I pushed Artemis off me. Not without some difficulty, I might add, given that she was literally super heavy, my injured hand and, y’know, not really wanting to. She really was quite an attractive woman but I was supposed to be an evil supervillain, a professional. I certainly wasn’t going to get down and dirty in the middle of a job.

I clambered awkwardly up to my feet, holding my injured hand against my ribs. She sighed a little, swiftly rose to her feet and helped me the rest of the way.

“What’s wrong?” She seemed frustrated and a tad upset. Her lower lip pushed out slightly as she stared at me.

“Noth...” I had to clear my throat again before continuing, “Nothing. Erm. What are you doing?” I asked plaintively. “This isn’t really the sort of thing superhero’s and I usually do, you know? It’s usually a little less, well, flirty to be honest.”

She looked down bashfully before peering back up at me from beneath lowered lashes, “I was going to apprehend you and bring you in quick, but I’m kind of a fan. I even used to have your poster over my bed, right next to MegaJustices’. When I saw what happened to your poor hand after you tried to hit me and then we started talking, I, I just couldn’t help myself”

“Yes, well. Be that as it may, we can’t fraternise. Have you never seen what happens when supervillains and superheroes get together? It’s not pretty. There’s always a fight at some point and someone ends up with a broken heart…and I’m not being figurative.”

She sighed in disappointment.

“Fine. Come on then. If we aren’t having any fun, I guess I’ll just have to bring you in. At least you can get your hand seen to.”

At the reminder of my injured hand, it suddenly seemed to flare in pain. I really should get back and get some Instacure on it but I needed to sort this situation before I did anything. I also had to know why my powers didn’t work on her. I wondered if it was a natural immunity, a device or magic spell. I knew I should at least try to find out or I just wouldn’t be doing my job. It’s really not that easy being evil you know…trust me.

I narrowed my eyes and surreptitiously made a small gesture with my undamaged hand.

Nope. Nothing happened. I tried again, this time closing my eyes and pushing slightly harder with my mind.

I opened my eyes to see her staring at me and very definitely not laid out unconscious on the floor, twitching spasmodically.

Argh!

This was really unfair! All I asked for were terrifying abilities that made people run shrieking in fear and terror from me and, in fairness, usually had them in spades but they didn’t seem to work on Artemis.

Which was unusual, to say the least.

“Finished?” She drawled while giving me a slightly amused grin. “It won’t work Hun, I’m protected against all of your abilities, although I must admit, that last one kinda tickled. Come on, let’s go.”

“Um, not quite yet Artemis, OK, so you’re warded against direct attacks then. What about … indirect ones?”

As I spoke, I saw a large piece of paving that had broken loose when she jumped on me and mentally levitated it behind her back before flinging it at her, hoping to take her by surprise. She just stood there calmly as it shattered against her invulnerable body.

Oh, right. Forgot about that. Bugger, this could be even harder than I thought.

She started to laugh again at my useless attempt at attacking her and, without saying another word, simply stepped forward and took hold of my right hand before effortlessly rising into the air with us both. I struggled ineffectually against her, striving to break free. I soon got bored with that though as it was like wrestling with granite and gave up, hanging limply in her grasp as she flew through the night sky.

Fortunately, I was more than warm enough as her body radiated heat. The view from up there really was quite spectacular and no, I wasn’t referring to the scantily clad young beauty carrying me through the air. The lights in the tall buildings glimmered through the fading air pollution, causing a beautiful luminescence that shimmered in the air. I could even make out some of the brighter stars when I looked up. Of course, even this view inevitably began to pall and eventually, growing tired of being held by one hand, I tried to smoothly lift myself up into a more comfortable position. This didn’t really work out as intended as, without thinking, I firmly grasped her shoulder with my sore hand and pulled. I gave a distressed little whimper as I found myself suddenly supporting my full weight on it for a brief, agonising moment and, finally giving in to the unexpected pain, began to pass out, vaguely hearing her cry out in surprise as I succumbed to the blackness.

“Tom! Come here, this minute!” The strident voice finally penetrated his consciousness. He was lay on his bed, voraciously devouring the latest novel set in a post-apocalyptic world of zombies. He was enjoying vicariously fighting the infected along with his heroes who had recently developed a hive mind and incredible speed and strength. He sighed in annoyance and put the book down.

“What?!” He shouted through the closed door.

“Come here and you’ll find out, won’t you?” His foster mother shouted back.

He grumbled and stomped over to the door, flinging it open and crashing down the stairs. He entered the front room and glowered at the occupants.

“What?”

His foster father gave his foster mother a Look. Tom hated those looks, they seemed to imply that he was an ungrateful little turd who should be more grateful that he had a roof over his head and food in his belly. His foster father could imply a lot in a simple look.

