Steel Life (Cape High Series Book 25), page 13
He screws down the final screw of his handmade toy and hooks it up to the television where the plug-in is supposed to go, and the TV lights up, regardless of the fact there’s no electricity here. He can only hope that he’s close enough to civilization for the tiny bit of power to not be noticed.
He fiddles with the antennae, and then taps it a few times before suddenly the TV is showing the HTV channels clearly. He frowns, though, seeing a strange logo behind the teen on the screen. “Not HTV?” he asks.
The teen is sitting on a rather ratty looking couch with the letters VTV behind her. They change to the words “The Blackbird and Gecko Show.” She bounces a little as she gets comfortable, and grins proudly. “Hi, everyone! Welcome to the Blackbird—”
“And Gecko!” a male calls from off screen.
“The Blackbird and Gecko show,” the girl says, dryly. “You’re watching us on the brand new, newly released Villain TV! Thanks for subscribing everyone! Today we have a very special guest, but we’ll get to that later.”
“Oye!” someone yells from off stage.
“Just wait for a bit, I have gossip to share!” she yells back. A teen with a lizard haircut in blue and purple comes into the scene, dropping down next to her. “Shouldn’t you be behind the camera?” she asks him.
“It’s set up!” the teen says. “Hello, everyone! I’m Gecko, and we’re here to tell you about what everyone’s been talking about! The big wedding between Taurus and Firefly.”
“Better known as Taurfly!” Blackbird says.
“No, it’s not,” Gecko says, looking at her.
“You just don’t understand how ‘shipping’ works, Gecko,” she says. “It is definitely called ‘Taurfly.’”
“That sounds terrible,” Gecko tells her. “Like some house sized mutant fly.”
“Okay, so what would you call it, then?” she demands.
“Fireus,” he says.
“Fire us? If we keep making these stupid jokes, they just might,” Blackbird says.
“Wait, wait, I gotta find the canned laughter app for that,” Gecko says, bringing out his phone. Blackbird groans and shoves his shoulder.
“But anyway,” she says as he starts laughing, “The perfect hero couple is now official, yadda yadda, but the interesting part for us villains is what happened DURING the wedding. It turns out that one of the guests to the show wasn’t very happy with the villain Cold Steel being part of the wedding ceremony.” A video starts playing, showing the lightning spreading out and then wrapping around Cold Steel.
“Why WAS a villain in the wedding?” Gecko asks. They both blink as Cold Steel himself storms onto the screen.
“I only got so much time, you know,” Cold Steel says before plopping down right between the two and kicking his feet up. He drapes his arms over both of their shoulders, completely ignoring how awkward the moment is. “The reason I was in the wedding is because…” He looks both ways, “I’m infiltratin’ the super hero community!”
“It is not,” Blackbird says, almost laughing.
“Okay, okay, I’m datin’ Firefly’s adopted daughter,” Cold Steel admits easily. “I’m trying to get HER on the villain side.”
“Life Light,” Gecko says, flatly. “Good luck on that one, man,” he says.
“Life Light is like the angel of the super world, and you know it,” Blackbird says. “How in the world did YOU start dating a girl like that?”
“She saved my life,” Cold Steel says. “The whole world knows I’m a mad science experiment, right? Well, she’s the one that fixed me. So, in a way, when I ain’t fightin’ them, Firefly and Taurus are like… my girlfriend’s parents.”
“You’ve never fought either,” Gecko points out.
“I should see if I can take down Taurus sometime, shouldn’t I?” Cold Steel says. “That would be epic.”
“Not Firefly?” Blackbird asks.
“What, you think I could?” Cold Steel asks, excitedly.
“Not a chance,” they both reply.
“Thank you so much for the support,” Cold Steel says sarcastically. “But it was no big deal, so I don’t get why everyone’s makin’ such a fuss about the wedding. I didn’t even get to punch them. That sucked.”
“That’s all?” Blackbird asks. “Nothing else to say about the wedding?”
