The Games of Supervillainy (The Supervillainy Saga Book 2)

by Phipps, C. T.

  Mandy gave me a sideways glance.

  “I am so sorry,” I whispered back at her.

  “The city was going to hell the past month anyway so I didn't have much time to train but experience is its own trainer,” Amanda said. “I got to do something meaningful for the first time in my life fighting the zombies out there and rescuing people. I was the Nightwalker even when I was wearing a fake version of the Reaper's Cloak. Someone who helped people. I got to give back the strength I was given by someone coming to my aid when I needed it. So, no, Gary, I will say it. Thank you for saving me. I'm not going to need it again but thank you.”

  “Well, you can save my life and we'll call it even,” I said, shrugging. “Hell, when we save the city we'll do it.”

  “I'll hold you to that,” Amanda said, clearly resenting owing anyone. “You can imagine my surprise, though, when my efforts to find who was responsible led back to my house.”

  I recalled she'd mentioned she knew her father was an evil cultist during her kidnapping. “Somehow, I don't think you were as surprised as you imply now.”

  “No,” Amanda said, looking down. “I always knew my father used black magic to make himself rich. I just didn't realize how black. My mom's death must have pushed him over the edge. Either way, I came home to find him surrounded by a bunch of cultists he'd killed and more on their way. They were there to seize the mansion, the Book of Midnight, and all of my father's collection of curiosities. Dangerous stuff they could use to take over the city. We talked, he gave me the cloak. That's the end of the story, simple.”

  “Your definition of simple is very different from mine.” I was about to say more when I heard Mandy's cellphone ring. It was David Bowie's Life on Mars.

  Mandy picked it up and put it to her ear. “Yes, Adonis?”

  “You have a specialized ring-tone for him?”

  Mandy waved her hand in my face. Her demeanor became serious. “Yes, Adonis, uh-huh. Okay, that's bad. Thanks for the head's up.”

  “What's wrong? You look like someone just told you someone is trying to kill us.”

  “Someone is trying to kill us.” Mandy confirmed my suspicions. “Angel Eyes just said that the Typewriter is coming after us.”

  “We knew that,” I muttered, wondering if Angel Eyes was just calling to make time with my wife.

  “I mean now!” Mandy snapped.

  I clenched my teeth. “Is no one staying dead in this town?”

  If the Ice Cream Man was a B-Lister then the Typewriter was a B-Lister who should have been a Z-lister. What else can you say about a lunatic who wore a helmet shaped like a giant antique typewriter? He wasn't even that devoted to his concept. No crimes based on the proper spelling or anything. He was just a regular criminal with a costume and a lot of access to advanced technology like an energy-spewing cane. It made me ashamed for Diabloman and Cindy that they’d used to work for the guy and Amanda that she'd been kidnapped by him.

  Amanda, meanwhile, turned around in her seat to stare out the rear-view window. “I have dreamt of a chance to get my revenge!”

  It wasn’t a very superheroic sentiment but I’d never quite been clear on the distinction between justice and revenge.

  “That’s the spirit, Amanda. Too bad the Typewriter is a complete loser or we could have a big epic—” I was interrupted by a pair of abandoned cars in front of us being hit by a glowing energy ray, which caused them to explode in a massive fireball. Pieces of debris and destroyed road hit our windshield as the Nightcar dodged around the resulting hole, followed by Angel Eyes’ car.

  “Merciful Moses!” I shouted, falling back into my seat.

  “Disengaging Autopilot: Activating Emergency Countermeasures.” The car's on-board computer spoke in a soft feminine voice.

  The dashboard started popping out a bunch of controls I didn't have the faintest idea how to use. Looking in the side mirrors, I saw Angel Eyes's car had pulled out of the way for a long red typewriter-shaped car.

  The thing was built like a tank but was moving like a jet, two flames shooting out of its back. Standing on top of the peculiar vehicle's roof was the undead Typewriter, his previously garish outfit now mostly burned beyond recognition. His theme helmet was half melted, missing keys on one side with a chunk from the other side, exposing bits of his fleshy skull underneath. In the eccentric zombie's hands was an Omega Corporation Fusion Cannon, the kind they marketed to the United States military after the last Thran invasion.

