#2: Checkmate

[Drake]

Ultimate Outsiders #2
Checkmate
By Drake

“Who the hell are you?” Harper Row growled out, fists clenched as she stood in a fighting stance in front of her armored intruder.

“I told you…” the blue armored teen stood up, arms held up defensively, “my name is Jaime Reyes.”

Harper recoiled as the other teen stood up. She dived to the side of Jaime and pulled a pistol out from under a pillow on her bed. Jaime’s armored left arm morphed into a cannon.

“Put the…cannon down!” Harper shouted, her arms shaking as she aimed at the other teen.

“I can’t exactly just ‘put it down!’” Jaime argued.

“I’m giving you to the count of three!”

“I’m sorry! I swear I didn’t want this—this thing to happen! You just scared the armor!” Jaime shook his arm and continued to shout at it.

“Stop shaking that around!” Harper demanded, “You’ll blast the damn ceiling in!”

“Sorry! Sorry!” Jaime stopped moving and stared intently at the cannon, “Stop. Now.” The cannon transformed back into a relatively normal blue armored hand while Harper just stared at Jaime incredulously. This was one weird kid.

“Listen, I…” the armor slid back from Jaime’s head to expose a gaunt, surprisingly handsome latino teen, “My name is Jaime Reyes…but I told you that, like, twice. I…I really need your help. You are Harper Row: Bluebird, right?”

“How the hell do you—“

“I knew it!”

Both Harper and Jaime swiveled around to see Cullen Row, Harper’s younger brother.

“I freaking knew it! You are Bluebird!” Cullen exclaimed, hands thrown into the air expressively.

“Damn it, Cullen! You’re supposed to be asleep!” Harper scolded.

“What? With all this racket? Who is that guy, anyway? Blue Beetle?” Cullen pointed to Jaime.

“Blue…no—I’m…actually, I like that. Blue Beetle…” Jaime admitted, before seemingly muttering to himself, “What? No! That’s a much better name than ‘The Scarab’? That just sounds gross!”

Both Rows stared at Jaime as he argued with seemingly no one. Jaime noticed the stares and rubbed the back of his head embarrassedly.

“It’s, uh, you wouldn’t believe me if I told you.”

“Anyway,” Cullen turned back to Harper, grinning, “I freaking knew you were Bluebird! All the disappearances, the late night arrivals…”

“Cullen, fine, yes, I’m Bluebird. Just go to bed. I can’t deal with this right now,” Harper explained.

“But I can help you here…with whatever this is!”

“No. Bed. Now.”

“I’m fifteen-years-old, Harper!”

“Cullen!”

“Fine!” Cullen marched out of the room, “I love you too, sis,” he muttered sarcastically.

Harper sighed and ran a hand through her dark blue mohawk exasperatedly. She turned back to Jaime, gun now held at her side.

“So, why the hell do you need my help and how do you know who I am?”

Jaime couldn’t help but grin a little.

“You know, you’re a lot prettier when you aren’t angry.”

“What?” Harper blushed, the furious red standing out on her pale cheeks.

“Nothing. Just…I guess I’m a victim for pretty girls,” Jaime smiled flirtatiously.

Harper lifted up her pistol, holding it just an inch from Jaime’s face.

“Ok, now I’m really suspicious of you. No one, like ever, acts like you do, all freaked out and crazy and then suddenly charismatic and flirty and…Just stop. No one does that to me.”

“Well, they’re missing out then,” Jaime held his hands, “Sorry I’m into the punk rock thing you got going on. Please don’t shoot me.”

Harper suddenly became very aware of the piercings and every little blemish on her face. What the hell was this? Was this guy using pheromones on her?

“Just…tell my why you’re here.”

“Fine,” Jaime sat back down onto Harper’s bed. Harper didn’t move.

“Alright, you wanna know how I know who you are? The best way is…I think it’s gotta be just telling you my story. Like I said before, my name is Jaime Reyes. I live right here in Detroit. I work at this grocery store on Shartel after school and tonight, like, four hours ago, I was getting off work. I decided to take a short cut past this construction site…”

4 Hours Ago

BOOM!

Jaime Reyes skidded to a halt atop his skateboard as debris rained down from a construction site across the street. The explosion centered around the seventh floor of the building, and seemed to be caused by a blue chunk of rock that got blasted out of the building and into a sign that read ‘Kord Industries: Reaching Out To Help Since 1987.’

Kord Industries, huh? They were a cellphone developer. Jaime decided to check out the blue rock. Maybe it was a prototype, as odd as it seemed. Maybe he’d get paid for returning it.

