~~~

Chloroform was surprisingly sweet.

Tim figured it was chloroform because why else would a couple of strangers put a wet rag over his mouth? People didn’t just walk around putting rags drenched in juice over someone’s face. They did put rags with pee on it sometimes, during wars and stuff. Apparently, it helped filter out gases or something, but Tim was pretty sure that wasn’t the case here.

Besides, pee didn’t smell sweet.

Unless you ate a lot of fruit or something. Maybe. Something to look up later but not really relevant right now.

He was being kidnapped.

Struggling should have been his first instinct, but Tim was from Ulik. His fight-or-flight response had long since been replaced by pretend-you-didn’t-see-anything-and-just-keep-walking. Unfortunately, that meant it took Tim a relatively long time to realize he should probably be trying to break free. Indeed, the instant the thought took shape in his head, all of his muscles tensed like coiled springs ready to be unleashed.

Tim hesitated.

Wouldn’t starting a fight in the middle of the street be too dangerous? Especially one so close to his home? These guys weren’t random muggers. No way. They probably had guns and stuff. If a fight broke out here, it could very well be someone Tim knew getting hurt. He’d seen plenty of comics where something like that happened. A guy at the comic store said it was propaganda to discourage vigilantism by impressing upon undiscovered Exceeds how their uncontrolled actions could easily have negative consequences on the general public. Tim thought that guy was thinking way too hard, but still.

Fighting here was probably not the best idea.

So, Tim played along. He went limp, pretended the chloroform was working—weird that it wasn’t—and let himself be carried into a dark van.

“Got him!” One of the goons shouted as the doors were shut with force. Someone banged against the window. “What are you waiting for? Let’s move!”

The reply did not come in words but in the sound of tires screeching against the asphalt as the van took off.

“That was way easy,” some guy said.

As if to taunt him, the van made a sharp turn left. Something bumped against it as everyone inside was sent tumbling around. Tim had the misfortune of rolling head-first into someone’s knee.

“Hey!” One of the mooks banged his fist against the window. Either that or some sort of division between the back of the van and the front. “Watch it!”

“Sorry!” someone, probably the driver, shouted back. “Couldn’t get out of the way in time!”

“Just get us there in one piece.” There was some rustling as everyone found a place to sit. “Say, you sure this kid is an Exceed? Dee is right. That was too easy.”

“Look, if my man says the kid is an Exceed, he’s an Exceed. So, what if it was too easy? That just means Joey was right about him being a kid that just came into his powers. Ain’t that right, Joey?”

“Y-Yes! He’s just some kid from around the neighborhood. They won’t notice he’s gone for a while.”

Tim’s fist didn’t clench.

His muscles did not tense.

His teeth didn’t gnash against each other.

Doing that would have required something Tim didn’t have: Control over his body. At that moment, Tim felt very far away. He hadn’t just taken his hands off the driving wheel. He had parked in the middle of a traffic jam, left the door open, and bought a packet of M&Ms at a store. Then he’d just kept walking, leaving the car behind, alone and forgotten.

Joey had sold him out.

Was that surprising?

No.

It wasn’t.

This was the same guy who’d tried to rob him the other night. Were it not for his Exceed powers kicking in, Tim would have been left lying on that alley with a big stab wound.

He’d probably be dead.

So no. Tim wasn’t surprised Joey was doing something shitty again. What was surprising was that Joey knew halfway decent kidnappers, halfway decent kidnappers that now knew where he lived and that he was an Exceed because stupid Joey had blabbed.

That was no bueno. No bueno at all.

His awesome plan of hitting everyone inside the van before they could start shooting was not going to work now. These guys felt like a gang or something. If so, there was no telling how many people knew about him. If Tim beat these guys and escaped, he’d be inviting another attempt. Who was to say the next one won’t be them breaking into his house in the middle of the night. No way he was going to put his mom at risk.

Tim needed to wait.

As soon as this van took Tim to whatever hideout these guys had, everyone was getting punched.

Or kicked. That worked too.

Tim wasn’t picky.

