Courageous Read online

  I looked at the visitor’s log and saw the last entry was listed as “Fuck You,” entered about thirty-five minutes ago. There was no sign of the guard, and no blood anywhere I could see.

  “Gears, how do we get to the main cloning chamber?” Back in Courage Point, Gears’s maps had shown us that while there were a handful of cloning pod chambers, only one of them had enough power and equipment to support the creation of an augmented humanoid like the one commissioned to kill me.

  “Go through the first door, then take the first right,” Gears said. I did as told, raising my wide-angle laser blaster to my shoulder as I moved. Hey, Megan wasn’t the only one who could pack high-tech firearms. And given that I was a lousy shot, a weapon that sent out a beam of concussive force in a ten-foot cone seemed like a good choice.

  The door leading into the facility stood slightly ajar, and turning right down the first corridor showed me a large door, the kind you’d see on a bank vault, sitting wide open. Green light poured from the doorway, and I could see shadows moving further in. I signaled for everyone to stay sharp, and then we burst into the room, our weapons covering every possible angle.

  “It’s over Treggen,” I called out. “This ends now!”

  “Why, Vincent Corinthos,” Treggen’s voice came from my left.

  “What a pleasure it is to see you.” Treggen’s voice again, this time from my right.

  “I certainly hadn’t expected to run into you so soon, but let’s make the most of our time together.” His voice was coming from everywhere at once. Damn, the acoustics in here were screwed up. It really sounded like there were a dozen of Treggen all talking at once.

  My blood went cold. We were standing in a cloning facility, and Treggen had often employed clones of himself. As if the universe were delivering the punch line of an extremely sick joke, a dozen Treggens stepped into view. “I do believe this will be an enjoyable exercise,” they all said in unison. “Let us begin.”

  Chapter 16

  “You know what?” I said, lowering my gun. “No.” I snapped Open portals beneath each of the clones, putting the exits hundreds of feet up in the Boston sky. In a few seconds, it would be raining Treggens, and while it would be messy, the forecast after that would be sunny and bright. But as the clones made contact with my extradimensional energy, the portals burst like soap bubbles, and the Treggens merely stumbled before pointing and winking at me.

  I got a good look at their tattoos in the dim light. Each clone had the sun tat on his neck, but each one also sported anti-extradimensional runes on the backs of their hands. Son of a bitch…

  “So much for the easy way,” I muttered and raised my rifle. So, we had twelve cloned assholes to deal with, but where was the original? I had a sinking feeling we’d find out soon enough. “Light ’em up!” I called to my companions.

  Not that they needed the encouragement. Megan had already shot forward, her vampiric speed turning her into a blur of claws. She had a new and fully charged pocket cannon, but was choosing to get up close and personal. The Treggen clone she was fighting, despite the fact that it would be undoubtedly augmented with enchantments and possibly even bionics, didn’t stand a chance. Blood and gore splattered the walls around her, and within seconds, it looked like someone had run through a Veg-O-Matic. A grim smile of satisfaction on her face, Megan then drew her pocket cannon and began firing.

  Herb was right at Megan’s side, shotgun at his shoulder. From the look on his face, anything that tried to sneak up on Megan was going to meet a very swift, loud, and bloody end. His eyes had gone orange, telling me that he was also looking for spirits to aid us.

  Blaster pistols bloomed from Billy’s wrists as Gears took aim and fired. The Treggens he was fighting dodged and ducked, somehow staying a hair’s breadth ahead of the shots. There was a chunk sound, like something shifting inside the mech, and the blasters retracted. Gears called, “Down, forward, low punch!” and a blast of ice shot forward, freezing three Treggens solid. Billy slid over, as if on ice skates, and delivered one uppercut after another, shattering his opponents into fragments of ice. “Sub Zero wins,” he called out with glee.

