen

8/3/2019 The Revenge of the Fallen

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PROLOGUE:

Intro: In 2010, the supervillain Lucifer seized control of the world after wiping out the

combined forces of the world's superheroes. Now, 39 years later, the world is still under his

iron rule. A small band of rebels join forces to fight the new regime.

Prologue

Alpha Force were the finest heroes the world had ever seen. For over two decades, they had protected

us. Collectively they had saved the world too many times to count, often thwarting some scheme or

plot at the last minute. Like most teams, they had their arch nemesis. Lucifer.

Their battles were epic and together they were the titans of their age. Alpha Force, the greatest heroes

and Lucifer the greatest villain. Each time they fought, the fate of the world hung in balance and the

course of history was changed. No matter how complex the scheme, Alpha Force foiled it. No matterhow many times they beat him, Lucifer would always rise from the ashes to once again threaten world

peace.

Until the unthinkable happened.

Until the day the Lucifer won.

March 4th 2010, after two years in hiding, Lucifer launched an assault on Washington DC. Using an

army he had raised seemingly out of nowhere, local heroes and military forces could only hold him at a

standstill as his forces besieged the centre of the capital. Finally, at 17:02 EST, Alpha Force arrived on

the scene. For the next two hours the heroes fought their enemy in what was quickly becoming one the

greatest super battles in history. Then Lucifer made his appearance.

Confronting Alpha Force in the middle of the National Mall, by the ruins of the toppled Washington

Monument, he smiled and awaited his foes. As the heroes prepared to strike during his customary

monologue, Lucifer simply glanced at the news crews that had arrived on the scene. Ensuring that the

cameras were broadcasting every second of what was to follow, instead of launching into a prepared

speech; he smiled and pointed his fist at the heroes. A beam of brilliant white energy shot out and

enveloped Alpha Force. In an instant, the world's greatest heroes were shredded and slaughtered live

on television; their deaths broadcast to a stunned world.

Gloating over his victory, and with his forces now standing unopposed, he turned to the cameras. With

a small wave to the viewers, he pressed a button his wrist and every computer on the planet crashed.

The world plunged into darkness and chaos as power grids failed, communication networks were

knocked out, and the delicate technological infrastructure of civilisation crumbled. Flashes of light in

the sky heralded the next phase in his plan as EMP weapons secretly deployed into orbit detonated

disabling all unshielded electronics. Hardened military systems were naturally immune but they had

already been compromised. The same self-aware electronic lifeform that had seized control of civilian



computer networks had co-opted the military ones. Crippling the secure communications channels,

Medusa quickly cracked the launch codes for the world's nuclear deterrents. As an object lesson, the

cities of Mumbai, Karachi, Delhi, Shanghai, Moscow, Sao Paolo, Seoul, Istanbul, Mexico City, Jakarta,

New York, Tokyo, Lima, Beijing, Cairo, Tehran, London, Bogotá, Lagos and Hong Kong perished in

nuclear fire, killing some 179 million people. With the world's twenty largest cities destroyed, Lucifer

threatened to unleash nuclear destruction on the rest unless the governments of the world

surrendered.

With the armies of the world paralysed and with Lucifer in almost complete control, resistance quickly

crumbled. Within 18 months, the world was his and a new order, The Unity had been born.

It is now forty years later. All the old heroes are either dead, imprisoned or in hiding. Few still

remember the glory days when you could look up into the sky and see the likes of Centurion, Patriot,

Defender and the rest of Alpha Force and know that hope, freedom and justice were more than just

words stricken from lexicon.

Lucifer rules the world with an iron fist imposing martial law. The Unity proclaims "One World, One

Vision, One Voice ... A World That Works". Summery justice and televised executions keep the

populace in line. Keep your heads down, obey the law, and don't make trouble. These are the rules

people live by now. Many have now forgotten the old world; they only remember the chaos and

fighting of the Unification War. The world still bears the scars of the biological and chemical warfare

used by the old regimes and the terrorist atrocities caused by the resistance before it was crushed.

However, the world is not without hope. A new generation has grown up in this brave new world

surrounded by decaying remains of the old. A new generation raised on the stories of great heroes and

epic battles. A generation that refuses to believe the propaganda and struggles to uncover the truth. A

generation determined to taste freedom at any cost.

The old heroes failed, time for someone new.

Intro: 39 years after the supervillain Lucifer siezed control of the world, young Toby Smith is

on the run from the new regime.

13:45 June 19th, 2049

North American Zone, East Coast Metroplex, Sector 23 (Old NYC)

A bullet ricocheted off the road sign just centimetres from the boy's head. Biting down a curse he

jumped over the footbridge's safety barrier and onto the hard shoulder of the road below. "Bullets," he

thought, "they're shooting ACTUAL bullets at me!" Darting between the slow moving traffic, he glanced

behind him as the armoured thugs of the Unity's enforcement division reached the side of the road.



The first shot had probably been a warning shot, probably. The next one though would definitely be

aimed at his head, as would the next 20 or 30 in the burst; UniCops were not known for subtlety or

conserving ammunition.

The day had started pretty normal all things considered. Waking up at seven, washed and changed by

half seven, at school by eight fifteen ready to begin another day of indoctrination and training. He had

never stood out at school, keeping his head down and avoiding trouble; the standard survival tactic for

anyone growing up under the Unity's watchful gaze. During lunch break, a pair of UniCops had turned

up at his school. Now Toby Smith, or Tobs to his friends, had never done anything to even warrant the

attention of Sector PD, let alone Unity's very own "secret police." When one of his friends ran up to him

on the playground and told him that the UniCops were looking for him, he knew that he was in serious

trouble. Everyone knew that if the UniCops came looking you got lost; anyone they took in "for

questioning" was usually never seen again. That's Toby had vaulted over the school fence and ran.

That's when they had begun chasing him. Overall, the day was turning out pretty lousy.

Down here, at street level, the congested traffic and crowded buildings might give him an advantage.

Ground vehicles would be hard pressed to make it through the traffic and flyers would be unable to

manoeuvre between the towering skyscrapers and arcologies. After the Unification War, the Unity hadrebuilt the devastated Manhattan Island in order to house the refugees from the continent's interior,

fleeing the ecological devastation being inflicted on the former US heartlands. It had meant to be a

showcase for the new regime but like most things the Unity promised, the reality was different from

the newscasts. Forty years after the original was destroyed, Manhattan Island was once again a

towering collection of buildings cramped together on a small and overcrowded island.

All that stood between Toby and relative safety was the drone lane. A section of road reserved for the

sole use of automated cargo drones. Huge articulated lorries, often three or four trailers long, and

travelling at up to 100 kph. Controlled entirely by computers and using satellite navigation, they

stopped for nothing, even if a pedestrian was in their path. Only the largest corporations could afford

to operate the behemoths, and even then, licenses were only granted to those corps that were on good

terms with the Unity. Taking a deep breath, Toby launched himself in to a gap between a pair of AlliedTechnologies trucks. Legs pumping furiously, he was halfway across when he realised he was not going

to make it.

Time seemed to slow down to a crawl and in crystal clarity he could make out every detail of the

truck's grill rushing towards him at bone crunching speed. Instead of leaping out of the way in a futile

attempt to get clear, he boy jumped up. His left foot planted itself firmly on the front of the bonnet,

thrusting downwards and propelling him up and over the front cab, onto the trailer behind and landing

on all fours. Toby looked at his hands in amazement as he crouched on the roof, scarcely believing

what he had just done. He'd always been athletic at school but jumping over the cab of a truck moving

nearly a hundred kilometres per hour to land safely on the trailer behind was practically impossible. He

was still trying to process the thought when a spray of bullets caught him directly in the leg. Losing his

footing, he slipped off the side of the fast moving truck and sailed through the air. His head connectedwith the concrete wall of a building with a snap of breaking bone and his limp body rebounded into a

side alley. It landed in a dumpster, half filled with stagnant water and trash, quickly sinking below the

murky surface as the dumpster's lid slammed down, nudged with the force of the body's fall in to the

dumpster.

"Did you see that shot?" One of the UniCops asked as they forced their way across the road stopping

traffic, "sent that punk flying."



"Our orders were to take the kid in alive, dipshit. Not in a body bag," his older partner retorted,

obviously not impressed by the rookie's over-enthusiasm.

"The brat resisted arrest; you know what these muties are like."

His partner did not respond, he had already reached the pavement near where they had seen the body

hit the wall. There was no sign of the kid, not even a blood splatter or trail to follow. He pressed a stud

on the collar of his helmet, activated the built-in communicator. "Central, unit 219 reporting; we've lost

track of the target."

"Unit 219, sat scan reports that his ID implant is still transmitting in your vicinity." The operator on the

other end said after a few seconds. "We put it within 50 meters of your current location. Can't narrow

it down any further, we've got some interference from the buildings."

