The Powers That Be: A Superhero Collection

by Swardstrom, Will

  The Powers That Be

  A Superhero Collection

  Featuring stories by

  David Adams

  Ann Christy

  Carol Davis

  Wes Davies

  Samuel Peralta

  Thomas Robins

  Logan Thomas Snyder

  Will Swardstrom

  &

  Paul K. Swardstrom & Will Swardstrom

  Foreword copyright © 2014 by Ernie Lindsey. Used by permission of the author.

  “Cassie Dreams of Flying” by Carol Davis, copyright © 2014 by Carol Davis. Used by permission of the author.

  “Lucky Chance” by Wes Davies, copyright © 2014 by Wes Davies. Used by permission of the author.

  “Repose” by Thomas Robins, copyright © 2014 by Thomas Robins. Used by permission of the author.

  “Who Will Save Supergirl?” by David Adams, copyright © 2014. Used by permission of the author.

  “Yankari: A Talking Earth Tale” by Ann Christy, copyright © 2014. First published by Ann Christy in 2014. Reprinted by permission of the author.

  “Hotbox Runner” by Paul K. Swardstrom & Will Swardstrom, copyright © 2014. First published by Paul K. Swardstrom & Will Swardstrom in 2014. Reprinted by permission of the author.

  “We’re Coming For You” by Logan Thomas Snyder, copyright © 2014. Used by permission of the author.

  “Faster” by Samuel Peralta, copyright © 2014. Used by permission of the author.

  “To Sacrifice A King” by Will Swardstrom, copyright © 2014. Used by permission of the author.

  Cover design by David Adams

  Formatting by Polgarus Studio

  All Rights Reserved

  Dedicated to all the heroes, both imagined and real.

  You inspire and challenge us to do better, to be more, and to fight on.

  This is a work of fiction.

  The stories, including ideas, powers (both natural and supernatural), dialogue, and villains are all from the imagination of the authors.

  Table of Contents

  Foreword (Ernie Lindsey)

  Cassie Dreams of Flying (Carol Davis)

  Lucky Chance (Wes Davies)

  Repose (Thomas Robins)

  Who Will Save Supergirl? (David Adams)

  Yankari: A Talking Earth Tale (Ann Christy)

  Hotbox Runner (Paul K. Swardstrom & Will Swardstrom)

  We’re Coming For You (Logan Thomas Snyder)

  Faster (Samuel Peralta)

  To Sacrifice A King (Will Swardstrom)

  FOREWORD by Ernie Lindsey

  The power of flight. Super strength. Technologically advanced gadgets. Incredible suits made by some reclusive, billionaire genius that incorporate all of those factors.

  Being a superhero is pretty fun stuff, huh?

  Recently, I participated in a panel at StoryCon in Vancouver, WA, and we discussed the role of superheroes in society and why so many people are absolutely fascinated by them. A member of the audience made a great point when he suggested that mythical people with superhuman abilities didn’t begin with fancy drawings of bulging men and women in brightly colored tights; they’ve been around since Greek and Roman gods ruled on high. Maybe even further back, but who’s counting?

  The point is, whether you’re a few thousand years old and telling stories on the steps of the Colosseum or riding on the subway in 2014, reading the latest Superman comic, the idea remains the same: who hasn’t dreamed of becoming something bigger than what we already are?

  Who hasn’t fantasized about leaping into the air and flying away at supersonic speed? (As an adult, I would use this ability to avoid traffic. As a child, I remember wishing we could hurry up and just get to the beach already, Dad.) Who hasn’t wanted super strength to teach that bully a lesson? Who hasn’t thought about tossing on a pair of red, white, and blue tights and fighting evil in some form?

  Dreaming of superheroes or wishing we could be one gives us something to look forward to, and that’s hope. Hope that we can change what we are for the better, or hope that there’s someone looking out for us when we feel like life is getting out of control. If we feel like we’re not capable of taking on something that seems impossible, then the role of Great Protector goes to the people who are, and they’re the ones we expect to save us.

