by R. J. Ross
“I’ve always wondered what it would be like to fly. You’ll have to tell me about it when you do.”
“Dad says it’s overrated and filled with bug splatter. I think he’s jealous of the capes that use other forms of transportation, like Reaper, or Cheval, or Rocco. He’ll probably figure out how to copy Reaper’s powers before you know it.”
“Ah, yeah, I could see him doing that.”
“And if you really wanted to fly, you could ask him. He’d probably build you a jet pack, or something. Heck, he might even have one somewhere.”
“Probably,” he agrees. “You’re surprisingly awake right now.”
“I’m going to fly,” I say. “I’m too excited,” I have to cover a yawn with my hand, “to sleep right now. Ah, but is this going to interrupt Adanna’s training? You’re the one teaching her.”
“Do you really think she’s going to miss this?” he asks as we reach the school. There, parked in front of the building, is the Panterus’s car, and the entire family is standing next to it, watching us.
“So,” Pan says, “I hope you don’t mind an audience.”
“Good to see you, Pan,” Taurus says. “Sunny, do you mind?”
Of course I don’t want my girlfriend’s family seeing me fail, but I don’t really have a choice, if the smile on Pan’s face is an indicator. “Not a problem,” I say, looking at the yellow tape that surrounds the school. If we don’t start soon, I get the feeling my audience is just going to get bigger. “Are Liz and Skye coming?” I ask, turning to look back at the apartments.
“Skye’s probably still sleeping,” Dad says as he heads towards us. “And Taurus should have a better idea of where Liz is than I do.”
“Wait, what?” I say. “What did you do to my aunt?” I ask him.
“We had patrol this morning,” he says, laughing. “So I came home, took a shower, and grabbed you, while she ran off to pick up breakfast for her and the girls. She should be here soon enough.”
“Did you catch anyone?” Pan asks.
“No, somehow they got away,” Taurus says, making him laugh. “You want to take a turn at tossing him?” he offers, motioning to me. “We’re seeing who can throw him the highest.”
“You’re seeing if throwing me in the air will help me learn to fly while I’m awake,” I correct him. “The whole height thing is just a bonus.”
“Sunny,” Adanna says.
“Are you worried about me?” I ask, grinning at her. “I think I’ll be okay! If I really start to fall, I’m sure someone will grab me, right?”
“No, that’s not what I was going to say,” she says. “This time, while you’re falling, make sure you focus on what you’re up there to do, got it?”
“Yeah, but—”
“No calling me, no doing flips,” she says, listing them on her fingers, “and absolutely no napping, got it?”
“But falling is really comfortable,” I complain as the group starts to laugh. I drop off of Taurus’s back as he shifts into his minotaur form. He’s almost twice as tall as I am, now, I think as I look up. “That is so amazing,” I have to tell him as he holds out a gigantic hand. I jump onto it, standing on one foot on his palm. “So… no nap first?”
“No nap first,” he says, his voice rumbling and deep. “You ready?”
“Should we wait for Liz and Skye?” I ask.
“I figure you won’t catch on the first few times,” he says.
“WAAAAAIIIIIT!” I hear Liz bellow. “I’m coming, already! Is this what I get for picking you up a coffee?” she demands, heading for us with a cardboard cup holder in her hand. She has a coffee in her other hand, which she takes a gulp of. “You’re just here for the muscles, mister,” she lectures Taurus as he uses two fingers to delicately take a cup from the tray. “Skye is getting dressed, Sunny, so do you think you can wait just a little longer?”
“Sure,” I say, hopping off of the hand and reaching for one of the other cups in the tray. I don’t even like coffee, but if it’ll keep me awake--
“Should you be drinking that?” she asks. “I’ve heard that coffee stunts growth.”
I pull my hand away from the cup. The last thing I want to do is stay short! I hear people laughing, but I play it off. “You didn’t bring orange juice, or anything?” I ask. She laughs at me.
“I’ll have Ditto or Repeat get you something, but it’s best to wait until after this is over,” she tells me.
“I’m HERE!” Skye yells, racing over to us. “Let’s throw him!”
