Super Powereds: Year 2 (18 page)

“How long do we have?” Blaine asked.

“About an hour,” Gerard replied.

“Until we have to leave or until we’re supposed to be there?”

“Leave,” Gerard said simply.

“Good,” Blaine said, and gulped down more beer. He would have had to quit if it was the other way since he was driving, but he was happy to discover he could still finish his drink. “Remind me why we’re doing this again?”

“Because Clarissa was on our team back in sophomore year, because she’s our friend, and because the girl asks for so little that this is the least we can do,” Gerard said.

“Yeah, but still... a dinner party? And with a dress code? That seems cruel.”

“She’s a girl. She’s allowed to have fancy tastes.”

“We’re guys; we’re allowed to not have them,” Blaine pointed out.

“Yeah, but we’re also her friends.”

“I know, I know. We’re going. I’m just getting all the complaining out of my system now so I can be pleasant when we arrive.”

“Stiff upper lip, Blaine. These are the best days of our lives, after all.”

Blaine snorted a laugh into his beer. “I certainly hope not.”

“Okay, maybe not the best days, but they are pretty good,” Gerard amended. “Who knows, there may be a point when you look back on the day of Clarissa’s dinner party with fondness and nostalgia.”

“If that’s the case then I can only imagine what kind of nightmare I’d be dealing with that this seems pleasant by comparison.”

* * *

The facility was higher tech than where Sean Pendleton had been stored, with retina scanners along with well-armed and armored guards populating every door. This wasn’t a place for Supers with the propensity for escape. This was for Supers whose abilities could easily turn deadly. In most cases of those here, said abilities had already taken that turn. The walls were concrete, reinforced with steel, and covered in hidden wires carrying heavy voltages. The actual location of this testament to incarceration was on a mountaintop far from any nearby society. There were at least ten Heroes on site at any given time, all combat-hardened and able to make the tough choices in an instant.

Blaine stepped through a final checkpoint, ignoring the suspicious gaze of the guard that let him pass. It was their job to be paranoid and he wasn’t going to critique them for doing it well, even if the long and loud flight had left him in a bit of a foul mood. Blaine stood placidly as the heavy steel door before him slid open, revealing a room void of anything but bare concrete walls, a pot for excretion collection, and a man.

The man had every appendage locked down and encased in a series of large metal tubes. Blaine knew those restraints each weighed in the tons and cut off all movement even to the strongest of Supers. They also served the purpose of sealing off any lasers or other attack apparatuses the prisoner might have in his arms and legs. Had he possessed such destructive abilities in his chest or head, equally restrictive measures would have been taken for those as well.

This was not the case, so it was with a perfectly unobscured face that George gave Blaine a weary smile of welcome.

“Good to see you again, Boss. I think it’s time we talked about a cost of living raise. Not sure if you’ve noticed, but this place is kind of a hellhole.”

32.

The pounding on Nick’s door was a far cry from the delicate knock his late-night visitor had used last time. He pulled the door open quickly before any of his neighbors could be roused from their slumber.

“You need something, fearless leader?”

“I need to know when you decided that tactician meant the same thing as person in charge,” Mary said, walking stiffly past him and dropping into his desk chair. Nick closed the door securely before attending to the diminutive invader.

“I believe I was also declared strategist, wasn’t I?” Nick asked as he took his own lanky strides across the room.

“You were, but I don’t see how that applies here.”

“Of course you don’t,” Nick said. “You’ve been a good girl lately, not digging into people’s minds nearly as much as last year. I’m not going to ask why - it isn’t my business after all - but I will say that it’s a damn stupid idea given our present situation.”

“It’s because-”

Nick held up a hand to silence her. “I don’t want to know. It’s either emotional or ethical and in either case I’m not the person you should talk to about it. Let’s stick with the matter at hand. You want to know why I overstepped my boundaries.”

Mary nodded.

“Because going to tomorrow’s little party will offer us the chance to peek at minds of the competition. Amber Dixon’s boyfriend happens to be part of the frat that’s throwing the shindig so she will be in attendance.”

“Amber is on Shane’s team,” Mary pointed out.

