The Masked Family

 

By

 

Robert T. Jeschonek

*****

More Superhero Tales by DC Comics Author Robert T. Jeschonek

  

7 Comic Book Scripts

A Matter of Size (mature readers)

Forced Retirement (Forced Heroics Book 1)

Forced Betrayal (Forced Heroics Book 2)

Forced Partnership (Forced Heroics Book 3)

Heroes of Global Warming

The Wife Who Never Was

 

*****

 The Masked Family

Chapter One

Wheeling, West Virginia, 2006

Though Cary Beacon knew in his heart that heroic measures would soon be called for, he left behind his super-hero costume. After all, it was only the costume of a make-believe hero from comic books and movies. Cary just wore it to make money by showing up at kids' birthday parties or car dealerships.

It had nothing to do with the fact that he was a real-life super-hero.

He laid the blue tights and red cape on the bed and stared at them for a moment. He would just have to be a hero as he was--bony tall body, red hair streaked blonde, beat-to-hell leather jacket and jeans, red t-shirt with comic book sound effect "POW!" in black block letters in a jagged yellow starburst on the chest. He knew it wouldn't matter what he looked like as long as he managed to save his kids.

Cary stopped staring at the costume and went back to packing. If he wanted to save his kids, he had to hurry.

Well, they weren't really his kids, at least by blood. In fact, the people who had taken them were their actual birth parents, their genuine mommy and daddy.

That didn't mean the kids belonged with them, though.

Cary charged through the trailer, gathering up clothes and odds and ends and pitching them in Wal-Mart shopping bags. His ex-girlfriend, Crystal Shade, had taken the suitcases at the same time she'd taken the kids.

Cary shouldered the screen door open, raced down the battered wooden steps, and chucked his loaded shopping bags into the back seat of his taxi. Without closing the car's door, he bolted back inside the trailer to grab a few last things.

He bagged what little food was left in the place, which amounted to a jar of peanut butter, half a loaf of bread, two apples, and three cans of SpaghettiOs. He yanked the sheets, blankets, and pillow from the bed and threw them in the cab, too. Beyond that, Crystal had pretty much cleaned the place out. While Cary had been hard at work driving fares around town, she'd been stealing the kids he loved and everything he owned.

Almost everything.

Kneeling in the rear corner of the bedroom, Cary peeled up the stubbly gray carpet. Jamming the blade of his pocket knife into a crack in the floor, he pried up a square of plywood.

Sweat ran down his back and sides as he reached into the hole and drew out a manila envelope. He undid the clasp and folded back the flap, then pushed his hand inside.

He pulled out a rubber-banded wad of money and dropped it on the carpet, then reached back in to fish out what he really wanted.

As his fingers closed around the familiar shape, he felt a surge of relief. Crystal hadn't taken everything, hadn't even found this hiding place.

Super-heroes need good hiding places because they've got so much to hide.

Crystal didn't even know the Starbeam Ring existed. Cary had lived with her for over a year, and he'd never shown it to her or even mentioned it.

Thank God thank God thank God.

Holding up the ring, he watched the light gleam on its faceted surface. To the uninitiated, it might look like a hunk-a-junk kids' toy from a gumball machine, molded from see-through blue plastic.

Only Cary and the rest of his super-hero teammates, the Nuclear Family, would know better. They would know at a glance that this was a Starbeam Ring, said to bestow super powers on its wearer.

Not that any of them would believe that the ring really did bestow powers...except Cary, that is.

The rest of the Nuclear Family--Cary's brother and two sisters--all had rings of their own. They all agreed that their father, who had given them the rings in the first place, had made up the story of the Starbeam Rings just to stoke their imaginations when they were kids.

"When you need your powers most, they will come to you," their father had told them solemnly, back before the oldest of them had turned ten. "Always remember that when the chips are down, your secret powers will save the day."

The others had stopped believing, but not Cary. He still thought that when he truly needed his powers the most, the ring would activate them. Even though they had let him down before, again and again, he still believed.

Even though, years ago, when he'd never needed them more, they'd failed him...and someone he'd loved had paid the price.

This time won't be like before. Nobody dies this time.

He slid the ring onto the only finger small enough to fit through it--his left pinky. He stuffed the wad of bills, his secret savings, back into the manila envelope, and got to his feet.

Just then, his cell phone rang.

Pulling it from the pocket of his bluejeans, Cary stared at the glowing blue caller I.D. screen embedded in the shell. Instantly, he recognized the number displayed there.

It was the number of the cell phone he'd given little Glo for her birthday a month ago, in case of emergency. The phone he'd made her promise to keep secret from her mother, who'd been starting to make him suspicious.

He snapped his phone open and pressed it to his ear. "Hello?" He kept his voice low so the caller would be the only one to hear it.

"Help." The voice on the line was midway between a whisper and a squeak. "Please help us."

Cary had a thousand questions, but he knew the little girl wouldn't be able to talk for long. "Where are you, Glo?"

"Bathroom." Glo sounded like she was on the verge of breaking into sobs. "At the airport."

Rage swirled deep in Cary's heart. Crystal had planned her escape well. "Which airport?"

"Arizona somewhere." Glo paused, and Cary heard a woman's voice in the background. "Gotta go!" she said. "Mommy's calling."

"Is Late okay?" said Cary.

"Yeah," said Glo. "Bye!"

"Call next time you have a chance," Cary said quickly. "Don't let them find your phone."

He wasn't sure if Glo had heard him, because the call was dead by then.

As he closed the phone and slid it back into his pocket, he wished that Glo had given him more details about her location. At least he knew that she and her brother, Late, were okay.

For the moment, anyway. The key now was to catch up before the monster could hurt them...the monster otherwise known as Crystal's new boyfriend, Drill. He was also her boyfriend from years ago, long before Cary came along.

And he was Glo and Late's father...but no less a monster for having brought such great kids into the world.

Just thinking about Drill and what he might do to Glo and Late was enough to throw Cary into high gear. He didn't even take the time for a last look around the trailer on his way out.

He switched off the lights and darted outside, letting the screen door bang shut behind him. He didn't bother locking the door, because nothing of value was left inside.

Nothing mattered anymore except the kids, and saving them from the bad guys.

As much of a rush as he was in, Cary hesitated once he got behind the wheel of his cab. For a moment, as he thought about the job ahead of him, he felt overwhelmed.

Crystal and Drill had a huge head start. Cary didn't even know exactly where they were. Drill, especially, was tough enough that he'd probably kick Cary's ass if he did catch up to them.

Looks like a job for the Nuclear Family.

Unfortunately, as much as Cary would've loved having some Nuclear Family backup, he knew it wasn't coming. His brother and sisters had abandoned the super-hero life long ago. Cary had held out hope for a reunion longer than any of them, but even he had finally given up on the team.

His brother and sisters just didn't care about being super-heroes anymore. The fate of Glo and Late was up to him and him alone.

Cary took a deep breath and gripped the steering wheel.

Only The Hurry can come to the rescue this time! Don't miss this pulse-pounding solo adventure of the Nuclear Family's own human sonic boom!

With a steely gaze and a grim expression, he threw the cab into gear and stomped on the accelerator. Gravel spun out from under the tires as the car leaped away from the trailer and hurtled off down the road at more than twice the legal speed limit.

 

*****

 

Chapter Two - Lilly, Pennsylvania

Saturday, April 5, 1924, 7:30 PM

 

One hour before the power was cut and all the lights went out in the town of Lilly, Olenka Pankowski shivered as she watched the white-robed men pile out of the train. One after another, they poured from the five coaches and onto the platform, melting together into a shifting sea of white.

Except for the stomping and scraping of their feet on the coach steps and platform, the robed men were silent. Every one of them wore a conical hood with a flap drawn up in front, leaving only the eyes visible through a rectangular slit.

And they just kept coming.

"How many are there?" whispered Olenka's friend, Renata Petrilli. Like Olenka, Renata was seventeen, and her father and brothers worked in the coal mines.

"Dozens." Olenka pushed a lock of jet black hair behind her ear. "Dozens and dozens."

Renata's pudgy fingers tightened on Olenka's arm. "People were saying they'd come, but no one said there'd be so many."

Olenka watched with wide, dark eyes as more of the robed men stepped off the train and into the swarm of white. "Maybe more of them than there are of us."

"But why so many?" said Renata.

Dominick Campitelli, who stood just in front of them in the crowd of townspeople, spoke over his shoulder. He was just a year older than the two of them and was already at work in the mines.

"Because they're afraid of us," he said, pitching his voice well above a whisper...loud enough for the robed men to hear it. "Because every time they send some guys to burn a cross here, we send 'em runnin' back with their tails between their skirts."

"But what about this time?" said Renata. "There's so many of them."

Dominick snorted. "This time, too. Wait and see."

