“I think it’s fun to give you a chance to be a real reporter,” Kira shrugs. “Beat my story and maybe you’ll keep your job after all. Consider me telling you this a repayment of the debt I owe you for letting me break the Kid/Duplication Girl relationship.”
13
Jason thrusts into Melody from a good place. Sex with his newest girlfriend doesn’t come with the psychological damage inflicted by Sandra Flack or Mrs. Overing, or with the passionate abandon experienced with Jula, Becca, or Duplication Girl. If this isn’t love, this is something close to it.
That it’s boring sex — a repetitive pattern of some fondling, some oral, missionary only — is something he tells himself is a good thing. Looking back, the goal with the others always seemed to treat sex the same way superheroes treat everything in their lifestyle: exaggerated and dramatic, like some brighter, splashier version of ordinary life. Normal rules never apply to capes, so why should societal norms conform?
He often thinks of Jula, Becca, and Duplication Girl as he slowly pumps into Melody, especially on nights when she takes her nerd glasses off and he sees a face that’s plainer than he would like. She doesn’t like him to talk during sex, especially if he uses the same words he used with Deege. He’s seen a few DGs around Vegas, but they never talk to him. Some still like him, some hate him, but all of them blame him for what happened to their central body, even if it was one of them who killed her.
Becca seems well. Fake Out is becoming a vital part of the Revolutionaries’ support staff. He thinks now he should have spent more time thinking about the non-sexual aspects of their relationship. She was beautiful and funny and smart and damaged by what her uncle put her through. Melody has information about Becca’s past, she claims, but wants to discuss it after dinner.
It’s his night to cook, and this pre-boiling-the-water-and-dropping-in-the-elbow-macaroni tryst is a way for him to add a little spice to the night. A way to … what? Be the man of the relationship? What does that even mean?
Melody starts to moan and her lips are wetted by her wandering tongue. There is an urge to use words to bring her forward, to push her further, but he resists and his mind replays a therapy session inside the Fort.
“You were damaged as a result of what Sandra Flack did to you,” Psychic Navigator had told him during one of their first therapy sessions. “Of what Domina Tricks did to you through the mind-controlled Mrs. Overing. She used her Influence Net, a large net, made of black rope, that makes a victim susceptible to her commands. This is important, Jason. The I-Net cannot make you do something you don’t want to do, but it can make you do something you prevent yourself from doing. Do you understand the difference?”
“Not really.”
“Do you want to shove your dick between Striped Star’s tits?”
“What? Jesus, Navigator, you can’t say that!”
“Exactly,” he said. “I can’t say it, but I can’t deny that somewhere inside of me is the truth that I would do it, if given the opportunity. That’s what the Influence Net can do. If Domina can plug into something you want, she can break down whatever moral or social blocks you construct to keep you from doing it. Mrs. Overing fantasized about you, just as you fantasized about her, and so you were both susceptible to Domina breaking down the walls that you built to prevent that action.”
“That’s so messed up.”
Psychic Navigator nodded. “These are the obstacles we must overcome in your development. Even what Winton did to you by stealing memories of these events from your mind and placing them inside the Amulet of Anamnesis has stunted your development by denying your mind its ability to cope with problems in the long-term. That does not absolve you of the responsibility for what you put Belle Flower through on an emotional level, or Duplication Girl on a largely physical level.”
“What about Becca?”
“It is your healthiest relationship,” Navigator told him. “Yes, she turned out to be a villain, but from your perspective, there are more positive than negative aspects in how you treated her. Did you love her?”
“I loved being with her.”
“Do you understand why those are different things?”
“I do. I think. No, no, I do understand.”
He starts to rock faster into Melody as the phone rings. When the answering machine picks up, it’s the agent for a rising pop star who’s performing in Vegas next weekend. She’s interested in setting Kid Rapscallion up with the pop star for a date.
“It will be good press for you both,” the agent says and hangs up.
Melody says nothing, but turns her head to the side when he tries to kiss her. She’s a sophomore at UNLV but this is different than his relationship with Nancy had been.
This, at least, is what he tells himself as he finishes inside of her.
“Wash your hands before you make dinner,” Melody says.
“Yes, dear,” he replies, his mind thinking ahead to what he wants to do with the pop star.
14
Jason fills the pot with tap water and sets it on his stove, flipping the burner’s dial to “High.” He has moved out of the Grand Vegas and into a small duplex on the outskirts of the city, though Old Man Cuellers still allows him a free room at the casino anytime he wants it. Melody is taking a shower, and he is to have dinner as ready as possible for when she exits.
She does not like showering together, though she will do it if he pushes her.
Pre-9/11, he would have pushed her, but since Deege’s murder and his brief imprisonment in the Fort by Belle Flower and Becca, he has tried to be a better person. There were therapy sessions with Navigator and chemical therapy with the Big Brains. Some part of his mind still scoffs at himself for attempting to be … what? A hero? A good guy? Jason doesn’t think he’ll ever truly be these things but Psychic Navigator has helped him see that part of a person is forged by the experiences of youth, and Jason’s experiences were neither normal nor healthy.
