So this month is National Novel Writing Month, and I've decided to devote this month to write out a novel idea that I've had for the past year or so. It's set in a distant future, following in the aftermath of a devastating war between men and super-men. Following the war, the super-men built a city called Theopolis: a massive sprawl legislated by a human-run senate, but protected by a league of superheroes. In this setting, the story focuses on Troy Gaines: an outsider who uses a teleportation device to pass himself off as a super-hero, with the hopes of joining the Pantheon and becoming a true protector of the city. To prove his worth, he is sent on a mission to investigate the disappearances of key personnel. After snooping around for a bit, he has the following encounter.
This is still a work in progress, and is quite rough.
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Troy stopped at a
café for lunch, and was enjoying a hot beef sandwich served au jus, with a side
of home fries and peas. As he dipped his
sandwich in the savory sauce, he relaxed and watched the people on the street
as they passed by. There were no
shortages of pretty girls on the boulevard.
Suddenly, a man
sat down at the table across from Troy.
Tall, with bulging muscles, the man was easily twice Troy’s size. A number of red tattoos ordained his ebony skin,
accentuating the curvature of his massive biceps. The stranger had long, mangy black hair that
rippled down to his shoulders. His eyes
were dark and wicked, and he had a nasty scar cutting across his cheek down to
his jaw.
Regarding the
scary-looking man, Troy smiled and said, “Hello,” before taking a bite of his
sandwich.
Scowling, the
stranger spoke with a booming, intimidating voice, “The boss says you’ve been
asking too many questions.”
The threat was all
too obvious to Troy; any other man would have likely been frightened by the
encounter, and would have given up on the investigation. Instead, Troy felt a certain giddiness in
knowing that he had come so close to the truth that he invoked a reaction. Whatever villainy was at work, they felt threatened
by Troy’s snooping, and they wanted him eliminated. More importantly, this was Troy’s chance to
dig for more information.
Still smirking,
Troy said, “That’s my job. I hope you’re
here to answer some of my questions.”
“I’m here to shut
you up for good,” the man warned.
“Who sent you? I
hope it’s not my ex-girlfriend.”
Showing off his
teeth in an amused smile, the man revealed a set of jagged, sharp
dentures. He said, “Oh, you think you’re
a funny man, do you? You’ll be a dead man soon.”
“Oh my, what big
teeth you have,” Troy mocked.
“That’s nothing,”
the man grinned. He held up his hands,
and his fingernails extended to form long, sharp claws. “Now these, are all the
better to rip your heart out with.”
“Who says I have a
heart worth ripping out?”
“Me,” the man
growled. “My name is Snipes McBane.
Enemies call me the Wolf.”
“I can’t imagine
why,” Troy said. “Are you a friend of Duran DeLange?”
“You keep asking
questions, I’m going to claw your throat out!”
“All I see so far
is all bark and no bite.”
“Do you really
want to see what I can do? I’ll take a bite out of you!”
“Not without a
little sauce first,” Troy said, hastily throwing the cup of jus at the
Wolf. Steaming hot broth splashed on his
face messily, making him scream in irritation.
A deep beastly growl came out of his throat.
Snipes suddenly
thrashed his arms up and knocked the table to the side, throwing off all the
food and appliances that were on it.
There were shouts and cries from the people around them, either fleeing
or watching the scene with alarm.
Stepping closer, Snipes grabbed Troy by the throat and lifted him off of
his chair. He brought his other hand
back and balled it into a fist, ready to strike it hard against Troy’s skull.
As Snipes took a
swing, Troy turned on his teleporter device and vanished. The enemy’s arm slugged through empty space,
with tendrils of blue mist wrapping around his fist. Swirling around Snipes, the glowing
apparition moved behind him, before Troy reappeared. Flanking his enemy, he swung his foot out and
struck Snipes in the back. The Wolf
staggered forward, crashing into a nearby table.
Whirling, the Wolf
grabbed the table he fell on and hurled it at Troy. With his teleportation, Troy vanished for an
instant, allowing the table to fly through his disembodied form. As he reappeared, the table crashed behind
him.
Regarding his
enemy, Troy tried to consider how he could possibly overpower him. It probably would have been sensible to
teleport far away; he fly to the other side of the city in an instant if he
wanted to. He didn’t consider running
away to be an acceptable option; he was eager to question Snipes and find out
everything he knew.
