“Thanks for coming, John,” Morgan said.
The reporter shuffled on the spot. “The stone woman didn’t give me much choice.”
Morgan smiled and gestured to the seat across from him. Like the desk and the filing cabinet in the corner, it was well made and barely used, though it was getting a little dated. “Please.”
John Bishop shuffled to the chair, keeping his head high, and sat down without much difficulty. He was only in his twenties, but his hairline was already beginning to recede, leaving a V of dark hair pointing to his forehead.
“How are your new quarters?” Morgan said. “Comfortable?”
“Yes, sir.” His voice was clipped, probably hiding his nervousness.
“How’s the story coming?”
“Good, sir.”
“You’ve been able to talk to my people? They haven’t given you any trouble?”
John shook his head. “Most have been eager to tell me their stories.” He licked his lips. Perhaps John wasn’t so eager to hear some of what his people had to tell. Many had killed before, and some had done worse. But it was necessary.
Morgan smiled to try to put the man at ease. “I understand this is a difficult time for you. Truly, I do. I was taken against my will once myself. This is a dangerous world we live in. Though I’m sure you knew that already. You’ve done some war correspondence, correct?”
“Yes, sir. I covered the last coup d’état in Syria. There was fighting in several major cities.”
Morgan nodded. “A young man, to have seen that. What you do is important. A single soldier is nothing to anyone, but a single reporter can change the world.”
John nodded, but said nothing. His mouth was in a tight line, and he would only make eye contact with Morgan for the briefest moment before shifting his gaze.
“Cigarette?” Morgan asked. He produced a packet of Rothmans from the desk drawer. John hesitated, then nodded. He leaned over, took one, and allowed Morgan to light it.
“Aren’t you going to…?” he said when Morgan returned the packet to the drawer.
“I don’t smoke.” Morgan smiled and leaned back, resting his hands on his white trousers. “You’ve been with us a few weeks now. So I suppose you’re wondering why I want you to write this story.”
John looked more comfortable with a cigarette in his hand. He brought it to his lips and inhaled. “It’s not unheard of. My editor once had an exclusive with Suicide Prime. Sometimes supervillains want—” His eyes widened and his mouth slammed shut with an audible click. His gaze met Morgan’s, then darted away again.
Morgan laughed. “It’s all right. I’m not going to dangle you above a pool of acid because you called me a supervillain.” He leaned forwards and put his elbows on the table. The poor man looked like he was going to drown in his own sweat. “The media doesn’t like to use those words anymore. Supervillain, supercriminal. Even superhero. It’s like society has tried to forget its past, don’t you think? All around the world, metahumans are pushed to the fringes of society. The Alpha League went so far as to leave Earth entirely. And now the world treats nearly two decades of metahuman activity as if it never happened.”
The cigarette slowly burned down in John’s fingers. He held it inches from his lips, but he made no attempt to take another drag. The cigarette trembled as Morgan let the silence draw out between them.
“You’re right,” Morgan said. “I am a supervillain. But I didn’t bring you here just to show off. Without you, everything I’m doing, everything I’m going to do, will be worthless. Without you, I’m just another madman.”
He stood, opened the filing cabinet behind the desk, and pulled out a series of folders bound together with rubber bands. He tossed them down and they hit the desk with a thud. John jumped, but stayed silent.
“It took me nearly a decade to put that together. Years of planning and tracking down fragments of information. That file contains everything. Every operative’s report, every piece of tech I had specially designed. You can read it, all of it, if you want. Everything will become clear soon, anyway.”
Smoke drifted from John’s cigarette, but he hardly seemed aware of it. He licked his lips, staring at the file. “Why?” he finally asked.
Morgan smiled. “That’s always the best question. And that’s the one thing you won’t find an answer to in there.” Now that he was standing, he didn’t want to sit down again. I’m getting restless, he realised. He was so close to the end now, so close. Years of setting up the chessboard. Months of moving his pieces into position. Checkmate in two moves. He wanted to act now.
