In League With Fear

He blended in with the night shadows, a cowl partially obscuring his face as he watched the men unloading the truck he had followed from the waterfront. They stacked the metal drums in a corner of the work area. The men quietly left when the job was done. He waited until they drove out of sight before he used a piton gun to shoot a line over the fence. He slid along the rope until he could drop inside the perimeter of the place. His ragged cloak flapped around him like the wings of a bird before he landed.

He moved to the drums silently. Shaded eyes read the labels. The intruder examined the rest of the area for more of the green cans. Earlier shipments had been emptied, and stacked neatly on pallets.

The cloaked man returned to where his cord crossed over the fence. He used a hook and a leap against the wall of the work shop to vault over the fence. He went to retrieve his cord before vanishing back into the shadows.

Charles Flores limped into the newsroom of the Church Hill Crier, supporting himself with a plain wooden cane. He waved at his coworkers as he sat at his desk. He dug out his notepad to see what stories he needed to pursue.

"Hey, Chuck!," called Emma Zerling, a human interest columnist. "What do you think of these comic book heroes showing up in town?"

"Superhumans have been appearing worldwide the last few years," said Flores. "Why shouldn't Church Hill have a few? Why the sudden interest?"

Emma walked over to his desk, folder in hand. She opened it up. Numerous clippings of mysterious vigilantism peered up at Flores.

"This guy has been all over town," said Emma. "No one has been able to track him down for an interview."

"No one has interviewed Johnny Shield either," said Flores. "Comes with the turf with Lone Ranger mentalities."

"This guy only works at night," Emma continued. "Never stays around for the cops, and has busted a lot of felons almost without being seen. If he hadn't stepped in front of the ATM camera at Hill National last week, I wouldn't have the one shot I do have."

"This is all interesting," said Flores. "What do you want me to do about this?"

"Everyone knows you and Leaguer are tight," said Emma.

"We are?"

"I was hoping you could ask him to help me track this guy down for an interview," Emma said.

"Even if I did have such influence," said Flores, trying not to smile. "What makes you think Leaguer could track this guy down for you?"

"I was hoping he would do that for you," said Emma.

"I doubt it," said Flores. "We're not that close. If it will make you feel better I will ask him and see if he will do you the favor."

"You're the best, Chuck," said Emma.

"I am not promising anything," said Flores, holding his hand up.

"I know, I know."

Rick Conlin sat at the bar in Duffy's. He had sucked down a couple bottles of Scotch, and was thinking about opening a third. The bartender looked at him, eyebrows arching up before cutting him off with a shake of his head. Conlin snarled. He threw his empty glass at the bartender, missing by a wide margin.

A bouncer grabbed Conlin's arm. One hard yank from the bar's peacekeeper was enough to set the drunken dock worker on his feet and headed for the front door. A hard shove got the man outside and pointed to an empty cab. The driver shook his head as he opened the back door of his hack.

Conlin got in. The cabbie shut the door, walked around to the other side and got in behind the wheel. He pulled away from the curb carefully and drove away.

Rick Conlin's body washed up the next day against a deserted pier. A couple of kids skipping school saw the corpse floating in the water and turned it in to the police department.

He walked the halls of the morgue, cloak swirling around him. He didn't like to invade the halls of authority, but something had caught his attention. A john doe had been fished out of the water off the coast. No obvious cause of death, but the man's skin had a mottled appearance.

The hooded man opened the drawer with the unidentified body in it. He nodded when he saw the face of the body. He took a card, wrote on it with a borrowed pen, and left the card in the hand of the corpse.

Everyone should have a decent burial under their own name.

The cloaked man retreated from the morgue, shadow swirling around him as he moved. He decided that a look at Rick Conlin's place was in order. There might be some kind of evidence to point the authorities in the right direction.

Of course, he would also have to get inside where Conlin had worked.

There might something there to explain why he was dead.

Charles Flores checked the wire when he limped into the bullpen. He had spent half the night helping people. He couldn't be everywhere, sometimes couldn't act fast enough. Still, he was doing his best.

