Harper gasped.
“I know, it’s bad, believe me. And you won’t, um, read about this stuff in the news. I shouldn’t be telling you.”
She took a step closer to him and placed a hand on his chest.
“You trust me?” she asked, her eyes softening.
“I do.”
Her hand dropped below his waist, where she lightly moved it over the front of his pants.
Yep, a keeper, he thought as he watched her walk back to his bedroom. A good view, too. One of his favorites.
It was almost a relief when she left; the sexual tension between them was thick as smog and it took every ounce of willpower he had not to go for it.
Roman finished getting dressed, combed his white hair, and mentally arranged for a teleport.
I need to go to the Centralian Lottery Commission, he thought aloud, and it was only a few seconds later when he got the reply.
A teleporter will arrive at your location shortly. Please make sure there is a four-foot-radius circle around your body.
Roman did as instructed, and he was adjusting the front of his jacket when a male teleporter wearing Centralian government clothing appeared, touched his arm, and whisked him away to the Centralian Lottery Commission.
They arrived in a flash and the teleporter disappeared again, leaving Roman standing there with a thin smile on his face.
It was a cool day, with a slight breeze that carried over the smell of baked goods from the bakery across the street. Roman’s stomach grumbled; he was hungry, but he could grab a snack later.
More commotion turned his attention back to the Lottery Commission.
The front was heavily guarded, not because of what lay inside as much as people trying to see who’d won the Hero Ticket.
This kind of crowd scared the hell out of Roman, but there were telepaths outside the main entrance next to the Type I security guards, and all he had to do was think, I have the winning ticket.
A female telepath in Centralian government clothing sensed him and immediately replied, Thank you, Mr. Martin. I have verified that you indeed have the winning ticket. Please step away from the crowd and walk toward the trolley stop one block away. A teleporter will escort you inside, where you’ll be able to claim your prize. Next time, please tell the teleservice that you have a winning ticket so that you may port directly into the winner’s chamber.
You mean I can win this thing twice? Roman thought back, not trying to be snarky but coming off that way.
Please move to the agreed-upon location, Mr. Martin.
“So that’s how it works,” he whispered as he moved away from the crowd.
A teleporter appeared and grabbed Roman, and a second later he was standing in front of a large pair of doors framed by Centralia’s golden flags.
The doors opened and a short woman stepped out, clipboard in hand. She wore her government-issued clothing in a way that accented her cleavage—clearly her best feature—and as she approached Roman, she lifted her nose into the air.
“The Hero Ticket, please, and your identification,” she said, her nose held high.
Roman provided both the items and she held each individually, light pouring out of her eyes as she scanned them.
Type IV, Class E, Roman thought as she handed the documents back to him.
“Congratulations,” she said, then turned away. “Follow me.”
Chapter Twelve: Paris Pretzel
“Roman Martin is my asset,” Paris told Nadine, whom she’d strung upside down in the back room of a warehouse off 19th Street.
Nadine had heard her the first time, but feigned as if she hadn’t, her eyes still clenched shut as she mentally focused on her Zero Ring, her thumb slowly pressing onto a groove on its bottom.
“I will tell you once more: we have plans for Roman, and this is your only warning. If you get in the way, not only will I see to it that you’re exposed, but I will personally make sure your family is well taken care of back in the East. And by taken care of, I mean I will kill them. Your father and your mother.”
Nadine’s throat quivered. She was acquainted with Paris Renara and had encountered the spy who doubled as a super (or super who doubled as a spy) several times before.
“Nod if you understand what I’m telling you,” said Paris. “Roman is ours.”
Nadine opened her eyes and settled them on the upside-down image of Paris—dark bangs framing her eyes, slim figure, bitchy look on her face. She squinted one eye and looked at Paris with the other.
“You’re really fucking stupid, aren’t you?” she asked.
Paris licked her lips, her elastic tongue falling out of her mouth as she sneered at Nadine.
“If you want to lick me, then lick me,” Nadine said. “And fuck your Type IV shit power anyway.”
That did it.
Paris’s tongue came flying out of her mouth and wrapped around Nadine’s throat. It started to squeeze, and just as Paris’s lips curved into the wicked grin of someone who had overpowered another, Nadine activated her ring.
Paris’s tongue loosened up, and Nadine grabbed onto the limp appendage as Paris stumbled backward.
A desperate look on her face, Paris tried desperately to use some of her abilities, any of her abilities, all to no avail. Nothing happened, and as panic came over her, Nadine pulled Paris closer.
And Nadine was strong.
That was something her physique betrayed; she’d purposely not muscled up just to keep her appearance. But while she wasn’t quite an exemplar, Nadine had the strength of two men, a gift passed down to her by her grandfather, an actual super, a famous one in the East.
It only took a few seconds for Nadine to yank Paris over to her, pull her fist back, and knock Paris the hell out, still holding the woman’s elastic tongue with her free hand.
Rocking back and forth, Nadine used her strong core to bring herself up to her feet, where she could work getting free.