Olenka wasn't so sure he knew what he was talking about. As she watched, the robed men continued to stream from the train. She'd lost count of how many had debarked already, but she thought there must be at least a hundred of them.

A fear that she hadn't felt for years began to build in her chest. A storm was coming, the kind of storm she remembered too well from her early childhood in Poland.

She recognized the signs. Something terrible was about to happen.

"This is bad," Mrs. Froelich said behind her. "Why won't the union just take back their men? The Klan's only here because the mineworkers threw out the Klansmen."

Mrs. Lorenzo, who was standing on the other side of Renata, turned around. "That's not the only reason they're here, and you know it."

"You don't know what you're talking about," said Mrs. Froelich.

Father Stanislavski looked back at Olenka and nodded. "They're here because they hate us," he said
matter-of-factly. "The Wops and the Polacks and the Hunkies take their jobs."

"Bah," said Mrs. Froelich. "You got a prosecution complex."

Olenka watched the robed men as they lined up on the platform. She thought Father Stanislavski was more right than Mrs. Froelich gave him credit for.

Directed by two men with more decorations on their robes than the others, the Klansmen arranged themselves into four columns stretching the length of the platform. They looked like an army, ready to march, their ranks continually swelled by the white-clad comrades who kept flowing from the train.

Not for the first time, Olenka thought about hurrying home before whatever was going to happen got started. She knew she wasn't safe there. If a storm started--when the storm started--the robed men would surely be at the heart of it.

Then again, she had a feeling that nowhere in her tiny town would be safe that night. She didn't really think it would make much difference whether she was out in the open or locked away in her family's rooms two blocks away.

On the platform, the two leaders walked between the columns, talking to the lined-up men. As the leaders passed, the men undid the ties that held their masks in place and lowered the flaps, exposing their faces.

Most of the men looked straight ahead, like soldiers in formation, but some of them glanced at the townspeople. Olenka couldn't see all of them, and she didn't recognize the ones she could see. They might as well have left their masks in place, as far as she was concerned; to her, the cold, stern expressions of the strangers looked as unreadable and inhuman as the masks.

She had seen those expressions before, on other men who came in the night. She had seen them in the village her family had abandoned over a decade ago, back in Poland.

When the leaders had finished walking the length of the lineup, they returned to the front of the group. Standing a little apart from the others, the two men talked in low voices and looked at their wristwatches. The train conductor stepped down from the locomotive to join them.

"What's happening?" said Renata. "What are they talking about?"

Olenka shrugged. The conductor pulled a pocket watch on a chain out of his vest pocket. He flipped open the cover and looked at the face of the watch, then said something to the two robed leaders.

The three of them walked down the stairs from the platform and crossed the track of the siding on which the train sat. For an instant, Olenka thought the men were heading for the crowd...but they rounded the locomotive instead and stood along the main track, gazing in the direction from which the train had come a half hour before.

As the leaders and conductor stared along the track and checked their watches and talked some more, Olenka looked back at the men on the platform. Draped in white, they stood at attention, maintaining their rigid columns like statues.

Waiting.

In front of Olenka, Dominick Campitelli and Nicolo Genovese talked in hushed voices, but not so hushed that she couldn't hear what they were saying.

"They can hide a lot under those damn robes," said Dominick. "I bet they've got plenty of guns."

"Pistols," said Nicolo. "Knives, I bet."

"They must think we're pretty dumb," said Dominick, "if they think we don't have 'em, too."

Olenka's mouth was dry. The palms of her hands were damp with sweat.

She could feel it. The storm was closing in.

Turning, she scanned the crowd for her father, Josef, but didn't see him. She wondered where he was; though she had come straight from Renata's home to the station and had not seen her father since the train's arrival, she had no doubt that he knew what was happening. Lilly was too small a town for word not to have reached him.

And Josef was too much a man of action not to be doing something about this.

All the more reason for her to worry when he was nowhere in sight at such a dangerous moment.

"What are they waiting for?" said Renata.

"Maybe they're havin' second thoughts," Dominick said loudly. "Maybe they're gonna hitch up their skirts and go home."

Some of the people in the crowd laughed, but not Olenka. Not Father Stanislavski, either. He looked back at her and shook his head slowly.

"Not yet," he said, as if his words were meant for her alone. "They won't leave until they're done with us."

Olenka shivered.

"The big bad KKK," said Dominick. "Looks like a bunch of sissies to me."

"Hey, you!" a young man from the back of the crowd hollered up at the men on the platform. "Yeah, you! With the white hat on! I think you need a little more starch in them bedsheets next time!"

Most of the crowd laughed. The blanket of anxiety that had lain over them since the train's arrival seemed finally to have lifted.

"Don't'cha know you're not supposed to wear white before Memorial Day?" shouted another young man.

"No, no," said someone else. "Those are wedding gowns! They're gettin' married!"

"If those are the brides," yelled a woman, "I'd sure hate to see the grooms!"

Just about everyone laughed at that one.

And then, they all stopped.

The whole crowd turned as one to stare out along the track in the direction that the conductor and Klan leaders were looking. Everyone had heard the same thing at the same moment.

A distant, high-pitched toot. And there it was again.

"Oh my God," said Renata.

The second one had been closer than the first.

The third was closer yet.

Father Stanislavski turned and nodded knowingly at Olenka. "This is what they were waiting for."

Like everyone else, Olenka knew what it was. She had heard it thousands of times before, by day and by night...but never with such a feeling of dread.

It was the whistle of an approaching train.

Fifteen minutes later, the train pulled onto the siding behind the first train and unloaded another hundred white-robed men.

Fifteen minutes after that, every electric light in the town of Lilly went out at once.

*****

 

Chapter Three

Baltimore, Maryland, 2006

 

If Spellerina were here, this guy would be one dead frog.

That was what Celeste Beacon was thinking as she sat in her favorite restaurant in town in her favorite red dress and got dumped by her favorite boyfriend of all time.

Abracadabra, dumbass! Take that!

Sure, Spellerina could have handled this...if Spellerina existed, that is. If only she were a real, live super-hero instead of a make-believe one Celeste had pretended to be as a little girl.

If only Celeste still had that stick she used to pretend was a magic wand, only it really was a magic wand this time, and she could zap the guy sitting across the table before he hurt her any more than he already had.

Where's the damn magic when you really need it?

"It's nothing you did." Eric, the freshly minted ex-boyfriend, gazed into Celeste's eyes with a look of intense sincerity. "I want you to know this is all on me."

All on him. I like that.

If he wanted it all on him, Celeste could oblige. She'd start by hitting him with her empty wine glass...the one he'd let her drain, refill, and drain again before letting her have it with the dumping speech. When the shards of glass were all on him, she'd follow up with the point of her shoe, jammed hard into his nuts. Then, she'd put the table on him, too, overturning it on top of him and jumping up and down on it as hard as she could.

That was what she wanted to do to him, anyway. If only she were the hard-bitten bitch she wished she could be, not the least bit afraid of unanticipated consequences and heavy public scenes.

Why can't I be the kind of person I hate?

"You've made me very happy." Eric still exuded sincerity from every pore. "It's just the rest of my life I'm not happy with. I need a fresh start, you know?"

Celeste broke eye contact and stared at the burning white candle stub in the center of the table. Even as her mind roiled with visions of violence, she couldn't quite believe what was happening.

Eric had completely surprised her. Earlier that day, when Celeste had put on her favorite little red dress and put up her long, blonde hair, she'd never suspected for a second that she was primping to get dumped.

She'd thought that things were going so well. The last two years had been great, with no bombshells or danger signs along the way. Finally, she'd thought, after her long record of bad choices, she'd found someone who was as perfectly matched to her as it was possible for another human being to be.

That was the first sign of danger right there.

"I'm moving to Colorado," said Eric. "A buddy of mine from school is setting up a chiropractic clinic, and he wants me to partner with him. It's a great opportunity."

Celeste stared blankly at the candle stub, thinking about a picture she would paint when she got home.

The image of it was as clear to her as if she were remembering a painting she'd already finished. Ninety percent of the painting would be a field of daisies, resplendent in midsummer sunlight. The heart of the image, however, positioned slightly northwest of dead center, would be a mangled, fetal creature hunched in a patch of blackened flowers. The gnomelike figure's gnarled hands would be full of dead daisies, contaminated by his touch; his face would be a twisted version of Eric's, decayed, surreal, but recognizable.

And she would sell this painting for a lot of money. Macabre stuff like that always sold best in her shop.

"This is an opportunity for you, too," said Eric. "You have a secret admirer."

Suddenly, Celeste's eyes snapped up from the candle stub. She stopped thinking about the daisies and deformed gnome.

"It's another reason why I'm stepping aside," said Eric. "I know you well enough to know you're this guy's total soul mate. He's had a thing for you ever since you met at his New Year's Eve party."

