《John Doe: A Nobody in Space.》


 Nobody - 1

    Repeat customers always depressed me.


    I was dressed in blue overalls with J.D Plumbing & Heating emblazoned across the chest in simple black lettering. My plain brown eyes were reflected in the immaculately polished glass windows of the suburban home I found myself in front of, staring back at me with silent judgment.


    I am not the type to lose sleep over my actions, but my current job was well beyond what Ihad grown accustomed to justifying to myself.


    An errant strand of slightly curling black hair fell down on my face and I pushed it back up into the unruly mop on my head. It was summer in the city, and sweat poured off of me in the kind of way only someone with absolutely no physical fitness can manage. Istarted giving myself a final once-over as I eyed my own reflection, tucking in my shirt and wiping sweat from my brow when it hit me.


    A wave of disgust passed over me as I realized that I was primping. Trying to look presentable to - who? Jane was an old friend of sorts to me. A client I''d had occasion to meet a number of times and who I''d come to like a great deal. She was honest to a fault - a rare trait in people I generally have to deal with, and far too intelligent to be anything short of the best at what she did. Unfortunately, the key phrase was ''to me''. From Jane''s point of view, this would be our first meeting. Heck, from her point of view she would probably hope it was the last.I should have been worried about how little work I''d put into my job today - but frankly, this was my fifth time here and Jane had yet to catch on.


    I quicklyswept the grimace from my face at the thought as Jane came to the door. She pulled it open quickly, with an aggressive little huffing noise that was the product of cold air from within rushing out into the heated afternoon. Under better circumstances, she would have probably taken her time opening the door, greeted me politely and asked what I needed. Which was something I knew as an unpleasant side effect of my profession. Instead, she just stared, already impatient and intolerant to my presence.


    "Is Mr. Ardin in? He scheduled a maintenance of the heater for today. . ." I said trailing off in mock confusion, hoisting my toolbox (full of tools I could not use) as if to protect myself from the scowl she levied at me for daring to mention her husband''s name. It didn''t harm her features much. Her nose scrunched up in obvious distaste, and her full lips pressed together into a thin line. Even scowling she managed to be more beautiful than her bastard husband probably deserved.


    "I don''t remember him calling." her response was quick and curt, a clear sign she was trying to rein her anger in. The change in tone helped me focus, distracted me from looking at her luscious red hair and brilliant green eyes. Reminded me that I was the bad guy, and that part of my job was to make sure that hourglass figure stayed complacent and unaware. And his. The annoyance at that last thought lasted long enough for me to start pulsing gentle suggestions at her using my meager telepathic talent.


    No one really knows what happened, or where talents came from. Suddenly, 70 years ago the world just became. . . weird. Supermen and women, wizards, werewolves, mutants - you name the fiction and suddenly it existed. Scientists still can''t make heads or tails of it. An experiment a long time ago set two of the pentagons now magically inclined types to summon forth two - well, angels for lack of a better word. Religious people the world over watched as two supposedly divine beings spilled forth into our world. Only both of those beings were the same Archangel from very different versions of heaven. They agreed to disagree - which they did, all across the city of New York, flaming swords in hand. In the end the only thing the world learned was that humanity was far out of its depth.


    My particular brand of weird takes the form of Telepathy. Well. Everyone whoisn''t telepathic calls it that, for those of us in the loop it''s less like suddenly getting easily described psychic powers, and more like suddenly being able to broadcast and receive information on a wavelength everyone shares - but no one else is aware of.


    I was pulsing ''let him in'' about a thousand times a minute the moment I snapped back to attention. Using my talent made me think a little harder, process a little faster. It usually paid to apply that extra focus to my pathetic telepathy, but it takes a moment to adjust. I never relish that moment -It isfar to easy for my mind to wander towards unsavory topics and self-depreciation.


    It was a psychic broadcast tightly focused on the redhead, bombarding her unconsciousmind with my own very, very conscious one. Still, she paused for a moment deciding whether or not to tell me to piss off. There were reasons I wore a plumbers outfit and not spandex.


    Janefurrowed her brow and glanced down at the grey sweatpants and plain black t-shirt she was wearing, obviously displeased with a stranger catching her without her carefully crafted outside persona on. A twinge of annoyance passed through me. Not at being potentially turned away - but at her failure to recognize and revile me like the intruder to her life I was. I''d never worked with the same person so frequently, and frankly, it scared me how completely I''d erased myself from her memory. How easy it had become. A standard job for me could take weeks while I lined up all the factors and advantages I''d need to nudge things in my favor. This? This job had taken me hours. Part of me felt even that was more than I''d needed. Guilt though... guilt didn''t pay the bills. So I didn''t let up.


    Being the most technically skilled telepath on the planet, I could say with confidence that even going all out, there was still a fair chance she could shake me off. While I was innately skilled at the use of my telepathy, I was so weak at broadcasting that the few Capes I''d met with similar talents had simply laughed at me. I was like a high-end car with no motor. The best knife thrower in the world is still going to get killed in a gunfight.


    Sweat began to bead on my brow in a way that had nothing to do with the heat. It was an especially hot summer this year and it took all my concentration not to inch uninvited into the cool, air-conditioned entryway. She stared me in the eyes the entire time - like she was expecting me to flee in the face of her ire. I just returned the blank dead-eyed stared every nine to fiver adopts when under professional scrutiny. Eventually, she gave in with a sigh and a shrug, realizing I''d done nothing to warrant the hostility.


    "Come in then John," she said with an air of resignation and a glance at my name tag. "Sorry about that. Heaters this way." she grumbled pointing a perfectly manicured finger in one direction before flicking some auburn hair over her shoulder and heading that way herself. I was only briefly distracted by the roll of her hips as she stomped away from me. It probably helped that I was falling into the leering handyman stereotype - but it certainly didn''t make me feel like a good person to be so mesmerized by it. Of course, a very rich man had paid me a significant amount up front to keep the peeved redhead to himself, which chauvinistic though it was, spoke volumes about just how amazing she was. I felt another pang of depression shoot through me. I knew pretty intimately how amazing Jane was - and none of it had to do with all the hearts she could stop just walking up the street.


