Sidekicks (20 page)

“You can trust me.”

“Can I really? Because here you are, getting all bent out of shape over Rogue Warrior, a big, dumb screwup that you barely knew. What are you going to say if we need to use this on your ‘daughter'? Huh?”

“Nothing. I'll say nothing”

“Really? Why do I find that so hard to believe?”

“I don't know. Why do you? Maybe it's because you
don't want to acknowledge the REAL problem I have with what you just did, because it makes you look like an idiot! You just made a
body
… and that
body
can be studied, and if a smart enough investigator is the one doing the studying, they might be able to trace it back to us.”

“Nobody's going to be able to trace it back to us.”

“How do you know?” Edward yells at him. “There
are
other plus intelligences out there, you know! Look, you just made a loose end. And that loose end can lead to others.”

Trent starts laughing. “You're so dramatic! Do you know how many loose ends there are on a daily basis in a city this big? Hm? Trust me. I speak from experience.”

“Experience as a witness … or experience as someone who makes loose ends?”

Trent smiles. “Well, let's just say I like to dabble.
Lots
of murders go unsolved in this city.”

“It was risky … and pointless … that's all.”

“You're wrong, Doc. It was neither. We needed to know if the dart penetrated the skin, and whether it would dissolve without leaving a trace … but we also needed to know if it would put our targets down permanently, or just for a little while. And now we know.”

“Yes … great … and maybe the police will know, too.”

“There's no way … and even if there was, so what?”

“You're not the one who'll be up for murder charges!” Edward yells.

“And neither will you, if you stay calm and stick to the plan,” Trent says. “What is your problem?”

“Nothing.”

“Was I wrong about you?” Trent asks. His mouth is curled in an ugly sneer. “You're trying to get out of it, aren't you? You actually
feel
something for your little sidekick? I thought your cold, calculating plus intellect had kicked in. I thought she was just a pawn to you.”

“She is.”

“Why don't I believe you?”

“I don't know, Trent. Maybe because you don't want to,” Edward says.

“And what is that supposed to mean?”

“I've heard rumors, too … about strength and speed pluses like you … about the possible side effects of that little ‘gift' as you get older … about why right now you might be a little desperate. This all might be coming to an en—”

Trent places his hand over Edward's mouth.
“Ssshhhhh,” he says, moving in until he and Edward are nose-to-nose. “You don't want to say that,” he whispers. “That'll just hurt my feelings.”

Trent's eyes look black … opaque … drained of any significant human emotion. Edward tries not to shiver, but a little one sneaks out.

“Listen, Edward,” Trent says, his voice lowering to a tone that sounds almost sane, “I know this is going to be a bit of a change, and you're not all that thrilled about change, in any form … but what choice do we have? IGO is getting restless. You know, they threatened to pull out of the deal?”

“When?”

“This morning. They're upset, Edward. They put millions on the table, and they want us to deliver, and if we don't, well … they mentioned that they might have to do something drastic. Now, I can't say I blame them … they spent a lot of money, and they want results, and well, we're just not getting them. And why aren't we getting them, Edward?”

Edward doesn't say anything.

“That's right,” Trent continues, “Because we've managed to lose the key young demographic. And why do you think that is? Hm? Because it's been stolen from us,
by our sidekicks. The stupid public and their stupid love of stupid romance. ‘Ohhhh, they're on different sides of the law!' ‘Ohhh, it's just so ro-freakin'-mantic!' Morons.” His face breaks into an easy, relaxed smile. “But what can you do, right? The public wants what it wants, right? And you know what's even more romantic than two little tweety birds from opposite sides of the tracks falling in love? Two little tweety birds from opposite sides of the tracks falling in love and dying.

“All the screaming little girls and boys who can't wait to see them kiss and hug and all that junk will cry themselves to sleep at night at the thought of Monkeywrench and Bright Boy loving each other in the afterlife,” Trent continues. “And all of them will tune in to our final battle, as the two mourning father figures fight each other for revenge.”

“Final battle? Are you going to kill me, too?”

“Only if you step out of line,” Trent says, then laughs. “Kidding! I'm kidding! What good would it do to kill the golden goose? You realize, once we set this thing in motion, all of our battles from here on out will be huge! We'll always be battling over our fallen children. And that will always suck in a new audience, looking for teen love and tragic romance. The kids will be dead, but their
story … their passion … will live on, forever … sniff … sob …” Trent laughs. “And you and I will rake it in.”

“Sounds good,” Edward says.

“Of course, it sounds good. You'd have to be deaf for it not to sound good. Well, Edward … are you deaf?”

“Just stop, OK. Maybe I'm not as ecstatic about killing a couple of teenagers as you seem to be, but I'd have to be an idiot to not see the possibilities. And—”

“You're not an idiot,” Trent says. “Exactly. Two little pawns taken off the board, and you and I are set for life.”

“Sounds good. When?”

Trent smiles. “No time like the present.”

on Allison's favorite roof, looking out at the Brooklyn Bridge for the past half hour, and she's been quiet the whole time.

