The Supervillain and Me

by Danielle Banas

  I didn’t need the reporter to spell it out for me. The man who saved me last night was no hero.

  He was a villain.

  * * *

  Morriston had never seen a supervillain before. Our supers used their powers for good; the only criminals were ordinary citizens. Thieves, gangs, drug dealers. Never a super. No one knew how to handle a criminal with both evil intentions and superpowers. I supposed there must have been supervillains in other parts of the country, but no one heard much about them. They were apprehended quickly, before the problem brought on by their presence could escalate.

  The problem in Morriston had already escalated. Iron Phantom had done so much damage during his first official act of evil that the city was terrified to see what he would do next. Thankfully, no one was harmed in the city hall fire. Very few people were in the building, and those inside got out quickly with Connor’s help. City hall, however, would be closed until further notice.

  Classes continued as scheduled, but no one got much learning done. We were all glued to the televisions as footage of the fire played on a never-ending loop, the video of Iron Phantom’s kindness toward the homeless man forgotten. Most students were addicted to the drama, eating up the chance to either gush about or condemn Morriston’s first supervillain. For them, he was an excuse to skip out on class for a day. His actions were very real, but he was still a fantasy. For me … I didn’t understand. Iron Phantom had proven himself to be worse than the criminal he rescued me from. Honestly, I couldn’t figure out why he bothered to rescue me at all.

  I headed to the library during my study hall, hoping for a quiet reprieve from the news. No such luck. By midafternoon, I’d seen the same clip of the same flames two dozen times, and each one made a golf-ball-sized lump form in the back of my throat.

  Even in the library, it was everywhere. A group of girls from my gym class huddled around someone’s cell phone, watching a replay at a study table. Gary Gunkle, Morriston’s most flatulent member of the senior class, was hunched in front of a computer in the corner, bulky headphones covering his ears as he listened. Upstairs, a group of sophomores from the drama club traded their fears of Iron Phantom as they lounged near the newspaper racks. And in the back corner, near the bay window and the most comfortable squashy armchairs in the library, several stage crew kids hurled an imaginary torch at the wall, shouting Iron Phantom’s name.

  Ridiculous. Childish, I thought as I headed for an empty table near the stacks of spare history textbooks for rent. Only one other table was occupied. The boy that Sarah had knocked into before auditions—Rylan—sat with a laptop, watching the flames flicker on his screen.

  I pulled my chair across the wooden floor with a loud screech that had Ms. Jacobson, the librarian, poking her head out of her office to shoot me the stink eye. I slumped down at the table, trying to ignore the plume of smoke covering Rylan’s screen. My fingers rubbed circles into my temples as a stress headache started to form.

  “That video is the same now as it was five hours ago,” I snapped at Rylan’s back. He jumped a little, causing his chair to creak, and pulled out one of his earbuds.

  He turned around slowly, raising his eyebrows. His brown eyes blinked, but he didn’t speak. When I first met him, his silence unnerved me a little, but after putting up with nonstop chatter all day long, I welcomed the quiet.

  The news clip still played on his screen, and I couldn’t help but stare, feeling queasy for the millionth time that day.

  “Somehow those flames look taller every time I watch that,” I said.

  Rylan glanced at his laptop for just a moment. “Yeah,” he said quietly. We stared at the clip as it played out and the screen went black. With nothing to look at, I started to feel a little awkward, so I watched as a freshman girl pushed through the library doors with tears in her eyes. I wondered if she knew someone who worked in one of the buildings downtown.

  I thought back to last night, picturing the boy’s bright eyes and the playful lilt to his voice. Iron Phantom, what did you do?

  “Are you scared?” I asked Rylan. He blinked at me. Such a stupidly personal question, especially after just meeting a person. I tried to backtrack. “I mean, I guess no one likes admitting they’re scared.…”

  “I am,” he said, using the half whisper that Sarah and I dubbed the “library voice.” But for Rylan it just seemed to be his normal voice. “A little. Maybe even more than a little.” He packed up his laptop, gently zipping it into a case before slipping it into his backpack. His shy eyes flicked to me before drifting to the window. The city was too far away to see the buildings, but smoke hung in the sky like a deadly storm cloud.

