Post by Admin on Aug 30, 2011 16:07:34 GMT -5
The Flash
Issue #40: “When Hell Freezes Over”
Written by Pat Owen
Cover by Matt Erkhart
Edited by Mark Bowers
Issue #40: “When Hell Freezes Over”
Written by Pat Owen
Cover by Matt Erkhart
Edited by Mark Bowers
I’ve been to Hell.
It’s called Iron Heights.
A prison where us Rogues are sentenced to rot for the rest of our lives. A place where we burn for our past sins and are shut out from all light. A place where demons rule the land and we’re nothing but trash. And most of all, it’s a real pain in the ass and it’s the one place I never want to go back to.
My name is Len Snart but you can call me Captain Cold.
And lucky me, it looks like I’m heading back to Hell---and I can promise you this---
This time, it’s gonna freeze over.
***
“Honey, I’m home!”
We all look up from our poker game, surprise all over my pals’ faces. The door to our home has been kicked open by some jackass who’s standing in the doorway.
He’s a tall man with short brown hair and a duffle bag hanging over his shoulder. He steps into the room, looking at us uncertainly but with a thin smile pasted on his lips. He throws his bag onto the trash-filled couch (thank Mardon and Rory for that) before approaching our group.
His theatrics can’t fool me. They never did.
“Scudder,” I say, recognizing him immediately.
Sam Scudder, the original Mirror Master. He was one of the first members of our group and even I can’t deny that he was an essential part of it. Hell he hooked most of us up with our now-trademark toys.
“You guys miss me?”
“Not really, mate. Forgot you were even gone,” Captain Boomerang snorts.
“What are you doing here, Scudder?” I question sternly, my eyes looking up from behind my visor. “I thought you were off exploring the world or whatever?”
“I was. But then I heard about what happened to Flasher and decided, what the hell, home’s probably way more fun now than ever since he’s not even allowed in this city. So I got a ticket back here. And after having to sit next to a rather talkative old woman on the way, I’m finally home sweet home.”
“Sorry to disappoint but things haven’t picked up much. Some new guy’s trying to take our territory,” Heatwave interjects.
“Looks like I came back just in time then, wouldn’t you say?”
Scudder’s gaze wanders over our faces and suddenly stops when he comes to the masked man wearing the navy blue trench coat. I was wondering when he’d notice the latest addition to our group.
“And you are?”
“Plunder.”
“He’s from one of those mirror dimensions, Scudder. Picked ‘im up and brought ‘im here. We were in need of expandin’ our ranks a wee bit. He even managed teh clip Flasher with a bullet,” Mirror Master, the second one, a Scotsman by the name of Evan McCulloch, tries to explain while Sam looks Plunder over.
“Impressive. Looks like you’ve been putting my technology to good use while I’ve been gone, McCulloch?”
“Yes. But I’m goin’ to have to tell yeh right now, that if yeh want this suit back, yer going to have teh take it from me,” Mirror Master says with his usual cackle.
“Relax, relax. I have no intention of becoming Mirror Master again.”
“Then why are you here?” I repeat. I’m hardly ever in the mood for games and right now is no exception.
“Watch the attitude, Lenny. Don’t forget who made you that freeze gun in the first place,” Scudder says threateningly. Pity that I don’t scare easy. “And McCulloch just said you guys could use some backup. I’d be happy to throw in my two cents. Like I said, I don’t want to go back to being Mirror Master and constantly getting into fistfights with Flash but even you can’t deny, Cold, that my inventions have really benefited you guys.”
“So what’s your point, Scudder?” I say stiffly.
“I want back in with you guys like the good old days. But I want to get back to basics. No more masks, no more mirrors, and above all else…no more Flash. My life’s been a lot better without him.”
“So you just want to be Sam Scudder…very sinister.” Boomerang laughs, lighting a cigarette.
“You’re right in a way, Digger. I do just want to be Sam Scudder. I want to go back to what I do best---inventing.”
“And you want to continue inventing for us like you used to do?” My teeth grind while I ask my question. Sam’s technical skills would be a great help to us but I still don’t trust the guy. I never have. Hell, none of us trust each other. That’s just the way our world works.
“Exactly. I even brought a couple presents for my pals.”
Scudder picks up his duffle bag and drops it down on the table and, to Boomerang and Weather Wizard’s horror, splashes all of our cards into the air off the table. They look pissed alright but Scudder doesn’t even seem to notice or care, far too occupied reaching into his mystery bag.