Celeste stared at Eric as if he'd just sprouted D-cup breasts. "Coley Bassinette?" she said, her voice dripping with disgust--not for Coley Bassinette, but for the moron ex-boyfriend who was actually trying to set her up with someone at the same time he was dumping her.

"Is it okay that I gave him your number?" said Eric.

*****

So what if I can't ever go back to my favorite restaurant? It was worth it.

As Celeste rode home in the taxi, she couldn't help smiling. Every time she remembered the moment when she'd up-dumped the table on Eric, she could barely hold back the hysterical laughter.

Hysterical was the right word for it, too. The laughter definitely had an edge of rage and desperation. She was proud of herself for what she'd done, the bastard had deserved it...but he'd still come out the winner. Other than having to foot a dry cleaning bill to get dinner out of his clothes, he'd strolled off free and easy and unhurt.

I hope he dies. Even as Celeste thought it, she knew it lacked conviction. Up until an hour ago, she'd been all the way in love with him. She hadn't had nearly enough time to hate him properly.

I'll get there. One day at a time.

She just hoped her brother, Cary, wouldn't make her feel better too soon. She really wanted to nurse her hatred a good long while, and Cary had a way of helping her get over things fast. It figured, because his childhood super-hero code name in the Nuclear Family had been "The Hurry."

Would she be able to hold off calling him so she could nurse her grudge a little longer? No way. Celeste hadn't spoken to him in weeks, and she sure couldn't resist calling him with this news.

In fact, riding in the taxi made her look forward to talking to him even more. Cary's latest job was driving a cab. That and dressing up like a super-hero for parties, of course.

And being a full-blown super-hero in his own mind, don't forget. Not that there's anything wrong with that.

Better to be a delusional wannabe super-hero than a selfish asshole who won't even ask to drive his ex-girlfriend home after he dumps her in public.

 

*****

Cary really did make Celeste forget about Eric dumping her, it turned out...only not in the way she'd expected.

When she got home to her apartment over the shop where she sold her paintings, she called Cary's number again and again. No one picked up...not Cary, not Crystal, not even one of the kids. Nobody home.

No big deal, thought Celeste. People go out for the evening sometimes.

Two hours later, she was packing a bag, tying her hair in a ponytail, and getting ready to drive to Wheeling, West Virginia, which was where Cary lived.

When she thought about it later, on the way to Wheeling, she had trouble convincing herself that what she was doing made sense. So what if Cary hadn't answered a phone call in weeks? Most of his cab-driving shifts were at night, which was when Celeste usually called him. So what if she had a terrible feeling in her gut? Maybe that feeling had something to do with her just being dumped by her favorite boyfriend of all time.

Maybe she just needed to get out of town for a few days. Maybe she was hurt worse than she thought, and needed a face-to-face with Cary instead of just a phone call.

It wouldn't be the first time. Of the kids in the Beacon family, she and Cary had always been closest. Even decades ago, in the golden age of their childhood as the Nuclear Family, Celeste and Cary had stood more closely together than the others. Even back before what had happened in the fire, back when the brothers and sisters had all still been on speaking terms with each other, Celeste and Cary had been tight as twins.

He was her safety net. When all else and everyone failed, he would catch her. Just like he'd done the night of the fire, long ago...though he hadn't been able to save everyone.

To Celeste, he would always be a hero. To her mind, he was the only member of the Nuclear Family who had never stopped acting like one.

Maybe now it was time for someone else to be a hero for Cary. That was why, three hours after getting home from the dump-fest, Celeste tossed an overnight bag in the back of her silver Hyundai and headed west.

If her gut feeling was a false alarm, all the better. Getting some face time with her brother, especially after such a crappy day, was worth what she'd pay for the gas to get there.

If Cary really was in trouble, then she would be the cavalry. She wouldn't let him down.

The Nuclear Family took care of its own.

The survivors did, anyway. The survivors who were still on speaking terms with each other.

Two out of six, in other words.

Don't worry, Cary. Spellerina's coming.

Well, someone who used to pretend to be her, anyway.

Though Celeste was usually a careful driver, she floored the accelerator and flew down the interstate at eighty-five miles an hour, pointed toward West Virginia.

 

*****

 

Chapter Four

Johnstown, Pennsylvania, 1977

 

As the Nuclear Family (except Father Law, who was on a separate mission) hunkered down in the trees behind the firehouse, they faced their most dangerous mission yet.

The four of them were ready for action, dressed in the colorful super-hero costumes that struck fear in the hearts of their enemies. Musclebot, the senior member of the team at twelve years old, wore bluejeans and a navy blue T-shirt with a foot-high foil letter "M" on the chest (stitched on by Maxi-Mom, the team's seamstress). Musclebot also wore a bright red cape, tucked into the neck of his shirt and hanging down to the backs of his knees.

Eleven-year-old Moon Girl wore a black leotard with another giant letter "M" on the chest, this one stitched on in sparkling, multi-colored sequins. Her cape was bright yellow and stitched to the leotard's neckline; her shorts and sneakers were yellow, too. Her domino mask was as black as her short, bobbed hair.

Ten-year-old Spellerina's leotard was pink, with the letter "S" glued on the chest in glitter; her ballerina tutu skirt was pink, too. Over her eyes and nose, she wore a glittery Mardi Gras-style mask flocked with little white feathers around the top and sides. Pink and white ribbons streamed through her long, blonde hair.

Then there was The Hurry, nine years old. The "H" on his red T-shirt was painted on in lightning bolts like the ones that streaked the sides of his red shorts. He wore plastic goggles (from Father Law's tool bench) to protect his eyes when he ran faster than the speed of sound (which happened during every adventure). The natural blond streaks in his red hair were like racing stripes on either side of his head.

Costumed as they were, the four heroes left no doubt that they meant business. Elsewhere, they might be dressed like ordinary kids, and no one would give them a second look...but when they broke out the Nuclear Family costumes, all who saw them knew that danger was near and the four heroes would save the day.

Even today, when they faced their most dangerous mission yet.

"There it is!" whispered Spellerina, pointing her magic wand (disguised as an ordinary stick) at what looked like a barbeque grill beside the back door of the brick firehouse. "I see it!"

"Yes," said Musclebot, the oldest, watching the back of the place through his invisible binoculars. (His fingers were looped around the invisible lenses in front of his dark-framed eyeglasses.) "Simon Says was right."

"Simon Says," who was as invisible as Musclebot's binoculars and communicated in code through their super walkie talkies--even when they didn't have batteries in them--assigned the Nuclear Family to missions when Father Law wasn't around.

"Space diamonds," Moon Girl said in a hushed and angry voice. "Stolen from my people, the Star Angels. Enough space diamonds to make a hundred Starbeam Rings."

Musclebot lowered the invisible binoculars and patted Moon Girl on the shoulder. "Don't worry. We'll get them back before the Puke-a-zoids can use them to take over the world."

Moon Girl clenched her teeth and nodded.

Musclebot smiled. "Now let's get to work," he said. "First, we need to know what kind of defenses they have. Moon Girl, use your starsight to scan the area for alarms and weapons."

Stepping out of the tree line to the edge of the gravel parking lot, Moon Girl turned slowly from left to right, staring hard at the lot and building. Then, she raised her eyes to the firehouse roof and turned from right to left.

"There are gravel bombs everywhere," said Moon Girl, pointing down at the parking lot and sweeping her arm from side to side. "If you step on one, it'll blow you up."

"Good thing three of us can fly," said Musclebot.

"And I can run faster than explosions," said The Hurry.

"Plus, there are disintegrator rays all over the roof." Moon Girl pointed upward. "You can't see them 'cause they're invisible."

"They'll bounce right off my super-steel body," said Musclebot. "The Puke-a-zoids think the space diamonds are safe, but they can't stop the Nuclear Family, can they?"

"No one can stop the Nukelar Family!" said The Hurry, plunging his gloved fists in the air.

"Moon Girl and Spellerina, hold onto me," said Musclebot. "My super-steel body will shield you as we fly in. Hurry, run in a zigzag pattern to avoid the gravel bombs and disintegrator rays."

"I'll run so fast, you won't be able to see me," said The Hurry, "so don't worry I got blown up or somethin'."

Moon Girl and Spellerina stood on either side of Musclebot, and each wrapped an arm around him. "On the count of three," he said.

"One two three!" said The Hurry, and then he took off, kicking up dust as he zigzagged full-tilt over the gravel parking lot.

"I meant my count of three," shouted Musclebot. Then, he shrugged. "Oh well."

Musclebot extended his right fist in front of him so that the blue crystalline Starbeam Ring on his index finger was directed dead ahead. Sparks of reflected sunlight danced on the central rectangular facet on the face of the ring (which was disguised as a cheap plastic piece of toy jewelry). "Hold on, you two!"

