Villain (Book 1): Villain 1

by Laddusaw, Cole

  Darweshi kissed Alexander firmly on his lips as soon as he walked through the door. Alexander loved that Darweshi never cared how badly he smelled after long days at work. In fact, on many occasions his boyfriend would use it as an excuse to get him into the bath, which usually led to another thing that Alexander loved about Darweshi.

  On this day in particular, Darweshi seemed more giddy than usual. After a short game of Alexander attempting to coax the good news out of him, Darweshi finally caved. He had been offered a high-level position at a startup in South Africa and they were offering to pay all of his moving expenses.

  Alexander was ecstatic for Darweshi, as any boyfriend would be, but deep down he feared this long-distance move would be the end of their relationship. As if reading his mind, Darweshi dropped down on one knee and produced a wedding band from his pocket. It was untraditional, but the sentiment meant the world to Alexander. He accepted it and they made love late into the evening.

  ◊ ◊ ◊

  The year was 2006. Alexander was resting inside his and Darweshi’s modest home located in a small town west of Johannesburg. Darweshi’s tech startup had quickly risen to prominence and already expanded to more than two-hundred employees. His success meant Alexander no longer needed to work, but he grew restless without the daily exercise of manual labor.

  To pass the time, Alexander had begun entering in local strongman competitions. He was pleased to discover that a lifetime of manual labor had more than prepared him for the relatively simple tasks of lifting stones and throwing kegs. He found himself succeeding at each challenge with ease and won every competition he had entered thus far.

  Despite the progressive legal stance South Africa had on LGBT rights, smaller towns were not as accepting of same-sex couples as they were in Iceland. It wasn’t that Alexander and Darweshi had to keep their relationship a secret, but they were still careful about how they displayed their affection while in public. The fact that they were a biracial couple didn’t help their odds of making friends, either. Racism was not something Alexander ever experienced in Iceland, but that was mainly because the majority of the people there were Icelandic. As he was forced to learn while in a relationship with Darweshi, many people would make up their minds about a person simply upon seeing the color of their skin. Unfortunately, their neighbors were those types of people.

  ◊ ◊ ◊

  The year was 2009. Life had never seemed better for Darweshi and Alexander. They were only married for two years when Darweshi was made the Vice President of his company. Alexander had begun traveling for his strongman competitions and was bringing in a sizable sum of money himself, so their combined income left them quite comfortable. Alexander wanted to move into a nice apartment in the city so Darweshi could be closer to work, but secretly his reasons were more personal. He wanted neighbors that would look him in the eyes when he got the mail, or who he could invite over for dinner parties on the weekends. However, when Alexander suggested they move, Darweshi disagreed.

  Darweshi insisted on staying in their small town since he felt the city was no place to raise a child. This comment had taken Alexander entirely by surprise. Adopting a child was not something he had even considered, but when Darweshi brought up the idea it immediately felt right. They started the arduous process of adoption the very next day.

  ◊ ◊ ◊

  The year was 2011. It was the first day Alexander and Darweshi brought home their daughter and it was by far the happiest day of their lives. Emilia was eight years old, incredibly bright, and full of love. When they first showed her that she had her own room, she embraced them both and wept for a solid ten minutes. The room was painted lavender, her favorite color, and filled with more books and toys than she had ever seen in her short time on Earth.

  Alexander and Darweshi’s neighbors did not share in their excitement. To them it was already bad enough that this interracial couple had decided to be gay, but to live together and bring a child into that home was a slap in the face of God. Their angry glares and spiteful comments soon became much, much worse. They fueled each other’s hatred and it grew in secret, entirely unbeknownst to the new happy family.

  ◊ ◊ ◊

  The year was 2012. Alexander was returning from a Grand Prix event for the Strongman Champions League, one of the most distinguished strongman competitions in the world. He initially did not want to go. It was the first time he would be leaving the country since they adopted Emilia, but Darweshi had insisted. It was the last qualifying match before the championship and Alexander was a shoe-in for that year’s victor.

