Hearts of Darkness

by Andrea Speed

  Crusher still grabbed Ash and flung him away, but almost fell down doing it. Now Kaede could see blood trickling from the monster’s ears.

  And Kaede could see what supersteroids did to their victims’ eyes. Crusher’s eyes were gray, and there were tiny black veins in the irises, making them look corrupted, diseased. And that was just a taste of what the shit did to their insides. Yeah, they were made impossibly strong and impervious to most (but clearly not all) physical damage, but most were also dead within ten years. It fucked you up but good.

  Kaede had nowhere to go. He was stuck at the end of the hall, with Crusher between him and everything else. He had no choice but to fight him. Fuck.

  Crusher grabbed for him, missed, and Kaede sprayed him in the face with the toxin. He snarled and spit like a cat, then lashed out blindly and clocked Kaede with one of his huge, ham-hock-sized hands, sending him sprawling. He caught Kaede just on the edge of the jaw, and it hurt like fuck. He had no idea how Ash took any of those harder blows.

  Kaede attempted to crawl out of Crusher’s way as the monster shook his head and fell to his knees, but there really wasn’t anywhere for Kaede to go. Crusher still had him hemmed in. He couldn’t fight his way past this steroid monstrosity even though Crusher was compromised by his shattered eardrums. Kaede was just going to have to wait for the toxin to take effect.

  Suddenly Ash sprang up behind Crusher and caught him in a headlock before brutally yanking Crusher’s head to the side. There was a huge crack, like someone breaking an ice sheet the size of Switzerland, and Crusher finally slumped forward, a big, dead lump.

  “Are you all right?” Ash asked.

  If Kaede’d had the strength, he would have laughed. “You’re asking me? I should be asking you that same question.”

  Ash shrugged. “I’m fine. I think Mastermind got away.”

  “Yeah, I think so. Not your fault. This big fucker was a handful.”

  Ash offered his hand, and Kaede took it, allowing Ash to help him back to his feet. His jaw was throbbing like he’d just made an unexpected visit to the dentist. Kaede rubbed it, careful to avoid the exact area of the bruise, as it hurt to even touch. How could Crusher get through day-to-day activities being so freakishly strong? He must have broken every door he opened.

  Ash was still standing in front of him, blinking slowly. If he was hurt from the relentless pounding he took, it wasn’t obvious. “Did you get the weapon?”

  “Yeah. I don’t know what it is, exactly, but it’s all mine.”

  On their way out, Kaede paused by Paladin’s body. He wasn’t actually sure if Paladin was alive or dead, but he had something that looked like some kind of steampunk nail gun, snub nosed, with lots of exposed gears. Kaede took it just because he wanted to see what it did.

  Outside, there was no sign of Mastermind. Whiplash must have been the woman facedown on the ground, beside an outstretched whip. Kaede didn’t know if she was alive or dead either and didn’t much care.

  At least two of the Dark Legion—Dagger and Crusher—had been killed tonight, along with Nighthawk. Kaede had no idea what this was going to do to the city’s underworld once word got around. But Kaede figured the sooner he learned how to use his dad’s superweapon, the better.

  BACK AT the penthouse, the bruise on Kaede’s jaw had swollen into a knot, and he felt grumpy and tired. Ash seemed fine, but when he peeled off the cowl part of his symtech suit, there was blood smeared on his face.

  “Where are you hurt?” Kaede asked, abandoning both the bag with the superweapon and Paladin’s odd device on the coffee table.

  Ash peeled off the shirt portion of the suit. Bruises of black, purple, and the ugliest blue were just as bright and vivid as his dragon tattoo against his pale skin. The smeared blood seemed localized to his face and neck, although there were no obvious bleeding wounds.

  Kaede winced at the bruises, even though that simple action hurt his jaw. “I guess the suit didn’t protect you from everything.”

  Ash looked down at his torso and shrugged. “It got most of it. Crusher was a hard one. It still stopped the bullets.”

