The Trials of Renegade X (47 page)

“I’m not taking over—I’m staying on my side. It’s not my fault your guests find me so fascinating and keep defecting.” And staring at me. And taking pictures. And trying to talk to me, but then giggling and running away instead. It’s like I’m famous or something.

Amelia grits her teeth. “It’s
my
birthday. My sixteenth. It’s supposed to be
special
.”

She means because her thumbprint’s going to rearrange itself to form an
H
at midnight. Which is a once-in-a-lifetime event and is something she’s been counting down the days for since I met her. “It can’t be
that
special if you didn’t even invite your own brother.”

She scoffs.

I catch snippets of a conversation from across the room, hearing the words
shorts
,
video
, and
pretty much naked
, and look over to see a couple of Amelia’s friends ogling me. I make eye contact with them, and they turn bright red and pretend like they weren’t just picturing me without any clothes on.

They’re lucky Kat’s in the bathroom.

One side of Amelia’s face twitches. “Everyone’s supposed to be here for
me
, not you. Couldn’t you have had your party
next
weekend?”

“Kat could only make it home
this
weekend. So, no. But if it makes you feel any better, I got you a present.”

“You did?” Her face lights up, like she’s willing to forget she doesn’t want me here, at least for the moment, if it means getting another gift with her name on it.

“Yeah, but it’s too big to wrap.”

“What is it?”

“A stripper.”

“
What?
” She grabs my arm in a death grip. “You’d better be joking.”

“Don’t worry—it’s a male stripper. I know what you like.”

Her nostrils flare in and out, and she makes an angry noise in the back of her throat that sounds kind of like a tea kettle about to go off. “Can’t you guys go to your room or something?!”

“And miss the entertainment?”

One of her friends from Heroesworth
ever-so-casually
walks up to us, as if she can’t tell Amelia’s busy chewing me out—or trying to, anyway—and pretends like she doesn’t notice me at first. Then she blinks, acting surprised, and says, “Oh, hey, Amelia, is this your brother? I didn’t know he was going to be here.”

“He’s
leaving
, Kim,” Amelia seethes, her fists clenched.

Kim holds up her phone. “Can I get a picture first? I thought you could—”

“Take it for you?” Amelia snaps. “Even though it’s
my
birthday?!”

“
No
. God. I thought you could stand next to him, but I guess not.” She puts her phone away and backs off.

Amelia glares at me, as if her losing her temper just now was somehow my fault. She points her finger at me and says, “You’d better not be here at midnight.” Then she leaves to go find Zach.

“You didn’t tell her we’re going to the movies?” Riley asks.

We’re going to go see
Pirate Zombies from Hell
once Sarah gets here. Kat might have gone to see it with all her friends, but I missed out, and now we’re going to go see it with mine. “Nah, I don’t want to ruin the surprise. But, speaking of ruining things, you’re as bad as your brother. I told you this was a costume party.” I shake my head at him, sighing in disappointment at the jeans and hooded sweatshirt he’s got on.

“I’m
wearing
a costume.”

“Going as yourself doesn’t count.”

“I’m not
me
. I’m a supervillain.” He unzips his sweatshirt to reveal a purple and gray Vilmore T-shirt. It says, Vilmore: villainy at its finest since 1903, in swirly, vintage-looking letters. He holds up his thumb, where he drew a
V
on it in black marker.

“That’s the best you could do?”

“My other idea was dressing up as a clown.”

I point to the door. “
Get out
.”

He grins, like he thinks he’s really hilarious.

I wonder what’s taking Kat so long, then glance over and see her attempting to cross through enemy territory on her way back from the bathroom. She’s wearing a dark-green flapper dress and one of those circles around her head with a feather sticking out of it. A couple of girls from Amelia’s party have clustered around her and are now talking excitedly at her and holding up their phones.

“I dare you to wear that shirt to school on Monday,” I tell Riley.

“How bad do you think Brian would flip out?”

Brian’s one of the kids in our group in Intro to Heroism—the one Riley was complaining about before. He’s got a lot of bad ideas and thinks people will listen to him if he just says everything forcefully enough and shoots down anyone who argues with him. A method that was working pretty well for him, actually, at least until I showed up. “I think he’d have an aneurism.”

