The Rise of Renegade X (25 page)

“Oh, yeah?” Can it, say, change my thumbprint? For less than three thousand dollars, which Gordon apparently doesn’t have left on his credit card? It was practically maxed out. The most I could have gotten out of him was five hundred, and it wasn’t worth it. Instead, I bought five hundred dollars’ worth of subscriptions to risqué supervillain magazines in his name. He should be getting at least one a day for the next two years, with such favorites as
Hottest Villains, Girls Galore—Supervillain Edition
, and
Naughty, Not Nice
, to name a few. His subscription to
Hottest Villains
includes a special Baddest Girls of the Year issue, where they go in depth with the supervillain girls who committed the “hottest crimes.” It also includes a sixteen-month calendar, swimsuit edition.

“It changes what a person looks like,” Sarah says, explaining her invention to me. “What I mostly had in mind was being able to change outfits with it. Think of all the money it could save on clothes.” She buckles it around her waist, tinkers around with a few buttons on the side of the seat-belt buckle, and presses the metal circle. I watch as her white T-shirt turns into a black one. Her arms look really tan and her facial features suddenly look pinched and not like Sarah at all. Then the device makes a little
zap
noise, like something’s shorting out inside it. The image flickers, blinking between Sarah and the holographic projection.

“Oops,” Sarah says, banging her fist on the side of the device. “I haven’t quite worked out all the bugs yet.”

It’s neat, I guess, considering Sarah made it at home, but it doesn’t compare to Kat’s power.

Sarah sighs, seeing I’m not impressed. “I know it doesn’t seem like much. It can only handle simple changes so far, but I’m hoping to have it up to something more complicated before prom. I’ll save money on a dress, and I won’t have to go to a salon to get my hair and nails done. But I’ve got a couple years to work on it.” She deactivates it and takes it off, reaching for another invention. “And this one—”

“Actually, maybe you could show me later. I’m here as Damien, not Renegade X.”

“Don’t mix business with pleasure,” Sarah says. “Got it.” She sits down on the bed with me. “You want to watch something?”

“Yeah, sure.” Anything to make this not feel so awkward.

A dog barks outside. “Oh, that’s Heraldo. Here”—she shoves her TV remote in my hand—“I have to let him in.”

Sarah runs off, her footsteps echoing down the hall. I inspect her remote, but it looks store-bought, like it might actually go to her TV and not to, say, a robot in the closet who’ll bust out and try to kill me as soon as I press power. I wince as my finger pushes down on the button, but the TV flickers to life, and nothing else in the room seems to do anything. I’m safe from Sarah’s crazy inventions, for now.

The news is on, so I flip the channels until I get to something I recognize:
The Crimson Flash and the Safety Kids
. They show it in the mornings, and again in the afternoons in case you miss it the first time. Strangely enough, it doesn’t make me think of my dad—it reminds me of Kat. That’s the last thing I want right now. I’m about to conduct a serious make-out session with my new girlfriend—er, lab partner—something I got involved in so I
wouldn’t
think about my ex. I hold up the remote to change the channel, but I hesitate, waiting to see which episode this is.

“Today,” the Crimson Flash says, “we’re going to visit the zoo. What do we think about that, Safety Kids?”

The camera pans to a dozen elementary-school children, ranging from ages six to ten, sitting on the floor, wearing little red capes. They wave noisemakers and shout,
“Yay!”
There’s no standard set of Safety Kids. It’s one of those shows where any kid can be on it if they sign up and are between the right ages.

I hear pounding footsteps in the hall, and then a Great Dane leaps on the bed, knocking me down and causing me to throw the remote across the room. It lands in a pile of gears. The dog pins me to the bed and licks my face. Similar to what I was hoping to do with Sarah, but
not even close
.

Sarah claps her hands. “Heraldo! Down, boy! Leave Damien alone.”

Heraldo reluctantly gets off of me. He stands on the bed and walks in a circle a couple times before lying down and panting heavily in my ear. I sit up and wipe the dog slobber off my face.

