Ascension (The Ascension Series) (30 page)

“They’ll destroy you. Wait until my boyfriend gets to you,” Chloe said angrily, still lying on the floor.

“More empty threats,” Caine laughed. “I wouldn’t be too sure about that.”

“If we can inhibit your powers, what makes you think we can’t inhibit theirs? We’ve become more knowledgeable. We’re better equipped than ever before.
But there is one other thing I need from you, Chloe Li.”

Chloe looked at him with disgust. “Screw you.”

He ignored her insult and continued talking. “When you arrive at Wu’s place, he may ask you how you got your powers. That is what I want you to tell me right now.”

“Fuck you,” Chloe spat at him.

He grabbed her by the neck and squeezed tightly. “Give me the right answer or your parents die. I will personally kill both of them.”

“A crystal,” Chloe said reluctantly
, gasping for breath. “My powers came from touching a crystal.”

“Tell me more,” Caine demanded as he
loosened his grip around her neck.

“It’s located in a warehouse,” Chloe admitted before divulging the exact location.

“That’s all I wanted,” the mercenary said. “But here’s the deal maker or deal breaker. As I said, Wu is going to ask you the same thing I just asked you. Under no circumstances are you to tell him the truth.”

“Why?” Chloe asked.

“Because I want these powers all for myself,” Caine said truthfully. “If you tell Wu the truth, I’ll kill your entire family.”

“Okay,” Chloe nodded. “Deal.”

“Let’s go,” Caine said as he let go of her neck. He tied her hands up with and walked behind her as she went down the staircase. Then he directed Chloe to walk outside and enter the black van. She did as instructed and the van pulled off with Caine sitting next to her in the backseat.

Chloe was nervous as she sat tied up in the van.
She watched as Caine pulled a cell phone out of his pocket and handed it to her.

“Call one of your little super powered friends,” he told her. “Tell them you’ve been kidnapped
by Zhang Wu. 831 Oldsdon Street. We’ll see them at noon.”

Chloe grabbed the phone and dialed a number.

“Hello?” Donny said on the other end of the phone.

“Donny,” Chloe said, her voice cracking with fear.

“Chloe, is that you?” Donny asked.

“Yeah,”
she said nervously. “I need your help Donny. I’m being kidnapped.” She began crying and Caine the mercenary ripped the phone from her hand.

“You heard that?” Caine said over the phone. “We’ve got
your pal, Chloe.”

“Who are you?” Donny asked frantically.

“The men who work for Zhang Wu. As if paralyzing Walsh wasn’t enough. You can find us at 831 Oldsdon Street. Bring your pals at noon,” he said immediately before ending the call.

Soon enough the black van pulled into the parking garage of a large penthouse that was located downtown.
Once they were parked, Caine pulled Chloe out of van and forced her across the garage and into an elevator. They arrived at the very top floor of the penthouse. The door opened and Caine pushed Chloe into the suite.

Sitting behind a desk was Zhang Wu, an Asian man with jet black hair and pale skin. He was wearing a black pinstripe suit and red tie. Seated next to him were Chloe’s parents. They were both bound and gagged.

“Mom! Dad!” Chloe yelled out. She attempted to run toward them but Caine grabbed her by the arm and prevented it.

“
Why hello, Miss Li,” Zhang Wu smiled slyly as he stood up from his desk. “I am so happy you could be a guest today along with your lovely parents.”

“Why do you want to kill us?” Chloe asked him.

“It is simple,” Wu said. “You and your band of Do-It-Yourself superhero misfits are costing my empire millions. You have caused a drastic decrease in violent crime and drug output. In effect, as Cincinnati’s largest crime lord, I have lost large amounts of money, Miss Li.” Zhang Wu placed his hand up and led his fingernail down her face. “And for that, you will suffer.”

“Excuse me, Mr. Wu,”
Caine said. “May I leave now.”

“What is the rush?” Wu asked.

“I have somewhere I need to be.”

“And where is that?” Wu asked Caine.

“Let’s just say I have a warehouse I need to visit,” Caine said as he smiled to Chloe.

“Then be gone,” Zhang Wu hissed.

***

Back at the hospital, Clark was in the delivery room holding his new baby brother for the first time.

“And what’s his name?” Clark asked his parents.

“We decided on Matthew,” his father told him.

“I love it,” Clark smiled. He cradled the newborn in his arms for a moment and returned him to his mother.

“I worry and I worry,” Clark’s father said. “But then I lay my eyes on our new child for the very first time and I know that everything is going to be alright.”

“He looks just like you when you were a newborn, Clark,” his mother told him with a big smile.

“But at least I popped out at the right time,” Clark joked.

“Yeah,” his father laughed. “Glad I put in that overtime yesterday.”

A nurse walked into the room. “Clark,” she said.

Clark turned around and asked what she wanted.

“There’s a boy named Donny in the waiting room. He wants to see you.”

“Okay,” Clark said. He turned to his parents, nodded, and walked out of the room. As Clark walked down the hallway, he saw Donny who was looking frantic and afraid.

“Hey, Donny. What’s going on?”

“They have Chloe,” Donny whispered in a frenzy.

“What?”

“Zhang Wu! You said they were picking us off one by one. I got a call, they kidnapped her. They told me the address. We have to save her.”

“They kidnapped Chloe!?” Clark said, surprised.

“Yeah,” Donny told him again as he spoke frantically. “They have her hostage. They want us. Jesus, Clark. We can’t do it alone. First John went off the deep end. Then Charles got shot. Now they’ve taken Chloe─ What I don’t understand is how they got her? She can do just about anything.”

“No,” Clark told him. “We have one weakness and they know it.”

