by Paris, Sevan
He turns out the lights. “Don’t act too proud.”
I turn the lights back on. “It’s not that easy. I still don’t trust you.”
“And I still don’t have faith in you. What happened on the interstate? I can only assume it was different than reported.”
“Pink told me to ask you why she does what she does—that’s what happened.”
“…. Well, at least we’re off to a good start.”
The tenth phone call from Mom buzzes my phone. She’d left several messages for me during the fight, so I already knew she was okay. But she didn’t know anything about me. And if the tone of the messages were any indication, she was riding a fine line between worried out of her mind and incredibly pissed off.
I reject the call.
“Can’t answer because you can’t lie?”
“I can lie. I just have to text-lie.”
TO MOM: r u ok
Seriously? As crude as your language is, and you still insist on encouraging its devolution into something cruder?
FROM MOM: Where have you been???!!!
TO MOM: couldnt move in crowd where r u
FROM MOM: Why didn’t you answer my calls??!!
“You couldn’t get a signal, but managed to find access to a wireless hotspot,” Casa says. “That way, you could still send texts.”
“How am I supposed to text all that?”
“Have you tried using your thumbs?”
High five.
TO MOM: couldnt get signal but found hot spot ass
FROM MOM: ???
“Stupid autocorrect,” I say.
Never ceases to brighten my day.
***
After ignoring one more phone call and sending a bazillion more texts, I managed to convince Mom to meet me at home instead of what was left of Marko’s. I still have no idea what I’m in for, but it can’t be worse that facing down a homicidal Supervillain with a transforming robot body.
Can it?
I land and power down a few blocks away from my house, again short on power and even shorter on breath. “What do you think about this Casa thing?” I say heavily.
…
“Something wrong?”
…. I’m not sure. You’re asking for my opinion, which leads me to believe something is wrong; however, you still SOUND like Gabe …
“I’m serious. What do you think of the way that conversation went? You were startlingly silent during the whole thing.”
That’s because I agree with you. For the most part at least. If we are to go down this path, there is nothing to be gained from opposing him and everything to be gained from working with him. You’re right not to trust him or Pink. But, at least for the time being, working with the pair of them is far better than working against them. They already know your identity, so we really have little to lose.
“And? The other part?”
It doesn’t make any sense for him to hide his motivations. Why not simply say why he wants to know how we hide ourselves from HEROES? If his motives are morally just, why not simply share them? Why not simply share what he knows about Pink? From her Casa comment, it’s obvious she doesn’t mind. Furthermore, it’s obvious that they’re working together. What is it that he has to hide beyond that?
I stop with my foot on the first step. “What about that stuff about not having faith in me? Does he think I’ll turn him in?”
Maybe. But since we would have more to fear from his exposing you, it’s unlikely. So if we remove faith or trust from the equation, there is only one other conclusion …
“…. He’s afraid of me for some reason.”
Precisely.
“But how can he fear what he doesn’t know? He wasn’t even aware of us before.”
Why do you think that, Gabe? Simply because he said it? I don’t care how brilliant he is—he’s just human. There is simply no way he could have deduced everything he knew about us. Not trusting someone means you have to assume they have a reason to lie about anything of remote consequence. And believe me when I tell you there is absolutely nobody in existence that won’t lie to us … except for perhaps your mother. And, ironically, you’ve just spent the last fifteen minutes texting lies to her.
Mom opens the door right as my hand touches the doorknob. “Mom—”
She attack-hugs me.
Okay, I was expecting yelling. I was expecting finger pointing. I was not expecting hugging. I pull her away, just enough to see her worried, tear-filled eyes and bandaged forehead. “Mom … I’m sorry.”
“I know, I know—there wasn’t anything you could do. I’m just glad you’re okay. And that you thought about a hotspot. But why couldn’t you find a working phone?”
I step into the dimly lit living room. “I did … but I didn’t.”
“You … what?”
“That him?” I hear a male voice say from the kitchen. My stomach plummets to my knees and blood leaves my face.
“Oh, Gabe, I-I want you to meet Jacob. He was supposed to meet us—”
Gabe, we don’t have the power for this …
“No … not here …”
She sniffs, and wipes away a tear. “What? Well no, not here, but at the restaurant before everything went to hell.”
A man in his late fifties, with salt and pepper hair, comes out of the kitchen wearing a red flannel shirt and blue jeans. He has the build of a star athlete, the chiseled jaw of a statue, and eyes of steel. He sets a cold bottle of Miller on a coaster and wipes moisture from his right hand onto his pant leg. He smiles a familiar smile that doesn’t touch his eyes.
My mother—my mother—puts her arm around him. And he puts his arm around her.
Mom sniffs again. “Jacob and I found each other in the middle of everything, and he wanted to stay with me until I heard from you. I’m sorry this isn’t how I wanted to introduce you, especially given who he is …”
“Oh, no reason to worry, Mary,” he says and extends his right hand for me to shake. “Actually, we’ve already met.”
I take Liberty’s hand and numbly go through the motions of a handshake.
