The Inside-Out Man, Part 4
A desperate appeal.
Welcome to Olympus City, where super-powers, physics-defying tech, and unearthly creatures are all possible now. Human nature, however, remains unchanged.
No one is born a perfect superhero, but a few strive to live up to the ideal anyway.
Previously: Carey fled, and Ken sought help, leaving Miranda alone to halt the forward march of the Inside-Out Man—a person she had once failed to save.
Part 4
Miranda was used to pain, was used to persevering despite it. She recently proved it again when a woman’s pestilential power spread out of control. She proved it early on by flying through thousands of miles of outer space on depleted lungs.
But Ollie Neal’s power terrified her. It was something else entirely, something beyond pain—it belittled pain.
Nevertheless, she flew toward him because people expected her to. They had just watched the Golden Gladiator flee in terror, so now Miranda needed to face the man who had that effect on the perfect superhero from a perfect universe.
Ollie was stepping across the sky on a moving staircase of scrap metal. He had climbed high above the rooftops, which were getting lower anyway as the coast neared, so he now flattened the steps into more of an aerial walkway. Eight steps took turns rotating to the front, ensuring a continuous march to Argus Max.
And Miranda had no way of touching him. He could rip her apart without laying a finger on her. He could rearrange her organs and muscular structure like she was putty, like she didn’t even matter, like nothing mattered, like she was a fool for expecting to take basic anatomy and physical cohesion for granted.
She couldn’t touch him. Didn’t dare try. But maybe she didn’t have to.
Fists forward, she pointed herself at the furthest step and accelerated to maximum speed. She ripped through it and shot far into the clouds before she allowed herself to turn around.
In the same fashion, she destroyed another step, and another, and one more, halving the supply. On her next pass, she simply grabbed one of the remaining steps and pitched it at another, knocking it from beneath Ollie’s descending foot. His inverted form tumbled toward the Olympus City Dock.
People were down there. Not many, but some, and Miranda couldn’t let even one more person experience what Ollie had subjected her to.
“Watch out!” she called down, zooming ahead.
At super-speed, she whisked all bystanders away to a safe distance, apologizing to each one as she did so. She hated this. It was such a violation. One moment, they’re all just walking around, going about their business, and then super-strong arms suddenly scoop them up and relocate them in a bewildering rush of motion. Another betrayal of basic reality, and this time Miranda committed it—but only to save them from a far worse betrayal.
When Ollie hit the ground, his various organs and systems splattered, then swirled back together into their usual horrific arrangement. Recollected, he picked himself up and directed himself toward the water.
Miranda had cleared the area of people, though others may have remained aboard the various boats that lined the shore, mostly personal vessels in this section. She didn’t see anyone, so she hoped they were safely hidden away in the cabins.
But the fall had done nothing to halt Ollie’s progress.
“You were a decent person,” Miranda said, landing at the furthest edge of a pier. “Think about who you were. Think about what you’re doing now.”
“I was a jigsaw puzzle. For weeks.”
“And I am so, so sorry. No one should have to go through that. But what you’re putting people through now—”
“You didn’t stop it. Bloman kidnapped me—you didn’t stop him.”
That was true. Miranda had no idea what she was doing at the precise moment Bloman threw Ollie into that cube, pulled the lever, and reduced him to inanimate objects. She might have been rescuing someone else. Or she might have been sleeping, looking for work, watching TV …
“I rescued your colleague—Evelyn Flynn. Remember her? Remember your friends, family—everyone who wanted to see you pull through this, who still wants you to pull through. Remember who they are. Remember who you are. Not what, who.”
“Who I am.” Ollie lifted a skeletal finger and pointed at himself. “Is this.”
Ollie lumbered forth, pointer finger drifting toward Miranda, a harbinger of imminent torment. Miranda considered fleeing. Carey had fled, after all, so why shouldn’t she? Ollie was only after Bloman. The whole thing was Bloman’s fault. Some might even call this justice.
But not the people who were getting hurt along the way. The Inside-Out Man instilled no confidence that he would distinguish between Bloman and anyone else at the prison. Even if he did, Ollie’s power was the very definition of cruel and unusual. Ultra Woman couldn’t condone such vengeance.
She ripped up a plank of wood and swung it at Ollie’s skull. It never landed, because all sense, all logic—everything—ruptured.
The docks, pier, boats, and buildings swirled into an ever-tumbling kaleidoscope. All sense of direction abandoned Miranda. There was no ground. No safe haven.
Soon, there was no her either. She split apart, fingers over there, toes way up high, tongue way down there, teeth’s location unknown—a murky stew of whoever she was supposed to be.
Thoughts were gossamer. Everything refused to solidify. Except a single sentence. It cut through the psychedelic storm and entered the various pieces of Miranda’s brain.
Miranda, we’re here.
The distorted voice bounced around the nonsense, but it alone was not nonsense. It was Alyssa, and she was calling directly into Miranda’s mind.
A gentle pressure surrounded the scattered elements of Miranda and pulled her together. As her eyes rediscovered each other, she found herself lying on a solid pier—a damaged pier, but the remaining section proved stable enough.
Ollie was gone but not out of sight. He marched above the water, across floating planks of wood. Nothing stood between him and Argus Max as he closed the distance.
Miranda tried to push herself up. Residual vertigo forced her back down. A hand reached toward her. Two hands. She grabbed each and found her way onto steady feet.
One hand belonged to Ken, still draped in the gray of Mr. Amazing. The other arm extended into a familiar silver trench coat, above which sat a Venetian volto mask and fedora. Dental scrubs spilled out at the ankles.
“So,” Alyssa said, “you heard me.”