"Received Central," he responded with a sigh. "You check that way, I'll go this way. Stay in radio

contact and for chrissakes, use your damn blaster. We need him alive." As his partner stalked off, he

muttered "damn rookie" under his breath.

Back in the alleyway, a head bobbed up out of the water gasping for breath. Toby lifted the lit and

pulled himself out of the dumpster, sitting slumped against it on the floor. Gingerly, he felt his

forehead, where only moments before the bones of his skull had been crushed inwards, and let out a

shudder. "Ok, that was new." Things like that had been happening recently. Cuts healing faster than

they should, not being burned when touching a hot pan. But nothing like getting his neck broken and

his skull crushed in yet still being able to walk away from it just a few minutes later.

"Hey you!" Zap! A blue bolt of energy struck the ground at his feet. "Freeze!" One of the cops, the

rookie, stood at the entrance to the alley with his hand blaster drawn. Toby was beginning to suspect

that he could take a bullet but he wasn't so sure about the stunning energy of a blaster and he had no

intention of finding out. As the cop began to advance, Toby reached for the nearest object, a lump of

stone, and hurled it at the cop's helmet. The stone shot through the air and smashed into the visor

which shattered with the impact. Screaming in pain, and clutching his now broken nose, the cop looked

at the boy with murderous intent in his eyes.

"You little shit, I'm gonna enjoy making you pay for that!" He howled as he drew a combat knife and

charged at the boy. The two grappled in the mud, the knife at the boy's throat. Momentarily stunned

by the ferocity of the attack, Toby locked eyes with the cop as he tried to hold him back.

The look in someone's eyes that wants nothing more than you to be dead is a cold thing, something

that can chill you to the bone the first time you see it. This was it; this was where he was going to die.

Alone, sopping wet in a filthy alley; murdered by a psychotic cop at age fourteen. It was at that point

that Toby snapped. "Fuck that," he thought, "I am not going to let it end like this." With a howl of rage,

he hurled cop against the wall as if he was nothing more than a rag doll. The cop struck the wall hard

and fell to the floor, dazed, dropping the knife.

As the cop groaned, Toby stood up and grabbed the knife, holding it awkwardly. Logically, he knew

that his only chance to escape was to make sure that the cop couldn't follow him. However, for a



fourteen-year-old boy, even one in his situation, that was an option that was difficult for him to

choose. Pausing for only a few seconds, he tucked the combat knife into the back of his pants under

his sweatshirt and ran. The guns he left behind because he knew they could be tracked and they most

likely could only be fired by their authorised owner anyway.

A figure in combat fatigues watched the fleeing boy through a pair of old binoculars from a nearby fire

escape. "Echo Four to Echo Two, target is heading your way." He said into a headset microphone. "He's

going to run into some trouble before then. Is your distraction ready?"

Toby ran out into the next street and raced down the pavement trying to put as much distance as he

could between him and the cop. As he turned the corner, he glanced behind him to make sure the cop

wasn't following him and ran headlong into the cop's partner. The boy was knocked to the floor by a

vicious punch to the head. "That's enough running for you kid," the cop muttered as he shot Toby with

the blaster. Toby screamed as the electrical energy coursed through his system, paralysing his

muscles.

"Toby Smith, citizen ID 7115202 dash beta, you are charged with violation of the genetic security act,"

the cop began as he drew out a set of manacles. "You will be taken into custody where your mutations

will be analysed. Once your abilities have been catalogued, you will be terminated." He crouched down

to look the boy in the eye, his tone softening slightly. "I'm sorry; your file says you're a good kid.

Maybe if you hadn't ran you could have been recruited, but the law says runners get executed. Them's

the breaks unfortunately."

The cop was reaching down to cuff Toby's hands behind his back when the blast of a horn caused him

to turn around just in time to see a cargo drone swerve from its assigned lane, through the safety

barrier and onto the pavement. Toby, still paralysed, was unable to move as the hulk bore down upon

them and he could only watch as the cop leapt to safety, leaving him in the path of the runaway

behemoth. At the last moment however, the truck swerved to the side following the cop. With a

sickening crunch, it ran headlong into him, leaving behind a bloody smear on the pavement. Withanother blast of its horn, the drone crashed back through the barrier and rejoined the flow of traffic as

if nothing had happened.

He was still trying to make sense of what had just happened when he was enveloped by a white glow.

A fraction of a second later he vanished leaving behind no trace that he was ever there.

A figure watching the scene from a nearby footbridge spoke into a throat mike. "Echo One, this is Echo

Two, package is delivered did you get him?"

Several kilometres away and over two hundred meters underground, a man stood over an unconscious

Toby, a tranquillizer gun in his hand. "Package received Echo Two. Good work people, everyone get

back to base. Oh, an Echo Three, we need to have a word about that distraction of yours."

Chapter 2

Intro: Toby wakes up to his new life.



16:22 June 19th, 2049

200m below Sector 23

Toby woke with a pounding headache and a ringing in his ears. Cracking open an eye and groaning

slightly, he looked around. He was lying in a bed surrounded by beeping equipment, and judging by

the vague antiseptic smell, it was in some sort of hospital room. Along with from the bed he was lying

in and the medical equipment, the room contained two other unoccupied beds and several computer

displays which were currently turned off. A clock mounted on the wall opposite the bed indicated that

he had been unconscious for over three hours. As he propped himself up on his elbows, he tried to

recall what he was doing in hospital. Had he been in some sort of accident? Looking at himself, he

didn't seem to be injured, although he did notice that under the blanket he was stark naked.

As he tried to process what was going on, he began to remember the last few hours in flashes.

Fragments of memory barely connected to one another. The UniCops at school. Vaulting over a four-

meter barbed wire fence. Being chased through the streets. Being shot in the leg. Surviving a broken

neck and crushed skull. The cop with the knife. Being stunned and paralysed. A cargo drone swerving

off the road. The wet crunch as it hit the cop. The red smear being left behind then a flash of blinding

white light.

Toby was now sitting bolt upright in near panic, his mind racing from one worst case scenario to the

next. One of the two doors into the room opened and a young woman, no older than twenty backed

into the room carrying something. She was wearing black jeans, black trainers and a loose-fitting

white shirt. Her long blond hair was tied back into a ponytail. As she turned, Toby could see that she

was wearing a silver chain around her neck and was carrying a digital clipboard with two cans of cola

balanced on it in one hand and two shrink-wrapped sandwiches in the other. Whoever she was, she

certainly didn't fit the picture of the stereotypical UniCop.

Seeing that he was awake, the woman smiled and tossed one of the sandwiches over to him.

"Thought you might be hungry. Didn't know what you might like but cheese seemed the safestchoice." She followed up the sandwich with the cola can. "And you can never have too much liquid

sugar in your system."

"Er," Toby began, "no offence, but who the hell are you, where the hell am I, and what the fuck

happened to my clothes!"

She laughed as she pulled up a chair and began to munch on her sandwich. "Ok, in that order, my

names Sarah and I'm the one who brought you here. You're in a safe place where the Unity can't find

you and you're clothes are in a plastic bag under the bed. You were soaking wet after that dumpster

dive of yours. They were filthy and you'd have probably caught pneumonia or worse if we'd left them

on you so I had them dried out."

Toby sat back, only partially satisfied by Sarah's answer. "Safe? One minute I'm being chased by

Uni's who want to kill for some reason, there's a flash of light and then there's a guy standing over

me with a tranq gun. Before I can do anything he shoots me and then I wake up naked in a hospital

bad. Lady, you got a funny idea of safe."



"Sorry about that," Sarah said apologetically, "we didn't know the full extent of your abilities and

Talbot didn't want you panicking; you could've done serious damage to the base and yourself."

"Huh?" Toby said, his forehead furrowed in confusion, "what do you mean abilities? And what am I

doing here?"

Sarah looked at him carefully for a few seconds, then her eyes widened in realisation. "He doesn't

know," she thought to himself, "he has no idea."

The way she was looking at him unnerved Toby. "What?"

"When you arrived at school this morning, your attendance was registered by scanning your ID

implant as you entered the classroom."

"So?"

She went to explain how the implants that every citizen of the Unity received shortly after their birth

had a hidden function. They had the ability to test the blood of the host and look for certain genetic

markers. They weren't capable of a full DNA scan; all they were capable of was detecting the

presence of active mutant genes. One in four people are born in dormant mutant genes, another fact

that few people were aware of, and only in tiny majority were they ever activated. She paused and

studied Toby's confused expression. At first Sarah thought he didn't get what she was trying to tell

him, but she slowly began to realise that wasn't it. Toby knew, or at least he suspected, the boy just

didn't want to admit it, especially to himself.

