Free Villainous by Matthew Cody

Shades’ prisoner. Those creatures turned out to be the manifestations of lost memories and powers Herman had stolen with his Witch Fire pendant, a piece of the meteorite that hadburned St. Alban’s to the ground. All the Shades had wanted was their freedom, but Daniel had been too obsessed with catching Herman to see the truth until it was almost too late.
    Keeping an open, objective mind while Herman was on that board was next to impossible. The Shroud was a black hole sucking up all the light.
    “Herman’s powerless,” said Mollie. “So, what do we write on his card?”
    Daniel thought about this for a moment, then took up the black marker and wrote “Really, really evil” beneath his name. Yep, really, really evil. It was important to remember that.
    Mollie had taken two more note cards and written “Tree fort fire” on one and “Attack at bridge” on another. Daniel tried to tell her that the word
attack
was a bit strong, but she wouldn’t change it. He could have been seriously hurt, or worse, she said. So
attack
stood.
    The only girl on the board was Skye, and naturally their suspicions centered on her. But if she was their mysterious laughing girl, how could she have learned about the tree fort in the first place? Another unanswered question.
    Finally, in the center of the board Daniel pinned up a new article from the
Noble Herald
. The headline read, “Superpowered Delinquents Suspected in Vandalism Case.” The article went on to say that because of the speed with which Mr. Lemon’s shop was vandalized, combined withthe sheer amount of destruction, the sheriff’s department suspected that the culprits were “members of the town’s superpowered population.” Beyond that they had no suspects at this time.
    Daniel stepped back so that he could take in the entire board. All the smiling faces staring back at him. Academy students, every last one.
    The sheriff’s department had no suspects, and Daniel had too many
.
    The next morning, Daniel was just finishing breakfast and arguing with Georgie over who’d get the last of the syrup for his French toast when Mollie appeared at the door, looking panicked.
    “Have you all seen the news?” asked Mollie, not bothering to ask if she could come inside.
    “Why no,” said Daniel’s mother. “Is something the matter?”
    Catching the significant look that Mollie was giving him, Daniel hopped out of his seat and headed for the living room. Georgie snatched up the undefended syrup bottle with a shout of triumph.
    The TV was already tuned to the local news, and as soon as the picture came on, Daniel saw it—an overhead shot of downtown Noble’s Green. The camera was panning overthe wreck of a building: windows shattered, doors missing. Several buses in the parking lot were actually overturned.
    “Oh my,” said Daniel’s mother. “Is that the high school? What happened? Was it a tornado?”
    “There weren’t any storms last night,” said Mollie.
    Daniel looked back at the scene of destruction. One of the buses was a smoking, burnt-out shell. As the shot cut between the helicopter and a reporter standing in front of the rubble, a graphic flashed across the bottom of the screen:
    “Superpowered vandals turn to rampage?”
    At that moment they heard the shatter of a bottle breaking, and from the kitchen Georgie’s voice.
    “Uh-oh,” he said. “Mom, can I have another syrup?”

Chapter Eight
The Scene of the Crime
    Never had Daniel felt so slow. Since the high school was only a block away from the middle school, he had sped out of the house on his bike, hoping to get a chance to see the destruction up close and still make it in time for Smiley’s class. Mollie, of course, had simply flown ahead. Daniel pedaled like he was competing in the Tour de France and still it wasn’t fast enough. It felt like he was steering his bike through a swamp.
    As he finally neared the school, he passed streets lined with news vans and crowds of gawking people, and