School for Sidekicks (8 page)

“I think so, but my legs don't seem to want to work properly yet.” My voice came out very small. It was more than a little bit embarrassing to collapse like that. Not very Mask-like at all.

“I'm sorry, I should have moved quicker to prevent that. The lab rats thought you might have some problems walking after you came out of the cocoon—electro-osmotic flow rates between the healing layers destabilizing the brain-body connection, or some other gobbledygook. They left a chair for you, and I should have had it ready at the door. Hang on while I get it.” He started down the ramp.

“Lab rats?”
That didn't make any sense.

“Sorry, the OSIRIS techs and scientists who study us.” He collected a wheelchair from beside one of the alien machines at the base of the ramp and brought it back up to me. “That's why you were at the far end of nowhere.” He jerked his chin toward the tram I'd ridden down in. “Quarantine is isolated from the rest of the facility.”

After he helped me into the chair, he continued. “Now, back to the AMO. Here, you will learn how to control your powers … along with more mundane things like algebra and English composition.”

“Wait, algebra, English comp? I thought kids who went to supersecret schools for people with magic or superpowers got to skip all that stuff. The Harry Potter books lied to me…” Okay, that was just plain babbling, but I couldn't seem to stop talking. I'd never even known there was a school for metas, and now I was going to be studying there. Me, plain old Evan Quick. Woohoo! “Wait, are you a Mask, too?”

“Slow down there, son. You've still got questions waiting for answers, and I still need to take you to talk to your parents.” He began to wheel me down the ramp. “So, where to start? Let's go with the Mask questions. Yes, you are probably going to become one, and
everyone
at the AMO is metahuman.”

I turned in the chair, taking another, closer look at Professor Matheny. “Then why don't I recognize you? I thought I knew every Mask there was.”

“I didn't have all that much of a Mask career before coming to teach at the academy, and even when I was active, very few people got a good look at me. I was far too tiny for that.” He smiled sadly and slowly started to shrink. “Some might even say minute,” he added, in the tone of someone who doesn't expect you to get the joke. Then he returned to normal size.

“Oh my god, you're Minute Man! You fought the Shrinkster like three times back in '94.” There was a great picture of the two of them duking it out on a dime like it was a boxing ring. “I always wondered what happened to you.”

“Really?” His smile turned briefly into a grin. “It's nice to meet someone who's actually heard of Minute Man.”

We were about halfway across the big room with its wild cacophony of weird gadgets at that point—nearly to the pipe organ thing. Most of the instrument-like devices had very uncomfortable-looking contoured seats associated with them. Imagine a chaise lounge built for something shaped more like a gigantic wasp than a human being.

A mesh lounger had been strapped over the top of the one under the organ, and it was occupied by a woman. I'd have guessed her to be somewhere in her late twenties by her features and the way she moved as she twisted around in her chair to face us as we rolled up. But there was something about the expression in her eyes that made me think she was older than that—much older. Her hair was a mixed green and gold—the exact shades of a circuit board. Reinforcing the effect, more gold ran down the right side of her face in precise angular lines, as though someone had tattooed an elaborate circuit on her skin.

“Hello, Evan. I'm so glad that you'll be joining us here at the AMO.” I recognized her from her accent, so I wasn't surprised when she introduced herself. “I'm Backflash. I am the director of OSIRIS and Chancellor of the AMO, though the latter is mostly an honorary appointment.”

That
startled me, and I blurted, “I thought Orlando Mendez was the director of OSIRIS.”

Backflash smiled. “Orlando is the political director—a four-year presidential appointment in consultation with the UN. I am the director of operations, which is a … quieter and less … impermanent role. Unfortunately, I am terribly busy at the moment.” She looked at Mike, and he nodded.

“Come on, Evan, let's get you to your appointment with your parents.”

Backflash smiled at me, a cold expression. “It's been lovely talking with you, Evan, and I look forward to seeing how your powers develop.” Then she turned away and seemed to forget we were there.

