Mutation (11 page)

Chapter 14

The double date ended with Smokey letting me and Electra out at my house.  This was an impromptu decision, made primarily because a) Smokey wanted his night to end with him alone with his date (as opposed to with me and Electra), and b) we still didn’t think it wise that Sarah see the safe house.  In short, the drop-off order for the double date couldn’t simply be the inverse of the pick-up order.  Electra and I needed to exit first; ergo, I suggested my house.

Knowing that I was going to use my teleportation power, Smokey didn’t wait until we were safely inside; he simply honked his horn lightly and sped off.  Once they were far enough away, I got ready to take us back to the safe house, but then I felt relief and an easing of tension coming from inside our home.  Although it was getting way late, an unexpected feeling suddenly motivated me in an unsuspecting way.

I turned to Electra.  “Would you like to meet my mother?”

*****

There’s something odd that happens when mothers and girlfriends (if Electra could be considered such) meet for the first time.  There’s often this little tug-of-war, an odd back-and-forth as each tries to figure the other out.  Sometimes it ends disastrously, with the women hating each other.  In my case, it was just the opposite, with Mom and Electra taking to each other as if they were the blood relations and I the outsider.

Mom, of course, was over the moon about meeting Electra.  This was the first girl I’d ever even dated, let alone brought home, and she was determined to make her feel welcome.

Electra, on her part, seemed equally smitten.  I think part of it was the fact that my introducing her to my mother was an indication that I did indeed think Electra was special.

All in all, during an introductory meeting that couldn’t have lasted longer than thirty minutes, they exchanged phone numbers, shared beauty tips, agreed to write each other while Electra was at the Academy, and promised to go shopping together during the holiday break.

Shortly thereafter, I teleported Electra back to the safe house, where I received a memorable kiss before returning home.  I really did like her, and it seemed odd to me that, although our date had just ended, I’d be seeing her again in a few hours when we’d be leaving for the Academy.

I took a quick shower and climbed under the sheets.  Although it had been a long day, I didn’t feel particularly tired.  I closed my eyes anyway, trying to force sleep to come.

I’d only been lying there for a few minutes when the hinges on my door squeaked softly.  I didn’t have to open my eyes to know that it was my mother; I could feel the emotions flowing out from her as she came into my room:  love, affection, and anxiety over her only child.

To the best of my knowledge, she hadn’t done this in a while – watch me while I slept.  When I was younger, I know that it was almost a habit with her, the need to check on me and make sure I was safe.  I know a lot of guys my age would have hated it, would say it made them feel like a baby, but it didn’t bother me in the least.  In fact, if it made my mother feel better, then I was all for it.

I felt her place her hand on my head, then touch my face the way she would when I was small.  I opened my eyes and looked at her.

“Mom, is everything alright?”

“I’m sorry,” she said.  “I just…I just wanted to see you one last time before you leave tomorrow.”

“You’ll see me in the morning.  I wasn’t going to slip out before you woke up.”

“I know,” she said, laughing and taking a seat on the edge of my bed as I sat up.  “But when you’re asleep, I remember the way it used to be when you were small.  When you needed me.  Now you’re practically all grown up – bringing girls home, heading off to the Academy – but for a second I could pretend you were still my little boy.”

“It’s not like I’m going to be gone forever.  I’ll be home for the holidays and summer, and the rest of the time I can write and call.”

“Yes, but it’ll be different.  You’ve had your powers for a while, but after this, you’ll really be recognized as a superhero – and one of the elite ones at that.”

There was a slight trembling in her voice as she spoke.  I had a sudden idea of where this was all coming from.  We never really talked about it, but if there was ever a time to do so, it was now.

“Do you miss it?” I asked.  “Being a superhero?”

She snorted derisively.  “What’s to miss?  I was a cape for all of two seconds.  People barely remember me.  I had hoped to make an impact, but then
–
” She sniffed slightly before continuing.  “Then your father and I…before I knew it you were en route, and being a superhero didn’t seem like a viable option any more.  So I turned to my other passion – writing romances.  And trying to be a good mother.”

“I’m sorry, Mom,” I muttered, eyes downcast.  Below her maternal feelings for me, I could sense a slight amount of anguish, a small sense of loss over what might have been.