“Enjoy.”
My mates’ eyes light up with excitement, but not mine---well that’s something my eyes never seem to do.
***
It’s been a few hours and already Scudder’s making himself at home, dumping a ton of supplies of his into a corner of the room.
It’s funny, Scudder gave the rest of the group additions to their arsenal; McCulloch a mirror that, when cracked into shards, was laced with a poison on its edges; Digger got an acid-spewing boomerang; Mardon was given a radar that told him exactly what type of climate and weather every part of the world was having… practically the entire weather channel in his pocket; Rory got a device that goes over his wrist, spews out whatever the hell they call that stuff that comes out of extinguishers. He told Scudder he’d probably never use it. Wasn’t a fan of putting out fires. Scudder even provided the new kid with something, improving his sniper scope on the spot.
But ya know what I got---a new pair of shades that protect me from my freeze guns blasts.
The exact same shades that I have dozens of pairs of. Can’t say I’m surprised. Scudder and I have never been the best of pals but for a guy who wants back in the club, he should’ve been a bit more generous to the ringleader of this circus.
For everyone else, it was an early Christmas.
That’s fine by me.
I was the type of kid who’d get coal in his stocking.
“So what happened to Jesse?” I hear Scudder ask McCulloch.
“He got arrested by the FBI. He’s bein’ held in Iron Heights,” McCulloch says.
I notice a small cringe in Scudder’s face at the name of the prison. He’s been there plenty of times before. We all have at one time or another. And each and every time has been a living nightmare.
“They even had the nerve teh keep ‘im in a room without light. Makin’ it-“
“Awfully difficult to get in. No light, no reflections,” Scudder concludes, well aware of the Mirror Master tech’s limitations.
“Aye.”
“But not impossible,” Scudder says.
Everyone suddenly gives their attention to him, me being the last to do so. I’m skeptical of his claim to say the least. Breaking out of Iron Heights is tough enough. Breaking in. Definitely not on the list of things I was interested in trying to do this weekend.
“Wolfe’s not warden anymore, right?” Scudder asks the group of us.
I can hear a bit of vulnerability in his voice. That’s what being away for a while can do to you.
“No,” Weather Wizard replies, “but the new runners of the place aren’t pushovers at all. If we intend to free James, it won’t be an easy task.”
“Of course not. But we’re not pushovers either, right?”
Scudder looks to me for an answer and I just stare him down silently. He knows what buttons to push with me, that’s for sure. I don’t want to respond, I want him to be unsure of what he’s missed, but slowly, I nod.
“No. We’re not.”
“I didn’t think so.”
He smiles, picking up his laptop and putting it on the small counter in front of the couch. The others slowly gather around him, peeking over his shoulder at the monitor. I’m the last to go over, not entirely sure I want anything to do with this.
“When I was Mirror Master, I could plant these special mirrors, that when activated, allowed me, on a designated computer, to monitor anything that was happening within around a half a mile from the mirrors’ reflections. Due to the bending of light and all that jazz that you fellas wouldn’t be interested in at all, I’m assuming,” Scudder explains.
“And why would those super-duper mirrors of yours be helpful?” Mardon asks and I’m actually happy to see someone else not jumping for joy over this plan.
“Once those mirrors are planted on each side of the perimeter of the prison, I could monitor everything going on both inside and outside of that hellhole. So, it would be a piece of cake to sneak by any guards when we know where they all are.”
I couldn’t argue with that reasoning. But Scudder was making this sound too easy. I’ve had plenty of experience and I know, for a fact, that what seems easy beforehand is never so once you’re actually out there.
“You’d be monitoring all of this from here, right?” I ask, my eyes narrowing.
“Well, yeah,” Scudder says.
As I thought. No wonder he’s making it seem so simple. He’s not even going to be getting his hands dirty like we’ll all be doing.
Scudder, apparently, can see the skepticism on my face.
“Just trust me on this one, Len.”
“Trust you?” My temper rises a bit. Something that only happens every so often. “Trust you like the time when you and Jesse turned on me because you thought you were more fit to lead?”
Scudder purses his lips, trying to hide any expression, but I know that he’s having the time of his life remembering those days. I thought I’d taught him why I was the real leader of the Rogues but, clearly, he still believes otherwise.
“Water under the bridge,” Scudder finally says. “You know Jesse is an important part of our group, Cold.”
