Chapter Text
If the museum wasn’t going to kill Grian, he was going to do it himself.
Kids were running wild, dragging their carers by the arm to see the next cool exhibit, the bathroom, or to try to convince them to buy some lollies or merchandise from the overpriced - not an opinion, simply fact, Impulse and his overpriced junk could cry about it - store downstairs.
Grian watched as another large group of them was drawn to the armour exhibit that had recently welcomed a new addition into its walls; a large iron breastplate with trimmings of gold along its edges. Archaeologists working with the museum had discovered the breastplate over a year ago in some excavated ruins out in Dogwarts near the Desert. He hadn’t personally visited the site, too occupied with work at the museum and running tests on some remains found near The Three Mounds that were discovered in what the archaeologists on the scene believed to have been an old graveyard dedicated to a village that they assume had once existed in the area - though the town itself had yet to be found.
Grian only became involved in the site at Dogwarts after receiving a call from Tango, telling him that he was needed at one of the labs near the site. He had no clue how important what he was going to see was on the trip down, it was only when he laid eyes on two figures of bone, tightly embracing one another as if they refused to be separated even in death, and the oddly shaped legs of one of the women that he realised the significance of what he was dealing with.
At that point it had been 4 years since the last superpowered individual’s remains were discovered, and if the age of the site was as the tests revealed, the satyr-like woman that Grian was shown, was the oldest superpowered individual found, dating back to 300 AD, 100 years older than the remains of a small child - with wings attached to her back and hollow enough bones as to carry her in the sky - that was formerly believed to have been one of the oldest remaining bodies of a superpowered individual in the entire country.
Of course, Grian didn’t hesitate in agreeing to the chance at being one of the few osteoarchaeologists to date the remains. And in the end their hopes proved to be true, in fact, the remains of the women were older than the remains of the town found, which not only made the faun the oldest superpowered being to be discovered, it also meant there was a chance the archaeologists hadn’t completely excavated the entirety of the town, and Grian couldn’t help but pray to the Void that she wouldn’t be the only one. He knew the archaeologists on the site were taking their time excavating each strata, carefully dissecting it piece by piece, but he couldn’t help but feel impatient at the aspect of more of them out there, more of him, scattered throughout history.
Even a year later the site was still being excavated - of course that’s mainly due to the insanely long process of renewing the permits that made Grian wince just thinking about - with only one other superpowered individual’s remains being discovered that dated to around 60 years after the death of the satyr and her partner. All of which were stored within the labs at the museum, being studied before they were set to become exhibits.
Today was the day that most of the artefacts found at the site and some others in the surrounding area were displayed, which - to Grian’s utmost displeasure - had brought a barrage of families to the museum, and where there are families, there are screaming babies, rude parents, grubby kids, and an overall cacophony of unpleasant noises.
It’s not like Grian hated it! He loved seeing the museum doing well and educating people on what actually mattered, he just hated everything to do with the people who sought out said education.
Even as he made his way over to the exhibit of the satyr and her partner - wives most likely, judging by the jewellery they had worn that was usually found buried with married couples, and the intimate pose their bodies were buried in, which they were likely put in after their death due to there being no indication of any disaster in the area or wounds on the bodies that would prove otherwise - he heard whispers from children about boring horse legs - goat legs, as was stated quite evidently on the tablet next to the exhibit-, homophobic assholes joking about the ‘woke agenda’ - Grian wasn’t even bothered to question the stupidity of that one -, and dramatic people walking past making gushy comments about love and tales of tragic deaths in one another's arms - again, people really needed to learn how to read.
People claimed they desired an education but when they see something that presents a message or helps them finally understand their world, their focus shifts, they don’t think about the significance of a queer couple from over a thousand years ago, nor about the fact that superpowered individuals were like regular people, with love lives, friends, families, a beating heart that would eventually stop, and the fact that if these people so many years ago, before any type of modern science was developed, didn’t fear these individuals, then there was surely no reason for them to fear them hundreds of years later - ok maybe Grian wasn’t particularly helping in the lack of fear aspect as Videntium but that was besides the point.
