57 pages • 1 hour read

Vicious

Fiction | Novel | YA | Published in 2013

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Chapters 38-41Chapter Summaries & Analyses

Chapter 38 Summary

Back at the hotel, Mitch shows Victor three EO profiles, including the blue-haired girl, and labels them as Eli’s target list. Mitch hacked the police database and found a set of flagged possible EOs. Each has a middle name containing Eli’s name. Sydney flips through the list of dead EOs and finds herself in the pile. Her middle name is listed as Elinor, which isn’t true, and she’s both elated and scared by the idea that Eli “thinks [she’s] dead” (198).

Chapter 39 Summary

Eli meets Detective Stell, who’s now working with Eli, at the bank. Against Eli’s wishes, the cops killed Barry because his powers were performing erratically, making him a potential threat. Eli finds a note Victor left with Barry: a drawing of stick figures that represent Victor and Sydney. Eli orders Stell to burn Barry’s body and retreats to his car, where he remembers shooting Victor a decade before. Eli calls Serena to proclaim they “have a problem” (202).

Chapter 40 Summary

In the past, Eli talks to the cops after shooting Victor and spins the tale to absolve himself of suspicion. Eli wants to care about Victor’s injuries and Angie’s death but senses a “gap between what he felt and what he wanted to feel” (205). He tries to convince himself God left this gap to make him stronger. Eli breaks into his thesis advisor’s office, steals his own research, and destroys the computer where the information is also stored. On his way out, he encounters his professor. The professor refuses to accept Eli’s withdrawal of his thesis, and the two grapple for Eli’s backpack. Eli takes a blow to the lip, and his professor watches, mystified, as the cut heals. Frantic to keep his secret, Eli pushes his professor down the stairs, killing him. Taking a life makes Eli feel “like more than himself” (212). In the parking lot, Eli runs into Detective Stell. Eli accompanies the detective into the building and watches the police find his professor’s body. Eli lies to cover his tracks again. Later, Eli grapples with his existence while repeatedly cutting his wrists and watching the wounds heal. He concludes God saved him for a reason.

Chapter 41 Summary

After the incident with Barry at the bank, Eli and Serena unknowingly check into the same hotel where Victor and Sidney are staying. Eli passes Mitch in the lobby and commits his face to memory, sensing something off. In his hotel room, Eli logs into the Merit police’s EO computer database. Eli stares at the picture of the blue-haired girl he murdered and “[drags] the profile into the trash” (218).

Chapters 38-41 Analysis

These chapters focus on Eli, his gradual change into a monster, and who he is in the story’s present. Chapter 42 shows the moment Eli becomes a monster bent on murdering EOs. His inability to die affirms his belief that God wants him alive to carry out a purpose greater than himself, even though Eli has no tangible proof to support this idea. Unable to understand his new life after death, Eli uses the notion of God’s approval to justify his actions for the next 10 years. Eli also finally admits he feels like something is missing. Rather than take this as a sign that he is like Victor and other EOs, he twists the meaning of his missing piece to fit his needs. For other EOs, the difference is a sign they are somehow wrong. For Eli, the gap is a challenge from God he must overcome. Again, Eli believes what he wants to be the truth in order to make himself feel better about his situation, and Schwab interrogates the notion common in comic books that people with extraordinary abilities are obligated to use those abilities for the good of others. Like Victor, Eli is motivated more by existential distress than by altruistic motives. In this way, Schwab participates in a comic book trope, giving nemeses a shared emotional framework and exploring how the different decisions they make within that framework—including different notions of power and obligation—contribute to their divergent and opposing paths.

In the story present, Eli using his name to mark EOs in the database shows how self-centered and self-important he feels as a result of what he’s convinced himself is the truth. Marking people slated for death with his name tells others who have access to the database that he doesn’t fear death. He believes God will save him and so associates his name with death to show his confidence. After the confrontation with Lynch, Eli has Detective Stell burn Lynch’s body for a few reasons. First, he wants to show Victor that he won’t allow his victims to be used against him. Second, he needs to hide his fear. The police killed Barry because his powers were acting erratically and posing a threat. While Eli may not fear death, he fears a disruption to his power—the part of himself that makes him special and important to God.