The Superhero's Son (Book 1): The Superhero's Test

by Lucas Flint

  “Okay, Kevin,” said Dad, standing across from me in the field where we were doing our training. He was in full Genius costume now, his arms folded across his chest. “Try to hover off the ground.”

  I looked down at the ground under my feet. I willed myself to rise off the ground, just like I had back in Fallsville earlier this week, and soon found myself floating a few inches above the ground. I looked up at Dad.

  “So?” I said. “Am I doing a good job?”

  “It looks like it,” said Dad. “What is the highest you have flown so far?”

  I scratched my chin. “Um, I dunno. I floated up to the second floor of the Fallsville General Hospital, which was like twenty or thirty feet off the ground, I think.”

  “Thirty feet, then,” said Dad. “That's not very high, but I bet you can fly much higher than that.”

  I looked up at the sky apprehensively. As excited as I was to fly, I suddenly found the idea of being so high up in the sky frightening. “What will happen if I fall? Will I get hurt?”

  “Probably, but I doubt it will leave you paralyzed or anything like that,” said Dad. “You have super strength, after all, and most neoheroes with super strength also tend to be strong enough to survive falls even from great heights.”

  “Okay,” I said. I pulled my goggles down over my eyes. “So how high should I go?”

  “As high as possible,” said Dad. “But I suggest not going into orbit. We don't know if you can survive in space without a space suit, so try to stay within the atmosphere at least.”

  I nodded. I looked up at the sky again, again feeling apprehensive, but I figured that if Dad was not panicking about it, then I didn't need to, either.

  So I started rising again, increasing my speed bit by bit, until soon I had definitely passed the thirty foot mark and was now going higher than I ever had before. I looked down at Dad, who was looking up at me and becoming smaller and smaller with every foot I climbed.

  But I looked away from the ground, because I didn't want to freak myself out. Instead, I focused on going higher and faster, and before I knew, I was soaring through the sky like a lightning bolt. Wind blew through my hair and the goggles protected my eyes from getting dried out.

  It was a lot of fun, flying around in the sky. It was almost like swimming, except that I didn't need to move my limbs. I just soared through the air, passed through some clouds (which got me a little wet), and then abruptly stopped and looked down at the ground.

  Bad idea. I felt woozy. I could see Dad below, but not very well. I looked up again and immediately felt better. It was weird how I apparently had the power of flight, but did not have the stomach to go with it. Or maybe it was one of those things that I'd get used to after a while.

  Then I heard the earcom crackle in my ear and then Dad's voice said, “Kevin? Can you hear me? How are you doing up there?”

  I cringed slightly at the volume of the earpiece, but said, “Okay. I can't really look down, though, otherwise I'll get sick.”

  “You and heights have never mixed even when you were a kid,” said Dad. “I'm sure you'll get over it, however. Now you should try to land near me.”

  “Okay,” I said. I gulped. “Can I do it without looking down?”

  “Your aim would be off if you did that,” said Dad. “Just do it slowly. No need to hurry.”

  “All right,” I said. “I'm coming—hey, what's that?”

  I heard what sounded like a jet approaching me. I looked around, but I didn't see any planes in the sky around me. All I saw was the blue sky, the sun, and the clouds beneath me, yet that jet engine sound was still clear.

  “Kevin?” said Dad again. “What do you hear?”

  “Something that sounds like a jet engine,” I said, turning this way and that as I searched for it. “But I don't see any jets.”

  “Odd,” Dad's voice crackled in my ear. “I picked this location to test your flight powers specifically because no commercial airlines fly here, which I thought would minimize the possibility of a plane flying into you.”

  The jet engine sound was much closer now than before, but I still couldn't see its source. I decided to try to land now before whatever it was hit me when something exploded out of a nearby cloud and surged toward me almost too fast for my eyes to follow.

  My reflexes, however, were as fast as ever. I flew to the side, narrowly avoiding the thing that was coming at me. I watched as the thing flew away from me, came to a stop, and then turned to face me.