He was forced to listen to the constant yabbering of people as he walked past, sure, he was meant to take notes on the opinions of the visitors, but he really had no intentions of straining his brain enough as to try to make sense of the nonsense they were spouting.
In truth Grian would be lying if he said he hadn’t released an all too dramatic sigh of relief as he only saw one person at the exhibit of the couple - he really needed to come up with a better name for them.
Grian was perfectly fine with only interviewing one person - so long as they weren’t obnoxious - and then making his merry way back to the labs with some excuse or other about why he was too busy to have gotten more interviews which Impulse could accept whether he liked it or not.
As Grian got closer to the exhibit, the man finally came into his view. He was in a wheelchair which made it difficult for Grian to guess his height but judging by the size of the wheelchair he placed the man at a little more than 180 centimeters - having looked at dead bodies all his life really did help in guessing measurements of people, Grian mused.
The second thought he had was about the man’s hair, a dark brown that, if it was out of his ponytail, may have just barely grazed his shoulders. He wondered what was the purpose of having hair that length if you were going to put it up anyway?
Grian couldn’t see the man's face but after years of studying bodies as an archaeologist and even more years having studied the bodies of living people in combat, he could notice the little scars on his neck that snaked their way onto his jaw, and even more of them were visible of what Grian could see of his arms
It wasn’t uncommon for people to have scars these days, especially in the local area with all of the explosions that took place - all of which Grian happily blamed on Mumbo - but the way the scarred man carried himself, the alarm bells in Grian’s head couldn’t help but ring a little bit.
Of course, being the mature man he was, Grian ignored the bells and approached the man, planning to stand next to him, ask for a quick and easy interview, then make his escape. But when he finally got a glance at the man’s face, lips parted in concentration, and deep green chrysoprase eyes sparkled as he looked back and forth between the tablet next to the women and their bodies, Grian couldn’t help but halt in his attempts.
He seemed… entranced by them. The man looked as if he were attempting to get any part of their story, take photos of it, and practically staple it to his brain.
There had always been visitors who had stared at exhibits in similar ways, yet the way that the man seemed wholly enchanted by the exhibit stopped any thoughts of an interview from surfacing in Grian’s head.
He wanted to know what the man saw, what he thought, what he felt. Yet he couldn’t bring himself to move his lips, all he could do as he finally came to stand still to the side of the man was watch him from the corner of his eye as his focus didn’t seem to break in the slightest as the newcomer arrived.
Grian wasn’t sure how long the two sat there in silence. It wasn’t very often the man got the chance to relax, be it due to his tasks at the museum or his other life outside of being the man people knew as Grian. He hadn’t even had the chance to simply look at the remains of the women without a paper and pen, a computer, or some tool that even after ten years in archaeology he could not name.
He had fought so hard to get them shown to the world, and even harder to keep them in one another's arms in the museum, yet he had never truly beheld the fruits of his labour. Maybe it was time for a break, maybe it wasn’t and Grian simply needed to blow something up. Neither mattered, for in that moment, Grian and a stranger saw the same women, the same love, and maybe, just maybe, even the same story.
The weight of the explosives on Grian’s person was a welcome feeling. The stuffy mask and cloak? Not so much. It wasn’t like he could complain, no, really, he couldn’t complain, because every time he even dared to utter a single negative word against the constricting design of his Videntium outfit he would wake up strapped to his bed as it hung from the ceiling.
Of course, he knew the reason behind the clothing he and the other Villies had to wear. Unlike the heroes who had protection and loyal fans who would pounce on anyone who would try to find out their identity from under their - frankly pathetic - costumes, the Villies were, notably, not as well received by the public - which Grian thought was absolutely stupid mind you, who wouldn’t love such a charming group of scallywags here and there?
Just because it was practical to an extent didn’t mean he wasn’t flapping his wings every two seconds trying to get them to adjust to the gaps in his cloak that were meant to allow his wings some breathing room. Unfortunately he hadn’t yet gotten the chance to adjust to this new cloak after the one he had finally gotten comfortable in had caught fire in an unfortunate series of events that were absolutely not his fault - no matter how many times Morbus reminded him it was his lighter that did it.
