King Of Bad [Super Villian Academy Book 1] (9 page)

Source said to Jeff, “Try pinning both the table and
the rock to the ground.”

Hogan set the table and rock down again and waited.

At first Jeff tried dispersing some of the gravity
around the rock back toward the table legs, but he felt the grip on the rock
loosen. So he gathered it all together again and then sent more gravity through
the ground to wrap around the base of each leg. He nodded to Hogan.

Hogan grabbed the rock and yanked. Nothing happened.
He wrapped his other hand around the rock and braced his stance and pulled, but
nothing moved. Jeff could feel the pull on the gravity wrapped around the legs
of the table and quickly reinforced it.

“Come on, Hogan.
You turning
into a pansy-boy?” Bake jeered.

The group erupted into laughter and broke Jeff’s concentration.
Hogan and the rock flew backward. Jeff sent all the gravity to Hogan’s feet and
stopped him in mid-stumble. Hogan nodded to Jeff and Jeff let go of all the
gravity.

Sweat drops dotted Sherlock’s forehead. His heavy
rimmed glasses slipped down his slick nose. He panted.

“Dude, are you okay?” Jeff asked.

Sherlock beamed at him. “That is amazing, kid! You’ve
got polar abilities.”

A few kids cried, “Polar!”

Source smirked. Shake rolled her eyes and pulled Bake
back toward their table.

Sherlock giggled giddily. “Polar.”

Jeff smiled and nodded. He liked it.
Polar.

Chapter 12

“They calling you anything yet, kid?” Coach asked.

“Polar, sir.”

“Polar,” Coach mused. “Hmm, could mean you have ice.
Could mean you’re like a big mean bear. I give up, why Polar?”

“I have opposing abilities, sir.”

“Interesting.
Now, let’s see
if we can improve your S&S, Polar.”

They performed drills on long jump and hurdles. Coach
explained which muscles needed to be engaged to optimize the length or fluidity
of the two different jumps.

Jeff tried to pay attention, but his mind kept wandering.
It seemed to him that he had an opposite
for each ability
he was slightly better at and as far as he could tell, he was at least slightly
faster than most S.V.’s. Was there something he was slow at?

He was just as relieved to announce his new name in
Psych, but once again had a hard time concentrating. He wondered if the polar
ability thing worked backward too. For example, was there a polar disability of
defense?

Dinner was far more tolerable than it had been the
night before. Source may have been right when he said that most of the kids
were intimidated by Jeff’s performance.
Though if Jeff were
honest with himself it would most likely be his lack of control that scared
them.
In any case, they didn’t taunt him at all.

“I heard you got a name.” A small shadow fell across
his peas & carrots. “What is it?”

Jeff swung his long hair out of his eyes and found Oceanus
standing next to him. A fresh, salty scent wafted around her.

“Um…it’s um…”

Oceanus arched her right eyebrow.

The simple action hit Jeff below the belt, making him
squirm further under the table.

“I didn’t think the question was too hard.” Oceanus
snickered. Her straight jet-black hair fringed tropical blue eyes. Her lips
were an enticing rose color.

Jeff cleared his throat. “Um, you just, um, interrupted
a conversation.
Polar.
They call me Polar now.”

“Polar?” She cocked her head and turned to face him
completely, no longer ready to continue on to her own table. “To me that says
polar ice caps. But as we saw yesterday, you have fire. So why did you get
tagged with that name?”

Jeff knew he shouldn’t stare at her lips, but their
rosy contrast to her cream-white skin, their beautiful curves and graceful
movement when she spoke had
him
transfixed. “I do have
ice.”

He hauled his eyes up to meet hers just in time to
see them pop open. Unfortunately, her mouth fell open in amazement, capturing
his complete attention again.

“You have ice too?” She set her tray on the table and
slid into the chair next to Jeff. The scents of sea salt and lilacs drifted
around him and he unconsciously leaned toward her.

Source rescued Jeff from proving further idiocy by explaining
the discovery of the polar abilities. “That’s why Sherlock didn’t find his root
ability on the first day. He’s never had to test for opposing abilities in an
S.V. before.”

