She had her long black hair tied back and was wearing grey jeans and a plain red T-shirt. The only thing that marked her out as anything other than a normal girl was a pair of thick leather gloves and the black Zorro mask she’d “borrowed” from her little brother.

The midday sun broke through the clouds and illuminated the tall man making his way towards her.

Renata stood her ground, watching him approach.

Though Dioxin was still twenty metres away, there was a stench of death about him: a putrid, damp, fungal smell that reminded Renata of the rotting timbers in the basement of her grandmother’s house. He sneered at her as he stomped forward over the rough ground, his grin spreading across the blotched yellow and red skin of his face like an opening wound. “Haven’t you got the sense to run away, little girl?”

He continued walking towards her, the grass dying where his bare feet touched it.

Renata watched him carefully. She knew all about Dioxin, knew what he could do. His skin oozed a thick, clear, acid-like venom and if his touch didn’t scorch the flesh from your bones, it infected you with a deadly poison.

Dioxin stopped a couple of metres away. “Seriously. Run away.”

Energy had told Renata that of all the villains she had faced, the one who scared her most was Dioxin. Ragnarök was incredibly intelligent, strong and fast; Brawn was four metres tall and capable of knocking a moving train clear off its tracks; Slaughter was a ruthless killing machine; but they were nothing compared to Dioxin.

“So what do they call you?” Dioxin sneered.

“Diamond.”

Dioxin looked her up and down. “What’s the deal here, kid? Don’t tell me that you’re one of Titan’s crew! You’re what, fifteen?”

“Fourteen.”

“Fourteen. And you think you can stop me?”

With that, Dioxin lunged towards her, his poisonous arms outstretched.

Paragon quickly checked the information that was projected on to the inside of his visor. Flight power was down to less than forty per cent.

A plasma bolt hit him in the left shoulder, burning a hole into his armour. He dodged to the right, quickly unclipped the still-burning shoulder pad and let it fall to the ground. A deep red welt appeared on his dark skin. One of the few active superheroes who didn’t have any superhuman abilities, Paragon relied on his armour and weapons as much as his natural intelligence and athletic abilities, but there were times when even these weren’t enough.

Paragon was sweating – and it wasn’t just from the weight of his armour, or the heat of the plasma bolts.

This was a bad situation.

There had been no sign of Ragnarök for months and now this: a hundred-metre-long mobile fortress, rumbling its way across Pennsylvania towards the city of New York. The tank stopped for nothing; cars, trees and even houses were crushed beneath its giant wheels. Unable to halt or even slow the machine’s progress, the police and army had concentrated on evacuating people from its path.

Another volley of plasma bolts streaked towards him and Paragon cut the power to his jetpack and dropped, angling his descent so that he was falling directly into the path of the enormous battle-tank.

He reactivated his jetpack ten metres above the ground and found himself face-to-face with Ragnarök, protected by the battle-tank’s metre-thick windshield.

They stared at each other for a split second, then Ragnarök frantically gestured to one of his henchmen, mouthing the words “Kill him!”

The armoured hero dodged to his left just as a huge column of white flame scorched the air around him.

He swooped down towards the battle-tank’s undercarriage, settled long enough to attach the explosive charge, and then zoomed away, dodging a storm of bullets and plasma bolts.

Paragon glanced around. He could see Energy floating above the battle-tank, using her powers to deflect the tank’s fire away from the others. Paragon activated the communicator built into his helmet. “Everyone! Pull back! Three seconds!”

There was a flurry of activity as the assembled superheroes darted to a safe distance, then—

The sound of the explosion was almost unnoticeable over the roar of the tank’s massive engines, but everyone felt it; the ground trembled, the blast rattling windows for ten kilometres in every direction.

Paragon peered through the huge column of smoke and dust. He activated his visor’s infrared filters and … Yes! The tank was burning!

“All right, people!” Paragon said. “Maybe the big guy isn’t with us, but it looks like we’ve just had our first break. Max?”

Max Dalton’s voice said, “I’m here, Paragon.”

“Get inside the thing. See if you can lock on to someone.”

“I’m on it.”

“Energy, follow him. You might need to shield him against weapons-fire.”

“Will do,” Energy said.

“Quantum?”

Silence.

