Not Your Villain

by C. B. Lee

  “Welcome to the Meta-Human Training Center,” a computer voice says, and the doors open.

  The main building is large, filled with windows and light, despite labyrinthine hallways. Pathways lead out into the trees, where Bells sees smaller rooms—dorms ensconced in the trees. At first it seems as if it will be cool to live in the trees, and then the rooms shake in the wind.

  “Dorm assignments and maps have been sent to you. Classes begin tomorrow promptly at eight a.m. Please report to your respective rooms and be on time. Evening meal is at six sharp.” Dylan about-faces and disappears in the network of hallways.

  The other students pull up projections on their DEDs and wander off. Bells is still trying to figure out his map when Christine nudges him. “Hey, I’m gonna take a nap, but see you at dinner?”

  Bells nods blankly, and one by one the students leave. He looks at his map. He has to go east, out this door, and then down that walkway…

  He opens the door and is met with open air and a narrow bridge. Bells takes a deep breath and sprints to the safety of the next building. He does the same for the next three walkways.

  Finally, he finds his dorm module and scans his DED. The door opens with a smooth, “Welcome, Barry Carmichael,” from the computer.

  Bells drops his bags on the floor, and the entire module shakes. It’s made out of solar-cell material, designed to maximize the amount of energy a building can generate. The room is curved. It’s as if he’s inside a giant, smooth egg. He has a bed, a dresser for his clothes, a desk with desktop projector and charging dock for his DED, and nothing more.

  Bells flops face first onto the bed. Out one window, the view is nothing but green, shifting trees as far as the eye can see. Out the other window, the gray ocean storms.

  He lets go of the shift and sighs in relief. The effort required to stay shifted and the fact that the entire training center is hundreds of feet in the air have taken a toll, and he’s exhausted.

  His room shakes again. Bells shuts his eyes, but that makes it worse. He can still sense how high they are and imagines the entire structure falling out of the tree. He groans into the pillow.

  * * *

  Emma: what do you mean its too high up

  Bells: [img0022.ppg]

  Jess: !!!!

  Emma: oooh pretty

  Bells: IT IS BUT ITS ALSO TERRIFYING. CAN’T BELIEVE ALL OF AERIAL CITY IS LIKE THIS

  Jess: well, it is in the sky.

  Bells: SHUT UP

  [Group chat “WE MISS YOU BELLS” has been renamed to “HOLD ONTO ALL THE RAILINGS BELLS” by Emma Robledo.]

  A message springs up outside the chat, and Bells grabs and enlarges the window, then smiles.

  Emma: but really, are you ok?

  Bells: I’LL JUST HAVE TO GET USED TO IT. IT’S THE WHOLE SUMMER

  Emma: you can do it. i believe in you

  Bells: AND THERE ARE LOTS OF RAILINGS AND THINGS EVERYWHERE. I JUST HAVE TO NOT THINK ABOUT IT

  He can’t tell them just how terrifying the center is, but he does send them all the photos of Aerial City. The city itself seemed very navigable with buildings, covered walkways with railings, and lifts going in every direction, making it easy for anyone to get around, even if they were scared of heights.

  But the center—with its shaking rooms and open-air paths—is a different story entirely. Bells should find out if there’s another way to get to the main annex without taking the terrifying open pathways. He glances at his DED; there’s still plenty of time before dinner to look for an alternative route.

  Bells looks in the mirror. His usual form isn’t imposing. It could be, but it’s not. Still, he likes what he sees: the strong jaw and the long, elegant nose of his mother and the stocky build of his father. He can look like anyone; he can change his hair and clothing and face on a whim. And he does; he’s always loved bright colors and standing out, and it doesn’t take much energy to shift his hair into whatever color he wants for the week. Using his powers to style it in the morning is a great time-saver.

  The first time Bells shifted himself was out of panic at the way his body was changing. Breasts were never part of his plan. Neither were superpowers, but here he is.