“What are you talking about?” Donny asked.

“Lead!” Clark said. “It’s the one thing we can’t control. I’m sure they’re gathering things like lead bullets and maybe even lead walls or whatever.”

“How do we save her, Clark!? I can’t go on without her. But we need help.”

“I called in backup last night,” Clark assured him.

“Who?” Donny asked.

“Andrew and Big Dan.”

“Seriously!? They’re returning to Cincinnati? Are they going to help?”

“They’re going to meet us at the warehouse. Come on, let’s go,” Clark told Donny.

Before they left, Clark found a nurse and told her to tell his parents that he was leaving and would return in a few hours.

“Tell them I’ll be back before they get discharged,” Clark said to the nurse.

“Sure,” she told him.

With that, Donny and Clark quickly exited the hospital. Once they were outside,
Clark quickly called Sarah and told her to meet them at the warehouse. The he and Donny swiftly ran behind a large set of trees and took off into the air.

Traveling at an extreme speed, they
reached the warehouse in minutes. While they usually entered through the back, this time they landed around back but walked to the front of the warehouse because Clark spotted two figures standing near the front door.

“Andrew! Dan!” Donny yelled as he saw them standing around the entrance to the warehouse.

“Nice to see the both of you!” Dan said.

“When did you guys get here?” Clark asked.

“I don’t know. About five minutes ago,” Andrew said.

“We noticed the door was open but we didn’t go inside
,” Dan said.

Sure enough, Clark looked at the main door of the warehouse and saw it cracked. He assured them that it should have been locked so they entered the warehouse and found everything in its normal place.

“Nice digs,” Andrew said.

“We call it the Mecha,” Clark told him. “Well that’s the name Charles made up for it. And he decorated it too.”

“We don’t have much time for small talk,” Donny told them. “Zhang Wu’s got Chloe.”

“Who?” Andrew and Dan both asked.

“A crime lord,” Clark told them.

Moments later Sarah entered through the backdoor.

“Hey guys,” Sarah said.

She greeted Andrew and Dan but Donny told her there was no time. He filled her and the rest of them in on the details about
Chloe’s disappearance. Andrew and Dan agreed to help them and Clark informed them that Zhang Wu would likely use their one weakness, lead, against them.

“What’s a little lead matter when we can move buildings?” Dan laughed.

“We’ve got to get you two suited up,” Sarah said to Andrew and Dan.

She and Clark pulled out several boxes full of costumes and told them to pick out something they liked. While Clark, Sarah, and Donny got into their usual costumes, Andrew and Dan began
piecing things together. Dan chose a black suit and domino mask along with an orange cape. Andrew picked out a similar outfit but one with a black cape and a yellow infinity symbol on the chest plate.

“I look so ridiculous,” Andrew said as he adjusted the mask that went over his eyes. “I promise I’m never going to wear this again.”

They were all dressed and ready to go until Sarah noticed something off.

“Guys, look,” Sarah said as she pointed to the door that led to th
e basement. The door was open.

“The front door was open too,” Andrew told her.

Clark and Sarah jogged over to the door. They pushed it further open and walked down the stairs as the others followed behind them. Once they reached the bottom of the stairs, they noticed the second door was missing. It was the security locked door and it appeared to have been blown off its hinges.

“What the hell happened here?” Clark asked.

He and Sarah walked inside. The crystal was located in the middle of the room and lying on the floor was the lifeless body of a man wearing all black. It was Caine, the mercenary.

“Who is that?” Sarah asked.

“He’s dressed like one of those men that came after us,” Clark told her.

“What the hell happened here?” Andrew asked as he and the others entered the basement
and peered at the lifeless corpse.

“He touched the crystal too long,” Clark said to him.

“Shit,” Dan said. “You mean that could have happened to us?”

“Yeah,” Clark answered.
“He must have broken in here. Looks like he blew the security locks off. I guess he held onto the crystal and it killed him.”

“I bet he deserved it,” Donny sneered.

“Come on guys,” Clark told them. “Let’s go. We’ll have to deal with this guy later. We have to save Chloe right now.”

The
y left the basement and returned to the normal portion of the warehouse. Donny told them the address where Chloe was located so they exited through the back and flew off─ wearing full costume regalia─ in broad daylight.

Minutes later, onlookers watched and gawked as costumed teenagers descended onto the
penthouse of Zhang Wu. They all landed on the ground and entered through the glass doors. A security guard in the main area reached for his gun and Clark threw his hand out. The guard flew back against the wall and was knocked unconscious.

“That’s all?” Donny asked.

Clark put his hand out again and commanded the guard’s gun. When the gun flew into his hand, Clark unloaded it and checked the bullets. He tried to make the bullets move with his powers but they remained motionless in his hand.

“Just as I thought,” Clark said. “They’re armed with lead bullets.
Everyone be careful.”

There was a click and they all turned toward the elevator. The elevator opened and three men armed with automatic guns began shooting left and right. The six teenagers all ducked. They jumped behind metal tables which they flipped over as bullets flew everywhere. Some of the bullets even shattered the glass doors of the entrance and flew outside.

Sarah was hiding behind a table when the men stopped firing their guns. She and Clark took this opportunity. They jumped up and flung their arms out. The elevator door shut on the men.

“You didn’t mention how dangerous this would be, Clark!” Dan shouted as the others all stood up.

“Yeah, it sort of slipped my mind,” Clark said sarcastically as he continued to use his powers to keep the elevator closed.

“I’ll handle it,” Donny said. Donny looked at the elevator doors and the others could hear the elevator moving. “There,” Donny told them. “I jammed them in, I think you can let go now.”