Saving Supervillains 1 Chapter 23 (Patreon)

Melody was plodding through the hotel lobby, but she wasn’t storming out quickly. It was almost like she wanted me to catch her.

She looked over her shoulder, spotting me and slowing even more. I took that as a sign that Stella was right.

I walked up to her, gently grabbing her arm and pulling her to the side. She didn’t give much resistance.

“I’m sorry.” Squeezing her shoulder, I tried to comfort her.

“Miles.” She said solemnly. She looked around to make sure no one was listening before talking. “It is too much. You… you killed her.”

“She was corrupt, and I needed to protect my secret.” I reminded her.

“What can be worth that much to protect? I don’t understand. Miles, help me understand.” She pleaded with me.

There wasn’t much I could do in the open area where we stood. I’d shown her just the tip of the iceberg, but she needed more. I walked with her out the lobby door.

Instead of saying anything, I dismissed her ki, making her powerless and wrapped her in kinetic energy, forcing her to keep walking.

“You see, my power is very varied.”

The shock on her face made me smirk.

“How are you doing this?” She asked.

“That’s a good question.” I pushed light away from her eyes, blinding her. “But the other question is, do you trust me?”

Her voice quaked. “I can’t see.”

Dampening all the sound waves around her ears, I made her deaf to everything but my voice. “Melody, I’m terrifying. There’s no way that I don’t get locked up in the deepest, darkest cell if I’m found out. Or worse, they bring in a telepath to warp my mind, make me pliable, make me a tool.”

I gave her back her sight, hearing and powers before letting her walk on her own again.

Melody stumbled, catching herself and staring at me in a new light. “You are terrifying.”

I nodded, sad it was the truth. “Those in power couldn’t let me exist if they knew everything I could do, everything I’ve done.”

“When does it stop?” Melody asked. “Do you ever think you’ll stop having to defend your secret so fiercely?”

I shrugged. “For a long time, I didn’t have to. I just lived a normal life. I stayed away from anybody in power.”

Melody clenched her jaw and walked quietly with me for another few blocks, thinking through everything she’d learned.

“Miles, if I had been there with you, or if Stella had been, we would have stopped Omnigirl from taking you. It would have saved her life.” She tried to rationalize a solution, wanting to find a way it could have worked differently.

“Kim said I wasn’t the first. If it wasn’t me, it would have been someone who couldn’t have defended themselves.”

Melody cursed. “Why does this have to be so complicated?”

“Because right and wrong aren't so clear. When you’re with me, you’re going to be straight in the murkiness. I want to do good, but I also won’t allow my abilities to be turned into weapons. The law isn’t as fair as we’d all like to pretend. I’m driven more by my own moral compass.” I paused, preparing myself to go a bit into the past, one of the places I hated to go.

“When I first discovered my power, it was amid chaos. I did something that made the BSH come after me.” I continued.

“But I was taken in by a woman. She channeled my anger into petty crime and theft, mostly. But do you know what she did when she wasn’t out stealing priceless jewels?”

Melody listened intently, but shook her head, waiting for me to continue.

“She ran an open door orphanage. It didn’t matter if you were young or old, what sort of state you were in. If you wanted food or a place to sleep, no questions were asked. She let you in.”

Melody touched me for the first time since I had caught up with her. She squeezed my hand. “She sounds like an amazing person. What happened to her?”

I laughed. “Tax evasion. A for-profit orphanage got the city to investigate her. Because she had such an open door policy, her records weren’t great. They got her on a technicality.”

“That’s horrible.” Melody gasped.

I nodded. “She went away quietly, the orphanage was shut down within a day and all of them transferred over to the for profit place. They won.”

“Now that’s evil.”

“But that’s life. It was legal; they used the law against her. Objectively, she was a criminal. Morally, it was a shit show.” I sighed, thinking about her. She was probably out by now, but I hadn’t reached out, not wanting to go back to that life.

Melody hesitated. “But that’s different from what you did.”

“Completely.” I agreed. “I took matters into my own hands. A woman who attacked me and remained a threat to my safety and freedom was still out there, being given another chance. I subverted justice when I didn’t think it was working.”

It was self-serving, but I didn’t regret the decision. I’d helped the city in the process, stopped a hero that was terrorizing citizens and protecting villains.

Melody nodded slowly. “I know your life is complicated, but I need to understand everything.”

“When we head back to Point City, I’ll take both of you out of the city to train. I’ll show you everything I can do, or at least everything I’ve learned to do so far. But when it comes to my past… it should stay there.”

She shook her head. “I can’t believe I’m considering this.” She paused, biting her lip before she spoke again. “Just promise me one thing.”

“Name it.”

“We need to start making decisions as a group. Part of what hurts the most is that you ran off on your own to do it.” Melody gazed into my eyes. “You didn’t trust me to know what you were doing beforehand.”

