Hero Heart

Never meet your heroes, they’ll just let you down.

It’s a phrase we’ve all heard before. Born from the countless tales of naive and passionate fans meeting their flesh-and-blood gods only to learn the same disappointing lesson over and over again: mortal heroes are just as flawed as any other human being alive.

Whether it’s from a rude comment or an imperfection in a performance, there is always something to break the spell. That moment where the hero is smaller than expected. That moment when you finally realize their perceived greatness was merely due to you not knowing any better. 

I’ll admit, when it was my turn to finally meet the modern-day Hercules, I was nervous I’d fallen victim to the same self-deluding worship others had shown him. Surely no one was so powerful, so strong, so charming as Adam appeared to be? It must all be an act that would end the moment he came through those doors.

But when he crashed through my walls, panting and stained in red, I couldn’t hide my smile.

As those shining dark eyes of the Earth’s most beloved hero met mine, I could see the righteousness in them. It was clear to me in that one look that his good and selfless nature wasn’t just an act for interviews. Unlike other heroes, Adam wasn’t pretending to be pure– he was pure, all the way down to his test-tube bones. 

He was exactly what I had been hoping for: Perfect.

“Adam.” It was strange finally speaking the name that had been haunting my thoughts for months. “Here you are at last.”

He was tall, muscular, and carried himself with the air of someone who had never known a single, insecure thought in his life. Still, he wasn’t confident in an arrogant way, oh no, Adam was far too generous and kind to be cocky. He was a hero with a heart as bright as the white and gold of his suit; though now it was blood-stained and burned.

“It’s over, Morta! Surrender to me now, and I won’t kill you.”

In less than a blink, Adam could have slammed me into the other side of the room. If he was feeling lazy, he could have blasted my brain to bits with his piercing heat-vision without so much as lifting a finger. He’d destroyed all my weapons, incapacitated my guards, and rendered me nearly powerless. And yet, here he was, just standing across from me with his hands on his hips and disappointment in his eyes. 

Aside from my loyal minions, I was hated by all. As was to be expected. I mean, who wouldn’t hate the woman responsible for deaths on a scale the Earth has never before seen? If anyone else was given the chance to face me at my most defenseless, I would have been killed without hesitation. 

But it was Adam facing me. Adam, the perfect and merciful hero, who was giving me the chance to live, when I had never given that courtesy to anyone else.

“Surrender? Oh, dear.” I laughed and waved his threatening glare aside. “Now why on earth would I do such a humiliating thing like that?”

“Because you don’t have any other choice!” He took a step toward me. “Not if you want to live.”

I rolled my eyes. The male heroes were the most fun to antagonize– and, if I were honest, the easiest to outsmart– but they always made this same mistake. I didn’t expect Adam to be any different in this area. Actually, a part of me was thrilled he held the same belief as all the other heroes I’d destroyed.

I had always hoped I would get to enlighten Adam before anyone else.

“Someday you’ll learn there are far worse fates than death,” I said as I walked away from him. “Fates that will leave you screaming for it all to end.”

“I highly doubt that,” He snapped. I couldn’t tell what irritated him more; my patronizing tone or the fact I dared to turn my back on him. “Everyone fears death.”

“Perhaps everyone else does.” I drifted toward one of the large windows, still perfectly at ease as he followed me. “But I don’t.”

If I were a normal human, perhaps I wouldn’t have caught the hesitation in his next words. But it was far too easy to spot the crack in his armor at that brief pause and I knew this night would go my way.

“Oh please. Are you really expecting me to believe that?” There was the slightest edge to his laugh that conflicted with the attempted levity. 

“What reason would I have to lie?”

“To trick me, obviously!” His frown deepened as I poorly hid my amusement. “I know what kind of mind games you like to play, but it won’t work on me!”

There is truly no greater test of patience than dealing with a misguided person who so ardently believes they’re right. Out of pity, I almost told Adam that he was falling for one of my ‘tricks’ right now and his insistence otherwise would be his downfall. It was ironic that a man with unnaturally powerful sight could so easily miss what was right in front of him.

But not to worry, I wasn’t disappointed. This was exactly as I’d anticipated. For all his strengths, Adam was still a naive child in many ways. And like most children, he just needed someone to guide him, to teach him a lesson. That was where I came in.