  Bells glances at the holostill on his desk of Emma, Jess, and himself grinning at each other. He misses them already. He takes another look at the group chat text still projected in the air. He traces the rounded emojis from Jess and the hearts from Emma, smiles at the teasing and the support, and wishes he could tell them the whole story.

  Classes are a rigorous blend of physical training, sparring tournaments, meta-human history, hero-skill workshops, and power development sessions. The training is challenging, but this year the intensity of the classes is matched by the difficulty of dealing with his fear of heights. In class, he walks the line between wanting to show off all he can do and trying to stay in disguise.

  Bells spends as much time as he can working out at the gym. His power isn’t physical, but being a hero requires being fit. If he’s going to take on supervillains with only the ability to shapeshift, he’s got to be strong. He logs countless hours on the treadmill and picks up where he left off with his weight trainer, Barbara, who oversees physical training for all the meta-humans.

  “Come on, three more reps; you’ve got this!” Coach Barbara shouts.

  A bead of sweat drips off his brow as Bells pushes up the barbell. The muscles in his arms strain, screaming for him to stop. His whole body aches, but he’s got to finish this. “One more. Come on, Barry!”

  Bells almost loses concentration as he struggles to lift the weight, and he can’t lose the shift. He grits his teeth, pushes the bar higher, and sets it in the rack. Chest heaving, he flops back on the bench.

  “There you go! That’s a new record for you; you’ve gotten so much stronger!”

  Bells takes the water bottle Barbara offers him as she continues prattling. Her short ponytail bounces as she talks with her hands. He sits up, catches his breath, and spots his reflection in the mirror. It’s still Barry’s face, he notes proudly.

  It’s amazing, how far he’s come. The first year at the training center, it was all he could do to stay as Barry for a whole class, and then he had to run back to his dorm room, let go of the shift, and hide until he had enough energy to shift into the disguise again.

  It was easier the second year. He’d had more practice shifting, since he would try to go half the school day without a binder and change at lunch. He worked up to going a whole school day using his powers, and it’s really paid off.

  This year he can do the extra physical training he’s always wanted to do because he can hold the shift for so long. He can attend the day’s classes and then relax as Barry too. Being able to walk around after class and spend time with some of his classmates is much more fun than hiding in his room to recover from using his power. Mostly, though, Bells keeps to himself and ignores the hushed whispers that follow him.

  Bells has no idea why people think the League has handpicked him already. He’s not the most impressive. The twins, with their teleportation skills, have the coolest powers in Bells’ opinion, but apparently their power class rating is low. But that’s hard to tell because they use their powers together. Sasha can summon anything that she’s touched to her side, and Tanya can teleport anything she’s touched to anywhere she’s been.

  Ricky can be invisible, but he’s also rated low. Bells has only seen him use his power on purpose to pull the most obvious pranks—stealing Sasha’s hat and putting it on Tanya or putting on Christine’s sweater and following her, pretending to be a ghost, but Ricky often struggles during class with using his powers deliberately.

  Aside from Bells, there are fifteen meta-humans in the training program this year, all rated C-class or lower. Power ratings are supposed to be hush-hush, but the students constantly gossip about their abilities and
who’s likely to get in the League.

  “Maybe I’ll just join the United Villain’s Guild,” Ricky says one afternoon after another unsuccessful attempt at control, earning him a few scattered laughs and more than a few nervous glances. No one talks about villains here.

  “Well, they do seem really incompetent; you’d fit right in,” Tanya says. “I mean, they all seem to be ending up in Corrections.”

  A chorus of giggles follows, and Bells tilts his head to listen to the gossip from his classmates from all over the country. Apparently Tree Frog and Plasmaman have recently been captured as well. It’s a bit strange, Bells muses, since he’s never believed the heroes in those towns to be very competent. It does seem there are more heroes than villains now, and he taps his fingers on his desk while wondering how long this is going to last and whether it’s a sign of something worse to come.

