#7 The Brave and the Blue

[The Wonderful Wachter]

Ultimate Brave and the Bold #7
The Brave and the Blue

Kord Electronics
Seigelville, Texas

When a three-day fieldtrip to Seigelville, Texas had been suggested last year for the sophomore class, parents were fine with the concept. Sure, it was a big city with its own brand of major crime, but that could be said of any place not set in the suburbs of Midwest America. Then the Brave and the Bold started filming in the city. A giant prison break occurred. Freaks in costumes showed up on a daily basis, televised for all to see.

Parents were understandably concerned with the safety of their children and voted against the trip. Suffice to say, the students were unhappy with this turn of events. One enterprising member of the student-body wrote a fan letter to the Blue Beetle lamenting about the failed trip. That letter somehow found its way to Ted Kord, Beetle’s Owner and the CEO of Kord Electronics. The billionaire took it upon himself to surprise the entire school with a visit, inviting concerned parents and teachers alike. He reassured them that the city was safe. Safer than most even with the super-crimes.

It didn’t quite work out.

Then he opened his checkbook and funded the entire trip while simultaneously accepting legal responsibility should any danger befall the students and chaperones. It made national headlines. All the way from Gotham to Coast City.

They got their trip.

Unfortunately for Jaime Reyes, Kord never made public the fan responsible for bringing this travesty to his attention. And nearly everyone in his class took credit for it. Some more than most. But he knew the truth. He had written that letter. Blue Beetle was his favorite hero. He voted for him every chance he could get. Even had his own pair of Beetle-Eyes; a replica of Blue Beetle’s goggles.

Jaime was a plain kid of obvious Hispanic descent. A little bit below average height, a tad bit scrawnier than most kids his age, he still held hope for one last burst of puberty to give him that much needed increase in mass. Made him somewhat a target for bullies and jokers. Nevertheless, he dealt with it as best he could. Turned the other cheek and all that jazz.

Too bad for him, turning the other cheek left his right cheek open to a spitwad shot out of Eddie’s straw. The bigger and blonder jock boasted the most out of all his classmates. Said his aunt, who happened to work at BlueGold Media as a producer, put a good word in for them. That was even the reason why Kord refused to make the student’s name public. The rich guy didn’t want to make it look like he was playing favorites.

“Hey!” the freckle-faced Brenda yelled at both Eddie and Jaime’s supposed friend Paco who was currently laughing his ass off. She was a giant firecracker with extra pop in a cute girl’s body. Petite, red hair, a tad tomboyish at the moment with her N7 T-shirt and cargo shorts, she was about to leap to his defense when Jaime pulled her back down.

He really didn’t need a girl to fight his battles.

Paco closed his mouth and had the decency to look shamefaced. Nearly twice Jaime’s size, the two of them had been friends for ages. Raised together. Played together. The cliques of high school had yet to break their friendship though at times like these, Jaime could feel the strain. Paco and Eddie were both on the JV football team and in the same honor classes back home. And well, in Texas, if you didn’t like football – Jaime – then well… it sucked to be you.

Still, here at the executive cafeteria for Kord Electronics, Paco had chosen to sit with Brenda and Jaime. Not his football buddies. Or worse… the brainiacs.

The trip had been disappointing so far. Kord had arranged for everything, including transport which Jaime swore had been under guard, and even greeted them on arrival. They toured the city for a bit but had encountered nothing Super-worthy. The best thing to happen was a visit down by the Gulf where Paco took a picture of Jaime sprawled on the ground in the same position af Renegade with Brenda standing over him like Batwoman.

Things seemed like they would look up at Kord Electronics. Or at least maybe they’d see Booster Gold or Blue Beetle but in reality… they watched cellphones and tablets and all other kinds of tech that had put Kord’s competition out of business get built by machines. The lesson there was go to school kids and you too can be a technician that makes sure robots don’t go Skynet on us all.

But hey, at least they had lunch up where the bigwigs ate. That lesson there implying you get better food based on how successful you were and how many underlings you had. However, Jaime had to admit, the food was delicious.

He stuffed his face while staring at the wall-length TV-screen, hoping beyond hope something cool would happen. If they didn’t get to see heroes in action or at least meet one then they might as well have gone to theme park like their parents wanted. Nothing special about Seigelville that they couldn’t find elsewhere beyond that. At least San Antonio had the Alamo and Six Flags.

