LeftOvers - How to Become a SuperVillain and Take Over the World

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I lounged back in what must have been the single most uncomfortable bench ever put in a park. My back hurt where the iron bars bit into it, but I didn't move too much to try and find a more comfortable position.

I was looking at the sky. It was cloudy, but not so much that you couldn't see the ocean-deep azure blue fringing the horizon or the even lighter blue right above. The moon hung there, silent with gentle white clouds skirting underneath it. It looked almost as if they were moving around the single, faraway satellite.

For a moment, I wished I could see the full moon, the moon before some Asian warlord had carved his name in it.

I suppose that, as far as advertising went, it was a pretty good stunt. He, Hiro, was not the only villain to become notorious in the last few years. Hiro, Chessmaster, Elizabeth 'Blue Blood' Marquise, Weaver, HH the Axe, Ushanka, and my personal favourite; Grim. The Seven as everyone knew them.

No one messed with the Seven except for the Seven and a few heroes that had gone off-kilter. For the most part, though, the Seven left everyone else alone. There was more destruction and death every year by members of the SPA (the Superhero Protection Agency, or just the Supers) trying to kill members of the Seven than anything the Seven did. Well, unless you counted defacing the moon as damage.

I looked around me, at the towering, glass-covered buildings of Crawford. I knew now that the seven-story buildings were twice as deep as they were tall. So different from where I had grown up. When I was very young, this sort of grandiose architecture had been common. Famous skylines across the world were growing year-by-year. Now, there were more people but fewer true cities.

I liked this school, and this city. I would like it better once I ruled over it.

Idly, I wondered if it would become the Eighth, or if I'd just oust another member of the Seven.

Two things needed doing first: I needed to make a name for myself, and I needed a nap. I was thinking about the first and trying to do the second, when Clarence showed up.

"Good news," he said as I groaned and sat up. He dropped into the bench next to me.

"Oh?" I said.

Both of us watched a girl in jeggings and a sheer tank-top run by. I did mention that I loved this school, right? "Yeah," Clarence said. "Annabelle called me, she wants to meet up this afternoon. And I got some info you might like to hear."

"Like to hear because it's good for us, or because I need to know it?"

A smile touched his lips. "Both?"

I grinned back. If my wrist watch was still accurate, then it was eleven and a bit in the morning. "When are we supposed to meet her? And where, for that matter."

"She said noon-ish," his nose wrinkled in distaste, he didn't like vague words like that. "As for where, she mentioned this place called the Six-Shooter. I have the address, it's only a few minutes from here."

"I have nothing better to do," I said as I hopped to my feet. My whole body was sore from three gym classes and one tussle in an alley. Still, I felt good, all hyped up and ready for anything. "You can tell me about that good news as we walk. And about your mission."

Clarence led the way out of the park, then he slowed down, holding himself just a little bit behind me while pointing to the direction we had to go in. "My mission," he began. "It's going well enough. I think I have one or two ways to get information, one of which has definitely panned out."

"Ah, what did you do?" I was curious. Clarence didn't seem the type to bug someone's house, but he might be the sort who used more... creative, ways of learning things best-left-unlearned. "Did you track the security's movements? Or did you start taking notes of the restocking in the kitchens and offices of Crawford? Or did you go the old fashion way and started bribing the janitors?"