Vicious

by V. E. Schwab

  “Next week would be better,” called out Toby Powell, a broad-shouldered surfer, pre-med, and the son of some governor. Max had only earned a murmur, but this time the other students laughed at a level proportionate to Toby’s popularity.

  “Enough,” said Professor Lyne. The class quieted. “Now, Lockland encourages a certain level of … industriousness where theses are concerned, and offers a proportionate amount of freedom, but a word of warning from me. I’ve taught this thesis seminar for seven years. You will do yourselves no favors by making a safe selection and flying under the radar; however, an ambitious thesis will win no points on the grounds of ambitiousness alone. Your grade is contingent upon execution. Find a topic close enough to your area of interest to be productive without selecting one you already consider yourselves expert on.” He offered Toby a withering smile. “Start us off, Mr. Powell.”

  Toby ran his fingers through his hair, stalling. The professor’s disclaimer had clearly shaken his confidence in whatever topic he’d been about to declare. He made a few noncommittal sounds while scrolling through his notes.

  “Um … T helper 17 cells and immunology.” He was careful not to let his voice wander up at the end into a question. Professor Lyne let him hang for a moment, and everyone waited to see if he would give Toby “the look”—the slight lift of his chin and the tilt of his head that he had become famous for; a look that said, perhaps you’d like to try again—but finally he honored him with a small nod.

  His gaze pivoted. “Mr. Hall?”

  Max opened his mouth when Lyne cut in with, “No tech. Science yes, tech no. So choose wisely.” Max’s mouth snapped shut a moment as he considered.

  “Electrical efficacy in sustainable energy,” he said after a pause.

  “Hardware over software. Admirable choice, Mr. Hall.”

  Professor Lyne continued around the room.

  Inheritance patterns, equilibriums, and radiation were all approved, while effects of alcohol/cigarettes/illegal substances, the chemical properties of methamphetamines, and the body’s response to sex all earned “the look.” One by one the topics were accepted or retooled.

  “Next,” ordered Professor Lyne, his sense of humor ebbing.

  “Chemical pyrotechnics.”

  A long pause. The topic had come from Janine Ellis, whose eyebrows hadn’t fully recovered from her last round of research. Professor Lyne gave a sigh, accompanied by “the look,” but Janine only smiled and there wasn’t much Lyne could say. Ellis was one of the youngest students in the room and had, in her freshman year, discovered a new and vibrant shade of blue that firework companies across the world now used. If she was willing to risk her eyebrows, that was her own business.

  “And you, Mr. Vale?”

  Victor looked at his professor, narrowing down his options. He’d never been strong in physics, and while chemistry was fun, his real passion lay in biology—anatomy and neuroscience. He’d like a topic with the potential for experimentation, but he’d also like to keep his eyebrows. And while he wanted to hold his rank in the department, offers from med schools, graduate programs, and research labs had been coming in the mail for weeks (and under the table for months). He and Eli had been decorating their entry hall with the letters. Not the offers, no, but the letters that preceded them, all praise and charm, batting lashes and handwritten postscripts. Neither one of them needed to move worlds with their papers. Victor glanced over at Eli, wondering what he would choose.

  Professor Lyne cleared his throat.

  “Adrenal inducers,” said Victor on a lark.

  “Mr. Vale, I’ve already turned down a proposal involving intercourse—”

  “No,” Victor said, shaking his head. “Adrenaline and its physical and emotional inducers and consequences. Biochemical thresholds. Fight or flight. That kind of thing.”

  He watched Professor Lyne’s face, waiting for a sign, and Lyne eventually nodded.

  “Don’t make me regret it,” he said.

  And then he turned to Eli, the last person to answer. “Mr. Cardale.”

  Eli smiled calmly. “EOs.”

  The whole class, which had devolved more and more into muffled conversation as students declared their topics, now stopped. The background chatter and the sound of typing and the fidgeting in chairs went still as Professor Lyne considered Eli with a new look, one that hung between surprise and confusion, tempered only by the understanding that Eliot Cardale was consistently top of the class, top of the entire pre-medical department, even—well, alternating with Victor for first and second spot, anyway.

