Warning: Minor eye squickiness and blood
"I should have thrown you in here decades ago."
Thaddeus rubbed his jaw. He blinked, trying to force his vision into focus. His whole body felt as if it were filled with jelly.
"You were a child. Despite what you almost unleashed, I still believed you to hold a spark of innocence. For that I released you from my halls." The wizard sneered. "I see now that you were not even worthy of that. There's no telling how many lives might have been saved had I simply thrown you down here with the rest of the worms."
Thaddeus gritted his teeth. His vision had stopped shaking. Looking down, he saw that he was sprawled on the ground. To his sides were walls of smooth rock and ahead were a row of glowing bars. Standing between them was the wizard, straight backed and glowing fists held high. Smoke streamed forth from between his clenched fingers.
Gone was the weary eyed and frail old man that Thaddeus remembered. In place of many of the wrinkles that Thaddeus once remembered decorating his face was a single, sharp scar that ran from the skin above his right ear and down his lip to the end of his left jaw. It was pink and puffy, surely no more than a few days old. Similar scars ran up and down his neck and arms. His robe had been ripped, revealing an Olympic runner's legs and hard muscled arms. His beard had been trimmed down to a white goatee. With his hair held back in a ponytail, his face seemed sharper.
The only things that hadn't changed about the wizard were his voice and eyes. Thaddeus would sooner forget his own name than he would that damn voice. The wizard's eyes glowed blue as the blood of horseshoe crabs.
Thaddeus sat up. Turning his head, he saw a sheet of smooth rock growing out of the wall behind it. Crawling forward, he grabbed it and used it to push himself to his knees.
"I ask you again: What has brought you back to my home? Do you seek to perturb my champion? To take back the sins and wreck havoc upon your world once more?"
Even if Thaddeus had an iota of desire to do either - and right then he would have sooner chosen to spend the night on a bed of burning coals - he doubted he would have been able to. Walking forward, he gripped the bars, his hands meeting icy white metal. Looking up, he saw that they extended seemingly forever into the shadowy air above.
"I don't know what I'm doing here." He brought a hand to his face but pulled it back before he could touch the flesh.
"You have the tongue of a serpent and the heart of a scorpion. Even you cannot think that I would actually believe you."
All those years of searching and scratching down symbols for nothing and yet here he was.
"I never wanted to come back here." He released his grip on the bars. He didn't recognize this area of the Rock of Eternity. His jaw tightened, eyes narrowing. "You're supposed to be dead."
"Fate cares little for your desires." He smirked. "Even I did not think you so arrogant as to view yourself a god slayer. But should I expect anything less from the sins' guaranty?"
The sins! Everything came back in a flood of sound and sensation. The taste of blood burnt his tongue as Pride grabbed his face and the tips of its nails ripped through his cheeks. The boys' bandaged faces flashed through his mind.
He brought a hand back up and let his fingers slip through that saggy lid. When he brought his fingers back, the middle and index were stained red.
"Am I dead?"
"A champion cannot ever truly die, Sivana. Not even, it seems, one claimed by your masters." He held his hands out. "Perhaps I should turn you to stone like your allies."
Thaddeus tongue was suddenly heavy as a brick. The wizard couldn't be lying - only a living heart could beat so fast and hard.
"And I will unless you answer me this question. What does my champion know of you?"
"Frederick?" Thaddeus could still remember how small he'd been. The boy would be lucky to reach one-hundred-ten pounds soaking wet.
The wizard narrowed his eyes. "I summoned Billy Batson, yet the boy told me his name was..."
"William Sivana." Thaddeus' arms circled his own waist.
The first champion, the wizard's chosen. His own key back to the world of magic.
"Be truthful or I will turn your bones to kindling and set you alight."
"My son," Thaddeus finally said. "Before he was ever your champion, he was my son."
Billy wanted to tear off his seat belt, rip open the door, and run. If he went west past the highway, he'd hit the ocean. East would lead him straight to Nevada. From there, it was anyone's guess where his feet might take him. The destination wasn't his priority. All that mattered was running until his heart gave out, running until he was finally free of this pathetic excuse for a life.