  “Oh come on!” I shouted, staring at it in the rearview mirror. “That’s not even in theme! It should at least shoot out big exploding light construct letters or something!”

  The Typewriter pulled out a bullhorn and shouted. “I'm back, Merciless! Do you know what it's like in hell? Hot! Hot and unpleasant! You'd think they'd reward the bad guys there!”

  “Do you have any rear-rocket launchers on this thing, Cloak?” I asked, looking at the various buttons.

  “Yes. Did your henchmen bother to arm them before you stole the car?” Cloak asked.

  I asked Cindy and Diabloman. They grimaced in a way which told me they’d sold the ammunition for the vehicle in my absence.

  “I need new henchmen,” I muttered.

  “I’ll tell you how to use the other defenses,” Cloak said, quickly. We were, finally, on the same page.

  In the end, I settled for caltrops and dropped a horde of them behind me. Shockingly, the Typewriter's unseen driver managed to dodge them all. Meanwhile, the garishly-costumed supervillain above him was reloading his rocket launcher.

  “Can this thing take a rocket launcher blast?” I asked Cloak.

  “That depends. Do you mean would we survive it if it hits us?”

  “YES!”

  “Then no,” Cloak replied, sounding as crazy as the rest of us. “I suggest you avoid being hit.”

  Steering the car hard to the right, I managed to avoid a second blast from the Typewriter, this one tearing another massive hole in the city pavement.

  The Typewriter lifted his bullhorn to giggle maniacally at me. “You're going to die, Merciless! Die with a capital D!”

  “Finally!” I snapped. “At least a token nod to your theme!”

  I could tell everyone wanted to murder me then.

  I didn’t entirely blame them.

  I said stupid stuff when I was excited.

  Which was, admittedly, all the time lately.

  “If it’s any consolation, you say stupid stuff when you’re bored too,” Cloak said. “You need to rely on the Nightcar A.I’s skill at avoiding his attacks. That cannon’s batteries won’t last more than a few shots. There’s a reason Omega Corp’s weaponry is sold to criminals—no soldier wants to rely on it.”

  Mandy stared at me. “Gary, give me the wheel!”

  I should have let her have it. I trusted Mandy more than I did the autopilot but pride got in the way. “I've got this under control!”

  That was when the Typewriter fired another blast which landed right in front of us, exploding under the Nightcar and sending it flying into the air.

  Dammit.

  Chapter Ten

  Where I Deal with the Typewriter (Again)

  I have to give credit to Arthur Warren's engineers. The Nightcar was a remarkably durable piece of machinery. It managed to survive not only a fusion blast exploding underneath its front engine but being propelled in the air by said explosion before landing on its roof. Smashing my head against the steering wheel, I felt like I'd been thrown into a washing machine set on 'spin.'

  “Wow.” I lifted my head up. “That was bad. It could have been worse, though.”

  A moment later, the Typewriter's novelty vehicle slammed into the side of the Nightcar and sent it into a spin that bounced several times in the onto the Falconcrest City bridge.

  I don't know how many times I banged my head during all this but I managed to stay awake long enough to see that Mandy, Diabloman, Cindy, and even Amanda looked banged up but alive. The safety features of
the Nightcar had kept them from being seriously injured. I was a different story since a huge chunk of metal had jabbed through the window and struck me in the shoulder.

  “Gary, Gary... are you alright?” Cloak asked, his voice ringing in my ear.

  “Yeah,” I said, glancing over at the piece of metal impaling me. “Swell.”

  Reaching up to my forehead, I pulled back my hand after touching something sticky. To my surprise, my hand was covered in blood.

  “Damn. That's no good.” I collapsed on the steering wheel.

  “Try and stay awake.”

  “Yeah, I'll do that.” I felt blackness swirling over my consciousness.

  “Gary!” Mandy shouted, slapping me across the back of the head.

  “I'm up!” I shouted, waking up. “Who slaps an injured person?”

  “You're supposed to keep a person from going into shock!” Mandy said. “By keeping them awake. I think.”

  “Leave the medicine to Cindy!” I snapped. Turning down to the piece of steel imbedded in me, I stared. “Okay, how do I pull this out?”

  “You shouldn't be doing that,” Cindy said, calling from the back. “You'll bleed out.”