“She is; however, she never goes to these events without her exceptionally close friend, Britney Ferguson,” Nick continued.

“How could you possibly know that?”

“Patience, research, and attentiveness,” Nick replied. “Unlike you lot, I made a point of eavesdropping on all the gossip-filled comings and goings of our peers during and between classes. I kept track of minuscule and pointless details methodically and I did it for moments exactly like this. We can go pick the brain of our opponent’s leader mere days before the match.”

“It’s a sound idea,” Mary agreed. “But why couldn’t you have asked me beforehand? And how did you know Alex would suggest it?”

“Because he is a boyfriend to a beautiful woman plugged into the live-wire of the social system and because I needed you not to be fully on board with it, which you would have been if you’d known my reasons,” Nick said.

“Explain,” Mary demanded.

“You’re the leader; you need to come off as dedicated and uncompromising in the pursuit of victory. I’m the screw-up; I’m allowed to do things like suggest we take a day off right before a big test.”

“But you got your way,” Mary pointed out.

“And you agreed to it, which allows you to keep the responsible image while at the same time showing you are considerate of the wishes of your team. It was the optimum way to get what we needed while framing you in the best light.”

Mary narrowed her eyes. “You put a good spin on it, but I’m still not happy at being circumvented in the decision-making process.”

“If you were, then you’d make a pretty shitty leader. What’s done is done, so how about I promise not to do it again and you decide it’s not worth fighting over so late in the night?” Nick suggested.

“Fine,” Mary said. “Just know that if you pull something like this again we’re going to have a problem. These matches are what will decide if we make it to another year in the HCP. That means the future of everyone in Melbrook rests on the decisions I make. I don’t take that responsibility lightly.”

“I’d wager a guess that’s part of why it was assigned to you in the first place,” Nick said. He walked back to the door and slid it gently open. Mary stared at it for a few moments then purposely walked out without so much as a backward glance. Nick eased it shut and went back to his computer.

He was back at work finishing his Statistics assignments for November (Nick preferred to work ahead so that he had the necessary free time for finals) when another set of knocks echoed through his room. These were more subdued than the first set; he supposed Mary was feeling less cocky this time around. Nick hefted himself from his chair and walked back across the room, pulling the door open to greet his returning guest.

“Forget something?”

“Huh?” Alice said, her face sparking in surprise. “What are you talking about?”

“Oh, um, nothing,” Nick said, feeling the unfamiliar sensation of being caught off-guard. “What’s up?”

“I need to talk to you,” Alice said simply.

“At two in the morning?”

“Yes,” the blonde girl replied simply.

Nick took a deep breath and tried to fully grasp the situation. He and Alice had barely spoken, let alone been friendly, ever since last year’s fiasco. A late night call was a strange and curious anomaly. Nick didn’t like anomalies; Nick liked to know what was coming so his spontaneous reaction was already prepared.

“Well then, come on in,” he said, stepping aside and gesturing to his room. “Mi casa es su casa.”

Alice couldn’t stop herself from chuckling. Nick had no idea just how accurate that statement was.

“So Giggles, what do you need?” Nick as asked as he closed the door yet again.

“I need to talk you about, well, you,” Alice said as she started to sit on his bed then thought better of it; she took the same desk chair Mary had previously occupied.

“Fair enough,” Nick said. “I like smooth jazz, margaritas, and long walks on the beach. That fill in the gaps?”

“Not even a little,” Alice said “I’m serious. I’ve been playing along with you this year, not raising a stink about your attempts to bail on our friends, but now that you seem to be helping Mary call the shots on our strategies we’ve hit a problem that needs resolving.”

“And that is?”

“I don’t trust you,” Alice said simply.

“All things considered, I don’t know that I can fault you on that one,” Nick said.

“No, you don’t understand,” Alice said with a shake of her head. “Even last year when I thought you were full of shit, when I already suspected the person you acted like was wildly different from who you really were, I still at least trusted that no matter the facade you put up, you were a good person. I thought you were a good friend. I don’t have that anymore, and it makes listening to the orders you give and the tactics you implement a lot harder.”