  It was a robot. It was bigger and taller than me, with thick steel plating that made me wonder how it was even remaining airborne. Flames shot out from its feet, which were apparently its exhaust ports. Its face was nothing more than a glowing red stripe with a voice box directly below it. It also had two guns for hands, which made me wonder how it was supposed to grab anything.

  “What the hell?” I said. “Dad, what is that?”

  “I'd like to help you, Kevin, but I can't see it very well from down here,” said Dad's sardonic voice in my ear. “Can you describe whatever it is you see to me?”

  “It's a robot,” I said. “A flying robot.”

  “A flying robot?” said Dad. His voice became serious. “Uh oh.”

  “Uh oh?” I said. “Dad, do you know what that thing—”

  I was interrupted when the robot aimed its hands at me and started firing off bullets. I dropped through the clouds, just barely avoiding getting riddled with bullets, and then shot through the air toward the robot. I tried to punch it, but the robot dodged, allowing me to fly straight past it.

  “Kevin!” Dad's voice shouted in my ear. “I heard bullets being shot. Are you okay?”

  “Yeah, but just barely,” I said, looking over my shoulder at the robot, which was now following me. “What should I do? Should I go back to you?”

  “No,” said Dad. “Try to distract it. I'll see if I can get one of my drones to back you up.”

  “Distract it?” I said. “How?”

  “Just do whatever you can,” said Dad. “And whatever you do, remain calm and don't panic.”

  Remain calm? How was I supposed to remain calm with a flying killer robot coming after me? I was going to ask Dad that, but then I heard the sound of bullets coming at me and I twisted and turned, dodging most of them, although one bullet grazed my shoulder. It didn't hurt or even cut through my suit, but the impact of the bullet nonetheless sent me spiraling through the sky before I regained my balance and flew back into the air.

  Looking over my shoulder again, I saw that the robot was still on my tail. I had never seen a robot like this before. It didn't look like anything Dad might have made. It looked like something from out of a video game, which made me wonder again where the hell it had come from.

  But it didn't matter where it came from. What mattered was that I needed to destroy it before it destroyed me.

  So I stopped, turned around, and flew toward it. This change of tactics seemed to take the robot by surprise, because it stopped in midair for a moment before raising its gun hands and aiming at me.

  But I didn't give it a chance to fire a single bullet. I slammed into its abdomen with my shoulder, knocking the robot back and sending it falling to the earth below. I zipped after it, but then the robot started firing at me as it fell and I had to swerve to avoid getting hit again.

  As I flew away, I looked back and saw that the robot had already recovered from the attack and was flying after me again. Now, however, it looked less like a robot and more like a plane, with its arms and legs combining together to give it less wind resistance. What, was it a Transformer, too?

  Then it started shooting at me again. I flew upwards sharply to avoid getting riddled with bullets, while the killer robot zipped by underneath. I floated in the sky for a moment, watching as the robot changed course to come after me again.

  Again, it aimed its guns at me, but I didn't stay still long enough for it to take aim. Instead, I flew over and landed on its back, putting all of my weight on
it in an attempt to make it fall to the ground. We actually did fall several feet before the plane transformed again, forcing me to jump off it just as it returned to its killer robot mode.

  But rather than shoot me with its guns, a cannon rose off the robot's back and fired a missile at me. The missile soared through the air toward me, forcing me to fly as fast as I could to avoid it, but it must have been a heat-seeker, because it started following me just like the robot itself.

  “Dad?” I said into my earcom, glancing over my shoulder at the missile that was following me. “Is the drone ready yet?”

  “I'm working on it,” said Dad. “And yes, I am aware of the missile following you.”

  “Great,” I said, banking to the left in an attempt to lose the missile, although the missile kept following me. “So what do you think will happen if it hits me? Do you think I'll explode and discover that I have the power of regeneration?”

  “Not sure,” said Dad, who sounded like he was seriously considering the question. “Your powers are similar to Omega Man's, so there's a good chance you'll survive, although I can't say the same about your suit.”