  Petra was punching Treggens, and while Petra’s super strong to begin with, the infragillium knuckles she was using turned her blows into torpedoes. Jab, jab, right cross, and the face of the Treggen she’d been sparring with turned to paste. I was about to call out how awesome that was, when one of the Treggens tackled me from behind and kicked my gun away as I fell. I snarled and snapped out my switchblade. The Treggen had already retreated a few feet by the time I’d gotten back up. He waggled his fingers at me and called out, “Oh, Corinthos, this is such fun, but there’s someone else here who’s just dying to meet you.”

  With all the fanfare of Vanna White revealing a crucial letter on Wheel of Fortune, the Treggen clone pulled open a door I hadn’t noticed before. The man in the doorway squinted into the dim light of the room. He wore a tight white T-shirt, cowboy boots, and a pair of blue jeans that were so new they were practically purple. His dark hair was cut close, his body was covered in corded muscle, and his eyes had the look of someone who knew how to handle himself in a fight.

  I stared at him, dumbfounded. “The Mentem,” I breathed. Back when La Place’s demon had corrupted the timestream, the Tempus had thrown me into a pocket dimension that was outside time. In a desert environment, devoid of any other life, I’d found the Mentem, a being that possessed the same level of psychic powers I’d had back when the Urisk worshipped me. Back then, the Tempus had used the Mentem to kill anyone with psychic powers who’d been trying to muck with time, and I was to be his next victim. I’d barely survived that fight, but during it, my Glimpse had triggered, showing me an event from the Mentem’s past, which coincidentally happened to be in my future.

  An event which was happening now. I thought back to that Glimpse. I’d seen an older me, with gray at the temples, wearing a black suede jacket and holding a glowing switchblade. Well, my hair had gone gray at the temples, I was holding my glowing Olympian-steel switchblade, and I was wearing a black suede jacket. So, we’d come full circle. Now, the question was, how much power did the Mentem have? And how well did he know how to use it? And was there any chance that I could talk my way out of this?

  “I don’t know what they’ve told you,” I said to the Mentem, “but it’s not true. You’re being used.”

  “They said you’d say that,” the Mentem said, a hint of a drawl in his voice. “They said you talked a lot, and that your lies had killed hundreds of people. They made me to stop you. They made me to save the world from your evil.” He gave a wicked grin. “They even made me immune to any mind tricks you might play with me.”

  “Mind tricks? What’d they tell you, that I was some kind of Sith Lord?” Even when I’d had my Urisk-based gifts, I couldn’t do mind tricks on humans. I could compel non-human entities, sure…. And then it hit me that the Mentem wasn’t a human entity. When I’d killed him, his body had devolved into some sort of gray-skinned monstrosity with tusks and a snout. So yes, if I still had my old powers, maybe I could’ve compelled him. “Listen, you don’t have to do this. Treggen is using you as a distraction, trying to keep me from stopping him. Right now, all of time and history are in danger.”

  “All of time and history?” several of the Treggens said at once. “Listen to yourself, Corinthos. That’s simply preposterous. You see, Mentem? This is what we meant.”

  The Mentem nodded gravely as he stared at me. “There you go with the talking already,” the Mentem said, shaking his head. “Well, son, that’s just not going to fly. I know what you are. You’re a monster who’s affected with delusions of grandeur.”

  “Seriously? Dude, you need to think for yourself. I—” And then it occurred to me that the Mentem was specifically designed to kill me, which meant he’d undoubtedly been mentally conditioned to see me as an enem
y no matter what. I wouldn’t be able to convince him otherwise. This was a preordained fight, and I knew it.

  He threw out his arm, and a wave of telekinetic force slammed me into the wall. If not for the enchantments on my jacket, my ribs would’ve shattered. As it was, it had knocked the wind out of me, and I didn’t so much dodge as I flopped out of the way of the fireball he sent toward me.

  Think, dammit, think.

  When I’d fought the Mentem in that desert, he’d implied that he’d seen me use psychic powers; he’d even taunted me that I didn’t know how to use them effectively. Had that been because in his timeline, the Urisk had still worshipped me? When Commander Courageous had fractured time, had he inadvertently shifted when I was supposed to first fight the Mentem? Okay, great question, but maybe I should focus on more pressing matters first. Like, how the hell was I going to beat him?

