The Invincibles (30 page)

***

In her kitchen, Lindsey mixed a strawberry smoothie in her blender. It made a racket, whipping and whirling the fruit, juice, yogurt, and ice around into one thick slop. She poured it all into a big glass and wandered into her living room. She wore a slightly sweaty tracksuit and had only just finished a brief evening run. Yawning, she perched up onto her couch and flipped through the channels on her TV.

Hyperman as Cal in a white t-shirt and musty old jeans flashed into her living room. He abruptly materialized before her, blocking her view of the TV. She saw him and spat out her drink. Her glass dropped out of her hand and the smoothie spilled down across the rug on the floor.

“
CAL?” she asked, her mouth gaping open.

“
Um, hi,” he sheepishly said, blurring down and cleaning up the spilled smoothie so fast she didn’t even notice it.

“
How did you get in here?” she asked. “Where have you been? I’ve been calling you for weeks! Nobody knew where you’d gone! I was worried to death!”

Shyly, he shrugged. “I can explain.”

“
Really?” Lindsey’s eyebrows arched wryly up. “What? Were you kidnapped? Did you go on a secret mission for the government? Did you fall into a coma?”

“
No, none of that, but…but it does sound ridiculous. It’s true though. I can prove it, and it will probably blow your mind.”

“
Really? You have some awesome explanation for all this? Well, now I’m curious. What is it?”

“
Well, you see…I’m…I’m Hyperman.”

Lindsey scoffed. “Oh fuck you and your ‘I’m Hyperman’ shit! I’m supposed to believe that? Get out and leave my spare keys behind.”

He gulped. “I’m not kidding. I’m Hyperman and I was fighting the devil on another planet with some space angels.”

“
You should have just told me you were doing drugs.”

Sighing, he whipped around into a little whirlwind, vibrating all his molecules to change his clothes, hair, and musculature. He stood revealed before her, shining and divine, his posture perfect and his muscles impressively cut and tight. Smooth, handsome features realigned his face and his hair spiked up, flashy-blond and bright. Setting his hands on his hips and striking a heroic pose, he beamed out a confident smile.

Lindsey screamed and recoiled. She scrambled back into a corner of her couch. Anxious, terrified sweat broke out across her forehead and she coiled up into a tense, quivering little ball.

“
Wh-What do you want?” she cried out. “What did you do to Cal?”

“
Lindsey, I am Cal,” he said, reaching for her.

“
STAY AWAY!” she screeched and wept hysterically. Her body shuddered and heaved. Hyperman put up his hands and slowly backed a few paces away.

“
I’m the same person you’ve known for months, Lindsey,” he said. “I’m still your friend. There’s…there’s just more to me and my life.”

“
You lied to me!” she shrieked.

“
No, I just couldn’t tell you everything! Not at the time! But I’m telling you now! I’m trusting you! Don’t you see how important this is to me?”

“
You’re not human! You were using me for something! I’m an experiment…or…or some kind of pet to you!”

“
Of course not! Look, I know you have issues with superheroes, but you know me! You know me as Cal! You know you can count on me for anything!”

“
You’re going to get me killed! The city will fall on me or a mutant will come and eat me, and all these people will hate me just because I know you!”

“
No! I’d never let all that happen!”

“
You can’t stop it!”

“
YES! I CAN!”

The force of his shout flipped the couch over, battering it upside down against the wall and leaving holes in the plaster. Lindsey flew back and banged against the wall. She thudded down to the floor underneath the couch and moaned.

The shock of what he’d done froze Hyperman in place. How could he have done this to Lindsey? His sweet, lovable Lindsey! A hyper-scan showed that she was a little scuffed up, but otherwise, fine. Badly shaken up, but all right. Biting his lip, he meekly called out her name.

“
Just…just leave me alone!” she whimpered.

He wanted to go to her and make everything better. He yearned to hold and comfort her. He would and could do anything for her. Whatever it took, he would do. Yet, his shame stopped him. It burned across his face and sank deep into his shoulders, feeling like a gigantic weight that threatened to drag even him down.

She wanted nothing to do with him now. He’d shown her that he was every bit the monster she’d feared he actually was. The longer he stayed here, the more afraid she’d become. He couldn’t stand it. She looked at him with fear and confusion, and he couldn’t stand that. He’d only ever offered her love. He’d show her though. He’d show everyone in the end, and he and Lindsey would be together. He believed it with every fiber of his being.

He hyper-sped away out the back door, leaving her spare keys behind on the kitchen table.

Chapter 16: REAPER CHILD

Feeling light-headed and sick, Nightshadow slumped down against the wall. Hot, tight tension stiffened his shoulders and chest. The world hazed before him as if it weren’t real.

Piper cackled and gleefully clapped her hands together. “Yep!” she said. “We know EVERYTHING about you, Mister Big Superhero Man! All your names and homes and secret identities! We knew exactly how to play you!”

It hurt Nightshadow even to breathe. His head throbbed and his chest ached. His mouth cracked hesitantly open. “H-H-How?”

“
How? HOW? How did you, the master detective, never figure out who I REALLY am? Because you didn’t want to! Because we’re ALL over! The Reapers run this whole damn world! You never thought there was just one, did ya? Of course not!”

She licked the side of Wally’s decapitated, decomposing head and laughed hoarsely and hauntingly, somehow sounding exactly like HIM.

“
That thing with Doc Lethe?” she said. “Classic, right? You thought that’s how we make people into little, little reaper children? HAH! We’re all ALREADY reaper children, baby! We’re born this way!”

