Defection Prologue

Please note that there is currently a rewrite in progress, so there might be a sudden drop in writing quality. The quality will then slowly improve to the level of the rewritten chapters. The rewrite is up to chapter 7.

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Hercules watched the three young super-villains before him. He remembered when he had been that young, back then he was still a hero. Just starting his downward spiral that ended here forty years later. Funny how being such a big failure had been so successful for him. Not for these three, however. They weren’t failures, they had hit the ground running and hadn’t stopped for the last three years. Well almost, Prysim had stopped for the last year, but everyone was expecting her to reappear in a hail of glory. The heroes even had a dedicated phone line and emergency procedures for when she did.

“Are you really going to do this Prysim? There will be no coming back.” Hercules asked, sounding almost as concerned as he was. Prysim just looked over at Hercules; she looked almost sad.

“I’m sure Hercules, today is the day everything changes. You two should go.” Prysim had directed that last comment to her closest friends and confidants, the other two super villains in the parking structure, Thread and Needle. Needle was an enforcer, fast, strong, and ruthless. Thread was an information type, always knew more that he should and employed it to great effect.

The two of them pulled Prysim into a hug, a year ago they might have worried about hurting her; now they couldn’t if they tried. “We’re going to miss you, remember we will always just be a phone call away.” It was Thread talking, of course; Needle was too busy silently crying.

As they said their farewells Hercules pulled their two duffle bags out of the trunk of his car, he also pulled out a slim silver briefcase. The two super villains grabbed their bags and headed off down the stairs. Prysim turned back to him; she was crying too, Hercules decided to ignore it.

“They’re only going to be gone a year; you’ll see them again soon,” Hercules said, trying to sound comforting. He was half lying, Thread and Needle might only be leaving for a year, but it was unlikely that Prysim wouldn’t be waiting when they got back.

“I know, think we should get something to eat while we wait until their plane takes off?” Prysim asked, stalling for time.

“We shouldn’t wait, it’s not like this will shut down the airport or anything,” Hercules replied, knowing that there would be no comfort in waiting for what was coming next.

“Fine, if today is the day I die. Then so be it, no point putting this off.” Prysim replied. Reaching for the briefcase Hercules held up and opened for her, Prysim put her hand on the scanning pad that revealed itself.

“Biometrics acknowledged.” A synthesized voice said from a hidden speaker.

“Begin sequence, Mr. Fox.”

“Beginning the sequence. Rest in Peace Prysim.”

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Ares aka Bernard Marsh got the call just as he walked in his front door. It came on the priority line that had been set up for whenever Prysim reared her head and whatever mechanical, biological, or magical monstrosity that came along with it. The call however didn’t come from any of the usual dispatchers; it came from his wife Uriel aka Sophia Marsh. She’s mostly retired these days but was still called in whenever a bomb needed diffusing, or some crazy machinery turned up and needed to be deactivated.

“How bad is it?” Ares asked, dreading the possible answers.

“Prysim is dead,” Uriel replied, her mechanical voice precise and emotionless.

“What do we know?” He asked.

“That explosion this morning, it was some lab accident. Can’t say what happened exactly but we have her body.” She replied.

“So we can just close the file on her then. I know she was young, but this is good news in a way,” Ares said regretfully. Prysim might have been a nightmare to deal with, but he was pretty sure she had still been a kid.

“Not quite yet, there are seventeen growth tanks in the lab. Only sixteen of them are occupied.” Some emotion creeped into Uriel’s mechanical voice; fear. Everyone remembered the last time Prysim’s biological toys had run rampant.

“Do we know what was growing in them?” Ares asked as he walked back out his front door; he was pretty sure the kids weren’t home yet anyways.

“Well, they look mostly human, they do seem to have a skeletal structure made to support wings, and they haven’t grown fully.” She answered.

“Any good news?” He asked as he took flight; it was dark and the neighbors probably already knew about them.

“Yeah, the tanks are labeled beta one through sixteen. The empty tank has the label Alpha. So it might be viable and running around, or Prysim already disposed of it.”

“That won’t help me sleep tonight.”

“Nothing will honey, we’re ordering a citywide search. It will probably take all night.”

“Love you too.”

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