Super Mega 3 (Heroes & Harems)

by Nolan Fury

  Owen jogged down the track back to his starting point.

  “I think we need to go pay Kayla’s friend Amanda a visit,” I said.

  “Kayla’s got motive,” Chrome said. “Maybe she hired somebody to kidnap Madison. Get her out of the way so she could seduce Owen.”

  “It might not be that much of a stretch,” Surge added.

  “What about the kidnapping we witnessed last night? Those have to be connected, don’t they?”

  The girls shrugged.

  “Maybe. Maybe not,” Surge said. “Maybe the guys Kayla hired saw what easy targets were on campus.”

  “This is all speculation,” I said.

  “Sure,” Surge said. “But we have to keep our minds open to all possibilities. Even ones that seem far-fetched.”

  We marched across campus and caught Amanda at her apartment in between classes. Her complex was a U-shaped building centered around the pool. There were two metal switchback staircases that gave access to the upper floors.

  I knocked on the door. When Amanda answered a few moments later, she looked confused. “Who are you?”

  “Ben Johnson,” I said, tentatively.

  “I thought you were the pizza guy. What do you want?”

  Amanda had her blonde hair in pig tails, tied with pink bows. She had sparkling eyes and plump lips. She wore a tight pink tank top that hugged her luscious breasts. Her boy-shorts showed off her tanned legs. My eyes took in her sumptuous form.

  Chrome noticed and elbowed me in the ribs.

  “I’m trying to find out what happened to Madison James. Kayla mentioned she was with you the day Madison disappeared. I’m hoping you can clarify a few things for us.”

  “What are you, cops?”

  I chuckled. “No. More like private investigators.”

  “You look a little young to be a private investigator.”

  “I’m a close personal friend of the family.”

  “Do you have any ID?”

  “This really won’t take long,” I said, deflecting her question.

  She sighed. “Fine. Come in. You don’t look like serial killers.”

  We stepped inside and she offered us a seat on the couch. The place was pretty sparse, but she made it look cute on a budget. The apartment was 800 square feet. there was a small dining nook, and an even smaller kitchen. The hallway to the side led to two bedrooms and one bathroom. Not bad at all for a college apartment.

  “She said she was with me?” Amanda said with a surprised look.

  “She said you two pre-gamed before going to the Kappa party.”

  Amanda got a look on her face like she smelled something bad. “No. She did not pre-game with me.”

  I couldn’t tell if she was trying to distance herself from Kayla, or she really disliked her.

  “Let’s get one thing straight, Kayla and I aren’t very close. We hang out occasionally. She can be fun to party with, but she gets a little out of hand. And for the record, I’m not as easy as she is.” She made a disapproving face.

  “So you didn’t see Kayla that night?”

  “I saw her at the Kappa party later.”

  “Tell me what you know about her and Owen.”

  Amanda looked mildly surprised that I asked. “What do you know?” She paused for a moment. “I guess it really doesn’t matter, everybody knows. I don’t like to gossip, but she was totally obsessed with him. She wanted to get his name tattooed on her ass.”

  “So, it’s safe to say she saw Madison as an obstacle?”

  “Madison was the bane of her existence.”

  “She wanted her out of the way?” Surge said.

  “Look, that bitch is crazy. She would have done anything for Owen. I wouldn’t be surprised if she killed Madison and stuffed her into a wood chipper.”

  I exchanged a glance with Surge and Chrome. We definitely needed to have another word with Kayla.

  Amanda’s blue eyes flicked from Surge to Chrome, then to me. “So what’s the story with y’all?”

  “What do you mean?” I asked.

  “Are you guys, like, together?”

  “He’s really great in bed,” Chrome said.

  Amanda’s eyes widened. She couldn’t believe that Chrome was so blunt. She was also skeptical of the claim. “Really?”

  “You should see for yourself,” Chrome said, knowing full well that I couldn’t stop staring at Amanda’s breasts.

