by Peter Moore
“Fine, move out of the way. I’ll go.” Yeah, that was me, and I was as surprised as everyone else to hear the words come out of my mouth. I pushed between Layla and Javier, bent down, and felt for the ladder. I found it: cold metal, hooked onto the wooden pier. I stepped down three rungs and felt the water lap against my boot.
“You gotta step off, there, tough guy. We’re a few feet from the pier. Just one big step toward my voice.”
It hadn’t occurred to me to find out what my suit would be like if it got wet. My guess was that the KevFlex and all the rest would become really heavy. I wondered how long it would take to drown.
I knew that Layla and the rest of them were waiting for me to act, so one more second of hesitation was going to make me look even worse than Javier.
I stepped out.
My boot splashed in the water. And landed on something solid, maybe a few inches below the surface. I stepped with my other foot. I couldn’t tell if it was emotion or reality, but whatever I was standing on felt like it was swaying and bobbing, just slightly.
“Here ya go,” said the voice, to my left and down by my feet. “Right over here.”
I took two steps, crouched down and felt around. My hand touched a metal lip. Some river water sloshed against it. I leaned over and felt a cold updraft.
I was leaning over a hatch. I was standing on some kind of submarine.
Five minutes later, we were crowded into a small nautical cabin. It was just Layla, Javier, Boots, and me. Peanut was too nervous to squeeze through the hatch, so he waited out on the wharf, under the watchful eyes of several Phaetons.
The cabin was exactly wide enough for the four of us to squish into and sit on a steel bench, shoulder to shoulder. There was a single red light on the low ceiling, which made it look like we were in some kind of hell. There were exposed pipes, cables, conduits, and flexible ducts running along the ceiling and all the walls. It smelled of diesel, sweat, and some other sharp organic scent—something pungent, like musk. I didn’t hear a thrum of engines or anything else mechanical.
You think this thing is mobile? I thought to Layla.
Why? You looking to go on a cruise?
No, I was just thinking that we might be getting kidnapped.
You’re really making me feel so much better.
Then again, we don’t have to be kidnapped. They could just kill us in here and dump our bodies in the river.
You’re a ray of sunshine, aren’t you?
“What do you want?” The voice was deep and resonant, like a pipe organ. When he spoke, I felt a vibration in my sternum. And it just about made my heart stop.
I don’t think any of us realized that there was someone sitting in front of us. He was on some kind of a chair, wedged into a narrow end of the cabin. It was too dark to tell for sure if any of the hoses and cables that looped all around his chair were actually connected to him, but it looked like some were.
And I realized I was sitting in front of someone very few people in the world had seen. There was a lot of conjecture, but nobody who ever got close enough to get a look at Mutagion had survived.
He seemed big, but he was sitting. There was a partial helmet or mask covering the left side of his head and face. The right side of his face was shiny and distorted. It looked a little like half-melted wax. There was a vision enhancer strapped over his right eye, glowing blue.
“I took a chance, letting you come in here. Make it worth my while or I just might flood this cabin with cyanogen chloride gas.” His voice was filtered through a vocal simulator, giving it an odd rhythm when it emphasized the wrong parts of words. “We’ll stuff your corpses in the torpedo tubes for safekeeping. How does that sound?”
That didn’t sound too good to me. I would have thought about how much I hated Javier for getting us into such a bad situation, but I guessed it was a better use of my time to figure out how we could get out of it. And other than not making Mutagion mad, I wasn’t coming up with any ideas.
“Well, the point is,” Javier started, “we believe the so-called heroes are nothing but a bunch of tools and henchmen, working for fascist governments to suffocate the—”
“If you came here thinking you were going to impress me by reciting some political lecture you got from a book, you made a big, big mistake. When you first made contact, you said you wanted to do business with me. What do you think you have that I need?”
“We did pull off that incident with the building. You know that was a Justice Force surveillance lab?”
“Of course, I knew that. Big deal. They got more. That showed me you can get stuff done, but it doesn’t mean I want to get in business with you.” Mutagion leaned forward. Now I could see how big he was. His head was almost twice the size of a normal man’s, with a large lower jaw and heavy, almost apelike brow.60 He put his enormous hands on his knees. His fingers were huge and flattened at the ends. “Let me make this perfectly clear,” Mutagion said, a gurgling undertone in his electronically modulated voice. “You have twenty seconds to convince me that you’re more use to me alive than dead.”
“We thought we could work with you. Since we have a common enemy—”
“I don’t need more partners and I don’t need friends. You got ten seconds left.”
There was one thing I could think of that I had that he might want, but there was no way I could make that offer. Not and still be able to live with myself.
“Here’s what we have,” Layla said. “We go to school in the same building as the Academy. The Monroe Academy?”
“Yes, well, I’m not looking to finish my high school education, so—”
“We have access to all the information on the hero families of every student.”
It was all I could do not to snap my head around to look at her. Are you crazy?
Hush.
You can’t—
I know what I’m doing. Just follow my lead.