And it happened.

Live footage from a chopper. The wall TV broke into dozens of smaller pictures from multiple angles. Jaime knew them to be images from the “Baby-Bugs” supposedly invented by his favorite hero. The floor vibrated from the increased sound and bass. It was like they were there with the heroes. They were riding shotgun with Blue Beetle in his Bug as he swooped down on a fleeing car from above.

They watched in amazement as the image zoomed in on the car, one with swept back fins of a classic yet possessing a roaring engine. The teal plating reflected the afternoon sun magnificently. Gave the camera quite the artistic lens-flare.

“Blue Beetle, following up on a lead brought to him by yours truly,” gloated the announcer Charles Szasz, “Is about to end this high speed chase before the Twins can even get out of bed. Quite the change in pace. And believe it or not folks, that is the suspects’ car. Classy.”

One of the baby-bugs managed to get inside the car, granting the audience a clear view of the three inside. The two in the back looked like brothers. Swarthy complexion with second hand suits, one had a mustache dripping with sweat and a pulsing vein across his bald head as he leaned out the window to take potshots of Blue Beetle with his gun. The other was terrified, sweating for all different reasons. He clenched the seat scared stiff, looking like it’d only take one more bounce before he’d start tearing out his hair.

“You said this would be easy,” screamed Mr. Mustache. “A simple exchange you said.”

“Lev, shush.”

“Don’t tell me to *BLEEP* shush! He said no heroes. There’d be distractions!”

The baby-bug panned over to show the driver for the first time. The girls in Jaime’s class screamed in horror. Paco coughed up his drink. It was a misshapen man in a mangy suit and the grossest face he had ever seen. The driver’s skin was green, his head unusual… almost toad-like. And worst of all he had bowler hat. Not a man Jaime wanted to walk into on a brightly lit street let alone a dark alley.

“Idiot jossers. They’re filming us! No names.” The toad-man screamed over his shoulder.

The two in back noticed the flitting mini camera for the first time. If the little machine felt fear, it was probably experiencing a bit right then. Static flared across the screen as they smashed the bug.

Jaime turned his attention to an open stretch of road, cleared by Beetle’s teammate, as it came into view for all to see, circling around Charlton Bay. The unusual bug-shaped airship fired a smoking canister over the fleeing vehicle’s hood. Twenty feet away it exploded into a sea of blue foam, covering the street from side to side. The toad driver tried to swerve out of the way; not knowing what would happen if they hit it.

The Bug hovered over the car to the sound of screeching breaks and squealing tires. An instant later, it had attached itself to the vehicle through some sort of magnetic connection. Jaime cheered from his seat as Blue Beetle flew off over Charlton Boy, criminals in tow beneath his ship.

The cheer turned to a groan of confusion when the screens turned white and fiery. His classmates followed suit. They talked amongst themselves waiting for the smoke to clear. That’s when the first pieces of blue wreckage fell from the sky, splashing into the water below.

An image focused in on hero dressed in gold on the edge of the explosion. Dismay crossed what bit of his face that could be seen beneath the mask. “Blue!”

Jaime wanted to scream too but he was speechless.

“Ladies and gentleman,” Szasz’s voice had caught in his throat. “It seems Blue Beetle has been shot down…” The image replayed itself in slow motion. At first Jaime wasn’t sure what he was witnessing, a shimmering form rocketed from the historic district, until the announcer cleared things up. “A phase-shifting missile has collided with his Bug.”

Reactions were shown from the other heroes arriving on the scene. Kaldur wasted no time before leaping into the Bay in search of Blue Beetle. The twins stumbled to a halt and reversed direction towards the shooter, closely followed by Cheshire piggy backing on Batwoman. Only Booster Gold remained frozen. The terror on his face shifted to rage the he too flew off.

Jaime slouched down, stunned. It wasn’t until Brenda and lifted him from his chair that he became aware of the blaring alarms.

---

Neon red lights that had once given Danni headaches had long since become yet another routine thing she dealt with while working in the depths of Kord Electronics. She was cute for a scientist, her long blond hair pulled back into a tail and her dark blue eyes hidden behind welding glasses. Beneath her lab coat, she had the whole mad scientist look going on, often forgetting to tuck in her shirt or wear business appropriate clothing. As long as it didn’t catch on anything, it was wearable to her.

