Nolan Grayson
“Ugh…”
Nolan opened his eyes to his reflection in a mirror—or rather, one-way glass. Heavy hydraulic arms thicker than tree trunks framed the windowless room he’d awakened inside. The restraint itself was attached to the wall behind him, built similarly to medieval stocks. Of course, with the sterile, overengineered feel of the Global Defence Agency. He was still in his tattered costume, as stained with blood and dirt and dust as it was. The bloodstains had long since dried, nearly brown in colour. Nolan frowned at the recollection of how those stains got there in the first place, and then winced as he breathed in.
Cracked ribs, by the familiar feel of it. While he wasn’t as injured as the time he fought the Guardians, Nolan had taken far more hits than he should have. What was that abominable frequency? He had singlehandedly documented and accounted for all Viltrumite weaknesses before becoming a surveyor. Was it something that originated on Earth? But if so, how could he have gone so long without encountering it? Or was it something unique to that Green Lantern boy?
His eyes widened.
“...My ears!”
…How long had it even been? Not long, most likely, judging by the state of his body. Then why were his ears… fine? Nolan shouldn’t have been able to hear so soon after waking up, and ought to have been in much more pain. A hidden speaker crackled overhead, forcing Nolan to crane his neck in search of the origin of the sound.
“I see you’re finally up.”
“...Cecil.”
“You know, I’d ask if you’re feeling alright, but we made sure to only heal your ears. Leave you to stew a little. How are those cracked ribs?”
Nolan’s eyes lingered on the restraints. He stared at them for several long seconds before realising something that should have been obvious the moment he opened his eyes. They wouldn’t hold him for more than an instant.
He could feel it. Twenty years on Earth meant he’d never had cause to go all-out. Cecil couldn’t hold him back even if he knew his true strength. Earth simply lacked the material to bind him. A slight flex of his shoulders and the restraints answered with the faintest metallic groan. Nolan let the tension leave his body, allowing the silence to linger.
The lack of an answer wasn’t because he wished to spite Cecil and his minions. He simply… didn’t care. Oh, the physical pain registered and he catalogued each injury just to be sure he was alright. But then he moved on. His gaze drifted back to his bruised reflection and found himself equally indifferent.
“Sit tight. I’ll be right down.”
It dawned on Nolan slowly that escape hadn’t once entered his mind. Neither had Viltrum. Or rather, the thoughts were there, but they passed through him without finding purchase on anything. He searched himself for rage and found none.
For shame.
For relief.
Or grief.
Instead, all he found was an immense absence. He knew with absolute certainty that restraints were nothing to him. If he wanted to, he could walk out, soaring thousands of feet in the air before Cecil ever reached him. But therein lay the issue…
Nolan Grayson wanted absolutely nothing at all.
He watched the mirror lose its silver sheen, his own battered reflection fading to reveal the observation room beyond. Cecil stood waiting on the other side with one hand in his pocket and a steaming cup of coffee in the other.
“I expected yelling,” Cecil said after a slow sip. “A death threat or two. Maybe a speech about Viltrumite superiority. You know, the whole spiel you gave Mark? …Got to admit, I didn’t expect nothing.”
Nolan regarded him through the glass.
“You’re taking captivity better than I thought.”
“I wouldn’t say that.”
His own voice sounded distant to him.
“I… don’t particularly care.”
The admission surprised neither of them more than it surprised himself. For a decorated Viltrumite to admit such a thing out loud was unthinkable. Then again, the delusion that he was the perfect Viltrumite had thoroughly run its course. Cecil studied him for several long seconds, searching for the angle. Perhaps finding no lies, he set the mug down atop the observation console.
“We’ve been busy while you’ve been unconscious. The frequency.”
He craned his neck to look Cecil in the eye. That caught his attention, if only because it was information.
“What about it?”
“We’ve isolated it.” Cecil gestured vaguely around the room with a thin smile. “Speakers. Walls. Ceiling. Floor. Enough redundancy that destroying one won’t make much difference.”
Nolan looked around. Only now did he notice the countless narrow seams running through the walls. Speaker grilles machined so precisely they were almost invisible if he didn’t know to look for them. All poised to bring even Grand Regent Thragg to his knees. And yet… Nolan felt nothing at that knowledge, which perturbed him far more than the existence of such a glaring weakness for Viltrum’s enemies to exploit.
“I can flood this room with the sound whenever I feel like it. See, I’ve got a lot of questions about Viltrum and all the time in the world to ask them. Whether this becomes more difficult than it needs to be is entirely up to you.”
Eventually, Nolan spoke.
“...Do your worst.”
Cecil lifted his cup of coffee back up.
“Well...”
A faint smirk tugged at one corner of his mouth as he started to turn.
“Trust me. Compared to her, I’m the nice one.”
He stepped aside. Nolan was just beginning to hang his head when she shuffled into frame. The sight of her made him afraid to even breathe. Her eyes were red-rimmed beneath sleepless bags, the swelling betraying days of tears. But now, they were simply… tired in a way he’d never seen before.
Nolan’s heart stuttered.
“...Debbie.”
She stopped a few feet from the glass to stare at him.
“You look awful.”
He almost smiled. “...Yes. I’ve looked better.”
Debbie folded her arms. His attempt at humour died before it reached her face.
“I spent three days trying to decide what I’d say if I ever saw you again. I rehearsed it. I was going to scream and call you every name I could think of.”
