by R. J. Ross
"I noticed," Nico says.
"He might need to be warned about egging it on when she gets older, though," Taurus says. "Those teeth of hers won't be for show by then."
"He likes the attention. Otherwise he'd never wake up that early," Nico says, not even bothering to pretend to whisper. I flush as I stretch, wondering what will happen next. I'm supposed to go back with them, right? I won't be going home to my own house, to see Mama, Papa, Cubby, or even the cats... I feel really lonely right now, honestly. I've never slept anywhere but at home or on vacation with my parents. But now it's just me and people I've only known for a little bit of time--
"I'm so jealous," Zoe says, making me jerk as I realize she's standing next to me. "I mean, I really like my morning training, I get to actually be in the games I play, but it sounds like yours was a lot of fun."
"It was okay," I say.
"Sunny got to go, right?"
"He managed to actually wake up for once," I say.
"Will you show me your panther form sometime?" she asks.
I jerk, a bit surprised that she hasn't seen it. "Um... it's sort of...embarrassing, but I guess?" I say. I'm going to be sleeping in her room for a week, I should at least try and be--
Oh man. I forgot entirely. I race for my bags, searching through them for the bag of cookies I baked. "Don't let Max leave?" I say to Zoe.
"Why?" she asks.
"I just need everyone to--I was going to--" I blush, feeling shy. "I baked cookies," I admit. "I forgot about them until now, but I wanted to thank everyone--"
"Oh, bring them with you!" she says. "Max always sticks around at our place until dinner time--and half the time his dad is working, so he sticks around for that, too." She reaches down, grabbing one of my bags for me. "Come on, let's go home. We put together a cot for you--it's more comfortable than it sounds, I laid on it last night to make sure."
"Thank you," I say.
"You're welcome," she says. "You like meat, right? Because we got chicken for tonight, but I don't want to--"
"Zoe," I say. "I'm a panther shape shifter."
"Well, yeah, but it's never a bad idea to make sure, right?"
"Then yes, I like meat. Do you need help cooking? Or whoever does the cooking--"
"We take turns," she explains. "But I'm cooking tonight so you can help, if you want!"
"I would like to--I usually help Mama do the cooking at home," I admit, a wave of homesickness hitting me again. It's too early to be homesick, I tell myself. I have to wait at least until tonight! I stand, grabbing my bags and following her up the steps to the exit.
For now, my week with strangers has just begun.
***
Rita doesn't know how to speak English. She doesn't have her greencard, either, but she does have several children at home and no one else to support them, so Rita does the work in front of her, knowing that it is evil, knowing that all her prayers the night before cannot atone for helping this woman, but prayers do not pay the bills, as her life has told her several times over.
She isn't the only one that has been hired for this work. There are several just like her, speaking the wrong language in the middle of the country of English speakers, hiding from the law, working hard to earn half the pay of the citizens, and taking whatever jobs they can get. She cleans up after atrocities, creatures neither human nor animals. She tends their wounds when she can get close enough, and she takes care of the beautiful lady.
The lady is the one reason she feels she can come back each day. She lies peacefully on her bed, in her sterile, comfortable room. It's the moment Rita gets to clean after her that she feels she's doing something good--something proper, like a proper nurse.
But there's something wrong, Rita realizes as she enters the glassed in room. The beeping is off on the machines--in fact they're not making any noise at all. The lady is still there, though, sleeping peacefully, but--
Rita moves forward, looking closely at the machines beside the lady's bed. There's a vine, she realizes as she crouches down, it's sticking out of the machines, woven in and out.
"Silencio," the lady whispers, turning and looking at her with eyes so green they outshine gemstones. "Por favor."
"Sí," Rita says, her heart pounding in her chest. The lady has awoken.
***
He's watching me. No, it's not who you expect, and I'm sure there's several people that come to mind right now--it's Trent. Trent is just sitting there in the front room of Nico's apartment, watching me closely as Emily and Ditto sit on either side of him, talking a mile a minute with everyone else. They tend to say the exact same things at the exact same time, so I'm not quite sure why both of them are here, other than the fact that sometimes they start arguing about strange things.
