Aces Wild: Cape High Book Six (12 page)

That's not a good thing.  He'd not been able to kill Superior with Tatiana as he'd planned.  Tatiana...  His jaw grits as the woman in question flashes through his mind.  If anyone could kill Superior, it would be Tatiana--even if it's just an illusion of her.  She could have driven him to wanting to die.

Had the boy not shown up when he had, Mimic could have driven Superior over the edge.  He deserves to be driven over the edge, Mimic thinks sharply.  He should be dead already.  But if using Ace's abilities means he's going to lose them, he can't do it.

Unless, that is, he has a way to refuel.
  That perfect solution is staring him right in the face, he thinks with a hint of disgust.  It's not the only one staring him in the face.  He can almost swear that Nico knows he's out here.

***

Jetta is confused.  She'd thought hitting him and walking away would be good enough--that she could go on with her life.  Find another boy that's got super powers and a thing for her, and execute the plan.  Thing is, all she feels is betrayed.  She sits on the swing set, her hands wrapped around the metal chains holding her up, her mind trying to wrap around what happened in the warehouse.

It was only a kiss.  But it was a kiss with a--a--she doesn't even know WHAT Ace is.  Is he seriously an escaped convict?  If he was, then why was he still living with his mom?  It's not like it's hard to find him!  And how did he just get his powers back?  He'd seemed to think there wasn't a way, or that it would take forever, or something, she doesn't exactly remember.  Blackjack getting mad at her overthrows that little detail.  THE Blackjack.  He's an A class hero--retired, sure, but still technically a member of the Central Hall.

The Central Hall.  That echoes in her mind and her hands tighten on the chains, bending the cool steel.  Everyone knows the Central Hall capes.  Everyone knows they have movies made about them--like Mega, Mega has a movie coming out sometime next year, right?  He's not even the most powerful of the group!

They really need to make a Firefly movie, though.  It's like all super hero movies have male leads, which is stupid.  Female super
s rock--she shakes her head, knowing she's gotten off track.  She needs to just walk away.  Give up on Cape High and Central Hall, and most especially Ace King.  So what if he's kind of sexy in that goth boy super villain sort of way?  She doesn't even like goth!  Goth is so ten years ago!  He needs a tan and more colors than black!

There's no way she can go out with a guy that accessorizes with metal studs.  She sets her mind fully on that and starts to stand, only to stop as she realizes someone is watching her.

"Hi, Jetta," Ace says, tugging down his black hoodie and walking over to her.  "I was wondering why you didn't come back yesterday."

"I thought the slap answered that question for me," she mutters, wondering why it's so easy to say that she's done here when he isn't in front of her.  For a second she swears he looks confused.  He goes still, then looks away.

"Oh, right," he says.  "I'm sorry."

"Because I slapped you?" she asks.

"Because I guess I gave you reason to slap me?" he offers, looking at her again.

"Oh no you don't," she snaps.  "Firefly told me!  You're an escaped convict!  That's why you wanted me to go out and find those capes!  You were using me as a lookout!"

"You--oh, wow," he says, his eyes widening.  "You really think I'M the one that's a convict?" he asks her.  "Jetta, look at me," he tells her, placing both hands on her shoulders and looking her in the eyes.  "I'm not a convict.  I'm just a teenager!  I'm the son of Blackjack--I still live with my mom, for crying out loud!"

"That... that's true," Jetta admits, a bit hypnotized by his swirling black and silver eyes.

"And really, do I SEEM like a super villain?" he asks.  It snaps her out of it.

"Yes, you do," she says bluntly.

"Okay, stupid question--but do I seem like a super villain that's done enough to get stuck in Cape Cells?" he asks.  "At seventeen."

"Well... yeah... but who was that girl?" she asks abruptly.  "The one that jumped on you--the one that took your powers away?"

"Who knows?" Ace asks with a shrug.  "Maybe she's the one they're really looking for--they just got us confused or something.  Super heroes aren't that bright, you know?"

