by Lucas Flint
Blast snarled. “I’ll never—”
“Cut the crap,” I said without missing a beat. “You’ve already told me what it is. No point in playing tough by refusing to tell me where it is.”
I probably sounded harsh, but that was because I really had no time to play with him. With my shoulder wound still bleeding, I just wanted to get straight to the point. That way, when Cyberkid returned with the other superheroes, I could tell Rubberman what I learned. Then he and the other heroes would be able to figure out a way to get Big Boy while I spent time in the hospital.
Blast, however, did not know any of that, but he must have sensed the annoyance in my voice, because he said, “Okay, fine. Big Boy is being kept on the outskirts of Golden City, inside that old abandoned car factory that closed down years ago. Do you know the one I’m talking about?”
I nodded. “Yeah. The Williams Car Factory, right? My uncle used to work there before it closed down ten years ago.”
“Yeah, that place,” said Blast. “That’s where Big Boy is.”
“Is anyone else there? Like some of your own allies?”
Blast smiled. “Why don’t you find out for yourself? Go up to the front door and knock on it and see who answers. I’m sure it will be fun.”
I took that as a ‘yes,’ but at the same time, I found it suspicious how easily Blast was willing to tell me about Big Boy. Either Blast was a cowardly, traitorous little snake or he was lying to me. He didn’t seem to be lying, but then, I didn’t know Blast well enough to tell when he was lying and when he was telling the truth.
Before I could resume interrogating him, however, I heard the sounds of dozens of feet stomping across the floor outside and in another moment, Cyberkid, Rubberman, and several other superheroes appeared in the doorway to the Engine Room. Rubberman immediately made his way over to me, while the other superheroes who had come with him were led by Cyberkid over to Blast, who was still smirking at me like he had just told a funny joke. It was a creepy expression, not helped by his goggles, which made him look more like a cyborg than a human being.
“Beams, are you okay?” said Rubberman, stopping beside me and bending over. He looked at my shoulder and grimaced. “Good God, that looks awful.” He suddenly looked over at Blast, who was now being escorted out of the Engine Room by the other superheroes. “Did he—”
“No, it was another vigilante I was fighting,” I said. I winced at the pain in my shoulder. “But it does need to be looked at anyway. It hurts like hell.”
“Of course,” said Rubberman. “Blast’s fellow vigilantes have already fled, so The Mystery is safe now. I’ll have Myster fly us to the hospital so we can have that shoulder looked at.”
I nodded, but then I remembered what I was talking about with Blast and said, “Wait, Rubberman, I was talking to Blast and he was telling me about the Legion’s plan to save Iron Angel. It involves using a big—”
“Tell me about it later,” said Rubberman. He scooped me into his arms and stood up. “For now, we need to get you to the hospital, and fast. I don’t want your shoulder to become infected and you end up losing your arm because of it.”
With that, Rubberman turned and walked out of the Engine Room. I kept quiet, but at the same time, I couldn’t stop thinking about Blast and his smirk. It made me wonder if it actually would make sense to tell Rubberman about Big Boy or if I should just keep it to myself. Something told me that Blast had not shared everything with me, but at the same time, if Big Boy was real, then it seemed to me that Rubberman needed to know about it.
Whatever. I would just tell Rubberman about it later, after I had my shoulder looked at.
CHAPTER THREE
A couple of hours later, I lay in my bed in the Golden City General Hospital, my shoulder bandaged up and a soft white blanket pulled up to my waist. My shoulder was stiff thanks to the bandages around it, but the doctor who had cleaned and bandaged my shoulder had told me that it should be okay as long as I didn’t move it too much. Even though it had hurt like hell, the injury was apparently not going to leave me with any lasting health problems, at least as long as I didn’t get myself into any more fights. I told the doctor I would try to avoid overexerting myself, though deep down, I knew I couldn’t guarantee that, because as long as the Vigilante Legion was still in Golden City, I would never be able to relax entirely.
