Big Superhero Action

by Raymond Embrack

  26

  When Captain Madame X picked up her own death squad she decided to kill two birds with one avalanche.

  According to the AXIS debriefing, the last six Motorchrists in existence were now OSD enforcers with an edict to find and kill AXIS members. Captain Madame X had picked them up on the Brutalia Freeway. From there they clung to the paisley Siren cycle like chopped metal shadows, looking for the chance to pop her. It took work, a Siren cycle was faster than a chopper and it projected a visual distortion zone of thirty feet.

  Captain Madame X decided on a tactic and its location, led them twenty miles to the spot. Apple Gotti had been tracked to a house pirated and occupied, isolated in deep woods one quarter-mile outside of Brutalia. The Captain passed the Limit, slowed the cycle for the wrong moment. The Siren cycle stopped. It was now a toy motorcycle. You had to travel prepared for crossing the Limit, keep non-super tech for emergencies. The Siren guns were toys. She pulled the two 9mm semi-auto pistols.

  She left the Siren cycle in the woods, continued to the house.

  There it was, woodsy as a tree house. Exterior spotlights were on. Chopper roar grew behind her. Here, she was a twelve year-old girl with no edge going for her. No regeneration here, any hit she took was for good. All she had was what Siren training remained in her reflexes.

  She was counting on the plan she envisioned. It went like this: Apple Gotti would already be watching. She would see a girl in the uniform of Captain Madame X, see the Motorchrists after her. She would go to her weapons collection, to the wall of firearms, to the shotgun rack, pick the sawed-off one. It would be already loaded. Through a camouflaged emergency exit Apple Gotti would slip outside, be unseen in the woods, moving soundlessly. She would raise the shotgun and take out the Motorchrists from the darkness, splattering their heads over their choppers while Captain Madame X took them out with her twin semi-autos. The bikers would be crossfired, taken apart in one minute. The last six Motorchrists in existence would be dead, the M.C. starting its total extinction.

  Captain Madame X stepped over the bodies toward the house. She went in guns first. When Apple Gotti came back she would be waiting. She was halfway through the first floor when Apple Gotti came in from the deck shotgun in hand, hands ringed with fading scars. The scars were a product of her porn career and a spinal cord condition that gave her the inability to feel pain. Wearing black bunny ears, she was in a black leotard, bare legs down to black ballet shoes laced over her ankles. Apple Gotti was the closest thing to a Siren a non-super could have been. An actual grown woman, years back she had mentored the first generation Siren Syndicate, taken them to target practice. But she so had a fucking screw loose.

  Apple Gotti said, “You’re back, huh?”

  Captain Madame X said, “The Syndicate is in effect. Second generation.”

  “Six little girls in Mom’s clothes playing with lipstick and guns. Good for you.”

  “Don’t hate, liberate.”

  “What’s with the biker gang?”

  “I didn’t want to show up without bringing something.”

  “You think dead bodies get rid of themselves?”

  “Maybe you can use them. Find somebody who hates bikers.”

  “Meaning what?”

  “You went OSD,” Captain Madame X said. “Doing hits on order for the Customizers. Between you and Mafia 9, you killed eight strippers for the client Sonny Ditlow. Sonny got busted, got the credit he paid for; but he didn’t get the suicide; poor guy now has to do eight life sentences. For your next client, Mafia 9 moved on to hitting Iraq War vets. Looks like you went on hiatus. Nice hideaway you have.”

  Apple Gotti’s stare twitched. “Guess I forgot about Gingiri. Stop scaring me with your super mind reading powers. But then that’s in Brutalia. Here, I could spank you and send you home.”

  The Captain raised her guns. “Spank me.”

  Gotti aimed the shotgun. “Never killed a child until now.”

  “You kill more people, don’t you?”

  “That’s my life’s work.”

  “Killing people is your life’s work?”

  “I kill people who will live longer than me.”

  “Right, I heard. Large category.”