Paragon paused. “All right. We’ll have to do it without him. Anyone know how Diamond is holding up?”

Dioxin raged. He ranted. This is impossible!

He’d reached out to infect her and the girl – Diamond – had simply locked her hands around his wrist and changed.

It had taken less than a second; she had shimmered, glistened and become solid, unmoving and transparent. Even her hair and clothes had changed. It was as though she’d been replaced with a statue carved out of solid diamond.

Dioxin couldn’t shake her off. She wasn’t moving. He didn’t think that she could move in this form. All she was doing was holding on to his wrist, still staring at him with that determined look on her face.

A voice called out, “Dioxin!”

He turned to see an annoyingly familiar figure behind him.

Dioxin sighed. “Dalton.”

Joshua Dalton smiled. “You can let go now, Diamond.”

As Dioxin watched, the girl instantly turned back to normal. She let go of his wrist, jumped backwards and ripped the leather gloves from her hands. She tossed the gloves aside. Even before they hit the ground they were a smouldering ruin.

“See, the trouble with your power, Dioxin, is that you can’t even lift weights to build up some muscle, can you?” Joshua Dalton said. “No, you’d just burn through the bars. Now me, on the other hand… Well, I’m not that strong either, certainly not compared to Titan. But a psychokinetic doesn’t need to be strong.”

Dioxin felt a sickening lurch in the pit of his stomach, then looked down to see that he was floating a metre above the ground, unable to do anything but wait to be arrested.

High above the battle-tank, Energy concentrated on drawing the enemy fire towards her. Tiny flashes of blue and orange lightning crackled around her body and through her short auburn hair. Her eyes – normally a pale grey – were now almost solid white.

She knew that she could absorb a huge amount of power, but there was a limit. Pretty soon now she’d have to discharge that power.

A voice crackled over her communicator. “Energy? I’m on the way!”

“Titan! Thank God! Where are you?”

“Just crossing the east coast. I’ll be there in a minute,” Titan replied.

“Make it quicker! We’re not doing well here. I’m trying to pull in all their plasma bolts, but it hurts. I’ve never seen so much fire-power!”

“I see you!”

Energy looked to the east and Titan was suddenly hovering in front of her, his dark blue cape billowing in the light breeze. “Don’t just float there! Do something!” she told him.

“Yes, ma’am!”

Titan gave her a quick smile then darted down to the battle-tank.

Shots blasted into him, missiles exploding to his left and right. It was as though the battle-tank had been designed with the sole purpose of hurting him – and it was doing a pretty good job.

Titan was strong and fast, but he wasn’t invulnerable. When he was hit, he felt it. And he was being hit a lot right now. Soon his chest was a mass of bruises and his costume – bright blue tunic and leggings, darker blue cap, gloves and boots – started to get more holes than a fishing net. Much more of this and he’d be flying around in his underpants.

Through the tank’s metre-thick windscreen, Titan could see Ragnarök at the controls, ordering his men about. The madman had a determined look on his face. That wasn’t unusual for someone like him; they all believed in what they were doing.

Where the hell is Quantum? he wondered. He should be here by now! He’d be able to phase himself inside the tank! And what about Max? Why hasn’t he been able to reach someone on the inside of it? Could Ragnarök have found a way to shield the tank from Max’s mind control?

Titan looked again at Ragnarök. The villain was looking determined, but not concerned.

There’s something else happening here. What is Ragnarök planning?

For the first time in years, Titan was genuinely worried.

Diamond stood on a low hill, some way from the main battle. Ahead, she could see Ragnarök’s battle-tank as it rumbled onwards.

The tank had left a channel of destruction as far as she could see.

“It’s huge,” Diamond said. “Energy said it was big, but I didn’t think… Josh, how can we possibly stop something like this?”

He hesitated. “I don’t know. Look, Diamond… You shouldn’t have to face this. Not yet. I’m going to leave you here. Somewhere safe. OK?”

“No! Not OK! You can’t just leave me out of it!”

“This is your first battle.”

Diamond stared into Joshua Dalton’s eyes. “I can take care of myself! I’m invulnerable! And I’m strong! A lot stronger than you are!”

“Physically, yes.” He glanced past her, to the battle that was raging. “Emotionally, you’re not ready. You stay put, Diamond. That’s an order. Got that?”