    The doorway opened into a long hallway that I knew from experience would lead to a spacious kitchen on the right and a number of smaller rooms and a large dining room on the left. The hall terminated in a circular alcove with a spiraling staircase that could be taken either up or down to reach the other floors. A literal red carpet spanned the length of the hall, with a single small stand bearing a number of wedding photos and a flower vase. It was the only decoration visible, though there were dust laden squares lining the walls where other pictures had obviously been taken down recently. The entryway spoke volumes about the homeowner. The red carpet, all the pictures (of him) that his wife had taken down, his wife''s clear beauty, they all spoke of a singular focus in life. Aggrandizing himself. Since I happened to know the man quite personally, this didn''t surprise me. If anything it was all quite tasteful by comparison to how he usually acted.


    The second my foot passed over the doorway I started the next part of my plan. Crucial if only because I couldn''t actually do anything with the heater OR any of my tools. Well - any of these tools at least. I had my own bag of tricks after all. I switched my broadcasting from a single, focused thought, pulsing out on repeat at rapid speeds, to a hellacious cacophony of violently conflicting images, thoughts, feelings and concepts, closing the door behind me as I did so.


    If I was a more powerful telepath Jane would have suffered a blinding seizure and died pretty much on the spot. I''ve seen it done before. Instead, the weak reaction I was capable of causing was more akin to a brief stupor. Like losing your train of thought and forgetting where you are and what you were doing. The befuddlement as I''d taken to calling it, would last about as long as I kept the broadcast up. Unfortunately, I had to be actively thinking about all the things I was broadcasting, so it was extremely difficult not to fall into a pattern and therefore release my victim. Don''t believe me? Try thinking about twenty random things. Truly random, no connection between them. Jane stood perfectly still, eyes glazed over inmid-stepas I jogged to her kitchen.This was one of the few feats of mental acuity I wasactually proud of. A bonafide hero grade ability, even if itwas only really at the C lister level.


    Stepping into the kitchen - a huge island countertop affair - I palmed a fairly mild roofie into the steaming mug I knew would be there. I wasn''t going to do anything untoward toJane of course, but I needed a pretty open mind to work my magic, and I simply didn''t have the time to coerce Jane into getting blackout drunk or otherwise impaired under her own power.


    All that prep work I mentioned? In this case, I''d spent about an hour hovering around the neighborhood, telepathically blasting the need to drink a stupendous amount of tea. If another telepath had been passing by they''d have probablydropped in on me just to check my sanity. Of course, since I was so weak, this had the lesser effect of getting a handful of people to get the urge to drink a little tea and nothing more.


    Finished my task, I had made my way back into the hall with Jane and gently placed the cup containing the still hot tea on the small table nearest her - then ceased the befuddlement.


    "The heater been doing anything funny lately ma''am?" I queried, seemingly as confused about the sudden need for maintenance as she was annoyed by it. I was verbally prodding her, directing her attention to what I wanted and leaving no room for her to ponder the sudden blip in her memory. People I befuddledo still have a vague awareness of their surroundings, but unless they spend a lot of time and energy trying to remember it their rational minds will typically just sweep the memories away the same way you tune outmost things that you find inconsequential. Selective attention at its finest.


    "No. In fact it''s been sitting here looking pretty and expensive just like everything ELSE in the house." her tone of voice left the fact that she included herself in that category unspoken but obvious. I winced at that but stuck to doing what I was paid for and otherwise minded my own business. My silence and pained smile seemed enough of a response for her, so she snapped up her cup of tea without any thought as to why it was there, and continued speaking. The tirade lasted all the way across the - fairly large - home, and included some things I''m sure were lies I was meant to pass on as rumor. A subtle jab at her husbands reputation that I knew was more than just the idle chatter of a housewife. Jane was a trophy wife certainly, but stupid, she was not. The entire time she spoke I paid special attention to her cup of tea. While shehadpicked it up, she had yet to take a sip of it.


    This content has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.


    By the time we''d hit the stairs going down I''d already pulsed her with ''drink your tea'' thousands of times. If I was lucky she would head up for a sip or two before I had to start pretending to fix something. Of course, luck and I don''t get to talking all too often, so I naturally intended to assist the matter.


    "If it''s alright with you ma''am I''ll need someone to turn the hot water on and off as I work to test it." I croaked awkwardly, setting down and opening my toolbox on the floor next to the heater. It wasn''t something I''d usually say - if only because it made no sense to need her to do so, but repeated visits to a house I couldn''t afford, so I could deal with this woman who was out of my league,were beginning to grate on me. I''d dealt with her long enough that she had become a person instead of a job to me. Telling that douche Patriarch that this was my last job for him wasn''t going to be much fun either. You''d think a guy who could fly faster than the speed of sound would be able to avoid getting caught cheating on his wife simply by dint of choosing to do his business in some far off impossible to discover locale. Instead, the idiot had been in his bed, at home, with his neighbor''s wife when Jane had gotten home two days ago. I usually wouldn''t have been called to involve myself at that point, but in a blind rage, Jane had gone tearing through the house destroying things in retaliation. Which is how she''d found the secret compartment Patriarch kept his costume in.


    When I looked back up at her from my toolbox while contemplating this, Jane was staring at me, a curious look in her eyes. I started to panic, palms already sweaty from stress before her face returned to normal. Like she''d hadn''t been staring me down for some reason.


    "Do you owe my husband something then John?" she asked stepping within arms reach of me. Sympathy rolled off her in waves, no doubt born from a misguided feeling of camaraderie. A mutual dislike for her husband. If nothing else, I had to respect the fact that she hadn''t tried to seduce me at all. In my long career, I have had more than my fair share of superheroes wives thinking a great way to get back at their shitty, inattentive husbands was to sleep with the help. While from their point of view this was the petty type of thing rich sociopaths got up to, for me it would mean drawing the ire of one of the very real gods that traipsed about the earth using childish codenames and even more childish costumes.


    "Because I remember him pawing through his phone for the number of your company just yesterday." she continued her gaze panning over my figure with steadily increasing confusion. I shrugged noncommittally at that, though inside I was starting to sincerely lose my grip on inner peace. The part she had left unspoken was ''right after I found his costume.''


    "Just so happens I had an opening today. A guys gotta make a living." I said, with a deliberate calmness and a belligerent tone to my voice that I hoped would convey the sense that I was just the average tradesmen trying to get by, who didn''t particularly care about his clients outside of what they paid him to. Which usually is true of me, if not really in this context.