“Yeah. I'm fine,” she says in a way that is clearly not fine.

“Did I do something wrong?”

“You? Oh God, no …”

“So there is something wrong, it just isn't my fault.”

She sighs. “You can be a real pain sometimes, you know that?”

“OK, so
now
it's my fault?”

That gets a smile out of her, but then her eyes start tearing up. She puts a hand over them to try to hide it,
and I know enough about her to know that she's not thrilled with the idea of crying in front of someone … anyone.

“Allison?”

“It's nothing,” she says in the slurry way people talk when they're talking and crying at the same time.

“Right. It's nothing. Obviously.”

“I feel like an idiot, OK?” she says, and the tears are really coming now.

“What? Why?”

She wipes her eyes, but the tears keep falling.

“Tonight, when that woman screamed and you stopped kissing me, there was a little voice in the back of my head that was like, Only a dork stops kissing a girl in order to go save someone he doesn't even know. How horrible is that?”

“Absolutely horrible. So horrible, in fact, that I was thinking the EXACT SAME THING. You think I wanted to go save someone instead of kissing you?”

“No! And that's my point! You didn't want to go, but you did! Because you knew someone was in trouble! I would never do that.”

“What are you talking about?! You went with me, remember?”

“Yeah … tonight. But how many nights in the past five years have you done this? Huh?”

I thought about it. There were too many to count.

“Too many to count, right?” she said. “And how many times have I done it? Counting tonight … once.”

“So?”

She sniffles, takes a deep breath, and lets it out quickly. “So, all this time—even these past couple of days—I thought you were naive…. I thought you'd have to be to be a ‘good guy.' Saving the world, one person at a time … and while you're helping other people—people you don't even know—your own life is going right down the toilet.”

“That seems a little harsh, but OK …”

“I thought only a total sap would do that.”

I shrug. I don't know what to say.

“Except I was wrong,” she says. “Look at you. You don't even know what to say right now because you're trying not to hurt my feelings. You're trying not to point out the obvious … except it wasn't obvious to someone selfish like me. You're not trying to save the world … you're trying to save the people in it. You're not naive … You're noble.” She's crying hard now. “And I'm a jerk.”

I start laughing. I can't help it. “Bull,” I say. “And
I'm not just saying that because I want you to stop crying so we can get back to the making-out portion of the evening. Although, if you wanted to stop right now so we can get back to making out, I wouldn't think less of you.”

She laughs through her tears, but then immediately goes back to crying.

“You wanted a normal life,” I say. “There's nothing selfish about that.”

“Yes, there is. When you're like us, it's completely selfish to pretend like you can't help people because you want to fit in … because you want to have friends, and go out, and have fun.”

I shake my head and am about to argue, but she cuts me off.

“Five years!” she says. “Do you know how many people I could have helped in five years?”

“No. I don't. And neither do you. So stop beating yourself up over it. All I know is that when I went to go help those people tonight, you were right beside me … And quite frankly, that's how I'd like things to be from now on.”

She nods, but in a distracted way, as if she's only half-listening to me. I take her in my arms and hold her. She
lets me. Her tears are winding down. She wipes her face on my shirt, then looks up at me. I'm about to kiss her when she pulls away from me

“Oh man,” she says, taking her phone out of her pocket. “My dad just texted me.”

She opens her phone to read it when my phone goes off. It's Trent. For a second, I consider not answering it. I don't really want to talk to him. Plus, I'm suspended, right? That means he doesn't get to call me.

The phone rings again. I pick it up.

“Scott?”

“Yeah.”

“It's Trent. Listen”—he pauses—“I think I was a little harsh on you last night … no … wait … I don't think … I KNOW I was a little harsh on you.”

“Oh … uh … OK …”

“I'm sorry. I'm just”—he takes a deep breath, then lets it out—“I'm just a little frustrated. You know how important justice is to me.”

I don't know what the proper response to that is, so I just say, “Uh-huh.”

“And well, it's just killing me that filth like Dr. Chaotic is running loose in the city. I just wanted to make sure that it was killing you, too,” he says.

“Trent, listen. I'm still with you. I am. I just needed to make a few changes, that's all.”

“No, I get it. I get it. You're getting older now, and … well, you're going to start having your own opinions”—he stops—“no. Wait. Scratch that. You've had your own opinions for a while, it's just that now you're a little more forward in voicing them, right?”

“Right,” I say cautiously.

“And I'm not really used to that … and I didn't really handle it as well as I could have. In fact, I didn't handle it well at all.”

“No, you didn't,” I say. I look over at Allison, but she's still hunched over her phone, tapping away.

“I have no excuse. You've saved my life, for God's sake. The least I could do is show you the respect you've earned many times over. I'm sorry,” he says … and is that a sniffle? “Hold on a second.” He puts the phone down, and I hear it again. It's definitely a sniffle.

I'm too shocked to say anything. Trent has never expressed anything close to this to me before, let alone gotten all teary. I mean, I knew he cared, I guess I just never realized how much.