Velveteen vs. The Junior Super Patriots

by Seanan McGuire

  If Swallowtail was here, this wasn’t some random kid trying to prove himself against a retired hero. This was something much, much worse.

  This was The Junior Super Patriots, West Coast Division.

  *

  There’s one thing about the world’s superhuman community that most people would realize, if they really stopped to think about it: there’s really no way to control them if they don’t want to be controlled. Oh, individual powers can generally be suppressed, but there’s no way to un-mutate a mutant, disconnect a magical hero from the belief that fuels them, or somehow transform an alien into a human being. Lobotomies can be used on gadgeteers, but unless the gadgeteer in question has wiped out an elementary school, that’s still classed as unnecessary cruelty. The superhumans police themselves. There’s simply no other way to keep them from taking over the world.

  The Super Patriots, Inc. controls ninety-seven percent of the world’s superheroes. That gives them controlling interest in every super team, every super-force, every organization of supers supposedly formed to “watch the watchers.” With all that being simple fact, it stands to reason that there’s one entity deciding who the heroes and the villains really are.

  Marketing controls more than just what brand of cereal your children cry for. Marketing names the heroes and the villains, gives them primary colors, and tells you who to root for in the fight.

  And Marketing doesn’t take “no” for an answer.

  *

  Velma took a step backward, toward her car. She could feel her powers gathering, straining for release. That was what you did when you were surrounded by unfriendly supers: you broke out with everything you had, and you fought back. The Bedbug and Swallowtail were still in pose-and-bluster mode, trying to impress her with their color-coordinated outfits and perfect hair. It would have looked silly, if she hadn’t recognized the maneuver. They were waiting for the rest of their team to arrive.

  Current lineup, current lineup, Velma thought frantically, taking another step backward. She hadn’t really been keeping track. Sure, she knew a few—Swallowtail was one, and then there was their current techie, what was his name, Blackberry or iPod or something like that—but beyond that, she’d done her best to put the team entirely out of her mind. She hadn’t wanted to know. And now, what she hadn’t wanted to know was preparing to have a genuine superhero throw-down with her on a frontage road half a mile from the Oregon border.

  Sometimes the world really wasn’t fair.

  “If you come quietly, we can guarantee that will play a part in your sentencing,” said The Bedbug, still posing heroically. “This doesn’t have to be ugly.”

  “Guys, I really don’t think you want to do this,” said Velma, raising her hands, palms outward. “Whatever it is you think I did, whoever it is you think I am, I didn’t do it, and I’m not that person. I’m just trying to get to Portland. Now can you please—”

  “THE PARTY’S ON!” shouted a voice from behind her, barely audible over the roar of a motorcycle. Velma whipped around to see a teenage boy in black and orange racing toward her on a tricked-out bike in matching colors, three flying heroes right behind him. Three flying heroes, and—she had to blink to be sure she was seeing this right—a trio of girls riding what looked like a disk of flying peppermint.

  “Fucked-up times fucking infinity,” she groaned, and with that, the fight was on.

  *

  The membership of The Junior Super Patriots, West Coast Division, at the time of The Velveteen Incident (SPI Code vm049):

  Handheld. Team leader, technopath. Machine control, ability to intercept wireless transmissions within a six-block radius of his current location. Hand-to-hand fighter, no physical powers of any sort. Powers originally acquired through an industrial accident in his father’s special effects lab. Believed to be an altered human, although mutation has not been ruled out.

  Swallowtail. Second-in-command, energy projector. Power limitation: all Swallowtail’s energy forms conform in appearance to the Tiger Swallowtail butterfly, native to the West Coast of the United States. Powers originally acquired through exposure to irradiated bug spray released in the Indianapolis Science Museum during her junior entomology course. Of the six students exposed, four are now deceased.

  The Bedbug. Energy projector. Power limitation: all Bedbug’s energy forms conform in appearance to an unidentified form of scarab beetle. The Bedbug shares limited psychic communication with his bugs, and can be “stunned” by their destruction. Powers originally acquired through exposure to irradiated bug spray released in the Indianapolis Science Museum. Highly protective of Swallowtail, the only other survivor of the incident.