    "Hmm." was her only reply. It didn''t sound very convinced and her eyes had a contemplative look to them when she eventually turned and headed back up the stairs, to the kitchen. I tracked her all the way up with my power. I''m a weak telepath at best, and most of the really strong ones can only really tell what direction people are in, but strength doesn''t really have a whole lot to do with the skill. I wasn''t really reading her mind - mostly because I lacked the ability to -it was more like tracking the miscellaneous static all thinking beings produced by being conscious relative to my own position. Again, a highly useful, extremely specialized skill - that would do absolutely nothing for me in the event a D lister with super strength threw a car at me.


    Once I was sure she''d made it to the kitchen I switched from tracking her back to spiking compulsions at her from within my limited range. I would give it a few more minutes before going upstairs, ostensibly for a glass of water or a bathroom break if she was still awake when I finally went up the stairs. I would easily be able to tell if she was still conscious if I continued tracking her - but I could broadcast compulsions and track at the same time. In fact, I couldn''t really do more than one ofany kind of telepathic operation at a time.


    "Sorry, I just need to use the-" the words fell from my lips several minutes later, as I rounded the needlessly long staircase to see Jane laid out on the ground in the kitchen doorway, mug of tea cracked and dripping a few feet away.


    See, I''m a disgustingly weak telepath. I can''t just invade a persons mind on a whim. I have to metaphorically scream my compulsions over and over again just to get people to consider them. But with the right set of circumstances, memories? Memories are like files in a cabinet to me. My relatively low telepathic power combined coupled with sheer finesse lets me fiddle with peoples memories and brain chemistry in ways most other Telepaths couldn''t even consider without burning out their targets. But for me, the only challenge is getting in. Hence the LSD.


    I crouched on the ground next to her and got to work worming my way into her thoughts. Making my way to her memories and experiences. The source code of her being. That''s all people are really. Handfuls of memories that inform how we react to future situations. It didn''t take me long to find her memory of the last two days. They were recent and she''d been thinking about them frequently. A late night at work. Coworkers that won''t stop hitting on me. A door opens. Relief.


    Then everything goes wrong. Cassandras in my bed. My husband''s in her. Smashed doors, broken chairs. A Spandex suit. Confusion. Loss. Listlessness. Then the repair guy again. This is the fifth time. First?


    I pull back a bit in abject horror at that last thought. I don''t just ''change'' memories. I take them, and little bits of relevant knowledge with them. Then I push out fake memories in their place. I''ve never experienced that process to be anything less than absolute. Jane shouldn''t have been able to remember me. Shouldn''t have recognized me at all actually. I frowned, but eventually chalked it up to repeated visits and added it to the list of reasons I was done with the god damn Patriarch.


    I pulled out the memories of a cheating husband and Janes subsequent rampage. In their place, I left a pleasant night with the hubby, and a good time gotten out of hand because of some alcohol. At least the moron had followed my instructions and minimized damages to the house to a level that could be mistaken for such. It''d leave her with a headache afterward, but she''d probably rationalize away the last day or so of listless depression she''d been in.


    Next was the good part. My guilty pleasure as it were. I sifted through Jane''s memories for, well skills for lack of a better word. A skill and all the accompanying training and memories that supported it. I sorted through Janes whole life, front to back - her childhood, puberty, all the schooling she''d ever received and every lesson she''d ever learned. Eventually, I settled on accounting. It seemed useful enough, if not exactly flashy. I pointedly ignored her self-defense classes, because no one was more aware than I that in a superpowered world, I would either be able to make my way using my power, or I was fighting something that could kill me with an errant thought or flick of the wrist. Not that I ever fought anything. Again - plumbers clothes, not spandex.


    I gently scooped up all the accompanying memories and split them. They''d still be there for Jane in this case. She wouldn''t suddenly forget how to count or something. But the memories would fade just a little bit. Be less vivid. There would be just a little less emotion behind them for her now. I, on the other hand, would be the proud owner of a brand new set of memories. Since most people remember things chronologically I had been working backward. Changing and copying things as I came upon them. Now, on my way back out I left a compulsion to stay asleep for at least a few more hours, and erased my visit, and her fall. In their place, I left an afternoon nap and a slumbering hand knocking a favorite mug off the table.


    Everything in place, I gently slid out of her thoughts and back into my own perfectly motionless body. Since I was working at the speed of thought, it had only been about a minute since I''d left - but since I literally wasn''t in my right mind, I hadn''t been breathing for about the same duration of time.


    It felt like crap but it didn''t bother me much. I used to think I''d pop back into my body already dead when I first started doing this. Years of practice have made it a negligible risk at best. Once I''d taken a deep, gasping breath, I got to work carrying Jane up to her bedroom and arranging a couple things to match the new memories I''d left her. The entire time I was consolidating my memories, slipping inconsequential moments that weren''t at the core of my personality down the drain. Eventually, I settled on erasing my week long binge watch of Friends to make room for the new memories. I did that a lot. Binge watch television shows. It was an enjoyable way to pass the time that doubled as leaving me an easy stretch of time to track down and swap for something more useful. I didn''t have cable, and the only media I owned was a complete collection of the show Friends on DVD. I''d tried for variety at first a long time ago, but after a while, I realized I had just been re-watching Friends every time I erased the memory - so sold the rest of my DVD collection.


    Now done covering my ass, I quietly walked out of the expensive suburban home making sure to gently close the door behind me.


    Or at least I tried to. A sudden meat hitting pavement noise was the only warning I had before I blacked out. When I woke up no more than a couple seconds could have past but I was no longer in even vaguely familiar surroundings. Now I was situated atop a skyscraper overlooking the city - or rather acity. I had absolutely no recollection of where I was. The skyline was vastly different from where I had been, and Thurbrook - the town I had just been working in - was nowhere near a large body of water, which is what this one seemed to be built around. A large Adonis bodied man wearing a white and red spandex body suit hovered in front of me, eyes crackling with a foreign energy no one had ever been able to identify, illuminating a strong jaw and high cheekbonesthat were framed perfectly by made for tv hair. Despite the obvious speed we''d been moving, he looked perfectly put together, like he was preparing for a talk show - though the baleful glare he leveled at me would have certainly scared any audience half to death.