Either way, Emily and Ditto aren't the problem. Trent is. I move further into the kitchen to help with the salad as Zoe checks on the chicken. Of all the students in my class, Trent's the one that makes me feel most worried. He's got the same super pedigree as mine, but on the opposite side. He's a bred super hero, not just born--we're talking America's Son and--
"You okay?" Zoe whispers as she comes over.
"I'm fine," I lie. "Does Trent come over often?" I add silently.
"All the time," she whispers back. "He lives downstairs. And he's Sunny's best friend."
"I see," I say, going back to tossing the salad. This week just got worse in my mind.
"I know he's a hero and you're a super villain--but he's really not that bad of a guy," she whispers with a hint of worry. "I mean, you don't need to worry about him attacking you or anything, you're safe here."
Is it that obvious? "It's fine," I whisper.
She gives me a little smile then stops whispering. "Your mom looks familiar," she says. "Is she an acting super villain or something?"
"Oh, no, Mama doesn't really do much with her abilities--although she works with the--well, she's very good with animals. But if you recognize her face you've probably seen her in magazines," I say, stopping whispering as well. I'm proud of my Mama. You probably noticed that already. "Mama was a very popular model, but she stopped when she got pregnant with Cubby," I say.
"She was? That's amazing," Zoe says. "What magazines?"
"Oh, several," I say. "I have a book of the covers and pictures all at home--I should have brought it. Isn't she beautiful?" I say, knowing I'm fangirling over my own mother, but not caring. "But she's so much more! She's extremely smart--she's a working veterinary with several papers published! She's saved so many animal lives, especially big cats--she and Papa work so hard on running the sanctuary--I've been helping out, of course, but--"
"The sanctuary?" Trent asks, making me jump and turn as I realize he's stepped into the kitchen when I was talking. How did I not notice?
"Um--"
"It's fine, Adanna," Nico calls from the front room. "Everyone in the super world realizes already."
"I... ah... well," I say, hesitating. The sanctuary isn't very villain-esque. But Taurus said the same thing Nico just did. "My family, we are cat type shapeshifters, that means we're very active in the rescue of large cats," I say, feeling everyone watching me closely. "Papa is a biologist in his private life, he specializes in animal genetics and welfare, he’s very famous in those circles. Mama is an animal speaker and a veterinary for our home's sanctuary for endangered and abused large cats. It's behind our house," I admit quietly.
"Wow," Sunny says. "Can we visit sometime?"
"I will have to ask Papa when he comes back," I say, not wanting to make that commitment.
"So how do you get the cats in your sanctuary?" Trent asks.
"There are people that bring in wild animals as pets," I say. "In illegal ways. They like them as cubs but when the cat grows older it becomes more than they can handle. We go in and rescue those cats, provide them with a home, or if they're able, return them to the wild. Mama's work as a model helped fund that, plus we have several fundraisers and other things. It's a lot of work, but
it's... important," I finish with a shrug.
"Pan's always liked animals better than humans in general," Nico says. "There's exceptions, of course, close friends and family, but he'll go to great lengths for a cat he's never seen long before he does for a norm."
"That's because there are more supers for norms than there are for animals," I protest. "There are very few animal rights supers, you know. Papa can afford to be one, since he's a super villain!"
"She's got an excellent point," Liz says. "Super villains have more free time to do things like that, while us heroes get stuck taking care of the daily drudge on top of fighting them. I still smell like smoke," she complains. Liz confuses me. She is the one and only Firefly--one of the most amazing female supers in the world, yet I'm definitely picking up on a super villain mindset. Especially when she showed up, yelling about the stupidity of norms so loudly that the walls shook, and how about she should have let the (explicit word) that caused the fire burn. Then she dropped down on the couch and pouted until Nico patted her on the head when he walked past.
"Ms. Liz, why aren't you a super villain?" I ask. She grins at me and hops to her feet, coming over.
