“Don’t worry White Knight, we’ll get you out,” said Camille in as comforting a voice as possible.
“Screw it, helmet off,” said White Knight and the suit disengaged the helmet. It hung loosely, but he couldn’t get his arms freed to take it off. He just started shaking his head and then the helmet fell off and hair was everywhere. Long black hair, and then she shook her head to clear the hair from her face - it was Gabrielle Fox.
“Damn it, stop staring and get these beams off me!” yelled Gabrielle.
Starfish just stood there gaping and then muttered, “but…but you’re supposed to be Matteo.”
“Sorry to disappoint, but I swear if you all don’t get me out of here now—” hissed Gabrielle.
“Starfish, pull it together and help me get her out of here!” said Camille, who picked up the pace in hefting off beams.
“So do you have to be naked to wear the power armor suit?” asked Starfish. “Just scientific curiosity.”
Cosmic Kid stifled a smile and put his back into helping move beams. At that, Dr. Sterling’s voice came over their headsets. “Alright everyone. Coast Guard helicopters will be arriving soon. We have an incoming tsunami and the lower neighborhoods are being evacuated. We need you all back in the city to help with disaster relief ASAP. It’s going to be a long night.”
Chapter 28
12:09 p.m., Tuesday, June 11th, 2013
Oberon Avenue
West Pacific, CA
Blue Star was enjoying himself for the first time in weeks. He was on patrol with Camille and she was a damn good flier and not afraid to show off, which forced him to keep up with her, especially since he was still recovering from the injuries he’d sustained taking down Ian Roache. He had always considered himself a good flier, but as the two of them threaded their way through downtown West Pacific he was having trouble narrowly avoiding the various obstacles from streetlights to power lines that crisscrossed the roads. It was exciting and a nice break from physical therapy, not to mention the incessant meetings and phone calls he had to handle as team leader, especially in the wake of the Avalon One debacle. Plus it took his mind off the nightmares. He should be used to those by now considering how many years he had been relying on occult healing to stay in the field. They made his nights hell, but it was a small price to pay to be back on his feet so soon.
His biggest complaint at the moment was that Dr. Sterling seemed to be constantly finding ways to remind him that she really ran the team, even if her title was only operations director. She should be catering to him, not vice versa. But whenever he tried to exert authority over her, she’d bring in her trump card: the team president, Dr. Hodges, who trusted Dr. Sterling implicitly and would never listen to a word against her. Blue Star was beginning to think that Dr. Hodges, who occasionally seemed a bit senile, was really just a figurehead for Dr. Sterling, who had managed to gain subtle or outright control over most of the team and staff, and a lot of the Governing Board. It was like she was running some god dammed shadow government. He knew that he needed to sit down with her and hash the situation out, but that was a battle royale that he was not relishing. At his age he should have known better than to take the team leader position without investigating further, but he was too stubborn sometimes, even with himself.
“Lunchtime!” said Camille over the headset as she dropped down to a café along Oberon Avenue, which ran through the revitalized downtown. Oberon was lined with small restaurants and stores, including two movie theaters, one a big stadium theater with OmniMax and a smaller one which played artsy movies. It was a very trendy area in a forced sort of way.
“Alright,” said Blue Star awkwardly as he landed behind Camille with a sloppy three and a half-step landing, nothing like Camille who could casually stop even when she had been going close to Mach 1 the second before.
He had to admit she was the type of super he would have been chasing 30, hell 20, years ago. She was good-looking, nice body, good hair – though her hair was a little too short. Thank God she was not like a lot of superheroines who were often more plastic than flesh nowadays; she was solid, not fat, but solid. He couldn’t understand supers who were skinny, that was just another word for brittle. He saw in the news a few days ago some super in New York, Glorisa or something, a little stick-figure girl who was broken into kindling by a few of the Knights of Misery. Sickly was not a turn-on.
Of course, Camille was married with a kid, besides being a member of his team, so to even be checking her out was some breech of etiquette. This was why he would never have a psychic on the team. He was basically a dirty old man and it was best if he kept that to himself.
