“Your world is suddenly very small and you feel every point where it touches you.”
“Yes!” She swallowed. “I can taste my mouth.”
“Everyone can, you’ve simply forgotten how to ignore it. But you’ll remember. I prescribe rest, for now, and a quiet place with not much happening. Hope?”
I nodded and took her elbow. She slid off the table and came with me easily enough, and I wanted to scream.
I turned the indirect lighting in my rooms up as bright as I could as Shelly stretched out on my bed and tried not to move. She didn’t react when I carefully sank down to sit on the end by her feet. I counted heartbeats, the most beautiful sound in the world, and remembered the day I first heard Jacky’s. Father Nolan would draw some interesting observation from my having witnessed two resurrections. Except in both cases they hadn’t been dead — just differently alive.
“You used the Wishing Pill, didn’t you?” Shell whispered.
I nodded.
“Why couldn’t you have just wished me fixed?”
I shook my head but kept my mouth shut.
“Why?”
“Because you can’t wish for something you don’t want. Not a true wish.” She looked away, but since I’d started I had to finish. “I wished for you, Shell. Not you in a robot body or in my head or in a secret future computer CPU somewhere. I wished for you. I’m so, so sorry.”
She wiped her eyes, sniffed. “My nose is running. God, I hate this.” Sobs convulsed her like hiccups, and she folded in on herself. When I touched her ankle, she rolled over to my side and I pulled her into my arms.
“SuperPooh’s around here somewhere if you want him,” I whispered into her hair, and she laughed wetly.
“Cheater. That’s not fair.”
“Really?” the Shelly standing at the foot of the bed asked. “‘Cause I could use him right now.”
I screamed and almost crushed Shelly. “Sorry! Sorry!” I loosened my grip.
“What?” Shelly gasped.
I stared at the new Shelly. “You can’t see her?”
“See who?”
“You! How — Oh. Oh.” I wanted to laugh and cry at the same time.
“What? What?”
I glared at virtual Shelly. “Your quantum-mirror backup just arrived.”
She nodded. “Woke up in the Teatime Anarchist’s computer as soon as the signal from Galatea was completely lost. Well, it took me a little while to really wake up. Then I had to catch up on everything since last spring. Good to know the neural link in your head is still working. Hold on.” She disappeared and the TV behind her turned on to show her grinning face. Now Shelly got it.
“Better?” New Shelly asked from the TV. “Hey, me.”
I nodded, still trying to breathe right, but Shelly almost shrieked.
“Better? Seriously? Seriously?”
“Hey! No harm no foul! Remember the bio-seed we sent Hope to give to Mom and then chickened out on? Gulp it down, give it a few months to wind itself into your new meat-brain and bang! We’re connected again.”
My mouth dropped open so far Mom would have objected. Then the giggles started and I couldn’t stop.
“Hope? Hope?” Eyes closed, I wasn’t sure which Shelly was talking.
I’d made two of them.
Chapter Thirty Four: Astra
“Personally, I’d rather leave other people alone. But when someone comes round and bothers your neighbors, you’ve got to put your boots on.”
John Chandler, Atlas: The Last Interview.
“Could anyone be more of a cowboy?”
Hope Corrigan, Notes from A Life.
* * *
The team got back three hours after they left, flying in over the ruined and wild forest that had been Grant Park. The Green Man had gone south almost as far as Roosevelt, trying to get around Superintendent Redmond’s fire line and into the Loop, but focusing on the Dome had kept him from crossing Jackson north of us. All the heroes in Chicago couldn’t have stopped him, but the CPD had held him long enough.
I handed Dispatch duty back to Blackstone the second I could, left Shelly to fight with herself (Chakra could referee), and flew out to help find and deliver everyone hurt to the designated aid stations. There’d been a few traffic accidents in the evacuation, mostly fender-benders, and injuries, people falling or being accidentally pushed down in stairwells and other tight spaces, but most people had helped each other.
