by C. T. Phipps
“Talk about a long-distance romance,” I muttered. “Do they know about me?”
“It wouldn’t be fair if they didn’t,” Gabrielle said.
“Yeah,” I said, sucking up my jealousy.
“My father was with Polly Perkins, Penelope Porter, and a mermaid,” Gabrielle said. “Guinevere and him—”
“Ah, Moses. Really?” I interrupted, having had that told to me by Cloak. “I mean, I thought the shippers and fanfic writers were just making that up.”
“Guinevere had a thing with the Nightwalker, too, and Aquarius.”
“I am very weirded out. This changes a lot of my opinion of the Society of Superheroes headquarters or as I now will mentally refer to it: The Love Shack.”
Gabrielle looked amused. “When you’re immortal and in a nonstop conflict with evil, I suppose you seek what comfort you can.”
“Is that what I am? Comfort?” I asked.
Now wasn’t the time to bring up the fact I didn’t want to be with anyone but Gabrielle…and Cindy. Also, Eliza Dushku. Not that I’d made any moves toward her but if we met at a party and hit it off then that would be okay. Okay, I lost whatever point I was trying to make there.
Oh, right, when you were a supervillain and a superhero with hundreds of adventures then you were bound to develop unconventional relationships. Like Case and Jane, who I pretended were not just straight up cheating on their partners. Okay, bad example.
Gabrielle turned to me. “You’re the father of my child, Gary. My children. I love you. I will always love you.”
“Then marry me.”
I wasn’t just throwing it out there. I was fully prepared to commit my entire life to her and never look at anyone else ever again. I wanted to be with Gabrielle and Gabrielle alone if she wanted it that way or part of a weird trapezoid if that was what it took to have her in my life. I just wanted people to know how much I loved her, and marriage was a symbol of that. Nothing said true love like the willingness to shell out a small fortune for jewelry, weddings, and the legal fees to make sure they could strip you dry if you didn’t make them happy. And yes, that was my father’s description of the institution after one of his fights with my mom.
Gabrielle paused and looked down into the water.
“Not the reaction I was expecting,” I said, softly. “Mind you, I can’t crush coal into diamonds to get a ring.”
Gabrielle shook her head. “Gary, it’s not you, it’s my enemies.”
“We’ve had this conversation before, Gabrielle. I was hoping you’d maybe have figured out that I’m not the same helpless college student I was before. Also, the whole mind-wiping me thing? Dick move.”
Gabrielle blinked but didn’t meet my gaze. Instead, she just stared forward. “It’s not you I’m worried about. You’ve more than proven capable of handling yourself against the worst scum of the Multiverse. No, it’s Mindy and Leia.”
“The children you’ve been deliberately avoiding.” That came out much harsher than intended.
Gabrielle looked like she’d been punched in the gut. “Gary, do you know what happened to Aquarius’ daughter?”
That killed the mood quickly. “Yeah, I do.”
Aquarius the King of Atlantis had married an alien woman and had a child with her named Neptina. The family had been controversial from the start because of Neptina being an alien-Atlantean hybrid as well as a superhero’s daughter. My brother Keith had been in jail at the time but he’d had a partner named Doug Calistos, a.k.a Whipray.
Whipray was one of those supervillains that didn’t have my charming personality or a code of ethics. He was a homophobic, misogynist, racist piece of garbage who eventually turned on Keith, turning state’s evidence, so he was a rat, too. Whipray’s most infamous act was the one that had permanently soured superhuman-supervillain relations. I mean, not that they’d ever been good, but he’d crossed the line that led to antiheroes like Shoot-Em-Up and the Extreme!. He’d snuck into the royal palace and killed the infant girl.
“I hear Aquarius fed him to a dozen sharks,” I said. “One piece at a time.”
Honestly, I thought he was too soft on Whipray. I would have done much worse to someone who laid a hand on my child, but I think we’ve already established that. Capital punishment is the least thing you can do to anyone who harms a child.
“Smaller fish I believe,” Gabrielle said. “He was never the same afterward.”
“I don’t blame him,” I said.