“Our? You haven’t been part of the group for a while, Scudder, remember? You have no right to call the shots.”
“Then fine, you call them. Either way, you know you’ll need all the help you can get against this new guy.”
I look over and see the others all watching the debate intently, as if unsure whether they should speak up. Rory shakes his head at me, his eyes focused on something in front of me. I peer down and realize that my freeze gun is drawn and aimed directly at Scudder’s face.
I didn’t even realize I had pulled out my weapon…
“So what’s it gonna be, Len? You going to let one of us rot in Iron Heights, and if you do, what’s to stop you from letting the rest of us rot? Or are you going to actually do something about all of this?” Scudder says forcefully.
My finger slowly tightens on the trigger. I’m not sure why I feel so hostile toward Scudder but now I’m starting to appreciate the fact that McCulloch’s been Mirror Master recently. I’m even willing to overlook his annoying accent.
“Cold.” Heatwave’s put a firm hand on my shoulder. “He’s right, Len. We can’t just let a fellow Rogue be tortured by those bastards at Iron Heights.” His voice grows quieter while he whispers in my ear, “I don’t trust him worth a damn either but I can’t say the same for the others. Let’s play along for now, alright?”
“Fine,” I mutter through clenched teeth. “Just tell us how to break Jesse out, Scudder.”
***
Next thing I know, we’re standing about two hundred meters from the gates of Iron Heights, rain pouring down onto us from above. My pals suddenly appear around me and McCulloch emerges from the reflection in the puddle we’re standing in.
<<Good. Time to put the plan into action then.>>
Scudder’s voice rings through the earpiece he told me to put in before we left.
<<McCulloch, do you have the mirrors?>>
I watch while Mirror Master pulls out four hand-sized circular mirrors from within his belt pouch, putting a finger up to his mask where his ear is underneath.
“Right here, Scudder.”
<<Good. Set one where you guys are, then one at each corner of the prison, about as far away as you guys are right now.>>
McCulloch sets one of the mirrors onto the ground, wedging it into the dirt so that it’s facing the prison. He nods at us before leaping into his own reflection in the puddle and then reappears on the other side of the field, across from us, planting another mirror.
I catch Plunder with his rifle raised out of the corner of my eye and turn to find that he’s looking down his scope, aiming at one of the guards on the towers. I grab the barrel of his rifle and he looks at me from beneath his mask, and I know he’s glaring. I can tell.
“Not yet, kid. This is a stealth operation right now.”
“What’s stealth mean?” He snickers.
“Just holster it for now. I seriously doubt we’ll be able to get Jesse and get out of here before having to crack a few skulls.” I see him brighten after I speak my words.
McCulloch’s out of view now, on the other side of Iron Heights, getting the rest of the mirrors all set up. We have to wait a few more minutes before he rises from the puddle once more, giving me a thumbs up. I tap my earpiece.
“All set, Scudder.”
<<A computer image of Iron Heights is showing up on my monitor now. Hmmm, looks like you’ll have to head into the basement first. No guards but the mirrors are picking up a strange aura down there. Radiation maybe. High levels of it too.>>
“That’s fine by us. As long as it aint a nuclear bomb, we’ll make it through.” I tell him assuredly. No way in hell have I submitted to this whole plan only to stop at a few signs of radiation. “Just get us in.”
<<Fine. McCulloch will take you into the basement and I’ll direct you from there.>>
McCulloch kneels down and presses his hand against the water of the puddle before we all sink into its reflection, vanishing from the rainy field outside. Just as the dark sky disappears from sight, I see a light coming toward us in the air…
I suddenly feel hot and we walk out of the reflection of a broken shard of glass, in a grim room full of large heating systems.
“So this is this place’s basement, eh? Think they could clean it up a wee bit?” Captain Boomerang says from beside me. “My cellar used to have table tennis.”
“You’ve told us like a million times, Digger,” Weather Wizard groans. “Where to next? This place smells.”
<<Go to the east, through the basement and you’ll find a staircase. Travel up it, and there’ll be two guards across the hall. Take them out and you’ll be all clear to head to the Pipeline.>>
The Pipeline. The lowest level of Hell. That’s where they throw us ‘super villains’ once we’ve been welcomed to Iron Heights by a thrashing from the guards. They let us keep our costumes, a reminder of the people we used to be, before tossing us in the Pipeline and letting us burn there for eternity. So as you can tell, I’m not a fan of it.