  Fifteen pairs of eyes flicked between Eli and Professor Lyne as the moment of silence lasted and became uncomfortable. Eli wasn’t the kind of student to propose something as a joke, or a test. But he couldn’t possibly be serious.

  “I’m afraid you’ll have to expand,” said Lyne slowly.

  Eli’s smile didn’t falter. “An argument for the theoretical feasibility of the existence of ExtraOrdinary people, deriving from laws of biology, chemistry, and psychology.”

  Professor Lyne’s head tilted and his chin tipped, but when he opened his mouth, all he said was, “Be careful, Mr. Cardale. As I warned, no points will be given for ambition alone. I’ll trust you not to make a mockery of my class.”

  “Is that a yes, then?” asked Eli.

  The first bell rang.

  One person’s chair scraped back an inch, but no one stood up.

  “Fine,” said Professor Lyne.

  Eli’s smile widened.

  Fine? thought Victor. And, reading the looks of every other student in the room, he could see everything from curiosity to surprise to envy echoed in their faces. It was a joke. It had to be. But Professor Lyne only straightened, and resumed his usual composure.

  “Go forth, students,” he said. “Create change.”

  The room erupted into movement. Chairs were dragged, tables knocked askew, bags hoisted, and the class emptied in a wave into the hall, taking Victor with it. He looked around the corridor for Eli and saw that he was still in the room, talking quietly, animatedly, with Professor Lyne. For a moment the steady calm was gone and his eyes were bright with energy, glinting with hunger. But by the time he broke away and joined Victor in the hall, it was gone, hidden behind a casual smile.

  “What the hell was that?” Victor demanded. “I know the thesis doesn’t matter much at this point, but still—was that some kind of joke?”

  Eli shrugged, and before the matter could be pressed, his phone broke out into electro-rock in his pocket. Victor sagged against the wall as Eli dug it out.

  “Hey, Angie. Yeah, we’re on our way.” He hung up without even waiting for a response.

  “We’ve been summoned.” Eli slung his arm around Victor’s shoulders. “My fair damsel is hungry. I dare not keep her waiting.”

  III

  LAST NIGHT

  MERIT CEMETERY

  SYDNEY’S arms were beginning to ache from lifting the shovel, but for the first time in a year, she wasn’t cold. Her cheeks burned, and she was sweating through her coat, and she felt alive.

  As far as she was concerned, that was the only good thing about digging up a corpse.

  “Couldn’t we do something else?” she asked, leaning on the shovel.

  She knew Victor’s answer, could feel his patience thinning, but she still had to ask because asking was talking, and talking was the only thing distracting her from the fact that she was standing over a body, and digging her way toward it instead of away from it.

  “The message has to be sent,” said Victor. He didn’t stop digging.

  “Well then, maybe we could send a different message,” she said under her breath.

  “It has to be done, Syd,” he said, finally looking up. “So try to think of something pleasant.”

  She sighed, and started digging again. A few scoops of dirt later, she stopped. She was almost afraid to ask.

  “What are you thinking of, Victor?”

  He fl
ashed a small, dangerous smile. “I’m thinking about what a lovely night it is.”

  They both knew it was a lie, but Sydney decided she’d rather not know the truth.

  * * *

  VICTOR wasn’t thinking of the weather.

  He hardly felt the cold through his coat. He was too busy trying to picture what Eli’s face would look like when he received their message. Trying to picture the shock, the anger, and threaded through it all, the fear. Fear because it could only mean one thing.

  Victor was out. Victor was free.

  And Victor was coming for Eli—just as he’d promised he would.

  He sunk the shovel into the cold earth with a satisfying thud.

  IV

  TEN YEARS AGO

  LOCKLAND UNIVERSITY

  “YOU’RE seriously not going to tell me what that was about?” asked Victor as he followed Eli through the massive double doors and into the Lockland International Dining Suite, more commonly known as LIDS.

  Eli didn’t answer as he scanned the eating hall for Angie.