"How about this, kitty? You grow up and become one and I'll become your nemesis--"
"Liz," Nico says. "Don't tease Cub."
"But she's so adorable!" Liz says, hugging me with one arm. "You look so much like your mother, too."
"Why don't you have a nemesis?" I ask her, curiously. "It seems like it's an important part of being a super, right?"
"Not necessarily," Nico says. "It's just if you find someone on the opposite side that has good compatibility with your powers--or bad, I should say, then you tend to be drawn to them. Banshee and Pan are a great example. He has superior hearing, she specializes in sound attacks. He's smarter than she is, she's got flight, they balanced out well, but she's a lot older than he is and decided to retire, leaving him without a nemesis."
"Did you have a nemesis, Dad?" Sunny asks.
"Your mother would have been it," Nico admits. "But she never really got into the brawling game on a regular basis. A shame, really. It would have been one heck of a rivalry."
He looks at his laptop as it beeps, tapping on the screen a few times. "Huh, Taurus is coming up," he says. "First time he's been in the apartment building. I wonder what he's after."
There's a knock on the door before anyone can say anything, and we all look up as Taurus, in his human form, steps into the room. "I was told I'm moving in for the week," he announces.
"Why?" Liz asks bluntly.
"They want at least one cape per kid," he says, looking at her with a little smile. "Although I know you might prefer Mega--" (Liz snorts,) "I figured since I'm already living in a tiny, cramped apartment building, moving here won't make much of a difference. So if you could tell me the most usable apartments that aren't occupied, I'll just be getting comfortable."
"I would say this is overkill," Nico says. "But I'm not the Hall. You can have one of the apartments on the fourteenth floor. I think there's a few left."
"Why is no one allowed to move onto the fifteenth floor?" Liz asks.
"Because I'm taking the other apartments on this floor sooner or later. I've already converted the one across the hall into a computer lab," Nico says.
"In other words he's greedy," Taurus says.
"If I can't build weapons of mass destruction anymore I can at least build new televisions," Nico says. "I'm thinking of making that entire wall a television as soon as Zoe gets better control."
"Well, either way, I'll go pick out an apartment--"
"There's plenty of chicken," Zoe says. "You can stay for dinner, if you want." I look at her, but she seems intent on it.
"There she goes again, making sure everyone's fed," Sunny says with amusement.
"I am not!" Zoe says, her cheeks turning red. "I just thought that since he was here and everyone is eating over, anyway--"
"You're very mothering," I tell her, patting her on the back. "It's not a bad thing, really. Not very super-villainous, but not a bad thing."
"Says the one that made everyone cookies," she points out.
"You made cookies?" Sunny asks eagerly. "I want a cookie!"
"Not until after dinner!" I say, only to look at Zoe, who said the exact same thing at the same time. The rest of the room starts laughing.
***
It's like Fort Knox, but more heavily guarded, Procurer thinks, sitting on the roof of a building half a block away. The job had seemed easy enough when the collector called--pick up a cape brat, make millions of dollars. Collector's little zoo of capes and exotics has made him a millionaire several times over, but--
Collector never asked for a kid this heavily guarded, Proc thinks with disgust. Honestly, he should have done more research before accepting the job--he'd known that Technico was out! It's just, he admits, he'd never imagined Technico being so involved with cape brats. The man is a genius, one that Proc had admired greatly when he was just starting out sixteen years ago, but he'd had little attachment to humanity whatsoever at the time.
"So why is he guarding them so tightly now?" Proc asks himself, bringing out his smartphone. He looks at it for a long moment, his mind weighing the pros and cons. He's rich enough to avoid the trouble, right? But at the same time...
If he can steal this girl out from under four or five Hall members' noses his name will go down in infamy. He slips his smartphone back into his pocket. For a moment the simply clad, nondescript man stands there, his hands in his pocket. Then he steps forward and is gone.
