Trainee Superhero (Book One) (2 page)

Every day I wake up and look at that poster;
it’s got me through some hard times.

“Dude?” asks Tenchi, interrupting my
thoughts.

A Superhero Corps Officer is sitting behind a
dark desk in the corner. He ignores us, although he interviewed
Tenchi and sold me most of my posters. Beside him is a waiting area
corner with leather chairs and a coffee machine. Tenchi’s parents
are waiting there, and both look worried. I'm glad; they've been
like family to me. His tiny mother, Jen, gives us both a hug. She
was born in Japan and is responsible for Tenchi's love of all
things ninja and robot. His father, Kev, is a tall, heavyset man
who spent his youth in rural Australia and has the robust sense of
humor to prove it. Tenchi grew up speaking Japanese and swearing
like a sailor, a strange combination.

“Ready?” Kev asks.

“I guess,” I say.

“They'll be lucky to have you,” Jen says.

“If they say that you don't have what it
takes,” Kev says gruffly, “you tell them to get-”

“-your father...?” Jen interrupts with
practiced ease.

“He couldn't make it,” I say quickly,
although I'm not sure he even tried.

She gives me a kind smile, the kind I
normally hate getting. For once I don't mind.

“I'm sure he wanted to be here, dear,” she
says kindly.

“You should come around for dinner tonight,”
Kev says, “I'm cooking. Barbeque.”

It's always a barbeque when Kev cooks. The
thought of it makes me hungry.

The officer at the desk looks up and pretends
he has only just noticed me.

“It's time. Please follow me.”

He leads me to a large interview room with a
view over the lake. The room is empty except for a wooden table
with chairs on either side. I sit down before my jelly legs betray
me, and the officer places a small black box on the table between
us. He confirms my name and address in a bored voice, and then we
begin.

“Everything discussed during this meeting is
considered confidential under the Superhero Corps Laws. Breaking
this confidentiality is considered treason under these laws and is
punishable by death. Do you agree?”

“Yep.”

“Yes,” he corrects me sternly.

“Yes,” I echo. This man does not have a sense
of humor.

“Your mother died in a saucer attack three
years ago,” he says.

It's not a question. My mother was famous for
her work, and her death was heartbreaking for my father and me. A
thousand people died in the attack, so I wasn't alone in my grief.
I nod to the officer, but he points at the recorder.

“That's correct,” I say.

He rolls off a list of my sporting
achievements and extramural activities, which doesn't take long,
and then moves onto my academic achievements. These, at least, are
more impressive.

“... and advanced physics,” he finishes.

“Yes.”

“Allergies?” he asks, reading from a list on
his computer screen.

“Strawberries.”

“Medical conditions?”

“Mildly asthmatic.”

Those are just the easy questions; everyone
gets those. The hard part comes next. He places a red box on the
table and my heart misses a beat. This is it; this is the real
test. He waves to the box and I place a hand on it. I start up all
the chips in my head; it’s now or never. A little blue L.E.D.
lights up, but there is no other sign that anything is happening.
The officer looks at his computer screen and types a brief
note.

Did I do it? Am I in? I'm frantic to find
out, but the officer is in no hurry.

“Thank you. We now move on to the second
phase of the interview.”

I have no idea what this means, and I sit
forward eagerly. The officer, in contrast, is in no hurry to work
down his list of questions.

“If offered a position at Superhero Corp, do
you agree to waive all rights to freedom of speech, movement and
association from the moment you enter the Superhero Corps Training
Facility and until further notice?”

“Yes.”

He nods and ticks a box. “Do you agree to
medical treatments including-”

“Yes!” I interrupt impatiently.

He holds up a finger in warning and carries
on.

“-including, but not limited to: surgical,
psychological, neurological, nutritional, physiological, radiation,
chemical, hormonal, genetic, cybernetic, infranetic and other
interventions not approved by any international body or listed
here?”

Wow. What does infranetic even mean?

“Um... yes,” I say, with less confidence than
before.

“Thank you,” he says, making a note.