    "John." He said, in a business-like tone. Almost bored sounding. I had to steady myself and wipe blood from my ears and nose before answering. The son of a bitch had let me catch the edge of a sonic boom before scooping me up in the bullshit physics-defying field he could project to stop random passers-by from being cleaved in two by his passing. I''d have yelled at him but the truth was I was scared shitless. He could murder me with no one the wiser simply by throwing me so hard my corpse was burned up on re-entry.Which sucked - because I had already decided to break ties with him.For all I feared the man, he was still at least nominally a Hero. A good guy who didn''t destroy people for no reason. I''d have liked to sayany reason, but I knew him too well to believe that.


    I finally pulled my wits together and pushed myself to my feet looking him in the eye when I greeted him, my body aching and blood leaking from parts of me I''d rather have not thought about. I scowled at the most powerful man on the planet and spat "Patriarch".

 Nobody - 2

    I could tell something was wrong just by looking at his face. Patriarch was never a pleasant man where I was concerned. Rare were the days I could speak to him without a condescending smile or a disappointed scowl marring his face. We were friends once me and him. But that tends to fall by the wayside when one of you turns out to be godlike in power and the other gets a power weaker than a conventional cell phone.


    This time though, he had his stern fatherly face on. The one the media loves. The one the world at large knows best. It was the face he always gave a televised criminal when he pleaded for them to turn themselves in and reform. So few other people actually knew Patty that I''m sure no one but me noticed the one televised appearance where his opponent took him up on his offer was also one of the only times he''d ever looked disappointed on television. Unhappy.


    At the end of the day, the Patriarch was an institutionalized bully. He loved lording his power over others,and he had a lot of power to lord. His intent was never to help anyone. It was just to look good while he indulged.


    "Patty. Please. I know we-" I started, sputtering but was immediately cut off.


    "John, Please. I know we''re not friends anymore. But this has to stop."


    He''d said what I wanted to say so perfectly in sync with me, that it felt like he''d been waiting for it. But that wasn''t what told me something was wrong. No, it was his tone of voice more than anything that convinced me I was in for trouble. It was his televised voice. Larger than life, loud enough that every camera could hear it over a fight.


    It also didn''t make any sense. I''d been working for him and his discount Justice League for as long as I could remember. As it turns out, superheroes are just as bad as, if not worse than, Hollywood celebrities for getting themselves into easily avoidable scandals. That was what they retained me for after all. To make the shittyPR go away. To cover their asses when they drunkenly used their powers to impress some airhead in a bar. Sometimes it was easy. One man jobs I could plan an pull off in a few days. Like Jane. Sometimes I had to spend weeks stalking and fixing a handful of people that had seen something they shouldn''t. If that sounds immoral to you that''s because it is - but I was getting paid by the good guys to do it, so I didn''t have a lot of reason to complain.


    Instead of immediately answering his apparent plea for mercy, I started scanning my surroundings, both mentally and visually. I felt uncomfortably naked as I spun around on the rooftop, my bag of tools coming around from where it hung on my shoulder to smack me sharply in the chest with a light thwacking noise and a dull clang as all my useless wrenches and screwdrivers careened into each other. I realized with a disturbing suddenness that I couldn''t sense any people. Everything LOOKED fine. But there were no people. No psychic imprints in the surrounding space, no ambient thoughts, nothing. Given that we were on top of a multi-story building that should be TEEMING with people at this hour, I was struck with the alarming wrongness of it all, before turning inward to examine my own mind, and spinning back around to face the Patriarch when I didn''t notice anything wrong.


    "In memory of our long and storied friendship Patty, I''ll listen to you at least. I''m more than willing to stop." My tone was conciliatory, almost casually friendly. I had to assume that if his media face was on then the media were around, and the appearance of cooperation would at least guarantee that no one had an excuse to spread me out over the top of the nearest mountain range like so much strawberry jam. Besides. He hated when I called him Patty. Everyone else would assume it was a short form of his alias, Patriarch, but I knew better. Patty, to the Patriarch, was always the glib nickname that fat bullied Patrick wore. It was always going to be a reminder that he wasn''t always a demigod. It was a reminder that I KNEW him.


    And there was nothing he could do about it if we were being watched. Not without damaging his image.


    "Ah, Felix. You were so driven when we were younger. You wanted to be a Hero even more than I did. You were dedicated. Even helped me through my early years. But this? Its low John. Never would have pegged you for it. " Patriarch grit his teeth as he spoke, no doubt forcing himself to keep up the act. Anyone watching would probably assume he was distressed by confronting a friend. Which was bullshit. He just really,really wanted to kill me. I couldn''t read minds worth a damn and evenI could pick that one out of the mental static coming off him.


    I noted he''d used my real name during his little speech. If I had much faith in the man''s intelligence I''d think he was subtly acknowledging my jab. Unfortunately, I knew better. More than likely, he was just trying to turn the implied threat back on me, not realizing that someone like me was so unimportant that threatening my reputation or implying unspoken truths was meaningless.My entire career was basically shot the second he came for me. Patty got so much TV coverage whenever he was in costume, that being seen near him pretty much meant my days of pretending to be a plumber were over.


    Still distracted as mind worked overtime to figure out what was going on, I was somewhat slow in answering as I said "I didn''t do anything that you-" but was abruptly cut off as I found myself three feet behind where I was originally standing, and pressed firmly into the side of a large metal vent that had been erected there. All the air left my lungs at once and I struggled for breath as the too large hand of the Patriarch held me aloft by the throat, his face only inches away from mine in a vicious and indignant snarl that I could easily tell was fake. The first hints of a smile had crept on to Patty''s face as he''d finally laid hands on me. Not noticeable in any way really, except to someone who''d grown up with him.


    "SHE''S MY WIFE JOHN!" he cried out, just a bit too loudly, then continued in astage whisper "What you''ve done to her, to so many others. Was it worth it John? You couldn''t be a Hero so you became a villain?"


    It took me a moment to grasp what he was implying, gasping for breath through the pinhole-sized airway Patriarch had left me. He was trying to spin this on me. Make it look like I had done something to his wife for.. revenge? Because I had weak powers? I couldn''t understand who the show was for. I''d worked for pretty much every heavy hitter on the planet at this point and I''d never so much as set foot near a deal with a bad guy. We may not be best friends but these guysknew me. The only member of Patriarchs team who didn''t like me was -


    Panic struck me as I recognized who must be blocking my power from sensing my surroundings, and I began violent wrenching myself back and forth in Patriarchs grip, hurting myself more than him. Unable to think of another way out I started to try and befuddle him - anyone really. It wasn''t a targeted thing, or calculated, or surgical as is my usual operating procedure. It was a wild flexing of every iota of psychic power I could muster, fueled by panic, and rage, and more than a little bit of pants shitting fear.


