A Villain's Hero

Chapter 20 - Matteo

Despite the initial shock and unease, they spent the next few hours piecing together the evidence and putting together a file to present to the head of the Legion.

Max didn't comment on the situation and Ciara was surprisingly silent, so Matteo decided to keep quiet and get on with his work as well.

The rest of the night was spent on the Tigress and Mimic file. Max discovered that at the same time as the fake George was being recorded on the CCTV, Mimic and Tigress had a mission just thirty minutes away from the station. With this last piece of information, all three were confident that they had enough suspicious material to get the two of them called in for questioning by headquarters.

The only thing they could work on until morning was the Revenger investigation. The problem was that they hadn't found anything conclusive, even though Ciara had managed to mark all the places where he had been seen on the map. Revenger just wandered around different parts of the city, stopping at everything from private homes to banks. There was no pattern. Well, there was one for him, but they just didn't see it.

"Maybe we missed something," Matteo muttered, although he didn't believe it himself. Ciara immediately stabbed him with a look, having taken his words as a criticism of her work. "Speak for yourself."

"It's not important," Max finally spoke up, stopping their argument before it could begin.

"What do you mean?" Ciara asked before Matteo could.

"Revenger is obviously after Tigress and Mimic. If we can get them in here for questioning, I'm sure he won't miss the opportunity, whatever that means."

"You think he wants them dead?" Matteo asked.

"I doubt it." Max replied in a voice that made it clear he was more than sure of his answer. "If he wanted to kill them, he would have found them long ago. If he could find their secret hiding place and their identity, it would be a piece of cake for him."

"Sounds like his goal really is to expose the Legion's corruption," Ciara remarked, and Matteo immediately frowned. If that were the case, it would mean that Revenger wasn't really a villain at all, and that was just silly. Matteo spent a year chasing him, trying to stop him from breaking into buildings and stealing things. Everything he did screamed crime. Revenger was a criminal.

Before Matteo's thoughts could consume him, Max spoke. "Whatever his goal is, I'm sure we'll find out soon enough."

"So what now?" Matteo asked.

"Now we go to bed and put this file on the president's desk first thing in the morning." Matteo doubted he'd be able to sleep tonight with all the information he'd found plaguing his mind, but he didn't protest against Max's orders.

...

After the Legion president listened to their suspicions and promised to investigate further, Matteo thought they had won. He thought justice would finally be served and the world would return to normal. Where superheroes were good and criminals didn't look for corruption.

How wrong he was.

A few days passed, and although the President decided to summon Tigress and Mimic for questioning, no one knew where they were. They were still agents of the Legion, so no one wanted to issue a warrant for their arrest, so they were practically waiting for them to turn themselves in.

Matteo's faith in goodness had been shaken to the core lately, and so after two days of no show, he began to worry.

There was no sign of Revenger either, and after all he'd learned, he wouldn't be surprised if he tracked them down himself and took justice into his own hands. That, however, was unlikely. Why go to the trouble of pointing them in the right direction if he was going to do all the work for them?