  Super-Cool. Flight, limited invulnerability, super-strength. Powers originally acquired through exposure to irradiated maple syrup. His dose seems to have been more dilute than the doses to which Majesty and Action Dude were exposed; plans are in place to expose him again, hopefully increasing his power levels without further damaging his psyche. Super-Cool is only able to function in combat for an hour before becoming confused and unable to fight.

  The Nanny. Psychic projection, limited flight, limited weather control. Power limitations: The Nanny can only fly when holding something which can appear to “catch” the wind (actual functionality not needed; umbrella is preferred, and seems to give her the highest speed). She is unable to fly at all indoors. Her psychic projection functions through control: her commands must be obeyed, provided she can first convince her target of their own “naughtiness.” Definitely a magical hero.

  Apex. Flight, super-speed. Mutant, no point of origin known for his powers. Power limitations: none yet identified.

  The Candy Sisters: Candy Cane, Candy Corn, and Candy Apple. Mutant daughters of Trick and Treat. There is no known point of origin for their powers. All three are matter manipulators, level five, with no limitations yet identified beyond those imposed by their personas. Research believes these limitations to be self-imposed, and recommends further study when the opportunity presents itself. Should one of the sisters be rendered somehow surplus, the remains would be a great asset to the research division.

  Nine super-teens against one out-of-shape, out-of-practice, essentially retired former teen superhero. The odds were clearly stacked in the favor of The Junior Super Patriots, West Coast Division. With this fact presented plainly, the question remains:

  What went wrong?

  *

  Officially cornered, Velma finally gave in to the power that had been pleading to be unleashed, spreading her hands and closing her eyes as she heard the motorcycle racing closer. The toys in the car stirred, awakening to her command. The plush rabbit from the Isley Crawfish Festival. The action figures from the coffee shop. The stuffed frog she’d found abandoned in a gas station parking lot. Even a cartoony wind-up spider from some forgotten fast food special. They all awoke, scuttling and jumping out the open door to surround her in a loose semi-circle.

  She heard Swallowtail laughing. “Is that a stuffed rabbit? Does she actually think she’s going to defeat us with a stuffed bunny rabbit?”

  “She walked away, remember? We knew she was crazy.” At least Bedbug sounded uncertain. “I think we should try to take her.”

  “She’s just standing there . . .”

  Things fall out of cars all the time. Things get left beside the road and forgotten. Things are dropped in front yards, abandoned in fields, put in boxes behind the barn for the next big church rummage sale. Velma spread her hands wide, and spread her mind wider, letting herself forget about the superheroes who were closing in on her position, letting herself forget about everything but finding the lost ones and calling them to her aid.

  She didn’t feel it when Candy Apple spun sticky strands of caramel around her, tying her up in a sugar cocoon. She didn’t notice when the Nanny commanded that she stop what she was doing. She was beginning to shake from the strain, a thin trickle of blood running from one nostril. Distantly, she heard screaming as her action fig
ures swarmed the flying heroes, as the stuffed rabbit went at Handheld’s eyes with a butcher knife it had managed to acquire somewhere. She concentrated. She called.

  The sound of screaming. The sound of a zap gun being fired. Soft splattering sounds, like balls of sugar being dropped from a great height. Velma cast herself further, aware that she was no longer entirely sure where she’d left her body. It was a nice feeling. It was—

  “RETREAT!” shouted a voice.

  Velma opened her eyes.

  The Junior Super Patriots, West Coast Division, were a colorful blur receding down the road, back toward California. The road around her was covered in toys, most weathered, muddy, damaged. A few had “died” during the fight, their plastic limbs and dirty stuffing turning the pavement into a war zone. Velma blinked back tears, suddenly aware that she was aching, and exhausted, and almost there.

  “If you have a home,” she said, hoarsely, “go home, and thank you. If you don’t . . .”

  This meant she was admitting it. This meant she didn’t get another out.

  She sighed.

  “If you don’t, get in the car.”

