The Post-Humans (Book 1): The League (25 page)

“YOU ARE NOTHING, but a nerd,” Kiranda said shaking her head, leaving Athan feeling a little hurt. “I love reading, but I’m not going to read your comics! They are little kid’s books for big kids!”

“No way! They are just as good as novels, they just have pictures as well.” Athan sniffed. “Kick arse pictures.”

“Yawn!” Kiranda laughed.

“That’s so harsh!”

“As if Nerd,” she teased.

Athan shook his head and smiled, it was impossible to argue with her.

The two of them sat in the yard of the warehouse that The League was using as their base. They had been at this location in Melbourne’s outskirts for the last six months while they had been trying to uproot a drug making and distributing operation that had been rampant in the city’s northern suburbs.

The last year or two had been really good for The League. They had remained anonymous and brought several drug and gun moving operations to justice, even taken down a gang leader and got him thrown into prison.

They had been discussing moving their operation to the nearby capital city of Adelaide for a period, just to show the criminals that they couldn’t hide, and it would also perhaps give them a few new members and maybe make a new branch to operate there as well.

Tonight The League was celebrating a success in their war on organized crime.

Athan sat back on the iron roof of the warehouse and looked at the stars. The night was clear and bright, with no clouds to be seen. It was like the stars were reflections of the lights in the city.

“It’s beautiful, isn’t it?” he whispered to Kiranda who rested back on her elbows beside him.

“Yep. Very,” She said quietly before having another sip of her beer.

“It makes me feel kind of proud of what we can do, you know, when we sit back knowing that people are able to try and live normal lives because of us.”

“It does make me happy, but it makes me sad too.” She whispered.

Athan rolled onto his side so he could see her better in the moonlight. She looked at him with eyes that were glittering with gathering tears.

“It just reminds me of what I had, or what we all don’t have. You know what I mean?”

“Like a normal life?” Athan nodded.

“Yeah, I guess so. It’s been hard, Athan. You guys mostly have your parents around, even if you don’t see them much. Cynthia gets it, but she deals with it ‘cause she has no soul.”

Athan chuckled. “Don’t let her hear you say that!”

“She was the one that said it!” Kiranda said smiling.

“She’s crazy!”

“I know, but I’m not.” Kiranda took a deep breath. “I miss my family everyday, and sometimes I wonder if it was worth them dying so I could help some people that cant say ‘thank you’.”

Athan looked at the glittering buildings in the distance, the brightly lit skyscrapers in the centre of Melbourne.

He remembered when he first came into his ability in that Ballarat night club, and the horror on the faces of his friends and the screaming strangers. He wondered if it was always hard to become this new kind of human being. A being that held a piece of a puzzle. This was a puzzle that had the ability to save humanity if enough of its pieces could be united to the same cause.

“We are still human, you know?” Kiranda said as she gazed at the stars.

“Yeah, I know.”

“No,
really
human. None of us are like the super heroes in your comics, Athan. We can all be hurt, and we can all feel pain, and we all feel like we are a little less than perfect because we can’t have a human’s perfect life.”

“We can still live like humans do. Family home, two cars and membership to the local bowling club.” Athan said with a half smile.

“I’m serious! What kind of happily ever after includes someone accidently incinerating her family?” She shook her head. “Imagine me with road rage? Or if I get stuck in a queue for more than twenty minutes.”

“Are you really worried that you will flip out and hurt someone?”

Kiranda shrugged. “Well, maybe not. You know what I’m saying though, right? We can never
really
be human. Normal humans can’t jump from one subconscious to the next, and you can travel miles that way. You will always leave someone behind Athan, and everyone else is just a way in or a way out.”

Athan hung his head.

“I suppose. I haven’t really thought about it that way and I try to live as normally as I can. Are you worried that I will leave you behind?” Athan tried to understand.

Athan ran his fingers over her forearm reveling in how soft and perfect her skin was. He was amazed at how different her skin could be; warm, cool or even hot to the touch. He didn’t understand how her skin could summon fire and let it dance on the surface. She was a miracle.

