The Other Eight (9 page)

Undo nodded once. He was dressed in a
denim-on-denim outfit, had a reasonably fit build, wore mirrored
sunglasses, and had five o’clock shadow. Those around him also
sensed that he was recovering from a potent hangover, judging from
the strong smell of old alcohol and his general aversion to the
louder comments being made.

“You’re up, sir,” Phosphor said, when the man
in question didn’t speak up on his own.

The man was dressed in a much classier outfit
than any of the other hopefuls. He wore slacks, polished black
shoes, and a white dress shirt topped with a satin vest and a black
tie. He had a cold, distant look to his face, though the fact that
it became colder and more distant whenever he noticed someone
looking at him suggested there was something not quite legitimate
about it. “My name is Omnivox.”

The words instantly seized the attention of
even those who had begun to lose interest. It wasn’t one voice but
a chorus of them, deep and tightly harmonized. The way they
combined gave him an almost robotic sound. “I am from Salem,
Oregon. You are hearing my power right now.”

Nonsensica tipped her head to the side. “That
effect sounds so familiar. Did you ever go by a different
name?”

“That’s not relevant. Who is next?” he
replied hastily.

“That’ll be me,” said a greasy-looking fellow
wearing a sleeveless flannel shirt and a bandana. “Third Person,
I’m from New Hampshire, and I’m looking over my own shoulder right
now.”

“Like in a game?” Bomb Sniffer asked.

“Exactly.”

“Cool.”

“I’m Johnny On the Spot, I’m from wherever
the wind blows me, and I’ve got the ability to be in the right
place at the right time,” blurted the next man in line. His
appearance was a near perfect representation of the classic image
of a superhero: a strong chin and lush hair with a spit curl
hanging down over his forehead. His physique bulged with chiseled
and bulky muscles that were more about size than strength, and his
clothes were two sizes too small, the better to show off said
muscles.

“That’s it?” Chloroplast said.

“I’ve gotten twenty-five walk on roles on
television just by stumbling onto a set while they were shooting,
I’m living rent free after a real estate tycoon’s prize Chihuahua
fell out of the penthouse window and landed in my arms, and I was
the millionth customer at three different grocery stores in the
last four months, earning me free groceries for life. I do okay,”
he said with a shrug.

“Wow. Your codename should have been Lucky
Bastard,” said Gracias.

“Or just Bastard,” said Chloroplast.

“Ha haa! This guy, am I right? Seriously. You
and me, partners,” Gracias said.

“Give it a rest,” Chloroplast groaned.

“I guess I’m next,” said Preston Logan. “My
name is Non Sequitur—”

“So
you’re
the one!” Nonsensica
yelled, jabbing an accusing finger in his direction.

“I’m the one what?” said Non Sequitur,
suddenly on the defensive.

“
I
was supposed to be Non Sequitur. It
was the perfect name! But they told me it was already taken.”

“Well, I’m sorry. I didn’t know. In all
fairness, it is a pretty good name for me, too.”

“Is it? What’s your power?”

“I can do things out of order. Open a door,
then unlock it. Stuff like that.”

“Nope, fits me better. I say two words that
make no sense in rapid succession. When you say an unexpected thing
it is
called
a non sequitur.”

“Well, yeah, but non sequitur means ‘it does
not follow,’ and the whole deal with my power is that I do things
that should follow, but don’t.”

The two continued to bicker for a while.
Gracias leaned over to Chloroplast. “Man. I didn’t realize there
would be so much vocabulary involved in superhero-ing. There isn’t
going to be a test, is there?”

“It’s boot camp, not high school,”
Chloroplast replied.

“Okay. Good. Math was always my subject.
Vocabulary, not so much. Heh. I think I just saw a road sign for
Manassas,” Gracias quipped. “You think there are a lot of
proctologists there?”

“It’s pronounced Man
ass
as, not
Man
assas,” Chloroplast corrected.

“Oh,” Gracias snickered. “So the emphasis is
on ass.”

Chloroplast shook his head and looked away.
The argument between the others was winding down.

“You know what? It’s fine. It’s fine,”
Nonsensica concluded. “I like Nonsensica better now. It’s more
dynamic and feminine. And that’s me all over. Dynamic and
feminine.”

