CHAPTER 86: Malcontents
Adam and Abbey had finished their visit to one group of South Hampton survivors, and were moving to exit the elementary school so they could go to the next group. Right before Adam reached the door, he was stopped by one of the soldiers on guard duty with a “Warrior [12]” tag.
They always kept soldiers, police, or Sentinel members at every entrance of the buildings where newly brought in people were initialized. It was as much to protect the people outside as those inside. There was no telling if someone was a disguised invader or had their mind manipulated. Two soldiers were standard for each entrance, however in the case of the group from South Hampton they kept two inside and two outside, so four at each doorway.
Now that he was stopped, he realized that this soldier was alone.
“Sir! Sorry to bother you but we have a bit of a situation outside,” the man said while saluting.
Adam nodded to him and stepped through the doorway, prepared to act. On the other side were two more soldiers waiting. They seemed to be ready for action since both casually rested their hands on their swords. While there were handguns in belt holsters as well, it seemed like those who fought were becoming more accustomed to eschewing guns. Guns were mostly useless once you rose past level 10 and led to bad results in both hunting and when in combat.
A third soldier was standing to the side, trying to speak to an odd group of 20. Most of the group were males, with only one girl, who was a teenager and looked ready to cause some trouble. There were also two male teenagers, with the rest of the groups being middle aged men. Every one of them had some type of gun, from handguns to rifles, with several semiautomatic AR-15s.
If Adam had to describe them, they all looked unhealthy. Two of the men were skinny with wrinkled suits and unshaven faces. Most of the other men were outright fat. None but the teenagers looked like they spent much time making themselves presentable. There were also three signs being held by them. The picket signs looked like they had been hastily written on the cheapest materials by someone who couldn’t draw a straight line. They read, “Freedom or Death,” “Save our Country from Tyranny,” and “Stop Oppression, Restore Democracy.”
The sight stunned Adam for a moment, stopped in the doorway with Abbey behind him. It was the most biased and pathetic political protest he had ever seen. It had only been a few days since he had heard of these malcontents, and they were already forcing an encounter with him.
Upon coming into their view, they all snapped their attention onto him, no longer concerned with the soldier in their midst. Then the booing started. They yelled things at him, calling him a fascist and a strawman. They insulted him. There was even a “give peace a chance” thrown in that didn’t seem to fit.
Adam frowned at them, and immediately saw a few smirk at him as if somehow their disorganized and sloppy shouts had hit home. After coming from seeing those who had suffered at the hands of the invaders, these people were just outright stooges. He went to walk past them when one of their insults did catch his ear.
“What was that?” Adam demanded of one of the men in the wrinkled suits.
The man smiled smugly.
“I said get out of our town you alien supporter!”
His compatriots patted his back and cheered him on, smiles on their ugly faces.
“How am I an alien supporter?” Adam asked through clenched teeth. Even the simple accusation had triggered that voice and hate that had arrived in his soul when the soul corruption occurred. It was taking a lot of strength to suppress the urge for violence coming from his soul, but the strained look on his face just emboldened the men.
“That’s right! We knew it was true when we were told. All your strength is just so you can take over and enslave us for your invader masters. We aren’t buying it. We’ll fight you the whole way! The right way!”
“The right way?” Adam asked with confusion, even in the midst of his heat pounding through his body. “What’s the right way?”
Adam looked towards the soldiers and they just shrugged, clearly as confused as he was.
“With words and reason! The pen is mightier than a sword. We’ll fight with reason and just arguments, like our forefathers did when founding our great country,” the man pontificated.
“Didn’t they fight with muskets and sabers? I’m pretty sure no one swung a pen on a battlefield,” said Adam, losing his heat due to the absurdity.
“You can’t hide the truth! It’ll come out!” Someone else from the crowd shouted.
“Is that an X-files reference? I liked that show,” muttered an older soldier.
“Are those signs the truth that we can’t hide? The pen that will overthrow the aliens?” asked Adam.
“We’re workshopping the slogans right now. A good slogan can shake the world,” a man holding the picket sign explained hesitantly, looking a little embarrassed.
“We won’t be oppressed,” yelled one of the teens. “You can’t take everything for yourself and leave the people to suffer.”