~~~

It took half an hour for the van to stop. Tim would like to say that meant he had a rough idea of where they were, but that’d be a lie. They could be in Kentland, or maybe they had driven around in circles and were near the docks. They could even be down south. Who knew?

Halfway through, one of the goons had put another rag with chloroform over his mouth. This one had so much in it Tim was left smelling of rotten fruit. It was a miracle he’d managed to keep still while that happened.

Also, he was definitely immune to chloroform. Tim hadn’t known that was an Exceed thing.

Maybe that was his power? Some sort of chemical immunity? Not as cool as he’d have wanted, but it was coming in handy right now.

As the doors of the van opened, two gang members moved to grab him.

“Is it just me, or is he kind of heavy for such a little guy?” asked one of them.

“He’s dead weight, brah. Of course, he’s heavy.”

“He’s heavier than before.”

“He’s right,” said someone else. “He feels heavier now.”

“Than when we carried him into the van? Of course, you’d think so. It was all of us doing that. Now it’s just you two. You’re just letting him being an Exceed get in your head, brah. Just bring him inside. We’re almost done with this.”

“I don’t see you helping out.”

“I’m the one with the key.”

A big padlock, probably a brass one from how it rattled, was unlocked. Tim could feel how the air changed from cool and salty (so maybe they were near the docks) to stale and moldy as he was carried into a building of some sort.

“You brought him?”

That was a new voice. Deeper. Older. Almost definitely the boss.

“One Exceed ready for harvesting, boss.”

That sounded bad.

“We’ll see whether he’s an Exceed soon enough. Put him in the cage.”

That sounded worse.

Okay, not really, but a cage meant metal bars. Metal bars were not something Tim was sure he could bend or break. There were about fifteen people, ten guns, and four stun guns in the room. None of the people with stun guns were close to him, which meant this was probably the best time to break loose.

Wait, how did he know all that stuff just now?

That was freaky.

And worrying.

It was a worry for later, though.

Tim’s eyes snapped open, immediately making contact with one of the guys carrying him. Confusion. Shock. Panic. All those emotions flashed across the goon’s face in an instant.

A lone light bulb flickered above them.

Tim twisted his body, shaking off the grips of his kidnappers. His hands and feet touched the floor, his posture vaguely resembling a racer at the starting line. However, there was no firing gun as Tim bum-rushed the guy closest to him, tackling the man’s much larger body all the way to the nearest wall and slamming him against it. Shouts and yells filled the warehouse as Tim turned around.

Two levels, one cage, a bunch of crates, sticky floors, and one lone lightbulb illuminating the place.

Formulating battle plan...

Suggesting battle plan…

Okay. That worked.

Tim snatched the guy he’d just tackled and hoisted him over his shoulders as if he weighed no more than a baseball.

He threw him like one.

Skull connected against skull as one of the gang members found himself the target of Tim’s human projectile. He went down like a bowling pin.

Thirteen left.

“Get him!”

Tim’s surroundings blurred as he followed the suggested route, zipping over to the next mook and burying his fist deep into his stomach. The acceleration boosted Tim’s punch and sent the mook flying into a support beam. Another mook raised his gun at him. Tim pivoted sharply to the right, ducking behind one of the crates. He tore a plank of wood and made two more rights to come at the guy from behind and hit him.

His gun—Smith & Wesson Model 645, semi-automatic, 8-Round Box Magazine—clattered to the floor.

Eleven left.

Tim went back in between the crates for cover. “After him!” someone yelled, one of the goons that had been on the van. The sounds of footsteps chasing after him were loud on Tim’s ears. Using his knee, Tim broke the wooden plank into three pieces. The first one missed, so did the second one.

The third one struck the lone flickering lightbulb dead on and submerged the room in darkness. Shouts, screams, and shots filled the warehouse.

Tim put his shoulder against one of the crates and pushed.

The large crate skidded across the floor and slammed into a group of mooks, trapping them against the wall. Tim gave it an extra push for good measure, further squeezing them there.

Eight left.

A panicked goon on the second level started firing blindly, yelling and screaming at everything.

“Shit! Calm down!” Someone bellowed, but it was no use. The gun kept firing until it was empty.

