Life Light (4 page)

“Are you a super hero?” one kid towards the back asks earning dark looks from the others.

“I am not,” Andre says.

“You look sort of like Taurus!” a girl says.

“Taurus is SO hot,” the girl next to her whispers, “he’s way hotter than this guy.”

“No, seriously, if you cleaned Taurus up--“

“No way.”

“If we could,” Andre says, trying not to laugh, “I’d like to focus. How many of you have seen something on Hero TV? I'm sure you've probably seen the channels we release to the public, but what about the heroes only channels? Don't worry about lying—we know there are people that try to hack my channel and post things online.”

There’s absolute silence in the room. “A few of you, hmm? And there are always the YouTube leaks,” he says, looking perfectly comfortable discussing it. “Do you have any idea how many workers it takes to run a television station?”

“Well, there are the reporters, right?” a girl offers when he seems to be waiting.

“Of course--they’re extremely important. Unfortunately most of those are required to have powers,” he says, “considering who we’re interviewing. I would hardly expect a norm--a normal person to interview a super villain, or even Firefly.”

“Is she hard to interview?” a guy asks curiously.

“She tends to let off a few sparks if you’re not careful,” Andre says with a little smile. “Her half brother can be even more difficult to deal with. Technico tends to hijack our entire station if he doesn’t like the questions.”

The classroom is still laughing as Ms. Vine comes in with a rather curvaceous young black girl. The girl heads to the back of the room, not looking at anyone, her chin up in a rebellious manner. Andre finds himself watching her for a moment too long.

His instincts are screaming that he’s found her. The girl gives off the same slight pressure as his granddaughter. The teens sitting near her give her dark looks and scoot away as much as possible without being obvious. Yes, he's found the healer. He just can’t do anything about it right now.

“Do you know Technico that well?” one girl asks, waving a hand at him.

“I know him well enough,” he says. “We go way back.”

The look of shock on Alyssa’s face alerts him to the fact she doesn’t know who he is. “My name is Andre Henderson,” he says, looking her straight in the eye, “I’m the owner of Hero TV. I’ve come looking for people interested in working for me in the future.”

There’s a stunned look on her face, one that says she hadn’t actually expected them to come for her. He feels like laughing at the very idea of them ignoring this. A possible healer type is something the Hall will turn heaven and hell over to find.

“Now I’m going to explain a few of the jobs you might think about pursuing in the future, and then I’ll open it up for questions,” he says, launching into his speech. He tells them all about the various workers, cameramen, script writers, and so on. The hour goes by in a blink, complete with more questions about various heroes, including Mastermental and other branches of HTV. It’s only when the bell rings in the middle of an explanation that he realizes he’s forgotten to keep track of time. He also realizes that Alyssa hasn’t said a word.

The kids reluctantly start to leave. He moves to the door, shaking hands whenever one is offered. That’s why he can stop Alyssa as she tries to sneak out. “Can I speak to you?” he asks silently. She can’t help the slight jerk that reveals she hears him, he notices. She nods and steps aside, letting the rest of the class leave. She gets several strange looks for doing that.

“Is there a problem, Alyssa?” Ms. Vine asks.

“No, Miss Vine,” Alyssa says. “I just--um--“

“I asked her if I could speak with her privately,” Andre says. “Of course you can stand outside, Ms. Vine, I don’t want anything to seem less than above-board.”

“Um--but--“ Ms. Vine looks from him to the girl and back, obvious confusion on her face. “I would have sworn you were here for one of our more... athletic students?”

“Are you saying I’m out of shape?” Alyssa demands, her expression going sharp and dangerous.

“It’s not that--it’s--well--with him being what he is--“ Ms. Vine stutters, blushing brightly.

“If you could step out here, Miss,” Andre says, gently touching her back and escorting her out of the room. “We’ll stand right here where you can see us,” he goes on, leading Alyssa to the other side of the room, still in view of the door.