“The people inside this building, the people that we were just helping, were tortured for months. They would have kept suffering if we hadn’t saved them. We’ve been taking care of everyone,” Adam said with an edge.
“That’s just a cover. You’re keeping all the good stuff for yourself,” accused the lead voice. “We deserve it every bit as much as anyone else.”
“I see. All our people spent time and money preparing, and now you want to leech off us without putting in effort. Simply because you deserve it.”
“The only reason you knew in advance is because you are one of them!” The girl shouted, smiling when she saw Adam’s reaction.
Adam frowned and went to step towards them. Being accused of working with the invaders was a trigger that he couldn’t ignore. His very soul burned with the fury.
Stolen novel; please report.
A soft hand touched Adam’s upper arm, where there was exposed skin. Adam turned around even knowing that his skin was practically on fire. Then a cooling heal flowed from that hand.
“Let’s just leave, Adam. These people don’t matter,” said Abbey gently. She pulled him down by the collar of his breastplate and gave him a light kiss on the lips. The gesture was enough to distract him and get control back.
“Yeah, you’re right. Let’s go to the next people who actually matter,” Adam said while knowing the river was still flowing inside. Then he turned and whispered to the soldier, “If these buffoons cause any problems feel free to shoot them.”
He took Abbey’s hand and they headed towards his motorcycle. That was when a gunshot sounded out immediately followed by a ping as the bullet ricocheted off his back armor. Adam turned to see a man who looked like he had been muscular more than 150 lbs ago.
“That didn’t feel like a pen,” he said between clenched teeth.
“Oh, didn’t like that, you wanna be tough guy. You alien loving freak. It’s just what you’ve earned,” the man snarled as Adam saw the barrel shift from himself to Abbey.
“No!” screamed the man in the suit. “That’s the leader’s daughter!”
The man started to pull the trigger, but never completed the small motion. Instead, his head exploded as Adam appeared right in front of him, hand crushing the barrel of the gun, heat wafting off him. Parts of the man’s head had splattered the people behind him, including the now terrified teenagers.
He didn’t intend to kill the man, but he also didn’t regret it. Pointing the gun at Abbey had been more than a mistake, even if being shot with it was unlikely to kill her. The act of carrying guns had been a mistake. Adam wouldn’t allow those intending to harm his people.
Adam roared, freezing the group. A group of level zeros. A group that had no tolerance for his pseudo-skill.
By the time they were able to move again, they were all on the ground with their guns crushed. The soldiers also hadn’t wasted time, with two rushing forward and the third using a radio to report the situation.
Zip ties were pulled out and the protesters were bound. They were watching Adam with horror.
“Let me explain this to you,” Adam said in a quiet voice staring down at the group. “I don’t care about your arguments or words. I don’t care what you think you deserve. I also don’t care if you think of me as a despot or a tyrant. It isn’t politics that I’m known for, it’s for swinging a hammer in a deadly way. The lives of parasites like you mean less than nothing to me.”
"Sir, reinforcements are on the way,” said the soldier on the radio.
***
Adam watched blankly as the reinforcements arrived. He had expected a few people to maybe arrest those he had subdued. Or someone knowledgeable with interrogation to ask some questions.
What arrived was an army. Trucks, motorcycles, and people running. There were a few hundred soldiers. Around 50 former policemen, led by Captain Sanchez got out of police cruisers. The Demo Men unit trucks with Lucas in the lead on his motorcycle headed everyone. Tom had brought along about one hundred people Adam recognized from the General’s Guards. Brandon, Nick, Elias, and Lamar were accompanied by Tom’s brother Phillip, his friend Jake, and quite a few of their college friends. The final surprise was when Lucas walked to the back of one pick-up truck and helped Elouise climb down.
Every single person looked at Adam, waiting. Adam stood there looking back. Abbey poked him in the side.
“Thanks for coming,” said Adam. “Isn’t this a bit overkill though?”
“We were told they shot at you,” said Lucas.
“They did…” Adam’s response trailed off.
“Which of these bastards was brazen enough to shoot at the boss?” asked Tom, while brandishing a sword at the zip tied malcontents.
Adam pointed to the headless body that was off to the side.