“He does you,” Gabrielle said.
“Excuse me?” I asked.
“You’re the brother of Whipray’s partner,” Gabrielle said. “Stingray taught Whipray everything he knew.”
“Which, in the words of Dark Helmet, makes us absolutely nothing,” I pointed out.
“He won’t care, and neither will others,” Gabrielle said. “If we get married, Gary, it’s putting a target on not just you but our family.”
“So, you want me to be your dirty little secret,” I said, moving away.
Gabrielle sighed. “My mother got kidnapped, attacked, and cursed on a regular basis. Hell, she even got turned into a goat once.”
Polly Perkins was the gold standard for damsels in distress. This wasn’t because she wasn’t a tough old broad. Several supervillains found out to their lasting regret that she was a lot more willing to use lethal force than her nigh-omnipotent husband. However, she’d probably been kidnapped over a hundred times over the years. It was only a miracle she’d ended up with nothing more than the occasional broken bone or bloody nose. Other superhero boyfriends and girlfriends weren’t so lucky.
I’d noticed a lot of bad guys who targeted the few superheroes with public identities’ loved ones tended to die in tragic accidents while being arrested. A little more subtle than what Aquarius did to his son’s murderer but no less effective. Most crooks got the message and the rest were quickly sorted out by Darwin. World’s Smallest Violin here.
“Your mother spent like a decade trying to prove Moses Anders was Ultragod,” I pointed out, remembering some of the silly reality comics I’d read as a child. “My guess is your father made some stupid argument about his secret identity keeping her safe but missing that people still knew she was important to him.”
“Yeah,” Gabrielle said, wistfully. “My mother knew what she wanted and took it. No matter the cost.”
“Also, I think the ship has sailed on the supervillain community knowing we’re together. They were all there when I rescued you from Merciful.”
Gabrielle sighed. “Yeah.”
“And the fact that I have a mixed-race indestructible child,” I pointed out, “who glows when she flies. You don’t have to be Tom Terror to do the math on that one.”
Gabrielle didn’t have an answer for that. “I suppose we could brainwash the entire world or I could spin around the planet—”
“No spinning around the planet,” I interrupted. “It never works, and everyone gets a headache.”
Gabrielle smirked then frowned. “I just don’t want my children living in fear.”
A nasty part of me wanted to point out that if she wanted to claim Leia as her child, too, then she should marry me. Otherwise, it was just her occasionally showing up to give gifts for the holidays and spending time with them. Of course, I didn’t say that because I wasn’t an idiot. The greatest superpower of all was one I was still struggling with: keeping my big mouth shut. “We all live in fear. It’s part of knowing life is trying to kill you.”
Gabrielle smiled. “Then you’re right. We should get married. Down here.”
“What?”
“People suspecting you’re the father of Ultragoddess’s daughter isn’t the same as knowing it,” Gabrielle said, softly. “Besides, a lot of criminals are deeply stupid.”
“Speaking as an evil genius, you are correct. Mind you, I have an Honorary Doctorate in Superpowered Thievery from the Crooked Isles.”
“Gary—”
“Which means people have to call
me Doctor Merciless: The Doctor without Mercy.”
“Gary—”
“Man, did that piss off Cindy. She hates whenever supervillains use a doctorate in their names without a PHD. Even the Brothel Madame with her Pimps and Hookers Degree.”
“Gary!”
“Right, you want to get married here? It will be for ourselves, our friends, and our loved ones. But it will be official.”
In that moment, I didn’t care about either of our reputations. Whether superheroes would come after me for corrupting their idol or whether supervillains would come after her because, well, she was Ultragoddess. People would hate her for loving me and maybe it was dangerous for us to be together. But I loved her. Like the Nightwalker and Larceny Lass, the Nightwalker and Ms. Demeanor, the Nightwalker—okay, that guy had a problem.
Gabrielle looked uncertain about my proposal. “I don’t know. Who would even perform the ceremony?”
“I’m sure there’s a sun-worshiping weirdo around here we can hire for some shiny beads—which sounded a LOT more racist out loud than in my head. Listen, I’m not sure my rabbi will agree our marriage down here is valid, it would mean a lot to me. We can figure out how this affects our other relationships later.”