Oceanus studied Jeff. He fought the urge to run his
hand through his hair. He concentrated very hard on keeping his jaw from
dropping, but her mouth was slightly opened in a smile and he desperately
wanted to capture it in a kiss.

“Polar abilities,” Oceanus said.
“Fascinating.”

Jeff donned his trademark crooked smile and her gaze
fell to his mouth. With her eyes on his lips, Jeff thought he was going to grab
her right there in the cafeteria and claim her mouth for his own.

“Uh, Polar…buddy…Jeff!” Source smacked Jeff on the
arm.

“What?” Jeff spun toward his friend and saw Source
looking meaningfully down at Jeff’s hand. Jeff looked too. “Shit!”

Jeff closed his eyes in order to concentrate. He
pulled cold air from deep within his lungs and slowly blew it onto his hand and
the melted fork it held.

Oceanus gasped. Jeff expected to find a disgusted
look on her face, but instead she looked like a kid on Christmas morning.

Her eyes sparkled as she captured the frost Jeff had
just laid out and made it dance and sparkle over the table. “It’s real!”

“Uh, yeah, of course.”

“But it’s coming from you and it’s real. How does
that not…I don’t know…sap you of energy? Or dehydrate you?” She built a small
frost snowman in the middle of the table.

“I don’t know,” Jeff said. “My fire is from inside me
too.”

“Oh I guess it is, huh? Oh…but water! I never thought
to look within for a source of water.”

Source pursed his lips.
“Hmmm.
I guess there is a possibility that you could. But I don’t know for sure.”

“We could try it,” Jeff suggested. The idea of working
with Oceanus made his pulse beat double time.

“Would you, guys?” Glints of turquoise sparked from
Oceanus’ eyes. Her straight black hair swayed hypnotically as she bounced with
excitement. Jeff only nodded. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Source shrug
and nod. “That would be fabulous.”

“What would be fabulous?” drawled a lazy, baritone
voice.

A stormy looking Set stood over them.

Oceanus stared at the table. Jeff saw her eyes darken
to a deep gray blue. Her explanation was delivered through clenched teeth. “I’m
gonna
experiment with water, a little.”

Seeing Oceanus’ mood change so
dramatically made anger buzz in Jeff’s head.
He glared at Set who loomed
over Oceanus like a prison guard.

“What kind of experiment?” Set asked, looking first
at Source and then at Jeff. When Set’s eyes met Jeff’s the atmosphere around
the table changed. Set’s muscles tensed, and his jaw seemed carved from
granite. The air around them crackled with unseen electricity. Jeff’s napkin
rolled and bounced across the table as if a wind had gusted through.

“Set,” Oceanus whispered.

Set cocked his head toward her, but his eyes didn’t
leave Jeff’s. “What is it, waterspout?”

“There’s no reason for you to be upset,” she told
him.

Jeff held Set’s gaze though the distress in Oceanus’
voice cried out to him. He desperately wanted to comfort her. It infuriated him
that
her own
boyfriend didn’t feel the same way. Jeff
wanted to blow Set’s storm right back in his face. Two things kept him from
trying. He didn’t want to upset Oceanus further and he remembered Source’s
warning the day before that Set was bad even for an S.V. If he expected to best
Set, he’d need training.

“Set,” Jeff asked, “how long have you been at the academy?”

Confusion skittered across Set’s expression and the
static in the air disappeared. “Since I was twelve, why?”

“You seem formidable. I just wanted to know when I
could aspire to be like you.”

Set puffed up like a rooster, all animosity
forgotten.

Jeff almost chuckled out loud.
Pretty boys,
they’re all the same
.

Oceanus stood and grabbed her tray, ready to follow
Set
back to their table. As she walked away she threw one
last appraising look back at Jeff. Then she winked.

Chapter 13

The abilities classes were the core set of classes
everyone needed to pass to earn their degree in villainy. It only took about
eight weeks to work through a level, and then you’d move to the next level.
This meant that the members in Jeff’s abilities classes were always cycling in
and out. Within a few weeks of his joining the academy, he’d already lost half
his original class members and had them replaced by newer academy members. When
it was his turn to move to the next level class, he was back in with all the
initial kids again. Fortunately, Shake and Bake were among the first students
to transfer up each cycle. Unfortunately, so was Source.

