TITAN

No one changes. Some people find new clothes, bigger homes, and many cars. They might take trips and they might surround themselves with expensive things. But deep down, they’re still who they are. They only change what others see. No one gets to see what’s inside. Not really. Sometimes a flash of light or dark flickers out from inside a person, but no one gets the full view.

No one changes. What really happens is more meaningful. Most folks don’t know who they really are. What others see as change is really realization of who you always were. Change isn’t really becoming something different but understanding and embracing what you are.

Many people have come to these realizations throughout history. The really bombastic ones are well known—Hitler, Stalin, etc. Those men not only discovered what they were, but they also picked their moment in history. Their legacies of evil will be remembered forever.

But not all are bad. Jesus, Gandhi, and many others discovered who they were and shared goodness with the world to save it or bring it enlightenment. They, too, will be remembered for all time. But those are the big guys, the world changers—literally God in the case of Jesus. He drank from the cup that came to His lips. Everyone has that potential, too; to know who they are and take up that mantle. Unfortunately, some refuse to know who they really are and instead simply exist through life. They are more pitiable than Jesus, the world’s greatest martyr. Sure, He suffered terribly, but damn if He didn’t know His purpose. And you’ll find that most people prefer to know important things like that, even if the news is bad.

No one changes. Realization is not always a good thing, though. For every Mother Theresa there is a Jeffrey Dahmer. For every Abraham Lincoln there is a John Wilkes Booth. And for every Eric Steele there is a Jim McNulty. You see, sometimes good, decent people live their lives and come to realize that their cup to claim is not one of heroism but one of villainy. In the case of Jim McNulty, his cup is one of manipulation and desperation. He drank.

No one changes. Eric and Jim were realizing who they really were in very different ways.

* * *

Jim was almost gone. Inside, the rooms were empty, the paint was stripped, and the lights were burned out. What remained of his self, his “belongings,” was boxed in the basement, sealed and in the dark. Only one window remained open and it looked out over the frail form of his little sister. If it was possible to lose one’s humanity—and Jim seemed to be proof that it was—it was also possible to find ways to hold onto it. Sometimes the only way to do that is through other people. Beth McNulty was all the humanity that Jim had left.

Since the Old Town fight, Jim wasn’t allowed in the room with Beth, so he watched her through glass and tried to avoid the reflection that stared back at him. It wasn’t human. It was the face of a monster. The rest of him was monstrous now, too.

His skin wasn’t entirely gone yet. But the patches that remained were dour and sick and stuck to his new bony exterior like loose wallpaper. Fortunately, his organs weren’t spilling out of him as his skin dwindled to nothing—his bones were growing around him like a suit of horrific armor. The process wasn’t complete yet—so he had been told—but if skeletons could be ripped, then Jim was 1980s Arnold Schwarzenegger.

Rock-hard bone plates developed around his pecs. His ribs interlocked like teeth, holding his organs in place. His arms were wrapped in scale-like bone fragments that had erupted through his arms and curled into place. His legs were similarly armored but with a gnarled kneecap on each leg. Jim’s head was a living, breathing skull without flesh. His gums had dissolved out of his mouth. His hair had fallen out, followed by the peeling of his skull. His face had ripped open in the fight with Eric, so it had flopped off first. His eyes were intact and so was his tongue to an extent. Though, his voice was now little more than a gravelly rasp.

Through the whole maddening process, Jim’s heart continued to beat, his blood continued to pump, and he felt pain. Oh yes, Jim’s nerves were quite alive. His transformation had been an exercise in sadism. But the pain was diminishing and he was gaining some perspective.

First off, Eric had to die. That was clear, if only for being a little bitch in their fight. Eric had fought for a draw, not a win. Whether or not he wanted to admit it, Jim wished Eric had killed him. Then it would be over. Of course, had that happened, Beth would likely have been killed and Eric would still get to live. And neither one of those scenarios was particularly enjoyable.

Second, it was becoming evident that the Shadow Man reported to someone. That superior, whoever it was, probably didn’t know much about what the Shadow Man had been doing. It would explain a lot. For instance, as well armed as these guys were, why take the time to turn him into a freak and sick him on Eric when they could’ve just stormed Eric’s house? Low profile, that’s why. These guys were supposed to be under the radar. Jim got the feeling that the fight in Old Town had gotten the Shadow Man in some trouble. After all, it was a public street fight between two freaks that smashed storefronts, windows, and walls. If laying low was the idea, then letting Jim loose was a bad idea.

