Heroes Wear Capes

“No villain ever knows that they’re in the wrong because they know that they’re in the right.”

~Oliver Storm (White Lightning)

Trevor was on his way back to his penthouse apartment and was ready to throw it all in. He was so tired that he felt he could slip into a dreamless sleep with no trouble.

He had just come from another meeting with Lacey Carlton. His father’s death had thrown off their entire plan for the takeover of Rossi Corp, and Trevor could tell. Carlton Laboratories weren’t as confident relaying facts and statistics to the Rossi Corp team anymore. If anything good at all had come from Paul’s death, it had been that it was helping Rossi Corp fight back against Carlton Laboratories.

The company wouldn’t admit it out loud, but Lacey Carlton had been weeks away from buying the company out from under the Rossi fingertips. But, now that the leader and creator of the company was dead in a tragic accident, investors felt sorry for the company. They weren’t going to betray Rossi Corp when their last CEO had just been murdered.

Lacey Carlton was a problem though. She was still trying to sabotage Rossi Corp, Trevor was sure of it. He was certain it was their spy who had gotten his father shot in the first place. Maybe they hadn’t meant for Paul to get shot, but they had been the fault either way. And then they went back to the hospital to finish the job. The security camera footage that his team was able to steal from the hospital showed that the super had spent quite a few minutes in Paul Rossi’s room. Maybe trying to get information out of him. Maybe the spy found that Paul knew too much. Maybe the spy decided it was better to get rid of Paul and slow down Carlton Laboratories’ takeover of Rossi Corp than to risk whatever information Paul knew.

Or, at least, that was Trevor’s best theory. It only made sense that Lacey Carlton and her company were after Rossi Corp. His father must’ve been doing a project that Carlton Laboratories really thought they had to stop. It was common knowledge that Carlton Laboratories was basically a hedge fund for the supers of the League of Legends and basically all supers in the world. Rossi Corp must’ve been doing something detrimental for superheroes, and Lacey was just watching out for her superhero besties like a good little lapdog. And Trevor was going to find out what it was and avenge his father in the best way possible.

“Trevor, have you even been listening to me?”

Trevor snapped himself out of his daze and shook his head. “Is it that obvious?”

Ian Thompson narrowed his eyes at Trevor. “I know when you’re listening, trust me. I didn’t spend months around you not to learn your patterns, Trevor. You were thinking about your father again, weren’t you?”

He sighed and ran a hand through his hair. “What else can you expect from me?”

“You know that there’s nothing you can do about it, right?” Ian reminded Trevor, putting a hand on his arm. “You’ve done all you can for now. All you can do is move on and grow.”

Trevor shook him off, bursting out in anger, “No, okay! That medicine was not switched on accident! My father was the head of a successful business and he had countless enemies who would be glad to put a price on his head. Carlton Laboratories would’ve been grateful to see him dead sooner. I swear, I am avenging my father for his wrongful death, and I don’t want to sit idly by again while his killer is roaming free. I need to be doing something.”

Ian looked at Trevor for a long hard moment, letting him settle down. Trevor was rightfully angry that his father had died, but Ian wasn’t going to let him destroy himself over it. Not if he had anything to say about it.

“Trevor, I’m just watching out for you. I don’t want you to go on a rampage looking for this secret super assassin and end up destroying yourself in the process for nothing.”

Trevor nodded. He knew Ian’s intentions were good, as they always were, but he didn’t know how much it pained Trevor to watch that security camera footage they had stolen, fully aware that the guy was now walking around, free of charge.

And it was hard for Trevor to admit, but if Paul Rossi hadn’t hired Ian, Ian Thompson may have been on the opposite side of the argument. All you had to do was look up his name on the internet to see that he was the son of the Secretary of State in a presidential cabinet that was entirely superhero friendly. Not to mention the countless times he’d been involved in some way or another with superhero activity. There was no way he could be so involved with supers and not give them the benefit of the doubt. It was just the way Ian was, too forgiving.

If only Trevor knew what had turned Ian away from his life in DC, being surrounded by some of the most legendary superheroes, to come and work for a company not known for its superhero friendly activities. Only then could Trevor fully trust his intentions.

“Artic Frost still hasn’t gotten back to me.”

Ian shrugged it off. “Yeah? And she’s a super villain. What else do you expect? Besides, most of this speedster’s appearances haven’t been public. It’ll take her a while to track him down, especially seeing as she has the same information we do, which is basically nothing.”

Trevor clenched his fists and closed his eyes, leaning back in his seat. “I know, but it’s still hard to know that he’s out there.”

“Don’t worry,” Ian assured him, putting his hand back on Trevor’s. He squeezed. “You’ll get him, like you always do.”

The limo came to an abrupt stop.

“Hey! What’s the hold up?” Trevor asked the driver, his voice harsh and unforgiving.

Trevor heard commotion outside and sighed. If it was what he thought it was, he would be thoroughly annoyed.

He opened the side door and got out of the limo. He observed that many other people on the street were getting out of their cars, doing the same. All you had to do was look at the sky to see the reason for the traffic jam.