Guilt came welling out of the emptiness, forcing him to lower his eyes from hers. Not merely at hurting her, but destroying so many innocent people’s families just as he had his own.
“...I’m sorry.”
“You know what keeps going through my head?” she asked. “The broken sink in our first apartment. You insisted you could fix it.”
“...I couldn’t.”
A tiny laugh escaped her.
“You flooded the kitchen.”
For the briefest instant, the two of them were transported twenty years into the past. Water had poured from beneath the kitchen sink in great sheets, soaking the cheap linoleum. Nolan stood there with a wrench in one hand, staring at the disaster he’d confidently made worse, while Debbie laughed so hard she had to lean against the counter to stay upright.
”Don’t laugh,” he’d protested.
”I’m trying,” she managed between fits of giggles. ”I really am.”
He’d eventually joined in, the pair of them splashing through ankle-deep water with mops and towels that only seemed to spread the mess further. They were absolutely drenched by the time they’d finally deigned to call a professional. Debbie’s hair clung to her cheeks. His shirt was plastered to his chest. They’d looked at one another… and kissed long enough to forget entirely about the flooded floor beneath them as they made love on the spot.
The memory dissolved as quickly as it had come, leaving only the cold fluorescent lights of the GDA cell.
Debbie’s laughter eased into a long sigh. “I keep remembering things like that. Like when you took Mark and I to our first Renaissance Fair and got into the stocks so we could hurl tomatoes at you. Then you wrote it into your debut fantasy novel.”
He closed his eyes, unable to bear that look on her face.
“I-I don’t know what to do with those memories anymore. They all feel… contaminated by what you did.”
“Debbie…”
Nolan couldn’t argue or tell her she was wrong, but his heart ached watching her suffer and knowing it was entirely his fault. So, he hung his head once again. Debbie took a slow breath, sniffling, and looked him straight in the eye.
“Was a pet all I ever was to you, Nolan? My husband would never say anything like that about me. He wouldn’t. But… I don’t know who you are anymore!”
The words lifted his head as she brought the question lodged in his chest to bear. Nolan searched her eyes for an answer he knew he wouldn’t find and hung his head.
“...Neither do I. Earth has changed me.” He looked up. “You’ve changed me. I… diminished our relationship with those heartless words, but you have.”
“Oh, really?”
“You did. All my life I’ve believed compassion and love are weaknesses. But you showed me that those weaknesses are great sources of strength. They let our son stand firm against me… and whatever else I’ve done, I am unimaginably proud of him for that.”
“What changed? Why kill the Guardians? They were our friends. Your friends.”
“Our son.”
She frowned. “Why now? He’s twenty years old… oh my god. That’s why you were so weird at dinner! You didn’t want him to get his powers!”
“From here, I’ll tell you nothing but the truth. Please. Don’t interrupt me.”
Debbie swallowed thickly in anticipation, the sound crackling through the cell’s speakers. What he was about to say would no doubt be penned down by the minions inside the observation room, or perhaps elsewhere, watching him through a live feed, but he didn’t care. If that made him a traitor to Viltrum, then so be it. Lying to Debbie had been its own kind of suffering. Nolan was going to take the chance to unburden himself with both hands.
“My mission, my true mission, wasn’t to just conquer Earth. It was to assess whether humans and Viltrumites were compatible for interspecies breeding. The Great Purge that I described to Mark was before my time, and while it culled our population, it was a controlled culling. See, shortly after my birth, we were decimated by a disease. Our population dwindled to a handful, making repopulation impossible without severe inbreeding.”
He looked up to see the silent question in her eyes.
“...No. You were never a broodmare to me.”
Debbie’s shoulders seemed to ease.
“Usually, Viltrumite powers kick in at around ten. So, when Mark didn’t exhibit any signs, I let myself relax. It’s not that I didn’t want him to have my powers, but… deep down, I knew I’d changed. I wasn’t just a Viltrumite anymore. If Mark got his powers, I would need to report my success instead of leaving Earth after you and Mark and his children and their children died. I’d no longer be able to treat the man I’d become as a mere chapter in my life. The time to do my duty as a Viltrumite had come.”
But how true was that, really? If Nolan were dedicated to his mission, he would have reported news of his success as soon as he’d recovered from his fight with the Guardians. Earth had never been as vulnerable as it was now… and yet he delayed.
Why?
“Nolan?”
…He slowly glanced at the first and greatest love of his life. The hands that had once reached for him without hesitation now folded tightly across her chest, as though holding herself together. She searched his face with equal desperation. Was she trying to find a hint of the man she’d fallen in love with? Nolan found himself drinking in every detail he could see. Like the faint tremor in her lower lip, all the way down to the wedding band still circling her finger.
...She was still wearing it.
He furrowed his brow in thought. …If he had always intended on treating Earth as temporary, why had the thought of leaving her behind become so unbearable years before Mark ever got his powers?
“Nolan?” she repeated.
He hung his head again as the words formed slowly over his tongue. Nolan drew a ragged breath before straightening to his full height. The cylinders containing his arms exploded into jagged fragments that clattered across the floor. Debbie stumbled back with a sharp gasp, one hand flying instinctively to her mouth. Crimson emergency lights washed into the observation room with the sudden blare of an alarm.
The restraints forcing him onto his knees screamed, then burst apart in a shower of snapped bolts, sparking harmlessly against his ruined costume.
“...You can hear me, can’t you? I’m ready to talk, Cecil.”