Primadonna, who was the next person in line
to speak, emitted a scoffing noise.

“Now what’s that about?” Nonsensica
snapped.

“Nothing, nothing. You are right. You are
very dynamic,” Primadonna said.

“And feminine.”

“So you say. Who am I to disagree?” she said.
There was a slight accent to her words, possibly Eastern European.
“My name is Primadonna, I come from LA, and when I dance, the world
dances with me.”

“Look, can we please explain exactly what our
powers are, instead of getting cute with the descriptions?”
Chloroplast groaned.

Primadonna frowned at him. “When I hear music
and I dance, everyone else who can hear the music dances also.”

“So you can make spontaneous dance routines
happen? Like in that Moonwalker game for the Genesis?” Gracias
said.

“I suppose,” she said.

“Wait, what’s ‘the Genesis’?” Bomb Sniffer
asked.

“Okay, now I
know
you are not
twenty-three,” he shot back.

“Hello? I believe I was the one who was
talking,” Primadonna asserted, once attention had begun to wander
away from her. “Yes, the dancing is like in the Michael Jackson
videos. Only not so showy. More graceful, and more classy.”

“Neat!” Gracias said, “You know, I’ve got
pretty good rhythm. Maybe you and I should be part—”

“No,” Primadonna said.

“Okay, okay. No pressure. We’ll talk about it
again later, once you’ve had a chance to see me in action,” he
said, waggling his eyebrows. “What about you, man? What’s your
thing?”

The man in question now was clearly
Polynesian, quite a bit heavier than the average recruit, and had
thus far not said a word. As a matter of fact, he hadn’t even
opened his eyes. He simply sat, head tilted back, and popped his
knuckles one at a time until enough time passed that he could do it
again.

“Sir?
Sir
?” Gracias remarked, finally
leaning forward to tap him. Instantly his eyes shot open and he
spat, the action filling the air with a brief whine and punching a
neat hole in a wooden slat of the troop carrier’s safety rail. The
hole was barely an inch from Gracias’s left ear.

When the startled moment passed, the man
looked around and realized it was his turn. “I’m Hocker. I’m from
Hawaii. I spit seeds fast enough to kill a man.”

“I believe it,” Gracias said, looking
nervously at the hole beside his head. “Maybe you should be a
little careful with that.”

“Maybe
you
shouldn’t sneak up on a
dangerous man while he’s concentrating.”

“I tapped you on the knee, that wasn’t
really—”

“Enough with the third degree! Move on to the
next guy,” Hocker growled, popping a fresh sunflower seed in his
mouth from a packet in his pocket and crossing his arms.

The other members of the group made a mental
note to give Hocker the same sort of respect one might give a
canister of nitroglycerin, then turned their attention to the final
member of the group. Since Primadonna had spoken, he had been
glaring in her direction, arms crossed and teeth clenched. He was
wearing a pair of loose shorts, a T-shirt, and sneakers on his
athletic build, and his hair was an immaculately kept coif of dark
brown.

“My name is The Number. I come from Los
Angeles, and
when I dance, the world dances with me
!” he
explained angrily.

“No way. You have the same powers as
her
?” Nonsensica asked. “Why would they pick two people with
the same powers?”

“Maybe the army is trying to start a glee
club,” Chloroplast guessed.

“I don’t just have the same
powers
as
her, I have the same
origin
as her! I
thought
she
looked familiar. We were in the same dance troupe when the building
was struck by lightning. I moved to New York and started doing
choreography for Broadway, with an exercise studio on the side. I
guess she stayed behind and got all tarted up.”

“You are just jealous that I am a better
dancer than you were, and that I will be a better hero as
well.”

“Now listen here, I was always a better
dancer. You just got more attention because of your ‘personality,’”
he said, cupping his hands to his chest as he said the operative
word.

“That is a vicious lie!” she snapped,
standing to defend her honor. “You take that—”

The troop carrier suddenly slowed, causing
Primadonna to tumble forward and give Hocker a face full of
personality. Curiously, he didn’t seem to object to this particular
violation of his concentration. She righted herself and adjusted
her costume.

“I guess that’s everyone?” she asked,
glancing around the troop carrier to silently assure the rest of
the heroes that, contrary to what they may have thought, the last
forty-five seconds hadn’t actually occurred.

