Superfreaks/ACRA: Superfreaks #14

[Martin Phipps]

Michael King, Mary Jones and Frank Lopez: crime scene 
investigators.  John Phelps, Mark Johnston and Tom 
Jackson: police officers.  Jack Greenspan, Edward 
Bailey and Samuel Leonard: medical examiners.  Alan 
Russell and Leroy Laurel: lawyers.  These are the men
and women who are truly our last line of defense.  But
what about the capes whose cases they have to
investigate?  Should they be considered a help or a
hindrance? 

                   SUPERFREAKS #14

                        DEATH 

                        PART I 

7:35 pm

  Detective John Phelps sighed a big sigh.  "I want to
understand how your Geena Davis clone ended up dead in
your living room with a bullet hole in her head."
  "Right," Charles Baxter said, "it a long story."
  "Do I look like I'm going anywhere?"
  "No.  No.  Of course not."  He sighed.  "It's like
this, I thought she was a ghost.  Or a zombie.  I
mean, it didn't occur to me that they'd just send
another one."
  "Another one?"
  "Okay.  I'll start from the beginning.  I've always
been a big Geena Davis fan.  Anyway, my wife got me a
Geena Davis clone for my birthday."
  "You're kidding."
  "No.  Really.  We have an open relationship.  Even
so, my wife and I are both past our prime and we
thought she could cook and clean for us.  And do
laundry.  Stuff like that."
  "The clone was the maid?"
  "Exactly.  But then one day I sent the clone outside
to put out the garbage.  Going outside was never part
of her programming.  She got hit by a car."
  John Phelps took another look at the body lying in
the living room.  "That head wound doesn't look
consistent with a car accident."
  "Oh no no no," Charles said.  "That was the first
one."
  "The first one?"
  "Yeah.  See, I didn't realize it at first but seeing
as how our clone did get herself killed and accidental
death was part of our warranty then my wife must have
called Clones R Us and asked them to send a
replacement.
  "Thing is, my wife didn't tell me so when this new
one shows up my door so soon after the last one got
killed -and she's a brand new clone right off the
assembly line or whatever so she doesn't say much or
rather she didn't- and she's got this blank look on
her face and, well, I guess I've seen maybe one too
many zombie movies and I just freaked out and grabbed
my gun and started shooting, you know before she could
get me."
  "That's insane."
  "Fine.  I'll plead temporary insanity.  Or self
defense.  I really did think she was a zombie.  I
mean, I don't know, I really thought for a moment that
the first clone had come back to life."
  "Hold on," John said with a slight grimace.  "It
turns out that there's no law that says you can't kill
your own clone, seeing as how it is your property. 
Now, seeing as how you say your wife must have ordered
a replacement I suppose your wife could press
charges..."
  "Oh!" Charles said.  "I called her after I called
you.  After I called 911 I mean and they sent you
here.  She'll be home soon.  She just had some things
to finish up."
  "You told her what happened?"
  "Yeah.  She's pissed actually.  I mean the warranty
doesn't cover fatal shootings."
  "I don't imagine it does."
  Just then there was a rumbling sound and the whole
room started to shake.
  "What's this?" Phelps asked.  "An earthquake."
  "I guess so," Baxter said, "not that I've ever felt
that strong an eathquake."
  Phelps shrugged his shoulders.  "I don't even know
if there's a faultline near here."
  "There must be," Baxter reasoned.  "I mean, that
felt pretty strong so the epicentre can't be too far
away."
  "Guess so," Phelps said.  "So when do you figure
your wife will get here?"
  "Around eight or so."

8:10

  "Mrs. Baxter?  I'm Detective John Phelps from the
Pepperton Police Department."
  June Baxter nodded.  "I'm sorry about this,
officer."
  "Your husband says that this is the second Geena
Davis clone that they sent you.  Is that correct?"
  "Yes, that's right.  The first one died in an
accident.  She was hit by a car."
  "And you didn't tell your husband that you had
ordered a replacement?"
  "Not in so many words but... Jesus, Chuck, you knew
about the warranty!"
  "I know I know," Charles said sadly.
  "And what if it had been the real Geena Davis? 
Would you have killed her?"
  "I know."
  "You'd be going to jail for sure if you had killed
the real Geena Davis."
  John Phelps nodded.  "As it is," he said, "I'm going
to write this down as an accidental homocide."
  "Thank you!" Charles said.
  "Don't thank me," John insisted.  "Thank your wife. 
She could, conceivably have pressed charges.  I assume
you're not going to...?"
  "No," she said.
  "Because although it is my opinion that a real
living human being was killed today, the fact remains
that they could just make another one.  And, as you
said, the real Geena Davis is still alive and well." 
He grimaced.  "I would ask, however, that you be more
careful in the future.  Both of you.  It does cheapen
the value of human life to say 'Oops, she's dead. 
Let's get a new one.'"

