The Rise of Renegade X (12 page)

“Otherwise what?” Sarah asks after a minute of silence to appease Mrs. Log, keeping her voice low. She seems eager for my opinion all of a sudden.

I shrug. “Decent.”

She doesn’t have her glasses on, on account of having just been wearing the goggles, but even without their magnification, I can see how much her eyes light up.
“Decent.”
She repeats the word to herself, as if it was a precious gift I’d just handed her and told her never to let anything happen to.

“As for the twenty bucks,” I say, getting back to business, “since it was your first offense, how about you buy me lunch and we call it even?”

“Wow.” I drag my feet down the aisles at Helen’s antique shop downtown, unable to stop gaping at her collection. Not everything here is actually an antique, but it’s all superhero and supervillain related.

A proud smile creeps across Gordon’s face as he gives me the tour. Which you’d think wouldn’t take very long, since the shop isn’t that big, except that I have to stop at every item and gawk for five minutes; I can’t believe the stuff she’s got.

I point to a recliner in the corner. It’s made of purple leather and has a chunk of one of the arm’s missing. The price tag on it is, like everything here, disgustingly more than I could ever afford. “That’s Professor Doomsworth’s chair! He wouldn’t leave it for a
month
before he died. He was a little, you know …” I spin my finger next to my head, indicating he was crazy. “Oh, and that’s the spot where Gregorio the Necromanticore blasted Doomsworth’s hand off, and that’s—”

“Yes, Damien,” Gordon says, setting a hand on my shoulder and steering me on to the next one. “We know.”

I only get excited about the supervillain stuff and don’t really know anything about the hero artifacts, but Gordon seems to enjoy showing off the store to me anyway. We pass half a broken magician’s wand, the black kind with the white tip, and I’m like, “Is that … is
that—”

“Part of it,” Gordon says. “Come on. The best is in the back.”

“And that’s the shooter the Marbler choked on. Mom says she was at the game when it happened, but she was a little kid at the time.”

Gordon winces when I mention Mom and picks up the pace, leading me around the
L
shape of the store and into the back section.

I drool at the sight of even more cool stuff. “And over there, that’s—”

“Damien.” Gordon taps me on the shoulder to get my attention and points to a ring under a glass case.

I recognize it immediately and press my hands and face against the glass, unable to resist getting as close as possible. Alarms blare and red lights flare overhead as soon as I do. A camera flashes, practically blinding me.

“Get back!” Gordon shouts. He jerks me away from it just as Helen hurries over to us. I’d say she ran, but it’s not what I would call running, what with her limp and all.

I’m still seeing spots from the flash, but I notice a little panel open up beneath the case, revealing a nozzle that sprays out some weird mist. Gordon pulls me back farther and warns me not to breathe it in. He sounds ashamed when he says, “It’s, um, a supervillain deterrent. Puts them to sleep.” He scratches the side of his head. “Since you’re half villain, you might be susceptible.”

Helen pushes a series of buttons on a keypad on the wall. The little panel closes, and the alarm stops blaring. “Sorry about that,” she says, but I can tell she’s proud her security system would have stopped me.

“That’s the ring,” I say, forgetting to cover my mouth and nose against the mist. It’s a gold ring with a ruby in the middle. It has
BB+CM
engraved on it. Bart the Blacksmith and his wife, Cissy Miles. I know all about it, and not just because the man was a legend but because he was Kat’s grandfather. He had the power to imbue the metals he forged with special abilities. He was notorious for making chains that could bind superheroes’—or supervillains’—powers, for making innocent-looking jewelry that could warp your mind or make you do his bidding, and for forging bullets that could take down
anyone
, no matter what their special ability. They say that when his wife died, he took the ring he’d originally made for her, melted it down, and forged this. It’s supposed to keep the wearer free from heartache. He
never
took it off, not for anything, until the day he died. Nobody knows whether it worked or not because when he bit the big one twenty years ago, the ring was never found. And now here it is.

It’s the only item in the store without a price tag, though I don’t know how you could put a price on it—it’s too valuable.

Helen watches me taking it in, her expression shifting from pride to melancholy. I yawn, suddenly tired and feeling the effects of the antivillain mist kick in, and wobble a little on my feet. I’m about to ask if the ring really works when she says, “I earned that ring.” The corners of her mouth almost twitch into a smile, then sag back down. “With my superspeed, I was the fastest, the only one who could get out of there in time to”—she licks her lips, her eyes shining—“to save everyone.”

I shift my weight uncomfortably, trying to keep my eyes open and wondering about Helen’s limp and if she got it in the fight. “Is that how you, um …?” I glance down at her feet, then away again.

“Got this limp?” She shoots me a half grin, but she still looks really worn out. “By the time we got the go-ahead from Headquarters, Bart knew we were coming. He was waiting for us when we raided his workshop. He was going to blow it all up and take us and him with it, rather than get captured. One of us had to stay inside to try and stop him, to at least stall him, while the rest of the crew got out. I was the fastest. I thought I could get away in time. I thought—” She chokes up a little and clears her throat. “I’m lucky to be alive. None of us thought about the consequences of Bart’s workshop blowing up. We didn’t think about the effect the explosives would have on some of his creations. But even if we had … You know he crafted jewelry that inhibited a person’s power? Made it so they couldn’t use it at all?”