“I think so,” Phosphor said.

“No, sir. There’s still me,” sighed a rather
downtrodden voice.

All eyes turned to an overweight, balding,
middle-aged man in a gray sweat suit.

“Oh, I’m sorry. I didn’t notice you there,
who are you?”

“I’m Afterthought. I’m from Branson,
Missouri, and I have the ability to be a last-minute selection and
then swiftly forgotten.”

“Wait, so your power is to end up on a team?”
Nonsensica said.

“Specifically, to be picked last and then
never given anything worth doing.”

“Isn’t that cheating? Doesn’t that guarantee
you a spot?”

“Probably. Don’t worry about it though, no
one will notice.”

Phosphor craned his neck. “It looks like
we’re here. Time to see what they’ve got in store for us.”

The sixteen
finalists piled out of the troop carrier, followed by the camera
crew and the guards, and surveyed their new surroundings. In many
ways, it resembled a traditional boot camp. The grounds were mostly
grass with fields of tilled up dirt here and there, assorted
obstacles and training equipment scattered about, and gravel paths
connecting them all. The carrier had pulled onto a packed gravel
circle, the center of which was marked with a ring of large stones
and contained a flagpole and a brown sign with GP Proving Grounds
written on it in white lettering. To one side was a barn-sized mess
hall, and to the other side were four small cabins, each numbered
and split into identical A and B halves. Dr. Aiken and Private
Summers stepped out of a jeep that had pulled in shortly after the
troop carrier.

“Welcome to the Guardian Project Proving
Grounds,” announced Aiken. “It is here that you will be tested for
military aptitude, and your interactions and team building will be
assessed. I’ll be on hand to observe and offer counseling if
required, but once you’ve been assigned to your bunks your trials
will be in the able hands of Sergeant Roberts.”

The group looked around and finally noticed
the sergeant standing beside the entrance to the mess hall. Either
no one had seen him arrive, or he had been present the entire time.
Neither option was terribly comforting.

“Jeez, I thought that was a statue,” Gracias
remarked.

“In a traditional boot camp you would all
share a single barracks, but the military theorizes your powers
make you a bit more volatile than a standard soldier. You will
instead be separated into two-person cabins. I know you all
probably want to get yourselves set up, so when I call your names,
step forward for cabin assignment. Primadonna and Bomb Sniffer,
you’re in cabin 1-A.”

The hot-blooded dancer tottered along, heels
poorly suited for gravel. Behind her the youngest of the group
lugged a heavy backpack.

“Phosphor and The Number, Cabin 1-B. Omnivox
and Hocker, Cabin 2-A. Johnny and Retcon, 2-B. Undo and Third
Person, 3-A. Chloroplast and Gracias—”

“Oh come on
,
” objected
Chloroplast.

“Eh? Eh? Pa-a-artne-e-e-ers!” Gracias said,
elbowing his roommate.

”—3-B. Nonsensica and Non Sequitur, 4-A.”

“Um, Dr. Aiken? Nonsensica and I didn’t
exactly hit it off. Can I switch roommates?”

“I’ll do it!” Chloroplast volunteered
instantly.

“No switching roommates. These were carefully
selected pairings.”

“Oh come
on
!” Chloroplast moaned again
as he headed toward the cabin.

“Two peas in a pod before you know it,
buddy,” Gracias said

Non Sequitur looked sheepishly at his new
roommate to find her staring him down.

“And finally, FM and… I’m sorry did I
miscount?” Aiken said, flipping through the clipboard.

“Right here, sir,” said Afterthought.

“Oh, right. Yes, you’ll be with FM in Cabin
4-B. That’s all. The rest of the day is yours. Tomorrow you’ll
start your training under Sergeant Roberts. You should take some
time to get to know your cabin mate. The two of you have been
paired because we feel that you will make the best operational
unit. You’ll be collaborating on any group trials, so the better
you work together, the further you’ll go.”

#

As the rest of the finalists made their way
to their cabins. Non Sequitur turned to his new roommate. While his
own luggage was little more than a backpack, Nonsensica had brought
a hockey bag that was nearly as big as she was.

“You need a hand with that?” he asked.