“The veggie gyros here are great,” said Camille, taking a seat at a table outside of the café.
“If it doesn’t have meat, then it isn’t worth eating,” said Blue Star.
“Heathen, this is California – the land of vegans and fruitcakes.”
“I’ll take fruitcake then and let you be the vegan.”
Camille laughed. “Nah, I’m not quite vegan. I can do vegetarian, but that’s my limit.”
A family that had been walking by stopped as their two kids were pointing at Blue Star and Camille. The father looked appalled, but the mother came over with a determined look.
Camille smiled and whispered, “fans at 11 o’clock.”
“Good-looking fans?” asked Blue Star.
“You can do better, plus she’s with her husband.”
“Hello, I’m sorry to interrupt your lunch, but my son, Ethan, is a huge fan and well, could we get a picture?” asked the mother. Ethan was stunned and his younger sister was hiding behind their dad, who clearly wasn’t happy with this plan.
“Absolutely,” said Camille, getting up to pose next to Ethan. She glowered at Blue Star, who reluctantly got up and put himself into celebrity mode as he stood next to the boy. The mother took a picture. Then she had the sister come up for another shot. She was about to do a family photo, but Camille interrupted her.
“I’m sorry, but we need to get back to lunch. We’re planning how to deal with some supervillains,” said Camille with a wink to Blue Star.
“Really?” asked Ethan. “Who?”
“I can’t say – but watch the news,” said Camille turning back to the table. The family moved off and Blue Star was relieved. He was tired of dealing with people.
“Why so glum, Blue Star?” asked Camille as she sat back down.
“What? Sorry, just team leader stuff and all that,” said Blue Star. He was in a bad mood, but what he needed instead of a talk were some villains to knock around. He should have been thrilled that the team had survived Avalon One, but the fact was that he had missed out on what might be the biggest crisis of the Season. It might have been his absence that allowed the tsunami to be created and the city flooded, which had dropped the team ranking to #8.
“Crappy job, isn’t it? West Pacific goes through team leaders like you wouldn’t believe. Mr. Awesome was team leader the longest and that was only seven years. I only had to do it for the last two weeks, thank God. It’s like a revolving door here.”
“Revolving door on supers as well,” said Blue Star, thinking about Keystone’s pending trade to the High Rollers.
“Yeah, it was for me,” said Camille quietly.
“Sorry, I didn’t mean… I mean, if I was you I wouldn’t have come back here,” said Blue Star. “You were treated unfairly.”
“Probably, but we’re all treated unfairly the day we’re born – my goal is to just try not to treat anyone else unfairly,” said Camille with a shrug.
“How’s that working out for you?”
“Crappy, Jules really worries about me,” said Camille looking off sadly.
“As he should. I’m haunted by a lot of ghosts and will no doubt be haunted by more.”
“Man, you’re depressing,” said Camille with a laugh. “Though I know what you mean, since coming back here I feel like I’ve been walking with ghosts of the past as well.
I feel like Sarah should be here – and she died a decade ago.”
“It’s not the time, it’s the connection. I actually met Supersonic Cat a year before she was killed. She was tapped for a mission to deal with an alien incursion in South America. Operation Silver Riposte.”
“I remember that. I was so pissed that Supersonic Cat got to go and I had to stay here minding the fort. You know, I don’t think I will ever be tapped for the President’s Team,” said Camille with a sigh.
“The current President, bless his soul, doesn’t like me,” said Blue Star.
“I thought you were a Republican?” asked Camille.
“I am, but we have a history. It doesn’t matter about political affiliation; there’s an independent commission which names the 12 members of the team, but the President has to sign off on each one of them. I’ve been on the President’s Team during three administrations, but won’t be on the current one.”
“So what happened? Failed to rescue his only daughter or something?”
“No, I knocked him unconscious back when Legion attempted to possess Congress. President Carlington was a member of the House of Representatives at the time. Needless to say, he wasn’t actually possessed, just really pissed, but you know how those two can look alike.”
“That was like 30 years ago! You’re telling me the President still has a grudge against you since then? Seriously, I didn’t vote for him, but he does seem more reasonable than that.”