I was certain Cindy would demand a prenuptial agreement that would guarantee her three mansions and a small island off the coast of Hawaii. One of the good ones, not the leper ones as Homer Simpson would say. That is if she didn’t try to invite herself on the honeymoon to get her next reality TV show off the ground. Cindy in Paradise. Sounded like a porno.
“I’ve always wanted to be your wife, Gary,” Gabrielle said. “But—”
“But what?”
“It didn’t feel right when you were mourning your wife. Both times.”
I blinked. “Yeah. Well, I’ll always be mourning her. That doesn’t mean I’ll love you less.”
“Or Cindy.” It seemed to bother her that I left her off, which was not usually how these things went.
“Or Cindy,” I said, pausing. “Is that a yes?”
“Yes, Gary.”
CHAPTER NINETEEN
TOM TERROR TERRIFIES THE TRIO (MINUS ONE)
So, of course, that’s when we get attacked.
Superior Boy was back and the superpowered Aryan form of poor Ken Masterson was followed by him grabbing both me and Gabrielle by our throats. He could have killed both of us in an instant but instead just gloated.
“You didn’t think P.H.A.N.T.O.M had installed a chip to force Ken to transform at will!” Superior Boy said, laughing. “Once more the Master Race triumphs over—”
I aimed my hand at his groin then froze it over.
“Son of a—” Superior Boy started to say.
Gabrielle then gave him a knee to it, making a painful crunching sound as if something had broken to pieces.
“Ahhhh!” Superior Boy said, falling to his knees.
I summoned my cloak around me and the Spear of Odin and aimed it at him. “Sorry, Ken.”
Superior Boy hissed at me and then disappeared with a zip behind Gabrielle, holding her in a headlock. “Strike at me and I shall snap her pretty neck!”
A part of me wondered why people with superspeed didn’t automatically win every single encounter they had. Was it because the brain couldn’t keep up with their speed, time-dilation, or were people just not capable of properly harnessing the full extent of their abilities? I mean, if I had superspeed not only would I have taken over the world by now, but I would have had time to fix the Star Wars sequels and get Daisy Ridley the role of Lara Croft in the next Tomb Raider.
“Right,” I said, aiming the spear at him and pushing a button that resulted in a blast of Ultra-Force energy striking them both.
Superior Boy laughed it off. “You fool! Do you really think that Ultranian weaponry can harm a being empowered by the gods?!”
Gabrielle’s eyes glowed. Her uniform appeared over her as she crackled with the power of the immortals.
“Oh, crap,” Superior Boy said.
Gabrielle proceeded to smash him out the side of the temple before starting to deliver the mother of all beatdowns.
“Have fun, ya dickless Nazi freak,” I said, waving bye. “Also, take note that I’m insulting the weird demonic second personality possessing you, Ken. No offense to you. My sympathies go out to you. Just not your brainwashed self.”
“That’s just silly,” Tom Terror’s voice spoke behind me. “We simply brought out his true self. At least, how he should have been.”
I spun around and blasted him. Instead, the energy blast passed through a hologram of the overweight, sweaty bald man in a khaki shirt and camouflage pants. His right eye was missing and replaced by a clear purple crystal with a lightning bolt scar etched into it. The Chaos Orb I presumed. He looked a lot like Marlon Brando’s Colonel Kurtz but there was something vile in his presence that exceeded that role. Standing behind him, one foot in height was a little mechanical spider with a red eye. It was projecting the hologram I was looking at.
“Oh, look, it’s the Godfather of Suck,” I said, trying and failing to come up with a decent insult.
Tom Terror just smiled. “I’m surprised to see you down here, Gary. Usually, supervillains end their lives one of three ways: in jail, dead, or retiring on a pile of money. I thought you’d picked option three.”
“Yes, well, I found myself coming out of retirement for one last fight.”
“That never ends well outside of movies. The older fighters almost inevitably lose and embarrass themselves,” Tom said, his voice lowering. “You should have quit while you were ahead. Killing Ultragod, seducing his daughter, taking over Falconcrest City, and preventing superheroes from being resurrected is a career I almost envy.”
