Benny internally sighed to herself she watched as the last of the brightly dressed tourists walked through, their voices silenced in anticipation of the goods that would soon be on display and for direct sale to them and only them. The auction itself functioned on near total secrecy with only specific guests permitted to the premises.

If that pair hadn’t been arguing so much, this whole experience would have run smoother. Calling up Frank hadn’t been the best idea as the whole plan hinged around getting these customers into the shop downstairs, giving the whole sales routine, and exchanging goods before they departed along a separate route that would lead several blocks away.

As it was, she’d done her best and Frank needed to get a move on. They’d be excited to head downstairs but their patience wouldn’t be sated until they got what they were looking for.

Addicts never were.

Benny looked around the now empty shop seeing that the windows had now fully self-repaired themselves. It’d be best for further privacy for the moment so she closed down the shop and put a back soon sign in the window. At most the auction would only take an hour. Barring unforeseen circumstances, part of her wanted a challenge to vent her stress but she still needed to follow the rules and that meant running her decisions through Frank right now. Besides, it’d give him a chance to play the hero again. That would always put him in a better mood for a little bit until he remembered how capable she was.

***

His feet were pounding on the hard pavement of the street, a short distance away was his destination, safe and secure from prying eyes and especially those of that Agent Golden. He thought hard about a topic that bothered him frequently ever since waking up from his coma in the hospital.

If Frank had to tell anyone who asked him what daily issues, he had to take on, he’d give them a full written list of his responsibilities and obligations to the people of his neighbourhood and surrounding areas.

The same question was asked again but on a more personal note, he’d give a different answer. Superheroes were like the sky; you could hate them, but they existed. If he had a magic lamp with a genie then he’d wish for the same thing only two times. No more superheroes. His third wish would surprise people though, his age.

Despite other people around him having developed the habit of calling him an old man, he was still only a twenty-two-year-old. He didn’t mind Shelly saying it because she was getting older and a lady like herself was a blessing to the local community in her way. Jokes that she made about him like that were fine if it made her feel better emotionally and mentally, Frank needed to respect his elders. Most of them anyway, a few others came to mind and one specific man in particular. An old silver fox who liked to dabble with playing at matchmaker in his spare time, for his amusement for sure.

Georgio. He was just an attention-seeking drama queen looking to turn matchmaker for Frank which was none of his business and he could focus on his luxury goods sales with his business partner thank you very much.

If he kept calling Frank an old man because he hadn’t decided to get married in his early twenties or had an active girlfriend, then any anti-supe measures could be withdrawn from both his storage units and business premises. For a week at least, Frank might be a nice guy, but he wasn’t that nice.

To have a magic lamp with a genie, Frank would change his age to early thirties in a heartbeat. He wanted to lose years of his life in return for having a little more respect and understanding when he was trying his best to support a community.

Dealing with idiot pretenders as he was on his way to now and stopping people from calling him old would all be worth it. It was the first reason that Benny had told him about getting a box of tricks and party favours from one of his hidden locations. He hadn’t sprinted to Teeve Street, but he’d done a decent job of jogging while trying to keep his heart rate low. Sweat would be the issue and he was in no position or time to have a shower and dry himself off given that she would be at this moment dealing with a group of wannabe supes who liked to dress themselves off to try and pass for the real thing.

In a really bad situation, a few of them might have given themselves minor enhancements or gene therapy to boost their natural physical capabilities. From the phone call with her and the speed at which she’d talked to him it was going to be one of these difficult days.

Luckily, Frank knew exactly how to deal with low-level enhancers, and he’d make full use of his knowledge and prowess when he hit his shop. He tightly held the brown package that Shelly had given him under his arm, when he had time later it could be returned to her safely and securely along with a large bouquet thanking her for her kindness.

Right now though he had to deal with more immediate concerns. He wouldn’t let go of the package though and the whites of one hand showed and his fingers wrapped tighter around it the more he ran. His breath came a little bit harder now and he slowed down his fast jogging into a walk.

4 Teeve Street. Finally.

Looking up at the street sign to make sure of the right location he looked around for his specific destination. He had never told anyone this as he rightfully assumed that his behaviour would be picked up as being anti-social or paranoid but one of the reasons that he had always sprung the money for free pastries, hot drinks and coffee was to gather the entire community in one specific location.

It factored in as a security measure when he needed to pick up the goods and a magic bag and party favours. They were in fact code words that he had pre-determined with Benny in case anyone was listening to them. Magic bag meant DNA, recorded samples and any clothing or other materials that could be collected and stored away.

Frank had developed a semi-autonomous drone network in the vicinity of any superhuman fights that would both collect and store. It was so illegal that if found out, both of them would be sent immediately to prison or worse if higher level supes found out. Although in their case it would be all about lost opportunities for money, good or bad, it was all about money and resources.

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It was the main reason that richer areas and financial centres went untouched. Private security forces would patrol those areas and the leadership or more powerful superheroes, and supervillains didn’t want their financial incomes touched. Frank thought that a government-mandated supe like Agent Evie would never have been to those areas aside from public relations events or for training purposes on how a perfect fight-free area would be.

