#Herofail

by Lexie Dunne

  The sarcasm seemed to fly right over Raze’s helmet. “You can come with me tomorrow when I go to give my answer about whether I’m joining her or not.”

  “And do what?”

  “I dunno, beat her up or something. That’ll show her allies that she’s weak.” Raze shrugged and took a dainty sip.

  “Or they’ll rally around her in solidarity,” I said.

  “Nah, they don’t care that much.”

  I looked at Guy. Finding Tamara Diesel’s headquarters was a scoop even Naomi could be proud of. “So what—in detail, please—is your plan?”

  “They’ve been asking for Hostage Girl—seems they’re kind of pissed at you—so I’ll bring you in as a gift. You can beat her and then things go back to the way they were before. Everybody wins.”

  “How do we know you’re not just taking Gail in to curry favor with Diesel?” Guy asked.

  “I am a woman of my word. Why wouldn’t you trust me?” Raze asked, drawing herself up in affront. When we both merely watched her with unimpressed looks, she considered. “Oh, right. Villain. That makes sense, yes. But I’m not going to do that.”

  “You do realize that the minute you bring Gail in and she turns on Diesel, they’ll suspect you were in on it. And they’ll be right,” Guy said.

  Raze rocked back in her seat. “I didn’t think about that. Never mind. All of this is a bad idea. I’ll go.”

  “Wait,” I said. “Give me the location of the headquarters first.”

  “Are you kidding? She’ll know it was me. Didn’t you hear B—Guy? I can’t do this. What if it fails? What if you’re not good enough?”

  At the very first sign of adversity, she was willing to drop everything? This sort of second-guessing certainly explained why Raze had never elevated herself beyond a low-tier villain. I exchanged a telling look with Guy, who merely raised his eyebrows and sipped his beer.

  “What if I could offer my protection?” I said, a thought occurring to me.

  Raze wrinkled her nose. “What good’s that going to do? You’re a—” She paused. “You know what, I don’t even know what your job is. Do you even have a job?”

  An idea began to take shape, forming roots in my mind. For all Raze’s bluster about hating alliances, she knew how to form attachments when she wanted to. She’d once given me a ray gun in a fight. She’d broken me out of prison. She’d claimed it was because she’d been waiting for my powers to kick in so that we could have a rivalry the likes of Raptor and Fearless. I’d always suspected she simply wanted companionship. And a villain’s main companion was inevitably their enemy.

  “Here’s a deal for you,” I said. Guy tilted his head, probably catching a note in my voice, but I didn’t look his way. “You take us to Tamara Diesel’s headquarters, and you help us stop her before she can activate the nanobots on all the infected people. And in return—succeed or fail—I’ll give you this promise: I will make sure absolutely nothing bad will happen to you.”

  Raze looked dubious. “And how will you do that?”

  And leaning forward, I made my offer.

  “Just so we’re clear,” Angélica said in a deceptively cheerful voice, six hours later, as we huddled together in an alley in New York City, “when Jessie—our boss, the woman who pays us—wakes up from her medically induced coma, she will discover the following things: her mother blew up a prison and escaped and has been wreaking havoc on the world at large, you’ve found her secret base underneath her other secret base, a supervillain used an official Davenport function to blackmail the local government of New York City, and by the way, you’ve hired a convicted villain to join the team.”

  “Put that way, it sounds like we really need a vacation,” I said.

  “We do need a vacation. That’s not my main concern, though. You hired a villain, Gail.”

  I knew what she meant. I’d had a chance to grab a couple hours of sleep, but it hadn’t made me feel better about the fact that I’d offered Raze a job. I hadn’t revealed it would be working for the Raptor—I’d save that for her first day orientation.

  “Raze is, like, barely a villain, when you think about it,” I said, the words sounding lame even to my ears.

  Angélica gave me a look so devoid of emotion that it practically screamed every feeling under the sun. “Gail, we’ve apprehended her six times in the past year, and we’ve confiscated all of her weapons. People who are ‘barely’ villains don’t carry around weapons called death rays.”

