“Goodmoring, Eric,” Sebastian Shaw’s voice forced its way past the walls of sleep and ripped him back to reality. The cat was nowhere to be seen, but his tormentor was there as always. “It’s a very special day, you’ll finally get to see your beloved mother again!”
Eric suppressed the rush of acrid bile at the back of his throat and hurried to his feet, silent in the face of Shaw’s jovial attitude. The happier the man was, the worse things were. He resisted a shudder as a hand fell on his shoulder and led him towards the door.
“Let’s hurry, we don’t want to keep her waiting!” Shaw pulled Eric along, a short walk that ended in the man’s combination laboratory-office. Tools of torture lined the walls, visible through the thick glass that separated the lab from a comfortable study. “Today is the day, Eric, I know it!”
Shaw left him in the middle of the room and took a seat behind his desk. His hand reached out and seized a small, silver bell. Its hollow chime summoned a pair of armed guards, his Mother held between them.
Mom!” Eric rushed forward, to be repelled by the escorts and returned before Shaw with a casual shove. “Please, don’t hurt…”
“Here's what's going to happen,” Shaw flashed Eric his pearl-white teeth and set a coin onto the wood between them, a pistol in his right hand. “I’m going to count to three… if you haven’t moved the coin by then, I’m going to pull the trigger.”
Eric’s mind filled with a terrible drone, the world reduced to a coin on the table and the weapon in his enemy’s hands. He reached out, a deadened sorrow stuck at the pit of his stomach. His eyes flicked to his Mother’s thinned, pale face.
“You can do it.,” she forced an unsteady smile of encouragement, eyes filled with tears. “It’s going to be alright…”
“One…”
His gaze tracked back to the coin, hands extended as he pushed with every fibre of his being. It HAD to move. If he couldn’t use his power to save the last of his family, what good was it?
“Two…”
The room blurred, his target masked behind a veil of tears. It wouldn’t move, still and immovable as a mountain. Waves of anguish levered against his heart, an agony of the soul. Eric’s face twisted, muscles taught as he leaned closer.
“It’s going to be alright,” his Mother’s voice filled the pause in Shaw’s count, marred by an emotional crack as she gazed at her son. “It’s going to be alright…”
“Three,” Shaw’s final word was punctuated by the sharp blast of his pistol, a hammer that broke something deep with Eric’s mind. Crimson rage flowed up and out, into the ocean of grief that filled his soul.
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Shaw’s head tilted to one side, focused over Eric’s shoulder, but he had no room to think. The fire in his heart exploded, a rush of power that ripple through the room. Shaw’s bell crumpled, compressed by an invisible force.
“Yes!” Shaw’s eyes snapped back to Eric, a wide smile on his face. He clapped his hands and stood, arms spread wide. “Wonderful!”
Eric let loose a primal roar, fueled by his sorrow and rage. Hands extended, he reached out to the steel cabinets behind Shaw and crushed them into a ball. Shaw clapped once more, his words lost as Eric turned his focus toward the guards.
“Mom?” Eric froze. His mother was still alive, face pale as snow. She stood, somehow unharmed by Shaw’s bullet. “You’re alright!”
“Meow!” A familiar proud croon echoed out from the side of the room and drew Eric’s gaze. The black cat sat, bright eyes focused on Shaw with a strange ferocity. Balanced atop its front, left paw, it held a bullet up to the light.
“What is this creature?” Shaw rose from his desk, eyes locked onto the unusual cat. He held out his hands, as if he was next to a warm fire. “There is so much power inside it… a bright, sunny glow of energy…”
The air cracked as the cat flicked its paw. The bullet returned toward Shaw, many times faster than he’d set it out. It halted the instant it touched the man’s clothes and fell to the ground, the sound of its fall hidden by a sonic boom.
The room shook around them, gunfire and explosions from beyond the walls complemented by horrified screams. Shaw marched forward and reached for Eric’s arm, but the world blurred and the boy found himself next to his mother. The cat stood between them and Shaw, lips twisted in an unmistakable smile.
“It seems you’ve made a friend, Eric,” Shaw scowled, wary of the bizarre cat. “Someone is out there killing my soldiers, you can hear them dying… who’s coming for you, boy?”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Eric leaned into his Mother’s embrace, reddened eyes focused on the man he hated most in the world. “Everyone I know in the world is standing in this room…”
Another quake rocked the building, strong enough to flicker the lights. A massive explosion finished the work and darkness filled the room. A small, blue light lit up, a spark that drove back the shadows.
“Meooow-meow,” a small rune floated free of the black cat’s eyes and shaped itself into an orb of light. Its tail flicked at Eric and his mother, curled like a beckoning finger. Silent on its feet, it walked toward the door and looked back over its shoulder. “Meow!”
“You’re not going anywhere!” Shaw lunged forward, but his hand passed through air. First his mother, and then Eric, vanished from the office. “Get back here Eric, you’re only making a fool out of yourself!”
Nausea flickered in the back of his throat at Shaw’s words, muffled by their sudden separation. The cat had moved them both into the hall, faster than his mind could follow. It curled its tail for a second time and pranced a few steps forward, before it stopped and motioned again.
“Come on Son, Let’s follow our saviour,” Eric’s mother wrapped an arm around his shoulders and led them into motion. Shaw burst from his office, a few dozen metres at their backs. “Hurry!”
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“This is kind of cathartic…” Dan floated a few metres above the ground, unconcerned by the maelstrom of gunfire directed his way. Hundreds of German soldiers surrounded him, heavy machine guns and handheld weapons unleashed upon his untouchable skin. “There are no moral questions here, I can just let loose!”
He drifted toward the closest group of men, several squads accompanied by a unit with flamethrowers. Fire erupted, warm curtains that Dan parted with a flick of his finger. A flicker brought him amongst the soldiers, hands extended to pierce the fuel tanks of the men to his left and right.
Fire consumed the horrid squad as Dan flew toward the next group in line. They carried handheld rocket launchers, useless as their shells exploded on contact with his chest. Dan inhaled a deep breath and expelled a frozen wind. The heavy weapons unit turned to crystalline statues, left behind as he appeared in front of a primitive tank.
“Stormy should have Eric and his Mother in hand, but I’d better hurry up regardless…” A casual flick sent the machine through a line of soldiers, before it exploded against the side of a watchtower. “There aren't many left now, anyways.”
Dan’s eyes glowed, pinpoints of blue that speared from man to man. The last of the guardsmen turned to flee, vaporised one by one until a single soldier remained. Terrified, he huddled on the ground, hands over his head.
“Sebastian Shaw is a powerful mutant,” Dan gripped the soldier by the front of his fatigues and tossed him toward the horizon. “I wonder if his ability can absorb a full power attack of mine…”