Chapter 01

"You cannot stop me, you pathetic heroes!"

"Mastermind you have to stop! You have no idea what that machine will do!"

Mastermind payed little attention to the words of the leader of his adversaries.

"Even you aren't fast enough to stop me, Celerity."

"Watch me." Celerity sped forward, not even visible to the naked eye, when a turret moving as fast as he was coming out of the ceiling and shot an electrified net trapping the speedster.

"You stupid fools, none of you in your Honor Guard have the power to stop this change."

"You should not mess with other dimensions," started Hopper," I know the chaotic effect it can have upon a world."

"This change isn't something you can control; it will be utter chaos." The Author warned.

"I do not seek to control the chaos; I only wish to unleash it." Mastermind began as he powered on his machine. "You lucky heroes will be here to witness it, the end of the world as we know it."

A notification pooped into the vision of everybody present.

-Dimensional Bridge powered on.

-One minute until activation.

A timer with sixty seconds appeared in their vision.

"Looks like it isn't too late to stop you after all." said Orbital Force.

As the four heroes in the room started toward the machine, a burst of fire shot out stopping their charge.

"Prometheus, it is about time you showed up," Mastermind called out.

"Sorry for the delay, the other one proved more of a challenge than I thought." Prometheus answered the unasked question.

Orbital Force asked the question on the heroes' minds, "What did you do to Lucky Break?"

Prometheus gave an evil smile before he answered.

"His luck ran out."

-Forty-Five seconds remaining

"I'll take care of him while you three handle Mastermind and his machine." Orbital Force told the others

A nod from the other members of The Honor Guard was all he got in response.

As the two battled it out, gravity vs fire, the others charged anew.

Celerity ran as fast as he could pushing his limits as three more of the turrets from before came out of hiding. Running into different positions that would cause the nets to hit other turrets.

The Author pulled out his pen and book and began writing vigorously until the book turned into a similar, but smaller version of the net turrets, and aimed it at Mastermind.

While the other two were going about their business Hopper vanished, phasing into a slightly different dimension.

-Thirty seconds remaining…

The Author fired, his net flying towards the villain. Mastermind saw it coming, he started to dive out of the way before Celerity nudged the slow-moving net to alter its course.

Mastermind was wrapped up by the net just as hopper appeared next to the bridge. Hopper started to deactivate the machine from its control station.

"It's encrypted I can't get in."

-Fifteen seconds remaining…

"Mastermind tell us how to get in."

"You foolish heroes. Even I can't get in. That's how I programmed it." Mastermind told them as he let out a chuckle. "No one can stop it, not me, not even you, the best heroes this world as seen."

-5 seconds remaining…

The heroes went back to trying to hack into the machine, to no avail.

-4 seconds remaining…

Orbital Force and Prometheus stopped their fight to watch the results.

-3…

The heroes smashed the machine, holding their breath.

-2…

The heroes locked pain filled eyes with one another and waited. All while Mastermind and Prometheus escaped laughing maniacally.

-1…

A new notification popped into the vision of every person on the planet.

-THE DIMENSIONAL BRIDGE HAS BEEN OPENED ON BOTH SIDES.

-NEW PEOPLE WITH AMAZING ABILITIES ARE COMING.

-REAMAIN VIGILANT, SOME WILL BE HEROIC SAVIORS.

-OTHERS WILL BE TERRIBLE VILLAINS.

-THE WORLD WILL NEVER BE THE SAME.

~//~

That was about ten years ago. That we failed to stop all the destruction that followed.

Since that time, people from the other side of the bridge have come and gone, they all had extraordinary abilities, and were the first of people to have more than a single superpower.

Some heroes some villains, neither we could compete with. Even though we tried to. Eventually the Honor Guard were asked to relinquish the titles as the heroes of the planet, and for a while we trained some who shared our ability, but eventually they stopped coming to us. So, we were let go. We stayed together doing what we could to help but were asked to seek out other ways to help people, we had become too much of a liability.

We tried to stay in touch, but like people do, we grew apart. Stopped talking, handed off our mantles to the people from across the bridge, and our secret identities became the only ones we could do anything with.

