Subject 12

by S. W. Douglas

  Not everyone, though. One of his attempted marks had unloaded two barrels of buckshot into his abdomen at fairly close range. It was a miracle he'd survived. It took him months to get back on his feet, let alone the beat, and he'd never been the same afterwards.

  So. Hypnotico and The Justice Fiend. I really was getting the A-list here.

  I'd finished meditation and had begun some low-impact exercises when lunch arrived. A small loaf of bread still steaming from the oven and a sealed bottle of spring water, beading moisture from the humidity, rode a tray carried by one of the guards from the wall, faceless behind his riot helmet. He pushed it through the feeding slot and walked away without saying a word.

  I ripped the bread open and inspected it for any pills that might be hiding. I nearly burned myself twice before I gave in and let it cool. The insides were warmer than the crust, so it actually was freshly-baked.

  That left me in a quandary. I was hungry. There was no escaping that fact. I hadn't eaten in days, the bread smelled delicious, and there were no pills. Yes, someone might have perfected a tasteless, temperature-stable hypnotic, but I doubted they'd try to use something like that on me till they'd gotten a better idea of my metabolism and abilities.

  To be truthful, the whole idea of not eating had been an attempt to throw them off than any real worry on my part, though I kept flashing back to the look of agony on that poor woman's face. Kinsey had injected her vocal cords with a paralytic so she couldn't even scream...

  Gut-check time. Did I trust them to play fair? No. I didn't trust anyone to play fair in a situation like this.

  Let me try another tack. Did I really think they'd try to dope me so early in whatever game they were playing? Again, I didn't trust anyone to play fair.

  I stared at the still-steaming lumps of bread.

  What way could I put it that it seemed like a good idea to eat the bread?

  There wasn't one. But I was going to eat it anyway. If this was going to work either they were going to find some way to dope me to make me more malleable or they were going to play it straight, at least for a while yet.

  The more I thought the more I'd get myself twisted into a knot. What was it going to be? Eat it or flush it?

  I ate it. It was really good, though it would have benefited greatly from copious amounts of butter melting into the nooks and crannies. Then again, what doesn't? The water I drank greedily, even though the stuff out of the tap in the sink was fine, if a bit warm at first.

  It was my gesture to my hosts that I was willing to trust them for now. It was also the only way I could think of to shut my stomach up once it smelled the fresh bread.

  I could go long periods of time without food. Shortly after I escaped from the Alpha Zulu testing lab (I'd been confined to it after I'd refused to go on the last mission they'd assigned me) I had gone two weeks without anything more than rusty water from a drain pipe. I hadn't suffered any ill effects that I knew of, but it wasn't a pleasant experience.

  On the other hand I'd been living on a razor's edge up till that point. Maybe my increased focus then was what had kept me going; there was so much even I didn't know about what I could and couldn't do that I couldn't really trust anything that I hadn't already done or experienced.

  I was much more certain about what was going to happen to me, though. First they were going to try to play off the fact that I'd shown I trusted them, even so little an amount. Once they thought I actually trusted them on some significant level they were going to get me to show off so they could test me. The form the test would take I couldn't fathom, but no matter what, I had to be in better shape when it came around.

  And all the while I had to keep Hypnotico at bay. Maybe even learn something from him.

  It sounded like it could be fun, but I already felt a little bored.

  I wasn't bored after the first trip out of my cell. Hypnotico kept me on my toes whenever we talked, the food was always a challenge to decide if I wanted to eat it, my meditations started going really well, and my body responded so well to the exercises that even I was surprised.

  My host always followed me around on my walks, even if Hypnotico begged off for whatever reason. Sometimes he would interview me through the bars, but he never once stepped inside the cell. He didn't trust me, even if he showed all the signs of doing so while we were out and about. The Justice Fiend didn't trust me either, not that I was surprised. He watched me like a hawk whenever we were out, probably seeing if I was giving any signs of making an escape plan. In fact I had no plans to try to escape. Well, that's not totally true. I had several plans in place if I needed to, but I didn't feel the need. Things were remarkably easy for me, all things considered, and the longer I had before I tried to go the better off I was physically and mentally.

