Comics, Cookies and Revenge
By Lejindarybunny
A/N: Yes, the title of this chapter is a reference to the Bare Naked Ladies song 'If I had a Million Dollars'. If you haven't heard the song, the lyrics go "If I had a million dollars, I would buy you a green dress, but not a real green dress. That's cruel."
There is a new pic of Mikhail up at my deviantart gallery greer-the-raven. Also on deviantart, ookami-ayane has done a wonderful doodle of Vex for me, it's in her scraps section. I will also be drawing Vex shortly, so check d-art tonight for updates.
Disclaimer: The Incredibles, Syndrome, and all affiliated characters are property of Disney/Pixar. Sharon/Vex belongs to me.
Chapter 10: The Peril of Wearing the Real Green Dress He Bought Her
Vex had never thought of herself as an extreme sociopath, but apparently, she was. After all, sitting calmly at a dining table eating a ham sandwich shortly after you had tortured and killed a man simply was not normal behavior. Torturing and killing man was not normal behavior in and of itself. She was stunned by her own lack of hesitation. And of remorse. She pitied Mikhail, certainly, but his death had been necessary. After all, he was a super, and not only that, he wanted Syndrome dead. If they had let him go, chances were he would have come back to attack them. His death had been precautionary, if not exactly self-defense.
But the torture? That didn't sit quite as well with her. None of the questions Syndrome had asked seemed particularly vital. Syndrome had just wanted to cause the man pain. Then why not do it himself? Vex realized she'd had the answer all along. It was to prove a point to the Russian, that she was completely loyal to Syndrome. And she had jumped at the chance. But she didn't buy that the villain was trying to prove it to Mikhail; rather, she guessed that he had been proving it to himself, and with a traitorous woman so close in his past, how could she blame him for testing her?
Still, though she hadn't been shaken by the sight at the time, the memory of Mikhail's screams and spasms disturbed her a bit. But more than that, the fact that it didn't affect her more seriously worried her. What sort of person accepted that she had to torture and kill a man to gain another's trust was a fair bargain?
Perhaps it was the sort of person who became the lieutenant of a man who wanted to take over the world?
And yet, it had never been this complicated in her stories. She had never killed a man, even in fanfiction. Her heart was heavy with guilt that sprang from not feeling guilty enough, and she needed reassurances that she couldn't give herself.
"Syndrome?" she asked slowly.
He looked up from his sandwich, his peaked hair swishing, his ice blue eyes shining out from behind the dark mask. "Hm?"
"Do you trust me now?"
He seemed taken aback, and for a moment, Vex saw his face soften, and become almost childlike. The he nodded confidently. "Yes. Completely."
Then she didn't regret it, not a whit. She'd do it again in an instant, just as thoughtlessly.
000
Syndrome felt slightly ashamed of himself, for testing her that way. Especially when she brought it up that way. Had he been wrong to do so? Had it been too obvious? Would it alienate her?
The next thing she asked surprised him.
"So, when do I get my costume?"
He blinked at her, well, she certainly bounced back quickly. "I'll order it later today, kay? It'll be ready in a few days, I'm sure."
She nodded. "Sounds fine."
"In the meantime," Syndrome decided, finishing up the last bites of his sandwich, "I'm going o try to get security back up and running."
"If you like," he shrugged, standing up. He held out his hand to her, and pulled her up. They left the late doctor's dining room, and headed down the back stairs again.
The damage, they discovered, was not extensive. It was merely two crucial wires that had been cut, or rather, chewed through by Mikhail's rats. They would have to be replaced. Syndrome was going to simply remove a couple of unimportant wires of the same type, and use them as replacements, but he didn't have to when Vex discovered a tool and repair kit underneath one of the workstations.
"Will this help?" she asked, proffering it to him. He lay on his stomach on the cold floor, half inside the wall, where he had removed one of the cover plates.
"Yeah, lots," he took it from her, did a little rewiring, and rebooted the system. One by one the monitors and terminals began to light up with renewed life. "All systems are go," he announced, holding a screwdriver up triumphantly.
Vex giggled and clapped amusedly.
"Now, where were we before that little mishap, hm?" the red haired man sat down at the main terminal, and began to access the files he had been looking through. Now that the threat had been dealt with maybe he could actually get some work done. "Sit there." He nodded to Vex, gesturing to the second commuter. "I found some of Rasputin's personal files, I want you to go through them for me and tell me if you find anything that looks important."
