“One million dollars or the school becomes a sinkhole,” a spandex-clad villain says. This one wears mainly black. The only exceptions are his white cape.

The supervillain goes by the mantra, Pitfall, and is currently standing on a raised platform of dirt next to an elementary school. Surrounding the school is a fence of dirt.

Pitfall is a traveling supervillain, so no given hero learns much about him. No one knows the full extent of his powers. They know he can control the elevation of ground, rock, dirt, gravel, and pretty much everything else, but that’s it.

He has been a villain for over two decades. He’s physically weak, but his abilities make him a pretty powerful villain. He’s more disliked than most villains because of the large number of people he chooses to kill.

The villain and the police have been in a standoff for over an hour now, but Naturalist still hasn’t shown up.

Pitfall only decided to come to New Baru because Naturalist has been missing for the last six weeks. He’s too scared of him to come any other time.

A second person shows up on the roof of the elementary school.

“Hey!” Intelegant shouts, getting the attention of everyone. “This is my city!” She points at Pitfall in a stance similar to a kid calling someone a butthead.

The second villain dismisses her: “Go away and let the real villain do his work.”

“‘Real villain!!!?” She laughs. “Who do you think you are? Challenging me like this is a big mistake, but I’m sure you didn’t mean it. Because I’m nice, I’ll give you a chance to leave. If you do, there’ll be no hard feelings.”

The black and white villain turns to her and laughs. “You don’t stand a chance in a fight with me.”

“I routinely take on a hero you’re scared of. If that’s not proof that you should take me seriously, I don’t know what is,” she sasses back.

“You are an arrogant one,” he says. “It’s obvious that the only reason you are allowed to work as a villain in this city is because you’re sleeping with Naturalist.”

All Intelegant can do is stare at him, her face contorted with disgust.

Though Pitfall is generally too oblivious to notice such things as others' complete and total hatred and/or disgust for him or his actions, the awkward silence gives him the sudden need to justify himself. “You never do any damage, or take anything. It’s obvious this villain act is just some weird role-play.”

A case of literary theft: this tale is not rightfully on Amazon; if you see it, report the violation.

She opens her mouth to say something before deciding it would be useless to contradict this idiot. She sighs at him with a hand over the eyes of her mask. She needs to calm herself. If she goes at him now the kids will hear her curse and she doesn’t want that.

Pitfall doesn’t see the danger. He sees her posture as an admission that he is right. “Just get out of here. I’m tired of dealing with you.”

Rather than a verbal response, Intelegant hops over to him and wraps an arm around his neck.

“Just because I’m not constantly an ass doesn’t mean I’m not a villain,” she whispers into his ear as he lifts parts of the ground in an attempt to get her off of him. Frantically, he claws at the arm around his neck.

“Still think I’m just here ‘cause some guy has a soft spot for me’?”

“S-sorry,” he croaks out.

“Too bad,” she says just a little too cheerily, “cause you threatened kids and challenged me. Now I’m going to send you to life in jail. Maybe if you’re lucky you won’t get the death penalty!”

He tries to say something else, but he is too oxygen-deprived to manage it. His eyes close. At the same time, the fence collapses.

Intelegant keeps her cool and gets him to the ground safely.

She checks Pitfall’s pulse before turning to the police with a smile and saying, “You’re welcome!” She then takes a few quick steps to jump to the school’s roof so she can make her escape. Before she can make the jump, a little kid runs to her.

The little boy smiles up at her from where he’s hugging her leg. “That was so cool!”

“Awww!” Intelegant squeals. “Thank you!” She pats him on the head. “But you’re the cool one. You were so calm and didn’t freak out! You and all your classmates were so brave!”

The villainess hears footsteps and looks over to find a crowd of little kids running toward her; their teacher following them. She looks back to make sure none of the police are after her before deciding she can have a quick conversation with the children.

“What’s your superpower?” a little girl asks as she catches her breath.

“Do you love Naturalist?” another kid demands.

“I want to be like you when I grow up,” a child's voice says from behind her.

“I, um…” Intelegant tries to collect her thoughts.

“Children,” the teacher says, “Back up and remember, if you have a question, you have to raise your hands.”

Twenty hands pop into the air.

The villain can’t help but laugh.

“Sorry about them,” the teacher says sheepishly.

“I don’t mind,” Intelegant says with a smile. All the kids, though overwhelming, are too cute for Intelegant to refuse.

“Max, why don’t you ask your question first,” the teacher decides.

“Thank you for saving us,” Max, a little girl with pigtails says.

“Why don’t all of us thank Mx. Intelegant?” the teacher suggests.

“Thank you,” they all say.

Intelegant smiles as she tries not to die from the cuteness overload. “You’re all very welcome.”

“Intelegant!” Smeen shouts as she runs over.

“I’ve got to go now so bye!” Intelegant says as she scoots her way out of the crowd.

Quickly, she jumps up onto the building and runs away.