“Other governments?”
She said, “Goes back to the extinction of homo-sapiens. I can only theorize the people in power saw us all as their common enemy, for the other first world countries who see supers as dangers to the state, national security, and as weapons of mass destruction.”
I frowned, “How do the superheroes get chosen? They all have strong powers, so what made them not get killed and work for the SAB instead?”
She smirked, “In almost every case they’re the ones that have already been serving as a soldier, agent, or officer in some way or form. They’re recruited and in almost every case they go. Like soldiers or the police, a small percentage of them aren’t in it to protect and serve, but for the power and authority over others. But they also toe the government line. Those are the ones that are recruited into the know, like Mistral. A small black-ops group you could say, within the main group. Kind of like a seal team is part of the Navy. Obviously, they don’t publish that data, and it’s not talked about. I’m also not disparaging the Seals, just using them to compare the numbers.”
That… explained a lot, actually. Not that soldiers were bad people, they weren’t, not most of them, but they followed orders.
“There needs to be more like me, those that fight to preserve life first, and take down the supervillains second.”
Prisma said, “And that’s their worst nightmare. Some kind of comic book world where the government has no control. Superheroes that use their own morality, judgement, and integrity instead of blindly obeying orders and rules of engagement that get bystanders killed. That work with the government instead of for the government, but they have no real control over them.
“In a lot of ways that should be the goal. That won’t be perfect either, but the slaughter of innocents needs to stop. Most of those sixty nine percent could go either way, but most would take the side of angels or merely stay out of it. There’d be more supervillains, but there’d be more superheroes as well, people like you, Debra, Germaine, and the others who can’t right now because they’d be put down or captured without your ability to hide and go unseen.”
“More supervillains?”
She nodded, “What they’re doing is wrong, and based in fear, but they’re not entirely incorrect about all of it. Some few in that sixty nine percent would go bad. Be corrupted by power and ignore or even turn against the authority of the government. The answer of course is to stop them once they’ve done something wrong, not because they might.”
I frowned, “I’m not perfect, and I just played judge, jury, and executioner for a murderer. I feel a little disgusted about how he died, but I don’t feel any guilt at all. Bastard deserved it, and the world’s a better place without him.”
It was true enough, the third one was a lot easier than the first two. Of course, the first two were only self-defense. I wasn’t really doubting myself either, except corruption was a slow process, who would I be in a year, or two? Not three weeks ago I’d sworn I’d never kill again. I hadn’t enjoyed it or gotten a sick thrill from taking a life, but neither was I at all upset about it.
She looked unimpressed, “You didn’t get a sick thrill from it, and it wasn’t murder. You were defending twenty thousand against an evil man who had already killed over a hundred. You put down a monster before he could do more damage, and any cop in the city would’ve shot him dead if they were in a position to do so under the same circumstances to save the hostages.”
That was true enough. I could forgive myself a little arrogant pride and confidence, and the surety that I felt that he’d needed to die. I’d just wondered how she saw it.
She added, “If I ever have concerns that way, I’ll let you know.”
“You said should be the goal?”
She nodded, “Well, if we succeed. If we sway the populace and force the government to take action, to investigate, and SAB falls. Something has to replace it. We can’t have anarchy either, for anyone with superpowers. Some kind of government recognized superhero groups, or even working for them, just without all the killing of anyone powerful that walks through the door and doesn’t fit their current definition of safety and loyalty. The training and rules of engagement need to change as well.”
“Give me a couple of days for that one,” I said dryly.
She giggled, “Anything worth doing is usually difficult.”
“Alright, I need to get a couple more hours of sleep.”
“Goodnight, Bell.”
I changed back into my panties, and she sent me back to my room. That night, I really did sleep like a baby. I don’t know what that says about me, but it was what it was. If I was upset about anything, it was the ones I couldn’t save. The ones that died before I put that piece of shit down. But I had zero doubts that the debt of those deaths weren’t mine, they were his.
Chapter Sixteen
The video of that takedown went viral, and it had several million views by mid-morning. The views of my first patrol takedown video as well as the video detailing my quickening day from hell and how the government was murdering people also rose in views sharply from the past.
Of course, I was now guilty of not only murdering two government agents, but also of recklessly endangering the lives of twenty thousand people and interfering with a police action during a crime in progress. The words to describe me by the pundits expanded from crazy and dangerous supervillain, to also include reckless, and vigilante.
Instead of focusing on what I’d done, save a lot of lives, they focused on all the what ifs and what could’ve gone wrongs, and how wrong vigilantism was and how it could lead to misjustice and anarchy. Some few did suggest the superheroes couldn’t have done better, and perhaps it would’ve led to a horrific tragedy if they’d breached, but those pundits were shouted down by the opposition toeing the government line.
They also weren’t entirely wrong. I was a vigilante, and I was prideful enough to believe I was an exception because of both power and circumstance. Of course, when your government tries to kill you, you wind up losing respect for the technicalities of the laws meant to control you. I was also dangerous, though not in the way they were implying, like I might one day go on a murderous rampage through the city.
