by Sevan Paris
***
I shut the passenger door to Mom’s Mini Cooper and meet her at the front of the car. She buttons her black coat and refolds her gold scarf. “Thanks for coming with me tonight,” she says. “It means a lot.”
I avoid her eyes. “No problem.”
She smiles faintly and we walk down the lit sidewalk, absorbed into the wave of people slowly shifting toward Doss’ Landing. They wear coats, toboggans, and gloves in variations of red, gold, and black—the colors of Liberty’s costume.
I just stuck with a blue jacket.
The crowd slowly weaves its way down the sidewalk, to the concrete stadium facing the landing. A lot of music concerts are held here in the summer, with crowds in the stadium facing performers on barges docked at the landing. HEROES has one such barge here now, set up with a platform, curtains, and stage equipment.
Soft lights shine from the stage to the stadium, giving people enough light to move around. People clutch candles punched through paper cups closely to their bodies, as if they’re the most precious thing in the world. Poster signs decorated with paint and glitter dot the crowd. The most common are “Liberty—World’s Greatest Hero” and “Galaxy—World’s Greatest Zero.”
That is actually fairly clever.
I clench my fist …
These people—these idiots—cry, they whisper about how great Liberty was, all of the things he did for the city, the country, the world. They don’t know. They don’t know the man they call … worship, as a hero—as in The World’s Greatest Hero, as in the Superhero to which all others must be judged—was nothing more than a sadistic asshole. He built an image of himself based on a series of lies that everyone embraced. And now that he’s gone, they wail and curse into the night. They curse whomever took him from them …
They curse me.
The guy who saved them from him.
“Why isn’t anybody doing anything about Galaxy?” a woman says behind me. “Why aren’t they even saying anything?”
That would be the fault of our great plan to prevent HEROES from coming after us. Which they haven’t in the strictest sense. Just another example of how a language, as slippery as yours, has managed to turn an omission into an implication, and later into an inference.
“It’s like they’re afraid to say anything,” a male voice says.
“But how can they be afraid of anything?” the woman replies. “They’re HEROES.”
“I don’t know. But if they’re afraid of him … how should WE feel about him?”
“Mom,” I say, loud enough to drown out the conversation behind us. “What do you think about Galaxy? I haven’t heard you say either way.”
She looks down at her feet, the way she always does when she’s trying to think of what to say. “Well, I think the news can make it easy for us to believe that things are … uncomplicated.” She looks back at me and stuffs a strand of blonde-gray hair back under her red toboggan. “I met Galaxy. He saved my life and the life of everyone in Marko’s, including yours. In a world where so many people tell you what to think, what to feel, it’s more important than ever to question ideas. To believe something blindly is like … intellectual suicide.”
“There’s an incoming but.”
“What?”
“You look like you’re going to say ‘but.’”
“Oh, well … ‘but’ too many people have said they saw Galaxy at The Bend. Why isn’t he doing anything? Why isn’t he saying anything?”
At least half of him has been trying to find a way off planet.
I lean closer to her, looking over my shoulder to make sure nobody else can hear. “Why haven’t you said something? About you and Lib—Jacob—being together?”
She takes a deep breath. “Jacob and I … we weren’t together long enough to be close, but I was happy. And there was a connection. It’s like when he looked at me, he really knew me. And he talked a lot about you.”
Imagine that.
“Even though he never really knew you, he could tell a great deal from the stories I told him.”
A wave of anger tingles in my chest.
“Those moments—where he talked about you, him, or us—were private,” Mom says. “And if I share them with Lisa Lancaster or whomever, they’re not going to be my moments. They’ll be Prose’s. Maybe it’s selfish, to keep that part of someone who gave so much to everybody else … but I’m okay with that.”
A large theater screen on the barge flickers to life, bringing the murmuring crowd to a silence. Mom grabs my hand. I try to give her a convincing, reassuring squeeze.
“World’s Greatest Hero” shines on a black screen in white letters. It then fades, holding on a black image for a few moments while the Liberty Anthem, an original score by John Williams, slowly comes in with deep brass instruments. Spotted and streaked black and white footage flickers in: A Japanese aircraft carrier floats on open water in World War II. The Liberty Anthem slowly gets faster, jitterier, building to its crescendo by the time a streak of movement, an ant by comparison to the aircraft carrier, streaks by overhead and smashes into the the deck of the massive ship, breaking its bow. Liberty tears through the top and sides, too fast to see clearly, and the ship buckles. Planes, sailers and debris tumble away from the ship right before the image cuts to footage of Liberty pushing the moon back into orbit. Then it goes into a full montage, each scene perfectly timed with the goose bumpy music: Liberty throwing a Zyborg spaceship into the sun; Liberty shaking hands with Eisenhower; Liberty saving Lisa Lancaster from Major Mayhem’s troll army; Liberty waving at a parade crowd from a float; Liberty fighting his evil clone; Liberty fighting the tentacle monster that crawled out of the Tennessee River fifteen years ago; Liberty tearing apart tanks in some desert; and the music stops when the footage freezes on the last image …
It’s Liberty shaking hands with me on the Michael Booth Bridge.