  I grimaced. Every time I’d raided Raze’s stash, she’d upped her game. Death Ray had only been the first generation. After that, Deathier Ray had taken its place. We were now on Deathiest Ultimate Super Extreme Ray, which told me that she was both running out of ways to elevate her gun names, and that she also didn’t understand how final death was as a concept.

  And I’d offered her a job that morning.

  “I know it’s not great, but we’re in a bind,” I said. “The longer Tamara Diesel’s out there, the worse it’s going to be when she unleashes all the nanobots. Politicians are freaking out, and that’s the last thing we want politicians to be doing.”

  “I can think of worse,” Angélica muttered.

  “And the nature of this plan—well, it isn’t great either. But attacking at the source is our best option.”

  Angélica leaned out of the alley to study the building where we suspected Tamara Diesel was hiding out. Raze hadn’t given me an exact address. She’d told me to meet her in an alley, which wasn’t promising, but also this was Raze we were talking about, so I wasn’t terribly worried yet. “We don’t even know what’s waiting for us in there,” Angélica said.

  “Yeah,” said a new voice, and Guy dropped into the alley, fresh from a recon run, “that’s what concerns me.”

  I frowned at his clothing. He’d come back to New York with us on the Raptorjet—he’d refused to stay behind—but he’d been wearing his typical off-work khakis and sweater. Now he’d put on his old Blaze attire, save for the mask. The gloves and boots were even more battered than I remembered.

  “Whoa, whoa,” I said, holding my hands up. “You’re not suiting up.”

  “Yes, I am.”

  “But you gave it up—you wanted to be a chef. You love being a chef.” I stepped in front of him, putting my hand on his arm.

  Guy glanced briefly at Angélica. Without saying a word, she held both hands up and turned away. Like that would give us any privacy whatsoever, given how sharp her hearing was, but it was a nice gesture on her part.

  “I can’t do this anymore,” Guy said. “I can’t keep watching you throw yourself into danger repeatedly without backup.”

  “I have Angélica. And I can handle myself,” I said. “You don’t have to—”

  “I want to.”

  “But you gave it up. All of it. And if you go back once, you know you’ll never be able to leave it behind entirely.”

  Guy touched my cheek. “I was an idiot to think I could.”

  This conversation, I realized, had reached its conclusion before it had even begun. Guy had been so happy to lose his powers when the Demobilizer had hit him, even if it had been temporary. He was, overall, a rather serious person, but I got the feeling that he’d been this way even before his powers had shown up. The opportunity to walk away from it all to follow his dreams of cooking for a living had infused a lightness into him that had been almost unbelievable.

  Of course, a lot of that light had gone out when he’d started to work for his tyrant of a boss. So maybe it wasn’t the worst thing in the world to come back to the superpowered game.

  I still wanted to stomp my feet.

  “Gail, you’ve had a really awful couple of days,” Guy said. He stroked my cheekbone with his thumb. “It’s not giving up my dreams to come back and help out occasionally. It’s honestly just giving the person that I love a break when she needs one.” He paused to consider. “And backup when she’s going into dangerous situations with nobody but an ex-enemy to back her
up.”

  “Also me,” Angélica said over her shoulder.

  “What if somebody sees this—” and I held up his Blaze mask “—and the next big story is about how Blaze is back?”

  “The world’s a little distracted with the relentless wave of supervillains. I doubt they’ll notice.” Guy took the mask and pulled it halfway on. “It doesn’t have to be all or nothing. I can still cook and maybe I’ll run my own place one day, but I can also help out my girlfriend when the world tries to explode. Fair?”

  “I still don’t like it,” I said. “But okay. Yes. But take it slow.”

  “That’s what she said,” Guy said, laughing.

  I rolled my eyes at him even as I popped up on my toes to kiss him before he pulled the mask all the way on. He touched my cheek once more, gave Angélica a high five, and headed back to the balcony before Raze arrived.

  Which she did with the usual flourish of her rocket sled, which spat exhaust all over Angélica and me.

  “You brought a friend?” she asked, jealousy rampant in her voice as she hopped off the sled.

  “I did. Angélica, this is Razor X, villain extraordinaire and newest member of the team. Raze, meet Angélica Rocha, my trainer and de facto team leader.”