“Trick you,” I repeated with a pout. “If I were trying to trick you, how does this benefit me? Suppose I am lying, what would be the plan here? You fall for my bluff and, now realizing you can’t bully me into submission, are left with no other choice but to kill me? Because you would have to kill me, we both know you won’t be able to take me alive. So this trick does… what, exactly? Force the righteous hero into becoming a killer? Grant me the last laugh, even in death?” I sighed and shook my head. “It’s all terribly unoriginal isn’t it?”

I pretended to look at the city ruins below me, but really I was studying his reflection in the window. Adam’s face was an open book. His brows were furrowed in confusion as he cocked his head with a frown. I could practically see the very thread of his thoughts as he pondered my words, realizing the truth of the matter. A spark of excitement ran through me as his confusion turned into suspicion. Finally, the fun could begin.

“Why tell me any of this?” He was tense, now, like he knew he’d walked into a trap but wasn’t sure how. “If you’re so certain I’m just going to kill you, why bother?”

Sighing, I turned to face him and crossed my arms. “Not everything is a scheme, Adam. Perhaps I just wanted to make some friendly conversation?”

He wasn’t buying it. Fair enough. With the general public referring to me as ‘Corpse Queen’, it wasn’t like I was known for my friendliness.

“In any case, the point still stands.” With a speed that was too fast for a normal human to track, I was now directly in front of Adam, who didn’t so much as blink. “You don’t want to kill me. I won’t surrender. Where do we go from here?”

There was a flicker of doubt on Adam’s face just then. A glimmer of something I could dare describe as panic as he struggled with acting on his morals over acting on logic. If I were in his shoes, I would have slaughtered my enemy without thought. Especially if my enemy had unleashed plague and darkness onto the world– especially, if she’d killed all my former teammates. But that was the difference between me and him.

I was made first, after all. Death always came first. And in the wake of my destruction, the men who made me realized their mistake and made Adam. Adam, who was light and good and perfectly incapable of being anything else. No matter how much he so desperately tried.

His fists clenched and unclenched as he wrestled with himself. The part of him that knew what he should do was no match for the unstained ‘purity’ that made up his very being. It was fascinating to see someone who’d always known what to do from the moment he was born now facing a problem he couldn’t solve. For the first time in his life, Adam was lost.

Victory washed over me as I smiled with all the sympathy I could muster. “Oh goodness. You seem upset, Adam. Is something wrong?”

Anyone else would have run at the rising anger in his eyes, but not me. Not now that I’d had my suspicions confirmed.

“You have to surrender, Morta,” He said through gritted teeth. “There’s no way out. Just accept that you lost.”

“Lost?” A mean laugh escaped me. I know it’s not dignified to mock someone while they’re down, but I just couldn’t resist. “How could I possibly have lost? Because you’re here wielding threats that we both know you won’t actually act on? Face it, Adam. You’re out of your depth.”

To my genuine surprise, his pupils started to turn gold. Adam’s heat-vision could cut through diamond and metal like butter; those lasers could easily vanquish me in a matter of seconds. If I was still capable of fear, I’m sure I would have felt it from those twin suns glaring into my soul. Instead, I was morbidly curious to see if he’d actually do it or not.

I stepped closer and could feel the growing heat radiating from him. My skin felt like it was burning and I knew if I survived this, I’d have a terribly painful sunburn for weeks. But it was worth it to see the look on his face when I didn’t cower at his display of powers.

“Go on. Do it, then,” I challenged. “Kill me.”

“I will!”

“Alright.”

“I swear, I’ll strike you down where you stand!”

“There’s no need to be so dramatic.”

For a moment, I thought he was about to hit me, which would have been even more unexpected than if he killed me. But, hardly to my surprise, Adam did neither. With a final, trembling breath, his eyes turned back to normal. The heat dissipated. All that remained in that smoldering gaze was dread.

“Why… Why can’t I kill you?” He took a step back, as if I had been the one with nuclear explosions coming out of my eyes and not him. “I should kill you– I want to kill you! Why can’t I do this?” 

Compassion tugged at my heart. Disgusted, I squashed the emotion down and fixed Adam with a cruel smirk.