Jim wasn’t just clever enough to figure this stuff out, though. He had also overheard things. Some of the Shadow Man’s men had been talking and Jim heard them even though his ears had melted off. They were worried and they were going to stay underground for a while. The fight in Old Town had brought all kinds of attention and someone was now looking into the Shadow Man’s business. Even more suspicious, the Shadow Man had been AWOL since the fight. Jim had seen the guy every day for months and all of a sudden he’s missing for a week? No, it didn’t make sense, unless some ass-kickings were handed out. Jim’s skin might have been melting off, but his mind was still sharp.

However, despite how much everything seemed to have quieted down, Jim had been noticing a buildup of sorts. Some of the nameless thugs were carrying around a lot of equipment—guns, body armor, black suits and tuxedoes, and other assorted equipment. They were preparing for something. And if they were preparing for something, then Jim was going to be in play again. He wasn’t limited by weakness any longer, he had become the monster they intended him to be.

Jim would kill Eric when they met next. As he stared at Beth through the glass, Jim considered all the ways he was going to kill his captors once he presented them with Eric’s body. He didn’t know how he would kill the Shadow Man just yet, but he knew he’d save him for last.

* * *

All of the years of waiting were very vivid in the Shadow Man’s mind. None as clear as the moment it had all been taken from him—his future, his promise. With a single stroke, his entire life had changed inasmuch as the Shadow Man was now just like all the others destroyed by Titan.

What a name that was… Titan… It evoked heroism and strength. In ancient mythology, Titans held the sky on their shoulders. They were gods that towered over men. But really, this Titan was nothing more than a man and barely that. But he was human. And the best thing about humans is that you can kill them. Yes, that was the best thing about humans the Shadow Man could think of.

The Shadow Man knew that when the beast, Bone, looked at him, he saw an evil man. It occurred to the Shadow Man that he didn’t really care what the tool thought. And that’s what Jim McNulty was—a tool. Something used in pursuit of a greater end. That end was no secret. At least not to him—it never was. The Shadow Man would have his revenge. His relationship with Titan had never been revealed to anyone, especially not his superiors. But he knew and that’s all he really cared about anyway. He kept the knowledge—filled with pain and anger—balled up deep inside. He nurtured it and watched it grow over the long years and saw it blossom into rage, which consumed him whole.

As tantalizing as revenge was, it was not the Shadow Man’s only goal. It couldn’t be. None of the people he had reported to would have allowed him to remain with the program if they had known the truth. Now, those “people” were down to one two-star general who would like nothing better than to rid himself of the Colonel and his secret team. His efforts demanded money, support, and time—none of which the military had in plentiful quantities these days. This was the Shadow Man’s last chance for justice and his last shot to redeem his career.

Titan was great power from God, if the stories were true—and who better to wield that power than the United States military? The possibilities were endless: adaptive body armor, weapons that could rebuild themselves if destroyed, and physical enhancements to make soldiers faster, quicker, and more resilient. Though, admittedly, the physical enhancements needed some work.

Jim McNulty was a failure as far as the military was concerned. He was armored with rock-hard bone and he was incredibly strong, but he was hideous—a living skeleton, stripped of humanity. Jim was the final test; the final proof that without Titan they could not duplicate what made him so powerful. Who would volunteer for that program? Obviously, if the military wanted you, they’d get you, but the objective of physical enhancements like the ones that ultimately failed on Jim and so many others was to use them on all of the troops. Super-strong, bullet-proof soldiers that could jump on legs like springs and run on legs like pistons. Hell, if they could work out how to produce weaponry from their limbs like Titan could, all the better. “Army of one,” indeed.

The Shadow Man’s superiors lacked vision. The military liked things fast, on point, and done well. Hunting down Titan’s progenitors had not been any of those things. And now it was drawing attention. The Shadow Man had always planned to unleash Jim on the public. He had to justify releasing Jim by explaining that Titan’s powers had developed faster than had been anticipated—that only Jim would be a match for Titan. Really though, they needed to test Jim in the field to see how he would stand up. He had performed better under duress and physical strain than the others. Jim also seemed to be getting stronger as his exterior deteriorated.

