Episode 1: A Summer Day in Valley View

The balmy Texas air settled heavily on Valley View that day. If Amy heard one more annoying old person say "It's not the heat, it's the humidity" she thought she might go all Havoc on them right then and there. She smirked at the thought of sending one particularly sour-looking old woman in a wheelchair flying by using her sonic powers.

"See, I told you this would be fun!" Hartley beamed at her. Hartley continued her excited frenzy over the new stock at the stationary store.

Amy rolled her eyes. "Remind me why were shopping for school supplies in the middle of July again?"

"Mr. Jackson always orders new stock in early July to prepare…" Hartley interrupted herself with a high-pitched scream. "Isn't it adorable? I have to get it! What do you think?"

Amy wrinkled her nose at the rainbow, sunshine, confetti-themed folder. "I think that looks like a unicorn ate a box of donuts and threw them up."

"Well, what are you going to get?"

"Nothing," Amy shrugged. "Don't need to. It's not like I'm planning to do any studying anyway, and if I just happen to feel like doing something, I'll borrow it from you."

"Well, that is better than what you did last year—stealing your school supplies from random kids." Hartley mused over Amy's social transformation from villain to civilian over the past year.

"See."

"It's still not a great thing to do," Hartley continued her search through the new inventory of folders and notebooks. "I have to admit I'm kinda surprised they let you move on to 11th grade…"

"Yeah," Amy interjected with a laugh. "None of those 10th-grade teachers wanted to experience this nightmare again!" She pointed her thumbs at herself.

Hartley nodded in agreement. "Well, I suppose that's true, but do you think that's going to keep working for you?"

"What do you mean?" Amy's head snapped toward Hartley.

"Well, I mean, you're not a villain anymore…"

"Hey, I will always be a villain—it's who I am, it's who I was born to be. I'll never not be a villain!"

Confusion washed over Hartley's face for a moment. "Never…not…double negative...so that's..."

"Oh, you know what I mean!"

Hartley did, and she nodded gently. "Yes, but, you may not get to live that life anymore. "Maybe it's time to start thinking about what else you could do?"

Amy looked away and started casually rifling through the notebooks.

Hartley frowned. Amy always shut down at any hint of this conversation. She let out a gentle sigh and went back to the task at hand. It would only be a matter of moments before Amy would find a way to change the subject anyway.

"Oh, gosh, Hartley, how long do we have to be here?" Amy moaned while exaggeratingly dying on the counter. "I'm starving!"

Hartley's watch did say it was almost 1pm. "How about we finish up here and go to the Can-teen-a?"

"But it's so far!" Amy stomped her feet and pouted.

Hartley raised an eyebrow. It was only a 10-minute walk away. "How old are you? Three?

Amy paid this no attention. "And I really don't want to see my idiot brother working there today. Really!"

"What'd he do now?" Hartley's tone was flat as a pancake.

"Overheard him video chatting with Starling last night" Amy's face contorted into a fake vomit position.

"Really?" Hartley looked like it was her birthday. "Did she say anything about me?"

Amy's face morphed from fake vomit to an eyebrow raise. "Uh, that'd be a hard no. Might of felt less sick if they had."

"Aww, thanks!"

Amy's eyebrow shot up even higher for a moment before changing the subject. "Anyway! I'm hungry! What are you going to do about it?!"

"Well, if you don't want to go to the Can-teen-a then how about…" Hartley thought for a moment. "Burgers?"

Amy looked reasonably satisfied with this answer. "I could let you buy me a burger."

"Crown Pharmacy is just around the corner. We could go there." Hartley pointed over her shoulder at the door with her thumb. "The milkshakes are to die for!"

"I've killed for less."

"You're joking, right?"

"Well…" Amy ignored the question and picked up two different notebooks, one with flying space ostriches and the other with a retro 80s theme. "Pick your poison, and let's go!"

To Amy's annoyance, it took Hartley a few more minutes to make her final selection at the stationary store, but soon enough, the two were heading down the street to Crown Pharmacy and Soda Shop. The little pharmacy and diner had been a hallmark of Valley View for generations. One of Hartley's earliest memories involved her ordering a Strawberry-Creme Soda Float for the first time and her grandmother "testing" most of it to make sure it was safe for children. Of course, that easily could have been a memory from a couple of weeks ago. If there were two things that never changed in Valley View, they were her grandmother Celia and the Crown Soda Shop.

And that is why it was all the more shocking when the word "Closed For Business! Are you kidding me?!" flew out of Amy's mouth. "Where is Hartley supposed to buy me hamburgers and milkshakes now?"