Blowing out a breath, I nodded. “I’m very used to doing everything myself.”

“But you aren’t alone anymore.” She put a tender hand on my arm, looking into my eyes.

I nodded, and she leaned up and kissed me. I let out a sigh of relief that she’d decided to stay. Somehow, these two women had wormed their way into my heart, and I knew I wasn’t going to let them go, even if it put my secret in more danger.

As I pulled back, I realized we had circled around back in front of the hotel. “You should go back up and talk to Stella. I think she was thinking about tracking you down and tying you to a bed if you tried to run. Better comfort her before she does just that.”

Melody laughed, and her fingers lingered on my arm as she moved away.

Letting her go first, I lingered in the lobby, spotting Kim ending a call. I heard the end of what she stated. “You better put a lid on her. She got far too close, and we can’t let anyone know.”

Kim made a point of looking at her phone as she ended the call and noticed me watching. “Sorry, Bureau problems.”

“Anything I can help with?” I asked automatically.

“Actually… yeah. Let’s talk. You drink coffee?”

I didn’t really, but I could drink a cup if she wanted to talk elsewhere. “Sure.”

Kim nodded to a shop across the street. “That place is good. Come with me.”

I walked back out of the hotel. “What was the call?”

Instead of answering me, she asked a question first. “Did you see Venus’ press conference?”

“Caught part of it. Someone helped her from the shadows.” I said.

Kim grunted. “And what did that make you think?”

I tried not to pause in my steps, wondering if they found me out.

“Didn’t think much about it.” I tapped my fingers to my chin. I pretended to think about it, when I was really trying to determine what she wanted me to think. “Someone either has similar powers to hers or was helping her another way.”

Kim clicked her little device that prevented others from listening. “Someone boosted her power.” She clicked it again as we crossed the streets.

“I didn’t know that was a thing.”

“It isn’t, or at least it wasn’t.” Kim’s face went serious. “It’s big. The analysts looked at her two attacks already, and we are seeing a tenfold increase.”

I had a sinking feeling in my gut. “The Bureau is going to look for them.”

“Hell yes we are. Venus is determined to look for them too; that’s why she pulled the stunt she did today. But someone else is going to realize what happened.” Kim opened the door.

The particularly sensitive part of the conversation had already passed, and we continued after we ordered our drinks, finding a table by the window.

“Have any leads?” I asked, keeping my voice from carrying.

“Some. She’s a fairly weak telepath, but she poked inside his head before she exhausted herself. It’s a guy, and he’s in Point City.” Kim shook her head. “That he can project his power all the way to this city is remarkable.”

I almost choked on my coffee.

She might have dug around to find my location, but she failed in some of the context. Instead of my exact current location, she got more of a ‘where I’m from’.

Telepathy was hard like that. Human minds weren’t exactly linear in their thoughts.

But I was thankful her failure had thrown all suspicions off of me. No, they thought the augmenter was currently in Point City.

That didn’t explain why Kim was telling me, of all people. “If this is so important, why tell me?”

Kim grinned. “Because I want to bring you up in the Bureau. I say jump, and everyone jumps. The real brown nosers ask ‘how high’. But you don’t. You argued with me last night. I think you have potential.”

I blinked, surprised that made me more valuable.

She must have seen my shock. “Don’t be like that. I’m…” Kim paused, counting in her head. “Sixty-eight. I’ve been a hero longer than anyone here, and I could take on the best if I ever wanted. People bend far too easily to me.”

“All I had to do was argue?” That was too easy.

“Argue and stand up for what you believe in, which just happens to be your own view of how our hero system should work. You see the flaws, but you have charted your own course.”

“A different view from your own.” I reminded her.

“That’s what would make you a great number two. You stood up to me and have a different view of this whole thing.” She gestured vaguely at the world. “So you need to build up your team.”

I took a sip of my coffee to give myself a moment to think. I’d recently accepted being a part of the BSH, and this was a large swing that I hadn’t been prepared for.

But at the same time, Kim was offering me an opportunity to change something that I thought was flawed.

For a long time, I had been a cynic of heroes, but now she was giving me a real shot at changing the system.

If I was honest with myself, that was almost terrifying. I’d have to find a way to do it better. But I might be able to, and if I could, I felt like I should. I owed it to my younger self to fix the problems that had been thrust upon me.

“Deal. But we’ll have to figure out what to do with my old job. Technically, I’m supposed to go back to work for Candice on Monday.”

Kim brushed that off. “I’ll talk to Candice, and just tell her I’m taking you. She’ll bend over backwards for me.”

I snorted. “Better not get too used to that. If you really want me, you aren’t going to get that from me.”

Kim put down her coffee cup and leaned over the table with a grin. “Perfect. Now, what do you think we should do about this most recent problem?”

