Boy Sorceress Pt. 04

I correlated my list of Alpha personnel with Stills' contact list and picked nine of his friends that were single and not on duty that night. I reviewed his recent communications with them and phrased an email to make it seem like it was being sent by him. The email invited his friends to have a gangbang with me. I wrote, in Stills' words, how he didn't want his pals' jizz on his furniture, so all they had to do to fuck me was drive to the abandoned motel during the next hour. The email assured them that a room had been outfitted for their "party". It also instructed them to not invite anyone else, cause they were the only ones that I had picked to fuck me and I'd leave if there were any party crashers. Attached to the email was my slutty invitation video.

I hit send and drove back to the motel. I checked up on Stills. He was softly snoring, oblivious to the world.

Earlier that day, I had reconnected the motel to the grid. I turned on the parking lot lights. Only a few had working bulbs in them, but they provided enough light to allow my guests to park. I turned on the lights in the room I had prepared for my trap and put on some loud music. With the heavy curtains drawn and the bass softly throbbing, who could tell the room was empty? No one. The room had a door that adjoined it to the next room.

I stood in the adjoining room, waiting behind the door for my first victim to come into my trap. The first guy was there just five minutes later. "Steve," he called out loud from the parking lot. "Steve, you crazy fuck!" I peeked out of my darkened room. The guy was striding towards the door. His face was split by an elated smile. "Ready, or not, here I come!"

He walked into the lit room and paused right in front of the adjoining door. "Steve? Steve, where are you? What's-"

I reached out from behind the door and tazed him unconscious. I stuck him with a dose of tranquilizer and applied zip ties to his limbs. I moved him into the dark room and waited for the next one. There was no activity for the next twenty minutes, but five more guys showed up in the fifteen minutes after that. I'd barely manage to hide one and the next was already pulling up. The presence of the other familiar cars parked out front relaxed them so much that they never saw me coming.

I waited until the hour was up and then I waited for fifteen minutes more, but no others came. I had seven hostages. They would just have to be enough. I turned on the lights in the adjoining room and rolled all of the guys until they were lying next to each other, face up on the floor. I frisked them all as I gathered their phones. One of them had a watch with a GPS locator beacon in it. I smiled. What a stroke of luck. My original plan had been to choose the most concealable of their phones and leave it on, as if I had missed it, so Alpha could track it to the motel on Route 29. The beacon watch was way, way better. "Thank you," I said to the owner. I removed the batteries from all the phones.

I took my clothes off and drew a deep breath. I slowly let it out and aimed the camera at my Susan Hamilton face. I pressed record and smiled. "Hello, Alpha cunts! Did you know your firm's acronym is ASS?" I giggled. "I'm betting you didn't! I bet your brains are too far gone from all the steroids you must use." I paused and put a finger to my red lips, as if I had just thought of something. "Oh, wait! Iknow you're brain-dead, cause you idiots actually thought you could threaten us and get away with it!" I giggled some more, putting my hand over my mouth, like I had seen a lot of Asian chicks do in their movies. Then I became dead serious in an instant. "Guess what the price of your presumption is?"

I pointed the camera at Stills' face. "And these are the little asses that will pay it!" While I slowly panned the camera over the faces of my hostages, I undid the adhesives holding my mask in place. I took the wig and bra off and tossed them aside. I made the flower in my brain retract and my perspective shifted. I opened my eyes as wide as I could and pointed the camera at my face. I looked into the lens as I laughed the fakest laugh I could muster. I hit the button and ended the recording.

I reviewed it and honestly scared myself with my performance. The Asian chick at the beginning was disconcerting, the sight of the helpless men would leave Alpha infuriated, but my crazy face at the end was the cincher. There was no way on Earth that Alpha could ignore this. They would shit themselves and then commit with all the force they could muster.

For a long moment, I wondered if I hadn't overdone it. My face was scary enough from being on the TV with "armed and dangerous" captions for a month now. My face with crazy eyes and a clearly fake laugh just screamed insanity. Like I was too far removed from the human condition to even be able to gloat at my victims' predicament.

I shuddered. Where the fuck had such thoughts come from? I was removed from humanity, but it wasn't by choice. I shivered some more and realized I was cold. "Well, duh, dummy." I shook off the last of my dread and got to work. I made the flower bloom and got dressed.