“Well… I was also dating his only daughter at the time and we broke up a few months later,” muttered Blue Star.
Camille roared with laughter. “You’re nearly as bad as Count Courageous!”
“I’ve never bitten anyone I’ve dated,” retorted Blue Star.
“That you’ll admit!” laughed Camille. “So who’s your current poor quarry? I’ll warn you that going after Gabrielle is a bad idea. I mean, I thought she was scary before and now I’m sure she’s insane.”
Blue Star shifted uncomfortably for he had entertained the idea, but nixed it as it would be the height of unprofessional to date her. “I’m actually holding off on dating for the time being.”
“Oh my god, you were actually thinking of dating Gabrielle! You are such a cad!” laughed Camille. “You and Keystone are going to give the team a bad name.”
“All my faults are off the field,” said Blue Star. “I would never leave the team hanging during the Season for contract negotiations, let alone switch teams mid-Season.”
“So what about that?” asked Camille. “I still can’t figure out why he’d move to Las Vegas after coming off the sidelines for Avalon One.”
“Yeah, well, I guess the whole reason he got off the bench was to prove to the High Rollers that he was worth the salary he was demanding. And he made his point; from the tapes I saw, I don’t think that fight would have been as smooth without him. The final straw apparently was when the tsunami hit – his house was one of the ones that washed away. From what I hear, he signed with the High Rollers the morning after. Still he’s been with the team awhile, nearly six years.”
“I’m not sad to see him go,” snorted Camille. “He’s the one they brought on to replace me.”
“Ouch,” said Blue Star.
“Hey, life’s looking good right now,” smiled Camille. “With you and Starfish back on duty, Keystone finally cut loose, and the PGZ investigation wrapped up – well, of course, Seawolf is still on Injured Reserve and we haven’t solved the Boardwalk attack yet… ”
Blue Star frowned. “No we haven’t and the longer that hangs out there, the more… ” He glanced around; this really wasn’t the best location to be discussing the attack on the team. “At least we’re down to only one member benched.”
Camille grinned. “And I haven’t been on Injured Reserve yet! I’ve always been healthiest with Annie as my Ops director.”
“Surprising, since Dr. Sterling seems to want to kill off the entire team in training exercises.”
“Not really, actually, she’s been pretty tame with the new team.”
“You’re kidding – she used live ammunition in the last session,” said Blue Star.
“Yeah, low-caliber stuff, Annie has mellowed over the years. You wouldn’t believe—” started Camille before she was interrupted by several flashes from a camera.
Coming up to them was a man loaded down with camera equipment. He was wearing jeans and some t-shirt with writing on it that was obscured by his gear, which Blue Star realized included an audio-receiver that could be used to listen in on conversations. The man had superazzi written all over him.
“So does the happy couple have any comment?” asked the man as he filmed them with a video camera.
“Please, we’re eating lunch and would like some privacy,” said Camille calmly.
“Not bad, Blue Star, not bad, a nice piece of ass – though Nova Girl you should never have given up the mini-skirt,” said the man.
Blue Star jumped up. The surrounding temperature dropped ten degrees and the man noticed it and took a cautious step back. “Listen dumbass, you apologize to Camille or I’ll…”
“Whoa, Blue Star,” said Camille, getting up and grabbing him by the arm. “Come on, just ignore him.”
“Yeah, what are you going to do Blue Balls? It’s good you have Nova Girl here to protect you,” said the man, who was capturing the entire exchange on video. “So you’re after both your public relations director and Nova Girl? At your age you’re supposed to be slowing down. I imagine…” The superazzi took a quick step back from an angry Blue Star and slipped, crashing down hard on the ground and the ice that formed beneath him.
Blue Star was pissed. Partly because the guy was an ass and really deserved a good thrashing and partly because the idiot superazzi was somewhat correct about him.
“Look at the ice!” yelled the man. “That’s assault! I was attacked by a super! My back!”