People look at each other, their candles whitening angry and surprised faces. I take a deep breath. This has been easy to ignore. Because of the snow, because of Liberty being gone, because of HEROES knowing to stay the hell away from me. All of it—every single bit has been easy to ignore—until now. When I’m right smack in ground zero of a vigil that HEROES not-so-subtly crafted into a Galaxy hate fest.
Thinkor, the Human Brain, walks onto stage. The guy doesn’t have a mouth, eyes, or a nose—his head is just one big brain, the same green color as the rest of his body. He nods in the direction of the crowd, I guess in some form of acknowledgement. Silver Sentinel follows him, his Andrium armor reflecting the stage lights back at us.
A microphone has been provided but Sentinel, using the speakers in his armor, completely ignores it. He holds his arms wide: “Friends of Prose and Liberty … thank you for coming tonight.” He gestures to Ted Benjamin and the news cameras. “Thank you for reminding the world of what makes this city great. Liberty, wherever he may be, would be honored to know that those he gave so much for are, in turn, giving so much back for him.” Sentinel walks in front of the giant screen, becoming nothing more than a silhouette, backlit by a frozen image of me and Liberty.
The signs in the crowd pump up and down.
“To know that people will never forget the sacrifices he made,” Sentinel says. “Or that people will never stop looking for him. And most importantly—”
“WHAT ABOUT GALAXY?!” someone with a Galaxy Zero sign says from the front row. He’s a younger guy, in his early twenties.
Sentinel steps away from the screen, closer to the edge of the stage. “What about him?”
The guy looks around him, as if the answer is ridiculously obvious. He then points at the screen. “Galaxy was there, at The Bend! The night Liberty disappeared! But nobody’s said nothing about him!”
“Our investigation is still ongoing. But if anyone knows Galaxy, please urge him to come forward, so that we can—”
“MAKE HIM COME FORWARD!” A woman behind me says, nearly blowing out my eardrum. Sounds of agreement echo throughou
t the crowd.
“Are you okay?” Mom says.
“Yeah, why?”
“You’re squeezing my hand. Really hard.”
I look down and immediately let go. “Sorry.”
Sentinel raises his hands and the crowd quietens. “Friends, now isn’t the time for thoughts of revenge.” He steps in front of the image again. “It’s a time for—”
“I CALL FOR A CITIZEN’S ARREST!” the same woman says, the cold making her breath frost angrily. Most of the crowd faces us, with nodding heads and narrowed eyes.
“GALAXY HAS TO ANSWER FOR WHAT HE’S DONE! CITIZEN’S ARREST! CITIZEN’S ARREST!” She keeps repeating, pumping her fist each time. The crowd follows her chant, slowly at first. Then, within a matter of moments, concrete benches vibrate with hateful cries, and the amphitheater fills with pumping signs and candles.
Ted Benjamin tells his camera people where to scan. The Human Brain shifts back and forth, probably suffering some kind of telepathic backlash from the fury of the crowd. Silver Sentinel steps away from the screen and crosses his arms.
And nods the purple plume on top of his head in my direction.
I lean close to Mom’s ear: “This is too much! Are you staying?”
Mom leans back. “For a little while! I want to see if HEROES has anything else to say! I’ll meet you at the car!”
“This may take a while! I’ll call Bo! I may just stay with him tonight!”
Mom seems to think about saying something, but gives me half a nod instead.
I turn and weave through the fist pumping crowd, assaulted by bumping shoulders and jabbing elbows. Nobody tries to move out of my way or even looks at me. It’s a good thing we can’t use our powers right now. I’d be tempted to shove the dumb-ass ingrates away with a Grav Blast.
I finally make it to the edge of the mob and take a long breath, like I’ve been swimming underwater forever.
This is beyond belief, Gabe.
“Right? How can so many of them be so blind to—”
Not them—you.
“Come again?”
Throughout all of that Superheroing nonsense, you actually thought that nothing like this was going to occur. You thought that ridiculous ploy of yours actually had a chance of working against an organization that’s been spinning lies for mindless drones since long before you were born.
“We’ve done—I’ve done—what I’ve done because it was the right thing to do.”
Take a look at that lynch mob behind you, Gabe. Does it look like the “right thing” is getting us anywhere?
Supervillains I can handle. Creeps posing as Superheroes I can handle. An entire town where ten percent of the population has Superpowers? Hellbent on arresting me or worse? That might be too much. I rub the back of my neck, trying to figure out a response to M. Trying to figure out what my next move is going to be.
And then I see Ember.
She stands twenty feet away, hair brightly flowing from a black hoodie. Her eyes briefly flicker in the dark, like a dying campfire.
She stays still long enough to make sure I see her, and then turns, walking away from me and the river.
I follow Ember into the night.
CHAPTER THREE
Ember leads me through the freezing sidewalks of Prose for twenty minutes. After throwing a look behind her to make sure I’m still following, she enters an alley beside Betty’s Barbeque off Walnut Street. I round the corner and find her there, waiting.
With glowing eyes and a humming sword in each hand.
“Is that necessary?”
“Until I know a little more about you, absolutely.” She shakes her head a little, throwing the hood back. The swords bathe her button nose and slender cheeks in a fiery light. “You expect me to apologize for it?”