  The two of them sized each other up. I heard bones creak as they shook hands, and winced.

  “I thought I would be team leader,” Raze said. “We don’t need you.”

  “Too bad,” Angélica said.

  I cleared my throat and gave Raze a pointed look. “Did you bring it?”

  Raze sighed and pulled a small bag from a compartment on her rocket sled. She’d traded her leisure suit for the most demure armor I’d seen her wear yet. Black and red leather and a helmet to match, with no cape in sight. She threw the bag at me.

  I caught it before it could hit my face. The contents made me groan. “I Heart NYC?” I asked, holding up the shirt. “Seriously?”

  “What? Tourists are funny. And easy pickings, which makes this shirt even more brilliant. It’s an advanced polymer that should be perfectly shock absorbent.”

  “Should be?” Angélica asked, catching the emphasis faster than I did.

  Raze shrugged. “You gave me six hours. I haven’t tested it fully, but I feel really good about this one. It’s almost certain it won’t blow up like the first six did.”

  Angélica turned away so that Raze wouldn’t see her face, which was a kindness considering the look of what the hell are you doing? displayed there.

  But I’d asked Raze for some kind of incognito armor. An audition, I’d called it. There was a chance, of course, that putting on the shirt and the bedazzled jean jacket that came with it would send me into paroxysms of pure pain. But it wasn’t like I could go in wearing armor without giving our entire plan away. So Raze’s tacky tourist armor it would be. I still took a deep breath before I pulled it on over my tank top. And I squeezed my eyes closed, waiting for the inevitable explosion.

  It never came. In fact, besides being a tiny bit itchy, the armor felt like clothing.

  “You’re sure this isn’t just a shirt you picked up on your way over because you forgot?” I asked, twisting around in it.

  Raze rolled her eyes, whipped out a gun, and shot me point-blank in the chest before either Angélica or I could move. I yelped, expecting pain, but the blast shimmered right off me, and dispersed into the air.

  “Satisfied?” she asked.

  Angélica’s eyebrows went up. “You got any more of those?”

  Raze grumbled, but reached into the compartment again.

  And so when we stepped out of the alley, I wore an I Heart NYC T-shirt and Angélica was decked out in a hoodie that bore a cartoon of the Empire State Building lit up in rainbow colors (“Not one word,” she said to me). Raze trotted along without her rocket sled, which she’d hidden behind a Dumpster. Following behind us from the air, hiding from Raze, was Guy.

  “Where’d you leave Naomi?” I asked Angélica as we walked along.

  “Back at the Nest. I asked Kiki to keep an eye on her.”

  Kiki, who was busy restoring Davenport to rights. “Uh-oh,” I said. “How long before she shows up?”

  “Maybe we’ll get lucky,” Angélica said. I hoped that Guy, wherever he was, had heard that and would know to stay on the lookout for Naomi. I loved her dearly, but I’d never encountered a situation her nosiness couldn’t make worse.

  Raze led us four blocks away and ducked into an alley. “You’ll need to sell it,” she told me, looking at me critically.

  In order to believe that Raze was bringing me in without it being a trap, Tamara Diesel needed to think that I’d been bested in battle. So I turned to Angélica and braced myself, giving her a nod.

  She punched me in the face.

  Because I wasn’t expected to hit her back, I let myself do what I’d always wanted to, which was to jump back and flap my arms around in pain. “Gah,” I said. “I always forget how much it hurts when you do that.”

  “Do you think that’s enough to fool her?” Angélica asked Raze.

  Raze’s eyes glittered. “Hit her again.”

  “Okay, but only once.”

  This had been Guy’s least favorite part of the plan for a reason. I took the second blow with more swearing and arm flapping.

  “Are you sure that’s enough?” Raze asked once I’d smeared blood down one half of my face. “Maybe you should do it at least once more just to really sell it, you know—”

  Angélica yanked a metal pipe from the ground and wrapped it around my wrists. Her Mobium had allowed her to absorb superstrength, which meant I could barely budge the metal. “I think that’ll sell it. You’re sure you can get out of this?”

