by Dee Benson
He noticed her staring at him. The look of guilt that crossed his face was another telltale sign.
"Tom from Texas?" Axel asked.
"His real name is Jasper," Prince Drake said.
So Prince Drake knew about it?
Anger shot through Axel's veins like fire. She walked away and stood at the back of the gym near the punching bags. She'd punch one if her right hand didn't feel like it'd been crushed by a tank, and if the other hand wasn't engaged with cradling her sore hand.
Thankfully, Nigel didn't ask her why she'd walked away.
Tears coursed down her cheeks. She didn't feel the emotional pain she should because of the drugs in her system, but her brain knew that she was in shock and was triggering the correct response. If they hadn't gone out for dinner that night would they have been found?
Someone handed her a tissue.
Axel closed her eyes briefly. She hadn't even realized that anyone had approached.
"I'm sorry for what I did."
Axel opened her eyes. It was Tom from Texas. Or Jasper. She couldn't reply. She was too choked up to speak.
"I didn't hurt them, personally," he whispered. "I was just stationed on the island as a lookout. I was surprised when you came over to talk to me."
She'd thought he was cute. Axel was disgusted with herself. She most definitely didn't think so anymore.
"Are you coming?" Jasper asked her.
Axel realized that the rest of the class was filing out of the gym. Nigel was glaring at her from across the room. She remembered what he'd said about how she'd be drugged if she didn't fall into line.
She walked over to the door, Jasper on her heels, and followed the rest of the class out.
Trojan was waiting for her in the hallway. "Are you okay?"
"I'm great. Where are we going now? Are we done?"
"No. We're going to the laboratories for an activation session."
Great. Everybody else would probably activate powers, while she would probably be the only one unable to do so.
When they got to the labs, Nigel ordered them to sit according to their units. Axel grudgingly left her seat beside Trojan and went to sit with Prince Drake, Jasper, and the rest of her unit.
"I thought we were going to get to do actual fighting today," Prince Drake said.
"There's no time," Nigel replied. "We'll do that tomorrow."
Prince Drake turned to face his unit. "Guys, we have to nail our training. We have to be the best. I suggest we train even outside of classes. Only the very best will be chosen to go to battle."
In that case, Axel decided to just be rubbish so that she wouldn't be chosen. She couldn't do this.
I am rubbish anyway. She wouldn't have to try very hard not to get chosen.
Nigel moved around the lab, handing out worksheets and unlocking the cupboards beneath the benches. Axel's unit members began to remove scary-looking objects from the cupboards.
"Electricity is usually good for activating dormant Supers," Prince Drake told them. "Of course, it has to be a sub-lethal voltage."
Jasper pulled Nigel's worksheet closer. "We have all the specifications for voltages and other things here."
"Chemicals and radioactive substances are also known to be helpful," Prince Drake said. "We'll start with those."
"Should we pair up?" Candy asked.
"No," Prince Drake replied. "I would like us all to help one another in turn. I think we should start with Axel since she seems to be struggling the most."
"Electricity?" Jasper asked, picking up the electrical probe.
Axel stared at them. They wanted to electrocute her? She grabbed the worksheet and scanned it. "Ten thousand volts?"
Candy rolled her eyes.
"I'm not overreacting," Axel snapped. "This is dangerous. Is this just some big conspiracy to get me killed? If so, I'd prefer a bullet through my brain rather than all this crazy stuff."
"Ten thousand volts won't kill you," Prince Drake said. "You can take up to twenty thousand and be fine. It's the number of amps that is the tricky part. But don't worry, that's why it's Nigel who teaches this class. He has mind powers and is protecting us all while we try to activate."
At the next bench, Trojan was using the probe on a teammate. The girl tensed slightly when it touched her, but that was all.
Axel swallowed. She licked her lips which had suddenly gone dry. She could do this.
She watched as Prince Drake and Jasper set the controls. They looked like they knew what they were doing.
She took a deep breath as Jasper reached out with the probe.
The instant it touched her hand, it seared her flesh like a knife.
She didn't want to scream. Again. But she let out a scream that even to her own ears was blood curdling.
Nigel was at their bench in an instant. He looked at the settings on the probe and the glared at Axel. "Screaming the room down over 0.009 of an amp?"
Axel was shaking uncontrollably. "It burned me—"
"Get out."
"I—"
"Get out of here, now!"
Chapter 13
"YOU ARE A SUPERIOR human being."
Axel didn't feel Super. She did, however, feel slightly human today. Her hand still ached and the burn still stung, but she'd had a shower this morning. Trojan and Angelo had guarded the shower room so that nobody could enter while she was using it. She'd also managed to locate the bag she'd brought from home and had her mom's pendant hanging from her neck. It made her feel close to her family.
"You are a Super."
Axel sighed. Seriously? It was five a.m. When they'd been awakened at four, she'd expected fight training, weapons training, drills, a workout. Not this.
She looked up at the ceiling, yawning. It was stark white, as was every surface in this tiny box of a room.
She'd been drugged again this morning. This time by somebody she hadn't yet met. And it hadn't been a neutralizer this time, if that instant happy and giddy feeling was any indication.