"Well... maybe," she says, looking away and hugging herself.  "But it scared the crap out of me, you know?  All of a sudden Firefly is standing behind me, demanding to know who I'm calling--and why WERE you looking for them, anyway?" she demands.

"Because I was skipping school.  I still am, which is why we need to find something cool to do rather than just sit here talking," he says, grabbing her hand.  "You want to go on that date?" he asks.

She hesitates.  Why does it feel different talking to him from this morning?  Probably because she hadn't let him talk this morning, she thinks as she lets him drag her along.  "Just this once," she warns him.

"Just this once," he agrees.

"So... weren't we done with the whole norm hero thing?" I ask as I find myself standing in the middle of a metal field, surrounded by robots.  They've got human clothing on and come in all different sizes.  I have no idea what it's supposed to be.  "Tell me honestly, this is a form of hazing, isn't it?" I demand, looking over to Taurus.

"You got your powers back too quick--I've got an entire WEEK of things I want to try out," he says, looking at what appears to be a controller of some sort.  "Zoe, did you know your dad had this setting for the field?" he asks, sounding way too enthusiastic right now.

"No, but I'm not surprised," she drawls.

"It's amazing.  Okay, Ace, you're going to want to get to the other side of the field--you can knock them out and they'll fall over and their heads will flash yellow, but if you hit too hard they'll start flashing red, which means you killed them.  This has a ton of different settings for crowd control training, including a zombie attack setting!" he goes on, looking at the controller.  "And since you've got your powers back... let's put it on... B class hero," he decides.

"I'm not sure I've got ALL of them back!" I yelp even as a press of robot bodies rushes forward.  I grab the one right in front of me, hauling myself upwards so strongly that I find myself floating in the air for a moment.  The shock of flying hits me a second too late and I drop like a stone.  I'm pretty sure I'm going to get stampeded, I realize as I shove myself to my feet again.  But--

"He just flew," I hear someone say.

"He just flew," Taurus agrees.  The robots go still, their green lights flickering off as Taurus turns them off.  "Who wants to try next?" he asks the group.  "Trent, you're still working on flight, right?"

"It was only for a few seconds, I'm not sure that counts as flying," Sunny says.  "Let's make him do it again!"

"Let's drop him off the top of a building, instead," Jack says far too eagerly.  "I've been trying to do that with Trent for months."

"Think it'd work?" Trent asks Taurus.  "I mean, if we did it at the apartment Nico would kill me for leaving dents in the sidewalk."

"Shouldn't you be more disturbed by the idea of him wanting to toss you off a building?" I ask.  "Because I am."

"Eh, I get hit with gravity attacks all the time," Trent says.

"Guilty," Max agrees, lifting a hand.  I should be more bothered by this conversation than I actually am.  But what should
really
bother me, I think, is that Taurus is actually looking at the school buildings with a thoughtful expression.

"Let's do it!" he says, setting his sights on the science building.  "But Trent you're going first--that way you can catch the ones that don't actually fly."

"I don't need to," Jack says.  "Nico already told me I'll never fly, so I've got my metal trick."

"Then you can help catch.  You as well, Max.  Who all wants to jump?"

"Do I get a choice?" I ask.

"No," the entire school says.

"I want to jump!" Carla says, only to get her head pushed down by Vinny.

"You're not a flying type," he says.  "Idiot."

"But I still want to jump!  They're going to catch us, right?"

"She can jump," Morgan says before Vinny can argue.  "But if someone misses catching her, I'm going to kill them," she adds with a sharp look at the catchers.

"No pressure," Max adds dryly.

I blink as the air is suddenly full of the school staff.  I'm positive they came out here to stop this from happening--until I see that Dad's got a bag of popcorn in his hands.  "You don't mind us watching, do you, Taurus?" Dad asks.  "It's getting a bit boring getting our classes ready for next week."

"Sure.  You might help with the spotting if you want," Taurus says.

"I think the boys could use the practice,"
another says, floating in the air in a lounging style.  In other words, they're just here to watch.  I can feel most of their eyes on me and I know that I'm probably the one most of them are intent on seeing.  I'm the new kid.

