Not Your Villain (Sidekick Squad #2)(31)
They’re at the downtown ice cream parlor indulging Jess’ sweet cravings and planning their next move. Bells digs into his mint chip and is staring off into the distance when he sees smoke rising from the desert.
“What’s that?”
“An explosion! In the Unmaintained lands!”
The patrons are whispering to one another, all staring at the flash of fire and the blur of smoke on the horizon.
Jess freezes with her spoon halfway to her mouth. “That’s where we were,” she whispers.
“Do you think… ” Abby wonders.
“They’re destroying the evidence,” Emma says darkly.
The music video projected onto the main wall of the ice cream parlor changes to a serious-looking Wilton Lysander. His slick, coiffed hair doesn’t move as he gestures wildly. “Very grave news for the Collective today… today we have uncovered a calamity. After the recent discovery of Chameleon’s defection to the United Villain’s Guild, I am shocked to say that our own Captain Orion has been caught doing illegal and immoral human experimentation for her own gain in these facilities in the Nevada region.”
A familiar clip from their video plays, and Bells’ hope rises like a bubble. This is it. Their efforts have paid off, and the truth will be broadcast for everyone to witness.
The bubble bursts.
It’s not the entire video Abby recorded, just bits and pieces of Orion talking about her experiments and looking menacing as she paces in her home. There aren’t any mentions of the Collective or the League or that meta-humans—villains—were being kidnapped for these experiments.
Other clips from the base, taken by security cameras, were edited into an incriminating compilation showing Captain Orion running a host of experiments: Orion walking through the base, perusing datasheets, smirking at vials of serum. There are shots that Bells doesn’t recognize from the base: a dark hallway with closed doors and indiscernible shadows behind them.
In one clip of Captain Orion and two guards entering the base, Bells recognizes himself and Jess and Abby in disguise. There are more from that day: shots of Chameleon in his familiar green-hued bodysuit, masked, but walking through the base to make it seem he was a part of Orion’s scheme, even though there aren’t any clips of them together.
The video transitions from scenes at the base to the Smashmobile speeding through Andover and another shot of the Jones’ house.
“That photo is from a month ago,” Abby mutters. “Before I broke that window.”
“And that’s the corner of Main and Saffron,” Jess says. “It could have been from anytime Mom went out.”
The camera jumps to Lysander again, panned out to show him standing in the ruins of the Jones’ old house. “It was here that Andover’s own Smasher and Shockwave confronted Captain Orion and defeated her in a stunning display of heroics before turning her in to the League.” Lysander gestures broadly. “Although this civilian home was destroyed in the process, citizens of Andover—and the Collective—can rest assured that they are now safe from Orion and her nefarious exploits.”
The ice cream parlor is silent, save for the wet thwap of a scoop from Bells’ cone hitting the table.
*
CAPTAIN ORION SENT TO CORRECTIONS FOR ILLEGAL HUMAN EXPERIMENTATION.
SMASHER AND SHOCKWAVE AWARDED HONORS BY MAYOR OF ANDOVER.
THE COLLECTIVE IS SAFE AT LAST.
The headlines over the next few days paint a compelling narrative—very little of it true. The pieces of the video that have surfaced on the Net are all edited to show Orion as the sole perpetrator of the “human experiments” and conspiring with Chameleon to destroy the evidence at the base. Then, apparently Smasher and Shockwave apprehended Orion, and Chameleon escaped to pursue his unfathomable plans with the United Villain’s Guild.
According to the Trans, the League put Smasher and Shockwave on official “vacation,” having assumed that they were involved with the confrontation with Orion.
“It’s a good thing,” Li Hua says to the anxious teenagers in her living room. “It means they don’t know about your involvement, Jessica, and they don’t know we’re aware of their corruption. They’re just covering their tracks.”
“But—! You could go live with the story!” Jess protests.
Emma nods. “Yeah, you could call Lysander right now and schedule your own interview! Tell the truth about what really happened.”
Bells ticks off multiple truths on his fingers. “There were so-called villains who went missing, and it’s all deliberate, the hero-villain battles, everything…”
While the three of them argue with Jess’ parents, Abby sits with arms folded and a defeated expression on her face.
“What about Claudia?” Jess asks.
Her parents’ expressions darken, and they sigh. “We can’t assume anything. We don’t know if she’s working with the League or with Orion,” Li Hua says.
“She must have done something to influence that cover-up story,” Victor adds, frowning.
Abby finally speaks up. “The League has absolute control over what the press says and does. I don’t see how we can change that story unless we can get our broadcast out, and without…” Her voice falters. “I mean, we’ve been trying, but they have all the power, and we can’t do anything. I should have known it was dumb to try.”