9:01 pm

  John had just gotten home and turned on the TV.
  >>... what appears to have been a meteor that fell
from space hit the town of Saint Michael today killing
an estimated one thousand, three hundred people...<<
  John thought for a moment.  Saint Michael.  That's
just upstate.
  Apparently that wasn't an earthquake.

                        PART II

9:15 am

  Experts were sent in from all over the tri-state
area, experts from the FBI, FEMA, CIA, even the FAA
given their expertise regarding crash sites. 
Detective Michael King was sent in both because of his
military background and because they needed a forensic
expert to help identify victims, assuming their bodies
weren't completely vapourized by the heat of the
impact, of course.  Going in, nobody suspected that
this was anything other than a meteorite impact.
  "Who's in charge here?" he asked.
  "I am.  I'm Matthew Rosen from the FAA.  We tracked
the course of the meteor by radar before it hit the
ground and we were the first on the scene."
  "Fair enough," Michael said.  "Can I see the
epicentre?"
  "It's still a bit hot."
  "I'll take off my jacket then."

9:45 am

  "We believe the meteor struck right here."
  "What's with all the twisted metal?" Michael asked.
  "Presumably this is from one of the buildings in the
town," Matthew speculated.
  "But Saint Michael was a small town.  What buildings
were here that there would have been this much
wreakage?"
  "Perhaps some of the metal came from the meteor."
  Michael shook his head.  "This was all refined
metal.  It doesn't look like a meteor impact so much
as a crash site."
  Matthew smiled.  "It wasn't a plane crash.  No
planes are missing.  And besides, the object came from
space."
  Michael gave him a blank stare.  "That doesn't rule
out a crash."
  "What are you suggesting?" a woman at the site
asked.
  "Excuse me?" Michael asked.  "You are...?"
  "FBI Special Agent Lana Lewis.  I'm didn't eam to
evesdrop I was just wondering if you were suggesting
what I thought you were suggesting."
  Michael gestured at the area around him.  "Well just
take a look around.  If you didn't know that this was
supposed to be the site of a meteor impact then
wouldn't you think it was an airplane crash site?"
  "Which means?" both Matthew and Lana asked.
  "Do I have to spell it out?  My guess is that some
sort of spacecraft crashed here."
  "A spacecraft?" Lana asked.  "A UFO?"
  "Until it hit," Michael argued, "in which case it
stopped being an unidentified flying object and became
an unexplained hole in the ground."
  "We have an explanation," Matthew said.  "It was a
meteor."
  "If this was a UFO then where are the little green
men?" Lana asked.
  Michael sighed.  "Okay, look, you're both working
for the government, right?"
  "Yeah," Matthew and Lana both said.
  "So I'm sure either the CIA or homeland security or
the national security agency, somebody in the
government thought to take satelite pictures of the
damn thing as soon as it was in American airspace. 
I'd be disappointed, as a taxpayer, to believe
otherwise."
  "There are some CIA people on site," Matthew said. 
"I can ask them what they know."
  "Fine," Michael said.
  "This is crazy," Lana complained.
  Michael smiled.  "Except we're living in a world
where people fly, climb walls and have razor sharp
claws pop out of their forearms.  And that's just in
Pepperton."

11:21 pm

  "You wanted to speak with me?"
  "Depends," Michael said.  "Who are you?"
  "CIA Special Agent Gary O'Henry.  You wanted to look
at some satelite images."
  "Yeah.  Do you have any?"
  "Only the ones downloaded to my laptop."
  "Let's see them."
  Michael and Gary went over to a table that had been
set up at the site.  Gary set up his laptop and the
two of them sat down.
  "I swear we don't have clear pictures of the object
coming down because it was already getting dark.  But
we do have good pictures of the impact and the
aftermath.  These pictures here are in infrared."
  "What's this?" Michael asked, pointing to an object
on the screen.
  "It appears to be a piece of burning debrie."
  "Can you show me a series of satelite images in
succession starting from the time of impact and
separated about a minute apart?"
  "You want to see the impact as a stop action movie?"
  "Something like that."
  "Should only take a moment to set up.  Okay.  How's
this?"
  Michael watched as the images appeared on the screen
in front of him.  "Now, look, notice how that bit of
debrie is moving away from the crash site."
  "Must have been something blown away from the
impact."
  "But look: ten minutes after the impact and this
thing is still moving away from the crash site." 
Michael grimaced.  "Something emerged from that crater
and walked away."
  "Walked?"
  "This is something big.  It's too big for you and me
or anybody here.  But I know some people back in
Pepperton and this is a job... for them."  He took out
his cell phone and made the call.

