“It’s been a while, mate,” he said, staring into the flickering dark.

  In the living room, there were two sofas that reeked of piss, sweat, and vinegar; and sprawled out on them were a hand full of emaciated, toothless junkies. Each looked more miserable than the other. Their faces looked like oxygen starved planets, covered in volcanic craters and pus-filled cankerous sores.

  “Whatta you want?”

  Dave, as it were, didn’t at all sound pleased to see his old friend.

  “Ya know dis cunt?” said Junky Number One, sounding if havoc were her middle name; yet looking as if it were spelled back to front.

  “Yeah,” said Dave. “We go way back.”

  On the table in front of them were a dirty spoon, some elastic band, and an old copy of The Communist Manifesto. There were small clear bags scattered all over the floor, along with the squashed and rolled up filters from the ends of half-smoked cigarettes.

  “So,” said The Man. “Did you kick the heroin?”

  “Fuck you,” said Dave. “What would you know about it?”

  Junky Number One looked feral, on the verge of some violent outburst. The only thing holding her back from lashing out with her claws and teeth was this damn gravity; that and her crippling atrophy.

  “Who are youze cunts anyway?” she said. “Fucking Salvation Army? Ya do goodin’ wankers. Fuck off en build a fuckin’ church or sometin’.”

  Whether she thought they were superheroes or architects was hard to gauge.

  “Can we speak in private?” asked The Man.

  When he wasn’t focused on himself, he almost sounded bold and convincing.

  “Anytin’ ya gotta say ta da Comrade, ya say ta us too. Dere’s no autority here.”

  It was clear that, without teeth, Junky Number One had hocked more than just her health, her wealth, and her piece of mind; she had also traded in the richness of the English language.

  “In all due respect, mam,” said The Man, “shut your rancid fucking mouth.”

  Had this been said in any other context, in any other room, to any other woman, there would have been war by now. Any of the heroes in the hallway would have been already convulsing; their eyes would be bulging from their sockets, and their mouths would be spitting meme laden rage and nonsensical rebuttals. And though logic deemed that they should, all three heroes in the hallway kept patently still, feeling the filth and depravity in the air, seeping into the pores of their skin.

  It was clear then, where the line was drawn for social justice.

  “Why are you here?” asked Dave.

  “I was in the neighbourhood.”

  “Really? You were in the neighbourhood; hundreds of kilometres from anywhere and you thought… you thought what exactly? We’d go through some old stories together until eventually, we’re on the same page? That it?”

  Not only was The Man unprepared, but how could he have prepared for this?

  “Life is short,” said The Man.

  “Yeah, no shit. And some us are racin’ to the fuckin’ end. So what’s your point?”

  The Man stared at the blood-stained syringes on the table.

  “I see you’re doing some light reading. Communism, aye? I wouldn’t have picked it.”

  “Whatta you know, cunt?”

  For a woman, she spoke like a tractor stuck in gear.

  “I know who you are,” she said. “And what you did. So now what; you hangin’ round dikes and pussy boy faggots?”

  The Diver and The Leader felt rage while The White Knight lowered his head in shame.

  “At least they stand for something,” said The Man.

  “Stand for what? Fatties and queers; that’s it. If dis was ten years ago you’d all be gotic losers; lookin’ like sluts but too piss scared ta fuck. So now what? Nobody’ll fuck yaz so youze pretend ta be superheroes. Call it what ya want, youze will always be fukin’ losers.”

  “What are you?”

  “I’m evolved, you faggot.”

  “We’re communists,” said Dave.

  His voice was less severe this time.

  “What does that even mean; you’re communists? What, because you share needles?”

  “One day you’ll see. Religion is fuckin’ gone or goin’; it’ll be gone soon. We all had our Kundalini Awakenings; all of us. Soon capitalism will turn ta shit too; already is really – always was. Communism will save da world.”

  “Based on experience…”

  “Fuck you about da past. Based on experience I know about you…You tink we’re shit, right? If dis was a communist society we’d….”

