Other People's Heroes (The Heroes of Siegel City)

by Petit, Blake M.

  Hotshot, meanwhile, had managed to get Icebergg into a full nelson. “Calm down, Frosty,” he was saying, “or I’ll charge up that charming little snowcap you wear on your face.”

  “You idiot,” Icebergg growled, “do you really think you can bluff me? You were one of Lionheart’s original peons. You won’t kill me.”

  I was about to rail against him in defense of Lionheart, but Noble broke in, growling, “Nah, but I might.” He grasped Icebergg’s head between two powerful hands and started to compress them. The ice cracked rather quickly.

  “Noble, let him go!”I shouted.

  “Buzz off, wasp-boy,” he said.

  “Noble!” Hotshot released Icebergg and grabbed Noble’s hands, prying them off. Icebergg dropped to the ground between them and rolled away.

  “Crazy son of a bitch,” he hissed.

  Noble pulled out of his tangle with Hotshot and dove at Icebergg, who responded by blasting at Noble with razor-sharp spike.

  Noble threw up a rampart of telekinetic force and the spike bounced away, flying through the air and going straight for Hotshot’s face.

  “Hotshot! Look out!” I bellowed.

  It’s amazing how natural this stuff was coming to me at this point. I reached out with Noble’s own teke field and caught the spike inches from Hotshot’s eyeball. I let it hang there for a second, then looked a Noble with a glare of pure fire. With a twist of my arm, I used the teke field to grind the spike into slush and then let it fall to the ground.

  “Nice save,” Hotshot gasped.

  “Thanks,” I said, failing to add, “and I’d do it again.” I never apologized to him for being such an ass earlier, either. I never needed to after that. He knew I was sorry, and I knew he forgave me.

  He was right. When one person with the Heart of a Lion saves another, the two become bonded. Loyal and devoted to one another. For life.

  “You want to finish this?” I asked him.

  “Let’s shall,” he said. We both pivoted at the same time, pulling darts from our utility belts and charging them up. The ion streams surged forward, striking Icebergg in the face and melting holes in his frost helmet. He slumped to his knees and then rolled over, unconscious. He was stunned, but not seriously hurt. We’d focused our blasts just right.

  There was a trumpet fanfare and a still woozy Conductor approached us, clapping. “Heil the conquering heroes!” he called.

  “Heil my ass,” Noble said.

  “Not even if you got a crucifix tattooed on it,” I returned.

  “You maggot. Never, never copy my powers again, do you understand?”

  “If you knew how to use your powers properly in the first place, there wouldn’t have been a need to copy them you pompous--”

  “Gentlemen!” Spectrum said, stepping between us. “Perhaps we can settle this later? The rubberneckers are gonna be back any minute now.”

  “Yeah,” Noble spat, slinging Icebergg over his shoulder. “We’ll finish this later. We are so gonna finish this later.” He took off, the others close behind, but Hotshot clapped my shoulder before I could take to the air.

  “Jason,” he said.

  “What?”

  “My name. It’s Jason Lear. My friends call me Jay.”

  I smiled, but I don’t think I’ve ever called him that except if we were in civilian gear in public. He’s always been Hotshot, where I was concerned.

  ISSUE NINE

  THE SOUL RAY

  Unlike many residents of Simon Tower, Morrie Abadie’s skin tone was perfectly normal. Not green, not orange, not blue, but a simple, healthy fleshtone. So I was fairly impressed at the way he turned six shades of purple when I told him what happened during the hunt for Icebergg.

  “You used Noble’s powers?” he shrieked.

  “Hotshot could have died!”

  “When are you gonna get it through your skull? These guys are pros. Somebody else woulda stopped that ice. Noble hisself might have done it.”

  Not damn likely, I thought, but I managed to hold my tongue. As Morrie sat down behind his desk, his cheeks returned to a more healthy tone. Mental Maid, on the other hand, just stood there looking as alien as ever.