He sat down at his desk, pulling out his work book. He had some appointments to keep with the lawyers of Alchemo. One of their chief officers, Raymond Lampion, had been found dead in front of his wrecked house. Police investigation had shown that Lampion and a chemist named Cruise had placed an unknown chemical for sale on the street as a new designer drug.

The substance was apparently the same that created Joe Hartly, the Jack of Hearts.

Flores had started investigating the chemical company when he had heard the details. One of the victims had vanished from his bed, and no one knew what had happened to him. The reporter had tried to get information on Tyson Lewis, even calling his parents. So far all trails were dead ends.

Flores put the work book aside as his watch began to beep. He glanced at it as he stood up. He limped to the elevator, and pressed the down button. As soon as the cab opened, he stepped inside. He pressed the 'close door' and 'stop' buttons so he could have some privacy.

"System boot," Flores said into his watch. "Flores, field operator, Terra."

A yellow haze exploded from the watch face. Billions of nanobots assembled his armor around him in a gold haze. System blinked to life in its exoskeleton form.

Leaguer pressed the elevator's 'start button' as he left through the emergency hatch, and headed out of the building.

Flores reviewed all the data System had gathered as he flew toward the Church Hill Bay. It wasn't much. The ocean water seemed to be boiling without heat. It was something unusual enough to trigger the artificial intelligence's attention.

A large wave opened the surface of the ocean. Bubbles burst along the top of the wave as it sped toward shore. An eddy of smoke followed along with snake-like contortions.

Leaguer dropped down in front of the wave. He expanded his aura into a circular wall. The onrushing water slammed the force field. The liquid scattered as it rebounded back to the top of the ocean. Flores scanned the top of the water. Something was mixed in the ocean, but System thought that the simple chemical reaction was a symptom of something worse. The compound resembled some mutagenic formulae used in other solar systems.

Leaguer turned back to the city to gather ingredients for a neutralizer to stop the flow of the stuff toward shore, and the city.

Flores arrived over the ocean with his antidote in a bubble created by his force field projectors. It had only taken moments to locate the proper ingredients. Mixing it had taken far longer. The boiling stain had grown much larger in his absence.

Leaguer dumped the chemicals into the ocean by cutting the force field off. The thick compound struck the strange waves. It sank out of sight, mixing with the salt water in a small cascade of pops.

Flores waited for a few minutes before taking another sample from the ocean top. He ran his scanner on it. System said the water was clean again. He dropped the water back to its source.

Leaguer flew back into the city, stopping to deal with an armed robbery on his way back to the Crier. He would have to track down the source of that strange pollution as soon as he was free again.

It was a simple matter for him to slip by Alchemo's security forces. His search turned up Rick Conlin's personnel file. Supposedly he had been fired weeks before for incompetence. Oddly enough Conlin's work history did not include what he had been working on for the chemical company.

He cleaned up after himself before leaving the building.

He decided that his next order of business was to talk to Arnie Cruise. He had been head of the research division. The death of Ray Lampion had revealed a great deal of criminality. Cruise had been released on his own recognizance until his trial.

He crossed the city with the grapnel gun he favored for swinging among the rooftops. He landed on the apartment building where Cruise lived. Time for a little talk with the chemist.

It was nothing for the cloaked man to open the locks on Cruise's door. He slipped inside, standing in shadow by the door as he quietly examined the apartment. The resident of the place was busy with some concoction in the kitchen. He seemed to have not noticed the intruder.

That was nothing unusual for the cloaked man. He preferred the surprise this lack of perception gave him when he did make his presence felt.

The hooded man crossed the apartment silently, cape swinging around his limbs. He deliberately let his shadow fall across Cruise's back.

"Not you again," Cruise said, turning to face the wraith. He gasped at the ravaged face before him.

"I don't think we have met," said a whispery voice. "I am interested in what happened to a man in your employ who died recently. His name was Rick Conlin."

"I don't know what you are talking about," said Cruise.

"Starting with a lie is a bad move," said the hooded man.