"Okay," she nodded, calling up the first file. "Wait, he wrote everything in English?"
Syndrome chuckled. "Yeah I wish. No, I had to translate it while you were upstairs."
"Oh, okay."
The first thing Syndrome did was find the controls for the hallway deathtraps, and shut them off. He also discovered that there were similar halls throughout the base, which could be keyed to be triggered by any number of responses. He'd deal with those later, for now he wanted to make sure he was the only one who was controlling the system.
They spent the next several hours sitting beside one another in silence, either absorbed, or seemingly absorbed, in their own work. Vex's was the more engaging, he assumed, since all he was doing was checking programs for malicious coding. Pretty mindless work in his opinion.
So his mind wandered onto other things. For instance, how was he actually going to go about taking over the world? Even with all of his resources it would take a hell of a lot of conventional military might to take the straightforward approach, especially with the supers back in business. He was going to need some kind of doomsday weapon to hold the world hostage with, make them turn over control willingly...
Yes, it was cliché, but it was the only way that Syndrome thought of that could work. Should he begin work on a new Omnidroid? Maybe a fleet of Omnidroids? Oh but then they'd all know it was him. And anyway, he'd have to completely redesign them for pilots, because artificial intelligence was not an option. Maybe he could design a whole new kind of robot, one with a pilot in mind, giant fifty foot behemoths to strike terror in the hearts of mortals...
Or just remind them of Power Rangers.
He smacked his fist disgustedly on the desk. Why was this so difficult? Maybe he should concentrate on killing the Incredibles, before he talked such a complicated problem. Revenge should be a simpler task than world domination. He could lure them into a trap and crush them one by one.
Except that was exactly what he'd just tried to do, at the peak of his power, with minions and robots and an entirely functional base. And look how well that had turned out.
Okay, okay. Before anything, he needed to concentrate on getting his headquarters up and running. Self-sustaining was preferable, but he wasn't sure how feasible that was in the middle of Siberia. So, first he'd need about fifty or so goons, before or with his first shipment of weapons and parts. Then, technicians and so forth.
000
Vex was getting a little annoyed. After nearly four and a half hours of work she still had yet to turn up anything remotely interesting or significant. Most of what she had found was schematics, and designs, all of which Syndrome already had in hard copy in his folders. She was starting to think that maybe the doctor, or Mikhail, had taken the trouble to delete all of his research before they got a hold of it. But that didn't make any sense, not when the doctor's lab was still full of stuff.
That was it. After this one last file, she was going to ask Syndrome if she could take a break.
The file was labeled 'bwstat01' and Vex expected it to be full of the precise measurements of Rasputin's lab coats, or something equally useless and redundant.
It was a brief document, and the first thing that Vex spotted was a comparison of three charts, each with four wavy lines on them, red, green, yellow, and blue. On all the charts the red, green and yellow lines were fairly similar. On the first chart however, the curves of the green line were long waves, short and even overshadowed by the other colors. On the second chart however, the green lines were much taller, overlapping the other lines, and bunched close together like the coils of a spring. But on the third chart the green line was completely erratic, now short, now tall, spiking, and jumping, and even disappearing altogether in a few small spaces.
Even without knowing what the charts showed, Vex could tell that if chart number one was the comparative norm, then whatever the third chart was doing was bad. Possibly very bad. She scrolled down, and found some notes on the diagram.
'Parawaves, previously thought to be simple psionic background noise, as they occur in all centers of the brain, can now be fairly surmised to have some linkage to the bodies metabolic system. Diagram one expresses the typical ratio of brain activity, in which the parawaves exert no influence over the rest of the brain, and can be understood to in this instance, have no significance whatsoever. Diagram two expresses an extraordinary intensification of parawaves activity, seeming an exact correlation to the subject's remarkable metabolism. It can not be given that these two factors are in fact related, without further research pertaining to others with the same extraordinary metabolism, however if one assumes that the two are in fact related, then the results of the third diagram can then be linked to the third subject's dire physicality. If one then assumes cause and effect, it is possible that stabilizing the parawaves in subject three will also stabilize the physicality.'
'Stabilize the physicality?' Vex pondered to herself looking over the notes again. She wasn't positive, but it sounded like the document was talking about Rasputin's son's illness. Mikhail had said that it was a disorder of the brain. And what was this about an 'extraordinary metabolism'?