With that, he took flight, the girls hanging on at his sides. Though it looked like their feet never left the ground, the three of them felt the wind rush past as they glided through the air, soaring safely over the field of explosive rocks.

"Watch out for the disintegrator rays!" said Moon Girl.

"My magic wand can't stop them!" said Spellerina.

In response, Musclebot followed a zigzag course like The Hurry's, weaving from side to side as the invisible ray guns filled the air with invisible blasts of energy.

"I made it!" said The Hurry, who had reached the target before them, the way he always did. "I'll use my super-fast vibrations to open the safe!"

"Be careful!" said Moon Girl. "It might be booby-trapped!"

The Hurry drummed both hands fast on the lid of the alien safe, which looked like an ordinary Earth barbeque grill. The vibrations, faster than the human eye could see, deactivated the Puke-a-zoid locks in seconds.

As Musclebot and the girls landed beside him, The Hurry raised the lid of the safe. The three taller heroes looked inside; Spellerina, the smallest, had to push to the front of the group and stand on tiptoe to share the view.

"The space diamonds," Moon Girl said reverently.

"Take as many as you can," said Musclebot, grabbing what looked like ordinary charcoal briquettes from inside the safe that looked like an ordinary barbeque grill. "Put them in your pockets."

As Musclebot stuffed the space diamonds in the pockets of his jeans, Moon Girl and The Hurry grabbed handfuls and did the same. Since Spellerina couldn't reach inside the safe, Moon Girl dug some out for her...two, just enough to fill her left hand, as Spellerina's right hand held tight to her magic wand.

Then, suddenly, Musclebot dropped a handful of diamonds back into the safe. His head spun left, and his eyes popped wide as baseballs.

"Oh no!" he said in a hushed voice. "Puke-a-zoid killbots! We must've set off an alarm!"

Everyone followed his gaze at once. Two Puke-a-zoid killbots--disguised as ordinary firemen in white uniform shirts and black trousers--walked around the far corner of the firehouse.

"We must return to headquarters immediately!" said Musclebot.

Just then, the killbots caught sight of the four young heroes.

"What the hell?" said the first killbot, who looked like an ordinary, dark-haired man smoking a cigarette.

"They're takin' the charcoal outta the grill!" said the second killbot, who looked younger than the first and had curly red hair and a mustache.

"Run!" shouted Musclebot.

The Hurry shouted back over his shoulder at the killbots as he bolted for the tree line. "Tell your leaders! No one can defeat the Nukelar Family!"

 

*****

Minutes later, after running through the patch of woods behind the firehouse and up the street on the other side, the Nuclear Family charged across the front yard of their headquarters (which was disguised as an ordinary
two-story white house).

"Look!" said Moon Girl, pointing to the dark blue Dodge Dart parked in the paved driveway. "Father Law's back from his mission!"

The four heroes pounded up the steps to the front porch. "Come on!" said Musclebot, opening the screen door and stepping inside. "We just had our toughest adventure, and we can finally relax."

Confidently, Musclebot led the others into the house, stomping over the mat and rectangle of brick-patterned linoleum on the other side of the door. As soon as he looked into the living room, however, Musclebot stopped in his tracks. The other three heroes bunched up behind him as he silently stared.

All four kids gazed into the room, none of them making a peep for a long moment. It was as if they knew, before a single word had been spoken, that their lives were about to change for the worse.

It was as if they knew that they were about to meet their arch-enemy.

"Hi, gang!" Father Law--whose name was E.Q.--smiled at them from the sofa. He still wore his short-sleeved blue button-down shirt and red-and-gold tie from work. His black-framed glasses perched on his head, stuck in his thick nest of curly brown hair. "Come on over here. There's someone I'd like you to meet."

The Nuclear Family hung back, suspiciously watching the new kid beside E.Q. on the sofa. Right away, they could see that he was older than any of them.

It was what they couldn't see, however, that kept them holding back. It was as if they instinctively sensed danger, though the new kid had done nothing and said nothing to suggest he was a threat. He certainly didn't look intimidating, either; he was skinny to the point of being scrawny, with a long, horsey face and wavy, blonde hair.

But there was something about him that set off alarms in the Nuclear Family. Maybe it was the strange glint in his eye, a glint that could have been mischievous or smart-alecky or just plain mean in contrast with the friendly smile on his face. Maybe it was his crooked teeth, more crooked than any of them had ever seen, with incisors that poked like fangs over his lower lip when he smiled.

"Kids, this is Grogan Salt," said E.Q.

"Hi," said Grogan, nodding and raising a bony arm to wave at them.

"Grogan's your cousin," said E.Q. "Maybe you remember him. He's Aunt Agnes's son. Your mother's sister's son."

None of the four heroes said a word.

"Grogan's going to live with us for a while." E.Q. stroked his neat mustache as he looked from kid to kid. "I want you all to make him feel at home."

The Nuclear Family kids stood stock still. It was as if a bomb had gone off in the middle of the room, and all they could do was stare at the damage from the explosion.

At that moment, Maxi-Mom walked down the stairs into the living room, carrying a yellow laundry basket full of sheets. She wore her cleaning clothes--bluejeans and a deep green sweatshirt with the Notre Dame "Fightin' Irish" logo on the front. Her glossy red hair, with bangs and sides feathered in the latest style, had fallen askew the way it sometimes did when she was running around doing housework. "All set." Green eyes sparkling, she smiled at Grogan. "Grogan, you'll use Cary's bed in his and Baron's room for the time being."

Finally, The Hurry was able to speak. "But where'll I sleep if he gets my bed?"

Maxi-Mom--whose name was Lydia--rubbed her chin on her shoulder. "We'll set up a cot in the girls' room. Just till we get another bed."

"But Mom!" said The Hurry. "I wanna sleep in my own bed!"

"Well, you'll just have to make do." Lydia narrowed her bright green eyes at Cary.

"I-I-I cansleeponthefloor," said Grogan. "Ihaveasleeping b-b-bag." When he spoke, he stuttered on some words and ran others together in a breakneck crush. He talked differently from anyone else the kids had ever known; they could barely understand him at first, though they would soon come to know his voice well...and dread it.

Lydia beamed at him. "That's very kind of you to offer, but I won't have you sleeping on the floor. Cary will manage."

"Come on, Grogan," said E.Q., getting up from the sofa. "I'll show you around."

"ThanksMister B-B-Beacon," said Grogan.

"You kids go clean up your rooms," said Lydia. "Baron and Cary, make room in your dresser drawers for Grogan's things."

With that, Lydia turned and headed into the kitchen on her way to the basement with the laundry basket. E.Q. followed.

On his way past the kids, Grogan Salt turned and gave them a look of pure disgust. He pointed an index finger at Musclebot and sneered...then curled the finger back into his fist and shook it.

Then, he curled out another finger--the middle one this time--and stuck it straight up.

It was at that moment that the Nuclear Family knew that they were truly facing their greatest enemy. He'd fooled their parents and infiltrated their secret headquarters.

He'd come to live among them, and they had a feeling that wasn't a good thing...though none of them knew at the time just how bad it would be.

 

 

*****

 

Chapter Five

Lilly, Pennsylvania

Saturday, April 5, 1924, 8:30 PM

 

The white-robed men of the Ku Klux Klan looked more menacing than ever as they marched by torchlight through the streets of Lilly. Olenka Pankowski shivered as she watched the firelight flicker over them, picking out their pale forms like ghosts in the night.

"They had it all planned out, didn't they?" said Renata Petrilli, squeezing Olenka's hand almost hard enough to crush it.

Olenka nodded. The Klansmen had brought the torches with them from the trains and had been ready to light them just as soon as the blackout hit. Moments after all the electric lights in town had gone out, the Klansmen had ignited the torches and held them high without missing a step of the march.

"This is different from the other times they were here." Renata's voice was a frightened whimper. "What happens now?"

Olenka pointed at the river of white flowing down the street. A huge wooden cross glided past, carried overhead by the ranks of robed men.

"They didn't bring that to donate to the church," said Olenka. "That's for sure."

Old Father Stanislavski was standing behind her. "The cross is just part of it," he said. "They brought other supplies, too."

Olenka watched the white-robed men marching past. Some of them carried crates and cartons. Many toted sacks over their shoulders, sacks bulging with unidentifiable, heavy-looking shapes.

"This is a big night for them," said Father Stanislavski. "Their idea of Christmas."

Just then, Dominick Campitelli pushed out of the crowd. He shouted at the passing Klansmen just a few feet away. "You think we're afraid of the dark? Turn off the lights and we'll turn tail?"

The Klansmen must have heard him, but they gave no sign. They kept their eyes straight ahead and their faces without expression, as if their hoods deflected all noise.

