Super: Underground: Book 2 in the Super: Series

by Palladian

  The talking quieted once they entered the building, and everyone fell silent by the time they reached the offices on the third floor. Rolf approached and let the man at the front desk know their purpose, and then everyone followed as he led them to an inner conference room where a man in a suit sat at the far side of a long table, obviously waiting for them. He rose and introduced himself as the lawyer who’d drawn up the contract, then handed the paperwork across the table.

  Lex briefly reviewed it against the set of dog-eared papers she’d been carrying in her coat pocket and confirmed that the contract seemed unchanged save for the addition of Lily, Ron, and Mr. Chen’s names. After she nodded and handed the contract back to the lawyer, he indicated several places where the document should be initialed, which Lex did, and then where all of them should sign at the end.

  After all eight of them had signed and the papers had been handed back to the lawyer, he straightened the papers and smiled at them. “Thank you, and welcome to the EU and the special forces. Your new passports and identity paperwork will be taken care of through the special forces, and Rolf will probably be the one to deliver everything to you. Do you have any other questions for me at this time?”

  Everyone exchanged glances, but no one spoke. Finally, Lex ventured, “No, I think we’re all right. Anyone have anything to ask?”

  After watching the group shake their heads, the lawyer nodded, packed the papers into his briefcase, and wished them all a good day before he left the conference room. The group looked at one another across the table for a moment until Casey finally broke out laughing.

  “I know, it seems so underwhelming after all we did to get here,” Kate agreed, starting to laugh as well.

  “All right, everyone,” Lex said, chuckling, “how about some food to celebrate?”

  The afternoon had been wearing on and the weather had gotten steadily colder by the time the group made it back out to the street. However, the hotel they’d chosen stood only several blocks away, and the place they had planned to eat at was on the ground floor of the same building.

  Rolf tried to excuse himself on the way there. “It’s been wonderful meeting your companions, but I should probably get back to work. There are a few things I should take care of this afternoon.”

  “You know we’d love to have you with us,” Lex said, feeling shy and not wanting to press him.

  “Oh, come on,” Kate said, suddenly appearing on his other side. “We owe you, you know. I’m sure you could take off another hour or so and no one would notice. Besides, I still want to ask you what you can do; Lex said she told you everything about us, so I want to hear about you.”

  “Come on,” Casey said, turning back to shoot a smile at him over her shoulder. “It’ll be fun. If we’re going to be on a team with you, we should probably get to know each other better, anyway.”

  “All right,” Rolf finally said with a small smile. “I’ll make a call when we get there to let them know where I am, and if they give me permission, I’ll stay.”

  Once the group had arrived and been seated, Rolf rejoined them. “No problem,” he said as he slid into the only empty seat, between Lex and Kate. He gave Lex a private smile before turning to answer Kate’s questions.

  Flurries of activity and noise occurred as waiters came to take orders and deliver food and drinks, but an overall hum of discussion and conversation continued as everyone caught up and made plans for what was to come next. At some point during the middle of dinner, Lex looked around the table to see Victor and Riss deep in discussion about something technical with Kate listening intently and occasionally asking questions; Lily, Casey, and Ron all talked quietly together while Mr. Chen and Lou spoke quietly but fervently about martial arts. Lex felt herself smiling widely and realized Rolf had noticed as she turned back to her own plate.

  “It seems like you’re glad to have everyone back together,” Rolf said quietly to her, surveying the table as he did.

  “I can’t even tell you how glad,” Lex replied, smiling at him once his glance came back to her. “I feel like I can relax for the first time in a really long time.”

  Kate broke into what they’d been saying then to ask some questions about the new facilities, and Lex just smiled as she turned to join Lou and Mr. Chen’s conversation about martial arts. Having never taken lessons, Lou seemed fascinated by the topic, so she found she had a lot to say.