She undid the knot and thrust her upper body forward as she fell. Rather than land on her head or the back of her neck, Nadine landed on her knees, her fall partially cushioned by Paris’s body.
Her right knee aching, Nadine got to her feet and blinked a few times to adjust to standing on solid ground again.
She felt sick to her stomach, but her training had prepared her for situations like this, especially the six-month-long proactive hostage training.
Taking a breath in and focusing on a single stationary object, in this case a pipe jutting out of the wall, Nadine regained her equilibrium.
The Eastern government had spent a lot on Nadine’s training, and their limited tax dollars were paying off as Nadine got her bearings and began contemplating how to deal with Paris. She could kill her, but there’d be paperwork for that and oddly enough, spies usually didn’t kill other spies if they could help it.
Her training had even gone over this code with her, a code in place namely because everyone was spying on the same authority—the Centralian Government.
But making Paris’s life difficult was definitely something Nadine could do, and she knew exactly how to do it.
“Let’s see how you like dealing with this when you recover,” she said as she spread Paris’s right leg wide, scoffing at the fact that the dumb bitch was still wearing a skirt.
Holding Paris’s heeled boot with her left hand, Nadine punched her right hand into the outside of her knee, the flesh responding and moving inward.
Paris let out a whimper as she opened her eyes, and Nadine stretched her leg well past its breaking point.
Paris tried to speak to her, making a series of grunting sounds due to air blockage from her tongue. Nadine simply lifted her other leg, pulled her fist back, and cracked it against the outside of her knee, bringing the elastic knee backwards so it matched the first leg.
Both legs splayed, Nadine used Paris’s arms to wrap around her ankles, Paris’s entire body giving way and showcasing her elastic capabilities. While Nadine knew she couldn’t actually break
one of Paris’s bones, she could tie her up in a knot, making it difficult as hell for her to free herself.
She continued wrapping Paris’s arms around her legs until the Western Province spy resembled an oddly shaped pretzel. To make it even harder, she knotted the ends of her arms, tucking the woman’s wrists back into one of the folds on her shins.
Paris’s eyes were now bloodshot with rage, snot dripping out of her nose as she seethed at Nadine.
“See you next time.” Nadine turned to the exit and lifted a single middle finger over her shoulder as she slowly walked away.
Chapter Thirteen: With Great Power
“Roman Martin, the council is confused by your lack of response.”
“I apologize.” Roman swallowed hard.
The Lottery Council sat like judges behind a high, circular desk, all wearing white robes, and all Type Vs, which was the classification used for supers with god-like powers.
Roman had only ever encountered a handful of Type Vs, or if he’d encountered more, he’d been fooled by them. Most had false papers and identification cards that listed them as the other types.
And the reason he knew they were Type Vs was also strange to him. It was this gut instinct, something he intuited, a whisper at the back of his skull.
“What do you say to the power that has been granted to you?”
Roman bit his lip for a second. He felt no different than he’d felt an hour ago, and even though the council had told him of the power he’d been rewarded, he was completely skeptical of it. “Thanks?”
The council laughed. A white-haired man at the right continued to chuckle as he said, “That is possibly the best response this council has received this year.”
“Don’t people normally thank you?” Roman asked.
“Not in the skeptical way in which you have just thanked us,” the man replied. “Rest assured, while the power we’ve given you may be random, it is a good one, one that would clearly put you in the Type II, Class A & C range. Possibly even a Type I.” He smirked. “I don’t know, you’re the expert. How would you classify yourself?”
“Type IV.”
The man’s white eyebrows furrowed. “You have doubts in the ability we’ve given you?”
Roman bowed his head. “No, and I thank the council for bestowing it upon me.”
The lead councilwoman, a rail-thin brunette in a white diamond tiara that matched her robes, narrowed her eyes at Roman. “Most are grateful, and most actually purchased their tickets themselves.”
“Consider it gifted to me.”
Her lips curled. “It would be very hard for me, or the council, to consider the way you acquired your Hero Ticket as gifted.”
“Kevin is dead, isn’t he? Poor guy died, didn’t deserve it, but that’s why I have all his cases now. That’s why I had his ticket in the first place.”
The council exchanged glances, but only the lead councilwoman spoke. “Regardless of the ticket purchaser’s life, you are the one who has turned it in, a controversial rule that the council has debated before. Ultimately, we have found allowing users to gift the Hero Ticket allows for older half-powereds to grant abilities to their children, and we’re looking at your case in the same light. So the ability is yours.”
“I appreciate it.”
“We can tell,” the man on the left said, an amused grin on his face.
“Enough, Gary,” said the lead councilwoman. “Mr. Martin, there will be much to learn about your power, and to get you started, you will attend your first class on using your new ability this morning.”
“But I have work.”
The councilman known as Gary snorted.
“Enough, Gary,” said the lead councilwoman in a way that reminded Roman of how his manager, Selena, talked to him from time to time. “You have a power now, Mr. Martin. As in, right now. And you can’t leave here without knowing the basics of it. After today’s briefing, you will visit our gymnasium for training on a daily basis. Once you are trained, your new role will be assigned. Until that time, you must keep your new power a secret, or it will be stripped away from you.”
