Chapter 17
Blackout“You want me to drive?” Annie asked suspiciously.
Alexander glared at her, incredulous that she’d chosen now to argue.
“Yes, Annie! Get over here and take the wheel!”
She narrowed her eyes. “But you hate my driving…”
“This is not the time!” he growled.
Lights and sirens screamed behind them. Half a dozen police hovercars pursued their stolen Lux Aero. They had taken too long to shake Iron Nadya. She was capable of leaping from rooftop to rooftop with bursts of raw strength, plummeting toward them like a missile every time they slowed.
With her edge in speed over a straight path, Alexander had been forced to turn down every other street, dodging her increasingly dangerous attempts to crush them into the road. Within minutes the police had caught up.
Annie clambered over him, letting him slip into the backseat.
Something crunched under his hands. He looked down to see the seat littered with crumbs and peanut shells.
“What? How did you make such a mess back here after using it once?” Alexander asked, exasperated.
“Dunno!” Annie replied cheerfully. She grabbed the wheel, sitting up straight so she could see over it while reaching the pedals. The car immediately began swerving through traffic under her chaotic touch.
Alexander ignored the motion, focusing instead on the police vehicles closing in behind them.
“Hey, uh, Alex…” Annie mumbled mid-turn. “My implant says I just leveled up my Density’s output, control… and some other stuff.”
“Hm? Explains how you sent that supe flying,” Alexander replied, distracted. “Mine did that earlier when I was dropping from the balconies.”
The car swerved as she glanced back at him. “You did what?”
“Had to get out somehow,” Alexander huffed. “Now focus. Head for the expressway tunnel.”
He reached out with his senses, tracing circuits and protocols inside each pursuing hovercar. Multitasking over this distance strained his mind, a trickle of blood running freely from his nose, but he pushed past it, sidestepping the countermeasures designed to block powers like his.
Initiate emergency engine shutdown. Override safety protocols.
The hovercars shuddered and dropped, metal screeching as they skidded across the road. Sparks flew as they spun out of control.
“Awesome!” Annie shouted. “Now you just need to do something about—”
She swerved violently. Alexander saw the road ripple as Iron Nadya smashed into it, missing them by meters and blasting asphalt into the air.
“—her,” Annie finished, eyes still on the road.
He’d been thinking about this ever since she started chasing them. Only one solution seemed possible.
“Annie, drive straight,” Alexander said firmly. She opened her mouth to argue, but he cut her off. “I’ll tell you when to swerve.”
He could see her disagreement, but she sped up hard into the straight. She was more focused now than he’d ever seen her..
Alexander pressed his face to the rear window, tracking the arc of the superhero overhead. Every attack she’d made so far was direct. She might be tough, but she wasn’t versatile. Bombardment was the only way she could keep pace with the hovercar.
He kept tugging at his weapons, aligning them with the plan in his head.
Iron Nadya fell toward them again. He swallowed hard, nerves spiking at the knowledge of what would happen if her aim landed true.
He waited. Timing would be everything.
“Now, Annie!”
She wrenched the steering wheel to the right. The luxury car groaned, but executed the maneuver precisely.
Iron Nadya struck the ground, knee and fist first, hand reaching for the vehicle. Fingertips scraped paint.
Then her head snapped toward a horn blaring—
A pursuing hovercar slammed into her, metal and carbon fiber crumpling as it carried her into a building. Dust, brick, and mortar exploded outward. He sent the second vehicle crashing into the building after her, just to be sure.
Annie turned down another street, heading straight for the tunnel.
Alexander’s last glimpse as they rounded the corner was of Iron Nadya, furious, bending and twisting steel as she stepped free of the wreckage.
As their hovercar shot into the expressway tunnel—cutting beneath the city’s central business district—Annie glanced sideways.
“Why here?” she asked. “They’ll have a blockade waiting at the other end.”
Alexander pulled himself back into the passenger seat. “I know. But a hovercopter was tailing us outside my range. The tunnel’s the only place to lose it.”
“Which means you’ve got a brilliant plan to get out of here, right?”
He wiped his bleeding nose with the back of his hand.
“Something like that. Pull into the emergency lane at the big bend coming up.”
He gave a serious look. “And no distracting me until we get there.”
To her credit, Annie only nodded and turned back to the road. She might not have known what he was up to, but she understood the stakes as well as he did.
Alexander leaned back, closed his eyes, and reached out.
The tunnel was alive with signals: hovercars, implants, cybernetics, overhead lights, cameras, sensors. His Technopathy stretched fifty meters with minimal ease by now, but walls reduced the range. This would be the first time since the prison cell that tried pushing beyond that limit.
Sixty meters. Seventy. Ninety. One hundred and twenty. Almost two hundred.
A buzzing vibration built inside his skull. Blood streamed from his nose again, dripping from his chin.
Focus.