She spoke to Caleb. “If what you’re saying is true and your brother has non-combat oriented powers, then he’ll be treated as a regular civilian.” She turned to look at Noah. “I’ll warn you though that I’ll be reporting this and if you are hiding powers that could be useful, you should probably come clean now, because they’re gonna investigate you after.”
Noah nodded his understanding.
But Caleb protested. “You can’t leave me, Noah! Please!” pleaded Caleb, clutching at his shirt like a lost child. “Please! Don’t leave me alone! I-I’m scared!” His stepbrother was building up to another mental breakdown, getting more and more anxious by the second.
Noah sighed and placed a hand on Caleb’s shoulder; it was sweaty and greasy to the touch. “Caleb calm down,” Noah said, trying to find a way to calm the manchild down “You are going to be fine. You won’t be alone. Miss Bright Knight here will be looking after you, won’t she?”
“That’s right.” said Bright Knight, impatient but smiling nonetheless. “You’ll be in good hands.”
Caleb was sniffling now, having calmed down a little. “B-but Noah. I don’t want you to go! I want you with me! I want you-”
Noah tried a different approach. Boy, was it hard to reason with someone as mentally stunted as Caleb! “Come on little bro, you are a hero now. Like in that show you watch, what’s the name…” Noah struggled to recall the annoying animated kid’s cartoon his step brother sometimes blasted at full volume in the living room tv.
Then, remembering, he snapped his fingers and grinned. “Yeah, just like in Doki Doki Hero Academia! You are a hero, just, like, you know, like, that character, uh… John Deku! And like a hero, you now have to save me and the city, Caleb! You need to be just like John Deku, Caleb! You need to go with her and save everyone, understand?!”
The pep talk was getting him all fired up. “Yeah! You are right!” he said, wiping his tears away and moving his hands excitedly in those weird movements of his. “I am a hero! I always knew I was destined to get powers! I am gonna beat Famine! I am gonna save mom and dad and-”
“That’s the spirit, kid.” interrupted Bright Knight, having reached the end of her patience. “Now let’s move out-” She turned to Noah “-But before that, you should give your brother the mask so his secret identity is not revealed.”
Noah complied and took off the mask and gave it to Caleb. He really hoped none of the bugs would sting him on his now protection-less face.
The fire escape stairs had been wrecked during the fight, so the three of them worked on removing the barricade on the room’s door. Once they cleared the obstruction, they made their way out of the house, not bothering to lock the door.
Out in the hallways there were more of the creatures and Bright Knight and the summon fought them.
Cadavers and gore lay scattered everywhere. Many of the dead, half devoured humans had been armed with weapons (most people in Jackson owned some kind of gun, his family being one of the few exceptions). Noah picked one of them up, an assault rifle he couldn’t identify. He made sure to grab some cartridges of ammunition from the corpse closest to the weapon.
He began fiddling with it as he walked, trying to see how it worked. Noah had a rough idea of how firearms worked from all the FPS shooters he had played on his VRisor, but he didn’t have formal training. Eventually, he found the button that ejected the magazine. It was empty, so Noah replaced it with a new one.
Just in case, he tried to fire a round and his ears rang from the noise.
“Fuck, that is loud!” said Bright Knight, rubbing her ears. “Don’t fire that again unless you have to. None of us have ear protection.”
Noah nodded. “Gotcha,” then, he asked, “So…how far is the nearest shelter?” He didn’t need to know, but it would give him some psychological comfort.
Bright Knight fiddled with her VRisor, silent for a few moments. “Says here it’s like two and a half miles. Now let's all be quiet. We need to keep an ear out for civies.”
As they went down the building, they found a few survivors, but most of them had been infected with parasites and/or viruses and/or were melting from the inside due to poison. They all begged and cried for help, to be saved. They clutched at Noah’s clothes for dear life, and Noah often had to push them away.
The practical thing to do would have been to kill the ones with obvious signs of injuries, since the parasites would mind control the survivors soon enough and the viruses would turn them into more of Famine’s creatures. But Bright Knight was a hero, so she allowed all the ones that could move and wouldn’t slow them down to come with them.
