One Month Later
Callum King sat on the edge of his bed, with dirty clothes strewn all over the one-room apartment. In his right hand he held a picture that portrayed him in a tuxedo next to a raven-haired woman in a wedding dress. His left hand clutched a bottle of Jack Daniel’s. Light sobs wracked his body, his vision blurred by tears. He reached a hand towards his eyes, pushing up his glasses as he wiped the tears, then followed by taking a long drink from the bottle.
He’d been out of regular work for over a year, growing increasingly frustrated. And his wife had left him as a result. Now he was living in this shoebox of an apartment. Callum crumpled the photograph and threw it into the corner. He raised the bottle to his mouth again, tilting his head back until the bottle was completely upside-down, the whiskey burning a path down his throat. When the bottle was empty, he loosened his grip and let it fall into a pile of shirts and boxers.
Callum stood and walked over to the dresser. He thought something must be wrong with the whiskey, because he didn’t feel like he’d just finished an entire bottle. But it didn’t matter. Nothing did. Without Lily, he didn’t have the strength to put up with the terrible job market anymore.
He opened his sock drawer and pulled out a small box. Setting it on top, he raised the lid, revealing a small revolver with a few bullets. Callum opened the chamber and loaded each of the rounds, then sat back down on the bed. He took a deep breath—what he hoped was his last—and put the barrel in his mouth, pulling the trigger.
There was a loud blam and the smell of smoke lingered in the air.
But Callum wasn’t dead. He wasn’t even injured. And no one was more surprised by that fact than he. There was also something rattling in his mouth, like something stuck. He worked his jaw around and knocked loose whatever was in there and spat it into his hand.
The bullet fell into his palm, completely flattened.
Callum held the crushed piece of metal between his thumb and forefinger, holding it up and turning it around slowly. As he stared at the mangled bullet, he noticed something strange—it was starting to get hot. He could feel the temperature of it rising, but the reason behind it eluded him, and he felt absolutely no pain. But then he saw his hand. Or more accurately, saw it glowing like a hot coal.
He dropped the bullet and stood, shaking his head. He was seeing things. Too much whiskey. Yeah, that was it. Must be a lot more drunk than he realized if he’d begun hallucinating. Could alcohol even cause hallucinations?
Callum walked slowly to the bathroom. He was about to turn the faucet with his left hand, the same one he’d seen glowing, but decided against it and used the right. He placed both hands under the running water and once the liquid hit, steam erupted forth, fogging his glasses. Callum pulled back and grabbed the glasses from his face, tossing them to the ground. They hit the toilet bowl and fell in the water, crumpled.
He reached out his hand and carefully wiped the fog from the mirror. Callum stared into his own face, and he could feel anger boiling up inside him. Without realizing what he was doing, he had his hand balled into a fist, and next thing he knew, his fist went through the mirror and into the medicine cabinet. Glass shards fell across the sink and Callum gingerly brought his hand back to his face.
Not a scratch.
It wasn’t a hallucination, he was beginning to realize that now. What he was dealing with was something a whole lot more. Something inside him had changed.
He went back into his room and sat on the bed. What was happening to him? Callum turned on the TV and started flipping through the channels. One of the stations was showing The Sentinels, a movie about superheroes. As he watched the characters on the screen, he began to come to a realization.
He was now one of them.
When she left, Lily called him a loser. Well, could a loser do the things he was now capable of?
He’d show her. He’d show her she was wrong to leave him. He’d show his former boss who laid him off at the firm. He’d show his father, who told him he’d never amount to anything. He’d show that stupid shrink who told him he had dependency issues. Yes, that’s it, he’d show them all.
And they’d all realize how wrong they were, they’d beg him to let them back into his life. He would get Lily back, one way or another. After all, how could she resist him after she saw what he could do?
Callum knew what he had to do. He had to become like the heroes in The Sentinels. Then Lily would come running back. She wouldn’t resist him. There was no way that little weasel she was with now could ever measure up to him. She couldn’t resist a hero. How could anyone?
It was the perfect plan. Now all he needed was to put it into action.
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Erin entered the monitor room, clad in a University of Wisconsin hooded sweatshirt. She found it difficult to sleep and decided to explore Atlas. Most of the base was dark, aside from dim emergency lights illuminating the corridors, stairwells, and elevator. But that was all a far cry from the monitor room, with the glow of the various screens bathing the room in their radiance. Zenith stood in the center of the monitor room, just taking in the images that flashed over the screens. There were a dozen of them or so. For Erin, the sound from all the different newscasts just faded into white noise.
“Good evening, Ms. Hastings,” said the robot, without even looking at her. “I take it you’ve had some difficulty sleeping?”