She nodded.

“Good.” Joshua Dalton leaned forward and kissed her gently on the forehead. “Wish me luck.”

Max Dalton’s power, like his younger brother Joshua and sister Roz, was mental rather than physical; he could temporarily take over the minds of anyone within a twelve-metre radius.

Max and his siblings were always easy to spot, even on this crowded battlefield; the members of The High Command were the only superheroes who didn’t wear masks. All they wore were matching black Kevlar uniforms.

Now, as he ran across the battleground towards Paragon, he was glad of the fact that his costume was bullet proof.

Max helped Paragon to his feet. “You OK?”

The armoured hero coughed and spat out a mouthful of blood. “I will be. Thanks. How are we doing?”

“Not good,” Max replied. “Titan can’t get close enough to the tank to do any damage. I’ve no idea where Quantum is. Impervia and Brawn are locked in a stalemate. Apex is down; The Glyph got him. The others… I’m losing track of them.” Half an hour earlier, Max had seen the five members of Portugal’s Podermeninas team battling dozens of Ragnarök’s henchmen. Since then, there had been no sign of them.

“Max, I don’t mind telling you… I’m scared,” Paragon said. “I don’t think we’re all going to make it. If we can’t stop that machine…”

“We will stop it.”

“How? We’ve thrown everything we have at it and it’s still going.”

Max Dalton bit his lip. “I know. Listen, I passed something on the way back to you. It’s… I think it was Thalamus. I think he’s de—”

Max spun away, his hand clutching his neck. Blood dripped between his fingers.

Paragon grabbed Max’s free arm and dragged him to the relative safety of a fallen tree.

“Let me see it,” Paragon said. He pulled Max’s blood-covered hand away and inspected the wound. “You’ll be fine – I’ve had worse shaving cuts.”

He removed a large bandage from his med-pack and pressed it against the wound. “This’ll help for the time being and we can get it looked at properly when this is all over.”

“Thanks.” Max grabbed Paragon’s shoulder and hauled himself to his feet.

Paragon said, “What we need right now is a miracle.” He paused. “Or, to be more accurate, we need—Quantum!”

“Exactly.”

“No, I mean… he’s here!”

Max Dalton and Paragon ran towards the battle-tank. Quantum, the fastest superhuman of them all, could not be seen, but there was no doubt that he was there. Ragnarök’s henchmen were being knocked about by some invisible force, their weapons ripped from their hands, their armour torn off.

“Quantum, where the hell were you?” Paragon shouted as they neared the tank.

The white-clad superhero suddenly appeared in front of him, slightly out of breath. “I… I don’t know. Something happened to me. How badly are we doing?”

Max said, “We have some dead and a few missing. We thought you were one of them. Look, we need Impervia to help Titan, so you’ve got to take on Brawn. You feel up to it?”

“Sure. Yeah. I can slow him down at least.”

Paragon shook his head. “No, wait. Quantum, use that intangibility trick of yours; get inside the tank and see what damage you can do. At the very least, try and take out Ragnarök.”

“OK,” Quantum said, nodding. “I’ll—” He shuddered. “Something’s wrong.” He looked down at his gloved hands. They were shaking. “I… I don’t seem to be able to move.”

Paragon exchanged a quick glance with Max. “What is it?” Paragon asked.

“I… Wait! There’s a sense of… There’s a machine, it’s dangerous to us. Ragnarök’s been used…” Quantum blinked rapidly, swaying back and forth. “Paragon? You’re older.”

Quantum’s knees buckled and he collapsed.

Paragon reached out and caught him. Paragon turned to Max, who was staring at Quantum. “Don’t just stand there, Max! I’ll look after Quantum. You get to Brawn – maybe you can control him.”

Max hesitated. “No, it’s never worked on him before.”

“Damn it, Max! You have to try!”

Paragon watched Max go, then looked down at Quantum. “You still conscious?”

Quantum’s eyes rolled back. “Paragon…” His voice was weak, barely a whisper.

“I’m here.”

“When the boy comes to you, you have to believe him. You won’t want to, but you must.”

“What boy? What are you talking about?”

Quantum smiled. “He will be strong. That’s how you’ll know.”