Ultimately, however, the psychological effect of kidnapping Eric Steele’s best friend was disappointing. Using Eric’s best friend was supposed to be a backup plan in and of itself—if Bone couldn’t pummel him outright, it might make Titan doubt himself and pull his punches. Titan did pull his punches, but Bone wasn’t quite ready. Next time he would be.

Jim was a necessary evil. The Colonel’s men were losers and has-beens. They had failed at the hospital. They had failed at the Steele’s house. And they could barely hold on to Jim. The Colonel couldn’t trust them to get the job done and with so much hanging in the balance, he would do whatever he had to. His whole life had been building toward this since he was an infant. If torturing Eric’s spirit by turning his best friend into a monster brought the Steeles even the slightest agony, it was worth it.

The general had told the Shadow Man that he had one month to acquire Titan. One month and it was over. The cost-benefit analyses showed no benefit—just more money poured down a bottomless hole in the name of Titan. Jim’s terrible appearance wasn’t much help either. The whole reason for capturing the power of Titan was to utilize it as a weapon, but not if soldiers using it turned into monsters. Milking samples from twenty years ago created freaks like Bone. They needed the original.

One month… ridiculous.

All these years preparing for Titan’s reemergence and it had come down to a month. If it hadn’t been for 9/11, maybe he would have had more time. But with the military committed in so many overseas hot zones, funds were tight. Special projects were few and far between. The “ancient superhero division” was not high on the priority list.

In a month, the Shadow Man would either have Titan or he wouldn’t. He would be finished without Titan. He hadn’t practiced medicine in a long time and his expertise otherwise was limited. Unfortunately, knowledge in supernatural weaponry and ancient legends was not a hot commodity in the War on Terror.

With so little time left, Jim needed to be ready. They all did. Because if the Shadow Man could not have Titan, then Titan would just have to die and so would his parents, though he hadn’t decided in what order yet. There was still time to pull this off.

One month.

* * *

It hadn’t been real for Eric until the fight. Even when he was scorched from the inside out and felt like he was going to die, it wasn’t real. What did being Titan really mean? In fact, it seemed pretty cool for a while. He had superpowers! When he learned what his abilities were, he tried to shoot metal cabling out of his wrists like Spider-Man and he tried to pick up a car. But the games ended when he saw Jim. His friend was a mutant monster made of the same stuff that made him superhuman. Jim tried to kill him because other people wanted Titan and they were going to do anything to get it. They once mutilated an innocent baby girl and crippled her for the rest of her life just to get their hands on it.

When Eric recovered and met a not-so-friendly demon, something changed. The joke was over. It was time to get real. This wasn’t going to end until he ended it. He felt like he was being led by events, by destiny, by other people—he needed to take charge and make some moves of his own.

But he wasn’t ready.

That’s what his dad was for. Tim Steele was the only one left who knew what Titan was, other than the monsters trying to take it. Eric felt like he had power and a reason to use it, but he had no idea where to begin. Jim and the people that took him were missing—though, he couldn’t understand how a giant skeleton man could just disappear without a trace. How could he find them? Eric was not a detective. He was no hero. In his dreams, maybe.

Tim Steele had been Titan for years, raised and trained by Arthur Steele who had been Titan for a good deal longer. Eric needed that training, but he was years behind. He didn’t know what he was supposed to do or how to do it. He knew time was running out and he needed to be ready. The book was important, too, but Eric make it work for him. Or maybe he just didn’t understand what it said.

For weeks—in the evenings after school, on weekends, and sometimes in the middle of the night—Eric and Tim went out and trained. They left the empty field behind and went into D.C. and looked for trouble. Tim was not specific about what kind of trouble they sought, only that they’d know it when they found it. The first few times they didn’t find anything. They drove in silence and Eric looked to his dad for some kind of sign. He just drove.