He stands up, looks me in the eyes for the
first time and puts out his hand. I shake it, not knowing what it
means. He hands me an envelope and smiles.

“Congratulations. These are your joining
instructions. You are the town's second trainee this year. There
must be something in the water.”

I stand there dumbly for a second.

“You're in,” he explains, “next time we meet
I’ll be saluting you.”

I’m going to be a superhero!

The next few minutes are a haze. I walk out,
and everyone hugs me. I feel amazing. I’m going to be a
superhero.

“Why don't you boys hit the lake for a few
hours? Dinner's at six,” Tenchi's mom says.

“Barbeque,” his dad adds proudly.

We have nothing to do but celebrate, so
Tenchi and I drive his car to a park on the lake. I’m still shaking
a little from the adrenaline as he cranks the stereo and we sit on
the hood, enjoying the perfect moment. The lake is an intense
spectrum of blue, from the very dark to clear turquoise. There
isn't a cloud in the sky, and most of my high school is already
splashing in the water. A few kayaks float lazily in the lake. One
of them is much further out than the others.

“That’s Stace out there, you know,” Tenchi
says with his Cheshire cat grin.

I can’t recognize her from this distance, but
he’s probably right. I’m feeling far too good to blush at his
teasing. We walk down to the water’s edge with a fair bit of
swagger and look out over the gentle waves.

“Best day ever!” Tenchi says, slapping my
shoulder.

We are going to be superheroes.

We are going to be SUPERHEROES!

Then the music skips and splutters.

“Just a glitch,” I say, but I pull out my
phone to check its status.

Phones are always the first to go during a
saucer attack. Mine seems okay, but the reception is way down. Then
the song dies, and my phone screen goes dark. We run over to the
car and flip the radio to the emergency channel.

“Seek…-elter, seek….shelter!” the radio
crackles.

I panic and try to use my dead phone. Tenchi
is already moving, climbing onto the shack’s roof.

“SAUCER! SAUCER! SAUCER!” he screams.

People start moving fast, racing out of the
water and into their cars. High school cliques and divisions are
forgotten as people pile into whatever car they can find. I see
James and his friends squeezing two nerds into the back of their
overloaded car and waving more people on. Tenchi keeps shouting
until he can see that everyone has heard him, and then leaps down
to his car.

“We have to wait for Stace,” I yell, and he
nods.

She was the furthest kayak from shore, and it
feels like forever before she lands beside us and jumps into the
car. Everyone else has already left, and the lake is quieter than
I’ve ever seen it.

“Hi Stace,” I say, and she gives me a worried
smile.

The nearest shelter is across town, which
should only be a few minutes away. Tenchi takes the most direct
route down the main street, but we are cut off by the ruins of a
fallen clock tower.

“Here we go,” he mutters.

A lumbering figure stands on top of the
ruins. It’s a triclops, an alien with three arms each ending in a
laser cannon. Tenchi makes a handbrake turn as the triclops scours
the ground around us. We swerve down a side alley, knocking over
trash cans as we flee. The car scrapes along a water pipe but we
squeeze through and skid into a broad street lined with tall trees.
It had been a beautiful area yesterday, but now most of the trees
are on fire and the road is already littered with burning cars and
glass.

We start driving, but a car cuts Tenchi off
and races down the street.

“No good!” yells Stacey, pointing out another
triclops at it leaps off a roof and right into our path.

Tenchi hits the brakes and we slide into a
tree. The car that cut us off doesn’t stop in time and runs right
into the triclops. There is a bright flash that leaves the car as
flat as if it had hit a cliff wall, but the triclops is
unscathed.

“Out!” Stacey orders.

There is smoke everywhere. We escape behind
the safety of a SUV and hunker down. The triclops turns and walks
away, ignoring us but firing at random into shops. Glass shatters
and bricks melt beneath its haphazard barrage, so we keep our heads
down. I hear glass crashing further down the street as a kid bursts
onto the road. She sees the triclops and freezes in panic. The
triclops turns towards her, lasers red and ready.

We are too far away to do anything.