But the timing had to be perfect. If he made his move now, he’d bring retribution down on him and his people. He paced back and forth, hands clutched together behind his back.
“I’m not in this for money,” he said. “I have no desire to rule anything. I don’t want revenge, at least, not in the usual sense. No doubt others will challenge my motives in the coming weeks, but I need you to understand.”
He stopped pacing and faced the reporter. Part of him bristled at the idea of sharing information with this man, laying out his plot like a moustache-twirling villain. But he had to make John understand. The reporter’s eyes were still nervous, but he leaned forwards slightly now, brow furrowed, interest piqued. He’d stubbed out his cigarette, but the aroma remained.
Does he see? This was the weakest link in Morgan’s plan. The realisation that he needed someone like John only came to him two months ago, during a nightmare. He dreamed his plan unfolded perfectly, every cog meshing with the next. But a decade afterward, the world began to forget. It had all been for nothing. He woke in a cold sweat that night. It was only by chance that his people found John in Moscow, an English journalist trying to peer behind the Iron Curtain. If John fails, everything fails.
Straightening his white jacket, he continued. “My plan would have stayed just a plan, never acted upon, if my life had remained the same.” He gestured to the file. “Back then, all this was just—excuse the expression—academic masturbation. I realise that now. But of course, things never stay the same, do they?”
He resisted the urge to massage his forehead. The ache was building again. “I have a condition. Oligodendroglioma. A type of brain tumour. Surgical resection is too risky. The tumour will kill me, eventually.” He’d accepted that. He’d always been a logical man, and having your cause of death presented to you with such stark certainty had a certain beautiful logic all of its own. Most metas died of cancer, of course. He’d just never truly considered that he might be one of them. “I take medication to control the seizures, but it won’t be long until I can’t function at the level I need to. I suppose I should have carried out my plan years ago, when I was still healthy. But I never would have, of course. No one ever acts until they’re forced to, supervillain or not.”
Turning away from John, he fell silent. He wasn’t a robot. He feared death like any man. But more than that, he feared leaving the world as it was.
“Who…” John said. “Who are you?”
Morgan watched his people fight the training drones in the warehouse. Only Obsidian knew about his cancer. She knew almost everything. The others had their own reasons for being here. But regardless of their motivations, they were serving a noble cause.
“My name is Morgan Shepherd. I went to school in Birmingham, and in nineteen fifty-five I left home to attend the University of Cambridge to study law and politics. My powers were known only to me at that stage. I assume they were a result of the atomic bomb tests in the North Atlantic Ocean, but of course, I cannot be sure. You can’t imagine how excited I was when I first discovered I was a metahuman. After years of collecting Dr Atomic comic books and watching the exploits of the world’s superheroes at the pictures, I was becoming one myself.
“I practiced in private, training for the day when I’d take a cape for myself. I wasn’t content to just be a superhero. I was going to be a hero to make Dr Atomic himself proud.” He turned back to John and
gestured to the blotches of pale skin on his face. “My skin started to change at the same time. I didn’t mind. Why would I? The last thing I wanted to do was hide.” He paused. “And then the protests started. You know of the Cambridge protests?”
John nodded. “Nineteen fifty-seven. Students Against Metahuman Control.”
Morgan smiled. He knew he’d picked the right man for this. “We couldn’t stand idle while governments across the planet restricted metahuman rights more and more. Registration, compulsory medical checks. The introduction of kill-switches was immoral beyond reason. We clashed with other protesters on more than one occasion. The student body was divided into pro- and anti-metahuman. Other students across the world protested in solidarity with us, but it was strongest at Cambridge.”
He could tell the reporter knew what was coming next; he would have heard of the day, but Morgan kept speaking. It had been a long time since he spoke about it with anyone.
