Chronicles of the Supers (Book 1): Born From Darkness (The Story of Max) (12 page)

"You'll remember soon." came Max's voice. From behind her.

Max turned to look and saw a pink clad Max, wearing a pink tshirt
with her name in glitter and white/pink underwear. Suddenly the dream
she'd had when she fell unconscious earlier returned to her. They
stared at each for a few moments before Dark Max finally moved.

In a blur of motion Dark Max attacked Light Max with a straight punch
to the face. Light Max dodged nimbly and countered the punch with a
kick to the gut of Dark Max. Dark Max flew up into the ceiling and
ended up in her old bedroom. She impacted that ceiling and bounced
off of it.

Light Max flew up through the hole and grabbed her Dark counterpart
by the throat. Then she slammed Dark Max into the frame of her bed.
There was a loud crunching sound and Dark Max fell limp to the
ground.

After a tense moment Dark Max sat up on her knees. She looked into
Light Max's eyes and tried to glare. Instead all that happened was
she started to cry. Light Max went over and grabbed Dark Max in a
gentle hug.

"Am I really like him?" Dark Max asked between sobs.

"Not anymore." came the response from Light
Max, with a hint of crying evident in her voice.

Chapter 15:

Forgiveness
and Change

Light Max sat holding Dark Max as she cried. Though the term 'Dark'
no longer applied. After everything she'd been through since the mess
at the prison, she had begun to have her own doubts about whether her
chosen path had been right. While it was True that the Light Max part
of her had a helping hand, all she had done was guide the other part
towards the correct path. The choice was down to her 'Dark'
counterpart int he end.

As the
both held each other the room they were in began to slowly dissolve
from the top down. After a few minutes the surroundings were
completely gone and the girls floated in a sea of nothingness. After
a few more moments a small circular arbor appeared around them.
Inside of it was a small table with 2 chairs. However, neither Max
noticed the change for a long time.

After
both Max's tears had dried up they finally got a good look at their
surroundings. Dark Max looked around in wonder but Light Max went to
go sit down. As she did a small cup appeared in front of her on the
table. After several more moments the other Max finally noticed the
table. She silently went to go sit down. When she did a small cup
also appeared before her. She looked down at it and noticed that it
contained nothing. She raised an eyebrow and looked in her twins
direction.

"So
what is this place?" 'Dark' Max asked. Light Max genuinely
smiled at her counterpart.

"I'm
not entirely sure but I know it's inside our mind. I suspect it has
to do with our powers. Like some kind of internal landscape for us. I
also know that the world we see in here is formed by our thoughts.
That's how I knew who you were. But I'm afraid to say I don't know
much else."

"Wait,
you're saying the landscape reflects me?"

"And
me, in a way."

"So
does that mean I'm empty now?"

"No,
it means you're a clean slate.
We're
a clean slate. We're ready to rebuild."

"So we're empty then. Got it."

"Well if you want to be so pessimistic, then yeah, we are."

As they said this, the air around them grew darker and more
forboding. Both of them noticed the change and glanced around as a
chill ran down their spines.

"That's what this place represents. Those negative thoughts make
this place darker. I tried to avoid it for that reason."

"Oh. Okay then."

Both girls sat in awkward silence for a long time. As they did the
empty space became a bit more cheery than it had been a moment ago.
After a while Light Max started squirming a bit.

"Gotta go pee?" her counterpart asked, with a hint of
sarcasm in her voice.

"No, I just really want to get out there myself."

"What do you mean?"

"Well..." Light Max began. "You see, you're the
original me."

"Okay? But what's that got to do with your earlier comment?"

"Well, when that man..." Both Max's swallowed a bit at the
mention of their father. "Well when he attacked us, it caused a
trauma. That dream we had later on caused a split. The part of us
that used to be him split off from the part that wanted to save
people."

"So I became evil and you became good?"

"That's a horrible way to look at it" Light Max said with a
pout.

"But I'm still correct?"

"Technically yes. If you wanna be a downer."

"Okay then. So what did you mean by 'get out there'?"

"Well, being that I'm a completely different person, I've never
gotten to experience the outside world. I really want to!"

"Wait wait, what? You're saying you haven't seen the outside
world?"

"Yes. You see I'm technically another person, stuck inside your
mind."

'Dark' Max raised an eyebrow. It was a bit much to take in. Then
again, in the last few weeks, she'd developed super powers, become a
killer, fought the Max sitting opposite her and won, fought again and
lost, and learned a valuable life lesson from a rapist. If any of
that was even remotely believeable, then this was too. Just to be
sure, 'Dark' Max pinched her cheek. The only response was a minor
twinge of pain.

'Yep, definitely real.' she thought to herself.

##########

"So when's this plan going down?" asked a tall dark skinned
man. He was wearing a pair of glasses with a broken lense and his
shoulder length hair was unkempt and greasy. He was fairly muscular
as evident beneath the skin tight blue shirt he wore.

"It'll be a few more months. Surveillance at this hold is kind
of sketchy. We have to wait it out and do a count during every shift
change to figure out how many are inside." said another man.
While the other guy was fairly muscular, this guy was an insane bulk
of a human being. His light black skin contrasted sharply with the
dark black shirt he wore, which was too tight on his body despite the
fact that it was a XXL. He looked like this shirt and his skin were
going to rip off of his body if he so much as twitched. His hair was
cut extremely short, making him appear to be on the verge of balding
and he was wearing a pair of thin black sunglasses.

"Right. Well then let's get on with it." the one with the
glasses said as he pulled out a very large laptop.

"So that thing'll do what you said?" the muscular one
asked.

