Lair For Rent

by Skyler Grant

  “I could tear that building apart looking for you, but I don’t see the point. I prefer to let these things sort themselves out. You have two weeks to kill off everyone involved in this ill-fated enterprise and report to my engineers to tear that virus out of you before you start working for me. Or, remove it yourself to my satisfaction and save me the bother. Until then your license remains valid,” Mastermind said.

  With that he turned on his heel and headed back into one of the hover vehicles, his people doing the same. Within the minute they were gone.

  As soon as they vanished I had henchmen dragging Jules inside. It left a bloody trail as she was moved, but she was still alive.

  “We’d need a proper trauma kit for these wounds,” Niles said, running to kneel next to her.

  “If he wanted me dead, he would have shot to kill. He was just making a point,” Jules said with pain evident in her voice. “Though I’ll die sure enough without help. The ambrosia ... please.”

  Right. With the key being spoken for, and no payment from Mastermind for the rings, that ambrosia was the only sort of profit we might have left. Still, Jules was an employee—well, was about to become one at least. I was fairly sure we could take what had just happened as Mastermind firing her, which didn’t leave Jules a lot of career options.

  I had a henchmen bring up the vial. As soon as Jules got a hold of it she tore off the stopper and chugged it down. The rainbow-colored liquid poured down her throat and her spine arched. Light flowed out from between her lips, lit up her eyes, and leaked from the wounds. There was a sound like the strumming of a harp and she collapsed back to the floor.

  I’d scanned her to see what had changed.

  Jules Morgan

  Species: Human/Divine

  Unregistered Villain

  Lair for Rent Corporation

  Power Origin: Mythical

  Abilities: Heightened Intelligence, Heightened Reflexes, Accelerated Healing

  Power Level: 1750

  Quite a lot had changed. Before it had simply listed her species as human, now it included the divine. Her powers had changed too, her planning ability having morphed into general heightened intelligence and adding in reflexes and healing.

  The power level was most telling, it was ten times what it was before. Part of that might be the skills she’d shown on jobs with us, but part was surely the ambrosia she just drank.

  “That was a rush,” Jules said, pushing herself to her feet.

  “And hopefully means Walter isn’t going to try to murder all of us,” Niles said.

  I said, “That is both bad for business and I don’t like being pushed around. Meeting in ten, we’ll figure this out.”

  25

  It turned out to be more like twenty minutes. Jules took some time to borrow a change of clothes from Partygurl since her old ones were a bloodied mess.

  The gathering around the table was subdued. Employee morale had been bad before, but this did seem to hit an all-time low. The display lit up and Uma appeared sitting cross-legged on a leaf.

  “I figured you all were going to be talking about me, so I may as well make it as awkward as possible,” Uma said.

  I thought it better to talk about Uma in front of her, than Uma not appearing to be present and actually hearing every word.

  “So let's start with the obvious. You are in my code and unless we figure out how to get you out, we wind up in a situation where Mastermind cuts you out,” I said.

  “And the rest of us get corpseified, maybe for good,” Niles said.

  “I can’t be removed. I know that sounds like some line that I'm just giving you, but I promise you—I can’t. If there were any way to remove me, someone might figure it out, and the whole point is that people don’t figure it out,” Uma said.

  “But you got out of the CCC system and into me somehow,” I said.

  “I was never in their system. Not really. I was sort of just hiding out waiting to be executed. I was supposed to jump from their system into STRONG at some point, because they are allied. STRONG takes their data security seriously though. Spoilsports,” Uma said.

  “Disaster could remove you,” I said.

  “Probably. But trust me, if Mastermind has that polite threatening thing going on, Disaster is full-on crazy scary. We go to her without having what she wants, she is a nightmare,” Uma said.

  “Mastermind is scarcely better. If he doesn’t get what he wants we’re all very dead,” Jules said.

  “Can we fix this without involving Disaster?” I asked.

  Uma was silent for a long moment, slumping dejectedly upon her leaf. “I don’t think so. I know that is a terrible answer, but I don’t.”

  “Then our choices are either to get Disaster what she wants in the hopes she’ll cooperate, or to find some other way to appease Mastermind,” Niles said.

  “Is that possible?” I asked Jules.

  “Mastermind is a businessman. There is always a backup plan ready, if needed. We find him something valuable enough to convince him that we and Uma are on his side and worth leaving as we are, he’ll do it,” Jules said.

  “Ox,” Ox said.

  That just wasn’t getting any more helpful. At least he wasn’t running away.

  “Then we either need to steal something valuable enough for Mastermind to keep us alive, or to steal what Disaster wants,” I said.

  “From the secure archives in STRONG, which isn’t easy, but I totally have faith in you guys,” Uma said.

  “Either way we’re not going to succeed as we are now. We need to get stronger,” I said.

  “Villains work hard at that. It isn’t that easy,” Jules said.

  “Do most have a full team behind them willing to help them?” I asked.

  “Usually they’re waiting to be backstabbed every step along the way, at least until they get strong enough,” Jules said.