As much his legs yearned to chase the sun, his arms remained limp at his sides.
Aunt Addy had pulled into a Taco Whiz parking lot about a minute prior. She hadn't said anything in that time. Despite the chill air of the roaring AC, sweat trickled down Billy's forehead.
Ahead of him, Annie sat mute and still as a statue.
Aunt Addy turned, her phone held up. "I need an explanation for this." She tapped her finger across the screen.
If not for his torn hoodie and dirty jeans, Billy might not have recognized himself. His face was buried in Freddy's shoulder. Not that he gave himself much more than a quick glance. His friends suits' were glowing so brightly that it seemed physically impossible to look at anything else.
They were positioned some twenty feet from the back porch of Annie's house. The night had been windy and cold - probably no higher than thirty degrees outside - but dry. The shock of cold air had ripped him from the cave and brought him back to the present. For a moment, all that had existed was the bare trees and thin grass of Annie's yard.
Then his dad's face had flashed through his mind.
"'What just happened?'" Annie's voice sounded tinny. Billy had to focus to hear her. She stretched her toned arms out above her head.
Aunt Adelaide paused the video and pressed the volume up.
"Mom-"
She gave Annie a quick, cold glare before holding her phone back out and tapping the screen.
"'I wish I could tell you.'" Freddy readjusted his hold on Billy. "'I think I'm still alive. You?'"
She pressed a hand over the glowing yellow lightning bolt decorating her chest. "'I've never felt anything like this before. Are you sure this wasn't a dream?'"
"'I'd rather it be mine than yours.'"
Annie motioned him forward. They began to make their way towards the porch, Annie on foot and Freddy floating behind. When they made it to the short set of wooden stairs that separated the house's exterior from the ground, Annie turned back to Freddy.
"'So how do I, you know, stop being this?'" He couldn't see her face.
"'Oh, didn't you hear Billy earlier? All you gotta do is say the word.'"
"'That's it?'"
He nodded. "'Just don't ask me how it works.'"
Annie turned back towards the camera, put her hands on her hips, and held her head high. "'Shazam!'"
Billy had to strain his ears to hear her over a sudden boom of thunder. The screen momentarily went black. He only had a second to take in his double chin before the video started back up. It was grainier than before, the colors muted. Annie stepped up the porch and went straight for the door. By then, she was out of shot. Freddy floated behind her.
"'Here,'" she said, holding the door open. Her regular voice sounded squeaky. The two hurried inside, the lock clicking shut behind them. For a few seconds, all Billy saw was the lit porch and the empty backyard beyond it. Then, a large white replay button appeared across the screen.
Aunt Addy pulled her phone back and began pressing the screen. Then, she held it up again.
It was mid-afternoon then and sometime after his and Annie's little shopping trip. Billy was dressed in navy blue running pants and a burgundy coat. He stepped out into the backyard and began to stretch his arms and legs out. His desire for fresh air had been fickle, leaving almost as soon as it had first appeared. Aunt Addy paused the video right as he was walking back up the porch.
"Well?" she asked once the video had stopped.
"We have superpowers." At this rate, Billy might as well get it tattooed on his forehead.
Annie turned, looking straight at him. "What?" she mouthed.
"A wizard gave them to me. Whenever I say his name, I turn into a superhero." He looked Aunt Addy straight in the eyes. "Go ahead, tell me you don't believe me."
She raised an eyebrow. "You have them too?" Her tone was softer than before.
"Billy was the one who gave me powers." Annie's face was hidden behind her hands. "It's a long story." She pulled her hands away and reached out, grabbing her mom by the arm. "You know, Billy could give you powers too if you wanted some!"
His eyes widened. "Wait! We can't just-"
Aunt Addy cleared her throat, pulling away. "No thank you."
So much for a secret identity.
Billy slumped back against the car seat. His legs felt as if they were filled with cement. He should have run when he had the urge. Now all he could do was close his eyes and hope he never woke up.
"So," Aunt Addy said, cocking her thumb towards the drive through line behind her. "What all do you want me to order?"