“Then I’ll do it.”

Kat makes her escape from the girls and their camera phones and hurries over to us. She drapes her arms around my neck and leans into me. “Save me, Damien. I only got away because I told them I’d be right back.”

“Pretend to faint and I’ll take you to my room.”

She smiles. “Last night wasn’t enough for you?”

The whole family—well, everyone except me—went over to Gordon’s parents’ house last night, so they could give Amelia her birthday presents. And even though I’m technically just as related to them as any of their other grandkids, I wasn’t invited. Which is fine with me. I mean, I don’t think they
hate
me anymore—not after that video I made, which has gone a long way toward putting the Crimson Flash back in everyone’s good graces—but they’re not exactly eager to get to know me or anything, and the feeling is mutual. Besides, one benefit of being the black sheep of the family is not having to visit stupid relatives with everyone. I can’t say I minded having the house to myself. Or having my girlfriend over.

In my bed.

Several times.

“Come on, Kat,” I say, tilting my fedora to one side. “You know I can never get enough of you.”

She sighs. “Have I mentioned how hot you look in that outfit?”

“Likewise. Though it doesn’t hurt that I can totally see down your dress right now.”

She punches me in the arm.

“Dude,” Riley says. “Either go to your room or don’t, but
stop talking about it
.”

“And leave you alone to get poached by Amelia? I don’t think so. We’ll wait until we’re in your car.”

His eyebrows come together and he folds his arms over his chest, like he thinks I’m serious. “
Absolutely not
.”

There’s a knock on the door. I go answer it and find Sarah in a Crimson Flash costume. Complete with a bright red cape.

“Whoa.”

She adjusts her glasses and says, “I would have been here sooner, but my cape got stuck in a sticker bush.”

She tries to move past me, but I hold up a hand. “Oh, no. You can’t come in here dressed like that.”

“You said to wear a costume.”

“I didn’t say to dress like my
dad
. That’s weird.”

“It’s part of my plan to keep myself on track. I’m dressing as a positive role model.”

“Oh. If
that’s
all you need, then you can ditch the cape and borrow some of my clothes for tonight.”

She rolls her eyes at me. “You’re not a positive role model.”

“Sure I am. I go to hero school. Why, just last night I captured a supervillain. More than once.”

Her lip twitches in disgust. “Damien, I
don’t
need to know about your love life.”

“Fine. But you can’t wear that. This is my party, plus you owe me.”

“For what?”

“Oh, I don’t know, maybe because your favorite show in the world just got renewed for another season because of me?” They just announced it yesterday, capitalizing on the positive publicity that’s been building since my video aired. A
lot
of people have seen it, first on TV, then online. A fact I try really hard not to think about.

“You’re the one who almost got it canceled in the first place. And I didn’t spend ten minutes picking this cape out of that stupid bush just to go change.” She shoves me out of the way and steps inside.

Riley smiles when he sees her and gives her a thumbs-up. “
Nice
. It turned out great.”

“What?” I narrow my eyes at him. “You knew about this? And you didn’t stop her?”

“Why would I? It’s awesome.”

“The cape isn’t very functional,” Sarah says, “but otherwise, I like it.”

Kat stands off to the side with her arms crossed and scowls. Like she was hoping Sarah wasn’t going to show up tonight. “We’d better not miss the movie because of her,” she mutters.

“Have I mentioned how awesome you are?” I ask her. Kat agreed to be civil to Sarah tonight—and, you know, not punch her—so I could have all my friends together in one place, even though Sarah’s not exactly her favorite person in the world or anything. More like the opposite. And I’d say she and Sarah just need to get to know each other, but I’m not 100 percent certain that that wouldn’t make things worse.

“Have
I
mentioned that we’re learning how to hide dead bodies in one of my classes right now?”

“Wow, seriously?” I can’t help the excitement in my voice, even though technically she was implying she was going to kill Sarah.

She smacks me in the chest. “
No
. You know that’s one of the advanced classes. Would you regret your decision if we were, though?”

