Finding Noah had been unplanned: an unexpected but pleasant surprise. I’d taken Juliette out for a walk in the park after she killed one of the family members in one of her bouts of murderous jealousy, saying I “was always busy and we were not spending enough quality time together as a couple”. And, while we were walking around, we ran into the suicidal boy.

 

The moment I used my power on him, I knew he was prime recruit material. I’d been eating quite a bit as of late and my symbiote had grown stronger, more complex. My power raced through Noah’s mind and made me see a curated selection of the most important memories that were at the forefront of his mind, experience hours of his life in seconds. 

 

I kept my power running on him as we talked. The longer it was active, the better it got at feeding me key moments, mental weaknesses, and other critical information. These days I could keep it on multiple people permanently, so there was pretty much no downside to doing this. 

 

“So, what exactly do you want me to do?” Noah asked, “Who are you guys?” he asked next after I did not answer, “How long would I have to work for you?”  He had too many questions for a man who had been about to jump off a bridge moments ago. It was ridiculous, as if he was suddenly worried about his future all of a sudden.

 

“None of those questions matter,” and it was true. My way or the bridge were the two options available for old Noah here.

 

“What do you mean?” His confusion was evident.

 

We were similar on many levels, but he was pathetic, a quitter, and I let my contempt for him show in my eyes. “If you really wanted to win—if you were desperate enough—you’d take my offer in a heartbeat.”

 

I raised my voice and let some of the burning fury of emotions I kept inside, barely contained, seep into my words, adding power to them. “Are you really so worthless that you are going to let Caleb get one over you? That you are going to let him, a mentally ill, fat bastard, win the game? When are you going to stop letting the world do what it wants with you? You are always criticizing others and feeling sorry for your ‘bad luck’, but now that you can finally change your life for the better, you are getting cold feet.”

 

I could see my improvised speech was having an impact on his psyche. I was getting warmer.

 

I continued, putting even more fire in my words. “For once in your sad life, make the right decision and follow me. Help me and I will teach you how to be triumphant. All will know your name. All will fear and respect you. All you have to do is say you will be mine.” 

 

I had tailored my words based on what my power had given me to work with, and he bit, hook line and sinker. “I will be yours,” he said, his words a plea for help, a prayer. “Please help me.” And, just like that, I had him.

 

Damn, but I was good at speeches. You’d be hard pressed to find someone who disagreed… or at least someone who did and was still in one piece.

---

 

After I persuaded Noah, I ordered Juliette to transport him in his wheelchair. Part of being a leader was to promote the image that you were above others, above menial tasks. People would only follow someone they believed was better or more powerful than themselves.

 

Juliette almost killed Noah twice before we got to the hideout the family had found. In her mind, he had interrupted our quality time together. The only thing that had stayed her hand were my promises of romantic times later that night.

 

The hideout was located in one of the areas of Jackson that had been hit the hardest. It used to be the financial district, but now it looked like a warzone. Everyone decent had relocated to greener pastures and the homeless people, gangsters, and other undesirables had taken over. 

 

We had picked the best building in the area which had survived the battle. It was a rich, opulent penthouse. From the outside it looked perfectly fine, but the inside was a different story: dead, half eaten bodies lay scattered around like dolls a child had forgotten to put away. Some of the more demented family members had made some art pieces with them, stringing intestines into a tapestry that hung from the roof and walls, making human effigies, and painting graffiti with blood.

 

Noah did not react well to it. He’d deduced we were villains, but didn’t expect us to be utterly insane. At least he was smart enough to remain silent.

 

We made our way through the ground floor, Juliette getting annoyed at having to maneuver the wheelchair over the bodies or around them.

 

I called the elevator.

 

Juliette tapped her foot, impatient. Noah was shaking with fear: he’d finally realized who we were. Our faces had been vaguely familiar to him, but he didn’t recognize us up until this point. The gruesome display shocked his memory and made his mind race, and, finally, he remembered where he had seen our faces—the wanted posters for The Genocide 6. 

 

I did tell him I was worse than the devil.

 

The elevator arrived with a ding and the doors slid open. The three of us got in. Bones, flesh, and empty food wrappers littered the floor inside. The panel with all the buttons had dried blood on it, mostly on the close door button. 

 

I pressed the top floor.

 

While we were riding the elevator, Juliette began observing one of the crayon drawings that Barker had scribbled on one of the walls. “Awwww, isn’t this lovely!” she said pulling my arm to get my attention, “Look! Look! She drew our family! Isn’t that cute?!” 

 

It looked like some shittily-drawn stick figures to me.

 

I tore my arm away from her grasp. I hated people touching me without permission, and I particularly hated this crazy, obsessive bitch for what she did to me in the past. 

 

I felt like grabbing her throat and choking her within an inch of her life. But it would have been futile. She was the strongest speedster alive. At the moment there was nothing I could do to her, not unless she let me, and, besides, I needed her…at least for the moment—but once I’d taken care of my other enemies, she’d be next on the chopping block, and I’d get extra creative with her torture.

 

“Oh, come on, don’t be like that, honey!” she said in reaction to my dark mood. “I forgot! You know how it is: I’m a dummy and my body sometimes moves faster than my brain!”