Cruise's hand went to the pan on the stove top. A gloved hand closed his throat before he could take a deep breath. The other hand seized the pan's handle and lifted the boiling contents off the burner.

"Don't turn this into something unpleasant," said the hooded man, glittering eyes peering from the hideous scars crossing his face. "I know Conlin worked for you at Alchemo. I know he died under unusual circumstances. I know that Alchemo is dumping something in the ocean.

"What I don't know is why Conlin was killed when things are looking bleak for your company now," said the whispery voice. "Please enlighten me."

"I don't know anything about that," said Cruise through the crushing pressure on his neck. "All I know about is the thing I had with Ray Lampion. That's over. I'm working on a deal to stay out of jail."

"Who would dump chemicals in the sea?," said the intruder. "Who else had a side venture going on?"

"I don't know," said Cruise. "Do you mind? You're choking me."

The choking hand opened.

"Thank you for your time, Mr. Cruise," said the intruder. "I'll be keeping my eye on you until your trial is done."

"Glad to know that," the chemist said. "My dinner?"

The hooded man dropped the pan on the stove. Cruise looked at it without thinking, making sure it wouldn't fall to the floor. When he looked for his questioner, the man had vanished in the night air.

"Why am I getting the crazies now?," Cruise said to himself.

The cloaked man decided to wait to take another look inside Alchemo. The night was fading fast. He returned to the clock tower downtown. He had hoped to pry more information out of Cruise.

Hopefully the radio microphone he had planted in the apartment would gather some clue to point at the real brain behind the chemical company.

He seriously doubted that Cruise and the late Ray Lampion would develop a drug syndicate on their own, and then cleanse the files of any company involvement.

The radio would work for him while he planned his next step.

Someone had wanted Conlin dead. That someone was connected to his job. That seemed obvious. What was that connection?

How did the toxic waste dumping in the ocean fit in to the scheme of things?

His mentor had once told him it was useless to speculate without facts.

The cloaked man listened to the saying as he put his search aside to wait for the coming of night again. The day might bring things to him that he needed.

Charles Flores looked over the paperwork he had assembled on Alchemo, Inc. He wasn't sure what some of it meant at the moment. Someone had covered their tracks as far as the real ownership. He had put System on it. The AI was still tracking the papers.

A labyrinth of lost retinue and identities.

Nothing System couldn't crack with a little time.

Flores turned to the other work on his desk. The company's chemical division had decided to replace Arnold Cruise with one of the chemists he supervised. His trial was winding down, and there was no way he was going to escape jail.

The replacement, a man named Lewis, had a son that was currently missing. The boy had been attacked and beaten by a street gang. He was in a coma for months, then one day he vanished from the hospital. No one knew what had happened to him.

Then there was this spillage into the ocean off the coast, along with the dead man who had been positively identified as an ex-employee of Alchemo. Both events happening at the same time was more than coincidence. A look around the ocean bottom had revealed where the chemical bath had been dumped.

Flores wondered what else he could do. As a reporter, he knew how to dig into things. So far he had amassed a snarl of dead ends with all of his probing. No one who knew anything concrete was talking.

Flores decided that he needed to get some air. He activated his hidden armor as he rode the elevator towards the roof. He soared away from the Crier in a gold haze.

He decided to fly over Alchemo's facility. Maybe someone would talk to this identity where they avoided the reporter. At the very least, it would allow System a chance to scan the place for anything unusual.

Flores circled in from the ocean. The chemical company looked out on the Atlantic, docks for shipping forming strange teeth. Trucks had a long drive to the main road which led to the highway. A storage warehouse squatted off to one side.

A stack of empty drums rested on one of the piers. Whatever had been inside still gleamed slightly in the afternoon sun as Leaguer dropped down. He touched down gently. The analyzer was already waiting for a sample. He ran a gold finger over the lip of one of the empty containers. The analyzer began to compare the molecular breakdown with the numerous files it had from what had been gathered by the other Leaguers.

The breakdown on the chemicals confirmed that the goop was more mutagenic solution. Anything exposed to it without protection would change into a new species.