  However, deep in Alexander’s gut, something felt wrong. His neighbors had recently become emboldened and their remarks toward him and his family only worsened after he adopted Emilia. Their angry glares had evolved into hateful comments, inappropriate graffiti, and as Alexander had once claimed, stalking. Darweshi waved off Alexander’s concerns. He chalked it up to his white boy’s first experience with racism simply making him paranoid. So with Darweshi’s coaxing, Alexander had left, competed, and won the Grand Prix.

  When Alexander stepped off his returning flight, he immediately knew something was wrong. Darweshi had not responded to his text that he had landed and was not answering his calls. He rushed to the airport garage where he had left his car and raced home. It was the longest hour of his life.

  He saw the smoke first. The black plumes rose in increasing intensity out of his neighborhood and were visible from the road leading into town. As he drove closer he knew the smoke was coming from his home. The fire appeared to have started recently, the smoke hadn’t been visible for long and he couldn’t hear any sirens. He thought if he hurried, maybe it wouldn’t be too late.

  He turned the corner to his street and slammed down on the brakes. The car screeched to a halt several houses down from his own. His home was indeed on fire, but that wasn’t the image that was causing Alexander to freeze in place. He turned off his car and shakily opened the door. In jerky, uneven steps he slowly made his way down the street.

  Standing on his lawn were three tall, imposing crosses. They cast long shadows that danced with the ever-increasing flames growing behind them. Tied to two of the crosses, bound by their wrists and necks, were Darweshi and Emilia. They were stripped naked, beaten and bloody. As he moved closer, he could see fresh stab wounds still bleeding from various places on their body.

  Alexander overcame his horror and rushed to Emilia. He attempted to untie her from her bindings but could not reach the rope. He dug frantically at the earth around the cross before lifting it out of the ground. He carefully lowered it to the ground with Emilia still bound. He did the same for Darweshi and placed them close to each other. He fell to his knees beside them. He was too late. They were both dead.

  Alexander wailed into the hot air. His entire world lay dead before him as the memories of their lives burned. He collapsed over the two loves of his life, weeping uncontrollably. Alexander was so overcome with grief that he didn’t hear the footsteps approaching from the street behind him.

  His neighbors emerged from their hiding places. Hooded. Angry. Bloodied knives still in hand. They had kept tabs on Alexander’s competition and knew when he would be returning. Everything was timed perfectly. Only one member of the sacrilegious family remained, but not for long. They would use these deaths to send a message to all others who dared to live a life of sin in their God-fearing town.

  Alexander didn’t feel pain when the knife stabbed into his back. It was inconsequential, a tiny flick of pressure, yet it pushed in on his grief like a freight train and brought him back to reality. The hooded man standing behind him tried to pull the knife out but could not. It was embedded in the muscle of Alexander’s flexing back. As he struggled with the knife, Alexander stood and the knife rose above the man’s head. He looked up at Alexander, spitting insults and egging on his fellows to come help him finish the job.

  As the neigh
bors drew close, their knives drawn ready to strike, Alexander turned suddenly. He gripped the hooded man’s head in both of his hands and squeezed. The man screamed, but Alexander couldn’t hear him. His world was silent. Red. In a quick POP the man’s eyes exploded out of his head, his skull caved in by the massive pressure put on it from Alexander’s titan-like grip.

  The others rushed forward, swinging wildly at Alexander. Their knives fell, some stabbing, some slicing, all painless to Alexander. He turned on them like lightning. Three more were killed before the group could understand what was happening. This wasn’t going the way they had planned.

  Alexander was in a fury, disconnected from reality. He tracked down and killed every last person in his neighborhood. Those that ran were chased. Others that chose to stay inside and watch from their homes were not judged as innocent. Their doors were battered down. Their families were slaughtered. Alexander was gone. He heard nothing, no screams, only seeing red.

