Chronicles of the Supers (Book 1): Born From Darkness (The Story of Max) (3 page)

She scoffed at the thought of the man complaining about not being
able to fuel his truck as another vehicle pulled up to the front of
the store. A small woman got out of the drivers seat as the passenger
side door was opened violently. A very very large and very scary
looking man with light tanned white skin got out. He moved behind the
woman as they both walked into the store.

They quickly made for the restrooms and the woman went
inside the womens room. The man took up position just in front of the
door and pulled his jacket hood in tighter to cover his face. As he
put his hands back in his pockets Max caught sight of what appeared
to be a gun in his pocket. Her heartrate rose as adrenaline flooded
her body.

Could he be carrying a gun? Was he going to use it?
Would he rob the store? Or shoot Max? She didn't know and she didn't
want to find out the answer. Max reached for the silent alarm and
subtly touched the button. As she watched the man he made no apparent
movements to indicate he'd noticed. Internally Max sighed with
relief. The police would be here soon and she'd be safe. And so would
the woman she hoped.

Suddenly the manager burst from his office in a fit of
rage. As Max looked at him she suddenly became very afraid that his
attitude would set off the powder keg in the room. She was, sadly,
correct.

"What the hell did you call the cops for? I don't
care if you're dying we don't want that kind of attention!" The
manager began to yell at Max. That was all he said though because in
the next moment a bullet pierced his skull. Max quickly fell off her
stool in shock and terror as several more whizzed past where she had
been.

She fell into the cabinet space underneath the counter
top as the man hesitated on whether he should go over and shoot her.
When the woman exited the restroom behind him he decided against that
plan. Even though she had seen his face he couldn't risk taking time
to kill her. The cops were already on their way before he'd even
fired the first round.

He roughly grabbed the woman and forced her out of the
store. On his way out he fired several shots into the counter hoping
to hit the girl who was hiding behind it. But he couldn't stop to see
if he was successful, so he left with an iron grip on the womans
hair. After he forced her inside the passenger seat of the car he got
inside the drivers seat and quickly left around the back entrance,
just in case the police might already be waiting up the road for
them.

Back inside Max was trying her best not to vomit at the
sight of her now dead manager. She looked upon his mangled body in
horror. She finally passed out from the sight just as the cops
entered the store with their guns drawn.

Chapter 3:

Despondent

Max blinked her eyes open to see a few people looking over her body.
She quickly realized they were either police or Emergency Medical
Techs. After that her mind drifted into wondering why they were
looking at her. When she remembered the events that caused her store
manager to be shot to death, she sat bolt upright, causing the men to
jump back in surprise.

"Shit!"
she exclaimed. Then she jumped off the wheeled cart they had put her
on and ran off. Distantly she heard the men yelling after her but she
was sprinting faster than they could move on foot and left them
behind in a matter of seconds. She followed the road for a while but
when she heard police sirens behind her she left the road and entered
the trees nearby, hoping to hide from them.

She
hid behind a very large one and held her breath as they passed. When
the cars passed by she could see the abnormally bright search light
as it enveloped the trees in a harsh white bath. They passed by
without noticing her however and she finally breathed a sigh of
relief.

After
standing there and contemplating her situation for a few minutes, Max
started crying and slid down the tree and onto the muddy ground..
After a few minutes she sat up and started puking again. Eventually
she passed out from the stress and had another nightmare.

##########

14 year old Max sat on the ground, her hands roughly bound behind her
back by duct tape. They were also taped to a heavy wooden table. In
front of her was her father, holding a gun to her face. He span the
revolvers barrel a few times and pulled the trigger. There was a
slight click but thankfully it seemed the bullet hadn't been in that
chamber.

The man frowned cruelly and stood up. He went over to the room where
Max's mother was standing. She was crying and begging the man to stop
but he wasn't paying much attention. He spun the barrel a few times,
then pointed it at her head and pulled the trigger. There was a very
loud explosion as the bullet shredded the womans head and exited out
the back, embedding itself in the wall along side a gruesome blood
splatter.

The man frowned some more before turning on Max.

"Just remember, this was her fault for complaining about not
having money to buy me some beer." he said roughly before
leaving the room. He left Max tied up like that for several hours
while he silently cleaned up the resulting blood splatter. After that
he untied her and sent her out to find him some beer to drink.

##########

Max's younger self stood behind the door of her house scared. There
in front of her was her father and a few police officers. She'd been
crying when she went out and had quickly attracted police attention
by muttering about her mothers death.

The police officers were looking around the house but didn't seem to
care. After all, why should they? Her father was a respected member
of the community and was a volunteer firefighter. They would never
believe that he would do any harm. It didn't help that the man had
cleaned up the entire mess before he'd even sent her out to get him
his drinks.

"Listen, officers. I'm sorry about this. Like her mother she has
a very active imagination." Max's father said politely. "She
probably took a nap and had a nightmare. That happens often at their
age."

"Oh no problem sir. We're sorry about the trouble." The
officer said. Shortly after they exchanged pleasantries and the
officers left. Max's father watched them with a seemingly genuine
smile plastered across his face until they were out of sight before
turning to Max with a scowl. Without a word he walked over and kicked
her in the stomach. The kick was so powerful that Max instantly
collapsed on the ground and fell unconscious from the pain.

##########

Max awoke to find herself sitting on the floor of her dorm with her
head laying against the side of her bed. She realized she was covered
in dirt and grime and blood. As the events of the previous night came
back to her again. She retched a bit but quickly calmed herself.

