The Super 4 : Dark Death (3 page)

“
Carly.” Papa called. “Go to bed
it’s late!”

I sighed. Stupid curfew.

“
Alright.” I responded. I shut my
diary just as papa was coming upstairs.

“
Night darling.” he said leaning
forward to kiss my forehead. Papa had shocking red hair and fierce
blue eyes that reminded me of the ocean.

“
Night.” I told him. I shut my
eyes and fell asleep almost immediately.

I was surfing. I had never surfed in my life
but somehow I was the best in the world. I was riding a wave in the
Atlantic Ocean in a surfing competition. Then I spotted a fin
sticking out of the water. Everyone else panicked, but I stayed
calm. I made a giant fist out of water, grabbed the shark and threw
him all way out into the depths of the ocean. I jumped of my board
and started paddling towards shore. Everyone was chanting my name
and boy did it feel good.

“
CARLY! CARLY! CARLY!”

I awoke with papa screaming my name. “Carly!
Wake up! It’s time for school!” I hopped out of bed and started
getting ready for the day. All the time a big fat smile was stuck
on my face. Those sharks better beware. A new superhero was in
town. And she was called Electric Eel.

Darryl

IV

I knew the others were using the powers for
fun, but I had a job to do. Dad died when I was five, so Mum was
the only family I had (not that she was a good relative, and my
mother no less!). We were never rich even when Dad was around. But
know we were almost bankrupt. Luckily I gained a scholarship in
D.C. so we packed up sold our house and flew here. We didn’t get a
lot for our house, but it got us enough money for a two-bedroom
apartment and a small car. I was never what you could call popular,
but I was smart. It didn’t win me any friends, but it did make
school easier.

I had a love for books. Any book.
Encyclopedias, fantasy, myth, legend, adventure. I loved them all.
But for a reason I never understood most people hated books and
thought reading was labor.

I hated that.

Being born in the twenty-first century I
didn’t experience labor like my grandmother and mean mother did.
Being an African-American was a terrible thing to be back then.
There were all kinds of horrid laws, which stated a black couldn’t
do things a white can.

Sure those rules were banished, but some
humans just never change. I still get dirty looks wherever I go for
daring to be an African.

My hair and
complexion was not far off from the color of a roasted coffee bean.
But my eyes were the color of gold. Okay
maybe
they’re not gold, but hey a
guy got to dream.

Anyway, everyone in my family has those eyes,
but the gift seemed to be limited to only my family. That really
boosted my self-confidence. But not enough to make me immune to the
teasing of bullies.

I’ve had my share of bullies over the year, but
know bullies are the least things on my mind now that I have my
powers.

My elastic powers really help with studying so
that’s a bonus. For example if I’m sitting on my bed and I want to
get a book on the other side of the room I can simply stretch my
arm and pick it up instead of having to get all the way up from my
bed and walking all the way to my desk, just so I can read my
favorite book: Moby Dick.

Also my ability to invent things so quickly and
with such ease would make science projects so much easier. Now I
wouldn’t have to spend weeks studying magnets just to figure out
how to levitate a can of coke for more than thirty
seconds.

My powers came
right in time for the annual science fair. This time I used my
powers to invent a super magnet that could allow a dozen cans of
coke to hover for more than an hour. No research needed. I wondered
if the others had thought of that. Using the powers to win the
competition. I mean Carly could use her powers to cause a blackout
and say it was all because of her “machine”. Jake could also make a
force field and say
his
machine had made it. Harrison could make a fire
and make shapes out of it, but never letting it harm
anyone.

I realized all the others could use their
powers to win and it wouldn’t be fair. But life isn’t fair. I
decided it would be fine for me to use something I had been given.
On top of that I didn’t have a rich daddy like the rest of them
ready to import any machine they wanted from halfway across the
globe!

I didn’t even have a daddy.

I woke up the next morning eager for the
Science Fair to start. I walked to school with my project in hand.
I set it down in the science lab and went to Math. I waited
impatiently for the day to end. The way my school does it is during
the day some teachers examine all the projects and try them out. In
the end the best one or the clearest one wins. Usually I win but
this time I was especially anxious to find out if my winning streak
had continued.

When the day finally ended I rushed out of
class to the science lab. Sure enough my project had a big blue
ribbon attached to the side, but my name. Which I had boldly
printed onto the side off my project, had been replaced by an even
larger name. Margaret Garvey.

Margaret Garvey was my sworn enemy ever since
she had dumped her thick protein shake on my head. I couldn’t get
the smell of broccoli out of my hair for weeks!

And now she had tortured me again. Stealing my
five minutes of easy work! She stood next to my project, smiling
with all of her shining white teeth. Her face was dotted with a
mixture of pimples and freckles. Her greasy, brown hair pulled back
in a ponytail. Her bushy unibrow lay low above her bright green
eyes.

In short she was ugly.

And yet she had stolen my project behind my
back. Something had to be done. I opened my mouth,

“
Margaret stole my project!” A
hurricane of mutters greeted me.

I was certain everyone would agree with me,
after all Margaret had a lower IQ than me. But instead people
started calling me jealous. At the time I couldn’t help but think
of how ridiculous that sounded. Me, with an IQ of 154, now 428,
jealous of Margaret, with an IQ of 137. But looking back I realized
that it made sense. I had won the Science Fair four times in a row.
Of course I would say that I was supposed to win.

But I still couldn’t believe that they
believed. After all Margaret hadn’t won a single Science Fair in
her life. Or at least up until now.