"There's no easy way to say this," she said, deciding to come straight to the point, "at eight fifteen

this morning, as you entered your classroom, your implant was instructed to perform a routine

genetic scan. Later that morning, the results were sent back to the Unity reporting that active mutant

genes had been detected and a two man UniCop snatch squad was sent to arrest you."

"I'm a ... a mutant?" Toby asked, whispering and looking down at his hands, "but I can't be."

"Trust me; removing the implant from someone who regenerates as fast as you is not easy. As soon

as I made an incision, you healed it back up." Toby's eyes widened as what she was telling him

started to sink in. "It was a real hack job, I had to get someone to hold the hole open with their

hands while I cut the implant out from under your heart."

"You cut me open!" he shouted, staring at her in indignant shock.

"Of course," Sarah said shrugging. "We put a fake implant in to replace the one we took out. You

can't reprogram the ones the Unity put in, but the one that's in there now can be reprogrammed with

a new ID with the right tools."



Toby looked down again, his hand running across his bare chest where there no sign of a surgical

scar. Deep down, as much as he might want to deny it, he knew that it was true. The fast healing

cuts, leaping on to that cargo drone, recovering from a broken neck and a crushed skull, all of it

made sense if he was a mutant; no normal human being could have done those things. "I feel sick,"

he said quietly, looking pale.

Sarah consulted the display next to the bed and tapped a few things on the clipboard. "That's a

normal side-effect of the drugs. It should pass in an hour or two. We didn't want you to wake up mid-

op. THAT would have been messy." She laughed at the last bit. Toby just grimaced meekly.

He sat in silence looking down, not even touching the unopened sandwich. Sarah got up and threw

her empty wrapper in the trash before turning back to the boy. "Look kid, get dressed. Talbot, that

big mean man who tranqed you, wants to talk to you and he can probably explain things better than I

can. I'll be waiting outside when you're done." She left him alone in the room, closing the door behind

her.

His head was swimming with a thousand unasked and unanswered questions. Reaching under the

bed, he pulled out the plastic bag containing his clothes. The dirty marks from the stagnant water

were gone but there was still a slight discolouration around the bullet holes in his shorts, dried

remnants of blood. At least they were dry. Still feeling a little numb, he pulled on the knee-length

grey shorts and his red hooded top.

As he stood up, a sudden wave of nausea flooded over him. Looking around frantically, he saw the

other door in the room was marked toilet. Clutching his mouth, he leapt over the bed and sprinted

across the room. He threw the door open and just made it to the sink in time before he could no

longer hold the contents of his stomach down, vomiting up his lunch. After a few heaves his stomach

was empty and he gulped down some water from the sink tap to get rid of the acrid taste. Wiping his

mouth with the back of his sleeve, he looked in the mirror. His face was pale and his eyes puffy and

red.

It was at that point that everything that he had been suppressing and avoided thinking about since all

this had started finally came crashing down on to him. Toby Smith was a mutant and an enemy of the

state; a freak and a traitor. The Unity would be looking for him now, and if they found him, they

would probably kill him. He could never go home, that would be the first place they would look for. As

far as his family was concerned, he might as well be dead. Knowing the Unity, they had probably

already told his family that he'd been executed and his body incinerated in the city's waste

incinerator. His life, as he had known it, was over. His legs buckled at the knees and the tears that he

could no longer contain finally burst free; he lay on the floor sobbing.

Sarah stood outside the door listening to the boy crying. "Poor kid," she thought, "it's not every daythat you learn the authorities want you dead." Thinking back, she remembered when the Unity had

come for her five years ago. She hadn't been much older than him and she'd cried for days, prepared

to give anything to see her friends or her parents again.

After a few minutes, he seemed to calm down and he opened the door, joining her in the corridor.

He'd cleaned himself up but he still seemed a little delicate. Sarah knew better than to push him

about what had happened after she'd left him alone.



Sarah started walking down the corridor, Toby following silently behind. He glanced curiously at the

walls as they walked. Unlike the clean and white walls of the infirmary, the walls out here were dirty

and grey. The cracked concrete looked old and in places, faded and illegible markings were still visible

on the wall. "Just where are we?"

"In a bunker 200 meters below ground," said Sarah. "Apparently, this place was some sort of bomb

shelter during the Cold War or something."

"What's the Cold War?"

"It was this big war between two countries. It happened before the Unification War but there was no

actual fighting."

"Hmph, don't sound like much of a war," Toby mumbled.

They passed several doors marked unsafe "Unsafe: Do Not Enter". One corridor branching off from

the one they were walking down was barred with wire mesh, beyond which Toby could see the rubble

of a collapsed ceiling. The general state of repair didn't exactly fill Toby with confidence about the

bunkers structural stability.

Eventually, after a climbing flight of stairs, they emerged into a large and well lit room. The room was

dominated by a large table in its centre surrounded by several chairs. At one end, a large video

screen was mounted on the wall. It was currently showing what Toby assumed to be a dozen feeds

from security cameras. Disks and data chips were scattered over the table. They were also not alone,

two other people in the room waiting for them.

Sitting at the table was a boy not much older than Toby wearing ratty blue jeans, a white long

sleeved t-shirt and an orange sweatshirt with cut-off sleeves. A deep scar crossed the brow of his

nose, spanning the full width of his face just under his eyes. He was glaring at Toby for some reason,

hostility in his eyes.

From across the room, a young Hispanic man waved and walked over. He looked to be about twenty

and his long dark-red hair was held out of his face by a headband. Unlike Sarah and the boy at the

table, he was dressed in a more militant style; wearing combat pants with an urban camouflage

pattern, black trainers, a grey shirt and a tan coloured military style utility vest over the top. Tribal

style sleeve tattoos covered his arms and he had a single gold earring in his left ear.

Sarah smiled and greeted him with a brief hug before turning back to Toby and introducing him.

"Toby, this is Jared. He's what you might call our wheelman." Jared smiled and grasped Toby's hand.

"He's also our resident mechanical genius. Pretty much keeps everything here running."

"If it's got wings, I can fly it. If it has wheels, I can drive. If it 'aint got neither I can still make it

break the speed limit and evade the cops." Jared boasted with a slight grin. "I saw how you handled

that UniCop in the alleyway. Pretty cool. You ever play baseball? You've got a great pitching arm kid,

nailed that cop right in the face with that rock."



"Not really, I'm more into combat hockey," Toby replied, still a little bewildered.

"Great, another one. Does no one on the East Coast play baseball anymore?"

While Jared and Toby talked, the boy at the table pushed his chair back and moved over to the group.

As he approached, Sarah rolled her eyes. "And this charming young man is..."

"So this is the little runt whose arse we saved?" the boy interrupted looking Toby right in the eye, an

obvious challenge. To Toby's surprise, he had a British accent.

"As I was saying, this is Tommy and..." Sarah attempted to continue.

"What's your problem huh?" Toby countered, squaring up to Tommy. The two boys now stood only a

few inches apart.

"I can't believe we risked our lives for this ... this runt." Tommy spat dismissively. "I mean he's

nothing more than some brainwashed arco-brat; force fed that subliminal shit they shovel out in the

schools."

"Hey, maybe you should leave him..."Jared began, although there was little chance he would finish

the sentence before one of the two boys cut him off.

"I don't have to stand here and listen to this." Toby turned and started to walk away.

Tommy laughed before continuing in a fake American accent. "Yeah, why don't go home and cry tomommy?"

Toby stopped in his tracks; his shoulders hunched and his fists balled. He turned and faced the

Tommy, his face flushed red. "What did you say?" He said slowly and deliberately.

"You heard me, why don't you just curl up on the floor again and cry." He punctuated his statement

with a sharp shove to Toby's shoulder.

Jared looked at Sarah and mouthed "here we go" before looking over at the man that had quietly

entered the room at the start of the argument. The man appeared to be in his late twenties with shortbrown hair and brown stubble on his chin. He wore dark grey cargo pants, black combat boots and an

open dark grey khaki jacket. On the right shoulder was a patch of the old US flag. Underneath the

jacket was a simple white t-shirt. Leaning against the wall, he was watching the confrontation with

bemused interest.

"Touch me again," Toby said calmly but with a hint of menace "and you'll be sorry."



Tommy tried to shove him in the shoulder again but Toby batted the hand away. "Ooh, tough guy."

"Back off scar face." The instant Toby uttered those words he regretted them. Tommy's face flashed

red with anger and he lashed, aiming a punch to at Toby's face. The younger boy instantly caught

Tommy's fist in a blur of motion. With his free hand he shoved Tommy in the chest, forcing him back

a meter. Without hesitation, Tommy leapt forward kicking out at Toby's left side. Toby span to the

side, avoiding the blow, using the momentum to respond with a spin kick of his own. Tommy, the

more experienced fighter, stopped the spin dead by grabbing on to Toby's foot with both hands. He

lost his grip when Toby jumped back, landing in a crouch. Tommy adopted a martial arts stance as

Toby charged forward.