  “Yes,” I said, though I had no idea if I could intentionally use Brook’s pain ray acid.

  Angélica searched my face. “I need you to be sure.”

  “I’m as sure as I can be.”

  But Angélica only shook her head. “You’ve gone into too many situations unprepared lately—”

  “We’re not exactly wealthy on choices here,” I said. “They need to buy that I’m properly restrained, and I have a way of getting out of this. Let me do this.”

  Again, she peered at my face, but settled back on one heel with a sigh. “Off you go, then,” she said, and with a final pat on the shoulder, she sent Raze and me into the lion’s den.

  Chapter 18

  Outside the building, Raze kicked me over and I let her. “Your friend worries a lot,” she said.

  “It’s her job to keep me alive.”

  “I still say she should have punched you more.” Raze grunted and began tugging. She’d pulled on some kind of carapace that allowed her to pull my weight. One more point in her favor for joining the team: she was resourceful.

  The doorman held open the door. Either dragging bloody bodies inside was normal for New York City, or this building really did contain a supervillain lair. I suffered the indignity of being dragged, peeking through mostly closed eyes at a fancy lobby as Raze hauled me onto the elevator.

  She hit the button for the penthouse. “How are you so heavy?” she asked, wiping sweat away from her brow. “What do you eat?”

  Since I was faking being unconscious, I didn’t answer.

  As the elevator doors closed, my heart found its way to my throat and clung. Angélica’s comments about being unprepared didn’t help. Jessie would’ve insisted on a lot more recon, but we hadn’t had time. So here I was, hauled in before the lion. To keep my mind from replaying every terrifying encounter I’d had with Tamara Diesel, I focused on my hands. My palms began to heat up.

  I hoped Guy and Angélica had found places to hide.

  The elevator opened straight into an opulent foyer. Twin staircases with lush ruby carpeting bracketed the foyer. Beyond the staircases, I could see an airy living space, decked out in expensive furniture. The foyer held two doorways, one on either side of me. I kept my eyes mostly shut as Raze towed me over black a
nd white marble tiles. My gaze stopped on an ornamental stand nearby.

  Dear god, she actually had a gong.

  Standing at the top of the stairs, resplendent in an ivory tuxedo and carrying a silver-topped cane, was none other than Tamara Diesel. Blood glittered on the silver beads threaded through her braids. My pulse sped up.

  From the sounds of people moving around deeper in the penthouse, she wasn’t here alone either. One set of footsteps belonged to a set of distinctly old-fashioned high heels, which meant the scratching sounds from a room to my left could be none other than Viceroy Fitzhubert, Esquire and Captain Fortescue the Third. Great. Had it been too much to hope that everybody had inexplicably chosen to run an errand all at once?

  “What’s this?” Tamara Diesel asked from the top of the stairs.

  “‘Morning, your Dieselness.” Raze sketched an obsequious bow. “I’m here to answer Lady Danger’s offer to join the team. I brought membership dues, of a sort.”

  “I see.” Diesel descended a couple of steps. “And what have you brought me?”

  Raze kicked me over onto my side. “A hostage. An oldie but a goodie—Hostage Girl herself. I heard you were looking for her, on account of how she overheard something.”

  I lay on my side, in the middle of a supervillain’s foyer, the acid from my palms steadily eating through the bar around my wrists. Hopefully it didn’t smell like burning metal, but I didn’t dare breathe to find out.

  “Excellent,” Tamara Diesel said, ambling closer. My ears told me she’d reached the landing, but she stopped there. “That seems like a suitable gift. Assuming you found the correct one. You’ve brought me duds before.”

  Raze scoffed. “Check for yourself.”

  “Hmm. Letty, would you mind?” Tamara Diesel raised her voice slightly.

  “Letty” appeared to be the owner of the high heels, for she trotted in. Had I simply been mishearing Letty Danger as Lady Danger? Had Letty been her name all along?

  God, this day was just full of surprises.

  She minced toward me. Her floral perfume cloyed at my nose, making me want to gag as she shoved Raze toward the corner with one hand. She knelt over me. “Indeed, this does appear to be Miss Godwin, brought low by Ms. X.”