    For a brief moment, I thought I might make it too. Patriarchs grip loosened and he started shivering violently, frozen in place by my power, and capitalizing on the moment I scrabbled across the ground to my bag, scooping it off the ground where I''d dropped it, and sprinted for the roof access, hoping to make my way into the guts of the building where I could get lost in someone''s apartment or simply make a run for it. It occurred to me that it was functionally impossible for me to escape Patty and that I might want a hostage. Not because I''m a villain mind you, but because Patty killing me was the type of nightmare I had so frequently I reallydidn''t want to be captured by him. I rapidly began trying to make the best of a bad situation. I hurtled across the gravel-covered rooftop towards the door, already planning to cause a scene that would require someother hero to come along that I could turn myself in to.


    Unfortunately, it was a testament to how much focus it takes me to project a literal seizure field around myself that I had actually forgotten WHY I had resorted to its use in the first place. No sooner had I opened the door to the stairs when I found my tenuous grasp on the seizure-causing waves of thought shatter, and not by my own lack of focus. A man wearing ancient greek robes like that of Plato and Socrates rose up from the staircase.The pristine white fabric of the thing clung to him in impossible, gravity-defying ways as he came to slow stop in front of me. Looking every bit the scholar as those men he''d patterned his costume after, there was one thing that was impossible to forget about him: his brain extended out the back of his head by at least a foot and a half, suspended in the air by specially designed plastic case of some kind that was clearly embroidered with golden filigree where it was anchored to his distended skull. You could literallysee Headcase thinking, as his brain produced a tesla coils worth of neuroelectric energy.Reading on this site? This novel is published elsewhere. Support the author by seeking out the original.


    Headcase hates me. Vehemently. I''m significantly more technically skilled with my power than he is, and he''s one of the few supers I''ve never done work for. Despite being hilariously rich and powerful, he simplywasn''t very fun to look at - and I suspect he knew it.He''s such a powerful psychic that complicated mental processes are permanently locked to him. Oh, he can send and receive thoughts, throw crap with his brain and all the other really useful stuff - but mind control, memory manipulation, and pretty much anything else that involved actually beingin someone''s mind were impossible for him.Even applying his full psychic attention to a person is enough to fry their brain - let alone tamper with their inner workings. I''d trade him in a heartbeat of course. Even WITH the hideous extended brain thing.


    All that is to say, he''s the worlds preeminent Telepath and Telekinetic, boasting extreme range and power - and he''s under the misguided belief that what I do is a horrible attempt to make him look bad.


    Instantly I felt the ironclad grip of Patriarch around my throat again.


    "I see you really did need my help with this dreg Patriarch. How ironic that the most powerful super on the planet is such a poor match for the weakest." Headcase drawled in the sort of snarky high society tone of voice you''d expect only exists in television dramas.


    "As I said at the briefing, he is EXTREMELY dangerous. I''m glad at least you took me seriously or he could have kept me seizing on this roof until I stopped breathing." Patriarch groused, his tone becoming dark and vexed, his stare boring a hole through my the back of my head.


    I realized belatedly that he''d been faking it. There was no way I could cause that much damage to another person with my befuddlement - let alone one I threw at the worlds most powerful man, while in a barely restrained state of panic. He''d just baited me into attacking him so whoever waswatching could tell I was ''dangerous''.


    "I wonder at that ability of his though..." Headcase mused, his tone of voice condescending and mild even as he zipped around my once more limp and hanging form. "


    It''s just so wonderfully thought out. Artificial Seizures. Something like.. this perhaps?" A cocksure grin spread across his face, and I girded myself mentally for only the briefest of moments before I was struck by a Grand Mal seizure. My entire body spasming at odd angles, pain radiating out through me as my jaw worked and my stomach and bowels attempted to eject their contents in both directions at once. I had only just managed to focus hard enough to ensure I didn''t bite my own tongue off and drown in my own blood - when I blacked out.


    I awoke confused and disoriented. I could feel drool and vomit where it had dried on my front and chin, and felt my bare feet dragging across what felt like a smooth stone floor. Occasionally I could hear the derisive cries of what I assumed were other people, muffled and in the distance but couldn''t see anything ahead of me but a long stone hallway.


    To either side of me, only barely holding me up with a large metallic hand under my arms were two, largemetallic men - each one at least two feet tall, sporting gleaming white plating all across their bodies, fit together in patterns and sizes so perfect it was nearly seamless. They seemed to flow up the enormous hallway as they dragged me, like living quicksilver. The hallway itself seemed to have no light source, and yet was completely illuminated, as though by magic - which I supposed it was.


    Patriarch''s team of sycophants happened to include one, highly pretentious (all of them were), spellcaster. While the enigmatic man known as Reeves had absolutely no costume, merchandise, or silly cartoon name, he styled himself as the ''Archmage of Earth'' and spent much of his time expanding, maintaining, and improving, the tremendous stone prison the league had contracted out for use to any government that couldn''t hold a super in a conventional jail.


    This immense, miles wide, ever-expandingcomplex of granite sat dead in the middle of nowhere - with no searchers ever having found it to exist on the earth, likely because it was so far underground that everyone in it probably qualified as a moleman. And only the worst, most powerful villains got sent here.


    I began struggling violently, no longer concerned with any punishment my ironclad escort might apply to me as some of the bigger names I might meet here flitted through my mind. I imagined the King of Skin slowly flaying my skin from my still living body and binding my soul to it like a sick sort of sock puppet. I considered the terribly ruin the biokinetic monster known as the Cancermancer could bring to my flesh. And I struggled. And screamed. I even tried using my powers for a while.


    Not once did the beings holding me flinch or even loosen their grip on me. They were without pain, mercy, or evidently, even one single fuck to give about whatever it was I was doing.


    Eventually, the guards dragging me came to a stop and turned to face a section of the wall that appeared no different to any other. My struggling had died down at this point, my pitiful stamina finally giving out on me. A voice boomed from somewhere in the center of both quicksilver men in stereo, unfamiliar to me, but easy to guess at once it began speaking.