  The back seat was cluttered with dirty dolls and damaged bears when Velma climbed inside, checking her reflection in the rear view mirror. Blood caked her upper lip, making her look like she’d been in a fistfight, and streaks of caramel were matted in her hair from before Candy Apple’s loss of control. She studied herself for a moment, then sighed, and started the ignition. Oregon was waiting.

  A quarter of a mile from the Oregon border Velma Martinez —a.k.a. “Velveteen,” a.k.a. “one of the only superheroes to voluntarily and successfully quit The Junior Super Patriots, West Coast Division, a wholly owned subsidiary of The Super Patriots, Inc.”—finally passed out.

  Fortunately for her, she had been traveling at barely ten miles per hour when her eyes slipped shut. Even more fortunately, there was no one else on the road. Her car was able to drift gently off to the left, finally coming to a sedate rest in the drainage ditch. Velma didn’t notice. Velma’s head was down on the steering wheel, eyes closed, one strand of hair sticking to the crust of blood that was drying on her lip. Velma was, for the first time in months, utterly at peace with herself, her place in the world, and the powers that had been making her life miserable for most of her life. Velma was, in short, down for the count.

  Unfortunately, especially for Velma, she was really the only one in the area who was anything like “at peace.” Even more unfortunately, any peace achieved under such circumstances was destined to have a short, violent life before coming to an anything-but-peaceful end.

  *

  Saying that the man from Marketing was lividly angry was an understatement on a par with saying “the ocean is slightly damp” or “the paparazzi have a mildly unnerving interest in what Sparkle Bright is having for breakfast.” He’d been pacing back and forth for the past ten minutes, the heels of his glossy leather shoes clicking against the carrier’s faux-hardwood floor. Every third step was punctuated by a tap of one toe, creating an irregular rhythm that was beginning to make Handheld’s teeth hurt. It was bad enough that he and his team got their butts handed to them by the Island of Misfit Toys. Was there some cosmic law that said his day had to get even worse?

  Apparently, the answer was a definite “yes.” “Please remind me, if you would be so kind, of the current makeup of The Junior Super Patriots, West Coast Division,” said the man from Marketing, pronouncing the capital letters as clearly as if they’d been carved in stone. “If you would be so kind.”

  “Sir—” began Handheld.

  “Current makeup, please, and no included exposition or excuses.”

  Anyone who’d spent more than ten minutes as an employee of The Super Patriots, Inc. knew that arguing with Marketing was a good way to waste a lot of time and wind up spending a few months getting the least-desirable interview and publicity assignments possible. Schooling his expression to one of earnest obedience, Handheld squared his shoulders and recited, “Handheld, team leader, technopath. Swallowtail, second-in-command, energy projection and self-powered flight. The Bedbug, energy projection. Super-Cool, limited invulnerability, super-strength, and self-powered flight. The Nanny, team psychic, object-based flight, limited weather control. Apex, super-speed, self-powered flight. The Candy Sisters, thematic matter manipulation.” After a pause, he added, “Sir.”

  “Excellent. You are aware of the nature of the team which you presently,” and the stress on that word was impossible to ignore, “command. Now, tell me, Handheld, is your awareness of the makeup of past iterations of The Junior Super Patriots, West Coast Division, of equally high quality?”

  “Sir?”

  “He’s asking if you should have known that the Energizer Dummy was going to kick our butts,” said Candy Cane, pulling her ubiquitous peppermint stick out of her mouth just long enough to make her proclamation. “Duh.”

  The man from Marketing shot the Candy sisters a sharp look. The trio was standing together a few feet from the rest of the team, and were the only ones not showing any outward signs of their recent battle. Being matter manipulators, it was a small thing for them to repair their costumes, smooth out their hair, and plaster pancake makeup over any visible bruises. They looked distressingly unstressed at the idea of being lectured by the man from Marketing. Maybe—probably—because they understood that they were the only current members of The Junior Super Patriots, West Coast Division, who were effectively immune to all casual punishments. Heritage heroes. They should never have been allowed to join the roster. But done is done, and spinning what’s been done was one of Marketing’s primary duties.

