Powerless Against You

by Elizabeth Gannon

  Gavin blushed lightly. “I wanted you to like me for me, not because I’m a superhero.”

  I blinked in surprise and smiled softly. He really was a sweet guy. I’d have to put up with Carolina saying I wasn’t good enough for him, but I think I’d deal if he stuck with me.

  “I do like you for you. I felt bad I was drooling over Captain Awesome and trying to date you at the same time, because I knew if there was a chance to meet Captain Awesome, I’d ditch you in a second.”

  Gavin laughed and kissed my nose. “Wow, thanks.”

  “No, seriously, I didn’t want to let you down.” I pouted slightly. I was trying to explain I liked him so much I didn’t want to hurt him, but he was just taking it as a big joke.

  Gavin smiled softly and cupped the back of my neck, pulling me into a gentle kiss. Our lips moved against each other, his tongue sliding lightly over my lower lip, requesting entrance. I opened up for him, meeting his tongue halfway, pressing closer to him as our kiss deepened. My skin felt like it was tightening from the heat and arousal coursing through me.

  Again, Gavin was the first to pull back. I whined softly, eyes half closed in bliss. I just wanted to make out with him on the couch all night.

  “Why don’t we move this to the bedroom?” Gavin asked, his voice a little lower than usual. I looked down at him in surprise before grinning so wide I felt like my face would split in two.

  “Done.” I grabbed his hand and pulled him to my bedroom.

  ***

  “So you two are a thing now, huh? About time,” Jake said, rolling his eyes as Gavin and I held hands under the table.

  “I’m glad you’ve given up chasing after Captain Awesome,” Carolina said with a smile. She acted like my bagging Captain Awesome would be impossible, which was even funnier now I had.

  “I made him see reason,” Gavin said with a shit-eating grin. I laughed and stole a kiss, my heart beating a little faster. We’d been together no more than a week, but Gavin was quickly turning out to be the best guy I’d ever met.

  “He knows that if I ever met Captain Awesome, I’d totally bang him still. He’s on my exceptions list.” I smirked and rubbed Gavin’s thigh under the table. He smiled at me and put an arm around my waist.

  “Yep, I fully support the exception. If you get a chance to meet Captain Awesome, why wouldn’t you bang him?”

  Our friends stared at us in surprise. I hid a grin in Gavin’s shoulder. I didn’t know if he’d ever decide to tell them he was Captain Awesome, but I’d have fun messing with them until he did. The looks on their faces were worth the jokes.

  It was going to be difficult, being the boyfriend of a superhero, but I was looking forward to the challenge. Besides, I had my “villain” persona to back him up if he ever needed help. For now, though, I was going to be the Q to his Bond and provide him with cool gadgets. It was the perfect relationship.

  And I finally got to tap that amazing ass.

  About the Author

  ME McLaughlin has been writing since she learned to put pencil to paper. She lives in Michigan, but is excited to attend graduate school in Minnesota to earn an MFA in creative writing. Her best ideas come when she’s driving. If you see someone reading or writing at a stoplight, it’s probably ME. She also enjoys puns way too much.

  “A Lesson in Secret Identities” is her first published story.

  No More Mr. Bad Guy

  Elizabeth Gannon

  “Well, evil to some is always good to others. I shall have many fellow-mourners for the ball.”

  — Jane Austen, Emma

  “Did I ever tell you about the time I wrote George Washington a bad check?”

  God, she was so sick of hearing that story.

  Mia Hartfield AKA “Miasma” smiled pleasantly at the man who was dressed as a snake creature and shook her head. The trouble with going to these stupid things was that you always ran into the same people and had to listen to their same boring tales about their fantastic powers and their amazing triumphs over the super-heroes of the world. Personally, Mia thought the stories were greatly exaggerated. If the number of people who claimed to have achieved world domination this year actually had, the world would have had more rulers than a stationary store.

  But instead, she tried to look interested as the man rambled on and on about his glorious victory over President Washington’s bankers two hundred years ago.

  Her eyes darted around trying to surreptitiously find an exit and escape this nightmare.

  “Wow, you sure showed him,” she robotically parroted for what had to be the umpteenth time. Every year, she seemed to have the same conversations with the same bunch of people at these parties, and she was sick of it. Thankfully, she saw her chance out of the corner of her eye, and she took it. “Oh, I see my mother over by the punch bowl. Would you please excuse me?”

  She didn’t give the man a chance to reply and all but ran from the scene.

  Her mother glared at her reproachfully as Mia tried to hide behind her. “You need to get out there and mingle, Mia.” She pointed to the man Mia had been talking to. “’The Krait’ is leader of one of the biggest super-villain groups around, and you shouldn’t be so quick to dismiss him. Elton’s always looking for new talent, and he could really open up a lot of doors for you.” She reached out to straighten Mia’s jacket to make her look more presentable. She needn’t have bothered. Mia had always stuck out like a sore thumb amongst the villainous set. “You’re never going to find a team unless you’re your charming self. You need to show people how confident and evil you can really be.”

