Kingdom: The Complete Series (33 page)

Something within him is
fighting.

It burns away the
chemicals clinging to his cells and coating his lungs. It renews the nerve
endings paralysed by the toxins and breathes life into him once more, keeping
his blood flowing and his brain alive.

But it is running out
of fuel.

Mark, his eyes and nose
gushing blood, wraps his fingers around the flask on his belt and tries to
slide it up towards him. His elbow catches on some rubble in the molten
darkness. Trying not to scream as the heat begins to burn and singe his skin,
he forces his elbow to twist farther and father -

He feels a pop and
can't contain his screaming this time. His elbow and his wrist dislocate, and
he loses his grip – but now, with beads of sweat coursing down his cheeks, he
uses what little strength remains to push it up his chest, where his other hand
is trapped.

Whimpering with the pain
and the effort, and sobbing out of fear, he makes one last effort and lifts his
hand. Where it was pinned against his chest, he now has an inch of movement or
so, and uses it to loop his fingers around the flask's top. He swings it like a
pendulum, down over his chest and into the gap between his neck and his
shoulder.

The temperature is
getting too much. His legs are on fire, he can feel the skin melting away from
them.

He can't see. His lungs
are ablaze with the heat of the air that he is breathing. Everything is
beginning to fail.

He has seconds.

He twists his neck as
far as he can, reaching for the top of the flask like a child to a bottle.
Twinging, the muscles in his neck lock, and he pushes further, afraid at any
moment that his neck will break and the cool, calming peace of death will
finally find him.

Instead he finds the
top of the flask, and his teeth grip around it. He works his aching jaw muscles
to pop the top off the flask, and spits it to the side.

Whisky splashes over
his face.

Grinning and laughing,
he feels the torrent of reeking alcohol flood against his chin. He opens his
mouth, scooping up what he can and gulping it down. Stretching and aching, he
jams his teeth around the opening and tilts his head back.

Down there in the
darkness, with his life seeping from his nose and his body beginning to
disintegrate, a fire explodes within him. It roars as he fuels it, downing the
contents of his flask like a victorious runner. The fire seeps into his muscles
and strengthens them, repairing the damage done by the poison.

The heat fades – he is
still aware of it, but the pain is no longer searing through his mind. He tries
to move and finds that he can. It's tough; the weight of a building is pushing
down on his arms, but now he pushes back.

The rubble begins to
shift and he pushes harder, struggling to his knees as he takes the weight of
his old project on his shoulders. He stands up, roaring in triumph.

With a cry that is
heard on the surface and snaps heads around in surprise, Mark bends his legs,
focuses his strength into them, and leaps upward.

He crashes through the
rubble and streaks into the cool evening air like a firework.

Mark flies, bathing in
the frozen atmosphere, and for just a few seconds of elation he is hovering.

Flying.

Mark tastes the
sweetest air he has ever breathed, and looks around at the city from on high.

Then the magic goes,
and he falls back to earth like an angel, arms outstretched.

Mark crashes to earth
like a meteor, smiling as he fights to get his breath back, grateful to be
alive.

Lying there, in a
man-shaped crater in the pavement, he laughs and opens his eyes to see a crowd
of fire-fighters staring at him. He realises now that most of his overalls have
burned away, leaving him with little else to cover him.

One of them, an older
man wearing a white helmet who is obviously in charge, raises an eyebrow.

“
Well,
shit.”

 
Episode
8

Superhero

Mark's nostrils are
still filled with ash and heat. His tattered overalls are lying in a heap on
the road, shredded like road-kill. Sitting in the open side of a fire engine –
where the hose is kept – he wraps his arms around himself and shivers; not from
the cold, as he'd gladly bathe in ice, but from the adrenaline.

All around him are the
red trucks of the fire service, with ambulances approaching out of the darkness
with enough lights and sirens to wake the dead.

“
Right,”
announces the commander of the firemen. He walks over, unbuttoning his heavy
black jacket and throwing it around Mark's naked shoulders. Standing before
him, he takes off his white helmet and ruffles his hair – the same shock white
as his headgear. His face is far darker, caked in smoke and sweat – he has the
look of somebody who has overdone their sun tan, his face like a wrinkled
raisin. “It's time we spoke, son.”

“
Thanks
for the coat, but I don't really it,” says Mark, shrugging.

“
You
aren't sitting around naked on my watch. You're that laddy from the news,
aren't you?”

“
The
news?”

“
Aye.
A few months back – you were jumping about Glasgow punching helicopters and
fighting soldiers and what-not. That was you.”

“
What
gave it away?”

