by Lucas Flint
“Actually, I did,” said Dad. “I’m your dad. Dads protect their kids. Of course I needed to do this. I’d be a pretty terrible father if I didn’t.”
I couldn’t help but smile. I also felt a bit silly now for keeping my identity secret from Dad for so long. I should have known right from the start that he would have supported me, and Mom would have, too, probably. It felt kind of nice to have allies aside from TW, if only because it would make me feel a lot less lonely than I did before.
“Now,” said Dad. He held out a hand toward me. “Let’s go home, son. The police will be here any minute and I think you need to leave, given how you’re an illegal superhero and everything. I’ll answer the questions they’ll inevitably have about all of this.”
“Right,” I said.
A loud groaning sound from the floor made Dad and I look down at Holes. The supervillain was not, as I previously thought, dead. He was moaning softly, leaving no doubt at all that he had survived being shot in the back, though given how much he moaned, I figured he was probably in a ton of pain.
“No …” Holes raised his head to look up at me. The hole on his face had faded slightly, allowing me to see two brown eyes peering out from the other side. “I will get my revenge … he will get his revenge … this is not over yet …”
“What are you talking about?” I said. “It is over. You’ve been shot. Unless you want me to beat you into submission, this fight is definitely over.”
“The fight … the fight might be over …” Holes breathed heavily. “But my revenge isn’t.”
Holes held out a hand toward me and squeezed his fist.
Without warning, a portal appeared under my feet and I fell into it before I could react. The last thing I heard before I disappeared into the portal was Dad calling out my name in surprise.
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
I fell through what seemed like endless darkness for hours on end. I could see nothing, feel nothing, hear nothing. The only thing I felt was the sensation of falling, like I was hurtling down a cliff, but even that was vague and uncertain. The only thing I knew for sure in here was that I had been tricked and that Holes might very well get his revenge after all, depending on where he sent me. Knowing Holes, I bet he sent me into the heart of a volcano, though now that I thought about it, there weren’t any volcanoes in Texas at all from what I knew, not even dormant ones. Still, I doubted Holes had sent me to a tropical island with plenty of pretty hula girls to wait on my every need.
Suddenly, I landed on what seemed like hard, metal floor. Blinking hard, it took my eyes a while to adjust to the change in lighting. It didn’t help that the fall had jarred my senses, making it hard for me to tell where I was. The best I could figure was that I had fallen into some kind of laboratory, based on the metal floor and antiseptic I smelled. I thought it might be Bug Bite’s lab in the Hive at first, but as my vision cleared, I realized I was definitely not in the Hive.
Under the fluorescent lights on the ceiling, I saw robotic arms hanging above me. The robotic arms were tipped with tools of every kind, from screwdrivers to hammers to surgical knives and everything in between. They looked like they might help a worker build something, though what they were used for building, I didn’t know.
Sitting up, I looked around at the laboratory in which I found myself. A few desks topped with large desktop computers stood here and there, while workbenches with machines in various states of completion stood along the desks. That explained the robotic arms. They obviously aided in the creation of these machines, machines whose purpose I could not quite get but which looked rather ominous. I wondered if I had somehow ended up in some kind of factory rather than a pure lab.
“Hello?” I called out, rising to my feet and using a nearby table for support. “Anybody here? Hello?”
“Hello, Trickshot,” said a familiar monotone voice behind me. “Nice of you to drop in. I wasn’t expecting a visitor today.”
I turned around to see someone I had not expected to see here: Jim ‘Techno’ Albert. He was no longer sitting on his hover chair, however. Instead, he stood on his robotic legs, his arms folded in front of his chest. Standing up, I realized that he was about a foot taller than me, mostly thanks to his legs, though he had a surprisingly lanky body. I had not realized, the first time I saw him, just how tall Techno really was. I wondered if he had always been that tall or if he had increased his height after he lost his original legs.
Regardless, I said, “Techno? What are you doing here? Is this your lab?”
