Super Sales on Super Heroes
Page 6
“No wire, either,” Dimitry said, lifting Felix’s arm to run his fingers down his side. “Or a piece.”
“No. I’m just—”
“Yeah, yeah. Sorry. One of those things. Twenty grand?” Dimitry asked, looking at Felix first, then over his shoulder towards where he’d worked up until about ten minutes ago.
He’d undoubtedly seen Felix a number of times while he was working. Felix could even remember intervening once between a worker and Dimitry when they’d messed up an order.
Dimitry knew exactly who Felix was.
“I don’t normally lend so much to someone I don’t know. I don’t know you, but I know of you. I want forty back from you in three months. If you try to pay up early, it’ll still be forty grand. These are my terms.”
“I accept.” Felix said it with as much authority as he could.
Dimitry sniffed and took a drag of the cigarette in his left hand.
“Fine. Go inside. Here’s some markers. Head inside, talk to the hostess, get your money.” Dimitry pulled out four tokens from his pocket and handed them to Felix.
Taking the plastic circles, Felix realized there was no going back from this point. Closing his fist around them tightly, he went into the restaurant.
“See you in three months, Felix Campbell,” Dimitry murmured with a shark-like grin.
The skin on the back of Felix’s neck prickled at the use of his last name.
Getting out of the cab, Felix walked up the driveway towards his aunt’s oversized SUV.
He tried not to use their vehicles since they weren’t technically his.
Opening the rear door, he tossed in the thirty-three thousand dollars in a briefcase and then shut it.
“Where’s your car?” Ioana asked from the corner of the garage, startling him. He hadn’t even seen her or realized she was there.
“Sold it. There’s an auction that’s going to start. They’re selling… slaves. I needed money so I could participate. If I can get more supers, I can make money faster.”
Ioana wrinkled her nose at that, yet said nothing. She eased herself back into the chair and ignored him.
Felix darted into the house for a quick change of clothes, something a bit more professional and anonymous. Put together in a simple black business suit, he slipped into the large black SUV with its tinted windows.
His aunt had disliked being seen.
Looking over, Felix found he wasn’t alone.
Kit waved from the passenger seat, dressed in her street clothes.
“I’m going! You’ll need me anyways. You’ll need to set my power to about twenty percent, I bet. We should probably stop and get me some clothes to match your own. You can spend a few points to fix up what the clothes can’t cover.
“Miu and Ioana have offered up one eye each, their left arms, and their toes to get me presentable.”
Felix cringed at the morbid nature of the discussion, but then sighed and nodded his head.
They’d been quick to convene and discuss it since he’d only been home a short while.
“Fine, let’s get this over with.”
At least it won’t be painful for anyone.
Felix gave his name at the front door. A paper was checked and he was allowed in after a cursory pat-down.
The building they’d been directed to was a large thirty-floor building that served multiple governmental needs.
One of which was apparently auctions on slaves.
“It’s almost like an industry,” Kit murmured, walking along beside him.
She’d chosen a simple black dress with long sleeves. They’d only had to do some minor work to restore her exposed skin.
She was also functioning at thirty percent of her original power, as she’d suggested.
“It isn’t like an industry, it is one. This is where debtors, prisoners, and other malcontents who meet certain qualifications end up. I imagine the bulk of the money generated here ends up in the hands of the government itself.” Felix moved at a regulated pace. This wasn’t a normal auction, per se.
All of the “goods” were on display on different floors and rooms. From what he understood, after a few hours, everyone would be asked into various meeting rooms. Everyone would be given a simple button remote that tied into the Wi-Fi and would register their bids.
Everyone would be anonymous. He imagined it would help to increase bids and prices. If no one knew who won an auction, he figured it was better for everyone involved.
“No,” Kit said, as they walked by a glass-walled conference room. Inside was a number of men and women seated in chairs with placards in front of them. “None of them will be worth our time. They’d only work against us.”
Us?
Felix was taken aback momentarily at that statement. Kit had always been supportive, oddly so. He didn’t like it. It didn’t make sense to him.
Nonetheless, he had to agree. From the look of them, they all valued themselves highly and would be accordingly attributed so. They weren’t for him.
Kit turned her head slightly, as if she were looking into the roof.
“Two floors up, that’s where we want to be. Everything above that isn’t worth our time, and everything below that will be out of our league.”
“And how do you know this?” Felix asked casually.
“Powerful enough to be useful, smart enough to fall in line, not prideful enough to raise problems. Trust me.”
He didn’t like that. Didn’t want to. Trust wasn’t easy, wasn’t really in his vocabulary or his dictionary.
“Alright, alright. Makes sense. Anything we don’t spend here we can use to buy lead,” Felix said, agreeing to her desire.
They walked over to the elevator and Kit hit the button to call it.
“I think you should limit yourself to three at the most. Six will strain your ability to keep everyone in check. Once everyone is more settled and up to speed, you can increase the size again,” Kit said as they stepped into the elevator and the doors closed.