  If they wanted me to go soft while I was waiting they weren't going to get their wish.

  A mere three weeks to the day was I allowed to enjoy the solitude and routine. On the twenty-second I awoke to four guards armed with stun rods standing outside my cell and The Justice Fiend standing just inside, the door wide open, and an air of irritation radiating off the stubby prick so thick I could have used it as a blanket.

  I was somewhat groggy upon awakening that morning, so it took me a full minute to begin interacting with them. I could tell my status as an unwelcome guest was about to be pushed further into the unwelcome territory.

  "Get up," Stumpy growled at me. The way he spoke and the insolent way he stood there with his arms crossed over his chest was insulting, but I chose to let it pass.

  "In a minute," I replied as smoothly as my furry tongue would allow, trying to blink the last of the sleep out of my eyes.

  "No. Now." He uncrossed his arms and seemed ready to commit some violence. Another day, another place, I would have welcomed it, but right then and there I knew something was up. That didn't mean I was going to be any more cooperative than I had to be, however.

  I sat up as slowly as I could. When I'd fully risen I turned to face him so I could meet his gaze, bloodshot eye to bloodshot eye. He glared balefully at me, biting back a curse. He looked like he'd been out a little later than he should have been the night before and probably had had a drink or two too many. We stared at each other, daring the other to look away, even blink first. A simple, immature contest of wills I refused to lose. Maybe it was the testosterone. Maybe it was just the kind of guy we both were. Maybe I was getting bored and hoping for something to happen.

  He wasn't going to give. I wasn't going to give. On the other hand, I didn't need to assert dominance like he did. That meant I could cheat.

  I smiled and slowly blinked. "Like what you see, big boy?"

  He grunted and looked away, grimaced, shook his head for a second, bared his teeth in what I could only guess was anger, and made some animalistic noises. He took at least ten seconds to get control over himself before he could speak again.

  "Getta fuck up and getta fuck outside." The struggle to remain in control was obvious in his eyes and the way his jaw was set. The words "before I kill you" didn't need to be said.

  I slipped my sandals on and walked out of the cell, making sure I walked far enough around him that I didn't invade his personal space. Whatever was going on, he didn't like it and if his history and exploits had taught me anything it was that he was quite capable of taking it out on me. Turning my back on him and walking out of the cell without a backwards look might have been a mistake from a survival point of view, but I couldn't resist throwing that insult at him. He didn't know I would have caught him and put him through the wall without raising my heart rate if he'd rushed me.

  The guards took up flanking positions and followed me at what they must have thought was a safe distance. I paused at the foot of the stairs leading to the courtyard until I could hear the unmistakably heavy tread of the "greatest hero that ever lived" following me. For a moment I reflected on his career, both the good and the bad, as I waited for him to catch up.

  It just didn't
seem right to meet whatever was waiting for me without my escort.

  His response was about what I'd expected. I was grabbed, thrown against the wall, and growled at. I stopped the impact from actually touching me, making a buffer of air between me and the wall. What I didn't stop, and in fact redirected the entire force of the impact into, was the wall from crumbling. A cloud of fine dust flew into the air and bathed both me and the man holding me against the wall before all the pieces settled on the floor. Oh yes, my focus was better.

  "Don't you ever act like that around me again or I will kill you, orders or not." There was no humor in his voice or eyes, only serious intent.

  "I'd like to see you try," I said quietly, cool confidence infusing every syllable.

  So there it was. I'd thrown the gauntlet down. The question was --- would he pick it up now or follow his orders to deliver me wherever I was supposed to go? But the reality was he was a man of duty first and foremost, at least when he was sober. I hadn't pushed him quite hard enough to forget his word, nor did I want or need to.

