Chronicles of the Supers (Book 1): Born From Darkness (The Story of Max) (9 page)

Still
that would be hard. The police had a picture of his face included in
the profile, but to date he'd eluded escape. They suspected he was
heading east of Raleigh but hadn't found him with various roadblocks.
Not that those were effective given how many roads there were, but
they still tried, even if sometimes it was to placate the public
outrage over their lack of results.

Max
didn't know where to start looking for him either. However she had
abilities the police didn't. She also didn't have the legal bindings
they did when searching for criminals. Though it seemed that might
not help her this time around.

The
police files, as it turned out, were kept in a private database with
no internet access. It seemed the police in larger areas were more
paranoid. And it iritated Max endlessly. She needed a way to get
information and she needed it fast. But so far she couldn't think of
any way to get any info. So instead she filed his public information
on a folder on her computer and went on to find other targets who
were easier to find.

She
began searching again and found another target within minutes. This
one was quite a bit further away than the last few had been and she
would almost certainly need some form of transportation. Her top
speed, that she'd been able to measure, was only around 60 miles per
hour. At that rate it would take 3 hours just to arrive at the
location if she followed established public roads. Meaning she needed
a faster way to get there.

Of
course she didn't have a car. And couldn't afford one. Her town had a
bus stop but that was only for local transportation. If she ran in a
straight line and didn't get lost, a huge assumption, then she could
be there in roughly 2.5 hours. As she considered her options she
decided that she would just have to run and pray that she didn't get
lost.

She
decided to set out that night despite the fact that it was a Sunday.
She had school tomorrow morning and really wanted to get some sleep.
But she decided that her vengeance was more important. Plus being
unpredictable would make it harder for the police to trace her trail.

##########

Max was sprinting as fast as she could through some underbrush. But
she had to be careful. One power she noted was missing from her
repetoire was invulnerability. She would still be cut easily by
things like the underbrush she was running through. Though she had
super healing to make up for it, so she was pushing faster than she
would have normally dared already.

She was only about 15 seconds out from her destination if she had run
in the correct direction. While that was a really big if, she'd
managed to orient herself using several roads in the area. The
possibility of her being lost was certainly much smaller. Especially
since she also had a map of the area she'd printed and compass to
help her navigate.

She slowed down at the map when she saw a clearing ahead. If her
guess was accurate, that clearing was the compound she had planned to
infiltrate. As she came near she saw a very large 3 story plantation
style home.

'Yep, this is it.' Max thought to herself.

The house was painted white and was very lavish, with a porch that
wrapped all the way around the first floor. The third story seemed a
little out of place to Max's eyes, but she couldn't figure out why.
Perhaps it was a new addition to the home or something like that.

Max looked around and surveyed everything she could see. She would
need a way in that was quiet and quick. On this side the home had
lights on the porch, so she would have a hard time getting in. But
she slowly circled around to the other side, taking care to stay
hidden in the underbrush along the way, so she could fully scope out
the place before planning on how to get in.

On the back of the house Max lucked out and found a stealthy way in.
There was a pickup truck parked close to the house and the lights on
this side where being blocked by it. She could climb up on the pickup
and reach the roof over the porch and from there get inside the house
through a window.

Quickly making up her mind, Max sprinted across the ground, taking
care to stay in the shadows. When she reached the pickup she
scrambled on top of it and stepped across to the roof. From there she
squatted down and awkwardly squat-walked across the roof to a nearby
window. She looked inside and found that the room appeared to be
deserted. After getting a thorough look she tried the window but
found it was locked.

She blew out a silent, frustrated breath and moved to the next.
Methodically, she tried 3 more windows and found they were all
locked. The 5
^th
window though was unlocked, allowing Max
to sneak into the unoccupied room. She opened the door on the other
side and found the hallway to be empty but well lit. Cursing her luck
she gingerly stuck her head out into it but prepared herself to run
as fast as possible if she needed to.

She found no one in the hallway though and decided to step out into
it. She stood still but kept the door opened in case she needed a
fast out. She looked around but found no one and no opened doors. To
her right she saw a stairway and heard some voices coming from below.
She quietly moved over to the stairs, with the floor thankfully not
even making any noise as she moved.

She carefully moved down the stairs, squatting down as she went to
get a better view from below. Though it was unnecessary as their were
walls on both sides. At the bottom there was a small landing that
split both left and right and went down a further 2 steps before
flattening out into the floor. She listened carefully and heard the
voices coming from the left.

Max scooted up against the right wall and moved further down. As she
did she looked towards the room the voices were coming from. Once she
arrived on the final step before the landing, she noticed the room
was actually a hallway. And at the end were 3 men talking to each
other. Max moved back a bit and used her hearing to pick up on the
conversation.

"Now gentlemen, I know my proposal may sound a little forward
but..." said one man, who sounded very intelligent.

"Now listen here yank, forward is when you talk to a girl. Crazy
is what you're proposing!" another interrupted, with a very
distinct redneck accent.

"Well, it may sound crazy, but it should work. And if not, I
have the money to ensure that we can find another way out." the
first man said.

"Listen here Danny-boy," the third one began. He had a
voice that sounded like a mix between the first 2 Max had heard,
sounding very intelligent but with a distinct redneck inflection. "I
want assurances that we won't need your backup. Because if we do I'll
make sure you don't get your own help."

"I told you, you are only allowed to call me Mr. Penale."
the first man said. Max froze at the name. Daniel Penale was the name
of the man from earlier. The one the police in Raleigh had failed to
catch. If this was him then she was in luck. But she still felt the
hairs on the back of her neck stand up at the name. It made her
nervous to be confronting him for some reason.

