The Friend

I started thinking about the Overkills in a social scene, like at pubs or parties and wondered what type of people they'd meet other than canon characters. This would be after their reputation has been established. They'd be in the top echelon of the villain hierarchy.

They're at some kind of party, one a villain colleague threw for whatever reason.

A man approaches Herb and starts chatting with him. Or maybe someone introduces them.

He's young, handsome, muscular and broad-shouldered, dressed in a stylish suit. Kind of the country club or movie star type. Let's call him Jules. He's a real charmer. Smart, but not stuffy. Perfectly coiffed hair.

Jules has a background in science and it turns out he's an inventor, too, so he and Herb hit it off big time. As soon as Scarlet gets a whiff of where the conversation is going—all tech and scientific jargon—she heads off in search of other company lol. I imagine she likes the idea of Herb having someone with whom he can talk shop, so her leaving them alone is recognizing this need is best served by someone like Jules.

Herb and Jules converse about their work. Jules is a villain. He invents and also engages in villainous deeds—maybe infiltrating the government/military, stealing classified secrets, and either uses them for his own inventions or sells the info to the highest bidder. Kind of a two-in-one deal.

Herb and Jules hang out for the rest of the party.

A few days later, Jules contacts Herb and invites him over to his mansion/lab lair. Herb's excited and Scarlet's like, sure, have fun, honey! She's busy with planning a heist. I figure with Herb being a sociable type, he's gone to visit villain colleagues/friends in the past, so this is nothing new.

So Herb hangs out with Jules in his cool lab and they bond over shared interests. Before he knows it, the whole day has gone by.

As the days and weeks pass, they hang out more and more.

Sometimes Jules visits the Overkills and attends their parties, but mostly he and Herb go out together or run experiments in Jules' lab. Jules likes giving Herb gifts—of the scientific kind. Some of them are items he swiped from government/corporate labs.

Occasionally, they drink or smoke weed and get silly, like a couple of schoolboys. They're like two BFFs. Lots of joking around and outrageous invention fun.

Scarlet is happy for Herb, but one part of her is a wee bit jealous since Herb is now spending more time than ever outside the fortress. She's checked Jules out via her various secret contacts and no one reported anything suspicious.

Still, she doesn't have anything like a close friend apart from Herb, so she struggles a little with the emotional adjustment to him having a new pal, one that takes him away from her more than she anticipated. A pang of loneliness hits her now and then. Usually a heist is enough to quell her anxiety. But it always creeps back. She does her best to hide it from Herb, well enough that he never suspects.

When they make love, she clings to him a little more tightly, though.

Herb is mindful and has only come back home late a few times (and he always calls if he anticipates being later than usual). It's a really cool time for him and then one day Jules refuses to let Herb leave his lair.

Jules is the sly, subtle type—he'd been grooming Herb all this time. So Herb doesn't suspect anything until the moment he decides he'd better head home. He says his goodbye and heads for the door.

Jules attempts to entice him to stay. Herb, however, is missing Scarlet and wants to head back. But when he goes to leave, he discovers the lab doors are locked. Strange. He turns to Jules and is like, what gives, man? Can you let me out?