1968
Miya Shimada stretched languidly beneath her silk sheets, enjoying the way the fabric caressed her lean form. With a satisfied smile, she stepped out of bed, carrying one of the sheets with her to hide her nakedness. She strode down marble-floored hallways until she reached the library.
He’d be inside, she knew, working away on some new scheme. This was where he could always be found, except on the rare occasions when she could pull him away from his work for a bout of lovemaking.
She paused before a mirror in the hall, looking at her face. Though she was nearly sixty years old, she retained the vitality of a woman twenty years her junior. She lived well and was happy.
With a contented sigh, she looked away from the mirror and stepped into the library. It was massive, with numerous shelves so high that her lover had to risk life and limb on a tall ladder to reach them.
He sat with his back to her now, his attention fixed on an ancient manuscript before him. Her mind drifted back to another time, another world, where she had lost him… and maybe even worse, she had lost herself.
Placing her hands on his shoulders, Miya asked, “What are you working on, my love?”
Lazarus Gray looked up, his mismatched eyes shining with interest. A small white goatee that he wore on his chin matched his white hair, making him appear to be much older than he actually was. “The ancient Sumerians had a cure for cancer. It’s horrifying to think that The Illuminati had all this knowledge that they could have used to help the world… and all they did was sit on it.”
Miya smiled. “It’s been over thirty years since we staged our coup and you’re still finding these hidden secrets?”
“I think it would take a century more to uncover them all.”
Miya could tell that Lazarus was thinking back to that day in 1933 when she’d approached him, telling him that she knew of his plans to betray the order. They’d banded together and killed Lunt, seizing power within the group themselves. They’d turned all the dark powers of The Illuminati towards helping those in need… and had transformed the world in ways both great and small over the years.
It hadn’t been easy. The entire process had begun with Miya entering this timeline’s past from her own future. She’d hunted down and killed her younger self, taking her place in the world, and then had been forced to use all her knowledge of the next few years to help Lazarus in his bid for power.
Over three decades later, they lived in a world free of war and nearly all known forms of disease. After today, it seemed, even cancer would soon be a memory. She and Lazarus had become the parents of seven children and grandparents to several more.
Given the chance to abandon her desires for power and world domination, she had rejected her lover’s overtures in 1936. Ultimately, her decision had been proven to be the right one: she had managed to alter history, so that she had both Lazarus and her own position of authority.
“I love you, Lazarus,” she said.
“And I love you,” he replied, a soft smile touching his lips. “I can’t imagine what my life would be like without you.”
They kissed, secure in the knowledge that they were always meant to be together, in this place, in this way.
THE MAKING OF A HERO
Prologue
“Your name is Bob Benton. Repeat it for me.”
The handsome man with the dark hair sat with perfect posture. He stared at the man in the white coat without much expression. The room in which he sat was completely black save for a single high-powered bulb that was directed at the handsome man’s face. He squinted at the light, trying to make out facial details of the man in the coat but it was impossible. “Bob Benton.”
“That’s right. You were a pharmacist who invented a compound you called formic ethers. This gave you superhuman strength and dense flesh.”
“Formic ethers,” Bob said, as if testing out the words. “Did I invent it on purpose or by accident?”
“On purpose. You’d been experimenting with them for a while before they started working. You breathe in the ethers and they give you your powers. After a time, they start to fade and you have to ingest more.”
“Is it addictive?”
The scientist paused, looking off to the side. Bob heard someone murmur something and the scientist said, “No. They’re perfectly fine.”
“That’s good.”
“You have a girlfriend named Jean Starr but you don’t see her as often as you’d like. It’s okay, though. You love each other and you write her letters all the time. Sometimes you even get letters back.”
“Why don’t we see each other?”
“She’s secretary to the mayor and that’s a really important job. But not as important as what you do.”
“My pharmacy work?”
“Not just that. Once you got your powers, you became a hero. You smash mob rings, battle enemies of America and help those in need.”
Bob smiled. “I like that. It’s important to do what you can to help people.”
The scientist nodded. “That’s right! It’s part of the American Way. Now, Bob, your battle is sometimes a lonely one but you have a partner — a young boy. His name is Tim Roland and he sometimes accompanies you on missions.”
“Seems dangerous and more than a little irresponsible.”
“Tim has the same powers that you do. And when you go on missions, both of you protect your identities by wearing uniforms like this.” The scientist pushed a box towards Bob, who rested it on his lap. Inside was a black uniform with skull and crossbones displayed prominently on the chest. A domino-style mask, cape, gloves and boots completed the gaudy attire. “You call yourself The Black Terror. With Tim, you’re known as The Terror Twins.”
“What name does Tim use on his own?”
The scientist hesitated. “Uh… he just goes by Tim.”
Bob frowned. “How can he expect to protect his identity like that? The domino mask won’t hide much and he’s using his own name?”
“That’s not important right now,” the scientist snapped.
“He’s my friend. It’s very important. And where are his parents during all of this?”
The scientist rubbed his eyes in a tired move and reached up to flip off the light, leaving the room in total darkness. “We’re done for now, Bob. Put on your suit and wait for me to return.”
Bob said nothing, watching as the scientist left the room in a hurry. Then he stood up and stripped off the hospital-style shirt and pants he’d been wearing. He pulled on the garb of The Black Terror. He looked around the room as best he could but he could barely even see the hand in front of his face. The only light remaining was whatever squeezed in through the bottom of the door.
He sat back down and adopted a pensive expression. “I wonder where Tim is now,” he said aloud.
“I think he’s almost ready,” General Arbogast said. He was standing just outside the briefing room, a thick cigar clutched between his lips. “I want to see him in the field.”
The scientist, Kenneth Butler, ran a hand through thinning hair. “I don’t know. He’s getting the basic story down but he’s begun asking difficult questions. The story just doesn’t hold up. Why in the hell did you authorize the writers to include a kid in his adventures? It makes no sense. It’s one thing to eventually hire an actress to play his girlfriend but what are we going to do — dress up a midget and send him out into the field with The Black Terror?”