Not that her appearance mattered to Ted Kord.

He hadn’t hired her for that.

No. He had known her for long time. They both had the same mentor… Her grandfather, the original Blue Beetle. She was as much responsible for his fortune and research as he was. She simply didn’t care about the fame and visible aspects as much as he did. Hers was a curious nature. Danni worried more about the next breakthrough than about the actual application.

A wave of cerulean light pulsed through her laboratory, washing over her and masking the scarlet energy for but a moment. Confounded, Danni raised her goggles and spun around in circle in her chair. The sarcophagus was still there. Built to the specifications found in the Scarab and her grandfather’s own research. Lines of red trace intricate patterns across its surface. As far as Danni and Ted could tell, the patterns did nothing but they were in the notes on Kha-Ef-Re.

Her eyes traced the strange alien energy cables flowing into the coffin back to its source. The Scarab. Crawling with wires, it provided limitless power to her current experiment. A much better use for it than trying to force more data out of the uncooperative machine. Sometimes she had thoughts like the Scarab was offended by it but those were nothing more than passing notions she squashed behind an analytical mind.

The Scarab was motionless. Danni stared at it for a few more seconds before returning to her computer and keeping her attention on the vitals within the sarcophagus. . . Her eyes widened in surprise. For a second… there had been a heartbeat from within. Her fingers flew over the keyboard, recording the data. Getting images from with—

Skritch. Skritch. Skritch…CRASH!

The scratching could be ignored. Sometimes the Scarab liked to stretch its legs against the glass. The crash on the other hand…

Danni screamed as something flew towards her head and ducked out of the way. The neon light faded from the room with her silence. She glanced up to see a softball size hole burned through the six inch thick steel door to the lab. Through it, she could see another hole in the contamination chamber and farther down, though she had yet to notice a third hole led into the building’s ventilation.

The scarab’s case stood empty.

She was all alone with the sarcophagus. Her eyes glanced back towards the monitor where yet another heartbeat had been recorded. It took her a full minute before she realized it was probably in her best interest to sound the alarm.

---

A single punch from Booster had all his frustrations behind it. Not again. Not again. Was all he could think. Ted was gone again. Every reality. Every single time, Ted died and there was nothing he could do about it. The duplicate in a maroon jumpsuit vanished as the fist punched through it.

Numerous. A pathetic jewel thief that had been plaguing the Brave and the Bold for over a week. He sent his copies all out through the city to steal but never before had he used such a level of violence. Never before had he been equipped with such advance technology so as to be able to take the Bug down in one shot. He normally wasn’t even violent.

That all changed today. Mas y Menos had seen one fleeing with a rocket launcher straight into Reaper territory. Numerous understandably split up to avoid being caught, leading them all on a merry chase, only for Batwoman and Cheshire to be waylaid by the hooded gangbangers. They had a bone to pick with Jade after her defeat of one of their lieutenants weeks ago.

With Skeets help, Booster used his advanced sensors to track down the more solid of the duplicates. Those with more substance. His belief was he’d eventually find the real copy and be able to make him talk… and bring him to justice of course.

Energy lanced out from Booster’s gauntlets to fry a herd of the clones intent on swarming him. As they popped into nothing, he caught sight of one fleeing through an alley. He seemed thicker… smarter. Booster steeled his resolve and flew over the building and landed with force before the murderer. He approached the man, knuckles cracking.

“Wait… You…. You can’t.”

“You killed a good man,” Booster grabbed him by the jumpsuit and tossed him into the brick wall where surprisingly he did not go poof. “My best friend.” Numerous slumped down to the dirty street. “You’ll pay for that.”

Then Numerous did something surprising. He sneered up at the hero. “Gotcha.” He vanished.

A roar of aggravation was all Booster had left to say and for a second he considered blasting the building to rubble as a stress reliever. But no. Ted could not be honored that way.

“Sir,” Skeets floated down in front of his face, “a dis—“

“Not now, Skeets.”

“-tress beacon has been activated,” he finished. “It belongs to Blue Beetle.”

“YES!” That time, Booster did fire off an attack. The brilliant gold beam shot high into the air. A sign of hope… a sign of relief that he had not lost Ted again.

