by Andy Briggs
“I have enough weapons to launch an assault—”
“Your weapons are so old that they fall apart when you pull the trigger!” snapped Basilisk. “Now we will temporarily overload the Web site with a virus. That will buy us time, and create enough of a diversion to make the Primes go into hiding. Then we implement phase two by recruiting a couple of other villains I have in mind. They will help us take out the Hero Foundation’s satellite system.”
“I don’t understand.”
Basilisk took a deep breath. Had it been anyone else, he would have been shouting at the top of his lungs. He at least had to pretend that he respected Worm.
“Remember, we want to use Hero.com to fight the Council. We don’t want to destroy the Web site. We need to paralyze it long enough for us to bring down the Foundation’s satellite. And then, even if their technicians get the Web site back up and running, they’ll have no means of distributing the superpowers.”
“Okay. I get it. I think.”
“When we get to the satellite I’ll be able to pinpoint the exact position of the Foundation’s headquarters.”
“And then we attack?”
“Yes. Phase three, we knock some heads together. They will have no heroes willing to lay their lives on the line to stop us.”
“That I understand!” Worm was practically dancing with glee. If he achieved what Basilisk was promising, then he would have powers at his fingertips equal to the Council’s. And if the plan failed, he still had Basilisk—dead or alive—to hand over to the Council instead. “Then what are we waiting for? Let’s do it!”
“We’ve been waiting for your pea-sized brain to work out what the plan is,” Basilisk mumbled under his breath as he pulled a slim USB memory stick from the depths of his cloak. He examined it as if it were a precious gem.
“Time to exercise your particular talent.”
The computer virus on the USB stick was complex by any standards, and it had taken Basilisk the last few weeks to create it. He had swiped the basic structure from several nasty viruses that had recently stricken big businesses, combined with his working knowledge of Hero.com. He had a good knowledge of the hero Web site because he’d been one of the people who had helped steal it and convert it to Villain.net.
When he inserted the virus into the Ground Station system, it had been immediately isolated by the system’s antiviral software. He needed Worm to bypass that.
Worm dipped his finger into the system. He closed his eyes, visualizing the cyber world that his atoms were navigating through. He could “see” Basilisk’s virus as a lump of electrons. He literally poked the malicious code past the security software and into the system. Only then could its devastating effects run free.
The virus pinged from the Ground Station to the Hero Foundation’s private satellite, and then back down to the Foundation headquarters, where it buried itself in the HERO servers before sending a pulse of corrupted data outward.
The virus was subtle, just enough to trip the Foundation’s computer systems, in the same way a power surge blows a fuse. As Foundation technicians rushed to try to fix the damage, the power surge slowly rippled through the satellite system in a destructive wave that would take hours to radiate out.
The next day brought stormy showers, which made Toby apprehensive. He was half-expecting Doc Tempest to smash through the windows and sweep him away. That thought, coupled with the memory of fighting Tempest in his ice base and seeing the super-fiend crushed under a block of ice, still haunted his dreams, even though it had been a while ago—one of his very first Hero missions. And now he had the smothering memory of nearly drowning to contend with.
All in all, Toby was beginning to worry that the superhero business was seriously stressing him out.
But today was a lazy Sunday, and he and Lorna had congratulated each other on successfully sneaking home exceptionally late during the night without their parents finding out. They hoped Pete and Emily had had the same good luck.
Walking down the stairs, Toby massaged his shoulder where the captain had hit him. Luckily he hadn’t broken or dislocated it, but the skin sported a nasty purple-brown bruise that was tender to the touch. He turned into the living room—but found himself in the kitchen instead. They had moved to a new house after their old one was declared unsafe and demolished after Doc Tempest’s attack. Toby liked the new house. It was a little bigger and still had that “new” smell. And right now it was filled with Christmas decorations that added to the excitement of the season.
