by Drew Hayes
“Did he tell you anything about the place?”
“Only that it was a restaurant,” Mary answered from the car’s back seat. “He said it was somewhere that my eyes and Vince’s hair wouldn’t stand out.”
Camille couldn’t picture many businesses where that would be true. Though it was fashionable to emulate the strange physical characteristics some Supers, like Vince and Mary, were born with, it was still frowned upon in a professional setting. Much like nose rings or tattoos, there was definitely a crowd that appreciated them; however, that crowd was rarely staffing the human resources department at major corporations. Mary would be able to get by if no one looked too closely at her eyes. However, if Vince wanted a non-Hero career after college, he was going to have to get used to the idea of shaving his head, or wearing a lot of hats.
One last turn put them in a half-filled parking lot with a sizable building in the center. The color scheme was garish, to say the least, and a large neon sign announced the establishment’s name proudly for all to see. Through the windows, they could see a woman in a bright blue-and-yellow outfit showing a family of four into a booth, then setting down menus in front of them.
“Supper with Supers,” Vince said slowly, reading the words off the glowing sign and taking in the colorful business where he was scheduled to interview.
“Well, you guys definitely won’t stand out,” Camille said, trying to point out a silver lining. It was not terribly effective.
* * *
“That is . . . not a whole lot of clothing,” Alice said, eyeing the uniform critically.
“No, it is not,” Angela agreed, “which is why it gets us such generous tips.”
Alice had been surprised to find Angela already working at the place where she was set to interview, but it made sense. There could only be so many businesses that had agreed to take in HCP students, so some overlap was unavoidable. Alice had been sitting by herself, since Roy was interviewing first, when her fellow blonde had recognized her and come over to chat. It seemed Angela genuinely enjoyed working here, and was adamant that Alice apply for a position as a fellow shot girl, a prospect she’d initially found appealing, until she took in exactly what the uniform consisted of.
“Wouldn’t it be easier to start as a waitress?” Alice asked. “What do they wear?”
“Jeans and a low-cut top, though they can also go with shorts if they want. The plaid half-shirts are all us though. Makes sure the customers know they can buy booze right off us, not ask for more lemons or napkins or any of that bullcrap. Trust me, shot girl is much more fun than waitress. They have closing duties and cleaning and all that. Us? We are agents of alcohol delivery, and nothing more. We flirt, we get guys to buy more rounds, and we take a few shots ourselves, if the customers feel generous.”
“How often do they feel generous?”
“Often enough that I carry an empty beer bottle for spitting some shots into.”
“I think I saw that in a movie,” Alice recalled.
“It’s a trick that’s been around for ages. Trust me, you’ll want to carry an empty.” Angela paused and looked her fellow Super up and down critically. “Actually, with your chest and waist, you might want to carry two.”
Alice noticed the discussion had somehow maneuvered from whether or not she even wanted the job to what she should know before starting it. Some might have thought Angela was manipulating the conversation to lead her to a conclusion, but the truth was much simpler than that: Angela had already decided what the outcome would be, and the idea that she could be wrong hadn’t even occurred to her. Alice decided to steer the topic of conversation back to something that didn’t require her to walk around half naked.
“How can you keep this up senior year? I sort of assumed things would be . . . busier.” Discussing the HCP in public, even when it seemed they were alone, was always handled with careful word choices and vagueness.
“Oh it is, but you’ve got to make time for other things, or you go nuts,” Angela replied. “Besides, I’m still top of the class, so graduation is looking imminent. My biggest worry is lining up an internship, and even that’s not too stressful, thanks to some connections.”
“Internship?”
“Yeah. Blaine should have told you all about it back in freshman year.”
“I think he mentioned something, but never explained it.”
“Oh, well he’ll do that before the end of this year, don’t worry,” Angela assured her. “I can’t go too much into it right now, obviously, but you know how, after doctors finish med school, they still have to work under the supervision of more experienced doctors before they’re trusted on their own?”
“I actually didn’t know that,” Alice admitted.
“Well, now you do,” Angela said with a smile. “Anyway, same basic premise.”
There were an abundance of questions Alice wanted to ask, but she didn’t. Partially because this wasn’t a safe place to talk about HCP business more than they had, and partially because, at that moment, the owner and Roy emerged from his office, and he motioned for her to come over.
“Remember,” Angela encouraged as Alice walked across the bar, “you want to be a shot girl!”
15.
Brenda, the general manager of Supper with Supers, could be faulted on many fronts, but lack of enthusiasm was not one of them. She’d greeted Vince, Mary, and Camille at the door, and immediately pulled all of them into her office, either ignoring or not hearing Camille’s protests that she would wait outside.
“As you can see, we have licensing arrangements to allow our employees to wear the costumes of many famous Heroes,” Brenda said, gesturing to the wall lined with staff photos, all of them in some sort of costume. “However, for the most part, our staff wear generic ones, designs we have ample stock of. It makes accommodating different sizes much easier. For those who have been here more than six months, we allow them to design their own outfit and name, if they want to be unique. Of course, we retain all rights to those designs, so not many of our HCP workers take us up on that opportunity.”