  But, the role of ‘hero’ in society doesn’t just apply to superhumans we create with our imaginations—certainly DC Comics, or Marvel, or Hollywood does an excellent job of that—they can be anyone, anywhere, at any time. Doctors, nurses, officers, police, the man who jumps in an icy river to rescue a drowning stranger, the mother who chases and tackles a thief…they take on the role of Great Protector or they become someone bigger than the average norm by their actions.

  Being a super human, or a super hero doesn’t have to involve tights, capes, or gadgetry or even watching them for two hours at your local theater. Those things are for fun. Those things are for dreaming about possibilities when we want to escape from reality.

  Super humans, super heroes…they exist all around us in everyday life, quietly making the world a better place, risking their lies to protect us, and they’re out there doing it selflessly for the greater good.

  You don’t have to wear a suit with a symbol emblazoned on your chest to be someone’s hero. Maybe all you have to do is be bigger than the norm, a little at a time, each and every day.

  Cassie Dreams of Flying

  By Carol Davis

  “It looks stupid, doesn’t it?” I said.

  And no one answered me. I turned away from the mirror to find Lily checking her email and Cam picking at a smudge on the toe of his left sneaker. Neither one of them looked up, and you know… that pretty much answered my question.

  “It does look stupid!” I wailed. “I can’t go out like this.”

  “It’s a Halloween party,” Cam offered helpfully. “We all look kind of stupid.”

  The thing was, they didn’t. Lily had put on a white lab coat with L.M. Douglas, M.D. embroidered on the breast. The stethoscope she’d bought on eBay (a real one, to replace the plastic one she’d decided looked too childish) dangled out of the pocket. Cameron was wearing army fatigues and boots, courtesy of his stepdad, who’d served in Desert Storm back in the Nineties.

  If I’d followed their lead, I’d be dressed as a ballerina.

  We’d worn the same costumes – more or less – every Halloween since we were three years old.

  “You can’t control how other people think,” Lily announced, still scrolling through her email. “We could hire some professional wardrobe person or whatever, and spend a ton of money, and what would it accomplish? We’re us. We’re not gonna blow anybody’s socks off no matter what we do.”

  “Then I do look stupid.”

  “You look fine,” Cam said firmly.

  “You need to tell me the truth!” I insisted. “If I look awful, you have to say so, while there’s still time to find something different.”

  Like my old ballerina outfit.

  True, it was just a Halloween party – but in our tiny town, the Halloween party had been a big deal for something like sixty or seventy years. Before that, it’d been some kind of harvest celebration. These days, it was a chance for everybody to dress up and be a little crazy. The people with good imaginations got pretty artistic about it, or metaphorical. They’d turn some famous phrase or quote into a costume.

  Some of them spent all year working on a new concept. Then they’d spend days fixing their hair and makeup.

  “You’re gonna start hyperventilating again,” Lily warned. “You know what the paramedics said the last time.”

  “
Oh, God,” I moaned.

  We all made good use of eBay, and not just for Halloween costumes. We pretty much had to, because the closest mall was a forty-minute drive away, and even there, the shopping opportunities were pretty limited: a Sears, some shoe stores, the typical stuff. Closer to home, we had a big Walmart, a Hallmark shop and a dollar store, which you’d think would be enough, but we (my family, and Cam’s, and Lily’s) had kind of outside-the-box needs. Online, we could find the indy books Cam liked to read, shoes for Lily’s unusually narrow feet, the tiny antique bobbleheads my mom collected, car parts for my dad’s old Mustang, and… well.

  This.

  White short-shorts with a high enough spandex content to cling to my butt like a second skin. Clingy silver lamé knee-high boots. A tight, bright blue long-sleeved t-shirt, on the front of which Cam had created a big, stylized “M” (for “Miracle Woman”, he said) with fabric paint and glitter. That part of it looked pretty good, I thought: artistic, bold without being in-your-face. Like a big logo. His original plan had been to paint an “A” (“Astounding Woman”) – until I reminded him about The Scarlet Letter.

