Hero

by Robert J. Crane

  “Finally, someone asks the brave, tough, probing questions,” Friday said. “Like a penis.” Veronika just rolled her eyes.

  “We know she’s a hacker, and Jamal has a big-ass crush on her,” Augustus said.

  Jamal looked like he was torn between smacking his brother and crawling under a desk. “I do not have a crush on her, okay? She’s just got skills, that’s all.”

  “I kinda have a crush on her,” Abby said, from over in the corner of the room, hidden behind a few cubicles, with J.J. “Her work is A+.”

  “She was involved in the New York attack,” Scott said, brow furrowed. “The one that brought down the US Attorney’s office and FBI HQ. The one that eliminated the evidence against Nadine Griffin and let her skip out of trial.”

  “She freelances a lot,” Jamal said, still sending his brother some side-eye. “Works out of Eastern Europe.” He stared me down. “Most likely Revelen.”

  “There’s that name again,” I muttered, and Isabella squeezed my arm sympathetically. “So … is this straight out of Revelen, then? We’ve been getting a lot of noise, a lot of mess out of that country over the years. Is this the final play? Grab Sienna and … what?”

  “Have a lovely tea party with her, surely,” Augustus said. But his whole body was tense, and I could tell he was only joking to diffuse the very real worries he was feeling.

  I knew those feelz.

  “What do we know about Revelen?” I asked. “They’ve had that serum flowing out of them. They’ve been sending us trouble since that guy Benjamin that Augustus and I dealt with. The one that blew up the Minneapolis airport customs line.”

  “That was not a great time,” Augustus said. “I got my back broken.”

  “They absorbed the nation of Canta Morgana not that long ago,” J.J. said. “Just annexed a neighboring country for Baltic Sea access. They border Russia—”

  “Stop reading the Wikipedia page,” Abby said. “I think Reed was looking for stuff that’s a little more practical. Like: a huge number of the world’s mercenaries run through there. A lot of hackers, too. They’ve got a flourishing black market there.”

  “Why?” Scott asked.

  “Low enforcement on cyber crimes?” Jamal asked, shrugging. “Or they’ve got a considerable cyber army, like China and Russia. It kinda works as an alternative funding method to taxes. Lots of identity theft for profit, that kind of thing.”

  “I, uh … know some stuff about Revelen,” Friday said. His voice was quiet, subdued—which was the main reason I noticed it.

  “The only thing you know is dick,” Veronika said. “And even in that, really, you only know your own.”

  “Hold it,” I said, looking right at Friday. He was maximally shrunk now, skin and bones, a ninety-eight-pound weakling. Friday never shrunk all the way. “What do you know about Revelen, Friday?”

  “Been there,” he said, as Chase re-entered the room. She paused at the outside of the circle we’d formed in the middle of the bullpen, listening. “We both have,” he said, nodding to her.

  “What? Where?” Chase asked. “And please do not say ‘Pound town.’ Because we have never visited there together, ever. And I question whether you’ve visited it at all.”

  “Validation,” Veronika breathed. “I knew it.”

  “Revelen,” I said.

  “Oh, yeah,” Chase said. “We’ve been there. Grim-ass place. Lunchbox here didn’t talk for two weeks afterward.” Her eyes glimmered. “It was the best two weeks of our acquaintance.”

  “Oooh, can we go to Revelen?” Veronika asked. “With Friday?”

  “Hold it, hold it,” I said, and Isabella let loose of my biceps. “Friday—what happened in Revelen?”

  “He got separated from the team and got scared,” Chase said, after Friday didn’t answer for a beat. “When we found him, he was catatonic, and his pants were shat.”

  “My pants were not shat,” Friday said in low, raspy, Batman-voice. “I did not shit my pants.”

  “Fine, someone else must have shit his pants for him, then,” Chase said, shaking her head, “because they were definitely shat.”

  “Dude,” Augustus said, “that ain’t even right.”

  “What did you see, Friday?” I asked, closing in on him. But not too close, now that Chase had said the thing about pants being shat.

