Flag Man eyed his partner up and down. “My government has need of me, Rusty, and I agree with General Wallace on this. Atoman is a potential threat to this country and needs to be contained.”

Flag Man and Rusty stood inside the base’s hangar. Both had traded in their costumes, Rusty for civvies and Flag Man for standard issue military casual. Only their loud conversation drew the attention of the flight officers and hangar crew on duty.

In just over an hour they were scheduled to be moved to a top secret army complex in Nebraska. From there they could further track Atoman’s whereabouts. That is, if Rusty couldn’t talk logic in to his mentor.

Rusty had serious misgivings about the whole situation since General Wallace approached them at the farewell celebration. “I just can’t understand how you wear that flag on your chest so much of the time and still can’t grasp that Atoman deserves his freedom just as much as you or I.”

“Atoman is a walking weapon of mass destruction. You’ve seen the havoc wreaked on mankind in the history films. You remember Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Someone with that much power is not someone we can leave walking free.”

“Then what? Do you think if we start rounding up the likes of Atoman that the government will just stop there? Why not pick up Lightning Girl or Golden Lad or anyone else they might think has the possibility of a super power. Where does it stop?”

Anger was beginning to creep in to Flag Man’s voice. “Don’t be foolish, Rusty. We’re protecting American citizens here from a dangerous threat. Those people are American heroes, veterans of the war, not living atomic bombs.”

“Until someone decides otherwise.”

“We can trust General Wallace. He’s a good man.”

Rusty shook his head. Nothing could get through to Flag Man. He could see it clearly now. “My time of following orders is over, Travis. I’m sorry, but I can’t be part of this, not the general’s game and not this illegal manhunt.”

He threw his duffel bag down. “My costume’s inside. You can have it. I quit.” Rusty turned and walked away from the jet, away from the man who had been like a father to him for years. A man who raised him after finding him an orphan on the streets of Liverpool. None of that mattered now.

“Rusty, wait!”

Rusty didn’t look back. He pushed back the tears as he walked away. He would not look back. He would not let his friend see what this was doing to him. He headed back up to the living quarters to pack his things.

*****

Atlanta, Georgia
June 29, 9:26 p.m.

Atlanta was—dear God, what had happened to her city? When she stepped off the train, the first thing Sally Lincoln noticed was the grime. Dust seemed to hang on everything. Not actual physical dirt, but her ghost-vision detected it everywhere. Usually the Dust came with some kind of severe trauma, mental or physical, but a thin layer of it laid spread across the entire city. Her previous experience in Times Square was worse than what she knew, but nothing compared to what coated her hometown.

She could see the area had grown by leaps and bounds. Buildings were larger now, but no cleaner or better put together. The ACTION agents in charge of relocation warned her that the neighborhood was overrun by crime and nearly destitute financially. Still, conditions were still better than they were in the Depression.

Strip clubs seemed to pop up ever block or two, if not more frequently. She couldn’t imagine how so many girls could debase themselves in such a way, but she also remembered Marcus’s words. A lot had changed in sixty years.

The music she could have done without. Jazz was all but gone, replaced by heavy thumping sounds and vile language. All in all she wondered if this is what progress brought, was it even worth it?

A massive Negro—African American, she reminded herself, was the new term—smiled a toothy grin from the front door of one of the gentlemen’s clubs. The gold in his mouth shined under the multi-colored lights of the club.

“Hey baby, looking for a job? We got lots of positions for someone as sexy as you?” He chuckled. “I can think of a few positions you and me can get in to personally, if you what I mean.”

Sally shook her head at the young man. What happened to simple class and respect for others? Did modern women really respond favorably to perverted words like his?

“No thank you,” she said. She let her shadows creep across the ground. She continued down the street, and she could watch his eyes following her through her third eye. He never noticed the presence around his legs before it pulled his feet out from under him. The shadow retreated back to Sally as she continued to her old address.

Well, what was once her address. Now it was a massive apartment complex, what Marcus called a “project”. He looked sad, almost depressed, at the word. She hadn’t inquired further. Now she could see why he was so affected. The building looked unlivable.

Which made the fact that it was her new home that much more unbearable. The structure reached up twenty-seven stories. The apartment ACTION found her was on the fifth, a floor most of the residents would kill to be on, or so they told her. As she looked at the teenage boy sitting by the broken elevator, a needle still in his arm, she wondered now if they had meant “kill” literally.

Sally wondered what she was thinking when she decided to make the trip here. ACTION’S assimilation team warned her. They tried to tell her that her community had changed and not for the better. She hadn’t listened. She was a superhero for goodness sake. Who better to live in less than ideal conditions?

She walked up the stairs two at a time. After reaching the fifth floor, it took her only a few moments to find her apartment. She opened the door and entered in to her new living quarters.

The once-white walls were spotted with water stains where they hadn’t already yellowed. A dingy single bed sat in the middle of the living room, just a few feet away from the stove and the ice chest that could have looked modern in her day.

She slumped down on to the bed despite the many states that rivaled the marks on the walls for sheer numbers. Her head hurt again. How could she have been so stupid to come here? To choose to live here without even looking at it first? And with her less than ideal job credentials… She was an expert seamstress, but she doubted much call existed for her talents in this neighborhood.