Techno nodded. “Yes. The better question is, what are you doing here?”
“Um …” I rubbed the back of my head. “I was fighting Holes and nearly defeated him, but then he opened a portal underneath me and sent me here. Not sure why he sent me here specifically, but maybe he didn’t have a specific destination in mind and just wanted to send me as far away from him as possible.”
Techno turned and began working on a small, odd-looking device on a nearby workbench. The device resembled a screwdriver, although the actual screwdriver portion was replaced with a tiny gun barrel, though I doubted the device shot bullets. “He didn’t send you very far away, though, now did he? We’re still in Rumsfeld, after all.”
“Right,” I said. “But I need to get back to the warehouse where we were fighting, because I left him alone with my parents and I’m afraid what he’ll do to them without me being nearby. He was pretty badly wounded the last time I saw him, but—”
“Your parents will be fine,” said Techno, again without looking at me. “Just fine. There’s no need for you to worry about them.”
“What?” I said. “Techno, I’d think that you of all people would understand how dangerous Holes is, especially because my parents aren’t even superheroes. The longer I’m away from them, the more time Holes has to kill them.”
“Oh, I’m well aware of how dangerous Holes is,” said Techno. He put down the tiny monkey wrench he had been using to tighten a bolt on his device and then lifted up the device itself. “After all, I wouldn’t have gone to all of this trouble to break him out of prison if he wasn’t dangerous.”
My mouth fell open. “Wait, what?”
Techno lowered the device, seemingly satisfied with its design. He looked over at me, but he looked far less friendly than he did before. His red optic was glowing dangerously, while a mad smile crossed his lips. “You were asking why Holes sent you here. You thought he just sent you to a random place. I suppose it never occurred to you that he sent you here deliberately, on my command, now did it?”
Before I could say anything, something sharp pierced my back. I cried out in pain and fell to my knees as my muscles turned to mush underneath me. I tried to stand, but my muscles became so soft and relaxed that it felt like I was wearing a heavy chain around my neck.
I heard footsteps before me and then Techno forced my head up to look at him. His smile had become even crazier, to the point where I was now genuinely afraid of him, even though he wasn’t anywhere nearly as strong as I was.
“What … what did you do to me?” I said, my voice weaker than normal.
“One of my robotic arms injected you with a fast-acting sedative,” said Techno, “a sedative you should be familiar with, I think, because it’s the same one Holes injected into you during your first fight with him.”
Techno kicked me in the gut suddenly. I cried out in pain and fell over onto the floor. My eyes watered from the pain and I could barely think straight.
“Oh, you don’t know how long I’ve waited to do this to Trickshot,” said Techno. He took a deep breath. “Man, that kick felt good. But it’s only the beginning of the world of pain I’m going to inflict on you. You think you know the meaning of pain now? Trust me, you’re going to experience far worse before I give you permission to die.”
“But … why …” I said. I was trying to fight off the effects of the sedative, but it was too potent for me to fight off entirely. “Why are you doing this …?”
Techno squatted
next to me, his crazed smile never leaving his lips. “Isn’t it obvious? I want my revenge. Revenge against your grandfather for ruining my life. You’re not your grandfather, perhaps, but you are close enough for my purposes.”
My eyes widened. “So you are the one who freed Holes?”
Techno nodded. “That’s right. For years, I’ve been nursing a grudge against Greg, waiting for the right day to strike. It seemed like all of my waiting would be in vain, however, when Greg disappeared ten years ago. That’s why I put my focus on developing my wealth, because I had no other purpose for living other than that.”
Techno patted me on the cheek. “Then you came along out of the blue. I knew from the start that you weren’t Greg—you’re too young—but I didn’t care. You may not be your grandfather, but killing you would get me the revenge I sought just as if I killed Greg himself. Therefore, I put together a plan to take you out, though of course I had to do it subtly in order to make sure that you didn’t realize what I was doing until it was too late.”