  “This is even worse than last time. At least then you were using the right powers. Are you trying to blow the lid off this whole operation or something?”

  I just gulped at that and dared a glance over at Mental Maid, who was still displaying all the emotional range of a mannequin on Ritalin.

  “And you lost your helmet!” Morrie continued, still sputtering. “Do you know how many people may have seen your face, kid?”

  “Oh come on, how many of them are going to recognize dumpy old Josh Corwood?”

  “All it takes is one,” he said. “Or even worse, what if one of those rubes had a camera? Or a camera phone? People get their picture taken pickin’ their nose at every stoplight these days! Did you ever think of that?”

  I hadn’t. In this confrontation with Morrie I was feeling less like James Dean and more like Wally and the Beav getting chewed out by Ward.

  “I still think I did the best thing I could,” I grumbled, looking at my feet.

  “You’re thinking too much, kid,” Morrie said. “That’s yer problem.” He sighed and rubbed his eyes. “All right, get outta here. We got Icebergg’s hearing to deal with now, I’ll decide what to do about you after that.”

  “What, right now?” I said. “We only brought him in a half hour ago.”

  “Whaddaya think this is, the Federal Court system? Nah, when we got a crime against a Cape we hold the hearing immediately, none of that screwin’ around.”

  When I left Morrie’s office I found the Conductor and Miss Sinistah waiting for me, both with sullen looks on their faces.

  “How’d it go?” Ted asked.

  “Could have been worse. He could have had Mental Maid wipe my brain right there.”

  “You don’t think he’d really kick you out?” Annie said.

  “That’s got to be at least three strikes at this point,” I said. I told them what Morrie had said about “deciding what to do with me.” Ted’s face lit up at this.

  “You see? He didn’t say he was kicking you out!”

  “He may as well have.”

  “You’ve got to be more positive, Josh,” Annie said, taking my arm (which did far more for my demeanor than Ted’s pep-talk could.) “A lot of people have messed up a lot worse than you have and Morrie’s kept them around. Just look at the Photon Man fiasco.”

  “Annie!”

  Our heads all spun around at once. “Oh great,” Ted moaned, “the moron patrol is here.”

  Dr. Noble came up to us and thrust his own face in Ted’s. “What did you say, Ossian?”

  “I said, ‘Look, here comes Todd,” Ted replied, his voice somewhere between angry and quivering.

  “You better. And you,” he said to Annie, his blazing voice resonating through a barrel-chest, “I don’t want to see you hanging around with these two wanna-be Capes anymore. I’m sick of ‘em shoving ideas into your head.”

  “Oh yeah,” I hissed, “God forbid she have any ideas you didn’t put there, right?”

  “Back off, little man.”

  “The hell I will! Annie, are you actually gonna let this stupid prick tell you who your friends can be?”

  “You think you can take me, worm?”

  “You’re forgetting,” I said, “you aren’t dealing with an inferior here. You’re not dealing with a normal human and you’re not dealing with someone who’s scared of you. For once you’re dealing with someone who can give you exactly as good as he can get.”

  We stared at each other down for a long moment and I briefly worried he would take me up on my challenge, but he finally turned on his heel and stormed away. “Come on, Annie!” he shouted over his shoulder.

  “I’m sorry, guys, I’ll talk to him,” she said. “He’s really not that bad.”

  “Not that bad?” I asked once they were gone. “What is she
waiting for, some accident to scar his face so he can wear sinister-looking armor? Or maybe it’ll just make his hair fall out and he’ll declare himself my arch-enemy. Christ, he’s as bad as they come!”

  “You have got serious gonads, my friend,” Ted said. “I thought you two were going to throw down right here in the hall.”

  “Yeah, well, you know how it is. My mother always said a bully will stand down if you face them on your terms. Thanks for backing me up, by the way.”

  “Heh. Sorry about that,” Ted said. “Come on, the hearing must be half-over by now.”

  “So fast?” He nodded.

