So with some encouragement from a friend, I dragged this up from the depths of livejournal. It was originally written in 2011, and I haven't changed a word of it, for posterity's sake. There's a bit of Doctor Who in the beginning, and the name 'Syx' is from SilverSheperd's 'Times Syx'.
The Warden had seen a lot of things in his lifetime. In fact, he'd seen just about everything he thought there was to see. He was, after all, the warden of a prison that was brimming with the criminally genius. There were escape attempts, brawls, and a wide spectrum of personalities ranging from absolutely insane to surprisingly good-natured.
But this…
This was new.
The Warden rubbed the bridge of his nose, fighting off a headache. "Yes, blue. Yes, miss, I did call the government. No, I'm not letting them take care of this. He's just a baby. Surely you can find someone who is willing to…" He growled in frustration as the woman on the other end of the phone apologized and hung up. Child Services was no help. He'd gone through almost every orphanage in Metro City. When he'd tried to report the child to the authorities, he'd been redirected through at least fifteen connections until he was talking to a secretary from some government organization he'd never heard of. The conversation had gone something like this:
"Hello, United Intelligence Taskforce, Manhattan. Please state your name and the nature of your alien encounter."
"I'm the Warden of the Metro City Prison for the Criminally Gifted. A pod containing a baby just landed in the yard."
The secretary fell silent for a moment. "Uh, what kind of baby?"
"Blue. Large head."
She murmured his words back at him, apparently writing down the description. "Thank you, sir. We'll have a team over as soon as-" She was cut off suddenly as someone in the background shouted, "Hang on a sec!" There was a brief moment of static as if someone was wrestling with the phone, and he heard the secretary protest, "Sit down, for Chrissakes!" Then someone else was talking to the Warden.
"Yes, hello, this is the Doctor. We won't be sending a team over at any point. At all. So, uh… just find a nice home for the kid or something. Bye!" And the line had gone dead.
Now the Warden sat behind his desk, rubbing his hands over his face. What a nightmare. He would take the kid home himself, but he already had one son, and he doubted that his paycheck would allow him to take care of a second child. An alien child.
There was nothing for it. The baby would have to live here.
The Warden groaned. The kid would probably be a psychiatrist's field day by the time he hit puberty. If he even had a puberty.
The explosion shook the building to its foundations. The Warden leapt to his feet a split second before the alarms began to blare, and sprinted out the door. The radio at his hip crackled. "West wall down!" a guard shouted through the static. "The prisoners are escaping!"
The Warden raced towards the west wing of the prison. He was pretty sure he knew exactly who was behind this.
His suspicions were confirmed when he arrived on the scene. About twenty prisoners were making a break for freedom, and pedaling right alongside them was a tiny blue form on a tricycle made of license plates. He decided to let the other guards handle the prisoners - he was taking Six.
The child was so wrapped up in riding his homemade toy that he didn't see the Warden until he nearly bumped into his legs. Six stopped the trike and stared up at the Warden with wide green eyes.
It was only a matter of time before it came to this, though the Warden hadn't expected it so soon. Six absorbed information faster than it could be supplied, and the Warden knew that one day the inmates would try to use it to their advantage. He frowned at the toddler. Six knew exactly what he was doing - he was too smart not to. But at the same time, he was only a child, probably desperate to be liked and accepted by the men he looked up to as uncles.
Six quailed at the stern look on the Warden's face, and the Warden plucked him off the tricycle and carried him under his arm back inside.
If the inmates are uncles, what does that make me? the Warden couldn't help but wonder.
Ms. Smith sat behind her desk, hands folded in front of her, watching the Warden as he looked over the test paper in his hand.
"I wasn't sure how to grade it," she admitted.
The Warden noted with some amusement that Six had misspelled his name, replacing the 'i' with a 'y.' He was sure the change was unintentional, but it did make the number seem more name-like. Privately, he resolved to edit the boy's records to accommodate the spelling. Turning his attention to the actual test, he quickly discovered the teacher's dilemma. Syx had answered all of the questions correctly, but made notes in the margins about how simplistic, idiotic, or even, in one case, completely wrong the questions were.
Ms. Smith's mouth was set in a line.
The Warden cleared his throat. "He means well."
At this, her eyebrows flattened into a similar line. "This is only the beginning."
"Yes, I understand the popcorn incident-"
She cut him off. "Not just that. This isn't the first test he's turned in like that. He's also handed in homework claiming that the textbook is wrong. Undoubtedly, he's a clever child, but he's disruptive, rude, and has no respect for either me or his peers."
The Warden was unsure of the complete accuracy of that last bit, but he decided not to comment. "I also understand he has trouble connecting with the other children."
She pushed her glasses up her nose. "He has trouble with staying out of trouble."