"We are the dark," said Dominick. "We live in the dark. We're miners, you idiots!"

Some of the men in the crowd clapped and shouted encouragement. Olenka just watched, her heart pounding as Dominick took another step closer to the marching columns.

"Death is our best friend," said Dominick. "You boys don't know what you've got yourselves into here."

Olenka heard scattered cheers and applause. Grinning, Dominick hawked something up from deep in his throat and leaned forward.

Before he could spit it out, however, Father Stanislavski shot from the crowd and grabbed him by the arm. Dominick stumbled but didn't fall as Father Stanislavski yanked him back away from the river of white robes.

"Hey!" said Dominick. "What'd you do that for?"

"You almost gave them the best gift they could ask for." Father Stanislavski glared at him. "An excuse."

Dominick shook his arm free of Father Stanislavski's grip. "How much longer are we gonna wait? Are we gonna let these strangers wreck our town?"

"Hell no!" said Dominick's best friend, Nicolo Genovese.

Father Stanislavski stood his ground, staring down at Dominick. Though Father was in his seventies, with wispy white hair and wrinkles, he was seven feet tall and could still be an intimidating presence when he wanted. "Please be patient. Don't give them what they want."

"I'm talkin' about givin' 'em what I want." As the end of the long parade of Klansmen passed by, Dominick ran out to stand in the street behind them. "I wanna get rid of these morons for good."

Nicolo trotted out after him. "This is our town." He shook a fist in the air. "I say we run 'em out on the same rail they came in on!"

At that moment, a pair of headlights flared from the darkness as a car turned a corner down the street. Olenka looked toward it, as did the rest of the townspeople. Everyone squinted as their eyes adjusted to the brightness. It was the first electric light they'd seen since the power had been cut.

"Is that more of 'em?" said a man in the crowd.

"I bet it is," said another man.

"Well they ain't invited." With his hands held out in front of him, Dominick marched straight toward the headlights. "They'll have to go have their picnic somewhere else."

Nicolo followed Dominick, and other men trickled out of the crowd after them. The approaching car drifted a little closer, then stopped.

Through the windshield, Olenka saw a middle-aged, dark-haired man at the wheel. A big dog sat beside him and barked its head off as Dominick and Nicolo drew up to the driver's side window.

"Hey, buddy," said Dominick. "What brings you to Lilly this fine evening?"

"There's another one!" said one of the other men, Stefan Volta. He broke away from the first car and headed down the street. Three men went with him, aiming for a car that had just turned onto the main drag.

As the rest of the crowd filtered into the street, Father Stanislavski turned to Olenka and Renata. "You girls should go home," he said. "If the Klan doesn't get you, your neighbors might."

"Yes, Father." Renata pulled Olenka by the hand as Father Stanislavski walked away. "Come on, Olenka."

Olenka resisted. "You go." She watched as Father Stanislavski approached Dominick and Nicolo and joined the conversation with the man with the barking dog.

Renata pulled Olenka's hand harder. "It's not safe."

"I can't just leave." Olenka wrenched her hand free. "I have to help."

"But this is bad." Renata's voice trembled. "It's like the end of the world."

"That's just what they want us to think," said Olenka.

At that moment, a roar of voices surged up from the direction of Piper's Field on the edge of town. Looking that way between buildings, Olenka saw the top of the giant cross that the Klansmen had carried through town, erect now and burning with yellow flame.

The crowd of townspeople fell silent for a moment, all staring at the fiery cross. Then, an angry murmur began to build among them.

Dominick and Nicolo abandoned the driver they'd been interrogating and turned toward the firelight. "Well ain't that pretty?" said Dominick.

"Nice of them to light things up some," said Nicolo.

"Know what I'd really like to see, though?" Dominick raised his voice to a shout. "A couple a' Ku Klux Klannies burnin' like that."

The crowd clapped and cheered. Dominick waved, and almost everyone followed him and Nicolo down the street.

Olenka had to hurry to keep up with Father Stanislavski, who stayed near the front of the crowd. She was glad, when he spotted her, that he didn't reprimand her for not going home like he'd told her to.

"These are good people, aren't they?" he said to her.

"Yes, Father," said Olenka.

"Then if I were you," said Father Stanislavski, "I'd say a prayer that they stay that way."

"I will, Father," said Olenka, and she did.

 

 

*****

Chapter Six

Indianapolis, Indiana, 2006

 

Cary's cell phone rang when he was sitting in traffic on Interstate 70 in the middle of Indianapolis, Indiana. The flashing lights of emergency vehicles strobed up ahead, where two crashed cars smoked in the heavy rain.

"Tucson," whispered Glo, only she said it like Two-Shawn. "That's where we are. Where we were, I mean."

Cary's heart hammered in his chest. He wished he were on the other side of the wreck, free and clear, charging to the rescue...though he wouldn't have been much farther ahead, not really.

"What do you mean?" Agitated as he was, Cary forced himself to speak softly. "Where are you now?"

"I don't know." Glo sounded calmer than the last time she'd called, but her voice still shook. "In the car. Mommy and Daddy are in a bar."

With his thumb, Cary rubbed the blue Starbeam Ring on his pinky finger. More than anything, he wished the ring would activate his powers right now and send him racing to Glo's side in a fraction of a heartbeat.

"I'm glad you and Late are all right." Cary thought about ramming his way through the traffic jam and wreckage, anything to get moving again. "So you say you're in a car?"

"Uh-huh. Driving away from Two-Shawn."

Cary kept rubbing the Starbeam Ring. "Do you know where you are? Do you see any signs?"

There were shifting and rustling sounds from the other end of the call. "Eighty-Six," said Glo. "And a 'W'."

"West," said Cary. "Anything else?"

Suddenly, another, younger voice piped up on the line. "I wanna come home. Please take us home." It was six-year-old Late, unselfconsciously making no effort at all to keep his voice down.

Cary's eyes burned as tears welled up in them. "What's the Nuclear Family's motto?" he said.

"'No one can stop the Nukelar Family'?" said Late.

"The other one." Cary sniffed and wiped his eyes.

"'The Nukelar Family takes care of its own'?"

"There ya go." Cary stared at his Starbeam Ring as he said it. "And you're part of the Nuclear Family, right?"

"Yeah," said Late.

"So I'm going to take care of you," said Cary. "And you're going to take care of your sister till I get there. Got it?"

"I'll use my powers," said Late.

Cary smiled. "You do that." Glo and Late were the new generation of the Nuclear Family, picking up where Cary and his brother and sisters had left off. Cary had even made them costumes and given them rings that were similar to the original Family's Starbeam Rings.

The cool thing was, the kids were naturals at the super-hero game. In fact, they'd been playing super-heroes long before Cary had come into their lives. By the time he'd come along, they'd already invented their own code names. Glorianna had become "Glo," and Nate had become "Late."

Cary had bonded fast with these kids who were so much like the Nuclear Family of his childhood. They also had a lot in common with Cary in his adulthood.

For one thing, like Cary, they claimed to have actual super powers.

And Cary believed them.

"Cary?" Glo broke in on the call again, the tone of her voice urgent. "I have to tell you something. I think I know where we're going."

Glo said something else, but her voice was drowned out by a blast from the siren of the ambulance up ahead.

"What was that, Glo?" Cary pressed the cell phone's earpiece more tightly against his ear.

"Here they come!" Late said in the background. "Mommy and Daddy are coming!"

Cary's heart pounded so fast, he thought his chest would explode. If Crystal took Glo's phone, or the battery died, this could be the last time he'd hear from Glo over her cell.

It might also be the last time he ever heard her voice, period. "Quick, Glo! Tell me where!"

Glo whispered one word and hung up.

Cary let out a deep breath and leaned back against the seat of his cab. His trip had just gotten longer.

How am I going to do this?

He'd been on the road for more than five hours. He still had a day of solid driving ahead to get to Tucson. Twenty-four hours at least.

Now, he had to go further still. He might have to go a very long way indeed, because Glo hadn't narrowed it down much for him.

After all, Mexico was a big place. It would be an easy place for the new Nuclear Family to disappear forever.

Cary closed his eyes and clutched the Starbeam Ring tightly in his hand.

Please give me my powers so I can save those kids.

Please please please give me my powers.

He opened his eyes when a horn beeped behind him. He felt no different and knew right away that his powers had not returned.

But when he looked ahead of him, he saw that the wreck had been cleared, and traffic was moving again.

*****

 

Chapter Seven

Wheeling, West Virginia, 2006

 

Celeste brushed her fingertips over the super-hero costume laid out on the bed in Cary's trailer. Her latest thought was the same as the first one that had run through her mind when she'd walked into the place.

I knew it.

The sick feeling in the pit of her stomach grew stronger. Something about the way the costume was spread out on the mattress pad made her throat tighten.

Cary's in trouble.