“Black Knight, your reign will soon be ending.”

“Not if I have anything to say about it, White Knight.”

Trevor huffed, even more irked than he thought he’d be. Of course the two supers would decide to have a fight right above his late night commute. What else really made sense?

Suddenly a spotlight was aimed at the top of the building to the left of Trevor. It lit up what seemed to be a huge gun of sorts. No doubt it was some super powerful death ray or something that he would use to destroy the city. They went through this spiel so often Trevor wasn’t sure how the rest of the populace wasn’t as annoyed as he was at the pair. But, despite the almost monotonous nature of how often the two did such antics, the people around Trevor were caught up in the show, taking videos of the encounter or just standing there biting their nails as they hoped their favorite hero ended up on top.

“Do you know what this is, White Knight?” Black Knight asked with a sinister tone. “It’s a Doctor Destruction prototype that I have fixed up like new. With one click of the button in my hand, this city will be under my mind control.”

The crowd gasped.

“And there won’t be anything you can do to stop me.”

White Knight floated in the air, but he seemed a bit confused. “How do you mean? There is literally nothing stopping me from flying over right now and knocking that button out of your hand.”

It was Black Knight’s turn to look confused at the situation. He looked like it had just occurred to him too. “Oh . . . with Miss Watson on vacation I couldn’t really think of another person to put in my deathtrap, so I just decided to go without it. I didn’t really think it through.”

Trevor sighed. If anyone wanted to know why he thought supers were the most overrated thing in the world, it was stunts like this. The two supers didn’t know what to do without a damsel in distress to fight over.

He wondered what would happen on the day that April Watson grew tired of their antics too and stopped allowing herself to be their damsel.

“Oh, okay,” White Knight responded, seemingly uncomfortable by the whole situation. “Um, I guess now is where we fight for the button instead of the girl?”

Black Knight nodded. “Yeah, that seems good.”

Then the two charged at each other from midair. The crowd was enthralled by the fight. No one seemed to remember how just moments before the two supers had been lost and talking like old friends. Trevor doubted the conversation between them would even be remembered the next day. The SNN and all of the papers would just be talking about how awesome the fight was and how weird it was to see April Watson missing from a White Knight activity. No one will talk about how confused the superhero and villain had been at the prospect as well. After all, they were the pillars of any society, they couldn’t be seen as anything less than perfectly refined.

As they knocked each other into building walls, the crowd realized that they were in danger of falling rubble. It was only then that they started to get to their senses and run from the scene of the fight so as to make sure they didn’t get harmed.

Trevor himself was about to join the runners when a blast of fire knocked a falling piece of building from hitting a little kid on the corner of the street with a lollipop in his hand.

Of course Trevor’s day couldn’t get any worse.

Wild Fire appeared out of nowhere, smiling brightly at the citizens of his city. “Don’t fear, for your savior is here.”

Wild Fire was able to block a few more pieces of rubble from the people on the street after White Knight delivered the final blow to his foe, throwing him into the side of a skyscraper. White Knight then took the mind control gun and snapped it in half. He flew into the air and towards the atmosphere, presumably to get rid of the two pieces of technology. When anyone bothered to look back for Black Knight, the hole he had made in the nearby skyscraper was empty.

This was the theatrics involved with living in a super infested city.

Wild Fire was just about getting ready to take a picture with a teenage girl when a blast of ice hit him in the chest, knocking him down.

“Awe, looks like that hurt, Wild Fire.”

Are you kidding? Could Trevor have gotten any worse luck for the day? On that count, why was Artic Frost randomly attacking a hero when she could’ve been out on the look for Momentum?

Wild Fire didn’t take any time to rest, he immediately set himself on fire and charged after his nemesis.

After a couple of minutes of pointless fighting where neither got the upper hand, Artic Frost taunted Wild Fire, “Where’s your newest recruit, Hothead? I heard on rumor patrol that Silver Streak met him yesterday and brought him over to meet you today. I would just love to meet Kingdom City’s newest hero.”

Trevor was impressed. How Artic Frost had figured it out, Trevor was unsure, but the expression on Wild Fire’s face said it was the truth. She was getting closer after all.

The hero shook his head. “Now, Frosty, you know I don’t take on sidekicks. I just gave Momentum a few pointers and sent him on his way.”

Artic Frost tilted her head. “Pointers in how to catch a super villain? Because if my facts are right, I’m still kicking and fighting.”

“Not for long,” Wild Fire stated.

The villain laughed, a snowy haze surrounding her while she spoke, “You keep on believing that. Whatever helps the poor superhero sleep at night.”

Wild Fire shot another fireball at her in retaliation. Their fight traveled back down the street and the crowd followed eagerly at a distance. Trevor sighed and ducked back into his car. Ian was waiting, an expectant look on his face.

Trevor sat down on the leather seats and huffed. “It looks like we’ll be stuck for a little bit longer.”

Ian smiled slyly. “I know a great way to pass the time in the traffic jam.”

Trevor chuckled. “I bet you do.”