“Let’s go, lads,” McCulloch urges and we press on, walking through the labyrinth of heaters.
I hate hot places like this. Anywhere that makes me sweat.
“…the fire…” I hear muttering from behind me.
Damn. Heatwave’s stopped in his tracks and is looking through the vents of one of the coal heaters, staring into the burning flames. I storm up to him, placing myself in between him and the heater.
“Focus, Mick. Now either keep up or I’ll shatter your ankle so that you can’t.”
“Sorry. I… got distracted.” He sighs.
“Don’t let it happen again. We can’t afford you to be daydreaming.”
“Hey, Cold!” Digger calls in a loud whisper. “You might want to see this!”
Mick and I rush ahead to where the others are all gathered around a large glass tube where we see something even I’m shocked by.
A man, or what at least looks like a man, is trapped inside, banging furiously on the transparent walls. His skin is bright green, almost like what you see when things glow in the dark. His appearance though is shocking. It’s as if his outside flesh is see-through, and we’re able to see glimpses of the bone structure beneath his skin. Tubes are connected to his chest from the ceiling, pumping each time he glows with anger.
“HELP ME!” he cries, his screams barely able to be heard through the thick glass. “PLEASE! YOU HAVE TO HEELLLPP ME!!!”
“What should we do, Cold?” Weather Wizard says.
I stare hard into the man’s skeletal face and see tears congregating near his eyes. He pounds at the glass desperately, his muffled yells echoing through my ears.
“Leave him.”
“But Col-“ Mirror Master starts but I scowl at him.
“He’s not one of us. And I’m not going to go through all of the trouble of figuring out a way to get that freak out of there. Now let’s move it.”
The others scornfully follow my lead and we approach the staircase Scudder had mentioned. As we climb it up to a metallic door, I can still hear the quiet screams of the man in the tube, pleading for us to help him escape. But I’m not here to help him.
“What the hell is that thing back there?” Plunder asks, pointing one of his pistols back in the direction of the green man.
I have my hand on the knob of the door but I’m not stupid enough to open it while my pals are having a conversation. We’d be spotted almost immediately.
<<He’s the source of the radiation, it looks like. And judging by those wires he’s connected to, it’s like they’re fueling the prison with his radiation like a living battery.>>
“If ye call that living.” McCulloch chuckled.
“Shh. I hear someone,” I say, creaking the door open just a little.
Two guards are walking past, laughing loudly. Just as I remembered, those damn guards never gave any of us a chance for shut eye. But it’s what they say next that grabs my attention.
“Better roll out the red carpet then for that arrogant S.O.B. It’s been so much easier here without Wolfe, so why is it he thinks he has to drop by for a visit?” one of them grumbles while the other laughs.
“Probably hasn’t gotten to beat up any of these losers for a while. I bet he doesn’t want to get out of practice!”
“Wolfe’s coming here?” Mardon asks from behind me and I see the fear in his face from the light of his weather wand. “That is not good!”
I tighten my jaw and sneer at the guards who’ve now walked past.
“Nope… not good for him.”
With a kick, I knock the door open, the guards not even having a chance to react, and I roll into the hallway, firing my freeze gun at them. In seconds, they’re both frozen on the spot in their own poses; one reaching for his gun, the other pointing his own directly at me.
“Scudder. Any signs of Wolfe?”
<<Haven’t seen him at all. Do you think those guys were talking about today…wait. There’s a helicopter beginning to land on the pad outside.>>
My memory flashes to the light I saw in the sky from the distance.
Damn it all.
<<And that’s not everything, Len. Looks like the guards are gathering at the East gate and there are definitely guns being fired. Apparently at two signatures coming from outside. Cold…>>
I wait for him to finish.
<<One of them is your sister.>>
This day couldn’t get any worse.
Mardon seems to agree. You see, he had a thing going with my sister, Lisa, and she wound up pregnant with his kid. I didn’t like it; her relationship with Weather Wizard. She fell into a coma though and when all hell broke loose on the Twin Cities, I tried to get to her, but when I finally got to her room, she was gone. A month or so later, she reappeared as the Golden Glider, with a brand new attitude and was suddenly not pregnant. Turns out she’s also working for Candyman.
Everyone turning on me. Story of my life.
“Well then it looks like we’re going to have to make this rescue a bit quicker than planned. Split it up into pairs. Mardon, with me. Digger goes with Plunder. And McCulloch, you go with Mick. Alright?”