As the ever expanding and heavily armed group made its way through the city to the nearest shelter, a few of the injured began to attack the rest of the group and had to be put down.
Noah made sure to stick right next to his stepbrother and Bright Knight, his guard up and rifle ready. After some discussion everybody in the group decided to keep an area of personal space. Whenever someone got inside that area, they were gunned down without preamble. Noah had to shoot a couple infected that got inside his space.
It truly was a blessing that Caleb’s creature could operate mostly independent of its master, because all of the horrors had taken a visible toll on him and not even Noah’s previous peptalk or John fucking Deku could fix his deteriorating mental state. He looked ready to go catatonic and shut the outside world at any moment.
As the group traveled, distant explosions, fighter jets, and gunshots could be heard, an ever constant backdrop. Noah did his best to keep it together, but it wasn't easy. He was no hero, just some poor bastard with bad luck. All he wanted was to reach the shelter, rest, and forget all about the last few hours.
It felt like it took forever, but eventually they reached the shelter. Jackson was close to the edge of the barrier, but still far enough away that attacks were rare, so city planners and politicians built a conservative number of shelters. Of course, for them it was just numbers and budgets. They had bodyguards and private military security and would suffer none of the fallout, but for the little people like Noah a few miles more or less was the difference between life or death. Those two and a half miles had been the longest and most stressful miles of Noah’s life.
The moment the group reached the underground, heavily fortified shelter, the infected in the group hurried to get inside the shelter, crying and begging for medical attention. They had seen what would happen to them in due time and wanted to get their parasites surgically removed or receive a shot of antivirals as soon as possible.
Noah stayed behind to thank Bright Knight along with some of the other healthy ones in the group that had the same idea as him.
He waited until it was his turn in the line that had formed and stepped up to her.
She had dropped her light armor to shake hands with people. The costume she wore beneath that armor was very skimpy and risque. It looked like a golden monokini or slingshot with a white sun emblazoned over one of her breasts. The thing had many gaps and revealed a lot of sweaty and tantalizing olive colored skin. Her white and gold mask covered most of her face but her eyes were a striking amber, her lips a luscious red, and her hair a chocolate brown.
This story is posted elsewhere by the author. Help them out by reading the authentic version.
Noah had gathered all of this in a split second, doing that furtive, speed of light glance guys sometimes do trying not to get caught staring. The heroine thankfully didn’t seem to have noticed him checking her out…although it could be possible she was used to it and simply pretended not to notice.
“I can’t thank you enough for saving me,” said Noah, smiling amicably and extending his hand for a shake. “I don’t have much money, but I’d like to buy you lunch or dinner sometime. I promise to get whatever food you want.” Noah was a scumbag, but he wasn’t that far gone that he didn’t feel gratitude for his savior.
Bright Knight tried to put on a good smile, but it looked tired. Noah was but one of many to thank her today and it all got pretty repetitive and tedious after the nth person thanked her. “That’s really sweet, but I had help from your brother,” she said, shaking his hand back. “I’ll be kinda busy these days, what with all the damned bugs running around…” She grinned, this time more genuine. “But I have never said no to good, real meat. Just be warned that, like any other super, I eat a lot.”
Noah laughed. “Don’t worry about it. It’s the least I can do.” Real meat was crazy expensive, but it would be worth it to befriend a hero in case he ever needed one, and, maybe he could even ask her out…Noah had to admit that he was crushing hard on her. “So…should we exchange contacts?” he asked her.
“‘Course,” she answered, doing a few hand gestures and then pointing her finger at Noah’s VRisor. “There: sent.”
Noah saw the alert of a new contact request on his cracked HUD and accepted it. He smiled again. “Alright, I’m gonna go now. I’m sure you wanna get back to saving poor fools like me and I don’t wanna get in the way.”