As the two boys fought Sarah and Jared moved over to the man. "So Talbot," Sarah began, "can

those two actually hurt each other?"

Talbot shrugged, "Short answer no. Long answer yes but not permanently."

"Where's Kai?" asked Jared.

"He's out getting supplies. It's handy being the only one not wanted by the government for being a

terrorist."

Toby and Tommy exchanged a flurry of punches and kicks; both seemed evenly matched. Tommy

seemed to rely on pure hitting power whereas Toby was the more agile of the two. After a few

minutes, both boys were sporting rapidly fading bruises but surprisingly few blows had connected.

Talbot stepped away from the wall, put two fingers in his mouth and whistled loudly. "Ok you two,

that's enough. Break it up." Instantly, Tommy somersaulted back from the fight, obviously showing

off. His entire demeanour changed, all trace of hostility vanished and He held his hands up in a

placating gesture.

"Easy there mate, just testing ya," he managed between breaths. Unlike Toby, Tommy was still trying

to catch his breath. "Haven't had a work out like that in a long while." Toby, a little confused, looked

at the other boy who was now grinning. "Sorry about that whole cry baby thing, no hard feelings

right?" He took a step forward holding his hand out.

Toby, still a little wary, stepped forward and took the hand. "If you can forget about scar face thing

then I guess we can call it even."

"Sure. Looks like I've finally found someone in this group worth sparring with. Now, if I'm not

mistaken," he continued while flicking a look at Talbot, "I'm about to be told to go and clean the

hydroponic waste vats." In response, Talbot just raised an eyebrow in an unspoken order. Without

complaint, he made his way to the door. As he backed out, he turned to Toby and raised his hand in

mock salute.

"Oh yeah, welcome to BetaForce."



CHAPTER 3

Intro: The UniCops make a move against the family of a BetaForce member, but the team is

there to stop them.

16:30 June 19th, 2049

Westgate Arcology, Sector 23

The door to the 65th floor apartment flew open as a pint-sized, dark-haired ball of energy ran

in through the door, heading the direction of the living room; shoes and coat dumped

unceremoniously on the floor as the young boy ran in. A few seconds later, a teenage boy

entered carrying bags of groceries. The bags blocked his view and he stumbled forward over

the discarded items, dropping the bags. A quick wave of his hand and the bags halted in mid

fall, suspended motionless in the air. "Lee, how many times have I told you about those

damn shoes!" he yelled half-heartedly; he knew the chances that his cousin would listen were

remote.

"Hey Kai, what's for dinner?" was all the response he got.

Eighteen year old Kai had a slight build, with dark skin; darker than his cousin's and

indicative of his Japanese-Hawaiian ancestry. He was clean-shaven with scruffy murky blond

hair. His unkempt, almost uncontrollable hair was kept back by a red bandanna style

headband. The long baggy blue jeans he wore trailed along the ground and he wore a white

short-sleeved t-shirt underneath a black vest, the logo on which was off a local combat

hockey team. Tattooed on his forearms were the kanji symbols for courage and as he

shrugged off his backpack and let it fall to the floor, the metal karabiners attached to it

clinked noisily.

Picking up the groceries from mid-air, he back-kicked the door closed. "I swear that boy is

going to kill me one of these days," he muttered, dodging the skateboard and bike lying on

the floor in the middle of the entryway. "And you better get this lot cleaned up before your

dad gets home."

As he entered the apartment, a feminine electronic voice made itself known. "Welcome back

Kai. You have five new messages one of which is from Kiba. You also asked me to remind you

to complete the college application form by Monday the 21st of this month."

"Play uncle's message."

"Message received today at fourteen oh nine. Message begins."

"Kai, I've got to work late again tonight. There's a couple of frozen pizzas in the freezer for

you and Lee. Make sure Lee does his homework and gets to bed by nine if I'm not back

before then. See you tonight."



"Message ends. Do you wish to review the other four messages?"

"No, I'll listen to them later."

The lights came on in the kitchen as he entered, triggered by the motion sensor registering

his presence. He dropped the groceries on the metal counter and reached for the freezer

door. An electronic post-it note on the freezer's smart display caught his attention. "Oven's

bust." Uncle Kiba must have forgotten about that when he left the message earlier. Ignoring

it, he pulled a large pepperoni pizza out of the freezer. "Oi, sprocket, pepperoni ok with you?"

he yelled in the direction of his cousin in the living room. Over the din of the latest episode of

Jake Danger: Mutant Hunter he got a vague affirmative response.

After unwrapping the pizza, he placed it on a baking tray and pulled out a silver permanent

marker. As he etched a series of glyphs on the black surface of the tray, he called out to Lee.

"Anything interesting happen in school today?"

"Nah, not much 'cept a bunch a Uni's running around," the younger boy said from the living

room.

The glyphs faded from sight and he reached for the emergency flashlight stored in the

cupboard above the counter. "UniCops? What did they want?" He said trying to keep his voice

neutral.

"Miss Anderson said that it was just a routine visit checking up on security but she was

lying."

"How do you know she was lying?" As he listened to his cousin, he checked the battery in the

flashlight. Satisfied that there was enough power, he bit the end of his finger and traced a

complex diagram on the lens in his own blood.

"She always scratches her nose and fiddles with her glasses every time she tells us

something she knows isn't true." Lee explained. "Like the time she taught us about the

bioterror attack on Africa and the quarantine afterwards. 'sides Billy said they were after

some 9th grader who jumped the school fence and ran off."

Kai held the torch over the frozen pizza and turned it on. As the light passed through the

blood diagram, it was converted into heat and magnified several dozen times. The now

invisible silver glyphs on the baking tray also acted as a temporal compression circle

increasing the speed of time on the tray and its contents. The effect was to turn the flashlight

and the baking tray into a jury-rigged microwave. After a couple of minutes, he had to swap

hands holding the heavy flashlight; he may be able to violate the fundamental laws of the

universe but he couldn't do anything about stopping his arm from getting tired.

As the pizza quickly cooked, he thought about what his cousin had told him. That 9th grader

was probably the one his team had tried to get to before the UniCops. From what Lee had



said, it sounded like they had cut it pretty close. He asked the apartment's computer to show

him the text of the other four messages on the freezer's smart display. As he expected, the

last one was a coded message from Virus, Tommy's online handle. "Package received intact,

little wear and tear but nothing serious." Relieved, he went back to quizzing Lee on the rest

of his day.

Five minutes later the pizza was cooked, and after letting stand for a minute to cool, he took

it into the living room along with a couple of plates. Jake Danger was leading a squad of

valiant Unity Soldiers against a mutant stronghold, gunning down the evil terrorists with his

twin Pacifier assault rifles. "How can you watch this shit?" Kai mumbled between mouthfuls of

pizza.

----

Talbot had taken Toby to his office, motioning him to sit down. "So, history lesson 101,"

Talbot began as he walked over to a fridge in the corner, "a long time ago in a galaxy far

away there was a super team called Alpha Force." He opened the fridge, pulled out two

bottles of beer and passed one to Toby.

"You do realise I'm only fourteen right?" He asked the older man as he held the beer.

"Oh please, you're a teenage boy living in the big city. I'm sure you know of at least four

stores that don't ask for ID when buying a six-pack of beer. Besides, after what you've been

through today, you deserve something a little stronger than fizzy pop." Talbot took a swig

from his bottle as he sat down opposite Toby.

"Now where was I ... ahh yes, Alpha Force. Before the Unification War, Lucifer's victory and

the rise of the Unity, Alpha Force was the world's greatest team of superheroes. Along with

the EU's EuroForce, the UN's Overwatch, and independent teams like Legion and the Army of

Light, they kept the world safe from supervillains and global disasters. They were good at

their jobs too." Talbot paused for a second, with a distant expression on his face as if

remembering something from long ago. "A little too good perhaps. You see whenever some

major league bad guy showed up; the hero teams would take them down. When some tin-pot

dictatorship started ethnic cleansing or invaded a neighbouring country, by the time the

international community had decided on the wording of their statement of condemnation, the

heroes had already gone and sorted it out. Even on a local level, the indie heroes helped

keep crime levels down." As Talbot got up and began pacing, Toby began to suspect that this

was a common rant of his.

"When Lucifer took out Alpha Force with a single shot and shut down the world's

infrastructure, his minions were taking out the other teams at the same time; a coordinated

worldwide strike. With our protectors gone, everything started to fall apart and we realised

how dependent we were on them. You see, we'd gotten complacent and started relying on

them. By the time Lucifer made his play in Washington the world didn't really know how to

deal with a crisis on that scale any more. Some tried to fight, to resist Lucifer's new regime.