  “I’ll call the refugee centers we’ve set up.” Mandy said, rapidly pulling out her phone. “We’ve got a healer super there.”

  “I'll be fine. I'm partially invulnerable,” I said, trying to pull myself free and only causing myself massive pain.

  “Partially is right,” Mandy said, dialing rapidly. “Now shut up and let me do this. Amanda, Diabloman, go kill the zombies. Cindy make sure everyone is taken care of and provide backup.”

  “I love it when you take charge,” I said, smiling as I forced down the pain of my ill-advised wiggling. “You guys okay with that?”

  “Not really,” Cindy replied, coughing. “I demand overtime for this.”

  “I don't pay you. You just get a cut out of my profits.”

  “I want a salary then,” Cindy answered, not missing a beat.

  “Sure,” I said. “Time and a half on weekends. Now go get to killing the Typewriter. Protect Amanda while you’re doing it. I doubt she’s fully mastered her cloak.”

  “Like you have?” Cloak said.

  “Not in the mood,” I snapped back.

  Diabloman coughed in his fist. “That may be a problem, Boss.”

  “Why's that?” I asked, looking over my non-wounded shoulder.

  “We're missing Senorita Douglas,” Diabloman pointed out. “She seems to have slipped out in the last few seconds”

  I did a double take, realizing our hostage was indeed absent. “How the hell does she get out of this before the rest of us?”

  “I can turn intangible,” Amanda said, sticking her head through the door beside me. Literally. “Like you should have done.”

  “Gah!” I practically jumped out of my seat. Given I was impaled at the time, to say it hurt like hell was an understatement defying words. “New definitions of the word pain! Ow!”

  “Oh don't be such a big baby,” Amanda said, reaching in and turning the bar intangible. She removed it without issue. “It didn't even hit an artery.”

  “We can get Angel Eyes to cast a spell on it and you should be fine,” Mandy suggested.

  “Thanks but no thanks,” I replied.

  Amanda pulled back out of the Nightcar and ripped off the door, tossing it to the side.

  “Questions about why you're so suddenly friendly with the people who kidnapped you are being put aside for the issue of why you have super strength and I don't.” I slowly stepped out of the car.

  “It came with my cloak,” Amanda said, defensively. “Dad says all of the cloaks have different powers.”

  “Just my luck to be stuck with the crappy one.”

  “I heard that.”

  “I wanted you too!”

  “Does he realize he sounds insane?” Cindy looked over at Diabloman.

  “No,” Diabloman replied. “He does not.”

  “As for why I'm being friendly with you. I don’t think the Typewriter’s zombie…survived for lack of a better term…crashing.” Amanda’s smile was big and satisfied—not at all the sort of look a superhero should be having at someone’s death.

  “Well, that’s anticlimactic.” Holding one hand over my wound, I burned it closed. I was relying more on movies and knowledge of basic First Aid than anything real. If not for my semi-useful invulnerability, I suspect I would have collapsed then and there.

  Unbuckling my seat belt, I slowly slid out of the car and rolled onto the Falconcrest City Bridge. It was our equivalent to the Golden Gate Bridge, bisecting the cities' massive harbor and giving drivers a view of the hundred foot tall statue of Persephone holding a torch in the middle of the bay. Yeah, the city fathers hadn't had a single original bone in their body.

  Dozens of cars were abandoned across the bridge as I saw the Typewriter's car burning nearby. Oddly, the other end of the bridge was cordoned off and there were signs a police barricade had been set up for some reason. There was no sign of the Typewriter, however, which made me nervous.

  “I don’t think he’s dead,” I said.

  “What?” Amanda said, spinning around. She then looked at a spot where I suspect she’d seen his fallen frame. “He looked dead.”

  “That’s because he’s a zombie!” I shouted before scanning the area. “Fuck. Will someone check on Angel Eyes to see if the immortal demigod is, somehow, dead? I hope not. We need him. Kinda-sorta. Not that I like him or anything.”

  “You're protesting far too much.”

  “Shuddap.”

  My inquiry was rewarded by having Angel Eyes's broken and battered frame tossed at my feet. Looking up, I saw his car had been totaled, its engine having been literally ripped out. Overlooking the destroyed car was the Typewriter.

