Mom, I'm Bulletproof

Chapter 18.1: Brawl at the Ultramax

"Amy, how are your finances?"

Amy, while on the phone with her mother, flipped through the stack of unpaid bills next to her laptop in her bedroom.

"Um, they're OK."

Mom knew better. "The money from those commercials is probably running out by now, right?"

"I'll be fine."

"You know, your father and I could..."

"I don't need a loan."

"Yes, well, if times get tough, you know that your father and I..."

"I'm not moving back in with you, either."

"Well, what are you going to do, Amy?" Mom said, using her serious voice.

Amy sat down on her bed and closed her eyes.

"Amy? Are you still there? Darn these stupid cell phones."

"Talk to you later, Mom." Amy clicked off the phone and fell onto her bed again. It was late morning, and she had no plans for lunch. She wondered if she had enough grub in her kitchen to make a decent something to eat.

Still in her hand, the phone vibrated, making that unpleasant "blaaat!" noise. She clicked it on and held it to her ear.

"Sorry, Mom," she said. "You know the reception here is..."

"Is this U.S. Amy?" a shaky male voice said.

Amy sat up. "This is Amy."

"Oh, God," the man said. "This is Lt. Mochill. The damage it's... oh, God."

"Calm down, officer," Amy said. She had learned from experience that the cops responded better to being called officer during a crisis than a specific rank. "What's going on?"

"The Ultramax," he said. "It's in ruins. The prisoners are everywhere. It's..."

"I'll be right there."

In a matter of seconds, Amy donned her uniform, applied some makeup, fussed with her hair a little, and chewed some Tic-Tacs instead of brushing her teeth – not a substitute, she knew, but this was a crisis.

Amy flung open her bedroom window and flew forward.

The sun was setting as Amy flew at top speed straight westward, toward the Ultramax prison in central Massachusetts.

Already she saw black smoke coming from the prison building. She wondered who could orchestrate an escape from one of the world's most fortified prisons, and if it had been someone she'd sent there.

A bright yellow fireball burst out of one corner of the otherwise grey nondescript building, followed by the accompanying loud boom and sensation of heat.

Amy floated down and landed right in front of the structure that had been damaged the most. Half of it was still standing, while the other half was now a crumbling ruin. The parking lot was behind her, and she assumed that's where fleeing prisoners would run to first.

"Death to America," a voice shouted from deep within the debris. Amy recognized this voice.

"Hater?" she said.

The 9-foot-tall muscle-bound monstrosity Amy knew as the Hater stepped forward from the smoke. His mechanical arm had been replaced once again, this time with a gleaming silvery metal device, mimicking a human arm with its movements.

"You!" the Hater said. "You who I hate!"

The Hater's new arm looked like an ordinary human arm, except that it shone like bright chrome. No longer hidden behind his usual Terminator rip-off sunglasses, the Hater's pupils were black against a background of that should have been white, but was now filled with vivid red veins, to give the appearance of solid red eyes surrounding a black center.

"I will destroy you," he said.

Amy made a fist. "Many have tried."

"The Temple will rise," he said. "Mankind will pay for its sins."

"That's what I'd thought you'd say," Amy said. She flew right at the Hater. He held his new human-like hand open right in front of her. Whatever the silvery material was, it moved just as easily as flesh and bone.

An unseen force struck Amy and threw her against the ground.

"The Temple has blessed me," he said. "I am the instrument through which the United States of America will finally fail. Behold as I leave a path of American death in my wake on my way to Washington."

"Good for you," Amy said, getting on her feet. "You learned a bunch of new vocabulary words from some prison library – that, and a new arm. So what?"

"You are everything that's wrong with the world," the Hater said, aiming his new, five-fingered metal hand at her. "You represent the old way. The flawed, sinful way. I represent the new way."

"What? A Temple agent gave you a new arm? What makes you think I won't smash it up like your old one?"

The Hater smiled. He then waved his hand through the air, as if shooing away a fly.

Amy was knocked down, feeling like dozens of hands had slapped her at once, right across her cheek. She collapsed, staring upward.

"Oxygen!" the Hater screamed. "My arm now controls all the oxygen around me. I can suck it from the space around you and suffocate you, or I can solidify it and use it as a weapon."

Still breathless, Amy pounded against her chest trying to get her lungs working. The Hater, complete with new arm, red eyes, and orange prison jumpsuit, walked over and scowled down at her. He smiled, revealing his yellowed teeth. "Watch this."

He brought his hand up and then down in a pantomime motion, as if to flatten something. Instantly, Amy felt a solid force pressing her into the ground. She heard and felt the pavement cracking beneath her.

"Let her have it, dudes," the Hater said.

Amy, her head spinning with a loss of oxygen, saw other escapedprisoners marching toward her. They all held bricks and chunks of rubble.

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Next: Fighting the air.