Maybe it would be just a matter of time before she accepted that lecher on the streets offer.

She walked in to the bathroom and looked at herself in the cracked mirror. The ghost vision of her third eye showed even more of the Dust in the room, but she ignored it. She looked at herself instead.

She had the figure of the girls on the posters on the front of the clubs. Her bosom was full, her posterior firm but large. But the clothes they wore—

She shuttered at the thought of parading around in such attire.

“Not quite what you thought the future would bring?”

She recognized the slightly inhuman voice instantly. She looked up at the blank stare of Doctor Frost’s gas mask.

“You! Where have you been?”

“Around,” he said. “Seeing this new world unencumbered by the blinders put on me by a government we can no longer trust. We need to talk.”

Sally raised her hands up in to the runic signs that summoned her full shadow energies. Her skin faded to white as she formed a shadow bolt in each hand.

“You can talk about it to ACTION,” she said. “I didn’t trust you before you broke in to my home. Now I’m not sure if they weren’t right about you.”

“Wait, just listen—”

“It’s too late for words. I’ve heard enough today.” Ghost Woman unleashed her twin blasts upon Doctor Frost.

Frost raised his hands and the shadow bolts shattered on the block of ice that instantly formed before them. A layer of ice formed beneath both their feet and Frost used it to slide out of the room.

“I’m not here to fight, Ghost Woman. This I promise. I need your help.”

“My help? Just like the slime on the streets want my help with their sick shows? I’m tired of being everyone’s little servant girl. I’m my own woman now, Frost!”

She unleashed another bolt of shadow energy, this one full strength. Frost threw up another ice shield, but the blast shattered it and continued in to the man’s armored chest. Doctor Frost flew back in to the living room and crashed just a foot short of the bed. Ghost Woman could hear him wheeze for breath through the mask.

What was going on? Sally looked at her own hands, unable to fathom what had brought her fury to this level.

She rushed to Doctor Frost’s side. “I’m sorry, Doctor. I don’t know what came over me. I think I lost control.”

Frost slowly moved in to a sitting position. “It’s this world. Something about it is tainting us, making us like it. I don’t know how and I don’t know why, but I know we need to find out.”

“You are out of your mind?”

“Am I?” Doctor Frost’s shook his head beneath his helmet. “Everyone wants to solve the problem of why we’re here. They want to find which of us to blame for the time jump. I’m sure Atoman and myself are on the top of the suspect list. But they’re missing the point.

“It isn’t who brought us in to the twenty-first century, but why?”

Ghost Woman let the glamour and her shadow energies fade. She didn’t know if the sounds of the fight would draw any attention to the apartment, but she didn’t figure she wanted anyone to see both Ghost Woman and Doctor Frost there. “I don’t know if I even care anymore, Doc. I… I can’t even figure out what I’m going to do with myself in this world. I don’t know if I even want to know what brought this about.”

“Even if it could takes us back to our own time? Even if we could fix this future from ever happening?”

“Damn you, Frost. You always were a smooth operator. Not even that Halloween suit you wear now can change that.” She turned away from him. “But what we had… that was the past. What the hell do you think I can help you with now?”

“Sally, things have changed for both of us. All of us, really. But I need you on this. This whole caper stinks of mysticism, and there’s only two mages I trust in this world. The Green Lama isn’t around anymore, so I nominated you. I need you, Sally. I need your help.”

She looked across her pathetic excuse for an apartment. “All right, I’ll help you. It’s not like I have much of a life in this world anyway, and this place is sure enough not where I want to start it. So what’s our first move?”

“We need stealth if we’re going to continue this investigation. Someone who can get blend in, disappear in to shadows, and record everything.” Sally knew Frost’s tone. The I’m far too clever for my own good tone, she called it. The tone that meant he had a plan and she wasn’t much going to like it.

“Tell me, Sally, how hard would it be to break in to ACTION Base?”

*****

San Francisco, California, somewhere on the docks
June 30, 9:48 p.m.

Something didn’t feel right to Golden Lad. This world of tomorrow just wasn’t what it used to be. It seemed dirtier, less safe, and far less friendly. What was worse, it seemed to be rubbing off on Golden Girl.

Take today for example. Agent Chance had used their new unofficial position to assign them to this mission: to take down a group of sick criminals. Their crime: sex slavery.

Golden Lad wish he hadn’t asked Chance what that meant.

The sickos operated out of a small warehouse on the docks. They packed their victims in cargo crates with minimal amounts of food and water and left them there for weeks as they moved overseas. Most ended up in various locations in Southeast Asia, where sex remained a top tourist attraction.

This world is a sick, sick place, he thought. What happened to my world, where at least the enemy was easily found and conquered? None of this sickness, this malignant tumor that threatened to burn a hole in my mind.

He wanted to see these bastards fry. He no longer cared about Dart, about Ace; these men needed to pay.

He busted through the wall and flew down toward the group of men. He counted twelve of them easy work for himself let alone with Golden Girl.