“Have you done your chores?”

Tom looked at her in disbelief. “What? No. God! I was busy then!”

His foster mother, Jane, looked disappointed. She looked at her husband, Jim in mute appeal.

Jim looked at Tom gravely. “Look, son. You’ve been here for, what? Six months now? You must start pulling your weight, kiddo. Jane and I, well, we love you, son, but your attitude could use a little … adjustment.

Tom was confused. Adjustment? What the hell was he talking about? “Look, Jim, you’re not my father so don’t call me ‘son’, OK? I’ll do my chores when I want, not when you tell me!” Tom turned and made to leave the room.

“You stop right there, young man!” Jim sounded uncharacteristically angry. Tom didn’t turn but he heard the chilling sound of a belt being unbuckled. His mouth went dry and the sound made his stomach clench in a way that he hadn’t felt since his mom’s ‘lessons’.

He began to shake.

“Come here, Tom! If you won’t do as we ask, maybe you’ll learn to do as you’re told!”

I woke from my impromptu rest with a jerk, my heart still beating hard from the remembered fear. The dream faded fast, leaving nothing behind but vague feelings of impotence and frustration.

I blearily took in the sea of self-righteous, judgemental faces surrounding me, most of them familiar from the various beat downs I had given them in the past.

Oh. Those guys.

Bloody Protection council, I hated these guys. I narrowed my eyes and blinked a few times until my sight began to clear. The room gradually began to come into focus as I looked around. I was sat in my underwear on a metal chair in the centre of a large, circular hall with no windows and only one exit. It was filled with various Enhanced humans. I immediately recognised some of the so-called heroes dotted here and there in the throng. Crimson Rabbit, casually leaning against Sheathed Blade and, over at the edge of the assembly, Moondog, busily scratching behind his left ear, a vacant expression just about visible on his hairy face. I even recognised the small guy from the apocalyptic universe who was handy with knives where he was stood listening to a tall, dark haired man with intense, dark eyes and an axe at his side … I vaguely recalled that the small one had blown up a cow once for some reason. They were all discussing what punishment I should suffer for my heinous crimes, which I’m sure had nothing to do with most of them being utterly humiliated by me during past encounters.

Judgemental pricks. I much preferred being the one doing the judging rather than being judged. I should point out that I tended to ignore irony unless I was the one being ironic at people.

I would like to say it was a humbling experience that gave me a fundamental respect for ordinary people and the horrible things that they have to put up with. I would like to. To be honest, it just annoyed the hell out of me and made me more determined to escape as soon as possible. I needed to get back to telling others what to do, or, as I liked to call it, the natural state of affairs.

I decided that this had gone on long enough. “Ahem!” I ostentatiously, and, I admit, slightly obnoxiously, cleared my throat. “Has anyone seen my clothes?” Good thing I was proud of my body and didn’t suffer from a nudity taboo really.

“Hello? Guys?”

Nobody so much as glanced at me.

OK, if there was one thing I hated more than the good guys being self-righteous, it was being ignored by the smug, arrogant little bast … swines. I quickly assessed my physical state. I appeared to have been healed, probably by The Nurse I would imagine, so my hand was at least not hurting any more. I was also quite tightly secured to the narrow metal chair by what must have been enhanced bonds. I couldn’t move an inch and my powers were apparently still on the fritz. I hadn’t felt this helpless in years and wasn’t particularly enjoying the experience. I narrowed my eyes and glared around slowly at the committee of goody two shoes as they discussed me. I’d better get my shadow cloak back or there was going to be hell to pay.

“I demand to know what right you have to detain me! I’m an innocent man. Innocent, I tell you!”

There was a brief pause in the talking as everybody suddenly seemed to turn to look at me before someone at the back of the crowd began laughing derisively.

A deep voice, filled with contempt came from behind me. “Innocent? Hah! What right do we have? Well, let’s see. We’re the guardians of law and order on this planet and you, well, you’re what we guard it against. That’s what gives us the right, mate.”

I groaned inwardly at hearing the words spoken in a rough British accent…Liverpool or Manchester, I believe, though I’ve never really cared enough to find out properly. Goddamn Decker! He’d had it in for me ever since I had first begun my career and accidentally kidnapped his wife. It probably hadn’t helped that she didn’t want to go back to him after spending some time with me. To find myself apparently at his mercy was not going to be a pleasant experience, still, I had to try to face it out.

“You haven’t got anything on me Decker and you know it. Now, let me go before I do something truly horrific to you all and make you let me go.”

He came around into my line of sight and grinned at my poorly hidden ire. “If you could’ve, you would’ve already mate. It seems that Artemis has found some way to neutralise your abilities so there won’t be any funny business out of you tonight.”