Kiranda sighed, and shook her head.

“I mean all of us Athan.” She looked up at him with sparkling dark eyes in the moonlight. “Cynthia for example; she can’t really touch people or she takes their life force away.”

“She can choose. She doesn’t do it automatically.”

“Well, she can’t have a real relationship with a normal human being. She could maybe with one of us, but it wouldn’t be easy. Ian is a bit different too, who could keep up with him? And Cal? Well…Cal would probably be okay as long as he stayed away from competitive sports.” She paused to chuckle at the thought. “He would smash the team to pieces by accident.”

“I think, we have to make the most of the life we have,” Athan said, “and use our gifts, or burdens, whichever they maybe, to make some kind of a difference to a world that can be cruel to everyone.” Athan looked back at Kiranda who was staring at the corrugations in the iron they were sitting on. “I wandered about for a while like a ghost, I didn’t fit anywhere into the picture of society. I sat in parks watching the people go about their business and enjoying each other’s company. And I didn’t see how I fit into that. I could live in two very different worlds and not tell anyone about the things I’d seen.” Athan took another sip of beer. “It ate me up for a while. Then when I met Brad and Ian, I felt like a misfit, but I had a gang of misfits to be part of. I guess what I’m getting at, is that everyone has wars with themselves on the inside, and it can cloud our thoughts and make us forget that we all have the capacity to be happy.”

“You get that from a comic book?” Kiranda teased with a raised brow.

“Of course I did. It’s where all the best quotes come from.” Athan leaned in to kiss her on the cheek and she rolled her eyes and smiled.

“Stop trying to cheer me up, Sleepwalker! You’re supposed to be all moody and mysterious.”

“I am mysterious.” Athan said grinning.

“You are an open book, you doofus.” She leaned over him and gave him a warm kiss on the lips. It was long and tender which made his skin tingle.

Athan could feel her warm, sweet breath rushing over the skin of his face and it made him dizzy and comfortable. Her long dark hair brushed against his face.

“Hmm…”

“What?” she looked into his eyes a little concerned.

“Never hooked up on a roof before.” Athan said smiling and leaning in for another kiss. She shook her head and kissed him back.

“Don’t get shot…” she whispered.

BRAD AND AADI had ridden the motorcycle around the roads of Melbourne for two hours, taking all kinds of detours and side roads so as to lose anyone following them after the Lucas and Associates raid.

When Aadi received confirmation from his people that all was clear, they headed for the industrial area on the banks of the mouth of the Yarra River, called Docklands. Docklands was always a bustle of activity. It was full of tradesman, warehouse workers and dockies coming and going from various buildings and ships. And it was a clutter of warehouses, factories and store sheds, so there was always somewhere to hide. Aadi had organized a few of his team to set up a tech lab and surveillance unit in a derelict building that was owned by friends. He chose to split his base of operations into three locations around Melbourne, just to be safe after uncovering the threat posed by Lucas and Associates.

As the two of them cruised along the service roads and loading bays of Docklands, they passed vans moving their equipment to the new location.

Aadi turned into another loading dock, headed for an open garage and began to slow down. The bike bumped over a ridge in the driveway then disappeared into the dark of the garage, where Brad could see two women and an older man sitting at a desk and workbench.

The bike came to a halt and the three people left their tasks and came over.

“Not far off complete, boss. Just waiting on two van loads.” Aadi smiled and stepped off the bike, taking off his helmet.

“Very good.” Aadi said, as he unzipped the riding jacket.

The taller of the two women took the bike and began wheeling it off to a safe spot in the garage.

Aadi turned to Brad, “you have what you wanted, Apollo?”

“I think so. We have a lot of files to read, that will need many eyes, but I can do the work of about five, I suppose. While we wait we can go through these hard copies. I don’t know how long Sleepwalker will be.” Brad slipped the strap of the carry bag onto his shoulder.

“I understand.”

