V Is for Villain

by Peter Moore

  Could you get to it? I thought to him.

  “If I can get to water, I’ll be okay. I could be in the sub in seconds.”

  “Wait,” Radarette said to the JF. “That doesn’t look like Artillery, does it?”

  I reinforced the image projection of Blake. It seemed to be going in and out. Is anyone else from your team alive?

  “I don’t know.”

  I threw a few more weak punches, trying to make it look real. I wasn’t sure if I was selling it. I put my hand on the back of Mutagion’s neck (it felt almost scaly) and pulled his head closer to mine. Okay. I’ll get you off the pier and into the water if you do one thing for me.

  “What?”

  Take my girlfriend with you. Get her far away from here so she doesn’t get hurt or get caught.

  “Where is she now?”

  Don’t try to talk out loud. I can read you. That’s her over there. Bionica. Right behind me.

  I see her. I think.

  “What the hell… ?” I heard Mr. Mystic say behind me. “Do you see that?”

  “Yeah,” Flatliner said. “Is that Artillery or…who is that?”

  I had to concentrate again and project the image of Blake into their minds. But I realized I couldn’t do that and concentrate on what I was saying to Mutagion. If I could get him out of there and get Layla safe….

  First, I took a couple of seconds to reintroduce the image of Blake. After that, I gripped Mutagion’s coat at the shoulders and swung him around. It took every bit of strength I had not to let him fall.

  “Artillery, finish him off!” Miss Mistral shouted.

  Can you do this? I thought to Mutagion.

  “I can try,” he said with a gasp. “Need water.”

  You’ll have it. But you have to take my girlfriend.

  If I go in the water, they’re going to jump in after me. They’re not going to let me go.

  Just leave that to me.

  “Wait a second,” G-Force said. “That is not Artillery! What’s going on?”

  What about you? he thought to me. I have room for you.

  I can’t go. I have to finish up out here. You’ll take her?

  Mutagion nodded. It didn’t sound like he could get enough air to speak.

  “That isn’t Blake,” one of the JF called. “I think it…wait, what?”

  I whispered one last thing to Mutagion, knowing that my image projection wasn’t working anymore. “Remember what I told you before: your name is Robert Lathrop and you’re from Dallas. Layla can tell you more. Find out who you are and what they did to you. Don’t quit until you do.”

  And with that, I threw a punch while at the same time heaving him into the water. I only had time to take a quick look. I saw his body rotate, then swim underwater like he was born there.

  Get in the water, I thought to Layla. Right now. Mutagion is going to pick you up in his sub.

  What about you? she thought back to me.

  He’s going to come back to get me after you’re in. Hurry up.

  Okay. You did great out there.

  See you soon, I thought. And hoped.

  Closing the Circle

  The battle above us on the ship seemed to be dying down. There were heroes up there, flying around and shouting to one another, but I didn’t hear too much fighting. Not that I listened long, because things were pretty intense down on the pier.

  G-Force and Radarette edged behind me, closing the circle. The heroes from the Justice Force closed ranks, cutting off any chance of me getting off the pier.

  “Who is this kid?” Miss Mistral said. “Anybody seen him before?”

  Nobody had, of course, and they said as much.

  Next thing I knew, it felt as if two telephone poles had pinned my arms to my sides, then crossed over my chest and squeezed me against a brick wall. This was G-Force, putting me in a bear hug. If the fate of civilization depended on it, I couldn’t have used physical strength to break his hold.

  Fortunately for me, though, I didn’t have to rely on physical strength.

  And fortunately, G-Force was stupid enough to think, I gotcha, you little brat when his head was practically next to mine. This made picking up his thought patterns espe-cially easy.

  I couldn’t breathe and I was getting scared. I had to concentrate and use my only strength.

  Like mentally trying to lift a car, I projected every bit of my psi energy straight into his mind at once and overloaded his brain with psi energy. My guess is that it feels a lot like having ten flashbangs go off at once, but inside your head. That was a psionic blast.