  As a fireball sailed toward me, I conjured a portal and redirected it so it came out and exploded into the back of one of the Treggens. The Mentem was a psychic powerhouse, and the more I could turn his power against Treggen, the sooner this could end. The Mentem lifted me with telekinesis and hurled me at another wall. This time, I Opened a portal just before I impacted, placed the exit behind him, and tackled him to the ground. The air left his lungs with a whuff, and it gave me a chance to take stock of the situation.

  The others were holding their own with the Treggens; the lower half of Megan’s face was covered in blood, and her grin was practically feral. Petra was grabbing Treggens by the collar and bodily hurling them down the hall; and Gearstripper was making use of the additional Mortal Kombat characters I’d included in the new Billy. Right now, he was using some of Shang Tsung’s moves to immolate Treggens with flaming skulls. So far, so good.

  And then I was sailing backward again, telekinetic pressure against my chest. The Treggens and the Mentem traded dance partners, and I found myself surrounded by a group of assholes while the psychic assassin turned his attention on my friends.

  Gears went down first, the telekinetic force unable to break the infragillium exoskeleton, but bending it so Billy couldn’t walk anymore. A pulse of fire hit Megan square in the face, the air filling with the scent of burning hair and undead flesh. Herb howled in rage, and his shotgun roared hellfire as he unloaded round after round at the Mentem, but the synthetic psychic merely casually waved a hand in Herb’s direction, and the shot bounced off a telekinetic shield.

  The Mentem threw his arms forward at Petra, who crossed her arms in front of her and leaned forward, trying to resist a telekinetic wave of her own; but if the Mentem could bend infragillium, he just might be able to crack Petra.

  Not going to happen. My friends could handle the Treggen clones. I needed to take the Mentem out of the equation. I needed to get us someplace out of the way, someplace where there would be little in the environment for him to use to his advantage, and most importantly, someplace where he wouldn’t be able to hurt my friends.

  Someplace, for instance, like a desert in a pocket dimension outside of time.

  I created a portal to the desert and dropped him through. For all his planning, Treggen hadn’t put an anti-extradimensional ward on the Mentem. I created a second portal and came out in the desert as well. I could’ve used the Anisa Amulet’s powers to fly, to menacingly shout down at him, but the Mentem hadn’t mentioned me flying when we’d spoken during the bit with La Place’s demon. And since he hadn’t asked why I wasn’t doing it back then, it meant he’d never seen me do it, which meant I couldn’t do it now. I had to be mindful of everything I did now to ensure I didn’t somehow screw up that event from my past, which also happened to be from the Mentem’s future.

  Have I mentioned how much I hate dealing with time travel?

  I’d wanted to just drop the Mentem off in that desert, seal him away, and be done with it, but I didn’t know for sure if the place was completely uninhabited. For all I knew, there were people living there that the Mentem had killed before I’d stumbled across him. I didn’t want the death of more innocents on my conscience, so I had to check.

  The desert was as barren as I remembered it; nothing but sand dunes for as far as I could see. The air was so dry that it almost hurt to breathe, and the sun beating down on me might as well have been a billion degrees. I shielded my eyes against the glare coming off the sand. There was no vegetation, no insects or animals, just miles and miles of sand dunes. In short, the place was a complete and utter wasteland.

  Satisfied this place was uninhabited, I Opened a portal and prepared to rejoin my friends back in the Undercity.

  And then something latched around my stomach and jerked me back. The Mentem had gotten me with a telekinetic lasso and was now tightening it. My portal vanished as I frantically tried to break free. But the only thing that could break telekinetic bands like these was equal and opposite telekinetic force, which I hadn’t had for a while now. The enchantments on my jacket were protecting me from being crushed like a corn chip, but they weren’t going to last forever.

  Think, dammit, think.

