Airfoil: Drake City: Airfoil

By Steve Rzasa

Brandon Tusk has taken the mantle of the superhero Airfoil and defeated his first great enemy - but the challenges don't end there. After a harrowing adventure in San Camillo that nearly brings about the world's end, Brandon returns to his hometown to face threats just as dangerous to the lives of the people he's sworn to protect.

 

"Airfoil: Drake City" collects the short stories "Hotspots," "Repercussions," and "Heartbeats."

• Language: English
• Publisher: Steve Rzasa
• Release date: Sep 27, 2021
• ISBN: 9798201671044

Steve Rzasa

Steve Rzasa is the author of a dozen novels of science-fiction and fantasy, as well as numerous pieces of short fiction. His space opera "Broken Sight" won the ACFW Award for Speculative Fiction in 2012, and "The Word Reclaimed" was nominated for the same award. Steve received his bachelor’s degree in journalism from Boston University, and worked for eight years at newspapers in Maine and Wyoming. He’s been a librarian since 2008, and received his Library Support Staff Certification from the American Library Association in 2014—one of only 100 graduates nationwide and four in Wyoming. He is the technical services librarian in Buffalo, Wyoming, where he lives with his wife and two boys. Steve’s a fan of all things science-fiction and superhero, and is also a student of history.

Book preview

Airfoil: Drake City

Steve Rzasa

Airfol: Drake City  by Steve Rzasa

www.steverzasa.com

This book, or parts thereof, may not be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means—electronic, mechanical, photocopy, recording or otherwise—without prior written permission from the author, except as provided by United States of America copyright law.

INTERSTICE BOOKS and the INTERSTICE BOOKS logo are trademarks of Steve Rzasa. Absence of TM in connection with marks of Interstice or other parties does not indicate an absence of trademark protection of those marks.

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any similarity to actual people, organizations, and/or events is purely coincidental.

Cover illustration: Tithi Luadthong

Layout and design: Steve Rzasa

Copyright © 2021 by Steve Rzasa

All rights reserved

International Standard Book Number: 9781736741108

Books

The Interstice Universe

The Echo Watch

Mercury On Guard

Airfoil: Origins

Airfoil: Drake City

Mercury For Hire

Mercury At Risk

Mercury Is Hot

Mercury Out Cold

Mercury Off Course

Mercury With Style

Space Opera

The Word Reclaimed: The Face of the Deep 1.0

The Word Unleashed: The Face of the Deep 2.0

Broken Sight: The Face of the Deep 2.5

The Word Endangered: The Face of the Deep 3.0

Severed Signals

Cryptic Commands

Failed Frequencies

Mixed Messages

Empire’s Rift: A Takamo Universe Novel

Strife's Cost: A Takamo Universe Novel

Science-Fiction

For Us Humans

Man Behind the Wheel

Multiverse

Fantasy

The Bloodheart

The Lightningfall

Just Dumb Enough (contributor & editor)

Steampunk

Crosswind: The First Sark Brothers Tale

Sandstorm: The Second Sark Brothers Tale

The Stories

The road to Airfoil’s debut is a convoluted one. His first published account was the short story  Hotspots , which actually appeared year and a half prior to the debut of  Airfoil: Origins , the novel.  Repercussions  was a download offered when the Origins went live.  Heartbeats  is a brand new tale, following Brandon Tusk’s further adventures as a superhero.

As his contemporaries Mercury Hale and Dominic Zein have embarked on more and more fantastical adventures, Brandon—arguably the most powerful of the three—has remained a local champion of right and wrong. Thus the inspiration to offer these three stories of his crimefighting exploits, all aimed at making Drake City a safer and better place.

Whether or not he succeeds is the question Airfoil must face every waking moment.

Steve Rzasa

Fall 2021

Contents

Airfoil: Hotspots

Airfoil: Repercussions

Airfoil: Heartbeats

Airfoil: Hotspots

Part One

SEPTEMBER

It’s a hot autumn in Drake City. The leaves on the trees lining every boulevard and avenue are fading from brilliant emeralds to pale imitations. Their edges hint at gold and red and fiery orange coming within a few weeks, a riot of color soon to sweep up the slopes of Mount Stafford looming to the northwest. Cool breezes off Sculpin Bay banish summer steam.

The beachgoers haven’t all left. Most tourists have found their way back down the East Coast, and out West. Locals still throng the best stretches. From the roof of my apartment building in the Nine Square neighborhood, I can’t see the beaches a few miles away in Longshore, but I can see the families returning from a day well spent there, bodies bronzed and in some cases burnt red. They pile out of cars laden with umbrellas, coolers, towels, and floats. The wind carries the odor of sunscreen up to me.

Sculpin Bay is a sparkling blue velvet cloth spread out beyond the edge of the city, toward Newport’s shipping docks and industrial gantries. Venerable windjammers cut white fins across the surface. Their sails are incongruous next to the long red and blue hulls of container ships.

Dad, you’re gonna seriously roast the burgers if you don’t quit daydreaming.