  His mind was overloaded, as was his nervous system, which meant he collapsed to the deck of the pier. I suspected it would be at least an hour or so before the aftereffects would start to dissipate.

  One down…

  Fight each other, I thought to Mr. Mystic and Radarette. They turned, and to my great pleasure, they started beating the daylights out of each other.

  Miss Mistral took to the air and then went into a nosedive toward me. About twenty yards up, she dropped her feet beneath her to land.

  Easy. I projected that the pier I was standing on was a lot farther away from her than it was, and rather than slowing down to land, she just went straight through it and into the water. I heard a muffled clang, which was probably her getting tangled up in all the scrap iron underneath.

  Looking past where she’d crashed through the dock, I saw a weird and reassuring sight. Layla was walking on water. Then she took another step and started to descend. It was as if she was climbing down a ladder, which was exactly what she was doing. She hadn’t been walking on water; she had been walking on the barely submerged hull of Mutagion’s sub.

  The faint glow of light disappeared when the hatch closed, and I felt the thrum of engines build up and vibrate through the pilings and into the deck under my feet. When the vibration lessened and disappeared in a few seconds, I knew Layla and Mutagion were away, out of danger.

  I, however, was not.

  Flatliner was running at me.

  I tried another psionic blast, but nothing happened. I didn’t have nearly enough psi energy left to make one.

  He was close. If he caught me, he would either capture or kill me.

  But he was easy. I projected into his mind, Stop! And he did.

  I knew he wouldn’t stay like that for long. I needed to do something, and fast. Then I realized that, in effect, he himself had told me what to do. It was all in his name.

  I was already in his head. First I took away his sense of the present: where and who he was, what he was trying to do. Then, because I was in there and because he was a scumbag hero, I erased what was there. I cleaned out his entire mind.

  It’s not that I wiped his brain clean of synapses or did any permanent damage. All I did was wipe out every memory he had, putting his mind back into the state of a newborn. He would learn how to walk and talk, learn about the American Revolution and Hemingway and algebra and everything else. It would just take him a good, long time.

  “Ugga, ugga, ugga,” he burbled, drool running down his chin.

  That was that. It was time to make my getaway. He had been the last one.

  Or so I thought.

  I realized how wrong I was when a hand grabbed the collar of my jacket, yanked me backward and off balance, and then forced me down in a prone position on the dock. Strong hands took hold of my wrists and pulled my arms behind my back.

  The tight grip of armored flex cuffs pulled my wrists together.

  “You are under arrest. You have the right to remain silent,” Blake said.

  Villain

  To be totally honest, jail isn’t so bad. That is, there are much worse things. For example, a federal trial is a lot more unpleasant. Hearin
g witnesses testify, one after the other, hundreds of them, is not a lot of fun. Listening to the lawyers go on and on, trying their simplistic tactics, is pretty frustrating, especially when they’re telling flat-out lies about you. And those are just the lawyers who defended me.

  Getting used to your mother refusing to look you in the eye, even from across the courtroom, is worse than jail.

  The other thing that’s bad is when major information won’t be revealed, with the explanation that to do so would be a serious threat to international security. Kraden, the Demophon Program, Phaetons being made and sacrificed by the government and GenLab—all of it suppressed. Oh, well. I tried. Fight on, Phaetons.

  Preparation for the trial took almost a year, what with the federal laws, hero laws, my being a juvenile, and all that. The trial itself took only about five weeks. During that entire time, I was in jail, but like I said, jail isn’t so bad.

  Because of my powers, they kept me in strict isolation. Every VIO73 who had to deal with me wore anti–mind incursion earplugs so I wouldn’t be able to control them. Given that I had no physical powers to speak of, it was kind of overkill for them to keep me in an underground cell that was completely encased by some kind of titanium-tungsten cured-steel cage. But it didn’t make any difference to me. I was locked up, steel cage or not.