    "Welcome to Castle Reeve. As the Archmage of Earth I don''t really have time to care for the petty needs of every criminal to grace my halls, so in the interest of lightening my workload I have chosen to pair off inmates in... helpful ways." spoke the eloquent voice in what was clearly a fake British accent.


    The stone wall in front of us suddenly shifted, a section large enough to fit myself and my captors flipping to the left and open as though a giant domino shifted by an unseen hand. The stone seam surrounding the new protrusion seemed to change and flow outward, like silt as the door moved, leaving me to wonder how air got into these cells. It made hardly any noise at all, which was why the slavering shrieks and bellows coming from the cage set in the recesses of the newly opened cave were so disconcerting, and instantly jolted me out of my focus on the mechanisms of the door.


    The space inside was small, a circular room with one half walled off by tremendous steal bars, metal shackles hanging from the walls inside it. There were no accommodations usually afforded prisoners here. No toilet. No bed. No sink. just a plain stone room. And flailing about inside that cage was a tremendous, orange blur. It careened back and forth off every available wall and surface, leaving 4-inch rents in the stone walls and sending showers of sparks flying every which way when it hit the bars of its cell. Even as the being inside rampaged, the stone walls around it began to fill and reform, like a rapidly healing wound, faster than even the orange monstrosity could damage it. Eventually, the being came to a standstill in the center of the cage, its eyes 6 green eyes centered on me, giving me my first good look at what I was fairly certain was going to be my executioner.


    It was at least 8 feet tall, and possessed of a tail almost as long as long. Powerful muscles radiated up its digitigrade legs and across its four powerful arms, each one ending in vicious looking razor sharp claws. It''s head was almost snake-like, but attached to a stocky neck full of corded muscle. Three eyes were clustered close together, on either side of its head, where the eyes of a snake usually went. One eye from each side wasshifted slightly more forward than the others closer to the front of its face, where a humans eye would be. Its mouth opened and closed with the lower jaw splitting in half down the middle to reveal a maw filled with a mind breaking number of teeth, and a red tongue thick and long enough to choke me with.


    I recognized the creature instantly. No one knew if it was a human changed by its powers, or a lizard that had undergone some kind of experimentation, Lizardface was almost as old as the super phenomenon in general. He was iconic. He''d been around since the beginning, when people first started getting powers, and was known to appear in the middle of two other supers fighting and brutally murder them both. All the while screeching at the surrounding crowd like it wasn''t satisfied yet. The general consensus was that whatever Lizardface was, it was stupid. Terribly so. Strength, Speed, and Durability, to give Patriarch a run for his money, in the mind of a deranged child.


    I began hyperventilating at the sheer sight of the thing. A primal fear welling up in me that anyone with even basic survival instincts would feel in the face of such overwhelming force. It screamed ''Run away! Do something!Do anything or your gonna freaking die!''


    I immediately returned to flailing ineffectually at the constructs holding me in place. When that didn''t work, I begged them, pleaded for them to just kill me themselves if they were so set on it. Just anything but this. It didn''t work of course, and as I screamed obscenities at the heartless Archmage who built this nightmare, I became certain that I was going to be eaten alive.


    Ignoring me the entire time, the constructs holding me dragged me inexorably across the stone floor, my feet leaving a trail in the dust that implied nothing had come this way in a long while and threw me at the solid steel bars. I braced for some kind of impact, prepared to use the recoil to bounce out of reach of the horrendous monster within - but none came. My body passed harmlessly through the bars like they weren''t even there, a problem I quickly found they didn''t have going from the inside out, as I fell to the floor and tumbled backwards into them.


    Directly at the feet of Lizardface.

 Nobody - 3

    I hardly heard the metal men leave the room as I stared up in abject horror at the leathery-skinned form of Lizardface. A small part of my mind registered that they had left, but the overwhelming majority of me was thinking; ''I don''t want to freaking die!'' something which I had begun broadcasting at full blast from almost the moment I''d entered the room.


    Lizardface''s too long head hovered over my shivering form, the monstrous creature having dropped down onto its hands and knees around me, its prodigious size allowing it to trap me in a cage of its limbs as it slowly brought one side of its face level with my own.


    Three brilliant emerald eyes regarded me then, and time seemed to slow as the horrendous stench of its breathe washed over me. Details began to pop out at me as I stared at its unmoving form. I began to take note of several perpendicular scars in the meaty flesh of the creatures neck, a set of three of them near the base of its skull. At the end of each scar, a nickel-sized grey bump was present and as I stared straight past Lizardfaces waiting maw at its neck I realized that I was catching mental static from them.


    A full minute passed before It occurred to me that I was not dead yet - and that I was far too mentally drained to continue broadcasting my thoughts. Slowly easing back on my telepathic powers I refocused on deciphering the faint mental noise coming from Lizardface. When I did, If I hadn''t already shit myself at some point, I probably would have.


    Quietly, and faintly, as though I was receiving the communication through a thick sheet, I heard;


    ''No die. Stop Yell.''


    The sheer amazement I felt at the fact that Lizardface was sentient was enough to cause me to completely let go of my broadcast, and the moment I did, Lizardface let out a grunt that mental static coming off...him... indicated was made in relief. He pushed himself off the ground, his thick arms leveraging him up with ease. It then quietly walked to the opposite side of the barren cage, turned to face me, and then dropped into a crouch that was probably as close to sitting as Lizardfaces bizarre physiology would allow. All the while, his emerald eyes remained trained on me, an expression on its face that I couldn''t decipher - mostly because of his eponymous Lizard face.


    Tentatively, I turned my head to look at the entrance my captors had dragged me in through, and as I expected, found it already closed and sealed. The wall had returned to being sheer stone, with no sign that anything or anyone had ever passed through it save for the dust on the ground that had been disturbed by my somewhat shameful entry into the room.


    Slowly, I rose to my feet and shuffled backwards across the cage floor, keeping my eyes trained on the monster in front of me. When I reached the furthest part of the cell, I slid to the floor with my back to the cave wall. I wanted, with every fiber of my being, to go to sleep. I was beaten. I was hungry. I was beyond stressed out by the fact that I was now in what passed for jail for gods.