Then it hit me that I was needlessly incriminating myself. The faces of their captive friends were all the incentive Alpha would need to deploy. I disguised myself into Susan again and re-shot the video, only I panned back to Susan's face for the maniacal laughter. I reviewed the video. It was just as scary as before, only this version was zero percent likely to be used to send me to jail after all this was over.

I turned off all the lights and donned my night vision goggles. I checked that the coast was clear outside and moved the hostages into the van with the cart and a little telekinesis.

I drove down Route 29 until I came across the Gas'n'Gulp. My heart was beating like crazy.This is all wrong, I told myself,I need my Interceptor here. It's only safe to come this close to the One-Oh-Fours if I'm in my Interceptor. "Keep it together," I whispered to myself. "You're only here for a drive-by."

I drove past the motel and rolled my window down. There was no sign of anyone looking my way. I telekinetically made the beacon watch float to the eaves of the motel and attached it there with a glob of superglue. No one would find it there, but Alpha could surely follow the GPS to its location.

I drew deliberate, slow, deep breaths to keep myself from flooring the throttle and loudly speeding away from there.

I turned onto the side road and drove towards Bunker Hill. There was no sign of traffic at this late hour, so I parked in the middle of nowhere and initiated a chat with Mentor. We had chatted earlier that day, when I had explained my plan to him. It had met with his wholehearted approval.

Asker: Where the foe's haughty host in dread silence reposes. I tagged them with the GPS. Did you see me do it?

Mentor: And the star-spangled banner in triumph doth wave. Yes, you were in a white van. I didn't see any GPS device, though.

I smiled.

Asker: Well, that was the point. Can you confirm that all eight One-Oh-Fours are at the motel?

Mentor: Positively. Most are asleep right now.

Asker: And there's nobody else there?

Mentor: Only them and the clerk, who is pass-out drunk.

I breathed out a sigh of relief. Everything was coming together. A small part of me was egging me on to ask Mentor about what comes after tonight, but I didn't want to push my luck. This was the final straight. A distraction was just what the universe needed to fist my asshole. I was going to keep it tight and focused.

Asker: Time for phase two! I'm sending the email. You know what to do.

Mentor: Don't worry, I'll keep an eye on Alpha.

My fingers lingered over the keyboard. As much as I wanted to keep things on the straight and narrow, I also needed to plan ahead and be prepared, or I'd find my chair taken away and a fist placed under my ass instead. Tonight, the bad guys were taken care of, hopefully, but there was only one thing that could stop new bad guys stepping in to take over. Besides, if Alpha failed, I needed a plan B.

Asker: Wait!

Mentor: What?

Asker: The news have been banging on about Guthrie's fortune and who will inherit it and that got me thinking.

He shot off some text while I slowly typed with one hand and one eye out the windshield.

Mentor: Yes?

Asker: We need to find the book you mentioned. The one that is the source of all the magic. The one that they need to possess while they do their string of rituals. You said that they all need to jointly possess it at the same time for their mutual rituals to work. Well, how are they all still in possession of it? I've killed five of them already. Shouldn't that have disrupted the ownership of the book? Shouldn't someone else have inherited their stake of the book, or something? How are they all still the owners of the book? Did they name each other mutual heirs, or something? If we figured out the exact legal mechanism of how they inherited each other's stakes in owning the book, then we could maybe figure out where it was and take it.

Mentor: Excellent thinking. I'll get on it as soon as I'm done with staking out Alpha. We'll find the book, I promise!

Asker: Ok, that's it for now. Go to ASS HQ. Initiate chat if their response deviates from the plan.

Mentor: Will do.

He logged out and I looked at the empty road again. This was it. This was the moment of truth. With the press of a button, I was going to send the Crazy Riverside Ravager video to all six hundred and seventy two employees of Alpha Security Solutions. Whatever happened next was on me.

I could still call it off. I could just let the hostages go. But that would mean the One-Oh-Fours would take over the world. "Please," I said to the empty countryside as my finger lingered over the button.

I pressed it and let out a shuddering breath that I didn't know I was holding. I engaged the Deep-Fryer, put the van in drive and focused on getting to the warehouse. Once there, I secured my hostages inside.

