🚀 go-pugleaf

                                 [Part Four]


     The trains were full.  Kim was at the door, checking his watch.
     "Sir, we've got an alert," Pongress said.  "We think they've taken
Control.  It has to be now."
     Kim nodded.  "We're still missing the backup tapes, though."
     "Most of the information's been relayed -- the missing data--"
     "I know.  Send the trains and put the charges on automatic.  And get in
your seat.  It's time we got out of here."

                                   * * * * * *

     "It's just you and me now, Olson," Unorthodox Girl said, moving into the
room.  She walked with a limp.  Her legs throbbed.  Her back ached.  She had
some trouble focusing.
     "It always was," Olson said, turning his chair to face her.  He held a
large pistol in his hand.  It was heavy.  Dangerous looking.  She didn't
recognize the model.
     "I know the truth," she said.
     "What is the truth?"
     "This was all your sick, twisted game.  You and my father, and Doctor
Blue.  Or maybe they worked for you.  It doesn't matter."
     Olson smiled.  "That's the truth, is it?  All right.  That can be today's
truth.  Tomorrow we'll try another one on for size.  It's all a matter of
perspective."
     "Stop lying."
     "Who's lying to whom?"  He slowly rose.  "One `Unorthodox, Trudy' was
approached in a public location by Federal Agents working for the government
which she is a citizen of.  They asked her cooperation.  She refused, and
became agitated.  The agents, acting in self defense, attempted to sedate her
and she attacked."
     "That's not what hap--"
     He began to circle her.  "After she regained consciousness, the Agents
again requested her assistance in a matter of national security."
     "You--"
     "She refused.  They attempted a variety of methods of persuasion, but she
continued to resist the inquiries, until she attacked a psychologist, scarring
her perhaps for life.  At this point she was considered a dangerous, unstable
prisoner, and she was restrained.  She later escaped and attacked a man she had
fixated on, believing in her delusions that he was tormenting her."  Olson
stopped two feet from Unorthodox Girl.  "Isn't that right, Trudy?  Isn't that
all the truth?"
     Unorthodox Lass stared a long time.  It was so hard to remember the past
weeks... months... years, even.  Could he be right?  Was it all her?
     "Trudy, you're very sick.  We can help you -- even now, we can help you.
But you have to let us help you."
     Trudy stared at him.  "You tortured me," she said.
     "Did I?  Come Trudy, how could I possibly expect to lie to you about
torturing you if I really had?"  His voice dropped to the barest whisper, his
hand outstretched.  "Could anyone be that foolish?"
     Trudy shook her head.  She couldn't believe him, but he was right -- it
made no sense.  She was so tired, so hungry... pain and fatigue were closing
her down -- what had really happened... it was all like a dream....  Why would
he lie--
     Why... always look for the reason why.
     "Take my hand, Trudy.  Work with us, and we can get out of here."
     Trudy focused on the hand, trembling.  What was real?  Who was--
     His hand.
     His sleeve.
     There were bloodstains on his sleeve.
     "Why..." she whispered.
     "What?"
     "To disorient... to protect..."
     "Trudy--"
     Unorthodox Lass's eyes flicked up and fixed on Olson's sunglasses.  "The
truth, Olson."  Her voice was stronger, now.  "I know the truth."
     "Who can define--"
     "Fact!" she shouted, grabbing his arm.  "I did nothing wrong.  Fact -- I
was forced here against my will.  Fact -- I was stripped bare, body and soul.
Fact -- you made me believe a sixteen year old girl was suffering because I
didn't cooperate!"
     "Trudy, wait--"
     "Fact!" she snapped again, pushing Olson back against the wall, both arms
gripping him now.  "You rifled through my life, tricked me, drugged me, beat
me, and made me relive horrors I spent years burying!  Fact!  At no time did
you identify who you were or who you worked for!  Fact -- I saw no lawyer, no
doctor, no advocate, no one at ALL!!!"
     "Please," he said, trying to calm her.
     "Fact!  You made me *die!!!*"
     "Trudy!"
     "Fact fact fact fact FACT!"  She threw herself into a back somersault,
hurling Olson across the room.  She forced her tormented body to snap and roll
into a three point stance, her powers thrumming through her arms, driving away
the pain.  "Those are the facts, Olson.  And you can't take them from me.  Not
*ever* again!"
     Olson landed professionally, twisting and taking the fall on one buttock.
He rolled into his own three point stance, his gun pointed at Unorthodox Girl.
     "Facts die with the mind that knows them," Olson said.  "You can't say I
didn't try, Trudy.  You can't say I didn't try."

