Chapter 21: Chapter twenty

Present day

 

Liz had been taken to a non-descript apartment in a non-descript building by the non-descript man who had rescued her. He had made her a cup of coffee and listened to everything that had happened to her. Then, he had warned her not to leave the apartment for any reason. Apparently, the people who had taken her would be looking for her and she wouldn’t be safe at her apartment. She suggested the police, but he claimed that wouldn’t be safe either. She had been inclined to listen to him, he had saved her after all and had he assured her he would be back soon. But that had been two days ago, and she hadn’t seen him since.

She was beginning to wonder if the man had exaggerated the danger and if she hadn’t swapped one prison for another.

She was just thinking through what authorities would be the safest to go to when the door opened and the man entered carrying groceries and a large bag of clothes. It looked strange to see him with food. She knew, intellectually, that he was human and would therefore have to eat. But how could his clothes stay that pristinely black while eating? How could he seem so unreal and still do something as normal as have a meal or go grocery shopping? Like a tiger at an accountant’s, it just didn’t seem right.

“Did you check on them?” Liz asked. “Are they all right?”

“Yes. Your colleagues are fine,” the man said. “They don’t know enough to be in danger. You are officially missing now, so a Mrs. Margery is taking care of your cat until you get back.”

Liz closed her eyes and let out a long breath. She had found out that her captors had killed Lukas while she was a prisoner and had been afraid her other colleagues might be in danger too. Also, it was nice to know Blaise was okay, even if her family would be worried sick about her.

“Have you left this apartment?” the man asked, unpacking a mish-mash assortment of food, everything from microwaveable meat lover’s pizzas to vegan quinoa salads. He also seemed to have bought six different varieties of chocolate biscuits which seemed odd.

Liz shook her head. “I’m surprised you don’t have security cameras to confirm that.”

“Remote feeds are too easy to hack.”

Jesus, Liz had been half kidding. “I’ve been thinking. Maybe they got to the local police, but we could go to the FBI. If we contact a couple of field offices at once, we reduce the chance of corruption.”

“The more people know where you are, the greater chance of discovery,” the man said. “That would put the FBI in danger also.”

“I think the FBI can handle themselves.”

“Not against these people. If you’re important enough to their plans, there isn’t a place in the world well-protected enough to keep you safe from them.”

That should have sounded paranoid in the extreme, but something about the way the man spoke gave everything he said an air of absolute truth. “Who exactly are these people?”

“They’re called the Program. They made the superheroes.”

“What?” Liz asked, trying to wrap her mind around that. “All of them?”

“Some were copycats,” the man said, “but the effective ones, yes.”

“What do they want with me?”

“It appears they want your technology and were having trouble recreating it themselves.”

“I got that. I mean, what do they want it for?”

“That isn’t clear yet.”

“But you don’t want them to get it? That’s why you blew up the lab?”

“That was just a temporary setback,” the man said. “They would have backed up all their research daily. But, yes, I aim to keep it from them.”

“You used to work for them,” Liz said, making it a statement rather than a question.

He nodded.

“Which one were you?”

The man looked her in the eye then for the first time and she saw her answer. There had been four true superheroes. Four who weren’t pretenders or wide-eyed kids just giving it a go. Bodycount, who tore through terrorist cells and organized crime syndicates with explosives and automatic weapons. Dusk, who came like a whisper and killed from the shadows, though she had died years ago. And Reaper, who cut down criminals and warlords like a scythe through wheat. But this man was none of them. In his eyes there was a void, an emptiness so complete that there was only name that could apply. He was the first and most terrifying of the heroes, the faceless man that lurked in the darkest nightmares of criminals even after his supposed death.

“Oblivion,” she breathed.

He nodded.

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“You’re not dead.”

“I found out some things about the man who runs the Program. I left.”

“And that’s why you’re trying to stop them now?”

“In a sense.”

Liz had always had mixed feelings about the so-called superheroes. On the one hand, they did do a great job of reducing crime, especially in places where the government seemed more interested in lining their pockets than protecting their people. But they killed without trial, storming into places and imposing their will. And then to find out that they were all backed by some secret organization that kidnapped people. It was a lot.

 “So,” she said, “you travelled around the world killing criminals?”

The man in black stared at her. “No.” Then after a few moments he added. “They weren’t all criminals.”

A shiver ran down Liz’s spine. “How many?” she asked.

“Including the men in that laboratory, four hundred and fifty-six.”

I shouldn’t have asked.

“That’s very precise.”

“I have a good memory.”

“Does it bother you?” she asked without thinking.

The man seemed to consider this. “Sometimes I think it does.”

Liz didn’t know what to make of that. This man was very strange.

“Why do it then?” she asked to fill the silence that the man seemed to wear like a cloak.

“I wanted to be a hero,” the man said quietly.

“And the way to do that is killing gang-bangers?”

“Is that what you thought we did?” the man asked. “Took out thugs on street corners?” From someone else this would have been delivered with a wry smile or a tone of offence. But this man asked the question with no emotion whatsoever.

“No,” she admitted. “I suppose not. Were you a hero then?”

“Sometimes I think I was. Other times, I think not.”

Liz found conversation with this man a bit surreal. On the one hand he was unnerving, like there was an vast icy nothingness just behind his eyes. But on the other, something about the way he spoke made it seem he knew much more than he was letting on. He was a puzzle, and Liz had always liked puzzles. She imagined this was what speaking to the angel from the paradox of the question would be like, if it didn’t have that silly one question rule and wasn’t being engaged by intellectually greedy logicians.

“How long do I need to stay here?” she asked.

“Until I find my old employer and stop him.”

“You’ll kill him?”

“Yes.”

“You don’t think that should be left up to a jury or something?”

“No. Too dangerous.”

“Who is this person anyway?”

“His name is Kessington Smythe. If I was the world’s first superhero, he was the world’s first supervillain.”

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