“He likes you,” Sarah says. Then she spies what’s on the TV. The Crimson Flash is standing in front of the zebra pen at the Golden City Zoo, explaining how they use their stripes to avoid predators. “Oh, I love this show!” She bounces down on the bed next to me, grinning, as if I chose this on purpose because I knew it was her favorite. Sarah grabs my hand and leans her head against my shoulder.

Heraldo crawls forward a little, so his front legs are across mine. He puts his head down and drools.

My face is dry now, but I can smell his spit. Gross. I’m not only stuck with him, but it looks like Sarah’s not changing the channel anytime soon. These experiments are supposed to be fun, so I decide to make the most of it.

“Look at that—is he wearing an honorary zookeeper badge?” I scoff at the screen. “Does he think being a superhero makes him a
zookeeper?”

Sarah lifts her head and scowls. “Damien, he’s your dad.”

“Exactly. That’s how I know he has no zoo training whatsoever.” Kat would have taken the bait. She would have snickered and made comments about spying the superhero in its natural habitat.
You’ll notice, kids, that the superhero wears bright colors to trick its enemies into believing it’s poisonous. The bright colors mean
, Danger, stay away!
This, however, is a rare evolutionary flaw, as the bright colors serve only to attract the dreaded supervillain
.

Sarah looks at me like I’m speaking another language. “That’s why he’s only an honorary zookeeper.” She adjusts herself so she’s sitting up more and not leaning on me.

Heraldo’s breath is hot on my knee. I’m uncomfortable, physically and emotionally, and I’m ready to go home. I wish Kat was here instead of Sarah. I’m not supposed to think that or feel that way, especially since Sarah kissed me like she really meant it earlier and invited me to her house and wants me to meet her dad, but here I am, doing it anyway. I put my arm around Sarah to appease my guilt, even though she can’t possibly know what I’m thinking. She smiles at me—a warm smile, like you’d be more likely to give a boyfriend than a lab partner—then turns her attention to the screen, taking the Crimson Flash’s zoo trip really seriously.

I’m sitting upside down on the couch Thursday evening, my feet up where my head should be, and my head hanging off the edge of the cushions, talking on the phone.

“I can’t believe Pete called my parents,” Kat says.

“Pete’s a narc. What do you expect?”

Amelia stomps through the living room, making fussing noises and straightening out the furniture. She plunks a bowl of chips down on the coffee table, steps back to get a good look, then shuffles them around until they’re all at the same level while still looking “casually tossed.” God forbid Amelia’s friends find out how much effort she’s put into making this slumber party perfect.

“Don’t touch those. They’re for the party,” Amelia says, storming off to check that her Superhero Day streamers are straight. We get a whole day off from school for it tomorrow, hence the slumber party, especially since Amelia’s the only one of her friends with any superhero heritage. She acts like it’s her birthday. Her friends might not know Gordon’s really the Crimson Flash, but you can bet they know Amelia’s a superhero and expecting to get her
H
this year. Amelia’s told all her friends—and me—that she’s already applied to Heroesworth Academy for fall, since her birthday’s in October and she’d just barely miss the cutoff otherwise. She’s hoping they’ll let her in early.

“Who’s that?” Kat asks.

“I’m, um, staying with relatives.”

Kat clears her throat. “Listen, Damien … I’m not too clear on everything that happened Monday night, but I know you stopped by. At Pete’s.”

“Yeah, for about five minutes. Why?”

“I wanted to say I’m sorry.”

“For what? Drooling on my shirt? You can buy me a new one.”

“What? No. I got pretty wasted and made out with one of Pete’s roommates.” I can tell by the tightness in her voice that she’s not looking forward to my response to that. “Julie brought me to the party,” she goes on, when I don’t say anything. “I didn’t know it was at Pete’s, just at Vilmore, and then I was so upset about …
things
that I didn’t care what I did. I wanted to have a good time.”

“So you did. Good for you.”

“But I didn’t. I was miserable.”