She waved her hand and blew air through her lips, making them flap. “Pshhh, it’s nothing. That’s what I’m here for.” Then her expression turned mock serious. “But give me a five stars review on Rate Hero or I will find you, and I will steal one of your socks every time you do laundry until all you have are mismatching socks.”
The joke had caught him off guard and Noah laughed hard, crying with mirth and relief. Bright Knight found his laughter contagious and began laughing as well.
Once Noah had gotten his laughter under control, he promised he would, and then began making his way to the shelter.
However, when his stepbrother caught sight of him leaving, he took his leave from the people who had been thanking him for being a hero and began running after Noah.
Noah sighed and waited for Caleb to wobble up to him.
“Wait, Noah!” Caleb panted once he reached him, hands on his knees. “Please…you can’t. You can’t leave. I want you to stay with me.” Caleb begged, his eyes looking traumatized and full of fear. “I can’t do this alone! I can’t! You need to-”
Not this shit again! Noah had reached the end of his patience. “Just go! Stop being such a fucking coward and go! Leave me the fuck alone!”
Caleb started shrieking and stomping on the ground, throwing another tantrum. “No! You have powers too! It’s unfair! You need to come too!” His summon reacted to its master’s emotions and began approaching Noah menacingly. “You are going to come! I won’t let you leave!”
Enraged, Noah aimed his assault rifle at Caleb’s head, pressing the cold metal of the barrel to his step brother's forehead. “Make your creature back off or I swear to The God, I’ll blow your fucking brains out.” He was serious too. He really would kill his stepbrother in cold blood just like that. He was sick of Caleb, sick to the core. The only reason Noah hadn’t already killed his stepbrother and taken away his powers for himself was fear of the law: heroes were like cops and came after you hard if you killed one of their own. “I’m not going to die like a dog out there for one of your whims, Caleb. I’m going to go into that shelter and there’s nothing you can do about it.”
The titan stopped on its tracks, either due to an order or having sensed the threat to its master. Caleb looked at Noah with fear and indignation, as if he was a victim and Noah a bully, as if what he wanted was perfectly reasonable and Noah was the one who was mentally ill.
People were looking at them now, the situation drawing attention.
“Whoah, woah, what the hell’s going on here.” said Bright Knight, stepping in between them, moving the rifle away from Caleb with her hand.
Noah spoke first, speaking over Caleb. “I pointed my gun at him in self defense. I already told you that he is mentally ill. He tried to use his powers to force me to come with him. I just want to go inside the shelter and get some damned rest.”
She turned to Caleb. “Is that true?”
Caleb began crying those crocodile tears of his, and shrieking, and saying a bunch of unreasonable things. Noah didn’t stay to hear it. He left while Caleb was busy with the hero, making his way into the shelter, past the entrance and heavily armed guards.
Inside, they made him go past bio detectors, mind detectors, the whole shabang. Once they were certain he was clean and not in need of medical attention, they let him through but not before they confiscated his rifle, putting it into a plastic container brimming with weapons.
The place was funded by Bezos Enterprises as a charity. Their logo was plastered everywhere, on the walls, medical equipment, everything. They wanted them to know who to thank, as if saying ‘Hey, we saved your shitty life! Buy our products!’.
There were thousands of people in the shelter. It was packed to the brim.
Most were sitting down in neatly arranged rows, maximizing space. They slept like that too, laying against one another.
Noah moved around until he found a free space and sat down. He was exhausted and despite feeling uncomfortable about sleeping among strangers, he tried his best to get some rest. Nevertheless, sleeping on a hard floor and in a non-horizontal position with nothing to lay his head on was difficult.
“Hey,” said Noah to the man behind him, embarrassed. “Sorry, but could I please use your legs as support to lay down?”
His response? “No, fack outa’ ‘ere with that, you damn chink-faggot!”
The middle-aged, latin lady next to him took pity and let him lay his head on her shoulder.
Noah thanked her profusely.
Now with a more comfortable position, he was able to find sleep eventually.
---
The next day the heroes were still cleaning out the city and they were all asked to remain in the shelter until most of the monsters had been taken care of.