"Listen here Danny-boy," the third man said again. "I
don't like your tone. You come in here with a plan to get us out of
the eyes of the police so that we can run our growin operation in
peace and quiet. But it involves leading them right to our doorstep.
You think we're just gonna take a plan like that and run with it?"

"No I don't Mr. Warren. I can make assurances that it will work.
I've been looking to expand my empire after I got chased out of
Raleigh because that bitch blabbed about me. Thankfully she was just
a whore and she never saw the full extent of my operation."
Penale said.

"So what all were you into then?" the second man asked.

"I would rather show you than tell you. " Penale said.

"Then you can show us. We'll make our decision then." the
third man, Mr. Warren, said.

"Very well. I'll lead you there. We can even take your truck."
Penale said.

"Listen bro, I want you to stay here and tend the place while
I'm gone. If I'm not back by this time tomorrow then you have
permission to grab Ken and take this fucker out." Warren said.
Max held her breath. Ken Warren was the man she had originally come
here for anyway. If she could find him she could take out 2 of her
targets in one night. Hell she could apparently cross off 2 other
criminals too, though she didn't really care about what they were up
to. They were merely growing drugs to sell on the streets as far as
she was concerned.

"Speaking of, where the hell is that son of a bitch anyway?"
the one with the thicker accent asked.

"Hell if I know. You go find him and tell him where I'm going."

"YO KEN GET YER ASS IN HERE!" the man with the thick accent
started yelling. Max could hear him stepping closer to her position
and started to quickly but quietly back up the stairs.

"I think I will, but I'll be bringing a guest with me!"
came a voice from behind Max. Without thinking Max reacted by darting
around the corner to the right, away from the voice behind her and
hid behind the wall. The men in the hall had seen her and she could
hear them pulling and readying guns.

Max was in trouble now. But she was determined to make
it out, no matter how many people she had to kill.

Part 3:

Conflict

Chapter 11:

Frozen

Max began analyzing her situation immediately. She was in a kitchen
of some kind. Looking around, she could see a block with knives in it
on the table in the center. There was also a light switch on the
opposite wall.

To her
right was a small table with a hunting knife and a spoon. Thinking
quickly, Max formulated a plan and had started moving when the first
shot rang out, going through the wall and scraping her ear but
otherwise leaving her unharmed.

Max
pushed aside the pain of losing a chunk of her ear and grabbed the
spoon. She compressed her fist, turning it into a roughly ball shaped
hunk of metal. Then she took aim at the light switch. After taking a
moment and listening to see how close the men were, she let the spoon
chunk fly. It struck true and had an unexpected effect. The metal
shorted out the switch wiring and threw the breaker. The house was
plunged into darkness after a moments delay.

Max
smiled. The situation was now a lot better because she could see just
as well in the darkness as she could in the light because of her
superpowers. Add in her super hearing and she could easily overrun
her attackers.

Max
grabbed the hunting knife and waited. She waited for a good 10
seconds in fact before she heard the men continue their approach.
Apparently they had been disoriented by the blackout and had to wait
until their eyes adjusted.

While
she waited, Max stretched out her senses and found that her 'human
radar', as she called it, could detect the exact positions of those
in the house with her. She cursed herself. If she'd used it she could
have figured out that someone was upstairs behind her.

Max
found the nearest guy and gripped the knife a little bit tighter. He
was about to round the corner. She looked back at the bend and saw
the gun leading the mans arm. She waited until she could see the
shoulder and then reached the knife over. With a minor grunt, she
embedded the knife into the mans shoulder. The loud shriek of a
scream followed and Max deduced from the pitch that it was Penale.
Smiling cruelly, Max twisted the knife around in his arm. He fell
down and grabbed his shoulder in agony.

Then
Max's shoulder flared up with white hot pain. She lost her balance
for a minute and staggered forward. It was then that she heard a
gunshot. After a moment she figured out what had happened. She'd been
shot in the shoulder through the wall. Looking back she saw the
bullet hole that confirmed her theory.

She
was now in significant trouble and she needed to get out of there as
soon as possible. But she also needed to take down her targets before
they got away. As she began planning 3 more bullets came through the
wall at her. Then behind her she heard the sound of one of them
tripping. She looked around and saw that the one with the thick
accent had tripped over the body on the floor. Smiling she bolted
over to the table in the center of the room and grabbed a knife.

Hefting
the knife Max threw it as hard as she could at the wall. The
unusually long blade embedded itself in the wall and she heard a loud
scream of pain from the other side. She'd managed to hit her other
target too. Max's face curled into another cruel smile as she grabbed
another knife and hurled it at the men on the ground, hitting the man
who'd tripped in the back of his head. The knife cleanly severed his
spine and killed him.

Then
she grabbed another knife and the whole knife block, one in each
hand. She rounded the table to where she could see the hall. Looking,
she saw the oldest brother, Jon Warren according to his file,
standing there trying to aim his gun without hitting his brothers.
She threw the knife block at him as hard as he could. When it hit his
head exploded and his remaining body fell to the ground in a slump.

The 2
that Max weren't targeting were now dead, giving her time to take
care of the other 2. She went over to the body of who she assumed was
the youngest Warren brother, though she didn't know what he looked
like because he didn't have a criminal record. Somehow.

Regardless
Max now could finish off her 2 real targets. She grabbed the body of
Penale and saw he was unconscious. She frowned and decided to simply
end his life. While she could wait for him to wake up, that might
take too long. She couldn't stick around for too long so she stomped
on his head, crushing it with no noticeable effort.