Lunging toward
Troy, Snipes took a wide swing, threatening to dig his claws into his opponent’s
side. Teleporting for just an instant,
Troy evaded the Wolf’s attack, and appeared at his side. Grabbing a chair from nearby, he swung it at
Snipes with all his might. The enemy
blocked the chair with his arm; with a strong downward thrust, he bashed the
chair to the ground and smashed it to pieces.
At that moment,
they could hear sirens sounding from the distance. It was an indication that the nearest patrol
of enforcers were on their way, to stop the fight and maintain the peace. Oblivious to the noise, Snipes rammed himself
into Troy. His fists slammed into Troy’s
side as he pushed him into the café’s wall.
Just as the Wolf
swung his fist again, Troy vanished and slipped away as a flowing blue
stream. Snipe’s hand struck the wall
with a bone-crunching crack, and he cried out in pain and rage.
From above, an
enforcer patrol vehicle glided over the boulevard and lowered gently. As it hovered just a few feet off the ground,
a pair of enforcers jumped out of the vehicle’s side. They were dressed in gray and white body
armor, and had laser pistols drawn.
Approaching Snipes from the rear, they aimed their guns and ordered,
“Freeze!”
Snarling, the Wolf
lunged at the nearest policeman and slammed him against the side of the
vehicle. Punching at the man’s head
repeatedly, Snipes knocked the enforcer out, before snatching away his helmet
with his claws.
Flanking Snipes,
the second enforcer fired his gun. A
pair of laser beams spat from the gun’s barrel and into Snipe’s side; the beams
sent electric pulses rippling through his body, making him convulse. The guns were usually enough to stun a normal
man; as big and strong as the Wolf was, he merely became agitated, and growled
at the enforcer.
Slamming himself
into the enforcer, Snipes swiped his clawed hand out at him, and knocked the
gun out of his hands. Thrashing his
hands again, Snipes threw the policeman into the side of the vehicle. It was a strong enough blow to knock the
enforcer out.
Reappearing in
front of Snipes, Troy picked up the gun that was knocked away from the
enforcer. Aiming it at the Wolf, Troy
turned up the weapon’s power, and said, “Down boy. You’ve been very naughty. I’m going to have to put you down.”
Still seething,
Snipes was clearly overcome with a volatile mixture of adrenaline and
rage. He was still cognizant enough to
recognize that Troy could still outflank and gun him down, especially with his
teleportation powers. Sneering, the Wolf
said, “I’m not telling you anything.”
“No matter,” Troy
shrugged. “The Pantheon can take you in, and they have ways of making you
talk.”
“They’ll never
cage me!”
Snipes suddenly
moved, and Troy snapped a shot at him.
The laser beam from his gun missed the Wolf by mere inches; the blast
cut the air behind him, singeing some of his long black hair. The beam continued into the enforcer vehicle,
boring a clean, smoldering hole in the metal siding.
It took an instant
for Snipes to climb into the enforcer’s vehicle and move to the front
seat. Taking the controls, he flew the vehicle
over the street and accelerated toward the nearest highway. As the vehicle flew away, Troy aimed with his
pistol and snapped another shot. A
bright red beam lanced toward the hovercraft, striking its underside and
blowing another hole in its chassis. A
shower of sparks followed, and the vehicle tilted to one side; it was an
indication that Troy had struck a vital system.
Transporting
himself, Troy zoomed over the street and flew in tandem with the enforcer
vehicle. He pushed himself fast enough
to catch up to it; he brought himself side-by-side with its driver’s side
window, and could see Snipes through the glass.
He saw Troy’s disembodied mist, and reacted by veering the hovercraft
into him. The vehicle swerved sharply in
the air, passing directly through Troy’s vaporous form.
The vehicle glided
toward a skyscraper; Snipes tried to bank around it, but thanks to the damage
the hovercraft sustained from Troy’s gunshot, it was unable to turn
effectively. Striking the side of the
building, the vehicle scraped against the concrete wall with an explosion of
sparks and flying shrapnel. Continuing
forward, it dived and spiraled toward a highway.
Raised high above
the lower levels of the city, the highway was a major bloodline to the heart of
the city. There were hundreds of cars
and light hovercraft speeding along its smooth stone surface. When the damaged enforcer vehicle slammed
into the middle of the highway, several cars immediately struck the wrecked
vehicle; one of them rammed straight into the vehicle’s side, crunching its
hood in with a shower of broken glass and metal. Two others struck the crashed ship at odd
angles, causing them to flip and vault into the air; they flew for a short
distance, before landing hard on the road with earthshattering crunches. Behind the wrecked vehicles, more cars
skidded to a sudden halt, causing more of them to crash into each other.