“You want to be attacked by a super? I can arrange that!” snarled Blue Star who was sizing up the guy for how much he could take without serious injury. Camille grabbed his arm and pulled him back. He had forgotten how strong she was; she nearly lifted him off the ground and dislocated his shoulder in the process.
“Get your ass up in the sky!” snapped Camille.
Blue Star nodded and sprang up and took to flight. What the hell had he been thinking? He attacked a superazzi! Then again, he hadn’t done anything wrong and that punk just got in his face and started insulting Camille. Blue Star was tempted to go back and truly deck the guy; if he was going to get in trouble it might as well be for something real.
“What was I thinking?” muttered Blue Star as he climbed up higher and the cooling wind brought him to his senses. He decided to head back to HQ. Why the hell had he ever decided to take this job? In Portland no one cared about him, but just a few hundred miles away in West Pacific the superazzi were after him and this incident would bring more of them. They were like piranhas, except with worse manners.
Gabrielle was going to kill him.
Chapter 29
11:15 a.m., Wednesday, June 12th, 2013
Sarah Minoli Conference Room, WPS HQ
West Pacific, CA
Gabrielle was so mad that Cosmic Kid thought she might actually spit. PR, legal, plus all the team members were sitting around the massive oak table in the conference room, with Gabrielle at one end partially obscured by a massive pile of newspapers and internet printouts. Even Seawolf was here, though she walked with a limp and apparently was having trouble hearing out of one ear. Gabrielle kept grabbing randomly from the pile and reading out headlines and quotes in an increasingly hostile voice.
“Oh this is priceless: Blue Star dumped President’s daughter; President still holds grudge! The new team leader of the West Pacific Supers has admitted that 27 years ago, while married to his second wife, he seduced Joyce Carlington, the daughter of then-Representative Roland Carlington, who was only 18 years old at the time…”
“That sente
nce doesn’t even make sense,” Cosmic Kid pointed out. “It makes it sound like Representative Carlington was 18 years old at the time - which would mean that Joyce would have been like…” Blue Star and Gabrielle both fixed him with stares like laser beams and he quickly shut up. Matteo chuckled.
“Or how about this one, then?” snapped Gabrielle, pulling a print-off from the stack. “WPST Facing New Crisis. According to a conversation captured between Camille (formerly Nova Woman) and team leader Blue Star, Keystone was the key factor in the team’s recent victory over the villainous Avalon One project. With Keystone now a member of the High Rollers of Las Vegas and the aging Seawolf still recovering from an unknown assailant, Blue Star worries whether the team is prepared to handle whatever next crisis faces the city. Adding to the team’s burden, Camille herself admitted that she is injury-prone and concerned about making it through the Season intact. As if that were not enough to give the team leader heartburn, Camille also told him that operations director Dr. Annie Sterling’s heart just isn’t into the new training regime…”
“That is not what I said!” exclaimed Camille angrily. “I said…”
“You said?!” screeched Gabrielle. “Do you want me to tell you exactly what you said?! Because I have a verbatim transcript right here!!!” She grabbed a folder at the bottom of the stack, sending a cascade of papers across the table and floor.
“Stop it,” said Blue Star in a low voice, looking up for the first time. “This isn’t helping.”
“Oh,” said Gabrielle sarcastically. “This isn’t helping. What phenomenal advice coming from the man who apparently is intent on screwing anything that moves - no, not my words,” she added as he started to jump out of his chair. “Ah yes, here it is, my personal favorite:
“Senior Super Still Gots It Going On. Blue Star, the 61-year-old superhero and father of 3, proves that age doesn’t slow down his love train. Kudos should be given to whoever handles Blue Star’s scheduling, because it’s got to be hard to keep track of this grandfather twice-over who apparently is still intent on screwing anything that moves. In between lunches with Camille (formerly Nova Girl and now supposedly settled down with husband and baby - we know how boring the suburban life must get) and closed-door meetings with Gabrielle Fox, the team’s smokin’ hot Latina public affairs director, Blue Star also finds time to check out good-looking fans and keep tabs on a list of broken-hearted exes that some say is over 50 names long…”
West Pacific Supers: Rising Tide Page 30