“I’m hopin’ they have a lot of kids!” Cold Steel says. “I’ll be able to talk at least one of them over to our side, I’m sure.”
Blackbird rolls her eyes as Gecko starts laughing. “So how is the base building coming?” she asks. “We saw a rather interesting broadcast today, would you like to explain it?”
“That’s two questions,” Cold Steel says, looking at her. She looks rather tiny tucked under his arm like she is, but she doesn’t look worried.
“They’re related questions,” she says.
“Okay, yeah, but you gotta give me time to answer one at a time, got it?” he says. “The base building had a bit of a setback, today. I’m tryin’ to do this in proper villain fashion—that means you keep the area around you nice and clean, you know?”
“You’re kidding, right?” Gecko asks.
“Perfectly serious. Even the old-school mafias used to keep their home towns nice and clean,” Cold Steel says. “You go to the NEXT neighborhood to do your business. You keep your neighbors happy an’ they won’t squeal on you to the Hall.”
“Wait a moment, I need to write this down,” Gecko says.
“I thought you two were gonna live in a van,” Cold Steel says, and then pointedly taps on the wall behind them. It makes a distinctly metallic sound, even though it’s lit up with a screen.
“We’re going to WORK out of a van,” Blackbird says. “We’re not living here! And quit changing the subject, Cold Steel. We want to hear all about how you threatened people over all the video screens in KC.”
The grin on Cold Steel’s face is sinister. “I’m claiming that neighborhood as mine. I don’t like people messing around with what’s mine.”
“But the people that were vandalized were the ones that were protesting you moving into the neighborhood,” Gecko says. “Don’t you think the vandals were doing it in defense of you?”
“Who says I need to be defended?” Cold Steel asks, “Especially from a bunch of moms and little kids? Nah, this wasn’t done for me. This was done because they could SAY it was done for me. There’s a difference.” He reaches up, scratching his jaw, and Herold’s eyes go to his hand, distracted from the conversation.
The metal on his skin isn’t solid. It swirls, showing thin lines of skin here and there. That could explain how flexible it is, but not entirely. And then Herold sees the metal on his wrist move slightly. It’s adjusting at a slightly slower rate than the skin that actually makes up most of his flesh. Cold Steel is still wearing the living metal. He probably wears it all the time. He might even be training the stuff by doing that. The question is, is it just on his wrist or does he have it other places, as well?
Wait, Herold thinks, he’s talking about a neighborhood? A house build? Could it really be THAT easy? And here he had gotten a hold of that family and doled out a lot of money to trap the girlfriend! What a waste of time. Well… he might as well follow both leads. The girl might be more vulnerable, and a better start, regardless. Something tells him that they wouldn’t just leave this kid out all alone, even if it looks like he is.
The chatter on the television fades into the background as Herold starts thinking about Technico, and just how paranoid the man is. Well, soon he won’t have to deal with him anymore. Once he gets out into space, he’ll leave this crappy little planet behind, along with Technico. Technico can have it, he seems happy enough to kiss up to the Hall leaders.
He turns, picking up his pen and paper again and then looking irritated. He doesn’t have a proper table to use so he can work on his special spaceship uniform design.
He punches the wall, and then groans as the entire area threatens to collapse on his head. He never has been good at judging how much physical force is necessary to do a job. Being behind a desk doesn’t lend itself to that sort of knowledge. He starts patting on the ceiling, trying to keep it from collapsing. When it seems stable enough, he sits down again, wondering if he should have gone with the random hotel room idea, instead.
Tomorrow, he thinks as a clot of dirt drops onto his paper, tomorrow he’s going to find a hotel room, one with a shower. He’ll just have to avoid all the many, many, MANY cameras that are scattered throughout this area. Every single one of them is connected to Technico’s system, he’s sure. He probably already knows that Herold was in town during the wedding.
***
Nico steps into the science room, AKA his workroom, a cup of coffee in his hand. The lights turn on automatically, and he almost doesn’t notice the little mess to the side as he starts for his desk. The only reason he turns is because Clinky lets out a tiny squeak of surprise.