  He was crap with a sewing machine, though, and Lily and I were no better, so we’d turned to my aunt Nora for the cape.

  A huge, billowing white cape, also decorated with Cam’s “M”.

  When I fastened it to my shoulders, it flowed all the way to the floor. “I’m gonna step on it,” I said. “Every step I take. I’m gonna step on this thing and faceplant in the middle of the street.”

  “Stop it,” Lily said. “You look fine.”

  “I look like a hooker.”

  “You do not look like a hooker.”

  Cam put in, “Not in those boots. They don’t have high heels. I believe the Manual of Professional Hookerdom calls for at least six-inch heels.”

  “So do the comic books,” Lily said dryly.

  “This again?” Cam groaned. “Okay, for the forty thousandth time: I don’t draw those things. I’m not even personally acquainted with anyone who draws them. It’s entirely not my fault that a significant percentage of female comic book characters – heroes and villains – wear skimpy outfits, spike heels, and have cantaloupe-sized breasts.”

  Lily pointed out, “You read them.”

  “And… what? That makes me complicit in the downfall of American womanhood? They’re comic books. I’m a sixteen-year-old guy. I’ll admit to a fondness for cantaloupe-sized breasts. What do you want from me?”

  A glance at the clock told me it was almost four o’clock. The party was only an hour away.

  Ballerina, I thought.

  The safe choice.

  Quivering, I grabbed the hem of the t-shirt, intending to pull it up over my head, forgetting Cam’s presence in my sudden need to get rid of the thing. Luckily, Lily popped up off my bed and yanked my hands away from the shirt. “You look great, Cass,” she insisted. “Now stop fussing. You’re gonna get it all messed up, after you spent a whole hour ironing the creases out of that thing.”

  I garbled out a groan that made me sound like I had a bad case of stomach flu.

  “She’s right,” Cam said. “You look awesome.”

  “I’m wearing shorts that are hiking up my butt crack and a pair of lamé boots!” I howled. “They’re gonna start laughing the second I walk out the door!”

  How was it, I wondered, that Clark Kent’s mom could sit down with the blankets she’d pulled out of his spaceship and with a couple of hours’ work on her sewing machine could turn her kid into Superman, and not a geek wearing an old blanket? His cape was a blanket, for crying out loud.

  At least mine was satin.

  Lily wrapped her arms around me and pressed her forehead to my temple. “Let’s calm down,” she said quietly into my ear, like someone trying to control a toddler, or an agitated dog. “And think this through. WWDJD?”

  What would D.J. do?

  Lily and I had bonded over reruns of Full House, beginning back in first grade and running all the way up through middle school. Even now, on the occasional rainy Saturday afternoon, we’d grab some chips and sodas and watch a couple of episodes on DVD.

  As little girls we’d dreamed of being Tanners, of having D.J. as a big sister. (I suppose that made us side-by-side versions of the hapless Stephanie.) Whenever something went cataclysmically wrong, we’d ask ourselves, what would D.J. do? Would she work things out on her own, or would Dad, Uncle Jesse and Joey need to come to the rescue?

  How much of the house would get trashed in the process?

  “D.J. would never wear this outfit,” I said. “This is a Kimmy Gibbler outfit, and you know it.”

  Cam and Lily both gaped at me, eyes comically wide.

  “Gibbler would be wearing five-inch heels,” Lily said. “She would have stuffed her bra past the point of all reason and slapped on about six pounds of neon-colored makeup. And yeah, she’d be stepping all over that cape. She’d be making a fool of herself in front of the cutest guy in school. You are not gonna do that.”

  I took a step backward.

  To my surprise, the cape billowed out behind me, and I didn’t step on it. Frowning, I did a half-twirl.

  “Wow,” Cam said.

  My aunt Nora made her own clothes – some of them, at least. She also made outfits for her kids, and had a little Etsy shop for toddler clothing that had done pretty well. Now and then, she’d make a wedding gown. She did beautiful work: things that fit properly, moved properly, and didn’t come apart in the wash.