“Why didn’t you just kill me yourself?” I said. My lips were not quite numb, but it was getting harder to talk nonetheless. “I was in your apartment. Your disintegration rays—”
Techno slapped me in the face. “Do I look like someone who wants to go to jail for murder? If I had killed you then, your parents would have realized you were missing and there would have been a citywide manhunt for you, one that might have eventually linked back to me. I didn’t want to risk going to jail just to sate my own desire for revenge. Hence why I worked with Holes. If Holes killed you, then it would be considered tragic, but no one would ever link him back to me, especially after I killed him myself to ensure he didn’t snitch on me.”
Breathing hard, I said, “How did Holes get his powers back? Was that your doing, too?”
“Yep,” said Techno, nodding. “I managed to get a hold of some of that Depower stuff which Gregory originally used to defeat Holes all those years ago. Then I reverse engineered it so that it would have the opposite effect of restoring a super’s powers. It was an experimental drug, I’ll admit, but it worked fabulously, as you have no doubt noticed.”
“You’re crazy,” I said. “With his powers back, there’s no stopping Holes.”
“Oh, I don’t intend to let him live forever,” said Techno. “He’s just another tool, like the screwdrivers I use to create my devices. Once he outlives his usefulness, I will end his life. I told him I would let him do whatever he wanted after he killed you, but in truth my hatred for him burns as brightly as ever. After you are out of the picture, I’ll get rid of him, and he won’t even see it coming.”
“Are you going to kill me now?” I said with a slightly numb lower lip. “I thought you didn’t want to be wanted for murder.”
“Different circumstances,” said Techno. “You see, no one knows where Holes sent you. I suppose they probably will still search for you, but without any clues leading to your current location, I sincerely doubt they will even come close to finding you. And because I plan to dispose of your body in the cleanest way possible, they will never even think to look here in my lab. I hope you agree that it is quite clever.”
“Clever? It’s mad,” I said. “You’re going to murder a teenager just because you had a falling out with my grandfather a long time ago. You’re crazy.”
“Lots of people have told me that,” said Techno. “Crazy though I may be, I am also very intelligent and clever. Besides, this isn’t my first rodeo. I’ve killed other people in the past using similar methods. You’re just the latest of a long line of victims I’ve eliminated after determining that they were a threat to my plans.”
“You jerk,” I said. I struggled to get up, but the sedative made my muscles feel like mush. “You monster. You—”
“Yes, yes, call me whatever you want,” said Techno, waving a hand at me dismissively. “I don’t care. But if you would like a bit of good news, I’m not going to kill you right away. You have something I want.”
Techno reached over and removed the Trickshot Watch from my wrist. As soon as he did, my entire costume turned into blue energy and vanished, leaving me in my street clothes, lying nearly paralyzed on the cool metal floor of Techno’s lab.
“Here,” said Techno, looking the Watch over. “The Trickshot Watch. Just what I always wanted.”
“Give it back,” I said, though my voice was weaker than ever. “Give it back to me. That was my grandfather’s. It belongs to my family.”
Techno chuckled. “Oh, so you think this is just a family heirloom? Please. You and I both know what kind of power this weapon—which is what it is—really holds. In the wrong hands, it could be used for great evil and destruction. In the right hands … it could be used for profit.”
“Profit?” I said. “I don’t understand. What are you talking about?”
“Isn’t it obvious?” said Techno. He leaned closer toward me, his crazy grin growing wider with each passing second. “I’m going to mass produce the Trickshot Watch and make a fortune off it. Unfortunately, you will not live long enough to see it yourself.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
“Mass produce the Watch?” I repeated. “You mean, like, in a factory?”
Techno nodded. “Sure. It will sell like hotcakes, because everyone wants to be a superhero but not everyone wants to pass the Superhero Exam. With their very own Trickshot Watch, however, anyone will be able to put on a costume and fight evil. It will be even more popular than Power, especially because it will be legal.”
“How could this be legal?” I said. “Superheroes who don’t have their licenses are considered criminals. Mass producing the Watch won’t change that.”