I look at Taurus, who finishes off his coffee and holds out his hand again. “Should I be wearing a helmet?” I ask, stepping into the hand. He doesn’t even bother to answer before throwing me straight up, so fast that my ears threaten to pop. For a moment I don’t know what to do. Well, it’s not like I CAN do anything, right? So I close my eyes—
“Don’t close your eyes,” Liz says. I look over, seeing that she’s only feet away, and flying just as fast as I’m going. “Your biggest problem is how attached you are to the ground. It’s in your mind, it’s in your heart, but you need to let go of it for a bit, understand?”
“But—” I say.
“Feel the air, Sunny,” she says. “Air is as much a part of you as the ground is. You were made to fly.”
“If it helps, you can pretend like you’re swimming!” Skye says from below. She comes up beside me. “Just relax and enjoy it!”
“But that’s not how Zoe learned,” I say.
“You aren’t Zoe,” they say in perfect tandem. “If you learned to fly in your sleep, it just means you need to let go and let it happen,” Liz finishes. We’re slowing down. The throw is probably— “Don’t look down,” she tells me, grabbing my chin. “Look at us.”
“Liz… is it…” I try to think of how to say it. Right now there’s just the three of us up here, right? I didn’t put on an earbud, or wear a watch, or anything, so maybe now is the time to ask it. “Is it hard having Dad as a big brother?”
“Is it hard having Zoe as your sister?” she asks, smiling a bit crookedly.
“Daddy likes me better than he likes Nico,” Skye says, cheerfully.
“Dad likes EVERYONE better than Nico,” Liz says. “But you are my favorite sister, if it helps.”
“YAY!” Skye says, throwing her arms around Liz’s shoulders. “You’re mine, too!”
“It’s hard,” I admit. “I love her, sure, but she’s just… she started flying before I did, she started driving before I did, she’s always being called by the Hall leaders. She’s practically running the school, too. I’m… like the joke of the family.” I absently relax, lounging in the air. “I mean, sure I’ve got an idea of what I want to do, but it’s not like people take me seriously. I don’t even take me seriously. And when there WAS something I wanted to do, Dad just said we’ve got too much going on and it’ll have to wait… then again, it was sort of illegal, so I guess I can see where he’s coming from, but…”
They’re both staring at me. Skye has such a huge grin on her face that it scares me, and Liz looks smug. “What?” I ask.
“You can look down, now,” she says. I have no idea what she’s talking about, I think, looking down. I was just sitting here… on… the air…
“Whoops, there he goes,” Skye says as I lose my balance and start to plummet down. “Hey, hey, when you do your illegal thing, can I come along?” she calls to me.
“If I survive the fall, sure!” I yell, my arms and legs flailing.
“He’s such a drama queen,” Liz says, shaking her head.
CHAPTER THREE
“It was really bad when he started shouting out his living will halfway down,” Trent says, laughing so hard that tears threaten. “’Trent! You can have my manga collection!’” he says, mimicking me. “’Zoe, don’t forget to water my flowers!’”
Jack is roaring with laughter. “I know! I got it on tape!” he says.
“Ha ha ha,” I say, but a little grin is trying to pull at my lips. Fa
lling is a LOT of fun, okay? It’s probably one of my favorite things, next to sleeping, which says a lot since I did it over and over again for an hour. The others took turns launching me into the sky after I fell that first time. I think Taurus sent me the highest, but there’s still an argument over that. Dad eventually put a watch on me just to check, but nobody knows for sure just how high I went that first throw, or at least, they aren’t saying. But anyway, since I couldn’t figure out how I floated that first time, and just kept falling, I decided to have a bit of fun on the way down. At least it made people laugh.
“You did fly for a little while, though,” Adanna says, moving to my side and taking my hand. “We all saw it.”
“Yeah… I have no idea how. I wasn’t even thinking about the fact I was flying,” I admit. “That’s probably the problem, right?”
She goes quiet, lacing her fingers through mine as she thinks. “I used to hate that about you.”
“What?”