  Duty would release him soon enough, and when it did...

  "Not today, little man. Not today. But watch your fucking back."

  "You know, I always heard that about you, but I didn't want to believe it."

  Anger peaked behind his eyes and then he laughed. "Just gotta keep pushing, huh?" He dropped me. "You got spirit, boy, I'll give you that. Now get up those fuckin' stairs before I rip your fuckin' arm off."

  "Such a mouth on you," I chided dangerously. But I went up the stairs.

  A pavilion had been erected in the middle of the courtyard during the night.. That meant either the fountain had been removed or covered, though it didn't matter to me unless I needed to do something inside the blasted thing. I didn't relish the idea of being drenched with cold water, especially without a bar of soap.

  "Move," I was ordered, punctuated with a rough shove. I whirled and punched the guard in the face. My fist went through the riot shield without any resistance, shattering the bulletproof plastic, and connected solidly with his nose. It flatted, blood welled, and he fell to the ground unconscious.

  The remaining three stun rods snarled and flew my way, but I moved away from them faster than they could swing them. I retreated, step after step, letting the guards swing wildly at where I'd been standing the step before. To my relief The Justice Fiend didn't join in immediately. Either this was supposed to happen or he was waiting to see what I did.

  No matter how this played out, the guard who'd shoved me was lucky I hadn't just killed him.

  I kept ducking and retreating till my back was against the fabric of the tent. It wasn't hard to stay ahead of these three basic-stock assailants, so I barely had to exert myself at all. I could have done this for hours without even getting out of breath, but it was getting rather boring, so I started to watch the guards more closely. One of them swung a little wilder than the others, often coming a little too close to his companions.

  It didn't take much to make his next swing come even closer, and the one after that graze the side of a helmet. That was all it took.

  A stun rod used a combination of high-frequency electricity tuned to overload the nerves in the brain (causing temporary unconsciousness and a headache upon awakening that would put apple palsy to shame) and an intense electromagnetic field. If a stun rod merely comes close enough to an unshielded head, the poor sod on the receiving end would suffer intense disorientation leading to a short blackout as the brain started shutting down one neuron cluster at a time. The process was basically the same as rebooting a computer.

  The guard jerked, shook, dropped his stun rod, groaned, vomited inside his helmet, then fell backwards.

  That left two guards who were aware of what had happened but not how it had happened. Perfect.

  The next swing caught the tent fabric, with a little help, and gave me just enough of an opening. I twisted around the other rod, caught the guard's wrist with my left hand, drove my elbow into his helmet hard enough to snap his head back, wrenched the rod free, caught the other guard's chest with the rod's handle making him step back, then finished the swing against the first guard's helmet. He went down hard.

  The last guard shook his head to clear it and took in the situation. I could almost read his thoughts as he realized it was just him and me.

  "Sorry," I said, thrusting the business end of the stun rod into his midsection. When he dropped, I dropped the rod, then stood there, awaiting my fate.

  "That was pathetic," a gruff voice said behind me. I didn't recognize it, but it was obvious it had come through a hole in the tent a stun rod had burned.

  "I'm sorry it didn't meet with your approval." I looked for the missing Fiend and couldn't see him. "Am I to stand here and talk over my shoulder or should I join you inside?"

  "What are y'all waitin' for, then? Come on in."

  I wasn't sure what I'd been expecting, but what I saw wasn't it.

  Raymond/Hypnotico was there, in the background, looking deferential. The Justice Fiend was standing near him, looking annoyed, but containing himself. I had no idea when he'd ducked into the tent, yet there he was. If he was worried about the guards I'd just manhandled there was no sign of it.

  Off to the right were a couple of high-density computer arrays tied to some sensor equipment and three techs monitoring the readouts.

  But standing in the middle, dressed in full costume, were four aged but potent figures I immediately recognized.