Flores alerted the authorities to his find, telling them the care the Hazardous Materials team would need to dispose of the stuff. He recommended the use of a flame thrower to burn the goop away. He hoped that would be enough for warrants and a shutdown for Alchemo.

He didn't want to think about what would happen if the waste got in the city's water supply.

The chaos of transformed humans unleashing their new abilities would wreck the city worse than any normal riot. There would be no telling how many would die in such event.

Flores waited for Haz-Mat team to arrive. He helped them dispose of the barrels before taking flight. He soared out over the Atlantic in a golden glow. System ran checks on the water as he searched for the loose chemicals dumped from the docks. Most had of it had been diluted to safe levels with the passage of time by the salt water.

Most of it.

The rest had been absorbed by the local fish before it lost its potency.

Flores's visor posted pictures to him of the new species as they preyed on the local food chain. He would have to do something about that.

Leaguer sailed through the air over the ocean. System plotted a configuration for force field cages that he could use. Hopefully the fish wouldn't have grown anything other than extra fins.

Powers could have grown with the new shapes. The files from the other planets did mention that. Flores hoped that this would be an easy catch.

Monstrous fish emitting plasma was not on his list of favorite things.

Leaguer dove into the water, visor switching to infra red to give him a heat sensitive view. He slashed the liquid. Carets marked the suspect animals. They tried to scatter away from the glowing intruder. System extended his aura out in round cages as he blasted forward. Some of the fish tried to fight back with razor teeth and prehensile tails. The space agent snared them with his greater speed as he sailed pass in a flurry of bubbles.

Leaguer veered upward. Nine glowing balls followed behind him on glowing tethers. Each sphere held a weird fish in its grasp. He broke the surface, sending waves rippling away until the sea calmed below him.

Flores wondered what he was going to do with his specimens. He couldn't plunk them in a normal aquarium. They were still too dangerous for casual viewing by spectators. One had flattened out against the walls of its prison in a ribbon. It swirled violently in the trap as Flores headed out to sea.

He bypassed the locks and alarms with ease. He hated to interrupt his patrol for this, but he needed to use the county records that were under lock and key. The night was his accomplice in what he wanted to do.

Hours later, he had a few reams of records in his gloved grasp. His withered face twisted slightly with a smile. His careful search had gave him the identity of the owner of the Alchemo corporation.

Maybe he should visit him at home and have a little talk.

First, he would do something with the evidence he had gathered. The Church Hill Crier was covering the illegal dumping in their pages. They had pictures of it, sparking an investigation by the EPA.

He wondered what would happen if he revealed the ownership to the city.

He returned the files to their places. Better to make it look like no one had bothered them in a long while. He slipped from the room, and silently crossed town. He knew just who to call and tell about his discovery.

The Crier had a reporter especially interested in Alchemo at the moment. One phone call would put him on the right trail.

He couldn't wait to see how his meddling would affect things.

He hoped Flores appreciated his assistance.

It was too bad he would have to wait for the fireworks.

Charles Flores reached his desk early the next morning. Several messages had been left with the night desk for him. One attracted his attention more than the other tips on street crimes that had happened and the paper was looking into.

That one message said "Stephen Mark owns Alchemo."

Flores picked up the paper. He couldn't place the name. Still it was something to grab and run with.

Time to find out who Mark was and ask for an interview.

Government investigators had already sealed the buildings after he had grabbed the mutated fish out of the water. Sources said they were going over the records.

Someone was going to jail for a number of years when they could find out who was responsible.

Flores limped to the elevator. He couldn't just act without proof. He had to see if this tip was real before he reported it. His cane tapped along at his side as he waited for the cab to reach the bullpen floor.

A cab ride would take him over to City Hall, and maybe he could confirm what he had been told once and for all. Stephen Mark's name should be the perfect starting point for an ownership search.

Then he would have something to report, one way or the other.

Night wrapped Church Hill. A shadow separated from the clock tower that dominated Downtown with its four round faces. The flapping thing sailed gently from one pool of darkness to another.