He found Lorna in the living room with his mother and father, with a look on her face that warned him of what was happening. The television was on and his father was about to show them, yet again, video footage of his latest archaeology dig in Mexico.
John Wilkinson was a tall, thin man who always got excited over seemingly mundane things. Toby usually found him entertaining, but after watching the same footage over and over, the novelty had completely worn off.
Toby sat down next to his mother, Sarah, and offered a warm “good morning.” Sarah returned his smile, and then exchanged pleasantly surprised looks with her husband. After the house had been struck by the tornado, she remembered nothing other than waking up in a field not far from home. But since then Toby had been incredibly civil toward her. He used to refuse a hug or any sign of affection, but now he did what she asked almost without question.
Toby had once thought his father was a closet superhero rather than an archaeologist. But as it turned out there wasn’t much more to his dad than met the eye.
“I just want to run through this again,” said John Wilkinson excitedly. “I’m going to show it at the museum this evening before the public opening of my exhibition on Tuesday, so I need to keep it straight in my head.”
He sat on his chair and looked around for the remote control, which he had a habit of always misplacing. Lorna glanced at Toby and shook her head. She buried herself in the broad pages of a glossy magazine, a world of celebrity gossip.
“Here we go,” John exclaimed as he found the remote, which was tucked under his leg. Toby had been watching, out of the corner of his eye, the TV program that had been on. It was about the new Russian space shuttle ferrying tourists into space from Kazakhstan. Both he and Lorna were desperate to try it, but at twenty million dollars it was just a little too expensive.
John hit the “play” button and the gleaming shuttle was replaced by shaky camcorder images of his archaeology dig. To Toby’s untrained eyes it showed a mound of rubble among thick jungle.
“The jungle was so dense it took us two days to hack a narrow track through to the site,” his father narrated. Then he suddenly looked up with a frown. “Do you think I should tell them about the trip home? Add a little more drama?”
“No, John,” Sarah said firmly.
Again, Lorna peeked from behind her magazine and gave Toby a peculiar look.
John had cut the dig short to fly home after he had heard that a tornado had demolished his house and injured his wife. As the airplane was getting ready to land, the captain reported problems with the landing gear. John had panicked and called his wife on the inflight phone, convinced they were going to crash. But something odd had happened minutes later as the aircraft circled the runway. John could have sworn he’d seen something flying alongside the plane. A minute later, the captain announced that the front wheel had now successfully extended and they could safely land.
Toby forced himself to watch the footage and listen to his father’s increasingly excited narration as his team uncovered the tomb of some long-lost Mayan emperor. His father paced the room as he described the tension of opening the tomb, then lowered his voice to a whisper when he revealed that they had only examined the outer chamber before he was called away. The inner chamber still lay waiting for them to explore.
Toby stifled a yawn as the camera zoomed in on some symbols and murals on the wall. He had seen the ritualistic swirling icon so many times it had started to seep into his dreams, an
d his father’s handheld camera work was beginning to make him feel nauseous. His dad might be a fantastic archaeologist, but he was a lousy cameraman—as all of their family photos proved.
The rest of the day passed in the inert stillness of an average Sunday. During the early evening Emily turned up and disappeared with Lorna into Lorna’s room. Sarah and John left for the museum as Pete arrived. And a night without the parents snooping around meant a night to explore Hero.com.
Pete looked at Toby with a frown.
“Man, you look terrible.”
“Thanks, Pete. I haven’t been sleeping very well.”
“Why?”
“Bad dreams. What about you? I mean, after everything we’ve been doing, doesn’t it get to you?”
Pete shrugged and pushed past his friend. “Nah. If anything, I sleep better. More exercise than I’m used to!”
Pete made his way into the Wilkinsons’ new office. It looked pretty much the same as the old one: it had not taken Toby’s father long to give it that lived-in effect. Their old computer hard drive had been removed from Pete’s computer and installed in a brand-new system that they had bought with the insurance money.