“What would you like me to do about that? I can tell you it was all a joke, a lie, or a farce. I can tell you it never occurred to me to not go after our friends,” Nick offered.

“More lies aren’t the answer,” Alice said. “Not that I know what is. Hell, I don’t even know why you still act the way you do. You let the cat out of the bag already.”

“Only to you,” Nick said, his voice softening slightly. “Mary and Hershel weren’t there, and Vince never believed me about not going in the first place. Or maybe he did and didn’t care. Maybe he knew all along I’d go; I’m not sure what to make of that guy sometimes. Anyway, the point is that to nearly everyone else, including our classmates, this version of Nick is the real one, and it’s the one I prefer they see.”

“So I’m the only one with issues,” Alice surmised.

“Oh, Princess, let me assure you everyone here has issues; they just aren’t all with me,” Nick corrected.

Alice snorted out a weak laugh. “I want to get past this,” she said. “I want to trust you, at least trust your core morality again. I just don’t know how.”

“Wish I could help,” Nick said. “Unfortunately, I’m the one person who can’t. Anything I say will seem suspect or manipulative, even if it’s the truth. So however you get past this, I doubt I’ll be the one to guide you.”

“You’re right,” Alice agreed. “Because I’m even asking myself if that little piece of basic logic is real or if it’s just a ruse to get me to drop the issue. Either way, it proves your point.” Alice rose from the seat and headed toward the door. “I’m sorry I bothered you. This is something I have to work through. And if I can’t... well, I trust Mary a lot. Maybe I can believe in her judgment enough to follow your directions by proxy.”

“Seems like a workable plan,” Nick said, unmoving from his perch.

“Best one we’ve got,” Alice said, giving him a brief smile. She left Nick’s room silently, pulling the door closed behind her.

Nick started to get back to his work again, then gave up and merely saved his progress. Instead, he layed down on his bed and stared at the bright bulb wedged into its socket above him. He lay like that for nearly an hour before he made any motion to turn off the light.

Nick truly hated anomalies.

33.

“You look like hell,” Blaine said flatly. The truth was, aside from his shackled appearance and somewhat dirty face, George looked pretty good for a man in maximum lockdown. He showed none of the usual distresses of someone who has lost all hope of ever seeing sunlight again. That was disturbing to Blaine, because the only explanation was that the current captive didn’t intend to stay that way. If it were someone else, Blaine might have suspected delusion, but if there was one thing one could say about George, it was that he was a realist.

“If that’s true, then hell never looked so good,” George snapped back. He didn’t bother following Blaine with his eyes as the bespectacled man walked around the room. If Blaine was the kind of man to attack someone who was helpless then it was going to happen and no amount of watching would stop it. Besides, he’d seen his former employer a few times since his incarceration and things had yet to get physical.

“Funny. The guards treating you well?”

“We’re up to beatings three times daily. If they keep working at it they might even leave a bruise on me by Christmas.”

“Oh, that legendary George Russell toughness. You always have been notorious for your durability. That’s part of what made you such a good teacher.”

“Cut the shit, Blaine. Of all things I know you might be here for, complimenting my teaching skills isn’t one of them.”

“Kidnapping and assaulting students does sort of mar your previous credentials,” Blaine admitted.

“Hey, I just kidnapped. They’re the ones who assaulted me.”

“Assaulted you in an effort to retrieve the friends you had stolen away from them.”

“I didn’t say they didn’t have good reason. I just said they threw the first punch,” George pointed out.

“They also threw the last one, seeing as they beat you.”

“How kind of you to remind me.”

“As if you’d ever forget a loss. Assuming you even count it as one.”

George showed no outward reaction to Blaine’s words. Nevertheless, Blaine felt something in the bound man shift.

“No sense in pretending otherwise. They got me, fair and square,” George said with an attempt at what might have been a shrug.

“You know, I’ve read through the reports about the incident dozens and dozens of times. Several things keep standing out to me. If you were really bent on taking Mary at all costs, why bother breaking Hershel’s arm until he let go? With your strength you could have just ripped it off of his body.”