They were given cheap, mass produced food to satiate their hunger. It consisted mostly of algae, bugs, nuts, and a small portion of lab grown meat. Needless to say, it did not taste very good. But it was better than starving, so Noah ate it.
The bathrooms were limited and the line was endless to use one. People who couldn’t wait just left the shelter and did their business right by the entrance, pissing or shitting in the middle of the street. Noah was one of them and tried to keep an eye for bugs while he was draining bladder.
To pass the time, Noah used his VRisor. He noticed a message left by his dad on his social media account. It read: ‘Shanice and I are okay, son. We lost our VRisors during the attack, so we had to borrow someone else's to send you this message. I pray that you and Caleb are safe. If you see this message, please reply telling me where you are and if you are okay and write down your phone number so I can give you a call. I hope you are okay and pray every hour for your safety, Dad.”
Noah answered the message and his dad gave him a call from the borrowed device. They spoke about what had happened and he told them about Caleb, about what they went through. Eventually, they all decided to stay in the shelters until the situation had cleared up and it was safe to go out. They decided to meet back at their home once it was all over.
Another day passed and his battery ran out. He had to socialize and do other activities, such as playing cards to entertain himself. On the third day, the shelter ran out of food, but a military truck came by to drop off more. Two more days passed and the city was judged clean enough for people to go back home. Noah left the shelter, taking back his stolen rifle with him. Despite his dad’s views about weapons, there was no way in hell he was ever going to risk getting caught defenseless again.
Back at his home, Noah reunited with his family. They had been picked up by Caleb and his new superhero buddies, much to everyone’s surprise. As it turned out, his step brother had not only survived the whole affair (much to Noah’s displeasure), but had also been recruited into Bright Knight’s team.
The company she worked for apparently had an opening and thought it would be a good idea for their image to have more diversity. And who could be better than one such as Caleb: mentally challenged, plus sized, and black. Him having a strong and fairly idiot-proof power sealed the deal for them.
Shanice and his father had been reluctant at first when one of the recruiters brought them the offer. But, being a hero, the recruiter had told them, brought forth a lot of benefits. Unlike most of society that lived below the poverty line or barely scraped by, a hero got paid a good salary with almost all of them living a comfortable life. Moreover, a few of them gathered popularity through good PR and marketing and ended up making fortunes, becoming superstars.
But the thing that really convinced them was the fact that Caleb was now a living weapon. Their child, the recruiter said, could at any moment have an outburst and do something regrettable. And, considering Caleb’s psychological disabilities, there was a higher than average chance for this to happen. The company would provide the best legal assistance in such cases. The recruiter hammered down this particular point by using Noah’s incident with Caleb with the gun as an example.
Of course, Shanice and even his father were furious at him for pointing a gun at Caleb’s head and saying the hateful words he did. They yelled at him a lot for that while Caleb got a slap on the wrist for using his powers on Noah.
The first thing the family did once they finished arguing was use the materials that they had been provided by the city to barricade their home. They had covered the windows and sealed the toilet and other possible methods of entry for Famine’s creatures. The materials were acid resistant and had other technology meant to thwart the creatures’ methods of entry.
Some time later, when Noah went out with his father to the local distribution center to get some bottled water to shower and drink, since now they couldn’t use the sink and shower, he saw a disturbing sight. Many streets had stacks of belongings piled up along the pavements. Furniture, bundles of clothing, kitchen-ware. Some of it looked worse for wear, and had probably been recovered from ruined dwellings. Other piles looked to be more intact, the items carefully packed. People were moving out of the city. They had piled up their possessions while they tried to secure a way of transportation or waited for permission from the relevant authorities.
On the contrary, Noah’s family decided to stay and weather the storm. If they sold their farm now they would incur a very heavy loss. Property values had fallen quite a bit due to many rushing to sell and leave.
Most of the people who stayed in the city stayed because of this fact, because property or business tied them down. They would all wait for prices to go up and recover.