Hartley raised a finger. "Wait a minute, why do you always assume I'm buying…and…" The realization of the matter washed over Hartley like a crushing tidal wave. "Closed? For good?" Hartley's eyes scanned the area trying to make sense of the situation. The lights were off, packed cardboard boxes were stacked up almost to the ceiling, and a big moving truck was parked out on the street. She barely noticed the jingle of the front door as an elderly man and his wife stepped outside into the summer heat with dejected looks on their faces. Shaking out of her daze, Hartley greeted the couple with a sympathetic smile. "Mr. and Mrs. Palmer!

"Ah, Hartley," Mrs. Palmer said while her countenance lifted. "What a pleasure to see you here."

"Mr. and Mrs. Palmer, what's happening here? Are you guys really closing down the Pharmacy?"

Mr. Palmer sighed. "I'm afraid so Hartley. I'm afraid so."

"I don't understand…" Hartley trailed off.

Mr. Palmer put his arm around Mrs. Palmer for a moment before he spoke as if knowing what he would say would upset her. "The bank called in some of the outstanding loans we had. Selling the place was about the only option we had." He looked over at his wife. "And besides, with Mrs. Palmer going through that cancer scare last year, perhaps it's time to retire anyway."

"But the fundraiser the Sunshine Club held…" Hartley looked devastated. "Didn't it help with some of the medical expenses?"

Amy remembered that–getting roped into making about 1,000lbs of spaghetti for a community dinner fundraiser all because Hartley batted her eyelashes and begged her for 3 days straight. It all turned out all right anyway; she blackmailed Colby into using his superspeed to do her share of the work.

"Oh, dearie, it did," Mrs. Palmer reached out a comforting hand to Hartley. "It's just hospitals these days–they're so expensive. We had to take out a few extra loans more than we originally thought."

"We were managing the monthly payments pretty well, but the bank sold the loan off to another party. And they wanted their money back right away," Mr. Palmer said. "It's just the way the world works."

Amy shrugged in agreement. She knew how cruel the world could be, but the crushed look on Hartley's face still didn't settle right with her. She zoned out for a few moments until she heard what seemed like the end of the conversation. The Palmers headed toward their car to go somewhere while Hartley put her arms around herself.

The two stood quietly for a moment as they watched the Palmers drive away.

"So," Amy said. "Where are you going to buy me lunch now?"

Hartley tisked. "Don't you have any tact?"

"Not when I'm hungry," Amy replied.

"What are you doing home already?" Was the first thing that flew out of Celia's mouth when Hartley and Amy entered the house.

"Oh, you're here," Amy said flatly.

"Yeah, I live here," Celia responded in the same tone.

"Could have fooled me since you're always over at our house bothering us."

"Grandma, you're looking so lovely today!" Hartley exclaimed to diffuse the boiling tensions in the room. "Connie! Tessie! You look lovely as well!"

The three long-time friends looked up at the two teenage girls as if they had interrupted a sacred ceremony. They were nice and comfy sitting on their tushies in the Plushmaster 2000 recliners Celia ordered a few months ago.

"Well, we all better look lovely today! We spent 3 hours at the beauty parlor…" Celia finally said, fluffing her new hairdo.

"It'd take more than three hours to pull off a miracle like that," Amy snorted.

"It'd be a miracle if I ever learned to like you or that family of yours," Celia narrowed her eyes.

"Anyway!" Hartley put her hands up in a placating manner. "Did you all hear the news?" Hartley wasn't much for gossip, but Celia and her friends were. That'd distract them quickly enough from Amy's sassy mouth.

Connie pursed her lips for a moment before speaking. The ice cubes rattled in her glass of iced tea while she sat up in the recliner excitedly. "You mean how Crown Pharmacy's closing down? Honey, we knew about that days ago."

Amy raised her eyebrow in amusement at Connie's excitement.

"Yes! Wait, what?" Hartley asked. "You all knew already? How?"

"Please," Tessie looked mighty pleased with herself. She leaned forward toward the teens and then looked around the room as if someone might be listening in. "I've got a friend whose brother's ex-wife works down at the Valley View Bank."

"And what did your friend's brother's ex-wife say?" Amy said with feigned interest.

"Apparently some big shot out of Metro City's buying the place." She paused as Connie's ice tinked against her glass again. "Don't know what they'd want with someplace in the middle of nowhere Texas, but that's not my business." Connie took a sip of her drink.

"Are you sure?" Amy snorted. "You seem to know an awful lot about their business."

Connie choked on her iced tea.

"It's a shame, isn't it?" Celia sighed. "Robert and I liked popping in there and having a milkshake." She winked at everyone. "One milkshake, two straws."

The women giggled while Amy and Hartley wrinkled their noses.

"Oh, I've been going there with my many boyfriends since 1979! Johnny, Tommy, Billy…" Celia continued.

"Kill me," Amy rhymed.

"Yeah, it is a real shame. That pharmacy's been around for a long time," Connie swirled the ice in her tea again as she reminisced about the old days. "Been in Valley View as long as I can remember."