The Warden couldn't argue with that. But at the same time... "His heart's in the right place."
Ms. Smith was trying to keep her expression neutral, but he could tell she didn't believe him. "I've tried talking to him, but he disregards anything I say. Perhaps you can talk some sense into him, but I'm sure he has far too many negative influences."
His heart sank slightly. He had hoped that by sending Syx to school, the boy would have a shot at some semblance of a fairly standard childhood. Unfortunately, the teacher seemed to have already written him off as a lost cause. The Warden stood. "I'll have a talk with him," he said, leaning over the desk to shake her hand.
She stood as well. "Thank you for your time, Warden."
He nodded, wished her a good afternoon, turned, and walked from the school house. On the walk back to the prison, an icy feeling of dread began to crawl up his spine. Though he could be blunt about his opinions, Syx obviously enjoyed learning. It was the social aspect of school, however, that had the Warden worried. Syx never said anything about being bullied, but he would often come back looking like he'd been in a fight. A fight in which he got worse than he gave. That, combined with growing up in a prison, well...
The boy certainly would make an excellent criminal mastermind.
So the Warden wasn't thoroughly surprised when one day, Syx set off a paint bomb in the schoolhouse. In fact, he had a sneaking suspicion that it was only the beginning.
Despite the fact that the Warden did not adopt Syx, the alien was like a second son to him. In an odd, convoluted, and unlikely way, they were like a family. Technically, the Warden was his legal guardian, but it was more than that. Before the boy had reached puberty - which he did have - the Warden had gotten the feeling he was one of the few living people that Syx admired and respected. But then Syx reached high school, and that was the end of it. Actually, the end began with the paint bomb, but once Syx entered the rebellious teenage years... that was when the Warden truly lost the boy.
Yet, they were still father and son. This idea was only reinforced by Syx's actions. From ages twelve to seventeen, at least twice a year he would make a half-hearted escape attempt, just to stir things up. Some of the inmates would get out in the process every now and them, but Syx never made it off the grounds. The Warden got the distinct feeling that Syx was holding back, and if he really wanted to leave, then he would be long gone.
Sure enough, when the Warden went to check on Syx on the boy's eighteenth birthday, he was greeted with an empty cell. No explosions, no dramatics, nothing.
Syx was just... gone.
In a way, it made sense. He was eighteen. Legally an adult. That was the age most offspring left the home to make their way in the world. The Warden put out a notice to keep on the lookout for Syx, but he knew that no one would find him until he wanted to be found.
A month later, Syx appeared on the front page of the newspaper as Megamind, incredibly handsome criminal genius and master of all villainy. The picture showed him battling a young man the Warden recognized as a child from Syx's school days, going by the name of Metro Man. Syx - no, Megamind - was cackling in delight, and Metro Man's face was set in determination.
The Warden felt a pang in his heart. Every other citizen of Metro City would look at this picture and see a villain being brought to justice. All he saw was the horribly skinny young boy in an ill-fitting prison jumpsuit, hopeful and desperate to be liked, trying too hard to find a place in the world.
The Warden strode down the corridor, one hand holding his other wrist behind his back. In his other hand was a small white box, done up neatly in a gold ribbon. He came to a stop next to a guard who sat behind a desk in front of a cell door. The young man was reading a newspaper.
"Read on your own time!" the Warden snapped. He didn't tolerate laxness in his prison. "Open up."
The guard hastily folded the paper and hit a button on the desk. The iris over the round window in the door opened, to reveal an empty chair in the middle of the round room beyond.
Alarm jolted through the Warden. "Hey!"
Suddenly, Megamind was there, his face pressed to the window. "Boo!"
The Warden jerked back, feeling his aging heart stutter a beat. Megamind laughed heartily, leaping into his chair and spinning it around. The Warden growled. This boy was the reason he'd gone grey by the age of thirty-five.
"Oh, good morning, Warden," Megamind greeted him cheerily. "Great news! I'm a changed man, and I'm ready to reenter society as a solid citizen." He gave the older man a smile that managed to come off as innocent and mocking at the same time.
"You're a villain," the Warden replied, his features hardening even more than usual. "And you'll always be a villain. You'll never change, and you'll never leave." This, the Warden knew in his heart of hearts, was untrue, but he'd long since given up trying to correct Megamind on anything.
Megamind just gave him that patented up-to-no-good smile. "You're fun."
The Warden composed himself, arching his eyebrow and lifting the small box. "You got a present in the mail."
"Is it a puppy?"