“Your original parents abandoned you when you were four,” Navigator explained, handing him the same kind of report on Edward and Ingrid Kitmore that he might hand him about Mr. Monster or Pot Kettle Black. “There is no dramatic origin attached to this, I am afraid. They are not alien refugees or spies or brilliant chemical engineers, on the run from a foreign power. He is a drug addict and she was a nurse that was eventually fired for feeding that addiction. A year after they abandoned you, their bodies were found in Khutzeymateen Grizzly Bear Sanctuary, torn apart and partially digested. Copious amounts of heroin, speed, and crack cocaine were found in their belongings.
“You then spent years bouncing around various orphanages and foster homes. Most of these experiences were bad, some were good, but all of them were temporary. We can start giving you the foundational support you have lacked, if you are willing.”
The water begins to boil, and he reaches for the package of macaroni.
He hates his life.
15
“This is really good, Jason,” Melody smiles.
“It’s not tough,” he smiles back, looking down at the elbow macaroni with marinara sauce in the center of the table, the leaf-less salad bowl on its left, and a small loaf of garlic bread on the right.
“Remember the first time you tried to cook it?” Melody asks playfully.
“Boy, do I,” he says, smiling, half-hoping this is all some sick game of Domina’s to convince him that being boring is actually the right way to live.
16
Jason knows not to press Melody for information, that she will tell him when she’s ready and only when she’s ready. It’s her small way of controlling him — one of them, anyway — and what made him seethe when she first started staying over is now something he accepted.
“Not every battle,” Psychic Navigator told him, “is worth fighting.”
Melody does the dishes and he dries them and he tries hard to keep his mind focused on what she wants to talk about: Chandler and Monica’s decision to have a baby. Jason doesn’t
know if this is a conversation that’s really about the TV show or about the two of them, but he quickly does his part of the conversation by saying, “I’m way behind on my Friends viewing, hon. Tell me about it.”
As she talks, his mind wanders to all the villains he’s defeated in the past week: Thumbtack & Thimble, Punch Baby, Catagin&tonic (dumbest name ever), Bottled Lightning, Stormy Wednesday (her powers literally only work on Wednesdays), Rich White Dudes, and the new team of Podunk Pete and Prospector Patty.
All of them losers.
“Fucking 9/11,” he mumbles.
“What’s that?” Melody asks, handing him a white plate to dry.
“Nothing,” Jason smiles. “Just starting to think about tonight’s patrol.”
“85th and Taunton,” Melody says, kissing his arm. “Abandoned factory.”
“What would super villains do without abandoned factories?”
“Ugh,” Melody giggles. “We’d probably have to work in a cubicle.”
17
Melody Macomber is #16 in the 20-Sided Dice.
They’re not much more respectable than Punch Baby (he’s a robot baby who punches people) or Catagin&tonic (she can make any drink become a gin and tonic that puts a drinker to sleep), but there’s twenty of them, so they occasionally get away with something.
As Jason pulls off his clothes and pulls on his costume, he injects himself with a vial of Francis’ Peak solution.
“Better than working out,” he mumbles to himself, wondering if he has to worry about his drugs being taken away after Francis’ trial.
18
The abandoned factory is really just a large garage. Some kind of custom design shop for automobiles, Kid Rapscallion discovers. He walks around in the dark, shining a flashlight across dusty tools and supplies, and a few old muscle cars that need too many repairs to ever be highly profitable.
The past few months have been dreadful for superheroes. Not only is the public confidence in them at an all-time low, the big hitting villains have largely dried up. Either they’re hiding or the Revolutionaries have swooped down to pick them up, leaving heroes like Kid to fight villains no one has ever heard of before. He finds himself actually disappointed when Wednesday rolls around and Stormy doesn’t try to make it rain over a mini golf course.
He reminds himself he’s still only 20 and that he’s got a lifetime of being a superhero ahead of him (what else would he do?), but for the first time in his brief career, being a superhero isn’t fun.
It’s boring.
It’s work.
But honestly, what else would he do?
19
Jason is almost convinced there is nothing here, and that this is another dead end in his search to find the person impersonating Domina Tricks that captured and bound Colbie, but didn’t, the young girl swears, touch her beneath her purple and white uniform.
He has patiently moved from room to room, checking inside every car and under every bench and behind every door. Melody has never led him wrong, which makes him start to wonder if he’s being played.
“This is the danger of a relationship with someone in our life,” Psychic Navigator had told him in therapy, when Jason first revealed who he was dating. “The constant questioning of motives can be poisonous in a relationship.”
Melody has never done anything to suggest she’s playing him, but Jason can’t deny the rush of blood he feels at the idea of her playing him. It’s not healthy to think this way, but it’s not boring. He shakes his head, trying to get Domina out of it. It sounds like she’s doing the same things to Colbie that she did to him: capture, bondage, teasing, but keeping the hands outside the costume.