  Gone was the somewhat pathetic figure of before. Undeath agreed with the Typewriter, at least in terms of increasing his ability to inspire terror. Part of his prop mask was missing and it exposed the rotted corpse beneath with yellow broken teeth. Other holes in his costume exposed ribs and the gray twisted flesh that marked him as really most sincerely dead. It made up for the fact he no longer had his awesome energy-blast-shooting cane.

  Obliterating any sense of intimidation was the fact that, also on the car, was a giant gorilla. A giant zombie gorilla. The Typewriter, it seemed, had come with backup to fight me. The thing was far larger than a normal gorilla, about Mighty Joe Young sized, and at least twice the size of a normal member of its species. Its jaw was distended and half of its face was missing. Oddly enough, the gorilla had a t-shirt with a GLG on it. I’d have wondered how he fit in the Typewriter’s vehicle but I was starting to learn to just go with some things in this crazy mixed up world I lived in.

  “Should I know this guy?” I asked.

  “Ganglord Gorilla,” Cloak said. “The Simian Super-Crook.”

  “Weird even by my standards.”

  The Typewriter hissed at me, pointing at me. “You have no idea what I've pondered doing to you. A month has gone by since you murdered—”

  “Ahem.” I coughed into my fist. “I'm sorry. I don't mean to interrupt your monologue. I appreciate them as much as anyone. However, what's with the zombie gorilla? I have to ask. It's like I expect him to start throwing barrels at me any time soon. Are you two like buddies?”

  The Typewriter paused, stunned at my nonchalance. “If you must know, he’s my brother-in-law! He has the strength of ten gorillas due to exposure to the Ultraforce.”

  “Your brot…you know forget I asked. Sorry, Amanda, I’m taking this one,” I said, snapping my fingers.

  Nothing happened.

  “Mister Merciless?” Amanda asked, looking at me. “What are you doing?”

  “Apparently nothing.” I stared at my fingertips.

  The Typewriter let out a nightmarish laugh, unnatural sounds exiting out a hole in his cheek. “If you're referring to your supernatural power to shoot fire and ice.
I made a deal with the Brotherhood. They gave me an amulet capable of resisting your spells.”

  I grit my teeth. “I am getting sick of people having counters for my powers.”

  “Blame my working in the city for eighty years,” Cloak said.

  “Kill these bastards!” I commanded.

  Diabloman responded by lifting up the Nightcar and hurling it at the Typewriter, causing him and his gorilla to run away. Angel Eyes crawled out of his vehicle, still alive, and I saw his wounds healing over instantly. A third zombie-supervillain, a woman in a purple-sequin outfit with a domino mask with an open rib-cage I didn’t recognize, started firing a magic wand at us. I dodged out of the way but this allowed Ganglord Gorilla and the Typewriter to regroup. This was going to be a fight.

  The Typewriter tackled me, trying to strangle me with its rotting desiccated hands. “I was going to be rich, dammit! I was going to make millions selling her! Then you had to kill me! Now look at me!”

  “Quit your whining! We all have problems!” I choked out, struggling to try and force his hands from my throat.

  The monster's grip was tremendous, pressing against my trachea with force I didn't think possible. If I'd been a normal man, he would have snapped my neck then and there. Instead, I felt like the life was being choked out of me one second at a time. My attempts to press against his face and eyes did nothing. The Typewriter obviously no longer felt pain in his current undead state. Instead, it just salivated as it opened its mouth and moved to take a huge bite out of my face. Don't let zombie movies fool you, being eaten alive has no dignity.

  Amanda Douglas, Nightwalker wannabe or not, then saved my life by striking the Typewriter in the head with a full-moon shaped shuriken. The monster fell over, hissing as the shuriken buried itself into the back of its skull. One of the benefits Amanda’s Cloak granted was super-strength and those little throwing stars Sunlight used were now much-much more deadly.

  The Typewriter was down, but not out, thrashing his arms wildly. I didn't know what was required to kill these zombies, precisely, but it seemed more extreme than the typical headshot you saw in movies. Destroying the brain did seem to work, somewhat, so I decided to go for that. I was just going to make sure I destroyed a lot of it.