---

Ted pulled himself to the bank of Charlton Bay, nursing fractured ribs and who knew what other kind of internal injuries. Hard to judge considering his current level of fourteen on a scale of one-to-ten in pain. He had ejected from the Bug a fraction of a second before the missile had collided with it. His suit had probably saved his life as it took the brunt of the explosion. Nevertheless, a few burning fragments had managed to pierce his skin and then there was fall down into murky depths of the bay.

It took quite some time to swim to the shores, injured as he was. And for some reason, his beacon had been disabled. He didn’t exist to his flitting baby-bug cameras. He gave off no signal. Grimacing, he pulled a tiny transmitter out of the back of his boot and activated it; not something he could do while swimming.

He shuffled farther inland, recognizing the place as the Seigelville trainyard. Perfect. Just perfect. The logical part of his mind knew this was the perfect place for an ambush. The pessimistic part of his mind pointed out that he was probably about to be attacked again. That attack had been pre-meditated. Planned.

The empty train cars loomed before him and he considered going back to the water to wait out his rescue. Of course, the gods of fate had something else in store for him. Like a twisted imitation of The Birds, figures in a maroon jumpsuit popped into existence for as far as the eye could see. On top of train cars, inside them, under and between wheels.

Numerous.

Great.

Holding his arm against his chest in pain, Ted pulled out his beetle-gun as the first baby-bug zoomed on scene. He opened fire on the villain before any could bring their guns to bear on him.

Where were Más and Menos when he needed them?

---

Lev helped pull a wet Mr. Toad from the waters of Charlton Bay. He tried not to grimace at the disgusting, slimy feeling of his boss’s fingers. Probably wouldn’t get him a better portion of the payout. Might even get him killed.

“Whatdida tell ya?” croaked the freakish man. “Mr. Toad’s a slip-slip-slippery customer. Nobody catches Toad if Toad doesn’t want to be…” his voice trailed off as something ball shaped fell past him to splash in the water and Lev’s headless body slumped to the ground.

Blue and red fire flickered before his eyes. It took a moment for his dull mind to comprehend that the fire was sprouting from a pair of swords. It took even longer for him to notice the figure dressed in the garb of some lost Templar holding the blades.

“How bout that?” the figure swept the flat of a blade against the side of his head.

---

I can fly! I can fly! Oh crap. That’s a wall!

Jaime crashed through a building with surprising force, feeling nothing until he was on the other side of structure, gray dust rushing off his newly formed armor. Mere minutes ago he had been on a tour, well… eating lunch, of Kord Electronics when alarms blared and the guide had tried shepherding them to some place safe. He had followed like the semi-good student he was – Brenda and Paco no longer needing to drag him along – when a skittering in a vent above him caused him to stop and look up.

It was like a giant, blue tick had fallen from the now open airduct and latched itself on his back. But it hadn’t sucked his blood. It hadn’t really done anything. Then there had been the sting. Quickly followed by a voice invading his mind and imagination. All this before he had the commonsense to scream for help. The group had moved on without him, leaving him to wonder when his friends would notice his absence.

Blue and black armor had erupted from his back. Wings followed that. A strange helmet, more a second skin than something metal, fused itself to his face and just as suddenly he saw the world in a new light. And heard that voice that had invaded his mind. Still faint, but there.

His body was stolen from him at that moment. Not that he cared. He was a Beetleborg with wings racing across Seigelville in the direction of flying choppers and the sound of battle. It was so epically awesome a feeling that he forgot all about not being in control. Up until he had crashed through a building that is.

Cannons burst from Jaime’s arms. The voice tilted his head down to focus on over a hundred beings in maroon swarming about a single man in blue. Around him were the helicopters. Below him were the beings and zooming baby-bug cameras Jaime recognized from Behind the Scenes with Brave and the Bold. It was literally Hero Time TV.

Which meant the single man in blue had to be the Blue Beetle. Relief washed through Jaime at the sight of his favorite hero still being alive. Yet… as he watched, Blue Beetle was in no condition to survive a prolonged fight after the explosion. Soon he was lost in a sea of maroon swarming out from traincars.

Brilliant white energy erupted forth from his arm cannons. The maroon sea more than parted. It flat out vanished in some cases and was tossed across the street in others. Jaime was horrified at what he had done. He, the suit, he couldn’t keep track had just murdered dozens of people. Yet, the feeling lessened when the voice told him they weren’t real. Merely copies.