Mutagion cocked his huge head, and that big jaw moved as he ground his teeth, thinking. Not all Phaetons had limited intellectual ability, like Gravel-Voice. No, Mutagion didn’t become one of the most dangerous and doggedly hunted criminals in the world by being stupid.
“What do you mean by ‘access’?” he asked.
Good question. I was wondering that myself.
“We can get access to all their information,” Javier said.
“How?”
Layla jerked a thumb at Boots. “She’s a genius with computers. Me, I’m a genius with biomech merge. And him,” she said, tilting her head toward me, “he’s just a straight-up genius.”
Mutagion began to cough, a horrible sound like a piece of wood getting snarled up in a table saw, from deep in his chest. He turned away from us and put his face over some kind of bowl while he coughed some more. The steel walls of the cabin didn’t exactly soften the sound.
When he turned back toward us, the exposed part of his face seemed to have darkened. “Yes, so. That’s terribly interesting. If I wanted to invite them to a party or send them e-mail, that information might be quite useful. But other than that, I’m not so sure what you have that I need.”
“Well, if you think about it,” I said, again surprising myself, “there’s a whole lot. There are more than a hundred kids in the Academy. Taking siblings into account, conservatively, we can say that there are around seventy-five families directly connected to the school. Then you have all the alumni. My colleague here just proposed sharing intel about some of the most famous and most important heroes in the whole country. Are you telling us that getting access to their private information—secret identities included—isn’t something that has a lot of value to you?” I still don’t quite know where this all came from. As much as I couldn’t stand so many of the Academy kids, I wasn’t actually planning to sell them and their families out to Mutagion. But
this salesmanship seemed to flow out of me without the slightest bit of effort. “If you don’t want that information, we can definitely find other people who do.”
He moved in his chair, and I winced when I heard sounds like thick sticks snapping from inside his body.
“Relax,” he said. “I never said I wasn’t interested. I said I needed to know more about what you had. So let’s say I do want this information. What do you want from me?”
I didn’t know exactly what the answer was, but it didn’t matter.
“Endorsement,” Javier said.
“Public recognition,” Boots said.
“An alliance,” Layla said.
Me, I just wanted to get out of there alive. I didn’t say anything at all.
Big League
Javier was so delirious with excitement while he was driving us back that I worried he might crash his car. We had already changed out of our costumes and stashed them in hidden compartments he had built into the car doors. Javier hadn’t stopped talking about our meeting. Finally he wound down and smiled while he shook his head to himself a bunch of times, lost in thought.
Boots was also excited. “Boy, was that, like, right out of a movie or what? It was just like U-Boat Patrol, only cooler.”
“So is he, like, handicapped or something?” Peanut asked.
“No, no. He’s just too big to stand up in that low-ceiling cabin,” Javier said. “Believe me, he is not crippled.”
“He might be,” Layla said. “And that coughing? What was that about?”
Javier nodded. “Ja, that was from when the Victory Squad trapped him in that São Paulo apartment building and burned it down. He got permanent lung damage before he escaped.”
Suddenly Javier was an expert on Mutagion.
“I think he was going for some amphibian type of mutation,” I said. “That could explain the breathing problems.”
“He looked kind of decrepit,” Layla said. “I wonder if maybe that’s why he’s talking to us at all. Like, maybe he’s breaking down and needs some dumb kids to do his dirty work for him?”
“No,” Javier insisted. “He is talking to us because he is awesome, and because he realizes we are going to be awesome, so he wants to encourage young talent.”
“What’s so awesome about us?” I asked.
“What a nice attitude,” Javier said. “That kind of confidence is exactly what we need on this team.”
Boots spoke up. “I think Brad is right. What makes us so special? Why are we so much better than all the established villains already out there? Lots of people want to work with Mutagion. Why would he pick us?”
“What the hell is wrong with all of you? We just got into business with one of the top villains in the entire world, and all you can do is criticize? Why can’t you be happy that we’re going to make it in the big leagues of villainy? What a bunch of whiners. Let me, at least, savor this sweet moment.”
He’s a little over the top, don’t you think? I thought to Layla.
Yeah, he gets like that.
For the record, I have no intention whatsoever of sharing all that info with Mutagion. Too many people who did nothing wrong will end up being collateral damage.
Yeah, there are tons of great kids in the Academy. They’re cogs in the giant hero wheel.
I thought to her, They’re kids of heroes. The little ones in the lower school, they didn’t do anything wrong. I’m not giving Mutagion the records. No way.
Then why’d you go along with the offer?
Because if I didn’t, it seemed like there was a good chance we would have ended up at the bottom of the river. There’s something about this arrangement that seems off. Are you getting that, too?
What, you mean aside from you making a deal that you’re not going to follow through on? she thought to me.
Yeah, aside from that.
Not sure.
I don’t know why we even got involved with Mutagion, I thought to her.
Javier wanted to.
So whatever Javier wants, Javier gets?