Jaime rolled up to the sign and glanced around. No one else was coming around. He looked up. No one was looking out of the building. God, maybe someone was dead up there.

Jaime shook the thought away. Blue rock thing now, worrying about dead people later. He reached out to grab hold of the rock, which now at closer inspection proved to be some sort of bug-shaped backpack. Jaime’s only problem? The backpack reached back.

The blue object leaped out and morphed into a liquid form.

“Ah!” Jaime cried out, recoiling. The liquid slid under his sweatshirt and undershirt and moved all the way to his back where it nuzzles in around his spine. The action oddly brought warmth to Jaime’s body. It didn’t hurt, it just…

“AGH!”

Jaime collapsed to the ground as the blue object covered his body. Suddenly he could see images in his mind. The thing was in his head!

“GET! OUT!” Jaime shouted. Out of the corner of his eye, Jaime could see a man shout for help.

The images grew clearer. Jaime could see the building now…the Kord Industries construction site, back when it first started being built. He saw a man and a woman, but their faces were obscure. And…and a word. A word kept coming up.

Checkmate.

But that wasn’t the end of the images…or the words. A face. A beautiful, pale face appeared in Jaime’s mind. It was that of Harper Row. He knew the name instinctively. The object…the Scarab was telling him it. He needed to find her. Checkmate wanted her. Checkmate…it was organization, and it wanted…

The images and words stopped. That’s all the Scarab knew. Whatever that thing was, it was sentient, and it had been taken or created by Checkmate. But what did Checkmate want?

^I do not know, but the girl is the key.^

There was the voice again. The Scarab. And it made one thing clear—Jaime needed to find Harper Row.

Now

“So…that thing told you?” Harper pointed to the blue armor on Jaime’s armor.

“Yeah.”

“And it can…make weapons?”

“And allow me to fly, among other things,” Jaime concluded, “It’s pretty cool, actually, when it isn’t yelling at me.”

“Wow…” Harper collapsed onto the bed beside Jaime, “Your…your parents, do they know?”

“I haven’t seen them since the morning. It’s not a big deal though. My parents are pretty chill about me staying out late,” Jaime explained.

Harper massaged her forehead. There was so much to take in. At least one thing was solved. Checkmate was the organization giving the supervillains their power boosts, and they were the ones killing them. Harper had only one thing she could do now. She had to go back to work.

“You’re coming with me to see a friend, but I’m gonna have to blindfold you,” Harper said, standing up.

“OK…but it won’t make a difference. The Scarab can let me see through things. That’s X-Ray vision, right?” Jaime replied.

Harper crossed her arms, “Really?”

“Yeah,” Jaime grinned mischievously, “You’re wearing a blue sports bra and…are those hearts on your….?”

“Shut up, perv!” Harper smacked Jaime, causing the armor to transform both of his arms into swords.

“Sorry! For both the swords and the peeping! I needed to prove the blindfolding was no use somehow, right?”

“You could’ve just told me if my brother was actually asleep!” Harper exclaimed.

“He isn’t.”

“That’s a big help now!”

“Sorry! Super sorry!” Jaime apologized.

“Ugh! Whatever!” Harper turned away, “Just give me a second to get changed, then we’ll leave.”

“To where, if you don’t mind me asking?” Jaime wondered.

Harper briefly turned back around and actually smiled, “My super secret headquarters, of course.”

The Nest

The elevator doors slid open, allowing Bluebird and Beetle in to Harper’s dubbed “super secret headquarters.” The HQ’s manager was not happy in the slightest about this sudden arrival.

“Who the hell is he??” Cameron Snow said.

“Relax. He’s a friend. I think. And he knows about Checkmate.” Harper retorted.

“I know!” Cam, once-Batwing, replied.

“How would you know?”

“I have your entire apartment bugged!”

“WHAT?”

“Ooh, that’s messed up,” Beetle whispered.

Cameron ignored the problem at hand, continuing with his rant, “That isn’t the problem now, Harper! Did you ever consider that maybe he wanted you to bring him here? Or maybe, at the very least that Blue Beetle was—no pun intended—bugged!”

As if on cue, the ceiling above The Nest caved in, as the secret base’s automatic defense systems unleashed burst after burst of electrically charged pellets at the cause of the cave in—a teenaged boy!

The mystery boy was the tallest in the room, standing a few inches above Cameron. His dark hair was long, nearly shoulder length, and it contrasted strictly with his ice-blue eyes and pale skin, which made it almost seem as if he’d never seen the light of day. The electric pellets bounced off the boy’s chest and suit, a simple black skintight jumpsuit decorated with a large green ‘V’ at the center, that was surrounded by an equally green hollow upside-down triangle.