  “Miss, if this was a communist society you’d be preaching to the choir right now; and you’d lose that very thing that makes you feel significant, unique, and maybe even a little dangerous. Dangerous ideas are fun to disperse but they hold little weight against dangerous people when they’re acting dangerously.”

  “You tink you’re so fuckin’ tough.”

  “Let me ask you; when was the last time you cut your hands on a hammer and sickle?”

  “What’s dat supposed ta mean?”

  “What would your role be, in a fair and equal communist society? What would you do for your community? If everyone got paid the same, how do you judge fair and unfair work? Let’s look at your perfect model. Now, you’re smart and articulate, right?”

  Junky Number One fought with all her might not to smile or blush.

  “So, what would your role be in this ideal world; holding lectures on your sofa in your underwear, surrounded by your junky friends, telling folks what they already know?”

  Her cheeks were red; this time it was anger.

  “The fact that you’re able to voice your post-pubescent anti-capitalist rhetoric is, in fact, an attribute of capitalism. You’re denouncing the telephone in the middle of a conference call. Try this shit in North Korea and see how far you get with your “I’m angry with my daddy’ political idealism.”

  “You know how many people have died because of capitalism?”

  “Do you? Do you know the date? Do you know the time? Do you even know if it’s day or night?”

  “What? Ya tink cause I’m a smackhead I don’t read? Dat I’m fuckin’ illiterant?”

  “Not everything works like it’s supposed to in a book; that’s just how wonderfully complex and chaotic life is. Hell, real life ain't got nothing on fiction; there’s no resolution, no growth; and there sure as hell ain't any closure. Humans are flawed. They’re happy one minute and miserable the next, and in-between they’re just racked with doubt. They make mistakes – constantly. You have to look at which model does the least damage and offers as much technological, educational, health, and moral growth and initiatives at the hands of corruptible and imperfect human beings.”

  He really did sound bold and convincing.

  “Now back to my question,” he said. “What physical task could you do for your community? What would your role be; a doctor, pilot, surveyor, anesthesiologist, a steelworker, what? You think clipping an aneurysm is the same as changing some geriatric’s diaper? You’re not communists, you’re junkies. And like all of us, democracy and capitalism allows you to dream; it allows you to imagine yourself as whatever you want to be. That’s the whole point of free thought; but the rest, that comes down to your free will.”

  “Is not,” said Junky Number One.

  And that was it, the discussion was over.

  “Dave,” said The Man. “Can we talk privately.”

  Junky Number One was about to open her trap again but Dave closed it shut.

  “Just have a shot or somethin’, babe.”

  The thought that they were lovers horrified the heroes.

  “Alright,” said Dave. “You got five minutes.”

  The two of them walked through the house, out into the back garden. It was amazing how fresh air could smell so fetid.

  “Why did you come back?” said Dave.

  The Man’s posture was stern yet apologetic.

  “Like I said, life is short; too short to carry around regrets.”

  They both knew what he was talking about.

  “You remember the old times, right?” asked The Man.

  He did so with a nostalgic grin.

  “Yeah, I remember. We had a fuckin’ blast, didn’t we?”

  “You remember The Gargantuan Twins?”

  They both laughed.

  “I remember their dogs nearly ripped my balls off,” said Dave in hysterics.

  “Yeah, but we put em away. We put a lot of bad guys away.”

  Dave’s smile turned into a vacuous stare.

  “Yeah, but it was always you, wasn’t it? It was always Justice Man; nobody ever gave a shit about Punition Boy.”

  “That was all marketing. The important thing is, I knew.”

  “I didn’t want your fanfare; I wanted what you got – from everyone else. And besides, if you knew then why didn’t you ever say anything? Why did you wait until now?”

  “You know. We’re men; we’re genetically programmed to not know how to talk about our feelings. Men die from being men; you know that.”

  “You got kids, right?”

  “One, a girl.”

  Instantly his heart felt warm.

  “She’s fucking astounding.”

