The Dimension Heroes Trilogy Omnibus

CHAPTER TWO

CHAPTER TWO

Kevin Jason—better known as the superhero Bolt, son of the late superhero Genius—thought that becoming a full-time member of the Neohero Alliance, the largest superhero organization in the world, would make his life easier than it had been when he had been the leader of the Young Neos, the most famous young superhero team in the country. At the young age of eighteen, Bolt had already faced his fair share of supervillains and world-spanning catastrophes that even a lot of adult superheroes twice his age had never dealt with. He had looked forward to living a much easier but also more exciting, life, because adult NHA members had more privileges than Young Neos members did.

I thought I might get to fight more supervillains, travel around the country protecting innocents from danger, and doing all sorts of cool things, Bolt thought. But I didn’t think I’d get stuck with janitor duty, of all things.

It was true. Hovering in the air with a bucket of soapy water in one hand and a brush in the other, Bolt surveyed the work he had done on the Justice Statue already. The Justice Statue was a massive marble statue depicting Omega Man, the leader of the NHA’s Leadership Council, and the Midnight Menace, the leader of the Independent Neoheroes for Justice, which was the second largest superhero organization in the country, standing together and shaking hands. It was supposed to be a symbol of unity between the two superhero organizations, whose past relations had been strained due to their differing approaches to crime and the non-superhuman world. It was a beautiful statue, Bolt had to admit, and both Omega Man and the Midnight Menace were so realistic that they looked like the real people just blown up to titanic sizes.

But the Justice Statue didn’t look pretty on its own. It took effort to maintain and clean it, and Bolt had just spent several hours cleaning the Statue by himself. Well, it wasn’t entirely by himself. The lower parts of the Statue had been cleaned by the Hero Island Janitorial Team, but the upper parts were considered too difficult for the non-superhuman janitors to reach.

So, naturally, the task had fallen on Bolt, who, with his flight and super speed, was considered the best available candidate for the job. Bolt had been told by the head janitor, a jovial black man named Curtis, that it would take him less than a couple of hours to clean the upper half of the Statue and that all he needed was a good bucket of water and soap to get the hard-to-reach parts.

Now Bolt was starting to wonder if Curtis knew just how dirty the upper part of the Statue was. Although the Justice Statue looked beautiful from a distance, up close, you could see where all of the dirt and even bird droppings collected on the heads of Omega Man and the Midnight Menace. The bird droppings in particular were bad, because the seagulls which lived on the beaches of Hero Island sometimes liked to come inland and rest on the Justice Statue, which they seemed to think was a toilet.

Bolt had started at eight that morning and now it was about lunch. That was good, because Bolt had gotten hungry from all of the scrubbing he had done, not helped by the fact that he dropped the brush a couple of times and had accidentally knocked over the bucket at least once. The Janitorial Team were always patient with him and let him refill whenever that happened, but Bolt felt embarrassed every time he had spilled the bucket nonetheless.

For that matter, Bolt was tired from all of the work he’d done. He was strong, young, and in good shape, but scrubbing dirt and bird droppings off the Statue took a lot of effort, not helped by the harsh wind that blew around up here. He was glad that the sky was mostly clear, because if it had been raining, he was certain he would never have gotten the job done.

Of course, if it had been raining, they’d probably find some other job for me to do, Bolt thought. Maybe they’d have me pick garbage off of Hero Beach or entertain tourists or something like that.

Shaking his head, Bolt lowered down to the base of the Statue. Here, he found the rest of the Janitorial Team gathering their supplies and getting ready to go to lunch. There were about a dozen janitors in all, not counting Bolt himself, and they all wore the distinctive blue uniform that all Hero Island workers wore. Bolt didn’t have to wear it, because he was technically not a janitor, though he found himself asking again why he was doing janitorial work if he didn’t even get to wear their uniforms.

Then again, I like my costume just fine, Bolt thought as he gently landed on the ground, glancing down at his red and black full body spandex costume, which also had a cool lightning bolt design on the chest. Way cooler than their uniforms, that’s for sure.

“Kev!” a loud, jovial voice shouted suddenly. “Good work!”

Bolt started and looked around until he spotted a huge black man, clad in the same blue janitor uniform as the others, walking up to Kevin, with a big, friendly smile plastered on his face. The middle-aged man had very little hair, but he did have a big black mustache across his upper lip that made him look much older than he actually was.

“Hi, Curtis,” said Bolt. “Sorry. I didn’t see you coming.”

“That’s all right, man,” said Curtis, stopping a few feet away from him. He gestured at the top of the Statue with one massive hand. “I just wanted to congratulate you on doing such a fantastic job cleaning the upper parts of the Statue. That’s always the hardest part to clean and the most dangerous, because unlike you, we can’t fly, so if we fall off while cleaning it, it’s disability for us.”

“Uh, thanks,” said Bolt. “So, um, where do I put my bucket and brush?”

“Oh, I’ll take them off your hands and get them to Manny,” said Curtis, holding out his hands. “He’ll make sure they get put up properly. Meanwhile, you can get some lunch if you want.”