Techno stood up, the Trickshot Watch still in his other hand. I could have reached up and taken it, if not for the fact that the sedatives kept me more or less paralyzed on the floor. “I have a few connections in the federal government to have the laws regarding supers changed. I’m not in much of a hurry to mass produce it anyway. I just wanted the Watch so I can study its properties and figure out how to duplicate it on a mass scale.”
“But why?” I said. “I thought you hated Trickshot. Why would you—”
“Money,” said Techno simply. “Plain and simple. I’m already quite wealthy, but if I play this right, I will become the richest man in the world. Americans are not the only people in the world who would like to become superheroes with a simple press of a button. There’s practically no limit to what I can accomplish if I put my mind to it.”
“Superheroes aren’t for profit,” I said. “You wouldn’t be making people into superheroes. You’d just be giving them powers, powers they might not know how to use well.”
“Who cares?” said Techno. He held up the Watch. “I’ve never been one for philosophy or morality. All I care about is what works and what will make me money, and this fits both criteria excellently.”
I gritted my teeth. “I won’t let you get away with this.”
“Amusing,” said Techno. He leaned toward me, a wicked grin on his face. “You’re in even less position to stop me now than you were a few seconds ago. Even if I didn’t take the Watch from you, my plans would still go apace, because I’ve got the other Watch as well.”
“The original one, you mean?”
“Precisely,” said Techno. “I gave Holes the money to purchase it from that kiosk vendor in the Mall. I was worried for a bit that Holes might take the money and run, given his notorious greed, but I think his desire for revenge against you overrode his inherent greed. Either way, I now own both Watches, which means I am guaranteed to discover the secrets of the Watch sooner or later.”
I couldn’t believe what I was hearing, but it made sense. I didn’t understand why Holes would want to buy the old Watch in the first place or where he, a wanted criminal on the run from the cops, could have gotten enough money to buy it. Looks like both of those questions had just been answered for me. Unfortunately, I was in no position to act on those actors.
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“With the Watch in hand, my plans are nearly complete,” said Techno. “There’s just one loose end I need to tie up, however.”
Techno took the small handheld device off the table and pointed it at me. “Your death.”
“What is that thing?” I said, staring at the strange device in horror. “Some kind of blaster?”
Techno stood very still for a few seconds, not saying a word, until he suddenly laughed out loud and put the device back on the table. “Ha! That expression on your face was priceless. You genuinely thought I was going to kill you with that little toy.”
“Toy?” I said. “What do you mean?”
“It’s a glorified flashlight,” said Techno. “I have a lot of little devices like that just lying around my lab, because I like having projects I can jump to when I get bored of my current one. I was just trying to scare you with that one, and it looks like I succeeded fabulously.”
“So …” I said hopefully, “you’re not going to kill me after all?”
Techno abruptly stopped laughing. “Don’t be ridiculous. Of course I’m going to kill you.”
Techno raised his hand and snapped his metal fingers. One of the robotic arms lowered from the ceiling and aimed a cannon of some sort at me. I stared down the barrel of the cannon in confusion and fear. “What is that?”
“One of my disintegration rays,” said Techno. “One blast from the cannon and soon it will be as though you never existed at all. Don’t worry. It’s a lot less painful than it sounds. In fact, it’s practically painless. Or should be, at any rate. All of the test subjects I’ve used it on have been unable to tell me how much it hurts due to the fact that they get disintegrated into nothingness.”
“Don’t do it, Techno,” I said. “It’s not worth it. You’re not a murderer. You were once friends with Grandfather. What do you think Grandfather would say if he saw you do this?”
“Eh, he probably wouldn’t approve,” said Techno with a shrug, “but I’ve already explained that I don’t give a damn about Greg’s opinions on anything. Actually, I would love it if he were here. Then he would be able to watch as his beloved grandson is disintegrated into fine powder and there would not be a damn thing he could do about it.”