Every now and again, they happened upon a mugging or a fight. Eric transformed into Titan and broke things up. One thief who had just struck a man on the back of the head and stolen his wallet shot at Eric. When the bullet ricocheted off his titanium shoulder plating, the man backed away and stumbled into a bunch of trash cans. Eric bound the criminal’s hands with crude hand cuffs and left him on the street with a disposable cell phone dangling from his neck dialed to “911.”

Eric started to think that his dad was testing him. He didn’t talk much on these drives, but Tim seemed to sense something and looked to Eric to see if he was picking it up too. The fight with the demon in the alley had scared him. He had been led beyond his control and it was a frightening to lose himself in the tunnel vision of the Source. Maybe Eric was holding back. He worried about where his “senses” would deliver him next. There was a raging river flowing through his heart and he feared that if he stepped into it, it would sweep him away.

Tim stopped pulled to the curb in front of the National Air and Space Museum. The evening sun was gone from the sky, but a pink hue clung to the horizon. Short buildings cast long shadows.

“Why’d you stop?” Eric asked.

“You’re being lead instead of leading,” Tim said.

“What does that even mean?”

“It’s not your fault. You didn’t learn this stuff as you grew up like I did,” Tim shifted to face Eric.

“Kind of like when Yoda told Luke he was ‘too old.’”

“So I’m the green dwarf Muppet in your analogy?”

“You can be Obi-Wan if you want.”

“You’re letting yourself be dragged by the current. You’re not swimming,” Tim said. “That ‘sense’ you feel is from God. He’s telling you what to do. All of the time. Everywhere you go. Like intuition or conscience. But He’s mysterious. God doesn’t say go kill that monster over there. He’s given you a compass, but you have to find north.”

Eric believed that this power came from God, but not the same way that his dad did. Eric thought that God had put things in motion and let people sort the rest out while Tim seemed to think that God made things happen. At least, he was trying hard to impart that. Eric didn’t think it was that simple. Free will wasn’t worth a damn if God was involved in day-to-day life—God gave us the resources to choose. Of course, maybe there was no free will. Eric didn’t choose this. Sarah certainly didn’t.

Ruminating ideological differences with his father dried up. A chill ran up his spine like the last time he had looked into his “sense.” Overwhelming dread filled him. He believed that his “sense” was like looking into death and darkness. Or it was something close to that. And Tim was telling him to look again.

Tim put his hand on Eric’s shoulder. “There are others in that dark…”

Could he hear what I was thinking?

“God’s not the only thing in there,” Tim’s face was calm, but his eyes betrayed him. He knew what Eric was talking about. Tim blinked and the shadow of remembrance was gone. “The Source can help you find the other things out there. You start to know them.”

“I don’t know what you mean.”

“It’s one thing to understand that people steal and kill. It’s another thing to see it in them. You’ll begin to know that, too. That’s why I stopped the car. You sense them here.”

“I didn’t see anything. You were driving,” Eric shook his head.

“Eric, I haven’t been driving around the city at random. You’re guiding me.”

“More muggers?”

“They’re bad, but seeing them is just scratching the surface. You’ve got to go deeper. Titan has to let himself know evil.” Tim paused a few beats too many. Eric’s senses, as a son, told him that there was something more to that. Tim finished. “To fight it.”

“I brought us to the Mall,” Eric said. It wasn’t a quite a question. “I should see something here.”

“You already sensed them. I’m not Titan anymore, but even I can still feel them. They rattle in my bones. But I know you can feel them deeper. I can feel them through you. Being with you is like an antenna.” Tim opened the driver’s door and stepped out of the car. Eric followed. He circled around to his dad.

“If ‘they’ are here, they’ll look human. But you think I can find them.”

Tim nodded to the folks walking around the area, moving along the sandy paths, going in and out of the museums, and standing in line at the concession areas. “You can.”

“Alright.” Eric avoided a couple of jackasses in cars who appeared to speed up as he crossed. He looked back at his dad who remained beside the car.

Eric remembered how he had just slipped into the sense before. But like his dad said, he couldn’t let it sweep him away. He would move into it and try to find what he sought. People crossed alongside him, in front of him, and behind him. Some stopped forcing Eric to move around them, only slightly aware that he’d needed to. Eric was reminded of a term he learned in drivers ed: highway hypnosis—it’s when you’re driving, unabated, and you become hypnotized by the road yet are still aware of it. That’s what it was like walking through the National Mall looking for them. Whoever or whatever they were.