"Syndrome?"
"Yes?" he asked, looking up at her.
"Have you ever heard of parawaves?"
He furrowed his brow. "Nope. Why, what are they?"
"Er, I'm not sure, but, you better have a look at this."
Syndrome nodded, standing up, and stretching, shaking one leg out. It had probably fallen asleep, Vex guessed, from sitting down. She wasn't all that comfortable either, but she was used to sitting at a computer for hours at a time, from all her fanfiction writing.
The redhead stood over her, peering at the screen.
"Is it just me," she asked, "Or does it sound like they're talking about supers?"
He frowned, and seemed to skim through the passage. "Hey. Hey, yeah. It does..." He rubbed his chin in consideration. "Are there any more about this?"
"Uh, not sure. I'll check." She backed up to the root folder. Sure enough there were more 'bwstat' documents. She pulled up the next one.
There were several more brainwave charts, each of them with the same type of green line as the second chart.
'Procuring other samples for comparative data has proved difficult, but with the co-operation of certain associates, the necessary evaluations were eventually made. As previously hypothesized, conclusive evidence suggests that an excess of parawaves in crucial brain centers is in fact the source of various extraordinary metabolisms. No cause, however, has yet been determined as to why some develop excess parawaves.'
Vex opened the third part, or tried to. An error message appeared on screen.
'File not found.'
"Damn it," Vex grumped. "Looks like it was deleted."
"Or corrupter, or encrypted, or moved," Syndrome suggested. He didn't seem upset, quite the opposite in fact. "Try the next one."
The next several documents also produced error messages, until she got to the eighth one.
'Early attempts to stabilize the subject's parawaves have failed. It has become apparent that raising the level from its natural state produces a violently negative reaction, as wave channels must be formed inherently. Attempts to artificially induce higher parawaves in subjects have proved fatal in most cases, and worse than such in others. Suppression to normal levels has been more successful, however, given the main subject's weakened state, it would be unwise to enfeeble him in such a manner.'
Two more documents were missing, but the last one was fine.
'Implementation of the stabilizer chip has proved effective in negating the ill effects caused by the main subject's erratic metabolism. However, certain emotional changes have been noted as a side effect. The subject will be watched closely.'
"Interesting," Syndrome commented," Very interesting. So super powers originate from brain wave, and Rasputin found a way to control them…"
"Too bad we don't have any more of his research."
Syndrome smirked. "I wouldn't make any calls on that just yet."
Vex raised her eyebrows, but he didn't say anything further on the subject. He put a hand on her shoulder. "I'm almost done with reprogramming this, why don't you take a break?"
"Okay," she nodded. "What are you going to do after you finish?"
"Gotta make some calls, get this place operational," he sat down back at his own terminal. "You're welcome to the guest room, by the way."
"Alright," she stood , but didn't leave right away. Instead, she lingered behind where Syndrome was sitting. Decisively, before she could talk herself out of it, she bent down and hugged him quickly. "See you later," she said, and hurried out of the room.
000
Down in the brig, the body of Mikhail Padosev Rasputin hung limp and dead. His chocolaty brown curls hanging over his still white face, arms and legs still spread-eagled in the instrument of his death. He had been a young man of twenty, his youth stolen by obsession, his father's, and his own.
In life Mikhail had possessed what his father had called an 'extraordinary metabolism', and it was the reason that his own father had hated him. His first son's metabolism was killing him from the inside, why should his second's not bear such a curse?
His talent had been to manifest from nothing creatures who were separate from his body, but carried out his intent. It was a psychic bond of sorts, the creatures didn't really have minds of their own, they were guided by his. He could sense where they were, and what they were doing, and they carried out his wishes. Oddly, the bond strengthened when Mikhail slept, and many times in his younger days he had experienced what he believed to be dreams, in which he fully inhabited the body of one of his creatures, only to find himself when he awoke, away from his bed; often where he's last dreamed himself to be.
A creature, the size of a small dog, with a rat's form and a lizardlike tail sat staring up at the body, feeling strangely detached. Its whiskers twitched, and its tail flashed, as it spotted a ventilation duct. Escape now, and later?
Payment.
000
Vex found herself growing quickly bored as she sat on the great bed in her new room. There was a TV, yes, but all of the channels were in Russian. She could take a nap, she supposed, but she really wanted to try to avoid messing up her sleep schedule. Syndrome had mentioned that he'd turned off all the deathtraps, so she didn't think there would be any harm if she got up and explored the base a little herself. After all, they'd only really seen the main areas; there were all sorts of alcoves and subsections that she hadn't even seen yet.