Aadi led Brad to a passage that went down to water level. It was an old smuggling walkway that went below the buildings, from one to another building, further towards the main dock. After this short walk beneath the dock, they climbed up a set of steps into a warehouse building that looked totally enclosed with a mezzanine that went the perimeter of the building. As they climbed the stairs Brad saw an office area, a section of the warehouse that was tidy and modern and four floors high.

“I have been renovating this area for a while, but I had no real reason to put staff here. There is a bunk area that sleeps ten and a kitchen and dining area. At the top we have our surveillance office that has roof access to our customized Internet and satellite technology.”

“This is great, Aadi! It’s wonderful. It is like an operational warehouse fully disguised. I assume you can park vehicles in here?”

“When needed. The last of the equipment that is coming will be small enough to be carried in the way I brought you. We have three buildings here Apollo. We are planning a detention block. It was the idea of our friends in Canada, from there we can interrogate culprits of various crimes to trace the sources of all kinds of unrest. And maybe even hold those man-creatures we saw in the subway. If we can find out why they are the way they are, maybe we can prevent more like them from becoming so…troubled.”

Brad looked around, obviously impressed.

It looked as if Aadi was building a very professional facility. He wondered if things would have been different for The League if they had had the backing of these people.

“I would like to keep up to date with discoveries you make; I may visit from time to time. It makes me feel like humanity has a chance, like the old days.”

“The League,” Aadi said with understanding eyes. It had been awhile since Brad Lewis had felt that his abilities meant something.

He had been watching the world for so long and now he had the chance to act again.

Brad and Aadi commandeered the break room table for all the papers he had stolen from Lucas and Associates. The two men sat at the table gleaning one sheet after another for information that could help them stop the big companies from undertaking the telecommunications boost that so many people had died trying to prevent. They also scanned for anything regarding Furnace or the girl kidnapped in Indonesia.

“He should be back by now,” Brad said as he finished nibbling on the last of his share of the hot chips.

“You are worried?” Aadi asked.

“Yes, I know he can look after himself, but when he told me to get out, he sounded desperate, like he was hot on my heels.”

Aadi nodded and put aside another sheet of paper. “It is still soon, my friend. Have faith. He would know that we would fear for him. When he can contact us, he will.”

“Yes, of course. It’s just that…”

“
Wait
!” Aadi interrupted taking a closer look at the sheet in front of him. “This is a transfer code for two subjects to a research facility in Melbourne’s South East. From an E. Boothe.”

“That could be Furnace!” Brad said taking the sheet from Aadi and scanning it frantically.

“There is another, a request for additional DPHR units.” Aadi held out the new sheet. “What is that?”

“DPHR? That is what people like Sleepwalker and I fear. They are what we call PHC. Post-Human Collectors. They are an extraction force, that we have recently learned is allied with people holding the fattest wallets.”

“This is confirmation enough for investigation then is it not?” Aadi said with concern etched on his face.

“Yes it is. I think I was hoping it was all a big mistake.” Brad rubbed at his short beard and paced around the room.

“It shocks me Apollo, but I am with you.”

Brad nodded in agreement and kept scanning.

There wasn’t anything else that looked as informative in the collection of papers. “There are other things here signed as E. Boothe. He is new to me.” Brad said rubbing his cheeks.

A man rushed down the stairs to the break room to interrupt the two men.

“
Sirs
!”

“What is it Alex?” Aadi said as he began to stand.

The Asian man was in his fifties and carried a code-breaking device that he had been using with the computer to unscramble coded text or locked documents.

“We have something from the hard drive, several
somethings
actually. You had better come and see. Both of you.” Then he ran back up the steps to the surveillance office. Brad and Aadi followed him up the steps to find two more of the upstairs team looking at a monitor.

“Look at this!” Alex pointed.

On the screen were engineer’s blue prints of a box that connected to a computer, scanner and monitor.

Brad looked at all the labels on the components. “It is a machine that is powered by a human body. These leads are buried in the nervous system and endocrine system. They connect to heart monitors …” Brad was silent a moment then turned to the man who had stumbled on the blue prints. “Has this been built yet, or was it a proposal?”