“I--“ Ms. Vine says. She looks like she wants to protest, but Andre ignores her, stepping a good two feet away from Alyssa.

“I’ve come on behalf of the Hall,” he says silently. “Are you the one that sent the email?”

“How--how did you find me so quickly?” Alyssa asks in a tiny whisper.

“The Hall has a technopath,” he says simply. “Now, since you can hear me from this distance, I think I’m right--but tell me truthfully, are you a healer?”

She looks down, staring at the gloves and long sleeves she’s sporting. It’s the end of summer, and close to ninety degrees outside. School only just recently started for their district. “I want to talk to the healer,” she says instead, “the alien girl that looked like a normal person at first.”

“Unfortunately Life Light is out of town at the moment,” he says.

“Then I have no reason to talk to you,” she says, turning and walking away.

***

The plane lands and I jerk awake as Emily pokes me. “We’re here! I can see Grandpa and Grandma from here--they don’t exactly blend in,” she drawls with amusement. I glance out our window, looking at the tiny airport next to the plane. Just as she said, the two ex-super heroes are standing right at the window, watching us. They’re both tall, muscular, and white-headed. One alone tends to stand out. When you put them together, you tend to attract a crowd of curious side-glances and flat-out gawkers.

“Let’s get going, shall we?” Taurus says, starting to stand.

“I think I’ll go out the back and fly home, if it’s all the same to you,” Liz says, her hands wrapped tightly around the armrests. “Yes, that’s definitely the right plan. You guys have fun with your grandparents, okay? Tell them I got a call--pressing business--“

Taurus leans down, looking her straight in the eye. “Liz?” he says.

“I’ll be home in an hour or two--I might stop and see a few sights--“

“Liz, you’re not going home,” Taurus says as Emily and I get up, grabbing our things from the overhead compartment. “You just spent ten hours in a crowded plane for this--you’re not going to waste all that time by running home like a chicken. Besides, they WANT to see you!”

“But I don’t really want to see them,” Liz says childishly.

“Mom?” Emily asks.

“Yeah?” Liz asks, looking over at us.

“I really want to meet Duplicitous.”

“Oh... you’re right, that is going to be awesome, isn’t it?” Liz says in a milder tone.

“And if you don’t come, you won’t get to meet her, right?” I say. “That’d be a shame, since we’ve been looking at everything we can find on her for the past week, right?”

“Well, yeah...”

“You even called Prisma to help us find things, since she’s a reporter, right?”

“Yeah...”

“Then we need to get off this plane before the people behind us start getting angry,” Taurus says, grabbing all our bags and heading for the door.

Liz follows, sighing loudly in an obvious sign that she’s only doing this for our sake. I can’t exactly blame her--she’s never had that good of a relationship with her dad, and she only recently met Tatiana. Tatiana was Superior’s wife a long time ago, but she was taken out by Mimic, and then brought to the present by a future version of Nico. Yeah, another one of those long stories that I’d rather not get into. Regardless, Tatiana isn’t really Liz’s mom.

We head into the airport and through the waiting room to the baggage claim. This airport is so tiny that they don’t even really have set perimeters for the two areas. It doesn’t matter, because in front of us are Superior and Tatiana--who promptly holds out her arms, waiting for a hug. Emily races forward, accepting the hug happily. I think of all of us, she’s the most thrilled with calling Tatia family. I understand, don’t get me wrong, Tatia is amazing even if she WAS originally a U.S.S.R. spy, but she's not my problem with this visit.

“Well?” Superior says, stepping right in front of me. I stare up at him, trying to hide my surprise. “You ARE my granddaughter now,” he tells me softly, “as well as my own personal hero.”

“I still don’t think you should have killed Distort,” I tell him, still irritated over that.

“I know, I know, I hear that from my son all the time, as well--but as I consistently say, ridding myself of a useless multiple personality is not murder, it’s just cleaning house.”

I just stare at him, crossing my arms over my chest and tapping a toe to exaggerate my reaction to that. A tiny little twitch of his lips says he’s fighting the urge to laugh.