But for most, survival was the priority. After the pulse, supplies in the cites ran out pretty

quickly. There was looting and rioting everywhere, what was left of the government folded

within a couple weeks. Then came the collapse of the biosphere in the central states. The



Unity blamed it on biological and chemical attacks by terrorists and massive climatic

upheavals. But anyone with an ounce of sense knew that was a lie. With the grain belt gone,

people began to starve. So called relief efforts were confined to the coastal cities where the

Unity had total control and as the centre of the continent became uninhabitable that's where

everyone fled. A similar thing happened to Africa. They had a quite successful resistance

going until Lucifer just got tired and ordered the entire continent dusted with bioweapons

wiping out the entire population. Sure it was blamed on a terrorist's bioattack gone horribly

wrong, but nobody back then bought it. The message was clear, fuck with the Unity and they

gang bang back."

"Why are you telling me all this?" Toby asked a little confused as to where Talbot was going.

Talbot sat back in his chair and looked at Toby.

"To try and make you understand the world that YOU live in and what it is that we face. After

Africa everybody was terrified at what the Unity would do if people tried to rebel. Now, after

30 years of propaganda filled with subliminal programming and chemicals like G26 Paxilon-

Hydrochlorate in the food and water, people don't want to rebel."

"Can you blame them? Pollution levels in the ECM are less than 10% of New York's before

Unification. The ECM has a population of 200 million compared to New York's 10, which

makes that reduction all the more impressive." Toby wasn't convinced by his own arguments,

that much was clear from the lack of conviction in his voice. "Thanks to synthetic foodstuffs

and urban AgroTowers, famine has all but been abolished and climate modification

technology has repaired most of the damage done by the Polynational Era. The planet's not

been in better shape in the last hundred years!"

----

"Unit Delta Six," said Central's voice over their headsets, "sat scan confirms that the targets

are still located in their apartment."

Officer Travis rubbed his nose as his commander talked with Central. His nose had only

recently been healed by the med techs after the run in with that young mutant earlier in the

day. A run in that had cost the life of his older partner. He was itching for some "occupational

therapy," as his instructor had once put it.

"Be careful men," the squad commander advised, "as far as we know, our targets do not

possess any metahuman abilities but take no chances." With a flick of his finger, the

commander ordered the six-man squad of UniCops to move out and they began to approach

the target's apartment. They positioned themselves around the door and the commander

signalled to one of his men stationed at the building security centre to override the locking

mechanism, granting them access. He held his hand up; fingers outstretched and began a

silent countdown.

----



Talbot sighed; this wasn't going as easy as he had hoped it would. "Are you seriously going

to defend a government that tried to have you gunned down on the street less than three

hours ago?" Toby looked away and shook his head. "I thought not. The fact is that all that

'progress' was done with a gun to our heads. But in a way you're right. Over half the

population believe the lie. Most of the rest know they're being lied to and either don't believe

anything can be done about it or think returning to the chaos of the Unification War is not an

option. Only a tiny minority can see that there is something terribly wrong with the world and

have the courage to do anything about it." The man smiled as he remembered a line from an

old movie, a quote the movie itself had taken from one of the most important documents in

history. It was oddly appropriate given the current situation. "Someone once said µwhen a

long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same object, evinces a design

to reduce them under absolute despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such

government, and provide new guards for their future security.'"

"And in English?"

"When there's something wrong, those with the ability to do something about it have the

responsibility to act."

Toby looked down at the table and took a deep gulp from the beer bottle in front of him.

"Let's cut the crap okay, the only reason you're telling me any of this is you want me to sign

up with your little rebellion." He stood up, leaning forward with both hands planted firmly on

the table glaring at Talbot. "Thanks for saving my ass and everything, but what help could I

be? I'm still in school for chrissakes!"

Talbot looked at him for a second, the silence hanging between them. Then, in one swift

motion, he reached behind him and pulled out a handgun, aiming it at Toby's forehead; the

end of the muzzle just a few centimetres from the boy's face, the laser sight illuminating his

forehead. Toby froze, not moving an inch. The only sign of a reaction on his face was a slightwidening of his eyes. "Despite the fact that you're still just a kid you are the strongest person

on this base, not to mention the fastest and most agile. If I pulled this trigger you'd be back

up and in my face within fifteen seconds max." Putting the gun down on the table he

continued. "Plus you didn't even flinch when a near-stranger pointed a gun straight at your

face. You've got the guts and the ability and I know you're not stupid."

Toby sat back down; let out the breath he had been subconsciously holding and took an even

bigger gulp from the bottle. "Interesting recruitment technique you get there," he paused

while he tried to think, "Okay, let's say I wanted in. What would ..."

He was interrupted when a wall mounted phone started to ring. "Hold that thought," Talbotsaid holding up a finger as he walked over and picked up the handset. "This is Talbot, go

ahead." Toby couldn't hear who was on the other end but from Talbot's expression, it was not

good news. Talbot glanced at Toby, his face grim. After a couple of minutes, he hung up and

pulled out a handheld communicator. "Just got a message from Spectre, we need to intercept

a UniCop snatch squad ASAP. Everyone to the hanger bay on the double. Tommy, do your

thing and get Kai." He turned to Toby as he started to leave. "Looks like we'll have to

continue this conversation later."



As Talbot got to the door, Toby stood up and caught up with him. "Look, if you need a hand I

could..."

Before he could finish, Talbot turned around and put a hand on the boy's shoulder. "Maybe

next time Toby. This time I really need you to stay here until we get back." With that, he

turned and began running down the corridor towards the hanger.

Toby watched him leave angrily. "So much for having the ability," he muttered under his

breath.

----

Mercifully, Kai's mobile rang giving him a convenient excuse to slip out and not endure any

more of Jake Danger: Mutant Hunter. He left the living room and headed to his bedroom in

order to not disturb his cousin and to ensure that the conversation was not overheard.

"S'up Tommy ... Ok, see you as soon as I can." As he ended the call, he heard the front door

open.

----

On zero, Travis opened the door and quietly entered the apartment. He was taking point

partly because of the screw up that happened when he and his partner and been sent to

apprehend an unregistered mutant at school earlier that day. Travis had also volunteered for

this operation and had asked to take point; he had a score to settle.

Advancing into the apartment, he could hear the sounds of a TV in the living room. Raising

his stunner, he took aim at the small figure silhouetted by the screen.

----

Kai stepped out into the hallway just as his uncle walked in the door. Hearing his father call

out "I'm home," Lee ran out of the living room and into his Kiba's waiting arms. Kai waited a

second as his uncle said hello to his son before interrupting.

"Stacy just called," Lee wrinkled his nose and made puking sounds as he heard what heassumed was the name of Kai's girlfriend, "her computer's down again and she needs my

help." His uncle, on the other hand, recognised the code phrase and simply nodded.

"Don't be out too late; I need some help with the shop's inventory tomorrow."

"I won't." Kai knew his uncle worried about him and he wasn't happy that his nephew was

part of BetaForce. However Kiba understood why Kai had chosen to fight the Unity. Kiba's



brother and Kai's father had been a street mage living in Honolulu and had been killed trying

to liberate the island from Unity control eighteen years ago. Kiba had never known his father

or mother; his father dying before he had been born and his mother fleeing the islands after

giving birth to her son. Kiba had held off telling Kai about his parents, partly out of worrying

that his nephew would do something stupid and partly because he didn't know how to explain

to kid that his old man was a mage who got himself and lot of people killed. He finally told

Kai the truth after Kai turned thirteen. The boy's latent magical abilities had begun to

manifest but the boy did not know how to control them. Kai's mother had left a set of

notebooks written by Kai's father. They were part journal, part treatise on magic. Learning

magic helped Kai focus and settle down but it also ignited a desire to make the Unity pay for

everything they had done. Kiba couldn't stop his nephew from doing what he believed in;

secretly he was proud of his nephew for following his conditions. He did lay down two

conditions, that Lee never find out what his cousin gets up to and that he never bring

BetaForce personnel or business home with him. Kai readily agreed, he respected his uncle

too much to put his adoptive family in danger.

"Be careful," Kiba whispered quietly, as Kai closed the front door carrying his backback.

Kai hurried down the corridor towards the emergency stairs. The door on this level had

thankfully had its alarm disabled by an enterprising young mutant with technopathic powers,

as had the security cameras on either side. Making sure that nobody was watching, he

quickly opened the door and slipped through.

The lights were flickering in the stairwell, more off than on, and the air smelt stale. Using the

flashlight on his mobile, he located a patch of graffiti on the wall; a stylised leopard with tiny

Japanese characters in place of spots. Kai placed the fingers of both hands very carefully on a

set of specific spots and uttered the word "Kendra." A split second later, he was sucked into

the wall.