He reached out and grabbed Paragon’s hand. “You’ve been a good friend.” Then, in a stronger voice, he added, “Next, we lose. We all lose. Paragon, don’t tell the others. Promise me.”

“I promise,” Paragon said. “I won’t say a word. But I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“You will, Paragon. Not for a long time, but you will.”

1

IT WAS A Thursday in October, early afternoon. Normally at this time, Colin Wagner would be hiding behind the boy sitting in front of him, because Thursday afternoons were what his teacher liked to call “Discussion Time”. This was when Mr Stone would pick a topic he found interesting and do his very best to make sure that none of the students would ever find it interesting again.

The previous week, Mr Stone had shown them a five-minute video about how birds build their nests and then proceeded to lead the class in a discussion about birds, nests and why he believed that starlings were more evil than magpies. But today, for a change, Mr Stone had picked an interesting topic.

Today they were talking about Mystery Day.

Mr Stone waited until everyone had settled down. “So… tomorrow it’s Mystery Day,” he began. “Exactly ten years since the disappearance of all the superheroes. When this all started, nine years ago on the first anniversary, it was supposed to be a day of remembrance. But somehow over the years it’s turned into a bloody holiday! Instead of the heroes being honoured for giving up their lives, we get balloons and parties, and people setting up stalls at the side of the road to sell knock-off Titan action figures and T-shirts. And if you think it’s bad here, it’s ten times worse in America!”

He picked up his chalk and began to write on the blackboard.

Titan, he wrote, and underlined it twice. Podermeninas, he wrote next, but he only underlined that once. He followed that with a series of other names: Paragon, Apex, Impervia, Thalamus, Thunder, Inferno, Energy, Quantum and Zephyr.

Then he picked up his red chalk and wrote Ragnarök. Underneath that he wrote Rayboy, The Glyph, Terrain, The Shark, Slaughter, Dioxin and Brawn.

“Right…” Mr Stone turned around to face the classroom. “Superheroes,” he said, pointing to the words written in white. “And supervillains.” He tapped at the words in red. “Who were they? Where did they come from? Where did they get their powers?”

“Nobody knows, Sir,” Colin said.

“Weren’t the powers inherited?” Brian McDonald suggested.

“That would certainly explain The High Command: Max, Josh and Roz Dalton,” Mr Stone said.

Malcolm O’Neill put up his hand. “I heard they all came from another planet.”

“Speculation,” Mr Stone said. “Pure speculation. Let’s just stick to the facts, shall we? Their capabilities – their powers and strengths. Titan, who could fly and had the strength of a hundred men. Energy, who had the ability to absorb and then release almost any kind of energy. It was said Quantum could move so fast he was able to out run a supersonic jet. But then ten years ago at least twenty-five superheroes and upwards of a hundred villains were involved in a battle just east of Pittsburgh. Ragnarök’s huge battle-tank caused massive destruction as it rumbled across the United States towards New York City. Three whole towns had to be evacuated. There are reports of a huge explosion and then… nothing. So what happened to the superheroes? Colin?”

“They disappeared, Sir,” Colin answered.

The teacher nodded. “Disappeared. Vanished. Where to? Danny?”

“Nobody knows,” Danny Cooper replied. “But it wasn’t just the heroes who disappeared. The villains did too. There weren’t any bodies found in the wreckage. It was probably all covered up by the government.”

“They went back to their home planet,” Malcolm O’Neill said.

Adam Gilmore laughed. “Give it a rest, Mal! They were probably just vaporised in the explosion!”

“They can’t have been,” Colin said. “Brawn or Impervia would have survived any explosion. Energy could have absorbed the blast. Quantum could have just out run it.”

“Right,” Danny Cooper said. “And Max Dalton and the rest of The High Command survived.”

“Yeah, but they weren’t there,” Adam said.

“Mr Gilmore raises an interesting point,” Mr Stone said. “Despite what some witness claim, the official word is that the Daltons were not present during the attack. As far as we know, they are the only superhumans to have survived Mystery Day. Every other superhuman – whether or not they were present during Ragnarök’s attack – has disappeared.” He shrugged. “Tonight Max Dalton will give his first interview in ten years. The first time he’s ever spoken in public since he retired.” The teacher walked around to the front of his desk and leaned back against it. “Anyone want to guess what he’s going to say?”