“Oh, thanks,” said Bolt, handing Curtis the brush and bucket without hesitation. “I was worried for a second there that I might have to put them away myself.”

“Nah, man, you don’t need to worry about that,” said Curtis. He emptied the bucket onto the ground without looking at it, getting some water splashed onto the legs of his jeans in the process. “Figured Mecha Knight has a ton more work for you to do today, so I wanted to make sure you got lunch so you can regain your energy.”

Bolt groaned inwardly, because Curtis was probably right. It had been Mecha Knight’s idea to put Bolt to work helping around Hero Island, rather than going out and fighting supervillains like he did before. Mecha Knight had explained to Bolt that it was for his own good, but Bolt was pretty sure Mecha Knight had done it just to get him out of the way.

“Yeah, you’re probably right,” said Bolt. He rubbed the back of his neck. “Think I’m going to take a minute or two to rest before I head back to the House.”

“Okay,” said Curtis, nodding. “Well, thanks for helping again. These jobs are always easier whenever we have one of you superhumans helping, especially one as powerful as you. Heck, even ones like your dad were helpful, because they can use those big brains of theirs to figure out better ways to clean things that we can’t.”

“Were?” said Bolt. “Did you know my Dad?”

“Genius?” said Curtis. “Sure. He was actually the guy who hired me back when Hero Island was first created. I was in my twenties back then, barely out of college, and no one really knew much about superheroes back then, but I thought the NHA was awesome after they defeated Nuclear Winter, so I was eager to help.”

“Huh,” said Bolt. “You’ve been around for a while, then, haven’t you?”

“Yep,” said Curtis, nodding. He patted his chest. “Longest serving worker on Hero Island, which is why I’m the head janitor. But I wouldn’t be nearly as effective as I am if your old man hadn’t given me a few pointers in regards to efficiently cleaning up the island. I wish I could have gone to his funeral, but I was in the hospital because of a knee injury at the time and couldn’t go anywhere.”

I nodded. “It’s fine. Thanks for your condolences anyway. I’m sure Dad would have appreciated them.”

“Sure,” said Curtis. “Anyway, I got to go and make sure the rest of these monkeys don’t mess everything up, because I’m hungry and can’t wait to have lunch myself. See you later, Kev.”

With that, Curtis turned and walked away, shouting at the other janitors to stop messing around and put everything away. Bolt watched him go for a second before shaking his head and looking up at the Justice Statue, which shone under the rays of the afternoon sun.

Bolt liked Curtis, and the rest of the Janitorial Team for that matter. They treated him like one of their own, even though he was a superhuman and they weren’t. They were certainly nicer than Hero Island Security, anyway, who always treated Bolt as if he was some kind of spy.

Still, Bolt would have traded janitor duty for active duty in the NHA in a heartbeat. When he graduated to full-time NHA membership, Bolt had assumed he would do on missions all the time like when he led the Young Neos. He was sure he would have been set against the really dangerous threats and villains, the kind that the Young Neos were not allowed to deal with due to how dangerous they were.

Instead, Bolt spent nearly all of his time on Hero Island doing these kinds of chores while every other adult NHA member seemed to go on all kinds of cool adventures. Even the Young Neos seemed to go on more adventures than him, which Bolt was not allowed to join or help with because he wasn’t a part of the team anymore.

Mecha Knight had told Bolt that it was common for new NHA members, especially ones who graduated from the Young Neos, to go through a probation period where they did chores on Hero Island until they were called to active duty by the Leadership Council. But Bolt suspected that this was just an excuse to get free labor and help for the Janitorial Team, because Bolt wasn’t paid anything extra for all of the work he did.

Wouldn’t surprise me if Black Blur suggested this, Bolt thought. Jerk has never liked me for some reason. I could see him convincing the rest of the Council to relegate me to janitor duty just to mess with me.

It was just such a drastic change from his time in the Young Neos, which made the change hard for Bolt to deal with. Going from leading a team of young superheroes against various and sundry supervillains and even world-threatening catastrophes to glorified janitor duty was as hard as it sounded. It didn’t help that Bolt was not in the spotlight as much as he used to be, which he had to admit was one reason he disliked his current job.

I didn’t even get to help during the Tsunami incident, Bolt thought, a frowning appearing on his lips, despite the fact that I have as much experience fighting supervillains as anyone else.

That was when Bolt noticed something shining in the sky out of the corner of his eye. He turned his attention in the direction of the shining object and squinted, trying to see what it was. At first, he thought it was just an airplane flying overhead, but the object wasn’t merely flying over Hero Island. It was flying toward the Island … and based on its speed, it would be here in just a few minutes.

Bolt whirled around and shouted to the other janitors, “Everyone, get down! Something is coming out of the sky and is going to crash any minute—”

Bolt was interrupted by a roaring flame above. He had just enough time to look up and see a massive fireball hurtling through the sky toward them before the fireball struck the ground behind and exploded.