Sizzling, and the smarmy voice of my fourteen-year-old son, draw me back to the rooftop. I flip all eight patties over, unleashing flares and smoke. Summer’s only over when it’s too cold to grill burgers. Period.

Sean’s all gangly limbs and pale skin. Somehow, he’s remained unaffected by the season, as if summer skipped him entirely. He’s hunched over an Algebra book that’s been propped open on a metal table with a blue glass surface. He scratches equations on a notebook so bedraggled I can’t understand how it’s been merely three weeks since school started up again.

I breathe in the smell of the meat, where it mingles with the rest of Drake City’s summer scents—the aforementioned sunscreen, plus hints of garbage, sweat, and exhaust. You can’t roast anything on a grill, Sean. Not possible, grammatically speaking.

Wow. Okay, take a break from the rules, Number One. Reed Andreen passes me a bottle of hard cider so cold it sweats worse than I do. Reed’s face is tanned, making his blond hair and broad grin beam like the local lighthouses. He’s wearing a blue Hawaiian shirt so bright my eyes water, and olive green cargo shorts. Take some advice from your friendly neighborhood library director: chill out.

Chill out? Sean moans as if we’ve shredded his homework. Uncle Reed, come on—nobody says that.

What, you have something better?

Roasted.

Reed’s lip twists. Ack. Brando, your kid needs cultural sensitivity training. As in, he should be sensitive to the indisputable fact that the 1990s were the height of culture in America.

You’re preaching to the choir, Captain. I clink my bottle against his and swig.

If that’s the case, take my further advice and use your vacation hours.

Is this advice from my best friend or my supervisor?

Both. Duh.

Summer’s over soon, Reed. I doubt I could get away. Do you have any idea how many boxes of books I have left to move?

Of course! I helped you and Kelly label all of them. And typed up the inventory. And reported to the system director at the Center main branch library. Reed shakes his head. Besides, your problem isn’t the inability to get away from work—it’s taking time from your extracurricular activities. He taps a sandaled foot against a bulging backpack set alongside a green and white striped lawn chair.

Reed’s got a point. My patrols have sucked up an insane amount of time, without much to show for it. With Domitian defeated, I’m left with robberies and shootings to clean up. Child’s play.

You are looking pretty run down, Dad. Sean’s abandoned the notebook for a Dr. Pepper.

There’s a lot of crime to fight in the city.

But you can’t be everywhere at once.

Aware of that. Every time I read of a murder in the Messenger.

He isn’t trying to guilt trip you. Relax. The big battle’s done. Reed takes a swig of his cider and announces his completion with a belch. On the bright side, the books didn’t all get blown up.

I glance toward the Hull neighborhood, ten minutes away by bicycle. It’s hard to miss the wreckage. Chain link fencing surrounds several blocks’ worth of broken windows, shattered walls, and crumbled structures. At the heart of it, what was once my home away from home—the Hull Branch Library—is pulverized ruins. Not everything is lost. Already construction crews are shoring up surviving buildings. But the damage my adversary and I did while locked in the throes of battle is telling.

I’m just a librarian. I didn’t think I was supposed to have throes of any kind. But God’s ways are higher than my ways. That fact is the only thing keeping me sane.

No one’s saying it’s your fault, Brando, Reed says.

What are you saying?

You should stop moping and get me a burger. Because I’m starving.

Unless you want yours still alive and mooing, exercise some patience.

Reed chuckles. I’m ready for my next verbal assault, but something catches my eye. A flash on the horizon? I scan the harbor. Probably the late afternoon sun glinting off the windows of a ship.

Ha! Bam, done! I hadn’t even noticed Sean finishing up his final equations, but judging by the way he’s just slammed the book shut hard enough to make the table legs hop, he’s done. "Uncle Reed, when’s my next installment of Iron Man getting here?"

Pushy much? I’ll get you the next issue in a week.

Cool.

I clear my throat.

Oh, yeah, thanks, Sean adds.

No problem, my graphic novel inclined protégé.

I shake my head and take a long drink of the bottle. I’m thankful to be standing up here, with my son and my best friend, letting the cool breeze and cold drink soothe my body’s aches.

But the urge to fly nudges me. The medallion dangling from a slender steel chain around my neck sends cold needles into my chest.

That’s when I see the tendril of smoke.

Uh-oh. Sean’s at the edge of the building, right next to me. His phone’s in his hand, and he snaps a few pictures. Then he’s on the Internet, fingers dancing across the screen with the surety of a pianist.

Where is it? I’m already moving toward the backpack. I unzip it. White armor plates, flexible as plastic and lined in metallic blue, unfold. They’re attached to a slim gray bodysuit.

Nothing yet—hold up. Twitter. A ship’s on fire. One of the big schooners.

A fire out of control on a 100-year-old refurbished wooden sailing ship? My window for intervention just narrowed significantly. I strip down to my boxers and tug the suit on as fast as I can. You’d be amazed how short a time it takes with near daily practice.

You’re burning the grub! Reed leaps to the grill, rescuing our burgers.

Boots secured. Chest plate attached. The medallion burns with cold intensity. One of these days, will it leave visible frostbite on my skin? Every time I wonder.