Saving Her Billionaire Vigilante

Four: Ransom Tanager

Four:

Ransom Tanager

            “I saw that.”

            Mr. Leech’s old voice, warbling, came from behind me. I turned to face him. I had no idea when he’d entered the garage. But he stood in the doorway of the side door that was attached to the house.

    “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

    “You’re in love with her,” he said.

    “I’ve always been in love with her,” I said, “that isn’t a secret, you know. I’ve always made it so that I would be seen as someone that wasn’t her brother. We’re going to be together. One way or another.”

    “Do you really think it wise?” he raised an eyebrow. “Considering the endeavor that you’re about to take on? What with your whole, new crime fighting agenda?”

    “We’re not going to be together now,” I said, “but I’m going to put the motions into play so that we can be. I’m going to find the Evos, I’m going to save the people that were destroyed by my father’s work. Including her.”

    “Well, our visitor is finally awake. I think you might want to come check on them.”

    I nodded, and I went into the house after him. The manor that my father built was our original, ancestral home from England. He’d rebuilt it, brick by brick. It had two parts to it. The East Side and The West Side. Kind of like Manhattan.

    The West Side had been my Mother’s side of the house. She’d been an artist, and my father had fallen in love with her paintings first. Then he’d fallen in love with her. Once she died, he locked up that side of the house because that was where she worked. Now that my father was gone, I’d converted that side of the house.

    I had a room I used entirely filled with security purposes. I had another room that was set up for combat training. And another one entirely devoted to weapons. It was my own, personal Bat Cave.

    I knew it was stupid. The idea that I could save everyone that had been affected by the terrorist attack on the Tanager building, but I knew that I had to try. Especially if I was going to live with myself. Because the whole thing had been a result of the monstrous things my father had created. And if I had a chance of getting Piper, I had to make things right. I couldn’t live with the knowledge that my family had destroyed hers. I walked to The West Side that I kept locked up and went into the room that was my Mother’s old art studio that I’d kept exactly the same.

    Except for the woman that I had tied up there.

    Kathleen Kore was tied to a chair. She had light, brown hair, and wore glasses. She had a tan colored turtleneck and wore black slacks. Her lip was also cut from something that I wouldn’t go into the particulars of. She looked up and laughed at me. She’d worked in the lab with Piper’s parents as an assistant. She’d been an intern first, during her college years, and then had stayed with the company through her Ph.D. Until the night of the explosion.  “Your little girlfriend is back, isn’t she?”

    I glared at her. “Piper Powell is none of my concern.”

    The woman laughed. “Of course, she is my concern. She’s your concern too, you know. Especially if you’re talking about Evos.”

    I frowned. “What do you mean? Piper’s not…she’s not like me. She’s not a freak. She’s normal.”

    She laughed. “Your father was conducting experiments on humans to see if he could create the next generation of humans. A technologically, advanced race. One that was half robot, half human. The Tanagers were the scientists that worked for him. You really don’t think that they didn’t experiment on their own children? Perhaps you should look into Piper’s history.”

    “She’s not…. She’s not like me.”

    “You remember that she was at the party, right?”

    I frowned. “Of course, I remember that night. I know that she was at the party. She was one of thirteen survivors. My Mom made us dance together.”

    “Including you, and your father,” said Kathleen, “how do you think that happened?”

    I hesitated. I’d never questioned why myself and Piper had been saved.  Or why there had even been anyone to come out of a catastrophic explosion like that. Thirteen was an unusual number.

    “Are you implying those are the other Evos?” I said. “The so-called Evolved humans?”

    “I’m not implying it,” said Kathleen Kore, “I know it. I helped the Powell’s on their experiments. I know what was down there in the lab. You don’t. You only found out about it because of that attack by one of the Evos that happened three months ago.”

    “I found out about it because my powers started to resurface,” I said.

    “Exactly,” said Kathleen, “you hurt people when you were using them, weren’t they?”

    I hesitated. I’d discovered my fathers experiments because I’d realized that I was one of them. Whenever I was little, I was always going to the office with my father. I lived in the lab. Because my father was a scientist, I didn’t think anything weird of it. But then, when I was a teenager, I noticed there was something strange about me.

    When I got angry, I turned into….an explosion. My particles tore apart, and then rebuilt me. My father had made me part bomb, part human. And I had every reason to suspect that I was the real cause behind the Tanager building exploding. “She’s not like me.”

    “Haven’t you always wondered why she was always there too?” Kathleen asked. “I’ve heard of bring your daughter to work day, but not have her live there. Also, he didn’t go through the trouble of adopting any of the other orphans besides Piper. Your connection has always been there. Because you’re cut from the same cloth. Piper is an Evo, like you.”

    Clenching my fists, I turned on my heel and left. I couldn’t stomach anymore of the woman’s lies. Piper was beautiful, and smart, and there was no way that she was just as broken as me. Because if she was broken, it had been at my father’s hand, and that changed everything.

    Then, I could truly never be with her. Because there was no repairing that, I knew well.