 

I ignored her. She had deep psychological issues stemming from childhood neglect, and depriving her of attention was the best way to hurt her.

 

She began crying, “No! Please, don’t ignore me!” she begged, “Honey! Please! Don’t do this! I’m sorry!” she shrieked.

 

I might have pitied her in the past, but these days I had less pity in me than a rogue AI. Less even.

 

Noah watched all of this in silent confused terror.

 

The elevator doors opened and I stepped out.

 

With my power I could tell that she wanted to use her superspeed to turn Noah into a red paste. However, she knew, from past experience, that I’d ignore her for a longer amount of time if she tried to get back at me. 

In the end, she bit down her frustration and dutifully continued escorting him, sobbing all the while.

 

There was no door to the penthouse: some of our bigger members did not fit through the doorway, so now there was this huge hole there.

 

Even from out here, the chaos could be heard. And its source was obvious: inside the messy penthouse lay twenty four of the most savage and deranged criminals the world had ever laid eyes on. And the world had laid eyes on quite a few. One of them, a little girl, was running all over the place on all fours like a dog, barking loudly. Another, a short man with a rat-like face was raping an underage boy with gusto on the sofa. Five were fighting each other to death over what show to put on TV. Most were having fun with their spoils of war, which for the most part consisted of people unfortunate enough to cross our path, their wails and screams and moans of pleasure were a constant backdrop. 

 

All in all, they were a bad bunch. The worst of the worst. Monsters to a man—but they were my monsters.

 

I grabbed one of my throwing knives from my pocket and threw it at the small device that projected the holographic TV screen. Despite being quite far away, it landed right in the center, shattering it.

 

The five turned, enraged that someone’d robbed them of their entertainment and ready to do terrible things to them. But when they saw it’d been me, their anger turned to fear. 

 

These five: Acidface, Vorepal, Tremor Trevor, Deadalos, and Meltdown, had been around for a while and knew me well enough to be terrified. You see, these crazies, these so-called-monsters, are fond of telling people they are fearless. But, everyone with an undamaged brain, without exception, fears something. My power was good at finding those fears and I would subject them to them if they displeased me.

 

I launched into another speech. Believe me, I would love to be able to crack the planet with one punch like Paragon, but mind reading was what I had, so speeches it was, “We are all one big family here, aren’t we? And, I get it, sometimes brothers and sisters fight. That’s natural. But what are the two rules?”

 

Four of them replied obediently, meek as sheep. “Rule one: do whatever you say. Rule two: don’t kill other members of the family.” The fifth, Acidface, grit his teeth and clenched his fists. “No! I am fackin’ sick of watchin’ the fackin’ presidential debate,” he said, defiant, “or the Love Rangers, or the fackin’ Discovery Channel, or- I jus’- I jus’ wanna watch the Super Miss America beauty pageant godamit! I don’ wanna watch their stupid sherda!”

 

He had a hatred for strong, independent, beautiful women, our old Acidface. He’d be watching that pageant and dreaming of disfiguring them. 

I waited patiently for him to finish talking and then said, “Is that all you have to say for yourself?” I gave him a dark smile, full of hatred and contempt.

 

After his rant, most of the heat had left him and now he was starting to feel fear again, to regret his momentary impulsiveness. “No, I, ah. I jus’ waned to watch- I waned-”

 

“Overload,” I said to Juliette, “Null him.”

 

She went so fast that we couldn’t perceive it, but from reading her mind and Acidface’s after the fact, I knew she had injected him with the appropriate dose of Null to deactivate his powers.

 

“Nooooo!” Acidface was desperate now, wailing like a baby and begging, “Please! I’m sorry! No no no, please! I’m sorry!”

 

“Nerves!” I shouted over him. “I want you to finish the job his ex-girlfriend started and ruin the rest of his intact face! I am sure Acidface misses his old friends, sulfuric and nitric acid, so get him reacquainted with them!” As if I had remembered something I forgot, I then added, “Use your power, make it triple pain!”

 

Nerves stopped torturing whatever poor bastard had caught his fancy and walked over, grinning. The beer-bellied, heavily neon-tattooed man grabbed Acidface and began dragging him to one of the torture rooms. Acidface screamed and begged for help, clawing at the floor all the while.

 

Everyone was watching in silence now, arranged in a circle around me. Just like that, the chaos had become order.

 

I cleared my throat, “As I was saying: we are all one big family here. The rest of the world reviles us. Dreads us. Children wake up at night having nightmares, blubbering with fear about the horrible monsters and madmen of The Genocide 6-” Many in the audience began chuckling and laughing at the thought of this- “Men gnash their teeth and pray for our downfall when they see us on TV. They pray for The God himself to strike us down! But, despite all their countless prayers, despite all their heart-felt wishes…here… we… are…” I paused a moment to let that sink in, looking at each of their grinning faces, “and here we will fucking stay!” They began howling and cheering now, drumming their feet on to the floor and clapping, “But we need to work together! It’s us against the world! The family against everyone! Save your bloodlust! Save it for them! For later tonight! Because you will need every drop of it for the enemy you will be fighting in a few hours!”