She sighed as she realized that she had lost that job. Not only was
the manager dead, but she'd run from the police. Not that it mattered
much. She'd faked her application, like she had with all of her
others, including her boarding school application. She didn't need or
want them interfering with her life in case they found out her real
identity. She was underage and would be sent back home against her
will if they ever did. She wanted her real identity, the one she'd
been given at birth, to disappear forever and would do anything in
her power to make that happen, even if it meant doing something
illegal.

Sighing deeply, Max stripped her clothes off so she could clean up.
It was still early in the morning and the sun hadn't risen. Given
that it was the weekend, her fellow classmates would all still be
fast asleep, so she should have the privacy she needed to clean up.

After she cleaned herself and her room, she sat down at her computer
and started searching for a new weekend job.

##########

Max sighed deeply. She'd been searching all day for a new job and had
yet to find one that was even remotely close. The nearest one had
turned out to be well over a hundred miles away.

She went and laid down on her bed silently. Staring at the wall, she
finally covered herself up. Then she buried her face in her pillow
and started crying.

It was all over for her. If she didn't have any money she wouldn't be
able to finish her final semesters in this hellhole some would dare
to call a school. Add in the fact that she held her own personal hell
everywhere she went and things were decidely grim. But she was
determined to not let that get to her and so she tried forged ahead
into her future.

But now she was doubting she could make it. She'd probably end up
dead from stress before the year was out. And even if she didn't she
would end up on the wrong side of the law when she couldn't pay back
her debts for school. And if that happened they might end up
uncovering her birth identity, which would be very bad for her. All
things considered, she didn't see any way out of this anymore.

##########

"What have you got?" asked a man in a police uniform. It
was only a week after they'd reviewed the security camera footage
that they had to call in the FBI. The man who'd killed the grocery
store manager was on the run after a series of bombings that had
killed 307 people in California. Since then, he'd been spotted in
nearly every state in a straight line between Nevada and North
Carolina, which is where they were now.

The detective looked at him with a weary, defeated look.

"We didn't find a whole lot on his whereabouts. By the time you
called he would have already left the state." the man said. "We
did, however, find out more about the girl. Only that more turned out
to be nothing. She faked her application there. So 'Amelia' doesn't
even exist."

"Great. So basically we're stuck at square one. Hell probably
boxed in with steel walls." the police officer said. The case
had not gone well despite it only having a been week since they'd
opened it. Add in the fact that they had received word that a guy who
murdered a girl during a rape gone wrong would probably be hiding
somewhere in the area and he was having a very tough week.

"Not entirely Chief. During the course of the investigation we
were able to determine the gas station was just a shell corporation
for a private terrorist group based here in the states. They were
using it to launder money for their operations. We've passed the
information along and they'll be caught soon."

"What kind of terrorist organization?" the police chief
asked.

"A white supremacist group. Our buddies in the state
investigations bureau here have been tracking them for some time but
haven't been able to make an arrest before. With the info we've given
them the group will be dealt with swiftly." the FBI agent
responded.

"Alright." the chief said, not totally convinced that they
should just let the matter drop. "Where are we with the security
camera footage."

"About the same place we were yesterday when we got the footage.
The shitty quality of the video made it hard to clean up."

The chief sighed heavily. It looked like this investigation was going
nowhere fast, just like all of the others he was overseeing.

"Still, our techies did a good job. The girl was on shift for
nearly 18 hours, so we got plenty of shots of her face. The techies
spliced a couple of images together and we have a decent profile to
run by the state media for identification."

"Remind me again why I care." he said, with a hint of
exasperation.

"Because the girl is a witness to one crime, a potential suspect
in another, and the only person to survive seeing the face of the man
we're after. Until now, he's been careful to kill anyone who saw his
face so he couldn't be identified easily. Even these security cameras
didn't catch more than his back or his hood. We only know for sure
it's him because we recognize the woman he has in tow when he arrives
and leaves the store. She's currently being used as a hostage in case
we corner him."

The chief glared at the agent.

"That was a rhetorical question." he said before walking
out of the room. The agent, however stayed. He boredly refreshed the
email on his phone because he was waiting on the physical profile to
be sent back to him. The email would contain a rough picture created
along with a basic description for the police to release to local
media. If they could find the girl then they could maybe get the
answers they needed to help take down the bomber. But no matter how
far they got, the agent couldn't help but feel that the bomber was
always 3 steps ahead of them.

##########

"And in other news the police department of Brittlewall, North
Carolina are on the hunt for a person who may be a witness to a crime
involving the California Bomber. The police spokesperson released a
statement asking the citizens of North Carolina to be on the lookout
for a young woman around the age of 18. She's wanted in connection
with a killing that police believe she was witness too, performed by
the California Bomber according to security camera footage. Police
have provided a partial profile including a rough sketch of what the
girl may look like." As the newscaster spoke a black and white
computer generated sketch of a young teen girl appeared in a box on
the upper right corner. The box zoomed in to fill the whole screen
and a description and phone number appeared across the bottom
underneath the sketch. "Residents are advised to call the number
on screen if they see the girl or know her whereabouts."

The man watching the television stood up and smiled
evilly.

"Found you, bitch." said the man. "Daddy's
coming to get you."

With that, he turned off the television and grabbed his
car keys. Brittlewall was about 8 hours away, not counting any breaks
he'd have to take on the way. If he left now, he'd arrive around
midnight. Not that he cared. He wanted his daughter back, and would
do anything to return her home.