“Hey!” she uttered forcefully, taking my chin in her hand and lifting it until I met her eyes.  “Don’t you ever be sorry – for anything!  You’ve done nothing wrong.  I may not have gotten my own personal happily-ever-after, but I got you.  And you are worth a thousand happy endings.  Don’t ever doubt that or forget it.”

With that, she kissed me on my forehead and left, closing the door behind her.

Chapter 15

Morning came with exceptional swiftness from my point of view.  It seemed like I had barely drifted off before Gramps was banging on my door, telling me to get up.

I got dressed quickly, then went downstairs where Mom had made bacon, eggs, and toast for breakfast.  Not wanting to prolong things, I raced through the meal almost at super speed.  Then it was time to go.

We had already made the decision that we would say our goodbyes at home.  I didn’t want Mom bawling in front of a bunch of strangers, and I was still wary of people knowing my superhero lineage.  Even Mouse didn’t know that my maternal grandparents were supers; he only knew that Alpha Prime was my father.

Bags in hand, I got ready to leave.  As I suspected, Mom cried, but at least they were silent tears.  Gramps wasn’t particularly sympathetic.

“Geez, Geneva,” he said.  “You act like we’re never going to see the boy again.  He’ll be home again before you know it.”

“And at that point,” I added, “you’ll be so used to me being gone and having a life again that you won’t want me back for long.”

Mom didn’t really say anything, but she didn’t have to.  There was an outpouring of emotion from her that I couldn’t help but sense.  And, despite his stoic demeanor, the same was true of Gramps.  I felt him exuding love, pride, and warmth, as well as melancholy that I realized was sadness at my departure.  I hugged them both, promised that I would write and call, then teleported.

*****

The Academy, as I mentioned before, actually resides in another dimension, on a parallel Earth (albeit one without sentient life).  That being the case, there were at least two ways to get there:  magic and technology.

The only person I’d encountered thus far with enough mystical power to make the journey was Rune, the enigmatic sorcerer who was the current magic-wielding member of the Alpha League.  However, he was off-planet at the moment, meaning that technology was the method of travel we’d be employing this time.

Based on my own experience, I knew that it was possible to create an aerial vortex that planes could fly through in order to get to the Academy.  Today, however, we would be going through a ground-based dimensional doorway.

The departure point was a huge barn on what was – to my amazement – a working farm located about an hour outside the city limits.  In all honesty, I was completely surprised when, a week before I was to leave, Mouse had given me instructions on how to get to the farm in question.  On my last trip to the Academy, I’d had to travel to a secret departure point in a car with tinted windows that you couldn’t see out of, then board a plane that flew into the vortex.

“That’s because you were essentially a civilian back then,” Mouse had said when I mentioned it to him.  “Now you’re officially part of the team, so we can share some things with you.”

“Well, why won’t we be taking a plane?” I’d asked.

“Because,” Mouse had explained patiently, “when we first started opening up these dimensional rifts, they ate up a lot of power due to the fact that we were punching a hole all the way through from this side alone.  Now we have equipment on both sides, so it doesn’t take nearly as much power, but the machines have to be aligned, and it’s the nuances of that alignment which determine whether we should open an aerial vortex, one on the ground, or elsewhere.”

Thus it was that I teleported out to the aforementioned farm shortly before it was time to leave.  I actually showed up behind the barn in an attempt not to startle anyone, as some people have had a bad reaction to me simply popping up out of nowhere.

As I entered the barn, I noticed that everyone else – about eighty other teens – was already inside.  Almost all of them, I noticed, had at least two pieces of luggage, including Electra and Smokey, who were standing near the rear of the group.  With my single duffle bag, I suddenly felt woefully unprepared, as if I’d missed some important office memo.  I don’t know if she sensed me or not, but Electra immediately turned in my direction as I entered.

“Where’d you come from?” she asked when I got close.

“I teleported,” I answered, thinking it was an odd question since she knew my power set.

“No, I mean how’d you know how to get here?”

Now I saw what she was getting it.  As far as she knew, I hadn’t been here or seen the place before, so it shouldn’t have been possible for me to teleport here.

“Mouse gave me directions last week.  I zipped out here at super speed days ago to eyeball the place.”

“Figures,” she said.

Everyone was, of course, eager to get the trip underway.  Before we could leave, however, we had to get a farewell speech from Buzz, the speedster who was the on-duty Alpha League member overseeing our departure.  Thankfully, his remarks were brief (essentially of the do-your-best-and-study-hard variety), and then he gave the green light for us to depart.

