Miracle's Touch Read online

  21

  John slipped the duffel off his shoulder, going straight for his rifle as the giant clawed fingers flexed, slicing through the roof of the warehouse before prying it up like the top of a tin can. Those metal digits were attached to piston-like arms, which were then attached to an oval torso the size of a water tower. The battle robot towered over us, at least three stories tall at the peak of its body, the thing having no visible head. Instead of gleaming steel, the whole thing had the look of hematite, a semi-glossy black-grey that almost blended into the evening sky. If it had any weapons outside of its claws, they were concealed in its seamless body. The only markings or openings at all was a glowing green slash across the middle of the egg-shaped body.

  “There’s a pilot inside,” I said as I tensed, waiting to see how exactly the war machine would attack. “With how dark his emotions are, I don’t think it’s just another lackey. It might be Hardware himself.”

  Around us, the entire warehouse’s automated systems grew silent and even the emergency lights cut out. If Hardware had been able to jam our secure communications, having some way to cut power to a warehouse wasn’t out of his wheelhouse.

  As the glowing green line of sensors in the bot scanned over us, Paragon rose into the air, thoroughly unimpressed. “I would think a genius such as him would know not to send an inorganic tinker toy with me on the scene.” He glanced back at us on the ground. “Fear not, this will only take a —”

  I caught the pulse of smugness from Hardware before I heard the hiss of intense pressure. “Paragon!” I cried in warning, but it was too late, even with my incredible new reflexes.

  A burst of doughy tissue exploded out of the mech’s right hand as one of the pistons in the forearm fired. Robert started to look back just in time to take the nauseatingly pink blob right in the face and chest. It stuck to him as the tremendous impact knocked him back down to earth, tendrils exploding out of the rapidly expanding mass.

  A modulated voice, tinny, robotic, but still recognizable as human, boomed out from the robot. “As if I wouldn’t have planned for your presence, Paragon.” That sickly green sensor swiveled to me. “And you as well, Ms. Miracle. You might have dealt with my combat android, but in comparison —”

  John unloaded a series of tight, controlled bursts that sparked off the robot’s black shell, to no effect.

  “Seriously, can none of you ignorant fools let me finish a single speech without interruption?!” the voice screeched as it bent over to swat us flat. Something about that struck me as familiar. I’d figure it out later. Now, I had to act.

  If I hadn’t seen what I had just hours ago, I would have been worried about Robert, about all of us. Instead, I was confident, already sensing from him a particular fascination as the blue glow of his powers crept out from the smothering tentacles. I sprang to one of the closest warehouse racks, ready to take the fight to the monstrous mech above.

  “John, take our friend and get out of here,” I called behind me, not taking my eyes off the huge claw that was rocketing toward me. “We’ll stop this thing.”

  The ex-Marine cursed as he slung his rifle, frustration and hesitation swirling inside him as he ran for the barrel that had been brought out to us. The mass of organic goo around Paragon started to dissipate faster than it was growing, more and more blue light shooting out in rays. As for me, I gauged the speed of the rushing claw, time seeming to slow as adrenaline shot through my veins.

  Right at the last moment, I sprang upward off the rack, the war machine tearing through the space I had just occupied. It struck with such force, it ripped the entire steel structure apart with one go, sending concrete, metal, and crates flying. With the robot over-extended, I landed lightly on top of its forearm, cocking back a fist as I started to sprint up, towards its torso. It didn’t have a head, but that only meant the pilot’s compartment had to be in the main body. There had to be a way inside, and I’d find it.

  “And I thought you were smarter than the rest,” the voice scoffed.

  Before I got five steps, the entire surface of the robot lit up like a downed power line, electricity running through its steely shell and right through me as well. With nothing to ground out to, burning agony raced through me as muscles spasmed and twitched, sparks dancing over my skin. If I hadn’t been as durable as I was now, if this had happened even a day before, my heart probably would have stopped stone dead from the jolt.

  I know John cried out my name as I lost my balance, still twitching as I tumbled off the arm. Blessed relief hit immediately, even as I plummeted down towards the warehouse floor and the painful landing it promised.

