The Revolution Factory

CHAPTER THIRTY

When DarkFlood put an end to the criminal gangs of the city a power vacuum was left that he neglected to account for. Too distracted with Dr. Fitzsimons chasing him down, DarkFlood never saw what was coming next...


3 Days Ago


Jack and Dr. Randolph sat in a booth along with Jack's backpack by the window of a diner off Route 66. "How're your powers out here?"

"It's getting harder to get back each time," Jack went on, cutting his pancakes with his fork, "Must be something about long distance jumps."

"It's a shame all this had to happen. I still ha-"

"It's a shame you couldn't still be sleeping with my wife behind my back?"

"..." Dr. Randolph could plead his case now, he could...

But he ignored it and continued, "I still had a final phase of testing for all your developing powers."

"Like what?" Jack conceded, slowly allowing Dr. Randolph into his good graces. For they both knew Dr. Randolph did nothing wrong but keep it from Jack, besides that, he need not feel any guilt. Back when Jack was Philip Dresden, he was separated with his wife for years. It was not until the day he regained his sight did they come back together, but he left for Afghanistan that very day and was never heard from again. So who was truly in the right?

"Like your teleportation...if you hold your breath...can you jump into water or even space?"

"Remarkable, Doc." Jack was flabbergasted by Randolph's gall, "Do you want to be me?"

Dr. Randolph looked up from his egg whites and whole grain toast, "...I'm just fascinated by your condition..."

"...That's all..."

* * *

Jack teleported back on top of the roof across the street and made sure the coast was clear before going inside. Once in, he grabbed what he needed when he saw Jason's hat on the bedpost, he must have forgotten it in all the haste and confusion. A soldier pops out of the closet and the lights and alarms go off, the trooper tackles DarkFlood with an assault rifle harnessed around his shoulders and stuck in between them. A net falls from the ceiling and lands over both of them.

Jack teleports out, accidentally taking the soldier with him. They land on the mats in Sensei's old dojo next door. Free from the net, Jack springs up and beats the living shit out of the soldier. Using a combination of short teleportations and Flood technique, Jack finished him off with a hay-maker. The soldier was rocked off his feet and out of consciousness. Jack caught his breath.

He laughed that instinct and impulse brought him here. One of the safest places in his world, up there with his grandfather's old cabin by the lake. Sensei's dojo held a special place in his heart. That's when he realized, that day of the fire...when he discovered what Sensei left behind for them. Jack brushed his vest off as his cape flapped behind him, shaking itself clean, and he walked over to the giant chest. He opened it and took the ancient scrolls out. A beeping sounded off from behind. The soldier had a tracker on. They were coming. Jack teleported away.

Jack lands outside the city block after a quick twitch back across the country handing the Doctor the scrolls and coming back. After such a far jump he would not be able to teleport for a little while. Why didn't he stay with Randolph and avoid risking the danger of going back? Jack had to find Sarah. He watches the cops move in. They were sheep. This was getting a little disappointing for Jack. With Fitzsimons out of commission for the time being, it looks like Jack had nothing to be afraid of. The spotlights return only this time they catch DarkFlood on the rooftop.

Instead of teleporting away Jack must wait before he is fully recharged and so he utilizes some of his other abilities for a change. He leaps across each building and can feel the muscles in his legs stretching and strengthening. In fact his whole body was transforming, adapting, evolving; not just his legs. Randolph's theories were turning out to be right. Jack's abilities grew the more he used them. Jack summoned all his might in the last leap off the building's rooftop.

He shot his hands out and slung his cloak out over both of his arms. The gesture acts as a switch and the cloak turns into stretched cloth over a rigid glider-like exoskeleton. The helicopters carrying the spotlights chase after him, but just as they come into firing range, DarkFlood turns around, abandoning his glide, and flips them off before teleporting off; not far. Just far enough to get him away, he was still drained. No Jack picked a place he was familiar with, he went to the top of the Empire State Building.

DarkFlood stood just below the massive antenna at the top of the most infamous skyscraper in the world. Hopefully, he would be safe in plain sight for awhile. He desperately needed to conserve his energy to teleport back across the country to Randolph and the scrolls. Jack felt something emerging from his entity. He felt this sort of...excitement...like he had never felt before. He was stuck inside his head and for all he knew it felt good. He was in touch with the collective soul of the city.

The antenna was pulling every cry for help in the city to DarkFlood's mind. He could hear them all. He could see the tear of faith and hope within the city, the heartache, the darkness brewing. He could feel the fear out on the streets of the city. A city ripe for deviance and crime. No longer did the drug dealers and gangsters rule the underworld. The criminal fraternity was dead, and in their absence a cancerous kind took over.

Murderers and rapists who preyed on women and children, bank robbers that kill their own just to better a share or profit, and sociopaths set out to watch the city burn itself down infested the alleyways and shadowed street corners. When the cops tried to intervene they were mercilessly slaughtered.

This was out of their league and the innocent were paying the price. Fitzsimons used this recent rise in crime to cover up his private sector infiltrating the city. Disguised as martial law, they were officially here to keep the public safe. But that is not what they did. The city run red with the blood of the innocent while troops needlessly search each borough for Jack. It was undeniable. Only DarkFlood was to blame. He had no idea what the ripples of his actions entailed. But for now, he was beginning to see the toll. One thing was for sure. He could not stop now.