“Thank you for the advice. Are you my consigliere now?” Felix asked.
“Better. I’m someone who wants you to succeed because it gives me what I want, while providing me with the least number of problems. So I’m an involved, and willing, party to all of this.”
“Uh-huh. We’ll see,” Felix muttered as the doors swung open.
This floor was definitely different than the others. There was a tension in the air that was palpable.
Felix couldn’t pinpoint the problem or why it was so different. Instead, he looked to the conference rooms on each side of him and saw a very similar display to the ones on the floors below. There were less interested parties, but it was roughly the same type of situation.
“They have villains and heroes both on this floor. Everything below this was heroes with a certain mindset or civilians with talents.”
Felix couldn’t help but feel confused about that. Villains selling villains.
“I wouldn’t worry about purchasing villains. They’ll serve just as well. You do realize Ioana isn’t a hero, right? She falls more on the villain side of things,” Kit explained, pulling him into a conference room.
“I thought you didn’t know her.” Felix was rapidly losing control over the whole thing.
“I didn’t, I looked her up on the internet. She fights anyone who she feels is stronger or a better warrior than her. Often, she kills them if they didn’t live up to her expectations. She’s called War Maiden.”
“Oh,” Felix said intelligently.
Chapter 6 - For Sale -
“Do you think we should talk to them?” Felix asked, looking at the information displayed on terminals in front of the conference room.
Kit was standing next to him, flipping through a similar terminal.
“Doesn’t matter. I can read their minds. I think we’re better served by you using your hypothetical screen to get an idea of what we’re working with.”
“That almost seems like cheating. Readi
ng their mind for every answer you’d like.” Felix looked at the men and women in the first conference room.
Kit sighed and looked into the room as well. “It made dating impossible. No room for white lies. Let’s start with this group, then. Give me a bit. You read through the terminal while I sort through them.”
Felix shrugged and started to read through the information available to him. In minutes, he wasn’t really reading it anymore. It didn’t matter.
Kit would tell him if these people fit the bill or not.
“Hey, Felix.” The voice jolted him from his wandering thoughts.
Looking up, he grinned as he realized who it was.
“Leon. How’s it going?” Felix asked, holding out his hand.
“Good, good. Holy shit, is that… it is,” Leon said, shaking Felix’s hand.
“Yeah,” Felix said, looking back at Kit as she did her thing. “So what’s up?”
“Huh? Oh. Nothing. Working the crowd. Building contacts. Apparently the brass were real pleased. Getting rid of their castoffs and making money at the same time really turned a head or two.
“You’ll have to tell me some time how you managed to—”
“You’re welcome,” Felix said, interrupting him. Then he turned to look back into the conference room. “Thanks for the invite, by the way. I’ll not forget it.”
“I’ll hold you to that, man, I’ll hold you to that. Alright, I’m going to go keep making rounds. Most people think she’s dead, by the way, so make sure you stick to that story.”
Felix nodded, glancing back at Kit and then to the terminal as Leon left.
Fuck that. Marcus, Caldwell, Leon, whatever. From now on he’s Mr. No-Name.
“See ya later, Mr. No-Name.” Felix tapped at the screen, pulling up the rap sheet on the woman he was looking at again.
Felix shifted in his seat and adjusted his tie again.
“Stop, it looks fine. Besides, no one can see you,” Kit said, lounging in the recliner next to him.
Being invited here by No-Name had provided them with a few benefits he hadn’t expected. Like being sequestered in a small office and watching the auction on a TV screen.
“Though this is going to be a lot easier to talk. I was a little concerned about how we were going to do this.” Kit sipped from the soda can she’d gotten from somewhere.
“Yeah, true. Hey, should I be concerned about people recognizing you?” Felix asked, putting his thoughts out there. He’d been mildly concerned about it for some time but kept putting it into the back of his mind. He hadn’t wanted to consider it.
“Not really, no. Most people who knew me as Augur knew that without my helmet, I was fairly susceptible to forced thoughts.”
“Forced thoughts?” Felix asked as the announcer on the screen rambled on and on. Until they got to the actual auction portion, he wasn’t that interested.
“My helmet protected me from what basically came down to people thinking nasty thoughts at me. I don’t have a way to block them out. Er, well, didn’t have a way to block them out. Now I just have you turn down the volume.”
“So… you don’t think we should worry because most can’t recognize you without the helmet, and the ones who do would try to break your brain?”
“Yup. Besides, you can always change my hair color with your fancy powers, can’t you?” Kit asked, swiveling her head around to peer at him.
“Actually, I think I can do that.”
“So, yeah, not worried about it. Wouldn’t matter if they did. Oh, here we go,” Kit said, turning back to the TV. “Lucky us, it’s even one we were thinking of.”