                                   * * * * * *

     Paul was tense.  He had expected something to happen by now.  The waiting
was worse than fighting would be.
     "Olson -- E.T.A.?"
     There was no sound at all.
     "Olson?  He-LLO Olson?"
     There was a sudden knock at the door.  Paul jumped back, his training
taking over.  He came within a hair's breadth of shooting three holes through
the door.
     There was a second knock.  "Burglar!" came a male cry.
     "What?"
     "Burglar!"
     Paul squinted.  "Are you an encyclopedia salesman?" he asked.
     "No sir.  I just want to come in and ransack the flat."
     Paul considered this.  "If I let you in, you'll sell me encyclopedias," he
accused.
     "No sir.  I'm just going to come in, steal your valuables, tie you up and
leave you in a closet."
     Paul thought for a moment.  He sounded sincere enough....  "All right."
He opened the door.
     The Masked Bruce walked in with a set of encyclopedias wrapped in
cellophane.  "Mind you, have you considered the advantages of owning a really
fine set of encyclopedias?"
     "Uh, well--"
     "Think it over," he said, and slammed the 22 volume set into Paul,
knocking him unconscious instantly.

                                   * * * * * *

     The rotors reengaged.  The small man shifted in his seat slightly.  He
glanced at his watch, though he didn't need to.  He knew exactly what time it
was.
     One of the Special Agents was drumming his fingers absently on the
armrest.  He was nervous.  The small man could tell.  He couldn't blame the
agent, really.  The metahumans on the scene were not likely to be cooperative.
     The small man wasn't nervous, though.  Not at all.

                                   * * * * * *

     As soon as the last Exodus Train pulled into the sub station, the computer
relay activated, and the charges went off.
     They were powerful, capable of reducing the lowermost four levels of the
lab to garbage.  The upper six levels slammed down to fill the gap.
     On the topmost levels, it felt like a bad lurch.  It was designed to not
kill the invading forces or the horatio patrol.  Of course, if someone got
close to the testing lab, to room One oh One, or to the Exodus station... well,
National Security was the overriding concern, of course.
     Unorthodox Lass felt the lurch and rolled against it, causing the first
three shots Olson fired to fly wide, shattering thick, bulletproof one-way
mirrors.
     Shattering them.  This weapon was far more powerful than conventional
handguns.  Unorthodox Girl had to be careful.  She rolled back to her feet, the
pain being shoved to the back burner as her sympathetic nervous system kicked
in.  She wheeled around and fired a stream of silly string at Olson's
sunglasses.
     Olson threw himself back, using his momentum to force himself into a back
somersault.  The string arced over his head as he rolled somewhat upright,
firing another shot as he went -- not so much to injure Unorthodox Girl as to
keep her off balance.  He slid along the floor and kicked a chair at her,
recovering.
     Unorthodox Lass threw herself off her good leg, catching the back of the
chair as it skidded and flipping over it, arching herself to avoid another
three shots.  She didn't know how many were in the clip of the weapon, so she
had no way of knowing if he was out or not.  She assumed he wasn't, and swung
her arm around.  It thrummed as biochemistry changed it, and felt the cool,
smooth metal coil in her hand--
     Hitting the ground painfully, falling to the side, she snapped her hand
and wrist.  She had the first three inches of a metal tape measure coiled
around her hand, causing the heavy metal dispenser to fly out, smashing into
Olson's hand.  She snapped the tape back, and the belt clip on the side of the
dispenser caught on his pistol, knocking it away.
     Olson threw himself to the side, clutching his hand.  He managed to push
himself up against the wall, facing Unorthodox Girl.
     She limped towards him, her face cruel.
     "Trudy," Olson said, his voice wavering for the first time.
     "My *friends* call me Trudy," she said bitterly.  "*You* can call me
Unorthodox Girl."
     "Unorthodox Girl, I--"
     "Lass!" she spat.
     "But--"
     "Do you know what I plan to do, Olson?  Do you?"
     "I--"
     "I don't have time to break you, you see.  I don't have much time at all.
Do you know what I *do* have time for?"
     Olson shook his head.
     "I have time to kill you.  And that's exactly what I'm going to do."