  We made our way to the auditorium, where Icebergg was being held by a pair of what looked like handcuffs from the starship Enterprise. “Power dampeners,” Ted explained as we grabbed a couple of seats in the back. Icebergg was clothed in a robe now, his ice-sheathe having melted away. His skin was very pale and there was no visible hair on his body, not even eyebrows or lashes. His only distinguishing features were his eyes, blue and freezing.

  They had already replayed First Light’s holographic recreation of Deep Six’s... termination. No one was saying a word, but the looks on people’s faces spoke volumes. This was a crowd that wanted blood.

  Flambeaux got up and testified in a voice cold enough to re-freeze Icebergg, and Doc Noble and Hotshot each made statements about the rumble in Kirby Square. Once everybody who had something to say had done so, Morrie took the podium. “Well, Icebergg? Anything to say in your defense?”

  Icebergg grinned. “Yeah. I got something.”

  “Well? This is your only chance. Spill it.”

  The grin just got bigger. “You make me wanna vomit.”

  “Fine. Mental Maid?”

  She stepped up to the podium, robes swirling around her, and turned to stare Icebergg straight in the eyes.

  “What happens now?” I whispered to Ted.

  “Mental Maid holds judgement. If she finds him innocent, he’s let free and life goes back to normal. If he’s guilty... punishment.”

  “Has anyone... any rabbit ever been found innocent?”

  Ted covered his face. “No. I don’t want to see this.”

  “See what? Ted, what’s the punishment?”

  “The Soul Ray.”

  The Soul Ray, I later learned after already having seen it in action, was Mental Maid’s strongest power. The Ray totally obliterated a person’s physical form, vaporizing their body and reducing the matter that comprised it to dust.

  It then took their emotional essence, what a person really was in the bottom of their soul, and gave that physicality. Someone who is inherently good will become strong and handsome and a wonder to behold. Someone with an evil heart will become a monster. Once someone hit by a Soul Ray morphed into a giant insect. Another literally became a snake. If the Soul Ray hit you, you became what you always really were, effectively making it perfectly safe to judge a book by its cover.

  That’s what I found out later.

  What I saw was this:

  Icebergg was taken before Mental Maid. Both stood there without a trace of human feeling.

  A beam of the purest white light I’d ever seen poured from Mental Maid’s hand, bathing Icebergg.

  The light stopped.

  Where Icebergg had been was a screaming, agonized, humanoid mass of fire.

  “Makes sense,” Ted said, finding the nerve to uncover his eyes. “Icebergg was always one of the angriest people I knew.”

  “What did they do to him?” I gulped.

  “Reduced him to who he was.”

  “What happens now?”

  “He gets exiled. We’ve got an arrangement with this space federation, they’ll take him to an intergalactic penal colony.”

  I raised an eyebrow. “Does anyone around here ever listen to himself talk?”

  Judgement passed, Particle and Justice Giant escorted the smoldering mess that was once Icebergg from the chamber. The assembly broke apart and went about their business, no doubt trying to forget the whole damned affair had ever happened.

  Not that everyone could forget... Flambeaux and the Spectacle Six -- or Five, I supposed -- each walked around with looks on their faces that betrayed the deep wound each carried that otherwise would not show.

  I took a deep, strengthening breath. “Well, I guess it’s time to face the music.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “I’ve got to see Morrie, Ted.”

  The Conductor recoiled and I heard a bugle dirge stir within me. “Taps,” to be specific.

  “Your vote of confidence is staggering,” I said.

  “That’s how you feel, buddy.”

  I moved up through the dispersing throng until I got to the big boss. “Hey, Morrie.”

  “Oh yeah. Corwood.”

  “Not to sound pushy or anything, but... have I got a verdict yet?”

  “Yeah,” he said. “Yeah, I suppose I do. Yer trouble, kid. You’ve only been on two ops and you’ve given me more headaches than some of these guys have in ten years.”