  So I spent day after day, alone in my cell.

  Not that I’m trying to get you to feel sorry for me. I liked being alone, left to think about whatever I wanted. And I did have lots to think about.

  Eventually, they allowed me to write, no doubt hoping I would inadvertently give up some information that would be useful to them. But they must have forgotten who they were dealing with, that I never do anything inadvertently. Not anymore, at least.

  But thinking is only entertaining for so long. I began to dwell on mistakes I had made, how I would have done things differently if I had known how they would turn out. My desire to make things right became almost painful.

  Layla got word to me through Mom, who had started visiting me, heartbroken as she was over my chosen path as a villain. Javier, Boots, and Peanut had dropped out of the villain track once they saw how things had gone for me. They continued quietly in the A-program, keeping low profiles.

  And when I found myself thinking more and more about Layla, time seemed to slow down to a crawl. Thinking wasn’t such a pleasure anymore. Time was wasting.

  One thing my jailers hadn’t counted on when giving me so much time alone was that I might use the time to develop myself. Now, I don’t mean the kind of self-development done in most prisons—getting a high school degree or college degree or law degree, or doing a twelve-step program to battle addictions, or even finding religion. And no bodybuilding in the yard for me. No, no. What I’m talking about is developing in a way that would truly help me.

  Some inmates do pushups and sit-ups all day; some find a way to exercise using their cell bars. Some get to work out with weights in a weight room.

  I didn’t have to move a muscle to exercise and get stronger. All I had to do was sit there and concentrate.

  No, it wasn’t easy. But I didn’t give up. The prison authorities had been right to equip all the VIOs with anti–mind incursion devices every time they came to deal with me, deliver anything, bring food or whatever.

  The prison authorities were wrong, though, to think that I wouldn’t be able to make my powers evolve.

  They didn’t expect that I would be able to develop mind projection to the point where I didn’t need to be in the room with the target; that I could build up the ability to project to people who weren’t in my immediate presence. That was a big mistake on their part.

  Because a cook can turn a key just as easily as a prison guard can. And once getting released into a prison’s general population, it’s ridiculously easy for an inmate with highly developed telepathy powers to do mind incursions and practically be escorted off prison grounds by suddenly friendly and cooperative prison staff.

  So there you have it. I have a lot to do on the outside.

  Layla has been traveling with Mutagion and trying to come up with ways to bust me out of prison. She’s waiting for me. I want to find her and see what kind of hell she’s raising. I want to look into forming another group to fight the heroes. Or maybe we’ll just do it, the two of us, on our own. The Deadly Duo. Has kind of a nice ring to it.

  And, of course, I need to get my revenge on Artillery, a.k.a. Blake Baron, originally my brother, then betrayer, now sworn enemy.

  Yes, if you’re reading this, it means I’m gone. I left this reading material for the prison personnel, in thanks for their hospitality.

  By now, I’m out there. Among you. I can’t tell you exactly what I’m doing, but whatever it is, you can bet on one thing:

  I’m up to no good….

  Glossary

  A-HOLE: slang term for a student in the A-program

  A-PROGRAM: alternative academic program that serves students with few, weak, or no powers. Students with powers but who are considered to have a bad (unheroic) attitude are also assigned to the A-program.

  ACCELERATE: a person with the power to move extremely quickly. The more gifted accelerates can move much faster than can be perceived by the (typical) eyes and mind. (pronounced “eck-SELL-er-et”)

  AEROTRANSVECTION: flight; more specifically, the superhuman ability to fly

  AURAL: a person with enhanced hearing

  AVID: Anti-Villain Investigation Division; a branch of the FBI

  BIO-MECHANICAL PSYCHIC MERGE: ability to touch any mechanical object or system and immediately gain a mental image of its physical inner workings. The image can be rotated and manipulated at will by the user, allowing different viewing angles and magnifications.

