man, that’s rough,” he chuckled, glancing around my shattered house. “I guess no subletting this one. But don’t worry; the walls in San Quentin are a bit sturdier.”
I rushed him, but he was quicker. My fingertips almost latched onto his cape as he flipped over me and flung a powerful charge of wind that heaved me out of the house through the damaged balcony, and down the rocky Malibu hill. I crashed down the cliff through rock, brush and dirt, bouncing a half dozen times until I came to rest on the soft sands of the beach two hundred feet below my home.
Bruised and battered, I came to my unsteady feet and looked up, half-expecting the next bolt of lightning from Atmosphero, but he hovered over my home looking down at me. Maybe he was surprised I was still on my feet, or perhaps he was unsure what to do next, but he got an idea fast.
Atmosphero summoned up his storm powers with a wide cast of his hands, a tornado formed beneath and around my house, a great howl of wind and sand that ripped the structure from its foundation, piping and wooden struts and lifted the whole thing into the air.
Then he hurled it at me.
It came so fast, a whole house hurling headlong at me, that I had no way to avoid it, nowhere to go. I could only chortle before the house crushed me. The sheer weight of the tons of concrete and masonry forced me down, collapsing atop me and burying me deep in the sand. The crashing sound was deafening, a disharmonious mix of exploding wood, shattering glass and twisting metal. But I lived, and started to dig myself out.
Atmosphero helped, noticing the movement in the wreckage and wanting to finish me once and for all. He lifted a whole wall section off me, casting it aside. Still stuck under some of the structure, I could see him floating above; feel the rush of his wind powers lifting whole pieces of the devastated house.
Above me lay the bent and twisted remains of the garage door, and when he flung it away, I struck, hurling one of the destroyed refrigerators at him (though how the fridge ended up in what was essentially my garage, I’ll never know).
It caught him by surprise, slamming into his chest and knocking him over, pinning him long enough for me to reach him. I picked up the fridge and lifted it off his stunned and bloodied form; his eyes were filled with a mixture of rage and fear.
“Hey asshole,” I said, “Thanks for fucking up my house. Now I’m going to fuck up your face,” I said and slammed the heavy fridge down with my full strength back on him. I lifted it and pounded him once more with the shattered fridge, pulverizing the wobbly aluminum and plastic frame. Now it was my turn to rip through pieces of metal to get to him. And his turn to surprise me.
Atmosphero whipped back the remains of the refrigerator into me with his wind powers, sending me reeling a few paces. At the same time, he came to his feet and summoned a vortex of wind that spun around us, whipping up shreds and pieces of the destroyed home like a wall of metallic and wooden death.
“Time for you to learn a valuable lesson,” he said, spitting blood. Atmosphero slugged me across the face with more strength than I had imagined he had, but this was what I wanted: a standup fight.
The only problem was my body didn’t cooperate. My arms were heavy and useless, pinned to my sides and I stood there, semi-paralyzed, as he powered fist after fist into my face. I couldn’t do anything, couldn’t focus my thoughts. I could barely stand. He unleashed his full fury and the pain of each blow was intense. I staggered backwards a few steps then fell down on to my knees, receiving more and more punishment, blow after pummeling blow.
The rub is he’d get away with it because he was the hero and I was a scumbag villain.
Chapter 1
For almost two years Atmosphero had been tracking me down, following my every move. I must have made a mistake, or maybe he was casing the regular villain hang out joints, then followed me home.
Takes a special guy to motivate someone to spend so much time after you, takes a guy like me, and it might be because the first time we met, I