                                   * * * * * *

     Spandex Babe was tired.  She knocked away the last field agent, and
slammed herself through the secured blast doors.
     There was a single agent standing between her and the next door.  An agent
holding a weapon.  A weapon Spandex Babe recognized.
     "Don't come any closer," the agent said.  "Killing a pretty girl like you
would seriously ruin my day."
     "I don't think it's an issue," Spandex Babe said coolly.
     "Be serious.  Do you know what this is?"
     "A Heckler and Koch fourteen millimeter gyrojet pistol, thirteen bullets
in the clip, one in the chamber.  The ammunition's probably teflon coated for
armor piercing and would make a talon bullet look pacifist."
     "Uh, yeah.  How did you know that?"
     "Spandex Babe," she replied, cocking her finger towards the pistol.  A
supercoherent neophotonic beam rippled from her gloved fingertip, lancing into
the barrel of the pistol and slagging it from the inside, with snaps as the
gyrojet bullet in the chamber misfired.
     The agent looked down at the gun in his hand, and then back up at Spandex
Babe.  "Heh," he said.  "Look, I'm going to go check on the other agents.  You
stay here and I'll be right back."
     "I thought you'd be happy," Spandex Babe said lightly.  "I thought killing
a pretty girl like lil' ol' me would ruin your day."
     "Uh, yeah, but--"
     "Of course," she continued, "the fact that this pretty lil' girl could rip
steel in her hands made that unlikely anyhow, right?"
     The agent smiled weakly.  "Heh.  Right."
     Spandex Babe half-sauntered to the agent, her eyes wide and innocent. "I
mean, I'm a girl.  I couldn't *possibly* know how to fight or dodge or junk,
right?  I mean, I need a big strong man like you to protect me, 'cause I'm a
girl and all, right?"
     "Um, is this going to hurt badly?"
     "Probably," Spandex Babe said, nodding slightly.  She then drove her fist
into the agent's stomach, knocking him back fifteen feet and slamming him into
the wall.  As the agent fell forward, Spandex Babe leapt for him, curling her
body into a pirouette, her left knee tucked beneath her.  Her right knee she
held back all the way behind her until she was three quarters of the way
around, and then snapped it into a circle kick that would have blasted the
agent a good sixty yards, if there weren't a concrete block wall six feet from
him.  As it was, all the kinetic force from was transferred into the wall
through the agent's body.
     The agent didn't comment on these actions so much as slump to the floor,
trailing blood from his nose.  Spandex Babe kicked him in the head to check and
see if he was conscious, muttered something about Paternalistic bastards, and
threw the next door open.
     It led to a T intersection, with a corridor extending out of sight both
ways.
     No way to know which way to go.  She turned right and started to sprint
down the corridor.
     "Spandy!"
     Spandex Babe skidded to a stop and looked back.  The Masked Bruce and
Healer were running for her.  She waited until they were close and then began
running herself, pacing them.  ][What's the word,][ she sent over Healer's
link.
     )(We're getting closer to the Unorthodox Effect I'm detecting.)( The
Masked Bruce replied.  )(But we've had no sign of Trashman or--)(
     A doorway smashed open, and an agent stumbled back.  "No!  I *am* a good
shot!"  He fired three times.
     )(--Kid Solipsism,)( the Masked Bruce finished.
     Kid Solipsism jumped through the door.  "Oh right.  Point blank range and
you missed.  I've seen ten year olds with better aim."
     "I was third in my class!  I'm a professional assassin!"
     "Right.  You're barely a professional wrestler."  The Kid gave the agent a
beaut to the solar plexus and he went down, coughing.  "What's the word?"
     }{We keep going,}{ Healer said.  }{That was Bankert.  Spandex Babe, I
sensed when you took out Burns.  That leaves Pongress and Olson, if the full
first team is here.}{  They kept running, rounding a corner.
     And skidded to a stop.  They saw what looked like a shattered mirror, and
behind it they saw--
     "Trudy," the Masked Bruce whispered.  "My god..."
     She was limping forward, naked.  She looked washed out.  Her hair was
gone.  She was bloodied.
     And she was lifting something into view.  Pointing it at an agent.
     A gun.
     "Jesus, she's gonna kill him," the Masked Bruce said, starting forward.
     A hand grabbed the Masked Bruce's shoulder and yanked him back, hard.
"Stand down," Trashman said, his voice ice.  "That's an order."
     "Trashman -- but where did you... never mind.  Trashman, she--"
     Trashman looked through the shattered one-way mirror.  "This is her's.  We
won't interfere."
     "And if she kills him?"
     Trashman arched an eyebrow, looking into the Masked Bruce's eyes.  "Then
I'm going to testify in any court of law on this planet that it was self
defense... and so are you."
     The Masked Bruce swallowed and turned to watch.