The organ thing seemed to be responsible for projecting the solar system display above. At least, that's what it looked like from up close. You could see faint lines of light coming from various spiky pipes and extending out to the planets and other celestial features.

Too weird.
I watched over my shoulder as Mike wheeled me away and saw a spiky blue-raspberry tentacle-thing suddenly curl down from the pipes above and touch its starfish-shaped tip to Backflash's forehead.

That was some superbizarre Mask technology!

Once we'd gotten out of easy earshot, Mike leaned down. “Sorry about the interruption in answering your questions there, but this is the only way to get from Quarantine to the school proper, and you can't just ignore the director. So, you've been asleep for a while—in some sort of regenerative cocoon.”

We reached another huge vault-style door and he paused for a moment, placing his palm on a hand scanner, and leaning down to speak into a microphone and expose his eye to a retinal scanner. “Michael Matheny.”

A mechanical voice said, “Handprint verified. Voice verified. Retina scan verified. Subject OHB113 verified. Bittersharp special-exception status verified. One-time passthrough/passback authorization for central core verified.” The door swung open. “Reminder OHB113: passback closes special exception.”

“Maximum-security level here.” Mike stepped around behind me again and we started rolling. “The central core is the only connection between the research side of the facility and the school proper, and Backflash is the only one with unlimited access. Kind of a design flaw in my opinion.” A long, curved hallway lined with concrete opened out in front of us.

Mike's cell phone rang before he could continue. “Argh, sorry but I've got to take this and it's sensitive. Let me just put a sound damper on and I'll be back to answering your questions in five minutes, okay?”

“All right.”

Mike suddenly went silent and I glanced over my shoulder. A shimmering bubble had appeared around his head, and though he was animatedly speaking into an earpiece he'd popped in, I couldn't hear a word. It was actually kind of a relief to not have to think for a few minutes. There was so much to try to take in.

As we were hitting our third hallway, I saw the first of my fellow students—two girls and a boy, maybe three or four years older than I was. They were playing some kind of game that involved flinging a handball at each other in the narrow corridor. It could have been as simple as some kind of tag, except for the way they were using their powers.

The taller of the girls had the ball when I first spotted them. She was Native American, with long dark hair and a bright smile. She pulled her arm back, snapped the ball at the wall, and … blinked out. One second she was in the center of the hall, the next, she was three feet to her left! And again and again—traveling fifteen feet in four quick snaps.

The ball bounced off the wall at an oblique angle, sailed straight through the chest of the second girl, a pretty Minnesota blonde, then bounced off another wall. When I say “through,” I mean exactly that. In the instant before the ball would have hit her, she shimmered and went all misty and the ball went right on through her.

As the ball bounced a second time, it slapped straight into the hand of the blinking girl, who caught it, spun around and whipped it to the floor. It bounced up to the ceiling, down again and stopped dead in midair. The boy, a black kid with shoulder-length dreadlocks was making a catching motion, but he was a good five feet away from the ball. But then he turned quickly and made a throwing gesture, and the ball followed as though he had it, even though he didn't.

“What the heck…”

Mike must have been done with his phone call by then. “Delroy's a projector with a ten-foot range. Where he is and where it looks like he is are two different places.”

The misting girl caught the ball this time, but paused and didn't throw it as she saw us. “Hey, Mike, new kid?”

“Evan,” said Mike. “Evan, Gretchen, Delroy, and Selene. They're several years ahead of you, so you won't see much of them except maybe in the lunchroom.”

“Hi,” I said.

The trio made hellos and then went back to their game as we rolled away. This was going to be one coooool school.

“Sorry about all the interruptions, Evan. Normally, I don't have quite so crazy a day. Where was I? Oh, right, the cocoon. So, according to the OSIRIS agent who delivered you to our facilities last week, you were badly injured in your fight with Spartanicus, and your healing powers needed the time to put you to rights. If Mr. Implausible hadn't accidentally boosted your powers along with Spartanicus's you'd most likely be dead.”