  They had walked through a number of spent cartridges on their way out. Ash couldn’t tell him how many bullets Mastermind fired, but Kaede guessed it must have been dozens. How many times did he reload, and why did he keep doing it even though he must have seen how ineffectual they were at stopping Ash? Maybe they were all Mastermind had on him. Kaede made a mental note that, as smart and sociopathic as he was, you could fluster Mastermind.

  “I’m glad. Still, do you want to take a bath before I do? Your bruises probably need a good soak.”

  Ash looked briefly confused. “We could bathe together.”

  That blindsided him like a two-by-four to the face. Kaede had to breathe through the sudden flush of lust as logic reared its ugly head. It wasn’t a sexual thing at all. Ash grew up in an Asian culture. Group bathing was just a thing, an accepted social activity. And it wasn’t at all ironic that Kaede was the Japanese guy, but it was the Caucasian who lived a more contemporary Asian lifestyle. “Sure. If you wanna go ahead, I’ll meet you in there.”

  Ash nodded, turning to head to the main bathroom. As soon as he was out of sight, Kaede went to the bar and gulped almost half a bottle of vodka. It was for his nerves, yes, but also for the pain in his jaw. He really hoped he didn’t get a boner around Ash, as that was a conversation he didn’t want to have with him. Kaede was just hoping the combination of nerves, pain, and booze would keep everything manageable.

  He peeled his symtech suit off in his bedroom and undressed there, wrapping a towel around his waist before heading to the master bathroom.

  To say the master bathroom was huge was a bit like saying the Empire State Building was tallish. Kaede had stayed in hotel rooms the exact square footage of this bathroom. It was done in blue and white marble tile with chrome fixtures, mimicking the cold color scheme of the rest of the penthouse. The bathtub was the centerpiece of the room—round and huge, like a communal tub. It could easily fit half a dozen people at one time, and there were a number of buttons controlling a variety of features, including jets and water treatments of many varieties.

  Kaede had waited long enough, as Ash was not only in the tub but leaning back with his eyes closed as the mist fogged the bathroom. From the churning of the water and the scent in the air, he guessed Ash had turned on the pulsing jets and the sea-salt treatment. Those sounded like they’d be good for injuries.

  Before Ash could open his eyes, Kaede dropped his towel and got in. The water was soft and warm, and the tub large enough that he managed to get in without disturbing Ash at all. Except when his leg accidentally touched Ash’s leg. Ash didn’t react to it, which Kaede considered a good sign, but he still moved his foot. Kaede sank down until his jaw was touching the water so the warmth could penetrate the knot making the whole right side of his face ache. It did seem to help. Either that, or the vodka was kicking in. Maybe a bit of both.

  “This is nice,” Kaede admitted.

  “Do you have any idea what the rest of these buttons do?” Ash asked.

  Kaede opened his eyes to find Ash scowling down at the control panel beside the tub. Ash had slicked back his hair with the water, and it made it seem almost translucent.

  “They’re not all marked?”

  “No.”

  “Then I can’t help you. My dad is weird. That’s all I can tell you about him.”

  Ash frowned at the controls, as if he could intimidate them into showing their purpose. Randomly, he stabbed a button, and the overhead lights switched from blinding white to a shadowy blue that made it feel as though the entire room was underwater.

  Kaede looked around, a little surprised. “Mood lighting?” Little his dad did shocked him anymore, but this did. Since when did he go in for mood lighting?

  “Is he interested in meditation?” Ash asked. “This is a soothing environment for it.”

  “I guess,” Kaede admitted, moving over to th
e control panel for a look of his own. The jets were all marked, as were all the water treatment options, but there were half a dozen buttons on their own at the bottom of the console, unmarked. “Maybe you’d just better leave it be.” He was afraid one of the unmarked options might be lye or something. Not that he expected his dad to use his own bathtub as a body-dissolving place—he would definitely separate those two things—but he kind of didn’t want to find out.

  “Sure,” Ash agreed. Kaede suspected he was humoring him, but that was okay. As long as he didn’t blindly poke any more buttons.

  “By the way, busting Crusher’s eardrums? That was really clever.”

  Ash shrugged. “His muscles seemed to make him impervious to pain, so fighting him was difficult. There were no muscles in the ears.”