When buildings dropped below his ability to use them effectively, he dropped on the top of a bus. It carried him to the southern edge of the city. His work very rarely carried him beyond the city limit.

He would simply have to secure reliable transportation for those occasions when it did.

The shadow leaped from the top of the bus at the last stop on the line. It became a man in a hooded cloak for a moment as a street light fell on it. Then it became a shadow among shadows, vanishing in the cover offered by suburban trees and fences.

The hooded man reappeared briefly at the wall of a small estate, shrouded by trees, fed by a long driveway. It was a moment's work to vault the wall, and drop in a shadow on the other side. He watched the lit house for seconds before moving quietly across the wide yard.

He paused as a golden glow appeared in the night sky above. The light dropped to the small stoop on the front of the house, becoming a man in golden armor. A gauntlet finger pushed the door bell gently.

The hooded man waited. Half of what he did was wait patiently for the other shoe to drop. Something had brought the Leaguer here. He wondered if it was the ownership notice he had sent to the Crier. He was supposed to be an ally of the reporters there.

The door opened, the man inside stepping aside for the famous hero. Leaguer stepped inside with a nod of his head.

The hooded man moved silently across the lawn, looking through the windows before finding the spot he needed to be in. He placed a small suction cup to the window, a rubber cord leading from it to the earpiece he put in place under his hood.

Leaguer stood in the center of Stephen Mark's home office. System highlighted objects it considered evidence. Several were books on genetic engineering. Flores moved his head in a shallow nod at the marked items.

"What can I do for you?," asked Mark, settling his lanky form in a swivel chair behind a work desk. A cup of coffee steamed on a coaster within reach.

"I understand that you own Alchemo," said Flores. "I was wondering what you knew about the dumping they've done."

"I think you should be talking with my operations officer," Mark said. "I plan things, but he runs the day to day."

"So if I told you that the chemical dumped in the water transformed the local fish, you wouldn't know what I am talking about," said Flores.

System placed an overlay on Mark to measure his responses to the questions. It didn't like the low temperature reading that the thermograph relayed. It was far below normal.

"That's right," said Mark. "Ideally Winston was supposed to legally transport the chemicals to a dumping site and destroy it in an incinerator. If he did something else with it, then he used his own initiative."

"I find that remarkable," said Flores.

"Winston has a free hand to carry out my wishes," said Mark. He took a sip of coffee. "He reports to me when he is done with the job."

"So you don't know what is going on?," asked Leaguer.

Leaguer crossed his arms. He was at a loss for his next question. He silently agreed with System. Something was wrong with Mark. The simple heat overlay was pointing them toward some type of conclusion.

Flores decided to turn all of System's analyzers on the businessman. The program began with simple life form screening, and started working its way up the scale toward quantum output analysis. The scan only took seconds, but the results made Flores lift an eyebrow.

"When were you exposed to the mutagen?," Leaguer asked. "It's running throughout your body."

"I guess it would be pointless to deny it," said Mark. "You might say I created the stuff, and exposed myself doing that. No matter. I am sure Winston has acted ethically to get rid of it."

"I doubt it," said Leaguer. "I think you knew your subordinate dumped the chemical in the ocean, even ordered it."

"I doubt you could prove such an accusation," said Mark, smiling over his cup.

"I wonder what Winston would say if he knew you were laying all the blame on him," said Flores.

"I don't think that matters."

"Do you think it will matter if proof is given that you have undergone the same mutagenic changes that have resulted from this chemical being dumped?," said Leaguer. "The authorities will take your life apart."

"I have very good lawyers," said Mark. "I am sure they can handle that. That's what I retain them for in the first place."

"So you are willing to sell your assistant, and your company down the river," said Flores. The overlay that System was using to examine the industrialist was showing too many changes in his body.

"I wouldn't say that," said Mark. "Like I said, I have very good lawyers on the payroll. This might be tied up in court for years. Winston will probably never see the inside of a prison."

"I think you're wrong," said Flores. "I think warrants are being drawn for you right now. You will be seeing the inside of a jail, at least until you make bail at your arraignment in the morning."