“For that, no. For knocking me up with this Magick stuff—yes.”
“Interesting metaphor,” she says.
He does that.
“I—okay, can you just tell me why you did this? My life has gotten a lot more interesting than I would have liked in the past few hours. And considering it was already pretty freaking interesting to begin with, that’s saying something.”
She takes a step forward, catching a few flakes of snow in her red hair. “Wait—you can USE the Magicks?”
“That uncommon?”
“More like impossible”
“Well … good. Cause I don’t want to keep it. I just want to give it back. Whatever is going on—it’s keeping me from using my powers.”
She hesitates for a long, awkward moment. Her eyes narrow from the other side of the sprinkling snow, barely showing two fiery slits.
Wonderful idea. Why don’t we advertise our helplessness to HEROES as well?
Ember takes a breath and tosses the swords away. They fade into nothingness before touching the ground. “I’ve heard of things like that happening before. If a Sayer had Superpowers beforehand.”
“Yeah, well everything I know you could fit into Thimbleman’s helmet.
“Okay,” she says, eyes returning to normal. “So what do you know?”
I fill her in on everything Casa told me. Then, I cut right to the chase: “So why put this crap in me?”
“You mean why did I let you help me? After you offered your help? After I told you in no uncertain terms to walk away, that you were dealing with powers you didn’t understand?”
“Okay, enough with the touché already—I get it. But … like this? Getting all of this power? It seems like a stupid dangerous thing to do.”
“Had to hide it somewhere to keep Mystick and her goon from getting it. And the chances of your being able to access it were like 3,720 to one.”
“Did you just make that number up or did I actually have the same chance as successfully navigating an asteroid field?”
Gabe, if I’ve told you once, I’ve told you a thousand times: Those are not the correct odds.
The corner of her lips rise, just a little. “I’ve been waiting to contact you until I found a way to get the Magick out. When I—”
“So you definitely can get it out?”
“—when I felt you headed for the vigil, I thought you might have been trying to contact Ms. Mystick. I assumed the worst and got preemptive.”
“But they’re no longer on your tail?” I look over my shoulder, painfully aware of how much easier this less-than-easy-life has been with M able to sense dangerous things long before they became dangerous.
She steps closer. “Oh, they’re still on my tail. That’s probably why she didn’t go to the vigil. But as long as I don’t stand still for too long, I’m okay.”
“Alright, well, let’s make with the de-Magicking already. This amulet is only going to last another few hours.”
“Hang on, cowboy, I’m still not sure if it’s possible to get it out of you. There’s a stop I have to make. I’ll find out what are options are and then I’ll catch up with you later.”
“Yeah, I don’t think so.”
She narrows her eyes at me and takes a breath, getting ready to tell me why I can’t go, how I’m in over my head, or some other crap.
I hold up my hand. “Stop. Before you say what you’re gonna say, just stop and listen. I have a right to see this through—every freaking bit of it—until the Magick is out of me. After that, if you want me to help you do whatever, I’ll help. If you want me to disappear from your life and never see me again, that’s peachy too. But letting you just walk away when everybody else knows frak-all about what’s going on? That’s so off the table it’s in a different time zone.”
Ember cocks her head to the side, as if she’s studying me. After a few moments, she seems to make a silent decision and digs into her back pocket. I try not to take notice of her perfectly round breasts, swelling with each breath under a tight runner’s shirt. It’s purple and I can just barely see the outline of a nipple.
Gabe … are you getting an erection?
I clear my throat.
You’re
such a simpleton.
She checks the pockets of her hoodie and looks up. “Problem?”
“No, I, just um … what are you doing?”
“Looking for …” she pulls something white out of the left pocket, “… this.” A gust of wind howls through the alley.
I squint. “A piece of old chalk?”
“Not just a piece of old chalk.”
MAGICK CHALK!
She draws lines on the brick wall of Betty’s Barbeque. “It gives us a doorway to Old Prose.”
“Us?”
Ember finishes drawing a rectangle the size of a doorway and mumbles something under her breath, more Latin I think. She taps the wall three times. Sections crack inside the chalk line, turn sideways, and retreat inward.
I step closer, peering in. “What’s Old Prose?”
She gestures into blackness. “Where the Magick happens.”
***
Come to find out, Old Prose is a lot like the Star Wars cantina scene … on crack.
Something that looks like a ninja turtle passes in front of us, leading reins attached to a horse-sized frog. Saddlebags loaded with gold trinkets clink and clank with every hop.
“Come on,” Ember grabs my wrist. “This way.” She weaves us into the motley crowd of people, creatures, buildings and kiosks.
“This—all of this—is directly under the city?” I say.
“More or less. We’re a little under it and a little—” we part to let a gondola pass overhead, oar paddling the air between us. “—a little between it.”
“I, uh,” I point behind us. “That was a gondola.”
“Yeah.”
“In the air. Flying through the air.”
“You get used to the weird in places like this.”
“I’ve had plenty of practice with the weird, but nothing on this level. I do a couple of circles, taking in everything. “This place is huge. How does it all fit?”