  Later that evening, small knots of people left the restaurant together to make their way into the hotel proper. Lex walked with Lily and Rolf, talking to Lily but watching Rolf, who now had his coat on, ready to go.

  “Riss took care of transferring your money over here, but you may want to wait until your new IDs come in so that you can verify your personal information and officially open your account, get an ATM card, and all that. We have some cash you can use in the meantime, enough for the three of you to rent a place until we get back–”

  “Excuse me for interrupting,” Rolf said quietly, and Lex turned to him as he started speaking. “I just wanted to mention that the three of you are welcome to stay at the local special forces headquarters until all of you find a place. There’s always room for people to stay on the grounds, but a lot of people live somewhere else in the city. It’s open for you to use, however, if you like.”

  After a short conference between Lily and Mr. Chen, who’d been trailing behind the three of them, Lily turned back to Lex and Rolf. “I think that would be fine. That way we can take our time to find someplace permanent, like Lou and Casey have been talking about.”

  Lex turned to Rolf. “That’s true. I know that they’d like to find a place, and I think a number of the rest of us would, too. Do you think that’s reasonable to do?”

  He nodded in response. “Yes, when a station is decided upon they are more or less permanent, unless the special forces member expresses an interest in moving around. I can confirm that for you, however.”

  “That would be great,” Lex said, giving him a big smile. “Thanks so much for your help with everything.”

  That evening, nobody seemed to get much sleep with all of the running back and forth between rooms and long discussions, but everyone still came to see the band off at the train station late the next morning. Casey, Lou, Victor, Kate, Riss, and Lex made sure to say goodbye to the three newcomers and their liaison, all four of whom stood near the train.

  “I’m really sorry we can’t stay,” Lex said to Mr. Chen for the fourth time. “You are absolutely welcome to come on tour with us, but it can be sort of a pain, especially if you aren’t performing.”

  He shook his head and smiled. “I think I should stay here and get started with work. I’m very interested to see the people we’ll be working with here, especially since we’re not being forced to. I especially like this liaison of ours,” he concluded, and there was definitely a sparkle in his eye as he met Lex’s gaze.

  “I’m glad to hear it,” she replied, feeling the burn of a blush on her cheeks. “Take good care of yourselves. We’ve got about two weeks off around the holidays, so we’ll come home then, but we’ll be back for good by the end of March.”

  “I know, Lex; have a good trip,” Mr. Chen said, patting her shoulder.

  The last person she said goodbye to was Rolf. They stood near to each other but not touching, as if that last inch might bring something unexpected. “I can’t thank you enough for everything, Rolf.”

  “Really, it was my pleasure, and I’m glad it all worked out well.” He paused for a moment, looked her in the eye, and then looked away. “You know, now that everything’s worked out, you can still call me.”

  “I will,” Lex said, also not able to meet his gaze. “I’m sorry to hear you won’t be around during the holidays, but I’m looking forward to dinner once the tour’s over.”

  “So am I,” Rolf replied, taking her hand in both of his, squeezing once quickly before letting her go. “You’d better get going, though, since the train’s about to leave.”

&n
bsp; She met his eyes then and smiled, then waved to everyone as she got on the train with the rest of the band. They all waved again as the compartment passed by their friends on the platform. As the train left the station and really got underway, silence fell in the small room and a sudden wave of exhaustion hit Lex. She sighed contentedly as she stretched her neck out, allowing her head to rest on the cushion behind her.

  “Can’t believe we did it,” she murmured, mostly to herself, but Casey, sitting across the compartment, must have heard.

  “I can’t believe you’re going out on a date,” she replied, laughing as she saw the look on Lex’s face.

  “Oh, shut up, you,” Lex said without heat, laughing along with everyone else as a number of the rest of the people in the compartment broke out into chuckles or giggles. The miles seemed to dissolve away into nothing as the six of them continued to discuss their plans for the future.

  Chapter 36: Plans

  “It’s perfect. I think we should take it,” Kate said, surveying the front porch from the sidewalk.