He smashed in to one. The man flew up and through the air, but Golden Lad didn’t see it. He turned and struck another thug in the room.

Golden Girl swooped down and hefted two men by the collars. She slammed them together head-first before she dropped them to the ground. She turned to strike again. Her eyes were that of a hawk seeking its next prey. He threw up his arms but it did nothing to stop her strike.

Golden Lad’s vision was a large as he struck one man after another. He didn’t care how hard his blows landed. If he injured them well, that’s what they had coming.

His fists flew out independently of all thought. His vision was gone, replaced by the barking anger inside him. He grabbed another slaver by the collar and raised his fist to deliver the final blow—

“Stop! Tommy, it’s me! It’s me!” Golden Lad’s vision cleared, and he found himself face to face with Golden Girl. He released her shirt and floated back. He looked around the room. Broken bodies were strewn everywhere. None moved.

How could I let myself do this, he wondered. How could I have so easily lost control?

Golden Girl floated over to him and wrapped her arm around his shoulder. “Calm down,” she said. “They are all still alive. Probably going to spend a few weeks in traction but alive.”

With her free hand, she missed her bright red hair. “Now, let’s find the kids before. Agent Chance arrives.” She looked back at the injured slavers. “Maybe we won’t be in quite so much trouble then.”

Golden Lad knew she was right. They had children to free. He would have to deal with the consequences of his action another time.

*****

New Salem, Kentucky
July 1, 11:36 a.m.

He wasn’t Captain Fearless anymore. Good or bad, he was just Ernesto Ramirez. His powers were gone, disappeared with his sudden time slip. His wife was gone with them, but he still had family to come home to. Family he may have never known, but family nonetheless. Which is why he stood on the street in one of the worst parts of the city, in the rain, knocking on a dingy white door.

On the flight to New Salem, his mind flew from thought to thought at supersonic speeds. Would his family believe his story? If they did, would they accept him after a sixty year absence? Would any of them even know the name Ernesto Ramirez or even care about the heroics of Captain Fearless.

Now he realized that the placement aides back at ACTION base were probably right. He should have first made sure to contact them, at least make sure they were home.

He couldn’t quite understand it. According to ACTION’s report, he should have found a house bustling with four adults and six children from ages five to eighteen. It seemed odd to him that every family member would be gone on such a dreary summer day.

He pulled the strange phone out of his pocket. The assimilation trainers at ACTION base explained to him how to work this “cell” as they called it. Nonetheless he still couldn’t quite get his head around the idea of a phone that fit in his pocket and could work anywhere in the word. It was the stuff of dreams.

He dialed in the house number. It would ruin the surprise, but at this point he didn’t much care. He just wanted to meet them at last after all this time-travel mess, losing his powers, losing every aspect of the life he knew, he needed at least a chance to reconnect with even his most decent relations.

He walked around the house. His hope was to find someone in the rear, but the backyard sat empty as well. He looked around the small patch of green and brown. He found several things he thought might be toys—it was hard to tell when everything seemed to be made of garish plastic.

When he turned to look at the back door, he saw it was cracked open. He walked closer. The door had been forced open, and the broken back took much of the frame with it. He pushed the door farther open.

“Hello?”

No answer. Ernesto stepped inside. Fearless, he reminded himself. You didn’t call yourself that for nothing.

The home was a mess. Furniture lay on its side. Glass from a broken lamp lay in the center of the living room. A large stand, perhaps for the massive modern television boxes, sat empty at the far end of the room. The cabinet doors on the stand were torn and broken, their contents either gone or spilled on the floor.

He continued in to the kitchen and dining area. It was a bigger mess. The dining table lay sideways. Broken pieces of glass and ceramics covered the floor between the table and the kitchen proper.

A chill ran down his spine. Something bad had happened here. Happened to my family dammit!

“Who are you? What are you doing here?” The words were Spanish and the voice female. Ernesto turned to see a young Latina no more than twenty years old standing in the living room. She wore a pair of shorts that hugged her muscled thighs tightly and a low cut shirt that exposed excessive amounts of cleavage. The word BITCH was emblazoned across the front of the shirt. His wife wouldn’t have worn so little even to bed, but he reminded himself this is what passed as fashionable in this modern world.

He stumbled as he started to respond in Spanish. He hadn’t spoken the language, even at home, for several years before the leap through time. “I’m looking for the Ramirez family.”

Her eyes narrowed in obvious anger. Her posture changed; Ernesto recognized an offensive stance when he saw it. “You won’t find them, you bastard. I’m tired of criminal scum like you in this neighborhood,” she said. “I’m tired of break-ins and robberies and—”

Her eyes went dark. Ernesto took a step back. He knew anger, but this was beyond anger. This was malice, hate, the urge to kill. He knew it well. He had seen it and felt it before.

She bounded towards him. Ernesto threw his arms in front of him to block the blow. Her fist caught him in the right arm. The arm screamed out in pain at the blow. He lost his footing as well and stumbled back in to the kitchen counter.

He didn’t much like fighting women, but this one gave him no choice. She would kill him otherwise.

He couldn’t have that. Not until he found his family.

*****