I felt great; I’d forgotten how fast my powers let me bounce back from physical trauma. After flying hurt citizens around, I joined Watchman and Variforce to help clear around the Dome — the green had come within an inch of breaking through into the atrium before Megaton went off — until Blackstone sent me to represent the team at the press-conference staged by the mayor’s office just before sunset.
I got to stand beside Superintendent Redmond and behind the mayor at the podium hastily set up on Congress Plaza. The frozen tide of green half-covering the battered Atlas Memorial just across the Congress Parkway bridges made a dramatic backdrop as the mayor thanked the CPD and all the heroes for saving the city; no details yet, just getting word out that the Green Man was dead (at least we hoped so and the city was willing to take our word for it so things could get back to normal). “Hope?” Shelly — which one? — whispered in my ear after the mayor read his short speech and started taking questions. “Blackstone would like to see you in his office as soon as you can get away.”
My stomach sank, but I kept the smile on and shook hands with Big Red and the mayor (the newsies got some nice shots) before flying away.
* * *
Blackstone sat reading reports and watching a narrow-brimmed fedora sitting on the corner of his desk next to a megaphone. He smiled when I stepped through the open door.
“Astra,” he greeted me cheerfully. “Good job today, my dear. We’re going into an after-action meeting before we stand down tonight — not in depth, just catching everybody up — and I want you on my left at the table. It’s a leadership thing, and we need to — ”
“I — no.”
I never interrupt, and he stopped, looked at me. He frowned.
“And you need to sit down. Careful of the hat.”
“What?” I sat and tucked up my costume skirt, wondering what he was talking about. He gave me a tired smile.
“Ozma assures me that tomorrow at sunrise it is going to turn back into a rather obnoxious protest leader, but I can’t help feeling that if I bump it... You would think I’d be used to magic by now, but neither mine nor Chakra’s is quite so physically spectacular. Do you have a problem with sitting at the front, my dear?”
“Why? After I screwed up so bad? You left me on watch and — The Green Man — I was all over the place! And Shelly...”
“I’ve watched the recordings, and you appeared to be quite on top of it.”
“I didn’t do anything but follow the book! If it wasn’t for Megaton, the Green Man would have eaten the city!”
Blackstone put his hands together and regarded me over steepled fingers.
“Rule number one of winning, my dear, is to avoid fighting a stronger enemy. Rule number two is, when you do fight, avoid losing so badly that there won’t be a rematch. The Green Man always picked the time, place, and objective, and if the entire team had been on hand this time, we might have been able to contain him again. I am convinced that he coordinated with the Wreckers to insure that we could not be here today.
“Perhaps I should not have gone to Detroit, today, but like you I believed that the Crew was involved, which meant we would likely face another communications blackout, which meant Chakra and I needed to be on the spot.”
I slumped. “So I didn’t even help you there, either — you already knew.”
“I’d already seen the possibility, but that is my job. And I considered the possibility that the Green Man would attack while we were absent, because that’s also my job. I’m afraid you are going to have to live with having been
the Sentinel in charge of the successful defense of the city. I’m sure the blow to your reputation will be considerable.”
“But — ”
“Haven’t you wondered, my dear, why I’ve been loading you down with studies, why I brought Watchman on the team, why Watchman doesn’t split police-liaison duties with you now, why I’ve succumbed to Quin’s blandishments and allowed a junior team, why I let you choose our new Young Sentinels?”
I shook my head, stopped. What had Seven said? Thinking five steps ahead is his job, and I’m pretty sure he’s always up to something. The little hairs on the back of my neck felt electric, and my seat creaked before I loosened my grip.
“Why — What are you doing?”
He sighed, stood up. “Walk with me, Hope?”
* * *
He took me down to the Assembly Room, to the “trophy” wall with all its framed news clippings, magazine covers, publicity shots. He stopped in front of the oldest news photo of Atlas, in his cheesy first costume, the one that looked like Elvis Presley in a cape.
