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Chapter 23
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His phone was silent, and the city was unusually quiet for this time of day.
Walter sat along the edge of the skylight of a three story building, his chin pressed against the top of his cane. It was, after all, a good time to ponder on things while he waited for someone to get back to him.
It brought back an odd memory from his youth, decades ago, when he had applied to a few places for his first job, just to get out of the house. He had waited by the phone for far too long for one of those places to call. That memory of the old him came and went as moments often did.
He could hear someone climbing the ladder on the side of the building, but he didn’t turn his head to look in its direction. Instead, he listened. The hands and feet had to be small, but either the person was heavy or they were carrying something big on their back. Walter moved his eyes over to confirm what the sound was when Gemma appeared at the top of the ladder.
“Ah, Gemma,” he said, returning his gaze front and center with a smile.
Gemma said, “I thought I would find you up here. One of our new customers said they spotted a banker getting ready to jump.”
“Oh? Does your father’s company watch over this building now?”
“It does, as of this morning. It almost didn’t happen this soon because that fundraiser was attacked by some villains.”
“Assassins, actually, but close enough.”
The young woman sat next to Walter. “You’re not actually going to jump from anywhere, are you?”
“No, of course not. I’m just waiting on some people to call me back while two of my friends are out patrolling somewhere that doesn’t get terribly good reception. Meanwhile, I thought I would enjoy the air and think about the days gone by.”
“Oh my god, it’s worse than I thought. You’re not a banker; you’re an old man.”
“Gemma!” He chuckled.
“I looked up the Dallevan League after we met the other day. How did I miss the heroic supergroup known for its wild reputation?”
“Truth be told, I think a lot of the city likes to pretend we didn’t happen. We had our share of adventures, because we were naturally a dysfunctional, loving family the moment we became a team. We had an impact on the city as a whole because our methods were more outlandish than the average person was ready to believe. Then, in a brief period of time, we vanished from the scene.”
“Do you have any favorite stories to tell?”
“A few.”
A sleigh burst through a window, out the side of an office building where a duo of villains were attempting to terrorize and extort money from the company. The fight against the villains led to one thing and another, and one of them fought against a still-male Adamast Cross on the back of the giant sleigh. Mortar Mage stayed at the front, acting like a driver, while he used his magic to slow the sleigh’s descent.
Meanwhile, Princess Undercut and War Lagoon were back inside the building. They saw the sleigh take off, but they kept on fighting the villain left behind and took him down in seconds.
Down below, the mayor and a real estate agent were showing off a store to a hopeful tenant they both wanted to add to the community. Both tried so hard to be prim and proper.
“So, here we are,” said the agent. “This building was built right before the Prohibition Era. As we step inside, you will find that it is in perfect condition. Nothing wrong or out of place whatsoever.”
Suddenly, the sleigh came down and struck against the surface of the building’s roof before taking off again. Mortar Mage could be heard laughing like Saint Nicholas as they sped off in the other direction.
The mayor smacked himself in the face.
The real estate agent said, “Yes, well, I’m sure we can find another suitable location for you.”
However, the upcoming tenant was staring in the direction the sleigh had gone. He said, “You know what? I think I’ll take it.”
Eventually the sleigh landed on a boat leaving Shiva Bay. Adamast managed to knock out and cuff the villain while they all drifted further away from Paragon City.
“That must have been a fun trip back to Paragon,” Gemma said.
“Fun or them, maybe,” Walter said.
“Why did she—or I guess ‘he’ back then—go with the name Adamast Cross? I always wondered that since I heard the name.”
“One word is the root behind ‘adamant’ and ‘diamond.' The other referred to Adamast’s signature punch to the face at the time. I don’t think I’ve seen her use it lately.”
“Huh. I see.”
“She never was that good with coming up with names. In fact, I think her girlfriend still pesters her about it.”
“I guess that’s why they leave all of the planning and big decisions to you, huh?”
“Not necessarily. Aside from providing them with the things they need, I’ve tried my best to teach them all to think and act on their own when they need to; to come up with their own master plans, especially after more recent events. The problem with that, though, is that being a chess master isn’t for everyone. A small part of me misses being able to live without that particular skill. As for the part of me that enjoys it, well . . .”
An illegal gambling ring had moved into town. It was so bad that people were already starting to lose homes and lives while the group responsible worked underground for one week. Those same individuals behind the gambling ring made a mistake early on. They let slip an email advertisement when Pixeletta was active with the League, but the League had their eyes on the place already for other reasons as well.
Walter and Judy worked on a distraction to draw away the few guards one night. As a team, the League took over the gambling ring’s headquarters, redecorated it, and waited until morning when the criminal group arrived.