Easy now. Down, boy.
This whole night was pretty scary. I’m wondering if we got in over our heads.
A little late to be thinking about that.
No kidding. But we’re dealing with a really dangerous guy. I think we’re playing with fire.
Then we’d better play carefully so we don’t get burned.
Mutagion and his ilk are sick in their souls. That’s why these Phaetons tried to change themselves physically: they weren’t satisfied with what they were. They wanted to be more, to be like us. They tried to take on nature itself, but they failed. They failed because their basic evil cannot be changed, by themselves or anyone else. The only choice is to extinguish them.”
FLATLINER,
Co-leader of the Justice Force
We are not interested in perpetrating crimes, per se. We are devoted to bringing down the fascist institutions that support individuals who call themselves heroes. We will do whatever is necessary to achieve this aim. If that requires tearing the whole system down and starting anew, so be it.”
THE HELLIONS
Public message
Fight on, Phaetons!”
GRAFFITI SEEN IN MANY U.S. AND BRITISH CITIES;
Slogan of “Operation: Reset”
computer virus
Forget It
Ihad a hard time paying much attention in English class. Wittman was talking about Finnegans Wake, which was pretty boring and incomprehensible even if you were inclined to study it. (And I was not.) I was more focused on replaying our visit with Mutagion. It seemed almost like a dream: I couldn’t quite believe that we had met him, infamous as he was. And we’d survived it.
One big problem, though. I had made a promise to get information about the Academy students and their families. Without question, Boots could easily hack into the school’s database, but no way was I in favor of that. Even though Layla had brought it up, I was the one who had made that bad promise. I felt it was up to me to find something else we could offer Mutagion that he would want more than names and addresses of the hero families with kids enrolled at school.
“Okay, guys,” Wittman said. “The period’s about over. I can tell from the conversation that you haven’t been keeping up with the reading. So I think it’s time we pick up the pace a little. And since we’re about to go on break, instead of reading up to page 240, I want you to finish up the book before we come back. That means all 665 fun-filled, action-packed pages, friends. And read it carefully. We’ll have an in-class essay as soon—”
He stopped talking suddenly, and his face went a bit blank. That was due, no doubt, to my stealth mind incursion and clandestine command projection.61
He blinked, then smiled. “You know what? I changed my mind. Any objections if we just call it quits on this book?”
A chorus of shouts of “No!” and “Dump it!” and “Thank you!”
“Yeah, to tell you the truth,” Wittman said, “I never liked it much anyway. No homework. Have yourselves a good break.”
That was almost too easy. Then it occurred to me: maybe that’s what I could offer Mutagion. I was becoming a pretty good telepath. Maybe he would want to use my skills. There were just a few more that I wanted to hone.
That night at the lair, I wanted to try something. Layla, Boots, and I were politely listening to Javier go on about how magnifique it was that he’d gotten us into business with Mutagion and how lucky we were to have him leading the team. I wasn’t paying too much attention; I wanted to get my little experiment started.
Peanut was on the floor, his back up against the couch and his massive legs straight out in front of him, crossed at the ankles. He was studying the video game he was playing with the same concentration you’d expect to see i
n someone performing microsurgery. I walked over and sat on the couch, looking at the back of his big head.
“Hey, Brad,” he said, his attention still riveted on the monitor. “What’s going on?”
“Nothing much. How are things with you? How’s your little brother doing?”
“Pretty good. He’s going to another school now.”
“Yeah, you mentioned that he might. How’s that?”
“A whole lot better for him. I’m glad he got in.”
“That’s great.” I wrote a feeling of physical warmth to him. After a minute, he took one hand off the game controller and used his shirt to wipe his forehead. “Damn! Is it hot in here or what?” he asked loudly.
Nobody responded. Layla and Boots were still listening (or pretending to listen) to Javier’s self-aggrandizing bombast about his great feat of making the initial contact with Mutagion. “Feels fine to me,” I said to Peanut. “Maybe even a little chilly.”
“Really? I feel kind of hot.” He shrugged.
I’m thirsty, I thought to him. I had been working hard on this skill, clandestine command projection. It had worked easily on Wittman earlier, so I figured it would take practically no effort to make it work on Peanut.
“I’m thirsty,” he said, and he got up to go to the little kitchen. Peanut was so easy.62 I followed him.
“Want some?” he said. He held up a bottle of soda when I leaned against the doorframe.
“No, thanks. I’m good. Hey, I’ve always meant to ask you: what’s the story with them calling you ‘Peanut’?”
“Oh, yeah. It’s pretty funny. Javier thought it up. It’s because when I started on Myomeg, I had this crazy appetite and I wanted to keep my protein intake, like, real high, so I put peanut butter on everything I ate. Even steak! So Javier and the girls called me ‘Peanut’ because of that.”
I nodded and smiled. “Well, actually, that’s not the real reason. They call you that because of a condition called testicular atrophy. One of the negative side effects of taking Myomegamorpherone.”