Celeste jerked her hand away from the blue tights and red cape and stepped back from the bed. Wide-eyed, she looked around the stripped-down room; nothing was left but the costume and the bed with its mattress pad.

Nothing and no one was left.

The last time Celeste had been here, the place had been full of junk and life and noise. If anything, the single-wide trailer had seemed crowded, what with Cary, Crystal, Glorianna, and Nate all sharing the space.

Now it was the opposite of crowded. It hardly seemed like the same place. Cary, Crystal, Glorianna, and Nate had disappeared and taken everything with them.

And no one told me. No one said a word.

That was what made it scary. If it had been business as usual, there was no way Cary wouldn't have called and told Celeste.

Unless he couldn't call. Unless something's happened to him.

Cary was always unconventional...often unpredictable...but never unreliable when it came to Celeste. Without fail, he had kept her in the loop every time something big had happened to him.

But not this time.

Cary's in trouble.

The big questions, of course, were why was he in trouble and where was he now. Celeste wouldn't be able to help him if she couldn't find him.

And she wouldn't be able to find him if he'd left no clues behind.

Hunkering down on her hands and knees, Celeste looked under the bed. She saw nothing nearby, but on the other side of the bed, a piece of carpet curled up in the air.

Celeste got to her feet and walked around the bed. In the corner of the room, she spotted the curl of carpet, riding up over a square of plywood twelve inches on a side. The square sat cockeyed over a square hole of the same size, as if the piece of wood had been pried up, then dropped haphazardly not quite in place.

Frowning, Celeste squatted by the hole. She lifted the carpet, then pushed the plywood square aside and peered down into the gap.

Nothing. She reached into the hole and fished around, but it was dead empty.

Someone had beaten her to it. She wondered, though, if that someone had found the other hiding places Cary must have staked out in the trailer.

I'll bet you missed one.

For the next two hours, she went over every inch of the place. She tried every spot that she knew from experience might likely hold a hiding place.

She yanked up every loose patch of carpet and looked for more secret panels cut from the plywood floors. She pulled out the drawers in the bathroom and kitchen, searching for envelopes taped to their undersides. She checked behind and below the refrigerator and stove. She pried at the paneling and woodwork to see if any of it would easily break free.

But she didn't find Cary's secret plan until she went to work outside.

In the dim light of dawn, she walked the trailer's perimeter, examining the siding and the latticework skirting. She had gone almost the whole way around when she finally spotted the vertical cuts in the skirting...two of them, spaced four feet apart.

Jamming her fingers into the holes in the latticework between the cuts, she tugged. A four-foot-wide section pulled free of the skirting.

Celeste set the panel aside and leaned down, gazing into the space under the trailer. From the corner of her eye, she thought she saw something small and furry scurry away, but she forced herself not to look in that direction.

Instead, she looked up at the underside of the trailer. It was a good thing she did, or she would have missed the plastic box.

At first, in the dim light, she thought it was just part of the trailer. The box blended right in, attached to the trailer's underside and just as white as the surface it was stuck to.

The box was rectangular, two feet long by one foot wide. It was shallow, less than six inches deep, and mounted at the trailer's midline.

Celeste got down on her knees and crawled in after it. Reaching up, she took hold of the box with both hands and pulled. When it came free, she saw that it had been suspended from a lid that was screwed to the trailer's base.

When she lowered the box, she saw that the only thing inside was a spiral-bound notebook with a green cover.

She backed out through the hole in the skirting with her find. When she got out from under the trailer, she could read the title scrawled in Cary's longhand over the notebook's cover.

Secret Plan.

 

*****

On the way to Akron, Ohio, Celeste called all three numbers programmed into her cell phone for her sister, Paisley. Paisley's home, cell, and work all came up the same: no answer.

She left a message on Paisley's home answering machine and cell phone voice mail and resolved to try again later. She didn't mention the one question she wanted most to ask, though.

Why are you the first stop in Cary's secret plan?

It was hard to imagine Paisley and Cary having anything whatsoever to do with each other. The two of them hadn't been on speaking terms for decades.

One thing was for sure: the plan was definitely secret, even to someone who'd managed to find its hiding place. Each step was based on a clue that wouldn't make sense to anyone outside the Nuclear Family...and the clues seemed to have been fine-tuned further, designed to be deciphered by specific members of the family. Even an insider like Celeste didn't understand many of the clues, though she recognized certain references throughout.

Luckily, the first clue was one she could figure out on her own.

Go to the one who worships Belgian waffles.

Celeste had known the answer right away. One of the Nuclear Family kids had loved Belgian waffles more than the others, to the point of obsession.

That was why Celeste was heading for Paisley in Akron, Ohio. She'd combed every inch of Cary's trailer, inside and outside, and the secret plan was the only clue she'd found. She just had to hope it was pointing her in the right direction.

Not that she could convince herself that her doubts were unfounded. For one thing, given the rift between Paisley and Cary, how likely was it that the two weren't just talking, but cooperating? Not only were they not on speaking terms, but the plan was just the kind of thing that Paisley would have thought was ridiculous.

For that matter, if Cary was following the secret plan, why had he left it under the trailer? How could Celeste know it wasn't a decoy, leading her off in the wrong direction while Cary ran headlong into disaster elsewhere?

She couldn't. All she had to go on was a gut feeling that she was on the right track.

That and a note scrawled in Cary's handwriting on page one of the secret plan. Gut feeling aside, every possible reason and rationale aside, that note itself was enough to make her follow the plan.

And do it fast.

My last chance.

Trust no one and hide where I can never be found. Only the Nuclear Family can find me.

Only they can save me.

  

*****

 

Chapter Eight

Johnstown, Pennsylvania, 1977

 

Two days before Grogan Salt framed Cary Beacon for a crime he didn't commit, Grogan made breakfast for the Nuclear Family.

"Thisismy w-w-way ofsaying th-th-thanks." Grogan carried the skillet around the kitchen table, raking scrambled eggs onto everyone's plates. "F-f-f-for lettingmestayhere."

Cary was the only one who had cereal. He was the only one who wasn't warming up to Grogan.

Or "Blacksheep," as Cary called him behind his back. Blacksheep, the evil arch enemy working to destroy the Nuclear Family from within.

"Sorryforwhippingthe f-f-finger atyou," Grogan had told the kids a week ago, the day after his arrival. "I-I-I've gotarudesenseof h-humor." And then he'd shaken the hand of each kid.

Except Cary, who'd walked away.

Can't fool me. The hand may be quicker than the eye, but not quicker than The Hurry.

Unfortunately, Cary's parents weren't exactly keeping up with him.

"This is wonderful, Grogan." Maxi-Mom Lydia beamed as she raised another forkful of scrambled eggs. "What a nice surprise."

"I could get used to this," said Father Law, in his secret identity as E.Q. Beacon. "If each kid takes a different day, we could have a cooked breakfast just about every day of the week."

All the Nuclear Family kids immediately looked in E.Q.'s direction. "Just kidding," he said, and they all laughed loudly.

All except Cary.

Father Law's a genius. Maxi-Mom has super woman's intuition. Why can't they see how bad Blacksheep really is?

"I'm g-g-glad youlikeit," said Grogan. His fang-like incisors jutted out of his big, proud grin. "Icanmakehomemade B-B-Belgianwafflestoo."

"Belgian waffles are my favorite!" Paisley tossed her head, which gave her black hair a shake. It was immaculate as always, glossy and bouncy and neatly brushed. "They're the best!

"Belgian waffles?" E.Q.'s eyes widened. "Mmm!"

"Now now, E.Q." Lydia patted E.Q.'s back. "Grogan's not here to be our personal cook."

"E.Q.?" Grogan tipped his head to one side as he stared at E.Q. "What's that stand for?"

"No one knows," said Baron.

"He won't tell anyone," said Paisley.

"But maybe I'll tell you, Grogan," said E.Q. "If you keep making me breakfast."

Cary looked around the table from one kid to the next, and all of them were laughing. He couldn't believe it.

He couldn't believe Father Law had just said he might tell Grogan what "E.Q." stood for, though he'd always refused to tell anyone else under any circumstances. Cary didn't even think E.Q. had told Lydia.

And now he might tell Grogan?

Cary had been carrying around a brick of pure anger in his stomach for the past week. Suddenly, the heavy brick became an even heavier cement block.

Just then, Celeste looked at him with a worried frown. It made him feel just a little better knowing that she, at least, wasn't so Grogan-blind she didn't notice something was bothering Cary.

Still, Cary would've felt even better if she were glaring at Grogan like he was, carrying a block of cement in her stomach right along with him.

Then, he wouldn't have to worry so much that she'd get hurt when Grogan carried out his evil plans.

Cary knew those plans were coming. He had found out in a way that left absolutely no room for doubt.