“You know,” Blackstone said quietly. “John was only a few months younger than you were when he had his own breakthrough. You’re not like him. John wandered up here from Texas, and Alex did what older brothers do — he knew a guy who knew a guy, and he got John a tryout job slinging bags around at the airport. Fresh from slinging hay bales on the ranch, he was all wiry muscle, restless energy, no idea what he wanted to do with his life besides see more of the world than Texas. But the Event — when he leaped into the sky and caught that plane — he knew what he was supposed to do with what he got, and there you’re exactly alike.”
He chuckled, surprising me.
“Took him a while to figure out how, though, and he thought the whole mask-and-cape thing was pretty ridiculous — especially since everyone knew who he was already. You’ve heard him talk about that, but it was Alex, the marketing and public relations expert, who convinced him that people would be less scared and the government would have a harder time locking up and experimenting on superheroes who had the public behind them. He still said he felt damned silly wearing the cape and answering to Atlas. But.”
Blackstone always looked a little sad when he talked about John, but when he turned away from the wall there was a twinkle in his eye. A ghost of a smile played on his lips.
“This morning, you were just Hope Corrigan, no powers, on the injured list. When I left you in charge, the first thing you did was change into costume, mask and all. Why? Everyone knows who you are now, and you weren’t flying off to save the day.”
“I — ” I had no idea. Why had I wasted time changing?
He nodded.
“The same thing happened to John. It became who he was, like a policeman’s badge or a soldier’s uniform. He became Atlas, and you’ve become Astra. It’s not just a name you wear, anymore, and your mask doesn’t hide you — it shows who you are. Your powers are back, and that is a very good thing. Chicago has its Astra back.” He turned back to the wall and tapped a glossy picture of me flying over the city, taken last fall. It had been shot from the ground looking up and it caught me against the sky, laughing as I flew, Atlas alert and watchful, higher in the sky above me.
“But powers aren’t enough, my dear, and strong as you are, you know you’re hardly invulnerable. Even if you were, you can’t be everywhere. You’re just one more Atlas-type. But so was Atlas, and we need you to be Atlas.”
Now I was completely lost. Virtual Shelly popped into existence beside me.
“He’s leveling you up, dummy,” she said, eyes rolling. Blackstone chuckled, touching his earbug before I asked.
“Shelly is correct, Hope. I’ve gotten you the toughest A Class trainer I could steal, and I am sorry for the bumps and bruises. I’ve made you the face of the Sentinels with our city’s law enforcement.” He smiled. “And since you don’t have the seniority or experience to be leading the team in the field yet, I’ve given you a starter team.”
Wait, what?
What what whaaaaaaaat?
I dropped into a conference chair, covered my eyes and tried to breathe normally.
“But I haven’t done anything, yet!”
Blackstone started laughing.
“Dear God, Hope.” He wiped his eyes. “What haven’t you done? Forgetting all the cape stuff, I am alive today because of you. I allow you to choose your team, and you give Shelly her life back! You have a way to go, but you are not the scared little girl I met last September, and even then you were stunningly brave.”
The smile dropped but the twinkle stayed in his eye.
“But you don’t have ten years to ‘level up,’ Hope. Shelly knows this. More Ultra-Class threats will appear, the political situation will get more precarious as the threat level rises, and we need Atlas. He was a national figure, the iconic cape, a symbol worth more political and public capital than all the rest of us combined. We don’t have him anymore, but he can have heirs.” He waved at the wall, all of it, first group shot to the Times Funeral Edition.
“The Sentinels are heirs. The Young Sentinels will be the next generation of heirs. And you are his principal heir. You can close your mouth; we’ve talked about legacies before. I’m not saying you’ve earned it, it just worked out that way.
“So go clean up, briefing in an hour. The Green Man may be gone, but there will be others. We need to find out what Dr. Pellegrini and the Wreckers want with a bunch of young supervillains. We’ve got to formally introduce the Young Sentinels to the city — not that they haven’t had a hell of an introduction already. And we’ve got the biggest cleanup job Chicago has seen since the Event. If you hurry, you may have time to see your family first, so get moving.”
