Love for the Cold-Blooded (36 page)

What exactly had he said? “Yeah,” he mumbled, uncertain. “It started off kinda weird with him, so. Not bad weird, just weird weird.” To think they hadn’t even gotten to the hoagie part yet, and Pat was already in over his head, explaining-wise.

The moment of awkward stretched painfully, to be broken at long last by Dad’s decisive nod. “I’d like to meet this young man.”

Pat stared at his dad in horror. He couldn’t even count the ways in which that would be a spectacularly bad idea. The only way it could possibly be worse would be if Mom were in on it, as well.

“Pretty sure they’re not at the ‘meeting the parents’ stage yet, Dad.” That was Zen — sweet, lovely Zen, Pat’s most favorite sister, forever and always. “It’s always a mistake to jump the gun there. Imagine only just having resigned yourself to going out with our little Patpat here, and then being dragged to meet his family next thing. You couldn’t blame the poor man if he ran for the hills.”

“Would not,” Pat muttered down at the tablecloth, grumpily and very quietly. He suspected only the snake — which was inspecting Pat’s dessert fork with some interest — heard him at all. Just as well, really.

“What kind of man is this, anyway?” Dad asked suspiciously. “You’re still very young, Patpat, and you know you tend to leap before you look. I just don’t want you to fall for some bounder and get your heart broken.”

Bounder? Wow, Dad had skipped being stuck in the last century to go right back to the middle ages or something. “He’s not like that,” Pat mumbled. “Seriously, he’s not boundy at all. In fact he’s freakishly serious and reliable. It’s sickening, is what it is.”

“Pat’s not that young anymore, either,” Hell jumped in unexpectedly. “He’s been looking for someone for a long time, Dad, and from what I can tell, he hasn’t made a horrible choice. I got a brief look at Pat’s friend and rather liked what I saw.”

Pat stared at her in blank incomprehension. Not that he didn’t appreciate the support, but what did she mean, she’d gotten a look at Nick? She’d never met him! Unless — oh no. No way. Surely she didn’t mean the battle in front of City Hall, where she’d led Sir Toby’s minions into the fray against Silver Paladin and Nexus.

Hell’s grin was a wicked, razor-sharp thing. “He seemed very dedicated and hard-working. Very busy, too. He rushed off after barely a moment.”

“Of course he’s busy,” Cea jumped in, an evil sparkle in her eye. “Pat’s honey is a successful entrepreneur, Dad. A real catch.”

Dad hummed noncommittally. “Let’s let Patrick speak for himself, girls. Tell me about your young man, son. What’s his name? What does he do? How did the two of you meet?”

“His name is Nick,” Pat mumbled at the crumbs of condensed cake left on his plate. The snake on the table looked at him curiously, tongue flickering as it scented the air (and probably his despair, which at least rhymed). “He just, you know. And I guess we just ran into each other, or whatever.”

“Pat made a big impression right off the bat!” Cea’s entire being seemed alight with unholy glee. “Didn’t you, Pat? Nick was really eager to meet him again. Must have done something right, Patpat.”

“One of these days you’ll have to give us a blow by blow,” said Zen, with an absolutely obscene smirk. Pat knew better than to hope she hadn’t made that pun deliberately. His sisters were evil. One and all.

“Okay, okay,” Dad said, shaking his head with a laugh. “Leave Patpat alone, girls, he’s red as a tomato. I’ve never known you to be shy, Pat, so I guess it must be serious. We’ll arrange for dinner with your… Nick once your mother arrives, alright? She’ll definitely want to meet him.”

Yeah, sure. Pat would put it on his schedule right after ‘jump off a bridge’ and/or ‘win the Bonelle prize for astrophysics’. He was beginning to suspect he should have stopped to think this whole thing through at some point.

Had Nick been any other guy — okay, had Nick been any other guy who was bright and respectable, entirely non-bounding, had a good job and treated Pat right, and who was emphatically not a hoagie… had his parents been someone other than the original Serpent Slut sidekick and Serpentissima herself… if everybody involved had been an entirely different person, in other words. Sure, then it would have been a different story, and they might all have gotten on like a house on fire. As it was, the house on fire seemed likely to be way more literal than Pat could handle.

“Uhm. He’s real busy. Like Hell said. And uhm, I’m not sure. I mean.”