There, on one of the tables, the little guinea pig from the kindergarten class is putting together another small, four legged robot. Nico stares at him silently as he tries to hide the Allen Wrench behind his back. “Clinky,” he says.
The little AI starts squeaking urgently, explaining just how unfair it is that the poor kitty is stuck in code form while he and the others can run around like they do. If it was anyone else (well, except for Zoe) they wouldn’t understand him, but Nico listens for a long moment, sighing when he’s finished. Well, LISTENS isn’t exactly the right word. With each squeak, the guinea pig is sending out a stream of binary code into the system, which Nico reads without any trouble.
“Do you know who this cat is?” Nico asks.
The guinea pig squeaks defiantly, saying that he’s another AI like himself and like Robo.
“That’s true,” Nico agrees, thinking about it for a long moment. “What body are you making him?” he asks, not getting into that argument.
“Squeak squeak!”
“A cat, huh?” Nico says. “No, not for this time around. I think we should make him another guinea pig. He can join you in the tube system. But this is just a trial run, understand?” he says, waving a hand at the wall. The cat’s digital form appears there. “Do you hear me, Micro?” he says to the cat. “You’re getting a new chance with a lot of little kids that will love you. Don’t screw it up.”
The cat lets out a mournful sound.
“Herold’s forgotten all about you, Micro,” Nico says. “He’s not your daddy, he’s a bad man. These kids are good kids and they’ll love you far more than he ever did, got it?” He sighs, feeling guilty for being so blunt with a being that’s basically the same as a child. But this cat has been with Herold. He’s been manipulated and used several times. It affects his programming. “Don’t make me wipe your memory, Micro,” he says softly. “You really are one of the more brilliant ones.”
“SQUEAK!” Clinky shouts, angrily.
“I know, I know,” Nico says, sighing. “It’s not right to wipe memories, but… sometimes some memories are better off forgotten, Clinky.” He heads over to the things that Clinky had been putting together, looking them over. “Change this to this in the design,” he says, bringing up the design Clinky had been working on. The image changes from a cat to a guinea pig. “We’re going to have to speak with Hisato… or maybe Kim can do the fur and eyes for us.”
“Squeak?” Clinky asks, hopefully.
“No, you said you wanted to put him together, you’re going to put him together,” Nico says. The guinea pig waves his short little front legs, trying to show just how difficult this form is to work with, and Nico sighs, waving a hand. Unfortunately for Clinky, all that does is make the parts float where he can grab them. “You were doing just fine without me before I came in, kid, you can keep it up,” he says, reaching down with a finger and rubbing Clinky’s head fondly. “And thank you for the pretty pictures. I’ve got them displayed on my main wall.”
“Squeak!” the guinea pig says. The little kids might send their coloring projects to their parents, but so does he! He sends one copy to Nico and another copy to Tony! They both take care of him!
“Ah, sorry, boss, didn’t know you were back,” Tony says, sticking his head in. “I was about to clean this room—” he stops as he sees what’s going on. “Clinky,” he says with a sigh.
“Clinky’s decided to do a fellow AI a favor,” Nico says a bit drolly.
“I wondered why he didn’t show up for bedtime last night,” Tony says. “I thought he might have decided to sleep in his bubble, again. He likes to do that when he wants to binge watch his shows. I keep telling him that’s not healthy, but he never listens on the weekend.”
“And what shows have you been watching, lately?” Nico asks the guinea pig.
“Squeak squeak squeak!”
“The Super Hall Friends?” Nico says. “That’s the one about Ken and them as cartoon kids, isn’t it?”
“Squeak!”
“Well, sure, I can get them to sign a poster for you,” he says. Tony watches them for a moment before shaking his head with amusement.
“I really would appreciate it if you could make him speak,” Tony says.