                      PART III

12:50 pm

  "I appreciate you coming," Michael said.
  "From waht I was told, this is where I need to be
right now," Exreme said.
  Matthew, Lana and Gary gathered around: they'd never
seen Extreme in person before.
  "Is it okay if Extreme takes a look at the site?"
Michael asked.
  "Um... yeah... sure," Matthew said.

1:15 pm

  "You were right to call me here," Extreme said.
  "How so?" Michael asked.
  "This was not a meteorite."
  "What was it?"
  "It was a space ship.  From planet Neon."
  "Is that so?" Michael said, loud enough for Matthew
and Lana to hear him.
  "Which means that this plenet is in great danger."
  "How so?"
  "Because as far as I know the entire population of
Neon is dead, all save the one who destroyed them. 
The one named Zon."
  "Zon?" Michael asked.
  "General Zon.  He took over the army and was going
to use them to take over the entire planet.  When that
failed, he used his weapons to destroy the entire
planet.  Nothing survived.  So Zon moved on to find
other world's to conquer."
  "And this one is next!"
  "Zon!"
  It was Zon.  "You've never been tld not to speak of
the devil, hmm?  Oh don't look so surprised Earthers,
I've been studying your language and culture so I know
your manner of speaking, inckuding its idioms. 
Actually though, Extreme, I was looking for you and
these humans were kind enough to bring you to me."
  "I will stop you!" Extreme promised.
  "You will try."
  Extreme flew at Zon, planning to hit hit but Zon
deftly moved out of the way, causing Extreme to move
past him.
  "I have all of your powers and more, Extreme.  You
should join me.  Be my Lieutenant!  Together we will
quickly conquer this world!  There will be no need for
bloodshed!  Isn't that the best way to ensure that
your precious humans don't get hurt?"
  "I will never join you!" Extreme said.
  Zon sighed.  "Very well.  You made your choice." 
Beams shot out of Zon's eyes and struck Extreme and,
just like that, he was gone.
  "Oh my God!" Lana said.  "Extreme is dead!  He's
killed Extreme!"
  Zon flew down and smiled.  "Indeed, Extreme is no
more.  Now, humans," he said, "knell before Zon!"

                   TO BE CONTINUED!

Okay.

This is the shortest issue yet.  But a lot is going to
happen next issue so that's okay.  I finally got round
to doing an investigator-on-the-road story and I think
it turned out well.

You might be wondering "Why Geena Davis?"  I wondered
the same thing.  You see, two nights ago I dreamt that
my wife had gotten a Geena Davis clone for me.  I
didn't want the Geena Davis clone.  I wanted the Eva
Mendez clone.  Or both of them.  But my wife wanted us
to get a Geena Davis clone.  Fine.  And of course the
clone kept hitting on me but me, not realizing that I
was having a dream and that I could have had guilt
free dream sex, rejected her advances.  Then she got
killed.  I don't remember how, only that it was pretty
gruesome.  And when what I assumed to be the same
Geena Davis clone appeared later in the same dream I
freaked out and woke up.  My higher reasoning started
to kick in and I realized that it had to have been
another Geena Davis clone.  When I was fully awake, I
realized that it was all a dream anyway.  True story. 
If I have the dream again I'm going to want the Eva
Mendez clone.

And, oh yeah, Matthew Rosen.  At first, I was going to
call him James Rosen but then I realized that Jamie's
real name probably is James.  I just thought Rosen was
a good name for a government agent, just like Brenton
was a good name for a superheroine, Russell was a good
name for a lawyer, Enright was a good name for a
student and Willey...?  Well, I really was thinking
about Willy Lopez from Ghost.  Honest.  Any
similarities here with any real people living or dead
is purely coincidental.  Fictional characters, I've
ripped off, yes, but real people I don't play around
with.

Martin


 
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