In Hero Years... I'm Dead Delux Edition
Read In Hero Years... I'm Dead Delux Edition Online
Authors: Michael Stackpole
Other Kindle Books By Michael A. Stackpole
Merlin Bloodstone Mysteries
Kid Binary and the Two-Bit Gang
Trick Molloy Mysteries
Novels
The Dark Conspiracy Trilogy
How To Write books
Writing Fiction: A Short Course
In Hero Years… I’m Dead
A Superhero Noir Novel
By
Michael A. Stackpole
Author of
I, Jedi
and
Rogue Squadron
In Hero Years… I’m Dead
is ©2010 Michael A. Stackpole
Cover art by
Aaron Williams
; Cover design by Kat Klaybourne
The author worked hard on this story and hopes you enjoyed it. Please visit the site for more stories and information about the author. By purchasing stories directly from the author, you become a patron of the arts, and enable him to continue creating stories for you to enjoy.
Dedication
To the memory of Bob Kane and Bill Finger, who created Batman. Without their work, you’d not be reading this book.
Acknowledgements
The author would like to thank Kat Klaybourne, Richard R. Klaybourne and Seamus T. Bellaforte for their work editing and proofing the manuscript. Any errors and omissions in this work are the fault of the author alone. The author also thanks Aaron Williams and Kat again for the great cover.
Chapter One
Why did I think the bank manager was a super-villain? He didn’t particularly look like one. Then again, he wouldn’t have been much of a super-villain if he had.
Maybe it was his nervousness. He covered it, but he was trying too hard. I couldn’t dial in just what he had to be nervous about.
Then it dawned on me.
Me
.
The cheap suit they’d given me hadn’t stood up well against thirty-six hours of planes and airports. Neither had I. I wasn’t quite coming apart at the seams like the suit, but my eyes burned. I was also drifting in and out–those little one second blank stares make most folks wary.
Had I been him, with me standing there, I’d have speed-dialed Security and had them coming at a run.
Then again, I might have been reading things completely wrong. I hadn’t spoken to a bank manager in about two decades. I couldn’t imagine they’d changed much over time–machines need the same sort of cogs year in, year out. The last one I’d dealt with was probably the bank’s chairman of the board.
My exhausted brain skipped back a step. I wondered what the manager had for a superpower. I looked for clues: the way he looked up from his desk, the quick smile, the casual tug at his cuff as he stood to offer me his hand; none of these were very helpful. I thought for a moment I’d lost it, then his powers came together with a name.
The Ingratiator.
He’d overplayed it with the smile. He’d added a hint of welcome surprise, but his office had a glass wall overlooking the bank’s lobby. He couldn’t have missed Invisible Lad coming for a visit, much less my approach. He probably figured me for Rumpled Man–able to wrinkle perma-press slacks in a single sit.
In his world, that would make
me
the villain.
Unaccustomed to his courtesy and temporarily mesmerized by it, I stared at his proffered hand. Too neat. Perfect manicure. No scars. He wasn’t a super-anything.
Check that
. He could have been a mentalist. That smile, his manner; he definitely could have been a mind-reaper. I could see him in a hostage situation. He convinces the perps that all will be well; and will go better if they surrender. He’d never have to lay a glove on them.
I’d always had a problem with mentalists. Wasn’t a day went by I didn’t feel crowded in my own head. I really didn’t need squatters.
The Ingratiator remained frozen with his hand out—waiting, wondering. His distress snapped me back into reality.
Be good.
I shook his hand heartily. No crushing on his part, just a firm grip, like he was pulling me from a collapsed skyscraper.
His smile brightened. He liked having folks see him as a savior.
“So pleased to finally meet you, Mister Smith.” His smile hit the megawatt range. “Please be seated. May I get you coffee, tea, juice, water?” His executive assistant, Penny, stood poised to fetch those things.
I declined. I wasn’t used to people doing me favors. I’d felt like a lab rat. Behind every treat there was an electric shock with my name on it.
I lowered myself into a chair made of steel and white leather. It matched everything else in the office, all of it glass, steel and white leather. Seemed to me that I’d seen this décor before.
Nostalgic revival, has to be.
That didn’t do much to make me feel at home.
The manager’s nameplate was etched glass. Lawrence Baker. Not really a secret-identity-sounding name.
He pressed his hands to his desktop. “It is a privilege, Mr. Smith.”
I was supposed to smile at that line. I did, to be polite. “You’re very kind.”
“I’m serious. You see, I vowed, when I became manager of this branch of First Capital City Savings and Loan, that I would get to know all of our customers. I’ve made it my business to get to know them, so we can figure out how better to serve them. You are one of the last, especially among our older customers.”
“I’m not that old, Mr. Baker.”
I just feel old
.
“No, no, of course not. I didn’t mean to suggest you are. It’s just you’ve been with us for a long time, through several acquisitions. You’re a highly valued customer.” He shifted uncomfortably, but remained seated on the tails of his gray, pinstriped jacket. It kept the shoulders down and him looking sharp.
Leaning forward, he lowered his voice into that conspiratorial whisper intended to build rapport. “Frankly, I wish we had more customers like you.”
Part of me—a part that had gotten me into a lot of trouble in the past–wanted to mess with his head.
Remember, be good.
I played nice. “I appreciate that, Mr. Baker. And it is good to meet you, but I don’t wish to take up your valuable time.” I flashed the key to my safety deposit box.
“Yes, of course, you are a busy man.” Baker glanced at the luminescent scroll coming up across the pane topping his desk. “You’ve not accessed the box for the last twenty years.”
“I’ve been away. In Europe.”
“Fighting them over there so we don’t have to fight them here?”
“Something like that.” I nodded wearily, then pointed past him. “Could you turn that off, please?”
Baker glanced back, then turned to me again. “The Murdoch?”
“The television.”
“Oh, yes, they still call it that over there, don’t they?” He chuckled. “Of course, we can’t turn it off–given the laws and all–but what if…?” He reached back and slid the flat panel around so I didn’t have to be watching it. “I don’t think anyone will notice, just for a moment.”
“Thank you.”
He studied the scroll again. “I was hoping to update your records. Your fees have come through your solicitor and are all paid up through the year. You don’t have an account with us, and I thought, perhaps, that if you are returning to Capital City on a permanent basis, I could convince you to bring your banking to us.”
“I really hadn’t thought that far ahead.”
The conspiratorial tone reentered his voice. “I want you, Mr. Smith. I want you to think of me as your personal banker. We can set you up with a cash chip, make any transfers you need, and really handle any transactions that will ease your transition back into Capital City.”
“You’re very kind.”
Just a hint of consternation flashed over his face. “Please, let me be of help to you.” He reached inside his jacket and produced his uTiliPod. He held it out to beam information to mine.
I opened my hands. “I don’t have one. They don’t use them, you know,
over there
.”
“I’ve not been, but I’ve heard.”
I smiled. “Perhaps you could just give me your contact information.”
He blinked.
I mimed writing with my hands. “Paper? Pen?”
“Oh, yes, of course. I’ll have Penny get that information for you. Paper and ink. How, well,
continental
.” Baker aped my smile. “And we’ll have to have lunch so you can tell me about the other quaint customs you’re used to from Europe.”
“I would just bore you.”
“I doubt that.” He knitted his fingers together. “I do want to mention, however, that if you were to transfer just ten thousand into our bank, we’d give you the latest uTiliPod as a gift. Phone, GPS, NetLink, cashflash and enough space to store everything that’s happened in the last twenty years so you can get caught up. You think about it while you’re getting your box, how does that sound?”