Grian could feel Lunatum’s eyes boring into him after every single flap and shake, she would probably tie them up next if she was ever in the mood to abuse her friends for the nth time.
He wondered if he could bribe Morbus enough to distract their friend whilst he found a place to hide - maybe running away would be a smarter option? A very serious point he would have to consider at a later date.
Though, Grian doubted Morbus would deprive Lunatum the chance to torture their - significantly more attractive, intelligent, and all around wonderful - friend.
Absolute sadists.
Grian sighed, turning his head to finally look at the woman who was melting the hood of his cloak with her stink eye. He couldn’t even see her face from underneath the creepy full face mask she wore, but he knew the exact look she was sending him, after having been on the receiving end of it since they were much younger when Grian would stumble into her infirmary for the millionth time that week.
Morbus must have realised too as he heard a horribly unsubtle snort coming from behind her mask that she tried, and failed, to cover with a cough.
He watched as Lunatum’s shoulders dropped slightly, and a long suffering sigh could be heard from beneath her mask. She turned to Morbus, who had her entire body angled away from the other two Villies - which did absolutely nothing to hide the shaking of her shoulder - and shook her head.
Noticing the stare, Morbus tilted her head to look up at the top of the building they were in the alley of and directed the conversation to anywhere but the smile that was most definitely still underneath her mask.
“So… what are we going to do?”
Grian raised an eyebrow at her, not caring if she couldn’t see it, “What we’ve been planning to do for months? Blow it up, make a show of it, then run before we have to deal with any of those poorly dressed buffoons."
Morbus sighed, a long, dramatic, long suffering sigh, that made Grian question whether he was losing his mind and had come up with an entirely new, nonexistent, plan, that he hadn’t bothered to tell to the other Villies. To be honest it wouldn’t be the first time.
“No, V, what I meant to say was, what are we doing in regards to the camera thing?” She waved her hands in a gesture that Grian assumed was her dismissing his stupidity, “I know we have a set of security and street cameras we plan to be caught on, but what are we planning to actually do when on camera?”
The three were silent for a moment. All three of the city's most feared villains, sat in a wet, dusty - and all around disgusting - alley, with no clue what poses they wanted to strike as they were caught after exploding a building.
Ok, the plan sounded down right stupid if you thought about it like that, but they had their reasons! If the people of the city didn’t know they were the most fearsome, powerful, and coolest villains to, frankly, ever exist, there would be no point to anything they had done. How would it be possible to instill fear if there weren’t clips of you doing backflips off of a burning building all over the internet every once in a while?
Lunatum hummed in mock-consideration, “It’s got to be intimidating, maybe we could like, I don't know, blow stuff up? Like we had always planned to do?”
Grian groaned, “But that’s so boring! Why can’t we do something cool for once, like flip off the building, make some graffiti cursing the Rejects and their entire bloodlines, then disappear into a cloud of smoke?”
Lunatum threw her arms up in the air and began to walk on the side of the building - an absolute child -, “Void forbid one of us has a good and mature idea for once.”
He turned his head to Morbus as she snorted, “What are you, V, twelve?” No, but apparently Lunatum was judging by her reaction to a half intelligent idea.
Grian responded maturely by sticking out his tongue, not caring if she could see it.
She seemed to understand the gesture anyway if the way she dismissively shook her head was any indication. “How about we just do whatever we think is best in the moment.”
“Whatever Videntium thinks is best is probably going to involve us all getting killed.” Lunatum said, standing on the wall a little above their heads.
Grian grabbed her by the arm and pulled her off of the side of the building.
He heard her cursing him out as he began to walk down the alley. He, the mature man he was, ignored it in favour of humming a random tune he had heard in the museum's speaker system that day.
There was a slight scuffling from behind him, which he recognised as Morbus likely attempting to get Lunatum off of the ground. Grian reminded himself not to start laughing at the unruly string of curses he heard from Lunatum as she kept slipping on the wet floor of the alleyway.
It was her fault for not designing non-slip shoes.
He heard Morbus heave a dramatic sigh as it sounded like she finally managed to lift their colleague to her feet.
