Super Girls (Cape High Book 13) (2 page)

Yes, I'm not powerful, but I AM a wind manipulator. I can hear really, really well. I glance over at Olivia, who's staring at the twins, and then at Elidee, who's trying to escape them without actually running away. I can't help the hint of a grin that crosses my face. This is actually amusing. I mean, here's Elidee saying how much she wants a boyfriend, trying to avoid two boys that will probably grow up to look like their Dad—and Hard Knocks is seriously good looking for an old guy. And Olivia is—if I'm hearing her gritting her teeth properly, extremely irritated by all of this.

But none of this is my business. I'm being forced to leave school in my junior year, and tossed into a school of kids that are WAY more powerful than I am—and probably younger! I step into the line blindly, feeling sorry for myself again, and jerk as I realize Isotonic is standing behind me.

"I noticed, Nico seemed most interested in you of the new group," he says silently as I look at him. "What are you?" he asks me.

I swallow, wondering why I have the sudden urge to tell him everything. He's one of the greats. He's the leader of the North Branch Hall. "Nobody you need to notice," I say quietly.

"My daughter promises to be at my level when she grows up, yet all he said was she had a lot of promise. I didn't get to be a Hall leader by being stupid. If Technico seems interested in a kid, it's for a reason."

I turn, glaring up at him.

"Jennifer," Nico says, making me look up. "It's your turn."

I almost yelled at a Hall leader, I realize in shock. Blindly I head forward, pressing my hand to the handprint on the screen and following the glowing footprints inside. I'm almost shocked as the campus comes into sight. It only covers a portion of the massive canyon, but it's still impressive.

"Welcome to Cape High," Nico says from behind us. "It's only the beginning for our school. With groups like you coming in, we're already starting to expand. That structure over there will be more dorms," he tells us, motioning to a group of norm clothed supers working on a large building. "And soon the classes will have to be split by grade level. That means, Isotonic, if you have any retired supers that are qualified to teach, we're welcoming applications. Right now most of my kids are out trying to rescue the outed healers. You might have already heard about them. That's another thing you have to realize—once you've gotten past a certain level of training, I won't hesitate to send you out into the field." He pauses for a second and lets us soak in that statement. "Now head on down the steps and we'll begin the official tour."

***

My name is Jennifer Berkley. Honestly, I'm not even sure why I claim that last name anymore. My dad, George Berkley, died before I ever met him. I mean, I guess he was a nice guy--he adopted Jetta, after all, she was from a previous relationship--one with another super. My mom remarried again when I was two. All I've known is my step-dad, and he's pretty much a puppet for Mom. I think I'll change my last name to Aunt Barbara's when I'm older, even if it is my mom's maiden name. Jennifer Gentry sounds good, right? Of course most people are going "You're a girl, you'll get married and change your last name soon enough." Whatever. I might have thought that back when I was interested in Matt, but no thanks. Romance is SO last season.

But here's my story. It's a real simple one, and I'm sure it's been played out a ton of times before. I'm the second kid—the one that mostly took after my norm dad. I'm just the excess baggage. I have NEVER lived up to my big sister. I always had lower grades, lower IQ scores, lower everything. I heard the sentence "Why can't you be more like your sister?" so many times that it's burned into my eardrums. I was always a disappointment to Mom, and she made no attempt to hide that fact.

Once Jetta came into her powers it really blew up in my face. She could do no wrong in the sight of Mom and my step-dad. Even when I started kicking up some wind they barely even acknowledged it. In fact I think Mom's words were, and I quote, "Honey, would you STOP THAT? I'm trying to listen to your sister!"

I got frustrated. The more powerful Jetta grew, the more invisible I seemed. When I finally confronted Mom about it, she yelled at me. Like it's my fault I'm not the same person as my sister. Like it's my fault that I—

Yeah, well, anyway, next thing I knew I was on a plane to Kansas City--alone. Mom didn’t even bother to come along, she just shoved me out of the house. When Aunt Barbara insisted on having the proper guardianship paperwork signed, Mom drew up papers handing all parental rights over to Aunt Barbara--she signed, notarized, and filed them all in the East Branch. She never even stepped foot in Kansas City during the process. As of that time, Aunt Barbara was my only legal family.