“
Lifting
twenty tonnes of rubble off yourself? Then leaping sixty feet into the air?”

“
Oh
yeah.”

“
My
boys said you ran into that place when it was burning to the ground. Trying to
save people?”

“
Actually,”
says Mark. “I was trying to save the building. I thought it was empty.”

“
A
building isn't worth your life, son.”

“
This
one is my life,” says Mark, staring at the mound of ruins. His voice grows
quieter, softer, as he goes on, taking an aching breath.  “Was, rather. He knew
I'd come running.” He laughs, but there's no humour in it. “I should have
listened to my mother.”

“
Who's
'he'?”

“
You
ever heard of the King?” The fireman nods. “Me and the King don't get on.”

“
Weren't
you the one that exposed him? I remember watching it on the news.” The fireman
looks around as though afraid of being overheard. “So he is back, eh? The
rumours are true?”

“
Oh
yeah,” says Mark, wiping his forehead and leaving a grimy streak across it. In
the encroaching darkness, everything is tinted orange by the immutable flames
raging over the ruins of the Gardens.

Mark stares through the
myriad of engines and the cloud of steam coming from the hoses, straight at the
rubble of what was once his dream.

Another fireman appears
out of the darkness and Mark tenses up, but the figure simply produces a
plastic bottle of water, handing it to his officer, who thanks him and offers
it to Mark. He takes it and gulps it down, wincing as the icy water chills his
stomach.

“
Better?”
asks the fireman.

“
Actually,
what I could really use is a drink.”

“
Another
water? I'll have someone -”

“
No,
no,” Mark waves him down. “Look, it's complicated, but I'll get better a lot
faster if you get me some alcohol.”

The fireman scratches
his head. “You uh, got any preference?”

“
I
normally like a nice single malt, but I'm bloody thirsty; six beers ought to do
it.”

“
Any
particular type?”

“
Oh,
surprise me.”

“
Anything
else I can get you?”

“
Yeah,
actually. Are there any reporters or journalists or anything milling around?”

“
A
dozen or so by the barriers, we aren't answering questions until the fire is
contained.”

“
Send
them in,” he says. “Preferably with cameras.”

“
You
sure?”

Mark nods. “I don't
have a phone or any other way to contact my friends – I want them to know I'm
ok.”

“
I
can get you a helmet to wear over your face or something, if you'd like?”

“
What
for?”

The fireman laughs. “To
preserve your secret identity.”

“
Bit
late for that, the King knows who I am. Besides, I'm not a superhero.”

The fireman nods,
putting on his helmet as he walks away. He stops, turning around with one last
question on his lips.

“
Here,
if the King's back; are you going to stop him again?”

“
I'll
try. Why?”

“
I'll
sleep better at night for knowing that, is all.”

Mark smiles. “Thanks.”

The fireman returns the
smile and walks off into the darkness, heading for the lights of the camera
crews.

Jamie sits on the edge
of a bed that is covered in cheap floral patterns, in a room stained yellow by
cigarette smoke. Stacy sits beside him, with an alarm clock in her hands. She's
staring down into the grimy clock-face; as she stares, the mechanical hands
stop moving.

She nudges Jamie. “Hey
look: I've got your power now, too.”

Jamie lets her have a
weak laugh, more out of appreciation for her effort than anything else.

“
You
ok, son?” asks Donald, who is sitting by the window with his legs crossed.

“
Of
course he's not ok, Don,” says Cathy, sitting across from him. “Honestly, I
thought doctors were taught about this stuff.”

“
We
are: it's best to talk about these things. Keeping it all cooped up won't
help.”

“
Aye,
Don, but so soon? Give the boy time.”

Jamie looks at the
alarm clock, watching as Stacy turns the hands forward in time, and then back.
His eyes narrow, his face stony.

“
What?”
asks Stacy, seeing the look on his face. “What are you thinking?”

“
I'm
thinking that I can stop time,” says Jamie, and looks up into her nervous eyes.
“I've never tried pushing it back -”

Before he can finish
his sentence, the Trespasser throws the door open and storms into the room, his
helmet on but his mask absent.

“
Turn
on the TV,” he points at the brown antique sitting on an office desk. “Now.”

Donald, the closest to
it, barely gets out of his seat before Stacy closes her eyes and switches it on
without touching it.

The colours bring the
screen to life, and the Trespasser flicks the channel over using a dusty button
on the bottom of the TV.

Impatient silence
suffocates the room.

Jamie stands up, hands
over his mouth, as Mark's face appears on the screen and his voice fills the
room.