  To my knowledge, this was her first crack at a cape.

  “Do it again,” Cam said.

  Half a dozen steps took me all the way across my bedroom. I marched back and forth a couple of times, with the cape obediently floating behind me. Then I strode out into the hall and down the stairs, moving as quickly as I dared in the unfamiliar boots. The whole time, the cape rode the air behind me. I stopped when I got to the living room; as much as the little voice in my head had started urging me to go on outside and march up and down the length of the patio, that would have put me in full view of the neighbors. Neighbors who had cell phones with cameras, and who were fully familiar with how to post video on YouTube.

  “You’re gonna chicken out now?” Lily asked from the stairs.

  Now that I was standing still, the cape had again drifted down to lie against my back and my butt.

  My white-spandex-covered butt.

  I could run across the yard, the voice in my head told me. It was a good sixty feet long, which was what, thirty or forty really good strides? I could really book it out there, and get that cape flapping behind me.

  About ten strides into it, I’d want to do the bounce thing.

  You know the bounce thing.

  Run-run-run-BOUNCE. Hit the ground hard with one foot. And you take off into the air, arms outstretched ahead of you to cut the wind resistance like the nose of a plane. It’s an easy thing to do, and every kid knows it. Run-run-run-bounce. After that, you’re soaring. You’re a superhero.

  I’ve done it in my dreams.

  That didn’t come from watching reruns of Full House. Those dreams – the ones where I was soaring through the clouds – didn’t start until after Jon was born. I thought for a long time that they meant I thought I was better than him. That I was (in a word) super, while he very much wasn’t.

  But that’s not it at all.

  I heard a soft sound from the other end of the living room and turned to see Jonathan sitting there on the couch, his O2 tank snugged up close on one side of his legs and his beloved Barker – the stuffed dog my parents had given him when he was three, because we couldn’t have an animal with fur in the house – on the other. He had a book lying open on his lap; one of his favorites, I supposed, Harry Potter, or maybe one of the Narnia books.

  At first, he was his normal shade of pale. Then his face flushed and he broke into a huge grin. “Hey, bud,” I said. “What’s the tale, nightingale?”

  For a minute he didn’t say an
ything. Then he whispered, “You look awesome.”

  “Nah,” I said. “I look kind of goofy.”

  “No you don’t.”

  He was seven years old that Halloween, and small for his age, as he’d been all his life. Our dad could still pick him up pretty easily; so could Lily and Cam and I, if we didn’t have to carry him very far. His expression shifted a little as I stood there, and I could tell he was making comparisons, sizing me up against the superhero action figures he kept lined up on his bookshelves. He had dozens of the darn things, and every time I tried to dust them for him, they’d go tumbling down to the floor.

  “It’s all in the attitude,” Lily said from behind me. “Right? Tell her, J-man.”

  “It is,” Jon said sagely.

  “Maybe it’s the boobs,” Cam put in. “Maybe if they were bigger, you’d have more confidence.”

  I swung around, pivoting on the heel of one of my $15 silver boots, eyebrow arched, brow furrowed. “You being my cousin does not mean I’m prohibited from kicking your A-S-S,” I growled.

  “Just a thought,” he said.

  “I like it,” Lily said. “The power’s in the boobs. Like Samson’s hair. But yeah. Being stricken with self-doubt… ack. Don’t go that whole Peter Parker angsty route. You’re…” She turned to Cam. “Who is she, again?”

  “Miracle Woman.”

  Lily scrunched up her face. “Nah. Mega Woman?”

  “How about Mortified Woman?” I said.

  Some part of me wanted to go to the party, wanted it to be happening right now, so I could get the whole thing over with. It wasn’t the skimpy costume that bothered me, not really; the ballerina’s tutu I’d worn the past couple of Halloweens was just as skimpy and skin-tight as the shorts and the blue t-shirt. And the swimsuits I wore during the summer were skimpier yet. If you ditch this outfit, you’ll have spent all that money for nothing, I told myself. More than forty dollars (including the shipping) down the tubes.