***
The cookies are all gone. It happened in a blink, I think, looking blankly at the platter I'd placed them on so carefully. I probably shouldn't have bothered trying to be artful, I admit as I put the platter in the sink. I would wash it but Zoe says we can do that later, so I just stand here, wondering what to do next.
Going into the front room where everyone is laughing and talking seems like a form of intrusion. I'm already intruding enough as it is--
"Hey," Sunny says, coming into the kitchen. "The cookies were really good."
"Thank you," I say, deciding that washing the dishes can happen now instead of waiting. To my surprise, Sunny walks over, joining me at the sink.
"I'll wash, you dry?" he offers, starting the water. I nod, since it's better than going into the front room. "They don't bite, you know," he says quietly, starting to wash the dishes. I grab the towel that's hung on a hook and start drying. "I mean, you might, but they don't," he adds with a slight grin.
"I have no idea what you're talking about," I say stiffly. The dishes are done too quickly, I think, washing my hands off before looking for something else to do.
Sunny grabs my hand. "Come on," he says, tugging me along behind him. "You can show the others your panther form."
"But I don't--" I start out, only to stop as I realize everyone in the room is looking at me expectantly.
"I haven't seen it," Max says.
"Neither have I," Trent admits.
"I have! It's adorable!" Emily brags.
"It's... not very impressive," I say, trying to tug my hand free from Sunny. He ignores it.
"If she doesn't want to show you, she doesn't have to," Taurus says. He's claimed a chair for himself and I wonder if he even has things to move into the apartment he's claiming at all. He more likely forgot about it, or something.
"Why not show it?" Liz asks. "We won't laugh, all of us have had the beginning ability blues."
"Some of us are still having them," Zoe says.
"If I do this, will you stop asking me?" I ask.
"I won't!" Emily says shamelessly. "I like the kitty form!"
"Em," Trent says with a hint of dry amusement. "We're trying to talk her into it, not out of it."
"But there's no point in me lying," Emily says. "If anyone laughs I'll hit them for you, okay?" she tells me.
"Fine," I say, giving up. I might as well get it over with, I think as
I shift into my cub form, sitting on the ground in front of them. Maybe I can ask Zoe about studying in her room after this--
"Holy crap," Max says, coming over and getting on his hands and knees next to me. "You're so tiny," he says, reaching a hand out. He hesitates, though, not touching me. "Can I feel?" he asks. I look at him, then reach a paw out, patting his hand. He grins and reaches up, patting my head a bit hesitantly. "So soft, too."
Trent comes next, crouching down in front of me. "So shifters start out this small?" he asks, tentatively petting my head as well. "Wow, you really are soft."
I'm scooped up from behind and look up in surprise at Sunny. "Okay, enough petting," he says. "She's a super villain, not a super pet," he says, scratching me under the chin even as he claims that. I nip his hand, because he's being such a hypocrite. "What?" he asks, looking wounded.
"You were petting her even when you said that," Max points out.
"Ah--oh, right," Sunny says, flushing. "Well I'm different!" I bite him, since my teeth don't seem able to pierce his skin, anyway. He yelps, pulling his hand out of my mouth. Emily takes me from him, cuddling me against her chest.
"You were asking for that," she tells him as the boys start laughing. "Can Zoe hold you?" she asks, holding me up under my front legs. I think about it, then nod, finding myself handed over to the black haired girl.
"You're so beautiful," Zoe says in an awed tone as she carefully sits down, placing me on her lap. I sit there, looking up at her, then at Nico who's sitting next to her. He reaches out, scratching me behind one ear.
"By the time I met Pan he was an almost full grown panther," he says, "and my college roommate for a bit--he had this bad habit of shifting into his cat form in the middle of the night, so I'd wake up, stand, and be looking into this massive mouth of teeth first thing in the morning," he says, laughing, "cuz he liked the top bunk. I was shocked out of my mind the first time it happened--I didn't know he was a shapeshifter," he explains. "Then there were all the times he took catnaps in the sun--literally. Every time a student walked past for the first couple of times there would be this massive shock through the campus. He got caught a few times by animal welfare trying to take him back to the zoo."