Thaddeus had never imagined himself being turned into the wizard's personal paperweight, but it certainly didn't seem out of the realm of possibilities.
"Satirev. Satirev!" The wizard slammed his sandaled foot to the ground, sending pebbles and dust flying. He looked up, eyes flashing. "You speak the truth?"
"I wouldn't lie about that." Despite himself, he couldn't help but smile. Even if he ended up a decoration, he could die knowing he'd sent a nigh omnipresent magician into a temper tantrum.
"You must excuse me. Even I have forgotten how cruel fate can be." His gaze tightened. "It speaks to the strength of my champion's spirit that he could be worthy of my power despite your influence."
Thaddeus' blood was burning. His father and brother he could understand. Not forgive, not condone, but he could at least see where he had fallen short. He and his family were tied as much together by expectations as by blood.
When Thaddeus was born, his father had given him three things. A warrior's name so that he might always have courage, his father's own name so that it might live beyond him, and the family name that the men before him had carried for decades. A name that his father insisted he'd never truly been worthy of, but one that he could never take away from him.
His father had wanted Thaddeus to be tough, a winner, a piece of himself. Because that was what the world had been to him, a mirror to reflect his glories.
Whatever their thoughts on the other, fate had tied them together with the noose of filiality. Even now, his father's dirty blood filled his veins. Thaddeus doubted even the strongest magic could change that.
The wizard was different. By all means, they shouldn't have ever met. There was no telling just what he might have accomplished with his life if they never had. Their relationship was born of chance, a sudden, irreversible stroke of bad luck.
"When you first came to me, I had such high hopes for you. I truly thought you worthy of my power."
"That's all I'll ever be to you, isn't it? A disappointment."
And if he does, Thaddeus mused, does it really matter?
"Hey, Billy, did your dad ever listen to Queen?"
The way Freddy saw it, Billy moving onto playing Fleetwood Mac non-stop had to count as some sort of progress.
"Yeah, I guess when they were on the radio. I don't think he had any CD's for them or anything."
"What? Who doesn't like Queen?"
They were setting up furniture around Billy's new room. Set into a small room in Annie's basement, it had four unpainted walls, zero windows, and a single overhead light bulb that glowed a dim orange. Had someone not dragged down an extension cord and plugged in some floor lamps, Freddy might have had to squint to see. Someone had also brought down a space heater, which had turned the surrounding space so warm that he'd had to roll up his pants legs and ditch his hoodie.
Billy shrugged. "They aren't bad. I don't know, maybe he had them on vinyl. Dad never let me touch his record collection." He looked Freddy over. "Why?"
"Just curious."
For him, setting up furniture mostly meant pushing around chairs and telling Billy where to put stuff. Everything showed signs of use, from the dresser with the chipped paint top near the back wall, to the scratched plastic folding table by the door where Billy had placed Annie's old laptop. It was nothing too special, but at least he had a place to call his own.
"You know," Freddy said, shifting the weight on his legs and leaning forward on his left crutch, "you're still welcome at my place whenever."
"I don't think Aunt Addy's gonna let me leave anytime soon. She's really happy that I know how to cook."
"I'm just saying, if you ever need to get away, mi casa es tu casa. Just don't eat all my gummy worms." He turned. Taped to the wall above Billy's makeshift desk were a handful of pictures of him with his dad. Besides that, the walls were blank. "Hey, is it okay if I stop by again sometime tonight?"
"Uh, yeah. What time? Why?"
"I just need to drop something off. I don't have it on me now."
"Okay."
Later, as he sat in his own room, head bent over his sketchbook, he thought back to the pictures on Billy's wall. His dad was the reason all this shit had gone down, wasn't it? He was the guy who made Brett and Burke look like they wore kiddie gloves.
Oh, he'd said he wasn't evil. But wasn't that exactly what a supervillain would say? No one really saw themselves as evil, even when they had its literal embodiments crawling straight out of their eye.
Freddy hadn't dreamt about him in a few nights, but that hadn't made sleep come any easier.