Amidst the dark, shadowy shapes that flanked his vision both in his eyes and mind, flashes of Jim came unbidden. The sting of punches landed. Terrible skeleton features impossibly alive. Eric didn’t realize it, but he winced as he walked. They were here. Eric still had no idea what that meant, but all the people around him carried with them a kind of presence, like a cool wind—constant, with occasional fluctuations here and there. Amidst the cool “breeze” of the people around him, there was a warm current—a heavier and thicker swath of air that he detected. It was out of place. It stank and only Eric could smell it. It got stronger as got closer.

Eric was in the wide-open park of the National Mall beneath the trees across from the National History Museum. He stalked through the twisted shadows cast by the trees and their newborn spring leaves. People crossed ahead of him, behind him, and beside him; they moved in his presence like wind through tree leaves.

The hot, thick, stifling gust was ahead of him. There was a set of beach umbrellas cocked to the west. Beneath them, a few groups of kids, more or less college age, were kissing, talking, and doing what people do. Eric passed alongside them. They wereall doing what people do, but they weren’t all people. The darkness around Eric’s vision cleared and he saw the world around him like he always had—but with enhanced visual acuity.

Eric’s veins stirred with heat and he felt Titan well up in his muscles, in his bones, and even behind his smile. He crossed back so he was in front of the group. Eric didn’t know what to do or say, but that didn’t worry him like it used to. Warmth surrounded him and he wasn’t sure if that was hot metal radiating through his skin or something else. He went with what felt right.

“How’s it goin,’ Guys?”

One of the “kissing guys” rolled over from the sloppy kisses of his lady friend and glanced up at Eric. He was tall, but not broad, with shoulder-length, sticky brown hair. Simply sitting, he was about three-quarters as tall as Eric. “You need something?”

Kissing Guy was one of them. Eric wasn’t sure how he knew, but he did. Instead of fear or worry, Eric felt excitement. The feeling was old, innate, like instinct; it was a feeling he had never experienced but somehow remembered. “Yeah, actually. Uuumm, I’m gonna need you and...” Glancing over the rest of the group, Eric picked out the others. He knew. His eyes had adjusted, so to speak. “...him, him, and her to go hang out somewhere else.” The three others Eric had pointed out shifted into seated positions as well, with queer amusement on their faces.

Kissing Guy climbed onto his long legs and looked down at Eric, who didn’t budge. The man grinned like a surfer, happy but with nothing behind it. “And why would we…” Kissing Guy paused. His fake, L.A. smile faded into something akin to a grimace. Kissing Guy knew too. He sampled the air like a cat who senses something no one else does. Whatever this guy was, he knew what Eric was, too. Maybe not exactly but enough to know he was a threat.

“It’s been awhile since we ran into anyone like you.” Kissing Guy held his ground.

Eric was interested in that remark—“anyone like you.” There were others?

Eric’s first impulse was to clear out the kids who weren’t one of them. He motioned to the other kids lying on the grass, who were perplexed by what was happening. “You guys oughta leave.”

Kissing Guy turned back to them. “Nah, stick around. This won’t take long.”

It didn’t. Kissing Guy’s head was off his shoulders and exploding over the grass in burning embers within fifteen seconds.

* * *

It happened fast. Kissing Guy threw a punch at Eric. Using quickness that was still new and unwieldy, Eric pulled his head back. The punch missed, but Eric could feel the knuckles pass just in front of his face. It wasn’t so much speed as it was Eric anticipating his attacker’s motion building up. Speed would come later.

That’s when Kissing Guy and his brethren revealed their true faces. Quite literally. A sound like cracking twigs and meat ripping accompanied their transformations. Each of their faces expanded at the forehead, revealing a long bone across their brow, and their mouths grew wider unveiling large canine teeth. Eric’s first thought was silly: Cavemen! But then he saw the teeth—long vicious canines beneath yellow, piercing eyes.

Vampires.

Actual vampires.