  Lex looked over at her friend as a breeze blew through the tiny spring leaves of the oak that overshadowed them. “That’s what you’ve said about all of the ones we’ve seen,” she replied with a little smirk. “I think you don’t want to live at the base for another week, but that’s no reason to just pick anything.”

  Kate laughed as she returned Lex’s gaze. “OK, so you’re right, but I really mean it with this one. I think it is perfect.”

  Nodding in agreement while thinking how grateful she felt that Lily and Mr. Chen had done the legwork to set up all of the house tours over the past couple of days, Lex looked back up at the front door to see Ron come bouncing out of it. “Come on in, aunties! I want to show you the room I want,” he said excitedly.

  Watching as Kate ran up the stairs, Lex laughed as her friend picked Ron up and went back inside. “OK, let’s go take a look,” Kate said, scooping him up in her arms and making him laugh. Turning to face Lex from behind the screen door, she continued, “Why don’t you see if you can get everyone together so that we can vote on it?”

  After taking a final look at the outside of the stone house, Lex nodded and went inside. She took a glance at the large kitchen on the left and the dining room on the right and then noted Lily in the living room gazing out the back windows into the garden below. “Hey, Lily,” Lex began, then waited to continue until her friend faced her. “I think we should vote on this place since it seems to meet all the basics. If anyone comes by here, can you get them to stay? I’m going to go over the rest of the house and get everyone else down here.”

  Lily nodded in return and gave a small smile. “Sure, I’ll just wait here.”

  Ducking back out, Lex took the stairs down to the basement. She found Lou and Casey in the back room, a large and airy place with French doors leading to the garden outside. Lex had been surprised to find it so when she first checked the basement out, but it made sense once she realized the house had been built into the side of a gradual hill. “What do you two think?” she asked with a grin.

  “The house is solid,” Lou replied as he looked back at Lex. “It’ll need some work to get it the way we want it to be, but it’s in good shape, which is the most important thing. Besides, with the stone and metal roof it should last nearly forever.”

  “Glad to hear it,” Lex said as she shot a look at Casey, smiling back at her. “Come upstairs to the living room in a couple of minutes, because we want to vote on it.”

  “Sure,” Casey replied as she took Lou’s hand.

  Lex poked her head into the large basement room that she thought would be perfect for the band’s practice and recording studio, before skipping up two flights of stairs to find Ron riding on Kate’s shoulders in one of the front rooms. Both of them gazed out the window at something Ron had pointed to. “Hey, you two,” Lex called, “go on downstairs in a couple of minutes so we can hold a vote.”

  “No problem,” Kate said, waving behind her.

  She searched the other rooms on the floor, which consisted of two bedrooms on each side of the hall joined by a bathroom in the middle, and found Mr. Chen in the last room she peeked into. “What do you think?” she asked her teacher.

  He smiled at her. “It seems like a nice old house,” he replied as he turned to face her.

  “You know, I was thinking,” Lex continued, “I know that Riss and Victor have their eyes on the attic for a lab, but I think we could use half for a workout space. I think we’d need to reserve any sparring for the base, but we could use it to practice, maybe put up some mirrors, that kind of thing. What do you think?”

  He looked thoughtful for a moment. “I haven’t seen it yet, so maybe I should take a look.”

  “OK, but then come down to the living room because a vote’s been proposed,” Lex said with a smile. “I’ve got to go find everyone else and tell them, too.”

  “I’ll check quickly and then see you there,” her teacher replied with a nod.

  Mr. Chen followed her up the stairs, but he continued up while Lex only took the first flight and then started searching the third-floor rooms, which had been arranged the same way as the ones on the previous floor. She found Riss in one of the front rooms.

  “So, what do you think?” Lex asked, grinning as her friend turned to her.

  “I think I’ll need some more power outlets,” Riss replied as she surveyed the walls.