“
That
no-use bastard,” whispers Jamie, grinning.

Trespasser One claps
his back. “I've got a chopper coming for us, we're going to pick him up. Up to
the roof, now.”

“
No,
no,” says Jamie, pawing him away and sitting down, beaming at the screen with
one eye still swollen shut. “I want to hear this.”

The King sits in the
gloom of his office whilst Gregor stands aside him, wearing a suit similar to
the King's, his hair still wet from the shower he insisted upon taking – to
'wash the poverty off himself'.

Around them stand a
crowd of similarly dressed men and women, each wearing long black coats. The
scene resembles a funeral: a damp room filled with dark-eyed people staring at
a pale-faced man in the centre.

That pale man is the
King, and the colour has drained from his eyes and lips as he watches the tiny
phone screen on his desk, casting a sickly white light over him, illuminating
the tired rings under his eyes.

“
Attack
helicopters still circle the prison,” says the newsreader, a balding man with
trendy, thick-rimmed glasses, “but the sounds of gunfire have finally stopped.
What little information we do have points to an unsettling prospect: that the
fugitive known as the King – currently the most wanted man in the western
hemisphere – intended to unleash his followers upon the city of Glasgow
en-masse. Yet again the people of Glasgow must watch the military tear their
city to pieces; another blow in a long and difficult struggle to return this
city to normality.”

Gregor leans in, his
shirt and suit jacket open to let his bandaged ribs breathe. A bile-coloured
bruise has spread over most of his torso. He whispers, informing the King as an
advisor would inform a General of a military defeat:

“
Our
men in the prison aren't answering calls, sir. We can assume that they're
lost.”

The King says nothing,
staring straight ahead into the screen. He cracks his knuckles, and then lets
out a deep sigh.

“
No
matter,” he says. “We managed to injure one of them, right?”

“
Correct,
sir. The same one that struck you on the eve of your arrest.”

“
Jamie.
His name is Jamie.”

“
As
I understand, sir, yes.”

“
And
you buried Mark under his own building.”

“
Indeed.”

“
Then
we've hit all of our objectives. You said that the prisoners – they were thwarted
by other people with powers?”

“
Yes,
sir.”

“
Good.
We need more information on them. If they are indeed using these powered people
in field operations, Gregor, then we currently have the advantage. They aren't
trained soldiers – we killed Mark and injured Jamie, and showed that we are a
capable and legitimate threat. They'll be reeling. They won't be thinking
straight – and that makes them easy bait.”

“
What
would you have us do, sir?”

“
They'll
want revenge. Move me to a secure location then fake a leak of my whereabouts,
rig it to blow or gas them or whatever – you handle the details. My guess is
that they'll be unable to resist the temptation to come and get me. I killed
their superman, after all.”

“
As
you wish, sir,” says Gregor, bowing. “And the arrival?”

“
Stick
to the plan. Track the fire as it falls, find the people it hits, and persuade
them to come with you using our usual methods.”

“
Intimidation
and threats, sir? Those methods worked before, but they do depend upon us
having a firm grasp on the city.”

“
For
all they know, I still have the details on almost every person in the city
centre. Allude to their family's safety, be vague but firm. Make the Agency out
to be the bad guys. Handle the details, Gregor; like I said.”

“
Yes,
sir.”

“
How
long is left, anyway?”

“
Until
the arrival, sir? Just under one hour.”

“
Then
the first hours of a new Kingdom are approaching. Wait until just before the
arrival to spring the trap; we want them far enough away that they can't affect
our mission even if it fails, ok? Don't forget to...”

The King trails off,
his face dropping in the pale light as the news switches to another story.

Across the bottom of
the screen, in white writing on a red card, it reads:

Superhero Speaks Out

The room drops in
temperature as though a chill breeze had blown through. The King stares into
the screen, into the eyes of a man he is coming to hate more than anybody else
in the world.

Mark, plastered across
his TV screen, with his face covered in ash, soot and sweat, smiles and stares
right back at him.

“
I
want to say something, and then I'll answer your questions.” Mark tells the
crowd, and looks straight into the nearest camera. “Innocent people died
tonight. This building was once a project called the Gardens, and I set it up
myself to help Glasgow's less fortunate break the cycle of poverty and abuse
that many were trapped in. The King didn't like that: for years he put
financial pressure on me, eventually driving me into poverty like those I tried
to help. He intended to have me killed; it didn't work out for him. He was
exposed for what he is: a coward, who ruled through fear and intimidation; who
preyed on those too weak to fight back. I was the one that brought him in, and
I stand here before you: unmasked, and unafraid.”