“The others here?” Pete asked as he sat down in front of the computer and booted it up.
Toby didn’t answer right away. He had noticed that Pete’s confidence had increased almost to the point of impoliteness since they had discovered the Web site.
“Do you mind?” Toby said, pointing to the chair. Pete looked startled for a second before he stood up and pulled over a free chair, mumbling, like old Pete.
“Course, sorry. Just getting excited. So where are they?”
“Right here,” Emily said as she entered with Lorna. “Toby bossing you around again?”
“Yeah,” Pete said with a laugh. Toby looked at him sideways; was it his imagination or was there a peeved tone to the laugh? Lorna and Emily pulled up chairs and didn’t seem to notice.
“How you feeling after your swim yesterday?” Emily asked Toby with concern.
“Shoulder’s killing me and my ears still feel like I’ve got half the sea in them, but that’ll go away eventually.”
Emily squeezed his uninjured shoulder in a gesture of solidarity. Toby shifted uncomfortably, aware that Pete was giving him an odd look.
They didn’t waste any time logging on to the Internet, and within a few seconds they were on Hero.com. Pete pressed a greasy finger on the screen.
“Look! Our ‘Heroic score’ has gone up!”
Sure enough, the points allotted by the Web site for each successful mission had increased, which was a good thing. If they failed the missions, then they would have to pay out of pocket to use the powers, until they’d built up enough credit through their successful deeds. At least the Heroism points meant they could download powers for free.
Toby had hoped to see a video message from Chameleon waiting for them on the site. He had spoken to him online a few times for advice. But he hadn’t yet told the others that.
“Are we actually going to do another mission tonight?” Emily asked in a weary voice.
“What’s up? Bored already?” goaded Pete.
“No. Tired. And we have school tomorrow.”
“Great,” Pete said without enthusiasm. “Dunno why they didn’t just let us have Monday off.”
It was an odd week for them. Tuesday and Wednesday had been allocated as study days while the school was closed so that the woodworking department, which had mysteriously burned down a few weeks ago, could be demolished.
“Let’s just look at the instruction manual then,” Toby said.
“Exciting,” Pete mumbled unenthusiastically.
Toby moved past several icons on the screen, none of which gave any obvious indication of what they represented. He stopped at one that depicted a wrench. The screen was replaced by reams of text that shimmered through numerous languages before settling on English. It did look like a technical manual, with icons and flow diagrams and simple illustrations.
Pete looked at him with a curious frown. “You found that pretty quickly.”
When they had first met Chameleon, the shape-changing hero had expressed surprise that they hadn’t read the Web site’s instructions. Toby had searched through the site at the earliest opportunity and finally located it after several days of searching.
Pete shifted nervously in his chair. “So you’ve been on the site?”
“I wanted to read this.”
“Been on it a lot?” Pete asked, probing for information.
Emily and Lorna exchanged a look. They knew what Pete was getting at; he’d been subtly hinting at it for weeks.
“There’s a lot to read,” Toby said enthusiastically, oblivious to the edge in Pete’s voice. He circled the mouse pointer around a section of the screen. “Like this section gives the basics of how the powers are transferred …” He trailed off when he became aware of the atmosphere in the room. Pete was staring hard at him. “What?”
“I’m just pointing out that you’ve been on our Web site a lot lately. Without us.”
Toby groaned. “Come on, Pete. Don’t start.”
“Well, it’s not fair that you have access to it but we don’t. We found it together—”
“On my computer!”
“On Dad’s computer,” Lorna corrected him. Toby threw her an annoyed glance.
Pete thumped the desk. “Your computer? Is that how it is now?”
“I didn’t mean—”
“We should all take turns at reviewing the Web site,” Pete continued. “Or copy your hard drive so we all have it. It’s just not fair that we have to go through you all the time.”
“What’s the point?” said Toby. “We’re a team, we do things together.”