The dimensional doorway was basically a metal ring about ten feet in diameter that was set against one wall of the barn.  Various wires, tubes, and cables ran from the ring to assorted terminals and machinery that were all being operated by security guards seemingly cut from the same cloth as those manning the entrance to the safe house.

The interior of the metal ring began to shine, becoming so bright and intense that it was almost impossible to look at.  At the same time, a peculiar humming noise began to fill the air.

At this point, most of the other teens pulled out sunglasses and put them on.  Suddenly, I remembered Mouse’s advice to ask Smokey and Electra about what to expect.  Failing to do so had obviously been a rookie mistake on my part.  Nevertheless, I could fix this.

I switched my vision over to another wavelength, one where the light was less intense.  I smiled to myself.

Sunglasses?  We don’t need no stinking sunglasses!

At that point, people began to amble through the ring, bags in hand, like Third-World refugees fleeing a war-torn country.  Since we were at the back of the crowd, Smokey, Electra, and I would actually be part of the last group to enter the vortex.  We’d only taken a few steps forward, Electra walking immediately to my left, when I felt someone smack me - lightly but firmly - on the back of the head.  I jerked around in anger and saw Smokey behind me.  He tilted his head towards Electra, as if trying to tell me something.  Unsure of what he was trying to get me to notice, I looked at her, but didn’t see anything unusual.  She was walking along with a large, fully-stuffed gym bag hanging off her right shoulder and was pulling a wheeled upright suitcase with her left hand.  I looked back at Smokey and shrugged my shoulders in an I-don’t-know-what-you-mean gesture.  At that point, he tapped his own carry-on bag, and my eyes went wide as realization hit me.

“Let me get that for you,” I said to Electra, reaching over to take the gym bag from her.  I swung my own duffle bag up to my right shoulder, and then switched her bag to my right hand.

“Why, thank you,” she said with a smile, and then she reached over to take my hand.  I looked back at Smokey, who – even with sunglasses on – gave me a what-would-you-do-without-me look.  Then we were in the vortex.

From the inside, the dimensional gateway had the appearance of a tube – an elongated cylinder of light that sparkled with various colors.  At the same time, though, it was transparent, allowing me to look outside at a void so dark and endless that it boggled the mind, but which also seemed to be moving in some way, as if it might even be alive.  All in all, the entire view was mesmerizing.

“Wow…” I said in complete fascination.  “Do you see that?”

“See what?” asked Smokey.

“The light’s too bright,” said Electra in agreement.  “Even with the sunglasses, I can barely see anything.”

I was about to explain how the vortex appeared to me, when I noticed what appeared to be a small glowing string off to one side in the void.  There was something weird about it, something other than the fact that it just didn’t seem to belong out there in the opaque and murky gloom.  It seemed like it was almost close enough to touch, but the darkness was so complete and encompassing, so lacking in reference points, that the object I was seeing could be ten feet away or ten miles.  I telescoped my vision to get a better look at the thing in the void.  When I gained a clear view of the object, I was so stunned that I almost stopped walking.

It was another vortex tube.  Even more, there were people inside it.  Like the teens in our own tube, the people in the other tube – primarily men – wore dark goggles.  They seemed to be in the process of moving an inordinate number of machines and equipment from one side of the tube to the other.

“Well, I’ll be…” I muttered.

“Jim.” Electra stopped and put her hand up to shield her eyes, trying to see what I was looking at.  “What is it?”

I just laughed before responding.  “You wouldn’t believe me if I told you.”

I walked on absentmindedly, more intent on watching the people in the other tube.  The angle I had wasn’t great, but I could see that the end of the tube they were heading out of seemed to open in a large area like a warehouse.  I also caught a glimpse of a tarp of some type covering some equipment and some letters,
A
-
K
-
A
, painted on a window with broken glass.

And then we stepped out of the vortex.

“I’m glad that’s over with,” said Smokey.  “I always hate having to walk through.”

“Me, too,” agreed Electra.

They were probably waiting for me to add to their complaints about the tunnel, but I was still fascinated by what I had seen.  There were other people – other worlds – making use of transdimensional technology.  I didn’t know what it all meant - or if it meant anything at all - but I still found it exciting.