The lights turned on, and there was a surprise party with the entire League and a number of willing police officers.
Princess Undercut danced—for a lack of a better word—on the table where the gamblers kept their main equipment. Luckily, the information had been backed up the night before, because she kicked the screens and half of the computers off the table.
Two of the masterminds of the gambling operation tried to get away, but a cop car arrived then to take them away.
The party lasted for a few hours. The gambling organizers who didn’t immediately try to leave couldn’t do anything but watch while they were bound.
Now, Gemma was laughing a little. “You’re crazy.”
”Whoa, what? What is this?” a villain asked, coming to.
The villain was strapped to a harness that he was just now discovering, and a cord that he couldn’t yet see. He was wanted for the blackmail of a few officers who made minor mistakes in the grand scheme of things, and for beating up a few heroes.
Walter was among the heroes who stood behind the villain, along with Adamast Cross and Rampart, back when he was a member.
“How do you do?” Walter asked. He was holding the cord just tight enough to keep the villain standing.
“Huh?” the villain said. “I’ll get you!”
This villain turned and grabbed the banister along the side of the bridge. Walter had just let go of the cord, and the top of the railing was slicked with a lubricating jelly. It was cheap as it was effective. The villain fell backward off of the bridge.
“Well, that was fun,” said Adamast.
Walter waited for the bungee cord to finish bouncing the villain around a few times before he walked to the banister with his fellow heroes. He asked the villain below if he was ready to cooperate with them and go in quietly, while Adamast pulled up the cord and Rampart put a protective field around them.
There was no surprise that the villain would take another swing, his arm radiating with black and lime green energy bubbling outward. Walter sighed while Adamast dropped the villain again.
It turned out that the villain had always wanted to try bungee jumping as a child, but his parents never let him try anything fun, as he put it. The experience on the bridge awoke those old memories, and made the villain ready to turn himself in, set on a path for redemption.
“Why didn’t you just bring him in?” Gemma asked.
Walter said, “It’s in our nature as heroes to help people. Often times, villains are people who need a hand no one else would give them. It’s why the Dallevan League usually avoids exposure with the media, and the media often leaves us alone when we work. They think we’re somehow laughable and boring at the same time. Meanwhile, Channel 9 still hasn’t figured out who sent them the cake-flavored condoms that one time.”
“Cake-flavored what-now?”
“That was my reaction at first.”
Suddenly, sparkles the size of Gemma’s fist flashed in the air in one corner of the roof. A woman appeared, wearing what looked like a one-piece suit, excluding her tangerine colored sash tied below her visible belly, and her boots. The woman’s mask looked like a folded cloth of the same color, with two holes cut into it.
It had to be Princess Undercut, who hadn’t been seen or heard of in over a month. Gemma had no idea the heroine was pregnant, or even a member of the Dallevan League, before today. For some reason, she was soaked from head down to her ankles.
Princess Undercut said, “Two showers down, and I still feel dirty.”
Walter said, “How did it go? And where’s Diamond Grace?”
“She’s in a bubble bath back at my place. We brought breathing masks with us, but it just wasn’t enough. I don’t know how those people live down there. Still, at least we know that they haven’t seen anything of the Vanquishiri. The only thing they did see or hear was someone digging through the ground, but no one dangerous.”
The heroine sat on the opposite side of Walter and leaned back against the glass of the skylight with a sigh of relief.
After a moment, Princess Undercut said, “Hi, by the way. What’s your name, sweety?”
“This is Gemma,” Walter said.
“Oh, I should have guessed with that large gun you’re carrying around. So what were you both up to before I came here?”
Gemma said, “He was telling me some entertaining stories about your supergroup.”
Was that a giggle, or a low cackle, coming from Princess Undercut? “Was he now? Did he ever tell you about the time . . . ?”
Adamast returned to the mansion with Ohm Wire, and joined the few others in the downstairs observation room.
“Welcome back,” Psi Wizard said.
“Hello,” she said in turn. “Mortar, I have a list of smugglers that we might want to look at if we have time. There’s a chance that at least one of them might know a thing or two about how we can find the Vanquishiri before they cause too much trouble.”
She reached into her top and grabbed the written list that Tucker had provided her and Ohm Wire of possible suspects of smuggling artifacts and jewelry from other countries. Adamast handed the note to Mortar, who looked it over.
“We’ll see what we can do,” Mortar said. “In the meantime, you received a voicemail from someone while you were out.”
“Thanks.” She took her phone off of the charger, and took a look at the call history before checking her voicemail. The call had come from Saelum Blaster.
Comments
a glimpse into the past
nice break from the action