  That was true, although if anyone had told him Crusher had muscles in his head, he probably would have believed it. Crusher was that thick.

  Kaede forgot to be nervous after a while. In fact, he found himself almost falling asleep a couple different times. The water was so warm and the jets so relaxing, it was difficult not to.

  The third time it happened, he started awake, only to find that Ash was propping him up. He had an arm around his shoulders, and Kaede could feel his naked thigh right against his own.

  “You almost slipped under the water,” Ash explained. Contact wasn’t bothering him in the least.

  But Kaede was aware of it—much too aware, really. He was deeply torn between wanting to stay there and wanting to bolt out of the tub like his ass was on fire. Finally he had to crawl out of the tub, hastily dry off, and then go collapse in his bed. He forgot to be anxious, as he was too tired to think at all. He’d probably had a little too much vodka.

  But he’d gotten through a bath with Ash and managed not to be inappropriately sexual. That had to be a small victory of some sort, right? He was still trying to decide when he fell asleep.

  6

  BY THE time Kaede woke up, he found breakfast waiting for him as Ash had finally figured out how to order in from a local cafe that delivered to the building.

  Over croissants and mini quiches, Kaede discovered the bodies were front-page news. Apparently Whiplash and Paladin had survived, along with Mastermind, but Crusher, Dagger, and Nighthawk were definitely dead, and it seemed the paper had no idea what killed Nighthawk. Not only was the neurotoxin super lethal, but after an hour, it was gone from the system. It was his dad’s fuck you to toxicologists everywhere.

  The newspaper made it a mystery, why they were at the warehouse, why they were dead, where the rest of the Dark Legion was. There was lots of speculation about who could have possibly killed a monstrosity like Crusher, and that speculation fell on other supersteroid victims, such as Grudge, and mad-scientist-created mutants of different yet similar stripes, such as Black Wolf or Smash. There was some conjecture that there was a “new menace” in town, but they didn’t offer any guesses or theories.

  New menace. Kaede tasted the words, rolled them over in his mind, and wasn’t sure they were apt. He didn’t feel new or like a menace. “Think that’d do as my nickname?” Kaede asked Ash. “Menace?”

  Ash seemed to think it over as he tore pieces off his croissant and ate them in tiny bites. This was how he ate all bread products, and Kaede wondered if he really was new to these types of bakery items. These kinds of foods were universal now, but he had no idea if they’d ever gotten to rural Laos, or if the Hans had exposed Ash to that kind of diet. Maybe he just preferred eating in this fussy, weirdly dainty manner.

  “You could do worse,” Ash finally said.

  Well, he couldn’t argue with that. “Have you thought of a nickname for yourself?”

  “I’m Ash.”

  “That’s your name.”

  “Yes.”

  Kaede stared at him over the table, wondering where the disconnect was. “Your nickname and your name can’t be the same thing. It defeats the entire purpose of a nickname.”

  “Oh.” He chewed on another bit of croissant before replying. “What would you call me?”

  That was a good question. Several ideas came to mind, but none he felt he could share. Finally he thought of something. “What about Kintaro?”

  “The Japanese hero?” At Kaede’s nod, he appeared to weigh the idea while chewing thoughtfully. “Am I especially heroic?”

  “You’re strong. Kintaro was strong.”

  “True.”

  Kaede considered their names side by side. “But Kintaro and the Menace sounds like a really bad sitcom.”

  “What’s a sitcom?” Ash asked.

  “A comedy on television that usually isn’t very funny.” Kaede folded up the paper and set it aside. “At least Moreau will be furious.”

  Ash popped the last piece of croissant in his mouth. “Why? The Dark Legion were his enemies.”

  “Yes, but his name is Dark Justice. Only he gets to mete out the punishment, at least as far as he’s concerned.” Kaede wondered if he was going to make an appearance today. He might. Kaede wondered if he could keep a straight face.

  “What about the superweapon?” Ash asked. “What is it?”

  “Ah. I’m not sure. I was going to bring a sample into work today, see what the lab geeks make of it.” And if it turned out it was just another toxin, he was going to call his father and curse him out.

