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Still, it wasn’t as though I lacked the necessary materials to carry out the operation. I have a veritable army of synthadroids-synthetic androids, to the laity-stored on the bottommost level of this underground lair, so activating one was a simple as pressing a button. Most of my artificial henchmen lack features, because more than a decade ago I discovered that the sight of faceless warriors precision marching down a street will do more to incite panic among civilians than roving bands of thugs wearing helmets fitted with Plexiglas visors. A hundred or so of my mechanized legion, however, were constructed with features that matched my own: stunt doubles, as it were, who stood in for me when it became apparent that faking my own death was the only option left available if I wanted to ensure my escape from a particularly sticky situation. A suicidal leap from a cooling tower into the heart of a nuclear reactor; vaporized in the explosion that ripped apart my base in Antigua; chewed up by tentacled, interdimensional creatures from a parallel universe-synthadroids provided me with countless ways to cheat death and avoid capture. And not only were they relatively inexpensive to manufacture (one of the many advantages of outsourcing jobs to southeast Asia), but they were biodegradable as well. Ten minutes after their “deaths,” the androids would either dissolve or turn to dust, leaving behind no trace of evidence that might have proven to my enemies that I still lived… although I’m fairly certain they knew, anyway. As the saying used to go in my line of work, “Just because you saw them die doesn’t mean they’re really dead.”
I did manage to keep them guessing more times than not, however, and that was due to the lifelike actions of my stand-ins: they mimicked my physical characteristics so well that even Elsinore could be fooled into thinking she was talking to me and not a mechanical fabrication. Yet in a way she was talking to me, through the aid of one of my more inspired creations: the Psychelmet™. By putting on this device (which, I’m sad to say, looked not unlike an overturned colander with wires and jumper cables attached to it), I could transfer-or upload, to use the more accurate terminology-my consciousness into the synthadroid’s computerized brain, and direct its actions from a distance of up to five miles. Usually, that meant I was nowhere in the immediate vicinity of whatever final confrontation was about to take place with my opponent, but through my body double I could still experience the pleasure of beating some costumed cretin to a bloody pulp without actually having to be there. And when the odds eventually turned in my enemy’s favor, as so often they did… well, all I needed to do was withdraw my consciousness from the android at the last possible second, and let the hero (or heroine) dispose of my now-lifeless doppelganger in some typically dramatic fashion-unwittingly, of course.
So I had the means to deliver my message of retribution to the world. Now all that was needed was a way to ensure it would be heard… and understood. But I’d already settled on a solution to that minor intellectual challenge an hour before I convened with my lieutenants.
A decade ago, a series of experiments I was conducting with wormhole technology resulted in the weakening of the vibratory barriers that separate this world from its counterpart in a neighboring dimension: a parallel Earth. It exists temporally out of sync with mine, just seconds apart-a hairs-breadth in distance on a cosmic scale. As the years passed and I was able to stabilize the wormhole to permit travel through the barriers, I learned there were other Earths, in other dimensions-an almost infinite number of them, in fact. And on none of the parallel worlds to which I made excursions did I find a single superpowered man or woman. To say I was shocked would be accurate; to say I was delighted by this revelation would be an understatement. That’s not to say there are no dimensions brimming over with costumed lunatics; I’m almost certain there must be, somewhere. It’s just that I saw no evidence of spandex-wearing simpletons on the Earths I visited.
On one such alternate-not the one inhabited by the tentacled monstrosities that devoured my synthadroid stand-in, thankfully-I learned of a powerful explosive invented by my counterpart, an acclaimed scientist praised for his humanitarian work and idolized by the world at large.
I killed him, naturally. Put a large caliber bullet through that much-loved brain of his, and stabbed him in both eyes.
As I may have mentioned before, feelings of inadequacy tend to bother me a great deal.
My late dimensional brother christened his explosive “hellfire” because of the intense heat and flames produced when the mixture was detonated-in poetic terms, it provided a brief glimpse into what “hell on Earth” might be like on a small scale. Or so he believed. As it turned out, he’d never actually put his wondrous discovery to use, although he had submitted a patent for “ Plum ’s Controlled” something (it looked like “Detonation”-his handwriting was atrocious) “Compound.” According to his notes, he wasn’t certain of what might happen if the mixture were set off or even whether the explosion could really be controlled, but had no intention of finding out. Like Alfred Nobel, who was condemned for his invention, dynamite (and who then used the vast fortune he amassed from sales of the explosive to establish the prizes he named after himself, so the world might think better of him-the fool), Other-Plum was concerned more with his legacy than with demonstrating to his scientific peers that his was the greatest intellect.
And you wonder why I killed him.
Unlike my altiverse twin, I wasn’t the sort who trifled in making busywork for myself that no one would ever see. And if he was too timid to make use of Plum ’s Explosive Compound, I wasn’t. Based on his notes-some words of which I had to guess at, that bad handwriting of his again-and my computer simulations, it appeared that a two-pound charge of this “hellfire” was sufficient for the task I’d set.
The charge was shaped and fitted into the chest of the Plum synthadroid. All that remained was for me to make my dramatic reappearance.
I chose a bench at the southeast corner of Cor-man Park as the location from which to stage my comeback, situated as it was at a large intersection close to the financial district. The spot was also directly across the street from the criminal courts building, home to the multitude of prosecutors and judges I had come to know-and despise-so well over the decades.
An unmarked white van, driven by one of my underlings, delivered the android to the target. Then I slipped on the Psychelmet™, slipped into the robot’s mind, and stepped out to greet my adoring public.
The panic that ensued was glorious and, unfortunately, as short-lived as it had ever been. Because within two minutes of my appearance, the Devil chose to confront me, as he had so many times in the past.
DeviHawk, I mean, not Lucifer… although an appearance by the Prince of Lies would have been a welcomed change after enduring so many encounters with the heroically-garbed pissant who play-acted at being him.
I never understood the Hawk-his motives, that is. Why a grown man would choose to dress in gaudy red spandex and black leather, glue a tiny pair of horns to his temples, and parade around in public beating up people could probably be better explained by a mental health care professional. I’d always been too preoccupied with killing him to give it any real consideration.
He swooped down from the noonday sky on red glider wings that were attached to his gauntlets, and landed a few feet away. Keeping his distance, naturally.
“Hey, Prof,” he said casually, knowing full well how much I hated being called that. “Finally decided it was time to crawl out from under your rock?”