by S. J. Delos
I pulled on a pair underwear and an over-sized t-shirt—one pilfered from Kurt’s dresser—then crawled under my Wonder Woman comforter. It took less than a minute for me to drop into a deep sleep.
CHAPTER 3:
AN UNEXPECTED NOMINATION
An annoyingly cheerful voice dragged me, kicking and screaming, out of a deliciously steamy dream involving a secluded green meadow, a large blanket, and Kurt, wearing nothing but a smile.
“Good grief,” the intruder in my bed groaned. “It’s been hours already! Wake up, sleepyhead.”
Against my better sense, I cracked open an eye to see Alexis lying next to me under the comforter, her face only a few inches from my own. Her mouth was spread in the widest smile ever seen on a normal person and her eyes practically screamed at me with excitement.
Something was making my best friend act like a kid at Christmas. Knowing Alexis, that something could be anything from gaining a new Enhancement to the discovery that her favorite television show was just renewed for another season.
“You’re not really here,” I moaned, flopping over in the other direction. “You’re a horrible nightmare here to bring me back to the world. Go away.” I closed my eye again and pretended to snore.
She gave my shoulder a little shake. “If you don’t get up, K, I’m going to phase the bed and dump you on the floor.” A little mischievous giggle followed the threat. Alexis’ hero code name was Phantasm. An apt moniker, since she could make herself, as well as other things, intangible as a ghost.
I opened my eye again, this time staring at the Spider-Man alarm clock on the nightstand. After a few confusing seconds of trying to make sense of the numbers, I sighed. “Alexis, it’s ten. AM.” I rolled back over to glare at her.
Unfazed, she continued grinning like a lunatic super-villain. “See? That means it’s almost lunch time. Now, are you going to get up on your own or do you need a ghostly assist?”
“Lexi-chan, I patrolled the city most of the day yesterday and all of last night. I’ve been asleep for a total of two and a half hours.” I shook my head, pulling the blankets back over my face. “Come back later. Say, in six hours?”
I felt her sit up and start bouncing on the bed as if Mister Electron was standing behind her, zapping her in the ass.
“Sleep? Seriously, Karen? How in the world can you possibly sleep? If it was me who’d been nominated, I would be so jazzed I wouldn’t be able to sleep for a month. I thought you’d be excited. Aren’t you excited?” The sound of her trademarked palm smacking her forehead followed. “Duh! What am I saying? Of course you are. You’re just sleepy.”
Phantasm might be a world-famous superhero—and one hell of a best friend—but she was also a typical seventeen-year-old in many ways.
I sighed as I threw back the covers. I wasn’t going to get back to sleep as long as she was in my room babbling nonsense. Then I popped upright, looking at her as my brow crinkled.
“Hold up,” I said. “Nominated? What nomination?”
She rolled her eyes, giggling again. “Right. Like you don’t know.” She winked at me.
I put my hand on her arm and squeezed very lightly. “Alexis, I love you dearly … most of the time. You know this. But right now, my brain is way beyond tired, and I really just want to go back to sleep. So please, please, please … just tell me what in the hell you’re talking about.”
The bridge of her nose scrunched up as her pig-tailed head tilted to the side. “Oh. My. God. Seriously? You mean you really don’t know?” She looked over at the door. “But … I thought Greg was going to tell you when you and Zip got back from patrol.”
“Zip came first to fill out the reports.” I shrugged. “Greg did say he needed to talk to me, but he didn’t say what about. Or indicate that it was anything super urgent.”
“Oh.” That gigantic grin vanished for only the briefest of seconds before roaring back to full intensity. “Well, okay. Then I guess I should say congratulations!”
“Again, I ask, for what? Exactly?”
“The Heroes’ Ball.”
The Heroes’ Ball, or Enhanced Heroes Recognition Banquet as it was formally known, was an annual event for heroes from all over the world to gather to swap stories, adventures, and techniques. It was one part party, one part networking. Being invited to attend was supposed to be a big deal in the hero community.
