Chapter 136 Villain.

Chapter 136: 136 Villain.

Khonsu gave me a shrewd, glowing look from beneath his wraps, and I tried to smile encouragingly.

I must have managed it, as he then led us up the hallway and to a seamless brushed-steel door, stopping outside of it.

"We wish to speak to you alone," Khonsu said with a pointed look at Glacia.

Glacia immediately drew herself up, the air around her dropping twenty degrees as her eyes narrowed into icy slits. "I do not obey you."

Ugh. Just one thing after another. I was starting to think I should have just skipped this whole thing, come hell or high water.

I rubbed my face, exhausted before the meeting had even started. "Glacia?" I said. "It’ll be fine. I’ll be out soon."

She plainly didn’t like it, her jaw tight, but she nodded in the end. "I... Yes, sir. I understand. I will wait right here."

"Thanks. Well?" I said to Khonsu.

He nodded and passed a massive, linen-wrapped hand over the door, making it slide seamlessly into the wall with a faint hissing sound.

Given the gravity of this summons, I was expecting a typical federal interrogation room—a huge, bolted-down metal table, a two-way mirror, and a pair of chairs deliberately made too light to be thrown around and do any real damage. But instead, it was a politely appointed, highly expensive meeting room with a massive screen on the far wall and a sleek, oval mahogany table in the middle.

It looked more like the sort of room you’d use to pitch a new tech startup than interrogate a supervillain, which was a little encouraging, but, admittedly, not a whole lot.

Sitting right at the center of the table was Mister Invincible himself. I recognized him at once.

He might hate corporate sponsorships and brand deals, but the man wouldn’t have gotten as far as he had if he didn’t know how to market himself.

He was a massive guy, incredibly top-heavy but solidly built. Thick muscles corded his arms, and he was dressed in the sleek, form-fitting cape and spandex of a true golden-age hero. A huge red ’I’ cut a line down his chest, outlined against a bright blue background. Blonde-haired, he had a heroic lantern jaw and a thick, bristly mustache—the exact kind that suggested a 70’s porn star.

"Well!" he shouted, leaping up and grinning ear to ear in a way that heavily suggested the local asylum was short a patient. "If it isn’t the amazing Polaris! Great to meet you!" he boomed, grabbing my hand and enthusiastically shaking it.

I tried not to wince as he almost pulverized the bones in my fingers with his grip. "Is it?" I said warily.

"Of course! Hahaha! But you probably don’t know me."

"Actually—"

"It’s the glasses!—"

"Oh my god." Cloudfire muttered through the fingers across his face. That alone told me this wasn’t the first time Invincible was doing this.

Mister Invincible however didn’t seen to care as he continued. "But I am indeed Rick Steele! But you know me as Mister Invincible! Long ago, I was struck by a radioactive meteor, and discovered that absolutely nothing could harm me. Want to see? Here!"

He suddenly grabbed a heavy steel tire iron from off the table and shoved it into my hand. "Wail on me with that! Crack me right over the head with it. It’ll be fun!"

I looked at the heavy piece of metal he’d just forced into my hand, then back to his eager, beaming face.

"Ricky, could we please not do this every single time with every single interview?" Mystic sighed too.

"Then how DO THEY KNOW I’M INVINCIBLE?!" His voice boomed back at them, not with anger but more of anticipation.

I answered finally as his echo died down. "Uh... no thanks. I’m good," I said, carefully handing it back to him.

"Come on. Then here!" he said, widening his stance, throwing his arms back, and pointing directly at his crotch. "Kick me in the balls! Give it a good punt! C’mon, don’t be shy! I won’t even feel it!"

I turned to the other members of The Five who had their hands raised in exasperation.

Alright, this wasn’t quite what I was expecting from the leaders of the free world.

I turned back to Khonsu, desperately searching for some rock of sanity. "So, can we start? Or..."

"Yes, it’s time to begin. Richard? Please sit down," Khonsu sighed, sounding like a tired father.

"Aw, you’re no fun. But the offer is still on the table!" Rick said with another blinding blast of a smile before he spun a chair around backwards and straddled it, resting his massive arms on the backrest as he looked at me expectantly.

"Sure," I said, taking a seat across from him.

Mister Invincible, unsurprisingly, sucked up a massive amount of oxygen and attention, so I finally looked at the other three S-listers sitting around the table.

To Rick’s left sat Cloudfire. Grey Coleman.

The guy was leaning back in his ergonomic chair, his expensive Italian leather shoes casually propped up on the mahogany table.

He was handsome, cocky, and dressed in a bespoke suit that probably cost more than my entire car.

Most blue-collar guys in my line of work hated the billionaire playboy types, but honestly? I respected the hell out of Cloudfire.

Unlike the trust-fund heroes or the ones begging Nike for sponsorships, Cloudfire had built his own empire and made his own money. He marched to the beat of his own drum, and in my book, he’d earned the right to be an arrogant prick.

Across from him was Mystic. Didn’t know her alias, and I wasn’t even sure she had one, some didn’t really care for that.

The hero was the person and the person was the hero, pretty sad if you asked me.

The sole woman on the council, she wasn’t actually sitting in her chair, but rather floating about two inches above it.

She was terrifying—a reality-warping powerhouse whose magic sat somewhere in the terrifying overlap between Doctor Strange and the Scarlet Witch.

Strangely, her glowing eyes were fixed entirely on me, studying me unsettlingly.

And then, sitting completely motionless at the far end of the table, was Cortex. Micheal Carter.

The brains of the BSA.

He was one of the only people on the planet with hyper-intelligence who hadn’t gone completely insane, turned into a megalomaniacal supervillain, or plainly offed themselves.

Super intelligence made sense in theory till you realised that the world was fucked up, and the problem was everyone and everything.

He was dressed plainly, his hands folded neatly on the table. He didn’t speak. He just sat there, staring at me with wide, unblinking eyes—heard he never blinked either.

Some people found him terrifying. I just thought he was a total weirdo. Who stares at someone without blinking for two straight minutes? Creep.

Khonsu took his place at the head of the table, looming over the proceedings.

"As you can see, Polaris, I have convened the founders," Khonsu intoned, his starry eyes sweeping the room. "Though we are missing one. Extraordinary is not permitted to sit in on this inquiry due to a direct conflict of interest."

Oh, fuck.

"Right," Khonsu continued dryly. "Seeing as the matter at hand involves his son, Golden Boy, who is currently breathing through a tube in the intensive care unit thanks to you."

I swallowed hard. Yep. There it is.

"When I informed the Council that I was bringing you in," Khonsu said, resting his hands on the table, "they insisted on attending this meeting personally. Now, if we could begin..."

"ARE YOU A VILLAIN?!" Mister Invincible suddenly shouted, violently bolting to his feet and pointing an accusatory finger right at my nose.