  “Are you scared?” he asked.

  “No.” That was a big fat lie. “I mean … yeah.”

  Rylan nodded. Gripping the straps of his backpack, he slung the heavy-looking bag over one shoulder. The corners of his lips lifted in an encouraging smile, and he left the library without another word.

  * * *

  “What do you think Dad’s plan is?” I asked Connor while we watched our father’s press conference from the comfort of our living room couch. Dad was fielding questions from a roomful of reporters who were demanding details on the precautions being put in place to increase our safety from Iron Phantom. He wouldn’t go into detail, but said more would be revealed soon. I wasn’t even sure if he knew what to do. Because of his superpowers, Iron Phantom was quickly labeled as one of the nation’s most dangerous criminals. How could my father possibly keep him at bay?

  Connor shrugged. He had returned home briefly to make sure I was okay—he was still dressed as Red Comet.

  “I don’t know. I haven’t talked to him yet. He’ll probably try to bring in more supers to find this guy. What else can he do? I just don’t get it.” Connor sighed and started pacing in front of the TV. “We’re given these powers for a reason. They’re a gift. They help the less fortunate, like you.” He pointed a finger at my face.

  “Gee, thanks, Connor.”

  “You know what I mean. We help people. We don’t destroy things. We…” He sat down again and stared at me. With his blue eyes narrowed and his face covered in sweat and ash, he looked much older than nineteen. “You saw him.”

  I gulped. “I what?”

  Connor’s eyes continued to narrow. “You said you saw some dude dressed all in black yesterday and then this happens? That’s not a coincidence, Abby. You saw him—”

  “Yeah, but he was different then. He was helping. And there was that video this morning—”

  “A guy isn’t suddenly a saint just because he decided on a whim to feed the homeless. He burned down a building, Abby!”

  “Thanks. I wasn’t aware.” I leaned back into the couch, raking my fingers through the knots in my hair.

  I couldn’t find a good reason to defend Iron Phantom. He might have saved my life, but he ruined any gratitude I had when he burned down city hall. And yet, for some reason, I couldn’t bring myself to tell my own brother the truth about what really happened last night.

  “So what do we do now?” I asked.

  “We? Nothing. You stay here. I have to get back out there in case something else happens.” Connor sighed and pulled his mask over his head, trudging toward the door. “Promise me something, Abby. If you do see him again, you have to let someone know. Me or Dad—let us know and we’ll take care of it.”

  I felt my cheeks start to burn. “Connor, I’m not completely helpless—”

  “Abby,” he stressed. “Please.” His voice cracked. Although I couldn’t see his eyes, I knew they had that watery sheen to them, the same look he got whenever we talked about our mom or any other victim for slightly too long. He was just trying to do the right thing. Even through his mask, I knew Connor was staring me down, silently begging me to agree. Because that’s what Connor did. You couldn’t help but listen to him and be on his side. It was the reason he was such a great superhero.

  “Promise me,” he said again.

&nb
sp; I knew the right thing to do. I had no obligation to Iron Phantom. He was nobody. I would always be on Connor’s side. He was one of the only family members I had left.

  “I promise, Connor. I’ll let you know.”

  When he flew back downtown, I took the steps two at a time to my bedroom. But it wasn’t until I pushed my door open and dropped my bag (and all the homework I didn’t want to think about) on my desk chair that I realized something was different. I hadn’t left my lights on this morning. I knew I hadn’t. All my belongings were undisturbed, but I couldn’t shake the unmistakable feeling that something was here that shouldn’t be.

  If I hadn’t known that Connor was out of the house all day, then I would have thought he was playing a stupid prank on me. But as I cautiously padded across the room, my toes sinking into the carpet, I knew that not even my doofus brother was to blame.