"You can do it, Ace!" Dad calls cheerfully.

"Should you really be cheering your own kid on when he's about to jump off a building?" I ask him.

"You just floated for fifteen seconds, you can fly," he says.  "Have fun!"

Fifteen seconds at what, less than ten feet off the ground?  There's a big difference between that and flying, but he doesn't seem to notice.  Oh well.  "You're not catching me," I say, pointing at Jack.

"What did I do?" he asks as I start for the building with the rest of the group.

This feels insane, I think as I head up the stairs of the building, stepping onto the roof.  The wind tugs at my clothing and I look around as the others join me at the top.  "What sort of school encourages you to jump off a building?" I ask myself, heading to the edge to look down.

"This one," Justin says, making me glance back at him.

"Are you going to jump?" I ask him.

"I... doubt it," he says, looking over the edge as well.  "None of the guys doing the catching like me enough to bother.  Or if Jack does catch me, I bet it'll be worse than if I'd hit the ground."

I feel something at that statement.  It's like I finally understand what he said about maybe being friends when he went to the future.  I look over at him, grinning slightly.  "I bet it would be, too," I tell him.

"Aren't you supposed to tell me I'm paranoid when I say something like that?" he complains.

"When it's Jack?  No chance."  Don't get me wrong, I don't think Jack is that bad--but he's not that good, either.  He'd probably catch a guy by his underwear to give him a super wedgie or something stupidly painful like that.  "But I'm surprised you don't trust any of them," I admit.

"Trent and Jack are brothers and Max is a super villain," he says bluntly.  "What's there to trust?"

"I wouldn't let you die," Trent says simply, making Justin jump as he drops a hand on his shoulder.  "I'm the good Liberty, remember?  Somebody grab Carla, I need to jump first," he calls as the black girl stares down at the ground with a little grin on her face.  Morgan grabs her shirt, tugging her back.

"INCOMING!" Trent bellows, starting at a run across the building and jumping off.  For a moment he falls like a rock, then abruptly stops, floating in mid-air--

Then drops again, face first into the ground.  "Almost worked!" Taurus says.  The entire staff starts cheering as Trent shoves himself off the ground.  "You're getting there, Trent!  You just need to do it a few hundred more times."

"I've changed my mind," I say, starting to turn.

"Oh c'mon, Ace, we'll catch you!" Max calls.  "Don't chicken out--you can do it!"

"You didn't catch Trent!" I yell back.  "Who's to say you'll catch me?"

"Trent's face caught Trent!" he says, flying up so he's looking at me.  "C'mon, it's not like you wouldn't live through it even if you do drop!"

"I don't have all my power back," I say again, intent on arguing this.

"Trent, you up for this?" he calls down, completely ignoring me.

"I'm ready!"

"I said--" I say, only to blink as he disappears, reappearing behind me and pushing me off the ledge.  Seriously, with friends like these--

Wait, I should be screaming right now, right? 

Before I decide the answer I feel something rushing into me.  For a moment I'm no longer in the air, I'm in my paint field, staring at myself.  It's shocking, especially when the image of me looks right back into my eyes, his mouth opening slightly--

I grunt as I feel my physical body fall hard into someone's arms, dragged out of my paint field.

"Sup?" Jack asks, looking down at me curiously.  We're floating, I realize as I twist to look at the ground.  He's standing on a sewer lid, which is hovering in the air.  "Looked like you sortta blacked out there for a bit."

"Something... weird just happened," I say, trying to escape his hold.  "Let me down, I need to check my paint field."  He doesn't say anything, just lands on the ground and puts me down.  I stand there, closing my eyes and focusing inward.

Where the illusion of me had been is now a castle front, big and gothic looking, with vines growing up the walls.  I walk around it--but that's all there is.  Just the front wall of a castle.  Suddenly the paint field seems even larger--because I see just how much of the castle is missing in my mind's eye.