“In June of fifty-eight, our group was marching through campus. There were dozens of openly meta students amongst us, and several more that we all assumed had powers as well. Our protests had mostly been peaceful, but times were changing. We tried to continue our march out of campus, and found our way blocked by officers of the new Metahuman Control Unit of the police. They attempted to force us back, and some of our more extreme members retaliated.” The day was seared into his memory. “I couldn’t believe it when the police opened fire. My people—my friends—all crumpled. Other people’s blood coated me. I couldn’t hear; I couldn’t see through the smoke. This wasn’t how it was supposed to be. We were going to be heroes.
“The practice I’d been doing saved me. Without thinking, I brought up a shield of light to protect myself against the gunfire. It was the first time I’d ever used my powers in public. But my people were still dying. My best friend, a meta I’d known since school, took a round in the throat. I watched him drown in his own blood. All thought fled from me.”
He flexed his gloved hand into a fist behind his back. “Next thing I knew, I had sliced a police officer’s head from his shoulders with a blade of light. I can still see the blood pulsing from his neck as the body slumped to the ground. I kept moving, kept cutting. A few of the surviving metas saw what I was doing and tried to stop me. Others attempted to fight as well. But most of the killing I did alone.” He sighed and bowed his head. “You know the event I speak of?”
“Yes,” the reporter said. He paused as if debating with himself, and his fingers tapped on his knees. Finally, he appeared to make up his mind. “They were rounding up the survivors of the riot for months.” His voice barely quavered. “How did you escape?”
“Luck, mostly. I made contact with the Erasers, and they helped me out of the country. I made my way through Europe under several false identities. It wasn’t hard to stay ahead of Interpol and anti-metahuman squads. They were overwhelmed in those days. I moved every few weeks, never spending more than a couple of months in a country at a time.” Until I met Lisa. He shook the thought from his head.
“Even if this is all true,” John said, “it doesn’t explain any of this.” He waved his hands at the office, but the gesture seemed to encompass much more. He’d fully transformed into the reporter now. “You said this wasn’t revenge. You’ve freed criminals and kidnapped people, but for what?”
Morgan relaxed his hands and pushed his plan file across the desk to the reporter. “Read. And think. I hope you’ll understand now.” He caught a glimpse of movement through the office window, and he sensed a kind of darkness approaching. His heart sank a little, but he steeled himself. Doll Face was coming. He must be done with the boy, for now. A necessary evil, he told himself, but it wasn’t convincing.
“We’re done for now,” Morgan said. He picked up the file and pushed it into John’s hands. “Read.”
The man nodded jerkily. Morgan held out his hand, and after a moment, John shook it. A strong grip. Yes, he thought, he’ll do it. He’s the one.
He showed John to the door. Obsidian was waiting outside, ready with the handcuffs, but he waved her away. “John won’t be needing those. He has writing to do.”
Something giggled in his ear. “What’s it writing? Is it writing a story?”
Morgan forced himself not to shudder at Doll Face’s stench. How did he move so quietly? The makeup on Doll Face’s mask had been recently reapplied. The crooked lipstick smile sent shivers down Morgan’s spine. John was almost cowering behind Obsidian.
“Take John back to his quarters,” Morgan said to Obsidian. She bowed and escorted the shaking man away. The reporter cast fearful glances back at Doll Face as he went. Doll Face cocked his head to the side and watched the reporter until he was out of sight.
“It’s done?” Morgan asked shortly. The less he had to deal with this creature the better.
Doll Face returned his attention to Morgan and leaned close. “Doll Face enjoyed playing with the boy’s mind. So many secrets. So many dark places to explore. When can Doll Face cut him?”
“Not yet. You have more…playing…to do.”
The creature’s head jerked to the other side. “Doll Face is patient. Doll Face likes to play.” He glanced around, leaned in, and whispered. “But the best bit is making a toy cut its own eyes out.”
Doll Face turned and slipped away, making no sound as he went. That was a good sign. He only made footsteps when he wanted his victims to be afraid.
Morgan realised he’d been holding his breath. He exhaled and massaged his aching head. A necessary evil, he told himself again as he watched Doll Face disappear.
Just like me.