  Goose bumps crawled up my arms. Placed on my mattress, directly in front of the pillows arranged meticulously against my headboard, was a chocolate bar sealed in a red wrapper and a note written in a messy scrawl:

  I’ve heard chocolate helps with head scrapes. I hope you’re feeling better.

  —IP

  P.S. I’m going to need your help with something.

  CHAPTER FOUR

  There was a knife under my pillow. I could say with absolute confidence that I had never slept with a knife under my pillow before.

  Sure, it was only a butter knife, but I still felt like I needed some form of protection. He knew where I lived. He had been in my room. My promise to Connor played in my head like a scratchy broken record. I’ll let you know. A load of good that promise did. Connor’s cell phone was dead, and once he didn’t return home after midnight, I assumed he took up his usual post on a skyscraper downtown, watching for trouble. I just had to hope that if something happened, if Iron Phantom showed up again, Connor would come.

  Telling Dad should have been my next move, but after returning home from fifteen hours of dealing with a charred office and a frightened city, he passed out on top of his blankets with his shoes and tie still on. I wasn’t about to bother him. I changed my clothes, got my knife, and went to bed. It was just one night. I could take care of myself.

  But I had overlooked the fact that it was impossible to sleep when your mind was somewhere else. I rolled onto my side, my back facing the window, while I plumped my pillows and attempted to count sheep in desperation. I had just reached twenty, and was no closer to falling asleep, when I heard a dull thump on my carpet followed by a gravelly voice.

  “You should really lock your window. Dangerous criminals are running rampant around this city, you know.”

  Right, like the window mattered. The guy could teleport. The fingers of my right hand inched under my pillow. I took the knife in my fist, the steel handle freezing against my sweaty skin. Maybe if I didn’t move, he would leave. Like an animal playing dead as a defense mechanism. I watched an entire special on opossums doing that on Animal Planet once. If I held my breath and started drooling a little, he would grow bored and walk away.

  “Psst. I know you’re not sleeping.”

  The floor creaked as the thumps moved closer. Be the opossum, Abby. Just be the opossum.

  “Hey.” A gloved hand touched my bare shoulder, and I whipped my head around, coming face-to-mask with the guy who’d haunted my thoughts for the past twenty-four hours.

  “Get away from me!” I hissed, rolling out of bed. My mattress was the only thing between us. I couldn’t work up the courage to throw the butter knife, so I dove for a thick anatomy textbook on the floor instead, hurling it through the room, aiming straight for his dumb, evil face. With a shake of his head, Iron Phantom disappeared, winking back into existence a few feet over. The textbook spun through the empty air, smacked the wall, and hit the carpet. Iron Phantom stepped on it with his boot, and my weapon was rendered useless.

  “Easy there, Bazooka.” He sounded like he was trying to hold back a laugh, and I hated him for it. In the darkness of my room, I could hardly see him in his black suit, just barely make out the occasional glint of his eyes as they caught the glow from my alarm clock. “I’m not allowed to pay a visit to the damsel in distress I rescued?”

  “No. Why don’t you pay a visit to one of the people who almost burned alive today in the fire that you set instead?” I snatched his note off my bedside table, waving it through the air. “And how do you know where I live?”

  “Oh, good. You got it.” He noticed the unopened chocolate bar. “You didn’t eat it? It’s not poisoned.”

  I blinked. I didn’t eat it because I wasn’t hungry; I hadn’t even thought that it might be poisoned, but now I was starting to reconsider.

  “It’s not poisoned,” he repeated. “And maybe I know where you live because maybe I followed you here last night to make sure you got back safe.”

  I knew I hadn’t been alone. I clutched my knife tighter. He knew where I lived. Where I slept. What else did he know?

  Connor’s plea echoed through my head. Let me know. He had to be aware that something was up, right? He had to realize I was in danger.