  Maybe if I dropped straight down through a portal, I could snap it shut really fast and sever the Mentem’s hold on me. The extradimensional energy shimmered Open, and my feet slammed against a wall, or perhaps I should say a floor, of force. The Mentem was a quick study. That got my adrenaline going even faster. When we’d fought last, he’d told me I was stupid because I’d never used telekinetic force to crush the hearts of my enemies from thirty feet away. It seemed this newly minted Mentem hadn’t gotten that particular brainstorm just yet, and I wanted to be the hell out of here by the time he did.

  My jacket constricted, and it was suddenly hard to take a deep breath. The enchantments on the jacket were failing. No, no, dammit, he couldn’t kill me now. He hadn’t killed me now. I either beat him or I got away. Otherwise, he’d have reacted differently when I fought him before. Okay, think, how do you defeat someone like this? My brain kept going back to telekinesis and the Urisk. I desperately wanted my old powers back, more than anything I’d ever wanted in my life. My heart rate accelerated as the telekinetic bands surrounding me constricted further. Sweat popped out on my brow. Desperation was creeping in, my vision narrowing. There had to be a way, what was it? I needed time.

  Time.

  I tried to slow time down, to give myself a chance to get my terror under control, but as the tachyon surged around me, something from the Anisa Amulet did, too. It was warm against my skin—

  And for the first time in what seemed like forever, I heard the Urisk praying to me.

  My pulse quickened, not out of terror this time, but out of sheer, desperate hope. I pulled on those prayers, felt the energy swell inside me, felt telekinesis, pyrokinesis, telepathy and holy light fill my veins. If it were possible for my hair to turn yellow and a power aura to flare around me, I had no doubt I’d be looking like a full on Super Saiyan right now. It hadn’t been that long since I’d given up the Urisk as followers, but holding this power again was such a rush. I could fight the Mentem now. Fight him and win.

  I started to laugh, but then it hit me that the Urisk’s prayers were mournful, filled with pain and suffering. As I listened to them, I realized I’d somehow linked back to the time right after half of their city had been destroyed, just before I’d created the sentient city wall, Aegeon.

  I remembered that during that time, I’d worked like crazy to restore the city, to heal the land and the injured. And I remembered that had been the only time I’d ever felt weak and tired on the Bright Side. Back then, I’d chalked it up to a combination of both the exertion at what I’d done and the state my followers were in.

  Now I realized it was because there were two of me drawing energy from the same set of prayers. I gave a silent apology to the Vincent Corinthos that was currently trying to heal the Bright Side, gathered up a lance of telekinetic ene
rgy, and slammed it into the Mentem. He managed to block it, likely sensing the force in the same way I could, but it was enough to get him to release his hold on me.

  I decided to test what he’d said about Treggen making him immune to my “mind tricks.” I reached out with telepathy, trying to touch his mind, but it was like slamming into a brick wall. My ears rang as the psychic feedback reverberated in my skull. Huh. I wondered if this was what it felt like when a paranormal tried to compel me.

  Ditching the mental domination route, I shot out a quick volley of fireballs, pelting him from multiple directions at once. I shot a handful of them into the sky above him, deliberately missing him, then Opening portals in their flight paths and placing their exits right where I guessed he’d dodge. The desert sand turned to glass beneath him as he hit the ground, and cut him when the force of his landing shattered it.

  He threw out a barrage of fireballs which I deflected with a quick telekinetic shield. Man, I’d missed being able to do this. A childish part of me wanted to drag this fight out just so I could hold on to these powers just for a few minutes longer. But I pushed that aside, knowing I had to end this quickly. I was burning through someone else’s faith reserves right now, and if I took too much, then Past Me might not have enough power to do all the things I did back then. I summoned up a ring of fire around the Mentem, spinning it faster and faster, weaving in telekinesis to create a flaming sandstorm. As he tried to use his powers to counter mine, I Opened a portal behind his head and slammed a telekinetic blackjack onto his skull. He dropped to the ground, unconscious.

  I let out a breath and released the Urisk’s faith for the final time. Touching the Anisa Amulet, I gave a sad smile. Only telekinesis can stop telekinesis, and I’d been scared that I wouldn’t have weapons I could use. The amulet had done its job and given them to me.