Cameron Snow took no time to brag about his point, “Bluebird, run!”

“Wait! What if he’s not an enemy?” Bluebird began, “What if—“

But she was silenced as the intruder leaped for her, growling incoherently. He was blasted away by Blue Beetle, whose arm had yet again turned into a cannon.

“Yeah, definitely not friendly, bonita,” Blue Beetle said, “And I swear, my armor isn’t bugged. I mean, it would tell me if it was…I think.”

“Enough!” Bluebird had leaped into action. She realized the intruder was bullet proof, so she had to scramble to come up with a plan. He had to have a weakness, just like that guy in Metropolis. Speaking of, he kind of looked like Super…

“RAH!” The Intruder tackled Beetle into the ground. The azure armored teen had tried to blast the other teen away, but the seemingly inhuman man had just continued forward, shaking the energy burst off.

“Back off, ese,” Beetle pushed The Intruder’s face away, “And don’t bite me!”

Luckily for Blue Beetle, Cameron Snow had brought out the big toys. He fired a highpowered harpoon gun at The Intruder, knocking him away. The force of the shot caused Cam’s chair to tip over, and he fell helplessly to the ground.

“God, I gotta get me one of those.” And in response, Beetle’s cannon arm transformed into a near-replica of the harpoon gun, only shaded blue, “Sweet!”

“Less chitchat, more kick ass!” Harper ordered, flipping over a desk and pulling her taser gun off of it. She figured it couldn’t do much, but it may slow The Intruder down long enough for Beetle to blast the guy to smithereens.

“Hey, me Grimlock!” Harp quipped, causing The Intruder to look up, “Get a load of this!” She fired half a dozen pellets at the teen. On contact, they exploded, erupting into static electricity. The superhuman shook it off.

Beetle effortlessly followed up with a harpoon, hitting The Intruder square in the chest. He was knocked to the ground, but he got right back up.

“Stay down, ese!” Beetle’s arm transformed again and fired a staple, sticking the superhuman into the headquarters’ reinforced steel wall. “I really need to stop speaking Spanglish when I get stressed.” Beetle mused.

Again, the superhuman broke his restraints like they were nothing. He spent no time charging Beetle faster than Harper could see. The armored teen tried to blast him with more giant staples, but The Intruder simply dodged them, and grabbed Beetle by the neck. He threw him away and into a life-size piñata, the spoils of a victory months ago.

Next, he turned his attention to Harper. It was all Cameron could do to scream out her name. The vigilante shrugged her mentor’s cries away. No running now. It looked like there was gonna be no winning either. That meant she had only one option: a good death.

“C’mon, brawn over brains. Or are you ‘too much of a man’ to hit a girl?” Harper raised her stun gun.

“It won’t work,” The Intruder said.

“Oh, so he can speak!”

The Intruder didn’t relay any sort of emotion other than anger, “I don’t want to do this…stop me. Lead.”

“What? Lead, like the…”

“STOP ME!” The Intruder shouted, leaping towards Harper. The teen girl cussed and ducked under the superhuman’s primary attack, but she soon found herself caught in his clutches, being gripped by the throat.

“If only you were faster…maybe the others would live…” The Intruder seemed genuinely sad now. Maybe it was the lack of oxygen getting to her brain, but Harper could swear that thing in his eyes, what she’d thought was anger, was actually pain.

“Yeah, well, the others aren’t so dead yet!” Beetle fly-tackled The Intruder away, “And guess what, ese, you are not…”

The superhuman punched Blue Beetle away and into a wall.

However, this distraction gave Cameron Snow exactly the time he needed to make a move. He’d heard The Intruder’s words; he’d seen the expression on his face. Cam had crawled over to the computer and pulled open the drawer beneath it. Inside lay a last option, something he’d swore he’d never use again…

Cam pulled out a pistol. This was no stun gun like Harper’s. It was loaded with genuine bullets. The Intruder caught sight of the gun.

“Good!” He shouted, “Hit me somewhere my suit doesn’t cover.” That was only his neck and head.

“HARPER!” Cameron called out, throwing the gun to his partner.

“What?” Harp turned, eyes wide, but instinctively caught the gun, “But—“

“I can’t stop. I’m sorry. There’s a bomb in my chest.” The Intruder calmly said, running towards Harper.

The teen rotated back around to The Intruder and turned the safety off on the pistol. She lifted it up. There was no way she could kill him…but there was no time. It was him or her. The Intruder stepped towards Harper, arm held back to punch her. He was just a foot away. Him or her.

Harper fired.