“Fine,” he says, “will you forgive me for doing it in front of you?” he asks.

I sigh, giving up--because he’s still certain he wasn’t in the wrong. I’ve talked with him enough to know that there’s no changing his mind on this. I hug him, a bit gingerly, only to get pulled off my feet in a massive bear hug. “Welcome to my home, Aubrey,” he says.

“We will be trading now,” Tatia says, plucking me from Superior’s arms and handing him Emily as if she were a baby. I find myself hugged just as tightly by Tatia, almost smothered by her impressive chest. At least this is a hug I can happily return. I’m still a bit irritated with Superior. What happened back then--when I healed him--had shocked me and angered me so much that I used my only attack on my boyfriend. The only thing that saved him was his metal skin. The attack bounced off of him and hit me, instead. Thankfully I heal amazingly fast.

I’m still irritated by the fact that it happened in the first place. I blame it on Superior, of course, but it was easier to do that when he wasn’t stealing a hug. Tatia puts me down, grabbing Liz next. I hear Liz let out a tiny yelp of shock. Okay, that’s sort of funny, I admit, especially when I see her kiss Liz on the forehead before dragging Taurus into a group hug. The look on Liz’s face is downright hysterical. Emily sidles up to me, grinning like a cat as she snaps a picture with her phone. “Trent’s going to want to see this,” she whispers.

“Don’t you dare,” Liz says.

“Too late!” Emily says with a wicked laugh.

“When we found out that Taurus was coming, we changed our plans slightly,” Superior says when the hugs are finished. “There’s no reason to force him to be carried or run, not when I am who I am. So if you’ll get your luggage, we can get going.”

“Thank you, I appreciate it,” Taurus says as we head for the luggage. He grabs all of our things, including his massive backpack. “I thought, though, that we could do a bit of hiking while we were out here,” he says to Superior, dropping the massive pack next to him. “I’d love to see more of your land.”

“I’d love to show it to you,” Superior says, looking slightly surprised. “It’s a beautiful place, if you can handle it.”

“I think I’ll be able to,” Taurus says with a slight smile.

“So, have you met Santa?” Emily asks as we get the rest of our things and start for the door. Superior looks at her sharply, one eyebrow rising. I jump forward to his other side, touching his arm and shaking my head sharply. Look, a lot of people argue over whether Santa is real or not--if a super hero can live over a hundred years and still look young, why can’t there be a man living in the North Pole that does the same? There’s the theory that Santa is a long line of supers that have passed down the mantle over the years. Others--the more cynical in the world--say he’s just a myth. Superior strikes me as extremely cynical.

“That is not something we discuss among norms, young lady,” Tatia says in a faintly scolding tone.

“Oh, right,” Emily says, blushing brightly. There’s a grin on her face, though, that I see as I glance around Superior. I’m so busy worrying that they’ll burst her “Santa bubble” that I don’t notice Superior dropping a hand on the small of my back until he presses me forward.

“This way,” he says, leading us to the parking lot. There’s a massive beast of a machine taking up two parking spaces. It’s somewhat like a Hummer, but I’m pretty sure Superior built it. It looks patched together. “Try not to compare it to what Nicolas can do, please,” Superior says dryly. “We all know that he’s much better at this sort of thing--on my behalf, though, I’m not actually a technopath,” he added as a door swung open on the monstrous machine. “Well, come on, we need to drive out of norm sight before I can transform it.”

“Clifford has found the movies about the robots very fascinating,” Tatia says as we load out things in the back and climb into the car. “They have sparked his latest hobby!”

“Creating Frankenstein cars?” Liz asks. There’s a bit of curiosity in her voice, rather than disapproval. I see her looking around as we sit down on the long bench seats inside. It’s a lot like a full sized van on the inside. Superior gets in the driver seat and pulls out of the parking lot. We drive for a while. It drives surprisingly smooth for such a weird looking vehicle. He pulls to a stop outside of town, motioning everyone out.