Brian turned around to look at Malcolm O’Neill. “Hey, Mal! Maybe he’s going to tell us that he’s going to take you back to your home planet!”

The class laughed. “Right, Brian…” Mr Stone said. “You’ve just won the right to set today’s homework for the rest of the class.”

“Seriously?”

“Why not?”

Brian glanced around the room. Every other boy was staring at him with the same expression, doing their best to send Brian the same telepathic message: make this easy on us or you’re a dead man!

Under his breath, Colin muttered, “No homework! No homework!”

The teacher said, “Mr McDonald?”

“I think that for our homework we should all have a good think about what it would have been like to be a superhero.”

“A good think?”

“Yep,” Brian said, nodding vigorously.

“Perfect. You all have a good think about it and then, when you’re done thinking, write down those thoughts in the form of an essay.”

Everyone groaned. Someone shouted, “Oh, well done Brian!”

“It won’t be that bad,” Mr Stone said. “There’s no school tomorrow, so you have a three-day weekend in which to get it done. Four pages should be enough. And I want normal-sized paper, too! No more essays written on bloody Post-It notes!”

Colin, Danny and Brian lived in different areas of the town, and every day they followed the same “going home” ritual: they would walk together until they reached the north-west corner of the park, then Colin would go east, Danny would go north to the apartment blocks and Brian would go west. As always, however, they spent an hour or so sitting on the low wall, chatting, arguing and watching out for flash cars or good-looking girls.

It was while they were doing this, sheltering from the rain under the park’s enormous pine trees that overhung the path, that Brian spotted his younger sister approaching on her bike, doing her best to cycle around the puddles.

“Hey, here comes your girlfriend, Danny,” Brian said.

“Oh, ha ha,” Danny replied.

They watched as Susie wobbled her way towards them and stopped right in front of Danny. “Hi, Danny!”

Danny muttered a greeting, but deliberately avoided looking her in the eye.

“What do you want?” Brian asked her.

“Mummy says you’re to come home now and stop dawdling.”

“Does she really?”

“Yes.”

Brian thought about this. “OK… I’ll race you. You on the bike and me running.”

Susie wasn’t about to pass up an opportunity to show off in front of Danny. “OK then.”

“I’ll even give you a head start,” Brian said. “I’ll let you get as far as the end of the road.”

She eyed him suspiciously. “No. You’ll cheat or something.”

Brian tried to look innocent. “Cheat? Me? Never! Danny will vouch for me, won’t you, Dan?”

“Sure,” Danny said, reluctantly.

With that, Susie tore off down the road, pedalling like mad.

Brian watched her go. “Sucker.” He turned to the others. “Pretty cool about the homework, isn’t it? A lot better than maths or geography.”

“Couldn’t you have come up with something easier?” Colin asked.

“It wasn’t my fault! I didn’t think he’d make us do an essay!”

“I’m going to pick Thalamus,” Danny said. “He’s my third favourite after Titan and Paragon.”

“So why not do Paragon, then?” Brian asked.

“Because he’s everyone’s second favourite. What about you?”

“Thunder.”

Danny laughed. “He’s the one with the dumbest powers! Power over rain! What use is that? You never hear stories about how he managed to use his abilities to do anything other than make a loud bang or cause a sudden downpour! Why not pick Apex? He was pretty cool.”

“Yeah, but no one knows much about him,” Colin said.

“That’s what makes him a good choice.”

Brian said, “Well, maybe you think that Thunder is a bad choice, Danny, but I’ve got a few ideas to make it work. Who are you going to choose, Col?”

Colin shrugged. “I don’t know… I’ll probably end up forgetting again and doing it when I’m having my breakfast on Monday morning.” He grinned. “I seem to work better when my Dad is standing in front of me telling me over and over that I shouldn’t put things off until the last minute.”

“You could always write it from the point of view of one of the villains,” Brian suggested.

Danny raised his eyes in disgust. “Brian, you’re a moron! He said we have to write about one of the heroes, didn’t he?”

“Yeah, he did. But look at it like this… Suppose that, say, Ragnarök thought that he was a hero.”

Colin looked up at this. “Yeah, he always believed he was doing the right thing.”