Kissing Guy came at Eric again. Eric lowered his head and when it came back up, he revealed his true face. Titan swam from his veins and slathered over him in a wash of heat and strength. Eric’s arm snapped to his side and unleashed a scythe’s blade from his forearm, which extended a foot and a half beyond his hand. In this case, Kissing Guy’s best weapon, his snapping teeth, was his biggest weakness. When he lunged forward with his neck stretched out, Eric cleaved through it. His body dropped and his head rolled across the grass towards his friends. The decapitated body shriveled into itself, burning inward like a leaf put to flame. The head did much the same, but it flickered and flashed with heat and coals of fire like an immolating pumpkin.

The guests who hadn’t heeded Eric’s “suggestion” to leave screamed and scrambled over the beach umbrellas to clear the scene. The umbrellas weren’t necessary any longer anyway. The setting sun disappeared behind the Washington Monument, casting a long column of shadow over the Mall where sun-allergic citizens could safely congregate.

Other patrons of the National Mall saw the exploding body and either fled or tried to catch the fight on their camera phones. Others who didn’t see anything, but saw screaming masses flee followed suit and on it went. Park police and Homeland Security officials were swept up in the panic and drawn away from the scene. Fortunately, it worked in Eric’s favor to shield his identity so that no one would remember the short, average-looking white kid that had been at the center of it all.

For now, though, he was faced with three pissed off vampires dressed like hippies. The part of his brain that was still enthralled by the fantastic nature of what he was, let alone the other fantastical things of the world, was momentarily in awe. He watched ­Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Angel religiously. But that faded fast as all three vampires attacked at once. Fists and feet came from all sides and Eric received the initial onslaught without a ready response. As it happened, it occurred to Eric that these vampires could have been alive for hundreds of years and fought together for just as long. He had been Titan for a little over a month.

Eric wasn’t a fighter by nature and in the panic of the moment, he unleashed the only thing he knew he had—raw strength. As the vampires swarmed over the top of him, he exploded upward throwing them off. It worked; though the vampires were strong too. It gave him a space of seconds to formulate a defense. The girl recovered first and caught him in the stomach with a damn good shot; Eric suspected she had been aiming lower. He brought his arm across, meaning to take her head off like Kissing Guy, but she ducked. Just not low enough. The blade sliced the side of her head, taking off a mane of hair and her ear. She shrieked and wobbled to the side. Her two buddies then came at Eric, one from the front and one from the back. Eric anticipated both and charged backward, lowering his torso and flipping his aft attacker over the top of his body. The vamp attacking from the front clobbered into his buddy and they collapsed into a tangle together.

The female vamp was royally pissed. Streamers of blood and hair whipped off the side of her head and there was more than murder in her eyes. With blind rage, she came straight ahead. Eric sliced her across the chest—sideways, up, and down. A cross. She roiled with pain, rage, and globs of blood, reeling back to the grass.

Her two friends regained themselves and charged at Eric again. Eric ducked under the first punch but ducked right into a kick that sent him back in a flash of pain. He was more surprised than anything. His armor seemed to harden in anticipation of hits and lessened the impacts. Flat on his back, he drilled the first vamp to arrive right in its ancient balls. That hurt vampires too apparently. Good to know.

The other vamp sidestepped Eric’s kick and came at his side, meaning to pin him. Another shape entered Eric’s blind spot and swung something like a tire iron into the vamp’s face. The loud crack sickened him and he thought the vampire’s skull cracked. It landed on the grass hard. Tim appeared over Eric.

“Cops are coming. We gotta go,” Tim said.

“How do I kill them?” Eric climbed back to his feet.

“You’re kidding, right? All that TV you watch and you don’t know?!”

The vamp whose balls Eric kicked came at them. Eric dropped him with one swing, then turned to his dad. “I’m not made of wood.”

“Silver,” Tim said.

“That’s werewolves.”

“And vampires, too.”

“How do I make silver? I can pick?” Eric asked as the vamp he just punched recovered and tackled him.

The moment became confused in a mish-mash of grass, sweat, terrible breath, and police sirens. Eric rose and forged a sharp spike extending from his palm. He jammed it deep into his attacker’s chest right between his pecs, generally where he knew the heart to be. The vampire gasped and then went into a rage, biting and clawing and kicking.

