You taught me how to live in the streets of shame
- "The Death of Saint Jimmy" by Green Day
When Mr. Incredible and the police arrived at the scene, Syndrome was disappearing rapidly into the air. "Got away again?" he asked, rather pointlessly, as he jogged over to where Static was standing.
"He saved me," she mumbled, her eyebrows knitted in so deeply they were completely hidden by her visor. "Why did he? He had nothing to lose. Nobody ever tried to save me."
Mr. Incredible stared curiously at his fellow Super. "What are you talking about?" he asked quietly.
Static ignored him. "It doesn't make sense," she said.
"Especially not since you won't explain," Mr. Incredible snapped testily.
Static continued to stare upwards. He had the bad feeling that she was completely lost in another world.
"Stat, come on," he said loudly, grabbing her arm. She suddenly seemed to jerk out of her reverie as she looked at him. "There are still the robots to deal with! He's leaving them behind!"
Static frowned. "It'd be just like him to leave us a lot of trouble," she muttered angrily, and she started at a run towards the downtown area.
"You could ride with us!" one policeman called uselessly after her, but she was already turning a corner. He shrugged and looked back at Mr. Incredible. "Are all Super heroines like that?" he said, jerking a thumb over his shoulder.
Mr. Incredible shrugged somewhat helplessly and then took off after her.
- - - - - - - - -
"And topping our headlines today is the newest attack on Metroville by the villain 'Syndrome', the nemesis of the famed 'Static'. He sent in three new robots in his Omnidroid line to distract the other Supers while he battled Static alone. There was damage to an apartment building in the western area of the city, where the battle apparently took place. There were no witnesses to the event, but it would seem that Syndrome saved himself from certain death by using his rocket boots. How Static survived the fall is uncertain. Experts guess that she must have thrown something at him from ground level that caused him to start to fall. Policemen arrived at the scene shortly after the fierce fight had ended, but they were too late. The wondrous Super 'Mr. Incredible' witnessed the departure of Syndrome.
'He was flying off as soon as we got there. There was nothing we could do to stop him at that point,' said Mr. Incredible.
"Static herself was not available for comment on the battle. Reporters attempted to approach her when she had finished dealing with the Omnidroids themselves, but she refused to say anything relating to the events of the day. Other Supers aided Static in her fight against Syndrome's machines. Included in the battle were Mr. Incredible, Elastigirl, Invisigirl, The Dash, DemonChild, and Frozone.
"Their battle with the Omnidroids lasted over four hours. Metroville sustained serious damage during the fight, but the Supers finally ridded the city of the machines at five o' clock this evening. There were 12 dead, 39 wounded. Counts are still coming in. There will be further news bulletins when we receive the latest count."
"I can't believe you," Mirage said icily to Syndrome.
Syndrome turned off the large television screen with a flick of his wrist and swiveled his chair around to face his previous second-in-command, whom he was currently holding on the island until further notice. "No?" he questioned, raising an eyebrow.
"Just to get revenge on an ex-girlfriend, you would harm so many people?" she demanded angrily.
Syndrome shrugged slightly and glanced at the picture of Bex now sitting on his desk. "Just making a statement," he said.
"A fairly demented statement!" Mirage exclaimed. "When are you going to stop? You can't keep killing Supers, Syndrome!"
"I don't intend to."
Mirage's eyebrows shot up at this. "Oh really?" she said quizzically. "So what's the next step in your plan?"
"I'm going back into Metroville to see Bex again."
"So you can kill her."
"No," Syndrome said flatly. "I don't want to kill her. I need to make an appearance once in a while, so it looks like the great Static is doing something in the name of the public and I'm still a huge menace."
"Why?" Mirage asked, genuinely curious now.
He shrugged slightly. "The more I see Bex, the more chances I have to rebuild some sort of relationship with her, whatever that is," he said, getting up and walking over to his desk. He lifted her picture from the surface and stared at it. "We can keep meeting under the guise of a fight, but without hurting anyone else. It's perfect."
"Except that you can't ever go public with your relationship," Mirage pointed out. "And do you really expect her to forgive you for killing off so many of her fellow Supers?"
Syndrome turned and gave Mirage a piercing stare. "Do you expect her to ever forgive you?"
"Me?" Mirage repeated. "But I didn't - " She stopped. Oh, yes you did. You could have stopped him a hundred times, and you didn't. You're as much to blame as he is, and Bex will know it.
Mirage crossed her arms over her chest and said, "I don't suppose she would, would she?"
Syndrome shrugged again and turned away once more. "We're going to find out," he said softly, setting the picture down. "I need her to forgive me. I need somebody to."