Freddy tried to focus on their time together on the bridge. To almost getting beaten to death, to feeling his insides boil like a hotdog on the stove.
Somehow, his mind always wandered back to Billy's apartment. To being picked up and carried like a baby. To having hair brushed away from his forehead as Dr. Sivana gently pressed a warm washcloth against his face.
Dr. Sivana was a supervillain. Freddy reminded himself of that. And not just any, but the very first Freddy had ever faced. He supposed that made Billy's dad special.
Yeah, it was still weird that his first big bad was his best friend's dad. But hey, there had to be a badass nemesis somewhere out there in the world for him.
"I only had the video footage you sent me and memory to go off of, so it's not my best."
"No, it's great." All the same, Billy couldn't keep his eyes on the drawing. Looking at the three black and white figures reminded him that he wasn't just his plain old boring self any longer. The version of himself that Freddy had drawn in the picture's center was smiling and holding up a flexed arm. Billy himself hadn't changed back into his new body in over a week.
"You know, Annie and I have been training together. So far, we know she can fly, pick up cars, and shoot lightning from her hands. Oh, and run really fast." Freddy tapped his chin. "It made me realize something."
"Mmm-hmm?"
"Other than starting earthquakes, we all pretty much have the same powers. We're probably gonna need some kind of team strategy for using them." He removed a roll of tape from his pocket. "You want to hang that up?"
"Uh, sure," he responded. He held it out. Freddy would start asking questions if he just shoved it in the back of his dresser. "Put it wherever you want."
"I think Annie's gotten the hang of this pretty quickly. I think it's time we sent her out in the field." He tore off a piece of tape, rolled it around his finger, and stuck it to the back of the paper. "Why don't we do something together? It's always more fun when we team up."
Billy bit his lip. "No offense or anything, but I'm not even sure if I want to keep doing this superhero thing."
"Why?"
"I never asked for the wizard to give me superpowers. I don't even think I was allowed to say no."
"Is this about your dad?" Freddy's voice dropped.
Billy looked back to the pictures taped to his wall. "Freddy, I gave you superpowers because being a superhero has always been like your life dream. I won't say it isn't fun, but... Well, people want different things, okay?"
"Look, I know things are really shitty for you right now."
But just how could Freddy understand? It wasn't as if he didn't have a family to go back home to.
"Well, that is my point. Things totally suck for you right now. I'm not gonna pretend otherwise. But..."
"But what?" There was something about Freddy's tone of voice that made Billy stiffen.
"But you're really lucky! You want to know why?"
Billy groaned. "Because I'm basically Superman?"
"I mean, yeah. But I was gonna say that you had a socially acceptable reason to punch people." Freddy grinned. "Come on, you've gotta be mad about all this. Might as well take it out on some armed robbers."
Billy turned away. Despite everything, a smile tugged at his lips.
"Do you think your mom would be proud of you for this?" Freddy shook the masked dude by the shoulders. "Why don't we take you to see her? I bet she'll be excited to learn you've been robbing banks!"
"My mom is in prison!" Blood spilled down his bottom lip as he spoke.
"Oh, uh," he replied. "Well, you won't like it there either!"
"Uh, I think we have to take him to the police anyway." Billy said.
"I thought bank robbers were the FBI's problem." Annie added.
Freddy looked back to the guy. He couldn't have been more than five-six and one-hundred-fifty pounds. With his gun crushed into scrap metal, he didn't look so intimidating.
"Look, it's not our job to figure that out." He turned, eyeing the rows of people huddled with their faces against their knees on the floor. "How much longer until the cops or whoever show up?"
"It can't be more than five minutes," a woman in a trim navy suit called. Her hands, he noticed, were still shaking.
"Did you hear that?" Billy stepped forward, a finger held directly towards the man's face. "For five more minutes, you're still our problem."
"Uh, guys, I think we can skip the action movie talk." Annie pointed downwards. "I think he got the message."
Freddy had to hold back a laugh. For this guy's sake, he could only hope that he got a new pair of underwear with that orange jumpsuit.