James leaps out from behind a tree, grabs the
kid and dives back into cover. He moves fast, just not fast enough.
The triclops hits the tree, sending James and the girl flying
through a cloud of splinters. They land in the street, completely
exposed. The girl runs to safety, but James falls over as he tries
to stand.

“He’s broken his leg,” whispers Tenchi.

We stare in horror; James looks right at me,
and I swear his eyes meet mine. We both know what happens next.
James shakes his head in disbelief.

The triclops incinerates him, leaving nothing
behind but ashes. Tenchi pulls me aside before we are next, and the
building behind us explodes showering us in hot brick and glass.
The blast knocks us over, and my ears are ringing as I stand up.
Tenchi grabs me, points down the street and says something, but I
can’t hear. He shakes his head and points at the ground to where
Stace is lying unconscious, then back down the street to where the
triclops is heading for us.

“I’ll distract it, you take Stace and run,”
says Tenchi.

“Wait!” I protest, but he’s gone.

I throw Stace over my shoulder and I start
walking as fast as I can, looking back over my shoulder to make
sure Tenchi is okay. I hear lasers firing behind me, and Tenchi
yells something that sounds like “faster, dude!” We reach an alley,
and I relax enough to look behind me. I can’t see Tenchi. Windows
start exploding around us, so I drop Stace and fall to the ground.
I’m bleeding pretty badly, but I try to shield her with my body as
best as I can. She opens her eyes and smiles a little.

“Stace? Are you okay?”

“Idiot,” she says.

“What? This isn’t my fault.”

“This is the first time you’ve spoken to me
all year, and now we are going to die. Idiot!”

Ah. I really am an idiot.

I see a scout ball near us. It’s nothing much
more than a laser cannon mounted on two thin legs, but it's more
than enough to do us in. I freeze, but it starts walking towards us
anyway.

Stace holds my hand and closes her eyes as
she passes out.

“Sorry,” I say again, but she doesn’t hear
me.

The scout walker explodes in a brilliant
flash of white flame. A familiar figure floats over its ruins. It’s
The General
; we’re saved!

He flies towards me, staying about three feet
off the ground.
The General
taps a button on the side of his
helmet and the faceplate folds away revealing an angry face covered
in sweat. Wires and metals plates run over his bald skull and back
into his green suit. It’s really him,
The General
, one of
the greatest superheroes who ever lived, the man I've always
admired, the man who-

“Get to a shelter, idiot!” he snarls, swiping
the air with a massive blue sword.

“Huge fan-” I mumble.

My head is a bit foggy. I want to ask for his
autograph, but instead I just roll next to Stace and groan.
The
General
's eyes flick over to Stace and then back to me. The
look in his eyes makes my whole body freeze.

“What. Are. You. Doing. With. MY DAUGHTER!”
he roars, and with each word his sword swipes closer to my
face.

“Who-”

He blasts the ground beside me with a blue
laser. I can feel the heat and my mind shoots into overdrive. Stace
is unconscious, covered in blood and wearing a bikini. I realize
that this doesn’t look good for me, but
The General
doesn't
stop to ask questions before he blasts me with blue lightning that
rips through my body. I roll away and open my hands.

“It's not what you think-”

A bolt of lightning rips through the air and
blasts the wall behind me. I scramble towards Stace; maybe being
close to her will keep me safe.

“MY DAUGHTER!”
The General
screams,
flying towards me.

He kicks me in the chest and I feel a rib
break as my body lifts off the ground. I moan; my childhood hero is
trying to kill me. This can't be happening. A car explodes nearby,
showering
The General
in boiling metal that rolls off his
shields. Lightning crackles down his arm and leaps into my body. I
spasm and scream, dropping to the ground.

I’m going to die.

A superhero drops from the sky and glides
between me and
The General
. She hovers in an unusual,
cross-legged stance as if she were sitting on an invisible flying
carpet. I recognize her as
Blizzard Master
.

“Stop!” she says, but
The General
blasts me again.

Blizzard Master
spreads out her hands
and a wall of green ice bursts from the ground in front of me and
takes the brunt of
The General
’s storm. The pain stops, and
I breathe again.