I hope the instructor is hot, Roman thought as he offered the councilwoman a tight grin.
“Yes, she is hot,” the lead councilwoman said.
“Shit, you weren’t supposed to hear that.”
“I didn’t hear it.”
“Please don’t read my mind.”
The man known as Gary laughed. “Trust us, we’ve already seen enough there!”
“Enough, Gary. Now, Mr. Martin, your instructor will be my younger sister, Ava,” said the lead councilwoman. “Until you have been cleared by Ava, you will need to continue the things you’d do normally, including taking part in the mandatory Heroes Anonymous program and going to work. Once you are cleared, you will be able to put in for a position more related to your new abilities. Good luck, Roman Martin, and remember, with great power comes great power.”
The other councilmembers chuckled, all aside from Gary, who was giving the lead councilwoman a salty look for having put him in his place.
Chapter Fourteen: Interrogation
“Wake up, Kevin,” Turquoise hissed.
The two cat girls had tied Kevin’s wrists and feet to the bed posts. He was nude, his chest and large stomach covered in bloody scratches. The former immigration advisor was delirious, his peripheral vision tinted in soft orange hues.
Obsidian, the cat girl with black hair and pigtails, sighed. “He’s sleeping.”
“I’m… not sleeping,” Kevin said, suddenly more awake than he’d been in the last two hours.
Has it really been two hours? He had no way of knowing how long the two had played with him, clawing up his body while rubbing their tails and mounds all over him, occasionally using their sandpaper tongues to grind into his new wounds.
The clawing was fucked, but the fact that they seemed to be getting off on doing it was straight-up disturbing.
Kevin had the feeling they were poisoning him in some way, but he didn’t know why, because they could just as easily kill him. They were at least Type IIIs, maybe even Type IIs, and that they believed he was someone other than himself was beyond Kevin.
He was a goddamn immigration advisor, a glorified administrator, a government employee who had tried to commit suicide and failed miserably.
He was a fucking nobody.
“I really wish you would say something we could use,” said Turquoise as she scraped a finger along the inside of his thigh. Her counterpart straddled his other thigh, rubbing her wet mound against the fresh wounds on his leg.
What was happening to the middle-of-the-road salaryman made absolutely no sense to him.
And Kevin was an honest guy, the type of guy who never lied, who actually cared about the clients he worked with and tried his best to not really disturb anybody.
He wasn’t a bad dude, and the fact that he had tried to commit suicide didn’t make him a bad guy either, just misguided.
He didn’t deserve any of this.
So with a deep breath in, which got both their attentions, Kevin decided to do something he never thought he’d do.
“Okay, okay,” he mumbled, not quite certain of where this was going to go. “I’ll talk…”
Turquoise stopped scratching at the inside of his leg and looked up at him, one of her ears twitching. “You ready, dear?”
“Ready,” he barely managed to say.
Obsidian purred. “We’re tired of hurting you. We want to pleasure you, but you’re going to have to speak to us first.”
“I will tell you everything I know, just…” Kevin gulped. “Loosen up the ropes on my wrists—it really hurts.”
“That’s all you want?” Turquoise exchanged glances with Obsidian.
A laugh formed at the back of Kevin’s mind, but it didn’t reach the front of his lips. “Of course I want more than that, but just do that and I’ll talk, I promise.”
“No problem,” said Obsidian as she loosen
ed the ropes. She sat behind him and laid his head across her knees. “There, there, just relax.”
“What do you want to know?” he asked, not able to fully focus on her.
“First, there has recently been a decrease in exemplars admitted from the Western Province,” said Turquoise. “Why is this? And are the Centralian authorities planning to make another move on the West?”
The thought came to Kevin and he felt stupid for not realizing it earlier: These two were actually after his better-looking brother, who just so happened to also share the same name as him.
It was a cruel joke played on them by their father, because Kevin, the one tied up, nude, with a semi-erection from being tortured by topless cat girls, was older and had always been somewhat of a failure.
The younger Kevin Blackbook was about half his weight, handsome, and had risen pretty high in the Centralian government.
Just go with it, whispered a voice at the back of his head, and Kevin obliged. “Okay, the truth is… there has been a decrease in supers admitted from the Western Province because… there aren’t any, um, healers there, and Centralia wants to have more healers immigrating than other classes. So you see? It’s basically about healers.”
Kevin was lying out of his ass, and since the floodgate of bullshit had opened up, he figured he might as well continue. Watercooler gossip wasn’t really his thing. He didn’t have many friends at the office, but he’d heard people ask questions in meetings and whatnot.
So he went with it.
“All this is about healers, then?” Obsidian asked, looking down at him.
“Yep, it’s all about healers.”
Kevin smiled at Turquoise, hoping they couldn’t see through his lie; the curious look on her face told him she was buying it.
“And to answer your second question, yes, we are planning to make a move on the West, but not in the way you may think. We are recruiting certain classes, and to do so, we have to, um, work out some agreements.” Kevin sucked back snot.
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