Climbing out of
the smashed enforcer vehicle, Snipes had a deep gash on his scalp that trickled
blood. He staggered onto the road,
disoriented.
Flying into the
scene of the accident, Troy appeared behind Snipes and pressed his gun against
the Wolf’s head. Troy firmly iterated,
“It was a nice attempt at escape, but it was completely reckless. The Pantheon won’t let this carnage go
unpunished.”
“You think this is
carnage?” the Wolf scoffed. “You haven’t seen anything yet!”
“Oh? Tell me what
you know then.”
“You’ll find out
soon enough! A plague is coming to this city of gods, and there’s nothing you
can do to stop it!”
Before Troy to
inquire any further, Snipes darted forward, and he crossed the median. Troy reacted by snapping several shots at the
Wolf; one of his laser beams grazed his enemy’s leg, burning through the pant
leg and drawing blood. Snipes shouted in
pain, but continued to run into highway traffic.
Stepping into the
busy road, he faced an oncoming car. It
skidded to a halt with its horn blaring.
Leaping, Snipes jumped onto the car’s hood, just as it bore down on him. Running over the car’s roof, he leapt onto
another car in the next lane. Landing on
the car’s hood, his body weight crunched the metal inward. In a panic, the car’s driver slammed on the
brakes and sent the car into a skidding turn.
It flung Snipes off of the hood, and he rolled across the street.
With two stopped
cars in the middle of the highway, cars came to a stop and cautiously moved
around the vehicles. One car roared past
Snipes; he reached up with a clawed hand and grabbed onto the car’s side door. As the car sped forward, it dragged the Wolf
among; he used his other clawed hand to grip into the car’s side and pull
himself up. He clung to the roof and
rode the car further down the highway.
Teleporting, Troy
appeared as a brilliant comet hovering in tandem with the car. Snipes snarled at the disembodied
specter. Veering into him, Troy
materialized for a split-second, to shove Snipes firmly in the chest. Knocked off of the car, he tumbled off and
landed on the hood of another car in the next lane. It was a strong enough impact to smash in the
car’s hood, crippling the engine and forcing the car to slow to a halt.
Reacting to the
accident, other cars slowed and continued around the stopped car. Troy materialized beside the stopped
vehicle. Seeing him appear out of the
blue haze, Snipes immediately ripped open the car’s door and grabbed its
driver. He held up a young blonde girl,
who screamed in terror and squirmed against his grasp.
When Troy came to
full human form, he saw the hostage and immediately trained his gun at Snipe’s
head. While the Wolf held up the woman
with one hand, he brought his other hand to her throat, with his claws
extended. He warned, “Time for the
moment of truth, hero! You could take me in, or you can save this girl!”
Just a few miles
down the road, where the other accidents occurred, sirens rang out, and more
enforcer vehicles hovered around the highway.
Troy said, “You’ll never get far.”
“Then your choice
has been made! Catch her if you can!”
Snipes threw the
girl over the side of the highway, with the ease of tossing a rag doll. Flying over the guardrail, she plummeted
through the air to the city blocks hundreds of feet below. Her scream was shrill and constant, and gradually
faded the further she fell.
Troy had only an
instant to react. He could have taken a
shot at Snipes, but he feared that the falling girl would have died by the time
he aimed and fired. Instead, he
teleported and raced after the girl. His
vaporous form fell through the road, and he zoomed toward the freefalling
figure. She was halfway to the ground;
the buildings beneath them were rising up like teeth, threatening to devour the
falling hostage.
The combination of
gravity and speed helped Troy cross over a hundred feet within seconds. Honing
in on the girl, his immaterial form wrapped around her, before he
materialized. It took only a second for
him to grab her and teleport again.
Together, they disappeared in mid-fall, turning into a singular stream
of glowing particles.
Troy led them back
to the highway, and he materialized on the side of the road next to the wrecked
car. When he reappeared, he released the
girl, and she staggered on the ground disoriented and confused. Once she realized that she was out of danger,
she regarded Troy with astonishment and pleaded, “Oh my God, I thought I was
going to die!”
“Oh no, we
couldn’t have that,” Troy remarked.
“Thank you so
much, mister! You are a real hero! I owe you my life!”
Looking around, Troy saw no sign
of the Wolf. As expected, he made a
clean escape, and Troy felt disappointed.