  FLASHBANG: a sport similar to rugby, but using a ball that can randomly be triggered to detonate with a loud and bright percussive flashbang, causing temporary blindness, deafness, disorientation, pain. The “ball” can also be forcibly attached to a player when desired.

  GRAVITYGAIN: an applied electromagnetic field that causes receivers worn by individuals to feel heavier than usual by artificially creating a stronger gravitational field. Typically used for strength training.

  HITTER: (alt. sp. HiTTer) slang term for Hero in Training: Teen. May be used in a complimentary way or derisively. (More insulting use is when an S is put at the beginning, supposedly to signify SuperHeroInTraining: Teen.)

  INTERFERENCE GENERATOR: device that can partially block intersight, enhanced aural sensitivity, and other sensory powers (often referred to simply as IG)

  INTERSIGHT: the ability to see through various types of substances and objects. Those with Intersight are colloquially called: scopers, peepers, or for those who are known or suspected of using Intersight to look through clothing, creeper-peepers.

  KEVFLEX®: extremely durable material that is resistant to small firearm bullets and knife attacks. However, its flexibility makes it ineffective against blunt force.

  MATTER INGESTION: the ability to safely eat or drink various types of matter and gain certain qualities of the substance. Examples: the ability to eat fire and then become blazing hot, or to drink acid and then spit caustic lye. Those with the power of MI are colloquially called eaters, grazers, or mangers (from the French, mangeurs)

  METAHUMANS: humans with powered genes

  MICROVISION: the ability to see small things without the aid of magnification devices

  MIND INCURSION: using telepathic powers to access another person’s thoughts or memories

  MIND-TAPPING: slang for mind incursion

  MYO-AUGMENTATION: artificial enhancement of an individual’s musculature. Typically performed through a combination of pharmaceuticals (see Myomegamorpherone®) and surgical procedures.

  MYOMEGAMORPHERONE®: prescription drug widely p
rescribed to heroes to help them achieve a muscular build, even when being mesomorphic is not necessary. Myomega is primarily used for aesthetic purposes. Essentially, it’s a pumped-up version of anabolic steroids. A person who abuses Myomegamorpherone is colloquially called a Triple-M, from Myomega Muscle Monster.

  NATURAL: someone who was born with powers, or with latent powers, due to genetics. Many Naturals believe that they were destined to have powers, and therefore their powers are of a higher order than powers gained through artificial means.

  OSTEOMEND: a medication that accelerates healing of bone

  PHAETON (“FIE-tahn”; also commonly—but incorrectly—pronounced “FAY-TONN” or “FATE’n” or “FAY-uh-thonn”): a criminal or villain who has experienced failed mutations, allegedly as a result of black market or ineptly performed genetic restructuring in the attempt to gain powers. Many are enraged or insane, deformed, have no control over powers, or are otherwise handicapped. Viewed by general public, governments, and heroes much like huge, powered, rabid pit bulls. (From Greek mythology: Phaethon got permission from his father Zeus to drive the celestial chariot, led by fiery horses. He lost control, and the out-of-control chariot set the earth ablaze. Zeus killed him.)

  POWER SUPPRESSORS: devices that suppress some metahuman powers

  PSI: see Psionics

  PSIONICS: the practice or ability of using the mind to produce paranormal phenomena, specifically telepathy, telekinesis, empathicism, and precognition. Also spelled psyonics, and often abbreviated as psi or with the symbol ψ

  PT (PHYSICAL TRAINING): a general gym class

  READ AND WRITE: two distinct powers of telepathy. Reading is the ability to find out what is in another person’s mind. Writing is the ability to project messages to someone else’s mind. For example, “I can read, but I can’t write yet.” See Mind-tapping.

  REGULAR: a person with no powers beyond typical human abilities

  SHOCKER SHOTGUN: similar to a Taser, but without wires. The projectiles (typically 37–40 precharged darts per cartridge) spread in a wide scatter. Can subdue multiple people with each shot without causing permanent damage.