  The whole place resembled a theme park, in Victor’s opinion, all the mundane trappings of a cafeteria hidden beneath plastic and plaster facades that were out of scale and out of place beside each other. Circling a quad-sized stretch of tables, eleven eatery options each boasted different menus in different fonts with different decor. By the doors was a bistro, complete with a low little gate erected for a waiting line. Next to it Italian music played, several pizza ovens gaping behind the counter. Across the way the Thai, Chinese, and sushi places sat in paper-lantern colors, bright and primary and inviting. Joining these were a burger joint, a carving station, a comfort food kitchen, a salad bar, a smoothie shop, and a basic café.

  Angie Knight was sitting near the Italian eatery, twirling pasta on her fork, her coppery curls wandering into her eyes as she read a book pinned beneath her tray. A small prickle ran through Victor when he spotted her, the voyeuristic thrill of seeing someone before they see you, of being able to simply watch. But the moment ended when Eli saw her, too, and caught her gaze without a word. They were like magnets, thought Victor, each with their own pull. They showed it every day in class, and around campus, people always drifting toward them. Even Victor felt the draw. And then when they got close enough to each other … well. Angie’s arms were around Eli’s neck in an instant, her perfect lips against his.

  Victor looked away, giving them a moment of privacy, which was absurd considering their public display of affection was very … public. A female professor looked up from a folded paper several tables over, one eyebrow quirking before she turned the page with a loud crack. Eventually, Eli and Angie managed to pry themselves apart and she acknowledged Victor with a hug, a gesture that was simple but genuine, all the warmth, but none of the heat.

  And that was okay. He was not in love with Angie Knight. She didn’t belong to him. Even though he met her first, even though he’d been a magnet for her once, and she’d wandered toward him in LIDS that first week of school freshman year, and they’d had smoothies because it was still ungodly hot out even in September, and her face was red from track and his was red from her. Even though she hadn’t even met Eli until sophomore year when Victor brought his new roommate to sit with him at dinner because it seemed like good karma.

  Fucking karma, he thought as Angie pulled away and floated back to her seat.

  Eli grabbed soup and Victor bought Chinese, and the three sat in the growing noise of the eating hall and ate and made mindless conversation, even though Victor desperately wanted to find out what the hell Eli was thinking picking EOs as a thesis. But Victor knew better than to interrogate him in front of Angie. Angie Knight was a force. A force with long legs and the most severe case of curiosity that Victor had ever encountered. She was only twenty, had been coveted by the top schools since she could drive, had been given a dozen business cards followed by a dozen offers and just as many follow-ups, both subtle and not-so-subtle bribes, and here she was at Lockland. She’d recently accepted an offer from an engineering firm, and upon graduation would be the youngest—and, Victor wagered, the brightest—employee of their company. She wouldn’t even be able to drink yet.

  Besides, judging by the looks the other students had given Eli when he made his thesis selection, word would reach her soon enough.

  Finally, after a lunch dotted with pauses and occasional warning glances from Eli, the bell rang and Angie left for her next class. She wasn’t even supposed to have a next class, but she’d taken on an extra elective. Eli and Victor sat and watched her cloud of red hair bob away with all the glee of someone off to eat cake, not explore forensic chemistry or mechanical efficacy or whatever she’d picked up as a pet project this time.

  Or rather, Eli watched her go, and Victor watched Eli watch her, something twisting in his stomach. It wasn’t just that Eli stole Angie from Victor—that was bad enough—but somehow Angie had stolen Eli from him, too. The more interesting Eli, anyway. Not the one with perfect teeth and an easy laugh, but the one beneath that was glittering and sharp, like broken glass. It was in those jagged pieces that Victor saw something he recognized. Something dangerous, and hungry. But when Eli was with Angie, it never showed. He was a model boyfriend, caring, attentive, and dull, and Victor found himself studying his friend in Angie’s wake, searching for signs of life.

  Several quiet minutes passed as the eating halls thinned and emptied, and then Victor lost patience and kicked Eli under the wood table. His eyes drifted lazily up from his food.