It only took the cops two minutes to get inside. Not that it was hard to with the seven foot tall hole in the rear of the building.
"Remember, crime doesn't pay!" Billy called, his hands cupped around his mouth. An officer lead the handcuffed figure outside. He turned to Freddy and grinned. "Oh man, you should have seen his face when I flew straight towards him. The guy looked like his brain broke."
"You're acting like he ever had one to begin with." Freddy flew towards a group of people still scattered across the floor. "Is everyone okay? Does anything hurt?"
An old man held his arm out. Freddy took it and helped him get to his feet. Billy did the same for a very pregnant looking woman.
"Oh, thank you!" she cried. She pulled Billy into a hug.
"It's nothing, ma'am," he said, quickly pulling away. "All in a day's work."
"Damn," Freddy said as he watched a policewoman motion the group back towards the side of the building. "You almost got a date!"
Billy wrinkled his nose. "She was, like, forty!"
"And you're what?"
Billy gestured towards his face. "Thirty tops."
"You wish!" Freddy paused. "Hey, where's... Glitter Girl? She totally aced this."
"Jesus Christ, Glitter Girl?" Billy laughed.
"You got any better ideas, Lieutenant Shimmer Fists?"
He jabbed Freddy's side with his elbow. "I thought I was Captain Sparkle Fingers."
"Yeah, well I Googled it and captains are higher up the food chain. Besides, it's not like you wanted the name."
"Hey, I see her!" Billy pointed towards the front corridor, where Annie stood by a row of rotating glass doors. She was talking to two police officers, moving her hands as she spoke.
It was only when Freddy flew up to her that he noticed the lumpy tarps on the floor. The wall ahead of them was stained red.
"No, sir, I'm not sure how much he was trying to take."
"Do you know the approximate time he entered?"
"Don't they have security cameras? By the time we showed up, he had already..." She gestured towards the bulging figures decorating the floor. "I've already told you everything I know."
"We'll review the footage." The officer who spoke had the body of a lineman. He looked from Annie to the two boys. "Would either of you be willing to make a statement?"
"Uh," Freddy began. It was one thing to talk to news reporters and another to cops. He'd tried to limit it whenever possible - with his luck, he'd say something wrong. Lying to the police was a crime, wasn't it?
"They'll just tell you the same thing." Annie said. "Can we go?"
The man looked to his partner. "I don't see why not."
"Who do we say helped us?" The second officer, who had ebony skin and only looked to be in his late twenties at most, asked.
"Oh, us? You can call us the Sparkle Squadron." Billy said.
It was only when they were outside that Freddy could glare at him. "Seriously?"
"Hey, you're the one that started with the stupid names."
"We sound like an eighties cartoon!"
"Is that really a bad thing?"
Okay, maybe not. Still, they better hurry up and do some major brainstorming or the names might actually stick.
"Hey, Ann-" Billy stopped mid-sentence. "Heroic ally, do you know what our compatriot called you?"
She turned on her heel mid-air, gave him a quick glance, and then continued upwards.
"Glitter Girl! Can you believe it?" It didn't sound half as cool when Billy said it.
She didn't reply.
It was only when they were about sixty feet in the air that she stopped and looked at them again.
"So, that happened."
"Yeah," Freddy said. "Usually there are multiple guys doing it together. You know, heist style. I think it would have been fun if we'd all had someone of our own to punch."
"Hey, I'll take what I can get." Billy boxed at the air. "Gotta keep sharp, you know?"
"Maybe one day you'll actually land a hit!"
"Why not try right now?" Billy jabbed at him, but Freddy pulled back.
"Hey," he said, holding his hands up and out. "Superheroes fighting each other is so cliche."
"It didn't seem fair."
"Huh?" Freddy asked from between a mouth full of pizza rolls.
"Our fight." Annie crossed her arms over her chest. "He was just a normal dude."
"So?" Billy asked. He was digging into a bag of chips.
"And he had a gun," Freddy added. "I'm pretty sure it was loaded."
"Yes, it was." She leaned against the kitchen counter. The adrenaline rush from earlier was still there, but it was fighting for her attention with the questions clawing at her brain.
