Apex 2: Rise of the Super Soldiers by Adam Moon Page B

he protect her. Every moment of ambivalence from her only drove him further away , emotionally. She’d managed to break his heart without even trying. Hank was too young to deal with such sour emotions so he reverted back to his old self; if someone hurt him, they’d get hurt too. It hardly mattered to him that he had never actually had the guts to tell her how he felt. She should’ve simply known. But he was pretty certain she did know by the way she looked away from him every time he tried to tease her or test her. She had rejected him and it hurt the more he realized it.
    Sally was already climbing into the back of the truck when Hank reached her. He followed behind her. Before them was a large metallic sphere, propped up on a plastic skid and secured by bungies latched to the walls. It had faint etchings all over it and it seemed to radiate its own heat.
    Sally knelt down and touched it, a smile widening across her face, giving her a demented look. “This looks just like the orb those teenage superheroes described.”
    Hank grabbed her shoulder and whispered, “Alright, we saw it. Now let’s lock it back up before anyone gets back.”
    Sally shrugged him off and said, “Let them catch us. Who cares?”
    That was fine by Hank. He’d just get out and make sure to act flabbergasted when the others returned, blaming the whole thing on Sally. Just so she wasn’t surprised when he blamed her, he said, “Well I’m getting down. If you want to stay and get caught, you can just take all of the blame.” But before he had a chance to get away, the sphere hummed. The hum intensified to a deep vibration until it started to shake. Then it split open like an egg. A thick blue mist engulfed them, choking them on contact. Sally fell over backwards clutching her throat with both hands. Hank fell to his knees as his vision went hazy. Then the floor rushed up at him and he saw nothing more.

Disappearing Sphere
     
    Watson was livid. There was no sphere in the truck. But two of his troops were in there, knocked unconscious.
    He turned on the soldier’s who’d delivered it. “What’s the meaning of this? Where’s the sphere? What did you do to my men?”
    The truckers had no response. They were as perplexed as Watson was.
    Finally one of them said, “The sphere was there. I saw them loading it myself. We checked every ten miles to make sure it was secured. Those men of yours must’ve done something with it.
    Watson shook his head, partly out of anger and partly of frustration. He keyed his radio to call for someone to move the unconscious soldiers. When Hank and Sally were removed from the scene, Watson gingerly approached the area where only an empty skid and loose bungie cords now stood.
    The air smelled odd, equal parts decomposition and some unidentifiable disinfectant. The floor was slick. When he knelt down to inspect it, he saw a faint blue glow. And then he remembered that part of the interview that the teenagers gave to Fox News. They said they were assaulted by a blue mist that knocked them out and that when they awoke, the sphere had vanished.
    Had that just happened to his men?
    So close to the floor, he was able to discern a sizzling sound. He followed the noise to one of the leg depressions in the plastic skid. Inside the depression was a silvery metallic concave object the size of his hand that was rapidly disintegrating into a blue haze. So the entire sphere was made of the blue mist. That explained why it vanished; it disintegrated into fine particles that dispersed, leaving behind no trace of their origin.
    It was quickly diminishing before his eyes. He acted quickly, pulling one of the latex gloves he’d brought with him from his pocket. He put it on his right hand and then threw caution to the wind. He picked the crumbling chunk up. It was hot to the touch but not so much so that it burned him. It continued to crumble into dust so he quickly flipped the glove inside out. Stray blew particles swirled out