Page 203 of Villainous Intent

The dark clouds outside my window thickened and swirled, pulling my attention away from the revelation that had momentarily cleared my mind. I tried to latch on to the thought, Cipher, a Trueborn, but it began slipping away as my mind tugged me back toward that hazy, disconnected state.

No. I needed to hold on to this. This was important.

I forced myself to look away from the hypnotic dance of the clouds, focusing instead on the institutional beige wall opposite my bed. A Trueborn Super. Hiding in plain sight. Pretending to be something else.

I can’t be here. I can’t explain to them⁠—

Cipher hadn’t finished the thought, but now, the words made more sense. He was alive when he clearly shouldn’t have been. He had killed a Trueborn Super when his suit wasn’t functioning, when it couldn’t possibly have “enhanced” his manufactured abilities. Then he had flown. Flight wasn’t in his registered power set, he needed his suit.

I had a duty to report him immediately. Trueborn Supers were strictly regulated for a reason. They were required to register, to take the dampening serum, to submit to monitoring. Cipher had deliberately circumvented all of that, breaking one of the most fundamental laws.

I should call Havoc back. I should contact the Council. I should⁠—

I didn’t reach for the call button.

Instead, I watched the storm clouds gather, feeling an odd kinship with their gathering darkness. The knowledge I now possessed was power—power I wasn’t ready to relinquish just yet.

Was I protecting him? The thought made me laugh, though it came out as more of a strained wheeze. After everything, was I actually considering shielding Cipher from the consequences of his deception? Or was I simply waiting for the perfect moment, when revealing his secret would cause the most damage?

I honestly couldn’t tell which motivation was driving me. Perhaps both. Perhaps neither.

For now, I would wait. Let this knowledge settle within me. Let the fog clear from my mind.

As the storm approached, another realization emerged from the fog, slower this time, but no less powerful.

Cipher had come for me.

Not for Dread. Not for the Hammer. For me.

I closed my eyes, trying to hold on to this thought as my consciousness began to drift again. I was being pulled back under, but I fought against it, clinging to this new understanding that felt so significant.

He could have let Dread kill me. It would have been simpler that way. One less complication for him.

But he hadn’t.

Instead, he’d come to that rooftop without his technological shield. He’d placed himself between me and Dread. He’d fought, not as Cipher the tech Villain, but as whatever, whoever, he truly was underneath.

He’d risked everything to save me.

Why? Why would he risk exposing himself? Why would he care whether I lived or died?

But he had come for me.

As the fog finally pulled me under, I surrendered to sleep with that single certainty anchored in my mind.

CIPHER

The city lights were beginning to blink on across the bay as dusk settled. Chroma Bay looked deceptively peaceful from this distance, all glittering promise and no hint of the chaos churning beneath its surface.

I’d dressed carefully in civilian clothes, dark jeans, a t-shirt, and leather jacket, nothing that would mark me as anything but an ordinary man enjoying the view offered by the cliff-side trail. Thomas Smith, not Cipher. The thought alone made my shoulders tense.

My fingers brushed against the small object in my pocket for perhaps the twentieth time in the last hour. Such a small thing to carry such weight.

My brain helpfully supplied that my guest was fifteen minutes late. Perhaps he wouldn’t come after all. Part of me hoped he wouldn’t. Another part, the part that had brought me here instead of handling this through proxies and subterfuge, needed this resolved face to face.

I felt the change in the wind, signaling an arrival. I didn’t turn, just listened to his feet touchdown on the grass, the crunch of footsteps on the path.

Would he try to kill me? I almost smiled at the thought. He could try. But I hadn’t come for a fight.