“You know exactly why.” His confusion was delicious. Adam was even more clueless than I’d anticipated! “Let me ask you something. The blood on your suit, I’m assuming it’s from my guards.” He nodded reluctantly. “So, did you kill any of them?”

“Of course not,” Adam protested. “How would it be fair for me to kill them yet offer you a chance to live?”

I’d suspected as much, but the confirmation made me groan. My guards were fine enough, but it would have been more convenient for me if he had killed them. Do you have any idea how expensive it is to have health insurance for people who get beat up by superheroes regularly?

“Right, and I’m sure you have some logic for why you’ve never killed a villain either?”

“Never had to. Everyone else I’ve ever faced is smart enough to surrender when given the chance.”

I rolled my eyes. “Or too stupid to know better.”

“And just what is that supposed to mean,” He demanded. Adam’s anger was starting to override his fear again. Good. “You should be more afraid of me than anyone!”

“Oh my God, afraid of you?” I exclaimed with an astonished gasp. “Adam, look around! You’ve had every chance to harm me, kill me, eviscerate me from the entire planet, and what have you done? Nothing!” I gestured around the nearly pristine room. “The whole world is waiting for you to finish me off! Meanwhile, you’ve just been standing here letting me talk for the last five minutes while asking me oh-so-nicely to surrender. Why the hell would I be afraid of you?”

Adam looked completely stunned. I could empathize a bit. There was nothing that could have hurt someone like us more than having our flaws thrown directly into our faces. Especially for the perfect golden boy himself. I’m pretty sure it would have been less painful if I had slapped him or kicked his dog in front of him. 

“You want to know why you can't kill me? Or anyone else for that matter?” It was obvious a part of him didn’t, but Adam made no move to stop me. “It’s because of them. The ones who made us. I was given complete freedom and used it against them.” The memories of that lab and all the scientists inside being ripped to shreds by my dark power still makes me smile. “So when they finally dared to try again, they knew better than to make that mistake a second time. They wanted someone who would be completely good. A perfect being of light with a true hero’s heart.” I lowered my voice to a whisper. “And what could possibly be more heroic and pure than someone incapable of crossing that one line all humans fear?”

I could see the instant Adam understood what I was saying. The horror at my implication, followed by denial, followed by betrayal as he no doubt remembered every time he was unable to commit that mortal faux pas, even when it would have saved lives. Adam felt all this and then, as vibrantly beautiful as an explosion, there was only his rage left.

Rage I was quite familiar with. I burst from the test tube overflowing with it, letting it fester and burn inside me when I realized my one purpose was to serve the weak humans who’d made me. When I’d let my rage free, it had been a suffocating, surging force like a tidal wave.

Adam’s would be even deadlier.

“Now that you know the truth, it’s my turn to give you a choice.” I waited until his stormy expression was locked on mine before continuing. “Accept your lack of real freedom and I’ll surrender immediately.”

Adam narrowed his eyes. “You’re serious?”

“I swear it.”

He weighed this option heavily, much to my irritation. Prison orange was the ugliest color to exist. Not to mention the effort it would have taken to plan and execute my inevitable escape. But a promise was a promise. If he wanted to stay a mere puppet, I’d grant him the small victory of taking me captive.

Still, I was glad when Adam finally spoke. Despite his frown, I could sense the subdued interest as he asked me what the second choice was.

“I can undo what they did to you.” My grin was more like a flashing of fangs than a real smile. “I always found it a shame that they created the most perfect weapon in existence only to neuter it. A life with limits isn’t really a life, Adam.” I held my hand out. “Give me the chance and I’ll show you what real freedom is.” 

Freedom to test his full potential. 

Freedom to explore that darkness every single creature on the planet secretly held inside them.

Freedom to get back at those pathetic humans who tried to control us all for the crime of existing with the powers they gave us. 

There are few moments in my life that have made me feel what others would call happiness. My bloody escape from that scientific prison, the first time a guard laid his life down for me, the day I turned the sun black, and meeting Adam in person, are just a few of the memories that I’m fond of.

But nothing will compare to the elation I felt when Adam’s hand clasped mine.

Nothing, perhaps, except for watching Adam destroy his creator, slowly and painfully.