“Huh,” said Tom. “That seems about right. No one gets away with shooting at the boss.”
Tom sheathed his sword with emphasis, as if he had done the deed himself.
“And why did you come?” Adam asked Elouise.
“A bunch of armed and violent men rushing towards other humans in the city…someone needs to be the voice of wisdom,” she answered him.
Police Captain Sanchez coughed. “What now, Adam?”
“I think we should go meet with the leaders of their group and make sure something like this doesn’t happen again. We don’t want them causing problems or hurting people,” said Adam hesitantly.
“Throwing your weight around,” Tom said with vigor. “I like it, boss.”
“I do too,” said Mr. Fenton, Lucas’s dad. The rest of his unit, including Lucas nodded in agreement.
“Before the invasions I would council you not to,” said Sanchez, “however, as someone interested in survival and protecting people, I think it might be prudent to check on the situation.”
“Plus, we aren’t sure if they’re being manipulated by an invader. I want to check on that,” said Adam.
“They might just be garden variety idiots,” said Nick.
“Let’s hope that’s the case and that it doesn’t lead to violence,” said Elouise.
All the people began getting into their vehicles. Adam picked up the malcontent with the wrinkle suit, who now looked significantly more cowed.
“Do you have any problems with taking us to your leader?” Adam asked with his face up close to the previously pompous man.
The man was terrified and shoot his head. Adam handed him to Mr. Fenton in his pickup truck.
“Lead on,” Adam said.
***
The line of cars, trucks, motorcycles, police cruisers, and military transports followed Mr. Fenton as he drove through the city. He headed towards the outside of the more business-oriented area. Here there were large business buildings, corporate centers, higher class restaurants, hotels, medical centers, parking garages, and several high-class condo buildings.
“That’s where my dad’s double condo is,” Abbey told Adam from the back of his motorcycle as she pointed towards a distant high rise while holding onto him with the other arm. They were going slow enough that it was easy to hear each other.
“Isn’t that kind of far from our high school? I’m sure there are more schools closer to you. From what you’ve said about the man I’m surprised you didn’t go to private school,” said Adam.
“We hired a driver for me. I also spent most nights with Andrea and Alissa since dad wasn’t even around much. The reason he allowed it was that I made a deal with my dad,” she responded.
“What was the deal?” asked Adam.
Abbey sat in silence for a minute before answering. When she did, there was both embarrassment and pride.
“I promised not to burn all his suits. It would have been easy with how quickly his hair gel ignites. The suits would go up before the sprinklers could even come on. That and after high school graduation I would stop seeing the other girls.”
“Sounds like you know about the suits from experience,” Adam joked, only to be met with silence.
“Anyway, hold on. I think there’s a problem,” Adam said very seriously as he revved the bike and drove on the sidewalks to get to the head of the procession.
Adam had been frequently checking his soul map. He hadn’t found the trapped memory of that skill yet and wasn’t sure what it was really called. The way he used it was to sense the souls around him and their level of hostility. He could also influence the space between those souls and himself to manipulate them, though that was challenging and unpleasant.
The soul map didn’t show him where everyone was positioned or their exact direction and distance in relation to himself, but he did get a general sense of them. What he saw now was hundreds of souls, all extremely hostile and ready to attack.
When Mr. Fenton saw Adam coming with a concerned look on his face, he pulled to a stop, forcing everyone else in the line to also stop. By the time his window was rolled down Adam had reached him.
“Problem, General?” asked Mr. Fenton, with Lucas joining him on his own motorcycle.
“Definitely. If we continue down this road there’s a good chance we’ll be attacked from both sides. See those glass walls? There’s movement on floors 2 thru 5, and they’re angry enough to kill,” pointed out Adam.
“What should we do? How far should we take this?” asked Lucas.
Adam looked one more time at his soul map. He might have turned around and gone back to the base, knowing these idiots weren’t worth any injuries to his men, but some of the other souls he saw had given him pause. Further in, there were quite a few souls distorted and suffering in ways he had never seen before on his map. He wasn’t about to leave them to these men.
With one final glance at the lines behind him, Adam said loudly and to the terror of the captive leading them, “Prepare for a raid!”