----

Jared sat behind the controls of the Tank, the team's primary vehicle. It resembled the

bastard love child of an APC and a stubby winged aircraft. Two swivel-mounted thrusters

mounted on each side of its lifting body fuselage provided propulsion and small folding wings,

insufficient to provide any lift, acted as stabilizers along with a pair of vertical fins at the

vehicle's rear. The ten-meter long body was covered in dark grey armour plates, hexagonal

in shape. The plates themselves were in turn coated in chameleon paint, providing reduced

visibility and limited stealth capabilities. Two pods on the roof contained micromissiles and a

large autocannon mounted beneath the cockpit completed its armaments. As the craft

completed its boot up sequence, Jared quickly pulled on a set of charcoal grey camouflaged

fatigues. Behind him, Sarah was pulling a set of her own from a storage locker. Both of theirfaces flush from what they had been doing in the Tank when the emergency call had come

through. Although Talbot had not exactly banned relationships between team mates, they

were guessed that the older man might not approve.

A console flickered and Tommy appeared in his seat accompanied by a burst of static,

already in uniform, of the benefits of teleportation. Seconds later Talbot bounded up the rear

loading ramp, hitting the close button as he passed it. "Kai's on his way, he'll be ready when

we get there," Tommy reported as Talbot passed him.



"Good," Talbot responded as he sat down, fastening his safety harness, "I need you to get to

the Hudson Arcoplex in quadrant 3 and see if you can shut down comms in that area."

"You got it boss." Without bothering to unbuckle, he shifted back to digital form and

vanished.

"Jared, let's get this hunk of metal on the road so to speak, as soon as we're airborne I'll fill

you two in on our targets."

----

Left alone in the office, Toby began to pace up and down the briefing room. Talbot had made

this big speech about responsibility and making a stand; trying tried to persuade him to join

their group. However, the moment he had offered his help he was back to being treated like

a kid. Balling his fists, he finished off the beer and started down the corridor that Talbot had

ran down. He got to the hanger bay just in time to see the dust left behind as the Tank

accelerated up the exit ramp.

Looking around, he saw that the hanger bay contained several vehicles. A couple of generic

commercial vehicles, two ground cars, a long range cargo plane and even a familiar looking

two trailer cargo drone complete with blood stains on the front grill. Nestled between these,

Toby saw exactly what he was looking for, a hovercycle. The keys were even in the ignition.

Without a second's hesitation, he leapt aboard, gunned the engine, and roared off.

Chapter 4

Intro: BetaForce swing into action to prevent the UniCop snatch squad from completing their

mission

16:45 June 19th, 2049

Hudson Arco Complex, Sector 23

"We're approaching the rendezvous point, you ready Sarah?" Jared called over his shoulder

as he swooped the Tank down towards the roof of the Westgate Arcology.

Sarah stood at the Tank's side door, clipping on a safety harness. "Just about," she said into

the headset microphone. She slapped the release button and the door slid open, the wind

buffeting the interior the craft. On the rapidly approaching roof, she could just make out a

figure in dark grey camos similar to hers, hunched by a graffiti strewn ventilation grill. It was

Kai, waiting for them at the usual rendezvous point. Sarah focused on the figure and held the

microphone to her mouth. "I've got visual, keep her steady Jared. I don't want Kai

materialising upside down again." As the Tank streaked over Kai, she held out her hand and



pointed at him. He was enveloped in a white light and vanished only to reappear at the back

of the Tank's cabin. She closed the door while Talbot gave Jared the go ahead to continue on

to the Hudson Arco Complex.

----

Tommy's digital form coalesced next to a chandelier-like structure of blue light. It

represented one of the many cell towers in quadrant three that served the residents of the

Hudson Arco Complex. In the distance, he could see the glow of the rest clearly against the

inky blackness. Flashes of blue light connected them while others raced out into the ether.

Each mote of light represented a communication packet or computer instruction. Tommy was

never sure whether this was what communication networks really looked like from the inside

or whether this was simply how his mind decided to interpret the sensory information he

received while in digital form. Either way, he thought it was beautiful, a universe of stars and

fireworks that only he could perceive.

He watched the pattern of lights inside the structure for a few seconds, studying the flow of

data through the cell tower's system. Then, carefully, he reached between the threads of

light and grasped the core of the system's programming. Squeezing hard, he restricted and

blocked the flow of data through the core, overwhelming its programming and security

software; almost as if he was throttling the life out of it. The light within spluttered and died,

leaving only a few flickering embers.

"Now," he said, "for the tricky part." Tommy reached into his pocket and pulled out a glowing

red spark. He gently placed the spark on the now dark core and pressed down on it, pushing

it deep into the system. Finally, he leaned forwards and breathed gently on it. Slowly red

glow spread throughout the core and into the matrix of data conduits around it. Soon he was

standing in front of a red version of the blue structure that had been present before. He

shielded his eyes in preparation for the next move. With a mental command, he instructedthe cell tower to transmit the new system software to the other cell towers in quadrant three.

It complied instantly and several jagged bolts of red lightning lashed out and struck the other

towers which soon took on the same red hue. Once all the towers were infected, instead of

relaying the motes of light they began to repeatedly emit a bright red flash that swept

outwards extinguishing all the other lights. "That should hold for a couple of hours," he

thought to himself. His work done, Tommy closed his eyes and shifted back to the real world.

----

Kai buckled himself and looked around the cabin. "Isn't the new kid coming along?"

Talbot loaded a clip into an assault rifle before responding. "No, he's staying behind."

Kai looked surprised at this. "Huh? If I was him no force on Earth could stop..." he stopped

mid-sentence and looked at Talbot as he suddenly realised the situation. "Jesus Talbot, you

didn't tell him did you? You didn't tell him who the targets were."



"I felt it best that for the time being that he not know. It'd only worry him unduly."

"The kid has a right to know that ..." Kai began before he was interrupted by Talbot.

"The last thing I need is an emotionally unstable teenager panicking and screwing this

mission up."

Tommy reappeared back in his seat. "All the cell towers in quadrant three are now emitting a

broad spectrum jamming field which should render all communication devices in the area

unusable. It should also play havoc with sat scan as well."

Talbot nodded at Tommy before turning back to Kai, his voice slightly softer. "Besides, he still

needs to process what's already happened to him. At the end of the day, BetaForce does not

put minors in combat situations unless we are sure they can handle it." He glanced at Tommy

who was busy checking his equipment and weapons before continuing. "Unlike the Unity, we

don't like training children to be soldiers."

"ETA 30 seconds," stated Jared from the cockpit as they banked left and descended until they

were flying down an artificial canyon formed by skyscrapers. Their target, the massive

Hudson Arco Complex stood directly ahead. Its five arcology towers standing tall; their upper

stories hidden by the low cloud.

----

Travis was whistling when he shoved the last of the prisoners, a little girl, into the van. The

operation had gone off without a hitch. Although the father had managed to get a lucky hit in

before he was stunned. For his troubles, he had earned a nasty head wound and a

concussion and Travis had particularly enjoyed administering the post stun beating.

The squad's three vehicles, a prisoner transport van and two escort vehicles, were parked in

the sky garage on the 50th floor of the tower, a quarter of the way up. Surrounding the

convoy was a detachment of police officers from the local Sector PD. None of them looked

happy to be there as there was little love lost between the two forces. The chronically

underfunded Sector PD was responsible for law enforcement, keeping the peace and

providing a public service. On the other hand, the UniCops solely concerned themselves with

enforcing the authority of the Unity, frequently breaking the law themselves in the pursuit of

their duty. Something that Sector PD could do nothing about and caused much resentment

towards the UniCops on the part of Sector PD officers.

Travis and the other UniCops ignored the police officers as they congratulated themselves.

Suddenly, a squeal of static caused UniCop and Sector Cop alike to clutch their earpieces.

The commander of the UniCops tried in vain to get in touch with Central but received nothing

but static in response. "Let's pack up and move out boys. Comms are down which probably

means trouble's coming." The commander got into the lead escort vehicle with one of the

UniCops, two others into the rear escort, while Travis rode in the back of the prisoner van

with the remaining two UniCops in the front.



As Sector PD began to quietly disperse the crowd of onlookers, heavy metal grates started to

lower down across the vehicle access-ways, preventing exit to the outside. The UniCop from

the lead escort vehicle hopped out and jogged over to a control box beside the entrance in

front of the convoy. After inspecting the panel inside, he turned and called out to the

commander. "It's no good sir; the manual override has been overridden. Someone has taken

control of the system and locked us in."

The commander's response was drowned out as the Tank rose up behind the UniCop at the

grate, its autocannon spraying bullets through the metal grill and tearing into the UniCop's

body. The bullets continued onwards, ricocheting off the armour of the lead escort vehicle

and causing the UniCop commander to duck. Using the gunfire as a distraction, Sarah

teleported Kai and Talbot into the sky garage, a pair of skycars to the side of the prisoner

van and the rear escort providing them some cover. Talbot disengaged the safety on his

assault rifle, selecting burst fire mode and turned to Kai. The youth nodded, confirming he

was ready and both of them simultaneously popped out from behind cover, taking aim at the

UniCops.