It got better. I’m not that great as a super, but as a norm, well, I’m fantastic. I excelled at all of my classes, became a cheerleader, and started dating boys that were popular--all the best things in life, right? Sure, a part of me hated myself for just giving up on the cape--but the cape gave up on me first, okay? My FAMILY tossed me out and never looked back.

And then Ace started talking. Sure, I had the feeling he might be a super, I mean, it’s kind of obvious if you watch him long enough. But he was quiet so I could just ignore him. The only reason I was stupid enough to make fun of him that one time was because he’d never done anything about it. Matt liked making fun of him, I liked Matt, and Ace didn’t care. It all worked out, until it didn’t.

Things just kept getting worse after Matt broke his fist on Ace’s face. All of a sudden Ace was a big name and I was an idiot for sticking up for Matt. Then, even MATT became a Dragon fan! What a moron, right? But I’m even stupider--I thought, hey, he’s a fan of Ace now, right? So he’ll be a super fan of me if I tell him that I’M a cape too!

Wrong. He just looked at me like I’m a freak--and all my insecurities from my family came rushing right back. I AM a freak. Not in a good way, and not just among the norms, either. I’m just as big a freak among the supers, a useless cape. A D-Class, like my sister told me.

There is nowhere I fit in. I’m not going to fit in at this stupid school, either. I don’t even know why I’m here at this stupid tour to begin with--I’ll be flunked out of super school within a week.

“Now, if you will follow me,” Nico says, jerking me back to the present, “I’m going to tell you about the other half of our training.”

“And what would that be?” Aunt Barbara asks.

“The super villain training. Now that we have three of the larger names in teenage villains on the streets, we’ve gotten a bit of a reputation for it,” Nico answers with an evil grin as he leads us past an archery field. “Listen closely, Jennifer, because I think you’ll fit in perfectly there.”

The entire group turns to look at me in shock, but they’re not nearly as shocked as I am.

“What?” I ask finally.

“I’m thinking of making you a super villain,” he says.

“Wait a second!” Aunt Barbara says, “that wasn’t in any of our discussions! My niece is NOT a super villain!”

I’m still stuck in shocked mode. It must show, because Nico lets out a laugh. “Of course you don’t have to, if you don’t want to,” he says, “but I’d say you were passing up an interesting opportunity. Do any of you think you’d like trying out super villainy?” he asks the group.

Both boys bounce on their feet, waving their hands wildly. "I'll note that for when you join," Nico says, his hands moving through the air as if he was typing on a keyboard. "Now, are there any questions?"

"What does the super villain job even involve?" I ask. I can't help myself. Being a super villain is something that never even occurred to me.

"You will be trained, outfitted and sent out to give newcomer heroes their debuts. You lose dramatically and run off to fight another day."

"And I'm supposed to WANT to do that?" I demand.

"The boys seem to enjoy it. Why don't you try the school out for a few weeks before deciding? You'll understand better. For now, why don't we go see our training areas—including those I use to train my villains on dramatic entrances and exits."

***

The dining table is silent, save for the tiny clinks of our silverware on the plates. It's an unnatural silence, one of those "You have to speak first" silences that get awkward after a few minutes. This time it's Aunt Barbara that breaks it. She puts her fork down in her plate with a loud clink.

"You're not going to that school," she declares. "There is no way I'm letting him take my beautiful girl and make her a—a SUPER VILLAIN!"

I stare at my fork of lasagna, wondering why all of a sudden I don't feel like going along with her. "I'm going to get beat, regardless," I say, not looking at her. "I saw my stats, Aunt Barb. The only thing that looked even passable was my air manipulation ability. The rest of my abilities are in the single digits, speed, strength, basically anything good. I’m useless as a cape."