Back when I was evil, I repeatedly begged Martin if we could go and crash it. I thought it might be fun to mingle with the heroes while they were unaware they were in the presence of Doctor Maniac and Crushette. The thought of wiping the superior smug smiles off their faces filled me with such glee.
However, Martin steadfastly refused to grant my wish. Mainly on the grounds that he wasn’t sure he could resist killing half the attendees.
We didn’t do a lot of parties when we were together.
I groaned, trying to discern what Alexis’ fuss was about. “The Heroes Ball. Big deal. What about it?” I asked.
“Well, it’s being held in Chicago this year. You’ve been officially invited. You know, since you’ve been nominated for the Hero of the Year award.”
I blinked, sure I was hearing her wrong. “I, uh … do what?”
The teen nodded. “It’s true. I was standing next to Greg when the invitation arrived. He said he wanted to be the one to tell you.” She frowned again. “Oh! Well, crap. I guess I ruined the surprise, huh?”
I threw the blankets off and jumped out of the bed. “Surprise? This isn’t a surprise, Alexis. It’s a disaster. A complete fucking disaster.” I grabbed a pair of relatively clean jeans from the floor, quickly shoving my legs into them. “I can’t believe he just let me walk off to bed without saying anything about this.”
“Maybe he thought you’d be happier if you rested first?” She offered, her voice devoid of any sort of conviction.
“I don’t care what he thought,” I said, stalking out the door and down the hall. “This is getting resolved right now.”
Alexis’ semi-transparent form emerged from the wall ahead of me. She re-solidified as she walked backward as fast as she dared, all the joy gone from her young face. We’d been friends long enough that she could easily detect that I was beyond mad.
“Wait,” she said holding up her hands. “Maybe you should take a few minutes to calm down first. We both know if you’re mad, you’re going to end up saying something you’ll regret later.”
“I’m not mad, Alexis,” I said through gritted teeth. “I’m pissed.”
I found Greg in the training room, laying on his back doing bench presses with the help of a specially-designed weight machine.
The bar in his hands was connected to a pair of durasteel arms that ran up into the larger portion of the device overhead. Inside the housing, an artificial gravity generator created the approximate resistance based on the setting on the console next to the bench. It allowed individuals with super strength, such as Greg, Darla, and myself the ability to exercise at our maximum without the need for several thousand pounds of weighted plates. The digital display on the side of the machine indicated that Greg was currently pressing around twenty tons.
“Greg,” I said, stopping to stand next to him. “Why didn’t you tell me the something you wanted to talk to me about was the Heroes’ Ball? Specifically, this Hero of the Year crap?”
Sweat saturated the dark skin of his forehead, his eyes flicking over to me for a moment before going back to the bar in his grip. “Can we … do … this later?” His arms trembled as he struggled through another rep. “This isn’t exactly … light.”
“Karen,” Alexis said softly, taking part of a step toward me, but changing her mind at the last moment. “Maybe we should just come back later—”
I grabbed the center of the bar and yanked it out of Greg’s grip, pushing it over my head with one hand. The weight was nothing more than an annoyance to me. Of course, my Class Six strength far outmatched Mister Manpower’s Class Four.
“W
hy did I have to find out about this from Alexis?” I jerked my head in the direction of the uncomfortable-looking girl next to me. Then the memory of my hallway exchange with Darla floated to the front of my brain. “Wait,” I said looking down at Greg. “Does everyone else know about this but me?”
He stared at me silently for a moment, then sat up, grabbed a towel from the floor, and mopped his sweaty brow. His eyes took on a hard look.
“You know,” he said, hanging the towel on the back of his neck. “I tried to tell you about it when I saw you earlier. However, you made it abundantly clear that you weren’t in the mood to talk about anything until after you had some coffee and some sleep. And no, I didn’t tell everyone else. Both Darla and Alexis happened to be standing there when I found out.” His gaze drifted over to Phantasm. “I expected them to adhere to my request to keep it a secret.”