  “I plan to put a dent in it. Insane, huh? Subtract the pain, what’s left is a short-ass life. I think my mind is going. I remembered something yesterday. When I was little, I used to play pain. You know those tests of the Emergency Broadcast System on TV? Whenever those came on, I used to pretend I was a superhero and the noise was a Kryptonite ray sapping my powers. Arrgghh…then sink to the floor. I have no reason to let anyone live longer than me.”

  “You’re unbelievable. You wouldn’t live longer than me, anyway. I can tell.”

  “I never killed a lover.”

  “Then don’t. OSD is bad. AXIS is good. Join up.”

  “Got no time to be good. I’m pushing it, already past the limit. I know when it’s over. I’m a tool for the OSD. You’re back with AXIS? You’re a tool for AXIS. We’re both tools.”

  “I’m a tool for good.”

  “Good? Evil? I saw them on TV once.”

  “Pick your side.”

  “I did. I don’t betray it.”

  “I had to try, though,” Captain Madame X said. “You’re always true to Apple Gotti.”

  “I’m a natural. Born with a super power. Yet I’m technically an amateur because I can’t fucking fly. But I pass the Batman test. What do we do now, Captain?”

  “One of us has to fall.”

  “Pink Roulette?”

  “You can’t be serious. I’m a twelve year-old girl.”

  “That makes it a little pervo but it is what it is.”

  A staring awkward silence stretched out between them. Captain Madame X felt her blood flow change direction to empty the blood vessels in her brain, confusing the guns in her hands.

  It was a whisper breathed out: “Shit.”

  “I know,” Apple Gotti said. “Me too. For one of us this will be the last time. Yours.”

  “Great.”

  “Put yours down.”

  Captain Madame X didn’t put hers down.

  “I don’t feel pain. I don’t feel pleasure much, either. Maybe this is something I can feel? Intense life-and-death thrills. Sex and violence. You? Yeah you. We always had more fun, Captain X.”

  “You never change.”

  “I have. I’ve changed a bunch. I’m older. Time is shorter.”

  Apple Gotti slowly lowered the shotgun to the coffee table, left it there.

  Captain Madame X put her guns on the table. “Okay. But make it fast.”

  “Keep your shirt on,” Apple Gotti said. “It isn’t done fast. Time is too short. Take your shirt off.”

  Captain Madame X set her boot on a chair, unclipped a garter strap. “What rules? Italian or Russian?”

  “Russian.”

  Russian rules: after climax the first one who gets a gun wins.

  27

  JKM said, “Forget that useless crackhead.”

  The Halo: “Meth.”

  “Whatever. Forget her.”

  “We can save her.”

  “She’s a pig. Pigs aren’t worth saving.”

  “She is a pig. But you have to look at her childhood.”

  “Fuck her and her transphobic shit.”

  “What do we care what comes out of her mouth? We’re heroes.”

  “Right, we’re heroes, not intervention counselors.”

  “Did you ever think we were meant to save her?”

  “I decided what our task will be,” JKM said. “We stick to the list. Shutting down the meth lab. Cleaning up Perv Town. Looking into the households of two battered children.”

  “We will do those too. You can never do too much good, can you?”

  “Then do it without me. And make it fast.”

  The Halo’s tiara went dark.

  “Take that as a sign,” he said.

  “What?”

&nbs
p; “Your halo went off.”

  She rolled her eyes at him.

  The Halo crossed the street. The street was a blur. She walked into the club. The club was a blur. Mostly empty. Club music.

  Where was Remy? There she was, at a table. Remy Rocco, porn burnout, recovering street hooker. Sucking a filter king, her lipstick crooked, blonde hair in her face. But still hot, a wrinkled mini dress clinging to her huge implants. She was with a man. The man was a black dude in black leather. The Halo hated this shit already.

  The Halo walked to their table. Cristal in an ice bucket. Unhip as she was, even she knew that was a cliché. On the table: a gold credit card with a different woman’s name on it. The man stood, put out a hand with gold-blinging fingers outstretched, telling the Halo to keep her distance. He flashed gold uppers.

  “No autographs,” he said. “Walk.”

  The Halo said, “Remy.”

  A stoned eye peeped up through the hair. It frowned with confusion. Her crooked lipstick cracked dead porn star breath.

  “Whuuut?”