Grogan had told him.

 

*****

Yesterday afternoon, Grogan had cornered Cary in the basement. Cary had gone down there to look for a Nerf football, and no one else had been around.

"H-hey, asshole," Grogan had said. "No one'll b-believe you, asshole."

Cary had been scared, being cornered by someone almost twice his age, but he'd tried to act brave. "Believe me how?"

"That I t-toldyou I'll k-killyou, asshole." Grogan had sneered as he shoved Cary back against the basement wall. "I'll k-kill youunlessyou j-j-join me, asshole."

"Join you?" Cary had thought about making a run for it, but Grogan had grabbed his arm.

"You're m-my n-newslave, asshole." Grogan had shaken him hard by the arm. "Y-You're gonnahelpme m-make these idiots m-m-miserable, asshole."

"Never." With that, Cary had lashed out a foot, cracking Grogan in the shin. The second Grogan had let go of his arm, Cary had sprinted around him and raced upstairs out of reach. He had hollered down behind him: "The Nuclear Family takes care of its own!"

Grogan had hissed out his words between clenched teeth. "They'll allknowabout y-y-you w-when it's over, asshole. They'll knowitwas all y-your f-f-fault, asshole!"

Even as Cary had run away, he'd known his escape was only temporary. He'd known he wouldn't be able to outrun Grogan forever.

And he'd known that the danger ahead wouldn't be anything like playtime make-believe.

 

*****

So now Cary was in a bad situation. He knew Grogan had evil plans in mind, but he didn't know exactly what they were or when they'd happen. Not only did no one else suspect a thing, but they all seemed to have been taken in by Grogan's Mr. Nice Guy act.

Cary knew he had to tell the rest of the Nuclear Family as soon as possible. Ever since his encounter with Grogan in the basement, Cary had tried to get the word out...but every time he'd gotten close to talking to someone, Grogan had popped up nearby.

Today, though, Cary had to find a way to warn the others. The longer they stayed in the dark, the more chance Grogan would carry out his plan.

The more chance Cary would be blamed for it.

But he was already too late.

Not long after breakfast, Cary got Celeste to meet him in The Cage...the space under the back porch that the Nuclear Family kids used as headquarters during their adventures.

The Cage had an orange dirt floor and low-hanging beams that even Cary, the shortest kid, had to duck. One of the two latticework walls was a door, complete with hinges and a sliding latch on the outside.

"What is it?" Celeste said loudly as soon as she swung open the door to The Cage.

Cary held a finger to his lips. "Shhh."

Celeste dropped her voice to a loud whisper. "Okay, okay. What do you want to talk to me about?"

"It's Grogan," said Cary, looking around nervously. Through the holes in the latticework wall, he saw that no one was nearby out in the yard. "He said he'll kill me if I don't join him."

Celeste frowned. "Join him?"

"Help him make the family miserable." Cary didn't hear anyone coming, but he still kept looking outside. "He said he'll make everyone think it's my fault."

Celeste narrowed her eyes. "This isn't part of an adventure, is it? The Hurry versus Blacksheep?"

"No!" Cary caught himself raising his voice and dropped it back to a near-whisper. "I swear this isn't make-believe, Celeste! I'm scared."

"Okay then." Celeste twirled her blonde hair around one finger. "Did he say anything else about what he's going to do?"

Cary shook his head. "He just said no one'll believe me when I tell them he said he'll kill me."

"He really is a liar then." Celeste smiled as she reached out to touch his cheek. "Because I believe you."

"But what if nobody else does?" said Cary.

"You know they will," said Celeste. "Grogan just got here, right? You've been here all your life."

"I don't know." Cary stared out through the holes in the latticework. "What if I lose my powers and Grogan gets me?"

"He won't get you." Celeste leaned close and kissed his forehead. "I'll save you."

"But how can we stop him?" said Cary.

"Let's go talk to Mom." Celeste tousled his racing-striped red hair, then turned and pushed open the door of The Cage. "She'll know what to do."

 

*****

Unfortunately, when Cary and Celeste found Lydia, Lydia was looking for them. She was looking for Cary, to be exact.

"You've really let me down, young man," said Lydia, standing in the doorway between the kitchen and living room.

Cary and Celeste shared a glance. Instantly, they both understood what had happened.

Blacksheep had beaten them to the punch.

Cary was almost too scared to speak, but he managed to squeak out one word. "Why?"

Lydia glared down at him with cold, implacable fury. "Did your father and I teach you it's okay to steal?"

Cary shook his head.

"Then what do you call this?" Lydia opened her fist, revealing a handful of crumpled cash. Cary identified some of the bills by the green numbers printed on their corners.

Hundred dollar bills.

"M-money?" said Cary.

Lydia pushed the cash toward him. Her voice grew harsher. "I found it in one of your hiding places. It was in the shoebox under your bed."

Cary shivered. Celeste stood shoulder-to-shoulder with him, which helped, but he still felt like he'd turned to ice inside.

"Five hundred dollars," said Lydia. "Your father had it in an envelope in his dresser drawer."

"Mom," said Celeste. "Listen..."

But Lydia wasn't interested in listening. "It makes me sick to think we can't trust our own kids."

"Mom." Celeste said it a little louder. "We have to tell you something."

Lydia stepped back and pointed at the stairway. "Get up to your room, young man. Your father and I still have to decide what to do with you."

Cary had tears in his eyes. "I didn't take that money," he said.

And it was then that he saw Grogan had been right.

Lydia didn't flinch. "Upstairs," she said. "Now."

She doesn't believe me.

She doesn't believe me.

Just then, as Cary slogged through the living room and headed for the stairs, Grogan walked in the front door.

He didn't say a word. He frowned at Cary with intense puzzlement and concern on his snaggle-toothed racehorse face.

But Cary heard everything he really said and saw right through his mask to what he really thought as if liar vision were one of his super-powers.

 

*****

 

Chapter Nine

Lilly, Pennsylvania

Saturday, April 5, 1924, 9:00 PM

 

"You've got the wrong man here," said Father Stanislavski, standing between the crowd and the man at the ticket counter. "Leave him alone."

Though Olenka had stayed back until now, she moved up to stand beside Father. Her heart pounded as she looked at the angry faces glaring toward her.

Dominick Campitelli and Nicolo Genovese had the angriest faces of all and stood right in front. They were two people who usually made Olenka feel at ease, but now they just made her nervous.

"Out of the way, Father." Dominick stepped up to stand toe-to-toe with Father Stanislavski. "We have business with that guy."

The whole crowd pressed forward...as much of it, at least, as could fit in the train station ticket office. Olenka guessed that forty or fifty people had squeezed into the room, with another fifty or so just outside the door.

They had all followed the same guy who had gotten off the train, the guy whom Father Stanislavski and Olenka now shielded. The guy was short and stout, maybe in his thirties, with thin brown hair and a bushy mustache. He wore a dark blue jacket and trousers, black necktie, and a blue and black cap...what looked like a train conductor's uniform.

That was the problem.

"Now hold on a minute." Father Stanislavski was usually a soft-spoken man, but now he raised his voice in a commanding way. "What will it hurt to make sure this is the man you want?"

"We want those trains out of here now." Dominick looked at the man at the counter as he said it. "We want those Klan boys trapped here without a way home."

"Then we'll show them some local hospitality," said Nicolo.

Some of the men in the crowd cheered. One of them waved a rifle overhead.

Olenka's eyes widened. It was the first gun she'd seen that day, and it made her wonder how many more were in the room.

It also made her wonder how smart it was to be one of the two people getting in the crowd's way right now.

Father Stanislavski raised his arms. "Hold it!" The crowd quieted as he turned to the man at the counter. "Excuse me, sir. What's your name?"

The man took off his cap. "W-Wilbur," he said, nodding six times fast.

"And are you a conductor, Wilbur?" said Father Stanislavski.

"No, F-Father," said Wilbur. "I'm a brakeman, and I'm n-not even on the j-job today. Just on my w-way to Altoona."

"Thank you, Wilbur." Father Stanislavski turned back to the crowd. "You see? You have the wrong man here."

"He's lying." Dominick snorted and shook his head. "I would, if I were him."

"No," said Wilbur. "I'm t-telling the truth. Louise knows m-me." Wilbur turned and peered into the ticket window. "Louise? Louise?"

No one answered. Wilbur leaned closer to the window and called out again, but still there was no sign of Louise.

Dominick laughed. "That's proof enough for me. I guess you are telling the truth."

The crowd laughed, too.

"C'mon now." Dominick pushed past Father Stanislavski. "We're not gonna hurt you. We just want you to take the train outta here."

"But I'm n-not the conductor." Wilbur shrank away from Dominick's outstretched hand.

Father Stanislavski grabbed Dominick's shoulder. "Careful," said Father. "Remember how it feels."