I got into my Interceptor that I had hidden in the warehouse under cover of darkness. Its description was all over the news, just as my real face was, so I could only drive it around at night.

I drove back towards the motel where the One-Oh-Fours were holed up. I parked about a mile away, in a gully behind a slight hill, and pulled my camera, tripod and folding chair out of the trunk. I lugged it all to the top of the hill and set up my camera. I pointed it at the motel's parking lot. I sat on the folding chair and peered through the lens. There was no activity.

I ran back to the car and retrieved my laptop. I reinstalled it in record time. Then I resumed my vigil over the motel. Every few seconds, I took my eye off the camera and glanced at my laptop, awaiting to see a chat request that would spell doom for my plan. My legs jumped of their own accord. I chewed on my lower lip as my fingers drummed against my bouncing knee.

After an hour of this, I growled with rage. "Fuck you, you fucking hacker fuck and your fucking...fuck with the...fuck!" I was so sick and tired of hiding my electronic trail. Not talking to Mentor at this stage of the plan just felt like I was transported back in time. Like it was the eighteenth century and I had to know everything important all on my own, every day of my life. "How the fuck did people live before smartphones?!"

I flexed my fists and drew deep breaths to try and keep my cool. It wasn't working all that well.

I was just about to give up and initiate a chat myself, when I heard it. The wash from the chopper's main prop colliding with the wash from the boom prop, creating eddies of supersonic airflow which made the loud noise of a helicopter in flight. My gaze rose and I scanned the night horizon in the direction of Springfield for any sign of the flying machine. This had better be them.

I didn't have the time to properly entertain my doubts. A second noise joined the symphony. A Hummer's engine makes a distinctive noise that carries a fair distance, particularly when it's matched by the noise of about forty other Hummers' engines, revving to the redline.

I jumped up and screamed with joy. I quickly clamped my mouth shut with both hands, but I couldn't keep my lips from curling up into a smile. It worked. They were there.

Two helicopters suddenly turned on their floodlights and illuminated the motel's parking lot. Every vehicle engaged its lights and I was treated to a glorious sight. A dozen APCs had rolled into the parking lot, blocking all the vehicles there. There was a ring of Hummers surrounding the motel. All the vehicles disgorged armored men with guns. It was Shock and Awe done properly.

I loudly hummed the "Imperial March" from Star Wars. I don't know why, I just did.

I sat back down and pinned my eye to the camera. The Hummers had armored people sticking out of their roofs, manning .50cal machine guns. Each of the APCs had a remote controlled turret on top of it, and the guns on those turrets looked like they ate .50cal machine guns for breakfast.

The men broke down the doors to all the motel rooms at the same time. I stopped humming. The One-Oh-Fours could fight back indoors. The witnesses outside can't dispel what they don't know is going on inside. I kept looking through the lens. "Come on, come on, come on!"

I nearly jumped for joy when I saw Susan being hauled out of her motel room by her long hair. The men dragging her were slapping her around and sticking a gun in her face. I chuckled. The cunt deserved everything she got. She was suddenly dragged off to the side as the men interrogating her turned their attention elsewhere.

There was activity in the parking lot and I zoomed in and out as I panned around to see what was going on. The sound of a blast reached me, followed shortly by the faint noise of distant gunfire. "Shit." There were only supposed to be a few shots. Not this sustained fire. That meant trouble.

I searched with my camera and finally spotted men being piled high right outside the door to a motel. I quickly figured out what was going on. The Magneto of the One-Oh-Fours was throwing the Alphas out by their rifles. Once their colleagues saw it happen and the unnatural trajectories they were taking, he was doomed. There was well over a hundred of them present in the parking lot alone. I heard a different kind of gunfire and saw one of the APCs fire its big-ass cannon into the motel.

"Geeze," I groaned. One-Oh-Fours aside, this was a military invasion of a roadside, American motel. And I had caused it.

I focused on the motel again and watched. The Alphas began dragging bodies out of the motel. The first few were wearing armor. I winced. Then came half-naked people. I zoomed in further, but the press of Alphas in the parking lot became too big for me to see through.

