The Life of a Villain

Chapter 17

    Now it was time to prepare for a fight. Even being my friend, The Conductor will put out a fight before telling me the information I needed. I've had to fight him before, and it wasn't easy. Now you may wonder why us villains fight each other. I honestly don't know, but I can speculate on it. I think it could be because we are like gang members, trying to prove that we are tough. Another reason is that we are trying to make it seem like us villains don't have an underground organization. Whatever the reason was, I needed to win this fight. Most fights end in draws, but I had a feeling that The Conductor wouldn't give easily.

    Now, let's go over what we, and by we I mean I, know about him. He is like the Music Mister of the real world, being able to control people through music, but more like instrumental music. He was a renowned conductor, the best in the world, until he lost his arms in a plane crash. He got robotic replacements, but his conducting wasn't as good as it used to be. He was fired, and replaced. Then most of his wealth was taken, along with his home and his family. He started going crazy with hatred, knowing he was still the best around. With whatever wealth he had left, he started building mind control technology. He then made his signature conducting baton. He usually listens to music or has a live band with him, and he'll conduct the music. The music entrances his victims to do the fighting for him, or entrances his attacker to attack himself. He also made his baton to shoot bolts of sound, so when he gets into some powerful song or has very strong notes, he can blast sound out. I haven't really figured out the science behind it, but it's pretty powerful.

    In previous battles, I've taken out his band or sent out a small EMP to short out whatever device he was using to listen to music. But, like most villains, he learned from his mistakes. Last time he had a faraday cage protecting his electrical devices, and he more than likely has some way of protecting his band. So what would be his next weakest point... thinking... thinking... drawing blanks... pizza... mmm, piiizza... hmm... I just thought of something. Gabby has some nice thighs... mmm hmm, damn dat girl thicc... Ah ha! Perpendicular! That's the word I couldn't think of the other day!... Now I'm just getting off topic... Baabby Shark do do d... NOOOO! NO! NO NO NO! Think about something else!... Wait a minute... What about his baton...? Break that... and it should stop him, right? The only problem would be getting close enough to break it...

    I thought for a while, then devised a plan. I needed my smaller knives. My chain knives would be nice to bring, but they were broken in my last fight. Too much wear and tear. And I need to work on my flaming knives. Used up way too much phosphorus. Ran out of my supply. Looks like I can use the good ol' throwing knives. Also gives me a chance to use my magnetic ones. I've been working on them for a while. I got tired of losing my knives, so I tried to come up with a way to get them to come back to me.

    First few tries were failures. Either I got the knives to come to me along with a series of other metal things, or I was dragged to the strongest metal thing around. Eventually I had to make my own kind of metal, and get the magnets on my sleeves to only pick up that specific kind of metal. That part was hard. Magnets are made by exposing ferromagnetic metals like iron and nickel to magnetic fields. I needed to create my own magnetic field that was specific to the metals in my knife, or at least stronger than other magnetic fields. To do that I needed to make an electromagnet, which was simple enough. I needed a good core made out of the metal I made, and decently sized. I made a shirt of sorts out of the metal, so it would go on my body. The shirt was heavy of course, but nothing a few workouts couldn't fix. Then I needed to wrap copper wire around the metal shirt. The further the wire was from the core the less effective it was, hence making the entire shirt out of the core metal. Now I needed to make a current go through the electric wire.

    The more current I could provide, the stronger the magnet. I needed a strong electrical device, so along the back of the shirt I had the copper wires attached to two batteries of my own making. I made a very small battery designed after a motorcycle battery, but smaller. They put out about two hundred cranking amps with about six-amp hours, and they weighed about two pounds, adding next to no weight at all. It was a good lithium battery, and provided more power than I needed. When I first tested my electromagnet out, I got shocked extremely bad (Should of thought about running an electric current through a metal shirt attached to my body), and the heat it generated was SUPER hot. I forgot to factor in how electrical energy converted into heat. With two batteries I increased the heat generated by four times. To solve the shocking problem, I lined the inside of the metal shirt with rubber. To combat the heat problem, I used a heat exchanger to recover the energy from the heat and used some absorption technology to work with the heat exchanger to provide cool air, which would help cool me down.