She means me turning down Vilmore in favor of Heroesworth. “That depends. Are you guys going to learn how to seduce supervillains to get information out of them?”

“You’re
so
not learning that.”

“Oh, aren’t we?” I grin and raise a suggestive eyebrow.

Kat rolls her eyes at me just as Sarah comes up to us.

“I wanted to say I’m sorry,” she says.

“You said that already.” Kat’s voice is icy, leaving off an implied “and it didn’t work the first time.”

“But I don’t think you knew how much I meant it.”

“So, I’m just supposed to forgive you for almost killing my boyfriend? Plus all that other stuff you did, just because you didn’t
mean
it?” She shakes her head.

“Not all at once, but I thought it could happen in small increments. Over time.”

“You mean you think I’m going to get over it.”

“Well, once you realize I would never have done any of those things normally, your anger will start to fade, and then we might be able to be friends.”

Kat makes this half-laughing, half-scoffing noise. “Yeah, right.”

“I would never hurt Damien. Not on purpose. And I wouldn’t hurt you, either. And since I went crazy and committed all those crimes, I’ve been more open-minded. About supervillains. You wouldn’t have hurt anyone, but I did, and I didn’t even have a
V
on my thumb. I wasn’t myself, but I’m still the one who built all those machines. And I wouldn’t have tried to hurt supervillains like that if I didn’t already have some biases. What happened was my fault, and I’m trying to take responsibility for it.”

“Whatever,” Kat says. “Just don’t talk to me.”

“But how are we going to get past this if we don’t interact?”

“We’re
not
.”

Sarah gets this confused look on her face, like she just can’t accept that answer. “But—”

“Will you look at the time?” I say, not actually looking at it. “We really have to get going.”

“Yeah,” Riley says, actually checking his phone. “There’s always a line Saturday night, and I don’t want to miss the previews.”

Sarah looks like she still wants to protest, like she thinks she can
make
Kat like her if she just apologizes enough, but then she gives in and lets it go. At least for now.

Kat grabs her coat, and the four of us head outside. It’s cold out, and I can see my breath in the air. Gordon’s just pulled up, after going to the store to grab more party supplies for Amelia, and he gets out of the car, carrying a couple of grocery bags.

He notices Sarah’s costume and chuckles to himself, like he thinks it’s actually funny. “You guys leaving?” he asks me as the others climb into Riley’s car.

“We’re going to go see
Pirate Zombies from Hell
.”

“I heard that one was really— Wait, isn’t that rated R?”

It is. But Kat can shapeshift to look way old enough that no one would ever card her. Plus, Sarah has a fake ID, which she claims she got just in case she needs it for chasing down bad guys who try to hide in bars or night clubs. She said it would be stupid to only be able to catch criminals who are under twenty-one. “Don’t worry,” I tell Gordon. “I’ll probably be too busy making out with Kat the whole time to be scarred for life by all the raunchy sex scenes.”

“There are sex scenes? I thought it was about zombies.”

“Hence the raunchiness.”

He laughs. “But you’re not seventeen. How are you—” He stops himself. “You know what? I don’t want to know.”

“A wise choice.”

“Have fun.”

He goes into the house, and I get into the backseat of Riley’s car with Kat.

“What did your dad want?” she asks.

“Nothing. He just told me to enjoy the sex scenes extra for him.” I lean toward the front and say to Sarah, “What do you think of your positive role model now?”

“He didn’t say that. He told you to have fun. I was watching.”

“Yeah, what do you think he meant by ’have fun’?”

“Not
that
.”

“Are we ready to go?” Riley asks. “We’re going to be late.”

“Hold on.” Sarah opens her door and pulls in part of her cape, then closes it again. “Okay. Now.”

I sit back and put on my seat belt. Kat slips her hand into mine and leans her head against my shoulder. Riley starts driving, and Sarah changes the radio station. They start talking about who would win in a fight between a lion, a tiger, and a bear.

A commercial comes on, saying the circus is coming to town. Besides the usual stuff, like the trapeze and elephants and things, it gives a quick rundown of its top performers and their acts, as if they were rock stars or something and we should already know who they all are.