I no longer wore my green and yellow costume; however, I still wore my helmet in order to keep my identity secret from the doctors, nurses, and hospital workers. A glance at the mirror on the right wall showed me looking silly in my hospital gown and helmet, but again, I didn’t want to lose my license, so I had to keep my helmet on at all times while I was here in the hospital. And the only person who could visit me was Rubberman, because if my parents or girlfriend showed up, that would be a good way for everyone to find out my real identity.
Leaning back into my pillows, I stared up at the ceiling. On the flight to the hospital, I’d told Rubberman everything Blast had told me about Big Boy and what the Legion intended to use it for. Rubberman had listened closely, though he didn’t say what he was going to do about it. When he dropped me off at the hospital, however, he mentioned he needed to talk to Myster about this and that he would come by to visit me after that.
But Rubberman had not said exactly how long it would take for him to talk to Myster about my findings. I’d been lying here in this hospital room for half an hour now and had had no guests besides the doctor and my nurse since my arrival. I understood that there was probably a lot of cleanup going on as well; when I first saw how wrecked the deck of The Mystery was from the battle between Heroes United and the Vigilante Legion, I shuddered to think of how much money it was going to cost for Myster to fix it.
Even so, I felt lonely, sitting here in this hospital room all by myself. The doctor had suggested I rest, but I didn’t want to rest. The adrenaline was still running through me from my earlier fight with Blast. Besides, I kept expecting one of the vigilantes to burst through the window or front door to get me. I was very defenseless in my current position; sure, my eye beams still worked, but I couldn’t exactly defend myself in bed, at least not effectively.
At that moment, the door to my hospital room opened and Rubberman entered. He looked tired, his normally pristine black hair still messed up from the battle on The Mystery, and his costume had a few cuts and holes in it. Nonetheless, he smiled at me when he closed the door, albeit in an exhausted way.
“Hey, Beams,” said Rubberman as he closed the door behind him. “How are you doing?”
He sounded extremely tired. The bags under his eyes—which were due to his lack of sleep over the last couple of weeks—looked even worse combined with his injuries.
“Okay,” I said. I rolled my bandaged shoulder slightly. “The doctor says my shoulder should be fine, just as long as I rest and don’t move it too much.”
“No fighting?” Rubberman questioned as he walked across the room toward me. He sat down in a chair next to my bed and propped his chin in his hand.
“No fighting,” I said, “at least until my shoulder gets better. That’s what the doctor said.”
Rubberman sighed. “Damn it. I mean … sorry, Beams, but I hope you understand why we can’t afford to keep bleeding members like this.”
I nodded. Over the last couple of weeks, ever since the Heroes United members came to Golden City, every clash with the Vigilante Legion seemed to end with someone on our side dying or getting too injured to keep fighting. To the best of my knowledge, we’d lost about three superheroes and four sidekicks so far, while the Vigilante Legion was more or less still at full strength. Blast was one of the very few vigilantes who we had managed to capture, and even then, he nearly took out all of us by himself.
“I understand, boss,” I said. “If it was my decision, I’d be out and about fighting the Vigilante Legion with you and the other heroes.” I sat up. “Actually, I think I will go and fight with you guys. My shoulder is fine. The doctor isn’
t my father any—”
Rubberman’s left hand stretched toward me and shoved me gently but firmly back down onto my bed. I looked at Rubberman in shock, noting his expression, which was serious and grim.
“No, Beams, you should listen to your doctor,” said Rubberman. “I know the doctors who work here. They’re usually right about everything.”
“But you’ve always been able to recover quickly,” I said. “Why can’t I?”
“Because I have a healing factor and you don’t,” said Rubberman as he retracted his left hand. “Unlike you, I recover from injuries far faster, but even I wouldn’t leave the hospital just a couple of hours after I got in. You should at least stay the night, though if you want to go home tomorrow, I think that would be wise, because I’ve been getting calls from your mom demanding to know if you’re okay. I think she is concerned about you.”
