Villain (Gone 8)

“I guess I’ll go invisible.” She tried for a joke. “I’m too nervous to think of looking like anyone.”

“I’d go with you, Cruz, but I guess I’d be kind of noticeable.” Armo made a sad smile. “But look, if anything goes wrong, I won’t be as fast as Shade, but I’ll get there.”

Cruz nodded, not trusting her voice. Armo didn’t really know her, might not even know quite what she was. But she believed he would try to save her.

On stiff legs she walked from the room, with Shade for once walking behind her. The casino staff—many bandaged, with torn uniforms and haggard looks—nodded respectfully as they passed. Strange, Cruz thought, how quickly people could adjust to the impossible, when they had motive enough.

“I live in a world where lots of people hate me for not being what they want me to be,” Cruz said as they rode down in the elevator. “But now they’re tipping their hats to a pair of Rockborn monstrosities.”

“Mmmm,” Shade said. “I don’t mean to disillusion you, Cruz, but there are a lot of idiots in the world.”

“Two of them in this elevator.”

Shade blew out a breath. “It’s hard to argue with that.” She leaned forward and pushed the stop elevator button.

“What?” Cruz asked.

“You don’t have to do this, Cruz. You don’t have to play hero; that’s not what you signed up for.”

“No, I signed up to be a sidekick,” Cruz replied, trying and failing to make it a joke.

“Well, Robin, I think you picked the wrong damn Batman.”

A few minutes one way or the other, and we would never have met. A roll of the dice.

Perfect for Las Vegas.

Their eyes met. It’s different now, Cruz thought. Something is different. When life was more normal, Shade and I would talk like friends, like equals, but there was always something in Shade’s gaze that marked her as dominant. In charge. After the rock, that became even more pronounced. Shade almost craved battle, each confrontation a rehearsal for the revenge she could never achieve against a creature long dead.

And there had always been something in Cruz’s own eyes, no doubt, that signaled her submission. Her willing, even eager submission. Shade was smarter. Shade was stronger willed. Shade was a “real” girl. So defined, so definite.

So different from me.

What am I? What the hell am I? Even my power is about concealment—proof that the alien rock had

a sense of humor?

Yet, when she looked in Shade’s eyes, she saw herself reflected now as an equal.

Suddenly Cruz laughed. “Malik’s list. His, what do you call it?”

“His superhero taxonomy?” Shade said, and curled her lip.

“Monster, villain, hero,” Cruz said. “There’s no category called ‘sidekick.’”

“Well,” Shade said almost tenderly, “you are not a monster, Cruz. And you are definitely not a villain.”

Cruz pushed the emergency stop button and the elevator began to descend once again.

“I’m scared to death to go out there,” Cruz said, fighting back tears. “But I’m doing this.”

“Kind of the definition of a hero, isn’t it?” Shade said. “Scared to death; doing it anyway.”

CHAPTER 26

The Hero Thing

CRUZ WAS USHERED past casino security and stepped out into the world.