  “Like I said, I’m not Kayla,” Amanda said in a snooty voice.

  We left the apartment and headed back to Thornton Hall. Several campus patrol cars were parked out front, their blue and white lights flickering. Something had happened in the dorm.

  16

  “I’m sorry, but you can’t enter the building,” Officer Frank said.

  I’m not sure he recognized us from the previous evening. They had the area cordoned off with yellow police tape. A crowd of students had gathered around. Whispers and rumors filtered through the crowd.

  “What happened?” I asked.

  “I guess some student couldn’t take the pressure of exams,” Frank said.

  “What do you mean?”

  “Some girl hung herself.”

  “Who?”

  “I can’t say. I’m sure you’ll hear about it on the news.”

  He didn’t have to tell me the name. I knew it was Kayla. The whole suicide thing had me suspicious. I mean, maybe she was involved in Madison’s disappearance? Maybe all these questions freaked her out, and she thought she was going to get caught?

  For all I knew, Madison was dead and dumped in a ditch, buried in a shallow grave. Kayla could have done the job herself, or hired someone else. Or, maybe we were way off base?

  Surge and Chrome worked the crowd, trying to find out as much information from the other students as possible. But it was all rumor and conjecture—until the EMTs brought Kayla out on the gurney.

  Their efforts to resuscitate her had failed. The medical examiner loaded her into his van and drove away, taking her to the morgue.

  “I’d like to see the autopsy report,” Surge said.

  “I can try to hack the database,” I replied.

  “She was our best connection to Madison,” Chrome said. “What are we going to do now?”

  “She was fine at breakfast,” Surge said. “A little hung over. But not suicidal.”

  “Maybe she got spooked,” I said. “She hires the guys in the van to abduct Madison to get her out of the way so she can be with Owen. But when we started poking around, she couldn’t take it.”

  “I don’t buy it,” Chrome said. “We don’t have anything, aside from speculation. We’ve got nothing to associate her with the guys in the van who abducted the other girl.” She paused for a moment. “We need to search through emails, financial transactions, bank statements. See if she made any payments to anyone.”

  We went back to my dorm, and I filled Curtis in on everything we learned so far. I didn’t know what to tell him. At this point we had no indication whether Madison was alive or dead. But the fact that we didn’t have definitive proof of her death gave Curtis encouragement. At least he could hold out hope that she might still be alive.

  Curtis had a spare key to Madison’s dorm room. We went back to Thornton Hall and entered her room after the commotion had died down. Curtis said he was going to his parents house and to contact him there after we were through and let him know what we found. Being in Madison’s dorm room was just too much for him.

  The room had an eerie stillness to it. The rope still dangled from the fire sprinkler. We couldn’t find Kayla’s laptop, or her cell phone. It made sense that she might have her cell phone in a pocket. But the laptop had been taken. One of the detectives could have taken it in an attempt to look for motivation behind the suicide. Or it could have been stolen. I would imagine a homicide detective would want to scroll through her text messages and see if there was any indication of a suicidal state of mind or an intention to harm herself.

  We ru
mmaged through the drawers and found a checkbook. It gave us her account number. We could use that to check her transactions. All I needed to know was some basic security information which I could get from the University database, which was exponentially easier to hack than the banking system.

  A quick trip to my favorite terminal in the library, and I had Kayla’s social security number and her mother’s maiden name. I used that information to reset her password and access her bank account online. There was $653.27 in the account. I looked over the transactions. There were debits for groceries, checks for rent, bills, etc. But nothing unusual. No large cash withdrawals.

  If she hired someone to take care of Madison, I sure couldn’t find any evidence of it. But she could have had other accounts, or paid in other ways.

  We left the library and made a quick trip to the mall. I had to get another phone. It took an hour to jump through the hoops and get it activated. Fortunately, I had synced all of my data in the cloud, so I still had all my numbers.

  I took a moment to call my mom and let her know I was okay.