  “I didn’t see anything,” he said.

  “Oh, he’s lying,” Veronika said.

  “Am not!”

  “Look at his eyes darting beneath the gimp mask,” Veronika said. “He’s like a bird trying to find a direction to fly away.”

  “Friday,” I said, lowering my voice, “this is your niece we’re talking about. She could be over there, right now—and I need to know what you know. I need to know what she’s dealing with—”

  “It’s Vlad,” Friday said, the words coming out like an abrupt squeak. “Vlad the Impaler. Vlad effing Dracula. That guy.”

  “That … is not what I was expecting,” Augustus said. “Vlad … Dracula?”

  “The guy he’s based on,” Friday said. “And I can tell you,” and he sounded so haunted I wouldn’t have been surprised to see a ghost come flying out of his ass right then, “having stood in his presence … having been threatened by him … his legend is earned.” He looked me right in the eye, all the normal Friday bombast absent. “That man … is the single most dangerous and frightening human being on the planet.”

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  Sienna

  “Would you like us to stop off for some cotton candy, perhaps?” Vlad asked. “A cappuccino? Cucumber sandwiches? A little spot of lunch? I could have the chefs back at the castle prepare something to your liking.”

  I sat in the back seat, staring at him, the window divider like a dark mirror reflecting the entire back seat’s scene for me. Sophie sat to my left on the bench that stretched along that side of the limo. ArcheGrey and Yvonne/Owens were sharing the bench to my right, and I sat staring at Vlad as he made his curious offer.

  “I am kinda hungry,” I said, getting an idea. I looked to my left, and saw a little café coming up through the smoky, tinted glass. “How about we stop right here?” And I pointed.

  Vlad evinced a little surprise, brow rising, and then knocked on the window divider and said, “Stop here.” And we stopped.

  I opened my own door before Sophie could manage to surge in front of me and got out before her. “Oh, sorry,” I said, not sorry as she stepped out behind me. “What are you, my bodyguard?” I had a darker thought about what she was doing, but I wasn’t prepared to share yet.

  “Well, you do get in a fair amount of trouble,” she said, clearly trying to pass off her actions as no big deal.

  “Just as long as trouble doesn’t get into me,” I said, walking through the open door of the café. It had a little sign out front with Café written on it, and above that, probably the local translation. I couldn’t read it. “I’m seriously germaphobic.”

  “Why? Your immune system makes you practically invincible to conventional illness,” Sophie said, following a step behind me. “And you don’t fool me, you know. Or him.”

  “Whatever do you mean?” Damn. She’d figured me out.

  “You think this whole experience is a Potemkin village,” Sophie said as we stepped inside the café. It was a nice place, a little worn, with some dirt around the edges. The booths had seen some mileage, and the chairs were kinda banged up. “That the crowd we encountered was mind-controlled or prepared for you. That’s why you asked to make the sudden stop, and it’s why you don’t like me following you. You think I’m mind-controlling people to give you the reaction you’re looking for.”

  “The thought did cross my mind,” I said. Lie. It was top of mind. “Points for using ‘Potemkin village’ in everyday conversation, though.” I headed for the counter.

  Apparently, the lunch rush had either died down or never existed at all. There was a woman behind the counter peering at me as I walked up. She was prob
ably late twenties/early thirties, and had the look of someone who’d seen a fair amount in her time. Jaded, I guess you could say. She was trying to decide how she knew me as I walked up to her and thumped my elbows down on the deli counter, glancing into the glass display below. “Hiya.”

  “Hello,” she said, frowning in concentration. She was trying to place my face. I got that a lot. Maybe the jumpsuit was throwing her off, orange not really being my color.

  “Nice place you got here,” I said, looking over my shoulder and out the window. Past where the limo waited at the curb there was an expansive square with a few people scattered around it on benches, grass growing out of the triangles of space that were cut through by sidewalks. A few trees dotted the green sections, and a statue I couldn’t quite see dominated the center of the square. “Got any specialties on the menu I should try?”