  Iron Phantom leaned against the wall, crossing his feet at the ankles. He looked almost … bored.

  No. He was messing with me. Trying to get me to let my guard down.

  I’d vowed not to wake my dad up, but that was before Morriston’s new supervillain made an appearance in my room. Dad was on the other side of the house, but maybe if I screamed loud enough.…

  “Da—”

  Iron Phantom’s eyes widened. He snatched one of the pillows from my bed, chucking it at me. It smacked my stomach, then fell to the floor.

  “Shh! What are you doing?”

  “Getting help. What are you doing?”

  “Getting you to shut up. If you were really in danger, wouldn’t a super have come to rescue you already?”

  “I…” He had me there. But Connor could just be busy. Wouldn’t be the first time.

  “Wave that butter knife around all you want,” he said, “but if you were really scared, you would have thrown that at me, not the book. Actually, if you were really scared, you would have grabbed a larger knife.”

  I didn’t lower my arm.

  “Fine.” He hung his head. “You don’t like me. I get it. But I wasn’t trying to hurt anyone today. You don’t understand why I did it.” His voice softened as he toyed with the edge of his mask around his jaw. His green eyes were fixed on the collection of photos scattered across my desk, not on me. I could have run out of the room and gotten my dad. Maybe I should have. What if this was some kind of trap?

  But looking at Iron Phantom tentatively examining a picture of me and Sarah at the beach last year, a small smile on his face, it didn’t seem very urgent that I let someone know of his presence.

  “Make me understand,” I said.

  He dropped the picture frame, pressing his palms against his eyes. “Look, I didn’t want to hurt anyone. I was trying to send a message.”

  “To who?” I glanced at my door. I could still make a run for it. Iron Phantom noticed, but he didn’t try to stop me. Instead of stepping closer to the door, or to me, he took a step back, toward my window.

  He didn’t answer my question, but he did hold out his palm. There was something small and shiny resting on his glove, but with my bed filling the space between us, I couldn’t figure out exactly what I was looking at.

  Iron Phantom took one small step forward. My muscles tensed, but I didn’t move. Then he took another, and another, until his knees were resting against the edge of my bed and his body was leaning over the mattress toward me.

  He held up the object between his thumb and index finger. A silver rectangle half the size of my thumbnail.

  “What do you know about microchips?” he asked.

  “Pretty much nothing. Why?”

  Iron Phantom hummed, watching me. What I could see of his face under his mask looked completely blank, emotionless.

  “
Here’s the issue,” he said. “I’ve seen microchips like this before. This looks like a tracking device, the kind that can be implanted under a person’s skin, and believe me, there are plenty more where this one came from. But whether they’re for people like you or for people like me, I can’t say.”

  “People like you? Supers?”

  My heart skipped a beat. Connor?

  “Someone wants to follow the supers … to find out who they are?” I asked, hardly daring to believe it.

  “Maybe more,” he said. “To capture them, to control them, to test them. Use your imagination, Bazooka. Or maybe they’re to spy on the rest of Morriston for some inane reason. I don’t know. I’m really just spitballing here. You see, this particular microchip is actually empty on the inside.” He popped the tiny box open, showing me smooth metal walls and not much else. “From my experience, that’s not normal. I want to know what should be there and why it’s not. That’s where you come in. Think of it as your … supersecret mission.” He wiggled his fingers, like the whole thing was supposed to be really grand—an honor or something.

  “I don’t want a supersecret mission,” I said.

  “Too bad. I need you to find out what’s up. But don’t ask your dad outright. Be sneaky about it, because if someone catches on, I’m not sure it would be a good thing.”

  “Wait, wait, wait. Hold up. My father?”

  “Yeah, your father. I may be new to the whole superhero gig, but I’m not stupid. I knew last night you were the mayor’s daughter.” He slipped the chip back into his suit, patting his pocket for good measure. “And I also stole this little guy from his office this morning.”