Chapter Fifty-Five - In Want of a Plan
Kevin was enjoying his time the way time was meant to be enjoyed. He was in a hotel today instead of a seedy motel. It was one of the only ones in Eauclaire, just a few blocks over from the big college or whatever. At the moment, if anyone asked, he was...
Actually, he couldn't remember the name on the ID he'd stolen. He was some college guy that had paid for one of the nicer rooms in cash, that's all that mattered.
He was laying on a large, comfortable bed, pantsless, and watching a large-screen TV while enjoying a few beers he'd nicked from the minifridge of the room next to his. No way was he going to pay for the stuff in his own room's minifridge, the prices were just shy of villainous.
Kevin reached under his shirt, rubbed a hand across his belly, then yawned. He'd done nothing all day, and it was exceptionally tiring.
He couldn't do this forever, of course. Eventually he'd run out of cash and need to head out. And overstaying his welcome wasn't wise. There was a chance the poor sap whose ID he'd stolen would notice something amiss, or the hotel would.
He doubted it. This hotel didn't seem like it was getting a lot of patronage at this time of year, so it was pretty understaffed, but it was still possible that someone with too much time on their hands would want to look into Kevin, and that could mean trouble.
But that would be a problem for later.
What was the point in being a villain if he didn't get to sit back and just relax once in a while? It was meant to be a way of life, not a nine-to-five job.
He shifted on the bed, then winced as the shifting pulled something along his side.There was a long, discoloured bruise running up his calf. It was yellow and a little green on the edges. The bruise had been fading nicely for the past couple of days, but it was still present enough to hurt when he moved.
Another reason to stay inside.
Kevin didn't have any of that fancy self-healing stuff. He had a few tricks though. Reaching down, he ran a hand over his leg. His whole hand started to shake, tremble, then vibrate like a phone going off. The vibrations were redirected into his leg, and he could feel all the muscles and bones shivering.
It felt nice, like a massage. Most people wouldn't appreciate it, though. The vibrations were tuned so that they'd probably melt the flesh off of someone's leg, but his power didn't work on himself that way. To him, it was soothing. Like pressing a hotpack into a sore muscle.
The fact that he'd been hurt at all was what annoyed him.
Eauclaire was meant to be easy. It was some nowhere little city with nothing important in it. It should have been a piece of cake for him to waltz in, wreck the local heroes a little, then rule this little kingdom.
If he had to pick between being the king of a slum or some servant of something bigger, he'd always pick the king.
Yet here he was, stuck in some hotel in his underwear watching cartoons. Not a single minion in sight.
This, he concluded after thinking about it for a while, was all that Boss chick's fault.
She'd popped up out of nowhere. Some brand new hero-type-do-gooder that couldn't mind her own. Her and her gaggle of brats.
Kevin flung an empty can across the room where it clattered against the floor. He picked up another and popped the tab with a satisfying hiss. He should have had a cool base by now. Maybe a bunker, maybe a nice club. Yeah, a club, with a DJ, and those flickery lights, and maybe a few hot minions that would serve him hand and foot.
He grumbled some more, then reached for the remote. The cartoons had turned to obnoxiously loud ads, and he didn't care to be advertised to. Flipping the channel forward, he flew past vapid sitcoms, re-re-releases of old movies, the news--
Kevin paused, then flicked back a few channels to the news.
It was playing some boring feel-good story about the local Eauclaire hospital. A bit of cellphone footage taken from a parking lot. There were a couple of HRF vans, and a larger recreational vehicle parked out front.
Stolen from Royal Road, this story should be reported if encountered on Amazon.
His attention was mostly on one person in particular. The Boss, standing outside, the brats all around her while she talked to some patchwork-looking hero.
The newscaster was going on about some big visit thing, raising money for charity and some sort of children's fund. He wasn't paying it much attention.
There she was. Looking fine and smug and unbothered that she was in his city.
It wasn't fair. He'd won their last fight. Sure, he'd pulled out after kicking them around a little, but he'd still won.
He watched as the tiny pixelated image of the Boss shook. The person holding the camera was far from professional. She seemed happy.
The remote burst in his hand, and Kevin swore and shook off the bits of plastic. He'd forgotten to keep a hold of his power, and now the remote was shattered like so much glass. Kevin shook it off, then realized that the TV would be stuck on the news now.
"Damnit," he swore. The news went on to talk about some economic stuff that he didn't care about.
He stood, took another swig of his beer, then just stood there for a moment. He didn't know what to do next, exactly. He felt like rushing over to the hospital and wrecking the place, but... well, he was a villain, not a monster. Besides, destroying the children's wing of a hospital wasn't robbing a bank, that kind of thing would get way too much heat on him.
Kevin scoffed. "Enjoy your time, Boss," he muttered under his breath. "We'll see how much this city loves you once it's nothing but ruins."
He didn't finish his beer. Instead, he flung it into the trash, found some sweatpants, and left. Eauclaire wasn't good for him, he was realising. He'd made a small fortune hitting up the poorly protected banks here, but his dreams of super villainy weren't amounting to anything.
Worse, he was getting fat and lazy and complacent here. The hotel room was feeling too small, too constrained, so he left and made his way over to the hotel's gym.
It was nearly unoccupied. There was one guy there, at the free weights, casually pumping iron, but he was off in his corner, and Kevin decided to ignore him. He wasn't all that great at the whole exercise thing. He kept up a little, because he had to, but that was it.
Some of the gangs he'd been in had been really into building muscle and doing cardio. Kevin preferred to rely on his power to beat others down, not his fists.
But if he wanted to rule, then he'd need to lose the gut.
He got onto a treadmill and worked up a sweat. The entire time, he glared ahead of himself. It helped if he imagined himself sprinting after that stupid woman and her brats, running towards them to give them a beat down.
Kevin pounded on the treadmill, each step thudding with the weight of his frustrations. Sweat began to pearl on his forehead, running down in rivulets as he picked up the pace. The mindless rhythm, the mechanical whirring of the machine, seemed to mirror the turmoil in his mind. He kept seeing the Boss's smug face, surrounded by her 'brats', and it fueled his resolve.
He had enough of playing small-time. Eauclaire was supposed to be a pit stop on his way to greatness. Instead he felt stuck here.
There was only one thing to do about it, escalate. Show the city the magnitude of his power.
Kevin cursed under his breath. That would feel fantastic, to finally let loose in a big way. But the attention... he knew he was good. He was powerful. But he couldn't take on the entirety of the HRF. If he started collapsing entire streets, then they'd be on him in a big way.
After an hour, he wobbled off the treadmill. The sweat was nice. The feeling in his gut wasn't. He was still annoyed, still frustrated.
He moved to the free weights and started pumping. It was so easy to imagine himself crushing this entire city, but even if that's what he wanted to do, he knew it wasn't the right thing.
He needed a plan. He needed a concrete idea of what to do next.
And the first step on that plan would be to crush the competition.
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