  Ash, thanks to his unique genetic makeup, had no bruises, but Kaede still had one on his jaw. Luckily his father had perfected synthetic skin, and he just printed some out in the lab (of course a 3D printer was involved), a piece big enough to cover the bruise and blend in with the rest of his skin. It was like it had magically disappeared. Even up close, you couldn’t see the seam.

  They went to work, as usual, and Kaede found his mind going back to Ash’s arm around him, his leg touching Kaede’s. It was innocent, yes, but it had been really nice, and startlingly casual and intimate. Was it wrong to want more of that? Even if it was, he still wanted it.

  They had been at work ten minutes—Kaede had just barely settled down behind his desk after giving an intern the sample of the superweapon to take to the tech lab—when the receptionist buzzed him and said, “Sir, Dark Justice is here.”

  Kaede exchanged a knowing glance with Ash—had he called this or what?—and said, “Send him in.”

  Ash took up his usual position staring out the window, his back to the room, as Moreau came in, his visible face flushed and twisted with rage.

  “Mr. Justice,” Kaede said, sounding cheerful to cover up his savage urge to laugh. “What can I do—”

  “This was you, wasn’t it?” Moreau snapped, slapping the folded-up newspaper on Kaede’s desk.

  Kaede made a show of picking up the paper and scanning the front page. “I’d think it would be you,” he finally said, doing his best to keep a poker face. “Aren’t Dark Legion your enemies?”

  Moreau put his hands on the desk and leaned against it, trying to glower down at Kaede in an intimidating manner. But Kaede was never going to be scared by a guy in a latex cowl, and certainly not a millionaire playboy with serious daddy issues. “I don’t kill. Three of these men are dead, and I want to know what kind of steroid monstrosity you have that could break Crusher’s neck like it was made of celery.”

  How hilarious would it be if Moreau knew that “steroid monstrosity” was the slender man staring out the window, seemingly ignoring them, but ready, at a single word from Kaede, to tear Dark Justice to pieces? “Supersteroids was more Dr. Blood’s thing. My father never went in for that. I’d have thought you, of all people, would have known that.”

  “You and your father are up to something,” Moreau said in his most growly, butch voice. It was adorable. “What was in that warehouse, and what happened to Nighthawk?”

  Kaede picked up the newspaper again and scanned the main article. “Nighthawk was a member of the Dark Legion? I had no idea.”

  Dark Justice ripped the paper out of his hand violently, and out of the corner of
his eye, Kaede saw Ash tense slightly, but otherwise he didn’t move. He would do nothing until given the word.

  “Is this a joke to you?” Moreau snapped. “You’re responsible for this.”

  “I don’t know where you’re getting that. I had nothing to do with this. Do I look like I could fight Crusher to you?”

  Moreau frowned, and Kaede was just beside himself with glee on the inside. Could he be more ridiculous?

  “I know you’re not the type to get your hands dirty, Hayashi. I want to know who you sent and why.”

  Kaede was almost offended by that remark. What did Moreau mean, he wasn’t the type to get his hands dirty? “Are you having a problem hearing me? Maybe you should take off your mask. I said I had nothing to do with this, and you insisting I did changes nothing.”

  Moreau straightened up, crossing his arms over his chest and huffing a sigh through his nose. “So you just show up in town, and it’s a coincidence these things are happening?”

  “You got it. I’m just a businessman. My father is what he is, and it has nothing to do with me.”

  “I will find out what you’re up to, and you will be sorry,” Moreau insisted, and his gaze slid over toward Ash. But it was a brief glance. “This is my city, and you should leave while you have the chance.” He pivoted on his heel and stormed out.

  “I look forward to our next empty-threat session,” Kaede called after him. As soon as the door was shut and Dark Justice out of view, he started laughing. Once he could talk again, he asked Ash, “Why does he bother coming here if he’s going to do nothing but bluster?”

  “My guess? He wants to catch you off guard and hopes to intimidate you. But if it hasn’t happened by now, it’s not happening.”

  “I don’t think common sense is a part of Dark Justice’s world. Do you think if we push him enough, he’ll throw a punch at me?”