"I am afraid that I will be unavailable to the police and others," said Mark. He carefully placed his cup on the desk top and stood. "You see I am leaving the city for a while, and an arrest can't be allowed to interfere in the running of my corporations."

"Really?," said Leaguer.

"You will leave now," Mark said. "This interview is over."

"I think the both of us should talk things over with the county prosecutor," said Leaguer. "Come along with me."

Mark raised his hands in front of him. Golden light erupted into tentacles whipping through the air. The swirling ribbons clashed against Leaguer's casual field. The armored agent crashed through the nearest wall in a cloud of broken drywall and plywood. Mark swept his desk out of the way with a whipping of energy as he strode forward.

Flores activated his force field as he struggled to his feet. System was already lighting up power gauges, comparing what happened to other enemies filed by other Leaguers. Its assessment of Mark's powers wasn't heartening.

Mark pushed out with his powers, throwing small objects like bullets in front of him. His tendrils crackled as they let fly. Leaguer's field dropped the projectiles in front of him as he was driven back by the deluge.

Flores decided to go on the offensive, firing the small stunners he had added to his arsenal from his gauntlets. The precise beams vanished in the wavy lines of Mark's defensive blocking.

The hooded man had been following the conversation until Mark had said he was leaving the country. He pulled away from the window, putting his listening device away. He stepped back, using the night shadows as cover.

It won't be long.

The sound of breaking wood crashed through smashing windows seconds later. The hooded man waited as various sounds invaded the night air. Then the roof of the house partially caved in from one of the combatants breaking a support beam.

The hooded man's scarred face was hideously split by a calculating grin.

Sooner or later, they would bring the battle outside.

Then he would evaluate what tactic he could use against someone who was holding his own against one of the strongest men in the city.

The golden hero smashed through the front door. He skidded to a stop, plowing up the ground. He rolled to his feet as the owner of the house came out on the front steps. Both men were surrounded by energy fields that hissed at each other.

The hooded man watched, ready to move if he had to. He held a cylinder in his gloved hand as he waited. Sooner or later, his chance would come.

The Leaguer and Mark lashed at each other futilely as they vied for position. Their different tendrils of energy lit up the night like striking lightning.

Leaguer frowned, wishing he had built a stronger midrange weapon design into System's armor. He didn't want to use the omniwave in the city. The loss of life would outweigh the benefit.

He wrapped a field around Mark to restrain the lightning tentacles that weaved around the industrialist's body. Then he could try to disperse the protective aura to end this battle.

Mark's extra limbs were collapsed by the sudden move. For a moment, it looked as if the plan would work. Then the tendrils swelled, expanding against the glowing field like tires on an air pump. A sudden push down carried the mutated man over the top of the circular hold. A bunched set of the lightning held Mark in the air while others reached for the golden hero with the speed of thought. They wrapped around Leaguer, and his shield, with incredible strength and started to squeeze.

System poured most of its power into the bubble shield. It barely kept its integrity intact as Mark continued to bear down. The industrialist's aura had faded as he poured all of his mental strength into crushing his prey.

A shadow detached itself from another. A black garbed hand gestured a cloud of white smoke into existence around the combatants. When the sudden fog cleared seconds later, Mark was asleep where the mist had enveloped him. The shadow was gone.

epilogue

Stephen Mark was placed in Stonedyke Maximum Prison for the duration of his trial, and for his sentence. It was the only place capable of holding a metahuman for any length of time. Records, a recording of his conversation with Leaguer, and pictures of the mutant sea life had been presented at the proceedings by the prosecution.

The Leaguer had provided restraints to keep his powers in check while he fought for his freedom.

The jury said there was no reasonable doubt of his guilt, so they shipped him to a cell for the next twenty five years.

Only he didn't plan to stay in that hole for that long. He would free himself. Then he would have a little talk with Leaguer. Then he would deal with the other one that had appeared ever so briefly in the corner of his eye and helped engineer this.

He would see who was afraid then.

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