  The Halo said, “You’re not back in business, are you?”

  “It’s cool.”

  “You almost died.”

  The man said, “You ignoring me, dude?”

  The Halo said, “What?”

  “You a dude, right? You’re almost cute enough but the voice is all dude.”

  “Look…there’s no need for trouble here.”

  The man said, “What’s your name?”

  “What?”

  “What’s your fucking name?”

  “The Halo.”

  “Know who I am, ‘the Halo?’”

  “Not by name.”

  “Know who the fuck I am?”

  “No.”

  “I’m Murder Mouse.”

  The Halo said nothing.

  “You a super, the Halo? Or amateur super? You look amateur.”

  The Halo said nothing.

  Murder Mouse pulled up his top to bare hard abs and the handle of a nine-millimeter handgun under the waistband.

  He said, “What are you now, ‘the Halo?’”

  The Halo stepped back. Fuck Remy. Fuck Remy and her problems. Now this superhero shit could get her killed. The Halo looked for someone who looked like a bouncer. Saw no one around who looked like a bouncer. Saw hardly anyone around.

  Murder Mouse took the gun out, set it on the table.

  “Don’t need a gun for you, the Halo.”

  The Halo took another step back, the plan to turn and run.

  “Don’t try to run, the Halo.”

  The Halo didn’t know what to do. The Halo was paralyzed. This was only one guy, a guy calling himself “Murder Mouse.” The Halo didn’t think she could take him even with the gun. The Halo did not trust her self-defense skills. So the Halo backed away.

  “Stand the fuck still.”

  “Look, I don’t want trouble.”

  The Halo stood still. She looked for the sight of a bouncer. She even looked for JKM. Everything else was a blur. She felt like she was trapped inside a bad movie.

  Murder Mouse said, “You want to get hurt?”

  The Halo said nothing. Her heart was pounding.

  “Answer me.”

  The Halo shook her head.

  “Speak.”

  “No.”

  “No what?”

  “No to your question.”

  “You don’t want to get hurt.”

  “No.”

  “You’re gonna get hurt unless you do what I say. You understand that?”

  The Halo said nothing.

  “Answer me.”

  The Halo nodded.

  “I can do anything to you I want, she-male. I can hurt you or not. That’s up to me. Feel me?”

  The Halo’s heart hammered her chest.

  “We need to talk about shit, the Halo. We’ll go into the men’s room where we can have some privacy and work this out.”

  “I don’t want trouble.”

  “No trouble. We talk.”

  “We talk?”

  “Right. Just talk.”

  Murder Mouse took the Halo by the sleeve, started walking, the Halo towed along like a little girl. By now JKM would’ve hurled Murder Mouse head-first through a wall. The Halo thought about breaking into a run for the exit. But she knew it would be like running underwater. She’d never make it.

  He took her into the men’s room. The Halo hoped it was occupied. It was empty, emptier than anywhere in the city. Dim lighting, exposed brick walls, yellow stink versus green stink.

  They stood there between the row of urinals and the row of sinks.

  “Now we can talk,” Murder Mouse said.

  The Halo stood there. Her lips were drying up, about to crack. Her heart still pounded.

  “Halo, I’m almost insulted by this.”

  Murder Mouse stuck out a hand, gave the Halo a light tap across the face. Just like that, the Halo was a child again taking slaps to the face. Murder Mouse smiled. His other hand slapped the Halo’s other cheek a light tap.

  “There’s one way you can get out of getting hurt. You gotta get on your knees. Do it. Get on your knees. Then I won’t hurt you.”

  The Halo was drowning, knew any punch she would throw would be like she was underwater. The Halo didn’t want to get hurt. The Halo didn’t want to get on her knees. The Halo didn’t want to get hurt.

  To stall, she said, “What?”

  “‘What?’” Murder Mouse mocked her. “Get on your fucking knees.”

  A flash of rage hit the Halo. The moment passed. She started thinking about getting on her knees. No one else was around to see it. Maybe getting on her knees was worth it if she wouldn’t get hurt. Except she knew what would come next.

  “Do it.”

  “No.”