Drawing his hands back as if getting ready to pitch a baseball, Kai touched the seal he haddrawn on his hands with a marker pen and uttered a word in a long forgotten language. The

word activated the seal's magic and a ball of electricity formed which, with a grunt, he hurled

forwards at the UniCop in the passenger side of the prisoner transport and a bolt of lightning

arced between him and his target. Taking the full brunt of the strike, the UniCop howled in

pain as several million volts of electricity coursed through his body. Talbot ducked as gunfire

from the UniCops in the rear escort vehicle peppered the skycar he was crouching behind.

As the Tank's bullets sprayed the lead escort vehicle, shattering the front windscreen, the

commander sheltered in the foot well. Cursing his bad luck, he clambered over to the

passenger side where the weapons console was located. He armed a missile and launched it

at the enemy craft ahead of him. The missile leapt out of the launcher and streaked across

the garage towards the Tank on the far side of the grate. Inside the Tank, alarms screamedtheir warning as Jared swore as he saw the incoming missile. "Hang on Sarah," he yelled as

he threw the Tank into a deep spiralling dive. The missile tore through the security grate,

leaving a gaping hole and sending jagged pieces of metal tumbling to the ground some 180

meters below.

Sarah unbuckled her harness and opened the side door. "The others might need me!" With

that, she leapt out of the door and into the air. As she fell silvery ethereal wings, glowing

with a soft light, formed behind her.

Jared watched her soar back up to the garage level and sighed. "I hate it when she does that

... but boy does she look good when she does."

----

By the emergency stairwell, the last of the civilians were being evacuated by the sector police

officers. One of the officers turned at looked back towards the combat.



"Sarge, shouldn't we go back and help?"

"No," the sergeant in charge of the detachment responded as he pulled the young recruit into

the stairwell, "let the Uni's take care of themselves."

----

Seeing the missile tear the security gate apart, the commander sat up and leant out the side

window. Looking back towards the other vehicles, he surveyed the scene. The sound of static

attracted his attention and he turned back around. He was shocked to see a teenager in grey

camos sitting in the passenger seat. Tommy slammed his left elbow into the commander's

chest causing him to double over. He followed this off with a savage blow to the side of the

head with his right fist, striking him hard with the knuckleduster he was wielding. The

commander fell forward, knocked unconscious.

Meanwhile, the other two vehicles had fired up their thrusters and begun to hover. The rear

escort vehicle rotated on the spot to bring its weapons in line with Kai and Talbot while the

pilot of the prisoner van, after seeing his partner literally cooked alive, was panicking and

moving the van around the front escort towards the opening. Laser target designators

painted Kai and Talbot as the escort vehicle brought its weapon systems online. "Tommy,"

screamed Kai as he saw the boy jump out of the lead escort, "pulse the garage NOW!"

Tommy closed his eyes and focused his concentration. With a howl, he flooded the control

systems of the three UniCop vehicles with enough electromagnetic energy to fry their

circuits. Tommy collapsed to his knees panting, covered in sweat and bleeding from the nose.

Generating an EMP was incredibly painful and he couldn't do it very often without serious

injury, but when he did the effects on the enemy could be catastrophic.

----

The anti-aircraft missile streaked after the Tank as Jared threw the vehicle through a series

of reckless evasive manoeuvres. He nearly collided with a hover bike, almost knocking its

young rider off. Concerned for the safety of other motorists, he pulled the Tank away from

the traffic lanes and up into the sky. The missile was getting closer by the second, the digital

range counter rapidly approaching zero. Then, he spotted the break he had been looking for.

With the lock on warning tone nearly a continuous screech he headed for the cluster of

communications antennas on top of one of the Hudson arcology towers. Jared jinked and

threaded the Tank between the antennas, clipping one and leaving a trail of sparks behind.

The missile however could not keep up, smashing into one of the relays, and exploded in a

massive ball of flame.

"Phew," Jared smirked, "that was close," as he brought the Tank around, heading back to the

garage. His eyes widened in realisation. "Wait, wasn't that..."

----



The engines on the UniCop vehicles spluttered and cut out as their control systems died. The

prisoner transport fell to the garage floor and screeched to a halt as the rear escort fell

unceremoniously to the floor with a bone-jarring crunch.

Talbot exchanged fire with one of the two UniCops in the escort vehicle, rounds spraying in

both directions. Kai reached into one of the pockets on his tactical vest and pulled out a white

golf. It had a series of runes drawn on it in black ink, a mixture of Japanese and Cuneiform

characters. From another pocket he pulled out a slingshot. Placing the ball delicately in the

slingshot's pocket he took a deep breath, and in one fluid motion, popped up from behind the

skycar, fired the projectile at the escort vehicle, and ducked back down again.

As the ball left the slingshot, it became enveloped in a veil of green energy leaving a trail of

sparks behind it as it flew through the air, its runes clearly visible burning with a fierce green

light. On impact, the ball erupted into a green explosion that left retina burns in the eyes of

anyone looking directly at it. One of the UniCops, the driver, howled and clutched his eyes.

Talbot turned and looked at Kai who was grinning and loading another ball. "Does your

cousin know you're borrowing his slingshot?" Kai just laughed and prepared to fire again.

"And are those MY golf balls you're enchanting?"

Sarah landed at the hole in the grate and dismissed her wings. She ran past the lead escort

vehicle towards the back of the prisoner transport. When she got there, she found Tommy

repeatedly pounding on the door in frustration. "Door's locked from the inside," he said,

cursing his own stupidity, "and I already fried the frigging electronic lock!"

"Echo One should have some C4," Sarah suggested using Talbot's codename now that they

were on mission, "we could blow the door lock."

"No good," Tommy began, "the Aerodyne AV5 Prisoner Transport Craft used by the Unity has

a titanium-carbon fibre pseudo-alloy fuselage. A charge powerful enough to pierce its armour

would SARAH BEHIND YOU!"

Sarah span round as Tommy called out his warning to see a UniCop standing behind her

pointing a gun at her head, at point-blank range. Tommy cursed as he tried to pull Sarah out

of the line of fire, how could he have forgotten about the prisoner transport's driver?

Before any of them could react, a hover bike flew in through the hole in the grate. A helmet

held in the rider's outstretched hand smashed into the head of the UniCop as the bike shot

past. There was a loud crack and the UniCop collapsed to the floor like a puppet with its

strings cut. The young rider jumped off the bike and ran over to Sarah and Tommy.

The two of them were a stunned by what had just happened; Tommy was the first to recover

when he recognised the person running towards them. "Toby, what the hell are you doing

here?" The younger boy didn't answer, he just glared at Tommy.



Inside the back of the van, Officer Travis was now getting very worried. First the comms had

gone down leaving him unable to contact any of his comrades, then gunfire and explosions

had erupted outside. The lights in the back had died at the same time as the engines, inside

of the van was now only lit by his helmet light. Someone had started pounding on the doors,

rocking the entire van with the force of the repeated impacts. Taking advantage of the

distraction, the father, still with his hands bound behind his back, shoulder barged Travis.

The man merely bounced off Travis's armour and Travis punched the man in the chest, drew

his sidearm and shot the man in the leg. The man fell down, hissing in pain through gritted

teeth.

Travis grabbed the little girl by her hair and lifted her off the floor. She screamed as she

dangled and her mother moved to get up. "One more move and I cut the brats head off!" He

threatened, putting a knife to her throat. A terrific wrenching sound made him turn as the

armoured doors of the van were torn of their hinges and thrown across the garage, smashing

into a pillar. Before Travis could act a combat knife, standard UniCop issue, was hurled into

his right shoulder burying itself up to its hilt. He dropped his own knife the little girl, she

scrambled back to her parents, and clutched at the wound. Travis immediately recognised

Toby; you don't forget the face of someone you tried to gut just a few hours earlier. The

UniCop suddenly realised that he was in serious trouble.

Blood was dripping from cuts on Toby's palms; he had torn at the metal with his bare hands.

The young mutant's entire body shook with rage and he glared at Travis.

"GET AWAY FROM MY LITTLE SISTER!"

Chapter 5

Intro: His family threatened, Toby loses control and savagely attacks Officer Travis

16:48 June 19th, 2049

Hudson Arco Complex, Sector 23

"GET AWAY FROM MY LITTLE SISTER!"

Toby leapt forward into the van and grabbed Travis at the waist and shoulder, lifting the

shocked UniCop as if he was made of nothing more than paper. With a feral scream, Toby

threw Travis out of the back of the van and over the heads of Sarah and Tommy. Travis

sailed through the air across the garage before smashing into a concrete pillar, landing on

the roof of a nearby skycar. The roof of the car buckled, shattering the windscreen and

triggering its alarm.