  On the extreme left was Jackhammer, a super hero whose glory days were more than thirty years past, though he had been active until fairly recently. He'd tangled with and bested more villains than anyone else short of The Justice Fiend --- if you include the corrupted one-offs he'd put down during the Boston and London Equality Riots --- and some would argue the worst of the worst. He was super-strong, super-tough, and fast, and his abilities as a strategist were renowned. His yellow costume was impressively sculpted, especially when you realized he was pushing eighty. His mask was shaped to his face and covered everything from the nose up, leaving a gray-streaked but well-trimmed beard to disguise his mouth.

  Standing next to him was his wife, Steamroller. Her abilities involved gravity. She could manipulate the local gravitational field so intensely that if she wished she could make objects, including people, look like they'd been hit by a steamroller. Hence the name. She was fairly close to, if not past, Jackhammer's age, though her powers wouldn't be affected by any slowing of her reflexes. Not that I was counting on her to age like a norm; a lot of supers didn't.

  Her suit and full-face mask were black with a light mottling of dark gray and midnight blue that would allow her to blend in with the shadows better. Since her body was only as tough as a norm's, stealth was important. I imagine both parts of the costume had become armored as technology had improved.

  On the extreme right was a beautiful woman who looked to be in her late twenties though I knew her birth records would show she was at least fifty. She'd called herself Pretty Poison till she went Fem Lib after the Equality Riots. She'd changed her name to Venom to reflect her new attitude and her costume had been modified as well. Interestingly enough it showed a lot more skin now than it ever did. Her impressive cleavage swelled with each breath.

  Venom's powers were interesting, if not unique. Her skin was impervious to piercing or cutting, including bullets, but her bones were just as fragile as a norm's, even though they healed a hell of a lot faster. She wasn't super strong, she wasn't super fast, her sense of balance was gymnast quality but that was from training, and she couldn't fly or scream like a banshee. No, her abilities lay in an almost magical understanding of what natural or chemical ingredients would form interesting compounds when mixed. If anyone else tried to follow one of her recipes they'd meet failure --- or death.

  There was a story of a time she'd used nothing more than a bottle of rum and a packaged cake mix to create a knockout gas that let her escape the Happy Homemaker's dungeon, but t
hat's a story for another time.

  Venom was also the only one of the four who wasn't wearing a mask. Her green eyes twinkled in the light and her smile would have made a celibate priest revoke his vows if she'd turned it on him.

  She was also very familiar looking. Not that I hadn't seen pictures of her in the past, but there was something more immediate about the feeling.

  Standing next to her was a tall, thin man wearing a wildly-decorated one-piece suit that covered everything from head to toe. The decorations shifted constantly, though they seemed to change faster the more he moved. Since he was merely standing still and breathing the alterations were slow at that moment. I saw red diamonds morph into hearts, spades, and clubs. Stylized faces changed gender, grew swords out of their heads or reabsorbed them.

  Only one man would wear a suit like that.

  Wildcard.

  Wildcard was, reportedly, insane. He had been since a super villain had trapped him in a giant spider web and burned his torso and face with acid so badly he'd lost the ability to speak or even blink his eyes. His eyelids had been burned off.

  He was a morph --- he aged slowly, his physical strength was greatly enhanced, and he could alter his body as he saw fit. Elongate it, bend it, change its color, flatten it, shorten it, whatever. The only thing he couldn't change was its mass. Or heal the scars.

  Where his eyes should have been were two subtly-glowing green ovals. I couldn't tell if they were part of the mask or a prosthesis to protect what was left of his eyes, but the effect was very creepy.

  They were the founders of the Heroes' Guild and the greatest super hero team in history. Together they'd taken on and beaten super villains that would have given The Justice Fiend a run for his money. They'd saved the world from more threats than I could count. They had retired years ago; Wildcard to a sanatorium after being so grievously wounded, Jackhammer and Steamroller about a year later to a ranch in Canada where they could live out their remaining years in peace, and Venom simply vanished about the time Wildcard had retired.