She stood, and sauntered out of the room, stopping beside the unopened main suite.
'I wonder what it looks like in there,' she thought to herself. 'But I better not touch it. If I guess the password wrong, I'll probably get shot at, or dropped into a pit of alligators, or something. And if I did get in, Syndrome might get upset. It is his room now, after all.'
So she left the apartments, into the dark cavern that was Rasputin's lab. As she picked her way carefully through all the scientific equipment, she wondered if any of it had been used in his experiments on his son. Vex wasn't sure .After all, the doctor had not built the mountain retreat until after Piotr's death, then again, he'd been obsessed with his elder son, so maybe he had continued his experiments. What else would he have been researching?
She wished there had been more of the data available. Syndrome seemed confident that he could find it, or repeat it, at least, but Vex wanted to know now. Had the doctor ever figured out why some people became supers, or not? It was one thing to say it was caused by brainwaves, but that still didn't tell her what determined the lucky few to have these 'parawaves'. Why, for instance, didn't she?
It was with some trepidation that she approached the elevator. They were running normally of course, but still, her last memory of being on it was not pleasant. Of course, Mikhail couldn't jump her again, he was dead.
'I vould have spared you,' she heard the echo of his voice in her mind, and felt a twinge of guilt. Then one of anger. How dare he? How dare he assume that she'd just stand by and let him kill Syndrome? What was that? Especially since Mikhail couldn't have known that she'd only been with Syndrome for a day. And he assumed she'd let him do that, just because her own skin was safe? No, as he had no doubt discovered, anyone who wanted Syndrome was going to have to get rid of his first.
The elevator hummed to life as she stepped inside it, and she rode up to the barracks level, intent on wandering around the most complex honeycomb of rooms in the base. Most of the rooms were pretty much empty, except for a bit of furniture. It seemed that whoever it was Rasputin had employed, they'd all had time to take their personal items with them when they'd left. Personally, Vex was currently regretting not having brought more clothes when she'd been asked to pack quickly. She didn't know exactly how long it would be until she would have something different to wear.
This made her wonder what the costume that Syndrome was getting her was going to look like. She thought of the various outfits of her characters, and things she had drawn, but they all seemed too showy when compared with Syndrome's simple, yet elegant design.
She thought of the way his cape swished when he walked, and how intense his eyes became when they shown out from behind his mask.
But what about the question that she had been trying not to let creep into her mind. It was unaskable, just rude. What was she supposed to do, walk up and ask him 'So, Syn, was that an "I like you" kiss, or a "ha, in your face prisoner" kiss?' Even in her head it sounded stupid. She'd been rude enough asking him whether he trusted her or not, though she was glad he'd said yes. It was comforting, to know that he was at least pleased with her so far.
And besides, did she really want a straight answer? The 'in your face, prisoner' option would be horribly disappointing, not to mention embarrassing. And the 'I like you' option threatened to be…complicating. Sharon had never had a date before, or even come close. She had no idea what to expect if she became entangled in a romantic relationship with the man who was really supposed to be her 'boss'. Besides, he was a whole eight years older than her, which didn't seem like a lot when compared with the fact that the men in her fanfictions were often in their thirties or forties. But that was a story, this was real life. She was practically a kid compared to Syndrome, which was probably how he thought of her. Yes it was almost definitely an 'in your face, prisoner' kind of kiss. But that didn't stop her from savoring the memory of his vicious embrace, and secretly hoping that he did like her, even if it wouldn't work out well.
As she had been wandering through the barracks, Vex was surprised to come to a room that hadn't been emptied of all of its contents. Its furnishings were slightly more expensive than those of the other rooms as well, though nowhere near as grand as her room. This must have been the room that belonged to Mikhail. Unlike the other rooms, his was carpeted, and had such extra amenities a writing desk with a computer, a dresser with a mirror on it, and a bookcase. Some of the books, she noticed, were even in English. This made sense with what she knew about foreign countries though; they made a lot more of an effort to learn English, than Americans made at learning their languages. One book was sitting open on the desk, set face down, as though he'd meant to come back to it quite soon.
Vex picked the book up, noticing first that it was quite old, and worn, and the pages were yellowed. It was a well loved book, obviously, and then that it was in English. It was a copy of 'Alice Through the Looking Glass, by Lewis Caroll.