  “Oh my God, I’ve been worried sick about you?” she said.

  “I’m sorry. I wasn’t able to get to a phone.”

  “Where have you been?”

  “I went on a road trip with some friends.”

  “And you didn’t tell anyone? Who are these friends?”

  “Mom…”

  “Well, excuse me for being concerned.”

  “Look, everything’s fine. I’m okay. I’ll fill you in on all the details later.”

  “And what about your studies? Did you just skip class for two weeks?”

  “Gotta go, mom.”

  “Benjamin, do not hang up this phone. I want answers.” She paused. “Are you on drugs?”

  “No, Mom, and not on drugs.”

  “Then explain to me what’s going on with you.”

  If I told her the truth, I was sure she would certainly think I was on drugs. “I’ll come home next weekend and we can talk about it then. But I really have to go. I’m late for…. class.”

  She didn’t buy it for one second, but she let me off the hook for now. I wasn’t sure what I was going to do about class. My whole perspective on life had changed. Did I really need a college degree now? What does a superhero do with a college degree?

  I wasn’t interested in ever getting a real job. My job was to defend against evil—whether it was on earth or in the Ultraverse. But, like I said, that job didn’t really pay well. I just couldn’t fathom getting myself a few hundred thousand dollars in debt for a college degree that I was never going to use. Besides, I had other, more important things to attend to.

  Back at the dorm, we tried to formulate our next move. My phone buzzed with a message. Amanda had found me on social media. I was a little surprised to hear from her. Campus Connect™ was a platform where students could interact, form study groups, etc. But it was mainly used for hookups.

  I checked my messages:

  [Have you heard?]

  Yeah, Kayla committed suicide, I typed.

  [No, she didn’t.]

  What?

  [Haven’t you seen the news?]

  No.

  Amanda sent me a link to a video. It was drone footage from outside Kayla’s dorm room. My jaw dropped as I watched the footage. I couldn’t believe what I saw.

  17

  A masked figure strangled Kayla, then staged the event to look like a suicide. Chrome and Surged watched over my shoulder.

  Despite my initial shock, I can’t say that I was surprised. Something smelled fishy about the whole situation.

  Another message appeared from Amanda:

  [I’m scared. I think someone’s following me.]

  Are you sure?

  [Meet me at my apartment. I don’t feel safe.]

  “Oh, she totally wants to bang,” Chrome said.

  “You think?” I asked, innocently.

  “Please—come over, I’m scared—yes, she wants dick,” Chrome said. “I think you should go hit it. What’s college for if not to bang hot sorority girls?”

  I glanced to Surge to see her reaction.

  “Look at me. I’m totally Zen. I have no jealousy issues,” She said taking in a deep breath, posing as if she was one with the universe.

  “Well, she is concerned for her safety,” I said. “Maybe I should just check up on her.”

  Chrome rolled her eyes. “We’ll see what we can find out about this masked killer. You go see if she’s got any new… information.”

  I went over to Amanda’s apartment. I could see her look through the peephole, then she unlatched the chain and the deadbolt and pulled the door open. She grabbed me by the shirt and pulled me inside and slammed the door behind me. She locked the door up tight. She seemed a little frazzled. Maybe she really was scared? Maybe this wasn’t just a ploy to get me over here and take advantage of me. Though, I was totally willing to be taken advantage of.

  I watched her hips sway as she sauntered into the kitchen. “You want a shot?”

  My face scrunched up. “Isn’t it a little early for a shot?”

  “This is college, Ben. It’s never too early for a shot.” She poured two glasses of golden tequila. She came back into the living room and handed me one. “It calms my nerves.”

  “Are you really that worried?”

  “I swear somebody started following me around campus after I talked to you. Now that Kayla’s been murdered, it’s got me totally freaked out!”

  I couldn’t blame her for feeling that way.

  We clinked glasses, and Amanda slugged down the tequila. Her face twisted, and she gasped afterwards.