Jaime rocketed down to the crisscrossing railroads, leaving another crater as he landed and destroying even more of the clones. Instantly, a sphere of shining azure exploded out of the armor, protecting him in a force field that electrified all those who touched it now that he had been noticed. His immediate area clear, the cannons and field vanished only to be replaced with a massive sword of glowing cerulean.

The armor cleaved its way through the wave of foes too numerous to count, shrugging off the potshots of occasional gunfire from the few who had weapons. The voice told him they had to save the Blue Beetle. That they had to save… Ted? A massive swing, a haymaker with ten foot blade, cleared a pile off his favorite hero. Suit torn, but chest still rising in breath, Beetle lay there.

Somehow he wasn’t surprised that Ted Kord was Blue Beetle. It kinda made sense. But there was no time for that. The man was not in good condition. His uniform was in shreds and a tad crispy. One goggle had busted open. He was bleeding from many wounds and soaked from head to toe.

Suffice to say… He wasn’t looking very heroic at the moment.

Before Jaime’s eyes, a HUD took readings of Beetle’s body in a language that Jaime could now innately understand. His hero would survive. But when those eyes opened, the heart beat raced and rage filled Ted. How could the armor know such things?

“Danni?” whispered a broken Blue Beetle.

“No,” Jaime was surprised to be able to move his own mouth. Even more surprised that the armor moved with him, showing teeth. “I think I’m just here for the ride.”

“The scarab has chosen then,” Ted muttered mostly to himself. He clicked on something on his belt and from across the way zoomed his Beetle-Gun into a waiting glove. “I’m not the right successor but it brought you here to save me no doubt.” A circle of duplicates had moved to surround the pair of Blue Beetles. “Well, get to saving.”

The voice in his head spoke clearly for the first time. ”!#% SER!@@# SDR”

“If you say so,” Jaime answered, happy he had his body back. Feeling like a samurai more than a knight, he split the sword into two smaller ones. Seemed the voice was right.

“I do say so,” stated Ted, bruised and unsteady but ready to fight. He obviously thought Jaime was talking to him. “We call him Numerous. You can see why.”

Together, Jaime and Ted proved why two beetles were better than one. Swords and concussive gun worked in tandem to clear the field. And soon enough, Numerous became Nothing.


---

“Wild Card strikes again, Szasz,” Linda dropped the case file on his desk, noticing for the first time he was something of a neat freak. Everything was perfectly aligned. Nothing out of place. Not a single speck of dust to be seen. The journalism award he won while working at the WGBS shined so much it almost blinded her when a stray beam of sunlight peaked through the blinds.

Charles looked at her over the tips of his boots propped on his desk. “Who this time? That General who kissed Kord’s ass last week?”

At the mention of Ted Kord, Linda kept her face completely emotionless. There was no hiding that he was Blue Beetle now. He crashed his car around the same time that Beetle survived a exploding airship… unlikely. Though with that second Blue Beetle on the scene and visibly mechanical, BlueGold Media’s official statement revealed that the Blue Beetles were highly advanced androids built by Kord Electronics. She didn’t buy that story for a second but the general public ate it up.

“No,” she flipped open the folder to reveal the crime scene photos of the headless corpse. “That Lev character who tried to flee from BB the other day. Four of Spades.”

Lines creased Charles’ forehead. “This is the first time the Wild Card has attacked someone outside the support deck. Wonder what changed things.”

Her only answer was a shrug.

“They never found that toad-looking man either.”

“Don’t forget about the third suspect.”

“Lev’s brother,” guessed the host. “They spoke with a Russian accent.” He rose to his feet suddenly, an idea forming. “The police haven’t identified him yet. Neither has that fancy software Kord wrote. We’re going to have to do this the old fashioned way.”

“Old fashioned way?”

Charles patted her shoulder and pulled her with him out the door of his office. “Legwork, my fair lady. Seigelville has quite the little Russia near the trainyard Beetle was attacked in.”

Linda’s protests fell on deaf ears. She was an office worker. An intern. The most she did was do a little bit for the podcasts which involved looking pretty, smiling, and reading a teleprompter. She didn’t go out into the field. But Szasz saw potential in her. The man was bound and determined to make her come over to his team.

She truly was a special woman.


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