DarkFlood must save the city that he condemned with his foolish attempt at vigilante justice.

The stream of cries and prayers were all too much for one man to bear. Jack lost focus on his surroundings and lost his grip along with it. He threw his hands over his ears to try and make it stop. Jack fell off of the skyscraper ledge and plummeted one hundred and four stories to the floor.

He was not in control. This new psychic ability was undisciplined and incapacitating him. Jack fell helplessly as the voices got louder and louder. He passed the fiftieth floor. His eardrums were on fire. They would not stop. Jack passed out and the voices still persisted. His mind shut down in an attempt to reboot and Jack slipped into a coma. He passed the thirteenth floor with nothing to stop him...

* * *


2 Days Ago


Faulkner talked to Fitzsimons via satellite, "What do we do next, sir?"

"Clearly you will not find him like this...combing the city neighborhood by neighborhood has only proven ineffective. No, you will have to do something else," Fitzsimons elaborated, "something more, something cold and calculated... You must make him come to you."

"Sir...?"

"Prepare the package."

"Yes sir."

* * *


1 Day Ago


"They're looking for you..."

Jack was still dazed. He could not recall what had happened, nor how much time had passed since the Empire State Building. He was in a bed, in the dark. It looked like he had been there for awhile. There was a bandage going around his head, over his brow. His DarkFlood equipment was still on, but his face was not covered with anything. Whoever this was now knew Jack was DarkFlood.

Jack could hear him in the kitchen, using the sink. He tried to get up from the bed, but when he got to his feet Jack was shaken like he had severe vertigo and landed back down on the bed. The man walked in to the dark room from the lit hallway. All Jack could see was his approaching silhouette holding a tray. He placed the tray down on the nightstand.

"Chinatown is under martial law....because of you..." the man handed Jack a teacup, "....Drink."

Jack sipped the tea. If this man was trying to kill him, he would have already.

"I knew it was you the whole time. Ever since the fire..."

Moses comes into the light emitting from the candle on the nightstand. Jack laughed. He could not believe it.

"...You...but how?"

"There will be a time when I can explain everything, but now that you are up we need to get out of here."

"Why?"

"They're searching this complex next. I was going to hide you but you're awake now."

"Okay." Jack tried to stand up again but Moses quickly put his hands on his shoulders, keeping him on the bed.

"Easy...I'm gonna help you. Gather your strength," Moses said as he walked out of the room and down the hallway.

Moses came back in the room with clothes in his hands, "First get rid of that costume, they are looking for 'DarkFlood'" he explained as he threw Jack the clothes, "and getting dressed will help you stretch out. Then when you're ready...we're gonna make a run for the roof."

And that is exactly what they did. When the swat team got to Moses' floor they were already on the roof searching for a way out. Jack was still struggling to walk and could not do so without leaning on Moses. He sat on the edge of the guard rail around the roof while Moses tried to access the fire escape.

"Wait!" Jack tried to exclaim.

Moses kept shaking the lock trying to get it loose.

"Wait dammit!"

Moses finally stopped and came back over to Jack, "What?"

"I...I can...tele....I can...get us outta here..."

"You can barely breathe." Moses continued to work at the lock to the fire escape as the military men finished sweeping the floors of the apartment complex. Jack tried to teleport away. Moses was right. He was too weak to do anything but sit there and wait. Moses kept striking the lock.

Jack looked up at the sun. It was a beautiful day. He closed his eyes and felt the warmth on his eyelids. Jack opened his eyes back up and saw a helicopter between himself and the sun making an inbound flight. Instead of landing on the roof right away, the helicopter hovered in the air before them and turned showing its side. The door opened and inside was an estranged Faulkner with a female hostage.

"NO!" Jack screams, adrenaline rushing the nerves back into his system, he steps off Moses, "FAULKNER!"

The helicopter blades blast unapologetic noise through the air, it muddles the senses. Moses cannot tell what is going on, or who that woman is. He rushed to the door back downstairs. It was locked, and he could hear the swat team on the other side. They were surrounded.

"DON'T DO THIS!"

The gunshot was barely heard, except for Jack. His pursuing scream was heard by every soul in New York. It nearly deafened Moses. "What was that!?"

The hostage's body leaks out of the chopper bound and limp through the Manhattan canopy.

Jack fell to his knees as the helicopter turned away to leave. Moses came up next to him. Jack was emotionally paralyzed. "That was my wife..."

Only the sun remained.

And in that one instant of total destitution, a second sun was born in the sky. Both lights conjured a spark in Jack's eyes, of something he had never felt before. A tear dropped down on top of Jack's head. He looked up at Moses who was looking at the suns too, reflected in both his eyes. He was experiencing the same thing.

The 2 Suns affected mankind instantaneously. It was a precursor, a preliminary, a blueprint being laid down for something much bigger. Jack knew Sensei's scrolls were about the 2 Suns Prophecy, he had mentioned it before...during his training. This world was in for a revolution, one that has only happened once before in the early days of earth, an age believed to be the birth of all the basic elements found on the periodic table. And Jack had the key to it all safely hidden away with Dr. Randolph where only he could find them. Yet, Jack was only focused on one thing right now...

Avenging Sarah's death.