I swallow and nod, not wanting to think about where this is going.

Helen shrugs. “I was the fastest, now I’m not. Sometimes I wonder whether I made the right choice. Maybe I didn’t need to stay; maybe we all could have gotten out anyway. But maybe not. And when I come down here and look at this ring and remember my friends are safe and he’s not going to hurt anyone anymore, I know it was worth it. I know I’d do it all over again if I had to.”

I don’t even have a power yet, but I can’t imagine losing one. Especially while trying to defeat someone in Kat’s family. An awkward pause hangs in the air, but I have one more question, and I know I have to ask now or miss my chance. “How … how did you get the ring?” I picture her prying it off his cold dead finger, but then I remember he died in an explosion.

Helen smiles. Not, like, a happy smile. It’s kind of sad, but still hopeful. “He took it off,” she says. “Before he hit the detonator. He said he wanted to remember his wife in death. He didn’t want to die masking the pain of her loss. He was only human, after all, and the ring is a reminder of that, too. That’s why I took it. I wanted to remember.”

She stops and looks at me, like she’s expecting me to say something. Like she wants me to tell her yeah, villains are people, too.

Luckily, Gordon’s phone rings, rescuing me from Helen, and he answers it. As he listens to the voice on the other side, his gaze falls to me. His jaw sets and his eyebrows furrow. “Yes, yes,” he mutters. “I’ll see to it.” He grips his phone so hard, I’m surprised he doesn’t break it. “Damien,” he says, sucking in a deep breath through clenched teeth, “that was the school. We need to talk.”

Gordon sighs across the dining table. “Did you or did you not put scorpions in those kids’ backpacks?”

He means Marty and Jill. I told them they made my list. “You know I don’t like to brag.”

“The school has reason to suspect that you did.”

“They can’t prove anything. I have it all under control.” I fold my hands and flash him a reassuring smile.

“You sent them to the
hospital.”
Gordon trips over his chair, he gets up so quickly. He clenches his fists and paces the length of the table. “How is that having it under control?!”

“They only went to get checked out. Besides, they weren’t
real
scorpions—just clever robots with stingers. They might be really itchy for a couple weeks, but it’s not like they’re going to die. I know what I’m doing. This is only phase one—”

“Phase one? Dear God.” He slides a hand over his forehead and through his hair. “This is not an acceptable way to behave, young man!”

“Says you.” I screw up my eyebrows at him.

“Don’t you dare …” He takes a deep breath to calm himself. “They didn’t deserve what you did.”

I say it very slowly, so maybe it’ll sink through his thick skull. “Yes. They. Did.” Anger boils up inside me—how can he be so stupid?—and I have to make an effort to squelch it down. This is why I hate superheroes. They might seem all right for a while, but only on the surface; deep down, they’re all deranged.

Gordon is about to yell at me some more, but my tone at least must have gotten through to him, because he seems to realize how serious I am. “Listen, Damien, let’s say they
did
deserve it. …” He rubs his temples, like I’m giving him a headache. He slumps down in the chair across from me. “I’m not saying they did, but even so, superheroes can’t act this way. The sooner you learn that, the easier life will be for you.”

This man is completely insane. I hope it’s not hereditary. “Who said I was a superhero? I don’t see how letting people bully my friends is going to make life anything but hard, no matter what I am.”

“You could have told the proper authorities.”

“Psh.”
I roll my eyes at him.
“Nobody
cares what they do. They think they’re so cool, that they can get away with anything, but they can’t push me around.
I
care.”

“You could have told me.”

“It’s not a problem. I took care of it.”

Gordon pounds his fists into the table in frustration. “You’re missing the point! Putting other kids in the hospital, even for a checkup, is
not
okay. Not ever. Listen, son, any decent superhero is going to sign the League Treaty. Maybe you’ll be thinking about it when you’re eighteen or so, when you’re getting ready to start your career. If you don’t sign, no one’s going to trust you. They’re not going to have a guarantee that your methods are safe. The League makes sure everyone follows the same rules, the same moral code of conduct—”

“You keep talking like I’m a hero, but I’m not.” I lean back in my chair. “I don’t have to abide by your useless mumbo jumbo.”

“It’s not
useless
. That’s what I’m trying to tell you. You might think you’re a villain, but there’s got to be more to you than that. You’re
my
son, and that means you’ve got hero potential, Damien. You need to consider the possibility.”

I press my fingertips together. “And what happens when some bad guy comes along who you can’t beat with your precious League rules? What then?”

Gordon sputters, trying to come up with a real answer, getting angrier and angrier when he can’t. Finally he says, “We work together. We find a way. But we
don’t
break our code. It’s what binds us together, what separates the heroes from the vi—” He stops. His mouth thins into a tight line. “You can put your faith in the code, in the Treaty.”

“Well,” I say, “I put my faith in me.”

He shuts his eyes, the anger seeping out of him, too exhausted to keep it up. “I can see what your mother meant,” he mutters. “Relentless.” He shakes his head. “You’re going to have to change.”

“I won’t. Let me ask you one more question.” I look him straight in the eyes. I pretend I don’t notice they’re the exact same green color as mine. “Would Helen still have her powers if you’d all played by my rules instead of yours?”