I had not received any calls from Mom myself, but I wasn’t surprised to hear that she had called Rubberman. I bet Dad was also worried about me, though he always expressed his worry differently than Mom. Regardless, I realized that Rubberman was right about this: I was lucky to get off with such a relatively minor injury and needed to rest if I was going to be able to help him in the future.
“So I want you to take time off work,” said Rubberman, “as much as you need to get better, however long that may be.”
“But the Vigilante Legion—”
“We’ll deal with them,” Rubberman cut me off. He patted me on the shoulder. “We’ve got more than enough superheroes and sidekicks to deal with the Legion. You don’t need to worry about them.”
“Are you sure you can trust the others?” I said. “They’re from Heroes United, after all.”
“I’m sure,” said Rubberman, though he didn’t sound very sure to me. “I—”
All of a sudden, the door to my room burst open, causing both me and Rubberman to look over at it just as someone stepped through the doorway, someone who I recognized from pictures I’d seen online but who I had never seen in real life before.
The man who entered was the striking image of a superhero. He was tall and muscular, with arms built like marble columns. A long, red cape flowed behind him, while his hair was perfectly smoothed back as if done by a professional hair stylist. His square chin looked strong enough to smash rock, while his blue eyes shone from his face like lights. On his huge chest was a single, stylized P, which by itself would be more than enough to identify him.
Even so, I was too stunned by this man’s appearance here in Golden City General to speak. There was no way that he could be here, in person. This had to be a hallucination caused by the medicine the doctor gave me, right?
Either the man who had strode into my hospital room was real or Rubberman was also sharing in my hallucination, because he turned to face the newcomer with the same level of disbelief on my face. “Prime Man? Is that you?”
The superhero who stood before us smiled, flashing his perfect white teeth. He held out a hand toward Rubberman. “I’m glad to see you remember me, Rubberman. It’s been a few years since we last met at Super Con 2015, but I see you have not forgotten me in the slightest.”
I still couldn’t believe that this man was the Prime Man, the richest, most successful superhero in the world and head of the Heroes United superhero hiring agency. He consistently topped the list of richest superheroes in the world for the last ten years, and was always somewhere in the top ten wealthiest superheroes for five years before that. He rarely did any crime-fighting himself—guess he was what Rubberman would call a Cape—but that didn’t diminish his fame or success in the slightest.
Rubberman, however, did not get up to shake Prime Man’s hand. He did extend his own hand toward him, which he shook firmly, though Rubberman did not seem terribly excited about seeing Prime Man. As for myself, I just pulled my sheets up a little closer to my chin, because I felt kind of naked in my patient gown.
But Prime Man must have noticed my movement, because he looked at me and, still smiling, said, “And you must be Beams, Rubberman’s newest sidekick, right?”
“Y-yeah,” I said, nodding. “Let me get up so I can—”
But Prime Man held up a hand as if to silence me. “No need, young man. I heard all about the fight on The Mystery and how you were badly wounded during it by Blast from Myster and Cyberkid. You stay where you are. No point in having your arm bandaged up if you’re not going to give it a chance to heal up correctly.”
Prime Man spoke genuinely, which made me relax. He kind of reminded me of Rubberman, although he definitely had his own feel to him, maybe a bit more self-important than my boss, but good nonetheless.
Rubberman—who had retracted his arm by now—was still looking at Prime Man in confusion and, if I wasn’t mistaken, also with a hint of suspicion. “Prime Man, I didn’t know you were going to be in Golden City. I thought you were too busy running Heroes United to come here yourself.”
Prime Man’s smile never left his face, though it did seem a bit creepier now. “Ah, well, normally I am too busy to check on these sorts of things. Living in New York City, having important discussions with the President and Congress regarding laws regulating our business, managing my multi-billion dollar corporation and the five hundred sidekicks who work for me—”
“Five hundred sidekicks?” I repeated in shock. “You have five hundred sidekicks?”
Prime Man nodded. “Indeed. Compared to most businesses, that’s a rather small number of employees, but it is more than most superheroes, to be sure.”