“You never thought about things and they all worked out. That tree you grew, you weren’t thinking about it. I got stuck up that tree, you know.”
“I told you I was sorry about that!” I say. “I really didn’t plan for that to happen, I was still just learning to use my powers. You know, operating on instinct.”
“But that’s when you do your best, Sunny,” she says. “I know I give you a hard time about not learning to drive, but that’s because I know you won’t have any trouble at all doing it. You can do anything you put your mind t—no, that’s actually not true,” she says, cutting herself off. “The problem with you is that you do better when you stop letting your mind get in the way.”
“Stop letting my mind…” I dwindle off, staring at her blankly. “Now I’m even more confused than usual.”
“Stop thinking and just do it,” she says.
“Oh…” I say. “You really think that’d work?”
She sighs, rolling her eyes. “Not with that attitude it won’t.” She walks off, heading for the school where the student body is hanging out front. They all look to me, expectantly, and I have to shrug and shake my head.
“Still not flying,” I admit.
“You’ll get it sooner or later,” Rocco says. “Ace still uses a disk to fly, and he doesn’t need it, right?”
“That’s because Ace likes to stand instead of doing the Superior pose,” Jennifer explains. “At least that’s my theory.”
“We should do a poll,” Freddy says to her, “on all the flying type capes. We’ll ask them what sort of pose they like. Hey, Ward, ask Mega for us, would you?”
“He’s already lectured me for an hour about that,” Ward says, gloomily. “I can’t even fly, yet, so he spent the whole time carrying me, going ‘No, your right arm needs to be like this.’” The group starts to laugh, especially as his expression gets darker and darker. “It gets worse,” he goes on. “I had to pay him back for the Advent thing, right? So I spent an entire day dressed in uniform at the Central Hall Amusement Park. Now he’s negotiating for toys and posters.”
“You haven’t even debuted yet, though,” I point out.
“It’s the ‘Mega and Son’ thing,” Ward says. “He’s been pushing for my debut for months, now, but Nico keeps putting it off.”
“Do you want to debut?” Carla asks.
“Not really? It’s not that big of a deal, though.”
“I’ll do your debut!” Jack says. “We can write it off as you betraying me to become a hero. It’ll be fun. Still think you’d be a great lackey, though.”
“Can’t,” Ward says.
“Figures.”
“All right, everyone, time to get to class,” Dad calls out over the loudspeaker. “We can discuss flying methods during our second practice hour.”
We head into the school, heading for our classroom. To our surprise, instead of Blackjack at his desk, Dad is sitting on top of it, tapping on the air as usual. “What’s happening?” Trent asks as we all go to our chairs.
“You’re all invited to my wedding,” Dad says, “which means you all need clothes to go to a wedding. Since some of you are official capes, you’ll be wearing formal uniforms. The rest of you will need something dressy, and I’ve arranged for Kim to set you up.”
“Another suit,” Ward says with a sigh.
“Not for you,” Dad tells him. “Mega paid for your formal uniform, himself. You’ll be sitting with him for the wedding. That goes the same for people that have chosen their Halls, as well. Vinny, you’ll be sitting with Century, Voltdrain, and your uncle. Carla, you can choose which Hall you’re sitting with, but make sure to get a dance with both of them.”
“There’s going to be dancing?” she asks, excitedly. “Oh, but I don’t know how to dance formally…”
“Dance with Mastermental, first, then, and I’m sure you’ll learn how quickly. Ah, and Sandra,” he says, looking over at her, “Your father wants you to sit with him, and paid for your formal uniform.”
“Oh,” she says. “Does that mean I don’t have to wear a skirt?”
“That means you don’t have to wear a skirt,” he agrees.
“I’m good with that,” she says. “That whole ‘father daughter’ thing was online long enough that people already know, anyway.”
“I don’t have to dance with both Hall leaders, do I?” Rocco asks, making a face as we laugh.
“No, you don’t, but you do have to give them a hard time,” Dad says. “Zoe, you do, though, and mingle with the other Hall leaders, if you want.”
“Of course,” Zoe says, “I was planning on it.”