"You are powerful. You have powers beyond your wildest imagination."
The voice was beginning to get annoying but Axel tried to stay calm. She had electrodes stuck all over her head, no doubt measuring her response.
"You are activating. You are discovering your powers and realizing your full potential."
Axel yawned again.
Today was going to be another long day. And there was probably a lot more humiliation in store for her.
Axel pushed that thought out of her mind. She didn't want to think about all that had happened yesterday.
Soon, her eyelids began to droop.
Sometime later, she was prodded awake. She sat up quickly, causing the electrodes stuck to her head to detach suddenly. She winced with pain.
Desmond was staring down at her. He gave a long-suffering sigh. "Please follow me."
Axel got off the bed and followed him out of the room. He opened a door down the hallway. Axel's heart skipped a beat when she stepped inside and saw Serloyd sitting at a desk, tapping away at a computer. The office was overflowing with papers.
Desmond remained standing by the door. "Sit," he ordered Axel, nodding at a chair on the other side of Serloyd's desk.
Axel sat down. As she did, Serloyd turned away from his computer and fixed her with a hard stare.
"You need to activate," he told her.
"So everybody keeps telling me," Axel replied. "But nobody has let me know exactly how to do that."
Serloyd steepled his fingers. "Somehow, I get the impression that we don't have your allegiance yet."
Axel said nothing. They'd killed her parents. If they wanted her allegiance they were going about it the wrong way.
"If you do not do your best for us and activate powers that will help us, you will never see your cousin again."
Axel returned his steady gaze. She could tell he meant every word. Despair filled her. "I'm trying."
"Try harder."
"Listen, I've been tol
d all my life that I'm not Super and I don't have any powers—"
"I don't care," Serloyd replied. "Do you think I brought you in here to hear your life story? We will be attacked next week Friday. We need you to activate before then."
Why me? Axel wondered. Okay she was of an aristocrat bloodline, but couldn't they just kidnap an aristocrat who knew their powers and force them to do their bidding?
"Let me give you an incentive," Serloyd said, an evil glint appearing in his eyes. "If you don't start pulling your weight, and you fail to be selected for next week's battle, Zanda will die."
Axel hated the tears brimming in her eyes. She wanted to be stronger than this, less easily manipulated. But the thought of Zanda dying because of her was torturous.
There went her plans of being deliberately useless so that she wouldn't get chosen for the battle.
"Where is she?" Axel's voice came out as a whisper. "Can I at least see her?"
"No."
"How do I know she isn't already dead?"
"You don't know that." Serloyd smiled. He was obviously enjoying this sick little game he was playing with her. "I guess you just have to trust us."
"She's still alive," Desmond said from his position at the door. He removed a cell phone from his pocket and tapped the screen and then showed it to her.
Axel jumped up from her seat and went to see. She gasped at the sight of Zanda. Wherever she was, it was dark. Ropes bound her wrists and ankles. Tears streaked her cheeks. Her hair was a scraggly mess.
The screen blacked out. Desmond tucked the phone back into his pocket.
"Activate," Serloyd said, a smug smile on his lips.
AXEL WENT TO THE school library the first moment she had that morning. Dynamo had let them out of class early so she had thirty minutes to spare.
A fierce determination had cemented in her heart after her meeting with Serloyd and Desmond. Zanda's fate depended on her activating. She needed to take this seriously. Needed to do her best and get selected for the battle next week.
She'd thought that obeying their orders to come here would mean they would release Zanda. A bitter laugh escaped her lips. She'd been so naive.
Once in the library, she found the 'activation' section and began to peruse the books. Some of them were so thick she would never finish reading them. She needed something she could read in a day. Something that would give her all the information in a clear, concise manner, and enable her to work out how to activate.
She thought of Zanda, tied up in a dark room, crying. She must be scared out of her mind. Axel wondered if she was being fed much. They were probably giving her just the bare minimum; enough to keep her alive.
Axel's teeth clenched. She could kill them for doing this to Zanda. Zanda had already suffered so much in her life, losing her parents at such a young age. Did these people have no pity at all?
I'm doing this for Zanda, she told herself as she checked out a bunch of books. As she made her way out, she noticed a section full of novels about Remodel and Chameleon Girl. Axel stopped. So far Zanda had only found comics about them. If she saw this vast array of books, she would be giddy with delight. It was a shame that Zanda, who loved all things Super, was having such a horrible experience in Super Land.
The next class was some pretty boring theory about battle strategies. Axel opened one of her activation books and placed it under the wad of notes the teacher had handed out. She began to read about activation.
After many years of Supers accidentally activating new powers in addition to the ones they were born with, the Super government and found out how to make activation happen on purpose. However, Supers needed a license to do it. Accidental activation was fine, but deliberate activation had to be sanctioned and a form completed.
We're breaking Super law by trying to activate?
Axel wasn't sure what to think of that. Did she care about Super laws? She figured she should since she was in the Super Land, but she was in a position where she didn't have any choice. She had to obey the demands of The Firemaster and his people.