    Weighing my options, I found my curiosity at the famously uncommunicative Lizardface just slightly outweighing my bodies need for some respite from all the duress it was under. I began to broadcast the beginnings of a simple question at Lizardface, blaring the message hundreds of times a second at the monster, but before I could even finish ramping up my speed there was a thunderous crack and I found myself pinned to the stone wall I''d been leaning on, an enormous clawed hand gouged hunks of stone out of the cave wall on either side of my neck, and terror once more gripped me.


    A rapidly disappearing impact crater on the opposite side of the room was the only evidence Lizardface had ever been there, and the monster once more leveled one side of its raptor-like head at me.


    ''Stop Yell. Say Once.''


    There was no way anyone was going to be able to hear a thought I didn''t bother to broadcast at high speed. Literally, nothing was that sensitive to telepathy -


    ''Sorry?'' I ventured, not expecting an actual response.


    ''Accepted. You, Sleep. I, Guard.'' replied the tiny voice in my head.


    I openly gaped as the unstoppable force known as Lizardface - with surprising grace for its size, slid back to the side of the room it had been on, and took up position staring at me again. One of its hands gently rubbings its head as though it had a headache of all things.


    Though I knew I probably shouldn''t trust Lizardface, the sheer relief that I wasn''t in immediate danger of death was enough to bring how tired I was back to the forefront of my mind. I''d obviously been out of it long enough for Headcase and the Patriarch to bring me here - but I was pretty sure that telepathically induced seizure blackouts didn''t count as sleep. Without any further fuss, I put to work a skill I''d garnered from having once helped a veteran get over his night terrors. The long hours that man had put in sleeping in dangerous locales, in uncomfortable positions, culminated in one thing: I could sleep anywhere.


    I closed my eyes, and within moments, my head sank - and I began snoring.


    Lizardface, for his part, merely made an annoyed chuffing noise, andcontinued staring at me.


    <hr>


    I didn''t wake up with a jolt, or a start. I woke to the distant sound of a hammer banging on metal. A sound that became louder the closer to wakefulness I came. Dimly, I realized I was not in the same position I had gone to sleep in - I was no longer leaning against the far wall from Lizardface, instead I was quite literally, stuffed into a corner of the room.


    My face was pressed firmly into the ground of the cell, and my arms and legs were huddled close to my torso, as though someone who didn''t understand human anatomy had been attempting to fit me inside a trunk when they''d been interrupted.


    The sound of metal being pounded grew louder and louder, occasionally being punctuated by the shrieking noise of steel being torn. I began to slowly unfurl my arms and legs from where they had been tightly wrapped around me and raised one hand to my face to wipe the debris from the floor off my face as I pushed myself upright. I stared blankly at my hand as I lowered it, a bright crimson stain becoming apparent as my palm fell away from my face.


    I realized something must have happened while I was asleep but muddle-headed as I was I couldn''t quite figure out what. I debated getting up - possibly making another attempt to communicate with Lizardface, something countless telepaths before me had tried and failed to accomplish when the decision was abruptly taken out of my hands.


    An immense blur of orange sped across my vision and I suddenly found myself on a different end of the room, the rapid speed I''d been shifted at stealing the breath from my lungs and leaving me huffing and wheezing as I attempted to reestablish my relationship with beautiful life-giving air.


    "What-" I wheezed, producing a high pitched whistling noise. "What the fuck is-" my mouth remained open mid-screech, but no more words spilled forth as my mind finally caught up with my surroundings. All around me lay the broken and in many cases ripped apart forms of the Metal Men I had first seen upon my first waking here. They lay strewn about the floor of the cave we were in, gouts of energy I could neither identify nor look directly at occasionally spurting from them. Arcane symbols hovering over each corpse faded slightly with each spurt as the force animating the beings slowly bled from this world. The gigantic form of Lizardface crouched in the center of the cell surrounded by the carnage, one trunk-like arm slowly pressing forward onto a still functional Metal Man, though the pressure he was applying to it made that seem very, very temporary.


    "Listen to me you foul creature." bellowed a voice that immediately drew my eyes away from my erstwhile roommate and past where the bars of our cellshould have been. Standing in the center of the room, looking more annoyed than distressed stood the impatient form of Reeves. The man wore black slacks, a button-down shirt, and a hideous tweed vest. The vest had small symbols handstitched into it, crisscrossing it in elaborate patterns that glowed slightly as the Archmage of Earth spoke.The genuine version of this novel can be found on another site. Support the author by reading it there.


    "You are defending acorpse. You have been throwing that criminal around like a ragdoll. You areentirely too stupid to realize that you''ve likely already snapped his neck, and I have important people need to confirm hisdeath. So if you''ll kindly stopdestroying my guards, I will find you someother playmate as soon as I return."


    ''You. Stupid.''


    I could hear Lizardfaces simple mental broadcast as though he was right next to me, and was alarmed to realize he could evenunderstandReeves. The Archmage for his part seemed completely unaware of Lizardface''s response and kept his eyes trained on the leathery-skinned titan - which probably contributed to why he hadn''t noticed me moving around in the pile of scrap metal Lizardface had created.


    The two monstrous entities in the room with me merely stared at each other as I peered about the room to try and see if survival was still an option for me. The bars of the cell were gone, and the magically sealed entrance to the room hung open, even as more Metal Men walked into the room to take position on either side of Reeves, clearly in preparation for another assault.


    ''Big guy? You there?''


    Usually, I would have been more careful about communicating with Lizardface, but I was way out of my depth - and to be honest, probably suffering a concussion. The minute I sent my broadcast, two of the eyes on the side of Lizardfaces head spun to look at me. This would not have been so disconcerting for me, if not for the fact that they seemed to be moving completely independent of the rest of Lizardface - his frontal eye remained trained on Reeves, and his body remained perfectly still as the two rogue serpentine eyes appeared to give me a quick once-over.


    ''You bleed.I punish.''


    Lizardface''s response was quick and simple, like all his prior communications - but this time I couldfeel indignation suffusing the words. As though Lizardface was offended.


    Before I could think to ask whatthat was about, Lizardface had taken off, tearing across the room at Reeves like a guided missile. Only an orange blur was visible as Lizardface careened into an unimpressed Reeves, rebounding off the iridescent dome of energy that appeared around the man that appeared seemingly out of nowhere. Leaving no time for the mage to strike back, the still airborne Lizardface grabbed the skull of the nearest Metal Man, a powerful thrust of his arm shunting the construct several inches into the ground with an audible groaning noise as the steel making up its body creaked and bent under the force.