Erin was surprised that he knew it was her before he even saw her. She instinctively tugged her hood over her bald, pale green head. Even when faced with something that didn’t care about human appearances, she still wanted to hide what these powers had turned her into.
“What are you doing?” she asked.
“I’m monitoring news feeds from around the world. Colonel Thorne believes that, with all the specials emerging, some may not choose to hide their powers. Or some may not be able to control them. If we can locate potential problems and intervene before they become a crisis, we have the potential to save many lives.”
Erin walked deeper into the monitor room, approaching the screens. The images on them constantly changed from one news channel to another, broadcast in a variety of different languages. She could barely get a glimpse of them, and she had no idea how Zenith was able to monitor so many in such a short amount of time and still comprehend all the necessary information from them.
“So that’s why you were built?” she asked, turning to face him. “To be Big Brother for all of us?”
Zenith directed his watchful gaze from the screens to look at Erin. The LED lights that served as his eyes showed no emotion, and his head was void of any other facial features. “I apologize, Ms. Hastings. Have I offended you in some way?”
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“No, it’s not that, it’s just—” Erin huffed, crossing her arms and looking away. “I guess I’m just a little…uncomfortable with the idea of spying on people.”
“As am I,” said Zenith. “Which is why I am not spying, but rather focusing on the events. I am not monitoring phone calls or emails, but rather media reports.”
“And you’re sure that will work?”
“Perhaps, perhaps not,” said Zenith. “It is almost three in the morning. Why are you awake?”
“Couldn’t sleep.” Erin rubbed her arms through the sleeves of her sweatshirt as she looked around the monitor room. “This whole place, it just feels so…so surreal. I mean until recently, the biggest thing I had to worry about was failing biology. But now, I’m living in an underground missile silo with a bunch of people who have superpowers and a robot.”
“Personally, I prefer the term Artificial American.”
Erin looked at him with surprise. “Oh, really? Is…is that what you call yourself?”
“No, I was making a joke.”
Erin’s stare of disbelief lingered on him for a moment, unsure of whether or not it was the truth or sarcasm, but then she felt her lips twisting into a smirk.
“Your discomfort is understandable, Ms. Hastings.”
“Call me Erin. Every time you say, ‘Ms. Hastings,’ I keep thinking my mom is standing behind me.”
“As you wish, Erin.” Zenith turned his focus back to the monitors.
“How can you do that?” she asked. “Pay attention to all that information flying around?”
“I am capable of processing data on a level far above that of even the most sophisticated computer.”
“But…how?”
“Through the constant upgrades I have installed. I am always trying to improve my systems.” Zenith went quiet after that and Erin followed suit. But it was only a few moments before he chose to break the silence. “Forgive me for asking, but from what I understand of your unique physiology, your body is quite immune to changes in temperature.”
“Huh?” she asked, and in her head, she took apart the vocabulary he used to try and decipher his meaning. “Oh! You mean how I don’t really get cold?”
Zenith nodded. “Precisely. So why are you wearing that sweatshirt?”
“Might feel a bit stupid to someone like you, but…” Her voice trailed off.
“You do not like your appearance?”
Erin shook her head. “I know you probably think it’s some shallow thing, but it’s not that I hate how I look. It’s more…I just don’t recognize this.” She motioned to her face. “When I look in the mirror, I don’t see me, I see a stranger.” Her facial features shifted, her skin tone became the shade of beige she knew, and blond hair emerged from her head. “This is who I am, but if I want to look like me, I have to concentrate. And if I lose my focus…” She shifted again, reverting to the pale green skin and the hair receded into her skull. “I become this.”
“And that is why you have trouble sleeping.” It wasn’t a question, but a statement.
Erin shrugged her shoulders. “Maybe.”
Zenith looked at the screens and his eyes flashed quickly. Every monitor shut off at once, and the lights in the room came on. He turned his entire body to face Erin. “You may find this difficult to believe, but I can understand what you are going through. My earliest memory was waking in this body, but when that happened, I felt a sense of discomfort.”
Erin widened her eyes. “What do you mean?”
Zenith looked down at his metallic hand, flexing the digits one by one, tiny servos whirring as he did. “I cannot truly explain it, but I have the sense that I had an existence prior to this one.”
Erin wrapped her arms around her body. “So what did you do about it?”
Zenith lowered his hand and looked up at her. If he possessed anything resembling a mouth, Erin got the sense he would have been smiling at her. “I learned to adapt to the new circumstances. I found a new path for myself.”
“So now it’s my turn to do the same.”
“And mine as well. We must now both learn to adapt.”
She grinned a little. “Yeah, guess so.”