Still, her conscience tugged at her. She was with people who were trying to overthrow a government. Back home, she would never join an organization that was trying to overthrow the president.
They have Zanda, she told herself. Yes, she was on the villain's side, but that couldn't be helped. She would do whatever it took to save Zanda, even if it meant breaking Super laws and helping a treasonous organization.
Trojan, who was sitting beside her, nudged her. He nodded at his wad of notes. Axel looked at it. He'd scrawled a note across the bottom: Prince Drake is having a pool party tonight. Coming?
No, Axel wrote at the top of her paper.
Later, at lunchtime, she was reading the activation book while eating, when somebody settled into the chair beside her. Axel looked up into Prince Drake's ice blue eyes.
"I heard you're not coming to my pool party."
Axel swallowed the lasagna in her mouth. "Yeah." She wasn't sure what else to say.
"It's for our cell. If we're supposed to fight as a unit we need to bond. I expect to see you there at seven."
He probably thought he was being nice, but Axel had to bite down hard on her tongue to keep herself from making some snarky comment. "It was Trojan who invited me, and it sounded like something for everybody."
Prince Drake frowned. "How did Trojan get to know about it? It's not an offer everybody, it's only for our cell." He looked at her activation book. "We'll give each other tips on activating and honing our powers. Maybe you will do better in a relaxed atmosphere rather than the formal atmosphere of the classroom."
That piqued Axel's interest. She nodded. "Okay."
"I'll send a car to pick you up."
AXEL WAS SHOCKED WHEN a shiny black limousine pulled up outside the dorm building that evening at six forty-five.
However, Candy, Jasper, and the other three guys in their cell didn't look surprised, so Axel tried to look unimpressed too.
They piled into the limo and it began to snake its way through the streets.
"How big is The Firemaster's territory?" Axel asked.
"He took over this whole city," Candy replied. "This city is called Merspool, named after the conflux of rivers in the forest at the east of the city. That's where the Gifts and Graces can be accessed by those they choose. The Omends and Philimnes are also there, but it's the Gifts and Graces that everyone is more interested in."
"Serloyd pledged allegiance to the king after The Firemaster was banished," Jasper told her. "But he was really on The Firemaster's side all along. He continued to work on his agenda during his banishment, setting up Super High and other institutions to train people to help The Firemaster when he was ready to make his comeback."
Axel still didn't like Jasper, but he'd been making such an effort to talk to her. Maybe he really was sorry for his role in her parents' death. Not that he'd had much of a role anyway. He was only a lookout. And he probably hadn't had much choice in the matter. Still, she wasn't sure whether she should forgive him. Could she forgive someone who'd played a part in her parents' death, no matter how small that part was?
Soon, the other three guys started flirting with Candy. Axel turned to the window and focused outside. It seemed the whole city was fire themed, not just the high school. It was both eerie and intriguing.
After about twenty minutes, they pulled up to a huge, imposing iron gate. The limo driver spoke into the intercom, and then the gates began to open. Axel could only stare as the limo rolled through the vast grounds of what could only be described as a mansion.
What did you expect? He's a prince.
Axel turned away from the window. "What happened to Prince Drake when The Firemaster was banished? Was he banished with him?" If Prince Drake was her age, he would have been a baby at the time.
Candy was busy trying to extract herself from the arms of one of the guys who was tickling her. She was squealing.
Jasper was the only person listen
ing. "Prince Drake's mom was pregnant with him at the time. Serloyd helped her hide and assume a new identity. Prince Drake was born a few weeks after The Firemaster was banished. The other women who The Firemaster had been planning to make his concubines were killed. Some were pregnant, but the king didn't care. He didn't want any of The Firemaster's children alive to take revenge on him in later years, or to try and claim the throne. "
Axel looked out of the window again, in time to see them pass a raging ball of fire suspended in midair. No wonder Prince Drake was passionate about The Firemaster's agenda. The whole situation was a mess. Family shouldn't fight and kill one another. They should love each other and be there for each other. Axel thought of Zanda. She would never do anything to hurt her, not even if they were both heirs to a throne and Zanda was chosen above her.
When they reached the house, the limo doors were opened by men in smart black uniforms. They were escorted around the back to the pool.
Axel stopped dead. At least fifty people were here, splashing around in the pool, or sitting on the sides. All the guys were shirtless, wearing only swimming trunks. Most of the girls were in bikinis. A handful wore all-in-one swimsuits. Music blasted, and people in black uniforms moved around the crowd, bearing trays of drinks and nibbles.
Predictably, there were fire features all around the pool. At the very center of the pool, a water fountain bubbled. Small balls of fire were suspended in the air around it.
The sky was ablaze with the colors of sunset. The place looked like a strange sort of paradise.
Chapter 14
CANDY HOOKED AN ARM around Axel's shoulders. "Let's go get changed."
"I didn't bring a swimsuit," Axel replied.
"I didn't think you would, so I brought one for you."
Axel looked at Candy. The first impression she'd had of her had been slightly negative. She'd thought Candy would be full of herself and snotty, but she was actually okay.
"Are you wondering why I'm being nice to you?" Candy asked.