“He’ll learn to text soon enough,” Nico says as Clinky squeaks at Tony for a second before getting back to work. “I was thinking of inviting Chooperic up for a bit to spend some time with him. You wouldn’t mind, would you?”
“Not at all,” Tony says. “He’s got a poster of him in his room, too. But… why texting?” he has to ask.
“Talking animals just seems wrong to me, for some reason,” Nico says.
Tony stares at him for all of a second, wanting to point out a few important facts, and then gives up. He’s worked for Nico long enough to know when NOT to ask.
***
Jack pulls to a stop in front of Ms. Clerk’s house, having had to run off to do the interview. Getting the very first official episode of Blackbird and Gecko was something he wasn’t going to miss. Max is going to be complaining about it for months, and that fact has Jack grinning like a fiend right now.
“Okay, do we have the measurements for the broken windows?” he asks as he reaches the black suits that are painting the house.
“They’re in the system,” Carla’s dad says. He’s actually working on buffing out the key marks on the car. “I should have had them take the car into the shop,” he complains.
Jack walks over, looking at the marks and then reaches down, running his hand over the car door. Soon a streak of silver is perfectly flush with the paint job. “Think you can fix the paint job if we take it in?” he asks.
Mr. Johnson walks over, crouching down to look at it from all angles. “Mm, yeah, I can work with that,” he says. “I did a bit of work on her engine, already.”
“Did they go after the engine?” Jack asks, heading for the hood.
“No, but if you have to justify the work—” Mr. Johnson says.
“Nah, we never have to justify that,” Jack says. “But what you did was more than I’d expect in that period of time… wait…” he looks at the man, realizing something. “You’re a cape, aren’t you?”
Mr. Johnson smiles slightly. “They list me as a D-class,” he says blandly.
“You’re a speedster, like Carla?” Jack asks curiously.
“A basic technopath, actually,” Mr. Johnson says. “It actually makes me a Specialized C-class, according to your principal, but nobody told me that back when I went into the army. I’m almost positive they hid the fact, but they acted like they didn’t ever realize it when I told them I was going to work for the Hall.”
“You work for the Hall?” a little girl asks from behind them. “I thought you worked for Cold Steel.”
The look of guilt on Mr. Johnson’s face has Jack fighting a laugh. “He did,” Jack says, “But I brainwashed and kidnapped him so he can do this.”
She looks at him, clearly NOT believing what he’s saying. “You did not!” she says, glaring at him.
“You wanna be brainwashed?” Jack asks her, moving closer. She lets out a squeal of laughter and runs away as fast as she can—until she’s far enough to turn and stick her tongue out at him before racing inside the house. “So… technopath, huh?”
“Absolutely nothing like your principal,” Mr. Johnson says before he can jump to conclusions. “I’m just faster at putting things together. I can levitate parts a little, but I spent so many years NOT doing it that it’s taking a bit of practice to get back in the habit. I just…” he looks over at the other black suits, hesitating. “They won’t be bothered by it, would they?”
“Nope,” one of them calls back. “We’ve got a good handful of D-classes in the group, and we’ve been working with those new ones. Now that we know for sure you are one, we might assign you to their rehab. It wouldn’t be bad to get a few more mechanics like you.”
“Even if I train them, it won’t make them as good as I am,” Mr. Johnson says, but he doesn’t sound like he’s bragging.
“Technopaths,” the black suit says with a hint of amusement.
“I’m not claiming to be as good as Technico is, either. I’m not even in his league. I can’t fly, I can only lift things like motorcycles, not cars, and definitely not tanks. I—” he stops as Jack places a hand on his shoulder.
“You’re good,” Jack says. “You raised one of the nicest kids in the entire school, and you can rebuild an ancient motor in half an hour, those two things are enough to tempt me to poach you. Now, let’s get those windows made. Where’d you put the panels?”
He stops though, as he sees a small group of teenagers watching him from the sidewalk across the street. They all look outraged. He stares at them for a moment before starting for the back of a van. A can goes flying, almost hitting him before it stops mid-air.