“Sorry,” Alexis said, looking down at her sneakers. “I thought she already knew. I just wanted to celebrate.”
“I should have told her,” Greg said with a little nod. “Despite her insistence on waiting until later.”
He reached over to flip a switch on the front of the machine. The cycling hum of the gravity generator slowed to a stop. I released the bar as it retracted into the bottom of the unit.
“As close as you two are,” he continued. “I might have guessed Alexis would be bursting to share the good news.” He crossed his arms and looked up at me. “But from your less than thrilled response, I’m going to guess you don’t find that news to be good. Want to talk about why?”
I shook my head. “No. There’s no need to talk because there’s nothing to discuss. I’m not going. Period.” I stared at him for a moment hoping to get the seriousness of my statement across. “So call whoever you need to call and tell them I’ve decided to pass.”
“What shall I tell the selection committee when they ask why you are refusing to attend?”
“You can tell them I have more important things to do,” I snapped. “I don’t have extra time to waste socializing with people I don’t like. Plus, continuously wearing a fake smile is bad for my mental health.”
“Such as?” he asked, a little smirk on his face.
“Such as what?”
He shrugged. “What ‘more important things do you have on your plate? I mean, the new hovercraft is almost fully operational, Joey seems to be adjusting well to being a hero. We’ve managed to go six months without anyone being seriously injured on a mission. As far as I can tell, that covers all the big issues.”
I threw my hands in the air. “Look, just call and cancel. Or better idea, send someone else.” I reached out to put my hand on Alexis’ shoulder. “I hereby nominate Phantasm to attend in my place.”
He shook his head. “Sorry, Karen, it doesn’t work that way.” He climbed off the bench, rising up to tower over me. “The attendees are selected by a special committee. Only those chosen few can go. No Plus Ones or transfers. The Good Guys received two invites this year, a rarity considering our area of heroic responsibility isn’t as big as those of larger cities.”
“Who from our team got the other invite?” I asked.
The two of them looked at each other. The matching frowns on their faces told me the answer before Greg actually said it.
“Richard,” he mumbled, glancing away.
My mouth dropped open. “Are you shitting me? How in the hell does he rank high enough to be invited to such an exclusive event? I mean, he’s more of a damned menace than hero.”
“He’s rich,” Alexis answered.
“What she means,” Greg added, giving Alexis a look, “is that the Paulus Foundation is one of the banquet’s major sponsors. As the foundation’s chairman, he attends on its behalf.”
I put my hands on either side of my head, yanking on my hair. The chin-length strands only added fuel to the fire.
“That settles it! I’m definitely not attending now.” I gave Manpower one last hard stare before turning to walk toward the door. “Now, if you will excuse me, I’m taking my unhappy ass back to bed.”
“Karen?” Alexis’ voice echoed in the quiet room.
“No,” I said, never breaking stride in my departure. “Nada. Nope. Negative, No way, Jose. I was dead set on not going before I came in here. I’m doubly sure as shit not attending now.”
I stalked back to my room, anger increasing with each step. It was probably a good thing I didn’t see any of my teammates along the way, particularly Darla. While the others would have gotten a growl, Omega-Girl probably would have gotten worse.
Back in my quarters, I flopped on the bed in an attempt to go back to sleep. Despite being exhausted, both physically and mentally, I couldn’t unwind enough to actually nod off. After twenty minutes of fuming, tossing, and turning, I got up, left the room again, and headed toward the hangar.
Flying always seemed to help me relax when I was upset. I hoped it would calm me down enough to be able to get some real rest. Of course, beating up a bad guy would help, too.
Along the way, I passed Zip on his way from the kitchen.
“Good work out there today, Joey,” I said, managing to dig up a genuine smile from somewhere deep beneath my brooding thoughts. “Just try to remember we work with the police, okay? Every EAPF officer you see isn’t interested in hauling you to the Max.”