  “I know what you’re thinking, Halo. Faggots like you think too much in these situations. Maybe let me throw the first punch, force you to fight back. Then maybe run for it. Except when I get started, I don’t know when to fucking stop. I will rip out one of your eyeballs. I will ruin your pre-op face, Halo. You’re pre-op, right? You don’t want that. You have a chance to avoid that, Halo. So get on your fucking knees.”

  The Halo got on her knees on the sticky floor.

  “Next step. You get a choice. You blow me. Then I won’t hurt you.”

  The Halo said, “What?”

  “You heard me.”

  Looking at Murder Mouse’s white sneakers, the Halo said, “Can’t do that.”

  “You’re on your knees. You can do it. Or you get hurt.”

  Murder Mouse’s sneakers stepped forward. It was going on too long and the fear was running out, leaving her with a slow-cooking rage over catching this much shit. It was only a matter of jumping off the edge.

  Murder Mouse flipped a hand, tapped the Halo across the face. “I’m giving you a chance, Halo, but you’re starting to piss me off. You got four seconds.”

  Fuck.

  “One.”

  Murder Mouse made a kissing sound. Murder Mouse’s hand slapped the Halo’s face again, harder. “Two.”

  The Halo lunged, grabbed Murder Mouse’s right leg, held on. From her heart ripped a long scream. A fist popped her left eye, exploded her brain. A knee banged the other side of her head. She held on to the leg like it would save her.

  Murder Mouse stumbled, fell over, knocked over the trash can. From the trash can an empty beer bottle rolled out. The Halo grabbed it by the neck. Beer soaked her glove, trickled into her sleeve. The Halo stumbled atop Murder Mouse, clubbed his face with the bottle. The blows jolted up her thin arm as below the bottle cracked bones and teeth. She saw the face below her changing shape. She felt primal, connected to the Dawn of Man.

  The Halo stopped. Murder Mouse: cherry syrup smearing his face, pooling on the floor around his head. The Halo pawed her way up one of the sinks, pulled off her bloody gloves. She stared at her face. Just then the tiara lit up.

  She came out of the club w
ith Remy. Remy wobbled atop clear heels, bent over, puked on the sidewalk.

  Remy turned to the Halo, said, “Take out your cock. Wanna fuck?”

  “Then I’d puke.”

  “Fuuuuck you.”

  JKM crossed the street to her, his jaw dropped. “Halo, what went down? Who hit you?”

  “Nothing happened,” she told him. “Fuck off.”

  Alone, she took Remy to the apartment, dumped her on the couch for the night. She uncorked a bottle of Rhine, too it out to the fire escape, brooded over her situation. She had committed homicide. But it was obvious self-defense. Look at him. Then look at her. She’d never get hard time for that. And they wouldn’t give a fuck about a dead thug pimp anyway. She could afford to take her chances.

  28

  Xoir had raised sunken mines that surfaced and exploded in Dr. Playground’s brain at odd moments. Like the night his stepmother took young Simon Stranko to a strip club.

  She picked the music for her set. The song was “White Rabbit.” That song belonged to her. It made her shimmer. It set her off her darkness with larger-than-life flashes of bold Moscow red. Red latex mini dress, matching thigh-high latex boots. Red candy-red hair, black-eyelinered eyes, a large nose. Black leather gloved hands, one pulling the zipper ring down her 42DD implants baring candy red painted aureoles.

  Then he was next to her as she drove a lipstick-red ‘67 Chevelle. It was one of his father’s cars. She started talking in the Russian he did not speak. Palm trees rolled past. Close up, she was more striking than beautiful. The dark red surrounding her set off pale white skin until it glowed like moon surface. The face a bit too round, too circular, the nose thrusting from it, the mouth small and cruel. Her eyes were too wide and round and intense and unnatural, like they were staring from a cracked mind. But she was beautiful. Simon felt deep love for the night city lined with palm trees and places darkly-lit with mystery-colored female wonders.

  Simon figured she was telling him her whole story. Anyway, something more than just being a Russian babbling at him. He wanted his ears to somehow strain meaning from her babbling like he was dreaming in a dream where he could do that.