The Games of Supervillainy (The Supervillainy Saga Book 2)

by Phipps, C. T.

  My city.

  For years, decades even, I'd been trying to use Keith as an excuse for doing what I wanted to do from the very beginning. I'd made supervillainy into a code rather than a label people slapped on people they feared.

  I'd made it a game.

  Well when I played games, I played to win.

  “Then let me be a villain,” I said, looking down at his hands. “A villain who does what he wants, when he wants, and how he wants. I'm going to follow my own code, screw society's, and I'm going to fix what I hate about this planet. I'm also going to get rid of the people who I hate about it. I'm not going to do it for Keith, I'm not going to do it for America, I'm not going to do it for Death, or even God. I'm going to do it for me.”

  I conjured a ball of flame and a handful of ice in my hands.

  Then made them disappear.

  Gary Karkofsky was dead.

  Now there was just Merciless.

  And I was okay with that.

  “It's a hard road putting on a mask,” Gabrielle said, staring at me. “The mask compels you to become more than who you are under your birth name. It demands an immense toll and enacts an immeasurable price. It also grants strength greater than you could ever imagine if you believe in what it represents. That's why your mask should also be of someone you want to be.”

  I understood that. “Are you happy with who you are, Gabby?”

  Gabrielle gave a half-smile. “Sometimes. It would be easier to be Ultragoddess if there were more people she could not be her around.”

  I took her hands and looked at her. “You should come visit more often.”

  “Thank you,” Gabrielle said, blinking away mist from her eyes. “I'd like that. I need to take a vacation after this. The world can take care of itself for a few months.”

  I nodded. “I think we all will need one. Know any nice beach planets?”

  “A few,” Gabrielle said, smiling fully. “I'll recommend Mandy some sexy swimsuits.”

  I thought about mentioning she preferred to swim in the nude but this conversation was already awkward enough as is. “You'll always be part of my family, Gabby.”

  “I...” Gabrielle started to say something.

  “Gary, we need you over here!” Mandy called to me.

  I stepped away from Gabrielle, gave her a smile, then levitated over toward Mandy. My leg felt much better now and it seemed whatever healing effect was spreading to other wounds over my body. It didn't help with the guilt I felt over the slaughter I'd just enacted but maybe that was how I was supposed to feel. I'd been bottled up for decades after killing Shoot-Em-Up and felt nothing after killing the Ice Cream Man or Typewriter. Maybe confronting Keith had allowed those emotions to finally pour forth.

  “There's also a difference between killing two people and killing a hundred,” Cloak said.

  “Yeah, whoever said the million is a statistic thing was a dumbass,” I said, stepping over a couple of bodies to get to Mandy.

  “It's falsely attributed to Joseph Stalin—not the best source of wisdom.”

  I walked over to the Black Witch and Mandy, the former looking like I'd interrupted a moment they were having. I'd never liked Selena, even when we were classmates, and that feeling hadn't changed now that I'd married her girlfriend. The pair of them were standing over the body of a black-robed cultist who was now drooling out of the sides of his mouth.

  “We've found out some vital information,” Mandy said, looking at me. “Are you okay?”

  “Yeah, I killed a bunch of people but I'm fine,” I said, giving the peace-sign.

  “Excellent,” Mandy said. “We've managed to take down a third of the cult here but the strongest of their necromancers as well as the Reaper's Cloak wielders are elsewhere.”

  “Your Princess is in another castle,” I said, giving a tired smile.

  Gabrielle snorted behind me, laughing.

  Mandy looked confused. “Okay, sure. Whatever the case, I need you at your fighting best, can you do that.”

  “Aye-aye, Skipper.” I saluted. “So what did you learn?”

  “The final ritual to summon Zul-Barbas is at midnight,” Mandy said, coldly. “Which, along with the black robes is just one of the many clichés they're following.”

  “There's nothing wrong with black robes,” I said, frowning. “Well, aside from a few of those guys on the stadium fortifications shooting at me.”