  “I know, mother.” Mia tried to restrain the frustrated sigh, but couldn’t quite manage. “I know you want me to go out there and find some great new villains to work with, but I’m just not interested in that. I’m perfectly content where I am. And I know you only want me to make you proud, but…”

  “This isn’t about me, dear. This is about you. This is your opportunity to go out there and really find someone who can take you places.” Her mother took a sip of her punch. “…Other than prison or that horrible SeaCastle Asylum for the Supernaturally Able Offender.”

  Mia made a face.

  Her mother was one of the matriarchs of the super-villain game, but it apparently skipped a generation because Mia had never found herself especially adept at crime. Everyone seemed to expect her to be, but she just wasn’t. Mia wasn’t against evil. She had just never really felt the need to be evil herself. If others wanted to be evil though, she was more than happy to help them. It felt good to see how joyful it made them to do bad things, and if she could put them on that path, all the better.

  True, some called it “meddling”… but that person never had any idea what he was talking about anyway and was best ignored at all times.

  Her mother was tall, elegant and had jet black hair despite her age. Mia was gangly and awkward, despite being well passed an age when being gangly and awkward was to be expected. She had a head full of curly brown hair which seemed to have a mind of its own. She’d thought of dyeing it a more interesting color, but she’d still be the same Mia underneath.

  With her mother’s looming retirement, Mia was without a partner and without a criminal group to call home. Generally speaking, super-villains always preferred to work on a team. They liked having someone else around, even though they rarely went on jobs together. It was sort of like being in a biker gang; one person sitting alone in the clubhouse or a single bike roaring down the highway to threaten shopkeepers would look ridiculous.

  Plus… it got lonely. The villain community was always trying to improve its own group’s social status or ditch them to move on to some better group. It was the evil ladder which everyone was trying to climb. Sometimes it seemed they were more focused on that than on the crime itself.

  As such, Mia found herself here, at this year’s “Acme Polymer and Urethane Annual Summer Social.” Or at least that’s what it said on the colorful vinyl banner hung up in the convention hall. In a
ctuality, it was a chance for the larger villain community to come together and party. It was where the evil went to meet and greet. Most people in attendance had taken to calling the event: “Hell’s Waiting Room.”

  Mia hated it.

  She lacked her mother’s experience with the field, and she had no interest in joining up with these people. They were all awful human beings, including Mia, but at least she drew the line at unspeakably awful. Sure, she had dabbled in “appalling” that one time a few years ago, but that was an isolated incident. Besides, she had gotten away clean, so it had all worked out.

  Her mother made an excited sound. “Oh! Look! There’s ‘Fiasco!’” She pointed to a woman walking in the door and rushed off to great her. “Phee! How are you! I haven’t seen you since your big missile silo job! Congratulations!”

  Mia made another face and absently ate a mini quiche. Her mother knew everyone involved in the game, both villain and Cape. Sadly, Mia didn’t even like the few people she did actually recognize here. Call it a consequence of spending her early life at the top of the villainous social scene, but Mia didn’t especially like being among everyone else now. Not that she thought she was better than them or anything… just that she kinda did. She was better than them; she knew it and had an indulgent mother to remind her of that fact whenever she was feeling uncertain about herself.

  She was used to getting her own way, and the last thing she wanted to do was spend time at a ball with people she didn’t want to talk to.

  “I can tell you one thing I’ve learned about villain parties: do not ask a man named ‘Dustbowl’ how he likes the wine,” said someone behind her.

  Case in point.

  Mia closed her eyes and silently swore to herself.

  She recognized that voice, and she liked the man it belonged to least of all.

  She pinched the bridge of her nose, already annoyed with the man, and he’d only just arrived. “Thought you were in jail, Deacon? Guess I’m not that lucky.”

  The man appeared beside her, plate of food in his hand. Deacon DeWitt was the crowned fucking prince of crime. Handsome, clever, and rich, with a comfortable home and carefree disposition, Deacon seemed to unite some of the best blessings of existence. He lived in his own little world with very little to distress or vex him, except wondering when he’d next get the opportunity to distress and vex others. He was practically royalty among this social scene. His parents had been so well-respected and successful, that Deacon didn’t even have to look for people to partner up with. Everyone already wanted to be on his team, despite the fact that he was seemingly incapable of doing anything. For some reason though, he didn’t have to. Deacon was one of those people who could get away with contributing absolutely nothing to the world, either to make it better or to make it worse, and who most people still liked.

  Mia didn’t understand it.

  In his lifelong parade of disappointments, Deacon had even switched over to being a Cape for a time. He had quickly given it up, though, evidentially realizing that it wasn’t as much fun.

  At the moment, Deacon was head of his own team of villains which he had named “The Loners”… which was a rather silly name both because pluralizing the word robbed it of all meaning and because Deacon was currently the only person on the team and thus was singular.

  None of that seemed to bother him, though, because Deacon was an asshole. He didn’t even try to hide it most of the time.

  He readjusted his fedora and laughed in amusement. Deacon always dressed like something from a '50s detective movie. His vintage clothes coupled with his classic Hollywood movie star good looks made sure that he was someone everyone noticed. Which would usually be a problem for someone looking to commit crime and get away with it, but it didn’t seem to bother Deacon. Even on the rare occasions when he got caught, he’d just flash his perfect shiny smile and smooth his carefully groomed black hair, and no one on the jury could ever conceive of someone so handsome doing something wicked.