Tommy had to duck as Toby bounded out of the van almost like an animal, landing on all

fours. Dumbfounded, he watched the boy race after the UniCop. When they had sparred

earlier, Toby had not been that fast as that, nor had he seemed that strong.



Sarah climbed into the back of the van, pulling out a first aid kit. "Three," she called out to

Tommy, "go after the kid and stop him from doing anything stupid. I'll take care of his

family." The boy nodded and turned to go after Toby.

With a grunt, Travis pulled the combat knife out his shoulder, recognising it as the one he

had lost earlier that day; at least now he knew where it had gone. He looked up and saw the

crazed young mutant charging towards him, pure rage visible in his eyes. The UniCop quickly

sprang to his feet and into a combat crouch, the knife held tightly. As Toby got in close, the

boy punched at Travis's head. The UniCop ducked under the blow, barely, and grabbed

Toby's arm. Using the mutant's own momentum, he tossed the boy over his shoulder,

sending him sprawling to the floor. As the boy scrambled to his feet, Travis span round and

slashed at him with the knife. The knife sliced across Toby's chest, leaving a ragged cut in his

sweatshirt. A spurt of blood splashed onto the ground and the boy clutched his chest, hissing

in pain.

Kai dived across the gap between two skycars to join Talbot, a burst of gunfire narrowly

missing him and striking the wall behind them. Concrete chips sprayed both of them. The

remaining UniCop in the rear escort was proving to be a tough opponent. "We need to end tothis," Talbot spoke as he peeked over the top of the skycar using a snapped off wing mirror,

"cover me." Slapping a fresh magazine into his rifle, he passed the weapon to Kai. "This

should do the trick," he muttered as he pulled out grenade. A sharp pain suddenly struck his

head and he inhaled sharply between his teeth.

"What's wrong?" Kai asked worriedly.

"Nothing," he answered rubbing his temple, "just a headache."

It was no ordinary pain but an empathic flash. Talbot usually kept his telepathic and

empathic abilities in a dormant state; most people constantly broadcasted their surface

thoughts, and unless he focused his control, it was like a thousand rock concerts taking place

simultaneously in his head. However, occasionally a powerful empathic flash would break

through his mental defences; that was what was happening now. He could sense a powerful,

almost feral rage, like that of an enraged animal. Talbot looked round the side of the skycar

just in time to see a UniCop slash at Toby with a combat knife. "What the hell is he doing

here?"

As Travis prepared to slash the boy again, Toby growled and dropped into a one handed

handstand. His left leg lashed out and kicked the hand holding the combat knife. It was sent

spinning through the air and clattered to the ground several meters away. Travis drew his

sidearm only to have kicked out of his hand by Toby's right foot as the boy flipped upright.Toby now had his back to Travis but if the UniCop thought that gave him an advantage, he

was mistaken. The boy thrust his right elbow into Travis's armoured chest before spinning

around to deliver a vicious follow-up punch with his left fist to the same location. The

armoured plate buckled and cracked under the force of the blow. Travis coughed and blood

splattered Toby's face.

"Shit," Talbot thought as he watched the fight across the garage, "he's gonna kill him." The

man could barely feel Toby's own psyche underneath the animal rage, it was as if something



from deep within the primal part of the soul had burst forth and overwhelmed the boy's

normal personality. In his current state, there was no telling what the young mutant would

do; or what he was capable of. However, at the moment he had another problem to deal with

and he had to leave dealing with Toby to Tommy who was already running across the garage

to try and intervene. Not the best solution, the older mutant had his own problems but for

now at least, it was all they could do.

He signalled Kai, and leapt out from behind the skycar. Kai opened up with the assault rifle,

spraying the cab of the escort with gunfire. The UniCop inside ducked down as the bullets

riddled the windscreen, spider-webbing the bulletproof glass. Talbot charged towards the

vehicle, readying the grenade. At the last second, he pulled the pin and tossed it through the

side window before throwing himself to the floor in preparation for the blast. The grenade

bounced of the helmet of the UniCop and landed between his feet. He had just enough time

to utter a resigned curse before it detonated.

In the back of the prisoner transport, Sarah had begun to treat the gunshot wound. The

mother was clutching the daughter, afraid to let go. "Who ... What..." stammered the father.

"Hold still Mr Smith, I need to bandage this before you lose too much blood." Sarah said as

she searched for the exit wound. "And before you ask, you're safe with us. We're here to get

you and your family to safety."

"Was that..."

"Your son? Yes."

The mother looked up hopefully. "Toby? But they told us he was dead."

"Don't worry, he's very much alive and my team mate is taking care of him." Sarah said as

she found the exit wound and began to bandage it. "I hope," she added silently under her

breath."

Travis staggered back, winded by the blow to his chest with his hands held out in surrender.

The boy didn't seem be in any mood to listen and grabbed hold of his head. "This is for

shooting me," he screamed in a guttural voice into Travis's face as he head butted him. The

UniCop's nose crumpled in a spray of blood and he collapsed to his knees. "This is for trying

to stab me in the alley." He smashed his fists into Travis's jaw sending him to the floor. "This

is for hurting my family." A savage kick to the groin caused Travis to groan meekly, pleading

for mercy. Toby sat on his chest, repeatedly punching him in the face. "And this is for my

sister." He clenched both his fists together above his head and prepared to smash them down

on Travis's face. The semiconscious UniCop lay beneath him unable to resist or defend

himself.

Tommy charged into Toby, body tackling him off the UniCop. The two boys slid across the

floor in a tangle of flailing limbs. Toby landed face down next to the discarded combat knife.

As he rose to a crouch, his back to Tommy, he grasped the knife. Before Tommy could call



out, Toby span round and leapt through the air. He landed on Tommy, knocking the older

boy down and pinning him to floor by sitting on his chest, the combat knife to Tommy's

throat. Tommy looked up at Toby's face; he almost couldn't recognise the boy. Toby was

snarling through gritted teeth that almost appeared to have fangs and Tommy was sure that

his eyes used to be blue, not orange. His entire body seemed to have altered as well; he felt

heavier and definitely looked more muscular. Seconds later, Toby's eyes seemed to refocus

and see for the first time what he was doing. He glanced at the bloodstained knife he was

holding and his eyes widened in shock. Dropping the knife, he scrambled off Tommy's chest

and fell back against a concrete pillar. Toby looked at his hands, which were covered with

blood and down at his blood stained sweatshirt. Tommy looked at him carefully and was

relieved to see that he seemed to be back to the blue-eyed, freckle faced kid he had met in

the briefing room earlier.

"Jeez, I'm sorry, I ... I ... God what was I doing?" Toby struggled to apologise as Tommy got

up and walked over. Tommy held out his hand to Toby.

"Well, er, you kinda lost it." Tommy answered as he helped him up. Toby glanced warily over

towards the UniCop and gulped.

"Did I ... is he ... you know, dead?" He asked quietly.

Tommy walked over and checked the body. "No, the bastard is still very much alive." Toby

came up behind him and looked down at the UniCop. Tommy stood up and put a hand on the

boy's shoulder. "Look, go and see to your folks. I'll take care of this guy." Toby sniffed and

wiped his nose on his sleeve before turning and running over to the prisoner transport.

As Tommy watched him climb into the back of the transport only to be engulfed by his

parents, he heard a noise behind him.

"Thank you." Travis barely managed to whisper. Tommy knelt down and looked at the man's

face. It was a mass of bruises, one eye swollen shut, his noise broken and blood was

everwhere.

"Don't thank me," he began to whisper to Travis, "I didn't do it for you. I could quite happily

have let him do it. He would have smashed down, and with his strength, he would've crushed

your skull, splattering your brains all over this floor. Given what I just saw, he might've even

have enjoyed it too. But here's what makes him different from you and me. Later, when he

calmed down, he would have regretted it, he would've felt guilty about and it'd probably

destroy him." Travis opened his mouth to speak but Tommy clamped his hand over his

mouth cutting him off. "You call people like me terrorists, monsters even. You don't see us

fucking each other over because of a few differences in our DNA. How many people have you

sent off to their deaths? How many of them were kids, and how many of them even knew

WHY they were being tortured and then executed?" He paused and looked around the

garage. His teammates were by the prisoner transport helping Toby's family into the Tank;

none of them were paying him any attention. "If I were someone else, I'd just leave you here

for the paramedics. But unfortunately for you," with his free hand he rolled up his right

sleeve revealing a tattoo consisting of the number "217" with the word "Gamma" underneath.

When Travis saw it, his eyes widened in fear and he tried to call out. His cries muffled by



Tommy's Hand "I'm just following the training you people gave me." He shifted his grip to

cover Travis's nose and held on tight as Travis tried in vain to twist out from under his grip.

The struggling became weaker as Travis suffocated and eventually they stopped altogether.

He got up, took one last look at the body and joined the others.

the revenge of the fallen

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