  “We've located another of their bases and Ultragoddess' group is going to try to stop them but the actual location of the Nightmaster and her inner circle of spellcasters is unknown. This entire city is one gigantic summoning circle and they only need to do the ritual from anywhere in the city to do it. It'll have to be a place of great violence or significance to the citizen's residents, though.”

  Great.

  It was like finding a needle in a pile of other needles. “It seems like a good idea to split up then. Gabrielle's team should go deal with this other base while carry on with our original plan to retrieve the Book of Midnight.”

  Angel Eyes seemed thoughtful before giving a short nod. “A wise plan. I will follow your lead on this.”

  Diabloman, on the other hand, looked troubled. The older supervillain was sitting nearby, looking exhausted with several wounds regenerating as his tattoos moved across his body. He seemed almost disappointed at his survival “You should go on without me. You have surpassed anything I ever accomplished as a supervillain and have no further need for my counsel. I am an old man and would only slow you down.”

  The last thing I needed right now was my second in command quitting.

  “You're my wingman,” I said, looking at him with an even look on my face. “I still need you for many important tasks that only you can do.”

  “Oh?” Diabloman questioned.

  Pointing at Diabloman then myself, “You're part of a proud and illustrious tradition, you two. It is an Every Big Bad needs his top enforcer. The Emperor had Darth Vader, Sauron had the Witch King, and I've got you. I'm awesome but, honestly, not that scary. I need you to stand around looking menacing so people don't think I'm too nice to punish them. That's why I pay you the big bucks.”

  Diabloman, I suspect, smiled under his mask. “You are too good to me.”

  “I really am.” I looked at Cindy. “What about you?”

  “If we’re going to save the city, I want to be famous because of this. Like talk-shows, television appearances, book deals, and Shirley Manson playing me on television.”

  “Will do,” I said. “I want Wentworth Miller.”

  Cindy snorted. “You wish.”

  “I'm going with you. You will do what I say and not try to stop me.” Mandy’s gaze brooked no interference.

  The Black Witch seemed disappointed, then nodded. “Good luck.”

  “Our prayers will be with you,” Gabrielle said, looking between her fellows before wrapping them all in Ultraforce bubbles and taking to the sky.

  “Thanks, you two,” I said, knowing only Gabrielle could hear me. “Okay, Amanda, whatever you can tell us about your father's defenses would be great.”

  I was expecting state of the art security systems because of the man's billionaire status. It was also likely he had some magical defenses due to his membership in the Brotherhood of Infamy. With my group's combined strength, I was pretty sure we could tear through that like wet tissue paper.

  “Well, I don't know how much has changed. I had to flee the mansion when the cult killed my father.” Amanda looked bitter. “They slaughtered the cleaning staff and their families too. Some of them were friends of mine.”

  “End of the world, Amanda. Try to keep your brooding to a minimum here.” I immediately regretted saying it.

  Amanda shot a withering glare to me before Mandy put a helpful hand on her shoulder.

  “Please, just try and remember.” Mandy said, her voice calm, even soothing. “We’re on your side. Mostly.”

  Amanda took a deep breath. “Well, if I had to narrow it
down to one single thing you have to worry about I'd probably tell you to look out for the giant robot.”

  “The giant robot,” I repeated, looking over to the cyborg dinosaurs. “Right, okay, sounds about right.”

  Amanda nodded. “My Dad is... was... a collector of a lot of weird superhuman stuff. One of them is the German Automatisch Ubersoldatten, a twenty-foot-tall machine from WW2 powered by the souls of the damned. My Dad never used it but I'm sure the cultists have reactivated it.”

  “A magical Nazi robot.” Mandy blinked rapidly. It was as if she couldn’t quite digest what she just said.

  “You’ve had a very interesting childhood,” I said.

  “Tell me about it,” Amanda said, wiping her face off with her sleeve. “It kind of put a crimp on inviting anyone over to play.”

  “I call cultural dibs on smashing this thing to pieces.” I raised my hand. I needed to apologize to God for my blasphemous boast earlier.

  “Ditto,” Cindy added, grinning from ear-to-ear.