    The only thing that was left to do was to have a toggle switch. I didn't want the magnet to be constantly on, because I wouldn't be able to throw my knives, they would just come back to me. Having it off constantly would be useless because I would have gone through all of this shit for nothing. So I made a single wire go up my sleeve and to my hand, where it split into two, one half going to my thumb, the other half going to my index finger. Touch my thumb and index together quickly turns on the electromagnet, touching them together again turns it off. Simple enough. I tried it a few times, throwing my knives different distances, seeing how long it took for them to come back to me and how far I could throw before my magnet could no longer pick them up. Wrote it all down in my weapons log. Gotta be like a scientist and record observations. I got some good times and speeds out of my magnet, so I called that experiment a success. Now time to try it out in the real world.

    So, this is the game plan. Wear him out, give him a lot of cuts. Nothing too deadly, just enough to hurt him and wear him down. Try to cut his baton if I can. If not, when he is completely tired out, I snap it with my own hands. Not like that was going to be easy. I need to be mobile, fluent, quick, and with my new magnetic suit thing, it's not going to be easy. I made the suit where it has movable joints, but with the weight of the suit, plus copper wire, plus the rubber and the heat exchanger and the absorption technology, I have about fifty pounds added to myself. I know I said that the batteries were light and you would assume copper wire is pretty light, but all that weight adds up. Lucky for me, I've been training. Not for this specific situation, but just to stay fit in general. I have gone on runs and on mountain climbs with a bookbag of rocks and other heavy things. Along with my enhanced abilities, I was hopefully strong enough to be fast enough. I put on the suit, and did some basic exercises, then moved on to some basic parkour. So far so good. I worked with the suit until it got dark out, and by then the suit was just an extension of myself.

    I knew that more than likely he would be at his club, The Inferno Archangel. Being a member of the Villain Association, you get certain perks such as buildings that you get to own or rent. That's how I got my warehouse, and how he got his club. At his club he has his personal band play, and people come and listen. It is a pretty esteemed underground club, and he gets good money out of it. Tonight was a band practice night, so I wouldn't have any civilians to deal with. His club was in his normal jurisdiction, out in Clatmond City, which is an hour or two drive away. Looks like I'm skipping school tomorrow, because it is already getting dark out, and after this whole battle and the drive, I'm going to be pooped.

    I went to the garage, and opened the door. I twirled my keys for a moment, basking in the glory of my Dodge Challenger. I opened the door, and got in. The black leather seats were very comfortable, and the car still had the new car smell. I shut the door, then put the key in and turned. The engine roared.

    "Oohh yeah," I said with a smile. I revved the engine a few times, just for good measure.

    "I missed ya girl. You are my one true love. Yes oh yes," I said, gripping the steering wheel. I then put the stick in drive, and did a burnout, squealing out of my garage. I was zooming down the roads, taking whatever backroads I could. I don't think my meter went below eighty miles an hour, it was just me and the road. I was lucky not to get nailed by any cops (They don't watch the backroads that often), and I arrived within an hour and a half. I found a decent place to park my car, rather nicely hidden, and then I put a dirty ratty old tarp over it. If it works in the movies then it is bound to work now. I walked about a half mile and finally ended up at the club.

    There was a bright sign that held the name, all lit up and glamorous. The building seemed bigger than I remembered. I lockpicked the door and walked in to see that the entire place has completely changed. There were big chandeliers, lavish seating, and a huge stage. On the stage was the band, and they sounded... amazing. All the right acoustics, bases, great blending of sound. The room was perfect for music. I let the band play their song they were on all the way through before I intervened.

    "Was that Robert W. Smith? Winds of Poseidon if I'm not mistaken," I said walking down the aisles of seats.

    "Knifesliger. You have no business here," The Conductor said.

    "Man, this new villain must be paying a LOT! Man, it looks amazing in here," I said looking around.

    "Yes. Now leave," he stated.

    "Now I can't do that. I need information that you possess. Now, I don't want any trouble," I said offhandedly.

    "Look, you know I can't give you anything. You can leave now unharmed, but I can't promise you safety if you instigate," The Conductor said threateningly. Looks like it's going to be the hard way.