There is one final room to check, the building’s only upstairs room. The first floor is a showcase for the shop’s work, but whatever nice cars were once here have been removed. Kid moves up the single, wide staircase in the back corner to the second floor, where he assumes the garage’s offices are held. His feet leave the stairs and hit the linoleum floor and his flashlight hits a dark-haired woman in leather and latex.
“Domina,” he whispers, as her Influence Net falls from the ceiling to cover him.
20
“How is this possible?” he asks, trying to push the net off of him.
“You do not want to leave,” Domina says.
“The hell I don’t,” he says, but his hands fall limply to his side. The Influence Net causes its victims to become susceptible to Domina’s commands, and Jason knows what it’s power can do and knows he really doesn't want to leave because then he won’t get the answers he needs.
“You want to know if I am really me, so walk to me and take a look,” Domina commands and Kid Rapscallion does just that, shuffling across the dirty floor to the middle of what he now sees is an entrance area. To his right and behind him are couches. On his left is a table with chairs. Ahead of his is a service counter and behind that are the offices of the shop’s former owners.
Kid’s eyes glance over them on their way to examining Domina. She looks exactly like she always had: mid-30s, cultured, her curved body encased in black latex and leather. Shaking her head, Jason watches her black curls spring around her face.
“How …?” he asks.
“Simple,” Domina smiles, reaching into the net to run a latex-encased finger under Kid’s chin. “Francis never shot me.”
21
“I saw him shoot you,” Kid Rapscallion seethes.
“You saw what I told you to see,” Domina smiles. “You don’t really think Francis could kill his daughter, do you?”
“Why are you back?”
Domina laughs, letting her finger slowly trail down his body. “Daddy’s on trial. It’s not like he can stop me, anymore.”
“He will if you keep hurting Colbie,” Kid promises.
“No, he won’t,” Domina smiles. “Ms. Stagger keeps him locked up during the trial and he is not allowed to have any communication with his latest sidekick. It’s up to you to stop me,” she says, letting her finger move over the bulge in his pants. “Not that you want to.”
“You’re sick.”
“Always and forever,” she laughs.
“What do you really want?”
“I want to break Daddy’s heart,” she says, “and there’s only really fantastic way to do that.” Domina steps in close and grabs the Influence Net, pushing it back tightly over Jason’s face. “Kiss me,” she says, and he does.
22
“How was your night?” Melody says from the couch as Jason enters through the front door, his Kid Rapscallion costume in the backpack slung over his shoulder.
“Disgusting,” he says, shaking his head. “That garage you sent me to is filthy.” He forces a wink. “Wanna do it right here on the floor?”
“Shower!” she yells, smiling and making a gross face.
23
The hot water can’t erase the shame of what he’s done.
Domina’s voice rings in his head. “You will have sex with me whenever I want it,” she said, “and if you do that, I’ll leave Colbie and Francis alone. Now stop pretending you’re a nice guy happy with your nice little boring girlfriend and tell me every dirty, filthy thing you’ve ever wanted to do to me.”
24
“Captain Foggen?”
“Yes?” Trisha says, answering her phone in the dark. The clock on the wall tells her it’s 3:52 am. She’s been sleeping for all of thirteen minutes.
“The hotline received a call from Kid Rapscallion,” one of the night staff tells her. “He says there’s something you need to see at 85th and Taunton.”
“What’s there?”
“An abando—”
“What’s there that we need to see?”
“He did not say, ma’am, but he insisted you needed to see it for yourself, and that after you did he’d be waiting for you inside his suite at the Grand Vegas.”
25
“Kid Rapscallion is dating a member of 20SD?” Nancy asks Andres. “Are you ki
dding me?”
He shakes his head and laughs. “Nope. Number 16 and him have been seeing each other for weeks.”
“What the hell is he thinking?”
“I think he likes her,” Andres says. “I don’t know, though, she doesn’t exactly bring him around to group meetings.”
“How did you find out about it?”
“Number 1 told me to follow her,” he shrugs. “He’s rather protective of her, actually. It’s a little creepy.”
Nancy hates all of this. She doesn’t mind that Jason is dating someone because it’s clear he’s never going to date her, but if he actually likes this woman it would explain why he hasn’t tried to sleep with her in months.
She hates that she misses these trysts, and hates that 20SD is turning out to be something of a joke. “Look, Andres,” she says, “I know I said I needed better information, but I don’t really care who Kid Rap puts his dick in.”
“Really? Because you looked pretty mad when I just told you.”
“I’m mad that he’s keeping information from me,” Nancy says, which is also true. “Do you have anything else? Anything big?” she asks, thinking of Kira’s threat. “Maybe anything about the Rapscallion trial?”
“Nope,” he says, smiling. “Do you want to … you know. You can call me Kid, again, if you want. I’ve still got the costume.”
“Not tonight, Andres,” she says. “I’ve got to go find me a story.”
26
Captain Trisha Foggen, head of Homeland Security’s Capes Division, looks at the scene before her in the entrance area of a former garage, calmly and professionally. There is no hint of an emotional reaction on her exterior, but internally, she admits she is surprised that a second-level hero like Kid Rapscallion was capable of this:
Used to Be: The Kid Rapscallion Story Page 15
