Meta (25 page)

  
"Yes, I have. I believe I can help you," Jones says, motioning towards The Controller's nearly depleted metabands. "You do want to finish this job, don't you?"

  
The Controller looks back at me.

  
"More than anything, sir," he says.

  
"Good. Deactivate your metabands, and I can recharge them for you, then you can finish this properly," Jones says.

  
"You can do that?" The Controller asks.

  
"There are many, many things I can do that you cannot even begin to fathom," Jones says.

  
"You don't want to kill him yourself, sir? I know that that was something you enjoyed too," The Controller says.

  
Jones stares through him. He is growing impatient.

  
"It's just that, if I deactivate the bands, he'll see me. The real me," The Controller says.

  
"And how will that matter once he's dead?" Jones asks.

  
"I guess so, it's just..," The Controller begins, but Jones interrupts him.

  
"It appears I've made a mistake," Jones says, as he turns and begins walking away.

  
"No! Wait! I'm sorry. You're right. I want this. I want to do this. I want to kill him, and I want you to help me. It would be such an honor for you to help me!" The Controller yells out after Jones.

  
Jones stops walking but does not turn around. He simply stands with his back to both of us and waits.

  
The Controller brings his fists up to his chest and clicks his metabands together. He brings his arms back down to his sides, and his suit retreats into the bands. Before me no longer stands a tall, muscular male form. In its place is a short, squat, overweight, balding, man with an unkempt goatee. He looks like the stereotype of the person working behind the counter at a comic book store. I don't know what I expected from someone so depraved and obsessed with the darkest aspects of metahumans.

  
"Ha! This, this is the 'great and powerful' Controller?" I laugh at him. This enrages him, which is what I expect and what I want. He races towards me with the rage of someone who's been tormented in the past. I might not have much power left in these bands, but whatever is left is more than enough to at least break the arm of a non-metahuman. If all of this is going to be over for me in a few minutes, I at least want to leave him a token to remember me by.

  
"Stop," Jones says. The Controller freezes in his tracks. "That's what he wants you to do."

  
The Controller turns his back to me and walks back towards Jones.

  
"I'm sorry, sir. My anger got the best of me. There's so much I can learn from you. You're right. I need my powers to finish him off correctly, even in his weakened state," The Controller says to Jones.

  
"Yes. You do. Now let me help you with that," Jones says.

  
"Of course. But how?" The Controller asks.

  
Jones places his hands on The Controller's metabands and stares him deep in the eyes.

  
"By letting go. Release these bands from your control, and I can transfer a fraction of the limitless power I contain in mine into yours," Jones says.

  
The Controller seems unsure, but in the end he relents to Jones. To his hero.

  
"Okay," The Controller says. He closes his eyes and Jones slowly, steadily slips the metabands off of The Controller's wrists. Once they are completely off, Jones disappears right before both of our eyes.

  
The Controller is confused, but tries not to show it. You can tell from his nervousness, that he's not quite sure what has just happened. He admires Jones. More than admires. Worships. But anyone who knows Jones, knows that he is nothing if not deceitful. There isn't much Jones can do with someone else's metabands though. They're still unbreakably tied to The Controller's DNA. They cannot be used by anyone else, under any other circumstances. But then again, I wasn't aware that one could transfer energy from their own bands into those of another and from the looks of it, The Controller didn't know this either.

  
Suddenly, Jones appears before both of us again. He's grinning. The first real show of emotion he's exhibited. The Controller smiles with him. There's a look of relief on his face.

  
"Ha, for a second there I thought you'd run away with my metabands!" The Controller jokes awkwardly.

  
Jones’ expression remains unchanged. A huge, grinning smile.

  
"Soooo, what now?" The Controller asks after an uncomfortably long silence.

  
"Now? Nothing," Jones says, still grinning ear to ear.

  
"Wh... what do you mean nothing?" The Controller stutters out. "Where are my metabands?"

  
"Where are your metabands? Somewhere where you will never, ever see them again," Jones says.

  
"What?" The Controller says, his voice cracking. He is on the verge of tears. "What have you done with them?"

  
"I've just told you. I've put them somewhere where you will never find them. You're done, Controller," Jones says.

  
"You can't do that! You can't!" The Controller screams. "Those are mine! Those are my metabands! You can't just take them from me! Why would you do something like that, I thought we were friends!"

  
"We are anything but friends, you human garbage," Jones says.

  
The Controller is in a state of shock. He's been betrayed by his hero and lost his metabands all at the same time. He is practically in hysterics.

  
"I'll find them! I'll do whatever it takes, and I'll find them. Mark my words. I don't care if I have to scour the entire Earth, I
will
find my metabands again, and then you'll be sorry!" The Controller screams, his anger blinding him to the fact that Jones could snap his neck like a twig right now if he wanted to.

  
"Scouring the Earth to find your metabands isn't going to do you much good," Jones says. There's something happening. His facial features are changing. His clothes moving on their own.

  
Jones is no longer standing before either of us.

  
Iris is.

  
"Because your metabands aren't on Earth. They're on Mars," Iris says.

  
"What?" The Controller stammers out in confusion. For once, we're both in the same boat of not knowing what the hell is going on.

  
"Mars. That's where I put them. To be honest, they're not buried very deep, I never was that good at holding my breath, but nevertheless I still think you'll have a pretty hard time finding them," Iris says.

  
Iris was holding out on me. She never told me she could shapeshift. Seems she has a legitimate gripe for me getting credit for being the meta with the most varied abilities after all.