OK, so this told me two very important things; one, that Artemis had done something to prevent my abilities working properly. Two, that this bunch of jackals didn’t have access to it or even know what it was and three (yeah, I know what I said. I’m evil, I lie, suck it up) they didn’t know that my peripheral attacks would still work and I knew that not everyone here was invulnerable.

I just had to wait for the right time and then they would pay, oh yes! They would all pay! Mwah hahahaha!

Huh, I didn’t expect to go on full on crazy then, I should probably watch out for that. I’d seen way too may contemporaries go down that route and it never ended well for them. I took control of myself with an effort of will and gave the smug bastard a winning smile.

“OK Decker, fine, so I can’t do anything to make you let me go. What am I doing here anyway? Shouldn’t I be in a police station where I can call my lawyer rather than some clandestine little get together? What do you call this group of boybands anyway? A gaggle? A murder?”

“Funny.” Yet he didn’t laugh. I was hurt.

I told him so.

He ignored me and continued on as if I hadn’t spoken, “No lawyers this time mate. This time it’s go straight to jail, do not pass go and no chance to get off on a technicality. You’re staying in our facility from now on. Its purpose built for scum like you and you won’t ever be getting out.”

“But, that’s not constitutional! I have my rights and I demand a court date with a jury of my peers!”

“Sorry mate. Like I said, you aint going nowhere except to the lower levels where you’ll be housed in our lovely new cellblock where there’s no escape, even for you.”

I was frankly aghast at this development. Something seemed to have happened to make the good guys a little less on the side of rights and freedom than they should be. Not good. I was the one who was meant to imprison people without due process, not these guys. If they started to play on my side of the fence, then who the hell would be the bad guys? How bad would they have to be to stand in opposition? This was definitely a concerning precedent and I wasn’t just thinking that because I was about to be locked up for the rest of my natural life. Well, not just because of that.

Luckily, I wasn’t called an evil genius for nothing, despite current appearances, and I still had a few tricks up my sleeve.

“Yes, OK, you got me, Decker. Pity about the girl, though isn’t it?”

“Yeah, it I …” He paused and closed his eyes, possibly suspecting what was coming. He opened his eyes and glared at me. “What girl?”

I plastered an oh so innocent expression on my face and smiled widely at him. “Oh, did I forget to mention? Silly me, must be all the excitement of my rights being stripped away and the threat of being falsely imprisoned I guess.”

“If this is some stunt to get out of this, then let me assure you that …”

I lost the smile and interrupted him, “Come on Decker, you know me well enough to know that I don’t do stunts. I am referring to my hostage. The one I thoughtfully took before heading out tonight and who is currently submerged in a tank that is filling with water at an excruciatingly slow rate. The one where, if I don’t disable the mechanism in time will eventually result in her painful demise. Her name is Penny Dwindle, a 21-year-old med student. I’m sure if you check police records, it should show that she is missing by now.”

He gave me a look of pure frustration and anger before rushing off for a hurried conversation with the rest of the team, casting frequent glances in my direction and alternately shaking and nodding his head in response to some heated questions. One of the group, Starling? Sparrow? Some small bird’s name anyway, pulled out a portable computer, lifted the lid and hurriedly began dictating questions to its AI. He checked the readout and paused, slowly closing the lid and putting the computer away before smashing a gloved fist into his other hand. Bird Boy, whatever his name was, bowed his head before looking at the others with the resignation in his eyes clearly visible behind his mask.

I waited quietly, a wry smile on my face, secure in the knowledge they would not allow an innocent to die simply to gain a little revenge on me.

“NO! I say it’s worth the life of one person to finally be rid of him. He’s a menace to everyone and the loss of one life is a trade I’m willing to make!”

The hero shouting was, surprisingly, the tall, strongly built, handsome and of course, honourable, MegaJustice; my nemesis since, oh, felt like forever. I was concerned for a moment that he was serious but that would have been ridiculous, he would never countenance trading an innocent woman’s life simply to imprison little old me.

Mega’s brown eyes burned with fervour at finally having caught me. Uh oh. It didn’t look like he was letting it go.

“I said, no. We finally have the chance to put him away where he will never again be a danger to anyone else. I feel terrible for the girl but who knows what horrors he may have already inflicted on her? She could be beyond help by now, maybe even prefer death … I know I would if I’d spent any time with this offal.”

Ugh. I hated the way he talked. Seriously, who spoke like that?

The group began to argue among themselves about the relative moral points of letting her die to imprison me.

My smile started to slip slightly at this point as I realised that something was going badly wrong. The main supporter of Doing the Right Thing, wasn’t and it was going to result in someone’s death. I didn’t make idle threats and they all knew that. What were they thinking?