They all nod in agreement.
***
I’m running next to Mardon now, heading East. I hate running but when I have to, I’ll deal with it. I sent Heatwave and Mirror Master to keep an eye on Wolfe’s activities while Boomerang and Plunder go bust Trickster out.
To Hell with Scudder and all his careful ‘planning’.
“I want you to know, Cold, that if your sister doesn’t tell me what she did with my kid…”
“You won’t do anything, Mardon. Not to her, understand?”
“But she’s one of Candyman’s now. And you said when you and Flash fought her recently, she wasn’t exactly acting like herself.”
“She’s still my sister. And it when it comes to family, it’s personal business.”
“Then why bring me along with you if you didn’t want me to confront Lisa?”
“Scudder says that the majority of this pit’s guards are there. Needed someone who could take on all of them without a problem while I deal with Lisa,” I say, my voice shaking a little. How am I going to deal with Lisa?
“Whatever you say, Cold.”
He clearly doesn’t fall for the excuse.
And who was the second reading with Lisa on Scudder’s computer? She’d been working with Chillblaine last I saw her. A third-rate wannabe with a cold gun; an amateur me.
I see the doorways with the exit sign posted up ahead and we’re mere inches from it when a wall of ice suddenly grows across its surface before shattering into a million pieces with a bang, throwing me and Mardon off of our feet.
Light filters through the gaping hole in the wall from the outside and two silhouettes stand before us. As I thought, Chillblaine is one of them, standing in his yellow and blue outfit, a freeze gun in each hand. And as expected, my sister is the other, her golden skirt fluttering in the wind and her ice skates gleaming with light.
Behind them lies a pile of dead guards.
“Guess there’ll be no need for me to take out the guards then…” Weather Wizard grumbles from nearby.
“Well if it isn’t my brother and my lover,” Lisa says with a twisted smirk.
She never smiled that way before---not ever.
“Stop this, Lisa. Stop this and no one will have to get hurt.” My view shifts to Chillblaine. “Well, maybe he will.”
“We’re not here for you, Lenny. We’re here to do a little recruiting of our own,” she says rather pleasantly but there’s an edge in her words. An edge that’s almost as sharp as her skates.
“For Candyman,” I sneer, climbing to my feet. “You’re doing that bastard’s dirty work. Tell him if he even wants to contend with the Rogues, he’s going to have to start fighting his own battles.”
Chillblaine aims his freeze guns at me, a not well-hidden expression of worry in his face. Before he even blinks, my own weapon is drawn and we’re staring each other down like you’d see in those old Clint Eastwood movies.
“Move it or you’ll be on ice, Cold.”
“You know there are a lot of crooks running around who can freeze things. There’s me, Mr. Freeze, Killer Frost, the Icicle, and you, to name a couple…but you know one thing everyone but you has seemed to learn?”
He raises a brow, puzzled while I just crack a satisfied smirk.
“Puns just aren’t all that intimidating.”
I pull the trigger of my freeze gun and in a flash of chilling air, a gray beam of pure coldness shoots from my weapon at Chillblaine. Chillblaine has only a second to react and, to my surprise, he fires his dual freeze guns. Our blasts meet head on and the moment they collide, the entire room erupts with a man-made blizzard.
Frost flurries circle through the air while the beams are crashing against one another. My gaze wanders to my sister, still standing beside Chillblaine, staring directly at me, still wearing that demented smile.
“Mind giving me some traction, baby!?” she cackles to Chillblaine who stiffly nods, most of his attention centered on me. He keeps firing at me with his left-handed gun but uses his other to create a sheet of ice across the hallway. “Thank you, dearest!”
Lisa runs onto the ice path, gliding across it with her skates, moving so fast that I see Mardon flinch from beside me. She darts right up to his face, leaping through the air like a panther before swirling in a spin, kicking her leg out and slashing Weather Wizard across the right shoulder with her skate.
Some blood spurts onto my parka and I glance to my left where Mardon has been hit against the wall of the corridor, gripping his wound with his free hand and trying to aim his weather wand with his other.
“Hush, little baby, don’t say a word. Mama’s gonna buy you a mockingbird,” Lisa taunts with glee.
Mardon’s eyes are crackling with lightning. It’s how he usually looks before he bursts someone’s chest open with a tornado. But something’s different this time---he’s hesitating. Is it fear of what I’d do to him if he harmed Lisa or is it something else?