“So, it’s just a restaurant where people wear costumes?” Vince asked.
“It is a theme, dear boy. We transport the customers to a world of high-paced action, where capes and costumes are everyday occurrences. The point is to submerge them in the culture, to turn a simple meal into a memorable experience.”
“It seems lovely,” Mary said, defaulting to politeness, since she had no idea what else to say.
“Thank you very much. I’m quite proud of it, and we have a great reputation for fun and delicious food. Now, I’ve got two openings for wait staff,” Brenda said, checking her folder. “And I can squeeze one of you in as a host.”
Camille debated speaking up once more; however, by now, it seemed obvious her protests were not making any dents in Brenda’s enthusiasm. Plus, if she were honest with herself, the idea of working with Vince wasn’t totally unappealing to her.
“The waiting jobs require more social interaction. You have to chat with the table, remember orders, that sort of thing. Host duty will revolve around charting the wait times and making sure to seat customers in a rotation that lets the waiters serve them best.”
“I think Vince and I should be the wait staff,” Mary suggested. Camille threw her fellow small-statured girl a glance and received a not-too-sly wink in response. There were definite benefits to having a friend who was a telepath. “Knowing Camille’s sense of organization and sweet demeanor, I think she would excel at the hosting position.”
“She does seem downright adorable,” Brenda agreed. “Any objections to that, Camille? Don’t worry, you still get to wear one of our amazing costumes!”
“Sounds . . . great,” Camille said weakly. She was immediately beginning to regret going along with this; however, if it had been hard to back out before, then doing it now was well beyond the realm of impossibility.
“Fantastic. Now, that leaves you two as servers. The training process is
a little more arduous for those positions, but I’ve never had an HCP student who couldn’t hack it. Running food and pre-bussing is much less stressful than fighting or robot battle or whatever it is you folks do in there.”
“I did have a question, ma’am,” Vince said, raising his hand tentatively.
“Go right ahead.” Brenda gave him a warm smile of reassurance when she spoke, the type that can only be conjured by master politicians and the truly sincere.
“I get that the costumes will let us blend in somewhat, but how does that help with things like my hair or Mary’s eyes?”
“A very fair question,” Brenda replied. “The answer is two-fold, actually. For one thing, many of our wait staff like to employ the sort of look you two have naturally. This is one of the few establishments in town where bright green, spiky hair and makeup that looks like a salamander make you more likely to get a job, rather than less. The other aspect is that, for those employees who don’t favor such affectation in their personal lives, we offer a wide variety of wigs, contacts, and makeup, all for your use. Since people come to work in costume—a policy I’ll have to insist you adhere to as well— they won’t know your look isn’t just part of the uniform, as long as you don’t spend time with them outside of work. Even if you do see them beyond the restaurant’s walls, you can always claim you dye your hair.”
“Thank you, that does make me feel more at ease,” Vince said. His opinion of both Kent Mears and Brenda were rising steadily. This really was the perfect place to stash Supers like him and Mary. Some of the others were quite noticeable when they used their powers, but at least they could blend in when they needed to.
“Perfectly natural. So, when would you be able to start?”
“Don’t we need to be tested or something?” Mary asked. Even she had expected the hiring process to be a bit more arduous than simply showing up and answering a few questions.
“In normal process, yes, you would, however, I’ve had nothing but positive experiences hiring from the HCP pool in the past. Rather than make you jump through the hoops, I’d prefer to give you the benefit of the doubt. Obviously, if we run into attitude problems, or you can’t handle the work, I’m afraid you won’t be able to stay here, but otherwise, I don’t see any reason not to push forward,” Brenda explained.
“I guess we can start whenever you’d like us to, then,” Vince said, once the reality of impending work had set in.
“Great. First, I’ll need you to fill out some paperwork, get me copies of your schedules so I don’t put you on shift during HCP courses, and, of course, we’ll need to do your fittings.”
“Our fittings?” Camille asked. “Don’t we just put on a costume?”
“Oh heavens no, these things are full-body suits. You don’t want one that hasn’t been hemmed and trimmed in the right places, or you’ll be tripping over loose fabric. Don’t worry though, we’ve got a wide selection, and I’ll make sure each and every one of you looks eye-catching."
Brenda couldn’t have chosen a better phrase to alarm Camille.
16.
Her team wasn’t really her team anymore. Mary had difficulty with that realization, yet the longer she mulled it around, the more she realized how it couldn’t quite be denied. It wasn’t just because the team dynamic had been dissolved at the end of sophomore year. They’d been a group long before that had even been a part of their education. It wasn’t losing Nick either, though that damn sure hadn’t helped things.
No, the problem was one of focus. They’d once had a shared goal: keeping their secret and making it through the program for as long as they could. Even after they’d been outed, they’d been the collective of freaks and had needed to stick together. It had galvanized them, given them the teamwork they needed to overcome opponents with years more experience than they possessed. Then, somehow, they’d lost it.