Mirage's eyebrows shot up. "Are you feeling remorse for what you did?" she questioned.
Syndrome's hands balled into fists. "No!" he snapped. "I did the right thing! I showed those arrogant bastards that they weren't the only people who could be heroes! I didn't -!" He stopped, staring blankly at the wall, and then hung his head. He lifted his hand to his eyes and ran it across them. "I don't know, Mirage," he said dejectedly. "Did I do the right thing?"
"No," Mirage said bluntly. "No, you didn't. What you did was horribly wrong. We thought we were the right ones. We thought we had a purpose. And we were both wrong. You're right to want forgiveness."
"But the Supers hated us!" Syndrome shouted angrily. "They destroyed our lives! They -"
"Are only human," Mirage said quietly. "I see that now. And, frankly, what with Bex being a Super, I'm surprised you don't see it yet either. Bex isn't invulnerable. She never has been, and never will be. You should know this better than anyone. She's not any different than any of the other Supers. They all have their own flaws, fears, and weaknesses. They all need someone to save them once in awhile, too."
This was obviously a major revelation to Syndrome, and it was one he didn't like. Supers had always been like gods to him - invulnerable, perfect, undefeatable. Mirage knew that he had always thought that if he could just be like them, all his problems would be solved, and he would never be weak again. The fact that this wasn't true, and that he had to face that now, was something he did not want to deal with.
He had known it before, of course. He had known it all along, and so had Mirage. But she had accepted it much more readily than Syndrome had. He was never ready, never willing, to face the fact that his idols were just as fallible as he himself was. Mirage had just forced him to look the fact full in the face. He still wasn't ready for it, but, Mirage reflected, he probably never would have been.
Syndrome was still gaping at her disbelievingly, looking confused and almost helpless. "But - but -" he stuttered uselessly.
Mirage waited for him to say something more coherent. Instead, he looked away from her and dropped down into a chair. "Then I'm as bad as all the dictators in history," he said tonelessly. "I've been killing off innocents because of a worthless bias, like Hitler."
"Well, not quite on that scale, but - " Mirage interrupted uncertainly.
"But it amounts to about the same thing," he finished. "She'll hate me forever."
Mirage chewed her lip. "It certainly seems the most likely possibility," she said softly. She couldn't lie to him; Bex would probably never forgive him for all the things he had done. Things would be worse if he wasn't forewarned.
Syndrome continued to stare blankly at the wall. "I never wanted things to be like this," he whispered.
"I know," Mirage murmured.
"All I wanted was to be a hero," he said. "Just like Mr. Incredible. Just like all of them. But they thought I wasn't good enough. They thought I wasn't worth their time. And I thought - I thought I was doing something right, getting rid of them. I thought if they were gone, no one would have to be pushed aside, like me. Everyone who wanted to could be a Super, and no one - no one - would have to suffer like I did."
Mirage looked away. "Things get twisted around as time goes on," she said quietly. "The world becomes too complex, and our view gets darker and our motives less clear. We keep pushing towards some goal assuming it's for the greater good, but really, we've forgotten why we're still doing it."
Syndrome laughed mirthlessly. "No wonder this world sucks so bad," he said.
Mirage couldn't bring herself to smile even a little. It wasn't fair that the little boy that Buddy Pine was had become Syndrome, this cruel, cold, bitter supervillain who hated the world because of all the evil it contained. "There are still good things here," she said, somewhat pointlessly. She didn't think he would believe her.
She was surprised when she saw his eyes move to the picture on his desk once again. "Yes," he said, contemplating Bex's face. "Yes, there are. But even those things tend to get ruined."
"Not necessarily," Mirage protested. "Bex - "
" - Is living in the slums with an alcoholic Super who abuses her and who she won't leave because she's terrified he'll kill her if she does," Syndrome spat, and now the bitterness, if it had not been clear before, came bursting to the surface. "What the hell happened to us, Mirage? Bex has turned into some kind of scary schizophrenic - one second she's Static, the next second she's poor, scared, abused Kauri - you've become this sidekick who's turned traitor on both sides - and I've become some sort of psycho serial killer!" He buried his face in his hands and moaned, "I hate my life. I hate, hate, hate my life."
Mirage laid a hand hesitantly on his shoulder. He made no attempt to remove it, but he didn't seem to welcome it, either. "The world works in strange ways, Buddy," she said, taking a huge risk by calling him by his real name. "Someday, maybe, things will be different."
"Well, I wish that day would hurry up," Syndrome snapped angrily. "Because right now, my world is basically falling apart."
With that, he got up and stormed out of the room, leaving Mirage alone to contemplate.