Chapter 10: SAVAGE HUNTING
The bridge smelled like burnt coffee and too many people in too small a space.
Rip's holographic displays painted the room blue as I found a spot near the back. The team had assembled quickly—Sara front and center, Snart leaning against the far wall with Mick, Ray already taking notes on something only he found fascinating. The Hawks stood together, Carter's hand possessively on Kendra's shoulder.
1958, I remembered. Harmony Falls. The teenagers with the wings. One of the episodes where Savage almost seemed human.
"Harmony Falls, Oregon," Rip announced. "1958. A small town that should be unremarkable, except for the three disappearances in the past month."
The display resolved into newspaper clippings, police reports, grainy photographs of smiling teenagers who wouldn't stay smiling for long.
"Vandal Savage has embedded himself in this community," Rip continued. "Our intelligence suggests he's conducting experiments—something related to the Hawks' biology. We need to stop him before more innocents die."
Sara stepped forward. "Team assignments?"
"You'll lead ground reconnaissance with Mr. Palmer and Mr. Bennett. The Hawks will provide aerial support. Snart and Rory will handle our extraction route." Rip's eyes found mine briefly. "Mr. Bennett, your historical analysis will be particularly valuable here. 1950s social dynamics are... specific."
He's watching. Still watching. Using me while he investigates me.
"I'll pull what I can from the archive," I said. "Small-town America in the fifties. I know the patterns."
What I knew was far more specific than that. Savage had been posing as a doctor. He'd been selecting victims based on genetic markers—looking for anyone with trace amounts of Hawk biology in their ancestry. The teenagers he took weren't random; they were distant descendants of the Hawks' previous incarnations.
I couldn't say any of that. But I could point us in the right direction.
[1871 Chicago — October 8, 1871]
Harmony Falls lived up to its name. White picket fences lined every street. Children played on manicured lawns. American flags hung from porches, and every car was some shade of pastel that would have been horrifying in any other decade.
My 1950s clothes itched. Gideon's fabricator understood period accuracy better than comfort—the wool slacks were too warm, the button-down shirt too starched, the hair product making my scalp feel vaguely greasy.
"Charming," Sara murmured beside me. Her outfit matched the era perfectly: a modest dress that hid at least three knives. "Very Leave It to Beaver."
"The town's had three disappearances in the past month," I said, keeping my voice low as we walked down Main Street. "All teenagers. All from families that moved here within the last five years. All with... unusual medical histories."
Sara glanced at me. "Unusual how?"
Here's where I have to be careful.
"Genetic anomalies. Things that wouldn't mean anything to 1950s medicine but would stand out to someone looking for specific traits." I paused at a intersection, scanning the storefronts. "If Savage is hunting, he's not hunting randomly. He's looking for something in their blood."
"And you know this because...?"
"Historical records. Savage has patterns. Four thousand years of patterns." The lie came smoothly now. "He's never been subtle about what he wants—just about how he gets it."
Sara's expression didn't change, but something shifted behind her eyes. The same look she'd given me after the 1986 mission. After D.C.
"You've been right before," she said. "About the Soviet operation. About 2046. About things you shouldn't have been right about."
She's connecting dots.
"Pattern recognition. It's what temporal physicists do."
"Physicists deal with math and theories. You deal with people." She stopped walking. We'd reached the end of the commercial district; ahead, the town gave way to residential streets and, beyond those, the forests that surrounded Harmony Falls. "Where would Savage be? Right now, based on your patterns?"
A test. She wants to see how good my intel really is.
I closed my eyes. Not because I needed to think—I already knew—but because the gesture sold the performance.
"Medical clinic," I said. "He'd need access to blood samples, medical histories. A position of trust that lets him choose victims without raising suspicion. And he'd need a cover story for why a European man with unusual mannerisms showed up in small-town Oregon."
"A doctor."
"A specialist. Someone brought in to consult on a rare condition." I opened my eyes. "There's probably a refugee narrative too. Europeans displaced by the war, starting fresh in America. It's common enough that no one questions it."
Sara was silent for a long moment. Then:
"Ray, what's the status on that medical clinic?"
Her comm crackled. Ray's voice, cheerful despite the gravity: "I'm looking at it now. The Harmony Falls Medical Center. Records show they hired a new consulting physician six months ago. Dr. Vandal Konrad." A pause. "Not exactly subtle with the name."
"After four thousand years, you stop caring about subtle," I said.
Sara's eyes stayed on mine. "You're useful, Bennett. I'll give you that."
"I try."
"But if you're hiding something—something that puts my team at risk—I will find out. And I'm not as patient as Rip."
The threat was delivered casually, almost friendly. That made it worse.
"Understood."
She nodded once, then started walking toward the clinic. I followed, the system's interface flickering at the edge of my vision.
[PROXIMITY ALERT: TEMPORAL ANOMALY DETECTED]
[CLASSIFICATION: IMMORTAL ENTITY — THREAT LEVEL: EXTREME]
[RECOMMENDATION: MAINTAIN DISTANCE — COLLECT RESIDUAL ENERGY ONLY]
Thanks for the obvious advice.
The confrontation with Savage went exactly as I expected—which meant it went badly.
The team tracked him to the clinic. Ray infiltrated through an air vent, because Ray loved air vents. Sara and I provided ground support while the Hawks circled overhead. Snart and Mick held the perimeter.
Savage ran. He always ran in Season 1. The whole point of the early episodes was establishing that he couldn't be killed without the right weapons, the right circumstances, the right cosmic alignment. Everything before the finale was just delay tactics.
What I hadn't expected was the energy discharge when he fled.
The clinic's back door exploded outward. Savage emerged wreathed in golden light—temporal energy, the kind my meta-knowledge recognized from the show's more dramatic moments. He was using something. An artifact, maybe. A weapon from one of his many lifetimes.
The discharge washed over everything in a thirty-foot radius. The Hawks were thrown backward. Sara rolled with the impact, coming up in a fighting stance. Ray's suit sparked and flickered.
And me? I stood in the aftermath, feeling the energy settle around me like warm static.
[TEMPORAL DISCHARGE DETECTED]
[AUTOMATIC ABSORPTION INITIATED]
[+15 ✧ CHRONO-ESSENCE]
[+30 XP]
[NOTE: IMMORTAL ENTITY RESIDUAL — HIGH CONCENTRATION]
Thirty experience. From one discharge. The system had mentioned that proximity to major temporal events would accelerate growth, but this was beyond what I'd calculated.
[CURRENT XP: 105/500]
Still a long way from Level 2. But closer. Measurably closer.
"Bennett! You okay?"
Sara's voice. She was beside me, scanning for injuries.
"Fine." I blinked, dismissing the interface. "The discharge—it didn't hurt me."
"It hurt everyone else." She gestured at the clinic, where Ray was helping Kendra to her feet and Carter was already shouting about pursuit. "Savage is gone. We lost him. Again."
You were always going to lose him. That's how the story works.
"There'll be other opportunities," I said. "He's not done here. The experiments he was running—he didn't finish them. He'll try again."
Sara stared at me. "You sound very sure about that."
"Pattern recognition."
She didn't reply. But later, when she briefed Rip on the mission failure, I saw her mention my name. Saw Rip's expression sharpen.
Two people watching me now. Two sets of suspicions building.
"If you're right, keep being right," Sara had said. "If you're wrong, I need to know immediately."
That was the deal. That was the balance. Be useful enough that they tolerated the mystery. Be accurate enough that they didn't dig too deep.
The experience bar glowed in my peripheral vision. One hundred five out of five hundred.
I could work with that.
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