Shadow Operator/Arrested Development
From Unofficial Handbook of the Virtue Universe
Arrested Development
I’d never fallen so far. Well to be honest, I didn’t think I’d fallen at all. Hell, last time I checked I was one of the good guys. Being led through the Zig in an orange jumpsuit with handcuffs on tends to rattle that notion of being one of the ‘good guys’. Of course all the jeers from the peanut gallery didn’t help that either. Yeah, it’s one hell of an experience, alright.
Not more than thirty, fourty-five minutes prior, I’d gotten off work and was digging the keys out of my pocket to my apartment, when the PPD swarmed me. I was on the ground and kissing pavement so fast, I thought the street had risen up to give me a hug or something. It was at this point I realized just how badly the streets of King’s Row could use a scrub. I’d have to write a letter to my city council about this. Right.
So despite my protesting and obvious disinclination to be thrown into a van, I’d been told I was under arrest for murder, and had already been tried and convicted. Well well well, that was news to my ears. Usually I get a letter about those kind of goings on, typically from the medical examiner. And even then it’s usually a “thank you” or Christmas card, thanking me for helping him stay busy and keeping his work interesting. Phil’s a nice guy, a bit odd, but that’s kind of expected from a guy who hangs around with corpses all day. Hence why I was kind of surprised by all this sudden interest in my arrest, not to mention the snide remarks... Oh! And that one guy who smashed my face in with the butt end of his M-16? Yeah, that was... that was just classic.
In the back of the van, some...I don’t know. I’d suppose you call him a stuffed shirt. I wasn’t really paying attention to whoever it was. I mean despite the fact it looked like a woman, it sure as hell sounded like a guy. I say this, because I had only the one good eye, and my ears were ringing like mad. Probably something to do with the concussion I got from getting smacked earlier. Either way, this lady’s five o’clock shadow went clean down to her legs. So while she droned on about whatever it was she was going on about, I decided to pass out involuntarily. I guess that means I went unconscious.
Dreams are really amazing sometimes. We can go anywhere we want, be anything we want to be....
.... I dreamed I was a breakfast platter at a diner. I had just been served to a couple engaged in a conversation. They spoke English with an obviously British accent, and I couldn’t remember what the topic was about. Either way, I sat there on the plate happily, eggs over easy, a slice of toast and two links of sausage on a warm plate, relaxing without a care in the world. God, how I loved being those sausages. Just the thought of some woman putting me into her mouth was enjoyable enough. The only problem was, I think I was his breakfast. Then the mood shifted, and all I remembered hearing was, “I love you pumpkin,” followed by, “I love you hunny bunny.” There was some clattering, and someone had stepped on me. “Every body be cool this is a robbery!” “If any of you fucking pricks move, I’ll execute every mother fucking last one of you!” Then some surf guitar kicked in, despite the fact, I had been summarily squished underfoot, much to my relief and displeasure. Wait, no that was Pulp Fiction, and I was watching the DVD the other night.
Leave it to a high pressure spray of razor cold water to wake anyone of an unconscious state. I guess it’s one way to clean out the back of a van. After having been unceremoniously stripped and thrown into a Zig jumpsuit, a doctor slapped me around a bit, said I was fine and injected me with something. I was then dragged rather half-assed down a corridor to my cell. I don’t really remember what the other convicts were yelling about, but if I had to shoot a guess, it was probably the fact another ‘cape’ had fallen. The cell I was tossed into looked like one of the max security units reserved for high profile villains. I guess something I did as a Marine warranted the upgrade from a double to a suite. Probably something about the forty confirmed and two hundred some odd unconfirmed kills I racked up during my years in the service, and my war record. Nah, that couldn’t have anything to do with it.
I’m locked in for three days, all my meals are brought to me, and it was the first time in my life I actually wished for canned beans, army surplus. I keep up my morning and evening calisthenics to keep my sanity, and to beat the box. After all, they locked a Marine Scout Sniper in a room, not some regular grunt. We know how to play the waiting game, and make the other team fold every time. I remember going to sleep the third night though, thinking this was going to be pretty easy, if I just kept my mind active. I did what I normally did out in the brush: Run movies through in my head. Good way to kill a few hours, and keep the mind active and awake. Plus helped with lucid dreaming when need be. You could say I was one of those guys with a nasty habit of mouthing each and every last line of a movie while I was watching it, word for word.