Smartass. "It's from Metro Man." The Warden turned his attention to the note attached, reading it aloud. "To count every second of your eighty-four life sentences. That's funny, never thought Metro Man was the gloating type." He glanced at Megamind. Metro Man wasn't the gloating type, and this watch definitely wasn't from him. The Warden had two options - give Megamind the watch and risk him escaping, or keep the watch and risk him escaping. The boy was watching him, his mischievous grin stretched from ear to ear. The Warden wanted to bang on the glass and shout some sense into him, but he knew it wouldn't work - he'd tried it before. Megamind was too stubborn. He was better than this, but he'd never learned that. Maybe he would, one day. An old man could dream, couldn't he?
The Warden decided to keep the watch. It was more likely the plan hinged on Megamind actually getting whatever device this was. "Oh, but he has nice taste. I think I'll keep it," he commented, strapping the watch around his wrist, making a show of it.
Megamind's expression didn't change a millimeter. "Any chance you could give me the time?" he asked in a falsely sweet voice. "I'd hate to miss the opening of the Metro Man Museum."
The Warden checked the watch, anger bubbling in the pit of his stomach. At least his real son didn't disappoint him like this. What had happened to the sweet, nervous boy? The Warden was sure that Syx was still in there somewhere, and that was what made his blood boil. The young man in the chair before him still had the potential to be Syx again, but was putting everything he had in to suppressing that potential. "Oh no," the Warden declared. "It looks like you're going to miss it. By several thousand years." He spun on his heel and stalked away, the sound of Megamind's cackling echoing after him.
After being tasered by his own guards and locked up in Megamind's cell, the Warden consoled himself with the knowledge that Megamind would soon be back, and that he could watch Metro Man open a can of whoop-ass on the scrawny villain on the TV in the cell.
Unfortunately, he was wrong on both counts. The afternoon began as per usual, but ended with an unexpected bang. The Warden could only watch slack-jawed as Metro Man revealed that Megamind had finally - quite accidentally - found his only weakness. When it was all over, and only Megamind was left on the screen, looking as shocked as the Warden felt, the Warden could only repeat Megamind's disbelieving phrase.
"He did it."
Then Megamind was grinning like a loon, crowing his victory to the city, and the Warden's gut twisted.
This was it. He'd done it. He'd killed someone. He was a villain. The city was his.
"Oh, Syx," the Warden murmured.
Being at the edge of the city limits, the prison was mercifully exempt from Tighten's rampage. And what a mess that was.
The Warden's radio crackled. "Warden, you'd better come to the front."
The Warden hurried down the front corridor, and saw Megamind walking towards him, the front-gate guards trailing nervously behind. Megamind came to a stop in front of the Warden, and Megamind held out his wrists, silently asking to be cuffed and taken away. The Warden looked deep into those bright green eyes, and was once again shocked by his ward.
Something deep in Megamind had broken. Maybe it was his heart. Whatever it was, the fight had been snuffed out of him and replaced by despair. He'd given up - on what, the Warden couldn't tell, but the effect was obvious. He was turning himself in. Something had chewed him up and spat him back out, and he didn't want to fight anymore. He was once more the scrawny little boy whose schoolyard beatings had finally snapped him, except instead of lashing back, he was surrendering.
For the first time in years, they connected. The Warden saw that Megamind had realized how wrong he'd gone, and Megamind saw how profoundly he had disappointed the Warden.
Megamind swallowed and pushed out his wrists a bit further, and the Warden cuffed him and led him away.
The Warden walked through the halls of the prison, trying to look like he was patrolling, but was actually doing something closer to loitering near the area Megamind's cell was in. He couldn't stop wondering about what had happened to make Megamind act like that. It wasn't like him at all. Finally, he decided to go see if he could get the boy to talk. He almost made it all the way there when there was a tap on his shoulder. He turned around to see an exact copy of himself standing there. No... not exact. The eyes were brown. He hazarded a guess. "Minion?"
Minion smiled apologetically with the Warden's face and held up a length of rope. "I really don't want to hurt you, sir. Do you mind...?"
The Warden thought quickly. He was past his prime, not to mention Minion was mostly robot, so there was no chance of fighting back. Undoubtedly, Minion was here to get Megamind. But why, if he had turned himself in? Perhaps to talk some sense into him. The Warden had always trusted Minion's judgement, as the fish always had Megamind's best interests in mind. "What happened?" he asked.
Minion gazed steadily at the Warden. "He's changing," was the simple reply.
Down the corridor, Megamind began to bang on the window. "Warden!" he shouted desperately. "Warden! You have to let me go! Tighten has to be stopped!"
The Warden made his decision. "I hope you know what you're doing," he told Minion as he let the fish tie him up.
"Of course not, sir," Minion replied.
The Warden sat down as Minion continued on to Megamind's cell, and was close enough to hear the ensuing conversation. He couldn't help but smile as they walked past him again, laughing.
"Good luck, boys!" he called after them.
Make me proud.