"I don't have my powers back yet," I say quietly, opening my eyes and finding myself face to face with an entire school.  "I thought I did, but..."

"What did you see?" Morgan asks.  I look at her, seeing honest concern on her face, and wonder if I've ever seen that look on a girl before--one other than my mom, that is.  "Was it bad?"

"I saw me," I say.  "That's not the first time he's done it, either--but... that doesn't make any sense," I admit in frustration.

"No, it doesn't," she says.  "I mean, since he's taken your abilities and your appearance--why would he need to make an illusion of you, too?"

"He's using me for something," I mutter.  For some reason that tiny scene with Jetta this morning flashes through my mind and I go perfectly still.  "Jetta," I say.  "She yelled at me this morning, about lying to her and being an escaped convict--but I barely talked to her, much less had time to lie."

"It's true, you were plain stupid around the blonde," Max agrees a little too easily.  I can feel Morgan watching me, which really shouldn't matter, but for some reason it makes me feel a bit ashamed.  Not going to think about that right now.

"But maybe he's the one that lied to her... why does he need an illusion of me to do it, though?"

Dad is quiet, but I can practically feel him thinking, so when he speaks I'm not surprised.  "How much of your power is still missing?" he asks me.

"All but the front wall of my castle," I say.  "It's huge.  Like, I think it'd fill up half the field."

"That's a lot of power," Dad says.  "Probably too much to risk losing."

"So he won't risk touching a B class super hero," Morgan says.  There's a strange look on her face, one that has me watching her.  "What?" she asks.

"How do you know so much about him?" I ask.

"Because... reasons," she says sharply, looking away.  "I'd rather not get into it.  But we have no way of finding them--I mean, Nico's out looking for them now, right?
He flew off as soon as everyone came on campus. If they could be found that easily we would already have them, right?"

"No, because Nico needs to know two things," Dad says.

"What?"

"One, that he's using your appearance--either as himself or as an illusion, and two, that he's with Jetta."  He digs out his phone, tapping in a number as we watch.

I can't help but think that even with that information I could find him faster.  "I sense my own illusions, Dad," I say.  "Let me go out and find him.  If he is using my abilities to make another me, I'll be able to find it."

"I don't think--" Dad starts out.

"We'll help," Max says.  "We've got an entire Hall sized group of heroes right here doing nothing but jumping off of roofs.  We might as well put them to good use."

"I'm going, too," Morgan says.  I look over at her, taking in the stubborn expression on her face.

"Why?" I ask.

"Because this is--I--" she says, a look of hesitation in her eyes as she looks at me.  "I feel like this is all my fault.  It's like that old like you hear about the sins of the fathers, or something," she says, looking down.

"Sins of the fathers?"

"Mimic," she says.  "Mimic is my father.  And I'm not sure, because I don't remember much, but I think the reason he's even here is me."

Wow... and here I thought having Blackjack as a dad was bad.

***

Why did he go along with her idea to go to a theme park?  Mimic is still cursing himself over that one, because there's no possible way to maintain the illusion with this big of a crowd.  He'd had to let the illusion go--which meant another bit of his power leaving--just to keep this silly little girl happy so he can use her as bait for the real Ace later!  And worst of all?  She insists on holding his hand.  Thankfully it's cool enough out still to wear gloves, he thinks, glancing down at the hands in question.  He doesn't dare risk it.

"This is awesome!" she says excitedly.  "Do people always just automatically get out of your way?" she asks.  "I've never seen that happen for anyone!"

"Always," he says with a little smile.  "They sense it, even if they don't realize it.  Humans are like prey animals in some ways.  They instinctively know who's a predator."  Sheep, he thinks.  Humans are a lot like sheep.  Especially when they flock to places like this.  Flock.  Hah.

"Let's ride that," she says, pointing at the Superior Slider.  He hadn't realized the theme of this freaking park until they got here--now he's regretting it with every cell of his body.  A Central Hall
theme park?  Whose psychotic idea was that?  When he finds out, he plans on killing them.  Painfully.