“-and if that mockingbird don’t sing-“
“ENOUGH!” Weather Wizard roars.
The air around us seemed to be sucked into Mardon’s wand and he let it all out in a fantastic burst of wind. Chillblaine skids off his feet and hit his head against the wall, being knocked senseless immediately while Lisa is thrown into the air, spiraling into the opposite wall and then crashing down onto the floor, glaring up at Mardon like an animal.
With Mardon like this---all I can do is watch.
Weather Wizard marches forward, weakly. Crimson blood is trickling down his gloved hand while he tries to apply pressure to the wound.
I’ve never seen him this upset before.
It’s as if something’s ignited a hurricane in his very soul.
Don’t kill her, Mardon. Don’t.
“Where is my child, Lisa!?” he says, the lightning in his eyes crackling wildly. “What have you done with my CHILD!?”
“Hehe. You’ll never know, Mark. And if you’re really so upset about the baby…why don’t you just end my life right here? Or are you worried that if you zap me, I’ll end up like the last person to be hit by a lightning bolt, and haunt you for years? Hehehe.”
Mardon’s hand is shaking and I don’t think it’s from the wound. I think he’s really struggling with this. But why? The man killed his own brother with that wand but he can’t even use it to kill Lisa?
“I care about you, Lisa…” he says, his lips quivering. “I really do. I didn’t at first…I mean, you were just another fling to me. But over time… I realized it wouldn’t be so bad having a baby with you…watching that baby grow up with you…I thought just for a minute, that maybe I could be happy again.”
The whole hallway seems to freeze and it isn’t from the remnants of the fight I had with Chillblaine. I feel stuck to the floor, not sure exactly what to do while Mardon just stares blankly at Lisa. Her face goes from bewilderment to a warm smile before she lets out a horrid laugh.
“Hehehe! You’re so sappy, Marky. So… pathetic.”
I aim my freeze gun at Lisa while she gets back on her feet, still laughing hysterically. Mardon says nothing, stunned by her response.
“Lisa. I don’t know what Candyman did to you. But you’re coming with us. Okay?” I say. It comes out more like a plea than I had intended it to.
“No, Lenny. That’s not going to happen.”
Mardon looks over to me unsurely and I keep my gun trained on my sister. This isn’t how it was supposed to go down. She wasn’t supposed to be here.
“Marky-Mark! El Capitan!”
I turn to find the source of that familiar voice and sure enough, James Jesse is sprinting down the hallway with Plunder and Captain Boomerang on his flanks.
“You have no idea how horrible it’s been here, guys!” He puts his hands up to his head dramatically. “The food was atrocious! The people were downright rude! And the lines, oh, don’t get me started on the lines!”
Good old James Jesse.
He’s doing a decent job at covering it up with his usual witty ‘charm’, but I can see leftovers from all of the pain he has gone through. Bruises still darken his face and I can see that his nose was broken and then snapped back in place multiple times, and he’s running with a kind of limp that tells me he’s seen a fair share of beatings these last couple of weeks.
“Lisa? It’s a reunion!” Trickster cheers, throwing his fist into the air but then sees all of our expressions and then Chillblaine on the floor. “Hey…who’s that guy? And why do you look so POed, Lis?”
Lisa smiles that new freakish smile of hers before sliding back a bit on her skates, heading for the door. Chillblaine, as if on command, climbs up and brushes himself off, glaring at me while he does.
“Candyman’s not going to be happy with you, Lenny. Stopping us from recruiting more followers won’t save you in the end,” she says ominously. “Oh and Marky, dear---“
Weather Wizard looks up at her, the storm in his eyes having calmed, and she blows him a kiss.
“I’ll say ‘Hi’ to our son for you.”
Strangely, a car rolling by in the distance seems to stop completely for a brief second, as if paused, before it continues at its usual speed. It may just be my imagination, but when I look back at where Lisa has been, she and Chillblaine have vanished.
“What the hell?” Plunder asks and I have to agree with his confusion.
“LEN!” shouts a voice from behind us, a long way down the hall.
We all peer down the hallway where flames can be seen spurting along the walls and yells from even further beyond that. Heatwave is running at us, Mirror Master hanging over his shoulder. Mick’s shooting off a blaze of fire at whatever is behind him and that’s when I remember…
Wolfe is here.