"Since nineteen thirty-four," Tessie emphasized each syllable with a finger.

"So like a hundred and…" Amy began trying to solve the math problem.

"89," Hartley interrupted. "Eighty-nine years."

Celia looked at Amy with her nose wrinkled. "And how did you pass the 10th grade with math skills like that?"

"Eh, who needs math anyway," Amy shrugged.

"No wonder your family never seems to be able to pay the correct amount of rent each month." Celia crossed her arms.

"Anyway, Hartley, let's grab your stuff and head back over to my place."

"About time." Celia wiggled in her chair and looked back over at Connie and Tessie. "We can finally get back to gabbin'…" She peered over at the teen brunette "...once she leaves."

"Yeah, I'm sure you have loads of interesting things to talk about…like Mrs. Hernadez's mismatched socks or how Principal Tennyson's can afford those flashy new Toyota rims with that teacher salary of his."

"Let's go!" Hartley grabbed Amy's arm and marched toward her bedroom trying to avoid another spat.

Eva walked into the living room from the kitchen while adjusting the messy bun in her chair to see Hartley and Amy sitting on the couch. "Oh, hey girls! What you would like for dinner tonight?"

Amy turned around from the couch. "Awe, mom. That's so sweet you asked." She looked at Hartley. "Chicken parmesan sounds amazing." Hartley agreed with a nod.

Eva paused for a moment and thought about it. "Yeah, that does sound good." She looked at the girls. "Better get to cooking!" She ran up the stairs with a small spring in her step.

Amy was annoyed. "I walked right into that one."

"Maybe we should just have some leftovers from the fridge," Hartley said

"Or maybe you could buy us a pizza?"

"Or maybe you could?" Hartley lifted her hands to convey her broke status.

"Leftovers are good." Amy turned back to their task at hand–looking for something good to watch for their movie marathon.

The front door opened suddenly, letting in the excited conversation of the two villain brothers. "Sometimes I forget that going on the run from the League of Villains actually does have some freedoms and benefits," Jake could be overheard saying.

Amy didn't need superhearing to catch something like that. "Wait, what are you talking about?"

Colby and Jake's arms were loaded with a bunch of white plastic bags, but Colby already had something interesting in his hands. He couldn't stop himself from shuffling through a shiny new deck of cards. "Jake and I went down to Android's Comics and got a whole bunch of cool stuff!"

Amy looked less interested. "Oh."

"Like…Shadow Syndicate…cool stuff." Jake smirked.

"Oh!" Amy's eyes flew wide open and she slammed her pink laptop closed.

"Right?!" Jake threw up his arms.

Hartley looked back and forth between the three supervillains. "What's the Shadow Syndicate?"

Amy sat up on her feet next to Hartley on the couch. "You know how my family used to work for Onyx and the League of Villains?" Amy looked around as if someone might overhear. "Well, let's just say that they aren't the only villains in the world."

"You mean the Shadow Syndicate is another group of villains?" Hartley deduced.

"Yeah," Colby said. "But we were never allowed to talk about them. It was like Shadow Syndicate was a swear word or something."

"Colby Madden!" Eva's voice cracked through the room like thunder as she stood angrily on the stairs. All four teens shot to attention. "We don't use words like that in this family!"

"Mom! Mom! Mom!" Jake tried to intercede. "Think about it. We're not in the League of Villains anymore. The old rules don't exactly apply to us."

Eva's facial expression took a few moments to melt. She let out a deep sigh. "Still, I don't like the idea of you all talking about…them." She waved her hands in the air instead of saying the name of the nefarious organization.

"You weren't allowed to talk about them?" The gears in Hartley's head turned round and round trying to figure things out. "How can someone stop you from talking about something?"

"Hartley?" Amy's voice asked innocently. "Do you remember my villain band back in Centropolis?"

"Yeah," Hartley said, not following.

"Our bass player, Stingray," Amy placed her hand over her heart. "Happened to be ordering a submarine sandwich over the phone, but Onyx thought she said Shadow Syndicate."

"What happened?" Hartley's brown eyes went wide.

"Onyx threw her into his fiery furnace," Amy said. "Toasted her sandwich alright."

Hartley looked terrified.

Eva stood still on the stairs with her arms wrapped around her and her hand soothing her neck gently. "That's been the rule longer than even I've been a villain. Nobody ever seemed to know the full story nor dared enough to talk about it."

"Yeah, but now we've got their cards!" Colby held up his brand new deck of supervillain cards featuring the greatest evil beings of the Shadow Syndicate.

The kitchen door flew open and Vic stepped into the room dramatically. "What are you all doing?" His face was uncharacteristically silent and stoic. This caused the teens to jump to attention again.