Unfortunately, Grian forgot to expect the chance of projectiles being thrown from a woman who had just spent more than enough time on the ground, and received a dull thunk to the back of the head.
Unimpressed, he turned around to look at Lunatum, who had her arms crossed and an all too proud look about herself if you asked him. He considered the possible ways he could harm his now certainly former ally before a hand grabbed his arm and tugged him further down the alley. He hadn’t even noticed Morbus’s approach, likely a mix of him being too focused on plans for murder and her unnerving ability to be eerily quiet wherever she went.
Grian released a too loud sigh, ignoring their obvious need for silence. He didn’t let himself worry though, it was late enough for everyone to be asleep and even if some insane person was up that late - no the Villies didn’t count, they were well known for their sanity - then it was likely they weren’t going to question it, knowing the strange heroes and villains that wandered the streets - or any other random person who deemed it normal to walk the streets at night and make obnoxious amounts of noise.
As soon as the sigh had left his lips a hand collided with the back of his head, right where the rock had hit him.
He yelped in shock and absolutely not due to the pain of her hit. Lunatum snorted as he stared at Morbus with every regret he had ever held after meeting her sitting on the tip of his tongue.
She didn’t bother staying around long enough before she grabbed her grappling hook and launched herself onto the top of the building.
Usually Grian or Lunatum would carry her around places, especially since the grappling hook always made a bit of noise but it was evident she was feeling too tired of the antics of the two and had no intentions of waiting for them to grow up just so she could reach the top of the building.
He heard Lunatum guffaw from her solid place on the ground behind him, obviously not expecting Morbus to dismiss not just Grian. He allowed a shit-eating grin to spread upon his lips - for once thankful that there was a mask on face - and allowed his wings to carry him to the top of the building.
The building was by no means large compared to other apartment complexes in the area but he made sure to go even faster than necessary so as to avoid the curious gazes of any person who may be looking out of their window at the time. Grian made sure to keep his eyes on the windows just in case he had to make a swift escape, even one bystander could have ruined their entire plan.
Thankfully it wasn’t long before he reached the roof and it took him even less effort to spot Morbus sitting on the ground with an array of explosives and a couple of weapons spread out in front of her. Grian’s eye caught on her cutlass, her prized sword in close combat that held engravings of roses and vines on the handle. He remembered one day in his loungeroom as he watched TV and the name “pestis gladio” coming from some random old lady and how afterwards it seemed to have just stuck. Much like most of their villain names he supposed.
His sword was not with him as he knew it too much of a bother to carry, he much preferred the use of explosives or a bow and arrow, that latter also sat in The Lighthouse beside his scimitar.
“Where are the timed explosives?” He asked Morbus as he heard Lunatum begin to reach the top of the building.
He watched as her head slowly raised to meet his, uneasiness radiating from the small slits on her mask. “I thought you said you would pack them? If you are about to tell me you don’t have some of the most important pieces of this mission, I will wring your neck and feed your body to worms.” Her tone was rising drastically with each word and Grian couldn’t help but snort at the shock and anger that was radiating off of her.
A sharp slap hit the back of his head did nothing but make the man laugh in ernest.
“Lunatum, I beg of you to hold me back lest I beat our former friend to death.”
His giggles started to quieten down a little. He couldn’t even understand why he was laughing at such a silly off-handed joke in the first place. Maybe it was just because he could practically envision the look Morbus had beneath her mask that amused him so much.
“Wrong person to ask, M, I was just about to beg you to do the same thing.”
His laughter had finished up at that point but had begun anew when a light shove threw him off the side of the roof.
He expected the shove and already had his wings extended as he dropped off of the building. His giggles started to patter out as he sat in the air, all too aware of how loud he was being and trying to calm down enough so they could finally begin blowing things up.
Lunatum and Morbus were watching him with a mix of mild amusement and disapproval as he finally calmed down and landed on the roof, his breathing still a bit unsteady and his face a little bit hot.
He grinned at the women - uncaring if they could see it or not - and sat down in front of Morbus’s array of weaponry and explosives and began to joyfully take out his explosives and lay them out as well.