  “As the young Ms. Cane has so. . . delicately stated, yes, that is precisely what I’m asking,” said the man from Marketing, focusing his attention back on Handheld, a hero he could legitimately bully, terrify, and even (should circumstances demand it) effectively destroy. “One woman, with extremely limited recent combat experience, and powers generally regarded as earning her a level two rating. A level two rating at best. There are nine of you, three of whom are rated level five. How could she possibly, under any circumstances, have managed to get the best of you?”

  Handheld and Swallowtail exchanged an anxious glance, followed by an almost imperceptible shake of Handheld’s head. He was the leader of this team. If there was a fall to be taken, he was going to be the one to take it. “I’m sorry, sir,” he said. “I honestly have no idea.”

  The man from Marketing narrowed his eyes. “Well, then,” he said, briskly. “I hope you’re all rested up.”

  “Sir?”

  “Given the nature of your humiliation, it seems that a rematch is in order.” And then the man from Marketing did something truly terrifying.

  Then the man from Marketing began to smile.

  *

  The rating system applied to the world’s superhumans was not, surprisingly enough, developed by The Super Patriots, Inc. or by any of their divisions, sub-divisions, branches, training offices, charities, or other holdings. It came out of a government lab during the period following the emergence of the first superheroes, but before those heroes had organized themselves into the entity that would come to be known as The Super Patriots. (The “Incorporated” would come even later, when Jolly Roger left, when Majesty died. But that is a story for another footnote.) The scientists responsible were not superpowered themselves, at least not when the experiments started. They were simply, in the way of scientists, curious. Curiosity, it has been argued, has done more to endanger the world than every supervillain who has ever lived.

  After the initially suggested rating schemes had been abandoned—the somewhat stereotypical “alpha” through “omega” level powers, and the less formal, less socially acceptable “kinda cool” through “whoa fuck we’re all gonna die”—it was decided to divide all the world’s superhumans into five somewhat nebulous levels. (Had they been more precise, several grudge matches and the total destruction of Redding, Cali
fornia might have been avoided.) All known superhumans were labeled over the course of a single drunken weekend, and standards for grading future humans were set before the hangovers faded. This may also explain the difficulty of any future superhumans achieving the level five rating: by the time those standards were set, all the scientists involved simply wanted to stagger home and die.

  Level one superhumans, a.k.a., “the support staff”: superhumans whose powers are distinct enough to distinguish them from the general populace, and yet provide them with no real advantages in either a combat or real-world situation. Examples include the first TiVo, who possessed the unerring capability to turn on the television just in time to catch his favorite shows, or Tip-Annie, who could convince even the stingiest of customers to leave her a fifteen percent tip in exchange for decent service.

  Level two superhumans, a.k.a., “the grunts”: superhumans whose powers are pronounced enough to make them useful under specific circumstances, and to even qualify them for limited field work, without ever qualifying them for real starter status. Examples include the Electron, whose minor control over electrical devices made him useful for surveillance work, but lacked offensive capabilities unless located under a high-voltage line, and the Moose, who possessed all the heroic strengths and weaknesses of a moose. Also antlers and an inexplicable fondness for standing in the middle of highways destroying the cars of unsuspecting motorists.

  Level three superhumans, aka, “the working men”: superhumans whose powers give them a distinct inclination toward either good or evil, with the capacity to do a lot of damage if those inclinations are not properly channeled. Interestingly, most gangsters fall into this category, despite having no innate powers. Almost all of the world’s working superhumans are initially rated as level three, and either rise or fall from there. Examples include Swallowtail, whose energy manipulation is severely limited by her own associations with the incident which gave her superpowers, and Mississippi Queen, who can do almost anything with her elemental manipulation. . . as long as she’s surrounded by water. These are the safest superhumans, in some ways. Sure, they’re powerful enough to do some serious damage if they really wanted to, but they’re also powerful enough not to be insecure about their capabilities. Level three superhumans are generally regarded as the most stable, and the least likely to destroy the universe to prove a point.