  “Ahhh … the Reuben sandwich is good,” she said, clearly still trying to place me. “Westerners like it. You … Canadian?”

  “What the hell?” I asked. “Do I look like a maple syrup guzzling lumberjack to you? Because that’s all Canada is. Lumberjacks and maple syrup. And toothless hockey players.” I fake smiled at her. “See? Still got all my teeth.” Only because of my powers, though. If not for my regrowth abilities, I would have had a smile like a centenarian sugar addict with an aversion to tooth-brushing.

  She laughed weakly, probably trying to decide whether I was serious or not. “Your accent … sounds Canadian.”

  “I’m from Minnesota,” I said. “It kinda bleeds into Canada, so I guess that’s an honest mistake. But I’m way less polite than a Canadian, so … anyway, I’ll take that Reuben.”

  She nodded, then jolted upright. “You—Sienna Nealon?”

  I smiled. “There are some who call me that.”

  She blinked. “What … do others call you?”

  “Nothing I’d care to repeat in polite company,” I said. “Reuben, please?”

  “Yes, of course,” she said and rushed to work. “I have watched you many times.” She pulled loose, clear plastic gloves on and started to fuss with the sandwich bread.

  “That so?” I asked. “Not from outside my bedroom window at night, I hope.”

  “Mm? Oh, no, no,” she shook her head, smiling at my little joke. “I am, how you say—great admirer of you. You are fine exemplar of what we can accomplish. You inspire me to live at best possible level.”

  I tried to suss out what she was saying there, but it was lost on me. “How do I inspire you?”

  “You want sandwich toasted, yes?” she asked, and I realized … she was done. She’d made that whole sandwich in the seconds I was mulling how I inspired her.

  “Uh, sure—”

  Taking the glove off her right hand, she lit a flame out of her palm and held it over the sandwich, flipping it with the other and then applying the heat again, slowly, evenly, until the bread was nicely crisped. That done, she slid it onto a plate, sucked some of the excess heat out of it, and nodded at a display of chips behind me. “You pick one of those—and also drink.” She slapped a cup next to the plate.

  “Huh,” I said, “you’re a Gavrikov.”

  “It’s a very common type in those of Eastern European and Russian extraction,” Sophie said quietly. “Not quite Hercules common but common enough around here.”

  “Natural or serum?” I asked, looking at the cashier.

  She shrugged. “I ended up with powers at age twenty-seven. Two years ago.”

  I looked at Sophie. “Serum.”

  Sophie did not respond. I took that as its own answer.

  “Do you know a lot of people with powers?” I asked.

  The cashier nodded. “Almost everyone here has powers now. We are … very special country.”

  I had been just about to pick up my sandwich and froze. “… Everyone?”

  “Almost,” she said. “Maybe one in five not have powers of their own? Is very sad when that happens, but … it happens.”

  I stared at her across the counter. She stared back at me. Eventually, she pushed the plate to me. “You … want your sandwich? Is ‘on the house,’ I think you say?”

  “Sophie, pay this lady,” I said, and Sophie evinced a flash of irritation. I didn’t have money, and I figured she did. She fumbled in her pocket and produced a roll of the local currency. Whatever she put on the counter, it sure made the cashier happy. That done, I started to walk away.

  “You not want your sandwich?” she called after me.

  I didn’t look back. “Sorry. I just lost my appetite,” I said. Because I had.

  An entire country of people with metahuman powers?

  Suddenly … I did not feel nearly so safe as I had a few minutes earlier.

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  Vlad looked up from his phone as I got back in the limo. What was it with this guy and his electronics? Maybe he was a Thor type, though he seemed to part with it fairly easily when I sat down, and he was actually looking at a lit screen. Jamal didn’t always. He also held his finger over the charging port to allow direct access to the net using the phone’s antenna. Vlad held his phone like a normal person.

  So probably not a Thor. Or at least not the kind that manipulated electricity at the digital level.

  “I thought you were getting something to eat?” Vlad asked, those black eyebrows dragged down in the furrow of his brow line.