“C’mon!” Shelly echoed, laughing. “Vulcan and I have worked up a new Galatea-shell I can telepilot for the meeting, too! Awesome Girl and Power Chick ride!” Blackstone’s deadpan, determinedly serious expression was too much, and I lost it completely to dissolve into helpless giggles.
Here we come to save the day...
Chapter Thirty Five: Astra
“Everyone is the center of their own story, and thinks that they know what is going on and that they have some control over the plot. The truth is that everyone has plans for you or plans that don’t involve you, and really all you can do is choose what to do with what happens next.”
Hope Corrigan, Notes from A Life.
* * *
Believe it or not, I enjoyed cleanup. For Watchman and Riptide and Variforce and me it meant two solid days of non-stop clearing, uprooting the trees that had shattered and covered Lake Shore and Columbus so that the Crew could lay passable roadway. Till they finished, Michigan Avenue would be a bumper-to-bumper nightmare. For the rest, there was already talk of leaving the new primeval forest more or less intact except around the Dome, filling in Monroe Harbor (which was half-choked and half-wrecked now anyway), and rebuilding the landscaped park and fountain on the new land.
Virtual Shelly picked up for Shell without a hitch, though she had to settle for tele-operating an older Galatea model. Shelly left the Dome to stay at my place while Mrs. H got everything settled for her, which was all good as far as I was concerned. She wasn’t acting mad, or sad, or Shelly. She was still scaring me, and Mom would know what to do.
Blackstone used the cleanup days to pull together a detailed after-action briefing of the Green Man Attack. He gave us huge props for the way we handled it — they were going to give Megaton a medal for sure, at least, I hoped so — and saved his comments on my misuse of Tsuris for a private conversation.
He was right; I’d misused Tsuris for civilian rescue when I should have put him on holding back the green as soon as the other flyers arrived. When Vulcan’s heat-bomb didn’t do the job, he’d ignored my instruction for all fliers to assist with evacuating the park. Instead he dropped to the south end of Grant Park and used his ground-stripping winds to keep the Green Man from outflanking the CPD’s fire moat. From the reports of his of
ficers on the spot, Big Red pretty much concluded that Tsuris stopped the Green Man from tearing into the Loop south of Roosevelt before Megaton and Galatea blew him up.
But Blackstone also said, “Hope, when Charlie dances the foxtrot, you bring your moves — you don’t sit it out trying to think of the best moves.”
And he used the briefing to finally share the preliminary DSA analysis of the Detroit Breakout. Redback (obviously boosted to A Class or higher) “hijacked” the body of a prison officer to get inside, used codes provided by Phreak to hack the security system, and released Dozer from his hard-cell confinement. With the cell blocks locked down, Dozer cleared the room for Drop to teleport everyone else in on his nifty platform. They had plenty of time to free exactly the prisoners they wanted before we even got there, but they focused mostly on juvenile breakthroughs. Blackstone had no idea why Dr. Pellegrini wanted a bunch of kids, at least nothing he’d share, but it couldn’t be good.
Three days after the attack, we got our first Young Sentinels team picture on the I Love Me wall; Powers Magazine took the picture for their next cover, all of us standing in front of the wrecked Atlas Memorial; Galatea, Crash, Megaton, Tsuris, Ozma, Grendel, me, clean and shiny in our best costumes. Nox and Nix rode Grendel’s shoulders for the picture, and everyone behaved at the magazine-sponsored photo party for us and the Guardian teams (well, almost everyone — Tsuris hit on Safire and Blue Fire before Ozma shut him down by miming a hat).
And then I took off, the old-school way by taking the backdoor and driving home. Our security reported a few die-hard paparazzi lurking on our street, but Ozma stopped me on the way out of the Dome and handed me a small case which turned out to hold a stylish pair of nonprescription glasses. She’d inscribed Anonymity Spectacles inside the case in gold; apparently, so long as I didn’t do something startling like strip naked or, more realistically, start flying, even my own family wouldn’t recognize me when I put them on...
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