  ◊ ◊ ◊

  When Alexander came to, he found himself in the Chris Hani Baragwanath Hospital in Johannesburg. There were no doctors in his room, no police officers, only a well-dressed man with a metallic hand. He leaned over Alexander and whispered a promise that he could help him forget his pain, forget what had happened to his family, forget what he had done in return.

  In his half-conscious state, Alexander agreed. The man injected something into his arm. As Alexander slipped back into unconsciousness he ceased to be, for a time.

  ◊ ◊ ◊

  Alexander woke in Doctor Isaac’s lab. The memories of who he was, the horror that had happened to his family, the atrocities he had committed, the years of abuse from Hans and the nefarious tasks he forced upon him all flooded back in an overwhelming tidal wave. He shouted a primal roar into the empty lab, tearing at the helmet attached to his head. The wires attaching it to his head popped off and he tossed the helmet aside.

  He forced himself out of the chamber and fell to the ground in anguish, breathing in gasping breaths of the lab’s recycled air. After he caught his breath, he looked at his surroundings. Another empty chamber was left open beside him. An assortment of folded pants and shirts lay on the floor next to it. They appeared to be in his size. He looked down. The carbon-nanotube body armor was still tightly wound around his body. He tore it off with ease.

  Alexander donned the clothes left for him, choosing a pair of jeans and a white t-shirt. They were a little tight but he didn’t mind. Something more important had filled his focus. Revenge. He left the lab, barefoot, and began tearing through Crymson Tech floor by floor in a mad hunt for Hans.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX

  A few hundred miles away from Los Rebeldes, Deimos and the members of the new Villain Movement were celebrating. That day marked their third month spent on Redbeard’s island and they were toasting mimosas inside their volcano lair to celebrate.

  To say they were ‘inside’ would be a bit of a stretch. By definition, to be ‘inside’ means one must be completely surrounded and removed from the ‘outside.’ Given that their lair consisted only of a floor and a portion of curved wall, it was more like they were celebrating ‘on top of’ their incomplete lair. Nevertheless, Deimos, Siren, Professor Paws, Terry, Glenn, Harold, Eve, Captain C, The Buzzard, Sasha, Aria, Marty, Veronica, Carly, and all of the other nameless yet equally important henchmen were immensely proud of their accomplishments thus far.

  The island looked almost exactly the way it did the day they arrived, save for the missing thousands of pounds of volcanic ash they had collected from it and converted into concrete. The barren north side of the island had also changed, but certainly for the better. Eve’s farm was flourishing under the guidance of Sasha and Aria, who proved themselves to be very caring, albeit underdeveloped, young women. Eve attributed any success from the farm to them since she had entered the project with no experience herself and was unable to grow anything without their help.

  Deimos, Glenn, Harold, and Terry had completed eight drones from their planned ten drone fleet. The final two were near completion but still needed the new manual controls that Deimos had designed as a fail-safe. On top of that, they had also sand-proofed Deimos’ robotic legs and improved their overall speed and reaction time by modifying their thrusters using borrowed tech from Redbeard’s Revenge. Not only were the thrusters more powerful, but they spit a brilliant blue flame when activated.

  The assorted jobs and projects were all in a good place, so work was called off and the day was instead scheduled to host a variety of team beach sports followed by some well-deserved relaxation. Deimos had brought out his drones, including the two incomplete ones, to show off to the henchmen and take them on rides around the island. Yet, before that and any other activities were to begin, Captain C had his chef prepare a brunch that everyone could enjoy in the open-air lair.

  With a spread of pancakes, eggs, bacon, toast, beans, prosciutto, coffee, tea, juices, and quite a few fruits and vegetables from Eve’s farm laying before them, Deimos held up his mimosa in a toast. The other villains and henchmen followed suit.

  “If you all don’t mind, I would like to say a few words before we begin,” Deimos said, his voice echoing in the cavernous volcano crater.