  Lex shrugged in return. “Well, all of the places we looked at have needed some work. Fortunately, we have someone here who can do just about anything we need. What do you think aside from that?”

  Riss gave one of her minuscule smiles as she met Lex’s eyes. “I like it. It’s got character, plus we can walk to work from here. Are we voting?”

  “Yeah, go downstairs to the living room. I’m going to check the attic to finish collecting everyone and we’ll be down after that.”

  Her friend nodded and headed downstairs. Lex went back out into the hallway and took the temporary pull-down stairs up to the attic and looked around the mostly empty, slightly dusty space to find Victor and Mr. Chen both up there, each surveying a different end of the house.

  “Hey, you two,” she called. “Let’s go to the living room for a vote. You can come back up and look some more afterwards if we decide we want it.”

  All three of them went down to the living room to find it filled with the rest of their friends. They took positions around the room, some leaning on the wall or a windowsill, a few of them sitting on the floor.

  “Hey, everyone. Let’s talk a little about what we like about the house,” Lex said as she leaned against the wall near the door. “Who’d like to start?”

  Lou raised his hand, then began to speak. “The foundation seems sound and the house itself is in good condition. They used care and good materials to build it.”

  Continuing around the room, everyone mentioned the things they liked about the place, many of which Lex had already heard as she collected the crew. As they went around a second time, to talk about issues, Lou kicked off the discussion saying, “It’ll need some work to get it exactly like we want it to be, but I’ve said that about every house we’ve seen. I don’t think we could find a house that’s already been built that fits all of our specs.”

  A few people passed before Kate piped up. “I wish it had more bathrooms,” she said. Victor, who spoke next, snorted a laugh. “I don’t think you’ll have much to complain about, since you’ll probably end up sharing one with me and of course I’ll always give in to you when you want more time.” Kate grinned at him and nodded as he shook his head with a smile. “I would like a larger lab space, but it’s adequate. It’s also bigger than the space in any of the other houses we’ve looked at.”

  Riss’s only comment noted a desire for more electrical outlets, but she admitted that it was well within the group’s power to change that if they decided on the house. Silence reigned for several moments before Lex spoke back up.


  “All right, let’s have a vote. Everyone that wants to buy this house, please raise your hands.”

  She looked around the room to see that all hands were raised, including Ron’s. Lily said softly, “Ron, I told you that only the grown-ups get to vote.”

  “I know,” he said quietly in return, “I just wanted to let everyone know that I want to live here, too.”

  “I guess it’s unanimous, then?” Lex asked, looking around the circle at everyone smiling and nodding back at her. “I’ll go get the realtor and let her know we’ll buy the place, then.”

  About a week after they’d moved into the new house, Riss called everyone together that happened to be home. On that day, an early Saturday afternoon, it had turned warm, so they’d opened many of the windows to let in the scent of the flowers that had begun to bloom in the garden below as people gathered in the living room. They had added some furniture since their move—two large couches and an end table—but they were still working to pick out all of the pieces they wanted for the house, so Casey and Lou made themselves comfortable on the floor. Kate and Victor sat on one couch and Lex and Mr. Chen took the second. Lily and Ron had gone out shopping, so Lex looked expectantly at Riss once everyone had assembled, as did all the other people in the room.

  Since Riss kept so much below the surface, most people missed any upset she might have, but to Lex’s eye her friend looked nervous. “I mentioned this to Lex a while ago, so I finally decided to stop putting off talking to all of you. I have someone I’d like all of you to meet,” Riss said, turning the laptop in her hands to face the assembled group.

  Lex saw a picture on the screen of a set of continuously shrinking and expanding bars that moved smoothly, changing colors and bouncing off the sides. After a moment of silence, a voice came from the speakers.

  “Hello. It’s very nice to finally meet you, Casey, Lou, Kate, Victor, and Lex. Mr. Chen, I haven’t seen you before, but I have heard of you and it is nice to meet you, as well.”