Some of that was my evil(er) doppelganger. The rest was, uh, well, sadly accurate. “Afraid I’ll show you up, you Nazi jackass?”
Tom Terror chuckled. “I’m not a Nazi.”
Okay, that took me by surprise. “What?”
“I have long since exceeded the ambitions of failed painter. There are planets named after me, conquered in Earth’s name. Alien races I’ve exterminated or enslaved. The technology I’ve created will form the basis of the First Great Interstellar Human Empire. Plus, I’m not racist.”
I stared at him. “Really, that’s what you’re ending on?”
“Not that racism isn’t useful,” Tom Terror said. “Gerald Ford said that if you can convince a man he is fundamentally better than another man and it is his best interest to keep them down, then he won’t notice when you pick his pocket. White supremacists are an easy source of recruits for P.H.A.N.T.O.M. Lonely, bitter, isolated, and misogynist young fools with no prospects are as common now as they ever were. The difference is now we have the Internet to contact them.”
I stared at him. “What? You’re the leader of the Alt-Reich?”
Tom Terror actually laughed. “Oh, that’s a good one. We need branding like that. It’s why I’m here to offer you a job.”
My disgust was so great I wanted to vomit on him, but he wasn’t here, and I really liked this bathhouse’s tile. “Yeah, I don’t think so.”
“If it’s the Jewish thing, we can work around that,” Tom Terror said, cheerfully. “One of our chief spokesmen is a fundamentalist pedophile.”
“Oh you charmer, you.” I clutched the Spear of Odin tightly. “How about we just settle this personally? I come to you, kill you, and then end this whole ‘take over the world’ business.”
Tom Terror snorted. “There you go again, underestimating my ambitions. Gary, with the sorry state of the Society of Superheroes, taking over the world is child’s play. It’s really mostly a question of which archvillain will be in charge and I’ve been ignoring the fight between them to focus on larger matters.”
“Larger matters?” I asked.
“Superhuman trafficking,” Tom Terror said, as if it was the cleverest idea in the world.
“Superhuman trafficking?” I rep
eated his word, wondering what I was missing. “That’s more important than taking over the world? Frigging slavery?”
“Earth is a backwater shithole I’m ashamed of being from,” Tom Terror said, wrinkling his nose in disgust. “The Ultranian colonies of humans are far more advanced than us and that’s not counting the thousands of other species in Galaxy Prime. We’re centuries behind the technological curve and it will require a vast amount of resources to shift our economy to a galactic-level one, let alone make us a superpower. But we do have one resource no one else in the universe has an abundance of.”
“Superhumans,” I said, starting to appreciate the shape of his plan. “That’s what you’re doing. You’re kidnapping superhumans in preparation for brainwashing them like Superior Boy. Once you have control of the Inner Sun, you’ll be able to use it to turn regular people into living weapons. From there sell them to every tinpot dictator or corporation in the galaxy.”
“Precisely,” Tom Terror replied. “How very observant. Part of why I wish you would join me. Where else would I find someone so close to my level?”
“Try the local…” I paused. “Nope. Not going to waste a Raiders of the Lost Ark quote on you. Here’s the question, though, how would that benefit you? I mean, aside from you making trillions in Venusian dollars.”
“I will trade our ‘human resources’ in exchange for the technology and materials to up humanity’s potential. To make us a galactic player.”
“Sounds reasonable except for the whole slavery part,” I said, sarcastically. “But there’s going to be a really evil part to go with the evil part.”
“Oh, yes,” Tom Terror said, his smile becoming somewhere between Emperor Palpatine while torturing Luke with force lightning and Satan’s during a baby barbeque. “There is a very evil twist.”
“Which is?”
“Why would I tell you?” Tom Terror said. “We’ve long since passed the point where I’m compelled to reveal vital information that could be used against me.”
“Yes, but gloating is a pleasure everyone should be able to enjoy. Besides, why do you think I care about a bunch of dead aliens? Even if most of them are human.”