Danny nodded. “That’s true, but let’s face it; Ragnarök was a complete nutter. How the hell could robbing banks and holding the world to ransom be anything but the work of a villain? If you do evil things you’re still evil – no matter what the reason.”

They fell silent as they spotted a quartet of girls wearing the uniforms of St Mary’s.

One of the girls glanced at them as she passed. “Hi Danny!”

Danny was taken aback. “Er… Hi, um…”

“Judy,” Brian whispered.

“Hi Julie!” Danny said.

The girl gave him a filthy look and hurried a little to catch up with her friends.

Brian thumped Danny on the arm. “You idiot! I said Judy, not Julie!”

Danny rubbed his arm. “How was I to know? I’ve never even seen her before!”

Brian said, “Danny, two weeks ago she spent an hour listening to you going on about how Manchester City were the greatest football team in the world. She was all over you!”

“That was her?”

“How do you do it?” Brian asked. He got up from the wall, pushed back his sleeves and held out his bare arms. “Look at that! I’ve got muscles! Everyone knows that girls like muscles, but this lanky git gets more action than both of us combined!”

Danny said, “Maybe they go for quality over quantity.”

Brian sighed, shook his head, and sat down again. “So what time’s the party tomorrow night, Col?”

“About eight.” Like many people, Colin’s parents always threw a party for Mystery Day. For Colin’s mother, it was really just an excuse for a family get-together. Sometimes Colin felt that his parents only wanted the party so that they could embarrass him in front of his cousins. “You’re definitely coming, then?”

“Yeah, but… right, here’s the thing, OK? My folks are going out and they said it’s going to be hard to find a baby-sitter for Susie. So they asked me to ask you if she could come to your party.”

“I’m sure my folks won’t mind. And she’ll be able to keep my little cousins busy.”

“Speak of the devil…” Brian said.

The others looked up to see that Susie was cycling furiously back to them.

“She does not look happy,” Colin said.

Susie stopped her bike in the middle of the road and glared at them. “Brian!”

“Now what?”

“I’m telling on you!” She yelled across at her brother.

Brian laughed and got to his feet. “OK! OK! I’m coming.” He turned back to Colin and Danny. “Right, I’ll see you tomorrow. What time did you say the party starts, Col?”

“Eight,” Colin said. “You’ll be there, right, Danny?”

But Danny wasn’t paying attention. He was standing very still and staring into space.

“Danny?”

Suddenly, Danny screamed, “Susie! Get out of the road!”

Colin turned to see the out-of-control bus screeching around the corner. Heading straight for Brian’s sister.

Cell 18 was four metres to each side and a little over three metres high. It contained a narrow, uncomfortable bed, a single chair, a small desk, a large, full bookcase, a hand basin and a toilet.

The walls were made of reinforced concrete. There were no windows. The only light came from two small but powerful bulbs set into the ceiling, shielded by unbreakable glass.

A man stood in the centre of the room, staring at the blank wall. He had not moved for over an hour.

Later, he would sit on the bed, or perhaps lie on it; he hadn’t yet decided. Then again, he might just choose to remain standing.

The wardens referred to him as Joseph.

He was in his early forties. He was tall, thinner now than he had been ten years ago, but by no means skinny, and had long, unkempt black hair and a greying beard.

A decade ago Joseph had been carried, unconscious, into the cell. On his clear days, when he was aware of his situation and his surroundings, Joseph knew that officially he was not a prisoner; there had been no trial and no legal proceedings of any kind. He didn’t even know where this cell was located. But the clear days were few; most of the time, Joseph existed only inside his own head, living with his memories and nightmares.

Joseph continued to stare at the wall. Last night he’d had the nightmare again, the same terrifying, recurring dream: visions of blood, pain, murder and death on an overwhelming scale.

Joseph was often glad of his imprisonment. Here, he was safe. No one could harm him. And likewise, he couldn’t harm any one else.

If I’m here, he would say to himself, then everyone is safe.

This thought was always followed by a conflicting one: But I’m not just here, I’m out there too. And if I’m out there, then no one is safe.

Joseph slowly turned and looked towards the bed. I could sit. Or I could lie.

He smiled.

Why not? I’ve lied before. Sometimes it seems like my whole life has become a lie.

He wondered how long he had been here.

Then he wondered how much time he had left.

How much time the world had left.

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