  “Dad, that was just a joke,” I said. “Anyway, talk to you later. I'm going to try to lose this missile.”

  I clicked my earcom off and increased my speed, but the missile was still on my tail. Actually, it seemed to be flying even faster than me, because it was getting closer and closer with every passing second. I figured that it would not be long before it actually caught up with me and blew me into chunks of meat, at which point I probably wouldn't need to worry about Master Chaos killing me anymore.

  I needed to stop the robot. I figured that it probably had control of the missile, so if I could kill the bot, then I could stop the missile. It was worth a shot.

  So I flew upwards sharply and then flew back the way I came, flying over the missile, which soon turned in midair and resumed following me. I looked around the sky for the robot until I spotted it hiding near some clouds, obviously trying to avoid being spotted by me.

  I shot toward the robot. It noticed me immediately and started firing more bullets at me, but I avoided them easily. The missile was still following me, but that gave me an idea about how to get rid of both it and the robot at the same time.

  I quickly flew upwards and then cut off my power, causing me to go backwards through the air until I was above the missile, which I landed on. Then I wrapped my arms and legs around the missile and flew it straight at the robot, which must have been surprised by my tactic, because it didn't even move as the missile drew closer and closer to it.

  At the last second, I let go of the missile and flew off as fast as I could. I managed to get several hundred feet away from the cloud before the missile collided with the bot and exploded, creating a massive explosion, the shock wave from it sending me hurtling through the air. I spun through the air crazily for a couple of seconds before regaining my balance and looking over my shoulder, wondering if the missile had destroyed the robot.

  I didn't see the robot anymore. All I saw was a bare patch of sky where a bunch of clouds had been, clouds that had been vaporized by the explosion. The robot must have been vaporized, too, because I didn't see anything to indicate that it had ever been there.

  I activated my earcom again and said, “Dad! I managed to blow up the robot. Did you see?”

  “I saw the explosion,” Dad's voice crackled in my ear. “But I didn't see the debris of the robot fall. Are you sure you destroyed it?”

  “Yeah!” I said. “It totally vaporized the clouds. I bet that the robot was also—”

  The sound of a loud jet engine interrupted me, causing me to look over my shoulder just in time to see that same robot—now blackened from the fire of the explosion—hurtling toward me from the clouds. I didn't have time to dodge. The robot slammed into my back, sending me flying uncontrollably through the air. I heard Dad yelling in my ear, but I was too disoriented to respond.

  In fact, now I was falling, falling through the sky toward the ground. The impact of the robot's blow made it hard for me to regain control. The sky and ground kept switching places as I fell, but I managed to regain control of my powers quickly and started flying again.

  But then the robot came out of nowhere and tackled me like a football player. I tried to wrestle out of its grasp, but the robot wouldn't let go. We just fell and fell through the sky, wrestling for dominance, until we crashed into the earth. The impact dazed me, but the robot was already recovering. It stood up and slammed its foot down on top of me, knocking the breath out of my lungs. Then it aimed one of its gun hands at me and I knew my life was over, because I couldn't move in time to dodge the bullet.

  Then, all of a sudden, I heard the sound of helicopter blades slashing through the air and in the next instant a small, white-colored drone flew out of nowhere. It fired a dozen bullets at the robot, causing the killer robot to look at the drone. The robot was distracted only for a moment, but it was long enough for me to regain my strength.

  I shoved the robot's foot off of me, making it stagger backwards. Before the robot could recover from that, I jumped to my feet and punched it as hard as I could through its stomach. My hand smashed through steel plating, wiring, and everything else inside the robot, making it fall over with a crash. But it still tried to get up, so I jumped into the air, using my flying powers to give me an extra boost, and then fell straight down on its head.

  My feet crashed through the robot's skull, smashing it to pieces. The robot's body immediately went still, which was how I knew that it was down for good.

  Stepping off of the remains of the robot's head, I looked at the drone, which was floating nearby, though it had retracted its gun. The drone had the same white color as most of Dad's equipment, so I figured that the drone must have been created by Dad.

