Grant Tower used to be a gigantic building
located in the limit between downtown and the industrial districts. It had been
abandoned for many years until it was bought by a mysterious person who
recuperated its former splendor. In a city filled with strange things happening
everyday, the destruction of Grant Tower did not go unnoticed. After all, it
had been Captain Incredible the one to destroy it during his battle with his
arch nemesis, Doctor Perdition.
The battle had taken place all over the city. The
superhero and the villain were able to fly, so they moved from one area to the
other and the destruction was palpable all over the place. Captain Incredible
had promised it would be the last battle to fight in the city as, according to
him, every other gang and criminal organization had been dismantled. Only
Doctor Perdition stood in the way of a pacified city. So every single person
affected by the last battle, tried to understand what was as stake.
Many inhabitants of the city fled beforehand,
others just locked themselves home (if they had a basement). The battle took
several hours and affected every single inhabitant in the same way. They knew
what they would get in exchange, but many were already pissed at both the bad
guy and the good one because for years and years, their battles against the
other side had caused devastation once and again. People were tired of all of
it and Captain Incredible knew he was risking a lot by saying that was going to
be his last battle.
Inspector Paulson was the first one to arrive
to the site of the former Grant Tower. The battle was still going on but it had
moved to the port, where they could be less damaging to the people. Pieces of
the tower had fallen all over the neighboring streets and some of the neighbors
were attempting to move the pieces by themselves. Others were looking for
objects to recuperate from the destruction.
Delia Paulson put on her gloves and entered
the destroyed building. Only a couple floors were still standing. All the other
seventy floors had disappeared. She used a mask to walk inside and join two men
of her team who had gotten there before her. Neighbors had told them that a
sound could be heard coming from the building, from below the ground. So they
had to look where it was, probably a bomb made by Doctor Perdition.
Inspector Paulson descended towards the lower
levels of the building, that had received no damage, and encountered the noise
was coming from a boiler room. The machine that used o heat up the water from
the tower seemed to be about to explode. A rapid move by one of the policemen,
helped to bring the pressure down.
When he moved away from the boiler, with a
face of triumph, the policemen pushed a pipeline that changed positions. But
not only that, it also opened a door on the wall, just in front of the boiler.
The inspector told everyone to be on the lookout and entered first;
illuminating her path with a flashlight she took from her long coat.
She walked slowly, covering her face because
the air was charged with dust particles, probably because of the violent
movement suffered by the building when it had been destroyed. It was a long
corridor and then a path that seemed to descend in a spiral, down into the
ground. Paulson ordered one policeman to stay at the entrance and was only
joined by two of them, one being the one that had stopped the boiler from
exploding.
They walked slowly through the narrow passaged
until finally they could see artificial light. They arrived at a massive room,
carved into the natural rock. It was very humid but there wasn’t as much dust
as there was above. They could breath at ease and not feel trapped anymore. The
policemen were visibly scared because they remained just behind Paulson and she
didn’t say anything because she was scared too. What was that place? Why was it
there?
On the wall, there were dozens, hundreds of
screens showing different TV channels and also some footage from closed circuit
cameras. Paulson saw the inside of the Central Bank, the security cameras from
the police department building and the mayor’s office. It was all live. Someone
had them all cornered and they hadn’t realized it.
One of the policemen attracted her attention
to one of the screens. It was a news channel reporting that the battle between
the superhero and the villain had ended: good had one versus evil. The two men
cheered but Paulson did not say anything. The existence of that room was proof
that things did not stop with Doctor Perdition. She kept walking to find more
clues and all she saw were plans of every building in the city, including Grant
Tower, weapons of every kind and a diary hidden on the drawer of a work table.
She started reading and, at first, it didn’t
make much sense. It was all about a boy telling his sad high school stories.
Apparently he was mocked because of the way he dressed and the way he looked.
He hated people for laughing at him but would only find solace in one friend he
had away from school, another kid. Paulson kept on reading as the policemen
looked around, still happy that the last evil plaguing their city had finally
been defeated and was dead for good.
Paulson kept on reading and realized the diary
belonged to no other than Doctor Perdition. She then raised her head and told
her men to stop walking round and touching everything. She did so just in the
moment were one of the weapons fired a set of arrows against a wall, piercing
the wall with incredible strength. The men decided to get closer the inspector,
who told them to bring their scientific team in order to bag every single thing
in that lab. She told them they had
probably gotten the big prize of the night.
The two men went back upstairs but Delia
stayed behind to wait for the science team and in order to keep reading. She
didn’t excuse Doctor Perdition for what he had done; after all he was a felon
that had served time after killing people and doing the most unspeakable acts
of violence. But she kind of felt sorry for him, as she read more and more of
the diary. Apparently, he was the only son in a family of only women and he had
been mistreated by his parents because he wasn’t the man they wanted him to be.
He also hated his family. Paulson wondered if
he had them killed at some point but the diary didn’t say. It only spoke about
his childhood and the most beautiful pages, because they actually were, were
dedicated to his encounters with a friend that shared his vision of the world.
He was a bit younger but seemed older than him because of his convictions. He
was a strong believer that people that did wrong should pay, no matter what is
was that they had done.
She stopped reading and looked for more
diaries in the drawer but it was the only one. When the scientific team
arrived, she ordered them to scan the room for hidden compartments and traps.
They found a small hiding space beneath a huge metal table, which the inspector
moved by herself. There, covered in dust, she found something else. There were
no diaries but papers that assigned this property to the kid she had been
reading about. If the kid was Doctor Perdition, the building must have been
his. He was the one to renew it, all those years ago.
There was also an electronic book, which could
be turned on but had a password to protect it. A member of the scientific team
helped Paulson bypass the password in order to read whatever it was she had on
her hands. And when she was able to read it, she almost dropped it on the
floor. Because what was in that book was not only a diary or some legal papers.
There were pictures, and statements and videos and text that talked about that
other kid, the one that had been Perdition’s friend when he had been bullied in
school.
That friend had helped him seek revenge, which
had resulted in the death of at least two children and it had been Perdition
who had put a stop to it.
That kid… That kid was Frederick Edwards AKA Captain
Incredible.
