Used to Be: The Kid Rapscallion Story (17 page)

All of them losers.

“Fucking 9/11,” he mumbles.

“What’s that?” Melody asks, handing him a white plate to dry.

“Nothing,” Jason smiles. “Just starting to think about tonight’s patrol.”

“85th and Taunton,” Melody says, kissing his arm. “Abandoned factory.”

“What would super villains do without abandoned factories?”

“Ugh,” Melody giggles. “We’d probably have to work in a cubicle.”

17

Melody Macomber is #16 in the 20-Sided Dice.

They’re not much more respectable than Punch Baby (he’s a robot baby who punches people) or Catagin&tonic (she can make any drink become a gin and tonic that puts a drinker to sleep), but there’s twenty of them, so they occasionally get away with something.

As Jason pulls off his clothes and pulls on his costume, he injects himself with a vial of Francis’ Peak solution.

“Better than working out,” he mumbles to himself, wondering if he has to worry about his drugs being taken away after Francis’ trial.

18

The abandoned factory is really just a large garage. Some kind of custom design shop for automobiles, Kid Rapscallion discovers. He walks around in the dark, shining a flashlight across dusty tools and supplies, and a few old muscle cars that need too many repairs to ever be highly profitable.

The past few months have been dreadful for superheroes. Not only is the public confidence in them at an all-time low, the big hitting villains have largely dried up. Either they’re hiding or the Revolutionaries have swooped down to pick them up, leaving heroes like Kid to fight villains no one has ever heard of before. He finds himself actually disappointed when Wednesday rolls around and Stormy doesn’t try to make it rain over a mini golf course.

He reminds himself he’s still only 20 and that he’s got a lifetime of being a superhero ahead of him (what else would he do?), but for the first time in his brief career, being a superhero isn’t fun.

It’s boring.

It’s work.

But honestly, what else would he do?

19

Jason is almost convinced there is nothing here, and that this is another dead end in his search to find the person impersonating Domina Tricks that captured and bound Colbie, but didn’t, the young girl swears, touch her beneath her purple and white uniform.

He has patiently moved from room to room, checking inside every car and under every bench and behind every door. Melody has never led him wrong, which makes him start to wonder if he’s being played.

“This is the danger of a relationship with someone in our life,” Psychic Navigator had told him in therapy, when Jason first revealed who he was dating. “The constant questioning of motives can be poisonous in a relationship.”

Melody has never done anything to suggest she’s playing him, but Jason can’t deny the rush of blood he feels at the idea of her playing him. It’s not healthy to think this way, but it’s not boring. He shakes his head, trying to get Domina out of it. It sounds like she’s doing the same things to Colbie that she did to him: capture, bondage, teasing, but keeping the hands outside the costume.

There is one final room to check, the building’s only upstairs room. The first floor is a showcase for the shop’s work, but whatever nice cars were once here have been removed. Kid moves up the single, wide staircase in the back corner to the second floor, where he assumes the garage’s offices are held. His feet leave the stairs and hit the linoleum floor and his flashlight hits a dark-haired woman in leather and latex.

“Domina,” he whispers, as her Influence Net falls from the ceiling to cover him.

20

“How is this possible?” he asks, trying to push the net off of him.

“You do not want to leave,” Domina says.

“The hell I don’t,” he says, but his hands fall limply to his side. The Influence Net causes its victims to become susceptible to Domina’s commands, and Jason knows what it’s power can do and knows he really doesn't want to leave because then he won’t get the answers he needs.

“You want to know if I am really me, so walk to me and take a look,” Domina commands and Kid Rapscallion does just that, shuffling across the dirty floor to the middle of what he now sees is an entrance area. To his right and behind him are couches. On his left is a table with chairs. Ahead of his is a service counter and behind that are the offices of the shop’s former owners.

Kid’s eyes glance over them on their way to examining Domina. She looks exactly like she always had: mid-30s, cultured, her curved body encased in black latex and leather. Shaking her head, Jason watches her black curls spring around her face.

“How …?” he asks.

“Simple,” Domina smiles, reaching into the net to run a latex-encased finger under Kid’s chin. “Francis never shot me.”

21

“I saw him shoot you,” Kid Rapscallion seethes.

“You saw what I told you to see,” Domina smiles. “You don’t really think Francis could kill his daughter, do you?”

“Why are you back?”

Domina laughs, letting her finger slowly trail down his body. “Daddy’s on trial. It’s not like he can stop me, anymore.”

“He will if you keep hurting Colbie,” Kid promises.

“No, he won’t,” Domina smiles. “Ms. Stagger keeps him locked up during the trial and he is not allowed to have any communication with his latest sidekick. It’s up to you to stop me,” she says, letting her finger move over the bulge in his pants. “Not that you want to.”

“You’re sick.”

“Always and forever,” she laughs.

“What do you really want?”

“I want to break Daddy’s heart,” she says, “and there’s only really fantastic way to do that.” Domina steps in close and grabs the Influence Net, pushing it back tightly over Jason’s face. “Kiss me,” she says, and he does.

22

“How was your night?” Melody says from the couch as Jason enters through the front door, his Kid Rapscallion costume in the backpack slung over his shoulder.

“Disgusting,” he says, shaking his head. “That garage you sent me to is filthy.” He forces a wink. “Wanna do it right here on the floor?”

“Shower!” she yells, smiling and making a gross face.

23

The hot water can’t erase the shame of what he’s done.

Domina’s voice rings in his head. “You will have sex with me whenever I want it,” she said, “and if you do that, I’ll leave Colbie and Francis alone. Now stop pretending you’re a nice guy happy with your nice little boring girlfriend and tell me every dirty, filthy thing you’ve ever wanted to do to me.”