  I didn’t hit the hard concrete though. The last of the amoeba-like blob exploded with the mighty force of Paragon’s superhuman might, and he was there, snatching me out of mid-air like a guardian angel.

  “That should have sent your poor little heart into cardiac arrest,” the warbling voice of the robot cried, “and my biomass should have trapped you forever, Paragon! What is going on here? Why won’t you people just die and give me what I want?”

  Robert’s heart surged with a mix of anger and protective instincts as he sat me down on my feet. He countered another swipe from the mech with a casual wave, his enormous strength not only blocking the car-sized claw but shattering the entire hand assembly.

  As the mech staggered back, he put his arms around me. “You might not survive the next one, my dear. I can shield you or ferry you away if you —”

  My head was clearing and my heart beating strong. I shook my head, gritting my teeth. “No,” I croaked. “I’m getting a piece of this thing.” Glancing sidelong up at him, I grinned fiercely despite the pain. “You could give a girl a hand up, though.”

  As a look of understanding and acceptance came over Robert’s face, the robot reoriented itself. “You low-minded idiots! Fine, if I can’t kill you, I’ll simply take what I need.”

  John had managed to wrestle the drum off the pallet, distracted by worry over me, and was starting to roll it for the door as a dozen ports opened across the egg-like body of the death bot. As Robert knelt, cupping his broad hands into a stirrup for my feet, those holes disgorged more of that pink protoplasm, but in long, stringy vines. Shooting out in a burst, some went wide, sticking and wrapping around all manner of debris and warehouse junk, but three splattered over the barrel and John, holding them together as they began to retract.

  That was when I hopped with both feet into Paragon’s hands. Twisting as he rose up and threw me over his back, I kicked off with all of the muscle in my enhanced legs. Our superhuman strength combined sent me hurtling with the speed of a missile as I thrust both fists out, arcing straight for the green sensor strip in the dead center of the thing.

  The impact sent shudders down my arms and spine, but it was worth it. I tore into the thing’s armored shell like a javelin, my arms plunging in up to my elbows as well as shattering the sensor strip itself. The glowing light flared and went out as the robot rocked back on its heels. As it did, I pressed the attack, turning my wrists inside the hole I made and grabbing on to the torn armor.

  Letting out a cry, I pulled and tore with everything I had, peeling back the shell from the top and bottom of the rupture, along the weak point of the broken sensors.

  I wasn’t the only one giving it their all. The moment he threw me, Paragon launched himself upward, tearing the tendrils that had captured John apart with one wave of azure light. As John and the barrel began to tumble towards the ground, I felt a surge of acceptance come over him, joined by an eager cry from the million thoughts that had to be Ohm, the Omniarmor.

  The steel drum suddenly dissolved into a shining, gunmetal grey sphere, not quite solid and not quite liquid, and in a blink of an eye, it morphed, spreading out to engulf John’s falling form much as the pink blob had swallowed Robert. Instead of something to fear, though, my heart jumped as a cry of triumph echoed in a multitude of voices on both the empathic level and the audible one. For a split-second,
we all froze, from the battle robot to Paragon, all eyes drawn to that shout.

  “Fine,” John shouted, his voice amplified as his plummeting form reoriented in mid-air and slowed to a hover. “You want the Omniarmor? I’ll give you more of it than you bargained for!”

  But he wasn’t just John Munroe, Jr. anymore. The liquid metal of the Omniarmor now covered his entire body like a second skin, conforming to his powerful muscles and trim physique. There were no joints or chinks in the armor, though it formed a smooth helmet over John’s head, his face visible through a transparent faceplate. Even as he hovered, the armor continued to shift, as I could feel the millions of nanomachines at work, forming heavy gauntlets, boots, and shoulder guards, and then weaponry atop those.

  “Fine,” the mech’s distorted voice growled, frustration and loathing dripping off his heart, “you win, heroes, but this is the last time!” I could feel his emotions start to fade and distort, causing me to work harder, tearing at the shell as Paragon caught the bot’s other arm before it could swat me off it. “And trust me, there will be another time, heroes.”

