(Frankenstein POV)
The old order would not go down without a fight.
I glanced to my right. For the first time in so long, I was alone with Rosita. We were both wanted people, yet we didn’t have enough people we could trust to do the grunt work needed outside our safe areas.
“What are you looking at?” she said roughly. “What schemes is your crazy mind thinking up right now?”
“No schemes.” I smiled softly. “It is my overscheming that has us in this situation.”
“We have made contact with the Houses of Doom. The world will soon bend the knee.”
“But we’re going to be among the ones kneeling.” I clenched my fists. “I did not plan for that. If we had acted faster, with less convoluted plans that only served to lessen our impact, we would have won. Order, or Paragon, or whatever his name is, and Crisis. Iron Jaw and Alpha Surge. I could go on and on.”
“You’re thinking about it too much. Take the win. And revel in the fact that we’re standing so close to our dreams. Things aren’t perfect, but you’d be a fool if you think they’ll ever be.”
No, things weren’t perfect. In more ways than one: we had failed. More and more I came to think of this as a pyrrhic victory than anything else.
We were subservient to Lady Doom–at least for now–and sent out to a mission to find what we could about this Moros.
The only solace I took was the fact that we were in a busy American city, surrounded by a sea of people that drowned out our faces. We were a long way away from the Isle of Heroes and any European countries.
New Weston was the perfect place for us to go for this mission. A city full of multi-storied buildings, and a diverse array of people. Perfect for us to blend in.
An explosion broke me out of my thoughts. I turned to its source. A bunch of animal-like people dressed in all black were screaming out of a car–a couple bird-like ones were flying–followed closely by two pairs of heroes running on the walls of the buildings.
It was enough to warm even my broken heart.
“Do not be discouraged.”
My blood froze. As discreetly as I could, I turned to Rosita. Her eyes and arms had already started glowing. I nodded ever so slightly. Good. If there was one thing I could rely on her for, it was being ready to hurt people. I thought about it often, but I was extremely lucky to have her on my side.
“What can we do for you?” I turned to the voice that spoke before. It was a gaunt, almost sickly looking man with grey hair and a small smile.
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“Alpha Surge was a great hero. He was in our city often. Even now, his Project: Tomorrow is the one thing that allows the heroes to keep up with him and stand against the wave of villainy that followed after his death.”
“Who are you?” Rosita asked sharply. I winced at her tone and hurried to come up with some sort of explanation but the man just laughed.
“Just a man,” he said. “I used to be a teacher actually.”
“Don’t mess with me.”
She took a step forward but I put out my arm to stop her. All the while, I didn’t take my eyes off him.
“You’ve both changed,” he said. “You’ve grown out a beard, and you have dyed your hair red. Enough to pass by here, but what will you do when you need to go back to Atlantis?”
For a brief second, I contemplated leaving him to Rosita. The heroes were clearly busy, and what was just one more thing in our already too long rap sheet? But I knew better.
“To know us, you must be in some, let’s say unorthodox fields. So I suggest you stop trying to act so smug. Unless, of course, you want my friend here to satisfy her blood lust with you.”
“Come now, Victor,” he said with another laugh. “I merely want to help you achieve what your namesake did. Unless you no longer want to build your monster.”
A beat of silence. I wouldn’t say anything. Any response now would put me at a disadvantage. More than I already was.
Trying to bite off more than I could chew? I’d learned not to do that the hard way.
“Call me Georg Jensen,” he said. “I’ve been watching you. You’ve been working with young Amelia–I suppose you know her better as Lady Doom. She sniffed around her higher ups and told you to come here to find a girl by the name Sofia Galivan.”
I grit my teeth.
“Crisis.”
Nobody else would be as smug or as seemingly omnipotent. The worst mistake I’d ever made was working with him. I put my arm down. Rosita didn’t attack him. Smart move. No matter how much he looked like a frail old man, we both knew better.
“We are at the first stage you see,” he said in an even tone. “Your plans, Amelia, Project: Tomorrow and so much else. A new world order is on the verge of being formed. You were right about me. I am insatiable.
“I flew as high as I could until they caught me. I tried for decades to be a good man. Until I was asked to become Crisis again. And again. Until the good man was gone and I was, metaphorically speaking of course, reborn. I’ll be my own master once more and the whole world will be at the palm of my hand.”
Vague words and statements specifically made to be grand. I didn’t doubt they had some truth to them, but there was much more going on that I didn’t understand.
What I did understand was that he wanted–or needed–me alive. Me and Sofia Galivan–whoever she was. I smirked. He didn’t show it, but he was scrambling. Maybe it was our coming here, maybe it was something else.
But whatever he was doing wasn’t going according to plan either.
“Give me something,” I said. “Give me something about Moros and Lady Doom and we will leave.”
His jaw clenched. It was small and almost imperceptible but it was there.
“Lady Doom’s real name is Amelia. Your best bet is to go along with her, for now at least. She is going against her House’s plans. There will come a time when you’re able to exploit that.”
“And Moros?”
“You won’t harm him. Not if you can help it. He’s a student at Atlantis. That’s all you need to know.”