  I followed suit. The warm liquid burned my throat and pooled in my belly. It was pretty smooth for cheap tequila. And it would get the job done just the same. Though, I didn’t need to get drunk in the middle of the afternoon.

  “I’ve got a theory. Do you want to hear it?” She took my glass and sauntered back into the kitchen.

  ”I’m all ears.”

  I watched her ass as she strolled away. It looked amazing in those boy shorts. I noticed she wasn’t wearing a bra either. The ribbed tank top hugged her perfect breasts, and her nipples poked through the fabric.

  Amanda returned a moment later with two full glasses of tequila. “Where are your two girlfriends?”

  “They’re back at my dorm.”

  A devious grin tugged on her lips. “I was hoping you’d come all alone.”

  “Why is that?” I said, fishing.

  She shrugged, then shyly said, “It will let us get to know each other better.”

  She batted her lashes and looked at me with innocently devious eyes. She slugged the second shot of tequila down.

  I gulped the shot down and was already starting to feel it. The tip of my nose felt numb, and in general, I had a better attitude toward life.

  She took my glass, spun around, headed back for another round.

  “Maybe you should slow down?”

  “Maybe. But then I won’t have an excuse for taking off my clothes and jumping your bones.”

  I arched a surprised eyebrow. This kind of thing never happened to me before. I was sort of getting used to it in the Ultraverse, but I didn’t expect it here. Maybe it was the way I carried myself. I had a lot more confidence than I used to. My time in the Ultraverse gave me that. I had more charisma and charm.

  Amanda returned momentarily with two more glasses. Before she slugged it down I asked, “So how about you tell me that theory?”

  “Is that the only reason you came over here?” she said with a naughty glint in her eyes.

  “That’s not the only reason,” I said, trying not to grin.

  I had barely finished the sentence when she planted her lips on mine. They were full and soft. Her tongue danced with mine, and I tasted the tequila on her breath. The fruity smell of her shampoo filled my nostrils.

  She wrapped her arms around me as our kiss grew more passionate. She accidenta
lly spilled her glass of tequila down my back.

  She broke away. “Oops, my bad. I guess you have to take off that shirt.”

  I wasn’t going to argue with her. Though I was a little shy about my lack of a physique. I was nowhere near the ripped god I was in the Ultraverse. But Amanda didn’t seem to mind.

  She pulled my shirt over my head and tossed it on the couch. I think she was more interested in the conquest. She wanted to know what the hell was so great about me that I could score two women like Chrome and Surge. She just had to have me to find out.

  “Well, this is awkward,” she said in an insincere tone. “You’re standing in my living room without a shirt, and I’m fully dressed.”

  She grabbed the bottom of her tank top and pulled it up over her head. Her beautiful breasts bounced free. My eyes were transfixed by the site. She was in great shape. She had sculpted abs and tan skin. My eyes drifted down past her belly button to the waistband of her shorts which hung precariously low on her hips. She tossed her shirt aside. “See anything you like?”

  18

  I saw plenty of things that I liked.

  Amanda and I made out in her living room. Our bodies collided, and my hands traced her glorious curves. I fondled her perky breasts and got a handful of her sweet ass cheeks.

  She kissed my neck and licked her way down to my nipple. She gave it some nice attention for a moment, then traced her tongue down past my bellybutton. She unbuttoned my pants, pulled my zipper down and pulled my boxers down past my hips. My stiff shaft sprang free.

  It didn’t take long for her to give me a demonstration of her oral prowess. One hand grabbed my shaft, the other fondled my balls while her tongue gently circled my head. Soon, her full lips engulfed me. It was all I could do not to explode in her warm mouth.

  She plunged down my shaft, slurping and sucking, while expertly jerking it. She must have watched a lot of Internet porn—she worked me over like a pro. This was definitely worth out-of-state tuition.

  She brought me to the brink of ecstasy, then pulled away from my throbbing shaft at the last minute. A trail of saliva dangled between her lips and my root.