The OK Team (14 page)

CHAPTER 17
GAME OVER

W
e're sitting in the Vegie Bar, the only place I could be sure nobody would look twice at us. We've just been left humiliated by six ten year olds running rampant through the local streets on a sleep-over birthday party.

Any way we look at it, we are hopeless. Every night, on Channel 78737, I watch story after story from around the world of Triple A rated Heroes performing the most astonishing rescues, captures and Earth-saving feats. Occasionally a B or C rated Hero is applauded for punching above his or her weight. One night, a D rated newcomer saves a car from an oncoming train, through ingenuity and muscle.

I can't even make a guy pick up after his dog. The team's success rate stands at zero wins, fourteen losses. Lurch gives us a long, long look as he takes our order, then raises an eyebrow in my direction before walking silently away.

Cannonball is holding a wet hankerchief to the lump on the side of his head. The garage door he unintentionally slammed into is feeling worse.

‘How can we be so crap?' he rants, following a familiar theme. ‘We were worse than crap. We were mega-crap. We redefined crap. We're more crap than a pile of horse poo. We completely reinvented the word crap. If you built letters to describe us that were big enough to cross the Nullarbor desert, they would read “Crap”.'

‘Cannonball, give it a rest,' I say. ‘You're not helping.'

‘Crap! Ultra ultra ultra ultra crap.'

Yesterday is slumped at the table next to her brother. She spent the whole battle with the ten year olds yelling, ‘Don't you dare hit my friends! Oh, I KNEW you were going to do that! I'm really mad now. I know you're about to try and hit me so I'm going to run. VIOLENCE DOESN'T SOLVE ANYTHING!'

The last bit was yelled over her shoulder as she bolted from the scene.

Liarbird, now putting a Bandaid on a scraped elbow, still with garbage in her hair from where the birthday girl tipped a rubbish bin over her, says, ‘The good news is we're getting better. Did you know the only team to be better than us was the Bare-Bottom Four who waved their bums at bad guys for six months in Turkey, before being arrested for unseemly behaviour?'

I'm glad I can discount that as a ‘Liarbird Fact', because it would be simply too depressing if it was true.

The Torch just sits, head down, in his own little world of pain. He'd frozen through the entire battle, apparently unable to garner the confidence to even attempt an attack after so many OK Team disasters.

Switchy is currently in the shape of an iPod, sitting quietly next to my elbow on the table.

‘Crap,' says Cannonball again, just in case anybody missed it before.

I feel a surge of anger. Without thinking, I lash out and try to punch the wall, only to watch in frustrated amazement as my fist passes straight through the band posters plastered there. I'm so hopeless that I can't even manage a classic display of temper.

Lurch approaches with our drinks. He gives us another look.

‘Team,' he says.

‘You know we're a team?' I stand to be slightly closer to Lurch's face, way above. ‘I knew it! I knew you were one of us.'

Lurch looks at me for a long time, then at the team members, one after the other.

His gaze fixes on Torch. ‘Team,' he repeats. ‘Family.

Holds the key.'

He walks away, and I stare after him.

‘Cannonball?' Liarbird says. Everybody looks up because it probably means she wants to talk to anybody other than Cannonball.

She is looking at me, but struggling to meet my gaze, which has never happened before.

‘What is it, Liarbird?'

‘I'm thinking that we should keep trying, because we're sure to improve.'

There is total silence.

‘You want us to quit?'

‘No,' she says quietly. ‘I don't think we are wasting our time.'

I put both hands to my face, glad that they don't pass through my skin. I feel numb. It's over. Is it over? It might be over.

I finally look up and see the others gazing steadily at me, except for Cannonball who has the wet hanky across his face and isn't moving a muscle. The Torch looks like he is holding his breath.

‘What do the rest of you think?' I ask, my voice unnaturally high.

‘We are pretty crap. I always knew we would be,' says Yesterday.

‘You want out?'

‘I don't want out, but I think Liarbird might be right for a change. As a wise man once said, “Foolish is the man who walks uphill beside a chairlift”.'

‘Torch?'

This is the most intense moment we've shared. Torch shrugs miserably, unable to talk.

‘Switchy?'

The iPod makes a faint sound. I pick up one of the ear plugs and can hear The Beatles' song, ‘Ticket to ride'. I don't know whether that's a yes or a no.

‘Cannonball?'

‘I'm not quitting.'

I could kiss him.

‘You're still in?'

‘Of course I'm still in.' Cannonball finally moves the hanky and sits up straight. ‘You all thought we'd just turn into IncredoMan overnight? Put on a mask and away we go? I'm in this for the long haul and I don't care how many garages I crash into.'

I feel a burst of pride, until Cannonball adds, ‘What the rest of you losers do is up to you.'

‘Well, I'm not quitting either,' I say. ‘And you know what?

I'm not quitting on the OK Team. I believe in us. I like hanging out with you guys,' (some more than others, I think to myself, working hard not to look at Liarbird), ‘and I say we keep going. Before too long, we'll be giving a bunch of delinquents like we faced today a real kicking.'

‘They were pretty tough, for under twelves,' Yesterday admits. ‘I'll bet higher grade heroes than us would have had trouble with them.'

‘Yeah, right,' snorts Liarbird, arms crossed and giving Yesterday her most withering glance.

Yesterday cocks her head to one side. ‘What's with the look, fib-face? Even without my superpowers, you'd be
so
obvious.'

‘And an excellent power you have too,' snaps the girl in purple.

‘You two, please,' I say, and am surprised to find I'm hardly out of whack at all. ‘Give us a couple more weeks.

We're just missing one thing, and I think I know what it is.

Torch, you still with us?'

