All characters are over eighteen years of age.
***
She pushed through the other students, past faces confused or sympathetic or cruelly smug. She stepped out the door and stood at the school gates, eyes darting around. She saw a figure walking off in the distance, shoulders tense with anger.
She ran after him. It took a while to catch up; he was taller and moved with a furious energy. But eventually she closed the distance to the point where he turned when she called out his name.
He waited for her to catch up before saying, "Why'd you come?"
It sounded like an accusation and her shoulders slumped. A moment later he relented. "I guess I should have guessed."
"Is it true?"
"Yeah." His taunt expression broke out into a grin. "The fuckers had it coming."
"You got expelled!"
"Yeah." The smile didn't waver.
"Why did you do it?"
"Because," he said, face entirely serious, "I was sick of their shit." He looked away. "They're always hassling me."
She opened her mouth to tell him they were doing their jobs; that the last time he'd fucked with the school's computer records or brought one of his inventions to school people had nearly lost their jobs, been seriously hurt; but then he smiled again and the words died in her throat. She settled for, "You really did it this time."
He shrugged. "Nah. I was kind of running out of stuff to learn there."
That was true. His grades were a bizarre mismatch of plunging scores for some subjects (English, Arts, Social Studies) and rocketing for others (Physics, Maths, Shop). The results from the last few subjects were the only reason that this hadn't all happened sooner. She knew that the teachers were frustrated, had heard them say that he'd get perfect scores all round if he tried; but he held most of his schoolwork in total contempt.
He held a lot of things in total contempt. She sometimes wondered if she made the list.
"You should come."
"Come?"
"Yeah." He reached forward and held her hand. Her heart skipped a beat. "Come with me."
"Where?"
"I got some friends. They're in with the cape scene."
You couldn't believe what she was hearing. "You mean, like...henchmen?"
"Yeah." He nodded. "Look, we don't need school, okay? I got my inventions. I become a henchman, I show off some of my stuff..."
"But." She struggled to find the words. "We'd be...you know." She whispered the word. "Villains."
He laughed. "Yeah. And villains get the best shit. Money, respect, fame..."
She didn't want money or fame or riches. She'd only ever wanted one thing in her life. "I don't know."
"Look. Don't worry." He took her hand and squeezed, and that warmth, clutching hard against her heart, was back. "Trust me, okay?"
***
Nathan woke with a start.
He waited while the fragments of the oracle dream swirled around in his mind, the Dark Gate pulsing in place of his long-lost heart. Rising from his solitary bed, he stepped into the shower.
The hot water rushed down his body while he pondered what he'd just experienced. That was the second oracle dream in a week. Both involving the same children, if years apart.
The Dark Gate was sending him a warning.
He went over the contents of the dreams. The school the girl had walked through didn't feel modern. The scene must have happened, he estimated, about twenty years ago. Both of the kids had midwestern accents. He could take a look at the list of known villains and henchmen, narrow down a list of potential suspects, ask Umma-
Umma.
He turned the shower setting to cold and stayed under for a long time.
***
"Sounds like a bunch of teenage drama."
"I suppose you would be an expert, hmm?"
"Hah! Not with you around, teach."
Grey Sentinel turned to look at his apprentice. "I have told you not to call me that."
She smiled back and he scowl deepened.
Tanya was in many ways an ideal apprentice. Smart, dedicated. Wise for her eighteen years. Instinctively attuned to the mystical and mysterious. Athletic and, in her own way, just as driven as he was to preventing evil from spreading across the globe.
If she'd just stop
smiling
so much.
There were other issues as well. The apprentice of the Grey Sentinel- master and jailer both of the dark powers- should be expected to maintain a certain mysterious and grim aura, so better to strike fear into the hearts of the damned and demonic. The Grey Apprentice at least wore her namesake colours- but with her long blonde hair out in the open, and in a leotard that he found far too tight for the dignity of the office that she held.
And she wouldn't stop
smiling.
He'd complained to Umma once, only for the woman to laugh for a full minute.
Her smile did dip for a moment as they approached the meeting room. "Are you sure you want to do this?"
He shook his head. "No. But we have to. Endless and Exiled Prince are...they're not fit for duty right now."
Grey Apprentice sighed. "I can't believe the stories."
"Nor can most of the other heroes. That's the problem."
"What happens after the meeting?"
"Afterwards," Grey Sentinel said, "We go and talk to
my
master."
That wiped the smile off her face.
He opened the doors to the meeting chamber and swept into the room. He nodded to the assembled heroes. "Thank you all-"
***
"-for joining me," said Mocking Mistress.
She eased back upon her chair and eyed the other villains gathered around her. Her hands were clasped in front of her, perfectly manicured fingernails clicking together. She was dressed in her standard outfit; a pale business suit- made with the best technology her organisation, Shrike, could manage, of course, and brimming with technological additions and potent enchantments. A dark mask, carved into an ironic half-smile, sat upon her face.
Right now her own lips matched it perfectly as she surveyed the other villains in the meeting.
"Why have you summoned us?" murmured the figure to her immediate right. Tommy Deadlord relaxed back against the chair, his tattooed chest and tattered jeans at odds with the spectral crown atop his head. A woman dressed all in black, slivers of bone-pale skin showing here and there, stood behind him. "You promised revenge against the Bright Lovers."
"You promised advantages for us all," spoke the figure next to him, a hulking grey-furred monster with one eye lost to a hideous scar. Grendlekin Jack all but slavered as his long claws cut grooves into the surface of the table. "Fimbulwinter beckons, and with it, the right for my people to rule."
"I came solely for news of the Black Gate," said Barrow Witch, running one hand through her red hair and narrowing her jet-black eyes. "Do you have any such news, or am I wasting my time?"
"I am sure," said a dark-skinned, buxom woman, clad only in strips of pale leather marked with eldritch runes, "that Mocking Mistress would never dare waste our time. Certainly not the time of the Hellfire King's emissary on this little world."
The man next to her- dark-skinned with a fetching goatee and dressed in a suit of pale blue armour- said, "Pitfire Mistress. Calm yourself. I'm sure Mocking Mistress will explain herself in good time." He did his best to smile at the assemblage of monsters. "Right?"
Mocking Mistress waited a few moments before responding. "Of course, Mad Maker. I'm so happy that you were able to attend our little gathering."