  “Lost my appetite when I found out you’ve dosed your entire population with meta serum,” I said. Sophie took her seat and Vlad knocked on the window, causing the limo to slide back into motion on the quiet street.

  “This bothers you?” Vlad asked. He looked concerned. “The idea that so many people here are like you—this disturbs you in some way?”

  “Maybe a tad,” I said. It was more than a tad. It was a lot.

  “Is this not the purpose of your Second Amendment?” Vlad asked. “To see that the people are suitably armed against all threats that may come their way? To give them—how do you say it? Right of revolt should your government become too overbearing? To allow them to defend their families should dangers come to their door?”

  “Yes, that is the philosophical underpinning,” I said, “and I suppose I shouldn’t be surprised that a guy who was alive during the Revolutionary War would know that. But we don’t allow rocket launchers on our streets, and a whole lot of metahuman powers are way more dangerous than your garden variety gun. Like that girl back in the café who made me a sandwich.” I chucked a thumb behind me. “She had Gavrikov abilities. It was nice that she was able to toast my Reuben for me. It was cool. Looked good. Kinda wish I’d picked it up and brought it with me, because now that I’m over the initial shock of you experimenting on your entire population with metahuman drugs, I’m hungry again—”

  Sophie lifted a white plastic bag in front of me that I hadn’t even seen in her hand. She’d gotten my sandwich boxed by the girl in the café. One of her eyebrows was slightly above the other. She was definitely annoyed at me.

  “Thanks,” I said, taking it up from her and setting it on the seat next to me. “The point remains, though—that girl used her powers for good. But what if she decided not to? What if she decided to—I dunno—blow up the tallest building in Revelen?” I nodded at that under-construction skyscraper, which was now out my right window, looming in the middle distance.

  “The ‘Dauntless Tower’?” I must have given him a funny look, because he shrugged. “It loses something in the translation. If she did that, then she would be arrested, tried, and punished,” Vlad said, very calmly. “Just as we would do to any other criminal.”

  “But the loss of life—” I started to say.

  “Would be terrible,” Sophie said calmly. “But what would you have us do? Lock them all up ahead of time? Round up anyone you deem ‘too dangerous’ before they even act?”

  “No,” I said, “I would have not given them powers to begin with. Duh. That’s what I’m arguing.”

  “But you have pow
ers, do you not?” Vlad said, leaning forward, eyes sparkling with amusement. So help me, he was actually enjoying explaining this to me. “They allow you to have an advantage over others? In any situation you walk into with a human, there is a power differential, yes? You could enforce your will upon them. Make them do things against their own will with greatest ease. This is … dangerous. Unfair.”

  “Inequitable,” Sophie said.

  “Consider at its base, what you fear,” Vlad said. “Your fellow man. His actions. The danger he brings. And you are right to fear, for we have all, at this point, watched enough of The Walking Dead to realize that the true threat is not the walkers—it is the humans.”

  I blinked. “Did you just—?”

  Vlad smiled. “You fear the brotherhood of man more than any other threat now. We all do. We prey upon one another. The strong take from the weak. Might makes right, yes? Allows those with more tanks, more planes … to simply run over those without. The rule of the sword—or the missile, now, yes? This is the principle that governs our world. Police with guns enforce the peace at the community level, and America enforces the peace as it so chooses across the world, hm? Or at least their version of it?”

  “That’s … a vast oversimplification,” I said.

  “But it works in general, yes?” Vlad was smiling, not quite smugly, but confidently. It was borderline.

  “Dude,” I said, feeling like a headache might be coming on, “you experimented on your people. Put serum in their water—”

  “Good guess,” Sophie said. “How did you know it was the water?”

  “It’s how your agents did it in the US every time that stuff came up,” I said.

  She shook her head. “That wasn’t us.”

  I let my shoulders sag as I rolled my eyes. “Yeah, okay, liars. It all came through and from Revelen.”

  “We certainly have the substance in question,” Vlad said, “the serum, you call it. But it was not us that have been shipping it to the United States, inserting it into your water, causing your problems.”