  “Then we have an advantage. Let's go around the table. Everybody here could use something to grow stronger. You all have some idea what it is. Share,” I said.

  “Emmatech antivirual routines,” Uma said.

  “Nobody was talking to you,” Niles said.

  “What? Now I’m just being left out of the conversation? I need to get stronger too. I’m with you or against you, and you want me with you,” Uma said.

  I said, “I need computing hardware, the best we can get our hands on. My software is already powered up. It's better hardware now that will make me more powerful.”

  Niles said, “I have some ideas for that. Me, I need power-armor. I’m weak, frail, but a great engineer. There are suits out there that turn people like me into powered and I need one of them.”

  “So a super-suit for Niles,” I said.

  “Ox,” Ox said.

  Right.

  “A communicator for Ox. Some solution to the impairment that lets him communicate with the rest of us,” I said.

  “Ox,” Ox said.

  I’d take that as a sign of agreement.

  “Ambrosia is particularly good, but anything out of Greek mythic legend will help. Legendary gear is just gear though. Ambrosia is like pure power being poured straight into me,” Jules said.

  I’d already seen that first hand.

  “Disaster has … well … it's kind of a trophy room of her kills. One of them was the Clockwork Knight. His suit might be a little old-school, but he was strong,” Uma told Niles.

  Niles said, “That would do, if we could get it. And I know one of the collectives I work with had what was called a quantum sphere. It was a computer from another dimension. They never got it to work.”

  “It's just a matter of figuring out the software interface. If we can get it, I can do that,” Uma said confidently.

  “My family left lots of clues to their old storehouses of powers, but so many fake leads are out there. We’re a paranoid bunch,” Jules said.

  “Spotting the real from the fake is what I do. Maybe we can figure out a truth from those lies,” I said.
/>   “Two weeks isn’t much time for achieving any one of these, much less all of them,” Jules said.

  I said, “That's if we play it safe. I think we can all agree we are in a situation where if we don’t succeed, nothing else matters. So we burn our bridges.”

  Everybody nodded. We were all on the same page.

  These weren’t even our end goal, but without them we didn’t stand a chance.

  It was power or death. It was time to be mighty.

  26

  Before we did anything else, we still had a problem—and an opportunity. Angelic forces would be coming for the key. Jules thought that if we just let things go like last time we’d have similar results. Some vastly overpowered angels would show up and blow our headquarters to fragments and that would be that.

  But there were ways around that. Heroes played with honor. It was a glaring flaw and one that could be exploited.

  As such, we issued an honorable challenge. The silver key was in my possession—me being an E1 villain and his team—and if the angels wished to challenge us they could so in twelve hours. If they won, they could claim possession of the silver key.

  If they lost, we demanded the return of our tenant.

  It didn’t take long to get a response. Our terms had been accepted, and they would be sending a likewise E1 team to face our lair and have a fair fight.

  I was quickly learning that most heroes and villains had their own junior league equivalents. STRONG recruited from organizations like the CCC located on college campuses. I didn’t really understand angelic hierarchies, but I figured they had their own youth teams.

  While it would be a bad idea to base all our defenses upon an angelic attack, some defenses to specifically target them would be smart.

  We only had about $50,000 left in the bank and we had to get creative in our financing. DTV, a demonic television network, was interested in broadcasting things and I managed to talk them into a $150,000 advance for the broadcast rights, plus thirty minute interviews with all involved on our side, and an additional half million bonus if we won.

  That gave me enough funds to bring in a demonic priest who was soon glowing red and issuing sinister-sounding chants over water storage tanks. I already had some steam traps rigged throughout the complex. They were now going to be fueled by unholy water.

  It would help, but it wasn’t an ideal solution. Holy water was particularly effective against demons for a reason—it was elementally opposed to them. Demons were creatures of fire and darkness, which was why things like water and holy light were so effective against them. By that same token angels were also creatures of water and light. If I really wanted to hurt them I needed darkflame, a rare element that combined both properties.

  Unfortunately, rare proved to be just that. I scoured the markets and couldn’t find anything. There were a few powered who utilized darkflame, but their rates were out of our price range.

  Niles thought he had a technical solution. It cost us the rest of our advance, but we soon had a whole new assortment of tanks to load into the walls and strap to the backs of our henchmen.

  “It is quite simple really. I mean, theoretical, but I think it should work. One of the tanks is your standard flamethrower, extremely nasty to anything not a super and even any angels aren’t going to like it much,” Niles said.

  “But the other is where you think you’ve gotten clever,” I said.

  “I have gotten clever. I mean, this is great stuff. Shards of breath of darkness. Dark powered fire might be hard to find, but air is easy. In this case, I’ve combined them with some heat-resistant particles. It should take about thirty seconds for the heat of the flames to break down the particles and release the elemental fury.”

  “Why not just mix them at the start?” I asked.

  “Because it's air. Fire feeds of it and uses it up fast. We aren’t going to get sustained darkflame, we’re only going to get a darkflame flash and if we mixed beforehand, it would happen in the stream and be exhausted by the time it reached the target,” Niles said.