Felix nodded his head. They’d spent most of the time in the conference rooms figuring out who they were interested in and how many points they’d give back to him.
The man on the screen was a big, brutish thing. He looked more in line with a classic representation of a caveman than a modern-day human.
Before Felix could press the button to bid, the price listed over the man’s head jumped into the twenty-thousand-dollar range.
“Damn,” Kit muttered. “Not surprising, though. To be perfectly frank about this whole thing I think I already know the three we’ll end up with. Mostly because others will see them in a certain way, even if we know better.”
Felix sighed as he watched the price go ever higher. He’d wanted this one. If nothing than for the simple fact that he was worth in excess of eight thousand points.
“I never dealt with him personally. I’d heard of him. I hadn’t realized he’d come into the city,” Kit said conversationally about the man on the screen.
Felix wasn’t really interested in him anymore. He was far and away out of his price range.
“What was Miu, exactly? She clearly knows you. Well, it seems like she knows you, but you don’t know her,” Felix said. The auction closed out on the man and someone he wasn’t interested in took their place.
“Miu. She was internal security forces. For civilians. I knew of her, but didn’t really interact with her. She’d applied for higher-end teams but never put in the training or time to do it. She’s actually got a good power. Anything she is, or can do, is multiplied.
“If she could normally lift eighty pounds, she’d be able to lift one-sixty.
“So if she became a real bodybuilder, she’d probably be on par with the one we just saw get purchased,” Kit said, with a small frown curling her lips.
“That’s… odd. I wonder why she didn’t do just that, then,” Felix said.
On the screen, the auction continued, sale after sale concluding, none of which held any interest to him.
“I probed her once. A little. She’s… different. Her brain works in a way that I wasn’t really familiar with. Got out of there quick after that. Unique minds are touchy things. Think of the geniuses of an age and those are all unique minds.
“Her motivation isn’t there, though. It’s like she’s lacking one key thing.”
Felix shrugged his shoulders at that. “Maybe I could order her to train more vigorously?”
“Oh, oh. Here we go. We liked this one. She was the magic user.”
“Magic us—oh. Her.” Felix didn’t really care for this one. She was a powerful magic user alright. One that had fed on the souls of other supers to increase her own abilities.
She was a powerhouse. A powerhouse who was a walking demon.
Long black hair flowed down her back and shoulders, and an aura of energy crackled around her. She had black eyes that seemed too big for her face and skin that was as pale as porcelain.
Her features were sharp and elegant, something you’d expect more out of a fashion model than a villain who tore the souls out of the living.
She’d been called many things, but the name that stuck with the masses was Mab. The fairy queen of legend and story.
No one seemed to know her actual name.
Felix didn’t really get the connection or care what name she used. What he did care about was the fact that her point value was significant.
Two thousand five hundred. A cool thousand above Kit even.
That and he was pretty sure people weren’t going to bid on her. Something about stealing people’s souls made everything touch and go.
The opening bid was set at five thousand.
Nothing happened.
After a minute, the bid dropped to four thousand.
Again, nothing happened.
As if sensing the problem, the moderator in control of the bid dropped it down to a thousand dollars.
Felix thumbed the button, his own number of forty-two popping up in the top right of the screen.
The bid locked in a green color. Below that, an increment bid of five hundred appeared with a question mark.
There were no counter bids. They’d underestimated how much people had been unnerved by the soul-taking thing.
The number turned black and “sold” was written across the screen.
Mab was taken away and the next person was br
ought up.
Curious, Felix mentally opened his “point account” as he had taken to thinking of it. He also deliberately tried to skew his thoughts about tomorrow’s projected point values, rather than what they were today.
Today’s points were a mess of body parts and other things that he’d have to put to rights before the day ended.
PROJECTED
Received
Spent
Remaining
Daily Allotment
150
0
150
Miu Miki
400
0
400
Ioana Iliescu
800
0
800
Kit Carrington
1,500
0
1,500
Lilian Lux
2,500
0
2,500
DAILY TOTAL
5,350
0
5,350
“Her name is Lilian Lux. Lily.” Felix shook his head and closed the window.
“I doubt her parents knew what she’d become when they named her.”
“Yeah, but Lily Lux? That’s just…” Felix snickered, shaking his head.
Next, a man was brought up. He had the look of a man in his thirties who’d spent his life working outdoors.
This was another person they’d decided on trying to pick up, Aeric.
His power had been rather straightforward—he could move with unheard-of speed and grace. It put quite a strain on his body, so he’d trained himself to cope with it.
The bid started at ten grand, which Felix happily pressed his button for.
“Oh good, we might have a sho—” Kit started when there wasn’t an immediate incremental bid.
Then it jumped to fifteen thousand.
Felix gritted his teeth and thumbed the button again. They’d gotten Lily cheap. He could spend a bit more on Aeric.
He saw his bid flash on the screen, then vanish as it was replaced several times, ending at twenty-two thousand.