  “He’s trying to get away,” I yelled as I threw another punch, driving up to my shoulder into the mech’s softer insides.

  Paragon ripped the other arm free from the shoulder socket, sending gouts of lubricant and inert pink goo spraying across, as John let out a growl of fury, gunmetal gray cannons fully formed on the backs of his gauntlets and what I thought were rocket pods mounted on each shoulder.

  “No way in hell you’re getting away this time, Hardware,” he roared, his voice amplified through the Omniarmor. “Light this thing up, Ohm!”

  On command, the full array of the weapons the Omniarmor had formed unleashed hell. Despite John’s rage, he still expertly aimed, staying well clear of Paragon or me as his arm cannons chewed through the main body, a volley of rockets spiraling through the shattered walls of the warehouse to explode right into the robot’s knees. Shrapnel flew as oil and other viscous fluids spurted out of the growing breeches in the machine, its legs utterly failing.

  I rode the thing down as it collapsed backward, crashing into the warehouse across the street, still trying to get to Hardware before he was gone entirely. Robert hit it from the side, tearing with his vast strength with one arm as he disintegrated swaths of the armor at a molecular level with the other. John, cannons morphing into whirring chainsaws, landed hard next to me, plunging the spinning teeth into the heart of the machine.

  A maniacal cackle split the air, filled with static as the battle robot’s systems failed. “See you at the next lecture, heroes,” the buzzing voice managed to get out before the speakers shut down, as John cut through the compartment to let me pry a hole and as Paragon burst in from the other side.

  The emotions were gone as we forced that last bit of the way in. There was still a purple-black light in the air, rapidly fading, from one of the crew seats, the leather smoldering. For a split-second, we all thought Hardware had gotten away.

  But then I saw him. Strapped into the other pilot’s chair, his thick lips curled into a rictus grin, Hardware, the supposed mastermind of all this tragedy, hung lifeless in a five-point harness. His signature blue-and-gold combat armor was intact above the waist, but the sensor visor he usually wore over his cowl was pulled up, and his glassy stare was one of someone in the throes of pleasure.

  His pants, however, hung low around his thighs, the greaves of his armor sitting undone on the back of the compartment. If the death grin and wide eyes weren’t enough to provide clues as to how the techno-villain died, his still-erect penis was irrefutable proof.

  It looked as if someone had quite literally killed him with sex.

  22

  I was still trying to process what we had seen as I sat on the tail end of an ambulance, an EMT triple-checking my heart rate. I had eaten probably a gazillion volts, after all, and honestly, every muscle ached, even muscles I didn’t know I had. New Harbor’s finest and a full contingent of E-SWAT in power armor were working the scene, clearing rubble and starting to disassemble the wreck of the battle mech. Fortunately, this late at night, there were only a few minor injuries among the skeleton crew that maintained the warehouse the robot had crashed into at the end.

  I had suffered the worst of anyone physically, and I was totally okay with that. I’d get better a lot faster than an unpowered civilian.

  Still, Robert hovered over me, literally as well as figuratively, worry for me and confusion over the grisly murder racing through him, while John, the faceplate of the Omniarmor now opaque to keep his identity from the police, leaned heavily against the ambulance.

  “What did we just see?” he asked aloud, his voice modulated by the suit in much the same way the real pilot of the mech’s had been. “I saw the look in your eyes. There was something you both recognized when you saw, well, whatever the hell that was.”

  “The head of the robotics department of S.O.S. Laboratory died recently in a near-identical state,” Robert intoned absently, rubbing his bearded chin. “Of course, we cannot say conclusively if the cause of death is exactly the same, not until the coroner can confirm it, but …”

  “No, it is,” I said softly. I glanced at both men. “I can feel it in my gut, and my gut’s rarely wrong.”