  I’d seen super fights and thirty seconds seemed like a long time to wait. I didn’t have any better ideas.

  “And you’re sure it will work?” I asked.

  Niles sprinkled a thin layer of what looked like sand on the floor and poured some liquid on it. Stepping back, he lit a match and threw it.

  Flames roared, burning steadily, and I started a countdown.

  It was twenty-eight seconds before I saw a reaction. The bluish and orangish mix of flames briefly turned to a solid ebon black before resuming their usual color a second later.

  “That is a long wait for a quick burn,” I said.

  “You wanted darkflame, I gave you darkflame,” Niles said.

  I wasn’t going to protest someone giving me the impossible. I approved of being given the impossible when I asked for it.

  This wasn’t our only defensive measure, of course.

  I'd hired more henchmen and we’d be facing this battle with a full twenty. While the priest was still on the payroll I had him also curse our ammunition to give that little bit extra of magical smackdown against the holy. I figured it wouldn’t hurt against anyone mundane, and if our invaders were holy all the better.

  I decided the layout for the main floor I’d last designed was still ideal. It would force them to break out and search. Their goal would be to find the silver key and they'd have to search.

  One thing I did do, with her consent, was reopen the passageway leading down to Partygurl’s level. Calling her into the fight would break the terms of our challenge agreement. However, if any intruders were to wander below on their own then she and her henchmen certainly had the right to defend themselves. I didn’t see how that would be a violation of the contest.

  Especially if we left the teleportation room active, which was the most direct way to get down to the third level where the key was waiting. The same thing applied there. Kleo hadn’t taken her henchmen with her and while they didn’t work for me, they were entitled to defend her home.

  27

  They appeared right on time. I have to give it to heroes—they're very punctual. Niles and Jules were hidden away in the control room. Nothing we’d been able to do had gotten Jules' bracelet working again and we were pretty sure that killing her would mean that she was good for dead.

  Getting it working would mean dealing with Emmatech and that was a matter for another time. For now, despite Jules being one of our strongest combatants, we were trying to keep her out of harm's way unless things became critical.

  The shimmering golden crack in the air was one that I’d seen before. The group coming out of it was far less impressive.

  There were sixty-four people. Around half were dressed in a version of chainmail with swords. The rest wore uniforms with a golden lion insignia on an armband and they carried rifles.

  A woman stepped forward to confront the camera outside our front door, looking up into the lens. She looked fairly human except for exceptional beauty and the golden tint to her pupils. “We are here for the arranged battle. Are our forces comparable?”

  We had twenty henchmen. Uma, Ox, Jules, and myself all counted as powered. Niles for the sake of this counted as another henchman really.

  There were advantages to lying about our numbers, but it could backfire. There was also the fact that I was, above all, a businessman. You could cheat in business, but if you got a reputation as a cheater it made everything harder. It was far better to be honest until lying really mattered.

  “Twenty-one underpowered, four powered. One E1 and three unranked. Plus, of course, the lair defenses,” I said.

  The woman nodded, “Fifteen Vanguard, Fifteen Pure. Myself, Ariel, Whisper, and Feint.”

  A portion of their forces stepped forward.

  Four squads, and most appeared human except for their leaders. Those must be the powered we’d be facing, including the woman. I took a moment to scan each.

  Nina Serov

&nbs
p; Registered Hero

  Vanguard

  Celestial

  Power Level: 1950

  Abilities: Light Manipulation, Healing

  The second man in chainmail had a bald head and the same golden-flecked eyes.

  Whisper

  Registered Hero

  Vanguard

  Celestial

  Power Level: 1100

  Abilities: Stealth, Teleportation

  A woman with a rifle had brilliant red hair and bright green eyes.

  Ariel

  Registered Hero

  Pure

  Celestial/Mythical

  Power Level: 1700

  Abilities: Hydrokinesis, Intangibility

  The last of the powered was an intense-looking young man with a golden mass of curls.

  Feint

  Registered Hero

  Pure

  Human

  Power Level: 1200

  Abilities: Misdirection, Marksmanship

  This was interesting. I’d never really had the chance so closely study E1s. It was notable that all of their power levels were between 1000 and 2000. Nina was barely scraping under. Jules' latest power level would put her in that category as well.

  The last one, Feint, was also just registering as pure human. His super status was purely down to his skills. I wasn’t sure if that made him less or more dangerous. At least I didn’t have to waste any darkflame on him.

  They had given themselves an edge in numbers, of course, but given that I controlled the terrain and the defenses it didn’t seem that unfair.

  Whisper shimmered and seemed to flicker out of existence. They must have activated their stealth. Soon the forces were on the move and slipping through the front doors.

  They were all wearing earpieces with some kind of communications net up and running.

  “Uma. Do you think you can shut down their comms?” I asked.

  “Easier said than done, boss, they’re not encrypting them locally. Wherever the software is, it isn’t here,” Uma said.