There was no doubt about that, I was a walking weapon of mass destruction. I’d never actually do it, but it was incontrovertible that I was capable of killing every single human within a third of a mile radius around me, all at once, in a split second, with a blast of violent sonic power.
I also didn’t see myself as a supervillain, although technically I supposed I was that too. Self-defense wasn’t allowable against a government agent or other representative of the law. I’d become a supervillain on the day I refused to lay down and die. That didn’t mean I wasn’t in the right morally, and that the corrupt conspiracy to murder citizens as a preventative measure wasn’t in the wrong.
At the same time, I didn’t give a shit about what they said, and I didn’t let it bother me. I mean, I didn’t care what they thought about me or my actions, nor about their judgements. I was secure in the belief I was right to do the things I’d done, and would do, to accomplish what was really important.
It didn’t matter to me if my actions were ever seen as courageous or right.
Point being, it wasn’t about me at all, in the end. That’s not why I put on the suit. It was about what normal people on the street thought, and protecting them, until the media started to ask the right questions of the government. Until the conspiracy theories turned into a possible truth in their eyes, and investigations were demanded.
It was about taking down evil men, and about protecting the people in the city for me. What some powerless and smug armchair quarterback thought about me didn’t matter to me in the least. I had enough validation in my life from an A.I. more intelligent and logical than any human could be, not to mention Debra, Maria, Germaine, Sarah, and Joey. I’d respect the opinions of those I cared about, and that knew me as more than just some super stir
ring up trouble.
Though really, my own integrity, confidence, discipline, and I supposed even arrogance would be a valid emotion to assign me, would’ve been enough for me to carry on with it. My empathy was pointed toward the victims like my husband, those are who I cared about, not the opinions of strange men and women who measured themselves as the wise of this generation.
That next day when I patrolled again, the panic wasn’t so bad. It’d be a slow process to win hearts and minds as they say. They weren’t cheering me or anything, there was certainly tension when I appeared and started to stroll down the street. But the general screaming and running not so much. Some of the braver ones didn’t even walk off at all, usually the younger men and women, who still had a false sense of invulnerability about life.
A few of them even exchanged a few words with me, as if meeting a celebrity, but those were rare. Probably crazy, too. It wasn’t lost on me they were also all young males in their late teens or early twenties with wandering eyes.
There was that cheap thrill about it too, same as the first time. Between staying ahead of the superheroes who tried to close in on me, to the young men who couldn’t keep their eyes off me in the skintight suit, to the arrogant extra swish I put into my step as I strutted down the street as if I owned it. The arrogant belief that I could keep the city safer, and save more lives, than the superhero drones working for a corrupt and murderous part of the government.
It hadn’t been arrogant hyperbole when I’d called it my city the previous night. At least not just that. In a very real way, I’d taken on a personal responsibility for it in my mind, the government be damned.
As usual, I had the conflicting emotions as well, to keep the worry of corruption in check. Or of allowing arrogance to compromise my integrity and my caution. To maintain vigilant awareness of what was around me and not just depend on Prisma’s eye to keep me safe. I was careful though, and so far so good. There weren’t any super incidents that day, just wandering the city, being seen, and being ready for anything to happen.
The important part in all that was there was already a shift happening in the general populace. A shift in perception. The woman that was supposed to die, the woman that was supposed to be a murderously insane person, had saved twenty thousand people last night. It was also pointed out I’d never killed a bystander at all.
Supervillain or not, I saw myself as a hero as I risked my life and future to prevent horrors, and so did my friends. It was a good start.
That girl in the library, the geeky one that I self-professed had integrity and still lived at the core of me, despite the changes in me. Well, that integrity was never tested more than the very next day during my third patrol.
It was a bit warmer, in the nineties, and it was the start of a brutal week long heat wave that August. The sky was clear, and only the cooling breeze of my flying stopped me from sweating buckets. For all my invulnerability against sixty tons of force, it wouldn’t do me a lick of good to keep me warm in the winter or cool in the summer. The suit breathed really well though, which helped.
I was flying on the south side when the alert came in.
Debra said, “Silent alarm at the bank on Main and forty second. Superheroes were dispatched.”
I headed in that direction, and I stayed invisible and silent in the beginning as usual. If the superheroes saw me, I had no doubts they’d let the bank robber go and come after me. Not that they’d catch me, but it would be annoying.
Prisma said, “Sentinel and Solar wind at location…” she trailed off, and then reluctantly she added, “Supervillain is Bane.”
Several stats came up, which was useful. Sentinel was a brawler which I already knew. He was large man, like a brick wall of muscle, in a dark blue super-suit tight enough to define all his muscles. I’d known he was strong and tough, but he also had superspeed. He had black hair and brown eyes, and he stood at six foot two.
Solar wind had a white suit with pink designs, and she was just a couple of inches taller than me at five foot three. She had white blonde hair and blue eyes, and her generous measurements made her lushly sumptuous for her height. She could wield fire, fly, and had an energy shield of some kind that could block both physical and energy attacks.