  They didn’t know him at all.

  Mia understood him. She’d basically grown up around the jackass. She had seen him at least once a week from the time she was ten until she was nineteen. Now, even when she was trying to avoid him the rest of the year, she still always saw him at this stupid event. And like clockwork, he showed up every year. No matter where he was or what he was doing, he could be counted on to make an appearance at this stupid villain’s ball, just to hassle her. It was like he marked it on his fucking calendar or something.

  Three years ago, he had brought a sonic disrupter with him which he locked in the “on” position and slipped into her bag, so that at random times throughout the night its irritating noise blared out causing all of the party goers to glare at her in annoyance and cover their ears in pain.

  Five years ago he had gotten into a screaming match with a female shapeshifter made up to look exactly like Mia over whether or not he was just too… big.

  Seven years ago he had spent the entire party handing out business cards with her unlisted number on them, each of which proclaimed her an “expert villainess” in a different field, everything from "nuclear fission" and "full-body massage" to "floristry" and "pet grooming."

  No matter how much she tried to ignore him, he always found ways of reminding her that he in fact existed and that she should feel near constant embarrassment over the fact that she did. He seemed to live to find fault with her and always had.

  He smiled down at her, his voice oozing syrupy sweetness. “What prison could ever hold me when I knew your smiling face was waiting for me on the outside?”

  She rolled her eyes. “Why don’t you just go bother your own people? Or have they given up on you, too?”

  “Nah, Mom hooked up with a new partner, who thinks that he and I should be ‘best buds’ so I’m avoiding them both and their entire team.”

  “Lucky them,” she deadpanned.

  “Thanks for hooking them up by the way. Really. You could have let her be on her own for a while, but instead you just had to play the little criminal matchmaker, didn’t you? Just had to poke your spoiled little button nose into someone else’s business and get her involved with a new partner-in-crime?”

  “She needed to get out more.” She shrugged. “And I think they’ll be very successful at evil together. I mean, they already stole that anti-gravity gun, didn’t they? And used it to send Freedom Squad headquarters into orbit?”

  “Oh, yeah. That worked out great. Until my ‘best bud’ turned out to be a Cape in disguise and arrested everyone.” He patted her on the head condescendingly. “Nice job with that match, by the way.”

  She made a face.

  Crap.

  “Well, it’s not a perfect science. I mean, not even I can get it right all of the time, okay?”

  “Or even some of the time, apparently.” He popped a cracker into his mouth. “It’s a good thing you’re beautiful, Mia, because sometimes I just think you don’t have the sense that God gave a chicken. Better to be without sense than misapply it as you always do.” He sighed wearily. “We’ll add these poor souls to the long list of victims your ‘good deeds’ have rung up over the years.” He took off his hat and held it over his heart. “Poor bastards.”

  “I was just trying to help them. He seemed like such a nice man. Your mom’s not angry with me, is she?”

  “She’d still cut off her own arm for you if you asked her… don’t worry. Your many fine attributes are all I ever get to hear about. She sent me a birthday card last year, and the sappy message inside was crossed out and several paragraphs about you were scribbled in in their place. It’s like being the only son of your fucking Facebook wall or something; you’re all she ever talks about.” Deacon made an exasperated sound. “In any event, now I’m waiting until they’re transferred to break them out, so you can undoubtedly hook her up with someone even worse. But in the meantime, I knew I’d always be welcomed here.”

  “Uh-huh. Remind me to keep an eye on my purse.”
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  “Well, one of the advantages of only stealing from criminals? The cops don’t really care overly much, and the villains aren’t exactly going to show up for their day in court.” He nodded smugly. “And even if they do, it’s not like a man using the codename ‘Bad Touch’ is really going to have much jury appeal, now is he?”

  Deacon had turned his brief stint as a Cape into a newfound niche of simply robbing criminals rather than the city. If anyone else had tried this, the other villains would have simply killed the person outright for breaking an unwritten rule. Since it was Deacon, though, they applauded his inventiveness and celebrated his criminal achievement.

  It wasn’t fair.

  “What kind of man steals from thieves?” she asked the room at large. “Are you a Cape? Are you a villain? Make up your damn mind!”

  “I’m not good or evil, my dear; I’m morally ambiguous.” He held out his plate. “Canapé?”

  “You’re not ‘morally ambiguous.’ You’re a bad person, and I don’t know why no one else can see it.”

  “Oh, come on.” He looked hurt. “I’m not such a bad guy once you get to know me.”

  “Yes!” She nodded. “You are! It’s your goddamn codename!”

  He smiled in obvious pride. “I’m 'The Bad Guy,' honey; everybody roots for me.”

  God, she was sick of hearing that, too. Once, he had even added it to his letterhead.

  Yes, the man had his own letterhead which he used to write his ransom notes and robbery demands, because again, Deacon was an asshole.

  She pushed him away. “Just leave me alone and go steal from another charity or something, okay?”