To Find a Villain [Villain AU]

Chapter 7

Looking for an excuse to leave TAPOPS in the middle of the night was easy. They just didn't need much of a reason. There was curfew, but you can't punish people who you can't find. The streets on Skepto were littered with villains, and the civilians had locked themselves in their houses. One wrong move and their entire family might crash and burn.

At first glance, it looked like a normal busy street. But if you look closer, you could see the weaponry everyone wielded. These were no ordinary people. They were all idiotic self-proclaimed villains that can't even hijack a TAPOPS cruiser without getting caught at least twice under two minutes.

"Look! They have red carrot donuts at the refreshments!" Fang pointed to a banquet of refreshments. "Let's go get some!"

And that was how Reverse was dragged over by his boyfriend.

The meeting was in open air, so it was fortunate that it wasn't raining.

Still, the same building where they had seen their doppelgangers. Surely, they had left? If they were villains too, this will be awkward as it could get. Were they dating? Zu had mentioned another version, a third with seven brothers. How bored were his parents there?

There were more people than they expected. Most of them were warranted in small-time organizations, but ever so rarely, Reverse could see some of the potent villains that had a bounty for at least a million credits year-round. Most of them relied through spreading fear, having deep pockets or plain cruelty, there was no in between.

A few moments later, the meeting started. They gathered at a clearing seemingly like a town square. A stage was set in the very front, and there was a crowd that had gathered as the lights turned on.

"Welcome, you miserable little fucks!" Zu exclaimed on stage, holding a microphone. "It is me, the #1 Villain! Save your applause!"

Fang snorted. "How big is her head?"

"So our first topic of this meeting is regarding the matter of your idiocy!" Zu snapped. "Other than the anonymous villains who can do shit, the rest of you are fucking peons! If you want to testify my theory, get on stage and FIGHT ME LIKE A MAN!"

Nobody testified her theory. They all gritted their teeth as they listened to the #1 Villain yap nonsense.

"You! And you!" Zu pointed to multiple sickly-looking individuals. "What the hell are you doing here? You have money? You have smarts? Well, I don't care! I have all of those and you won't achieve my standards even if you sell your non-existent brain! You see that fucking star? The one you can't see? It's brighter than your fucking future!"

Reverse bit his lip. He was trying hard not to laugh. Fang blinked. This girl could really rapid-fire insults if she wanted to.

"And those of you with weapons and muscles!" Zu screeched. "You're so ugly your parents are still trying to abort you! You're so fucking weak, even a kid can beat you with his right hand tied to his back!"

"Is this a meeting or giving her a chance to make enemies?" Fang grumbled. "If it is, she's not wasting time."

"Y'all so ugly I can't even look at a toilet without seeing you shits!" Zu slammed the microphone onto the stage. She stepped on it and glared at everyone. She turned to the backstage. "YOU FUCKERS BETTER GET ME A REPLACEMENT!"

An alien the size of a dwarf panicked. He wobbled to hand her a new microphone. Zu took the microphone and kicked him off the stage.

"Back to the topic!" she trumpeted. "Here we have the rankings of the previous year! You people are so weak you can't even take down a TAPOPS cruisier!? That's the one thing that doesn't have defences! You pieces of crap need to go back to school and learn how to say your alphabets!"

The screen behind her lit up. Reverse squinted. It was a ranking board of all the Top 10 villains, with them on the list with no picture and name. Reverse was knocked back to #2, Fang was #4. Zu was, of course, the #1. He frowned. Why was Fang on number 4? Someone named Vargoba had took his place, but wasn't he a power sphere hunter?

The difference in crime levels were as great as night and day. Starting from 5, the crime rate of the villains were the lowest of the low, with the fifth and ninth having merely a 0.5 difference. In contrast to Reverse and Zu's close counts, the tenth villain was no more than a petty thief that stole jelwery from little girls. No exaggeration.

Reverse massaged his temples and muttered a few choice words under his breath. He never cared for the top spot, but if someone like Zu was going to be the new face of the new generation of villains, he's willing to make an exception. Even if one's a villain, no one has an excuse to act like that. Zu was not the top, but the lowest of the low. If it wasn't for TAPOPS's infiltration mission, he would still be number one and at least the villains' future still had some hope.

But now? Not so much. Reverse was a firm believer of skills and knowledge being power – and Zu very well has all those traits – but being an asshole kind of ruined your image. It didn't matter how powerful you are, because people will only remember your cruelty, not your true power. It causes people to look down on you. It gives people the wrong image of villains.

Zu spent the next five minutes bombing insults and dropping microphones like they were her way of expressing herself. Occasionally, there were some villains who couldn't take her insults and assaulted her on stage, but she either a) kicked their balls and sent them tumbling off stage, b) threw the microphone in their faces with force that broke their noses, or even the rare c) get shot in the balls with a laser gun.

Five minutes later, the supply of microphones was depleted. Zu kicked the dwarf off the stage for the zillionth time, and dismissed the entire meeting, but not before giving a warning for starting a riot for the coming week's VilCon celebration. If someone were to start fights or destroy any property without a reason, they would be kicked off into space, literally. She has enough physical strength to do just that.

And that was it. Reverse teleported them back to their room. After a quick shower and a change of clothes – for Reverse anyway because Fang slept shirtless – they called it a night and tried to get the ringing out of their ears, courtesy of Zu's yelling.

Even so, they were able to wake before 7. No one questioned their disappearance, and they were certain that they weren't even aware of it in the first place. The reason why nobody found out was because of Ochobot's predicament.

"What's going on?" Reverse asked as Ochobot was being scanned by other power spheres. "Is this some sort of maintenance?"

Gopal frowned. "You remember Bora-ra, right? Klamkabot said he gave Ochobot his teleportation power, but Ochobot doesn't have it, even after upgrading! Do you know where it went?"

Reverse shook his head. "No. Bora-ra and his minion was defeated and that's all."

He knew where the power had went. It's within his possession. If anyone questions it, they can go suck a lemon.

"Do you think there's a mistake within the transition?" Fang suggested falsely. "Bora-ra did interrupt it. Heck, we almost died."

Bullshit. That was as easy as fuck.

"Possibly," Klamkabot rumbled. "This energy cannot simply disappear. I suggest we return to the floating island to investigate."

Everyone nodded. The commander sent Yaya, Ying, Ochobot and Klamkabot to search for the supposed missing teleportation power. The best lie Reverse could come out with was Bora-ra stealing the power then falling to his death. And that was just a backup. If anyone asked, screw them.

As Reverse and Fang had their breakfast in the cafeteria – the food tastes like sandpaper and cardboard had an ugly baby – Fang glanced at his boyfriend and sighed.

If anything happened to him, there was no telling what Fang would do.