  “Us mindin’ never stopped ya before!” Captain C bellowed.

  This was greeted by raucous laughter from Captain C’s henchmen and a polite chuckle from everyone else. Deimos grinned through the laughter, making a mental note to ease back on talking people’s ears off between shifts.

  ‘I’ll keep it brief then,” Deimos continued.

  He looked around the crowd in front of him, careful to make eye contact with every single person.

  “It is difficult to find the words that properly describe what you all are accomplishing here on this island. We have not been given much to work with, yet we are creating something so much grander than the sum of its parts. We are not simply creating a lair, or a base to store cool gadgets. This is a refuge, a fortress, a home for us and everyone like us who feels that life can be more than what society dictates it should be.

  “This is a sanctuary for brilliant minds and lost souls, for anyone that has been hurt or cast out, for those that have been wronged when all they want to do is right. This place does not belong to Redbeard, or to me, or to any single person. It is for all of us here today, and for everyone still out there in need of asylum from a world that has turned its back on them. So I raise my glass to us, to those who have yet to join us, and to those that are no longer with us. May we always do what feels right in our hearts, and continue to find happiness here for many years to come. Cheers!”

  When Deimos finished he was met with resounding cheers. Every single henchman put down their drinks in order to clap and cheer. There were a few who had even been moved to tears by Deimos’ sentiment, his words having validated a feeling inside of them that they had felt their entire lives. This was the only family many of them had ever known, and now that family had a home.

  The cheers and applause continued for far longer than Deimos had anticipated. It finally began to die down only after a tear or two had fallen from Deimos’ eyes. He took a sip from his drink. The others joined him and finally sat down to their meals.

  It was a joyous brunch that carried on well into the afternoon. It continued far past what they had scheduled but nobody seemed to mind. There were congratulations to be given, backs to be patted, friends to be hugged, and cheeks to be kissed. At one point, a dance contest broke out entirely without music or beat, but it was clear to everyone that Professor Paws was the undeniable winner.

  When the henchmen began to ask for something to actually dance to, Deimos turned on the Wi-Fi extender he had installed on Indiana Drones and set it to hover above the lair in order to pull a better signal from Redbeard’s Revenge. His first thought was to play Michael Jackson’s Bad album to give his new robotic legs a test run on the dance floor.

>   As everyone’s cell phones automatically connected to the Wi-Fi, alerts began to ping on each of their devices. An unsettling cacophony of rings, beeps, and chimes issued nonstop from their pockets and filled the crater. One by one they checked their phones and the positive energy was drained from the lair, only to be replaced by silent dread.

  On each of their phones were breaking news alerts that everyone else in the world had already been intently following for the past two hours. It was Glenn who finally broke the silence and summed up what everyone else was thinking.

  “Fuck.”

  Los Rebeldes was in a state of emergency and martial law had been declared. Military troops were stationed on all roads and borders. Cell towers and the Internet had been cut, no further information could come out from the civilians or journalists still trapped inside city limits. This was all secondary to the inciting incident of this madness, which was plastered on every corner of the web.

  Hans Goenn had threatened the imminent destruction of Los Rebeldes.

  Due to the Internet being cut within the city there hadn’t been many recent developments on the story, but early reporting told them all they needed to know. Hans had issued a statement, though nobody knew from where, that he had constructed a thermonuclear weapon and hidden it somewhere within Los Rebeldes. He claimed the police and military would never be able to find it, even if scanning for radioactive materials, due to the specially designed shell encasing the weapon. Even worse was that they would not have the time to try.

  Hans had given a twelve-hour window for his singular demand to be met. He didn’t care if people fled the city or attempted to find the weapon in that time as it would do nothing to delay the inevitable. The only way for his weapon to not go off, for Los Rebeldes and its millions of innocent civilians to escape certain doom, was for Deimos to come to the city and surrender himself to Hans.