Of all the strange things that Alice saw in her journey Through The Looking-Glass, this was the one that she always remembered most clearly. Years afterwards she could bring the whole scene back again, as if it had been only yesterday -- the mild blue eyes and kindly smile of the Knight -- the setting sun gleaming through his hair, and shining on his armour in a blaze of light that quite dazzled her -- the horse quietly moving about, with the reins hanging loose on his neck, cropping the grass at her feet -- and the black shadows of the forest behind -- all this she took in like a picture, as, with one hand shading her eyes, she leant against a green, watching the strange pair, and listening, in a half dream, to the melancholy music of the song.
Vex set the book down, immediately wishing that she hadn't touched it at all. How cruel of her to touch the things of a man that she had killed. How cold of her to think she could leaf through his possessions.
Was Alice his favorite, she wondered. She turned to leave the room, when something caught her eye sitting on the bed. It was the briefcase full of money that Syndrome had given him. Of course it was still here, Mikhail had never left, and Rasputin had been dead when they'd arrived. So, in essence, the base had been free, because they had killed the owner.
Vex picked up the briefcase, with the intention of taking it back to Syndrome. She wondered if he had realized that he hadn't lost the money. Two and a half million dollars might, or might not be a lot of money in his mind, but it was more than Vex had thought she'd ever see in her entire lifetime.
The next room she found herself in was the barracks rec room, with a large screen TV being the dominant item. What excited Vex more though, was the sight of a small CD player. Vex had brought her walkman, but didn't want to use it, in case she ran out of batteries. She unplugged it, picked it up with her free hand, and headed back to her room.
000
Syndrome had gone through the same mercenary agency as last time to hire his minions. Of course, this meant he had to pay a higher price because of the fact that he'd lost a fair number on them in his last debacle. But money, as ever was not an issue. He's also ordered a shipment of his own equipment, and more parts and such, to get the technical lab in working order. Both would be arriving in two days.
Which meant there was time to kill.
He stood up, and stretched, his whole body felt better for it, having been hunched over the computer for so long. And then he remembered, there was one call he hadn't made yet.
He picked the cell phone back up, and dialed.
"Bonjour," greeted a cheerful French voice. "Theese is Maurice speaking."
"Maurice, it's Syndrome."
"Syndrome? Zey said you were dead! To what do I owe the pleasure of your call, eh?"
"I need you to design make a costume."
"Oh? 'Ave you become tired of your own? Eet was one of my finest achievements."
"No, no, I still love it, Maurice. It's not for me."
"Oh, zen who eez it for?"
"My lieutenant."
"Very well, what are his measurements?"
"Hers. And, uh, I don't know. Should I…go ask?"
The fashion designer chuckled. "Why don't you just bring her to my office for a fitting, eh?"
"Alright. Are you free tomorrow?"
"For you, mon amie, the door eez always open."
"Riiiight. See you tomorrow Maurice."
"Au revoir."
To be continued…
And now, the reviews….
C.D. Anders: I definitely don't mind long reviews! Sorry I didn't respond to yours last chapter, but I got it after 9 was already posted. I hear what you're saying about too much romance. I think you will be pleased to note that while romance is a factor, it is not really the main attraction. If you knew where this was going at chapter 8 you must be psychic! I didn't think I'd put in quite enough clues!
RavensHaelo: Yes, Vex is a bit remorseful. But not much.
Artymas: Homework sucks! Hope you enjoyed the chapter.
Shadow Fox Forever: I really liked chapter 9 too. It practically wrote itself.
Dark Fire Angel: I'm so glad you like the fic! Syndrome is my favorite character…ever!!
Maya Beebop: Mmmmmm….kiss. Lol I'm glad you liked it. It's very convenient where you left off, eh? Haha, I made you like a mary-sue!!
Megan the Vampire Slayer: go check out my deviantart gallery, and also ookamki-anye
WormmonABC: I checked the lyrics in the flap of my cd, and they say damp. I personally always thought it was damn, as well.As to calling Syn handsome being extreme, people have different tastes. Vex thinks he's handsome. She has a thing for redheaded, pudgy men, I guess, and so do I.
Oh, by the way, my friend loved the Incredibles, and I made a Syn fan out of her. Though she also likes Dash, so I get to call her a pedophile!
See you tomorrow!!