“Okay… that must be, what, iron?” He changed something, not really understanding what or how he was doing it, and his arm shifted color to a metallic sparkly hue. The color change moved down his forearm, over his hand, and onto the spike. Now, the vamp looked worried. He threw his head back in a mask of fright, pain, and howling. His body turned to burning ash in an ever expanding wave away from the stake. When it reached his head, his yellow eyes turned orange and popped into balls of ochre light. The beast burned away. Streamers of flame fizzled against Eric’s suit.

The vamp Tim clobbered with a tire iron was back up and after him. Tim caught the creature by the shoulders, holding his thrashing, snapping jaw at bay. Eric leaned to the side and flicked his wrist towards Tim. The silver spike stuck itself in the vampire’s shoulder. Tim ripped it out of the creature’s shoulder and plunged it into its chest. The vamp exhaled ash and burst into a hazy cloud of burning smoke. Tim kicked away, singed by the heat.

Eric got back on his feet and met the charging female vamp head on. She was a mess of blood and sweat. She smeared the “T” on his chest with gloppy, sticky blood. Eric pushed off on her and came across with the now silver scythe blade taking her arms clean off in a puff of ashy flame. She screamed, but not for long. Eric backhanded the blade through her neck and ended her. She shuddered to the ground in a jetting, fountain of embers and crumbling ash.

Unable to stop himself, Eric looked to Tim for approval. Tim flashed a grin he couldn’t hold back either. Eric was oddly reminded of playing catch with his dad and seeing a similar sign of approval. But there wasn’t time to dwell on their peculiar, demented bonding.

Police sirens echoed around the Mall. Eric slipped out of Titan, regaining his short, average persona. Tim grabbed his shoulder and hustled them both among the fleeing crowd. Thankfully, no one seemed to take notice—it was strictly a “keep your head down and run” affair.

They moved with the flow of panicked tourists and found the car. After jumping into their seats, Tim started the engine and pulled the car into the street amid a lull in running bodies. They disappeared around a corner and eventually made their way back to the highway, no one the wiser.

* * *

“...thirteen people were trampled. Two were transported to GW Hospital in serious condition. Other injuries consisted of bruises and cuts,” the anchorwoman explained.

“Police and Homeland Security officials reiterated no suspicion of terrorism. However, authorities noted a ‘person of interest’ resembling one of the participants in the Alexandria, Virginia fight from a few weeks ago was sighted but disappeared. He is wanted for questioning as well as a large male with blonde hair, six feet two or taller, with a large contusion on his face.

“In other news, Lindsay Lohan got a stomach ache today in court...”

Rose flipped the TV off. She ran a furtive hand through her hair and switched off her bedside lamp. Sleep was elusive.

* * *

The Colonel turned off his TV.

“The news isn’t very reassuring this evening,” he muttered.

There were more appearances of the “metal man” throughout the region. His anger grew. Frustration fueled it and he gritted his teeth until his jaw ached. A knock at his door distracted him from focusing on the pain.

“Yes?”

A young lieutenant entered with a manila folder. He saluted and held it, waiting for the Colonel, who eyed him for a few moments. The Colonel wanted to kill him. Not for any particular reason, but because he could. Titan seemed so far out of his grasp now. He couldn’tget Titan, so killing this dumb boy might reaffirm his power. Or maybe it would just make him feel better.

Eh. Wasted effort.

The Colonel returned the salute. “What?”

“We obtained the information. The event’s at the Hotel Monaco downtown on Friday, May 22,” the lieutenant reported. “A busy spot, sir.”

“Meaning what?” the Colonel wasn’t really asking. “That we shouldn’tdo it?”

“Ah, no, sir. It’s just a busy place. I thought this was deep cover.”

“There’s your problem, Lieutenant. Stop thinking. Execute orders. We’re out of time. We have to catch Titan where he’s vulnerable. Where better than a place surrounded by family, friends, and that cute little redhead? Hmm?”

“Won’t we be seen, sir?”

“People have a way of forgetting details like that. Who’s going to remember well-dressed men in tuxedoes at a prom? But our boy will worry about being seen. More importantly, he’ll worry about all his friends and the girl. He knows what’ll happen if we let Bone loose on the place...” the Colonel felt a rare pang of joy.

“Hell, let’s do that anyway.”