"That is NOT true! You'd be a perfectly fine cape! And if you don't want to go into the super business, I can get you a job at HTV. They hire all sorts of classes for their business!"

"Yeah, like I could be a reporter," I say, but the sarcasm is absent this time. "Actually… it wouldn't be bad working for HTV," I admit, playing with my fork. There are a lot of D-class capes working there, right? "But…"

"It's GREAT working for HTV," Aunt Barbara says, her face lighting up. "Everyone that works there is amazing. You know Prisma! She's a prime example!"

"Yeah," I say. She gives me a sharp look. "I just…" I start out slowly, far too intent on staring at my food, "it's like he offered me something Mom always said I couldn't have," I say. "Like, FINALLY someone thinks I can be a super. It doesn't even matter which side I'm on, it's still more than anything they thought I could accomplish."

"So you're just going to let him turn you into a villain?" she asks. "You are BETTER than that, Jennifer," she says urgently. "You are more than a silly villain that has to take the fall every time!"

"I would take the fall regardless of what side I'm on, Aunt Barb!" I say, standing. "I'm not hungry anymore," I add. I stop, too conditioned, and grab my plate to take it into the kitchen and put it in the fridge before storming off to my room.

It's silent for a moment, until I hear Aunt Barbara dial on her cell phone. "Mr. Harrison? Hi, sorry for calling so late. Can I ask you something?" I jerk, almost heading into the front room again. I hear the door close, showing that she walked out of the house. I'm so tempted to follow, I think, but she left on purpose—there's no way she'll let me hear the rest of the conversation. Instead I drop down on my bed, digging out my yearbook from last year and flipping through it. This picture is someone that pretended to be my friend. So was she, and her, and her, and him…

None of them talk to me anymore.

I slam the book closed and throw it at the wall, falling back on my bed and staring at the ceiling. Maybe it isn't the future I want, maybe it isn't going to be any better than what I have now—but it can't be worse. I'd rather be surrounded by people that hate me from the first. Being surrounded by people who used to be my friends is a million times worse.

I hear the tiny click of a door closing and let out a heavy breath. "Aunt Barbara?" I call.

"Yes?"

"I want to go to Cape High."

"I see. Then… I'll call the Hall and tell them your decision."

"What did Mr. Harrison say?" I can't help but ask as she comes into my room.

"He seemed very enthusiastic about you becoming a super villain," she says, frowning. "I'm sorry, Jennifer, I guess he's not looking for more workers right now."

"Yeah, okay," I say, my heart dropping into my stomach. It looks like my future was decided for me, after all.

***

"Barbara just called, freaking out over the super villain thing," Andre says, looking at the man on his computer screen. "I told her that it's a great idea, but now she thinks I'm a real jerk. I dislike my employees hating me, Nico."

"I realize that, but you're the one insisting on absolute silence until you're ready to start hiring," Nico says, kicking his feet up on the desk. "She's a pretty little thing, she has decent grades, and even a D-class wind manipulator can be trained to be impressive. I think, though, that Elidee would be perfect for this project, as well."

"She would, wouldn't she?" Andre says, a little smile pulling at his lips. "Her mother would try to kill me if I even suggested she go the villain route without explaining why. Barbara is easier to handle."

"She's also too young to launch into the program. I can offer up a few others that might interest you, though," Nico says. A folder appears on the screen next to him and he flicks his hand. "Looks these over, I think Freddy, especially, should interest you. He'd make an excellent hidden camera operator. Of course Negatia's already put in a bid for him, but he's still technically up for grabs."

"I'll look into it," Andre says. "Of course this is risking them actually choosing villainy full time, isn't it?"

"That's a risk you knew you were taking when you decided to do this," Nico says easily. "But still, I think it'll be a nice addition to your channels."

"I hope so," Andre says. "It’s a channel fully dedicated to the villains, rather than just interviewing them here and there. This is the first time any of the HTV stations have tried something like this—I want to do it right."