  “So where is she?”

  “With her mum. Fuckin’ state won’t let me see her. I tell ya, mate, any woman who claims she has less basic rights than a man has never been a father fighting for custody of their children.”

  “Sounds rough,” said Dave, staring at the track marks on his arms. “I would have liked to have had a family.”

  “It’s not too late, you know, just, ah, not with her.”

  They both sort of laughed.

  “I’m tryna clean myself up. It’s just… the fuckin’ smack, you know? That and…what is there to go back to? I can’t be Punition Boy anymore, so what’s the point?”

  “I get ya.”

  “Ya hear Trev hanged himself?”

  “Fuck me,” said The Man, in shock. “When was that?”

  Dave stared off into the yard as if he knew looking The Man in the eye would be grim.

  “A few years back. Mate, he had everything; fuckin’ pretty wife, kids, stable work and all that. Then out of the fuckin’ blue, he goes and offs himself. Fuckin’ world we live in, right?”

  “I was there myself, mate; not a day ago.”

  “Yep,” said Dave, as if he had been there his whole life.

  “That’s all changed now, though. It’s been a weird couple of days, mate.”

  “It’s been a weird fuckin’ life,” said Dave.

  They both stared silently into the garden for a while.

  “So this is it?” asked Dave.

  “Mate, I wanted to apologise. For years I’ve been carrying this weight in my stomach. I felt terrible, you know, not just turning my back on crime fighting, but turning my back on you – my best friend.”

  “Ahh, you’re right,” said Dave.

  He meant the exact opposite; luckily every man on Earth spoke the same code.

  “I’m serious, Dave. I just abandoned you. I didn’t even look back once.”

  “Mate, why would ya? Ya had it all; fuckin’ suburbia. Like I said; if I could…”

  “You’d make a bloody great father,” said The Man, lifting his friend’s spirits. “Without all the heroin and that of course.”

  “Yeah,” said Dave, now picking at the scabs on his arms.

  “You were always good with kids.”

  “Nah, not me.”

  “Yeah, you were. I remember that time we saved that kindergarten class from The Jelly Bean Bandit and…. Oh yeah,” said The Man, kind of deflated.

  “That was you. They hated me; all of em.”

  “Well, there was that one.”

  “The retarded kid?”

  “He wasn’t retarded was he?”

  Dave lifted his shirt showing a faint but still clear bite mark.

  “Retarded as a downshifting Chevy.”

  “Geeze, sorry mate. I honestly thought…”

  “Nah, you’re right,” said Dave, once again, taking it on the chin. “Cognitive bias; we kind of see shit how we wanna see shit.”

  “Cognitive what?”

  “Ah, I read a book once.”

  “So what’s with the communism, shit?”

  “You know? When you don’t have anything, idealism is everything. I don’t have much going for me so… They don’t understand any of it. They just want something that makes them feel good about having nothing and being a nobody. Easier to drag everyone down to a colourless agenda and paint the world with a broad even stroke than to learn how to paint with contrast and colour.”

  “Even you?”

  “It’s just nice to have someone listen, is all. That’s all we all want right; to be heard? You said it, mate, I just want to feel like I matter.”

  “Yeah,” said The Man.

  Were they women, this would have been where they would have hugged. Instead, they were men and so they nodded in agreement and stared silently out in the yard while the feeling they wanted to eschew sank back into the pits of their bellies where one day it would grow into an ulcer, and maybe even cancer.

  “Listen,” said The Man, garnering the courage. “About everything, I’m…”

  And then his phone rang.

  “It’s her,” he said.

  “That your misses?”

  “Ex,” as if he was naming a kind of bacteria.

  “So don’t pick it up. You’re not fucking married to her.”

  “It’s complicated,” said The Man reaching for his phone.

  “Everything is,” said Dave.

  “What’s up?” said The Man, turning away from his old friend.

  “I have your wife and daughter,” said The Doctor. “If you’re not here in the next hour, I’ll kill them, and then I’ll kill you.”