Bane was five foot eleven in height, with a wiry body. He wore a black suit with blood red accents, and he didn’t bother covering his face. He could fly in excess of Mach speed, and it was estimated his dead lift was right around twenty tons. He weighed just over six hundred pounds, and he could take quite a beating before he’d be out for the count. His wiry body was extremely tough and dense.
It wasn’t until I truly looked at his picture in the bio that the blood drained from my face and I felt a rage build in me that physically felt like my chest was being crushed. My heart lurched and slammed in my chest as I felt a level of fury I’d never felt before. A deep and abiding level of abhorrence for a human being I’d never felt before. I learned what the words loathing repugnance truly meant on that day.
I’m pretty sure I lost my mind a little bit that day, for a time.
I was looking at a face I’d never forget. The face of the man that just for fun, had sent Freefall crashing into a bridge, and used the object of my husband’s death as a baseball bat.
My first thought was that this fucking bastard had to die. He’d earned it. He got off on causing collateral deaths, the deaths of innocents. But the truth was I wanted to kill him in vengeance, I wanted to kill him slowly and painfully for what he’d done to me. For what he’d cost me that day, when I was a naïve innocent heading to the beach for a day with my husband and daughter. He was the reason my sweet Wynn wouldn’t grow up with a father. He was the reason my bed was cold at night.
I knew even then, that if I killed him, it would be in vengeance with a joyful heart. I could already feel a dark enjoyment just imagining slowly choking the life out of the bastard, only to feel empty and cold when it was finished. It wouldn’t bring my husband back, and it would destroy me.
That wasn’t who I was, that wasn’t what I stood for. I just wasn’t sure I cared in that moment.
Integrity and discipline are important, because they aren’t emotions. They’re standards of beliefs. They are moral truths and absolutes. They are a way of life. Good intentions, motivations, those are emotions, and come and go. It was integrity and discipline that carried you through, when emotions failed.
And emotions always failed, and they failed me big that day. I could practically taste my hands around his throat. It would be so easy. He was a third as strong as me, and he couldn’t escape. I could even turn him invisible, keep the sound strictly between him and I, and kill him slowly while the heroes spun in circles wondering where he’d gotten off to.
It wouldn’t even be hard, Bane was about a match for me like Freefall was for him, and I wanted it so badly in that moment my whole body trembled in sick anticipation of watching the life slowly fade from his eyes.
Prisma said, “Your heartrate has significantly increased.”
No shit. I suppressed the sonic boom and flew across the city in seconds.
Even in my insane rage I spoke out when I slammed into the ground and sent asphalt flying up in all directions. I controlled the sound, so it would blanket the whole street loudly, but be silent and unheard inside the bank.
“Clear the street, now.”
They listened, since I used the doom voice.
“Bell? What’s wrong?” asked Germaine, but I didn’t answer.
I didn’t have to, Prisma did it for me, “Bane was responsible for the bridge incident. He escaped that day. He’s also wanted for several crimes, including murder. He’ll be locked away a long time if you catch him,” she added in that chirpy and cute hopeful voice of hers.
I think I might’ve sneered at the thought. The thing of it was, he did deserve to die, but killing him would change me far more than the deaths I’d caused in the past. It would destroy me. To save people, to safeguard people, that’
s why I’d killed red dwarf man, that and for justice for the ones that died. Not revenge.
Point being, was it was a thin line, and vengeance was a dark reason to kill, it wasn’t the same as defense or justice. But at the time I wasn’t thinking of any of that, outside of knowing my intentions were wrong and I didn’t really give a shit that they were.
Sentinel and Solar Wind showed up, the latter in the air and the former running on the ground, as I moved for the bank entrance.
Boom!
The glass exploded outward as Bane came flying out. He backhanded sentinel in the jaw, literally launching him into the air and straight at Solar Wind. Bane started to fly up and away, but he only made it about four feet before I caught up to him.
I saw red as I turned and exploded off the ground, and I punched him in the back sending him down like a meteor to slam face first into the asphalt.
Solar wind caught Sentinel as she looked around, probably for me, and Sentinel started to drop to the ground.
Bane’s head rose up as he punched up with his arms, but I smashed down on him as hard as I could, feet first, and both of his shoulder’s cracked where my boots hit. The sound was incredibly deep for a bone snap, probably because of his much higher bone density. His body slammed back into the ground hard. I imagined it’d felt like getting hit with sixty tons.
I flew back off his body and glared, as Solar Wind strafed red hot fire over his body, trying to hit me.
Sentinel said angrily, “Stop hiding you crazy bitch, and I’ll tear you apart.”
I flew forward and rocked my whole body as I bent my knee back and kicked for the stars like a kicker on a football team. My leg fully extended, and my athletic body was limber. My ankle ended up close to my own face when I finished extending.
Death's Mistress: Origins of Supers: Book One Page 15