For the next few minutes, I stared anxiously at the backs of Alphas standing around the motel. I had no way of knowing what was going on. At one point, the helicopters landed right on the road in front of the motel and I could see that stretchers were loaded into them. I could just make out armor and camouflage on the people on the stretchers. Alpha had taken casualties. The choppers took off and flew back towards Springfield. I took their departure as a sign that the situation was under control, but I feared that the One-Oh-Fours might yet talk their way out of this.

After a few more minutes, I saw an Alpha climb atop an APC which drove all the way up to the motel. The Alpha was holding a handheld device and he reached up at the eaves of the roof. "Shit!" He found the beacon watch and pried it free with a knife. Now Alpha knew their people weren't there. "Shit, shit, shit, shit, shit!"

I sprinted to the Interceptor and grabbed Kurt's revolver out of the glove compartment. I was just as fast dashing back up the hill. I pulled all four rounds of ammunition from the drum and held them in the palm of my hand. If the Alphas weren't going to kill the One-Oh-Fours, then I had to, while I still had them there to dispel their magic. I would just have to emulate my magic sniper thing from when I had killed Sturbridge. I sat in front of my camera again and looked. "Oh, no!"

The Alphas were pulling out. They were getting back into their Hummers and APCs and the vehicles were pulling away, driving down the road back towards Springfield. "No! Don't go!" I growled with irritation, staring through the lens, trying to see what was going on.

As the crowd left, I saw eight half-naked bodies on the ground of the parking lot. They all appeared to have been riddled with bullets. My heart nearly stopped as I peered at them with maximum magnification. I soon recognized that one of the bodies was Susan Hamilton. I also recognized the two general-purpose magicians. The other five's faces were turned away from me. I prayed that they were the One-Oh-Fours and that they were dead.

Twenty-five Alphas remained behind, along with five Hummers. They paced the parking lot. I watched with bated breath. If the One-Oh-Fours were still alive, if their powers still held sway, this is when they would make their move. An eternity seemed to have passed before the flashing lights came. I zoomed out and saw three police cars show up from the direction of Bunker Hill. A little later, I heard their sirens.

The cops drew guns on the Alphas, but the mercenaries didn't even react. There was some kind of discussion going on. The cops holstered their guns after a few minutes. Finally, the Alphas got in their Hummers and drove off. "Wow," I said to myself. They shot up the place, stood over eight corpses and the cops just let them drive off.

Good thing I wasn't a vigilante, or I'd have to see to Alpha Security Solutions next.

The cops covered the bodies with dark bags and I stared at them until the Bunker Hill coroner arrived. I half expected to see John Barton and Doc Hamilton, but this was out of their jurisdiction. Forensic investigators began documenting the crime scene and I could see the medical examiner poke the bodies in the liver with the very long thermometer.

"That's the fork. They're done."

My revenge was something of a letdown. I was glad that the nightmare was over and that the world was made safe again, but I hadn't gotten to see the bad guys' downfall. Not really. Staring at the backs of the cavalry from a mile away can hardly be considered witnessing the event.

I reminded myself that it was over and that that was the only thing that mattered. My plan had worked. The bad guys were gone. I won.

I didn't feel like I had won. I was still a wanted man that hid in Ashley Williams' shape. I still needed to go investigate the cops and the feds and figure out a way to clear my name. And after that, I'd have to bury my parents and figure out how to make a life for myself. The bad guys were dead, but I was still a college dropout.

I groaned. The road ahead was unknown, but sure to be difficult. I had no idea what I was going to do. Fightingagainst someone else was much easier than fightingfor yourself. What was I going to do? What did I want to do? Get an engineering degree? Explore my magic? Which came first? How was I going to do any of it? The questions multiplied in my mind until I got a headache.

I reminded myself of the philosophy of Skip The Wise. Break down my goals into tiny steps. Take them one at a time, every day of my life.

Well, whatever my goals turned out to be, they still had to take a back seat to releasing my hostages.

I stood up and stretched my protesting limbs. I yawned and swayed unsteadily on my feet. It was well past two in the morning and I had had a loooong night. I needed to get some sleep. I packed up my things and drove towards Bunker Hill. I was practically falling asleep behind the wheel. Fortunately, a cop car was rushing in the opposite direction with lights flashing. I was wide awake as I turned off the road, turned off my lights and prayed they would pass me by.