She chomped down her teeth. “Simply delicious, wasn’t I? The perfect pretty, witless girl? Piper? An idiot’s name! Who else would put up with all your absences and shitty moods and age and scars? Well, I will admit, I did like the freaky, twisted things we did in bed. I even had to try a few of our little tricks out with Wally, Teresa, Paula, and James, and everyone else! They were all too dead to say no!”

Snickering, she tossed Wally’s head aside. It rolled down off the bed and across the floor, clumping to a stop against the far wall and spilling out its flowers. She purred and reached down to undo her laces. She kicked her boots off to show her taunting, tight legs. Next, she slowly unbuttoned and slipped off her willowy Nazi uniform, revealing the lacy black lingerie she’d been wearing underneath and her smooth, silky-pale flesh. She pulled the golden-red necklace she still wore up to her mouth and kissed it.

After stretching out cat-like on all fours, she proceeded to crawl down off the bed and across the floor toward Nightshadow. He remained motionless, paralyzed by shock, and stared at her necklace as it swayed hypnotically back and forth above her small, supple cleavage. It flamed and sparkled gold, red, and white, reminding him far too much of the mind-fires Phoenix Bright had tried burning him with not long ago.

She wormed up to him, caressing his chest, kissing her way up his neck, and probing his ear with her snake-like tongue. He twitched and flinched at her cold, wet touch. His limbs felt too heavy to move, and he was still having trouble processing all of this. Her hand snared his groin and gave it a good, hard twist. He grunted in pain and she giggled.

“
So what next?” she cooed, throwing her arms around him and cuddling right up onto his lap. “Do I tell EVERYONE who you really are and out ALL your secret identities? Steal all your money? Maybe I can take some of your equipment and run around as Lady Nightshadow? Or frame you for mass murder! That’s always fun! But snack-time comes before playtime, honey! I know you want another taste. I can FEEL it!”

Her hand tightened around his groin, and he hated it, but he’d become hard.

“
Don’t worry,” she breathed into his ear. “You can always claim that I raped you.”

She forced her vile-tasting mouth onto his, cramming her hot, dirty tongue down his throat and thrashing it around. As she did so, her necklace rubbed up against the side of his throat. At her touch, his entire body clenched up. He couldn’t move or react. He could barely think with the cloudy, hurtful fugue overtaking his head.

What could he do to her? What did he dare do to her? Could he somehow subdue her and keep her drugged up and locked away somewhere? Then what? Did he try to futilely redeem and reform her? Or she would she have her way with him and slip away? Then she and him could fight for the rest of his life, putting so many lives at risk as their deadly game played on and on. No, he had to end this. He couldn’t risk any more lives and couldn’t let her run free or have any chance to terrorize him, the city, or anyone else.

As if of their own accord, his hands snatched her by the head and gave it a good, hard twist, audibly snapping her neck. She gasped and collapsed down onto him. He let her lay there and reached around her neck to unhook her necklace. He held it up to the light to see it better. Remembering how happy he thought it’d make her when he bought it caused him to tear up. He squeezed his hand around it and, snarling, hurled it across the room where it hit the wall and left a mark.

He laid her down across his lap like a broken doll and stared into her dull, lifeless eyes. He began stroking her hair, trying to pretend she was someone else.

***

At some point, he must have tromped up to call S.I.L.E.N.T. and returned to sit back down against the wall and take her into his arms again. He simply didn’t remember doing it or anything other than rocking her gently back and forth.

Nonetheless, S.I.L.E.N.T. agents appeared, cleaning up and investigating the crime scene. He overheard them chattering about blocking off the whole street and covering up any trace of the vigilante Nightshadow’s involvement. They asked him a few questions and he apparently garbled some nonsense to answer them.

Paul Wrath materialized, crouching down next to him on his rickety old knees, gently asking him to set her aside and come with him. Nightshadow numbly shook his head. He couldn’t let her go, not now. He still half-expected her to sit back up and rip at his throat with her teeth or laugh maniacally or…or go back to pretending to be Piper again.

Eventually, Wrath gave up and hunkered away, but Danny padded into the room. His lanky, dark hair swooped down over his youthful, unwrinkled, and sun-red tanned face. After asking the agents to give them some space, he knelt and put his hand on Nightshadow’s shoulder.

“
She’s gone, Night,” he softly said.

“
She was never really here,” Nightshadow replied, tracing his fingers across her scarred skull-face.

“
You can’t blame yourself for this,” Danny said. “She was killing all of those poor people while you were halfway across the world! You couldn’t have done anything! And…and what happened here…it was self-defense! You were only protecting yourself!”

Nightshadow vaguely recalled the agents interpreting his vague mumblings to mean that he’d had to kill Piper to save himself, but didn’t care about any of that. What was a murder stacked up on top of all the deaths he was responsible for one way or another? He tried to remember the names and faces of all Piper’s victims, the people he’d worked and lived with here, but they only came up as a massive blur right now.

“
This wasn’t your fault, Night,” Danny said. “Yes, she targeted all the people here because you knew them, but you can’t control the actions of a psychopath and at least she won’t be able to hurt anyone else. It’s a horrible thing, trust me, I know, but that’s why we put on our masks and do what we do. We avenge people like this and make sure there are fewer victims in the world. That’s why we have to stay strong…even…even when something like this happens. The world needs us. It needs us to help stop more horrible things like this from happening.”