“Uh-huh.”

“So … I’m sorry. That I did that. Especially in front of you. It’s not something that’s going to happen again. I was upset, but I’m going to fix that.”

“And you’re telling me this because …?” My tone is friendly, possibly even cheerful. Pretending I don’t know exactly why she feels the need to apologize to me.

“Because, Damien, you’re … we … I thought you’d be mad, but forget it, okay?” She’s silent. Then, “Also, at the party, did I say anything weird?”

“Hmm. Let’s see … Other than when you stuffed a hundred bucks down my pants and told me to take off everything but my socks? No, can’t think of anything.”

Amelia almost falls over in shock, sloshing punch over the edges of the punch bowl she’s carrying. She makes a face at me that’s half revulsion and half wide-eyed terror. From my upside-down position, I can totally see up her nostrils. She sets down the punch bowl and runs into the other room, shouting, “Mom! He’s not going to be here during my party, right?”

Oh, I’m going to be here. Starting up a rousing game of Truth or Dare with a bunch of fifteen-year-old girls. Amelia wants to get to know me better, right? It’s perfect. The great things about siblings, I’m learning, is it turns out you can be as awful to them as you want, and they still have to put up with you.

“Har-har, Damien,” Kat says. “And where did I get that kind of money?”

“A better question is, did I give you the show of your life and you can’t remember it, or did I take the money and run?”

“But, seriously, I didn’t say anything, did I?” She sounds awfully nervous.

“No.”

Gordon comes in from the bedroom, wearing a bathrobe. His hair is wet and he keeps touching it, like he’s feeling for something. He seems kind of twitchy. “Damien,” he says, “can I have a word with you?”

I put my hand over the receiving end of the phone. “Do you mind?”

“Did you put …?” He shuts his eyes and shudders. “Did you put
worms
in my shampoo?”

I guess the worms all sunk to the bottom of the bottle. That or he’s waited four days to wash his hair, since I put them there on Sunday while everyone was at church. “I don’t know. Pushed anyone off any buildings lately?” Saving me in a fire makes up for him trying to kill me, but it doesn’t mean he’s learned his lesson. Thus he will get no sympathy or apologies from me.

He plants his hands on his hips. “Damien, I was only trying to help you. If you’d just listen to me—”

I tap the side of the phone impatiently. “Can you speed this up? I’ve got a hot girl on the other line, and you know how those nine-hundred numbers are. The first couple minutes are cheap, and after that, they rack up the price.”

He looks like he wants to throttle me. His face turns red and his forehead knits up. “I know you don’t like to leave the ground. It was a little scary for me at first, too, but I think you’ll find that it’s not so bad. Even if you are afraid of heights,
you’ll
have control. It’ll be a very different experience for you once you realize you can’t fall.”

I don’t acknowledge him, going back to my conversation with Kat. “Yeah, baby, tell me again what you’ll do to me.”

“What?” Kat says.

Gordon storms off, grumbling about “that boy.” He’s as bad as Amelia.

“Nothing.”

The doorbell rings and Amelia shouts,
“I’ll get it!”
She thunders to the door, glaring at me and motioning for me to
get out
.

“Hey,” I say into the phone, getting a great idea, “do you want to come ov—” I stop myself. Kat doesn’t know I’m living with a bunch of superheroes. She’s going to find out about my
X
eventually—I’m going to tell her soon, I promise—but maybe now isn’t the right time for it. It might ruin the Truth or Dare session. Plus, I don’t want Amelia teasing me that Kat’s my girlfriend, because as I’ve stated a million times before, she’s not. “I mean, it’s a nice day for a white wedding.”

“Yeah … What are you doing tomorrow night?”

“Undressing myself at parties for money. Tonight’s my trial run.”

Amelia’s eyes are going to burst out of her head. She drags her friend, the one with the green stripe in her hair, as fast as she can through the living room, sleeping bag and pillows in tow. “My brother’s
not
going to be at the party.”

“So,” Kat says, “in other words, absolutely nothing?”