The explosion sent Bolt flying. He hit the ground and rolled several times until he hit the base of the Justice Statue, where he lay, dazed from the blast and trying his best to clear his head. He was aware of a hot flame burning somewhere in front of the Justice Statue, as well as huge clouds of smoke rising from within.

“Kev!” said Curtis, suddenly appearing in front of Bolt. “You okay, boy? That explosion looked bad. Can you walk?”

Bolt pushed himself up and coughed. “Yeah, Curt, I think I’ll be okay. Is everyone else okay?”

“Yeah,” said Curtis. “The other guys ran as soon as they saw that ship.”

“Ship?” Bolt repeated. “What ship?”

Curtis jerked a thumb over his shoulder at the fire. “The one that fell out of the sky. Saw it with my old eagle eyes before it blew up. Not sure if it’s still in one piece or not, though.”

Frowning, Bolt slowly rose to his feet, dusting off his shoulders, and looked around Curtis at the burning flame not too far away from them. The fire was already starting to die down, though it was still too hot and bright to approach.

But as the flames died down and the smoke began to clear up, Bolt saw that Curtis wasn’t joking. The thing which had crashed into the ground wasn’t a meteorite or anything like that. It was a round, ball-shaped spaceship, almost like a pod. In fact, unless Bolt’s eyes were playing tricks on him, he thought it looked an awful lot like—

“Pokacu,” Bolt muttered under his breath.

Curtis started when Bolt spoke. “Poka-what?”

“Pokacu aliens,” Bolt said. He looked at Curtis seriously. “Remember? They invaded Earth twice, nearly destroyed the planet the second time. That looks like one of their escape pods”

“Oh, you said Pokacu,” said Curtis. His face became pale. “I remember ‘em now. Scary dudes. Are you saying that they’re—”

“I don’t know what they are,” Bolt said, interrupting Curtis. “They can’t possibly be back, because when I blew up the Mother World, all of the Pokacu died with them, but that’s obviously a Pokacu escape pod.”

“Holy crap, Kev,” said Curtis. “What should we do?”

“Call the Leadership Council,” said Bolt. “Tell them Code A. They’ll know what that means. Meanwhile, I’ll inspect the pod and find out where it came from.”

Curtis nodded again and ran off, pulling his phone out of his pocket and dialing the Leadership Council’s emergency number as he did so. Bolt didn’t doubt that the Council would respond, because Code A was the NHA’s official codeword for potential alien invasions of Earth. It could also be used if you found yourself dealing with individual extraterrestrial visitors. Either way, it was only supposed to be invoked in emergencies and there were harsh punishments for anyone who used it to spread false alarms.

The return of the Pokacu is definitely what I’d call an emergency, Bolt thought. Time to see what’s going on.

Carefully, Bolt approached the crashed escape pod. It was completely blackened from its reentry to Earth and radiated heat like a furnace. But Bolt’s suit allowed his body to handle extreme heat, so it didn’t bother him that much. He made his way through the charred earth and between the flames until he got to the main hatch, which was firmly closed shut.

Coming to a stop, Bolt listened carefully for any sounds coming from within. He heard nothing, but that didn’t mean anything. For all Bolt knew, there could be a Pokacu warrior waiting for him to get close enough so it could pop out and kill him. He would have to be careful, regardless of what was inside.

Electricity began dancing along Bolt’s fingers as he prepared himself for the pod’s occupant. He took a step toward the pod when, all of a sudden, the hatch burst open. Bolt jumped and nearly fired a lightning bolt at the hatch, but caught himself at the last moment. That was good, because when the hatch opened, someone fell out of the hatch and onto the ground below.

The being who had fallen out of the hatch was not human. It wore strange, blocky armor and had slimy blue skin that seemed to be constantly sweating. It was vaguely humanoid in shape, but it looked more like a Pokacu than a human, though Bolt didn’t think it looked exactly like a Pokacu, either. There was something extremely familiar about it, but Bolt didn’t know where he could have seen it before until the creature raised its head and looked at him, showing its glowing red slit eyes and vent-like mouth.

Bolt gasped. “Nicknacks, is that you?”

Nicknacks gasped for air and said, “Bolt …”

His face fell onto the dirt, but Bolt rushed toward him and, flipping Nicknacks over, grimaced at the sight before me.

Nicknacks’ body was cut up. Deep gashes ran along his chest and stomach. His right arm hung awkwardly off his side, while a large open wound ran directly underneath his chin. He looked like he had just lost a fight with a kitchen knife, making Bolt surprised he was alive at all.

“Nicknacks, what happened to you?” said Bolt in horror. “Who did this to you?”

Nicknacks opened his eyes and stared up at Bolt. His eyes, which normally glowed a rich red, were softer and even slightly pink.

“Bolt …” Nicknacks’ voice was raspy and dry. “He’s coming … they’re coming …”

“Who’s coming?” said Bolt. “Who?”

Nicknacks made a deep, shuddering gasp before he said, “The Dread God’s Avatar. And he will destroy us all.”