He nodded rapidly, making his features blur. “Okay. I mean, I will. Thanks, Kayo.”
When I entered the hangar, Luminosity looked up from the terminal in front of her, arching a brow as she frowned.
“Let me guess,” she said. “Can’t sleep?”
I shrugged. “How’d you figure that out?”
“My Dark Knight-level detective skills. I’m also going to guess you didn’t come here to work on the ship?”
I shook my head and crossed over to a panel on the wall. I pushed one of the red buttons, causing a large section of the ceiling to slowly roll back, revealing a Carolina sky much cloudier than it was earlier this morning.
Great, even the weather was trying to make my mood worse.
“I promise I’ll help tomorrow. I’ve got too much shit running around in my brain right now. I just need to get away for a bit.”
She nodded. “Yeah, I can totally relate to that. Be safe, okay? You seem a little distracted.” A little smile formed on her face. “Wouldn’t want you flying into a building or anything.”
I returned the smile as I floated upward. The freedom of the open sky before me.
“I’ll do my best,” I said. “Oh! Will you keep an eye on Zip for me? I think he’s been in the soda again.”
“Oh, god,” she murmured with an eye roll. “Okay, but I make no promises.”
I turned my attention to the sky. With a thought, the invisible hand of negative gravity pushed from below, catapulting me through the opening. I rolled on my side as I rose higher. Tucking one arm close against my side, I extended the other out before me, bending the knee on that same side. The typical comic hero flight pose.
Right after discovering the incident with Daniel gave me the ability to soar with the eagles, I learned the position of my arms and legs didn’t have any bearing whatsoever on my direction or speed. I could have broken the sound barrier while curled into a ball.
However, I was a sucker for the classics.
Having no particular destination in mind, I soared aimlessly over the heads of the millions going about their daily routine.
Below me, people went to work or to school. They were loving, fighting, being born, and dying. Lives were being lived, even if they were full of struggle; the saying about everyone having problems seemed more real than ever.
Of course, my biggest issue at the moment was being selected to win an award I didn’t really deserve or want. Some kind of hero I was, huh?
It began to sprinkle as I left the city behind, heading east on a long loop of the metropolis.
Technically speaking, The Good Guys were only responsible for protecting the greater Char
lotte Metro region. Including the surrounding suburbs. There was a smaller, two-member hero team fifty miles to the north in Salisbury as well as a group called the Terrific Trio who handled incidents in the northern part of South Carolina, from between Rock Hill to Columbia.
Occasionally, we would assist the others if asked, but with the largest city in the state under our watchful eye, we typically kept to our jurisdiction.
I was over the city of Concord when a series of flashing blue and red lights in the distance caught my attention. I dropped down low and zoomed over the highway toward the scene, coming upon the horrific aftermath of a multi-vehicle crash.
A large tractor trailer had jackknifed off the shoulder of Interstate 85 and flipped onto its side. The extra-long trailer lay across a couple of passenger vehicles, crushing them beneath its weight.
Emergency crews were working as fast as they could to get the drivers pinned beneath the truck to safety, but the heavy rescue equipment kept sinking in the soft grass beside the road, unable to get close enough to do any good.
I landed behind a highway patrol officer and gently tapped him on the shoulder, noticing the triple-striped patch sewn there. “Excuse me, Sergeant,” I said. “How can I help?”
He turned around, looking me over as his mouth opened. I could only assume he was going to yell at me to get back behind the cordon tape when recognition stole his voice. His mouth closed, and he gave me a hard stare. “Kayo, right?” The question came out as part-impressed, part-surprised, and part-suspicious. Not completely unexpected.
I still received that reaction, usually from older EAPF agents. For all I knew, this particular patrolman wasn’t won over enough by my current deeds to forget about my once being Crushette.
I nodded. “I was flying overhead, thought maybe you guys could use a hand. Or two.” I held up both of mine and smiled.
He wasn’t taking the bait.