24

“Captain Foggen?”

“Yes?” Trisha says, answering her phone in the dark. The clock on the wall tells her it’s 3:52 am. She’s been sleeping for all of thirteen minutes.

“The hotline received a call from Kid Rapscallion,” one of the night staff tells her. “He says there’s something you need to see at 85th and Taunton.”

“What’s there?”

“An abando—”

“What’s there that we need to see?”

“He did not say, ma’am, but he insisted you needed to see it for yourself, and that after you did he’d be waiting for you inside his suite at the Grand Vegas.”

25

“Kid Rapscallion is dating a member of 20SD?” Nancy asks Andres. “Are you kidding me?”

He shakes his head and laughs. “Nope. Number 16 and him have been seeing each other for weeks.”

“What the hell is he thinking?”

“I think he likes her,” Andres says. “I don’t know, though, she doesn’t exactly bring him around to group meetings.”

“How did you find out about it?”

“Number 1 told me to follow her,” he shrugs. “He’s rather protective of her, actually. It’s a little creepy.”

Nancy hates all of this. She doesn’t mind that Jason is dating someone because it’s clear he’s never going to date her, but if he actually likes this woman it would explain why he hasn’t tried to sleep with her in months.

She hates that she misses these trysts, and hates that 20SD is turning out to be something of a joke. “Look, Andres,” she says, “I know I said I needed better information, but I don’t really care who Kid Rap puts his dick in.”

“Really? Because you looked pretty mad when I just told you.”

“I’m mad that he’s keeping information from me,” Nancy says, which is also true. “Do you have anything else? Anything big?” she asks, thinking of Kira’s threat. “Maybe anything about the Rapscallion trial?”

“Nope,” he says, smiling. “Do you want to … you know. You can call me Kid, again, if you want. I’ve still got the costume.”

“Not tonight, Andres,” she says. “I’ve got to go find me a story.”

26

Captain Trisha Foggen, head of Homeland Security’s Capes Division, looks at the scene before her in the entrance area of a former garage, calmly and professionally. There is no hint of an emotional reaction on her exterior, but internally, she admits she is surprised that a second-level hero like Kid Rapscallion was capable of this:

Domina Tricks’ head sitting on top of the service counter and the rest of her body is lying limp on the floor.

27

The door to Jason’s suite at the Grand Vegas opens and Jason readies himself to be arrested. Domina’s Influence Net is on the table before him and he fingers it nervously.

“Jason?”

“Nancy? What are you doing here?” he asks, rising to his feet. “You’ve got to get out of here! Right —!”

“No one is going anywhere!” a strong female voice announces. Captain Foggen enters the room, gun drawn, with a cadre of FBI agents behind her. “Jason Kitmore, also known as Kid Rapscallion, you are under arrest for the murder of Domina Tricks.”

28

Transcript from Las Vegas Channel 10 Evening News

August 19, 2002

NANCY CATHALL

This is Nancy Cathall, standing outside of the Grand Vegas, where Kid Rapscallion was arrested less than one hour ago for the murder of the super villain, Domina Tricks. There are two pieces of information I can report exclusively to the Channel 10 audience. The first is that sources tell me that Kid was arrested personally by Homeland Secruity’s Director of Capes Division, Captain Trisha Foggen, who is so far denying any and all requests for comment. The second piece of information we must keep in mind is that Domina Tricks is a noted nemesis of Rapscallion, Kid’s former mentor, who is currently on trial in San Francisco to answer charges of child abuse and endangerment. It is unclear if the murder of Domina Tricks is related to the Trial of Rapscallion. This is Nancy Cathall. Channel 10 News.

29

“I want to hear it,” Captain Foggen states, holding up the Influence Net. “All of it.”

“You don’t get to,” Jason says. He is sitting in his uniform, sans domino mask, in an interrogation room at Nellis Air Force Base. “I’ll talk to Ms. Stagger, but I’m not talking to a cape traitor.”

“Cute,” she says, running her hands down the front of her business jacket. “I’ve heard worse and I’m not in the mood for games.”

“I get a phone call, don’t I?”

“No.”

“Fine,” Jason shrugs. “Call the Fort. Psychic Navigator will explain what you’re holding.”

“When we’re finished.”

“God damn it, Foggen,” he grunts. “Turn off the cameras for five minutes and I’ll explain everything.”

30

“You’ve got two minutes,” Foggen says. “Go.”

“That net you’re holding is called an Influence Net,” he explains.

“I know what it is and what it does,” she snaps. “I was in the Revolutionaries, remember?”

“What you’re going to find when you run the evidence from that room is my semen inside of Domina and my fingerprints on the skill saw that took off Domina’s head. She ordered me to commit both acts and Psychic Navigator will testify that it’s not the first time Domina mucked around with my brain.”

“That’s convenient,” Foggen says, shaking her head. “You’ve got one minute left. Mind telling me why Domina Tricks was feeling suicidal enough after fucking you to order you to cut her head off?”

“Yeah,” Jason says, pointing a finger at the blonde woman. “She’s Rapscallion’s daughter. Not that either of them knew that while they were doing all the things we were doing before I killed her.”

“What?” Foggen asks, her stomach lurching. “If you’re lying to me, Kitmore —”

“Call Psychic Navigator,” Jason says, leaning back, “and when you’re done, you, me, and Indigo Impster can pay Rapscallion a visit in the Stockade. Because my guess is that all of this shit is something that you aren’t going to want to get out to the public.”

31

California State District Attorney Caldwell Sanchez steps to the podium in the press room of the county courthouse and waits for the reporters to settle down.