“Venus or the unknown person? Because I think Venus might just be the bigger problem.”

Kim nodded. “Venus thinks he’ll come forward. I don’t think so. When he doesn’t, she’s going to come to Point City.”

I nodded, comfortable thinking through problems. “She will want to search the city top to bottom and flip it upside down to see what she can shake out. She might even walk around breaking telepathic laws, digging around peoples’ minds on the street.”

“We could set up a token effort to help her search.” Kim went with the soft approach.

A genuine laugh bubbled out of me. “Or just lay down the law. She can come and try to gain popularity to see if he comes out, but she absolutely cannot rip through the city looking for him.” I caught myself just in time. I almost said ‘me.’

Kim shook her head. “If there’s no progress, she’s going to take it into her own hands.”

I took a minute to think. My solutions were partially in conflict with my own goals of her never finding me, so it was a lot to think through.

“What do we do if we find him first?” I threw out the question I’d wondered for a large part of my life. Yet here I was with the person that would make the ultimate decision if they ever caught me.

“Big question.” Kim agreed. “If he’s a citizen, we have to weigh his personal freedom against the risk he poses. Because he unfortunately poses a very high risk.”

She waffled her head back and forth. “The simple answer is to grab him and stuff him in a cell.”

“Jumping straight to force isn’t the answer here.” I tried to hold back my passion, but the current hypothetical conversation was about locking me up. “I’d entice him into the Bureau, use that as an excuse to protect him.”

“Venus sure is interested in him. I bet we could get her on board with that, but we’d need a few safety measures in place.” Kim didn’t go into detail, but I didn’t like the sound of safety measures.

“See, already you are working wonderfully. I’m going to go call Candice and officially poach you.” Kim dug around in her purse for her phone.

I held up a hand as she lifted her phone. “You said I needed to build up my team? Tell her I’m taking Ben, Mary, Rachel, and Kate from her.”

“Your team over there?” Kim frowned.

I nodded. “If I’m going to be your number two, I need my own analysts and admins.” I countered.

Ben could handle the technical aspects, and I was pretty sure Mary could tag along with him.

Rachel and Kate were highly capable. I was confident they could pick up some of the science and work well enough with the general bank of analysts.

And if I was leaving, I was not leaving them all with Candice.

Kim stared at me for a long moment before shrugging. “Deal. They are yours. I’ll have Beatrix make room for them.”

I pulled out my phone, texting the team quickly that they were going to come join me in the Bureau.

As I expected, they were all shocked and excited.

I couldn’t believe what I was doing. I was becoming part of an organization that I had hated for so long. More so, I was going to be at the helm, helping steer the ship.

Stella had dragged me into the world, but I had to admit I finally felt like I was doing some good and making up for a bit of my past.

If I didn’t take the chance I was being given, then I’d be the biggest hypocrite. Now I had to see if I could really make the differences that I believed possible.

Only time would tell.

Kim chattered on the phone idly with Candice for a minute before making her demand.

There was a long pause before Kim’s face stretched into a victorious smile and she hung up. “All done.”

“That was far too easy.”

Kim shrugged. “That’s how it is being the director of the Bureau of Superheroes. Just wait, I’m sure the new Deputy Director will feel some of the same perks.”

“Deputy Director?” I said, surprised. “Don’t you think I skipped a few steps?”

“Nope. You were a senior manager in one of our contractors, and now we are bringing you over as an DD.” It sounded more like she was preparing to answer a reporter.

“I agree. But I keep Stella and Melody.”

“Of course.” Kim nodded. “I don’t think I want to pull you away from them. We’ll even keep building out that team. The Deputy needs to have some pull, especially since you aren’t a former hero yourself.”

She snapped her fingers as if something had just occurred to her. “When Venus announces her move, we can stick her with your team.”

“No.” I quickly jumped in, but Kim wasn’t going to budge.

She continued as if she hadn’t heard me. “I think it would be a perfect chance to see if you can’t keep her under control.”

“Maybe she won’t transfer.” I tried to convince myself, but I was doing a terrible job at it.

Venus was going to chase after this augmenter while I, the target of her search, did everything I could to stop her from finding me.

I could already feel the headache forming.

“A problem for another day.” Kim agreed. “We need to get the heroes rounded up and back on a plane. Come on, we’ll let everyone see me working closely with you for a few days, then announce your new position.”

AN - I've been a little out of pocket doing some work on the house. I see some people didn't like Omnigirls death. Interesting enough I'd already been talking with my alpha reader that I think I should go back and make her a little more opposed to Miles(to make that kill more satisfying, lol). Probably a change you'll see with the live version. Oh well. And yes, Stella is ride or die. Sometimes I'm not sure if it is Miles' harem or Stella's.