Vince still trained relentlessly, but at least one part of his mind was always on his father and the criminal actions he’d taken. Alice dwelled endlessly on the mystery of her mother. Hershel and Roy were focused on the goal of graduating the HCP, but they thought of themselves as a duo rather than a piece of the group. She heard all this swimming about in their thoughts, along with the occasional pang of sadness for their lost comrade, one who had returned to campus, and whose presence would eventually be noticed—it was only a matter of time. When that happened, it would likely splinter their focus more. On top of that, the addition of jobs wasn't going to help the situation one bit.
Mary’s own mind drifted back to freshman year, when they’d been left on the mountain. At the time, she’d thought it overkill, but in retrospect, it hadn’t been a bad idea. They’d bonded, they’d come to rely on one another, and they’d had their first taste of functioning as a team. She wondered if she could talk Mr. Transport into doing it again. No, even if she could, that wouldn’t be much of a challenge anymore. Alice could float them all up with ease, and Vince would keep them toasty as she did it. Even her own control had evolved to where she could hold and lift a normal person’s body without accidentally crushing them. Strange to think that what had been a nearly insurmountable task only two years ago would now be little more than an inconvenient few minutes. Assuming they worked together, of course.
With a groan, Mary set her head on her desk. She’d been best at moving them along personally, helping each one find their own strengths and talents. Wrangling Roy’s ego, pushing Vince through his fear of himself, helping Alice to stop seeing herself as useless, this was stuff she could handle. Nick had been the one who could move them as a group. He saw the way people fit together, how to use them as a unit, and how to tighten the cogs so that it worked more efficiently. Mary’s chess skills had advanced to where she could utilize each piece for the whole of a greater strategy, but that didn’t mean she knew how to impart in them a sense of unity.
They needed a goal, or a trial, or something to push them back into a solid mass. Right now, they were drifting apart, turning into four people working to graduate, instead of one team. That might work for everyone else, but they were different. The others couldn’t hear the barbs, the angry thoughts percolating in some of their fellow student’s minds, but she could. To much of the student body, they weren’t welcome here.
And if Mary didn’t think of something soon, she doubted they’d be here for a whole lot longer.
* * *
Mary wasn’t wrong about Hershel and Roy’s dedication; at that very moment, Roy was underground in the HCP gym, pushing hard to find his new limit. Only a year ago, the concept had terrified him. Not the concept of running out of strength during a lift, but of hitting the sort of wall where, no matter the effort, his muscles refused to make progress. That had been when he thought such things were permanent, though. Now, he knew better. Now, he understood it was his way of tossing the ball back into Hershel’s court.
In a way, it had become a game between them: could Hershel ratchet up Roy’s potential before Roy hit the wall? It drove them both to train hard, each brother trying to stay one step ahead of the other, to avoid plateaus and continue growing. And they were growing, that was ridiculously evident. Roy’s strength had risen exponentially, and his endurance had nearly kept pace. Even his reaction speeds were improving, though at a slower rate. Hershel had taken up sparring over the summer, the genuine combat experience helping to push up Roy’s potential just as effectively as Hershel’s exercise.
It was a testament to the construction of Lander’s workout equipment that the weight bench didn’t shudder as Roy set down the bar after his final rep. No, there was no question of his strength anymore, even if there were still miles to go. The real hurdle facing him was skill. Despite Owen’s belief that their kind only existed to hit and get hit, Roy saw value in learning to punch and dodge more effectively. He had a feeling they weren’t going to move him up the ranks unless he was able to actually land his blows, and Roy absolutely intended to move up the ranks.
Mary had been right about the
ir dedication, but not about their goals. Hershel was focused on graduation, that much was true, but Roy’s eyes were set on another prize. He’d come here with an undeserved ego and been put in his place. He understood now just how far behind the head of the pack he’d been. But that didn’t mean his pride wasn’t still there. Roy wanted to be on top, he wanted to be the King, to use Nick’s old analogy. This time, he didn’t want to claim to be the best from misplaced idiocy though. He intended to earn it.
Roy was aiming for one thing and one thing only: beating Chad.
17.
As he checked his schedule and walked down the hall, scanning for the appropriate room number, Vince was definitely confused. It was Friday, and everyone else was done with HCP classes for the week. He, on the other hand, had a single remaining item on the printed paper clutched in his fingers. “General Discussion” was all it said—that, and a room number Vince was certain he hadn’t been in before. If not for the subterranean location, he would have assumed it was some lab that went with one of his usual classes that he’d forgotten about. The fact that it was underground, however, and that no one else seemed to have it on their own schedules, made him wary.
Vince finally located the room; it was only about half a hallway down from the infirmary where he’d woken up so frequently last year. The door was open, so he was spared the awkwardness of knocking. Instead, he stepped through and took in the surroundings.
Immediately, it was clear this wasn’t a classroom. Though the walls were thick concrete like all HCP rooms, it was too small to accommodate more than a few people at once. Besides that, there were personal knick-knacks and a large central desk that gave away this room’s function as an office. The curious part was that the woman sitting behind it was unfamiliar to Vince. After two years in the HCP, he believed he had met all of the teaching staff, yet the salt-and-pepper-haired woman with dark-framed glasses currently sitting at the desk before him was utterly foreign to his memory.