“Son, if this man is important to you, then your mother and I want to meet him. If he cares about you the way he should, he’ll want to know your family, too.”

Wasn’t that a charming thought. Fuck, Pat was so screwed.

~~~~~

“M
oats are a fine thing, young Patrick, a fine thing indeed,” Sir Toby said, smiling benevolently as he put a hand on Pat’s shoulder. “If you have a castle, that is. I do not, you will notice. However, I believe that this might be a career goal to keep in mind for yourself, no?”

Sir Toby’s scheme had taken off with breakneck speed after the enforced hiatus. The Battery of Bounty had an even sillier name than the Crystal of Power, in Pat’s considered opinion — who named these things, anyway? — but it got the job done. And once the Mind Control Ray was fully operational again, Sir Toby went full speed ahead, no quarter given.

It was pretty awesome to watch the man in action. He was impressive as hell when he got going, all inexorable drive and determination, steely imperious gaze, ringing sonorous tones and ramrod-straight posture. Even the mustache suddenly made sense. There was a reason why Sir Toby was one of the most respected and feared challengers around, and this was it.

That, and the android dolphins. Because, come on.

Within a single week, the municipal government had been abolished, the entire city and environs had joined Sir Toby’s official fanclub (no joke, that was a thing), and Sir Toby had called out the independent city state of Tobyville, to great public enthusiasm. The spontaneous outbursts of celebration included dancing in the streets, flowers and streamers everywhere, and a great variety of supportive initiatives by the city’s businesses. (Happy Beans set up stands on the street, giving out free coffee and baked goods. None other than Malvolio sent Pat a friendly text inviting him to drop by for old time’s sake. If that wasn’t proof of the amazing mind-bending power of the MCR, nothing was.)

But Pat didn’t drop by any of Happy Beans’ stands. He’d quit his job, too. There was no time in Tobyville for coffee breaks. General happiness made it a lot easier to get shit done. Sir Toby and Hell were putting down the groundwork for a new and better administration… a new and better everything. Accordingly, Pat, Cat and all the other minions were rushing around like crazy, bearing memos, setting up meetings, writing protocols, visiting power plants and schools and bookshops and all kinds of places where the potential for improvement or a deficit in municipal policy or urban planning might lurk.

It was mad awesome. Pat had managed to sneak in a few vital suggestions of his own, too. The one regarding worthy bookshops had been well-received, and Sir Toby had also asked Pat to work out his proposal of a more efficient trash collection schedule into a concrete plan ready to be implemented.

Unfortunately, Sir Toby was less on board with the idea of a moat around the downtown area (in lieu of a castle). Pat felt a little disappointed in the man as a person, to be honest. Moats were the shit. “How about a pond, then?” he suggested hopefully. “With trout? We could have a half-sunken bell tower in the middle for atmosphere, and also to provide a home for bats. They’re endangered, you know. Bats, not bell towers.”

“Your future schemes will be remarkable to behold,” Sir Toby said, and turned to the next minion trying to get his attention.

Pat was holding on to the half-sunken bell tower idea, just in case. He wasn’t going to be a challenger, but urban planners needed dreams and aspirations, too.

~~~~~

S
tar Knight crashed through the City Hall’s wall in an explosion of plaster, bricks and mind-splitting noise. He landed squarely on the Mind Control Ray, the horrible shriek of tearing and breaking steel momentarily eclipsing even the deafening rumble of falling masonry outside.

Discretion was definitely the better part of valor where superpowered alien hoagies with a penchant for smashing things were concerned. Accordingly, Pat ducked into the limited shelter afforded by a solid oaken bookcase, covering his ears and as much of the rest of his head as possible with his arms. He caught a glimpse of Cat and Nessa seeking refuge beneath Sir Toby’s desk, and was momentarily relieved. At least there hadn’t been anybody in the room who was stupid enough to think that attacking Star Knight was anything but a suicidally bad idea.

When the brief shower of debris had ended, Pat risked a glance around the edge of the bookcase. Their own personal alien invader was now perching on the MCR’s ruined base, gripping the machine’s still-standing bent and twisted frame from the inside to pull it down hand over hand, as though taking down a sail. He folded the metal over his forearm as he worked, periodically pausing to compress it into a lump of misshapen metal. Black, acrid smoke rose around him, shot through by occasional showers of hissing sparks and the sullen white-orange glow of overheated steel. Pat coughed and blinked against his watering eyes, straining to see.