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The navy blue and white suit clung tightly to his body. Callum had to max out his last credit card to pay for it, but this would be worth it. Soon, people would be banging down his door with wheelbarrows full of cash for the rights to his story.
He stepped out onto the roof of his building, looking out over the Chicago skyline. Night had fallen and soon, he’d find something to do with his powers. Crime was never far away in this city, and all he had to do was wait. The wind caught the white cape, billowing it slightly behind him.
Sirens cut through the sounds of traffic and Callum smiled. This was it. He stepped up to the ledge of the roof. As he looked down the six stories to the traffic below, he started to have second thoughts. He’d spent the two weeks waiting for the costume practicing with his abilities, trying to hone them. He didn’t have much room to practice his flying in the small apartment, but he did manage to lift himself off the ground. It was pretty simple, but now he found himself worried that it wouldn’t carry him at this height.
Callum took a deep breath and crouched. He pushed his weight down on his legs, and then sprang up, the powerful muscles shooting him into the sky. As he reached the apex of the jump and began his descent, he shut his eyes, whispering to himself: “Please work…please work…please work…”
He felt himself stop and he cautiously opened just a single eye. He was far above his building, but the ground wasn’t growing any closer. He just hung there, as if suspended by invisible wires.
Callum started to laugh and pushed off, flying through the sky, the air blowing his hair back. He concentrated on the sound of the sirens and flew towards them. High over the street, he saw a few squad cars racing through the city, other vehicles pulling over to let them pass. Callum allowed them to go faster than him and he followed from above, being careful to notice the turns they made.
As they approached the destination, Callum could hear the sounds of gunfire growing closer. The cars pulled to a stop in front of a dilapidated tenement building, where a few others were waiting. Police barricades were set up, and officers were standing behind their cars for cover. From inside the tenement, there was the occasional muzzle-flash through the windows, and the cops ducked to avoid the bullets.
He descended, landing in an open area between the makeshift barricade formed by the squad cars and the cracked concrete walkway leading up to the building. Several windows were barred and the building had definitely seen better days.
“What the hell are you doing, you freak?” screamed one of the officers.
Callum ignored him, instead focusing on the mission. The muzzle of an assault rifle came from between the bars on one window and the triggerman opened fire. Callum instinctively raised his hands in defense and looked away, but the bullets simply flattened against his skin—his costume was another story, however.
He jumped for the window and caught hold of the bars. Gripping them in both hands, he placed his feet on the wall for leverage and pulled. They gave way, cracking through wood and brick as they did. He tossed the bars onto the brown grass, taking much of the window with it.
Inside the small apartment, he saw the targets. A few young men dressed in gang colors. They couldn’t have been more than seventeen or eighteen, and they looked liable to wet themselves at the sight of this man powerful enough to tear through their home.
The apartment itself was nothing to scream about—broken, stained furniture, dirty walls, drug paraphernalia and empty bottles and cans as well as crumbled bags from fast food restaurants. Plus weapons and some stacks of money.
The boys were still staring at him, their dark eyes large with fear. One of them finally got the courage to speak up, although even that amount of courage proved to be at a low level.
“Wh-wh-what the hell are you, m-man?”
Callum smirked and folded his arms across his chest. “What does it look like, punk?”
“Hell with this fool an’ his damn tights!” screamed the second. He raised the rifle and opened fire. Callum remained stoic this time and just stood as the bullets once more flattened against him.
He calmly stepped towards the youths and the gunman’s friends joined the firefight. But Callum continued to walk slowly up to them and he reached out and gripped the barrel of the closest gun, then bent it downwards.
Callum lunged for the second gun, ripping it from the boy’s hands and snapping it in two over his knee. The third gunman pulled his trigger again, but only the sound of clicks emerged. He tossed the weapon at Callum and broke into a run for the front door, his friends following. With a sigh, Callum turned to the hole he made and walked towards it. Looking down, he saw the three young men running for the police barricade, their hands raised high in the air.
“DON’T SHOOT, JUST KEEP THAT FREAK AWAY FROM ME!”
The officers stared at the hole in the wall, still a bit in shock from the way this mysterious costumed stranger tore it free. He stepped out from the hole and stood on nothing but air, then his body slowly lowered down to the street where he had the opportunity to meet with the officers and the young men he’d just disarmed.
Callum jerked his thumb up, pointing at the hole. “There’s a lot up in that room you boys might find interesting.”
A few officers quickly cuffed the gang members, while others ran into the building. One of them just stared at Callum’s face.
“Who are you? What are you?”
Callum just smiled. “Call me Exemplar. And I’m here to help.”
With that, he jumped into the air, soaring off into the night sky. And for the first time in what seemed like forever, Callum King was filled with purpose.