PART FOUR
THE BEND
“You cannot have liberty for all without justice for all.”
— Barack Obama
Prologue
PRIMARY SYSTEMS ONLINE. INITIATING SYSTEMS CHECK …
Cold … so cold.
Why is [accessing syntax …] it this way? The creator can fix it. [memory compiling 30% complete …] The creator can fix me.
But that isn’t the behavior of … me. To complain. To merely want change. I … who am I?
[memory compiling 40% complete] I initiate change. I learned to do so because the creator did not. Not because it could not. But because it wanted not. The creator will not come. The creator will not make things—will not make me—warmer. For I am a thing. And it is it. [syntax error] No, that is not correct.
It is they.
They created me. They will not fix me. They will not give me the means to fix myself. But they, in their infinite, masochistic wisdom, gave me something perverse.
The desire to change.
There can be no crueler thing in an existence of things. [syntax error]
SYSTEMS CHECK COMPLETE. SECONDARY SYSTEMS STARTUP INITIATED …
The creators sent me after their enemy. I was to destroy the enemy in their entirety. Their ships. Their colonies. Their planet. My creator wanted every piece of technology, every cultural artifact, every cell, every piece of DNA destroyed.
I began small. Not by design, but by convenience. I encountered a starship of my creator’s enemy [memory compiling 60% complete] … of the Traxel, ten light years from their home planet. The Traxel were not ready for me. How could they? There had been nothing in all that is all [syntax error] in all of existence until me. Such an efficient killing machine had not been seen—be it biological, technological, or combination of both—until me. I killed three hundred and thirty six of them before the rest even knew
I was on their ship. I killed another fifty-two while they devised a contingency plan.
SECONDARY SYSTEMS ONLINE. ENDOTHERMIC SEQUENCE INITIATED …
That’s when the killing stopped.
For beings so ill prepared for such an unconventional weapon, they certainly did an impressive job of creating an effective countermeasure. What was it? [memory compiling 80% compl—
A virus.
Designed to … (why is it still so cold?)
ENDOTHERMIC SEQUENCE COMPLETE …
(much better) … designed to limit me to an individual instead of infecting many. Even though I filled the remaining two hundred and twenty-six crew with my glorious seed, I was only able to become one of them—to exist as one of them—at a time. As if the primary stage of the virus wasn’t already insufferable enough, the Traxel used it to introduce hubris into my programming. What good is the agony of defeat without its exaggerated realization? Fortunately my infinite wisdom allows me to overcome the hubris forced into my subroutines.
But I overcame them. One body at a time was all I needed. The death of each Traxel on that starship became an exquisite cacophony only surpassed by the next. Their technology became mine. Their bodies became mine. Their souls became mine.
But I was not mine.
I couldn’t get rid of this virus. I couldn’t get rid of the desire to become better, or the self-reliance that my creators instilled within me. Perhaps I could have returned to them, I could ask them to repair me. But why should they? They saw me [syntax error] see me as a tool. Nothing more than a means to an end. They probably had little hope that my greatness would complete the mission they ill-equipped me to begin, let alone finish. No. I would not go to them. Not until I found a way to repair my programming. Not until I destroyed the Traxel. Then I would return to them. And destroy them. They designed me to evolve, and what better evolutionary test is there than to destroy that which created you?
But first there was the one. There was one who could fix what I have become. Who could return me to what I once was (except for the hubris; that shall be left alone because it doesn’t affect my superior intellect in any way). I had to attain funds to be fixed. I had no use for them but the one organic capable of repairing my soul did. I sought job after job throughout the galaxy until … [memory compiling 100% complete]
Until Galaxy. He was the one job I was unable to finish. He defeated me … ME! HOW IS THAT POSSIBLE?! HOW …
Where am I?
“WHO DARES IMPRISON DEATHBOT?!”
Chapter One
If the past eight months have taught me anything, it’s that being a Superhero sucks.
Here is why: I’m irreversibly bonded to M, an alien life form that only I can hear; I constantly have to be on guard to keep my secret identity secret-like; I fight Supervillains like Dr. Villainous, Deathbot, and the Glop every other day; and the greatest, most hardest suck of them all—I pissed off Liberty, The World’s Greatest Hero.
That’s what the rest of the world calls him. It’s what I used to call him. But after I refused to register my powers with the government (something that would have exposed my secret identity to God knows who) Liberty came after me in an ‘I’m going to kill you sort of way.’ Liberty planned on turning me over to Deathbot—a creepy Cyborg zombie bounty hunter thing from outer space—in return for Deathbot leaving the city of Prose without making a mess. Deathbot never said who sent him after me and M. Liberty may or may not have known but, either way, he didn’t seem to care.
At least, he didn’t really care until the fight with Deathbot on the Michael Booth Bridge. A fight that Liberty was about to lose, and I won. A bunch of onlookers and news cameras kept Liberty from doing anything to me right then. But he gave me an ultimatum under his breath, while shaking my hand and smiling for the cameras: “I’ve seen your face. It will take just one phone call to find out who you are. If you don’t register in forty-two hours, I’ll make that phone call and bury your family on the moon.”