When Jeff and Source were in class together they always
partnered up; Source helped Jeff
figure
out how to
employ new abilities and identify the opposing ones. Jeff felt insecure
whenever Source moved up to the next class.

Before he knew it, Jeff had been
at the academy for eight months. Having just completed the fourth cycle of abilities
classes, his control had improved to the point that he could arc a burst of
flame and hit a target 30 feet away. He had shot up another six inches in
height, putting him at 6 foot, 2 inches, making his S&S classes all the
more challenging trying not to trip over his ever lengthening feet. The classes
were as physically demanding as any army boot camp and helped Jeff to develop
into an intimidating physical presence. Luckily, the academy fed the kids as
much food as they needed or wanted because Jeff stopped by the cafeteria five
or six times a day.

Once a year, the students
“received” their families for a school visit. This meant that groups of kids
flew to the bogus school on the east coast and pretended to be completely at
home there while they entertained their families and showed them around town.

It was Jeff’s and Source’s turn.
They’d flown east with a dozen other academy members and gotten settled into
dorm rooms. They had two days to get to know the layout of the school and the
surrounding town and to learn their bogus class schedule and where the classrooms
were. On the third day, the families arrived.

Jeff bent over in front of the
mirror in their dorm room, straightened the tie of the unfamiliar uniform and
arranged his hair into the perfect windswept look. His hair was shorter than
when he’d lived at home, but the style hadn’t changed. That was the only thing
that hadn’t changed about him. He wondered if his family would even recognize
him.

“You
look great already!” Source dropped a couple of flakes into Pucker’s bowl.
“What is it with you and your hair?”

“What do you mean?” Jeff glared at
Source.

“You’re always flipping it, fixing
it, shaking it. You’re worse than a girl!”

“I am not. I could care less what
my hair looks like.”

Source snorted. “Sure, dude.”

They argued over Jeff’s vanity all
the way down to the commons area.
When they walked into the
room, Jeff nodded at a couple other boys from the academy and high-fived a third
as they passed by.
He saw Tubs standing like a prison guard in the
corner of the room.

“Jeff?”

Having gotten used to everyone
calling him Polar, Jeff almost didn’t respond. Just in time, he realized that
was meant for him and he swung around and smiled down at his family.

His dad was as gregarious as ever.
“Jeff, ole boy!
Look at you. What on earth are they
feeding you around here?”

He clapped Jeff on the back a
couple times and pumped his arm in an enthusiastic handshake. Then he yanked
Jeff into a hug and clapped him on the back again. “I’d say, the place agrees
with you, huh, son?”

Jeff nodded and smiled. He scanned
over to Mother and froze. Tears welled in her eyes and her hand was clamped
over her mouth. His smile crooked naturally and heat rushed to his cheeks.
Feeling an uncharacteristic appreciation for her, he stepped forward and hugged
her. “Hi, Mother.” Jeff didn’t stress the M for the first time since he’d
turned eleven.

She patted his shoulders awkwardly
during their brief hug. When he pulled away she blinked the tears away.
“My, my, Jeff.”
Her voice caught. “You’ve really grown up.”

“I think he’s my brother.” Sandra
socked Jeff in the arm.

Jeff rolled his eyes. “Still
annoyingly touchy-feely, aren’t you?”

“It hasn’t been that long, bro.”

“Can you believe this,
Sandy-girl?” Dad waved his hand indicating all of Jeff.

“I must admit, it’s very creepy
realizing your own brother is good looking.” Sandra grimaced.

Jeff chuckled. He saw Source
standing off to the side.

“Oh, hey everybody, this is my roommate.”
Jeff’s eyes grew wide when he realized he had no idea what Source’s real name
was.

Source stepped forward and shoved
his hand out to Jeff’s dad. “Henry Lippy, sir. Pleased to meet you. I’ve heard
so much about you.”