Down the darkened hallway, through the fire, I can make out the almost-demonic crimson eyes of the ex-warden. Heatwave finally reaches us, gasping for breath while McCulloch is unmoving over his shoulder.
“What happened?”
“Wolfe spotted us watching them, and we fought for a bit, took out a few guards, but we were outnumbered so we tried to run but, before McCulloch could get us into a mirror, Wolfe did something. His eyes glowed red and then McCulloch’s muscles tightened up. He fell and hit his head against the wall.”
I see those red eyes coming even closer.
“Digger, Plunder,” I call.
Captain Boomerang and Plunder rush up a few steps ahead of us, Plunder with a grenade in his hand and Digger with one of his boomerangs.
“Evenin’, govna!” Digger calls, throwing his boomerang down the hall at Wolfe and his men. Plunder rips the pin out of his grenade and tosses it down the hall too. The boomerang twirls into the ceiling, just in front of Governor Wolfe, before exploding, with the grenade following suit. The ceiling comes crumbling down in a pile of rubble, blocking the path for Wolfe.
“How’re we going to get out without Mirror Master?”
“Anybody have any ruby slippers?” Trickster asks.
We all leer at him and now I’m beginning to wonder why we even went through all of this trouble to free him.
“…guess not.” Trickster sighs.
“We could make a run for it,” Heatwave says, pointing at the exit where all of the guard corpses are scattered.
“They’ll catch us for sure if we go that way,” I reply, looking around for an answer.
<<Not if you make a distraction, Cold.>>
I almost forgot Scudder was even here.
“Right. A distraction,” I finish and suddenly realize what Scudder means.
We can hear Wolfe’s men trying to dig through while we rush away, en route for the basement. We climb down the dark stairs as fast as possible before seeing the familiar glow of the skeletal man in the tube.
“HELP ME!” he screeches at the sight of us.
“No worries, pal. You’ll be out in a sec.” I examine the glass tube closely before looking back up at the man. “You’re giving off radiation, right?”
“Can’t you tell?” I barely hear him say through the glass. His skeletal face showing through his nearly-transparent skin. “Yeah, I do. Doesn’t give them any reason to make me their Energizer Bunny.”
“Well, you’ll get your chance to get back at them for it in a few minutes, Mr. …“
“Borman. Neil Borman. These guards have been calling me Fallout though. I’d be careful. Once you break me out, if you get too close, you may get real sick---or worse.”
“I’ll try and keep that in mind,” I say gruffly. “Everyone get back! Digger?”
“Remind me to thank Scudder for this boomerang, mates!” Captain Boomerang says, pulling out his newly-acquired acid-spewing weapon.
He spins it at the tube, small holes in the boomerang letting out a fountain of acid in its wake. The boomerang makes impact with the glass, sticking into it while the acid melts it away. We all step back as much as possible while Neil rips off the wiring connected to him and climbs out of the tube once the opening is big enough.
“Those guys you hate so much, Jack Skellington, are right up that staircase,” Trickster says and Neil doesn’t seem too appreciative of the name.
He gives one last glance at the group of us, a smile forming on his hideous face.
“Thanks.”
With that, he marches up the stairs, the floor melting away beneath his feet as he walks, and I hear screams coming from the top of the stairs.
“Fellas, it looks like we’ve escaped Hell again.”
***
Mardon says he needs a few days off, needs some space for a little while. Don’t blame the guy, my sister played a very dangerous game with him and she came out with the better hand. Everyone else is still pretty shaken up over the whole rescue, well, except for Jesse. I’ve never seen him more hyper and energetic in my life, and that’s saying something.
Me, I just need some downtime.
“Says here that this ‘Fallout’ escaped from Iron Heights too. Killed a bunch of Wolfe’s men when he did but Wolfe is fine,” Scudder says, looking over the newspaper.
“Yeah? Well Wolfe had it coming. Was at the wrong place at the wrong time.”
I pour myself a beer and then take a seat in my messy chair, Scudder sitting at the desk across from me, looking at me curiously, as if expecting me to say something.
“What?”
“McCulloch told me what you did to Kadabra and Top. Killed them both in a matter of minutes?”
“They weren’t real Rogues,” I reply coldly.
“And now that I’m back in the business, what about me?”
I snicker, pulling off my hood and laying my freeze gun on the counter beside me before taking a sip of my beer.
“What’s that they say, Scudder?”
I turn on the TV and get comfortable while he waits for an answer.
“Only time will tell.”
END.