  Just as I thought that, Dad himself appeared next to me seemingly out of nowhere, although he appeared to have teleported, teleported because he took his hand off the Teleportation Buckle as soon as he appeared next to me.

  “Kevin, are you all right?” said Dad, looking down at me.

  I looked down at my suit. It was muddy and soggy, probably from the impact of the fall. I felt my hair, which was also quite dirty, but I didn't feel any blood or anything. My body ached from the impact, though nothing felt broken, which surprised me, given how hard and far I had fallen. Guess I must have been even stronger than I thought.

  Lowering my hands to my side, I said, “I'm okay. But what is that robot? Where did it come from?”

  I gestured at the headless robot beside me, which Dad immediately walked over toward. Bending over the robot, Dad looked its body up and down, but his Genius helmet made it impossible for me to tell what he was thinking. I could tell that he was at least as troubled about the robot as I was, if not more so, which made me think that he had to have an idea about its nature and origin.

  “I've never seen this kind of robot before,” said Dad as he stood up. He sounded troubled. “It looks like it was designed for war.”

  “War?” I said. “You mean like a military weapon?”

  “Possibly,” said Dad. “That would explain its gun hands and the missile launcher on its back.”

  I looked at the robot again. I wondered what a military robot was doing all the way out here in Texas when a sudden, terrible theory occurred to me.

  I looked at Dad and said, “Dad, do you think this is one of the top-secret military weapons that Master Chaos stole from the military?”

  “I think it very likely,” said Dad. “I'll need to contact the G-Men about this and let them know that we've found one of their weapons.”

  Dad didn't sound very excited about that, which made sense, because Dad never seemed very excited about talking to the government about anything.

  “Good idea, but this still freaks me out,” I said. I looked up at the sky, but didn't see any other killer robots raining death from above. “But if that's what this robot is, then does that mean that
Master Chaos knows my secret identity? Did he send it to kill me so he wouldn't have to do it himself? How did it even know where to find us, anyway?”

  “I don't know,” said Dad. “It's possible Master Chaos simply wants to eliminate any neoheroes in Silvers to make it easier for him to get us. Because you are the only known neohero in town, that makes you a prime target, though that still doesn't explain how he knew where we were training.”

  “Is Master Chaos watching us?” I said anxiously.

  “I don't know,” said Dad. “What we need to do is contact the G-Men and inform them about what we found so they can take it away and possibly use it to find out where Chaos is.”

  “Are we still going to continue my training, then?” I said.

  “Not today,” said Dad, shaking his head. “I don't want to put you in anymore danger, not if Master Chaos knows where we are. Let's go home for now and wait until we hear back from the government. Seeker One, my drone, will keep an eye on the robot's remains until someone from the government comes to pick them up.”

  Chapter Fifteen

  When we returned home, Dad immediately went down into the Lab to contact the government, while I returned to my room to rest and relax. But first, I explained to Mom why we had returned from training so early. I tried to make the fact that a flying killer robot had tried to kill me sound not quite as bad as it was, but Mom was still worried by the time I finished explaining it to her and she was in no mood to listen to my constant reassurances that I was okay and hadn't been badly hurt. I did, however, let her wash my super suit, mostly because it was really dirty and smelled bad and needed the wash.

  For the next couple of hours, the atmosphere in our house was very tense. I fully expected Master Chaos to show up at any moment and kick down our front door, or for more of those government robots to fly over our house and blow it up with missiles. Dad didn't seem that worried; at least I didn't think he was, considering how he did not come out of his Lab with any bad news.

  I tried to pass the time by playing games on my phone, but I found it hard to focus on them because I was so worried about Master Chaos. Almost getting killed by his robot had completely changed the way I looked at Master Chaos. His threat—both to my life and to my family's safety—suddenly seemed a lot more real than it had just a few hours ago. I wasn't sure how to take it. I normally wasn't one to stress over things, but this was different because my safety, and the safety of my family, was at risk.