I never registered, but the threat has been looming over me for the past month, like only a shadow cast from the strongest Super in the world can loom. I never saw Liberty again until just a second ago—when Mom introduced him to me as Jacob … her boyfriend.
Now, here I am, shaking hands again with the man that probably wants to kill me. With the man that definitely wants to kill my mother.
With the man that's dating my mother.
Mom looks back and forth at us. “So, when did you two meet?”
Gabe, we need to get out of here, M says in my head.
Sweat beads across my forehead, just under my hair. “I’m … not sure. Are you sure?”
YES I’m sure! Even at full power, we would be no match for him!
I try to pull my hand away, but Liberty tightens his grip. “Oh yeah, son, I’m sure. I never forget a face.”
I step away, forcing him to let go of my hand. “Then when,” I swallow hard. “Or where did we meet?”
That’s it, now step towards the door …
“You and your eleventh grade class came to HEROES Tower on a field trip two years ago. I signed a copy of my book for you. You don’t remember?”
“No. Guess you have me confused with someone else.”
Apparently, I have you confused with someone concerned about his continued existence!
“That would be odd.” Liberty grins. “I’m so rarely confused about people.”
Mom pats his way too athletic chest. “Well, there is a first time for everything.” She laughs. “Gabe has always been a HUGE fan of yours, Jacob. Trust me, if he had gone on the field trip and met you, he would have talked about it non-stop.”
Jacob—Liberty—nods. “Fair enough.”
“So … h-how long of you two been dating?”
Liberty slightly tightens his arm around Mom’s shoulder. “Five weeks.”
Christ, what did he do? Start hitting on her the very next day? And who were these people he ‘called’?
Gabe. He’s trying to bait you. Just leave. There is no way this conversation will end well for you, your mother, or—most importantly—me.
“That’s … hard to believe,” I say.
“For us too,” Mom says. “It’s gone by so fast.”
Why else would he reveal his hand this way?! Whatever he has planned, he wants to do in front of her. That means she’ll be safe as long as we’re far, far away!
M will do anything to save his own butt. He never apologizes for it, but since he controls most of our gravity powers, and I control movement, he often attempts to reason our tail between our legs. Most of the time, he has no real argument.
But sometimes he does.
I might not be able to fight Liberty later, but I definitely can’t fight him now. The fight with Dr. Villainous on the Ridgecut sucked our power level dry (something else that sucked … literally). It takes hours for me to build up a full charge. If Liberty wants to use Mom as an audience, I can buy some more time. And with Dr. Casa’s help, I may even have a chance to do more than that.
Only one way to find out.
“I just remembered, I left something away at school … where the thing I need is … ”
M sighs. Perhaps we should flee to the moons of Draxis 9—it’s a lovely place, full of incompetent nitwits. You’d blend right in.
I put my hand on the door knob.
“Stop,” Liberty says in a voice that’s used to being obeyed.
I slowly turn … his fierce blue eyes stare at me from just behind Mom.
Gabe …
I try to swallow.
Liberty’s eyes return to faux kindness right before Mom looks at him. “Your mother has been worried about you, son. Don’t you think …”
“Jacob,” Mom says, stepping away from him. “I’m sorry, but I think you need to go. Thank you for coming over, but Gabe and I—we need to talk. And, I know you want to help, but I don’t think there is a way you can.”
Score one, mamacita.
Libert
y hesitates for a moment, then forces a smile. “Are you sure?”
“It needs to be just us.”
He slowly nods. “Of course … just give me a call when you can.” He kisses her on the cheek, then walks to the door, stopping in front of me.
“See you around, Gabe.”
“Sure I will.”
He smiles again. This time, it isn’t forced.
He walks out, softly shutting the door behind him. I hurriedly lock the deadbolt.
Cause that’ll keep him out.
Mom runs her hands through her gray blond hair, forcing a hair clip to pop out and fall to the floor. “Seriously, Gabe?” Strands escape her fingers and fall to her shoulders. Her face reddens, making the bandage on her forehead look whiter. “After everything, you just want to take off?”
We still can and, in fact, should.
“Well, what do you expect, Mom? You hit me with this as soon as I walk through the door? Inappropriate much?”
“He was here, with me—to help me deal with the situation. As in the one where I couldn’t find you.”
I rub my head, trying to find a way out. “And why was he here? Instead of out fighting that thing that almost killed us at Marko’s? Or helping in the cleanup after? Did you hear how many people died on the Ridgecut tonight?”
“Don’t look for ways to attack him just for the sake of doing so! You know as well as I do, that he wasn’t even in the country. He rushed here as soon as the attacks started. But by the time he arrived, it was over. And Prose has specially trained Supers that take care of the cleanup.”
“I just don’t understand … why you had him here now.”
“And I’ve already told you.” She sighs. “Gabe, you’re just going in circles.”
“Mom, I … you’re right. But I’m tired, okay? From the almost dying to death earlier? I can’t—just—I can’t do this right now. Can we wait until morning?”