"Dad!" Colby stopped showing off the cards.

Vic cracked a smile and laughed. "I know what you're doing. I heard the whole thing from the kitchen with my new sonic-hearing device!" He held up a megaphone-shaped object with an obnoxiously large ear at the end.

"And you're not mad?" Jake winced and clenched his teeth together.

"You've got cards! Ohh, give 'em here! I'm curious!" Vic charged across the living room toward his sons and their bags of new supervillain memorabilia.

Eva sighed but continued to stay quiet while on the stairs.

"I've got all the big names. The girl at the comic store assured me." Colby started shuffling through the cards once again, showing Vic. "There's Warlock…Huntress…Madame Hex…Little Titan…"

"Wait, I know those names," Hartley spoke up. She pointed her finger in the air trying to remember. "Yeah, that Warlock guy and Madame Hex…they tried to steal Globex Tower from the Metro City skyline! Starling stopped them just in time."

Amy rolled her eyes. "Of course she did." She tried not to barf as she saw the subtle smile appear on Jake's face out of the corner of her eye.

"I suppose that makes sense," Vic said. "You've always had access to the mainstream media as a civilian, Hartley. Anything to do with the Shadow Syndicate was censored on OnyxVision."

"OnyxVision?"

"Onyx's streaming service," Amy supplied.

"Ah," Hartley nodded, a little surprised that villains have their own streaming platform.

"Here, listen to this one," Colby said, reading off one of the cards. "It says here that this villain named Nightshade once poisoned a box of donuts and sent them to the police station to avoid paying her outstanding parking tickets."

Amy snorted. "That's a good one! Another! Another!"

"Let's see," Colby shuffled through the cards. "Ah, Baron Blitz holds the record for most banks robbed in a single day…one-hundred and thirteen. Impressive."

"Meh," Amy judged.

"How about this one? Dr. Onslaught…she was this brilliant English professor but then turned evil after being denied tenure at her university."

"That'd definitely turn somebody evil," Vic mused sympathetically.

"Mr. Madden, do you know why your old boss wouldn't let you talk about these people?" Hartley asked. "Nobody seems to know."

Vic shrugged. "Nobody really does know the full story. Rumor has it though that Onyx and the leader of their group had some sort of falling out many years ago. The two groups split–Onyx and the League stayed in Centropolis while the Shadow Syndicate formed in Metro City. There's been an uneasy truce between our two organizations for years." Vic shook his head though. "And Onyx outlawed mentioning them ever since."

"And you heard how well mentioning it worked out for Stingray," Amy said flatly.

"But now we're free!" Jake threw up his hands letting some of his plastic bags fall to the floor. "We can talk about anything we want!"

"Yeah, like the row of plushy teddy bears on Jake's bed," Colby snickered.

"Leave Mr. Snuggles and Friends out of this!"

Eva finally came down the stairs. "It still makes me uncomfortable to be talking about this all willy-nilly."

"It'll be alright, Eva." Vic put a comforting arm around his wife. "Jake's right. We're not a part of the League anymore. As long as we're living on our own, their rules don't apply to us."

"I know that's true at the end of the day, but still…" She almost seemed to shiver which mostly went unnoticed except by her daughter. "...it just doesn't sit right."

Jake picked up one of the plastic bags he dropped and started digging through it noisy, taking the attention from his mother. "Ah, Amy, we got you something."

"You got me something?" Amy looked surprised.

"We got her something?" Colby looked surprised too until he saw the small plastic gift card Jake pulled out of the bag. "They gave us that for free," Colby said under his breath.

"Shut up and take the win!" Jake gritted back through his teeth. He beamed a smile at Amy. "It's a free album download from some villain band in Metro City." He looked at the card closer. "They're called DisChord."

Amy's interest perked up. She got up off the couch to take the card from Jake. "So the Shadow Syndicate has rock bands too. Huh. Guess some things are always the same no matter where you are."

"Well, hope you like it!" Jake smiled again.

Amy took the card. "Thanks. I'll listen to it later. Let me just go throw it upstairs." She ran up the stairs to put the card in her room.

Jake watched carefully until Amy was out of sight. He turned to everyone else in the room. "Want to see this year's new Havoc card?" He smiled devilishly. "They used that picture of her getting her butt kicked by Starling!"

"Oooh, let me see!" Vic held his glowing blue hand out, using his new telekinetic power to pull the card closer. "Stop it! You'll bend it!" Jake held on with his superstrength but nevertheless found himself slowly moving toward Vic. Soon, the pair abandoned their powers to wrestle the old-fashioned way.

Fascinated with his own new prize more than Jake putting their dad in a headlock, Colby continued to look over the silver-trimmed deck of villain cards. "Hmmm, I wonder what the Shadow Syndicate is doing right now." He mused to himself.