Tim hopped atop one of the crates and used that as a springboard to reach the second level. He’d like to think he was being all sneaky like Sentinel, but he was pretty sure the only reason why no one was listening to him was that everyone was yelling.

Oh, well.

Tim kneed a guy in the face and felt something crack, probably the guy's nose. Any twinge of pity Tim may have felt was quickly smothered when he saw this guy was wearing one of those unofficial Circle shirts

Seriously, fuck anyone who wore Circle merch.

That was just wrong.

The guy who had already emptied his gun came next. The poor dude was all shaking in a corner, holding his gun like a security blanket. His eyes were so bloodshot you could scarcely see the white in them. Was he a druggie too? It was something Tim briefly considered as he socked him across the jaw.

Six.

“Shit! Move out! Everyone! We’re getting out of here!”

No.

No, they were not.

The people on the second level headed for the stairs. Even if Tim hadn’t been able to see perfectly in the dark, he’d know that. He dashed to intercept them, barely having the time to see their eyes widen in surprise before he was right in between them, limbs lashing out and bodies hitting the floor.

Two.

The sound of the padlock rattling reached his ears.

Tim jumped.

The guy barely had the time to turn around as Tim came running at him at top speed, his fist already drawn back.

One.

~~~

No, no, no!

It didn’t make any sense, Joey thought, all huddled up in some dark corner of the warehouse. This was supposed to be easy! It was supposed to help him pay! His mind would finally make sense once more!

How had it all gone so wrong?

Tim was knocked out. They had told him he would be knocked out for a while. Exceeds weren’t supposed to be all that. They had told him that!

Tim was just some kid. Nothing more. His only experience with fights should have been the ones he saw at school and the ones from those old Chinese movies Carlos sometimes sold.

Being an Exceed didn’t change that!

They had told him that and-!

Blue eyes mere inches away from his looked right into his soul.

“Boo!”

Joey didn’t scream.

He fainted.

~~~

“Seriously, dude?” Tim asked the prone Joey. He poked him with his foot a little to see if he was faking it. Then he kicked Joey for, well, kicks. “I can’t believe I ever thought you were kind of cool.”

It would have been so dramatic if they actually talked too!

Tim sighed.

Whatever.

He carried Joey’s useless body and dropped it in the cage with the others. It was kind of cramped in there, but eh, who cared? Tim had already taken their guns, tasers, and other valuables. Now came the tricky part.

Using a phone he’d pilfered from one of them, he dialed a three-digit number.

“Hello, 911?”

Sending these guys to jail basically guaranteed they’d tell the police all about him. It was not ideal, but… eh. He was always going to reveal himself to CHEM. Better sooner than later. Maybe he’d even be able to get a patrol car near his house.

It sucked to admit it, but if some third-rate mooks like these had almost gotten him, there was no telling what would happen in the future. It was just pure luck he’d been immune to chloroform.

Ah, this sucked.

~~~

“Interesting. He’s calling 911.”

“I take it we’re intercepting the call.”

“Of course, we are.”

~~~

Tim returned home ready to get an earful from his mom.

Instead, he found a patrol car outside his building. Had the police already gotten there to see him? If so, they were way faster than he thought they were.

“Tim!” Mr. Espinoza came running at him. He had never looked angrier. His chest heaved like a dragon about to breathe fire. “Stupid child! Where have you been?!”

“Mr. Espinoza!” Tim reflexively waved at him. “Hey! What are you doing here?”

“Tim…” Mr. Espinoza let out a tired sigh. The fire left him. “Something’s happened. Your…”

“Is this the victim’s son?” a police officer asked, coming up from behind Mr. Espinoza.

Victim?

Son?

Mr. Espinoza harshly shushed him. “I’m getting to that. Tim… I am sorry. There was an accident. Your mother...”

However, Tim wasn’t listening.

There had been a bump!

“Sorry… Couldn’t get out of the way in time!”

Bump.

“Sorry… Couldn’t get out of the way in time!”

Bump.

“Sorry… Couldn’t get out of the way in time!”

That had been...

“Sorry… Couldn’t get out of the way in time!”

That had been his...

~~~