  21.

  It wasn’t easy being a villain. Most folks assumed that it was; that one merely sat around all day doing little more than conspiring horrible and terrible deeds. In truth, they were half right. What they missed, though, was the humanity; the thoughtful planning and careful consideration that The Doctor gave to all of his horrible and terrible deeds. Where would Christ be after all, if it weren’t for the brave and gallant betrayal? And The Doctor felt just as bold and courageous as Judas. What better test of one’s ideals than to sacrifice their own good name for an eternity?

  “Honey, have you seen The Girl?”

  Her timing was as inconvenient as ever.

  “We need to talk,” said The Doctor.

  He had the face of a man who’d just gotten his assistant pregnant.

  “You know I adore you,” he said.

  There was no way this was going to end well. She wanted to tell him to go fuck himself. She wanted to amass the courage to break his jaw and demand a good goddamned reason why; and at the same time, she wanted to crawl back inside her mother’s womb and hide.

  The Doctor rested a consolidating hand on The Woman’s cheek. It rested there for a second or two before it gently slid down to the curve of her neck, and there his hand stayed. Had he his second hand free, he could have strangled her by now.

  “I’ve never met anyone like you before,” he said, his voice like a gentle storm. “And I meant everything that I said, I really did.”

  He sounded warm and genuine.

  “Were I a man of God,” he said. “I’d call it fate; how we so unimaginably came together.”

  The Woman was trembling; that fine line between excitement and fear.

  “Then why do I get the feeling you’re about to say something I don’t want to hear?”

  His hand was so soft as it curled around her neck.

  “Everything’s fine,” he said. “Whatever gave you that impression?”

  For a second she felt guilty for having supposed any different.

  “I’m sorry,” she said. “It’s just…”

  “I know. You don’t need to say anything. This hasn’t been easy on anyone.”

  In the background, The Girl kicked and screamed. She tried to bite and chew her way through the rags that had been stuffed in her mouth, and she did her very best to wrestle her way out of the cable ties that bound her wrists and ankles. Even her eyes were covered. The Doctor did this so that everything was as dark as night, but unlike the bird in the cage, the damn child wouldn’t fall asleep.

  “It hasn’t been easy,” he said. “But we’ve come too far to turn around now. We’re together and it’s what we wanted right from the outset. The whole world may be against but I know you’ve suffered and I’ve suffered too. It’s terrible that other people had to be hurt…”

  As he said that, he thought about all the people he had hurt just this afternoon alone.

  “…but if love is as real as what I feel in my heart and veins right now - and even worse when you are gone - then surely that is worth a little sorrow. And if none shall agree, then let me have an eternity in hell if I can just spend one more day by your side.”

  The Girl gave it all she had. She could see her mother just barely when she stood on the very tips of her toes. No matter how loud she screamed, though, she couldn’t get her to turn. Eventually, she stopped kicking and carrying on, and sort of gave up; she collapsed on the floor and sobbed unendingly. It would have been terribly sad to see, were anyone looking. And even still, though it was as dark as night, the little brat wouldn’t fall asleep; she just kept on sobbing, as if that was going to save the day.

  “I love you,” said The Doctor. “But there’s something I have to confess.”

  22.

  “What is it? What happened? What’s going on?” said The Driver.

  So many questions, all of them very similar, and yet The Man couldn’t answer a single one. He just stood there, staring out into the filthy garden with a helpless expression. The Driver was seconds away from grabbing The Man by the back of the hair and slapping him senseless to try and get some kind of response, but this was hardly the time for foreplay.

  “He has my daughter.”

  As he said those words, a swirling ball of rage ignited in his chest and seared the back of his throat. He wanted to vomit profusely and he started to gag and tremor almost instantly. It was as if his shaking body might turn his bones to dust at any second and his cave in on itself. And yet, at the same time, he felt as if he could gnaw through a dozen padlocks and claw his way through a dozen stone fences to rip out a dozen men’s cold, black hearts.