"How what feels?" Dominick sounded annoyed.

"Being intimidated," said Father Stanislavski. "Being terrorized."

Dominick hesitated. Olenka saw the muscles of his jaw working as he clenched and released his teeth.

"How do you usually get things done?" said Father Stanislavski. "Surely not like this."

Dominick looked back over his shoulder, his expression more troubled than mean. He shook his head, then shrugged off Father's hand. In that instant, Olenka knew that Father Stanislavski had calmed him down.

"I didn't mean to come on so strong," he told Wilbur. "We're havin' a bad day around here. Any chance you might be able to help us out?"

Just then, a man yelled from the rear of the crowd outside. "That's not a conductor! They got the conductor over by the engine right now!"

Everyone turned and headed for the door, leaving Wilbur behind at the ticket counter.

Father Stanislavski and Olenka brought up the rear. Just as they stepped outside, the front of the crowd broke into a run.

Ahead of them, several men with uniforms similar to Wilbur's were scrambling up into one of the trains.

"Get 'em!" said one of the men in the crowd. "Get 'em and hold 'em!"

Father Stanislavski shouted through cupped hands. "Everyone, wait! Don't make the situation worse!"

Just then, something exploded.

A thunderous blast erupted, echoing off the mountainsides, and everyone stopped charging toward the train. The great boom sounded so close that people looked all around to see if something had blown up in the middle of town.

Olenka looked around, too. The porch of the ticket office shook underfoot, and she heard the sound of shattering glass.

Wilbur darted out of the ticket office without his hat. "What is it? What happened?"

Father Stanislavski put a hand on Olenka's shoulder. "Stay close," he told her. "No matter what."

Olenka noticed that the tone of his voice had gotten harsher. "I will, Father."

"Things could get bad fast now." Father Stanislavski drew a hand over his head, smoothing his wispy white hair.

As soon as he'd said it, a second explosion let loose, louder than the first. Olenka covered her ears but could still feel the shockwaves rippling through her body from head to toe. Her heart hammered so fast in her chest, she thought it might be the next thing to explode.

"They're blowin' up the town!" said a man in the crowd. "The Klan's blowin' us all up!"

 

*****

 

Chapter Ten

Near Tulsa, Oklahoma, 2006

 

Cary would have run his taxi headlong into a tractor-trailer if the child hadn't called on his cell phone. The child whose voice he didn't recognize.

Though it was broad daylight, a quarter after ten in the morning, Cary fell dead asleep at the wheel. Since leaving Wheeling, West Virginia, he'd been driving for fifteen hours straight, stopping only to gas up at truck stops and sit in traffic in Indianapolis.

He had no intention of sleeping, either, not while the kids were in danger. When waves of drowsiness washed through him, he blasted his radio, drank gallons of coffee, slapped himself in the face, and cranked the windows wide open to let in the cold air.

Again and again, he snapped himself out of tired spells. He kept racing down the long stretch from Indianapolis to St. Louis, then from St. Louis to Springfield, propelled by caffeine and visions of what Drill might do to Glo and Late.

But he finally slipped.

On the eternal flat between Springfield, Missouri and Tulsa, Oklahoma, Cary fell asleep. He was flying down Route 44, the Will Rogers Turnpike, when he dropped into a dream.

It was a new version of a dream he had often--the one about the Nuclear Family teaming up to battle a threat to America.

The whole team was there, and they all had real super powers. All the members of the Nuclear Family were grown-up, but the costumes they wore, the same costumes they'd worn as kids, still fit.

As Cary ran and fought alongside them, he was filled with pure joy.

We haven't been together for decades, he said in the dream.

This is how we were meant to be, said dream-Celeste/Spellerina.

We'll never be apart again, said dream-Mom.

When the Nuclear Family saw the danger at hand, however, they all came to a sudden stop. They gaped at the enemies who had appeared before them, so startling in their twisted familiarity.

A group of six men and women floated in mid-air or ran in place on the front lawn of the White House. They could have been twins of the Nuclear Family...except that certain details were reversed.

For example, instead of having a mole on her right cheek, Maxi-Mom's twin had a mole on her left cheek. Spellerina's twin's hair was black instead of blonde.

The colors of their costumes were switched around, too. While Paisley/Moon Girl's leotard was black with a yellow cape, her twin's leotard was yellow with a black cape. The "S" on Spellerina's twin's chest faced the wrong way, as if it were seen in a mirror.

Reversoids, said Father Law. Our equal and exact opposites in every way.

Not just Reversoids, said Baron/Musclebot. Look there.

Cary shivered when he looked where Musclebot was pointing. Off to one side of the Reversoids, someone hovered in a floating chair. He waved when he saw the Nuclear Family looking at him.

Cary recognized him instantly, especially since he literally hadn't changed since childhood. The Nuclear Family and the Reversoids were grown-ups, but this one was still thirteen years old.

Thirteen years old with a horsey face and crooked teeth. And a wicked glint in his eyes.

That's Blacksheep. That's Grogan Salt.

It was the original Grogan, too, not a mirror image. The white "B" on the chest of his black costume faced the right way.

Blacksheep fired a flare gun into the air. K-kill the Nuclear F-family! B-bring me their b-bones!

Just as the Reversoids shrieked and charged, Cary heard his cell phone ringing and woke up. His heart was pounding from the excitement in his dream, which had turned into a nightmare.

Then, his heart pounded harder from what he saw up ahead of him.

He was speeding head-on toward a tractor-trailer.

Reflexively, Cary jammed the accelerator to the floor and swung the steering wheel hard left. The tractor-trailer's horn roared, and the cell phone rang again.

Just in time, the taxi leaped clear, heading for the side of the road. As it flew across another lane on the way to the berm, the taxi was almost t-boned by an approaching car but darted out of the way unscathed.

The tractor-trailer barreled past with another blast of its horn. So did the car that had almost t-boned the taxi.

As the phone rang yet again, Cary slammed on the brakes and spun out the cab on the gravel berm. The cab's rear-end swept around, kicking up a cloud of dust, and finally came to rest.

Cary slumped back against the seat. The nose of the cab pointed down the road, facing the direction from which he'd come.

The phone rang again, and he grabbed it from the ash tray. His heart was jackhammering, his hands were shaking, and he was gasping for breath, but he had to pick up. The number on the caller I.D. screen was Glo's.

"Hello?" said Cary. "Hello?"

No one answered, but Cary thought he heard rustling noises on the line.

"Glo? What's wrong? Can't you talk?"

Cary heard more rustling, then a breath.

His imagination went berserk. Visions of Glo and Late burst into his mind, hurt and unable to talk on the cell phone...able only to dial it.

"Please say something," he said. "Tell me you're all right, Glo."

Another breath. Then: "Is this The Hurry?"

Cary's blood instantly turned to ice. He squeezed the phone so hard he thought it might snap.

He didn't recognize the voice on the phone.

It was the voice of a boy, but it wasn't Late and it wasn't anyone Cary knew.

What the hell's going on here?

"Yes." In spite of his rising panic, Cary tried to stay calm on the phone. "This is The Hurry."

"I have a message for you." The boy on the phone sounded like he could be anywhere between eight and twelve years old. "It's from Glo and Late. It's important."

Oh my God.

"Are they all right?" Cary leaned forward. "Where are they?"

"Mexico," said the boy. "The phone won't work there. That's why Glo gave it to me. I'm in Arizona."

Smart girl, Glo. "What's the message?"

"Rocky Point. They're goin' to Rocky Point."

"What else?" said Cary. "What else did she tell you?"

"Nothin'," said the boy. "G'bye."

"Wait!" Cary rubbed the Starbeam Ring with his thumb. "Are you sure there wasn't anything else?"

"That's it," said the boy. "I only talked to her a minute in McDonald's. She said I could keep the phone as long as I called and gave you the message. Then her dad came and got her."

Cary hated the thought of Drill dragging around Glo. "But she was okay when you last saw her?"

"I guess so," said the boy. "Gotta go now."

"What about her brother?" said Cary. "What about Late?"

This time, he got no answer to his questions. The boy on the phone had already hung up.

Damnit!

Cary threw his cell phone across the cab and smacked his fist on the dashboard.

At least he knew Glo and Late were alive. He knew where Crystal and Drill were taking them.

But until he got to Rocky Point, he was completely cut off from them. He would have no idea if they were okay or if something bad had happened to them.

He wouldn't hear their voices again until he rescued them.

All the more reason to get rolling. He put the taxi in gear, waited for traffic to clear, and headed for the median strip. The sooner he crossed to the other side of the highway and started driving in the right direction, the sooner he'd get to Glo and Late.

At least it wasn't likely he'd fall asleep and swerve into the path of a tractor-trailer anytime soon.

One thing was for sure. He was wide awake now.

*****