  “You'll have to wait in line,” Amanda replied, smirking. “I've lived my entire life with that stupid thing in our living room. Nothing on Earth is going to keep me from smashing to pieces.”

  “How are we going to get there, though?” Cindy asked, gesturing to the wreckage spread across the bridge. “Our cars are trashed.”

  No time to deal with that now, though. “When you're a supervillain, there's a never-ending supply of cars to steal. To the Merciless Mobile!”

  “There is no Merciless Mobile,” Cindy pointed out. “You trashed the Nightcar.”

  “I know that,” I said, having gotten caught up in the moment. “We'll improvise.”

  We, instead, hijacked a minivan abandoned on the side of the road.

  Chapter Eighteen

  Where We Go Visit a Creepy Castle (Yes Really)

  The journey to the Douglas family mansion wasn't long. They lived just outside of the city limits, still under the dome erected by the Brotherhood of Infamy. Their home was in a picturesque region of Falconcrest City filled with golf courses and houses worth more than some countries' national debt. Amanda's childhood home wasn't hard to pick out from the row after row of forty -room-plus villas.

  Hers was the only castle.

  The place was either a genuine Medieval castle transplanted to the United States stone-by-stone or a damn fine reproduction of one. It was complete with creepy towers and overgrown grass. A wrought iron fence surrounded the place with a large metal ‘D’ hanging over the gate. I expected bats to fly out of the tower belfries any minute. Storm clouds were gathering behind the castle, the edge of the bubble-like dome over the city shimmering behind it like the Aurora Borealis.

  “We're in a van heading to a creepy castle. All we need is a talking dog and this is officially an episode of Scooby Doo,” Mandy muttered, sitting beside me in the passenger's seat.

  “If so, I'm Daphne,” Cindy called from the very back of the van. Diabloman and Angel Eyes were sitting in front of her with Amanda between them.

  “I am not Velma,” Mandy’s voice brooked no disagreement.

  “Well I'm obviously Shaggy,” I said. “Angel Eyes is Fred. I suppose that makes Diabloman Scooby.”

  “This conversation has gone a direction I find insulting to a man who has overthrown governments,” Diabloman grumbled. “Besides, I like Velma.”

  Angel Eyes just ignored us, doing his nails.

  I shrugged and switched topics. “How did you end up living in a place like this anyway, Amanda? Most teenage girls only wish they lived in fairy tale castles. Albeit, in your case, the original dark and disturbing Brother’s Grimm version.”

  “It's not as bad as you might think,” Amanda said, smiling. “My dad bought it from Vincent Weird, the sorcerer. It came with a lot of cool stuff like secret passages, giant spiders, and other cool things I got to play with as a child.

  “You're like the debutante version of Wednesday Addams,” I said before turning around and reaching towards Cindy. “Henchperson, hand me my Merciless Binoculars.”

  “You mean your regular binoculars? The ones we stole from an Omegamart on the way here?” Cindy said, handing them over.

  “Yes, my Merciless Binoculars.” I shook my hand for emphasis.

  Cindy sighed and gave me a pair.

  Taking my binoculars, I surveyed the area before the mansion's entrance. I saw the place was surrounded by a group of about a hundred skin head punks. They were armed with a mixture of automatic weapons, bats, chains, and machetes.

  I did my best Harrison Ford impression. “Nazis, I hate these guys.”

  “You and me both, pal,” Cindy said.

  There was also a giant Nazi robot coming around the back, waving its arms in front of it like it was a monster from an old black and white science fiction movie. The Automatisch Ubersoldattan, as Amanda called it, was a classic art deco design. It was mostly blocky with a square head and body with rectangular arms as well as legs. A number of blinking lights dotted its crude face. Instead of hands, the robot had claw grips and there was a long spinning radar dish on the top of its head. The thing honestly looked like an oversized child's toy with the exception of the steel swastika on its front chest.

  “I have never wanted to destroy something so much in my life,” I muttered, narrowing my eyes. “Why the hell is the Brotherhood using a Nazi robot, though? I mean, at the very least, they could have scraped off the insignia. I mean, aren't supervillains today enlightened enough to avoid the sheer tackiness of it?”