And the guy had used it, hadn't he?
"The way I see it, if criminals don't want to get beat up then they shouldn't rob banks and stuff." Freddy said. "We aren't exactly the first superheroes around."
"I still can't believe you're fine with being called Glitter Girl." Billy's forehead wrinkled.
"I never said I was."
"Yeah, well Glitter Woman doesn't have the same ring to it." Freddy tapped his chin. "You know, this would be a lot easier if I could just be... The word. It sounds pretty cool and no one's got a name quite like it."
"But aren't we all, uh, Sha...?" Billy asked. "People kind of need to be able to tell us apart."
"They've got eyes for that." Freddy grabbed his phone and clicked it on. "If you guys aren't still hungry, there's probably time to get someone else."
"I'll pass. I have homework." Annie looked to the wall as she spoke.
"For real?" He looked to Billy. "You up for another round?"
"You were right," Billy said. "Punching people is a lot of fun. But if Annie's out, I'm not going."
"Whatever. Just don't tell me you have any plans tomorrow night." He stood, washed off his plate, and loaded it into the dishwasher. "See you later?"
"Wouldn't miss it," Billy replied.
Freddy was there one moment and gone the next.
"Billy, you mind if I head upstairs?"
"Course not."
Her mom was waiting at the top of the stairwell. "Tell me everything."
"Oh, you know, some guy was waving around a gun like it was a toy and telling people to give him money. We showed up, punched him, and then let the cops take him away." As her mom walked down the hallway, Annie followed her.
One mission in and something told her that this was gonna start being normal.
"It'd make more sense if you'd been there to see it."
"I think I'll stick to imagining it." Her face tightened. The two stopped in front of her mother's bedroom door. Her mom motioned her inside.
"We knew what we were doing." It was hard to believe how much easier her life might be right now if she'd just remembered the security cameras. "Really, it was kind of unfair. The guy couldn't have won a fight against one of us. Three was just being mean."
"Annie, I got a call today about Sid's will."
How did time pass here? Thaddeus had never given any thought to it. There had never been any reason to, not when he'd always been on the outside looking in.
Thaddeus rubbed at his eye. A jolting pain ran up from his lower back and into his shoulders. The sensation was familiar. Spending the night on a slab of stone hadn't caused it, but it certainly made the throb more noticeable than the times he'd woken up atop his own mattress. He imagined he'd get much the same feeling if he ever were to have a baby elephant sleep on his back.
It could have been minutes since h'd fallen into a dreamless sleep, maybe hours. How long he'd spent lying down, eye squeezed shut and his arms pulled up through the sleeve of his coat and beneath his shirt so that he could draw heat from the skin of his chest, was anyone's guess. It had been, what, three weeks since he'd last slept? For all he knew, it was even longer. What could have been days back home could have been months here. Thaddeus could only hope that it wasn't the opposite.
His chest tightened, releasing a low growl. The last thing he remembered eating was a string cheese stick. He'd only managed to get a quarter down before throwing the rest away once William and his prying eyes left for school. That had been... Every number he conjured up seemed wrong.
Thaddeus' heartbeat quickened. What had happened to William?
Thaddeus sat up, his head spinning as he moved. He held a hand against the front of his skull and took in a long breath before releasing it. What had the wizard asked him - if he was going to take the sins back? The boys must have stopped them, then. How, he could only guess.
His cell was almost maddeningly quiet. Thaddeus had fallen asleep to the sound of his own heartbeat. Standing, all he heard were pebbles crunching against the soles of his shoes. If not for the light of the bars of his cell, which stretched before him like a row of thin teeth, he would have been trapped in total darkness.
The sins should have been screaming, yet all he heard was his own blood pumping in his ears. They did not squirm beneath his muscles or wiggle in the space below his skin. All he felt was the hole in his stomach and the slowly dulling pinch of nerves in his back.
With a certainty that he could surely recognize, if not entirely place, he understood for the first time in over forty-five years that he was truly alone.
PineconeFace1222: Thank you so much for your most recent review. It made me laugh super hard.