“For the rest of you,” Nico says, “this is your chance to meet all of the Hall leaders. Chat them up, ask what they have to offer, and look as appealing as you can—Kaden, that means keeping your shirt buttoned, especially since two of the Hall leaders you’ll want to impress are female. Century might not care, but they’ll probably want to make sure you can act civilized when necessary.”
“That’s asking a lot, though,” Kaden says mournfully.
“You want to be near or on the water, right?” Morgan says.
“Yeah,” he says with a sigh, “I do.”
“Then keep your shirt on,” she says. “Do I have to go?”
“Yeah, you have to go,” Dad says, “although I can understand why you wouldn’t want to. Don’t worry, nobody is going to be paying attention to the kids in that room, anyway. The biggest draw is the gossip about the adults. Aside from using the opportunity to get to know the Hall leaders, I don’t really care what you do. Bring a date, if you want—but only someone in the system. If you want to date someone from our sister school, talk to me and I’ll arrange transportation, unless they’re coming with their father. Vinny,” he says, pointedly, when Vinny doesn’t even look up at that statement, “you need to pay attention, right now.”
“I was planning on seeing if I could help in the kitchen,” Vinny says. “It’d be interesting to see how the black suits do a catering job.”
“What about wedding gifts? Are you going to let us go shopping?” Carla asks eagerly. “I should have got something when I was down south, darn it.”
“We don’t really need anything,” Dad admits. “If you ask me, I think Summer would be just as happy with a card, or a picture.”
“We could make a video for them,” Jennifer says, “like a digital card. I would be happy to toss something together, if you guys would like?”
“Yeah, that sounds fun!” Carla says. “We can put on shows and everything, sort of like the Christmas special we did with Justin, right? Alyssa! You need to sing!”
“What? Why do I need to sing? Justin should sing, right?” Alyssa says, looking a bit panicked.
“You can do a song at the wedding, if you want,” Dad offers. “We’ve arranged for live music for the reception.”
“Who are you getting, Dad?” I ask.
“Who else? That one hippie lady that your mom loves so much,” he says, making a face. “Thank your sist
er for that.”
“It’s actually Mastermental’s wedding gift,” Zoe says. “He asked me what would be best, so I told him.”
“Oh heck, no, I’ll stick to the video,” Alyssa says.
“Make sure you wear your masks for it, we might show it at the reception,” Dad says.
“Got it,” we all say.
“Now,” Dad says, “since there’s no looming super villain in the background at the moment, who wants to head over to the Hall for their fittings? She can probably do half of you, today, and finish up the rest tomorrow. If you want, as long as you keep an eye on the younger ones, I can let you hang out at the Hall. There’s some interesting stuff up in the front part.”
“Let’s do it!” Ace says as the others start cheering.
“Everyone that hasn’t debuted will be guided by one of the older capes,” Zoe says to the group, taking to the air to get their attention. “If you find yourself lost from your group, check in on your commlink.” Dad just sits back and watches as she sets up small groups. I look at him, raising an eyebrow, at least until Zoe says, “And you will be with Sunny.”
I look over to see her leading the group of Piper, Ward, and Kaden over to me. “Sunny, you’re in charge of this group.”
“But—” I start out, looking around a bit wildly for Adanna. Adanna is good at leading groups… which, apparently Zoe already realized, because she’s standing with a few other kids to my right. “Hey,” I say, a bit stupidly.
“Hey,” Kaden says, grinning and holding out a hand. He’s taller than I am, as well as broader through the shoulders. My hand feels a bit small as I shake his. “Can we go shopping, there?”
“Yeah, sure,” I say. The group starts out of the school and to the bus. “Zoe, does Mastermental know we’re coming?” I ask her.
“No, but I’m sure it’ll be fine,” she says. “They get school groups in there all the time. But just in case, we might want to wear masks.”
“We could start working on the video while we’re there, right?” Carla asks Jennifer.
“We’ll see if we get anything we can use,” Jennifer says. “Either way, it’ll be interesting to see. I mean, we’re bringing three villains with us!”