He needed his party's favours to deal with the situation with Benny. Frank saw what he needed; a simple-looking matt-black box carefully placed into a nearby alleyway about a metre off the ground. It was around half a cubic metre in length and width and could have passed for any electrical junction box if you didn’t know what you were looking for; the warning labels telling of hazardous risks to health and fines for tampering meant that it would have been overlooked by most passers-by.

Frank did try his best to keep the entire collection and supply network as low-key as possible. Her dressing entirely in pink with hair, clothes and all was a great help. People would imagine an underground criminal element with all guns, weapons and scarred-looking people looking for trouble. Give them an overly bored employee of an electronics store with a severe fashion taste and generally, it was seen as a joke

Walking over to the box in the dirty and surprisingly smelly alleyway, Frank slowly placed one hand on one side allowing it to scan his biometric fingerprints. His pink friend had wanted her physical data registered as well, but friends didn’t put friends in more danger than necessary. It wasn’t a case of trust; he didn’t have many friends despite his relative popularity in the local community. He did care about her safety and the legal ramifications if she was involved. This way if he were found out he could always say that he had threatened her to work with him and she didn’t know any of the inner workings of the actual operation.

He stepped back for a moment before slumping against the wall. The stink of the place wouldn’t get on his clothes despite appearances. It was one of the security measures that he had installed, bad smells often kept away people who would assume that there was a direct connection to a sewer line that was open.

Catching his breath he watched the box cycle a few lights before gently powering up. When one side had a row of small almost indiscernible green lights showing he got off his feet, careful not to put his hands on the ground and applied his fingers to the other side going through the same process.

Your general members of the public would assume that genetic records, data, and any items of clothing would have been hard to shift even using drones. In reality, the actual size of the DNA samples was at most a small vial, the scans, video, and audio recordings were all electronic and sent directly to the box or one of its scattered brothers and sisters and the clothing was scraps at most.

Scarcity created demand. Shelly ran a costume shop by the same standard, she was able to purchase clothing, possibly mildly scorched or torn, repair it and then sell it on to collectors who liked to play dress-up supervillains or heroes in the comfort of their own homes. Frank had heard her tell him once that she had seen warehouses full of framed clothing like art galleries.

Once the box showed green lights on both sides, he went up to it, stretched his hands out and placed them on the sides when a slot opened up for a retinal eye scan. He made an eye open as large as possible before it was checked and verified against existing records

Frank knew that there must be shape-changing supes out there who could copy his exact appearance and even his physical structure, but he had one thing that they could never have. A small tray shot open just below where his mouth was and he spat into it, giving it a sample of his living DNA. He’d never been kidnapped yet and forced to use it to access the contents but if he had been Frank would simply place his fingers along the sides of the box in the wrong order giving it the directive to immediately destroy the contents inside.

‘Too long. This damn machine is taking too long.’

He might have to ask her to come out and check it to verify that it didn’t need maintenance or that one of the drones had dropped a sample in the wrong slot by mistake. The whole funding the community wasn’t a long-term solution he realised and although he could get around government-mandated cleaners coming in to fix up the place dealing with an active mid-level registered supe wearing a suit with a taste for an iced latte and almond croissant. Screw her soya milk.

He might have to approach one low-level criminal gang to request a courier to make deliveries to keep his hands cleaner. The black box finally verified his entire identity and his registered security clearance. Pointless in that he was the only one who had his records held in the damn thing, he’d need to set it to wipe clean all data after he emptied it.

The rest of the boxes could be dealt with remotely by Benny without her having to leave any physical traces behind. As long as he was careful, and he had been only touching the specific buttons and not letting any of his spit touch the floor this should be ok. A chemical clean-up would make sure of that after he got himself prepared.

With a small hiss and a release of gas the front cover of the box began to shift to the side and Frank stepped back taking a deep breath in. This was going to be tricky in the time that he had, did he want to run straight to the shop after getting ready or give himself enough time to be breathing calmly when he entered to deal with the idiots looking for a fix and source of income?

After grabbing a foldable metallic suitcase with a secure modified lock, Frank carefully placed inside all samples, recordings and scraps of clothing which had all been either placed in plastic vials or small electronic plug-ins.

Got my bag of magic tricks and now it’s time for the party favours.

There was only going to be one chance to deal with the copy-cats in the shop right now and he wasn’t going to get a do-over. First impressions mattered. This was the time that Frank wished he looked older than he was so he wouldn’t have to deal with the same mess over and over again. He couldn’t go and call other people the same age as his kids when they’d see him as the same.

First, he picked up a disposable plastic, self-inflating pop-up tent that was stored in all the security boxes and placed it in the middle of the alleyway. There was no way he was going to strip naked in a public space no matter how strong his body looked. Having muscles didn’t make him an exhibitionist. Not that he felt embarrassed about his current appearance; age brought maturity. It sometimes surprised Frank how many years he had been in a coma and the effect that it had on his mindset. Three years of life in exchange for clarity of mind wasn’t a bad deal

Setting the grey-coloured tent on the ground it rapidly expanded to encompass the space within the alleyway. He left it wide open for a moment, once he opened the valve it would deflate into a small easily foldable form and become another piece of evidence for him to dispose of in the black box on the wall. He’d be able to make sure everything was permanently taken offline from a room inside his electronics store later if he needed to but to begin, he had to get into character and costume as it was.