Carefully he distributed the explosives with 3 timed explosives going to each of them and a handful of instant ones being put into each pile. His actions reminded him of some kids at the museum he had seen a couple of weeks ago carefully handing out lollies to ensure all of them receive the same amount.
Explosives were much better than gummy bears in his humble, 30 year old opinion.
Lunatum didn’t sit down with Morbus and Grian and instead walked along the side of the roof as she looked out at the surrounding buildings.
They all knew what the building looked like and where it was located from their current location but they preferred to be sure rather than not.
Pearl always liked to scout ahead, it was something Grian had realised back when they first started working together. She liked being sure. Pearl was as precise as they came and even when she wasn’t back on the field all those years ago, she always had supplies prepared for whenever they would come back from missions. He could still remember hobbling into the infirmary to see her already prepared in a way that made young Grian believe that she was psychic. Fifteen years later he had come to the realisation she was just smart.
Grian separated his attention between her, his surroundings, and the distribution of their explosives. Even on a random rooftop dangers were always a possibility, even an open window or a security camera they hadn’t accounted for, were all things that could ruin them just because one unseen eye had seen more than it should have. And if The Watchers were always going to watch them, Grian would make sure he was always watching back - or blinding them, blindness definitely worked.
Quiet footsteps shifted his focus more onto Lunatum as she approached the pair. “Found it.” She said before plopping down next to Grian, disregarding the placement of her pile in favour of playing with his longer cloak.
“Right spot?” Morbus asked, not taking her eyes off of the explosives and her weapons.
Lunatum hummed affirmatively before looking at the piles. “Are all the locations still the same, V?”
Grian thought to himself for a moment, trying to recall if there had been any changes or updates to the plan before nodding, “Yeah, hopefully most of the timed ones will be close enough to the others so as to cause a chain reaction without our interference.”
With that he dusted his hands and placed the explosives that sat in his pile into his cloak. The other two followed suit, with the addition of their fancy little weapons.
“Nice to know that all of this is riding on whether we place a bomb not a centremetre away from its mark, no pressure at all.” Morbus remarked with a scoff that Grian grinned at.
He didn’t see the need to reply, for where’s the fun in comforting his friends? Instead he rose from his spot on the roof and reached out a hand to Morbus, who accepted it with a dejected sigh, before launching off of the rooftop with his friend in tow.
It was only a few moments later that they reached the outside of the building. The three of them knew better than to enter, lest the alarms that The Watchers had most definitely placed be tripped.
That was one of the few things that the Villies hadn’t managed to get complete information on. It had taken them so long to just find the location of the apartment building that acted as one of the safehouses for The Watchers and their heroes, the fact that they had gotten coordinates was impressive enough. Unfortunately, Pearl and Mumbo had too much free time on their hands - free time that had originally come from the time any sane person would save to sleep - and they had managed to get their hands on a floor plan and some knowledge on the security systems used in the safe house.
The three of them quietly revised their plan and Morbus and Lunatum made their entrance into the building, disengaging the alarms as they went with the assistance of Mumbo’s tech. He didn’t doubt Mumbo’s capabilities but his hair still stood on end as he watched the pair make their first few steps into the building. Grian was relieved to see his friends' heads not-exploded once they finally entered.
Unlike his friends, who were sent into the building to deactivate the security systems and begin placing explosives, Grian made his way to the street in front of the building. Carefully he removed a timed explosive from his cloak and set it on the side walk in front of the apartments.
The explosive would be the first to set off the chain of reactions towards the front of the building and would likely be what would cause attention to be directed towards the apartments, be it from neighbours or security cameras. Attention was what they needed, he didn’t doubt the Watchers eyes were always on them, he just wanted all of their focus.
Grian doubted any lives would be taken because of any of the explosions but if some idiot were curious enough as to approach the apartments in the dead of night due to any noises they would hear inside a supposedly abandoned building, then their death would be their fault and Grian would absolutely have the right to wipe his hands of the whole thing. If anything it might bring more attention to the Villies, and Grian would be lying if his cheeks didn’t begin to hurt at the idea.