The Battery of Bounty popped with a bright flare of multicolored sparks, like fireworks; a sudden roll of thunder and the sharp, grassy scent of chlorophyll filled the office. On the other side of the room, Nessa gasped, the small sound weirdly audible in the echoing silence after the thunderclap.

When Star Knight was done with his work of destruction, he climbed on top of the half-molten metal lump and jumped up and down a few times, flattening it into an irregular oblong that reminded Pat of the ugly modern sculpture down by the river promenade near the opera. Hot steel and burnt plastic flavored the air so thickly Pat was almost glad of the gigantic hole in the wall, even if the air that blew in was laden with the scent of crushed concrete and something acrid and bitter. Oil and coolant ran in rivulets across the marble floor, pooling in the bootprint-shaped craters Star Knight had left.

In the space of two minutes, the hoagie had reduced Sir Toby’s glorious Mind Control Ray to a ragged, stinking, super-compressed heap of scrap.

Belatedly, Pat looked around for his dread master and found him by the door, standing rigidly upright with his arms folded in front of his chest. Sir Toby’s aristocratic features were set in a stern frown as he regarded the ruins of his ingenious device (and with it, the ruins of his entire Plan A, which hinged on Tobyville’s population being mind-whammied into giving Sir Toby a chance). His previously impeccable charcoal suit was near-white with plaster dust, as were his hair and mustache. Remarkably enough, this didn’t detract from his air of dignity.

Sir Toby clearly didn’t have any instructions for his loyal minions just now, given that he was too absorbed in watching the alien to even notice Pat’s questioning look.

The alien in question grinned at Sir Toby with grating smugness as he hopped to the ground, sinking into splintering marble and concrete up to his ankles. Typical; the man couldn’t even walk two steps without destroying something. At least he managed not to sink more than a finger’s breadth or so into the once-luxurious stone floor when he pulled his feet out of the craters, glancing indifferently around at Pat (who was glaring at him from beside the bookcase) and the two other minions (who were glaring at him from underneath the desk).

Truth be told, the man (if the term applied to an alien) was something of a disappointment. Star Knight looked way taller and more impressively muscled on TV. He also looked far more handsome on a screen. Sure, his features were just as inhumanly even and perfect in person, but his was a boring, generic kind of perfection, uninspiring and forgettable. His face seemed to have been designed to look good from a distance and in news programs, where the lack of character wasn’t so immediately apparent. Granted, his eyes did spark in an unnaturally electric shade of blue, but that was about it.

Silver Paladin is a thousand times hotter than you,
Pat thought at the hoagie viciously. He was tempted to say it out loud, to see if he could wipe the infuriatingly smug righteousness from the bastard’s face, but it would probably have sounded weird. Pat suspected minions shouldn’t be going around publicly rating the relative hotness of their superhero foes.

Whatever. It was still true.

Nothing happened for a while. It was rather anticlimactic, really; Star Knight just stood there, blinking and looking around muzzily, as though he were wondering where he was. Pat supposed it was better than the man (whatever) paying too much attention to any of them, but still.

“Yay, go me,” said the world’s most powerful hero at last, speaking into dead silence broken only by the sound of another part of the building’s facade tearing loose outside. “Good aim.”

With that, he jumped back up onto the half-molten lump of metal that had — not a minute ago — been one of the most ingenious and advanced pieces of engineering in the world. He turned in place on its flattened top several times, tromping his feet in the manner of someone trying to pat down loose soil around a recently planted tree. And then, he lay down and curled up on the mangled remains, snuggled down as though cuddling into a feather blanket, and immediately began to snore.

Nobody said anything for a long, drawn-out moment. As far as Pat was concerned there was nothing to say, except possibly “what the everloving fuck”, which seemed inappropriate in Sir Toby’s presence.

“He’s gone into the Star Sleep.” Cat emerged from under the desk and got to her feet, closely followed by Nessa. Pat kinda wanted to go over and hug her, but suspected it would have been unfitting, and might have messed with the ‘I am completely unruffled and cool in the face of crisis’ thing that she had going on. “He’s going to sleep for at least 72 hours, probably more. It’s what he does when he’s exhausted, to regenerate his Star Power. Ideally he should be out in the open under starlight, though, so I estimate this Star Sleep will take even longer than three days.”