  * * *

  Sitting in his History of Superpowers class, Bells almost nods off. He tries to focus on the dancing rays of sunlight making patterns on Sasha’s face, but Harris is droning on and on about the history of the meta-human gene and X29: how the magnitude of the solar flare caused nuclear reactors all around the world to fail, which resulted in the Disasters and the world war. The same flare catalyzed the latent gene that would manifest in different abilities. Lieutenant Orion discovered his powers and founded the Heroes’ League of Heroes. Bells has to sit through it, though, and there are too few students in the class to get away with messaging any of his friends, as he does at school.

  “But what about mutants?” Tanya asks.

  Bells rubs at his eyes, then sits up. No one’s brought up mutations of the meta-gene before.

  Harris rolls his eyes. “Well, I suppose it is possible for a person to develop meta-abilities without previous expression of the gene in their family. The right mutation to the X29 gene could happen on its own in the parents’ reproductive cells, giving their children powers. But it would be extremely rare. I haven’t heard of such a case, and there is no instance registered with the Department of Meta-Human Regulations. There may be exceptions, I suppose, since the Registry doesn’t take into account people who don’t know their family history, such as immigrants to the Collective.”

  “So it’s possible that there are people with meta-abilities who don’t know it? Or just never registered with the Collective?” Sasha asks, playing with her hair.

  “Perhaps, but unlikely.” Harris drones on. “And I’m sure anyone who we can confirm is a mutant, who does not have a registered meta-human relative, would be of interest to our studies on the gene, but there is no such person.”

  Bells looks at his desk and smiles.

  * * *

  In the last week of training, the Heroes’ League of Heroes starts inviting people into their ranks. The offers usually come after the final assessment: the combination obstacle course. So far, Bells has done pretty well at hand-to-hand combat, the speed test, and even the weight test. He didn’t try to lift a car, because he knew he couldn’t.

  At the sight of the gleaming dome of Crabb’s bald head, Bells grimaces. “Really? Crabb is running this test?”

  James Crabb is the strictest trainer at the center. He’s not going to give Bells points for trying, as Barbara did for the weight test. She gave Bells a passing score for “solid judgment and not injuring himself trying to lift a car.”

  “Don’t worry, you’ll do fine,” Christine says. “I mean, you’ll do better than fine. You’ve gotten a lot faster in your evasion tests! Wasn’t that your personal best in the last run?”

  “Yeah, speed and sprints are one thing, but like… Crabb hates me.”

  “Carmichael! You’re up!”

  Bells takes a deep breath and steps into the testing arena. Some of the students watching from above give him thumbs up.

  Crabb has his DED ready to give marks. “You can skip this portion, Barry,” Crabb says. “No need to be humiliated. We know your shapeshifting abilities don’t lend themselves to shielding from attack. And I know you’re not very fast. I can just give you a zero for this, and you can move forward.”

  Bells bristles. He’s not going to take a zero just because Crabb doesn’t think shapeshifters are worth their salt.

  He regards the projector; it’s been modified to throw out electric shocks. It looks like a bigger version of the one they had last year. Bells was zapped on his first try. Christine created a shield from her jacket and ran forward toward the bolts. Another student was invulnerable to electricity and simply took attacks. Ricky went invisible and walked through undetected. Other students ran faster than the bolts.

  The projector rumbles and shoots a bolt, creating a scorch mark on the floor.

  Holding his hand out, Crabb walks up to the projector, which recognizes his signature and powers down. “So, a zero then?”

  “Absolutely not.” Bells steps into the arena. He stretches and nods at Crabb.

  Crabb waves his hand at the machine and steps out of range.

  “Intruder alert,” the bot says, advancing. And the bolts start coming.

  Bells swerves, running as fast as he can, and the bot follows him. Fifty points are awarded if a trainee reaches the other side unscathed; for every zap, points are deducted. For the assessment as a whole, three hundred qualifies for entry to the League. With Bells’ poor performance on the weight test, he’s coming in at a weak two-sixty, barely passing the requirement for the Associated League. If Bells wants to do hero work with the League, he’s going to need close to a perfect score.