                                   * * * * * *

     "Trudy, please."
     Unorthodox Lass was holding a gun now.  It seemed inconsistent.  A gun --
it was so... Orthodox.  But there it was.  A .357, fully loaded.
     "Please what?"
     "Please, you can't--"
     "Of course I can.  I am."
     "I was just following orders!"
     "Were you?"
     "Yes!"
     "Well, I am too.  I've been ordered to blow your brains through the back
of your skull."  She leveled the pistol, five feet from Olson, the muzzle
pointed directly at the bridge between the lenses of the Sunglasses.
     "Unorthodox Lass--"
     "Girl."
     "Who*ever*!  Please.  Please, I--"
     "For what you did to me--"
     "Don't!"
     "I do this to you."  Her finger tightened.
     "No!!!!!!" Olson screamed.
     Unorthodox Lass fired into the scream.  Three shots... four... five...
six....
     It got quiet in the room.  The smell of urine filled the air.
     Olson, shaking, reached to his forehead.  He could feel the powder burns.
"I... you..."
     Unorthodox Girl smiled.  The smile was hideous.  Without happiness.
Without warmth.  "Well," she said.  "Maybe I did have time to break you after
all."
     Olson whimpered slightly, shaking as hysteria took him.  He took his head
in his hands, pushing the sunglasses off his head and shaking.  "You said you
were going to kill me," he managed to spit out.
     "I did say that, didn't I?" Unorthodox Lass said.  She turned away.
     And there they were.  The Adjusted League Unimpeachable.
     They looked... smaller.  Different.  Too clean, maybe.  Even Trashman
looked too clean.
     Unorthodox Lass lifted her chin and walked to them, ignoring the thousand
aches and pains that were flooding her.  She was exhausted, bloodied, underfed,
overstrained....
     And free.
     She stared into Trashman's eyes as she approached the group, looking
through the shattered one-way mirror at them.  His eyes had always frightened
her.  They seemed to hold terrible secrets, sights no one could imagine.
     They just looked like eyes, now.
     "Trudy," the Masked Bruce said.  "Thank God."
     "Someone owes me a *big* bowl of ice cream," Unorthodox Girl rasped.  She
then let herself collapse.
     It didn't matter.  Her friends were here, now.

                                   * * * * * *

      The Helicopter landed outside of the lab.  The lab's location was obvious
now -- the destruct charges had sunk large sections of it, leaving cracked
depressions in the frozen sod that had covered it.
     The small man slid out of the aircraft.  His assistants followed
close behind.  They strode for the entrance.
     From here, it would be easy.




WOULD IT BE EASY?
WOULD WHAT BE EASY?
WHAT WILL THE SMALL MAN AND HIS FLUNKIES DO?
WHAT COULD THEY DO, SINCE TRUDY'S ESCAPED?
WHAT HAPPENS NEXT, BWANA?


The answers imply questions that statements will make interrogative, in an
imperative fashion.  If that makes any sense to you at all, you need to get out
more often.  Read Superguy anyway, or we'll kill you.