“Exactly! That’s my poi—”
A piercing feedback shriek from the computer’s speakers drowned him out. At that exact moment the ceiling lights flickered and the monitor screen strobed through a rainbow of colors before it suddenly exploded in a supernova blast of light.
Infection
Thick fingers of electricity sprang from the monitor and raked across the floor and ceiling. Books shot off shelves and stacks of papers and cups of pens flew off the desk. Pete and Lorna toppled backward from their chairs, while Toby and Emily both pitched forward and hid under the desk as the light storm ravaged the office.
With a loud crack the lightning fizzled out. Toby peered cautiously over the desk. The room was awash with scattered papers, but luckily nothing seemed damaged; it was just as though a gust of wind had blown through the house.
Or a tornado had hit it, thought Toby darkly.
Pete checked his clothing; they had all been struck by the lightning but he could see no physical marks. He looked up to see the others staring at him with wide grins.
“Your hair!” giggled Emily. “It’s sticking up everywhere!”
“My hair? You look pretty ridiculous too!”
Everybody’s hair was standing on end, thin whispers of smoke rising from each of them. Pete had mysteriously managed to get black smudges across his cheeks.
“What just happened?” he asked, standing up.
Emily brushed away the cordless phone that had fallen on her. “It felt like I was being tickled.”
They looked at the screen. The Hero.com Web site was still there but a warning box had popped up on the screen:
“MALFUNCTION: Hero.com is temporarily off-line. Please try again later.”
Pete pointed an accusing finger at Toby. “You broke it!”
“Don’t be stupid.”
“Then what happened?”
Toby found the wireless mouse halfway across the room and placed it back on the desk. He tried clicking on the icons but the computer just beeped stubbornly in response. Frustrated, he closed the browser. “Maybe it was a power surge? The site’s been running sort of funny lately. Remember what happened yesterday?”
Pete huffed. “So we can’t do anything?”
“We can always try again later,” Toby said thoughtfully. “Should be working then. In the meantime we’d better clean up.”
“Exciting,” mumbled Pete.
“I got a new game for my Xbox. Afterward you can let me beat you at that.”
The rest of the evening passed in relative peace. When they tried Hero.com later it was still down. That led Pete to speculate darkly over the fate of their heroic exploits.
Basilisk’s mood was as dark as Pete’s. When he got impatient he liked to pace briskly back and forth, since it made him seem imposing to his subordinates. Right now he wished he could pace through the forest clearing, but his injured leg wasn’t regenerating. He resented the fact he had to prop himself up using a cane. Even though it was black carbon fiber, he still felt it made him look vulnerable.
He had been waiting for almost an hour in the pine forest clearing. The clouds threatened rain and he could see his own breath as he exhaled. He bitterly reflected that it was a far cry from his tropical paradise, which now lay in ruins after his first scheme to topple the Council of Evil had failed. And he felt angry that he was under the thumb of the bounty hunter. Of course, Worm was not around at the moment so he could simply walk away—but the pint-size villain would soon be on his tail. And he still needed Worm to carry out his plans. Basilisk was nothing if not resourceful. If things with Worm succeeded, then it would save Basilisk an awful lot of effort in executing it all on his own. And afterward he would deal with the diminutive Worm—he was a relic of the history books and didn’t belong in a modern world.
A shriek in the forest snapped Basilisk from his ruminations. It was probably an owl. He looked across at the rogue he had recruited, who was leaning against a tree. Like him, she was a Prime—somebody who had the latent superpowers from birth, waiting for the chance to burst to life, usually in times of stress, or the old favorite: an industrial accident.
In her mid-twenties, she was tall and lithe with a tight white cowl over her head, her eyes visible through narrow slits. She pulled a stick of gum from the recesses of a cape that hung across her shoulders; no doubt keeping her warm, thought Basilisk as he shivered. When the woman moved, the cape seemed to possess a life of its own as it moved unnaturally, fluttering impossibly large behind her.