  He shifts into Crabb, complete with his balding head and Associated League uniform.

  The bot stops. “Instructor Crabb.”

  Bells walks forward casually and, with a wave of his hand, turns off the bot.

  “That’s cheating,” Crabb says.

  “How is it cheating? The object is to evade the attacks using my physical fitness and my abilities. I have done so.”

  “Full marks!” Christine cheers.

  Crabb puffs up. His face turns mottled purple, and a vein throbs on his forehead, but he gives Bells fifty points and even tersely offers congratulations on his final passing score.

  Bells smirks at him. He’s in.

  “And so, we induct Barry Carmichael into the League…”

  Bells stands tall.

  He’s alone with the trainers and a few blinking cameras in a small room that’s decorated only with the seal of the North American Collective. Crabb drones on about the values of the North American Collective: safety in unity, protection, peace above all else. Bells wonders about the person who wrote the speech. How many different ways they can say justice and good?

  He’s too excited to make fun of the cheesiness; it’s happening, after all his hard work.

  Finally, Crabb turns to him, and Bells raises his right hand.

  “Do you, Chameleon, vow to uphold peace as a member of the Heroes’ League of Heroes?”

  “I do.”

  “Do you promise to inspire others as a shining example of justice…”

  The oaths drag on. He says “I do,” over and over again: to follow Captain Orion into battle, to be a mighty defender of justice, to rescue cats. Bells eyes Crabb to see if this is a joke—it isn’t.

  Finally, the ceremony is over. Bells shakes Crabb’s hand, then Coach Barbara’s; Harris and all the other trainers congratulate him.

  Bells is the youngest at the after-party and the first to have completed the training program by age sixteen. Powerstorm, one of the most recent heroes to join the League, started training at fifteen and completed the program at seventeen. Though it took Bells four years to complete training, he’s still the youngest to finish. Even Harris is proud.

  Bells goes back to Andover with instructions to report to the Vegas Heroes’ League of Heroes Center in two weeks for his supersuit fitting and his first assignm
ent. He already met with the supersuit designer and chose his look. His colors are rainbow-hued and ever-changing, which fits his superhero name perfectly: Chameleon.

  He’s going to be a hero.

  Ch. 3...

  [Group chat “WHY SO FAR BELLS” has been renamed to “SOON SOON SOON” by Emma Robledo.]

  Emma: i can’t believe this i am so sorry i thought we would be back last week!!!

  Jess: bells is so tall!!!

  Emma: its only been one summer, how

  Bells: SHUT UP GUYS ITS NOT A BIG DEAL

  Bells: ALSO HOW DO YOU KNOW JESS DIDNT GET SHORTER

  Jess: i feel betrayed

  Bells: how is the South

  Emma: i am so tired of my cousins already. my abuela is awesome though. she’s teaching me how to cook but i’m hopeless at it. she’s so disappointed already. “just like your mom” ahahaha

  Bells: aww are you tired of your family already

  Emma: well, they’re never boring that’s for sure. oh! funny thing, there’s a kid from school visiting his family too. carlos? you guys know him

  Bells: we had Matteson together?

  Jess: no idea. not in AP, remember

  Emma: sorry jess; yeah he’s pretty cool, we’ve been hanging out

  Jess: did both your moms make it?

  Emma: nah, mama is traveling again. council work, blah blah blah. i think she wants to run for supreme mugwump, which could be cool.

  Jess: PRESIDENT ROBLEDO

  Emma: ahaha maybe

  but i don’t really wanna move to new bright city

  Bells: did you guys talk about it?

  Emma: yeah kinda? i mean mom talked to her and is like, super supportive? i guess it’s not a big deal since she can work as a doctor anywhere, and they’re all saying like, they waited until i would be done with school and in college, but it’s all so soon, like running for office during my senior year? it’s crazy