‘I guess,' he says, muttering from somewhere near his knees. ‘Not that I'm worth anything. It doesn't matter if I tag along or not for all the good I do.'

‘I disagree, Torch. Lurch said something about family holding the key, and I think he meant you. Tell me more about the Heroes in your family.'

The Torch shrugs. ‘There's not much to tell. My greatgrandfather and my grandfather could both flame up completely. My dad can only light up his left foot, which is such a useless ability he hasn't actually done it for years.

My uncle occasionally finds his eyebrows smouldering, but that's about it.'

‘Is your grandfather still alive?'

‘Yeah, sure. He lives two suburbs away.'

‘Can we go and visit him?'

‘What, now?'

‘Yeah, it's important. All of us. As a team. Liarbird?

Yesterday?'

Liarbird shrugs and says, ‘I've got better things to do, especially since my application to be an astronaut with NASA has been accepted. I leave on Tuesday.'

‘I sense we're going to see Torch's grandpa,' Yesterday declares.

I turn to Cannonball. ‘You in, mate?'

Cannonball sighs and shakes his head. ‘You guys are luckier than a green pelican to have me on board. Just don't take it for granted is all I'm saying.'

‘Was that you speaking, or Liarbird?' Yesterday asks, and has to duck as her brother takes a swing at her.

CHAPTER 18
THOSE WERE THE DAYS

‘O
f course, villains were real villains back then. You couldn't afford to be squeamish when you were facing down the Bloated Alien Rubbish-Monsters of Broome's outer suburbs. Nothing but you and some pure flames between them and Western Australia's top tourist destination. In fact, that reminds me of another story – the time I had a super team-up with Amazing Anzac to save a busload of tourists from a nasty flood in Queensland. He was a character, that Amazing Anzac. Old AA was the only Hero I ever knew who could keep his slouch hat on his head no matter how long he was dangled upside down and shaken by an oversized gorilla. He once said to me, “The young Heroes these days, Torchey . . . they just don't respect the history of the art.” And he was right. I remember . . .'

I sip my cup of cold tea and try to look interested. Next to me, I can feel Yesterday fidgeting. Liarbird is simply staring at the Torch's grandfather, perched in his big chair, rug over his knees, occasional whiffs of smoke rising off his hands as he reminisces about the old days. He's been talking now, stopping only occasionally to breathe, for more than forty-five minutes.

But the most intense heat is coming from Cannonball's gaze, boring into me from the chair across the room. I'm very careful not to look in that direction.

‘Um, excuse me, Grandpa Torch,' I finally manage.

‘You can call me Papa Torch, young man. That's what they used to call me in 1944 when I was in Singapore. I remember one day, I think it was a Thursday, no, maybe it was Wednesday. It was steamy, I remember that, and –' ‘Papa Torch,' I say. ‘We have something to ask you. A favour . . .'

‘Very steamy. You needed superhero deodorant during that campaign, I can tell you. Poor Jelly Girl was utterly –'

‘Papa Torch,' I say, almost sharply.

‘Eh? What?' the old man squints.

‘We have something to ask you. A favour . . .'

‘Me? A favour? What can an extinguished human campfire like me possibly do to help you young'uns?'

I take a deep breath and say it. ‘We need you to coach us so we can become better.'

I can feel my teammates' eyes swing onto me as one. I might even hear a horrified gasp. I can imagine Liarbird's voice saying, ‘That's an excellent idea.' But I'm hoping that if I make it sound like coaching a team, Papa Torch might forget that we're his grandson's random bunch of uselessly powered mates.

Papa Torch scratches his knee where it is slightly smouldering. ‘Coach?'

‘We don't know what we're doing. We're a bunch of kid Heroes who mean well but have no idea where to start or how to improve. We need someone who was once a Triple A Hero to teach us how to play in the big game.'

Papa Torch is shaking his head. ‘No, no, no, young Locust.'

‘Focus, Sir.'

‘Eh?'

‘Focus, Papa Torch. It's Focus.'

‘I am focusing, young man, but I don't think I can help you. I only know about flames, about my own power. Young Torchy, my favourite grandson, I might be able to help. But you lot, with your –' he waves an old, saggy-skinned arm in the direction of Cannonball, then Switchy, who is currently a refrigerator ‘– with your powers of flying, and changing, and shooting goldfish out of your eyes, and being able to lie down with birds . . .'

We all stare at him.

‘. . . well, I don't know much about any of that. You see, being a Human Torch is a very specific skill set. You have to learn how to flame on. You have to learn how to flame off . . . That's pretty much it, I think. Oh, hang on, no. There's clothes to think about. Temperature and outside weather conditions. Heavy rain etiquette. Marshmallow factory crimes need heat considerations. Um . . .'

‘So you can't help us,' I say, sagging.

‘Nope,' the old man says. ‘Although . . . I could tell you some stories.'

‘No, really, that's not necessary,' I say hastily. ‘We'd better be going anyway.'

The team stand and say their half-hearted, uninterested goodbyes. Nobody will meet my eyes, which I don't take as a good sign. Even Cannonball has stopped trying to stare me out. I've rolled one last dice and it's come up with the wrong number.

Liarbird is the first to leave, followed by Cannonball. Yesterday and Switchy, now a clown, wave on the way out. Torch hangs by the door, as I thank the old man for his time.

‘No problem, young fella. Always good to talk to up-and-coming Heroes. You'll be right. Great team you've got there.'

‘I'm not sure I have got a team any more,' I say.

But the old man is squinting again, as though trying to see an important fact on the other side of the room. ‘You know, I suppose I could call Fab.'

‘Who?'

Torch is suddenly smiling. ‘Grandad! Are you serious?'