After ensuring the area was secure he placed the timed bomb and activated its timer, ensuring that it would explode at the planned time, giving Grian and the rest of the Villies enough time to rig the building and hopefully escape.
With that he continued to place one more explosive at the front of the building - hopefully enough to explode the entrance and the path leading up to the apartments - before walking into the apartments and copying Lunatum and Morbus in rigging the entire building as the three of them avoided and disabled any security systems they found along the way - they may have stolen some supplies left by The Watchers here and there but who would really notice?
To his utmost surprise, placing TNT in an entire apartment building was actually quite an easy feat. He knew Morbus was being silly when she said he was an absolute moron for suggesting they blow up a whole building. Grian had never looked forward to the end of a mission as much as he was at that moment, just so he could laugh in her face.
Movement outside of the broken window of the third story distracted him from thoughts of any eventual bragging rights. A cruel grin spread across Grian’s face as he leaned against the wall beside the window and he watched a mindless fool walk along the footpath leading up to the front of the building.
Grian checked his mental clock, noting how soon it would be for the explosion to go off and almost giggled with glee as he realised how slowly the person was moving. How unfortunate it would be for some silly person to realise if they were just the slightest bit faster, then they may not have their limbs thrown across the street. Though he did feel quite a bit of pity towards the poor individuals who would have to clean it up later - he wasn’t entirely evil after all.
He wasn’t particularly in the mood to watch some random individual on the street get blown up and was mere seconds from looking away before he noticed something. He noticed a cane, and long brown hair in a familiar ponytail.
He was surprised at how quickly air could be stolen from his lungs as he recognised the man from the museum. Grian didn’t even think as he stepped onto the windowsill, ignoring the confused shouts of his evacuating teammates and leapt from the building, spreading his wings out wide behind his back as he dove for the man.
Said man seemed to notice the figure in a black cloak and wide wings approaching at mach 5 speeds and froze. For that, Grian was thankful as it was much easier to catch a still target rather than a moving one. He quickly swept up the man and moved him to an alleyway beside the apartment across the street.
It was as damp as the one he had been in earlier with Morbus and Lunatum and smelled even worse. He wondered if he was doing the neighbourhood a favour by blowing up a part of the area.
The man’s heavy, panicked breaths reverberated in his ears as Grian set him down on the ground, understanding the fear a person would feel after getting snatched from a random, well-known villain on the street.
He could already hear the questions from Lunatum and Morbus at his sudden disappearance but at that moment he could only concern himself with the man sat in front of him.
“Stay here. If you want to leave, wait for the heroes to arrive. If they ask you why you were here, tell them that you saw the first explosion and managed to hide in this alley before the Villies saw you.” Grian was thankful for the automatic voice changer in his mask, even though he and the man had never talked he was still scared that he would somehow recognise Grian even under a cloak and mask.
He finally looked at the man’s face and even in the dark of the alley he could see his wide, green eyes staring at Grian, snapping from his outfit, to his wings and the unnerving eye pattern that was on them, to his full-face, but to his surprise, never to the building behind him. Grian watched as the scar near the man's mouth seemed to stretch as he opened and closed it like a fish.
Grian catalogued the features of the man in the dark, drinking them in in a whole new light before he realised he was staring and rose from his kneeling position on the ground in front of the man.
He couldn’t waste any more time, the building was about to explode and as much as the Villies needed to be seen it was too much of a risk for them to be caught. Grian had already fucked up too much by saving some random man off of the street from his own stupidity.
Grian knew better than to question himself. If he did then he would question his mission, his morals, all of it. Saving one life didn’t mean he would save any more. The man was simply lucky that Grian had seen him appreciating history a few days before. That was all it was, pure luck.
With a final look he nodded to the man before zipping back to the building as the explosions began to go off. Already erasing the interaction from his mind.
The light of the television was the only light in his loungeroom.
Maui was sat at his feet and Pearl was on the cushion at the end of the L-shaped lounge, both of which were still asleep from the early wake-up and hadn’t fully registered that the sun was up - even though they were more than happy to keep him awake for the entire early morning after his return for the simplest of things. Spoilt rotten things they were.