  I gulped and nodded, unable to meet his gaze. Behind him, though, I could see Mental Maid’s eyes glowing and I began thinking, This is it, this is when she blows the whistle. It’s the Soul Ray and the penal colony for me.

  “But yer also good,” Morrie said. “Damn good. And Morrie Abadie ain’t the type to cut off his nose to spite his face. Thing is, I can’t have an ulcer worryin’ about which powers yer gonna use every time you leave the Tower!”

  “What are you getting at?”

  “Come back Tuesday, like you were gonna do anyway. We’ll fit you for a new costume then.”

  I let out the breath I hadn’t realized I’d been holding. “What character this time?”

  “I dunno yet. I’ll have the boys work something up this weekend.”

  My eyes lit and my heart jumped into my throat. “You mean--”

  “Yeah, yeah. I’m givin’ you yer own character. But don’t go gettin’ a big head about it. Yer still gonna be a Mask -- I don’t know if you got the stage presence to be a Cape yet. But I’ll see to it you got a character that can ape anybody else’s powers. If for no other reason than to cut down my expenses on antacid. Now go. Have a good weekend. And don’t let me have to see yer mug again before Tuesday or I might just change my mind.”

  I left. Fast.

  INTRUDER

  I practically tap-danced all the way home that night -- anybody watching would have presumed Gene Kelly was a Cape and I had found a way to duplicate his powers. My own character, I kept thinking, over and over. Me. It was like getting three BARs on a slot machine: Jackpot! I was still concerned about Annie -- the way the good Doctor browbeat her bordered on the criminal -- but I also knew that with my own character as an excuse to hang around Simon Tower I’d have plenty of opportunities to talk to her, hang around and, hopefully, break her away from that smarmy piece of filth.

  It was a little after eleven o’clock when I got home. As I turned the key I felt the lock click shut. My first thought was, Darn it, forgot to lock the door again.

  My second thought was, I never forget to lock the door.

  I quickly opened it into an already-lit apartment. In the front room, which consisted of a kitchenette and a living area, I saw David Letterman chattering away on my television and a plate with crumbs and a puddle of ketchup sitting on the counter. I knew I hadn’t done it. For one thing, I’d washed all the dishes before I left and, for another thing, I watched Conan.

  “Make yourself at home, why don’t you?” I asked my unseen visitor. I headed down the short hall to the back. The door to my bedroom was closed, but the bathroom was open and I heard the telltale hiss of a toilet running. I ducked in and jiggled the handle and the gasping noise stopped.

  “Damned inconsiderate intruders,” I muttered, heading for the bedroom door. In retrospect it was probably a stupid move, barging in like that. A typical burglar wouldn’t have had any powers for me to duplicate and he more than
likely would have had a gun. I didn’t have any special training, I wasn’t Nightshadow. I could have been killed. All things considered, I should have been relieved when I opened that door without meeting up with some crook. Instead, I was furious to find Sheila Reynolds, sitting on my bed, flipping through my notebook.

  “What the hell is this?” she asked, fanning the pages.

  “That? What the hell is this?”

  “Is what you’ve written here true?”

  “You broke into my apartment!”

  “And why did you draw little curlicues around the name ‘Sindy’ every time?”

  “What the hell are you doing here?”

  “And why are you misspelling ‘Cindy’ all of a sudden?”

  “Have you no regard for anyone else’s privacy?”

  We both stood there in infuriated silence for a long moment.

  “I think you owe me an explanation!” we shouted in concert.

  “It’s my apartment!” I said. “You first!”

  She dropped the notebook on the bed. “I came because I’ve been worried about you, Josh. Something just hasn’t been right with you lately. Now I think I know what. Is the stuff you wrote in there true? Is the whole Cape scene in this entire city a front?”

  “Of course not!” I sputtered. “I mean... I’ve been writing that stuff because I thought it would be funny... maybe for an April Fool’s edition. I mean, heh, Nightshadow as a disco freak? A female Five-Share? And who’s gonna believe Doctor Noble is a jackass?”