On the seventh day of Christmas, my true love gave to me, seven swans-a-swimming.
The Masked Marvel in…
Seven Swans a Swimming!
The maniacal laughter rang through the small concrete bunker, echoing throughout the room. Tommy struggled against the ropes that bound him to the only chair, glaring at the black feather-masked woman who was the cause of the laughter.
“You’ll never get away with this, you maniac!” he shouted at her.
“Don’t you see, little man?” the woman said, the orange bill on her mask flapping as she spoke. “I already have. Your hero is too late!”
Just then, a window near the ceiling broke in, scattering glass all over the place and causing Tommy to turn his face away to avoid being hit by it. He heard something heavy hit the floor, and then a clear, deep voice rang out.
“I wouldn’t count on that, Black Swan!” it said.
Tommy turned. There was a man there, tall with a square jaw firmly set. He wore a black suit and trench coat, with black gloves. Over his face, a black mask covered his eyes with eerie, pure white diamonds.
“The Masked Marvel!” Tommy cried out in triumph.
“No!” cried the Black Swan. “How could you have possibly known I was here?”
“Freedom City Dam has a silent alarm system, Swan,” The Masked Marvel said, setting himself into a ready position, his arms out and hands into fists. “My police scanner heard it, and I got here before the boys in blue. Of course, it helps that I have a rocket booster on the Maskmobile.”
“Very clever, hero,” The Black Swan said, pulling a small device from her black feathered cloak. “But you’re too late!”
Before Masked Marvel could react, she pushed the single, red button on the device. Marvel quickly reached into his own jacket and threw a small, metal ball at the villainess. Just before reaching her, it exploded into a strong net, tangling up the black clad woman and knocking her to the floor. She cried out in pain and growled in frustration. Tommy smiled. In a flash, Masked Marvel was across the room and roughly grabbed the Black Swan with both hands, dragging her up so that her face was mere inches from his.
“What did you do, Swan?” he said, his voice a low growl that had even Tommy wanting to spill his guts to the masked hero.
Swan, however, simply laughed. True to the implied threat, however, Masked Marvel let loose with a gloved fist and punched the woman through the net.
“What did you do?” he asked a again, his voice even quieter than before, which somehow made it more threatening.
“Simple, hero,” the Swan said, a smirk across her face. “That button launched my seven robot swans, who are right now carrying large loads of explosives to the Dam. In about twenty seconds, this Dam will collapse, flooding much of the city and cutting the rest from its power and drinking water.”
The Masked Marvel’s face went red with rage, and for a moment, Tommy thought he would break The Black Swan’s neck. Instead, he threw her across the room into the wall, where she fell to the ground, still tangled in the nets and obviously injured. He then lifted a glove to his face and pulled up it’s lower parts, revealing some kind of wrist band there, like a watch. He spoke into it.
“Masked Marvel to Marvel Boy, do you copy?” he said.
“Here, MM,” a voice replied as if coming from a radio. It obviously belonged to a young boy. “I heard the whole deal. I’m looking now, but I don’t… wait! There they are! They’re too spread out for me to get to them all, MM.”
“Do what you can, old chum,” Masked Marvel spoke into his watch band. “I’ll be right there.”
Quickly, he moved to Tommy and untied him by cutting the ropes with yet another device he pulled from his coat.
“Watch her,” the hero said to Tommy. “Make sure she doesn’t escape. I have questions for her.”
“You’ll never get them all, Masked Marvel,” the Black Swan taunted from the floor. “Even if only one gets through, the dam will be structurally injured enough that it may still collapse.”
Without answering, the Masked Marvel used his grappeling hook and pulled himself out the same window he came in through. Tommy watched, then quickly turned to the villain. He wasn’t quite sure how to keep her here should she even manage to escape the net. He didn’t have a weapon.
****
On the way to the upper part of the dam, the Masked Marvel reached into his jacket again and pulled out a re-breather, so he could swim without worrying about breath. The trench coat with the many pockets was the best invention he had created for himself as a crime fighter. Without these gadgets made by his crippled best friend, Maxwell Stone, the Masked Marvel would have been killed years ago. As soon as the mask was on, he dived into the water.
Like his young sidekick, he saw the robots heading for the dam. They were spread out pretty far apart, which meant he had even less time to stop them than the twenty seconds the Swan gave him. He pulled out a small, gun like apparatus from his coat. It was a electronic disruption ray, and he would use to stop as many of the bombs as he could.
He swam straight by the first two, firing as he went. They slowed and stopped seconds after being hit. He came up to the third one and zapped it, and it stopped too, but it was mere feet from the dam itself. The fourth one was coming up, but it was too close to the dam and too far for him to reach with the gun. He swam as hard as he could. He had to reach that robot before…
Suddenly, the robot exploded. Though not in the fashion Masked Marvel had expected. It fell apart in a splatter of shrapnel and broken bits. Masked Marvel was forced swim backwards and cover his face with his arm. When he looked back, he saw another figure swimming in the water, wearing a blue and gray acrobatic outfit with a domino mask and a large letter ‘M’ on his chest.
“Marvel Boy!” he cried.
“I managed to get the other three with the boomerang,” the teen said. “But only just. I think there are some cracks in the dam due to this one.”
“Better than a hole,” The Masked Marvel said. “We can let the dam personnel know about this. In the mean time, the Black Swan has some questions to answer.”
****
“Talk, Black Swan,” Masked Marvel said, pointing threateningly at the villain. “Tell me who’s behind these Twelve Days of Christmas themed crimes.”
“Oh, so you’ve figured out the pattern, have you?” Swan said with a sneer to her voice.
“It didn’t take much,” Marvel said. “Little Drummer Boy and the Pied Piper both used their mystical instruments to kidnap twelve and eleven people each. When the Leaper used the potion that gives him his powers on ten of the city’s top business men, it wasn’t difficult to figure out from there. Especially when the Puppet Master forced nine of those same men’s wives to dance until he was paid. I must admit that the Mad Cow’s crimes were the most unique, stealing eight paintings of women milking cows. And you, with your seven robot swans. It’s getting almost predictable by this point. I suspect the six Faberge Eggs on display in the City Museum to be the next target, no doubt by the Wild Goose.”
“But there’s someone behind all this,” Marvel continued. “Someone pulling all your strings. Tell me who.”
The Black Swan smiled, and it wasn’t a pleasant look. “It’s someone you already know. You know him quite well, in fact. He used to be your partner.”
“My par…? No!” Marvel said, his jaw going slack.
“Yes,” Swan said with satisfaction, and then laughed.
“Impossible,” Marvel said. “He died five years ago in the fire that also claimed the life of Mayor Murphy.”
“Did he?” Swan taunted. “There was never a body found, was there?”
“What’s she talking about, MM?” Marvel Boy asked. “Who’s behind this.”
Masked Marvel turned to look at his teenaged sidekick, a grim expression on his face.
“Remember when you first joined me, I told you that you weren’t my first partner?” he asked.
“Of course,” Marvel Boy said, excitement tingeing his voice at the memory of that day. “You told me about… oh. Golly, MM, is that even possible?”
“It looks like it, Old Chum,” Masked Marvel said. “Apparently, we’re facing off against my old sidekick. To end these Twelve Days of Terror, the Masked Marvel will have to take down… The Partridge!”
The End
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