Ch05En: Episode 1

  Chapter 2- Ruin

  When I’m back home, my parents are asleep. That’s good. I don’t feel like talking to either of them. I should have known they would start working together. The shift was logical. We’ve helped mom before with some of the villainy. There’s a lot on her plate now and my dad has always been frugal when it comes to hiring help. It’s easier than having to clean up the bodies afterwards too. But this newest reminder that they think they can just decide what I’ll do with my life… I felt trapped. Helpless, even. I don’t want to take over my father’s business. And I don’t want to be a super villain.

  I just want to deliver pizzas. When we all wake up tomorrow, that’s what I’m going to tell them. They’re going to listen, and that will be the end of the discussion. My resolve is feeling infinite.

  As I put my keys on their hook, the hunger I haven’t been paying attention to hits me with a second-round jab right to the gut. I need food. I head to the kitchen, remembering the Chinese food my father promised me. Resentment starts building until I open the fridge and see a container embossed with the emblem of the restaurant. On top of it is a note with my name on it.

  I want to be excited.

  I’m starving!

  But I obviously can’t eat the Chinese food. I can hear my mother already. “Frankie, metabolizing toxins is a common response to the activation of the Ch05En gene. I was simply eliminating variables.”

  Canned tomato soup it is. You’ve got to love preservatives. We bought this soup five years ago and it doesn’t expire for another ten. It’s pretty easy to believe that the food in the fridge may not be safe, but there’s no way mom found time to poison our canned goods.

  I’m halfway through my soup when the house shakes. For me, it’s a signal that mom hasn’t gone to sleep. I realize I’m more paranoid from our talk earlier than I thought, because I start to wonder if she’s keeping an eye on me while she’s doing whatever it is she does in her old lab.

  Then the house shakes again. And again.

  My soup spills.

  Whatever paranoia I’m feeling is now replaced by the anger I felt earlier. This might be the angriest I've ever been. It’s time for us to talk. Time for me to take a little control of my life.

  I don’t even grab a towel for the soup that’s on the floor. I just put my bowl down and head over to the bookcase in the dining room. All of the titles on the shelf are covered in a thin layer of dust, except for one. It reads: TEN RECIPES YOUR FAMILY WILL LOVE AND TWENTY YOU’LL LEARN TO HATE. A joke cookbook, printed in the early 90’s.

  I pull the book and the case clicks open. Its hinges aren’t as greased as they used to be, so moving it forward is a little difficult. I make it happen though and begin my descent. Motion sensor lights come to life as I make my way farther down the steep, winding staircase and I wonder why they weren’t already on. The foundation is still shaking every few moments. At one point, the rumble is so intense and lasts so long that I nearly fall down the rest of the steps. Is my mother testing some kind of tectonics machine?

  The door to her lab is already slightly open. That makes sense. The foundation has been shaking for over twenty minutes. As I draw closer and grab the handle, I realize the shaking has nothing to do with testing of any kind.

  My mother’s found a new nemesis.

  Or someone new has found her, at least.

  “How dare you come to my home, you insignificant insect! This lab isn’t even operational any more. This is purely sentiment. Look what you’re doing!” Mom is angry.

  “It wouldn’t have taken me so long to catch up with you, MegaTech, but something kept jamming my signal.”

  Probably the twenty feet of concrete surrounding the lab. Not the smartest hero, I see.

  It’s tough for me to see who this hero is. She’s moving extremely fast. At one point she manages to scale a wall with no foot or handholds to avoid a concussion wave. I can’t tell from the voice if it’s anyone I’ve seen before. I think she’s new. If my mom is the first villain she’s met, I feel pretty bad for her. That’s worse than jumping in the deep end the first time you go swimming. It’s like stepping off a cliff in an ocean full of sharks and angry jellyfish and you managed to cut your foot on the way down. This poor hero is doomed. Mom is floating above the battlefield, altering her position only to turn towards the hero. The stabilizers in her boots are top notch and her rockets are fueled via condensed carbon dioxide, which she has rerouted from her lungs. She can hover like this for eight hours before she runs out of usable fuel.

  They’re so focused on the battle, which has managed to become even louder, that neither of them saw me enter. At one point, the hero finds herself in a corner, and I start thinking her number is up. Mom’s small caliber machine gun in her right hand fires twice. Guided by her artificial eyesight, I’m not quite sure how she missed. Super speed is the only explanation that comes to mind.

  It’s only another five or six minutes before the section of the lab housing their brawl is basically gone. The machines are all leveled, reduced to little more than scrap metal. There are enough holes in the ceiling that I’m thankful we’re under our own backyard. Hope the perception dampener still works; we haven’t had to rely on it for a few years. Obviously frustrated, my mother resorts to laser weaponry. A smart choice, as it would be pretty hard to dodge. The hero manages to stay just ahead of the blasts, though if she stops running, one of them is sure to hit her. Scorch marks are left in her wake as she circles around and around. It’s lucky the concrete hasn’t caught fire. The hero doesn’t know it, but mom only has another couple of rounds before her laser overheats. It’s not enough to make me worry, though.

  I know the bots are coming. They were some of my mother’s earliest inventions when her gene activated. Most are nothing but places for her consciousness to download to from the cloud storage she’s placed it in. The others are already operational. She never has more than six copies of herself functioning at a time. At least four of them are on their way right now. The signal from this mom to the others might have had trouble being received before, but with those holes in the ceiling, they’ve been aware of the battle for quite some time.

  Like I said, this hero doesn’t have a chance.

  I guess she knew it, though. It was my fault she got away. There were some stray shots. I might have yelped. Mom’s enhanced hearing finally picked up that I was in the room. She relented for less than a second, but it was enough. Up flew a large piece of scrap metal, cutting away went one of her arms, and off ran the hero. She went right up the wall and out one of the holes in the ceiling.

  It was just in time. I was right about my estimation.

  Now there were five moms floating in the same pocket of airspace.

  Ten eyes, looking on with disappointment.