  “Yes?”

  “Why EOs?”

  Eli’s face slowly, slowly, began to open, and Victor felt his chest loosen with relief as Eli’s darker self peeked through.

  “Do you believe in them?” asked Eli, drawing patterns in what was left of his soup.

  Victor hesitated, chewing on a piece of lemon chicken. EO. ExtraOrdinary. He had heard of them, the way people hear about any phenomena, from believer sites and the occasional late-night exposé where “experts” analyze grainy footage of a man lifting a car or a woman engulfed in fire without burning. Hearing about EOs and believing in EOs were very different things, and he couldn’t tell by Eli’s tone which camp he fell into. He couldn’t tell which camp Eli wanted him to fall into, either, which made answering infinitely harder.

  “Well,” prompted Eli. “Do you believe?”

  “I don’t know,” Victor said truthfully, “if it’s a matter of believing…”

  “Everything starts with belief,” countered Eli. “With faith.”

  Victor cringed. It was a kink in his understanding of Eli, the latter’s reliance on religion. Victor did his best to overlook it, but it was a constant snag in their dialogues. Eli must have sensed he was losing him.

  “With wonder, then,” he amended. “Do you ever wonder?”

  Victor wondered about lots of things. He wondered about himself (whether he was broken, or special, or better, or worse) and about other people (whether they were all really as stupid as they seemed). He wondered about Angie—what would happen if he told her how he felt, what it would be like if she chose him. He wondered about life, and people, and science, and magic, and God, and whether he believed in any of them.

  “I do,” he said slowly.

  “Well, when you wonder something,” said Eli, “doesn’t that mean part of you wants to believe in it? I think we want to prove things, in life, more than we want to disprove them. We want to believe.”

  “And you want to believe in superheroes.” Victor’s voice was carefully devoid of judgment, but he couldn’t smother the smile that crept across his mouth. He hoped Eli wouldn’t take offense, would only see it as good humor—levity, not mockery—but he didn’t. His face snapped shut.

  “Fine, yeah, it’s stupid, right? You caught me. I didn’t give a shit about the thesis. I just wanted to see if Lyne would let me get away with it,” he said, flashing a rather hollow smile and pushing up from the table. “That’s all.”

  “W
ait,” said Victor. “It’s not all.”

  “That’s all.”

  Eli turned, dumped his tray, and walked out before Victor could say more.

  * * *

  VICTOR always kept a Sharpie in his back pocket.

  As he wandered the aisles of the library searching for books to kick-start his own thesis, his fingers itched to take it out. His failed conversation with Eli had set him on edge, and he longed to find his quiet, his peace, his personal Zen, in the slow obliteration of someone else’s words. He managed to make his way to the medical section without incident, adding a book on the human nervous system to one he’d already picked up on psychology. After finding a few smaller texts on adrenal glands and human impulse, he checked out, careful to keep his fingertips—permanently stained from his art projects—hidden in his pockets or under the lip of the counter while the librarian looked over the books. There had been a few complaints during his time at Lockland about books being “vandalized,” if not outright “ruined.” The librarian looked at him over the stack as if his crimes were written on his face instead of his fingers, before finally scanning in the books and handing them back.

  Back in the university-issued apartment he shared with Eli, Victor unpacked his bag. He knelt in his bedroom and slid the marked-up self-help book onto a low shelf beside two others he’d checked out and altered, silently pleased that no return calls had been placed on any of them yet. The books on adrenaline he left on his desk. He heard the front door open and shut and wandered into the living room a few minutes later to find Eli flopping down onto the couch. He’d set a stack of books and stapled printouts on the university-issued wooden coffee table, but when he saw Victor come in, he reached instead for a magazine and began to flip through it, feigning boredom. The books on the table were on everything from brain function under stress to human will, anatomy, psychosomatic responses … but the printouts were different. Victor picked up one of them and sank into a chair to read it. Eli frowned faintly as he did it, but didn’t stop him. The printouts were captures from Web sites, message boards, forums. They would never been seen as admissible sources.