Grian wished he could have slept in, just so he would have more energy for work later that day, but had woken up to spam calls from Gem and Pearl telling him to “move his lazy ass” and turn on the television to see them on the news.
So there he was, eyes barely open as he listened to the newscaster who had a name he wasn’t bothered to remember. The woman was talking about weather or whatever the Nether the news station needed to discuss at 5 am. To be honest he wasn’t paying much attention, he was much more occupied keeping his eyes open.
It was mere seconds and mere luck that just before his eyes were about to give up on him, a familiar backdrop caught his eye. The exploded remains of the apartment building sat behind a new reporter. Grian sprang up to grab his remote off of the coffee table as he noticed the speed at which the blond man was speaking.
Grian cursed as he hit his knee against the table before finally getting ahold of the remote and turning up the televisions volume. He was sure that was going to be a pain to deal with later.
He kept his group chat with the Villies open in his other hand as he sat on the edge of his lounge, refusing to let his eyes leave the television.
“Last night, a building on this very street was defiled by villainous hands. Video evidence shows a group many know as ‘The Villies’ fleeing from the scene after a series of explosions neighbours of the building had heard coming from these apartments.”
The scene shifted to an elderly, thin woman with short blonde hair cropped close to her head with a microphone close to her face. “You should have heard it! Good gracious, almost gave me a heart attack, my wife was lucky enough to sleep through it but I was the unfortunate one who had to call the police!”
A person off screen, Grian recognised as the blond man who was seen earlier, began to speak, “How do you feel after seeing firsthand the damage these villains are capable of?”
The woman shook her head with a scowl, “It is absolutely disgraceful that these monsters are able to walk the streets each night and wreak havoc upon the city. The heroes should be doing something about it, like those boy band fellas! The ones in the revealing clothing that all those young people swoon over!”
A notification pinged on Grian’s phone and he snorted at the messages.
‘PearlJam: Wow no swooning over the villains that are as covered up as nuns? What is this world coming to
Rock: Boybands with no sleeves apparently’
Grian reacted to the message with a quick laughing emoji before turning back to the television which had begun showing photos of the scene. It was all the basic post crime photos he had seen a million times in the past few years as a villain.
He still leant forward a bit in his seat as he examined each photo, analysing the remains, making sure there was nothing of note that would help any heroes or other crime fighting weirdos figure out the identities of the three villains, and ensuring that every single piece of the damned building was in smithereens.
A cruel grin split his face, causing a deep ache in his cheeks, but he couldn’t care less as he saw the remains of the beloved safe house of The Watchers. It was only the third one the Villies had managed to find and the second they had gotten the chance to destroy. But it was one out of what they suspected to be hundreds spread throughout the city and neighbouring ones.
The grin on his face widened tenfold as he began to calculate the amount of explosives he would get to set off in the next few years.
Grian’s phone kept pinging but he ignored it. He didn’t want to miss a second of their 15 seconds of fame for the third time in the past two weeks
The segment lasted for only five minutes but Grian couldn’t care less, in truth he was only annoyed by the small snapshot of the security camera footage of their escape rather than the actual video that included his very talented air tricks and some more tiny, less dangerous, explosions.
Amateurs, truly.
He sighed and leaned back into the cushions of the lounge, the smile on his face still faintly there, he doubted it would leave until he got to work, where it would undoubtedly drop to the pits of the Nether.
Grian reached for his remote, motioning to turn the television off so he could feed the cats and get ready for work but just as the segment was ending something caught his eye.
It’s in the corner of the screen Grian saw it; graffito of a purple, haphazardly drawn eye with the words, “Vident Malum”, he frowned as the translations began to register in his mind as he continued to stare at it in the background as the man wrapped up his segment. It was shit Latin and was just two Latin words mixed together in a way that Grian was unsure even worked in that context. Yet even as the screen jumped to an ad break, Grian's eyes never left the spot where the eye once was on his screen. He knew what it meant.
The graffito wasn’t there the day before. It wasn’t even there as they were running from the exploding building. It was fresh.
A chill ran up his back at the possibility that they could know. That they were still watching. That even over ten years later he couldn’t escape.