"Yup. All we need is a good picture of each face that enters and
the program will be able to count out the number of people inside.
Like you said, we'll need to do at least a few months unless you can
provide better surveillance. Which I wish you could."

"Not up to me. The black market isn't a god or a group of gods.
There's things even they don't know."

"Sadly enough."

"So where do we need the equipment?"

"Right above the entrance camera. Or if you prefer I'd like to
replace the entrance camera entirely."

"You can do that?"

"Given about an hours uninterrupted access, yes."

"Can we do that?"

"Maybe. The guards don't stand at the guard gate between
midnight and sunrise. Dunno why though."

"Then we'll do it. Less impact that way. With any luck they'll
never notice the new camera."

"Well then let's get to work. I don't want to get caught this
early in the operation Frank."

"If we're caught this early, James, the only thing we'll have
left to worry about is how long it'll be before the boss kills us."

##########

Max awoke groggily. Her entire body hurt a lot and she could barely
move. She opened her eyes to look around.

Her eyes took a long time to focus but when they finally did she
noticed she was lying across a series of chairs. It was
uncomfortable, but probably better than lying on the floor. Or on the
stairs.

She slowly tried to sit up but instead managed to fall off the chairs
and onto the floor. She landed with a thud and nearly passed out from
the extra pain. But she managed to keep herself conscious. If she
hadn't, the other Max would have argued her breathless about taking
over. As it was, she'd only barely convinced Milia, the named she'd
given to her "Light" half to help distinguish them better,
that she needed to be in control until she got them out of the house
they were likely still stuck in. Max had more training with her
actual physical body and so would be able to better utilize it. Milia
had begrudgingly agreed that she was right and allowed Max to be the
one to wake up.

As she rolled over onto her stomach, Max looked around at the place.
It felt like she'd been there for many months even though she
logically new it hadn't even been an hour. If her internal clock was
as good as her powers were, she still could take an extra 15 minutes
and not be late getting back to the school. Barring her body failing
her from the blood loss, anyway.

As she looked around she saw the man who'd she originally planned to
kill, Ken, lying motionless on the ground. She couldn't sense him but
she refused to believe he was dead. She willed her body to cross the
floor, inching along more slowly than a snail. Finally she reached
his body and placed a hand on his chest. She couldn't feel his heart
beating. He really was gone.

Max grimaced. It was her fault he was gone. She'd been the one to
kill him and that hit her like an anvil to the head. She felt
extremely depressed over that fact. As she thought about her life up
to that point she felt the weight of pure darkness on her shoulders.
She felt like simply giving up and just dying right there, as if only
death could atone for how she had let darkness consume her. As she
dropped her head she began to feel dizzy and she realized that if she
slept now she wouldn't wake up.

'I do deserve it.' She thought to herself.

'WAKE THE FUCK UP BITCH!' Milia yelled within Max's mind. Max jolted
up suddenly from the loud sound.

'That's better.' Milia said.

"What did you do that for you idiot?" Max said out loud.

'Because you were about to let yourself die, dumbass.'

"So? I deserve it after what I've done."

'No you don't. There are still people who need to be saved.'

"I hate it when you're right."

With that comment Max began to try and stand. She could feel Milia
pushing her on from inside her mind. As Max finally stood up she
started to feel a bit better. Her healing powers had already kicked
in before she'd even passed out the first time but the damage had
been so severe that it would be at least a day before she healed
fully.

After contemplating the area for a moment Max finally
decided to call the police before leaving. She was just sprinting
away, back to her school dorm room, when she heard the police sirens
closing in on the compound.

Part 4:

Consequences

Chapter 16:

Investigation

"What the actual fuck happened here?" asked a ruff looking
man in a police uniform. He had dark brown skin and was surprisingly
skinny. He was surveying the crime scene at the Warren farm after an
anonymous tip came in stating everyone there was dead. Nearly half
the police department, and the state bureau of investigation, had
showed up on receiving a tip. They had been after the Warrens for
various crimes for years now, but never could get the evidence
together to grab a search warrant for the place. Then when the tip
had come in, they finally had a legal way on to the farm to search
the place. But instead they found a small war zone.

"I
don't know, but we'll be able to figure it out when we collect
evidence." said a lab technician.

"Then
get on it. I want to know what happened
yesterday
."

"Aye sir. Alright people, get to work! Officer Dan here wants
that report finished yesterday, so get out the time travel boxes!"
the tech said, barking orders to his entire team. Officer Dan gave
the guy a bemused grin and left to search the premises with the rest
of the officers.

They all knew it would take them months just to work through the
plethora of evidence before them. But they had to. The entire family
they'd been after was now lying before them, dead. One of them even
had a missing head. It was a mess of a massacre that none of them had
ever seen. Several techs had to be escorted off the premises and to
an ambulance due to the gory sight.

It ended up taking them 2 whole days to catalog all of the evidence
from the plantation. But when they finished they dutifully began
their work tracking down the truth.

##########

Max lay in her bed back at her dorm unmoving while she stared at the
ceiling. She was feeling like she was stuck underneath Niagara Falls,
unable to breath or move from all the water crashing on top of her.
She couldn't explain what was wrong but Milia had been asking for her
to sleep for a long time. So finally Max closed her eyes and
instantly fell asleep.

She woke up in the same dreamlike landscape she had last seen Milia
in.

"Finally." Milia said from a table off to the side. She
stood up and went over and hugged Max.

"What's going on?" Max said. She noted she didn't feel the
same metaphorical crushing weight that she had been when awake.

"It's alright. In here you're safe." Milia said as she let
Max go.

"What's going on?" Max asked. It seemed that since Milia
had been trapped inside their shared mind, she knew a lot more about
the place than Max did, so Max had decided to defer to her with that
regard.