So I guess that didn’t really end my winning
streak, it only ended what everyone else thought of my winning
streak.

And in case you’re wondering Margaret did
enter a project under my name. It was a paper airplane.

At that point I decided to make the best of
what I had.

“
Hey, Ms. Brumars,” I said,
“Here’s my real project.” Everyone turned. I started spouting facts
about the Wrong Brothers and every invention of an airplane I ever
read about. Then for good measure I threw the plane. Everyone
watched as it sailed across the room. They clapped politely. Then I
pulled out the plastic plane model I had been working on while I
was talking.

“
Here is the model of the Wrong
brothers’ plane.” I said loudly. I threw the plane it did loads of
loops and spins before returning to me like a boomerang.

Ms Brumars got up, applauding, and announced.
“We have a tie!” She pulled out a second ribbon and placed it on my
plastic model.

I flashed a winning smile at Margaret. She
looked like she wanted to strangle me, which she probably
did.

But I felt good. Even with my project stolen
from me I still won and maintained my profile as the first student
to ever win the Science Fair five times in a row.

After my glorious victory, the others came
over. Carly was the first to say,

“
Well done. The look on Margaret’s
face was priceless.” I remembered how Margaret had sabotaged the
girls’ locker room to get back at Coach Irene for not letting her
on the team. Honestly it was no surprise.

However, rigging up the shaving cream so that
it would spray anyone unlucky enough to open the locker was quite
ingenious. I felt a surge of emotions run through my head, but I
quickly discarded them. I had found myself not completely revolted
at the weird emotions I felt for her. I shivered.

Harrison must’ve
noticed because he asked what’s wrong with a handful of fire. I
wondered how he could ever think I was cold on the last day of
April.
Hasn’t he ever heard of the phrase:
‘in like a lion, out like a lamb’?
I
thought. Aloud I said “Nothing.” There was no reason for me to
humiliate myself in front of them. They were my only
friends.

Harrison shrugged. “Oh.” He extinguished his
flame. I let out an inward sigh of relief. On the outside I tried
to remain calm. “So… what are we going to do now?”

“
Have a battle…. with our super
powers!” Jake grinned like an evil clown.

“
That sounds fun!” Carly
remarked.

“
Oh...yeah. Fun.” I said, trying
to keep myself from gulping.

We headed off to the tree house. Which we
decided should be called our HQ. When we arrived we silently split
of into teams. Harrison and I against Carly and Jake.

“
Okay,” Harrison announced.
“3...2...1.Go!” Harrison and Carly each sent a wave of fire and
water, which met in the middle and disappeared into a cloud of
smoke. Harrison then disappeared from sight. He had melted and was
using the smoke as a cover.

A couple of minutes later Carly and Jake were
both on the floor with Harrison standing on Jake’s chest. A flaming
sword was inches away from Jake’s chest.

Harrison grinned up at me. “Well that was
easy!” I tried not to look disappointed at the fact that I hadn’t
participated in the short fight.

“
So… what do we do now?” I asked.
They shrugged.

“
Go home?” Carly
suggested.

“
Play again?” Jake said, his voice
dripping with anger.

“
Sure.” Harrison said attempting
his best innocent face. He looked at me. “What d’ya
say?”

“
Why not?”

Five minutes
later the game had started. This time I made my body expand to
cover Jake and Curly. Harrison fell about laughing, while Carly and
Jake thrashed around. I released them smiling.
Ah victory is sweet
.

“
I’m going home!” Jake said and he
raced off. The rest of us attempted not to laugh. Then Carly
laughed, and the next thing I know we’re all giggling and rolling
on the ground.

When we had finally calmed down it was around
six.

“
Well I’m going.” Carly
said.

“
Me too.” Harrison said. “What
‘bout you?”

“
Sure,” I told him. “I wouldn’t
want to be the only one left!”

We exchanged goodbyes and headed our various
ways.

When I got home I went straight to my room and
read a chapter of my Moby Dick.

Herman Melville is one amazing
author.

I started thinking about animals after that. I
wondered if I could stretch my body and shape it to make a whale. I
tried that. It didn’t work. I tried again. Still no success.
Fourteen tries later I finally got the hang of it. After that
making animals was easy. I made lions, tigers, elephants and even a
huge mouse.

Then I moved on to something I once saw in a
superhero movie. I made a parachute with my body. Then, a raft and
then, for good measure, a car. After a while I got bored and
decided to type out all of our weaknesses onto a piece of
paper.

Darryl’s weakness: Cannot be
exposed to extremely hot or cold conditions. Results in either
melting or freezing.

Jake’s weakness: Force field does
not last long. Therefore defense is not very good.

Carly’s weakness: Fire and rubber.
Fire turns her water to steam and rubber absorbs her electrical
charge.

Harrison’s weakness: Water. Water
extinguishes flame and spreads liquid form.

I looked over my work. Not bad. The hardest
one was Jake. But I noticed his force field lasts only for a couple
of minutes, which makes it not very stable.

I glanced at my own handiwork once more before
falling asleep on my bed.

Harrison

V

I tried all weekend creating lava
unsuccessfully. Finally on Friday I made a feeble ball of lava,
about the size of a golf ball. After several more attempts I
eventually made a lava ball the size of a hockey stick.

I went to bed smiling at my miniature triumph.
I pulled the covers up to my chin and fell asleep.

I thought the world had ended when my alarm
went off, all high-pitched and crazy. I moaned while getting out of
bed. I hate having to wake up so early in the morning. Plus it was
Saturday.