I couldn’t even imagine how one superhero could have five hundred sidekicks at once. I mean, I knew that superheroes could hire as many sidekicks as they could afford, and I had also known that Prime Man was extremely wealthy, but I could never have guessed that Prime Man had 500 sidekicks, which wasn’t even counting the sidekicks who worked alongside superheroes who worked for his agency. What did you even do with that many sidekicks?
“Anyway,” Prime Man continued, “the reason I came down here is because I was curious to see how the battle against the Vigilante Legion was coming along. I expected it to be over in a week, yet it’s been two weeks now and the Legion is still active.”
“They’re tougher than they look,” said Rubberman. “Even with Iron Angel in jail, they’re still well-organized. We think that the Legion has a new leader, though we don’t know who it is yet.”
Prime Man sighed. “Ah, Iron Angel. He was an inspiration to us all, even though he never became quite as successful as me. It is always sad whenever the mighty fall, wouldn’t you agree, Rubberman?”
Rubberman nodded. “Yes. Still, we’ve got to deal with reality, and the reality is that Iron Angel’s followers are trying to break him out of prison and kill us.”
“Quite true,” said Prime Man. “But they haven’t had too much luck in either objective, yes?”
“Right,” said Rubberman. “Iron Angel is still behind bars, while Beams and I are still alive.”
“That’s good to hear,” said Prime Man, “though Myster informed me of a bomb that the Legion is building to break Iron Angel out of prison.”
“That’s true,” said Rubberman. “We know where it is being built, so within the next few days, we should be able to destroy it before the Legion can complete it. Will you be coming along with us on that mission, Prime Man?”
Prime Man stroked his chin. “Unfortunately, I will not be able to. I plan to stay in Golden City for only two days. I have a strict schedule to keep and that schedule does not, unfortunately, include stopping a bunch of criminals from staging a prison break.”
Prime Man sounded sad about that, as if he thought he was being deprived of a real treat. That made me wonder if he was more of a Mask than he let on.
As for Rubberman, he folded his arms across his chest and said, “What else do you plan to do while you’re in town, Prime Man? Talk to the police about the Legion?”
“Yes, I do have a meeting scheduled with the police chief
and the mayor about this threat,” said Prime Man, nodding. “But I also came to do business with Sasha Munroe. You know of her, of course?”
Rubberman’s smile almost turned into a frown, but he forced his expression to stay the same. “Yes, I know her. Why are you going to meet her? Are you planning to sell your business to her?”
Prime Man chuckled. “Don’t be silly, Rubberman. The Prime Man business is better and more profitable than ever. I’d have to be a genuine fool to even think of selling it right now. But Sasha did contact me about a possible business deal we could strike, and because I’m in town already, I decided to meet her for lunch tomorrow. I can’t tell you the details just yet, but if all goes as I think, the Prime Man business will become even bigger than it already is.”
I had a hard time imagining how Prime Man’s business could possibly grow any more than it already had, even knowing that Munroe Acquisitions was just as big if not bigger than his business. What did he expect to happen, that he would hire another 500 sidekicks or something? I knew better than to ask something like that aloud, of course, but the scale on which Prime Man operated was so huge that I had a hard time wrapping my head around it.
“Interesting,” said Rubberman. He leaned back in his chair. “I’m not sure it is wise to associate with Munroe Acquisitions, however. Their track record of hiring superheroes hasn’t exactly been stellar, given how Barriers conspired with the Three Fingers gang to promote his business.”
“That was just one bad hire,” said Prime Man, waving off Rubberman’s comments like they were nothing. “I’ve hired more than a few bad sidekicks in my time, including one who tried to kill me in my sleep one time. The deal Sasha has offered me is too good to pass up. And if things go south, I have enough money to afford the best lawyers in the country.”
“It’s your business, I guess,” said Rubberman. “Still, I’d recommend being careful around her nonetheless.”
Prime Man laughed. “’Being careful’ is a good way to survive in this business, perhaps, but certainly not how you get to the top like I have. If you were more bold and less cautious, Rubberman, you would be on my level already.”