Part Two
Both the victor
and the vanquished are
but drops of dew,
but bolts of lightning -
thus should we view the world.
—Japanese death poem by Ôuchi Yoshitaka
10: What She Doesn’t Know
Signed and ratified by 87 member countries in 1960, the Seoul Accord granted governments strict controls over metahuman rights in the interests of public safety and economic stability. Use of superpowers became heavily restricted, and many member countries also prohibited the employment of metahumans to protect the jobs of non-metahumans. The most controversial component of the Seoul Accord was the granting of governments the right to fit metahumans with so-called “kill-switches”. These could be activated by authorities to terminate the metahuman in case of violent criminal activity that could not be contained by conventional means.
—A Concise History of Metahumans, George Walters, PhD
Niobe greeted the dawn by pulling the curtains of her apartment’s kitchen shut and sitting in darkness. She couldn’t think clearly with sunlight streaming down on her. Everything became clearer in the shade.
She wore an old blank T-shirt and the same panties she’d slept in. A mug of instant coffee sat in front of her alongside a newspaper, but she made no move to drink it. The bitter aroma was all she wanted, really. Gabby had built a machine like the ones in new Neo-Auckland cafés, one that brewed fresh coffee directly from beans, but Niobe never used it. The smooth liquid it produced didn’t taste like coffee should.
She’d woken half an hour before dawn and slipped out of bed without waking Gabby. Her sleep—or what passed for it—had done nothing to leave her refreshed. All night she was tormented by images of uniformed figures striking at her throat and shoving bags over her head. Other shapeless creatures crept through her mind, stealing away with her memories. Again and again she woke drenched in sweat, until she finally gave up. She was probably just overtired. That was all it was.
She sighed and inhaled the scent of the coffee on the table. What she really wanted was a photo album. That was what other people had, right? Photos of their families and themselves growing up. Maybe if she had something like that she could patch over the hole left in her memories. The memories the Blind Man took had been the clearest ones she had of her parents. Now she could barely remembe
r their faces. All she had was the smell of the coffee her mum used to make for her dad before he went to see his patients.
Bugger it. She pushed the coffee away from her and folded her arms. She’d made the trade willingly. She had a lead on the kid, no matter how small. If she could get him back, maybe it’d be worth it. Maybe.
Solomon had made a call to the bloke he knew at the cape coppers’ headquarters. The guy wasn’t a meta; all he did was mop the floors. But the coppers had a habit of flapping their jaws when he was around. A cleaning guy was invisible to them, she guessed. Piss-poor security. That sort of thing wouldn’t have been tolerated in the Wardens. But those days were different. You could never be sure someone wasn’t a doppelgänger or the mind-controlled slave of some psychic supercriminal. It was a matter of survival to make sure no one was eavesdropping on a sensitive conversation.
Solomon’s man hadn’t heard any goings on about a kid being subdued on a boat in the harbour. No prisoners that matched Sam’s description were being held there either, as far as he knew. It was what she expected. The man she saw in the vision was acting outside normal protocols. Either he really was a copper, and he’d been wearing the uniform to get close enough to the Juliuses without attracting attention, or he was an impostor, and the uniform was designed to throw her off the trail.
She’d put out her own feelers, but nothing had come back yet. There weren’t many people willing to work with her and Solomon, but if metas were being snatched, maybe there were rumours her informants could trace. The information would cost. But not as much as the Blind Man, she thought. She scowled into the darkness and wiped her resentment away.
Soft footsteps padded behind her, and a second later the kitchen light clicked on. She didn’t turn around, so Gabby came and sat at the table opposite her. Niobe’s stomach clenched when she saw the bloodstains on the shoulder of Gabby’s robe. The cut on her forehead had begun to scab over, but the purple, raised bruise disappearing beneath her frizzy blond hair was still vivid. Niobe’s mood softened. Gabby’s eyes were puffy and tired, but she still looked beautiful. She was always beautiful. You should have protected her better, a voice in her heart whispered.
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