  “The Brotherhood of Infamy has often made use of Nazi remnants and their imitators across the decades,” Cloak explained. “The Brotherhood claims they will be rewarded with a purely Aryan world upon the destruction of civilization by Zul-Barbas. This is, of course, nonsense.”

  “So, they make use of Neo-Nazis and a Nazi robot because they're idiots?”

  “Yes.”

  “That, I understand.”

  “Don't you hate the way he talks to himself?” Cindy asked Amanda.

  “Let me ask my Dad,” Amanda said, staring at her cloak. A second later, she said, “No.”

  “Spoilsport,” Cindy said, pouting.

  Mandy took the binoculars and took a look through them herself. “The robot seems to be patrolling around the castle grounds rather slowly. We should probably wait until it's moved to the back of the castle grounds to move in.”

  “Yes, and all we have to do is kill a hundred or more Neo-Nazis,” I said, smiling at the prospect.

  “It would not be difficult to kill them all,” Angel Eyes said, rubbing his facial scar. “Apparently, Aphrodite has not abandoned me completely. Between my magic and your fire powers, we could kill them all in under a minute.”

  “Simple but effective, I like it. Who’s up for an old fashioned Nazi bash?”

  Cindy's hand shot up, oddly so did Angel Eyes's.

  “May I use lethal force?” Diabloman asked.

  “As much as you want. In fact, if you don’t kill every one of them, I'll be disappointed.”

  “We're not killing a hundred people,” Amanda said, taking charge. “Even Nazis.”

  “Really?” I looked back at her, raising an eyebrow. “National Socialists are where you're going to draw your 'no killing' line?”

  “Well...” Amanda trailed off, looking guilty. “It's not that I like them—”

  “Even Ultragod killed Nazis both before and after taking down the Fuhrer,” I said, raising my forefinger for emphasis. “Superheroes can kill three types of people: Robots, Ugly Aliens, and Goose-Stepping Morons.”

  “Don't forget zombies,” Mandy said, seemingly amused by our discussion. “That's important.”

  “Yeah, the undead don't count either. They’re soulless abominations,” I said, throwing my hands up in mock surrender. “Besides, Amanda, you're not going to be killing them. I'll be killing them. Angel Eyes too.”

  “I have no objection to killing fascists,” Angel Eyes said. “I killed more th
an my fair share during the Second Great War. I confess, though, I mostly ended up killing Italian fascists. They were not kind to Greece.”

  Diabloman simply said, “I am at your service.”

  “My family would never forgive me if I didn't kill Nazis,” Cindy said. “Even poseurs.”

  “Could you at least try and cut down on the mass murder in my presence?” Amanda sighed, exasperated.

  “After what happened at the stadium?” I asked.

  “Because of what happened at the stadium.” Amanda corrected.

  I sighed, realizing she was probably still traumatized by the slaughter there. “Fine, though this goes against my every instinct.”

  I crossed my arms and leaned back in my chair before rubbing my chin. “How powerful is this 1940s robot, anyway, Amanda? Do you know?”

  “It was designed by Doctor Terror,” Amanda said. “So it's got all sorts of bells and whistles like super strength, near invulnerability, and—”

  “Wait, Tom Terror worked for the Nazis?” I interrupted, shocked.

  “Uh, duh,” Amanda said. “Didn't you know that?”

  “I'm more a Silver Age fan than the Golden Age.” I felt sick to my stomach. “That son of a bitch. I can’t believe I didn’t kill him when I had the chance.”

  “That was probably a mistake,” Angel Eyes said. “For both the world and humanity.”

  “Bastard.” I cursed myself.

  Mandy patted me on the shoulder. “It's okay, I'm sure you'll be able to kill the global-trotting terrorist the next time you meet.”

  Mandy always knew the right thing to cheer me up.

  “Thank you,” I said, looking back over at her “In any case, please finish up what you were saying, Amanda.”

  “The robot has death rays—”

  “There's a classic,” I interrupted, smiling. “I've always admired Ming the Merciless for having one of those.”