  
"You can't do this to me! You can't! I'll find a way! I promise you, I will find a way and you will be sorry! You think Silver Island can hold me? I'm The Controller! I will have my revenge, I swear to you!" he screams.

  
"Silver Island? That's for metahumans. You're going to state lock-up like the rest of the regular scum," a voice from behind me says.

  
It's Midnight. He's alive.

  
"Midnight!" I can't help myself from yelling out. "I thought you were..."

  
"You don't give me enough credit," he says.

  
The Controller sees what he thinks is an opportunity in our little family reunion and tries to make a run for it. Iris rolls her eyes. He's not very fast. Midnight lets him get about halfway down the block before he throws a bolo in his direction. The bolo whips down the street a foot above the ground and catches The Controller's legs, wrapping them up instantly. He falls to the ground hard enough to knock himself unconscious.

  
"That'll hold him until the police get here," Midnight says.

  
"But, how did you..," I begin to say.

  
"I'll explain everything, but first we need to get out of here or else me and you are going to be joining him in a holding cell. Iris, do you have enough juice left to get us out here?" Midnight asks.

  
"Aww, for you guys? Of course," Iris says as she grabs both of us by the wrist and teleports us out of there.

CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN

I came to find out after the fact that Midnight and Iris' plan was set from the start. I didn't even know that they knew each other, but of course I didn't. Midnight isn't exactly forthcoming about his friends and aside from the whole crime-fighting thing, I didn't think he got out all that much.

  
Midnight had surveilled the apartment where The Controller was supposedly hiding in advance, that much I'd already known. What I hadn't known was that when Midnight first entered the apartment days ago, he found a crudely built pipe bomb already in place, rigged to explode whenever the door was opened for the next and last time. You had to give The Controller credit: he was actually one step ahead of Midnight. The only problem is; that Midnight is usually three or four steps ahead of even himself, so it doesn't do you much good.

  
He'd already had a deep psychological analysis of The Controller done when the attacks had first started. It was easy, considering there were years of blog posts, forums rants, etc. all under The Controller's online alias. Ultimately though, it didn't take a PhD in psychology to figure out what, or rather who, could get The Controller to lay down his arms: Jones.

  
Of course, procuring a dead man is difficult, even for Midnight. It's also inadvisable if said dead man is also responsible for war crimes that bordered on genocide. Which is why I was kept out of the plan. Midnight wasn't sure if I would be on board with the idea of resurrecting the image of the man who murdered half my family just to catch The Controller. He was sure that I would insist there was another way, or if push came to shove, simply refuse to be a part of it at all. He wasn't wrong. Seeing Jones, even if it wasn't actually
him,
brought about emotions that I hadn't felt in a long time. Emotions that I thought my metabands could protect me from ever feeling again.

  
Iris was the only meta that Midnight knew who could shapeshift, an ability I didn't even know she possessed, but this wasn't the first time I'd be surprised that Midnight knew something I didn't. He sought her out and talked her into going along with his crazy plan, making her promise not to say a word of it to me.

  
Neither understood or knew how powerful I was or could be. Their plan was risky, which was why it was a Plan B all along. Plan A was for me to simply beat The Controller. It was something that Midnight thought I might have been ready to do on my own. I couldn't. It's made me doubt just how unique my abilities truly are, if at the end of the day, I still couldn't even defeat the thirty-seven year-old loner who lived in his mom's basement and subsisted on a diet of pizza and cola.

  
But Midnight insists that he still believes in me. He's also lied to me in the past.

  
I still don't what to make of Iris. That night she teleported us back to the city and in another instant, she was gone again. Even Midnight seemed confused by that. I haven't seen her since.

  
It's quiet now. And that's good. When I was a kid, I dreamed of being a meta just like every other kid before The Battle. Possessing that kind of power and being able to do almost anything. In reality, the responsibility is terrifying, and inescapable. These metabands are bonded to me, and only me, until the day I die or they turn off. And as long as I have them, I'll never know which of those days is coming for me first.

  
"Hey. Space cadet. I don't want to tell you how to do your job or anything, but I'm pretty sure you're supposed to tie up those garbage bags once you pull them out of the can, not just stare inside them for five minutes," Sarah says behind me.

  
I'm at the lake, at work, but obviously my mind is anywhere but.

  
"There's a method to all of this. You wouldn't know the first thing about it, to be honest," I say to her, kidding.

  
"Sorry. I forgot you're a waste
engineer
. I'm just a lowly life
guard
," she says.

  
"Exactly! I'm so glad you see it the same way I do! All I'm saying is don't forget your place. Engineers always trump lowly
guards
," I say as I tie up the garbage bag which I now realize is unbelievably disgusting smelling, even for garbage.

  
"I'm so sorry,
sir,"
Sarah says with a smile.

  
"It's alright. I'll let it slide. This time. But I've got my eye on you."

  
"Actually, I think I noticed that."

  
Oh no. Am I flirting? Was my being a smartass, actually unintentional flirting? Is that all flirting is? Why didn't anyone tell me this sooner! I could have been doing stuff like this all along, barring the whole 'being scared to death of talking to girls thing' I guess.

  
Wait. More importantly, much more importantly: is she flirting back? I'm taking too much time to think about this, and now she thinks I'm being weird. Say something. Anything.

  
"Yeah?" I say.

  
Great job, idiot.

  
Sarah laughs. It actually almost sounds like a nervous laugh. That can't be though, right? She's gorgeous, smart, funny and all around amazing. Girls like that don't get nervous. Right?