“Dead? Wait, last week? How long have I been out?”

“Almost ten days.”

“What!? My parents must be frantic!” I was hurt they weren't waiting for me when I woke up, but I wasn't going to tell some stranger, no matter how trustworthy he seemed.

“Less so than they were a couple of days ago, if I'm any judge of people, though much angrier. I don't think they have a very high opinion of OSIRIS at the moment. Nor of their lawyer either.”

“Lawyer?” What the heck … “I think I missed something. My parents don't have a lawyer.”

“Didn't. Then kind of did. Now, don't again. After you went into your cocoon, an agent brought you to this OSIRIS facility for monitoring and potential emergency care—which you didn't need because your own powers were taking care of things. Your parents didn't like that and tried to hire a lawyer to sue OSIRIS to have you released back to them so they could take you to your local hospital. That was a horrible idea by the way. No regular doctor has anything like OSIRIS's experience with metahumans. Their lawyer explained the Franklin Act on metahuman activities to your parents, and what that meant in terms of their lawsuit. At which point…” He shrugged and lifted an eyebrow at me.

“Oh.” I nodded.

It was another Mask nerd moment. The Franklin Act basically created a bunch of special legal rules for activated metahumans like … well, me. The short version pretty much said OSIRIS didn't have to admit to my parents I even existed if they didn't want to. It also meant that, as a minor with metahuman powers, I had
very
limited rights at the moment.

“I see,” I said after a few seconds.

“I think you actually do. That's unusual, and fortunate. After your parents talked to the lawyer, they stopped yelling at everyone and started asking questions in a much more polite way. As your advisor of record, I've been the one to deal with your parents since then. In that capacity, I'd like to ask you
my
first question. Do you want to talk to your parents?”

“What? Of course!”

“I'm glad to hear that, truly. Once we've sorted a few more things out, I'll be happy to arrange for you to see them.”

“Why wouldn't I want to talk to my parents?”

“Any number of reasons. The most common one is that not every parent deals well with finding out their child is metahuman. It can get … ugly.”

“Oh.” I hadn't thought about that before, but as soon as Professor Matheny pointed it out … “I guess I can see how that might happen. My parents will be fine with it though. They've always supported me.”

“Any more questions before we see them?”

“You said you're going to be my
advisor
?”

“Yes. Like a homeroom teacher, only much more so. AMO is a semi-residential school. Most of our students live here during the week, some even year-round, and that means teachers have a bigger than usual role in their students' lives. Every student is assigned to a faculty advisor when they start.”

“Why you?” Then I realized how that sounded. “Not that I mean I'm not happy with you. It's just, well, you said you teach music, and I'm not a musician or anything and I wondered…”
Stop chewing on your foot, Evan.

“Why me? It's a reasonable question. In this case, it's mostly because you arrived in a cocoon instead of on your feet. The school knew that you—and your parents for that matter—were likely to be freaked out at first. I'm pretty good at calming people down, and—”

Mike's phone chimed again and he pulled it out. “Hang on a second, this one might be about your parents.” He answered. “Hello … Yes … Yep, we're almost there.” He looked down at me. “Ready to talk to your parents?”

“Yeah, sure,” I said, but my mouth felt dry and my head was still awhirl with all I'd just learned.

 

8

End Transmission

Mike wheeled me around another corner and through a door into a little half dome. Hanging from the center of the ceiling was another bit of cactus-candy tech like the stuff Backflash had been working with.

“Where are my parents?” I asked when I didn't see any more doors.

“They're at OSIRIS headquarters in Heropolis.”

“But I thought…” I was
so
confused.

“Just hang on two ticks. I'm going to step out so you can talk to them alone. Whenever you're done, just say ‘end transmission' and it'll shut the feed off.”