The last time I heard anything from them Hopper shifted to another dimension. The Author became an author and wrote a book about robots and dungeons or something. Orbital went to find himself and we didn't hear back from him. Lucky Break was hospitalized for several years but miraculously recovered.

Mastermind and Prometheus stayed in the villain game for another couple of years, mainly being a slight annoyance to the new heroes, until one day we heard about a gang war, and they vanished.

Then there's me, Celerity, I am only known as Ray Stevenson now. I stayed as a trainer longer than the others, but not much longer. After that I ran around a bit visiting the other cities, and just doing odd jobs here and there. Until getting back to Central Hub. Now I am a beer delivery driver who must force himself not to use his superspeed. Sounds fun right? Wrong.

“Hey Ray, how ya doing?” came the voice of the gas station’s manager, breaking me out of my thoughts.

“Not to bad Earl. How about yourself?”

“Just another day in paradise.” The sarcastic tone would be obvious to a fish.

“Oh, I hear that.” Was my response, trying to sound interested.

“Listen Ray we are stopping your product here. I’ve already told our sales rep, I just wanted to let you know too.”

“Well shit Earl, that really sucks.”

“Yeah sorry kid.”

Kid? Who is he calling kid? I’m older than him. Oh right, I do everything fast but age.

“It should be fine Earl. Now before I get out of here, I need that last check for this stuff.”

Earl handed him the check and gave his best wishes, which I returned.

As soon as I got in the truck my phone rang. The caller ID showed it was my boss.

“Hey Tony, what’s up?”

“Hey Ray, you on your way back yet?”

“Yeah just finished up at Earl’s place, so he’s dropping us?”

“Yeah we can talk about it when you get back.”

“Sure thing boss, see ya soon.”

The drive back wasn’t anymore memorable than any other time I made the trip. Lost in my thoughts I started to reminisce about the golden days when I was on the front lines in the battle of good and evil. It made me want to reach out to the few people of ‘The Honor Guard’ I had contact info for. I decided against it, I can call when I get off work.

As I pulled into the shipping depot and parked the truck, my phone chimed.

I pulled out my phone and found that I had a message from and Unknown contact.

Unknown: Enjoy your last day?

Ray: I think you got the wrong number.

Unknown: You could be right on that Celerity, but I don’t think so.

Time started to slow as I sped up, looking around there was no sign of anyone or anything unusual. I did a quick run around the building, nothing. Not knowing what else to do, I made the smartest move I could.

Ray: Who is this?

Unknown: If you need a job call me.

A contact attachment appeared underneath, with no name just a number.

“It is probably one of the Guard trying to play a prank. Yeah that’s got to be it.” I said to myself with a deep sigh.

At that moment Tony came out of the door,” Hey Ray come in in here we gotta talk.”

Heart sinking like I was about to get fired I followed Tony through the building and into his office.

“Have a seat Ray.”

“Tony I don’t like where this is going.”

“Don’t worry you aren’t fired or anything.”

With relief I sat down.

“Alright boss, what’s up.”

“Because of the loss of our customers, specifically on your route, we are cutting you back to two days a week.”

“What the hell Tony, how could anyone survive on that?”

“C’mon Ray look at it, your route alone has dropped four out of our six stops.”

“Tony, I have been here for eight years, I got seniority over half the drivers, give me one of their routes.”

“It doesn’t work that way.”

“The hell it doesn’t Tony!” Starting to get angry, it came out louder than I meant it to.

“Watch your tone with me.”

“Screw you Tony, I don’t need this.” Standing before he could say anything else, I stormed out of his office. Exiting the building into the back where no one was around, I sped off running the fifteen miles home in about five seconds.

After a couple of hours my phone chimed again. More messages came in from the unknown contact.

Unknown: My offer still stands Ray, or Celerity whichever you prefer.

Ray: Who the hell is this?

Unknown: You might wanna get that.

Before I could Respond there was a knock at the door. When I opened it there was no one. Just a packet on the ground.

My phone chimed again.

Unknown: It’s my offer. Call if it looks appealing to you.

Looking over the packet it was a business proposal, for a shipping company. At first glance it was a huge overestimate of profits, until I realized something.

“They want me to use my powers?”

Picking up the phone I hit the contact that Unknown sent me. After a moment of hesitation, I hit call.