Wasn’t long before I was sleeping soundly. No point in being awake with nothing to really do. At least until the sound of a torch burning through my cell door woke me up. It’s always something this week. Always. I’ll be lucky if I have a job to go back to on Monday. Then again they probably watch the news. Nuts. “Hey! You! Let’s go! Move it!” Arachnos troops? Oh right, the bi-weekly Zig breakout. I swear, with these guys it’s no wonder City Hall foregoes paying a parole board for Zig inmates. “... C’mon, meat! Off your ass!” Grabbed, once again. I was getting a little sick of this, being tossed about like a... well, you know.
Sometimes, I think my CO was right: I did have some anger issues, but only when it came to being handled in a less than friendly way. Righting myself on the slab that passed for a bed, I’d grabbed the Huntsman hand and twisted it in a damn near perfect ninety degree angle, in the opposite direction it normally bends. “Few things: One, don’t. Two, don’t. Three, see ya.” These Arachnos maces were odd damn things, and while I didn’t have time to figure it out completely, I did learn rather quickly, that as a club, it excels. Especially against Wolf Spiders.
The two sorry bastards didn’t have a chance. Thankfully they had their helmets on. It didn’t take me long to get out of the cellblock though. I did manage to shove one scared female guard into a locker. I just hope she got the hint to stay put since I didn’t give her any prompting. Last thing I need on my conscience is a woman just in the wrong place at the wrong time scared out of her wits. I don’t think I’ll quite be able to forget that image.
Arachnos troops were herding a few of us out into the yard; others were being kept back, some just right out shot on sight. The one Huntsman directing traffic gave me one look and sneered, shoving me back. So I returned the favor. As a kid my dad tried to instill a sense of baseball into me, which never quite took. I was too busy sneaking around among other things. After I was pushed back into the crap in the sewers, I stood up, gripping the mace with a previously unrealized vigor. It nested into my hands squarely, comfortably, almost feeling like a natural extension of my very being. I took two steps and yelled over all the commotion as I swung, “HEY FUCKO!” The Huntsman turned and must’ve glared at me surprised behind his helmet, “Eh?”
“Be the ball!” My form was perfect, the sound echoed and every one went silent. The limp form of the Huntsman went flying into the wall, toppling over like a rag doll in a physics engine. Dad would have been proud. The other Huntsman that had observed my Home Run, simply waved me through, no questions asked, and no hassles. Maybe these guys weren’t as stupid as I had been lead to believe. Wait wait wait, yes they were. Hell. Bad guys. Duh.
The fight against the yard wasn’t that bad. I got to put the hurt on a few fuckos I’d put away a few months prior. Nothing like payback from a cycloptic Marine armed with an Arachnos mace. It felt good to just let it all go. Eventually they got the idea and left me alone. I guess the prison GED programs are somewhat working.
Everything else was pretty much as straight forward as could be expected. The Pilot of the flyer wasn’t as stupid as the others though. I had to loose the club or face the hole when SWAT arrived. If I wanted to figure out what the hell happened and why I was in the slam, I had to get out. Hence my one chance to find out who the hell set me up in the first place.
Over the Atlantic, I sat near the open door of the flyer, watching the City of Heroes fade into the distance, Paragon, a place that’d been home for two years. It was going to take calling in every favor I had in the service to get back home, provided those favor’s could be called in. Wiping the sweat off my brow with the sleeve of my jumpsuit, I realized that I no longer had my eye patch on. Must’ve lost it in the scuffle of the breakout. Fuck. I really liked that eye patch too. The scruff on my chin was rough, coarse, I was exhausted, and a bit overwhelmed all at once, yet all I could do was sit there, watching the scene out the door. I’d no idea how high up we were, or how fast we were going. I just didn’t care, and I could feel sleep catching up to me.
That’s when I felt the boot upside my face, and out I went. Free fall’s a terrible thing when you’re tired. It’s worse when you realize you don’t have a chute or a chance in hell of surviving. Hitting the water at terminal velocity might as well be like hitting a concrete wall. The whistle of the air blew through my ears as I streaked earthward, rolling and tumbling, uncontrollably. I couldn’t right myself, and I had no control.
I was so tired... just so damn tired. Why couldn’t I just get a br-...