    Reeves attempted to turn towards Lizardface, just as the monsters came to a stop, courtesy of its new golem anchor, which was immediately torn from the ground and flung across the room at Reeves, shattering into several hunks of heated scrap metal that parted around the increasingly annoyed man.


    Realizing I was almost certainly going to die if I stayed in this room, I took a gamble. I began to martial my mental capabilities and focused my whole will on Reeves. I ached, I was tired, I was filthy. My focus was split in so many directions that if I wasn''t in imminent danger I doubted I''d be able at all. As I focused, an earsplitting headache ripped through me, and I had to work to contain a whimper and struggle through the pain.


    Finally, began to broadcast my befuddlement, causing Reeves and all the Metal Men to abruptly stop moving - though I was only broadcasting at Reeves. I had sincere doubts as to my ability to affect a mindless being with my powers.


    Shakily standing, I began to slowly make my way past Reeves, gesturing at Lizardface as I did so, the bestial creature seeming to have not noticed the sudden stillness in its rampage through the golems in the room. It seemed at some point as though he had given up on penetrating Reeves magical shield, and was now simply taking out his ire on the pompous mages minions.


    Lizardface flew about the room at dizzying speeds, ripping and tearing enemies apart almost in passing now that they were making no effort to fight back, only stopping when he belatedly noticed me motioning for him to stop. Once I had gotten his attention, I ceased gesturing, no longer having the leeway to be distracted from the broadcast I was firing at Reeves. Later on, I would wonder how Reeves - the most powerful mage on the planet, if he is to be believed, seemingly had no defenses against such a low ranking telepath. But for now, I had different priorities.


    I slowly picked my way across the body-strewn cave, and past Reeves, making my way to the door as fast as I could while still maintaining my focus. Out of the corner of my eye, I could see the lumbering form of Lizardface as he brazenly kicked and shouldered the still standing Metal Men out of his way. He seemed to pause briefly behind me, and there was a wet squelching crunch that rang out before the giant loped into place behind me. With no time to think, I merely shouldered on, eventually exiting the cave and walking forward along the seemingly infinite stone tunnel I had been dragged through to get here. After walking for several minutes, a trek uninterrupted by any change to the stretch of tunnel ahead of us, I reached the limits of my range and ceased my befuddling broadcast with a gasp, nausea washing over me.


    No longer hindered by intense focus, I gathered my strength and began to run up the tunnel - Lizardface loping along behind me like the worlds weirdest dog. I was frantic to escape what I was sure would be a swift and painful punishment once Reeves caught up with us, though Lizardface seemed unworried by our present situation.


    Lizardface, the monstrously powerful manchild that had killed more supers than I could even remember meeting. Lizardface the unstoppable serial killer. It began to dawn on me that while prior to this I hadn''t really been a villain in the strictest sense, my current sprint for freedom certainly wouldn''t be viewable as anything else once word got out.


    I tried very hard not to think about this as I ran, pointedly not looking at or broadcasting anything to Lizardface. So absorbed was I in pretending he wasn''t there that several minutes later when we eventually made it to the end of the hallway I nearly died of fright when he ''spoke'' to me.


    ''Stone. Breaks.''


    The matter of fact tone to the broadcast irked me to no end. Of course stone broke. Stone might as well be wet paper to you. I stared at Lizardface for a few moments in obvious aggravation before realizing how much of my present survival was predicated on his whims and hurriedly turning back to the tunnel''s end.


    I acted as though nothing had happened as I stared at the vast circular room the hall eventually ended in. It was giant, at least thirty feet wide, and completely lacked a ceiling. Arcane runes were scribed on the walls in dizzying spiral patterns that arced up into the darkness hanging over us, the magical lighting of the prison obviously not present further than fifteen or so feet above us.


    I frantically began searching the room for something that might be another doorway or even a button or panel that might open one. I realized with some trepidation that therewasn''t one. This room had clearly been designed for Reeves to enter and exit the facility.Reeves, who could bend stone to his will and simply lift the floor he was standing on straight up like a giant elevator.


    Panicking now, I returned to the entrance, wondering if there was another way out, or if I could ask Lizardface to burrow through one of the stone walls into another cell to hide - but as I did so I realized it was too late. Gazing out into the tunnel, I saw the walls beginning to visibly deteriorate in large patches roughly ever twenty feet on either side of the hall. Large, door shaped, patches. I began hearing yelling as whatever magical protections prevented noise from traveling in the facility failed, and detonation, impacts, and the roar of all kinds of energy slamming into stone began to filter into the tunnel.


    Slowly, I turned to Lizardface, unable to accept what I was seeing.


    ''Stone. Breaks.'' he repeated, shrugging his massive shoulders as though this was a simple explanation of the problem.


    ''What did youdo?'' I practically screamed back at him, forgetting again how easily he could separate me from my mortal coil.


    ''I Kill Burrower.''he said with another massive shrug.


    Burrower? What the fuck is aBurrower? Was this thing messing me with? What waswrong with this thing. It understood English just fine, that much I gathered from it''s response to Reeves taunting but -


    Reeves?


    Unable to bring all my thoughts together coherently enough to broadcast I waved my arms in front of Lizardface and mumbled gibberish at him for a few moments before calming down. This god damn lizard had killed us. Forget breaking Lizardface out of prison, we''dkilled Reeves. Well. Lizardface had, I realized, remembering the popping noise as we''d exited to the cell. But since I''d technically made that possible. . .


    I turned back to the mouth of the tunnel and marveled at the almost living tide of world ending threats that were slowly breaking free of their cells. I began to shake, now sure that there was no chance I was going to survive this ordeal. I was stuck in a dead end, with a serial killer, facing down the worst humanity had to offer. And if I escaped this? Patty would probably find me within seconds.


    Seemingly aggravated by my sudden lack of urgency, Lizardface made a chuffing noise and scooped me up under one set of his massive arms. Now carrying me like an unwieldy sack of potatoes, Lizardface leaped up, digging the resilient claws of his free hands and feet into the stone walls of the room. Each time his hands found purchase, he reoriented and leaped higher - leaving me staring down at the rapidly shrinking dot of light at the base of the shaft, as I wondered what I was going to do with the rest of my very short life.