Even from the sky, it looked like a huge house. Shaped roughly like an “L,” it had space for an outside pool and a tennis court, and rose three stories at the point where the two wings met. The short side faced the Pacific ocean.
In Michigan something similar could fetch a million dollars. In California, I didn’t dare speculate. The crazy thing was that in Michigan there would be space around it and probably some forest. Here, it crowded the edge of the lot and ten other houses of the same size stood right next to it.
If you happen to know the right person in the FBI, it’s not that hard to get the stealth suit plus a highly modified guitar controller through airport security.
The Department of Homeland Security guys at Grand Lake’s airport had looked at each other and then at me as the guitar controller (in its lead lined cloth case) rolled through the X-ray machine. The metal detector’s alarm went off as I stepped through too.
I blamed the sonic systems, but the utility belt hidden under my jacket didn’t help.
Both Vaughn and the King of Storms turned to look at him.
“Neither of you is going to change their name so now it’s time to come up with another way to handle it. You’ll want to choose seconds and Vaughn, you get to choose the weapon if it’s a duel.”
The thing faded into the storm and disappeared. Between the darkness and the possibility that its body might have been nothing more than falling rain, I didn’t know whether it had teleported away or simply ceased to be.
Either way, the rain changed from a downpour to nothing in the space of ten seconds.
As the rain ended, the clouds thinned, letting the sun illuminate the puddles in the road and the mud across the street in the parking lot. Continue reading King of Storms: Part 9→
Whether it hailed, thundered, or rained, it never became anything that could exist comfortably in the background.
Meanwhile, I attempted to explain the situation between Lee and Isaac while simultaneously not explaining things. I couldn’t exactly tell her that the friend saying nasty things another friend was an FBI agent who acted as a handler for heroes in this region. I also couldn’t tell her that what bothered Isaac about Lee wasn’t interpersonal stuff as much as that Lee might be capable of plunging the world into an unholy reign of darkness and terror. Continue reading King of Storms: Part 8→
On the one hand, he’d said he didn’t think organized crime had infiltrated the Bureau. On the other, he’d just told me not to send him information via the government owned and installed communication systems that pretty much only the government had a reasonable chance of bugging.
The point where the whole secret identity thing begins to get weird is when you start hearing about your exploits secondhand in real life.
I found myself stuck a couple people behind Sean Drucker and Jody on the way to class. Sean moved slowly on crutches. Jody carried his books. Apparently he’d had knee surgery almost immediately after our fight. I didn’t know the details. Anyway, with the hall as full as it was, it didn’t seem worth pushing past him. With my luck, I’d knock him over. Continue reading King of Storms: Part 6→
Russ brought his hands up to his eyes while Cassie dropped the cleaning liquid and mop, grabbing the sword’s hilt with both her hands and yanking it away.
Russ made grab for it as she stepped back, but stopped when she pointed the blade at him.
Eyes watering, he jumped sideways out of the building and into the parking lot, colliding with an old Chrysler Caravan that had been parked in a handicapped spot. He left a human sized dent behind and a shattered passenger side window. Continue reading King of Storms: Part 5→
The Legion of Nothing: A Series of Online Superhero Novels (Updates Monday and Thursday)