  John clenched his fist, the reflective grey armor effortlessly matching his movements. “Then Hardware was just a patsy? It’s not impossible, I suppose.” Tilting his head towards an unseen noise, he paused for a moment. “Ohm says the light show we caught when we burst into the cockpit was the remnants of a quantum wormhole. Whoever was actually in charge exited stage right at the last moment.”

  As the EMT patted me on the shoulder, flashing me a reassuring thumbs-up as he detached the heart monitor from my arm, Robert hover-turned to face the armored Marine. “Can your suit detect the end point of the wormhole?”

  “Sorry, Bob,” John sighed. “I don’t understand the science, but Ohm’s positive it’s wholly untraceable, well, unless the portal is live when we find one.” With a growl of frustration, he slammed a gauntleted fist into the side of the ambulance, rocking the whole thing and denting it. “Shit. Always forget how strong I am in this tin-can. No offense, Ohm.” He shook his head and tried to calm himself. “And that’s only at 67% compatibility.”

  Smiling thankfully at the medic, I forced myself to my feet, trying to ignore the last micro spasms and aches. “It may look like we’re at square one, but there have to be clues we can follow up on. Something our mastermind did or said, or maybe something in the physical evidence S.O.S. or the cops will find in the analysis of the crime scene.” I flashed a smile at my partners. “We’re not licked yet.”

  John pushed off from the ambulance. “Who’s we, Ch … Miracle?” He turned as he stepped away to look at Robert and me. “I said I’d help take down Hardware and save Ohm here.” He tapped his metal-wrapped chest for emphasis. “And I did that, but hell, he’s dead, Ohm’s fine, and my life is in shambles again. I don’t even have a hobo hut to stay in.”

  “Are you seriously implying that you are going to turn your back on a city in need?” Paragon pressed, hovering closer to John. “Especially now, with the power you now have at your fingertips —”

  “Which won’t put a roof over my head or food in my belly,” John countered. “I’m not saying I’m going to turn rogue, Bob, but I need to sort out my life, right? You and Ch … Miracle have got this covered. You’re only a step down from Jesus Christ, and she’s not far off.”

  I walked over to the two, eager to head this off before it went too far. I understood Robert’s frustration, just as I sympathized with John’s troubles. One never faced real adversity, and the other had seen nothing but that. I could bridge the gap, though, and bring them together.

  “Guys,” I said, steel behind the silky voice, “there’s no need for an argument.” They both looked at me, and I could feel the weird hint of chastisement they both felt. “Paragon,” – I laid a hand on his chest warml
y, causing him to melt a little more – “I’ll talk to John. I know what he’s going through. You should try to push the autopsy on Hardware through, maybe see if they’ll let Dr. Archimedes help.”

  Robert arched an eyebrow, trying to puzzle out exactly what I was up to, but after a moment, he seemed to accept it. “Very well, Ms. Miracle. Though if we truly wish this mystery solved quickly, I know who I need to bring this to.”

  I smiled up at him, leaning on my tiptoes to give him a quick kiss on the cheek. “Then do it. We need answers. We’ll meet back at the manor, okay?”

  I couldn’t tell, but I was pretty sure John rolled his eyes to match the stab of envy he felt. “Yeah, that isn’t happening.”

  Robert shot the armored Marine a quick glare but softened his eyes as he kissed me on the forehead. “Good luck and be safe.” He started to drift upward but slowed, glancing back down not at me, but at John. “I know it may seem that I should be powerful enough to deal with anything, but I am coming to realize more and more that isn’t the case. Keep that in mind please, as you talk with Ms. Miracle.”

  I knew it hadn’t been easy for Robert to admit that, and two days ago, I don’t think he would have. John’s featureless helmet tilted up to look back at the flying hero, a grunt of assent matching his slow nod. Paragon returned the nod before turning back to the twinkling night sky, disappearing in a streak of blue light a moment later.

  “So,” I said, holding a hand out to John, “why don’t we have this chat somewhere a bit more private?”

  “You’re not going to use that heart power you have to make me roll over and play nice, are you?” John grumbled even as he took my hand. “Because if you are, Ohm and I are just going to fly off, no matter how nice they seem to think you are.”